August 4, 2024 • 65 mins
Our expectation of God must not be that there will never be anything chasing us in life but that we are chosen while we are chased. In “Running For A Reason,” Pastor Steven Furtick reminds us that even though God has placed something significant in us, certain development can only happen in the caves of our lives.
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Scripture References:
1 Samuel 22, verses 1-5
1 Corinthians 9, verses 24-26
1 Samuel 17, verses 22-24, 48
Psalm 142, verses 3-7
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message.
How many are grateful to be in God's house today?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
All right?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
For all the early adopters who sat down, stand back up.
I hadn't read my scripture yet you jumped the gun,
did you? Oh? Man? I have a message today that
I believe is going to inspire your life and encourage
your faith for all of the things that God has
called you to do. If you receive it by faith,
say amen. We're going to read two scriptures, First Samuel
(00:47):
chapter twenty two, verses one through five and First Corinthians
Chapter nine, verses twenty four through twenty six. The Word
of the Lord from One Samuel twenty two one through
five and First Corinthians chapter nine, verses twenty four through
twenty six. The first one is about the Great King David,
(01:08):
and the second one is from the Great Apostle Paul.
David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adullam.
When his brothers and his father's household heard about it, they.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Went down to him.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
There all those who were in distress, or in debt
or discontented gathered around him, and he became their commander.
About four hundred men were with him. From there, David
went to Mizpah in Moab and said to the King
of Moab, would you let my father and mother come
(01:39):
and stay with you until I learn what God will
do for me. That is a very powerful way that
he says that until I learn what God will do
for me. So he left them with the King of Moab,
and they stayed with him as long as David was
in the stronghold. But the prophet Gad said to David,
(02:03):
do not stay in the stronghold, go into the land
of Judah. So David left and went to the forest
of Hareth. That's the first scripture. The second one, which
will come on the screen as well, is in one
Corinthians chapter nine. The apostle Paul, writing to the church
(02:23):
at corinth gives a metaphor that I want us to
apply our minds to for a moment today. Do you
not know that in a race, all the runners run,
but only one gets the prize. Run in such a
way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in
(02:43):
the Games goes into strict training. They do it to
get a crown that will not last.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
But we do it.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Look at your neighbors, say, we do it to get
a crown that will last forever. Therefore, I do not
run like someone running aimlessly. I do not fight like
a boxer beating the air. Let's stop there. I do
not run like someone running aimlessly. I want you to
(03:15):
look at your neighbor like you're on the same Olympic
team and tell them, real quick, just give them an
Olympic look, real quick, look at them with some Olympic eyes.
Did he say Olympic eyes?
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Olympic eyes?
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Look at him like a winner, Look them deep in
their eyes, and tell them we run for a reason.
We run for a reason. I want to remind somebody
that came to church today, we run for a reason. Yeah,
we run for a reason. God, only you know all
(03:51):
of the purposes that you have an eternity for this
moment in time. So I ask you, God of Heaven,
to invade Earth, fill these earthen vessels with the glory,
the oil of your anointing, so that we can flow
and move forward in everything you've called us to do.
We cannot afford in this season of our life to
run dry. So now, God, we asked that you would
(04:13):
pour into us, for we are poor without you. Your
word says that we will receive from you as we
acknowledge our need for you, and Father, we need you
this hour. Please come in a way that we didn't
ask for because we didn't know we needed it. Touch
the place in us that is too insecure to be
shown to others. But in your presence, there's no modesty
(04:34):
for you, our a maker, every hidden part, every secret thing,
Deal with it. God, in this place between you and them, God,
use me as your instrument. I'm available to you. Blow
through me, Holy Spirit, as if I were a woodwind instrument,
and speak to these people what you need them to
know for the place that you've called them to. I
(04:55):
consider it done because you're good and you're faithful, and
I thank you for it in advance in Jesus' name. Amen,
you may be seated. All the runners in the house,
raise your hand. I wrote that title down. We run
(05:17):
for a reason. That's my message. Running for a reason.
I thought, now that sounds like I'm launching a five k.
That doesn't sound like I'm starting a sermon. But the
Lord comes with these amazing confirmations. You know. I put
my Bible down yesterday for a few minutes to take
a little study break. I've been up since early working
(05:37):
on this message and I just needed a little break.
And when I put it on the Olympics, they were
running the relay race, and I had already picked out
the title and the scripture we run for a Reason,
So I kind of took it as a little bit
of a sign. What I must confess to you is
what so embarrassing? Are crying watching these people run? Now?
(06:04):
Not no big ugly cry tears or anything, not crocodile tears,
just a little trickle tear. But the bad part about
it was the person who won wasn't even American. They
weren't even from our country.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
And I didn't.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
I didn't. I didn't feel the tears come while she
was running. I felt that tears come when she was
looking at her teammates after she pulled ahead and won,
And I'm like, why am I crying? This isn't even
my country? I don't even like to run back. When
(06:38):
I see runners on the road, I judged them, like,
don't you know there's a better way to get in
shape than this? There are so many preferable ways to exercise.
Well it's the runners high. Okay, Well you know I
would choose a non runners low over whatever run. There's
(07:00):
no HI on the other side of that that makes
it worth it to me. But observing this lady, it
made me emotional. And as I paused and thought about
the correlation maybe between the message that I was preparing
and the emotion I experienced, I saw that watching someone
run and knowing the importance and the priority of what
(07:24):
they're running for and who they're running with. That's why
it made me emotional, because when I saw as a
relay race, so when I saw all the people that
the anchor of the race brought along with her into victory,
it touched me to know that something kicked in at
(07:46):
that moment that made her say for my country, I've
got to do this for my friend, I got to
do this for my mom, who sat at every track
meet since I was four years old, and I thought
about all the people that believed in her. When she
first started running when she wasn't much of a runner,
(08:11):
And I thought about my wife, Holly, And I'm just
telling you this because the connection was profound to me.
When we first started doing ministry together, I had no
visible gift or really any kind of clues that this
ministry would exist one day. But she believed in me.
(08:33):
She believed in me, and I know that she believed
in me because we served on a ministry team together
where we sat down and I didn't know how to
be a leader. I'd never let a ministry team before.
And we're sitting there and we're planning out our summer
that we're going to go around and travel and preach.
And I'll never forget this. I put up for a
discussion what should our theme be for the summer ministry?
(08:55):
And I was trying to get everybody involved, you know,
but I found out that God still love the world.
He didn't send a committee, and if you really want
to get something done, you just got to make a decision.
And we're going back and forth, and I threw out
the theme run to Win. I said, how about run
to win? Wouldn't that be a good theme from First
Corinthians Chapter nine, And well, one person didn't think that
(09:16):
was a very good idea because you know, well, it's
really not a competition. You know, it's really not about winning.
You remember when that girl told you it's not whether
you win. Or my son Elijah, my oldest son, a
girl told him one time, it's not whether you win
or lose, it's whether you're having fun. And he looked
back at her cold blooded and said, well, I'm not
having fun unless I'm winning. And he was like five
(09:37):
when he said that. So it's in the blood. Man,
we're kind of competitive. And I liked that theme about
run to win. And so this guy's saying, well, it's
not really a competition, and then this girl over here
is saying, well, I think that the Christian life is
really more like a walk. And one's got a problem
with the word win, and one's got a problem with
the word run. All I'm left with is too And
(09:58):
one of the team members looked at and she had
real soft spoken she said, Stephen, we need you to
lead us, tell us what to do. From that moment forward,
I decided you can be confused as long as you're confident.
(10:22):
That's a great secret for life. Yeah, you can really
bluff your way through a lot of stuff in life.
Because then I just said when she said that to
me so soft. I don't even know if anybody else on
the team heard, but she said that to me, and
I said, run to win. And then we went on
the road, right, We went on the road, and we
get to our first church. And I'm going to get
(10:42):
to this story about David in just a moment, and
what Paul said in First Corinthians, but just to set
the table for this revelation, we get to our very
first church. We're so excited. We have developed our curriculum,
we have developed our teachings. And this is Holly session,
and this is Seth's session, and this is Joni's session,
and this is Grace's session. And I'm going to come
in and close it out, and we're going to do
it over the course of five days and really build
(11:03):
this theme of run to win. You know, all these
all these wonderful plans. But we arrived to the spot
and there were no people. Zero kids had showed up
for the youth camp. And it was our first camp
of the summer. And I looked at Holly and I'd
learned from our little committee meeting. We need you to
(11:26):
lead us, and I said, you make a flyer, and
I pointed at her, and I think that's the moment
that she fell in love with me. When I said
you make a flyer. I think something about that, just ooh,
make a flyer. And she she she made a flyer,
(11:48):
said run to win. We went to Walmart. We covered
five hundred wind shields with run to Win propaganda, telling
those kids to get to.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
The Baptist church.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
And by the end of the week there were twenty
five kids in the room. And I preached like it
was twenty five thousand, because I've always been doing it
from a place of passion, not a place of performance.
And I'll preach if there's five of you, five thousand
and five million. See. I think that this is a
common misconception about people that you see who go really
(12:21):
hard after something, is that a lot of times you
will see the results of their ambition and not really
understand the reasons for their ambition. And for me and Holly,
I'm thankful that not only have we always had something
to run four, but I'm grateful that I had someone
to run with. And that made me smile to think
(12:43):
about how here I am twenty how many twenty five
years later, still running with the right one. Now this
is not a marriage seminar. So I'm crying watching the Olympics,
and I'm thinking, God, this is you speaking to me,
because I must be speaking today to people who are exhausted.
(13:07):
I must be speaking today to people who need a
second win. Come on, I must be speaking to people
today who are running the race of their life. Running
around running like a chicken with their head cut off.
What a disturbing image we use to just describe picking
the kids up from practice. I've been running around with
(13:28):
a chicken. Why you got to cut a chicken's head off?
Just say you're busy. But Paul said, watch this.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Do you not know?
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Then, in a race, all the runners run. When I
asked a moment ago, how many runners do I have
in the room?
Speaker 2 (13:43):
I was surprised.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
I thought every hand should go up, cause everybody watch
me preach is running from something. As a matter of fact,
if you are not a runner, you will find yourself lonely.
In the context of the Christian faith, the Judeo Christian faith,
(14:05):
which takes its roots and has its ripples from this
Holy Scripture, is full of people who ran for different reasons,
starting with let's talk about our most famous runner in
the Bible. If I say a big fish swallowed him
up and spit him out, you say, Jonah, Look how
smart you were with that Bible trivia you studied, didn't you?
(14:27):
And the Bible says that Jonah ran away from the Lord. Okay, well,
judge Jonah all you want. But Moses ran from a
crime that he committed once it had been discovered. Moses
ran from a body that he buried in an effort
to defend his own people. Moses ran so far he
(14:50):
ended up leaving the place where he was the prince
of Egypt and becoming a shepherd for his father in law, Jethro.
Jacob ran from me. Saw he read from his own
brother because he tried to steal his identity. Did I
say Joseph, I meant Jacob. Did I say Jacob, Well,
(15:14):
Joseph didn't run. Joseph was placed in Egypt and he
couldn't run because they tied him up. You know, we
never talked about we talked about runners though in the Bible. David, David,
David ran.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
You don't believe me, Well, he shows up one day with.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Some lunch for his brothers. Okay, check this out. And
he's just a young boy. He's like seventeen years old
something like that. He wasn't able to go out to
the war, but his dad charged him to bring his
brothers a meal. And I love this picture. What's the
first one I gave you in First Samuel seventeen. It's
somewhere in the twenty something versus. Put it on the screen, please. Yeah.
(16:00):
It says David left his things with the keeper of
supplies and ran to the battle lines and asked his
brothers how they were. If you know this story, you
won't be surprised to find that when David ran to
the battle lines, look at verse twenty three. Next thing
(16:21):
that happens, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gatz, stepped out.
I feel the Holy Spirit from his lines and shouted
his usual defiance, and David heard it. Verse twenty four.
Whenever the Israelites, that's all the people who had been
watching this go down day after day after day after day,
they all fled from him in great fear.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
So watch this.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
David is running toward what others are running from. There
is a spirit about David There is a belligerence about David.
Some would say a naivete about David.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
That what everybody else is run and then from he's like,
who's that?
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Some would call David dumb. I believe he's running for
a reason. And the reason I believe he's running in
this moment is he hasn't lived enough yet to know
that you don't run toward giants, you run from giants.
Some things, being dumb and young will help you with
(17:24):
intrusting God, They really will. Sometimes being young and dumb
will make you go to Walmart or Kinko's and make
five hundred flyers when nobody showed up for your event
and walk around Walmart putting them on wind shields and
not even worry. What if somebody shoots me while I'm
touching their car without permission.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
That's things I would think about.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Now, what if it's a lawsuit? If I don't want
nobody putting them on my windshield? I don't want to
do this. But something about being young will make you run.
We were laughing the other day because Elijah's been home
for the summer and I've missed the sound of him
just running through the house. No, not running for any
(18:04):
specific thing through the house, just running because apparently he
has the excess energy to just get where he's going
that much faster, and you would think maybe he was
late for an appointment, or maybe there was something that
needed attended to know, just running because he's young, just
(18:25):
running because why not? I just feel like running?
Speaker 2 (18:28):
And I think to.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Myself, I wish that I had the energy just.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
To run for no reason. But wouldn't that look weird
if you saw me run? I mean, why do you laugh?
Because it doesn't look right for me at this.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Age to just be running for no reason.
Speaker 2 (18:53):
You are thinking to yourself, Look, man, I mean that's
kind of awkward.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
We don't want to watch you run just for no reason,
just because you've got excess in to burn.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Touch your neighbor and say I'm running for a reason.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
And a lot of the times, the initial thing that
fuels our passion in our walk with Christ is our ignorance,
not our awareness. It's why we run into relationships and
we have no trouble trusting people because we've never had
trouble with people we don't know yet not to trust them.
Our trust muscle has not yet been ruptured, so we
(19:25):
run so we run. We run to opportunities because we've
never experienced loss. We run to investment because we've never
experienced collapse. We run because we're young. David not only
runs to the battle lies when he's delivering the food
to his brothers, but when Goliath came toward him with
(19:49):
the sword by some estimates, nine feet tall of philistine,
fierce warrior energy, steps to the battle lines, and the
Bible says in seventeen verse forty something put that one
on the screen. I got to show you. As the
Philistine moved closer to attack him, David ran. He ran quickly.
(20:16):
Something about this dumb young David that I think we
all miss in our lives. That's the power of nostalgia,
is taking you back to a time when it was
new to you and you didn't know what you didn't know,
so you would just go without a plan, because who
(20:39):
needs a plan? When I got youth, who needs a plan?
When I got personality? Who needs a plan? I'll figure
it out when I get there, And y'all to me.
These days, I don't go twelve minutes from the house
without locating the nearest restroom that I might have stop
at along the way. Now that's just the truth. But
here's what I want you to know. Listen to me.
(21:00):
Listen to me. It's one thing to run when you're young.
It is another thing to intentionally run when you've been
through some experiences that could have made you bitter, that
could have made you afraid, that could have made you
(21:21):
stay put where you are. Paul is describing in his
Great Letter to the Corinthian Church how the runners run
in a game. He says, they set their mind on
a goal, and they set their feet on a path,
and they run in a line. And when they enter
the games, I don't know if you noticed this, he said,
(21:41):
they go into strict training.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
And then David.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Now, let's do a little bit of a relay race
from David to Paul, because David, of course, was hundreds
of years before Paul came along. David and Paul are
both experiencing the same type of thing. Paul is taking
the gospel to the churches that have never heard about Jesus,
and he is dealing with these issues. David, of course,
is the second king that Israel has ever known.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
He's following in the wake of King.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Saul, who was supposed to support him and supposed to
mentor him and supposed to show him how to do
this king thing Ah, but Saul attacked what God was
trying to anoint. There is a sense in which sometimes
God is bringing you something that is intended to relieve you,
but you resist it because of something that is within you,
(22:33):
and you can't even figure out why you're pushing things away,
things that God sent as an answer to your prayer.
Have you ever pushed away and answered prayer because you
didn't know how to sustainably deal with it? I have.
I have prayed to God in seasons of my life
to send me people to encourage me and support me.
(22:56):
But when the encouragers came to support me, I didn't
believe what they said because my own insecurity made it
impossible for me to believe that you could really feel
that way about me. So I pray a prayer for
God to send a person. God sends a person in
response to the prayer, but the patterns of my life
(23:16):
will not enable me to receive that person. So I
prayed a prayer for a person. I got a pattern
that won't allow me to receive the person. And now
I keep praying about people that God has sent and
I am praying away what God gave because of something
on the inside of me. What I'm trying to say is,
as fast as God is running to you, some of
(23:39):
you are running from the answer that he gave because
it does not feel familiar. Now, let me slow down,
because I feel like I might be going a little fast?
Am I going a little fast? In Paul's letter, he
was talking about people who run to get a prize,
(24:00):
and in David's story there's a similarity. Both are about running,
but for different reasons. I want to read you the
story again now that I've set the context in for
Samuel twenty two, verse one, and then I'll answer the
question of the text. It says David left goat and
escape to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and
(24:23):
his father's household heard about it, they went down to
him there. And here's where we need to take a
little breakaway. David is in a cave, but he's called
to be a king. Ain't it confusing? When God calls
you one thing and your circumstances call you another man?
(24:49):
It crazy when God calls you free and your habits
call you addict.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Isn't it crazy when.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
God calls you love, but your emotions feel closed. Isn't
it amazing when God calls you chosen, but you feel
left out? Enter David, the chosen one of God, the
one who wasn't called to appear before the prophet Samuel
when he came to anoint the future king. As a
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matter of fact, at the moment that the king was
about to be chosen, David was just doing his chores,
tending the sheep. But the prophet knew each time he
went to anoint another son with oil that this is
not the one that God has chosen. So one commentary
says that the oil froze until David showed up. The
(25:40):
oil would not move from the flask of the prophet
to anoint the next king, and David did not have
to chase the crown. The crown chase David. This may
set you free from thinking that you have to be
at a certain place at a certain time, or you
have to get the attention of a certain person, or
you have to be recognized in a certain way in
(26:02):
order for your anointing to be real. Being recognized doesn't
make it real. It is what it is before they
say what they say, I was anointed to preach when
there were no people come into the run to win seminar.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
I'm anointed to preach today.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
The only difference in what has changed is the number
of people that I'm doing it with and for. But
one thing I need you to know about your life
is that it's one thing to run for something that
you chose to run toward. I'm gonna start this business,
I'm gonna find a husband, I'm gonna get my life together.
I'm gonna lose twenty pounds. I'm gonna run a marathon.
(26:41):
The devil is a liar. The Lord didn't tell you
to do that. It's one thing to run after something
that you chose, but it's another thing to run when
you're being chased. And I don't necessarily just want to
preach to those today who are running towards something, because
that's wonderful if you're motivated and you're inspired, and you're like,
(27:04):
by fifty, I want to have this much money.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
By forty, I'm gonna.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Have that much. So when I'm fifty, I can have
this much. That's fine if you figured that out. But
there is a sense in which you and I both
know that sometimes what's really moving you in your life
is not why you're running too. It's what you're running from.
(27:29):
And people see what you run to and they judge
you by that. People see what you run to, and
sometimes they admire you for that. But the significance of
the text and for Samuel twenty two, is that David
is a king and he's in a cave, and he's
not running from a giant. No, he's not running from
(27:52):
his assignment from God. No, he is running from the king,
and he is running from what he is going to be.
Not by his own choice. David did not sign up
for this event. Saul the King was supposed to hand
(28:15):
David the baton, and instead he is beating him over
the head with the baton that he is supposed to
be handing off. See, some of us run because we
weren't handed everything easily. Some of us run because what
we were handed was hazardous.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Well, I'm preaching some of us run. We don't even
understand what compels us and drives us.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
And you don't really understand this until you take some
time in life to reflect and say, why am I
so hard on myself? Why am I so so prone
to anger? Why do I always look for how things
are going to go wrong even when they're going right,
and you start discovering that some of the things that
you are broken by or because of the baton that
(29:00):
were not handed to you in the relay that never
was because you are running from something. It's hard to
run toward what I've never seen. It's hard to run
toward wholeness when I only saw my parents cuss each
other out. It's hard to run toward wholeness when I
only saw people continue to self sabotage. It is hard
(29:21):
to run towards something that has never been exemplified before me.
So now I find myself watch this like David, running
from something that I ought to be able to run too.
Saul should have helped David, and he didn't. So David
is in a cave because of a king that did
(29:44):
not ever want his crown to begin with. And the
Lord sent me to speak to somebody today to tell you,
don't let the place you're in make you confused about
the person that you are. Uh huh. That oil that
(30:04):
was on David's head, it didn't just stop on his head,
it ran down because when they anointed you in the
Bible Times, the anointing was an announcement, and the Bible
says that Samuel had a flask filled with oil.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
It wasn't a quarterfull, it wasn't half full. It was
a full horn of oil.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
And it was dumped on David's head and it was
dumped on David's head to signify David's destiny. And as
the oil ran down his head, David didn't know what
it really meant at the time, but the oil was
trying to tell him something. The oil was trying to
tell him that every king will.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
Have some caves.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Don't let the cave that you're in right now cause
you to forfeit or discontinue the thing that God has
put in you. Maybe this is why it meant so
much when I went to preach to the women in
the prison this week, because every day they are surrounded
(31:11):
by signals and signs that say my life is over.
And when we went in with our worship team and
our staff that go out there every month, not just
once a year, and we showed up to announce to
them that God knows your name, all of a sudden,
(31:35):
women who were stuck in a situation were lifted to
a place to remember that before the situation, God spoke
his word over your life. Uh huh, So this cage
situation in one Samuel twenty two is not David's fault.
(32:00):
He is not like Jonah who decided to run for God.
He is not like an Olympic athlete who wanted to
give their life to get a gold medal. He is
not like Elijah. Remember Elijah, not that one in the Bible,
the one who ran from Jezebel. And you want to
be like, dude, what are you running from? You just
(32:20):
called down fire on eight hundred and fifty false prophets,
and excuse me, I'm not being sexist. But one woman,
one woman won anything after what you've seen should be
enough to make you stand firm. Maybe you need an illustration.
I think you need an illustration. Okay, all, in our
(32:43):
backyard we have deer. We also have a Boston Terrier.
I noticed that the dog is smaller than the deer.
I also noticed that the deer run from the dog. Now,
if you watch bow chase the deer, you can see
(33:04):
his arrogance. That is unjustified because this little dog, who
can't do anything, is chasing a big deer. And I
think of myself. This must be the most thrilling event
in the world for his brain to process that I
can make something this big run and I don't even
have to bark. All I just got to do is this.
But I saw a movie in my mind the other day.
(33:26):
I wondered, what if the deer turned back and ran
at Bow? What if the deer even hissed at Bo
all of a sudden. I don't think Bo would be
so bold, because he would realize this thing that is
bigger is being triggered by emotion that can't affect him
in the least, and so I can no longer manipulate
(33:49):
this thing that is bigger than me into running from me.
If the deer ever turned around, it would be the
worst day of Bow's life. If the deer ever found
out I'm bigger than you, BO wouldn't run up on
a deer. BO wouldn't go outside. I told you last week,
he's scared of a suitcase.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
What do you think he's gonna do with a deer?
Speaker 1 (34:11):
If you ever got the revelation that greater is he
I am? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The devil is hoping you
never find out you're bigger. The devil is hoping you'll
always flitch and fall back.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
But I see.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Somebody turning around today. Come about, Wait a minute, why
am I running from you? I mean, if you're gonna run,
if you're gonna quit your family, at least have a
good reason.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Don't do it because they got on your nerves.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
If you're gonna quit loving your wife, at least have
a good reason.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Don't do it because she didn't appreciate you.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
That's not a good enough reason. Trouble isn't a good
enough reason for you to give up. Look, unto Jesus,
the author and finisher of our faith, who for the
joy set before him, endured the cross. Despising as shame,
Jesus said, I hate this, but I love that.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
The joy set before him.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
What I'm running toward, what I'm running from, It all
comes in concert in David's life. Now look at your
neighbor and tell them with confidence. Okay, tell them. If
God did it for David, I expect him to do
it for you.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Now, high five them and tell him run to wind.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
Yeah. Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
wait wait wait. God didn't protect David, Yes he did.
He didn't protect him from being chased. He kept him
chosen although he was chased. Our expectation of God must
not be that there will never be anything chasing us.
(36:05):
Our expectation of God is that we are chosen while
we are chased. I'm not preaching to everybody today. Some
messages are for everybody. This one's for somebody who's got
something on your heels. Matter of fact, you got hell
on your heels and you are running from something and
you can't figure out why. And you're like, well, but
(36:26):
the Bible says, rest in the salvation of God. Yes,
rest in his salvation, but run toward his arms for
this season of your life, and let him be your strength.
You know this preacher from California, he pulled me aside
one time and he said, I can tell you struggle
(36:47):
with depression. I said, you act like that's a hieroglyphics revelation,
the Da Vinci Code. I tell my church all the
time that I deal with depression. He said, no, I
can tell oh, And I thought this was a nice
thing for him to say. So I could tell that
you deal with it because you give people the tools
(37:11):
to deal with it. And then he said something, And
you know how preachers talking alliterated outlines. He said, the
tools that you use tell me a lot about the
trouble that you've been through. I said, that's a compliment.
I said, I'm not depressed all the time. He said, no,
(37:33):
I just can tell. I can tell what you've been
through by your tools. And maybe this is a helpful
way for you to look at the situations in your life.
You know, David, I gotta tell you a little bit
more about David. Do you know that David prayed in
the cave. He's hiding from Saul, who's already thrown multiple
(37:54):
spears at him at his head, talk about experiences on
the job, training and and he's lost his best friend,
and so he's all alone and he prays in the cave.
Now look at this in Psalm one and forty two.
(38:16):
This is the prayer that David prayed in the cave.
And you're going to be surprised what David prayed in
that cave. But maybe it'll be a tool for you
to use when you're in the cave. Look at verse three.
He said, when my spirit grows faint within me, it
is you who watch over my way. In the path
where I walk, people have hidden a snare for me.
I'm reading this fast because there's one verse I want
to get to.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Look and see.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
There is no one in my right hand. No one
is concerned for me. No one is concerned for me.
I have no refuge, No one cares for my life.
I cry to you, Lord, I say you are my refuge,
my portion in the land of the living.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Listen to my cry.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
I think he is feeling unheard. I think the key
is feeling unseen. You don't say listen to my cry
if you feel like the person is already involved in
the situation. Listen to my cry for I am in
desperate need. Oh David, I can tell you deal with depression.
You think so, I put it in the Bible. I
(39:19):
am in desperate need. The three people who need this
message you're going to really receive from this next part
right now. The three people who have been running a
race and you are being chased by something and you
cannot see what you are running from, but you can
feel it and you know it, and it has become
a template for the track that your life has taken
and the trajectory that you're on. Watch this, he said,
(39:43):
rescue me from those who pursue me, for they are
too strong for me. Set me free from my prison,
that I may praise your name. Then the righteous will
gather about me because of your good to me. Now
when he said the righteous will gather about me when
you get me out of this, because somebody our prayer. God,
(40:04):
when you get me out of this, Oh, it's gonna
be amazing. I'm gonna pay my tize. Lord. I'm gonna
give you fifty percent if you just get me out
of this. Fifty five do I hear of fifty six?
Do I here a fifty seven? Lord's like whatever, whatever,
whatever this listen is. He's praying the righteous will gather
about me. He's praying for support, he's praying for help.
(40:24):
He's praying for somebody to care. He's praying for somebody
to see. He's praying for somebody to hear. He's screaming
em in the cave. There's echo, echo, and there's no
one talking back. But watch what happened in Samuel twenty two,
verse one. His father's household heard David was running, and
(40:45):
they went down to him. There not only his family,
which we're gonna talk about in a second, but look
who else came all those who were in distress, or
in debt or discontented gathered around him. Okay, God, remember
how I was praying for you to send me people.
(41:07):
I take it back. I don't need anybody, Lord, just
me and you Lord. All my need is you, Lord.
And here come four hundred lined up. And what are they?
They are David's three D Army three D. You said,
where you get that from? They were in distress, they
(41:28):
were in debt, and they were discontented. God might show
up at your door with three D this week. But
remember how we were saying, sometimes you pray for something
and then it comes and you don't want it because
it came in three D. It came in debt, distress, discontented.
(41:54):
It came in the form of a need. Why would
God answer a prayer with a need? Come on and
think with me, Think with me. I can't I can't
just say stuff that makes you want to shout.
Speaker 2 (42:04):
I got to help you. So you know that.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
While he was praying in that cave these you know,
he prayed, God, then the Righteous will surround me, and
here comes in debt, in distress, discontented.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
David's like, let me try that again, then the.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
Righteous thought, I said, ratchet, I said righteous, Sorry, Lord,
And now we have a decision to make church. The
question is why did these four hundred people show up at.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
David's cave in the moment of greatest need.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
In response to God's answer to the prayer? And I
will suggest to you that it's this because David was anointed,
because he was chosen, because he was anointed.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
And for everybody who is in.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
The cycle of self pity, of why is everybody always
making withdrawals from me and not deposits because you're anointed?
Why doesn't anybody tell me good job because you're consistent.
(43:28):
They won't tell you good job when you do it consistently.
They'll tell you good job when they're surprised by it.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
The moment they.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Stop being surprised, they stop saying something. Ask your kids,
who ate your peanut butter? And didn't say a word,
didn't even throw the jar away either, just left it
in there because they expect peanut butter in the pantry,
because they expect you to be on time, because they
expect you to be kind, and their expectation is the
(43:57):
greatest compliment. So don't cry about it. I told one preacher.
One day, I said, you will know you're a good
preacher when people stop telling you good sermon, because they
will become all of a sudden less concerned about you
and how you felt about it, and they will become
more concerned about them and what God spoke to them
(44:18):
through it. And I put this to you as a
personal challenge today. Are they running to you for a reason?
What did you think God annointed you for? What did
you think the oil was for?
Speaker 2 (44:38):
What did you think.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
God blessed you with that experience for? And you say, well,
they're using me? Uh uh?
Speaker 2 (44:46):
God is God?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
Is the moment that the oil hit David's head?
Speaker 2 (44:58):
He should have known?
Speaker 1 (44:58):
Oh, because there is no crown where there are no caves.
So if God is going to do this thing for me,
there are going to be caves along the way. Oh
how I want to preach to everybody who has a
great dream. Oh how I want to preach to everybody
who wants to have a loving family or a righteous
(45:20):
life in Christ, that there will be caves along the way.
You will be confused along the way. Wait, I want
this and I'm reaching for that, and I feel this
and I'm doing that and I did that for them,
and they did that to me. Don't let the cave
confuse you. You're still anointed. Don't let their lack of
(45:42):
appreciation confuse you.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
You're still anointed. Don't let the fact.
Speaker 1 (45:47):
That they don't want to run with you anymore confuse you.
You're so anointed they don't want to go that direction anymore.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
That's fine.
Speaker 1 (45:54):
God to give you somebody else to run with, and
they might be three D, but you're just gonna have
to watch.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
This is the heart of the message. Look at me.
Speaker 1 (46:08):
This message is dedicated to my brother in law, who
just turned forty seven yesterday. I told him I'm gonna
dedicate this message to him. Look at me, Jody, Do
it confused? Do it confused? David was used by God,
but in this moment of his life, he was very
confused about what God is doing. Can both be true? Absolutely?
(46:29):
I am very confused about what God is doing a
lot of the time that He is using me. Do
you remember when Jesus knelt down and washed the disciple's feet.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
He told them something very important.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
He said, you do not understand what I do now,
but later you will. Sometimes you have to take a
lap and understand later. Sometimes you have to take a
lap and understand later.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
Sometimes you have to take six.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Laps around the walls of Jericho and trust that something's
gonna happen when I blow this trumpet. Something's gonna happen
when I blow this trumpet. I come against the discouragement
in your spirit.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
That says, what's the point.
Speaker 1 (47:17):
I come against the catalog in your mind that tells
you it was all in vain. I come against the
tears that you've cried because of who wasn't.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
By your side.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Open your eyes. David is a king in a cave,
and so are you. So are you. He is running
from a king, and he's going to be a king.
(47:52):
But kings can be announced and anointed anywhere. That can
only be developed in caves. The thing in me that
needed to preach today needed to show up at age
eighteen and there were no kids.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
It needed to be set.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
Free from the need to do it because of approval.
I could not have delivered this word.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
To you today without my caves.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
And I am saying to you, my brother, my brother
in Christ, my sister in Christ, I don't know what
you're running from. I don't know if it's generational I
don't know if it's recent, I don't know if it's
been heightened. I don't know if it's other people. I
don't know if it's deep down inside of you. But
God said to tell you, don't waste this cave. Don't
(48:45):
waste this cave. Tell your neighbor, don't waste your cave.
Caves come with the territory. Everybody's running from something, everybody's
running after something. Paul said, I'm just not running a
less anymore, running around like a Christian with your head
cut off, not even thinking about it anymore, not even
(49:09):
strategizing it anymore. Look what David did in verse three.
The pressure was so overwhelming. He is already a fugitive.
He is already confused. He looks around and here's his
old dad and his old mom talking about, Hey, we
heard you were in the cave. We came to keep
you some company. Do you mean, Holly. This is the
same Jesse that didn't even bring David in from the
(49:32):
field when they were coming to get the king. But
now he needs him. And I'm gonna tell you something
very important about people. People see you, how they need you. Hmm.
(49:52):
That's why some people hate you and don't even know you.
They need you to be an enemy, because if they
make you an enemy, they don't have to take responsibility
and be honest with you. That's why some people think
too highly of you, because they need you to be
(50:13):
a savior, and the truth is you're neither. So in
the moment that the three D Army, the dysfunctional Army,
the three D Army of dysfunctional derelicts, arrives at David's
door with his mom and dad. He goes to Moab.
(50:36):
You remember anything about Moab? Remember a lady named Ruth,
David's great grandmother. He had moabike blood, but Moab wasn't
his home. But he had to leave his home for
a little while, and he took his parents to Moab,
and he went to the king of Moab, who wasn't
exactly his friend, and he said, in verse three for
Samuel twenty two, this most anointed verse I've read in
(50:56):
a long time in this church. He said, would you
let my father and mother come stay with you until
I learn what God will do for me. My senses
were heightened and my attention was riveted by the word
until until, Because when the oil hit my head, and
when it flowed in it and it ran all the
(51:17):
way down. It ran for a reason, but I'm not
sure what it is yet. I know God speaking to
me about some things. I know there are some things
that he's pruning off my life right now, but I
don't know yet. And I'm not even doubting God's capacity
(51:37):
at this moment. I'm just lacking clarity. Listen to that again.
You're not doubting his capacity. You're lacking clarity. And David said,
this is too much for me right now, he prayed God.
I had no one to support me, and I look
at me, Look at me. You can be surrounded and
still not supported. You can have fifty thousand friends on
(52:03):
your phone and no one to be intimate with. You
can live in the house with them, breathe the air
with them, share the food with them, and still not
feel like you're one of them. And now David is
charged with the task of receiving his own family.
Speaker 2 (52:24):
He is running from a king, and he is becoming
a king.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
And he is about to occupy an office that he
did not even run for. There was no process of
David putting himself forth as a candidate for king. I'm
here to preach to somebody today. You didn't ask for
this battle. You did not even ask for this. You
didn't even know what it was. You did not point
(52:50):
to that item on the menu. You did not say
I want to deal with this. You did not ask
to be raised that way, exposed to that thing, dealing
with that thing. You did not plant it. But now
you are having to deal with the weeds of it. Well,
what then, what then? What is the answer for those
of us who are living in the until Because the
(53:15):
truth of the matter is, David was anointed long before
the others knew it. I want to say about you
that what will be true of you in the future
is true of you right now.
Speaker 2 (53:29):
You are a king even in this cave.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
You are valuable, even though no one else sees it.
Right now. There are times when I'm preaching you just
have to believe me where the Holy Spirit is giving
me what to say. And it is for somebody, and
I do not know who that it is. But God
is calling you watch this, saying this cave that you
(53:56):
have been in is closed for business because I have
more for your future and I need you to move forward.
Even though you're confused. You imagine a faith of that
might to come out of a cave and to go
(54:16):
to Moab and say, can you take care of my parents?
I don't know what God's gonna do. I don't know
how this report is going to turn out. I don't
know if my kid's gonna come back. I thought they
were the last time, but that was just a false alarm,
and they're still not doing well.
Speaker 2 (54:30):
I don't know, Bud. Will you keep what's important to
me even in my confusion?
Speaker 1 (54:41):
And I just pictured somebody in here today that you've
been running with weights that God does not intend for
you to carry forward into your future. There are some
things that you need to drop for what God has
called you to do. Expectation of where you should have
(55:02):
been by now, the guilt that Christ paid for and
nailed to his cross. Would you put that behind you
so that you can run the race that is marked
out for you. And while you're at it, stop looking
around at other people's race. God has called you to
(55:22):
run at your pace for this season.
Speaker 2 (55:31):
And I found out something about God, and I found out.
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Something about the enemy, And it's this. When God puts
something significant in me, the enemy sends something significant after me.
You should have known the moment that the oil hit
your head that this was not going to be easy.
Speaker 2 (55:58):
You should have known the moment that you.
Speaker 1 (56:00):
Survived the car accident that there's a reason the devil
tried to end my life right there. There is something
ahead of me that is so great it makes the
devil afraid. And that is the reason I run, because
I figure if the enemy sent something against me in
(56:23):
this season to try to get me to abandon it,
there must be something ahead of me.
Speaker 2 (56:34):
That's absolutely amazing.
Speaker 1 (56:38):
That it's amazing what's ahead of you, broke, It's amazing
what's ahead of you. Man, your kids are gonna talk
about that. He did it with the weight of the
world on his shoulders. There's something amazing in you. Mom
(57:04):
carried all that and she still carried us. So the
Lord said, make me your stronghold. Make me your stronghold.
You'll need that cave when you're called your cover. And
(57:26):
the prophet told David, I know you're running, and I
know there's a reason, but look at verse five. Do
not stay in the stronghold. What is a stronghold church?
It is a place of temporary protection. It is meant
to be visited, but not lived. In some of the
(57:48):
ways that you developed to deal with your life. They
were temporary and they served a purpose. But they're over now.
Speaker 2 (57:57):
They're over now. And the prophet named.
Speaker 1 (58:01):
God told David something. He said, go to Judah. Why
Judah put the verse up? Please verse five? Go to
Judah because that was the place David was from, and
that was the place where he would be anointed, and
that was the place where he would be covered, and
(58:21):
that was the place he would be protected. So God says,
I will cover you in every place that I call
you to. Would you come out of the stronghold? Would
you come out of the stronghold just for a moment today.
I know the cave felt safe for a season, but
the cave is closed now. I know you kind of
(58:45):
had to be like that for a season to get
through it. And I know you were trying to prove something,
having sex with every different woman to try to prove
something that you never received in your childhood. But would
you come out of that now? It's time to grow up.
God's got something with your name on it to make
a difference in the earth, and it's not just about
you anymore. Come to Judah with me. Judah is the
(59:06):
tribe that David is from, and Judah is the name
that means praise. I found it significant that when David
left the cave, God called him to a place that
meant literally praise. I think it is a sign that
when we praise God in the place where we are,
I said, when we praise God in the place where
we are, yeah, that God begins to move, that the
(59:31):
oil begins to flow. And I don't run for nothing.
Everybody runs, but I'm running for something. I'm running with someone.
And the Lord told me that if I can't run anymore,
he'll lift me up on wings like eagles. So I
appreciate the cave, but I'm already covered. I appreciate the cave,
(01:00:00):
but I'm already covered. Father, in the name of Jesus,
I thank you for the blood that covers me today.
I thank you for the times in my life that
I've known it to be true that while I was
praying in a cave, you were sending people Hallelujah. You
were making plans, Thank you, Jesus, And you were fulfilling purpose,
(01:00:26):
sending people, making plans, fulfilling purpose. I declare your word
over this church. Jeremiah twenty nine to eleven says for
I know the plans I have for you that just
because we are not aware of them does not mean
they are not active. God. I come against everything that
(01:00:47):
shoved those kings in those caves. I come against everything
that has told this child of God, this individual, that
they will never be what you've called them. And right now,
in the name of Jesus, I thank you for your covering,
protecting presence over our families. Said, I allow, devil, in
(01:01:10):
the name of Jesus, you can't have my kids. They're covered.
Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
Now start clapping like you know your kids are covered.
Speaker 1 (01:01:19):
Oh, thank you Jesus. I am cover.
Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
Try this devil.
Speaker 3 (01:01:34):
You can't have my mind it's covered. Can't have my
heart it's covered. Can't have my vision is covered. And
I declare that.
Speaker 1 (01:01:47):
In Christ, I am a new creation. I am a
child of God, and I'm running this race in the
strength of Jesus. Come on, give God a great prayer.
Hit back to Judah. Hit back to Judah. There's a strong, annoying.
(01:02:16):
Bow your head, close your eyes. Somebody needs to come
to Jesus right now. You need to run to Jesus
right now. He's already running to you. The Bible says
in the story of the Prodigal Son, the father ran
toward his son. God is running towards you, running with forgiveness,
running for your redemption, running to receive you with arms
open wide. All you gotta do is repent. All you
(01:02:37):
got to do is say God, I'm here. I'm sorry
that I ran from you. I was running from you
when I should have been running to you. There's somebody
here today. You need to receive Jesus. This is your chance.
I want to pray a prayer with you. If you
will pray this prayer from your heart. The Bible says
that God will hear you from heaven. He will forgive
your sin. He will give you his grace, and he
(01:02:59):
will make you new. You will be born again, You
will be saved. This is your moment. Repeat after me,
Heavenly Father. I am a sinner in need of a savior.
And I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God and the savior of the world. And today I
(01:03:21):
make Jesus the lord of my life. I believe he
died that I would be forgiven and rose again to
give me life. I receive this new life. This is
my new beginning on the counter of three shoots your
hand up if you prayed that prayer.
Speaker 2 (01:03:41):
I want to celebrate you. What two? Three? Shoot it up,
Shoot it up, shoot it up.
Speaker 1 (01:03:46):
I see it. God bless you.
Speaker 2 (01:03:51):
Incredible. Come on, we can do better than that. I said,
we can do better than that.
Speaker 1 (01:04:01):
Yeah, man, high five. At least three people say I'm
running for a reason. Campus pastors, you can have it, Valentine,
look at me this week. You got something to run for,
and you got someone to run with. You are not
(01:04:21):
alone in this thing, you hear me. I know it
feels lonely to be chosen. Sometimes you're not alone, You're chosen.
The two feel the same. Sometime you're not alone, you're chosen.
Tell somebody you're chosen. That's why you're running. That's why
(01:04:42):
the devil's chasing you. You're chosen. But guess what, what
I'm running toward is greater than what I'm running from.
So I'll see you on the next slap and now,
unto him, lift your hands. Who is able to do
immeasurably more than you ask or imagine.
Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
To him, be glory through Christ Jesus in the church.
Now and forever. I find somebody say, run your race.
Speaker 1 (01:05:13):
Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
you that this ministry is possible. You can click the
link in the description to give now, or visit Elevationchurch
dot org slash podcast for more information and if you
enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You can share it
with your friends. You can click the share button, take
(01:05:35):
a screenshot and share it on your social stories and
tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again for listening. God
bless you
Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message.
How many are grateful to be in God's house today?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
All right?
Speaker 1 (00:24):
For all the early adopters who sat down, stand back up.
I hadn't read my scripture yet you jumped the gun,
did you? Oh? Man? I have a message today that
I believe is going to inspire your life and encourage
your faith for all of the things that God has
called you to do. If you receive it by faith,
say amen. We're going to read two scriptures, First Samuel
(00:47):
chapter twenty two, verses one through five and First Corinthians
Chapter nine, verses twenty four through twenty six. The Word
of the Lord from One Samuel twenty two one through
five and First Corinthians chapter nine, verses twenty four through
twenty six. The first one is about the Great King David,
(01:08):
and the second one is from the Great Apostle Paul.
David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adullam.
When his brothers and his father's household heard about it, they.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
Went down to him.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
There all those who were in distress, or in debt
or discontented gathered around him, and he became their commander.
About four hundred men were with him. From there, David
went to Mizpah in Moab and said to the King
of Moab, would you let my father and mother come
(01:39):
and stay with you until I learn what God will
do for me. That is a very powerful way that
he says that until I learn what God will do
for me. So he left them with the King of Moab,
and they stayed with him as long as David was
in the stronghold. But the prophet Gad said to David,
(02:03):
do not stay in the stronghold, go into the land
of Judah. So David left and went to the forest
of Hareth. That's the first scripture. The second one, which
will come on the screen as well, is in one
Corinthians chapter nine. The apostle Paul, writing to the church
(02:23):
at corinth gives a metaphor that I want us to
apply our minds to for a moment today. Do you
not know that in a race, all the runners run,
but only one gets the prize. Run in such a
way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in
(02:43):
the Games goes into strict training. They do it to
get a crown that will not last.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
But we do it.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Look at your neighbors, say, we do it to get
a crown that will last forever. Therefore, I do not
run like someone running aimlessly. I do not fight like
a boxer beating the air. Let's stop there. I do
not run like someone running aimlessly. I want you to
(03:15):
look at your neighbor like you're on the same Olympic
team and tell them, real quick, just give them an
Olympic look, real quick, look at them with some Olympic eyes.
Did he say Olympic eyes?
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Olympic eyes?
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Look at him like a winner, Look them deep in
their eyes, and tell them we run for a reason.
We run for a reason. I want to remind somebody
that came to church today, we run for a reason. Yeah,
we run for a reason. God, only you know all
(03:51):
of the purposes that you have an eternity for this
moment in time. So I ask you, God of Heaven,
to invade Earth, fill these earthen vessels with the glory,
the oil of your anointing, so that we can flow
and move forward in everything you've called us to do.
We cannot afford in this season of our life to
run dry. So now, God, we asked that you would
(04:13):
pour into us, for we are poor without you. Your
word says that we will receive from you as we
acknowledge our need for you, and Father, we need you
this hour. Please come in a way that we didn't
ask for because we didn't know we needed it. Touch
the place in us that is too insecure to be
shown to others. But in your presence, there's no modesty
(04:34):
for you, our a maker, every hidden part, every secret thing,
Deal with it. God, in this place between you and them, God,
use me as your instrument. I'm available to you. Blow
through me, Holy Spirit, as if I were a woodwind instrument,
and speak to these people what you need them to
know for the place that you've called them to. I
(04:55):
consider it done because you're good and you're faithful, and
I thank you for it in advance in Jesus' name. Amen,
you may be seated. All the runners in the house,
raise your hand. I wrote that title down. We run
(05:17):
for a reason. That's my message. Running for a reason.
I thought, now that sounds like I'm launching a five k.
That doesn't sound like I'm starting a sermon. But the
Lord comes with these amazing confirmations. You know. I put
my Bible down yesterday for a few minutes to take
a little study break. I've been up since early working
(05:37):
on this message and I just needed a little break.
And when I put it on the Olympics, they were
running the relay race, and I had already picked out
the title and the scripture we run for a Reason,
So I kind of took it as a little bit
of a sign. What I must confess to you is
what so embarrassing? Are crying watching these people run? Now?
(06:04):
Not no big ugly cry tears or anything, not crocodile tears,
just a little trickle tear. But the bad part about
it was the person who won wasn't even American. They
weren't even from our country.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
And I didn't.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
I didn't. I didn't feel the tears come while she
was running. I felt that tears come when she was
looking at her teammates after she pulled ahead and won,
And I'm like, why am I crying? This isn't even
my country? I don't even like to run back. When
(06:38):
I see runners on the road, I judged them, like,
don't you know there's a better way to get in
shape than this? There are so many preferable ways to exercise.
Well it's the runners high. Okay, Well you know I
would choose a non runners low over whatever run. There's
(07:00):
no HI on the other side of that that makes
it worth it to me. But observing this lady, it
made me emotional. And as I paused and thought about
the correlation maybe between the message that I was preparing
and the emotion I experienced, I saw that watching someone
run and knowing the importance and the priority of what
(07:24):
they're running for and who they're running with. That's why
it made me emotional, because when I saw as a
relay race, so when I saw all the people that
the anchor of the race brought along with her into victory,
it touched me to know that something kicked in at
(07:46):
that moment that made her say for my country, I've
got to do this for my friend, I got to
do this for my mom, who sat at every track
meet since I was four years old, and I thought
about all the people that believed in her. When she
first started running when she wasn't much of a runner,
(08:11):
And I thought about my wife, Holly, And I'm just
telling you this because the connection was profound to me.
When we first started doing ministry together, I had no
visible gift or really any kind of clues that this
ministry would exist one day. But she believed in me.
(08:33):
She believed in me, and I know that she believed
in me because we served on a ministry team together
where we sat down and I didn't know how to
be a leader. I'd never let a ministry team before.
And we're sitting there and we're planning out our summer
that we're going to go around and travel and preach.
And I'll never forget this. I put up for a
discussion what should our theme be for the summer ministry?
(08:55):
And I was trying to get everybody involved, you know,
but I found out that God still love the world.
He didn't send a committee, and if you really want
to get something done, you just got to make a decision.
And we're going back and forth, and I threw out
the theme run to Win. I said, how about run
to win? Wouldn't that be a good theme from First
Corinthians Chapter nine, And well, one person didn't think that
(09:16):
was a very good idea because you know, well, it's
really not a competition. You know, it's really not about winning.
You remember when that girl told you it's not whether
you win. Or my son Elijah, my oldest son, a
girl told him one time, it's not whether you win
or lose, it's whether you're having fun. And he looked
back at her cold blooded and said, well, I'm not
having fun unless I'm winning. And he was like five
(09:37):
when he said that. So it's in the blood. Man,
we're kind of competitive. And I liked that theme about
run to win. And so this guy's saying, well, it's
not really a competition, and then this girl over here
is saying, well, I think that the Christian life is
really more like a walk. And one's got a problem
with the word win, and one's got a problem with
the word run. All I'm left with is too And
(09:58):
one of the team members looked at and she had
real soft spoken she said, Stephen, we need you to
lead us, tell us what to do. From that moment forward,
I decided you can be confused as long as you're confident.
(10:22):
That's a great secret for life. Yeah, you can really
bluff your way through a lot of stuff in life.
Because then I just said when she said that to
me so soft. I don't even know if anybody else on
the team heard, but she said that to me, and
I said, run to win. And then we went on
the road, right, We went on the road, and we
get to our first church. And I'm going to get
(10:42):
to this story about David in just a moment, and
what Paul said in First Corinthians, but just to set
the table for this revelation, we get to our very
first church. We're so excited. We have developed our curriculum,
we have developed our teachings. And this is Holly session,
and this is Seth's session, and this is Joni's session,
and this is Grace's session. And I'm going to come
in and close it out, and we're going to do
it over the course of five days and really build
(11:03):
this theme of run to win. You know, all these
all these wonderful plans. But we arrived to the spot
and there were no people. Zero kids had showed up
for the youth camp. And it was our first camp
of the summer. And I looked at Holly and I'd
learned from our little committee meeting. We need you to
(11:26):
lead us, and I said, you make a flyer, and
I pointed at her, and I think that's the moment
that she fell in love with me. When I said
you make a flyer. I think something about that, just ooh,
make a flyer. And she she she made a flyer,
(11:48):
said run to win. We went to Walmart. We covered
five hundred wind shields with run to Win propaganda, telling
those kids to get to.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
The Baptist church.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
And by the end of the week there were twenty
five kids in the room. And I preached like it
was twenty five thousand, because I've always been doing it
from a place of passion, not a place of performance.
And I'll preach if there's five of you, five thousand
and five million. See. I think that this is a
common misconception about people that you see who go really
(12:21):
hard after something, is that a lot of times you
will see the results of their ambition and not really
understand the reasons for their ambition. And for me and Holly,
I'm thankful that not only have we always had something
to run four, but I'm grateful that I had someone
to run with. And that made me smile to think
(12:43):
about how here I am twenty how many twenty five
years later, still running with the right one. Now this
is not a marriage seminar. So I'm crying watching the Olympics,
and I'm thinking, God, this is you speaking to me,
because I must be speaking today to people who are exhausted.
(13:07):
I must be speaking today to people who need a
second win. Come on, I must be speaking to people
today who are running the race of their life. Running
around running like a chicken with their head cut off.
What a disturbing image we use to just describe picking
the kids up from practice. I've been running around with
(13:28):
a chicken. Why you got to cut a chicken's head off?
Just say you're busy. But Paul said, watch this.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Do you not know?
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Then, in a race, all the runners run. When I
asked a moment ago, how many runners do I have
in the room?
Speaker 2 (13:43):
I was surprised.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
I thought every hand should go up, cause everybody watch
me preach is running from something. As a matter of fact,
if you are not a runner, you will find yourself lonely.
In the context of the Christian faith, the Judeo Christian faith,
(14:05):
which takes its roots and has its ripples from this
Holy Scripture, is full of people who ran for different reasons,
starting with let's talk about our most famous runner in
the Bible. If I say a big fish swallowed him
up and spit him out, you say, Jonah, Look how
smart you were with that Bible trivia you studied, didn't you?
(14:27):
And the Bible says that Jonah ran away from the Lord. Okay, well,
judge Jonah all you want. But Moses ran from a
crime that he committed once it had been discovered. Moses
ran from a body that he buried in an effort
to defend his own people. Moses ran so far he
(14:50):
ended up leaving the place where he was the prince
of Egypt and becoming a shepherd for his father in law, Jethro.
Jacob ran from me. Saw he read from his own
brother because he tried to steal his identity. Did I
say Joseph, I meant Jacob. Did I say Jacob, Well,
(15:14):
Joseph didn't run. Joseph was placed in Egypt and he
couldn't run because they tied him up. You know, we
never talked about we talked about runners though in the Bible. David, David,
David ran.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
You don't believe me, Well, he shows up one day with.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Some lunch for his brothers. Okay, check this out. And
he's just a young boy. He's like seventeen years old
something like that. He wasn't able to go out to
the war, but his dad charged him to bring his
brothers a meal. And I love this picture. What's the
first one I gave you in First Samuel seventeen. It's
somewhere in the twenty something versus. Put it on the screen, please. Yeah.
(16:00):
It says David left his things with the keeper of
supplies and ran to the battle lines and asked his
brothers how they were. If you know this story, you
won't be surprised to find that when David ran to
the battle lines, look at verse twenty three. Next thing
(16:21):
that happens, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gatz, stepped out.
I feel the Holy Spirit from his lines and shouted
his usual defiance, and David heard it. Verse twenty four.
Whenever the Israelites, that's all the people who had been
watching this go down day after day after day after day,
they all fled from him in great fear.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
So watch this.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
David is running toward what others are running from. There
is a spirit about David There is a belligerence about David.
Some would say a naivete about David.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
That what everybody else is run and then from he's like,
who's that?
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Some would call David dumb. I believe he's running for
a reason. And the reason I believe he's running in
this moment is he hasn't lived enough yet to know
that you don't run toward giants, you run from giants.
Some things, being dumb and young will help you with
(17:24):
intrusting God, They really will. Sometimes being young and dumb
will make you go to Walmart or Kinko's and make
five hundred flyers when nobody showed up for your event
and walk around Walmart putting them on wind shields and
not even worry. What if somebody shoots me while I'm
touching their car without permission.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
That's things I would think about.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Now, what if it's a lawsuit? If I don't want
nobody putting them on my windshield? I don't want to
do this. But something about being young will make you run.
We were laughing the other day because Elijah's been home
for the summer and I've missed the sound of him
just running through the house. No, not running for any
(18:04):
specific thing through the house, just running because apparently he
has the excess energy to just get where he's going
that much faster, and you would think maybe he was
late for an appointment, or maybe there was something that
needed attended to know, just running because he's young, just
(18:25):
running because why not? I just feel like running?
Speaker 2 (18:28):
And I think to.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Myself, I wish that I had the energy just.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
To run for no reason. But wouldn't that look weird
if you saw me run? I mean, why do you laugh?
Because it doesn't look right for me at this.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Age to just be running for no reason.
Speaker 2 (18:53):
You are thinking to yourself, Look, man, I mean that's
kind of awkward.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
We don't want to watch you run just for no reason,
just because you've got excess in to burn.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Touch your neighbor and say I'm running for a reason.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
And a lot of the times, the initial thing that
fuels our passion in our walk with Christ is our ignorance,
not our awareness. It's why we run into relationships and
we have no trouble trusting people because we've never had
trouble with people we don't know yet not to trust them.
Our trust muscle has not yet been ruptured, so we
(19:25):
run so we run. We run to opportunities because we've
never experienced loss. We run to investment because we've never
experienced collapse. We run because we're young. David not only
runs to the battle lies when he's delivering the food
to his brothers, but when Goliath came toward him with
(19:49):
the sword by some estimates, nine feet tall of philistine,
fierce warrior energy, steps to the battle lines, and the
Bible says in seventeen verse forty something put that one
on the screen. I got to show you. As the
Philistine moved closer to attack him, David ran. He ran quickly.
(20:16):
Something about this dumb young David that I think we
all miss in our lives. That's the power of nostalgia,
is taking you back to a time when it was
new to you and you didn't know what you didn't know,
so you would just go without a plan, because who
(20:39):
needs a plan? When I got youth, who needs a plan?
When I got personality? Who needs a plan? I'll figure
it out when I get there, And y'all to me.
These days, I don't go twelve minutes from the house
without locating the nearest restroom that I might have stop
at along the way. Now that's just the truth. But
here's what I want you to know. Listen to me.
(21:00):
Listen to me. It's one thing to run when you're young.
It is another thing to intentionally run when you've been
through some experiences that could have made you bitter, that
could have made you afraid, that could have made you
(21:21):
stay put where you are. Paul is describing in his
Great Letter to the Corinthian Church how the runners run
in a game. He says, they set their mind on
a goal, and they set their feet on a path,
and they run in a line. And when they enter
the games, I don't know if you noticed this, he said,
(21:41):
they go into strict training.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
And then David.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Now, let's do a little bit of a relay race
from David to Paul, because David, of course, was hundreds
of years before Paul came along. David and Paul are
both experiencing the same type of thing. Paul is taking
the gospel to the churches that have never heard about Jesus,
and he is dealing with these issues. David, of course,
is the second king that Israel has ever known.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
He's following in the wake of King.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Saul, who was supposed to support him and supposed to
mentor him and supposed to show him how to do
this king thing Ah, but Saul attacked what God was
trying to anoint. There is a sense in which sometimes
God is bringing you something that is intended to relieve you,
but you resist it because of something that is within you,
(22:33):
and you can't even figure out why you're pushing things away,
things that God sent as an answer to your prayer.
Have you ever pushed away and answered prayer because you
didn't know how to sustainably deal with it? I have.
I have prayed to God in seasons of my life
to send me people to encourage me and support me.
(22:56):
But when the encouragers came to support me, I didn't
believe what they said because my own insecurity made it
impossible for me to believe that you could really feel
that way about me. So I pray a prayer for
God to send a person. God sends a person in
response to the prayer, but the patterns of my life
(23:16):
will not enable me to receive that person. So I
prayed a prayer for a person. I got a pattern
that won't allow me to receive the person. And now
I keep praying about people that God has sent and
I am praying away what God gave because of something
on the inside of me. What I'm trying to say is,
as fast as God is running to you, some of
(23:39):
you are running from the answer that he gave because
it does not feel familiar. Now, let me slow down,
because I feel like I might be going a little fast?
Am I going a little fast? In Paul's letter, he
was talking about people who run to get a prize,
(24:00):
and in David's story there's a similarity. Both are about running,
but for different reasons. I want to read you the
story again now that I've set the context in for
Samuel twenty two, verse one, and then I'll answer the
question of the text. It says David left goat and
escape to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and
(24:23):
his father's household heard about it, they went down to
him there. And here's where we need to take a
little breakaway. David is in a cave, but he's called
to be a king. Ain't it confusing? When God calls
you one thing and your circumstances call you another man?
(24:49):
It crazy when God calls you free and your habits
call you addict.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Isn't it crazy when.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
God calls you love, but your emotions feel closed. Isn't
it amazing when God calls you chosen, but you feel
left out? Enter David, the chosen one of God, the
one who wasn't called to appear before the prophet Samuel
when he came to anoint the future king. As a
(25:18):
matter of fact, at the moment that the king was
about to be chosen, David was just doing his chores,
tending the sheep. But the prophet knew each time he
went to anoint another son with oil that this is
not the one that God has chosen. So one commentary
says that the oil froze until David showed up. The
(25:40):
oil would not move from the flask of the prophet
to anoint the next king, and David did not have
to chase the crown. The crown chase David. This may
set you free from thinking that you have to be
at a certain place at a certain time, or you
have to get the attention of a certain person, or
you have to be recognized in a certain way in
(26:02):
order for your anointing to be real. Being recognized doesn't
make it real. It is what it is before they
say what they say, I was anointed to preach when
there were no people come into the run to win seminar.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
I'm anointed to preach today.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
The only difference in what has changed is the number
of people that I'm doing it with and for. But
one thing I need you to know about your life
is that it's one thing to run for something that
you chose to run toward. I'm gonna start this business,
I'm gonna find a husband, I'm gonna get my life together.
I'm gonna lose twenty pounds. I'm gonna run a marathon.
(26:41):
The devil is a liar. The Lord didn't tell you
to do that. It's one thing to run after something
that you chose, but it's another thing to run when
you're being chased. And I don't necessarily just want to
preach to those today who are running towards something, because
that's wonderful if you're motivated and you're inspired, and you're like,
(27:04):
by fifty, I want to have this much money.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
By forty, I'm gonna.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Have that much. So when I'm fifty, I can have
this much. That's fine if you figured that out. But
there is a sense in which you and I both
know that sometimes what's really moving you in your life
is not why you're running too. It's what you're running from.
(27:29):
And people see what you run to and they judge
you by that. People see what you run to, and
sometimes they admire you for that. But the significance of
the text and for Samuel twenty two, is that David
is a king and he's in a cave, and he's
not running from a giant. No, he's not running from
(27:52):
his assignment from God. No, he is running from the king,
and he is running from what he is going to be.
Not by his own choice. David did not sign up
for this event. Saul the King was supposed to hand
(28:15):
David the baton, and instead he is beating him over
the head with the baton that he is supposed to
be handing off. See, some of us run because we
weren't handed everything easily. Some of us run because what
we were handed was hazardous.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Well, I'm preaching some of us run. We don't even
understand what compels us and drives us.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
And you don't really understand this until you take some
time in life to reflect and say, why am I
so hard on myself? Why am I so so prone
to anger? Why do I always look for how things
are going to go wrong even when they're going right,
and you start discovering that some of the things that
you are broken by or because of the baton that
(29:00):
were not handed to you in the relay that never
was because you are running from something. It's hard to
run toward what I've never seen. It's hard to run
toward wholeness when I only saw my parents cuss each
other out. It's hard to run toward wholeness when I
only saw people continue to self sabotage. It is hard
(29:21):
to run towards something that has never been exemplified before me.
So now I find myself watch this like David, running
from something that I ought to be able to run too.
Saul should have helped David, and he didn't. So David
is in a cave because of a king that did
(29:44):
not ever want his crown to begin with. And the
Lord sent me to speak to somebody today to tell you,
don't let the place you're in make you confused about
the person that you are. Uh huh. That oil that
(30:04):
was on David's head, it didn't just stop on his head,
it ran down because when they anointed you in the
Bible Times, the anointing was an announcement, and the Bible
says that Samuel had a flask filled with oil.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
It wasn't a quarterfull, it wasn't half full. It was
a full horn of oil.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
And it was dumped on David's head and it was
dumped on David's head to signify David's destiny. And as
the oil ran down his head, David didn't know what
it really meant at the time, but the oil was
trying to tell him something. The oil was trying to
tell him that every king will.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
Have some caves.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Don't let the cave that you're in right now cause
you to forfeit or discontinue the thing that God has
put in you. Maybe this is why it meant so
much when I went to preach to the women in
the prison this week, because every day they are surrounded
(31:11):
by signals and signs that say my life is over.
And when we went in with our worship team and
our staff that go out there every month, not just
once a year, and we showed up to announce to
them that God knows your name, all of a sudden,
(31:35):
women who were stuck in a situation were lifted to
a place to remember that before the situation, God spoke
his word over your life. Uh huh, So this cage
situation in one Samuel twenty two is not David's fault.
(32:00):
He is not like Jonah who decided to run for God.
He is not like an Olympic athlete who wanted to
give their life to get a gold medal. He is
not like Elijah. Remember Elijah, not that one in the Bible,
the one who ran from Jezebel. And you want to
be like, dude, what are you running from? You just
(32:20):
called down fire on eight hundred and fifty false prophets,
and excuse me, I'm not being sexist. But one woman,
one woman won anything after what you've seen should be
enough to make you stand firm. Maybe you need an illustration.
I think you need an illustration. Okay, all, in our
(32:43):
backyard we have deer. We also have a Boston Terrier.
I noticed that the dog is smaller than the deer.
I also noticed that the deer run from the dog. Now,
if you watch bow chase the deer, you can see
(33:04):
his arrogance. That is unjustified because this little dog, who
can't do anything, is chasing a big deer. And I
think of myself. This must be the most thrilling event
in the world for his brain to process that I
can make something this big run and I don't even
have to bark. All I just got to do is this.
But I saw a movie in my mind the other day.
(33:26):
I wondered, what if the deer turned back and ran
at Bow? What if the deer even hissed at Bo
all of a sudden. I don't think Bo would be
so bold, because he would realize this thing that is
bigger is being triggered by emotion that can't affect him
in the least, and so I can no longer manipulate
(33:49):
this thing that is bigger than me into running from me.
If the deer ever turned around, it would be the
worst day of Bow's life. If the deer ever found
out I'm bigger than you, BO wouldn't run up on
a deer. BO wouldn't go outside. I told you last week,
he's scared of a suitcase.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
What do you think he's gonna do with a deer?
Speaker 1 (34:11):
If you ever got the revelation that greater is he
I am? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The devil is hoping you
never find out you're bigger. The devil is hoping you'll
always flitch and fall back.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
But I see.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
Somebody turning around today. Come about, Wait a minute, why
am I running from you? I mean, if you're gonna run,
if you're gonna quit your family, at least have a
good reason.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Don't do it because they got on your nerves.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
If you're gonna quit loving your wife, at least have
a good reason.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
Don't do it because she didn't appreciate you.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
That's not a good enough reason. Trouble isn't a good
enough reason for you to give up. Look, unto Jesus,
the author and finisher of our faith, who for the
joy set before him, endured the cross. Despising as shame,
Jesus said, I hate this, but I love that.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
The joy set before him.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
What I'm running toward, what I'm running from, It all
comes in concert in David's life. Now look at your
neighbor and tell them with confidence. Okay, tell them. If
God did it for David, I expect him to do
it for you.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
Now, high five them and tell him run to wind.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
Yeah. Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
wait wait wait. God didn't protect David, Yes he did.
He didn't protect him from being chased. He kept him
chosen although he was chased. Our expectation of God must
not be that there will never be anything chasing us.
(36:05):
Our expectation of God is that we are chosen while
we are chased. I'm not preaching to everybody today. Some
messages are for everybody. This one's for somebody who's got
something on your heels. Matter of fact, you got hell
on your heels and you are running from something and
you can't figure out why. And you're like, well, but
(36:26):
the Bible says, rest in the salvation of God. Yes,
rest in his salvation, but run toward his arms for
this season of your life, and let him be your strength.
You know this preacher from California, he pulled me aside
one time and he said, I can tell you struggle
(36:47):
with depression. I said, you act like that's a hieroglyphics revelation,
the Da Vinci Code. I tell my church all the
time that I deal with depression. He said, no, I
can tell oh, And I thought this was a nice
thing for him to say. So I could tell that
you deal with it because you give people the tools
(37:11):
to deal with it. And then he said something, And
you know how preachers talking alliterated outlines. He said, the
tools that you use tell me a lot about the
trouble that you've been through. I said, that's a compliment.
I said, I'm not depressed all the time. He said, no,
(37:33):
I just can tell. I can tell what you've been
through by your tools. And maybe this is a helpful
way for you to look at the situations in your life.
You know, David, I gotta tell you a little bit
more about David. Do you know that David prayed in
the cave. He's hiding from Saul, who's already thrown multiple
(37:54):
spears at him at his head, talk about experiences on
the job, training and and he's lost his best friend,
and so he's all alone and he prays in the cave.
Now look at this in Psalm one and forty two.
(38:16):
This is the prayer that David prayed in the cave.
And you're going to be surprised what David prayed in
that cave. But maybe it'll be a tool for you
to use when you're in the cave. Look at verse three.
He said, when my spirit grows faint within me, it
is you who watch over my way. In the path
where I walk, people have hidden a snare for me.
I'm reading this fast because there's one verse I want
to get to.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Look and see.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
There is no one in my right hand. No one
is concerned for me. No one is concerned for me.
I have no refuge, No one cares for my life.
I cry to you, Lord, I say you are my refuge,
my portion in the land of the living.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Listen to my cry.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
I think he is feeling unheard. I think the key
is feeling unseen. You don't say listen to my cry
if you feel like the person is already involved in
the situation. Listen to my cry for I am in
desperate need. Oh David, I can tell you deal with depression.
You think so, I put it in the Bible. I
(39:19):
am in desperate need. The three people who need this
message you're going to really receive from this next part
right now. The three people who have been running a
race and you are being chased by something and you
cannot see what you are running from, but you can
feel it and you know it, and it has become
a template for the track that your life has taken
and the trajectory that you're on. Watch this, he said,
(39:43):
rescue me from those who pursue me, for they are
too strong for me. Set me free from my prison,
that I may praise your name. Then the righteous will
gather about me because of your good to me. Now
when he said the righteous will gather about me when
you get me out of this, because somebody our prayer. God,
(40:04):
when you get me out of this, Oh, it's gonna
be amazing. I'm gonna pay my tize. Lord. I'm gonna
give you fifty percent if you just get me out
of this. Fifty five do I hear of fifty six?
Do I here a fifty seven? Lord's like whatever, whatever,
whatever this listen is. He's praying the righteous will gather
about me. He's praying for support, he's praying for help.
(40:24):
He's praying for somebody to care. He's praying for somebody
to see. He's praying for somebody to hear. He's screaming
em in the cave. There's echo, echo, and there's no
one talking back. But watch what happened in Samuel twenty two,
verse one. His father's household heard David was running, and
(40:45):
they went down to him. There not only his family,
which we're gonna talk about in a second, but look
who else came all those who were in distress, or
in debt or discontented gathered around him. Okay, God, remember
how I was praying for you to send me people.
(41:07):
I take it back. I don't need anybody, Lord, just
me and you Lord. All my need is you, Lord.
And here come four hundred lined up. And what are they?
They are David's three D Army three D. You said,
where you get that from? They were in distress, they
(41:28):
were in debt, and they were discontented. God might show
up at your door with three D this week. But
remember how we were saying, sometimes you pray for something
and then it comes and you don't want it because
it came in three D. It came in debt, distress, discontented.
(41:54):
It came in the form of a need. Why would
God answer a prayer with a need? Come on and
think with me, Think with me. I can't I can't
just say stuff that makes you want to shout.
Speaker 2 (42:04):
I got to help you. So you know that.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
While he was praying in that cave these you know,
he prayed, God, then the Righteous will surround me, and
here comes in debt, in distress, discontented.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
David's like, let me try that again, then the.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
Righteous thought, I said, ratchet, I said righteous, Sorry, Lord,
And now we have a decision to make church. The
question is why did these four hundred people show up at.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
David's cave in the moment of greatest need.
Speaker 1 (42:49):
In response to God's answer to the prayer? And I
will suggest to you that it's this because David was anointed,
because he was chosen, because he was anointed.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
And for everybody who is in.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
The cycle of self pity, of why is everybody always
making withdrawals from me and not deposits because you're anointed?
Why doesn't anybody tell me good job because you're consistent.
(43:28):
They won't tell you good job when you do it consistently.
They'll tell you good job when they're surprised by it.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
The moment they.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Stop being surprised, they stop saying something. Ask your kids,
who ate your peanut butter? And didn't say a word,
didn't even throw the jar away either, just left it
in there because they expect peanut butter in the pantry,
because they expect you to be on time, because they
expect you to be kind, and their expectation is the
(43:57):
greatest compliment. So don't cry about it. I told one preacher.
One day, I said, you will know you're a good
preacher when people stop telling you good sermon, because they
will become all of a sudden less concerned about you
and how you felt about it, and they will become
more concerned about them and what God spoke to them
(44:18):
through it. And I put this to you as a
personal challenge today. Are they running to you for a reason?
What did you think God annointed you for? What did
you think the oil was for?
Speaker 2 (44:38):
What did you think.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
God blessed you with that experience for? And you say, well,
they're using me? Uh uh?
Speaker 2 (44:46):
God is God?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
Is the moment that the oil hit David's head?
Speaker 2 (44:58):
He should have known?
Speaker 1 (44:58):
Oh, because there is no crown where there are no caves.
So if God is going to do this thing for me,
there are going to be caves along the way. Oh
how I want to preach to everybody who has a
great dream. Oh how I want to preach to everybody
who wants to have a loving family or a righteous
(45:20):
life in Christ, that there will be caves along the way.
You will be confused along the way. Wait, I want
this and I'm reaching for that, and I feel this
and I'm doing that and I did that for them,
and they did that to me. Don't let the cave
confuse you. You're still anointed. Don't let their lack of
(45:42):
appreciation confuse you.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
You're still anointed. Don't let the fact.
Speaker 1 (45:47):
That they don't want to run with you anymore confuse you.
You're so anointed they don't want to go that direction anymore.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
That's fine.
Speaker 1 (45:54):
God to give you somebody else to run with, and
they might be three D, but you're just gonna have
to watch.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
This is the heart of the message. Look at me.
Speaker 1 (46:08):
This message is dedicated to my brother in law, who
just turned forty seven yesterday. I told him I'm gonna
dedicate this message to him. Look at me, Jody, Do
it confused? Do it confused? David was used by God,
but in this moment of his life, he was very
confused about what God is doing. Can both be true? Absolutely?
(46:29):
I am very confused about what God is doing a
lot of the time that He is using me. Do
you remember when Jesus knelt down and washed the disciple's feet.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
He told them something very important.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
He said, you do not understand what I do now,
but later you will. Sometimes you have to take a
lap and understand later. Sometimes you have to take a
lap and understand later.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
Sometimes you have to take six.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Laps around the walls of Jericho and trust that something's
gonna happen when I blow this trumpet. Something's gonna happen
when I blow this trumpet. I come against the discouragement
in your spirit.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
That says, what's the point.
Speaker 1 (47:17):
I come against the catalog in your mind that tells
you it was all in vain. I come against the
tears that you've cried because of who wasn't.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
By your side.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Open your eyes. David is a king in a cave,
and so are you. So are you. He is running
from a king, and he's going to be a king.
(47:52):
But kings can be announced and anointed anywhere. That can
only be developed in caves. The thing in me that
needed to preach today needed to show up at age
eighteen and there were no kids.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
It needed to be set.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
Free from the need to do it because of approval.
I could not have delivered this word.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
To you today without my caves.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
And I am saying to you, my brother, my brother
in Christ, my sister in Christ, I don't know what
you're running from. I don't know if it's generational I
don't know if it's recent, I don't know if it's
been heightened. I don't know if it's other people. I
don't know if it's deep down inside of you. But
God said to tell you, don't waste this cave. Don't
(48:45):
waste this cave. Tell your neighbor, don't waste your cave.
Caves come with the territory. Everybody's running from something, everybody's
running after something. Paul said, I'm just not running a
less anymore, running around like a Christian with your head
cut off, not even thinking about it anymore, not even
(49:09):
strategizing it anymore. Look what David did in verse three.
The pressure was so overwhelming. He is already a fugitive.
He is already confused. He looks around and here's his
old dad and his old mom talking about, Hey, we
heard you were in the cave. We came to keep
you some company. Do you mean, Holly. This is the
same Jesse that didn't even bring David in from the
(49:32):
field when they were coming to get the king. But
now he needs him. And I'm gonna tell you something
very important about people. People see you, how they need you. Hmm.
(49:52):
That's why some people hate you and don't even know you.
They need you to be an enemy, because if they
make you an enemy, they don't have to take responsibility
and be honest with you. That's why some people think
too highly of you, because they need you to be
(50:13):
a savior, and the truth is you're neither. So in
the moment that the three D Army, the dysfunctional Army,
the three D Army of dysfunctional derelicts, arrives at David's
door with his mom and dad. He goes to Moab.
(50:36):
You remember anything about Moab? Remember a lady named Ruth,
David's great grandmother. He had moabike blood, but Moab wasn't
his home. But he had to leave his home for
a little while, and he took his parents to Moab,
and he went to the king of Moab, who wasn't
exactly his friend, and he said, in verse three for
Samuel twenty two, this most anointed verse I've read in
(50:56):
a long time in this church. He said, would you
let my father and mother come stay with you until
I learn what God will do for me. My senses
were heightened and my attention was riveted by the word
until until, Because when the oil hit my head, and
when it flowed in it and it ran all the
(51:17):
way down. It ran for a reason, but I'm not
sure what it is yet. I know God speaking to
me about some things. I know there are some things
that he's pruning off my life right now, but I
don't know yet. And I'm not even doubting God's capacity
(51:37):
at this moment. I'm just lacking clarity. Listen to that again.
You're not doubting his capacity. You're lacking clarity. And David said,
this is too much for me right now, he prayed God.
I had no one to support me, and I look
at me, Look at me. You can be surrounded and
still not supported. You can have fifty thousand friends on
(52:03):
your phone and no one to be intimate with. You
can live in the house with them, breathe the air
with them, share the food with them, and still not
feel like you're one of them. And now David is
charged with the task of receiving his own family.
Speaker 2 (52:24):
He is running from a king, and he is becoming
a king.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
And he is about to occupy an office that he
did not even run for. There was no process of
David putting himself forth as a candidate for king. I'm
here to preach to somebody today. You didn't ask for
this battle. You did not even ask for this. You
didn't even know what it was. You did not point
(52:50):
to that item on the menu. You did not say
I want to deal with this. You did not ask
to be raised that way, exposed to that thing, dealing
with that thing. You did not plant it. But now
you are having to deal with the weeds of it. Well,
what then, what then? What is the answer for those
of us who are living in the until Because the
(53:15):
truth of the matter is, David was anointed long before
the others knew it. I want to say about you
that what will be true of you in the future
is true of you right now.
Speaker 2 (53:29):
You are a king even in this cave.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
You are valuable, even though no one else sees it.
Right now. There are times when I'm preaching you just
have to believe me where the Holy Spirit is giving
me what to say. And it is for somebody, and
I do not know who that it is. But God
is calling you watch this, saying this cave that you
(53:56):
have been in is closed for business because I have
more for your future and I need you to move forward.
Even though you're confused. You imagine a faith of that
might to come out of a cave and to go
(54:16):
to Moab and say, can you take care of my parents?
I don't know what God's gonna do. I don't know
how this report is going to turn out. I don't
know if my kid's gonna come back. I thought they
were the last time, but that was just a false alarm,
and they're still not doing well.
Speaker 2 (54:30):
I don't know, Bud. Will you keep what's important to
me even in my confusion?
Speaker 1 (54:41):
And I just pictured somebody in here today that you've
been running with weights that God does not intend for
you to carry forward into your future. There are some
things that you need to drop for what God has
called you to do. Expectation of where you should have
(55:02):
been by now, the guilt that Christ paid for and
nailed to his cross. Would you put that behind you
so that you can run the race that is marked
out for you. And while you're at it, stop looking
around at other people's race. God has called you to
(55:22):
run at your pace for this season.
Speaker 2 (55:31):
And I found out something about God, and I found out.
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Something about the enemy, And it's this. When God puts
something significant in me, the enemy sends something significant after me.
You should have known the moment that the oil hit
your head that this was not going to be easy.
Speaker 2 (55:58):
You should have known the moment that you.
Speaker 1 (56:00):
Survived the car accident that there's a reason the devil
tried to end my life right there. There is something
ahead of me that is so great it makes the
devil afraid. And that is the reason I run, because
I figure if the enemy sent something against me in
(56:23):
this season to try to get me to abandon it,
there must be something ahead of me.
Speaker 2 (56:34):
That's absolutely amazing.
Speaker 1 (56:38):
That it's amazing what's ahead of you, broke, It's amazing
what's ahead of you. Man, your kids are gonna talk
about that. He did it with the weight of the
world on his shoulders. There's something amazing in you. Mom
(57:04):
carried all that and she still carried us. So the
Lord said, make me your stronghold. Make me your stronghold.
You'll need that cave when you're called your cover. And
(57:26):
the prophet told David, I know you're running, and I
know there's a reason, but look at verse five. Do
not stay in the stronghold. What is a stronghold church?
It is a place of temporary protection. It is meant
to be visited, but not lived. In some of the
(57:48):
ways that you developed to deal with your life. They
were temporary and they served a purpose. But they're over now.
Speaker 2 (57:57):
They're over now. And the prophet named.
Speaker 1 (58:01):
God told David something. He said, go to Judah. Why
Judah put the verse up? Please verse five? Go to
Judah because that was the place David was from, and
that was the place where he would be anointed, and
that was the place where he would be covered, and
(58:21):
that was the place he would be protected. So God says,
I will cover you in every place that I call
you to. Would you come out of the stronghold? Would
you come out of the stronghold just for a moment today.
I know the cave felt safe for a season, but
the cave is closed now. I know you kind of
(58:45):
had to be like that for a season to get
through it. And I know you were trying to prove something,
having sex with every different woman to try to prove
something that you never received in your childhood. But would
you come out of that now? It's time to grow up.
God's got something with your name on it to make
a difference in the earth, and it's not just about
you anymore. Come to Judah with me. Judah is the
(59:06):
tribe that David is from, and Judah is the name
that means praise. I found it significant that when David
left the cave, God called him to a place that
meant literally praise. I think it is a sign that
when we praise God in the place where we are,
I said, when we praise God in the place where
we are, yeah, that God begins to move, that the
(59:31):
oil begins to flow. And I don't run for nothing.
Everybody runs, but I'm running for something. I'm running with someone.
And the Lord told me that if I can't run anymore,
he'll lift me up on wings like eagles. So I
appreciate the cave, but I'm already covered. I appreciate the cave,
(01:00:00):
but I'm already covered. Father, in the name of Jesus,
I thank you for the blood that covers me today.
I thank you for the times in my life that
I've known it to be true that while I was
praying in a cave, you were sending people Hallelujah. You
were making plans, Thank you, Jesus, And you were fulfilling purpose,
(01:00:26):
sending people, making plans, fulfilling purpose. I declare your word
over this church. Jeremiah twenty nine to eleven says for
I know the plans I have for you that just
because we are not aware of them does not mean
they are not active. God. I come against everything that
(01:00:47):
shoved those kings in those caves. I come against everything
that has told this child of God, this individual, that
they will never be what you've called them. And right now,
in the name of Jesus, I thank you for your covering,
protecting presence over our families. Said, I allow, devil, in
(01:01:10):
the name of Jesus, you can't have my kids. They're covered.
Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
Now start clapping like you know your kids are covered.
Speaker 1 (01:01:19):
Oh, thank you Jesus. I am cover.
Speaker 2 (01:01:31):
Try this devil.
Speaker 3 (01:01:34):
You can't have my mind it's covered. Can't have my
heart it's covered. Can't have my vision is covered. And
I declare that.
Speaker 1 (01:01:47):
In Christ, I am a new creation. I am a
child of God, and I'm running this race in the
strength of Jesus. Come on, give God a great prayer.
Hit back to Judah. Hit back to Judah. There's a strong, annoying.
(01:02:16):
Bow your head, close your eyes. Somebody needs to come
to Jesus right now. You need to run to Jesus
right now. He's already running to you. The Bible says
in the story of the Prodigal Son, the father ran
toward his son. God is running towards you, running with forgiveness,
running for your redemption, running to receive you with arms
open wide. All you gotta do is repent. All you
(01:02:37):
got to do is say God, I'm here. I'm sorry
that I ran from you. I was running from you
when I should have been running to you. There's somebody
here today. You need to receive Jesus. This is your chance.
I want to pray a prayer with you. If you
will pray this prayer from your heart. The Bible says
that God will hear you from heaven. He will forgive
your sin. He will give you his grace, and he
(01:02:59):
will make you new. You will be born again, You
will be saved. This is your moment. Repeat after me,
Heavenly Father. I am a sinner in need of a savior.
And I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God and the savior of the world. And today I
(01:03:21):
make Jesus the lord of my life. I believe he
died that I would be forgiven and rose again to
give me life. I receive this new life. This is
my new beginning on the counter of three shoots your
hand up if you prayed that prayer.
Speaker 2 (01:03:41):
I want to celebrate you. What two? Three? Shoot it up,
Shoot it up, shoot it up.
Speaker 1 (01:03:46):
I see it. God bless you.
Speaker 2 (01:03:51):
Incredible. Come on, we can do better than that. I said,
we can do better than that.
Speaker 1 (01:04:01):
Yeah, man, high five. At least three people say I'm
running for a reason. Campus pastors, you can have it, Valentine,
look at me this week. You got something to run for,
and you got someone to run with. You are not
(01:04:21):
alone in this thing, you hear me. I know it
feels lonely to be chosen. Sometimes you're not alone, You're chosen.
The two feel the same. Sometime you're not alone, you're chosen.
Tell somebody you're chosen. That's why you're running. That's why
(01:04:42):
the devil's chasing you. You're chosen. But guess what, what
I'm running toward is greater than what I'm running from.
So I'll see you on the next slap and now,
unto him, lift your hands. Who is able to do
immeasurably more than you ask or imagine.
Speaker 2 (01:05:02):
To him, be glory through Christ Jesus in the church.
Now and forever. I find somebody say, run your race.
Speaker 1 (01:05:13):
Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
you that this ministry is possible. You can click the
link in the description to give now, or visit Elevationchurch
dot org slash podcast for more information and if you
enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe. You can share it
with your friends. You can click the share button, take
(01:05:35):
a screenshot and share it on your social stories and
tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again for listening. God
bless you
Host
Steven Furtick
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