Elevation with Steven Furtick - I Thought It Was Through

Episode Date: July 20, 2025

When despair sets in, it’s easy to assume it’ll always be this way. But what if a shift in thinking could break that cycle? Your thoughts have the power to disrupt your despair, especially when you stop focusing on what happened and start trusting the God who never left you. If you’ve just made a decision for Christ, please respond HERE: ele.vc/tIepfr Scripture References:Psalm 77, verses 1-12, 19Exodus 14, verses 11, 26-28Exodus 15, verse 1See 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 want to let you know if you don't live near Charlotte, but you've always wanted to come to Elevation Church. We figured out a way to come to you. Elevation nights, fall tour, 2025. coming up October 21st through October 30th. St. Paul, Minnesota, Omaha, Nebraska, St. Louis, Missouri, Louisville, Kentucky, Duluth, Georgia, we might as well say Atlanta. And if some of you from Charlotte want to drive to Atlanta, that'll be great. There will be no traffic.

There never is any traffic on I-85. It'll take you nine hours to drive there, but you should do that. Tampa, Florida, Miami, Florida. Where my beautiful wife grew up, y'all give it up for Holly. And Orlando, Florida. Go to Elevationnights.com. Happy 11th anniversary to our Raleigh Campus. Help me celebrate them better than that. Come on.

Happy 11th anniversary, Raleigh, Raleigh Campus. We're praying for a great next year of ministry. It's our 20th year of ministry as a church. And just we'll continue the celebration all year. Thank you to all the wonderful guest preachers who filled this pulpit and preached and all of our home team that preached But my middle son Graham looked at me the other day. He said it is time. We want you back all these speakers have been great We want you back. I'm back I want to share with you today a scripture that the Lord gave me during our break a break was very unusual this year

Part of the time is just rest part of the time is study songwriting and all of that the first half we spent in an unusual way. Our oldest son Elijah had a surgery, and he was recovering from that. It was a pretty major surgery. And then he got infected, and we ended up back into ICU for quite a while after that. And he's doing all better now. In fact, the Lord healed him, and he's clipping my sermon for TikTok right now as I preach it in a back room somewhere. So let's give God praise for that. I told him before I came to preach test, I'm going to be very clippable today. I'm going to say good stuff. I'll make your job easy. But in our Bible reading, as we were going through some of that, for the better part of a month as a family. We came across Psalm 77. And there was a verse

I knew I wanted to share with you when I got back with you, and it's going to lead us into a series today. So remain standing for just when I read this one verse. Can you stand for one verse? It's in Psalm 77, verse 19, and I'll read this and then work backward from there to give you the message for today. And the Lord's going to help us in some remarkable ways. Psalm 77 verse 19 The psalmist says to God Your path led through the sea Your way through the mighty waters

Though your footprints were not seen That a beautiful scripture And the Lord really used that in my life And I believe he wants to use it in yours Really underrated scripture too Maybe it'll be your favorite At the end of today He says your path

led through the sea Your way through the mighty waters Though your footprints Were not seen And just turn to the person next to you And tell them even if you don't see it God is working Tell them even if you don't feel it

God is working Let's put our hands together and praise the Waymaker in this place Come on praise the waymaker in this place God, I thank you for every mountain you brought me over, every valley you brought me through. It was nobody but you. And I praise you today.

Speak now through your word. Use me as a vessel. I'm willing and available and open. Give me the courage, give me the clarity, the confidence to speak to your children today. And may they receive it and obey it. For it is in Jesus' name that I pray and believe and call it done. Amen. You may be seated.

Well, boys, bring out my teaching screen. Let's get this series started properly. As I announced to you our title for the next six weeks at least, and maybe even beyond that, because this is such a big topic that we're going to talk about. And the title of the series doesn't come exactly from the verse that I read you, but I'll show you where it did come from in a moment. And before you judge my handwriting, just know that Abby has made fun of my handwriting. so much. And today I made her try to write on the screen before we came out here, and she said, this is harder than it looks like. I'm so sorry for how I spoke of you, Father. But what I want to talk to you about for the next few weeks, the title of the series,

is, and you're going to like this phrase, because you can say it with attitude, okay? We're going to talk about that's what. You know, you got to look at your neighbor and say it like you were just right, and they were just right. wrong and you tried to tell them, but they wouldn't listen, tell them, that's what I thought. That's what I thought. Like you were certain and you were proved to be correct, there is no better feeling than that's what I thought. Or that phrase is so elastic that we use it also to mean that our bias was confirmed, like, no, that's what I thought.

Let's just checking. Let's make sure. That's what I thought. But we want to really use that phrase today to deal with the thoughts that we think. because honestly, not only pastorally but personally, 90% of the problems that I have faced in my life have not come from what the devil did to me or from what others said about me. The biggest problem that I have over and over again, trying to do what God wants or the biggest obstacle to God doing what he wants in my life over and over again seems to be

this tricky little thing called My bracelets are catching the screen Oh Lord I'm like for this I'm trying over here Yeah, better The biggest problem for me Over and over again

It just happens over and over again Is that I get trapped in What I thought This is going to drive me crazy over here Welcome back, Ferdic Who sabotaged my screen while I was on break? Was it Robert Madhue?

Did he mess up my screen? Was it Torin Wells? Who messed up my screen? The biggest obstacle. And somebody shout, if you know what I'm talking about when I say that the biggest problem that I seem to have over and over again. It's not necessarily the enemies that I face, but it's what I thought. It's not necessarily what my life is at this moment that's making me sad.

It's what I thought my life. was going to be at this season. It's not necessarily who I am as a person that makes me insecure. It's what I thought I was supposed to be based on what I saw that other people showed me from who they are. But I didn't see their flaws. And so now I'm comparing my future to somebody whose flaws I have never seen. And now I'm frustrated about where I am, not because of where I am, but because of what

I thought. I'm not frustrated because I'm not married at this age. I'm frustrated because I thought I would be. I'm not frustrated because I'm dealing with this situation. I'm frustrated because I didn't have the chance to prepare for it. And over and over again in my life, the biggest enemy to what God wants to do is what I thought he was going to do. Now, I want you to get a time in your mind where you were what I like to call confidently

wrong. And I don't know if you can think of one, or if you've blocked all of that out. Selective memory. I asked everybody in my family, and if y'all know any way to fix that while I'm not using the screen, that would be awesome. If not, we'll all work around it, and all of the OCD people will ignore that part of the screen that is not supposed to be like that. Now listen, I asked everybody in my family, I said, I need an opening illustration for my new series called That's What I Thought, and I need you to tell me a time when you were so. so wrong and you were so sure you were right. And everybody in my family said, can't think of one. Everybody in my family, I'll have to get back with you. And none of them got back to me.

Which either means they can't remember one time where they were completely wrong and assured that they were completely right. Or it means that there's nothing really harder in life than to going back and admitting and remembering when you were wrong. You just hit the lead on those times in your life, like don't want to remember them. And the problem with that is, then you can't grow from them as you go forward in the future. Now, when we say that Jesus takes away our shame and our sin, that doesn't mean that he wants to cancel out the lessons that we learn from our mistakes. It means that he frees us from the penalty of it and the bondage to it. But it doesn't mean that Jesus wants us to live our lives just to continue to be wrong in all the ways that we were wrong a year ago, five years ago. 10 years ago. And there's almost nothing more difficult than remembering and admitting when you were

just so wrong. I had one this week. I have fresh examples of being confidently wrong. I did it at the dinner table. One of our kids said something and I just came back with something. And I didn't listen to the rest of their sentence and I completely missed the spirit of what they were trying to say. Just confidently wrong. Now, I have about a 12-hour. expiration dosage cycle on the dumb things I do, it takes that long for me to digest my dumb and then apologize. So 12 hours later, I found myself saying, I was so wrong for that. Now, that's hard, isn't it? That's hard, isn't it? To say, I was wrong to talk to you like that. I was wrong to assume that about you. I was wrong to judge you like that. I was wrong to put you in that position. I was even to admit dumb things.

things. I was wrong when I said that song sucked. The first time I heard it, I thought it sucked. Now I realize it's a bop, and I feel dumb because I like it, but I can't admit I like it, because the first time I heard it, I thought it was silly. That actually is a banger. I've been wrong about songs that I've written before. We wrote a song in this church one time, and I thought it was good, and after the recording, I turned to Holly, and I said, well, I thought that song was good, but it's not good. She said, I thought it was pretty good. I said, it wasn't good. You could tell. The people didn't like it. The people didn't care about it, and it's not going to go anywhere. After we recorded, oh, come to the altar.

That's how wrong I can be about a song. And I'm glad I was wrong, because it means there might be something else in my life right now that I think sucks, but it's actually going to be an amazing thing. If I'm wrong about that, then I might be wrong about this. It is the utter relief of realizing that you were wrong and admitting it and growing from it. But the only thing more difficult than remembering when you were wrong and admitting you were wrong, which I know isn't a very good way to start a sermon, none of us want to talk about that. The only thing more difficult than remembering and admitting I was wrong is to realize I am wrong. If it's that hard for everybody in my family and everybody watching this sermon, to go.

Go back and remember, I was so wrong. How could I have been so wrong to think what I thought or to say what I said or to believe what I believed or to assume what I assumed? The only thing more difficult than remembering it, because it doesn't feel good, is realizing that I am wrong right now. If we don't even want to admit that we were wrong, how much less do we want to realize that we are wrong or might be wrong or could possibly be wrong. Just see if you can get it out your mouth. I may be wrong about that. And when you get to that point in your life, you realize

that a lot of us in here we have iPhones. How many of you have iPhones? Hold up your iPhone right here at this part of the sermon. iPhones. I want you to realize that not only do you have iPhones, but you also have I thoughts. And it's possible that the devil has you trapped in an I-thought right now in your life. And I thought, in the Psalm we just read, the Psalmist says something so incredibly miraculous and wonderful. He says, God's path led through the sea and his way through the mighty waters, though his footprint We're not seen. But to understand the process by which he arrived at that thought, I want to take you all the way back to the beginning of Psalm 77.

And journey with me now for a moment while I build this thought out for you. That's what I thought. The psalmist is lamenting here. There are four different types of Psalms in your Bible. There are Psalms of praise, songs of Thanksgiving, Psalms of wisdom, and Psalms of Lament. Lament is where they're just. telling God their trouble. Lament is where they are being honest with God, realizing that why would you hide it from him? It's not like he didn't see the whole thing. Realizing that

you can say something to God and he's big enough to handle your brokenness. This is a psalm of lament, but I want to show you how it goes from a psalm of lament to a psalm of wisdom. And over the course of the next several weeks, I want to help you with your thoughts. Some of your eye thoughts are wrong. Some of your eye thoughts about people are wrong. Some of your eye thoughts about what is still ahead of you in your life are wrong. And you could be confidently wrong, and you can be completely trapped. That's the situation for the psalmist in Psalm 77.

It's not David writing this time. It's one of the sons of ASAF, the musical leaders. He's pouring out his heart to God. He says, I cried out to God for help. I cried out to God to hear me. When I was in distress, circle the word distress, please. I sought the Lord. At night, I stretched out untiring hands, and I would not be comforted.

I remembered you, God, and I groaned. What a strange thing to say. I thought it was, I remember you, God, and I was grateful. I remember you, God, and I praised. I remembered you, God, and I was encouraged. I remembered you, God, and I rejoiced. He said, it was so bad, I remembered you, and I groaned. The reason Psalm 77 is special, and you might want to study it,

is because a lot of times when they wrote Psalms, they were asking God to deal with external enemies. We've got this giant facing us, this army coming against us, this sickness that we're dealing with, and it was an external enemy. Or in the case of Psalm 51, David is praying. about his own sin. He's saying, creating me a clean heart, oh God, I did something horrible, and I need you to make me new, and I need you to raise me up, and I need you to give me a second chance. But this is not a Psalm about enemies, and this is not even a Psalm about sin. In this

Psalm, the primary problem for the Psalmist is not an external enemy, or even his own sin. His problem is God. His problem is God. And more specifically, His problem is God. Where did you go? His problem is, God, when are you going to help me feel something again? God, when are you going to answer this? I'm holding out my arms to you, and you seem to be standing at a distance. I'm not even sure you're in the room. I'm not even sure you hear this. And so as he's recounting this, I want you to understand the heaviness of it,

so that when I encourage you in just a few moments like I plan to do with God's help, you will understand the place this Psalm starts at. He has a problem with God. And when you have a problem with bills, somebody can pay them for you. When you have a problem in your body, you can go to a doctor about that. When you have a problem even in your mind, you can have a therapist for that. But what do you do when your problem is with the one who has no boss? What do you do when your problem is with the one who has no supervisor that you may ask to speak to? What do you do when you're in a situation where what God did is so much different than what you thought he should do?

That is Psalm 77. I remembered you, God, and I groan, not shouted, groan, not clapped, groan, not danced, grown. I remembered you, God, and I groaned. I meditated, and my spirit grew faint. People will tell you all the time how much they've grown, but they won't tell you how much groaned so they could grow into the place where they are today. This is the process of becoming a person that God can use, and it is not easy. He said, my spirit grew faint. You kept my eyes

from closing. I was too troubled to speak. And then verse five gives us the entire problem, not only with the psalmist, but with ourselves. I thought. Everybody say, I thought. I thought. thought about the former days. Justin, do I even have to say it? Circle I thought. Circle it for everybody in here who's having doubtful thoughts. Circle it for everybody in here who's having fearful thoughts. Circle it for everybody in here who's having jelly, petty, jealous, petty, jelly thoughts. Jelly thoughts, we're calling them right now. Circle it for everybody in here who is dealing not with an external threat and maybe not even a personal sin, but with a I thought. Now, when I read this at first, you're going to be like, he did the

right thing. This is what you're supposed to do. This is what we teach in church that you're supposed to go back and remember if you're in a season right now where you don't know what God is going to do. Just remember what he did. And that's what it sounds like on the surface, but I want to dig a little bit because I've been waiting two months to preach this message, and I'm going to preach it today. I thought about the former days when my jeans fit a little I thought about the former days when my hamstrings weren't. I thought about the former days when I didn't need these readers to look at my Bible and this size 67 font in order to preach it to you.

I thought about the former days, the years of long ago. I remembered my songs in the night. My heart meditated and my spirit asked, what's wrong with any of this? It's an I thought. I remembered, verse 6, please, my songs. in the night. My heart meditated and my spirit asks. Now watch what happens when it starts with me. Verse 7. This is what you get back. When you send out an I-thought, this is what you get back. And you know what? You can't block an I-thought. Not with your fingers. You have to deal with it. And the psalmist is putting it all out there for us today, which gives us permission to know that we can feel emotionally confused and still get spiritually.

strong. Watch what he says. It gets worse before it gets better. Will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favor again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever? Has his promise failed for all time? Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has he in anger withheld his compassion? I thought. And that's what came back. And what I heard the psalmist saying today, I wonder if it's true of you. He says, I thought I suffered and I thought I thought it was through. I thought back over the best days of my life and I thought they're behind me. I thought about the things that I would love to see God do for me that he's done for others and I thought, well, I guess he just doesn't want to do it for me. I thought. I thought it was through.

I thought that my experience of God had completely dried up. I thought he didn't love me anymore. The psalmist said that, I didn't. So if you've ever felt that, you're in the Bible. I thought that God had taken his hand off my life. I thought he had just given up on me because others did. I thought it was through. And you see in this passage what they call the three Ps of negative thinking.

I'm going to be talking to you over the next six weeks about I thought. I'm going to be talking to you about three ways of negative thinking that you may recognize in your life. They're all here in the Psalm. We'll come back to them a few times, but I just want to point them out to you. He says, will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favor again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever? I thought it was through.

I thought it was gone. I didn't see his footprints in the sand. You'll ever seen that little poster on the thing? Did you ever see butt prints in the sand? That's another one. You can look that up another time. He says, I felt rejected. I thought it was never going to come again.

Now that's strong, saying never. That's strong when you think that he will never show you favor again. And he said, I thought his love had vanished. And they call these the three P's of negative thinking because they're traps. And it's when you take something that happens to you and you make it personal, rejection. It's when you make it permanent, never. And it's when it becomes pervasive, banished. Everywhere.

It took everything away. It's completely ripping through your whole life. Because one thing to have a problem and you've got it in a corner, and this is the one thing that I'm dealing with in my life. But you know the enemy has you in, and I thought, when it becomes personal, the Lord rejected me. There's something wrong with me. It's fine to be disappointed because somebody didn't want to be your friend. It is another thing to assume that they are worthy to be the Olympic figure skating judge of your life.

And then you stop putting yourself out there because you think that somehow they have the stamp of approval to give the human race and that they know just from their virtue of their own goodness, whether or not you're worthy, and now you've got yourself isolated because you took it personal, and there may have been something that they were going through that was so dark that if you would have known that, you would have given them a hug and said, I'll send you a Christmas card. But now you've got it personal, permanent. It's never coming back. It's always going to be this way.

It will never change. I'm never going to be able to go a week without doing this. I am never going to find anybody who gets me. It's permanent. It's going to stay this way forever and it's pervasive. It's when you can't celebrate the kid that's doing good because of the one that you're worried about. It's when you can't celebrate the health in your body because of the hell in your mind. It's because you're in an eye thought. He said, I thought it was through. I thought the dream was through. I thought the vision was through. I thought the relation. I thought my joy. I thought my very joy in life was through. It's an I-thought. And if you're there today, let's start there. I thought it was through. There are some things in your life that may very well be through.

That's why you can't dwell on. I thought about the former days. That's why you can't watch Andy Griffith reruns and wish again for wholesome entertainment and curse this love island that this crap. These kids are watching and the devil is taking over a generation. This is an I-thought. But the Lord, y'all are like, laughing like y'all been watching it too. I thought it was through. I thought the best days were behind me. I thought, and I want to show you something that really helped me. It's something that he said in verse two. And yeah, yeah, yeah, he said, when I was in distress. Everybody say distress. Distress is a normal part of the Christian life just like it's a normal part of the human experience. Distress in and of itself is not a problem.

problem when I was in distress. The promise that God makes is not to protect us from distress. The promise that God makes is not to keep all pressure from coming on our lives. The promise that God makes is not to make sure that he always takes us the long way around any problem. The problem is when the distress becomes despair. There's a difference. Distress is this hurts. but I have hope. Despair is this hurts and I have no hope. Despair is dangerous. Despair is hurt minus hope.

Despair is looking at the situation saying never vanished, rejection, personal, permanent, pervasive. I thought the psalmist said, not that this is just a difficult season and I got to get through it because we all have those. Not this is just a bad day and if I can make it until 5 o'clock without cussing anybody out, I can keep bringing home a paycheck and not get kicked out of this house that I'm behind a month on anyway. It's not if I can get through this. It is, is this all there is. Despair is. It's never going to get better. That's where the devil wants you. It's never going to get better. And you'll always lose your temper. It's never going to get better and you will always be a failure.

It's never going to get better and you are always going to be too loud and you are always going to be too quiet and you are always going to be too short. Did you ever think maybe God made you short so you could fit through little doors? Okay. Now, if this is where the psalmist starts, we have got to do something today to get to you out of this. If despair is dangerous and distress isn't dangerous, you can go through a lot of things. You've been through a lot of things. You've put up with a lot of things. Tell your neighbor, I'm tougher than I look. Tell them again, I'm tougher than I look. Don't let my

pretty smile fool you. I'm tougher than I look. I'm tougher than I look. I took a licking and kept on ticking. I'm tougher than I look. I'm like, I'm like, like a weeple, I wobbled, but I didn't go down. I'm tougher than I look. I've had some challenges to my faith. I've had some questions about God. I'm still here praising. In fact, that's my two-word testimony when I can't think of anything else to praise him for. Still here. Somebody shouts still here. In a funk, still here. Down in it's still here. Wondering about it, still here. Peace isn't... So what you've got to do, child of God, is never allow distress, which is temporary, to become despair, which says forever.

And the devil specializes in turning distress into despair to get you so clouded by one conflict that you have forgotten your calling. Who am I preaching to today? God sent this word to disrupt your despair. Hear me. God sent this word to disrupt your despair. Every I thought that has been telling you you will not make it. Every I thought that has been telling you you are not worthy of God's love. The cross made you worthy.

What does it have to do with your behavior? What did it ever have to do with your behavior? It's about his blood. I call you worthy in the name of Jesus. I call you healed by his stripes. I call you forgiven and his favor is coming to your situation right now, into your room, into your home, into your wound, into your family, into your business, into that thing that the devil told you.

It's through. It's through. Give up. It's through. Quit fighting. It's through. Don't go back to rehab. It's through.

Give up on it. Just manage the addiction. It's through. It's through. Just walk away from it. It's through. move to another city and start over the same stuff all over again until it catches up with you.

It's through. Leave. It's through. But I found something for the trap. I found a truth for the trap. For everybody who has been in an eye thought. And I know you know the one I'm talking about. Don't make me start prophesying.

The I thought. The one that starts with you and ends with misery. You know every thought that starts with me ends in misery? eventually if it doesn't involve God. So what I noticed from what I read from Brugamon and some of the other theologians that I was looking up, he said, I thought about the former days and I thought it was personal, permanent, pervasive. I would ask God to help me with the problem, but God was the problem.

I didn't know where to go. Now, I kind of lied to you when I set the sermon up. I said I was going to share a verse that I read that meant a lot to me right after Elijah. you got out the hospital. And I am, but it wasn't the one I read you when I started sermon. It's one, it's a little sniper verse. It's a little sniper scripture. It's like you could just gloss right over it. But remember how bad of a state this guy was in. What's going to turn it around for you? What's going to turn it around for us? What's going to break us out of these patterns and traps of thinking that the devil says, never all? What's going to break us out of this limited view of your situation that can't find God in it because you have gotten so

blurry in the battle? And so I told my mom, I said, I'm going to be reading from Psalm 77 to preach this week and she likes when I give her a little head start Well, she sent me back a picture of her Bible open to Psalm 77 She's like, I already beat you to it preacher I'm trying to do her voice when I do that. I already beat you. It was a text, but that's how she would have said to it.

And I said, bring that Bible, because I want to show you something. All right, get my camera. This Psalm, it's not Psalm 23. Everybody knows Psalm 23. The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not why. It's a relatively obscure Psalm. You see how she had that circled?

Sometimes it takes a minute to see it. That's like the Lord. Well, this illustration isn't really working too well either. But what I wanted to show you that I can show you, direct me, man. Do I need to stand somewhere different? I do whatever I need to. That's better? She has that Psalm 77 circled like a serial killer.

That's just like, ah, right? And I realized why. She's got it all underlined. I said, bring the Bible to church. I got to show the people something. She was circling everything in this Bible all the way down to has his unfailing love vanished forever, has his promise failed for all time. And then on her Bible, that's the part where that page ends. I told her, I was like, that's not the best part of Psalm 77.

She's like, yeah, that's what I was reading right after your dad died. Thanks a lot. I was like, yeah, no, that's a good part of Psalm 77 too, obviously, when you're going through things. But I said, read the rest and hit me a couple hours later. Now, my dad died of ALS. It was over 10 years ago, and it was in June of 2013. And this Psalm meant a lot to her during that low time of her life. And so she was reading it like we do, and we come to this place. I thought it was through, and she had just lost her husband. She had just lost him after caring for him. It was an atrocious, atrocious disease. But what I want to show her and you today from Psalm 77 is in verse 10.

May this change your life. May this break your pattern. May this bring you out of the trap? Because he said, I was stuck in an eye thought. Watch this. Then I thought. That's the whole sermon. Then I thought.

Circle it on the screen, Justin. Then I thought. No circle then I thought. Because the first thought wasn't the right. I thought. Then I thought. I thought, I thought, and I got stuck in a loop of eye thoughts. Then I thought. Verse 10 is the hinge where everything changes for this psalmist. Verse 10 is the hinge where everything can change for you and I. Verse 10 is the hinge that depression doesn't want you to know about. Verse 10 is the hinge that the devil wants to hide and delete off of your Bible lap.

Verse 10 is the hinge that the devil doesn't want you to turn to. Because after all of that, which is real, after all of that, which is a part of being you, after all of that, I thought it was through. After all of that, he says, then I thought. Let's see what he thought next. To this, I will appeal. the years when the Most High stretched out his right hand. I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.

I will consider all your works and meditate on all your mighty deeds. Go back to verse 10. Then I thought, to this I will appeal, the years when the Most High stretched out his right hand. Go back to verse 2. When we started with these I-thoughts, he was saying, When I was in distress, I sought the Lord at night. I stretched out untiring hands. Who stretched out?

I stretched out. I, I can't do this much longer. I don't care how many interior raises you do in the gym for your shoulders. You can only do this so long. And is it possible that the reason you are so faint in your faith and so weary in your worship, and so discouraged about your destiny. And the reason that you think that it's through is because you have been so focused on this.

God, I can't give anymore. I can't do anymore. I already feel so stretched. God, I feel so empty. I feel so unseen. I feel so uncelebrated. I keep stretching out my hands. I keep putting myself forth.

I keep taking my next step, but you're not there. Then, verse 10. Then I thought, I'm going to appeal to a higher court. Instead of thinking about how I'm doing this, let me think about the years when God stretched his hand. And when I start thinking about how he stretched his hand and I forget about my hands, suddenly my hands go up in worship because I remember that the past. The battle is not mine, but it belongs to the Lord." Fifteen seconds of praise for everybody.

Who needs a then I thought? That's anointing. Yeah. Five-year neighbors say then I thought. I thought over and over. I thought, then I thought. Oh, yeah, then I thought. thought it was through. Then, I thought I might as well throw in the towel. Then I was very

focused on all the reasons I had not to go forward. Y'all slow. Y'all are real slow. Y'all slow like molasses in the South. Then I thought, let me think about his hand. Let me remember his deeds. He does it in a quartet. He talks about the mighty deeds of God, the works of God, the awesome deeds of God, the deeds of God. He lists them off and rattles them off because he said, I thought it was through. And then after I had gotten done with all of my questions, then after I had poured out all my complaints, then after I had considered all the reasons that I had to be afraid, I thought it was through, but then I thought it through. I thought it through. I thought about saying, all right, devil, I quit.

Then I thought it was through, but then I decided I wouldn't despair unless I had believed that I would see the goodness in the land of the living. Five, seven people say I thought it through. I thought it through. I thought it through. I thought it through. I thought it through. I thought it through. Now, let me tell you what I mean. In verse 19, let's go right back to the top of the sermon. He said, when I thought about the way God works, don't sit down. You're about to shout again. You might as well just save yourself the calorie burn.

You might as well just save yourself the cardio. Just go ahead and jump up now by faith and get ready to celebrate. He said, your path led circle the word through. Let's do Bible study. I wanted you to take me around it. I wanted you to carry me over it. I wanted you to give me a boat. But instead of a boat, I got a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.

Your path, your path. Led, tell your neighbor I thought it through. Your way through the mighty waters, through the mighty waters, though your footprints weren't seen. Why didn't I see God's footprints? Because he was working with his hand at a higher level. He was driving back waters that I didn't know he needed to part so he could drown Egyptians that were chasing me and trying to bring me back into captivity. What am I trying to say? Think it through. You just keep thinking the same eye thoughts. And you're like, I do think it through. I'm an overthinker. Just because you think it again doesn't mean.

mean you thought it through. You underthink are you? You think like this. Oh, well, the devil's attacking me. I guess God's not with me. What if you thought that through? God must be so with me. This is how you think it through. God, I went to my in-laws' 50th wedding anniversary the other day. Clap your hands for that. And it survived betrayal. And it survived betrayal. And it it survived addiction and it survived special needs. And there were times where they thought it wouldn't make it. Then I thought, the challenge is you can't see the path in the present. It's only in retrospect that the Red Sea looks like a blessing.

I'll show you what I mean. Go to Exodus 14. When the Israelites came up on the Red Sea, you know the story? You know the story? They came up on the Red Sea. They were leaving Egypt. They had been slaves for 400. And God was leading them out.

They were happy. They were ready to dance. They even peck their tambourines. And as the tambourines are jingling in their suitcase, oh, no, here comes trouble. What is the sound of that very high pitch? It doesn't sound like a tambourine. It's an Egyptian chariot. Oh, no, the Egyptians are coming after us.

So watch what they thought, because I'm trying to get you to see that you might be wrong. You might think the attack means it's through. That's an I thought. They thought. Watch this. Exodus 14. The Lord said to Moses, let's stretch your hand over the sea. The waters may go flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen.

Most stretches hand over sea, daybreak. The Egyptians were fleeing toward it. The Lord swept them into the sea. Oh, so the Israelites didn't die, the Egyptians did. Go to verse 28. The water flow back and covered all the chariots and horsemen. Now, that all sounds so wonderful. God drowned their enemies, right?

And I know I'm rushing this. I don't have time. You go come back next week for part two of this. But what's crazy to me about this scripture is the scripture says that when they got to the edge of their escape route in Exodus chapter 14 verse 11. They said to Moses, was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? They thought that water was going to kill them. That's what they thought. Now look at chapter 15, verse 1, when they got to the other side and the Egyptians were all dead behind them and the thing they thought was going to kill them.

Exodus 15 verse 1. Exodus 15 verse 1 1 and circle the word. Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the Lord. I will sing to the Lord. That's fine. But you've got to sing that same song on the other side

so you can get through this. Somebody say, then I thought. It is the hinge of the scripture for the people of God. They remembered their exodus. This deliverance motif set. That's the entire story for Jesus, who would be the greater Moses, who would bring us out of the slavery to sin. It's all set up here, and the psalmist is looking back and saying, when I could not see your

footprints, I remembered that your hand was working in the night. And you've been looking at the wrong level, and you have been thinking at the wrong level. And God's thoughts are not our thoughts, and his ways are not our ways. And what if the attack that is against you is actually sent to remind you how valuable what you carry actually is? Think it through. Think it through. The devil is not omnipresent.

The devil does not have unlimited ammunition. So if there is an attack against your life, if there is an attack against your family, if there is an attack against your mind, there is something in your future that hell has recognized. Think it through. What is it? knows about my family, that I forgot about my family, then I thought it through. What is it that God knows I need to learn that He would let me go through this? And if you really want to get out of the I thought, what is it that he's going to use this

for in somebody else's life? Did I really suffer this much to stay silent about what he taught me as a student? So the Word of the Lord is, think it through. Think it through. It never comes like you thought it would come. Not when it comes from God. Because if it came like you thought it would come, then your thoughts would be God. And he says, my ways are not your ways, neither are my thoughts, your thoughts.

And it just blessed me to think about all of the people in here who, instead of giving up on this pursuit of Jesus, instead of giving up on your purity, instead of giving up on the impact God is called you, to make. Instead of thinking it was through, you're going to think it through today. So that the song you have to sing on the other side reflects the faithfulness of the God who split the sea. One moment, it looked like the sea was going to kill them. The next minute they realized, wait, God didn't bring us this far to drown us. He didn't bring us out here to leave us. He didn't bring us out here because he's not with us.

He brought us out here because the enemy can't swim. Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of you who give generously to this ministry is 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.

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