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Discerning His Voice By Knowing His Word
You're not alone if you've ever wondered whether God can actually speak to you. Or if you've been anxious because it seems like you can't hear Him.
Pastor Jonathan speaks to the heart of that struggle and reminds us that sometimes the problem isn't that God's not speaking. Or even that we're not listening. But sometimes His voice is drowned out by other voices, pressures, and even well-meaning clichés. But even in that, God can speak to us.
As he explains the temptation of Jesus, you'll understand why knowing, loving, and following what God has said is the best way to hear His voice amid the constant noise.
Scriptures Referenced
Deuteronomy 6 & 8; Psalm 91:11-13; Matthew 4:1-11; 27:40; Luke 4:13; 12:38; John 14:26; 1 Corinthians 7:9, 10:12-14; 2 Corinthians 1:8-9; 2 Timothy 3:16; Hebrews 4:12; James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 5:8; Revelation 22:17
Key Insights
- The Holy Spirit will not lead us in opposition to the words God has breathed out for us.
- Real discernment starts by prioritizing Scripture over feelings or spiritual trends.
- Even sincere believers can miss God’s voice by seeking experiences instead of engaging His Word.
- The enemy often tempts with half-truths, especially when we’re tired, distracted, or suffering.
- Jesus modeled resisting lies by anchoring decisions in what God already said.
- Catchphrase: Christianity Culture can’t give us the long-term sustenance that comes from the truth of God’s Word.
Key Sections
00:00:00 - Welcome and Announcements
Pastor Jonathan shares opportunities to serve in children’s and tech ministry, upcoming baby dedications, baptism signups, and then transitions the community with a prayer rooted in the value of God's word.
00:02:16 - Our Deep Need
It's easy to become discouraged when it seems like God is silent. Pastor Jonathan speaks to the underlying need and the real challenge at hand.
00:04:31 - Roots of Doubt
Wanting signs and feelings might make us feel disappointed in our faith, similar to the Pharisees during Jesus’s time. Simple spiritual phrases can cover up our need for real connection with God’s Word.
00:07:33 - Grounded in Scripture
Even the most persistent believers get distracted or overwhelmed by life. Making time for prayer and Bible reading is the key way we tune into God's voice and clarify what’s truly from Him in a world full of conflicting opinions and temptations.
00:10:29 - Battling Temptation with Truth
Pastor Jonathan explains how the enemy distorts our desires and the Bible. He shows this through Jesus’s temptation in Matthew 4. It is important to test what we hear, feel, and even what others say spiritually against the complete message of God's Word, not against culture or emotions.
00:18:33 - Trusting Through Trials
Christian culture catchphrases and partial truths about God's wishes can confuse us, especially when we face pain. True peace and patience come from studying the Bible with others and seeing challenges as meaningful.
00:28:08 - Satisfied in God
Jesus’s life and sacrifice teach us that true joy and success come from putting God first. It's not about seeking rewards without sacrifices or taking easy routes. We are called to open our hearts, especially when we feel dry, trapped, or spiritually confused.
https://springhouse.captivate.fm/episode/discerning-his-voice-by-knowing-his-word
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Gathering Times
- Sundays, 9:00 AM
- Sundays, 11:00 AM
- Wednesdays, 6:00 PM
Contact Info
Springhouse Church
14119 Old Nashville Highway
Smyrna TN 37167
CCLI License 2070006
Transcript
Good morning, church. Hello again.
Speaker:Hey, I need somebody to cart this table out for me when I'm teaching. Can
Speaker:I get any volunteer for that? Me.
Speaker:There you go. Thank you. So service
Speaker:opportunities. Okay. Anybody use our
Speaker:children's ministry here? Don't they do an amazing job?
Speaker:Listen, they need help, okay? I know my
Speaker:kids, I send them down there, they have to go through it down there. So
Speaker:if you have a heart to serve the children, we— they would love to have
Speaker:you. Also, guys, we need like 8 people
Speaker:to help us join our tech team and handle video
Speaker:and livestream and stuff like that. If we get 8 people, you would only have
Speaker:to serve one time per month in the second service. So if
Speaker:that interests you, please come see me after service. And I do want to make
Speaker:an announcement. Um, next Sunday is our baby dedication Sunday.
Speaker:Uh, tomorrow is the last day to sign up for that. And on the
Speaker:27th is our single service baptismal service.
Speaker:And next week is the last time, or the end of this week is the
Speaker:last time to sign up for that. So if any of those things
Speaker:If that would pique your interest, please come up and see us or sign up
Speaker:on the app. Let's pray.
Speaker:Thank you for the key change, Michael. That was cool. God, I thank you
Speaker:for your
Speaker:word that you have spoken. Lord, your word is
Speaker:beneficial to us for teaching and
Speaker:reproving and correcting and training In righteousness.
Speaker:It is here to complete us and equip us for good
Speaker:works, Father, in our lives of faith and love
Speaker:and righteousness and good works, God, are all to bring you glory,
Speaker:Lord. So Holy Spirit, we just pray
Speaker:that you would give us a love and a
Speaker:trust for every word
Speaker:That you have spoken. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Speaker:So when Pastor Barbie told the teaching team that we're going to be
Speaker:going into a series called Discerning His Voice, one of the
Speaker:teachers raised their hand and said, is there any particular topic or
Speaker:nuance about his voice that you want each of us to cover? And she simply
Speaker:said, I want you to discern his voice
Speaker:when coming up with that. So it's like some real Mr. Miyagi
Speaker:stuff she did there, you know. And as I prayed and considered what I
Speaker:might teach regarding his voice, a memory came to me from over a
Speaker:decade ago when I was serving as a youth leader here at
Speaker:Springhouse. And we had a night where we asked all the youth to get up
Speaker:and share one testimony, something that the Lord was doing in their lives, as
Speaker:well as one prayer, something they were really believing in faith
Speaker:for. And I remember several kids getting up one after another, and
Speaker:all of them basically Many of them, not all of them, but many of them
Speaker:basically had the same exact prayer to
Speaker:audibly and clearly hear the voice of God.
Speaker:One of them, this one broke my heart, was asking
Speaker:why God wasn't speaking to them anymore.
Speaker:These were not careless prayers. These were not throwaway prayers. They weren't prayers
Speaker:meant to sound good. There was sincerity in them. There
Speaker:was desperation in them. I knew these kids. I knew the challenges they
Speaker:were facing at home, the challenges they were facing at school every
Speaker:day. I knew that the, the thoughts and the feelings they were trying to
Speaker:process through a kingdom worldview, the temptations that were coming
Speaker:at them from the culture every day. And when they were asking God to
Speaker:speak to them, I sensed that they were asking in a
Speaker:way that their faith depended on it. They were saying,
Speaker:God, if you would, if I could just hear your voice,
Speaker:I would be, I would know, and I would be settled in my spirit in
Speaker:this wilderness that I'm going through, that I can get through. And that
Speaker:night I went home, I began to think, how could I, how in the
Speaker:world could I help encourage and minister to these kids that were
Speaker:so desperate to hear from God? And I remember at some
Speaker:point this question came to me.
Speaker:Not that question. Join us, question mark.
Speaker:Do I have slides, Pastor Will? Thank you.
Speaker:Is the problem that God is speaking to us less, or is the
Speaker:problem that we are listening less to what God has already spoken
Speaker:and therefore unable to distinguish between what is his voice and what is not?
Speaker:There's this warning in Matthew 12:38. The Pharisees and
Speaker:scribes had Jesus standing right in front of them, and they
Speaker:demanded a sign from him. They needed to feel
Speaker:more and hear more and experience more to be sure
Speaker:he was who he claimed he was. And because of chasing
Speaker:that sensation, they actually missed the
Speaker:gift of Jesus standing right in front of them.
Speaker:And I sense that in our culture today, we are sometimes, guys,
Speaker:tempted to overspiritualize and incorrectly
Speaker:categorize and attribute his voice to all
Speaker:kinds of thoughts and actions when it's actually
Speaker:more our feelings that are leading us.
Speaker:I was just talking to a friend of mine last week who told me a
Speaker:story. Uh, one of his buddies got a call from a girl and this girl
Speaker:said, the Holy Spirit is telling me I'm not supposed to date you.
Speaker:The very next week, That guy got a call from that girl again and said,
Speaker:the Holy Spirit is now telling me I'm supposed to date you.
Speaker:And here's a freebie for the youth group kids. If anyone
Speaker:ever says that to you, all you have to say is,
Speaker:the Holy Spirit didn't tell me that. Okay?
Speaker:This kind of thing happens all over the church today, and I just
Speaker:want to be careful that we are not chasing a sensation
Speaker:or an experience or an audible voice to the point where we forget
Speaker:Altogether, that we have the gift of his
Speaker:word right at our fingertips. We
Speaker:have the gift of the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, who
Speaker:according to John 14:26 teaches us all
Speaker:things, brings to our remembrance all that Jesus has
Speaker:said, or God has said. And I want to be clear about this up
Speaker:front. I don't want it to get twisted. This teaching is not a
Speaker:commentary on whether or not God still audibly speaks.
Speaker:Okay, it's not a commentary on that. I'm 0%
Speaker:interested putting him in a box like that. He can do as he
Speaker:pleases. But I think of that youth that
Speaker:was crying out, God, why aren't you speaking to me anymore? And I
Speaker:want to encourage, like, any heart that may be here today asking
Speaker:that same question, there are hundreds of
Speaker:thousands of words of scripture
Speaker:breathed out by God, accessible to each one of us.
Speaker:2 Timothy 3:16. These are not dead words.
Speaker:The effectiveness of these words are not confined to a culture and
Speaker:time. They are alive and active and sharper than any two-edged
Speaker:sword, according to Hebrews 4:12. So I believe
Speaker:our best hope for discerning his voice starts
Speaker:with knowing and loving and trusting what
Speaker:God has already spoken and having affection
Speaker:for him who spoke them as well. Today,
Speaker:if I encountered someone who was struggling in that way to hear his voice, I'd
Speaker:probably ask them what their prayer life is like. I'd say, are you making—
Speaker:like, when you— are you just giving up prayers, sending up prayers, and then going
Speaker:about your day? What is your Bible reading like? Are you going through the Bible
Speaker:and then just giving time for him to speak to
Speaker:you through his word? These are all things, guys, that
Speaker:we really have to fight for. I know I
Speaker:do. My attention is always being pulled in all kinds of different
Speaker:directions, especially father of 2 young
Speaker:kids. Uh, my favorite time to get alone with the Lord and read his
Speaker:word is very early in the morning before my family wakes up. So
Speaker:I get up, make breakfast, get my coffee, get the word open, and
Speaker:right about that time I sit down, these 2 happy little
Speaker:5-year-olds, a 5-year-old and a 7-year-old, the most extroverted 7-year-old you'll
Speaker:ever meet, come bebopping down the stairs and they're ready to go,
Speaker:right? So then I make their breakfast, get them situated, go back to the word,
Speaker:and now I'm trying to read Isaiah or something with cartoons and
Speaker:wrestling and yelling in the background.
Speaker:And I don't remember what comedian it was that said this, but he was
Speaker:referencing the advice they give parents of a newborn baby.
Speaker:And they say, just sleep when the baby sleeps. And anybody who has
Speaker:a baby knows that that's impossible cuz you have so many other things that you
Speaker:have to do. And his follow-up was like, yeah, and I'll do the taxes when
Speaker:the baby does the taxes. And I'll fold the
Speaker:laundry when the baby folds the laundry. In this sense, it's, I'll read Isaiah
Speaker:when the baby reads Isaiah, you know, but
Speaker:making and guarding that time for prayer in his word.
Speaker:is so important. It shows what we value. It's important because it
Speaker:allows us to better tune our ears to him.
Speaker:His word is clear, guys, to tell us his
Speaker:voice is not the only one that we will encounter in our
Speaker:lives. And I'd probably argue that the
Speaker:voices that aren't his are much easier to hear on a daily basis.
Speaker:We experience news and information more than any other
Speaker:generation before. endless social media feeds, these
Speaker:voices constantly promoting unthinkable,
Speaker:unspeakable evil, promoting, aiming, and tempting us.
Speaker:Voices that even claim to be in Christ but share
Speaker:a gospel that is not in alignment with his word.
Speaker:His word tells us that we are to test these voices.
Speaker:His word tells us that we are to test the words of prophets. His word
Speaker:tells us that our own hearts and thoughts deceive us. So this
Speaker:is what I'm getting at. In a world full of
Speaker:noises and voices and feelings and
Speaker:influencers and influence and devices and vices
Speaker:and uncertainty, the infallible and final
Speaker:authority of God's word is absolutely certain.
Speaker:It's a sure thing. Knowing his word,
Speaker:loving his word, Trusting his word. It's critical
Speaker:for every believer because every single voice that
Speaker:we encounter has the potential
Speaker:to echo that first voice in the garden
Speaker:that planted doubt in the heart of man and woman
Speaker:with one simple question: did God
Speaker:really say? Did God really say?
Speaker:The strategy of the enemy has been clear since the beginning:
Speaker:plant doubt that God has spoken, distort our understanding of
Speaker:what God has spoken, and by all costs cause us to lose
Speaker:trust that what God has spoken is
Speaker:absolutely best for us. So all of these realities
Speaker:are visible in our text today. Uh, we're gonna be looking at Matthew
Speaker:4. So if you brought your Bibles, please turn there with us. Jesus
Speaker:practically teaches us some really important ways to discern what is and isn't God's voice.
Speaker:through the use of his word. And also Jesus himself
Speaker:identifies himself as the living word, and he's made the way for us to
Speaker:turn our ears toward God once again. So this is Matthew 4.
Speaker:Do I got it? There we go. Then Jesus was
Speaker:led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
Speaker:And after fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. And the
Speaker:tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command
Speaker:these stones to become loaves of bread. But he answered, it is
Speaker:written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that
Speaker:comes from the mouth of God. Then the
Speaker:devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the
Speaker:temple and said to him, if you are the Son of God,
Speaker:then throw yourself down, for it is written, he will
Speaker:command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they
Speaker:will bear you up lest you strike your foot against the stone. Jesus
Speaker:said to him, again, it is written, you shall not put the Lord
Speaker:your God to the test. Again,
Speaker:the devil took him to a very high mountain, showed him all the
Speaker:kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, all
Speaker:of these I will give to you if you will fall down and worship me.
Speaker:Then Jesus said to him, be gone, Satan! For it is
Speaker:written, you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you
Speaker:serve. Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and
Speaker:were ministering to him. And Luke 4 has a parallel telling of
Speaker:this story that ends with verse 13 and says this: When
Speaker:the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him
Speaker:until an opportune time. So we see from these scriptures,
Speaker:there is a crystal clear picture of the
Speaker:supernatural reality of spiritual warfare that is in
Speaker:motion around us at all times.
Speaker:Supernatural reality of spiritual warfare right now in this very
Speaker:moment, tempting to distract us away from worship,
Speaker:distract us away from what the Lord has to say.
Speaker:We see that our enemy looks for these opportune times to tempt. He does
Speaker:it here when Jesus is weak, when Jesus is hungry and
Speaker:suffering through the wilderness. We should have no doubt that he would
Speaker:look for those moments in our lives as well. And this is what the Apostle
Speaker:Peter reminds us: be sober-minded, be
Speaker:watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a
Speaker:roaring lion seeking someone to devour. So we rejoice in
Speaker:a few things. The enemy is not
Speaker:all-powerful. Okay, we rejoice in that. The
Speaker:enemy is not omnipresent like God. Okay,
Speaker:he can do nothing outside of God's sovereign
Speaker:will and permission according to scripture. But
Speaker:Peter here is reminding us we should be mindful of his
Speaker:existence. We should be watchful of his
Speaker:tactics and his methods and his goals as they are revealed to
Speaker:us through scripture. And he's using the same method here on
Speaker:Jesus in the wilderness that he did in the garden all those years
Speaker:ago. And he still uses on us today. If you are the
Speaker:Son of God, like God says you are. So this
Speaker:moment is following the baptism of Jesus, where God says, this is my
Speaker:Son. So the devil is immediately saying,
Speaker:did God really say? Again, casting doubt on what
Speaker:God has already and really said. We notice here,
Speaker:Jesus' response to Satan with every
Speaker:temptation is the word of God. What God
Speaker:has already spoken. Okay. The first temptation to turn
Speaker:stones into bread is an appeal to
Speaker:Jesus's God-given desire to eat. This is something
Speaker:we all have. So the enemy likes to try to invert
Speaker:and pervert desires that God himself has put in us,
Speaker:put in each one of us. God has given us the good desire
Speaker:to delight in food and drink, The enemy tempts us to
Speaker:overconsumption. God has created us to be
Speaker:worshipers. The enemy tempts us to bring worship
Speaker:upon ourselves. God has given us the good desire for
Speaker:physical intimacy within the covenant of
Speaker:marriage. The enemy tempts us to pursue pleasures
Speaker:of that gift outside the boundaries of what God has
Speaker:designed it for. And that list just goes on and on and
Speaker:on. And on, on. This is what I noticed about
Speaker:Jesus. He does not go to God and
Speaker:ask God to make exceptions for his or to his
Speaker:word. He trusts that God's word speaks what is best.
Speaker:We are not called to bring the word of God into submission to our
Speaker:desires. We are called to submit our desires to the
Speaker:word of God. We are not called to bring the word
Speaker:of God into submission to our desires. We're called to submit
Speaker:our desires to the word of God. I once heard this story,
Speaker:it's actually last week, uh, of a pastor that was interviewing for a
Speaker:staff position at a church. And he got all the way through the interviewing process
Speaker:and he got that last interview with the senior pastor. And the senior
Speaker:pastor was asking him about his home life, like it was about his wife. And
Speaker:the guy said, Well, me and my partner, we're not married because we don't believe
Speaker:in marriage in the traditional sense, but we're committed to each other. We
Speaker:love each other. We're going to live with each other forever. We already live with
Speaker:each other. And you know what? We prayed about it and
Speaker:we feel peace. And the lead pastor, no joke,
Speaker:had to look him in the eye and said, I don't know what voice
Speaker:gave you that peace, but it certainly wasn't God's. Okay.
Speaker:Here's what God's voice sounds like regarding this. 1 Corinthians 7:9,
Speaker:if they cannot exercise self-control, then they should marry, for
Speaker:it is better to marry than to burn with passion. So this is
Speaker:a good takeaway. The Holy Spirit will not lead
Speaker:us in opposition to the words that God himself has breathed
Speaker:out for us. The Holy Spirit will not lead us in
Speaker:opposition to the words that God has breathed out for us.
Speaker:And one of the interesting things
Speaker:through this, and we don't— I don't have time to make all the connections, but
Speaker:Jesus is replying using Deuteronomy 6 and
Speaker:8, which is where we find Israel struggling through the wilderness as
Speaker:well. So we have all these amazing parallels of the garden and
Speaker:Israel struggling through the wilderness, and now Jesus in the wilderness.
Speaker:And this is the arc of the Redemptive story.
Speaker:It's showing us, guys, that Jesus will stand
Speaker:faithfully where Adam failed. Jesus will
Speaker:stand faithfully where Israel failed.
Speaker:Jesus will stand faithfully where we all
Speaker:fail as well. Jesus's second temptation,
Speaker:something that I see really affecting and
Speaker:challenging the church and lives of
Speaker:believers today, and that is scripture that
Speaker:is misquoted, misapplied and used out of
Speaker:context. Matthew 4:6, Satan says— he shifts
Speaker:now— it is written, and begins quoting Psalm
:11. That should floor us. That should
:bring us pause.
:Satan knows scripture well enough to quote it
:and use it against us deceptively.
:So it isn't always just like the obvious lies that we need to test
:against the word. Many times it's subtle omissions,
:distortions of truth that we need to be testing
:against God's word. When we pull up Psalm 91:11, and I'm going to
:add verse 12 to it, 'cause I think it's pretty interesting. This is what I
:see. For he will command his angels concerning you to
:guard you in all your ways. They will lift you up in their hands.
:So that you will not strike your foot against the stone. You will tread on
:the lion and the cobra. You will trample the great
:lion and the serpent. First of all, super
:convenient that Satan did not go to verse 12 in this.
:Super convenient. Secondly, within the
:verse that he quoted, he skipped guard you in all your ways.
:And that word, uh, word ways there is the Hebrew word Derek. It's not
:connected to the name that we know Derek, but figuratively it, it
:reflects Uh, it, um, connects to God's divine path
:for us, his ordered steps for us. So Psalm
:91 is not telling us to go and throw ourselves
:in front of lions and serpents in order to force God's hand
:of protection and provision so then we can learn to trust him.
:Okay. It's a promise
:that we can trust God to provide provision and
:protection In his wisdom as he orders our
:steps and in his timing and not ours.
:And what I love about this is at the end of Matthew 4, the
:angels do in fact come and minister to Jesus
:in God's timing. So
:simply hearing someone quote scripture is not enough
:to know that what they are saying is from God. The question
:is not only is this in the Bible, the question is, is that what the
:Bible means when that is said?
:And that this, guys, is like one of the reasons you often hear us up
:here say, Lord, will it— will you let anything that is of me fall
:away? We are fallible. Okay.
:But we also say, test every word that we say.
:Okay. You should be doing that. We all wanna be students of the word.
:And we have to contend with this kind of thing a lot in today's culture
:because we live in what I like to call catchphrase Christianity
:culture. This is the
:condensing or watering down of biblical truth
:into these small, palatable,
:marketable, easy-to-retain catchphrases
:that, in my opinion, are just unable to properly communicate the
:scope of the truth in scripture. So how many of
:us have heard this phrase, God will not give you more than you can handle?
:See, here's the deal. Everybody laughs at that, but nobody raises their hand.
:In first service, like, no one raised their hand, and I thought I was crazy
:and I was gonna have to take it off. But then when I asked it
:again, like, 20 people raised their hands. So let me ask again, how
:many of us have heard the phrase, God will not give you more than you
:can handle? Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord. I thought I was
:crazy. We'll go to point 3. No. So this is what cracks
:me up. Taking that in concept, somebody goes up to
:Job, right? Says, brother Job,
:you're going through it, man. Like, I know what happened to your
:animals, stolen, killed. I know what happened to your
:servants, your family taken out in the most horrible way.
:Your wife is all crazy and, and mad at you and all this
:stuff. And also all these sores and these boils, but I've got some good news.
:Good news, man. Be encouraged.
:The Lord would not give you more than you can handle. That's
:crazy. Don't say that.
:That's crazy.
:Sometimes it's just best to be quiet and hurt with people.
:Compassion. Now that phrase is really well-intentioned.
:It's not like the same heart that Satan is using. But we
:have to be very careful because depending on how, when, and when
:we use that phrase and what we mean under the surface, that may not be
:truly consistent with God's voice in scripture. Here's why I say that.
:This is 2 Corinthians 1:8-9.
:For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction
:we experienced in Asia. For we were so
:utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of
:life itself. So this thing that's happening to us,
:so beyond our strength, we wanted to die. That
:sounds like beyond what they can handle. Indeed, we felt
:we had received the sentence of death. This feels like a death sentence,
:but this happened that we might not rely on ourselves, but on
:God who raises the dead. So
:with that, it feels like Paul is saying, you know what, he does allow
:more than we can handle. And when he does it, he is allowing it with
:a divine purpose in mind that we might not rely on
:our own ability to overcome or handle
:anything, but we might rely on his presence to sustain
:us. Using scripture catchphrases about
:scripture out of context may give us a sense of temporary
:encouragement, but it cannot give us long-term sustenance
:that comes from the truth of the word of God.
:And that appears to be consistent with what the enemy is
:going after here. Every chance he gets, he wants to
:misdirect and take our attention away from God who can sustain
:us and turn our attention towards temporary,
:momentary satisfaction. So about 13 or
:14 years ago, I was newly saved
:and I was just going through the most incredibly difficult,
:spiritually challenging season of suffering.
:And I was suffering through things that certainly felt like more than I could handle.
:And because I was so new to the Lord and new to his word, I
:really didn't know anything about what the word said regarding my
:suffering or how to process it. And someone came along and shared
:this verse with me. This is James 1:2-4.
:Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various
:kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.
:And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete,
:lacking in nothing. And when I heard that, it pierced my
:heart. I knew this is an important verse— verses. I need to
:hold on to this. But honestly, I was in such a fog
:of what I was going through. I really didn't know what to do with that
:to help me through. Okay. So I remember going to Pastor Wayne.
:Everybody needs a Pastor Wayne in their life. Okay. And
:asking him about it and him just patiently walking me through those
:verses. It kind of felt like, uh, in Acts there's an Ethiopian
:man who's trying to read the book of Isaiah and Philip hears this and runs
:over to him and says, do you understand what you're reading? And he goes, how
:can I understand it if nobody guides me through this? Like, we need
:people to guide us through these things, being led
:by the Holy Spirit, of course. And Pastor Wayne was doing that. He was showing
:me the scripture is clear to say here, there
:are joys and there are trials. God
:intends for these trials to produce a fruit in you that you might not
:otherwise get if you weren't going through this.
:And he gave special attention to the count it all joy thing, and he gave
:me some real practical application here. He said, get a
:pen and paper, write down joy at the top of one
:column and trials at the top of one column. Write down all your joys
:and then all of your trials, and then take all your trials and
:literally move them over to the joy column.
:Count it all up. Count it all joy. And give thanks to
:God because the struggles and the suffering
:that you're going through is not meaningless.
:And that was so meaningful for me because
:he wasn't diminishing or discounting my trials down
:to something that I could just get over myself with enough
:willpower. He was simply pointing me to the word.
:The word shows that my suffering has purpose, that God is not
:distant from it, and that he is walking with
:me through it. This is evident in Matthew 4, because we remember the
:Holy Spirit led Jesus into this wilderness. I have
:no doubt that the Holy Spirit was with him this whole time.
:God's word studied and shared and taught and
:understood in proper context is
:sustenance.
:Life-sustaining. Those— that truth, those truths that Pastor Wayne helped me in have
:served me through multiple times rough
:patches and suffering that I've gone through in my life. Man shall not live on
:bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.
:So when I looked up that phrase, God won't give you more than you can
:handle, try to figure out where that comes from, my searches
:suggested it was most likely some amalgamation of
:1 Corinthians 10:12-14, which says this.
:Maybe. There we go. Therefore, let anyone who
:thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.
:No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man.
:God is faithful, and he will not let you be
:tempted beyond your ability. But with the
:temptation, he will also provide the way of escape,
:that you may be able to endure it. And therefore, my beloved,
:flee from idolatry. So we
:can see where that idea of that phrase comes from. We read those
:verses, we see it's more about our temptation than it is our suffering,
:which brings us back to Matthew 4. And
:we notice here that in God's faithfulness,
:he has changed our ability in some way to be able
:to choose God and flee from idols that we didn't have
:before the cross. And his faithfulness
:provided the way of escape. And I want to point out that that is singular
:and not plural. The way of escape.
:So not overcoming temptation in my own
:strength, of course, but through Christ in me.
:In the final temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4,
:Satan takes Jesus to a very high mountain, shows him the
:kingdoms of the world and their glory, and says this: All these I
:will give to you if you will fall down and worship me.
:This is what we need to understand. Jesus,
:prophesied Messiah, King of Kings, Lord of Lords,
:these kingdoms and this glory have all been appointed and promised
:to Him by His Father. But Satan is
:tempting Jesus in a very subtle
:and sinister way.
:Satan is suggesting that there is a way To have all the
:kingdoms and all of the glory without any sacrifice.
:A crown without a cross, glory
:without suffering, kingdom without obedience.
:And this is the voice, the lie of the enemy that the people of God
:have bought into far too often.
:To have the benefits of Christ without embracing the call
:to sacrifice and joyful obedience in him,
:as Pastor Wayne led us last week, chasing the living
:water but forsaking the fountain.
:Jesus's response to this lie: Begone, Satan!
:For it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and him only
:shall you serve. Now Jesus here is quoting Deuteronomy
:6:13, and that verse falls in the middle of an address
:to God's people Israel, where it actually starts in verse 4. And this
:is what it says: Hear,
:O Israel! Hear, O Israel! The Lord our
:God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your
:God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with
:all of your might. So the first directive given in this
:address to those who are being called to hear the voice of their Father
:And respond to his voice is to turn our hearts and our
:thoughts and our affections to him and worship.
:So Jesus this whole time has not
:been showing us how to overcome sin by
:Bible memory verses. Okay? It's much
:deeper than that. This was not a supernatural
:JBQ competition.
:Jesus's words, God's words flowing through Jesus,
:were flowing from a heart that not only knew and
:trusted the words of his Father, but he also found
:supreme satisfaction in the Father
:himself. John Piper says this: sin is
:what we do when our hearts are not satisfied in God.
:No one sins out of duty or obligation.
:None of us wake up and go, I need to sin today. Let me get
:that off my checklist. We sin because it feels good
:and it holds some promise of happiness. John
:Piper continues, I know of no other way to triumph over
:sin long-term than to gain a distaste for it because of a
:superior satisfaction in God.
:That's what I want. That's what I
:want for all of us— superior
:satisfaction in God.
:The temptations that Christ faced in Matthew
:4 was not the end of the
:temptations that he would face. That voice
:that left and was waiting for that opportune time
:comes back again at the cross
:with that same lie again. Matthew
:40. If you are the Son of God,
:come down from that cross, throw yourself
:down. Guys, I'm
:so glad Jesus did not listen to that
:voice. That was
:not the voice of the Father.
:Through his perfect sacrifice and obedience to God,
:Jesus has reconciled what sin had separated. He
:himself became the way for those that put their faith and trust in
:him. Making a way for us to hear and
:know and love and delight in the voice of our
:Father again. Could I
:have a few people to pray? And if you would
:stand with me this morning.
:If you find yourself struggling this morning to hear
:God's voice, If you're struggling through the wilderness,
:struggling with your love for his word, struggling
:to overcome the same old temptations, the same old lies,
:struggling to see the joy of the cross that was once
:so clear to you, I want
:to end with the voice of your Father in heaven
:from Revelation 22:17. Come.
:Let the one who is thirsty come.
:Let the one who wishes to take the free gift of the water
:of life come. So this morning, if that's you,
:please come. Let us encourage you and pray for you
:that you would see the goodness of God and
:put— and have joy and satisfaction in him and his word.
:Let's sing.
