Steven Furtick - Your Blessing Is Already In Motion
This is an excerpt from: Places Everyone
So, we change in the presence of God, and as the person changes, so does the place. You can even show up to a place you used to hate. Some of you hate going home. Look straight ahead right now. I promise you, if you're with your family, the best strategy is to keep your eyes on me. Holly has a great teaching on marriage that she does, and it simply goes like this: in marriage, when I change me, I change we. Is it possible that you keep changing places, keep running around like, "Yeah, well, I was in that relationship, but they were kind of…" You said that same thing about the last 13 relationships. Now I'm kind of suspicious about what you're running from. Is it the relationship you're running from or is it really something that's inside of you? I had a guy say it so brilliantly. We were at the mountains, and I ran into a guy in a gym at the hotel. I asked, "Where do you live?" and he said the name of a really nice beach.
Then, after he said the name of the nice beach… How many of you love to go to the beach? I do too. He said, "I live at the beach, but sometimes I just have to come here to get away". I thought, "Where I'm always trying to get to, he's trying to get away from". Everybody is running from something. The saddest thing of your life would be to run from something that you have said is outside and refuse to deal with what is inside. Now we see how powerful this one verse of Scripture is in Acts 3:1. "One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the time of prayer—at three in the afternoon". Isn't it crazy that they would be going to the temple where they have spent their entire lives in training, where they have spent their entire lives in tradition, but this time…? This is what's different this time.
I want you to catch this for your own situation. You might hate to go home not because home is so bad but because you're not showing up fully and completely. You might ruin something by running that God could have restored if you would have received what he had for you. I don't want that for you, so let me tell you the difference. All their life they went to the temple. They went to pray. They went to get sacrifices made, but Jesus is their sacrifice now. They don't need that sacrifice anymore. They went to the temple, but it's different this time. Before, they went to the temple. This time, they were sent to the temple. That is a shift that, if you get it, will change every place you set your foot. That's what God told Joshua. "Every place you set your foot I will give you".
What that means to me is God is not just allowing my life to be random. God is not just allowing you to live in Fort Mill until you can get a job transfer back to Miami where you really want to be. God did not just allow you to pass through this season because he didn't have any connecting flights available and the angels couldn't carry you. None of that is true. It's not really random; it's for a reason that you're here. It's for a reason. The reality of the fact is there was a mission on God's agenda that day that was not on Peter's calendar. How many know that sometimes God doesn't synchronize his agenda with your awareness? I should let that set in. That sentence right there… That is a bar.
Let me say it again. He doesn't synchronize his agenda with your awareness. That means he's up to stuff he doesn't let you in on, but the Holy Spirit will bridge the gap. When you're in a season where you go like… I was thinking about different ways people express it. It's like, "I hate this place. I'm just doing this for now". I heard somebody say this the other day. This is a great one. "How am I supposed to be everywhere at once"? You're not. Wait a minute. Let me check. Are you Jesus? No? You're not. That's his job. Even last week, I was talking about how God will only support you for what you're supposed to do and that a lot of our stress comes from trying to do stuff we weren't called to do. Here's the flip side of that. Just like a lot of your stress comes from doing stuff you're not supposed to do, a lot of your blessings are in things you don't even see coming that aren't even on your schedule.
This story proves it, but I could prove it from a hundred stories of things Jesus did in his ministry on the way. We were singing one of our favorite new songs. Miracle after miracle, Open door after open door; Here it comes, so get ready for another one, Another one is on the way. That means it's coming, but it also means that sometimes it's on the way to where you think you're going that God is going to do the most amazing things in your life. We don't ever want to get so goal-focused we become God-oblivious. Here's how the text says it. You have to really get the nuance to appreciate how intentional the Holy Spirit is. Every word of Scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit, so you can find a lot in these little places, just stuff you would skim over.
Verse 1 says, "One day Peter and John were going up to the temple at the time of prayer…" If they were going up, what does that mean? They weren't there yet. They were going up. In Scripture it always says, "Up to the temple". Part of that is geographical. It's literally up. But part of it is reverential, because they were going up out of the everyday affairs of life. Do you go up? Then the fact it says it was in motion is only complemented and made more powerful by this fact. As they are going up… I love how verse 2 starts. It says, "Now…" At the same time they're going up to do their thing in the temple… The temple is no longer the same place to them that it was, but they still have to go there.
See, sometimes, even though you're not going to stay there forever, you need to do everything God has called you to do in that place while you are there. As they're going up to the temple at the time of prayer, three in the afternoon… It says, "Now a man who was lame from birth was being carried to the temple gate called Beautiful, where he was put every day to beg from those going into the temple courts". Imagine the contrast. This gate is not just silver- and gold-plated. This is a bronze gate that looked so good they called it Beautiful. Every day, he was placed there to ask for money. Now, they are going to the temple out of their tradition; he is going there out of his trauma. They are going to the temple out of their routine; he's going to the gate out of his restriction. He can't go where they can go, and he can't do what they can do, but every day he would take his place at the gate and ask for change.
Now, about the time the temple guard is changing over from the morning sacrifice to the evening sacrifice, the Bible says Peter and John see a man… I always preached that they saw a man at the gate. Read it again. Verse 2: "Now a man who was lame from birth was being carried…" He hadn't even made it to the gate yet. They hadn't even made it to the temple stairs yet. What I'm trying to say is on the way to wherever you're going… Have a goal. Have a vision. Have a target. Have a thing, but on your way up to whatever you think God is calling you to do or whatever you would like to become in his name or whatever he has placed in your heart… Go on up. I'll help you. I'll cheer for you. I even named my church Elevation because I want you to go up, and God wants you to go up, and you are seated in heavenly places with Jesus. Just make sure that on your way to where you're going you stay open to what God is doing on the way.
See, they thought, "We've got to get to the temple. We've got to pray. We've got to watch the high priest offer the sacrifice, even though we know Jesus is our high priest, but this is our community. This is where we go. This is what we do". So, they're doing it, they're doing it, and as they are stopped mid-step, so is this man being carried. He is being carried; they are going up. Neither one is where they want to be yet, but God is right there on the way. Now I want to preach to everybody who's not where they want to be yet. Now I want to preach to everybody who hasn't mastered what they want to master yet and still feel kind of yanked around by some stuff right now. I want to preach to everybody who doesn't have the stability in their life they want to have right now and are in between here and there to let you know that God is on the way. I don't mean he's coming; I mean he's on the way. He's Alpha, he's Omega, and he's every letter in between. He's everything in between. He's God.
High-five your neighbor and say, "Stay open". On the way to where you think you're going God might do something greater. Are you open to that? I've had this happen so many times. I was reminded of one this week. There was a Sunday seven years ago. I was washing my hands in the bathroom, coming out to preach. Somebody was out here talking. "Okay. I'm going to get out to my seat". All of a sudden, this melody came into my head while I was washing my hands. Worthy is your name, Jesus, You deserve the praise, Worthy is your name.
I stopped and thought, "I kind of like that, but I don't have time for it right now. I've got to preach. I've got to get out there". God said, "Yeah, you do have to get out there, but why don't you get out there and get something here before you go out there, because what if I want to give you something on the way to where you're going"? You know what's crazy? I can't remember to save my life what I preached that day, but watch this. "Worthy is your…" How is it that what I thought wasn't even worth stopping for we're still singing seven years later because God gave it to us on the way? I pronounce… Places everyone. God is on the way. Places everyone. In the name of Jesus, rise up! Take my hand and rise up! It's on the way. Cry if you have to cry, but through your tears testify. It's on the way!