(Un)Settled | Ps. Keith Pittman

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Here's today's message.

Welcome to Celebration Church Orlando Church at Home Experience.

My name is Keith, and I have the incredible privilege of serving as the lead pastor here of Celebration Orlando.

And on behalf of my family, our incredible staff, our community, I just want to take a moment to say happy new year.

Thank you so much for creating the space to come and worship with us today.

If you're new to our community, maybe you stumbled upon this, or or maybe you're just trying to learn a little bit more about who we are as a church.

I want to thank you and invite you to come and join us for one of our in-person gatherings.

I love these church at home experiences, and I can't think of a better way to kick off our new year than worshiping God in the comfort of our home while surrounded by community.

I believe that God is not just meant to be experienced when we're in the building, but he's also meant to be engaged, more importantly, in our homes.

And so I'm thankful that you guys are engaging God in home and setting off the year.

Um, but if you're new, I also want to invite you to join us in person.

I truly believe that there is power when we gather together as community.

And I'm excited about what I believe God wants to speak to us today to kind of set the tone of what he wants to do.

Um I'm excited for the new year, as all of us are.

Many of us are just excited to turn the page, so to speak, on a calendar, which almost gives us uh permission to make some adjustments, to make some changes, to evaluate the previous year and and maybe add on to some successes or make some adjustments to areas where we didn't establish that momentum.

So I have so many goals and and things I want to accomplish.

I've like everybody, I want to lose weight, I want to pay off debt.

There's a lot of things that I'm looking to do.

But one of the things that I've left off of my list is growing closer to God.

Now that may seem a little bit unorthodox, but this is why I say that.

Because I don't want my relationship with God to just be on the list with other things.

I feel like that is such a disservice to him.

In fact, what I want to do is I don't want to just draw closer to God.

I want God to be the foundation that everything is built on.

So when I have these other goals, they are built on the foundation of my relationship with God.

For me, what I'm claiming is that this is going to be my Acts 17 year.

And what Paul shows us in Acts 17 as he's engaging with the community there, he quotes this phrase It's in Him we move, live, and have our being.

That means that it's God is the foundation of everything, that it's a God filter.

So as we're looking to set our goals and establish the rhythms of this new year, I want you to be on this journey with me.

I don't want to just draw closer to God, but my hope is that God is the foundation that everything is built on.

So when I'm stewarding my free sources, it's through the foundation of God.

When I'm stewarding my relationships, it's through the foundation of God.

That it is in Him that everything is built on, and I believe that is how we can have a healthy perspective.

I want to spend a few moments unpacking a simple scripture with us today as community and friends.

If you have your Bibles, I want to invite you to join me in Philippians chapter 1, verse number 6.

Philippians 1 · chapter mention

It's a super simple passage, and we're going to go in some other places in the Bible as we unpack it a little bit.

But this simple passage I think has such profound truth in it.

Here's what it says it says, and I am certain that God who began a good work within you will continue the work until it is finally finished in the day when Christ Jesus returns.

It's so good, I'm going to paraphrase it and say again.

I am confident that God who has begun a good work in you is able to finish it until Christ Jesus returns.

If God starts something, he is going to finish it until the day that Christ returns.

Today, I want to speak to us for a few moments about all of the rhythms and things that we've established and possibly things that we've started, but we haven't seen it come to the finish line just yet.

And maybe we're going into the new year a little discouraged.

Maybe we're going into the new year with all these goals and things in mind, but we also are reflecting on the things that we started off last year.

And if we're honest with ourselves, it seems as if we lost some momentum.

I believe that this passage is meant to encourage us that if God started it in you, He is absolutely going to finish it in you.

And that's what I want to speak to us about today.

So if you're taking notes, and of course it's celebration Orlando, that's what we do.

I want you to write this message title down, Unsettled.

Let's pray and let's get into it.

Lord, we thank you so much for your word.

We thank you for every opportunity that we have to come together in community with family, um, in our homes, in person.

God, however we gather, we know that you are with us and you are in the midst.

Lord, I just pray over the next few moments that you give us open eyes to see you.

I pray that you give us open ears to hear you and open hearts to receive what it is you want to speak to us today.

Allow this to be the beginning of the foundation of an incredible new year.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

One of the things that I have really grown to enjoy doing is I've enjoyed making my own homemade juices.

Yes, I enjoy cooking, but I also have grown to really appreciate homemade juices.

I was introduced to it by a friend of mine and he began to speak to me about the benefits.

What I didn't realize is that it takes a lot of work and a lot of preparation, and and sometimes all that effort can squeeze out just a little bit of juice, but but the nutrients and the energy that comes from it, it's it's second to none.

I still recall very vividly when I went and was preparing to make my first homemade juice.

I got my machine that I was going to be utilizing.

I went and got all the ingredients.

I found an incredible recipe, and each of these ingredients was going to provide some level of benefit to my body.

So as I laid all these ingredients out, I followed the recipe to a tea and I got this amazing juice.

And I remember taking a sip of it and it was so good.

But in the instructions, it said that when you drink it, it needs to be chilled, that you need to put it in a refrigerator at least for a couple of hours so it can get that perfect temperature, and then you could really appreciate all the flavors altogether.

So I made this in the evening time, I put it in the refrigerator, and I was prepared to drink it on my way to work the next day.

So I get up in the morning, I got my coffee, I'm on my way into the office, I get to the office and I have this juice that I just been expecting and so excited to drink.

And I open it up and I take my first sip of it, guys, and it was absolutely mediocre.

It was it was incredibly mediocre.

Now, now when I tasted it when I first made it, it was good.

But but for some odd reason, when I tasted it this time, it just it tasted very bland.

It tasted very, it tasted very watered down.

It wasn't all that enjoyable at all.

And as my wife is looking at me because she knew the amount of effort that I put into it, the amount of money that I spent, she was looking at me to see what my reaction was going to be.

And so I felt like I had to talk it up.

You ever had those moments where you want to justify the energy or the investment that you make into something?

You're like, oh no, it's actually really, really good, but inside of your heart, you know this is terrible.

That was me in this moment.

So as I'm drinking it and I'm like, oh, this is this is this is so basic.

It wasn't bad.

It was just it was just so basic.

Well, well, then my wife, I had given her one, and she's like, oh, this is great.

And I noticed she did something that I didn't do.

What she did before she popped the top off of her cup that she had, she began to shake it up.

And as she shook it up, she took a sip of it and she's like, Oh, this really is really, really good.

The the words that I declared in faith were her reality.

She said, This really is good.

The flavors are really good, but she had a different experience because she shook it up.

Once I saw her shake it up, it became clear to me why mine tasted so watered down and diluted.

It's because while this was sitting inside of the refrigerator, all of those powerful and pure ingredients had begun to settle to the bottom.

And and even though they were inside of the container, even though they were there, they were part of the flavor, they were part of the nutrients that were there.

They had begun to settle at the bottom because the glass had been sitting idle inside of the refrigerator.

So, in order to make sure that all of those nutrients, all of those things were going to be incorporated into what we were going to be digesting, we had to shake it up a little bit.

I hope you see where I'm going with this sometimes.

I believe that there is nothing that that waters downs, that that dilutes and takes away the flavor of our vision and our goals more than those moments when we are idle.

Those moments where we we kind of begin to stand still too long, and you know what happens?

We begin to settle.

We find ourselves getting comfortable in a place and we begin to settle.

The definition of the word settle is simply means to sit and come to rest at a comfortable place.

It means to gradually sink to the bottom.

I believe there are times that all of us have have dreams and ambitions and aspirations and things that we want to tackle, goals that we feel that are gonna make us fulfill our purpose, things that are inside of us that we're so inspired to do.

Maybe, maybe 2022 was a year where you had so many things lined up that you wanted to accomplish.

And I believe that the greatest enemy of true success is a little bit of success.

Because we begin to get a little bit of traction and maybe we get some resistance, maybe we stand still too long, we get idle and we begin to settle.

And then everything that we thought we were going to accomplish begins to get watered down.

Everything that we thought that we were going to see happen in our future begins to lose its pure flavor and the nutrients that are meant to benefit us spiritually and practically.

It just doesn't hit the way it's supposed to because we've allowed ourselves to settle.

My my hope and my prayer for us in 2023 as we're going into this new season to be filled with big, bold faith, a faith that allows us to be stretched to the point where we know that only God can make it happen.

We're gonna work our faith, we're gonna trust God through it, but we're gonna make sure that we stay active enough and we're not gonna just settle.

We're not gonna settle for mediocrity, we're not we're not gonna settle for basic accomplishments, we're not, we're not gonna settle for a single step when God wants us to go a whole mile.

This is gonna be a year where we are gonna be unsettled.

We're not gonna allow ourselves to settle.

The thing that I love about the Bible is that it shows us these profound and prolific biblical characters and their journey and them trusting God in order to fulfill their purpose.

But the thing that I love more than anything is that I love the fact that they're not perfect.

Except for Jesus, every character that we evaluate in scripture, they have those moments where they have those shortcomings.

Those moments where they got a little bit idle, and those moments where they settle.

In fact, some of the most powerful stories are the redemption that often comes on the other side of them settling, them being still too much, about how God's redemptive grace pursues them and how he uses them in that.

This is why we come back to Philippians, that he who has begun a good work in you is able to complete it.

Maybe, maybe you started off on a project, maybe you started off with a vision, maybe there's something on the inside of you that you started, but you've settled for, maybe going half the way, maybe you've settled for the alternative, another route that maybe has presented itself.

And maybe my assignment for you today is to shake you up a little bit and say, don't settle for mediocrity when God is calling you to greatness.

There's so many biblical characters that that can show us how we can come out of those funks, but there's also people that can be cautionary tales on what we need to avoid.

I believe Lot is one of those characters.

I want to share a couple of points with us today that I think can help set us up for the year.

And it's a cautionary tale of things that I think looking at the life of Lot that we can avoid to ensure that we don't settle.

Here's the first thing that I want us to make sure that we don't do this year.

Don't settle for the familiar.

Don't settle for what is familiar to you.

Don't settle for the familiar.

Genesis chapter 11, verse 31.

Genesis 11:31

It says this one day Terah took his son Abram, his daughter-in-law Sarah, um, his son Abram's wife, and his grandson Lot, and his his son Haran's child, and moved away from Erb to Chaldeans, and he was headed for the land of Canaan, but they stopped at Haran and they settled there.

Did you see that?

That Abram's father, we often think about Abraham and how God had put on his heart to go to the promised land, this land of milk and honey that ended up becoming the place that the children of Israel will inherit.

That dream was started back with Abram, but if we actually look a little bit deeper, it actually started with Abram's father.

That Abram's father was led to leave Ur the Chaldeans and go to Canaan, what was going to become the promised land.

But while they're on the journey, they make a pit stop at this place called Haran, and the scripture says, and they settled there.

Their GPS was taking them to Canaan, but they settled in Haran.

And what I think the reason why that's so familiar is because if we see earlier in that passage, Lot, whose father has passed away, so this is this is Abram's brother.

This is Tarog, this is his son.

His name was Haran.

Look at the connection.

They're going to a town, and that name of the town is called Haran, and now they are thinking about their deceased loved one with the exact same name, familiarity.

And what can happen sometimes when we're on our journey is that while we're on our journey, we can come across something familiar and we can get comfortable and we can settle there.

They settled short of the promised land.

They settled short of the place that they were supposed to go, and I believe it's because they came across an environment that was familiar.

How often do we have great dreams and ambitions and aspirations, but we settle for something just because it's familiar, something that we recognize, something that we're comfortable with.

Here's a simple illustration of this.

I'm a creature of habit.

Once I kind of find something that works well for me, I lock in and I I kind of do it.

Now, now that can go, that could be a benefit of consistency and making sure you're not disappointed, but it also can be a crutch.

And in instance, for me, when when I go out to a restaurant, if I find something that I like on that menu, more often than not, I stay within that family.

I don't I don't go beyond too much of what is on that menu when I find something that I like.

The problem is there are so many other options, but I can miss out on some of those other options just because I found the one thing that I like and I don't want to be disappointed going any further.

Megan and I have gone out to many restaurants and often she will say, Hey, taste this and check this out.

What do you think?

And then I'm sitting there filled with regret because I chose to eat what was familiar instead of seeing something that's outside of my comfort zone and seeing that there's something better available, but I've missed it because I settled for what was familiar.

That's a super simple and and reduced illustration, but I hope that you're catching the heart behind it.

What are the things that are on the menu that God has for you, but you're missing it because you're settling for what's familiar?

What are the great meals that God has laid out for us when it says I prepare a table for you in the presence of my enemies?

This this great buffet of blessing that God has for us, but we're so can we're so consistent in choosing the kids' menu.

Maturity allows us to recognize that there's other options available for us.

The Bible says, taste and see that the Lord is good, but how can we see that the Lord is good if we're not willing to deviate from our comfort level and the menu that we have just gotten comfortable with?

I believe one of the biggest things that can happen to us when we're on our journey is we can find something familiar and we can settle there.

Lot, he was in a family that they were on a journey to greatness, but they end up settling in an environment that was familiar.

Here's another thought that I want us to make sure that we don't settle for going into this new year.

Don't settle for what's convenient.

Don't settle for what's convenient.

So often in my own life, when I'm looking at the opportunities that are presented in front of me, it's it's not a matter of wanting to avoid the hard work, it's not a matter of avoiding the things that are uncomfortable.

But a lot of times we can mistake convenience for calling.

And then when we see it, we can mistakenly say, Oh, that's the will of God, that's the hand of God.

Look at how God has opened this door for me without recognizing that maybe that is the enemy leading us into an environment that is convenient that's causing us to miss our calling.

When we look at the life of Lot in Genesis chapter 13, there's this moment, this critical pivotal moment, where him and Abram and their herdsmen are having some tension.

Genesis 13 · chapter mention

There's a backstory to that that I encourage you to read.

If you can just read all from Genesis 11 up to chapter 13 where we are right now.

But there's this powerful narrative that begins to get produced where what Lot had in his possessions and what Abram had in his possession, they no longer could coexist.

They had all these herds and there was conflict there.

So, so so Abram being the elder says, Hey, listen, I don't want us to have conflict.

I want to be a peacemaker.

So why don't we do this?

This land can't sustain both of us.

We need to, we need to create some space so that what you have has room to grow, and what I have has room to grow.

I think it's a beautiful illustration of when you raise up our children and you want to give them space so that they can grow in their own individual environment.

But it's not intended for them to be removed from the covering and the blessing that is with the family.

So Abram says, Hey, look, I want you to look in any direction.

There's green pastures, there's opportunities.

I want you to look wherever you want to go and wherever you see that's going to be good for you, I want you to go there.

And so we know the story.

Lot looks around and he sees an environment that is lush, that is beautiful, and he says, I'm going to go to this place.

Unfortunately, the location that he chose was a convenient location.

It didn't require a lot of effort for him.

It didn't require him to plow the ground.

The ground was already flourishing.

It didn't require him to have to plant any seeds.

It was already producing fruit.

It looked very beautiful to the eye, but unfortunately, it was an environment that was going to lead him into bondage.

It was very convenient, but it wasn't connected to his calling.

And so now he moves to this environment right outside of Sodom and Gomorrah.

And if you're familiar with biblical narratives, then you understand how that falls.

That ends up becoming a city that God has to cast judgment on because of the sinful nature that is rooted there.

Because Lot chose to go to a location that was convenient, it ended up handcuffing his calling.

I think sometimes what can happen with us is that when we're looking at the landscape of the opportunities in front of us, we're looking for the convenient thing.

The thing that may require a little bit less of us.

The thing that looks a little bit easier.

Maybe this is why when we look in scripture, it says that we walk by faith and not by sight.

Sometimes our eyes can deceive us.

Sometimes things can look better than what they truly are.

And sometimes it can convince us that this is the will of God for our lives because it requires less of us, but it's actually handcuffing our calling.

Lot chose to go to an environment that was convenient and he settled there, but it wasn't where he was called to go.

My my challenge for all of us is make sure that as we are setting goals and as we are pursuing what God has for us, that we don't settle on what is convenient.

We don't settle on what we see, but we settle on the place that God has called us to go.

My third and final thought that I want to share with us is this don't settle for less.

Don't settle for less than what God has for us.

Don't settle for less than what God wants to do in you.

There's greatness on the inside of you, and sometimes we can end up breathing our last breath with greatness still on the inside of us, with unfulfilled potential and things that we just haven't tapped into.

You see, as I shared with us, that that Lot ends up in an environment that ends up being judged by God because of the godless nature of everything.

We we see that there's this moment where God literally sends messengers to rescue Lot from this environment.

But here's something that's powerful to look at.

And we see this in Genesis chapter 19, verses 16 through 20.

Genesis 19:16–20

I'll paraphrase it for the sake of time.

But the angels come in, and while Lot is trying to gather his family and get things together, the Bible says that the angels literally grab him by the hand and lead him out of the city.

And they're telling him, Don't look back, keep moving forward.

There's a mountaintop that God wants you to go to.

That is where you're supposed to settle.

Did you see this?

That God is leading him out of this destructive environment.

He literally takes him by his hand.

How beautiful is it knowing that we can be in some perilous environments and we can be in some environments where there's suffering and brokenness.

And God still came to personally remove Lot from that environment and says, There's a mountaintop for you.

But as he's leading him out of the city, and even after Lot loses his wife because she doesn't want to let go, but he still has to keep moving forward, there's this there's this little subtle shift that takes place.

That when they said, Hey, let's go to the mountaintop and settle there, he retorts and says, I don't know if I can make it to the mountaintop.

Can I go into the cave instead?

God was calling him to the mountaintop, but he was willing to settle to go into the cave.

And and it's a it's a disappointing reality that sometimes when God pulls us out of broken environments, that God is saying there's a mountaintop in our future, but we end up settling for the cave.

I believe Lot is a cautionary tale of what can happen when we settle.

We settle for the convenient, we we settle for the cave and instead of the mountaintop and we can settle for the familiar.

But what if this was the year that we decided that I am going to settle some other things first?

You know, another definition of settled means to be resolved.

What if we began to unsettle ourselves in the areas that have convenience, those areas that are familiar, those those areas that can pull us away from our callings, and we began to settle in our hearts that I'm going to do things God's way.

That I'm going to go to the mountaintop because I know that's what God is calling me to go to.

Let's get unsettled in the places that we've planted our feet and settle in our hearts that we're going to go wherever God leads us.

I truly believe that that will be the ingredients that leads us to having fulfilled lives and being on mission and on purpose for the things that God has called us to do.

Family, there's a mountaintop in our future, but let's not settle for the cave.

Let's not settle for the familiar.

Let's walk by faith and not by sight.

And certainly let's not settle for the convenient.

There's greatness, but we gotta be willing to take every step to pursue it.

I love you guys.

I'm so excited about what this year is going to produce, and I can't wait to see what God does through our community, which you are a part of.

But let's get unsettled.

Let's shake some things up.

Let's get those callings and dreams diluted with the purposes of God and remove the saturation of the world and culture.

There's a mountain in our future.

Let's get unsettled.

Thanks again for listening.

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