Steven Furtick - God Is Preparing You
This is an excerpt from: Rags to Righteous
I’m talking about God our Father who is never against us, who is always for us, but sometimes what he wants for you is so much greater than what you want for you, because God thinks legacy while you think lunch. God thinks destiny while you think desire. «What do I want right now»? God knows what he’s walking you into, so sometimes, while you are so worried about messing up your fit, God is trying to protect your future. Therefore, when we say, «God is not against me,» we cannot assume that means God will always be in complete agreement with us any more than I allowed Elijah to take off his helmet so it didn’t clash with his shoes.
This is so important as we understand the context of the Scripture I read you, because God has a prophet named Jeremiah. Jeremiah, of course, was a priest who ministered to the southern kingdom of Judah just before they were destroyed. They were destroyed because of their disobedience. I want to point that out. They were destroyed not because it was their destiny but because they were disobedient. Do you ever notice how a lot of things we call destiny really, if we look at it, dissect it, take it for what it is, and don’t deny it… Really, what we call destiny sometimes was a series of decisions we made. Looking back at it, we say, «That’s just the way it happened. That’s just the way it went. That’s just the way it unfolded, and there was nothing I could do». Yet throughout the book of Jeremiah, we see that what we call destiny is a collection of decisions.
In many ways, Jeremiah exists to turn the nation back to God, but knowing they would not turn back to God, God sends him as a warning, and then, after they are taken captive into Babylonian exile… I know I’m covering a lot, but I have to, because you have to understand why Jeremiah is in this pit when we pick up in verse 6. Really, Jeremiah’s words did not accomplish the purpose he intended them to accomplish; therefore, it would be easy to assume that he failed, yet he did not fail. The Bible says as he prophesied and told the people, «You really do need to surrender and turn back to God…» In this particular case, he was telling them, «You need to just go ahead and go along with what God is doing».
In this particular instance, God was sending the Babylonians to take his people captive for a season to bring them back to him for a greater purpose in the future. God is allowing something in their life in order to bring them into alignment with him for their future. Sometimes what God allows is for alignment. When God sees your life getting out of alignment with the word he has spoken and the purpose he desires to achieve, he will allow something in your life even if it feels like an attack. God will use the attack of the Enemy to bring you into alignment with himself. Tell me he won’t do that. Tell me he won’t make you put your bicycle helmet on and take your phone if you want, because he’d rather take your phone than for you to crush your skull.
I know this isn’t what you expected when we started, because I said, «God is not against me»! Yet I’m telling you that God is against some of the things that hurt you. God is not against you, but he is against some of the fake stuff you call you that is not you that rots you and robs you of what he calls you. Now, Jeremiah kept coming to the king and saying, «I’m telling you, you need to go with what God is doing. You should have turned earlier. You didn’t, but now if you just surrender, God will save you,» and they still won’t surrender.
So, these four officials, these four cronies of the king, the cabinet of the king, the guys who tell him what he wants to hear… They say, «You need to deal with Jeremiah. You need to lock Jeremiah up. Let’s put him in a cistern. Let’s find one of those things that holds water, and let’s throw him in there so he will shut up. He’s discouraging everybody because he’s preaching negativity». He wasn’t preaching negativity; he was preaching repentance. Repentance is the process by which when you find yourself in a pit, you stop digging. That’s what repentance is. Repentance is realizing, «Oh! I’m in a pit. Maybe I should stop digging».
The best strategy when you find yourself in a pit of sin is to stop digging. Let me just see if I’m the only one here who came to church willing to be honest and vulnerable and open today. How many have ever found yourself in a pit because of your own sin? Let’s try that again. How many of you have found yourself sinking deeper and deeper into something God tried to get you to stop sooner? How many of you waited until the consequences got so bad…? How many of you waited until the pain became so severe…? How many of you waited until the point where now you have to pray three times as long, because now you have 10 times as many issues?
If you just would have said something when you started sinking… «God is not against me»! He’s always for me, and he’s always with me. He’s always with me, and he’s always for me. So, now we have to answer the big question of Jeremiah 38:6. Let’s go back to that Scripture again, because now you’re really ready for it. It says, «So they took Jeremiah and put him into the cistern…» The cistern isn’t very big in diameter, only about three feet, but then it has a bulb at the bottom, because it’s 15 feet deep, and the deeper it goes the wider it gets. These cisterns were meant to collect rainwater, not human bodies. Yet in the nation of Israel, there was not much water to be found. The Bible says there was only mud in this cistern.
Look at it again. «They lowered Jeremiah by ropes into the cistern; it had no water in it, only mud, and Jeremiah sank down into the mud». That makes sense if Jeremiah sinned. I understand sinking when you sin, because I’ve done it. I understand sinking when you’re bitter, because I’ve been it. I understand sinking in an addiction, because I’ve dealt with that. I understand sinking in my own dumb decisions. How many of you have ever sunk in stupid? It isn’t even always sin. Sometimes you just bought a time-share. There’s not necessarily a Bible verse about that, but nature reveals… You’re still sinking 762 months later, and you’ve been there three days, and it has roaches.
Now we must ask the question. If Jeremiah was speaking for God, if Jeremiah was serving God and not sinning and not stupid… We’ve all sunk before because we sinned, and we’ve all sunk before because we were stupid. When you’re sinking in sin, you repent. What do you do when you are sinking while serving? This is the question I came to have a conversation about today. I’m serving God. I’m not saying I’m perfect, but I’m serving God, and I’m sinking. It would surprise you where some of my sermons come from. It would.
Some of my sermons, if you asked me where I got them from, I would have to tell you honestly I got them from the mud. Some of my sermons I preach to you… I must be honest with you. They came not because I was so high and not because I was so holy and not because I was so right and not because I was so righteous and not because I was so brilliant and not because I was so bold. Some of my sermons that I preach to you… I got them from a muddy place. Muddy messages. I know my boots are clean at this moment, but some of the stuff I’ve walked through and that you’ve walked through to be in your seat today would surprise somebody.
Some of the messages you get in your life come from the mud. Some of the things you help people with are from the hell you’ve been through that you don’t want anybody else to go through. So you tell them, «I’ve been through this hell so I could hand you this helmet so I can tell you…» That’s called a callback. Remember the helmet from the bicycle? Remember when he was mad because I made him wear the helmet? I told him, «I don’t want you to have to go through hell when you could just put on this helmet». I don’t want you to have to suffer the consequences when you could just listen to God. I don’t want you to have to go through 16 sexual partners to find out that you can’t get it from that, and after they’re gone, you’re still left with you. If you can’t be complete in Christ, nobody can complete you.
See, you have to get this from the mud. The people who are praising God on this point have been through something. The people who are cute are still not climbing out yet. When you’ve been stuck in something and finally take a step out of it, it’ll make you jump up and holler. «Look how he lifted me when nothing else could help»! Nothing but mud in the cistern, and Jeremiah, God’s man, is in the mud. What is God’s man doing in the mud? What is a prophet doing in a pit? I thought if you worked for God he would work it out for you. «Working through me…» I thought God was fighting for you. So, shouldn’t Jeremiah 38:6 read thusly? «So they took Jeremiah and tried to put him into the cistern, but the angel Gabriel grabbed them by the throat and said, 'Touch not mine anointed.'»
So, this is what I’m learning, because I talk to people who love Christ and have cancer. I talk to people who raised their kids in the fear and admonition of the Lord, and their kids still went buck wild crazy and never wore a helmet. I could say other stuff. Pray for me. I feel unfiltered right now. I don’t want this message to get so muddy you miss the heart of it. The point of it is you can do everything right and things still go wrong. I release every parent of the parental guilt that says, «If you would have put them in the special school when they were 2-½ years old… If you would have taught them Spanish by the time they were 4, they would have been doctors. They would have been the president».
First of all, they can’t be the president until they’re over 80, apparently. I told you it’s getting muddy. This is the dirty version today, I guess. It’s good to be back home. You can’t say this kind of stuff just anywhere. I can’t talk like this in Philadelphia. We were talking about Jeremiah, God’s man in the mud. Notice how it said he sank down into the mud. Now, I’m just going to minister this for a moment, because it seems to me very important. Strong people sink. If we want to get really technical about it, the more weighty the object, the more quickly and deeply it sinks. Strong anointing means strong attacks. Now I see why he was sinking…because he was saying something.
Now I see why he was under attack…because he was valuable. Now I see why he was under attack…because he had an assignment. Do you understand that about your life, that your assignment to glorify God, your assignment to shine a light for Christ, your assignment to make a difference in the lives of others will sometimes cause you to sink?