Decisions | Choose Life

We're so glad that you are here.

I hope you know that.

All kinds of things you could be doing this morning, but you're here in the presence of the Lord.

And here's what I believe that God has a word for you today.

We say this every week and we really mean it.

It's not just a catchphrase.

We really believe God is doing great things around here.

And we believe that that great thing can happen in your life too.

And so our prayer and our hope this morning is that the word of God would speak to you.

If you're ready, say I'm ready.

We've been talking about making decisions.

Anybody have any big decisions to make in their life?

Anyone ever made a few wrong decisions in your life?

Any of y'all thankful that Jesus can help you make some better ones in the days ahead?

I uh when I was in high school, uh, you know, you know, here's what we hope.

We hope that as we get older we mature, right?

We hope that we grow up.

And how many know sometimes the worst decisions we made were back in high school?

I know, so I'm gonna tell my stories this week and you get to tell yours next, okay?

I'll have the microphone ready for you.

I uh in high school I had a group of friends that invited uh me to go out with them, and they were two couples, and so that would have made me the fifth wheel.

And uh how many of y'all know I was not gonna go?

No thanks, not interested, no interest in hanging out with you people all night.

This is not gonna be any fun for me.

And I protested and I protested and I protested and until finally they convinced me, and so I went and we're hanging out, and what do you know?

I'm fifth wheeling it.

And as I am, I uh one of the girls, her friend, called her, crying and in tears and really emotional in high school because the boyfriend, love of her life, just broke up with her.

She she decided to invite her over, which meant I was no longer the fifth wheel somebody.

And so I remember this night, and I remember sitting on the couch, and everybody else was hanging out.

She realized her friend called her over, but her friend wasn't interested.

So, you know, boys, uh, here's how you get the girl, you listen.

All night I sat there and listened to her tell her story about her breakup.

I'm so sorry that happened to you.

Oh, I would never do anything like that to you.

And that's the story of the night I started dating the most popular cheerleader in high school, somebody.

And 48 hours later, when she called it off, my heart was broke and I was crushed because I I realized that I I wasn't going to spend the rest of my life with her.

And in that moment, I learned a very hard high school lesson.

And that lesson was this.

I didn't get her by my good looks, I didn't get her by my popularity, I didn't get her because she even really liked me.

I just got her because I happened to be in the right place at the right time.

Have you ever been in the right place at the right time?

I made this decision about at that moment in my life where I decided, you know what?

I don't want things to just happen to me by luck or by chance.

You know, it was great for 48 hours, but how many of you know that's no way to live a life?

That I'm just gonna hope or wish or if I think it hard enough that maybe if I'm in the right place at the right time, then my life will get better, things will look different.

You see, I had to learn that lesson the hard way, but here's what I realized.

I don't want to happen to be in the right place at the right time, I wanna put myself in the right places at the right time.

And when I'm talking this morning about making decisions in our life, here's what we know and here's what we believe.

That your life isn't a matter of chance, that the best life ahead for you is not just because you happen to be in the right place at the right time, but that as you grow in your walk with the Lord, as you study his word, as you engage in your relationship, here's what you're doing.

You're making the decision today, I'm putting myself in the best place I could possibly be.

Today I'm making decisions not just based off what might happen to me.

I'm making decisions today based off what God says can happen to me.

And so, my heart behind this series in tonight or this morning is this.

It's been a long morning, y'all.

You worship like that three times in one morning, you're you're ready, it's nighttime already.

Our heart and our burden for you is this that you would begin to make decisions in your life that are led by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Because I've discovered that I'm not always the smartest person in the room.

In fact, rarely am I.

I've discovered in my life that I don't always have all the answers and I don't always know which way to go, but I know the one who does.

And so our prayer in this is that you would catch this, that the choices you are making today, you already know, determine the life that you're living tomorrow.

So the hope in the prayer is this that while we may not get it perfect, our hope is that we would make some progress in making better decisions.

Deuteronomy chapter 30, verse 19, he's he's laying out an appeal to them.

Deuteronomy 30:19

He's saying, you know, when you can go this way or that way, here's what I hope you do.

When you go to the right or to the left or to good places or bad places, here's what I'm hoping.

Deuteronomy chapter 30, verse 19, he says, I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse.

Deuteronomy 30:19

How many of y'all know which one you want?

He says, Therefore choose.

Choose life that you and your offspring may live.

Here's what I've come to realize with the Lord that one of the greatest blessings and one of the most gracious things the Lord has done is given us the ability every day to wake up and choose Him in the decisions that we make.

And the life that we live tomorrow is started today when we make the decision to be led by the power of the Holy Spirit.

I I want to give today's message out of the book of Acts.

And if you've ever read the book of Acts and you're a historical type person, you're gonna like the book of Acts because here's what it is: it's the history of God's people in the New Testament.

What God begins to do in the early church, and he begins to recount the move of God that was happening among them.

And what I love about reading about the move of God is I think, God, if you did that then for them, let's see it now.

As I read and I learn, there's something to be learned in their story.

The early church, how many you know, they had a lot of decisions to make.

They're new to this way of Jesus.

Everybody is at the starting ground.

That's what I love about gathering in a new church.

I I love the energy in the environment in the room because we're all in the same boat.

Nobody's got it all figured out, nobody's been at it too long to not need the help of Jesus anymore.

And the early church knew it.

They knew they were depending upon Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit.

And so they started asking questions, maybe similar to the ones that you asked.

God, which way am I supposed to go?

You ever asked that one?

Do I go this way or do I go that way?

To the right or the left?

Do I buy this house or do that house?

Do I take this job?

Do what do I say here?

What do I do here?

And the early church was in the same boat.

They didn't know where to go.

This was all new to them, and so they had a heart that would begin to ask the Lord, Lord, where should we go to spread the gospel news of Jesus Christ in the early church?

Then they started asking the Lord, who should we go with?

In some of these conversations in early Acts, they're gonna you're gonna find that they would gather together and pray over one another and be asking, and in Acts chapter 13, it says this, that they came together and they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, and the Holy Spirit said, Set apart for me, Barnabas and Saul, that's the who is gonna go together for the work to which I have called them.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off.

So being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went and did the things God asked them to do.

They were asking God, who should go with us?

Did you know sometimes in your life where you should stop and ask the question, God, who should I run this race with?

Who should I marry?

Where should we how many of y'all know vacation is great unless you go with the wrong who?

Right?

You know in your life that there are these big questions that you're asking the Lord.

And the early church did it too.

What about this one?

They began to ask the Lord, what should we do about the things we used to do?

What about the things we used to do?

How many know if it's something you used to do, it can be really ingrained in you?

Some of us a little hard-headed than others.

There are times in our life where we get to this place and say, Lord, I used to do it this way, but then I met you, and now I'm not really sure that what I used to do I should keep doing.

And they begin to ask the Lord, why?

Because they have religious traditions before Jesus stepped on the scene.

There were things they were doing, religious practices that they were engaging in, and they're saying, Okay, Lord, now what?

Now what do we do?

Should we be doing the things we used to do?

And everybody who made a poor decision in high school says, nope.

Everybody who has a past or a history thinking, I don't, I don't, listen, here's what I'm so thankful for.

The grace of God that the way I used to do it isn't the way I have to do it today.

Just because I was that person doesn't mean I have to be that person.

Can you see what God can do in my life?

So they begin asking, should we do the things we've always done?

What about this?

Can we do the things we've always done?

Have you ever stopped and asked the Lord, can I be doing what I'm doing today?

Lord, would you permit me or allow me to engage in the lifestyle that I'm living, in the choices that I'm making, in the way that I handle my finances, in the way that I treat my kids or my spouse, or what about this one in the 90s?

They didn't come up with it in the 90s, they had in the early church.

What would Jesus do?

Not just a little merch wrist brand they sell at all the Christian concerts across America.

The early church is saying, Lord, we want to do it the way that Jesus would have us do it.

And they're asking all of these big questions.

Why?

Because they had rapid growth among them.

As an early young church, we can relate to this.

When the growth takes off, here's what you're doing.

You're saying, Lord, we don't know what to do.

We didn't do this.

We're just looking to you.

This isn't ours, it's yours.

What do you want us to do?

And the same decisions and the same choices that they were having to make then are the same questions we're still asking thousands of years later.

And that's why I love what it says in Acts chapter 13 that we just read.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

It says that while they were worshiping and while they were fasting, the Holy Spirit said, You have a decision to make in your life.

Can I tell you the best thing you can do is not scroll Zillow for another three hours thinking maybe you'll just find that miracle from heaven.

Hey, I'm speaking to myself.

Why?

Because you know, you know what sometimes does more work in the supernatural than what you can do in the natural is your worship.

And so maybe the best thing you do is not scroll and look for more answers.

Maybe the best 30 minutes you could spend all week is worshiping on your floor.

It didn't get the task list done.

Oh yes, it did.

Just not in the eyes that you can see, in the eyes that he sees in places you can't see.

It's coming to a place where we realize that in our worshiping and fasting, sometimes people come in here and they'll say on their way out, they'll say, Pastor, I'm so sorry, I didn't really get anything out of your message today.

I said, No worries at all.

And they say, I got what I needed in worship.

The Lord spoke to me before you ever even started speaking.

That is exactly what God can do.

Did you know that in your worship it is designed, not that I give you answers, but that the Holy Spirit downloads answers into your life.

And that comes when you worship and you fast.

And then here's what he says: He says, The Holy Spirit said, period.

I cut off the rest of the verse.

Why?

Because that's all we need to know.

Worshiping and fasting, the Holy Spirit spoke to them.

How do you make decisions in your life?

How do you make better decisions?

Let's start there.

How do you make better decisions in your life?

It starts with what the Holy Spirit has said.

And they got this and they understood this in the early church.

And so they began to walk in the power of the Holy Spirit speaking to them.

But how many of you know just because they were the early church doesn't mean they got it all right?

Listen, some of y'all come to this church and listen, I just want to tell you up front, we're not perfect people.

I just want to tell you up front we're not gonna make all the right decisions.

I want to tell you up front, I'm gonna make decisions you don't like.

Sometimes I'm gonna make the wrong decision.

Can I just be truthful with you?

But listen, it's not about getting it perfect.

The question is, are we looking to the Holy Spirit to lead us?

That when we go in the wrong direction, we have a humility in our heart to say, you know what, we probably shouldn't have gone here.

We need to course correct.

The Holy Spirit said to them, how did the early church take off?

Because listen, here's what the early church did.

The early church lit a flame.

A move of God happened in that place.

That the people, and this is the message, the message is this that the Gentiles, not just the Jews, that God is for all of mankind, that he loves everyone, and that the power of Jesus Christ dying on the cross and being risen from the dead was not just for the people who were the church people.

It was the message for everyone.

And this message took off in a day and age where, listen, I know we live in a day and age where we think our culture is strong, and it is, but it's no different than the Roman culture they were living in.

The pressure was against them.

People were out against them.

How many of you know when somebody is an infant or a baby, they're more susceptible to outside influences and factors, a dream for a new business or a new startup.

How many of you know in its dream stage is more vulnerable to the pressures that would be applied on it?

And yet the early church prevailed.

And yet the early church grew and it took off.

Why?

Because they were so acquainted with the power of the Holy Spirit, that wherever the Holy Spirit went, they went.

And therein lies our answer for today.

How do we make better decisions?

I love how Galatians chapter 5 says it.

Galatians 5 · chapter mention

If we live by the Spirit, then let us keep in step with the Spirit.

He's saying, let's just keep in step.

He doesn't say, be perfect, don't ever make a mistake.

He says, wherever the Holy Spirit is moving, you start moving.

It's a little bit like dancing.

In college, I went to a Baptist college, and every Thursday night, don't judge me, people, but we went dancing at Billy Bob's, Texas, somebody.

Drinking water with all our Baptist friends and country dancing around the place.

Don't judge me.

And uh I'll never forget because I was not a dancer.

I was not from Texas.

I thought everybody in Texas rode horses and uh to school.

And uh that wasn't true, but I did get my first pair of cowboy boots.

I was official Texan then.

And I'll never forget because I had no idea what I was doing.

I just knew the one I wanted to dance with.

We began to dance around the floor, and I watched this guy out in the middle of the floor, and he took this girl and he dipped her by her neck and popped her right up and did this magic twirl, and I looked at her, I said, Come here, baby.

We danced around the floor all the way around, and we got to the middle of the floor, and I took you to take your hands like this, I watched them like this, and then you followed around, up her neck, hold the back of her neck, plop, right on the floor.

She hit the floor so loud, people started looking.

How many of you know I still got the ring, okay?

Like we've we figured it out, but how many of you know I didn't get it right the first time?

I didn't get it perfect.

I didn't leave her on the floor, okay?

What did we do?

We got up and we practiced some more.

And here's what I want to encourage you with.

This is just a side note, okay?

My question this morning is have you stopped dancing with the power of the Holy Spirit?

Because, see, what can happen sometimes is those bird boots really hurt when you step on their toes.

Sometimes you made a few decisions and it steps on the toes of the people around you, and sometimes what you find is it's not pleasant.

Sometimes when you make decisions, sometimes I wonder if we drop Jesus on the floor and say, Well, that didn't work.

I'm gonna go try something else.

Let me find a new dance partner.

And my encouragement to you this morning would be this it's a practice, it's a rhythm, it's a relationship.

Anybody ever been in a fight with your spouse?

Show of double hands.

Okay.

Wow, we have a bunch of liars at church.

One fight doesn't mean it's over.

What do you do?

You learn the art of the dance.

That you come back to it and you engage.

So here's my conviction this morning that if as a church we make this commitment right here, then we will be no different than the early church.

It doesn't matter what day and age you're living in, the same power of the same Holy Spirit that lived in them is the same power of the same Holy Spirit that lives in us.

That if we learn to walk and live and lead by the power of the Holy Spirit, I want to promise you this: your decisions in life will get better.

And it has nothing to do with going to school, has nothing to do with your smarts, has nothing to do with being the best leader in the room.

It has everything to do with learning to live by the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

So I'm gonna give you three things this morning.

Number one, you will make better decisions when what seems good to God seems good to you.

How do you start making better decisions?

You will make better decisions when what seems good to God starts to seem good to you.

When I came out of college, I was offered my first job as a youth pastor.

I was so excited.

I knew I was getting ready to pop the question, but I couldn't pop the question to get engaged if I didn't have a job.

And listen, this job was in Highland Park, Texas.

I'm gonna be carnal and fleshly for a moment.

Go with me.

Highland Park, Texas is the third richest community in the state of Texas.

So here's what I figured.

They're probably the most best paid, wellest, bestest paid youth pastor in the country.

Instead of$35,000, there's probably$37,000.

You know what I'm saying?

Like I was ready.

And I got offered a job and and I was excited, and then I got accepted a couple weeks later to a seminary that I had applied for, and I was gonna go back to school because I wasn't smart enough after the first time, and so I was ready to go, and then I got a letter that said, You have a full ride scholarship to this school.

How many know on paper things look real good?

And all of a sudden, one night I just felt like the tap of the Holy Spirit saying, What do you think you're doing?

I said, Well, I know what I'm doing.

I'm telling her daddy that I'm gonna get my master's degree and I got a job.

He said, Ah.

Kept tapping me.

Have you ever had those moments in your life where something looked good, but you just knew you weren't supposed to do it?

Because there were some things at that seminary that I couldn't agree with.

You had to sign a document that said you would never teach something that was one of the most important things to me in my life with Jesus, and that is this message right here about the power of the Holy Spirit.

And they handed that paper across the table and said, You gotta sign this, and I remember looking at that thinking, I could I could sign it and then teach it anyway.

It's not gonna work.

I remember the church was a great church, but I remember we had some sharp disagreements about what the Bible says, and I remember thinking, Lord, all this looks good on paper, why isn't this working out?

Because what I realized is that what I thought sounded good to me didn't sound good to God.

And in our life, here's what happens as we make decisions.

We have to make the decision to allow what seems good to God to now become good to us.

And if what seems good to us doesn't match what seems good to him, then somebody has to change.

And may I remind you this morning, there are some words that have never changed.

We're not looking to God like He's a genie in a bottle.

God, will you change this so that I can?

And how many times I'm so thankful for all the times I prayed a prayer that God did not answer, and I say thank you.

Because if I had gotten to that place, it may have been a good place, but it wasn't a God place, and my life would look a lot different.

So there's this hard part about following Jesus.

We get excited, we get pumped up at church, we sing loud, we're we're hyped, and we're ready to go, but then Monday morning rolls around, and the Holy Spirit taps us on the shoulder and says, Is this seem good to you or does it seem good to me?

And if the two aren't together, then let's put them together.

And it's this work of having to rethink the things in our life that we used to always think.

And Acts chapter 15 is where I'm gonna read this, and I want to explain this to you out of the early church again.

Acts 15 · chapter mention

Because Paul, how many know things were going good, but anytime things go good, there's still people involved.

And anybody who lives with another person says, Amen.

And the early church is growing, but now they got people on the outside teaching something different than the way that Jesus had told them to teach it.

So they got a council of people, kind of like your uh HOA, you know?

How are we gonna handle this problem?

Whose fault is it?

What are we gonna do?

And all the people gathered together.

It was the apostles and the elders of the church, and they came together and they said, Listen, there's a growing conflict even in a great thing.

The mistake we can sometimes make is think just because God is in it and just because it's great, that there are not going to be challenges along the way.

And the early church is taken off in a powerful way.

And yet they had conflicts and issues that they had to address in the early church, just like you do in your house.

And they came together, they convened a council, and here's the commitment of the council.

The council came together and they said, we need to come to an agreement on this key issue, because if we do not, there will be a chaos in a place where there's supposed to be peace.

There will be death in a place where it's supposed to be life.

There will be teaching that is contrary to what Jesus taught us.

And so they came together and they drew the boundary lines around the early church.

And here's what it is in Acts chapter 15.

Acts 15 · chapter mention

For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements.

That you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols.

I'll explain this in a minute.

And from blood and from what has been strangled and from sexual immorality.

If you keep yourselves from these things, you will deal well.

Farewell.

See you later.

I'm out.

Mic drop, truth bomb.

Here's what they're saying.

You see, Jesus coming was a revelation of a mystery that had long been hidden.

At least they couldn't see it.

But now, in light of Jesus and the work that Jesus did on the cross, they can now see things they couldn't see before, which means they could no longer live the way they had lived before, which means they had to address an issue that was rising in the church, and the issue was circumcision.

Now I'm not gonna teach on circumcision today, you figure it out for yourself.

But here's what I want to tell you.

The early church had some Jewish practices that were intersecting with what they're teaching, and now the Gentiles are being invited in, and the Gentiles had not been circumcised.

And so people are coming along and saying, Well, if you're gonna be one of us, you've got to be like us, and if you're gonna be like us, you better get circumcised.

And so here's what's happening in the early church.

You think this doesn't sound like a very big dispute, this sounds crazy.

This is a very big deal.

Why?

Because it was a sign of their identity, it was a sign that they were the people of God.

And so you got Jews and Gentiles sitting on either side saying, we all love Jesus, but we got this problem in here.

And so they got together and they made this apostolic decree that we now live by.

We're living in the fruit of the decisions they made back then.

And here's how they made this decision.

They said, hey, listen, there's some things you can't do.

There's some ritual things that have a problem.

Sexual immorality obviously should not be allowed to be permitted in the life of the people of God.

And so here's what they said.

It seems good to God, and it seems good to us.

Did you know there are people at that council who would say that it didn't always seem good to them that some people don't have to be circumcised?

What happened?

What transpired?

The message of Jesus changed the way they thought about everything else in their life.

I'm gonna have to rethink this.

I'm gonna have to do this God's way and not my way.

I'm gonna have to allow what he taught.

Well, what is it that he taught?

Jesus taught that it's not by circumcision, it's not the works of the flesh that are gonna get you to heaven, it's by grace through faith alone in Jesus Christ that we all get to spend eternity in heaven.

And so instead of us worrying about the denomination and what style and are we gonna do this way or this way, they gathered together and they said, Hey, listen, listen here, listen here.

Here's the most important thing we can do.

We can preach the message of Jesus Christ and Christ crucified, risen, dead, buried, risen again, and the Holy Spirit comes.

That's a pat that's a message we want to be about.

And they made that decision.

Here's what happened: it seemed good to uh the Holy Spirit and it seemed good to us.

My question for you and the decisions you're making in your life today, do they seem good to you or do they seem good to God?

Have you ever made a decision in your household when only no show of hands, okay?

I want you to enjoy your uh chips at Papecitos today, okay?

Listen, have you ever made a decision where one party in the house was really behind it and the other wasn't?

And you had to keep going forward anyway?

How many of you know it the when the leadership in your home says, hey, this is the direction the Lord is leading us, and you go, even if it doesn't feel good to you, but you still go, you're obeying the voice of the Lord that He commanded in Scripture, and here's what happens.

In the end, there's an alignment that you receive the blessing of being obedient in that.

But how many of you know it makes it a lot better when both parties are unified?

All the difference in the world.

And this is what the Lord is inviting us to do.

When you make your decisions, will you do it from a place that aligns?

This seems good to me.

The words in here seem good to me.

They didn't used to.

In fact, maybe the first time you read some scriptures, you thought, I'm never gonna do that.

I don't know.

No thanks.

I'm not interested in that part.

But what happens is that over time you say, you know what, what I used to think didn't look very good, it now looks pretty good to me.

Why?

Because your appetite has changed, your hunger has changed.

What makes your world go round has changed.

And so it gets to this place in your life where you're asking yourself this question do I know the values and the principles and the words of this book?

Because when I do, guess what's gonna happen?

Your decision making gets a lot easier.

It becomes, some things become way more black and white.

No, we can't do that as a family, and the reason we can't do that as a family is because God's word says we can't do that.

Listen, I'm gonna give an example, it's just an easy example this morning.

I'm not emphasizing just this subject, but sometimes people will come to me as a pastor and say, Will you pray for me?

And I love that, and I'm I'm ready and I'm I'm excited, and and but here's what I want you to know.

Sometimes people will come and they will say, Will you pray for me and my partner?

We aren't married, but we live together, and and we just want God to bless our relationship.

And here's what I want you to know: God can bless every person in the room.

But here's what he can't do: he can't bless something that he already told us he can't bless.

This isn't harsh, this isn't critical.

Listen, hold with me for one moment.

His words in here say the blessing and favor of God come when one man and one woman get together in marriage that is blessed by him.

And so oftentimes, what I'll do in that moment, here's what I'll say.

I would love to pray for you.

I can't pray, I'm not gonna spend my time praying for things that don't seem good to God.

Does that make sense?

I I know that's strong, but I want to use that as an example today because my question is are you praying for things that God has already said, that God has already said don't seem good to him?

Because then in that equation and in that relationship, here's what has to happen.

Somebody in the relationship has to make a change, and it can't be God.

Why?

Because God is who he says that he is, he does the things he says that he would do, and he he was without change forever and always.

And for that we're thankful.

And so here's here's what I tell them.

I say, I want to pray for you, and guess what?

If you want to get married right now, I am a pastor, and y'all just come right on down front after service and we'll do it.

I'm not joking.

We have done it.

People will come up after service.

Well, I'll marry you right here.

Why?

Because I believe that God will bless anything that is in right alignment with Him.

I'm gonna make what seems good to Him seem good to me.

Number two, how do you make better decisions?

You will start making better decisions when you let God open the door.

I didn't hear any amens.

I just heard a baby.

That's it.

The baby already knows the truth.

You'll make better decisions when you let God open the door.

I uh God usually opens the door to Buckeys.

You know what I'm saying?

Like billboard, 37 miles, you can hold it, let's do it.

But one day I was driving down the road and I had to go to the restroom and there was no buckys.

There's gonna be buckies in heaven, just so you know.

Um, and uh, as I was driving down the road, I had to stop, and the only place was the place that may as well have a billboard that says, do not stop here, no matter what.

You know what I'm saying?

You already know before you walk in.

You're like, Lord Jesus, you know, like don't touch anything.

And we had a little kid at the time, a one-year-old, and she was all buckled in the car seat, so we made the decision.

I'm not I'm not unbuckling her.

My wife stayed in the car with her.

I ran in in a hurry, and when I go to get out, put my hand on the door and it won't open.

And for the next 15 minutes, I am stuck in the nastiest place in the world.

And I am calling as a grown man for help.

Somebody help me in here.

Nobody came.

So I picked up the phone and I called my wife and I said, You're gonna have to come in here, get the baby out.

I'm in trouble, I need your help.

And she was no help, y'all.

She came out there, I could hear her laughing the whole time.

She's in the hallway just laughing.

I said, Go get the attendant.

And for the next, I'm not embellishing, okay?

Listen, for the next five minutes, I am like pounding on the door.

I am kicking at the door.

He's taking a screwdriver on the other side, he's doing whatever he can to break the door to get it open.

Listen, I'm being humorous, but my question for you spiritually this morning is this Has God closed a door that you are kicking at to get open?

But God, it's it smells in here.

But God, this isn't the environment I want to be in.

God, this is not what I had planned for my day.

And what can happen is, like a normal human, we kick at the very door the Lord has closed.

And when we are making decisions, but we find that we're making those decisions while kicking on the door, I can promise you this, it's not gonna be a very good outcome.

And the challenge for us often is this.

Often we will never know the reason why the door was closed to begin with.

God, why'd you close the door?

God, why isn't this working?

I've been praying and it's not working.

God, why do I have to go this way when I wanted to go that way?

And oftentimes we will never know the why behind the closed door.

But how many of you know I don't really care if my kids don't know the why behind my no sometimes?

Dad, why can't we do that?

You don't need to know, you just can't do it.

Listen, parents, you've used this line.

Because I'm the dad, and I said so.

Why am I closing the door?

Because they have no idea what's on the other side.

Why am I closing the door?

Because it's for their protection and for their good.

But when I'm standing in the bathroom, I sure ain't seeing anything good in here.

Sometimes we get in these places and we say, God, I can't see the way out.

But listen, don't open a door that God has closed.

Listen to Acts chapter 16.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

Even the early church went through this.

The Holy Spirit would close a door from time to time, and they had to learn how to dance and keep in step with the Holy Spirit.

And they went through the region of ferrigia places, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.

And when they had come up to Mizia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the spirit of Jesus, listen to this line, did not allow.

Another translation says, did not permit them.

So passing by Mizia, they went to Troaz, and Troas wasn't even the place, but in Troaz he got a vision, appeared to Paul in the night.

A man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying to him, Come over to Macedonia and help us.

And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought up to go to Macedonia, concluding that God had called us.

God had opened a door for us to preach the gospel to them.

Here's the picture I want to paint.

Paul is going from this city to this city.

And that God closes the door.

Listen, I want to tell you what Paul is doing.

It's not like he's doing bad stuff.

It's not like he's being evil.

It's not like he's making bad decisions.

Do you know what Paul was after?

Paul was after preaching the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

And even in his attempt to do good, God still closed doors.

You can't go there.

You can't go there.

Listen, this is no like Houston, Texas.

Okay?

This was not like go get back in your car and sit behind the nice AC blasting.

It's like heaven in there on a Houston summer morning.

Listen, this is like Paul gets back on his feet and walks another hundred miles.

And this isn't the place, and he walks to the west a hundred miles.

And this isn't the place, because how many of you know when there are doors closed sometimes, there's a lot, a lack of clarity.

I'm headed in the right direction, I think, but I'm just not sure.

And then he goes to the north.

And then he goes to this, and he gets to Troaz, and in Troaz he has a vision from the Lord.

The Lord opens the door to the place that he's supposed to go.

The decisions you make in your life, you don't want to be the one to open the door.

You want the Lord to open the door.

Because I can tell you it makes all the difference in the world.

You want the Lord to open that door for you.

So you have to make this decision because every time Paul got a no or a closed door, he could have made the decision, well, fine, I'm just gonna stay right here.

Every time he got a no or a closed door, he could have said, okay, then I'll go back to where I came from.

Every time he got a no or a closed door, he could have said, You know, Lord, I could be out making some money.

I'm just gonna go do that.

But do you know what he did?

He made the decision to not quit.

That every closed door he came, had he have quit, we would not be reading the words that we're reading today from him.

He made the decision not to quit, but to stay with the call of God on his life.

So when he didn't get to the right place, you know what he did?

Lord, here's what I do know.

There's a lot I don't know, but the thing I do know is you are with me and you've called me to preach.

So I'm gonna keep moving until you get me in the right spot.

For some of you in the room today, you're walking and you have the temptation to quit because you had a closed door.

And the Lord says, I just want you to keep walking in the right direction, and I'm gonna get you to the place that I want you to be.

When God opens a door, it makes all the difference in the world.

The last one I want to give you this morning is this we'll make better decisions when we have a God-sized vision in our life.

We will make better decisions all the way around when we have a God-sized vision in our life.

Listen, I don't know what happened to me when God knit me together in my mother's womb, but he missed the cord that says, like coffee.

I don't know why, I try.

It's bitter, I don't like it.

I know it's an unpopular opinion, but I'm just stating the facts.

But when I make coffee for my wife, I know the simple basics.

And that is that if you take a filter and put the grounds in it and you pour the water over it, because there is a filter, what comes out is pure disgusting coffee.

Thank you.

Do you have a filter through which you make the decisions of your life?

A filter that causes what to come out of you is good.

That what comes out of you is godly, that what comes out of you is nothing short of the power of the Holy Spirit leading you.

We need a filter for our life.

And do you want to know what that filter was for Paul?

The filter was he knew God's vision for his life, he knew what he was called to do.

That every door could be closed on me, but I know my mission in this world is to preach the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

He knew that.

And so, what did he do?

Every decision he made about where he went and what he did and what he bought or what he gave away or how he prayed or what he said to someone, all came through the filter of the power of the Holy Spirit and God's word for his life.

He had a God-sized vision.

So when he had a vision in the night, here's what it was: it was a man from Macedonia saying, Come over here and help us.

We need the help of God.

And Paul says, I can see you over there.

I've never met you.

I don't know anything about you.

I don't know what it's gonna be like when I get there.

But Paul says, But I'm going there.

Why?

Because he had a vision.

Do you have a vision for your life that's bigger than you?

There's an old country song.

I'm not really gonna sing it for you, but I'm gonna try.

I'm gonna ask you to finish it for me.

Uh is uh I wanna talk about me, wanna talk about I want to talk about no.

You guys are so mean to me.

It's by Toby Keith, right?

By country people, where you at?

It's Toby Keith.

Yeah, I want to talk about me.

Listen, sometimes the problem with our decisions is that the filter of our life is me.

And when the filter of my life is me, then it means every decision I'm making, I'm making for the benefit of me.

I'm gonna buy that house because that's what I want.

Definitely gonna buy that truck because I live in Texas.

Bless God.

I want this much in my bank account.

What the filter of our life.

When the filter of our life is about us, we will never get the results that we deeply and strongly know that God has wired us for.

So, what's God's vision for your life?

And listen, some of you in the room right now are thinking, I don't have one.

Because you're thinking maybe God can use them, but not me.

Listen, that's the biggest lie, and you will not walk out of here with that lie in your mind today.

You are called.

You may think, well, I know that I'm called to be a part of what God is doing, but I don't feel like I'm qualified.

Listen, God is not asking you for a resume, He's asking you to release the power of the Holy Spirit in your life.

You're qualified to do what He's called you to do.

And here's what happens: when you have a God-sized vision for your life, all of a sudden the decisions become more and more clear.

Why?

Because you're not aiming to please yourself, you're aiming to please the name that is above every other name.

I listen, this is a story.

I want to tell you a testimony in my own life.

I I remember God calling me, and I remember when we were in seminary, we were working in the inner city of Dallas with at-risk kids and teenagers.

And every summer we'd put on a camp in a room like this, we'd have 400 kids in this size room for eight hours of a day.

That's where I lost all my hair.

They would come, why?

Because we offered free lunch, free food.

We'd give them backpacks and tennis shoes, and we'd bless them as much as we could.

Why?

Is it because we care about backpacks and food?

No, it's because we care about the Jesus who loves them and we want them to know it.

And I remember I came up on the first day and I said to my boss, I said, Hey, hey, how much does this thing cost anyway?

And she she told me, and I said, Well, how much have we raised for this?

And she said, Zero dollars.

It was the first day, 400 kids are lined up outside the door.

We were telling kids they can't come because they wouldn't fit in the room.

And I said something in my heart struck me.

That's not right, that's not okay.

And I remember the Lord had been speaking to us.

We had a set aside money, we were in seminary, we didn't have any money, but we had one uh account that was not allowed to be touched.

We didn't allow ourselves to touch it.

Baby, we're eating Jack in the Bax tacos tonight because listen, 99 cents is all we got.

But we had this money that was a down payment for a future house, and we had it set aside, and all of a sudden I felt the tap of the Holy Spirit again.

I want you to give that money.

It was exactly the amount of money that it cost to run the camp, by the way, for a summer.

And I remember the Holy Spirit tapping on the shoulder and saying, I want you to give that money for this camp.

Why?

Because God has plans that we don't have.

And listen, it may seem good to him, but how many of y'all know it didn't start good to me?

And I said to the Lord, What about my house?

And here's what I felt like the Lord prompted me.

If you take care of my house, you serve my house all the days of your life, I will take care of your house.

We gave the money, and shortly thereafter, we had the opportunity to live rent-free for 18 months.

We didn't pay one dime for 18 months.

And here's what I know that when God has a vision, he always makes the provision.

That when you live with the filter that says this is about advancing what God wants to do and not what I want to do, he'll make it happen.

But how many know that wasn't it?

Because we went to go close on our house a couple years later and we're sitting down, and the person who did our mortgage said, Hang on, hang on, don't sign the papers just a second.

I just learned about something else.

I said, Okay, what is it?

He said, Have you ever owned a home in Texas?

I said, No, but I got here as fast as I could.

And he said, Then you get a grant for the down payment monies on your house.

Listen, you can't make that stuff up.

That wasn't about being in the right place at the right time by chance and by happenstance.

You cannot convince me otherwise.

That is nothing only but the power of God that when you follow the voice of the Holy Spirit, He'll take you to places and do things on places you could have never gone on your own and doing things you could have never done.

And listen, that's not just for me, that's for you too.

Would you bow your head and close your eyes?

I want to speak some life and to you this morning as we pray out.

Holy Spirit, we ask that you would help us.