Sermon

VALLEYS: Valley of Heartbreak | Pastor Lance Morris | 8-31-25

Refuge Church – Sunday Messages

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  1. Hey, I'm really excited to be here with y'all this morning.

  2. I for those of y'all who don't know who I am, I should

  3. introduce myself, right? That's polite.

  4. I'm Lance Morris. I'm the youth director.

  5. Oh, wow. Pause.

  6. Stop. Whoa.

  7. Pastor. Now I'm the youth pastor.

  8. And the. I know.

  9. That's really weird. The offer still stands.

  10. I do weddings. Now I can, I'm actually really

  11. nervous to do a wedding, if I can be very honest with you

  12. guys. But I'm the the youth and the

  13. creative pastor here and I have been tasked to continue the

  14. Valley Series. Have y'all been, have y'all been

  15. like in the Valley series? Good.

  16. Yeah. It's tough, man.

  17. It's tough when you when you talk about a whole series of

  18. being in the Valley, it's like, oh, that's got some weight to

  19. it. You know what I mean?

  20. And I've been tasked with an equally weighty sermon of

  21. preaching the Valley of Heartbreak.

  22. Yeah. I hope y'all are.

  23. Hope y'all are ready for this one.

  24. But just as a preface and to just be very upfront and very

  25. honest, this will be a hard message this week.

  26. As I have been preparing, I have been Uber weepy.

  27. Like I'm just in my office. Like as I'm typing this message

  28. out and as I've been praying and it's I want you to, I want to

  29. preface all of this before we get into it because while I have

  30. been weepy, I feel like the Lord has called me to say some, some

  31. very tough love things this morning.

  32. So I want y'all to, I want you to hear my heart real quick

  33. before we get into it. I'm not standing up here as an

  34. emotionally distant person who's like, I know you need to know to

  35. be better. I'm up here sharing with you the

  36. very things that God has shared with me and the very things I

  37. have to hold myself accountable to as well.

  38. OK? Because heartbreak's inevitable.

  39. I would love to stand up here and go give your life to the

  40. Lord. Heartbreak will never happen

  41. again. Right on.

  42. You know, I would love to be able to say that to you, but if

  43. you've read the Bible to any capacity, you know, heart breaks

  44. a reality of living in a fallen world.

  45. It's a reality. And it's not even just a reality

  46. that we read Scripture where God's hearts, his heart is God's

  47. heart is broken for his people too.

  48. And there's this beautiful tension that we kind of have to

  49. hold with God, where it's like, God, you authored emotions like

  50. sadness and anger into us. So how do I walk through this

  51. sadness and this anger? Because I'm going to be honest

  52. with you guys. When you walk through

  53. heartbreak, are y'all happy about it?

  54. Anybody here happy about it? You're like, praise the Lord, my

  55. heart's broken, praise the Lord. No one's like that, right?

  56. You're sad, you're angry, you're anxious, you're depressed.

  57. That's heartbreak, right? Anyone in here got broken up

  58. with in high school? You feel what I'm saying here,

  59. right? You get it?

  60. I walk with students through that and it's I feel really bad.

  61. There's one time I had a student, it was Christmas Eve.

  62. He came up to me and he's like, hey, my girlfriend just broke up

  63. with me, blah, blah, blah, blah. Me and my infinite wisdom.

  64. I turned and I looked at him. I said we weren't going to marry

  65. here. So who?

  66. What's the big deal? Merry Christmas.

  67. Merry Christmas. Yeah, it was a lot of fun.

  68. We're sitting. I was working the the I was

  69. greeting at the front door then, too, and it was right in front

  70. of everybody. That student still, he's a

  71. volunteer now. I actually shout out.

  72. I guess I didn't hurt his feelings too bad.

  73. Praise the Lord. I have put my foot in my mouth

  74. more times than I would love to tell you guys about.

  75. But hey, as we are entering into this sermon, I'm going to stop

  76. telling you dumb stories. I want to pay honor to some.

  77. I want to kind of pay a little bit of honor to somebody.

  78. It's so cool that God will speak to us in all kinds of ways and

  79. there is nothing outside of of God's control.

  80. This week I was scrolling on Instagram, which you can kill me

  81. for it, it's fine. I'll stand on this hill all day.

  82. Instagram Reels is better than TikTok.

  83. OK, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you, Toby.

  84. I see you, buddy. So much better.

  85. OK, when I'm on TikTok, I feel like I'm scrolling through team

  86. news website. It's like, this is gross.

  87. This is gross. It feels gross.

  88. Anyways, I was scrolling through Instagram reels and I saw a

  89. sermon snippet from Pastor Tim Keller.

  90. And you know, when I, I, I heard it and I was like immediately

  91. put my heresy hunter hat on and we're like, is what you're

  92. saying true? And I went and I scrolled, it

  93. was talking about Job and he scrolled through And I sure

  94. enough, that man, that Pastor Tim Keller was right.

  95. And I want to pay honor to him because there was a lot of

  96. influence that that little one minute snippet had on what I'm

  97. about to preach to you all this morning.

  98. And I want to pay honor to him. OK.

  99. And I also at the same time want to say there's no such thing as

  100. a new sermon. If you, if a pastor comes up

  101. here, up here and goes, I have brand new revelation.

  102. Walk out, walk out. The church has been around for

  103. 2000 years. God's Word has been being

  104. preached for 2000 years. And I promise you in the year of

  105. 2025, no one's coming up here going.

  106. I figured something out that all the church fathers before me

  107. didn't like. They didn't know that's not how

  108. this works. OK, so cool.

  109. We we cool with that. All right, if you got your

  110. Bibles open up with me, we're going to be in Job chapter 3.

    Job 3 chapter mention

  111. We're actually in a couple different places, but we're

  112. going to start off in Job chapter 3.

    Job 3 chapter mention

  113. It's only fitting that we read through a little bit of job

  114. talking about heartbreak, right? Anybody in here know if you know

  115. who Job is? You know, right.

  116. But I'm going to give you some context before we really start

  117. reading through this this chapter 3, these little section

  118. in chapter 3. So Job, and this is what the

  119. Bible is saying of Job. He was a very righteous and

  120. upright man, OK? So much so that Job would

  121. OfferUp sacrifices just in case his kids send like this is how

  122. much he feared and he loved the Lord that like he was literally

  123. like, OK, Lord, my kids may have sinned and they may not have

  124. known that they sinned. I'm going to OfferUp extra

  125. sacrifices to you. And so you read about how holy

  126. or not holy, he's not holy, how righteous and upright Joe was in

  127. the eyes of God. And then you also read how

  128. wealthy Job was. Job was a very, very wealthy

  129. man, wealthy and livestock. Like he had like thousands of

  130. camels and different stuff like that.

  131. Like what do you do with camels other than ride them?

  132. You know what I mean? But like he's got other

  133. livestock too. And he's you read about how

  134. wealthy Job is and then you Fast forward later in chapter 1 and

  135. it's like the, it's like if sitcoms like instead of like it

  136. being funny, it was just like horror, right?

  137. Like sit horror, I guess. I don't know.

  138. And it's like 1 dude, one of his servants walked in and said,

  139. dude, your livestock's dead. And then another guy walks in

  140. and goes and your kids are dead. And another guy walks in and

  141. goes and more of your livestock are dead.

  142. And it's like, dude, it's literally in the Bible.

  143. It's like 1 after the other. They come walking in going

  144. everything you have is gone, dude, it's gone.

  145. And then we find out, right? We find out I'm reading Job

    Job 1 chapter mention

  146. chapter 1, that God is in heaven and the angels come before him

  147. and Satan comes with the angels. And it's so silly the

  148. conversation, like I just kind of play it out in my head.

  149. I'm a visual person. So when I'm reading the Bible,

  150. like I'm seeing it, right? I'm seeing it through through my

  151. lens of like my life, right? And Satan walks in and God looks

  152. at him and goes where you been? And Satan goes around read it.

  153. Read it. Where you been, Satan?

  154. Oh, I've been coming to and fro upon the face of the earth.

  155. It's like, Satan, are you trying to be cute, dude?

  156. Like, what the heck? And God's asking that question

  157. not because he doesn't know, but because I guess I don't know why

  158. God asked him that question, to be perfectly honest with you,

  159. right? And then immediately, you know

  160. what God says you're a thought about my friend Job.

  161. It's like, oh God, you just do that, dude.

  162. Underneath the bus, right? Well, really.

  163. So what does, what does Satan do here on earth?

  164. What he steals, kills and destroys.

  165. And So what God knew is that Satan is going to and fro on the

  166. earth looking to steal, kill and destroy.

  167. Here's the thing that we have to know about Satan, though.

  168. Satan is not the omnis, right? He's not everywhere all the

  169. time. He's not all knowledgeable.

  170. I'm missing 1. And we'll just say all the

  171. omnis, omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient.

  172. Thank you. That's why I just say all the

  173. omnis, Satan has to be somewhere at a specific time, OK?

  174. He's not this. He's like all knowledgeable, you

  175. know what I mean? He's like, I know what's going

  176. on in your head, Taylor. I see you, you know, like he's

  177. not doing that right. So he's going.

  178. The silly conversation plays out and God goes, Ever thought about

  179. my friend Job? I'm going to be honest with you.

  180. That's scary. And then we read about

  181. everything that happens to Job, how a gust of wind goes by and a

  182. house collapses on all of his kids as they're eating.

  183. We read of Raiders who come in and pillage and and steal off

  184. all of his lives a livestock. We read about all these things.

  185. And then as you would it, only it gets worse.

  186. After all that happens, Satan does the same thing again,

  187. acting all cute with God, right? He goes up while the angels are

  188. presenting themselves to God and Satan's there and her.

  189. He shows up with them and God goes where you been around and

  190. God again goes, you ever thought about Job and this is where

  191. Satan takes it up a notch. She goes, I guarantee you,

  192. guarantee you when I'm done, he's going to turn and curse you

  193. to your face, meaning he's going to walk away from you and curse

  194. you. And God goes, OK, he won't, but

  195. OK, so Satan comes down and he has sores from the the soles of

  196. his feet to the crown of his head.

  197. So this man can't sit because that hurts.

  198. He can't lay down because that hurts and he can't do anything

  199. standing it all, all of it hurts to the point where he's sitting

  200. there with, with, with shards of pot.

  201. Not not pot, right? Like pot like as in like clay

  202. pots, right? Shards of clay pots that have

  203. been dipped in ashes. And he's scraping the sores.

  204. Yeah, I know. It's pretty gross, right?

  205. Because these were like more like boils, right?

  206. Like there, there is pus on the inside of them and he's scraping

  207. them and his wife. And again, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm

  208. giving you context because I, I'm a creative person.

  209. So I use a lot of Photoshop and stuff and I love textures.

  210. And what I believe is that context give us, gives us

  211. texture for what God's doing. So I could just read chapter 3

  212. and you'd kind of understand. But I want to give you guys as

  213. much context as possible because I think it's important for us to

  214. understand context when we read the Bible.

  215. When we lose context, that's when you can take the Bible and

  216. make it say whatever you want it to say.

  217. And I ain't about that. I am not about that.

  218. So Job's wife comes to him and goes, dude, just curse the Lord

  219. and die already. Kids died, livestock died.

  220. He's got, he literally has nothing.

  221. And then his wife's like, dude just freaking die.

  222. Just do it, dude. Like curse the Lord and die.

  223. And that's where we pick up in Chapter 3.

  224. After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth.

  225. And Job said, Let the day perish on which I was born in that

  226. night, in the night that said a man is conceived, let that day

  227. be darkness. May God above not seek it, nor

  228. light shine upon it. Let gloom in deep darkness claim

  229. it. Let clouds dwell upon it.

  230. Let the blackness of the day terrify it.

  231. Aren't y'all glad y'all came to church that night?

  232. Let thick darkness seize it. Let it not rejoice amongst the

  233. days of the year. Let it not come into the number

  234. of the months. Behold, let that night be

  235. barren. Let no joyful cry enter.

  236. I would say Job's not happy. Anybody disagree?

  237. Right on. Job's not happy to the point

  238. where he's like, Lord, I wish I would have never ever, ever been

  239. born the day I was born. I pray it is blotted out.

  240. I pray it was nothing but darkness.

  241. I pray I never later on he goes, I pray it never came out of my

  242. mother's womb like he. This dude is just lamenting and

  243. going, father, please no, right, rightfully so.

  244. You can't stand, you can't sit. You lost everything and your

  245. wife said to curse the Lord and die.

  246. And then we read also in Job further on, he's got three

  247. friends and his three friends come to him.

  248. They are Elfaz, Bildad and Zofar.

  249. Those are crazy names. My wife's not here.

  250. I was going to ask if we can name our next child Zofar, but

  251. I'm willing to bet she's going to say no.

  252. They come and they sit with him for seven days, right?

  253. And then when they come and they sit with him for seven days,

  254. they're silent, right? They're just there with him,

  255. right? Sometimes you just need a friend

  256. that's going to come and just sit with you.

  257. You don't need them to try to tell you it's going to be OK,

  258. but you need somebody who's just going to sit there and be in the

  259. muck with you, right? So they do for seven days.

  260. And then his friends start getting frustrated with job.

  261. And they're like, job, dude, you must have done something wrong.

  262. And Job's like, I haven't, I've been, I've been sacrificing like

  263. I didn't do anything like like I, I promise you, I haven't

  264. sinned against the Lord. And so not only is Job has he

  265. lost everything, Job is now having to like practically like

  266. argue with his friends, debate team style on Hey, man, I

  267. promise. Like I haven't sinned.

  268. And his friends are straight up accusing him and they're pulling

  269. all the things out the book. They're pulling it all out.

  270. They're pulling scripture out to go.

  271. Dude, we promised you sinned, man, and this wouldn't happen if

  272. you didn't sin. And Job's like I didn't.

  273. I didn't sin. And then later on in Job, you

  274. read that Job calls God's judgement and his plan into

  275. account. Job goes, God, I I don't

  276. understand why you've done this to me.

  277. I don't get it. Why have you done this to me?

  278. And that's why I want to pick up again if you can move with me in

  279. your Bibles. Job chapter 38 verses one

    Job 38 chapter mention

  280. through 7. Keep in mind these last 35

  281. chapters is Job arguing with his friends and not only just

  282. arguing with his friends, he's lamenting and telling the Lord,

  283. I wish I had never been born. And now finally the Lord speaks

  284. and this is crazy to me, dude, this is insane.

  285. First off, I love God's word. I love God's word, man.

  286. It's we're undeserving of a God who would give us his word that

  287. would be so clear with us as to who he is in his word.

  288. We're undeserving of that. And so this is a book that we

  289. should cherish. His words are things that we

  290. should cherish. And verse verse 1 of chapter 38,

  291. who is this who obscures my plans with words without

  292. knowledge? Brace yourself like a man.

  293. Boy howdy, I will question you and you shall answer me.

  294. Pause. You know what God's doing here.

  295. God is calling Job into account. He's like, oh, you're going to

  296. call, We'll pause. Hey, you're going to call me

  297. into account for why I did what I did?

  298. Job, let me call you in for account.

  299. That's what that's what God's saying.

  300. Here He goes. Well, you questioned my plans.

  301. I'm going to call you to account now.

  302. That's where we're going to pick up in verse 4.

  303. Where were you when I when I laid the earth's foundations?

  304. Tell me if you understand who marked off its dimension.

  305. Dimensions. Surely you know who stretched A

  306. measuring line across it on what were its footings set, or who

  307. laid its cornerstone while the morning stars sang together and

  308. all the angels shouted for joy? Talk about being humbled.

  309. Boy howdy, that's just the catch phrase of this morning.

  310. I guess God in these verses are like, oh, you're going to call

  311. me into question. Well, let me call you into into

  312. question. Where were you?

  313. Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?

  314. Where were you at? And God keeps going on and keeps

  315. talking to him and keeps saying all these things.

  316. And I get it. It may sound like a crazy thing

  317. to, to say to somebody that you had just allowed Satan to in a

  318. way kind of torture and take everything away from.

  319. But I want to read one more passage to you.

  320. It's going to be 41 through 10. We're reading a lot of scripture

  321. this morning. I'm not sorry because I the

  322. Scripture is so it's just super important.

  323. This is the way that we get to know who God is through his

  324. word, right? This is one of the ways that he

  325. speaks to us. I want to read one more passage

  326. and I want to start connecting dots.

  327. OK, so I'm just kind of putting some dots out there.

  328. I promise I'm going to wrap it up with a nice little bow, but I

  329. need to give you all the context before we start connecting dots.

  330. Verse 40 or sorry, chapter 42, verse one.

  331. Then Job replied to the Lord. Pause real quick.

  332. Sorry, more context as I'm reading.

  333. I'm like, Mom, I need to tell you more things.

  334. This is the first time that Job is talking to God.

  335. After God goes through. Where were you after God says

  336. all these things? This is the first.

  337. This is the first reply that Job has to God.

  338. Then Job replied to God. I know that you can do all

  339. things. No purpose of yours can be

  340. thwarted. You asked who is this that

  341. obscures my plans without knowledge?

  342. Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too

  343. wonderful, wonderful for me to know.

  344. Job right now is repenting. I want y'all to see that you

  345. said. Listen now and I will speak.

  346. I will question you and you shall answer me.

  347. My ears have heard of you, but now my eyes have seen you.

  348. Therefore I despise myself, and I repent in dust and ashes.

  349. After the Lord had said these things to Job, he said to

  350. Eliphaz the Temenite, I'm angry with you and your two friends

  351. because you have not spoken the truth about me as my servant

  352. Job. As my servant Job has pause,

  353. pause, pause, pause, pause, wait, wait.

  354. So God here is saying, Hey Job, you question my plans.

  355. That's not cool, buddy. I'm just going to lay it out for

  356. you. And not only am I going to lay

  357. it out for you. I also still view you as upright

  358. and righteous even in the midst of practically 35 chapters of

  359. him mully grubbing and saying God why this hurts.

  360. I wish I was never born Eliphaz, you're wrong, right?

  361. Like I didn't stand out. Like in the process of all of

  362. this, God still just, he still looks at Job as righteous and

  363. upright. Can I present something to you

  364. this morning? God is not scared of your

  365. emotions, and He's definitely not scared of your words.

  366. Do you know why Job was seen as still righteous and upright in

  367. God's eyes? Because even in the midst of

  368. complaining, he never turned his back.

  369. Sure, he complained to God, He questions God, He questioned

  370. God's, God's plans, but he never turned his back on God.

  371. He never cursed God to his face like Satan said he would.

  372. That's why God still sees him as upright.

  373. Hold that and put a little dot in your head.

  374. OK, right. We're going to we're I'm going

  375. to keep reading verse 8. So now take 7 bulls, 7 Rams and

  376. go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for

  377. yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you

  378. and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to

  379. your folly. You have not spoken the truth

  380. about me as my servant Job has. So Eliphaz the Temenite, Bildad

  381. the shoe height. I hope I said that right.

  382. And so far, the Namathite did what the Lord told them, and the

  383. Lord accepted Job's prayer. I want, I want to, I want to

  384. show you all this through line that's happening here.

  385. In the midst of loss and in the midst of heartbreak, Job

  386. complained to the Lord. He went even as far as

  387. questioning the Lord, but the Lord still viewed him his

  388. upright. And then when the Lord came and

  389. said, Hey, dude, where were you when I laid the foundations of

  390. this earth? Where, where were you?

  391. And really in that, in that God is proving the point of hey,

  392. dude, I know more than you. I see things ready for this.

  393. I see things through the lens of eternity, not just your time on

  394. earth. And so you're calling me into

  395. question. The person who knew before there

  396. was a thing and I will know after there were ever after

  397. there will ever be a thing. You're calling me in the

  398. question. But even in the midst of all of

  399. that, God still viewed Job as righteous and upright.

  400. Can I present something to you this morning, Church?

  401. God is looking at your life through the lens of eternity,

  402. not just through your life here on earth.

  403. Do you know what we as believers in Jesus, do you know what we

  404. have for eternity? Relationship with the Father.

  405. And this is the part where I'm going to present something

  406. pretty heavy to you. Y'all cool with that?

  407. If God never did another thing for you, relationship with Him

  408. for eternity is vastly more than you ever deserve.

  409. A lot of times when we enter into heartbreak and we enter

  410. into seasons of loss, we like to question God.

  411. But not only question God, we start to ask the questions.

  412. Why would a good God allow something bad to happen?

  413. Why would he allow that to happen to me?

  414. And we start getting into this cycle of stinking thinking where

  415. it's like, why would God allow bad things to happen to me?

  416. I've done all the things right. Joe did all the things right.

  417. He was a righteous and upright man.

  418. That's what he was known for. But The thing is, is God isn't

  419. looking at you through the lens of just your time here on earth.

  420. Because if that was the case, your time on here on earth would

  421. be phenomenal. Then what would happen after you

  422. died? It's like, God, buddy, that's

  423. out of my jurisdiction. No, he looks at you through the

  424. lens of eternity because he's like, listen, dude, I know I get

  425. it. You live in a fallen world.

  426. It's really unfortunate. But I gave you the free will.

  427. I gave Adam and Eve the free will to be able to make that

  428. level of decision. And that's what happened.

  429. And because I'm a good and loving Father, I'm going to

  430. allow this to play out. But even in the midst of

  431. allowing it to play out, I'm still going to be there for you.

  432. I'm still going to supply you with the strength to keep going.

  433. In the valley of the shadow of death.

  434. I will fear no evil for your rod and your staff will comfort me.

  435. Church, is eternity enough for you?

  436. If God never delivered what you're praying for right now,

  437. would eternity still be enough for you?

  438. Is relationship with the Father is that enough for you?

  439. Is the Holy Spirit living inside of you?

  440. Is that enough for you? It's a tough question and again,

  441. this is hard, so please don't think that I'm up here as an

  442. emotionally distant person that's just telling you what to

  443. do and you should be more like me.

  444. That's not the case. I think everyone in this room,

  445. if we're to really go around and start to get real with each

  446. other, I think every single person in this room has

  447. experienced heartbreak. Every single one of us.

  448. We've had some kind of loss in our lives, some kind of bad

  449. thing, some kind of whatever, you name it, something has

  450. happened because we live in a fallen world.

  451. And I want to be so sensitive to that.

  452. And at the same time, Church, I don't want us to lose sight of

  453. eternity. James 414 Yet you do not know

  454. what tomorrow will bring. What is your life?

  455. For you are a mist that appears for a little time, then

  456. vanishes. Church, I want to present this

  457. to you. Please, please, please, please

  458. hear me. Please hear me, if you are in

  459. the middle of the valley of heartbreak, the only way out of

  460. it is surrender. Not surrendering to the world,

  461. it's surrendering to God and going, dude, I told you I gave

  462. my life to you. I told you that I made you Lord

  463. of my life. That verse where it says though

  464. I shall walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall

  465. fear no evil. Your rod and your staff shall

  466. comfort me. That whole chapter is about how

  467. God is a Good Shepherd. Are you cool if your shepherd

  468. leads you into a valley of heartbreak?

  469. Are you cool if he leads you through it?

  470. Church, I don't want us to lose sight of eternity.

  471. The battles already won. That doesn't mean that there

  472. isn't going to be loss along the way.

  473. But church, we're going to be in heaven one day with God where

  474. there is no loss, there is no heartbreak, there is no

  475. sickness, there is no evil. And it's going to be so awesome

  476. one day when we get to sit at the feet of God and just worship

  477. Him. I don't want you to think that

  478. heaven's just people going like singing the Halo theme song,

  479. right? That's not what this is right?

  480. Worship is so much. I hope some of y'all picked up

  481. on that. OK, thank you.

  482. I was really worried that that wouldn't go over and you're

  483. like, what's Halo? Like the Halo?

  484. No, y'all know. All right, right on.

  485. I'm in a good crowd. So squirrel moment.

  486. I hate that. OK, pull together, Lance.

  487. Worship is so much bigger than just music.

  488. Worship is doing anything for the glory of God and we get to

  489. go to heaven and we get to do all these different things for

  490. the glory of God because guess what?

  491. He's our Father and he loves us. Y'all, He's such a good father.

  492. He's such a good father. That doesn't mean because he's a

  493. good father, only good things are going to happen to you.

  494. But I can tell you this, a good father is going to put purpose

  495. to the heartbreak and revelations.

  496. I believe it's chapter Chapter 11, verse 13 for the testimony

  497. of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

  498. What if you going through heartbreak and a hard season and

  499. a lost season right now? What if that isn't for you?

  500. What if that's for the person next to you that you got to go,

  501. hey, I went through it and I promise you me going through it

  502. and God providing for me, He's going to bring you through it

  503. too. We're called to be ambassadors

  504. of Jesus ambassadors. You know what that means?

  505. We're representatives in a foreign land.

  506. We do not belong to this earth. We don't, we don't belong to

  507. this earth. This earth is not our home.

  508. Praise the Lord, this earth isn't our home.

  509. I'm going to ask another hard question.

  510. I hope none of y'all just start leaving on me, OK?

  511. Have you counted the cost of following Jesus?

  512. Have you counted the cost? He's a good father, but he's a

  513. good father that will walk you through a valley and he'll

  514. comfort you by his correction and his guidance or sorry, his

  515. perfection or pro. Right on.

  516. That's cool. He will comfort you with his

  517. guidance and protection. That's what a rod and a staff

  518. is, right? The rod was to beat off wolves

  519. and beat off bears and bears. Oh my right.

  520. And then the staff was to guide the flock.

  521. Is that comforting to you? I want y'all to notice

  522. something. Job's wife when she came to Job

  523. and said just curse God and die already.

  524. You know that's how Satan comes and talks to us, right?

  525. We're when we're in a valley of loss.

  526. Hey bro, just just go drink. You already lost them.

  527. Who cares? Hey, just just go back.

  528. Just hey, that that addiction that you, that you've been

  529. fighting for 20 years, that you've, that you've seen victory

  530. in, hey, just go back. You've already lost it all.

  531. Who cares? Just do it.

  532. Why not? Hey man, just go check out.

  533. You've already lost everything. That's how Satan talks to us.

  534. Church, I want to present something to you this morning as

  535. we are about to go into a a time of response.

  536. What I feel like is the Lord wants, He wants something very

  537. specific from us. He wants our surrender because

  538. when we say that Lord that, that Jesus is Lord of our lives, that

  539. he's Lord of everything. And not only is he just Lord of

  540. everything, He's Lord of the valleys and the mountain tops.

  541. That's what he's the Lord of. He's the Lord of everything.

  542. And the only way that you're going to be able to make it out

  543. of a heartbreak valley, a heartbreak season, is just

  544. surrendering and going, Lord, it's yours.

  545. Come what may, I don't care, but it's yours.

  546. And I'm going to follow you this morning.

  547. Can we enter into this time of response with surrender in our

  548. hearts going, Lord, it's yours. If that new job never happens,

  549. Father, for you, for God be the glory.

  550. If loss is the reality in which I have to live by, for God be

  551. the glory. If I lose everything for God be

  552. the glory. That's so hard.

  553. Like I can't imagine the like Peter, right?

  554. Peter was like crucified upside down and he's like for God be

  555. the glory. I can't be crucified like my

  556. savior did put me upside down, big dog.

  557. I'm not worthy of that. Let me read about these people

  558. who love the Lord so much that they're like, everything's on

  559. the table for this guy. Everything is church.

  560. Can we, can we do that? Can we surrender?

  561. Can we have that level of surrender where it's like, Lord,

  562. if you lead me there, I'll go through it.

  563. I promise I love you. I'll do it.

  564. You just take, you told me jump. I promise I'll jump.

  565. You just got to tell me where you want me to go.

  566. Church. That comes from fearing the

  567. Lord. It's not fear as in Almighty

  568. Snyder. It's like like fear as in Lord,

  569. I respect you and I know the power in which you hold.

  570. I know I know what you I I I know you and I know what you can

  571. do. It's what job is saying here in

  572. in verse 42. He goes, I know that you can do

  573. all things. No purpose of yours can be

  574. thwarted. Church this morning, can we

  575. enter into this time of response with surrender in our hearts?

  576. Because I know that during seasons where the Lord may be

  577. moving you around or seasons where there's heartbreak, we

  578. almost try to bargain with God. Well God, but if if you would

  579. just bring XYZ back or to fix XYZ, I'll do XYZ.

  580. The Lord isn't looking for that. He's not looking for your

  581. actions. He's looking for your heart.

  582. Is your heart surrendered to him?

  583. Is everything surrendered to Him?

  584. What if he asked for more time during your week?

  585. What if he asked you to sell your house?

  586. What if he asked? I don't know.

  587. Honestly. For you, for everyone, it's

  588. different. What if he asked you to give up

  589. a relationship? What if he asked you to give up

  590. your pride? Is His sovereignty and His

  591. Holiness not enough? Is eternity with a Father not

  592. enough for you to give those things up?

  593. I play, I present all these things.

  594. Not because you know, for giggles, I guess I want to

  595. present these things to you because what happens is I don't

  596. want us to be complacent in our walk with Jesus.

  597. I want us to when we are walking with the Lord, I want us to be

  598. fully abandoned going Father, it's your will, not mine.

  599. I just want to follow you. I'm going to leave you all with

  600. a really cool scripture here. It's First Corinthians chapter 2

    1 Corinthians 2:9

  601. verse 9. But as it was written, what no

  602. eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man, imagine what

  603. God has prepared for those who love him.

  604. If you are walking through loss and you're walking through

  605. heartbreak, please understand my heart is with you.

  606. I've been weeping for you all week.

  607. But I also really want you to see this too because too

  608. brighter days are coming and even if they're not here on

  609. earth, brighter days are coming. Unity.

  610. We're going to have unity with our Father in heaven one day.

  611. Like how crazy is that? I'm going to pray prayer team.

  612. If you'd start making your way up.

  613. We're about to go into a time of response, guys.

  614. And I, I want to encourage y'all with something as we go into

  615. this time of response. I want to discourage the, the

  616. leaving. I want to encourage y'all to sit

  617. on the altar of your heart and to go, Lord, what do I need to

  618. surrender to you today? What do I need to give you?

  619. The altars are open, right? You can come up here.

  620. You can just lay flat on your face.

  621. No one's going to judge you. I may walk around and pray for

  622. you, but I with with 0 hesitation guarantee that

  623. everyone in this room has something to surrender to the

  624. Lord today. For me, I have to surrender

  625. wanting to know it all because it consumes my mind thinking

  626. about all the little things. Well Lord, what if you do this?

  627. What if you do that? Everyone in this room has

  628. something to surrender. I'm going to be kind of bold

  629. here. So it hurts your feelings.

  630. I'm sorry if you walk out of here without surrendering

  631. something to the Lord. I want you to.

  632. I'm just, I would ask you that is your heart.

  633. Heart is your heart hardened to him.

  634. Cool beans, Father, we love you. Jesus, during this time of

  635. response, I ask that you would give that you would give us the

  636. boldness to surrender to you. Holy Spirit, I ask that you'd

  637. come and you would sit in this place with us, that your hand

  638. would be heavy, would be so heavy on us that in the midst of

  639. this surrender, Lord, this, this feeling, God, Lord, I know, I

  640. know, I know, I know that there's Father, I know that

  641. there's some people in this room that need to surrender regret to

  642. you. I need to surrender guilt.

  643. Father, I pray that you'd give us the boldness to come up and

  644. pray with somebody or maybe just to lay down on our faces and

  645. just give it to you. Lord, we love you, we love you,

  646. we love you. We thank you so much for your

  647. son and what your son has done. Thank you Jesus.

  648. God, you're so holy. In the mighty name of Jesus, we

  649. pray. Amen.