Elevation with Steven Furtick - I Know But I'm Not Nervous

Episode Date: June 7, 2024

In a world with an abundance of information and opinions, it’s difficult to know what’s true and who you can trust. But even when our circumstances look less than ideal, we can be sure that we have a purpose and God has a plan.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation Church, and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith. Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving in your life.

Enjoy the message. I was led to 2 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 6 through 10. And time permitting, we might hit verse 11, but we will have to see if we have anything left in the time budget before we decide that. And I didn't start with this text this week, but this is eventually the place where I felt like the Lord wanted to spend a little bit of time. If we, verse 6, 2 Corinthians chapter 1, Apostle Paul writing, are afflicted.

It is for your comfort and salvation. Everything I go through serves a purpose. And if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you have. experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken. For we know, come on, somebody shout, we know. Sound good shouting that. You sound rested. For we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort. For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers and sisters of the affliction we experienced in Asia, for we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself.

Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that, even when it got so hard, I felt helpless and hopeless, that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God. I found my foundation when I went through a shaking so that I would trust him who raises the dead. Now, he delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. Why? He's still God. So on him, we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. I want you to give your neighbor my sermon title, but I want you to have a little conversation with them to set the context for it.

Tell them, neighbor. It's kind of crazy in the world these days. There's a lot going on. The stakes are high. Now I want you to answer what they just said to you. Look at them and give them my title. Tell them, I know, but I'm not nervous. Try your other neighbor out.

Tell them, I know. I watch the news. I saw what your cousin Jimmy said on Facebook about a conspiracy theory. Tell him, but I'm not nervous. I'm not nervous. I am not nervous. I refuse to be, not going to be, not about to be. God is too great and he's been too good for me to be nervous.

Amen. I feel like I preached already. You may be seated. Paul would like to set the record straight. There are too many rumors circulating. There's too much noise and not enough signal. Come on, somebody. We are drowning in opinions and we don't have a drop of truth.

Such was the case in court. They're talking about poor Paul. All he ever did was preach Jesus Christ and help them and minister to them. These other preachers are seizing a political opportunity to run a smear campaign against poor Paul. that the NRA would have been envious of, that the Democratic Party couldn't even come up with. I mean, neither one on the right or the left could do any better than these opponents of Paul were doing to discredit him. And he wants to talk to the church that he loves from his heart and set the record straight.

In other words, he wants them to hear it straight from the source. It does make a difference where you get your information from. It really does. It's a strange thing that we live in an age where all information is deemed equal because it takes up the same amount of space on our timeline. And so we don't know whether we're listening to somebody who knows what they're talking about or whether there is a commercialized interest that is manipulating the information. It is safe to assume that most of what we are hearing is diluted, watered down, or polluted

added to and it's really kind of hard to even trust what you hear these days. Paul was frustrated about that and in much civil turmoil under oppression, not only political oppression but religious oppression, he writes back home to the church and he wants to tell them not what others say about his situation, but to allow them to see the same. situation and to hear it straight from the source. Straight from the source. He says in verse 8, and this could be a whole sermon in and of itself, we do not want you to be ignorant.

And he's setting us up here a little bit. His assumption is that there are some things that we know, that we think we know, that we don't really know and some things that we need to know. He uses this here a Greek word, and I wrote it down phonetically so I wouldn't mispronounce it for you. Agno Eo. Agno Eto. It's translated in my Bible here, ignorant on the screen.

It's translated in a more updated version, unaware. And it's translated different ways because it's a difficult concept to pin down. Paul is speaking to a group of people who have heard a lot, but in spite of all the information that they have received, they still know very little about the facts. In spite of all the access that they have, in spite of all the blogs that they've read, in spite of all the 24-7 news stations, what they're hearing isn't very true to reality because they're not getting it from the source. So he explains the situation, sourcing it with the reality because he doesn't want them to be ignorant. However, Agno Eo doesn't necessarily mean uninformed. Rather, it means more likely, given the Greek shade of meeting, misinformed. Can I teach a little bit today?

I figured that you would be excited to hear the Word of God because you have to hear everybody else talk all the time. So let's take a little time and talk about the Word of God. He said, it's not that you haven't heard things or that you have not been exposed to statistics that concerns me. It's just that I'm afraid that what you're hearing and what you're seeing is so far removed from the source that it is not pure in its essence. And I don't want you to be ignorant. Now, all ignorance is not created equal. There are different levels of dumb. Am I right?

Am I right about it? There's an innocent ignorance. Some things you haven't had the opportunity to learn yet. I hate when somebody tries to correct my five-year-old Abby from the way she says certain phrases that I think are adorable. She's got the rest of her life to get it right. Would you shut up and let my daughter call it a vacuum cleaner? I prefer vacuum cleaner. She'd call a vacuum cleaner the rest of her life.

She's only got a few years to call it a vancum. Get off my girl's speech and let her say it how she wants to say it. It's cute. It's beautiful. It's adorable to me. I like it. And that's fine. There is another type of ignorance. Agneweto, this would be when you have an indifference that leads to ignorance. You don't care enough to find out. Personally, this is the way I feel about all of the people who eat super healthy. They come to me and they want to tell me all of the chemicals that are in my food. And I know I probably shouldn't address this.

There's enough controversy in the world today as it is without me adding to it. And I know somebody is going to email me or send me a book about the 17 foods that cure cancer and the foods that are rotting my brain. But I need to let you know if the steroids will make the chicken bigger before Holly fries it, I am for the steroids. That might make me a horrible person. I might burn in hell for saying this in church, but I just don't care. Touch somebody say, I just don't care.

There are some things I just don't care about. I just want to eat. I do not care. Some things I just got to be honest with you, I just don't care. I am amazed at some of you men with your fantasy football. I am amazed how much you know about another man's ankle and whether or not he's going to play and how that is going to affect the $100 that you might win. 12 hours a week studying it and you've been to church once in the last six weeks crazy self

ignorant about the things of God but you can tell me statistics on somebody in some tight pants around there that's what paul's talking about he said i don't want you to be ignorant i don't want you to be those kinds of christians that just don't care you don't even take time to find out when they talk about climate change you won't even look into it because jesus coming back on a horse anyway and he's going to nuke this whole place and there ain't nothing we can do you know you sound crazy when you talk like that you sound so ignorant fall says i don't i don't want you to have that kind of hope i don't want you to have this cotton candy christianity where you are ignorant of the afflictions no i i want you to know some

things but the most dangerous kind of ignorance is not innocent ignorance or indifferent ignorance who i'm really scared of are the people who have that confident ignorance, not uninformed, misinformed. And they think they know everything about something that they know nothing. And perhaps half of maturity is coming to the place where you know that you don't know what you don't know. Am I preaching all right? I love my children, but when Elijah said to me yesterday, and I've heard a lot about the

teenage years and Elijah's 11, and a lot of people have tried to... create a sense of fear and dread in me regarding the teenage years because you know i'll say i really enjoy being a dad and they're going to get back to me on that when they're 14 and we'll see how much you love it big boy and i get it and i'm not planning on preaching my parenting series till i'm about 75 but but elijah i got a taste of what this rebellion may look like when we were pulling into the garage the other day and this boy looks at me Confidently and says, Daddy, I need you to know as one of the greatest albums from the 1990s plays on my car stereo, Counting Crows, August and Everything After, with the soothing, soulful lyrics of Adam Duritz blaring on the speakers.

And he has the nerve to look at me and say, Daddy, I hate to break it to you, but the music from your day really isn't very good. said it with swagger too. Like he worked for Rolling Stone magazine. It's really not that good. I hit the brakes. We weren't even in the garage yet. I hit the brakes. I said, what?

Because you can question me as a preacher. You can tell me I'm getting too old to wear my jeans kind of tight. You can say a lot of things to me, boy. But when you talk about my music, I said, what? He said, yeah, the music in your day didn't have loops. And I said, well, let's take a little lesson. Do you remember, and I gave him some history, do you remember when I took you to see Weird Al Yankovic at Oven's Auditorium?

And he was singing Amish Paradise? That song that you thought was so clever. And then I had to let him know that before there could be an Amish paradise, there had to be a Kulio. There had to be a Kulio. And so I played him, I took him to the source material. But before there could be a Kulio, and this is where some of you are ignorant, there had to be a Stevie because those strings on Ganga's Paradise would not have been there without

Stevie Wonder. See, there's always something before what you enjoy that enabled what you're a part of. That's why I can't stand people who complain about this country who don't even know the first thing about the price that was paid for you to have the right. to express your opinion that you don't like it. Come on, touch three people, say, get in the know, get in the no. Get in the no. Come on, Blakeney, get in the know.

Come on, Gaston. Get in the know. Paul said, I don't want you to be misinformed about the price that was paid. I don't want you to be misinformed about the situation. I don't want you to think that the hope that you enjoy came cheap. It didn't. It came hard. For an ignorant hope is no hope at all.

Nothing stable about a hope that has its head buried in the sand. I hear you, Pastor Rob Parsley. Anyone can sing a tune on a clear day at noon. God give me a song at midnight. That's what Pastor Rob Parsley used to say. I like that. Paul said, my hope came the hard way. Because if you just read verse 10 of this,

it sounds a lot like some kind of campaign slogan. Do you know the slogan and soundbite kind of mentality that people get over time? It's when we don't understand the source of our hope that we begin to sound kind of silly. And this is when people say, well, you Christians, you're just waiting on the apocalypse. You Christians, you don't even vote. You just pray. It's an ignorant imitation of hope. It's not confidence.

It's complacent. That you don't know. And Paul wants them to know. He wants them to know what he went through. He wants him to know what he's been through. And when he comes out on the other side, you might have noticed when I read the text, it shouted real good and you were getting fired up here at Valentine. I can't speak for the other campuses.

But we almost took off when I read verse 10. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. It got us excited to think about that. On him, we have set our hope. Does anybody have a hope, by the way? Anybody have a hope? Anybody have a hope? Regardless of the polls, regardless of the platforms, regardless of the pundits. Anybody have a hope? Anybody have a hope? Anybody have a hope? A hope? A living hope? I have a hope. I set my hope on the fact that he will deliver me again. He's been with me. The last 40 years, Kelly Kubacka, why not 41?

Why not? But you can only say that if you know where this hope comes from. It only means something. If you know, if you know, not if you heard, not if you thought, not if you wish. I have a hope. He will deliver us again. So let's make the campaign hats. He will deliver us again if we're representing the kingdom of God and if Jesus Christ is our candidate. He will deliver us again. And the world looks at that and they say, really, you believe that?

Yeah, I believe that. Totally believe that. How do you know? How do you know? How do you know? Why aren't you nervous? You notice everybody is so nervous right now. Just incredibly nervous. They're either ignorant or nervous. They're either in Canada or they're nervous. Just nervous. What if she and what if he? You know, I'm going to go press that button,

but I might press it with a blindfold on just to press it. I don't even know. guns nervous they might not take my guns nervous they you know nervous he might really build that thing nervous she might she might take away our civil liberties pa says hey hey hey hey hey hey I have a hope but it's a hard-boiled hope it's not an unaware hope I see what's going on out there I I know somebody say I know I'm not uneducated I'm not I'm not waiting for the clouds to split so I can go to glory land and shelf my troubles over. I got troubles right here.

And I'm in them. And it concerns me about our communities. And it concerns me about our schools. And it concerns me about our police officers and the way that they're treated. And it concerns me about certain communities in the way that they're treated. And it concerns me that people are marginalized. And I'm concerned about abortion. And I'm concerned about many things and some people get frustrated because you won't get nervous

What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do? Sound like a lachia servant. We're surrounded look out there man. What are we gonna do? You better call down something You better curse somebody. You better pray something. You better shoot something you got a bow, you got an arrow What we're gonna do? What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do? We're gonna nerve nervous And Paul steps into all this and said I was beat 39 times by the Jews Don't talk to me like you know something when you don't know anything. Don't talk to me about 21 pilots when you don't appreciate nirvana. Don't talk to me when you haven't seen the source of my hope.

This is a hope that has been through hell. And it comes from heaven. And the world didn't give it. And the world can't take it away. And it doesn't come from the right. And it doesn't come from the left. I have set my hope on one who is above it all. I set my hope on him.

I wouldn't put my hope on a party's platform right now. I don't think it can hold the weight of your hope. But if you're looking for a rock, Paul says, I have a hope. Don't be confused. I'm concerned. I'm concerned, but I'm not nervous. I have this peace that passes understanding. I called Tina last week.

Her son might die. She said, I'm broken. I'm devastated. He's 23. I'm uncertain. She said, but somehow I have peace. That's what Paul's talking about. We're taking him to every doctor that we can.

We will spare no expense to try to get him well. I can't imagine what life would be like. without him. I'm a mom. There's nothing I want to protect more than the life of my son, but there's a certain element of this where I just have to turn it over. It doesn't mean I'm disengaged. I'm engaged. I will cast my vote. I am not going to be apathetic and abstain because I don't like the options that the culture I'm a part of creating have presented to me, but I'm not nervous. I'm hurting. I'm hurting.

There are some things that broke my heart. I was utterly burdened, Paul says. His words. I'm burdened, but I set my hope, and my hope isn't shaken, although my heart is hurting. He sounds kind of crazy. I'm utterly burdened. Watch how bad. Not I lost the night of sleep.

I was beyond my strength. You ever been there before? I don't know what to do. I don't know which way it's going to go. I have no idea how to rebuild this one. I don't think I can get this one back. It's been too much time. This one's beyond my control.

I didn't see this one coming. I was so far out there beyond what I knew to do that the spirit of life itself. I didn't even think I was going to make it to see another day. I wondered would I ever preach again. I wondered, can we bounce back from this one? I'm burdened, but I'm not nervous. I'm concerned. I'm involved.

I'm praying. I'm doing my part. But I'm not nervous. I love it. I love it so much that I went all up and down the Bible. I wanted to interview some other people who might be able to corroborate Paul's theory of hope. That you can be burdened and not nervous.

That you can be broke and not nervous. That you can lose your job and not be nervous. That you can find drugs in your kids' room and be concerned and be involved and beat them half to death but not be nervous. Come on. So I asked David, really? You got to fight Goliath? David, nobody wants to fight Goliath.

He is the Philistine champion from Gav. His body armor weighs more than you, boy. As a matter of fact, you have no fighting experience nor a military title. If you were smart, you'd go back home. Goliath has been defying these people for 40 days. There's a good reason they hadn't fought him yet. He's bigger than you. You know what David said.

He said, I know. I see him. I know he's big. I know. Everybody else is standing back waiting on God to do something. But I didn't come looking for help from somewhere up there. I come in the name of the Lord God, and I'm not nervous. I know he's big.

I know he's strong. I know I'm a shepherd. I know I have nothing but a sling and five rocks, but I might only need one. If I can steady my hand and stand my ground, I'm not nervous. Hey, Shadrath. They're about to throw you and your buddies in the fire. Now you understand, you have a little bit of time left. If you will bow before this statue that Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar has erected, I mean, we talk

about crazy leaders. They ain't got nothing on Neby. Neby was so arrogant. Neby lost his mind. They said, you better bow to King Neby. They heated up the furnace. They turned it up seven times hotter. Don't you feel the flame?

Can't you see that there's a situation? in front of you that's too hot for you to handle and Shadrach look back at Mishak looked at Abednego they all look back at the church at Elevation Church and said we know but we're not nervous see the God we serve is able I said he's able to deliver us from the fire and we believe he will and we know he can but even if he doesn't I'm not nervous I'm on somebody's shot, I'm not nervous. They were real bold. Look them in the eyes.

Say, I'm not nervous. I'm not nervous. I went down in the lion's den with Daniel. Daniel was looking at a lion, y'all. He was looking at something that could have snapped him in half in a split second. Daniel, don't you see that lion? Don't you know your life is on the line? Don't you know you have a wicked king?

Daniel said, I know, but somehow, some way, the con eyes. He's not afraid. People are hungry. It's getting late. You've been preaching a long time. Jesus said, I know. And we don't have any bread.

Jesus said, I know. Jesus said, I know. And if you put what you have in my hands, it's going to be. Yes, disturbed a little bit. But I'm not nervous. Jesus, wake up. There's a storm raging on the sea.

See, how can you sleep in the storm with a storm on the sea? They asked them, don't you care if we perish? Jesus said, yeah, I care if you perish and I know there's a storm, but I'm not nervous because with one word, the one who spoke the storm into existence by virtue of the elements that created it can tell it to shut up. Jesus, this is it. They're going to kill you now. They got you on trial.

Pilot might send you to the cross. Don't you want to say something? No, I don't need to say anything. I am the word. I was there in the beginning. I am Alpha and Omega. I'm not nervous. This is the reason I came so they can bury me low.

I can reign forever. Come on, find five people and say, don't be nervous. Don't be nervous. Don't be nervous. That's what sets us apart as the people of God. is that we can know how bad it is and not be nervous. Because if we get nervous, what hope is there? If we start operating in the same spirit of the world that caused the fear that created

the division and the dysfunction that we're a part of, if the salt loses its saltiness, how will it be made salty? If you get nervous, if you lose, you're cool. What's the distinctive of your Christian faith? What kind of hope did you even have if one election cycle can threaten it? I set my hope, Paul said. I tried to put my hope on how I felt and I felt like I was going to die. I tried to put my hope on what other people would do for me in.

They got other people. That's like me asking you to hold this pulpit while I preach. That thing is too heavy for you. And some of the stuff that you've been putting on people, platforms, even the economy, It's too heavy. So Paul, man, I feel anointed today. Do I look anointed? I just want to get this message out to you.

I know. I see you in Babylonian captivity, but I know, Jeremiah 29-11. I know. Somebody say, I know. Now, this is God speaking, so the inference is you don't know, but I know the plans I have. for you. And we know that in all things, this is Romans 828, God works together, the good and the bad for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. I'm not nervous. I got purpose. I'm not nervous. He's got a plan. I'm not nervous. I've got a purpose. I'm not nervous. He has a plan. I'm not nervous. He has a plan. I'm not nervous.

I have a purpose. I'm here to glorify God. I'll glorify him in a lion's den in a fire on on a ship with a storm or even in a borrowed grave. Jesus said, I'm not nervous. I came for this. I'm God of the storm. I'm God of the grave. And beside me, there is no other.

So I set my hope when it got real bad, when it seemed like it was going to be the bottom. I set my hope on the one who is higher. I'm not nervous. I tried nervous. I didn't like it. I tried nervous. It made me irritable. I tried nervous.

It made me eat more. I gained 35 pounds being nervous. I tried nervous. It didn't make me a part of the solution. I tried nervous. It made me a critic rather than a contributor. I tried nervous. It didn't change anything.

I tried nervous. I'm going to show up at my job, do what I can, cast my vote, be the dad God's called me to be, I'm going to be the preacher God's called me to be, I'm going to be the mom God's call me to be, I'm going to do my part, but I'm not nervous. I'm going to do my part, but I will not panic. Because I lift my eyes, and I set my hope, I lift my eyes. We used to listen to that song all the time. It was a Brooklyn tabernacle choir.

I memorized all of Psalm 120. Just listening to that song in the King James. That lady who sang it, I can't sing it like she sang it, but she said, I will lift up mine eyes to the hills from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, the Lord which made heaven and earth said, he will not suffer thy foot thy foot to be moved the Lord which keep it be will not slumber nor sleep Lord is thy keeper the Lord is thy shame upon thy right hand upon that right hand The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by now.

Deserve thy soul. I have a hope. I left my eyes. Psalm 121 is called a song of ascent. There were 15 of them recorded in our canon of scripture for us to read. but they were originally intended for the pilgrims who would make their way to Jerusalem, so they would have a song to sing on the way. How many know you need a song to sing on the way to where you're going?

Because Jerusalem City of Peace was set in the hills, and the hills represent hope, but the hills also represent hidden enemies. And when the psalmist is saying, watch this, I lift my eyes to the hills. He might have felt like a 10th grader in a new school, or he might have felt like a nervous father on Election Day in America, or he might have felt like a refugee in another part of the world that would love to be a part of our democratic process. But he's on his way somewhere. He's on a journey. And as he progresses, he lifts his eyes to the hills, the place where his destination is, the place where his peace is. the place where his hope is.

He's going to Jerusalem. And on his way, he lifts his eyes to the hills. And he asks a question, from where does my help come? Where is it coming from? Not looking over here, over there. I'm not looking to the hills or the Donald. You get it by Tuesday. I'm looking above all of that.

And I always read the verse like this. The Spirit of the Lord is in this place. I always looked at it. Like he was saying, my help comes from the hills, you know, because God is above and he's a great king. And when Isaiah saw the Lord and your king Uzziah died, he was seated on a throne high and lifted up. Isn't it funny, he was seated? On the year the king died, in the year where the nation was wondering what to do, God wasn't pacing the marble floors of heaven wondering what he was going to do next.

He was still seated. I came with an announcement today. He's still seated He's still seated Had a vision the throne wasn't vacant and the one who sat on it was seated so always thought he was looking up and that's That's true. You know our hope is God reigns above Did you know that the same God who reigns above sustains beneath and that's why I'm not nervous He said I lift my eyes to the hills where does my help come from? I have hope in the hills hardship in the hills. Paul said, I despaired of life, but I set my hope. Both were happening at the same time. My hope came from my hardship. Watch this. This is so powerful. This is so

powerful. My hope comes from the Lord, maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved. Who are you talking to? He's talking to himself. He's having a conversation with himself telling himself don't be nervous I know you see what's in those hills and you imagine what might be in those hills and there's boogeymen in those hills and there might be real danger in those hills but the Lord is your keeper and watch this he's not sleeping he's not asleep he knows he sees he knows not one hair of your head falls to the ground that he doesn't count it. Not one sparrow falls from the sky that he doesn't have a funeral. He knows. Next verse, behold, it's all about what you focus on. He who keeps the people of God will neither slumber nor sleep.

For the Lord is your keeper, the Lord is your shade. For there to be shade, there must be heat. for there to be hope there must be hardship or else it won't really be hope. How can you know he will deliver you if you don't know that he can? And how can you know that he can if there isn't an enemy in the hills for you to run to him seeking refuge from? I know. I know you're worried about your teenager. I know you're worried about the state of things. I know you're worried.

I know you're worried. I know. But the Lord is on. your right hand. And this is what spoke to me. I lift my eyes to the hills. That means he's above it. And God is keeping me and sustaining me. That means he's beneath it. And he's on my right hand. That means he's beside me no matter which way it goes. So I'm not nervous. He's great and he's good. He's big and he's near. He's omnipotent and he's imminent. His name will be exalted. He is God. He is God. And I'm not nervous. Yeah.

The writer of Hebrew said, we have this hope. What kind of hope? This hope. The same hope that went down into a grave that hit rock bottle and still stayed strong. We have. No, let me personalize it. You have this hope. And it's not out there.

And it's not over here. and it's not over here. Watch this. It's an anchor for my soul. It's in me for the soul. Well, what does an anchor do? It flows around at the surface and looks pretty. It goes down all the way to the bottom and make sure that whatever it's holding on to. Come on, I got to close this sermon. But I have this hope. Touch somebody say, I have this hope. I have this hope. This hope that kept him on the cross. This hope that spoke the world's into existence. I feel the spirit of hope coming over the church of Jesus Christ. I live my I. Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of you who give generously to this ministry. It's because of you that this ministry is possible. You can click the link in the description to give now or visit elevationchurch.org slash podcast for more information. And if you enjoyed the podcast, you can subscribe, you can share it with your friends. You can click the share button. Take a screenshot and share it on your social stories and tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again for listening. God bless you.