Rick Warren - Trusting God in Chaos, Even If It Feels Impossible

Now you know, folks, today, it seems like that all

the values that create a healthy society have been turned

upside down. You agree with this. It seems like everything's

being shaken. Our economy and the foundations of our economy

are being shaken. The way we've done government in America

for hundreds of years is being shaken. Our freedom, our

freedom of speech and conscience and religion being shaken. Marriages

are being shaken, Families are being shaken, so many things.

Education is being shaken. The foundations of our moral and

ethical values are being shaken. Now we're living in a

time of great upheaval, when there's a lot of shakiness

going on. But I'm not here to talk about doom

and gloom because this book is not about doom and gloom.

It's about the answer. It's about the answer to those

and God says, no matter how bad the world gets,

in a rapidly changing world, and even in a decaying culture,

God says, I want you to survive, and not only that, thrive,

and not only that, I want you to succeed. What

should you do when your life is upended, when your

world is shaken up by a death, a divorce, a failure,

a bankruptcy, and a hundred other things that could up

in your life. How can you thrive in this culture?

First suggestion when your life is thrown into chaos, when

your world is shaken up. Number one, don't be surprised

by adversity. Now here's what the Bible says in one

Peter four twelve. Dear friends, don't be shocked or surprised

when you suffer painful tests and trials, as if something

strange is happening to you. He said, you know, shakeups

are a normal part of life in a broken world.

We do not live in heaven. In heaven, everything's perfect,

everything's done great, there are no tears, no sorrows, no suffering.

But on earth everything is broken because of sin. Every

relationship is broken, every body is broken. We don't have

healthy minds, the weather's broken, the economy is broken, and

so we shouldn't expect things to be perfect here on earth.

And when something bad happens in your life, instead of

going why me, you might want to say why not me?

I live here on earth and this is not heaven

that's coming later, and so there are going to be sufferings.

There are going to be trials, and don't be surprised

by it. Jesus said it like this, John sixteen thirty three.

Jesus said, in this world you might experience difficulties. Well,

that's not what he said. In this world you what

circle that will? Now if Jesus said it, you can

count on it. You will have problems in life. You

are going to face adversity. You are going to have

times where your world is tossed upside down and everything

is shaken and bacon and flying, and you don't know

which way is up. In this world, you will experience difficulties.

Jesus promised that, but he said, take heart, I have

conquered the world. He said, I've told you this so

that in trusting me, you will be unshakeable and deeply

at peace. Jesus warned us that adversity is going to

be a part of life. Don't let it blow you away.

Don't be surprised, don't be shocked. But you need to

be unshakable. I'm telling you so you won't cave in.

Now you know what the typical response is when you

go through a crisis. The typical union human response when

I or you go through a crisis is this. The

first thing we do is try to figure out who's

to blame. That's the last thing you need to work on,

whose fault is it. As long as you're fixing the blame,

you can't fix the problem. To blame is to be blame.

That's how you spell blame. And so when you when

you blame other people, you're not You're just perpetuating the problem.

You're not solving anything. Politicians love to blame each other.

These groups and that groups blame each other. You know

what blame is not blame is blame. And instead instead

of asking whose fault it is, you need to be

asking what should I do now? Just so you'll know,

let me tell you there are four sources of the

problems in your life. The first source of the shakeups

in your life is your own nature, your old nature,

which is your own biggest problem. You might want to

write next to that. Roman seven. Roman seven is the

classic chapter explains how you are the biggest problem to you,

and I won't go into that. The second source of

the problems in your life is the world, the world

and the world. Your nature is within you. The world

is around you, and it wants to pull you down

and The primary way the world tries to pull you

down is through ridicule and through withholding approval. We are

desperate for the approval of other people, and so we

will lower our standards, and we'll change our convictions, and

we'll give in and give up simply because we want

somebody to like us. You don't need the world's approval

to be happy. You're as happy as you choose to be.

You don't need the world's approval. But the world causes

a lot of problems in your life too. The third

source of problems is, of course Satan. The devil is

real evil incarnate, and the moment you wake up in

the morning, he's plotting to discourage you, to defeat you,

to create doubts, depression, discouragement, distractions, all these different things.

When you get up in the morning, if you don't

meet the devil head on, it just means you're headed

the same direction because he's been planning to take you down.

He hates you. God has a good plan for your life.

He's got a bad plan for your life. Okay, so

my old nature, the world, the flesh and me, and

the devil, they all work on me. But the one

I want to talk to you about this weekend. Is

the fourth source of problems in your life, and it's God. God. Yes,

some of the problems and pressures and difficulties you have

in life actually come from God. God will sometimes shake

up your life for very good reasons. And that's why

I want to cover this in detail, because this is

the one that's unexpected, and I want you to look

at that now. It really doesn't matter where your problems

came from. They could be caused by the devil, they

could be caused by the world, They could be caused

by you. They could be brought on in your life

by God. It doesn't really matter. God will use every

one of them for your good if you will trust him.

You mean, even the bad thing in my life, even

my own sins. Yes, even God can use those for

good in your life. He can turn crucifixions into resurrections.

He can bring good out of bad. Anybody and bring

good out of good. But God can change even bad

things into good if you will trust him. So, regardless

of the source of your shaking. What's got you all

shaken up? I lost my job, I can't get married.

I want this and it hasn't happened. I have this

dream and I'm hitting the barrier. Regardless of whatever is

shaking you up, God wants to use it for good,

So the source isn't nearly as important as your response.

Now here's the second step based on that. Anytime the

world your world is shaken up. Number two, look for

ways that God might use it for good. Look for ways.

I look for ways that God might use it in

my life for good, because He wants to use everything,

even the bad things in your life. He wants to

bring good out of even those And if you want

to succeed and thrive rather than just survive in a

hostile culture, you need to look for ways that God

takes the things that shake you up and can use

them for good. Jeremiah twenty nine to eleven says this.

God says, the plans I have for you are plans

for good and not to harm you. Their plans to

give you hope and a future. The devil has bad

plans for your life, and therefore bad and for destruction.

God has plans. His plans are always good, there to

give you hope and there to give you a future.

Sometimes God shakes things up. I'm talking about in your life.

Sometimes shakes things up in my life to inspect me,

to inspect me. And what I mean by that is

God will bring a problem in my life that reveals

a motivation that's out a whack, or a character or

a thought or an emotion or a motive. He examines

and he checks it out, and he does it all

the time. You've got a fear, you've got a wrong motivation,

you've got a value, you got a misperception, there's some

lie that you're believing. God uses problems to inspect you. Now,

of course, God already knows what's going on in you.

He doesn't need any problem to tell him what. He

knows you better than you do. When God allows a

problem in your life is because He wants you to

know what's out of whack. And sometimes when things are

just flying off the wall and you're in a crisis

and you know yours just your whole world is shaken,

God is saying, I want you to see what I

want you to work on in your life. We're going

to inspect this in your life. Jeremiah seventeen ten says this,

The Lord searches our hearts and examines our deepest motives.

So he can give to each person his right reward

according to how he has lived. Now, notice God examines

your motives. Listen to this. Why is always more important

than what in life. What you do in life is

not nearly as important to God. That's why you do it,

Not what you do, but why you do. There are

a lot of things you can do in life. God say,

that's fine, go ahead and do that. I made you.

You could do that or that or that or that.

That'd you all be fine with me? I just want

to know why are you doing it? God looks at

the heart, He looks at the motivation. You see. What

matters in your maturity spiritually is not how high you

jump when you feel God in a worship concert. The

test is how straight you walk when you don't feel

God during the rest of the week. And I have

no emotion, I'm in the desert, I'm in a dry period,

I'm in the wilderness. Will you trust me? Will you

obey me? You see what God is saying is that

the problems that come into your life, they're a measuring tool,

and your reactions to difficulty actually measure your faith and

a bunch of stuff. Your reactions to difficulty. Measure your faith,

measure your commitment, measure your mature. They measure your integrity.

What does this problem reveal about me? When your whole

life is being shaken and everything you're on shaky ground,

the foundation is unstable, what does this problem reveal about me?

Here's another reason. Sometimes God shakes things up in your life,

not to inspect you, but to correct you. God wants

to correct me. And here's a very important verse Hebrews

Chapter twelve, verses eight to twelve, eight to eleven. God

corrects all of his children, and if he doesn't correct you,

then you don't really belong to him. WHOA So if

you can sin and get away with it, you should

doubt am I really in God's family? God corrects his children,

and if he doesn't correct you, then you don't really

belong to him. God corrects us for our own good,

because He wants us to be holy as he is. Now.

It's never fun to be corrected. How many of you

agree with that part of the Bible? It's never fun

to be corrected. In fact, at the time it's always painful.

But if we learn to obey by being corrected, we

will do right and live at peace. He Ultimately it's

for your good so you can live at peace. Job

chapter five, verse seventeen. Consider yourself fortunate when God all

Powerful chooses to correct you. He says, it's a privilege.

It's an honor to be corrected by God because it

just means he loves you. I don't know why, but

sometimes God has to lay us flat on our back

before we look up to him. And God wants to

teach you about himself, and he wants you to teach

you about yourself. And some lessons really you're only going

to learn through failure. You know, don't touch the stove,

you don't touch it a second time, because you learn

by being burned. And sometimes you know some things in line.

You don't learn the value of money until you've lost it.

You don't learn the value of friendship till you've lost it.

So here's the question, what is this problem teaching me?

Instead of going why me? Instead of asking why, you

should ask what. Don't ask why? When you go through problems,

ask what What should I be learning? Not why is

this happening to me? But what should I be learning?

Sometimes God shakes things up to direct me, to direct me,

He wants to point us in a new direction. He

wants to guide us down a different path. Proverbs sixteen,

verse nine. A person may plan his own journey. You

got your own life plan out there, but the Lord

directs his steps. So you have all your plans, but

the Lord is going to direct your steps. Question, how

does God direct your steps? Real simple problems, That's how

he directs your steps. Have you noticed that problems often

change your plans? Have anybody had that happened in their life?

Your problems change your plans? What is God doing? He's

redirecting you. He inspects you, he corrects you, and he

directs you when things are flying off the wall. Pain

is a powerful motivation to change. Proverbs twenty, verse thirteen

says this, Sometimes it takes a painful experience to make

us change our ways. And every one of you could

give a testimony on that verse. We rarely think about

the direction of our lives when things are going good.

When your life's going good, you got it on cruise control.

You're not even thinking about your goals. You're not even

thinking about God. You're not thinking about anything but cruise control.

This is fun. I'm in the driver's seat right now,

but all of a sudden, you have a traffic jam

or car accident. All of a sudden, it gets your attention,

and God gets our attention many times, and he changes

the direction. One of the values of pressure and problems

and crisis in your life is it forces you to

think about stuff you wouldn't normally think about on your own.

You want to just live in denial, and you would

just like to take that part of your life that

needs changing and just forget it and go on with

your life and go, well, I just isolate that over here.

I'll compartmentalize it and that'll be just fine. But it

doesn't work. What is a problem in your life that

you're pretending isn't a problem. What's the big problem, the

big elephant in your life, in your marriage and your relationship.

Then you're just very well, it's not a problem. I

know we got that there, but we've had it in

this relationship all this time. No, it's still a problem.

And God will use difficulty to correct you, inspect you,

and redirect you if he needs to. We would rarely

change unless we had problems. We postponed difficult decisions. We

put it off. I mean, if you had a disease

that didn't hurt you. You'd never go to the doctor

about it. You just let it keep taking over your

life until you die. Pain gets your attention. We ignore

youll illnesses if they didn't hurt. So God uses problems

to prod us and to poke us, and to push

us and to prompt us, and he uses things to

direct us. Write this down. Question where is this problem

leading me? You want to ask yourself. You want to

get the most out of your problems. Where is this

problem leading me? Sometimes God shakes things up to protect us.

Did you know that? Sometimes pain protects you from something

worse that you're going through a problem, But it's actually

preventing you from a bigger problem. It's keeping you from

greater harm. You might have wanted a certain job at

a certain business and it didn't happen, and God was

protecting you because he knew that there was a relationship

there that was going to mess you up, and he

kept you out of that situation. Sometimes a problem is

a blessing in disguise. Honestly, there will be times you

have problems when you did the right thing, not the

wrong thing. Not every problem is because you did something wrong.

Sometimes you have a problem because you did the right

thing job thirty six, Verse sixteen. God led you away

from danger. God often does this and you don't even

realize it. God has led you away from danger, giving

you freedom. Problems are the preparation for success, and it

really comes down to a matter of faith. Will you

trust God? There are people in this world who intend

to harm you. Not everybody's nice in this world. There

are evil people, There are mean people. There are people

who don't like you because you're a Christian, or because

of a moral stance or an ethical decision you've made,

because you won't go with the flow and won't party

with the crowd, and they think you're too good, or

they think you're self righteous, and they misjudge you and

on and they want to bring you down. They mean

it for bad, but God means it for good. Now.

Sometimes God removes a harmful person in your life and

it breaks your heart. Don't run after him, some of you.

That's all you need to hear. You just need to

hear your pastors say that sometimes there's a harmful person

in your life, but you're you're addicted to them, and

God will remove them from your life. Don't run after them.

God has shake things, taking things up to protect you.

So ask this question, how could this problem protect me?

How could this problem be protecting me? What's being prevented?

What could be worse in my life? Then? What's than

this problem? Well, there are a lot of things that

could be worse, all right. Number five. The fifth way

that God shakes things up in your life, and the

fifth reason for shaking things up in your life is

not to correct me or inspect me or direct me.

But God uses things and problems to perfect me, to

make you more like Jesus Christ, to grow your character,

to grow you up. Pain is the high cost of growth.

If you want to grow up, you want to be mature,

there is no way to do it without pain. Pain

is the cost of growing up. You can't grow up

on easy street. And see, we want the product without

the process. It is a cliche, but it is true.

There is no gain without pain. There is no maturity

without growing pains. And the very thing that discourages you

is the very thing that God is using to develop you.

One Peter five ten. The Bible says this, after you

have suffered a little, while the God of all grace,

who calls you to share his eternal glory. God's going

to share his glory with you. In union of Christ,

will himself perfect you. Circle that will perfect you and

give you firmness and strength and a sure foundation. God

is not interested in making your life easy on this earth.

He's interested in growing your character. The easy part comes

for eternity. You're in school right now. You're in school,

and in school, God says, there are eternal rewards coming,

and I'm going to perfect you. So knowing that God

can even use the bad things in my life to

inspect me, to direct me, to correct me, and to

even perfect me, what should be my response? Romans Chapter

five tells us we can rejoice. We can rejoice. We

can rejoice when we run into problems and trials, for

we know it's perspective that they're good for us. We

run into problems with drivers, we know they're good for us.

They help us learn to be patient, and patience develops

strength of character, boom in us, and helps us trust

God more each time we use it. So here's the

fifth question, how can I grow from this problem? So

God is saying, he said, don't be surprised when you

have adversity in the world, you will have tribulation, Jesus said,

realize that I can use it five different ways. Okay,

I can inspect you, and I can correct you, and

I can direct you, and I can protect you, and

I can perfect you. I can use all these different

ways in what's going on in your life. And so

what's the third suggestion here? It is, finally, trust God

for what I don't understand. When there's a problem in

my life. This one does not make sense. I don't

get it. I don't see the perfection. I don't see

the inspection. I don't see the correction. I don't see

the protection. I don't see the perfection. This problem does

not make sense. Then I trust God for what I

don't understand, knowing that he has my best interest in heart.

Proverbs three five and six. Trust the Lord with all

your heart doesn't say intellect heart. Trust the Lord with

all your heart. Don't depend on your own understanding. Honor

the Lord in everything you do, and he will give you.

What's the word circle that success. I want you to

be a success in life. God wants you to be

a success in life as your pastor, as your spiritual coach.

It is my goal, my job, my role to help

you succeed in every area of the life that God

has given you. I want you to be a success,

not just survive when times are tough, not just survive

in a hostile culture to Christians, but to thrive and

actually get promoted and have greater influence and be used

by God an amazing way. Let me close with little

self evaluation. Why don't you ask these questions to God

in your mind? Here's the first one to say, are

you using these problems to inspect me? You know the

ones I'm going through right now? Are you using these

problems to inspect me? If so, what does it reveal

about my life? Is there a weakness? Is there a

misplaced priority in my life? Is there someplace I've compromised

the truth and you're trying to show it to me?

And then say, Lord, are you using this problem to

correct me? If so, what do you want me to learn?

I'm not gonna ask why why is this happened to me?

I'm gonna ask what what do you want me to learn?

What do you want me to know? Lord? Are you

using this problem not just inspect the correct or you

use this problem to direct me? If so, what's the direction?

What do you want me to change? What's the new direction?

Where where do you want me headed? Lord? Are you

using this problem to protect me? Did that thing not

happen because you knew something that I didn't know and

I was walking into a bigger trap, a bigger problem,

a bigger fiasco, a bigger difficulty, and you protected me.

It is so Lord that I was just going to

tell you I trust you, I know that you know best.

Thank you for protecting me. And God, I want you

to protect me. And when there's something that I want

that would be bad for me, don't let me have it.

I want your will more than my will. And then say, Lord,

are you using this problem to perfect me? You see,

God's at work in your life even when you don't

recognize it or even understand it. God has work in

your life is not dependent upon you understanding it. So

I want you to pray this prayer very say, Dear God,

I want to trust you with all my hearts. Just

stay it in your mind. I trust you with all

my heart, not my Intellectum, I'm not going to depend

on my own understanding. God. I want to honor you

in everything I do. Work, home, anywhere else. And if

I trust you and I don't depend on my own understanding,

and I honor you and everything I do, You've promised

to give me success, and I'm going to believe that.

Jesus Christ, I want to trust you with all of

my life as best I know how, and I'm doing

it today. In your name, I pray Ameno