Following Jesus through the Storm | Ps. Keith Pittman

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you for joining us to learn more about Celebration Orlando, a church devoted to reaching the lost, equipping the fountain, and helping the hurting.

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Because we're we're in the very beginning stages of an amazing series called Reclaim.

We we kicked it off last week, and it's it's a series that is near and dear to my heart because it engages things that are important to me and my faith journey.

And that is something that engages my heart, um, that engages my mind and engages my spirit.

Because being a person of faith doesn't mean checking your brain at the door, it means bringing the way that God has wired us, but allowing it to be formed by our faith.

And so this series was one that was going to allow me to lead us on a journey of engaging all of these things.

Um, but I felt a shift, at least for this service.

We we gather together as a staff on Thursday, every Thursday we do this, and it's a time of us talking about the service that we're experiencing right now.

It's also a time where we begin to go over um the prayer requests specifically, the things that are happening in our community that more so gravitate on the side of like, what are the needs, what are the burdens, what's going on, what can we take into prayer?

We we look forward to it.

It's our it's our our weekly staff prayer rhythm.

It's it's grown to be one of my favorite things of all the things that we do.

And in this year, it's been building momentum because now we have a whiteboard in our office and we're writing down these prayer requests.

We have the the names of every single person in our database that's literally printed out, and as we're praying in this time, we're looking at the things that are written down, we're we're looking at the prayer list, we're looking at the different needs, and we're we're just interceding on behalf of our community.

And this is just a part of our regular rhythm.

But but this Thursday specifically felt a little bit different.

There are always meaningful moments in the presence of God.

Um, but but this Thursday specifically, there was a heaviness, there was a there was a burden that was there that felt a little bit more unique than other times.

It's not that the pain was different than other times, but just the culmination of it, it just seemed very weighty.

So as we're all walking and praying and reflecting and processing in this time, I felt like the the Lord had nudged me to go and read this passage that I'm about to read to you, and I shared it with our staff.

I I briefly shared what I felt in the moment was appropriate for us as a staff, and then we went on with the rest of our day.

But I began to feel this stirring that that God wasn't done with that thought.

That the same way that our staff needed to hear it, um, I I believe that that our church needs to hear it.

So this weekend I've been praying and wrestling through, Lord, is this a word for the nine o'clock service?

Is this a word for our 1030 service?

Like, is this a is this a word during a worship moment?

Like, what does that look like?

And and what God told me was to, I'll know when the moment comes.

So I don't know who this is for.

In scripture they call it a Rhema word, which is a moment, spoken word of God.

A prophetic word from God that is meant to meet you where you are and lead you ultimately to where you're supposed to go.

So if this word isn't for you, you can hang out for the 1030 service where I'll preach the other message.

But if this word is for you, I hope that this can be just a little bit of encouragement.

That God would change the plans that we laid out, which I thought were pretty good.

But he wanted you to hear this specifically right now.

If you have your Bibles, I would love to invite you to join me in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 14.

Matthew 14 · chapter mention

This message won't have a lot of notes to it because I just sent these scriptures over to the media team just so we can have something that we can work from.

Verse number 22.

Immediately after this, this is Jesus who's just performed a miracle of multiplying the fish and loaves.

Immediately after this, Jesus insisted that his disciples get back into the boat and cross to the other side of the lake while he sent some people home.

After sending them home, he went upon the hills himself to pray.

Night fell while he was there alone.

Meanwhile, the disciples were in trouble far away from land for a strong wind had risen and they were fighting heavy waves.

About three o'clock in the morning, Jesus came toward them walking on the water.

When the disciples saw him walking on the water, they were terrified and in fear.

They cried out, It's a ghost.

But Jesus spoke to them at once and said, Don't be afraid.

He said, Take courage.

I am here.

Then Peter called out and said, Lord, if it's really you, tell me to come out walking on the water.

Yes, come, Jesus said.

So Peter went over the side of the boat and walked on the water towards Jesus.

But when he saw the strong wind and waves, he was terrified and began to sink.

Jesus immediately reached out and grabbed him.

I have so little faith, Jesus said.

When they climbed back into the boat and the wind stopped, then the disciples worshiped him.

And they said, You really are the Son of God.

Today I I want to just talk to us in an effort to try to keep it on brand with this reclaimed series where we talk about following Jesus.

I just want to entitle today's message Following Jesus Through a Storm.

I thank you for your faithfulness and your goodness.

And what you're doing in our hearts, in the lives of your people.

It's in Jesus' name that we pray.

Amen.

And A.

I want to oppose a question that I already know the answer to.

But it's it's meaningful for you.

And here it is.

Have you ever felt strongly about something?

Such a deep conviction on something, that it seemed as if the permission to pursue was given to you in high definition.

It was so clear, like it's it's in my sleep.

It's it's it's it's in my dreams, it's all I'm thinking about.

I'm seeing signs, I'm seeing these moments that are inviting me to step into these spaces, that I feel very confident that that maybe it's God that's nudging me to step into this space that's a little bit of an unknown, that's a little bit scary, but nonetheless I'm gonna do it anyway.

I would suspect in this room that there are some of us that have felt conviction, passion, desire, uh something that moves us in a direction that maybe we're not comfortable with, but nonetheless, we're we're gonna step out.

The signs seemed as if they were there.

I I remember when those signs came to me um when I transitioned from working in the corporate world um in the education system to going into full-time ministry.

I remember radically getting saved, and it's been decades now, but I remember when that journey started for me, just my my hunger and my passion and my drive for God's word and spending time in God's presence and going to services and serving with my pastor, and just all of these things seem to be just the journey that God was leading us on.

We end up moving to Jacksonville, and then I begin attending an amazing church, and I begin to feel this sense of man, God's God may be calling us into full-time ministry.

And and and really trying to wrestle with what the implications were because working in the corporate world, the finance structure is vastly different.

So, Lord, I know that you're asking me to step into this space.

It's gonna come at a seismic pay cut, and I gotta figure out what we're gonna do, but nonetheless, I feel that you're calling us to do it.

The the open opportunity was presented to us, and and and someone came to me and said, Hey, I believe that this is an opportunity that God is inviting you into.

And so to for long story short, I'm like, okay, like we prayed about it and we stepped into it.

I the details I've shared in other messages and I could share it a different time, but we said yes.

But I remember when one of the staff members at the church came to me and he didn't have the joy that I thought he would have, and the joy that everyone else around me seemed to have.

This is someone that I consider to be a dear friend, and what he said to me, he's like, Keith, man, like bro, I just I was just hopeful that you would, you would have, you would avoid it stepping into this.

And that seemed like an odd thing to say.

So I I asked him to expound on it, and he said, Because you have such a purity of faith, you you have such a a hunger for the things of God, and and and you and you truly walk this thing out.

And and what I'm concerned about is that when you get into full-time ministry, that that you're gonna see the business of ministry, you're gonna see the messiness of ministry, you're gonna see that everyone who says that they're a Christian doesn't always act like it.

And I don't want that to damage the purity of your faith.

And I thought that was an interesting cautionary tale that he provided, but nonetheless we still pursued because we knew that God had called us to.

But everything that he said was a very vivid reality.

That as you begin to find yourself immersed in the rhythms of leading a church, it's also a business.

And there's implications with that, but but not the business side, but the people side, because now you're working arm in arm with people who are struggling just like you are, and and sometimes there's there's conflict and friction, and it's not like we're all praying in kumbaya moments that sometimes you get along with people.

Guess what?

There may be some people that you just don't like.

You love them in Christ, but but the way that my life is oriented and the way that yours is oriented, we just we just don't vibe well together.

So as I began to find myself immersed in these moments, it was it was very shocking to me to be in a place where we're advancing the kingdom of God, but but nonetheless, you're feeling like you're getting hit with resistance.

I remember when we made the decision to move up to DC to serve the church there, and and and when we went there, I remember the moment.

I was I was literally standing on a platform preaching one day, and God seemed to freeze time and told me that it was time for us to to uproot ourselves and move to DC.

It was like this Abrahamic moment, and and we said, Yes, I had this divine encounter, but when we got there, we were met with resistance, spiritual resistance, relational resistance, and you're just trying your best to follow God, but you're just trying to understand why I am dealing with so much resistance.

Same thing happens when we come to Orlando, where God leads us here.

He's been showing us Orlando for 20 years, and then you get here and you get this momentum and you're feeling good about it, but yet you still feel that something's off.

It's this resistance.

What do you do when the very thing that should be giving you the most momentum is actually giving you the most resistance?

The thing that you feel like I should be stepping into this thing that God has blessed me to do, and it should be accelerating my path.

But it seems as if that very thing that seemed as if it was an answer prayer now seems to be the source of my pain.

Feeling the resistance.

When I look at this text that I read to us, there's a lot that we can unpack.

What we first see is that Jesus performs an incredible, life-altering miracle of feeding 5,000 men.

I've shared this with us before.

They didn't count women and children.

We know they were there.

So some speculate between 15, 25, and some even have higher numbers of thousands of people that Jesus has just fed with two fish and five loaves.

The disciples witnessed this, they participated in this.

So Jesus tells them, like, hey guys, like, let me go ahead and dismiss the crowd.

You guys get in a boat, I'm gonna clean up, and and I'll meet you on the other side.

They seek out to go to the other side, and Jesus is, he dismisses the crowds, and then he begins to pray on the top of a mountain.

This was a regular rhythm for him.

But while they are in the ship, a storm comes.

The text says that there was actually a wind that began to rise up against them.

The very wind that should have propelled them rose up against them.

And what I think is so interesting is that Jesus is all-knowing.

He sends them into this water, knowing that they are going to face a storm.

He tells them, I want you to go this way.

This is the method that I want you to use, this is the direction I want you to go, knowing that they are going to face a storm.

The Bible says they were out there for hours, stuck in one place, towing and toiling.

And in those moments, you can begin to question, did we hear him properly?

Did we hear, are we sure that he told us to get in the boat and go this direction?

Because I have to believe that if God is ordering our steps, why does it seem like these steps are so far apart?

That if that if God is leading me in a direction, why does it seem like I'm losing momentum and I'm not making progress?

For those men, many of which were fishermen, the water was a very deep and mysterious place.

You can see the way that they describe scripture from in scripture, how they describe water.

In fact, in Genesis, they describe the water as being a place of chaos.

We can see varying prophets refer to water as a place where there were unknowns, there were there were creatures in the water.

So they never knew.

So even though they knew how to engage the water, they had a fear of it.

So now let's put it together.

When God leads you to go somewhere that forces you to face the very thing you're afraid of.

You're forced to step into the very thing that makes you feel uncomfortable.

It's in those moments that we can feel as if, Lord, did I hear you correctly?

It reminds me of the Exodus narrative where the Bible tells us that the children of Israel were liberated from Egypt, but as they were going forward, they found themselves at the edge of the Red Sea.

It doesn't seem there's there's any path forward, and the past seemed like it's closing in on me.

Am I talking to anybody that you feel like God has sent you out on a mission, but you're finding yourself in the middle of a storm?

You're in a space where you don't know what the next steps are going to be.

I want us to consider for a moment the process of refining gold.

What we know is that wherever there is great fire, that means that there is great purity.

So the greater the fire means the greater the potential.

The greater the fire, that means that there's some more impurities that God wants to remove.

And I suspect that as I look out in this room and look at some of the folks that are online right now, that maybe you feel like things are heating up.

And you're wondering why those things are heating up.

And maybe you're feeling as if it's punitive, is the reason why they're heating up.

But what if I were to tell you that that storm is meant to reveal a deeper glory that's inside of you that you would have never known was there if you didn't allow the fire to first get a hold of you?

I believe that the fire of God is bringing something out of us that we didn't even know was on the inside of us.

I believe that the fire of God is rising up some people that are gonna learn how to be prayer wards as a result of what they're going through right now.

I believe that the fire of God is rising up on some of us that is allowing us to get a prophetic voice as a result of what's going on right now.

I believe that this fire of God that God is allowing in our lives is gonna develop a calling that's so unique that would have never come to fruition if we didn't have the fire in the first place.

I'm talking about those moments when we step into those uncomfortable spaces, but God pulled something out of us that we didn't even know was on the inside of us.

But this requires us to have a complete paradigm shift.

The Bible tells us that believers are encouraged and challenged to embrace these storms, and while that's very difficult when you consider the implications of them, what led to them, nonetheless, God's power is found in them.

The text tells us that that they're out there in the water, towing and doing their best to make some progress, and that they still haven't moved forward.

Scripture says that then Jesus begins to walk on the water.

It's about three o'clock in the morning.

From that timeline, that would have been the darkest moment of the night.

So many believe that they would have been out there for a couple of hours just trying to get progress, and in the darkest moment, Jesus shows up.

Somebody's gonna catch that in a minute.

That they're in their darkest moment, but in that darkest moment, then God shows up.

So some of us may feel that I'm in my darkest moment and I'm wondering why God hasn't shown up just yet.

But I believe that this is a moment where we have to extend our faith and begin to trust God's timing.

Because I know that I know in my mind that I have a timeline that I would love for God to move in.

I know that in my mind, I have a strategy that if God would just consult me, we would have already been there.

That if he just would have involved me in the plans, Lord, I promise you there's a way that we could accomplish everything that you want to do in half the amount of time you want to do it.

But maybe, just maybe God knows more than I do.

Maybe, maybe that God knows more than you do.

So, what do we do in those moments when we don't have the progress we want?

Those moments where it seems like we're losing all light, meaning that we're losing all hope.

What we have to do is learn to trust God's timing.

Lord, I gotta trust that you have a timing that you want to do these things in.

I gotta learn to trust your timing.

The Bible tells us about the Israelites and how there was 400 years of prophetic silence where they hadn't heard a single word from God.

But the Bible says on the other end of those 400 years, Jesus shows up.

On the other end of the silence, Jesus shows up.

In those 400 years, you know what was happening?

Rome was establishing its dominance.

As it was establishing its dominance, it was paving roads and they were changing the way the messages were being communicated.

They were changing the way that you had access to other countries.

So now when Jesus shows up, the gospel was able to spread quicker through that 400 years of silence than it could have done without him.

What I'm telling you is that there's those moments when we can just trust God's timing that maybe will have an impact that we never could have seen or even remotely even thought about.

We have to learn to trust God's timing.

The Bible tells us in the book of Daniel, chapter number three, that these men had refused to bow to the idol of culture.

And what the scripture says is that they were confronted and said, Look, I'm gonna give you an opportunity to change your mind and to bow to Nebuchadnezzar.

If you don't, you're gonna be thrown into this fiery furnace.

And there was a response that these boys had that I believe that we can pick up and walk out of here with.

They said, We know that our God is able to deliver us, but even if he doesn't, I am not gonna change my conviction that I have and my faith and my belief in God.

Even if it doesn't work out the way that I think it should work out, I know that God is going to work it out, even if it means that I'm gonna get healed on the other side of glory, God is still good.

Even if I don't get the job, God is still gonna be my provider, even if I'm gonna move, I know that God is still moving me.

Even if I'm gonna spin, I know that God is gonna heal me, even if I'm phenomenal, God is gonna deliver me, even if I trust God's time, even if it means I'm gonna be on the other side of glory, God is good.

The Bible tells us that these Hebrew boys that they were thrown into the fiery furnace, and that at that moment God had not shown up yet.

I would think my strategy once again, God, if you just let me get involved, it would have been great to show up while they were arguing with the king.

But the Bible says they were thrown in the fire, the fire was turned.

Turned up seven times hotter, and then Jesus shows up.

What if, what if your pain was meant to be the greatest testimony that could ever be told?

What if, what if we stop looking at our pain as a as punitive and start looking at it as God's trusting me with this?

God's trusting me with this disappointment.

He's allowing me to walk through this in this season so that I can model what it looks like to walk by faith, even in moments that are completely uncomfortable.

In these moments, when I think about the psychological effect, whenever we're overwhelmed and we find ourselves with fear and anxiety, and we feel like we're losing all control.

And in psychology, they call it, did you have to ground yourself?

The process of grounding yourself is when I feel so overwhelmed by what's going on, where someone begins to say, okay, let me help you to get grounded.

I know that you're worried about what you see, you're worried about what you don't see.

There's a lot of things that's working up, but but let's get you grounded.

What do you see?

Okay, I see a room full of people.

Okay, great.

What do you hear?

I hear a voice, okay, I I hear that.

What do you smell?

I I smell a museum.

Okay, what what do you taste?

I'm tasting this gum.

What it's meant to do is to bring you back to the reality of where you are because our minds can often take us to places where God isn't.

We have to ground ourselves.

So I don't think that there's any reason why that metaphor doesn't apply to us as people of faith.

That even when it seems as if our fear is getting the best of us, that when our anxiety is getting the best of us, that how do I ground myself?

I simply lower my center of gravity.

I get down on my knees and I ground myself and I begin to say, God, I don't understand this.

I feel overwhelmed, I am stressed, but I trust you, I trust your timing, I know that you're moving on my behalf.

So in this moment, I'm grounding myself.

What do I see?

I see that you're faithful.

What do I hear?

That there's no weapon formed against me, that's no prosper.

What do I smell?

I smell the glory of the Lord.

What do I taste?

The word of God because the Bible says, Taste and see that the Lord is good.

But I'm helping you to understand that even in those moments when you feel as if the world is falling apart, you need to ground yourself in the presence of God.

We can't lose our center of gravity, even in our moments of suffering.

For these men, while they were on the ship, they were they were literally facing their biggest fears.

They were facing this biggest anxiety, and in the darkest moment, Jesus shows up.

And what scripture says, He shows up just walking on top of the very thing that they thought was going to kill them.

Here's the image I want you to get.

God's in control.

He is in control.

The very thing that we think will consume us, God is in control of.

I don't know if that does for you what it does for me.

But when I know that God is in control, that means I don't have to be.

When I know that God is in control, that means that I can trust him.

When that means that God is in control, it is meant to produce a sense of peace that surpasses all understanding.

The Bible describes Jesus as being this man that even the winds and the seas obey him.

There's another instance where the Bible says that a storm rose up, and the disciples said, Lord, don't you care that we're about to be killed in this storm?

And Jesus comes up and he says that he hushes the storm like small children.

Shh.

Watch this, watch this.

The storm quieted down, and they were amazed at what Jesus spoke.

And they said, Even the winds and the waves obey this man.

He said, Calm down, quiet down.

Here's the point.

When God is telling the storm to calm down, but we won't.

When God is telling the storm, it can't go any further, but we still keep running.

There are moments when we need to look at God's word and see how He's speaking to demons and begin to apply it to ourselves.

Be quiet.

Let me step in and get in control.

Quiet down.

Let me take over steering for a little bit of time.

What I believe God is stirring us to do right now is that as we're in the midst of these trials, as we're in the midst of the storms, as we're in the midst of the things that seem like they're going to consume us, maybe God is trying to show us that we need to learn to trust Him.

The text tells us that Jesus invites Peter to step out on the water.

To walk by faith and not by sight.

He challenges him.

Yes, come out here.

I want you to walk on the very thing that you're afraid of.

And in other words, watch this.

In order for you to walk in complete victory, you're gonna have to face the thing that you're afraid of.

You're gonna have to at some point face your fears.

Peter gets out.

And because he keeps his eyes on Jesus, he begins to walk on the very thing that he was he was he was scared of.

Peter gets out.

And because he keeps his eyes on Jesus, that he's able to walk on the very thing that he thought was gonna consume him.

But but what the Bible says is that the storm waves had continued to rise up on the side of him, and that he began to fix his eyes on the storms, and he lost sight of Jesus in the midst of all of it.

My my encouragement, and I believe the reason why God shifted this message right now is for this main thought: don't you magnify the problems more than you magnify God.

That there's a moment that I know that the storm waves are gonna rise up.

There's a moment that I know there are gonna be some things that are meant to distract us, to take our eyes off of Jesus.

I'm not telling you to ignore your pain, I'm telling you to bring it with you, but keep your eyes on Jesus.

I'm telling you that if I can continue to walk with God and draw closer to Him, that maybe the very thing that I'm afraid of, it's not gonna overtake me because I know that I'm keeping my eyes on Jesus.

Keeping your eyes on Jesus means walking by faith and not by sight.

It means exposing yourself to your fears in a healthy way.

So that way your fears can no longer usurp control over you.

That every now and then that we have to begin to practically involve walking this out and inviting other people in and not allowing our logic to become the very prison that keeps the hand of God from moving in our lives.

The text tells us that after Jesus rescues Peter and puts him on the boat, that they are in awe of him and they bow and they worship him, and they said, Surely you are the Son of God.

Now that seems like a very beautiful moment.

That seems like a very captivating moment.

That seems like a very that seems like a very hallmark moment.

Cue the music, and let's roll the credits.

But I find it, I find it confounding that the text starts off by saying, after this, y'all remember that?

After this.

The this that we're describing is what I just told you about.

That Jesus has just fed 20,000 people with a little bit of fish and loaves.

And somehow, the next scene, when they find themselves in the storm, they completely forgot it.

They forgot the leftovers because they still had 12 baskets fulls of fish that they brought with them.

And they still found themselves saying, Surely you are truly the Son of God, as if God has not already shown them who Jesus was in other situations.

I believe what happened is they forgot about the leftovers.

Because what the scripture tells us is that after they finished with the eating, that they had 12 baskets fulls that were with them in the ship that should have served as a reminder that even though we're in the middle of a storm, Jesus is faithful, his abundance is clear, he's gonna provide for us, he told us he's gonna meet us on the other side, and we have these leftovers that show us evidence of his faithfulness and that God's gonna do it.

But how often do we find ourselves in the middle of a situation and we forgot to bring the leftovers, the leftover blessings?

We almost forget what God has done in the past and when we're facing our present situation, and it makes us to believe that there is no future.

But I'm here to remind you about the leftovers that God has done in your life.

I'm here to remind you that you're here because of God's grace that was on what he's done in your life in the past to lead you into a much better future.

I believe that there's some of us that are hungering for peace, but you forgot about the leftovers that God is still with you.

You're hungering for provision, you're hungering for your breakthrough.

But what you need is already in the ship.

Jesus is faithful and that he's gonna do what he says he's going to do.

God is faithful.

And I believe we have to break the bonds of our negative biases.

A negative bias is when we've experienced enough pain that that becomes the filter that we look at everything through.

You know what a negative bias is.

It's it's it's those statements, whenever someone disappoints you enough, you begin to make always statements.

You know the always statements of like, you know, man, they always do this.

This always happens to me.

So that means that anytime we see a glimpse of something that remotely looks close to that, we put our walls up and back down and we don't pursue it with faith.

They call that a negative bias.

My filter thinks of it, my mind thinks of it, and I react to it.

But I believe that there's a faith bias that God wants us to respond with.

That space where we're able to say that even in spite of what I'm currently going through, I'm gonna look in these leftovers and be reminded of what Jesus has done in the past, and I'm gonna stand on it knowing that he's leading me into a much better future.

He is not done with me, and my days are not numbered just yet.

God is still moving me forward.

This week we had a very meaningful meeting in preparation of securing next steps for our permanent location.

And this meeting was a was a good meeting.

It was a it was a meaningful meeting, it was a meeting that allowed us to understand the landscape of real estate and and getting a sense of what things are gonna cost.

And as I left that meeting, while it should have been encouraging because of the people that were in the room, but the the obstacle seemed insurmountable.

It seemed like, okay, like I'm glad I have this information, but it seems like this is so inaccessible.

So there are moments when I kind of just felt this weight, this heaviness, this discouragement that began to rise up on the on inside of me.

To put it more plainly, I forgot the leftovers.

Because there was a moment when God says, Man, I need you to be reminded of what I have done in the past.

I need you to be reminded of of how you uh survived and navigated different seasons of your life and you made it.

I need you to be reminded of the drama and church splits and and and leading churches to be stable and when you survived it.

I need you to be reminded that when people literally try to sabotage the church and empty it and cause chaos and spread rumors and disfusement, guess what?

Look around.

We still here, we survived it.

I was reminded of a couple of passages of scripture that I want to encourage you with.

2 Corinthians 4, 8 and 9 says this.

It says, We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed.

We are perplexed but not in despair.

We are persecuted, but not abandoned, we are struck down, but not destroyed.

Psalm 34, 19 says, The one who is righteous has many adversities, but the Lord rescues them out of them all.

Isaiah 43, 2 says, When the waters pass over you, I will be with you, and the rivers will not overwhelm you.

When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, and the flames will not burn you.

James 1 12 said, Blessed are he who endures the trials, because he has stood many tests and will receive a crown of life that is promised by God Himself.

Romans 8 31 says this, and what shall I say?

There's if God be for you, then what can be against you?

These are just a couple of examples that I know I had to ground myself in in moments of doubt and moments of fear and moments of anxiety, and I believe that that might be a word for somebody in here right now, that maybe you're in the midst of your deepest and darkest storm.

But I'm here to encourage you and let you know that even if you're in the middle of a storm and you're in your darkest moment, guess what?

That is when Jesus shows up.

That is when he shows up, walking on the very thing that you thought was going to consume you.

That's when he shows up, allowing his light to illuminate, to shift the atmosphere.

That's when he shows up to begin to let you know that if I am for you, then nothing can stand against you, that you will not be destroyed, that you will not be dismayed, that you may be feeling the pressure, but I want you to respond to my pressing.

I want you to get in these moments and step out of the boat and walk by faith and keep your eyes fixed on me and not allow yourself to sink in the things that the enemy is trying to distract you with.

Can you keep your eyes on Jesus even in the middle of the storm?

It says that they thought Jesus was a ghost.

And for many of us, we feel like Jesus is in the ghost in this situation right now.

I feel like God is ghost to me.

I feel like he's not there.

But it's in that moment that when we cry out, Lord, I need you, he reveals himself, he draws you to himself, and he invites us to step out of the boat.

I want everyone to stand on their feet.

And we're gonna go into a quick moment of worship.

And and I don't know if this resonates with you or if this was for you.

But if that is for you, I just want to openly invite you to step out of your boat.

Step out of your boat and meet me down at this altar where we can pray together, where we can encourage one another.

Because I believe it's in that moment where the storm is real, the darkness is real, the suffering is real, the pain is real, but Jesus is real.

And I believe that when we step out and we begin to draw near to God, that He draw near to us.

I believe there's a blessing in the seats.

I believe there's a blessing for those who are watching at home, but I also believe that there's power when we engage the presence of God.

So as we go into a time of worship, if you feel like, man, I need to step out of faith and I need to engage God, I need to step out in the middle of this storm, I need to keep my eyes fixed on Jesus.

If there's any part of that that resonates with you, here's an open invitation.

Come down to this altar.

I would love to just come and touch and agree and pray with you and believe that God is going to speak and do something in this moment, but it requires us to step out.

Lord, I thank you so much for your faithfulness.

I thank you, Lord, for shifting the program, changing our plans, and inviting us to engage your presence in a way of knowing that we can follow you even in the middle of our storms, even in the middle of our uncertainty.

So, Lord, I just pray in the name of Jesus over the next few moments, just as we worship, as we declare your name, as we step out of our boat, as we step out in faith, that you're gonna meet us exactly where we are, that even now, Father, we feel a stirring in our spirits, that even now that we find ourselves grounding ourselves in your presence, that even now, Father, we can feel chains being broken off of us.

So as we worship, as we declare your goodness, as you inhabit our praise, I believe that you're gonna bring revival and redemption and healing and hope to all of us.

We're going to make it on the other side because you said so.

So I pray, Lord, that you speak to us and stir our hearts in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Let's worship, let's engage, and we're gonna come and pray for every one of you.

Thank you for joining us to learn more about Celebration Orlando, a church devoted to reaching the lost, equipping the found, and helping the hurting.

Follow us on social media using the handle at celebrationorl or visit our website, celebrationorl.org.