Phone A Friend | Week 3 | Daniel Goulding | Echoes Church

Is they say that in an average day, you and I will make about 35,000 decisions a day. Now, again, a lot of them are inconsequential. You're probably about 2,500 or 3,000 decisions in already.

A lot of them you made on your drive here, like, should I go left here? Should I slow down? What shirt should I put on today? They say that of those 35,000 decisions, 250

of them are connected to what should we eat today. Right? And, again, it matters. Right? What are you gonna do after service today? Where are you gonna get some food? It matters. But my encouragement is just for a couple minutes, let's pay attention here and not think about the food afterwards so that we can learn how to navigate this idea of figuring out God's will. If you begin to understand and think about God's will being more

that, like, our life is the summation of all of those daily decisions that we make, it it begins to kind of reframe the idea of God's will a little bit, and the title of my message should have been more about like, man, how do you and I make godly decisions? How do we make sure that when we're making consequential

decisions because, again, some of them are gonna be insignificant, but some of them are are massively important.

Should we have another kid? Should we move cities? Should we start going to a different church? Should we, you know, take a different job? Should we get rid of one of our existing children? Like big big decisions that we have to wait,

making sure that we get those decisions right and do it in accordance to God's will and God's plan. It it matters. And and again, hear me. You can you can miss God's will for your life. You can miss his plan for your life and the bible actually says that some of us are living in active

opposition to the plan that God has for us. And so again, I wanna help you today know how to

make decisions that will always lead you into God's will. So if you got a bible, open up to Romans chapter 12. Wanna I show you three principles of how to walk in God's will, but how before I get to the practical part of Romans 12,

kinda like I did with politics last week, I've gotta lay a bit of a theological foundation

for us to work on and work from. And the Bible says a couple things about this idea of the will of God. K. The first thing if you're taking notes, three essentials to understanding the will of God. The first one is that you've gotta realize that God has

a plan. I know sometimes, especially where we sit currently today in this cultural moment, you're like, are you sure? You know, because it seems like if you did have a plan, like it's not going very well and maybe it's the time to call an audible. Right? And sometimes when life feels like it's out of control,

you and I will be tempted to step in and we take control because we start to believe that maybe God doesn't actually have a plan. But again, I'm here this morning to remind us that God is not a God that is distant. He's actively involved in his creation.

And there's this idea that's out there. It's called deism that God essentially created the world. He created you and I. Created the earth. He put the earth into orbit. He breathed life into humanity then he stepped away from creation and today what is happening on the earth is happening outside of his control and his reign and I'm here to tell you that that is not what the bible teaches us of the God that we serve. Now the bible tells us in multiple places, one of the most important ones is Jeremiah chapter 29 verse 11

where the prophet Jeremiah says to the nation of Israel, for I know the plans that I have for you, says the Lord. They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. Again, just the beginning part of that verse, he says, I know

the plans that I have for you. I just felt like I needed to remind some of us today that God knows the plans that he has for us.

He has good plans for our life and it it it allows us to not have to freak out when life feels like it's out of control, that we can remember that we serve a God who is who is always in control. Again, God is actively involved in the world that he created

and this is what's amazing about the majesty and the magnitude of this God that we serve. From our understanding right now with what we can see, there's somewhere between two to 3,000,000,000,000 known galaxies in the universe. Now again, it's hard for the human mind to even fathom

the number of trillion but just know, it's a lot. K? It's a massive insurmountable number and the God that we serve created trillions of galaxies.

All of the laws of physics, he perfectly holds in balance and yet at the same time, the bible goes so far to say that he's actively involved in all 8,000,000,000 people on this earth. Again, the scripture goes so far to say that he actually knows the number of hairs

on your head. Now for a lot of us, it's not as many as we used to have but god still he still knows, and here's the point, that God is actively involved in this world and that he has a plan and he's working and it's a good thing. And when we find ourselves in seasons where we're wondering,

God, I don't really get what you're doing, we don't have to freak out. We can instead we can rely on the promises as revealed in the scriptures. Paul says Romans eight twenty eight, for we know that god causes everything to work together for the good of those who love god and are called according to his purposes.

What this says is that not everything we experience in this life will be good, but we serve a God that has a good plan and he's working all things together for our good. And so if what you're walking in right now is not good, the scriptures say to hold on because God is working a plan that ultimately will be for our good. Secondly,

the second kind of essential to understanding this this massive theological concept of the will of God is you've got to realize that God has a general will for all of humanity

and this is again where we get wrapped around the axle a little bit but there is a general will and a general plan that God has for all of humanity that's universally applicable

but oftentimes when people are searching for, seeking out the will of God, when people come to me asking questions about the will of God for them, it's never about the general will of God. What we're usually seeking is the specific will of God and again, I will spend the end of my message talking about the specific will of God and how to discern it, how to live in it, but oftentimes we get wrapped around the axle trying to figure out the specific will of God. What's the specific will of God? These are questions like when are we supposed to move?

When is God going to come through with a spouse? When are we gonna have our future children? Where are we supposed to live? Right? These are these are really specific questions. This is what am I supposed to do for a career? What am I supposed to do with the calling that is on my life? Where am I supposed to go to college? When is this thing going to happen? That that's what's called the specific will of God. And again, I I sometimes laugh at the questions that people invite me into to to speak into. I'll have people that sit down with me and they're like, hey, I'm trying to figure out if I should sell my business. I'm just curious what you think.

I'm like, dude, I talk for a living. Know, like there's there's gotta be better people out there to tell you about whether or not you should sell your business or not. Right? But again, here's here's the principle I think we don't often understand.

We think that the will of God is like this binary thing that it's either black or white, and if you miss it, then you better watch out and what you've gotta try to search for is the specifics around the when, the where, and the what. But what's amazing to me is you read the bible, what you will see is void of the scriptures often is specificity.

Oftentimes, what God will do is he'll say, hey, this is who I want you to be, and then I want you to just go. And it's like, where should we go? Remember Abraham's favorite famous question? Where should I go? He's like, just go, and then as you're on the way, I'll reveal it to you. Right? And what oftentimes happens is you read the bible looking for specificity,

you won't see it. You won't find it. I've been a follower of Jesus for almost twenty years now and I'm telling you there's like two times in my life where God has given me specific

Move to this city. Marry this person. But the rest of it, it seems like God is almost silent and that's because what the primary thing that God wants us to understand is his general will that applies to all of humanity.

And if the scriptures are quiet on the specific will of God, the scriptures are screaming from a megaphone what the general will of God is for our lives. The general will of God is is centered around who we are, why we make decisions,

and how we carry ourselves. K? When we're asking questions about God, should I go to this school or this school? I don't think God really cares that much but I think God cares immensely

about what is motivating your heart to say yes to this school or this school. I don't think necessarily God cares, should I take this career or this career, but what God does care about is how you're gonna show up on Monday when you take option a or option b. God cares more about who you are than what you do and what is abundantly clear throughout scripture is what the general

will of God is. So again, the question is is how do we how do we learn what the will of God is? How do we learn what the general will of God is? Well, the general will of God is made clear

in the word of God. If you're struggling to know what the general will of God is for your life, you just gotta spend time in the word because all throughout the scriptures are the commands of how the people of god are supposed to operate and this becomes freeing

because we don't have to sit down after our our coworker or our mother-in-law or our neighbor has has frustrated us or offended us and go, man, I just I'm gonna pray about whether or not I should forgive them. Like we don't have to pray about that. Why? Because the general will of God as revealed in the word of God says that as followers of Jesus, we are commanded to forgive people who have hurt us. We don't have to when we find ourselves in seasons being tempted

to believe that maybe twenty years ago when we married our spouse, we made a mistake and we married the wrong person because this new person that I met just seems to get me a lot better and it seems to be a lot easier, and and you would be tempted to potentially pray about whether or not you should leave your spouse to find the right one. Let me just tell you, the general will of God for your life is revealed that God is a God that honors covenants, and marriage is a big deal. And the grass is not greener on the other side. The grass is greener on the side that you choose to water. Are there some exceptions? Are there times that the bible gives us some exclusions of when divorce is allowed? Sure. But 99.9%

of the time, you would have not made a mistake and you've got to you've to pour into the marriage that God has given you. You don't have to wonder. You don't have to pray. Does God want to reach your annoying neighbor? Does God wanna even save your mother-in-law who drives you up a wall? Yes. How can I say it so conclusively? Because the general will of God as revealed in scripture is that God's heart is that no, not one would perish and that he's still in the business of seeking and saving that which is lost. Here's my point. If you are struggling to discern and

determine what the specific will of God is for your life, start

by operating in the revealed general will of God, the ways of God, and as you walk in the ways of God, you'll always find yourself in the will of God. This is also the beautiful part for all of us sitting here today. We don't have to ask the question which we we ask often,

God, what's my purpose? I I just don't know why I'm here. Let me tell you if nobody's told you before, here's why you and I are here. Here's the purpose generally

for every single follower of Jesus. Isaiah chapter 43 verse seven says to bring all who claim me as their God for I have made them for my glory. It was I who created them. Through the prophet Isaiah revealed in the word of God, the will of God for every single person in this room is to understand that purpose

for the people of God is singular in nature.

You and I are created beings and we've been made by a maker who has given us a purpose. What is it? Isaiah tells us, Yor I's purpose is to bring God glory with our lives. It's why one of our values as a church is that worship is our lifestyle

because when you understand who you are in Christ, it's not about bringing God worship on Sunday morning. It's like, no. All of life is worship and how you show up to work on Monday is worship. How you interact with that umpire on Tuesday night at the Little League game, it's worship. So you better you better chill out dad. Alright? You gotta calm down a little bit because it's all it's all worship and maybe

maybe when we're contemplating a big decision and we're trying to determine the will of God in that decision, maybe we're asking the wrong question.

Maybe the question is not, God, should I take job a or job b? Should I move to city a or city b? And the question really should be, can I do it to bring you glory? Can I do this for the glory of God? And if you can answer yes to the question,

I don't think God really cares about whether you end up being a a teacher or a doctor, but like if your only motivation to be a doctor is because you watch Grey's Anatomy, you're like, they're awesome. I wanna be awesome, and so that's what like it's probably not the greatest motivation. Right? But what what you practically do doesn't matter as much as how you do it and who you are when you are in that job. This is why Paul will go so far to say in first Corinthians chapter 10, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do,

do it all for the glory of God. Whatever you do, do it all for his glory. I heard a pastor years ago say this about God's will. He said that God's will is essentially it's whatever.

Like, if God had a default out of office reply to your emails that you're sending him, his response would often be whatever. Right? We're asking God, should I should I move to Tennessee or should I move to Phoenix? And God's like, whatever.

Should I go to the University of Arizona or should I go to, you know, NAU? And God's like, whatever. But when you ask important questions like, should I be a Dodgers fan or a Padres fan? God cares immensely about that, and you should all be Padres fans to the glory of God.

Here's I think I think the point as revealed in scripture that that God God's will is it really is whatever because God's will is not just about what you do, it's about how and why you do it. Here's the third thing. Again, if God does have a general will for all of humanity, he also has a specific will for your life.

And every single one of us should be concerned with figuring out, okay, inside of the revealed will of God, how do we begin to navigate and discern what God's specific will is for our life, understanding

that God is a personal God and he cares about the details of our life. K? If he's personal, if he cares, then the details of our life matter. And again, told you to go to Romans chapter 12. I wanna show you three things, three kind of steps that I think Paul gives us a blueprint on how to determine

if what you're doing is going to lead you into the will of God or not. How to make a decision that will lead you into the purposes of God for your life. Now again, Romans chapter 12 is is an incredible chapter. It's where Paul kinda starts to turn a corner. We're gonna spend the entire summer walking through the book of Romans because I think the book of Romans is the most important book we have in the entire Bible. It's Paul's manifesto

on Christianity. It's his it's essentially his thesis statement to the world on why he believes that Jesus is the savior of the world and how he's the fulfillment

of all the prophecies of the old testament. And then in in the first 11 chapters, he builds his case. And then in Romans chapter 12, he starts to turn the corner to say, here's why this matters, and here's what this looks like for you and I to operate as the new humanity that Jesus died for us to walk in. Two verses, three things that show us how to walk in God's will. Romans chapter 12 verse one says, therefore,

I urge you brothers and sisters in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but instead be transformed by the renewing of your mind, then

then you will be able to test and approve, here it is, what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

Nobody's ever told you, friend, the goal of this life is to learn how to operate in the good, pleasing, and perfect will that God has for us. Three things that Paul says. The first thing that he shows us how to walk in God's voice is you gotta offer your bodies as a living sacrifice. Here's what he's saying is it starts by submitting your life to Jesus.

See, the Old Testament was built on a a system, a sacrificial system where you and I would come to a temple like this and there was an altar at the front, and what you would do to atone for your sins is you would bring an animal, and that animal sacrifice would atone for your your past mistakes, and you have to go through that process consistently,

continually atoning for your sins. Well, the New Testament says that Jesus two thousand years ago, he actually stepped out of heaven. He became one of us. He lived a life we couldn't live. He was perfect. He was sinless and he became he became what the bible says is our propitiation, our substitute.

He stood in our place. He became the ultimate eternal

sacrifice. So no longer do we have to go through the sacrificial system of animals because two thousand years ago, Jesus hung on a cross and if you believe that he is who he says that he is, you can actually be set free. And you've got to submit your life to Jesus, and now here's the new sacrificial

system that the New Testament sets up. You know what the sacrifice is? It's you. It's me. God no longer wants an animal sacrifice. What he wants is our heart. He wants our our life, and if we're going to make any attempt to make those 35,000

decisions we make every day submitted to the will of God and making godly choices, it starts by submitting to Jesus.

And here's I think again, so many of us, we go yes and amen. We would say yes and amen to submitting to Jesus, but I think for a lot of us, especially in westernized American churches, we don't really know what that means.

Because so many of us, what we think it means is that we we get enough of Jesus to make sure we get into heaven one day, but not so much of Jesus that we become the weirdo on Monday morning in the office. And I'm just here this morning to remind us that you you and I don't get to kinda play

a truce with God. We don't get to we don't get to make choices with God and tell him what parts of our lives are we're willing to sacrifice to him or not. I I just want to remind us what submission to Jesus was always supposed to be, what the Bible has been clearer from day one.

Paul says in Galatians chapter two verse 20 that you and I sitting here who have surrendered our life to Jesus, we have been crucified with Christ, and we no longer live, but Christ

now lives in us. In the life that we now live in the body, we live by faith in the son of God who loved me and who gave himself for me. Paul says the invitation to faith in Jesus that will get you into eternity one day, yes and amen, is actually an invitation to death and dying.

Yet so many of us, what we believe accepting Jesus is is that I get a little bit of Jesus to make sure when I die, go to heaven, but again, not so much of him that I'm like the weirdo and these are the parts that I'm still in control. These are the things that I still think like I know better than God and I'll give him this part of my life but I'm not giving him the rest of this and I'm here this morning to just remind us, friends, that is not that is not truly submitting your life to Jesus and my fear,

my general my genuine fear is that Matthew chapter seven says that there's many of us at the end of our life will stand before God and we're thinking we're gonna hear from him, well done my good and faithful servant, but instead what we're going to hear is get away from me for I never knew you.

You gave your life to a cultural version of Christianity, but you never actually surrendered to the lord of of the lord of the universe in in Jesus because you you gotta remember that in the decision to trust Jesus with your eternal resting point was also a decision to make him the lord of your life Monday through Friday as well. Friends, I wanna remind you that Jesus is both your savior and your lord,

but it's not the same thing. And so many people that fill the pews of churches on Sunday mornings, again, throughout churches in America primarily, they're okay with saying that Jesus is their savior,

but their life would indicate they have no idea what it means to submit to Jesus as their lord. And I just wanna tell you, you will never walk in the will of God. You will never experience the the blessing and the peace and the supernatural provision of God if you only ever know Jesus as savior.

What does it mean to know him as savior? Jesus as savior is the guy that he rescued you from sin and death, and this is amazing. It's incredible. It is the good news of the gospel is that you and I don't have a way to get back to God and that all of us are born sinners.

But again, Jesus on the cross of Calvary, he atoned once and for all for our sin. If you accept him as your lord and savior, when you stand before God one day, you won't have to give an account for your sins. You will get to just plead the blood of Jesus.

Are we thankful for it? Yes and amen. But is it the ending point of the journey of following Jesus? No. It's the firing gun that now says, friends, you're you're in a race and for the next forty, fifty, sixty years on this earth, you will have to now learn what it means to follow Jesus not just as savior

but also as as lord. Following Jesus as lord means that he now directs and guides your life,

that he's now the one in charge. What Paul says is I realized that my life, when I gave it to Jesus, that person died and the person that came back to life is only empowered by the spirit of God and every decision that I make, every all 35,000

of those daily decisions that I will make will be fueled by one of two things, my flesh or faith but they can't coexist

and what much of this human experience is on this side of eternity is learning to die to our flesh so that we can walk by faith and I'm telling you there's a reason that the bible says that without faith, it is impossible to please God, but I think so many of us sit back and we go, man, I'll I'll trust Jesus as savior, but I I refuse to acknowledge him as lord, and there's parts of your life that you are still the lord of, and I'm here this morning to gently remind you, friends, the will of god is a beautiful thing. It's good, pleasing, and perfect, but you will never walk in it. You will never experience the blessing that's supposed to be connected to it as long as there's still areas of your life that you are holding on to for dear life as lord. The first step the first step in in walking in God's will is you've got to make a decision to submit to Jesus, and then he continues in verse two and he says, don't conform to the patterns of this world but instead be transformed by the renewing

of your mind. Here's the second thing that he says, if you wanna walk if you wanna walk in the will of God, you've gotta not just submit to Jesus, but you've also gotta renew your mind. He says, you and I have to learn to think differently,

that we do not arrive into our relationship with Jesus with right thinking which also again is why the church needs to have margin for people who arrive to this faith thing with some jacked up ideas. Right? It's normal to walk in the doors of church, give your life to Jesus, and still have some quirkiness about the decisions that you're making. But here's the beautiful part is that the church allows, gives margin to the people who are still in process,

but you and I have gotta realize that we need to allow the spirit of God to renew our minds, to help us think differently, and again my fear is because we have a message that's been sold to westernized Christians

living in America that the only goal of this life is to have enough Jesus to get into heaven, we've never stopped to sit down and go, what about what parts of my thinking, what patterns have I allowed to stay in my life that are actually they're not of Christ. They're just of culture,

and I think so many of us are getting our our direction from the leading of culture and not from Jesus,

and if you look at some of the polling data, again, could pull up data for days to show you the proof and the indication of this, but there's two primary ones that are mind blowing. Go look it all up. Pew Research has done a ton of data connected to this. Two things that blow my mind that they consistently report on. K. The two questions are are is pornography

immoral and is homosexuality something that should celebrated? What what what is not mind blowing to me is that culture continues at higher and higher rates to say pornography is not that big of a deal and homosexuality should be celebrated,

but what is absolutely boggling to me is that it's not just the world that is continuing to accept both at alarming rates, but it's also the people who would raise their hand and say that I'm a I'm a bible believing, spirit filled, church attending follower of Jesus. That almost 60 to 70%

of bible believing, spirit filled, church attending followers of Jesus would say, don't think that pornography is that big of a deal, and I think homosexuality is something we just gotta just gotta give up on. We just gotta give into it.

And I go, no. Like, that that's crazy to me. And again, when I have friends of mine that push back and go, hey. You you talk about homosexuality being a sin, and I don't think it's that big of a deal. I go, okay. Help me understand how you get there. I'm down to be wrong, but help me understand how you get there. What almost always happens is subjective

data. Well, I have a friend. I have a family member that struggles with same sex attraction, and it doesn't it doesn't make sense to me that God would be loving and he would tell them that they just can't get married for the rest of their life. And I'm like, sure. I can concede that point. I I I don't disagree. Is it hard? Is it difficult? Is it a heavier cross to carry than others? Sure,

but it doesn't mean that the answer is that we then go, oh yeah, the word of God doesn't say that because I'm not getting my direction, I'm not getting my thinking from culture, I'm getting my thinking from the word of God and what is unapologetically clear to me in the Bible is that there's a standard

that God has set the bible actually goes so far to say that there's a way that makes sense to you and I but in the end, it's gonna lead to death and the reason that I refuse to cosign it is I'm not gonna hold people's hand and help usher them into what the bible says is is death and we have a responsibility.

Hear me. The church needs to wake up and the spirit of God needs to move in power in his church today because discernment is needed and we have to stop getting our direction and our leading from culture and instead we need to allow the word of God to change how we think,

but as long as we're letting culture set the tone, I'm telling you friends, we are we're hosed.

There are dark days coming for the church. The reason I can tell you that is because Jesus said it was gonna happen two thousand years ago. You and I need to learn to have our thinking changed. Paul says in Colossians chapter three, since then,

since you've been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on these earthly things. Here's why. Again, he reminds us because you and I,

we're dead. Our life is now hidden with Christ in God. Friends, let me just remind you. You are dead.

The question is no longer what brings me the most glory. The question is always, God, what brings you the most glory? It's not how do I build my kingdom. It's, God, how do I expand yours? Let me just remind you, friends. Culture is going to tell you, just do you. But the scriptures say, no. Deny yourself. It's the path to fulfillment.

Culture will tell you, just do whatever makes you happy. But the Bible reminds us, no. You've gotta do what makes you holy because holiness is what you really matter. Culture will tell you, cancel people to make mistakes. But the Bible says, forgive people, even your enemies. Culture says, get even when you've been hurt. But the bible says to love your enemies. Culture will tell you to follow your heart, but God says, follow me. Culture says that more is better, but God says it's better to give than it is to receive. Culture says chase success, but God says seek first the kingdom of God and then all things will be added to you. Culture will tell you that living together before you get married makes sense,

but God will tell you the scriptures will tell you what you need more than anything else in your marriage is the anointing and the presence of God inside of your marriage. With it, you can do anything. But without it, I'm telling you, it is impossible to stay married for more than five minutes because there's a real spiritual enemy that wants to destroy the cornerstone of God's creation.

Friends, you you need to learn to think differently. How do we think differently? We have to saturate our minds in the word of god. Psalm chapter one nineteen says, the word is supposed to be a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path.

Again, here's my fear. The bible, we've never had more access to it than we do today. Most of us sitting here have five to seven of them sitting around rooms in our houses today, yet bible reading is at an all time low. Bible comprehension is at an all time low.

Let me just tell you, friends, we've we've gotta learn to think differently. If we have any shot of living in the will of God, how do we think differently?

We saturate our minds with the word of God. First two steps that Paul tells us is submit to Jesus and renew your mind. Again, I wanna read the first two verses to you as I start to close. Here's what he says. Says, therefore, I urge you brothers and sisters in view of God's mercy,

offer your bodies as a living sacrifice. Step one, holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Think differently. Then you will be able to test and approve

what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will. So you think it would be enough to just submit to Jesus and learn to think differently, but that's still it's still not enough because just because you've submitted to Jesus and you started to think a little bit differently,

it doesn't mean that every decision that you make guarantees you end up in the will of god and that every decision you make leads you to a good place. And this is, again, this is the pride of humanity that believes that, well, every decision that I make, that means that it's a good thing. It's not true. If you don't believe me, man, go watch American Idol. Right? People made lots of decisions that day. I'm gonna go sing. I think that I'm a good singer, and somebody lied to them and agreed with them. Right? But we praise god that there are Simon Cowells out there that's like, no. You suck at singing. You gotta go do something else. Like, I don't I just gotta be honest with you. Right? Here's what Paul is saying that you and I have to start to do. The third step of this idea of learning to operate in God's will is you have to test the outcome

of the decisions that we make. What does that practically mean? What does he mean to test to test the outcomes to know if this is God's perfect and pleasing will? Well well, again, in nature, testing something is really simple because in nature, we know that something is what it produces.

I could bring you to my house and go, man, look at this amazing pear tree that I have, and you're like, bro, it's producing oranges. K? I don't care what the label says. I don't care what you say the tree identifies as. It is not a pear tree. It's an orange tree. Why? Because in nature, we know that something is what it produces. Yet for some reason for some reason, we do all these mental gymnastics to go, no. I'm a follower of Jesus.

The truth is the fruit of our life doesn't look like that.

I'm not saying if somebody followed you around with a a camera that that every single one of us wouldn't have moments where there's some snapshots where it's like, man, you've you've made some poor choices. That that's true about all of us, but what I what I am wondering is if somebody were to follow you around with a camcorder,

would the totality of the trajectory of your life produce a life that looks like the scripture says the fruit of the holy spirit is supposed to produce? Let me just remind this again. Jesus said in Matthew chapter seven, yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

Here's what Paul was saying. Friends, it's not enough to just submit to Jesus and start to think a little bit differently. Sometimes you gotta sit down. You gotta ask the question. You gotta ask the logical, realistic, sober minded question. What is the fruit that your life is producing?

What is being birthed in you? What is coming out of you? Is the fruit of your life? Is it glorifying God and is it making a difference in this world? If not, then maybe maybe at some point in this journey you made a wrong turn and you got off course

and you've started to be the lord of your life and maybe you've bent the knee to Jesus as savior but there's a huge opportunity to acknowledge him as king. And again, I I I don't say this with like a bunch of judgment and and anger towards you, but with genuine compassion, understanding, guys, nobody's promised tomorrow.

And all of us at some point are gonna stand before a holy God and give an account for the life that we've lived. The question is is what did you do with it? What did you do with this life?

Did you trust Jesus as more than just a a get into to get out of hell free card, to get into heaven, and make sure that I I get into eternity with God one day, Or did you believe him enough to begin to hand him the reins of your life? And, again, if you're seeing you're wondering, man, what is the fruit that God is supposed to produce in us? Again, we don't have to wonder about it. The Bible says the fruit of the holy spirit, it's it's love, it's joy, it's peace, it's patience, it's kindness, it's goodness, it's faithfulness, it's gentleness,

self control. Are you growing in peace? Are you growing in self control with the people that know you the best? Say that, yeah, that's what their life produces. Not all the time. There's gonna be seasons. There's winters where trees don't produce any fruit, but the totality of our life, the trajectory of our life should be

that we're growing in patience. We're growing in peace. We're growing in self control. We're better than we were two years ago.

Or if we're honest, is the fruit that's coming out of us, it's pretty contrary to what the spirit of God wants to produce in us and out of us. Us. Friends, here's at the end of the days I think about this idea of the will of God. How do you know sitting here today that you are actively in the will of God? I would venture to say the will of God, it produces the fruit of God. And sometimes we just have to have a sober minded look at our lives and go, what is our life producing?

What is the truth of what's happening inside of your soul? What's the condition of your heart? What would the people that know you most, not the people that don't know you, not not what your social media presence is, but the people that know you the best. What would they say is flowing out of you?

Because the will of God, I'm telling you, will always produce the spirit of God. But here's here's again the good news for those of us today that go, man, I I feel like I I completely missed it.

I made a mistake. I made a wrong decision. I don't if it's connected to a marriage or a business decision or a financial thing, but it's easy to get off course, and it's easy to make a mess of this life and to think that we're too far gone that we can't come back from it. But again, as somebody who is a chronic misser of the right turns with GPS's, like, I I I used to deny that I was bad at following GPS directions, but I just I've accepted it as a reality of kinda who I am now. My wife has to announce, like, three minutes before a turn's coming up. Like, hey, we're getting off the freeway here soon because she knows. If she doesn't say something, I'm probably gonna miss it. Literally, true story. This morning, on the way to church, there's nobody on the freeway when I'm coming here, how early it is. I make the same drive every Sunday, and I miss the turn off the freeway today to get here.

How? I don't know. Was in a great great time with God and worship. It was his fault, not mine, but details don't matter. Here's just amazing to me. Every time I miss a turn with the GPS system, not once,

not ever has the feedback been, hey. You know what, man? Just just pull over, get out of the car, and just try walking. Like, maybe try again next week, but, like, this driving thing is just not it's not for you. You're not getting to the destination. No. What what happens

when you miss the turn? The little GPS has to think for a second, and then it goes recalculating directions, reorienting directions. And it oftentimes will take longer to get there for sure. Sometimes the route is more difficult than it was meant to be.

Sometimes there's some extra turns and some u turns involved, but there's always a way to get divinely redirected back to the original destination.

I say that today to those of you who are sitting here today that feel like you have made such a mess of your life that there's no way that God can divinely redirect you back to the original destination.

Let me remind you that the greatest the greatest evidence that we have of God being in the business of supernaturally restoring that which is broken, those who have gone too far, those who've made too much of a mess of our life, it is the cross of Calvary.

That 2,000 ago, Jesus took on the the wrath of sin. He took on the full punishment of our mistakes, and the cross proves

that you are not so big that you could derail the plan that God has for your life. What do we do when we find ourselves in situations like I think some of you find yourself today just going, man, I've made a mess of this thing. I don't even know what to do. Here's the beauty. It's the same three steps we just looked at. What do you do when you don't know where else to go? How how else to even start again?

You submit to Jesus. You go back to the beginning. You bend the knee to the lordship of Christ. You invite him in as your savior and as your lord. And then secondly,

you start to go through the process of allowing the spirit of God to renew your mind. And then you start to test. You start to test the outcomes of the new decisions that you're making, but it always comes back to it always goes back to a decision of surrender.

I think there's some of you that are here that have been wrestling with some really big decisions.

And I don't know what it is, but there was there was like a genuine weightiness as I was praying this week about this morning. If there's some of you who are here that, man, there's something really heavy that you're wrestling through. I don't know if it's you're you're trying to figure out, can this marriage recover?

Can we get past the infidelity?

If it's like a financial thing, if it's a move you're contemplating, if it's a career change. But I think there's some of you who are here that there's like a there's a massive decision in front of you that you just don't know what to do. Here's what wanna do. I'm gonna ask if everybody would just close your eyes,

bow your heads, just create again with me an atmosphere of faith believing that the presence of God is here with us today, ministering, speaking, moving, challenging, correcting.

If you're here today and that's you, and I talk about like the heaviness and the weight of a big decision you're trying to make. If that's you, just so I can know who I'm praying with, if you would just throw your hand up in the air so I can know exactly who I'm praying with. Yeah. No shame. Hands going up all over this room.

And again, I I don't know all the details, but I appreciate you willing to to step out in faith and just raise your hands. And I I really do think some of you are putting miracles and motions right now by reaching out to God. You can put your hands down.

And again, I don't know what the details are, but I trust that God does. If you're here today and you are desperate

for the God of the universe to move in power and might, I wanna I wanna join you in prayer. I wanna stand with you in agreement. So father, right now, we lift up every single hand here to you. God, though I can never know the stories, trust that you do. And father, I know that there are people who are sitting here with marriages on the brink of failure.

People deciding if we should just throw in the towel and get the divorce papers drawn up. And father, I'm asking right now that the spirit of God would move in power. Supernatural grace would be restored to these relationships. God, we're asking for supernatural forgiveness

for them to see each other the way that they used to see each other. God, we are believing that what is impossible for man is possible with you. So would you resurrect some marriages this morning? God, we are standing in agreement believing that the people here today

that are desperate for a move of God in their finances, whether it's a a a windfall in their business, if it's a shortfall in their personal income, we are believing right now for supernatural finances.

We are asking God for faith to increase in this room. We are asking for the God of the comeback to begin to move in power and might. And Jesus, we are believing. We are standing in agreement in an atmosphere of faith that you are the same God that you were yesterday, that you will be tomorrow, that that is who you are today. And we can trust your promises, that your promises are yes and amen for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Father, you have good things in store for your people. So father, we ask that you do what only you can do. Move in power. Move in light. Supernaturally restore that which has been lost and taken and broken. It is in Jesus mighty and holy name all God's people said. Amen and amen.