It Was A Good Fight (Larry Brey)

our locations online. Family. My wife and I were one of the original families that helped start this church over sixteen years ago, and it's been the biggest joy of our life to see what God has done through this ministry. And I just want to show you just a little bit, just a visual. It's really good to look back and remember God's faithfulness because in a moment you're like, well, God, what are you gonna do? Just look back. What he did in your past is probably what He's gonna do

in your future. He's been good to you, and we have so many new people here at Elevation, and I just want to give you just a glimpse of maybe some of the things that you might know about that that God established in their past. So here at Valentine, I'm gonna get everybody on the floor to help me. Everybody else stays standing. All the locations stay standing by everybody on the floor here, just take a seat. Elevation began with eight families selling their homes and quitting their

jobs back in two thousand and five. My wife and I were one of those original eight families. Just to give you a point of reference, have the front row stand up here, stand out and then one, two, three, four, five, six you six stand up so right there. So February tap on the shoulder. There you go. February two thousand and five. This is the size of Elevation Church. Do not despise the day of small beginnings. Look how good

our God is. A year later, a year later February of two thousand and six, February fifth, we'd have our very first worship experience at Elevation Church. Center section. It's one hundred and twenty people stand up just the center section right here now. We had one hundred and twenty one that day, So jj I need you to stand up as well. This was our very first church service at Elevation Church. Look what God did one hundred and

twenty one people. So when I tell you we had sixteen people, now we've got twenty physical locations at Elevation Church. Isn't that crazy what God has done? When I show you that one hundred and twenty one that first Sunday. Now every weekend we have one hundred and forty nine different countries logging into watch one of our worship services. Isn't that amazing? Now? Take take the wide shot Balantine.

Everybody stand up on the floor. Now take the watch up so everybody, what you see on the screens, this represents the number of people that had been baptized this year at Elevation Church. One thousand, five hundred and sixty seven people. Come on once, you praise God for that. That's amazing. Look at his son sixteen years. Maybe God's been very good to our ministry. But also we wouldn't be here today. We're not for our pastors, Pastor Stephen,

Pastor Holly Ferdick. And I've been following Pastor Stephen for twenty years. I figured it out. I've listened to about twenty five hundred different sermons or teachings. Or preachings over that twenty years from Pastor Stephen, and he is annointed on the stage here. There's not a better preacher on the planet. He is a general in the army of God,

and he is speaking into this world. It's amazing. But twenty years ago, when I was first getting to know him, when my brother passed away from cancer, he was the first one that called me. When I was getting ordained. He was the one that came alongside me, put his arm around and said, I see God's hand on your life. When my wife and I went through miscarriage, he was the first one that called and said, you're gonna be okay. My dad passed away a couple of years ago, called

me every day just to check in on me. As good as a preacher as he is, he's an even better pastor. You're in a good house. You're in a good place. Would you help me? Thank Pastor Stephen and Holly. We love you, we honor you. I'm gonna give you one versus scripture and then I'll let you sit down. This is our verse for the day, and I pray that God would use it in a mighty way. Two Timothy Chapter four, Verse seven, it says I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have

kept the faith. The title for today's sermon it was, it was, it was a good fight. Look at your neighbor. Put your dukes up, say it was a good fight. You could put some boxing gloves in the chat. You guys can have a seat after you have threatened to hurt somebody with violence. Thank you, Worship team. I love a good fight. I'm a big MMA fan, you know McGregor Diaz. I loved it one and two. I'm praying

for a trilogy. I would love the my generation. The greatest boxing match of all time is hol of Field. Evander Holafield and Mike Tyson won not two with the ear thing. That wasn't so good. The best fight my wife and I had, it was amazing. It was at our one year anniversary. We'll celebrate twenty two years this year. Yeah, my girl. At our one year anniversary, I made dinner,

I had music on. I am trying to score up mortal merital points for marital blessings, and at dinner, I said, baby, in a word, how would you describe our first year marriage? She said, like flowers? It was like beautiful and before I tell you and I said, please don't judge me. I was young, I didn't know what I was doing. Jane said, well how about you, how would you describe it in a word? I said hard, Like she was all being married to me is hard. I'm like, yeah, no, no, no,

that's not what I've meant. That was a good fight. But when we read this text, I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race. I've kept the faith. It's really important that you understand the context in which that's written. Whenever you study the Word of God, to always study it in context. It's one thing of a sixteen year old looks at you when you're in a really difficult season, and that sixteen year old looks at you and says, I know it's hard, but stand strong,

you can do it. You're gonna make it okay. It's like my sixteen year old comes home and says, it was a really hard day, work day. I'm like, yeah, yeah, it was really real hard. Now, when a sixty one year old looks at you, who's a military veteran who spent time in prison of war camp, who's got all the scars, looks at you, and says, I know it's hard, but stand strong. You can do it. You're gonna make it.

Cares a little bit of weight there, doesn't it. So as we read these words out of Tewod Timothy, we need to understand the person who wrote it is a guy named Paul. Paul is a super possible. He wrote thirteen books of the New Testament. It's funny. In the New Testament there's twenty seven books. All the other people who wrote books in the New Testament, the names of the books are written by the person who wrote them. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John,

you know first and second Peter, but Paul's. They're all identified by who'd receive them. Otherwise we'd be reading thirteenth Paul today. He wrote that many books of the Bible. And when he writes this book of the Bible, you need to understand context is who wrote it, who'd they write it to? And then why did they write it? Paul writes this to Timothy as protege he'd left in charge of ephesis. Paul is in prison, and prison is actually an understatement. He's in a dungeon at this point.

If you go to Rome, you could actually see the place that's a hole in the ground that's sunken down there, and it's a dungeon. That's where he's last spent the last days of his life. So as he pens this letter to his protege Timothy, he writes two books to him, first Timothy, second to me. Second to me is the last book he writes. And as he writes it, and he writes these words, I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

He knows he's going to die. These are his last words, and he writes his last letter to his favorite person. And if you and I were at the end of our life and we are coming to the last words we would speak, who would we speak them to? What would we tell them? There's something in the text that speaks to us about the fight that you're facing today. Because Paul wasn't just admonishing Timothy. He's speaking to us in this moment today, and he's telling it was a

good fight. And Paul knew the difference between a good fight and a bad fight. As he writes the Book of Philippians, he writes that one in prison that's more like an air. It wasn't a Dungeon. That was a really nice place to be in prison. He writes that one, and people are talking trash about him, and they're saying, well, look at Paul. He's not annoying it. If he were, he wouldn't be in prison. But they're preaching the right gospel. Paul said, that's a bad fight. He said, false motives

are not in the gospels preached. I rejoice. I ain't gonna fight that fight. But chapter three of Philippians, there's some people that are judaizers that are telling all the new Christians, hey, yes, follow Jesus, plus also get circumcised. Paul comes on glooe. He calls them those evildoers, those mutilators,

those dogs. He says, that's a good fight. So we need to understand the difference between in a good fight and a bad fight, because if you don't know how to differentiate, you fight everything, and some of you are fighting everything, and you're fighting battles that God has never told you to fight. So when he pens this letter to Timothy, he says these words and Tewod Timothy two twenty two. It's my probably one of my favorite verses. Tewod Timothy two twenty two two two two two, He says,

flea the lustful desires of your youth. Some of you are fighting the battle by continuing to go to your phone, and you're getting defeated every time. And God is saying, how about you just throw that thing away? Don't even fight that one, stay away from that fight any worth it? He then he says in verse twenty three, he says, have nothing to do with foolish or stupid arguments, for you know they lead to nothing but quarrels. Some of you that needs to be your screensaver, some of you

that needs to be put on your computer. And the next time you want to go to Facebook and you want to post that because you know you're waiting for a fight, and you know you're about to get into an argument, May the word of God convict you? Bad fight? Bad say bad fight? Why would you keep fighting that one? So I love the way that Paula sets this up.

But the fight he's talking about here isn't people. It's the fight of faith, because he says, I have kept the faith, and the word he uses their fights fought is It's in the original language. It says agonisomy. It's not in the time restaurant Ago nees O Mine. There was a TV show in the eighties, the ABC Wide World of Sports. They would talk about the thrill of

victory and the agony. That's where we get a word agony from Paul is giving you a lesson from the battle he's facing that it's gonna have agony connected with it. And this wasn't just something Paul realized at the end of his life as he's sitting in a dungeon. It was something he knew what happened him thirty years earlier when he started following Jesus. It wasn't he got to the destination like, oh, I'm glad I kept the faith.

He said, no, No, there is a race from the moment he came to a relationship with Jesus and he said, this is the race. It is to testify. It is about faith in Jesus. That's the race. That's the fight. It's the fight of faith. In fact, in Acts chapter twenty, Paul says this. In verses twenty two to twenty four, he says, and now, compelled by the spirit, I'm going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. I only know than in every city. The Holy Spirit

warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. However, I consider my life worth nothing compared nothing to me. My only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me the task of testifying to the good news of God's grace. You See, a good fight does not need a good result, because what he says there is I'm going to Jerusalem. I don't know what's gonna happen to me there. It might be good, it might be bad. But he goes, I

know what's gonna happen. I'm gonna face prison and hardships in persecution along the way. So when Paul writes to Timothy, goes, everybody who follows Jesus is going to suffer persecution. It's going to happen. See, a good fight is about the good news, because he says there the task of testifying to the good news of God's grace. A good fight is always connected to the good news. It's not about a good outcome. But it begs us to ask the question, what is your faith in? Is it in the good

news or is it in a good outcome? Because when we start throwing around the word I got faith. Really, really, what's your faith in? I got faith and my vikings are gonna win the Super Bowl this year. I got faith my knee is going to feel better, and I got faith that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. Praise God, Heaven. And we we cheapen the word faith by connecting it to infeariorr things. That's why I love Jesus, he says. If anyone would follow me, he says, he

will hate his father and mother. He's not saying you'll literally hate them. What he is saying, when you compare the love you have for me, it will make everything else look like hatred. May we make faith a top shelf issue? Would you become so legalistic in your own life that you would, really you would only let faith be connected to Jesus Christ and the good news, not a good outcome. Is my faith that God is with me in the middle of it? Or is my faith

that I'll eventually get out of it? See? A good is all about faith. What do you have faith in? Let me ask it to you this way. If you want to know what your faith is, look what you're fighting for. If your faith is in your reputation, your Lawy's been fighting for how you look. If your faith is in your career, you'll fight by cutting corners to get ahead. If your faith is in the political party,

well that's not good. Don't do that one. But what I think Paul does, and I want to categorize there's three fights I think that we can learn from the life of Paul that I want to give you today that are good fights. Say, good fight, You're going to fight something in life. I want the Holy Spirit to give you discernment. Is this a good fight? And so the first fight is this is how you see Jesus. Here's the fight is how can you go through a bad situation and cling to the promise that God is

a good God. How can you go through something bad and believe that He is still good? That's the fight of faith. And some of you would get the gold star and a sticker because you've been to Bible camp. Yay Jesus, you know. But is he a historical figure? Is he a fairy tale? Is he a fictional character? Is he a prophet? Is he a princh? Or is he a savior? And Lord, I don't know. That's for you to decide, how do you see Jesus. Here's the thing. We were created in his image. In Bigo day he

made the male and female. He created us in his image. But will shape God into the image of who we think he should be? When you think about how you see God? Does who God is shape the way you see the world? Or does your experience with the world shape how you see God? Because I'm talking about the lens. This is the lens of faith. Here is Christ my lens. That everything I see I see it through that lens. Or is this the world? Then now I start to put it on in Well, God, I guess you're not

good because this bad thing happened. That's the faith. That's the fight of faith that's happening right now in your life. And it's very insidious. You don't even know what's happening. Because the word agonizoma I wasn't Paul talking about his

bad knees. It was the agony it was. But agonizem I also suggests an antagonist, an adversary, an accuser that wants to keep you from faith in God, because you really don't have Rocky unless you got Ivan Drago, you really don't have Rocky the hero unless you got somebody who's a villain. And in the opening act of humanity, the stage is set, Adam and Eve are in the garden and the serpent steps into the scene. Question, can you tell when the serpent steps into the scene of

your life? Are you aware when the advocate, the adversary, the accuser steps into the scene of your life? And this is the crazy part, because if you can't spot it, you're setting yourself up to follow his script. Why didn't Eve spot this serpent stepping into the scene Because God created a bunch of snakes, and so if snake comes along that he's crafty. We often think that he's like, uh, he's shown up with a pitchfork and horns. No, he doesn't show in up like that. He doesn't come in

kicking things over. He comes in asking questions, and he's stepping into the scene of the story, and he's blending in with the background of everything else. So before we impugne the character of Eve, we need to realize we're having conversations with snakes all the time, and he's crafty. He's blending in because the Bible says and he's like a roaring lion, raw it's easy to spot. Iful lion

rolls in. Sometimes the enemy the accuser, Hey, babe, hey, that's how Sometimes they enter the scene of your life. Sometimes it's it's just a dm that says what you're doing, because they don't come in kicking stuff over. They come in asking questions. Because if you can't spot the devils step into your scene, there's a good chance you'll start operating according to his script. Because he steps in and

he asks a question, did God really say? All he's trying to do is to get a conversation going, and what he's trying to do is to control the script. He's trying to control the narrative. Did God really say, Oh, come on, Eve, you won't certainly die. It goes from asking a question to making a statement you won't die.

Then it goes down into making an indictment. All sin casts a shadow of doubt on the character of God, because what the enemy is trying to do is to start at a very subtle shade of doubt that just slowly gets you creeping into compromising your view of God. And then you eat the apple. Can you identify with the devil sneaking in and say, did God really say, oh, come on, she's nice. Oh it's not that bad. No one will ever know everybody else is doing it. And then when you do it, you dirty dog. We see

the script of the Evil One. Can you identify where the devil has stepped into the scene and he's tried to get you to operate according to his script. But what Eve failed to do. Jesus redeemed because as he is out in the desert forty days of fasting, the Evil One comes to him. He slithers into the scene

and he comes up to Jesus, who is hungry. He says, hey, if you really got turn those rocks into bread, because I know you're hungry, And Jesus says, it is written, man does not live by bread alone, but every word that comes from the mouth of God. Then he tempts him again, if you really got to step off, and he goes, no, no, it is written, don't put the Lord your God to the tests. And it refuses him each time, not by having a conversation, but by speaking truth.

That's the difference. So when Paul he writes to Timothy, he says this to him earlier and two Timothy he says to me, he says Timothy. How you have known the scriptures from infancy, which you are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ. Jesus, he says to him. He says, all scripture is God breathed, profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. All scripture is God breathed. So when God wanted to make man,

he took dirt and he he breathed into it. When he wanted to make the Word, he took it and he he breathed into it. And this is different than every other book you read, every other book you read. This is the only book that reads you. It is the living word of God. And he tells Timothy, Timothy, I need your life immersed in this because when persecution comes and the devil comes along, he's going to try to get you operating according to his script or you

can operate according to the scriptures. So yes, it's easy to get the gold star. Say yeah, I know who Jesus is. It is written this persecution is relentless. It is the seas on the shore of your life, the relentless attack of the evil one who's always beating against your boat, trying to sink you, but you can anchor yourself in the word of God. Say no, it is written all scripture is God Breathe profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting,

and training in righteousness. And that's what God wants to do today. Did God really say? Because when persecution comes, it's your faith that will sustain you. Because whatever your faith is in, that's what you'll be fighting for. And God will use persecution to refine your faith, or the animal will use that same persecution to get you to forfeit your faith. Persecution is not optional. The great pugilist and theologian Mike Tyson said, everybody's got a plan until

they get punched in the mouth. Fight number two is how Jesus sees you. How Jesus sees you. The first fight is how you see Jesus now. The second one is how Jesus sees you. And I want to rewind a little bit to Paul, and I want to show you the first time he suffers persecution as he's following Jesus, because he had this radical encounter some thirty years earlier.

And I want to rewind to that his first missionary trip in actually chapter fourteen and In actual chapter fourteen, he's going on his very first missionary trip, and you're about to read it about the very first miracle that ever happens through the ministry of Paul. There's a lot of firsts there, and some of you know what it's like to be first, first in your family to come

to faith, or first to graduate high school. It's always hard being first, isn't it, Because you come up against resistance, and some of us quit because the resistance was more than what we thought. And what I want to see you is Paul have a perseverance to push through, because if he doesn't push through, he doesn't get to the end of the race. And I'm telling you, there's the race that God has marked out for you, and he wants you to run it. But the adversary is trying

to stop you from that race. So Paul starts on his very first of four missionary trips. In actual chapter fourteen he can read about. He goes to Antioch and he gets kicked out because they're preaching Jesus. They don't like him. Then they go to Iconium. They kick him out there because he's preaching Jesus there. So he shows up in ash fourteen, Verse eight says in Leestra, there said a man who was lame, who had been that

way from birth, and he had never walked. He listened to Paul as he was speaking, and Paul looked directly at him and saw that he had the faith to be healed, and he called up, stand up on your feet. At this the man jumped up and he began to walk. That's the first miracle through Paul's ministry. When the crowd saw that Paul of what Paul had done, they shouted into the Laconian language, the gods have come down to us in human form. Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul

they called Hermes because he was the chief spreaker. The speaker, the priest of Zeus, whose temple was just outside the city, brought bulls and reason the city gates because he and the crowd wanted to offer sacrifices to them. You see, the people in Lystra had an image of what they thought God was, So when Paul and Barnabas show up, they look at them through their lens of who they think God is, and they try to form the God into what their image of them was. We do that

all the time. It's so insidious. We do that everything God doesn't do that. People don't know who they think they are. We will always use our definition of what we think is right to conform everybody else into the image of it. We were created in his image, not to conform him into our image, and that's what they're trying to do in this point. So how does Paul

respond to this? Is funny, he says. But when Paul and Barnabas heard this, heard this, they tore their clothes and they rushed out to the crowd, shouting, friends, why are you doing this? We two are only humans like you. We're bringing you good news. This whole fight that Paul has been running for thirty years. Before we get to Tewod, Timothy is all about the good news. Everywhere he went it was spreading the good news. A good fight is always connected to the good news. That was funny. This

crowd flips really quickly on Paul. If you jumped down to verse nineteen. Then some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and they won the crowd over. Remember the towns he just came out of, and they kicked him out. They showed up on the scene and they stoned Paul and dragged him outside the city thinking he was dead. And that's not the modern recreational version of stoning. This is Old Testament version of stoning. This is where they drag him outside the city, and stoning in that point

it really served two purposes. They take him outside the city because you are stirring up and you're trying to create a God that's different than our God, and we don't like that. We want to conform you to the image of what we think God's supposed to be. So they drag him outside the city. And now they start grabbing rocks and they start throwing out at him, and the rocks are meant to kill him, but then this also meant to bury him. There's two purposes in those rocks.

You want to get him outside the city because you don't want to file the city by having a dead body in the city, so you'd take him outside the city. And now they start throwing rocks at him. And imagine Paul getting hid by every one of these rocks. And I wonder if he had a thought, but God, I'm serving you. God, you told me. They're like, I'm gonna spread the good news. Why is this happening to me?

I'm a good person. Why is this all happening? And we all know what it's like to have things thrown at us that we feel like should never have been thrown. And Paul, imagine the weight of the stones that are now starting to lay on top of him, on top of him, on top of him. And I wonder if at any point the devil snuck onto the scene said hey, Paul, where's your God? Now Paul gets a choice there, he gets his choice to say, how am I going to

respond in this situation. That's the first time Paul is stoned. In the scriptures, he would beaten, he would be flawed, But that's the first time he faced major persecution. But it was not the first time he had an experience with stoning, because it was not the first time we read of Paul in the scriptures. The first time we

read of Paul is in Acts chapter seven. And I want to show you a glimpse of Paul's past because I think as the weight of the rocks is starting to accumulate on top of Paul, I think he has a flashback and he starts to make the connection between Wow, I'm being stoned. But I remember a point that I did this to somebody else, because the devil will always try to use your past to disqualify your future. And

then think Paul's having a flashback. So if we jump back to Acts chapter seven, you're gonna get a scene of a man named Stephen, because at this point, a couple of years earlier, Jesus had been crucified. He was killed, and the Jewish leaders thought, that's the end of this Christianity. Yes, we win, you're dead, let's move forward. But like a fire, they tried to stop out, and the ember started to

spread other places. And now you got little fires and little fires and little fires of faith that are burning inside the walls of Jerusalem. And you got this man named Stephen that is filled with the spirit, and now he's going he is performing miracles and signs and wonders. And the religious leaders like, oh, I thought we ended this thing when we killed Jesus. So Paul, Stephen in

here too, because we need to end this thing. Because again, the Jewish leaders, like the Laconian people, had an image of how they saw God. And if you don't fit my image, we will kill you because you we will either conform you, or we will break you. So Stephen gets hauled in and in verse eight of chapter six is where I want to start. Well, I'm sorry, I apologize.

Chapter seven, verse fifty one, Paul is in front of the Jewish leaders, the same ones that had sentenced Jesus to death, the Sanhedrin, and he's standing in front of them, filled with the spirit, and he's about to fight, to fight. This is good news. It's not going to have a good outcome, because a good fight is connected to the good news, not a good outcome. And he says, you stiff necked people. Good way to start a conversation, easy way to win him over. Just start with that one.

Your hearts and your ears are still uncircumcised, just like your ancestors. You resist the Holy Spirit. Was there ever a prophet? Your ancestors did not persecute. They even killed the predicted, those who predicted the coming of the righteous One. That's Jesus. Now you have betrayed and murdered him. You have received the law that was given through the angels, but did not obey it. Verse fifty four. When the members of this Anahedron heard this, they were furious. They

gnashed their teeth at him. But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God in Jesus standing by the right hand of God. Look, he said, I've seen heaven opened, and the son of Man standing at the right hand of God. At this, they covered their ears and started and yelled at the top of their voices, and they washed him, dragging him outside the city. We've seen this fo heavenly dragged him

outside the city, and they began to stone him. Meanwhile, some of the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saw. So Paul that we just read about started as Saw. And now you have these people that are stoning Stephen, that all take their coats and they take them over and they throw them at the feet of Saw. Two purposes. In taking off the coat, physically, I get much better range of motion to throw a rock. It's a big thick coat. It's

a practical reason. I'm going to work up a lot of sweat here. I need to have a better range of motion so I can throw this thing at maximum velocity. So if I don't throw that a maximum velocity, I'm not gonna inflict maximum pain. So they leave their coats at the feet of Jesus. And now they started to stone Stephen, this man filled with the Holy Spirit. And picture Paul Saul standing there just watching this scene go down. He's just watching it. And now fast forwards to Paul

underneath the weight of all the rocks. I wonder if he remembered that moment where he heard Steven's voice, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And I wonder if there's a moment between those things that Paul is like flashing back to go, like when he's underneath the weight of his own sin because he was being persecuted in Acts fifteen. I wonder if he's over here going I deserve it. I deserve it. I did it all.

I persecuted all the speeple. But what's amazing in this story is Paul, the poster child for persecuting Christians, would be the become the one the primary voice to deliver Christianity to new people. Paul would flip from Saul the persecutor to Paul the preacher. And he was in these moments going back and put forth between these two where I started to see something. But something stuck out to me as I was reading this while they were stoning him.

Verse fifty nine. Stephen prayed, and he says, and Saul approved of their killing of him. First Chapter eight, Verse one says, on that day a great persecution broke out against the Church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea as Samaria. So what happened on that day is the Gospel needed to go beyond the walls of Jerusalem. God had given a promise. Jesus had

given a promise earlier in Acts one to eight. He says, when I leave, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and you will receive power, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samri and to the ends of the earth. Up until that point of Acts chapter eight, the first seven chapters of the Book of Acts, the Christians were content to keep the Christianity inside the walls of Jerusalem, because the reality is most of us will keep it to ourselves unless something forced us to get

it beyond ourselves. And so God comes along and he uses a great persecution. And one famous theologian said, persecution is the wind that God uses to scatter the seed. So in Acts eight one, it's a fulfillment of Acts one to eight. Acts one eight says you will receive power and you'll be my witnesses. For the first seven chapters they kept inside the walls of Jerusalem, Acts eight one. But now he takes it beyond the walls of Jerusalem,

and he takes it to Judea and Samaria. And what I want to tell you, persecution always serves a purpose. Why did that thing happen to you? Why did you end up in that other city? I don't know, but I know that God needed to get the good news to that place over there. What happened to Stephen was not good, but what God did with it was good. He works all things for the good of those who are called according to his purposes. That's what he does.

He uses all things. But when I think of Stephen being stoned, flash forward to now Paul is underneath the weight of the stones in actually chapter fifteen. Have you ever been in a space where the weight of your shame almost collapsed you, It almost killed you. Picture him underneath the weight of all these stones. Picture him lying there in just this weight on him, and he's having these flashbacks that I called Stephen to die, and I would cause many other Christians to die, and I was

to post a child for persecution. And I bet he's in that place to feel like I deserve it, and I get it, and this is what I should deserve, and this is what you should have brought me God, And I did it all. And Paul had this amazing ability to take it to the bottom of something. Have you ever been in a place where you felt like you forfeited everything because of your past? He ever been in a place where the weight of something was so immense you to feel like you could get back up.

That's where Paul's a what gave him the ability to do this. Paul had this ability in First Timothy, and this is where he writes to Timothy these two letters. In First Timothy, Paul had a realization of who he was in Christ, and he was able to take this thing to the bottom of it. In f one Timothy one fifteen, it says here is a trustworthy saying that the deserves full acceptance. Christ Jesus came into the world

to save sinners, of which I am the worst. But for this very reason I was shown mercy, so that in me the worst of sinners. Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life. Paul has this amazing ability to say, I'm not actually a good person, I'm the worst of them all. Because here's the power of what if. The devil will always get you to live in a place to cover something of because of

what if? What if they knew about you? What God knows about you? What if they were to find out that you did that? What if they were to find out that you actually said those things, did those things? And the fear of what if is paralyzing. And I think in this story I see Paul living underneath the weight of what if? What if? What if? My favorite sermon for Pastor Steven was twenty twelve. He preached a sermon called Fear's Greatest Hits and he said you always

have to take it to the bottom. Paul said, I'll take it to the bottom because I'm just the worst of all sinners. Now what you've got, devil, Now what you got. Paul also would say this, He would say, I will boast about my weaknesses, for in my weaknesses he has made strong. Paul said, I'm just going to boast about it because the fear of what if is dissipated. I'm just going to bring it out here. Pastor preached a sermon he said, take it to the bottom. It's

three steps. First step is what if what if that happened? What if the report came back and said it's cancer? What if you lose your job? Step two? That would that would be hard, that would be horrible. The third step that's when he preached last week. But God, but God,

see but God, what if that would? But God, when we started this ministry sixteen years ago, I would have such anxiety attacks backstage that it wouldn't I wouldn't want to walk out on stage and talk like this because the weight of the rocks of your past weigh you down to the point that you feel like you don't have a future. I didn't grow up around church. Sometimes when you look at somebody in ministry, oh look at them, they got it all together. No, we don't. People say like, hey,

you've got everybody's got skeletons in their closet. I got cemeteries in my closet like Everett, and so I didn't grow up around church. I grew up with a lot of alcohol and bad choices and all those things, And at five years old, I remember going to a wedding dance and pulling glasses off the top of the table and drinking them, and every thought, oh, it's really funny. Look at tipsy five year old. Oh it made me connect alcohol and laughter and people's approval. Great. So it's

set a stage in life. And now I'm eleven having a keg party. I'd pay for college one red solo cup at a time, I was really good at leading people a direction. But with that lifestyle comes all the choices that come with it. And there times I'd wake up and I'd be like, I don't know where I'm at, I don't know how I got here, and I don't even know who's next to me. And the anxiety I would have is what if what if you knew about me?

What God knows about me? So the anxiety attack I would have backstage for the weight of all of the shame that was saying on top of me was what if one of those women from one of those knights is sitting on the third row. And I would stay backstage and I would have a panic attackers like I can't even go out there because what if? And Pastor Stephen preaches a sermon Fear's great ast its what if, I guess I would go up and say, I'm sorry,

Would you please forgive me? I've given my life to a man named Jesus, and I'd love to tell you about him. What if that would? But what if that would? But God? What if that would? But God, what if that would? But God? So at the end of the story, asks chapter fourteen, Verse twenty, and this is the verse I want to give you the story. That's the pivot point in Paul's journey. He's on this race to finish the faith, but now he gets persecuted for the very

first time. And the lynchpin in the story is verse twenty. And this is the verse. I want to speak over you because some of you are living buried underneath the weight of your past. Some of you are living in this place and you're like, God, I know you don't love me. I know you don't even see me. But Paul says, in this moment, but for these things, God used me to show his grace. How does God see you? In that moment? He sees you he loves you, He

forgives you. And if he can use Paul, the one who's standing giving approval for killing all of these Christians, he can use you. He could use you asks fourteen, Verse twenty. But after the disciples said, gathered around hi. Remember they left him for dead. Remember they said, you're dead, You're dead, You're dead. Verse twenty. But after the disciples said gathered around him, he got up and he went back.

And that's the verse I want to speak over you today because there is a situation in your past that has left you buried. And what God is saying is to get up and go back. I needs you to go back and get your blessing. I need you to go back and see how God sees you in that moment, because Paul, I did it. How do you see me God in this moment. It's one thing if somebody does something to me for me to say, yep, God still loves me. It's totally different from me when I do

it myself, and I know I did it. Now God, how do you see me now? The first fight? How you see Jesus? The second fight? How Jesus sees you? And here's the challenge. I want to give you is to go back to that place where it's buried, because the devil's script is, hey, just forget about it. It's over and done with. And every time that memory comes back, it hunts you and the fear of what if? What if? What if? And some of you are destroying your present

because of the uncertainty of the past. And what I want to challenge you to do is to go back to this place and say, God, here's the fight. How did you see me? How did Paul in the moment that you are giving approval? How did Jesus seize you? He says, I'm going to use that what made me really good at at leading keg parties makes me great as a pastor. Get up and go back, Get up and go back, Get up and go back. It happened thirty years ago. Get up and go back, Get up

and go back. You gotta go back and fight. This is the fight to say, I'm gonna go back. It's just enough fair and tales and unicorns and Jesus loves me. Go back to the moment that hope nobody sees, and say, God, how did you see me in this moment? Paul ends his first missionary trip, and he starts his second one in Acts chapter sixteen. What does he do? He goes back Act sixteen when Paul came to Derby and then Lestra where he met a disciple, where a disciple named

Timothy lived. What's amazing about this. The place of Paul's greatest persecution would be the place of his greatest provision, His greatest resource would become the place come out of the place of his greatest pain. I am telling you there are blessings waiting for you. They're not all in the future. It is you gotta go to your past. You gotta get up, and you gotta go back and get it. Paul had to go back to Derby, He

had to go back to Lestra. Anywhar when he rolls into the cities, those same people that had tried to stone him were all there. How did he walk through? I don't know if he was hiding his editor He's like, oh, so, not what you got. But he got up and he went back and he found Timothy, his greatest resource, the one he would write his last letter to that guy.

And so when he writes these letters to Timothy, he had left Timothy in charge of the church in Ephesus, Paul is going to go on and continue the missionary journey. And if you're Timothy, you've been following You've been following Paul for fifteen years. You At the time we see Paul take Timothy underneath his wing, he's about sixteen years old. He's a teenager, and he's been following Paul his whole life.

And in First Timothy, he's it's a letter that's all about fighting, and he writes First Timothy says, Timothy, my son, I'm giving you this command and keeping with the prophecies once made about you step by recalling to him, he may fight the battle. Well. So he starts on Timothy like, it's a fight. You gotta remember where you've been. You got to remember what you come from. It's a fight. Then in First Timothy, chapter six, he writes this, he says, fight the good fight of Faith. Chapter six is a

fighting letter. It is all about fighting. What is the thing that Timothy needs to fight. It's the third fight. It's how you see you, that's the third fight, how you see you. Without being sacrilegious, it doesn't matter what God says unless you believe it. Unless you believe it the powers in the application. What was Timothy's struggle. I think Timothy's struggle was how he saw himself. One of the famous verses out of First Timothy as one Timothy

four to twelve. It's this. Every youth group, every youth ministry in the world has this as their mantra. He says, do not let anyone look down on you because you're young, but set an example in believers in speech, don't let anyone look down on you because you're young. Timothy is a grown man, thirty two years old with a beard. The problem was not his chronological age, it was his identity age. It was how he saw himself. How you see yourself determines what you become. What you believe is

what you become. Some of you are have such an inferior view of who God says you are. So when Paul writes two Timothy the last letter, he's gonna write his most important words, his last words, and he's going to admonish his protege, his man he found fifteen years earlier that he would follow and he'd leave in charge of the city in Ephesus. And he says, if I want to reach the city of Ephesus. I've got to

reach how Timothy sees himself. If I want to reach the home, I need to reach the dad, because how the dad sees himself determine what's the home to becomes. If I want to reach a people group, I need to reach the leader. And I'm speaking to every one of you, because when you believe that about yourself, you punish the people that are following you. Stop it, Stop it, Timothy. Quit thinking small of yourself. This is the battle. How you see you. It's one thing how you see Jesus.

It's another thing how Jesus sees you. But how you see you matters. And Paul gives these final words in tewod Timothy two Timothy, Chapter two, verses one, Chapter two, verse one. He says, you, then, my son, be strong. That is the grace is in you in Christ Jesus. Seven times in first and second Timothy, Paul would call him son, my true son, my spiritual son. He is validating the relationship before he ever gives him any instruction.

There's something for some of you. God has given you too much experience that you're wasting and you're not being appalled to another Timothy. I'm calling on those of you that got some experience out there to put sitting on the sidelines and to start getting into the game and use the experiences of your life to bless Timothy. Every one of you need a Timothy in your life. Now, every one of you need a Paul in your life.

And when you got a Paul on this side and a Timothy on this side, you've got somebody to help you get up and go back. It's hard for you to get up and go back by yourself. I need a Paul, and I need a Timothy to help me get up and go back. You, then, may my son be strong. The grace said is in you, in Christ Jesus. And what Paul is gonna give me. The next few verses is ways Paul needs to Timothy needs to see himself. Verse three, he says, join me with join me with suffering,

like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please as committing officer. Think of a soldier. So, Timothy, when you when you're gonna lead the church in Ephesus and you're tempted to run from the battle, lines. No, no, no. How you see yourself matters here, Timothy. And if you see yourself as a kid, as a teenager, you'll always retreat. But if you see yourself as a soldier, you'll go

towards the battle lines. That's when I need you to do, Timothy. You can't see yourself as small. You're not a kid anymore. See yourself as a soldier. How do you see yourself? Draw a picture and start labeling with the real words, how you see yourself? No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs. Verse five. He says, similarly, anyone serving or who competes as an athlete does not receive the victor's crown except by compete eating according to

the rules. And what Paul was telling link Timothy, this is not a recreational league where everybody gets a participation trophy. This is an athlete. I need to see yourself as an elite, hardworking athlete. And then the third analogy says the hardworking farmer should be the first one to receive his share of the crops. He says, I need you to see yourself as a farmer. How do you see yourself? It's just a kid as a teenager. You're a grown man. You're leading your family. How you see you matters. I

remember a couple of years ago and I preached. I preached the Saturday night. This was BC before COVID, and I get done preaching on the Saturday night, I go back to my green room and I'm getting messages from around the country saying that was a good sermon. But there's only one message I wanted from Pastor Stephen that never came. I preached the Sunday morning, the nine thirty cand of be honest. I need to tell the full story.

I go home Saturday night, I don't sleep the whole night because I stay up the who night reworking my sermon. So he didn't text me, so it means he hated it. So I preached nine thirty crickets nothing, preach eleven thirty nothing. By the time I got to the office Monday morning, I expect my keyfob not to work because I've been fired, and like I've been fired, like I've and it was it was so bad. In my head. I'm like, I'm such a failure, i am such an idiot, I am

such a dork. I'm such I'm never gonna get this opportunity again. Finally, Pastor Stephen text me on Wednesday. He says, thank you forgiving me a gift. No one else could have given me a weekend off in more than a decad where I didn't have to preach or take care of a guest. And I just watched your sermon. You crush it. I'm proud of you. I'm like, oh God, okay, I am blank. It's called filling the blank. I failed

to silence test. I am blank in that space I insecured, inserted my insecurity, my doubt, all of my past, and I put it into that space that says I am blank. What you put in that blank determines who you become. When I didn't get the message from Pastor, I'm like, I am an idiot. I am horrible. No, no no, no. I didn't know how to interpret the silence as approval. I didn't know how to interpret the silence as his greatest compliment to me. Who are you? I am blank?

And the only reason I can say I am forgiven is because of the finished work of Jesus Christ. The only way that I can say I am whole is because of what Jesus did on the cross. And when Jesus was on the earth, he said, I am I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. I am the bread of life, I am the Gate. I am the good Shepherd. And so Jesus, as he comes to the earth, he establishes the greatest fight of all time.

There was a gap between us and God. And the gap was so great we could have never filled it in our own action and her own behavior. Once you stand your feet of all of our locations. And the fight was this. We were separated from God because of sin. And Jesus came to the earth and he said, I will fight. I will fight for you. I will fight for your forgiveness. I will fight to make you whole. And the three fights we identified today. How you see Jesus, Who is he? To you? Who is he? Is he

just the historical figure? Is he your savior? And for some of you have never trusted him as your lord and savior. You've never been forgiven of your sins, You've never been made new. The race that's marked out before you that Paul talked about begins with Jesus Christ. It's about the good news. It's about following him. As you go through life, people are always going to throw stones at you, trying to pile them on you to get

you to die underneath that shame. Some of you need to get up and you need to go back, Go back to that moment, Say God, who did you say that? I was right now in the stillness of this moment, without anybody moving. Then you should buy your heads and close your eyes. And if you have never placed your faith in Jesus, this is the moment that God has set aside for you. He didn't bring you here by

mistake or by accident. It's by divine appointment because there's something that He needs you to hear in this moment. It's that you're forgiven that you're his son, that you're his daughter, that he loves you even though you did that, He's got a plan for you. I need everybody saying this prayer out loud with me for the benefit of somebody who's about to begin this relationship with Jesus. I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God who died on the cross and rose from the grave to

forgive me of my sin. I give you my life, I give you my sin, I give you my shame. Forgive me, and I'll spend my life following you with your head still bouting, your eyes still close. If you just place your faith in Jesus or you're coming back to him, I'm going to count to three when I get there, without hesitation, I want you to boldly shoot your hand into the air. One, two, three, should your hand up? Come on all across our locations. Come on, there we go. Come on, suit that hand up well.

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