TD Jakes - Re-Routing Your Life
Sometimes you'll be driving down the road, and you'll get to a certain point, and your GPS will say, "Re-routing". And it'll be rerouting, and while it's rerouting, you just standing there. You say, "Well, wait a minute, I'm driving. When you get through rerouting should I be going forward, should I have taken a right, should I have taken a left"? When you're in a state of rerouting, it's aggravating because you're trying to make progress and you're rerouting. This is an answer to somebody right now. You're trying to go ahead, you're trying to move, you're trying to figure it out, and you're at a buffering moment, and God says, "Your journey isn't over. The promise was not a lie, I'm still gonna do it. I might not do it the way you had imagined it". This is a moment of rerouting. Touch three people and say, "Rerouting".
David was trying to bring back the arc of the covenant, put my arc up there. David's trying to bring back the arc of the covenant. He was trying to do something that his predecessor had not done. His predecessor had ruled without glory. The arc of the covenant had not been present for 20-some years, and David makes up his mind that he is going to bring back the glory. It is made of wood, it is overlaid and inlaid with gold. It is an expression of Jesus Christ himself in the Old Testament. It has within its comprise the law of Moses, symbolic of the fact that the law is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It has the rod of Aaron that budded to give us a hint at the fact that God will bring life out of death. Inside, it also has a pot of manna to let us know that Christ is the bread of life. Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness and perished, but I am the true bread that cometh down out of heaven. All of that was in the arc of the covenant.
The two angels on both sides are standing pointing to a place where the Shekinah glory would rest. The Shekinah glory would rest right here and shoot up out of the tent and out of the temple because this is the mercy seat. They had lost the arc of the covenant, and David says up under my leadership, I'm gonna bring back the glory. This is a good mission, but just because you mean good doesn't mean that things go right.
Thirty-thousand people are following him to Jerusalem, dancing and shouting about how smart and how great he is, and then he started buffering. He had built a new cart, he had a good plan to bring back the glory. He had built the cart and designed it to travel. It's a ten-mile stretch he has to go, he has thirty-thousand people behind him. Everybody's looking at his new cart, everybody's bragging about him bringing back the glory. "Oh David, David, David," they're dancing, dancing, dancing, and then, all of a sudden, they hit a pothole in the middle of the road.
Have you ever hit a pothole in the middle of the road? Just when you're about to step into your destiny, just when you're about to finally show the devil who's boss, just when you're about to see the promise of God come to pass, the ox slipped, the cart moved, the arc of the covenant started sliding, Uza tried to save it, Uza touched it and died. In front of everybody, it turned into a mess, and the Bible says God was angry because Uza touched the arc, and David started buffering. Just when everything was going great, he started buffering.
You know what I hate about buffering? It always starts when you need it the most. And you be shakin' the phone, "Not now, not in the middle of this presentation, not in the middle of what I'm searching for, not in the middle of what"... not now. Somebody say, "Not now". God is angry, why would God be angry over the ox slipping in a hole in a road God made? Could it be that God ordered your slip? "Order my steps in your word, dear Lord. Teach me"... ugh. Whoo, does God order slips? Does God order layoffs? Does God order repossessions? Does God order heartbreaks? Does God order disappointment? Does God order mayhem? Does God order funerals?
Not now, and Uza reaches out to fix it, but when God orders something, nobody can--that's how you know God ordered it. When God orders it, nobody can... and God killed the one who tried to fix what he had ordered. He was trying to save the arc of the covenant, but that's like trying to save God. You tryin' to save what's tryin' to save you, that's the kind of stupid stuff Sarah did. Bringing Hagar in, trying to come up with a plan to cover up for something she thought God wasn't God enough to do.
See, all of these manmade carts always mess up. All the stuff you do for yourself by yourself always goes awry, because if you could be your own God you wouldn't need God. And sometimes God is revealed in the slip. You thought his greatest presence was when everything was going right, but God's greatest presence shows up when all hell is breaking loose. I think he said, "I am a very present help in trouble". If you never get in trouble, you'll never have an experience with God. How you gonna know he's a healer if you never get sick? How you gonna know he's a provider if you never get hungry? How you gonna know he's a way maker if you never get lost? Somebody slipped, but God sent me to tell you the slip is a setup.
And God starts a rerouting in his life, and all of a sudden, watch this, the David who was leading all the people, and all the people were singing, and dancing, and everything was going good, lost confidence in himself and in his plan, said, "Leave it at the house of Obed-Edom". After going all of that way to get it, just leave it. Everything starts buffering. I feel ministry in this place right now. The things that mean the most to you will always hit a point where everything starts buffering.
And David said, "I don't care, let Obed-Edom have it". Obed-Edom had no more right to the arc of the covenant than the man in the moon. He was a Gittite, he had no right to have the arc of the covenant, but because David has lost confidence in himself and in his mission, God moves into the house of a Gittite and starts blessing the Gittite as if he were a Israelite, 'cause God will bless whoever will open up the door. Whoo, I feel like shouting right now. And David was just a buffering, and a buffering, and a buffering, and a buffering, and a buffering, and while he buffered for three months, three months, God ain't sayin' nothin', David isn't sayin' nothin', they both upset, they just a bufferin'.
See, sometimes when we get mad at God, we think that if we stick out our lips and pout long enough that we'll have a tantrum and God will change his mind. And God is saying, "I spat that little temper in you that you got right now, I’m tougher than you are," and so you gotta buffer till you break, and this is how he broke 'em, he started blessing somebody else, hey, hey! David was saying, "I don't care," and they said, "You know, all of Obed-Edom's daughters are pregnant, all of his fields are growing, bringing in twice as much increase. Look like everything Obed-Edom touches getting' blessed," and David said, "I don't care".
'Cause God says if you won't receive this blessing, I will give it to somebody else, and I'll let you watch me bless somebody else with the blessing that was meant for you. I'll do it right in your face. I'll prepare a table and let you be a spectator at a meal I meant for you. And all of a sudden, David begins to humble himself, and he says, "I wanna go back, I do care". Somebody say, "I do care".
Stop lying about what you care about, because the Christos, the anointing is in your care. You're running from the care, 'cause caring hurts, but the anointing is in the caring, that's why God is using something you care about to make you stop being phony, to make you humble yourself down and admit I do need, I do love, I do care, I am thirsty, I am broken. Oh, Lamb of God, I come, I'm on my knees, I fallout, I collapse, I break my alabaster box. I don’t care what people say, I don’t care what they think, I'm willing to let my hair down, I’m willing to get down on my knees, I do care. I don't know who I'm preaching to, but somebody in this room stop saying you don't care about something you do care about, I do care!
And he says I want it back, somebody holler, "I want it back". I don't know what your it is, but I want it back. Say it, "I want it back". Now, why go back if you aren't willing to change? To keep doing the same thing the same way expecting a different result is lunacy. Okay, I'm gonna wrap this up, but I want you to get this. That means you gotta be willing to be rerouted. You have to be willing to change the way you take. You gotta be willing to accept responsibility that the way you did it the first time was wrong. You built a cart, God didn't wanna be on the cart, the cart wasn't Biblical in the first place.
I don't have time to teach it, but God never wanted to dwell on the back of a cart, he wanted to rest on the shoulders of his priests. You messed up, you meant well but you did it wrong, and you have to humble yourself and say, "I got it wrong and I'm willing to change". Somebody holler, "Change". So he said this is what I'm gonna do, let me give you this. These are the things you need to change, three things he changed. He changed his plan.
He said, "This time, when we get it back, I'm not gonna put it on a cart, I'm gonna put him on the backs of the shoulders of the priests. We're gonna make contact with God, we're not gonna let anything stand in between us and God. This time, we're gonna be personally involved. This time, I'm gonna have the weight of glory on my shoulder. I'm not gonna get a ox to bear the weight of the glory, I'm gonna bear the weight of the glory". This time, I'm not gonna take the position and not do the job, I’m gonna put the weight on my shoulder. I'm gonna be responsible, I'm gonna stand up to it, do you hear what... I'm talkin' to somebody, I don't know who it is, but you gotta accept the weight. You can't have the glory and not take the weight.
So number one, he changed his plan, number two, he changed his pace. For the Bible said that when they put the arc of the covenant on the shoulders of the priests, the Bible said they started pacing, and if you read it in the original Hebrew, it means big steps. God said, "If I'm gonna do this in you, you can't be takin' these little, itty-bitty steps," talkin' about gradually, someday, sooner or later, give me time, it just takes me more time, I'm not ready yet. God said I'm not walkin' with somebody that's not ready yet, I’m walkin' with somebody who's gonna take big paces.
I don't know who I'm preaching to today, but this is your season to take big paces. I want somebody to take a big step somewhere. God said I'm gonna walk with you if you take big paces. I'm not gonna walk with you while you feel sorry for yourself and make little, itty-bitty steps, I'm not a God of small steps, I'm a high-steppin' God. I prophesy to you, before the year is out, if you take a big step, God will open up the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing you won't have room to receive. For 30 seconds, give God a crazy praise. I see what we've been doing wrong, we almost got it right. One minute I told you to take big steps, and you took big steps, and the next minute I told you to praise the Lord, and you praised the Lord. But what you gotta do is learn how to take big steps and praise the Lord at the same time. Hallelujah, I bless your name.
Well, I'm almost finished, I feel a rerouting about to take place in your life. This message is a sign that the enemies that you see today, you shall see them no more. This is your breakthrough word, this is your breakthrough season, this is your step-out time, this is your come forth, shout, "Yes"! There's only one problem, I told you there were three points and I only gave you two. Number one, he changed his plan, number two, he changed his pace, but number three, he changed his position. You see, the first time, the people were praising God, but you don't hear where David was praising him. But this time, David got out in front of it, and he started praising God so much that while he was praising God, he started throwing off stuff and giving God the glory.
And the Lord said when you throw your whole self at your blessing, God's gonna open up the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing you don't have room enough... throw everything you got, throw everything you've got. Wait a minute, the Bible said that David started dancing. Jan, the Bible said he danced out his clothes. He danced till he looked like a stripper. The Bible said his wife looked out the window and saw him and got embarrassed 'cause he had stripped off his clothes.
I said, "Lord, what are you saying to me? Do you want us to strip out our clothes"? He said "No, I want you to tell them the reason you have not prevailed is that you have never thrown your whole self at anything I promised you". You thought it wouldn't cost you nothing, but if you throw everything in, God said, "I'll throw everything in". If you give all you've got, I'll give all I got. I'm through preaching to you, but I’m gonna give you three minutes to give God a crazy, supernatural, this is all I got, sanctified praise, give him that praise, give him that praise.
Oh, I gotta stop there, I’m so excited about this I could go on, and on, and on. You know I love to talk anyway, but I gotta go. I want you to know I’m praying for you, I'm believing God with you that the Word of God would dwell in your heart and sink deeply down into the soil of your spirit, and come up bringing forth fruit in your life, your home, and your relationships. Go with God and may God go with you.