Elevation with Steven Furtick - Not Here

Episode Date: September 29, 2025

Do you ever feel like your prayers are going unanswered? The enemy wants you to believe God’s not listening, but the truth is He hears you. His presence is with you in the mountains and the valleys, and He’s working one moment at a time.If you’ve just made a decision for Christ, please respond HERE: ele.vc/tIepfrScripture References:Psalm 120, verses 1-71 John 5, verses 14-15John 20, verses 11-17See 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 you to give out 10 hugs all around you. Make everybody in your section feel so welcome. Tell them, I'm so glad you're in church today. Roll call. Who made it? Online right now, let us know your name, your country. I'm pulling out my phone.

I'm checking the roll. A-ray's in the house, front row. Good to see you, A-ray. That's not your seat. He never sits there. How'd you get over there? It is going to throw off the entire cosmic balance of my preaching. If you are sitting there instead of there.

I'm not telling the person down there to trade sense. seats with you. But you got big shoes to fill right there. Yeah, in the Jersey, in the Washington commanders jersey. Big shoes to fill. That's my guy right there. But apparently he's holding it down on this side today. So who do I have over here on this side of the room? Come on, who came to worship God? Get a word from him. Hear from him. Worship him. Glorify him. Put our attention on him. Feels good to give God all the glory, doesn't it? I have a tattoo on my back that says Kavad. It's the Hebrew word for weight, W-E-I-G-H-T, and it also means glory.

And I found out when I try to take the glory for myself, I have to carry the weight myself. But when I give God the glory, I feel like I can move better. I feel like I can stand longer. I feel like I can make it. All right, a few shout-outs for online. They all remain standing. Forgive us if we're a little loopy. Kind of goes along with my series.

We're talking about same lies, new loops. We're a little loopy because we just recorded 13 songs of brand new worship melodies and anthems. I'm so excited. That's one of them. Call God. Jesus be the name. Just so much good stuff we're going to be putting in your ears, in your heart, in your life, your car. Going to be playing these songs in your kids' nursery. Some of y'all got a kid

on the way in 2026. I got some anthems coming for your baby. Some of you're going to be pushing that baby out to one of these new songs. I prophesier right now. It's going to be good, too. You're going to be calling God and calling on everything. It's going to be really good. All right. Shoutouts from Adam from Oklahoma, Priscilla from Texas. Someone's joined. Someone came to church from Kenya today. Praise the Lord, Kenya. Cape Town, Palestine, Madagascar, Cape Cod, Chicago. Of all the places I've said, which one would you most like to go to if you could be transported right now? I read a few more. Where else? Somebody said, just not here. That's horrible. Not here. Louis, hello, Louis. Hello, from Maryland. Anyway,

You get the point. Let's welcome our eFAM all over the world, both watching it a later time. I want to get right into the Word if it's all right with you. Praise the Lord. The Lord spoke something to my heart for our next installment on same lies, new loops. Show my graphic real quick. It kind of looks like an infinity loop and zoom out so everybody can see it at the campuses, please. I'm trying to get you out of these things that. go on in your mind that keep you from meeting with God and keep you from believing what he says about you. And to do that, we've got to get you out of the thought patterns. The renewal of your mind is not a one-time event. Salvation is. Jesus saves you as done, is paid for, it's finished,

but the renewal of your mind is not a one-time event. It is a moment-by-moment decision. So when we get into God's word, when we worship God like you've done today, go ahead and give yourself a hand, because you made a new loop today as you were worshiping God. You were joining the angels around the throne of God, singing holy, holy, holy. And today for this installment, the Lord led me to Psalm 120. We've been sharing from a lot of the Psalms because the Psalms speak to the heart. In such a unique way, this is one of 15 Psalms that is categorized as a song of Ascent, ascent meaning going up.

because literally they would be sung as the people were going up to Jerusalem for their pilgrimage to worship the Lord for all of the different feasts that they would celebrate. Some were written by David, some by his son Solomon, and some by an unknown author. They were designed to be sung not only along the way, but on those 15 steps going up to the temple, and there were 15 of them. So it's really beautiful sometimes to understand that God has given us a song for every season. And this is a song of assent. And go ahead and tell your neighbor, just go ahead and prophesy over them.

Say, you're going up today. Put it in the chat. Say, I'm going up today. Yeah. A song of a sense. How many of you have your Bible and it says that over the heading? It says a song of a sense. Right.

So here's what he says. In my distressed, I called to the Lord. And he answered me. Y'all don't have anything you're having. happy that God answered you about. Not one thing. Not even just you had peanut butter in the pantry this week and you wanted it and you put it on that cracker and it tasted real good and it didn't get stuck on the roof of your

mouth. Come on. How many have at least one thing that God did for you? Praise the Lord. He said, in my distress I called to the Lord and he answered me. I'm going to read the full Psalm for context. He says, deliver me, O Lord, from lying lips from a deceitful tongue. lies, new loops.

Verse 3, what shall be given to you and what more shall be done to you, you deceitful tongue? A warrior's sharp arrows with glowing coals of the broom tree. Woe to me that I sojourn in Meshik, that I dwell among the tents of Kedar. Too long have I had my dwelling among those who hate peace. Wow. Does that verse mean you should delete Instagram? I don't know. Too long have I had my dwelling among those who hate peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.

Now go back to verse one now that you've heard the whole thing, and let's make a loop. In my distress, I called to the Lord, and he answered me. Today I'm going to talk about the lie that the devil has been telling you. This message is called Not Here. Not Here. Just reach around and tell seven people on your way to your seat. Not here. Not here. You may be seated. Not here.

Oh, I want to tell you why I'm here today. Why I'm in the pulpit today. You're like, isn't it your job? Well, not every single Sunday. I would have scheduled this Sunday off because of all of the intensive labor around our songwriting. But number one, I thought if the team's going to be here, I'm going to be here. But number two, I thought you needed this next word in the series. I didn't want the devil to disrupt the flow of what we're doing because I really feel

like we've got some momentum and I'm really hearing testimonies. And I really feel like there's something special that he's doing in some of our minds and delivering us from the devil that keeps us from making decisions and keeps us from rejoicing and keeps us depressed. So I wanted to keep that going. But thirdly, I'm here because it's my son Graham's 18th birthday today. Occasionally, I tell a little bit about our family because of a scripture that Paul said, we were delighted not only to share the gospel of God with you, but our lives as well.

And in this pulpit, a lot of times I get things wrong, but I'm willing to do that sometimes, because if I never get it wrong, I can never get it real. So I also share from my own heart and my own life of the things that I'm processing, as well as what the Bible says about other people's process. And Graham found out that I was going to take this week off because of the scheduling of our recordings so I could focus on that. He said, wait a minute. Sunday the 28th is my birthday. And mom said, we can get a guest. And Graham said, no guest. It's my birthday. And we started naming some of his favorite preachers and said, well, we could have and we named them. And he said, no, no, no, no, no. And Holly even said, how about if I preach? And Graham goes,

it's my 18th birthday. I want dad. I want dad. So, Graham, you got me. Whatever happens, we're in this together. If the ship goes down, come help me bail some water. He wanted me, and he got me. And there was a moment a few years ago in Graham's life where, as every parent does, I was teetering on the edge of not trusting God. Because as he was starting to move into manhood, I started to worry about the temptations.

It's one thing to protect your kids. It's one thing to pray for your kids. It's another thing to become so possessive about your kids that you don't realize that they were gods before they were yours. We all can relate to that either as a child or a parent. All the kids are like, did you hear that mom? I am gods. God said I could come home at 1230, not 11.30.

Don't use my sermon like a weapon later. But I was sitting down one Saturday to prepare a sermon for our church. And I was so worried about Graham, and not because he had done anything wrong. It was just that transitional season. Remember, I taught you last week, when you vent about a situation without God in it, you start to invent scenarios in your head. And so nothing was really even wrong yet. There was just the possibility of him getting on a bad path, and it started to possess my mind.

Now, the Lord spoke to me. What do you mean when you say that? It was an impression that was louder than a conversation. It was an impression that was deeper than a text message. And all I felt from God was that he said, I've got ground. It was a short sentence, but I knew I heard it. I've got Graham. Immediately, a flood of peace filled my heart, my soul.

I got back to work. And since that day, he has not sinned. I can't say that. But it's funny, you said, I get dad on my birthday. And God told me, I got grandma. You know, he's doing pretty good, y'all. He's doing pretty good. Started a little Bible study.

He's doing pretty good. Now I'm getting emotional, and I'm forgetting the outline of my message. Will y'all pray for me, please, that I could just preach this from Psalm 120? He started a Bible study in the house, and about six to eight of y'all would come over, right? And he started recruiting me on Sunday nights to come teach it a little bit. And you talk about loopy. After I've preached on Sunday, I definitely don't know Hebrew and Greek words. I can barely speak English.

So I go up there and try to help the boys. And, you know, when you're talking to high school boys, it really revolves around a few struggles over and over again what they're dealing with. And one of those conversations that comes up is how do I deal with the times when I have a spiritual high, but then it goes away? And how do I keep the spiritual high? Well, of course, I told this person who asked this question, I'm not interested in teaching you to keep the high. I want to teach you how to look for God in the lows.

If you can look for him in the lows, you can only go so low. Because one Psalm says, if I make my bed in shield, you are there. If I make my bed in hell, you are there. Where shall I go from your presence? Where shall I ascend? If I ascend to the heavens, you are there. If I descend to hell, you are there. If I say, surely the darkness will cover thee.

Surely light will become as night to thee. You are there. Your presence is everywhere. So I want you to look for God in the love. Now, the contrast we have in Psalm 120, why I thought it would be so great for us to study together today, is because on one hand, this psalmist is going up. He's going up to Jerusalem. Jerusalem is in the mountain region, so to go to Jerusalem, you go up every time, a song of ascent. He's singing a song of as he's going up, but it's also a song of lament, which is grief.

So he's on his way headed up to worship, but there is something that is weighing him down as he walks. Every single person who is here in this room today, on your way up to worship, on your way up to lift your hands and praise God, on your way over here, there was something that was weighing you down. It's surprising you don't have a flat tire from all the weight that was in the car with the tension that is in your family and the tension that is in your heart and the tension of your faith and your frustration. And I got this picture that we all, like the psalmist, while we are on our way up, we are weighed down. And I want to tell you, Graham, and I want to tell you, my friend, that's normal. And learning to live with this, it's the ascent and the lament. All in the same song. All in the same room.

All on the same row. All in the same mind. I could get you to think about something right now that would make you so happy. You would start dancing. You would even forget that you don't know how to dance. You would forget you don't have any rhythm. and you would, I saw some of y'all doing it. Dear, an hallelujah.

I saw it. It got you so happy. We started thinking about God and how he deserves the praise and so happy. And then I could mention something else. If I really knew you, if I could really get in your life for five minutes, I could say something else. And you would be so heavy, your hands would drop, your head would drop, your heart would fall out. Because as I'm on the way up, it doesn't mean I'm not weighed down. I never praise God because my situation is.

perfect. And to wait for a perfect situation to praise God, to wait for a perfect situation to have peace. That's a setup from the enemy. If you procrastinate your praise or your peace until your situation is perfect, you'll never get the peace because I'm on my way up and I'm way down. And it was different in his time because listen to some of the things he was dealing with. Verse two. He said, deliver me, oh, Lord, from lying lips. Back in the Bible times, they had liars. You know, we've evolved as a species, but in those days there were rampant lies. You couldn't even tell what was truth and what was a lie.

You couldn't even tell if it was their real voice or not, or if it was really their lips moving. Graham showed me a picture the other day or a video of some lion jumping to the sky, snatching a baby lion from a bird of prey. And he's like, Dad, why are you crying? It was about praying moms, jumping up and grabbing their young from the talents of the enemy. And he saw a tear in my eyes. He said, Dad, that's AI. You are crying at AI.

It's not real. But it was powerful and it was good, and you should look it up when I'm done preaching. I don't even know what's real anymore, the man said. Because on one hand, watch this. I'm going up. On one hand, there are good things happening in my life. On one hand, I'm kind of excited about this new relationship. On one hand, I'm kind of excited about what I sense that God might be moving around, but on the other hand, there is something heavy.

I'm on the way up and I'm way down. And I'm on my way to the house of God, but there's something waiting for me at home that I have to deal with. So let me illustrate this with a picture, okay? I thought of how do I break this down? Not only for Graham's Bible study who's wondering, how do I stay in the youth camp energy year-round? But, you know, kind of all of us wish we could live in that youth camp energy all year round. Or at the very least, at the Sunday morning energy year round, if we would all be as nice to each other in our vehicles as we are in this church. What the world would be like, it doesn't take much to get you acting like you are not a Christian, does it?

All I got to do is put you in four doors with some glass and aluminum, and you forget all about the presence. The Lord is everywhere, except your car. And in that space, all is forgiven. I thought about it like this. I thought about the song we were singing earlier. We've got this song that says, I call God on the mountain. I call God in the valley. I call God on the good days.

Don't forget those. Sometimes the moments of our victory make us more vulnerable. than the moments of our defeat. Because sometimes in the moment of defeat, you're dependent on God. Sometimes in the moments of your victory, you pretend like he wasn't the one who gave it to you. So it's a great song. Or y'all enjoy and singing it, I call God on the mountain. I call God in the bathroom. And then we name everything where you could call God, because you could call them anywhere. And you could put anything in there with two syllables. It'll sing good. I call God in the kitchen. I call God in the bathroom.

You can't say that. Yes, you can say that. The Lord can go where he wants to, and he can do what he wants. He gave me a lot of sermons in the bathroom. I call God everywhere. I call God in the shower. Some of us, that's the only place we sound good singing, so we might as well call him in there, right? But here's what I wanted to show you.

I wanted to show you that the mountain and the valleys look like this. And if you ever go, just put the first graphic, please. That, if you go into a hospital and they check your heartbeat, and it looks like that, the good news is you're not going to be in the hospital very long. You go in somewhere else. But that's EKG. This is the one I wanted them to put up first, because this is normal. This is a normal heartbeat. I am going to say as little about this as possible because there are nurses and doctors that go to my church, and I don't want you to judge me.

Basically, it's telling me about the heartbeat and it's an EKG and those waves that you see, those peaks and those valleys. That's what life looks like. Yeah. Y'all see point R? I call God on the mountain. But do you see point S? I call God in the... Come on, be the choir, y'all.

And both of them are necessary for life to be present. The ascent and the lament. I had one just the other day, man. You know how it happens. You're feeling so good and you're feeling so much God. And it takes one text message. One. This is how strong my faith is.

One text message. And I can go from trusting God to wanting to wanting to. to tear into some... Okay, okay, I'm going to come back behind the pulpit. I can go from everything is so wonderful and I love my neighbor and I love you, Jesus. In fact, I think I was singing and working on a worship lyric when the text came through. And as I'm looking for the lyric, here comes a text, a mean text, a nasty text, an unnecessary text, and all of a sudden I felt the bottom drop out just like that.

And I'm like, where did you go, God? For the next hour it got in my head. Has this ever happened to you? Y'all are looking at me so confused. Just so quick, just so offended. I was so offended that I just, I was having this moment with God and then boom, drop down. I went from, put it back up there real quick, y'all. I went from R to S just like that.

You ever gone from R to S just like that? I used to think God was R and the devil was S. But I found out that in between the prayer and the answer is faith. And faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. You don't see your heart beating. That's what the readout is showing you, that you're still here. Your heart is beating while I'm talking, and you're still here. There are peaks and valleys in your life while you are journeying and sojourning through

this pilgrim experience of being a human, being a person, and you keep thinking it's not normal, and you keep thinking that you're broken, because you think that Christianity is always riding the high. But the moment that you learn that the God who is the God of this is the God of that, and this is what life looks like. It looks like I'm headed up in one area and I'm way down in another. And I'm headed up in one area and I'm way down. And I'm way down. in another. And I got one foot up and I got one foot down. And I'm doing better with my health, but I'm doing worse in my mind. And I'm doing better with my money, but I'm doing worse with my time. And here I am thinking that there's something wrong with me when God wanted me to know that both

steps are ordered by the Lord. The one here, the one there. They are both ordered by the Lord. Bring me my teaching screen. I got to teach and you about this because the enemy wants you to think that God is here but not here. But without here, here does not happen. So this message is designed to help you with your mind today because you keep thinking, what's wrong with me? That it keeps dropping out. What's wrong with me?

That I keep having to fight for this. What's wrong with me? That I keep having to relearn the same lessons. The transformation and renewal of your mind is not. a one-time event. You have to walk this out. You have to walk this out. You have to walk this out one moment at a time. Because another thing I found out put the chart back up. Yeah. Is that not only are both of those important for my heart to be, not only are both of those important for me to know God as my shepherd in the valley so I can praise him as my provider

on the mountain. But all of those things are happening at the same time. We used to talk about seasons of blessing and seasons of burdens, right? Like praise God on the mountain and call God on the mountain, and then when God's blessing you in season, and then when you're in the valley season, if I went around the room today and I asked, are you in a mountain season or a valley season? The only answer that would be appropriate is yes. So let's try it, class. Are you in a mountain season or a valley season? Yes. You mean you can go from the valley to the mountain, in a moment with a text, with a thought, because there is something to be said for seasons where God answers your prayers, and you're looking at it.

There's something to be said for seasons when you see no proof that he heard your prayer, and you're going by faith, not sight. But what I realize looking at that heartbeat is that those events are not much, that months apart. Those are moments apart. See, I thought God would bless you real good for about a month, and you'll be on the mountain for a month. But God doesn't bless you a month at a time. He blesses you a moment at a time. And it is not only the seasons that we need to celebrate, and not only the seasons that we need to be strategic, but Lord said to tell you, think seconds, not seasons.

Seconds, not seasons. As a matter of fact, this chart that is on the screen right now, this chart is showing you what happens not in one second in your heart, but in a millisecond. I had to study that. I know some certain things. I know that a season is made up of about three months. I know that a month is made up of about four weeks. I know that a week is made up of about seven days. I know that a day is made up of, well, not about seven days, exactly seven days.

Let's be clear about it. And those days are made up of 24 hours, and an hour is made up of 60 minutes, and a minute is made up of 60 seconds. But to get to a millisecond, I had to find out that is one one thousandth of a second that makes up a minute, that makes up an hour, that makes up a day, that makes up a millisecond. up a week, that makes up a month, that makes up a season. And you keep trying to handle things a season at a time when God says, I am the God who beats inside of your heart. Not every second. Take that second and slice it down to a thousand, and I am in every millisecond. So the reason I praise him isn't because I'm on the mountain nonstop, but it's that God can do a miracle in a millisecond. Yeah, I said it. I got a millisecond. Miracle working,

waymaking, covenant keeping, never leaving, never forsaking God. Give your neighbor five high-fives and tell him he can do it in a millisecond. Doesn't this make sense to us? Don't we know now why? Wow, I could go from the mountain up here to the valley. And for everybody who's self-righteous, I bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be on my mouth. Okay, Moses, when you come off the mountain, make sure you cover your face, because you're not always shining. And I can interview your family members and find out more details if I need to. But please be honest. I'm on the mountain for a minute, but most of us are one spilled cup of coffee on our khaki breeches away from saying the name of the Lord in a different way.

It is not a one-time event. And if you can go from the mountain to the valley in a millisecond, I wonder can God bring you from the valley? Come on, let's turn this thing around. Let's turn this thing around. Think of the goodness of Jesus. And all command your soul. Thank you God for saving me. Yeah, come on baseball team.

Praise God with me. I'm glad you're in the house. You had to be here. God wanted you to get this word. So what it is, when you're here, you're like, oh, that's God. The Psalm is back to Psalm 120. I am not going to get to all this all week, unless y'all would like to stay until about 3 p.m.

That did not sound convincing. I plan on wrapping up. He said, verse 1, in my distress, I called to the Lord, and he answered. me, past tense. Circle answered, Justin, how do he do that? He'd not even here in this room, but he hears what I said, and even though I can't see him, he can do what I asked him to do from a room where I cannot see him with my eyes. He said, I called to the Lord, and I couldn't see him, but he answered me.

Past tense. Well, if he answered you, then what is verse two all about? Deliver me, O Lord, from lying lips from a deceitful tongue. Why does he say, in verse one, he answered me and go on through the next six verses to describe a problem that is still waiting for him at home? I'll tell you next week. Y'all want it today? All right. I'm not like the Lord.

I want to make you wait. All right. The lie is this. You know, God is with you, but the devil wants you in this loop. Not here. Now, in the Old Testament, the temple was in Jerusalem, right? We are the temple of the Spirit of God now. God is not in this room until you show up.

Yes, he is. He's in the empty room. You know what I mean. God does not fill buildings. He fills people. But in the Old Testament construct, the glory of the Lord would fill the temple, so they had to go to a location to worship. So now get the contrast with me. He's going, I'm headed here to worship, but I'm holding some stuff as I do.

And I'm in between a battle and a blessing all in one heartbeat. You keep thinking the season's going to change and it's going to be all-meathing. mountains. I hope not, because then you're dead. Then your faith will flatline. And God's going to give you some of these, and He's going to give you some of these. And you will have to learn to praise him and worship him in the same heartbeat that your heart is broken and praise him and call him holy anyway. And the enemy will say, not here, you can't praise him here, not in this hospital, not in this prison, not in this rehab. When you get out, yeah, when you get out, you can give a testimony. You can give a testimony right now because he's the master of the millisecond

When I put it online, I might call it the master of the millisecond He doesn't just command the times and the seasons and creation from eternity not only is called in response built into the cadence of creation But in this moment in this heart he's showing me Cuckoo c c c c c I reveal myself in the rhythms of the ups the downs the eves the flows the yeses the nose and the leavings, the comings, I'm in all of it. It's all me. I'm in all of it. And the devil will say, well, God is not in this. Not here. Not here. And when he says not here, have your confidence like the psalmist did, because what's so beautiful about the psalm is that he says, God answered my prayer, but he doesn't even see the proof yet. The answer is in past tense,

but the trouble is in present tense. But he knows. Watch this. Here's your new loop. The devil is telling me God is not here, but I tell the devil he heard. Last week I preached on, he answered. And isn't that wonderful when the Lord answers? When you see your kid leading a Bible study, it's a beautiful thing. But between the prayer and the Bible study is a stage called He He Heard. And I don't have the answer yet. It's not here.

The answer isn't here. I'm speaking to somebody today, and the answer isn't here. The healing isn't here. The result isn't here. The reconciliation isn't here. The proof isn't here. And the enemy keeps trying to tell you what's not here. But in this moment, it is so vital and important for the health of your heart and the life

of your faith that every time the enemy points to an area and says, God didn't do that yet, how can you trust him? That hasn't happened yet, and you are not whole. This is not complete yet, and so you cannot call yourself a real Christian. Every time he says, not here, you remind yourself, but he hears me when I pray. He heard me when I prayed. He heard me. He's not hard of hearing.

God hears me. He heard me. There is a space between prayed and answered called heard. And when you know God hears you, you have confidence. 1 John chapter 4 verse 14 and 15 says something very interesting. That if we know 1 John chapter 5 verse 14 says something very interesting, this is the confidence that we have in approaching God. If we ask anything according to His will, shout it, he hears us. Let's read it again.

And if we have confidence in approaching God, we ask anything according to His will. He hears us. I can't hear you up here. Say it again. He hears us better than Siri. He hears us better than the people advertising to you on your phone when you're talking about lawnmowers and all of a sudden a wheat eater shows up on your phone. He hears us. That's why God spoke to me when I was praying. He said, I've got Graham, but he did not tell me the timeline, and he did not tell me that there wouldn't be lows, and nobody knows what the future holds, and nobody knows what there will be in the next season. serving God season by season. I'm serving him step by step, second by second. And since he's the

master of the millisecond, I can trust him right now and know that he heard me. Tell three people he heard you. Tell him he heard you the first time. I'm going to say that again. He heard you the first time. Sometimes you keep asking him to take things away and he leaves him. He heard you, he just isn't going to take it away right now because he's going to teach you something with it. And after he gets done teaching you with it, you will thank him for it. But that does not mean that it's fun to go through the season called Heard. Have you ever left somebody on red on a text message? Have you ever left somebody on Heard in a conversation? My family picks on Holly all the time. They'll say, Mom will leave you on Heard. Meaning that they're just asking her what they want, telling her what they want, like she's an Uber driver, telling her what they want, like she's some kind of servant to their every desire, and she's just looking right back at them, and they'll say, Mom, we'll leave you unheard.

And I'm thinking to myself, it's not that she didn't hear you. It's just that she doesn't have to. She doesn't have to do everything you ask. Look at 1st John, 5, verse 15. This is powerful. The Bible says, if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have what we ask of him. But verse 14 gives a condition. It says, if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And this is the part we don't know, because we think this is always his will. What if this is, too? Thank you so much.

You don't know how much I needed that encouragement. I'm going to get your seat on the front row next week, all right? He says he heard me and I can't really describe it to you like I want to But another one of our songs says I sought the Lord and he answered But there is a part that says I sought the Lord and he heard and he heard This sermon's so hot I'm dropping stuff up here and I realize that when he hears my prayer When he hears my needs when he hears my do you know the Bible says that God even says that God even speaks the language called groaning. One scripture says that God can interpret your groans

and the Holy Spirit will turn them into a prayer. God hears all those sounds you make. One psalmist said, I love the Lord. He heard my cry. Did you know that God speaks grief? God speaks groan. God speaks pain that you can't express in a word. God gets in that stuff too. And the devil will say, not here. And God will say, right here, in your tears, in your fears, in your sorrow, in your worry, in your anxiety. Right there. I'm coming. Right here.

Right here. New Lou. Because he hears. And what I learned while I'm waiting for the answer is to trust that what he hasn't answered, he's holding. He's holding. The Bible says, the Lord, to keep your tears in a jar. He's holding. The Bible says that he will keep your prayers in a bowl like incense, like a fragrance.

He's holding it. And he heard you. And sometimes he's holding it because he's got two hands. And sometimes he needs to do this for you and he will. And sometimes he needs to do this for you and he will. And he's the same whether the hand is like this or like this. And we don't like to be left on heard. We definitely don't like to be left on hold.

How long will you give somebody before you hang up on hold? But you don't really have that option with God, do you? You can't press Star 1-3 to speak to a supervisor. He ain't got no supervisor. You ask for God's supervisor, you're going to get God. Beside him, there is no other. So what are you going to do? I'm trusting that he's holding.

I got Graham. What else are you going to do with your kid but give him back to God? What else are you going to do with this thing? You can't control it anyway. You might as well give it. him, I promise you can walk up better if you let him hold it at the bottom. You can go to work better, even if you don't like the job, if you let him hold the part you can't control.

So I realize everybody say, he heard. Do you believe that? Do you believe he heard you? And I don't profess to know why God does what he does. He's my supervisor. I can't speak to that. But what I can see is times in my life that he was holding a problem. problem for me.

And I can not only see times where he was holding a problem, but I can look back. If I look back, I can't always see it when I'm in it because it's this and it's that. But if I look back over my life, sometimes I see how he used a problem to answer a prayer. Because he's holding both. He's holding both. Sometimes the stuff I was asking him to take away is the stuff that he used to give me grace for the thing that I didn't know what I was going to do about. Am I right about it?

Sometimes God sends a problem to answer a prayer, but if you can realize that he is big enough to hold both and you're not and you don't have to be. But I called to the Lord and he answered my prayer and the proof that he answered it isn't that the problem went away. The proof that he answered it is that he came. He came. He didn't just give the answer. Get ready to shout.

He is the answer. So not only am I saying, listen to me, not only am I saying to every person who's praying about a situation that he heard, everybody shout he heard. And not only am I saying that he's holding, everybody say he's holding. Yeah, he's holding it. He's holding it. He holds it all together.

Not you. When Chad was up here earlier, I know you didn't get to see it online, but he said those exact words to you. I was like, thank you for the confirmation. God, this is the word somebody needs. You're not holding it together. He is. And all things work together for the good of them that love the Lord.

So it's this and it's this. And it's this and it's this and it's this. And it's this. And they're not a season apart. And they're not a month apart. And they're not a minute apart. It is second by second, bless the Lord. It is second by second.

The Lord has been good to you. It is second by second. His mercy endures forever. That's why I couldn't believe when I told you after your dad's death. I didn't know what to say to you. All I could think of to say was, you have one job, breathe, next breath. When your son died and I cried on the porch and I felt so incompetent to advise you at that moment, because what would I do?

And through my tears, I told you one job, next breath. I got off the phone with him and I left your house. feeling like such a failure, because that's all I could think of to say. But he told me, and he told me, that that simple thing, next breath, was enough to get them through the hardest season of their life, one millisecond at a time. I thought I failed when I told him that, but he heard. He heard. He heard.

He heard what you didn't say. He heard what you don't know how to say still. He heard how disappointed you were and how they responded to you and didn't reciprocate after all you did for them. He heard what they said about you that wasn't true. He heard. He heard what they said about you that was true, that you wish wasn't. He heard.

He heard what you said about yourself that wasn't so. He heard. He heard what you said about yourself that was so, but he speaks a better word. He heard. I'm here to remind somebody today that he heard, and he's holding. The God of seasons is the God of seconds and milliseconds. I realize why I'm alive now, because my first point is he heard, and my second point is he's holding, and my third point is.

Y'all can't decide whether to write that down or clap your hands. I see a lot of conflict in the... The crowd is him. Sometimes you don't recognize as him, because it feels like this. The Psalmist said, man, I got some stuff waiting for me back home. Don't we all? I hate when you all go fake on me. Don't we have some stuff waiting for us at home?

Every bed is not going to be made up in your house when you go home just because you made up your mind to worship God today. And everybody that's around you didn't hear this message like you did, and they are not going to encourage you in your dream. Go for it. The Lord is with you. He said, I got some lying tongues, and if God doesn't step in, but see, he did. Now I realized why he said answered in past tense, because the answer to his prayer wasn't it.

The answer was him. Remember what Graham said? He said, I want dad on my birthday. He didn't ask for a cake, but he's going to get a cake. He didn't ask for any of those things that I've got wrapped back there. Let's be honest that Holly's got wrapped back there. See, I am the gift today. I don't have to wrap anything, just put on a black hoodie and preach.

But since you called for me, if you need something, I got it. And since I'm here, and since you're here, what do you need? You can have it. Oh, I'm not saying God will give you everything that you greed. I'm saying He will meet all your needs according. So if you need another one, I got you because I'm here. Because when you said I want dad, you got everything that dad has with dad. This is the confidence, not that the answer came, but the one who is the answer.

Pastor Mickey used to say, I went to school, and when you know the answer, you raise your hand. I wonder, is there anybody in here who knows the answer? And his name is God. His name is El-Shaidai. His name is El-Ele-Yod. His name is Jehovah Chira. And your father had what you ask for. Him.

That is the answer to this. It is not when it goes away that you can say he answered me. It's when he shows up to remind you that if you make your bed in hell, I will be your bunkmate. If you make your bed in a bad decision, I'll start breaking prison doors to get you out. If you make your bed in depression, I'll give you a burst of joy in this moment. And as long as you're breathing, I want you to know that God's got, Graham, God's got you. God's got this. Oh, I felt chills on my, what do you call these traps when I said it?

God's. No, Pastor, not here. I made too many mistakes. It's Him that shows up. In this and in this is Him. That's what life looks like. How can I ride the spiritual high? I don't know.

When you figure it out, write a book. We'll all buy it. We will make you a New York Times best-selling author every day for the rest of our life. But in the meantime, most of us have to look for God in the lows. to praise him with the next breath. He said, I'm going to worship, but I'm dealing with some things back home. I wonder, is that you today? Stand to your feet.

I'm here to worship. How many of you are here to worship today? Don't raise your hand if you didn't come to worship. If somebody made you come, don't raise your hand. It's all right. But even in the chat, say, I'm here to worship. What you have to do is get this word to go. Because what good is it for you to go to Jerusalem for a minute if you're not going to invite God into the low places to?

I remember a Bible story. It's normally for Easter, but it doesn't have to be. Where this woman named Mary Magdalene, who had had seven demons and Jesus had cast them out of her mind, tradition says she was a prostitute. There's no textual evidence for that. But tradition will label a lot of things wrong, won't it? The Bible says that she went to the tomb of Jesus early in the morning while it was still dark, and Peter and John were having this arm wrestling match to see who could see him first,

and he wasn't there. What would it be like to get to the tomb, and an angel tell you, not here? What do you do when you look for Jesus in the last place you saw him, and you feel like he's not here? What do you do when you experienced God in one season of your life, and it was so high, and now he's got you down here? I love the Word of God because it helps me get a new way of thinking about those moments for myself. Hey, I go through them too. I got flipped off on Friday, on the road, in my Jeep, with the roof down.

You know what the roof down means? That means easy access for reciprocation. Man, the Lord helped me so much. Holly said, don't look at this guy. Because here what happened. Boy, that was such a tender moment. And I feel like I need to tell you this real quick to make it practical. He's driving this big pickup truck, right?

And I already let two people out ahead of him, and it's a busy intersection. Now, I don't know how you feel about Good Samaritan rules on the road, but I think if you let more than two people go out and I have to stop behind you and the light is green, you are no longer a good Samaritan. You are overdoing it, okay? You just do what the light says and let the Lord work out when they get out. You can let one, maybe two out, but two is the max, okay? You're not helping anymore. You're overdoing it. That's the loudest y'all shout it all day.

So now listen, I let not one but two people out, but he thought he should get out too. But no, I can't do that. We've got to go. The light's green. It's busy. So I go. And Holly said, oh, don't look over there at him. He is mad at you.

I said, don't look over at who. And he had that middle finger up in his truck. And the Lord, I called on the Lord. And he answered. And he told me what to do. I stuck my finger back up at him, this one, right out my top of my roof. You know how good that felt? I said, hey, yeah, praise the Lord.

And I drove on to my house, and I checked to make sure he wasn't following me. Because sometimes the Lord will call you to answer something a little different than you normally would have. And take but a millisecond just to go from what you wanted to do to, hey. Boy, I even can see you walking around this week, just doing this to situations. I can see it. I can see it in my mind. Turn to three people and say, hey, hey, buddy. The renewal of your mind is moment by moment.

It is not on this row on Sunday. It is on the road on Monday that it will be tested. Did you get this message? And it is sometimes in the place where you expected God to be that He is not, that he shows you the greatest revelation of who he is. So the Bible says in John chapter 20, verse 11, that if she stood there at the tomb crying, and as she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels and white seated where Jesus' body had been past tense.

He's not here. He's not here. There was one at the head, the other at the foot. They asked her, woman, why are you crying? She said, they take my Lord away. And I don't know where he is. I don't know where is God in this. I don't know where the answer is.

I don't know what the right thing to do is. I don't know what doctor to talk to next. I don't know if I should call him. I don't know if I should block him. I don't know what God wants me to do. I'm just kind of like, honestly, I thought faith was like this all of my life. I'm trying to get God to do what I wanted him to do, and now I realize it's more like this. And in the dark outside the tomb as she's weeping, she turned around and saw Jesus standing

there. Oh, wait. It's him. But she doesn't realize that it was Jesus. And he asked her, woman, why are you crying? Not only a Savior who speaks the language of tears can ask a question like that. Who is it you are looking for? Is this so funny?

Who are you looking for, thinking he was the gardener, and he kind of is? She said, sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him and I will get him. Jesus said to her, Mary, and she turned toward him and cried out in her Meg, Rabonai, which means teacher. And Jesus said, do not hold on to me, for I have not yet. ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them I am ascending to my father and your Father to my God and your God. This is the gospel that God in human form died for your sin,

descended to the grave, defeated death and hell, awoke holding the keys to death, hell, and the grave. And he heard when you called to him for salvation. And he's holding the keys of death hell and the grave. And it is him in life, in death, on the mountain, in the valley. It's him. It's him. Yes, it's God. You called on him.

He's here. That's God making your heart beat. That's God giving you the next breath. That's God holding your tomorrow. That's God taking care of your needs. That's God. That's him. Give him a praise like you would give him if you knew he was here.

You knew he was worthy. If you knew he was holding your life. So now you know why. It says, I call God on the mountain. I call God in the valley. I call God. It's all God. Don't even need anything, Lord.

I just love you because you love me first. And I'm so thankful that you're here with me. that you got up out of that grave. So I call you when it's good. 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. 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. This is an IHeart podcast, Guaranteed Human.