"Great is the Lord, and most worthy of praise" - Psalm 48:1My praise will be consistent with my revelation of God's greatness. If I perceive Him to be an okay God, I will praise Him with okay enthusiasm. If I perceive Him to be a good God, I will praise Him with good enthusiasm. But if He's great, I will praise Him with great enthusiasm.
30 Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, "We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it." 31 But the men who had gone up with him said, "We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are." 32 And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, "The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. 33 We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them." - Numbers 13:30-33
So what is the ROLE of revival? Revival is not just a season and space of refreshing, renewal, and replenishing. Revival is also a season and space of reintroductions. It is a season and space where God reintroduces Himself to us. Moments where He pulls back the curtain to degrees and dimensions of His presence that we had not experienced before. A lingering moment that awakens an appetite within us that passionately pursues the presence of God and once you have been exposed, you can't be unexposed. Once you've had a unique encounter with His presence, your heart begins to beat for it, never to be the same again.
The second type of reintroduction God does is where He reintroduces us to ourselves. There is a you that you haven't met yet; a stronger you, a wiser you, a more fortified you, a more resilient you, a peaceful you, one that stresses less and praises more, one that has untapped potential and capability. God wants to grab the old you and pull you face to face with the new you.
Your perception of God impacts your perception of yourself. He wants to reintroduce you to you, and this introduction isn't just to get you excited, it is for your assignment. The course and the quality of our lives aren't determined only by how we see God, but also by how we see ourselves. When you look in, what do you see? Do you see a grasshopper or do you see a giant? There are some battles that we will not fight, some opportunities that we will not pursue, some things that we will walk away from prematurely if we only see ourselves as grasshoppers.
God has great and amazing plans for our lives, but could it be that His plans are His preferences? Could it be that His plans are His preferred future? Could it be that His plans are what He wants to do, what He's willing to do, what He's willing to turn heaven upside down to make happen? But could it also be that God will allow us to live on whatever level we settle for?
Our God is the God of exits, that is literally what the word Exodus means. Why should that matter? Because if our God is the God of exits, it means that we are never trapped. I may feel trapped, it might look trapped, people may call me trapped, but because God is a God of exits, if He has to part the Red Sea to get me where I need to be, He will.
The people of Israel were held in Egyptian captivity for over 400 years. One day they cry out to God, God hears them but doesn't answer them, He does, however, provide the answer, through Moses. Israel is sitting in a season feeling unheard, feeling abandoned, feeling rejected; having no idea that God is trying to convince the answer to accept the assignment.
"Just because God isn't talking to me about the problem, doesn't mean He isn't working on the answer."
- Dharius DanielsNow Moses wasn't without his own set of issues. Moses didn't feel qualified for the assignment, he seemed a little awkward, but his awkwardness wasn't awkwardness, it was uniqueness. Sometimes we have to wait for our life to catch up to give us a revelation of why we felt awkward in a previous season. Because maybe what made us feel awkward in one season, will make us relevant in the next.
So God is engaging in a conversation with Moses, telling him that He's got an assignment for him, and Moses responds with his inadequacy. He thought his inadequacy should exempt him from the assignment, but what he saw as an exemption, God saw as insurance of Moses' reliability. Moses basically turns around to God and says, "If you don't help me I can't do this" and God says "Exactly! Because I know that you know that you can't do this without me and because you know that you can't do this without me, you'll never try to do this without me. You'll always depend on me. You'll consistently listen to me." So Moses agrees and he attempts to lead Israel through the exodus.
Now the journey that they are on isn't exactly a walk in the park, but God is faithful, and He isn't just making them suffer for no reason. God tells Moses that this season of suffering they have endured is going to add something to them. Very often we celebrate what we have come out of, but the question we should ask is
"What did I leave with?"Did I leave with wisdom, did I leave with strength that I didn't have before, did I leave with perspective that I didn't have before; because it's only when we leave with something that we can look back on it and say like David said, "It was good that I was afflicted that I might learn your statutes." Some of our greatest lessons come in some of our most challenging seasons. So if you are going to suffer, leave with something. If you're going to play with the hand that life has dealt you, leave with something.
Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. - Exodus 14:21So now the Israelites and Moses are standing at the Red Sea, pharaoh and his armies are on their trail because he's trying to bring them back into captivity, and God has told Moses to raise his hand. The Red Sea parted, but it didn't happen immediately, God sent a strong east wind and Moses stood there all that night while the water receded. Because some miracles are not immediate, some miracles are incremental. And even when the Red Sea hasn't parted, we've still got to pause and praise Him and thank Him that the wind is blowing.
"Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow." - Isaiah 1:18 (NLT)Israel walks through on dry ground. Pharaoh and his army observe their activity and they attempt to do the same thing. But the bible says that the sea collapses and they drown. Because you drown when you try to follow a word that God didn't give you. He told the Israelites to walk through, He didn't tell Pharaoh to walk through. Just because it worked for them, doesn't mean it'll work for me because I may not have their word
So now we come back to the passage from Numbers 13. They're in the wilderness, they posture there for a season, now they have an opportunity to occupy what was always promised to them, Canaan, God's best for them. Moses sends over 12 spies to assess the land that they're supposed to occupy and 10 come back, they see giants, the other 2 see God and they talk the whole congregation into staying in a season that was better than their past, but not as good as their future. Present challenges have a way of infecting us with spiritual amnesia. After they had seen all the miracles, the parting of the Red Sea, God's provision for them, how could they stay stuck? Their problem as it related to their progress, wasn't God, it wasn't how they saw God, it was how they saw themselves.
"We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them." - Numbers 13:33The grasshopper in your mind is bigger than the giant out there. They didn't reach their redemptive potential, not because of immorality but because of inadequacy. Because some opportunities come wrapped in the wrapping paper of challenge. They settled for less than God's best in their lives because they felt they were capable of leaving Egypt, they believed in themselves enough to leave Egypt, but not enough to enter Canaan.
There is a reason that God talks to us frequently about who we are. Because God knows that I am always going to behave in a way that is consistent with my revelation of myself. So He tells me, I'm special, I'm chosen, I'm called, I am the salt of the earth and the light of the world. If that is already true of me, why does He need to tell me? It's not for Him, He already knows. It's for me, I need to know.
Do you believe you have enough? Do you believe that greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world? Do you believe that the God that's inside of you is bigger than the obstacles that are in front of you? Do you believe that you are not a grasshopper, but in fact, you are a giant?
What a fantastic message!! I can't believe it, only one more day of revival to go! Hope to see you check back soon for the last 2 posts of this revival. Carl Lentz and Steven Furtick. What a way to go out with a bang. See you tomorrow,
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