Steven Furtick - Keeping Negative Voices Out
This is an excerpt from: Focus Your Faith
You might be discouraged not because of something you're facing or feeling but because of something you are saying about what you are facing. "So, here's what you have to do, Joshua". "What do I do? Do I shoot them? Do I kill them? Do I stab them? Do I choke them"? "All right. Before we get to all that, because we're going to do all that…" Verse 8: "Keep this Book of the Law…"
Joshua is jealous of you, because he had the Book of the Law…Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, Deuteronomy. You have the whole story. Hold up. Let me see real quick. You have something Joshua didn't have. I just want to make sure real quick. Oh yeah. You win. Spoiler alert. I didn't mean to mess it up for you, because I know you were going to read it this week, but you win. We win. The grace of God's people be with you, amen. You win. Come, Lord Jesus. We win. He's already here with us. You win. Wherever you step your foot, he's already there. You win! It's like, "Oh, yeah"! I read this one. This is a good one. We have to fight a lot, but we're going to have faith. We're not going to feel it every time, and we're not going to see it every time, and we're not going to always know how, but he always makes a way. We know this by faith because we have his Word, his exceedingly great and precious promises.
One author said, "The living Word of God, which never returns void, is in your heart". We thank you for your Word, Lord. I thank you for your Word, Lord. I thank you for the promises I have in spite of the problems I face. I thank you, Lord. Now, with Joshua, the instruction is simple. "Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it…" "That sounds Eastern. Meditation… Isn't that Buddhist or something? Is this a yoga class"? We need to quit giving our definitions of words to the world and letting them take it from us. The Bible is Eastern, dude. I told somebody one day… I was like, "I'm concentrating on breathing more these days". They were like, "Oh, that's New Age". I thought God did that in the garden, like, the very first page of the story. I thought that's what the word for spirit meant…ruwach. God started this.
So, we need to take some of this stuff back, just like success, when I read that, or prosper. Oh god! Let a preacher say prosper…oh god! God said prosper. If you think that refers only to cars and places you can go on vacation, you just need a bigger definition of God. It includes your peace. It includes your freedom. It includes the richness of your interior life…all that. He said, "Let's fix this script you've got going on, Joshua. Before I take you into this place, before I give you the strategy, before I can get you the success I want you to have…" Which is not necessarily the success you imagine.
It's going to be much deeper. He said, "Do this. Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips, meditating on it day and night". That does not mean…hear me, please…to quote Scriptures obnoxiously at people when they're going through stuff. Just for a cautionary moment in this sermon. He said, "Be careful". Okay, I'm going to be careful. This does not mean you walk around the house, and your kid is like, "I had a bad day".
"Well, all things work together for the good of them who love God and are called according to his purpose. For those he foreknew he also predestined, and those he predestined he also justified, and those he…" Shut up! Say, "I'm sorry you had a bad day. Do you want to talk about it"? That's not what the Word always on your lips means. Somebody says, "Man, I'm really struggling". "Well, Judas went and hanged himself". Do you see how it could backfire if you hear me wrong? So, what does he mean when he says, "Meditate"? I have a picture of it. I got the picture about seven years ago, but I didn't realize it was a picture of meditation.
At the time, I thought it was a NASCAR race. I went to a NASCAR race to see Joey Logano, the champ, the two-time champ. The number on his race car is 22, like Taylor Swift. "I don't know about you, but I'm feeling 22". I know we have a lot of drivers in the church, but Joey is my guy, and I will always cheer for him. He said, "Come out and see me race". I said, "I don't want to". I said, "I respect what you do, but that sounds really boring". He's like, "Bring the kids. They'll like it. I promise. We'll take care of them". They treated us so well. As soon as we got there, they gave us these little… It looked like a walkie-talkie. Shout-out Warren. He gave each of the kids one, and we all had one. On it we could hear… Show them the picture of Abbey.
We have one of Abbey holding it, just to kind of bring you into the scene. They gave me a hat and a shirt. I think those are Joey Logano jeans, or something, Joey Logano underwear somewhere in there too. Then those yellow Joey Logano headphones, and all of this, because we're right by the track. We're standing by the track, and do you see that little thing Abbey is holding? That thing is… Hand it to me. Thank you, baby. She called, "Next sermon illustration is me," when I had Graham up here. She said, "Hey, next sermon illustration is me". So I'm kind of multitasking parenting and preaching right now. All right. So, we had this. I promise you this is not a made-up sermon illustration. It's going to sound like, "Oh, that's just too perfect. You made that up," but I promise you. We had a video of it too, but I didn't want to show you the video.
Abbey is 5 years old, and she's holding this thing, and she's standing there, because on this you can hear the crew chief of the driver and the spotter telling Joey what to do. You can hear what they're saying to him. It's amazing. It made it really fun for me. It helped me understand a little bit more what was going on. Abbey thought Joey could hear her too. So, she's standing over there. It's really loud. There are cars going fast. That's what they do at NASCAR. She's going (5 years old), "Joey Wogano. Joey Wogano. Joey Wogano. Can you hear me, Joey Wogano"? We let her do it for, like, an hour because it was so cute. I know we're going to hell, because we let her sit there for at least 45 minutes, going, "Joey Wogano. Joey Wogano. Is that you, Joey Wogano? Can you hear me, Joey Wogano"? Finally, after I got the video and the picture and we all laughed and laughed and laughed, I said, "He can't hear you, baby. This is a one-way device".
But what if he could? Just come with me real quick. From Palestine to the Charlotte Motor Speedway. I'll take you on a journey right now. What if Joey did? From Joshua to Joey. What if he did? What if they met every fan at the gate and said, "Here you go. Now put this on. The driver has a headset too, and you can put this on". Do y'all want me to put it on? It's going to mess my hair up. I should have practiced this. Is it on wrong? Is it upside down? What do you mean? Oh, strap in the back. Thank you. Like that? Is it right? I can't really hear y'all. It's wrong? Okay, I tried! But you saw it. Good grief. Okay, come back to the Bible. He's like, "Joshua, there are certain things that need to be in your heart that will enable you to fight the good fight when you are discouraged and afraid".
Now watch this. What if Joshua, when God spoke to him… Instead of verse 10 saying, "He went around and told all of the people, 'Get ready. Get ready. In three days we're going in. Hey, officers, go around and tell the people, "Get ready. Get everything packed. Get your shoes laced. Get everything ready. We're going in in three days. I don't know how we're getting across the Jordan. Joshua will tell us, I guess. We're going in. How are we going to get over the walls of Jericho? I don't know. Just get ready. We're going in in three days".'" Imagine if he had gone around asking them, "What do you think"? Then I remembered. They tried that 40 years earlier. The whole nation started saying to Moses, "We can't do that. We can't be that. We can't defeat that. We can't beat them".
Now, in your life this does not sound like Canaanites and land. I understand that. It sounds like chains you need to break. It sounds like impact you know you can make. It sounds like that thing you have been avoiding that you know God is calling you to engage. You know what it is. So, imagine Joey meets everybody at the gate and says, "Here. Just tell me when you think I should turn. Here's your device. Just tell me what to do". See, when you're in the car… I've never been in one, but this is what he told me. He said, "You can only look forward. You can't turn your head at all". That's why the spotter has to tell him, "Here's what's ahead of you. Here's what's behind you. Here's what's going on around you. Oh, they're about to wreck up there. This is where we need to be".
That's why the crew chief… Now, the crew chief doesn't talk as much as the spotter, but he can talk too. He can tell him stuff too. Imagine if every single beer-drinking NASCAR fan and 5-year-old girl got a device to talk to the driver. Here we are, trying to steer our lives in a season we've never been in before, yet the first thing we do when we wake up in the morning… "Oh, what do they think? Oh, where are they today? Oh, where are they vacationing? Oh, what is this political party up to"? Shut it down and look up and see what God is doing! In times of transition, you have to keep it tight. I'm not saying don't make new friends. I'm not saying don't read books. I'm not saying don't take a class. I'm not saying don't have counselors. "In the multitude of counselors there is safety". I know the Bible verses too. What I'm telling you is God is your spotter.
Oh, I have a better one. Jesus is my crew chief. There's more to the story, baby. Joshua wasn't the only one God saps. Three days later, Jesus said, "We're going across this Jordan. We're crossing over this chasm". From death to life, from dead to alive, from law to grace! He did it! "What do you think I should do? How do you think I should raise my kids? What do you think I should eat? Should I do Keto? Should I do Paleo? I don't know. What should I do? How should I feel about it"? It's so crazy that we have so many voices. Some of them aren't on our phone. Some of them are from our family from people who are dead who raised us, still talking. I can make the message really simple. Who's in your headset? Who gets to you? "I don't want to be stuck up". Then you'd rather be stuck? I'm not saying don't listen to other people's point of view. That is not this message, but the Lord said in transition times, you only need to listen to two.
How many spies did Moses send into the Promised Land? No, Moses. Yeah, he sent 12. Too many. Joshua knew, "That's 10 too many," because Joshua was one of the two. Y'all are never going to forget me up here in this headset with a wire dangling around, looking like I'm 5 years old, and I can't even put it on correctly. You are never going to forget this sermon, and that's just the way I want it, so the next time you have 10 telling you, "We can't do it," the next time you have Twitter telling you who to hate and who to like, the next time you have Facebook all up in your face, sapping your faith, making you afraid, you'll remember that preacher.
You'll remember, "Furtick was up there telling me I just need two. I just need my spotter. That's God. I need my crew chief. That's Jesus. And if I have the Holy Spirit, I have an engine that will never burn out. So watch me make this turn. Watch me turn this corner. Watch me do this thing. Watch me reinvent in this season to serve a greater purpose. Watch me be a mentor. Watch me be a single mom. Watch me break out of these chains. Watch me cross this Jordan"! "I've been discouraged". Then change the discussion.