Connected to the Source - Karl Romeus

Hey, let's hear it one more time from the worship team.

Come on.

So good.

So good.

Well, Hillsong.

It's not Hillsong, yikes.

Sorry, Aaron.

Hillside.

Very different.

Hillside.

It's a pleasure to be with you this morning.

God, gosh, God is funny like that, man.

It just keeps us on our toes.

Hey, if I got a chance to meet you, my name is Pastor Carl.

I'm coming from Denver, Colorado.

It's always a privilege to come and hang with y'all on the weekend.

And got a little bit of time and a long way to go.

So I just want to jump into the message with y'all this morning.

So I need some honesty, and it's church, so you can't lie.

I want you to think right now.

What are you trusting God to do that no one else could do?

So when it's done, you'll know only God could have done it.

What are you trusting God to do that no one else could do?

So when it's done, you will know only God could have done it.

See, if you've been a follower of Christ for a while, there's this danger of following Jesus.

Because we can get to a point as believers where we begin to not really rely and depend on the God that we say that we believe in.

See, we know that he works, but we know how to work.

We know he solves problems, but we know how to solve problems.

We know that he builds plans, but we know how to build our own.

Until we hit something that we can't fix.

We can't make our kids choose rightly.

Make someone love you.

We can't change the diagnos the diagnosis.

Or force a door open.

We can't answer the prayer that we hoped would be answered.

And then if you're like me, suddenly you find yourself in a season that you did not choose.

Maybe this is where you are today.

See, everybody else thinks you're fine.

But there's one thing that you can't control.

There's one thing that you keep bringing to God that has not yet come to the place where you're willing to accept it.

Jeremiah 17, the passage that we're going to be in today, this has been such a critical passage in my life personally.

My wife would say, she would tell you this was a significant passage for us that really changed the trajectory of our life about nine years ago.

In this passage, what we're going to delve into is how uh Jeremiah shows us how to live when a season that we're in isn't changing.

And this is the idea I want you to carry throughout this entire message.

It's I'm not saying that you're gonna be in a season that won't hurt.

I'm not saying that you're in a season that God will change tomorrow.

But what I am saying is this, and if you got notes, I want you to write this down.

If I'm connected to the source, I can handle the season.

If I'm connected to the source, I can handle the season.

Maybe the miracle you've been asking for God to get you out, but the miracle that God wants to do first is He's saying, Let me show you who you will become if you remain still in me.

Open up your Bibles to Jeremiah chapter 17.

Jeremiah 17 · chapter mention

We're gonna begin verse 5.

It reads like this.

Thus says the Lord, cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.

He is like a shrub in the desert and shall not see any good come.

He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness in an uninhabitable salt land.

But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.

He is like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.

Jeremiah gives us two people, two plants, two sources, and two outcomes.

One person trusts in human strength, the other trusts in God.

One is a bush in a parched land, the other is a tree beside a stream, and that stream where that tree is set by isn't just some ordinary stream.

That is giving the example of what the source of all power and life is.

But the tree still remains in a hot, deserty, drought-ridden place.

Meaning it's still gonna be affected.

And I ask you, when you're affected, are you trusting God even while you still wait?

Even in loss, even in hurt, even as the heat and stress and difficulties of life hitch you.

The difference is not the season, it's the source.

Same drought, different source.

Same drought, different outcome.

But this passage is more than a passage about trees.

It's a passage asking you and I, where is your life rooted?

What is your life rooted in?

And catch this, friends.

Everybody is rooted in something.

Everybody's rooted in something.

For some of us, it's money.

As long as the account's full, I'm good.

For some of us, it's we're rooted in our children.

As long as everything's going good with the kids, I'm good.

For some of us, we're rooted in success and work.

As long as the work and the place that I go and make my achievements, then we're good.

For some of us, it's ourselves or the relationships that we find ourselves in.

And listen, those aren't automatically bad things.

They just become dangerous things when they become the main thing.

See, for me, I'm often rooted in control.

I'm what people would call a control freak.

Okay, yeah, yeah.

If my wife, my kids, my staff, they would tell you, I got a problem with control.

See, I can walk into any situation having zero idea about what's going on.

But I walk in and within about three minutes, I've got a plan for everyone.

Nobody asks me for a plan, nobody wants a plan.

But I feel better that now we have a plan.

See, the problem is when control becomes my source, I'm asking it to do what only God can do.

When money becomes your source, you're asking it to do what only God can do.

When your children become your source, your spouse becomes your source, when your job becomes your source, you're asking it to do what only God can do.

And Jeremiah says about the first person that he draws his strength, one translation says, from mere flesh, from himself.

This thing that we say so often in our vernacular, I got this.

But friends, eventually life is gonna give you something where you and I have to admit, I don't have this.

Sometimes we have to come to the end of ourselves where we go, I don't have this, and God, I need you.

Because here's the deal: you will not know where your roots are until the heat comes.

You will not know, I will not know what I am connected to until the difficulties come.

Everybody looks strong when life is going according to plan.

But then the phone rings, the relationship ends.

Somebody disappoints you, the plans fall apart.

And when that happens, what do you reach for?

Alcohol?

Food.

Maybe mindlessly gaming.

Spending hours upon hours ordering things that you think you need on Amazon.

Or scrolling away on Zillow for a life you wish you had.

See, whatever I run to when life gets hard reveals where my roots have been growing.

Reveals where my roots are growing.

It takes that kind of difficulty for us to get it.

You you your iPhone ever get to one percent?

You ever get one percent?

Your iPhone gets to one percent, and you lose your mind.

You instantly turn into some sort of mad scientist of all things technology, right?

You're going into the back end of things, shutting down apps, bringing the screen level down.

No, don't call me.

You're searching around for for a for a plug, but but every plug is different because iPhone sells us a new plug for every phone that we buy, right?

And it's like, what's going on?

Then some person who has an Android and is useless goes, here, use this, and it's like that doesn't work for anything, right?

When the power gets low, that's when you and I become aware of the source.

Some of y'all came in here this morning on one percent.

Emotionally, you're on one percent.

If you're honest with the person sitting next to you, that you woke up next to this morning, relationally, you're at one percent.

And followers of Jesus Christ, if we're honest, spiritually, many of us are at 1%.

Maybe the question is what am I plugged into?

What am I rooted in?

Because pressure has a way of exposing your power source.

I want you to hold on to this for later.

A few verses later in Jeremiah 17, 13, Jeremiah writes this and he says, The Lord, the fountain or spring of living water.

See, God does not merely say, I have some water.

God says, I am the water.

God does not just give you what you need, he gives you himself.

And maybe you've been asking God for an answer, and God wants to give you his presence instead while you are waiting for that answer.

Maybe you've got to ask this question.

When instead of when will this change, the question is, God, can you sustain me with your living water until it does?

Here's what this tree understands this tree can't control the weather, this tree can't control the schedule of the rain, this tree can't stop the drought, it can't tell the wind what to do, and friends neither can you.

Yet we exhaust ourselves trying to control the things that were never ours to control.

People's opinions, our kids' choices, whether somebody stays, what happens next.

Listen to me on this, friends.

Life is gonna change.

People are going to change, relationships are gonna change, plans are gonna change, seasons are gonna change, but God, our source, remains the same.

And the stability is not getting everything around you to stop moving, stability is knowing where your roots are when everything else in your life is moving.

Friends, it's not the position of the tree, it's its location.

It's not the position of the tree, it's the tree's location.

I was sharing this talk with my wife yesterday, and I asked her, I said, babe, you think people are gonna understand when I keep talking about trees that I'm talking about them?

You all get that, right?

You're the tree.

Some of y'all are like, is this a botany class?

Why does this man keep talking about trees?

You're the tree, stick with me.

See, two people can experience the same season and have completely different outcomes.

Because one has access to something the other doesn't.

It's like the man.

The most important part of the tree is the part that no one sees.

Men, give me your eyes, I want you to get this.

Men across this room, online, I want you to get this.

The most important part of you is the part that nobody sees.

When you're scrolling and you avert your eyes from PG porn.

You know what PG porn is.

That's what you're doing.

Ladies, look at me.

When you avert yourself from coveting, from coveting what she and they have down the street, that is the work of God happening in the roots of your life.

See, the most important work that God does often is the work that no one sees.

It's your prayer life beginning to take form.

It's having this supernatural dependency on God.

It's God strengthening your character so that you can say no without somebody saying no for you.

It's your trust is growing, your surrender is growing.

See, when when we want to see branches look beautiful and impress people, God is looking at us and he's like, no, no, no, no, no.

I am more concerned with the roots because the roots are what's gonna help you survive the storm of this season.

What if the evidence God is working in you is not the branch, but it's how deep your roots are?

What if that's the thing that he's most concerned with today?

I grew up in Boston, Massachusetts.

Massachusetts is part of England.

Thank the Lord it's football season, by the way.

Okay, uh Massachusetts being part of New England, just kind of set of states in the Northeast.

And every fall, people from all across the country, all across the world, come to New England to see the leaves change.

I'm telling you, this is breathtaking stuff.

It is beautiful.

They call it, which is odd, they call it leaf peeping.

Which sounds like something you shouldn't ever admit that you do.

But nevertheless, that's the name of it.

And as people just immerse themselves in these leaves and the beauty of it, there's this deep irony going on.

See, we're taking pictures of something that the tree is letting go of.

The season is changing.

See, winter is coming.

And that tree can't control the season that is coming, but it can prepare for it.

Because when you go back in January, that tree can look dead.

There's no leaves, there's no color, but underneath the ground, it is more alive than it ever has been.

And perhaps things have started falling off in your life, an opportunity, a relationship, a position, a plan.

And because you have lost some leaves, you're assuming that that part of your life is dead.

Look at me in the eyes, I want you to get this.

You can lose leaves, but you can't.

You can't lose your roots.

Would you stop comparing your life to someone else's?

They may simply be in a different season.

Your responsibility is to keep yourself connected because, like I said, winter is coming, and the winter seasons of life do not get the final words when your roots are deeply connected to the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, and the Spirit indwelling within us.

The greatest threat isn't the drought, it's disconnection during the drought.

Jeremiah says this: the man, the trusting man, he does not fear when heat comes.

It doesn't say if heat comes, it says when it comes.

Well, the tree stays green.

When the heat comes, will you remain faithful when it's easier to leave?

When the drought comes, will you fight for her?

Though it's easier to file papers.

When the wind comes, he promise to remain true.

The promise.

The promise is that life is gonna challenge us, but we serve a God who will strengthen us.

And when we become disconnected, we have a propensity to isolate ourselves because listen, they don't get it, so I'm just gonna be on my own.

We have a propensity to stop praying because God hasn't answered the prayer yet.

We have a propensity to grow cynical, to numb ourselves, to pull away from God.

And maybe you are still here physically, but look at me in the eyes, I want you to get this.

I want you to get this.

Some of y'all, some of us, we're spiritually detached from the Lord.

Are you wondering why this season feels so heavy?

Maybe you're two steps too far from the source.

And all the meanwhile, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, the living water, is whispering in your heart.

Come back.

Stretch out.

Here's the thing when you get close to the water, I'm gonna guarantee you something.

You're gonna get muddy.

Mud is messy, mud slows you down, mud makes you feel stuck.

And some of you feel like that.

You're like, I should be further than this.

I thought we would be past this by now.

I thought this opportunity would have come.

I thought this relationship would be different.

God, why am I still here?

If you stay stuck long enough, you can start assuming stuck means forgotten.

But what if you're reading, what if you and I are reading the mud incorrectly?

What if we're reading this season incorrectly?

See, there's this interesting connection in Exodus 30, 23.

I'm gonna throw it up on the screen here.

See, here, God is giving Moses the ingredients for the sacred anointing oil used in the temple.

And one of the ingredients is an aromatic cane.

Tradition identifies this cane as calmus, a plant associated with wet, messy, marshly ground.

The space between the tree and the river, the tree and the stream.

Isn't it fascinating that God would take what grows in between the tree and the stream and use it for holy purpose?

But it's all about perspective.

Because listen, what we want to do, God's telling us not to do.

Do not despise the mud.

Do not despise the difficult seasons of your life.

We see mess and struggle.

God sees opportunity and moves us towards the present.

Sometimes the mud means you're closer and closer and closer towards the stream.

So maybe we gotta change the question and ask God.

Instead of asking God, when is this over?

We begin to ask God, what are you trying to do in me right now?

Because maybe this isn't just a season to survive.

Maybe this is a season to deepen yourself in the person of Jesus Christ.

Because when I'm connected to Jesus, you know what happens?

I'm stuck but sanctified.

Friends, you can be stuck and sanctified all at the same time.

Sometimes my circumstance makes me feel stuck while my soul is still moving towards God.

The job hasn't changed, but I'm changing.

The prayer hasn't been answered, but I'm changing.

The finances aren't adding up, but I'm changing.

The season's not over, but I'm not who I used to be.

That's the process of sanctification.

It's a lifelong process of being transformed more into the likeness of Jesus.

And no one else can see it, but you know it because you are experiencing it.

You are experiencing life differently.

You are responding differently.

You are trusting differently, and God is working differently.

But you gotta push through.

You gotta push through.

Spencer Silver worked at 3M for years.

And one of his projects that they gave him was to create a strong adhesive.

And instead, he creates the exact opposite.

Instead of this strong adhesive, he creates this glue that doesn't stick so good.

It would stick to something and then it peel off, and then it could stick on it again.

This isn't really what the assignment was, so Spencer shelves it.

Now, a few years later, his friend Art Fry, who also worked at 3M, who sang in the choir at his church.

Remember choirs back in the day?

Yes, yes, old people, me and you, right?

Art sang in his choir.

And he in his hymn book, young people, hymnal books before we had screens, it's where all the songs were that we sing.

They were in this book.

And and Art would take a piece of paper like my mom and put it where the next hymn was so he could get to it.

But he kept, the pages kept flying away.

So Art's like, I gotta, I gotta do something with this.

And he remembers Spencer's invention.

And he goes back and he takes this and he's like, oh, this is perfect because it can stick to the note, and then I take it off and then put it back on and put it back on.

That's where the post-it note came from.

The thing that looked like a failed experiment suddenly becomes a solution to a completely different problem.

And I wonder how many times we look at a moment in our lives and call it a failure because we're judging it before God is finished using it.

Are you judging this season before God is finished using it?

Don't throw away this moment before God is done with it.

Do not confuse God not moving you with God not moving in you.

But our responsibility is to stay connected to the source.

Remember Jeremiah calling God the fountain of living water.

Remember that?

I just we spoke about that earlier.

Centuries later, Jesus stands during the Feast of the Tabernacle and gives this invitation in John 7.

If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

Now, this he said about the spirit.

Stay with me.

This would have been scandalous.

Because what the Feast of Tabernacle represented, the feast was a celebration that memorialized the future moment of blessing for the Jews.

And this was seen in a vision that Ezekiel had where water symbolizes the Spirit of God flowing over his people.

Ezekiel is referring to the Holy Spirit being poured out through the temple.

The water flows east, the same direction that Adam and Eve left the garden, the same direction that Jesus was going to come back with the messianic age and the renewal of all creation.

So during this feast, priests are standing at the altar in the temple with large systems of water, and they're pouring it out east, reenacting Ezekiel's vision, symbolizing that one day the spirit would flow over God's people once again.

And in that same moment, Jesus says these words if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me.

Jesus says, We can stop all this.

You can stop all this.

I'm the source.

I'm the source.

And one day I'm gonna go and I'm gonna pour out my spirit upon you.

In Acts, when the Spirit of God was poured out onto the disciples, in that moment, these unschooled, ordinary people became vessels for the Holy Spirit to do something this world has never seen.

They were in perhaps the darkest season of their life.

Their savior has gone.

And instead of resting on their laurels, by the grace of God, they receive his spirit, and God does something extraordinary in and through them.

Something that they could not have done on their own.

Like the tree, we can't manifest or manufacture water, we can't manifest or manufacture the Spirit of God, but we can receive it.

The tree does not create the source, we don't create God, but He can indwell in us.

The same is true for you and I.

Right here, right now, whatever season you might find yourself in, God is like, if you abide in me, watch what I can do in and through you.

Author Andrew Murray says it like this the branch has nothing, it just depends on the vine for everything.

Are you depending on the source for everything?

Are you and I just trying to work this life out on our own?

The oil that Moses made was used to consecrate the priests and all the furnishings in the temple.

The foreshadowing of the Holy Spirit coming upon us, coming upon the disciples.

And God is like, listen, stop exhausting yourself trying to live this supernatural life on natural strength.

You weren't designed for that.

I was not designed for that.

So Jesus says, Come to the stream, the fountain of living water, and drink of me.

Fill yourself with me.

Because maybe the most spiritual thing you could say today is I'm thirsty.

I'm tired.

I'm emity.

And Jesus doesn't shame thirsty, tired people.

He invites them to come and drink living water.

He invites them to the stream of the Holy Spirit.

He invites us to be rooted and grounded in him.

Jeremiah goes on to say that this tree never fails to bear fruit.

God doesn't want you just to survive this life.

You get that?

Some of y'all are just surviving.

God's like, I don't want you to survive.

I want you to thrive.

I want you to be full.

I want you to produce the fruit of the spirit.

I want you to be an example of love, peace, joy, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, and there's something invisible that's happening in your roots that will one day become visible to your branches, one day become visible as a fruit to the world around you.

Because here's the question: when your children, when your spouse, when your co-workers, your colleagues, your neighbors look at you, who do they think is sourcing you?

The Bible says that we bear the fruit of the Spirit and our lives ought to produce it.

Friends, let me tell you you and I will not bear the fruit if we are not connected.

In good times and in bad times.

God often speaks to me in Ubers.

I know this sounds crazy, but he does.

See, when I travel, I have like a preference on my on the Uber app.

My preference is the car's gotta be cold because clearly I have a sweating problem.

And uh and I like it quiet.

And it never happens.

And it was no different this morning at 6 45.

I got in the car, and there's Deborah sitting up front.

Woman of God.

And Deborah looks at the destination and goes, You going to church?

Yeah.

Oh, is that the church you go to often?

I said, when they pay me to come, yeah, that's that's the church.

And he says, this is how she starts off.

Pastor, can you pray for me?

Would you pray?

Would you say a prayer for me today?

And I said, of course, Deborah, what's going on?

And this is where Deborah ministered to me.

Debora told me last year her 34-year-old son was shot and killed when someone's trying to rob his car.

And before he pulled his car into a ditch where the police would find him, he called his mother and told her what was going on.

This is one day after Mother's Day.

She's driving back from LA as she gets this call, and the seat next to her is her 86-year-old mother who's trapped in her mind by dementia.

And when she pulls into that Walmart adjacent to the scene, people are like, Why aren't you losing your mind?

Why aren't you screaming and yelling?

Deborah said to me the crawlwood, they didn't understand.

So I had the Spirit of God all over me.

I don't grieve like those who are not connected.

I don't face difficulties the same way that those who face difficulties are not connected to the source.

Y'all might think this is like funny pastor stuff that I'm I'm telling you, there's real life believers who are believing in the power of the Holy Spirit, believing about the connection to Jesus, who are living these exemplary lives while they're driving Uber.

You know what Deborah taught me this morning?

She taught me what it looks like to be connected to the source.

She taught me what it looks like when the season isn't what I want, when the season isn't what I would choose, what it looks like to be shrouded and covered in the spirit of God.

And you don't got to look any further than Jesus himself in Matthew 26, when he says, My soul is sorrowful even to death, and he tells his disciples, Remain here and watch with me.

And he goes a little further, and then he fall, fell to his face, and he prayed, saying, My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.

Nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.

Before Jesus ever said, It is finished, he said, but as you will, not as I will, but as you will.

Listen, people can see my season.

They can't see my source.

So one final time, I want to ask you, what are you trusting God to do that no one else can do?

So when he does it, you will know only God could have.

Listen, friend, I pray that our collective prayer this morning would be this.

God, deepen my roots.

God, deepen my roots.

Name your drought, name the season, and then plead and call on the one who can meet you in the midst of it.

Put down the controller, put down the glass of bourbon, put down the phone, pick up your word, confess to one another, plead with the Spirit of God that He might do something in you that no one else can, and watch what happens.

And as the world looks at you like you're crazy, you're gonna be able to say to them, if I'm connected to the source, I can handle this season and any other.

If I'm connected to the source, I can handle this season and any other.

So, friends, what are you connected to?

Lord Jesus, I thank you.

For this church, for this congregation, for your mighty spirit.

God, may you indwell us with your spirit.

May you strengthen us in our weakness.

And whatever season someone might find themselves in right now, Lord Jesus, would you remind them that you've got them, that you're holding them.

Right in the middle.

And you're gonna do something in them and through them for the sake of your kingdom and for the sake of your glory.

Give us courage today to remain in you.

We love you, we thank you.

In Christ's name, all God's people said.