New Normal with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at MetaCurch.

And my hope is that today's podcast finds you at the perfect time in your life that God uses it to inspire and enlighten you.

I hope that you enjoy today's message.

Alright, what's up, MetaCurch?

We want to welcome you back in to our stream.

If you're here with us for the first time, my name's Clayton.

I'm the lead pastor here at MetaCurch.

And we've made this announcement, but I know a lot of things are opening back up.

We are really taking our time and seeking God on when the right time is to reopen our venues.

The one word we really feel him pressing on our hearts is the word together.

So we're gonna pray and continue to seek him on how we can open up with unity.

But I also want to make it clear that we are not a church that is separated through streaming.

We are a church that is right now united through streaming.

And right where you are, we're having church.

If you're watching this on a live stream, this is church.

We're here together.

If you're watching it on an archive, the same Spirit of God is there with you in that room, in that moment, and you are doing church.

The church we know is not a service.

We definitely know it's not a building, it is a movement of God's people.

And so we're so excited that you've come in and you've joined us and we're trying to make this time as interactive as possible.

I really would like to know um if there's something new that you have started during this time of coronavirus and quarantine.

Like I've been trying to really up my game in the do-it-yourself at home projects, and Katie continues to have a list for me, and I continue to try like trial and a lot of error and trial and error and try to figure out some projects around the house.

Katie has been reading a whole lot more.

Uh, whatever is new that you're doing, throw it in the comments.

Maybe you've been working on cooking, right?

You haven't been able to go out.

Maybe you've been like a microwave specialist and you've moved down to the stovetop.

Just let us know.

You've started cooking.

Someone out there has begun exercising because you cannot buy a piece of workout equipment anywhere in the world right now, and you can't find a bike, even on the shelves at the stores.

So if someone doesn't say they're biking, there is a conspiracy going on in the bike industry because they are all sold out.

Let us know what you're doing that is new during this time of quarantine.

Maybe some of you have gotten in a rhythm because you're forced to be home for a while.

You've gotten in a rhythm of quiet time with God.

Maybe you've really started reading scripture for the first time and spending time in prayer.

That's something new.

And as you continue to fill up the chat with the new things that you're doing, I want to give you the title of my message today is New Normal.

New Normal.

I I can't really remember hearing that words, uh, that word, that phrase, except maybe like a dozen times in my life.

And now you hear it a dozen times every single day.

And everyone wants to know what is the new normal gonna look like as Texas begins to open and other states begin to open, and presumably over time our country and the world opens back up.

What is the new normal?

And there's kind of there's these stages now to normal.

There's pre-coronavirus, and that's what we call going back to normal.

Man, if we could just go back to normal.

And when some of you think of the new normal out of coronavirus, you're hoping that it reflects what old normal was.

You really just want to go back to what that was.

Now, there's also a new normal inside of coronavirus.

The new normal of educating our kids at home, the new normal of wearing masks and maybe even gloves, when we go out, the new normal of not shaking people's hands.

And so the question really is where are we going?

Like when it's all, I know it's not gonna be over, over, right?

There's not an end in sight, we learn that.

But like when it opens up, what's the new normal?

And the answers you get range all the way from the world as we know it is over.

It will be completely, completely different.

No one will shake hands again, everyone will wear masks forever, your kids will never play sports again.

Some ideas are, it's gonna be completely radically different.

On the other side of the extreme, people are going, give it a few more months, everyone's gonna be tired, and we're gonna go back to sneezing each other's faces, drinking out of each other's straws, kissing strangers, like it's all gonna go back to normal.

And so there's this tension, and really there's even a question of what do we want the new normal to look like?

What do we want coming out of quarantine?

I almost feel like I'm stuck having to be the bad guy because in conversations I have, most people want to go back to normal.

If we could just get back to normal, and it's like I feel almost forced to remind you that the normal that you're dreaming of getting back to, when you were in it, you were dreaming of getting out of.

Like that normal wasn't working well for the vast majority of people.

And you want to go back to it.

You you some of you want to just go back and hug your boss that you were ready to run over with your truck.

Like you forget you've romanticized it now, and you can't wait.

You just feel so bad for your kid that they're not out there working on their game, and you can't wait.

You forgot that it's every weekend of your life, thousands of dollars a month, driving all over Texas to your kid.

I hate to do it, I hate to be the bad guy who's not gonna be a professional athlete.

They're not gonna do it.

They're five foot two and they're 17 years old, they're not going to the NBA.

And it's like, man, when you were there, it was so stressful you wanted out, but now you want back.

We just want to go back to normal.

Can we go back to the way that it was?

But if we're honest, the way that it was wasn't always working.

The quarantine has been such an interesting period because it has really, really shone a light on different areas of our life.

It is almost made indefensibly clear some of the areas of our life that are broken.

And so, what does the new normal look like?

What does it look like to come out of this time?

What does it look like to get through this period and what's on the other side?

I want to go to a story in scripture that I've never preached on.

Uh, it's a very minor character.

He only shows up very briefly in the Jewish scriptures, what we call the Old Testament.

And this is a guy who was so, so desperate to go back to normal.

In 2 Kings chapter 5, verse 1, it says, Naaman, commander of the army for the king of Aram, was a man important.

2 Kings 5:1

Listen to these words.

He was important to his master, he was highly regarded, the commander of the army, important, highly regarded, because through him, the Lord had given victory to Aram.

Naaman was a valiant warrior, important commander, important, highly regarded, valiant warrior.

This guy has it going on.

Through him and his command of the army, they had won a ginormous victory, and now he's at the king's right hand.

And now he has the influence, and he's got the status, and he's got the possessions, and he's got the position, and he's got it all.

Naaman is living life, things are good, but but he had a skin disease.

And this word skin disease, other translations call leprosy.

And it is hard because we we really grammatically can't call it leprosy, leprosy.

And and maybe if you were with us at the beginning of the year, we did a gospel talk on the leper, and we talked about just the deb just debilitating disease of leprosy.

It ends your life.

Not only does it kill you, it is a death sentence, but you lose everything.

You're ostracized, you're kicked out of the city, you lose your relationships, you lose your resources, you lose your home, you lose your position, you lose everything.

He has a skin disease, and if it's not leprosy, it could be an early sign or early indicator of coming leprosy.

And he's in a position now where everything's great and everything's going his way and everything is really heading in Naaman's direction, but but he has a skin disease.

And all he needs is to go back.

If I could just get back to normal, if I could get back to before the disease, if I could go back to just the day before it and just live there, live in that state, live without it, where no one's questioning, no one's bringing up the L word around me.

We're not talking leprosy anymore.

If I can just get back to normal, it's so interesting.

All these big words: important, commander, highly regarded, valiant warrior, all these things, but there's a clause.

There's this little disclaimer at the end.

And we all have this.

We all have positive attributes that we can say about ourselves.

And maybe you struggle with it because for your whole life you were kind of beaten down and you were made to feel like you were less than, but there are positive things about you.

And even if it's difficult for yourself, you can look at other people around where it's like they're really put together, but and what happens is on the other side of that clause, on the other side of that, but there is this deep desire to go back to something that we know.

I'll give you uh one of the clearest examples, and something that we deal with a lot as pastors, are people who are in toxic relationships, abusive relationships.

And you can hear someone describe, it's like, man, they are so smart, they're so intelligent, they're so attractive, they have so much potential, but they just keep going back into this relationship.

They keep walking back into the same abuse.

Smart, attractive, intelligent, potential.

They've got it all going together, but they keep going back.

What is that?

Man, they gosh, this girl is so smart, and she's got such a natural feel for the industry, and it's like every decision she makes is right on par, but she won't leave this dead-end job.

She's been passed up over and over and over again.

She has offers from companies who will take her and use her to her full potential, but she just stays stuck.

It's so confusing.

It's so confusing.

It's like, man, he found a woman that loves him despite all of his flaws, hard person to get along with, hard person, and man, she just loves him and adores him and loves his kids from his first marriage and looks past all of it and deals with, but he just won't commit.

He won't marry her.

What is that?

Those can be the most frustrating moments where you see this should make sense to you.

You should be able to get past this.

And what we often don't realize is that sometimes the only thing that is more frightening than staying in a terrible situation that is normal is being afraid of the potential of what is new and unknown.

And so maybe my relationship is a little bit toxic, but at least I know what to expect inside of it.

And so often, normalcy becomes the enemy of what could be new in our life.

And Naaman is now in a position where the only thing he can think about, the only thing on his mind, the only thing in front of him is getting back to normal.

He's about to catch an incredible break, because in verse 2 it says, Aram had gone on raids and brought back from the land of Israel a young girl who served Naaman's wife.

And she said to her mistress, If only my master were with the prophet who is in Samaria, the prophet that we know is Elisha.

Elisha would cure him of his skin disease.

And this servant girl, she is a hero of scripture that nobody even knows about.

Because she was captured by an enemy force, she was kidnapped from her home, and she is now a slave and a servant in Aram.

And I gotta tell you right now, if I'm her and Naaman has leprosy, I'm going to watch him die.

That's what he gets.

I'm a broken person.

I'm sorry.

Maybe a second option is I will use it as leverage and say, listen, bro, I can get you help, maybe even cured, but you gotta let me go.

You gotta make it right.

You gotta pay me back.

You gotta sign a peace treaty.

You gotta make it right with my family.

Like it's gonna be leverage for me.

It's gonna be revenge for me.

And she exercises grace.

She gives a gift.

He can take it or leave it.

She asks for nothing in return.

This is what Jesus did.

This is what he offers us.

It's why it's grace.

He gives it to us but doesn't force it on us.

Take it or leave it.

Something we don't deserve.

Something Naaman didn't deserve.

He stole this girl.

And she graces him with the information.

And now he sees a way.

There's now a path back to normal.

And he goes to his master, and he goes to the king of Aram and he asks for permission to go into enemy territory to seek this healing.

There's a prophet.

There's a prophet named Elisha.

There's a prophet.

He does these incredible miracles.

Everyone's talking about it.

Man, person after person can line it up.

His name has come all the way across Israel into Aram.

I gotta see Elisha.

And the king says, Well, if you're gonna go, you gotta take something.

And he loads them up.

Thousands of pounds of silver, thousands of pieces of gold.

A huge, a huge, it took a whole caravan.

The gift was so large to exchange for his healing.

It's so interesting what Naaman does next because he doesn't go to Elisha.

The first place that he goes is to the king of Israel.

And the king of Israel is wrecked by this.

He's like, You already expect me to be the king, and now you want me to be God?

You want me to decide who lives and who dies?

You want me to try to deal with leprosy?

That's incurable?

Who do you think I am?

The king tears his robe in grief and embarrassment that this foreign leader has come to him.

Why did Naaman do that?

I mean, the servant girl didn't say go to the king, she said go to the prophet.

But Naaman is doing what is normal.

This is what's normal.

When you're a leader, you go to a leader.

When you are high up the chain, you go and you speak to the guy at the top.

You start with the king.

This is how the world works.

It's based on a hierarchy.

You go to the one with the most power, the most influence, and the most resource.

And so he goes to the king for healing when he knows he's supposed to go to the prophet.

He doesn't get it.

This is the normal way it works.

You go to the top of the org chart, you go to the king.

He doesn't understand that Israel and God's people are different, that it functions different, that the king may sit on the throne of Israel, but the prophet speaks to the God of Israel.

He doesn't understand the differentiation between God's people and everyone else.

You see, the normal way that the world works is not the normal way that God works.

And just because it's normal doesn't mean it's right.

He goes to the king, and the king's like, I can't help you, bro.

Honestly, Naaman's a little bit embarrassed, he even showed up.

But in verse 8, when Elisha, the man of God, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent a message to the king.

Why have you torn your clothes?

Have this guy come to me, and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel.

Send him to me.

He'll find out how things function.

Send him to me.

The power of God will finally be shown to him.

This guy thinks he is coming for the healing of his skin and has no idea that Elisha and God have in mind the healing of his heart.

Aram is a foreign nation, and in verse one, it says that he was highly regarded because the Lord gave victory to Aram.

The Lord, God, Jehovah, Yahweh, that Naaman doesn't even believe in or recognize has already given him victory to set him up in this moment to stand him before a prophet where he can learn of the name of the one true God.

And so Naaman came.

Showed up with his horses and his chariots.

He stood at the door of Elisha's house.

And this is the moment.

I mean, he took a camel ride all the way from Aram.

He came all the way in for this moment, the moment that everything could change, the moment that everything could go back to normal.

There's already been kind of a bump along the way.

Okay, I shouldn't have gone to the king.

These Israelites are strange, man.

They function a lot differently than everyone else.

I was just doing what was normal.

Normally you would go to the king.

I mean, I'm Naaman, bro.

Like I run things, I've got position, I've got power.

I show up at the restaurant, I speak to the chef.

You know what I'm saying?

I come to your business, I speak to the CEO, I'm Naaman.

I thought I'd see the king.

It's fine, messed up.

Here I am at the house.

Everything can go back to the way it was.

In verse 10, Elisha sent out a messenger who said, Go wash seven times in the Jordan, and your skin will be restored, and you will be clean.

And it sounds pretty easy.

He's already in Israel.

The Jordan's not far.

Go to the Jordan.

Get in get out, getting it out.

Dip, out, dip, out, dip out seven times.

Fully restored?

Miracle from God?

Sounds easy.

And there are two things that wildly offended Naaman in this one interaction.

There were two things that were so far out of the norm, what he normally expects to happen in his life, that he could not receive his healing.

It didn't go how it normally would.

Let's see what made him so mad.

In verse 11, Naaman got angry and left, saying, and listen to the story he was telling himself.

I was telling myself, surely he, Elisha, will come out.

Surely he will come out.

And yet he sent a messenger.

And this is Naaman.

This is Naaman.

Naaman won the victory.

He has no idea the Lord was behind it.

Naaman won the victory.

Naaman runs things.

Naaman has the influence.

Naaman walks into a room and everyone looks to Naaman.

He runs things.

And he's going, I came all the way here, embarrassed myself in front of your king.

I come to your door, and you won't come see me.

Unacceptable.

Unacceptable.

Power is met by power.

That is the normal way that the world works.

Spurs don't wait in line.

You know what I'm saying?

Have you ever been to a restaurant and a spur showed up?

They don't wait in line.

I just got handed a beeper and told it was three-hour wait and they show up.

No reservations tonight, sir.

Can't call in reservations.

Three-hour wait.

They show up, they don't wait.

Power gets met by power.

The owner comes out and escorts, they kick me out of a booth to sit a spur down.

I get it.

They're the spurs.

Power meets power.

That's the normal way it works.

And Elisha doesn't come to the door, which is a little bit hilarious.

I have to just wonder if Elisha was like right by the door.

It's almost hilarious to me.

It's like we're gonna make this so clear that the way that God works and moves in his mystery and his wonder and his glory and his power, it's almost never the way that we expect it to go.

Naaman said, I was telling myself, surely, surely this pool is gonna come out.

Have you ever been offended because of your own sense of importance?

Naaman is offended because of what he believes about himself.

I'm Naaman.

I showed up.

I was sent by the king himself of Aram.

You should come to the door when I knock, because of who I am.

And maybe you say, bro, I'm never, I am never like that.

I would never, I never and such a high percentage of the times that we get offended, if we really are audacious enough to dig down to the root of it, it is because our own perception of our own importance.

And any time you have ever been mad at a waiter, it is probably because you believe in your own importance.

And we just see it all the time.

And if you've been a waiter, it it's hard to forget, and maybe you treat waiters well because you understand some things.

Like that, it's difficult.

And sometimes people make mistakes for you, and sometimes you didn't fill the Coke up, that's the wrong Coke, and yet you get the Coke that's a diet coke and not a real Coke, and you're offended.

I mean, it's gonna take 17 seconds to trade it out.

They're not mad at you, they're not trying to poison you.

Is this diet coke?

I asked, I asked for real Coke.

Is this diet?

Are you calling me fat right now?

Are you calling my shirt too?

Like, what's going on right now?

We have this idea, like, if the food isn't out, the moment we think the food should be out, can I tell you an industry secret?

Your waiter doesn't cook the food.

That's the chef.

They're not responsible for that.

And yet we're so rude to them.

And we just dig to the bottom.

In your marriage, a high percentage of your fights are based on your importance.

Because at some level, your idea is more important, your time is more important, your career is more important, your worldview is more important.

Our own importance takes an event and turns it into an offense.

He's offended because of who he believes he is.

He goes on.

This is the story he told himself.

I was telling myself, he'll surely come out.

I mean, I'm naming.

That he would stand there, call on the name of the Lord as God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the disease.

He had it all planned out.

He is offended because of importance and because of expectation.

And of course he is.

He's the commander of the army.

He draws out the battle plan.

I make the plan, you follow it.

And his whole ride into Israel, he had made out the plan.

I'm gonna knock on the door, I'm gonna knock three times.

Before I even knock the third, he's gonna throw the door open.

He's heard I'm coming, he knows who I am, he knows the power that I hold, he's gonna come out.

Look, he's got it all laid out.

He's gonna wave his hands around.

He's imagined the whole thing.

We do this all the time.

We get mad at God for expectations that we put on him as if we are God and He is us.

We get mad at people who don't meet up to our expectations that we've never told them about.

And these moments happen, and we take an event and turn it into an offense, not based on the event, but based on things that are inside of us.

Our own sense of self-worth and self-importance and how valuable we actually are, and how thankful everyone should be that we're finally in their presence and we showed up and knocked on their door and the expectations we have of how it all should go when we aren't the healer, we're the diseased.

And Naaman is irate.

That's not the only thing he's mad about.

He's mad he didn't come to the door.

Listen, Wills.

He's got a whole laundry list.

In verse 12, he says, Aren't Abana and Farpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel?

Couldn't I wash in them and be clean?

You know what the problem is?

When Naaman, someone of privilege and importance, shows up to the door, you come to the door.

That's how it is normally to work.

That's what's normal.

You know what he's asking for?

He's going, why do I have to go to the dirty Jordan River in Israel when I could go to my normal spot?

My nor our rivers are better.

The Jordan, this creek.

You call this a river, this creek, this stock pond?

Like we've we've got rivers that are like the great lake.

This might as well be an ocean, bro, in Damascus.

Let me go to the rivers I normally go to.

He's just desperate for this to go in a normal course because he wants to go back to normal.

He leaves.

In a rage.

All of his expectations, all of the normalcy, the patterns and rhythms of his life that he's used to living in, they're all being broken and destroyed.

And it's it's so difficult to deal with broken expectations.

And it's so difficult when we're used to something that's normal, when we're used to a rhythm and we're thrown out of it.

It's why the beginning of quarantine was so difficult.

And honestly, it's why the transition out of it could be difficult because we get into a new normal.

And as humans, we do a lot of things well, but we don't handle change all that well.

We like our rhythms, we like what's normal.

And maybe coming out of quarantine, you're desperate to go back to normal.

And I have bad news.

There is no such thing as going back to normal.

And if you think about it, it's actually kind of simple.

There's no such thing as going back.

Time is only moving in one direction.

And tomorrow isn't going to be a repeat of a day you've already been through.

Tomorrow is going to be a new day.

It's new, it's always new.

Every day is new, every opportunity is new.

And some of you feel like you're like you're 15 years into a marriage and you keep having the same fight, but really you just have a same mindset.

The fights are different.

You just haven't found a new way through them.

We get stuck on what's normal.

And Naaman wants what's normal.

He's so desperate for it.

He wants it so bad.

He doesn't just want to go back to normal, he wants to get to normal in his normal ways.

And oftentimes, what we need is not what was normal.

What we need is something new.

And so often, God is trying to do something new in our lives.

God is trying to do something new in Naaman's life.

He wants to give him much better than normal.

And yet Naaman cannot see the new.

In fact, he has turned and left in a rage.

He's walking away from newness because he is so stuck being focused on his normal.

And if we get too focused on normal, normal becomes the enemy of what is new.

In the next verse, it says, His servants approached him.

And I love this because all throughout this passage, the wisdom has come from the servants.

That's not normal.

His servants approached him and said to him, My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it?

And how much more should you do it when he only tells you, Wash, and you will be clean?

And so Naaman went down and he dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, according to the command of the man of God, Elisha.

And then his skin was restored.

Now listen, it doesn't say his disease went away.

It doesn't say that.

That's all he wanted.

I just want to go back to normal.

I've got this, I just want it gone.

If I could go back to me five weeks ago before I got this, just back to normal.

No, his skin was restored.

It became like the skin of a small boy.

All of a sudden, Naaman is smooth as a baby's bottom.

He is renewed, not just restored.

He is not just given healing, he is giving a complete restoration of who he is, and he was clean.

And then Naaman and his whole company went back to Elisha, stood before him, and he declared, I know that there is no God in the whole world except the God in Israel.

All these idols we worship over here in Aram, all the temples that we have to people that we think are gods, to deities that we think actually exist, they're nothing.

None of them can heal this.

None of them can even get rid of it.

None of them can even get me back to normal, much less get me to something new.

And not only does he have newness in his skin, he has new revelation, new light, new salvation.

He now knows who God is.

And I wonder what your expectations are coming out of quarantine.

And I wonder if you're honest what you would like for the new normal to look like.

What does it look like for you?

And if you're honest, maybe before we got into this passage today, maybe you have fallen into the camp that says, I just want to get back to normal.

And I want to just give you some time today to really consider whether getting back to where you were is actually where God is trying to get you to go.

Maybe because of this virus and just all the confusion, maybe you are romanticizing what was instead of focusing on what could be when you begin to walk out the new life that God has for you.

What's your idea of a new normal, new rhythms?

And what quarantine has done for so many people is it has shown this light onto our lives, and it has made abundantly clear that there are some areas in our life where we need something new.

We talked about it a few weeks ago when we looked at our finances and whether we are projecting a persona or protecting a purpose.

This has been the great equalizer.

The coronavirus, the loss of jobs, the economic fallout.

It's been the great equalizer that is showing not how much money you have, but how wisely you steward it.

It has shown a light, and some of you have realized coming out of this, I have got to have new financial principles.

Maybe in this you've seen you need new worldview.

Some of you are so desperate to go back to dating, and you have forgotten that when you were dating, you were in these cycles of hooking up and then feeling worthless and then hooking up and feeling even more worthless and hooking up and feeling even more worthless.

You've forgotten that you were in a vicious cycle that was plummeting you to the end of yourself.

I can't wait to get back to dating.

Really?

Maybe you need a new view of dating and sexuality, a new view of your value and your worth.

Some of you are coming out of this hoping for a new spouse.

A new spouse, a new marriage.

You went out, you say if coronavirus has done anything, it has proven we are not going to work.

And you don't need a new spouse.

You need a new mind, and you might need a new you.

You need a new mindset.

Same fight over and over again.

It's not, it's new.

It's a new fight, it's a new day.

You can't go back.

You're only moving forward.

But will you move forward into normalcy or into what is new?

And we're so focused.

It's so hard.

This is a very difficult, difficult thing.

I want to read what the apostle Paul wrote about newness in the Christian scriptures, what we call the New Testament.

He wrote about what it means to be new.

In 2 Corinthians 5 17, it says, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation.

These are definitive words.

It says, the old has passed away, and behold the new.

The new has come.

A new creation.

The new has come.

This is the Greek word kahinos.

Cahinos.

And this is used in two different ways by Paul.

Right here, he is speaking of an eternal spiritual security.

If you have believed in Jesus, you are new.

There is a new spiritual reality in your life.

The old has passed away.

In this sense of the word, the word new, kahinos, is used as like a caterpillar to a butterfly, a completely different spiritual being.

This is a reality.

We can contrast that to how he uses the same word, new, cajinos, in Ephesians chapter 4.

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

In Ephesians 4, he is not talking about your eternal spiritual security.

He is talking about your temporal physical reality, your life right here and now on earth.

And he says this take off your former way of life.

That is the old self that is corrupted by deceitful desires.

Take off the old.

The new self is the one created according to God's likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth.

This is the same word, but it's used in a different sense.

To the Corinthians, he was talking about their eternal spiritual security.

You are new now and forever.

In Ephesians, he's talking about their life right here and right now and living out of that spiritual truth.

And this word new is like a fresh set of clothes.

In fact, he says, take off the old self.

Take off the old, put on the new.

If you've believed in Jesus, you are new.

That is a spiritual reality now and forever.

And yet we are free.

And yet we are broken.

And so Paul tells us every day, take off, take off the old.

He says, the old are deceitful desires.

These are the kind of desires that convince you that the normal way the world operates, the normal way that culture moves, the normal way that the world tries to sell you on significance and success will actually bring you the longing that you desire.

And if you go down the road long enough apart from God, you will come to the end of yourself and realize that the only thing that fulfills is taking off the old, the old deceitful desires, the old lies that say, let's just get back to normal.

Let's just live in our normal patterns.

Let's just keep going.

It's good enough.

We're making it, making a living, surviving.

I love my wife, doesn't mean I have to like her.

My kids are fine, they'll be gone soon, counting down the years.

I mean, they're five now, but I only got like 13 years left.

It's like, that's not good enough.

You are meant to live for more.

Take off the old and put on the new, created in God's likeness, in righteousness, in purity, in truth.

And for many of us, going back to normal would be such a tragedy.

Because we forget that the normal we were living in wasn't actually working for us.

It wasn't pushing us towards God's purposes for our life.

And the beautiful truth is that people who were living out their God-given purpose before coronavirus have also been living it out during coronavirus and will still be living it out after coronavirus because the newness that God has placed inside of us is not dependent on the circumstances of the world around us.

And God says he makes all things new.

And his mercies are new every morning, and his words are new every time we read them.

And his words are life.

They are living and active, and they are sharper than every two-edged sword, and they are dividing between the bone and the joint and the marrow.

They divide between truth and lie and deceit and purpose.

He's new, and every day is new.

And every day we are called to die to our old self.

We are called to take up our cross and walk in the ways of the purposes that God has placed inside of us and people who are already walking in purpose and already pursuing that truth and allowing the spiritual, eternally secure reality of being a new creation to result in them walking in new ways of life.

They are living out a purpose using who they are and what they have and the gifts and talents and their personality to do whatever it takes to get others to Jesus and your routines can stay the same.

But when God changes your mind, when your purpose and your worldview are renewed, when they are made new day after day after day, you can be stuck in the same monotony as before and yet be living an entirely new life.

God has not called us into something normal, He's called us into something new.

And all I see in Scripture is that new is the new normal.

And we're so afraid of what is new.

And in fact, so many of us stay stuck because the only thing that is scarier than staying in the terrible normal situations of our life is the unknown of the new that God might be calling us into.

And some of you aren't near as afraid of the pain you're experiencing as you are of the potential that could be inside of you.

And God is calling you out.

And we have said it from the beginning that if we allow him, God will take one of the greatest tragedies, one of the most unprecedented events in modern history that we are living through right now, and he will use it to push you so much closer to the person he created you to be.

God wanted something new for Naaman and he almost missed it.

He almost missed it because he was so stuck.

This isn't how it's supposed to go.

This isn't normal.

You're supposed to go to the king, and the king escorts me to Elisha, and Elisha comes out and he waves his arms.

And if I have to bathe, I bathe in the rivers of Damascus.

Like, let's do what's normal.

Just because it's normal doesn't mean it's right.

And as a matter of fact, the normal ways of the world, more times than not, are going to run in contradiction to the newness that God has called you into.

Because for believers, for followers of Christ, for members of this movement, new is the new normal.

Would you pray with me?

Father, we love you and we thank you.

We thank you for the example of Naaman.

Such just like a one-off character.

But I believe there is purpose for him making the pages of scripture.

Naaman is teaching me something in this season.

A season where so often I want to look back and wish for normalcy to come back.

The current new normal in quarantine.

God, I don't feel like this is what I signed up for.

I never dreamed of being a televangelist.

I never dreamed of preaching without a congregation in the room.

And when I can step back out of my own sense of self-importance, my own expectations, I can start to see that you're using it, God.

And who cares?

Who cares if I didn't really want to stream?

Who cares if I prefer people in the seats?

God, you want to do something new day after day.

And the newness of tomorrow might not look like the newness of today.

And God, I just pray.

I pray for myself.

I pray I would not get so enamored with the normal that I would miss the new.

Miss what you're wanting to do.

Miss how you're moving.

Miss how your spirit is leading us and guiding us.

I pray for every person watching, your people, God.

I pray that the new normal would be newness.

Would be the courage to walk into whatever you're calling us into and whatever you're calling us out of.

We love you.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Man, I want to thank you guys for joining with us today.

Just a couple of announcements quickly.

Uh, first, we uh always want to remind and encourage you guys to give generously to what God is doing here.

Uh, you can do that by giving online at metachurch.tv or by downloading the app.

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If you have a kid that is graduating high school or college, or if you are a graduate, we want to know about it, go to metachurch.tv slash graduates tonight.

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This is our last day that we're taking these submissions.

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Man, I love you guys, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.