Steven Furtick - The Struggle is the Same (Me Too) (01/29/2026)
This sermon from Philippians 1:27-30 focuses on the shared nature of our struggles. Pastor Steven emphasizes that while life's situations change, our core struggles with acceptance, insecurity, and surrender remain the same. He highlights the gift of empathy—saying "me too"—and that victory comes not from overcoming external circumstances, but by winning the internal struggle of surrendering to God's will.
The Gift of a Struggle That Connects Us
Philippians 1, verse 27, the Apostle Paul says, "Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel, without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God. For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him." If that's when you don't say "amen," you say "ouch" to that. "Since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have." Since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had and now hear that I still have.
I want to speak to you from this subject today. Are you ready? Are you ready? Are you ready? I need a little extra energy today. I'm working on very little sleep. Are you ready? Here we go. I want to speak on the subject: The Struggle Is the Same. The struggle is the same. And before I preach that, I want to pray just one more time. God, we thank you that you don't have to add a blessing to the reading or hearing of your word. Your word is already blessed, but we ask that our eyes would be open to see that blessing, and our ears would be open to receive it, and that our faith would be ready to respond to it now. In Jesus' name, and everybody who loves him, shout, "Oh, yeah!"
The new E-Kids album. If you're watching online or perhaps on television, Google it. E-Kids Worship Undefeated, the new album. It's out this week. Who wants a copy? All right. Go buy one. Have you ever noticed that sometimes in life you still struggle with stuff that you thought you would have been over years ago? Sometimes you just assume that when you reach adulthood, for instance, certain things that were a problem in adolescence will not be a problem anymore, but yet you still struggle. It's kind of a disillusionment of youth that you think… I remember being in middle school and watching all the high school kids and thinking that when you get to high school, that that would be like the ultimate.
They were so cool. They seemed to have so much fun. I remember thinking what it would be like to be in high school, how amazing it would be to be in high school, how if you were in high school, all the struggles that you had in middle school, not being able to drive, having all of these restrictions, that they would all be over. And then one day I remember, as they were trying to throw me in the trash can for freshman orientation as a freshman at Berkeley High School, I thought, "So this is high school. This is the struggle-free existence that I looked forward to." By the way, they didn't get me in the trash can. I kicked it over, and I beat them all up, and I hogtied them, and I put them in a basement. Part of that is true.
Wrestling on Different Levels
So, when my boys first got old enough to fight, you know, wrestle, and have good father-son bonding through violence, it took me a while to realize that I'm a little too strong to go full strength in fighting them. Because I want my boys to be tough, and yet at the same time there is such a thing as taking it too far. And when I first started wrestling with my boys, and we would have our Furtick Family MMA matches, and I think I've told you about this before, we all have MMA nicknames. You know, Graham the Man Furtick. Elijah the Stinging Killer B, because his middle initial is B. I am Daddy the Verdict Furtick. The Verdict Furtick. It took me some time to realize that, you know, I need to wrestle them on the level that they're capable of at this point.
And that if I win the match, but they end up crying, it's not so much of a victory as a parent. And so, you know, you learn these things as a parent. One thing that Graham will do, and Graham is actually watching me preach right now, but we were talking about this the other day, how before he will agree to wrestle me, he'll say, "Wait a minute, Daddy, what level are you wrestling on?" And we do it by age categories. You know, is this seven-year-old level? Is this nine-year-old level? Are you going to go 35-year-old level? Which I have been known to do. But he wants to know, what level are we wrestling on? Before he will agree, before he'll sign the contract, before he'll enter into the promotional schedule associated with these fights, he'll want to know what level.
And sometimes, in the middle of our match, when I'm, you know, maybe cranking on an arm bar just a little bit or got him in, you know, not a chokehold, but something similar to a chokehold, he'll say, "Daddy, what level is this? What level is this?" Now, I only bring that up, and I want to get to Philippians 1 in a moment, and I will get there. But do you remember when I preached about Jacob last summer? Those of you who have been in the church a while, it was my favorite series I've ever preached on, because all of Jacob's life was a struggle. And preaching through his life and preaching through his struggles and trying to understand the tensions of his character against his calling, it gave me a whole new perspective on the kinds of people that God uses.
The Same Opponent, a Lifetime Later
We kind of typecast who we think God likes and who we think God casts in the drama of his work on the earth. And then you run across a character like Jacob. And Jacob was born in a struggle. He was actually born wrestling with his brother Esau. He was a twin. And in the womb, which multipurposed as an octagon or a wrestling ring, if you will, Jacob is grabbing at his brother's heel, trying to be first. And that's really stuck with me, because it gave me a picture for how we in life try to be first, try to get ahead, and often find ourselves farther behind, just trying to grab at stuff. When I was preaching in Australia last week, I was sharing a little bit about Jacob. And, you know, I was at that place in Jacob's life where he's 97 years old and he's going to meet with his brother Esau.
By this point, he has really caused a relational rift between he and Esau. In fact, he's stolen his birthright. He's stolen his blessing. And he had to run from Esau for over two decades because Esau was homicidal about it. And after two decades of running, some stuff went down. And you can go listen to the series online. It's called Death to Selfie. But he gets to this point where he has to go back home. Because any conflict you run from is only going to be waiting for you in a future season. Anything you don't deal with will only grow the longer you leave it alone. So Jacob is preparing to go meet his brother Esau one night. And as he does, this man comes up and starts wrestling with him. And while they're wrestling, Jacob's hip goes out of socket.
And while they're wrestling, Jacob discovers something about who he is and he gets a blessing. But the reason I pointed it out just in review is because Jacob that night, while he was planning to go meet his brother Esau and try to reconcile and right what he had wronged with Esau, he has a wrestling match before he meets with Esau that tells us something about the nature of struggle. See, he thought he was going to reconcile with Esau, the same guy he had been wrestling with since before he was born. I want to point out how sometimes in life you can still be wrestling at the end of your life with the same thing you started your life wrestling with. You can still be struggling a century later with the thing you struggled with as just a little kid.
The Real Struggle is Within
And it changes shapes. You know, Esau had grown up and times had changed and situations were different, but it was the same guy waiting on the other side of the stream for Jacob that he had been fighting in the womb. You know, that's so true because in our lives, situations get more sophisticated, but really our struggles are very similar. Our fears that we have in one stage, if we don't deal with them, we carry them into the next stage. But what Jacob found out that night as he wrestled with this man who turned out to be an angel, who turned out to represent the very presence of God, he found out that night that his real struggle wasn't against Esau. His real struggle was within himself. If you haven't figured that out yet, I want you to know that your real struggle is not with another person.
Your real struggle is not with your money. Your real struggle is not with food. Your real struggle is not with your mother-in-law and my mother-in-law, but your real struggle is not with her, because your real struggle, the only struggle that you really need to be focused on to be victorious in life, is the one within, the struggle within. Paul is speaking to the church at Philippi, which he founded. In fact, it's the first church that he founded in what we call Europe. In modern-day Europe, he's writing to them, but he can't visit them, so the next best thing is to write a letter. He can't visit them because he's in prison for preaching the gospel, not for cooking meth, for preaching the gospel. And he's locked up. We don't know exactly where he's in prison, but we know that he can't get to them, so he writes to them.
And I'm kind of glad he couldn't get to them, because if he could get to them, we wouldn't have a recording of what he said to them. Isn't it interesting how God will take terrible circumstances in your life and use them for another purpose? If Paul wouldn't have been in prison, we wouldn't have the book of Philippians. We wouldn't have, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," if Paul had never gone to prison. We wouldn't have "rejoice in the Lord always, I say it again, rejoice," if Paul hadn't been in prison. I wonder what God is doing through your situation right now that he couldn't do if you weren't in a tight spot. But many scholars have called Philippians the happiest book of the Bible, and it was written from a prison cell. Stop blaming your situation and your circumstances for your lack of joy.
Stand Firm, Strive Together
Stop blaming your job for your lack of passion. Stop blaming your singleness for the reason that you're not satisfied in life. Stop blaming the person that you chose to marry for the state of your soul. And he writes these words to them. He says, "Whatever happens." Whatever happens. If you end up in prison or if you end up in a palace, whatever happens. True happiness is not about what's happening. "Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come see you or only hear about you in my absence..." What's he talking about? Well, there's a good chance Paul is going to die in prison. He doesn't know. And he said, "I might not be around much longer, but whether I'm here or whether I'm not, whether I'm watching or whether you're all by yourself, you ought to be governed by your calling, not your circumstance."
"So, I want to know," he said, "that you stand firm in the one Spirit." We have many different backgrounds in our church, don't we? Many different backgrounds, but one Spirit. Many different backgrounds, one mission. Many different backgrounds, one Savior. Many different backgrounds, one cause. He said, "I want to know that you are united." I love this next phrase: "Striving together." You know one thing about a church that's really unique? Most of the time, if you see a business or something, everybody's in it as long as they're winning. If you don't believe me, if you own a business, skip a few paychecks and see who's still with you. Just don't hand them out for like, yeah, I don't know. Just do it twice and see who stays with you. Now, Paul is in prison, and yet the church he founded is still standing with him.
Even though the social stigma of having your preacher in prison is less than desirable, he says, "I want to know that just like you were with me in my success, you're with me in my struggle. And I want to know that just like you're with me in my struggle, that you're with one another in your struggle." That's why you have to be very careful before you drop out of church. You have to be very careful that you don't buy into this little spiritual philosophy that says, "Well, I worship God in my own way. I don't have to attend church because I worship God in nature." That's beautiful. Worship God in nature and come to church, because nature can't pray for you when you get a brain tumor. Nature can't counsel you when your kid starts smoking weed and you find it in their pocket and you don't know what to do about this one.
We Need Each Other in the Struggle
You need some people in your life who are set in place that will join you in the struggle, that will hook up with you in the struggle, that will stand with you and strive with you and stay with you in your struggle. Ask somebody next to you, say, "Will you struggle with me?" That's why I have you touch your neighbor in church, by the way. Because we're supposed to be in this together. I'm not delivering a monologue for your entertainment. This ain't stand-up. We're supposed to be together, coming before God, worshiping God, hearing from God, receiving from God. So when you say, "Amen," that pulls something out of me. When you say, "That's right," that pulls something out of me. When you say, "Preach, preacher," that pulls something out of me. When you say, "Yeah," that pulls something out of me.
When you say, "Say it," that pulls something out of me. When you stand up and wave at me, that pulls something out of me. When you shout at the video screen, that pulls something out of me, even though I can't see you. When you say, "Oh," it lets me know we're in this together. Together. Together. Touch somebody and say, "Let's do it together." Say it just like that. "Together." Amen. Together. You can't do this alone. The church is still relevant. This ain't in my notes. I'm going to probably have to cut something that was important at the end. But we need to continue to extol the relevance and the virtue of assembly. Watching online is good when you're sick or out of town. But when you can get here, you have to get here, because you need to be around some people that will remind you that we're in this together. I've got your back. We can do it if we do it together.
He said, because you have some enemies. Verse 28, "I don't want you to be frightened in any way by those who oppose you." Who is opposing the church at Philippi? It's not exactly clear from the historical record. Our first instinct would be to blame the Judaizers, those Jews in the church that were trying to bring the Christians out of a state of grace and into a place of legalism. That is, if you keep these rules, God will accept you. Jesus came to not only break the rules, but to break their bondage to the rules so that they could live in a way that would truly glorify God from the heart. What Paul was so good at… He wrote all these letters. Okay, so when you say the Old Testament and the New Testament… The New Testament was not one book. It was a collection.
The Same Struggles, Different Situations
It was a collection of gospel accounts where the people who were with Jesus wrote about what they saw, what they heard. Then it was one account about the early church from a physician named Luke. And then pretty much the rest of what we call the New Testament was letters, where people like Paul and John and James, the half-brother of Jesus, would write to the church that they were invested in. And they would write to their specific situations. So Paul, for instance, who wrote the majority of the letters in the New Testament, if he was writing to a church where they had a lot of people that were saying, "It's not by grace you're saved, it's through works." He would write to that specific situation. And he would say, "How can you be saved by grace, but yet keep your salvation through works? No, the grace that got you started is the grace that's going to carry you through."
And he would speak to their specific situation. He would speak to the specific manifestation of their struggle. If he were writing to a church that was in a pagan culture, not a very religious culture, and they were just learning how to live for God, he would talk to them about don't sleep with prostitutes, because he would start on whatever level they were on, and he would speak to their specific struggle. And that's one of the challenges when you're trying to help people as a pastor is to try to kind of like speak to so many different struggles. Somebody I'm preaching to had an abortion this week. Somebody I'm preaching to this week went to three different prayer group meetings. Yet, you know what I found out about people? We all basically share the same struggles. That may sound narrow, or that may sound like an American thing to say, but now I've traveled to many places in the world.
I think I've been to six continents. I've seen a lot of things, and I used to get intimidated when I would go to preach somewhere where they were different than me. You know? Sometimes I've preached in a church where I was the only white guy in the church. Sometimes I've preached in a church where I was the only one who spoke English fluently in the church. Sometimes I've preached in the church where everybody in the room was farmers. One time I went to a little church, and they said, "Now, don't preach against tobacco. We all grow it." I said, "Don't even bother." And even this week, you know, I told you I went to Australia to minister. First time I went to Australia, I was like, "Well, I don't know what Australians are like. I don't know if my sermons will work. I don't know if my humor will translate. I don't know. I don't know."
Now I don't get as nervous anymore when I go to a new place. Because pretty much the same struggles you have, they have. They might drive on a different side of the road, but they still have to sit in traffic. They might pronounce words differently, say words differently, but it's really the same struggle. Jamie Waldron is on our staff. She helped me realize this one week. I had preached a sermon at Charlotte Rescue Mission, one of our outreach partners, and went to go be with the men there. And, you know, they're recovering from a season of homelessness, and I preached this message. That same week, I went and preached at a church leaders' conference. I preached the same message to the church leaders that I did to the men who were homeless. And she wrote me a letter, and I didn't even think about it at the time.
The Universal Struggle for Acceptance
She said, "That's crazy how the same sermon, the same Scripture, the same Word, the same ideas could minister to the guy who's homeless and to the pastor." And sometimes we think that other people don't struggle. You know, if I could be in high school, they don't struggle in high school. If I could make $100,000 a year, boy, I'd never worry about money again. It's funny, because all the people who don't have a lot of money are struggling to get it, and all the ones who do are struggling to keep it. But we are all struggling with money. I said, we're all struggling with money. And the people who have so much don't even know who their friends are, because they don't know what they're liked for. I met a dude recently. How much did they say? They said he was worth a billion. A billion? Yeah. And I thought, wouldn't want to be him. Some of y'all are like, "I will. Let me try." No, no.
I thought, man, I've been around enough people who you would think they don't struggle anymore. You would think they surpassed the place of struggle. I met beautiful people who are insecure about the way they look. I met people with eight-packs who talk about how fat they are. They make you want to slap them, kick them in their abdomen. And I'm realizing, the more I minister to people, that we all struggle. And we struggle for basically the same things. Acceptance. Belonging. Security. I was going to put this in the Stretch Mark series, but y'all are so cool I'm going to put it in now. I heard Oprah Winfrey say that she has interviewed everybody from the child molester to kings and presidents to Beyoncé herself. And at the end of the interview, they all want to know one thing. "Was that okay?" No matter how much success they have, they're still struggling at an inward level to know, is that okay? Did I do all right?
We're all still struggling. And Paul talks here about some kind of struggle that the church at Philippi is engaged in. He said, "There are those who oppose you." And we don't know if it's the Jews in the church or we don't know if it's the pagans outside the church. We don't know. History doesn't tell us. But can I suggest that it really doesn't matter? Like, it really doesn't matter who was opposing the church at Philippi, and it really doesn't matter what's opposing you in your life right now. Because if you can win the struggle within where the real struggle is, if you can overcome the insecurity in yourself, it doesn't matter what opposes you from without. If you can win the one within, you can overcome any struggle without, any deficiency, any bank balance, any doctor's report, any enemy, any critic. If you can win within, all you really have to do is win within.
The Sign of Your Salvation
It doesn't matter who my opponent is when I already know my outcome. It doesn't matter who my opponent is when I already know my outcome. It doesn't matter who opposes me when I already know the outcome. If I already flip to the back of the book and I already see that I won, what am I worried about while I'm in the middle of the war? Remember, they asked me one time in an interview how much criticism affected me. This is a thought that sometimes God will just give it to you, and you don't even know where that came from, but you just thank God for it. I said, "Any external criticism that I have received has only ever damaged me to the level that my internal insecurities enabled it." You can blame people that don't like you, but if you like yourself, you can bless them, you can pray for them, you can feel sorry for them. Because it must suck to be that mad at the world that you have to hate on me and you don't have a big enough life yourself.
Am I preaching good, Mary Kay executives and company? Am I? He said, "It doesn't matter who opposes you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved." So the same struggle that you've been taking for a sign that you're going to be destroyed is actually a sign that you're going to be delivered. Because if the Devil could have destroyed you, he would have by now. But the fact that you're still struggling is a sign that you're going to make it! You are! Come on, let's preach. Let's preach. Let's preach. "For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him but also to suffer for him, since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had and now hear that I still have." I can't believe Paul would say something like that.
You know, because although we all deal with the same struggles, we don't all struggle with the same situations. Paul is writing from prison to a church that is free, and he gives them a gift. I'm going to tell you what the gift is. He gives them the gift of empathy. He said, "The same way I'm struggling, I know you're struggling." And he takes the next three chapters to encourage them in their struggle, but before he encourages them in their struggle, he identifies with it. He says, "The same struggle I have, chained to this Roman guard, I know you have." And they must have read it and thought, "Well, not Paul. Our problems are bad, but they're not that bad." You know. Hashtag first world problems. Come on, Paul. I mean, we're not in prison. And it must have shocked them that he would say something like that. He said, "I know you're struggling just like I am. And I know your struggle and my struggle are the same." It's a gift called empathy.
The Power of "Me Too"
One of the reasons God will let you go through struggles is so that he can give you the gift of comfort so you can give others the gift of empathy. Now, empathy is not the gift of, you know, "I feel for you." That's sympathy. Empathy is, "Man, I feel you." Sympathy is when you say, "Oh, I feel for you. Something like that happened to me one time, and here's what I did." That's sympathy. Shut up. When you really empathize with somebody, you call and you just say, "I'm so sorry. I'm here." One of our staff lost his father last week. When I called him, I didn't get to talk to him. I had to leave him a voicemail, but it was less than 50 seconds, because he don't need seven steps to deal with the death of your father right now. I know because I lost my father. I said, "I love you. I'm sorry. You're a good man. You're a good son. Let me know if you need me, day or night." That's empathy.
If I hadn't lost my dad, I probably would have called him and said, "During this tough time, just keep your head up." You have to know that's sympathy. Empathy is, you hurt, I hurt. You struggle, I struggle. Sometimes what you need the most in those times is not somebody's words, but somebody's presence, somebody's assurance. This will help us in our parenting, and it will certainly help us as a church in our efforts to reach people. See, for so long the church has been known for two words: "You should." Usually we follow it with "not." We'll even get King James about it sometimes. "Thou shalt." You remember when we were talking about my book, Lisa, and you were telling me about in the first chapter, in the first chapter of your book, you can't start just showing everybody all the information that you have and all the things you know. That's great. That can be in the book.
But the thing that needs to happen when they first start reading the book is not, "You should." The first thing they say when they read your book, they need to hear you saying to them, that reader that's reading that book, they need to hear you saying, "Me too." And they need to read your struggle and say, "Me too." The two most powerful words you will use to minister to somebody are not, "You should," because half the time they already know what they should be doing. Can I be real? They already know what they should be doing. What they really need most of the time is just for somebody to say, "Me too." There it is. That's the two most powerful words you can use when somebody is hurting. You can get into the advice, but you have to start like Paul did in Philippians chapter 1 and say, "Me too." Just like you're chained emotionally, I'm chained physically. Our situation isn't the same, but our struggle is.
Jesus, Our "Me Too" Savior
It must have shocked them that the great apostle Paul would get down on their level and relate to their struggle. This is the guy who wrote most of the New Testament, and he's identifying with these nameless people at the church of Philippi saying, "We're all in this together. Me too. Me too. You cry sometimes. Me too." You know what the hardest thing about preaching is for me? It's staying up here on this stage. Do you ever notice how I come out to the edge when I preach? It's nerve-wracking for Holly. She's told me before. She said, "You know, you just make me so nervous. And it's just a matter of time. One day I am going to come falling off, and hopefully the people in the front row will love me." But in my heart of hearts, and I have to be up here because it's good for the lights and the campuses and all that, but where I really want to be…
And I used to do this in the early days of the church back at the Providence High School. What's up, Providence? I used to get down on that floor, and when I was preaching and it wouldn't feel like it was connecting, I'd come down off that stage. Because I like to look people in the eye, make them uncomfortable, you know, violate their personal space, and just get down here and say, "Me too! Me too!" I think that's part of what a good sermon is. It's just somebody saying, "Me too! Me too! You mean you yelled at your kids this week? Me too! You yelled at them this morning? Me too! You yelled at them right before you came to preach? Me too!" That's what I want to say. That's what I want to say. "You mean you wore pink pants to church?" I can't put that on my thing, but… "You mean you have doubts sometimes about some of the stuff you read in the Bible and you can't reconcile, and it doesn't make sense, and you just have to trust God? Well, I trust this as your word, but I don't understand it. Me too! I don't understand everything in the Bible!"
Remember the first time we had lunch and you said, "The favorite thing I told you was that I lose my temper." You said, "That's immediately your favorite thing." It wasn't something deep I said. It was just me saying, "Me too! Me too!" I'm saying, "You tried to pray this week, and you fell asleep? Me too! You ate a whole bag of Doritos by yourself this week at 11:30 PM? Me too! Me too! You wanted to cuss somebody out in traffic this week? Me too! Me too! But I remembered I had a sticker on my car, so I couldn't, but I wanted to! Me too! Me too!" Touch everybody you can reach and say, "Me too! Me too! You're not crazy! Me too! You're not the only one! Me too! You're not in this by yourself! Me too! Me too! Me too! Me too! I hurt! Me too! Me too! I struggle, Me too! Me too! If Paul struggled, you'll struggle! If Paul suffered, you'll struggle! Me too, man! Me too, sweetheart! Me too, bro! Me too!"
I want this to be a "Me too" church. Me too! Me too! Me too. Me too. And I'm so glad that Paul didn't get his ministry example from the Pharisees, because they stood up on the stage and preached down to people about what the people weren't doing right. But Paul didn't take his ministry cues from the Pharisees. Paul learned how to minister by watching Jesus. And see what Jesus did that the Pharisees wouldn't do is he got down from the main stage of heaven, and he came to earth in the form of a little baby, and he started to step down the staircase of heaven by being born to a virgin in Bethlehem. And he walked on the earth, and he suffered like you suffer, and he struggled like you struggle, and he was tempted like you were tempted, and he came down where you are so you could know when you struggle you've got a God who doesn't stand on a stage but steps into your situation and says, "Me too! Me too! Me too!"
If the Struggle is the Same, So is the Strength
High five five people! Tell them, "Me too! Me too! For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but where you were tempted, he was tempted, he was tempted, and where you were tested, he was tested, and where you failed, he succeeded, and where you fell, he got up." Can't you hear heaven the same saying, "Me too! Me too!" Jesus said, "If the world hates you, don't worry about it! They hated me too! But I have good news! If you struggle like Jesus struggled, if you carry your cross like he carried his cross, if you struggle with him, if you share in his struggle, you get to share in his strength! If the struggle is the same, so is the strength! And the same power that raised Jesus from the grave now lives in you! Me too!" Shout it off! Say, "Me too! Me too! If he got up, I can get up!" Please stand. Please stand. Please stand. Come on, clap your hands and give God a praise. I'm out of time. I'm out of time. I wish I could keep going.
Yeah. Yeah, you were supposed to say, "Me too." I've told you this story before, and I'll make it brief. But when the church first started growing, I started meeting with a professional counselor, and I wanted to make sure my internal struggles didn't outstrip our external success as a church. A lot of times when you see somebody's success, you underestimate the struggles it took them to get there. I meet a lot of people who will admire someone's success, and they want to share in that success, but they don't want to share in the struggle. That's kind of what Paul is saying here. He's saying, of all the ways that God has used me, I want you to see not only my successes but my struggles. I went to meet with a counselor. Now it's been about eight years ago. I've met with him for several years.
Circling the Same Struggle at a Deeper Level
Toward the end of our time meeting together, I had already given him the equivalent of Graham's college fund. One day I kind of blew up a little bit. That's what I pay him for. I'll tell him how. I said, "I'm so sick of myself." He said, "Why would you say something like that?" I said, "Because I'm still struggling with the same stuff I was struggling with when I first started meeting with you. I'm still struggling, matter of fact, with the same stuff I was struggling with as a seven-year-old boy. I'm still struggling. God has been so good to me, and I know so much, I've learned so much, and I have so many people in my life, but yet I'm still struggling, and I'm sick of myself, and I'm sick of my struggle." Have you ever felt that way? Raise your hand. "I'm still fighting with Esau after a century of living." I said, "I'm sick of myself. I'm still circling the same struggle."
He said, "Well, that's one way to look at it." God. I said, "Well, give me the other way." He said, "Well, you may be still struggling the same way, and you may be still circling the same struggle, but I've noticed you're not circling it at the same level anymore." He said, "Now you're circling it at a deeper level, because you used to just talk about your behaviors, and now you're starting to talk about your motivations." So I was... He was getting to a deeper level. He was saying, "I see you still struggling, but I also see you getting stronger. Struggle makes you stronger. To me, I thought the mountains in my life were something that either I should be able to climb or God should remove. But he said, "God gave you that to circle so you could circle at a deeper level. He gave you the struggle to develop your strength."
So he said that, and I said, "Man, that's good. Anything else?" He said, "Yeah." He said, "You're also struggling at a higher level or circling it at a higher level." I said, "Man, that doesn't make sense. You can't circle deeper and higher at the same time." He said, "Yeah, yeah. You're circling it deeper in your heart, but from your perspective, you've got more altitude now, and you're not letting things get you down as much and as long and as often anymore. So you've got more perspective now." Boy, I could do a whole message off of that, and I will. I'm going to pick that up on stretch marks. I'm going to pick that up a little bit next week. But I heard a preacher say one time that there was only one time in Jesus' life that he struggled. Only one time. That when he opened blinded eyes, he didn't struggle to do it. In fact, he was so good at opening blind eyes, it was so easy for him.
The One Struggle That Unites Us All
He would make up creative ways to do it just to keep from getting bored, I guess. You know, one way he'd touch the person, and the next time he'd spit on the ground and make mud and rub it in their eyes. It was just that easy for him. However he wanted to do it, he did it. He didn't struggle for lame people to get up and walk. There was no grunting when Jesus got a lame person to their feet and they walked. He didn't struggle to teach, preach. He did that effortlessly. The only time you ever see Jesus struggle, this preacher said, was in a garden where he was going to sacrifice himself for our sin. And he knew that on that cross that he was about to face, he would have to be separated from his Father in heaven for our sin. And this is the only time you ever see Jesus struggle. Blind eyes, I can do that. The lame walking, I can do that. Teaching, I can do that.
He never struggled except that one time the Bible says he prayed so hard and he struggled so much that his sweat became like drops of blood. The pressure of his struggle literally burst his capillaries. He was struggling so much. He prayed, "Father, if there is any other way, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will but yours be done." That was the struggle. It was my will or your will. Now, I want to tell you that you're going to face many different situations in your life. And some of you are going through situations that are much more difficult than their situation or their situation. But I don't care how many situations we can name in this room today. There's really only one struggle that unites us all, and it's called surrender. That's the real struggle of your life. You might be in a wrestling match, a struggle with life right now, going, "God, what level is this on? This feels like 50-year-old level. God, I'm only 23. God, what level are we on?"
But the only struggle you really have to win is to say, "Nevertheless, not what I want but what you want." And if you can win that struggle within, Jacob, you don't have to worry about Esau. If you can win that struggle within, everything else will some kind of way work out in your life. If you could just lift your hands to him. In fact, right now, if you just lift your hands in the air and say, "God, I surrender. I surrender my agenda. I surrender my plans. I surrender my dreams. I surrender my ways. Jesus, I receive your strength. I receive your power. I receive the same strength that raised Jesus from the grave. I declare it's working in me and for me and through me right now in the name of Jesus." We declare it. Everybody who believes it, shout hallelujah.