The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 1: In Due Time

Episode Date: April 28, 2019

Prayer is God’s invitation for you to snatch your faith out of the hands of your circumstances and place your trust in the hands of your sovereign Savior. Click the 1 Samuel Resources tab for the full study journal, summary recap videos and more.

That's pretty epic. The sermon better be awesome. All right. Hey, how's everybody doing? Doing good? Glad you here. Glad you're here. For some of you, two weeks in a row.

That's crazy, isn't it? Welcome. So glad that you are here. Church of 1122 is a movement for all people, in all means all, for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And would you join me in celebrating the 398 people that discovered a relationship with Jesus last weekend at our Easter services for the very first time? That's a lot of people.

And 43 of those were at our Baker Correctional Campus. Amen. Amen. So if you were one of those folks, then after you discovered, then the next step is to deepen. And one of the first ways that you deepen is you go deep into the water. You get baptized. The Greek word baptizo means to dip, dunk, or submerge. That means take you, put you under the water as a symbol that your sins have been washed away.

So at the end of all of our services at all of our campuses, we have a baptism class. go check that out so that you can get dunked in our Beach Baptism service coming up next month. And for those of you brothers at Baker Correctional, we're coming to you too, all right? So I know the Beach Baptist thing won't work for you, but go see Chaplain Cop after this service, and he will get you lined up because we are going to be coming in to do baptisms at that campus too. Amen, isn't that cool? Amen. All right.

As our campus pastor said, if you'll grab your journal, go to page two. For the next 12 weeks, we are going to be studying. prophet priests and kings found in the book called First Samuel. Now, a little background on First Samuel real quick. It comes right on the heel historically, the heels of judges. That's what was happening there. It's written by, part of it's written by Samuel, but he dies in chapter 25. So, spoiler alert, there's no way he wrote all of it.

So it's he and some of his disciples. There's like compilations of things that happen to get put together to talk about the history of Israel during this time period. And what's going on is this the account of Israel. Israel choosing its first king, which sounds cool, because they're going from like this rag-tag bunch of wonderers that were led by these kind of random judges to a nation with a monarchy. Turns out, not as awesome as you would think. But this guy named Samuel, he's going to play this significant role in the lives of prophets, priests, and kings, and we will pick it up in chapter one, verse one.

It says this, and there was a certain man of Ramatham, Zof. Sounds like a cool place. Of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Alcana, which is Hebrew from Elk Hunter. Did you hear it? Alcana. Now, I have not double-checked my Hebrew dictionary, but I'm going with Elk Hunter. All right. So Elk Hunter, the son of Jeroham, son of Alehu, son of Tohu, son of Zouf, and Ephrothite.

Verse two, he had two wives. trouble just right out of the gate we have trouble now if you'll allow me to go down this rabbit trail for just a second i have had people ask me when they're studying the bible maybe new to a bible study how come polygamy was okay in the old testament to which i say who told you it was okay it was not okay essentially what's going on here is that the people of israel would just adopt the cultural norms of the surrounding tribes and the surrounding countries. You see, the Bible is very, very clear in Matthew 2, verse 24, before sin ever enters the world, that God defines marriage this way, one man plus one woman for one lifetime, period.

Now, today, there are many options in our current culture. However, from the beginning, this is what marriage is. And if you pay attention here. If you read the Old Testament and conclude that polygamy was okay with God, then you need to go back to coloring books. You are not ready for adult literature yet, okay? Everywhere in the scriptures where these men had more than one wife, it never goes well. It always ends very, very poorly for that family and sometimes for the entire world.

Abraham had Sarah and Hagar. We're still trying to figure that out. Jacob had Leah and Rachel. that tore apart a family. Solomon had a thousand women, and it literally ripped apart the nation of Israel. And if you ask, well, how did these faithful men of God find themselves in this kind of circumstance?

And I think, honestly, I think it was just a blind spot. I think that they just began to accept the cultural norms of their day and apply it to themselves. And now the thing that we contend to do, though, is we look at that and we're like, how in the world did they not see that? So be careful, though. Be careful before you use the Bible as like binoculars to see everybody else's blind spots if you don't use it as a mirror to look for your own.

I'll give you an example. When I was in seminary, I spent a summer in Nairobi, Kenya as like a mission thing. I was there for like six weeks or something. And so for a couple of weeks, we went and stayed with the Maasai tribe. These are African warriors. Maybe you've seen pictures with like the big earlobes and they have all these little things in them. They're pretty awesome. They're all this tall and they just jump up and down with spears.

They're awesome. Okay. And so they invited me into the center of their village. village and you had to be a warrior to be invited in and I was the only warrior in our group. Because I was with seminary wusses. It was me. And if you're not laughing, you've never met a seminarian, okay? The warrior bar pretty low at the MDiv program. So anyway, I get invited in and the chief of the tribe or whatever. He was a Christian, a professing Christian, and he introduced me to his wives, to which I was like, hold on, dude.

Explain this. He was 35. He had one wife that was 20 and one wife since 15 and I was ready to get him. I was like, what are you doing, man? How could you, what are you doing? And then he just immediately goes, so yeah, here in our culture, we, if we marry a bunch, we take care of them all. So explain to me the Christians and explain divorce in America. To which I went. Oh, let's talk about something else. Because if we are not careful, we can just adopt the cultural norms and just say, well, those. Those verses don't mean this. That's just not what that is. Okay? Now let me be very, very, very clear. The Bible does say God hates divorce. He does not hate divorce people, all right? I'm not laying that label on anybody. Only Jesus gets to tell you who you are. But the thing we have to be careful of, the thing that we have to watch out for is what are the blind spots that we could potentially have today. I believe that hundreds of years from now there will be Christians that look back on American

Christians in the 21st century and they will say, how in the world did that group of Christians say that Jesus was the one thing that drove everything, and yet they spent all of their money on themselves. They were more concerned about flat-searing TVs than people in faraway lands dying without Jesus. Look, we all have blind spots, and I believe it was a big cultural blind spot during this time. And so he had two wives. So the book already starts off, and we are in trouble.

And it says the name of one of his wives was Hannah, and the name of his other was Panina. And Panina had children, but Hannah had no children. Now, this man used to go up year by year from his city to worship and to sacrifice to the Lord of hosts at Shiloh. Where the two sons of Eli, Hoffney and Phineas, there's a name I've heard. That's great. We're priests of the Lord. And on the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to Panina, his wife, and to all of her sons and daughters.

but to Hannah, he gave a double portion because he loved her. Write this down. When you have a favorite wife, that's never going to end well. It's just not. It's not going to go. Not then, not today. And here's the thing. We laugh because we're like, ha, ha, ha, that's funny.

But husbands, the reality is that some of you do have a favorite wife. It's more like a mistress. But it's your job. And every day. every Monday morning, you get up and you go and sacrifice and you give your job a double portion at the expense of your bride. You see, it's crazy, man. The Bible says that the standards for being a husband is to love your wife like Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

And yet in reality, what gets the double portion from you, from us, what gets our time, what gets our effort, what gets our energy, what gets our devotion, what gets our affection, is some other thing than this woman that we committed our lives to. For some of us, think about how dumb this is, we give a double portion to our hobbies, and it's dumb. Hobbies are dumb. Every man, you should have one. If you're married with kids, you get one.

Choose wisely, okay? But it is so dumb to give your heart to whatever it is, waves or golf or whatever that thing is, and yet some of us do. You see, for some, you know who your mistress is? Your big, fat, hairy drinking buddy, Earl, he is your mistress. Think about that for a second Because you can't wait to get out of the house To go run around with Earl

And he gets your time and effort And attention and laughter And your whole family gets all of your leftovers For some of you, it's your kid's sports Hey man, you can say out your amen All right? If you want to just take your shoes off I'm walking all over the toes

Including my own during the sermon, okay? Because we will rearrange our entire schedule to make sure you make every single game, but when's the last time you rearrange anything to pursue the heart of your wife? See, be careful, man. The fact is, a lot of us might have mistresses and we can give a double portion to the one

that is not our spouse. For some of you, it's an actual mistress. Repent. Repent. Repent. You see, to be a, you want to be a godly man? Here's what it means to be a godly husband. to love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. And this is what Hannah was dealing with year after year after year. It goes on to say he gave a double portion to her because he loved her,

though the Lord had closed her womb. And her rival used to provoke her grievously to irritate her because the Lord had closed her womb. So it went on year by year. You see, sometimes when it's amazing how things get resolved so quickly in a chapter in the Bible. It's like a movie, right? It takes an hour and a half. You can solve all the problems in the world unless you're an Avenger. It takes three hours.

But whatever. Still a relatively short period of time to save the universe. So this isn't like she heard one sermon and everything got okay, all right? This is year by year. So it went on year by year. as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she used to provoke her. Therefore, Hannah wept and would not eat. You see, I don't really know how to talk about this, and I'm totally outside of my lane,

but infertility is a beast. Okay? Obviously, I'm a man, have been my whole life. Well, I was a boy at first, and now I'm a man, and with two children, we've never struggled with this. So me to talk about infertility is like a Catholic priest giving marriage counseling, okay? It's just kind of theory. But I'm just telling you, a number of some of my dearest friends and staff members and members of this church have been where Hannah is. And it's hard to put in the words, the pain that is in there.

And the other thing, too, man, I know the first question is legitimately, why, God? Why? Help me understand this. I'm going to tell you, this is very culturally. insensitive and I'm so sorry, okay? But it seems to me that some of the best, what would be, the best moms and dads on the entire planet, they're the ones that struggle with infertility. I mean, people that are just praying, God, give us a baby. We'll raise them in the gospel, we'll raise them in the church. Like, you know, in such a broken world, a world where fatherlessness

is one of the key problems for the problems in America. And you got this dad and you got this mom, and they just want a baby more than anything. And yet it seems like the most unqualified human beings are the most fertile people on the planet. Help me understand that for a second. You know, like, God, this is where she is. She wept and she would not eat. Now, when you begin to ask the question why, I want to help you here just theologically, I'm going to give you theologically accurate answer, but if you are in

this space, I don't know that it's going to help your heart whatsoever. And if you came to me weeping and just saying, help me understand, my response would just be like, I love you and we would pray. But this is the reason. The reason that Hannah cannot have a child is a result of the fall. That when sin entered the world, the whole thing is fractured. The whole thing is broken. Not just our will to obey the father, but everything is broken.

From the macro level, like weather systems are jacked up. So you get hurricanes and earthquakes and typhoon that wipe out people down to the micro level where your very cells won't even do what they're supposed to do. sometimes, and we have infertility and cancer and things like that. But it's not your individual sin. That's not how it works. You see, the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And for sure, sometimes the enemy has a sniper attack on you.

And then sometimes it's just collateral damage because sin has entered our world. So it's not your fault. How do I know that? John chapter 9. Jesus and the disciples are walking down the road and there's a blind man. And in the first century, they thought if you had any kind of physical ailment, then you did something to deserve that. So the disciples say, Jesus, who sin?

This man or his parents, that he would be born blind. And Jesus says it does not work that way. But this man was born blind to the glory of God. So it is not your fault. And God is at work in all things for the good of those that love him and are called according to his purpose. That God never waste of hurt. That God has purpose in your pain.

I know it might not feel that way right now. but God does. Something that has helped me is an excerpt from a John Piper sermon. I'm just going to read it because I could never preach it as good as he does. Here's what he says about the problem of pain in this world. Not only is all of your affliction momentary, not only is all of your affliction light in comparison with eternity and the glory there, but all of it is totally meaningful. Every millisecond of your pain from the fallen nature of man to fallen man himself, every millisecond of your misery in the path of obedience is producing a peculiar glory that you will get because of that. I don't care if it's cancer or criticism. I don't care if it's slander or sickness. It was not

meaningless. It is doing something. It's not meaningless. And of course, you can't see what it's doing. Don't look at what is seen. When your mom dies, when your kid dies, when you got cancer at 40, when the car careens into the sidewalk and he takes her out, don't say it's meaningless because it's not. It is working for you an eternal weight of glory. Therefore, do not lose heart. But take these truths of the gospel and day by day, focus on them, preach them to yourselves every morning, get alone with God. God and preach his word into your mind until your heart sings with confidence that you are new and cared for. God is not done with you. And finally, women, your fertility does not define your

worth to God. Only Jesus gets to tell you, I am not trying to diminish your pain whatsoever, but I am just telling you, being a daughter of the most high king, that's what you are. And not only that. In Genesis, when Eve is created and Adam names her, he names her Eve, which means the mother of all living things, she has had zero babies at that point. And in God's economy, she's called a mom. Here's what that means for the church. Okay, for some of us, God has given us the responsibility, some babies that live in our house, that have my name, all that kind of stuff. But in the church, I need every female from 18 to 108 to help us raise up a generation of Jesus followers here in the church. That's your role.

So that's why every female here in the church, if you're a believer in Jesus, you're a mama. And we need you here. This is what she's dealing with. And so she's married, and Elkhona is going to come up and do what men do. Just make it worse. And Alcana, her husband said, Hannah, what's wrong with you? Why do you weep?

Literally, in Hebrew, it says, why are you downhearted? Or it means why do you have a bad heart? So she's allowed her circumstances to define her, and she's living in bitterness. And he's like, what's wrong with you? And why do you not eat? And why is your heart sad?

And then look at what he does. Am I not more to you than ten sons? typical man move dude okay and you know why I recognize it because I think this is what I would say oh you have a problem well two things one

I can fix it and two let's make it more about me you're welcome think about this it goes Hannah why do you weep and she could go well the list is long bro first of all

appreciate being your favorite wife but the whole two wives thing is throwing me for a little loop okay See, because essentially, Elkhana, what happened here is I couldn't give you what you wanted a son, so you went and found somebody else that would. So you want to start there? Or secondly, there's this cultural norm that she has not been able to live up to. I mean, particularly in biblical times, if you wanted to be valued in a society, you better make some boys.

You better have some sons for a number of reasons. One, it represented wealth. The more sons you had, the bigger the farm could be, the more work you could get done. If you wanted people to think much of you, then you better have some sons so you could carry on the family name. And in your old age, if you wanted somebody to take care of you, then you better have a son. That was Social Security. That is how you would be secure in your old age. So she had that going on, and then there is just something about the heart of a woman that wants to be a mama,

and she is just hurting. So listen, men, when your wife is emotional, like this, okay, she is weeping and not eating. Let me tell you what you say. You want to write this down, ready? Shut up. That's it. Shall we practice? I'm going to give you a tip. It's not in the Bible. It should be in the Proverbs, but it's not. When you're talking to your wife and she's emotional, okay? You should answer facts with facts and you should answer feelings with feelings. Okay? Because I know, I know what we do, man.

I know. We get the information. We run it through our man grid. We go, well, I don't feel that way. Therefore, you shouldn't feel that way. You're welcome. What's for dinner? That's kind of what we do, okay?

It's because you're dumb. We need a helper. Here's what I mean. If they're talking about facts, you answer with facts. If they talk about feelings, you answer with feelings. She's talking about feelings here. And then he tries to make it all about himself. Here's an example.

If your wife says to you, I feel fat. That's a feeling. And you answer. then don't eat so much. Fact. It's not going to go good. I know it's right, medically, physiologically, calories and weight are related to one another, but that is not the point in that moment. You see, here's just what's true. If you want to be a godly husband, you can be right or you can be married. Those are your options. And I mean this, that's rooted in the gospel. We are supposed to love our wives like Christ love the church. Did Jesus come to be right? Because think about it, he could have

showed up and just said, hey, I'm right, you're wrong. I'm perfect. You're a sinner. Sinner, center, center, center, center. And at the cross, he could have said, that's not my problem. I didn't sin. I don't have to atone for sin. Y'all figure that at yourself. When you get your act together then, but is that what he did? He laid down all of his rights so that we could be made righteous. Husband, that's your job. That's your job. And so, this guy screws it all up. He makes it all about himself. Am I not more to you than ten sons? You'll see that doesn't help anything.

And after they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh, Hannah Rose, now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorposts of the temple of the Lord. And she was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. Let's hang out right here for a second. She was deeply distressed. You know, literally in Hebrew, that's translated soul pain. It just doesn't make sense in English. She was soul pained and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly.

Here's what I know, man. The fake you's doing just fine. The fake you is doing just fine. And so, and I get it. Church, man. Church is probably the place that we got the disease called finitis better than any other place. Like you got some stuff going on on your life. I mean some real stuff going on in your life.

And then people talk to you about, hey, how you doing? And I'm not talking about just random people. I'm talking about people that you're supposed to be brothers and sisters in Christ with. How are you doing? You go, I'm fine. Really? Because I don't think you are. And I get it, man.

I get it. Some of you grew up in a church where you had to like, part of the reason we don't do dress codes here is because I would like for that to be a picture of what your soul ought to be like at church. That a real Jesus died on the real cross for the real you. If you want to wear a suit here, Praise God, wear a suit. But you don't have to, like, put on a look to show up.

You should come as you are. Because, again, some of your marriages are broken. I mean, that's jacked. You haven't touched each other intimately since you don't know when, and the idea of it even makes you kind of angry because he or she isn't treating you right. That's where it is. And yet, when you walked in today and people are like,

hey, how you doing? You say, I'm just blessed in highly favors. No, you're not. You're broken. It's okay to not be okay. It's okay to admit it. For some of you, man, you got this addiction. And in your mind, you don't understand how you can still be addicted to this thing because you do love Jesus.

You do. And yet, the thing that you've been struggling with since you were 14 is still in your life and now you have a 14-year-old. And you're like, I don't get it. And you feel distressed, deeply distressed. For some of you, man, you've got a financial situation and it's not just, you don't. don't get to go on the vacations that you used to. You're just trying to keep the business open for the sake of all the employees that are counting on you to provide for their families.

And it is stressing you out in a way that's hard to put into words. But you're a man, so you're trying to tell everybody, I got this, but you know I ain't got this. Or you got a prodigal son? And you believed, or some preacher told you that if you raise him in the church and you raise him up in the way that he should go, that when he is old, he will not depart from it. But you did, and he didn't because he departed. You ain't talked to him in multiple holidays now. And every time we talk about reconciliation around here,

there's a place down in you that is deeply distressed. For some of you, man, it's a depression. And honestly, until you started struggling with it, you didn't have a theology for Christian depression. You thought those two things, how do they go together? And you tried to bring it up to a Christian one time. Hey, how can I pray for you? You know what?

I'm depressed. And they were like, depressed. Oh, well, my Bible says, rejoice in the Lord always. And again, I say rejoice. And you're like, all right, screw you. I ain't talking to you anymore. See what I love about Hannah, man. She's just authentic.

She's authentic. She prays her tears. She doesn't hide them. You see, I don't know if you know this, but the cross, the cross is empirical evidence that, none of us are okay. The gospel of Jesus Christ is what makes it okay to not be okay. Now, God loves us enough that he's not going to leave us there, but we take all of our sin, we take all of our sadness, we take all of our sorrows, and we bring it to the cross. Because if we were okay,

then Jesus died in vain. But he died because every single one of us need a savior. And then he has given us these emotions. He's given us these feelings as a gift to navigate life. Now, Be careful because your feelings are not your God. They don't get to tell you what to do. He does. But feelings, emotions are a gift from God. Go to Ecclesiastes chapter 3 this afternoon, and you will see this whole list of emotions.

There's a time to laugh, there's a time to cry. There's a time to dance. There's a time to mourn. And then some dummy along the way said, I'm just trying to be strong for my family. I don't know who thought that withholding emotion somehow equaled strength. Jesus didn't think that when his friend died in John chapter 11. He cried it out, man.

And here's what I've found as a pastor for 25 years or so, that the people that don't know how to mourn when it's time to mourn, then they also don't know how to dance when God says it's time to dance. And so God has given you these gift of emotions, and you should pray your tears. This is what she's doing. She was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. Because I got news for it.

If everything's going great in your life right, now. God bless your ministry. But by the end of this service, you will be one hour closer to pain. It's coming. You're either coming out of it, you're in it, or you're heading closer to it. It is just coming. How you like that? Post-easter. Make you feel good. So what do you do when you are deeply distressed? Here's what she does. She, verse 11, and she vowed a vow and said, O Lord of hosts, if you will indeed look on the afflicted. of your servant and remember me and not forget your servant but will give to your servant a son then i will give him to the lord all the days of his life and no razor shall touch his head now

at first it kind of looks like she's just trying to make a deal with god which let's be honest you ever trying to make a deal with god i do that look i feel like i have very good theology and i have degrees to back me up and yet if i find myself in this place of need i will get to wheeling and deal i'm All right, Lord, let's make a deal. When I was at TPC playing in that TBO tournament the other day, and 17's out there by itself, I'm like, Jesus, if you will put this on the green, I will preach so good, please. But he did, so it worked out.

Whatever. So at first reading, it looks like that, except here's what I think's happening. I think Hannah is coming to a place of surrender, and here's what I mean. I think she's saying all of my life, I've wanted to have a child for me. I wanted to have a son for me. I wanted to walk into the marketplace and people look at my child and think more highly of me. I wanted to make sure I would be secure in my old age because my son could take care of me. I wanted him to be able to carry on my name for generation and generation.

And here when she says a razor won't touch his head, this means that it's called a Nazarite vow. A Nazarite was like a volunteer Levite in the temple. She was basically saying, God, I'm going to lay down my own wants and desires and preferences. and I want to have a son for you. None of those things that I've wanted from him will be available to me if he's like an internship at the temple. But God, this is about you and your glory. And in this moment, she surrenders.

She surrenders. So let me ask you, so what do you do, what do you do when it's not going your way? or I know you never say this out loud in front of so many people but I say it what do you do when God won't behave or at least behave the way that you think he ought to behave?

How do you respond? You see this is crazy she responds by moving closer to him not punning on the idea of him there is this heresy being taught in churches mostly on TV right now called the prosperity

gospel. Now listen, God doesn't want to prosper you. He just has a different definition of prosper. It may be salt in two and you prosper in heaven. But the prosperity gospel goes this way. If you have faith in God and you do the right thing, if you initiate, then God owes you health, wealth, happiness. So if you don't have health, wealth, and happiness, then you're doing something wrong. Now, the only problem with that is historically what we call the scriptures. It didn't go that way for Jesus. Right? He's a homeless man. They crucified him. And so the

problem, the heresy of the prosperity gospel is not that God doesn't want good for you. It's that who is the initiator? That God is one. God is first. God goes first. And so in the scriptures, pain was never a deterrent of faith. In the Bible,

the theme is that the faithful suffer great pain and disappointment, and yet it drives them to God and not from God. I mean, think about it. John the Baptist, he's a pretty good guy. In fact, Jesus said of John the Baptist, he's the greatest ever born among women. That's all of them. I'm not saying you're not awesome. Just Jesus said, compared to John the Baptist, as awesome as you think you are, you're JV. And where does John the Baptist faith leave him and lead him? Prison. Prison. And Jesus didn't even

come and break him out. Or how about Luke chapter 11, somebody comes running up to Jesus and says, Jesus, the one that you love, yeah, no, yeah. The one that you love is dying. And he just says, cool, and he hangs out there. And he allows Lazarus to die and be dead for four days before he ever shows up. And when he shows up, Lazarus's sisters got some questions. Where have you been? I know you can answer prayer.

I know you have the ability to. We know we sent you the email and you received it. We sent you at the text, and I saw the bubbles, so don't tell me you didn't see it. And where were you? Or maybe my favorite, the Apostle Paul in 2nd Corinthians? Can we agree that Paul was a man of faith? Okay? And yet in 2nd Corinthians, sometime we should just study this thing alone, he says that he has this,

he has been given a gift from God, a gift from God. And the gift God has given him is a messenger from Satan to torment him. who's got that theology I have a gift from God what did he give you he gave me the gift of preaching how about you um torment from Satan is there like a return policy how is that a gift from God and Paul says that he prays three times

and I don't think that's like one two three I don't think that's what it means I think it's like three seasons of his life of fasting and praying that God would remove this thorn from his flesh and I'm that praise God he didn't tell us what it was or we would have whole ministries just built on the details of the thing instead of the heart of the thing.

And the heart of the thing is this, that Paul came to the place where he realized that God's grace was sufficient for him. What the enemy meant for torment God used for transformation. You see, so what do you do and God won't behave? Here's what she does. She prays, man. You see, Hannah did not equate unanswered prayers with an unloving God. She didn't.

Hannah did not equate a lack of cooperation with an absence of God. That's not how she thought about it. And in fact, that's not how you think about it either. Really, think about it. If cooperation was the determination of existence, then when you were a teenager, you wouldn't have believed in your parents. Because you would have said, hey, I got an idea. I just need the car and some cash, and I'm going to Daytona for spring break.

And they were like, no, young lady, and you wouldn't be like, there are no parents. That's not how it works. And yet in our culture, if it does not go our... way, then we are quick to punt. And yet God has purpose and pain. C.S. Lewis will say this about pain. We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to.

God whispers to us in our pleasures. He speaks to us in our conscience, but he shouts in our pain. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world. So what do you do when you are deeply distressed like she is? and I am not trying to diminish your pain. The pain is real. We live in a broken and fallen world, and it gets hard. What do you do?

You pray. I don't mean say a prayer. I mean, you pray. Is prayer for you a first response or a last resort? So here's how she does it. Verse 12, as she continued praying before the Lord Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was speaking in her heart, only her lips moved, and her voice was not heard.

Therefore, Eli, took her to be a drunken woman. And Eli said to her, how long you go on being drunk? Put your wine away from you. But Hannah answered, no, my Lord. I am a woman troubled in spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor a strong drink. Pay attention to this. But I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord.

When is the last time you poured out your soul before the Lord? You see, we need to be the kind of people, and we need to be the kind of church that is praying, big, bold, audacious prayers like, God, if you hear my voice and you would give me a son, I will give him to you. Sometimes we pray the weakest little wimpy prayers. I mean, think about this. If God came to you today, when you got home from church and said, the answer is yes. And you were like, to what?

To everything you prayed for last week? What would you think? Like how would our world be different? Or would you think, oh, dang, I would have prayed differently? I wouldn't have just prayed for the draft. I would have prayed for injustice to be pushed back, that every poor child in the world would have food to eat. I'd have prayed against disease.

I'd have prayed that nations would come to Jesus. I would have prayed for revival. But instead, I just prayed thanks for the day and bless the food, for the nourishment of my body. I think it's going to nourish your body whether you ask him to do it or not. That's like praying the shower makes you wet. That's just what it does. And she prays these bold prayers.

Listen, if your prayer life is not intimidating to you, it may be insulting to God. And listen, some tragedy is going to happen in our world. And some stupid politician is going to tweet, how are your prayers going to protect our children? I'll tell you how our prayer is going to protect our children because prayer unleashes the power of God, and the power of God is demonstrated in the gospel of Jesus Christ, and there ain't a law that could be passed in this land that will ever change a human heart,

but prayer changes things. So she prays boldly, and she prays persistently. Year after year after year, she prays. Do you know this is how Jesus teaches to pray? He said, listen, you have not because you ask not. So when you pray, ask and ask and ask and keep on asking and knock and knock and knock and keep on knocking. And seek and seek and keep on seeking.

And then he tells a story. He's like, it's like this, okay? Prayers like this. Imagine you're at your house and somebody comes to visit you and you don't have anything to give them in the middle of the night. and hospitality was everything in the first century. So you get up and you go to your neighbor's house and you knock on the door. But that slacker's been to sleep all night and he sleeps in the middle of the floor

and all the kids sleep around him. And he's like, man, I ain't getting up. He's like, no, you're getting up. You're getting up. And that dude don't even like you because you turned him into the HOA because the sprinklers came on during the middle of the day like three weeks ago. And so he don't even like you. But if you keep on knocking and keep on knocking and keep on knocking, that slacker will get up and give you what you want.

And you should pray like that. To which people will be like, you're trying to say God is like a lazy man, I'm asleep at night. He's like, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying if you can convince that dude to do for you what he don't want to do, imagine what a good loving God would do if you would pour out your soul to him. That's how we're supposed to pray. He says, come on, bring it year after year, day after day, hour after hour, pray. Ask me again. Ask me again. Ask me again. I don't know about you, but in my house, if ask me again comes out of my mouth, it ain't good. It's not like, ask me again. It's more like, ask me again. That's kind of how it goes.

We are to pray persistently, and we are to pray passionately with great intensity. She poured out her soul before the Lord. Do you pray for your marriage with the same intensity that you yell at your spouse with? See, James 1 says this. James 1 says, what causes fights and quarrels among you? You want something, you don't get it. You steal, you kill, you do whatever it takes to get what you want, but you have not because you ask not. In other words, God is saying, bring your prayer request to me with that same intensity that you go after your own needs with.

You know how it works. You're talking to your spouse. You'd be like, I can't believe you. And you never, and your mama always. Back in 1989, and bam, he shut the door. So I've heard that happens in some homes. And you're like, I need to pray, dear God, would you just be with my spouse? He's like, are you even being serious?

bring it with the same intensity like this. Have you been praying for God's provision in a way that looks anything like the amount of anxiety you have around your finances? Pray with passion. Like, are you praying for your one more like they're actually dying and on their way to a Christless existence? Or do you just mention it sometimes this lady is pouring out her soul? He says, do not regard your servant as a worthless woman. For all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation. But God is not intimidated by your prayers.

He is not intimidated by your emotions. You have to be honest with God. He can handle it. Like I said before, man, the fake you is doing just fine. So if you want to keep faking it, nothing will change. Because if nothing changes, nothing changes. We talked about this last week, Psalm chapter 22, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Before David had any idea whatsoever that Jesus would be quoting this on the cross,

David in his own prayer life is saying, God, where are you? Why have you forsaken me? And the spirit of God says, that's good, put that in the book. We're going to pray that until Jesus returns. Be honest in your prayers. Bring it to them with everything that you are made of. and then look what happens look what can happen this is what hangs in the balance

and then Eli answered go in peace and the God of Israel grant your petition that you have made to him and she said let your servant find favor in your eyes and then the woman went her way and ate and her face was no longer sad this is so important before God ever changed her situation

God used prayer to change her it doesn't go prayer pregnant peace It's going to go prayer, peace, pregnant. See, here's the way Apostle Paul say it in Philippians chapter 4. He says, do not be anxious about anything. Let's just stop right there. This is why I love the Apostle Paul.

Can't wait to meet him. I think the Apostle Paul would be the worst counselor on the planet, all right? Because if you were like, hey, man, I'm anxious. He'd be like, cool, don't. Don't do that. This is why, by the way, I don't do counseling at our church. It's for your benefit, because I'm the worst. Because people are like, I'm just worried.

Well, don't. It says don't worry. Just don't. Well, how do you don't worry? I mean, in fact, just say don't be anxious. Make somebody be anxious. It's like trying to sleep. How do you do that?

You ever try to, like, the harder you try, you're like, I'm going now. And it just makes it worse. Or how? To not be afraid of heights. Pastor Ryanstone is deathly afraid of heights. So as often as I can, I get him up as high as we can go just to like say, stop, man, stop. Okay? You're centered.

The Bible says, don't be a lot. afraid and look at you all sinning. How do you just unafraid, right? Again, this is why I don't do counseling. We have pastors and professionals because I just yell for an hour. It works in large groups. If it's just me and you in my office, it's not as awesome. Because there's only three problems in human experience. And I can identify them in eight seconds. I'm like, I'm sorry, shut up. Here's your problem. Okay. So, who's what Paul says. Don't be anxious about anything. All right, Paul, how am I just going, don't be anxious. He's going to lay out the how. This is not. This is not. This is not.

not like three steps to no anxiety. That's not how it works. But imagine for a second. Everybody look at me. Imagine for just a second. Imagine if you were anxious for nothing. Like no matter what. No matter whether she comes home or not. No matter if the bank account works out or not. No matter the diagnosis and prognosis. Just imagine for a second. Imagine what it would be like on the inside of who you are if there literally was nothing that you were anxious. anxious about because you had this understanding that God still has the whole world in his hands, even though when people ask you, how are you doing this? And you were like, I have no idea. That is the offer that Jesus has for us. The way Jesus himself will say it is,

come to me all you who are weary and heavy burden. Dude, anxiety will wear you out, won't it? And he says, and I will give you rest for your soul. That's what we're talking about here. regardless of the circumstances. So Paul says, do not be anxious about anything. Okay, how, Paul? Here's how. But in everything, in everything, by prayer. This means if anything's a thing, it falls into everything category.

So we should be praying about the big things. We should be praying about the little things. We should be praying about everything. That in everything, by prayer and supplication, that just means you ask for stuff. with thanksgiving let your request be made known to God and here's the promise and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding I grew up in the NIV translation and the way it translated was this and the peace of God which transcends understanding transcendence is when there's something from the heavens that makes its way down to our personal experience and the peace of God that transcends all

understanding will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. You need to start praying that prayer. Those exact words. You want to know what to pray? Pray God's words to him. He's into them. I'm telling you, I've seen people be delivered with these verses. Years ago, I was doing a mission trip in Jamaica, and this young lady was with us. I didn't know her very well then. Now she's like family, but she was like 20 years old maybe. She'd just moved. to town. She has some serious family stuff going on. She finds herself at 1122, and we're on the mission field, and she is plagued with panic attacks. Now, I am sure there are all kind of medical reasons for what's going on, although, like, the doctors in medicine couldn't really do much to it.

And listen, I'm pro-doctor. I'm pro-medicine. God heals through people, prayers, and pills. Praise God God for all of them, okay? So I'm not anti-any of that whatsoever. However, I can tell you this. In the first century, they would have called it demonic. there's a thing that had a hold of her that she didn't want to have a hold of her. She didn't want to throw up. She didn't want to dry heat. She didn't want to lose her breath and hyperventilate. She didn't want to just be grit with fear to the point she couldn't get up off the ground.

And so we got around her and we just prayed and we prayed and we prayed and we prayed. And then I just said, I don't know what to pray anymore. I need you to go to your room. I was right there. I need you to go to your room and you just pray Philippians 4, 6 and 7 until either you go to sleep or the sun comes up the next morning. and I got up a little early to go check on her, and she walked out of the door, and she was a different human being. She'd just been set free. Now, I'm an exorcist?

I guess. Whatever. I don't know. But it is for freedom that we have been set free. And so her face was no longer said. Again, before God did anything to change the situation, he started changing her. And they rose early in the morning, and they worship before the Lord. God has not answered their prayer yet.

You get this? They don't worship God as a means to an end, but God, in and of himself was the end. They worship God for who he is, and they went back to their house at Ramah, and Elkhana knew Hannah, his wife, and the Lord remembered her, and in due time. Hannah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Samuel, for she said, I have asked for him from the Lord. I don't know if you know this, but oftentimes our time and God's time ain't the same time. You ever notice that?

He's rarely early. And a lot of times we find ourselves in due time. There's a long time between Joseph's dream and Joseph's declaration of what you intended for evil, God intended for good. It's a long time in between there. There's a long time from the aspect of the disciples from the day Jesus is laid in the grave and Jesus' resurrection from the tomb. And oftentimes we find ourselves in due time. So what do you do when it's not going your way? Here's what you do.

You pray. You pray. I don't mean say a prayer. I mean you pour out your soul. Prayer is God's invitation for you to snatch your faith out of the hands of your circumstances and to place it in the hands of your sovereign savior. That's what you do. And so some of you walk into this place and your soul is in pain. And maybe it is. Maybe it is infertility. You know what I found out this week was like infertility awareness week? Did you know that? Neither did I a year ago when I planned to preach on this. And maybe that's you. And God's not finished with you. And he's saying, bring your sorrow and bring your sadness and bring your pain and lay it at my feet.

Some of you, it is a broken marriage, it is a broken relationship. And honest to goodness, it's not your fault. You did your part. And he promised till death do his part. and yet he's parting and it ain't you. For some of you, you found yourself, you had this, you had this ideal version of what a Christian marriage was, and she broke you.

He broke you. And now you've got this, you feel like you've got this stigma, even though Jesus would affirm what the Apostle Paul says in Romans 8-1, therefore now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ, Jesus. Yet the pain that you carry sometimes, is you believe theologically that God forgave you at the cross when he says it is finished, it counted for you.

Just sometimes when you get to church, you don't feel like it in here. And the pain that you experience is really you need to forgive yourself. Or some of you have an addiction and you thought by now you'd be over this. Some of you have a depression.

Some of you, you are walking in paths that you feel like, are so dark and you don't know what to do and what you need is for God to give you a peace that transcends understanding. So the way that we're going to end this service is I want you to do what Hannah did. I'm going to invite you to come and pray. I don't mean come say a prayer. I mean come and pour out your soul. Now some of you, if you were here two weeks ago, you say, well, didn't we do that two weeks ago? No, two weeks ago, we also did what the Bible says. You came and we prayed for you.

Today I want you to come and I want you to pray. And you should not come alone. You should not come alone. You should bring somebody with you and you should say, I need you to pray for me. And if you say, but I came to church alone, that's all right, just grab somebody next to you. It's 1122, man. It's weird. Weird people here just grab me.

Like, will you pray for me? It's amazing what the Spirit of God will tell you to pray for people if you let him. And we're going to pray. And again, I don't mean say a prayer. I mean like Hannity did, pour out your soul. Because what I'm praying for and what I've seen in a bunch of services is I'm praying for miracles. See, a miracle is when something. happened that surpasses understanding.

Like, I don't understand how a man can walk on water. I don't understand how a man with a little bit of fish and a little bit of loaves can feed 5,000 people. I don't understand how a man can make a blind man see. I don't understand how somebody can bring back a dead girl and make her alive again. And I don't understand how the peace of God that transcends understanding can guard your hearts and mind in Christ Jesus. But that's what I'm praying for.

And that's what you need to come and pray for. You need to come to the altar and pour out your soul. Some of you, because of pride, men, mostly, have never stepped out from where you are and come down and pray. And I'm going to invite you to come and pray. Look, we have these altar rails, that's what they're here for. And when they're full, because they'll be full in a second, and then you can get on the carpet. And if the carpet's full, then just lay on the hard floor. And honestly, if you're young and flexible, get on the hard floor first so the rest of us can get to the kneeler thing.

And in just a second, I'm going to pray, and the band's going to come, and we're going to sing a song. called Come to the Altar. And that says this, are you hurting and broken within? Hannah would say, that's me. Are you hurting and broken within, overwhelmed by the weight of your sin, then Jesus is calling. Then Jesus is calling. Come to the altar.

So would you please stand? I'm going to pray. Don't even wait till the end. You can just start coming now. Don't come alone. Expect for somebody to pray with you and pray over you. And I'm going to pray. And as I start praying, you just come on.

our good and grace is heavenly Father God we love you more than anything and God we thank you so much that your love for us is not circumstantial that your love for us is not determined by the things going on in our life but you've demonstrated your love for us in this that while we were yet still sinners Christ died on the cross that from the cross your declaration over your people is I love you so heavenly father we don't understand sometimes the circumstances we find ourselves in. And we believe that one day Jesus is coming to make all things new. But in due time, in the meantime, God, would you make us new from the inside out? And God, I pray for these men and women. I pray for the students, Lord, I pray that you would give him a peace

that surpasses understanding that you would guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus. Amen. Hey, won't you come and pray.