Greater Vision

Hey everyone, this is Josh from Encounter Church

Henley and thanks so much for tuning into our

podcast. Our prayer is that through this podcast,

you can have an encounter with Jesus that'll

change your life. And now get ready for an inspiring

message from our preaching team. An entire army,

horses and chariots have surrounded them. I know.

What are we going to do? Elisha's servant asks

Elisha, he's petrified, what do we do? You know,

what's visible? An army surrounding them. Yeah,

and that, if I was surrounded by an army that

would make me poop my pants every day of the

week. Like, that's fair. But sometimes what's

visible isn't always what's real. Sometimes what's

visible is an incomplete picture. The Elisha's...

not stressed at all. In fact, he's very calm.

In fact, you could even say that he's confident.

Why? How? Doesn't he realize that he's surrounded

by a massive army that's there to take him? They're

there for him. Well, he probably does know that,

but Elisha is confident because he has greater

vision than his servant. Do not fear, he says,

for there are more with us than there are those

who are against us. There are more on our side

than on theirs. And I'll ask your praise. Lord,

open this servant's eyes so that he may see.

And his servant's eyes aren't opened. And what

does he see? An even bigger army with chariots

of fire. surrounding the army that's surrounding

them. An angelic army. There are more with us

than there are against us. There sure are and

ours are on fire. Metaphorically and literally,

but not in a bad way, like a good way. How can

Elisha face this with such confidence? Because

he has greater vision. His eyes are open. He

can see that the army of fire that is there.

It's not visible to all but it but it's real

That's not until his servants eyes are opened

does the servant know the reason for Elisha's

confidence His servant just had an incomplete

picture of the situation But Elisha knows And

it begs the question. How does Elisha know that

the army is there and how does he know what it

means? Or in second Kings to Elisha's mentor

Elijah is about to be taken up to heaven and

Elijah says to Elisha when tell me what I can

do for you before I'm taken away and Elisha replies,

please let me inherit a double share of your

spirit double portion and become your successor

You have asked a difficult thing Elijah replies

If you see me when I'm taken from you Then you

will get your requests, but if you if not, then

you won't And as they were walking along and

talking suddenly a chariot of fire appeared Drawn

by horses of fire it drove between the two men

separating them and Elijah was carried off in

a whirlwind into heaven Elisha saw it And cried

out my father my father. I see the chariots and

the charioteers of Israel and as they disappeared

from sight Elisha tore his clothes in distress.

Elisha can see this army and he knows what this

army means because he has seen this before. And

it's the fact that he can see this army that

means that God has granted his request for a

double share of his spirit. Now what spirit are

we talking about here? Were you talking about

Elijah's personal spirit? No, Elisha wants a

greater portion of the Spirit of the Lord that

came upon Elijah that activated his ministry.

Elijah has greater vision because he has the

Spirit of God upon him. Elijah can see the heavenly

army because he has God's Spirit upon him. God's

Spirit comes upon some people in some of the

times in the Old Testament. And because he has

God's Spirit he has the capacity to see into

the heavenly realm, into the unseen realm, into

the spiritual reality. He can see both as what

is visible and what is real but unseen. He can

see through heavenly eyes. And friends, that

spirit that's upon Elisha, the Spirit of God,

that gives him greater vision, that allows him

to see the visible and the unseen, this is the

same Spirit that comes upon you and me today

when we believe in Jesus and we ask Him for it.

It's the same spirit that gives Elisha a greater

vision to see through heavenly eyes, gives us

the capacity for the same vision, greater vision.

So that whatever we face, whether there's an

army in front of us, sickness, unemployment,

depression, financial insecurity, addiction or

relationship breakdown, whatever it is that's

in front of us, whatever we face, we can know.

That there is more with us than there is against

us. Or maybe put differently, if God is for us,

who can be against us? This is greater vision.

And as we begin year three of our church, this

is how we multiply resilient disciples. By having

greater vision in our discomfort and our suffering.

That God can use the things we go through to

grow us and to bring glory to His name. This

is how we have hearts on fire for Jesus by trusting

the sometimes unseen hand of God in our struggle

instead of simply what is immediately visible

to us. This is how we let our Sundays invade

our Mondays by living with spiritual eyes open

on Monday at work or uni or by walking into a

room and asking God what He wants you to do in

that room. This is how we become a church that

contends in prayer. by cultivating our capacity

for greater heavenly vision, earnestly pursuing

the spiritual gifts that are available to us

through the Spirit to see and fight and work

effectively in the spiritual realm. This is how

we live Bible -fed and Spirit -led, by growing

a greater vision for our lives fed by Scripture

and alive through the Holy Spirit. Now that's

all good, but I think we actually have a problem

here. It's a problem with the way that we and

many of Christians in the West see the world.

Because we should see the world like Elisha sees

the world. He has the same spirit that we have.

It was available to some for some times. In the

Old Testament it's available to all of us for

our all time here. Living in the New Testament

post Jesus death and resurrection. We should

have eyes to see and ears to hear the greater

reality of what God's doing But so many of us

don't always second -guess it Why do we do this?

Well, it's it's almost like we're collectively

nursing a hangover from the Enlightenment In

the late 17th century the Enlightenment project

kicked off and what it's done is resulted in

the separation of the physical and the spiritual

realms of truth as the default Western understanding

of what is real and what is true. So even for

us today as Christians, we can believe that the

physical world is the realm of fact, it's objective,

it's knowable, seeing is believing, and anything

spiritual is in the realm of opinion, it's subjective,

it's just faith. But there is something different

between what is visible and what is real, sometimes.

And this enlightenment rationalism has created

a Western culture who would look at the story

of Elisha and say, you're surrounded by an army.

You can see them. They're probably hairy, angry.

That's a fact. That's objective. But whether

or not you see a greater army surrounding that

army that you're facing and they're on fire,

well, that's subjective. That's an opinion. You

can't prove that. That's a matter of belief.

But friends, the Bible wholeheartedly rejects

this idea. The Bible does not have subjective

and objective categories. Anyone trying to sort

through fact from myth in the Bible is imposing

modern rules on a text that is not playing by

them. Michael Heiser says this, seeing the Bible

through the eyes of an ancient reader requires

shedding the filters of our traditions and presumptions.

They process life in supernatural terms. Today's

Christian processor by a mixture of credo statements

and modern rationalism The Bible is not trying

to deal with in fact or myth. It's dealing in

knowledge. I want you to get this it's dealing

in knowledge It's trying to convey personal knowledge

of this God through people and culture over thousands

of years through the natural and the supernatural

It's trying to convey humanity's personal encounter.

It's personal knowledge with this God that made

is made most perfectly manifest in Christ Jesus

And this is the problem that we face. This is

one of the biggest problems we face today as

Christians. We have the same spirit as Elisha,

but we get stuck in this trap of living life

rationally, objectively, Monday through to Saturday,

and we let our personal religious opinions and

feelings come out on a Sunday. We get sucked

into living supernatural on Sundays and natural

on Mondays, instead of letting our supernatural

Sundays invade our Mondays. No wonder it feels

so hard. to talk to our friends or colleagues

about our faith. No wonder it feels so hard to

be public as a Christian. No wonder it feels

like we're pulled in every direction away from

faith and church community. We don't feel like

when we talk about our faith, we talk about God,

we talk about Jesus, that we can deal in truth.

We're just dealing in our subjective opinion.

We don't feel like we can share what we know.

About God what we experience because we can't

objectively prove it to those who don't share

But I want you to hear this and I want you to

get this Subjective and objective is a false

dichotomy when it comes to faith. It's a false

dichotomy. They're two things Held against each

other that shouldn't be How do you know something

is true and real use the same muscles you use

to know what's AI or what's real There's a polymath

called Michael Polanyi who called it personal

knowledge. How do you know something is true

and real? You have firsthand personal knowledge

of it. And this enlightenment hangover continues

to sell us this idea that the only knowledge

that counts is objective, measurable, and emotion

free. But that's a very thin view of reality.

The things that matter most, love, meaning, beauty,

trust, calling, we know them personally. through

relationship, through committing, by jumping

in and experiencing them, not just observing

them from a distance. Personal knowledge of God

is what the Bible is actually most interested

in. Now if you're a Christian in this room, whether

you came to faith as an adult like Ash did, or

you grew up in a Christian family like I did,

chances are you are still here, you're still

a Christian because you have personal knowledge

of God. You've had experience with Him. You've

grown to know Him through the Bible. You've had

visions or dreams. You've had prophetic words

for others or others have spoken prophetic words

over you. You get the nudge of voice to the Holy

Spirit to go and speak to this person. Go here.

Check in with them. Go for this job. Stop being

a mean person to your friends. Maybe that's just

me. I get that when I'm hanging out washing.

There are coincidences that we can't explain

in our life if we think about our life story

Someone once said to me coincidence is the language

of God and I think that's so true We have personal

knowledge of God and if you don't it's available

to you through the Holy Spirit We can pray for

you. We want to pray for you For the same spirit

that came upon Elisha would be upon you But friends,

I want you to get this. I would argue that personal

knowledge is the deepest form of knowing anything.

It's the difference between watching basketball

and getting out on the court and playing it.

It's the difference between reading a paper on

gravity and falling out of a tree. It's the difference

between watching Grey's Anatomy and performing

heart surgery. Personal knowledge. If you're

a Christian, you have personal knowledge of God.

And friends, this should make us confident. This

should make us confident and assured. Felicia's

personal knowledge of God in this passage that

we've read today to be so confident. The army

comes to personally kidnap him is to pray. Now,

when a human is faced with significant danger,

our brains go into a defence and survival mechanism

called fight, flight, freeze or fawn. you probably

know these ones well um you know you hit them

you hit them back or you hit them first you you

run away you stay very still or you plead for

your safety Elisha adds a fifth fight flight

freeze fawn and face them down with prayer Elisha

faces an army down with prayer he prays Lord

let let them be struck down with blindness and

they are and he saves the day if you're a believer

in this room I wonder do you have Elisha's confidence

do you have his greater vision you have the same

spirit that within you that Elisha has you can

have it his confidence but friends it also gets

better Can I have the band come back up? Because

it's not just that we can have personal knowledge

of God like Elisha But the God has personal knowledge

of us God is not at a distance cold and rational

God is not objective and God is not just an opinion

flippy floppy Depending on how you feel. God

is not subjective. God is personal. Not only

can you know Him, but He knows you. He knows

everything about you. Why? Because He created

you for a purpose. He made you uniquely you so

that His glory and love could be made manifest

through your life for the sake of the world.

Being most deeply your unique self is something

that God desire Because your true self is grounded

in Christ God created you in uniqueness and seeks

to restore you to that uniqueness in Christ Finding

and living out your true self is fulfilling your

destiny Not only does God invite you into greater

vision through the Holy Spirit of reality, of

what's not just visible but true and there. He

actually has a greater vision for your life.

God has a greater vision for your life than you

will ever have for your own life. If I think

about the things that I wanted to do in my life,

the kind of person I wanted to be before I took

Jesus seriously. The things I wanted to do, the

places I wanted to go, the achievements I wanted

to have. The life that I've actually had in submitting

my life to Jesus blows it away by a factor of

10. God's vision for your life is far greater

than anything you will ever think you want to

do, achieve, hope or dream. He has a greater

vision for your life than you will ever have.

And He has made a way through the cross. to the

cross of Jesus through His blood, by doing away

with our sin and our shame and our guilt, through

opening our eyes, through giving us a gift of

His Spirit, to restore us, to restore you and

me into the woman or the man that God has created

you to be. I wonder, friends, what our lives

would look like if we lived with this kind of

confidence. This greater vision of life. I wonder

how God would use your life. I wonder where he

would take you. I wonder what burdens you carry

that would be lifted off by his greater vision

for your life and letting go of your own vision

for your own life. I wonder what kind of church

encounter Henley would become. If every one of

us, including me, stepped into the greater vision

of Elisha and lived with the supernatural confidence

that God's gonna bring people who are far from

Him into personal knowledge of Him. That God

keeps His promises. That God still heals today.

That He can make this church fruitful. That He

can restore broken relationships. That He can

restore to you the years that the locusts have

stolen. That He can bring peace to this world.

That He can bring justice into your life. That

He can awaken the city of Adelaide of faith.

That He can bring revival and do it again in

our day. That He will bring a multitude out of

the waters of Grange and Henley Beach. having

been baptized, that He will do it. Friends, year

three of Encounter Henley is a year of greater

vision, greater trust, greater faith, greater

confidence in Jesus and what He can and will

do in your life, through your life, through this

church. Through this community, Dave won a shirt

that says, in Henley as it is in heaven. God

can do it. God can make this suburb, Henley and

Grange, a place where his kingdom is. Where his

love, his justice, his reign, his goodness, his

peace could flow out upon. The people who are

far from Him, the people that are hurting, the

people who need to know Him, God can do this.

And we pray that He will. So let's pray together,

friends. God, we pray that You would just come

now in this place. Come Holy Spirit, let us be

more aware of Your Spirit in this room, that

You are always with us, because we have Your

Spirit in us when we have faith in You. But Lord,

let us see Your hand. Open our eyes to the unseen

realm, to the things that go on in the heavenlies

that we do not know or cannot yet see. And that

would fill us with faith and confidence. That

even though we may be surrounded in our lives

with things that scare us, that make us timid,

that distract us. that there is a greater army

that surrounds those things. You are the Lord

of hosts and your army surrounds those things

that surround us. God, thank you that when we

are in you, when we have faith with you, there

is nothing in this world that we need to be afraid

of. There is nothing in this world that we cannot

do. As Paul says, we can do all things through

Christ who gives us strength. We can be rich

or we can be poor. We can be sick or we can be

well. We can be in prosperity or we can be in

poverty. We can be successful or we can feel

like a failure. We can do all things because

your spirit is in us. Because we have your vision.

We see our lives through your eyes and not our

own. So come Holy Spirit, open our eyes today

we pray in the name of Jesus. Thanks so much

for tuning into this week's message. If you felt

challenged or need prayer, we'd love to hear

from you on Instagram at encounterhenny. Or if

you're interested in how you can support this

ministry, please go to our website encounteradelaide

.com .au. Thanks again for listening. God bless

you.