Walk in God’s Goodness | The Good God Journey Week 4

God might be good, but it sure doesn’t feel like it these days. After all, if God really is good, how can he let all this hardship, suffering, and evil happen? Today, Chuck talks about exactly that—what to do with the hard times, and how God can still be good in the midst of them.

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    - Wooh, welcome back to the Good God Journey,
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    we're asking this question of is God good?
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    My name is Kyle.
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    - And I'm Hannah.
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    And we are so glad that you're here with us today.
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    As you know, if you've been watching,
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    we've been doing something every week
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    to spread just a little bit of goodness.
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    And so this week, of course, we came prepared.
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    Ready to see it?
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    We've got a ball pit.
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    - Come on, a ball pit in van.
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    It's the best thing in the entire world.
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    - It's pretty fantastic
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    and it's one of the best ways to spread goodness,
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    wouldn't you agree?
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    It's probably also one of the best ways to spread diseases.
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    We thought about this.
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    These are brand new sanitize ball pit balls.
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    We thought about just one lucky family
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    will get a one time, only one use of this ball pit.
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    - So let's get --
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    We're extra prepped.
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    - Let's get our gloves on here.
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    - We've got our gloves, our mask.
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    - We've just got to find some kids
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    to convince to get into our van.
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    - That sounds terrible.
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    So we've got to find a family, right?
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    - Yeah. Yeah, that sounds better.
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    Yeah. Let's go. Let's go.
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    - Hi, guys. I'm Hannah.
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    - I'm Kyle and we have a question for you.
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    Could you guys use a little bit of God's goodness today?
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    - Yes, yes.
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    - OK, we have a surprise for you. Follow us.
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    - Come on.
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    - Are you ready for the instructions?
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    Give me a head nod like yeah.
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    In there Kyle has a large egg
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    and it is filled up with giant candy.
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    And it is stuff that you might want.
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    The team that does it the fastest
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    is going to get an extra special giant prize.
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    - Yes.
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    - Are you ready?
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    Let's get our good handshake going. Fist bump, bump, bump.
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    OK, we got to do this the fastest. Go.
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    Come on. There you go. That's right.
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    Get those out of your way. We've got to win.
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    [cheering]
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    Ok, there's one more in there.
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    Come on, you've got this.
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    - You got this, let's go, girls.
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    You're so close. Yes, good job.
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    Oh, yes, give yourselves a big round of applause.
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    Team Kyle.
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    - Team Kyle, we can do it, we can do it.
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    - Oh, she's ready to go.
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    - Go, go, go, go, go, go, go.
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    - Come on.
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    - Keep digging.
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    - She's not going to beat us, don't worry. We've got this.
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    - I love the energy. Yes!
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    - What?
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    - What? That was record. Yes!
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    - We have a prize for the winner. What is it?
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    - Whoa! - Yeah.
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    - You know what? That's a good duck
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    and God's goodness is for everyone.
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    Everyone is getting a special prize today.
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    - What?
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    - Isn't that wonderful?
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    Do you want to see what it is?
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    Yeah, that's amazing.
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    - Is that incredible?
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    - That's incredible.
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    - I think we've gotten off to a good start today.
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    - We've seen a little bit of God's goodness. Amazing.
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    - Yes.
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    - Let's catch up with Chuck as he talks about
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    some of the obstacles that may come against us
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    when we're trying to find out is God good.
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    - Throw this back in there.
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    - Is God good?
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    Is He good on day one of working from home?
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    How about day 180?
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    Is God good when school is online?
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    Is He good when your business is struggling?
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    Is He good even when everything in the world
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    makes you want to scream, "Good God, what is going on?
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    And where are you?"
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    That's a fair question and actually a great prayer
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    because we believe there is a good God with good answers.
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    - Hey, I'm Chuck Mingo,
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    and this is one of my favorite things to do.
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    I love leisurely casual walks in the woods.
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    We're in this Journey where we're talking about
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    a good God, right?
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    God being a good Father and Him being a good King.
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    And today, we're going to continue to talk about
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    how do we live that out over the long haul of our lives.
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    But I want to ask you a question.
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    Think about your favorite movie.
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    Now, think about the plot line of your favorite movie.
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    Let me say a couple of mine.
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    I love Remember the Titans.
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    You remember that one, right?
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    It's the one about the football team
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    that wins a championship.
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    I'm also a big fan of the Star Wars universe,
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    all nine of the main movies
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    and everything else that they've come out with.
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    I love it all, right?
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    Star Wars, you know that one.
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    That's the one about Luke Skywalker becoming a hero.
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    And I definitely and my family has a favorite superhero,
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    it is the Black Panther.
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    And you know that one.
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    That's the one about the guy who became king.
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    But aren't those movies boring or at least
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    they sound boring when I describe them that way?
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    You know why?
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    Because I'm not describing the adversity.
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    Remember The Titans is a great movie because
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    that football team had to struggle through racial tension
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    to become a team that won a championship.
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    Luke Skywalker had both the internal
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    and the external struggle of overcoming the dark side
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    to become the hero that we know him to be.
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    And yes, Black Panther became the king,
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    King T'Challa forever, Wakanda forever.
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    But the reason was because he overcame Klaw and Killmongar
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    and even his own family legacy in the past
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    to become the king that we knew him to be.
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    Great stories require adversity.
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    We love that in our movies.
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    We just don't necessarily like it in our lives.
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    In Psalm 34:8, a verse we've been looking at
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    over and over in this series, this Journey, it says:
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    we all love the first part of that verse:
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    Taste and see that the Lord is good.
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    And He is good.
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    God is good all the time and all the time...
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    That's right, God is good.
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    I just took some of you back to church. You know that.
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    But, that other side of needing a refuge,
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    what does that mean?
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    Well, you only need a refuge if life is a place
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    where you may find yourself under assault.
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    Guess what? That's the reality of life.
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    And so we've got to figure out
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    how do we walk in God's goodness.
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    And the way to do that is that we have to take
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    a long-term redemptive view that God is doing good,
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    that He's writing a good story in your life.
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    He is a good Father and he is a good King
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    and he has a good story planned out for you.
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    We're going to talk today about how to believe that
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    when life is not good.
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    You and I have a fundamental flaw
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    when it comes to our view of the world.
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    It's one of the reasons why we struggle to believe
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    that God is good in our real lives.
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    Because I want life to be a walk in the woods,
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    but the truth is, life is an obstacle course,
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    life is a struggle.
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    It is a struggle in so many ways.
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    And actually, the Bible helps us to see that.
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    It helps us to see that this issue of God's goodness
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    has to take place in the context of our crazy, crazy world.
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    I think about it this way.
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    Can you imagine if you were taking a walk
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    on Normandy Beach on June 5th, 1944.
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    That' might have been a great day
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    to walk on Normandy Beach. I don't know.
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    But I'll tell you what, not on June 6th,
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    because on June 6, it was D-Day.
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    On June 6, Normandy Beach became a war zone.
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    And that's what the Bible actually
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    describes the world that we live in.
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    It says we live in a war zone.
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    Ephesians 6:10-12 puts it this way:
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    "Finally, be strong in the Lord,"
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    Paul is writing to the early Christians, he says:
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    See, when you're in a war zone, you understand
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    that there's going to be collateral damage.
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    And as I look at our lives and I look at our world,
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    I see the collateral damage of a world that is
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    disrupting and destroying itself because of sinfulness,
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    because of the brokenness of humanity
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    and all the things that unleashed
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    in terms of evil in the world.
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    Now let me make a very clear point here:
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    I am not saying that God calls bad things good.
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    God doesn't call bad things good.
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    Cancer, sickness, illness, death,
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    those things are not good.
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    In fact, that's one of the schemes of the enemy.
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    One of the schemes the enemy is to make us think,
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    God is behind all that bad stuff
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    that's happening in your lives."
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    No, God never calls these things good,
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    but God uses those things,
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    even the things that he doesn't cause,
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    things that happen because there's collateral damage,
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    He uses those things for our good and for our growth,
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    only if we take a long-term redemptive view.
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    I wonder, what are the obstacles?
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    What are the things right now in your life that are
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    keeping you from walking out God's goodness in your life?
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    Maybe one of those obstacles is sin and sin patterns.
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    I know in my life, man, I have felt like
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    I have been on this web, right,
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    of behaviors that I want to change,
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    things in my life that I can't break through.
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    I can feel stuck and maybe you can identify with that.
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    Maybe sometimes those sin patterns keep you
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    from believing that God's goodness is for you.
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    Maybe they keep you stuck in patterns of shame
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    and that's one of the reasons you struggle
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    to believe God is good.
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    Or I wonder, you know, I know we've got
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    young parents that are watching, right?
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    You've got kids that aren't sleeping through the night.
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    Man, talk about feeling like Groundhog Day.
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    "Will this wall ever end? My goodness."
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    Maybe you have adult kids and it's the same thing.
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    You're like, "My goodness, will these kids ever leave the house?"
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    You know, and so many times in our lives,
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    the struggle for us and God's goodness is,
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    "God, I've been here long enough.
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    Will I ever be able to overcome this thing
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    that seems to be an ongoing challenge in my life?"
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    You know, for some of us though,
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    the struggle is really around taking those steps of faith
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    when things are shaky and uncertain.
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    Maybe right now you're struggling with the job market.
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    It's a really tough time economically for many people,
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    for business owners.
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    And you're struggling to say,
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    "God, if I keep taking these steps,
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    are you going to be with me?"
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    Maybe you're someone who's been single
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    and you thought, "By now I thought I'd be married.
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    I thought I'd have kids by now."
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    Maybe you are married,
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    but you're struggling with infertility.
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    There are all kinds of things in our lives
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    that require us to just put one step in front of the other
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    and believe that even though
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    we haven't reached our destination yet,
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    that God is good and He's worthy of our trust.
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    I don't know what the obstacles are for you,
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    but I bet you all of us have situations in our lives
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    where we pause and we ask ourselves the question,
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    "Can anything good come of this?"
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    - I really resonate with what Chuck said.
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    Sometimes life can feel like a war zone
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    with all of these obstacles,
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    and you have to ask yourself that question:
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    can God be good through all of this?
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    - It's an important question to ask because
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    it turns out that life doesn't get easy
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    when you trust in God as good,
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    but God does show up and have your back.
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    One of the places I've seen that in my life
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    is with my money.
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    God invites us to structure our money in a way
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    that is honoring to Him and put Him first.
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    And we can trust Him to be good
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    by following a biblical principle called tithing.
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    - If you want to join me and Hannah
  • 00:11:49
    and thousands of others who have taken that step,
  • 00:11:51
    it's easy, just go to Crossroads.net/give.
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    Right now we're going to catch up with a friend of mine
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    who share his story of trusting the good God so much
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    he decided to get baptized.
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    - Well, thanks for talking with us today, Brian.
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    You've got an amazing story I know
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    about seeing God's goodness.
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    Take me back to the beginning of your story.
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    - So my papaw practically raised me.
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    My dad was a truck driver, so he was on the road a lot.
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    My mom owned her own little beautician.
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    But my dad, he was a good dad when he was there.
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    And I think he tried.
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    My mom was a little abusive.
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    She came from abusive family.
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    They divorced when I was four.
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    She would later meet another guy.
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    He became my stepdad and he was very abusive to her.
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    So I got to see a lot of my mom getting hit on a lot
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    and that bothered me.
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    I just didn't get a whole lot out of the church.
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    It wasn't till later on my aunt
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    would take me to the Super Bowl of Preaching.
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    That's what kind of led me to starting to come to Crossroads.
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    I was still partying and and going out at night
  • 00:13:09
    and then I'd come to church on Sunday
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    and ask for forgiveness.
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    And I could communicate with people there.
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    Like, I feel like these people like me, you know?
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    I kept coming back.
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    I would come back every Sunday by myself
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    just learning who God is.
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    And I stayed with it.
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    And I think that's what has brought me to where I am now.
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    - So you started going to Crossroads,
  • 00:13:32
    but not everything was magically perfect in your life
  • 00:13:35
    from that moment on.
  • 00:13:36
    And you struggled with some addiction issues?
  • 00:13:38
    - Yes, sir.
  • 00:13:39
    I started doing concrete work when I was about 16, 17.
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    I was with a group of guys
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    that I probably shouldn't have been with.
  • 00:13:46
    And, you know, they introduced me to pain medication,
  • 00:13:49
    but I was a functioning addict.
  • 00:13:51
    I mean, people did not know that I was doing,
  • 00:13:53
    you know, what I was doing.
  • 00:13:55
    It just kind of spiraling out of control.
  • 00:13:57
    But, you know, what's done in the dark comes to the light.
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    It was time to make a choice.
  • 00:14:01
    I started digging into the Bible a whole lot more.
  • 00:14:04
    I mean, I was trying to get my mind
  • 00:14:07
    away from the outside stuff.
  • 00:14:09
    Some of the passages in the Bible that I would read
  • 00:14:12
    felt like they were speaking to me.
  • 00:14:14
    That He let's walk through green pastures,
  • 00:14:17
    lay in green pastures.
  • 00:14:18
    And just I wanted that. that good life.
  • 00:14:22
    It was just time to move on with life
  • 00:14:25
    and get over a huge, huge thing.
  • 00:14:29
    - So I know you made a bold decision this summer
  • 00:14:31
    to declare in front of everybody
  • 00:14:33
    that you believe God is good.
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    It's a decision that I'm sure people around you
  • 00:14:37
    might even thought, like, "What are you doing?
  • 00:14:38
    You're crazy, man?"
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    So tell me about that moment this summer.
  • 00:14:41
    - We were actually at The Cove on the good old Ohio River.
  • 00:14:44
    And I was sitting in the field and Brian said,
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    "If you want to be forgiven for your sins, stand up."
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    So I, I mean, I felt God jerked me off the field, you know?
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    And my buddy Mike was with me, stood up.
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    And two guys from Crossroads came over
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    and asked us if we'd want to get baptized in the river.
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    I was like, "Oh, my gosh, that would be awesome. Yeah."
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    I've always wanted to get baptized, like in a creek
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    or a lake or a pond, some kind of water
  • 00:15:10
    or something outdoors.
  • 00:15:13
    I was baptized as a child as a Catholic,
  • 00:15:15
    but I don't -- I didn't get to make that choice.
  • 00:15:17
    So now I got to make this choice.
  • 00:15:19
    And I've had so much guilt just from the past.
  • 00:15:23
    When I came out of that water,
  • 00:15:24
    I mean, it just felt so good.
  • 00:15:26
    I felt like I could breathe and chains are broken off.
  • 00:15:30
    To get rid of that guilt and resentment
  • 00:15:33
    that I had towards myself, just to let things go,
  • 00:15:36
    mainly, you know?
  • 00:15:38
    I even did it with a mask on.
  • 00:15:41
    So that really broke down the wall between me and God.
  • 00:15:47
    I bond with Him more. I call Him a Father.
  • 00:15:50
    He's my rock, my salvation.
  • 00:15:53
    The things that He's putting around me,
  • 00:15:55
    the doors that He's opened,
  • 00:15:57
    the opportunities that I've had,
  • 00:16:00
    my wife, my kids, my life, my house, my car.
  • 00:16:03
    I just -- we owe it all to Him, you know, it's all His.
  • 00:16:07
    I feel like I'm part of the family now
  • 00:16:10
    that I wasn't part of before.
  • 00:16:15
    - Man, baptism is such a powerful step
  • 00:16:18
    and that story was so impactful, so good.
  • 00:16:21
    He took this bold step to say to God,
  • 00:16:23
    "I believe You are a good Father and a good King,"
  • 00:16:26
    and declared it through baptism.
  • 00:16:27
    If you want to take that same step of baptism
  • 00:16:29
    that Brian took, you can.
  • 00:16:30
    Great news, we're working on plans for you.
  • 00:16:32
    Coming up the last week of the Journey
  • 00:16:34
    so go to Crossroads.net/baptism to find out more.
  • 00:16:37
    - Let's head back to Chuck.
  • 00:16:46
    - You know, one of the things that I love
  • 00:16:47
    about the Bible is there are many people
  • 00:16:49
    who Jesus interacts with who are asking that question,
  • 00:16:51
    can anything good come out of my situation?
  • 00:16:54
    One of those is a man who brings his son to Jesus
  • 00:16:58
    because his son is demon possessed.
  • 00:17:01
    Yes, I know that sounds weird,
  • 00:17:02
    but we see that over and over again in the New Testament,
  • 00:17:04
    people who literally have been infected
  • 00:17:07
    and affected by a spiritual presence.
  • 00:17:09
    That spiritual power that we talked about
  • 00:17:11
    in Ephesians that is not God's power.
  • 00:17:13
    And this boy is one of them and he's having seizures.
  • 00:17:15
    And it's been happening for a long time.
  • 00:17:17
    And he comes to Jesus and he just wants help for his son.
  • 00:17:21
    In fact, the story picks up with Jesus
  • 00:17:23
    interacting with him and his son and Mark 9:21, it says:
  • 00:17:42
    See, this is not a surface problem
  • 00:17:43
    that this father's coming to Jesus with.
  • 00:17:45
    This is a demonic problem.
  • 00:17:47
    There is a real spiritual force coming against him,
  • 00:17:50
    and it's a problem that's had a long duration.
  • 00:17:52
    It's been happening since his boy was a child.
  • 00:17:55
    And this father, as you can imagine, is desperate
  • 00:17:58
    and he is doubtful.
  • 00:17:59
    And I relate to this father because, you know what?
  • 00:18:02
    He's hit a wall. He's hit a wall.
  • 00:18:04
    Have you ever hit a wall
  • 00:18:06
    in your spiritual journey with God?
  • 00:18:08
    If you haven't, you're going to.
  • 00:18:10
    This is just the reality of the broken world that we live in,
  • 00:18:13
    this war zone that we live in,
  • 00:18:14
    that we come against things in our lives
  • 00:18:16
    that we just can't seem to get over.
  • 00:18:19
    And this wall stands is just a very clear reminder
  • 00:18:22
    of the brokenness of this world.
  • 00:18:24
    Actually, Janet Hagberg is a writer, an author.
  • 00:18:28
    She's done a lot of research
  • 00:18:29
    on what is a spiritual journey?
  • 00:18:31
    What does it look like when you're
  • 00:18:32
    on a journey of growing your relationship with God?
  • 00:18:34
    And she actually would say the wall is part of the process.
  • 00:18:37
    She puts it this way, she says:
  • 00:19:11
    Man, I've hit some walls.
  • 00:19:13
    I'll be honest and tell you,
  • 00:19:14
    month two of this pandemic I hit a spiritual wall.
  • 00:19:17
    Every part of my life was struggling.
  • 00:19:19
    My marriage was struggling.
  • 00:19:20
    I was struggling at work.
  • 00:19:21
    I was struggling to adjust to all the changes in the world.
  • 00:19:24
    I hit a spiritual wall.
  • 00:19:26
    I was walking through some difficulty
  • 00:19:27
    in my own personal life that led me
  • 00:19:29
    to places of depression and discouragement.
  • 00:19:32
    And I was in a slump.
  • 00:19:33
    I didn't know what to do to get out of it.
  • 00:19:35
    It was just where I was.
  • 00:19:37
    I hit another wall this summer,
  • 00:19:39
    first with the killing of Ahmaud Arbery,
  • 00:19:43
    then Breonna Taylor and George Floyd.
  • 00:19:44
    All of the things that happened this summer
  • 00:19:46
    put me in a place of saying, "God, again?
  • 00:19:48
    Are we here again when it comes to race in this country?"
  • 00:19:53
    And I've got a track record of walls.
  • 00:19:55
    At age 30, I hit a wall that led to anxiety attacks
  • 00:19:58
    and ultimately me needing to change my career.
  • 00:20:01
    A loss of a parent, went through that wall recently.
  • 00:20:03
    Miscarriage of a child.
  • 00:20:06
    There are all kinds of walls that I've experienced
  • 00:20:08
    in my life so I can relate to this father.
  • 00:20:11
    And Jesus says this to him, after he comes to Jesus
  • 00:20:14
    and says, "I'm struggling, I'm in a difficult place.
  • 00:20:17
    Jesus, can you help me?
  • 00:20:18
    If you can do anything, help me."
  • 00:20:19
    You know what Jesus says to him?
  • 00:20:27
    But I love the fathers honest response.
  • 00:20:36
    Friends, these might be the most honest words spoken
  • 00:20:38
    by anybody in the Bible besides Jesus and God Himself.
  • 00:20:43
    I believe, I believe, look at my life,
  • 00:20:45
    look at all the obstacles that God has walked me through.
  • 00:20:48
    I know what God can do. I know that God is good.
  • 00:20:52
    But I'm at a wall.
  • 00:20:54
    I believe, but help my unbelief.
  • 00:20:56
    And I love that Jesus doesn't scold this guy
  • 00:20:59
    for being honest about where he was in his faith.
  • 00:21:02
    You know what Jesus does?
  • 00:21:03
    He listens to him. He empathized with him.
  • 00:21:06
    He was present with him.
  • 00:21:08
    And I want you to know, when you hit your spiritual wall,
  • 00:21:10
    it may not feel like it.
  • 00:21:12
    It might seem like Jesus is distant,
  • 00:21:14
    but he is not distant.
  • 00:21:15
    He is listening to you.
  • 00:21:18
    He is present with you.
  • 00:21:20
    He is empathizing with you.
  • 00:21:22
    One of the reasons is because Jesus knows
  • 00:21:23
    what it's like to hit a wall.
  • 00:21:26
    Mark 14:36, we see Jesus in one of His walls,
  • 00:21:30
    the wall called the Garden of Gethsemane,
  • 00:21:32
    where Jesus knows the next day He is going to experience
  • 00:21:36
    unbelievable torture as He dies on a cross
  • 00:21:38
    for my sin and for your sin.
  • 00:21:41
    And Jesus says, "Abba, Father,
  • 00:21:42
    all things are possible for you."
  • 00:21:45
    In the Garden of Gethsemane, He says, "Remove this cup from me."
  • 00:21:48
    Jesus knows there's pain ahead and He's at a wall
  • 00:21:51
    and He's saying, He's asking His Father,
  • 00:21:53
    He's saying, "Father, if there's any way
  • 00:21:55
    to get around this wall, I want that.
  • 00:21:57
    But I want to follow you more.
  • 00:22:00
    Not what I will, but Your will be done."
  • 00:22:04
    Jesus hit a wall in the garden, He'd be put on trial,
  • 00:22:08
    He'd be wrongly convicted,
  • 00:22:09
    and then He would die one of the most torturous deaths
  • 00:22:11
    that humanity has ever invented, crucifixion.
  • 00:22:16
    And Jesus knows that as He meets with this man
  • 00:22:19
    who all this father can see is the wall.
  • 00:22:21
    He doesn't know what's to come,
  • 00:22:23
    he doesn't have a sense of what Jesus is about to do.
  • 00:22:27
    But Jesus doesn't just empathize with him,
  • 00:22:29
    He does something else.
  • 00:22:30
    The story goes on and says:
  • 00:22:34
    Jesus cast the demon out of this boy.
  • 00:22:36
    But it says:
  • 00:22:48
    I want you to hear those words:
  • 00:22:50
    Jesus took the boy and He lifted him on his feet
  • 00:22:55
    and he stood up.
  • 00:22:57
    Now, listen, I don't want you to take this
  • 00:22:59
    to mean that everything in your life
  • 00:23:00
    is going to have a happy ending right now.
  • 00:23:02
    That's not the point here. That's not the point.
  • 00:23:04
    But here's what I do want you to know.
  • 00:23:06
    I want you to know that Jesus will walk with you
  • 00:23:08
    until everything that is broken is ultimately made whole.
  • 00:23:12
    Hey, let me tell you something:
  • 00:23:13
    God is good because if the story isn't good,
  • 00:23:16
    then the story isn't done.
  • 00:23:18
    I think about a friend of mine who worked in a country
  • 00:23:22
    that really had, quite frankly,
  • 00:23:24
    an epidemic of sex trafficking,
  • 00:23:27
    young girls being raped for profit.
  • 00:23:30
    And when you're close to that work
  • 00:23:31
    and you see both the successes,
  • 00:23:33
    but also a lot of times when the pimps get off
  • 00:23:36
    and the girls are re-trafficked,
  • 00:23:37
    you have to ask yourself,
  • 00:23:38
    "How can you stay hopeful in that kind of work?"
  • 00:23:41
    And I'll never forget what my friend said to me.
  • 00:23:43
    He said, "Chuck, one of the things I had to believe
  • 00:23:45
    and still believe is that God has all of eternity
  • 00:23:49
    to make it right."
  • 00:23:51
    Friends, let me tell you something,
  • 00:23:52
    as much as the walls in my life, I would love
  • 00:23:56
    to get over all of them on this side of eternity.
  • 00:23:59
    The truth is, it's a war zone.
  • 00:24:02
    And in a war zone, there's collateral damage.
  • 00:24:04
    In a war zone, people die.
  • 00:24:06
    In a war zone, pain will keep happening.
  • 00:24:09
    But the hope that we have is that
  • 00:24:12
    this isn't the end of our story.
  • 00:24:14
    If the story isn't good, then the story isn't done.
  • 00:24:18
    And I believe what Jesus was doing
  • 00:24:20
    when He lifted that boy up and raised him up
  • 00:24:22
    was He was prophetically communicating
  • 00:24:25
    what He was going to experience Himself.
  • 00:24:27
    Jesus himself was going to go down
  • 00:24:29
    and be as if He was dead.
  • 00:24:31
    He actually was dead, but three days later, Jesus got up.
  • 00:24:34
    And so we had the hope of the resurrection.
  • 00:24:36
    We have the hope that our story isn't limited
  • 00:24:38
    to what happens in the 80 years or the 75 years
  • 00:24:41
    or the 55 years, or maybe sadly younger than that years
  • 00:24:44
    that we live on this earth, because our story
  • 00:24:47
    is connected to the story that Jesus is telling
  • 00:24:49
    of a resurrection, of a life that is yet to come.
  • 00:24:52
    Let me tell you why I know God is good.
  • 00:24:54
    I know God is good, because what I'm promised
  • 00:24:57
    is that I will experience
  • 00:24:58
    the same kind of resurrection that Jesus did.
  • 00:25:02
    That doesn't mean that I'm not going to have
  • 00:25:04
    a lot of setbacks on this side of heaven,
  • 00:25:06
    but it does mean that one day
  • 00:25:08
    all of those setbacks will be made right.
  • 00:25:11
    I love what it says in 1 Corinthians 15,
  • 00:25:14
    and I want to encourage you with this scripture.
  • 00:25:17
    This is after Paul has written some of
  • 00:25:19
    the most beautiful words about the resurrection of Jesus.
  • 00:25:23
    And he finishes all of that by saying this. He says:
  • 00:25:42
    Friends, your labor is not in vain.
  • 00:25:44
    The difficulty is not in vain.
  • 00:25:46
    The hard times are not in vain.
  • 00:25:48
    Going through the wall is not in vain.
  • 00:25:49
    God doesn't waste anything and He will redeem everything.
  • 00:25:56
    The story isn't good and the story isn't done.
  • 00:26:00
    When you face a wall, I want you to look for the rope.
  • 00:26:03
    I want you to look for the rope.
  • 00:26:05
    I want you to look and understand that
  • 00:26:06
    in the midst of your wall,
  • 00:26:07
    in the midst of your circumstances,
  • 00:26:09
    God is doing something.
  • 00:26:10
    He has not abandoned you.
  • 00:26:12
    He's present with you.
  • 00:26:13
    He's listening to you.
  • 00:26:14
    He's empathizing with you.
  • 00:26:16
    He will empower you and me,
  • 00:26:18
    and He will enable us to experience His goodness.
  • 00:26:20
    I think about the the wall
  • 00:26:22
    of the second month of the pandemic
  • 00:26:24
    and how it taught me some things
  • 00:26:27
    that are making me a better husband now to my wife
  • 00:26:29
    because of the difficult things we went through.
  • 00:26:31
    I think about the wall of the summer
  • 00:26:33
    and how amidst all of the pain
  • 00:26:35
    of the racial division in our country,
  • 00:26:37
    I am seeing seeds of hope and God is allowing
  • 00:26:39
    and inviting me into the work of hope.
  • 00:26:41
    I think about that every time I think about a wall.
  • 00:26:44
    I don't know what your wall is,
  • 00:26:46
    but I want to encourage you to look for a rope.
  • 00:26:49
    I want you to know that Jesus wants
  • 00:26:50
    to reach out His hand to you.
  • 00:26:52
    God is good and He will reach out His hand to you
  • 00:26:54
    in the midst of the circumstances that don't seem good,
  • 00:26:57
    that He will take you up by your feet
  • 00:27:00
    and He will stand you up in His goodness and in His love.
  • 00:27:04
    Friends, if the story isn't good,
  • 00:27:08
    then the story isn't done.
  • 00:27:12
    As we listen to this song,
  • 00:27:13
    think about what obstacles you need to lay down to God
  • 00:27:16
    and in a minute we're going to go through that wall together.
  • 00:31:45
    - To walk in the goodness of God,
  • 00:31:46
    you've got to press into the wall.
  • 00:31:49
    And how do you do that?
  • 00:31:50
    Well, I think that father in the story shows us how,
  • 00:31:53
    it's total surrender and connection to Jesus.
  • 00:31:56
    I love in the moment when Jesus is about to heal his son,
  • 00:31:58
    he has totally surrendered to whatever God is doing
  • 00:32:00
    in that moment, even to the point of being honest
  • 00:32:03
    about his struggle to believe.
  • 00:32:05
    And I think God wants the same of us.
  • 00:32:06
    When we remember that God is a good Father and a good King
  • 00:32:10
    that can totally be surrendered to no matter what we think.
  • 00:32:12
    And even with our struggle,
  • 00:32:14
    we experience more of His goodness in our lives.
  • 00:32:16
    One of the ways we practice that is by singing
  • 00:32:18
    these songs that are really prayers set to music
  • 00:32:20
    that remind us of God's goodness.
  • 00:32:22
    They remind us that He's a good Father and a good King.
  • 00:32:24
    So I want to encourage you to press in
  • 00:32:26
    and let's sing together.
  • 00:41:16
    - Man, don't let anything stand between you
  • 00:41:19
    and the goodness of God
  • 00:41:20
    that He has for you right around the corner.
  • 00:41:22
    - Yeah, and what Chuck talked about with surrender,
  • 00:41:25
    if that's something you're interested in,
  • 00:41:26
    you want to maybe surrender through baptism,
  • 00:41:28
    you can go to Crossroads.net/baptism right now
  • 00:41:32
    to find out more information.
  • 00:41:34
    And if you want to chat with us any time,
  • 00:41:36
    you can go to Crossroads.net.
  • 00:41:38
    - Next week on a Good God Journey
  • 00:41:39
    we're going to wrap things up by talking about
  • 00:41:41
    the family of God that He invites you to.
  • 00:41:42
    And that's not just any family,
  • 00:41:44
    it's a family with an amazing mission.

Oct 24, 2020 41 mins 48 sec

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