The Anthem of the Worshipper & Warrior - Worshipper Warrior

It's time now for the rope with Pastor Teacher Steve Hope.

What is me?

I'm frail, I'm weak, and I'm sad.

Why then, Lord?

Why would you take notice of me?

I let you down all the time.

I look at bad stuff all the time.

I think bad thoughts about people.

I'm jealous all the time.

I struggle with strife all the time.

Why would you, Lord?

Take notice of me.

Because men and women.

His loving kindness is better than life.

You're beloved.

Welcome to another edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

Steve is the head pastor of The Road in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

It's our vision to make wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ and to see you grow in the grace and knowledge of his love.

If you're in the area, we meet at Chapel Hills Church, located at 2025 Harleman Drive, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 80920.

You can go to our website at theroad.org for service times.

That's thheroad.org.

Here now with today's message is Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.

I want to talk about tonight this idea of being a worshiper and a warrior.

And the concept of worshiper and warrior came to me many years ago through a study of the life of David.

And in the life of David, I see a young man who is spoken of more in the Bible.

Listen, there's more about David's personal life than any other person in the Bible, even more than Jesus.

And so here's what's fascinating about David is he's he's not fully human and fully God.

He's fully human.

And he's really human and really screwed up in some areas.

David may be the first bipolar guy in the Bible.

David is really got problems.

But what's cool about David is he always worked through them with the forgiveness, the grace, and a passionate, fiery heart for God.

And so when we talk about being whole-hearted disciples, which is our vision at the road, David is a prime example of that to me.

Because I don't know anybody in this room that hasn't made some pretty major mistakes.

Well, you guys know the story of David.

If you don't, I started a young men's discipleship group this morning, and I told them as part of their assignment was to read one chapter a day through 1 Samuel and then 2 Samuel.

And we're going to talk about it each time we come together.

We're actually studying something different, but as their own PB and J, their prayer, Bible, and journal time, I want them to do one chapter a day in writing the journal, what they're getting, starting in 1 Samuel, because you're going to cover so much of the life of David by doing that.

And David gives me hope.

I don't know about you, but David gives me hope.

I mean, the guy was an adulterer, the guy was a liar, the guy was a murderer, the guy was a manipulator, but he's called, like no one else in the Bible, a man after God's own heart.

Now, does that seem like a little bit of a conundrum?

A man after God's own heart who did that.

That says to me that God, in God's economy and the way he looks at us, he's not as interested in all your mistakes and all your sins as he is in the direction of your heart.

So in Psalm 144, I think this psalm is so powerful because it captures this, the essence of the heart of David.

And so you guys know that have been part of the road for a while.

We started a ministry, a men's ministry called Worshiper and Warrior.

And Worshiper and Warrior is an auxiliary ministry for men that were developing through the road, and we had our first retreat in the fall called Whole Heart Advance.

But Psalm 144 is our anthem.

That's the anthem of worshiper and warrior.

And so I thought, you know what, tonight, we're not in Revelation yet.

I've not given a message on Psalm 144 before.

And so I just dove in, started studying it, and once again, the beauty of it came alive in my heart.

I pray it'll come alive also in your heart.

Psalm 144, I would entitle The Anthem of the Worshiper and Warrior.

Now, I'll just give you an addendum.

This psalm, in my opinion, is a psalm mainly for men.

But there's principles here that transcend gender, of course, because the gospel transcends gender.

And when I say a warrior, I don't mean that just for men.

For example, in the bulletin that some of you got who came to the memorial service this afternoon, my tribute to Ruth Perkins was a tribute to a warrior princess.

We need warrior princesses.

We need women who fight and battle for their men, who battle for the cause of Christ.

So don't in any way see this as some kind of a pecking order.

This is more the way I see the role of men who are called by God to be in the vanguard of the gospel, as David did when he wrote this from his heart, but this is also speaking to women also.

Now, here's what's interesting.

Psalm 18, when you read Psalm 18, it sounds a lot like Psalm 144.

It's direct quotes come out of that.

But Psalm 18 is at the end, I believe, I believe it's at the end of David's life.

So when David is speaking of the end of his life, and he's and he's giving a tribute, as it were, to the Lord's gracious mercy over his life as he comes to the end of his life, he quotes Psalm 18.

So here's what I want to say as an addendum to the whole thing.

Psalm 18 is at the end of David's life.

Psalm 144 are the phraseology that he would later use.

He's learning it now.

So in Psalm 144, he's in it.

How many of you know that you don't start connecting the dots of your life until you look back?

You can't connect dots that haven't dotted yet.

And so, life, as you grow older, you should be getting wiser.

Because, because you, well, here, let me say this.

You should be becoming wiser if you've practiced dynamic reflection.

Dynamic reflection means that you take time from time to time in your life and you get away and you think about your life.

You think about your relationship, you think about where you're going.

And you change where you need to change, and you grow where you need to grow, and you dive into where you need to dive in, right?

That's connecting the dots.

Well, listen, Psalm 144 is an anthem to listen.

Not connecting the dots, but connecting the battles.

As you grow older, some of you young people don't know this yet, but actually, life is not fun.

Life is hard.

There's fun times.

I mean, I like, I like as well as anyone catching an 18-inch trout on my fly rod.

It's fantastic, it's fun.

But life is not about fly fishing.

And life is not about going to the links and playing on the golf course.

Life actually is hard because there's battles in it.

So, what I'm learning is that when you look back on your life, you actually begin to connect the battles.

That's what this Psalm's about.

It's a connecting of battles.

Some won and some lost.

You don't win them all.

Even as a believer, you don't win them all.

Even as a believer, you lose seemingly.

You seemingly lose.

But what becomes our strength is that as we practice dynamic reflection in our life, as we journal what God's doing, as we think about it, as we pray about it, we go, you know, I'm not doing that again.

You know, and so we all learn different ways.

I mean, some people it's the two-knock method, and some people it's the one-knock method.

So here's the difference.

So, you know, the person in front of you, they walk up to the underhang and bam, they hit their forehead.

That's one knock.

And then the idiot that most of us are, go up and bang ourselves on the same underhang.

That's a two-knock method.

The one-knock method is learning to duck.

Okay, so in Psalm 144, let's get into it.

It's about a worshiper and a warrior who learned how to duck.

And it's about, it's a battle anthem because he is, I believe David, is beginning somewhere in his journey, probably in his 20s or 30s.

He's going, you know what?

This is how you fight battles.

And some are won and some are lost.

I want to start with my favorite quote.

This has been in my study for probably the last 15 years.

This is from Teddy Roosevelt.

I'm sorry, some of you heard me give it before, but hear it again.

This is Teddy Roosevelt in 1910.

His speech, Citizenship in a Republic, given in Sorbonne, Paris, France.

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who's actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs, who comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming.

But who does actually strive to do the great deeds, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spins himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who have never known neither victory nor defeat.

That's David.

David never quit.

David was not a quitter, it wasn't even in his vocabulary.

He kept coming at you, he kept coming at you, and he kept coming after God, and he failed a lot.

And I want to say to you, men and women here who failed a lot, you're my kind of person.

Don't quit.

You gotta stand, you gotta be strong, and you're gonna need bloodstained allies.

You need other men with you.

I was looking at a curriculum this week that's a very popular curriculum for boys, and as I was reading it, I, and I've taught it before, and I thought, you know, it's missing one thing.

It's missing a huge thing here.

And there's nothing about buddies, there's nothing about allies, there's nothing about how we need each other.

Men, you can learn a lot from your women.

Women are so much better at this than us men, but men, you need not just friends, not just fishing buddies or hunting buddies.

You need blood stained allies.

And these are men that have got your back.

They're bloodstained because they've been in the battle and they don't have it all together.

And if they've got it all together, run in the opposite direction as fast as you can.

Most men are Lone Rangers, and we've got to learn to battle in the battle together as bloodstained allies.

Verse one Blessed be the Lord my rock, who trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle.

That's how he starts.

Blessed.

Blessed in the Hebrew has the idea of kneeling in blessing to the Lord.

Now, look at verse 15.

Look at the last verse.

Happy are the people who are in such a state.

He's speaking now the entire psalm.

Happy are the people whose God is the Lord.

This is a happy psalm.

This is a happy poem.

This is speaking of, this is where your happiness comes from.

Your happiness comes from being in the battle.

In warfare.

Church.

You were created for war.

You were built for battle.

You are hardwired to handle the enemy.

You are hardwired to handle depression.

You are hardwired to handle your illness.

You are hardwired to handle that broken relationship.

Because the Lord becomes your rock in those times.

He's not your rock.

He's not my rock when things go my way.

I'm full of pride, and I can tell you the five reasons why I'm such a success.

Anybody like me who can't stand motivational speakers?

I mean, I think I think if they live in a van down by the river, then I can relate to them.

But other than that, I mean, you can get some good little quotes and little rhyme schemes that are kind of cutesy and all that.

But for me and for you, and here at the road, life's hard.

Life's a battle.

The power, though, comes in the Lord being our rock.

And he trains our hands for battle.

And guess what he uses?

He uses as Psalm 23, he says, Thy ride and thy staff, they comfort me.

It's the word of God and the work of the Holy Spirit.

It's the word of God and the work of the Holy Spirit.

Until I saw, I told my young guys today, we were having our, we were at Denny's.

Hey, Denny's coffee is pretty good.

I was actually surprised, better than Billy Jen's, I thought.

But we're sitting there and we're having coffee together and we're talking and we're looking at, and I said to these young guys, I said, look, you guys, here's the deal.

Life is hard, but you guys are more than conquerors.

But you will not be more than conquerors if the word of God does not become precious to you.

So, men and women, the word of God is, we can still read the word freely.

You can go down to a Christian bookstore and buy the Bible.

We can still carry our Bible to school.

We can still carry around our Bible.

Man, that's gonna be one of the first freedoms we're gonna lose in the days ahead as we lose our freedoms.

Because communism figured it out a long time ago.

You've got to ban the word of God because whenever our people start to read God's word, they start to believe what's in it.

And when they start to believe what's in it, they become freedom fighters.

They become revolutionaries, they become radical for this gospel stuff, this Jesus stuff.

And we don't want that.

So the Lord becomes our rock, and he trains our hands for battle when we're in the word.

Because this book is a battle manual.

It is a war manual.

It prepares us for life.

Ruskin wrote in Crown of Wild Olive.

When I tell you that war is the foundation of all the arts, I mean also that it is the foundation of all high virtues and faculties of man.

It is very strange to me to discover this and dreadful, but I saw it to be a most undeniable fact.

I found in brief that all great nations learned their truth of word and strength of thought in war, that they were nourished in war, wasted by peace.

Wasted by peace.

Taught by war and deceived by peace.

Trained by war and betrayed by peace.

In a word, that they were born in war and expired in peace.

Now that's from the Bushido Code.

Many of you know I was a missionary for years in Japan, and I love to study the samurai.

And that's one of the writers of the samurai, speaking of the Bushido Code in Japan.

Jesus was called and called himself the Prince of Peace.

But look at the life of Jesus.

You see, the way to peace is the way of war against an enemy that wants to steal, kill, and destroy.

And so Jesus becomes our rock.

If any of you have ever studied the Battle of Gettysburg, what made that battle unique and what made Colonel Chamberlain's stand possible on Little Round Top was that he got the high ground and he was able to get into the rocks.

So bullets were were defrayed from those rocks.

Rock solid rocks, rocks that defend, rocks that we can hide behind, deflect enemy attacks.

Jesus is your rock.

Men and women, Jesus is your rock.

And you may not have learned it yet.

You may not be old enough yet to know this, but he is your rock.

And you can count on him.

And you can stand strong in him.

Jesus is your rock.

And he's the one who trains your hands for battle.

He's the one who trains your heart for war.

My loving kindness in my fortress.

My high tower in my deliverer.

My shield and the one in whom I take refuge.

Who subdues my people under me.

Very interesting this phraseology.

My loving kindness and my fortress, my high tower, my deliverer, my shield and the one in whom I take refuge.

Six attributes of God, I believe, all under the rubric of loving kindness.

I believe what David is saying here is that God's loving kindness is the fortress.

God's loving kindness is the high tower.

God's loving kindness is your deliverer.

God's loving kindness is your shield, and God's loving kindness is your refuge.

So when Jesus came to the river, and John baptized him, it said the heavens were open, and it was like a dove that came down, the Spirit of God, and they heard a voice.

Men and women, you are beloved of the Lord.

Every one of you in this room are loved by him.

And that's your fortress.

And that's your strength.

That's what makes Jesus your rock, is to discover the intimacy of his loving kindness.

Have you ever been around loving, kind people?

And you just want to keep hanging out with them.

I love being around people who are kind and generous and careful about how they treat others.

It's amazing.

I wish I was more like that.

I'm not.

I think it's why I like them so much, is because I'm so like not them.

But Jesus is.

There's some song.

My my daughter Deborah, she's a hoot.

My daughter Deborah's a hoot.

There's some song, I don't know who it is, but it's called Don't Look at Me, Look at Him, or something like that.

And so she used to dance around in the room.

She put it on really loud.

And she had this fake microphone.

And she'd kind of do this.

And then she said, and she would mouth the words while it's playing.

She'd don't look at me, look at him.

But then when she said, it was like obvious that you're supposed to be looking at her by saying, Don't look at me.

Isn't that the way kind of we are?

Like, um, no, I I didn't have anything to do with that.

Oh, God.

Oh, Jesus.

It's true.

We all know that, okay?

We don't need to be told that.

Give glory to the Lord.

I'm being, obviously, I'm stretching my facetiousness a little far here, but the reality is that that's the way we are, but that's not the way he is.

And he's full of loving kindness toward you.

And he loves you.

And you're beloved.

Everyone in this room, you're beloved.

And I think to the degree that we discover that is the degree that we begin to understand that God's our fortress, our high tower, our deliverer, and our refuge in our life.

What's great about that is it makes you secure.

It breaks through.

Probably the greatest thing that can happen in any of our lives that gives us security is to understand the love of God and to personally experience the love of God.

And when you experience the love of God in your heart, it starts to break through your insecurities.

Because we're all blustering posers and pretenders.

Especially guys.

We're posers and pretenders.

So because of our fear of being known, we hide behind a mask of being a good Christian or having it all together or being really holy.

But when we can break out of that and just realize I'm not very holy sometimes, but he is.

And I'm not very loving at times, but he is.

That's freedom.

Because that allows God to get the glory because it's not going through us anymore.

It's his work in us, flowing through us through the belovedness of who you are in Christ.

What is man?

Verse 3.

That you take knowledge of him.

Or the Son of Man.

That you're mindful of him.

Man is like a breath.

His days are like a passing shadow.

The word man here is Enosh in Hebrew.

Three times he uses that word.

Listen, this is what man means here: frail, weak, and sad.

So David comparing himself to the rock, comparing himself to the loving kindness of God, comparing himself to the deliverer, the high tower, the name above all names, the king of kings and the Lord of Lords says, What is me?

What is me?

I'm Enosh.

I'm frail, I'm weak, and I'm sad.

Why then, Lord?

Why would you take notice of me?

I let you down all the time.

I look at bad stuff all the time.

I think bad thoughts about people.

I'm jealous all the time.

I struggle with strife all the time.

Why would you, Lord, take notice of me?

Because, men and women, his loving kindness is better than life in your beloved.

And you see, there's always that danger of on the one hand struggling with pride, but on the other hand, focusing in too much on Enosh.

Some of you struggle too much with Enosh.

That's who you are, and you know who you are.

And the Lord would say to you that you've got to take your eyes off you and put your eyes on Him and bring glory and honor to Him by taking your eyes off your frailty and putting your focus on the enormous loving kindness of Jesus Christ and how much He cares for you.

Bow down your heavens, O Lord, and come down.

Touch the mountains and they shall smoke.

Flash forth lightning and scatter them.

Shoot out your arrows and destroy them.

Stretch out your hand from above, rescue me and deliver me out of great waters from the hand of foreigners.

This is the warrior God.

This is David crying out to the warrior prince, the great royal warrior prince over all Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ, the fierce warrior who will fight for you, who will stand with you.

He's got your back.

When others betray you and others leave you behind, Christ is there.

He will flash forth his power and his anointing upon you as you need it.

And so this is the song of Moses after literally going through the great waters.

The song of Moses, as the Egyptians perish in the sea.

The Lord is my strength and song, and he has become my salvation.

He is my God, and I will praise him, my father's God, and I will exalt him.

He, the Lord, is a man of war.

The Lord is his name.

Pharaoh's chariots and his army he has cast into the sea.

His chosen captains are drowned in the Red Sea.

Exodus 15.

Note Moses calls God a man of war.

Man of war.

Fight.

Don't quit.

Don't let anybody label you as a quitter.

And you may have quit your whole life.

Or you may be famous for coming up during communion, coming up during our altar call, coming up for prayer and crying and asking for forgiveness, and then a month later you're back in the same stuff.

Keep coming.

If we're all honest, we've all done that.

If we're all honest, that's the reason Jesus spoke about forgiving 70 times seven.

That's a lot of forgiveness going on.

And if Jesus said it, then he meant it for our lives too, because we have his Holy Spirit.

So that relationship that we have with the Lord is one of a man of war that he's called us into a fight.

Don't quit.

And if you have quit, pick up the sword again and again and again.

And if your brother and your sister or your family member or those near you have been quitters and they're coming back, quit rolling your eyes and embrace them 70 times seven.

And by the way, if you get past 70 times seven, then I guess at that point you can reevaluate things.

Verse 8.

From the hand of foreigners whose mouth speak lying words, and whose right hand is a right hand of falsehood.

So he's speaking of that right hand coming out to shake a deal, to make a covenant.

He's calling it the right hand of falsehood.

Now look, in verse 11, he repeats the same thing again: rescue me and deliver me from the hand of foreigners, whose mouths speak lying words, and whose right hand is a right hand of falsehood.

If anybody got ripped off and betrayed, it was David.

If you think about the life of David, I mean, I think in our lives, and we look at some of the dilemmas that we find ourselves in, we deserve most of them.

We do, because we're we do things, we say things, we we sin.

But David, as far as we know, in 1 Samuel 16 onward, he just did what he was asked to do.

I mean, he's having a pretty happy life.

He's a shepherd boy with as many brothers as he had, probably maybe even a fairly wealthy home, because that's a lot of hands doing the work, so they're probably bringing in some income.

And Samuel comes to his house.

He didn't even apply.

He didn't look at any one-ads for kings and sign up.

So Samuel, the great prophet of Israel, comes to his house and anoints him with oil.

David had nothing to do with it.

His life at that point becomes one endless battle and one endless defeat after another.

I mean, it's kind of like I mentioned last week about the nation of Israel, like the great sage of Israel once said, if we are God's chosen people, I would just say to the Lord, can't you choose somebody else?

So he goes into Saul's court, he plays on his harp, drives back demons, it appears even drives demons off of Saul.

That's quite a profound worship leader.

And then he gets spears thrown at him.

And then he's kicked out and he's on the run for the next 17 years.

You're gonna get lied to, and you're gonna get betrayed.

And you will get ripped off relationally.

I think we could arguably say that 75% of all of our problems in life are relational.

So you're gonna get the right hand of fellowship and you're gonna get the left hand getting knifed in your back.

And you have to make a choice at that point.

Am I gonna have no more close relationships because there's a risk, or am I gonna have the courage again to be a warrior and dive back into relationships again?

But discerning.

But discerning.

I had a lady I know she meant well, but after something happened to me a couple years ago, she came up and she came up, it was in the other chapel over there, and she says, Are you gonna trust people again?

And I said, Yes, but she says, Oh, you can't have that, but you've got to trust.

And she walked out.

I felt really bad, like I guess I really don't have it together.

I guess I don't really have faith.

And then I thought about it, I thought, that's someone who doesn't understand the level of betrayal that life sometimes brings your way.

I can tell you this, folks, you'll be betrayed, but you do have to trust again, but with discernment.

Learn from it.

Not everybody deserves to be your friend.

Do you understand that?

Not everybody deserves to be your friend.

You're not a friend to everybody.

David certainly understood that, and he was certainly betrayed.

And the love you brothers and praying for your brothers, I'm sick of.

Don't say that to me.

Love your brother.

Unless we've got some history together.

Then you can say I love you, and I believe you love you because we've got some history together.

But this love your brother, praying for your brother, is um oftentimes less than sincere.

So as we grow, we get wisdom.

Here it is, all you young men in this room, this should be your journey.

From wild, go for it.

I want to encourage you to go for it, be all in, to wisdom, to sage.

So learn from your mistakes.

Be wiser as you go through relationships.

Don't give your heart away to everybody.

Use discernment.

I will sing a new song to you, verse 9, O God.

On a harp of 10 strings, I will sing praises to you.

The one who gives salvation to kings, who delivers David his servant, from the deadly sword.

You see, David had learned to be a worshiper.

He had learned to war through worship.

That's what we're gonna do on February 27th and 28th.

For some of you, probably most of you, this is really, really weird and really radical.

We're gonna pray for 24 hours.

I'm not, and none of you are all 24 hours, but I'm gonna challenge you tonight and next week and the next week until we get there to take one hour.

One hour.

And some of you are assertive enough and you're really into this enough that you might take two hours.

But from February 27th, that's a Saturday night, until Sunday night, February 28th, I want every hour to be covered in worship and prayer.

And we're gonna have a room right back here.

It's called the War Room.

And I'm looking for worship leaders who would take an hour and you'd lead worship and pray during that hour together in that war room.

And we'll and we're gonna cycle in and cycle out, cycle in.

And what Ryan was talking about, the seven mountains of influence would be like government.

So one hour will be on government, then another hour will be on arts and entertainment, one hour will be for the military, one hour will be on media, one hour will be on education, the church, etc., three times over.

Because there's seven.

Seven times three, twenty-one.

So we're gonna three times, and you'll see us cycle in and cycle out.

So what I want you to consider is coming.

I'm saying, okay, ladies, this is for your men and you men who don't have ladies, this is for you.

I want you to sign up for the most ungodly hours possible first.

So I would like to see our men sign up between midnight and 5 a.m.

All the guys who get it go like this.

I'm looking.

Go like this.

I see some of you guys aren't nodding your heads.

And here's the vision.

The vision is that for 24 hours, there's this one church in this city that cares about our nation, that cares about the kingdom of God enough that we would sacrifice in worship and prayer and give that time, dedicated to the Lord, that we're gonna seek God's face.

We're gonna see miracles when we do that.

So at the end of the service, Pam's gonna be back there at a table, and you can either sign up online with her, because she'll sign you up online, or you can sign up in written form for 24-hour war room.

So David says he sings a new song.

How many of you need, you'd say, I need a new song for 2016?

I'm tired of the old song, I'm kind of tired of the lyrics.

I'm tired of the tuning.

My tuning is really not very good.

I need a new song.

Raise your hand.

I need a new song, I need some new lyrics, I need God to show up.

That's what David's saying.

He's saying, I'm singing a new song as a worshiper and warriors, my anthem to the Lord, because he's delivered me.

I think we should have, looking back in our lives, a lot of new songs.

Some of you have been through miserable divorces.

Some of you have seen friends of yours die.

Some of you have been fired in your job.

You need a new song.

Because if you don't get a new song, you're gonna be singing the same old song.

And if you keep singing the same old song, you're gonna have the same old results.

You ever get tired of some of the music we play?

I do.

I mean, I like it.

I mean, it's cool because I know the words and everything, but I I don't even know what I'm singing because I've sang it so many times it has no meaning anymore.

So I liked in the memorial service, and I like tonight about home.

Never heard it before.

I need a new song.

It's a good song, Jeannie.

Keep it up.

It's fantastic.

Whether it's Appalachian or Celtic, it's awesome.

It's really good.

I mean that.

Good, good, good song.

That our sons may be as plants growing up in their youth, that our daughters may be as pillars sculptured in palace style.

That's where it lies, folks.

For you that are parents, your job is to build solid young men and solid young women.

You go, man, Steve, if you only knew my son, if you only knew my daughter.

Well, nobody said it was going to be easy.

And you know, don't quit.

Those kids want you to keep, you they may tell you opposite, but you just keep on a coming, dad.

And you just keep on a coming, mom, and you just wear them out by loving on them.

Keep knocking on that door, keep waking them up, keep taking them on a hike, keep taking them fishing, keep opening the word with them, keep reading in that, writing in that journal with them.

Don't quit, don't stop, keep fighting for your kids.

And if you're not doing anything right now and you're just kind of letting your wife do it all, then pick it up.

Be a man.

Be a warrior for your sons and your daughters, because we want to see our young sons to be plants grown up.

We want to see them strong, vigorous young men.

We want to see beautiful women, beautiful pillars.

That's what he compares them to like pillars, beautiful pillars.

Isn't that different?

I mean, nasty old trees.

That's what he says about boys.

Plants growing up.

I mean, it's like you don't know, it's gnarly, it's got blimbs going everywhere, and you know, and kind of gnarly.

But daughters are like pillars, they're beautiful.

I want to be able to say, as the years go by, you're single?

You want to get married?

Come to the road.

We got the best looking women in the city.

Inside and out.

They're all right here.

Women?

Looking for a man?

We got the most solid men you could ever meet right here.

Don't go over there.

They got duds.

Come over here.

We got it, man.

That our barns may be full, supplying all kinds of produce, that our sheep may bring forth thousands and ten thousands in our fields, that our oxen may be well laden, that there be no breaking in or going out, that there's no outcry on our streets.

You know what he's saying here?

He's saying, God wants you to be fruitful, gang.

God wants you to multiply.

God wants you to be successful.

He says, if you'll do it my way, I'll guide you.

If you'll do it my way, I'll multiply your efforts.

I'll take your talents and your skills, and I will exponentially empower you through the Holy Spirit.

It's Matthew 25 all over again.

Five talents, two talents, one talent.

We have nothing to do with that.

We got five talent folks in this room, we got two talent folks in this room, we got one talent folks in this room.

You can't do anything about that.

That's just the way you are.

You got five, you got two, you got one.

But what are you gonna do with it?

What are you gonna do?

If you read my blog this week, I told you.

One thing you learn as you grow older that the people who change the world are no smarter than you and me.

They just are crazy enough to think that they can change it, and then they go out and they do it.

So be crazy.

Be Looney Tunes for Jesus.

Be foolish, be hungry, stay hungry, stay foolish, keep trying, don't give up, don't quit.

And God will give you ten thousands in your fields.

My grandpa had a third grade education.

When he read the newspaper, it was hilarious.

We used to kind of hover around the kitchen table to hear granddaddy get the Columbia record.

That's what the, I don't know if it's Columbia Record is still around in South Carolina, main newspaper in South Carolina at that time, back in the 60s and 70s, and he and he couldn't read unless he read it out loud.

And so he'd read out loud, and you hear him struggling with words and everything and all that.

And could this guy ranch?

I mean, we used to laugh because he'd get out there and he'd have his big cigar and he'd walk outside and he'd put his hand on the fence and he'd look out, and he could probably see about a thousand of his acres from the house there looking out, and all the kids would be saying, There's grandpa, looking out over his empire.

Hard work, not quitting, trusting God.

God did that, and he'd be the first to tell you that too.

God wants you to be successful.

God wants you to move forward in something that you're good at.

He wants you to be innovative, he wants you to be imaginative.

He's the creator of the universe.

He's given you that creative ability, and you can think and you can create.

Don't be limited by what everybody says is already.

Been done.

Don't be limited that you have to color inside their lines.

Color outside the lines.

Make your own lines.

Make your own way through the power of the Holy Spirit.

We need world changers.

We don't need just the same old stuff.

We need people who look at life differently and say, I can make an impact in that area.

And God's gifted me.

Because when He comes in Matthew 25, he doesn't say, Oh, you had five and you had two and you had one.

He says, What did you do with the five?

What did you do with the two and what did you do with the one?

And the five and the two got the same report.

I'm so proud of you, my good and faithful servant.

Come and I'm going to give you more to rule over.

And so when I was looking at Ruth's Bible and mentioning it here in the memorial service tonight, she had this one verse.

I think it was Luke 12, 48.

I'm not sure it might have been 16, 48.

I can't remember, but it's written three times in the first three pages.

Guess what that is?

That's that passage where Jesus says, where much has been given, much is required.

Has there ever been a nation in the history of the world with the kind of opportunity and freedom that we have in the United States of America?

Yeah, we got problems, we got all kinds of issues.

But we have a chance to be what God's called us to be.

Don't limit what God can do through you by your lack of faith.

Ask God for greater faith.

And here's the end of the story.

Happy are the people who are in such a state, and happier the people whose God is Lord.

I want to be happy.

And happiness involves risk, and happiness involves taking some hits.

Happiness involves not quitting, but continuing to trust God.

So here at the road, as we're building discipleship groups, would you become a discipleship group leader this year?

Would you take on the challenge of asking God to give you two or three men and women that you might disciple, that you might pour your life into this year?

What would God say to you about your finances?

Have you ever tithed?

Have you ever learned to give 10% to the Lord?

Because if you've never learned to give 10% from the Lord, you're robbing God.

You're robbing God.

And God can't bless you.

And you may wonder, well, why is that door always closed?

And that door is always closed, and this door is always closed.

It's because you're not obeying God in the basic stuff.

Well, Steve, you don't know how hard it is for us.

We really struggle financially.

Just we can barely make it.

Barely make it people are people of no faith.

Because that's how we begin to grow as we start to obey God, and God will come exponentially and start to do amazing stuff.

It's kind of that counterintuitive part about marriage.

I hate this part.

That well, she just I mean, she just and then they you come to me, and I can tell you the first session of our time.

Is what are you doing to love her?

What are you doing to love him?

Well, I do that all the time.

I never get anything back.

Well, don't come back to me until you do a 30-day experiment.

Give, give, give.

And I believe there'll be some point in there where it'll be pressed down and running over.

I read that somewhere.

So, men and women, that's a happy warrior.

You've been listening to The Road with Pastor Steve Holt.

We pray that you've been blessed by the message today.

Our hope is to make wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ, and that's why we teach the Word of God verse by verse, scripture by scripture, and precept upon precept.

We're excited about all the things God is doing in the lives of our faithful listeners.

We understand that there are many trials and tribulations in this world, and we'd love to be able to pray for you as you encounter difficult times.

Please drop us a note and let us know how we can pray for you.

Write us at The ROAD, DO Box 88485, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80908.

If you've been blessed by this message, please let us know as well.

Again, the address is TheROAD.

DO Box 88485, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80908.

If you're in the area, please stop on by and join us at The Road.

We meet at Chapel Hills Church, located at 2025 Parliament Drive, Colorado Springs, Colorado, 80920.

You can find out about our service time and more about the road by going to our website at theroad.org.

That's thheroad.org.

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As always, we covet your prayers.

Thanks again for tuning in today.

And be sure to catch us again next time for another edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Hope.