After the Message: It's Not Over

Thank you for joining us for After the Message.

To learn more about Celebration Church here in Orlando, you can follow us on social media under the handle at CelebrationORL or visit our website at celebrationorl.org.

All right.

Welcome to After the Message.

Um if you are new to what we do here, uh we talk about the message from Sunday.

Pretty self-explanatory.

So today uh uh oh yes, and I do have to remind everybody, uh we implemented an email address for after the message.

So if you want to reach out and um question my theology or just in general have a conversation, feel free to do that.

Uh you can email atm at celebrationorl.org.

Pretty easy to remember.

Super easy to remember.

Yeah.

Today we have Pastor Becca Westcott with us for After the Message.

How are you doing?

I'm well.

I'm excited to be here.

I am an avid listener of After the Message.

Good.

So I'm excited to be on this side this time.

Amen.

Amen.

Um first of all, how's Elliot?

Elliot's good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How old is he now?

He's almost eight months old, okay, which is crazy.

He's crawling, and it's at that point where he's getting into things, and I had to Google like, at what point does an eight-month-old understand the word no?

Like, am I just splitting my energy trying to tell him no all the time?

Is this setting a foundation?

Yeah, but yeah.

Thank God for Google in parenthood.

Yeah.

I feel like uh I don't trust Google.

So you wouldn't trust Google So whenever I feel like when Jen and I ever have kids, by the way, Jen's our live studio audience today.

Hi Jen.

Um whenever uh whenever we have kids, um, I'm just gonna be making phone calls left and right.

Hey, what what would you do in this situation?

Like to my parents, hey, what would you do here?

Instead of Googling it.

Yeah.

But anywho, that's that's another after the message.

Um this past Sunday was a if you've been around church for any amount of time, you've probably heard a pre uh a message spoken on Lazarus.

Um which is one of the great things about the Bible is you can have so many messages spoken on one single topic because there's so much there.

How many messages do you think you've heard on this story?

Oh my gosh.

A lot.

I've spent my entire life in church, and my dad was a pastor for a good portion of my upbringing.

So I'm sure I heard Lazarus for the first time in like Sunday school, and I'm pretty sure we did like a you know, mock skit where somebody was covered in toilet paper and somebody played Jesus and it was like Lazarus, come forth, and somebody like tears the toilet paper off of the fake Lazarus, you know.

So that's definitely if that tells you anything about how many Lazarus sermons I've probably heard.

You know?

Preach your kid life.

Yeah, no, pastor kid life.

So yeah.

Hopefully we're speaking as I can attest to those as well.

The the children's church, like felt boards and everything.

Oh yeah.

Oh man, good stuff.

Like those felt boards, like universal.

You just sang felt boards.

I like feel like I smelled it, like just passing.

It's universal throughout all denominations and churches, the children's church smell.

Oh man.

Uh, but yeah, kind of like I said, it it is it's one of those great things about the Bible.

Um, you know, obviously there's there's only one interpretation, but there's a lot of different applications.

Yeah, fresh revelation.

Yeah, and you can you can read a scripture and 20 years later read it again and realize, man, that's not what I got from it 20 years ago.

You know, still the same word, but and so that's what that's one thing that uh I really enjoyed about this past Sunday's message was all the things that Pastor Keith saw for himself and was able to share with us.

Um so yeah.

Yeah.

The kind of the the way that he kicked it off was talking about it's not over, you know, like whatever whatever you're whatever you're facing in life or whatever is going in going on through life, um, it's never done, especially if it's a trial, or especially if it looks like a dead situation.

And so his first thing that he said was was take it to God.

Um and it sounds self-explanatory, but the thing that resonated with me the most is overthink and underprey.

Yeah.

I'm a uh overthinker to the max, and sometimes I forget like have have I even talked to God about this?

Yeah, you know what I mean?

Like Jen's back there amening.

Um but one of the things that one of the biggest points that he mentioned is what what holds on to what you hold on can hold on to you.

Yeah.

Has there been times in your life where you've you've realized without even maybe knowing, oh my gosh, I'm holding on to this?

You know what I mean?

Because sometimes we think of it as like a conscious thing, like, man, I'm holding on to to something right now and I need to give it to God.

But I think for me a lot of times it's when I realize, like, oh my gosh, this has been going on for a long time.

Like, let this go, you know?

Yeah.

Yeah, I think for me, the constant thing that makes me pause and go, man, I'm holding on to this is control.

You know, especially in this season, it's been so difficult.

Like everything feels out of control.

But when I know that I I trust God, but the handing over full control to him is something that I know I have a tendency to hold on to.

And even the the illustration that resonates the most with me is that difference between God giving me directions and me putting him in the driver's seat.

Like so often I use God as my GPS instead of putting him in my driver's seat.

And if I use him as my GPS, I can still take control back over and be like, you know what, God?

No, I feel like I'm supposed to take a left here instead of a right.

But if I have him in my driver's seat, he's in full control.

And so for me, the thing that shout out to Carrie Underwood.

Yeah, yes, Jesus take the wheel.

So um, I feel like that is the thing for me is handing control back over and recognizing really quickly when I have taken control back into my own hands.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And just a side note, I was thinking when I was kind of re-listening to the message, I was like, man, because I was writing notes and there is just so much in this passage.

So much that you could probably we could probably do like uh another session, another after the message.

This could be like a two-part after the message for sure because there's so much here.

But but one thing that the next part was after take it to God was wait on God.

And I feel like during COVID season or whatever, that we've been forced to wait on a lot of different things.

And so my question to myself is, and my question to you ultimately is man, how do I how do I wait well?

How you know, and and I've I heard that you know, patience, patience isn't the ability to wait, but it's how you wait.

And so learning how to wait well, have you discovered anything in your own life where it's kind of been a little bit easier for you to wait?

Patience is not a natural fruit for me in my life, Nate.

Um patience is one of those things going back to growing up in the church, people say, Don't pray for patience because God'll make you wait, you know.

And um, so being in a season where you are forced to wait is definitely one where you have to kind of do a personal heart check and say, Am I getting anxious like for the next thing without recognizing what God is trying to do in in this moment?

And I think that's why the Bible tells us to be anxious in nothing and anxious for nothing.

It's because we have this propensity to want the next thing.

And so in this season in particular, I think the waiting well, like how to wait well, is so much about yeah, you s you hit it on the head of uh of just being in the right posture of waiting and waiting on the Lord to do what he needs to do in your heart and not trying to push on past what he's doing in the moment.

Yeah.

But it's easier said than done for sure.

It is, and the great perspective that Pastor Keith brought up was allowing that grace of God to take deep root in your soul.

So you may go through something and it and you get out of it prematurely on your own will, uh instead of like sitting in it and you learn a lesson, but it doesn't take root.

You know, it's like the it's like the the soil isn't isn't isn't well um because you didn't allow you didn't allow the process to take full form, you know.

That's so good too.

It's such an interesting like illustration to consider because roots roots that go grow deep will endure storms later on.

Like the plant will be able to endure more because it has the strength of going in deeper.

And so um when we're impatient and don't allow the time for like our roots to grow deep and for the grace to go deep in our lives, like then we aren't gonna be able to endure more.

And I think that's the thing that we have to recognize in um seasons of waiting is what is God trying to build and establish in our hearts?

Like what character, what is he trying to sharpen in our character that will prepare us for the next thing instead of just trying to figure out what the next thing is.

Yeah.

We're always about the next thing.

Because there's always in in our society, there is a next thing.

Perpetual motion.

Yeah, yeah.

And and there always is something.

There's oh, look over here.

Oh, look over here.

You know, it's uh I forget what movie that was, but um, it's some Disney movie, I think, where the birds are like here, here, here over here.

But anyways, I digress.

Uh the next thing was listen to God.

And it was interesting because he spoke about how the the patriarchal system adds more weight to this story, um, which I never I never really knew or thought about.

And it's so true because if Lazarus is the only male in that family, there's so much writing on that.

Right.

Have you done any research around the patriarch system?

I mean, have I done any research on the patriarchal system?

I mean, yes.

Um I think it's something that in general it's good to be knowledgeable on.

And the fact that that adds so much to the weight of what Mary and Martha were going through and what Mary and Martha were experiencing in that moment of the, like Pastor Keith said, the disappointment of their dreams, um, just kind of going away because now they were they were vulnerable to attack because of what they lost and their brother Lazarus.

But what I love about it, about the story, like when you really dig into John 11, is um I love Martha's response because she kind of goes up to Jesus and it's like she knows all of the realities of what happened with her brother, but she still chooses to talk to Jesus and and be like, Yeah, I know that you're the son of God.

And kind of the way that I feel like she she was approaching it was like, yeah, I know the realities of where I'm at.

Like I know the realities of society, I know the realities of the fact that I just lost my brother, but I also know the realities of who you are.

So what are you gonna do about it now?

You know, is kind of the the take that Martha Martha had is she looked past the cultural um implications of the pain that she was in and chose to look at what Jesus could bring to the table.

And I think that that's something that I take away from a lot of those men, women, cultural things is yeah, our culture even now can stifle women or keep us from being able to be who God called us to be.

But the culture is something that uh Jen's dancing in the background.

Um our culture is something that Christ has overcome and and kingdom culture says there's a place for women, and kingdom culture says, you know, Jesus values what women bring to the table.

And so for me in general, every time that I look more into pay like the patriarchy and all of those um veins, the more I recognize that my identity is defined by a different culture, it's defined by the kingdom culture, and that's the one that I'm gonna pursue my value in.

So I know that kind of went off a on a tangent.

No, I mean that's what I always try to do.

This is you succeeded me.

What tangent can we get on?

You know, that's that's my goal.

And if we don't get on a tangent, I feel like we failed.

Um very interesting, because the other day I was reading something and it was mentioning one of the complaints that could be thrown at Christianity, is that that chauvinism has been in the past, it has been a thing, you know.

Um and the book was like, yeah, we're I mean, we can't we can't deny things that may have been in the church or been ugly parts of the church, but however, if you look at the origins of Christianity, especially after Jesus comes on the scene, they are more inclusive of women than their society around them, than the Greco-Roman, you know, empire.

And so to your point, Martha realized that even before Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection.

Right.

She realizes that man, there's something different about this, yeah.

You know, and I think that's a lot of times we think post-gospel and post-gospel meaning like when Jesus ascended and he's gone, but it is interesting to look at how people who how the lights click for them when he was there in their midst.

Yeah.

Because ultimately she had a revelation of who Jesus was, and that gave her a revelation of who she was.

I think that when we have revelation, when we understand who Jesus is, um, what he brings into our lives, it it illuminates who he has created us to be.

We we are able to walk in a freedom that we won't know if we don't have that relationship with God.

Yeah.

One of the tricky parts about that, however, is being in the midst of circumstances that seem dead.

Right.

And then looking and saying, Okay, God, I thought I knew who you were, do I?

You know, or I th I thought I was in the right spot, am I?

And that's what that's what this whole sermon is about, in my opinion.

The whole sermon is about yes, recognizing where you are, but also recognizing who's with you in that.

Yeah.

Well, and I think it's the the fact that they knew what Jesus could do, but in their perspectives, he he was late, you know, and to the point of the whole sermon, the title itself, it's not over.

But I think a lot of times when God shows up later than what we had anticipated or what we had desired, we count it as over, we count it as dead.

Um, instead of standing in the reality of our situation with the understanding of who Jesus is and that he's beyond what we consider to be, you know, over that he's working, you know, even when I don't see it, you're working, you know, like we sing about it.

But I think a lot of times it's easier to be like, man, I don't see it.

So and the time's up.

So I guess, you know, Jesus isn't gonna show up, but he does.

Yeah.

Think about if the story was different, you know.

Think about if they never reached out in the first place.

Yeah.

Like, oh, it is what it is, you know, this is we're not in we're not in modern medicine, you know.

There is no other, there is no other option for him.

Right.

So Mary and Martha just think, well, it is what it is.

How often, I mean, how often do I say that in my life?

Yeah.

Man, it just it's where I'm at, it is what it is, I can't do anything about it.

You know, and pass overthink and underprey.

Yeah, exactly.

Overthink and underpray, and that's even what Pastor Keith said in a couple after the message a couple times um a few weeks ago, or maybe it was his sermon, but he basically said, like, if I'm losing sleep over something, I might as well pray about it and then go to sleep.

You know, I'm not gonna not pray about it and lose sleep at the same time.

Like, right, that's that's foolish.

So so yeah, there there's just so many times where for whatever reason, in the midst of hurt or trauma or pain, we just forget because he said he said, stop focusing on the dilemma and focus on the deliverer.

Yeah, that's not forsaking the dilemma, or that's not like saying it's not existing, but it's not focusing on it.

There's a difference between realizing and focusing.

Yeah.

Well, and I think it's I heard in a sermon one time where you can are you standing with your problem looking at God, or are you standing with God looking at your problem?

Because one is going to magnify your problem and one the other is going to magnify God.

Yeah.

And so if you're standing with God looking at your problem, you realize how small that dilemma is in in comparison to how big your deliverer is.

And so uh he cares about those those things that we see as dilemmas, but if we stand with an understanding of how much bigger he is than that problem, that's when we can walk in the freedom and recognize it's not actually that big of a deal.

Right.

Inhaling our pollution and exhaling solutions.

Yeah.

Oh man, some of them you just gotta stamp with the star, you know?

Like that was that was good.

Where have you laid him?

Hmm.

If we don't engage in the pain of our past, it will determine how you walk in the future.

Yeah.

So true.

So true.

You can tiptoe around life situations because you don't want to experience that same hurt.

Yeah.

And you can even avoid great moves of God because you're trying to you're trying not to experience something that you've experienced in the past because you didn't actually deal with it.

Right.

Well, and I think um you and I are very similar in uh personality of, you know, if I I can just move past this.

Like I'm a strong person, so I don't need to acknowledge the pain, or sometimes it can feel like um, or at least for me, uh, I don't really want to deal with the vulnerability of admitting that I had this like painful moment, which can keep me from entering into the fact that I have pain in order to really dig in and and heal from it.

And so I think that's part of it for me is like acknowledging that I can be hurt.

And I think that's um a difficulty and something that Jesus and I have spent a considerable amount of time talking about is it's okay to admit that um you were hurt by this in order to fully heal from it.

How how has pain kind of operated in your life?

Um I think I'm just there are times when I don't trust the party that I want to express the pain to.

Yeah.

Because I'm afraid I'm afraid of the Maybe look at me not the same way ever again, you know?

Which I think is a great way of the greatest thing about grace, you know, and Jesus and the gospel in general is God looks at you through the lens of Jesus, yeah, and and he sees righteousness if you're a child of God.

But you know, in the community aspect, I think it takes I think it takes me more time to trust someone.

Yeah.

Just naturally, it just takes me more time.

Um I mean there, you know, obviously science tells us that if we experience stuff, our brains can wipe that.

And so there are areas and even years and and times in my life where I don't remember things because I've chose not to, you know, like when when my parents went through a divorce.

That that time in my life is very blurry.

So I try and think about like, man, what what did I learn through that?

And sometimes I can't because my mind's chosen to forget it, you know.

That's so interesting.

I think um another way I know like the brain can operate is recognizing common patterns and kind of seeing a butter knife and and calling it a dagger because of past experiences.

Um where oh, there's this common trait, common trait.

It's not the same situation, but those common traits kind of make us go warning, right?

Self-preservation.

Yeah, exactly.

It's it's that fight or flight mentality.

And so um just also recognizing I think adding grace to those things um help us to see where redemption comes into play.

Yeah, and I don't wanna I don't want to let anyone down either.

Yeah.

That's a big thing too.

Like I don't want you know, I don't want to let someone down um by saying like, hey, maybe you thought I was like this, but I'm actually like that, you know, or or maybe you thought my life was one way and it's not, but I think I think for me, especially, you know, in a position in a leadership role, that's tough.

Yeah.

And I think honestly, if your relationship with Jesus is skewed in any manner, it makes it even worse.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So well, and I think we talked so much about how important community is.

And community, I mean, even this sermon Pastor Keith talked about the importance of community.

And when you find good community, you know it because they can fully know you and still love you fully.

And I think that is one of the greatest gifts that God has given us is in community and in friendship, is being able to be wholly known, be able to bring your messy to the table and people look at it and go, Hey, that's all.

Hey, okay, like we can we can do this together, we can overcome this together.

That's not who you actually are in Christ.

And so let's let's pursue healing and let's walk this out together.

Yeah, and they can tell and they can help remind you of hey, Jesus has been there.

Yeah, you know, it it kind of segues into like Jesus wept.

Yeah.

And I again for the for the lifers, the Christian, the career Christians, shortest scripture, shortest scripture in the Bible, Jesus wept.

And that I just remember talking about that so much as a kid, like, what's a short scripture in the Bible?

Yep.

Uh Jesus wept, duh.

Yep.

And then you know, someone trying to, and it is profound, don't get me wrong, but someone trying to pull so much out of it just to say, like, look what I got out of two words in scripture, and look at this message that I you know what I mean.

So I PTSD, I guess.

Yeah.

I I remember one sermon, like this and this is so profound.

Like, Jesus takes up half of the scripture, and like Jesus takes up the entire Bible.

I mean, uh, but yeah, I agree.

Yeah.

Anyways, what I was alluding to is you know, in in Hebrews talking about he's our great high priest, you know, and um and Jesus Jesus has experienced anything that that you and I have experienced.

Yeah, and I was kind of thinking about this a little bit last night.

Even the age of Jesus, I'm in that time frame now of his of what we know about him, 30 to 33, just turned 30.

So I thought about that over this past year, like man, thinking about my life experiences, and obviously thousands of years later, but still nothing new under the sun, right?

And trying to relate that, I feel like I relate to him a little bit more, yeah.

And I feel like I'm able to accept the fact that Jesus did walk in my shoes just because of that age um similarity.

Yep.

I don't know, it's it's just been interesting to realize that and to kind of walk through that over this past year.

Yep, the emotions for sure, and that there isn't anything like he relates to us.

There isn't anything that we have experienced that he can't relate to, even to the point of like rejection.

Oh, nobody rejected Jesus.

He went into his own hometown and they wouldn't accept the fact that he was the Messiah.

He was doing the things that he didn't like, he was rejected by his own people, like people who grew up knowing like this is Jesus, like they they couldn't rectify the fact that that that kid that they saw running around was and he was rejected by them.

Yeah.

And so even in those types of moments, he can he understands how we feel.

And I think that's why it's so important to take our pain to Jesus, because he understands the pain that we're going through, because he he walked through that.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's uh once you can actually not just hear that, but you can actually hold on to that, yeah.

It changes your it changes your your worldview and it just allows you to take a deep breath and to exhale and say, Okay, God, you know, you're not surprised by this, your son experienced it.

What are we gonna do about it?

Yeah, you know, yeah, it's good.

Lazarus was not the one responsible for removing the stone.

Yeah.

And when I first heard it, I thought, oh man, he's gonna go like Jesus is the only one in your life, you know what I mean?

I thought he was gonna go there, but it was interesting because yes, Jesus said the word, but the community had to do it.

And it's what you pointed out earlier, like how important community is.

And I think it we harp there, I'm noticing now that I'm hosted after the message, there are certain things that just continue to raise their head during these talks, and one of the things that continues to come up is community, and it's one of the pillars of our church, and it's one of the things that we talk about all the time, and people that have been here for you know any length of time knows life change happens in the context of community, right?

Talk about life change, like like literally going from death to life, correct?

Yeah, and I mean from from the very beginning, like how helpless he was dead, like how helpless he was, and the family, the community came around and brought Jesus into it.

Yeah.

So it's a plug for groups.

Everything's a plug for groups, groups are so important.

How has uh how's community impacted your life?

I mean, community has truly been a game changer, and this is coming from someone who I don't really prefer to let people into my life.

I'm a homebody by nature, but just recognizing how important it is to be intentional and step out of community and step out of my comfort zone and into community um because it sharpens, it has sharpened my understanding of who God is in my own life.

Um and understanding like watching other people grow in their understanding of God sharpens and helps helps us grow.

Um but what I love about this one in particular, this illustration is a lot of times we think about community in context of okay, what is it gonna do for me?

But this is saying, okay, what are you gonna do for others?

And that was really something that I took away and and evaluated, man, am I being intentional, especially in these, you know, unprecedented times.

Um bingo word, yeah.

Am I am I being intentional with with stepping out in into the spaces like if Jesus asked me to go and help a friend, am I stepping into that space with them?

Or am I going, I don't want to offend them?

You know, uh Noah mentioned it last week, you know, wounds from a friend can be trusted.

That's what Proverbs says.

But we are are we stepping out and helping people out of the death that they're walking, walking in?

Like, are we helping them pull the grave clothes off and and saying, like, hey, this isn't who you are anymore.

Yeah.

Uh, when you bring Jesus into the picture.

And are we creating those spaces for other people?

Are we just entering into community being like, okay, what can you do for me?

Yeah.

You know?

Yeah, I look at it in a in a little bit of a different light along the same path, however.

I think as Christians, we're scared to be called bigots or we're scared to be called judgmental because those are two labels that the world has put on Christianity.

Right.

Has there been bigotry in churches before?

Sure.

You know, have there been judgmental Christians?

Yeah, you know, absolutely.

But I don't think that that excuses us from the responsibility and the role that we have to do.

Yeah.

And I and and again, like I'm saying this out of conviction of something that I need to do a better job at.

Like I need to be able to look at look at a friend, and this isn't this isn't just like some guy you met yesterday.

Like this is like relationships built over time, your community.

Yep.

But am I able to look at someone as a friend and say, hey dude, what are you what are you doing?

You know?

And I don't know.

I don't I sometimes maybe I can do it, but I still feel like I tiptoe because I'm scared of losing that relationship, you know.

But again, it goes back to not doing it in your own strength.

Like Jesus was present there, like he was the one that gave the initial instruction.

Right.

Hey, you know, remove the stone, get the get the grave clothes off of them.

Yeah, I think that's such a good point.

Like reiterating this is not someone that you don't have a relationship with.

Like, that's when if you don't know somebody's heart, and then it's hard to trust those wounds, you know.

Um but then also recognizing like, are you I don't know, are you creating those spaces?

I think we are have heard the um don't point out the the speck in somebody else's eye when you have a plank in your own.

And so I think a lot of times you think like, well, I'll never be able to do anything.

So how am I yeah?

Well, I can't, you know, I can't call them out on that Jesus because I have a lot of I have a lot of issues myself.

Thanks, Lord.

But I think that it's so important to um just like in everything else, like follow the voice of God.

And if He is calling you to have that conversation with somebody, you know, you start praying for your own heart.

You go in with a posture of um, I'm gonna speak the truth in love and not speak the truth out of frustration or out of judgment.

Are you speaking the truth in love?

And um, just really asking God to cover cover your conversation and to prepare their hearts.

And a lot of times, if if Jesus is asking you to like enter into that space of like, hey, help them get the grave clothes off, like they have an awareness that they have grave clothes, you know, and so um it's the helping them in the process.

Yeah.

And and it's super important to to be slow to speak, it's super important to listen to their side.

There's two sides to every story.

You can't call okay, here's where it gets here's where it gets 21st century on us is we want to call people out on Twitter or we want to call people out online, you know, and and or through a text.

Or through a text.

And I mean, I get that it that's convenient, but it's not helping anybody, you know, especially if it's somebody that you don't know.

Yeah.

So one of the things that really just hurts my heart more than anything is when pastors call other pastors out publicly, yeah, or leaders call other leaders out publicly.

Like that's not how we're supposed to do it, you know.

I mean, I'm I'm pretty sure I could be wrong because I'm not a scholar, but I'm pretty sure that scripture is is pr is clear on hey, go to that person.

And if they don't listen to you, bring another, bring a third party in and talk to them.

But I don't think it ever really says anything about you know talking about each other online or whatnot.

Social media, call-outs or not.

I mean, and here's a shameless plug for an upcoming sermon series.

Uh it's gonna be on what did Jesus really say about, and we're gonna talk about call-out culture, you know, and um I think that's gonna be a really powerful sermon where we talk about what did Jesus say about calling each other out, and even if if they are in the wrong, what does he really say about that?

So stay tuned.

Because there is that's gonna be a really good one, yeah.

There is a way to do it, yeah, exactly.

And but publicly, probably not, probably not a probably not a good idea, unless it's just so out of control that that person's never gonna listen to you in the first place, and you need to protect people that are in your sphere, yeah.

Or whatever.

Yep.

Um, but yeah, you know, like you said at the beginning of of this, is are you speaking that in love?

Are you speaking the truth in love or out of frustration?

And I think that's some of the best advice that you gave me early on when I first got into ministry was I asked you, like, hey, if you notice something in someone, like when do you decide to say it?

And you're like, Well, I first figure out if I'm frustrated or angry, and if I am, I don't say it, you know.

It's like so if it's gonna take you a little bit to like realize that you're doing it because you love this person and you know that there's more in them, yeah, then it's probably real.

But if after a while you're like, all right, whatever, yeah, I was just mad.

Exactly.

It's a really helpful tool to use.

Is okay, am I really doing this for them or am I doing this for me?

Because it's really easy to think that you're doing it for them.

Yeah.

Um, before Lazarus dies, he's on his deathbed, and he had to be wondering why Jesus didn't show up.

Yeah.

How often in your life have you said hello?

Yeah.

Well, especially uh because when they sent word to Jesus, the way they put it was like the one you love is dying, you know, and so Lazarus is laying there with the stamp of I'm the one Jesus loves, and this is the this is the treatment I get, you know.

Um yeah, the the disappointment of when God doesn't show up in the timing that you think he should is one that can really take blows to your heart, you know, and your trust of God.

But I I um a couple years ago, I when Brandon and I were in the process of trying to have Elliot, I went to somebody and I I just didn't want to go through disappointment again.

And I I asked her if she could pray with me, and she was like, you know, you said that you are dealing with disappointment.

And she was like, But here's the thing is we can never be disappointment if we keep God appointed as the person who's ruling our life.

Wow.

And that's something that I've just really hung on to is if I'm disappointed in something, it usually means that I have disappointed God as the ruler in that situation.

Kind of going back to our the very beginning of our conversation of me constantly trying to take and take control back into my own hands.

I I don't let him be the one who's appointed at controlling the situation.

And so uh disappointment is something to acknowledge, but for me, it's acknowledging that I I've taken God off the throne in in my own view.

And um, there are moments that I will never understand the way that he's working behind the scenes um until you know, sometimes a couple months later, and I'm like, oh, that's what he was doing, sometimes a couple years later, and oh, that's what he's doing.

And there will be some things I won't understand until heaven, but at the end of the day, I know he's still on the throne.

I just have to make sure that that's what's staying in my view.

Yeah.

And at the beginning of the story, Jesus says, Hey, this isn't gonna end in death.

And are we gonna are we gonna live live our lives in that manner?

Yeah.

You know, suffering job loss or whatnot, like, hey, this isn't gonna end with you.

And I mean, for goodness sake, just a person on a personal story, my dad lives in lives in Seattle and moved out there for like uh my stepmom's like family, because they were out there and she's from South Africa, and that's the only family that she has, you know what I mean?

So moved out there, a very noble move on his part, but it's uh it's across the country, you know.

Like he's from the South, he's been here his whole life, and without a job for goodness, three years in Seattle, yeah.

You know, we're not we're not talking about I don't know, it's a different economy.

So being able to to look at look at Jesus and say, really?

Like this isn't gonna end in like destruction or this isn't gonna end in poverty, for goodness sake.

Right.

But time after time he would just tell me, like, hey, we're just trusting God, that's all we know to do.

We're just taking a day at a time where we're trusting God.

And was it tough?

Sure.

I mean, there was probably points where he pulled a Martha and Mary was like, Where the heck have you been?

You know, like it's it's over, like he's he's dead already.

But just being able to to live your life saying, like, hey, this isn't gonna end in death.

Yeah, it looks pretty dark right now, but and that's true faith.

Yeah, that's walking by faith and not by sight.

That's good.

Um other thing if you're up for it.

Abraham's bosom.

Oh my gosh.

Were you thinking I was gonna bring this up?

Or I don't know.

I think part of me was hoping that you wouldn't.

But of course, I always get the super theological question.

Well, I mean, look, you and I have our weekly phone meetings, and I bring up the tough questions.

Sure.

So, how did you think that you were gonna be on after the message and not get the tough question?

Yep.

Abraham's bosom.

I want, I mean, there's just so many things that pop into my life spiritually, and I'm like, I need to research this, I need to research, and I just sometimes I don't even get to anything because there's so much.

Like last week we were talking about what role does the adversary play in your life?

Right.

Just normal conversation.

And this week we're talking about Abraham's bosom.

Like, is this heaven?

Is this purgatory?

Yeah, what is this?

It's like heaven-ish, yeah.

And um, yeah, I really liked the way that Pastor Keith broke down like Lazarus was probably getting used to being in that space and understanding, oh yeah, that's Abraham, that's Moses, and and being used like in in that in between space.

But obviously, um heaven is.

is something we all have access to and and the the life is something that we all have access to because of Jesus.

Um and that was not something that we all had access to.

We all being Gentiles, um those who were not God's chosen people, the Jews, you know, did not have access.

But I'm not going to get into all this because it has been I haven't been in school in a long time.

And there are some deleted mental files that I have.

So that's as far as I can go on Abraham's bosom.

That's fine.

If you this is a great way for us to test out our new email address if you know anything about Abraham's bosom.

I will pull up logos and I can answer some questions on that.

Yeah but if you're listening and you've done extensive study on this you can email atm at celebration but no it it is good um kind of going back to are you willing to step out of your misery so Jesus can step in that's you you would immediately answer that question well yeah of course you know like of course I I but are are you are you really oh you mean like right now like oh I have to actually move yeah it's too fun right now yeah but yeah that's that's a tough one because sometimes you don't even realize it and again it goes back to your proximity to God.

Yeah you know are you are you daily asking God to reveal things to you or asking God to to move the ball you know the proverbial ball down the field in your own life and if you're not then you might be stuck in some things that you don't even realize you're stuck in.

Yeah and it's just become it's just become human nature it's just become natural to you and and you don't see anything wrong with it.

Yeah and that's where community comes back into play too of uh having people that know you well enough to go hey this isn't this isn't you this isn't healthy this is you're you're sitting in misery like let me give you a hand let's pull you back out you know and I think that's what what is so important about community that that like both and community and relationship with God they work so hand in hand.

Yeah yeah um is there anything that maybe you wrote down or that struck you differently this time around on the the Lazarus message?

I mean truly the community aspect and I know we already hit on it, but just how am I being intentional right now with listening to God on behalf of my commun community?

And am I expecting my community to always only seek after me or am I being intentional about going and encouraging the person in my community that needs to be encouraged or um helping them move past things that they've been stuck in for years.

And that's something uh man Brandon and I have amazing community and we have endured a lot of years of um hard hard things together you know of and I have so admired the people in our community who have said hey like our marriage is struggling right now and we need y'all's help um to come around us and support us and and watching them like walk through and walk out of marital issues because we walked with them.

And I think the the willingness to both say hey here's where I'm vulnerable and the willingness to not judge but say okay yeah like let let's help you though those are the moments that um is what being the family of God is all about is that we come around each other and help each other out.

And so I think that's that's the thing that is challenging me from this sermon the most is looking around and saying when's the last time that I reached out to this friend and and had having the hard conversations and not letting good friendships go just because there was like a hard thing that happened in them.

And even just recently actually like I had a I had a friendship that we were at this crossroads.

Like we there were some words that were said that were hurtful that needed some clarification and I had to make the choice like no this this friendship is more important to me than the hurt that I might have endured.

And so we had a conversation that clarified everything and we we decided no there this is too important to just let go because good friendships uh godly friendships that move you forward are not worth losing because of one one misunderstanding and so going the extra mile to not just I think the world is like yeah if somebody hurt you you you cut them out of your life but if evaluate the fruit before that one moment and and enter into the conversations and give people another chance if they if they have proven that their heart was not to be that um make sure that you are not just letting good friendships die.

Because they're they're hard to come by and they're so important.

So that's something that this sermon really had me reflecting on.

Yeah.

Yeah it's about humility I guess at the end of the day like even if you are burned in a sense or even if you are hurt are you gonna be willing to to humble yourself and and have that conversation.

Yeah you know and I think again if God's if God's where he should be in your life you know if you're talking to Jesus on the daily then um that that can make it a little bit easier.

Yeah you know so yeah do what he tells you to do.

Yeah super simple.

And on that note thanks really appreciate it.

Thank you for having me this is fun.

Yeah it's good to I mean we do this every week we just recorded it this time good deal thank you for joining us for After the message to learn more about Celebration Church here in Orlando you can follow us on social media under the handle at CelebrationORL or visit our website at celebrationorl.org