Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - The Counselor, Part 2: Do You Believe I Can Do This?

Episode Date: April 5, 2014

If you could ask God one thing, what would it be? Our questions reveal more about our faith than our curiosities. When Jesus asks the questions, He sheds light on who we really are and what we truly believe. Find out how His questions reveal our h... Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I'm sure you've heard about this Jesus, right? As soon as I heard about what he could do, I knew that he was someone that I needed to go see. Well, I mean, not see, right? Anyway, I guess you know he was in town yesterday. People were talking about this sick lady that was healed, and they said that he brought a little girl back to life. I don't know if that was true,

but I didn't care. I knew where she lived. So I heard this great commotion going on from inside her house, and I waited outside. And when he came out, I was just like, Jesus!

Have mercy on me! Jesus! Over here! Mercy! Did he answer you? Tadda! you can see where I'm going with this, right? Yeah, he did.

He comes over, and he puts his hand on my shoulder, and he asked me, do you really believe I can do this? He touched my eyes and said, because you believe, it will happen. And then I open my eyes. It's like, I can see. Well, if you have your Bible's with you today,

let's open them up to Matthew chapter 9. We're in the second week of a message series called The Counselor. Perhaps you missed previous weeks. Let me tell you what happened last week and where we're going with this. What we're actually doing is we're looking at the different questions that Jesus asked in the Gospels. He asked well over 100 questions. We're going to look specifically at four of them.

Last week we talked to those of you maybe who feel like you're in the middle of a storm. When Jesus asked the disciples in the middle of a storm, why are you so afraid? Next week may be the most helpful message for some of you, I believe. if you are battling kind of an ongoing problem, maybe an addiction that won't go away, maybe kind of a physical challenge, something that just continues to last, we're going to see Jesus asked a guy who had a problem for 38 years, do you want to be well? On Easter weekend, we're going to deal with what is one of really the most common challenges in the church world, and yet, at the same time, one of the least talked about subjects,

we're going to talk about spiritual doubts as we see Jesus asked the disciples why did you all doubt? Why are you still doubting? Today, what I want to do is I want to talk specifically to those of you that really feel like you need a touch from God. You may have a problem, a challenge, something in your life that you do not know how to solve on your own. You've been praying about it. You've been believing God for a miracle. If you need a miracle, I believe with all my heart this week's message will speak to you. When we see Jesus ask two blind guys, do you believe that I'm able to do this?

So we're going to look at Matthew 9. I want to give you the context of a few verses we're going to look at it. We're going to dive right in. Jesus had just actually healed a little girl. He raised her from the dead. Blew everybody's mind, as you can imagine, if, you know, some guy walks into a room and there's a dead little girl, and then the guy and the girl walked out.

Everybody was going crazy about this going, oh, my gosh, this guy just raised the dead. and rumors were spreading about all that Jesus was doing. And evidently, these two blind guys that wanted a miracle, had heard about what was going on, and we pick up their story in Matthew chapter 9, verse 27, and we'll read on through verse 30. Here's how the story goes.

As Jesus went from there, two blind men followed him doing what, let's say it aloud, all of our churches. They followed him calling out. have mercy on us, son of David. Two blind men followed Jesus, calling out, have mercy on us, son of David. The fact that they called him the son of David indicates that they believed that he was the Messiah, a thought that would have made the Pharisees absolutely furious. Now, we read in the English translation that they were calling out, but the Greek word actually has a stronger meaning than just calling out. The Greek word is the word

Crozzo, and it means to cry with an animalistic cry. For example, the same Greek word is used in Revelation 22 when it talks about a woman screaming out in labor during childbirth.

This is a scream I've heard six times in my life. Amy kind of looking at me kind of, you know, she's sweet and stuff. You see her in labor and she's one of girls that didn't like medicine for some crazy reason. She looked at me like, you did this to me. You know, and help us all, Jesus. It's this animalistic cry, and that's what this guy does,

because he's heard that Jesus is healing and they're thinking maybe, maybe he could do this for us. Now, obviously, I've never been blind, and it would be really difficult to imagine and what it would be like. My closest experience to being blind, I had a bad headache one time. And Amy's into these, like, oils. I call them New Age oils, just to make fun of them. But they're, like, all kind of natural healing oils

that you're supposed to put on your body. I had no idea these things existed, but there's, like, frankincense and peppermint and probably, like, zucchini oils and motor oils. And, you know, there's something for everything. So I had a headache, and she didn't have the headache oil. So she had one, and she said, I think this will work.

Let me just put this on. And my head hurts so bad. you know, put it on there. And so she put this stuff. Well, the fumes from this oil, it was so severe when the fumes got it in my eyes. I couldn't see it all. They were burning. I'm like, and I was like, I mean, I literally was running around. I don't know if you've ever seen a squirrel that's about to run in front of your car. And then the stupid squirrel like just goes, you know, instead of just going on, they just do, that's what I was doing. I was like, and I mean, I'm screaming out.

shit. And Amy's like, does your head hurt? Like, no, my eyes. She said, I told you. The oils would help your head ache. And like, I'm going to die, get the zucchini oil out of my eyes. I can't see. And so, anyway, these guys are calling out. You did this. Help Jesus. And from the depths of their soul, they're believing that maybe he could do something. So here we see that they're following him and they're desperate. They've been blind. Maybe all their life we don't know. Son of David, have mercy on us. The next verse 28, when Jesus had gone indoors. So this is interesting. Jesus, Jesus. And we see no indication from scripture that he even replies.

He just keeps on walking and goes indoors. So the blind men came to him and then he asked them, do you believe I am able to do this? Do you believe that I have the power to make you well? And they respond, yes, Lord, we believe. Then Jesus touched their eyes and said, according to your what? All of our churches, according to your faith. Let's try it again, according to your faith.

Those of you in Florida help me out according to your faith, he said, It will be done to you, and their sight was restored. Notice it wasn't according to their income. It was not according to their social standing. It was not according to what other people thought of them. It wasn't according to whether they went to church or not on the last weekend. It wasn't according to the clothes they wore because they actually wore polo clothes instead of the night to the round table knockoff brand.

Those of you who are not around my age, you do not know what I'm talking about. Just thank God that you were not born during that time period. It was not according to any of these other things. it was according to their faith, which is really an encouraging faith-building part of this story to know that God responds to faith. In fact, Scripture teaches us that without faith, it is impossible to please God. God loves our faith. God loves when we believe in faith.

And this is a faith-building story because suddenly we realize if we have faith, we can move the heart of God. But at the same time, even though this can build our faith, for some people is really discouraging because in church circles, in Christian groups, sometimes people can be cruel about this teaching and say, well, the reason God didn't do it is because you had a lack of faith. And when God does something, God should get the credit, but oftentimes when God doesn't do it, we get the blame. You didn't pray right. You didn't have enough faith. You didn't pray long enough. You didn't pray hard enough. You didn't pray with the right sign off.

You know, you prayed in Jesus' name. You're supposed to pray in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Ghost. You didn't pray. You weren't shouting when you prayed. You weren't binding up the devil when you prayed. You weren't putting your finger in your ear when you prayed. Or in other words, whatever, you didn't have enough faith. And so while, yes, God does honor faith, and that's true,

at the same time, many of us live under a false sense of guilt believing we did something wrong, which kind of raises the question, what kind of faith does God honor? We know faith moves the heart of God. What kind of faith does God honor? And in this story, what I want to do is look at three different types of faith that God honors, and it's my prayer that this story will build your faith. Number one, if you're taking notes, what kind of faith does God honor? Number one, God honors a faith that believes when it doesn't see.

God honors a faith that believes even when it does not see. Hebrews 111 says faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen. It gives us assurance about things we want, say it with me, about things we cannot. see. It's the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen. It is the assurance of things we cannot see. In fact, this is what happens in Matthew 928. Let's read it again. When Jesus had gone indoors, the blind men who couldn't even see physically, he asked them, do you believe I am able to do this? And long before they saw the results, they saw, said, yes, Lord, we believe. I would ask you the same question today. If you take whatever

massive challenge that you're facing, a relational challenge, a physical challenge, a financial challenge, a spiritual challenge, do you believe that God is able to hear your prayer and answer on your behalf? Do you believe that all things are possible with God? Do you believe that all things are possible with God? Do you believe he is able? Now, the churchy answer, if you're kind of been in the church world, oh yeah, praise a little. Hallelujah. I believe he can. Because that's what we're trained to do. But so often our actions and our words betray us. Our actions and our words show the truth of what we really believe. Because our actions often indicate we do not believe. And even the words we speak, We'll say things like, oh, all we can do now is pray.

All we can do, you know, God's like looking up in heaven going, well, you're in trouble now. You're down to me. I mean, that's really bad. You tried everything else and I'm all you've got left. All we can do now is pray. Think about it. Ask yourself, in the last seven days, what were you praying? about faithfully every single day. Some of you, not much, right? Let's be honest. Not much. Okay.

What you pray about reflects what you believe about God. Think about it. What you pray about reflects what you believe about God. If you don't pray about much, that shows that you really don't believe God is active. You don't believe that God is involved. You don't believe that God can. if you don't pray much, that really shows what you believe about God. If you're praying for some really big things, that indicates that you believe in a big and powerful God. I would say it this way. The size of your request reveals the strength of your faith.

I'm going to say that again because that was pretty good. The size of your request reveals the strength of your faith. If all you do is ask God for like little things that are probably going to happen anyway, God give us a safe trip. Okay? What is that doing? That's indicating the strength of your faith. You know, you can pray for a safe trip all you want.

Guess what? You're probably going to get their safe even without God. Most people do. You're not laughing. It's kind of funny. It's quiet in here. And whenever you're telling the truth, it gets real, real quiet. You're probably going to get there safe anyway.

Most people do. Oh, God. Give us traveling mercies. Okay. God's going, yeah, it's going to happen. Give me a good one. Give me something that's going to push me. Oh, God, if all you pray is God bless this food, that it may nourish our bodies.

Okay, that doesn't take, well, for some of you that does take faith because what you eat, that really is a miracle. Bless these ding-dongs and taco with extra cheese that it may nourish my body. Okay, I give it to you. That takes faith. But the size of your request reveals the strength of your faith. What you pray about reveals what you believe about. God, do you believe I'm able to do this? And I don't know what your story would be, but do you believe

God is able to heal a marriage that's gone bad? Do you believe that God can help you overcome an addiction that's plagued you for years and years? Do you believe that the name of Jesus is bigger than the name of cancer and that his name can overcome and bring healing? Do you believe that all things are possible with God? Because a faith that honors God is a faith that believes, even though it does not see. Jesus asks the question, do you believe I am able to do this? What kind of faith honors God? A faith that believes even though it doesn't see.

The second kind of faith that honors God if you're taking notes is this. A faith that persists when nothing changes. A faith that persists when nothing changes. a faith that continues to believe. Think about this. The guys cry out, Jesus, have mercy on us, Son of David.

And then what does Jesus do? He keeps on walking. He walks indoors. And so what do these guys do? They follow him. You can almost sense there's like this. We're going to follow him until he either heals us

or kicks us out, but we're not going away. We're going to keep believing and persisting. We're going to follow him no matter what. It's a little bit like when I wanted to meet my hero.

Pastor Bill Heibel's back 35 years ago, Bill started a church that kind of rearranged the way church was. And in the 90s and so, it was like the biggest church in America. So I'd fly out there and listen to him speak and write down everything he'd say. Like he was my hero. And now I'm honored to have him as a friend. But I just couldn't meet the guy. I couldn't meet him. And so one day he was in town talking to pastors.

And at the end of the meeting, they said, okay, Pastor Bill's got to go catch a flight. Those are you who have been approved to take him back to the airport. come on back right now. I haven't been approved by man, but scripture says I've been approved by God, so I must be on that list. And so there were like three guys walking out to take him to his van, and I just kind of joined the group. I'm just like, I'm just like in there.

Like I'll take this as far as I can take it. Like I'm just acting like just trying to blend in, you know, we're walking. And then finally they stopped and I just kept on walking and walked up to the van. And then here came Bill to get in the van. And I opened the van door for him. And he looked at me and he said, thank you, Craig. He knows my name. He's been listening to my podcast.

Maybe he's going to invite me to his chair. I mean, he knows who I am. And I got in the car and I'm asking him questions. And I came back to my office like, you're not going to believe this. But I walked in and I followed up and I met him and he knew my name. And my assistant said, he knew your name because you're wearing a name tag, you idiot. So I'm going to play this out until they kicked me out. And that's what these blind guys are doing.

And they're like, we're going to stick with them. We're going to follow him in until he heals us or he tells us to go away. What kind of faith honors God? A faith that persists even when nothing changes. In fact, I love the way Colossians 4-2 says it about prayer. We are to be what? Let's all say it aloud. All of our churches.

We are to be what? We are to be persistent. Come on, somebody in a wasso. You can do better than that. Help me out. Be persistent in prayer. and keep alert as you pray, giving thanks to God. What do you do?

You're giving thanks to God for something that has not yet even happened? What does that take? It takes faith, persistent in prayer, continuing to pray even when things do not change. In fact, Jesus told a great story about a persistent widow in Luke 18. He said, there was this widow that kept going back

to this unrighteous judge and like hounding him and bothering him. Hey, hey, hey, judge. And I want this and judge, come on, do this for me, Judge, and do this for me. And she kept doing it. In fact, Jesus said that she was driving him crazy. You can read it right there in the Bible. You should read your Bible.

It's fun, powerful. Make you laugh sometimes. She's driving me crazy. And so the unrighteous judge finally said, all right, you can have what you want. And Jesus said, if an unrighteous judge would be moved by the persistence of someone, How much more would a loving father respond to the faithful, persistent prayers of his children? God responds to a faith that does not give up, even when nothing changes. In fact, I told you about Pastor Bill, kind of my mentor and hero.

The real reason I brought him up was because of a great story that he told. It was a baptism weekend, and they baptized an older lady. And her daughter was there with her. The mom was probably close to her 70s or so, and it was so neat to see someone later in life find faith in Christ. And after the service, Bill was walking out, and he saw the daughter, who was probably in her late 40s or so, and she was just crying, just uncontrollably crying.

And Bill looked at her and said, why are you so upset? Today was a great day. You've baptized your mom. And the daughter was just visibly moved with emotion, and she said, you just don't understand. for 22 years I prayed for her and I almost stopped more times than you could count. She said at two years in I was praying and I thought this isn't working. This is stupid.

Why am I still praying? At five years in this little voice started saying to me, God doesn't care. God's not listening to you. God could never reach her. At 10 years the voice was shouting. At 15 years, I just thought this is useless. Why even bother? At 20 years I thought, is there even a God? I mean, I'm praying for her to come. come to know him and there is no result. And she said, here we are 22 years later and I almost stopped praying. I don't know who here that's going to minister to, but I know there's someone who's been praying about something for a long time. And there's this voice that says, why are you still praying? Why are you still believing? God could never do that. It's never

going to happen. And I came to tell you that a faith that honors God is a faith that persists even though things do not change, even though you do not see it. You continue believing. That's the kind of faith that honors God. What kind of faith moves the heart of God? A kind of faith that believes even when it does not see. A kind of faith that persists even when nothing changes. And number three, if you're taking notes, a faith that works, even when it doesn't make sense. a faith that is moved and marked by actions, even though everyone else would think you're crazy. You see, there's a big difference between hope and faith. There's a difference between hope and faith.

Hope is a desire. Faith is a demonstration. Hope is just an inward desire. Faith is a demonstration that moves and acts and works with faith. In fact, James, who's the brother of Jesus, he powerfully described how Abraham's faith was marked by actions. In fact, if you don't know the story, it's one of the most faith-filled stories in all of the Bible when God moves upon the heart of Abraham to sacrifice his son, crazy, ballistic,

Mike, you know, I could not even imagine ever having this kind of obedience. And what does Abraham do? He goes and gathers the wood. And he gets the rope to tie up his son's hands or whatever he's doing. And he gets the material to start the fire. And he walks up the giant mountain with his son. And he goes and prepares to take the life of his son in obedience to God. And God would never, ever actually ask someone to do this,

stops it all and says you pass the test, you've shown your faith, I'm providing a sacrifice, there's a ram over in the thicket bushes, go sacrifice that ram. You've been obedient, I can bless you. And here's how James describes the faith and the actions of Abraham. This is so powerful, James 22. He says, you see Abraham's faith and his what, His faith and his actions were doing what? They were working together. And his faith was made complete by what? Not just by what he thought, not just by what he prayed,

but how was his faith made complete? His faith was made complete by what he did. His faith and his actions were working together. His faith was made complete by what he did. What kind of faith honors God? It's a faith that works even when it doesn't make sense. Think about these blind guys. These blind guys could have been like any one of us.

You have a problem and you magnify the problem. All you think about is the problem. You're so focused on the problem you lose sight of any solution in the hands of God. We've been blind our whole lives. We're blind, we can't see. I got to walk around with a stupid little stick or my little C and I dog. They probably didn't have them but work with me. I got to do this kind of thing.

I got to beg because I can never have a job. I can never have a wife. I can never have kids. I never have any meaning. And they would have lived under the shame because in that culture, if you were blind, they believe that you did something to deserve that. You or your parents. You must have done something wrong.

And so they live with the shame. They live with the embarrassment. They could have lived with no hope. We're blind. We can't do anything. But maybe one guy thought, hey, I can't see. but I can't hear. Faith comes by hearing

and hearing by the Word of God. And I've heard it said that there's this guy named Jesus that's healing. I can't see, but I can hear. And I think I actually hear some rumors that he's coming this way. I can't see, but I can talk

and I can yell Jesus, have mercy. I can't see, but I can't hear, I can talk, and I can walk. I'll follow him. I hear him, and I'm going to go into this building. You see, I can't do a lot of things, but there are some things I still can do. And I don't know what you can't do, but if you think about it, there are some things you probably can do. And when you mix your works with your faith, that's made complete with God. I don't know, maybe you can't heal yourself from cancer. But what can you do? You can seek God and believe for a miracle. And you can change your diet and you can go to the best doctors. And suddenly, your works and your faith are working together. You may continue to go to the wrong websites and

look at things you shouldn't look at. What can you do? You can pray for the power of Jesus to deliver you. And you can put a block or a filter or some different sort of app or delete the apps and you can work and believe together. You may not be able to change your spouse, but what can you do? You can continue with the help of God to love your spouse as Christ love the church and pray for your spouse.

And your prayer may or may not change them, but your prayer always changes you. And you can let God do a work in you, and your faith and your works can work together. You may hate the fact that people are abused in human trafficking and you cannot save them all. Or you can't rescue every unborn child and make sure they're born and given a chance for life. Or you can't help every inner city child get an education. But suddenly you realize I can't do everything, but I can do something. So I'm going to

pray big and I'm going to start small. And I'm going to let my faith and my works work together because that's the kind of faith that honors God. And so you may look on and say, oh, okay, so I just have to have faith and try really hard, and then God has to answer. Listen to me, our faith is not in us. Our faith is not in our faith. Our faith is always in the faithfulness of God. And when our faith is in the faithfulness of God, then we're able to trust him with a Shadrach, Meshach, and Abindigo type of faith. You want to talk about massive faith. You take three Hebrew teenagers standing in front of King Nebuchadnezzar, and the king says, you bow down and worship this God, don't worship your God. And if you don't, I'll throw you in the fiery furnace.

And what do these kids say? We're talking like junior high kids, maybe high school age kids. What do they say? No, mm-mm, not worshiping your God. You can throw us in there and our God will rescue us. But even if he doesn't, we will not worship your God. You see, that's the kind of faith I want to have. It's the kind of faith that says this.

Do you believe I'm able to do this? With every fiber in my body. I believe that you can, God. And I believe that you will. And even if you don't, I still believe. I still believe. Because my faith is not in my faith. My faith is not in my works.

My faith is not even in my desired outcome, you see. My faith is in the faithfulness of God. A God whose ways are higher than my ways. A God whose thoughts I cannot comprehend. A God who is good through and through all powerful, ever present, and all knowing. My faith is in that God. Here's the bottom line. You say, well, okay, correct?

Good for you, preach your boy. You just go ahead with your blind faith. Simple blind faith. You just have your blind faith. Yes. Absolutely. Because I would rather be blind with faith that God can heal than have sight and have no faith. I would rather be blind with faith that God can heal than be able to see and have no faith.

because without faith, it is impossible to please God. So what kind of faith honors God? A faith that believes, even though it doesn't see. A faith that persists, even though nothing changes. And a faith that works, even when it doesn't make sense. Because that's how good our God is. Do you believe that he's able to do this with everything in us? We believe that he can, and we believe that he will.

And even if he doesn't, you see, we still believe. Our Father, we ask that you would build the faith of our church, that we would know you, love you, God, and believe you for big things, that the size of our request would reveal the strength of our faith, and God that we would have faith to believe that all things are possible with you. All of our churches, as you're praying right now, those of you who are facing something that's really big, and you say, Craig, I really do.

I want my faith and my work. to be consistent. I want to, I want to continue to believe God for what others might say would be impossible. I need a touch from God. And by faith today, I want to take it before him and believe. If you need a touch from God in your life today in some supernatural way, would you just lift up your hands right now? All of our different churches, just all of our churches lifting up hands before God. There are so many today. Father, I thank you that we have an opportunity to see you display your power and your goodness. And we will worship you and honor you, God, always and forever because you are good. I pray today that you would build our faith, that God, we would, as we hear

your word, our faith would be built. And God, I thank you that we would be moved even to action, believing and acting, trusting in you. God, I pray for those today that maybe face a financial obstacle or God, those who've had a bad physical report, maybe relational challenges or spiritual challenges, God, we lift up these needs before you. And even just as you're praying right now, just tell God what it is, what you're praying for. And God, as you know, the intimate details of every situation, every person. We pray by the power of your Holy Spirit, God, you would intervene. God, that you would act. That you would do what others would say would be completely impossible so that you would be glorified. And God, we do. We believe that you can. God, we believe that you will.

And even if you don't do what we think you should do and know you could do, God, we still believe. God, move on behalf of your children. Build our faith to trust you always. As you keep praying today at all of our different churches, nobody looking around. There's a verse I put in your notes from 2. that talks about our spiritual enemy, he's called the God of this world, the little G God, has blinded the minds of unbelievers so they can't see the truth of the gospel, has blinded the minds. I can remember even growing up and going to church and being a church person, but I didn't see the truth of the gospel.

I was in church, but I didn't understand the truth of the gospel. I continue to think I'd have to try harder and be better and stop being so bad to win the approval of God, but I didn't understand that it was simply by faith. The only way I could ever be right with God was by His grace through faith, believing that His Son Jesus was enough. You see, God loves you so much. It doesn't matter what you've done. God continues to love you.

And he showed his love in the most radical way in that he became one of us in the person of his son, Jesus, who was perfect in every way without sin, died and rose again so that our sins could be forgiven, that we could be completely transformed. And the way we avail ourselves of this gift is simply by faith, believing that what Jesus did is enough for us. And all of our churches today, there are those of you, the blinders are going to be taken off, and you're simply going to believe. What will you say? That takes faith? Absolutely. It takes faith. Well, that seems too good to be true. It's so good. It's got to be true. No one could ever make this up. And that's why you're here today and you can sense it. By faith today, you're going to surrender your life and say,

yes, Jesus, take over. Forgive me of all my sins. Transform me, make me new. I surrender my life to you and give it to you today. By faith, I believe, and trust my life to you. That's your prayer. Would you lift your hands high right now? All of our churches lift them high and say, yes, that's my prayer. Right there, ma'am, and both of you right over here, God bless you guys, here in this section. Praise God for you right back over here and up here. God bless you guys. Others of you right back here, two hands high up here all the way in the back. Others call out on his name. There are others say yes. I trust you by faith. I surrender my life to you. Others today who say yes, that's my prayer over here right here as well. God bless you. I surrender to him. Church

online you click right below me. Would you all join your voices and your hearts and prayer with those all around you? Pray Heavenly Father. Today by faith, I surrender my life completely to you, calling on Jesus to forgive me, to change me, to make me new. My life is not my own. I surrender it all to you. Fill me with your spirit so I could know you, so I could serve you, so I could follow you for the rest of my life. Thank you for new life. I give you mine.

In Jesus' name I pray. Life Church, would you worship big worship God? Welcome those fours into the family of God today.