Elevation with Steven Furtick - Fighting For Encouragement (The Basin)

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

Do the thing you’d do if you knew God was for you. If you’ve just made a decision for Christ, please respond HERE: http://ele.vc/tIepfr To support this ministry and help us continue to reach people all around the world click here: http://www.elevationchurch.org/giving/ Scripture References: 1 Samuel 1, verses 17-20See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Got something today that was a little bit of a mind shift for me reading about the story of Hannah. and when she was unable to conceive and her rival, Panina, would provoke her every day. In First Simon chapter one, it says that she would refuse to eat. And her husband Elkanah, he kept trying to feed her like, you know, hey, I'm going to bring you a double portion because the Bible says that the Lord had closed Hannah's womb. And in this time, they saw things pretty clearly. they saw a closed womb as being from the Lord, an open womb as being from the Lord. And typically, this particular Israel-like conception of God's favor was, if you are able to conceive, you're blessed.

If you're not able to conceive, that's a curse. And they associated all kinds of things with the ability to bring life was a sign of a righteous relationship with God, was a sign of God's favor, was a sign of God's pleasure. and the inability to produce life, whether that was the land or whether that was human life, would be seen as a sign of God's displeasure, God's punishment, consequence of sin. And so you see that show up a lot in the different writings, not only of the prophets, but you see it kind of all throughout the stories of the Old Testament.

And then when we come into the New Testament, we find out that Jesus has come that we might have life and have it more abundantly, not to kill stills, and destroy. That's what the thief does. And so we see kind of this progression of the idea that not only does life come from God and that we're given life by God, but life comes from inside of us when we're in relationship with God, that we're able to bring life and bring joy and bring ideas and bring opportunities and bring partnership and bring encouragement and bring inspiration when we're in a place of connection with God. So I was reading Hannah's story today about how the Lord enabled her to conceive and give birth to a son

who was Samuel, a prophet whom like there has not arisen one since, and who did amazing things for the nation of Israel, in the nation of Israel. None of his words fell to the ground the Bible will say, but he started out as the product of a woman's woman's woman. womb that had been barren year after year after year. And the longer it went on that she was barren, the more she became distressed and disappointed until it got to the place where her husband was like, don't you love me? Why can't I make you happy?

And see, it wasn't him that she was unhappy with. It was the inability inside of herself to produce something that she had a desire for. Will that not preach to us? when we want something, when we want to get above something or past something, but we can't, when we want a certain type of experience, we want a certain type of feeling, when we want to be able to make a certain type of difference, but we can't. Sometimes our desires are not all that noble. Sometimes we want something that we can't afford or we want something to get easier and it won't.

And then sometimes a desire is given to us by God. And that desire, when conceived, when the desire is conceived in your heart and in your spirit, it becomes very powerful. And it can become dominant to the point that everything else in your life is overshadowed by this one desire. And I've met people before who wanted to be married more than anything else. I've met people before who wanted their marriage to get better more than anything else. people who not only wanted to have children but wanted something in the life of one of their children, people who were desiring healing for their body or someone that they love, people who were desiring clarity, people who were desiring peace. On the other hand, the Bible talks about evil desires,

and that's something that we could spend a whole devotion talking on. Here, though, I don't see an evil desire from Hannah. I just see the evil one trying to discourage her about a desire that she has that has not yet been delivered. She has not yet been able to conceive a child. And I use the word yet because since we're reading a book called First Samuel, we know that something's going to happen. And Hannah is crying and she's in anguish in this season. But we understand that this season we're seeing Hannah in is going to give way to Samuel, the one who she already has the potential to bring forth. It's inside of her.

But it's waiting on the moment for God to speak the word and open her womb, and she's going to bring forth. She doesn't know that, though. And that's the hardest thing about discouragement, is that you don't know that there is a tomorrow. And you certainly don't know that there's a better one ahead. And you don't know if tomorrow is literally tomorrow, if it's 10 years from now tomorrow, these elements of time, you know, I was talking to a friend the other day about how disappointment operates

on the basis of time. If you take time out of the equation, it becomes more difficult for the devil to disappoint you, because you can show up and know like, okay, I prayed for that today or I prayed for that in this area, but God is the Lord of the Harvest. Say that I loud. God is the Lord of the Harvest. It's on his timetable. I trust him with the timing. He has trusted me with this task. I trust him with the timing. He has trusted me with this task. my task is to trust him and to do what I can today with what he's given me. That mentality leads to a lot of freedom.

That mentality leads to greater faith. Okay, it may be today. Okay, it may be today. Okay, it may be today. Or it may be that today something else that I didn't even pray for comes out of the, let's call it out of the out of the garden of what i asked god for that he didn't do yet that will actually become more important than the thing that i asked for and i could go off on that because yesterday i did a key verse about how boaz boaz bought the land and redeemed the land but he also got

Ruth, and I did a whole devotion on the God of also. I'll teach it here sometime soon, if I don't preach it in the pulpit first. It was such a good word for me, the God of also. Many times what we call also is God's top priority. Like Boas said, if you redeem the land, you also get Ruth. But of course, Ruth, Ruth became the great grandmother of David. And David was of course, the great, great, great, great, great, great, 28 times grandfather of Jesus. Anyway, the side note, God of the also. In this passage here, you've got a woman who is very frustrated.

It hasn't happened yet. Looks like it never will. She goes to the temple with her husband, which they would do yearly. And she's praying before the Lord, and Eli sees her. And she's praying, but no. sound is coming out. And so he's like, she must be drunk. She's like, no, you misunderstand me. You're watching my actions, but you don't understand my anguish. A lot of times, people judge you by your actions. They have no clue the anguish that produced those actions. You even judge yourself by

your actions. Man, why am I so stuck? Why am I so messed up? Why am I so screwed up? Well, a lot of times that's coming from a place of anguish, from a place of desperation, from a place of, I don't know what else to do, from a place of, I don't feel like anybody hears me, I don't feel like anybody sees me, I feel like God has forgotten me, I've got a closed womb. But the verse that I chose for my key verse today from 1st Samuel 1 is where after Hannah says, I'm praying out of great anguish and grief, Eli answered, verse 17, go in peace and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of him. And look at verse 18. She said, may your servant find favor in your eyes. Then she went her way and ate something and her face was no longer downcast.

Verse 19 early the next morning. They arose in worship before the Lord. And then went back to their home at Rama. Elkanah made love to his wife. Hannah and the Lord remembered her. So in the course of time, what a phrase. We talked about the course of time, sometimes leading us to disappointment because it's taken too long. But the Lord said, if you take the element of time out of the expectation and go, man, I right now am believing God, in the course of time, Hannah became pregnant and gave birth to a son, and she named him Samuel. saying because I asked the Lord for him.

But here's what I want to point out. The Bible says she did something after Samuel said, or after Eli said, rather, go in peace. The Lord will grant your request. She did something after Eli said that that she didn't do when Elkhanna came back from the temple other times, other years. She did something that she didn't wait to do it after she found out she was pregnant. She didn't have a pregnancy test and then do this. She did this after she received the assurance that she would have what she had asked God for.

And is very simple. Verse 18, then she went her way and ate something. Then she went her way and ate something. Now, the timing of this is very important. She didn't eat something after she found out she was pregnant. No. She ate something after she received the confirmation from Eli, who represented God's house. After she received the word that it will be fulfilled that you'll have a boy, she went her way and she ate.

So I wrote down this phrase, I ate because I asked. I ate because I asked, or I ate after I asked. And here's what I'm using that to mean. Let me make sure it's not some mystical, ooh, like, yeah, she ate. Yeah, but she didn't eat the other times she prayed. She sat in anguish. But this time, when she prayed and her lips were moving, but her mouth wasn't saying anything, and then Eli said, are you drunk?

She's like, no, I'm in anguish. And then Eli said, go in peace. The Lord has heard your request. She went away and her face was no longer downcast. She ate. She ate. And she went on her way and she did the thing that she would do if she believed that God's word was true. Say it again.

She did the thing that she would do if she believed. God's word was true. The word of God said, it's going to happen. She got up even before being intimate with her husband. That happened the next day. But that day, she ate. She ate by faith. She ate believing that she had found favor. She asked for favor. The word of God came and she ate. She asked and then she ate. A lot of times we're like in a state of torment. We're calling it prayer, but really we're just in a state of anguish and confusion. And look, look, look.

The devil can use it to discourage us to an even worse place because all we're doing is just asking God, please, please, please, God, make it better, make it better, God, make it better. You know, our prayers sometimes sound like, I'm so sorry, God, I'm so sorry, I do better, I'll do better, I'll do better, make a change. I think something shifted not only in Hannah's expectation, but in her energy, and she got up, and she's like, I've got it, even before I've got it. Now, you get into a lot of extremes with this kind of teaching, and that's where they have it called for name it and claim it. Theology, they say, like, you know, we can't just name it and claim it or blab and and grab it. I'm sure you've heard all that before. Well, I'm not talking about blab it, grab it, name it, claim it. I'm talking about walking the word God gave you.

And do the thing you would do if you believe it was true. Do the thing that you would do if you believed that it was true. Like Hannah. She got up, she went in, she was intimate. Ooh, one thing God showed me this morning, that sometimes your fear of intimacy keeps you from conceiving what God wants to do in you. It keeps you from conceiving in your mind because you don't want to sit with anything long enough. And it keeps you sometimes from conceiving anything in your relationships.

It keeps you from taking the desire and making it known and seeing it fulfilled in your life. But something so simple as that little detail, I think will give us a mindset for how we need to approach today, is that she asked and then she ate. She asked and then she ate. It's like Elijah laying down and the angel comes and he's like, get up and eat something. You know, when I think of eating something in this context, I think of what we feed ourselves.

I think of feeding ourselves, you know, the joy of the Lord is our strength. I think of getting up in seasons of our life and believing that if we're praying for God to bring about something in our life, that we then kind of get in the mindset and get in the movements and get in the rhythms of what that's going to look like.

If we're believing God to do something in our life, let's be the kind of person that looks like we believe it. Let's don't ask God to send us opportunities, but we can't find our work gloves. Less don't ask God to send us people, but we're very, and even the people that he sends, we run out of our life. It's like a state of preparation.

Ask and then eat. But also it's a little bit deeper than that because sometimes we ask God, I remember thinking about the song, we sang a lot in my church growing up. Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place. I can feel his mighty power and his grace. I can feel the brush of angels,

wings, I see glory on each face. Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place. And sometimes you look around, you'd be like, glory on each face. I see gloom on a lot of faces. And that's okay. Like, hey, look, I got that RBF sometimes to that resting believer's face. But I want you to understand, oh, RBF be good. I've used it before, but never with believer, resting believer face. What is a resting believer face look like. Hannah before had this anguish that was making her act a certain way. And then after she heard the word of the Lord, she had this resting believers face. So she acted on the word that she heard. She acted as if it had already happened. She acted her way into activating the word that God gave her. She acted her way into intimacy

with Elkanah. She acted her way into the next season of her life, and then she weaned the boy and brought him back when he was ready, and he served in the temple, and she gave it back to God what God had given to her. But the first thing she did was got up and ate. So you're asking God for some things, right? Or maybe you've stopped asking. You need to ask again. Ask and then eat. Don't ask and then get up and just stay in anguish. about it. Ask and then eat. Ask and then feed your faith with the Word of God. Ask and then ask others to help you with it. Ask and then eat. Don't ask and then starve. You're not going to get anywhere. You're not going to step into anything. You've got to ask and then eat. Because what's interesting is when the

passage began, Hannah was definitely, she was not eating. She was being eaten. So sometimes I allow things to eat me because I won't eat what I need to eat. So then my disappointment ends up eating me because I won't get the word of God in my heart. I won't listen to a podcast that's going to give me perspective. I won't read something that's going to lift me up. I won't have conversations with healthy people who are going to challenge me to be a better self. And I won't eat so it eats me. I guess the title of this one is, eat or be eaten. Eat or be eaten. Eat God's word, which is living and acteth or be eaten alive by anxiety and anguish and thoughts of what didn't happen. Eat gratitude and sing songs of joy and make a decision to do the thing that you would do

and lift up your countenance and lift up your eyes and bring something wonderful into the world for the people that you love and even for yourself, for the glory of God, and offer the life and the breath that he's given you back to him, eat or be eaten. You've got a choice to make today. Will you eat what God put right by your head, Elijah, and go on your journey? Will you get up and eat and believe that what God said is going to happen in the course of time? Or will disappointment chew through your dreams and your future potential to develop what God is placed in the soil of your heart right now? Are you going to let disappointment chew through your destiny another year? Are you going to get up and eat? Eat or be eaten? I want to be like Pac-Man, man, going through life, gobbling up pellets of praise,

goblin up pellets of purpose, goblin up the promises of God. And sometimes I don't do too good. So then they come around and get me, boom, boom, boom, I get eaten. I want you to see that picture today. You like that, that Pac-Man picture? This is a little bit dated illustration, but it is very visual for those of us who grew up around arcades. Eat or be eaten and move and keep moving because God wants to make you stronger. And God wants to bring forth awesome things.

And God wants to open your womb. but if you just worry, worry, worry, worry, your womb won't open. If you take his word, get one promise, I had one today, I put it on a Post-it note, I looked at it, I let it eat the anxiety away from me so that the anxiety didn't eat me. Eat or be eaten. Take God's word, take this scroll, eat it. It was like honey. God wants to give you something sweet today.

Not that you stay in the bitterness of your rival. provoking you. Hannah had previously been praying in the energy of her enemy. She saw her rival Panina was able to conceive she wasn't and she prayed out of that energy. I think something shifted when she switched her energy and she's like, I'm going to go and be intimate with my husband. I'm going to worship the Lord and she conceived and you can too. Maybe not tomorrow, but in the course of time, if you don't let it, you've been letting things eat at you because of what you won't eat. Eat. Eat this bread of life. Eat this word of God. Take it in. Oh, you feel so much better. You know the Snickers commercial. You're not you when you're

hungry and you're not you when you're hopeless, Hannah. Get up and eat. God is going to do some great things in my life today. How about you? I'm excited to see it. I'm going to eat today. I'm going to eat believing that what he said to me, he's going to do it. And I'm going to go into the situations that produce, not the ones that bring death. And I'm going to live this day blessed. All right. Go get you something to eat. Hey, I hope you enjoyed the podcast.

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