After the Message: I Am The Good Shepherd

Thank you for joining us today for After the Message.

To learn more about Celebration Church here in Orlando, follow us on social media at Celebration Overlord or visit our website at celebrationoverm.org.

Hey, well, welcome to uh week two of After the Message.

I'm Josh.

This is Justin.

We're here with the man, the myth, the legends.

I'm the pastor, Pastor Keith Fitman.

Um, whether you're watching online or listening on whatever podcast you subscribe to, we're so glad you're here with us uh today.

We can't wait to just share more with you about what we talked about um this week and I'm the good shepherd.

I mean, it was awesome.

I loved it having church at home and seeing so many people interact with what we're doing right now.

It's been amazing.

I think that's one of the things that I love about our community is just how we adapt.

You know, when we kind of started church at home, it was like it was really birthed through that that hurricane that we had last year and just seeing how the community organically gathered together.

Um, and then we did it intentionally um towards the end of the year, and just really seeing our community there.

So I just love how God had been preparing us the entire way in the sense of us knowing how to gather, how to engage, learning how to engage the content online.

So this isn't anything like new, so to speak, for us, but but this past week, really just seeing um we're able to carry this momentum and talking about the good shepherd, and it really did fit uh a lot into like where we are because of what it means for the Good Shepherd and what it means for us to be sheep.

Yeah, it was good.

I loved all your uh jokes about Jordans as well.

It was great.

Yeah, let me ask you a question.

What is your favorite Jordan release to date?

Oh gosh.

You know what, man?

I'm an OG, man.

Probably the ones.

All right.

I think the ones are probably like my my favorite release.

You heard it here first, folks?

Um the ones.

Then there's the threes.

So the the ones, the threes, and the elevens are probably like my my my um, I was gonna say the trinity, but that would be inappropriate.

Um, but those are my three that um that are that I'll that I'll rock with.

So what you're saying is if someone happens to get you ones or threes in size nine and a half to ten.

Okay.

I can adapt because if they're a little bit bigger, I can just get thicker socks.

Um so whatever you have, if the Lord leads you, I'm not saying that it's a request, I'm not saying it's a requirement.

Um, but what I do tell you is that the Bible says, Blessed are the feet of those who preach the gospel.

Um and if you want, if you want to get in on this, okay, let's start.

Preachers and sneakers is gonna take this.

They're literally losing context.

All right, so I think one of the best things we can focus on uh for this one, honestly and truly is you know, there's a lot of kind of fear of the unknown and panic going on right now with everything that's going on with the coronavirus and all that stuff.

And you really talked about that this past week as sheep and in Psalms 23.

One of the things that you talked about is that I will not fear.

And I loved a lot of the things that you brought up in that.

And um, I think even maybe today we just talk about some of those things practically, yeah.

What it looks like to have practical faith in the face of fear, in the face of the unknown, and and just even the part that we play as the church, as the body of Christ for others during this time.

I think it'd be a great thing to kind of hone in on today.

Yeah, for sure, man.

I I there's a lot, there's a lot I can say.

So we're we're we're gonna talk around this, but um, I was sharing with you guys earlier just um, you know, we have the role of the shepherd, and we talked about that, and then we kind of talked a little bit about our role as sheep, and ultimately it is to follow.

And so there's obviously a lot of that goes with it, but ultimately it's our responsibility to follow.

But now you take in the fact that that we're human beings and we have more awareness.

Like for the sheep, they just really trusted the shepherd, like we're just gonna follow.

And they really didn't have the prefrontal cortex to consider other variables, they just they just followed the shepherd.

Where when you bring in the variables that we have, like we can look at our surroundings and we have all these things, but I think there's a reason why God still says, like in these moments for us to have childlike faith or to be sheep, he's trying to help us to not focus on things that that can distract us and that are fueled by fear.

So one of the things um that I've recognized that a shepherd does is that they're going before the sheep.

And when they go before the sheep, not only are they leading them down these paths, and sometimes from a human perspective, and maybe even from the sheep's perspective, it may get a little bit more narrow, it may get a little uncomfortable, but they're trusting the shepherd's voice.

But also, the shepherd is going before the sheep, and not only is he leading them to the green pastures, but he's preparing the environment.

So what shepherds would do is that as they're going ahead, they're removing the the barriers, they're removing the obstacles, they're removing any like rocks that can cause them to slip.

They're actually removing rocks where they're going to be grazing.

Now, if we were to like, if we were to like personify the sheep for a moment, if they were looking ahead of the shepherd, they're like, man, why is he leading us down here?

Doesn't he see all those trees out there?

Doesn't he see the rocks that are out there?

Like, why is he leading us this way?

I mean, let's just cut back and go a different way.

But what I think God is trying to show us is that if the if the shepherd is before us, he's actually preparing the way for us.

So that way, even if we are seeing things that are ahead of us, don't look past the shepherd.

Because the shepherd is gonna prepare the way.

So I think that's one of the critical things that we have to make sure with all of this stuff, is that knowing that we have a shepherd that's in this valley with us, but he's preparing the way.

Yeah, he's gonna he's gonna remove the barriers.

Are we gonna allow ourselves to follow that or are we gonna look beyond the shepherd and begin to react to what we're seeing, not realizing that the shepherd's gonna take care of it for us?

Yeah, and I think that's so important.

Like we've we've talked about it even in the last few months.

We've spoken in messages about like how important God's timing is.

It's like not getting ahead of God, not not not we may feel called to something, right?

Like we may feel called to something, and we want it so bad, and we try to like speed up God's timeline.

And we've said this before, like the right thing at the wrong time is actually the wrong thing.

Absolutely.

Like, you know, and that's what's so important.

Like, there's an illustration of a lantern, how the way God leads us sometimes is it's like we have a lantern, we're only able to see a few steps ahead of us because if we saw the whole picture, yeah, we'd see all the rocks, we'd see a spotlight.

Yeah, we want to spot, we want to see it all.

But oftentimes, man, when we see it all, either A, we'll try to get to it too quickly, or B, we'll turn from it and not want anything to do with it because it looks too hard.

Absolutely, one thousand percent.

And I think what's important for us is is a lot of times there's like this this tension that has to be managed because we're trying to figure out like what what part does my faith play and what part does the facts play?

Like what because we we can't ignore it.

Like we let's let's be very let's be very honest.

Like we we are a people of faith.

We believe what God's word says, we stand on God's truth, like we're we're unwavering in that.

But we also have to consider facts.

Yeah, and so one of the things that we talked about this past week is that we want to make sure that facts inform our strategy, but they shouldn't inform our faith.

Yeah, yeah.

So that means that there are moments that we are gonna have to like make sure, like, you know, faith does not deny facts, it just trust God in spite of them.

Yeah.

So yeah, there's some facts that are floating around, but there's a difference between facts and truth.

Yeah.

And so we have to make sure that we understand that there are going to be some facts that are gonna be presented to us.

We run it through the filter of faith, and then we stand on God's truth.

But whenever we have to process facts and we don't run it through the grid of faith, it fuels our fear and it has us believing in anti-truth.

We lose sight of what God's Word says about all that.

And so that's the thing that we have to be as sheep is making sure that we root ourselves in the right thing.

But on the other side of the coin, there are there are those moments where when do we identify those moments where we stand against whatever the facts may say?

Yeah.

Um, when we when we stand against, like so there's gonna be facts that are presented.

So let's take, for instance, we're in the middle of this coronavirus, and depending on when you're engaged in this content, who knows what what the season may be.

But in our as of present day, right now, the the suggestion is from CDC is that no more than 10 people gather.

Is that is that correct?

Like, what are we doing?

Right now it's still 50, but it's probably about to be 10.

Yeah, okay.

And we only have four people in this room, just so you know, just we're we're we're advising, we're following it.

So that's that's the current thing.

Who knows what this will be later and and all that stuff.

But it's it's 50, but advising 10, all those things.

So those are variables, those are facts.

Yeah.

And so we're aware that this virus is spreading through contact, it's it's it's it's it's it's in the air, there's all these things.

These are absolute facts.

Now the truth is, no matter what season we may find ourselves in, God's with us.

Yeah, he's gonna get us through it.

But to ignore the facts and kind of have like this this faith movement where it's like, well, we're gonna continue to gather and do what we want to do, even in spite of that, it's it's not so much that you don't trust God, and that's not what you're trying to say, but it's it's just being mindful of the fact that we have to use wisdom as well.

And so a couple of the ways that I've processed through things when it comes to like how do we process through these things, for me, it really boils down to scripture.

Yeah, and so what scripture says is that in Romans 13, and I want you guys to read it if you can, like, man, we submit ourselves to authority.

Yeah, that it actually says that there's no authority given unless God has provided it.

So there's that moment where we understand that that God puts people in positions for such a time as this.

We see this in scripture, that God is able to use people that that can be voices of wisdom.

So when we have these folks that are presenting these guidelines and things that they're trying to help hopefully help us to kind of partner with them with keeping us safe, it would be, I think it would be negligent for us to believe that there's not a believer that's involved in the CDC.

I think it would be negligent for us to believe that God's not using anyone to help inform society so that we can make good decisions to prevent this thing from spreading even more.

But then also on the other side of the coin, there's the there's the Acts 4, the Acts chapter 5, where where the disciples are told, hey, don't go and preach in the name of Jesus.

Acts 5 · chapter mention

Yeah.

And then their response is, well, who are we gonna believe?

Man or God?

So I realize that there are moments where it seems as if, okay, so here we're saying submit ourselves to authority, but over here we're seeing where the disciples are directly going against what authority said.

So so here's where I think our posture has to be when we're considering all those things.

We always are gonna submit ourselves to us under authority, however, we stand on God's word.

Yeah, yeah.

And whenever authority comes against what God's word said, that's the moment where we have to stand in resistance.

We see this even in our even in our in our culture, we see this even in our country.

So let's rewind time a little bit and then I want to hear from you guys on this.

But there's a moment when like segregation was legal.

There's a moment when we had all these oppressive systems in place to keep things the way that they were.

That was contrary to the word of God, and that was contrary to the nature of God.

So the people of God had to stand against that in order to get those things to change.

But let's let's be reminded that there's not been any sanction that has been said that the church can't gather.

There's been no sanction that says that it's illegal for you to preach the name of Jesus.

The truth of the matter is that if that's the case, then what do we say to those those churches that are that are gathering in other countries where it is illegal?

Is there a response to that supposed to be, no, we're gonna gather anyway, and we're all gonna get murdered?

Like, or or or is it their responsibility to adapt and recognize that, okay, we're facing some serious oppression.

We're gonna pivot and recognize that church has never been exclusively about the building, it's been with the people, and we will gather where we can and continue to move the gospel forward.

So it's about having a healthy perspective and understanding that we're not gonna allow fear to be the thing that influences our decisions.

We are gonna allow facts to help us to build a strategy, but we're gonna run it through the grid of faith, and it just makes wisdom to allow us to look at what these things are saying, to make decisions and build strategies around it.

But the truth of the matter is whether we're meeting at home, whether we're meeting in a building, the Bible says that wherever two or three are gathered, God is in the midst.

Yeah, so we have to get out of this mentality of saying that the church is only the building.

There's nowhere in scripture that says that.

Yeah, that's something that we perpetuated that has nothing to do with truth.

Yeah.

I mean, I've seen it firsthand traveling all over the world.

I've been to different places where like it is actually illegal for people to be uh Christians.

And so I was in China, I was in Beijing back in it was 2007.

I remember when I was there, we had a chance to meet with the guy, he was like the leader of the underground church in Beijing.

And we went to this restaurant, and the way this restaurant was set up is like there were little huts all around, like the center place where they cook the food, and then they would deliver the food through a little door about probably two foot high by two foot wide.

A tray would come in, and then your server in the room would take the food, put it on a little like a round daisy thing, you know, and you'd turn it around and everybody would eat off of it.

And then all of a sudden, in the middle of it, we see this box get shoved through, and this little Asian Chinese guy comes through, literally, like this little hole, and he's the leader of the underground church.

And he starts talking to us about what they're doing, and he's saying what they're doing, and literally we had brought Bibles.

So we took some of the Bibles that we had, we put them into this little box, and he was going to take this food delivery box and then take it and deliver these Bibles to different people who were leaders of the underground church.

And then what they would do is they would take pages out of those Bibles and then give them to people that were that they knew who were Christians and trying to follow Christ, and each person would take that page, they would memorize it, and then they would give it back to him the next week, like for another page, and they would talk about that stuff, and like that's what they were doing, and they were seeing miracles and they were seeing all these things happen, and never once did they think, man, just because we can't all get together in like one big location or one big building, are we not being God's church?

And I think like that's what we have to keep in mind.

Like, I mean, Justin, you you put it yesterday, you retweeted what somebody put.

It's like your first church is your family.

100%.

Like right now, we have the opportunity to like really pastor our families and lead our families and and friends and colleagues and people that we're around more than we ever have.

Because now it's like, I mean, it's not like, hey, here's an invite, maybe come on Sunday.

It's like, hey, stuff's getting real.

Yeah, like God is real, like this is where we're going.

And like I was talking to my dad about it on Monday.

We had a long conversation about it, and one of the things that he said at the very end of it is he's like, son, he's like, all the facts and the situation, he goes, it's ever changing and it's fluid.

He goes, but when you use God's word as a filter, it will always be a firm foundation for everything that you're going through.

And so I think for all of us, that's what we have to do right now in these moments, is like everything we hear, it's gonna be fluid, it's gonna change from new station to new station, from person to person.

But God's word, it's a firm foundation, it's the same yesterday, today, and forever.

And so when we actually focus on that and we do what we can do, which is we lead ourselves, we lead our families, we lead our homes, and we do that like I mean, God and I believe God's gonna do something amazing in these times, and we can't view it as the church can't meet because the church is bigger than a building.

It's like you said, the church is never canceled.

I love it.

And I think I think that's such a like like if if you're one of those people, like I mean, obviously, every anytime you get on Instagram or even the CDC is putting stuff out about how to overcome anxiety and fear like during this time, like I think one of the important things to know, like as as those of us who are followers of Jesus in the church, is that this isn't like the new mandate.

Like, we're doing this because of the situation, like we're meeting like this because of the situation.

I think what's important to to recognize is like we're gonna meet again.

As soon as we get the okay and everything, like we're gonna get back together, we're gonna have that community, we're gonna have that one on one that one-on-one.

But I think what is what is kind of like the silver lining in this is is use this time to then maybe you can't go into work right now.

Maybe, maybe, maybe you are having to stay in your home for you know for h however long.

Like, look at this time.

How often have you thought to yourself or you've gotten to church, you've been convicted of like, man, my life's so crazy right now.

I'm having such a hard time, like finding time to spend with Jesus.

I'm finding such a hard time to like read books and stuff that that that I know I need to do.

Man, the silver lining this is now is like, man, the the church is not a building, the church is not where everyone comes in, the church is wherever you are, wherever you are with your family.

Jesus is wherever you are.

If you were a follower of Jesus, you do not just get to meet with him when you're at a church building on a Sunday morning or a Wednesday night at 7.30.

Like, no, you can meet with Jesus and have the same experience exactly where you're at.

And so, man, if you've been praying and asking God, like, God, man, I I I want to know you more.

What better time than now to have no distractions, to have to have this time when the world around you is is is just it's pandemonium.

Like we are in a legitimate pan pandemic.

What better time than now to to lean on Jesus, to lean on the word of God, to listen to worship music, to to to open up that book that you've bought several months ago, thinking, man, I'll get around to it sometime, to open up that book, to open up God's word and and and I mean such a time as this.

Yeah.

I mean, it it's it's if you're struggling with fear and anxiety, you know, look at it as like, at least I got Jesus, at least, at least I have these resources, this access, things like this, like this is not stopping.

You know, you have so much at your fingertips.

You know, like what you were just talking about, like that the church you're talking about had to rip pages out to memorize God's word.

Yes.

You can open up your iPhone, you can love the internet is not down.

All of these things are not down, man.

It's actually free right now.

It's free, like all of these things, man.

Look at it as an opportunity.

Look at it as an opportunity for growth.

Yeah.

Yes.

I I love um, I believe it's Romans, yes, Romans chapter five.

And like for me, where it talks about like endurance and hope and salvation and all these things producing this stuff in your life.

For me, when you go through situations like this, I used to think, God, can you just get me through it?

But when I read that, I realize, no, God can actually help me grow through it.

Yeah, it's not just about getting through something, it's about actually growing through it.

And one of the things that I want to encourage you guys with, and that we've been, we we listened to this song as a staff yesterday.

It's been one that our families had on repeat.

There's a song called The Blessing by Elevation Worship.

You can find it on YouTube, it's not been released on iTunes or anything like that yet.

But this song is all about God being with you.

It's all about him being going before you, following behind you, being beside you, being in you.

And I love it so much because it reminds you, and it reminds me of what you said on Sunday, is that you can have victory in the valley if God is with you.

Because the shepherd is there.

And I think that's what people need to know now more than anything, whatever valley you may feel like you're in.

Maybe you're in something financially right now.

Maybe you aren't able to go to work and you don't know what that's gonna mean.

Maybe you're uh a mom who's now had to become a stay-at-home mom and homeschool your kids during this time.

I know, I know Callie's doing that right now.

Maybe you're having to relearn algebra.

And God needs to be with people that already already already always do.

Or you're trying to learn common core math.

Let's just be honest.

It's crazy.

But but the thing is, is like, remember, God is with you, He will lead you, He will guide you, and if He is with you, no matter what your valley is, you will have victory in that valley.

And so just remember that and be encouraged by that during this time.

I think one of the things that that I that I love to look at in these moments, so I've really been doing my best to kind of process through these these seasons where um the church or the people of God, like those moments where there's like uh some form of opposition, some form of challenge, something that comes from it, and and what does God through do through it?

Because like to your point, no one is no one is is saying, you know what I need?

Suffering.

Yeah.

Like, man, sign me up for that.

Like, that's give me something that I can just really struggle with.

Like, no one's asking for that.

But the reality of it is God uses that a lot to bring to bring about growth, to bring about um breakthrough, to bring about miracles.

And so I often look at these these narratives in scripture, these moments where there has been some form of opposition, and it kind of reminds me like of that famous statement that Joseph makes, like what the enemy meant for evil, yeah, God uses it for good.

It connects it with Paul's saying, like, you know, what you know, God works all things together for the good.

Like it's everything's not good.

Yeah, but God has this ability with his grace and his sovereignty of working it all together.

And Joseph wouldn't have been able to say that when he was in the pit.

That's right.

You know, he wouldn't be able to say that when he was going through all this stuff.

It was looking back.

Yes.

And I think a lot of us we're gonna look back on this and we're gonna be, man, what what was meant for evil, God turned it around for good.

So here's the thing, man, like greatness is never found in real time, it's in retrospect.

Yeah, very few people realize like in real time what this really is gonna mean.

Like, I've I've shared this before, but I've often looked at these moments in scripture, and and the way that I'm wired is I I look at it like, man, like imagine that moment.

Because like here we are, we're reading the Bible thousands of years later.

We're we're looking at these different moments, but I honestly don't believe, this is just me inferring, but I honestly don't believe, like, if these guys knew that, man, this is something that's gonna shape the beliefs of people thousands of years after me, I don't know how they would have responded.

I think they probably would have freaked out a little bit if you knew the weight of it, because I mean their flaws were very visible, their fear and some of their concerns were very visible, but yet it became this thing that in retrospect, when they look back at it, like wow, like this was something for this generation, and then the next generation didn't even we get a chance uh to benefit from it.

So I do believe that we'll have like that moment where we'll say, Hey, remember when when God and what did God do through that?

So I I look at like the birth of the early church, and I shared this with our staff yesterday.

Um, but with the early church, like if God had given them some instructions on what to do.

We knew that the early church that it had to be patient, they had to wait for the Holy Spirit to come, that they had to kind of persevere through that, they had to wait for power, the Holy Spirit.

We have to be led by the Spirit and not driven by fear.

Um, then there's that other spot where after the Holy Spirit comes, like they got kind of comfortable, if for lack of a better word.

The culture there was like Jesus was killed, was resurrected, at least for those who believed it, but yet these other believers were fired up.

So this is where we begin to see like they start dealing with persecution.

Yeah.

So now you have like this, all this pie in the sky stuff that the disciples had heard Jesus talk about.

Jesus dies, he goes up to heaven, now they're trying to figure it all out.

Holy Spirit comes, we're all fired up, but what do we do with it?

Yeah.

So they're still in Jerusalem at this time, and then that's when the persecution comes.

And when the persecution comes, they are forced to scatter.

But what the Bible says is the moment that they scattered, everyone that was a part of that original group, they preached the word of God everywhere they went.

And then the back end of that great commission, that back end of Acts 1.8, where it says, To all the ends of the earth, that's when that began to take place.

So what I what I believe is this I believe that we have these moments where we have patience, we have power that comes, we have a little bit of persecution, but when all those ingredients are there and we're obedient to the places that God called us to go, then there's great progress.

Like we see that they scattered and the church grew.

Not a single church building, not the numbers at Celebration Church Orlando, but the church, yeah, the people of God, it grew as as they had to deal with a little bit of scattering.

And so I I honestly believe this.

This is just me.

I really do believe that through this, the church, not our church, maybe our church will, maybe our church won't.

The church is going to grow.

Yeah, yeah.

I believe that people are going to be um gathering in their homes and they're gonna invite friends over and neighbors over.

And what's gonna happen is the church, the belief in Jesus Christ is going to grow as a result of this.

People that would Never come into the doors of a church until they have an encounter with Jesus.

They'll encounter Jesus in someone's living room.

And that's what I'm excited to see is what God does in it.

So even though I'm trying to diagnose it in real time, I realize that we won't see the harvest until we have some months down the road.

But I can sense in the spirit that right now God is already beginning to stir up some things that I believe that we're going to see the benefits of it and be like, wow, like who knew?

Yeah.

Who knew that God was going to do this through this season?

What I'm about to say is going to sound really saved, but it's all good.

When you're talking about that, if people don't know how, yeah, I've been really saved my whole life.

But just kidding.

Like, I mean, we hear everybody talking right now about flattening the curve, about trying to get ahead of the virus, about trying to get ahead of all that stuff.

What if this is the thing that starts flattening the curve of people who don't know Jesus?

Come on.

This is the thing that starts flattening the curve of like, I mean, like, I literally was thinking about that.

Like, I mean, like I mean, I mean, we think about it like we're about to inception this thing, but like, I mean, people are really dealing with this virus.

People are dealing with a virus in their life called sin that has separated them from Jesus Christ.

What if this thing helps flatten the curve?

And what if the church we helped to do that?

Like, it made me think about that when you said that, and like I I really, I really think if we will do this and we will be intentional about knowing that church is wherever we are at, that God is with us, that wherever we go, God goes.

We are a walking, talking billboard for him.

Then I really believe that everything that we do is gonna help flatten that curve.

And here's the thing that's where to Christ.

That's where the covering is.

So, like, like let's say this.

Um, we we realize, like, for for Noah, for instance, like here's here's the fact a storm is coming.

They didn't even know what that meant.

But Noah and his family, like, okay, we're gonna build this thing in preparation for whatever this thing is that God's talking about.

They build it, but the Bible says that it begins to raise up, God puts them in the ark, they go into the ark with obedience, and then God shuts them in.

So that talks about the protection of God, and who's Noah?

A family that's all together, that's obedient.

They have a structure that they have that's protected them.

Let's fast forward to the Exodus narrative.

Like, so there's there's these plagues, and all of these plagues are happening in the exact same environment that God's people are, yeah, but yet they were preserved and protected from it.

The people of God, the followers of God, that even when everything else was falling out, you've seen so many instances that when the plagues affected the Egyptians, it didn't affect the people of God.

But when you get to that last plague, and this is the one where it all comes together in regards to Jesus, that last plague, that whole Passover where that was instituted, like what happens?

Families came inside their home.

They put the blood of the lamb over the doorpost, and when a death angel passed by, which didn't get passed over, they were not affected by it.

Now, I'm not gonna get into like, okay, so that means that churches are bad and we all gotta sit in our homes.

That's not what we're saying.

What I'm saying is that we see this pattern and trend with God's people that whenever there's families that are together and the blood of the lamb is present, that there's covering for it.

So I gotta believe that that maybe what we have to make sure that we don't do as believers is that we don't outsource our intimacy with God.

Yeah, yeah.

A lot of times that's what the church has become.

The church has become the place where this is where I get spiritually fed.

Yeah.

Through Christianity.

Yeah, for sure.

So here's here's what I can tell you.

As a pastor, as a person who preaches, and you guys can probably test to this, I love when people come into the building with anticipation and expectation.

When they're bringing their, when they're bringing their encounters with God at their home into the church, then it becomes a place of excitement and inspiration and encouragement because we're all walking in with the measure of faith, and those who don't have faith can be inspired by what they're seeing versus versus the individuals like, man, I don't read my Bible except for when I come to church.

That's fine.

We love you.

Come as you are, but there's a momentum that happens when I'm bringing things that I've been reading.

I love when we have conversations and we're talking about the messages, and you're sharing stuff with me that you read, and and we even did just in our staff meeting.

People are sharing things like that's how it's supposed to be processed in the context of community.

We just have to stop outsourcing it to the professionals and allow us to know that we're all called to be kings and priests in the context of the kingdom of God.

That God, that the veil of the temple has been ripped in half.

Like we all can go boldly before the throne of grace.

We all can engage the presence and word of God, lead our families, and then contribute to the Lord.

Yeah.

Yeah, the building, the services, it's it's supplemental to your faith.

It's not, it's not, should never be your faith.

Yeah, exactly.

You know, growing up, and especially like in you know, here in America, like I grew up in church like my entire life.

Like there were, there was the majority of my life, honestly, where my faith, me being a Christian, was Sunday morning church, Sunday night church, Wednesday night, Wednesday night youth group, then Thursday night choir practice, like whatever it is, like that was my faith.

And it wasn't until I got older and I realized like I'm I am literally missing 90% of what it means to follow Jesus.

I am literally like there was a time in my faith, you know, grew up in church my entire life.

I don't really think I began to know who Jesus was until I I became an adult, really, and I I begin to kind of see like I begin to read the Bible for myself.

Yeah.

Not not it it's great to listen to preachers, it's great all that, but like, and Jesus can speak to you through through someone who is called and through through things, and Jesus can speak to you through anything, but for me, where I begin to see my faith actually become alive and and Jesus become real and relevant and what do you want to do in my life, it's when I begin to read the Bible for myself.

When I begin to to have church myself, when I begin to be the church, you know, it with me and other community, not just on Sundays, not just on Wednesdays, not just at a small group, but like it was there isn't a level of responsibility where it it is on you.

Like I love church, I am a church kid through and through.

You're in church through through.

We're all grew up in the church, like I love church.

I I I always want to have church.

I'm so bummed that we're not having church services right now, but it's it's a supplement that that is not and should never be your relationship with Jesus.

Yeah, and that gets us back to last week.

I am the source.

Yes.

I mean, so many times it's like we put our faith and our trust and our hope in resources, which are good, yeah, but it doesn't take place of the source.

Indeed.

And that's what I feel like all this is kind of pushing us back to.

And that kind of even ends with what we kind of ended on this week is that I will dwell.

Like I will dwell.

Like when we follow God, good things will follow us.

Yeah.

That kind of thing.

It's up there.

Thank you for listening.

I was listening.

I like that.

And so I I feel like that's a good kind of thing to help us wrap up in this, is that we're not only gonna have a chance to abide in the source, yes, now we're gonna dwell in the source, which is the good shepherd, and when we follow God, good things will follow us.

Indeed.

And I and I think that's where we can experience peace.

So here's what I want to say.

Like maybe, maybe you're just we we've talked about a lot, um, and and there's a practical aspect of it where maybe you're one of the ones who's been impacted where you can't go to work, and and maybe your job's not in a position where they can continue to pay you, whatever, whatever that may look like.

And so it does allow us to come back to recognizing that Jesus is our source, that God is our provider, learning how to like recognize that we may be in a valley, but we have a shepherd in the valley, and he's going before us.

Don't don't get don't get beyond God.

That's if there's one thing I can tell you is a lot of times our fear, you know what they say anxiety is?

I heard this definition and I thought it was brilliant.

They say that anxiety is being trapped in the future.

Yeah, it's like you're looking so far ahead and you're just trapped in the future.

And that obviously fuels fear.

And so often what happens, you know what, man, like we're looking past God.

Yeah, yeah.

Because we're looking at a future and are not considering what God's word says.

We're not considering the fact that the shepherd has gone before us and they're gonna take care of those things as we get there.

And there's been so many times, like, so many sleepless nights that I've had.

Um I've I became a father really young.

And you can only imagine being a father young, finding your best way to try to provide for your family.

Finances has always been a thing.

And and and and regardless, you never graduate from that.

Like, whenever you have a family, and I got granddaughters and son get ready to go to college, like, y'all pray for me, send help.

Like, but it's all it's always something, and sometimes you can look so far in the future that you just can get filled with this this anxiousness and this like, man, like how how how are we gonna do this?

Like, we didn't we didn't plan for all of my kids to go to college the way that we didn't have that information back.

I'm a little bit older, so we didn't plan for that back when I was coming up.

So you literally are just in these seasons.

Um, but what I found is whenever I look beyond God, whenever I look before God, that's where anxiety was.

Yeah, but I I've I found that God that God's grace has ability to meet us where we are.

Um and so every season where I've paused and acknowledged God's grace in that season, that's when there was peace, but then there was also provision.

Yeah.

But when we look past that, we just we lose sleep, we're filled with stress.

And so I know that it's easy for me to say those words, but take it from me, and I'm pretty sure you guys can say, like, I've been there.

Yeah, root yourself in a source.

Don't look beyond God, don't get ahead of God, and I promise you that you'll begin to experience peace, shalom, wholeness, and then you'll begin able to recognize um this sense of like provision.

Here, here's the last thing I'll say, and then I promise I'm gonna stop talking.

I was reading some um some literature from um um from some Navy SEALs, um, you know, just just just extreme ownership.

Oh yeah.

It's just a phenomenal.

It's a phenomenal book, Jocko.

I got the I got the audio version, it's great.

Like they it's actually them reading it.

So like when they're when they're telling their stories, you really feel like you're like in the middle of the world.

Like I just feel like I could fight and kill anybody.

Um so it's in the name of Jesus.

Um but it's it's it's really cool.

But one of the things that they talk about with their training is that they have to put them in these extreme pressure situations so that when they are in them in real life, that they don't panic.

And so the best way for me to paraphrase that there was like this sense of like how do you make decisions when everything is happening at once?

And and I'll paraphrase this summary.

So somebody who's got the book memorized, like, that's not what they said.

Listen, this is my translation.

So basically said it this way they said, you know, you have to like pause, yeah, process, make a decision, and execute.

Like pause, like, okay, what what can we do?

Process.

And here's and here's the point that they were trying to make.

If I am trying to make decisions and my mind is scattered, I won't have clarity of what I need to do.

Yeah, I won't have like so they would actually have this process of analyzing what's the immediate threat, dealing with that, being able to execute and move on to the next thing.

I think that is what we have to do.

We just can't get ahead of God.

Pause, process, analyze what you need to do, execute, and keep moving forward.

And I love how he ended that.

Because it was like the prioritize, execute.

Yes.

And then the way he did it, he said, but don't get target fixation.

Yes.

Which is looking too far in the future on something that you think may happen that you miss what's going on around you.

Absolutely.

And so I think that that that wraps it up.

You you used extreme ownership and after the message.

I love it.

Hey man, listen, you gotta stay tuned.

We're gonna get we're gonna get into movies, hip-hop, lyrics, not so much country music.

Um, you gotta make a hip saying the country.

The first song the first song I thought of when all this happened was A Country Boy Can't Survive.

Living never heard, it's okay.

But hey, whether you're the next one we'll have on the cowboy hat, I promise you.

Somebody will.

That would be awesome.

Um whether you're watching this or listening to it, if you're listening to it the day it releases, um, we're actually gonna have a web page up on our website that has all the information of how we can help you and then also updating you just kind of where we are at as a church during this time.

So make sure to look for that.

Um, and then we will keep you updated as much as we can throughout this entire thing.

But thank you guys so much for joining us for After the Message.

Uh, we will see you next week.

Yes, we will.

It might look different, but we'll see you next week.

Indeed.

Online.

Online, yeah.

Online.

Or unless we're in a store all trying to get toilet paper.

Yeah, I know.

In line, we'll see what happens.

We love you guys.

We're praying for you and with you.