Rick Warren - God, I'm Discouraged: What Do I Do Now?

I meet people who are discouraged all the time, and

they're ready to throw in the towel. They're at the

end of their rope, they're ready to give up, and

they're discouraged about a lot of things. And people go,

you know, there's so much bad in.

The world right now.

Well, I hate to tell you this, but there always

has been. It's not like it's worse. It always has

been bad because the Bible says God gives us a

free choice, and we often choose to not follow what

he says to do. The Bible calls that sin and evil,

and so people get discouraged. And I thought this week

we would look at how do you defeat discouragement in

your life. Now, I don't know what's discouraging you, but

if you've been discouraged by your finances or your health

or relationship, and you picked a good week to come

to church, because that's what we're going to look at.

If you take out your message notes, it's inside your program.

So we begin to look at defeating discouragement. You know,

discouragement can be quite debilitating. It can cause you to

give up trying, you can give up hoping, you can

give up caring, when you get discouraged. When you get discouraged,

you can give up believing. And the Bible has a

lot to say about discouragement. I put a couple of

examples there at the top of your outline. Exodus chapter six,

verse nine says this, Moses told the people what the

Lord had said, but they wouldn't listen anymore. They had

become too discouraged by the increasing burden of their slavery.

I wonder what you feel is enslaving you. I wonder

what burden is getting you down. I wonder what problem

you've had. You've had it for so long. It's been

so chronic as you get discouraged that like these people,

they wouldn't even listen to God. They couldn't hear God

because of their discouragement. The burden was too heavy in

their life. And we all know the times in life

you come to a point where you just go, I'm

so burdened down, I'm so overwhelmed, I don't even know

what to think, what to believe, what to care about.

That's discouragement.

David felt this and Psalm forty two, verse five, David says,

why am.

I so discouraged?

Why am I sad, and then he answers his own question,

I will put my hope in God. Anytime you feel discouraged,

you need.

To change your thoughts.

You need to change your focus, you need to change

your mind. Now, what we're going to do today is

look at a great example from Paul on how to

change your thoughts so you're not discouraged. Paul, of course,

had many, many reasons to be discouraged. Paul had a

very tough life, certainly a whole lot tougher than your life.

If you don't believe that, look at this on the screen.

Let me read this to you the Bible, the second corintheans,

this is Paul's testimony. I've worked much harder. I've been

in prison more frequently because of preaching the gospel. I've

been flogged more severely. I doubt you've ever had that.

I've been exposed to death again and again.

Five times.

I received thirty nine lashes, you know, with a whip.

Three times.

I was beaten with rods once, I was stone nearly

stoned to death. Three times. I was shipwrecked. I spent

a night and a day in the open sea. And

I've been constantly on the move and I've been in

danger from rivers, from bandits, from my own countrymen.

I've been in.

Dangers from the gentiles, in danger in the city and

the country, at sea, and at dangerous from false brothers.

He says, I have often gone without sleep. I've known

hunger and thirst, and I've gone without food. I've been cold,

and I've been naked, no clothes. Besides, it's everything else

I faced daily, the pressures of my concern for all

the churches.

And you think you got problems. I wanted to read.

That to you because if anybody had a right to

be discouraged, I would say, it's that guy. If your

life was that, you would have a right to be discouraged.

And yet in Second Corinthians chapter four, Paul gives us

the seven secrets of defeating discouragement. This is going to

be a very hopeful and very helpful message today. So

if you take the message notes out, and if you

look at Second Corinthians chapter four, let's get right into

what Paul says, and he just goes we're going to

go verse by verse. First, the first secret of defeating

discouragement is this, never forget how much God loves me.

Never forget how much God loves me. You have to

keep this constantly in focus if you're going to be

immune discouragement, because everything in life flows out of the

love of God, out of the mercy of God, out

of the grace of God, out of the kindness of God.

It all flows out of His love. Now, of course,

you know.

God loves you.

You've heard it probably all your life. You've heard me

preaching on it week after week after week. You know

God loves you, But do you feel it. When you

stop feeling the love of God, you can't feel it

in your heart, that's when you start to get discouraged.

And so you've got to know the mercy. You've got

to know the grace. But you've got to feel God's mercy.

You've got to feel God's grace. Here's the first verse,

Second Corinthians, Chapter four, Verse one, God, in his mercy

has given us this ministry.

And work to do.

That is why we do not become discouraged, and we

never give up. Now, in this whole chapter, about three

or four times this chapter.

He goes, this is why we don't get discouraged.

This whole chapter is on discouragement, and he starts by saying,

I don't get discouraged because.

I remember how much God loves me.

I remember the mercy of God, the grace of God,

I remember the kindness of God. When I'm focused on that,

it drives a discouragement away. Now, he says, God, in

his mercy, has given us. Everything you have in life

is a gift of God's mercy. The breath you're breathing

right now, the brain you have, the health you have,

the body, everything you have, your life in itself is

a gift of the mercy of God. What is mercy, Well,

it's a lot of things. But mercy is God gives

me what I need, not what I deserve.

And mercy is when.

God knows every mistake I'll make in my life and

yet he still created my life.

That's mercy.

And that God knows every sin I'll commit in my

life and yet he.

Still loves me. That's mercy.

And Paul says, for me to not get discouraged, what

I have to do is I have to focus on

the mercy and the grace and the love of God.

And he says that keeps me going. When you get discouraged,

I guarantee you when you get discouraged. At that moment,

you stopped feeling the love of God because you can't

feel how much God loves you and be discouraged at

the same time. So it's either one or the other.

I don't know why, but a lot of people who

followed the Lord for a long time, they've been Christians

a long time, they don't feel God's love because they

only think God speaks to him in the critical voice.

They hear their mom or their dad, and every time

God speaks to him, it's always negative. Friends, if the

voice is always negative, it's not God. I remember there

used to be a woman who came to Saddleback Church

and every Sunday out on the patio, I'd walk out

and she'd come up to me with this little whiny voice,

and she said, you know how, Pastor Rick, today, God

God really.

Convicted me of. And it was some sin.

And the next week I preach it didn't matter what

to speak on on even as an encouraging message.

You know, Pastor Rick, today God convicted me of.

And she did this every week. It was like sin

of the week, okay. And and finally after six months

she came up to me and says, you know, Pastor Rick,

God convicted me of and I go, ma'am, does God

ever say anything nice to you?

And the truth was she didn't feel that.

She didn't feel the love of God in her life,

and as a result, I guarantee she was discouraged. You've

got to keep the love of God in your mind.

Remember that you were created to be loved by God.

God made you to love you. We've talked about this

so many times. And the number one purpose of your

life is not for you to do good.

The number one.

Purpose of your life is not for you and to

love God back.

The number one purpose of your life is to let

God love you. Let God.

Are you letting God do that? Are you letting God

love you? That's your first purpose. You were made to

let God love you. He made you to love you. Now,

this is what it means to have the mercy and

grace and love of God always in your mind. Two

of the benefits of always focusing on God's love and

mercy is number one, I don't have to prove my worth,

you can get off the performance cycle trap. And number two,

I don't have to wallow in my failures because I

know of God's mercy and grace and his love.

So Paul starts with that.

Now in the second verse, he gives us the second

key of defeating discouragement, and this is really important. Never

fake it, never fake it, be yourself. What I'm talking

about here is being authentic, being genuine, being real.

You got to be who God made you be.

Nothing is more discouraging than trying to be something you're not.

Because when you wear a mask, when you act, when

you pose, that gets tiring, and you're afraid that other

people might find out who you are, and you're afraid

that God might not love.

You, and all of these things.

Nothing's more discouraging than trying to be something that you're not.

I'll say it as clearly, as simple as again, God

didn't make you to be somebody else. When you get

to heaven, God isn't going to say, why wan't you

more like your sister or your mom or your dad

or your brother or Billy Graham, or why wan't you

more like pastor Tom or pastor Yea. God does not

bless fakes or phonies. God does not bless posers. God

does not bless when you try to pretend to be

something you're not.

If you want.

God's blessing on your life. You better just start being

who God made you to be. Stop trying to be

live for the pleasure or the pleasing of other people,

the approval of other people. God didn't put you on

earth for the approval of other people.

He puts you on earth to be who you are.

And when you be who God made you to be,

God looks at it and goes, that's my boy, that's

my girl.

That's why I made you be.

If you try to be somebody else, we don't need

two of anybody else. And if you're not gonna be

you got you, just go ahead and kill you and

take on to heaven, because we don't need a carbon copy.

Most of us start off as originals in life and

end up as carbon copies. When you try to be

something you're not, that's discouraging. Paul says, don't fake it.

Here's what he says in tewod Corinthians four to two.

We don't try to trick anyone. In other words, we're

not putting on a phony mask. We're not trying to

pretend we're something we're not, and we don't twist the

word of God. Instead, we teach the truth plainly showing

everyone who we really are. That's an antidote to discourage me.

Who we really are. Then they can know in their

hearts what kind of people we are in God's sight.

Paul says, I'm just trying to be myself. I'm not

trying to please everybody else. I've got nothing to hide.

What you see is what you get. Nothing is more

discouraging than trying to please everybody. Why because even God

can't do that. If you realize this, even God can't

please everybody. Somebody's praying for the Rams to win, and

somebody's praying for the chargers to wink, and some is

praying for it to rain, and somebody's praying for not rain,

and somebody's praying ittle snow and I can stay home

from school, and I was.

Saying, please don't let it snow.

Even God can't please everybody, so only a fool will

try to do what God can't do. You know, just

about time you get crowd A, please, crowd B gets

ticked off at you. And then when you get crowd

B please, crowd A's upset with you. You know, I've

been on the cover of Newsweek magazine twice.

Once is the heat and once as a zero.

One of them they were building me up, and one

of them they were tearing me down. That's life, folks,

that's just life, and so you can't fake it. You've

got to be who you're going to be. If you're

always trying to be something you're not, you're always going

to be under stress, You're always going to fear being exposed,

You're always gonna have to wear a mask, and you're

going to be prone to discouragement. What I'm telling you

as your pastor is you don't have to be perfect

for God to bless you, but you do have to

be authentic.

You do have to be real.

So Paul says, first, I want you to remember that

God's never going to stop loving you, and then second,

be who He made you to be warts it all.

You know, I'm a very flawed man. If you don't

believe that, asked my kids are o Kay or Tom

or anybody who's close to me.

I'm very flawed.

But I actually think that talking to you about my flaws,

not trying to pretend like I've got it all together,

is a good thing. Because we don't grow from other

people's strengths. We grow from their weaknesses because you go, oh, man,

if God blesses Rick that much and he's such a dufus,

then maybe God could bless me because he that certainly

doesn't have it all together.

So maybe God could bless me like that.

And it is in our weakness we actually help other people. Now,

what keeps you from really being real? One word fear.

What keeps you from being honest about your weaknesses is

your own fear of rejection. And what's the antidote to

the fear of rejection? Point number one? Focusing on God's

unconditional love for me. And if I'm focused on how

much God loves me, If God loves being, I like

me and you don't like.

Me, that's your problem.

So it's really important these first two. Don't fake it,

but focus on the love of God. Now here's the

third secret to defeating discouragement.

Remember that it's not about me. Remember that it's not

about me.

The more self focused I am in life, the more

prone to discouragement I'm gonna be every time you forget

that life is bigger than you, that you're not the

center of the universe, you're not God's gift to the world.

You're not holding up.

You're not Charles Atlas holding up the world or whatever.

You think it's all about you. And anytime you forget

that it's not about you, you're going to get either

prideful or you're gonna get fearful, or you're gonna get bitter. Prideful,

fearful or bitter. Because God didn't make the world to

revolve around you. And not only that, when you think

everything's all about you, then you take everything personally and

you get your feelings hurt so fast. Now here's the

next verse, second Gradians four, verse five. He says, our

message is not about our It's not about us. It's

not about you. It's not about me. Our message is

not about us. It is about Jesus. Christis Lord. We're

merely your servants for Jesus' sake. Now says a couple

important things in that verse. First, he says, our message

is not about ourselves.

God has a unique life message for you.

He puts you on this earth, and he has a

message he wants to say.

To the world through you.

The message that God wants to say through you to

the whole world is called your life message. But your

life message is not about you. It's about him. God

didn't put you on earth to be about you. He

puts you on earth to be about Him. Is your creator.

Your life message is about God, and he says it's

not about you. You know, when I wrote Purpose Driven Life,

the first four words of that book are it's not

about you. And I intentionally chose those four words to

start the book it's not about you, because that's the

most counterculture message you could give in today's world, because

everything in our world says the exact opposite. It's all

about you. Have it your way, we do it all

for you. You deserve the best today. You're number one,

look out for one. I've got to do what's best

for me. Everything in society, every music song, every video game,

every TV show, you.

Know, the news, everything around you.

Every advertisement says you got to think about you. You

got to think about you. No advertisement says think about others. Certainly,

no advertisement says think about God. Everything says think about you.

It's all about you. You you, you you, And that's

why I put in there it's not about you. I'll

tell you personally. Sometimes I wish I hadn't put that

in there, because I had no idea I didn't know that.

For the rest of my life.

Maybe twenty times a day, I was going to get

tested person on that verse, on that phrase, it's not

about you, And sometimes I think I have to say

that to myself twenty times a day. Somebody gives me

a praise, it's not about you. Somebody gives me a criticism,

it's not about you. Somebody misjudges something that I did.

It's not about you. Somebody disagrees with me. It's not

about you. And I have often had to say it

to myself, sometimes every hour in a particular day. But

it's one of the things we have to learn. Remember,

it's not about me. When I focus on me, I'm

going to get discouraged. Now, the second part of that verse,

he says, it's not about us, but we're merely servants

for Jesus's sake. Now, this phrase for Jesus' sake, Paul

uses it twice in this chapter.

He says, we do what we do for.

Jesus' sake, And what he's talking about.

Here is motivation.

Now, motivation and discouragement have a lot to go do together.

God is always more interested in why you do what

you do.

Than what you do. Let me say it again.

God is always more interested in why you're doing what

you're doing than he is what or even how, Because

he cares about the motivations of your heart.

You can do the right thing for the wrong reason.

Why always determines how long in your life. If you

go out on a project, or you get a goal,

you get an ambition, and you forget why, you'll get

discouraged and quit. A lot of people start off in

life knowing why they want to do what they want

to do this particular career, or marry this person or whatever.

When you forget why you married the person, when you

forget why you went into that career, when you forget

why you gave your life to Christ, when you forget

the why, you're going to stop doing the how long.

Discouragement always happens when we forget the whych So let

me ask you before we go on, why do you

do what you do? Why do you do what you do?

Well?

I do it to put money, you know, in my pocket,

to put food on the table. That's not a good

enough motivation that that will wear out pretty pretty quickly.

So remember that it's not about me. Number four, the

fourth secret of defeating discouragement is in the next verse,

and it has to do with this.

I need to relax.

Excuse me, I need to relax in my limitations. I

need to relax in my limitations. Now, why is that

an important antidote to discouragement? Because you get discouraged when

you try to be superman. You get discouraged when you

try to be superwoman.

Get try.

You get discouraged when you try to do more than

you is humanly possible.

You have not relaxed in your.

Limitations, or I have not relaxed my limitations. What we

all need is a realistic view of you. I need

a realistic view of me. You need a realistic view

of you. And and the facts are I mean, let's

just say them. You can't fix everybody's problems. I agree

with that, but sometimes you act like you can. You

can't be in more than one place at one time.

Is that true? Yeah? You know people say, well, I'll

be with.

You in spirit. What does that mean? Absolutely nothing. As

long as you're in a human body, you can't be

You can't be in spirit somewhere else. You can only

be where your body is. Okay, so, uh, you can't

do everything you want to do. You can't spend money

you don't have. Now you try, and there's a word

for that, debt, and then you get discouraged. Anytime you

don't live within the limits of your life that are normal,

then you're going to get discouraged. You cram too much in.

Is it easier to fill your schedule than it is

to fulfill your schedule?

Oh yeah. Is it always easier.

To get in than it is to get out, Yes,

Easier to make a promise and keep a promise, yeah,

Easier to get into debt then get.

Out of debt, oh yeah, yeah.

And that's because we're not relaxing in our limitations.

Now.

Paul talks about literally physical limitations of your body. In

verse seven, he says, you know, you need to know

your limits, You need to know your warning signs when

you're over extended, and you need to realize you're just

a body. In Second Corinthians four seven, we are like

clay jars, in which this treasure, the treasure of God,

is stored and the real power comes from God, not

from us. He says, we're our bodies are like pottery,

We're like clay jars. Some of us have very big jars.

Some of the jars in this room are very ornate

and very beautiful. And now there's this kind of we're

kind of plain. But you know what, the one thing

in common about all pottery, you drop it, it breaks easily.

So we're all clay jars. God says, our bodies like

clay jars. And we're all a little cracked because we've

all been dropped. We've all been dropped here and there,

and this is just being honest about who we really are.

I don't know if you've noticed it, but I've noticed

this that God often puts his greatest gifts in the

weakest people. I think that's a good thing because then

people go, it's got to be God. There's some people

I watch on TV or like teaching the Bible, and

I'm going, boy, they're goofy, but God is using them.

God often puts his greatest gifts in the weakest vessel.

That way his glory shines through. The truth is, for

all of history, God has only used flawed instruments. He's

never used a perfect person except Jesus Christ. If God

only used perfect people, nothing would get done because there

aren't any. And so God has always used flawed instruments,

and sometime in this series, I want to do a

message on rethinking your weaknesses because you think your weaknesses

are something to hide, but they're actually something that God

wants to use in your life. I actually thought about

this the other day that I've grown through I don't

know five or six different phases or stages toward my

own weaknesses. When I first started living for the Lord,

they didn't even know I had any weaknesses.

Okay, I was so out of touch with me. I

didn't I know even had any weaknesses.

Then I discovered them and I denied them, and then

I moved from denial to just hiding them, and I.

Knew I had him. I just hit him.

And then I went from hiding them to rationalizing and

excusing them in my life, and eventually I matured enough

that I could actually accept them. But today I feel

like Paul, I glory in my weaknesses. Paul says, I

glory and weakness because when I'm weak, Christ is strong.

When I'm weak, He's strong through me.

When you think about it, God invaded Earth as a

baby of peasants in a barn. The Kingdom entered through weakness,

not through strength. God has always done that. He's always

used weak people who trust him strength can go through them.

So this is what humility is all about. You've heard

me say this. For humility is not denying your strengths.

It's being honest about your weaknesses. You're a bundle of both.

I'm a bundle of both. I have some good strengths

and I have some major weaknesses. You have some good

strengths in your life, and you have some good weaknesses

in your life. We're all a bundle of both. Humility

is not denying your strengths.

Just you're good at what God give it. The glory

to God.

God gave you that ability. Humility is being honest about

your weaknesses. And it's actually not thinking less of yourself.

It's just thinking of yourself less. I said, when you

walk into a room in a party and if you're going,

I wonder what everybody thinks about me? How do I look?

Is my dress right? Is my shirt right? My makeup

on right? And that's pride. When you walk into a

room and you go, who could use my encouragement? That's humility.

It's not thinking of yourself lest you're just so busy

thinking about other people, you're not even thinking of yourself.

That's real humility, not thinking less, but thinking of yourself less.

We all have our weakness.

I really come to the conclusion you can be spiritually

godly and emotionally dysfunctional at the same time. I don't

know if anybody's ever said that, but it's true.

It's true.

People can be close to God and can be a

veritable storehouse of Bible knowledge and actually give good wisdom,

and they're still messed up in their emotions or their personality.

And he says, just be real and be honest and

accept your limitations. Number five, the fifth secret of defeating

discouragement is use my pain to help others. This is

the fifth thing Paul talks about in this chapter on discouragement.

Paul says, I use my pain to help other people.

Remember that list we went through the shipwrecks and you know,

the prisons and the beatings and all those things. In

Second Corinthians, chapter four and verse eight nine. He now

says this we often suffer. We often suffer, but we're

never crushed, and even when we don't know what to do,

we never give up. There is again, we never give up.

We're not getting discouraged. We never give up, and in

times of trouble God is with us, and when we're

knocked down, we get up again. Now, why why is

Paul this resilient? Why is Paul so resistant to discouragement?

What allows him to just get back up again every

time he's knocked down? Well, if you were to ask Paul,

why did you put up with all that? Why did

you put up with all that? Jailings and beatings and

going without food and going without clothes, and being shipwrecked

three times, and you know, on the in the night

and the day, in the in the ocean, and all

of those things that have happened. Why did you put

up with all of it? His response would be verse fifteen.

The next verse, all of these sufferings of ours are

for your benefit. Circle that phrase, for your benefit, he says,

all the stuff this is called redemptive suffering. Folks, All

of these sufferings of ours are for your benefit. And

the more of you who are one to Christ, then

the more there are to thank Him for his great mercy,

and the more God gets glory.

Okay, what is Paul saying here? He said, I keep

on going.

I don't get discouraged because I know it's helping others,

even my pain. Study after study after study is shown

that human beings can handle an enormous amount of pain

if they see a purpose in it. When you have

pain and you don't see any purpose, it's unbearable. It's unbearable.

But when you can see a purpose, a good purpose

in it, then it becomes bearable. And he says, here,

what's the purpose. My purpose of my suffering is for

other people's benefits.

Sometimes you will.

Suffer for the benefit of other people, and at that

moment you are more christ Like than any other moment,

because that's what Jesus did. He suffered on the cross,

not for his benefit. He hadn't done anything wrong. He

suffered on the cross for our benefit, redemptive suffering. And

sometimes God will let you go through pain, not for

your benefit, yeah you can grow from it, but for

the benefit of other people.

He says. I keep going.

I don't get discouraged because I know it's helping us.

Kay, And I've tried to do this. You know, when Matthew.

Died, worst day in our lives, greatest pain, to lose

a child to mental illness.

It was excruciatingly painful.

It's still painful today. But we're not gonna waste our hurt.

So we use it to help other people who struggle

with suicide. We've used it to help other people who

families that have struggled with mental illness in their family.

Why waste a hurt. I'm not gonna waste that pain.

I'm not gonna go through it and waste it. What

is it in your life that's so painful that you

need to be using to help other people? Your greatest

ministry will come out of your deepest hurt if you

are honest to God, honest yourself, and honest enough to

talk about it with other people, the pain you've gone

through in your life. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but that's

called earth.

This is not Heaven.

This is Earth, and everything's broken on earth. So there

is suffering and pain and evil here. It's not good

and we should fight it and avoid it and you know,

push it back where we can, but it's gonna happen.

There is suffering on earth. Don't waste it.

Use it for good. Paul says, I use.

My pain to help others, you know, In a couple

of weeks we're going to be having Easter, and it's

going to actually be our fortieth Easter at Saddleback Church.

Last year we had almost seventy one thousand people at

Easter and several thousand came to Christ the very first time.

And this year we're reaching out to try to reach

more and we're telling everybody, bring your friends. And why

do we need any more people in this church?

I mean, like, isn't this enough? Isn't it big enough? Friends?

We don't grow for our benefit. We grow because people

need the Lord.

We go grow. We don't reach out.

We don't get this church bigger because we need a

bigger church. Friend, my favorite size was three hundred people.

That way they could pay my salary. I go play

golf three times a week. If we have stopped it

at my favorite size, none of you'd be here, well,

a couple of you would be in this service. But

the truth is we do this for jesus sake.

Paul says it twice. For Jesus. We put up with

the problems. The bigger the church gets, the more problems.

There are, the more stress there is, the more heartaches

to deal with, the more people to help. But why

do we do it not for our sake. We do

it because everybody needs to know the Lord. And as

long as there's one person who doesn't know Christ, we're

gonna keep reaching out.

Now.

Number six, the sixth secret of defeating discouragement.

This is an important one. Take time for renewal.

With a long haul, you're going to figure out how

have to figure out ways to recharge, to refresh and

to renew yourself. If you don't learn how to refresh

and renew and recharge yourself, you're gonna get discouraged and

you're going to give up, no matter what the project

or the goal or the dream is. Paul talks about

this in verse sixteen. This is why we never give up. Okay,

here's now. This is the third time you use this phrase.

This is why we never give up. He's talking about

overcoming discouragement. This is why we never give up. Though

our bodies are dying. Literally in Greek, that word they're

dying is wasting away. Okay, though our bodies are wasting away,

our spirits are read it with me aloud, being renewed

every day. Circle the word renewed. You're going to have

to learn how to be renewed. Every day. That's called

day renewal. Now you've got to renew your mind. You

got to renew your body, You got to renew your heart.

Renew constantly. Now, obviously and physically, our bodies are decaying.

Have you noticed that?

Okay, you're not the sexy being you were ten years ago,

all right? And so when we have bifocals and baldness

and bulges and wrinkles and aches and pains, and some

of us have furniture problem in our chest dropped into

our drawers. You can't stop the aging process, but you

can stay fresh inside. And notice, Paul says, I renew

myself daily.

How do you do that?

Well, you need to spiritually renew yourself daily with time

with God. Every day you spend some time with God.

Every day you read the Word, you pray, you talk,

You get spiritually recharges like hooking up the jumper cables,

get your spirit recharged. You need to know what renews

you emotionally. You need to know what renews you physically.

And you need to renew yourself every day. You've heard

me say divert daily, withdrawal weekly, abandoned annually, and I've

talked about that a lot so let's just go on

to number seven, the seventh secret of defeating discouragement. This

is a big one. Stay focused on eternity. Stay focused

on eternity. Paul's final secret for defeating discouragement. It is not,

you know, look at the hear and now. He says,

you need to maintain an eternal perspective. You can't live

for just here and now. You got to look beyond

the here and now. The here and now is what's

discouraging you. But when you look into heaven and you

look into the future, and you look at the coming rewards,

and you look at all the things that God has

planned for you, then you'll get over your discouragement. The

reality is you lose your perspective every time you get tired.

When you get tired, you lose your perspective. And so

Paul says this in Second Corinthians, chapter four, in verses

seventeen eighteen, the last two verses, he says, our present

troubles are quite small. Now let me just stop right there.

This is the guy who's been shipwrecked three times, been

thrown in prison, been beaten, gone without food, gone without clothing,

all of these different things, and he goes, our present

troubles are quite small compared to what, compared to what.

Okay, this is a.

Matter of perspective, and he's going to say it's small

compared to the rewards and the joys we're going to

have forever and ever and ever. He said, you know,

even if I had a chronic problem, and I had

that problem every day of my life, well, my life

on earth's only going to be maybe sixty seventy eighty years,

but I'm going to spend trillions and trillions and trillions

and trillions of years in.

Heaven reaping the reward. Words, so he says.

Really, this is quite small, even if I had it

all my life. Our present troubles are quite small and

won't last very long. Yet they produce in us and

the immeasurable great glory that will last how long, forever,

circle that forever, it's gonna last forever. So temporary problems,

joy and glory and results and rewards forever.

So he says, here's the key. We don't look.

At the troubles which we can see right now, that's

what discourages you. Rather we look forward to what we

have not yet seen. He's talking about in heaven for

the troubles that we see will soon be over, but

the joys to come will last forever. You know, there

are three kinds of motivation in life, and you've got

to have motivation to keep going. Now, there's internal motivation

that's inside you. There is external motivation that's something from

the outside of motivations, and those are okay. But stronger

than internal or external motivations is the third kind, eternal

eternal motivation, which is this life is not all there is.

We're made to last forever, and we're gonna spend more

time on that side of death. And on this way

you only get a little bit on this side. You're

gonna have far, far more on the other side. So

think about eternal motivation. You realize this is how Jesus

endured the cross. Look at the next verse Hebrews twelve

to two. Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus's

stay focused on eternity. Keep our eyes fixed on Jesus,

on whom our faith depends from beginning to end. He

did not give up. There's that phrase again. He did

not give up. He didn't get scouraged, He did not

give up because of the cross on the contrary, because

of the joy that was waiting for him. He thought

nothing of the disgrace of dying on the cross, and

he's now seated at the right hand, the right side

of God's throne.

See Jesus.

How did Jesus handle all the pain and suffering of

the cross? He was looking beyond it to the joy

that was set before him. He's looking to the reward.

He had his eyes set on eternity. Only when you

see the invisible can you do the impossible. You've got

to look beyond. You know, we've done a lot of

impossible things at saddle Back Church. Everybody thought they were impossible.

But you have to look.

Beyond the impossible to see the invisible. See what God

is doing in the spirit realm. Or one of my

favorite quotes Corey tin Boom, if you look at the world,

you'll be distressed. If you look within, you'll be depressed.

But if you look at Christ you'll be at rest.

It all depends on what you've got your eyes on.

Let us fix our eyes on GeSe or, as Paul says,

we look forward to what we have not yet seen.

Those are the seven secrets Paul gives us for overcoming discouragement.

But let me add one on that it will be

a little booster point, and it would be this all

seventy of these things. They're a whole lot easier if

you do them with other people. It's a whole lot

easier if you have a support group. And I know

I talk about small groups all the time because they're important.

That every one of these things.

Happen easier when you have other people who will help

you with the seven things that are going on.

If you have a.

Small group, you need to get in a small group.

We'll be glad to help you start a small group.

You can go out after this service out to the

patio and any of our campuses and say I'd like

to get in a group. Will help you start a group.

Let me close with this promised Galatians six, verse eight.

I don't know what's discouraging you this weekend, but here's

a verse for you. Let us not get tired of

doing what is right, for after a while, we will

reap a harvest of blessing if we don't get discouraged

and give up. That is a promise of God to you.

That's bow our heads. Let me pray for you, father,

I don't know who's hearing this message right now, but

you do, and you know the hearts, and you know

those who are on the edge of discouragement are deep,

deep in it. And I pray that we'll take your

word and not just hear it and not just learn it,

but actually apply it and do it and practice it.

And it would take these seven steps this week and

put them into our lives, and that will review this

message all week in order to fight the discouragement that

you don't want us to have. Now, you pray, say, Lord,

help me to never forget how much you love me.

Help me to never forget how much you love me.

Help me to never fake it, to not try to

be something that I'm not, just to be who you

made me to be. And Lord, help me to remember

that life is not about me, that it doesn't all

revolve around me. It's all about you. Help me to

relax in my limitations. Do not try to be superman

a superwoman. To realize behold your treasure in clay jars.

And Lord, when I go through pain, help me to

not just wallow in that pain, but to use that

pain to help others for other people's benefit. I don't

want to waste the pain I've been through, Lord, I

want to use it to help others.

Help me to take.

Time for renewal every day, to do the things that

recharge my spirit, my soul, my body, my heart, my relationships,

and help me to not get so caught up in

the day to day and the problems of the moment

that I lose my focus on eternity. Help me to

remember that this life is not all there is, that

I'm made to last forever, and that even the pain

in my life is temporary compared to the thousands and

millions of years that I will be with you. Tell

the Lord, I'm going to claim this promise that if

we do not get tired in doing what's right, that

after a while, we'll reach a harvest of blessing. If

we don't get discouraged and don't give up. God, I'm

saying today, I'm not going to give up. Tell the

Lord that I'm not going to give up, but I'm

going to trust you, just like Paul did in Jesus' name.

Amen,