AUG 5 2018 | Stuff Jesus Said S1E1 | I Will Not Leave You As Orphans

Sea Change Church · Stuff Jesus Said · "I Will Not Leave You As Orphans" Pastor Adam Stadtmiller · August 5, 2018
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

Okay, John 14, 15-21. You also will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them. The word of the Lord. What's up, church? Good to see you all. Yeah, great. Let me just pray for this. Lord, just bless this new sermon series as we jump into some of the provocative statements of Jesus, some of the wise statements of Jesus, some of the loving statements of Jesus. And we bless you. We ask that you would just download such a grace bomb on our hearts and our soul. So we just thank you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Amen. Starting a new sermon series after two weeks in the politics of Jesus. That's all I have for politics of Jesus. Hope you enjoyed it. Had some great response to that. But we're moving in now to stuff Jesus said and moving into some of the, that's very theological, right? And some of the key statements, and really wanted to focus, as we've been focusing on the Old Testament a bit with David and Jonah, moving back into kind of the hero of our story, and that's Jesus.

Jesus is the rock star of the Bible. He is the hero of the Bible. He is God's son. And he said some very provocative things. Many I don't agree with, but still believe. Let me say that again. It's a lot of things Jesus said that I don't agree with, but I believe. And I hope you understand what that means. Because so often we've been taught as followers of Christ that you have to like everything Jesus said. Maybe that would even be a better way to say it, that I don't like everything that Jesus said. Sometimes I don't agree with it.

I wish it would have said it a different way or not said certain things the way that he said them. But at the same time, my faith, hopefully, has the ability to accept what Jesus says as a reality for my life, whether I agree with it. Maybe that's a better way to say it or not. And so I want to give you permission to not always like everything the Bible says or not always say that that's the way I would do it, but also to muster the faith to be able to implement those into our life in a way of faith that even if I don't agree with it, I want to live into it.

And so some of the things I don't agree with is like a 65 mile an hour speed limit. Why can't we be like Germany, you know, and have, you know, is that an announcement? I said that there, Germany, because I am German. You know, why can't I go 110 miles an hour, you know? So I actually got a ticket in Germany driving and I was flying, you know, through the town. The guy pulled me over and he said, you're speeding. And I said, I can do the accent because I'm German.

And I said, dude, I wasn't speeding. I heard you can drive whatever speed you want. He goes, you watch too many movies. Speaking of movies, I went to, and so I don't agree with that, but I would like to drive faster if that makes sense. And so sometimes with the scripture, I want to drive a little faster than Jesus wants me to. Speaking of movies, I went and saw Christopher Robin. I like it that there's some wholesome movies out right now.

You know, the Mr. Won't You Be My Neighbor? I haven't seen that yet, but people have had, that's gotten great reviews. Christopher Robin, a little sluggish on the plot, but I loved it. And I don't know about you, but I'm a crier, you know, at movies. Like, movies is, God really speaks to me through movies. Not like Die Hard, but certain movies, God, is it a Christmas movie? I don't know. It's a question. Yes, I think it's a Christmas movie too.

And God speaks to me through movies. And he definitely spoke to me through Christopher Robin. I'm a big Winnie the Pooh fan. I like Winnie the Pooh. Tigger's my boy. That's the guy I dig. I kind of identified with him more. But as I watched that movie, one of the things I loved about it is that Pooh lives in a childlike state. He lives in the ability to be a child. And one of the things I just, I loved about the movie is that he has no guile, and he didn't understand sarcasm.

Like, he just didn't get it. It didn't, it wasn't on his radar. And so when somebody like Christopher Robin or someone else spoke to him, he would just take it at face value like a child often does. And so one of the plots, and this is not a, you know, I'm not giving you a spoiler alert because I won't ruin it. But Christopher Robin has gotten old, and Pooh and all of his friends have to go back, and this time they have to save Christopher Robin.

And you have Ewan McGregor is in that. And it's just, you know, a fantastic movie. But it really spoke to me, and I felt like the timing of seeing it before I move into the first two weeks of this eight-week series on the words of Jesus, is I want to focus on what Jesus says about children. And it's really important because Jesus says some very provocative things to adults about children. Things that wouldn't quite make sense in the real world.

When he says, points at children, he says, do not hinder these from coming to me. And I wrote a book called Give Your Kids the Keys that talks about all the way we hinder kids from coming to Jesus. We give them a child-sized portion of the Holy Spirit, but there is no such thing as a child-sized portion of the Holy Spirit. Like, if your five-year-old gets a taste of the Holy Spirit, they get it all. And so how do we allow kids to be fully present as God-seekers, as yet still allowing them to be children?

And so I spoke about that, and Jesus said provocative things. He pointed at children, and he said, I give them the keys to the kingdom of heaven. He speaks about the keys of the kingdom of heaven with children. He talks about their ability to come up and be upon his lap and sit and have no barriers that we often put on as adults. And really honest questions. Kids are so good at asking honest questions. And so as I watched Christopher Robin, I began to ask myself, like the adult version of Christopher Robin, have I lost the ability to be a child before God?

And what is the value of being a child? And how do we not act like children but maintain a soft baby skin before God? In a world that really tries to destroy the childlike nature in all of us. And I believe one of the biggest assaults that is happening in the world today is the assault on children. I believe there's an assault on them with some of the media that they see. And I don't know if you've gone into some very, you know, more adult-themed movies, and you look, and there'll be a seven-year-old there or a nine-year-old.

And oftentimes my daughter's friends from school will talk about the movies that they would see. And I'm thinking to myself, they had seen. And I'm thinking to myself, I wouldn't see that movie myself. And I would say if the enemy, which is the devil, had a plan, I think destroying a childhood, I think destroying childhood would be at the top of the list. Because when Jesus speaks provocatively about children and how important that is, because God created childhood, right?

He created us. We're not born as adults. And we know Adam and Eve were created as adults in the garden. But when they procreate, we have childhood. Why does God have this extended period where we get to live safe? And that's the key of childhood. Safe boundaries. The ability to not have to worry about the things of the world. The ability to not have to worry about what's happening in North Korea or whatever it would be or what's happening with famines and floods and all these different things.

But the ability to just be a child. The ability to just rest in that and in safety. And there is something, I believe, because in Romans it says that everything God has created shows something about his power, his invisible qualities, and his divine nature. And so everything that you look at in childhood was created by God. It is a created thing. It is something that God has given us for a reason. And it is within childhood that we are to master the skills that we are going to need to survive as an adult.

And these are childlike skills of imagination. We're talking a lot about screen time in my family. Because I believe that screen time kills imagination. When you are constantly sitting in front of something and playing Fortnite or whatever it would be, you are basically borrowing someone else's imagination. It's interesting how quickly my daughter can go back to being able to play. But I believe play is a lost, can be a lost skill.

I believe a lot of adults know how to escape, but they don't know how to truly play. They don't know how to truly imagine. They don't know how to live in trust. And so if you can break down and destroy the created thing of God that is meant to impart into you a code, much like in the movie The Matrix. Imagine if you could go and say childlike and boom, they download that. Remember that movie The Matrix where the ability to do kung fu or speak French is downloaded into a person.

Childhood is like being wired up to God. And it is meant to allow us to know God, to experience God, to be creative with God, and to give us tools that if we don't master as children or have the ability to master with safe boundaries and with a creative environment and a place where we can just be kids, I believe that we will often break as adults. I found that in my own life. About five years ago, God began to move me from, because Jesus was my gateway into the kingdom of God.

I understood, I don't understand him completely, but Jesus made sense to me. You know, as a matter of fact, when I turned my life over to Christ, within two months after getting off the streets of Mexico and PB and cocaine and all that other stuff, I was growing a beard wearing all white clothes, long, much like this. Of course, I didn't have a man beard back then. Like, I kind of, thank God, I'm 48 and I finally got a man beard now.

Anybody else had that problem? Any guys have that problem? You can't, kind of like these patchy, well, I won't go into that nonetheless. And so I had this, like, really, like, youthful beard and long hair, and I'd wear these Jesus Save shirts because I had to find something as radical. And I think I went way on the other side of the pendulum. But without that, I don't know if I would have survived. But in the midst of that, Jesus was this really easy entry point into the kingdom of heaven for me.

And I got it. And I camped on Jesus Island for probably 15 years until Jesus says, hey, I want to introduce you to the Holy Spirit. And I started just, you know, slowly moving into that. He scares the heck out of me. It's like, you know, it's like the crazy uncle at the party sometimes, you know, the Holy Spirit. Especially if you're in some of the movements that I was a part of. And so I jumped deeply into that. And the Holy Spirit led me and showed me who God was.

But about five years ago, God began, Jesus began to show me the core of the gospel. And the core of the gospel is not that Jesus died on the cross that you can be saved. That is not the gospel. That is part of the gospel. But it is not the complete gospel. The gospel is that Jesus died on the cross that you might be saved by your sins so that you may be restored to relationship with your father. That is the whole of the gospel.

And when we make the gospel only about salvation and sin and getting you all cleaned up and making sure that you can go to heaven, like Jesus is a big lifeguard in the sky, we miss the essence of the entire mission. It's like the new movie Mission Impossible, you know what I mean? Like if you just showed all the action with no storyline. Well, it kind of was a movie with no storyline, nonetheless. Like all the Mission Impossible movies.

But we removed the storyline. And let me just say that the whole reason Christendom exists, the whole reason Jesus died on the cross is so that he can reveal the father to you. And for me, that was a big jump. Because like I've said, because before our family made some major changes, my mom made some major changes in her life at around 50 years old. I remember I was about 12 or 10 or however old I was by then. We had already set a pattern where my childhood was almost over.

And there was some skills. And thank God I grew up before computers. Like my entire childhood, when I was 12 years old, Atari came out. And thank God I had a childhood without electronics. Do any of you remember that? I'm sorry for people that are after that. But there was a time where like you got on a bike and rode around the neighborhood and stuff like that. There was just something special about the creative imagination.

But there were other elements due to divorce, due to a whole bunch of things. Alcoholism was in our family, very strong. Alcoholism is another member of your family, whether you know it or not. It has a voice. It has an ability to shape and warp the family model. And so all these things cause a kid sometimes to feel unsafe. To feel that because the family broke up, because where did dad go? And my mom and I have this, you know, one of her stories she tells me is when I was, you know, three years old crying and asking, you know, is it my fault?

And I think most kids who have a divorce in your family, because divorce really destroys kids' souls and hearts in a long way. And that's no shame on you because there are broken relationships and I get that and no one wants that. But if you experience that, you know that it takes a long time as a kid to recover from that. And so five years ago, God began to show me to the Father. And to tell you the truth, I didn't want anything to do with the Father.

I really didn't want anything. And Jesus was my homeboy and he was enough for me to get a little taste of the Holy Spirit. But God the Father terrified me. And I remember going to wait for a three-day retreat. And in the retreat, I was sitting there and I felt like the Lord, you know, spoke to my heart and said, I want you to worship the Father. And I tried to worship the Father. Okay, I'm going to do that. Because I can always talk to Jesus.

It's so easy for me to talk to Jesus. So I started saying, Father. And as soon as I started trying to move into that Father, I had a mild panic attack. And I was like, we're on to something. Something is not right. And over the last five years, we won't go into that entire journey today, but over the last five years, God has begun to restore the childlike nature of the faith to me. And trusting that my dad's got this.

That I can live as a son. And if you're a daughter, you can live in daughterhood. But learning how to live as a child of God. Because when you live as a child of God, you live in a different skin. You live in a different reality. You live in an ability to metabolize the things that are going around your life with a different confidence that comes with that. And so I've been making most of my last five years, and probably for the rest of my life, to get to know the Father.

I want to know the Father. I want to know Him well. And I want to have Him restored. And I want to give you just a quick little story. In 2001, I was at a conference, and it was kind of more out there, you know, Holy Spirit stuff, which I like. I can swim in there. It's not how I lead the church, but I can definitely swim and hang out with those people, and I like it. So I go to this conference, and God has just spoke to me so powerfully.

Lots of worship, and people telling me what they think God is saying to me. It's awesome. I love it. So no disparaging comments about that. But I go, and I'm up front. And I remember as I'm sitting there at the conference, it was 2,000, and I went forward, and I desperately needed a word from the Lord. And as I was there, God speaks to me in pictures. And so God speaks to us all differently. He speaks to me like I get a picture in my mind.

I just get like a little movie, not a vision, just a little picture, just like you would imagine anything else. And I said, God, show me who you are. And there was a picture of Jesus with a baseball glove. Jim, you'd like this. With a baseball glove and a ball. And that was a picture. And I'm up front, and the worship's going, and there's a couple thousand people there. So like it's on, right? You know what I mean? The conference is on.

It's happening. People are experiencing God. You know, people are getting healed. There's all kinds of cool stuff. And I just sit there, and I see him tap me on the shoulder and tell me to go over there. And in this picture in my head, he's just throwing a baseball to me. And I'm like, really? And this is 2000. Now, it was 2015 until 14 when I started going on this other journey. And I walked away from that, and I was like, that's all you got?

Like I was really discouraged. I walked away, and I was like, man, next year, I'm back at the same conference. Because I was helping run the conference. I worked for him. So, and I'm there again, and I'm desperate again. You know, and I need to hear from God. And I go to the front, and I'm praying again. And I just start crying because I'm just broke. You know, I don't know about you, but, you know, God has healed so much brokenness.

And we appreciate it. If you're broken, you're in the right spot. We love broken people who are learning not to break things. That make sense? Because broken people oftentimes break things. So we want you to get whole and healed, but you're welcome here. And I go forward, and I'm praying for our word. And I'm remembering from the last time. And I feel this hand on my shoulder. And I'm just thinking, I don't want to be experimented with.

I don't know. One of the things is in churches, sometimes people experiment. I just didn't want anybody to touch me. I'm just like, I just want to be with God. And there's this hand on my shoulder, and it was bugging me. I'm like, ah. But it wouldn't leave. And then I kind of rested into it. I thought, what am I going to tell you? Go away. You know what I mean? Like somebody comes up and I pray for you. Of course. So, but I was doing business.

You know what I'm saying? I know I'm grumpy. I know. I got a lot of issues. So, I know. I get it. I get it. I'm grumpy. I know. Working on it. So, gentleness. Gentleness. Breathe. So, I'm up front. And all of a sudden, a picture comes back. But this time, it's Jesus. And we're by a lake, like in Psalm 23. And he puts me on his shoulder. I'm a little boy. And he puts me on my shoulders. And he starts running around with me.

And all of a sudden, I got it. And I was like, oh my gosh. Now, he knew that I wasn't to the place where that could be God the Father. I wasn't in a place. I was 15 years from getting to the place where that could be God the Father doing that with me. But he just began to speak and nourish and heal my soul. And I just cried like a kid. And I didn't know what he was doing at the time. I didn't know what it meant. Ten years later, I realized what it meant.

He was saying, hey, I want to show you what your dad's like. I want to show you what it's like. What this is like. What it's like to be safe and to have someone just take pleasure in you. To just say, you're the best. Yeah, no matter what. You know what? No shame. You're the best. I love you. I affirm you. You're my son. You belong. And just treat. And if you've had a parent that has done that for you. And that's, tell you what.

In my parenting model, thank God that he gave that to me. Because that's all I've tried to do. Especially for girls. I mean, I don't have boys. So I can't speak on boys. But for girls, just to let them know that they have a father that loves them. And they have a confidence in that. And I looked up at the conference behind me. And there was like a seven-year-old boy. And that's the kid that was praying for me. And I was like, ah, you know, I was going to shoo him away.

But Jesus says, let them come unto me. Do not let them hinder them. The Bible is full. Or excuse me, the world is full of people who are become orphans. And I believe that there is an orphan spirit in the world. That the enemy wants to disenfranchise you from the core of the gospel. And the core of the gospel, once again, is not that Jesus died on the cross. Thank you for dying on the cross, Jesus. But if you go to Jesus and say, hey, thank you for dying on the cross.

You're amazing. You know what Jesus is going to do? Hey, check out my dad. He's awesome. Yeah, but I want to thank you for it. Yeah, cool. Awesome. I was so happy to do that for you. But let me tell you why I didn't. Look, here's my God, my Father. I want to introduce you to God the Father. Like, that's what he's going to do. He's going to deflect to God the Father. That is scriptural. You read through the New Testament.

That is straight up scriptural. Jesus doesn't want to remember the cross as much as he wants to remember that you are reunited with the Father. When you get to heaven, it says that he'll have his marks and his scars. And thank God for the cross. But the cross is going to be left behind because we will have been reunited. It will have fulfilled its purpose. That we can be with God the Father. And I believe that if the enemy has a plan in the world, it is to destroy not only childhood, but the childlike ability in adults to experience God as Father.

Because then you will live like an orphan. And oftentimes orphans have very difficult lives. I want to talk about a couple, some, I did some study on some orphans. Here's some people that I found out were really influential that were born, that were orphans. Bill Clinton was an orphan. I don't know if you know about Bill Clinton was an orphan. Tolstoy, the author, was a orphan. Faith Hill was an orphan, born an orphan.

Steve Jobs, orphan. Read their story. And Babe Ruth. All really famous orphans who did amazing things in the world, but grew up having somehow lost their parents. And that is the definition of being an orphan. It is losing your parents. It is not, you know, somehow through a tragic, through they abandoned you, different ways. But it is somehow losing your parent. Your relationship with your parent. And your intimate connection with a parent.

That basically helps you understand who you are. I believe that one of the reasons we have so many people experimenting in some of the oddest ways of trying to define who they are. If you want to look up on Google a thing called Other Kin. Other Kin is a growing group of people who are beginning to say, We're not human. I'm a pixie. You think I'm kidding. I'm a pixie. I'm a fairy. I'm an elf. I'm an animal. My daughter actually knows a kid for three years.

It is every single day. Wears furry cat ears and a tail. Seems funny. Not funny. That is trying to decide, you know, that it is called Other Kin. There is a sense of identity that who in the heck am I? And I know that that sounds like the far reaches. But I want you to know, like I'm doing a ton of research on this stuff. That there is a growing group of people that are, because of the ability to self-identify, are deciding not to identify themselves as human beings anymore.

See, when you come to know your father, it will make you more human. It will make you more of who you are. It will give you safety and boundaries. And in childhood, when we have an orphan spirit, when we don't have those safe boundaries, when you don't have a father, when you don't have a mother, and love is important, by the way. I know a family right now that has, they're doing a three-parent parenting model, and they're all polygamists living together.

There's three of them, and they're raising the children. The three of them is all as parents. And the idea is, well, as long as you have love. And I would have to say that love is so important in raising a child. Absolutely. It is one of the pillars of raising a child. But I believe fathers are important and matter. I believe that mothers are important and matter. And that's a talk for in January when I get deeper into that.

But I believe that when you are living in an orphan spirit, it hurts your identity. And I gave you some of the extreme examples. But let's just go back to you. Wondering who you are. Do you belong? You know, I never used to feel comfortable in my own skin. I'd walk into a room, and I'd have to get the temperature of the room before I felt comfortable. And I'm looking for exit doors. I don't know if anybody else is like that.

But I couldn't just show up somewhere and be at peace. I was there, and I couldn't get at rest. As I've known my father, all of a sudden you've heard the term, I feel comfortable in my own skin. I've got to keep moving here. Characteristics of the orphan. And one thing quickly. The orphan experience for all humankind that goes back, we believe, to the garden was a self-orphaning process. We told God, we don't want you as father.

We want to be like you. And so we abandoned our fatherhood. We abandoned our father. And so God didn't leave us on a doorstep. God didn't have some divorce that caused or run away or wasn't killed in a train wreck or a plane crash that caused an orphan. It was a self-orphaning that says, I don't want anything to do with you. And that's a question I have to ask myself all the time. How much of God do I want? Do I really want enough of God?

My prayer partner recently challenged me and said, are you hungering and thirsting for righteousness? It's a great question. What does that look like? But it was a self-orphaning in the book of Genesis. And so it says, here's characteristics of the orphan. You'll see it in your notes. They often, and I put often because I don't like being definitive. They often don't know who their true parents are. They often don't have a home that they can call their own.

And home is so important. Territory is so important. And this is why they fight in Jerusalem and Palestine for territory. This is why home and boundaries, because it brings safety and security, they don't have that. And so the underpinnings of everything that makes you feel secure is ripped out from underneath them. Being moved from family to family. Tony Gallegos, one of our, you know, Drea's husband who was up here, speaks about his story as an orphan.

And going, I think it was nine or 15 different group homes, being put from place to place. And that's something he's been very open and honest about and shares about. But how difficult that is. Imagine what that does to you. How do you walk securely in God? How do you walk secure without knowing that you have a home? God, so many times in scriptures, it says, he gives analogies that he is our home. He is our shelter.

He is our rock. Over and over again, if you look at the role of parents in a child's life, you will see God speaking about providing those same things for us spiritually. That he provides rest. He provides us shelter. He provides love. He provides affirmation. And so, I guess the question is, do you process life like an orphan? Or do you process life like a son and daughter of God? Because there will be a different, there will be a different cadence in the way that you walk.

In the way that you feel. In the ability to not ring the panic alarm so quickly. I don't know if you've noticed, maybe you're one of them. But one of those people, I used to so quickly, immediately, like, it would go from zero to 60 in regard to, like, an emotional issue or drama. You know, orphans often, and I don't want to speak disparaging about orphans, but people with an orphan spirit oftentimes will have drama surrounding their lives.

When you know who your father is, it will give you an anchor in your life. And it will change everything about you. To constantly have someone whisper in your ear that I love you and that you are mine. They often lack a name that brings identity. Identity is so important. They often lack a history. Often don't belong to anyone. They lack a sense of security, of legitimacy. Do you feel legitimate? Do you feel like you belong?

That you have a reason? That you should be where you are? Why? Not because of how awesome you are, but because God the Father loves you deeply. And does God whisper in your ear often, when things go awry, when you're going underwater and you can't get that breath, is that Father there to reach out? Do you feel like he's right around the corner? Or do you live in a reality that no one is going to come get me? That's the difference.

Orphans often have a sense of being alone and rejected. And if I don't care for myself, no one else will. And that's massive. If I don't care for myself, no one else will. Jesus says, circling the tower, John 14, 18-21, I will not leave you as orphans. And this is such a provocative statement because you have to realize his audience. Jesus is speaking to Jews. And their whole deal is about ancestry, lineage, and knowing who your dad is.

Right? That's their whole deal. Oh, I go back, Paul says, I go back to this guy. I go back to David. I go back. And they just, and whoever has the best lineage, Paul even talks about this. He says, you know, God forbid that I'm speaking in these terms, but if you want to talk about being a true Jew, let me tell you what it's like to be a true Jew. I'll show you what's up. And he just starts throwing it down. Jesus looks at these men that he's speaking to.

I believe he's only speaking to men at this point, but he might be speaking to women as well. But he says to them, I'm not going to leave you as orphans. Now imagine how that's going to land on your ears. What are you talking about, bro? I'm not orphans. We go back to, I'm in a tribe of such and such. And I can, you know, look at, one thing about the Jews, they're one of the, one of, if only, you know, groups on earth that can trace their lineage back thousands of years.

Because they've kept a history. This is why you can separate them from Jerusalem for 2,000 years and bring them back in 1948. And they can still all be Jews and know each other are. Now there's a diaspora. But there was an importance to that lineage. But Jesus says to them, very provocative, I will not leave you as orphans. Will not leave you as orphans. And so what is he saying to that? Because they would say, we're not orphans.

What are you talking about? He is talking about a spiritual disenfranchisement. That rips you from the arms of your father. That kidnaps you. And sin kidnapped us from God. Sin took us from God of our own self-volition. That we decided to walk away from God and not step into that fatherhood. It says, I will not leave you as orphans. He's giving them this comforting word. And it says, because things are, you know, things are not going well at this point.

This is before he's crucified and all that's happening. And he says, I'll come to you. He's comforting them. And that's the one thing about having a father. And a mother as well. But we're speaking in this passage about the father. Because the primary metaphor in scripture is not God is king. Is not God is warrior. Is not God is Jehovah Jireh. But the primary, the one at the, if you had a list of all the names and roles of God.

The number one would be God is father. Number one. Matter of fact, go to the book of Galatians. Read through the book of Galatians. It starts out with him, Paul, just saying, hey, God, the father, father, father. Matter of fact, in John 14 here, Jesus uses the word father 27 times. I don't think he's just repeating himself for kicks. He's trying to say that there was a comfort for knowing who your father is. Not your earthly father, but your godly father.

That brings you back into ballast again. He's not speaking to orphans. And so turn the page. He's speaking of a, excuse me, 23 times. He used that word, not 27. I would say that he's speaking to people that are going to very quickly face a definite trial. In a time of fear, anxiety, and panic. Knowing who your father is comes and reduces the panic. Now, I'm a dad, and my kids don't really get night terrors. We've really done a lot, too.

But they've had opportunities. And if you've had children, maybe they've had that. But there's something about mom or dad or both. But just for me as a father, let me just speak as my experience. When I'm alone with the kids, there's something special about dad coming in that mom can't do in the way that dad does. And there's something special about mom coming in. And I believe just like muscle has fast twitch and quick twitch muscle, I believe that both men and women are strong.

Women are incredibly strong. I don't know if they're quick twitch or slow twitch. But in the same way, they're both strong. And there's something about a father coming in. Because that's my experience. When I go in, and I'm with my daughters, and I embrace them and say, everything's going to be okay. And I've just thought there's been certain times in a couple of my kids' lives where they have been at a crossroads. And if they didn't have Carrie as a mom to come in, or me as a father, or when both of us come in, because it's a great one-two punch when we both come in.

If they didn't have that, I don't know, they would have made a left turn in their life. And you can see it when kids make a left turn into fear and panic. And I can't tell you the amount of friends of my daughter, three to five, that deal with panic attacks, depression, anxiety. These things were somewhat unheard of when I was growing up. Things have changed. The needle was moved. It gives you an, if you have an orphan spirit, it's a mindset of insecurity.

And now back to you to put it back in, you know, to your wheelhouse. Are you regularly insecure? Fear, anxiety. And do you have a sense of lack? That's the thing. There's just not enough to go around. You have to fight for everything you get. There's a constant striving and a lack of rest. Orphan dreams, this is so key. I like open doors more than dreams. I'm not a big, hey, fulfill your dreams guy. I feel Jesus is the dream and that's the only dream I need.

And the rest is just, you know, icing on the cake. But I do pray for open doors. So there's things I want in my life and I pray for open doors. But I want to say that orphan dreams are not the same dreams as the dreams of sonship and daughterhood. There's just a whole different way of processing what is available to you. And I got to say, when you become a son or a daughter of God and you know that you're a child of God and you all of a sudden get filled with that confidence that my dad's got this, my father's got this, it is going to open up a world to you that will just expand everything that you do.

It'll change everything. Finally, Jesus is the ultimate son. Jesus' entire life paradigm is lived as a son. Did you get that? His entire life paradigm is lived as a son. That is his deal, being the best son that he could be. And that's something I want to do. So you read through this. John 10, 30. And this is the final as I'm closing. And so the band in a moment will have you come up. People, you know, it's interesting.

We know that God had to turn his attention, his back, to the sin when Jesus was on the cross. And there's this sense where Jesus says, my what? My God. My God. Why has that what? What does he not say? My father. It's interesting. If you look at the scripture, Jesus continues to speak to the father as if he's connected with him through the entirety of the cross experience. God was able to take the Godhead and the holiness of God and turn it upon that sin and turn.

But at the same time, because he is God, maintain a level of connectivity that this is my son and I am here with you. Jesus constantly speaks about the father on the cross. And he says, my God, why have you turned, you know, why have thou forsaken me? But he never says, my father, why have thou forsaken me? In John 10, 30. You know, he says, I am the father of one. And then Luke 23, 34. When he was on the cross, he says, what?

Who? Forgive them. Father, forgive them. Read the experience of the cross. Jesus is over and over again. Speaking of the father. Over and over again. He did never lost connection with his father. But at the same time, so Jesus was never completely abandoned on the cross, as I can see from scripture. And he continued to have a dialogue with the father. Final thing is this. If you spent your entire life committed to discovering what it means to be a son or daughter of God, the king, it would be a worthy pursuit of your life.

If you spent the rest of your life, I know you want to write a book. I know you want to sing your song. You want to dance your dance. You want your platform to be bigger. You want your house to be bigger. All that stuff. Stuff. If you spent your entirety of your life committed to one purpose of knowing what it means to be a child of God and to pursuing a relationship with God as father, you will not have wasted your life.

Because it will open up every other door that needs to be opened. I will not leave you as orphans, Jesus said. And if you've abandoned God, it's time to come back home. Let's have the worship team come forward. We're going to have our communion right now.