The Church of Eleven22 - Trusting God's Better Plan - Impossible to Possible - Matthew S5E6

Episode Date: July 5, 2026

What do you do when God doesn't do what you want? When life doesn't unfold the way we hoped, it's easy to question God's plan or lose sight of His goodness. But what if those moments are actually revealing something deeper about our hearts? In this message from Matthew 17–18, Pastor Matt Carter unpacks how unmet expectations expose where our trust truly lies and reminds us that following Jesus isn't about getting our way—it's about surrendering to His. Even when we don't understand what God is doing, we can trust that His plans are always better than our own. Supplemental Resources From This Week: • Jesus Through the Eyes of a Child • Do You Really Trust God? - Deepen with Pastor Joby Martin: Matthew S5E6 • Trusting God's Better Plan - Impossible to Possible - Matthew S5E6 (Full Service) • Matthew Season 5 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. That's up, 1122. Glad you're here. Happy 4th of July. You made it. If you're in church the morning after 4th of July, solid chance you're going to heaven. Congratulations. Glad you're here. Open up your Bible today, Book of Matthew. We're continuing through the text this morning. We're going to be in Matthew Chapter 17. Matthew 17. We're going to see Jesus rebuke the disciples today. in one of the most kind of profound, difficult ways that he rebukes the disciples in his entire three-year ministry with them. And we're going to look at why and then evaluating our own hearts if we see in our hearts what was going on in their hearts. But I'd love to pray. Let's pray. Y'all call with me praying real quick. Thank you. Thank you.

I'm glad somebody's with me. Let's go. Let's bow our heads and let's get our hearts ready to hear the word of God. So we leave here differently today. Father, I want to pray something more than any other thing. Lord, I pray that your name today would be exalted. That your name would be exalted over my name, that your name would be exalted over this church.

Lord, I pray that every single person in this room would hear clearly from your word today that your spirit would speak to us in areas that we need to change and repent and turn. And Lord, I pray that my preaching would not be in persuasive words of wisdom, but a demonstration of the Holy Spirit's power so that our faith would not rest on the wisdom of men but the power of God. And I ask that in Jesus' name.

Amen. Amen. Well, listen, Jesus used an analogy. He was talking about our faith in him. And this interesting analogy, he talked about your faith and my faith being like a house. And he said, the house of our faith is built on one of two foundations. talking about faith in him. He said, your house of faith is either built on a foundation of sand that will not hold.

Or it's built, the house of your faith is built on a foundation of the rock, the rock of Jesus. No matter what happens, it will hold. And then he said that there was something that was going to come into all of our lives that would reveal which foundation your house of faith is built on. Do you guys remember what he said would come in and be the revealing factor of your faith? He said storms. Storms. He said the winds blew and the rains came.

And those that had built their house on the sand fell. And the fall was great. But he said those whose faith, and whose house was built on the rock, the storms could come, the rain could come, the wind could come, and their house will stand because it's built on the rock of Jesus Christ. There's nothing that does a better job of revealing what your house of faith is built on other than storms. And so here's a question you and I are about to get to the bottom of hopefully, and it's this, is how are you going to respond when the storms of life come?

And specifically, specifically, because this is the storm we're going to see coming in the disciples' lives, specifically the storm of when God doesn't do something that you want him to do, that kind of storm. When God doesn't do things the way you think he ought to do them. How do you respond when God allows something in your life that you would have never chosen for yourself or for your first? family. It's honestly a very, very, very important question to get to the bottom of, because here's the harsh reality is that if you live long enough, if you live long enough, eventually something is going to come into your life and you would have never chosen it for yourself. Old people say amen. Amen. It's coming. Young people, you know, Jacksonville is full of young, beautiful,

perfect people. It's coming, y'all. Something's going to happen. The wheels are going to fall off. And how you respond in that moment, listen carefully, when that thing comes in your life, whatever it is, you know, the diagnosis comes, the marriage falls apart, the child rebels, the child gets sick, the friend betrays, the loved one passes away, the dream dies, whatever it is, the spouse doesn't ever come, like, whatever it is when that storm hits you, in that moment it's going to reveal something about your character and your faith and here's what it's going to reveal it's going to reveal whether Jesus is the center of your story or are you the center of your story that storm when God allows something or he does something away you never would have chosen for yourself it's going to reveal truly whether Jesus is the most important thing in your life or if you're the most important thing in your life. We're about to see the disciples have that moment right there.

They're cruising along, they're doing their thing. Jesus is kind of at the height of his popularity. They're kind of popular, too. They never dream that for themselves. And they're about to come face to face with a reality. Check this out that Jesus plans for their life are radically different than what they thought Jesus plans for their life was. And it's going to, y'all, it's going to shake them to their core.

Right? It's going to mess them up. Now, I think it's important to take just a second to talk about the context of what the disciples just experienced before we see them realizing that Jesus' plan for them is radically different than their plan. And I think it's important to understand what just happened. They just experienced the transfiguration. Now, if Pastor Jobb we talked about last week, y'all, if y'all want to hear that message, I want to encourage you. I want to challenge you to make sure you listen to it this week. It's phenomenal.

Amen? Anybody hear that last week? It was incredible. Go listen to it. Blew me away. But anyway, what happens is Jesus brings the disciples, Peter, James and John, up on this mountain. And the scripture says he was transfigured before them. Bottom line is that Jesus is fully God and fully man, but the disciples had only see the

fully man part. But up on the mountain of transfiguration, Jesus let them see his divinity. I mean, he was like shining and stuff. They saw that he was everything he said he was. He kind of took the veil off and they got to see that he is fully God. On top of that, he was, they would go up there, the disciples, he's having a conversation with Moses and Elijah for crying out loud. That's got to be pretty cool if you're Peter, James, and John, and you're seeing that.

And if that were not enough, God the Father starts talking. That would be amazing. I don't know about y'all, but I'm thinking, that if I'm the disciples, right, and I'm seeing Jesus in his fully divine state, he's having a conversation with Moses and Elijah, and God the Father begins to speak, I would like to think that in that moment, if I saw that and heard that, that my faith would become unshakable. I would hope. But that's not what happens.

I want you to watch. Now remember, they just experienced a amount of transfiguration. they saw Jesus divinity, they hurt God. I want you to watch what happens next. Matthew 1722, check this out. Jesus goes off the Mount of Transfiguration. They've seen him in his divinity and his power. Then he heals a kid, see his power again,

and then he's going to drop a bomb on him. Watch it, watch this. He's going to basically tell them about the cross and the resurrection. 1722, as they were gathered in Galilee, Jesus said to them, the son of man is about to be delivered into the hands of men and they will kill him and he will be raised on the third day. Now, how do you think,

considering that they just came down off the Mount of Transfiguration, saw Jesus, talking to Moses, heard the voice of God, how do you think they're going to respond? Again, I would like to think that I would respond something like this. If I just heard the voice of God and saw Jesus talking to Moses, I come down off the mountain, and he looks at me and says, hey, Matt, need to let you know, I'm going to get arrested and I'm going to die and I'm going to rise again. I would hope that my response would be, well, Jesus, you're God and I'm not. And I don't fully understand everything you just said, but I just saw you up on the mountain and God's pretty real and he seems to be a big deal.

I trust you. That's what I would hope That I would respond You would hope the disciples would But that's not how they responded I left out the last little part of that verse It tells us how they responded Let me show you how they responded

Look at verse 22 again It says then they were gathering Galilee And Jesus said to them The Son of man is about to be delivered into the hands of men That means be arrested And they will kill him And he will be raised on the third day

Watch this and they were greatly distressed. They were greatly distressed. Look at those two words. That was their response. Immediately after the Transfiguration, Jesus was like, hey, I'm going to get arrested and die and rise again, and they were greatly distressed.

I looked up those two words. Because I'm like, I wonder if there's any depth in the story there that that doesn't really show. And honestly, I'm not a big fan of the way that the ESV translated greatly distressed. because when I hear distressed, I hear stressed out, worried. It's kind of how I feel when I realize that the Dallas Cowboys will likely not win a championship. Before Jesus comes back, that's how I feel. Distressed, right?

Stressed out. That's actually not the word that Matthew uses. This word that Matthews in the Greek is not stressed out or worried. Matthew uses the word Lapeo. And I did some research on that, and here's what Lapeo means. It's a much stronger word. It literally means to be grieved to the point of profound emotional pain. They were grieved to the point of profound emotional pain.

Greatly distressed doesn't capture that. Here's what does. My mom, I don't know if I've ever told you all this. My mother was an identical twin. She was born in 1944, and her identical twin, my mom's name Shirley, and our identical twin was Sharon. They were born in 44 and they were inseparable. They literally, they were best friends.

I mean, it was hard to tell where one began and the other ended. It was just they were inseparable. Loved each other profoundly. In 1997, my Aunt Sharon, my mom's identical twin, was killed in a car accident. And I found out before my mom did. And y'all, I had to be the one to tell. tell my mother that her twin was gone. She didn't know. She walked into the door. I was like,

mom, sit down, and she could tell something was wrong, and she's like, what? And I said, Mom, Aunt Sharon was killed in a car accident. And y'all, the look on her face and the sound that came out of her, I'll never forget it as long as I live. It haunts me. that's lapio it's this deep profound from the gut level grief and that's the word that Matthew chooses to use to describe their response when Jesus says I'm going to be arrested now I'm going to die it wrecked them out to the point of profound emotional grief now here's the thing why are they grieved right there? Like, why are they flipping out? Why are they emotionally grieved?

Well, number one, they love Jesus. I mean, I don't want to diminish that. They love Jesus, but here's the other thing. Here's why it upended them, and we're going to see what I'm about to say is right here in a minute. But here's the other reason that they were profoundly grieved because Jesus just completely upended their plans that they had for their life.

We're going to see in a minute. What Jesus' words said, hey, I'm going to get arrested. I'm going to die. that statement completely upended their plans they had for their life. That's why they were grieving. And you're like, what are you talking about about? Well, you have to remember a little background.

You have to remember these guys were Jews. And every little Jewish boy grows up and he's really, really fired up about one thing. He's fired up about the Messiah being born potentially in his generation. Every generation of Jewish people, they were excited that the Messiah might be born in their generation. They were hoping beyond hope that they might get to see it. Now, what did they think the Messiah, the Savior was going to do when he showed up? They knew that he was going to be the Savior of God's people and that he was going to be a conquering king.

They knew the Messiah was going to come and he was going to restore glory back to the kingdom of Israel. You know, back in the day, you had David, you had Solomon and they had powerful, powerful kingdoms. But over the years, bad kings caused that to diminish. Rome comes in, takes over Israel. They're essentially in this moment slaves. And so they're waiting for the Messiah to come over and kill all their enemies, reestablish the throne, sit on the throne, and reign. That's what they think the Messiah is coming to do. Now, all of a sudden, this guy named Jesus from Nazareth shows up and that guy can walk on water, y'all.

They can walk on water. He calms with the sound of his voice and they see it. He raised the little girl from the dead. He fed 15,000 people with two fish and five loaves. And so these disciples, they saw all of it and so much more. And so understand that these men are absolutely convinced beyond a shout of a doubt that Jesus is the Messiah. Now, here's the thing.

The best part for those men, the disciples, the best part out of all of it, And honestly, I like the show Chosen because I think they did a really good job of showing this. But the best part for the disciples is that the Messiah, the future king of Israel, asked them to be his boys. Like they, these guys were fishermen. They had no status. They had nothing in the Messiah, the future king of Israel, just asked them to be in his inner circle of power. And so all of a sudden, these former fishermen nobodies are now.

in the inner circle of the king of kings. They have a future. They have lives that matter. They're going to be advisors to the king of Israel. And so when Jesus says, hey, I'm going to be arrested and I'm going to die, it shatters their expectations for their future, and it flipped them completely out. I'll give you two things that that moment reveals in the heart of the disciples. And I'm going to apply it and we'll be done. but I'm going to give you two things.

That moment where Jesus literally shares the gospel with them. I don't know if you got that. He shares the gospel and they flip out. Two things that reveals, number one. And by the way, evaluate your heart and see if you see this in your life. And I've been doing it all week. Number one. 1122, they were so preoccupied with their plans and their desires

that they completely missed out on God's better plan. They were so focused. on what they wanted. They were so focused on what they thought was right. They were so focused on their plans that Jesus just laid out his plan, and instead of rejoicing in it, it caused them to grieve. They completely missed it. Now, Jesus literally just told them one of the most amazing things

they would ever hear in their entire life, but they got so caught up on the whole arrest and death thing. They missed it. Did you catch what it was? Let me read it to you again. They're so focused. on themselves here, they missed a pretty important detail of what Jesus just said. Look at 1722 again. As this, they were gathering Galilee. Jesus said to them, the son of man is about to be delivered

into the hands of men and they were killed. And they started flipping out because that's not what they signed up for. And they missed this last part, which is kind of important. And he will be raised on the third day. And they were greatly... distressed. I have never seen that until this week. I was looking at that, and I got a smile on my face, and I thought, my goodness, Jesus just gave them the best news they're ever going to hear in their whole life. He just told them, I'm going to be a propitiation for your sins. I'm walking to the cross. I'm going to die. I'm going to be the last sacrifice. I'm going to die so that you don't have to die. And then he says this, he's like, oh, but don't worry, I'm going to rise

from the dead. He just said, I'm going to conquer death. That's pretty good news, don't you think? And yet they greeved. Church, they were so absorbed in themselves. They were so focused on what they wanted and their expectations, they completely missed the greatest news they would ever hear. You know, I was thinking about it because my temptation, let me say this, it's easy to do. You know, we dog these guys like, man, how do you do that? But it's easy to do when you don't have all the information, right? It's easy to miss the point. You can get so focused on what you want, what your plans are, and what your desires are that you kind of miss the message. and I have a tendency to look at these guys and go, my gosh, they're idiots, but then the spirit

convicted me and like, Matt, you do it all the time. I'll give you an example. And this story is maybe a little bit too much information, but you'll hang with me. You know, so I live in Houston. I preach here about six times of years. Come up at least once a month and hang out and help, you know, just pastor here, and I love it here, and it's amazing here, but I live in Houston. We live on the water in Houston, and we have two dogs, two golden, retrievers and they are worthless in the name of Jesus. Absolutely worthless. No point in there is just whatsoever. And I love them, but they're worthless. And they, this is never happening even before. I've had dogs my whole life. And grew up in, you know, East Texas and we had dogs and

dogs would get fleas every once in a while, but you'd give them a flea and give them a medicine, it goes away. These dogs, these dogs, about a month ago, got fleas, and y'all, it turned into a manifestation of, like, biblical proportions. We, we bathed them and

scrub them, and we're, like, vacuum and everything, and go away, and give them medicine, they go away, and then they go out in the yard, and they'd come back, and they'd be covering and flees again. And called my uncle, who's a vet, and he's like, man, you'd probably have some kind of hatch or something out in the yard, and they're picking them up, and it's just like,

He's like, you got to spray your yard with chemicals and like spray it down. So my wife is telling me constantly, she's giving me the message, Matt, I need you go spray the yard. I'm tired of these fleas. Go spray the yard. I don't want to spray the yard because I've had cancer before and I just, I don't like messing with chemicals. And I'm not going to say it. Anyway, I don't like these dogs anyway. And like, I'm like, I'm not going to spray the yard.

Well, I travel a ton and by the grace of God, I got to get to leave in the middle of the of the biblical proportion of flea manifestation, and I left, and Jen's fighting hand-to-hand combat with fleas, and she's texting me the whole time, like, hey, this is getting worse, this getting worse, this is getting worse, and she kind of didn't talk about it for a couple of days, so I'm hoping maybe it's gone away, it's gotten better or whatever, and I'm about to go home, and it's been a couple weeks as I've been home, and men, I'm going to talk to you for a second, because you'll get this, especially if you're married, you'll really get it if you aren't married, but if you've been away from your wife for a couple weeks, you have a certain

expectations about how you're going to spend your time when you get home. Amen. Thank you. And so it's been a couple weeks, so I had some expectations. And because we're married. And so I decide that, you know, I'm going to get home and potentially work a program, but I get home late. And if you're my age and you get home late, I don't care if it's been a month. You're like, sleep, marriage relation, we're going to sleep, right? So we go to sleep. But before we go to sleep, she looks at me kind of playfully, smiles at me, and she goes, I got plans for you tomorrow, boy. And I look at it and go, girl, I'm here to serve you any way you need, right? My son is about to crawl under his chair over here. He's here for the first time at 11. How you think you got

here, boy. Anyway, next morning, she gets up, reach your Bible, goes, works out. I kind of slept in late. I was tired, and I woke up, and y'all, the sun was shining, and the birds were singing. I put on the Rocky Four, like, theme song, you know, get ready, took a shower, put on some cologne, because, you know, and then she walks in the door, and she looks at me, and she smiles, and she goes, you ready for our plans? I'm like, girl, you know I'm ready. She kind of pauses like this. She goes, are you wearing cologne? I'm like, yeah, I'm wearing cologne.

And she says, why are you wearing cologne? We're just going to spray the fleas on the backyard. I'm like, oh, like when you said you had plans, I thought you meant you had plans. Now check this out. I had plans for passionate marital relations. She had plans for effective flea eradication. And I completely and totally and utterly missed it. And you know what my response was?

Honestly, you know what my response was? Y'all ready for this? I was greatly distressed. I was greatly distressed. It wasn't grieved, but I was distressed, right? Y'all, that, I'm being funny here, but that's what literally happened with Jesus and the disciples. They have these expectations. We're going to be something important in the kingdom.

We've got a future. have rank, and then Jesus just drops a bomb on him and goes, hey, this is going to go down way different than you thought it was going to go down, and they grieved. They forgot something in that moment. They forgot, number one, he's God. He's the God that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. Number two, they forgot that God works all things for the good of those that love him and are called according to his purpose, even if they don't see it.

And so that's the first thing, and let me give you the second real quick, the first thing is they get so in that moment where they're grieving, we just literally gave them the gospel, they're so preoccupied with their desires and what they think is best for their life that they completely miss that God had a better plan for their life. Here's the second thing, that moment showed, last thing it showed. And this is a little darker, but it's pretty real.

That moment where they grieved, when Jesus shared the gospel with them, shows that the disciples were using Jesus as a means to their end. They were using Jesus as a means to their end. Listen, here's the thing. These guys gave up a lot to follow Jesus, and so I don't think these guys were evil. I know that Judas was.

Jesus was 100% doing it for his ends. The other guys, I think they loved him, they were ready to die for him, but there was, and they're about to show you, my shouldn't see what I'm talking about, there's this moment here that reveals that there was a little part of these guys' hearts that they were absolutely following Jesus

for what they could. get out of the deal. So they leave here. I'm not going to get into this because I got to land the plane here. Got a few minutes. I got to check this out. So that right after they grieve, they immediately go. They're walking around. These two Jewish temple leaders walk up to Peter and go, hey, does your master, does he pay

the temple tax? So there was a tax that went to the temple. This was not a Roman tax. This was a Jewish tax. And so that they gave to the Jewish temple every year. And so they're like, does Jesus? going to pay the temple tax. And Peter's like, I don't know. So he goes back to Jesus. Like, Jesus, are we paying the temple tax? Because you're, you know, you're kind of a big deal.

And Jesus looks at Peter and says this. He's like, hey, look to Peter and says, let me ask you a question. He said, if you're a son of the king and the king taxes the country, do you have to pay the tax? And Peter goes, no, if you're son of the king, you don't have to pay the tax. Jesus said, exactly. Exactly. And guess what, Peter? I'm the son of the king. I don't have to pay the temple tax. Jesus is about to walk to a cross and he's going to die.

He's going to say, to Telestai, and the veil of the temple is going to get torn from top to bottom, giving us access to the temple and the presence of Almighty God. He's like, I don't have to pay that. I'm the son of the king, but we're going to pay it anyway. And then he sends Peter, that famous story, sends Peter to go fish, and a fish provides the drachma tax out of the time. of its mouth. What's Jesus doing? He's realizing. I know Jesus realized these guys have an entitlement issue. These guys are following him for all the wrong reasons. And so he,

the story happens so that he can show them entitlement has no place in the kingdom of God. If anybody didn't have to take the temple tax, it was Jesus. He paid it. And he sent them to a lake for a fish to provide to show them you follow Jesus. You put him first and I will take care of you. Okay? Now, last part here. Right after that, that he's looking at him and go, if there's any part of you that you're doing this for you, there's an entitlement thing in your life, you're missing the boat, they're walking down the road and the disciples say one of the dumbest things they ever say to Jesus, Matthew 18, 1. And at that time, the disciples came to Jesus saying, who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Who's the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? It was a

There was this thread that constantly followed the disciples around. They were constantly wanting to know. Keep in mind, they're going to be his advisors. They're big deals now. So they're wondering, like, which one of us is going to be tops? Which one of us is going to be the highest rank? Jesus, we know you're number one. We thought Peter was number two, but you just told him he was like Satan.

And so now we got a shot. And so, hey, Jesus, which one of us is going to be greatest in the kingdom? them. You just see their hearts right there. After all that Jesus has said and all that he's done and all the ways that he's lowered himself and humbled himself and served and washed feet and loved, they're still fighting for people to look at them. And Jesus says one of the harshest statements that he will ever, ever, ever say to these men that don't get it. Like Jesus is intentionally walking to a cross and these guys are trying to grasp a crown, and I want you to watch what Jesus says to him. Matthew 181. At the time,

the disciples came to Jesus saying, who is the greatest in the kingdom of him? In other words, which one of us is going to be tops? And Jesus called to him a child. It was in that word in the Greek means little child. It's not a toddler. It was like an infant. Somebody must have been holding an infant. And so he brings him over. And they'll look at verse three. And this is the rebuke. Jesus said, truly, I say to you. Now, he's speaking to the disciples here, the men that just said, we want to be the best, we want to be tops. Look what he says to them. He says, truly I say to you, and y'all, y'all heard this from Pastor Job, but he says, truly, that means y'all need to listen. Truly, I say to

you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Dang, Jesus! Whoa! How big of a deal to Jesus is it if you're following him because there's kind of something you think you deserve from him? These guys are doing it, y'all, and he says, unless you turn, that word does not mean repent. It doesn't mean like repent of your sins and get saved.

I believe he, I know Jesus uses the word doesn't mean that because the disciples are safe. It means that once you're a Christian and you're doing something really, really dumb, you have to stop doing it and go the other way. That's the word Jesus is using here. Bottom line, these guys are like, who's going to be tops?

Who's going to be great? And Jesus essentially looks at them and says, boys, you are acting like lost people that don't know God. That part of your heart that wants to be seen, you're acting like a lost person that doesn't know God. Let me ask you a question. I'm just got a few more minutes here. Listen carefully.

If I were to ask you this question, how would you answer? If I would ask you, what was the primary purpose for Jesus dying on a cross? By the way, one of the things I took away from this is that constantly Jesus was calling his shot that he was going to walk to a cross. Don't ever let anybody ever tell you that Jesus was a victim going to the cross. He absolutely intentionally walked to the cross. But what would you say was his primary reason for dying on a cross? and rising again. You know, I think we would say, well, obviously he was dying to make a sacrifice for our sins

so that we could trust in him and receive his righteousness, and you'd be dead right. You could say Jesus walked to a cross because he loves us, and he wanted us to have a relationship be reconciled back to God in what we were created for, and you'd be dead right. But if I were to ask you a question, what was Jesus number one goal? What is like the number one thing he was doing? What would you say? He actually, right before the cross says, like his thing. It's like the thing.

All that other stuff, super important. He said, this is it. Y'all ready for it? Don't turn to listen carefully. It's John 1227. Jesus is about to walk to the cross. He's about to die. He's about to become our sin.

And he's praying to his father. I want you to watch what he says. John 1227. read letters here he says Jesus said now my soul is troubled and what shall I say Father save me from this hour Lord should I ask you to save me from that hour watch what he says he goes but for this purpose I have come to this hour Jesus said this is the purpose I'm walking to the cross watch what he says verse 28 Father glorify your name he said for this is the

reason that I'm walking to the cross. This is the purpose for I've come to this hour because God, my father, I want your name to be glorified. That word means to be put first. It means to be seen. It means to be put out so that people can focus on that. He's like, this is why I'm coming to the cross because Lord, Father, I want your name to be exalted. Watch what God says. Can we bring that back up, 28, Jesus, glorify your name. And then a voice came from heaven. God started talking to say, I have glorified it and I will glorify it again. Y'all check it out. Jesus was walking around saying, look at the Father. While the disciples are walking around saying, look at me. Jesus was humbling himself to the point of death. And the disciples were trying to raise themselves to the

point where they had power and control. And Jesus says, when you're doing that, you better turn because you are acting just like somebody that doesn't know God. The action step, I'm just going to give this quickly, the action step he tells him, he says, you better turn or you're just going to miss the whole thing. And then he tells them what turning looks like. And this is what I want you to dig into. He says, this is what turn.

He said, you've got to humble yourself like a child. That's the action step. That's what we do when we walk out of here. If we see any of this in our lives, and if you live long enough, you will, if you're so focused on what you want for your life that you are not even paying attention to what God might want, or if there's a little part of your heart that you're following Jesus

because you think he owes you something, this is the action step. Humble yourself like a child. And when I got to this place in the sermon, y'all, you know what I did? Been thinking the disciples were stupid the whole time. Like, what in the world is wrong with these guys and something hit me like a ton of bricks? I do the same thing all the time. I can't tell you how many times in my life that looking back, God had a plan for me the entire time.

I just couldn't see it yet. And I just get frustrated and frustrated and frustrated because it's not going my way. And now that I'm old and busted, I look back, I look back and realize our God is faithful the entire time. time. The entire time, and I've seen it over and over and over again. Something comes into my life, you know, cancer, marriage difficulties, betrayal, and I grieve and flip out. Not realizing that God always works together everything in our lives good for those that love him and are called according to his purpose. Our God is faithful. Action step when something comes. into our life, we do what disciples should have done at the beginning, humble ourselves,

you're God, I'm not, I trust you. Last thing. How do you do that? Because it's totally the opposite of what we do naturally and flesh. How do we humble ourselves? How do we leave her today? And then like if tomorrow something bad happens, how do we not flip out and grieve? Because that's not our plan. If you're single and you really want to get married and it's taken a long time, you have a child or you're won a child and you can't have a child, how do you, how do you humble yourself and just trust the Lord? You know, I'm going to give you the answer. Jesus actually gives us the answer and it is going to be so unsatisfying for a lot of us. You know how Jesus said that we, what we can do to humble ourselves on a daily basis so that we walk the way he wants

to do. You know what it is? You know, we told us, he said we pray. He actually said there's something very specific though that you pray. He's like, you want to humble yourself? if you remember yourself this is what you pray he said this is it he said you pray our father who art in heaven and do you remember what the very first thing he told us to pray he said when you pray pray pray like this and he didn't say father aren't heaven um pray for your provision or pray for your safety or pray for your grandkids he said the very first thing that ought to come out of your mouth when you pray is this our father is art in heaven hallowed be your name you've said it a bunch of times if you're a guy in a football locker room.

You know what it means? You know what you were praying when you prayed that? That literally means, Father, I want your name to be lifted above my name. Did you know when you're praying that? That's what you're praying? Jesus says, when you pray, when your feet hit the floor in the morning,

let this be the first thing that comes out of your mouth. Father, I want your name to be glorified. God, I want your name to be lifted above my name. want you to be seen, not me. And there's something about that that begins to orient your heart towards him, not you. God killed this in me about 15 years ago. In a really interesting way. When I was a young pastor, man, I'm like everybody else.

I wanted to, I did it for Jesus. I really did. But there was a little part of my heart looking back on it that I wanted to be successful. I wanted people to know me. I wanted to be able to write books and speak at conferences. I thought a lot about legacy and stupid stuff like that in a selfish way. And I had a moment where God just killed that in me. I was when I was in Austin, Austin Stone, and we were full of college kids.

And I did a Bible study one night, about 150 college kids. And I was given an illustration on W.A. Criswell, pastor of First Baptist Dallas and he was hands down the like biggest deal with exception of one other guy in the country and his name was W.A. Chriswell, massive church, First Baptist Dallas. Everybody listens to him on the radio. And I'm giving this illustration about W.Criswell and those college kids like 2015, 2016 or something, they're looking at me like I'm from Mars. And I kind of said, hey, how many y'all know who W.A. Criswell is? One kid raised her hand. I was like, where are you from? He goes, Dallas. I was like, that's what I thought.

And just, it stopped me. And I was like, how many y'all heard of John Bessonio? He was pastor of First Baptist Houston, massive church, unbelievable preacher, nobody heard of him. And then I dropped the big one on them. I was like, how many y'all heard of Adrian Rogers? Nobody. These are Christian kids. Adrian Rogers, by the way.

W.A. Criswell would hands down be the Matt Chandler of that generation. Adrian Rogers would be the pastor, Jobie Martin of that generation. Everybody in the country knew. their names, listened to them, read their books, and man, you fast forward 20-something years, ain't none of those people even know their name. And y'all, it was like shackles fell off me. It was one of the most freeing things that ever happened in my life because it hit me. And nobody know W.A. Criswell, they're not going to know me. And I felt so much freedom. I felt so much freedom to embrace that famous quote.

I think it's Francis of the Sisy where he says, preach the gospel, die and be forgotten. Point is, y'all, listen, if there's any part of you that's going out there and doing something so that you can get credit for it, this is kind of bad news, nobody's going to remember you other than maybe your grandkids in like 15 years. So you might as well live for what's going to outlive you, and that's the glory of God. almost

Yeah All right Here it is I'm going to skip Kingdom come Because that just means What you're saying Is you walk out the doors

And if you're a businessman You're asking his kingdom To come, not yours You'll be the best stay-at-home You can ever be for his kingdom You go be the best football player in the world for his kingdom You go be the best businessman

Be the best teacher for his kingdom And it'll give you a reason to get up in the morning And then the last one's the hardest one Father, I want your will to be done Hall would be your name. Your kingdom be done. Church, that's difficult to pray.

Because you know what that literally means in the Greek? You're praying, God, I don't want what I want. I want what you want. That's a dangerous thing to pray. Could you pray that and mean it right now? God, I don't want what I want in my life. But I trust you so much that I want. what you want.

How do you do that, man? I have found that one is what I told you earlier. You just, young people, I just look back at my life and I've gone through so much. And can I just tell you that every single time he has been faithful. And you see him be faithful enough that you just like, look, Lord, I don't, this may be really difficult, whatever I'm about to face, but I'm either, I'm either going to like, you know, get over this or I'm going to heaven, but either way I'm making it out alive because you're God. The other thing is it's got to hit you deep down in your soul for you to be able to pray that.

God, I don't want what I want. I want what you want. You have to truly believe in the core of your being that he is worthy of whatever it is he brings in your life. Whatever sacrifice you have to make. Last week, my wife and I came face to face with how difficult that is to pray. I'll tell you the story. I'll pray and be done. My sweet little girl, Annie, was born in 2002, and she's my only daughter, and she is the light of my life.

and I adore her. I'll never forget the first time that she actually showed me affection. She was about two, and she kind of honorary, so it took her a while to like me, but she was about two, and she put my face in her hands on time, and she was like, Daddy, I love you, and I pulled out my wallet and started handing her credit cards, y'all. I'm like, back up, I was holding her for the first time in the hospital, and I'm looking at this little girl looking at me, and I'm more in love than I thought I could be for anybody.

you know, and I took my finger and I did like that like a cross on her forehead and I prayed this prayer. I said, Lord Jesus, this girl is for you. Lord, she's yours. And I met every word of it until the day, about a year ago when she told me that she was going to go to the mission field in a foreign country. Y'all, I've sent a lot of folks to the mission field over the years. Talk to parents that were upset and frustrated and freaked out and grieving and looked at them like, you need to trust the Lord. He's worthy. You need to trust the Lord.

He loves your kids more than you love your kids. You need to trust the Lord. He's worthy of it all. And that sounds great until your daughter says, I'm coming to a crazy place in the name of Jesus. Last week, Jennifer and I were at their church, and they were commissioning them to leave. And at the end, we sat on this big couch,

and we were all going to pray on them. And Jennifer sat beside Annie and her husband, my son-in-law, and I just sat right in front. of them on the coffee table and I got I got down on my knees and I put my hands on my daughter and like I just get wrecked out because it hit me like a ton of bricks. I do not want to pray for her to leave. Like I don't want to say God I trust you. Lord, because I'm like right now I'm not trusting you God. I don't want to let her go and I start bawling. I don't know it was from the Holy Spirit because it wasn't for me. I felt like the Holy Spirit.

Spirit, just ask me a question. Is he worthy? And I started praying, and I was like, Lord, is there anything in your life that you're not trusting to God? Is there any part of your life that you're flipping out on because you're missing what God has in your life? I'm telling you, he's faithful and he's worthy. Amen?

Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word today. Lord, I just want to lift up anybody. In this room, specifically anybody that's dealing with frustration with you, maybe anger with you. There's some folks in this room, God, that are holding on by a thread. Holy Spirit right now speak deeply into their hearts and their minds and their souls that you have them. You will never let them go. You're faithful and you're worthy.

Lord, help us to live lives where we howl your name with our life. Help us to live lives where we long for your kingdom to come. And Lord, help us to live lives where we literally don't want what we want. We want what you want because you are good. And we ask that in Jesus' name. Amen. Church, let's stand together. We're going to respond.

Today, we're a church that believes that this time right now is super important. So here's what we're going to do. We're going to sing and worship God because he's worthy. Amen? He's worthy of it all, y'all. And we're going to sing it. We're going to invite you to bring your first and your best, because God is worthy of our first and best.

Now, last thing is, listen, there's some folks in the room. It may not be many, but there's some. This is exactly where you're at. And God was speaking to you today. Listen, maybe it was a sign of surrender to him. Say, God, I don't want what I want. I want what you want. You need to show that to him physically.

You come forward. You surrender your life to him. Let's pray. Father, we love you, and I pray that as we sing now, it would be a sweet song in your ears.