Rick Warren - It Depends On Who You Depend On—Part Three

Hello, and welcome to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren.

We are so glad you're here with us. Today.

We're going to continue our series called The Keys to

a Blessed Life. And in these messages, Rick walks through

Jesus's Sermon on the Mount and shows us how to

live a truly hopeful and purpose filled life. And now

here's the final part of it. Depends on who you

depend on.

Now listen to me very closely. You're most like Christ.

You're most like Jesus when you say nothing in the

face of attack, in the face of unjust, unfair criticism,

in the face of lies about you. You're most like

Jesus when you say nothing and you remain silent, and

you just say, I'm going to put this in the

hands of God and let him be my defender, and

I'm going to try and myself and defend myself.

Back in One Peter two twenty three.

We talked about last week jesus crucifixion and his resurrection.

It says when they hurled insults at him, Jesus he

did not retaliate. When he suffered, he made no threats back. Instead,

he entrusted himself to God to set things right. That

means I depend on God to me my defender. You know,

I told you last week that they did six trials

for Jesus, three Romans, three Jewish trials. All of them

were sham trials, are all fake phony trials. And one

time the religious leaders take Jesus to Pilot, who was

the Roman governor of Israel at that time Palestine, and

they bring him in and they make a false charge

of Jesus and they said, this guy's trying to overthrow you.

He wants to be king. He wants your job, Pilot.

He wants to overthrow you. He thinks he's the king.

And Pilot looks at him and goes, is that true.

He's asking Jesus, you want my job? You're trying to

overthrow me. I'm the Roman appointed governor. You claim to

be the king of Israel, not when they don't have

a king. Do you want my job? Is that what

you're saying? And the Bible says Jesus would not even

dignify that false accusation with an answer. It said he

remained totally silent. He spake not unto them, He said

not a word under them. You are most like Jesus

when you face flack and don't defend it and don't

attack back.

Now here's an interesting thing. When people don't like.

You, they get what's called motivated reasoning, and so often

they'll just look. If people don't want to like you,

they'll believe anything negative.

Isn't that true?

If people don't want to like you, they are quick

to believe the name, and they do not believe anything positive.

They only want to believe the negative. Now here's the problem. Today.

On the Internet, anybody can say anything about you, and

it's global, it's searchable, and it's permanent and it's never

going on. So somebody can say something bad about you

and it's there and nobody's ever taken it down. And

ten years from today, somebody can google your name and

find that and it wasn't true today, it won't be

true ten years of today, but they'll believe it. That's

the kind of world you're going to live in. So

you've got to learn how to depend on God's defense,

not your own. Why Because to be a leader is

to be misunderstood. If you're going to be a leader

in your home, if you're going to believe leader at

your school, in your community, in your church, or anywhere else.

To be a leader means somebody's going to misunderstand you.

You can spend all your time trying to correct those misunderstandings.

But here's what happens. If they don't like you, just

and they have motivated reason. A lot of people say, well,

if I teach them the truth, then they'll like me.

But if actually you teach them the truth, it just

makes them more mad. It makes them more mad because

you've disproven they were wrong, and now I really don't

like you, and so they go and they find out

something else. The more effective you are in life, the

more you're going to be attacked. You know, I decided

a long time ago that I'm not going to spend

any of my time trying to answer every lie, every criticism,

every rumor, every gossip, every false misrepresentation. You know, I'm

just going to leave it to God. Why Because if

I did spend my time trying to correct all those things,

I wouldn't have any time for anything else. The more

influence you have, the more you're going to be criticized

in life. Just count on it, and pioneers get the

arrows in the back. If you're going to call the shots.

You're going to take the shots. So to be a

leader in a business means you're going to be criticized.

To be a leader in a church means you're going

to be criticized, community, anywhere else. I want you to

be fearless. What God wants is a generation of fearless

men and fearless women who say, I'm gonna do the

right thing. Doesn't really matter what anything else, because I'm

living for an audience of one, well done, now, good

and faithful servant.

That's what I'm living for. Now, you just leave it.

To God because you can't correct it all. And even

if you did, it's not they're not going to change

your attitude. Now let me show you a couple verses,

Psalm chapter two, verse twelve. God blesses and God protects

everyone who runs to him, not everybody who defends himself,

not everybody who fights back, not everybody who you know

goes tit for tatten And and you know you hit me,

I hit you back. No, God blesses those who run him.

So you let God be your defender against accusations and

against critics. The next verse, Psalm sixty two on your

outline gives us five metaphors for God's protection.

I want you to.

Underline him, he says David's And by the way, David,

who wrote this, was criticized his entire life. He was

attacked his entire life. In fact, most of his life,

people wanted to kill him because they were jealous. And

a lot of people are going to be jealous of

your success and they're going to want to attack you

for many different reasons. David says this, I depend on

God alone. I put my hope in him. He alone protects, underlines,

he alone protects, He alone saves. Underline saves. He alone

protects and saves me. He is my defender. Underline that

my defender. I shall not be defeated. Underlined not be defeated.

My salvation and honor depend on God. What's your honor,

it's your reputation, reputation. My salvation and my reputation depend

on God. He is my strong protector, and he is

my shield. Undersigned underside under aligne my shield. Now notice

the five metaphors. God says, He's my protector, He's my savior,

he's my defender, he's my victor, and he's my shelter,

he said, let me handle it. When you do that,

you are being poor in spirit. You're saying God, I'm

not depending on myself. I'm depending on you. I depend

on your wisdom. I depend on your strength. I depend

on your timing and your plan. And I depend on

your defense, not mine. And when God sees a person

like that, he goes, that's my boy, that's my girl,

that's who I want to bless. You're most like Jesus

when you don't defend yourself. Now, one of the greatest

sources of stress you're going to have in your life

is anxiety about money. In fact, studies show it's the

number one cause of divorce financial pressure. It's the number

one anxious anxiety producing issue.

Money.

Am I going to have enough to survive? Am I

going to have enough to make it? Financial worries. It

keeps people awake at night, and it causes people to

all kinds of stupid things because they start worrying about money.

So let me just give you one more way to

depend on God, and that is this number five. I

depend on God's wealth, not mine, for my own safety,

for my own security. I depend on God's wealth, not

my wealth. For my security. If you put your security

in your bank account, you are an insecure person because

you can lose everything you got in the bank.

If you put your.

Security in your job, you are a very insecure person

because you can lose your job. Put your security in

your investments, you're a very insecure person because you can

lose your investments. You have to put your security in

something that cannot be taken from you, and that is God.

Here's what the Bible says about God's wealth, not yours

Philippians four nineteen. And my God will supply all my needs.

My God will supply all my needs from his abundant wealth.

Circle that is God's wealth, not your wealth. That makes

you secure from his abundant wealth because of what Christ

Jesus has.

Done for me.

So I depend on God's wealth, not my wealth. I

depend on how much God's got, not how much I've got.

To be secure and to not be anxious, I want

you to write this down. Write it down on your line.

My job is a channel, but God is my source.

Explain this very important. If you understand this, you'll have

so much less stress in your life. My job is

a channel, but God is the source of my supply.

Let me give you an example. If I were to

go home from this service and I were to turn

on the faucet in our kitchen and no water came out,

what would I do?

Would I say, Oh, my, the world has run out

of water.

There's no water left in the whole wide world. I

turned on the faucet, there is no more water left.

Of course not, I'd know. The problem is not with

the source. The problem is with the distribution point. The

problem is not the source. There's plenty of water in

the world. The problem is the channel. The channel has

gotten blocked.

One way or another.

And you know what, if one channel gets blocked in

your life and this faucet stops working, God can turn

on another faucet just as easy. And if God closes

a door in your life, he can open another door.

And if another door closes, he can open a window

and you can crawl through it. God is not limited

to your ability and capacity. Your job is a channel.

If you think that your job is what keeps you

financially secure, you are going to be insecure.

Your entire life.

Living poor in spirit means I realize that God is

the source of my supply, and I depend on God's wealth.

My God shall supply all your needs according to his

riches in Glory, in Christ, Jesus, and I'm going to

trust in him that is going to handle me. Jobs

may come and go, bank accounts may come and go,

Economies can go up and down. Stock mar market's going

to go, bowl or bear, doesn't matter. My source of

supply is in God. And the more you do that,

the more blessed you're going to be. So here's the

first key to blessing. I don't depend on my wisdom.

I don't depend on my wealth. I don't depend on

my strength. I don't depend on my plan and timing.

And I don't depend on my defending myself. Instead, I

trust God in all of those areas.

So here's what I do.

Let's take this and I want you to rate yourself

on each of these five. I want you to give

yourself a plus.

Or a minus.

Let's go back over all five and a plus means

I'm doing pretty good in this area. I'm trusting God

really well. A minus means I need to work on

this one this week. Okay, how about the first one.

I depend on God's wisdom, not mine. Okay, here's the test.

Are you talking to God constantly throughout the day and

are you reading the Bible every day? If you're not,

you are not depending on God's wisdom. You're depending on

your wisdom because you're not talking to him about your decisions.

You've given first choice to every decision, and you're not

reading his word. So you're either doing those things and

depending on him or you're not. So give yourself plus

or minus. How about second one, I depend on God's.

Strength not mine. Are you doing that?

Are you walking in the strength of the Lord or

those are you those who trust in the Lord will

renew their strength?

Okay?

Give yourself a plus or minus. How about number three?

I depend on God's timing, not mine. How impatient are you?

Plus or minus?

Am I going? God?

You are? You're You're too slow. I'm going to take

matters into my own hands. I'm gonna find me a man. Okay,

I'm taking it in.

Okay, you know.

And are you just saying God, I'm gonna make sure

that I'm gonna make this job happen or whatever? Are

you depending on God's timing? Are you depending on your timing?

Okay? Number four?

I depend on God's defense, not mine. How well are

you doing on that one? Somebody says something mean to

you on Instagram, you immediately slam them back. On anything else,

I depend on God's defense, not mine. And how about

where are you looking for your source of security? Are

you depending on man? I'm so nervous because I don't

have any money? Or are you depending on God to

meet your needs? Give yourself a plus or minus on

each of those. Now, what's the first step you need

to take in this first condition of the blessings of God? Well,

you need to make a public declaration of dependence. You know,

in America we have the Declaration of Independence, and that's

a good thing. But for you personally, you need to

make a declaration of dependence God. I'm depending on you

in all five of these areas. By the way, do

you know what the public demonstration of your dependence on

God is.

It's baptism.

Baptism is saying to the whole world, I am totally

depending on God.

I'm going to depend on God for my strength. I'm

going to depend on God.

For my wisdom, my wealth, my defender, my plan in life.

I'm all in. I'm totally submersed into this will and

I am in, and God says, that's the person that

I want to bless. Let me show you this last verse.

The Bible says this in Romans chapter six. This is

what happens in baptism. By the way, did you know

that baptism is actually a Greek word. It's baptizo, and

the word baptism simply means to dip or submerge. Baptism

isn't actually a word, it's a transliteration. The translation of

the word baptism is dip, So like chips and dips.

So you go home to parties say I'd like some

chips and baptism please, Because the word baptism literally means dip.

That's what it means. It means the dip under. Okay,

this is what happens in baptism. When we went under

the water, we left the old sin behind, and when

we came up out of the water, we entered into

a new life of grace. Then Romans six is this.

When we're lowered into the water, it's like the burial

of Jesus, and we're raised up out of the water.

It's like the resurrection of Jesus. We are raised to

live a new life. Now, if you've never been baptized

like Jesus modeled and in the way Jesus.

Was baptized as an adult.

He was thirty three years old and he is baptized,

you need to do that as your public declaration of

He said, well, I was baptized a baby. I'm not

talking about that. Lots of us were baptized as babies.

Lots of us were dedicated confirmed his baby. There's nothing

wrong with that. But that was your parent's decision, not yours.

You don't even remember it. When Jesus was a baby,

they took him to the temple and he was dedicated.

That's what his parents did, and there's nothing wrong with

That's a good thing to dedicate your baby to Jesus.

But when Jesus was a full grown adult, he went

out and made his decision to be publicly baptized.

Have you done that? Have you fought?

Jesus commanded it. He commanded it that we'd be baptized.

And he said, if you're ashamed of me, I'll be

ashamed of you. Little boy asked for me on time,

pastor Rick, when can I get advertised? And that's what

baptism is. It's an advertisement for Jesus baptism, says, I

am all in. I'm totally submerged. I'm really into this.

I'm not just tinkling in here, twink, I'm just tippling in.

I know. I am all in.

And I'm going to depend on God for my strength.

And I'm going to depend on God for my wisdom

and for my wealth, and for my defense and for the.

Plan of my life. If you haven't done that, what

are you waiting on? Really? Do you? Why not? Why not? Now?

I mean, could it be that your pride is keeping

you from being baptized. That's the exact opposite of being

humble in spirit. It's the exact opposite of the attitude

that God blesses. That's power ahead. I'm going to pray

a prayer and you can follow me in it. Dear God,

thank you for sending Jesus to teach us how to live.

Just say that, Dear God, thank you for sending Jesus

to teach us how to live and to die for

my sins. I want your blessing on my life. So

today I want to take this first step of learning

to depend on You more. Just pray this. I want

to depend on your wisdom this week, your wisdom, not mine,

so you can replace my confusion with your confidence. I

want to depend on your strength, not mine, so your

power can show up in my weakness. I want to

depend on your timing. Help me to be patient and

quietly trust. I know that at the right time, you

can change things instantly. And Lord, when people misunderstand me

or criticize me, I want to quietly trust you for

my defense.

I don't want to retaliate. I want to be like Jesus.

Finally, Lord, I want to look to you as a

source to meet all my needs.

Help me this week.

To walk in the strength of the Lord. Help me

to walk in the strength of the Lord. And as

my public declaration of dependence, I want to be baptized,

and I pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

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