Going Through Difficult Circumstances

Thank you that you're meeting us and guiding us. Your ways are not our ways. Lord, teach us to number our days.

Remember that we're frail and our days are few in comparison to each other. Make good choices. I came into a new revelation in the last month.

Going through difficult circumstances. And I couldn't understand it. I had never experienced it before.

You know in James it says, count it all joy, brethren, when you face various trials. Knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Gone through some trials in the last month.

And when the trial came, I found that it didn't make any sense, but I had joy in my heart. And I was trying to reason it through and I couldn't make sense of it. It's happened twice now this month.

And I thought, oh, maybe it's because the Lord's going to bring a great victory out of the trial, but no victories come out of the trial. But yet the joy remains. It says the joy of the Lord is to be our strength.

So when we're going through things that are making us very weak, when we're weak, we can be strong. And that joy that I've experienced is not joy in circumstances, joy in Him. It's the only thing I can say.

I've been walking with the Lord for 20-something years, never experienced the joy of the Lord in adversity. And I'm grateful for that. Because I've been trying to reason it through and figure it out, it makes no sense.

But I'm grateful for it because what usually comes as anxiety and then trying to repent and get the anxiety off, but in the midst of a great trial, joy rests in our soul. Because we know that the Lord is working a greater weight of glory for us, knowing that it's going to produce something that we can't see, but yet is very valuable to the Lord. So it says that this joy comes knowing that the testing of our faith produces patience.

Let patience have its perfect work that you may be complete, lacking nothing. So why is patience and endurance one of the great qualities that the Lord is working in us? The Lord says we have need of it because, you know, Dan spoke about these blueberries and not only did Dan plant the blueberries, but I seen him out there on weekends. I seen him out there after work.

I seen him out there on Sundays when the weeds were getting away on us. You know, we have some raspberries here, the weeds are getting away on us. Dan was out there with both hands for hours, ripping weeds out of the ground and I seen him, and I thank the Lord for him.

You know, if you don't come into a place of endurance, and the sun was beating down on him, and he's still fighting through the road to get through the road to get the weeds. If you don't have that kind of endurance and that kind of patient endurance in your life, when you go through hard things, you won't fight through. You'll quit.

You'll give up. You'll say that's not for me. Serving the Lord is not for me.

But you know, it says after we endure hardship, it says you will yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it. You know, now we're hearing reports like the biggest blueberries, the sweetest blueberries, the best blueberries came, but they didn't come in the first few years. They came after many years of labor and hardship.

And the Lord delights that we would have this wonderful sweet fruit of the Spirit. And the only way to get that beautiful fruit and the sweetness of being a sweet brother is to endure the hardships and the trials of life. Otherwise, you'll just quit and you'll just be a sour brother, a bitter brother, bitter sister.

That's not the Lord's plan for us, that we would overcome in our situations. And it's never easy and it's not joyful at the time outwardly. But when you can enter into a joy that doesn't make any sense in the same way that the peace of God should rule in our hearts when we're in anxious situations and we can have perfect peace in the midst of a storm.

You know, in a hurricane, they show it on the Doppler map and you can see the eye of the storm. It's like sunny in there. And so they can have a storm.

If you're right in the eye, then you can have like a day where it's just like really nice and calm. And then the storm passes and it's horrendous again. God wants us to live in the eye of the storm where we will be kept in perfect peace whose minds are stayed on him because we trust him.

To trust in the Lord with all of our heart, not with our minds and not to meet on our own understanding. But in all our ways to acknowledge him and he will direct our path. You know, yesterday we were out bearing the heat for the last couple of days.

The heat and trying to prepare the parking there so there would be more parking for the people in the back and for the church. Trying to push it through and so many activities with the family and I found myself out there many times by myself. And my flesh is telling me, you know what, you don't need to do this.

It doesn't need to be done today. Just quit. I had to sit down and took a little rest.

I'm not going to give in to what my flesh is telling me. My flesh is telling me I don't need to do this. I need to overcome this.

Because you know what, there's many times in life when you're going to get tempted and you're going to say, you know what, I don't need to overcome this. It's no big deal compared to what everybody else is doing. This is like a small little conviction.

I don't need to worry about that. I'm going to just push through and I'm just going to live my best life now. I'm going to enjoy myself.

No, you need to fight against those convictions. That when they come and your flesh is telling you something different. Because the word of God is our guide, not our flesh.

We can't go about how we feel. You know, ten times I texted Kobe. I said ten times my flesh was telling me you need to quit.

You know what, let's quit in time. I said no, I'm going to kind of persevere. I have need of endurance.

And spiritually speaking, we have need of endurance. You know, after you've done the will of God and you've borne the heat of the day and then you come in and brother already shared on it. We have to say something like this, we are just unprofitable servants.

When the master says, hey, I want you to now prepare me supper now. After you worked all day. Now I want you to prepare me my supper and then you'll taste, you'll eat your supper.

And we're to have this hard attitude of being servants. Not saying, well, you know what, I did my job, I did more than my job. I deserve.

You're setting yourself up for a failure. After you've done the will of God. And you say, Lord, I'm just an unprofitable servant.

Doing what was my duty to do. You know, I was thinking, I was talking to my wife yesterday and I said, you know, we've been working hard six days. I said, the seventh day, we should rest.

Because there's a rest for the people of God. And then I said to her, tomorrow, I'm going to be preaching. I'm going to be serving.

You know, there's some people who get paid to do these things. That's their job. They prepare, you know, their sermons and they do their duties during the weekend.

Then they preach on Sunday. That's their work. But for us, that's our rest.

Our rest is to serve the people of God. And to have that kind of hard attitude and not to be grudgingly thinking, oh, it's Thursday night. We've got to do it again.

It's Sunday morning, we've got to do it again. Clean up after the people. You know, there's not one Sunday, everybody does their helping.

There's not one Sunday that the garbage doesn't have to get carried out and there's still dishes left and there's still some food rotting on the counter or something's going on. Or cleanup that has to happen. Or there's balls out in the field that got left out that the more it's chewing up.

There's cleanup has to happen. And it's all part of laying your life down for the brothers. Because Jesus didn't come into this life to be served.

But to serve. You know, when the brothers were arguing, he came in and they were arguing. You know, when you have a bunch of little children, I listen to them sometimes, they're arguing about who's the greatest.

They're out there and they're hitting their balls out there and they're talking about how they're so great. And Jesus was hearing the disciples talking about how great they were. And who wanted to be the greatest.

And why they should be the best. And then Jesus came and he took a little child and he put a little stool there and he set the little child there. Or maybe on the ground, he put the child on the ground in the middle of them.

And he said, listen, if you cannot humble yourself and become a servant and humble like this little child, you guys have no shot at going to heaven. Zero shot of eternal life. Because the greatest shall be the least.

Unless you be converted and become like this little humble child who is totally dependent on the father and the mother. You have no shot at eternal life. But you know, in this life, we want to be big shots.

We want to attain to something great. You know, and sometimes the Lord allows us to attain to great things. And then he humbles us.

And then we think about how we were once great. And then we realize we're nothing compared to how great thou art. When we sing that song, it's one of my favorite songs.

How great thou art, O Lord thy God. I stand in awesome wonder, considering all of the wonderful works thou hast made. When I see the stars.

When I see the world. And I think of your power. And that you're mindful of us as small little tiny ants.

You know, we have some ants and they come at night in front of our garage and they dig up and they make a mess. And I've seen some of them and I just took my shoe and I got about 50 of them and I just squished them. Because I was angry with them.

You know, what if the Lord just gets angry with us. Because we're just making a mess and we just think we're moving dirt and we're looking for some food and everything. He just takes his foot and just squishes out 50 of us.

Like nothing. Without a thought. Again, he's mindful of us.

The Lord is good to those. He's good to all. And he has compassion on all that he's made.

And that if we will just acknowledge that we are nothing. He is almighty. Like Job had to come to that revelation.

Job was righteous and the Lord pointed him out to Satan. And Satan asked to sift him. Just like he asked to sift Peter.

And the Lord allowed him to sift Job. You know, and Job was holding to his integrity. You know what? You come to the Lord and the Lord cleanses us up.

Once we get cleaned up, then we start thinking, you know what? I'm a little better than the way you guys are treating me. I deserve better. And we get this mindset.

And it's a lot of good mindset. And then the Lord starts showing us that before we were filthy, we knew we were filthy. We couldn't even look up we were so filthy.

And then now the Lord has washed us and cleansed us from our past sins. And he's made us beautiful. And he's given us new robe of righteousness.

And garments of salvation. And he's adorned us with jewels. And then we start trusting in our faith.

We start trusting and you know what? I don't need to be a servant anymore. Look at me. Look at how holy I am.

I'm worshiping the Lord in the beauty of holiness now. The Lord starts to expose the ugliness of self-righteousness in Christ. Just like he did in Job.

And then you know, to top it off, his three best friends, they started to say, you know what? You're going through hard times because the Lord doesn't inflict willingly. You've sinned, man. Look in the mirror.

You've sinned. And Job's like, I have not sinned. He said, you probably didn't help the widows that were living close to you.

You probably didn't help the poor. You were a miser. You know, you say you're doing all these things, but the Lord obviously, like the blessings and the curses.

You cannot run the curses, buddy. And the curses are overtaking you right now. And so you have secret sin.

And Job was fighting with his best friends. And there was animosity there going on. And he was holding to his integrity.

He was saying, you guys are judging unrighteously. You don't know me. But the Lord allowed all these things.

He allowed his best friends who were preachers to go and say all these things about him to him. Because the Lord wanted to show Job his pride. And he was getting frustrated with his friends.

And then he got angry with the Lord. And he said, you have inflicted me. And I've done everything right.

And look how you're treating me. I deserve better than this. Look at all these things I've done for you.

And look at what you've done, how you've treated me. We cannot have this kind of hard attitude toward the Lord. The Lord is allowing that to manifest, to show us that we are vile.

Our holiness is vile before the Lord because we are trusting in our own righteousness. Rather than saying, you know what, Lord? Any righteousness that I have is because of you. Any holiness that I walk in is because of you.

Does it mean that we should not be holy and not walk in righteousness? Absolutely not, we should. But it's not because of us. It's in spite of us that the Lord sends his spirit.

And he causes us to be conformed into the image of his son, Jesus. He causes us to change. He said, I will take your heart of stone and I will give you a heart of flesh.

So you begin to once again feel conviction. You'll be once again sensitive to the people around you, to the things that they're going through. Are you sensitive to the people around you, the things that they're going through? Or are you just all about me and mine? You can't live like that.

The Lord says we shouldn't be interested only in our own interests, but we also need to consider the interests of others. Ask the Lord to make you the kind of sister, the kind of brother, that is not only interested in what's good for me, but what's good for others. When you start to live like that, you will see the blessing of God overtake you.

So Job had to come to this revelation that he was self-righteous. That a lot of his doing, of righteous things that he was doing, was for reputation and it was to be seen by others. For honor.

But he didn't realize it. He was blind to this thing. And the testimony of it is, he said, Lord, you are holy.

You are almighty. And I am vile. And I am nothing.

You know, Jeremiah had to have that revelation. After he went and preached and prophesied to the kings and to Israel and all that, and they put him into a pit. And he said, you have been to me.

Jeremiah is speaking to the Lord. You have been to me like an unfaithful stream. You know, the Lord has treated me horribly compared to how I've been obedient to him.

And the Lord speaks to Jeremiah and he says, if you will remove the precious from the vile, then you'll be my mouthpiece. He was a mouthpiece for the Lord. But the Lord wanted to get to the root of something.

There was something deeper going on in Jeremiah's heart. And it was the trials of going into a pit and his brothers treating him horribly that brought it out and he started his accusations against the Lord. And Jeremiah repented before the Lord.

He said, I have sinned against you. He repented and the Lord responded and forgave him. Even the men of God, who are called of God, have need to remember that he is holy and our best attempt at holiness is still vile, still unclean.

Job says this. He said, Lord, I've heard of you with the ear. He heard the word of God.

He knew the right things to do. He had come to an understanding of God's will and God's ways. And he was walking in them.

But he said, now my eye has seen you. To see the Lord high and lifted up. Isaiah saw it.

Faith comes by hearing. Job had heard the word of the Lord. Job had an understanding.

But coming into the glorious revelation of seeing Jesus, we want to come into a greater revelation of knowing him. Not knowing about, that's hearing, but a knowing. The way when marriage happens, a husband knows his wife, and the wife knows the husband, and they become one.

When you come into that intimacy with Jesus, where you come, like Paul says, to know him. Paul came to a revelation who was once this Saul of Tarsus. He knew about the Lord.

He had the scriptures memorized. According to the law, he was blameless. Couldn't find any fault with the man.

But the problem was, his heart was not right within him. Until he had an encounter with Jesus. That when he saw Jesus, he was not ready to see Jesus.

Because the sight of him blinded him. He saw a great light, and he was blinded from the light. But he heard the voice.

And he didn't recognize Jesus. He said, who are you, Lord? I'm Jesus, the one that you persecuted. He needed someone.

A man of God. To come and lay his hands on him, and heal him so he could receive his sight. Three days he was blind.

The Lord restored his sight to him. And immediately he preached the gospel. That Jesus was the Christ.

His whole life, he was serving God. But he missed Jesus. He hated Jesus.

You can't say you love God and hate Jesus. In the same way, you can't say you love God and you have a problem with your brother. If you say you love God whom you haven't seen, but you can't love your brother whom you rub shoulders with, how can the love of God abide in you? God calls us to love one another.

And so we go through trials, and we go through tests, so that this fruit of love might manifest among us. Love is first patience. And if we don't endure the natural hardships and the trials, then we'll never enter into the sweetness of loving one another.

Because you know what, who knows each other best than my wife knows me and I know her. And there's things about me that really bug her, and there's things about her that really bug me. But what carries us through? Why don't we divorce? Love.

Jesus is the glue that makes us love. Just because we go through hard things, doesn't mean that we're ready to throw in the towel and quit. No, when we go through hard things, we stick through hard things.

Because we've gone through, we become seasoned like iron is seasoned through the fires. Becomes hardened and forged. We have a strong tower in Jesus.

The righteous run into it, and they are saved. The last day here, we were working together the last two days, and things were going sideways, and we were raising the voices. The wife was raising the voices at me, and I was raising the voices back at her.

All these things going on, and then afterwards, we go into the house and we're best friends. But why did all that happen? Yet our love remains strong. So we make our amends, and we realize that we responded wrongly in the trial.

That there's still prides there. There's still vileness there. We need the Lord.

I shot her a text yesterday. She was gone. I was working by myself, and then I was sweating there.

I sat on a bucket, trying to gain my breath. And I said to her, I said, you're my best friend. Sometimes we need to hear that from one another.

Even though we might have issues with one another in a fellowship, we can see each other's trials. We can see each other's faults, and we can be bothered by these things. But the trials are supposed to be the glue that keep us together, because there's a hundred reasons why we should just leave and just be done with everybody.

But there's one reason why we should stay, and it's Jesus. Jesus doesn't leave. He's a friend that sticks closer than a brother.

We sin against him a hundred times in a day, a thousand maybe. Not willingly, but we get frustrated. We say things.

We speak from pride. We don't even see the half of it. And then we say, Lord, I'm sorry.

He says, you know what? Fight the good fight. Overcome, man. You'll do better.

Persevere. Press on. That's what we need to do.

We need to press on to the upward call of God, which is in Christ. Paul goes through his trials, his beatings, his struggles, his humblings, and he comes to a revelation that all the things that were gained to him in his past life, that these he has counted as garbage, as dumb. You know what? When the dog goes out on the grass and makes a mess and somebody has to take a shovel and clean that mess up.

Paul says, I see all the things that I attained of my own efforts just like that dung, that species that's out on the grass that someone has to shovel. My own righteousness. I count it all dung.

According to the law blameless, I count it all dung for the excellence of knowing him. Job says, I heard of him with the ear of my eye. My eye sees him.

Did he see God with his eyes or did he come into a knowing that happens through the intimacy of understanding God in a way that he did not yet know. In the same way where I shared that I came to an understanding of God and having this joy in the midst of a trial that is unsolvable. That a peace and a joy rests in my soul that makes no sense.

One of the things that happens our car, Audrey, was on the coconut some of you know, blew up and they had to tow it home so we have an extended warranty in the States. I thought get it over the border then she was trying to die and we had to wait all day and they towed it to Bellingham only to find out that the Canadian warranty which covers the engine doesn't cover in the States it's a different warranty it's an American car and so the car is there and it's dead and it's toast it's for scrap but I have joy and I can't explain it it makes no sense but it's a joy that says you know what my hope isn't in what I have my hope isn't in that things are going to go better where does my help come from what does the scripture say I look to the hills from where comes my help you know you break down who am I going to call I'm going to call Jason he's going to solve my problem I'm going to go to that hill who am I going to call I'm going to call brother Dan he's going to figure this thing out for me I'm going to call in the name of the Lord from where does my help come from does it come from men who have the ability to solve our problems does it come from someone who's going to get us into that job or into that career or if we just rub shoulders and network with those popular people then our help's going to come from there no, our help comes from the Lord maker of heaven and earth it says they look to the Lord and they are radiant and their faces are not ashamed you want to look to the Lord your outward men perishes and our circumstances are not always exciting but our joy has to come from him many of us are fair weathered when things are good we're spiritually doing good when things are bad we're spiritually doing bad and that's when temptation comes is when a discouragement comes unbelief falls and sin is crouching at the door and temptation the end of that thing is getting kicked out of the garden that's for sure because you can't partake of the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons you can't eat from the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil and figure out you got this choose who you want to serve you want to serve the Lord then you need to learn to fear the Lord the fear of the Lord he says he brought us to his table says he brought us to his banqueting table his banner over us I think of David and he made a covenant with Jonathan Saul's son and you know after he was king in Israel he was looking to see if there was anyone left in Saul's house where he could he could bless them for Jonathan's sake and there was a descendent there from Jonathan And what had happened was, when the battle ensued, the nanny dropped the boy in the Fibber Shack. And he became lame in his feet.

He dropped him from the wall and became like a cripple. And David found out that there's this boy, he's a relative of Saul. And he said, listen, I want to show that boy kindness for the sake of Jonathan, his son, because I made a covenant with him, with Jonathan, and we were best friends.

And he called that boy in the Fibber Shack to him, and that guy was shaking. He was so scared and frightened, he thought, the guy's going to put him to death because he's wiped out the old lion, the old king. And he said, listen, he said, I'm going to restore some land that belonged to your family, and I'm going to put servants over them to make sure that they farm that land and that there's an income for you.

And I want you to sit at my table always and eat continually, even though you're a cripple, because of the covenant that I made with your relative, Jonathan. You know, I see Jesus being like that, having that heart. We've become crippled because circumstances have hindered us from fulfilling the purpose and call of God because of sin.

And yet, the Lord remembers the covenant that he made. And so, he gives us an opportunity to be grafted into the vine, because the promise he made to Abraham and to his seed, which is Christ, and he brought us to his banqueting table, and we can feast at his table, his baton over us as well. You may feel like a spiritual cripple, but Jesus can make us whole.

He can make us whole in the spirit, in the inner man. May the Lord help you to follow the Lord, to worship him in the beauty of holiness, and to seek him while he may be found. Don't seek your own righteousness, which comes from dotting I's and crossing T's.

A righteousness which comes by faith, and trusting the Lord with all your heart, not leaning on your own understanding. Acknowledge him in all your ways, and he'll direct your steps. You know, the flesh is very crafty.

It's always trying to have a way figured out. But you know what? We have to die to what we're held on. Faith has got everything to do with dying to the flesh and the old life, the old man, the old ways.

And trusting the Lord, not knowing where you're going, as Brother Aline shared, not knowing where you're going. It's as if you're justified by faith. James says, show me your faith by your works.

As your father Abraham did, when his faith was made complete, when he was obedient to what God had called him to, when you get your feet moving in the right direction, faith is a walk. It's not, oh, I believe this, I believe that, but you never take an action. It's like you buy a stock, but you never invest in it.

You never put your money on the table. You may lose it all, but you know what? When you invest in the things of God, if you lose all, like Paul said, I've counted all things lost, I count them as done for the excellence of knowing him. Put it on the table and trust the Lord.

Maybe you don't get what you want, but you know what? You'll get the Lord's best. And the Lord's best is far better than your best. May the Lord give you understanding in what I say.