Take Joy: In the Dark | Part 2

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

We pray this message encourages you and provides the hope and light of Jesus Christ.

Thanks for tuning in.

It was a dark and stormy night.

Yeah.

That's how some stories begin.

That's how this one begins too.

I was five or six, and it was we were living in rural Texas outside of Dallas.

It was in the days, if some of you had this experience where you went to church twice on a Sunday.

Yeah, you did it in the morning, then you went back for round two, and then there was a potluck and things like that.

And it was a summer night in Texas.

It was stormy.

And one of the differences in Texas like this to here is when it rains here, it's cold.

And when it rains there, it's still warm.

It's wonderful.

You can hang out.

And I don't know what was going on.

I was five.

I didn't need to know what's going on.

All I know is raining outside, and there was a bunch of us kids playing tag uh on the playground.

It was amazing.

It was magical.

It was wonderful.

Now, now this playground wasn't the type of playground you see today.

There were no like safety anything about it.

And I think whoever built it, like it was a few guys that went like, we're gonna build the biggest tower for these kids.

I mean, it just was crazy.

This thing was huge.

I swear it was like 20 feet high.

I think it was well over nine or 10 feet high.

This platform that you would climb up, and then you had these monkey bars that went over to another platform.

So you can imagine these five, six, seven-year-olds running around in the rain and it's storming, it's exciting, and we're playing tag.

And this girl that's just about to get me, I climb up the tower, and right as she goes to touch my foot, I jump to grab the monkey bars.

I get it, of course, because I'm a fantastic leaper.

Uh, and I grab it, but however, it was wet.

And my legs go and all of a sudden I am free-falling in the air.

I still remember this to this day.

Like watching in the night sky with the rain dropping onto my forehead, the bars going further and further away from my face, and I land on my back with a thud to the ground.

And this was the very first time that I had the experience of having the wind knocked out of me.

Have you ever had the wind knocked out of you?

Yeah, a few of you.

Uh well, let me describe it if you haven't.

Um, it feels like you're gonna die.

It is awful.

Like it hit it, and all of a sudden my eyes went big.

I couldn't breathe.

I'm like, oh and then you have all these five, six, and seven-year-olds going like, he's gonna die, you know, and I'm like, and I think I really am gonna die.

And then some well-meaning parent walks up, he'll be fine, you know, and then all of a sudden I'm like, oh, and I finally got a breath.

But it felt like for a moment I'd never breathe again, and the pain and the uncertainty.

We're in a series called Take Joy.

Uh we said this last week that joy is not just a passing sense of pleasure like it comes and goes, but but a pervasive sense of well-being that's infused with hope because of the very goodness of God, that it's this consistent, constant reality available to us through any and every circumstance in life.

And so, yet, how do you take joy when it feels like life has knocked the joy right out of you?

Like, how do you really take joy, experience that when it feels like life has just knocked the wind, knocked the joy right out of you?

I had a friend once say, never underestimate the amount of pain that's in a room.

He's really right.

I just think back just this fall in our community, in our church.

We lost a dear woman in our church, a mother just before her 50th birthday, leaving a college daughter and family and friends.

And I had two other incredible uh women in our church, both with those biopsy reports that you dread.

One was cancerous, one was a tumor.

Never underestimate the amount of pain in a room.

I have a friend who doesn't have a job, he's been trying to get a job, he's been working to get a job.

I I see him, he's a neighbor of mine.

He's he's on the phone nonstop, interviewing all the time, and he really moved into this area following God's calling, and and he's working two jobs right now.

He gets up at 2 a.m.

uh in the morning to load UPS trucks, and he works another part-time job in the afternoon just to make ends made.

Some friends whose grown kids are making decisions that are breaking their hearts, and a marriage that's on the crisis with others.

How do you take joy when it feels like life has just knocked the wind?

How can it be all right in here?

When everything's going all wrong.

The Apostle Paul pins these incredible words, ones that I think our initial reaction to them today is to dismiss them or treat them as trite because we rip it out of its context.

The Apostle Paul is writing these words, he is currently chained in a Roman prison awaiting his certain execution to a church in Philippi that is undergoing persecution and suffering for the cause of Christ.

And he writes these words.

This is what he wants to say to them of how do you take joy when life has knocked it out of you?

And he says this do not be anxious about anything.

Anything.

Well, Paul, you're you're looking ahead and you see that life is running short on you.

You're not really sure how much time you have left.

You're writing to us.

Will you know what we're going through?

Really, anything.

But in every situation, I researched that, it was really difficult.

Every means every, every, every single circumstance that you find yourself in, the good and the bad, the highs and the lows, the sweet and the sad.

By prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

How do we take joy when it feels like life has knocked the joy right out of us?

Here's what the Apostle Paul is gonna say.

We have to stop some things, we have to start some things, and when we stop some things, and when we start some things, we experience the promise of God.

See, here's the interesting thing about the promises of God.

Most of us love them, we want them, but we don't read the prerequisite to experience them.

Every promise it has, here, do this and you'll experience this.

And here's what he says.

He says, He's here's the stopping.

He gives us a negative command.

And do not be, help me out.

Anxious.

Anxious, thanks, Jay.

And do not, everybody else, be anxious about anything.

Anxious.

Don't be worried, don't be concerned, don't, don't, don't allow your soul to spiral.

Well, what do we worry about?

What are the things that keep us up at night, that that begin to cause us to obsess and to fret?

I think one of the thing areas that we worry about that robs our peace, that takes our joys when knowledge is insufficient, right?

When we just don't know what is best, what's the right decision, how do we move forward when we just don't have enough knowledge.

And isn't it true that many of us we will wake up in the middle of the night or we're sitting at our desk, we're trying to work, but our mind is in a different space, and it's like you're trying to solve a puzzle that you just have a missing piece to, when knowledge is insufficient, or perhaps when circumstances are out of your control.

When you do get that biopsy report and you have no control over it, what do you do?

Or when the future is uncertain.

We don't know what's gonna happen to the economy, we don't know what's gonna happen as we step into 2023.

We've lived in an uncertain future and we've become so much more aware of the uncertainties of life over the last several years, haven't we?

What we worry in produces anxiety in our heart is when we have relational conflict.

Whether it's with that friend, maybe it's with your spouse, maybe you walked in, and the anxiousness of your heart is that just your marriage is just hanging on by a thread.

Or maybe it's at work with a coworker, or your boss because she's a jerk, or he's a jerk, and you're not sure about your job, and you're not sure how you're gonna get your review and whether how it's gonna go, or whether you'll still have a job.

Or even regrets in the past.

Don't we worry about those?

And regrets in the past are interesting because they they attack us at such interesting times, don't they?

It just comes out of the blue and all of a sudden you have a memory, you have a past, it just begins to attack your heart and your mind and your peace.

The apostle Paul says, stop, it's literally the tense of the verb is stop.

It's stop doing something that you're already doing.

It's a habit you're already actually in process of.

It's not like, hey, this is coming, and when you see it coming, then you need to, you know, um, you need to like stay away from it.

It's like it already hit you.

So if you're here and it hits you, don't feel bad.

He's just giving you some direction.

He it's the warning light on the dash of your life saying, stop it.

Warning, the minute you begin to have that spiral of the soul, the thoughts that are keeping you up in the middle of the night, when you recognize that anxiety has become an unwelcome guest in your life.

And hasn't that been the case over the last several years that anxiety has become an unwelcome guest?

I remember, see, I I've dealt and struggled deeply with anxiety and depression over my life.

Um, I remember when I first became aware of anxiety, the unwelcome guest.

It was when I was, uh when we just had kids.

And, you know, the future's uncertain, knowledge insufficient.

Yeah, I don't know what I'm doing.

I don't know.

I want to screw this up.

Circumstances outside of my control.

I'm gonna try to protect you from all harm.

In fact, this is silly.

But we were living in Georgia at the time, and my wife's mom, my mother-in-law, I guess that's how you say it, my mother-in-law needed to get to the airport.

My daughter had just been born.

I drove so slowly to the airport she missed her flight.

That's the only time I've driven slow in my entire life, by the way.

But it wasn't, I mean, I just was so riddled with anxiety, and it began.

Here's what anxiety does is in troubled times, it just begins to multiply, doesn't it?

And it just grows and it grows and it grows.

Eventually, it became something that just was uh paralyzing to me.

As my kids got older, even the thought of going to Disneyland scared me.

I'd stay up days and nights wondering if we're gonna lose our kids.

Oh, is there a pull at this thing?

And I worried about all the unknowns, all these sort of things.

I'd literally have nights where I'd wake up and I'd stare out the window, worried that somebody's gonna break into our house and just stare looking for people.

Like, who's the crazy man?

Because anxiety and its outworkings doesn't always make sense.

And at the time we were preaching through the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus said something similar to the Apostle Paul.

He said, Don't worry about anything, don't be anxious about anything, and then he had this incredible line, so amazing.

He says, Can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

And the answer is an emphatic no.

Oh.

Can any of you by worrying, by anxiously obsessing about that thing, do anything?

No.

See, anxiety is less than unproductive, it's actually destructive.

See, when we begin to strip it back and realize all of that toying, all of that spinning, all of those areas, it's actually less than unproductive because here's what research shows us.

Research shows us not only can you not add an hour to your life, you actually take hours away out of your life.

You experience more sickness, poorer health, and die earlier.

He says, Stop it.

And here's the beautiful thing, here's the beautiful thing is he doesn't just say, don't worry, be happy, ignore your problems, and pretend like everything is okay.

He says, Yeah, anxiety is not just unproductive, it's actually destructive, it destroys your soul.

But let me give you a positive command.

Let me tell you what to do.

See, because remember, the context isn't like anxiety's coming at you way out there, and so I need to just be aware and stay away from it.

The reality is it hits you right now.

Anxiety knocked at your door.

Hello, you welcomed it in.

What do you do now?

Life.

Life was knocking the joy right out of you.

What do you do?

You are you acknowledge it, you're aware of it, you're like, okay, it's not just unproductive, it's destructive.

So what do I do now?

He gives us a productive action, a positive command.

Notice what he says.

And do not be anxious about anything, but with prayer and petition.

But in every situation, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

But in every single circumstance that you face, everything you come against, wherever you're at and whatever you're going through, he says, bring it into Jesus by prayer, petition, with thanksgiving, to present your request to God.

In fact, he gives us four words for prayer that begin to frame how do we pray in a way that actually keeps anxiety at bay and invites the very presence and the peace of Jesus into our lives.

How do we take joy when joy has been knocked out of us?

How do we experience and how do we pray in a way that experiences the very peace of God?

He's gonna say, first, by prayer.

And that's the most general term for prayer in Scripture.

And it's literally turning your attention to God.

Because here's what happens in the midst of those moments, in the midst of where troubled times, it multiplies your anxieties, is what has your attention is your troubles.

What has your attention is your anxiety.

What has your attention is the worry and the concern, and it begins to consume your every waking thought.

He says, stop that and turn your attention to God.

Begin to move in the direction of God, orient your life and your mind towards the things of God.

Begin to take what you're worried about and begin to make those prayers to God.

It's interesting.

Amen.

I love that.

We can have more of that in here too, by the way.

Because I think it's interesting, even in how he he addresses it.

He said, by in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request, and he's very clear, to God.

Isn't it interesting that in the midst of worry and anxiety and these incredible times, we bring it to everyone else but to God, don't we?

And we tell it to other people, and we talk about how hard it is, and we share it, and we think that's gonna produce something and help.

And certainly, I'm not saying get wise counsel, but have you shifted your attention to God?

Have you brought it to Him in prayer?

And he says, Well, how do you do this?

Turn your attention to God and then petition.

It's the word some of your translations say supplication, it's an urgent request.

It's bring your heart before God.

Bring your heart before God.

I think one of the reasons we talk to other people and not to God is we feel like we can tell other people what's really going on in our heart, but we don't really think we can tell God what's going on.

And so we have to like somehow go, like, I want to say the right words and say it in just the right way because I want you to work and move.

And I think there's a magical secret formula.

And if I use that, then hello, then you'll do something about it.

C.S.

Lewis, we said this in our prayer series six weeks ago.

Said, bring to God what's in you, not what ought to be in you.

One of the great places for you to go in learning to pray is the Psalms.

As they teach our hearts how to bring our hearts before God, how to bring the realness of us and hold intention who God is at the same time.

And he can handle all of you.

All of your anger, all of your hurt, all of your doubt, all of your despair, he can handle all of it.

He says, turn your attention to God, bring your heart before God.

And then he says this little line with with thanksgiving.

With thanksgiving.

Like all of this that's happening, all of it, it's with thanksgiving.

Give thanks to God.

See, thanksgiving or gratitude is the key that unlocks the power to peace in your life through prayer.

Without it, it's just griping, it's just complaining.

Thanksgiving is so powerful.

It it shifts our perspective.

It gives us a proper perspective on life.

And it begins to put God in his proper place in our life.

And you're like, Ryan, what do I have to give thanks for?

You don't know my circumstance.

It's interesting, the apostle Paul, 1 Thessalonians 5, 16 and 18, would write this something very similar.

He would say, Rejoice always.

Sounds like what Paul said earlier to the Philippians.

Pray continually.

And then this little line, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for your life.

Some of you wrestling with God's will for your life.

He's like, I wrote it down.

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances.

Notice he didn't say give thanks for all circumstances.

Like, oh man, I'm so thankful.

This sucks.

No.

God, I am so thankful.

This is the day you have made.

I will rejoice and be glad in it.

This day is a gift.

I was not guaranteed it.

This day.

The breath in my lungs, I have it, and so I'm gonna thank you for it.

You know what?

I have food, I have clothing, I have shelter.

God, I thank you for it.

I started this because gratitude doesn't come naturally to us.

We have to develop the skill of it.

And so I started, I journal, you don't have to journal, but I'm a journalist, so I write in my journal every morning.

Good morning, Heavenly Father.

I do.

I start that way every single morning.

Because I'm like, that's how I greet.

If I saw you in the morning, I'd say, good morning, Sam, you know, or whatever your name is.

Good morning, Heavenly Father.

And then the first things I begin, because I want it to be an orientation of my heart and mind, is thank you, God.

And I just begin to list them regardless of how I feel that day.

Because we all have incredible things to thank God for.

And it puts life in proper perspective.

And God in his proper place.

Thank you, God, that right now I have every spiritual blessing in Christ.

Thank you that you chose me.

It wasn't an accident.

You wanted me.

Thank you that you redeemed me, that you took me out of my sin and out of my shame, and I deserve nothing but death and hell.

And you said, I love you and I'll die for you, and I want you in my family.

Thank you that you adopted me.

I am your beloved.

I'm the object of your affection.

You love me with an everlasting love.

Thank you that I showed up today and new mercy is available.

Thank you that I am forgiven fully, finally, and completely.

As far as the East is from the West, so far have you taken my sin from me.

Thank you today.

We turn our attention to God.

We bear our hearts before God, and gratitude is the key in all of this to unlock the power through prayer, the very peace of God, where you say, I give thanks, and it's a defiant, nevertheless, regardless of the circumstances you go through.

And then with requests, be specific.

Bring your specific needs to God.

What are the specific things that you're needing?

What is the specific challenges?

What are the worries on your heart?

Peter would write this and say it this way: cast all of your cares or all of your anxieties on him because he cares for you.

That there's no problem too big for your God and no thing too small for your heavenly father's attentive care.

Bring the specific needs before God.

How do you pray in a way to experience the very peace of God?

We're going to identify right now.

I'm in a spiral, and instead of spiraling, I'm going to start praying.

Hello?

And amen by myself.

Isn't it amazing we can preach it but not practice it?

We can know it but not do it.

We all do this.

And some of you like you're going to hear something like this and you're going to begin to go, I should have, I should have stopped that.

And just begin to go, grace today.

And I'm going to lean in to what God has for me.

Over COVID, there's incredible leadership challenges and face some incredible relational issues.

Anyone have any of that over COVID?

Yeah, a few of you.

I began to develop a pattern and a habit.

Would be up, and then all of a sudden, I realized if it's big enough to worry about, it's big enough to pray about.

If it's big enough to worry about, it's big enough to pray about.

If it's on your mind, then it's on your heavenly father's heart.

If it's big enough to pray about, then it's big enough to or big enough to worry about, it's big enough to pray about.

And where you begin to go, why am I wasting time that something that's less than productive is actually destructive when I can pray about it, bring it to my heavenly father who cares about me and longs to hear, and then there's a promise.

And the peace of God.

The promise isn't that he fixed everything about you, what you were concerned or worried about.

He says, and the peace of God.

And it's not just like some peace that God might like dish out over here.

It's not peace that somehow you have to conjure up and work and get like, you know what?

I gotta somehow like, you know, like manufacture peace or or work my way or level up to it.

It's God's very peace is yours.

Jesus would say it this way to his disciples in John chapter 17.

John 17 · chapter mention

My peace I leave you, my peace I give to you.

Let your hearts not be troubled.

The peace of God, which transcends all human understanding, meaning you can't fathom it, you can't understand it.

You might be walking through something, and from the outside, people are going, I don't know how you're still standing, I don't know how you're still taking steps, but there's something in you, there's a settledness, there's a well-being, there's a way about you.

You're the storm is raging, but inside we just can tell there's something transcendent going on.

Well, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

That word guard, think about the context.

Remember, the context is so good.

That word guard is the picture of a Roman centurion.

Remember, Paul is in prison in Rome, most likely with a guard right outside his door.

As he's pinning these words, he's looking at that guard and going, Don't be anxious.

Bring all of it in prayer, and the peace of God is like that Roman centurion that's standing guard at my door, and he will not let anxiety come in.

He will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

It will stand guard over you.

Hearts and minds is your inner life, your thoughts and emotions.

Peace is this idea, a state of well-being, of wholeness, completeness, soundness.

It's shalom.

It's his peace offered to you.

I think most of us have had this experience.

Um I remember once as a kid, not a kid, I was 16, getting in a car accident.

And uh if you've ever been in a car accident and you're, you know, all of a sudden they're like, what in the world's going on?

And you don't know what to do, you never navigated anything like this.

And then I remember this image.

It was actually uh a few blocks away from where my dad worked the church, and I got in this accident.

I was like, oh my gosh, I'm freaking out.

And then all of a sudden, I see my dad running down the sidewalk to me.

And all of a sudden, peace came over me.

See, his presence didn't change the circumstance, it didn't change what was happening, but because he was there, I was at ease.

See, when darkness comes, we can choose to suffer from something or with someone.

That there is this presence of Jesus' peace with us, and his presence is more than enough for us, regardless of whatever you are going through.

And I know there's many in this room tonight or today would be like I'm walking in darkness.

And we celebrate in this season advent or arrival or the long-awaited of the Messiah.

And there's this prophecy, Isaiah 9, we read it around this time.

Speaking of the one who would come, who would be with us, his presence with us, and it makes all the difference.

It says the people walking in darkness have seen a great light.

Like if you're walking in darkness, the light has come.

On those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has gone.

For unto us, we know this, a child is born.

Unto us, a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulders, and he will be called.

Help me out.

Wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Wonderful counselor when knowledge is insufficient.

Mighty God when circumstances are out of your control.

Everlasting Father when the future is uncertain.

Prince of peace when relationships are in distress or conflict, and your past raises its ugly head.

See, we can suffer from something or with someone.

Jenny and I were in Georgia.

We were at a small, well, it was a church plant, and I was a youth pastor.

It was my first year, year and a half in full-time ministry.

And our worship pastor, his daughter, senior in high school, was dating uh the kid who was leading worship for our youth ministry, Mike, Mike and Shay.

And uh they were in a band together with some other kids.

They're both seniors in high school, and they uh were going to play this gig about a few hours away from where they were at.

A gig is where you're playing a show, for those of you who don't know uh what that meant.

And and they're they they go, they play this gig.

It's a great night, they had an awesome time.

They're driving back, it's around 1 a.m.

in the morning.

Uh, and so they had a trailer with all their gear in it and this big SUV.

Well, there's too many people for seat belts, and Mike and Shay said, we'll just sit in the very back of the SUV.

As they began to drive home that night, the driver fell asleep.

They veered off the road, they got in an accident.

Mike and Shay were thrown from the car, and both were crushed by the trailer.

Mike unfortunately died immediately.

And Shay was crushed and rushed to the hospital, and her parents got every the call, every parent, every parent's night bear.

They rush to the hospital.

Eventually, we get the call, and everyone on our pastoral team, we're there, we're just showing up.

We're in shock, but we're showing up.

And we're crying and we're scared, and Shay's in the other room, and like she's so she's a beautiful young woman, and she's like so disfigured and swollen, and we're just desperate and praying, and the parents are scared and praying.

And here's the only thing I can tell you about that moment the first time I think I've ever really experienced it like this.

There was a peace.

Can't explain it, can't define it.

There was a peace that transcended the circumstances, the moments.

I was talking to Jenny yesterday about it.

I was like, what do you remember?

She's like, I remember Susan, that's Shay's mom, sitting by Shay, and Shay couldn't respond and wasn't even responsive, and the swelling, and just, you know, calming, petting her hand, and talking smoothly.

And she said, there's just such a, there was such a settledness about her.

You see, prayer overpowers anxiety with the presence of God's peace.

It is not right, it is true.

And I don't know what you're going through, I don't know what you're walking through, and what dark night of the soul is upon you.

But the invitation, no, the promise, his presence.

Would you turn your worry?

Let's turn that concern.

When it knocks, when anxiety knocks, and when it will come back, trust me, it will keep coming.

And every time it comes, you're going, I ain't answering the door today.

I'm coming to you, and I'm praying to you.

I'm welcoming the very presence of Jesus and his peace in this moment.

As we close, would you just take time to pray?

To do what we just talked about.

Whatever that worry concern, the dark, and you just begin to turn your attention to God and bring your heart before him.

You start thanking him in the dark.

And you tell him specifically what's going on.

God, I pray for my friends right now.

Would you allow them to experience your peace because it's your peace you give to us and you leave with us.

Overwhelm them right now.

And church, would you lean in?

Bring to him what's in you.