Navigating Normal: Into the Cave | Part 3

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.

Good to be with you this morning, Awakening.

Great to see you.

Welcome if you're new.

My name's Ryan.

We're thrilled to have you join us today.

We're in part three of a series called Navigating Normal.

How do we navigate the normal that we now find ourselves in?

We've been studying the prophet Elijah in the Old Testament.

We found it in 1 Kings chapter 18 and 19.

1 Kings 18 · chapter mention

Today the sermon title is simply this Into the Cave.

Why don't you go ahead and say that to your neighbor?

Into the cave.

Or yell it across to someone who goes.

Yeah, that was weird.

Like, why in the world did I say into the cave to somebody today?

We're talking today, navigating through some deep waters.

We're going to talk about depression.

And I want to have kind of some opening uh comments, if you will.

First, I want to recognize I'm speaking as a pastor.

I'm going to share personally my story and journey through this.

I'm not speaking as a psychologist, nor am I going to try to there.

And yet, here's what I know you are a spiritual being with a physical body made in the image of God, and God wants to meet you spiritually, emotionally, and physically.

And I believe He's got a word for you and I, me today.

Second thing is, I know for some this might be a little bit of triggering of a subject, and just if you feel that way, I won't be offended if you go, like, hey, Ryan, I may pass on this one or listen to it later.

That's great.

And uh love, love, love, love for this to be ministering to you.

Now, as the pandemic and the fog of what we've been going through begins to lift a little bit, what we're seeing is kind of the aftermath of it all.

And when you look around and survey the landscape uh in the US, but this is global as well, what what we're seeing is there is a mental and health uh and emotional health crisis in our nation.

Um I lost my book.

I had a book called Out of the Cave, and I don't know where it went.

I still have the quote right here.

Uh the Chris Hodges in his book called Out of the Cave, and he's talking about his journey with depression.

He's a pastor, uh, wrote this over COVID.

He writes this he says, it has become the world's number one health problem, that is depression, causing more deaths than cancer each year, and ranking as the leading cause of disability.

One out of nine people are in some type of depression treating medication.

One out of five people have been on uh on it at some point.

Over the past decade, antidepressant uses have gone up 300% and continues to rise.

Boston College uh just released a uh study this last week and it said post-pandemic the rate of depression has tripled.

It's such a crisis in our nation that Walgreen, CVS, and Walmart are all now starting to offer in-person therapy and counseling at those places.

You can go to CVS and get a toothbrush and a therapist at the same time.

It's such an issue that uh Apple is doing studies to discover can they figure out uh whether someone is struggling with depression by the way they type and the speed that they type and the facial recognition on here, using the air buds to track uh your temperature and some of these sort of things to give indicators of your health here.

Now, here's the problem with depression for most of us.

Most of us, we don't know we're depressed until it's already robbed us of our joy and pleasure.

We don't recognize that we're struggling with this until our purpose and our passion has already been stripped from us.

And that certainly is or was my story.

Um about four, a little over four years ago, I went through really an 18-month depression.

I kind of am a high and low person, as you've talked about, have seasonal depression from time to time.

Um, but really, it was uh four years ago.

Now, uh, one of my best friends, uh ministry partner, Steve Siccone, he was on staff here.

He moved to um Florida, and when he moved, all of a sudden the weight of ministry and church world, it just landed squarely on my shoulders.

My personality is um just work harder, just fight it, just get through and don't back away from things or don't you know pull back on stuff.

No, you should charge ahead.

And so that's what I tried to do, and it really moved myself into burnout in so many ways.

And I had a sabbatical coming uh, you know, ahead.

And I'm like, okay, I got to build a team so when I'm gone for a while, that they can really support it.

So I'm working incredibly hard trying to build a team up for this.

And literally the day before my sabbatical uh started on a Monday, I'm pushing hard all the way through to the very end.

And uh on Sunday, I preach on Monday.

Jenny and I get away for like a dream vacation.

We've never done anything like this.

We went away to Italy for 10 days.

It was amazing, except she had a shell of a man uh in um in Rome.

I was so excited for Rome.

I was so excited about you know, seeing the Colosseum and all these things.

I'd been there once as a kid.

I was excited to like have the richness and understand more, you know, the history behind everything and connected to uh our faith, and I had nothing in the tank.

I I just couldn't even really function.

And so Rome was a bit of a blur.

Italy wasn't a waste, by the way.

We had a wonderful time, but there was something about working so hard and then suddenly stopping that when we got back, I had this experience I hadn't experienced before.

I'm a highly driven, passionate person, and the drive was gone, and the passion was gone.

I had all these things I wanted to do over sabbatical.

I did none of them, and I couldn't get myself to do any of them.

I didn't know what was going on, what was wrong with me.

While we get back from sabbatical, and you know, everyone's asking, How was it?

And you want to be able to go, it's amazing.

Like people sacrificed so that you could have time off to get rested and refreshed, and you want to go, like, this was the best offer.

And I was like, kind of, yeah, it was great.

It was hard.

It was hard for Jenny and I.

It was rough.

And so I thought maybe if I just give myself back to work, I got back in, we did a you know, a capital campaign.

I just started going as hard as I could.

And so on Sunday you'd see me, I'd be preaching or doing something, I'd look normal.

And if you didn't really know me super well, you'd go, it's just Ryan.

And yet the weight landed squarely on those closest to me, more specifically on Jenny.

And it wasn't until literally like 10 months into this, we were meeting with our counselor, and Jenny's explaining like what she's going through and what she's struggling with with me.

And our counselor Sue asks and says me, uh she asked me just a series of questions.

She says, you know, Ryan, I I think you're depressed.

Someone put words, a word, into what I was feeling.

And I was like, oh, that makes sense.

What do you do when the fog of depression begins to settle over yourself?

Like, what do you do when it feels like all hope is lost?

You know it's interesting.

During that season, after she said that, it didn't fix everything immediately.

I'll talk more about that.

But through that season, I didn't want to die, and I know some people that's where you're at, and I just want to ask you, would you reach out to someone?

It wasn't that I wanted to die in any way, I just didn't care to live.

They're different.

I didn't care about my life, and so I didn't actually care or give care to my life.

And so I just kind of ached out.

I really didn't think my life mattered.

And where is God, by the way?

Where is God when you enter the cave of depression?

When you enter those moments of the dark night of the soul.

You know, one of the things I'm so grateful for in scripture is we don't get a highlight reel.

We don't get somebody's just biggest accomplishments.

God just helps us see our frailty and humanity and how he meets us in it.

And Elijah is no different.

One of the great prophets of the Old Testament, just coming off one of the greatest spiritual victories, literally mountaintop moment on Mount Carmel.

And he hits the absolute low of his life, completely depressed, to the point where he isolates himself from community, wanders into a desert, and sits down under a broom tree and says, God take my life, I'm done.

I'm no better than anybody else.

I got nothing left to give.

I've done it all, I'm done.

And God meets him there.

And God meets us there.

God meets him in that desert moment, and he doesn't like, you know, try to fix everything right away.

And that's our thing.

That's what we try to do.

When somebody shares something like what I just shared, we we try to fix it, right?

We go, how how can I, what can I say, how can I fix it?

He just meets them.

Some scripture says that he fell asleep, God feeds him, he falls asleep, he feeds him again, he says the journey's long, and it says that Elijah wandered around for 40 days and for 40 nights, and eventually he wandered onto Mount Horab, or the mountain of God.

It's the mountain where Moses encountered God when he was wandering into the wilderness, uh, when he was, you know, watching sheep and the you know burning bush was there, and he met God and received his calling.

It was that mountain, it was the same mountain when Moses came back and led Israel out of slavery, and and they go to the Mount Horab or Mount Sinai, and God reveals his glory to him in on that mountain.

He says, In his wandering, Elijah ends up on the mountain of God, and that's where we pick up the story, and it says, on the mountain of God, there he went into a cave and spent the night.

In your notes, would you just do this for me?

Would you just circle the word a and right above it, write the word dot?

The author of Kings is actually trying to help us connect the dots between Elijah's story and Moses' story.

And you see these connecting uh ideas or illusions all over the place.

And in the Hebrew text, this is not just a cave or any cave.

It's actually the uh definite article, the.

This is the cave.

This is a well-known cave.

This is a cave uh that you know about and have would remember about.

You see, he gives us these illusions of Elijah wandering for 40 days and 40 nights.

It's in as if he's going in reverse of how Moses led Israel out of uh Egypt into the promised land, just as Israel wandered for 40 years in the wilderness, and then he stumbles upon the mountain of God where Moses received the ten commandments and he countered him, and he wanders onto the cave.

This is amazing.

In Exodus chapter 33, Moses encounters God and he says, This show me your glory.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

That word glory can mean real you.

Like God, I want to see the real you.

And God says, I'll let all of my goodness, by the way, his glory is his goodness, I'll let all of my goodness pass before you, and I'll hide you in the cleft of the rock because you cannot see me and live.

I'm gonna cover you in this cleft or cave.

And when the author writes the cave, the original audience would understand it in Exodus chapter 33 as the same spot where Moses encountered the glory of God.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

What an incredible reality! What an incredible reality that Moses in this mountaintop experience, show me your glory, and some of you are there, and he reveals himself to you.

And Elijah and his wandering and his depression as he enters the dark cave.

God says, I'm there in the glory moments, and I'm there in the difficult moments, I'm there, I meet you on the mountaintop, and I meet you in the valley below.

There he went into the cave and spent the night.

And the word of the Lord came to him.

What are you doing here, Elijah?

What are you doing?

What's going on?

You've wandered so far from home.

How did you end up here?

Elijah replied, I've been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty.

The Israelites, you know them.

They have rejected your covenant, uh, torn down your altars, put your prophets to death with the sword.

I'm the only one left.

No, you're not.

But that's what we do, right?

We we feel like it's only us and we're all on ourselves, and nobody understands us.

If you read the beginning of 1 Kings 18, you know that Obadiah set aside a hundred prophets and was hiding them in caves too, and taking care of them.

And Elijah at least knows that he's not just one prophet less, that there's a hundred and one prophets in a different movie uh there.

But we all of a sudden begin to throw this pity party for ourselves, and now they are trying to kill me.

No, just Jezebel is, bro.

The Lord said, and I love this.

Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord's about to pass by.

Elijah just pours out his heart, his perspective, his feelings, what he's experiencing in that moment, and I love what God does.

He doesn't give him a lecture.

He doesn't tell him, listen, man, listen.

You know what he gives them?

His presence.

And so often for most of us that are wandering in this darkness, you know, when we're trying to walk with somebody, we just want to give them a lecture.

We want to go, it's gonna be okay.

And that's true.

You know what?

Don't worry about you, you can, and we begin, and like just give your presence.

God gives him his presence.

And didn't notice the Lord said, go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to what?

Help me out.

Pass by.

Pass by.

Pass by.

Again, the same language of Exodus 33.

God's, I'm gonna pass by and let all my glory or all my goodness pass by you.

You may be wandering, you may be far, you may be discouraged, you may be depressed, you may feel like God's nowhere, but God is at work even when you're in the cave.

He says, I'm gonna pass by.

Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord.

But the Lord was not in the wind.

And the wind, there after the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake.

After the earthquake came fire, but the Lord was not in the fire.

And he's probably thinking, I chose a bad cave at this moment.

And then after the fire came a gentle whisper.

Literally, in the Hebrew, it means silence.

After the fire, after the spectacular, after all of these things that we think, man, God is in that.

And that's what we want.

We're like, God, show up in the spectacular.

Show up in some demonstrative way.

And so often he's in the silence.

He's in the stillness.

Because God shows up to us how we need him most, not how we want him in the moment.

And I love what says next.

And Elijah heard.

It was silence, and he heard it.

There was a sacred silence.

There was there was a moment there that all of a sudden caught his breath and took his breath away.

When Elijah heard it, the silence, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.

And then a voice said to him, What are you doing here?

Elijah.

And then he gives the same speech again.

I've been very zealous for you.

What do we do?

When the fog of depression settles over our lives.

I want to give you just a very important principle and then a practice with some specific applications for us.

And the principle is this from the text.

What you feel is real.

Elijah, he really was discouraged.

He really felt depressed.

He really felt like he was all alone and that there was no hope, no future, and nothing was going to change.

What you feel is real, and the problem is, is we do not finish the sentence.

What you feel is real, but not necessarily true.

What you feel is real.

And we do great harm to people when they begin to share what they're feeling, and we say, don't feel that.

I remember when Jenny and I were going through the process of church planning, and we went through this assessment, we met with this clinical psychologist, and I remember him saying, it's like you cannot choose your feelings, but you can choose how you respond to your feelings.

What you're feeling, what you're going through, you acknowledge it, that's real.

However, it's not necessarily that it's true.

Your feelings are an incredible indicator, a helpful indicator of how you are doing.

However, they are terrible gauge for what's reality and true around you.

Our feelings lie to us all the time, right?

You're like, no, I don't know.

Just look at any teenager and puppy you love, and you realize feelings lie to us.

What you feel is real, but not necessarily true.

I like how Chris Hodges said it in his book the darkness of depression is real.

Even when you're live.

In the light of God's grace.

God brought you here just for that one line.

Because I think the lie that we buy into and the lie that we believe is if I was more godly, I wouldn't feel this way.

If I was more spiritual, more mature, a Christian shouldn't feel this way.

In fact, I was talking to one man after the service, and he's sharing, he's like, what I was going through is like as a Christian, I'm feeling this way, and then I feel guilty for feeling this way, and it just compounds it.

Isn't that the good news?

When God shows, hey, one of the great prophets of old, this is what he walked through.

You're not alone, you're not broken, and the truth is there is hope.

So if the principle is what you feel is real but not necessarily true, what is the practice for us?

Recognizing that overcoming depression, this is our practice, we have to recognize that overcoming depression is first a process, and we have to be proactive.

It's a process.

We want quick fixes.

We live in the age of Google and instance.

And we think we can just immediately solve this, and you know, if I if you want to spiritualize it, I'm gonna pray a prayer and God will zap me.

Elijah prayed.

God didn't zap him.

I mean, they could have with the wind and the fire and that whole deal.

It's a process.

In fact, Elijah went on a 40-day journey.

We know this took at least a month and a half in his life, if not longer.

It's a process.

There's not a quick fix to this.

And secondly, we have to be proactive.

And this is the catch 22 of depression.

Because what's helpful to you is difficult to do.

That's what depression is.

The things that are most helpful to you are difficult to do, right?

The things that will bring you life, that will break depression, are incredibly difficult to do.

I don't feel like it.

I don't want it, I have no energy.

It zapped the strength out of me.

I mean, listen, I had this desire before sabbatical to like start a book club.

I know I'm not Oprah, but I just thought a book club would be awesome.

And I'm like, this would be so fun.

I have all this time, and I would love to like, I'm a reader, I'm a learner, and I want to start this book club.

And Jenny's like, are you gonna start it?

I'm like, I just can't do it.

I still don't have a book club, by the way.

But I do have a morning men's study that started this last week, and it was fantastic.

That's right.

Thanks, Jay.

Because what's helpful to you is difficult to do.

That is the catch 22 of depression.

Now, listen, there is a massive difference between difficult and impossible.

It is difficult, it is not impossible, and we need to take a step.

Yes, difficult, take a small step.

In fact, research tells us that even a small step, a minuscule step, changes our feelings and experiences.

And what we think is we have to feel differently to behave differently.

And no, no, no, you behave differently to feel differently.

I like how Dr.

George Crane said it in his classic applied psychology.

He says, remember, motions are the precursor to emotion.

We have to recognize.

One, it's a process, two, we have to be proactive.

Let me give you how God met Elijah in the text.

And here's what's incredible.

This is the same advice that you would get from a clinical psychologist or therapist.

Isn't it amazing that 3,000 years ago God knew how we were wired and designed and what we needed, and how God met him is how he wants to meet you.

And would you take these steps?

The first thing, the first thing how God met Elijah, and we talked about this last week, is God cared for his physical needs.

Before he ever addressed the internal world, he cared for his physical world.

And so we have to prioritize our physical needs.

And for many, I know many moms especially struggle to prioritize your physical needs.

Did you know in four verses, Elijah slept three times?

What if you had a holy nap this afternoon?

Have you ever thought that sleeping could be the most spiritual thing you could do?

And we all know when we haven't been able to sleep well or gone through those fits, or maybe you've had a you know small kids, how magical a good night's sleep is.

Right?

Don't you feel like a brand new person?

Would you prioritize rest and sleep?

Would you prioritize your nutrition?

What you eat?

See, when we're depressed, we go to what is most convenient and what feels good in the moment, but is not good for us long term.

Especially things that numb us out.

Whether it's, you know, high-fried stuff, like guilty for me, alcohol.

One of the practices I told you last week for me is I'm I'm in process with all of you.

Uh Jenny and I, and she's doing it for me.

Um, she already eats really well.

I I struggle with it.

Is we're doing the Daniel fast.

We're one week in, but if you don't know what that is, it's essentially eating vegan.

And it's just this physical reset.

And it's been so good.

There's been hard parts to it, but it's been so good.

Would you prioritize your physical health?

Rest, nutrition, exercise.

You're like, right, I'm depressed.

I don't want to exercise.

I don't want to go to the gym.

I look in the mirror and I feel bad about myself.

I don't like any of those sort of things.

I know it's difficult.

Here's what I'm asking you to do not to go to the gym, go for a walk.

Just go for a walk.

Ten minutes.

Can you go for a walk?

Yes, you can.

You walked here.

Okay, if you're watching online, you didn't walk here.

Ten minutes.

Get in nature.

For some, even.

Listen, and this is there's there's a chemical reality.

Getting good medication to help some of those imbalances.

But would you prioritize your physical health?

God ministered and cared to his physical needs first before lovingly caring for his internal world.

Secondly, embrace your true identity.

Embrace your true identity.

Do you know the very first word that Elijah or that God said to Elijah?

It wasn't a question.

In our text, it says, What are you doing here?

In Hebrew, you know what it says?

Elijah.

God started with his name.

Elijah.

Elijah.

And changes, doesn't it?

Doesn't that change?

Elijah, what are you doing here?

Elijah.

You know what Elijah means?

My God is Yahweh.

That's what Elijah means.

Like you've wandered, you're tired, but this is your identity.

In the Old Testament, in the New Testament, a name signified a person's identity and character, who they are.

And he's not a failure.

He's not a wanderer.

He's not whatever his identity is that he's taking on in that moment.

His name is Elijah.

This is your identity.

Your God is Yahweh, and he's with you.

I just wonder, what are the names that you've been calling yourself?

The names that you've been taking on.

Broken.

Unlovable.

Failure.

Worthless.

Lost cause.

Those are lies from the pit of hell.

Here's what I want you to do.

In your notes, I want you to write morning affirmations.

Morning affirmation.

And I want you to take a three by five card.

Yes, a three by five card, not on your phone.

I want you to write down Psalm 139.

Psalm 139 talks about who you are.

One of the lines that says, I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

See, I want you to daily remember and embrace your identity.

And you start with I am statements.

This is who you are, and this is who you are in Christ.

I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

You are not a lost cause, you are not a waste, you are not worthless.

No, no, no.

Those are lies.

Don't embrace those.

You are fearfully and wonderfully made.

Once you jot down Ephesians 1.

Ephesians 1, the Apostle Paul begins to unpack our brand new identity in Christ.

And so it begins that you have every spiritual blessing in Christ.

And so on that three by five card, just start off, I am blessed.

Then it says, you are chosen.

You're not unwanted, you're chosen.

You're not a lost because God wants you.

I am chosen by God.

Then it goes on to say, you're adopted into his family.

Like you're chosen, you're wanted, you're brought into the family of God.

I am a son or daughter of the King Most High.

It says you're redeemed, that God loved you so much that he gave his one and only son for you to bring you back.

You are valuable, is what redeemed means.

You are so valuable.

You're not unvaluable, you are valuable.

I am redeemed.

I am forgiven.

I am beloved.

Embrace your true identity daily.

Get those cards out.

And you say it out loud.

Because I ain't there to preach for you, you preach to yourself.

You start preaching every morning.

I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

I am loved, chosen, adopted, redeemed, forgiven by the God of the universe.

That is who you are.

Thirdly, challenge your narrative.

Embrace your true identity, challenge your narrative.

You notice that God challenged Elijah's narrative.

He's going, What are you doing here?

And then you notice what Elijah does?

He gives his explanation to God and is filled with truths, half-truths, and no truths at all.

And that's what we do.

And that's part of what affects our stories, determine our feelings that we tell.

The stories that we tell impact our feelings.

And so we tell it's got some truth to it.

And so we believe that it's all true.

No.

Look at what Elijah said.

I have been very zealous for the Lord Almighty.

True.

The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death.

Partly true and not true at all.

The Israelites did reject him, and then did you forget?

Have you forgotten that he used you to bring about a spiritual revival?

See, we dismiss the good, only focus on the bad.

And it wasn't the Israelites that put the prophets to death, by the way, it was Jezebel.

I am the only one left.

Completely false.

We know there's 101, and God later tells them there's another 7,000.

And they, Israelites, know just Jezebel.

See, we we we we make it bigger.

It's like everyone's against us.

No, that's not that's not true.

They're trying to kill me.

You have to challenge the narrative.

What's the narrative?

Nothing's gonna change.

This is just the way I am.

You know, for me, the narrative was simply this.

That I'm fundamentally not good enough.

And it doesn't really matter whether I'm here or not.

So why care?

It's not true.

What's your narrative?

Those stories we tell put them on trial.

Invite someone else in.

Have them help you see, okay, that was true, that's not true.

No, that's like crazy talent.

No, we don't say that.

You're not broken, you're not a lost cause.

Challenge the narrative.

Prioritize physical health, embrace your identity, challenge the narrative.

Then notice God meets Elijah, not in the spectacular, but in the silence.

Turn off the noise and tune into God.

Turn off the noise, tune into God.

Turn off the noise.

We talked about this last week.

This is hard for us to turn off the noise of social media, to turn off the noise of the news feed, to turn off the noise of Netflix, to turn off the noise of busyness.

And here's why I think it's hard.

Because I think if we stop long enough to be still, we're afraid of what will bubble up and what we'll find inside of us.

And so we keep ourselves busy and distracted and numb living so that we just don't have to deal with what's going on.

And there's a part of us, there's a part of me.

That if I really am afraid that I'm gonna see something that's unfixable.

God longs to meet the ache of your soul.

And it turns off that noise.

And as you tune into God and you allow the stillness, that's what that sabbatical exposed and did for me was to bring a level of stillness of the ache and the brokenness of my own soul, the hurry and the pace and the things that then began to bubble up.

And yes, it was hard, but I'm so grateful through it what he's done in and through me.

Turn off the noise, tune into God.

We talked about that last week, so go back, just apply last week's sermon, please.

And then finally, finally, we have to get outside of ourselves.

We didn't read this part, we're gonna talk about it next week as we close out the series.

But God says to Elijah, go back the way that you came, and then he gives them a purpose, he gives them a brand new purpose for his life.

He says, I want you to anoint a new king.

Yeah, we have some bad leadership, we gotta address that.

And I want you to bring on an apprentice.

You've been doing life on your own.

His name's Elisha, and I want him, you to pour what you have into him.

Would you start serving?

And would you get into community?

For some of us, we feel like we have to get our lives figured out and fixed before we can start serving.

God didn't say, Elijah, get it all fixed.

He said, Go.

Just get going, just go serve someone.

Get outside of yourself.

And get in community.

Andy Stanley had this sermon that I listened to years and years ago, and it's called it the Four Faces of Courage.

I'll just give you the last one because it always stuck with me.

The last face of courage was to ask for help instead of suffering silently.

And for some, you've listened to the lie of depression and the lie of the enemy, and you've retreated from community, you've retreated from help and stop today.

Would you ask for help?

Would you get a good counselor?

Would you get back into your small group?

Would you share with someone?

Would you go to the prayer area and just go, I need help?

Would you stop suffering silently?

Get in community.

Like I said, for me, my depression was an 18-month deal.

It was a process.

The minute my counselor identified what I was going through, there's another eight months of journeying of wrestling.

And there was one like tipping point for me.

Summer 2019.

Um we call it the summer for hell from hell.

Prior to that, I had three concussions in a four-month period.

I was that doesn't help depression, by the way.

And then we had a family crisis.

And it was sucked.

It was through that crisis.

God's going, like, no, you have a purpose here on this planet.

Through that crisis is realize, you know what?

The power of a father's voice in a child's life.

Maybe just maybe today.

You just need to hear, you have a purpose.

God's not done with you yet.

You matter, and there's hope, and he longs to use your life.

You have a purpose.

Like how Peter said it.

Talking to the church under really trying times.

He says, You're a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation of people of God's special possession.

I don't know how you feel right now, but that's what's true of you right now.

That, and then he gives us the purpose, that you may declare his excellencies of him who brought you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

God's not done with you.

You matter.

There's hope.

Would you lean in?

Heavenly Father, I pray right now for my friends that you would give us and give them the courage to take a small step forward and you meet us there.

Would you surround them with your love?

Would you anchor them with your hope?

Would you move in this moment to bring life to their weary souls?

We hope you are blessed by this message.

Please subscribe to our podcast for access to every episode as they're uploaded.

And hey, we'd love to connect with you.

Take a next step by filling out our virtual connection card at awakeningchurch.comslash card.