Turning Our Crisis into an Opportunity

Christ stooped down from heaven to be born in a manger. He stooped down to be mocked, betrayed, beaten, and even crucified. He didn’t have to. He could have said, “Father, I’ll pass on this assignment. Let Me stay up here on high.” But for your sake and mine, He said, “I’ll stoop down. I’ll go low, so low that I’ll be buried in a grave. So low that the enemy will think I’m defeated. So low that forces of darkness will have a celebration.” But the good news is He didn’t stay down. He stooped for a moment, but He got back up again. He defeated death, hell, and the grave for you and me.

And sometimes people say, well, I don’t know why I must not gotten any further along in life.
More than likely, it’s because back here watch this. Back here in things that you thought were insignificant.
God thought they were very significant because he was testing you, giving you the opportunity, testing you, trying you, and revealing to you how you responded.
Today on in touch, turning our crisis into an opportunity.
And Jesus came up and spoke to them saying, baptizing him in the name of the father, the Holy Spirit.
Tigeon enters all that I have to mention.
And I hope you always even to the end of the page.
How do you respond when you’re facing a crisis in life?
They’re all kind of crisis. Sometimes they’re painful, sometimes they’re costly. Sometimes they’re very surprising.
They come upon us. How do you respond?
If you respond the right way, you can profit by it.
If you respond the wrong way, then you find yourself paying a big price.
We all are going to have crisis in our life.
In fact, how many of you have ever experienced a crisis in your life? Come on. Put them up.
Everybody has. I know they have. Well, how did you respond? You said, well, I didn’t do very well.
Or maybe you said, you know, I responded right maybe for the first time or or the fact that I’m learning when crises come in our life.
Well, the message today should be very, very encouraging because there is a proper way to respond.
In fact, the truth is in every crisis, there’s an opportunity.
And oftentimes, we miss what God is up to in their life because we don’t think about a crisis which may be painful or suffering loss or difficult in hardship and it can be uh, a crisis in your finances, in your relationships, in your health, in your vocation, It can be all kinds of things that bring crisis into our life.
The issue is how do we respond? And what are the what what’s the basis of a right response?
Well, in this passage of scripture, the life of Joseph is a perfect example of the right kind of responses in time of crisis.
And the fact, instead of focusing on the crisis itself, the issue is what is my opportunity in the middle of this crisis?
And today, there are probably more people facing a crisis in our country than ever before in many, many years.
So how do we face it? How do we respond to it?
We couldn’t be angry and bitter and hostile. We could blame God or blame someone else.
Is there a better way? Yes.
Is there a way to profit in the midst of a painful crisis, yes, there is.
So I want you to turn if you will to the thirty seventh chapter of the book of Genesis.
Because this is the beginning of the life of, uh, Joseph as recorded in the scripture.
And the truth is not gonna read much of this because If you read all of it, it would go all the way to the fiftieth chapter because that last section of Genesis is all about the life of Joseph.
There are not very many people in the bible that, uh, nothing is said negative about them.
But Joseph is certainly one of those leaders that by that which there’s nothing negative said.
And I just wanna begin reading by a few verses in this thirty seventh chapter.
Now, Jacob lived in the land where his father had sojourned in the land of Kan.
These are the records of the generations of Jacob.
Joseph, when seventeen years of age was pastoring the flock with his brothers, while he was still a youth.
Along with the sons of BilHA and the sons of Zilpa, his father’s wives, and Joseph brought back a bad report about them to their father.
Now Israel loved Joseph more than all the sons because he was a son of his old age, and he made him a very colored coat, attorney.
His brothers saw that their father loved him more than all the brothers, and so they hated him and could not speak to him on friendly terms.
Now, I want to simply begin by saying, I want us to look at seven major crises in Joseph’s life.
And then I want you to see how he responded and how each one of these crises prepared him for some area in his future life.
Because god’s still doing the same thing.
When he allows a crisis in our life, he allows it for a purpose.
And if we respond properly, then what I experienced today in a crisis, if I respond correctly, it will prepare me from another crisis that’s coming along.
And what happens is that each one builds upon the other, and the natural response ought to be that our faith should grow.
Our confidence in God should grow. And our confidence in ourselves as far as the way to respond.
So as we look at these crises, I wanna begin with the first one, which is The fact that he grew up in a family where in that thirty seven chapter three times it says they hated him.
They hated him. They hated him. They hated him. He couldn’t do anything right.
He was always a subject of ridicule, of rejection.
And so that was the kind of family he grew up in.
Not not just society, if that was his close, intimate family, absolutely hated by his brothers.
Because they said, well, the father has, uh, has been prejudiced toward him and made in this coat of many colors, as we would say.
And, um, so he’d had this dream and this dream indicated that one day all of them would bear down to him.
Well, there’s enough turmoil in this family already and I must enough hatred.
And then he says, one of these days, here’s where it’s gonna be.
All these sheaves, my sheaves in the middle, all these gonna bow down, mine’s gonna stand up straight.
Well, that just made them hate him that much more. So the issue is how did he respond?
How did he respond to living in a close family with eleven brothers and all of them hated him?
Well, he could have said, it’s your fault. He could have blamed him.
He could have been resentful, hostile, angry, told his dad, and a whole lot of things he could have done.
But here’s what happened. He responded rightly, which means that he took the opportunity to learn how to live in that kind of a situation and circumstance where there was no love, no admiration, and no encouragement.
He took the opportunity to learn how to respond to that and to respond to them without growing bitter as infantil, hostile anger, and taken out vengeance upon them.
No indication of that at all. Now the important thing about that was this.
That was very, very important to what was going to happen to him later on when he found himself in a situation where normally that’s the kind of thing he would have felt.
So his first crisis were just growing up, uh, in that kind of a family and learning how to respond to that situation.
Well, the second crisis he faced was that his father sent him over to check him to check on the on the brothers and, uh, see how the flock was going and so forth.
And so when they saw that he was coming, they just decided this is a good time to take care of him, so we’ll just kill him.
So they stripped him of his garments and, uh, you remember they killed, uh, an animal and put the blood on the, uh, garment and took it back to the father and said, you know, poor Joseph.
He’s been killed by some animal and so forth. And so anyway, they throw him in a pit.
They throw him in a pit to leave him there to die.
And it was deep enough he couldn’t get out.
And so, uh, here he was helpless and hopeless, leaving him to die And what was his response?
Well, naturally, he wanted to get out, but that he had to come to the conclusion that he won’t, you know, let him out.
And so he had to take the opportunity.
If he was if he was gonna survive this, How could there be an opportunity when he’s in a pit and they’re leaving him to die?
But he had a dream.
And that dream was that one day all his brothers would bow down to him.
And what was happening in that period of time while he was in the pit, he was learning something.
And he found himself absolutely, totally dependent upon god.
Only god could get him out of that.
Well, because he had the right attitude about it, And because he took advantage of the opportunity to trust god in this helpless hopeless situation, what he didn’t know was that god was preparing him for a time when he would be in a similar situation.
Much worse. And yet, God would be there to rescue him no matter what.
You see, oftentimes, we forget that one crisis in our life is oftentimes preparation for enabling us to go through something worse.
And the truth is if you’ll think about it, how do we grow?
We grow in the Christian life by facing one trial after the other. One heartache, one hardship.
And oftentimes, if you’ll think about it, we don’t think it fair, but god does.
That it seems that well, if I survive this one, why should this one be so much more difficult?
And if I survive this one, god, it ought to get easier and easier.
Many of you have asked you don’t have to tell me. How many of you have said to god?
Why why doesn’t it get easier somewhere along the way?
Because what makes us grow is the testing and the trial.
And you see, the greater the test, the greater the trial, we keep it’s like we just keep pushing and pushing, or he does, and we just grow up up and up, and we don’t like it.
But at the same time, something good’s going on. So now he’s thrown in the pit.
So his brother comes along and says, no. We it’s no way we’re gonna kill him.
Let’s sell into these, uh, these caravans that are going by.
And so they decide to sell him as a slave into Egypt. So this was not a crisis.
Here he is going further and further away from his family in Canon. He’s gonna be sold as a slave.
That means he’s a nobody that is absolutely useless and that, uh, he’ll be lost.
In a civilization that was absolutely foreign, totally foreign to them. So think about it.
He could have fought against his captors Uh, he could have gotten very belligerent and blaming them and wondering where god was or take the opportunity.
I’m going to Egypt. I’m gonna learn what Egypt’s about.
I’m gonna if I’m a slave, I’m gonna learn their language. I’m gonna learn their ways.
Gonna learn how they operate. That is, uh, I’m gonna take advantage of this opportunity somehow in some way.
God’s gonna work me out of this. Which was also preparation for another event that was coming in his life.
So when he gets to, uh, Egypt They put him on the block to sell him.
And of all the people that would buy him would be the man who is the chief bodyguard.
He’s captain of the bodyguard, of Pedro himself.
And so he buys purchases, um, Joseph, and, uh, puts him in his household But you see, he’s already been learning a little bit as he’s coming along.
And now he could see himself as a slave or he could see himself with a tremendous opportunity.
He could learn the language of the Egyptians.
He could learn how the upper class in Egypt operate and live. He can learn about their wealth.
He can learn about, um, how the function and another family.
This is a family that saw him as a servant, and as a Hebrew servant at that.
And of course Hebrews and Egyptians don’t look down at each other.
The Egyptians thought Hebrews were law class because they’re all the shepherds.
And so he had to deal with that because naturally when he first got their household, uh, they didn’t just welcome him in as a part of the family.
So no doubt he was looked down upon it first and had the same kind of situation to some degree that he had suffered back in his own family as sort of a nobody in their mind.
Each one of these situations was just getting him ready for the next one.
And each one he saw is an opportunity. To learn something, to develop something.
So he certainly saw in potiphar’s household a wonderful opportunity to learn the ways of an Egyptian family to learn the ways of Egyptian culture.
He also learned how to be a leader. He learned how to manage.
Because finally, part of us said, you’ve done so well.
I’m gonna put you in charge of my whole household.
So he comes as a slave, as a nobody, and now he’s the number one person in the family, apart from the intimate family themselves, and he’s overseeing all of Polyfa’s billing his business, his bar everything.
He’s in charge. So what was god doing?
God once again was preparing him for something that was ahead.
And if we can get that in our thinking, that whatever I’m going through today is preparation for something I’m gonna face tomorrow.
If you get that attitude and you and you begin to operate on that basis, then things begin to change in the way you see them.
So he saw this as a wonderful opportunity, and watch this.
Every time he took advantage of the opportunity, he came out winning.
He came as a slave, but his attitude was right because, you know, in there’s no indication that it wasn’t.
And so what happens? It wasn’t an accident that the captain of the bodyguard of Ferrell happened to be the man who purchased him.
So now he is in, potifa’s household and everything’s going better. And then what happens?
The next crisis he meets is potifa’s wife.
And so she began to woo him and try to seduce him every way possible.
She could have destroyed him. The truth is he could have destroyed himself.
But here’s what he saw.
He saw this as an opportunity watch this skepticism to discover about himself, his weaknesses and his strengths.
And he said to her, your husband has placed everything in this household in my possession.
He said he has given me everything in this household, but you.
And I cannot proved to be unfaithful to god and disobey him.
That crisis was an awesome opportunity for him to discover his own strength his own faithfulness, his own loyalty, his own devotion, no matter what the price would be, and he knew there had to be a price.
Because she of course accused him, and he got thrown in jail.
And so you see every time you and I attempted by something, It is also an opportunity for us to find out something about ourselves, whether it is a moral temptation or financial temptation or temptation about some relationship or whatever it might be, there’s also an opportunity.
And the opportunity for him was that he could demonstrate to her that his allegiance and loyalty to god superseded every other desire in his life.
He had all of potiphar’s household. He didn’t have her.
More important than having everything was to have his relationship to god to be right.
How very important it was.
Because that too would provide basis for something else else that was gonna happen in his life.
So following that, of course, he gets thrown into prisons.
So now we are into the next phase of his, uh, crisis.
And when he’s thrown into prison, He could have said, well, god, at this point
in my life had to
be in his twenties by now. At this point, I’ve done exactly what you’ve said do.
I’ve been obedient to you. He could have blamed god, he could have blamed everybody, but you know what?
Wasn’t very long before he was in charge of the prison. Why?
Watch this carefully because He had the right attitude of what is what is my opp in other words, god has allowed me here.
What is my opportunity now? What was my opportunity in potiphar’s household to learn and and to be submissive to those in authority over me and to learn how to manage, learn how to rule, And now in prison, what kind of opportunity can that be?
Well, they put all the prisoners in his in under his charge.
And so now he’s learning how to be authoritative, but he’s also learning how watch this, the treat of a people right.
Because you see, he grew up in a family. They didn’t treat him right.
He knew what rejection and pain and suffering and heartache and feeling like you’re a nobody in that you don’t count.
In fact, I’m not too sure that there are many emotions in life, if any, that has the depth of pain that rejection has.
Every divorce, every separation, every separation of kids in their family, whatever it might be, the feelings of being rejected, especially by somebody that you love or somebody that is meaningful to you and somebody very important to you.
It is a very, very painful, indescribable, painful, emotion. And so he knows that.
And so when he’s head of the prison, I am sure that all those experiences he’d had back home and the way he was treated and the way, uh, they they just absolutely totally tried to destroy him.
How would he respond in prison? He would take the opportunity to do what? To express genuine caring.
Because you see, he was there, not because of something he had done, but because he was falsely accused.
Have you ever been really falsely accused of something?
It’s a very painful feeling when you know that you’ve done what’s right and somebody else accused you of doing something wrong.
So how did he respond? He responded, I believe, in a caring way for those prisoners.
Because you see his past crisis had made it possible for him to respond in the right way.
Then, of course, he’s in prison.
And you remember the, uh, the the, to gentlemen who worked for, uh, Ferrow, the baker and and the, uh, cup bearer.
Both of them had dreams and one of them was restored, and the other was not.
The baker had his was hanged. And so, you know, it’s just one crisis after the other.
Then one morning, he wakes up.
And they come to him and they say, you need to get a shower and get get dressed up here.
You’re you’re going before. Thearaoh himself. Well, what was all of that?
Uh, well, that meant his death or what, whatever it meant.
And so they dress him up and What’s happened is that Theros had this dream.
You remember the dream about the cows, the lean cows, and the fetid cows, and the uh, lean stalks and, uh, and the heavy stalks of corn.
And so he’s had this dream and all of us sued sales and so forth. They couldn’t interpret it.
So Uh, well, let’s say there was there was a man, uh, in prison when I was, he was a Hebrew and, uh, he interpreted my dream.
So payroll calls for him. Well, what did that mean?
He didn’t have an idea what that meant, but it was a wonderful opportunity to watch this.
Because Joseph had the awesome privilege and opportunity to present his god this Hebrew god, Jehovah, to confront all the Haven gods of Egypt.
Because he said, he said, uh, my god is Jehovah.
I’m not an interpreter, but he will. He can interpret your dream.
And so he told him the dream.
And Joseph interpreted the dream and said there’ll be seven years of awesome bounty.
Seven years of absolute nothing. Nothing is gonna grow.
And the wisest thing for you to do is to in these first seven years, plan for the next seven years.
And so when he got through talking to Ferro, Faraoh asked the question, well, what man is there in all of Egypt as wise as this man.
So what did he do? He made him second only to himself.
He said he’ll ride in the second chariot, and he said no one will lift a hand in all of Egypt
without Joseph’s permission. Now think about this.
When he was at home, he didn’t know anything. Except to be ruled.
In every circumstance, in every in every crisis of his life, god was preparing him for something else.
He served faithfully potiphar. He learned how to manage. He learned how to overseer.
And now he has the very awesome position of being able to rule over all of those who had ruled over him.
What was his attitude though during this time?
Looking to the father, trusting him, he had a dream, and he was believing that what god had shown him would be true one day.
Now I’m just giving you all that as a background of what I really want to say, about facing crises in your life and the opportunities we have.
Because you’re gonna have them. And you can either respond incorrectly and suffer the consequences.
And sometimes people say, well, I don’t know why I must not gotten any further along in life.
More than likely, it’s because back here watch this, back here in things that you thought were insignificant.
God thought they were very significant because he was testing you, giving you the opportunity, testing you, trying you, and revealing to you how you’re responding.
And I think many people wonder why how, somehow they missed it in life.
When the truth is, they didn’t respond correctly.
In the simple little test and trials that came their way.
So with all that in mind, I have fifteen suggestions I’m gonna put them all in mag screens, and I wanna tell you this.
I know they work. I’ve been through enough crises in my life to know they absolutely work.
So if you’re going through a crisis, no matter what it is, I can tell you this will work.
If you’re wise enough to write these down, put them to the test, try them you will find yourself in any crisis no matter what it might be.
God bringing you through it with confidence and assurance.
You may not start out with that confidence and assurance, but it’ll be there.
So I want to begin with one. The basic one is simply this.
I must see these crises, whatever it might be.
I must see them, first of all,
the way god would have me to look at it. And that’s
this. He’s working everything in my life for my good. Romans eight twenty eight.
You say, oh, I’ve been hearing that all my life. Well, but what have you done about it?
Have you been practicing that? In other words, if you can see And if you believe that Romans’s eight twenty eight is true that god causes all things to work for our good, If we you and I truly believe that, that is to those who are his children, that is the first step.
When a crisis comes, the question is Not god, why did you do this?
But I have to look and ask myself the question.
Do I really internally believe that he’s working everything for my good then I will take an opportunity in this crisis to discover what god wants to do in my life.
The second very, very important truth is in Psalm, uh, one zero three, um, verse nineteen.
And that’s simply this that god is in control of everything.
If you’re in a crisis and you don’t believe that god is in control of all things, and you you have a reason to be ringing your hands and ringing your heart.
He’s in charge of everything. He’s in control of everything.
Therefore, when it comes to Romans eight twenty eight, that he’s causing all things to work together for my good.
I may not understand it. He’s causing all things to work together for my good.
And, um, that being true, uh, it can only be true if he’s in control of all things.
The third thing, if you’ll think about it for a moment, you have to accept the truth of what is in Isaiah fifty five and, uh, you probably didn’t know this by heart.
But remember what he says, he said, my ways are not your ways. My thoughts are not your thoughts.
My ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts are higher than your thoughts.
That is, here’s what God is saying. You won’t always understand what I do.
You won’t always understand the way I go about things.
You won’t always understand why I allow you to suffer in certain situations and circumstances so that don’t don’t lose heart because you don’t understand why.
That is the big question when a when a crisis comes, if my first question is god why, then I’m gonna miss it.
It’s not why. I know that if he allows it, he says for my good, he has a reason.
So if I can get that in my thinking, then his ways are not my ways, his thoughts are not my thoughts, and that is because he’s omniscient.
Watch this. Because he’s omniscient, he knows that what’s painful for you today will be profitable for you tomorrow.
That what you just wanna run away from today, you wanna run to tomorrow. He knows that.
And so when a crisis comes, I have an opportunity.
To discover something about god that I’ve never discovered before, and that is that he is intimately involved in whether it’s your pain or whatever it might be.
He’s there. Uh, fourth thing that’s so very important, that’s this. Don’t make quick judgments when a crisis comes.
Don’t make quick judgments. First of all, we have revolving emotions, number one.
And when a crisis comes, Most of the time, we don’t have any details or don’t have any proper details.
If you’re certain listening to your friends, you won’t know where you are.
And so the truth is You have to ask yourself the question.
Well, maybe God will well, I don’t quite understand this. So, naturally, you’d ask that question.
But a quick judgment is always a wrong attitude. But god holding you up to in my life.
You can ask god, and you can tell them, and lord, I don’t like this.
I don’t understand that you’d allow this to happen in my life.
He understands that, but you have to get over that fast because you said Romans eight twenty eight, I believe. I believe that he’s in control of all things.
I know he’s ways to knot my ways. He’s ways to higher than my ways.
And if they’re higher, that means they are wiser than my ways. And much more profitable for us.
And then, of course, focus on god instead of the crisis.
In other words, all of us have faced crisis in life And if you get if you find yourself focused on that crisis and the pain of it and so forth, what happens is you’ll get off track.
And you’ll lose the awareness of the comfort and the knowledge you know that god has of you and his unconditional love for you.
You said, but it’s painful. Sure. It’s painful. But you can still focus on him.
And this is why somebody says, well, how can I focus
on god when I’m hurt?
And here’s how you focus on. Open the word of god and start reading.
You can read in the psalms, you can read in epistles or whatever it might be.
But what happens is when you get into the word, god becomes your focus.
And he’s going to encourage you, challenge you, or bring something to enter your mind that needs to go in your life.
It shouldn’t be there. And so he’s going to show you what that is. And you begin to understand.
Well, now god, I’m beginning to see what I’ll begin to see what you’re doing.
But if you focus on the crisis, you’ll lose something. And then, of course, avoid focusing on the pain.
In other words, the pain, you don’t focus on it. You don’t focus on the crisis.
Back to the word of god.
I may still be hurt and I can remember times in my own life, when I felt that same thing, that hurt, that pain, but when I get in the word of god and start reading, it’s like god would just he would just calm my spirit and quieten my spirit and it’s like putting sad on a cut and things begin to change in my thinking.
And what happens is you begin to look at things differently, but you’ve got to focus on him.
And that’s why I started at Romans eight twenty eight. And then on the hundred and third something.
In other words, all of these are basic, believable, indestructible, unchangeable, truths about god.
He’s working for your good. He’s in absolute control, and you don’t understand, but but he understands.
And then, of course, recall the past crisis and the opportunities that followed them.
Now all of us said, while ago, we’ve had crisis in our life.
So I ask you, well, how did you respond? Well, well, just pick out the worst one.
How did you respond? If you responded correctly, you can probably look back and say, well, thank god.
It was a very difficult time in my life, but now I see what you were doing.
You are preparing me for something else. And if you’ll think about this, it is the will of god.
He says that he’s predestined you and me to be conformed to his image.
That means he is continually working in our life to shape us into the character of Jesus Christ.
He is going to allow He’s going to send into our life whatever is necessary to shape us in character like his son.
So, therefore, when I look at that and I think about the opportunities, the opportunities, and I look into my own life and think about things that have hurt me deeply or a real crisis in my life, I can look back and see exactly what what God was doing.
Now, if you ask me over here in the middle of it, what’s he doing? Same thing you’d say.
I don’t have any idea what he’s doing.
But on the other side, that’s why if we respond properly, then what’s gonna happen?
We’re gonna make progress even in the midst of that situation, circumstance.
And then little by little, we’re gonna begin to understand what in the world was god doing in the process.
So I think about dealing with our anger immediately concerning it.
Now would you say, well, I thought you said you shouldn’t be angry.
I didn’t say you wouldn’t be angry at first.
In other words, the Bible says, don’t let the sun go down on anger.
Don’t take it to bed with you.
So the truth is When certain things happen to us, our natural normal response may be anger, but you can’t let it stay there.
You have to say, okay, god. I’m angry about this. I don’t appreciate this. I don’t like this.
I don’t know. They treat me this way, but I’m asking you to forgive me for my anger and I’m moving on god.
What what what is what what are you doing?
I wanna I want to take advantage of this opportunity of being able to be hurt without being angry but a few moments.
Because I know this is not gonna get me anywhere. We’re all gonna face crisis.
And when you when you when you respond immediately as we said a few months ago in anger.
And, uh, when you let anger, just lie there.
It’s going to cause you some problems that you could possibly miss god’s whole purpose.
And and there are people and I’ve met people who live, who have lived, now still living in anger over something that happened years ago.
And I would say to them, well, why can’t you lay lay it down?
Well, you don’t know what they did to me. Well, how long is it? You know, it’s been seven years.
I said, wait, wait a minute. You’re still angry over something that happened seven years ago. Yes. I am.
Well, what has it profited you? Silence. Because anger does not profit anything.
The question is what what was what was god trying to do in your life and you put this barrier up And you’ve said no, no, no, when god may be trying to do something in your life that’s absolutely going to make an eternal difference in your life.
Then, of course, submit yourself to the will of god in this situation, whatever it is.
Now that’s not always easy. But watch this, we have to go back.
You see, all this boils down to whether I believe him or not.
He says he’s working it for my good. Do I believe that? He says he’s in absolute control.
He says he understands why we don’t understand. He says he loves us unconditionally.
If I believe those things, then I’m going to be able to look at them and ask What’s my opportunity in this given situation?
My opportunity to grow spiritually or my opportunity that god may send some of the way that all this is just getting us ready for.
Everything that happened to Joseph until the day he met pharaoh face to face All of that was preparation for what god was going to do.
He was always growing, always being submissive to the situation which he found himself because he believed God.
God had given him a dream. You say, well, I’ve never had a dream like that.
You’ve got something about in a dream. You say, what’s that? You have the written word of god.
Uh, listen, dreams come. How many of you how many of you can interpret your dreams you have at night?
They’re useless. There’s just a mixture of something and you think, why in the world did that come from?
You can’t trust the dream. Listen, you and I have the word of god.
We can trust his word. We are far ahead of where Joseph was when it comes to truth.
And understanding what god is doing in our life. Then, of course, you have to demonstrate.
I believe this is an important part to demonstrate a sense of gratitude. You said, now wait a minute.
You mean to tell me when I’m hurting. I feel rejected.
I mean the whole world’s falling apart and I’m to express gratitude. Yes.
Only can you do that on the basis if you believe the first one of our principles?
And that is that he is working something good in your life.
And that he is in control, and that he understands why you don’t understand.
In other words, if I really and truly believe the truth of the word of god, which you and I read and we pray over and we talk to God about.
If we believe it, we’ll be able to say, lord, I don’t think I don’t like it. It hurts.
I wouldn’t do it this way.
I think you ought to do it some other way, but I know that you know better than I do, so I’m gonna thank you in spite of it.
Gratitude always works because what you’re saying in essence, I don’t understand it But you must love me enough knowing that I don’t understand it, that you let me hurt because you know something good is gonna come out of this.
And then, of course, uh, it determined in your life to view the crisis as an opportunity.
Determined to view it as an opportunity. That’s a choice we made. You say, well,
I don’t feel like it.
That’s nothing to do with feelings.
It has to do within this given situation I’m going to determine in my heart that god is giving me an opportunity.
I may not understand it today. I may not like it today or tomorrow.
But here is an opportunity for god to either teach me something or put me in a position that I would never have believed that he put me in.
You see, watch this. What you and I don’t see, and what what you and I don’t see, we don’t see all of the background.
We don’t see all the things that God is doing in our lives, that nobody sees.
We don’t see it. Nobody else sees it.
He’s working things in our attitude in our life, the way we view things, the way we treat people, every respond to people, He’s working in all of these things to do what, to get us where he wants us to be.
And so if we respond in the wrong way, what happens is either god’s perfect will for our life doesn’t work out that we we want it because we object to it because one of them was to be submissive to him whatever that might be.
And then watch this one, refuse to listen to unscriptural interpretations by other people of what’s happening to you.
This is very important. You can’t afford to listen to other people’s interpretations of what god is doing in your life.
Now sometimes there’ll be somebody wise who’ll give you some, uh, some good advice.
But for the most part, they’ll say, well, if I were you, here’s what I’d do, Remind them that they’re not you.
And secondly, they don’t know what they do if they were in your p particular position because You are where you are because god has allowed you to be there for god’s purpose.
And listen, god isn’t going around telling everybody else you’re a business.
He’s not telling somebody else, well here’s what I’m gonna do with him and her. No.
I have to trust him and I can’t trust other people to tell me uh, how I’m to respond in a given situation.
Unless I seek real wisdom from somebody whom I trust, who knows, and loves god, walks in his ways.
Before you start getting advice from anybody, his first thing you do, watch the way they live.
If they’re not living a godly life, don’t listen.
If they’re living a godly life, then that’s a possibility you ought to listen.
Then, of course, remain in constant prayer listening to god’s instructions.
You say, well, god has never spoken to me and as I always answer that question. Yes, he has.
Do you think God, what what god isolate one of his children to say, I’m not gonna listen to him.
I’m not gonna speak to him. Yes, he does.
If I don’t believe he speaks to me, I’m not gonna hear him.
And it may be that god may knock on your door over and over and over and over again until finally you listen.
But he’s speaking to you. He wants to give you direction. He wants you to take opportunities.
He wants you to take advantage situations and circumstances in life that make it possible for us to grow and be conformed to his likeness.
He he and that that’s what he’s up to in our life.
But if somehow I don’t think he’s going to listen, then more than life, I’m not gonna pray.
Think about this. What is it that drives every single one of us to increase our prayer life?
Pain, suffering, heartache need in some fashion.
So if you get a little lack of days going to your prayer life and you’re not reading the word and so forth, then you know what?
Thank god that you’re heading for a crisis because god loves you.
Listen, I know I know you don’t believe that. But but here’s what happens. Thank god.
He’s heading you for a crisis because listen, he loves you too much to let you go astray and stay there.
That’s an act of love on his part.
And so the reason some people go through more crisis and others that they they god just has a hard time getting them corralled.
I can just think of some people that that they’re always on the run.
But you know what? You can’t outrun god.
If you don’t believe that, you just read the book of Jonah.
It doesn’t make any difference how far you run, how long you run, how hard run, you’re not gonna get away from him.
He loves you too much. What you do is you lose the blessing and the run. You’re gonna run somewhere.
You run toward god, not away from him. And then, of course, refuse to give way to your changing emotions.
And this is what happens. You pray and things don’t change for all your things.
You know, I know, watch this. I don’t feel like God’s listening. I don’t feel like God loves me.
I don’t feel like circumstances, feelings oftentimes are the enemy of obedience to god.
Because I may not feel something, but god doesn’t operate on feelings and he doesn’t want us operating on feelings.
So Think about all of these. Now I just have one more.
It’s the bottom line.
Obey god and leave all the consequences to him. That’s a bottom line.
Obey god and leave all the consequences to him.
You see, if I believe the first one I gave you, I can do that.
He’s working all things for my good. I I I leave all the consequences to him.
Probably if he’s in control, I leave all the consequences to him. Obay him leave all the consequences to him.
No matter what listen, no matter what crisis you face in life, these fifteen suggestions.
That’s what they are, and I know they work.
They will help you through them no matter what that crisis is.
What you have to decide is this.
Do I believe that god is who he says he is?
Do I believe that god works the way he says he does?
Do I believe that god loves me enough to personally involve himself in my life?
Do I believe when I don’t understand, he understands me. Do I believe with all my heart?
That god has a plan and a will for my life. Yes.
Do I believe with all my heart that in every circumstance there’s an opportunity for me to grow in my Christian life or to prosper in other ways.
It all boils down to your faith.
It all boils down to the fact, do I believe What is true is really true because that’s the way we’re gonna respond.
And no matter what crisis you face, if you follow those fifteen suggestions, God’s gonna bring you through it.
Now I didn’t say he wouldn’t bring you through it with tears or no tears.
I didn’t say it’d be easy, but I know He will bring you through it no matter what.
You say, but I’m not even a Christian. Will that work for me? No.
No. It won’t work. You say, well, why won’t it work?
Because first of all, you have rejected personally, you have rejected the person that makes all this possible.
When Jesus, the son of god came into this world and went to the cross and died for your sins, he paid your sin debt in full so that You might be forgiven of your sin.
You might be adopting the kingdom of god. That is you become a part of the family of god.
Your name is written in the lamb’s book of life.
You’re going to heaven when you die to live with him forever.
If you have rejected him, You have rejected his ways, rejected his love, and rejected his plans, rejected his will, and rejected and rejected and rejected and rejected and rejected and injector and injector and injector rejected Now you’re expecting god to say, oh, we’re gonna forget all about that.
No. No. And the truth is you’re not gonna believe him.
Until you accept him as your personal savior, you’re not gonna believe him because you see the rejection of him as your personal savior says you reject him.
You do not believe him. You say, well, I believe in god, but not Jesus. Sorry.
You can’t have it that way.
Because g at the history of the Bible, Jesus says, no one comes to the father but by me.
And god speaks of sending his only begotten son into the world that you and I might be saved and have the gift of eternal life.
If you’re willing to surrender your life to him, I don’t care what kind of mess you’ve made of it.
It’s amazing the the impossible things. That look impossible does are very possible to god.
You want to change in life. You want to be able to face the crisis in your life.
Well, first of all, let me put it this way.
The first big crisis you have to deal with is just the surrender of your life to Jesus Christ for a life change for all eternity.
And when you’re willing to make that change by trusting a Him, everything we’ve said can become a possibility in your life.
Until then, you’re on your own. You have to face these crises yourself.
And you will not face them successfully apart from the grace and the love of almighty God.
It’s my prayer that you’ll be wise enough to surrender your life to him and watch him work in the most awesome ways in your life.
And, father, how grateful we are. That you have planned for each one
of us in such a fashion that you have the best for us.
And I pray the Holy Spirit will speak to every single listener, and enable them to understand that it all begins with trusting Jesus Christ as our savior, and then following him, and practicing these things that we’ve spoken about today, and we pray this in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
God uses the challenges he gives us to demonstrate his faithfulness and equip us to minister to others.
At in touch dot o r g. Learn more about trusting god’s timing, even in the midst of distress.
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Have we tried the drill?
Come on. I’m with you buddy.
Nearly two thousand years ago, the apostle John recorded Christ’s great unveiling. Revelation.
God’s climactic story of hope fulfilled, warning. The day of wrath, and judgment.
Bless are those who will live forever in the new heaven and earth.
The spiritual life is a life lived through a by the Holy Spirit, and the goal is to demonstrate and to express the character of Jesus Christ.
An intimate look into the ministry of Doctor Stanley, the spirit filled life, a new addition of one of his classic books, This biblical perspective on the work of the Holy Spirit can deepen your intimacy with God.
Parenting offers countless rewards.
But over a lifetime, it may bring us seasons of heartbreak.
When your child is living in disobedience to god, you’re enduring one of the most difficult seasons a Christian can face.
Faith and obedience are formed through a personal intimate walk with the lord, and that’s not something a parent can control.
So it’s easy to feel hopeless and even frustrated by your child’s lack of faith.
Today, we feature an email from a very concerned parent. And here’s what they wrote.
I raised my children in a Christian home, and each one accepted Christ at a young age, Today, they’re groan and no longer walking with the lord.
They groan when I point them to Jesus or to God’s word.
But I’m afraid to repeat the same mistakes that Eli and King David who lost their sons when they failed to confront them as adults.
And here’s the big question. How can I point my adult children to Christ without preaching at them?
Well, let me just say that that is a question. Many parents
are asking.
And let me say also, you are right by refusing to be silent.
And you see, one of the reasons that many parents are quiet and silent is they fear the rejection of their children.
But remember this, Your children will be disappointed in you if you begin to agree with them and begin to be silent.
They may openly groan about what you say, but deep inside, they know you’re right.
That groaning, really, in essence, is conviction.
They’re hearing what you’re saying and they don’t like it, but they know you’re right as their parent.
But there are several things you can do.
And of course, the first one is to pray, and I’m sure you’re already doing that.
But how do you pray? And I want to suggest a very specific prayer given to us in colossians chapter one.
If you’ll read that prayer, that Paul begins with the book, and begin to pray it specifically for your children, god will answer that prayer.
A second thing is this, continue to show them love.
Sometimes they may irritate you and you think, oh my lord, what am I gonna do?
You just keep showing them love anyway.
Another thing you can do, which is very, very, very effective, is to show them how god is working in your life.
How he’s answering your prayer, how he’s working in your life to strengthen you and to encourage you.
In other words, you don’t wanna look too disappointed. That doesn’t help them either.
Then here’s something you need to do that you’re not gonna like.
You need to pray that god would send your children pain, disappointment, failure and helplessness.
And your first reaction might be, well, I’ve been praying for god to help them.
They don’t need to kinda help you’re praying for. They need to be driven back to god.
And you and I know that what drives us to god’s pain, hardship, heartache disappointment, discouragement, When you begin to pray that prayer, god knows your motive is not to hurt them but to rescue them.
And so what’s gonna happen is they’re gonna come back to you over this situation of that.
Be ready to encourage them. Not to ever say, I told you so. Just encourage them.
Ready to point them to scriptural principles in the word of god because they’re gonna come back to you with something specific that’s going on in their life.
Then you can point them to a principle in the word of god and keep talking about Jesus.
They may not like it at first.
You just keep talking about Jesus because he’s all about love, he’s all about forgiveness, and you wanna keep your answers rooted in him.
Then be encouraged. You are obeying god by taking this approach, and god is going to hear your prayer.
Meditate on this promise, and there are many promises in the scripture that you can read.
But listen to this one, and I love it because I’ve turned to it so many times and recommended others do the same.
Here’s what he says in first John chapter five verse fourteen and fifteen.
This is the confidence which we have before him, that if we ask anything according to his will, He hears us.
What you’re asking god to do is to rescue your children. So, therefore, he’s going to hear you.
He says, therefore, If we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the request, which we have asked from him, which is god’s way of simply saying what?
You ask me anything that’s according to my will, I’m gonna hear you.
I’m gonna bring about the desire of your heart when the motivation is pure when your heart is pure and you’re trusting me for the answer.
And I would simply say to you trust the lord. Trust him with all your heart.
You may not feel like you’re making progress, but you are.
And the process of doing so you’re gonna watch God answer your prayer in the most awesome way.
Well, thank you for watching in touch today, and I trust that the lord will give you guidance and direction.
And before long, you’ll be saying, well, you know, I’m surprised how quickly God has begun to work in the life of my children.
How grateful I am.
Touching the world with a passion for god and compassion for people in touch with Doctor.
Charles Stanley, is a presentation of in touch ministries.
This program is made possible by the grace of god and your faithful prayers and gifts.