Into the Fire | Week 4 | Sermon

After he kinda did that with God and after a warning, boom, the humbling began.

So here we go. Chapter four. It says, king Nebuchadnezzar sent this message to the people of every race and nation and language throughout the world. Peace and prosperity to you. I want you all to know the miraculous signs and wonders the most high God has performed for me. How great are his signs, how powerful his wonders, his kingdom will last forever, his rule through all generations. I, Nebuchadnezzar, was living in my palace in comfort and prosperity.

But one night, I had a dream that frightened me. I saw visions that terrified me as I lay in my bed. So I issued an order calling in all the wise men of Babylon so they could tell me what my dream meant.

When all the magicians, enchanters, astrologers, and fortune tellers came in, I told them the dream. But they could not tell me what it meant. At last, Daniel came in before me, and I told him the dream. He was named Belshazzar after my god, and the spirit of the holy gods is in him. I said to him, Belshazzar, chief of the magicians,

I know that the spirit of the holy gods is in you and that there's no mystery is too great for you to solve. Now tell me what my dream means. While I was laying in my bed, this is what I dreamed.

I saw a large tree in the middle of the earth. The tree grew very tall and strong, reaching high into the heavens for all the world to see. It had fresh green leaves. It was loaded with fruit for all to eat. Wild animals lived in its shade, and birds nested in its branches. All the world was fed from this tree.

Then as I lay there dreaming, I saw a messenger, a holy one, coming down from heaven. The messenger shouted, cut down the tree and lop off its branches. Shake off its leaves and scatter its fruit. Chase the wild animals from its shade and the birds from its branches, but leave the stump and the roots in the ground,

bound with a band of iron and bronze and surrounded by tender grass. Now let him be drenched with the dew of heaven. Let him live with the wild animals among the plants of the field. For seven periods of time, let him have the mind of a wild animal instead of the mind of a human.

For this has been decreed by the messengers. It is commanded by the holy ones so that everyone may know that the most high rules over the kingdoms of the world. He gives them to anyone he chooses, even to the lowliest people. Belshazzar,

that was the dream that I king Nebuchadnezzar had. Now tell me what it means. None of the wise men of my kingdom can do, but you can tell me because the spirit of the holy God is in you. Upon hearing this, Daniel, also known as Belshazzar,

was overcome for a time, frightened by the meaning of the dream. He's like, he's not gonna like this. Kinda how I feel when I come up here to preach sometimes. And

some of y'all are gonna not gonna like what we say at the end of this. Then the king said to him, Belshazzar, don't be alarmed by the dream and what it means. Belshazzar replied,

I wish the events foreshadowed in this dream would happen to your enemies, my lord, and not to you. The tree you saw that was growing very tall and strong, reaching high into the heavens for all the world to see, it had fresh green leaves and was loaded with the fruit for all to eat, Wild animals living in its shade and birds nested in its branches. That tree, your majesty, is you.

At that point, he's like, well, that's not so bad. For you have grown strong and great. Your greatness reaches up to heaven and you rule

to the ends of the earth. Then you saw a messenger, a holy one, coming down from heaven and saying, cut down the tree and destroy it. But leave the stump and the roots in the ground bound with a band of iron and bronze and to be surrounded by tender grass. Let him be drenched with dew from heaven. Let him live with the animals of field for seven periods of time. That's seven years, by the way.

This is what the dream means, your majesty, that what the most high has declared will happen to my lord, the king.

You will be driven from human society. You will live in the fields with the wild animals. You will eat grass like a cow, and you will be drenched with the dew of heaven. Seven periods of time will pass while you live this way until you learn that the most high rules over the kingdoms of the world and gives them to anyone he chooses.

But the stump and the roots of the tree were left in the ground. This means that you will receive your kingdom back again when you have learned that heaven rules. King Nebuchadnezzar, please accept my advice. Stop sinning and do what is right. Break from your wicked past and be merciful to the poor.

Perhaps then you will continue to prosper. So it's a warning. And and Daniel gives him advice. Trust God. Turn from your ways. Confess and repent. But then it goes on to say, but all these things did happen to King Nebuchadnezzar. Twelve months later,

he was taking a walk on the flat roof of his royal palace in Babylon. In this time, we know historically he greatly expanded Babylon, the city, but he really massively expanded his own house. He put out you know, got a brand new hot tub, added four or five, like, chariot garages,

you know, really just, you know, got his boat for you know, when he ditches church and goes up to the mountains when the weather's nice. You know, he he he really did this stuff. And and it says he was out on a flat, and he says he looked out across the city, he said, and I only know one way to say this.

Gotta give him his voice. Here we go. Look at this great city of Babylon, my own mighty power. I have built this beautiful city as my royal residence to display my majestic splendor. That's how I imagine I'm saying it. While

these words were still in his mouth You ever have words kinda still in your mouth coming out and you immediately regret them? While these words were still in his mouth, the voice called down from heaven, O king king Nebuchadnezzar, this message is for you. You are no longer ruler of this kingdom. Bam.

The video stopped and the humbling began. You will be driven from human society. You will live in the fields with the wild animals,

and you will eat grass like a cow. Seven periods of time will pass while you live this way until you learn that the most high rules over the kingdoms of the world and gives them to anyone he chooses.

The same hour, that same hour, the judgment was fulfilled, and Nebuchadnezzar was driven from human society. He ate grass like a cow. They're really concerned with them eating grass like a cow. And he was drenched with dew of heaven.

He lived this way until his hair was as long as eagles feathers, and his nails were like bird's claws. After this time had passed, I, Nebuchadnezzar, looked up to heaven. My sanity returned, and I praised and worshiped the most high and honored the one who lives forever.

His rule is everlasting, and his kingdom is eternal. All the people of the earth are nothing compared to him. He does as he pleases among the angels of heaven and among the people of the earth. No one can stop him or say to him, what do you mean by doing these things? No one can look at him like Ollie in that video.

How dare you do this? He realized God was right. When my sanity returned to me, so did my honor and glory in my kingdom. He was restored.

My advisors and nobles sought me out and I was restored as head of my kingdom with even greater honor than before. Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and glorify and honor the king of heaven. All his acts are just and true as he is able to humble the proud. Moral of this story is be humble or get humbled.

And that's what he learned. And he learned in the end, even getting humble turned him back to being humble.

And we don't know if where he went with that. This whole story, you know, he learned something from God. God's been speaking to him, trying to get to him. He's using Daniel to reach him. God cares about this king. He's not punishing him. He's not out to get him. He's out to get him. Get it?

And we don't know where that ended. He seems to be like that's a genuine thing of faith. Does that mean Nebuchadnezzar finally put his faith in God? Does that mean like what we would say today is is Nebby in heaven? Is Nebby gonna be in heaven and be mad that I keep calling him Nebby?

The truth is we don't know. A lot of these stories where God shows a lesson, and then it just sends. The next chapter, next week, it's a whole new king. It jumps forward. His time is over.

But it does seem like he's he's learning. He's turning to God, but there's some also some questionable things when he says, I got my glory back. Could he he's he's talking about his gods. This is after the fact. He's so he's praising God as the most high ruler, but he still talks about his other gods,

these other idols he worshiped. And and we're and and and so and and so when you think about what is he really getting here? Not sure. Genuine profession of faith, partial, turns back, don't know. It's an everyday choice to be humble and trust God. But one thing he might be, which was very common in that era, was monolatry.

They think he might have been a monolatrous at this time. You're like, that sounds terrible. Sounds like a condition a doctor you have to see. This is bad. You need to go to the monolatrous. How much time do I have to live? Monolatry is the idea that you have this don't you have you believe in many gods,

but there is one supreme god that is more powerful than the rest. The ancient Greek gods. Think of it that way. You had this family of gods that all had these different powers, but Zeus was the father. He was the most powerful.

And how they would worship is they would go to these separate gods. So you'd say, I got this all powerful god, but I know there's these other gods, the kids, and I go to them for my specific desires. Then say and that's why it's it's idolatry, which idolatry is really not putting your faith in one god, the one true god, and it's going after these idols.

And they would go to these idols, and they would worship him. What they do is they go to the idol. And they had gods for all kinds of stuff. Like, Bacchus was a god that was the god of parties.

Like, a pleasure. I I I I go to him. I wanna experience more pleasure in my life. So you'd go to him. You'd give him what he wanted, and then he gave you what you wanted. You would Aphrodite, the the the goddess of love. I I I want a relationship. You go, you give what you want, you get what you want.

You know, god Ares, god of war. You go to him. I'm in a battle. I need someone to bring victory for me. You know? And and then you'd go to that. You'd give him what he want. And then the problem was if you were doing what the god said, if you're going and offering the sacrifice

and it wasn't working, you would cry out to to to Zeus. Hey, Zeus. Your kids aren't listening to me. When you think of that system, who's really got the remote?

You do. Because you know I go when I want this, I go to this God, and they just say, this sacrifice in, and you basically, you know, I know how to change the channel. I don't like this show. I want pleasure. I don't like this show. I want I want I want rom com. I want the romance. I want Hallmark Channel.

I don't like this show. It's showing poverty and stuff. I wanna be rich and successful.

And then if it's not working, you complain to the father god. So we're sitting here going, what does an arrogant king that needs to be humbled, who's probably a monolithrous have to do with us?

I believe we are more like Nebuchadnezzar than we even know. And we are more like those ancients than we will admit. You see, they had all these gods and they called them gods, and they sacrificed things in their life for them to get what they wanted. And they called them gods. We don't think we're idolatrous

because we call those gods normal things now. We don't say it's a god I'm running after. When we sacrifice good things to get what we want for these things, we put those things in front of God. We don't think of that as idolatry. We just think of it as life.

And so we and so we actually are many of us in this room here's a throw punch. You are effectively a monolatrous.

You come here and say, Jesus rules. God is God of heaven. But you are running after all these sub gods. And a lot of times when you do that, you come here. And when it you're not getting what you want, you try to spiritualize it, and then you cry out to God like, hey, Zeus. Or you say, hey, Zeus. You know, you're you're hollering out to Jesus.

Your kids aren't listening to me. But every day, you're running out there and you're going, hey, I'm running after the God of pleasure.

I want to have a better lifestyle, so I'm not gonna listen to God. I want I want to have a I don't wanna be alone, so I'm just not listening to God's advice on how relationships and marriage and sex should work. I'm just gonna go after this. I'm gonna go after I'm gonna I'm gonna sacrifice my character. I'm gonna sacrifice,

you know, this. I'm gonna sacrifice what it takes at the altar. I'm gonna sacrifice my commitment to church at the altar of my kids youth sports because I think they're gonna get a scholarship. Go read the percentage.

Bad investment. You have a better percentage of taking all that money and going to Las Vegas with it. I'm not kidding. The percentage is higher.

And we don't call it a god, but we say, yeah, god's the most powerful, but I'm really still running after all these other gods. And then you get frustrated with the father god because his kids aren't listening. And then we want the remote. We want to be in control. And we need to choose to be humble because humility

is the only way you're gonna ever relate to God in a way that you will truly understand his love for you.

And when you truly embrace his love for you, you will understand how deep it is and how wide it is. And the deeper and wider you understand it is, the more you'll trust him. And the more you trust him, all those sub gods, all those things we run after, power, pleasure, present, prestige,

all these things that we think are gonna make us feel the what we're longing, they never will. But the love of God embraced will then bring about the plan of God in our life and that will fulfill the longing we have. But you're not gonna get there if you're not humble because humility and pride are not what we think they are.

We think that that that that that pride is just being like this all the time.

You know, we think it's I'm being better than you. I'm confident. I'm cocky. I'm arrogant. It's like the king. He's like, oh, yeah. And then we think, don't relate to that. He's sitting up on top of this. He's like, look at my kingdom, but that's what we do. Prideful is when we approach our life as I'm making this happen. Here's what I I'm worried about my kingdom. I'm worried about my world. I'm not don't care about God. I don't care about his kingdom. I don't care about his calling. I just want him to give me the stuff that enriches. I just want my kingdom restored.

And we think of humility as just thinking less of ourselves. You know, really thinking poorly and less of yourself, admitting you're a sinner and knowing you're broken is not the same. God calls us masterpieces. He loves us. But we are broken by sin.

And if you're constantly thinking less of yourself, you won't lean into what God's called you to and the gifts he's given you. It's that thinking less of yourself is insecurity. And some of the most insecure people are the most prideful people. Because guess what? You live your life from your insecurity.

You believe your insecurity and your fears more than God, and you live in that. That is pride. Because pride is really saying, I'm gonna chase something or believe something more than I believe God. And most of the time, everything we believe is a lie, and it usually comes back to I trust myself

and my feelings more than I trust God. I trust my fears more than I trust God. Humility is not thinking less of yourself. Tim Keller, pastor of theologian, put it best. He said, it's not thinking less of yourself. It's thinking of yourself less.

And that's what we need to be about. That's what God is when he says he wants us to be humble. When he humbles us, he's trying to get us to that point of view.

And so how do we do that? James four ten says this, humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up in honor. Meaning, it's okay to have ambition. It's okay to go after this. It's okay to be confident in what the Lord has asked you to do. But it needs to be tied to and aligned with humility

because then you're going after the right thing. Without humility, you're using all your gifts and all your stuff for yourself. That's what the king the problem with Nebuchadnezzar was not that he was king of Babylon and he had all this power.

The problem is he was making it all for his own prosperity and comfort as he said in the beginning of the passage. It was about him. Humility will have you focus on what God's kingdom wants.

And guess, here it is. The key is it's a choice. Humility is not a feeling. It's not a character trait that you just have or you don't have. People go, I'm just not humble like them. I'm just prideful. No. Humility is a choice,

and it's a choice you have to make over and over again. Every moment you come across, every decision you need to make, you sit there and go, will I choose humility,

or I choose my way? Every time you have to make a decision, am I just gonna go where God's already got it going and I'm gonna agree with them? Or am I gonna say, give me the remote and try to control it yourself? Every single you could be humble one moment, five minutes later,

like a little kid. So if I'm gonna choose it, what do I need to choose? Two things, I think, is the beginning of all humility that'll help us. They're simple. It's not rocket science. That's the whole key. You gotta choose. Am I gonna be humble enough to do this?

Because you're having a lot of things. Like I said, fear can cause pride. Am I gonna trust my fear? Am I gonna trust my hurts? Am I gonna trust my hang ups? Am I gonna trust my habits? Am I gonna trust lies from the devil? Am I gonna trust lies from the people around me? Or am I gonna trust God's word?

So they here they are. There are these two things. First, choose to admit when I'm wrong. I am super committed to this one. I've never had to do it yet, but I if it happens, I promise I'll do it. No. That's how a lot of it are. I just gotta admit. Now this is actually great marriage advice too in a marriage. Do

that. But I'm talking about when it comes to God. This is the idea of confession.

We live in a world now that even in the church world, you see people that are Christians, they're like, I'm so sick of this preaching. It says we're broken. We're broken. Like, we're supposed to feel terrible about ourselves. We're supposed to we're not broken. We're beautiful.

Who said broken and beautiful are exclusive? God does say we're beautiful. He made us. But he also knows by our sin, it's been broken and it's marred. He wants to restore that to us. And the answer in most Christians were so insecure. The pride now even in following God is to just declare, I'm not broken.

If you don't see that you're a sinner, you will never understand the depth of God's love and sacrifice for you. And if you don't understand that depth of his love, you'll never trust him. Because he's gonna ask us to do stuff that does not just give us prosperity and comfort

like king Nebuchadnezzar wanted and had. We will chase prosperity and comfort every day of the week and twice on Sunday if we do not understand how much God loves us. And the only way you're gonna do it is to see yourself accurately through the lens of the gospel and a holy God and to know that we are sinners

that are selfish by nature. And we have to confess as choose, but confess is only half of it. It's like in GI Joe. You know, the GI Joe cartoon back in the day.

You know, I'm actually old. I was older when that came out, but I had, you know, I saw it. And and and and and and they would say that I've had all that lesson at the end, some kids doing something dumb and the GI Joe character come out and teach them and go, you can't do this. He goes, thanks, Joe. Now I know. And then the guy will say, and knowing

is half the battle. A lot of us think just admitting on my sin and understanding Christ died for me, I'm done.

You think that's it. So we live this life that we're still pursuing our monolatrous relationship with God and our idols, we realize we're done. We come in here. We hear a sermon. We break down. We're like, you know what? You're right. God, thank you. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I know I'm sinning. I know I've done this. I'm so thankful

for for for your forgiveness, and then we walk out and stay the same way. And that's why many of you are losing it. You're going insane. You're not out in the field eating grass like a cow. I mean, lot of you are eating grass like a cow because you're you're trying to lose weight, but I would just rather eat the cow. But

the reality is you feel like, I I don't I can't hang in there. I can't do this. I can't because you're probably trying to live a faith with God that's only half the battle. You admit you're a sinner, you confess, but you don't repent. We're to confess, and then by the power of God's love, we can now repent.

And repent doesn't mean just stop going this way. Repent means a 180 degree turn. It means start going the other way. And that's the second point. I need to choose

to surrender my plans to God's purpose. This is the one we get stuck on a lot. Because we admit we're sinners, but then we turn it. If you only do this,

you know what you end up turning your prayer life and even your service in the church too and everything you do for God is you were trying to convince God to surrender his purpose to your plans. You you're you're begging God to go, what I want God's purpose to be is to fulfill this plan for me.

And then you and you might even be serving God and doing the right thing and all that stuff. And and and and and and you choose to do these things, but it's really based. I know I'm a sinner, but here's what I really want, God. You if you won't surrender and just say, I am gonna get on purpose with my life, and we've explained this. You I'm gonna be a disciple. And a fully engaged disciple says, he's called us to a mission. Just like Daniel. He was in a broken world, and Daniel was used by God to try to reach Nebuchadnezzar.

God wants to use every one of us to disciple and reach other people, to point people to Jesus by loving them like Jesus. We need to know God. We need to grow in communion. We need to go live intentionally. God wants us to find out our gifts, use our service, use our gifts, our time, our money, and invest all of that in his kingdom. That's our purpose. And many of you, you'll

stop sinning. You won't do the bad the obvious really bad things. I'm gonna murder someone. I'm not gonna cheat on my wife. I'm not gonna cheat on my taxes. I'm gonna but I'm not gonna do the things that the guy Bible says this is what it means to be a church. I'll go to church, but I won't be the church.

And everyone has a reason why they can't. And one of those all those reasons are based in pride. Some of you I can't give money because I don't have any. I'm broke because I made really bad decisions with my money because you're living in prosperity and comfort.

And you'll say, I'll give when I have more money. No, you won't. You'll just spend more money on other things.

And you get mad at me when I say it because the reality is this. You're afraid you'll never be happy or you won't be able to survive if you literally started tithing.

Must be call it what it is. And that's why God called for a percentage because some of you are really out of a job, you have no money. That's why it should be a percentage because if you're not making any money, what's a percentage of zero? Zero. You don't have to worry about it. You need help.

Same with our time.

Some of you are are really successful. You're good businessmen, good businesswomen. And I'm gonna tell you, in thirty one years of being a pastor, you notoriously are the least generous with your time and your money.

Because pride some of think, well, if I really tithe, I don't think I would trust this church with that much money. You're not trusting us. You're just trusting God. And really, it's not your money.

Same with time. Well, I'm just busy. I travel so busy. I was like, you know what you're saying is? I'm more important than everybody else. I'm special. I don't have to serve.

And matter of fact, when you've been six and then some of us, we serve really hardcore. We do this. If I don't understand, I'm really surrendering to his purpose and his plans, but I'm really more about I know I'm wrong, but I want him to actually surrender

to my plans. You'll do the right things. You'll do all these things, but you have an expectation. I gave, now make me rich. I did this, now make me this. And and and we get this little unwritten thing, and that's bad too. That's a form of pride even though we're doing the right thing. We end up being like Ralph Kiner.

These are some old time illustrious. Ralph Kiner was a hall of fame player. He played for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He's so old, my dad played with him. And and my dad knew him. And he was great.

And one year, he played back in the day when you didn't get these big contracts. You actually had, like, a real deal job. Here's what your salary is. You can go in and ask for a raise. You can go, you know, whatever. You didn't really and and so he had a year where he led the league in home runs, and he went in and asked Branch Rickey, the general manager for a raise. He goes, hey. I wanna raise. And Branch Rickey goes, no.

And he goes, why not, Branch? I led the league in home runs. And he goes, yeah. But what place did we finish? And Ralph goes, last? And he goes, exactly. We can finish last without you.

A lot of us wanna go to God, and we get arrogant even in our serving and our giving. See, it's not just about doing it. It's doing it in the right way through humility.

And some of us are doing these things, and you have an expectation from God. You come to God, I expect a raise. I expect a better blessing, and here's what I want it to be, and cash and prizes.

And then when God says, no, you get angry and go, look what all I did. And God, you know what he says? Hey. What place am I in? First. And I can finish in first without you. The thing we gotta realize is this, and this is gonna sound harsh until you understand it's more loving. God doesn't need you.

He doesn't need your service. He doesn't need your he can do anything he wants without us. He doesn't need me.

But you know what? He wants you. He wants me. He wants to give us the gift of being a part of what he's doing. He wants to empower us with his love so we can experience what he made us for. He wants to relate to us and work through us and work with us.

He wants something for us, not from us. And you don't have to believe me, but that's the same thing I want for everyone in this church. And my prayer is, Lord, let the people of Rock Point, because we're not an organization or a place, we're a people. Allow us to be the tip of the spear of what you're doing.

And you won't do it without the the humility to choose these two things. Well then, how do I can how do I consistently do this? Here's what I do.

And I think it's Jesus showed us to do this. He he showed us how to pray. His disciples said, hey, you're praying all the time. How should we talk to God about our issues? How should we talk to God about life? How should we unlock the power of prayer in our life? Because that's what we should be doing about our human. We talk to God about it. And and and and he says, he teaches us how to pray, the Lord's prayer. Anyone used to go to a church where you just prayed it out loud, you just said it in in in the old King James? And

the problem is you learned it by rote memory as some magic incantation. When Jesus said pray this way, he says this is an outline. You should pray about these topics every time you pray. And so that's what I do. I finish all my prayer time, my quiet time by praying through the Lord's prayer,

Statement by statement. And what that means is you don't just say it. You say it, but you say what it means in your life. You respond

to it with where it is. That's what it's supposed to be. And now that I've shared what pride and humility is and what God asked us to do to choose, you're gonna realize this entire prayer is about choosing humility

and then asking for God for things. What he asked for you is a direct result of, if I'm gonna humbly choose this,

then I'm asking for this to be able to do what you asked me to do. It's not about making your wish list for God. So I just wanna walk through it and show you. In the old King James, verse nine, the first thing you pray. After this manner, therefore, pray. Our father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

He says the first thing we should pray is remembering God's in heaven, meaning he is the God overall. He has the perspective. He sees from time, from beginning to end. He sees more. He sees all. He knows all. He is all. He is hallowed. His name is to be hallowed, to worship, to be holy. Not us. It's about his name,

not ours. In other words, the first thing we should pray when we start praying to to set our heart right in a humble posture to be able to talk to God is, God, I realize you're God and I'm not. Step one. Then it goes to the the next verse says, thy kingdom come,

thy will be done on earth as in this heaven. This is what I love about the King James, thy. It's about thy, not mine. That's the second thing you gotta do. You're God, I'm not. And so then what I'm gonna come to you and pray about is your kingdom coming, and how it's gonna come is by your will being done.

And it's your will done on earth as it is in heaven. In heaven, it's perfect. So it means I need to fully commit. And here's the problem with this one. When you just pray this as general prayer and when we get arrogant and prideful because we don't look at our own mistakes and don't look at it the way we should, we generally pray this as like, yeah, I'm praying this over the world. I wish thy kingdom will come. I wish thy will would be done in The United States. I wish congress would get their act together. I wish our country would get his act together. I wish the world would get his act together. I wish they would all do it like it is in heaven when this prayer is really for us to talk to God. When do you say in my life?

This verse isn't about praying about everything out there. It's about aligning yourself with saying, is my life about God's kingdom? And in order to do that, I'm aligning my heart and life and actions with a choice of humility to do what God's asked me to do. So the very first thing is it's die, not mine.

And then he goes to the next line. Give us this day our daily bread. This is now give me what I need. Not for what I want, what I need one day at a time to do what you've asked me to do. It means, okay, you want me to give my time? You want me to give you money? You want me tell my friends about Jesus? I

don't know if that's gonna work. I'm afraid. I'm afraid for myself while I'd be happy. I'm afraid for the results. But today, today I'm gonna do it. But you know what I need. You know what I need to not die. You know what I need to accomplish what you've asked me to do. So this day, I'm gonna trust you for today.

And then when you don't die, you're like, wow. I didn't die. That was hard. It was terrible, but somehow I have peace.

And this even includes when you are trying to do God's stuff because you're saying, give me what I need to do what you've asked me to do. We can get, like I said, pride even in the moment. Even in the moment of doing what God wants, we make it about us or we forget about God.

We take his gifts, we get used to it, we do it, and then we forget that God is teaching us to rely on his power because his power is better than ours. Let me give you example from my own life. I can't do a a sermon on being humble and not tell a story about me being humble. I don't really want to, but

back when I was a youth pastor, I started getting asked to speak at a lot of camps. And yeah, I even thought about doing that for a career, just go be a speaker.

And my church actually give me a whole summer. I spake spoke for a whole summer in different camps. And one of them I went to was a friend's camp. It was a high school camp that was camping. We're up in the mountains. And so we would do our meetings outside.

Couple 100 high schoolers, you know. And so when we would meet, we'd meet down. Everyone be there's this little, like, little canyon wall to kind of an amphitheater thing. So they're all kind of around you. And we had a fire pit and a cross, and then we'd sing songs. And then I'd step up by the fire pit and the cross to speak. But they didn't really have any lights, so we would try to do our meetings at a time when it was light out. But this day, I was supposed to speak in the evening, but we were supposed to get back and do that before it got dark.

And it started we got back a little late, so it started to get dark. So I I I stepped up and I realized, oh, man. I need to get closer to the fire to see my notes because trusting God is not just you prepare. God takes your gifts. He wants your preparation. And through humility, he then adds his power.

So I had prepared. I had my little bit of notes. And I would take a note sheet about this much, this size of paper. I'd write down some ideas on and to guide me. And so I stepped closer to be able to see, and a wind gust came up and my notes did that. Right as I was supposed to start. I was like,

I think we should pray. Dear God,

I'm about to just tell everybody what I remember about what was on that piece of paper And this will never work. Lives won't change. Nothing's gonna happen unless your power, your presence speaks through these words and moves our hearts. Amen. It worked. God did show up. And I walked away. It sounds like a great moment.

And then I went to bed at night, I'm laying in my tent. Got hockey jersey throw punch at me, pulled the jersey up over your shoulders. And he said, hey, Bill. You do know that none of it works without my presence and my power even if your notes didn't fall in the fire. And I realized

that I took the gift God gave me. I developed it like he asked me to. And then I got pretty good at it. And I realized the only time I prayed that way was when I knew I was in trouble or thought my message wasn't good.

The rest of the time, I didn't bother because I knew I had a good message. In other words, I put the Holy Spirit in the bullpen, and I only called him in if I got in trouble. Well, I got this, God. I know how to preach. And that's a that's a temptation for anybody. Really, it's a strong temptation

for someone who's in front of a crowd. It's easy to rely. And then when you do that, you expect God to reward you based on look what I did.

It's not about me. So now as I pray through this, as I pray, I go in the back now as a top of praying to this. Before I come out here, every time I get quiet. It's the only time I'm talking to my security guys, I'm joking and I go and I just get quiet and say, Lord,

thy kingdom not mine, thy power not mine, your strength not mine, your words not mine. All I ask him for is can you give me what I need to say what I need to say? And may I feel your pleasure as I just do what you've asked me to do?

Give us this day our daily bread. Last two ones really quick that we go through. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. This isn't about being in, like, finance. Like, this is talking about sins. And notice how it's relational. It's talking about your relationships now. His, hey.

Forgive me my I'm gonna own my mistakes. But as I realize that I am a great sinner, I should be willing to let go of the people that have hurt me. And a lot of times, let me go now, they might not have asked for it. This one way forgiveness is letting you off the hook.

And a lot of you will not forgive someone because of the pride. You think they did worse than you did, and you can't let it go, and you're letting it eat you up and chew you up. It's like, hey, you know what? You're a sinner. They're a sinner. Let it go so you can get away from it.

But you like to live through the reality. You play a victim. You like to live in victimhood, which is pride. God, I have to be this, and I am not gonna change until you do something to them. That's only gonna chew you up. And then you move to the last verse, which is kinda sums it all up. And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil. For the time for thine, not mine, is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen in Greek means I believe. Do you? That's how I pray. That's a prayer you're supposed to respond to. And it's all about choose humility and choose to align your life and your plans around his purpose,

not the other way around. That's repentance. And that's when you're gonna feel the power and the love of God. Because you know what? If you won't do that, God will humble you. And some of you keep getting humbled over and over. He's trying to get your attention over and over again and you're about to go insane.

Maybe you are literally running around in fields eating cow, eating I would eat cow. Eating grass like a cow.

And the reason is he wants you to humble yourself so he can embrace you and you can learn. Because if you don't, he says protect us from evil, protect us from the evil one and the temptation because you know what the evil one does? He comes in and offers you a remote.

Don't trust God. Take this fruit. You can have all those things that you think God's holding. You can't trust God. He doesn't have your best. You need to spend your money the way you want to. You need to protect yourself.

You need to go after a relationship and who cares if God says don't live together, don't do this, don't do that. I really feel this way. Don't don't don't turn your sexuality into your identity. Don't do this. You're like, nope. He says, no. That's wrong. You need to be happy. You should just take the remote.

And the truth is he's handing you a false remote, a dummy remote, a distracting remote to keep you from listening to the God who has the real remote. I know this because this is my dummy remote from my house.

Because when I had kids, this is like 15 year old DVD room, but I leave batteries in it. It lights up when you push the buttons. And that's what the enemy will do. I'd leave this so my kids when they're younger. Now my grandkids, they grab this, and they leave the real remote alone.

And then they hit it, and it lights up. Oh, this is legit. It's got power. Now I am uncomfortable with me being Satan now in this story, but but it works.

And maybe I am being because I want him leaving the real remote alone, which that's what Satan wants. He doesn't want you to trust that God ultimately has the remote, and you just need to be on the same channel with him. He wants you to think that you can really have the same success. Here is a remote. You could change the channel of your life and experience what you want to. Get all the sex, all the pleasure, all the power, all the things you want. God won't give it to you. Just take it.

And you grab it, and you do it. The problem is it doesn't really have any power. But Satan will do what I would do sometimes or circumstances when my grandson, Phoenix, got old enough to start to point it and realize I would occasionally just turn the channel while he was doing it.

Give him a little win here and there, a little taste to deceive him even more. Because I don't want him to wake up and realize, you really ain't doing nothing.

That's why God will humble you. He wants you to get rid of that one. And trust that what he's calling you to may feel painful, may feel scary, may feel like you don't. But you understand he loves you just like my daughter was trying to tell Ollie.

And that's what a good parent understands. If you've been a kid, a parent, you understand that there comes this moment that you are trying to help your kids and they think you're trying to hurt them. You're trying to take something from them.

And then when I have to preach God's word, you get mad at me because you think that's what I'm doing. I am Daniel in this story. I'm just interpreting the dream for you. I wanna show you this still from that video as we close this down. That's the moment. Look at that face.

He's like, what the the eight g double hockey sticks do you think you're trying to do? Why are you trying to take that away? And you know what he's God's trying to take away? You thought it's the real remote. You never get the real remote.

God, that's what Daniel is saying. You think I took the remote from God. I took the throne. No. You didn't. You took a false remote. You're sitting on a false throne. God has never given the power to you. And you're fooling yourself and heading towards destruction.

We're gonna see that at the end. Then the series, God is patient till he's not. You have he will humble you and humble you and humble you to try to get your attention. But eventually, you're gonna run out of humblings. You're gonna run out of moments, and you are gonna answer for all of eternity for the choice you made.

God is trying to rescue you by asking you to trust him and do it his way. Just like my daughter was sitting here, and this is what's funny. I look at that, and I know it's serious, but I have to laugh because I've seen this face before.

I've seen that face on the person whose hand was down there in the video asking for the remote. My daughter. Almost identical to that face. And in that moment, I remembered, vengeance is mine, declares the Lord. We don't even have to go make things right for those who have heard us or not listened to us.

And in the case of being a parent, vengeance is in the form of you're gonna have a kid of your own someday.

And you're gonna now understand how I felt in every one of those moments that you thought I was being mean to you and forcing you into something instead of helping you. Matter of fact, the most one of the times I remember the most from Micah was when she was in middle school actually. And she was in a history class.

And they had to do these little paper. They do every Friday, these little synopsis of what they've been studying. They have these questions, and it had to be like a two page summary of this stuff. I looked at this. She came on. She's this is impossible. She found out she hadn't done the first one or two. I'm like, you can't fail the class. She always was a good student, but it just boggled her brain for two reasons.

One, she doesn't really, think linear like history, so it kind of bothers her the way her brain is.

And two, she doesn't write in linear. She writes like train of thought. You ever read someone that just writes train of thought, they're trying to tell a story? It totally makes sense to them when they're reading it. You've probably seen a few movies that the directors were that way. And you're like, this movie makes no sense.

It's it's it's like, don't understand where we're at right now. And so that was really hard for her. Secondly,

she had a teacher that I read this stuff. I minored history. I'm really good at history. And I was like, this is hard. This looks like a Harvard professor trying to make you do work. Well, I could have chickened out and been that parent that runs in and go, this is unfair. You're expecting too much of my daughter and and bailed her out. But I realized class is not just about getting a grade. It's not just about doing a work. It's about discipline. It's also about learning to work with different personalities. And you know what? You're gonna have a tough boss someday.

So maybe you should learn to deal with a tough teacher. Maybe you need to learn to deal. So I said, you know what I'm not gonna do? I'm gonna help you do it. I'm not gonna do it for you, but I'm gonna walk with you through this because you need to learn this. So I'm gonna make you go through this.

And it was a humbling experience because she had to realize it was hard. School generally came easy for her. She didn't wanna do it.

She would sit there and I go, let's go do it. And she made that face. I don't wanna do it. And funny and then. And I had to make her do it early early because I'm on the first time the first week to get her do it, we started at six, got done 11:30 at night. And and she was mad. I went, know, I'm not God.

So I I was not as patient. I'm like, oh my gosh. This is harder for me than it is for you. Think about how Jesus died for you. I mean, I'm not Jesus at this moment. I actually got a little bit more impatient with her. And I'd be frustrated. I'd go into my wife. I'm like, I can't do this.

I already went to school and to college. I checked that off my list. I never wanted to do this again. And then I saw she would manipulate her. She's like, how would you say that? What would you do? And I see her typing. I'm like,

I'm not writing it for you. Because the truth, if it was just about getting the job done, I could get her out of the way and be done with it in five minutes. And some of us, that's what we want God to do. He's, no, I need you to walk through this valley.

I need you to trust me, but I'm with you. And I'm gonna grow you, and I love you. And one time she got so mad, she looked at me. She's like, give me that face. And she's like, why are you so mean and why are you doing this to me?

Some of you are there right now with God trying to humble you. So you will humble yourself and choose to admit you're wrong. And choose to start aligning your life humbly around his purpose, not your plans. And you're looking up at God, you're listening, you're reacting to me, and you're saying, are you being so mean?

Why are you doing this to me? And what I said to my daughter is what God is saying to us all in those moments. I'm doing this for you because I love you and I made you and I am the king of all. I have the remote because I know where all the shows end. And I know what I built your story to be.

And I know that if you don't humble yourself and trust me, your story is not gonna end with what you really want. The story will only end with joy, peace, happiness and that peace that transcends all understanding and a glory for all of eternity is with you trust me. And that's the choice you have. There's no other choice.

Choose to be humble or get humble. Father God, I thank you Lord. I thank you that you do love us enough to humble us to try to get us to see your love. So I just simply pray for myself, everyone in this room, anyone watching online, that we would choose humility. We would choose to embrace your love.

Help us to see it. Help us to do that. Help us to every day get up and choose humility. I pray this in the mighty, mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Hey. I love you guys.

Thanks for joining us online this weekend. Let us know if we can help you in any way. Make sure to follow us on social media and connect with us on the We Are Rock Point app for prayer and everything happening here at Rock Point.