Shut The Door | Rich Casanova | May 13th, 2026

FA Admin: Welcome to the Faith Alive Sermon Podcast. This is a replay of a past sermon from Faith Alive Church. Whether you missed it, want to hear it again, or share it with someone you know, we're glad you're here. This sermon is by Rich Casanova. Tonight, we're gonna go right to Scripture. We're gonna talk about shutting the door and finding God in the secret place. It's about praying alone. It's about praying. And developing that relationship. Because we know it's not about religion, right? We know it's not about ceremony, it's about relationship. And Jesus was very clear on how to establish that relationship. So the title of this is Shut the Door, Finding God in the Secret Place. In Matthew chapter 6, verse 6, Jesus says, But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you. And pray to your father in private, then your father who sees everything will reward you. You know, we live in a world of just constant noise, constant distraction. I'm it may surprise you to know I'm not exactly a heavy sleeper. ⁓ that I just can't shut everything down. So I sleep really light. And one thing that happens, like if the power goes off or something is different that's not a noise, I wake. Right. There's always we live in a world of constant noise. I get used to that noise. Whatever it might be, refrigerator running, the furnaces kicking on and off. I get used to those noises. Right? One of us is snoring. Me. It's me. ⁓ I get used to those noises. So we live in a world with constant noise, constant distraction. Look at us now. We can't go more than a few minutes without looking at our phone to be entertained, right? I mean, think about when I was a kid, an exciting breakfast was to read the cereal box, right? And now I find myself, seriously, I'm eating. I I love to eat. I know it shows, right? I love to eat. And I find myself eating and I'm looking at my phone and looking at the it's constant distraction. Notifications buzz, voices demand, worries shout, worries and stress can be so loud. And even when we want to connect with God, distractions creep in. So Jesus gives us a very simple but powerful instruction Go into your room, shut the door, and pray. When we shut the door, we aren't just closing out noise, we're opening ourselves to God. We're taking out all that distraction. And and I find this hard to do sometimes. Sometimes when I get up and I've got my coffee and and and I I just get in these patterns, I'm ready to go. I'm ready to get something going, right? God deserves my first fruits. God deserves me to come to him. I need to go to him. I need him in my day, right? So I've got to take that time to not be distracted. So how do we start off with this? Well, first thing we do is we shut the door to the world's noise, right? Metaphorically, we just shut it down. Romans 12, 2 says, do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Don't you love that? Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. See, the world and its culture will always compete for your attention. The enemy isn't gonna shout at you all the time. Sometimes he just whispers. He's crafty. He's just trying to pull you away. Right? Maybe you've never done this, but this has happened to me many times. I sit down with the intention, Lord, I'm I'm gonna pray. I'll tell my wife, I'm going, I'm going 30 minutes, hitting it. Let's go. I start to pray, Lord. I love you. I I you know thank you for all this. Boy, I I really gotta get the grass mode today. I hope I can get that up. Let me get back to it. Lord, I you follow me, we get distracted by things. And then I find myself pulling away and not shutting the door by not renewing my mind. Social media. news, endless distractions, they drown out God's voice. You cannot renew your mind if you never disconnect from the world. You know, there's other ways to do there's all kinds of different ways to do this. One way that I like to do that I find God refreshing to me is I like to find that when I am in nature. I don't want my phone. I want to, I wanna s there's nothing man could make that can ever outdo the majesty of what God makes. Amen? So I love to be outside. I love to see those things. I love to connect that way. To hear God's creations, birds singing, to see trees and all those things. I love to see all that. That's a good way for me to disconnect from the world and connect to God. Everybody's different. But I will tell you this: you can't hear God's whisper if you're tuned into the world's noise. We need to concentrate on that whisper. So, so You know, I'm an access step guy. I like to I'd like to give you something that we can do today. We can start right now. And when I say we, I gotta tell you, I'm a work in progress. Right? I'm not up here because I have it all figured out. This is what you do. Right? No, I'm a work in progress. And I will tell you, we work together on this. So we need to choose one daily distraction to fast from this week, starting right now, whether that's social media, TV, Maybe even background noise and replace that time. Here's the thing. We don't just say, I'm going to give up social media. I'm going to actually just look at the news for an hour, right? We need to replace whatever we're taking out of there, replace that with time with God. Amen? Purposefully doing that, intentionally doing that. So let's do that this week. Replace that time with prayer for reading and studying God's Word. We need to shut the door to spiritual opposition. We just talked about it. We just prayed about that. James chapter 4, verse 7. Submit yourselves then to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. See, a lot of times we hear this verse and it's quoted, and it sounds like all we ever need to do is just resist the devil and he'll run away. But notice the order of what the verse tells us to do. Submit yourselves then. To God, resist the devil and he will flee. See, submission comes first. You've got to give up something. You got to submit. I used to look at vulnerability and submission and surrender as weakness. That's what I looked at. Vulnerability was weakness to me. And admission that I couldn't do it all by myself, that was weakness to me. Maybe you've never been there, but that's where I was. And even though I made some achievements, I can only get so far without God. Amen. So I want to encourage you. Submit yourself. Submit yourself to God. God, I give it to you. I give you my time. I give you my treasure. I give you my talent. I give you my heart. Take the time to submit. True resistance doesn't come from sheer willpower. You can't look, Pastor Chad used to say this all the time you try to fight the devil alone, he will eat your lunch. That was his words, and he's right. You can't just do it out of willpower. I like to think I have a lot of willpower. I don't have near enough willpower for that. I don't even have enough willpower to stay off a pizza for a Let's say it has pineapple on it, then I'm not having it at all. So for all you people that want pineapple on your pizza, I just offended you. I'm sorry. Pizza, delicious. Pineapple, delicious. Together, abomination. I'm just kidding. But think about that. True resistance doesn't come from your willpower. It flows out of your alignment with God. The closer you are to God, that's where that resistance comes from. When we humble ourselves under his authority, the enemy knows. He recognizes we're not standing alone. We're standing under God's covering. You know, when you hear us pray, we pray for the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, come cover me. That's what that's about. I want his covering, not my covering. I want his protection, not my protection. I want to be covered with the Holy Spirit. When the enemy looks at me, he doesn't see me. He sees Jesus shining around me. He sees the Holy Spirit cloaked around me. Because I know I'm, I'm, I can't do it without Jesus in my life. You know, the the Greek word for resist is anti-stemi. I love the Greek words and I love the Hebrew words. I seldom get them correct. I know that. But I love them, right? Like I could never go to Greece and and and like speak Greek to anybody because I don't I don't pronounce these correct. But I love these words. Here's why I love them. Because they oftentimes mean more than we can just translate into the English, right? I love this word, anti-stemmi. That means to stand against, to set oneself firmly in opposition. See, it's a military word used for an army holding its ground against an enemy charge. That's resistance. The res resisting the enemy is not passive or occasional. It's a continual posture of life rooted in a submission to God. Continual posture. When we teach self-defense, when we teach other things, we teach a way to stand, to make yourself athletic, to make yourself able to withstand, to resist. Think about that Greek word that's an army resisting. In our family, if we lock our shields of faith together, think how much more powerful we are. If our alignment is this, I'm here, my wife's here, as we get closer to God, look where we go. And we interlock those shields of faith. We resist and we stand. We stand firm, not by our own power, by the power of Jesus Christ. And that's where, that's where that resistance comes from. And I love this part too. It's a continual posture. You don't get to take a day off. Your adversary does not take a day off. Constantly prowling like a roaring lion, right? Whispering. Suggesting. It won't hurt you to look at that. It won't hurt you to go here. It won't hurt you to have that. Go ahead. But guess what? The enemy can only suggest. Jesus Christ commands. He commands. And he tells us we resist. Submit, then resist. So when you shut the door, when you shut the door, when you close that out, you shut out the enemy's lies. You shut out the lie that you're not good enough. You shut out the lie that your past will preclude you from being able to have the love of Jesus Christ. Shut the door on that. You shut the door on the enemy's suggestion. Nope, I'm going to God. You shut the door, you slam that door. All right? Have you ever slammed the door to make a point? You probably haven't, but I have. And you know what I used to like? Remember the old phones? Remember them old phones? Yeah. You get get ready to hang up on somebody, you get a spin going, and then you're going wham. Now what do you got? You got the Yeah. I'm not encouraging to be slamming things around. But I will tell you, close that door with intentionality. Shut the door. Enemy has no authority in your life. You are not identified by your past. You are a child of God. That's who you are. Here's our action steps. I want you to write down one verse of truth this week. For example, greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world. That's from 1 John. Chapter four, verse four. But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won your fight with these false prophets, because the spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world. You tell yourself that. This is your weapon against the enemy. Your prayer is the weapon against the enemy. Tell yourself, Ephesians 6, chapter 11, put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand. You can resist the devil's schemes. You declare it out loud. Say it out loud. There's power in saying it out loud. There's power in that. Make it your daily stand of resistance. I love that. That's taking action. That's doing something. That's not standing in the yard leaning on a shovel praying for a hole. Right? That's doing something. That's doing something. Taking a stand, resisting. We also need to shut the door to self-reliance. John fifteen, verse five. This is what it says. Apart from me, you can do what? Apart from me, you can do what? Apart from God, you can do nothing. Sometimes our greatest distraction isn't external, it's internal. It's pride, it's plans we make, it's performance that can keep us from surrender. But when we shut the door to all that, we step away from self-sufficiency and lean into God's sufficiency. We have to shut the door on that. I hate asking for help. I do. I hate it. I will struggle mightily for something by myself. Now, if somebody comes along and says, ⁓ let me give you a hand with that, I'll probably do that. But if they if I if they call me, hey, you need a hand with that? Nah, I'm good. That's foolishness. I get prideful that way. I don't need that. No, I need God. If God's gonna put somebody in my life to help me, then I need that. But apart from God, you can do nothing. So close that door on pride. Close that door on pride. Because when we close that door, when we when we shut out. Self-reliance, behind that closed door, we discover our open dependence to God. Close the door, open up dependence. I pray this prayer every morning on my way here or wherever I'm going. I say this exact thing. Lord, I can't do this by myself. I need you today. I need you today. And I say it out loud, I declare it out loud because I want. I want to I want to make it a point, right? Just like I when I pray, I say, Lord, save me from myself. I am my own worst enemy at times. Right, dear? That was right. Shut the door on self-reliance. Apart from God, you can do nothing. So, what are we going to do this week? We're going to begin each week, each day, with a simple prayer of surrender. God, I can't do this without you. So we'll start inviting God. To lead you before you start all your tasks, whatever they might be. Lord, I don't know how to how to run administratively through administration. I don't how to do that. Help show me the way. Put people in my life who show me whatever it is. Right? Invite them into your life every day. We also want to make sure we shut the door to open your heart to God's presence. Psalm 91, verse 1. Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. Paint that picture. Think about that. Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. And that's that's so comforting to me, right? If I can dwell with God, if I can. The same spirit that rose Jesus from the dead lives in you. We say that all the time, but I want you to believe that. Take heart to that. Hold on to that. Understand that. Believe that. See, the secret place isn't just about shutting things out. It's about inviting someone in. It's about taking a look at God's presence and found find it in the quiet. God's presence isn't found in the chaos. You know, we're discussing something today, and we said this this God's home, God's place is not a place of chaos. It's a place of order and discipline. It's a place of submission. God's home is not a place of chaos and disorder and and shouting and craziness, right? It's a place of dwelling. So think about that. When you shut that door, Close that door to distraction. Open your door to an encounter with God. Why did you come here tonight? Did you come here tonight just to hear some words? Or did you come here tonight to encounter the Holy Spirit? Because I'm just going to tell you: if you're just coming to hear words, there's more than that here. Come for an encounter. Worship is an encounter. You know, one of the biggest compliments I give our worship team all the time, because it's true, they work so Hard to do what they do. Let me tell you, they work very hard. A lot of discipline required to do what they do, but they make it look effortless. Why? Because they don't want to distract you from worship. They're leading a ministry. They're not playing music, they're leading a ministry. And when they do that, they're helping shut the door out to the distractions. You can just be there and you can worship in your in your little spa. I have to be careful on the end because my great friend was walking up to get some prayer, and I almost threw a backhand. I gotta be careful. But man, shut the door out to those distractions. Open the door to an encounter. And look, I'm not trying to try to beat you up with that, but I want you to come. I want you to enjoy an encounter with God. Because I will tell you, until I had a true encounter with the Holy Spirit, I never really was truly free. Once that began to happen, man, true freedom came. I understood that submission wasn't. vulnerability. I understood that it wasn't weakness to need God. All those things. So may I encourage you, come to an encounter with God. Shut the distractions out. Examine your heart. So I'm gonna challenge you. Set aside 10 to 15 minutes each day to simply be still in God's presence. Don't just talk all the time to God. I love you. But sometimes we do that, don't we? Thank you for this, thank you for this. Here's what I need. Baba boom, ba boom, ba boom, ba boom. Right? Wait a minute. Communication runs two ways. God wants to talk to you. He wants to speak to you. He wants to speak life into you. He wants to speak love into you. We have to take the time to listen to that. Shut out those distractions. Take 10 to 15 minutes. Hey, I encourage you to do longer, but at least take 10 to 15 minutes to simply be still in his presence. No requests, no agenda. Just sit quietly, breathe, and let him fill the room with his spirit, with his presence. Have that encounter. Doesn't have to just happen here. It can happen anywhere. God's with you wherever you go. He will never leave you, nor forsake you, nor abandon you as an orphan. Loves you. So wherever you're at, take the time, take the time to have an encounter. So this week, silence. Speak God's word and surrender daily in the secret place. Find that place. Intentionally find a place where you can shut the door to the world. You can shut the door to outside distractions, and you can invite in the Holy Spirit of God. You can have time with our living God. This is not a book of old times. This is a living, breathing text that's relevant now as it ever was. And to get into it and to get to God's word, you will find relevance in your life. So I encourage you. When you shut that door, you're not just keeping things out, you're inviting God in. So this week, shut the door daily. Silence the world. Resist the enemy, and surrender yourself fully to the Father who sees in secret. He already knows your heart. He already knows your moves. He wants time with you. He wants time with you. Father, today we choose to shut the door to the noise of this world. We choose to shut the door to the lies of the enemy. We choose to shut the door to the pride of self-reliance, Lord. In the secret place we seek you. We surrender our distractions, our fears, and our own strength, God. God, we we declare that apart from you we can do nothing. Lord, speak to us in the quiet. Speak to us in the quiet. Strengthen us in the battle. Draw us closer to your heart. Heavenly Father, may this week not be marked by not by the voices around us, but by the voice of our Father within us. Lord, thank you for those who took the time to fill out these prayer cards. Thank you that we have the honor of being able to go to you to intercede. on behalf of those who have needs. So Lord, I lift up all these needs to you tonight. And there are many. But I thank you, I thank you that we can go to the quiet place and we can shut the door on distraction. I thank you that the enemy has no authority in our lives. I thank you, God, that you're a God who loves, a God who listens. I thank you that you're a God of the infinite, but you're a God of the smallest detail. Lord, I lift up any marriage, any and all marriages to you tonight. Well I I Thank you for marriage. I thank you for relationship. I lift up any marriage that they would point themselves to you first. If there's hurt that there would be healing, I lift up anybody who's feeling alone. Feeling lonely, Lord I lift them up that they would they would they would feel your presence, they would feel your healing heart as you surround them, as you surround them with your love. A love that no worldly love could ever compete with. And I thank you for that. I lift up any unspoken need here tonight, any heaviness. That weighs on the heart, any heaviness that weighs on the soul. And Lord, I I just pray that that anyone suffering in that way, whatever unspoken request they had, whatever chains are weighing them down, that you would break those chains and you would deliver true freedom. True freedom. Lord, we love you. No one else is worthy of Of our love. Lord, we we humble ourselves before you. We don't deserve what you did for us. But we thank you that you did it. We thank you that through you we can be free. I pray for this entire community. Is there anyone out there that's never heard your word or felt your peace? That they would hear the truth, that they would feel your peace. Lord, give us all the strength to stand and resist. And to speak the truth. You are the truth. So give us the strength to do that. And Lord, we lift all of this. We thank and praise you in the mighty, matchless name of the beginning, of the end, of all, the great healer, the great provider. We lift all of that in the name of Jesus Christ. And we all agreed together and said, Amen. Thanks for listening to the Faith Alive Sermon Podcast. We hope this message encouraged you. If it did, be sure to share it with someone else who may need it. Or if you want to reach out to one of our pastors or staff, go to our website at faithalive.church. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss a message. We'll see you next time.

Matthew 6:6 James 4:7 Psalms 91:1