Today with Jeff Vines

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's time for help. And when I read the story
of Job again, it dawned on me. The beauty of
it is God does not care why are you got
in this situation. He's not concerned with you did this
to yourself? That God is not like us. When you
come to him, he doesn't spend an hour giving you
a speech about, well, this happened because you did this

(00:21):
and you should have done that. You got yourself into
this mess, You get yourself out. That's not the God
of the Bible. That's the way we treat each other. Today, Today, Today,
Today with Jeff Findes, pasta apologist and Bible teacher.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Welcome back to Today with Jeff Finds. My name is Aaron,
and this week we start a series called Help. Today's
message encourages us to just keep moving when obstacles in
your life seem insurmountable. We're part way through this message
and Pastor Jeff has been preaching from Job chapter thirty eight.
So let's pick up with the rest of this message.

(01:02):
Here's past your Jack.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Now focus just right here. The first response God gives
to Joe began. It's not a speech about what you
shouldn't have done that, or you wouldn't be in this position.
God is not like that. Instead, he says this to job, Job,
here's your assumption. Your assumption is that if you could
have a complete and exhaustive understanding of your pain, if

(01:36):
you could somehow get a revelation from God and know
exactly why you're having to go through this, how long
it's going to last, and will it will be over.
If you were to have a here's your assumption, Job,
a complete and exhaustive understanding of every aspect of your pain,
then you'd be able to embrace it and accept it.
Am I hearing you right? Job, to which thirty seven
chapters would say, yes, God, you're hearing me right, to

(01:57):
which God says, this, really, Job. There are a thousand
things that you readily accept every day of your life
that you don't have a complete and exhaustive and understanding about.
You'll never be able to understand the intricate details everything
that surrounds it. But I am God. Let me be God.
But here's what I'll promise you. In the same way

(02:18):
that I was able to take the chaos in the
early stages of the creation of this universe and bring beauty,
pattern and design into it, I am the God who
will bring beauty, pattern and design into the chaos and
the brokenness of your life. I walked out here last
night and there was a lady with her husband seated

(02:40):
about four rows back here, and I thought, you know,
I've been so busy. I need to get back in
touch with people. And I walked out and just start
talk up a conversation. The first thing I asked her
was how's I listen? How's life going. She couldn't even
answer me. She just immediately started to cry, which is
what a lot of you would do if I ask
you that. And she told me how she had lost
her baby girl to college. She just took her baby

(03:04):
girl to Texas and came back. And man, when she
started telling me that, I almost started crying because I
remember when I loaded up my car and my mom's
and we said goodbye, and I was just going two
hours away and she was a wreck, and I was
a rake. Why you cry, mom? It's not you know,
but that's real to her. It's real to her, isn't it.
And I reminded her of how God can bring beauty

(03:29):
and design out of that chaos, because her young daughter
is gonna go and she's gonna do it. She's gonna
gain a new revelation of God. You know, that's what
happens when your students go away, because you're not around
all the time anymore. They've got to go to the
one who is omnipresent. They will be forced to make
a decision whether they're gonna live with God or apart
from Him right then and there. That's what college does.

(03:50):
Mom and Dad's not looking around anymore. Is there a
God who's watching how I behave? Is he with me
on these tests and midterm exams? Is he real? You
lost your job? Let me tell you why. I have
no idea. I don't know. Pain is intricate, it's difficult,
it's complex. But what I do say is that if

(04:12):
you will run to God, God promises that he will
bring beauty and design out of the chaos in your life.
It might be to give you a better job. It
might mean to put you in a position that you
should have been in a long time ago. Or it
might be to get your attention that you're pursuing temporal
things and it's gonna lead to a sense of emptiness.
I don't know what it is. You've lost your house,
I don't know why. I don't know, but I know

(04:36):
that God is with you, that he will bring beauty
and design and pattern out of the chaos of your life.
Now listen, it gets more intense. Look at what happens
in Joe forty two. After Job has had his encounter
with God, he says this in verse five, My ears
had heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you.

(04:59):
Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.
Look at that again, I despise myself and repent in
dust and ashes. Why now, have you ever been to
a party or been in a meeting that you said
something you wish you had not said. As soon as
you said it, you wish you could just roll it
back in. That's what Job was saying. I can't believe
I said all these things to God for thirty seven chapters.

(05:22):
Now his eyes are wide open, and do you know
what he's recognizing Something that's going to be hard for
us to handle. Now, I promise you that God is
the creator and designer of all things, and that he
owes us nothing. You've been watching too much television. You

(05:43):
think that God owes you a good and easy life.
It dawns on Job that the very breath you breathe
is a gift from God, that life is a gift
from God. You didn't do something great and eternity pass
for God to say, you know, you've been really good
up here. I'm gona give you a good life. He

(06:03):
gave it as a gift. And if you experience good
in this world, that's just icing on the cake. I
can tell by looking at you right now, this sense
of entitlement in America has just it's destroying the depth
of our faith. Who we really are. This world is theocentric.
It's about God. It's not about you or me. And

(06:26):
God has the divine right to mold and shade and
bring pattern and beauty and designed out of the chaos
he allows in your life for his purposes. Job all
of a sudden starts to get that. And then in
the end he says, I know that my redeemer lives
and in the end he will stand upon the earth.
Why does he say that, because the best news came last.

(06:49):
Whatever God calls you to endure, listen, now, whatever God
calls you to endure, he not only promises to bring
beauty and design out of that chaos. He promises that
He's gonna be with you and upon you every step
of the way. But it's better than that. Now, don't
shut me out. You're gonna get a God revelation. You're

(07:12):
gonna see God. The more intense your pain, the bigger
the revelation God gives. Your eyes are gonna be open
in a way that no one who's ever who's never
walked your path, will ever see. I go back to
my friend in Bulaeo in Zimbabwe. Her name is Gloria,
you know, a great skeptic, sharp mind, and I share

(07:34):
my faith with her a week after week, finally she
becomes a Christian. Within weeks of her becoming a christ follower,
She's told she asked cancer in about six months to
live now. In the beginning, she said, Jeff, I know
God's gonna heal me. He is the God who is able,
and he is able, and he has healed. She said,
God's gonna heal me. She continued to get more and

(07:57):
more sick by the bay. The fifth month, the family
called me from Bulawayo and said, Jeff, I think we're
near the end. Would you please come down and be
with Gloria. Would you just come down. None of her family,
none of them were Christians, but they wanted somebody to
come and be with her and then to do the funeral.
When she died, I got on a plane, went down
there and I sat by her bedside. It is It
is the most powerful experience of my life, because she

(08:20):
moved in that last month from God is gonna heal
me to this. Stop praying that God heal me. I
want to go to heaven. What And she kept saying, Jeff,
You'll never understand because you've not walked this path. God
is revealing things to me that I would have never
seen that I'm seeing right now. And I'm telling you, rejoice,

(08:42):
be happy. I'm going to meet God. And as a
twenty two years I said, I don't want to travel
that road. I don't want to go that road. She goes.
She told me, it's okay. Remember I'm the pastor here.
It's okay that you don't. But I'm telling you, I'm
seeing things I've never seen before. And that's what I've
learned as I sat my hospital beds of age patients

(09:04):
who were dying. That God, when you're a believer and
you've crossed over, seems to give you a revelation of
himself as you get closer and closer to the end,
so that he can walk you across the waar. Ultimately,
down deep inside you really want to go. But that's true.
No matter what it is, some of you you won't die.
But in the midst of your job, in the midst
of your loss of a relationship, God gives a revelation

(09:26):
of himself. I saw this when my own mother died.
You say, I wonder if there's ever a time pastor
Jeff's going to stop talking about his mommy. The answer
to that is no, I miss her. I love my mom.
Getting to talk about it to you is a healing
thing for me. So will you continue to let me
just throw it in from time to time. I remember

(09:47):
having my struggle with God. Remember what I said with C. S. Lewis.
He said, you ought to bring to God what is
in you, not what ought to be in you. Let
me tell you that week when my mom was dying,
I brought to God what was in me? God? What
are you doing? Man? It's a good woman here. Once
you go over and kill Mamgaby over in Zimbabwe, he's
an evil dictator. If you have to have a life
take his My mom's a good woman. She's got a

(10:07):
lot of work to do here, and she was. And
then it was amazing how many times through that week
God continued to bring my attention back to a conversation
I had with my mom in the backyard when we
were playing baseball. I don't know, I was about twenty
two to twenty three somewhere, and my mom said, I'm
worried about you. Oh what are you worried about me? Mom?
She goes, I'm worried about you because you don't love people.

(10:29):
What do you mean? You don't love them enough. All
you want to do is get sermons. But you don't
love people. Until you learn to love people and love
them deeply, you'll never speak anything into their lives, you know.
And I realized when my mom died. I never thought
it was possible to hurt that much and still be alive.

(10:50):
I changed. I realized that in every seat right now,
there's pain. And I do love you. I wish I
could be involved in every every single one of your lives.
That's why we have multiple pastors here. But I want
to tell you, God kept showing me out of this chaos.
You don't understand. I am bringing beauty and design and Jeff,

(11:11):
I'm bringing it into your life. That's what I want
to say to you. That God always comes near. James
Chapter four, verse eight says come near to God, and
He will come near to you. And a reoccurring theme
in the Bible. When Habakuk struggled with the pain he
was called upon by God to endure. He had a
god revelation, and you know what he said. He said,

(11:33):
the Sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes my feet
like the feet of a deer. He enables me to
go on the heights. What does he mean when you
experience pain, if you run to God, he will He
will make you able to do things you never thought
you could ever do. In Isaiah forty, even you shall
fame and be weary, and young men shall fall exalted.

(11:54):
But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.
They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall
run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint.
Which leads me to believe this that the answer to
our pain is more relational than propositional, That the answer
to your pain is gonna be found in relation, not
some proposition. Not some apologetic argument. Again, I think God

(12:17):
would say, you want the truth, but you can't handle
the truth. I'm gonna give it to you in relationship,
and I'm gonna give you the power, and I'm gonna
give you a god revelation, and you're gonna be able
to go places you've never been, see things you've never seen,
and endure things you never thought possible. See. The problem
is there's a part of us in the middle of
all this that we think God's not hearing. We think

(12:38):
he's not listening to the cause of our heart. Because
of bad theology. We think if we are suffering, that
we've abandoned God and God's abandoned us. But the beauty
of the Bible, the Bible tells us that God is omnipresent.
He is everywhere, which is a good thing. I mean,
if I mean God over at Angel Stadium, I don't
want to know he's at Dodger Stadium. Why he would
be at Dodger Stadium. I have no idea yea, but

(13:00):
I need to know he can be two places at
one time. Right, that God is omnipresent. I just lost
half my audience. Jeremiah twenty three Jeremiah twenty three says,
am I only a god nearby, declares the Lord, and
not a god far away. Can anyone hide in secret
places so that I cannot see him? Declares the Lord?

(13:20):
Do not I feel heaven and Earth? Now read that
in the context of what I said last week, that
if you want God to reveal himself and be visible,
he would be so big he would feel the universe,
he would feel everything. He's not going to diminish himself,
so as diminished who he is, do I not feel
Heaven and earth? Declares the Lord. God is omnipresent, but
he's also omnicient, which means he knows everything. So I'm

(13:43):
one forty seven five. Great is our Lord and mighty
in power. His understanding has no limit. Now look up
and listen. Whatever it is you're going through right now,
God knows every last detail of it. He knows how
long it's going to last. He knows whether or not
he's going to bring you complete and full healing. He

(14:06):
knows how you're going to respond. He knows everything that
needs to be done to remove it. There is no
side of this that he doesn't fully and comprehensively and
exhaustively understand, and he can be with you at every
moment of every day to lead and to guide and

(14:28):
open your eyes to a god revelation where you start
to see Him in a way you've never seen him before.
The tendency, however, is this when we're experiencing something because
we feel like God has abandoned us, we run from
him rather than to him. If you run away from him,
you lose so much. If you run to him, he says,
if you come to me, I will renew your strength.

(14:49):
You will mount up with wings like eagles. You will
run and not be weary, you will walk and not
grow faint. Which tells me, is this there is a
spiritual adrenaline associated with the prevailing presence of God. Spiritual
adrenaline associated with the prevailing presence of God. With somebody
in the audience, please explain something to me how it
is that I go through this entire journey when my

(15:09):
mom died, of calling God on the carpet, taking him
behind the woodshed and speaking a peace of my mind.
And then right as we're lowering the casket into the grave,
I began to smile. Yeah, you know why, because right
when I needed God the most, because I had run
to God and I was honest with God. He gave

(15:29):
me a God revelation, and here's what he said. Jeff,
I got news for you. Your mother doesn't want to come back.
As a matter of fact, you think you're so smart, Jeff.
If your mom is so good, then would not be
a holy, unjust God to give her her reward now
and spare all the pain on the earth. If she's
so good, don't I have the right to say I
want her now, I need her up here. You think

(15:52):
you're so clever and so smart. It's tom that you
let me be God and realize your limitations. I would
hate to be in a room with God where he
started to explain everything, because I think we'd be like Joe,
I'd repent in dust and ashes. Well it was me, Isaiah,
says I am undone. Now here's the last one of

(16:14):
this message. As we take it home, let's review. I
want you to walk away encouraged. Pain is complex. God
is God, we are not. He promises to bring beauty,
pattern and design out of the chaos of your life.
He promises a prevailing presence where you will receive a
God revelation and see things that you've never seen before.

(16:36):
And the more intense the pain, the more powerful and
compelling his presence. But there's an end part to this,
and I love this. But in order to do this
and finish like this, we got to go over to
Hebrews chapter eleven. Turn over to verse twenty nine of
Hebrews chapter eleven. I want you to see this. Please
don't leave because a lot of you are saying, Okay, Jeff,
I hear your theory. I hear what you're saying. But

(16:57):
what am I supposed to do? Now? Where do I
go from here? What do I My life is still
arect Just because you gave me this powerful message doesn't
mean my life is not in disarray? What do I
do from here? Here's the answer. Now, remember, when you
go over to Hebrews chapter eleven, you are encountering what
has been termed as the Hall of Fame, the Hall
of faith. The whole chapter talks about people like Abraham,

(17:19):
who Dane shared with us was a friend of God,
Jacob who wrestled with God, Moses who oversaw the people
of God. And then all of a sudden you come
down to this tiny little verse verse twenty nine. In
this Hall of fame of faith. And here's what you read.
By faith. The people passed through the Red Sea as
on dry land, but when the Egyptians tried to do so,

(17:40):
they were drowned. Now what I want to know is
who are the people? What kind of people get to
experience a red sea miracle? These must have been some
good people, some powerful people, faithful people to be able
to have that disease cured just like that called Pharaoh's army.

(18:03):
And then I go over to Exodus, chapter fourteen, verse ten,
I get to read about the these those people. And
in verse ten, as Pharaoh approached the Israelites looked up
and there were the Egyptians marching after them. They were
terrified and cried out to the Lord. Okay, so they're
a little afraid, that's all right. They said to Moses,
wasn't because there were no graves in Egypt that you
brought us to the desert to die? Whoops, little sarcasm,

(18:28):
I think, what have you done to us by bringing
us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt,
leave us alone, let us serve the Egyptians. No, they
didn't say that. They said, get us out of here
and get us out of here. Now, God, if you're real,
you will rescue us from the hands of the Egyptians.
It would have been better for us to serve the
Egyptians than to die in the desert. Wow, pessimism, ingratitude.

(18:50):
And yet verse thirteen, Moses answered that people, do not
be afraid. Stand firm, and you will see the deliverance
of the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you
see today will you will never see again. The Lord
will fight for you. You need only to be still. And
then the Lord said to Moses, why are you crying
out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on? Oh?

(19:11):
I love that every time I read it. You gotta
think about this, Moses, time to move on. Excuse me.
Mountain on the left, mountain on the right, Pharaoh's army
in the back, and red seat. Big body of water
hughes right in front of us, and God says, move on,
move on. And only as they began to move did

(19:36):
God opened up the sea. Same thing happened to the
walls of Jericho. Why do we gotta march around this
wall seven times before it falls? Why don't you just
make it fall? Think of the ridicule, Hey, what you
guys doing down there. You're gonna march us to death,
gonna walk around, wear us out, walk, keep walking six days,
seven days, and finally the walls tumble. Here's how God works.

(19:57):
Number One, Our victory is not up to our own greatness,
but upon God's grace, love and mercy for people. It
has nothing to do with how good you are, whether
you're going to receive a miracle or not. If it
was depending on how good you are, forget it. We
all as will go home because it's never gonna happen.
But there is a catch. You got to take the step.

(20:20):
You've got to keep moving forward. And here's where one
of the most powerful principles kicks in in your life.
It's called power along the way. See, you want God
to solve it and tell you everything up front. God
says none. You keep walking, you keep moving forward. I
will give you power to endure. I'll give you wisdom

(20:41):
of why this is happening. I will give you clarity.
I will give you a god revelation. If you go
run and hide, you're just going to be defeated and
be more lonely and more depressed. But if you'll keep
moving forward, keep praying, keep worshiping, keep saying. Even if
he does not, keep loving, keep going to small group.
God may speak through one of them to you. Keep

(21:04):
singing my praises, keep doing what you know to be right.
And along the way, I will at least my divine energy.
I'll give you power. You'll have a god revelation, you'll
get wisdom, and I will bring beauty and pattern and
design out of the chaos in your life. The victory

(21:26):
comes as God gives us power and wisdom along the way. Listen, Now,
you lost your job, I don't know why. Run to God.
Run to God. You lost your house, I don't know
why run to God. And by the way, be patient?
Is it true? That? Is it not true? God's been
patient with you. Can't you be a little patient with

(21:46):
him and allow him to bring beauty and pattern and
design out of the chaos of your life. It's like
the economists who went to God and said, God, is
it true? Is it true that one day's like a
thousand years? Yes? Well, then so must be true that
one minute is like a thousand years. Yes that's true. Well,
if that's true, can I take that to the economy
of money, that one penny is like a million dollars

(22:09):
to you. And God said, yeah, that would be true.
He said, good, can I have a million dollars? And
God said yeah, wait one minute, I just think about that.
You'll get it. It'll turn. The issue is God has
been so patient with you. Man, be patient and let
him form and shape the beauty pattern and design out

(22:31):
of the chaos. And you know what, Walls will fall,
sees will open, whether they happen by a great miracle.
And don't give up of the miracle. Don't give up
on God working something miraculous because our God is able. Man,
don't give up, never ever give up. And along the way,
other miracles will happen the miracle. Have you seen things

(22:52):
you've never seen before? Of experiencing God's presence the way
you've never experienced it before. I think of this mother
over here who's just torn because of her separation of
her daughter. But wait a minute, this might be the
best thing, mom, that ever happened to you. You're gonna
have to depend on God now, because you're gonna have
to depend on Him to transcend the distance between you
and your daughter to look after. You're gonna have to faith,

(23:13):
you're gonna have to have trust in something you can't
control that might be real good for you. I don't know.
I just know God is able and he will bring Now.
By this time, you've memorized it beauty, pattern and design
out of the chaos of your life. Father, we are
grateful for your promises, your ability to heal, the power

(23:38):
that you bring into this church, into our lives. We
pray for forgiveness where we've forgotten that we've prayed for
forgiveness of where we've not allowed you to be God
and accepted that we are finite. There is a limit
to what we can comprehend, what we can understand, but
no limit to what we can endure if you give
us your prevailing presence. Father, we asked for that for

(24:00):
those who are hurting, you'd give them that God revelation
and they would see things like they've never seen them before,
and that you'd give them power and wisdom as they
continue to move along the way.

Speaker 2 (24:16):
You've been listening to Today with Jeff Finds. Next time
we'll bring you a new message from Pastor Jeff. You
can listen to more messages like this. Just search for
Today with Jeff Finds wherever you Listen to podcasts you
met

Speaker 1 (24:35):
With Today, Today, Today, Today with Jeff Fines,