FEB 18 2018 | David the Fugitive S1E3

Sea Change Church · David the Fugitive S1E3 · Adam Stadtmiller · February 18, 2018
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

Hi, my name is Sean Butland. I'm one of your newly elected elders. And as some of you know by our good friend, Joe Brandi here, I'm also known as the honey bear. So today's scripture, the honey bear is reading scripture today, comes from 1 Samuel. David departed from where he had escaped the cave of Adulam. And when his brother and all of his father's house heard of it, they went down there to him.

And everyone who was in distress and everyone who was in debt and everyone who was bitter in soul gathered to him. And he became commander over them. And there, there were with him about 400 men. And David went from there to Mispoth of Moab and said to the king of Moab, please let my father and my mother stay with you till I know what God will do for me.

And he let them live with the king of Moab. And they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold. Then the prophet of Gad said to David, do not remain in the stronghold. Depart and go to the land of Judah. So David departed and went to the forest of Heroth. The word of the Lord. Good morning, everyone. What's happening? Thank you, honey bear.

I have the honey. I'm just the stinging bee. But you're the honey bear. Great. I don't want to injure myself preaching today. So if you want to pray for my hamstring, that would be awesome. I've got a little, the rehab warrior on his ACL got a little too crazy. So I tore my hamstring in the midst of a rehabbing. So that's never great. I know, right?

Warrior. So fool, fool or warrior, you decide. Got a little too aggressive. So actually it was when I was cleaning the house. All right, let me pray. We'll get into this. I bent over to pick up some yarn that had dropped and it literally went pop, pop, pop. I was like, whoops. Jesus, I pray for this message. There's a lot of truth and a lot of deliverance in this message today.

And we just, we want to hear from you. Holy Spirit, just take the words and ride upon them like an arrow. Hit the hearts. And we just bless you in Jesus' name. Amen. If you look in your notes, we're going to continue to help you create a culture of victory in your life. I believe we are living in a culture of victimization or, excuse me, victimization and victims, but not a lot of talk about victory.

We'll talk about that in a moment and the difference between the two. No shame or shade upon victims. We want to obviously care for those that are victims, but a victim never saved anybody. It is someone who has overcome being victimized, like Jesus, that you actually become a hero. And we need to be careful not to turn victims into heroes, not saying that they don't deserve our empathy, that they don't deserve our admiration for when they fight through things.

But it is overcoming and finding the ability to save someone else where you actually become a hero. And if you have a culture that turns your victims into your heroes and has a culture that allows being victimized to have special entitlements that never calls you forward to step out of being victimized and all the things that come with it, because there are benefits with being a victim.

I don't know if you know that. There are benefits. But it is calling victims out of victimization and to becoming heroes. And that's what David had the ability to do in this scripture. You see that David, like Jesus, was the ultimate victim. But like Jesus, he never played the victim. And Jesus did not stay a victim after his victimization, but he was an overcomer.

And we want to help you at this church to create a culture of victorious believers. People that know how to live on the run. People that know how to strategize for victory when you're on the run and when everything has come against you. And that is what the Bible is about. The Bible understands that we're broken people, but it is not creating a culture of victims.

And that's one of the things I see right now is there's a lot of people who lean into victimhood and they find there's a lot of benefits to this. I get a lot of attention. I can actually make a living being a victim. And there's a big difference. And so what we want to do is help victims and people that have been victimized become victorious. Amen?

All right. Does that make sense? Good. So we look into that. We're going to be preparing for victory when we're on the run. I want to read through a couple things. I want to highlight a couple things in the scripture before I get into the message. I'll read through it. David left Gath. Where was Gath? Gath was in Philistine territory. David went to his, when fleeing, when home was no longer safe, he fled to his enemies.

And so he fled to Gath. And Gath didn't look like they were willing to receive him, although later on he ends up working for the king of the Philistines and kind of going on doing different services for him, as we'll see in this fugitive series with David. He was not accepted there. He had to be strategic. He had to be wise. And he pretended like he was a madman.

Man. And they sent him away. And off he went to Moab. This is the last time that you will see anyone from Israel having a friendly relationship with Moab. But we know that David, that Rahab, from that lineage of David, was a Ruth, excuse me, was a Moabite. And so David had some familial lines. And going to the Moabites, he was able to claim that he had some familial lines with the Moabites.

And so that's where he goes. Let me read through this. David left Gath. Escaped to the cave of Edulam. Question to you, as we just quickly read through this, is where is the cave that you escaped to? And is the cave a place of sustenance? Is it a place of victory? Or is it just a hiding place that increases your inability to fight while you're on the run?

When David was on the run, he continually went to places that increased his strength. There's a lot of places we can go to where we hole up in a cave, but it actually diminishes our ability to live in victory. David went to places that exponentially strengthened him. And we'll see that in a moment when we talk about strongholds. David escaped to the cave of Edulam.

When his brothers and his father's household heard about it, because they were at threat, they would kill your whole family, at least Saul was, they went down to him there. Now this is key. All those who were in distress, these are victims, all those who were in distress, or in debt, or discontented, gathered around him. And he became their commander.

About 400 men were with him. About 1,000 people total with children, maybe even more. David left with a few, with a company of a few people with him on the run, with no sustenance, nothing to sustain him, and he went to the house of the Lord. He went to Nob, and he knew where to go. And there he got the bread, and he sustained those that were with him.

And he was trusting the Lord. He immediately knew how to get home. One of the key things last week is when David was on the run, he always ran home. He might have gone to different places, but he was always running back to God, running back to Jesus, so to speak. And he is a Christ-like figure here that had an ability, when everything had come against him, to lead others to a greater victory themselves.

David eventually becomes king. We know the end of the story. And many of these that are with him go on to have a kingship. They did not stay victims. This is so key in our society today, that wants to use the victimized, oftentimes, for whether it be for gain of some kind. I won't say what kind of gain, but we want to use the victimized. And we often like to keep the victim in the victim's role, so that we can use them to leverage what we want to get.

This is one of the advantages of having a victim culture. You pull on the heartstrings. Rather than raising people up to be victorious, David would not allow you to stay a victim. If you were with David, you were going to walk towards victory. If you were with Jesus, let me assure you that his desire is to have you walk towards victory. Not an arrogant victory, not a prideful victory, but one that overcomes its circumstances.

Psalm 23 says, Though I what through the valley of the shadow of death. What do we not do? We do not lay down in the valley of the shadow of death. Some of us, and maybe it's you, I am not telling you this. You have to decide if it's for you or not. But some of us have become professional victims because of all that it offers us. I have met people that have been in verbally abusive relationships that have stayed in those relationships.

And they'll come to a marriage counseling session with me and share that I've been putting up with this for 20 years. And I will ask the key question at that point. Good, three letters, right. Why? Well, it's his fault, her fault, over and over. And it's continuing. Victims are so good at looking at other people of why they are where they are. One of the things that makes Alcoholics Anonymous successful is that you have to admit that I am the source of my problem.

I am an alcoholic. And I have chosen to no longer play the victim, to put my big boy and big girl pants on, and decide to move towards victory. And so the question to you that Jesus says in John chapter 5 is, do you want to be healed? And how healed do you want to be? I don't mind people that walk with a limp. I like following people that walk with a limp.

And we value brokenness. But we don't value people that continue to break things. And if you want to come here, we want to value your brokenness. But stop breaking things. And let's move on in victory. This church, as long as this staff and elder board and myself are leading it alongside of you, is going to be a church that is focused on victory, that is not going to lean in to a victimization culture to leverage it for the faux benefits that it brings.

We want a kingdom culture that brings victory. For Jesus is leading us in a triumphal procession. Amen? Sorry if that hurt. Moving on. From there David went to Mizpah, to Moab, to the king of Moab. Would you let my father and mother come stay with you? And I'll learn what God will do for me. He was waiting for God. Then he left them with the king of Moab.

And he stayed there as long as David was in the stronghold. Circle, stronghold. But David, prophet, but the prophet Gad came to David and said, don't stay in the stronghold. That's key. Go to the land of Judah. So David left there and went to the forest of Hereth. And so he was really good at hiding in the forest. Here's a pivotal verse that you can lean into this week.

And he has said to me in 2 Corinthians 12, 9 through 11. It's a great verse to memorize. My grace is sufficient for you. My power is perfected in weakness. This is when God was complaining. And if you're going to ever play the victim, play the victim to God. You're cool with that. The scripture is very cool with you going to God and telling him, hey, I am in distress, but also with an eye on hope.

David always, he would talk about how he's being victimized, but he rarely shares it. You look at Saul in these scriptures. Saul's always complaining. Earlier in this scripture, you're all following the Benjamite. Oh, everyone's against me. Even my son's against me. Ah, da, da, da, da. You can find a victim because they give themselves away. They're constantly talking about who's victimizing them.

David didn't do that, but he did get real with the Lord. I would say there's nothing wrong with telling the Lord that you feel victimized. But oftentimes, people find complaining, all they ever do is complain to God. And I want to say, I said it last week, complaining is not seeking God. Complaining might be a part of seeking God, but it has to have so many other components to it.

And the question to you is, are you really seeking God or is it just a complaint list that we're upset and we're constantly frustrated and that becomes our excuse that we sought God and he hasn't shown up? Because you see that a lot. Very quiet in here today. Preaching to myself, by the way. So if you want to know where I get all this good stuff, it's from my personal journals.

My grace is sufficient. And Paul says, most gladly, therefore. Most gladly. Most gladly. Remember in the Princess Bride, mostly dead. Well, most gladly. Why would he put that? Circle that. He says, I'm boasting in my weakness so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore, I am well content. Ooh, contentment. The battle of the age. There is peace and contentment.

Are you content? You want to be happier? Have less wants. That is a great way to be happier. To have more joy. Just make a list of your wants and quit wanting them. That's hard to do though. Saying. Therefore. Just a little fireside chat today. I'm Franklin Delanor. Therefore. I'm well content with weakness. Ooh. With insults. Ouch. With distresses. With persecutions.

With difficulties. For whom? For Christ's sake. For when I am weak, that I am strong. If you're going to get beat up, take one for the team. Team Jesus. I got to say, that is the team you want to take it for. A lot of times, in my own self, is I've created my own problems. My grandma said it a different way. I'm going to clean it up. Don't make your own messes, is what I will say.

You know, I tell the staff on a regular basis, we don't mind helping people clean up their messes, but let's not make our own. And one of the things we want to continue to do is if you're going to take a beating, take one for Jesus. They tend to, scripture says, give you a lot of blessing on the other side of that. Here's some psalms for reflection because we are going to be, I'm wanting to be in a dialogue with you.

I want you to be students of the scripture and have the ability to study on your own. My teaching should ultimately be the icing on the cake of what you've done in the scripture all week. I should be confirming things that God spoke to you about as opposed to this being the ultimate of all your biblical teaching of the week. What you end up having is a false representation of someone else's spiritual life and your spiritual life becomes a shadow of mine.

We don't want that. We want Jesus speaking to you individually and then you get here and think, oh, the Lord spoke to me all week about that and he will prepare your heart. Let me give you some psalms that go along with this because we know that in 1 Samuel, the psalms are the back story. We have this beautiful grouping of poetry and psalms that tell us what was going on, the angst behind, the heart behind, the actions that we're seeing happen here.

And so here's the first couple psalms. Last week, I forgot to mention these, but psalms 17 and 52 is David dealing with Doeg the Edomite, the Edomite. If you want to have any problems or you're struggling with a person, read those scriptures and go to the parts about the comfort God gives you. I wouldn't focus on the whole strike and smite my enemy thing, but nonetheless, it's there for a reason.

He was living in a different time and we don't want to back read our culture into the scriptures because things are different. We're living in a different post cross. Then we have stronghold psalms. We're going to be talking about the stronghold today. David was big about strongholds and my question to you is where are your strongholds? Where are the places you go when you're weak?

What are the things that you do that maximize your ability to fight while you're on the run? We don't want to constantly be on the run. We want to be able to find rest in the midst of running and strongholds that make you stronger. So some psalms that are going to help you with that. If you don't have a reading plan this week, Psalm 9, Psalm 18, Psalm 27, 59, and 144.

If you Google the chronology of the psalms, you are going to find a basic chronology. This is kind of like, you know, guessing in a lot of ways, but you're going to find when psalms are written according to what was happening with the story. It makes it such an awesome way to read the story and say, okay, this is what he was thinking when he was by himself writing or whoever was writing that.

Just an example, Psalm 9, verse 9, would say, the Lord is a stronghold for the oppressed. A stronghold in times of trouble. So we're going to look at this. Strength and weakness. Here's a key point. Look at your notes. And this came to me this week and I thought, man, that's good stuff, Lord. I want to share that with you. And I feel like this is one of the keys.

David was the most dangerous when he was on the run. It's interesting. If you read about David, I believe that his most effective Christ following was not when he was king. I think he did some great stuff when he was king. He did some great stuff when he was a boy and out, kind of rejected, but not in that kingship. He had his, most of his issues, his problems with God is when he was taking the census, he was king, Bathsheba, all that happened when he was king.

But when he was running, the two times that he was on the run, once here and once from his son Absalom, because he really wasn't a great father, we'll talk about that, unfortunately, he was most dangerous and he was most spiritually dangerous and he had this incredible ability to lead others to victory while being on the run, being victimized himself. I don't really want to call him a victim, although I want to say that he was victimized.

Jesus was not a victim because it says that he gave himself help. No one could take his life from him, but he was ultimately victimized. But he lived victoriously and once again, the question is, in your victimization, how healed do you want to be? Do you want to leave that way or has that become such a way of life where we basically tattoo it to ourselves and we become, we wear a cloak of victimization?

And maybe you've seen those people. If you have a strong spiritual gift of discernment, you will see that sometimes. Just people will walk into a room in the same way a prideful, boastful person will walk into a room. Sometimes a person will walk into the room and it's almost like they shout with their body language, I don't fit here. I don't belong here. No one's going to like me here.

No one, you know, and just, or easily offended or easily, you see that on people. David had the ability to find these distressed people and to move them out into victory. You know, some of you probably don't even know what victory tastes like. Israel was living in a wilderness and it looked so much like the promised land. It had God's blessing. It had the presence of God.

It had manna every day. It had no enemies. Their wilderness looked like the promised land and it can be easy to live in that wilderness ourselves and accept the wilderness as a promise and so my question to you is where's your geography and are you ready to go looking for a new house on the other side of your Jordan called victim? So we look at that as David was dangerous.

I'll tell you why he was dangerous. One, when he was on the run and you might be on the run from finances, from somebody at work, an emotional issue, you know, anxiety, fear, loneliness, you do not have to accept it. Now, sometimes we can't control all the emotions and thoughts. We know that. But you can make a decision not to do your best not to accept it. You can make a decision to fight or to stand and to come alongside Christ to fight whatever that is.

And so David, first of all, whenever he was on the run, he was incredibly strategic. You know, oftentimes I have found that when I've become, gotten on the run, I stop being strategic. I stop thinking, how do I obtain victory in this situation? I find myself just getting on the run and running and not thinking, wait a second, where am I running to? And is the place that I'm running to of strategic value to overcoming this obstacle or enemy in my life?

You look at David, where did he run to? Everywhere he ran to had a purpose. He ran to the house of the Lord. He got himself equipped with a sword. He got himself equipped with sustenance to survive, to eat, to feed his men. Then he wondered if he could go to Gath because he knew that Saul was an enemy of the Philistines and maybe they would accept him, but when they didn't, he strategically went to a cave and then from the cave he went down to the Moabite territories and then God spoke to him and said, now I want you to go here.

You see, there is strategery, to use a word from George Bush that has become in our lexicon now. There is strategery and then there's also hearing from the Lord and I believe that sometimes God's like, hey, just, you know, you're wise. There's a strategic decision. Just make that decision. But other times God will speak to us as we seek him and say, hey, I want you to leave the stronghold.

I want you to go to this place that's vulnerable. We know that when the Israelites went over to, across the Jordan, God put them to camp in the plains of Jericho and then he said, circumcise the men which made them an inability to fight their enemies. God put them in the plains of their enemies and he put them there strategically and sometimes God will put you right next to an enemy for a reason.

Perhaps because like Goliath he wants to use you to strike that enemy down. Are you being strategic? We don't want to be overly strategic though because sometimes the prophet of Gad comes to you and says, God doesn't want you here. But that doesn't make sense and then the Holy Spirit says to you, faith doesn't pencil out. FYI. Faith does not pencil out. Tweet that.

Bold. David, that was for you Chris. It was bold. I love David's boldness. Granted, he gets terrified. We know on the back story he's incredibly scared, terrified sometimes but he had the ability to overcome those dark moments and to come out and to be bold even when he was fleeing. You know, you can be bold when you're fleeing to live another day. Sometimes you have to know when to fight and when not to.

He was bold. He was humble. His humility. I love David's humility before the Lord. He's so humble. Humility is such a weapon. Another thing, he's all in. David was all in for victory. Anybody ever realize that? You know, I see him complaining to the Lord but I never have him saying, you know, I'm just, I'm just, I'm over it. You know, I'm just over it. You know, I see him complaining to the Lord but it seems like he was all in, always moving that I will.

He knew who he was called to be and though he might have doubted, he knew who he was. He was anointed as the king. I want to say, if you have become a Christ follower and you have asked Christ to allow the Holy Spirit through his death, Jesus' death on the cross to infill you and if you haven't done that, I'll give you an opportunity after the service today to do it or you can do it in your seat right now that God will say that you are my chosen child now.

You're my kid and David understood his position as a son of God and so he knew that the whole time and on the run, run towards victory, run towards home, never forget who you are. The enemy wants you to forget who you are. If you have to do something as rudimentary as write it down on a piece of paper and put it on your refrigerator and print it out every day, do it.

But remember who you are and surround yourself with a company of people who remind you who you are. Heck, even the Philistines knew who David was. Saul was the king at the moment but they said when he showed up, isn't this the king? You want to get to the point where even the demons know who you are. Jesus, Jesus was with demons and they spoke out to him and they said, Messiah.

Like I said, it was interesting. I wasn't going to, I told the guys that I wouldn't normally share this but I think it's important to share. I've had four times where I've walked by people in my life that are obviously mentally deranged where they have spoken to me beyond their mental state and spoken truth to me. Once was in Seal Beach and I was walking up and this guy was walking by and he was very mentally drained, talking to himself and as I walked, he stopped and he looked at me and he goes, teacher, preacher, evangelist, prophet and he looked at me and then he started going back into his machinations of his brain and I was like, whoa, heavy, thanks.

he's right and that's not an arrogant thing. I've just been discipled and we want to disciple you so that you know what God's given you gifts. He's given us all gifts and knowing what your gifts are is not arrogant although people can become arrogant. Last weekend, I was in Balboa Park with my daughter and I walked past this woman and she was in another world and as I walked by, she says, patriarch, you're a patriarch and then she said, turn around and go away and I said, okay, I will.

You can put that in your theological pipe and smoke it and figure that out however you want. I don't know what it means but it was very interesting and you know what, that was a new terminology and I had to go home and pray about it and that's one of the reasons I mentioned like Dick Cotton last week when he's a father to me where at some point I need to become a father to other men and let me, look, if you're in your late 40s, 50s and beyond or if you're a young guy with younger high schools or whatever, men, be patriarchs.

Women, be matriarchs. Do the same thing but men especially, let's be fathers of the faith. Let's pass that on. David was bold. He was on the run. Strategic. I love in 2 Samuel when Saul is sending men to attack David, the guys that had been, had fought alongside David because David had done a lot of fighting for Saul. These men had fought alongside of him and when Saul would send them out against David, trust me, they were fearful because he had proven himself a warrior and many of them knew that he was anointed and I love that and David shepherded his anointing.

That's what I like. He shepherded his anointing. Look what it says about him. When they spoke to Saul later on, this is 2 Samuel, this is a whole other Samuel down the road, it says, you know your father, this is speaking to Absalom, excuse me, you know your father and his men. They are fighters and they are fierce as a wild bear robbed of her cubs. I just stopped there.

You're on the run. Now he had been king. This is after he had been king but he was definitely on the run. He had to flee. He was going to be killed by his son. Things were not good. He was so on the run. Everything was against him. Fear, everything. Imagine that that and your own son coming after you to kill you and we're seeing that in society today. We're seeing some of that.

And it says that at that point that he was as fierce as a wild bear robbed of her cubs. Does that represent me? Does that represent you when push comes to shove? And what did David do in preparation that he could flee in a moment because he had to flee in a moment's notice where they would know that when the enemy knows who you are that they need to be careful when they attack you?

We tend to have this idea that the devil if he ever wants to attack us can always win. That's not true. The scripture says that you can tie up the strong man and we can plunder his things. I actually feel in the last six months we've been in a season at this church where we've just been taking the devil's stuff. We've been taking strongholds, tearing down strongholds of depression, of fear and anxiety, not that they don't exist, but I've been seeing people get healed.

We've been seeing people get saved. We've been seeing more and more territory being taken. We've been seeing people in the community that we're gathering more, I would say, acumen with or more influence with that want to partner with us, that have groups that aren't Christian that are coming and say, we want to partner with you as a church. I believe that at the moment the enemy is on his heels and as a church we are moving forward.

And have you ever thought that you can actually have victory and take ground? I want to assure you that we can take ground. If you were in a victim's mentality, you were not into taking ground. You were into running. And I want to say, we want to humbly take ground through prayer. And recently at Tuesday at our prayer meetings, we've been saying, God, give us another two feet out from this church.

Just another two feet. What would it take like to influence another two feet and the people that that would involve? In our core team strategic meeting, we say, you know, a lot of people drive from with 20 minutes to get to church here. But what would we have to do as a church? What would have to happen to say people, people to say, I'll drive 25 minutes to come to this community to be a part of it.

What would it take to go on the offensive and to break down the strongholds that are in this city, that are in this nation and are in the world? A culture of victory like David sees that and let us be like a bear that is robbed of her cubs, that is willing to fight. And if you put us on the run, you better be careful because we will strike like a snake. We will be as wise as serpents, but as gentle as doves, praying and caring for people and loving the entire way.

But we need to go on the offensive again, at least in the spiritual offensive. I hope that makes sense. David never, I'm going to move on, David never played the victim. I've already spoken about that. But like Jesus, he attracted the victimized to him, transforming them into a powerful force. Who are you transforming? And what are you transforming them into?

I was so good when I was 19 running the streets of bringing other people around me and transforming them into something less than they should be. It's so easy to transform people into less than they should be, to transform our children by the words we use into less than they should be. I like when my children have gotten to the point where they will correct me and say, Dad, that's using guilt to try to control me.

Let's not do that. We don't do guilt. Works so well though. Until you're healed of it and then it doesn't work anymore. Yeah, finding this culture. What's the culture of your home? Do you have a culture of victory in your home? Do you have a culture of peace, of sanctuary, or is it just yelling? You know what? You know who creates the culture in your home?

You and those that live there. The culture in your life, the culture in your car, the culture in your driving. What does it look like to turn your car into a sanctuary? You know, you can be the priest of your car. You can put worship on in there. You can even carry communion if you wanted. You can do the whole thing. Become a person where your car is an element of grace as opposed to a battering ram.

David created strongholds. Let's look at this quickly and then we'll close up for the day. David created strongholds. A place that has been fortified so as to protect against an attack. The city of David was this. He's known. It's still called the city of David. David was so good at creating strategic places. Not only invisible strategic places, but visible strategic places.

The city of David, the cave of Adullam, all these different places were places that if you came, he actually was quantifiably stronger. It might take, for his thousand men, it might take 10,000 to take him out. A physical stronghold is a place that is a physical place that you can go to. It might be a counselor's office. It might be a retreat place. It might be some place that you go and camp.

It might be a walk along the beach. It is a physical place that when you go there, it strengthens you. It revives you. My wife right now has her Lenten commitment to get into the ocean every single day for 40 days. And I love it. It's such a great commitment. Yesterday, she's tired and it's cold. A little bit cold. She went. She goes, I'm getting in the ocean today.

We went home and I stood at the side of the water as she did it. It was awesome. But the girls went in there. I got a bad hamstring. I got a bad hamstring. And she's just getting in the water because for her, it just rejuvenates her. It just makes her feel so alive. I love that as a Lenten commitment. Adding, getting in the ocean. Where's that place for you?

Do you have a family hovel up in Big Bear that you can escape to? Or some little place. And maybe if you don't have that, there's a place you like to go. It's a tea garden in Balboa Park. It's somewhere. But you have a place and you say, I'm committed. This is a stronghold for me. This sanctuary, you're welcome to come here during the week and sit here. It is a stronghold.

You can feel it. I don't know if you can feel it. I can feel it when I get here. And Kai and myself and others, we'll just come and we'll just sit because it's a stronghold. Come. We're open. Just email the office and we'll open it up for you. You can come and sit in here. David not only had physical strongholds where if you attacked him, he could defend at a stronger ability than he could without it.

But he also had spiritual strongholds. Developing strongholds of prayer. Developing strongholds of perhaps fasting or praise or getting rid of a stronghold of criticism. Bev wanted me to encourage you. Bev Adler wanted me to encourage you to demolish a stronghold of criticism for the rest until Easter. No more criticizing. No more criticizing yourself. No more criticizing.

No more judgment. Just take a month off. 40 days off. It won't hurt you. Try it. You know? Do that. Or cultivating a stronghold of joy. I do believe that over the last three years I've worked with my prayer partner, David, we try to create strongholds of joy that when the enemy comes that one thought doesn't knock me off my feet anymore. When I was having chronic anxiety years ago, one thought.

It would be the craziest thought about, one time it was about somebody in Montana not being able to pay their bills. It had nothing to do with me. And all of a sudden I was like, ah, I'm terrified. You know? It was just one little thought and knock you off. But maybe you can develop a stronghold of joy. Develop physical strongholds. Strongholds like David did and spiritual strongholds.

Read those Psalms and you'll see the strongholds that he developed. Do you even have a stronghold? Or do you just hit the road into the desert with no provisions, nowhere to go, no plan, no boldness, no one going with you? You're just on the run. I gotta say, be prepared. You know what? Never waste a crisis. And use every single crisis to prepare for your next victory.

When do we hear that? Okay? Every single time you're on the run, I'm preparing for victory. David was preparing for victory. Jesus was being crucified. They're driving nails in his hands. You know what he was doing? Preparing for victory. Preparing for victory. Do you have a victim's culture or do you have a victorious culture? We are not gonna let you be a victim here.

We don't wanna let you do that. And what I have found is victims, people who want to stay a victim and that don't wanna be healed or that will go away that when Jesus says, do you wanna follow me? And they say, no, I wanna go away. They won't stay here long. That's what I've found. In every ministry I've been in, we've created that culture. We hope that you wanna create that with us.

It's not just me. It's us. It's a place easily defended. The root Hebrew word, and thank you for Elliot and Pastor Jim, they will do study for me. I'll send them little helpers and they'll look things up for me. Elliot said two things that were really interesting. The Hebrew root, I might butcher this, Matsud, and that's like Masada, like you've seen that old show.

That was a Jewish stronghold up on a hill. Matsud actually means to hunt. And there is some thinking in some Hebrew scholars that believe that actually when you're in the stronghold, you become the hunter. I really like that. Whether it's true or not, I'm taking it on board because it is so key that you're dangerous. David was incredibly dangerous when he was in the forest.

Are you spiritually dangerous when you're on the run? I'm not trying to bring guilt to you. But maybe there's a whole way of saying, no, I'm on the run, but I'm going to do some things to become dangerous. That word, Matsud. It's also, finally, as we come in for a close, a place of rest. We undervalue the importance of rest in preparing for victory. Rest, a time where you just have time to get away.

You know, I became a, when I was going through chronic anxiety and different things, I became a chronic, just chronically in counseling, chronically healing, looking, like constantly healing to where it becomes a job. Like, you know, you're wanting so desperately to be healed. All you think about is your recovery. That's it. Chronic recovery is the word I'm looking for.

Sometimes you just need to take a break from your recovery and go to the beach. You know? Just take a rest. Go, you know, go to Palm Springs. Get a hotel. Do something. Whatever you do, but just take a rest. You know, this is the ability to rest. It is our core value as a church. Everything we do comes from rest and it ends in rest. The scripture says, enter into my what?

The scripture says, into my busyness? No. Enter into my rest. And if our job is to bring a kingdom culture on earth, then you, in earth, we should be entering into his rest. Not into some create and do a little bit more. This is a lie of being on the run. Run faster. Run faster. If you could only run a little faster, you could survive or this guilt that comes with running faster.

I gotta say, run, stop. Running to a standstill. U2 had a, one of my favorite U2 songs, running to a standstill. Just slow down and give the Lord a margin to win the battle. Say, God, you know what? Today I'm not gonna fight. Would you fight for me? Would you, would you do this for me? I need to rest. I need to be. Amen? Amen? Holy game. Amen? Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen.