DEC 10 2023 | Isaiah: Messiah S2E2 | Light in the Galilee

Sea Change Church · Isaiah: Messiah S2E2 · "Light in the Galilee" · December 10, 2023
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

The gospel of Matthew chapter four, verses 12 through 17. When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee leaving Nazareth. He went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulon and Naftali to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah, land of Zebulon and land of Naftali, the way of the sea.

Beyond the Jordan Galilee of the Gentiles, the people living in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the land of the shadow of death. A light has dawned from that time on, Jesus began to preach, repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near. And Isaiah chapter nine, verses one and two. Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress in the past.

He humbled the land of Zebulon and the land of Naftali, but in the future, he will honor Galilee of the nations. By the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, the people walking in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the land of deep darkness. A light has dawned this is the word of the Lord. Well, good morning if you have your Bibles open up to Matthew four 12 through 17.

It's also in your notes. And then concurrently as you're doing that, open up to Isaiah nine, one, and two. And why would we open up to two different scriptures? Because we're looking at Isaiah's Messiah, and Isaiah was the prophet who spoke the most about the coming of Jesus and told us about what Jesus would be like. And then Jesus fulfills that in the New Testament.

And so we're seeing here a strategic infilling of God's purpose that was pre announced into the life of Jesus. And I wanna lay that at your feet because I believe that God has plans, God has purposes for each of you. And if we get into the right place, not in the wrong place, in the right place, Jesus does some moves here, that God has things that are prophesied for you in his heart.

Maybe that prophecy hasn't been spoken over you, but God has prophecies and things that he wants to make known to you. Many of the things he has made known to you. And the tension is oftentimes getting into the right place at the right time. Jesus was pretty good at being in the right place at the right time. So in this passage, as we look at these two verses, um, we're gonna see a couple things before I get to what those two things are.

Let's just look at 'em real quickly. Matthew four, we see this passage, we just read it, of Jesus making a, uh, a geographical move to the Galilee. Jesus moves to this lake up in northern Israel. He was down maybe in Nazareth, Jerusalem, in in that area. And John the Baptist is beheaded and Jesus bolts. So he must have been terrified, right? Jesus was terrified.

He's, uh, the, the chips are down, everything's against him. You know, everything is gone south. And so Jesus is running away. I don't think that's what's happening with Jesus. Now, this is foretold where he's going is of importance. And so where he's going, you find that in Isaiah nine, one and two, and Isaiah nine, one and two says, nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who are in distress.

Let's stop right there. I love those words. You know me, nevertheless means something was going on beforehand. Uh, I like the, you know, but if when I love all those words because it shows us cause and effect. And so there was all these negative things that were happening, that people were being disobedient. Nevertheless, God is faithful.

And there's a lot of, been, a lot of nevertheless moments in our lives. And I realized recently, I've had a bunch of times recently, and my dau, my daughter, said to me, God must really love you. You do really stupid things and he keeps saving you. I'm like, that's right. So she didn't actually say it that way. She didn't call me that. But nonetheless, um, there will, nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress in the past.

He humbled the land of zein and the land of Naali natali. But in the future, he will honor Galilee by the nations, by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan. All that geographical stuff is important if you know what God has done in that region and in that area. And so nevertheless, despite all their sin, he sends his boy, he sends Jesus, God sends Jesus to make a difference and an impact in a strategic transition between his birth, his growing up, and the cross.

Galilee was a strategic transition. And, uh, one of the things we're gonna look at today is a strategic transitions. And oftentimes we don't value transitory places in our lives. There's a transition between college and your job, or us one summer, or maybe it's multiple years and before you have kids. And we get into these places that are strategic for God and transitory for God.

And when we're there, we, we can sometimes, um, be so displeased that we're in this transitory moment, that we miss what God's doing in the moment, right? We just wanna get to, we're destination people, right? We just want destinations. We like starting on the journey, the excitement of getting out on the road, packing your bag, starting the car, but then we wanna get to the spot and we miss that.

And so there's a couple things that are happening. We're gonna see one, there's a geographical significance to Galilee. It's important. We'll look at that in just a second. And number two, there's an evolution of light that is happening in this prophecy. And in this passage, you're gonna see that there's gonna be a dawning. You'll see a picture of a dawning right now where light is happening in this passage as we'll.

Look, in a moment, there's a darkness. And then the darkness moves to a shadow of death that is over the land to a dawning of light into they have seen a great light. You see a transition of light happening in this region. Now that is a larger transition that we see happening throughout the entire text and throughout the Bible where Jesus is being made known.

So I don't wanna pre preach that. I have a tendency to pre preach my points before I get to 'em, and then I'm left with an empty bag when I get to the point. So we'll just leave it at that. But there is a evolution of light that's happening. Let's look at the setting. Let's look at verse 16. The people living in darkness have seen a great light.

Those living in the land of the shadow of death, a light has dawned. And there you see those four elements of darkness, shadow, dawn and light, and great light. You see that happening and we see that. Well, let's talk about this area of zeum and Nepali. This area is up in Northern Israel, and the sea of Galilee is in Northern Israel, and it is on the one other side of it right now.

You have Jordan, and you have, uh, basically a path that'll take you all the way to Iraq and Iran is there, but it's in northeast Israel is where that is. And there's along the sea, there's a place called Capernaum. Jesus withdraws to Capernaum. This is a picture of a synagogue at Capernaum. I was there. It's an incredible city. It's an awesome little city.

We were just there. And they actually have dug, and there's actually the floor they have found to the first century synagogue where Jesus announced his coming, where they drove him out and tried to drive him from that synagogue up to, to throw him off. Remember, they tried to throw him off a cliff, not too far. We were looking at what cliff it might be, where he was thrown off.

But you can actually see the floor that Jesus walked on from the first century. This is from the fourth century. Peter's house is also there, and about probably 50 yards away is the house where Jesus heals Peter's mother-in-law. So, you know, Peter was married, healed, his mother-in-law. And then there's a picture of the sea right there.

I think there's another picture right here, um, that you're gonna see. I think we have it. Al Do we have another one? Nope. That's it. We do not have another one. But there's this incredible beauty of, so if you come to second service, you're gonna see that picture, but you won't see it. You can look it up on Google. A little teaser to get you to come to services.

Um, it is gorgeous. It is an absolutely beautiful wary that when we were just there, the weather was like today. And it's stunning. It just shimmers. And, and, and it is an amazing place and a place you would wanna be. If you're gonna have an Airbnb in Israel, that's where you want to have it. Not far for Capernaum. It's just this beautiful place.

Let's talk about it quickly. This area of zeum and Natal and natali. These, you can take that picture down. These, uh, two places were territories that were given to, uh, two of the tribes of Israel. And they're right there. And one of them, uh, um, Neftali, I believe is the one that borders the sali. And then there's Zeum as well.

And they're right there that they were there. So Jesus, when he withdraws, is withdrawing to one of the territories of the 12 tribes. He didn't take off to, you know, Egypt or somewhere else. He's going to a place where we, that is strategic and it's under God's covering. It's also known as the, the near the sea of Gali, the Mediterranean coast, by the way of the sea.

What does that mean? Well, a lot of trade was happening there because it's the way that you would go from the sea when you came in, from Cyprus or Italy, wherever it is. And you would stop on the coast of Israel on the west coast of Israel, and you would go directly across to the Sea of Galilee where there's tons of fish, there's tons of fresh water.

And then there it goes all the way. You can go all the way to basically India, straight through that. And it was a massive trade hub because it was a massive trade hub. It was a very wealthy area. You see that, uh, you see that with some of the things with, you know, Matthew, the tax collector, and he's there and there's a lot of wealth and, um, in, in that particular area.

And there's also a ton of false gods, because you have all these different peoples living together. You have a mix of religions. You have this cultural coming together, and Jesus is put right into the midst of that. That is why it is called the, the land of the Gentiles or the sea, or the place of the Gentiles. As you're gonna see that, it says Galilee.

If you go to verse 15, it says, Galilee of the Gentiles. And that was kind of new for me because I had always seen Galilee as a place of the Jews. You always see Jesus living there. It's all Jewish. Well, it wasn't when Jesus was there. The Romans had come in, they had used it as a hub. And it was really, it had tons of, it was, it was poly religious.

There was just all this religion. Maybe that looks like a place where you live today. It is smack dab where Jesus was sent. And then the final thing that we see, it was part of the northern, uh, kingdom before the, uh, Syrian conquest. If you go to, um, it's verse 16 again, the people living in darkness had seen a great light.

Those living in the land of the shadow of death. Why? Well, this was, if you were going to attack Israel, this is the best way to attack Israel from the East. Why? Because your troops could stop at the Sea of Galilee. They could have, you know, get fish and they could rob and steal from the people there. And this happened many a times. The Assyrians came this way.

The Babylonians came this way. You stop there, you, you oid her for a while, and then you just follow the Sea of Galilee. I mean, excuse me, the Jordan, all the way down to where you get to about Israel. And then you make a right hand turn and go up to, excuse me, to Jerusalem, and then you go up to Jerusalem. It's just a perfect way to attack a place.

My geography, professor in seminary said that the most ste strategically difficult piece of land to, um, to keep in the world is Israel. Where Israel is, you can attack it from the sea, multiple directions. Like if you were gonna go somewhere strategic, that's not the place to go. And it makes sense that God would put them in a place that is really difficult to keep.

And we actually see some of that happening in our culture today. Two things I wanna talk to you about that I wanna bring to your front door. And two things that we see in Jesus doing Jesus withdraws to this place, the Galilee, for a strategic reason where he makes an incredibly significant impact in a transitory part of his life.

Incredible impact that you see in so many of the stories. And so many of the miracles happen in this place. You see that God's power is in the place of the transition. Now, the power's on the cross, right? So I mean, obviously God's power is on the cross, but in the midst of that, in this transitory place, Jesus steps into the transition.

He lives in the transition, and he makes a difference in that region that we still read about today. If you watch the chosen, so much of it is where is it set? It's set at the land of the gen, the sea of the Gentiles here. It's set in this place that is incredibly difficult to minister to a hard and religious Jewish culture. And God sends them there.

And so maybe God has sent you to a place right now that's a transition, and you're just not comfortable. You're not comfortable. 'cause you're not to the green grass that you want to get to. And maybe quite possibly you are missing the transition and the power in the transition. So here's the first point. Find your Galilee. Find where you're supposed to be. Find your Galilee.

That might be the end point. Maybe God does have you in the end point, and maybe that becomes a place that is strategic for you. But find the place where even though it's difficult, even though the winds might be against you, it's still within the tribes. You're of Israel, you're still under God's covering and you can lean on God's power.

Where's your Galilee? And perhaps you need to rename something. Maybe you've called something, a place that you're in right now by a name that God wouldn't call it because you see it as something you don't want. And all of our dreams and all of our desires are not always God's purposes. And in this transition, maybe you need to say, Hey, this is more of a Galilee than it is some negative place or something that you have called it.

And to step into that, find your Galilee. And then the second point today would be flip the switch, which means be the light. I talked about that evolution of light that we see in this passage. Go to verse 12 for Find Your Galilee. When Jesus heard that it, John had been put in prison, I think I said beheaded earlier, put in prison, he withdrew.

That's John the Baptist. He withdrew to the Galilee Circle withdrew verse 13, living in Nazareth. He went, I was just in Nazareth. He went and lived in Capernaum. It's actually a really good move. I wouldn't wanna live in Nazareth, but I would wanna live in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulon. And to fulfill circle, fulfill what was said through the prophet.

First thing I want to say is, uh, that, let's just go to the first, the second one there fulfill, God wants to fulfill in you. That's what he wants to do in our lives. He wants to fulfill in you. It doesn't mean that you'll be fulfilled in the way that you think you might be fulfilled, but he wants to fulfill in you his purposes, his plans, his power.

And it happens in this place. And it's interesting that it's happening in a place of withdrawal, but strategic withdrawal. And when we see withdrawal oftentimes as something that's negative, right, you're never gonna back down. You hear those things. Strategic withdrawal is one of the most important elements, uh, in the art of war.

You'll probably read about it, uh, in the art of war, uh, by sunu, uh, or as you read through different, uh, uh, strategic, you know, uh, about different battlements, Jesus is withdrawing. But see, sometimes we often will with withdraw into our addictions, we will withdraw into the bad relationship, but we'll withdraw into these patterns.

What Jesus does is strategically different. He withdraws to a place of God's calling. And that takes discernment. Last week I used the word consider. Remember that we see Jesus considering something he was going to do. And so there was a consideration when, when, when something negative happened, he didn't immediately withdraw into something negative he would consider.

And then he would withdraw to a place. Maybe you've heard of the, uh, crossing of the Delaware by George Washington on Christmas Day, uh, night 1776, uh, after a strategic withdrawal by George Washington. He crossed the Delaware at li at night to take on 9,000 Hessians. They were mercenaries from Germany that were working for the British.

Now if you, you can just look at that and not realize that the reason he did that was because he had withdrawn or left New York. He had left New York with his troops because the British were going to overtake him at that point and defeat him. So he left, which was seen as a big defeat. It was seen as something he was moving away.

What did Washington do? He was an incredible leader. What Washington did was later on when the enemy wasn't expected, he withdrew. And he had one of the, probably, probably one of the most influential victories and battles, uh, of the entire colonial war. There was others as well. Um, by the war, the Revolutionary War. This is super important and it came off a withdrawal.

Wanna say, when you withdrawal from something, uh, something difficult's happened in your life, what's your pattern? Do you consider and withdraw to the shelter of God into healthy relationships? Do you withdraw into finding, you know, the geo, the, the geography of where you put yourself in church? Or maybe it's an AA meeting or maybe it's a reading, a good book or God's word.

Do you withdraw into prayer or do you withdraw into the same habits that you've been nursing since high school? Because a lot of us continue to have these structures that our lives are built upon. And when things are negative, we withdraw. This is important 'cause Jesus withdraws into a really strategic place and he draw withdraws into this place that is, that is Galilee.

I wanna say where Jesus went fulfilled Isaiah's prophecy, but also his mission and his purpose. When we withdraw, we want to try to withdraw into a place that fulfills us. It doesn't mean that it's not difficult. It doesn't mean that it's not the place that it's the place that you want to be, but when we go there, it fulfills us.

I know when I withdraw into the word of God, sometimes it's very difficult. I'd rather withdraw into escapism, distraction, my phone, a next vacation, a cup of coffee, whatever it is. And, and all those things aren't bad. But when it becomes the pattern of your withdrawal on a regular basis, you're not living like Jesus did. Who would withdraw to the geography of an area that had God's calling and God's fulfillment and God's purpose.

And that happened because he considered and he was following God. So the first thing is find your Galilee. Where's your Galilee? Where are the places that strengthen you? Where are the places that you go? And, and so, so Galilee, I'm not even speaking metaphorically, I'm speaking in regard to geography here on Sunday morning. This is a great Galilee.

I think we all have probably five to seven Galilee in our life where you, you are pre physically present, you're present in your home. Maybe you volunteer on your school board. Maybe you, you're at your kid's school. Maybe you're part of a club, maybe you go to the gym. We have these little places that, and I would say there's five to seven that we kind of just circle through 80% of our time, right?

And it's in these places. We have to ask ourself, are these the places I'm supposed to be? Are these the healthiest places I'm supposed to be? And when I'm there, am I on mission fulfilling what God has called me to do, even though I might feel like I'm in a transitory period? When I got sober, I knew that club A in Mexico on Thursday night was no longer a Galilee for me.

And so I went into the bubble. People say, well, you went into the bubble and that's why you got sober. You're darn right. I went into the bubble. I went to Point Loma Nazarene and I didn't leave and I only went to my grandma's house and I did my laundry there. And I ate there on Sunday nights and I'd go back to campus and I didn't leave.

And you know what? It might've been a bubble, but I got sober and I'm still sober because I went and I knew where to go. Geography matters. Where you go, how you spend your money matters. If you want to know what your values are, look at your calendar and look at your checkbook. That's it. Look at your calendar. It'll tell you where you are.

It'll tell you where you go and what you do. Those two things will tell you what you do. If your calendar says, read scripture in the morning and you have a date with God, spend family night. Or if it's like, Hey, back to Vegas. You know what I'm saying? It's like, you know, Vegas wouldn't be a Galilee for me. Nothing wrong going to Vegas, having a good time, but you know what I'm saying.

So we find that Jesus sees that and find your Galilee. And so I guess a great question is when you go to these places of Galilee, you find, whether you're on a school board or whatever it is, you have to ask yourself this question, why am I here? Why am I here? And that's such a great question. Wherever you are, do you know why you are where you are?

Sometimes we just do things. Jesus didn't just do things. Jesus was regularly listening. It says when he heard that John had been put in prison, he considered and he withdrew. I don't think he just reacted crazy, but he knew what he was doing. He knew why the father and he went there to be in ministry and think about the place he was in ministry at.

It was really dark. There. There was a land of, of it says of deep darkness. It says deep darkness. And it said it was also a place of the shadow of death. It was a strategic place where it could be invaded. It had been invaded, um, twice before Jesus got there by the Assyrians and the Babylonians. But God still put in there. Why would he put in there?

Because it was also one of the tribes. It was also a place under God's covering. And it was also a place where he knew that if he was most near to God, he could be near to those type of people and make it strategic impact. And so that's one thing that he had, right? We'll see, uh, in just a moment, I put this to end. This point is, is this, that God does some of his best work in obscurity.

God does some of his best work in obscurity. And maybe you're a place in your life and it's just obscure. You've lost your job, you're in transition. It's just obscure. You don't know why. But in the midst of it, God is working in that place. So I want to encourage you that God might have moved you to a Galilee at the moment, but you don't think it's a Galilee.

You think it's in Egypt. You think you're in slavery, you think you're in bondage. And God's like, if you please look around, you are surrounded by people. And I want you to love people. I want you to care for people. I want you to lean into people's lives. Second point is flip the switch. And so the first one was for you to, um, find your Galilee.

But once you get there, you really need to flip the switch because there is so much temptation in Galilee. Like no matter where you go, there's gonna be temptation. And we see that Jesus becomes an ever brighter light. Jesus is not known, right? He's born in darkness. He's born in obscurity. He's born in, in this manger and supposedly with all these animals and out in, you know, Nazareth and where he'd grown up and everything.

It was just, he'd been foretold, but it wasn't really bright, right? Maybe an angel was there, but it wasn't really super well known. At the moment. His light is getting brighter. His light is getting brighter, brighter. Go to verse 16, the people living in darkness, that's those in those two regions have seen a great light. That's Jesus. And those living in the land of the shadow of death that way where they would be attacked, a light has dawned, you put the picture back up for me again, al of the, the dawn.

Um, what I think is, is really interesting is there's four, there's four types of light that are mentioned here. And I think in our lives, we're one of those four at any time. Oftentimes, not always, but we can oftentimes be in darkness, right? We just walk in darkness and we want to be in darkness and we're surrounded by our darkness, and we're not moving towards the light.

We're not dawning or we live in the shadow of darkness. So, you know, it's, it's shadowy. It's 4:00 PM it's a short day, but there's still enough light to live by. And I'll kind of just live in the shadow of death, right? Satan loves people to live in the shadow of death. It's got enough light to walk by. You get a lot of, you know, dopamine and enjoyment from some of the things that he offers you in the shadow of darkness.

But it's not deep darkness like the next level. You're not kite there, but you're living in another area. You're kind of just living on the margins of God's goodness. And then there's a time where people start moving outta that, where they say, you know what? I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired. I've hit my bottom, I've hit my wall, and I I just want God.

And people begin to move. And all of a sudden the light starts to dawn in your life and it starts to dawn like that until that light becomes absolutely just resplendent with the glory of God, just absolutely resplendent with the glory of God. I think that's available to all of us. We're gonna have hard times, it's gonna go up and down.

But there are people sitting beside you right now in this congregation. And as part of this that are resplendent with the light of God, just you can see it on them. They're not perfect. Um, it's not like they don't ever frown or have bad days, but they're, but they're, they've actually moved from beyond the dawn to this splendid light.

Now I say in each of these five to seven glees that you live in, sometimes you're just, Hey, you know what? I'm just a little bit of a dawn here. I just got here. I just got accepted to this new school or whatever. I'm a dawn and I'm gonna, I'm slowly bringing that in. If I, I don't wanna blind them with the light, you know, I'm, you know, blinded by the light.

You can blind people with the spotlight of Jesus. But this light is a transitory light that is, that is moving and getting brighter. And you have to realize how much light you give in each of these situations. And it's about knowing where you are. You see, the land of Galilee was a sneaky darkness. The land of Galilee iss beautiful. It's so, I love Galilee.

I love the Galilee. It's so beautiful. The day we were there, it, it was like today, it couldn't have been any nicer. Um, it's so beautiful, but it was so full of temptation and darkness in that place. And it was a sneaky darkness. The Jews that were there, I, I read this in a, in a commentary. It said the darkness didn't just show up one day and say, Hey, forget about your God, love me more.

And I realized, that's not how darkness presents itself to me. It doesn't say, Hey, abandon Jesus. He, you know, you're gonna get a no answer on that one. But it's like, Hey, you know what? Let's make this thing a little bit more important than Jesus. Let's make this thing a little bit more important to God until they're competing, until they're rubbing shoulders, until Jesus is kind of in the back and it's up there in the front.

I wanna say, of your four options, you know, of becoming light, you can't be light oftentimes until you deal with your own darkness. You really can't be that light until you deal with your own darkness. I I think we have this idea that we, we wanna be light to the world, right? We wanna be all this light to the world, but we wanna have our own separate darkness.

Light doesn't come from a place of darkness. Light emanates from light and it emanates from a spark. And so in 2024, I want to challenge you to really deal with your darkness. I know we have a thing called men's skills here at this church. I'm actually gonna, I've been invited to go through it with a group of pastors. I haven't gone through it and I've just realized like I want more light in my life.

We all have shadowy spaces and places and thoughts and frameworks. Men's skills really works on the framework that you build your life around. And I'm personally gonna enter into that, uh, 12 weeks with, you know, a bunch of other pastors to go deep, uh, to kinda look at that. I want to have more light and I want to extinguish any darkness that is within.

And so in 2024, let this be a year of light. And I would say, now is the time to consider it. Right Now is the time to consider 2024, not on New Year's Eve. Like now is the time to prepare. You have three weeks until the new year starts to start preparing. If you want to know God's word more, go out and study bi, get a study bible, start researching Bibles, start researching how you're gonna spend your time.

Get your calendar. I'm working on a year. My word for the year is preparation for this year coming up. God's preparing me for other things. I know that's the word he's given me. Do you have a word for the year? What are your values? This is how we start to let the light come forth in our lives. Whatever you do is a value. I would say the final point is this. Verse 17.

From that time on, Jesus began to preach, repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near. When you get near to people, do they know that the kingdom of God is near them? Because you're there when Jesus, he was basically saying, because I'm near you. The kingdom of God is near you. Now, I'm not sure that that's the best message to walk into Starbucks with.

You know, hey, everyone here repent. The kingdom of God is near. This is Jesus speaking. But we do want to have an eye on what is dark and what is light, and have ways to, to, to, to do that. I had someone at a Starbucks say something negative about themselves and I just said something as simple of, you know what? I don't think that's probably true of you.

Uh, you know, and I wouldn't speak that over. I think you seem amazing. Uh, and, and just that little thing, they whoa, light has entered into the darkness to let light come on. The word of God. I put the Emmanuel life, which I spoke about last week, which means God with us is a life that is nearest to God and near to others.

You can't get that backwards and maintain the light. The Emmanuel life is a life that is nearest to God, nearest to God, and near to others. You can't be nearest to others and then near to God, it's gotta be nearest to God. And you have to get that right. When you don't get it right, everything goes upside down. So what are the practical takeaways for 2024 practical?

'cause I really want to give you practical teaching that you can, will change your Thursday and change your Tuesday. Take. Take an hour for yourself if you can this week with a cup of coffee, chai tea, whatever your vibe. And sit with a pad of paper and start considering, right. Start considering the first thing. Consider, where am I?

Where am I? Where am I in my health? Where are the five places I normally go? Are you part of a school at home? There's five to seven places you go. It could, one of 'em could be Trader Joe's For us, that's, we shop at the same place we're there every single week. It's kinda more Costco for me now. But nonetheless, uh, these places that I go where I'm developing relationships that God has me in these places as a Galilee where he wants to, to fulfill what he has spoken to me about my life in these places can't just happen in the pulpit.

It's gotta happen when I'm driving. And all these other places that I go, where are you? And then another question is, where are you supposed to be? Where are you right now? Where are the places in all these areas? And where are you supposed to be? Are you where you're supposed to be? Just because you don't want to be there doesn't mean it's not where you're supposed to be.

And God does some of his best work in obscurity by the way. Mom, stay at home moms that are there and your kids are, you got 12 kids with their fingers under the door going crazy. And you're like, is this all my life's about? God does some of his best work in obscurity. And maybe there's others that are in that saying that. Just one analogy of a possible analogy.

God hasn't forgotten you in the laundry or dads, I know we have a great stay at home. Dad, same thing. He goes, I do everything. My wife's out, you know, killing it and I'm home setting everything up. Wherever that place is, God wants to be there. Are you where you're supposed to be? And then the final thing, what are you doing?

And are you doing what you're supposed to be doing where you're at? So every place you're at has something you're supposed to be doing. And it's so easy to get that backwards. I, um, was, you know, I'm volunteering at the school with my, my daughter's basketball team and I love it. Uh, and the why, why I am there is to support my daughter to get time with my daughter, to love on her.

That's the number one priority that I'm there. The number two reason is to be a light and a witness on campus, to work with parents and to love people and be kind and open all that. And then we'll go down the list from there to like win championships and move up in divisions in CIF. So in the last three weeks month, that flipped for me.

And it's miserable. It's absolutely miserable. Especially when you get drummed by 40 points by Rancho Bernardo and all of a sudden you're, you're like, you know, all of a sudden you're, ah, nothing's. And then you have to realize, why am I here? I'll just be honest with you. It's so easy for me. 'cause it's 'cause it's into winning and playing and, and, and all that's intoxicating.

And there's nothing wrong with it. It's so fun. I love the game and I love like girls basketball and, and kids basketball and people being developed and the, the relationships and the stories. I love all that that's happening. I love it. I love my relationships on the board and the people who have started coming to the church here that were on the board and people I've met.

It's awesome. It's so good. But when I get it backwards and it's about did we, you know, couldn't we run a better five out offense? Why don't we play this kind of d we could. It's miserable. I gotta tell you. It's ab it's absolutely miserable. And I, when I was doing this message, I realized that I was in the right place, but I wasn't doing the right thing in the right place.

And that's so important. And I had to realize what this is all about again, and get it focused. And you know what, it just, it's a sneaky darkness, right? It just slips in. Next thing it's like, Hey, you guys had a great, and it started with like really great games. Like, you just get excited 'cause we were doing great. And then you play a D one school, 3D one schools in a, in a row, and you get a little taste of reality.

You know what I'm saying? And I realized, wow, wow, that happens quick. Maybe that's happened to you. So that's what we want to encourage you to do this week. Find your Galilee, you know, where, where are you, where are you supposed to be? And where are you doing where you're at right now? Let's get on point. Let's get on mission as a church and let's take 2024 for the Kingdom of God.

Amen.