Elevation with Steven Furtick - You Can Be Satisfied (Lisa Harper)

Episode Date: June 28, 2021

Our satisfaction can only be found in Him. In “You Can Be Satisfied,” guest speaker Lisa Harper teaches us that authentic hope comes from an authentic relationship with Jesus.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 really have to tell you, the first time, Pastor Stephen and Holly invited me to come to Elevation, I thought they were confused because I love this house. Tim, you even fat move. Like, dance, I thought he's only been a believer for a short period of time, because that's some BC rhythm, some before Christ rhythm right there, brother. But the first time, really, I want, like, I need a little bit of training between service.

My baby can dance, but mama ain't got no rhythm. The first time I got to come be with y'all, I was so excited because you have taught. me. I've learned so much about Jesus through your house, and I thought, surely Pastor Stephen has gotten me confused with Lisa Bevere. And I don't know if y'all know who Lisa Bevere is, but the woman can preach. We're about the same age, but she has much more authority than I do, and she wears leather pants. A lot of times when she preaches, and I thought, uh-oh, to keep up the charade, I might have to wear leather pants to elevation. And when I wear leather pants, it sounds like ducks are being killed.

So I'm not quite as lean as the other Lisa. And I thought, oh, this is going to be so uncomfortable. So I was thrilled to find out that they lowered the bar, that they actually knew. I wasn't that, Lisa. And so to get to be with y'all now, it's pure grace. Y'all, it's pure grace that I get to come back and run hard toward Jesus with this house. I love me some elevation. Deeply, deeply, deeply.

Respect. That's my cousin right there. So deeply respect what God has done and is doing through your house, through Pastor Stephen, Holly, the whole team here. I'm in the middle of a 40-day fast on sugar. And when Chunks called me, I was like, I'm going to get some sugar after all, baby. I get to go to elevation. Not too many sweeter houses that I've been.

into in the world, I do want to make just a couple of qualifications before we dive into the message. The first is I'm a spitter. And so I'm so sorry. We're just going to call it a baptism. E-FAM, y'all can breathe a sigh of relief that you're not in the room. I will not sprinkle you, but anybody with about 15 feet, y'all just plan to get wet. And then my second qualification is for the tech team. This is the first time I've been to elevation that I actually have a title. always have to make up a title for me because I'm creatively challenged, but I have a title. So for those of you who are Enneagram 1s or 3s or 8s, y'all are note takers. I know you are. Heaven and forbid. Here's the title. The title for our message this morning is Mick Jagger was wrong.

You with me, Mick Jagger was wrong. I'll explain that in a minute. I even have a secondary title, Bruce Springsteen was right. McJagger was wrong. Bruce Springsteen was right. Now, for those of you Gen Zers who don't know who's Sir Jagger or the boss, who they are, y'all need to rectify your Spotify. Because they're two of the best, but theoretically, Mick Jagger was wrong. In light of that title, we probably need to pray before we dive into God's Word. And so since we've loosened up a little bit on the restrictions and y'all are sitting next to your beloved reach out and touch them if they're not your beloved don't grope them but let's pray those of y'all who are listening to this online and you're driving please don't close your eyes while you pray Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus

King of kings Lord of Lords the lion and the lamb the lilia the valley mighty god wonderful counselor Messiah adonai the Christ the anointed one, Jesus, thank you for your mercy, thank you for your compassion, thank you for your accessibility, thank you that what we sang was not just inspirational. Thank you that you actually do meet all of our needs according to your riches and your glory. Thank you that you stick closer than a brother. Thank you that we can cast all our anxiety on you because you care for us. Thank you, Jesus, that when you ascended into heaven, to sit at the right hand of God, the Father,

you did not leave us as orphans. That even during those seasons when we feel missed or marginalized, your presence is palpable. Thank you that when we look back over our lives, we don't see your back, that you are present, that you left us your Holy Spirit, who even this morning reminds us that we have the right to call the God who breathe the universe into existence, dad. Thank you, thank you, thank you, and thank you for your word. As Chris said, we need it. Lord, sometimes we forget it's a love story.

We forget that we can find ourselves on these paper-thin pages, and we can find over and over and over and over again, that you're a God who condescends to embrace his people, that you're not a far-away, unibrowed librarian. You're an up, close, personal, compassionate Savior. your Jesus. We ask for more of you this morning. We ask that you would give us eyes to see more clearly and ears to hear louder and hearts that would really believe, really believe that you love us. Teach us what it is to know that, to rest in that, to live out of that reality. We ask these things, Jesus, by the power and authority of your name, and we ask it for your purposes. Amen.

Amen. I feel so close to y'all and so affectionate with y'all because you have become like a family of cousins for me. Holly has become just a dear, dear friend. I don't like standing next to her because her waist is about the size of my ankle. But other than not wanting to stand in close physical proximity, I love Holly. And so I feel safe enough to tell y'all a story that I have never told before publicly. because it's a story that is, well, it's just a little too revelatory, and it's about one of my most recent blind dates gone horribly awry. For those of you've been here before, you might remember that I'm old and single. I'm 57. My husband is lost and won't stop to ask for directions. And I do have a daughter by the miraculous kindness of God. I got to bring my baby girl home from Haiti the year.

I turned 50, and she was four. So I went through menopause of motherhood at the same time, but we don't have a baby daddy. And so I actually told her one day, I was teasing with her, and we were talking about prayer request, and I said, baby, it's okay for us to pray for a baby daddy. I said, you know, God brought you to me, but it'd be cool if we had a daddy with skin on in our house. And she went right to her little Christian school and gave that as a prayer request. I got met in the drive-thru pickup line by the headmaster, who was not at all pleased that I told a kindergartner to make her prayer request. I need a baby daddy.

So, anyway, be careful. Be careful who you use that terminology with. But I've gotten so content that I really have kind of stopped even thinking much about marriage. And part of it is I lost all my estrogen after menopause. So it's just like life, for the most part, is really good. except I can't wear pants with zippers anymore. And so I was explaining this to a friend recently. I was telling her how excited I was because I've been dreaming about a John Deere tractor for about 15 years. We live out in the country south of Nashville. I've got a little tiny farm at five acres.

And I've just been Jones in for a John Deer. And I finally found one that was used on sale. And I was just so fired up about this John Deer tractor. So I'm telling this friend of mine who's much more mature in her walk of faith of how I just, I feel like I'm finally content because I got my John Deere. And she said, Lisa, you need help. And she began to lecture me about the fact that I wasn't praying about marriage again, that I wasn't praying for a husband. And she lectured me so effectively that she finally manipulated me into signing up for a three-month trial membership

with a Christian online dating organization. Please hear me. I'm not dissing them. I've seen the advertisements. I've seen the cute couples, gazing adoringly at each other. Maybe some of y'all met through online dating, which is a cult. But other than that, I know it can work. I know it can work. And so she said the reason that I wouldn't even try it was because of my pride. And I thought, well, you know, my pride's got me in trouble before Pastor Tim. And so I thought, she's probably right. I'll sign up. It's only $79 for three months. And I thought, that's good. It's about Starbucks, you know, price. I can do it. So I sign up, and for some reason, I'm set up with a lot of men who live in their mother's basements and are

unemployed. Not that there's a thing wrong with that. Nothing at all wrong with that, but my preference would be preference. Just preference would be a man who doesn't live with his mama because we're in our 50s. And, you know, if he had a part-time job, that would be cool. And so I was really excited that one of the men I was matched with had a full-time job and had a place he lived by himself. So I thought, this is amazing. Well, we start, you know, just communicating back and forth on email. And he hadn't sent a picture, but, you know, we all lie on our pictures and we're over 50 anyway.

You should see my filters. Yeah, when Colleen takes pictures, I'm like, please stand on a ladder. so I can have, so I'm like, you know, I don't care if he doesn't have to have hair or money as long as he, you know, doesn't live with his mama. And so he was super witty. And I was like, oh, man, this is awesome. Humor is just, humor's it for me. Humor's like, wits like an aphrodisiac. I'm like, man, this is awesome. I like this guy. And, ladies, amen me on this, he could spell. That's amazing. I mean, to get a guy. And guys, I love men. Please hear me. I'm not trying to throw shade it, y'all.

It's just a lot of times on email guys are less than grammatically correct. And so if you get a guy who's witty and he can spell, I'm like, oh, my goodness, this is like Romeo with, you know, amazing. And so I thought, I'm kind of starting to feel myself kind of lean toward this fella. And so he sent me an email that happens in on. line dating that is okay let's move to the next step let's meet face to face and i was like well i would love to you that would be a delight and then he sent me a disclaimer it's rather lengthy disclaimer and i won't tell you everything in his disclaimer but i will tell you he explained and this part isn't funny so hear me he explained that he had extreme social anxiety and so he did not leave his home that he

worked from home they had not left his home in years except for rare occasions and that i mean that that's funny. That kind of broke my heart. And then he said he was also very hesitant to ever leave his home because he really, really loved his pets. I love my pets. I mean, I do. I have two dogs. I don't have, you know, a T-shirt where their picture on it or anything. Don't sleep with him, but I love my dogs. I really love my dogs. And so he went on to explain he loved his pets and he had 38 cats. And I was like, well, you know, I mean, I really want to be open. I don't want to be too picky. But Missy, my little girl, is allergic to cats, and I'm very much an extrovert. And so I thought, to stay inside all day with that many cats, I don't think I can do it.

I don't think, you know, Missy'd be sneezing, I'd be bored. I just, I don't think probably this is a match made in heaven. But I wanted to be really careful about telling this guy, probably, probably this isn't going to go anywhere, because I thought I don't want to be unkind or say anything that would be offensive to him. And I was thinking about it all afternoon. really kind of worried as to how to explain to this fella because you don't leave your home and because you're a cat boy, we're probably not going to connect. And I had to go to my doctor because I had bronchitis and a double ear infection at that time. And my doctor gave me,

he gave me some pretty strong steroids and then he gave me Ambien because he said, Lisa, the steroids are going to keep you from sleeping, so you're going to have to take Ambien tonight. Now, y'all may be able to guess the rest of the story. I took Ambien. I've only taken Ambien a few times. Last time I took Ambien, I signed up for a coffee club that I couldn't get out of it. It had an ironclad contract, and I almost bought a condo in Cabo because I get real liberated when I'm on Ambien. And so I took that ambient, and then I forgot what I did next. I can kind of identify with people who party too much, because those few little ambians I've taken in my life have just sent me right to the edge of a professional.

appropriate behavior. I woke up the next morning after this sweet man's missive, and I woke up in a panic because my iPad was next to me in my bed, and I just had this, oh, and I thought, I think I I messaged him while I was Ambien Loopy. And so I just, as quick as I could, went to that, you know, Christian online dating app, and I went to my sent messages, and sure enough, I had messaged him the night before when I was out of my mind. And I, I wrote him a dear John Lowe, and I, I wrote him a dear John letter that had bad grammar. And at the end of the note, I said, as I was basically saying goodbye, I said, maybe someday I'll be able to sit on your lap. Now, y'all, I meant to write, maybe someday I'll meet your cats. And I don't know, to this day, I am like, I am old,

have not dating forever. I am not sleazy. I do not say same things like that. It was some kind of horrible, ambient-fueled Freudian slip I meant to say, maybe I would meet his cats. And when I saw it there blinking on my screen, maybe someday I'll sit there. I just, I pin it. I got completely out of the dating app. I've never been on one since. I was like, oh, this is just so awful. And I had to tell my friend, I'm never doing it again.

I said, I'm never, it was so awkward. maybe not as awkward as, you know, rent in the plane to fly a banner, 1,800, 588, please call Lisa for a date, but awkward nonetheless. And I said, that just doesn't do it for me. I said, we were sharing stuff about ourselves, but we were sharing it digitally. I said, even if we had sent pictures, they would have been filtered. I said, that's not the kind of relationship that I'm craving. I want a face-to-face relationship. I want a real relationship. I want an authentic relationship. I want them to be able to see the spanks poking out of my stretchy pants. I want that kind of guys, if you don't know what they are, don't Google it because you can't unsee it.

But I want intimacy. I want to be known. And the older I get, the more I crave that with Jesus. I don't want a superficial relationship with Jesus. I don't want to just accrue information about Jesus. I want intimacy with Jesus. If you brought your Bible or you have your phone, turn to Genesis chapter 1, you'll know this. I've actually heard Stephen preach on this multiple times. Chapter 1, verses 26 and 27. Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness

and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock. And over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him male and female. He created them. Those verses are what we get the theology. Imago Day from. Imago Day comes from two Latin words, meaning image and God. And what this basically means is every single one of us here in South Carolina, listening online, in South Africa, every eFAM, everybody outside of the family of God, every every, single human being, regardless of ethnicity or gender or age or status socioeconomically, everyone was made in God's image. They bear his thumbprint. That means they are inherently

worthy of dignity and respect and compassion. It also means we were wired for relationship because God makes it clear in Genesis 1 that he fashioned us after himself. He's a Trinitarian God, God, the Father, God, the Holy Spirit. St. Augustine says, only the Christian God is a perfect community unto himself. And we were made in that image. That means we were hardwired for relational intimacy. We were hardwired for intimacy. We were not hardwired for social media.

We were not hardwired for distance. We were not hardwired for filters. We were not hardwired to cure. who we are so someone else will approve. And I'm not diss in social media. I'm saying, I think we've become content with what we were not made to crave. I think we call intimacy what is really merely information, both about each other and about God. A.W. Tozier puts it like this for millions of Christians. God is no more real than he is to non-Christians. They go through life trying to love an ideal and be loyal to a mere principle.

Bruce Springsteen says it possibly better. He says everybody has a hungry heart. Everybody has a hungry heart. Blaise Pascal, who have a massive platonic crush on and can't wake to hug in heaven. He was a brilliant physicist, philosopher, and theologian in the 1800s, he says it best. There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man which cannot be satisfied by any created thing, but only by God the Father, made known through Jesus Christ. I'm in the latter stages of a doctorate, and so I've been reading voraciously, because I get graded on that, and I've been reading a lot of papers about the spiritual condition of post-post, post-modern society. And one of the things that both theologians, scholars, and sociologists, that's the

hard word, smart people, have noted is that there has been an uptick in spiritual curiosity. So that in this era, I would say the modern era, there has been an increased curiosity about spiritual things. The latest survey I said, said that has been increased dramatically as a result of the pandemic. Because of the isolation, people are going, I want to have an encounter with something or someone transcendent. But those exact same polls, those exact same PhD papers and dissertations point to the fact that contentment is at an all-time low. all time low that most people feel missed. Most people feel like no matter how many likes I get on Instagram, I still feel like nobody really knows my heart.

We weren't made for that, y'all. We were made for more than what most of us are living in. Information about God is a really, really poor substitute for intimacy with God. I love this. book. I built my life on this inscriptuated revelation, but I'm telling you, if all you know is this as a rulebook or a textbook or an ancient tomb with morality tales, goodness gracious, you're not going to have intimacy. At its core, this is a love story. At its core, this is about the compassion of God. Turn to John 4. I know you know this story. You've read it a thousand times. If you were raised

half-baptists like me, you have seen it, flannel graft. John chapter four. Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John, although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples, he left Judean, departed again for Galilee, and he had to pass, that's actually not a great English translation, he didn't have to pass, he chose to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sycar, near the field that Jacob given to a son Joseph. Jacob's well was there. So Jesus, weird as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. If you are comfortable writing in your Bibles, those of you have brick and mortar Bibles. And those of you who don't own a brick and mortar Bible, this is because

I'm old, but let me bring an old sister word to you. If you're only Bible, hear me, if you're only Bible, because I know most of the times we don't bring our Bibles to settings like this. So I'm so happy you have your iPads and your phones. But if you don't have a brick and mortar biteable somewhere in your home, in your apartment, that's like an old man in short shorts. That's sad. You need a brick and mortar Bible. And I'm telling you as an older sister, those of y'all who still have tight skin and high metabolisms, there will be seasons in your life when you go, I got to be close to the promises to remember. I need to go back through the pages of my Bible and see the notes I made in my Bible.

and go, oh, he was there, he was there, he saw me. So no shame, no condemnation. If you're new to the family of God, if you don't know Jesus yet, you're still just kind of circling the church, wondering if this is true, please talk to somebody in your e-fam, somebody here in brick-and-morder elevation, and just say, I'd really love to be hooked up with the Bible, because we would love to get you an actual brick-and-mortar book to take home with you. But if you're I'm from writing in those underscore, underscore that Jesus was sitting by the well. I'll come back to that in just a minute. It was about the sixth hour. That means it was blazing hot because it was the middle of a Middle Eastern day. There came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus said to her,

give me a drink for his disciples had gone away to the city to get Chick-fil-A. The Samaritan woman said to him, how is that that you, a Jew, asked for a drink from me, a woman from Samaria. I won't go into great detail, but most of you know that Samaritans were considered half-breed. reads in the most, goodness, the most misunderstood, most demeaning way because they were half Jew and half Assyrian. When Israel was defeated and Northern Israel was carried away by the Assyrians, Assyrian warriors married Jewish widows. They'd killed their husbands. And they didn't do that because they loved them. They did that to further subjugate them and to water down Jewish lineage. So a Samaritan was considered by a Jew to be just way, way, way, way, way down on the social

totem pole. And there was even Mishnah, there was even application of Torah, the Jewish Bible, that said, if you have a Samaritan in your home for a meal, you've heaped coals of judgment on your family's head. So the persecution of Samaritans was like the persecution of some persecuted people groups we've seen in our era. So this woman's saying, how in the world would a guy like you talk to a girl like me? And Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God, verse 10, and who is it that is saying,

do you give me a drink? You would have asked him, and he would have given you living water. Well, they go on to have this beautiful discussion about theology, which again was highly unlikely. This is in the first century. This is the era and history that women were considered lower than a second class citizen, whether they're Samaritan or not, one of the most common rabbinic proverbs during the first century was better that Torah be burned

than read by a woman. A woman wasn't allowed to engage with the Jewish Bible. Women were allowed in the part of synagogue where teaching happened. They could go over to the other part and cross-stitch and share recipes, but they couldn't be in the part where they were talking about how God loves us, how he meets all our needs.

Another rabbinic proverb was thank the vow Jehovah, who didst not make me a woman. And so it's highly unlikely for a Jew to have a conversation with a Samaritan, even more unlikely, for a rabbi to have a theological conversation with a woman. And yet here's Jesus. He always turns culture upside down. Here's Jesus. Don to someone, everyone else would ostracize or marginalized. I understand this conversation with her, and y'all remember later on in John 4, he talks to her about worship.

And I know y'all have such amazing musical worship here. Chris could probably, he could probably stand up and recite all of John 4. It's one of those kind of orthodox walls about worship. It's foundational. But it's even better than we read in the black, white, and red. Because when Jesus talks to this woman about worship, Do you all remember any other facts about her besides the fact that she's a Samaritan? Y'all can talk about? Exactly. She's been married multiple times. Anybody remember exactly how many times?

Five times. And what's her current living conditions? Living with a man who won't do her the dignity of marriage. Perhaps had cats, we don't know for sure. But she's living with a man. She's living with a man who won't marry her. Now, I've heard from my earliest memories in church. I started to go to church when I was in utero.

My mom was there every time the doors were open. And so from my earliest memories, I remember this story. And I remember this woman always being castigated, not for being Samaritan, but for being sleazy. Because goodness, gracious. I mean, it's like she got marriage mixed up with Cinco de Mayo. I mean, she just gets married over and over and over again. And so she's castigated, even in modern evangelical culture, as being a woman of loose morals.

we've gotten it wrong. If you study Judeo-Christian history and culture in the first century, it's highly unlikely for a woman to be married twice. Because once a man gave a woman a certificate of divorce, it was also a label of shame. Rabbi Halel, who preceded Jesus. He died, I think five years after Jesus was born, but one of the most authoritative rabbis in Jewish history, Rabbi Hulel had such a disregard for women that he taught Jewish men. It is okay. It is okay with God for you to divorce your wife if you don't like the way she cooks. That's in Mishnah. They get to divorce their wives, and once they divorce her, what that man has said to his community is, she's not worth it. pick somebody else, she's not worth it. She's been married and divorced five times. No Jewish man is going to marry

a woman who's been divorced rarely once, but two times, three times four, there's no way. That just flies in the face of first century Jewish protocol. What modern conservative theologians assert is that not only did she not have loose morals, it's much more likely that she was beautiful with a tremendous character. That's the only thing that would justify men being willing to take the unnecessary risk, because they could have slept with her, but not given her a certificate of marriage. And yet five guys said, she's worth it to me. She's worth it to me. So stop and think. She's castigated. One of my favorite theologians believes, we can't prove this until we get to glory and meet her, but believe she probably struggled with infertility because that was also a reason

to divorce a woman. So stop and think she's been taken for test drives over and over and over again. Can you imagine at 12 when she got married the first time, which was common in their culture? And so for the first time in front of her friends and family, she says I do, there's no No way she would think at 30 I'm going to have been married five times. And then I'm going to be living on the outskirts of men with a guy who drinks and beats me because otherwise I would starve or else be sold as a slave. There's no way she considered that her lot in life. It's so interesting how other people's assumptions often cause us to step back from not only intimacy with each other,

bit intimacy with God. This woman is completely, completely ostracized. She's at the well. Heat of the day. We know all those parts of the story. We just didn't know that she may be innocent of a gossip that is maligned her. Jesus engages with her. He has an intimate conversation with her. He doesn't give her a meme that's, you know, inspirational. He doesn't give her a WWJD bracelet. They have an intimate conversation. And he talks with her about worship. Y'all, there are 10 words in the Greek translated into the word worship. Ten words in the Greek. Jesus uses one. It's pros, quinoa. It's often translated in Bibles as to bow down, but it's better than that. Pross in Greek means to move toward. Anybody guess what canuo means? It means

to kiss. It means to kiss. Stop and think about her story. She's been married five times. Every time she hopes, maybe he'll see beyond my flaws. Maybe even if I can't have a baby this time, he'll still say I belong to him. He'll still love me. Maybe if I burn his burrito, he won't kick me to the curb.

Maybe just maybe this love. will last, and it never does. And she finds herself dried up in her 30s on the outskirts of town, and she meets this man named Yeshua. And he looks into her eyes. He doesn't ignore. He's not condescending to her. And then he essentially says, if you'll move toward me with your kisses, you won't be thirsty for affection anymore. It's so intimate. It's so intimate we tend to read scripture as punitive. God is holy, perfectly holy. He gives us parameters for holy lives. I give misty parameters. When I first brought her home from Haiti, I told her that she had to hold my hand when we're in the Target parking lot. And I said, baby, you have to hold my hand

because you're little. And so when other cars drive past, they can't see you. And so if you're not holding my hand, they could run over you accidentally, and you would be a pancake. And she said, what's a pancake, mama? And so I took her home that night, and I made pancakes for dinner, and I flipped a pancake under her plate. She's like her mama. She loves her some carbs. And as she was eating that pancake, I said, baby, that is a pancake. And that's what you'll look like if you don't hold my hand walking into Target. I said, you'll get flat. And she said, I'll get flat.

And I said, you will. And she said, will I get dead? And I said, you will. Was I being a hateful, cruel mama? No, I love that kid more than I can wrap words around. I love her more than I knew. I had the capacity to love. God changed the topography of my heart through becoming her mama.

I adore this child, but I am determined to keep her safe. I'm going to protect her. I want her to live her best life. We are not created by a unibrowed librarian who's just waiting to step out of heaven and smack us over the head with the Bible. We were created by an up-close personal redeemer who longs for real relationship with us. You know, when John explains that she's the first, the very first evangelist to instigate a citywide revival, in verse 39, many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. So the whole town is changed by her testimony. And then John says that she says, he told me everything I ever did. Do you think she said that with her head bowed in shame?

It was amazing because he knew what I knew. That's how we tend to think God relates to us. that he goes, Lisa, I know sometimes in your singleness you've had naughty thoughts and you're tempted to watch sex in the city. That's not how he relates to me. That's not at all. He is holy. And he even disciplines me because I need it. But he does it with such kindness. He puts his hands on the side of my face and he says, look at me. I'm what you crave. You think. You think. You. He puts his hands on the side of my face. And he says, look at me. I'm what you crave. think that guy on some social media site, if he said, I'm okay, you're a little fluffy and you're old, but I'll marry you and I'll love your daughter. You think that would satisfy you. Honey, it won't because you were made for more than that. If he has a husband for me, hallelujah, if y'all have older brothers who are employed, hallelujah. But you know, that's not my hope anymore. That's not my hope. My hope is intimacy with Jesus.

I want to be able to say like this woman, he knows everything about me. And he loves me unconditionally. When you reveal your sin to Jesus, it's not because he doesn't already know it. It's for our good. It's for our healing. When we reveal our sin to him and he goes, I know, honey, I know. We go, he still loves me and he knows that Jesus knows. us completely and yet still loves us unconditionally. Turn to the end of the book to John

chapter 21 to bring you up to speed those of you who haven't heard this story. Peter, who is one of the original 12 disciples, he's the one I identify with the most because he's always stepping in it, always making mistakes, always doing stuff before he prays about it. He is just like caffeinated ADD and this close to being a prodigal every day of his life. just a stinker for Jesus. And I love that the stories we read, y'all, these are not perfect paleo kind of spiritual people. I mean, there are people who eat too much sugar and who struggle,

and sometimes say bad words in traffic, and I'm not justifying sin. Sin separates us from God. If sin was no big deal, Jesus could have just done detention. Sin is a big deal, but his grace is greater still. He's a kind God. He's a good God. Y'all remember the story.

You remember the story. You remember that Peter throws Jesus under the bus at the point of Jesus's most urgent, poignant need. It's just prior to the cross. And first Pete falls asleep outside the Garden of Gassimony. And then Peter denies that he even knows Jesus. He's afraid he's going to get caught up in the uproar and maybe he's going to be martyred as well. And he panics. And he goes, no, I don't know the man. I don't know the man three times. And then he throws in expletives to convince the crowd. y'all know this. Well, the next time he meets Jesus after throwing Jesus under the bus, basically it's the coolest story because the first time Peter meets Jesus, he's fishing, doesn't catch any fish. It's repeated. It's the exact deja vu moment. It's so sweet. He's fishing. Same lake. John calls it Sea of Tiberius for political reasons. It's the Sea of Galilee. Lake Gennasir. Pete's back out on a boat. He's fishing, hasn't caught anything. A stranger. appears on the shore and says, have you caught any fish? And he says, nope, not a one. He says, throw your nets to the right side of the boat. Same exact thing as Luke 5. They throw the nets

to the right side of the boat. Fish begin to catapult into the net. I mean, Pete, even as slow as he was, you know, Pete went, this feels familiar. Something about this feels familiar. And then he recognizes it's Jesus. Now, remember the context. Remember the context. Last time he saw his Savior. He has betrayed him horrifically. This is the next time. It's a week and a half later, only a week and a half. You'd think that Pete would go, I need to back the bus up. I need to get in a 12-step program. I need to go to John Maxwell Conference. I mean, I need to get myself together before I engage again with Jesus. That's not what he does. Instead, he dives out of the boat. Scholars tell us there are only about 100 yards from shore.

I mean, he could have waited two or three minutes, but he doesn't. He can't wait to get up close to Jesus, even though he's carrying horrific betrayal. But he knows what he'll find at the feet of Jesus. He knows he'll find mercy, because he's spent three years with Jesus, even though he totally messed up. He knows he'll find mercy. He gets to Jesus. You remember the story. Jesus eats a fish to show it really is me.

I'm not a mirage. And then they have a conversation. Do you remember the last conversation Pete had with Jesus? So when I was real familiar conversations in church, Jesus says to Peter, John 21, he says to him when they had finished breakfast, Simon's son of John, do you love me more than these? He said to him, yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him, feed my lambs. He said to him second time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? He said to him, yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said, feed my sheath. He said to him the third time, Simon.

Son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved because he said it the third time, do you love me? And he said, Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you. Now, y'all have heard why Jesus posed the question three times. Why have y'all heard Jesus posed that question three times? Talk back louder. Exactly, because he denied him three times. We're almost always taught that it's kind of a biblical quid pro quo that because Pete denied him three times, Jesus kind of resets Peter's faith by asking the quote. Oh, y'all, it's so much better than that. We cried at Super Rico last night, talking about the love of Christ over this one passage that we tend to miss. So often we miss the compassion in God's word. The first time Jesus asked Peter the question on the heels of

one of the world's biggest betrayals, he says, Simon, son of John, Pete, do you Aga Pell? Do you, Me. Three words in the Greek for love. Agapeo means sacrificial love. You love them more than anything. Phileo is a brotherly kind of Facebook friend kind of love. And then Eros is what I never get to experience. That's a frisky kind of love. And so Jesus says to Peter, Peter, do you agapeo me? We just translate them all love. It's so much better. It's so much more intimate. Do you agapeo me? Do you love me more than anything? Pete says, Lord, you know me. You know, I just threw you under the bus. You know, I totally blew it. You know, I filo you. You know, I love you like a friend. On my best day, that's all I've got. Second time, Jesus says, Peter, do you agapeo me?

Do you love me more than anything? Do you love me with a sacrificial love? Have you laid it all down? Are you living what you sing every Sunday at elevation? No, sir. No, sir. No, sir. You know me, Jesus.

a week and a half ago I was flinging the effort and telling people I'd never seen you in my life. You know me, Jesus. You know how fickle my faith is. You know how many times I've messed up. You know me, Jesus. You know I filo you on my best day. All I've got is a brotherly kind of love. Third time, our Savior. Don't you imagine Pete now just kind of staring at his feet?

You know, probably wearing chakos and that Middle Eastern sand. He's hot. He's grubes. He's grimy, just staring at his feet, thinking I am the worst of the worst. And I imagine Jesus, I don't know for sure, but I always get pictures in my head when I read these true stories. And I imagine Jesus grinning. And I imagine him taking his hands that have recently had spikes driven through the wrist. And I imagine him just taken that rough fisherman by the face and tilting his attention up toward him looking deep into his eyes those eyes that at that point thought no one's ever going to look into my soul again because all they'll find is failure and jesus

saying pete do you fileto me peter goes lord you you know me and jesus says i know i know you and peter right now that's enough. I'm not kicking you off the team. I'm naming you team captain. I'm going to build the New Testament Church on your shoulders. Peter, I know you and I love you. I love everything about you. Y'all, we've been deluded into thinking that our performance activates and accelerates intimacy with Jesus, and it doesn't. Intimacy with Jesus is not accelerated. It's not activated by our performance, by our deservedness, or lack thereof. It's his kindness. He closes the gap. He pursues us. Most of what it takes to have intimacy with Jesus is just recognizing you can't make it by yourself. One of the reasons I love Peter so much is my faith has been solidified in failure.

Twelve years ago, I lost everything that mattered to me, two primary relationships, one to death, and I was diagnosed with cancer, which at first looked very serious, all in the same week. And I've always been one of those girls who preaches grace, but I don't really believe it for myself. It's been like wet soap. It's been hard for me to hang on to. And so I talk about it. I can throw an across-a-cup about it.

I can even give you the Greek about it. But I, in the corner of my heart, thought that I definitely wasn't good enough for God. And I actually wondered if God was enough for me. I thought, if I don't have somebody with skin on, I'm not really sure I can make it. And I lost hope. And I got to a point of such deep desperation, disappointment. I lived in a little cottage south of Nashville by myself that I remember waking up one morning. and thinking, I've got Ambien from a time I was sick. I'm going to take too ambient, not because I want to die.

I was too afraid of the mess. I'd leave behind for people, but I just can't be conscious. I just don't, I just don't want to wake up and remember that I don't feel like anybody really knows me. And I don't feel like if they did, they'd really love me, much less Jesus. and he spoke to me during that season more clearly than he's ever spoken to me. I don't know if it was an audible voice. I was by myself. It certainly felt audible. But he said, Lisa, you've been running your whole life.

You've been running scared your whole life. So I'm going to take you to the basement and I'm going to sit there with you in the dark until fear doesn't own you anymore. I had already been to seminary the first go-around. I could pose that I had intimacy with Jesus, but most of the time that's all it was. I was running scared, and I had a lot of information about God. Intimacy with God, I just couldn't hang on to. And it was there in the dark.

It was there just smack dab in the middle of my failure. my ineptitude that Jesus held me and I learned how to be held. I learned to lean against his breath, breast and quit trying to perform for his affection. Nine weeks ago, I was hospitalized with COVID and I had a very, very severe pneumonia. And the first night, I overheard two medical personnel. They didn't know I could hear. they thought I was unconscious. I just had my eyes closed because I was so, so tired. And I overheard them lamenting the fact that they didn't think they could stabilize me. And I knew I was in trouble based on

the numbers. I knew that I couldn't breathe. I didn't realize how close I was to death. And I thought, oh, goodness gracious, I'm about to die. And I'm 57 and I have an 11-year-old daughter, and I certainly didn't want to die. But y'all, the presence of Christ in my hospital room, he was palpable. And he held me again. And I wasn't afraid. Because leaning into him is who I am now. He's my hope. He's my breath. He's my joy. He's my love. He's the reason I get up in the morning. I've been long-winded. Some people wish I didn't get my breath back after that pneumonia. And I apologize for going a little over. But I want to actually end with a question. The last thing you sang was, I shall not want. in mark chapter 10

Jesus encounters a man who's been totally missed he doesn't have intimate relationships he's blind he's ostracized he's alone in the dark and Jesus puts Easter on pause he's walking to Easter and he stops

and he says bring him to me he's that kind he is that kind he would pause everything for you. It's not a corporate grace that you're experiencing at elevation. He sees you. He knows you. He loves you. He sings to you in the dark. You may not feel it, but he is closer than your next breath. And he says to Bartimaeus, what do you need? I shall not want. Some of you are going to be. Some of you are going to

sing that, I'm going to walk out of service this morning, and you're going to get in your car, and you're going to feel overwhelmed by disappointment and loneliness. You're going to go back to your condos in your apartments, and you're going to say, I'd love to be with a guy with cats. I'd love to have somebody who pursues me. I'm tired of carrying the weight of my life by myself. Now, I just got to bow your heads and close your eyes. Again, if you're driving, listening to this, obviously, stay alert. But I would ask you the same question. What do you need from Jesus? What do you need from Jesus? A veneer of relationship with Jesus is not going to satisfy your soul. Our souls crave intimacy. He created us that way. He created us that way. He created

us to long to be held, to long to be seen by him, to have ongoing conversation with him every day, to walk with him. What do you need from Jesus? 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.

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