The Church of Eleven22 - Still Small Voice - Elijah: Wk 7

Episode Date: August 31, 2025

One moment Elijah is calling down fire from heaven. The next, he’s hiding in a cave ready to give up. What happened? In this raw story from 1 Kings 19:8-13, Pastor Matt Carter walks us into Elijah��s dark night of the soul, where fear, anxiety, and depression threatened to undo his faith. We discover that even in the cave, God does not abandon His children. Instead, He pursues Elijah in his failure, restores him with kindness, and redirects him back to his calling.  If you have ever felt like you were too weak, too broken, or too far gone for God to use, this message is for you. The story of Elijah shows us the relentless grace of a God who will never let go of His people. 📣 Episode Mentions: Scripture Passage: 1 Kings 19:1-8 Preacher: Pastor Matt Carter 📌 Supplemental Resources From This Week: From Broken Dreams to Deeper Faith - Chloe’s Story The Dark Night of the Soul - Deepen with Pastor Joby Martin S22E7 Elijah Sermon Series 🎙️ What We Discuss: 00:00 - Welcome & Setup: Elijah at Sinai 02:40 - From Bold Prophet to Broken 07:18 - The Dark Night of the Soul 10:45 - To Horeb: God’s Mountain (1 Kings 19:8) 14:06 - God Pursues Us in Our Failure (1 Kings 19:9) 19:01 - God Restores Us by His Kindness 24:00 - Elijah’s Honest Lament (1 Kings 19:10) 26:20 - Fire, Quake, Thunder: How God Met Moses (Exodus 19:17-19) 29:23 - Still Small Voice (1 Kings 19:11-13) 32:16 - Matt’s Story: Running from the Call 49:00 - Closing Prayer About The Church of Eleven22 The Church of Eleven22® is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. Eleven22 is led by Pastor Joby Martin and based in Jacksonville, Florida, with multiple campuses throughout Jacksonville and the surrounding areas. To support this ministry and help us continue to reach people all around the world click here: http://coe22.com/donate

All right, all right. Hey, it's good to be with you. My name's Matt Carter, one of the pastors here at 1122. Man, I wish you could see what I see this morning. This place is packed out. And, hey, good news. It's Labor Day weekend. It's raining outside here in Jacksonville.

You come to church on Labor Day weekend when it's raining. Solid chance. You're going to heaven, y'all. Solid. Now, if you don't know Jesus, that's a different story, but we're going to do business with that today. And so I want to invite you to open up your Bibles to the book of First Kings chapter 19. We'll be there in just a minute.

First Kings chapter 19, Pastor Jobi has been preaching for several weeks, and he is taking a much-needed break. And so we rejoice in that. Arrested Pastor Jobi Martin is a really good, powerful thing. Amen? And that's what we need. And so, going through a series on Elijah. If you, this is your first week, here's the crash course on Elijah. Eliza's probably, not probably, he is considered one of the top two or three greatest prophets in Israel's history.

I mean, this guy's an absolute powerhouse man of God. As a matter of fact, the way that the scripture describes him, and this is important. you to hear this. Over and over and over again, the Bible describes Elijah this way, that the word of the Lord would come to him and he would do whatever the Lord told him to do. What an amazing way to be defined by the scriptures, that whatever God said for him to do, he did it. And so Elijah's entire life. Biblically speaking, he was known kind of for one thing, the way that God used him powerfully when God asked him to do something. He did it. He was known for his obedience to God. This man was a stud. And then last week, if you heard last week, it was so powerful.

If he did, and I just strongly encourage you to go back and listen to it. It was unbelievable. Pastor Jobi dealt on the issue of depression. And, um, I, um, I just strongly encourage you to go back and listen to it. It was unbelievable. But last week we see just out of nowhere, out of nowhere, this incredible man of God that God has used powerfully over and over and over again. And who's walked in obedience, his entire life, all of a sudden something changes in Elijah. And what we see is this man who God has used miraculously over and over again. All of a sudden he gets overwhelmed with fear. He finds out that, I mean, this is after God has called him to stick his finger in the chest of the most evil king in Israel and call him to repent, and he did it. This is after God calls Elijah to go face to face with the prophets of bail.

And Elijah calls down fire from heaven and destroys their idols. And then all of a sudden he finds out that Queen Jezebel wants to kill him. and for whatever reason we don't know really why but all of a sudden that absolutely spirals him into fear and that fear leads to anxiety and that anxiety led to depression and that depression check this out it literally starts eroding this man's faith and to the point that this man whose entire life has been defined by obedience to God, where we find him today. Check it out, church. He's running from God. This man that's seen God do the miraculous over and over and over again. We find him today. He's running from the call of God on his life.

You know, when I was in my 20s, and I just started walking with Jesus and just really started studying the Bible and kind of had that first love with Jesus. I'd read stories like this, and it made no sense to me. I'm like, how can a guy that God just literally poured out his power through, in one of the most miraculous ways in the entire Bible, how can just a couple of days later, do we see him running from God in fear for his life? How does he forget the power of God that he just saw

to the point that he's depressed and running and afraid? Well, now that I'm 51 years old, and y'all, I've seen God do the miraculous over and over and over again in my life and now's a 51-year-old man, has been walking with God for a while, this story makes all the sense in the world. Because I have run from God. Tried it a couple times. And it didn't work. He wouldn't let me go. And that's what we're going to see today is we're going to see the faithfulness of God when we as his children get to a dry, weary place and begin to walk away from him.

Have you ever been there? Walking with God, you're in this great place in your life, walking with God, feel close to God, feel his power in your life, his approval in your life. Everything's going great. And then just like Elijah, out of nowhere, something happened. It's diagnosis comes, friend betrays, breakup happens, loved one dies, marriage hits the rocks, pregnancy doesn't go full term. The sin comes back again.

And when it happens, it just spirals you from the place of power and nearness that you just were experiencing. And just about the time that it hits you that you're struggling, that our enemy, who Jesus called the accuser, leans in and starts whispering in your ear, I thought you were a Christian. I thought you were a Christian. You fell into that sin again? Oh, oh, you're depressed. I thought Christians are supposed to have joy. Oh, you don't feel close to God? Well, maybe Maybe that's because something's wrong with you. I mean, look around. Everybody here has joy.

Everybody here is their hands raised. Obviously, they feel close to God. And so if you don't, it's probably your problem. Maybe God is done with you. And then when you get to that place at best, if this right here is just obedience and happiness and joy and faithfulness and walking with God, then at best you're kind of over here and you feel stuck to get to that place. and at worse, maybe you began to walk away from the Lord.

Maybe some of you are there today. Maybe some of you are just coming out of that place, and there are probably a good number of us that at some point in our lives will walk through that as believers, as people that love the Lord. There's a phrase that describes that season in a believer's life. You don't find it in the Bible, but you find the sentiment of it in the Bible many times

It's called the Dark Night of the Soul. I think it was first coined in the 1600s by St. John of the Cross. Dark night of the soul. It's just the experience of feeling distant from God, feeling like God is absent in our life, feeling like we've failed God, not being able to overcome a sin in our life, and we begin to be tempted to walk away,

the dark night of the soul. If you don't think it's biblical, I just want you to hear the words of the psalmist here. Just check it out. I don't have the scriptures with me, I just want to read to you some of the words of the psalmas who's crying out to God and he cries out to God. God, how long will you hide your face from me? God, how long must my soul and heart have sorrow all day long? How long, God, shall my enemies be exalted over me?

And then check this out. He says, how long, oh, Lord, will you forget me forever? Here's a guy that is struggling so deeply that feels like evil is so overwhelming in his life that he is at a place where he believes that the God of the universe who called him by name has forgotten him. By the way, who do you think said that? It's King David, man after God's own heart. And so if that's where you are today, church, I want you to know something. Number one, you're not alone.

I guarantee you there's a lot more folks in the room today and in the sound of my voice that are going through it that would admit it. So you're not alone. And number two, you're not abnormal. Some of the greatest, most faithful men and women and all of the scripture walk through something like that. And I want everybody to listen really carefully to what I'm about to say because here's what we're about to learn. We're about to learn. Yeah, it's in those mountaintop moments when we're slaying giants

and calling down fire from heaven that you learn that God is powerful. It's a good thing to learn. But it's in those moments when you're afraid, when you're broken, when you're failing, and you're running from God, that you learn something all together,

different about his character. It's in those places you learn that our God is faithful. And if you belong to Him and you put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, you're going to learn something. He will never let you go. Amen. Let's jump in the text. We're going to go through the text quickly. I'm going to end today with the story. I'm going to tell you my story and how God wouldn't let me go. First Kings, 198. Let's jump in. Now, if you remember here, what's happened is that Elijah's running from God, he's racked with fear, and then Pastor Jobi talked about it last week,

God, even though he's running from the Lord, God sends him an angel, the angel cooks him breakfast, ministers to him in his failure. Look at first kings 198. And Elijah arose and ate and drank, and he went in the strength of that food, 40 days and 40 nights, to Horib, the Mount of God. Now let's leave this up for a second. I want you to see that last part there. So he eats, starts feeling better, and the strength of the food, he goes to Mount Horib. the Mount of God. Now, this is going to be really important here for the end of this message.

Mount Horib has another name. The other name of Mount Horib, the Mount of God, is Mount Sinai. Mount Sinai has significance. I'm going to ask you a handful of theological questions through this sermon. Here's the first one. Why, you know, what's significance of Mount Sinai? I don't shout it out, but what is it? That's where God met Moses and revealed himself.

Moses and gave Moses the law, the Ten Commandments, and that's going to be really important here in a second. And so, angel comes and ministers to Elijah, cooks him breakfast, he eats, he feels better, he gets up, he goes back to the mountain of God. But in that moment, you know, we kind of think maybe he's back, he's better, he's back in the fight, he's ready to go, he's ready to be that man that did whatever the Lord told him to do, but no. First Kings 199

But there, he's back at Mount Horned out It says there he came to a cave And lodged in it Y'all, we see this later on in the story But Elijah's not back He's not overcome his fear He's still struggling, still wrestling, still running He doesn't go to a cave and be like

Oh, that'll be a cool place to hang out He's going to a cave to hide Because he's still afraid of Jezebel Goes to a cave, still running from the call of God and is like, no, listen, I don't know about y'all. But it seems like to me, just to show you kind of how far this guy's falling, how dark a place he's in, I don't know about y'all, but if I'm struggling with some faith issues and an angel shows up in my kitchen and cooks me breakfast, I'm probably going to be like, all right, my bad God

on the whole lack of faith thing. But Elijah doesn't. He runs, and we find him hiding in a cave. Now, second theological question for you. Here's a guy that God has sent an angel to, ministered to him, and he's still running and hiding in fear. How do you think God's going to deal with him? How do you think God's going to deal with this prophet that's currently walking in fear and disobedience? Man, do you think he's going to wipe his hands of him?

He's going to be done with him, disqualifying, maybe punish him, send some of that hell, fire, and brimstone we talk about so much? Watch, y'all, check out what God does. Check out what the Lord does here with this running, hurting, wounded, fearful prophet of God. Look at verse 9. There Elijah came to a cave and lodged in it. Now watch this. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him. Everybody look at those last three words.

What does it say? It says it came to him in the stone cold middle of Elijah's fear and failure and running from God. The word of the Lord came to him. Y'all check it out. 1122 church, this is huge. Elijah was not pursuing God. God was pursuing Elijah. That's one of the most comforting things you will ever hear. And that's kind of our first point. I want you to get today from this text is that if you belong to him, kind of point number one, God pursues us in our failure. Don't ever forget that. If you belong to him, it doesn't mean he won't discipline you. It doesn't mean he won't correct you, but you need to understand something. Jesus said, no one can snatch them from my hand. He will pursue you in your failure.

No better place to see that than Peter. You think you messed up in this room? I guarantee you you didn't mess up more than Peter on the night that Jesus was betrayed and arrested. Y'all know the story? If you don't, Peter was Jesus' best friend, one of his top three disciples. He was the guy that said, I'll never leave you, never betray you, I'll die for you if I have to. And yet on the night before the cross, three times, three separate times. Somebody comes out, aren't you the guy that hung out with Jesus?

And he goes, I don't know the guy. He denies even knows him. And the third time, Scripture says that their eyes met. Jesus was in the courtyard when Peter denied him for the third time. Their eyes met the rooster crows. It hits Peter. I have just disqualified myself forever. And he wept bitterly.

And even after the resurrection, everybody's cheering, everybody's pumped. Jesus is alive. Peter's trying to act excited, but there's that thing I did. You ever been there? Been to church, everybody's pumped, everybody's excited, everybody's worshiping, but there's that thing I did. That's the enemy, man. And eventually Peter just says, you know what, I'm out.

I'm going fishing. Going back to what I used to know. At least I know what to do. At least I'm not a failure there. Know how to catch fish. He runs back to the sea of galley, stays up all night fishing, wracked with guilt. You got to think, man, the whole night he's thinking it's over.

I'm done. Even though Jesus is alive, he can't get over his failure. And then maybe in one of my top five favorite verses in the whole Bible, the scripture says that when the sun, when the dawn was breaking over the mountains of the sea of galley, Peter looked up, and there was Jesus. standing there on the beach. And in that moment, in the greatest moment of Peter's failure in his entire life, something hit him that would change his life forever.

Church, what hit him was this, that I may have let go of Jesus, but he never let go of me. And now he just throws himself in that moment, he says, I may have run from Jesus, but Jesus is running after me. And he throws himself into the water, swims as fast he can, gets to the beach when he got there, Jesus cooking breakfast. Y'all see a theme? Jesus looks at him and says, you love me? Peter goes, you know I love you. And Jesus never shames him, calls him back into the ministry. Y'all, God, we serve a God. But if you belong to him, he will pursue you even after the worst moments of your entire life. After he pursues Elijah, what does he do then? The word of the Lord is going to come to Elijah.

You see God pursuing him. What's going to happen next? He's going to scold him? Going to tell him, as Pastor Jobby would say, suck it up, buttercup? What's he going to say? Man, what he does is pretty awesome, but let me go ahead and tell you what point number two is

after he pursues us in our failure. Point number two is God restores us with his kindness. The key word there is kindness. It's the kindness of the Lord that leads you to repentance. Y'all need to work on that. Let's do it again. The kindness of the Lord leads you to repentance. It's not the anger of the Lord. It's not the shaming of the Lord. It's the kindness of the Lord that leads us to repentance. And this is a beautiful picture. Look again, Kings 199. There, talking about Elijah, there. He came to a cave and lodged in it, and behold, the word of the Lord came to him. Watch what he says to him. And he said to him, what are you doing

Elijah? What are you doing Elijah? He goes to this child of his that's hurting, wounded, failed, running from God, and he asks him a question. He goes, what are you doing here, Elijah? Now, listen, I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this, but this is key. Listen carefully. I looked it up. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew. One thing's about Hebrew and Greek in the New Testament, there's nuance that you can learn as you study the original language that you lose a little bit in the English when it's translated. And this is one of those cases. Now, if you're anybody like me that grew up with a dad that when you messed up and he found you, he was pursuing you.

But he was pursuing you for a different reason. and he found me hiding somewhere, he'd ask me a question. But it was more like, like, what in the world are you doing here, boy? You know what I'm talking about? That's not the tone that God uses with this running, wounded child of God.

It's very tender in the original language. It's fatherly. It's more like God pursues him, and then when he finds him hiding in a cave, it's more like, son, what are you doing here? You know, if you get a chance, I want to encourage you to listen to the Deepen podcast for this sermon. Pastor Jobi 9, Pastor Jonathan,

had just a really, really deep, good conversation about this. And one of the things we jumped into and spent a lot of time on was parenting. We just ended up talking a lot about parenting because of this right here. We see God pursuing him, and then when he gets there, He doesn't scold him, doesn't shame him.

He loves him like a father. Speaks him tenderly. And one thing I talked about is my wife. My wife is here, by the way, and I'm thankful for that because God is moving in this church, and I'm so glad she's getting to see it today. But anyway, my wife, she's got a lot of gifts, but she, hands down, is the best mother I've ever met. My children, I tell them all the time, y'all hit the lottery with your mother.

She was not only she loved Jesus, she's godly, but man. she was a rock star mom. And one of the things she did really naturally that did not come naturally for me is when our kids would mess up. And by the way, all three of our children are adults and all three them walk with the Lord, which is super rare. And I attribute it not only to her prayer, but to what I'm about to tell you. So if your parent, take notes. When the kid would mess up, even when they were in high school and they'd really mess up. And I, You know, and my father's name, John Carter, six foot four captain in the Dallas Fire Department, when the John Carter genetics would start coming out of me?

Boy, what are you doing? It would be my wife who would come in and she would sit the child down and she would look at them and she would do something before she corrected them, before she get on them, punish them, and we did, we'd discipline our children. But she would do something before any of that. she'd look at them and very tenderly and motherly look at him and say, hey, what's going on? What was going on in your heart that brought you to make that decision? And it was brilliant because what would happen is our children would start talking

and they'd start sharing their hearts with her. And we weren't just punishing behavior, but we got down to the root issue of what was going on in their hearts. and by the way, when you're dealing with your children, you want to deal with the root issue of their hearts. My parents never asked me that question. They just started yelling at me. That's what God's doing. How cool is that? Elijah, man, son, tell me what's going on in your heart.

And we know that's exactly what God is doing with Elijah, because watch what Elijah does in verse 10. Elijah starts sharing his heart to God. As soon as God said, man, what are you doing, son? What's going on? Elijah starts talking. Elijah said, I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts.

By the way, the God of hosts means the God of angel armies. He's like, God, I don't know if you've noticed, but I got a crazy woman chasing after me, and I need the God of angel armies to show up. He says, for the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, they've thrown down your altars, your prophets with a sword, and I, even I only am left, and they seek my life to take it away. By the way, he'd been called to call the people of Israel back to repentance, and they're running

from him, so basically here's what he said to God. He said, God, number one, I'm a failure. Number two, I'm all alone, which wasn't true. And God's going to tell him that in a minute. Number three, he confesses the Lord, I'm scared to death. Look at verse 11. Almost done here with a text. I want you to watch how God responds, church.

This is one of the most beautiful, incredible moments in the entirety of Scripture. He's like, God, I need you to show up. You know why I'm running? Because I'm scared. And I'm alone. And people are trying to kill me. You ask God. That's the answer.

He's honest with God. And I want you to watch how God responds. Look at verse 11. And God says to him, go out. He's in the cave. God says, go out of the cave and stand on the mount before the Lord. Now, I noticed something yesterday that I've never noticed and I've studied this thing a hundred times.

God tells him to go out of the cave of his hiding, but he does not. He's still in the cave. It'll matter in a minute. God says, go out and stand on the Mount of the Lord. By the way, reminder, where is the Mount of the Lord? It is Mount Sinai, where God gave Moses the Ten Commandments. Final theological question, don't shout it out here, but how did God reveal himself to Moses? On the Mount of God when he gave the law.

This is key. When God showed up to Moses, when God revealed himself to Moses, how did he reveal himself? Now I'm going to tell you, look at Exodus, don't turn there, Exodus 1917, I'm going to show you, same mountain. I'm going to show you how God revealed himself to Moses when he gave the law. Then Moses brought the people, that's God's people, out of the camp to meet God. And so Moses had been up on the mountain. God revealed himself to Moses through what? A burning bush.

Fire. And so Moses, like, God's awesome, hey, all people of God, let's go meet God. And then God is going to reveal himself to the people of God. Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. So they're at the base of Mount Sinai, the same mountain that Elijah is on as we speak. Now watch this. We're going to see how God reveals himself. So when they got there, Mount Sinai was.

wrapped in smoke. Why? Because the Lord had descended on it in fire. So the people come up, there's smoke everywhere. Why? Because God showed up, but he showed up in fire again. So I was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire and the smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln. Watch this. And the whole mountain trembled greatly. So God reveals himself in fire and they're sitting there. And imagine if you're one of those people, there's like, fire everywhere, and then the mountains start shaking. And Moses is like, God's great.

He's awesome. He talked to me. Come meet him. Fire, earthquake. Are you scared? I would be. Verse 19, the sound of the trumpet. Last verse here.

The sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Moses spoke, and God answered. him in thunder. So God reveals himself in fire. The result of his presence is a mountain shaking. Moses starts talking to God and all the people here is thunder. They don't hear his voice. They just hear thunder. How did God reveal himself to Moses and the people of God on Mount Sinai that first time God revealed himself through fire, smoke, earthquake, and when he spoke, he spoke in thunder and the people were scared to death. But I want you to watch how God reveals himself this time on Mount Sinai

to this bruised and broken child of God whose faith is holding on by a thread. You all ready? And God said to Elijah, go out and stand on the mount before the Lord. And behold, the Lord passed by and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord watch but the Lord was not in the wind in other words what that means is God did not reveal himself through the wind he wasn't in it and then after the wind an earthquake but the Lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake

a fire. But the Lord was not in the fire. But watch this. And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper. Verse 13. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in a cloak. Seems like he'd read the Bible before. Different story for another day. But he wrapped his face in a cloak. He wrapped his face in the cloak and he went out of the cave of his hiding and stood at the entrance of the cave. Did you all see what just happened? When God was giving Moses the law on Mount Sinai, he revealed himself through fire and earthquakes, he spoke in thunder and the result was the people of God trembled in fear. But this time on Mount Sinai, when God was revealing himself to this broken, hurting man

whose faith was hanging on by a thread. He didn't reveal himself in fire and thunder and earthquake. Church of 1122, God revealed himself with tenderness and intimacy. And when he spoke, he didn't speak in thunder. He spoke in a father, tender whisper. And the best news of all is Elijah heard it. And he wasn't trembling. He didn't run away from God.

God. He came out of the cave of his hiding and he came to God. And God restores him back into the ministry. And something hit Elijah in that moment that I think changed his life. He was never the same. Here's what hit him. I may have let go of God, but he didn't let go of me. Never wavers again. I want to end today by telling you my story. My story of running from God, I've got 12 minutes. I went really long Thursday. I'm not going to do it today. I'm going to start before the story here, and I want to give you some really, really good news and some bad news about this God that pursues us and our failures. You're all ready for it? Here's the best news you're ever going to hear. I've shared it a few times. If you belong to Jesus, if you're here and you put

your faith and you're trust in him and you're a child of God, it does not matter how bad you fail or how far you run. Our God will never let you go. Now here's the bad news. Y'all ready for it? If you belong to God and you put your faith and trust in Jesus, it don't matter how bad you fail or how far you run. He will never let you go. And I learned that the hard way, church, got radically saved at Texas A&M University, my freshman year, got called. And the reason I went long is I told the story of my calling in ministry. I can't do that today. It was, I was not planning on going to the ministry. It didn't cross my mind. It was a road to Damascus experience. And I literally was so profoundly moving and impacting and encountering the presence of God. I had to pull over on the side of the road.

and I've been fighting God for months. And I just prayed this prayer, God. I don't care where you want me to go. I don't care what you want me to do. I'm yours. And that was the prayer that led eventually to me getting into the ministry. And I'm here today. But I had a little Elijah moment about six, seven years ago.

After I was a student pastor for seven years, went and planted a church in Austin, Texas, called the Austin Stone Community Church. y'all it exploded we had thousands and thousands of college kids coming which is great we need help like setting up chairs and stuff not so good when you need people to tie it amen so we were poor that's important knowing the story we were poor thousands of people come to this church but poor and I woke up one day about 2017 I started a planted church in 2002 about 2017 after all the success that God had given this church. Got to preach all over the country, write books,

do all that stuff. And man, I was bored. Stupid, but I was bored. I was frustrated with ministry, had some sin in my life that I was wrestling with at the time. I'd gotten to a place where, man, pursuing the Lord and studying the Word and praying is what I did because I had to get ready for Sunday, not out of an overflow of my love. for the Lord. And for the first time since I pulled over on the side of the road there, after the summer of my sophomore year at A&M and surrendered to him, I literally started thinking about getting out of ministry. He called me, make no mistake. But he wouldn't call me out. It was me calling me out. I actually even started praying about it. Like, can I do something else? That Christmas, a buddy of mine who's a billionaire in Houston. and invited me to go hunting with him at his ranch. By the way, billionaire's ranchers are pretty cool. I'm just saying.

It's like going to Disneyland, but there's 180 point deer running around. It's awesome. And we're riding around his truck. He looks at me one time. He says, hey, Matt, have you ever thought about getting out of the ministry? I kind of looked at him like, you've been reading my mail, man? What's going on? And I said, yeah.

As a matter of fact, I have. Why do you ask? Now, remember, I'm poor. And he looks at me and he said, man, I've been thinking about, you for a couple months. I have a position at my company, largest commercial real estate company in Houston. He said, I'm looking for kind of a corporate chaplain guy that can just train up my team, work with my executive team. I'll even teach you how to do commercial real estate. He goes, I'm thinking I'll start you. And he does, I'll start you at 1.2 million a year. Now,

you're laughing and you're right. That's like 2017, man. That's before inflation. That was a lot of money. A lot of money today. And y'all, when he dropped that number, angels actually started singing. And I, true story, I literally, I literally said, I'll take it running from the call of God of my life.

What I'm about to tell you, some of y'all aren't going to believe it, but we're going to be in heaven together one day and we're going to talk, and you're going to realize when we have our perfected mind, you're like, dang, bro, you were telling the truth. A few minutes later, my phone rings.

it's my doctor. I had gotten a little spot on my ear removed two days before. And, you know, not good when you get biopsy results, a call from the doctor two days after you get the thing cut off. And he said, Matt, he said, we don't know how bad it is, but you have melanoma. And if you don't know what melanoma is, it's the most aggressive kind of skin cancer. It's bad. If it spreads, you're done. Feel my heart stopped.

He said, we don't know what stage it is yet. I just got the initial results, man, you need to come home. So I looked at the guy that just offered me a job, and I said, man, I've got cancer, I've got to go home. So I go home, don't keep in mind through this whole story, none of my staff, none of my church has any idea. I'm having these thoughts about leaving. This church, I planed that God is using powerfully. Found out when I got home that it was stage one, cut a hole in my ear, everything was fine, moved on. A few days later, talking to the guy again, processing how much,

Now I'm going to tell my staff that I'm leaving and I get a call that one of my best friends, probably top three best friends in the world, dropped out of a heart attack. Did his funeral. I can still see it in my mind, his three daughters as I'm preaching about the faithfulness of God, them looking at me like I'm an idiot. How can God allow my father to be taken? A few days later, kind of moving on from that, getting over that and things got really weird and I'm going to have to do this fast.

There was a bomber. Some of y'all may remember this from the news. There was a bomber in Austin that sent a package bombed to a young man kind of randomly. He opens the package at his house, explodes, it kills it. Makes the news. Everybody's like, what in the world? A few days later it happens again to a Hispanic grandmother. She survives it, but the city is now freaking out.

They're thinking it was racial profiling. And so the city hasn't shut down yet because it's racial profiling. And then about three days later, another bomb blew up in the rich, white, suburban neighborhood. That got everybody's attention. And the city shut down. We had a serial bomber on our hands. The city shut down. FBI flooded Austin.

prayer service everything begging God to save our city everybody's nervous open up packages it's Tuesday morning on a staff meeting and somebody who should have been listening in staff meeting wasn't but was checking out Twitter found out that they had found the guy and said hey man they found him and they gave his name and we're all rejoicing thanking God that it's over and about the that we're all like, man, praise God, it's over. My phone rings. It's the chief of police for Austin. It was a buddy of mine. Hey, chief, what's up? He's like, Matt, where are you? And I was like, I'm in staff meeting. He's like, listen, man, I don't have time to explain right now, but I need you to stay where you are because the FBI is looking for you. Now, that's not a phone call you want to get.

And I literally, true story, I just started racking my brain going, what have I done illegal? Nothing. Nothing. There's a speed and take. it, but they're not going to come after me. And, but then it hits me and like, oh, I bet he went to our church. We got his name. I grabbed my executive pastors. We start pouring over our roles. Sure enough, we find the guy.

He went to the church. Not active, never given. He'd shown up a couple times. And so I'm thinking that's what it is. FBI shows up. They literally surround me, which is kind of weird. And they take me downtown, and they, they, they, they're questioning me.

And they're like, how do you know this guy? And I'm like, I've never met him. I'm like, I've never met him. And finally it hits me. They're like, okay, maybe they think I'm connected somehow because he went to my church or whatever. I'm like, guys, he went to my church, but I've never met him. And then they asked this question.

There's like 8,000 people coming to Austin at the time, which is nothing like this church, pretty big church. And they look at me and they say, you mean you went to your church and you never met him? And I'm like, yeah, unfortunately, yes. finally I got these guys to believe me that I didn't know him and the reason that they were doing all that is because the way that they found the guy as the SWAT team found him on R35

they figured out who it was SWAT team found him on the highway surrounded him and as they came in he had another bomb he was sending somebody else and he opened it and killed himself before the SWAT team could get there. I found out that the reason they kept asking these questions is because my name and address had been found in the bomb debris. Y'all, my name and address was on the bomb the guy killed himself with. He was sent it to me, and that shook me up.

Matter of fact, I took it as confirmation, it's time to go. I'm like, people, I'd had death thirst for somebody actually trying to kill me. I'm done. Two days later, I'm like, I got to go to the dear lease. Pastor Jobi and I are a lot of like. And I'm at the deer lease, and I'm hunting, and I'm calling. We're talking to the guy. I'm like, I'm done.

Dude, this guy tried to kill me. We're nailing down a date. I kid you not before Jesus. I'm on the phone with him. My phone rings. It's my son. My son never calls me unless he needs money or something's really wrong. And I'll never forget this phone call.

Sirens in the background. My son can barely get out a sentence. He stumbles. Dad, I've been in a horrible accident. I'm going to a seat in the hospital. Hangs up the phone. My son was at work that morning. He was coming home.

He'd been studying all night the night before. two-lane highway fell asleep as he hit a curve. The lady behind him said he went airborne. Thank God he was in my truck. Flip three times, full three times and smashed against a live oak tree. As I was driving 100 miles an hour back to Austin, to seat in the hospital. I did something for the first time in my entire life. I yelled at God.

Never done it before, never done it since. And I'm screaming to God, God, what are you doing? Like, if you want to kill somebody, Lord, kill me. Don't kill my boy. I get to the hospital. I don't know what I'm going to find. I walk in. I'll never forget it.

My son's immobilized. And I come and I get down in his face. And the doctor kind of comes running in. He says, he's fine. He's fine. The only thing that's broken is his wrist. And I'm like, oh, thank you. Yeah.

I mean, he's in medical school now. Fantastic young man. And the cop says. I've never seen anybody walk away from an accident like that. But it just undid me. I'm supposed to preach that Sunday. I call my executive pastor, say, I can't do it. I'm out.

He's like, who do you want to preach? I said, I don't care. He goes, what do you want him to preach on? I don't care. So he gets an associate pastor to come and preach. And then, you know, that's Sunday morning. I'm so wrecked out from everything that's happened. I'm so done that I didn't even want to go to church.

But my wife made me. And so I come to church, I'm sitting on the front row right here, the Austin Stone, and I sitting there and then this guy named Ross, who, by the way, knows nothing about what's going on in my life other than I had cancer. My son's been in an accident. He didn't know anything else about me wanting to leave. And as he opened up the Bible, he decided that day that he was going to preach on the book of Jonah. Some of y'all that grew up in church know where this is going. You know the story of Jonah? He was a guy that God had placed a call in his life to preach.

but he's running to Tarsus, which you find out he's running to Tarsus to make money. Running from the call of God in his life to make money. Goes the opposite direction of the call of God in his life, gets on a boat, heading to Tarsus, and I want you to look at the text that this man was preaching on that morning. Jonah won four. Here it is. Bring it up. But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea.

The storm. God did. The Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea and there was a mighty tempest of the sea so that threatened to break up the rest of the story. Jonah gets thrown in, whale picks him up. God takes him exactly where he wants him to be. And I kid you not, Ross was preaching. He's preaching through that text. He stops like he heard something. He kind of looks up like he heard something. He said, y'all, he said, this is a weirdest thing I've ever experienced in my life. I don't think I've ever done this before, but I just have the strongest sense in the world that I'm supposed to say this. He said, if you're here today and you're running from the call of God on your life,

and God is hurling storms at you to get you where he wants you, stand up. And in that moment, that that was the Lord speaking to me. And so right there on the front row, I stood up. The whole church is like, why Pastor Matt standing up? But in that moment, something in me surrendered. Because it hit me like a ton of bricks, and it would change my life forever, that I might have let go of God. But God hadn't let go of me. And so I prayed, I prayed this prayer. Lord, I don't care where you want me to go.

I don't care what you want me to do. And thank God. He pursued me. It's the only reason I'm here today. Listen, if you're here and you're running from the Lord, I'm dying. If you're running from the Lord, if you're running from his purpose and your life, I want you to know if there's breath in your lungs today, you have a choice. You still have a choice. And the choice is to listen to the lie of the enemy that's trying to get you to keep running

or you can listen to the voice of your heavenly father that's whispering to you. you, you are my child. You're not alone and you're not done. So come out of the cave and come home. Let's pray. Father, I love you with all of my heart. Thank you for pursuing me in that moment when I did not deserve it. God, I thank you that your word is true, that you will not let anyone snatch your children from your hand. God, I'll lift up anybody in this room. man and your woman in that place that is running from you today. And Lord, they feel in their hearts right now that you're calling them home. Lord, don't let them walk out of this room today without coming back to you. God, I ask that today in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen. Church,

let's stand together. We're going to respond. Listen, we're going to respond. Our God is worthy of a response. Amen? And so we're going to sing to him. And if you're here today and you can attest, My God is faithful when you sing what you sing with everything you got. The other thing we're going to do is want to give you the opportunity to come. If that's you, if I were to have stopped and said, anybody in here that's running from the call of God on their life, stand up. If that's you, you stand up. You come forward. We have a big old fat place down here that you can get on your knees and you get right with Jesus.

And if you're coming out of that place and God's been faithful to you, I'd love for you to come forward and you pray for the people around you. We're going to sing. Let's respond to God.