2017 Men's Retreat - Session Three

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I'll say, bless the Lord if you say oh my soul.

Bless the Lord.

Bless his holy name.

Amen.

Um we're gonna finish up Psalm 31 tonight.

Um just wanna say thanks, Don, for hosting.

And uh Don was gracious.

Uh I called him uh about five or six months ago and just said, uh, my brother just called and let me know uh he's getting married, and it happens to be on the weekend of our retreat.

Um and tomorrow's also one of my daughter's birthdays, and so I said there's three options.

You can find another speaker, um uh, or we can see if you can move the dates, or uh I'll fly out at the butt crack of dawn and try to roll in hot on two wheels to my dad my brother's wedding, and he said option three.

Um but I'm delighted.

This is uh this is such a a good time for for me.

Um my family's been praying for our time together.

Uh I have four kids.

The joke is four too many.

Um three biological, one adopted.

Christopher has my youngest, he has my name, and he has brown skin, and we call him a foreign adoption because we got him when we lived in Tuscaloosa, and he's from Auburn.

Um don't worry, he's on the right side now.

Um but just uh they're hot mess.

My oldest one is 13, and my daughters, uh, who was I talking to?

They're one of the key sanctifying agents in my life right now, um, who just teach me more and more how to be patient and present um and fully attentive.

Uh, and I enjoy it.

My beautiful wife Audrey, we met doing youth camp.

Uh what year is it?

17, 17 years ago.

Um, and she is loving and loyal and breathtaking, and I don't deserve her in so many ways.

Um and I'm just honored uh to do life with someone who absolutely wants God's best for you, uh, regardless of the service and sacrifice it takes.

Um and then uh I have a discipleship group of two guys, two good old Tennessee boys uh who are praying for us and you guys uh this weekend.

I sent them a picture of me shooting guns, and I think my spiritual authority just went up about three notches.

If they had seen me shooting the gun, it would have gone down a couple more notches, but they they know that's how I roll.

So um and then I pastor a congregation on Tuesday night that's part of a bigger family of churches called Brentwood Baptists in Tennessee.

And um it's predominantly young adults, 25 to 27 is our main demographic, but uh we've got kids as young as mine, and their friends are in there, and we've got uh retirees, and it's just this interesting amalgamation, and it's it's fun.

But just in the last couple weeks, um I'll get done praying and then just or get done preaching and say, hey, anybody wants prayer?

I'll be hanging around and here's some of the prayer requests that I get when I get done preaching.

I uh got a kid named Dom who works at the YMCA, and he's your stereotypical millennial.

Comes up to me with his bro tank and a deep voice, and hey man, will you pray for me?

He works at the smoothie shop right outside of the Y where I work out.

And uh he's like, bro, I'm trying to get a full-time job.

I'm getting ready to roll off my parents' insurance, and I just want to prove to my dad that I can work, but I don't mean to sound like a typical millennial, I just want to make sure I get to use my passion.

Like I want to do art.

Um, and I said, that's great, I get it.

Um but let's just get a job, brother.

Um, you know, just try try to be patient and gentle and yet loving and affirming.

And I have a teacher comes up who works in an under-resourced neighborhood and she says, Well, just tell pray for my kids.

Uh I want to be the light of the gospel in the school system.

Absolutely.

Girl walks up with her dad who's a pastor at a town, and uh, she was raped three weeks ago, and she is shut down.

There's nothing.

And she just goes, I want to know how God could let this happen.

And I said, I'd love to pray for you, and I'd love to set you up with someone to talk to and work through that.

Um, next girl comes up weeping.

It is a mother with um an autistic seven-year-old who bites her and tells her he hates her.

And she can't get through the tears and just says, I don't even know what I'm gonna do.

I'm at my end financially and emotionally, and today's my birthday.

I said, How's your marriage?

She says, I can't even begin to think about that right now.

Let me pray for you.

Um, and uh as I'm walking out, then I got another guy who's just like, hey, this is my second time setting foot in a church.

Great, tell me about your spiritual journey.

I don't have one.

Thank you for your honesty.

Um I said, Well, what are you doing here?

He says, I was talking to some guys at the dealership and they're Muslim, and I didn't like how their hell sounded, so your hell sounds better, so that's why I'm here.

Take out my minister's handbook and try to where is that response?

What do I say after that?

Tell me more about that, brother.

Um, he's great.

He wound up accepting Jesus.

Uh he's a hot mess, it's awesome.

He can't believe it.

I got a text from him who said this is better than drugs and sex, and I'm like, thank you.

Don't you love it when you get unchurched people who don't know the rules?

And I'm like, more of that, please.

Um, and then uh had a little uh Filipino woman uh stop me in the hall, and she's asking for money for a hotel room, and something checks in my spirit.

Um and uh I invite Stephanie, um, who's one of our connections ministers and she has an abusive past um and has a nose for BS.

And I said, Stephanie, would you help me out?

Uh here's what's going on, and she kind of takes it from there.

Come to find out, um, apparently in that culture, uh, a lot of men marry and wind up abusing and dominating those women, and she was fleeing literally for her life in a car, and we got her connected uh with the authorities and got her into a safe place.

This is what she said to me in broken English.

I heard you're Christian and you're supposed to help.

Yes, ma'am, you're right.

So when I think of all those myriad of prayers and people and lives, Psalm 31 has changed a little bit about how I pray for people.

Now, I I want to ask God specifically for things.

I don't want to be a Christian fatalist.

I want to step in, and where evil has taken ground, I want to take it back and just I want to be like the spiritual repo man.

Like, hey, that's my dad's, I'll take that back, I'll take that back, and we'll take that back, okay?

That belongs to him.

That was never yours.

That's not how he intended it.

And so I believe in praying powerfully and passionately and with specificity.

But I also discover sometimes in my prayer life, um, I bear the undue burden of trying to give God advice about how he needs to intervene.

And so there's phrases in here that really help have started to ground my prayers.

Lord, into your hands I commit their spirit.

Lord, into your hands I commit their brokenness.

With everything that's going on, I say, we trust in you.

You are our God, and their times are in your hand.

And for all those men and women, I believe that you have called them according to your purpose, regardless of where they're at, whether they're in a smoothie shop with a bro tank or fleeing domestic abuse or just trying to make it another day as a mom with a child with special needs.

I believe that God has a call on their life.

And I just pray, into your hands, Lord, I commit their call.

Would they be able to see the purpose and passion even in the most mundane and difficult circumstances?

So it's with that in mind, let's finish reading our psalm.

We'll be in Psalm 31.

And why don't we pray before we step in to ready our hearts to hear the word of the Lord?

Take a deep breath in.

Exhale.

Be fully present.

If it helps you to put your hands out, open up in a posture of receiving.

If you want to, you can, you don't have to, but here's a prayer that I often ask the Lord.

Hey, give me as much of your word and your power and your glory that I can handle that doesn't kill me.

Pray for the man on your right and on your left.

Pray that the Holy Spirit would arouse deep conviction and endurance within his soul tonight.

And that he would get a glimpse of how God sees it.

Holy Spirit, give us eyes to see and ears to hear.

Jesus, would you go before us in this text and make a way?

And together we say, Speak, Lord.

Your servants are listening.

Amen.

Pick it up in verse 14.

But I say I trust in you, O Lord.

I say, You are my God.

My times are in your hands.

Deliver me from my enemies, from those who pursue me.

I love this one.

Let your face shine on your servant.

Save me in your steadfast love.

Let me not be put to shame, O Lord, for I have cried out to you.

But let the wicked be put to shame.

Let them lie silent in the grave.

Let their lying lips be silenced, for with pride and contempt they speak arrogantly against the righteous.

How great is the goodness which you have stored up for those who fear you.

Fundamentally, men, we have to start with this assumption that God is a God of blessing.

And how great is the goodness that He has stored up for us.

Once we lock into that perspective, we'll see the world and relationships and people differently.

I don't know about you, but a lot of times my fear and my anxiety is always thinking, how great is the cursings that the Lord has stored up for me.

And if I experience anything good, you better hang on to it because he's going to take it away.

That's operating out of a scarcity mentality, not out of an abundance mentality.

How great is the goodness which you have stored up for those who fear you, which you bestow in the sight of men, for those who take refuge in you, in the shelter of your presence, you hide them from the intrigues of men.

In your dwelling, you keep them safe from accusing tongues.

Praise be to the Lord, for he showed his wonderful love to me.

When I was a besieged city, in my alarm I said, I'm cut off from your sight.

Yet you heard my cry for mercy when I called you for help.

Love the Lord, all his saints.

The Lord preserves the faithful, but the power proud he pays back in full.

Be strong, take heart, all who hope in the Lord.

I'll say the word of the Lord if you'll say, Thanks be to God.

The word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

So I think the progression that I like in this psalm is into your hands we commit our spirit, into your hands we commit our brokenness.

There's that one line that says, My times are in your hands, I trust your perfect timing for everything.

And then this last section, I just like to call it Into Your Hands I Commit My Call.

I think King David here, who is this incredible warrior, king, shepherd, poet, has the undeniably has a call of God on his life.

Yet for some reason that doesn't excuse him from suffering and sacrifice.

I wonder tonight what it would look like if each one of us, I think a lot of times when we hear the word calling, a lot of us just go, thanks, that's just for the ministers.

And maybe that's why we're in the trouble we're in right now in the church, is because men and women are not stepping into their God-ordained calling, giftedness, and uniqueness to expand his kingdom.

But I don't know about you.

Whenever the Lord, again, calls me into a new climbing space or a new area, or your eyes are open to a brokenness that you go, that is not how God intended it, and something's rising up in you.

Whether you're equipped or not, you feel the love of Christ compelling you.

The first question is, do I have the money?

Do I have the time?

And do I have the resources?

And usually the answer to all those things are no.

And yet the Lord is continuing to call you and push you because he is going to demonstrate that it's him working through you, not just you working in your own strength.

So looking at King David, let's see if we can do it this way.

I got three things that I want to highlight in this psalm tonight.

Uh, the phrase that just keeps rattling around in my brains for us is praise be to the Lord, for he showed me his wonderful love even when I was a besieged city.

If you're trying to figure out your unique calling, ask yourself this question: Where was I when God showed his wonderful love to me when I felt like I was a besieged city?

When is the chapter?

When is the time when you felt cut off from his sight?

When you thought you were abandoned, when you felt the world was against you, you cried out for mercy, and God answered you and showed you the wonders of his love.

Where was that place?

What was that issue?

Chances are those are God's sovereign foundations of building your trust and reliance on him.

What's the one thing that you've always dealt with, and then finally you got breakthrough in a certain area?

What's the biggest pain in your life that now is leading you to the biggest passion?

What's the thing that you go, son, if you don't have to walk through what I walk through, I will give my life to that.

Or you're walking through that, and I need you to know you're not alone.

I've walked that journey too.

Let me walk beside you.

This is how the Lord knits together the local church.

And each one of you brings something specific and tangible that the Holy Spirit is wanting and asking you for.

That's not what God's asking you to do.

He's asking you to do it the way you do it.

When does it happen?

Yeah, I'll leave it there.

Is that fair?

I submit that for interpretation, but that's that's been rattling around, so I just wanted to release that.

If that's unfair, oh well.

You can rebuke me later.

Don't despise the shepherd's field.

Okay?

Here's David.

He's in the shepherd's field.

This is the author of this psalm.

And we know that God has anointed him.

Samuel's coming to find him, and I don't know what David's life looks like.

He he grows up, he's one of the youngest in a big family, right?

Is he told, hey, we've got limited resources in this big family, so don't dream too big?

Um, did his dad just have incredible older brothers and sons that he looked at and said, Yeah, those are the leaders that David just kind of flew under the radar.

Here's God's anointed, and he's in his hometown working for his dad's business, sweeping out the garage, so to speak.

And when his dad is asked by a prophet of God, line up your sons, he doesn't think even about David.

Think maybe he had some daddy issues?

Thanks, dad.

Don't worry about me.

I don't know if he got picked on because he was a redhead or a ginger.

I don't, I really don't know.

I don't know if he was too tender, always playing the harp and writing songs and he wasn't manly.

I don't know, any of that.

But I do know his dad, when it came time to pick out the anointed king of Israel, didn't even ask him to come to the lineup.

And Samuel, after he gets done his character search, not his talent search, the Spirit says, and has to ask, do you have another son?

Yeah.

David.

Question mark.

How many of you, how many people would put question marks after your name when you said, Yeah, I'm getting involved in ministry?

Really?

Well, that church is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Spirit of living God says that one.

And hey, just a reminder for you guys there may be twelve other more qualified people that you could say could do a better job, but nothing and no one will stand in the way of God's anointing in your life.

Not your family, not your brothers, not anyone else.

If God wants to anoint you and call you, he's coming straight for you and he'll find you.

And so David's anointed the next king of Israel.

And do you know where his next move is?

He's not to the throne room.

He's not to the battlefield.

He goes straight back to the freaking shepherd's field.

How about that?

How discouraging would that have been?

Finally validated, finally called out, and God's first ordained place for him to go is straight back to the shepherd's field.

I just need you to hear this.

Don't despise the shepherd's field.

A lot of times in my life, when God has a calling, I get breakthrough, there's clarity, you find yourself straight back in things you said.

I wanted to be delivered from this in the first place.

Why am I going back to it?

Many of you found your places in life or career and you thought, I was done with this, and now you're circling back around it financially or relationally.

Don't despise the shepherds feel.

God is always concerned about your character, not just your competency.

We want our competency and we want it to be on full-on display, but God goes, I need a man whose character I can trust and mold in private.

And so one of the things that I want to say to all those people that I pray for in my flock, and I want to say to you, God customizes the curriculum to fit your life.

And don't you dare despise the shepherd's field.

There's some lessons we can only learn in the shepherd's field.

And so I don't know if he fantasized about slaying giants when he was protecting the flock from predators.

I I don't know if he sang songs and thought maybe, hey, one day I could lead worship.

I don't know what happened.

I do know that he was called and he was anointed and he went straight back to the shepherd's field.

And then finally, in his calling, it's time to go to the battlefield.

A lot of us, if you are familiar with David's story, right?

He kills Goliath and everyone knows that.

Do you know what got him to the battlefield in the first place?

Taking exiled sandwiches to his brothers.

After called and anointed the king of Israel back to the shepherd's field, his dad finally calls him like, Yeah, Dad, what's up?

Is Samuel here?

Time to start seminary?

No, I need you to take some lunchables to your brother.

Sweet! Finally, Dad, now you see me.

Great.

I just wonder if so many times we get upside down in the kingdom of God because we want to go to some place to rule and God's calling us someplace to serve.

I think serving is what proves you will be entrusted with responsibility within the kingdom of God.

They bring sandwiches to his brothers, and he's not trained.

He's not in the military industry.

What he does is he overhears someone taunting his God and something prophetic rises up with him and says that's not how God intended things to be.

And again, man, I think that's usually the primary place our callings start to stir.

Um, usually we can articulate what's wrong before we can articulate how God wants to make it right.

And a lot of us just start stop at what's wrong and we become critical and sarcastic rather than stepping in and going, Where's my fight in this lord?

You show me and I'll go.

But here's what's fascinating to me about that story.

He's not trained, doesn't have the right equipment, doesn't have the right training.

God still called him.

Here he is taking his brother's sandwiches, and King goes before King Saul.

He's like, Let's take this guy out.

And he's like, Okay, here, take my armor, and here's my sword.

Imagine what that was like to a young boy who knew he was going to be king one day, and he's looking at the king and goes, That armor doesn't fit me, and that I can't barely have that sword.

But I think the Lord was testing his character here because he would have to stand up to Saul later in his career, wouldn't he?

The thanks, but no thanks.

That's not how God has trained and equipped me.

Man, I think some of the things that stand in our way for us fulfilling our calling is there's a Saul you've idolized in your life, and you're trying to do it exactly the way he did it, rather than the Lord leading you in your own specific way.

He has no training, he has no equipping according to in their eyes, but he has the courage to go, here's what I do have, I have a sling, and he takes off.

And I just wonder if there's some of you in here tonight who have been shying away from the battlefield because you don't feel properly equipped.

And so I just want you to hear this don't retreat from the battlefield.

You were designed to fight and take over kingdom territory, and where is that place that prophetically it just rises up in you no matter how tall, how big, how insurmountable the odds are, no matter where you are.

And you're honored.

I don't have it all figured out.

I mean, I have all the resources, I mean not have all the right things, but I will not retreat from the battlefield.

Only I think in David's He moves from the battlefield and then he winds up making his way to an open field or his throne room.

He gets a chance.

Rule and reign as the king of Israel.

It's what he's been anointed to do.

I don't know if David thought this way, but I sure do.

Once you arrived, finally you can take a breath.

I don't need to sacrifice and suffer anymore.

That's what the young bucks do.

That's that's why we have interns.

I would say in your calling with God, when into the Lord's hands you commit his calling, when you finally arrive at a place, authority and opportunity, your sacrifice and suffering has just begun.

And don't be surprised when the Lord calls you to double down on it.

How many of us have abdicated our priestly responsibilities because we think, oh, I've already paid my dues, I don't have to do this anymore.

And I don't know where you guys find yourself in here tonight as you're considering your calling and your unique kingdom contribution, whether it's in the shepherd's field, if it is, don't despise it.

If it's the battlefield and you're in a fight for your life, don't you dare retreat from it.

Or if it's an open field where the Lord has gifted you with some power and some leadership and some authority and influence, know your sacrifice and suffering has just begun.

Why?

Because that's what Jesus did.

He didn't despise the shepherd's field, he had no problems living in obscurity for 30 years.

Submitting to a father, learning to trade, and then he becomes the good shepherd, for goodness sake.

He didn't retreat from the battlefield when it came to fight for the life of our souls and the future of his father's kingdom.

And instead of shedding blood for his cause, he allowed his blood to be shed.

And then the father brought him into an open field where he said, Now my spirit will be with all men, and we will rule and reign as we advance the kingdom.

If I can just find men and women who don't despise the shepherd's field, who don't retreat from the battlefield, and when they get to an open field, they won't shy away from sacrifice or suffering.

That is the way of the kingdom.

The upside down, inside out, inverted values that this world tells us, Jesus flips them upside down.

And I just hope there's some men in here tonight who are willing to embrace those things and aren't going to shy away and go, if you'll lock arms with me, I won't shy away from the shepherd's field, I won't retreat from the battlefield, and when I get to that open field, will you call me to further suffering and sacrifice for God's kingdom and his cause?

Amen.

So let's take 120 seconds and just kind of listen in.

What had your name on it?

If the shepherd's field, the battlefield, and the open field is helpful, great, use it.

If it's not, if it's confusing, disregard it.

But just ask the Holy Spirit right now, in your unique calling.

I believe we all have a general calling.

Make disciples that make disciples.

Faithful spouse, loving father, honorable son.

Yes.

When it comes to your unique kingdom contribution, where do you find yourself?

And what does God want to say to you tonight about that?

Let him speak into your identity.

How do you need to respond?

Those are the first thoughts that I want you to take into your small group time because I believe that's how the Holy Spirit starts to reveal collective wisdom within the body of Christ.

And just a reminder, when someone's sharing, give them the courtesy of asking good questions.

Don't rush to fix.

Don't rush to help.

Let your brother struggle.

And do them the courtesy of asking spirit-led questions that help facilitate a deeper discovery.

Be really aware of your own junk that you bring into that conversation.

If you guys are willing, uh before we part ways, I'd love to bless you.

So if you put your hands out in a posture of receiving, if you're comfortable with that, great.

If not, you can do other hand gestures.

May God sustain you in the shepherd's field.

May He make you brave for the battlefield.

And when you get to an open field, would you be there with open hands, open wallets, and open lives, ready to give everything and anything for the cause of Christ.

Together we say, Lord, into your hands we commit our spirit.

Into your hands we commit our brokenness.

We say, but we trust in you, and you are our God, and our times are in our hands.

We say, Praise to the Lord who showed me the wonders of his love.

How great is the goodness that God has stored up for us, and we say, into your hands, Lord, we commit our cause.

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Grace and peaceful.