Man. Welcome to the roads church online. So glad to have all of you with us. All of our erodes family, everybody watching, whether YouTube, Facebook, website, website, whatever it may be. We’re so glad to have you. My name’s Chad, my wife Dawn and I are the lead pastors here at the road’s church and we’re thrilled to be with you today. So hope you just settle in with your family. Enjoy this. Maybe you’re watching it back on a rebroadcast, maybe you’re listening to it on the podcast, but our prayer is today that you just be connected with Jesus. It’s our vision here at the road’s churches to connect people with Jesus from all roads of life. So even though we can’t be together physically, we believe that we can get connected to him. And it’s our desire to point you to Jesus. Who’s the hope of the world with our Mt. Carmel Church.
He’s the one who can change your life. So we pray that you experienced him and remember him today. We’re going to be continuing our talk that we started last week called we will overcome. And we’re obviously facing some difficult situations in our life today. But this word overcome is very important. And the Webster’s dictionary, the 1828 dicks version says this, the word overcome is to conquer, to vanquish, to subdue, to get the better of difficulty or obstacles. And we believe this is when it says that to conquer and to vanquish or subdue to get the better of difficulty, to get the better of obstacles with our Mt. Carmel Church. We’re facing some difficulty in our life. We’re facing some obstacles in our life, no doubt about it, on the world around us. It’s happening. So the question is which side are we on? Because the word overcome just by itself grammatically.
And depending on how you use it grammatically, it changes its impact dramatically. And what I mean by that is the word overcome can be a noun or a verb. And the word overcome as a noun refers to a state or a condition, something we are like we are overcome. It’s like a direct object. We can be overcome if it’s a noun form or the verb form, it’s an action Mt. Carmel Church. It could be something we do when we are the subject we overcome. So it depends which side are we going to be on with the Mt. Carmel Church. Are we going to be on the direct object side means that we are overcome, something’s overcoming us or are we going to be on the subject side which says we will action verb we will overcome and that’s what I’m believing for. That’s what I’m telling you today that we will overcome. We want to be on the subject side and not the direct object side.
So we just thankful for what God is doing in our lives. And today I want to talk specifically about one thing I want to talk about overcoming what we see by focusing on what was said, overcoming what we see by focusing on what was said, in order to overcome what we see, we need to know what is said. We need to know what God says in order for us to overcome what we see around us. A lot of times we’re all going to be faced with adversity and situations going on all around us in our life, and if we’re going to overcome that, we’re going to have to have something that God said that we’re hanging on to with Mt. Carmel Church. Now, the roads church, every time we open God’s word, we get excited because we believe that God is going to speak to us. We believe he’s got something to say and so even though we’re not together today, right there in your living room, right there as you’re watching on your phone or your TV, if you have your Bibles today, come on, let’s make some noise as we open them up to numbers.
Chapter 13 whew. Numbers 13 yes, yes, I feel y’all. I heard you in your room. Now give context as you’re turning there. Numbers chapter 13 the children of Israel had just come out of 400 years of slavery in Egypt and they escaped from bondage. After 10 plagues and through the parting of the red sea, they finally come to the promised land. They finally get there and the Lord gives them instructions to go spy out the land and he sends out 12 liters. We talked about this a little bit last week and I want to expound on it today. As we talked about overcoming what we see by remembering what was said, so he gives instructions to these 12 leaders to go out and check out the land and so they returned back and I want to jump in today where they returned back with the report and we’ll start reading if you are following along with me in verse 25 says, and they return from spying out the land after 40 days which is a long time Mt. Carmel Church.
Now they departed and came back to Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the children of Israel in the wilderness of Paran to Kadesh and they brought back word to them and to all the congregation and showed them the fruit of the land. Then they told them and said, we went to the land where you send us. It truly flows with milk and honey, honey and this is its fruit. Nevertheless, the people who dwell in the land are strong. The cities are fortified and very large. Moreover, we saw the descendants of Anak there, the Amalekites dwell in the land of the South, the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains and the Canaanites dwell by the sea along the banks of the Jordan. Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, let us go up at once and take possession for, we are well able to overcome it, but the man who had gone up with him said, we are not able to go up against the people for they are stronger than weak.
And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land, which they had spied out saying the land through which we’ve gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature there. We saw the giants, the descendants of Anak came from the giants and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight and so we were in there. So I want to pray. Father, I just thank you for the reading of your word. Holy spirit. I ask you just to move into every person, every screen, every home. I pray that you speak through me right now, Lord, that it will not be me, that people remember it not be me that makes an impact, but I pray will be your spirit Mt. Carmel Church. It will be your word. I pray that you bring it to life.
I pray that you bring clarity and understanding. Lord Jesus, we’re here to exalt you. There’s only one King in this place and his name is Jesus. See will lift you up and celebrate you and thank you for the life that you’ve given us, that we are overcomers through you. It’s in your awesome name, Jesus, that we pray. Everybody say amen. Amen. Now what happens here is again, we talked about he send the spies to search out the promised land in a verse 17 through 20 he talks about three things that he wanted to check out when he goes to spout the land. Three things I want to check out. One. I want you to check out the people whether they’re strong or weak. And once you check out the cities, whether they dwell in camps, you know like they got tents or where they have strongholds, where they have cities with walls and strong buildings.
See what the cities are like and then check out the land. See whether it’s rich report. In other words, does the land produce a big harvest? Is a fruitful land? Is it dry as it is a barren? What kind of land? What? What kind of land are we getting into? So you want to check out those three things. And he said this, these other four words we talked about last week. He said, don’t forget, be of good courage, be of good courage when you go into this land. The three things that I’m telling you to spy out, don’t forget to be of good courage. And that word courage means to persevere and withstand danger, fear or difficulty. So he was giving him a heads up, Hey, you’re going into a land and there’s going to be danger or fear or difficulty available to you. It’s got to be there, you’re going to see it Mt. Carmel Church.
But in spite of it, when you see it, I want you to have courage. I want you to persevere. I want you to keep going. Even when you see danger, fear, or difficulty, I want you to keep moving forward. Don’t be discouraged by what you see by the danger, fear of difficulty, but be encouraged by what I’ve promised you, what I’ve said. So don’t let what you see discourage you, but let what I said encourage you. Are you feeling me today? See, we got to remember what God said about something in our life more than what we see about something. And this is what God was saying Mt. Carmel Church. Hey, you’re going to see some things. Don’t let danger, fear or difficulty cause you to forget what I said. So they reported back, goes to jump down to verse 27 they come back to report back to Moses.
Here’s what they said. Verse 27 they said, yo Moses, we went back. We went to the land where you sent us and it truly everybody say truly it truly flows with milk and honey. And this is it’s fruit. Now, when it says that flows with milk and honey, it doesn’t mean literally that there was milk and honey just flowing everywhere. It was a phrase that they use and the phrase milk and honey is very important because it means it had an abundance of food. When you don’t want to ask them to spout the land and say whether it’s rich or poor. When they came back and said, the land flows with milk and honey, they were sending this, they were saying, this land is rich baby. It’s flowing with milk and headaches. In other words, an abundance of food. It’s not barren. It’s how they show that it’s even about how abundant was it Mt. Carmel Church.
They even brought back grapes, a cluster of grapes that they cut off between two people. They had a pole and they were carrying a cluster of grapes on a pole. Now went to the store and picked up some grapes the other day. I didn’t have to carry it home on a pole. They were good grapes. They’re wonderful grapes, but these were great. This is how abundant this land was. How rich it was that they were carrying a cluster of grapes on a pole. So keep that in mind when we’re talking about the land that they saw. This was what was true. They said, Hey, truly everything you said about the land, it’s true here, check, check out the grapes. So everything you said about the lamp was true. The problem was go to verse 28 they saw something else that was also true. And this is, this is what’s also many times the problem in our lives.
We, we hear what God says and we see some things about what God said is true. But what trips us up is when we see other things that are also true, and here’s what they saw. What else did they see? That the people, they’re strong. So the people we saw, the people that were strong, it didn’t mean that they walked in, was spied out the city and they saw a bunch of people in there working out. You know what? I didn’t see them doing bench press and curls and squats and go ahead. Those people are strong. Do you see their arms? No. It’s not what they mean when they said that people were strong. They’re not talking about just muscle physical strength. They’re talking about their military capability that these people had strong military capability. When they said that also said the cities were four to five Mt. Carmel Church.
What I mean by the four to five that means they were secured. They didn’t, they didn’t live in tents. They didn’t live in open fields. They had walled cities that were secure and four to five and then in other words, you weren’t going in there easily and how fortified were they? The very first city that they were going to face, city of Jericho had walls around this entire city and that those walls were so thick that the Bible says that they literally raced chariots on top of the wall. That means that that wall had to be at least two chariots wide so somebody could pass. It’s not much of a race when it’s single fire.
If it’s single vial and one person starts in front of the other one gets who wins, but no, this is so wide that they could race. That means there had to be room to pass. That’s how thick this wall was. So when it says the cities were fortified so that they were secure, so now they saw that. So what you said they, they came out and said, you know, most of what you said about the land is true. Nevertheless, everybody say nevertheless. Nevertheless they saw something else that was true. Now the word nevertheless is a conjunction that goes between two opposing thoughts or positions. I said this time, and I think it’s important to reiterate, we will often be faced with two opposing facts that are both true. The question is which one’s going to be the truth that defines our actions? We’re going to face two things.
Now when they saw the people were strong, the cities were fortified. They thought that those were two opposing facts, but God didn’t. They didn’t believe that those were opposing facts. They thought that the presence of opposition, this is where I get where we get sometimes in their life. They thought that the presence of opposition negated the truth of what he said. So the land is true. Check out these grapes, but when they saw the strength of the people and the fortification of the cities, they thought the presence of opposition negated the truth of what God said. So they have the grapes to compare the truth of the grapes, the land, what God has for them. It’s awesome. But they also saw the strength of the resistance and they thought the presence of opposition negated the truth of what God said. But God didn’t say that everything that God said, this is so important for us in our life Mt. Carmel Church.
Everything that God said about the land was true. God didn’t lie. God didn’t lie and tell them, Hey, the people are weak and feeble. They live in little puny tenths that you could blow over with a stiff wind. He didn’t say that. He said, this land is already inhabited by the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Canaanites. He said, they’re all there. He already told them they were there. He did not lie to them. They just didn’t expect to see it the way they saw it. He told them upfront. He said, Hey, go check out the land. So he told them they they weren’t supposed seeing the opposition wasn’t the problem. That wasn’t the problem. He sent them to spy out the land. He expected them to see the opposition. They weren’t supposed to be discouraged by seeing the opposition. They weren’t supposed to be discouraged by seeing the magnitude of their enemy. They were supposed to be encouraged by seeing the magnitude of their God.
Sometimes when we see the opposition, God, God doesn’t mind. When we see adversity, he expects us to see adversity in our life. Our problem is we’ve been programmed to think. When we see adversity, something’s wrong. When we see an opposition, something’s wrong. What did I do wrong? Everything isn’t going smooth. Everything isn’t easy. Everything isn’t just going the way I want it to all the time. What’s wrong? Nothing’s wrong. Sometimes in our life we’ve been duped to thinking that when my life is right, there will be no problems, but I want to challenge that thinking and tell you that if you’re never facing adversity, if you’re never facing trouble, if you’re never facing challenges, something is absolutely wrong.
God. God was saying to them, Hey, it wasn’t that I didn’t want you to see them. I wanted you to see them, but I wanted you to see me bigger than them. Was it that he didn’t want them? See, God doesn’t ask us to believe what he says, only in the absence of opposing facts that we see, but rather in spite of the presence of them. Let me say that again. You didn’t get it. Write this down. You’re taking notes at home. Come on, write this down. God doesn’t ask us to believe what he says, only in the presence or sorry, only in the absence of opposing facts that we see, but rather in spite of the presence of them. So even when we see adversity, in other words, God said something to you. He promised something to you. He told you this was what he has for you, and you see the opposing facts.
You see opposition, you see resistance. He’s saying, don’t believe me. Just when you don’t see anything opposite of what I said, I want you to believe me in spite of when you see something opposite of what I said. When you’re praying for your child and your child gets worse, believe me in spite of what you see. Don’t believe me just because you don’t see anything going wrong. Believe me, even when you see something going wrong, don’t believe me. Just when you feel well, don’t believe me. Just when you get the promotion, when everything’s going well at work, everything’s going the way you want it to be. Believe me, whenever God has given you a word, he’s given you a word for your mind and for your thoughts and for your family and everything you see around you speaks opposite to what God told you. That’s when he says, I want you to dig in your heels and I want you to believe what I said, that what I said to you will Trump what you see around you Mt. Carmel Church.
What I say about you has to be more important than what you see about you, because want to encourage you today, you will overcome when you remember what he said more than what you see now. The problem is that as much as what they saw that caused them to get discouraged or challenge about what he said, but it was what they couldn’t see. See the problem I don’t know about for you, but for me, the belief that God can do something is rarely my problem and you’re not. When I talk to people, the belief that God can do something is rarely the problem. The fact, Hey, I know that God can usually the problem is we don’t see how so God tells you something. You are. I believe it can have. I believe it’s possible. Your most people believe it’s possible, but where we get tripped up is where they got tripped up.
God said, Hey, I’m giving you this land. And so they see the land that God was to give them like, Whoa, yeah, I want that land. Look at him. Grapes. Right? But then they didn’t see how it could happen. They didn’t see how it could work. And this is where we get challenged with what God said, not the fact that he can’t do it. We usually believe that he can. We just don’t see how. And so our courage is tied to what we see about what we can do, how we think it can work out. And our courage doesn’t mean need to be tied to what we see. Our courage needs to be tied to what he sees and what he said about what we see Mt. Carmel Church.
Good.
God’s going to see it from a different, and so I wanna encourage you today to see it his way. They’re afraid about what was going to happen because they didn’t see how they all saw the same thing. All the 12 spies saw the same thing. You know, I said that it isn’t about as much what they saw. That was the problem with what they didn’t see Mt. Carmel Church. Well, they all saw the same thing, but two of them saw something that the tin did not see. They saw something. The other tendency. Notice what Caleb says in verse 30 Caleb speaks up, you know, after they gave him this doom, despair and agony on me, he hauled reference. They gave it to them.
Then he says in verse 30 he pipes up and he says, you’ll quiet it. The people hush up, hush up. Oh, you doubting fear voices. All you fear and anxiety, voices talking in my head. Come on, hush. Those voices in your head right now that telling you we’re not going to get out of this. This America is not going to come out of it. We’re not going to be victorious. We’re not going to overcome hush. Those voices quiet those voices in your life here, the voice of God, we will overcome. You need to hear a voice of confidence, not in ourselves, but in him. My confidence is not in myself. I’m not going to get myself very far, but I am persuaded that he was. He’s able to keep what I committed to him against that day, until that day. So I just thank God he, Kayla begin to quite some voices around there and look what he said.
He quiet those voices and he says, Hey, let’s go up at once and take possession for war. We are well able. Everybody say well, able, well able to overcome it, well able, that means to have power might and ability to endure and prevail. Caleb saw something. The other tendency he saw the well able. The question I’m asking you and that I ask myself in times, do we see the well able? We see the difficulty, we see the adversity, but what separates the overcomer from the one who becomes overcome? What separates the subject side from the drip direct object side is which way do you see? Do you see the, well Abel usually I can see that God can’t. I believe that men, God is able, but I don’t see that I’m able, but Caleb and Joshua said, we are well able to overcome it. You got to see yourself as well able with the best Mt. Carmel Church.
He said, well, we’ll able to overcome. I told you that word overcome means to conquer, to vanquish, to subdue, to get the better up. So Caleb and Joshua saw themselves as the subject. They saw themselves as the one doing the overcoming. They didn’t see themselves as the one being overcome. They didn’t see themselves as one that are under under the under the influence of something outside of them. They saw themselves as the one taking action. They saw themselves as applying themselves to the subject, to the verb part of overcome saying, Hey, we will overcome and that’s how God wants us to see ourselves. They said, we see the people, we see the strong people, we see the giants. We’re not blind. We see the adversity. We see fear. We see the difficulty. We see all that. We ain’t trying to pretend nothing we’ve done around.
Pretend it’s not there. We see all that, but we see something else and that’s my encouragement to you see all that stuff going on around you. Don’t pretend faith does not come from pretending troubles aren’t in our life. Faith doesn’t rise up because I pretend that I’m not going through difficulty. Faith does not show up in my life because I try and say I’m not having any troubles. I’m not having any troubles. I’m not having any troubles. That is not faith. Faith is when you see it, you hear it and you feel it, and in the midst of a juice, look at it and you say, I will overcome. I will not back up. I’m going to keep coming. I will keep coming right in the midst of it. Faith believes what God said over what you see. You can say, this is what’s happening in my marriage right now for our Mt. Carmel Church.
You can see it. You can say, this is what’s happening with my kids right now. I can see it. You can say, this is what’s happening in my bank account. I can see it with my job. I can see it. Yes, I can see it. We’re not trying to pretend. We can see that the Corona virus has had a huge impact on our country. We can see that the Corona virus has had a huge impact. Impact on employment, people losing their jobs, millions of people out of work. Because of the Kronobars. We could see people being affected from a health standpoint, all the fear straight. We see all of that, but in the midst of seeing all of that, we have to remember that he said something. He said something and I got to believe what he said more than what I see. I’m not saying I don’t see it, I’m just saying what he said causes me to see something bigger, and that’s what we got to have in our hearts.
We got to have another set of eyes. We don’t pretend. We don’t pretend like it’s not there, but man, we’re going to see something else. God’s moving goods moving. So they said they see all that, but they didn’t say, here’s what I liked about Caleb and Joshua. Here’s what I liked about them. They were not leaders. They said, well, let’s wait and see. They were leaders that said, watch and see. They were leaders that took action. They weren’t leaders. They stood passively by and said, well, let’s just wait and see what happens to us. No, no, no, no, no. They weren’t passively waiting. They said, watch and see. Let’s take action. And when we take action, look what God will do for us. Sometimes we’re waiting to see what happens before we believe God and God is saying, jump out and believe me, and watch and see what we have for you Mt. Carmel Church.
Watch and see God move in your life. When you step out in faith, when we say, God, I believe what you said more than what I see. Well now Jen, let’s calm down. Let’s wait and see what happens first. I understand there are certain applications for that theory or for that ideology. I understand that, but I understand most of the time if we’re just setting by to wait and see, we’re going to be more like the 10 than we are like the two and we got to be the take action. We want to be people that are overcoming adversity, not being overcome by it. Can I get an amen from somebody in their house? Come on, put it in the comments. Put below, go up. Type in there where you’re watching from. We want to know where you’re watching from today. Give us a shout out.
Give God some glory. Give. I’ll give you two seconds to type out a praise to God because he is worthy of our praise. We are overcoming because greater is he that’s in us, that he, that’s in the world. Type it out, that God’s bringing you through. Type it out that you’re going to overcome through your family situation, your work situation. It doesn’t matter. God has for you. We just sang about it. He’s for you and he’s with you. You need to be encouraged today that Jesus is on the throne. Man, if he’s for me, if he’s for me, who could be against me, it doesn’t mean nobody’s going to be against me. It just means I don’t even know their name. Compared to him. Who are they? Who do they be going to be against? Me? Jesus, my side. Come on, let God be praised in this place Mt. Carmel Church.
So now look what happened. He said, now we’re well able. We’re well able to overcome it. So he said, let’s take possession of it, so let’s, let’s make it to modern day taking possession of the promised land for them. What does that mean for you and I? We’re not taking any land. We’re not destroying or taking. We’re not taking any walls and defeating any Canaanites or Jebusites or any kind of EITs. We’re not. We’re not overcoming them. But here’s, here’s what we are doing. We’re trying to possess the promises. We’re not possessing the promised land, but we’re possessing the promises of God. Cause remember God said this land is yours. It’s available, but they had to go possess it. Here are the grapes. Go get them. So here, what’s happening? He looked at us. He said, take possession. What is possess means? Possess means the occupied by driving out previous tenants and possessing in their place for great Mt. Carmel Church.
Now I feel the presence of God just speaking to hearts right now to occupy by driving out previous tenants and possessing in a place, two part process for us again, modern day for us to possess what God wants for our life, the lifestyle he had a land for them. He had a lifestyle for them to possess. The promised lamp. Well God has a life for us to possess. He has a way of life for us to possess. It is available for us through Jesus dying on the cross, raising from the dead. He made a life available to us, but we have to go possess it. How do we possess it? By grace, it was made available through faith we go possess. So two part process to doing this, taking new territory in our life, new habits, new feelings, new beliefs, new behaviors. How are we going to do it Mt. Carmel Church?
Two things. Number one, remove and drive out the current occupants, which you don’t want. They drove out the Hittites. We may have to drive out fear. They drove out the Jebusites. We have to drive out addiction. They drove out the Canaanites. We may have to drive out worry or anxiety. You got to drive them out. Whatever you don’t want in your life anymore. You got to drive it out. We may have to drive out bitterness or unforgiveness. We’ve got to drive it out. You don’t want that in your life, so you said you got to drive it out. That’s number one. If you’re going to take new territory, new thoughts, new beliefs, new behaviors in your life, you’ve got to drive out what you don’t want. It’s not hoping. Come on. Come on honey. I need somebody to say, Hey man, I just feel like the encouragement coming. See, it’s not hoping. It goes away. Possessing the land is not hoping. It just magically disappears. It’s intentionally saying, you got to go. I ain’t having it. Ain’t nobody got time for that bitterness anymore. I want to live in peace in my life. Ain’t nobody got time for anxiety in my life. I want to be free from that. Ain’t nobody got time to be all grumpy and grouchy because what happened to me 10 years ago, I got to put that on to my past and move forward with greatness Mt. Carmel Church.
When you gotta drive it out, you gotta drive it out, drive it out. Number two, after you drive it out, then you gotta replace it and occupy it with what you want in its place. So get rid of what you don’t want. Shoot, go. You got to go. And then you put in a new belief, a new habit, a new way of acting, a new way of thinking in its place. You don’t leave it vacant. You intentionally put in a new way. So I’m going to get rid of that influence in my life and I’m going to put the Bible in my life. Instead of watching or listening to that every day, I’m going to start reading my Bible. Every day I’m going to start praying. Every day you replace it with a new source. Come on. Some of you need to unplug from some of the news unplugged from some of the social media.
There’s no way that we can get rid of fear if we’re constantly taking in fear. We got to bring in a source of faith and gotten. The Bible says that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. You want faith to stir up in your life. You’ve got to bring the word of God into your life. The word of God is more accessible than it’s ever been in the history of mankind. There’s no way. You can’t have enough word availability of the word in your life, so just encourage you, get the word in your life. Replace it with something else. That’s how we’re going to, that’s how we’re going to do a take possession. Now remember though, just as they were trying to possess the land whenever you were trying to possess a new territory or gain new ground, taking possession is not always going to be easy for your Mt. Carmel Church.
It’s great in theory, it’s great and thought that up, but remember the people who are strong, the cities are fortified. This represents oppositions and resistance. They’re going to try and keep you out and I’ll give up. So you say, Chad, okay, I want to break this habit. I want to break this, this habit of what’s happening in my life with me and my spouse of this attitude. I want to break these, this mouth. I have this attitude. I have this feelings that I have. I want to break these addictions. I want to, I want to, I want to break these habits. I want to stop doing this. I wanna, I wanna. I want to break that addiction to porn. I want to break that addiction to watching this or this. Whatever it is, be ready, be ready. The enemy will not give up easy. Here’s the part about overcoming you and I need to know that it’s there.
The enemies are strong and the cities are four to five. Now Jesus has already done the work for us. All we have to do is receive it by faith. So getting the freedom has already been purchased by Jesus. Oh man, you need to hear this. The freedom has already been paid for, but walking in it, possessing it is going to take effort, not effort like works, like earning it, not that kind of effort. I’m talking about resisting the lies of the devil and embracing the truth. The Bible tells us that we will know the truth and that truth that we know will make us free. It’s not just the truth will make us free. It’s the truth that we know that I know for myself, this is the truth about my life. This is the truth about my identity and who I really am in Christ and who, what God says about me with us Mt. Carmel Church.
Here’s the truth about what God says to me about me. So every lie that the enemy says about me, I’m not going to believe it. And then me knowing that truth is what’s going to make me free. But it’s not going to come easy. They’re going to try and resist. Have you ever heard this phrase? Old habits die hard when you step out this week to try and change some habits and take some new ground, take some new territory, get ready because you’re going to have some opposition. Expect it. You’re going to see it. Don’t be like the children of Israel that when you see opposition, Oh, what happened? I thought I was free. I thought God said that was going to happen for me. Why am I saying resistance? Because there’s enemies. He’s in our lands. We have thoughts that we have to deal with every day.
I wish I could tell you it was easy. I wish I could tell you. I wish I could tell you that I didn’t have to go overcome opposition and adversity just to preach this message. I have to overcome so much junk in my head. So much. So many voices trying to tell me what I can’t do, what I what I’m not good enough to do what I’m not smart enough to do, how I’m not good enough communicator. All these thoughts. I have to overcome them. I have to overcome them. I have two choices. Be overcome by them or overcome them and I have to press through. I feel it. I hear it. I sense it, but just because they’re there doesn’t mean it’s my truth. My truth is not tied to how I feel. My truth is tied to what he said and I always want you to know that God said something about you and what he said about you has to take precedence over what you see about you as with our Mt. Carmel Church.
So let’s finish this. He said, so listen, we have to focus. Old habits die hard, but God wouldn’t have been focused in this part. I thought it was really important. God wanted them to focus on the promise, not the opposition. He wanted them to focus on the promise and not the opposition. God wanted the land, the life that he wanted them to experience, to be their focal point and steered the opposition became the focal point. He wanted them to focus on the life that he prepared for them. He wanted them to focus on the life that he made. Ready for them, not how hard it was going to be to get there. Hear me. God wants you and I to focus on the land, the life that he has for us now, not how hard it’s going to be to possess that land. Is it going to be difficult?
Yes, but that’s not the focal point. Just because it’s going to be hard doesn’t mean it’s not for you. Jesus is our example. Jesus is our example. It says, the Bible says in Hebrews looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross despising the shame and has sat down at the right hand of the father. What happened that the joy that was set before him was his focal point, your redemption, my redemption, my salvation was his focal point. He endured the cross. It didn’t say he loved the cross,
right?
He didn’t say he had any joy in the cross. He said he endured the cross. Well, guess what? I’m going to have to endure some things to in order to possess some things, but when my focus is what on what I’m possessing, then I’m not discouraged by what I have to endure, but when my focus is on what I have to endure, what I’m trying to possess becomes fainter and fainter and fainter with the best Mt. Carmel Church.
Yeah.
That says, turn up your focus. Magnify, magnify what God wants you to do, the life that God has for you. Make that bigger in your eyes than the obstacles that are trying to keep you from getting it focused on the land. They said it truly flows with milk and honey. The grapes represented the abundant life that God had for them in the Canaan land. The grapes represented abundance. Remember, abundant life, he had abundant life. Well, God says he has abundant life for you and for me, John 10 10 the thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but Jesus said, I have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly. He’s got an abundant life for you. Abundant life, but here’s what you need to know about abundant life. As I was studying for this, I heard some voices as soon as soon as I got to this part about the bunny life, I heard people complaining saying about abundance, so he goes, he wanted the grapes to be motivation and inspiration of what kind of life he had prepared for them to possess, and some people hear abundance and they get all twisted about that.
They think that they think it’s materialistic, that they think it’s about having so much all this excess and just all about money or whatever. If you think it’s materialistic, that’s a you problem, not a God problem. Abundance is not about that. Look what he says in second Corinthians chapter nine and God is able to make all grace. Everybody say all grace, all grace abound towards you. You watching that, you always having all sufficiency in all things may have an abundance. Everybody say abundance, abundance for every good word. This is what he’s saying. The apostle Paul telling us that God says, I’m going to make all grace abound towards you, that you’re going to have an abundance for every good work, but here’s the part. Here’s the kicker. Here’s the kicker. Abundance is not an abundance of feeling, but it’s an abundance of resource with our Mt. Carmel Church.
This land that he was showing them, I want you to focus on the abundance that I have, the land that I have. I want you to focus on abundance. When I got to that part of what Jesus has abundant life for me, having abundance sounds great. Everybody wants abundance and God has abundance for us. He has abundance for us, but that abundance is not something that we think it is. It’s not an abundance of feelings because you and I are not always going to feel in abundance. We’re not always going to feel like we have abundance. The abundance speaks to the resources of God, not you and I’s possession. We’re not always going to feel abundant. We’re not even always going to possess abundance, but here’s what you got to know. Abundance is always available.
What he’s saying to us is there’s always going to be enough for you because the lie can be, here’s where I get discouraged when I don’t feel abundance. Then I think the truth is there’s no abundance. Just because I can’t see it or I can’t feel it, and God say, just because you can’t feel it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Said, I have an abundance available for you to possess. Sometimes you’re not going to feel it. Sometimes you’re not even going to have it, but I have abundance for you. So in those moments when we don’t see it, feel it or hear it, then we have to go and possess it from him. You’re not always going to have this in your life. It’s Philippians chapter four 19 and my God shall supply all your need according to the riches, his riches in glory by Christ Jesus, my God shall supply all your need according to his riches, his riches, his riches. What does that mean? That’s an encouragement to me. Encouragement to you that this land that they had, they remember that brought up the grapes and I wrote this down. I thought it was important. The grapes represented the abundant life that God had for them, but the giants represent what they had to overcome to get it Mt. Carmel Church.
I had this thought that came to me. Everybody wants to eat him grapes, but not everybody wants to beat them. Giants. If grapes represent the abundant life that Jesus has for me, I think we’d be hard pressed to find somebody that would say, I don’t want the abundant life that Jesus has for me. Everybody wants to eat them. Grapes. When they brought the grapes out on them poles, you got to know. Everybody was like, Whoa, that’s crazy. I’ve never secret everybody wanted them grapes, but when they saw the giants, everyone eat the grapes, but not everybody wanted to beat the giants. The difference is what do we focus on in the, whenever Caleb and Joshua saw the giants saw the adversity, saw what they’re all going to have to overcome to possess it, they said, God said we are well able to overcome it, so I want them grapes, so I’m willing to overcome whatever I have to overcome to get them. Come on. You gotta be encouraged this morning as you’re watching this, wherever you went, pay me watching it back later, listening to on the podcast, there’s going to be a price to pay some time to walk in the freedom that Jesus has for you. You may have to overcome resistance. I wrote some things down. Maybe this will apply to you. I may have to overcome a giant of fear and anxiety to possess peace of mind with our Mt. Carmel Church.
I may have to overcome a giant of unforgiveness and bitterness to walk in love. I may have to overcome a giant of hurt or abuse to find healing. I may have to overcome a giant of addiction to find freedom, freedom, but here’s the thing. We have to be hungrier for the grapes, the way of life that God has for us. Then we are afraid of the giants. We have to be hungry for the life that God has for us. Then we are afraid of the opposition trying to stop us. We have to be hungry for what God says and we are afraid of what we see. We will overcome. When we believe what he said more than we believe. What we see. Here’s what I know, what we believe that God has said about our life, about what we can possess, the what. We can walk in, what we believe will either be overcome by what we see or, and this is my prayer for us, that what we see here feel will be overcome by what we believe.
The what you believe about what God said about you is going to overcome what you see. So here’s the question, which are you hungry or for? Are you hungrier for the grapes or you afraid of the giants? Are you hungrier for what God has for you? Or are you afraid of the opposition? I want to be hungry for grapes. I will be hungry for what God has for me. I won’t be hungry to overcome. I want to be hungry to experience it. And that means I’m gonna have to overcome adversity. I’m gonna have to overcome some giants. You’re going to see here and feel giants in your life, but there is an of supply new mercies every morning are available for you. So I want to pray for you. I to pray for our country. I’ll pray for our nation bow and pray for you and your family and I want to tell you, we will overcome Mt. Carmel Church.
We will overcome not just because we want to, we will overcome because our faith and our hope is in Jesus. Am I desire for you today and what I pray that God encouraged your heart with today is it God has said something to you and even though you don’t see it around you the way you want to see it, what he said is resonating in your heart. You may not see what you want to see with your marriage or your family, your kids, your job, your finances, your health. You may not see what you want to see right here. We need to find out what he said. Find out what he said about your life and begin to put this in your heart more than the opposite. Let your words match up with what God said. So if you would I just ask you to just begin to pray right where you are.
Just foul your heads right there in your home. I want to pray with you. I want to pray and pray for you. Pray with you that you are an overcomer. You are an overcomer because Jesus is with you and he’s for you. Maybe, maybe you don’t know Jesus as the Lord of your life. Before we leave, I want you to take a moment. I’m going to give you a chance to accept Jesus into your heart, but this is for everyone. Followers of Jesus and followers, people who don’t even believe in Jesus. You need to know that there’s going to be opposition, but in the face of the opposition, victory is on the other side. When you keep moving forward, I want to pray and give an opportunity. For those of you that don’t know Jesus, you need to be a part of this first because there is no, come on, let me, let me make this very clear. There is no victory outside of Jesus Mt. Carmel Church.
There is no hope for our nation outside of Jesus. He is the hope of the world. He is the strength of the world. He’s the one that makes the difference. He’s the one I put my confidence in. He’s the one I put my hope in. He’s the reason that I’m overcoming because he’s in my life. So I want him to be in your life. I want you to spell your heads with me and I want you to pray. If you need to ask Jesus to come into your life, I want you to make him the Lord of your life. You need to know this. Friends, Jesus died on the cross. He did not sin at all, lived a perfect life and people still crucified him. He willingly, willingly gave his life for your life and for mine. The Bible says, if we will believe and put our faith in him, that the price that he paid for the sin of all of humanity can be applied to my life through faith.
Salvation is is extended to us by grace. We we can’t make it happen. We can’t, can’t make God give it to us. It’s by his grace. The fact that we can even be saved is by his grace, but the way that it’s applied into your heart is by you believing what he did for you. So I want you to pray this with me. Ask Jesus to come into your life to say, father in heaven, I believe that Jesus paid the price for my sin that I could not pay. I believe he Rose from the dead so that I could be an ex. I could experience a new life. Today I ask you to forgive me. Come into my heart, be my Lord, be my savior. I choose to believe what you say about me instead of what I see about me. Thank you for loving me.
Thank you for saving me. You are my Lord. You are my savior. In Jesus name I pray. Amen. Listen, if you prayed that and you meant that with all of your heart, I want to encourage you to take a moment and get out your phone. We’re going to pray for people just a moment, so don’t check out just yet, but take your phone. I want you to text to the number (618) 243-0900 type in the words, all one word, new life today you made Jesus the Lord of your life. All we want to do at the roads, churches connect you to Jesus from all roads of life. Maybe you don’t even know if you’re not even around our area. It doesn’t matter. We still want to connect you with Jesus. We want you to know him Mt. Carmel Church. We want you to know the life and the freedom that comes from a relationship with him.
Want to help you through next steps. This is not just about a prayer and you go on the rest of your life and hope it all works out. No, it’s about daily walking in him and growing as a disciple. Learning who he is and learning who you are in him learning everything that he has for you. It’s so important. Texts that new life to (618) 243-0930 or if you need prayer this morning for anything that same number (618) 243-0900 we want to pray for you. I want to pray for people who need healing. We have some words of knowledge that I want to give out. Just some prayer things that we feel like God showed us. So we want to pray for. Maybe you’re watching this and this. This is you that we want to pray for this. We will pray specifically that God touches your life.
Someone dealing with sciatic nerve pain and the right hip. If that’s you, we want to pray for that. We believe God wants to heal you. Muscle spasm, spasms rather in the middle of the back, someone’s struggling overweight issues struggling with trying to lose weight, whether it’s a thyroid issue or a way that’s just a dietary issue of blood sugar, whatever it is. I don’t know. You just let God speak to you. Let him touch you right now. Someone dealing with weight issues, someone’s struggling with fear over coronavirus. Fear, the very fear of it has you paralyzed her trap. We’re going to break that. We’ll break that fear over our life. In the name of Jesus, the God has given us a spirit of fear but of power and of love and of sound mind. Also someone with a right inner ear infection and the best Mt. Carmel Church,
so have the right inner ear inflamed and red hot. So if you have a right inner ear, ear, inner ear infection, God’s willing to heal that. Also someone with 104 degree temperature fever or higher, 104 degree fever or higher. Want to pray for that, swore to pray for you to be an overcomer. I believe some of you are going to take steps this week to overcome that. You’re not going to be the direct object anymore. You’re not going to be overcome, but you’re going to overcome. Let’s pray. Father, I just pray for the power of the Holy spirit right now to go into every screen through every speaker. Holy spirit. You are living in powerful. You’re not limited by time, space or matter. You create a time, space and matter. So Lord, I just release healing for all those that are needing it right now. In the name of Jesus, we rebuke the Corona virus and the main name of Jesus. We command it to die in this world. We pray that it come to a screeching halt in our country, that the power of prayer,
we’ll show the power of God that you will be on display. God, we thank you for those needing healing of the sciatic pain, the muscle spasms, inner ear infection, the weight loss issues. God, we thank you for your grace and for your, for your healing. Now for that fever to go in the name of Jesus, that the body temperature returned to 98.6 God for all those need healing of things that we didn’t even mention today. God, I just released the power of God, the presence of God to go right into their homes and we just tell that pain to go in Jesus’ name. The blood disorders are healed by the stripes of Jesus. Anxiety, fear. We break you in Jesus name. We overcome you because what God has said is stronger than what we feel and what we see. So God, we put our faith and our hope in you that nothing is too difficult for you no matter what we see what you said gives us courage today with us here at Mt. Carmel Church.
We praise you for it in Jesus name, but it’s our PR, our desire and prayer here at the road’s church for you to walk out your relationship with Jesus in power and in victory. Not that you’re always going to feel victorious, not that you’re never going to have problems, not that you’re always going to feel abundance in your life, but there is an abundance available for you, an abundance of peace, abundance of abundance, of love, abundance of grace. It’s available. So turn to Jesus. He’s the one that’s going to bring into your life. We pray that you have an overcoming weak stare that enemy in the highest stare, that difficulty of the eye and you say, Hey, what has been said about me is greater than what I see about me. We love you. Have a great week. Be blessed.
Thanks so much for watching with us. We love our online family and we invite you to connect with us. We have a few different ways you can do that on our website@theroads.church as well as on social media. You can text to give by texting the amount, space, roads to four or five, seven, seven, seven and we’d love to pray for any needs you might have. So send us a message and let us know how we can partner with you in bringing the light and love of Jesus to your world with our Mt. Carmel Church.