#165 Living Vertically (1 - Aligning with God's Perspective)

Look up, as you're living here, you're living horizontally, you're living on this planet, you can't just detach, but live from a vertical perspective. Welcome to the One Cry Podcast, a nationwide call for spiritual awakening. The goal, accelerating the movement of God through sharing revival truth, stories, and reports. Welcome to the OneCry podcast. We are so glad that you're joining us today. And you may be in a car or in your home or walking down the road.

I don't know what it is, but we're just glad that you chose to listen to OneCry. And we pray that, by the way, you'll make that a regular listen on your weekly routine. And I'm Bill Eliff. and joining me today is Dr. Reverend Kyle Reno III, Esquire. Esquire. Just keep adding, bro. Keep adding. I'm just, I'm putting enough of those things on there that maybe one of those will stick. Yeah, that would be true.

Kyle, the next few weeks, we're starting on something so critical because where our eyes are set, that where we look really determines our direction, doesn't it? I mean, you know that as a baseball player, where you're aiming is where that ball is going. And we've got a real problem about that right now, don't we? We sure do. Yeah, I think about coaching and being coached, I should say, is when we're learning sprint work and things like that, The coach is always

trying to give you a point that you're running to. Because if not, we're directionless. And even if you don't feel like it, you just get off course so easily. And I think so many things are vying for our eyes and through our eyes, our attention, our affections. And we live in a world right now that's just loud, very, very loud and screaming all the time. And I know, Bill, you pastoring for decades, this war is ever-changing, right? Right. Right.

And if we don't learn how to rightly gain perspective, we find ourself a people that's way off course. So, yeah, I'm excited about this series really about how do you live vertically. And, you know, there are certain seasons, you know, as we're taping this, we're in a political season. You may not be listening during that same time. But during political seasons, the noise and the images and the pictures are just, they're crying out for our attention and trying to demand.

They don't have to demand, but trying to demand their attention. And I think of the psalmist who said, I will set no worthless thing before my eyes. I'm not going to look there. And that's a determined decision that somebody's got to make. But Kyle, talk to us a little bit about where do you look? I mean, where should you look? And what direction should we be focusing our attention?

Yeah. Yeah, I want to encourage our listener. What I want to do, Lord willing, in the next couple of weeks, Bill and I, is to help us just freshly align and look to God in a way that's going to empower our praying. Because if you see him, you pray different. It will empower our living and our leadership. And here's the truth. Idols are always elevated. I mean, like that's a physical reality. You look at the Old Testament, like it's trying to block our view.

And so idolatry plays out a million different ways in our hearts and lives. And and even good things, even good things can become a distraction from the ultimate one and the ultimate aspect of our life. And so let me tell you where I like. Here's my confession. You're off the bat that where did this start? This thought started. I was a bill. You've been a good tired in ministry before.

Like you know that there's different kinds of tired but there's a good tired so a couple weeks ago i was a good tired and i had monday meetings we had just celebrated 50 years as a faith family in our church man it was a we threw a pot hey i mean it was 50 years so yeah right i mean 50 years of god's faithfulness on this corner in the lives of this people called crossgates it was fantastic. And so we threw a big party, but it's called for a lot of leadership to look through that.

And then the next week we we stopped and we had a visionary moment for our church that we said, hey, this in light of 50 years of God's faithfulness, looking into the future. Here's where we're going. Right. And man, it was fantastic. I mean, just get the momentum of the spirits where people's bought in. And awesome. I get out of my Monday morning meetings and I looked and I didn't have a lunch and I was like, glory to God, I'm tired.

And so I got out of the office and went to the gym and was working out, spent some time just being quiet with the Lord and the spirit of God as clear as I can hear him. Just framed up where I've been. And he said, Kyle, it is so right for you to spend the time looking back. And that was what we did with the 50 years. And it's in my heart, this is what I sense the Spirit saying, and it is right to look forward into the future.

And I'm telling you, just a moment, me and Lord, and this was the subtle, just don't forget to look up.

And and i and i went just to pause in my life in leadership going yeah you can get caught in the past or you can steamroll the future but the only chance we have as followers of christ for sure leaders in local churches and ministry is that we live vertically because that's where everything flows from it flows from this this pursuit of god knowing his presence and so i in this You had those moments. I wrote this sermon in 30 minutes on my phone, and that God's just bringing scripture to mine.

And it realigned me in just a fresh way, just a fresh way. So let me help you right now, wherever you are for a moment, and Bill will banter back and forth. If you want to live vertically, you got to start where it starts. Here it is. One, remember this. our God is the creator. Our God is the creator. Genesis 1, 1 says, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Come on.

Meaning nothing you've ever seen are all the things that are still unseen or all created by one who is ultimately the creator. Bill, I love this thought. Nobody's ever stood at the edge of the Grand Canyon and thought about how great they are.

Nobody, nobody, even, even the unbeliever that I've had the privilege of being in the Andes mountains, sit on the, on a boat on the Amazon river where at the mouth is 110 miles wide, stood in the savannas of Africa, bringing a little more local, been in the harbors and bay areas of San Diego, Smoky Mountains, and on a walk most days as the sun's setting, looking west with my wife.

And all that should for us as followers of Christ is help remind us, not look here horizontally, but look here vertically as I pray, as I seek His face. And remember, my God made everything. He made everything. We got a mantra around our house. I'm raising five kiddos, and I'll often ask this question if we're on a hunting trip or if we're watching the sunrise or if we're at the beach. I'll just ask my kids, who made that? And my, and Reno's have, have learned this. God made that.

God made that. And so I just want to stop for a moment and help us remember that everything we've seen and all the things that are unseen was made by one creator, God of the universe. It starts where it starts. It starts with him. I love what Psalm 19 says, the heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. It's shouting, man. Rivers are clapping. Wind's coming over the mountain this morning, and it is declaring a creator, God of the universe.

And by the way, Jesus doesn't show up in the New Testament. He's co-equal in creation. So this Christ that we worship as a crucified, risen king was there when it began. Colossians 1.16, for by him all things were created in heaven Heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, where the thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him, which should make us, Revelation 4, 11.

I want to say with all of heaven, worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power.

So people of God listening to a podcast, I want to ask, when's the last time you looked up and just worshiped this creator God? And you talk about put things in perspective, like the one that holds the sun and moon, this cosmos and the world that is spinning and the whole solar system is underneath his sovereign, sustaining control. That's our God. That's our God. The second thing, if you want to live vertically, remember this, not only is our God creator, our God is in control.

He's in control. I love what Proverbs 19, 21 says, many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails. Right now, in this chaos, few things will help you be settled, anchored in this crazy world than remembering this, our God is on his throne, that he is in control, that man has plans. God's got a purpose. Man's got plans. God has a purpose that he will fulfill in this moment, in this chaos, to look up.

You want to live vertically, man, as you're praying, walk into the throne room of grace and mercy and declare, hey, God, I know you're in control. Psalm 2, it just came to my spirit as I was thinking about this principle of the kingdom of God. Psalm 2, 1 through 4 says, Why do the nations rage and peoples plot in vain?

The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds apart and cast their cords from us. Do you not feel that right now? More so than ever, I do, man. It seems like the nation and the nations are raging, And what we're trying to do, humanity, is we're trying to burst the bonds, the things that God has put in place, the boundaries of life and design and all the things that God ultimately attended.

And humanity is railing against God, railing against Christ and what he intended in creation. And I think in this subtle part of humanity, we think we can actually win. I want to remind us, our God is in control. And this is what it says, verse 4. He who sits in heaven, in heavens, laughs. God's not looking down from his throne going, I wonder if I'll win. God's looking down going, no, no, no, no. Your plans ultimately just play into my purpose.

And I am going to glorify my name, advance my kingdom. I'm going to win in the end. and the Lord holds them in derision. To those that are listening today, maybe all of life feels out of control. Bill and I have been there. Man, moments when your personal pain, it's hard to see God's purpose. That you're walking through a season of hardship, suffering. And that's just a part of living in this broken world. Well, Romans 8, 28 reminds us of how good God is in His sovereign control. role.

And we know that God causes everything to work together for good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them. So people of God, listening to a podcast, lift your eyes. Look up as you're living here. If you're living horizontally, you're living on this planet. You can't just detach, but live from a vertical perspective that our God, our God, the God of the Bible is the creator, and he's in control, and that should give us a confidence.

And then the last thing, and then Bill and I are going to talk about this for a moment, that I want us to think about in this moment is the God that is creator and the God that is in control. And if you ask me right now, which aspects of God or attributes of God are forgotten and I would say are vital to living in a vertical perspective is this. Our God, by the way, is holy. He is holy. Exodus 15, 11 says, who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Little g.

Who is like you? Who's set apart like you? Who is like you? I love this. Majestic in holiness. Awesome and glorious deeds doing wonders. Now, I studied for us, what does holiness even mean? And there's There's several ways to describe it, but simply, it means set apart, separate. And here's what is true about our God. He is totally other. That there is none that is holy, holy, holy like him, meaning he is perfect in every way, all the time.

Everything that he does, everything that our God says is perfect. So right response, living vertically, is to come Psalm 96, verse 9, worship the Lord in the splendor of His holiness. Tremble before Him, all of the earth. And here's the heart-to-heart moment. In the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, right now in our nation, and God is at work in miraculous ways. But if we want revival, a part of revival is an all of God returning to the people of God.

And so I just ask, listen, this is where God, when's the last time that you came into His presence? And not in a way that makes you want to run away, but in a way that makes you want to run to. Do you rightly tremble at His holiness? That in light of being broken man, broken woman, that you came into the presence of a holy God, and you remembered He is totally perfect, and I am an imperfect person. And yet he beckons me come. And it makes me tremble before him.

I remember hearing a sermon by a guy named Dave Busby decades ago now. And he said something that is stuck in my spirit. He said, we often sing, show us your glory. And that's been true. Hymn writers to Common Day. And he goes, I wonder if we really know what we're singing. Because if the glory of God is made manifest among us, we have our Isaiah 6 moment, where it's, Lord, please depart from me. I'm a man of unclean lips.

I am from a people that are radically imperfect, yet God doesn't listen to me, want us to run away. He wants us to embrace His holiness. So, Bill, maybe just for a moment to just talk here. As we strive to live vertically, to be a people that know his presence, that changes how we interact, how we respond in the horizontal. Isn't it good to know that our God is creator, our God is in control, and our God is holy? How that would change how we pray, how we lead, how we believe.

Everything, just change Absolutely everything And you know I was thinking as you were. As you were talking, Richard Owen Roberts once said, I can give a one-word definition of revival. And I kind of leaned in. I thought, well, what is that? And he said, God, God. It's just God in his rightful place. God in our vision. God obeyed. God loved. God adored. You know, God worshiped. So there's, but you know what? We just don't think about God.

We go through, you think about the average person, the average believer even, and how little of their week is consumed with thoughts of God. And Kyle, I mean, everything you said, I'm just sitting here, my heart just rejoicing. I'm just saying, oh, my goodness, yes, yes, he is creator. And when you see that, you realize he's the creator. You're the creature. Yes, right. And the great problem of Romans 1 is we get that twisted around, and we think we're the creator.

And that he's in control and that he's totally different. He's so holy. But Kyle, let's talk just a minute about, for our listeners, what are the steps that we take to maintain this vertical look all day long? Yeah. Because I think that's the great problem. I think there's some of our listeners that, as you're speaking, it's lifting their eyes. Yeah, sure. Sure. And they're turning vertical. And guess what? Guess what immediately happens? We repent.

We we get happy. We you know, everything good that we need to do happens when we turn our eyes upon Jesus and look full in his wonderful face. Yeah. We just don't do it much. Well, you know, if you, a lot of times you'll go to a doctor and you think you've got this issue, but the doctor says, no, there's a greater issue of alignment. You know, like you have, you're feeling that, but the truth is your posture matters. You know, you remember your mom saying sit up straight, you know,

like that. What she knows is that as we slump. And as we are conformed and as the pressure builds, and the truth is everything in this, the world, the devil and our flesh wants to willingly cooperate with is ultimately to defeat us, to get us into this feeble posture. I'm just going to talk candidly for a second. If you live under the news stream of this nation right now continually, you are being conformed by it. Yeah. And it's not for your good. It is changing your posture.

So for me, a practical, I got to choose to position myself every day before God.

And i i have to it's that i gotta make sure that i stand up and then i i walk with him like it's for me and katie i'm gonna give you a practical that we go uh on a walk i would say six five six out of seven days right and we get the kids that moment and that's why i say walking toward the we'd walk a loop and we end up walking toward the sun setting in our neighborhood you know and that's we go vertical together we talk we talk on our way out about life,

we talk to god on our way back toward the house about our week about our day and we take it vertical well what does that do for me for her and i it aligns us it aligns it aligns us to the lord so does tomorrow morning with the lord when i come into his presence yeah and just tell him i'm I'm grateful to be here. I think, you know, I've been thinking, as you know, I'm writing this study on the presence-centered life. We've talked about it here on the podcast.

But I'm seeing these six practices or ways of a man who's a presence-centered man. And one of those is this drawing near and then secondly, communing. And if you don't have a morning and evening prayer, and when I say prayer, I'm talking about the word of God and prayer. I don't know how you survive. I don't know how you, because if you don't have, you're going to get bowed down.

You're going to get pulled down. You're going to get, Satan is going to see to it that he throws a thousand things at you to distract you, to just pull you away and turn your vision like Martha. And you become worried and bothered about so many things. But if you don't have at least. At one point, and we'll talk about all day long, but at least at one determined time to sit down in the quiet and listen to the Lord like Mary, seated at his feet, listening to the Lord.

I don't see how you survive in this world. You won't. You won't. You can make it through. True but you won't you won't walk through rejoicing you won't walk through with god's perspective you won't walk through in faith and and joy because that comes when you get with him and you realize he's the creator he's in control and he's holy and he's this and he's that and by going vertical yeah and i i think well here's and i'll end with this and we can pray it in.

But and here's i just asked this question that the spirit of god is asking me you know that, is in light of him being creator in control which i'm just there's such comfort and knowing that my god is in control he's king of the universe he he loves me and i'm gonna talk don't miss don't just listen to this one miss the next part because we're gonna it's gonna land uh in ways that impact you horizontally by looking vertically.

But here's a, I just, man, when's the last time personally, listener, um, that you just got into God's presence and you are overwhelmed by his holiness. Like I'm, man, we're missing too many of the I am. It's like, man, my God is pure. My God has no fault line. He has no fault in him. And he is whose eyes shine like the sun.

And and i'm gonna say it again like that's not shouldn't scare us to run from god but a right fear of god should make us run to him and be in all i can come before him and just go lord you are majestic in your holiness like you are and the scripture is telling us that from front to finish and to not and to not know god that way is because we're not we're not living vertically because he is that way. He is that. And think of this verse. It's repeated over and over in Proverbs.

The fear of the Lord, which comes from going vertical, seeing him, is the beginning of wisdom. You want to be wise? You can't. The beginning of that is to go vertical, see the holiness of God, and have a proper reverence, awe, respect, and fear for him. It all begins there. And I want to say one more thing before we pray. I know we're kind of going on about this, but it's at the heart of it.

You know, as an older man, I'm not – something could change this tomorrow, but I've just been thinking about it a lot, like in the last year. I don't worry as much about things. And I realize that part of that is the cumulative effect of coming to know God. Amen. And that's... You know, just years of looking at him. Amen. When I was under stress, when I was in hard, hard situations.

And seeing his faithfulness and his holiness and that he really is in control, and finally, lo and behold, you start to get it. You know, you say, man, I don't need to worry about this on the front end. He's got it. Amen. He's shown me for 72 years that he's got it. And so you start, you know, being kind of ridding yourself of some of that. But it is cumulative. That's right. It's day by day, week by week, year by year, getting aligned and looking up.

Amen. So, Kyle, we always, the name of this podcast is One Cry. That's right. And we always want to cry out to the Lord about these things, about our lives, about our nation. And so we want to invite our listeners to pray with us. Don't just listen, but pray with us right now. You may even, as we're praying, you may get to one spot where you just need to turn off the podcast and just get on your face and spend your own time with the Lord. But we're going to leave this here for just a moment.

Kyle, why don't you begin, and then I'll close this prayer. So why don't we do this? Just enter in. If you're a follower of Christ, we enter through a veil that has been torn because blood has been shed into the presence of a creator God.

And let's just thank him. Thank Him for being the reason why there is a sun and a moon, earth that we walk on, air that we breathe. Let's thank Him that He's in control, that He's not stressed out. He's in control of the nations and the narrative of our one story.

Take a moment and recognize his holiness, so father I know that's not near enough time but we just say thank you thank you that we can look up into the face of a God that made all things holds all things together and is absolutely holy. So we love you. I pray for Bill and I and for every listener that you would help us. Holy Spirit, would you help lift our eyes that we might live vertically and that would change everything about us and that you might be rightly glorified.

Lord, we think of that verse that says that they looked to him and their faces were not disappointed. Lord, when we take time to see you, we are never disappointed. We always see more than we can imagine. It creates awe in our heart that you're always bigger. You're always more. You're always right. You're always, Lord, you always give us the course correction that we need.

And father we spend so much of our time just looking at this sin-wrecked world and lord we know we have to deal with it we know we have to we have to live here but we think of lord paul who said set your mind on things above where christ is seated at the right hand of god Because we have died and our life is hidden with Christ in God.

So, Lord, I pray that that you would help us develop the practices to just regularly, daily, hourly look up, just look up, just align ourselves with you and show us how to do that. I pray for every listener on this podcast that, Lord, they would forever think about this, that it would bear that kind of fruit, Lord, in their heart. Lord, the problem is usually when we're worried and bothered and frustrated and upset is not the stuff we're dealing with. It's just we've lost sight of you.

And so, Lord, I pray that you would let it become a regular rhythm of our life, Lord, to look up. And we pray that for your glory and in your precious name. Amen. We do want to say to our listeners, thanks so much. And would you do something for us? Would you tell somebody about the One Craft Podcast?

Just tell them today. day and uh not we we're not we don't get any money yeah be nice but we we don't and there's no monetary incentive and there's no we're not interested in the any glory or fame because we make enough mistakes that that that you know brings that down real quick we want you to be walking in personal revival every day, and we want other people to. So tell them about the podcast and see if it can help them along the way, and together that we can experience God and His presence.

Well, thanks for joining us, and we'll pick this up next time, so don't miss next week as we... Music.