Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - Stay Positive, Part 1: Enough of the Bad News

Episode Date: May 10, 2020

REOPENINGSome Life.Church locations have resumed services. To ensure safety at our locations, our weekend services have been redesigned to create a sanitary, touchless environment that allows for physical distancing. To see if your location is open and to save your seat at an upcoming service, please visit https://www.life.church/updatesI’M OPTIMISTICOptimism doesn’t depend on what we see—it stems from what God says. This four-day Bible Plan unwraps eight reasons from Romans 8 to remain unwaveringly optimistic. Start reading part one of the six-part Stay Positive series: https://www.go2.lc/staypositiveSUPPORT COVID-19 RESPONSE AND DIGITAL MISSIONSYou can designate a gift to Life.Church to go to coronavirus relief or to Digital Missions like the Church Online Platform! Your gift above the tithe helps meet immediate needs in your community and around the world and helps other churches to spread the Good News of Christ to people everywhere: https://www.life.church/givingABOUT STAY POSITIVEThere’s no limit on hope. You can discover a whole lot to smile about if you know where to look. And we can help you find it! Don’t let life get you down. Stay joyful. Stay hopeful. And Stay Positive! For more about this series, visit https://www.life.church/staypositiveSTAY CONNECTEDStay updated with the latest news from Life.Church at https://www.life.church/stayconnected. You can also visit https://www.life.church/updates for the latest, or download the Life.Church app (https://www.life.church/app) and enable push notifications.NEXT STEPSHave you made a decision to follow Jesus? You may be wondering what’s next on your journey. We want to help! Let us guide you to your next steps in your walk with Christ: https://www.life.church/nextABOUT LIFE.CHURCHWherever you are in life, you have a purpose. Life.Church wants to help you find your next step. Our hope is that your journey will include joining us at a Life.Church location throughout the United States or globally online at https://www.live.life.church. Find locations, videos, and more info about us at https://www.life.church or download the Life.Church app at https://www.life.church/app. FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIAFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/life.churchInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/life.churchTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/lifechurchCONNECT WITH PASTOR CRAIGYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIIdiIO-Y20hRW9niR0CA8AFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/craiggroeschelInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/craiggroeschelTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/craiggroeschel  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Well, I really don't want to sound negative, but I'm getting sick and tired of all the negative talk going on in the world today. Does anybody else feel that way? Like it's just getting almost overwhelming everywhere that you look almost all the time. Anytime you turn on the news or read in the news app, and there is a lot of really difficult news, people are getting sick, people tragically dying, jobs are vanishing, the economy is struggling, the nation is divided, and it's a lot of really difficult. It seems like the pervasive message in the world today that this is the end of the world as we know it.

And it's so easy to get sucked into the negativity and the fear and the anxiety that seems to overwhelm so many people. And if I could just be transparent with you, there are so many different times when I find myself more emotionally on edge. I find myself getting easily angered. It's almost good that there's social distancing because it doesn't take much to get me lit up right now. I find myself more easily discouraged and often just kind of wake up feeling like, you know, can we ever rebuild this? Can we ever go back to something that is meaningful? So what I'm doing right now is I'm really, really asking God to help me to see the good

in the middle of all the bad. I'm fighting to keep a perspective of faith and a very positive attitude. So I asked all of my children, my youngest, the baby, Joy, is in the house, and she's 15. And I asked a little joy, I said, hey, Jojo, what do you think when you grow older and you're an adult? What do you think is something that's positive that's going to come out of this whole pandemic? Is there anything in your life that you think because of this, something's going to be different and it's going to be good? And she thought for me, she said, hmm, what's going to be positive when I'm a grown-up that came out of this season? And she smiled really big.

She said, I know what it is. She said, whenever my kids ask me to do something, and I tell them, no, you're not going anywhere. And the moment they start to whine at me, I'm going to look at them and say, when I was your age, they locked us up in the house for three months and told us, if you go outside, you're going to die. That's something positive that's going to come out of it. I'm going to tell my kids that. I like that. looking for something positive in the middle of all the bad news.

So I got some advice for you. Let's be wise. Let's social distance. Let's wash our hands. Let's wear a mask if you're in public and someone might be vulnerable. And let's do everything within us to stay positive. To have an attitude of faith. To look for the good in the middle of the bad and believe that God is still on the throne,

that he is still working, that he can be in this and with us, and he's still for us. Stay positive. Fight for faith. Because a negative outlook never ever leads to a positive life. What I want to do today is I want to show you why I am unshakably optimistic about the future. The title of today's message is, enough of the bad news. With that, let's pray. Father, we thank you that your gospel is nothing but good news for lost and broken people.

We pray, God, that your living word would build our faith to be optimistic about the future because you are a good, loving, and faithful God. Speak to our hearts, God, today, that we would be different in your presence. In Jesus' name, we pray, and everyone said, amen. Go ahead and type that in the chat wherever you're watching. online, just say it with us. You're with us today, type in amen and amen. Let's talk about optimism, and what I want to do is I want to first tell you what optimism is not, so we can be very, very clear, and then I want to help try to define what optimism is. Let's start with what

optimism is not. First of all, optimism is not a denial of reality. It's not putting our heads in the sand and act like everything's okay, nothing's wrong, just have a positive attitude no matter what, just deny reality. The reality is that we have very significant challenges all over the world. Optimism is not a denial of reality. It's also not blind faith. It's not just naive, wishful thinking that everything's going to work out if we don't do anything about it.

It's not denial of reality. It's not blind faith. definition online that I read, a very clear definition, is this. Optimism is simply confidence about the future or a successful outcome. It's a confidence believing that something good is coming or in assurance a belief that there's going to be a positive or successful outcome. What I want to do is I want to add some spiritual weight to a definition of optimism. This is my definition of what a faith-filled believer can be optimistic. mystic. Here's why. What is optimism? Optimism is the unwavering expectation that our loving God

is working in every situation for our future good. It's the unwavering expectation. It's an assurance deep within our souls that our loving God, he's involved, he's working in every situation for our future good. In fact, it was Paul who said this very thing to the Romans in Romans chapter 8, verse 28. He said, and we know that in all things, could somebody say in all things? Type that in the chat. Just type in all things. It might be your impossible boss or your financial setback or your annoying in-laws. Don't nudge them if they're with you at your house watching this, but you know what I'm talking about? It could be the challenges of home educating your kids or painful breakup in all things our God works for the good of those who love him who've been called

according to his purpose. In other words, even in a negative situation, it still holds the potentials to produce a positive purpose because we as faith-filled believers can live with the unwavering expectation that our loving God is working in every situation for our future good. I'm incredibly optimistic. So what I want you to do for a moment is I want you to just kind of pause, and I want you to think about what you think about. I want you to think about how you process your thoughts about the future. How do you see the future in your thought life? Because the reality is if your thoughts are consumed with negativity and fear and worry and anxiety, that's really, really, really,

bad news because what consumes your mind tends to control your life. Whatever you think about tends to direct your life. In other words, the life that you have is generally a reflection of the thoughts that you think. Proverbs tells us this that as a man or as a person thinks in his heart, so he becomes. Your life is generally moving in the direction of your strongest thoughts. And so if you tend to think the world is always in trouble and you can't trust anyone and I hate my circumstances, you're probably not going to get to the end of that day and go, wow, this was the best day ever. If you wake up with a bad attitude and a bad perspective and a bad filter and you see everything through a pessimistic lens, what you think about tends to direct your life.

What consumes your thoughts controls your life. And that's why the quality of your life will never exceed the quality of your thoughts. What do you think about? This is one of the big problems with pessimism, those who have a consistently, chronically negative attitude. Experts will tell us this about pessimists. Pessimists tend to view negative events as both personal and permanent. They're personal.

In other words, it's my fault, this has happened to me because I'm bad, I'm no good, nothing ever goes my way, I'm incapable, I'm unworthy of anything good. And then they tend to think that it's permanent. This is always going to be this way. I'm never going to have a good life. We're always going to struggle. Things are bad and they're only going to get worse.

And before long, we start to live with a very real victim mentality. The economy is bad. I'll never get the job that I wanted. The virus is unstoppable. You know, we're going to have to wear a mask for the rest of our life everywhere we go all the time. The world is never going to be safe again. here's what we have to recognize that being content, being satisfied, being blessed, being optimistic, it isn't a state of affairs, it's a state of mind. What controls your mind controls your life.

What consumes your thoughts. I want you to think about, what you think about, what consumes your thoughts. what consumes your thoughts? Are your thoughts typically drifting toward faith in God and optimism and belief about his power and his goodness involved in your life? Or do they tend to drift toward the negative? I'm just concerned, I'm worried the whole world's falling apart. If you move toward the negative, and if I can be kind of honest with you, I have to fight for an attitude of faith.

Because by nature, I tend to be a realist. I tend to be concerned, I tend to drift toward the negative. If you find yourself there, what you want to do is you want to feed your faith and you want to starve the negativity. Feed your faith and starve your fears. Why? Because whatever you feed tends to grow and whatever you starve tends to die. What I want to do is I want to starve the wrong voices that rob me of any people. potential joy, and I want to feed the things that help me grow in faith. This doesn't mean I put my head in the sand, but for me, what I do to starve the fear is I don't watch the news 24 hours a day, because if I did, I'd want to hop in a bathtub,

fill it up, and make toast in the bathtub. It's just too much. And so what I do is I do study the news every single day, 30 minutes max, one time. One time a day. One time a day, I want to know, I want to be very aware of what's going on in the world, but one time a day, I'm in focus for 30 minutes a day, and then I'm out. If I've got negative voices all around me, what I'm going to do is I'm going to distance myself from those who are only, you know, the world's falling apart, I'm going to distance myself, and I'm starving my fears. Then what I'm going to do is I'm going to try to feed the things that build my faith. And what I want to do is I want to

show you exactly how I feed and build my faith. One of the most valuable things that I do is I take a rich portion of Scripture. And I just, I try to get into Scripture so that Scripture gets into me. I don't just read through it, but I'm going to live in it. I'm going to focus on it. I'm going to meditate. I'm going to think about it. I'm going to let it. I'm going to let it work and start to renew my mind. So I'm going to give you an example. And since we're talking about Romans 828, the power of God that works in good things, I want to show you how I would go through Romans 8. In order for me to feed my faith, I'll take a rich portion of scripture. And first of all, I want to understand the context. Not just reading it, but I want to know who wrote it,

to whom was it written, why was it written, what's going on before the verses I'm reading. and so I know that the Apostle Paul was writing a very, very rich, meaty, weighty letter to the Romans. I know that Romans 8 comes after Romans 7, so I think about what's in Romans 7. And in Romans 7, I love Roman 7 because Paul was just totally a mess. It makes me feel better about me whenever someone who's spiritual is like just losing it. It makes me feel better whenever I'm losing it. And in Romans 7 he's going on this, like this rant. I don't understand myself.

I just kind of, you know, to put it in modern day language, he's kind of like saying, I'm just a screw up. The things that I want to do, I don't do them. And the things I know I don't want to do, I end up doing those. I'm such a mess. And then he shifts in Romans A. And it's almost like he's talking himself out in his negativity

and his dysfunction and his sinfulness. In the very beginning, he says, therefore now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. If you're in Christ, there's no judgment for your sins. Your sins have been forgiven, and he makes this hard turn as he starts to renew his mind. He talks about the mind that's on the flesh that thinks about the things of the flesh, but the mind that's on the spirit lives for the things of the spirit. He says if you're read by the spirit, you're children of God.

If you're focusing on the spirit, your mind will be at peace. And then I might just land in a portion of the text, like Romans 8, 18, where this is what Paul says. He says, I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed in us. And I'm just going to stop there and just read it and read that. and let it read me to feel it when he says, I consider that our present sufferings, all these things that we hate, that we're enduring that are so incredibly painful,

our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. So I'll remind myself, okay, the Apostle Paul wrote this, how did he suffer? Well, he was imprisoned multiple times, That's kind of worse than what I'm going through right now. Five times he was beaten with 40 lashes. That's pretty bitty bad.

Three times he was beaten with rods. He was stoned and not for entertainment purposes. I just felt like I should say that. I don't know. I mean, you know, rocks were thrown at him. He was shipwrecked. He spent the night out at sea. That I would hate that.

Like, you know, hanging on to a log for his life or whatever. He was betrayed, he was beaten, the guy was like left for debt on the side of the road. He didn't even look like he was alive. And this is the guy who said, our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that is to come. I let that feed my faith. Our present sufferings aren't worth comparing to the glory. that is to come. So I'd ask you, where are you hurting right now? What have you lost? Where are you experiencing a hardship that deeply grieves your soul? I know so many of you,

you're facing a job loss right now, and that's real suffering. Some of you are worried that you're sick. Some of you would be sick or have relatives that are. Some are battling. diseases like cancer and such. Some have relational challenges right now in your marriage or with your kids or you had a friend betray you or you're just dealing with the inconveniences of how do I work at home when there are kids crawling all over me, whatever it is. What I do is I tell myself as I'm reading this, what scripture teaches me essentially is that the struggle I'm in today is producing the strength I need for tomorrow. It's not even worth comparing. This momentary truce this momentary struggle is not even worth comparing

to God's future blessings and the glory that will be revealed in us. I've got an unwavering expectation that our loving God is working in every situation for our future good. So I starve my fears and I feed my faith. I starve my fears. I feed my faith. I let God's word start to renew my mind

because my life is always always moving in the directions of my strongest thoughts. So I read on, I get to Romans 826, and I stop there. Paul said in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weaknesses. I need that. It's really good news. It's good news for me. It would be good news for some of you right now.

Because I'm feeling incredibly incapable. I feel unsure all of the time. How do I lead through this? How do I preach the right message at the right time for the right spiritual response? I'm second guessing myself right and left. Don't feel prepared for this at all. And then I tell myself, he will never leave me. He will never forsake me.

His spirit helps me when I'm weak, when I'm broken. His spirit, the same spirit that raised Christ from the dead dwells within me. And I feed my faith. For those of you who are feeling weak, you feel overwhelmed. You feel discouraged. You feel like you can't take any more at all. People will tell you, well, God helps those who help themselves. Bible doesn't say that.

Bible says God helps those who need help. He helps those who are weak. He helps those who are broken. He helps those who cry out to him. He helps you when you are weak. So if you're hurting right now, who is God? He is your comfort. If you're confused, he is your guide.

If you find yourself discouraged, he's your hope. If you're anxious, he's your peace. If you are weak, our God is your strength. So I feed my faith. Starve my fears. I feed my faith. Then I go to Romans 828 and I let it sink in. We know that in all things, in all things, in all things, in all things,

and the good things and in the bad things, in the days that I love and in the days that I endure, and the heart breaks and the inconveniences in all things, God works for the good of those who love him. who've been called according to his purpose, he is that good, he is that good, he's that involved. That I visualize the olive guy. There's an olive guy, visualize it.

Literally, I call him the olive guy. Amy would remember this. 1995, I graduated from seminary. Before then, we were like poor seminarians. Before then, I think the nicest restaurant that we'd ever been to always started with an apple. Apple bees or apple woods. I don't know why, but those were like the places.

Apple woods, apple fritters, glory to God, those were the days. But when we graduated from seminary, we went to see a friend in California, and this guy, he took us to someplace we'd never been like it before. He took us to a Ritz-Carlton buffet to celebrate. Oh my goodness gracious. It's like heaven descends upon food in a buffet. There's more food than I've ever seen. seeing the most amazing buffet. And I was going through, like, we were nervous because it was

like way above our pay grade. You know, we didn't know, like, which force do you use? And, you know, like, do you, how do you get this off the plate? And so I was trying to, like, look like I knew what I was doing, because I was a seminary grad, you know. And I grabbed an olive-looking thing. It may not have even been an olive. It might have been like some foreign fruit, you know. And, but I put it on my plate. And when I put too many on there, one of them rolled off. And it hit my foot. And the moment it hit my. By foot, it rolled across the Ritz Carlton. I was devastated.

Horrible mistake. You know, a nice restaurant. And all of a sudden, this server who worked there jumped out of the curtains. Pastor Stephen was the most amazing thing. He was dressed in black blending into the curtains, and he came out and scooped up that olive so fast, perfect in form and fashion. and disappeared back into the curtains. It's the most amazing thing I'd ever seen.

I was so excited by it, I took another olive, and I just rolled it off my plate. And sure enough, out of nowhere, he came in, scooped it up, and disappeared again. And this was like the perfect visual of an invisible loving God. I mean, work with me, but I mean, this is what I honestly think,

who I don't always see, but he's always there. And whenever I need him, he's working in the middle of the situation, going in behind the scenes, whenever our enemy means something for evil. Our God, he can still use it for good. This is how faithful our God is. You may not see him, but he's there. He never leaves. He's always good.

He's always for you. And he's always with you. And I think about the olive guy. And I'm reminded of the goodness of God. So often people will say things. like this. Here's the key to happiness. You want to be happy? You want to be fulfilled? Lower your expectations. Don't expect anything good. Then you're never going to be disappointed. If you just lower your expectations and believe only bad things are going to happen, then you're not going to be

crushed when they do happen. I would tell you this. As followers of Christ, don't lower your expectations, raise your expectations in the goodness, the faithfulness, the power of our God. So many people say, I just want life to get back to normal. I've got more faith than that. I'm looking at a lot of you who want to go back to normal, and I'm remembering you were complaining about your life about three months ago. You're whining about all that you had to do, and now you want to go back to that. I've got faith in God that we can go back to something better than normal.

that he can do something in it. I may not like what I'm going through, but I appreciate what God will produce out of this present pain. God is working in all things to bring about good. I believe by faith that God can do exceedingly and abundantly more than all we ask or imagine according to his power. I'm believing that going through this, there are some of you you're going to come out on the other side and your marriage is going to be

stronger. I am optimistic that some of you, your families will be closer, that your love is going to be deeper for one another, that your generosity is going to become greater, that there are Christians who are going to become bolder in their faith, that the light of the church will shine brighter, and that the harvest is going to be bigger because we lift up the name of Jesus. I am optimistic. mystic and the goodness and the faithfulness of God. During worship today, I had to leave the auditorium. This is our first time to gather in what, 10, well, I don't know how many weeks.

It seemed like four years. And I was so emotional to have a small portion of my church family distancing themselves to be back together. So emotional. Because I realized there's nothing that's going to stop the love of God through his church. His church always prevails. His word is always true.

His presence never leaves us. He never ever forsakes us. And so I feed my faith and I starve my fears. And I read in Romans 8, 38 and 39 when Paul said, for I am convinced there is an unshakable assurance with everything in my soul I believe this to be true for I am completely convinced that neither death nor life neither angels nor demons neither the present nor the future nor any powers neither height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ, Jesus, our Lord.

I tell myself, no matter where I go, my God is there. No matter what I do, my God loves me. No matter what happens to me, my God is for me. And that's why I have an unwavering expectation that our loving God is working in every situation. for our future good. Enough of the bad news. Enough of the bad news. Let's acknowledge it.

We've got some problems. And we have a bigger God. We have a bigger God. I said we have a bigger God, a God to whom all things are possible. So rather than be consumed by fear and anxiety, I'm going to believe that our present struggles are not even worth comparing

to the future glory of what God is going to do in us and through us. Whenever I'm discouraged and weak, I remind myself, his spirit, his spirit is perfect. And my weakness, his strength is perfect. He's working in all things, to bring him, I may not see him, but he's still present, and he's still good. And even when our enemy means something for evil, our God can turn it for good, because there's nothing, not a disease,

not a sickness, not any fear that can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. And so I know that what consumes my mind controls my life. My life is almost always moving in the directions of my strongest thoughts. But the life that I have is a reflection of the thoughts that I think. My God has not given me a spirit of fear,

but of power, and if love, have a sound mind. So I starve my fears. I feed my faith. I lift up my hands and tell you, I have an unwavering confidence. that are very good, very involved, very loving God, is working in every situation in your life right now

to bring about future good, all for his glory, because that's how good our God is. So Father, today I pray that because of the truth in your word, that you would build our faith, God. to stay positive, to be optimistic. God, not because of what we see, but because of what you say. God, renew our minds with truth

that would change our perspectives, that we could reflect your goodness in all that we do. As we're praying today, those of you watching online, countries across the world, those of you social distancing in life church locations, who'd say, I want to be more full of faith and spiritual optimism.

Would you lift up your hands right now? Just lift them up in the chat. You can just say, me. I want to be more full of faith. Just type it in the chat right now. Just type it in. Father, I thank you. That it's your word that builds our faith.

That faith comes by hearing your word. And so, God, as we experience your word, would it help it to renew our minds? God, that we could focus on your goodness. your power, your presence, knowing that our present sufferings, God, are not worth comparing to what you're going to do in us and through us in this life and in eternity that you would be glorified. God build our faith. Help us to stay positive. Help us to be optimistic, not putting our faith in our desired outcome, God,

by putting our faith completely in you and your goodness. God build our faith. As you keep praying today at all of our churches, the title of this message is, enough of the bad news. Let me tell you some really good news. We call this the gospel, and the gospel is the best news ever. The bad news is, and there's a lot of bad news, the bad news is that we've all messed up.

If you look at your life and if you're really honest, you'd probably say there's a lot of things that you've done wrong that you're embarrassed about, you feel bad about, you feel guilty for. And the reason is, is because we've fought, We've fallen short of God's standards. Scripture calls that sin. And the Bible's really clear.

All of us have done it. We're all guilty. We've all sinned. And we've fallen short of God's perfect standard. But there is really, really good news. And the good news is this, that our God loves us, even though we sinned. And while we were still sinners, Scripture says,

Jesus, the sinless son of God, died on a cross. And God raised him from the dead. so that we could be forgiven. In other words, the way that you're made right with God is not based on your religious efforts and not by you stopping doing bad and starting doing good. The way that you're made right with God is by placing your faith in the perfect work of Jesus,

the risen son of God. And when you call on Jesus, God hears your prayers and he forgives your sins. And you're not just saved from eternal death, but you're saved for a life of joy and victory. reflecting his love on this earth at all of our churches that are open and all over the world online. Those of you who recognize you feel guilt and you feel the weight and you don't know where you stand with God.

If you'll call on that name that is above every name, the name of Jesus, God, here's your prayers. He forgives your sins. This is if you've never ever sinned and you become brand new, made right with God because of the perfect work of Jesus, those who say, I need his grace, I want his forgiveness. I want to put my trust in him at all. all of our churches and all over online, those who say, yes, I need his forgiveness today. I call on his name.

I need, I want his forgiveness. I surrender my life. Jesus, I give my life to you. If that's your prayer today, just lift up your hands right now and all of our churches, just lift them up. I see many hands going up right here. Type in the chat right now, I need Jesus, just type in the chat, I need Jesus.

I'm giving my life to Jesus. And as we have people all over the world crying out to him, I would love it if you would just pray right where you are, just pray Heavenly Father, forgive my sins. Jesus save me, make me new. Fill me with your spirit so I could follow you and show your love and all that I do.

My life is not my own. I give it to you. In Jesus' name, I pray. Could somebody say amen today, amen today? If you are in a life search location and you want to stand up to your feet, go ahead and stand up to your feet. If you're in your living room and your kitchen and you just want to stand up where you are, you might just get out of bed. How about that? If you're in your pajamas right now and you want to take just a moment to worship, just get on up out of your pajamas where you are.

Stand up in your bedroom right now and we're going to lift up the name of Jesus. We're going to give him some praise. Pastors, could you help me today? There be another in the fire Next to me Should I ever need remind There is a cross that bears the burden Where another died

Sing that again There be another in the fire