Mt. Carmel Churches | Trusting God Through Transition

Mt. Carmel Churches | Trusting God Through Transition

Good morning roads, church, and welcome to everyone who is watching online. My name is promise Bradley and it is my great honor this morning to get to share with you a word that is entitled, trusting God through transition. So if you would, let’s open up our bibles to second Corinthians chapter three, verse 18. Yes, I am so pumped to share this word with you because I feel like this is a word that the Lord has been developing on the inside of me for about three years now and I’ve shared snippets of this word throughout the three years, but Holy Spirit has finally weaved it all together into one cohesive message. Mt. Carmel Churches I hope because I’ve personally been in a season of transition myself for about three years now, a very long extended, excruciating season of transition and a lot of major things in my life have been shifting and moving around and some of them have been really, really awesome and super welcomed and some of them have been absolutely devastating.

In fact, from my perspective over the past three years, the majority have been very, very devastating and the Lord has been really, really patient to walk with me through this transitional season and to help me transition some things on the inside of me as I go through these changes and I really wish like it would be my heart’s desire to get up here this morning and be like, y’all. I did it so well. I was so graceful during this season. I mean I was so obedient and I learned all of my lessons right the first time and I came out on the other side and seeming really super holy. Yeah, but that would be a lie because the opposite is true. Mt. Carmel Churches In fact, I was kicking and screaming almost the entire way, just telling the Lord, I don’t like this. I don’t want to go this way. Why are these changes happening? This isn’t fair. I’m going to go do my own thing because I don’t like where you, my shepherd are leading me. You’re not very good at this job.

Just being real, but the good news is is that even when I’m not very graceful, he is full of grace for me and I learned a lot of things through this season. I learned, number one, that I’m actually created for transition. I’m actually created to go through seasons of transition. I am created to go through changes you see change happens in our life whether we want it to or not. The question is, am I going to let it change me? Am I going to let change happen on the inside of me? Mt. Carmel Churches, there are only two constants in our life. Number one, that God never changes. He’s the same yesterday, today and forever, but number two, everything else does change and a lot of people believe. They’re like, if God’s the same yesterday, today and forever, then he doesn’t want to do anything new. Can I tell you something that’s not true?

Because if God is the same today as he was yesterday, guess what he was doing? Creating something new. One day he just woke up and decided to create the universe. I think that was a pretty new thing in Isaiah 43. He says, behold, I do a new thing. Can you not see it in Second Corinthians? He says, he’s creating me a new creation. He’s making me a new creation and revelations. It says, I make all things new. In Stefania is says the Lord is a leaping forth into action from his holy dwelling place. He loves to do new stuff in our life and another thing I learned is that I’m not just made to survive transitional seasons, but I’m actually made to thrive in transitional seasons and I realized when I took stock of my life that the majority of my life seems to be transitioned, that those arrival seasons, you know, the arrival season, it’s the victory moment, Mt. Carmel Churches right?

It’s the resurrection. It’s the, Oh, it is finished. I did the thing. I have arrived. Now I’m just gonna sit back and bask in the glory of it and rest that those seasons I have them, but they’re few and far between and they’re very, very short when they get here that the majority of my life is getting to the arrival. Right. Just think about your day during your day at work or at home or at school, wherever you are most of the day. How often have you arrived, like finished something and you’re like, I got the thing done and how long until you’re onto the next thing. Most of our life is transition. You know, it’s like you, you go through school and this school is transition, Mt. Carmel Churches, and what is the arrival season? It’s the diploma and you have this moment where you put on a cap and gown and they call your name and you’re so excited and you invite all your family and you’re so excited and then they call your name and you walk through and you get a little piece of paper and you’re like, wow, that is at it. Like now I gotta go join the real world. I’m in transition again. Hey, it’s all the real world. You guys schools the real world to just let you know students. It’s okay. It’s still a real world. We spend most of our life in transition. When the baby gets here, they make you take it home.

They will not let you stay in the hospital forever. You got to go home and now you got to learn how to take care of it. Guess what? Transitioned comes with a learning curve. Every time transition comes with trial and error and failure of free time, so if you are finding yourself in a, in a, in a season of life and you’re like, what’s going on? I’m an adult. I don’t. I don’t. I should know how to do life by now and you’re finding yourself in a place in your life. It’s like, Mt. Carmel Churches I don’t even know how to do life. Can I tell you? It’s okay. God designed you for this. It’s called maturity. It’s called growth. We get this lie in our head that life is about arriving and one of these days I’m going to arrive and it’s different things for different ones of us, right? Like sometimes it’s like once I get that job, I will have arrived.

Once I have this many Zeros on my paycheck, I will have arrived. Once I had this house, in this zip code and this spouse and this family I will have arrived. Life is not about arriving, it’s about maturing with our shepherd. The Lord designed it to work this way. I’m going to prove it to you. Are You at Second Corinthians chapter three lists chicken out in Second Corinthians chapter three, verse 18, it says, but we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the spirit of the Lord. I love this scripture. There is so much meat in this scripture. Mt. Carmel Churches I could camp here for a month and still not get everything that’s in this scripture. That word transform. It’s the Greek word Metamorpho. It’s where we get our word.

Metamorphosis is what you think of when you think of a caterpillar going into a cocoon and becoming a butterfly. Mt. Carmel Churches The transformation happens in the cocoon. That is our transition season, and we moved from one level of glory to the next. The Caterpillar Level of glory to the butterfly level of glory is the direction that God takes us. Every time. That word glory means honor, splendor, divine quality, unspoken manifestation of God. These. This is the level that God is taking us from one level of his glory to the next. This scripture tells me so many things. Number One, it tells me that I am not made to be static. I’m not made to stay the same. Now, don’t get it twisted. I am not telling you today that you’re not made to be dedicated to something and to stick with something. Just because we change our circumstances does not mean necessarily that anything within us has changed.

It’s not always about changing my circumstances is it? Sometimes it is, but more often than not, it is about changing my attitude. Maya Angelou said this, she said, if you don’t like something, then change it, and if you cannot change it, then change your attitude. This scripture tells me that I am meant to be dynamic, Mt. Carmel Churches not static. I am Mitsubishi always increasing, always moving forward, always growing, always expanding, always moving from one level of glory to the next. I’m not made to stay in the same place. Martin Luther King said it like this. He said, if you cannot fly, then run, and if you cannot run, then walk and if you cannot walk, then crawl, but whatever you do, do not stay the same. Keep moving forward. This scripture tells me that I made for transformation, that I made to go from one level of glory to the next.

This scripture tells me that no matter what level of glory I’m currently experiencing, there’s more, no matter how much of his love I’m experiencing, there’s more, no matter how much power, how much presence, how much wisdom, how much truth, how much glory. There is more. There’s more for me and God wants to take me in that direction. The scripture tells me that as I move from glory to glory through seasons of transition with my shepherd, that what happens is I am becoming more like Jesus. That that’s what it means to go from glory to glory and isn’t that the whole point of Christianity? Isn’t that the whole point of this thing? To be Christ like to become more like him, and the scripture tells me that the vehicle through which I move from glory to glory and become more like my savior, is by beholding the face of Jesus by beholding his glory Mt. Carmel Churches.

And if all of that is true, there are a couple of things that I want to do. Number one, I don’t ever want to go through another transition season on my own. I want to make sure that I’m following my shepherd because he’s the only one who leads me in paths of righteousness. He’s the only one who takes me from glory to glory. During the past three years, there were so many times where I just wanted to check out and I did and I told the Lord, I was like, Lord, you know, I’m, I’m just, I’m not going to go with you. I’m just going to do what I want to do and that it. And I would go my own way. And can I tell you, there’s no peace in that. There’s no provision in that. Mt. Carmel Churches There’s no rest in that. There’s no blessing on that.

There’s nothing on that big, but when I go with my shepherd, he gives me peace that surpasses understanding piece that goes way beyond my circumstances. He blesses it when I go with him and it tells me another thing. I want to spend my entire life learning what it means to behold the face of Jesus. I want to know what that means. I desire to do that in my life. To behold the face of Jesus and I’m telling you what if my arrival seasons in life, my victory moments, Mt. Carmel Churches my resurrection moments in life are very, very few and far between and they’re very, very fleeting than I tell you what I want to be so present in those moments. I want to determine that I am going to be so present in every single arrival moments, not distracted by my past, not worried about my future with nothing distracted me, no unforgiveness, no bitterness, nothing hanging on my entire past under the blood of Jesus. Everything dealt with and my future that my future is held in his hand

and if my transition seasons are the majority of my life than my goodness, I want to enjoy the ride. I want to enjoy that journey all because we can make life all about arriving and we make the transition seasons miserable when we do that, do we not? Some people, some people vacation like this. I know nobody in here vacations like this, but have you ever been on vacation with somebody like this where they’re all about arriving, you know in your life, Mt. Carmel Churches driving down the road and you’re like the world’s largest ball of yarn. Can we stop and get a picture? No, we can’t have fun until we get there.

I do not like to vacation like that. I like to take my dear, sweet time. I like to stop at every antique store y’all. I like to get every crummy coffee at every gas station along the way, but when I’m coming home it is a completely different story. Get me home. Mt. Carmel Churches Yesterday I recently went on vacation with my mom and some women in my family. It was a girls’ trip and we drove down to Tybee island, Georgia. It’s about a 10 to 12 hour drive and we took two days to get there. We ate it, really fancy restaurants. We went to rock city, we went to lookout mountain. We had a great time, and then on the way home I drove from Tybee island, Georgia to Galatians, Illinois in under 10 hours. She want to know how I did it straight in. Uncertain hour straight. No, you’re not going to the bathroom. No, you’re not hungry. When I stopped to get gas, you can take care of all that. Guess, guess which trip was more fun?

The transition was the same, but my attitude made all of the difference. Oh, it’s so much about. Mt. Carmel Churches Our attitude is it isn’t. Some transitions though. They’re just better than others. Right? They’re just. They just look better. Write. Some transitions were so excited to get to that next arrival. We don’t really mind what we’re leaving behind and the transition just looks like open road and the birds are singing and the flowers are blooming and everything and some transitions though. We’re standing in the light that is on this side, right, and this transition looks a lot more like a really dark tunnel and I’m like, really? You want me to go that way? Is there even a light at the end of that tunnel like, do you even know what’s at the end of that tunnel? God, because I don’t and I’m pretty comfortable here

and some transitions. It’s not really that God has necessarily invited us into transition. Mt. Carmel Churches It’s the light that is is just and we’re not sure that the light that will be is something that we even want. Right? Sometimes the light that is becomes the light that was not because of anything God did, but because someone has come and snuffed it out, whether that’s me with my own mistakes and things like that or someone else’s sin against me or the enemy’s attack or just loss in my life. Anytime I experienced loss in my life, I got to walk through a transition, don’t I? Actually, every transition is like this in a way because no matter where we’re going, even if it’s something fun and exciting that we’re really looking forward to, there’s an element of loss, right? I got to say goodbye to the light that is so that I can move into the light.

That will be sometimes I’m just saying goodbye to a season of life. Sometimes I’m saying goodbye to who I used to be. Sometimes I’m saying goodbye to some relationships. Sometimes I’m saying goodbye to some statuses and things like that, but sometimes it’s really hard because I’m saying goodbye to a loved one. Mt. Carmel Churches Right? I’m saying goodbye to a very, very important relationship in my life and you know, I’m just. I’m convinced that the reason that transition is so hard for us sometimes is because it means death every time. Sometimes literally, but sometimes more figured. It figuratively not just death of the thing that we’re leaving, but also certain kinds of death on the inside of us, and actually this death on the inside of us is a really beautiful death. Now, just track with me here. If your arrival season is the resurrection, it’s the ines finished moment.

Then the transition is the cross bearing season. It’s the garden of guests emoney learning to lay down my will. It’s the Lord I’m going to give up. If you don’t send 10,000 angels to come and strengthen me. Moment. It’s the season of where are you? God on the cross, my God, my God. Why have you forsaken me? See, Jesus knows exactly what you’re going through. If you feel this way, he knows it can be a tough season, but here, here’s what I’ve come to realize. The older I get, that everything that God ordains in my life, it’s designed to kill me and I mean that in the best possible way. I mean that it’s designed to kill me so that I can truly live. Marriage is designed to kill me Mt. Carmel Churches.

Y’All are laughing, but it’s designed to kill you. To parenthood is designed to kill me. Lee, big time leadership is designed to kill me. Even friendship is designed to kill me in the most beautiful way. It’s designed to kill the caterpillar in me to make room for the butterfly that God wants to develop. I want to. I want to read it to you. Jesus said it like this, and Matthew Sixteen. This is what he said. Jesus said to his disciples in Matthew 16 verse 24, if anyone desires to come after me to follow me, in other words, to follow me through this tunnel from this level of glory to that level of glory, then this is what he has to do. Let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. Mt. Carmel Churches For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

In other words, if I’m over here at the entrance of the tunnel trying really hard to hang onto the light that is, or the light that was, then I’m going to miss out on the light. That will be, if I’m trying to hold onto this level of glory, I’m going to miss out on that level of glory, but if I will say goodbye to this side of the tunnel, I will say, I trust you, God with my past and I trust you with my future and I will move through this tunnel with my shepherd who leads me in paths of righteousness. I will discover a new level of glory Mt. Carmel Churches.

But man, I tell you what, the mourning process I want to tell you this. The past three years have been so tough because I’ve, I’ve just had a lot of loss in my life and that has caused me to have to walk through a lot of transitions, a lot of mourning process, and one very significant loss. I’ve lost a lot of people that I love over the past three years. And one very significant loss to me was my grandmother, my paternal grandmother. And um, you know, a lot of us lose our grandparents in our life. But I’m like, my grandma was my person. You know, I’m her maid over and she was the adult that I was most bonded to my entire life just from infancy on, and I had the great honor and privilege to be her primary caregiver and the great responsibility to be her primary caregiver for the last two years of her life Mt. Carmel Churches.

She had Alzheimer’s and Aphasia. And um, I just, through that process I was really mad at God and basically we as a family, we’re kind of locked into a season of mourning. But it was kind of a weird state of mourning because she was still there. You know what I mean? Like we were mourning the light. That was who she used to be and just watching her suffer and she really did suffer towards the end and just making really tough choices about her care. And I was. I realized through this process, and I’m not as holy as I think I am because all the while morning and watching her suffer and, and trying to do what I could to alleviate her suffering, I was pretty selfish. I was mad about it. Mt. Carmel Churches I was like, God, this is not fair. That I have to take care of her.

And um, oh my goodness, like the strain that this is putting on my family. I mean I was a complainer during this season. Like I was really telling God all about it and how I didn’t like what was happening and he was very, very patient and graceful with me. But I learned that a lot about the mourning process through this. Number one, I learned that God’s blessing is on morning. Jesus said in Matthew Five, blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted. And if his blessing is on the mourning process than my blessing should be on it too. I should invite it into my life and I should honor it in the lives of others. You know, Mt. Carmel Churches as Christians sometimes we get a little nervous about people who are in mourning. We just like want to come in and fix it, you know, and make them feel better and make everything good and tell them all the right things.

And sometimes people don’t need that. Sometimes they just need you to do like the Bible says, and mourn with those who mourn. They just need you to say it just, it’s just the worst. It just stinks. I don’t know what else to say except is it just stinks, but I learned that there’s a big difference between the mourning process and ungodly morning, that there’s godly morning and ungodly grief. Are you tracking with me? So godly morning looks like this. Okay, God, Mt. Carmel Churches let’s go into that deep dark tunnel. I know you’re with me. I’m going to go with you and I’m going through this tunnel and sometimes I get mad and I throw a little fit and sometimes I take one step forward and two steps back and sometimes I sit down and I cross my legs and I have little pity party and sometimes I scream and I cry and it’s all good.

You know why? Because my shepherd is with me. He’s with me, but ungodly grief looks more like this. At any point during this transition, I dig a hole and I get in it and I stay and I don’t get out of it. See, God doesn’t bless the pit. You know why? Because he didn’t create it and he can’t bless anything that he didn’t create, but you know what he does? He is so faithful to bring me out of that pit. That’s what he does. He brings me out of the pit and there’s all these lies that come in the midst of this transition of morning. There’s this lie that says he’s not with you, but can I tell you that is a lie. Even if you are in darkness in you cannot see him. He says that his word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.

He shows me the way he leads me in paths of righteousness and he is with you because it says in his word, in Psalm 23, even though I walk through the Valley of the shadow of death, you are with me. I will fear no evil for you are with me. Your Rod and your staff. They comfort me. Mt. Carmel Churches So even when I can’t see you, I know that you are there any promises to bring us comfort in that season and how? How in the world do we walk through this transition of morning? How do we do it? It’s the same way as the second Corinthians three, 18, the same way that we move from one level of glory to the next is the same way that we walked through. Transition from one are the mourning process from one level of glory to the next. We do it by keeping our face transfixed on Jesus’s face.

This is how King David said it. Check this out in a psalm 16, he said, verse eight, Psalm Sixteen, I will bless the Lord who has given me counsel. My heart also instructs me in the night seasons, he is with me. In the night seasons, I have set the Lord always before me. I’m looking in his face because he is at my right hand. I shall not be moved my flesh, us. Therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoices my flesh. Also will rest in hope for you will not leave my soul in hell. There’s a lie that says he’s gonna leave you. He will not leave you or forsake you. Church. He will not leave you in that tunnel alone. He is with you. He does not leave, nor will you allow your holy one to see corruption. You will show me the path of life in your presence is fullness of joy at your right hand are pleasures forever more. This is how we move from glory to glory in the mourning process, Mt. Carmel Churches and when I get over here and the light that will be, it is not a betrayal to the light that was, and it is. Not that I’m forgetting anybody at all. It is simply that I am walking into the glory that God has for me.

See, there’s a lot of lies that come in. Any transition we are, whether it’s morning processor, just you’re just transitioning. There’s a lot of lies. One is one is like God, there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, right? Like you’re leading me nowhere. Like where is this even going? Can you imagine a Abraham when God said go into the land that I will show you? It’s like, well, where is that? Where is that? God? Where’s that on Google maps. Do you know? Mt. Carmel Churches I actually asked Siri, I asked her, where is the land that you will show me or that God will show me, and she told me my address,

so I’m good. Y’All. I’ll know about you. You guys will have to ask her ass after service, but I’m right where I’m supposed to be, but this is what it says in Hebrews Eleven, verse eight. It says, by faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance and watch this, and he went out not knowing where he was going. So if you are in a season and you’re like, I don’t know where I’m going, can I tell you you’re in good company. It’s okay. God’s got you and he’s leading you in paths of righteousness. There’s a lie that says, the light at the end of the tunnel is not going to be as good as the light that I’m currently in the glory that God had the next stage of glory that God has for me, not as good as the old glory.

Ecclesiastes seven, verse eight, it says, better is the end of a thing. Then it’s beginning. It’s like boom, Mike, drop right there. We can all just go home on that one and the patient in spirit is better than the proud and spirits. Be Not quick in your spirits to become angry for anger lodges in the hearts of fools say not. Why were the former days better than these four? Eight is not from wisdom that you asked this. In other words, Solomon is saying, the best is yet to come. Mt. Carmel Churches. You can bank on it. That’s the word of God. When he is your shepherd, the best is yet to come. I love this section of scripture. I call it the transition sandwich. You know why? Because the first scripture is about how transitions. Good. The next scriptures about anger and then the next Christian scriptures about how transition is good.

Why does anger come in the middle? Because that’s often where anger happens in the middle of transition and Solomon saying, don’t let anger come and stay. It’s okay if anger knocks on your door and you open it up and you’re like, what are you selling nat? And I don’t want. I’m not interested and let him go on down the road, but don’t let him come live with you. Amen. But God, I don’t want to change. I’m so comfortable. I just want to stay where I’m at. I finally arrived somewhere. I just want to stay. What’s it going to be like over there in the light that will be, am I going to like it? What’s it going to feel like? Are People gonna? Think of me the same way. What are People gonna think about me? What is it going to cost? You see all of these questions, all of these concerns that come to us in the midst of the tunnel, they’re like vultures that come to steal our forward momentum. See, the enemy doesn’t want you to move forward because he knows what God has for you. On the other side of that, he knows that you’re increasing. He doesn’t want you to take another step forward

and to close out. Today. I want to tell you the story of a woman in the Bible named [inaudible]. Her story to me blows my mind. Here’s what you need to know about her. She was a woman, have absolutely no reputation. There were some rumors about her. The Bible doesn’t. No. It doesn’t tell us whether the Bible knows, but the Bible doesn’t tell us whether or not that, that these rumors are true about her, but people thought some things about her and she was a concubine of King Saul, so she wasn’t even a legitimate wife and her, her husband, King Saul had died, so she was a widow. This woman literally had nothing, no reputation, nothing, but she had sons. Her pride and joy, her everything, the hope for her future, her legacy, everything that she had put her hope in. And King David, he comes to the throne.

He’s the guy we’ve been talking about this whole time. He comes to the throne after Saul and he’s a righteous dude. He loves the Lord. He’s a man after God’s own heart. The Bible says, and he wants to set right everything that his predecessor saw had done wrong and there’s a famine in the land at the time, and so David’s seeks the face of the Lord and he, he, he asked the Lord, he says, Lord, why is there a famine in the land right now? And the Lord revealed to him that it was because of some wrongdoing that saul had done years past to this tribe of people called Gibeah nights. And so David goes to the Ghibli and nights and he’s like, listen, Mt. Carmel Churches I’m trying to make everything right. I’m trying to do everything right. What can I do to make this right to you? That my predecessor did?

And they said, give us seven of Saul’s sons. Crucify them outside the city and hanging their bodies up. And David was like, okay, I’ll do that for you. This is ot stuff. This is the kind of stuff they did in the Old Testament. And so he goes and gets five of Saul’s descendants. Saw has a lot of descendants. He goes and gets five and then he goes to risk bus and he takes both of her sons both and I’m like, Jesus, one is bad enough, but both you see a woman at that time had no agency unless she had a male person in her family to be her agent. She couldn’t speak for herself. She couldn’t make money for herself. She couldn’t take care of herself. She could do nothing. She wasn’t allowed by law to do anything for herself. Why did he take both of them? He’s a righteous man, a man after God’s own heart. Have you ever had someone who was a good person failure

and you had to walk through the transition of forgiveness? This is what happened to respond and so he goes and he take any crucifies his sons and he hates their bodies up outside of the city walls and then he’s supposed to by law, by the end of the day, take their bodies down and bury them, and David fails her again because he, he neglects to bury their bodies that day and he leaves them up on those crosses for five months, five months. Can I tell you that? Mt. Carmel Churches I mean just the horror of that is just too much, but can I tell you that risk va had nothing to live for at this point. She had nothing. She might as well go die. She has. She can’t go to the king and say, take my boys’ bodies down sheet. No one will listen to her. She had nothing to live for, but she decided to live for righteousness.

The Bible says that she went and took her place at the foot of those crosses and for five months all by herself. This little bitty woman kept the beasts of the field and the fowl of the air away from the bodies of her babies, and so David realized what he had done. I tell you something, if you feel like you have nothing to live for, first of all, I break a spirit of suicide off of you in the name of Jesus, and I’d speak to you today and I say, if you feel like you have nothing to live for, that live for righteousness, live for the cause of Christ to see the savior, the lamb of God received the reward of his suffering. So she stood there for five months and kept all of these animals at bay and you know the lies of the enemy had to come to her in that moment. You know, she had to hit some walls in a series of five months of doing this all by herself. Mt. Carmel Churches You know, she had to get tired. You know, she had to get hungry. You know, she had to think I’m crazy. You know, the voices had to come. What are you doing? This is pointless, but it wasn’t pointless. It was the right thing to do. And sometimes the easy thing and the right thing to do are not the same thing.

Everybody thinks you’re crazy. She had to hit a wall. I want to tell you about a time that I hit a wall in my life. I was given birth to my baby daughter Vivian and I looked at my midwife about eight hours in and I go, I can’t do this. You’re gonna. Have to cut it out. It was too late to cut it out. And uh, and, and, and I was serious. And she, you know, any midwife who’s worth their salt knows that when a woman says, I can’t do this, that the arrival of that baby is almost there. Mt. Carmel Churches It’s almost there because you know what? Almost every time when a woman says, I can’t do this, you know, what that signifies is the beginning of a phase of labor called, guess what transition? And that woman looked back at me. She looked me in the eyes and she goes, but you are doing this.

Can I tell you that? That simple statement has marked my life? Mt. Carmel Churches Because in every hard season when I believe I can’t do something, I hear that woman’s voice in my head saying, but you are doing it. In other words, you’ve already come this far and you’ve not come this far to only come this far. If you’ve come this far, you can go this far again and something rose up on the inside of me because Jesus has perfect strength in my weak moments and something rose up on the inside of me. When she said that and I was like, that’s right. I’m doing this and I did it.

The Lord is with you. In that moment, you see, sometimes we hit that wall in the center of the tunnel. Do you know the center of the tunnel the hardest? Because it’s the darkest because you’re the furthest away from the light that was in the furthest away from the light that will be and the enemy. Oh, he is scared to death that you’re going to take another step because every step that you take forward with your shepherd leading you in paths of righteousness, you are walking into more light, more light, more light. You’re moving into the outer banks of the glory that he has for you. So can I tell you something? If you’re in a place and you have said within your spirit, I can’t do this, can I tell you you are doing this, you are doing this. How did risks but do it?

How did she stand out there for five months? It tells us in Second Samuel, Verse Twenty, Chapter Twenty One, verse 10, it says, now risk. The daughter of Ai took sackcloth that represents her mourning, her grief, and she spread it for herself on the rock from the beginning of harvest until the late rains port on them from heaven and she did not allow the birds of the air to rest on the bodies of her babies by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. In other words, Mt. Carmel Churches she spread her grief on the rock and she took her place on the rock. Who is this rock of ages? It is Jesus. The same way that we move from glory to glory. It’s the same way that we get through the dark night of our soul is by standing on the rock of Jesus and the word came to David.

Finally, after five months and he realized, he finally realized, Oh my goodness, Mt. Carmel Churches I’ve neglected to do what was right. He was convicted by her righteousness. Sometimes the Lord, sometimes you’re in a transition because the Lord has given grace to somebody else to do the right thing and listen. He gives strength to the one in the tunnel as he gives grace to the other one that he’s waiting on, and I’m so glad that he does because sometimes I’m the one who’s waiting on and I need that grace for myself, but so David, not only was he convicted about the bodies of these seven boys, but he remembered something that is crazy to me. He remembered that he had also neglected to get the bones of King Saul and his best friend Jonathan, who were dead and their bodies had been taken by the enemy, and David went and gotten those bones as well, and he brought them all back home and he put them in one grave and he called it the king’s grave.

Listen, you might not realize, but that was a tremendous honor for risk sons to be buried in the king’s grave. Why? Because when you walk through morning with the Lord, when you walk from Glory to glory, trusting your shepherd, you know what he has for you on this side of it, you know what Mt. Carmel Churches he has for you in this level of glory and the light that will be not as he leads you on a path of righteousness on, on this side, he has honor and he has justice for you. You know why? Because righteousness and justice are the foundations of his throne.

Thank you so much for joining us today. We are so honored that we get to be a part of what God is doing in and through your life. If you would like for us to partner with you in prayer, you can click the link in the description below. If this ministry has impacted you and you would like to partner with us to continue to reach others, you can click the link in the description below to give. Now, if you’re new here or are you like this sermon, consider subscribing to our youtube channel. Mt. Carmel Churches You can also hear the road sermons on our website and our podcast. Thanks for watching.