Beyond the Noise: Silencing Satan and the World || Pastor Adam Mesa

You may be new to service or church for the

past couple weeks. When you leave service across our campuses,

they do it different. So dream Team during the service

in alamed or Pomona, maybe passing them out if you

never got one. If you're here in Rancho when you

leave service today, if you didn't get one of the

journals over the past couple weeks, you can go see

our guest services team, the dream Team, and they'll be

able to grab one for you. So if you want

to jump into your journal, we want to recap some

things as we've been in something together as a church.

What we've experienced as a church is that God has

totally been breathing on Patria and we've been growing in

incredible ways. And that has led us as a church

to take an opportunity that all of us take a

journey over the next thirty six months together the next

three years, believing God that what He's been doing in

our church, we want to fan the flame. And so

in your journals you can see the projects that we're doing.

What we're doing as a church is we're believing God

that color coctively. If we all do our part in sacrifice,

equal gift but equal sacrifice. We'll see that God does

something incredible. And so we've started a twenty million dollar

project together where we're believing God for some things. And

I think, do I have to go over here closer

to it in order for us to see it? I

could do it. So over here we can see. We

have some projects we're doing together as a church over

the next three years, and so we want to be

able to get into some churches and so literally as

as soon as this week, I have meetings with real

estate agents in Corona where we're looking at some properties

because what happened was we're looking at least options owning options.

And what happened was when we started launching Corona, more

people came than we expected. And so Corona doesn't have

a lot of opportunity for space, and so some of

the cities new, some of it's older, but there's not

a lot of opportunities for over five hundred people to meet.

And so therefore we're looking at warehouses, office buildings. We're

looking at an old like Best Buyer Toys r US

that's empty, you know this week, and so we're just

believing God for favor and we're believing as we take

steps of faith that our church campuses will align with

that faith together over the next three years, because we

don't want to live in a world where we take

on debt as a church. How many of you guys know,

economy can change left and right. And I met a

pastor not too long ago from Texas who they had

to sell their church building because they couldn't afford the

finances during COVID, So they sold their building and they

consolidated their church in three campuses across the city of Austin.

It just broke my heart, but it also sobered to

me be saying, if we don't take care and we

don't get out of our debts and we try to

pay down everything as fast as possible or as much

as possible, then what happens is we ebb and flow

with the economy. And that may happen individually find Adams

finances may change, but I don't want Patriot to be

able to have to make decisions whether a campus is

open or closed based off of finances. And so when

we take care of our house, that's what we're doing.

We're taking care of our campuses, We're taking care of

Rancho you could see all the Rancho campus things that

are happening, expanding our kids ministry, creating a teenage resource center,

creating space for Alameda. I've been getting emails every week

of opportunities in Alameda as well with our pastoral team

up there with Fego and Tiffany, and so what we

see is as God's been breathing on our church, we

have an opportunity to align together. If this is your

home church, If Patriot is not your home church and

you're just visiting or checking us out, this is for

you in any way, unless you'd like to be part

of it, but there's no pressure on that. But what

we do want is everyone who calls Patriot Home, we

would love one hundred percent participation. We're just asking that

you talk to God. Here's some events I want to

share with you just too, and then we're going to

jump in the message. We got two more events. Number one,

we asked, let's continue to go to service every weekend

as much as possible or watch online from March February

first to March ninth. Additionally, what we're doing is two

big weekends. I'd love for you to put them in

your calendar because what's happening is there's two big weekends,

March first and second is what we're calling our Commitment weekend.

In your journals, you've seen these pledge cards that we've

been asking you to pray over, to ask God, what

is it that you would have our family doing. Me

and Ashley have been talking about it. We had a

number in our heart and as we've been doing this

series and we're believing God for much, we talked to

each other. So that felt like God's stretching us. But

what I've also done is I say, God, if you're

stretching me, then I live on a fixed income and

so I need you to bring income in other areas

for us, because we want to give it back to

our church so that we can see God doing So. However,

God's talking to you however you're at financially. Some can

do more, some can do less. We're just asking that

you ask the Lord. And on March first and second,

we're gonna all come together and we're going to pray

over these commitment cars. It's a commitment over three years,

and you'll see on your pledge card what those kind

of categories are on what you could kind of as

examples commit to. And then what we're gonna do is

we're gonna say this is what we're all committing to

over the next three years, and we're gonna see what

God does in our church. We just seen God do

incredible things and we're believing God that he's gonna blow

our mind. And then on March eighth and ninth, what

we're saying is we're saying, hey, let's sow a one

time seed to the Beyond campaign to start projects right away.

As a church, we're ready to go. And so we

need to pay for what we want to do. In

kids ministry, we got to pay architects for architectural renderings.

Believe it or not, people don't operate off of IOUs, okay,

And so all this stuff we want to start, we

want to be able to say when we go talk

to an architect and say, hey, we want to start

building out this space, they're gonna go, oh, well, we

need a percentage of what the total cost is in

order to start turning those into the city. What we

want to be able to have finances from the Miracle

Offering ready to go. Oh and with your church, patriot,

you're gonna see stuff start literally within days after that

miracle offering. So these are two really big things that

we're asking anyone that calls this church their home to

participate in across all of our campuses. And we're going

to allow God to do the rest. Because what we're

going to talk about today is what does it mean

to hear the voice of God. One of the things

that we talk about with this is as we're in

this Beyond campaign, what we're saying is number one, in

order to be able to see God take us to

where he's taking us, we would at first had to

be able to say, God, is this you? Are you speaking?

Are you taking Patriot in this direction? To reach more people. Additionally,

in the same way, we're also as we're asking people

to partner with us, we're asking all of us to

make a God decision, not a human decision. There's always

something that you may put on your heart, but when

you go and ask God, God may say something else.

And so one of the biggest ball you'll have in

your life, and you're lucky since we're in the Beyond

campaign and we're blessed together, is as we're talking about

hearing the voice of God, you're gonna be able to

apply this to pretty much every area of your life,

because how many of you guys have ever struggled before

hearing the voice of God knowing what direction to go in? God?

What do you want from me? What do you think

I should do about this? Where do you think I

should go about this? Should I move away? Should I

not move away? And you're gonna see the examples this

weekend that we're gonna be able to show how can

I decide? How can I be guided on what the

voice of God is? Three weeks ago when I was

speaking and you'll see it's one of the ways that

you can hear the voice of God. Three weeks ago

when we launched this campaign, one of my biggest thoughts

that I shared was every believer needs a home base.

And then what I said in that conversation was, if

we're not your home base and Patriot isn't your mix,

I encourage you to go and I'll even make recommends

to go find your home because the enemy wants you homeless.

God wants you to have a home. So one of

the things I said was in this church, if you

feel God taking you somewhere else, like feel free. I

pray you out there was two couples that came to

me that said I had got a job offer in

another state, and the only thing that was keeping me

was thinking, I just don't want to let my church

down with this new project that they're doing. And they said,

the moment you said that we're released, they go, can

you just pray for me that I find a home

church in Texas. I'm like absolutely, And over the past

couple of weeks I pray for multiple people, and I said,

I'll even help you find a church if I know

someone there to be able to get That is one

way God may speak to you is when you are confused,

God may bring a voice into your life that begins

to confirm direction of what's already secretly in your heart.

I want you to see this verse in the scriptures today.

It's in John chapter ten, verse twenty seven to twenty eight.

Would you enjoin me today's standing for the honor of

reading God's word, because this is where we're gonna be

at today with this thought a little bit two verses.

As we've been doing to make it simple today, here's

what it says for all those following along. This is

Jesus speaking Jesus says, my sheep, hear my voice. I

know them, and they follow me. Want you to sit

right there? He says, I know them, And he doesn't say,

and they know me. He says, I know them and

what they follow me? Okay, I give them eternal life

and they will never perish, and no one will snatch

them from my hand. No one, no thing can snatch

them out of my hand. You may be seated. Leave

that up there for a second. Jesus says, my sheep,

what here my voice? And I know them? I know

who they are. I gotta spot them out in a crowd.

And how do I know that I know them? Because

they follow me? And he says, I give them eternal life,

and they'll never perish, and no one will ever be

able to snatch them from my hands. That was a

great thing about a shepherd, and even shepherds to this day.

Ever since a sheep is a little lamb, shepherds begin

to make whistles and noises so that the sheep can

identify the shepherd. And so what will commonly happen if

you're in Israel or other parts of the world, is

what shepherds will do is as their flocks are grazing.

You know, every sheep looks exactly the same, and so

what happens is when all sheeps look the same, not

every shepherd's voice is the same and their call isn't

the same. So how do you differentiate between individuals that

look exactly the same. Not only do they know the

shepherd's voice, but they respond to the shepherd's voice. So

what shepherds do in Israel is you'll see them get

mixed up with their sheep, will get mixed up while

they're grazing land. And then you'll see multiple shepherds begin

to whistle, and you'll just see sheep just begin to

separate and go towards their shepherd. That's what Jesus says

when he says, the sheep know my voice, And he says,

and I know them? And how do I know them?

Because they follow me. Just last week I was gone

for the weekend. And so I have a dog named Rooster.

He's not a rooster, he's a dog, but that's his name.

I'm a big fan of Top Gun of Maverick, you know,

And so I got Roosters my dog's name. He's a Doberman.

And so last weekend I had Rooster at a kennel

that watches over him. Because Rooster is a very protecting dog.

He's been trained to look after my wife and kids

and my family. And so Rooster is a highly trained

military dog. Okay, if there was a Navy Seals of Dogs,

Rooster would be in that, Okay. And so the thing

about Rooster is I have to if I'm ever traveling,

I have to take him to just there's a there's

a veteran who owns a dog clinic nearby, and so

they trained service dogs, so he knows they know how

to work with Rooster. Not everyone could work with a

dog like that. They're highly disciplined and so you highly

have to discipline them. And so last weekend I was

gone for most of the weekend, but at church, and

so I asked Jacob, who's one of the young guys

on our team who serves. I say, hey, can you

do me big favor because we have a guest speaker

and it's the Super Bowl? Could you me big favor?

Could you go pick up Rooster and bring him over

here for me so I can go straight home. He said, yeah,

no problem, He's done it before. He helps a lot

with Rooster. You know, with me and stuff like that.

And so he goes to the kennel and it's just

a young kid that's working there, and he says, oh, hi,

I'm here to pick up Rooster. And so the guy

brings a a doverman out and Jacob he grabs the

leash and the dog pulls back, and then Jacob begins

to use his commands that Jacob knows, and so he

starts to say, you know, Rooster, come on. Rooster pulls

back and he says, Rooster, where's your bark? The dog

just stares at him. Rooster, come The dog just stares

at him. Rooster, heel. The dog just stares at him. Finally,

Jacob goes, hey, man, I don't mean any disrespect, but

this isn't Rooster. And the guy looks at him, like,

tell me how to do my job. He said, that's Rooster.

Jacob said, I'm sorry to tell you this is not Rooster.

And then he goes, there's no way that he was

in Rooster's kennel that I know that that's Rooster. And

Jacob's like, I'm telling you right now it's not. And

he says, do you have another doverman in kennel by

any reason. He says, yeah, but I know who Rooster is.

I do have another Doberman, and he goes, can you

get it? And so I showed you a picture. When

you have Doberman's that are all lined up, they look

exactly the same. They look exactly the same, you know.

Some may be a little chunkier, skinnier, you know. And

obviously to a trained eye me who's with Rooster every day,

I would know right away because it's my dog. But

Jacob's way of having to tell because it's not his dog.

He's helping me out. He goes, can you get the

other Dobrian. The doverman comes in the kennel, He gets

the other Dobman that's not Rooster, and Jacob goes, Rooster, heal, Rooster,

Rooster down, goes down, Rooster, where's your bark? Woo woo?

Rooster come. Rooster lines up and then he looks at

the employee and he goes, this is Rooster. And the

guy goes, I'm sorry. What's the difference between a breed

that looks exactly the same, bark's exactly the same, tends

to eat exactly the same. The difference is is when

the master calls, do the sheep are the people? Are

we obedient? Do we listen? Obedience? Obedience dictates whether we

are connected to the master or not. It's obedience. The

thing that told Jacob right away that's not rooster was

not because of the way the dog looked. It wasn't

because the dog had a cross around its neck. It

wasn't because the dog had a scripture in its bio.

It wasn't because the dog goes to church on weekends.

It was because when he said bark, the dog bark.

When he said sit, the dog sat. When he said come,

the dog came. There was no negotiation. When the master

voice speaks, rooster listened, and he said that is how

you know that's rooster. Jesus says, I know my sheep.

In other words, I know they're small, subtle differences, just

like me. I would have looked at that dog right away.

I was saying, I don't need it to bark, I

don't need it to be obedient. But but you know,

we could just to double check to show you that

this is my rooster. What I'll do is I'll have

him follow me, and if he follows me and obeys me,

that'll be proof to you the world that he's really mine.

And so immediately Jesus stretches us. It's one thing to

know his voice, it's one thing for him to know you. Yeah,

of course, of course, you know you believe in the resurrection.

You're gonna go to heaven. But are you gonna go

to heaven with your butt burning and fire right on

that door? You're like, Oh, I barely slipped in, barely

made it. I said a prayer once. So he makes

some differences. He says, Hey, my sheep, they hear me,

they know my voice. Second of all, he says, I

know them. But then he says, but when I speak,

how you can really tell their mind? Is they follow?

They follow Jesus. And there's a lot of situations in

our life where we get into trouble because we aren't obedient,

we aren't understanding the shepherd's voice, and we are clearly

following him. Just disobedient children is disobedient children. And we

think to ourselves, God, where are you. I haven't heard

you in forever. Are you taking the steps to learn

the Shepherd's voice? Because to follow Jesus appropriately, we have

to learn how God speaks and when we learn how

God speaks and we know what type of things God

looks for in us, then I'll tell you this. Navigating

your life, It's not that it won't be easy, but

it will be clearer. You know, coming to faith is

not a promise that faith will be easy. But I

will tell you this, if you start to follow Jesus

and you begin to learn his voice, the steps will

become clear. And why I saw him says the word

of God is a lamp unto my feet. It's not

a light tower. It's not lighting up an entire city.

God's word is lighting your feet, which means it gets

clear one step forward at a time. But a lot

of times we're saying, God, give me the whole picture first. First,

give me the whole picture before I make any decisions.

We're gonna go, and we're gonna make this even clearer.

Right now, here's three things that we're gonna look at

that ultimately lead us that I believe to be able

to hear God's voice much clearer in our life. Here's

an imperative first thing that you and I must do

if we want to hear God's voice clearly. The first

thing we have to do is we need a silence

Satan's voice. First thing you gotta do is if you

are looking to hear God's voice more clearer, then you

and I must learn how to silence Satan's voice. Gotta

be able to silence it. I want to see what

happens is a lot of times when God speaks. I

want you to see in Genesis what God tends to

do when he speaks. God will speak in a pattern.

God God will speak in a progress. So when God speaks,

often times, and we saw it with Jesus statements, I'm

the shepherd, they hear me, I know them, they follow me.

In other words, he's sharing a pattern with you. I speak,

I see them. In other words, no one can fake it.

I know them. But also they're obedient. There's a step forward.

It's very clear, and you'll see a lot of other

times in scripture. Whether you want to hear the story

of Abraham. It doesn't mean that their life is perfect,

but it means as they're pat they're following God. There

is a progress and a lot of times you'll see

biblical characters they get into trouble when either they doubt God,

question God, or just all around pause In life. His pause.

You know, you see it with Jonah, you see it

with other individuals in the Bible. You see it when

they're just at a pause in light, they just pause,

they back up. It's like, whatever, God, I'm starting to

give up mentally, start to see things get messed up.

And so what happens is Genesis one to three says

that three to four says this, God said, let there

be light, and there was light, and God saw that

the light was good. And God separated the light from

the darkness. In other words, there is a pattern and

there is a progress. God spoke, let there be light.

Then what happened when God spoke progress there was light?

What happens after that? Now God sees the light and

he deems it good. He qualifies that it was good,

it's sufficient. And then what does he do separates the

light from the darkness. There is a pattern that he does,

and a lot of times what happens is when you

see this patterns, we get stuck in a certain period,

not knowing that God may be progressing our life. If

God is in your life, there is a progress forward

because that's how God operates. There is a pattern that

God's doing. So if you ever feel like I talk

to people, I just feel like I'm in limbo. That's

not God. God doesn't operate in limbo even when people

are on pause. Like Job, It's because God is in

the process of doing something. In Job's life, there's a

process even then. So what does God do? If God

does pattern, what does Satan do in return? If we're

learning how to silence God's voice, what will happen is

Satan will operate in question. God has patterns. Satan has

question for you to to question everything. Not in a

question to not a wrestle, Jacob means to wrestle with God.

God likes wrestling, but Satan brings questions. There's a difference

between wrestling something with God and questioning God. Satan wants

to lead you to questioning. Genesis chapter three, verse one

to four. Just a few chapters later, says this, Now

the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of

the field that the Lord God had made. He said

to the woman, Did God actually say you shall not

eat from the tree, any tree in the garden? What happens?

What happens? Satan issues a question which causes Eve to

doubt God. Did he really say, does he really care?

Does he really know you, does he really hear you?

Does he really love you? Satan will question I have

a different way of putting it on the next line.

If you see it about Satan's question and what happens,

give me the next verse actual the actual slide ahead. Okay,

so Satan's first question did God actually say? I want

you to pause right there? Does anyone know God's first

question in the Bible. God's first question in the Bible

is shortly after this, what does God say? God says,

where are you? He asks Adam and Eve? Where are you?

In other words, where's your position right now? Where are

you with me right now? Adam and Eve? So what

happens is when Satan asked a question, he wants to

lead you to doubt God can't do anything. Doubt God

can't do anything. He can't do any of it. When

God approaches a question, what does he do? Where are you?

He cares about where you're at? Are you good? Where

do you got clothes? On? Who told you you were naked?

Hold on? God knew what Adam and Eve were doing,

but imposing the question to him, he wanted to reveal

to them just where they are at. They're at a

place where they've gotten to a point where they began

to doubt God, which is what distance their relationship from God.

It's distanced their placement from God. And so how many

of you guys like this, We got our stairs And

as we've been talking about the Beyond campaign, you haven't

heard us give too much clarity on what the stairs

is is kind of self evident, but it's the place

that the final destination is where God, wherever God wants

us as a church family, that we would hear God's

voice so well that the doors God would cause us

that costs to open and want us to walk through,

that we will understand God's voice so well that we

will step through those doors. And what will happen is

through this journey as a church that we've taken for

over thirty years and here we're at now for another

thirty we want to go for the next generation. What

happens is through these steps of stairs. How many of

you guys have children and grandchildren. One of the things

that drives me nuts is my boys. They play with

legos and they leave them everywhere. And then I'll be

walking around the house and I'll go a step and

out and it's just painful. I'm a pain right now,

and most people, or a lot of people, this is

the first step. This is Satan's voice right here, and

Satan would love for you and I to stop right here,

stop at the pain, stop at the pain. Satan would

love for us to stop here and then just sit

here and then look up and be like, well, God,

I can't go any closer. It hurts every time I

take a step. They don't know that at some point

it ends. They don't know at some point God will

grow them out. If they don't know, at some point,

the pain and the journey may be different, but it's

not the pain, and so Satan's voice will get you

right here. This is where Adam and Eve were for

that first moment. They just stop right here where it

was painful, where they're just like, oh, God, lets us

see everything but this one thing. And then Satan causes

them to question and doubt God. And so then what

do they do they say here? And what results? Adam's

hard work is painful, and Eve has pain in childbirth.

The fruit of doubting God was pain. And there's a

lot of people, even when we come to church and

we think to ourselves, God, you are my indestination. Where

are you heading us? Is where I want to go?

But every step hurts so much that you just stop

right here because you think every step is gonna hurt.

So you think I just stop right here. And so

we stop in our broken marriage, and we stop in

our addiction, and we stop in our pain, and we

stop in our unforgiveness, and we stop in our trauma

because we don't think that Jesus can't free us and

heal us. And so so many times, instead of going Okay,

I'm gonna take one more step forward, I'm gonna take

one more step up, a lot of people they stop

right there. You may know people today that they've stopped

their whole relationship with God because of pain. And I'll

tell you this, stopping right there, that's not them hearing

God's voice, that's Satan going. I got you to doubt God.

I got you to question God, because what God wants

to do is what he cares at when you are broken,

when you are from from God. God's concern is where

are you at? What's going on? I love my wife

and all the time when I call, even though I

have her location on my phone that I could check anytime.

My first question when I asked when I call my

wife when I get home and she's not home and

not in like I'm trying to like tag on her anything,

just because I love her, I'll call her. I'll be like, Hey,

where are you at? I may have a question, but

my first question is where are you at? And she'll

do the same with me. Where are you I'm like, Oh,

I'm at lunch with Sosa, Okay, call me later. It's

not just her jump in here. She always wants to

where am I at? God loves you so much that

one of the questions he wants to ask you all

the time is where are you at? And one of

the best things you could do is when you're trying

to discover God's voice, is when you go to God

in prayer, tell God where you're at right now? You

gotta keep it real with God. God. I'm naked. I've

been building my own clothes out of fig leaves, and

I've been hiding from you behind bushes. That's where I'm

at right now. God, Like I'm done, i wanna hide,

i wanna walk away. That He wants you to say that,

so then he can say, Okay, you want to stay

in that bush, you want to stay in those fig leaves,

you want to step out? And we got to be

able to answer God because what will happen is then

obedience will dictate. Are we really wanting what God has

for us? And here's the second thing is, as we're discovering,

you got to silence Satan's voice. And here's Satan's voice.

Satan's voice wants you discont from God and he wants

you fully in sin. Now here's the thing. You may

get to a point in your life where you say, Okay,

I'm fairly well with uh. You know, I can tell

when Satan speaks. I can tell when he's trying to

guide me. I can see it, I can spot it.

But I'm still feel kind of disconnected from God. I

still feel like I don't hear his voice. Well, here

might be the second reason. And it teeters between these

two reasons or why oftentimes God's voice is muted in

our life. We have to silence Satan. But the second

thing is is you have to filter the world's voices.

You gotta filter the world's voices, so you may be

good at silencing Satan's voice. But then you gotta filter

the world's voice. Now here's the thing. It's not silence

the world's voice, because there are people you will do

life with that. Unfortunately, you just can't silence like there's

family members did I mean, I guess you could, but

it's probably not gonna end. Well, you can't fully block.

You know, a family member, can't just fully block your mom.

You can't fully block your dad. You can't fully blocking

in law. You may feel like it at times, but

it wouldn't be beneficial. But what you can do is when

all those voices spread, and when you turn on the

TV and you watch all the news, and then you

go on social media and you see everything coming at you,

and then you go to work and you hear it

and you just hear it and you hear. What you

can begin to get good at is you can filter.

Been a filter. How many of you guys have ever

seen a dirty pool? Before you ever seen a dirty pool,

it's like a broken down filter that just that pool

is so dirty. And then what happens is one of

two things happens is if you see a dirty pool,

more than likely you have an unfunctioning filter or if

you see a clean filter, if you see a clean pool,

you have a dirty filter. So if you saw a

pool like this, more than likely at times over time,

what's gonna develop is the filter is gonna be dirty.

That's what a filter would look like. It's doing its job.

The pool is clean and the filter is working. At

some point you got to change the filter out, put

a new one. But the goal of it is you

want it to collect all the dirt. And so you

and I what we have to do is we have

to get to a point in our life where we're

able to filter out the world's voices. Not take in

the good and the bad. No, take in the good

and release the bad. If advice comes, take the good advice,

spit the old bad advice down. If you got friendships,

may take good friendships, and there may be time you

got to spit out bad friendships too. So be times

that happens where we have to take in what God

says is good and we got to release what is

said back. And you and I have to get to

a place where we can see the filters that God has.

First John chapter two, verse fifteen to sixteen says do

not love the world or the things in the world.

If anyone loves the world, the love of the is

not in him. For all that is in the world,

the desires of the flesh, and the desires of the eyes,

and the pride of life, is not from the Father,

but it is from the world. Jesus encourages us that

there are voices all around us all the time that

are trying to be louder than God's. So you get

to a point that you know how to silence Satan's

voice so you can feel it. You can jump out.

You're like saying, you don't got those tricks. I'm not

addicted to nothing no more. I'm free. I don't be

watching things no more. My language has changed my life

is So you could dance on this step all day,

right like, man, I'm free, God's delivered me, I'm healed,

Praise God. And then what happens. You're like, okay, I

can move up. And then you go to these steps

and then you just where all that noise coming. Now

it's just loud. So you're like, God, talk to me.

You gotta make a decision like is that God? I

don't know. And what you gotta do is as you

get God's voice. Well, you'll be able to know that's

not God. God wouldn't say that that was you know,

I'm my best friend, I appreciate you, I love you.

But you're just squawking right now. That's not God right now.

That's not God right now. Or I appreciate you. You may

care about me, al that's not God right now. And

so what happens is is just because it's loud, just

because it's noisy doesn't mean it so God. Sometimes we think, God,

just give me a cloud in the sky and I'll

do it. And we just start cryptically reading clouds, like

is that a heart? Does that look like a heart?

Try to decide to marry someone? Hey, does that look

like a heart? It just we're injecting junk, and we're

looking everywhere other than where God speaks. And so we

got filtered the voice. So then here's the last voice.

Is we just uncover this for the last few moments

we have. Is what happens is is if you can

silence Satan's voice and you can filter the world's voices,

then the third what you will begin to do is

now you'll begin to be able to hear God's voice.

A lot of times one of the first things I'll

do with people that are like, I just feel like

I can't hear God. I feel like I'm trying to

make some big life decisions, and I'll ask them what

their pattern looks like. Who's the people closest to you

when some goes down? Who do you call? Who do

you listen? Okay, oh, I call my best friend. Does

your best friend go to church? Oh gosh, no, no

she doesn't. She like she like goes and does this

thing once a year in like Columbia, and then you

know she and then she drinks this tea and then

she does this and then she But she's my best friend.

That's who you're calling for wisdom on where God is

guiding your life somewhat. Someone who looks at crystals and

thinks that they talk to them, that's who you're calling.

Or you're like, oh, yeah, I'm deciding if I should

marry this girl or not. Well, who you talk to?

My best friend? Is your best friend married? Oh? No, man,

he'd be taking a girl home almost every day from

the gym. All right, hold on, that's who you're talking

to on whether you should take them. See a lot

of times we don't realize how foolish we are when

it comes to detrie trying to decide God's things. We'll

realize the voices we're taking are not God. No mean

you gotta cut him out your life. But you better

know on the hierarchy of voices, where they sit, where

they sit, And God's voice is number one. And so

how do we hear God's voice? What will happen? Is

two Timothy for the first part, and it'll be the

biggest value of your life. Tewod Timothy chapter three, verse sixteen.

All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching,

for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that

the man of God may be complete equipped for every

good work. What is the number one place that you

will find that God speaks to you? What do we

call this? Let's just let's just do it interact. What

do we call this? This is the Word of God. Okay,

so we're trying to hear God's voice. He gives us

something that we call the Word of God, and we

never open it, and we don't read it, we don't

study it. Said, well, I struggle with it. I courage

you get a study Bible have someone help you along

in studying. Get a commentary Bible where they're commentary. You

can learn it, you can understand it. God would not

give you something that you can't understand. It may be

a learning curve at first, because we got a lot

of filtering. You don't realize how much filtering you gotta do.

I can take a group of children. My son came

home one day from school and memorized all of the

fruits of the Spirit and the three verses that followed it.

And I was like, I don't know a grown adults

who know one of the fruit of the spirit. And

if I taught it all day, they wouldn't even be

able to remember it the next day. Not because adults

aren't smart. It's because we got so much junk up here.

We got so much junk in here that there's a

lot going on. But as a child man, he's fresh

all that sticks out. Joy, love, peace, self control. Oh yeah,

I remember those. I can retain those. So God will

often and He's gonna speak in this word. And so

if you're ever at a point in your life where

you're trying to understand the voice of God and you

aren't reading God's word then I pray he does a miracle,

but I also pray that he taps behind at the

same time, because if he gave us something for us

to know not only how to be saved, but how

to guide our life and we don't read it, then

we're missing out on his voice. We literally call it

the Word of God, and so God will oftentimes use

his word to guide you. You could also use his

word to filter out junk. God, does this sound right?

Let me study the word of God. Let me study

the life of Jesus. Because what will happen is the

first thing will happen is God's word will begin to

speak the lagos his word. Scripture John chapter one, verse

one says that Jesus is the Logos in flesh. So

Jesus is the Word of God in flesh. And then

he gives us his word, which is everything that we

need to sustain our life. And then what will happen

is as the word is read, the rama the convertible word,

where the Holy Spirit begins to translate this to you,

where the Holy Spirit begins to make it make sense

for you. Well, what happened is God will begin to

help you understand it. But a lot of times we're

not reading enough. Most of the time when I talk

to people who are saying I tried the Bible, but

I didn't understand, Austin, how much of it did you read?

Like half a chapter? I just didn't get it. Opened

up the Book of Matthew and there was just names

for a whole chapter and I didn't know. I didn't

know who they were. So I closed it and I thought,

oh God, this can't be for me. But anyways, pastor,

can you pray for me. I'm trying to get some

direction on whether I should take a job or not.

And I'm like, yeah, I can do that, but I

can't do anything better than what God can do for you.

And the spirit of God is impartial and he'll speak

to you too, And so you got advantage where you

talk to God all the time. And there was a

moment a couple months ago, I took my boys camping,

and so we went camping up up in Big Surn.

We stayed at this campground, and at a lot of campgrounds,

I'll have these little like mini grocery stores where you know,

they'll have firewood and they'll have you know, SODA's and

drink you don't play. Don't you don't have to play

that video yet you're giving away the best part. Yeah,

I'll give you guys the queue. Uh. So, they have

this little grocery store in this little market, and so

we're staying about one hundred yards. Our kind of camp

round was like one hundred yards away from this little market,

and so Matthias comes up to me and I can't

even see it at the time, and he says, Dad,

can you take me to go get Can I go

get a popsicle? Can you go take me? And I said, uh,

I said no, I don't. I don't want to get up.

How many guys know that? Parents, You're like, no, I

don't feel like it. I just sat down. I just

finished kicking the all food. No, and that's out to myself.

You know what, this is what I'm gonna do. Matthias

is six, Thomas is three. I say, here's what I

want you to do. I'm gonna give you ten dollars.

I want you to go to the grocery store and

I want you to buy the popsicle. And he's like

can I do that? Like, yeah, you could do that, Matthias.

So so so I said, here's what's gonna happen is

a few things gonna happen. I need you to remember

all of it. Number One, you're gonna go, but you

also have a brother, So make sure that you get

a popsicle for him because you're gonna come back and

he's gonna be like, where's mine. So you're getting two,

not just one, not just one for you, You're getting two. Second,

the popsicles are not gonna cost five dollars each, so

you're gonna get money back. I need my change back.

It's not a full donation. Son, the money comes back

to me. He said, okay, I said. Third, you're gonna

tell the guy you don't know how to count, and

you don't know how much the popsicles are. Can he

help you. He's gonna tell him right away. You don't

know what you're doing. He said, okay. So he takes off.

I give him the money. He takes off halfway back.

He turns around and he looks at me and he's like,

and I'm like, you got it. So he runs in

the grocery store. And what he didn't know was I

ran all the way around all the other campground, all

the tents, all the RBS, and I put my ear

right by the door, so the whole time listening, making

sure that he's okay, making sure he does it well,

making sure he don't freak out. And so sure enough

I hear him do the whole thing. And then before

he walks back out, I get halfway back to the

campground so that he doesn't know I was listening the

whole time, and he looks at me. He's holding both

popsicles up and he's so excited and he's so happy.

And he comes back and then I was just wait,

I didn't even tell I wasn't even gonna ask for

my change back. I'll just say, is he gonna give

me my change back? So he comes back, he's like, Dad,

I got it, Thomas. Look what I got for you.

Tom is like, oh, you got this for me? Thank you.

He's so happy. He's like, I got this for you.

I went and bought it and like, okay, yeah sure.

And so we do that with God's money all the

time anyway, but that's for later later sermon. He's like,

I got this for you and he's like, oh, thank you.

And so then he takes it, and then I wait

A couple minutes and then the this goes, Oh yeah,

that's right, Dad, here's your change back, gives me back

the change, and so then now for the rest of

the trip. I knew that he understands everything I ask

him to do. So what happened was the moment he

did it the way that I told him to do it.

I trusted him the rest of the week. And so

then the next day he said, can I take Thomas

and you can play the video? Now, can I take

Thomas to go buy some popsicles? And I said, yeah,

you could go take Thomas, And so I pulled out

my phone and I pulled out my camera and I

recorded them both buying themselves some ice cream, both waiting

for their change back for the rest of the trip.

And you'll just see how excited they come out. Thomas.

He don't know what he needed to do, but look

how excited Atthiasis. That boy starts beaming with excitement with

the change. Why Why did I trust them with more responsibility,

more resources, more opportunity because they followed my instructions. And

what happens is when we can follow God's instructions, he

can put more honest. When we can hear God's voice.

He can say things loud, but there's a lot of

times God's speaking, but God tends to whisper. When the

world tends to loud yell, God speaks in a whisper.

The world screams, and so we're waiting for God to

scream the way that the world screams. Oswald Chambers said

it like this. The voice of the spirit is as

gentle as a summer breeze, so gentle that unless you're

living in complete fellowship and oneness with God, you'll never

hear it. You ever caught someone say, oh, it's a

little breezy, and you're like, I don't know, I can't tell.

God's voice is similar to a summer breeze. It's light,

it's consistent, and you got to stop and pay attention

in order to catch it. That's how God's voices does

not scream. And here's so what God will do is

he'll speak through his word. As I begin to close,

the spirit of God will speak through the raima. What

God will do is begin to transform your heart so

that you hear him more clearly. The more time you

spend in prayer, the more time you spend in His word,

The more that the Holy Spirit will speak louder in

your heart. And then what God will begin to do

is he'll speak through community. If you can get around

godly community, God will speak through that community. John ten

twenty seven. Jesus says, my sheep hear my voice, and

I know them, and they know me. I give them

a saver and they will never playish. It's a group thing.

It's that we can actually hear God more clear than together.

It's strange when one sheep is following a shepherd's voice.

It's not strange when a collective group of sheep are thought,

Oh okay, all the sheep are hearing and together when

we follow Jesus, what will happen is is you'll see

that God's word will stick out. Because we got a

lot of great people in our church. We got seasoned

people in our church, in our faith. And I'll tell

you this. When I talk to a married couple that's

been seasoned, if I'm thinking about doing they got a

healthy marriage and I'm thinking about doing something that with

my marriage, like, oh, we may do this or that.

And a married couple that's been seasoned, that's been in

the present gun, they're like, I wouldn't recommend that. I

wouldn't go, oh, yeah, well that's your two cents. I'm good.

I would say no, that actually it means a lot

because I've seen that you hear the shepherd's voice. I

see it in the way that you pray. I see

it in the way that you read your word. So

why would I. There's been times in my life that

I've felt so strong towards something and I've sat with

my dad. I'm like, hey, what do you think about

it this? He's like, yeah, no, I wouldn't recommend it.

And I have a rule that with people that I

believe speaking in my life, when if something doesn't make

sense to if something makes sense to me but something

doesn't make sense to them, I follow their instructions. If

they've been down a path that I want to go,

why would I tell them where the terms are? And

so there's sees in people in the church. That's why

we do neighborhood groups here. That's why we want you

to get to a point where you can pass all

the voices so that you can get to a point

in your life where you see advantage, point of where

God is not just to stay here, but to invite

someone else. Hey, watch that step. No, don't I want

to step right there. That one hurts. So I stepped

on that one in ninety six. Don't step right there.

I stepped in that one in college in two thousand

and nine. Don't step there. I listened to that loser

ten years ago. Don't listen to that boys, I listened

to that kind of music. I'll tell you where that

led me. I'll hang out with those kind of people

I want to. I'll tell you where that led me, why,

and what will happen. What may have taken you thirty

years to get right here, you can help someone else

get there in five. If we're doing community together, we

could lean on each other. We could get to where

God wants to take us. And so you're not just

called to your own development. You're called to take someone

else with you. And there'll be a day that you'll

take your grandchildren with you on that journey. You'll take

other married people in this journey. You'll help other people

in the seasons of singleness. You'll help other people in

single in seasons of life that you face that you

wouldn't want another person to face. But you've been there,

and other people will be there, Yah will call you

to help other people. I want to encourage you with

this last thought. If you want to really grow in

understanding God's voice, here's a four step method that's really

easy and I'll say it really fast. First thing you

do is you go to scripture. You observe it. So

first you read scripture. Next thing you say is you

observe it. What is this saying? So what is it saying?

Not to you but just in the moment? What is

it saying? What point is the scriptures trying to make.

It's called the soap method. It's been around a long time.

Many people use it for devotional time. Many people have

heard it. Then what you do is you observe it.

When you observe it correctly, then what will happen is

now you can apply it. What is this saying to me?

And what do I need to do to change or

what do I need to do to apply this? And

then lastly, don't ever forget this part. A lot of

people stop right here, So you go to prayer God.

Whatever I just read right now, would it transform my heart?

Right now? I feel like a David. I feel like

I'm hiding in a cave. Right now, or feel like

I made a best sheeba mistake. God, may I need

your help. I need you, and you begin to pray

it so that the raima can transform you. And so

you do scripture, you observe it, you apply it, and

then you pray it. I'll tell you this, If you

can silence Satan's voice, if you can filter the world's voices,

know which are important for your life, know which aren't

important for your life, and then lastly you can observe scripture,

apply it and pray it. You will see God lead

you so clearly in your life. And there may just

be times that you feel are unclear, but that's just

God trying to get you to rest your faith on him.

He just wants you to lean on Him more in

times of unclarity, and that is the point of what

Jesus is trying to do. I just met with someone

recently and they said, I just don't know what I'm

supposed to do in this season. I feel like everything's

hitting me. And I said, well, have you been leaning

on God? Not really? And I'm like, well, I've lean

on him. Lean on him. He wants you. He's there.

You may feel like you're in limbo right now, because

he just wants you to lean on him, want you

to rest in him. That's what Jesus wants us to do.

I'll pray and we'll close to leave together. Lord, thank

you for this word today, God, I pray it may

transform our heart and mind together in Jesus' name. Amen,

you may be here today as we leave together in

just a few moments, and you may be far from Jesus.

If you're truthful and honest, you would say, I don't

know Jesus's voice. I don't know that I've ever heard

God's voice. I don't know that I've ever felt God

trying to talk to me or reach me. But today,

as you were listening, what maybe happen was the Holy

Spirit begin to knock in your heart. And what happened

was God began to speak to you in such a

rich way that Jesus began to say, follow me, follow me,

follow me. The first step to hearing the Shepherd's voice

is responding to the first call that God ever makes.

You only ever know God's voice when you respond the

first time his call, when He comes on your heart

and he says, let me in, and Jesus says, whoever

opens the door and ask me to eat with them,

I'll join them. And so, as Jesus knocks on your

heart and wants us to recognize today that his death

and resurrection was for you and I. It wasn't to

make a political point, it wasn't to start a revolution

of people. What it was meant to do is to

redeem our souls, redeem our hearts, bring us into perfect

relationship with the Father, and then the Holy Spirit would

come and walk with us in life, begin to renew

our minds, begin to allow us to grow in our

relationship with Jesus. And So, if you're here today and

you've been far from God and you're ready to make

that decision to follow Jesus and confess him as Lord

and Savior, and I encourage you at this moment, can

we all bow our heads and close our eyes. Some

of you are going to be praying this for the

first time, or you're going to repraying it again in rededication,

because as you've looked at your life, he says, I

really haven't been following my shepherd. But I want to

choose today wherever you're at in your season of life,

as you're ready to join the Lord's call and ready

to join Heaven. I want you to repeat after me, say,

Dear Lord Jesus. In this moment, I confess you as

Lord and Savior. I believe in my heart that you

died on the cross and you rose three days later.

From this day forward, I commit to follow you for

the rest of my days in Jesus' name. A man, Hey,

I'm going to do one last thing before we leave.

If you said that prayer today, either for the first

time or a second time, I like the way Pastor

Sammy says it. He says, if you said it for

the first time or last time, depending on who you are.

I'm going to count to three. If you said that

today for the first time, could you raise your hand.

All we want to do is welcome you in the

family and celebrate with you because we know that God

just did a miracle in this place. Would you raise

your hand? One? Two, one, two three? Would you raise

your hand? If that was you today, I see some heny. Hey,

God bless you, my friend, God bless you. What an

incredible decision. I see some other hands over there. Well, hey,

we want to welcome you to the family, and if

you'd like to grow in your faith, we'd love to

come alongside of you, and so before you leave, if

you'd like to go to our website ww dot grow

dot Faith. We'd love to come alongside of you and

help you walk in your journey of faith in what

you said yes for. Additionally, our elders, deacons and prayer

team will be up here at the front. If anyone

needs prayer for anything, please feel free to come forward

after service while our team will be able to pray

for you. Additionally, when I dismiss, if you want to

write that name of those people you've been believing God for,

don't forget to come on up to the front and

write those names as well. God bless you family. We'll

see you next weekend. Give us