TD Jakes - Led by the Spirit
It is important that we look at this with a very clear understanding of contextualization, because when people step into the middle of your story, they misdiagnose who you are and make false assumptions based on brief statements. We are living in an age now where people take a snippet of a sermon and formulate an argument against a phrase, one statement you have put out, claiming they know you by that phrase, as if you could be reduced to a sentence. The quickest way to fall into heresy is to take a text out of context. Now, I’m all for technology, but sometimes when people text me, I have to pick up the phone and call them, because you meant it in one way, but I read it in another. Before I respond, I just want to be sure: do you really mean for me to go off like I’m getting ready to go off? I just want to be sure. Let’s set some rules straight, because I might have read it wrong, and most of the time I was wrong, because it is difficult to deliver sensitive information in a text. The text does not provide you with context.
As we read this brief statement, these four verses of Scripture in the Gospel of Saint Mark, chapter one, I’m not sure that this text gives us context. Jesus wasn’t born in the wilderness; neither did He grow up in the wilderness. He wasn’t baptized in the wilderness, and yet He finds Himself there. I have been in the same spot that Jesus was in. I had the privilege years ago of going to Jerusalem and not only visiting Jerusalem, which is amazing, but going down to the Jordan River and across into the country of Jordan. When you cross the Jordan River, you are standing in what is now currently called Jordan, on your way to Amman, but you have to go through the wilderness to get there. Little did I know that the same wilderness I was standing in is the wilderness in which Jesus was tempted. It is also the place where Elijah crosses the Jordan to be caught up in the chariot of fire. The history of the text goes archaeologically deep into the soil of that same space; a lot of things happen in that same geographical location.
In the same place that God sends a chariot down from heaven to evacuate Elijah out of the human capacities of this mundane, ritualistic world, it is in that same spot where He allows the Spirit to carry Jesus to be tempted. Have you ever been to a spot that provoked many different memories, like a house you used to live in? You can remember good times and bad times; a person you grew up with—there’s something nice, and you remember something bad. Spaces are complicated, and the Spirit has brought Him to this place. But I don’t want to take the text out of context. It’s important to understand that Jesus has dropped off the scene for at least 18 years. We know nothing about that time, and it is funny to me because the Bible gives us the highlights of the life of Jesus and not the «nothing» moments.
The hardest parts of walking with God are through the days of nothingness. They’re neither hot nor cold; they’re neither good nor bad—just, «I woke up; I made it to another day.» What are you doing? Nothing. You know, «This stuff is just stuff I gotta do.» Can I stay with God through days of nothingness? Eighteen years are obscure to us, where Jesus is just an unnamed carpenter’s son, moving about, growing up from 12 to 30 years old in total obscurity. He doesn’t pick up again until this new, highly successful, and accomplished disruptive thinker, John. I call him a disrupter because he broke all his father’s rules and won doing it. He didn’t dress like a priest, he didn’t eat like a priest, and he didn’t function in the synagogue; he was in the wilderness eating wild locusts and honey, dressed in camel’s hair.
Don’t be scared to be different; different does not annul greatness. In fact, it actually confirms greatness. Nobody writes books about the ordinary. Go to the library; you won’t find any books about people who weren’t disruptive or in some way extraordinary. You have to understand that Jesus had 18 years we know nothing about. Then, at 30 years old, He’s in the crowd, not on the stage. He’s in the crowd, not in the program; He’s in the back row of the crowd coming to hear His cousin John. He comes down to the Jordan, and all the eyes are on John; none are on Jesus, because John the Baptist was the new hot thing. And you know how we love the new hot thing.
I tell young preachers, when you start a church, you’re only new once; you’re only new once. So while you’re new, you might as well rock it and go all the way with it. Because as soon as people get used to you, they start taking you for granted. «Oh, I’ll skip this week; I’ll go next week; I’ll check it out later; I’ll catch it online if I get to it.» That’s what happens in any relationship: familiarity breeds contempt. If you want to stay fresh, stay back, because if you overexpose yourself, no matter how good you are at what you do, people get used to you. You can sing the paint off the walls, but if you sing all the time, they get used to your riffs and runs. The person they shouted about today, they ignore tomorrow. You can be the greatest wife in the world, celebrated for the first few years, but after a while, they get used to it and want to know, «Are there any new tricks?»
So save some. Don’t fit everything in the first week. Hallelujah! Come on, somebody! Don’t tell everything in the first week because you’ve got to keep it fresh. You’ve got to update; you’ve got to remain interesting. You’ve got to keep reading; you’ve got to keep developing yourself, because once people get used to you, they walk past you; they ignore you. They walked past Jesus to get to John because John was the new thing. He was disruptive; he dressed differently, and people came to hear him and check him out. While John is baptizing in the Jordan, nobody is talking about Jesus. You better go make some shoes somewhere; make a table, a chair somewhere. Push your passion!
Jesus tries to get to John, but often we push past the greater trying to get to the lesser, because it takes time to fulfill and reveal greatness. When time has not exposed who you really are, people shove you to the side, trying to get to something that is less than what’s down inside of you. You’ve got to be okay with it, because that’s a test too. Obscurity is a test, too. Being ignored is a test, too. Being treated as ordinary is a test to make sure that your ego is low enough, that when God exalts you, you won’t start worshiping yourself. He’ll let people push past you and say, «How do you like me now?» Because He doesn’t want you to be ego-driven; He wants you to be Spirit-led, and you can’t be Spirit-led and ego-driven.
So God allows people to walk past you. Can you imagine walking past the water-turning Jesus? Can you imagine walking past the dead-raising Jesus? Can you imagine walking past the Jesus who turned water into wine? Can you imagine who you might have walked past this morning? Jesus does not stop them from walking past Him; He doesn’t whip out His business cards. He doesn’t start doing sideshow miracles to get on their itinerary. I like Him because He has class. There’s a difference between education and class. There’s a difference between money and class. There’s a difference between a great vocabulary and class. I’m not sure you can teach class. Jesus' class makes you handle rejection; class makes you handle not being celebrated.
Class won’t let you do anything just to get on the itinerary because you think too much of yourself to lower yourself down to make yourself a trap for somebody just so you can grab their attention. Class will make you wait. Class will make you a humble pillar. Class will make you roll over by yourself if you have to. It makes you hold your head up when others are ignoring you. Class will make you sit back and let them take somebody else’s attention. Listen to me today: class. Jesus had absolute class. Oh my God! I feel like preaching up in here! If y’all mess with me this morning, it’s going to be church up in this place! I feel something flowing in this place right now!
I want to celebrate all the people who have kept their class. It wasn’t that you weren’t lonely, but you kept your class. It wasn’t that you weren’t caught in the struggles of life; it’s that God was going to use you in a mighty way, but you held onto your integrity. Without your integrity, you have nothing. Your integrity is determined by what you won’t do. There are some things that I’m just not going to do. I’m just not going to do that. If I go broke, I’m not going to do that. If I have to sell the car, I’m not going to do that. If I have to sell the shoes, I’m not going to do it. I’m just not going to do it, because I think too much of myself. You don’t know me, but He does.
And all of a sudden, John the Baptist looks up with His feet standing in the Jordan River, in the same Jordan River that Joshua’s feet had stood in, the same Jordan that witnessed the children of Israel cross on dry ground. John is now standing in that same Jordan. Only he is not pulling out a rock; he is about to reveal the Rock—the Rock of Ages, the Rock in a weary land, the Rock in a sure place! I’m talking about Jesus. Everybody’s looking at John, but John looks up and sees Jesus, and how you manage greatness has a lot to do with how you end up. A lot of people will not shine a light on anybody who might make them feel less.
Let me hear some John say, «Behold! Don’t keep looking at me; behold! There’s something greater than me! Behold! The one you walked past! Behold! The one you overlooked! Behold! The one you ignored! He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!» And the Bible says the crowd parts. Jesus goes from obscurity to notoriety in a step. You think it’s going to take years; you just step into what God has. The steps have already been ordered. Don’t worry about the stage; pray for the step. If you make this step, the stage will take care of itself. Too many people are in love with the stage and not the steps, so they get on the stage and can’t stay on it because they haven’t taken the steps to qualify them for the stage. Don’t pray for the stage; pray for the step. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way. I feel something in this place! I feel something in this place! Something’s about to break loose here!