Let's uh let's talk for a few seconds about about rolling with it. That's what I said a few minutes ago. That's kind of the focus of our our message. We've been in a series for the last several weeks called Faith Verses. Because when you want to live by faith, you're always gonna live in opposition to something else. There's all kinds of other options when it comes to how you live. There's faith, and then there's there's the other things. And so we started the first week by talking about faith versus foolishness. Faith versus foolishness. That real faith, mature faith, is not just saying you're gonna do something stupid and saying, yeah, but I have faith, so it's gonna work out. Faith, real faith, is not a covering for foolish behavior. Faith and wisdom are really good friends. So we talked about that. The week after that, we talked about fear, how faith is not friends with fear either. We have typical responses to crises in life is either fight, flight, or freeze. We have a fourth option, and that's faith. And we want to be people who respond by faith. Last week we talked about faith versus fragility. It was all about foundations. Like what are you, what are you building your life on? And so we want to make sure that our foundation is strong. And we're finding out right now, as we look at the world around us, that many of the things most people trust as their foundation can't take the weight. They're way more fragile than we thought. And so we want to put our faith in in Jesus. We want to put our faith in him because he's able to take the weight. And so that's what we've been talking about the last few weeks. Today we're gonna wrap this whole thing up uh with a conversation called faith versus force. Faith versus force. And so I wanna ask you a really simple question. It's rhetorical, but I know the answer. Have you ever forced something in life? You ever you ever like force it? When I got married, my dad gave me this as a wedding gift. And this is actually something really, really special to me. Um, this is like a family heirloom. It was passed down from my father to me. I will pass it down to to one of my children, and they will pass it down to theirs. This rubber mallet uh has been in my family for a while, and growing up, this thing was a fixture. Because this is how my dad and I forced things to fit when they wouldn't fit. So, for example, when I was in high school, we bought uh a portable basketball goal, and it was for our driveway. If you've ever bought something like that, you know that it's always way harder to put together than you think. And so we got it, and uh we start putting it together, and we get to the moment where you have to put the main post into the base, and it would not fit. And you look at the instructions and it looks like it should fit easily, and we're looking at it, and we're doing exactly what the instructions say to do, but it would not fit. And so we think, okay, this one must be somewhat defective, but it doesn't matter because we have we have rubber mallet. And this is what we went to when all else failed. In fact, the words when all else fails used to be inscribed here, but they rubbed off, so I'm gonna have to write that back on. When all else fails, you go, you get this. My dad was putting it together, and like a surgeon putting out his hand saying scalpel, my dad went rubber mallet, and I said, I got it. I went, I got this to him, and uh, and we proceeded to make that post fit in the base. I mean, we hammered it over and over again until it was in there. And then we finished putting the gold together, but something didn't look right, and we realized we put that post in backwards. That's why it didn't fit. Uh, it was turned around the wrong way. And, you know, as much work as it took to force it in with the rubber mallet, the amount of work that it took to take it out because of the fact that we had forced it in, I'll just say that that was a very uh interesting hour of life. Sometimes, sometimes forcing it feels like the only way to get through. Sometimes you just have to power through, you know, and you just got you gotta force it, you gotta make it work. But but oftentimes, this is what's really interesting. Oftentimes, force is the opposite of faith. Oftentimes it takes more faith to recognize the season that we're in and sort of roll with it and trust God in it than to force our way out of it. I want to look at a scripture real quick, Ecclesiastes 3, 1 through 8. And understand as I read this that this is a poem. It's an ancient Hebrew poem, and so there's gonna be language you hear that sounds pretty harsh, like like kill and war and hate. Um, it's not encouraging those things. What it's doing is using extremes, it's using hyperbole to try to paint a picture for us of the fact that there is a season for everything in life. It says there's an opportune time to do things, a right time for everything on the earth, a right time for birth and another for death, a right time to plant and another to reap, a right time to kill and another to heal, a right time to destroy and another to construct, a right time to cry and another to laugh, a right time to lament and another to cheer, a right time to make love and another to abstain, a right time to embrace and another to count your losses, or rather to part, a right time to search and another to count your losses, a right time to hold on and another to let go, a right time to rip out and another to mend, a right time to shut up and another to speak up, a right time to love and another to hate, a right time to wage war and another to make peace. In other words, there is a an appropriate season for everything in life, and it actually takes tremendous faith to recognize the season that you're in and trust God with it, versus trying to force your way through it, out of it, or into it, trying to live out of season. We see a lot of biblical examples of this. For example, uh there's three kings in the Old Testament: King Saul, very first king of Israel. There's there's King David, uh, he succeeded Saul, and then there's a person who's king for a very short period of time named Absalom. Absalom was David's son. In fact, there's sort of this uh fictional take on the three of their lives book called A Tale of Three Kings. It's a phenomenal book. I encourage you to read it. Really brings some interesting ideas to light in their stories. And the difference between the three is that one of them, David, recognized that God was the one in control, that God was the one who dictates what happens, and that God is the one who determines what season we're in. The other two, Saul and Absalom, they tried to force things. And so Saul is king, and pretty soon into his rule, it becomes clear that God wants David to be king, that God has chosen David, that God is with David, but Saul refuses to roll with it. Saul refuses to step aside and say, you know what, my time as being king is clearly done. God is with David, I'm gonna step aside and let God's person reign. Instead, Saul tries to force things, he tries to hold on to his kingdom tightly, which is understandable, I guess, from a human perspective, but it doesn't go well for Saul. It ends in his death. David doesn't force his way into the kingdom. David doesn't force his way into kingship. He doesn't fight, he doesn't wage war, he doesn't kill Saul to take it, he waits. And he lets God give him his kingdom in the right season. And then he has this son named Absalom, and Absalom uh decides he wants to be king. He doesn't like the way his father is doing things. He's he's desperate to become king himself, and so rather than be like his dad and wait for the season that that would happen if it was God's will, he says, No, I'm gonna I'm gonna make it happen. I'm gonna force it. And so he takes out uh his rubber mallet, so to speak, he takes out uh an army basically, and and he creates a rebellion and he forces his father David out of Jerusalem and he takes over his king for a very short period of time, does it by force, and it doesn't work out well for him. And it just like Saul, it ends in his death. See, David, unlike Saul, unlike Absalom, he didn't force it. He didn't force his way into authority, he didn't force his way into power. It was given to him by God, and when someone else tried to take it from him, he didn't force that person out. He he trusted God. He rolled with it. He left Jerusalem and knew that if God wanted to restore him to the kingdom, he would, and God did. Jesus is someone who was incredible at living in the right season. In fact, in Luke chapter 2, verse 52, it tells us what Jesus was doing in the 30 years before he started his public ministry. It says he grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all the people. Jesus waited until it was the right time, the right season for him to step forward. And that didn't happen until he was 30 years old, but at 30 years old, he knew it was his season to step up, to step forward, and he did. And then three years later, it was his time to suffer. And when they came to arrest him, Jesus didn't run away. He didn't try to force his way out of that situation. He he rolled with it. He had faith because it takes faith to recognize this is the season I'm in. God clearly wants to do something with this, so I'm gonna trust him with it. We have a hard time with that sometimes. Sometimes we we even take scripture out of context so that we can just kind of power through and avoid difficult seasons. For example, Jeremiah 29.11, classic example of this, one of the most famous scriptures in the Bible. It's one of the most reposted scriptures of all time. Jeremiah 29.11, for I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. They're plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. It's an incredibly uplifting scripture, but it's it's it's almost always used out of context. People almost always use this to mean some type of immediate future, some type of thing that we're like, right now, God's gonna do something big for me. But the context of this scripture is God is making a promise to his people that 70 years from now, 70 years from now, he's gonna rescue them from their hardship. They've been conquered, they're in captivity, but 70 years from now, God is going to undo that. That's the context there. In other words, it took a it took great faith for Jeremiah and the people at that time to accept that, to accept, okay, the next 70 years is going to be a very difficult season, but we're gonna trust God with it and we're gonna let God shape us and teach us in the midst of it. Human nature is to just force your way out of it, to fight it, to say, you know, heck no, I'm not going along with this. I'm not, I'm not surrendering to this. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna fight through it, I'm gonna power through it. But but oftentimes, not all the time, but oftentimes, that's the opposite of faith. That it takes greater faith to recognize the season that you're in and go with it. Here's where that's so relevant to us. Guys, right now we're we're in the middle of a season that no one could have really seen coming just a few years ago, just a few months ago. All of our lives have been interrupted to some degree. And this is a season that most of us wouldn't have chosen, even if even if good things are happening. Like I'm spending so much more time at home right now, and I love my family and I love being home, but I'd also kind of like it to be on my terms. You know, not something I'm forced to do, not something that's dictated to me. Some of us have have lost jobs, and some of us that's temporary, some of us we're not sure. Some of us were just about to do some some amazing big thing. I have friends and no know people that are planning weddings in the short term. I have a couple of friends who who are having children right now, and you know, the husband's not able to go into the doctor to to see the ultrasound, to be there for those appointments. I mean, there's there's so many different examples of how this whole crazy uh outbreak has forced all of our lives to change. And you know, at the very beginning of this, I saw a lot of people trying to power through. A lot of posts online, and it was kind of like, I'm I'm not staying in, I'm going out, and I'm gonna do my thing, I'm not letting this change a thing. And and look, I'm not knocking you if that was your attitude. I'm like a lot of us were thinking that. I know I was in certain degrees for sure. But then you have to have the faith to recognize, okay, this is the way things are. This is the way things are. This is the season that I'm in. And whether or not I would have chosen this or not, this is the season that I'm in. Do I have the faith to recognize this season? To kind of surrender to the season that I'm in, to surrender to the fact that this is my season in life and roll with it. And let God, let God teach me what he wants to teach me in it. You know, I'll go back to David. David recognized that it wasn't his season to be king, even though God had promised him that he would be, and he recognized that the season he was in for several years was to basically live on the run as an outlaw. And it just so happens to be that in those those years of running for his life and those years of hiding, uh, those were the years that God he shaped David's resolve. He grew David's character. Many of the psalms that that we read today that were written by David that are the most precious to us, many of the psalms that we see such passion for God and such trust in God, those were written in that time. Because David, he rolled with it. He didn't force it, he he had faith to accept the season he was in, and he believed that God must have something he wanted to teach him through it. Can we be people like that? Can we be people that right now say, God, what do you want to teach me in this season? I wouldn't have chosen this. I don't really want to be in this situation, I don't want to be, you know, quarantined. I don't want to be away from work, I don't want to see my income drop. I don't want to see friends of mine get sick. I don't want to see any of this happen. I wish I could force my way out of it, but do we have the faith to say, God, you probably want to teach me something in this? What do you have for me? What do you want? What do you want to do in this? God, I surrender to you and I have faith right now, and I'm saying, God, I'm yours. I accept this season, I accept this situation, there's a time for everything. God, what do you want to teach me right now? What do you want to have me learn? What do you want to have me unlearn? Lord, grow my relationship with you. Show me what what I haven't seen before in this season, because right now, God, I'm all yours. We have an opportunity to be like that right now, to practice faith. And it's not surrendering to our circumstances, it's different, but it is a surrender to the fact that this is the season we're in. We can't change it. So, okay, God, maybe you have something for me in this season. You know, maybe there's a reason. Psalm 23 is one of the most powerful Psalms. And uh, it's one that David wrote. And it talks about God being our shepherd, and it says that he guides us. And right after it says that he guides us, there's the very famous line that though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will not be afraid because I know that you're with me. And so it's interesting because walking through the valley of the shadow of death, that happens immediately after it says that God guides us. Which makes us ask the question is is he guiding us through the valley of the shadow of death? You know, maybe following God means that you don't always go the easy route. I think sometimes we like to picture faith being that, you know, I put my faith in God and he paves the road, and it's just smooth sailing, and that's just not the story of most people who have ever lived by faith. Maybe, maybe letting God lead us means that we will absolutely walk through some valleys, through some very difficult situations and seasons. Maybe that's part of the path that God has for us. Because maybe there's things that we can only learn in the valley. Maybe there's lessons that we can only only learn if we go through the valley of the shadow of death. And I'm not trying to make it sound more uh more epic or or whatever. You know, for some people right now this is the valley of the shadow of death, very literally. There's a lot of people right now very worried and scared because of the fact that this sickness puts them at great risk. Um, for others of us, it's not it's not death, but it is change. It's it's loss for many of us in a variety of different ways. And we feel like we're walking through the valley of the shadow of death. Well, well, maybe, maybe God is leading us through this. I'm not saying God is the author of it. I'm just saying he's not. I'm not saying God is the author of the bad things, but what I am saying is that he'll use them. And maybe it's his will that he takes us through this and teaches us things that we would never have learned if he hadn't. There's a scripture, Romans 8.28. It says we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. Very famous scripture, Romans 8.28. And, you know, I hear that, and it's always important for me to remember that this is not saying that everything that happens to us is good. It doesn't say that that God will only let good things happen to us. It doesn't say that God will keep bad things from happening. No, it says that God will use everything, good and bad, for the good of us. I I read this and I like to think about uh about chefs. Um my wife loves cooking competition TV shows, and if you ever watch those, it's interesting because they will take these master chefs and they'll give them horrible ingredients, and these chefs will still be able to turn them into something that looks amazing. You could give me the best ingredients in the world, I can't cook, I'm gonna mess it up. But you take a master chef and you give them virtually garbage and they can somehow make something amazing out of it. God is like that, but to a whole other degree. God can take the worst of things and he can use them and shape them into something for our good. That's the promise that he makes for us. But it takes faith to recognize that. It takes faith and it takes surrender. All of this is to say that right now we have to, we have to accept the fact that we cannot force our way out of this. We're not in control. Some of us think we're in control right now, some of us who have prepared the most for this are tempted to think that we're in control. But but even those of us that have done that, nothing's guaranteed. We we can't force this to go the way we want it to go. But what we can do is we can step back and we can have faith. And we can say, okay, God, if you're leading us through this valley, lead us through the valley. We'll stay close to you. What do you want to teach us right now? What do you want to show us? God, we're we're yours. In fact, let's just go ahead and pray. Let's transition, we'll pray and we'll worship, and we'll just make this the prayer of our heart. So, Father, right now, we're yours. We trust you. God, we don't want to be in this season. Most of us, the vast majority of us, we do not want this to be the situation that we're in, but it is the situation that we're in. So give us the faith to accept what's happening and to trust you in the midst of it. Help us be people that don't force things when they don't need force. Help us be people that can surrender in our hearts and accept the fact that when we're out of control, we remember that you're in control. And Lord, we believe that you have a plan for this time. We believe, Lord, that you have a purpose for this time, that you will take this horrific situation that the world is facing and you will use it for the good of those who love you and who follow you. Because you do love us, Lord. You love us so much. Lord, we're so grateful for you. Lord, as we as we continue to worship this morning, I just pray that you remind us that you are faithful. Whether we feel good or not, whether we feel like everything's going the way it should go or not, regardless of our feelings, regardless of our thoughts, regardless of anything else, you are in control, you are good, and we just want to come to you and surrender to you. We want to cry out to you that we belong to you, that we lay it all at your feet. Lord, that we will accept whatever you give us and we will trust that you have a plan, that you have a purpose greater than what we can imagine. And so, Lord, we're not going to be people that force it. We're going to be people who live by faith and who learn whatever lessons you have for us in this time. We love you, Lord. It's in your name we pray. It's in your name, Jesus, that we worship. Amen.