Making Moves

Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.

I'm the pastor of Elevation Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank you for joining us today.

Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.

Hope it gives you perspective to see God is moving in your life.

Enjoy the message. Do you ever hear a recording of yourself and you think is that me? He said? Oh?

I sound Should I only send texts from now on? And like I walk around even I walk around the house preaching, and my kids know sometimes, like Abby is the most attuned, and she's only six, but she knows when I have left the room, but my body's still there and I'm thinking about a sermon, and she'll even called me out. She looked at me the other day and said, are you working on a sermon.

In your head?

And I was so busted because we were supposed to be watching this kids show together, this boring, awful television show that Abby enjoys, and I was trying to pretend to be watching.

It with her.

But I was working on something in my head and two things at once, And she said, are you working on a sermon in your head? And I said, Okay, yeah, how did you know? And she said, I watch your mouth. I said, so, I talked to myself when I work on sermons.

In my head.

She said, ish, you make moves, and she started showing me how I didn't even realize it. But when I'm preaching to myself, I start, I start making moves.

Did you know that when God is about.

To speak something, the people who really know Him who came to help me preach today, I'm looking for you, the people who really know their Father can see when God is up to something. Tell your neighbor, God is up to something. I know it, not because I feel it, but because I.

Know my Father.

And there is this unique ability that God will give you through his Holy Spirit, the sense when He is making moves. That's what I would like to talk to you about in this installment of Bars and Battles. I want to talk to you about making moves because for me, it's interesting to study the contrast between.

David's destiny and his decisions.

Have you ever thought about that how in a sense, he was anointed as a sixteen year old kid, and so he had no choice but to become king because God spoke it. So it had to happen. Wouldn't that be a good sermon? It had to happen. But there was a sense in which David's decisions either supported or sabotaged his destiny. And we've talked about shortcuts, but today I want to talk about decisions. I think it's important

To how he looked at his decisions. And I want to give this to you. In the King James version of the Bible.

Well, it's not necessarily a better translation, it's just the one that I've first heard it in. It says, the steps of a good man, this is twenty three Psalm thirty seven are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way. I love that scripture. How many of you love that scripture? I love it because I do believe that my life is destined, that there is an outcome that God intends, or he wouldn't have put me

Evidence is to the contrary.

And you know in a court of law, you present the evidence and then the judge.

Delivers the verdict.

Well, faith actually works in the exact opposite direction. It is that God has already established a verdict an outcome for your life, and now, as a child of God, you gather evidence to support the verdict of God's goodness. Touch somebody say, the verdict is in. I already know God is good. I already know He's for me. I already know I'm more than a conqueror. I already know that God is with me. And I found out that usually you will collect evidence to support whatever verdict you've

And for fifteen years.

We've been following David over the last several weeks, and it doesn't seem like his steps are very ordered. In fact, it seems more like Saul is determining his next move than God is determining his next move. In fact, it seems like he's moving away from the throne that God told him he would ultimately occupy. And we find him in Second Samuel, chapter two, verse one, in a place called zick Lag. It's a surprising place to find a

How could David be living in the territory of the enemy that he defeated.

But he's on this border between Felicitia and Israel, waiting to see what God will do next.

In his life.

And he just received news while in zick Lag that Saul is dead, which, I gotta be honest, would make me want to throw a party, because this is the guy who was coming at David's head with spears while David wasn't trying to do anything but give him some mood music in the palace. This is the guy who told him I won't mess with you anymore. And even while he was telling him, I'm gonna leave you alone, was heading him.

Off at the next pass.

And so while we are expecting David to celebrate the news of the death of Saul, not only has Saul fallen on his own sword and taken his own life. Because I got news for you. You don't even have to worry about fighting against what comes against you. God will kill it when the time is right. Some of the stuff you spend your whole life fighting against God is gonna kill it on its own sword when the time comes.

Who was David's best friend.

It should have been his rival, but it ended up being his partner.

And when he received the news.

That Jonathan had died, who was his friend and Saul had died, who was his oppressor.

Because usually if.

You look right past good news, bad news is right behind it, and they come at the same time. Have you notice this, I mean, I've gotten to the place where I am suspicious of good days. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. But for David, it's not a very sweet moment or an announcement that brings him joy. And he writes what's known in Hebrew poetry as a lament. It becomes a national lamit because after he writes it, he teaches all the people to sing it. Look at just a few verses,

How the mighty have fallen in battle.

He's not celebrating good times, come on, he is despairing over the death of someone who was trying to kill him.

That's kind of strange.

Jonathan lies slain on your heights.

Remember Jonathan was his guy.

I grieve for you twenty six Jonathan.

My brother.

You were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful. It's kind of hard with you not around. Know you in heaven smiling down watching us as we pray for you. Every day. We pray for you till the day where we meet again. In my heart is where I keep you, friend, members, there's something different on the screens.

I must have switched out of.

Second Samuel and went into second Puff.

But that's all right.

Stay with me, because there comes a shift. Everybody say shift where David knows I've got to stop mourning and move on.

And there comes a time in your.

Life when you must stop mourning.

Nobody can tell you when that is.

Only God can tell you when you've cried over Saul long enough. That's what the prophet Samuel had to come to terms with.

Then.

I know you believed in Saul, and I know you prayed for Saul, and I know you wanted more out of Saul. But it's time to fill your horn with oil and beyond your way because your Plan.

B is God's Plan A. I found a.

Man after my own heart, and his name is David. I think we might have a good time in church today. Touch somebody say there's a shift.

There's a shift that happens.

When now David has to decide to step into what God set him apart for. I'm hesitant to preach stuff like this because people will take and twist my words and quit their job. This is not a license for irresponsibility. I have received so many emails from people who started a bagel shop because they like bagels, and I talked about Peter stepping out of the boat. That's not what the passage is for. Why are you looking at me

But not on the first date. Because trust takes time. Trust takes time.

That's why Drake said, no new friends, because trust.

Takes time.

Let's get back to the Bible carnality coming on the church. The Bible says in this is Second Samuel, chapter two, verse one, in the course of time, even that phrase would preach.

I'm not gonna preach it.

But it's a strange phrase that is used throughout the narrative of David's life to signify a shift in the course of time. We don't know how long, we don't know exactly what period it's referring to, but it's a significant phrase because us it took David some time to shift and to figure out what God wanted him to do next. But in the course of time, David inquired of the Lord. Shall I go up to one of the towns of Judah?

He asked?

And the Lord said, go up? And David said, where shall I go? To Hebron, The Lord answered, So David went up there, and I'm like, well, yeah, if God would speak to me that specifically, I would do it too.

Wouldn't that be cool? If God would talk to you like that. Let's read it again. Shall I go up.

To one of the towns of Judah, he asked?

And the Lord said yep.

And David asked where shall I go?

And God said to Hebron. Will you love to have that kind.

Of clear insight on who to marry? Would that be cool if you were single, sitting over in this section and you could look over at that section and say, God, should I ask one of them out to lunch today?

And God would say go ahead, and you could say which one? And God would say the cute one five four brown hair.

Would that be amazing if God would speak.

To you so specifically like this. I think I could be a.

Man after God's own heart too, if he would give me this kind of direct information.

It'd be amazing.

God would speak to you about the important things in your life with this specificity.

God, should I start.

Aaron Rodgers and God would just show you the important things.

Life.

Write down the word strategy because David is asking God for his next strategic move.

Because he wants to take the right next step.

I've been running for fifteen years. I don't want to waste any more time. But God, I need to know my next step. I need to know is the marriage over or should I give it a little more time? Because I need to know my next step. I hear the doctor saying that my kids should be on this medicine, but I'm not so sure if that's.

The right thing.

And wouldn't it be nice if God would say yep lexapro and just tell you yep, ridling.

How easy would it be.

You'd go fill the bottle and you'd pop the pills, and you'd go to Hebron and you'd be a king. But most of us don't enjoy this specificity of connection with God, and the people who say they do are weird.

They're weird. The people who tell.

You that God told them which color shirt to wear to church that day, and they were purple because it's the color of royalty.

Are weird, and they will often.

Do something that contradicts the written word of God and blame it on an impression and call it the.

Holy Spirit, which messes it up for the rest of us.

Because now I don't even want to say God told me to do something, because I've heard so many people use that phrase to pimp their own decision and put it on God because now they don't have to deal with the outcome. I'm just trying to say that I wish it could be this specific. I wish God could be more like Google, just being honest with you. Because I have a great relationship with Google. Google knows what I want to ask it before I finish the word

What I like about.

Google is Google seems to anticipate what I need to know, and God seems to be the opposite. Because I'm begging him sometimes to let me know what to do about this relationship, about this decision. What did you can invest your money with the kind of knowledge with which David went to hebrin, What if God would tell you which stock? What if God would tell you how to balance the portfolio? What if God would tell you which position to apply for?

Wouldn't that be amazing? If God would order your steps like that? What's that Amazon? What's it called Echo?

Somebody sent us an Amazon Echo recently. I would suggest putting it on your Christmas list. It's an amazing device. This is not a product endorsement, but it's amazing.

Do any of you have it?

It's voice activated because sometimes you can't be bothered to have to use your thumbs.

So I like Alexa. That's her name, Alexa.

I have a relationship with Alexa where I say her name. I say Alexa and she lights up, kind of like Holly.

When I say her what she's not.

And I can tell her what song to play, what tasks to perform Alexa and she lights up.

She answers me, she hears me when I call. She's like the Lord.

Well, yesterday I walked in and Graham was doing his homework.

But I want you to see something.

I caught it on my video camera because I've never seen anything like this before.

If eighty eight mine is ed equals all right, Alexa, what is nineteen plus nine?

The sum of nineteen and nine is twenty eight? Are you kidding me right now? Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me right now? About what? How you're doing your homework? I am checking, he's checking, checking, check in.

Tell your neighbors, say, I'm checking, I'm checking. I'm checking. I already did the work. I'm just checking.

I see. I have a feeling.

When David inquired of the Lord, where do I go next?

He was already on his way. He was just checking.

Because when you walk in God's ways, you will know God's will.

All you gotta do is check. Jesus said, if.

I leave, I'll send you the spirit of truth, and he'll show you the ways to walk in. I'm checking, I'm checking, I'm checking. See.

I don't have to ask God about every decision. I don't have to stress about God's will. When I live my life in God's ways, I have the confidence that my steps are ordered.

Where's my organ My steps are ordered by the Lord, because I delight in his way.

Why aren't you all on your feet?

I'm trying to tell you.

I don't have to.

Worry so much about what when you get throw why right when you walk in the ways of God, when you submit to him, Because God's strategy is submission.

And now you can sit down, because you're not going to like this part. The other s word is submission.

And in all of the steps that David took away from the throne for fifteen years, into the land of the Philistines, into the place of zick Lad, while it looked like he was moving away from the promise God had made him, he was moving into submission. Submission. The steps of a good man are ordered. That's what they do in the military.

Ordered. And I found out a lot.

Of people will rejoice over the sovereignty of God but resist submission. And to believe in sovereignty without embracing submission is not faith.

It's fairy tale.

If I say my steps are ordered by the Lord as a way of excusing my decisions, I have misunderstood the implication of Psalm thirty seven twenty three.

I wonder how.

Much differently we would respond to Psalm thirty seven twenty.

Three if we considered the word ordered.

Because when God David went to God, David didn't give God his opinion.

He asked God for his next order.

Now, when you live like that, you can have complete and total confidence in every move you make, every breath you take, and whether you're moving away from your goal or toward your goal, you can know.

I'm in submission, so I'm at peace. Submission brings peace. When you try to.

Get the strategy before submission, you're out of order, and it doesn't work. When you say God orders your steps, understand what you're saying is not that God will take the step for you. It's that He will tell you which one to take. So when I asked God to heal my relationship with my dad, God did not do it until I submitted to the way that he wanted me to do do it, which was to humble myself and go into my dad and instead of proving how right I was and how wrong he was, to find

Life are because I'm out of order.

Sometimes when your finances are out of order, you have the money you need, it's just not in.

I think I've preached us into a funeral.

It's because God is really not first in your priorities.

I can tell by your ledger. I can tell.

Because everybody else gets your first, and.

God gets what's left.

When you give God your best, he blesses what's left. When you give God what's left, how can you believe him for his best?

You're out of order. The three times that me and Holly have fought.

In fifteen years of marriage. It might be understated, but when we fight, it's not because we don't have a blessed marriage.

It's because something is out of order. Something is out of order. There's a step I'm skipping.

See when I talk to my wife and I need to work something out.

The thing I gotta do before I.

Can explain myself is to empathize, which does.

Not come naturally to me.

To listen to your wrong point of view before I give you the correct one. But sometimes there's something I need to learn about how you see it, so I can come over onto your side. That's why we have so much racial and religious tension in our nation.

We're out of order. We're out of order.

Before we even listen to one another, we're giving a lesson to the other, but you can't give the lesson until.

You're willing to listen. So we're out of order.

And now we're frustrated because it's not working.

And we don't know what to do.

But David's life is a life is interesting how when he was in order, how everything had to flow to it. The oil flows when you're in order. The Bible says, he inquired of the Lord, shall I go up to one of the cities of Judah, which was not, by the way, the ultimate capital. Because everything God does he does in steps and stages. It would be I've been in a half more years before David would come into the fullness of his calling. But all you need for

Was set up now and he asked God, is now the time? Because I don't want to move? Do you want me to move?

And in one sentence God taught him his next move, because for fifteen years God had taught him to submit. If you can receive this message today, and submit your desires God will. God will tell you what to do.

When you delight yourself in His way.

That's what Psalm thirty seven says, that he delighteth in his way.

I thought that meant I'm so stupid. I thought that meant for the longest time. I don't know why we can't get this stuff. The first time I thought that man, God delights in his way. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. Put it up there.

The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way. I thought that meant that if I'm a good man and my steps are ordered, God will delight And well, of course God delights in the way that he orders.

I don't make any sense.

It means that when I delight in his way, See, he delighteth in his way.

Who's he the man whose steps are ordered?

When I delight in God's way, I will be in God's will, and my steps will be ordered.

And I can stay on.

This step as long as I need to stay on this step, and I can stay in this season as long as I need to be in this season. Because God, I don't want to go into any greater responsibility or influence until you say I'm ready. I don't want to come out of this oven until I'm ready. I don't want to enter into the promotion until I'm ready. And when you say step, I step, and my steps are ordered.

It's a statement of submission.

But it's also a statement of sequence, right because when you get.

Her number, not only.

Do you need the right digits, they need to be in the right because if she gives you the right digits in the wrong order, you'll be calling the wrong girl sounding like a stalker. Hey, remember I met you Thursday night.

She's gonna hang up on you. Because it has to be in order.

David couldn't be a king until he learned to be a shepherd because there was something that he needed to get at the bottom that would enable him to be who he needed to be at the top. Somebody shout, my steps are ordered. That means God not only knows where, but he knows what, and he knows when. And now I can trust him because I'll have it when I need it.

I'll have it when I need it.

I was thinking about something the other day, how if I had known this fifteen.

Years ago, how good it would have been, and I felt that voice in me.

It wasn't out loud, like David, where God just speaks to you in complete sentences.

It was an impression that God said.

You wouldn't have known what to do with it fifteen years ago. It took fifteen years of your foolishness to even respect what I wanted to show you. See, this is what I mean when I say my steps are ordered, I mean that not only are the ones, the steps, the steps that feel like this ordered, so are.

These and you can't have one without the other.

To say my steps are ordered means that not only does promotion not come from the East or the west, but it comes from the Lord. But sometimes the pain comes from him too.

My steps are ordered.

And God knows which is step three, and which is step one, and which is step four. And if I start skipping steps, I'm likely.

I'm likely to.

End up on my face, which is the next thing. David said in Psalm thirty seven twenty four. He said, watch this, though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholded him with his hand. It means that my confidence is not in the stability of my feet. My confidence is in the sovereignty.

Of his hand.

You want to shout right there, Even when I fell, even when I tripped, even when I stumbled, even when I missed it, My steps are ordered, and when I fall, I fall forward because God's hand.

Is over my life. Order. Order.

Everybody say order, It means sequence, sequence that God knows what to do and when to do it. There's a sequence to things. Do you trust God's sequence? Do you trust it? In some seasons he needs to move your way some seasons, he needs to move you toward. Some seasons, he's gonna use things that you hate. Some seasons, he's gonna use things that you love. Are all of your steps ordered by the Lord? Are just the ones that you like? Because some of you feel like you're going

Dancing in here. My steps are order.

And that's part of the reason that LJ makes me so sick. I mean to do this in front of everybody, but I'm jealous of his talent because we both play music, but he plays it so much better than me. I mean, I can play a little bit, but after about ten minutes I will have exhausted my knowledge of what I know to play.

This guy he took lessons the right way.

My mom sent me to lessons, but I didn't learn the right way.

It was my fault.

It wasn't her fault, the teacher's fault, or anything like that. I wanted to learn certain songs. I wanted to learn Every rose has its thorn, So I learned it, but I didn't learn I didn't learn the theory. I just learned right. I just learned how to make the chords, but I didn't know how the chords functioned together. That's solz problem. He got to be king too soon. He didn't have a chance to keep sheep while he was waiting to be king. That's the advantage that LJA.

He learned all the scales and.

The pentatonic scale and the modes and all the other things I didn't pay attention to that I was supposed to know. And I just learned a G chord and he learned showing a scale or something.

You see.

Doesn't that make you sick? How many of you took piano lessons? And he makes you sick? Makes makes makes me sick. He can just play stuff like, just play a few notes, just anything you want to play.

I don't care. Okay, do it, do it again, that same thing. Do it again.

Okay, m hm, do it again. Do those same notes, but do them different, like different order or something.

Do it again, all right, do it? Do it again.

Don't change any of the notes. Do it do the same notes. Do it in a different order, Maybe switch the instrument. Do it like an electric guitar sound or something.

Like that, some a little more interesting. Yeah, yeah like that. Do it do it again?

Yeah, do it do it again, different different order.

Yeah, I like that.

Now go up, go up again, and then back down to the first one. You're luck at him right there, right there, right.

There, a little faster minor six.

Four five and one that sounds like something the same notes he was playing before, but now with movement, an order, shift sequence order, if you know what you ought to sing? Six I'm laughing because the white people are singing the police and the black people are singing puffy, but keep playing. Those are the same notes he started playing, but when he cut him in order. Come on, I feel somebody's life getting in order today. I feel somebody's steps getting in order.

All right, stop, it's just an illustration.

I'm trying to show you that everything you need is in your life, and.

Your steps are order.

And if I'm going on or if I'm going down, my steps.

Har order. If you know your steps.

Harder sound right now, every step.

Every food.

Sent to your feet up said, I'm gonna take you down sometimes and you're gonna fall sometimes. But whether I'm taking you down or raising you up, your steps are in order. I don't know who is for, but you've been going this direction. Who there's something that you need down here that God is gonna use. You've been stuck on a step, but this somebody say this step, stop your foot, say this staff is ordered by the Lord. And David says, should I go to Hebron, and God.

Said, yeah, yeah.

Because when you're walking with God, you don't have to fast twenty one days to figure out what he wants you to do.

You'll know.

You'll know when you walk with him, every step you'll know his will. And the Bible says something in verse four that got my attention. It says that after David had inquired of the Lord, the men of Judah came to Hebron, and there they anointed David king over the tribe of Judah, where.

In the place of his next step.

Often we want God to give us confirmation before we obey.

That's out of order.

God said, your confirmation awaits your obedience. God, I'll forgive them if you give me the grace to forgive them. That's out of order. You forgive them, and then you get the grace. It's a decision.

It's a decision that leads to destiny, and every step is ordered by the Lord. In fact, if we're doing it our way, we would praise God when he moved in our lives. Real praise comes from a faith of place. Real faith, says God, I'm going to brace you on credit because.

You've never failed me yet, so I'm gonna take the.

Next step by faith.

I'm taking the next step by faith, and my steps.

Are ordered by the Lord. Give them a great sound of praya and watch the walls fall. Gather my great soun of praise. And what shall I come?

Here?

It comes the morning? Shall I go up? Yeah?

Go up, God says I'm already there. Your oil is waiting in the place of your next order. Father, I thank you for the word you gave me today, the spirit of Christ that I feel operative in this place, touching the hearts of people, meeting the needs of people. Lift your hands in the presence of the Lord. He's speaking now, be sensitive to his spirit.

He's speaking now.

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