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[0:00] What's up, guys? It's good to be with you guys. I'm from Franklin, North Carolina,! Which is about three hours from here. Only been there three years. Like Jared said, we connected! We connected many years ago. If you want to know any dirt on Jared, see me afterwards. No, I don't.

[0:18] No, he was at my brother's wedding, and so we go back, him, Sue, and I, and my wife, Sarah. But let's start. I just want to encourage us, as we've been hearing everything, I just wanted to start with the truth. Not that they haven't been giving you truth, but, you know, we hear all this stuff. We hear all of wars, battles, and things, and so I just want to start with 1 Timothy chapter 6, verses 11 through 12, and Paul's writing to this young guy, Timothy, pastoring a church, and he encourages him, and he just says, fight the good fight of faith. Lay hold on eternal life, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. And guys, I just want to start by telling you, it's a good fight. It's a good fight.

[1:09] You know, these fights, these battles that we're talking about this morning, they're good. You know, it's for our good, and how we approach them, and how we walk through them, especially with the presence of Christ with us. And Paul tells Timothy, hey, look, lay hold of. You know, he's given them a direction.

[1:31] He's given them a focus, as the guys have this morning. You know, this eternal focus, this eternal life, the promises of God's Word, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many. And that word fight is, we get our word agonized from. It really means to exhort oneself in a military or athletic contest. And a lot of times, that's not easy. That's not easy.

[1:57] And this morning, you'll hear a little bit of, you know, what's been going on, the fights that have been going on in my life, and why the Lord led me to share what I'm sharing this morning. But as was alluded to, you know, we have an adversary, right? We have an adversary, and it's not just this. It's not just the old man, the sinful nature, but it's our adversary, the devil, right?

[2:20] And in 1 Peter 5, verse 8, I just, I want to draw your attention to this fact. He says, be sober, you know, be watchful, be vigilant, because you're, you're adversary. He doesn't write our, he writes your. We have a personal adversary, guys, who knows us. He was there at the creation. He knows the tendency of man. He knows the trappings of man. He knows how a man thinks.

[2:55] No, he's not God. He's not God equal. He's not omniscient, but he knows our nature. He knows our fallen nature. He knows the signs, and he's personally your adversary. But praise be to God, we have Jesus Christ, right? You know, we have the victory in Christ, and so let's pray before we get into our passage of Scripture this morning. Lord, we just thank you and praise you for who you are and all that you've done for us. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the blessing to be able to draw from your word, or to be equipped, to be encouraged, to be challenged, to be corrected, or whatever you see fit by the power of your Holy Spirit. And so, Lord, I just pray this morning, as you have, I know for me and these men, Lord, that you would continue to just have a word for each and every one of us, that you would speak directly into our lives, or into those battles that we face even now here in this moment. And Lord, we just ask and pray that, Lord, we would walk in your victory.

[4:12] Lord, that we would leave this place, Lord, truly challenged, truly changed men as we go forth from this day. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. So if you want, turn in your Bibles to, we're going to be in Judges chapter 6. Our theme is 2 Corinthians chapter 10, and I land on every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.

[4:42] Judges chapter 6. You know, there's one thing that Satan had, and that was pride. And there's one thing a man has, and that's pride. And there are many things that are exalted, but I think, you know, this morning, the Lord led me to talk about, not pride, but complacency. And you say, how is complacency elevated? And we'll get to that in a second. But my mind's going a million miles a minute here. But what did Jesus say? Jesus said, and through John, he said in John 3.30, he must increase and I must decrease, right? When Jesus taught us to pray, whose will is to be done?

[5:37] His will. His will. Not my will, but his will. And we have a way of elevating ourselves, exalting ourselves in place of God's will. And we have a way of doing that, and this is going to sound crazy to you, without doing it. We have a way of just letting things happen. We have a way of letting Satan, letting things in our minds and things in our lives to just take place without confronting them, and essentially exalting any other will but God's will for our life.

[6:18] And I want to remind you, as at our church, we're going through Joshua Wednesday nights, and the Lord is getting ready to have Joshua lead his people into the promised land. And the Lord makes a promise to Joshua that I told our congregation, I wish he made to every pastor, to every, I wish he made it to me when I was younger and I was an athlete, that no man would be able to stand against you, that every battle you will be victorious. That's what he tells Joshua. No one will be able to stand against you. And then he encourages Joshua to not turn right or left, to hold true to God's word. And so he encourages him. And I encourage you guys, as you've heard this morning, we don't just have one battle, but we have a series of battles, don't we? We don't just have one thought, but numerous thoughts come flooding in, don't they, at a moment's notice. And it could be the most randomest thing, and I can assure you, it's happened to me many times. I could be walking through a grocery store, and this thought pops into my head that's so wicked and evil, and I look at my wife and say, where did that come from? And so we're faced with these many battles, and we know, and I encourage you guys, as I've prayed and alluded to, Romans 8, 37, we know it, right? We're more than conquerors for those who are in Christ Jesus. More than conquerors. So we don't fight, we're not fighting for victory, we're fighting in victory. We've already won the battle. Jesus has already won on our behalf.

[7:48] We're more than conquerors. And so Paul's challenging us here in 2 Corinthians chapter 10, and he's challenging the people who live in a society that's exalted. This sexual immorality is exalted. They have these prostitutes that would come down off the hill from the goddesses they worship, the goddess of sexuality. And they were intermingled with the people, and Corinth was a very wicked, very carnal city. And so this status, this sexuality, all of these things, the church was confronted with. And Paul would address so many things with the church in Corinth, and their condoning of sin and things, and the complacency in the church of Corinth, how they were letting a sexually immoral relationship happen, and were doing nothing about it. They were condoning it by not doing anything. And so complacency, we get a good description in Scripture of what complacency is. And if you're taking notes, Zephaniah chapter 1. You say, Zephaniah is a book of the

[8:49] Bible? Yeah. I've never heard a pastor preach through Zephaniah. Zephaniah chapter 1, verse 12, speaking of the day of the Lord and how the Lord is going to walk through Jerusalem. And this is what he says. He says, and it shall come to pass that at that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps and punish men who are settled in complacency, who say in their heart, the Lord will not do good, nor will he do what's evil. Basically, they've given up. Oh, God, oh, if God doesn't do good, okay, if God doesn't do that, God doesn't show up. And this morning in Gideon's story, we're not going to get in the part that everybody knows where God dwindles down Gideon's army to 300.

[9:35] No, we're going to get that pre-Gideon, that Gideon that's alone, that Gideon that is complacent with the rest of Israel. But this complacency, this settling in, this comfort, it would speak of a wine when it's fermented too long and it gets very syrupy.

[9:56] And not palpable. And you don't want it. It's disgusting. And so you don't drink of it. And this is these men that Jesus is speaking to in the day of wrath. And men like today, I believe, where we're stuck, we're complacent, we're unmoved, we're unconcerned. We watch the world around us.

[10:20] We watch our towns and communities, like I call it, we sit around and watch them go to hell. And so let me ask you, and this is a good thing, and this is where the Lord has been taking me.

[10:33] I long for more of him. I long for a deeper relationship with him. I long for the relationship he had with Moses in Exodus, where the Lord comes down in a pillar and stands in the doorway of Moses' tent and they just talk. And the Bible says, the Lord talked to Moses like he was a friend.

[10:57] I want that intimacy with him in my life. I don't just want to settle for mediocre. I don't want to settle for the getting by. I don't want to watch other men grow in their faith and their relationship with Christ. I want to be that guy. And so Judges chapter 6, we begin in verse 1, it says, And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord delivered them in the hand of Midian for seven years. And the hand of, excuse me, Midian prevailed against Israel because the Midianites, the children of Israel, made for themselves the dens, the caves, and the strongholds, which are the mountains. You know, there was peace in the land for 40 years. And we read, you know, my wife and I talk all the time. We see today, we see a lot of, because we're not in a Calvary chapel right now. We're in an independent, non-dominational church, whatever you want to call it. And we see a lot of Israel in the church. We see a lot of the Old Testament in the church today.

[12:03] This selling short for what God's promised. You know, Israel only has a smidgen of what God has promised them, if you really study it. They only took a, really a fifth. They took 30, I think it's, what was said, 33 square feet of what God promised them, which was 3,300,000 square feet of land.

[12:24] They settled. They settled. And because of that, over and over again, Israel struggled and was confronted with an enemy and confronted with themselves, confronted with worshiping these other gods. And Gideon finds himself here. Israel finds himself here. And they're delivered into the enemy's hand. And they made themselves strongholds. They hid. They were complacent.

[12:52] They're in the caves. And guys, I want to tell you, the Lord will never force you to go further than you want to go. He won't force you. He'll wait for you. He'll go through some things, but He'll wait for you. And He can outweigh you, as He's told me recently. He'll outweigh you. He's long-suffering, impatient. He's eternal. He can eternally outweigh me, so to speak. He can eternally outweigh you.

[13:28] And so they're hiding, and they're waiting in these caves. And we go on in verse 3, it says, so it was whenever Israel had sown, Midianites would come up. Also Amalekites and the people of the east would come up against them. And they would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the earth as far as Gaza and leave no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep, nor oxen, nor donkey.

[13:53] We see the heart of Satan, don't we? He's a destroyer, right? We just read it. He's a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. It's quoted this morning, John 10, 10. He comes to rob, steal, and destroy, right?

[14:07] But I love the imagery of a lion, because we just think of this lion pouncing on something and ripping it to shreds, right? No. A lion waits. A lion's cunning. It hides in the brush. It moves about subtly, waiting for the opportune time, waiting for the right body part, if you will, on an animal to be exposed, where it can make a move. That's deadly. That's crushing. That will destroy whatever it sinks its teeth into. He's not just out in the open. No, he's waiting for the opportune time for you and I.

[14:48] And more often than not, it's incomplacency. It's when we're just like, huh? Okay, God, whatever. I'm just going to roll with it. Huh? I'll go to church once in a while. Maybe I'll go to men's study. Huh? Huh? How the world's going to hell. Huh? Let somebody else share the gospel.

[15:09] He's waiting. He's watching. And notice Satan, you know, John 10, 10. He comes to rob, steal, destroy, but Jesus came to give life and life more abundantly. You see, there's so much more that Jesus offers. And you see, guys, when we think of Satan, you know, Satan doesn't gain anything by destroying. He doesn't inherit anything. There's no eternal blessings waiting for him. He doesn't get crowns. He doesn't get anything by what he does. No, what awaits him is hell. That's all that he gets. But in verse 4, it says, what did the Amalekites and Midianites do? They left no sustenance. They just destroyed. They didn't need it for themselves. They just destroyed it.

[15:57] And that's what the enemy does. He just wants to see you destroyed. He wants to see you fall in sin. He wants to see you bring that thought into fruition of your life. He wants to see a particular lifestyle exalted in you. There was a while in my life where pride was a big thing. I elevated myself very highly I was a very talented basketball player. I was in ministry, what I felt was successful in youth ministry. And all these other things were clicking for me. And God said, okay, I'm going to bring humility to you and I'm going to give you cancer at the age of 33. And I'm going to give you a cancer that they can't figure out how to fix. And I'm going to give you a cancer that typically you'd find in an 80-year-old. That's what my oncologist told me. And he said, we have no research to help you, so we're going to give you a Whipple procedure. And we're going to take half your stomach out, half your liver, half your pancreas, and all these other pieces that you don't need your body.

[16:54] We're going to fuse it together. And then we're going to tell your wife that you're only, you need to prepare for your husband to die because the typical lifespan after that surgery is two to five years. And so he shot me down real quick, real quick. I couldn't even shoot a free throw. I couldn't even do a layup in basketball after my surgery, 14 hours. And you know, by the grace of God, I sit here today going on 14 years.

[17:25] And so even the knowledge of man that can be elevated in a person, an education, an occupation. No, God's numbered my days. He receives the glory.

[17:38] But Satan leaves nothing. He attacks. He removes the substance. He likes to attack the strongholds of faith, the strongholds in our lives. He undermines the truth. There was an old way that you would attack a stronghold back then, and it was called sapping, or they call it undermining. And you would dig a hole under a wall, and you dig so that you were all the way across through. And as you dug, you put a beam. And then when you would want to collapse that wall and destroy it, you would throw pitch, you would throw hay, whatever it was, and you light it on fire so that that beam would fall and the wall would collapse inside that which you dug out.

[18:24] And you see, isn't that the enemy? He seeks to undermine the truth of God's Word. He seeks to undermine the promises of God's Word and say, hey, this isn't worth it. It's not worth it for you to sacrifice TV time to be a men's Bible study. It's not worth it. You don't want to do that. You won't gain anything from it. They're probably not speaking on anything that applies to your life anyways tonight.

[18:49] He likes to attack in such a way. He likes to go after our marriage. How many of you, I'll ask you guys, how many of you guys are complacent in your marriage?

[19:05] How many of you are deliberately, intentionally investing spiritually in your wife? Or are you just going day to day? I snagged her. I did everything I can. I looked good. I combed my hair. I shaved. I did all these things. Now I got her, and I'm good.

[19:21] And I look good. You know? And you kind of let off. Guys, I'll share with you, you know, I let off the gas in my marriage a couple years in.

[19:38] And I became complacent in my marriage. I grew up in a pastor's home. My dad was a Calvary Chapel pastor. And we hit some time. We had two kids at the time.

[19:51] I lost my job. We were being evicted from our home. And I walked out on my wife. Walked out on my wife. And I started hanging out with this guy, Dan.

[20:02] And we started hitting the casino. We started hitting the bar. And at the time, I didn't know it. But I saw my life spiraling. And the enemy, like the lion, waited.

[20:16] And I met a woman. I met a woman. I had a relationship with this woman. And I can remember one night sitting in this house.

[20:30] I don't know why. But I was playing, trying to play the part, trying to live in both worlds. And I had my Bible open. And I was sitting in this, around this table at this kitchen.

[20:44] And I was just sitting there. And I wasn't even looking for God, really, guys. And it was like, audibly, I could hear the Holy Spirit just say to me, Bradley, what are you doing?

[20:58] That's it. What are you doing? And I literally, guys, I grabbed my Bible. I closed it. And I packed up my stuff.

[21:09] And I left. And I went to my wife. And long story short, you know, we had to work through things.

[21:20] It was a battle, so to speak. A battle against this old sinful man. And God had to do some work on my life.

[21:32] And I can assure you, and I tell you this, because, guys, I was face-to-face with the grace of God through my wife. When a pastor counseled my wife to ditch him, he's not worth it.

[21:46] He'll just do it again on you. But God was chastening me because I went to a church on that Sunday. And the pastor wasn't there.

[21:56] And a couple were sharing their testimony. And there were actually three of them. And here it was the same situation I was living in or had lived in and how God saved all of them.

[22:08] And how God restored this marriage. And I'll tell you what my dad told my brothers and I, whatever. If you don't love your wife, someone else will. Someone else will.

[22:20] How intentional are you in God's word with your wife? Are you praying with her? Are you investing in her spiritually with your kids and grandkids? I got four kids, two boys, two girls. They're in the world all week in school.

[22:35] How much are we investing in our kids and our grandkids when they're being fed all this doctrine? Doctrine of demons, as Paul would call it, in the public school now. Hours, almost eight hours a day.

[22:49] And what do they get? Are we just giving them a Sunday morning? Or should we be giving them more? Or should we be giving them more? They're being trained.

[23:01] You know, the church. Satan loves to attack the church. He's been attacking our church. How involved are you guys in your church?

[23:14] You know, for a while at our church, we didn't have a men's Bible study. We started Tuesday night Bible study. We have about 20 to 30 guys that come out. We're going through the book of Hebrews. But it's every Tuesday night.

[23:24] And God has brought in and out men. But you see this God building these men and building them and molding them.

[23:35] And the discipleship of the men that God's word calls them to be in the church. To help lead the church. To come along like you guys. I'd encourage you to do your pastors.

[23:47] Come along your pastor. Come alongside of him. Are you interceding for him? Are you intentional about praying for your pastor?

[23:58] Are you amongst the body encouraging them with the message or pastor that the Lord laid on his heart to give? Are you filtering that with him through the congregation? Are you involved?

[24:11] Or are you just there Sunday morning? Because you're supposed to be there. You know, and as we go through this, I'll give you some pieces. You know, just, you know, God's word is our substance, right?

[24:24] It really is. Psalm 119 verse 28 says, My soul melts from heaviness. Strengthen me according to your word. That's Psalm 119.28.

[24:35] But it's the words of Jesus that get me in Matthew 4.4. He answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

[24:46] We looked at it this morning. You know, we're to meditate on God's word. We're to give our thoughts to it. Let it consume us. Let it truly be what we live on.

[24:56] Let it be a part of every decision of our life, every action of our life. We go on in Judges 6.

[25:07] He says, For they would come up, in verse 5, with their livestock and their tents, coming in as numerous as locusts. Both they and their camels were without number, and they would enter the land to destroy it.

[25:19] So Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites, and the children of Israel cried out to the Lord. Isaiah chapter 59, verse 19 says, When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him.

[25:39] Now imagine this. Imagine you're in these caves, you're in these things. You've just spent all this time sowing this crop, and this innumerable amount of people, your enemy, which you know is your enemy, comes in and just wipes it out, just destroys it.

[25:56] We don't even read where they take it for themselves. They just destroy it. Now that's not, that's just evil. That's wicked. And you just watch it.

[26:08] And you think, man, what can I do? There's all those people. What am I going to do? And that's Gideon, as we're going to see. Just innumerable.

[26:21] And so what does it cause them to do? To pray. And you know, guys, it's not until, isn't it funny, it's not until typically, and it was for a while in my life, it's not until we reach those points in our life where we can't do anything, where the attack of the enemy, all that we're dealing with is too much for me to handle, and then I resort to prayer.

[26:49] Then I go to the throne of grace. Then I'm pleading with the one who should have had a control of it the whole time. Right? Matthew 11, you know, lay it all at me.

[27:00] Come to me. You who are heavy and burdened, heavy laden, I will give you rest. Learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in spirit. We have no business.

[27:13] It's not our role to carry it. It's his. But when the enemy comes in like a flood, the spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him. Are you guys praying?

[27:25] This has been an area that I've been for a while in my relationship with Christ, apart from a meal or apart from a Sunday morning. My prayer life was pathetic.

[27:38] And the Lord has ignited it in my life, and the importance of having prayer is part of my daily life. Every week on Thursdays, I'll be honest with you guys, I look forward to Thursdays.

[27:50] There's a pocket of us of eight people, these men and women, and we get together and we pray every week. And it's like what I love for and can't wait for, and even after we're done praying, we don't want to leave the room.

[28:05] And we pray for anything and everything, however the spirit of the Lord leads. Jude would tell us in Jude 1.20 says, But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the spirit.

[28:24] 1 Timothy 2.8, I desire, therefore, that the men pray everywhere. Luke 18.1, men always ought to pray and not lose heart.

[28:38] Are you intentional in your prayer life? Do you see value in it? We've been, at our church, we've been just trying to follow where the Lord leads us.

[28:51] And we went through this season where we just felt like the spirit wasn't moving, like stuff wasn't happening.

[29:04] And we had this imagery of like a dam, and the Lord confirmed it through various visions with different people in our church.

[29:15] And then in a prayer meeting, a Thursday morning prayer meeting, the gentleman who runs it, Michael, great believer, just a prayer warrior, he runs it. He's not an elder in our church. He's just a guy who loves to pray and intercede.

[29:27] And it was quiet this one Thursday morning, and he just prayed, Lord, I just feel like there's a dam here. There's this wall, this imagery that's keeping your spirit from coming in like a flood and moving in our church.

[29:48] And right at that moment, my associate pastor, one of my elders, my youth pastor, we looked up at each other. We opened our eyes and we looked at each other because that's what we felt. And so we began to pray in this direction, Lord, Lord, do this work.

[30:01] Would you just break the dam? Would you just destroy this? Like we want your spirit to move in this place. We want to follow you. Like we want to go with you. Like Moses, we, Lord, don't leave without us.

[30:14] Don't stay put. We want to go where you go. We want you to go. And we prayed, like Lord, whatever it is, we even prayed as boldly, Lord, if it's us, remove me.

[30:27] And I'll tell you this, guys. It's like when you pray, we might pray and we might throw words out. And I think sometimes we truly don't understand and we really don't pray truly what we mean because the Lord ended up removing almost 50 people from our church.

[30:53] He just exited out. And man, was it heartbreaking. Two of those people were my elders, were two of my elders. And he removed all these people.

[31:06] And our church sits right now with this exodus of all these people that we love and so many of us we're close with. And so many that don't come to prayer are like, man, what happened?

[31:20] Why did this, this, this? And us in that room are like, okay, Lord, like you answered a prayer, but I don't think we were ready for that answer. I don't know if we truly meant, if we were truly ready for what we were praying for.

[31:38] And so here we sit and the Lord calls for you and I as men to be prayer warriors, to pray always, to pray everywhere, to be intentional about it. Prayer is our communion, when the Lord speaks to us and when we speak to him.

[31:53] And there's an intimacy there, guys. It will transform your life, but I'll tell you right now, the moment you start praying, the enemy is going to go overtime. Because you're dipping into the spiritual realm, you're dipping into where the battle's really fought.

[32:12] He goes on in verse 7 through 10, it says, And it came to pass when the children of Israel cried out to the Lord because of the Midianites that the Lord sent a prophet to the children of Israel who said to them, Thus says the Lord of God of Israel, I brought you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of bondage and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of all who oppressed you and drove them out before you and gave you their land.

[32:35] Also I said to you, I am the Lord your God. Do not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell, but you have not obeyed my voice. What a sad state to be in.

[32:47] That God has done all these wonderful things and like you and I, God has done all these wonderful things in our life. Me sitting here in front of you today is a wonderful thing. It's a testimony to the marvelous working of God, but yet it's not enough sometimes, is it?

[33:04] That we find ourselves like these guys. The Lord reminds us, Hey, I've done this for you. I brought you out of this. I brought you out of this. Why are you acting such a way? Do you not know I gave you this land?

[33:16] Why aren't you possessing it? Why aren't you living in victory? It's yours. It's yours. And God just says to him, Hey, you haven't obeyed my voice.

[33:32] And maybe that's you this morning here, guys. Maybe like with me, the Lord's been nudging me and pushing me in areas of my life where I've been complacent, where I've been sitting dormant, where I've settled. And the Holy Spirit's like, Brad, I want you to have more of me.

[33:45] I want you to do this. I want you to do that. You know, like Moses. In that moment, talking with God, Moses says, Lord, show me. Show me your way. And why does he say it?

[33:56] The very next phrase is, So that I may know you. It's not so that I can know and make a plan to go the way you want me to know, but so that I know you. And that's what this is all about. It's about knowing Jesus.

[34:08] It's about being who he's called us to be for his honor and glory. Effective. In that world around us and wherever we come from. And so God says, Hey, listen, you're not listening to me.

[34:21] You're not obeying me. And for you and I, are you obeying those nudgings by the Holy Spirit? Are you obeying? When that thought comes into your mind, Oh, man, I need to take that captive. I need to bring that in and give it to the Lord.

[34:35] I need to place my thoughts somewhere else, like we read in Philippians 4a. And for me, you know, a lot of times we're like, Okay, Lord, what do I do?

[34:48] You're nudging me. What do I do? And for me, the Lord just said, I've already told you what to do. Just do it. I've already told you what to do. Just do it. And Israel was the same way. I've already told you.

[34:59] I've already given you this. Just do it. Do it. What did you wake up to do this morning? Did any of you wake up to do anything this morning?

[35:10] What did you set your heart and mind to do today? Besides come to this conference, anything else? Did you intend to pray this morning?

[35:22] Did you intend to spend time with Him, to know Him a little more? You know, I think one of our weapons is our perspective.

[35:33] And that's 2 Corinthians 4, verses 16 through 18. They have the right perspective to remember, to know that, Hey, it's all about the promise.

[35:44] Right? It's the promises we have through Christ. It's to stop looking at me, to stop looking at my circumstances, and to look at Him, and to look at all that He's promised, and all that He's doing.

[35:56] And He says, For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. Eternal. Are we investing in the eternal?

[36:10] It goes on in Judges. It says, Now the angel of the Lord came and sat underneath the terebinth tree, which was in Oprah, which belonged to Joash, the Abizurite, while his son Gideon threshed weed in the winepress in order to hide it from the Midianites.

[36:25] And the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, The Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor. Can you imagine him? Here's this guy. did you pick up on the imagery there? He's threshing wheat in a winepress.

[36:38] That's not where you do that. You do that on the threshing floor, which is usually typically at the top of the hill. Why? Because the wind blew the best there. And it was the easiest for the wheat and chaff to be separated.

[36:52] But where's Gideon? He's down at the bottom of the hill. He's down where the winepress is because you'd carry the grapes down the hill because they were heavy. And it was easy, excuse me, an easy travel.

[37:04] And he's down there threshing wheat in the winepress for what? To hide. To hide the food.

[37:17] And essentially to hide himself so he's not overrun by the enemy. He's not even where he's supposed to be. Gideon's even settled.

[37:28] And yet all of a sudden the Lord, which we won't get into, the Lord, which I believe is the Christophany, it's Jesus Christ because later on the chapter talks about Gideon giving this offering and this angel of the Lord has a staff.

[37:45] And Gideon offers a thing of worship to them. And we know in Revelation that angels aren't worshipped. John seeks to worship an angel and he's rebuked for it. He's like, no, no, no, don't worship me. But here he is and he's settled and he's working at something that he doesn't need to be.

[38:06] And the Lord comes and shows up and says, listen, I'm with you, you mighty man of valor. And verse 13, Gideon said to him, oh my Lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us?

[38:20] And where are all his miracles which your fathers told us about saying, did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has forsaken us and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.

[38:31] Do you hear Zephaniah there? Do you hear the complacency? Oh Lord, you didn't show up. Where are you? You're not doing any good and you're not doing any, you're just letting stuff happen, God. You're missing in action, God.

[38:44] So I'm just doing whatever. I'm just doing my thing. I'm just surviving. I'm just getting through the day. Whatever comes, comes. Because God's not doing anything. Or so Gideon thought till God showed up.

[38:59] God is always working. That's one thing I know. But he's like, he throws this out in the Lord's face. Like, well, where is he? The one who did this?

[39:09] The one who did that? Where is he? And a weapon we have, guys, against this mentality, against such things as Nehemiah 10, thanksgiving and praise.

[39:21] The joy of the Lord is our strength. The psalmist would tell us that we're to declare the marvelous works, the things that the Lord does in our lives. or to declare them amongst one another.

[39:33] Or to tell them. Tell of it. I'll tell you one that just happened this past week. Sunday night, I had 105 temperature. I was struggling. I preached. I went home and I was struggling.

[39:45] And my wife took my temperature and literally at that moment, a guy from our church texted me. And he said, and he just texted me a prayer. He's praying for my health. And I was like, I texted this guy Greg back and I'm like, Greg, the Holy Spirit just spoke through you because my wife just took my temperature.

[40:02] I basically had 105 and here you are praying for my health. And so he's working. God is moving. His spirit is moving and we don't talk enough about it. And that's the reason we can become complacent because, oh, God's not doing anything.

[40:18] Okay. He's not moving in your life. Okay. His power isn't evident in your life. Okay. Verse 14 through 16 says, And the Lord turned to him and said, Go in this might of yours and you shall save Israel from the hand of the Midianites.

[40:33] Have I not sent you? So he said to him, O my Lord, how can I save Israel? Indeed, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh and I am the least in my father's house. And the Lord said to him, Surely I will be with you and you shall defeat the Midianites as one man.

[40:47] The presence of God, guys, is where it's at. Zechariah chapter 4, verse 6. And I see I'm running out of time, so we'll close with these two weapons of truth.

[41:00] And that's the presence of God. Zechariah 4, 6 says, Not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. That phrase, not by might, not by the collection of an army.

[41:16] It's not by all these people. It's not by the strength of an army. And it's not by power. It's not by my own individual strength. It's not by my own abilities. It's not by anything I possess.

[41:27] It's not by anything you possess, but it's by his spirit, says the Lord. It's the presence of God with us. It's knowing that he never leaves us nor forsakes us.

[41:39] That all the battles of our mind and of our life and of our flesh and from the enemy, we don't walk through alone. That he's with us. And if he's with us, his power is with us.

[41:49] And it resides with us and in us. And therefore, we can walk in victory. We can overcome anything that this throws against us, anything the enemy throws against us, anything that enters this mind, we can overcome.

[42:04] Because God is with us. His presence and power are with us. And sometimes I'll encourage you, we have to wait.

[42:18] We have to wait. Because some battles take longer than others, don't they? Maybe a marriage we're working on. Maybe in a church, a ministry, to come together.

[42:30] Whatever it may be. Sometimes we have to wait. But Isaiah chapter 40, verse 28 through 31, we're encouraged.

[42:41] Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak and those who have no might.

[42:54] He increases strength. Even the youth shall faint and be weary and the young men shall utterly fall. But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles.

[43:05] They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. Let's pray, guys. Lord Jesus, we just thank you for your word. We thank you for the truth, the equipping that we can find in your word.

[43:20] And Lord, we thank you that your word desires of us. You desire of us, Lord, to live in your promises, to live in victory, Lord, not to live as you would have John write, a lukewarm life.

[43:35] Lord, that's a repulsive thing to you. And so, Lord, I just pray that we as men would be challenged this morning. Lord, not to sit complacent, not to be settled in our complacency.

[43:51] In whatever area of our life there is complacency, but Lord, we would pursue you. Lord, we would desire a relationship like Moses had with you, Lord, where, Lord, we will do nothing and want to do nothing without you.

[44:08] Lord, that all of you would be in all that we do, all that we think, all that we say. And Lord, I pray that, Lord, if we don't have that longing, if, Lord, we are content being complacent, Lord, I just pray that by the power of your Holy Spirit you would free us from such a place of bondage, a place of lacking, a place of, Lord, missing out on all that you have to offer us, all that you've promised us in your word.

[44:38]  And so, Lord, I just pray that you would encourage the men this morning to walk in all your promises and in victory. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.