Good morning, Springhouse! Well, it's
a great day to be in the house this morning, and
I am, I am glad to see you all. Before we get— I say before
we get cranking, we're already cranking. I'm just continuing the crank. Okay, here we go.
But this afternoon, immediately following this gathering, we're having a
luncheon in the fellowship hall. Celebrate Recovery, we're going to be launching in
August, and so if you are. If you
are interested in learning about that ministry, we invite you to come to be a
part of that. Even if you didn't sign up, you can come over and learn.
We have plenty of food today for you as
well. And then Easter is coming! Are you guys excited
about that? Easter's coming, and we
are going to have church on Easter Sunday. It's going to be good!
9 and 11 o'clock, and you know, wrapped
around the Easter season, some of you know, one of
the core testimonies that we find in this The house, of how
people arrived here and they stay, is I got here and
I did not expect the level of authenticity
and community that was available here at
this house. And so, what we do, you know, anybody know anybody that are
those Easter churchgoers and then that Christmas churchgoer, and that's about
all they do, you know? And so, around the Easter
time, what we've done historically is we've offered an
opportunity for you to invite people back to church after
Easter, Easter by bringing something special to the stage. So we've had the Skit Guys
here, we've had Jonathan Evans here, we've had other
people here, and so this year we are going to have a guy by the
name of Mike Goodwin, Bow Tie Comedy, and he's going to be
here. He will be ministering through comedy and laughter, and he
ties it in the end with a strong message. And so this is
an opportunity for you to ask your friends and those people who
you bring on Easter Sunday if they would come back. Now, why do we want
to do that? We want to do that so that when we're in those hallways
and when we're in here that we have opportunity to build relationally
with them so that they might come back and be a part of something that
they're not necessarily a part of regularly. And if they do continue
to come back, we'd like them to come the following week to our
Newcomers Luncheon to learn about SpringHouse, to learn about our church.
If they have questions about who we are, our pastoral team will be
there and our leadership. And so that is— all of that
is strategic in that window of Easter for us to
offer an opportunity for people to plug in and get to know us
and be a part of our family here at Springhouse. And some of you have
the testimony of, "I came at Easter and I continued to
come." And so praise God that you are continuing to journey with us.
So today we are going to continue— well, there's him
again. Today we're going to continue our series Abide. So we did have
the Abide Conference that closed last week, but we are still in this series Abide
for a few— we're in the series of Abide all year, but this section
on Abide is— we have a few more weeks leading up to Easter. And so
today we're going to talk about hearing the voice of the shepherd.
So if you'll stand with me, we're going to read out of The Message version
of the Bible. That is John
10:1-5 and 27. And
if you would read as if you're trying to get somebody saved this morning,
okay? Let's read real, with some real gusto. Here we go. Let me
set this before you as plainly as I
can. If a person climbs over or through the
fence, of a sheep pen instead of going through the
gate, you know he's up to no good. A
sheep rustler. The shepherd walks right up to
the gate, the gatekeeper opens the gate to
him, and the sheep recognizes his voice.
He calls his own sheep by name and leads them
out. When he gets them all out, he leads them and
they follow because they are familiar with his
voice. They won't follow a stranger's voice, but will
scatter because they aren't used to the sound of
it. Everything I have done has been authorized by
my Father, actions that speak louder than
words. You don't believe because you're not my
sheep. The Father who put them under my care is
so much greater than the destroyer and
thief. No one could ever get them away from Him.
I and the Father are one heart and mind. Father, I
thank you for your Word. I thank you that we can trust it. I pray,
Lord, that you would speak today through it. God, let my words fall to the
ground. Let those words that would be
eternal be eternal and do its work, in Jesus' name. And everybody
said, amen. Amen. My
friend Dustin Howell and I took a trip to Ireland
together. It was a really fun trip. This was several years ago.
In fact, I think it was before— the year before I got married. So this
is pre-Shari, and we went, and one of the things that— one of
the notable things that I took away from Ireland was there
are sheep in Ireland, and the sheep are
everywhere. If you've seen stray cats or dogs running around
anywhere here in Smyrna, Murfreesboro, Nashville,
sheep are everywhere in Ireland.. They are
just walking the streets, and you know, they won't get out of
your way necessarily. They're just there.
And sheep, you know, many of you know this, but sheep historically are
just known to be dumb.
And so are we. And that's
why Scripture calls us sheep,
because like sheep they cannot cannot defend themselves, they cannot find
their way home, they cannot protect themselves from predators, and
as much as we think that we on our own strength can do those things,
we can't. So probably more important than us being called sheep is
that scripture repeatedly calls God
our shepherd. We need
a shepherd. When it comes to sheep, something real interesting
will happen. Flocks will merge together and you'll see a variety
of different sheep in a, in a pen or in an area. And what
will happen is a shepherd will come and
call out for the sheep. And what's interesting is the
sheep that belongs to that shepherd will make a move or an
adjustment to go toward the sheep the minute it hears the
shepherd's voice. And so as dumb as sheep are, the one thing they've got going
for them is that they know the shepherd's
voice. They know the voice of their leader. Can the
same be said about you? Do you
know the voice of
the shepherd? Do you know the voice of the shepherd? Jesus
said, "The gatekeeper opens the gate to him, and the sheep recognize
his voice." I want us to start here with this point: The voice
of the shepherd protects you from the one who seeks to destroy
your life. The voice of the shepherd protects you from the one who
seeks to destroy your life. In other words,
the security of the sheep is not the fence. The security of the sheep
is the voice. It's a voice. Do you know the
voice of God? This is not a popular teaching in a lot
of Christian circles, but I have to tell you, I'd be remiss as your pastor
not to equip you and inform you that you have a
real, breathing, live enemy. Enemy that is
after you. This enemy wants to steal, he wants to kill, he
wants to destroy you. Now, here's the great thing about
our great glorious God. If you belong to the kingdom, the enemy can't
touch you. He has no power. Greater is he who is in you than
he who is in the world. And so he has no power over you,
but we sometimes gloss over this understanding that, guys,
we are at war. Now, I know that in our cushy seats with
our latte and with everything, you know, seeming we've got
everything at our fingertips. It might not seem that way, but there
is literally an active war going on right now for
your soul. There's an active war going on for— now here's the great glorious thing
about the war that we're in. We know who has the victory at the end
of the day, and the one who has the victory is also the
same one who's inside you, who gives you greater power
than any enemy that can come against you. But there
are these things called battles along the way. Has
anybody ever succumbed to a battle and lost? My
hand's up. Lost the battle because I got wayward, or
I lost my way, or as we're going in the vein of
today's topic, I lost sight, or I lost earshot
of the shepherd's voice. And so the
security of the sheep is not the fence, it's the voice. Jesus says
that the sheep will recognize the shepherd's voice and they
run from strangers. My experience is that we don't
run from strangers, we tend to run to strangers. And might I
go a step further? We run to strangers and we will build our whole life
based on what a stranger says about us. Now sometimes, here's the
thing, sometimes those strangers manifest themselves on TV programs that we watch
at 4 o'clock because they don't really
know us. And so we can grab— there's no conflict in people who don't know
us who are speaking into our lives, so we'll just grab one little thing that
they say and build a whole theology on it, or build a whole foundation of
our lives. The voice of the shepherd protects us
from danger. The voices in the world are all around us, and they're trying
to lead us somewhere. They're trying to lead you. They're trying to lead you toward
life. They're trying to lead you toward destruction, some
of them. But a shepherd's voice will always protect you.
The ability to hear the shepherd's voice comes from proximity, and
that's why abiding trains your ear to hear
His voice. Jesus says, "Remain in me, and I will remain in you."
So as we abide in him, we are learning
the voice of our Creator. As we remain in him— let me
tell you, all of you guys could be talking to me at one time, and
Shari could be sitting here in the front row, and if Shari says something, I'm
going to be able to pick out her voice more than anybody else in
the room because I live with her. I'm in proximity to
her. I know I know what Shari's voice
sounds like. The closer you are to your King, the
more you recognize what His voice sounds like. The closer
you are to your God, the more you recognize what's His voice
and what's the world's voice. I heard the pastor tell this story one time. He
was talking about this blind girl, and she was up on the third floor of
an apartment complex. That's where they lived. Now, she wasn't rendered
unable to do things. She was make her way around, but she
was legally blind. And so, the father went to the grocery
store, and the apartment complex that day caught
on fire. She was stuck in the apartment that caught
on fire, and so she goes out to the balcony, and the police had come,
the firemen had come, and they put out that big trampoline type
thing that they jump into, you know, to be safe.
And so, she gets out there on the balcony, and everybody is yelling
at her, "Jump!" Jump! Jump! Let's go! Come down! Come
down! They had no relationship with her, they didn't know that she was
blind, but there she was in this burning fire not responding to all of their
cries. Well, the father got the call at the grocery store that the apartment was
on fire, laid his buggy down, got in his car, got to
the place, jumped out of the car, and
said, "Jump!" She took off and jumped and saved
her life. Why did she jump for her father, but didn't jump when everybody
else was saying, "Jump"? Because she knew
his voice. There is protection in the voice that you
know. There's protection in the
shepherd's voice. Hearing His voice is not accidental, it
is trained. It is trained. Again, Jesus says, "Abide in Me,
and I abide in you." When you abide long enough, His voice
stops sounding unfamiliar. The sheep that hear the
shepherd the clearest are the sheep that stay the closest,
because closeness creates familiarity. And
so we want to recognize and distinguish His voice, because sometimes
the loudest voices we hear are our
own. I succumb sometimes to the voices inside my head that are bathed
in fear, bathed in preferences, in
ambitions, or opinions, or emotions., and then we are so
quick to attach a spiritual label on that.
Might I suggest this morning that not every voice inside your head
is the shepherd? Not every voice that's
inside your head is the shepherd. We live in
one of the loudest— no, we don't live in one of the loudest, we live
in the loudest culture
of all history. Let that sink in for just a moment. We
live in the loudest culture in all
of mankind in history today.
Phones are going off like crazy, the news is shouting at
us, people's opinions all around us. Everywhere we turn somebody's trying
to tell you what to believe, what to think, what to
fear, what to chase, what success
looks like. And external noise is not the whole
problem, it's just part of the problem. The other problem is
that sometimes the world tries to
imitate the shepherd's voice. One of the most dangerous
phrases that you and I can say— listen to this, believers— one of
the most dangerous phrases you and I can say is this,
"God told me." And we throw that phrase around like seed hitting the
ground for birds. "God told me." Because
"God told me," you're talking about
the Star Breather, Sovereign God, Creator of the universe,
and when we say, "God told me something," there's not anything
else to say about the conversation. If God told
you to do something, if He literally, if He said to you, "Do this,"
it doesn't matter what I think, doesn't matter what I say, doesn't matter what anybody
else says, That's something you better do. If God said it, if the God of
the universe said it, you better walk in obedience. And so, so
often I hear somebody say, "God told me," and I turn around, I don't see
them doing what they say God told them, and what it really was was, "I
really wanted to do this, so I labeled it as God told me
to do it." And when we do that,
it is destructive. Destructive in our lives,
and destructive to others. Because if God didn't say
it and we claim that He did, we are putting His
name on something that originated with
us. And that's
problematic. That's problematic. Discernment matters because
not every voice inside your head is
the shepherd. John 1, Jesus, as
John 1 opens it says, "I am the the Word. He says, "In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was God, and the Word was
with God." And so what we learn in that is that the
written Word and the living Word are never going to
come in disagreement to one another. A
surefire way of knowing whether you've heard the Shepherd's voice
is to test it against the Word of
God. This is truth. There is
foundation here that we can rely on and that
we can trust. Now sometimes people will take, you know, "I
like page number 826 of scripture, so I'm going to take this little portion here,
I'm going to base my entire life on it." And we run with
that, forgetting that there is an entirety of scripture here that we're supposed to
live and abide by. And so this is why it's very important
for us to be familiar with the Word of God. We need to know what
the Word of God says so that whenever we're testing what God is
saying to us, we know what we're testing it against, that
we actually understand the Word of God and that it is true, that we
actually know what His Word says. So that if somebody says, "God told me to
do this," and it doesn't line up with scripture, you know that was
not from the Shepherd. That was not from the Good Shepherd.
So how do we discern God's voice? Let's look at 4 ways
that we can discern God's voice, okay? The first one we've
talked about already. It's the Word of God. Psalm 119 says
this, "Your word is a lamp unto my feet and a light
light unto my path. And so we take the
Word and we test whatever it is that we feel like we're getting
in terms of discernment,
direction, whatever the idea is, whatever motion we're
trying to set into the course of action, we test
it by God's Word. Now, when something happens in
my life, some dramatic event, something at
work, some financial crisis, something emotional, whatever,
the first question that I think is good to ask is this, how did I
How did I get here? How did
this happen? How did I arrive here? How did I arrive to this dilemma? How
did I get here? The second question,
after you've discerned, how did I get here? The second question is, what
does God's word say about this? Now, here's what
we have the propensity to do. How did I get here? Okay,
I got that answer. What does God's word say about
it for them? What does God's Word say about it for their situation and the
part that they played? What's the truth that they need to
hear that they're not hearing? But see, what we
need to do is we need to turn that around. We need to
understand that it's, "How did I get here? And God, what is Your Word
saying to me about this dilemma? What is Your Word saying
to me about how I'm supposed to respond? What is Your Word saying?
What does Your truth say about my thought process about what's going
on? What is your Word saying about my opinion about what's
going on? And everything surrenders and bows down to the
truth of God's Word.
Church, say, "Amen." Your circumstances,
your problems, your drama, your emotions, they
are not your rock or your foundation. The truth of
God's Word is your foundation. It is where your peace comes
from. Holy Spirit is the second thing. First thing is the Word.
The second, we've been given the gift of the Holy Spirit. John 16 says, "When
the Spirit of Truth comes, He
will do," what? He'll do what? Okay, I need
a guide. I need a guide. So I've got truth, which is the path. Now
I need a guide to the truth. So I look at the Holy Spirit kind
of like a flashlight. It's like, okay, here's the
direction you're going, and He's going to illuminate reality right in
front of you. He's going to be able to separate truth from lies. He's
going to be able to point you in the direction. He's going to allow you
to walk with Him. And here's the thing, most of the time what
we are looking for, what the Lord is looking for, is that you are
taking a step with Him. That you're taking a step
with Him. That you're taking a step, and as you walk faithfully with Him,
He will order your steps. We're going to talk about that in just a few
seconds, okay? But it's like a flashlight. He looks
at He lets us look at our situation, our
experience, whatever is in front of us through the mature spiritual
lens, through a biblical lens, and then we can
begin to move. The third thing, if we have the Word and the Holy Spirit,
the third thing we look
for is peace. Is peace. I do
not find many situations in scripture where the person who
was in charge moved or did anything when they were not
at peace. Peace. God comes down, has a conversation with them, they get straight
with the Lord, they're looking at the Lord, and there's peace. And a lot of
times, listen to this, friends, a lot of times what the Lord does is
He strips them of everything that they brought to the table, and then
He gives them peace to move. But, but God, you don't understand what
they did. You don't understand what they said. You don't understand how this is affecting
everything. God says, lay that all down.
Look at me. I have a friend who, I have a friend who has been
married for a very long time, and she
has every biblical ground to leave her marriage. She has every biblical ground
to leave her marriage. She wants to leave her marriage. She wanted to
leave her marriage. And she came across the crossroad, and the Lord said, "I want
you to stay. I want you to stay."
And she did. These are the types of things that happen in the
kingdom of God. These are the types of things that you need a shepherd who
gives you the strength when you're weak to
continue to endure. Just because you have the right to do something doesn't mean it's
what God tells you to do. Colossians says,
"Let the—" I highlighted the wrong word here. "Let the peace
of Christ rule in your heart." Let the peace
of Christ rule. Guys, when your peace begins to get off kilter, it's time
to be still and get close to the Creator. When your peace is
not— when your peace is out of whack, that is not the time to be
making big decisions. That's not the time to be— that's not really the time to
be talking to people. It's not the time to be texting or posting
on Facebook or posting on Facebook or posting
on Facebook, right? When you don't have peace, when you don't have
peace, let me— okay, any football watchers here? Okay, when you watch
a football game, okay, and you see a play that has happened and
the ball's gone out of bounds or something has taken place and the ref
blows the whistle, you know, if you're an avid football watcher and you know the
game, you know what's about to happen. You know the call that they're about to
show you on the screen, and then they show you the call and then they
move on and you move on with them. Okay? Peace is
like that referee. Peace is like illuminating what you already know by
truth in the direction of the Holy Spirit. Peace gets in there and says, "You're
going in the right way. You're going in the right direction." You
can trust in this peace, okay? So you have the Word, you have the Holy
Spirit, you have peace, and the last thing, and guys, we poo-poo
this away like
crazy, godly counsel. And the reason that we poo-poo away godly
counsel is because here's what godly counsel really means to a
lot of us. Godly counsel It also means, "I've come to inform you about what
I've already
decided to do." I can't tell you how many times I get calls every
week, I have meetings with people, and, "Pastor, I've just come to let
you know this is what I've decided to do. This is a big decision in
my life. This is what I've decided to do. This is the choice I've made."
And I'm thinking, "Okay, I don't know why we're having this conversation
right now. I appreciate the information, but were you asking me to pray for you?
Did you want me—" Because what we want is we want people to surround us
to affirm us in the the things we want to do. We want, we want
somebody to come say, yeah, that's good. I'm good with that. You know, I had
a call just the other night. Somebody was just kind of sharing their heart
with me or whatever. And I mean, they got through everything they want to do.
And my first two words were,
absolutely not. Absolutely not. That I do not agree with. I do not think that
at all. That's the direction that you're supposed to go. This person was emotional. It
was a, it was a good call. Listen, godly
counsel is super is super important. God confirms His voice
through wise believers around us.
We have behavior issues at the school sometimes, and we've got a— I've
got my authority, her name is Debbie Landers over in East Tennessee, and sometimes I
have to call her and I have to say, "Hey, listen, we've got this particular
situation. What do you think about this?" And she'll give me some counsel.
We'll talk as an administrative team. I'll call Vonda or Rachel and say, "Hey, we've
got this issue. What are your thoughts about this? Before we take action,
what are the thoughts?" Because because there is wisdom in
getting other perspectives. There's wisdom in
getting other counsel. And so, when we're looking for counsel, you
want to look for people who have a track record of a
grace gift in whatever it is that you're trying to get counsel for. So, for
instance, if I need the Lord to give
me some calculated information, I need to grab some counsel on
administrative functions, I'm probably going to go see I go see Mark Laughlin because he
has a consistent track record of being calculated and being able
to have this administrative grace gift, and so he
can impart some information into my
life. James. James and I have been friends for a long time. He's a guy,
you know what he sows into situations? Peace.
He's a peacemaker. If there's a situation going on, he always comes in and he
will speak peace to a situation. Wisdom. There's times when I
need concrete wisdom, whenever I got a situation going, I need to get some wisdom
on which direction to go, and I'll go see Ronnie. I'll go see I'll tell
you, there's been so many lunches I sit down and Ronnie will just put a
nugget of wisdom on the table and it will blow my mind because he's got
a grace and wisdom. There is, there
is wisdom in having a multitude of counselors. This is what the
scripture says, "Where there is no counsel, the people fall, but in the
multitude of counselors there's
safety." There's safety. And so, Amongst all those
things, the Word, the Holy Spirit, peace, and godly
counsel, where do we get off kilter? Well, I think the biggest culprit
in all of that
is distraction. Distraction is the
enemy of discernment. This is
my puppy Emmett. Come
here. Hey, buddy. Now Emmett came right to
me. Emmett knows my voice. Let me tell you something,
Emmett knows my voice, but every now and then
when
he goes outside, I can be screaming at the top of my lungs
with my voice, and, and he is more concerned about the squirrel going
up the tree, the field before him, the birds that
are flocking around, and this guy can run!
This guy can run! And I have ran after
him with no avail. And so when he's getting away, do you
think I'm screaming for Emmett to come back to me because I don't want him
to play with the squirrels, or I don't want him to play with the birds,
or I don't want him to have fun in
the field? I'm, I'm, I'm calling him because he doesn't see the
Mack truck that's on the road that's about to end his life.
And if he will listen to my voice, he will come back
to the place of safety. Are you picking up what I'm putting
down? And so what happens is, is we got this little contraption
on his, his neck here that is controlled
by this little device. And if he doesn't listen to my voice,
I push this little red button and boy, he makes a
beeline right to me. Okay, here's what I want
you to understand. The God of the universe loves you so much
that He will push the red button to get you to come running back to
Him. He will allow you to go through
some difficult, hard circumstances to allow Him
to become the focus.
I love this boy. Don't make
me push the button! Abiding creates
space to hear God clearly. So here's the deal, guys.
Let's just be real. There are times in our lives where we have a mountain
in front of us. The mountain can be a work situation,
could be a financial problem, it
could be a relational fallout. It can
be some type of contentious thing that's going on. It can be,
and it feels like a mountain. It's weighty. Anybody
ever had a mountain? Yeah, it's weighty. It's, it's,
it's real. It's there. You wake up thinking about it. You go to work thinking
about it. You drive around thinking about it. You emote about
it. You, it comes up in your conversations because it is right there in
front of your face. There this mountain, and it is huge.
And if you're a believer and you're really close to the Lord, what you're doing
is you're seeing this mountain and you're crying out to the Lord, and what you're
saying to the Lord is, "Get this mountain out of my way! Tell me what
to do here! I've got to make a decision here about this mountain!" And
what you talk about more and more and more is about the mountain, far more
than what you talk about Him. And what happens
is the mountain becomes so, so illuminated and
huge in our lives, and here's the deal, It's
so tiny to the Creator of the universe.
It's so small in comparison to everything else. What
is ruining your day is tiny to the Star Breather.
Are you with me? And so the Star Breather
says, "Take that mountain and surrender it to me so
it becomes this big." Now, here's the thing. The mountain's not gone away.
It's just become a molehill now. And so here it is,
and you've got this mountain in your peripheral,, but you've
got Jesus in front of you and He's so much bigger than
this, and all of a sudden you start to see
things at a different perspective. You start to come in line with the truth.
You start to get yourself in line with His precepts and, and what the Lord
says, and all of a sudden your response
to this mountain shifts, and it changes, and it
evolves to line up with the Shepherd
Whose voice you're listening to. And so this mountain
becomes small. The Word tells us this is what this really means in real time.
We don't like— listen, if nothing's going on, we don't care about this verse, but
let there be a mountain in front of us. This is the truth
of God's Word. Trust in the Lord
with some of that problem. Trust in the Lord with a few things.
Trust in the Lord with everything else but the mountain. Mountain.
No, trust in the Lord with all your heart,
and do what? Lean not on your understanding. But
God, you don't understand what
they, what it, what— No!
Lean not on your understanding. Now, I don't know how to get here
when I'm facing a mountain, because everything in my understanding wants
to pull out the the Lord wants
to throw my opinions, my attitude,
my emotions, everything within me wants to use what I think I know
is
right to fix the problem. But things that the Lord is really trying to do
in us and heal us from are the reasons why mountains get erected in
the first place. I'm doing Celebrate Recovery right now, and one
of the things that I'm learning about myself is the biggest struggle that
I have in my life, one of the biggest struggles, got a lot of them,
is the fear of rejection. And so what happens is, is when I feel
like I'm coming up against some rejection, a mountain will
be erected in my path. And so all of a sudden, what will happen in
my life is I'll begin to make unhealthy
decisions, and unhealthy choices, and unhealthy conversations fueled
by me wanting to fix the rejection issue. But here's what
the Savior says. He says, He says, "Don't you know that I've accepted you, Kevin
O'Day? Don't you know that the rejection of your past should not fuel or be
a foundation with which you are making decisions on today?" You understand
what I'm saying? And as I surrender that to Him,
then my mountain becomes a molehill, and I look at it and say, "Wait a
minute, God, you are so much greater than this little thing over here." And
all of a sudden I'm walking in peace, and I'm walking in grace, and all
of a sudden— I don't know what your thing is. Everybody's got I
don't know if yours is
rejection, but everybody's got stuff. I call them
mountain erectors. A mountain comes up. You know that verse over,
I think it's in Matthew 17, where Jesus is talking about if
you have faith like a mustard seed, right? He says you
can tell this mountain to move. Now, He could
have been talking about a literal mountain.
But the context of that scripture is that the disciples
could not cast out the demons, and they come to Him and He says, "You
have such little faith. If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can take
this mountain and cast it into the sea." I believe it works
metaphorically too. I believe it works that you can take that mountain,
whatever it is that you're facing today, whatever that
mountain is that consumes your thoughts, consumes everything going
on, that your text messages are about, and your phone calls about, and your mind
is wrestling, you can't sleep at night, whatever that mountain is, Jesus says,
"I believe with mustard seed faith you can take that mountain and say,
'Get out of my way! Get out of my way!'" Let's look at
some examples in scripture, okay? First of all, the shepherd always leads like a shepherd.
Let's see how that happens here. Here we go.
Moses at the Red Sea. Moses at the Red Sea.
The people were saying, "God, Moses, God, do you not see this
army behind us?" If you go back and read that the messenger.
God does not address the army. "Look at this army back here!"
You know what He does? He says, "Trust in my—" You know, in fact, Moses
is crying out to Him, and you know what God says to Moses? "Why are
you crying out to me? You have everything inside you
that you need to move forward." And I'm telling
you today, you have everything inside you,
you need to move forward. We make the issue the
army. He's get the pathway forward. What's next? Feeding of the
5,000. The disciples come to Jesus and say, "Hey, we don't have
enough. This is an impossible situation. We don't have enough food for all
these people." You know what Jesus' response was? "Oh no, what
are we going to do?" No. Jesus looks
right at them and says, "Kirk, you feed them."
Isn't that what He says? "Susie, you feed
them. Scotty, you feed them." "With what,
Lord?" "You have little faith. Don't you know that the Creator
of the universe is literally talking to you in front of
you? Have you not seen anything?" Gosh, we
make it so much about things that it's not really about. Okay,
Peter walking on the water. News flash,
the problem wasn't the water. Jesus didn't go,
"Now, water, get it together!" The problem was, "You took your
focus off of me, Peter. That's
why you can't walk anymore." And lastly, "Lord, won't
you tell my sister to
get up and help me?" "Arthas, you are
worried about so many things. The best thing right now is," what? "Come
on, what?
To spend time with me." Guys, that mountain,
that mountain can be deceptive. It can mess you up. It
can cause you to make decisions in
your life that are wrong. Dangerous.
Here's the thing, the shepherd's voice
always will lead toward
life, and Restoration and righteousness. Am I listening to the Shepherd's voice? Is it leading
you to places of life? Is His voice leading you to
places where you're being restored? Relationships
being restored? Is it leading you to places
of righteousness? Of right standing? Meaning
you can't continue to sin. He's leading you out of sin. He's
leading you out of destruction. Restoration. That's where His voice leads you. He woos you
to life. He woos you to restoration.
He woos you to righteousness.
Anybody ever been to Buc-ee's? I don't struggle with anxiety. That's just not a
struggle that I've had to contend with. Closest I ever came was the
first time I went to Buc-ee's.
I walked into that store and everyone was screaming. Everyone
was running. There was no semblance of traffic I
walked in there, I hyperventilated for a
minute. It was a moment. Guys, here's the
honest truth here in 2026. 2026,
our lives look like Buc-ee's. I was up here a few months ago talking about
that red ball. You know what I'm talking about? Truth of the matter is
there's 52 red balls happening every day at all times, everywhere across the way. It's
just all the time, is it not? Am I telling the truth? Amen? Isn't that
the truth? The distractions are enormous,
and it is so vital, believers in this
room, that we know the voice of our Savior.
That we know the voice of the Creator of the universe.
The one who knows your name. That when He says, "Be
still," we know that's the voice that's telling me, "Be still." When
He says, "Go," that's the voice that's telling me, telling me to
go. When He says, "Stop," that's the voice
telling me to stop. Do you
know the voice of your
Creator? Have you measured His voice against the Word,
the Holy Spirit, the peace, and godly counsel? Are
you contending with a mountain this morning? Or have you contended
with a mountain that you haven't settled
up He has peace to offer you. There was a guy in
the Old Testament who I think had a real good handle on this whole
shepherd thing. His name was
David, and he wrote this,
"The Lord is my shepherd. I
lack nothing." Everybody say, "Nothing." When you trust
the shepherd, you lack nothing. Listen, the prerequisite of lacking nothing
is not what your bank
account says. "The Lord is
my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me
to lie down in green pastures." We do
not like that word "makes." He suggests that you might take up a
spot on the green pasture here. Maybe this might
be a good idea if you just took up some— No, it
says He makes. That's what the Word of God says. He makes us to
lie down in green pastures. You know what that communicates
to Kevin? He says, "Lay down the worry that you're caring
about this mountain, and come lay with
Me in this pasture. Because the more you worry about this mountain in front
of you, the more it consumes you, the less you believe that I
am bigger than that that thing, whatever
it is. But he continues. He says, I— he says
this, he leads me beside
rushing waters that are fierce. No, who knows their
scripture this morning? He
leads me beside quiet waters. And you know what he does in that? You're
laying down beside the quiet waters. Robert, what does it say?
It says he He refreshes my soul.
Has He refreshed your soul? I want to be in a place of refreshing
all the time. Here's a pathway.
Come lay down. Come stop. You refreshed, April? Come
on, are we refreshed this morning? He
guides me along the right paths. This shepherd, not for me,
not so that Kevin can get glory. So
it's for his name's sake. And it says
this, even though, even though, which means I can be walking through
the midst of a dark valley, even
though I walk through the valley of what? The shadow
of death, where things are deceased, where things are falling off, where
things seem to die, where relationships are dying
all around me, where work situations are dying all around around me, where I
thought I had purpose and it's dying around me, although these perceptions
are all around me, even though
I walk through that valley,
he, my shepherd, comforts me. I fear no evil because you are with me. It
says his rod and
his staff. There's a distinction. One of
them is used for discipline. One of them is used
for protection. Do you welcome the discipline of
the Lord in your life? Because the Word says a good— listen,
if I did not discipline my 5 daughters, I would not
be a good dad. If God Almighty did not discipline you, he
would not be a good Father.
But he doesn't just discipline, he protects. He
protects the shepherd dog. He does. And then it says
this, "You," I love this, "You prepare a table
before me in the presence of my enemies." Anybody ever felt like you
got a target on your back? No
one, just me. Okay, well, in the presence, it's not, "Hey, come around here, we're
going to let your enemies do a thing." He literally
brings the table to them and says, I don't care nothing about
what y'all trying to say, what you're trying to do. We're going to sit
here and eat and watch you lose your minds at the peace
that we have right now. Your enemies should be losing their minds
that you are at such peace. They should be losing their
minds that you're at such peace. This doesn't faze me. You know
why? Because it's so small compared to the
great, glorious God I serve. He sets this table, and
then he says, "In the presence of the enemy." And then guess what? He says,
"He anoints your head with
oil." He gives you purpose. He said, "I'm gonna give you something to do, and
I'm gonna give you the power and the strength to do it right there while
your enemies are watching, all under the protection
of the shepherd." "My cup overflows," because with
the Lord, everything's always
more. It's always more. Overflows. Surely
your goodness and your love will— what? Will follow me. Who needs
his goodness and love to follow them all the days of their life?
I need his goodness and love following
me. But you can't recognize his goodness and love when
you're looking at the mountain. And I will dwell in
the house
of the Lord forever. Forever. This is our
shepherd. This is the one who knows your
name, cares about you, created you, sees you,
knows you, and guess what? Yes, he sees that mountain
too, and he says, "Stop thinking about that mountain and
start looking at me. Start listening
to my voice. Let me take care
of that mountain." for you. The best things that have happened in my life
have been when I have relinquished control. When I've
backed up and said, "God, you do it." The best things
that will happen in your life is when you relinquish control and
you back up and you say, "God, you do it." Would you
stand with me this morning? I would like
to be a church known known for
people who actually hear the voice of the shepherd. I
would like Springhouse— when they talk about Springhouse, they're talking
about a group of people who know his word, who know the
Holy Spirit, who know what peace looks like,
and that participate in godly counsel. That the whole package is there
because we are listening to the shepherd. And so that when people out
in the world are contending with their very mountains. You
don't have people guiding them the wrong way because they're listening to their
own voice, ideas, and opinions, but they are listening to the voice of the shepherd
by the example of the people around them. If you're going to pray with people,
would you come forward this morning? In a group this size, there's got to
be people dealing with some mountains. I just, I just feel that. I just believe
there's got to be people this morning. You got mountains. It's been consuming your
week. You've been thinking about it. There's been relational fallout because of it. Of
it. There's been text messages, all these things. It could be financial, it could be
a work thing, whatever it is, there's mountains in this room, and I
believe today that God wants to address those mountains. Now, one of the ways to
get godly counsel is for me to be able to go to Mel Galeoni over
here and say, "Mel, I have this issue. Would you agree with me? Because I
can't see it. All I see is this mountain, and I need you to speak
truth, because I believe that you have truth inside you to speak over me." You
can say, "Kevin, the way you're seeing that mountain is Actually not the perspective of
what's really happening. Let me tell you what God's saying about this. And they speak
into your life, and they begin to get your frame of
mind. And it takes humility. It takes such humility. But I
believe that the Lord wants to help us overcome some mountains
today. So that's you. Today's the day of salvation. It's the day to do
business. He's alive and well today. Come, let's worship.