Beth Moore - Compelling - Part 5
One of the things that it has been very beneficial to me in my walk because I do come from a background of defeat, is that one of the things that would get to me is that I could not imagine particularly early in my walk to freedom, I could not imagine that I would still be free of certain addictions and of certain things in a year. It was overwhelming to me. I just couldn't picture it, and it almost made me feel like I should quit before I even got started. I wonder if anybody can relate with what I'm saying because I thought, "I'm going to fall back into it. I always have and this is gonna be my pattern. This is gonna happen again". And it felt so defeated because I thought, "It's just a matter of time, anyway".
And so somebody in here knows exactly what I'm talking about and I cannot begin to tell you what a help it was to me early on when God began to really press in to me. I'm gonna put into words what wasn't in words, but it was something that just came with such clarity to my understanding. I felt like God was saying something like this to me: "Okay, but could you get through today"? "Well, probably". "Give me this day my daily bread. Just this day. Can you get through today"? I am telling you, particularly in those early days, and when I tell you, I had my spiral with my Scriptures on it, but my mind was so defeated and I had so much pain in my background. I come from a background, childhood, of victimization and sexual abuse, and as if that is not enough, I did what many people like me who've had those boundaries mown down, I don't remember any boundaries whatsoever, so I never had any.
Now, there are some people that do that differently, and I'm thankful for that. I was not one of 'em. Literally, the word "no" was not even in my vocabulary. I don't even know how to tell you, I wouldn't have thought I could say it. I felt overpowered instantly. Anything, any kind of bully completely shut me down. If I even thought you were a bully, you'd shut me down. You didn't even have to prove to be one. I mean, it just was like, it was a miserable mess. And I could remember that in the early days when I wanted so much, I knew I was gonna have to think differently to live differently. That was the only way it was gonna work is I had to re-wallpaper my mind and I had to get it, and so I began to memorize Scripture.
That was my... I still do it to this day. I am always working on something that I'm memorizing out of Scripture because it is the way that I keep my mind renewed, that I don't go back to those old patterns of bitterness, who I don't wanna forgive, who I wanna be mad at, all our offenses, the things that we get all obsessed with. I needed out of that whole cycle of defeated thinking. And so this was my beginnings of my way out. And I would go to the grocery store during this really early part of it, when it, I could feel that draw back in. You know what I'm talking about? And listen, again, I want to say to you, I had a heart for God. But I had a broken heart that was so addicted to defeat, I did not know what to do. And I would push around my grocery cart with saying my Scriptures right in front of me. I mean, one right after another. One right after another, one right after another, one right after another.
And that was the way I lived. That was the way I lived until my mind started breaking free and I don't mean the Bible study, I mean the real thing that the Bible study is written on. I mean to begin where I would begin to realize that I had not thought about X, Y, Z until 2 o'clock in the afternoon, until 5 o'clock in the evening, until maybe 10 o'clock at night. And I'd realize that the next morning, oh my word, I slept. I slept. And just living off of him, just one day at a time. And what happens is that these little singular days of victory start getting stuck together, just here comes one and here comes another one, not perfectly lived, but victory. Not falling back into a stronghold of sin.
Here comes another one, and a month and 2 months. And a year, and 2 years. And 3 years and 4 years, then 10 years. And 20 years. And when you experience something like that, and you come to realize what he said works. It works. And I wanna tell everybody. I just wanna jump up and down and go, "It works. What he said works". You shall know the truth, not the truth shall sit on your bedside table. But you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. My word will live in you and it will abide in you and you will abide in me. And things start happening, and lives are transformed. I have an 8-month-old puppy that is awful. Absolutely terrible. I'm going to show you what she has done to the inside of my shoe. I just wear 'em anyway, because see, this here is where she's chewed on the back of it. The shoes I had on earlier today, same exact thing. The back of 'em is chewed off because this is what this puppy does.
But this is somebody in this room. It's like something's nipping at your heels all the time, just nipping at your heels. Everywhere you go, I mean, the enemy's just after you, just after you, just after you, just after you, just after you. There's this glorious place at the very end of the book of Romans where Paul says to the Roman believers, "God will soon crush Satan under your feet. He will soon crush Satan under your feet". After all of those times that he has nipped at the back of your heel and tried to drag you back into what God has freed you from, one of these days you're just gonna step right back on him and crush him. Anybody know what I'm talking about? I need somebody to know in the house, this ends well.
Does anybody know what I'm saying to you? I am saying, this believing life you're living, however hard it may be right now, however big your challenges may be to live faithfully in the Spirit of the living Christ, I want you to understand something. This thing ends well. I need to hear somebody say, "Amen". Oh, it ends well. Acts chapter 20:22 through 24, and then I want you to see a passage in 2 Timothy 4. "And now I am on my way to Jerusalem, compelled by the Spirit," everybody say, "compelled by the Spirit". "Not knowing what I will encounter there, except that in every town the Holy Spirit warns me that chains and afflictions are waiting for me. But I consider my life of no value to myself". Doesn't say "no value". "My purpose is to finish my course and the ministry I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of God's grace". You have six points already and I wanna hear every one of 'em. Would you say them with me.
Number one, "We have everything it takes to be the most compelling people on earth".
Number two, "In an effort to be culturally compelling, we have forfeited our uniqueness".
Number three, "We get to live a life worth dying for".
Number four, "We have a legacy both of bold truth and bold tenderness".
Number five, "We're called to relationships that would be the envy of the world".
Number six, "We are recipients of prophetic insights, partial but plenty". Would you turn with me to 2 Timothy chapter 4, verses 16 through 18. These are the final words of the apostle Paul in print. I mean, he knows he's about to die. He's telling Timothy this, and this is beloved Timothy. God had not ordained that Paul would have natural children so these sons of the faith were he called 'em "my true sons," Titus and Timothy and no telling how many others. This beautiful family of faith. There's this place at the very end of Romans where he refers to Rufus's mother. He gives greetings to Rufus's mother, "who was also a mother to me".
That's the beauty of the faith is that you can parent people when you've not had any natural children, you've got "great are the children of those that may be barren because you have all of this tent that you can open wide to draw in people to bring up in the faith". It is the most beautiful thing. And so, truly, this young man who is as much blood to him as any of us could ever imagine in natural terms, even more so in the Spirit.
And he says to him in his closing out of the letter, it says in 16 through 18: "At my first defense, no one stood by me, but everyone deserted me. May it not be counted against them. But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that I might fully preach the word and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion's mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil work and will bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever! Amen". I want somebody to hear this when it says that he had a time when he was just all alone and deserted and the Lord stood by him and strengthened him to fulfill his calling. We will all have, almost certainly, at least a season or seasons like that.
It's imperative that you know and that I know what it is like to simply get through something on Jesus alone. One of the things we need to do is just forgive people that did not come through for us because we wanted them to be a false Christ for us and they didn't live up to it. And we don't realize that there are times when it's not just them, it's God doing this because he's saying, you know, "This is where you and me", do you realize that it, "compares to me, to Jesus in the Garden. When the three that he was the closest to, that he left them there and he had to go further". He says, "He went further still into the Garden where he just like, sweat blood and cried out in trembling and tears before the Lord".
And then the cross was on the other side of that. After all the miracles he had done, the thing he had come to do was on the other side of his Gethsemane. I always think to myself that perhaps and perhaps it was the way he bore the cross privately before he bore it publicly, was in that place where there just was nothing but resolve. Lord, you can take this from me, but if you don't, I wanna do as you will and not as I will. That struggle, that earnest crying out, on the other side of that was the most important thing he came to do. He could have performed all of those miracles, but we still would have been lost.
And I wanna say this to you. Sometimes, on the other side of that very intense time, when it's just you and Jesus, and you're thinking, "Where is everybody right now? Where are they? Why is it my phone is usually blowing up, and not one person has texted me? So-and-so has not called me. No one has checked on me. I'm nearly dying here, and no one's reaching out to me". There is something about the intensity of that time with Jesus. And very often, I'm not making a rule of this. I just want you to think clearly about it. Very often, on the other side of that intensity, when it is just the two of you, what lay on the other side of that is the single most important thing you were put on the planet to do. If we demand to be surrounded every second, we will not know the level of that intimacy.
I'm gonna tell you something. There are so many things I don't know, but I can tell you what never occurs to me, that Jesus would not be real and that I have an imaginary friend. Not ever. No one I made up could possibly have gotten me through what God has gotten me through. No one. There is a personal situation I live with on an ongoing basis that is not playing around. I'm just not free to explain it. Maybe someday, I will. But I am telling you a long-term and by anyone's standard, a very, very difficult, unrelenting situation. It eases up some and then it comes back with a force, and I mean, this has just been the way of life. I promise you I would not have made it without Jesus. There was no imaginary friend to get me through. I promise you that he has been more real to me at times than anyone I could touch with my fingertips or see with my physical eyes.
On the other side of that, maybe the most important part of what you're doing on the planet will stay there forever. It'll stay there longer than he means for you to, but if you've got a time of intensity with Jesus, take it. Take it. Bear it. Come to know him. Tell him you will not make it without him and you will not have to. You will not have to. I want you to see something here that he says. It has always blown my mind. It says in verse 18: "The Lord will rescue me from every evil work and will bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom". This is our final point and I'll wrap up: "Though we walk in harm's way, we shall make it safely home". Remember when Paul declared to them, the whole counsel, and so he was committed not to just tell them what was fun, but to tell them what was also hard and challenging and I'm gonna tell you something. We live in harm's way. We do. We do on planet Earth, everybody does. I mean, this is a cold world and it is a dark world and parts of it are very evil world.
There are things that happen, accidents happen, tragedies happen. But I'm gonna tell you this and I wanna speak very, very frankly with you. One reason why we have got to stand up, draw the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God, have the shield of faith which is faith, faith, that extinguishes all the fiery darts of the enemy. Reason why we've got to get up in Christ and be mighty in him is because we have no idea what is coming for our great-grandchildren. No idea. What we have had to suffer by way of a little bit of annoying persecution here and there, let me tell you, the Word of God is already telling us in advance that difficult days are ahead for the people of God as it gets closer and closer and closer to the time of Christ's return. And we've got to be mighty and we've got to be brave.
And so here's what I'm gonna tell you. I mean, we're in harm's way. We've got a very, very vile and powerful unseen enemy, but greater is he who is in us than he who is in the world. We're more than overcomers in Christ Jesus. In him, we have the strength to do anything he calls us to do and without him we can do nothing. But we will make it safely home. I'm gonna tell you what blew my mind about this and what was a game-changer for me, is because the apostle Paul is the one who wrote this under the inspiration of the Spirit. He is writing to Timothy because he knows what's coming. He is in no time at all, he's in Rome writing this from prison. In no time at all, he is gonna lose his head and he knows it. He will be led out and he will be taken to the place of beheading and there will be a blade come down over his neck and he will lose his head for the gospel, and he knows he's going to. He tells him, "I am about to depart. I have finished my race. I have completed it. I now have in store for me the crown of righteousness".
And so I ask you this question before we leave today: What part of having your head cut off is being delivered safely home, hm? That does not seem "safely home" to me. I don't know what your idea of getting safely home is but, to me, it would not be losing your head. It would not be a pool of blood. And yet, it happens all the time. Not beheadings. Car wrecks, cancers, drunk drivers, maybe you're the drunk driver. Things happen all the time. I want you to listen to this carefully and to the degree the Holy Spirit would enable you to receive it, I want you to get this down, so far down, that the enemy can never unearth it. Listen carefully to what I'm gonna say to you. You will be delivered safely home. I don't know how to explain how this works. I only know that it is the absolute gospel truth. I want you to listen carefully to me. We will arrive safely home, no matter how we get there, we will arrive safely home.
I wanna remind somebody, if this is familiar to you, of these wonderful words from the hymn "Come Thou Fount": "Here I raise my Ebenezer, hither by thy help I come. And I hope by thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home". We will safely arrive home. Listen carefully. Every terminally ill infant will be delivered safely into his heavenly kingdom. Every Christian martyr in Eastern Europe and the Middle East will be delivered safely into his heavenly kingdom. Every believer killed by a drunk driver will be delivered safely into his heavenly kingdom. Every believer lost at sea will be delivered safely into his heavenly kingdom. Every man on death row who came to know Jesus will be delivered safely into his heavenly kingdom.
I don't know how it works. All I know is it is the truth. And all I know is this: that when we get there, none of us are gonna say, "You did not deliver me safely into the heavenly kingdom". We're gonna look around us and go, "Safely home. Safely home. Safely home". A mother see her son that she died so concerned about, didn't know if he was in the faith or not. He just lived like the devil. After she's gone, the Lord saves him and she sees him one day in eternity, safely home. Safely home. The worst of all acts of violence cannot keep Jesus from bringing you safely home. Do you understand what I am saying to you? I want you to stand to your feet. So he just, like, ends that letter going, "So, I was rescued from the lion's mouth".
Man, we have such an adventure. It's real. The perils are real, the turmoil is real. I just found it so interesting that when Paul is listing all the terrible things he's been through, I mean, like how many times he's been shipwrecked, how many times he's been beaten, how many lashes he's had, how many times he's gone hungry, and he says, "Not to even mention the anxiety I feel over all the churches". I thought it was the strangest thing that he throws that in to his level of suffering. I mean, there's just so much that drives us crazy here. But we got this long, this long. This long. Y'all, let's do it. Let's do the thing. What you got going better than Jesus?