Summary
Pastor Safrit walks through Acts 22 and the first part of Acts 23, focusing on the theme "Anchored in the Resurrection." He emphasizes how Paul, despite facing opposition and isolation, finds reassurance in the presence of the Lord, who stands by him in his darkest moments. The sermon encourages believers to live authentically, confront hypocrisy, and rest in the hope of the resurrection, reminding them that God is always with them, even in chaos.
Welcome and Announcements
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Thank you for that choir. If you have a child who wants to be dismissed to Children's Church, that's available for you at this time. Ms. Santana will be taking them back at this time. And thankful for that opportunity.
If you have your Bibles, it will be in Acts chapter 22. And we'll go through the first part of Acts chapter 23. Acts 22, the first part of 23. And next week, thank you choir for singing.
Next week will be our men's choir. And so any of our men that want to help with that, we'll be kicking off our Advent season with Christmas time. I think they'll be doing some Christmas songs. And we'll start our Advent as well with our Advent candles.
And excited about looking forward to that time of Christmas time. But today we'll be looking at Acts chapter 22.
Looking at, I've titled it, Anchored in the Resurrection. And looking forward to what Paul experienced here.
Because I think it can help us in our daily walk as well. And so we'll read the last verse of 22. And the first 11 verses of 23. Let's all stand and read the God's Word. And then we'll go forward. My voice is a little bit shaky today.
This past Friday we did our annual Turkey Bowl football games at my wife's school.
And they wrote me into coaching two football games. And then at the very end, after I had already lost my voice, they're like, hey, will you coach a third game? And so I didn't have a voice to begin with. And I really shot my voice the last game.
So I've been struggling all weekend to even be able to talk. So we'll see how the Lord blesses.
It may be an early service and get you out of here real soon. I have no idea.
So let's read the Word of the Lord. It says, The next day, since he wanted to find out exactly what Paul was being accused of by the Jews, he released him and instructed the chief priest and all the Sanhedrin to convene. He brought Paul down and placed him before them.
Verse 1, Paul looked straight at the Sanhedrin. I want you to imagine this. He had just been beat. The crowd he preached last week. And now he stands before the high priest, the Sanhedrin. And he says, Brothers, I have lived my life before God in all good conscience to this day.
The high priest Ananias ordered those who were standing next to him to strike him in the mouth.
Paul said to him, God is going to strike you. You whitewashed wall.
You are sitting there judging me according to the law. And yet in violation of the law, you are ordering me to be struck. Those standing nearby says, Do you dare revile God's high priest? Talking about Ananias.
They looked at each other and said, I do not know, brothers, that he was a high priest, replied Paul. For it is written, you must not speak evil of the rule of your people.
When Paul realized that one part of them were the Sanhedrin, Sadducees, and the other were the Pharisees, he cried out in the Sanhedrin, Brothers,
I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee, and I have been judged because of the hope of the resurrection of the dead. And when he said this, a dispute broke out among them, between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided.
For the Sadducees say there is no resurrection, neither angels nor spirit, but the Pharisees affirmed them all.
Then shouting grew louder, and some of the scribes of the Pharisees' party got up and argued vehemently, We find nothing evil in this man. What if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?
And when the dispute became violent, the commander feared that Paul might be torn apart, and they ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them and bring them into the barracks. Verse 11, and we're going to spend some time on this verse because it is an impactful verse.
It says, Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for your reading of your scripture. Be with us today as we worship you in spirit and truth as your word is proclaimed. In your name we pray. Amen. You may be seated.
William's Story at Sea
Amen. Several years ago, a young man named William was traveling across the Atlantic on a cargo ship. He hadn't sailed much. He wasn't a sailor.
The story actually goes that he was just a simple school teacher, and school teachers are not simple, but that's just how the story is listed.
I'm thankful for the school teachers that are in this room and those that invested in me, but he was returning home after a visit, and one night while he was on this ship, a violent storm rolled in without warning,
without anyone knowing what was going to happen, and the waves began to pound this old cargo ship, and it was like a hammer on the side of the still. You can just imagine the shaking that was going on.
He was down in the bottom, and he said that the crates that were strapped to the walls were breaking loose and just going back and forth because the ship was being moved so much.
Men were shouting. It says that the decks were slick, and everything was just chaotic and crazy, and he was in the lower cabin, and William said he held on to the edge of his bunk as the ship lurched into the darkness.
At one point, a massive crash shook the entire hole, and the beam that was in his room had snapped. The lights began to flicker, and for a moment, everything went silent,
and he said too silent for himself, and he said in his moment, he wrote in his diary, I believe with all of my heart that we were sinking and we were going to die.
He said panic began to set in, and men were running, and others were shouting in every direction, but nothing sounded certain in the chaos that was going on, and in that chaos, William did something unexpected. He did something that no one else was going to do.
He climbed out from the bottom of the cargo, and he climbed to the top of the ship, and he walked out on the deck in the raging wind as everything is going crazy around him, and he said that he had to see for himself how bad it was really out there.
He had to see if this storm was going to be the last storm. He said, I've got to see this storm and see how bad it really is. He said as the waves slammed into the rails, he looked toward the bow of the ship, and he saw the captain there.
The captain was holding on to the boat, the wheel, yes.
He was holding on to the wheel, and in that moment, he said he was calm, he was steady, but he was drenched in seawater, and he said as he was standing there firm, his hand on the wheel, he said the captain turned and locked eyes with William,
and in that moment, he locked his eyes, and he simply nodded to William that everything was going to be okay. He didn't say a speech. He didn't explain what he meant. He was just steady in what he believed, and it was confidence in that nod.
See, William later wrote in his diary, the moment I saw the captain, I knew we would make it through the night. He said the storm didn't change,
but my confidence in who was guiding us through the storm changed, and oftentimes, this is where we're at in our life. We're surrounded by noise. We're surrounded by chaos, uncertainty,
the pressures of the world that come on us, and it makes us mistakenly think that the storm is our story.
It makes us think that the storm that we're going through is writing our story, and in reality, God is outside of the storm, and he's saying, no, no, no, this is just part of your story, but it's not
Paul's Experience and Assurance
the story. The story is who stands by you in the storm. In Acts 23,
we see as night falls with Paul here, Paul is beside himself, and the Lord steps in beside of him,
reassures his soul, and helps him to go forward with his life, and that's sort of what we're going to look at as we set the stage of where Paul is at. In the first couple of verses, we see the first thing is that Paul rebukes the religious.
There are times for this to happen, but when rebuke comes, when difficulties come, and difficult people come against us with boldness, Paul shows us that the boldness comes with respect,
it comes with truth, but it also comes with humility. He stands before the Sadducees, and the Sanhedrin, and the Pharisees, and he says this statement of, brothers, I have lived before my God in good conscience on this day, and he says this with a sense of humility, of
saying, I am here in good conscience. And so I believe as we look through how this rebuke happens, we can learn two things. The first thing we can learn is, Paul exposes their hypocrisy.
Oftentimes, as we go through our life, it is good for people to expose things in our life. I yearly put myself into submission, and say, hey, Allison, and several other people in the room, evaluate me.
Help me understand where I'm at as a leader, as a pastor, as a father, and I want to be better. I want to put myself in humility,
and allow these things to come in our life, and Paul, in this sense, was rebuking them and challenging their hypocrisy. By saying this, he looks at their face, and he says, I've lived in good conscience. And when he said this, it infuriated Ananias. Ananias was a man historically known for cruelty,
corruption, and bribes. And Paul looks at him, and he calls him a whitewashed wall.
He says, on the outside, you're decorated, you look good, you've got the garments, you've got the high priestly robe, you've got everything on the outside, but on the inside, you're decaying, and you're disgusting on the inside. And Ananias, in rage and fear, comes up, and begins to attack him.
As I was thinking about this on my drive out in the Alexander County, and as I drive in to here, as I'm coming to work, I see often just old barns that are off to the side, that people have abandoned.
Maybe it was a grandfather, or a great-grandfather's barn, that is no longer in good shape. And there's this one barn that I see often. It's over when I'm taking Hudson to daycare. The outside of this barn is, it's dilapidated. There is, I mean, you can like see through the whole thing.
It's gone. Something happened a couple of years ago, and a tree had fallen on top of it, and they cashed in some insurance money to put a brand new roof. I mean, this roof is like, it's spotless. It's red.
It is the nicest thing you've ever seen on this barn that is just completely gone.
There's no point that they would have spent the money on this barn. Every time I see it, I think, why did they put this new roof on this barn that was going to fall apart anyways? And it reminded me of this story. Paul is saying, listen,
on the outside, you've made things look good, but on the inside, you are completely broken, and you're trying to impress people with the painted religion on the outside. And he says, this must get to the heart of the issue and ask yourself, what are you doing and how are you living your life?
And as I begin thinking through this, this is the thought that came to my mind. Does our outward Christianity match our inward Christianity?
Does our outward actions that we do on a daily life and a daily basis, do they match the inside of our life?
And are we doing the same thing on the inside as we were doing on the outside?
And are we challenging ourselves to live a life that is a life that is abstaining from hypocrisy and living a life that is full of God's glory from the inside out? That's, as Logan clearly said this morning,
how whatever is on the inside will eventually come out. And whatever we put on the inside will eventually come out as well. So Paul exposes their hypocrisy, but Paul also acknowledges his limits.
Now this is key for every leader and everyone in here today is to know where your limits are at.
Oftentimes people have to tell me, James, you have to be better at managing and delegating some things. I'm a go-getter. I'm a type A personality. I want to attack everything and fix everything.
I'm a fixer by nature. And Allison will tell me, hey, you've got to know your limits. You've got to know what to hand off and what to take care of and what not to take care of. And it's difficult for me to not have my hand on every little thing.
And it's really, really difficult for me to let other people do things. And I work on that. I truly do.
But this is this passage where Paul understands this and he understands his limits as well. You see, he's confronting the high priest. And in this moment, he realizes that this is the high priest. And he realizes that he's speaking against this high priest.
Boldness and Submission to God
Now he continues to speak with boldness, but he softens his tone a little bit. This tells us that rebuke can come as long as we're submissive to God's word.
And the Bible says, as Paul was saying here, he says, true boldness doesn't ignore authority, but it submits ourself and it bows ourself to God's order even when confronting sin.
It's understanding that it's okay to be bold and it's okay to call things out as long as it's in the proper order of life. There is an order of how things go in life and in scripture. And we must submit ourself to that order.
And Paul understood that and he changed his tone and he even changed his tactics.
Because as we look through this, the religious leaders rebuked him and now he begins to say, you know what? Let's change this, not out of fear, but let's change how I'm doing this out of wisdom.
I pray often. And right now we're reading through the Psalms as our family. And we just read Psalms 21 just a couple of nights ago. And the whole Psalm is the Psalm of wisdom.
Of just asking the Lord to give wisdom to David as he's leading his nation, as he's becoming the king. And I told our kids, I said, oftentimes we don't pray for wisdom. We just try to live out of wisdom.
And we must ask God to step in our life and give us wisdom to give us the truth that only he can give to us to reveal the wisdom in our life. So Paul acknowledges his limits and he exposed their hypocrisy. But number two, he rests in the resurrection.
Paul here, when his truth is attacked, he doesn't go back and try to defend himself. And I think this is important for us to see because as Paul was going through his life and he's rebuking the religious people and he's doing the right thing, he's doing what God told him to do.
But then when he sees that his tactics are not working, he just simply steps back and says, I'm going to live and anchor my life in something that can't be taken from me. And I think it's important for us to realize that when we anchor our life in something that is immovable,
our life will also be anchored in an unmovable way.
And Paul says, I'm going to live in the resurrection. I'm going to live in this moment of the life and the death of Jesus Christ and the resurrection of him is where I'm going to live my life. He looks out and he notices there's a divided room.
He notices that there's ones on this side that believe a certain way, the Sadducees who don't believe in the resurrection, who don't believe in angels or miracles. And then there's a group on this side that are like, yeah, we love the resurrection.
We love the angels. We love the demons. These are great things. And so he steps in and he says, you know what? Let me just sort of divide the line here and state where I believe. There is a resurrection.
Jesus died and he was crucified and he rose from the dead and now he intercedes for you and me. And in this moment, he divides the elites. He divides those that were there and he begins to say, listen, I'm on trial for having hope in Jesus, having hope in a resurrection.
And all of a sudden, the room erupts in a moment of, now the ones that were attacking him, the Pharisees, are now on his side. They're like, hey, this guy's for us. He believes like we do.
He's got to be one of us. And the Sadducees are like, no, no, no, no, this guy, he can't be one of these guys.
And all of a sudden, now the crowd erupts and the storm erupts in the room here and everything goes crazy. It reminds me, and I'm not a camper by any means. I was never a Boy Scout or an Eagle Scout. Was there any Boy Scouts in the room?
Okay, a couple Boy Scouts, Eagle Scouts in here and Brown, were they Brownies, the girls, is that what they were called?
Brownies and the Girl Scouts. And they would teach you how to build a fire and how to put a tent up and they would go through this really fun class called Orienteering.
Orienteering was how you take a compass and you read a map and you were able to direct yourself through the woods and the geography of everything. And this is one thing they teach you. They say that a compass always points north.
Doesn't matter if you take that compass and you shake it up really hard
and you put it down, it's always going to face north again.
Doesn't matter if you throw it up in the air and you catch it, it's still going to face north. The dial inside of that compass is always going to direct you in a northern area and you're going to be able to base your boundaries off of those things.
And this is what Paul was saying, I am bounding myself to the compass of this spiritual identity of Jesus as the resurrection. The resurrection is not just a doctrinal statement, it's a dividing line to people.
When we talk about the resurrection, when we talk about Jesus, people are going to have one or two responses. They're going to say, yes, tell me more or they're going to say, no, I don't want to have anything to do with you. It is a dividing moment and we have to ask ourselves,
are we living in that moment? Are we living in the resurrection so that no matter what comes in our life, we're able to grab onto that resurrection, we're able to grab onto the truth of God's son and say, this is where my life is at.
Not only does God have a division here of the elites, but he delivers his servant.
God delivers his servant in a way that in this violent matter, in this violence that erupts, the commander of the Roman army steps in and says, we've got to take care of this because we're afraid, the Bible says that he's going to be ripped apart.
This thought came to my mind, what looked like chaos in Paul's life was actually God clearing a path.
What looked like chaos that was going through Paul's life, God steps in and says, I'm going to just clear the weeds that are in front of your life for a moment.
I'm going to allow someone that you never even thought that was going to step in to save your life to step in and save your life and give you direction of your life. Oftentimes, chaos in our life is the same way.
It's God giving a rescue of a means that we would have never chosen.
We would have never chosen conflict for it to be a way to help our life, but yet God steps in and he uses the unexpected to clear the path. See, the night falls. Paul is sitting in a barracks. He's isolated. He's misunderstood. People have slandered him.
And this is the part that really gets me. He's unsure of his next step. He's unsure of where he's going to go and what's going to happen next. And as darkness settles in, you can imagine the loneliness that he feels. He's by himself.
Literally, as we looked at last week and two weeks ago, the group that was part of him tried to kill him. He tries to preach to them. They're listening to him. Now he gets arrested.
He's about to be beat. He says he's a Roman. They take him to trial. He tries to preach to the ones that were there, the religious leaders. Maybe they're going to help me. No, they turn into a revolt.
The Romans have to come in and now take him out and put him into the barracks in isolation. If there's ever been a rollercoaster ride of emotions,
Paul could say he was on that rollercoaster ride of emotions. Those that loved him, those that were for him in one moment are now against him. And now the uncommon,
unexpected way of salvation comes to the Romans and he's just sort of sitting there in isolation.
God's Presence in Isolation
I want you to just imagine where you would be at as you rest in this moment and Paul begins to be reassured by the Lord. He begins to sit there in verse 11, the turning point of this whole passage. The Bible says, the Lord stood by him and said.
As we begin to close this message down, as we begin to ask ourselves where we're at in life today, some of you may be sitting here today saying, man, I'm overwhelmed with thankfulness. I can't give God enough glory for what he's done this last year. My life has been on cloud nine.
I'm not even thinking of Psalm 22. I'm thinking of the goodness of the Lord and how great he is and I'm just so optimistic but there are some in here that are sitting here saying, things happened this year and I don't know what's going on.
I don't know where my life is. I don't know why these things are happening and you're almost where Paul is at. You're in the barracks, you feel lonely, you feel isolated, you feel like the darkness is setting in in your life and I'm here to tell you this morning, Paul in that moment was reassured by the Lord.
God came to him in the darkest moments of his life and said, I am here with you. These are the four things I got as I studied this last one verse. The first is this, the Lord knows us. The Lord knows exactly where we're at.
Jesus came to him at night. The voices of the men had faded. The riots, the confusion,
the chaos that was going on all was taken away and now the doubts that can happen in our lives when we're in silence begins to come in to Paul's life and yet God steps in in the presence of
God, in the presence of Jesus Christ steps in and says, I'm personally here for you. I'm precisely right beside you because you're doing exactly what I've called you to do.
Just know that I haven't left you alone and I'm going to be here in a timely fashion. I'm so thankful that the Lord shows up when we need him the most, not when we expect him to show up.
And that often happened in David's life as you go through the stories of all the characters of scripture. God shows up when they needed him, not when they wanted him.
And oftentimes in our life, we have to be as a sheep who understands that the shepherd is going to show up and take us to the green pastures when we need the green pastures.
He's going to take us beside the still waters when we need the still waters, not when we think we need them, but when we know we need them, when the shepherd is in charge of that sheep and the
ones that are on the valley. They are understanding that God is there and the shepherd is there to take care of them. This morning, do you believe that God knows exactly where you're at?
Do you believe that God knows what is weighing on your heart this morning and that he knows who you are and he is intricately working in your life? He was intricately working in Paul's life and he reassured him in this moment.
Not only was the Lord knowing him, but the Lord was with him. The Lord is with us as well. The Bible says that the Lord stood by him.
I think it's interesting because as we think through, as we go through the Christmas story, as we think about the angels coming, we think about the messengers coming and delivering good news, God on purpose didn't send an angel. He didn't send Paul a dream that was going to comfort him.
The Bible says that the Lord himself stepped into his story and said, Paul, I know things are tough. Paul, I know you don't know what's going on.
I know you don't, you're questioning some things and you're questioning why these things are happening, but Paul, look, I'm right here beside you. As I was thinking through that, this is what came to me. The presence of the Lord is the antidote to what we're walking through.
It's not the panic of what we're going through. The presence of the Lord is the thing that cures the thing that is going on in our life. You fill in whatever it may be and God says, I want to step down into your story.
I want to step down in where you're at to deliver you in a way that you never even saw fit. You may be surrounded this morning with enemies,
critics, those that are uncertain of your life, but trust me, you are never alone if you have God with you.
Christ stands by his servants and he loves us and he cares for us and he is with us no matter what happens in our life. So not only does the Lord know us and not only is the Lord with us, but the Lord is for us.
Look at this next statement in this verse. The Lord stood by him and said, be of good cheer. Be of good cheer.
Don't fret. Don't go through this life not knowing what's going to happen in your life, but be of good cheer. Have courage, the Bible says, as we walk through this because this is the same phrase that Jesus used all throughout Scripture. When Jesus met the paralytic,
he said, have courage. Be of good cheer. Stand up and walk again.
When Jesus was walking down the street and he was going to Jairus' daughter and the lady reached out and grabbed his cloak and he said that the Spirit of the Lord has left me and the lady finally said it was me.
I've been dealing with an issue of blood. He looked at her and he said, be of good cheer. You've been healed.
Have courage in your life that the Lord is with you. As the disciples were in the storm, as they're going through the chaos of life, Jesus looked at them and said, peace be still and he looked at his disciples and he says, be of good cheer. I'm with you.
I am here around you and know that I am for you in your life. If Christ commands us to have courage, I promise you he'll supply you with the courage in your life.
If Christ is there and he says, have courage and be of good cheer, he's going to be the one that's going to help us to have the courage. It's not going to be in our own strength. It's going to be through his strength because he is standing there with us and he is guiding everything in our life.
Oftentimes, as we go through our life, we will live our life based on the approval of others.
And I'm guilty of this as well. I'm guilty as I'll sit down at lunchtime or dinnertime with my family and I'll say, okay, tell me all the good, the bad, the ugly. How bad was my sermon today? How rough did I lead?
Did I say something that was out of line? And it's really good when they tell me all the good things and then Allison will go, well, James, you probably
shouldn't have said that. And it's like, oh, man. I'm not trying to live in the acceptance of others but it's human nature that we want to say things or do things that others say, hey, well, it's a great job. We want to live for that but oftentimes, we don't live for the approval of Christ.
For Christ looking down at us and saying, well done, thou good and faithful servant.
You preached faithfully, you witnessed faithfully, you saw the person that was struggling in school or at work and you went out and you gave them hope, you gave them encouragement and that's what I've encouraged you to do.
Oftentimes, we don't live that style of life because we don't get that instant gratification of someone else telling us good job. Whose approval matters more to us?
Is it God's approval in our life or is it the people that are around us that are approving in our life?
Christ's Ongoing Work in Us
And the last one that I want to bring out in this simple verse is the Lord is not finished with us. Paul is reassured by the Lord and Paul tells, Jesus tells him in this last statement, as you have testified into Jerusalem, so must you also testify in Rome.
You see, Paul's life is dark, it's desperate in this moment and God comes in and says, you may feel sidelined in this moment.
You may feel like that you don't understand what's going on but I'm here to tell you I'm advancing you in a way that you never saw fit. Right now, you feel like you're put in chains but understand you're perfectly on assignment where I have given you.
The men put you in chains but I am delivering you in to a greater area of your life.
I wish I knew chess. I play every once in a while with Brody and I had a pastor that was teaching me and I just couldn't understand it and there would be times I would be playing with my former pastor and we'd be
messing around and he would do something. He would go backwards and he would do, I'm like, dude, I'm about to win this game. I'm about to beat him in chess. This is going to be awesome.
He's retreating because of how great I am and there was a moment where he went backwards and I'm like, yes, I'm going to go after the queen. I'm going to get him in checkmate and I move forward and he's like, boom, you're in check. How'd that happen?
I was doing so good. You were in retreat. You were going backwards
and oftentimes what feels like a setback in our life is really just God preparing us for what he is going to do for us to set us up for something great where we feel like it's a retreat or a step back or going backwards in life. God said, no, no, I'm preparing you.
I've brought you to this point as Paul was looking through his life. He's like, God, I've preached and I've done the things you want me to do and now I'm isolated in a jail cell. I'm isolated away from everybody. Why are you doing this to me? Jesus looks at him and says,
you've testified in Jerusalem. Now you're going to go to Rome.
Now you're going to testify in Rome. I am not done with you and there is nothing in your life that is wasted. I'm here to tell you that you have a greater plan in your life if you'll just continue to follow me. Don't give up now, Paul.
I know it's tough. I know you're feeling like you're discouraged. That's why I didn't send an angel. That's why I didn't send a dream. I came personally to you to encourage you to tell you now is not the time to give up.
Invitation and Reflection
Christ is not done with you and Christ was not done with Paul in his life. As Terry comes and plays for our invitation, I want us just to think for just a moment. As the night settles in over Jerusalem, oftentimes we would finish a sermon and Paul's in a pulpit.
He's up and he's preaching or he's doing a miracle and hundreds of thousands of people are coming to know Jesus and man, Paul is like doing some awesome things but now he's in a barrack. He's in a jail cell. There's no crowd. There's no applause. There's no visible momentum in his life.
All it is is a tired servant who's wore out, who's been beat to death multiple times and he's sitting in the dark wondering what the morning is going to look like. Maybe you've been there. Maybe you're sitting there and you're saying, I don't know what tomorrow is going to look like.
I'm afraid to even go to sleep because I don't know what tomorrow is going to look like. I don't know what the pressures of life are going to look like. The room's divided in my life.
Some people are telling me to do one thing and they're getting louder and another group is telling me to do one thing and Lord, what are you doing in all this? Then this verse 11 comes. The climax of this passage because verse 11, the Lord is standing beside him.
That's the whole message. The whole message is the Lord is there with us. The Son of God stepped next to his servant and spoke courage to him in the darkness. He knows you. He's with you. God has placed you. Even if it's uncomfortable,
even if it's uncomfortable to say the things that God is telling you to say to that person, say it anyways.
Rest in the resurrection. Know that when you live in the resurrection of God, nothing in your life can be shaken. Rebuke empty religion. Start in your own heart and say, am I truly serving the Lord today? Am I truly living the daily life of the believer on the outside as I would on the inside?
Receive Christ's resurrection and reassurance today. As we stand in our deliverance of the Lord, are we standing in the way that Paul would stand in knowing that this is what the Lord is having for him? Maybe today you need to ask for courage because it is tough to stand up to other people.
Trust me, Thanksgiving is coming. I did a counseling service with a lady just two weeks ago talking about family dynamics and what that's going to look like and I said, people are going to say things and you're going to be tempted to say
things and it's tough to speak courage. It's tough to have courage and maybe you need to say, God, I need the courage to say what needs to be said this Thanksgiving or this Christmas season. Maybe you need to confess hypocrisy!
And say, God, I want to be bold for you. I want to stand for what is right and maybe you need to stop living like your story is over. God says, I've got a plan for you.
I've got a plan for you to go to Rome. I know you don't see that. I know you're in a desert. I know you're in a dry spell.
I know you're stuck in the barracks and you just did what I asked you to do but know I've got something else for you. Know that I'm
doing these things to get you ready to stand in front of who you're about to stand in front of.
Know where your anchor is. Know where your courage is and finally this morning I want to end by saying this. When people surround us, when the fear presses in on your life and even when the future is uncertain in your life, Christ still stands beside us. He's holding our hand.
He's walking with us and as he says in John,
I'm going to go away to give you a comforter that's going to be with you no matter what. And if Christ is standing there with us then we can stand when difficult times come as well. lean in and trust on the Lord as we go through our life. Lord, we love you.
We thank you for what you've done for us. Lord, help us to be so anchored in your resurrection, so anchored in your goodness,
so anchored in the grace that you've given us that even when difficult times come, even when times come that we don't even know what's going on, we know that you're still in control and we're just going to keep
Closing Prayer and Farewell
serving you no matter what. God, we thank you for what you've done for us. We love you. In your name we pray. Amen.
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