Guest Speaker: Jonathan Evans

(upbeat music)

- Just real quick, because I don't wanna take

any more time away from our guest speaker.

If you are new to Springhouse,

we are going to have a newcomer's lunch

in two Sundays from now.

So that would be not next Sunday,

but the next Sunday, right?

April 28th, April 28th, right following this gathering,

we're gonna provide a lunch for you.

Our pastoral staff is gonna be available,

and we just wanna meet you and tell you about Springhouse.

So that's going to be on April 28th,

make plans to attend that if you are new here

to Springhouse, okay?

Guys, we have a special guest speaker with us.

He has been with us before.

He has an on-time word this morning.

Would you guys please stand to your feet

and welcome Pastor Jonathan Evans.

(audience applauding)

- Good morning. - Good morning.

- Y'all doing all right? - Yeah.

- Good, good to be here once again.

It's been several years since I've been here,

but it's good to see familiar faces

and be back in the house.

Before I get started jumping into God's word,

I have my better half here with me.

And so, Kanika, stand up, stand up, say hello to everyone.

(audience applauding)

As you can tell, I out-kicked my coverage on that one.

I out-kicked my coverage on that one.

But I'm excited to have the opportunity to share.

She's here with me, so she gets a good little break

from our five children.

She's a stay-at-home mom as well,

formerly a physical therapist,

but she stays at home and homeschools.

(audience applauding)

So she's got it going on.

My oldest daughter's name is Kelsey.

She's 15 years old.

She's the artist in the house.

She loves to sing, color, dance, draw, anything,

but you know, formal learning.

(audience laughing)

And then we have Jonathan II.

His name is J2, just to throw a little swag on it.

But J2 is my intellectual.

He's the one who asked the question why,

which gets the common parental response,

because I said so, boy.

I ain't got time to be explaining everything to you.

(audience laughing)

And so that's my boy J2.

And then I have, after that, Camden.

Camden is my 10-year-old.

We call him Spider Cam, because he climbs on everything.

He's not happy unless he's trying to beat up his brother,

wrestle his dad, or swinging from the chandelier

in our kitchen.

And so that's Camden.

Then I have Kyler.

Kyler is my eight-year-old daughter,

and she is the athlete of the family.

Okay, she is fast now.

At seven years old, her first quarter time

was a minute and 20 seconds.

And so she was flying around that track

as a seven-year-old, and so I said,

it was not for me, that's your mom.

(audience laughing)

And then I have Jade Winter, who's our five-year-old.

And she just basically has all of her siblings jealous,

because she's the baby, that means she gets

whatever she wants.

(audience laughing)

Is there any babies in the house?

Is there any babies in the house?

Isn't that the best?

It's the best position.

You got parents taking care of you,

siblings taking care of you, you know what I mean?

Your parents are already tired, they're like, whatever,

just do whatever.

(audience laughing)

You know what I mean?

So it's a great position.

So I'm excited to introduce my family to you this morning.

Y'all ready for the word?

- Yeah. - Yeah.

- Let's jump in.

Heavenly Father, we love you and honor you.

If you don't do anything else, you've already done enough

by sending your son, Jesus Christ,

to die on the cross for our sins.

Help us to believe in it and walk in it.

We love you and give you the glory as you teach us today.

Help us to remember the words,

and we remember the words by applying the words,

so that it's not like a seed that falls amongst the thorns

that just gets choked out.

We love you and we honor you today.

In Jesus' name, amen.

I'm gonna read one thematic verse for you,

and that verse comes from Exodus 1.22.

I want you to key in today because you'll learn

some principles that I really believe

can change your life.

It has mine from this story.

So Exodus 1.22, so Bibles, Bible apps, whatever,

I want you to be able to see this.

Exodus 1.22, it simply says this.

Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying,

"Every son who is born, you ought to cast into the Nile.

"Every daughter you ought to keep alive."

One more time, then Pharaoh commanded all his people,

saying, "Every son who is born,

"you ought to cast into the Nile,

"and every daughter you ought to keep alive."

Today I wanna talk to you from the topic surviving Pharaoh.

Surviving Pharaoh.

Here is a commander in chief, if you will,

who has put out an edict in the land.

An edict is an official order by someone in power.

Basically, he said, y'all, this what we finna do.

And everybody has to prepare to do what he says to do,

and he has a evil edict, an afflicting edict,

against the Hebrew people.

He said, "Every Hebrew boy that is born,

"I want you to throw him into the Nile.

"I want you to take him out.

"Every daughter, I want you to keep alive."

What he's doing here is he's a little insecure.

The enemy is a little afraid,

because he does not want the advancement of God's kingdom.

He's in the business of advancing his own kingdom.

And one of the things I want you to notice

is that while the enemy is coming after everyone,

he does have a specific hit out on men.

He is not interested in godly men,

godly fathers, godly husbands, godly city council,

godly men in the church,

godly men leading their community.

He's not interested in godly men

stepping up and stepping out.

He's not interested in none of that.

And so what he wants to do is put out an edict

to take out the men, because in society at large,

in all of history, there has never been a society

in all of history that has ever survived without strong men.

So if you can take them out,

then you can take out a culture.

Has nothing to do with the significance of women,

because here, he's talking about a military threat.

And so he's saying, I need to multiply,

and the Hebrew people are multiplying at a faster rate,

and that makes me insecure.

Don't you know that the enemy is insecure

when the Church of Jesus Christ begins to multiply?

That's not something that he's interested in.

And in this context, he's speaking

from a military standpoint,

so he's really specifically thinking about taking out men,

because he's thinking in terms of war.

Okay, and so what he says in Exodus 1, 9,

he says, "He said to the people, behold,

the people of the sons of Israel are more mightier than we.

Come, let us deal wisely with them,

or else they will multiply in the event of war."

Okay, or else they will come against us,

multiply and come against us in the event of war.

So the enemy here is thinking in war terms,

so he comes up with this edict,

let's go ahead and get rid of these boys

before they grow up.

I wanna get the boys before they become men.

Okay, so you need to understand this, mothers,

that your sons, they don't fly in on storks.

This ain't Dumbo.

They come out of your wombs,

and you need to understand

that when it comes to spiritual warfare,

when it comes to war, the enemy is trying to take men out.

So if you've ever said to yourself,

boy, it sure is hard to find a good man,

understand that what you see,

if all you see is what you see,

you do not see all there is to be seen.

(audience laughing)

Okay, the enemy has a hit out on everyone,

but he's got his eye on men

because he knows what happens when strong men stand up

and say, "For me and my house, we will serve the Lord."

Okay, he already knows that,

and I need you to understand what he's saying is,

I don't, I'm really not interested,

and I'm really afraid because the Hebrew people,

God's people, are multiplying.

That's not what I'm interested in.

Understand, from the beginning,

the enemy is just an imitator of God.

God said from the beginning,

be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

God's goal is the visible manifestation

of his invisible self all over the earth, okay?

And so that's his goal.

When Noah docks the ark in Genesis 9,

he gives them the same command he gave Adam and Eve,

be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

He tells the disciples the same concept in Matthew 28.

Go ye therefore and make disciples of all nations.

Be fruitful and multiply and make replicas of who I am.

The enemy is insecure with more godly people

coming into the fold because he wants to build his kingdom,

and not only does he want to build his kingdom

through multiplication, he wants to build his kingdom

and is so bold to try to use God's people to do it.

Here, he's trying to enslave God's people

to build his kingdom.

He doesn't mind you going to church.

He just minds you being the church.

He minds the multiple,

he don't mind you sitting in a worship service.

He just doesn't want you to break huddle

from the worship service.

As a chaplain of the Dallas Cowboys,

I know I'm a Dallas Cowboy,

I know there's Green Bay people in here,

especially your pastor.

Your pastor is a Green Bay guy.

I ain't worried about none of that.

I'm up here, I'm talking.

As a chaplain of the Dallas Cowboys,

100,000 people don't come to AT&T Stadium or Texas Stadium

to watch 11 men bend over

and have a private conversation in the huddle.

That's not what they come for.

They don't mind the huddle,

but they want to know what difference the huddle makes.

They want to know having now huddled, can you now score?

What are you going to do about 11 other men

on the other side of the ball daring you to go public

with that private conversation?

That's why people come in.

You got to understand this is a huddle,

but the kingdom of God wants to know

what difference the huddle makes.

They want to know having now huddled, can you now score?

What are you going to do about Pharaoh

outside of these buildings daring you to go public

with this private conversation?

Pharaoh is totally okay with this private conversation,

but once the church of Jesus Christ begins to break huddle,

begins to multiply, begins to teach their children,

have healthy families, begin to multiply

and infiltrate the culture, then all of a sudden,

he becomes insecure and has a plan of attack.

So you need to understand that that's what he's doing here

is that in this context, he is insecure.

Do you know the devil's insecure?

He does not like when God's people do more than be churchy.

We're good at being churchy,

but he don't like it when we start multiplying.

And so he comes up with an initial plan.

His plan is found in Exodus 1, verse 11.

Exodus 1:11

He says, "So they appointed taskmasters over them

to afflict them with hard labor,

and they built for Pharaoh his cities and ramses

and all of those different things."

So his plan was, I'm going to make life so hard on them

that it will prevent them from being encouraged enough

to multiply.

So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna appoint taskmasters

to just give them a hard time and make life hard on them.

I need you to understand that the enemy uses affliction

to make things hard on you and to make you stop.

But God will allow you to be afflicted

to actually produce in you something that he can use

for his purpose, he has in you.

So while the enemy is using affliction to stop them,

God is allowing affliction to take them.

Okay, so I need you to understand that.

But what the enemy does is he says,

"I'm going to make things so hard on them

that they don't want to continue in the faith."

Okay.

If you're going through affliction,

you need to think of it differently.

Affliction means that God has a purpose.

My coach used to tell me,

"If I don't yell at you and I'm quiet,

that's when you need to be worried.

(audience laughing)

If I'm yelling at you, it's because I see something in you

that I think can grow and become better

and be useful for the team.

But if I'm quiet, then I don't really think

that you're that good.

I don't think that you're usable."

In other words, when things are loud in your life

and there's affliction in your life,

it's because the enemy knows

that God has something major for your life.

And you cannot build a skyscraper

on the foundation of a chicken coop.

Anytime you see a skyscraper in downtown Nashville,

the higher they go up is evidence

of how low they had to dig down.

God will allow something to get dug down in your life

and afflictions and hard times in your life,

but that is evidence that the enemy is insecure

of the skyscraper that God wants to put on top of it.

And so you need to understand that even in your affliction,

that's what the Bible says in the book of James,

consider it joy when you go through various trials

and affliction because I am producing something in you.

Okay, so the Christian sees affliction differently

than the non-Christian sees affliction.

We see affliction as, "Oh, you afflict,

you think so highly of me.

I'm glad you think about me the way you are

because I'm going through this affliction

because there's something that God must be doing."

And so you need to understand 'cause the people of God,

this is what Pharaoh found out.

It says in verse 11, so he appointed taskmasters.

In verse 12, he said, "But the more they afflicted them,

the more they multiplied."

Because God knows when there's affliction,

all of a sudden the people of God are more dependent on God.

When there's affliction, all of a sudden

they're praying again.

When there's affliction, all of a sudden the church is full.

When there's affliction, all of a sudden

they're linking arms.

God will allow the affliction because in affliction,

actually the church begins to multiply.

So the enemy was like, "Well, that didn't work."

Pharaoh said, "That plan wasn't a good plan.

That actually went against what I'm trying to do."

They are multiplying even the more with the affliction.

So he has to come up with a new plan.

And the new plan is found in Exodus 1.15.

Y'all still following along or am I going too fast?

Y'all still with me? Okay, good.

Gotta stay with it now.

Exodus 1.15, it says, "Then the king of Egypt

spoke to the Hebrew midwives, one who was named Shiphrah

and the other named Puah.

And he said, 'When you are helping the Hebrew women

to give birth and sieve them upon the birth stool,

if it is a son, you shall put him to death.

And if it is a daughter, then you shall let her live.'"

Okay, so the affliction didn't work.

So do you know what Pharaoh just said?

Okay, this dude is so slick and so sly

that he went to the Hebrew midwives,

not the Egyptian midwives.

He didn't go to his people.

He went to the Hebrew midwives and said,

"Let me holla at you for a minute.

Whenever there's a Hebrew woman who's giving birth,

if it is a son, Hebrew midwives,

I need you to put the Hebrew boys to death.

What does a daughter let her live?"

Okay, let me say that again.

Y'all didn't get that.

Hebrew midwives, I need you to go kill the Hebrew boys.

Well, that's bold.

Hebrew midwives, I need you to go kill your Hebrew boys.

Okay, y'all still ain't.

Springhouse, y'all ain't.

Okay.

Pastor Kevin, I got to tell them in a more modern way.

The enemy went to God's women

and tell them to go kill God's men.

So the enemy must know the power, the influence, the ability.

He must know that there is enough influence,

power, and ability in women

that if he can distort them,

he can take out a culture of men.

(congregation laughs)

Okay, there's not enough

of people talking about the power of women.

But if the enemy knows it, certainly we should know it.

Because from the beginning, Eve, let me holler at you.

He skipped at him.

He said, "Eve, let me holler at you.

I'm going to use your influence."

Offered his brother this fruit.

He going to eat it if it come from you.

(congregation laughs)

Delilah, just cut his hair.

It's his hair.

Jezebel, kill the prophets.

Herodias, y'all know who Herodias is?

Y'all like, "Herodias, who is that?"

Herodias in Matthew 14 got her daughter

to go get the head of John the Baptist.

Through scripture, if you look through it,

the enemy knows he can use the power and influence of women

to go take out men in God's plan.

But also the opposite is true.

That's why Proverbs 14, one says,

"A wise woman builds her house,

but a foolish one tears it down with her bare hands."

Which means and suggests that a woman has the power

to build a house, she also has the power

to tear a house down.

Women possess that power and the enemy knows it,

but guess what?

God knows it too.

That's why he would call Rahab to hide the spies

and save her families while the walls are crumbling down.

That's why he would call Ruth and tell her,

"Don't go back to the past.

It's time to go to the future and go with Naomi."

And she meets a man named Boaz, has a son named Obed.

Obed has a son named Jesse.

Jesse has a son named David

and puts her in the lineage of Jesus Christ.

That's why he would call Priscilla.

I need you to teach Apollos the word appropriately

so that he can teach the gospel

so that we can continue to multiply.

That's why he would call Phoebe.

Paul would send Phoebe out and tell the church of Rome

to listen to her because she's able to help carry out

the advancement of God's kingdom.

There are women who were used for destruction,

but there were also women who were used for building up.

So I'm just letting you know, Springhouse Church ladies,

that you have the power for good or the power for bad

and because we're the church of Jesus Christ,

you can build the house.

What am I telling you?

I'm telling you, if you've ever heard the impact

or ministry of Pastor Kevin,

it's because you have his wife's fingerprint all over you.

I'm telling you, if you've ever heard the ministry

of Jonathan Evans, it's because you have

Kenneka's fingerprint all over you.

If you've ever heard the ministry of Dr. Tony Evans,

it's because you have the fingerprint

of Lois Evans all over you.

When the enemy came into the house,

they told the enemy, no, I'm gonna lift him up,

not tear him down.

And so I need you to understand that the enemy

wants to use your experiences, your emotions,

your past, your abilities, and he wants you to use it

to tear down instead of build up

because he knows you possess that power.

I need you to understand that there would be

no sermons on Moses if it wasn't for two ladies

you've never heard of, Shiphrah and Puah.

There would be no sermons on Moses.

It's because they were able to look at the enemy

and say, we are not doing that.

I know the pressure and you,

Pharaoh is the most powerful man on the earth right now.

He can, this is a very lucrative deal.

You understand, he can write big checks,

gold and silver, for Shiphrah and Puah

to carry out his plan.

But they thought it is not good for me to take something

that is momentary lucrative that will have

our whole culture in debt.

I need you to understand that you can do something

that's in the moment that's emotionally lucrative

that can put your whole heritage in debt

because the enemy wants to use the power

to tear things down instead of build things up.

And fortunately, fortunately for the Scriptures advancement,

because Moses is kind of a big deal.

Fortunately for the Scriptures advancement,

these ladies got influenced by the enemy

and looked at Pharaoh and said,

modern, we ain't doing that.

I mean, I understand what you can do

and how much you can pay and how this may,

but we just ain't doing that.

We have to, we're gonna have to find another way.

And so Pharaoh's trying to get ladies to work for him

did not work, but Pharaoh would not quit.

It says in Exodus 1 22, then, this is back

to our original passage that I read at the beginning.

Then Pharaoh commanded all his people saying,

every son who is born, you ought to cast into the Nile

and every daughter you ought to keep alive.

So he's trying again.

So I'm going back to our original verse,

but you need to know that Pharaoh had already tried,

this is his third try.

Okay, affliction God's people didn't work.

Trying to get the ladies to tear it down didn't work.

So now he called all his people.

He had to go back to his minions.

He had to go back to his minions and say, okay,

now let's try this again.

So now that we're back at my initial verse

and I've got the introduction out the way,

we can get going.

So now you need to understand

that Pharaoh is after what has been conceived in you

that you have given birth to that you want to see develop.

You want to see it grow.

You want to see it be nourished.

You want to see it come to maturity.

He wants to kill whatever that thing is.

He will let you live,

but he wants to kill the thing that gives you life.

Because if he can kill the thing that gives you life,

then he can even enslave God's people to build out his plan.

He can make you so anxious, so depressed, so fearful,

losing faith, become a doubter.

He can put you in position where you're actually doing

more harm to the kingdom than good

because you're wondering, well, if I don't have this,

what is it all for?

And God must not be on my side.

And God is not working it out for good.

And God is not doing it.

I thought the pastor said this.

Maybe he's not.

And if he can get believers to start talking like that,

then he can have you enslaved

even though you've been set free.

That's why Galatians 5, 1 says it is for freedom

that you have been set free.

Therefore, never again return to the yoke of slavery,

which means there's a yoke of slavery you can return to

even if you've been set free.

You say verses backwards, you'll get them.

(congregation laughing)

So he says, I know something's been conceived in you.

And as soon as you deliver it,

and your expectations are that you'll get to raise it

and nurse it and develop it, oh, I'm coming for it.

And this is now the start of the story

where there's a lady who gives birth.

In Exodus 2, 2, it simply reads,

"The woman conceived in Bora's son."

Ah, oh man.

You know how people do the reveals?

It's a girl, yeah, it's a boy, yeah.

Not here.

It's a girl, yeah, it's a boy, ah.

Ah.

Now, you can't read these stories like novels.

You have to read them and put yourself in it.

She has a baby and it's a boy.

And she saw that he was beautiful, verse two,

and hid him for three months.

Can you imagine hiding a baby for three months?

You gotta put yourself in there now.

Shh, shh, shh, shh.

That's nurse all the time, keep you quiet.

I don't know what their diaper situation was,

but probably wouldn't, you know.

It's just a disaster.

It's a disaster.

She saw that the baby was beautiful.

The word beautiful there means healthy,

meaning, oh, this is great.

But now I have to, since it's great,

I'm gonna do what I can to protect it, okay?

Many of you have beautiful things.

You're excited about it, it's great.

So now you put your hands on it

to do what you can to protect it.

Simple as that, that's what she's doing.

Beautiful baby boy, I wanna protect him.

I wanna make sure that the enemy does not get his hands

on this thing, this person.

And many of you have callings, destinies, purpose.

You have families, you have children relationships,

you have businesses, you have finances,

you have things that you desperately want the enemy

to keep his hands off of, is that correct?

So what we do initially is we try to use our stamina,

our relationships, our intellect,

we try to use our finances, we try to use our wit,

we try to use our whatever it is

to try to keep the baby safe so that it doesn't come

in contact with the enemy's plan.

Am I right by saying that?

Okay, this is what she was doing.

And it's a disaster because it's very hard

when Pharaoh has an edict out against you

and you're doing what you can to keep the baby safe,

whatever it is for you, it becomes a struggle.

How do you know when Pharaoh was after your baby?

Simple, your blessing starts turning into a burden.

Have you ever had a blessing that starts becoming a burden?

Your battle is not against flesh and blood.

It's against the rulers, the principalities,

the world forces of darkness, the spiritual forces

of wickedness in heavenly places.

The reason why your hands are burning is because Pharaoh's

on the other end of the rope and you're playing tug of war

in the spiritual realm trying to keep the baby safe

through which there's gonna be a kingdom advancement.

So that's why it's hard is because if you can picture

Pharaoh doing this, trying to pull out of your hands

what God has placed in your hands,

that's why your hands are burning.

So I need you to understand that for her,

she got to a place where the blessing was now becoming

a burden and it became hard to hold this precious baby.

Verse three lets you know it says,

but when she could no longer hide him.

I don't know if you've ever gotten to a place

where you told God, I just can't do it anymore.

Some of us have gotten to a place in our marriages

or with our wayward children or with our business

trying to keep it together or our home or our school

or our things that we're trying to put together.

I can't do, I'm tired.

Three months of keeping this baby quiet

and Pharaoh's minions are everywhere.

I'm tired, I can't do it anymore.

So for any person in this room that has ever experienced

being tired or you are tired or if you're not one of those

two, you will be.

'Cause trials in this world are like the mailbox

that you get and your mailbox that says occupant.

Translation, we don't care who lives here.

You just have to be on earth and you gonna get some.

You're about to learn a valuable lesson in surviving Pharaoh.

She couldn't do it anymore.

Time was up.

Three months is a long time.

You know how slow three months goes trying to hide a baby?

It feels like forever and your hands are burning

and cramping up trying to hold on with your own power.

It says that she put the baby in a wicker basket,

covered it with tar and pitch and placed it in the Nile.

What?

You gotta be at your wits end to put the baby

in the Nile yourself.

Now, if you've ever gotten to a place,

ladies and gentlemen of Springhouse Church,

where you begin to lose your mind trying to keep something

safe or keep something healthy or keep something going,

do you know why you're losing your mind?

Because you just stepped into God territory.

And once you step into God territory,

you find out quickly you ain't him.

So then you start to lose your mind to hold it yourself.

When you're losing your mind,

he's just allowing you to experience what's evident.

That is that you have stepped into a territory

that your humanity can't handle.

And when you're handling things in the spiritual realm,

you may have to go get the spiritual realm

to help handle that thing.

Because that is a realm that's too strong for your hands.

And while Pharaoh's hands are stronger than your hands,

God's hands are stronger than Pharaoh's hands.

Matter of fact, God doesn't even have to use both.

The Bible says the mighty right hand of God.

He can just use one on Pharaoh, just.

And so she realizes this is too big for me.

I can't do it anymore.

I can no longer hold on to this situation.

I'm losing my mind, which is evident

that I'm in God territory,

and God will allow you to lose your mind

so that you can come to the realization

of how good at being God you are.

Not that good.

And then what do we do?

We get to a place after, some of us, three years,

some of us a decade, some of us three months,

some of us figure it out quick.

I've got to put this situation in a basket

and put it in the Nile.

This lady said, "God, I'm giving the baby to you.

I can't do it anymore."

I need you to know, Springhouse Church,

this is very, you need to grab this,

that your survival will not be contingent upon

what you're able to hold onto.

Your survival will be contingent upon

what you're able to let go of.

And if you're not willing to let go of it,

then you won't experience God in your life

who is able to do much more than what you can do

keeping that thing in your hands.

A lot of us think we're waiting on God,

and God is saying, "No, I'm waiting on you,

and I got more time than you, trust me."

(audience laughing)

She puts the baby in a wicker basket

and places it in the Nile.

Now, I know some of you scholars are thinking,

"Now, how did you get she gave it to God

by putting it in a basket and putting it in the Nile?"

I'm glad you asked.

(audience laughing)

Wicker basket in the Hebrew is translated ark.

Y'all didn't get that?

(audience laughing)

The ark found in Genesis 6

was used for the salvation of Noah's family.

So he built the ark for purposes of salvation.

So when she put the baby in the wicker basket,

which is translated ark,

she didn't put the baby in there for death,

she put the baby in there for life.

She had the full expectation

that if I give this baby to the ark,

if I place faith in the ark, Jesus Christ,

then my life will be saved.

So this wicker basket actually represents the ark,

which represents Jesus Christ, who's our salvation.

So she was fully expecting salvation

by putting the baby in the ark.

So she put it in the hands of God.

She went to the prayer closet,

she came to the church service,

she had an expectation that if I go to God with my problem

and put it in his hands and let it go out of my hands,

that he can do a much better job in the basket

than I can do in my hands.

And so she's saying here, God's word is saying here,

that you need to get ready, if you haven't gotten ready,

and take that situation and put it in the hands of God.

But not only did she put it in the wicker basket,

it says she covered it with tar and pitch.

Genesis 6, Genesis 6, the Bible says

that the word of the Lord came to Noah and said,

make yourself an ark, make yourself an ark of gopher wood,

you shall cover it with tar and pitch.

So then I had to look up pitch.

Well, what's pitch?

The Hebrew word for pitch is kefer.

The root word of the Hebrew word means atonement.

Oh my goodness.

(audience laughing)

Atonement has to do with reconciliation,

forgiveness of sins.

So she had to repent.

She had to say, it is actually sinful to trust me

than it is to trust you.

I repent, Lord, here's the situation.

Let me reconcile my trust in you and my faith in you.

How do you know if you trust God?

I can tell by what you do.

I can tell by whether you give him the baby or not.

Anybody can say they believe until there's a baby

that has to be given up.

And once there's a baby that has to be given up,

then all of a sudden, there's some reconciliation

that needs to happen.

And so she is in a repented state that,

Lord, I am sorry that I thought more of my hands

than I did of your hands.

So let me reconcile, and how I reconcile

is by giving my life away, giving my situation away,

actually placing it in your hands.

We walk by faith, not by sight.

Faith is acting like it is so, even when it's not so,

so that it might be so, simply because God said so.

(audience laughing)

Faith is actionable.

You can feel faith-ish and not have much faith.

You can feel like you don't have a lot of faith

and have a whole lot of faith,

because faith has to do with your feet and your movement,

not just your feelings.

And here, she's reconciling with God

because she's saying, I'm going to put it in the basket,

I'm gonna cover it with tar and pitch

so that it's sealed from the devastation of denial.

Don't you know that if you're in Christ,

the Bible says in Ephesians 1, 13,

you are sealed by the Spirit.

Don't you know that there is, Romans 8, 1,

there is therefore no condemnation

to those who are in Christ Jesus.

So she's sealing it with the full expectations

that the crocodiles won't be able to get through it.

She's sealing it with the full expectation

that even if I put my baby in the same scenario

where everybody else is drowning,

my baby will have destiny.

The Nile was the place of devastation,

but for her, it was the place of deliverance.

The Nile was the place where everybody else was dying,

but for her, it was the place where she would be surviving.

Because in the hands of God,

you can be in the same scenario

where everybody else is getting destroyed

and be experiencing victory.

Here she is placing the baby, what we need to do.

I'm giving it to the hands of God.

Now notice, she doesn't put the baby in the Nile

without a wicker basket.

There's wicker basket, then Nile.

Can't need you to understand this.

If there's no wicker basket, you gonna be dead.

You have to have the wicker basket,

meaning the expectation of what you're letting go

is that God will save it.

I wanna make sure, Pastor Kevin,

that nobody thinks that I'm saying,

well great, I'm gonna let my marriage go.

The pastor said I can let it go.

I'm just gonna take this marriage like a football

and punt it, boom.

Oh no, that's not expectation of salvation.

That's just selfish.

No, he says wicker basket.

If I'm letting it go, I'm letting it go

for the purpose of salvation,

that God will bring it back.

Now, okay, here we go.

Are y'all still with me?

Here, you're tracking?

Okay, so she does, remember, put yourself in the story.

This is very difficult.

A mother, you're talking about trusting God

with your situation.

She's trusting God with a literal baby.

Whatever your situation is is hard, but it ain't like this.

She's putting a baby with the crocodiles?

That is a level of trust that we can only aspire to,

but that's the level of trust that God deserves.

She puts the baby in the now, now.

Verse four says, "His sister stood at a distance

"to find out what would happen to him."

So this is Moses' sister Miriam.

Moses' sister Miriam is watching this like,

"Oh my goodness, this is terrible."

She's watching her mother's faith.

And at first, it's scary to watch the generation before you

or your parents show faith and just give things to God.

You're thinking to yourself, "You've lost your mind."

But this little girl is watching her mother's faith, okay?

I need you to remember that and lock that

in the back of your mind, okay?

She's watching her mother's faith.

At the moment that Moses' mother puts him in the Nile,

watch what happens.

Verse five, "The daughter of Pharaoh came down

"to bathe in the Nile with her maidens

"walking along the Nile and she saw the basket

"among the reeds and said to her maid

"to bring it over and sent her maid to go get it

"and she brought it to her."

So when Moses' mother puts the baby in the Nile,

by luck and chance,

Pharaoh's daughter decides she stinks

and wants to come take a bath in the Nile.

I need to go take a bath at the moment

Moses' mother puts the baby in the Nile

because God's not doing anything.

It's just all happenstance and luck.

And Pharaoh, as the story goes,

Pharaoh's daughter says, "Hey, go get that basket."

The basket comes over, it's a baby,

and she says, "Oh my goodness, coochie, coochie, coo."

(audience laughing)

This is all luck and chance that Pharaoh loves,

Pharaoh's daughter loves babies.

She knows it's a Hebrew boy,

but she doesn't care 'cause she just felt pity in her heart.

It's just kind of a thing that happened.

But I want you to notice that now Moses is taken out,

but God's sovereignty would only pick up what she put down.

If she doesn't put it down,

then Pharaoh finds that boy a different way.

When she puts it down,

then God's sovereignty comes and picks him up.

God's sovereignty is waiting on you to put it down.

(humming)

Because he has a plan.

He's waiting on you to stop doing his job.

Pharaoh's daughter, shoop, picks the baby up,

and she says, "Coochie, coochie, coo."

And then watch this.

Remember that thing I told you to put

in the back of your head?

What'd I tell you to put in the back of your head?

You don't remember.

(audience murmuring)

Miriam, Miriam was watching.

So at first she's nervous,

but she's also watching everything

that I just told you play out.

Pharaoh's daughter pick it up,

she's watching the maid go get it,

she's watching Pharaoh's daughter say, "Coochie, coochie, coo."

And now she's watching her mother's faith play out.

See, when you give your things to the Lord parents,

your children's get to watch God work in your life.

They get to watch it play out.

And when they're able to watch faith work,

then they know faith works.

But we talk a lot in church,

but nobody's trusting God,

and so they're out there in the culture

just trying to figure it out on social media

like everybody else,

because they've never seen their parents

put it in the Nile.

And here Miriam is watching coochie, coochie, coo.

She's watching Pharaoh's daughter do all these things.

She's watching this play out,

she's like, "Immediately,

the boy is not even in the Nile anymore, he's out."

So now her faith is conjured up

and she wants to be a part of God's plan.

Watch this, verse seven,

"Then his sister," Miriam,

"said to Pharaoh's daughter,

shall I go and call a nurse from you from the Hebrew women

so that she may nurse the child for you?"

Y'all ain't, come on, Springhouse.

(audience laughing)

Miriam's, it's a little girl.

Now you gotta understand, her faith is conjured up

because she's seeing God work.

You can't just go up to Pharaoh's daughter.

That's not how this works.

They can have you killed, you're supposed to be a slave.

If she's going up to Pharaoh's daughter,

that means her faith in God has been conjured up.

She is no longer afraid.

She know this God thing works.

So she's coming against the culture now at a young age.

Young people, you don't have to wait till you're old.

God can use you when you're young.

And so she comes, y'all still with me, y'all getting tired?

Okay, so she comes up to Pharaoh's daughter and says,

"Listen here, I got an idea.

You like the baby, right?"

"Yes, oh coochie, coochie, coo."

I saw you doing that.

I think it's a great idea, since you like the baby,

you don't want them to go hungry.

I can go get a Hebrew woman

to nurse the baby for you.

You know what Pharaoh's daughter's response was?

That's a great idea.

I would love that, that's awesome.

Let's do that, that's a great idea.

Little did Pharaoh's daughter understand

that Miriam was just gonna take the baby back to the mother.

(audience laughing)

She says, in verse eight, Pharaoh's daughter said to her,

"Go ahead," so the girl went and called the child's mother.

Ooh!

You got to be kidding me!

That child said, "I love this, let's go.

Hey, I got an idea, let's do this."

Pharaoh's daughter, not knowing she's being used by God,

is about to give the baby right back to the mother

against the edict of her own father.

(audience laughing)

I need you to understand that a boomerang

only comes back when you let it go.

That God is trying to return to you

the very thing that you have to trust Him to put down.

And He's going to work, the providence of God,

He's gonna work out the details

and bring that thing right back around.

But not only is He gonna bring it around,

you're talking about God.

Okay, Springhouse, this is God we're talking about.

He don't just do the normal.

Okay, y'all don't know the story,

so let me show you how to, okay, let me read this to you.

You're gonna trip out, you're gonna trip out.

Okay, here it goes.

Pharaoh's daughter said, "Go, go get the mother,"

she didn't say go get the mother,

but go ahead, go get the Hebrew woman.

So the girl went and got the child's mother.

Then Pharaoh's daughter said to the child's mother,

"Take this child away and nurse him for me

"and I will give you wages."

(audience laughing)

So the woman took the child and nursed him.

(audience laughing)

She got paid to nurse her own baby.

(audience laughing)

'Cause you need to understand

that God can do exceedingly, abundantly, beyond

all that you can ask or think.

(audience applauding)

Watch this.

According to the power that works in you.

Everybody jumps over pews

with the first part of Ephesians 3.20.

They forget the last part.

He can do exceedingly, abundantly, beyond

all that you can ask or think

according to the power that works in you.

So if you're experiencing a little bit of God,

he's saying, well, I'm experiencing a little bit of you.

(audience gasping)

Because when God's sovereignty picks something up,

she got paid to do what she would have done for free.

(audience laughing)

You got to be kidding me.

And this all came from one point and one concept.

Let it go.

(audience applauding)

(audience cheering)

[APPLAUSE]