The Surprising Secret to Progress Pastor Steven Furtick -

Change your approach and stop trying to grow in the

stuff that is glamorous and noticed by people.

Paul said, I want to know Christ.

That's one of those little phrases that I don't think

we really know what it means.

It's like, sort of, I want to know Christ. You

know what that means?

Sort of I've heard it before. It's like, coulding Bible right?

Stop smoking stuff like that? Pray a lot mission strips.

To know him.

Paul said, I had to go into partnership with his sufferings.

To experience closeness. And this is.

Why Jesus was forsaken by those that he called love

shepherd and taught and parted into is because the closer

you get, the further you feel. Wow. This is the

paradox of progress. And this is why you are growing

in your faith at the same time that you're about

to give up on it, because it's a paradox of progress.

The closer Jesus got to the cross, the more confused

his disciples became. And sometimes the closer you get to

God and the more you walk in His ways, the

more questions you will have as you give up on

the answers that were simple for one stage. But the

closer you get, the more mature you become, the more

progress you may.

You find that the answers don't come so easy. You're

no longer content with cliches because you want to know him.

You want to know who he really is. Now. They

loved him on Palm Sunday. Remember they put these palm

branches down.

I don't even know where they got it from, because

that was from the other festival.

They didn't even use those that pass over.

But whether or not it's two different accounts merged together,

we'll never know. They put the palm branches down in

this passage and all of the gospels that record it,

and they were like, in a loud voice.

Hodasda blessed is he who comes in the name of

the Lord. Ho's Adam. Here's what's weird about it. The

Pharisees are like, shut them up. Jesus is like, I can't.

If they stop, the rocks will start shouting.

Because who I am creates praise, who I am creates expectation.

When my presence shows up, things have to change.

Things have to change. If you're sitting next to somebody

who doesn't like you, clap and tell them. If I

don't do it, the chair will.

Something's gotta praise God, something's gotta glorify him. It might

as well be something with breath. It might as well

be me. So now back to the text. He's going

in and they're like, oh's that. I bless this the

king who comes in the name of the lard Peace

in heaven and glory doxa, doxa remember, doxa glory doxology, doxa,

glory in the highest, doxa, peace and glory in the highest.

Some pharisees were like, shout of mup, and he's like

in the stones of crowd. But then what's crazy to

me is this paradox. Remember, I love that word. I

want you to love that word. I'm gonna preach on

that word until you love that word. Paradox is like

a contradiction, only it happens to be true. And sometimes

when you are when you are frustrated with yourself because

you feel like a contradiction. Right, I love God, but

I love certain sins. I love God, but I still

love this thing over here that I shouldn't love. It's

not a contradiction, it's a paradox because his strength is

made per in your weakness, and his grace needs a

place to operate. So he leaves a weakness in your

life so that the king can ride in on a cult,

so that they won't celebrate what he rode in on.

They'll celebrate him when he rides in. Where was aa oh?

Verse forty one.

As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city you got

it nineteen twenty one, he wept over it.

Wow. They were shouting. He was weeping. They were cheering,

and he was crying.

He wasn't on the cross yet, That's not why he

was crying. He wasn't in the garden yet, That's not

why he was crying. There was no physical pain. He

was crying because he knew they were celebrating the wrong thing.

He knew that they thought that he was coming to

fix it, and he was coming to fix them.

Wow.

They thought he was coming to change the situation and

the kingdom.

Would come at once.

But what he was really coming to do was deeper,

He said, Jerusalem, the name of the city means peace,

city of peace.

Jeru Salem. Salem sounds like shalom.

Write peace, city of peace. You were supposed to be

the city of peace. And look at verse forty two.

If you even you had only known on this day

what would bring you peace, But now it is hidden

from your eyes.

What would bring you peace is at your gate, and.

You will reject it because it comes riding on a cult,

looking common, looking ordinary. You will reject it because you

do not understand the cross. And the closer Jesus got

to his purpose, the further he got from their plan.

Have your plans been disrupted lately? You might be getting closer.

You know how we used to play closer, closer, closer.

I always thought it was interesting how.

Paul was blinded when he first got converted by Jesus

on the Damascus Road. And it must have been weird

because he had never been closer to God than he

was in that moment. He'd been close to religion, he

had climbed that ladder, but now.

He can't see. And there's a sense in which, when

you really.

Make progress in your walk with God, at first you

think you know everything, and now you've got the answer.

Jesus is the answer. What's the answer? Jesus is the answer.

What's the answer for America? Jesus is the answer for America.

What's the answer for our young people in the drug

epidemic and the apolatric Jesus is the answer. You know,

what's the answer for the innert that Jesus.

Is the answer.

What's the answer for alcoholic Jesus is the answer. But

over time you start asking better questions, and as you

ask deeper questions.

When you first start, you think you're awesome.

Like Elijah is making beats right now, and I'm so

proud of them, and they're good. The first one he made,

he thought it was ready for radio. He was ready

to send it to pump Uzzie all the other littles

that I don't really like to listen to. And he's like, Dad,

this is amazing, listen to my beat. But then he

messed around and got good enough to know how much

better he needed to be.

When you first started something.

You know, when I first started playing guitar, I told

you about this last week.

I thought I was amazing.

When I first started preaching, I thought I was Billy

Graham just waiting for a Tokyo Crusade to call me.

But today I stand before you, and I understand that

ever more than ever before, at this point, that even

the attempt to describe the ways of God as an

exercise and futility. So it took me getting good enough

at it to know how good at it.

I was not. It took me. It took me getting

just good enough at it to know I'm not good

at it at all.

Paul said, the more that I press toward the mark,

the more I realize that I have. I have so

far to go and so much to learn, and so

many things in me. You know, when you first start

trying to walk with God, you get the mechanics down,

and you do this and you don't do that.

But then God starts challenging your motives.

And now it's no longer just about doing the right

things and saying the right things and learning the right

words and changing these protocols.

Now it's about something so much deeper.

But the good news is if you feel like you've

got so far to go, that is a good sign

that you are actually getting closer to God. God's presence

creates awareness, awareness of your need, awareness of his grace,

awareness of his greatness, awareness of his glory.

And you start to see.

That all of sinned and fall in short of the

glory of God. And I don't have any judgment to give,

and I don't have any hell to put anybody in.

And I'm writing off all the things that I thought

I knew to know the one who made me. The

closer you get, the further you feel you have to go.

This is the paradox of progress. It's the paradox of

Jesus hanging on the cross. And he's never been more

powerful and he's never looked weaker. So I want to

address what Paul said before we finish today, because it

always confused me. It always seemed like a paradox.

You know what that means. Paradox sort of you know

what I'm saying. It's like the idea that God is

sovereign but I'm responsible. It's a paradox. That's what makes

some God.

If I could explain it, I wouldn't have to have

faith to believe it.

I'm completely comfortable. How can you serve and love God

when God?

I'm completely comfortable with that He's a great, big God.

I'm a little old me. That settles it for me.

I understand how his ways are higher than my ways,

his thoughts are higher than my thoughts. So Paul says,

I want to know him the power of his resurrection. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

I want some of that resurrection power and participation in

the fellowship of his sufferings. At first I thought he

meant that he wanted to die for Christ, and ultimately

he was on house arrest at the end of the

Book of Acts when he did suffer many imprisonments and

eventual death for Christ.

Right, But I read it differently.

He said I want to participate in his sufferings, in

his death while I live. That's the paradox. Now watch this, Lord,

help me deliver this. Paul's not saying I want to

die like Christ died. He's saying I want to live

like Christ died. And that means that I'm constantly going

through cycles of death and resurrection. That means I'm constantly

having to die to shallow desires so that He can

give me the desires of my heart and do a

new thing in me. And whatever I have to let go,

and whatever I have to write off, and whatever I

have to let you have. You know, some things are

not worth me fighting for anymore. Whatever was gain, whatever

I thought was important, I'm giving it up for something

more important. I want to know connection with Christ, and

I want to live like he died. So when people

insult me, I want to learn to let that go

like he did.

I want to live like he died. You want to

die like he died. No, I want to live like

he died. And what it'll look like.

Sometimes people will think I'm losing, but really I'm winning.

It'll seem like and feel like I'm losing. Now the

Lord told me it was really important to say this.

Some of you have been convinced you're in a losing

season right now because you feel very discombobulated on the inside.

You're not so certain about certain things that are going

on in your life right now.

It is not a loss. In fact, it is a

new level.

It is actually you going deeper into the things of

God to understand his heart.

At a level that you could have before.

So Paul said, if I have to take an l

if I have to go through some things that are

painful for me, if I have to be a cult,

if I have to look like a donkey, if I

have to ride in looking ridiculous, for the purpose of

God to be fulfilled.

I want to live like he died. If I have

to hang on.

A cross to bring forth resurrection, power. If I have

to go to Jerusalem, and if I have to face

the jeers and the taunts, and the ridicule and the rejection,

if I have to pray in the garden of gethsemone, Nevertheless,

not my will, but yours be done.

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