Overcoming Spiritual Obstacles - LIVE

Okay, very much looking forward to where we're going in the time that we have left. I want to double check something with the desk back there. I noticed you weren't able to get Pastor Jonathan any overhead support. Is everything okay on my end? From my end? Is that a yes? Yes. Yes. But you weren't able to get what he had up? I noticed that. So I want to say that Pastor Jonathan did an excellent job given the fact that he had no support. And he just threw himself out there and mentioned giving and that whole wrap party. Wherever you are, Pastor Jonathan, you need great. All right. So I am looking forward to this because where we're ending is what I'm hoping will be a time of great refreshing in our soul. Now the way we're going to get there is we're going to be continuing on as was mentioned with our staying power series here as specifically we're going to talk about that in a moment. But a lot of what we're about to do is going to be engaging what we might call spiritual warfare concepts. And I think we're going to make our way with Nehemiah and think about some things and reflect on some things and consider how the Lord has something He wants to do in our hearts and in our lives. But we also have resistance from what Jesus clearly described as an enemy of our soul. And we need to be aware of that and how we are to prevail when we find ourselves under very difficult situations, pressure. But I'm not just talking about when things happen in life that are hard. I'm also talking about spiritual pressure and how those two things are often intertwined. So we're going to talk about overcoming obstacles. And we're going to talk about this from a spiritual, physical, emotional, relational. There's many directions we can go with this. And so I have a couple of quick questions that I want to just put out there at the opening here just to get us thinking. And so one of the questions I want to ask is have any of us been trying to make progress and grow, but we're having to deal with resistance? And I think they're still trying to get that support up there. But if you guys have that, just let me know when it gets reset. And I want to sit with that question. And I guess I'll ask the second one as well because I'm also talking about how we can learn to overcome these obstacles and these points of resistance. So whenever we're facing certain types of, I will call them resistance to our growth, we are going to have to figure out how we are to respond to that and how we're going to deal with that. Sometimes that pressure is coming from the inside and sometimes that is coming from the outside. And when that is happening on the inside, obviously it shows up in things like anxiety, fear, when it's on the outside, sometimes it's related to people issues or, you know, it's connected to other things that if they're not directly a part of a spiritual attack, they are at least connected. And one of the things I'm convinced of is the enemy of our soul does not sleep nor relends. And so I don't know if you guys have my third question, but it is what is it that you sense the enemy may be seeking to rob you of? Do you guys have, there we go. Okay. That one we have. And one of the things that as we go into where we're going, I want you to sit with this. I know it can sound a little strange to some of us, especially if you're new to the faith. Okay. Word is very possible that there are more than a few of you that you haven't yet opened up your heart to Jesus. You just started coming to church. A friend, a family member brought you. But you're open. But one of the things that we talk about here, and we talk about it because Jesus talked about it. He was clear about the reality of not just evil, but of what he described as the evil one. And he didn't point any punches. He was explicit in the way in which he said that the enemy of our soul wants to steal, kill, and destroy. And again, I'm not trying to scare those of you who maybe don't know anything about these things. But when you're following Jesus and you start reading the words of Jesus and the New Testament certainly, but just the Bible period, you cannot miss this as a reality. One of the things that Jesus taught us is that the one that he called that thief who comes but to steal, kill, and destroy. He said that the first desire that he had would be if he could literally just completely make us die of rejecting God, rejecting the provision that he had. So the first goal would be for us to reject Jesus or to turn away from him. But the second, if that is not achievable, and the second is, again, if killing us and robbing us of our faith is out of reach, then the second goal would be to essentially make us ineffective to completely neutralize our growth and development as a sincere follower of Jesus. And then if possible, to rob us of our joy, of our peace, and our sense, and this came to me this morning, I was thinking about it, and rob us of our sense of belovedness that we are loved by the Lord. And to keep us beaten down and listless, uninspired, worn down, filled with fear, anger or anxiety, and I don't know which one of these might be the card that is typically played or what you're walking through maybe right now. But again, I don't know if I can say it anymore clearly and I just said it, if the one that Jesus called the enemy of our soul cannot destroy us completely and get us to renounce Jesus, then the next best goal is to make us essentially neutralized, ineffective, so beaten down, so stuck that we do not experience the life and joy and the security and the wholeness that he has died for us to have. It is part of our inheritance. And it doesn't mean that every season of life we will be experiencing complete victory. There are some seasons and many of you who I've trained over the years, you've heard me say that there are some seasons where survival is a form of victory. But by and large, the Lord's will for us is wholeness, security, to live in His love, to know His peace, to be free and be filled with His joy. And that's going to take us all the way back to this account of Nehemiah, whose remarkable really, I mean, His life story is what we've been sitting with. Oh, at different times since the opening of the year, we've woven in and out of it and yeah, we're talking about what happened to the people of Jerusalem in the year 445 BC. And some of us may recall that they had real opponents and oppressors who were trying to discourage them and keep them paralyzed in fear and to keep them stuck in a defeat mentality. And make no mistake about it. Discouragement and fear, I've already alluded to this, are real weapons that can cripple our capacity to flourish and be the blesser we were born to be in Christ Jesus. So we're going to, we're not just going to look at that as a reality and watch what happens here, but we are going to try to create dimensions of breakthrough in our own heart. By the time we're done, our goal is that the Lord would touch us in such a way that we are more inspired to walk in the fullness of what Jesus has made available to us and that We are less likely to settle for less than what the Lord would have for us. So even now, Lord, I ask that you would speak to us as we sit with these words and with this account in the Scriptures, I ask that you would remind us that you would teach us that you would help us and that you would strengthen us in your name, in the name of Jesus. I pray this. So by the time we get to Nehemiah, which is again a book in the Old Testament and it's focused on the central figure as Nehemiah, who's a type of holy spirit in many ways. He's a leader, a deliverer that God raises up. By the time we get to chapter 6, the entire wall around Jerusalem has been rebuilt. Many of the doors we are told remain to be hung. So for the most part, the wall, the goal was to build a wall to allow them to have compounding, safety and security and the ability to have blessing and not be plundered. And we remember that that wall had been in disrepair for, this is incredible to me, but for almost 150 years. And it was rebuilt. We are told in a mere 52 days. So what had been in disrepair for 150 years was repaired under the leadership of Nehemiah in 52 days. I mean, you want to talk about a generational breakthrough? That was generational breakthrough. And so I want to come back though and watch what happens because the opposition is not pleased with that progress. And there is still going to be an effort that is made to undermine and hinder and neutralize all the blessing that the Lord wants for His people. And I want us to see the connection I really do between the real opposition that Nehemiah and the people of Jerusalem were still facing. And what can happen in our own lives as we seek to follow Jesus and bring the Lord into our hearts, into our minds, into our families, into our workplace, just everywhere. The way of Jesus is not just meant to be a belief system. It is meant to be something that Jesus said would find this way into every part of our life and that there would be a flow of life because of it, that there would be no stronghold, that the enemy would be allowed to have in our lives because we are Christ. And what He is building in us by the power of His Spirit is meant to bring us wholeness and breakthrough and life and, yes, blessing that that is where the Lord wants us to be moving towards. So let's, but watch what happens here, okay? We're going to see it. If we think as Jesus taught us that good ground is just going to be given to us with no cost and no opposition, we are very mistaken. And what strikes me and what we're about to see here is how you would think that after the wall has been built and just a few things are left to be done, you would think that the enemies would back away and go, wow, they beat us. But that is not what happened. So watch this. It says now when Sambalat and Tobiah and Gisham the Arab and the rest of our enemies heard that I had built the wall and that there was no breach left in it, although up to that time I had not set up the doors and the gates. There it is. They sent to me saying, come and let us meet together and you can see it says in the plane of Ono, but then Nehemiah says but they intended to do me harm. The invitation to talk things through with those who had been opposing him fiercely and who had a vested interest in keeping the people of Jerusalem in a place of insecurity. They said, hey, we want to have a meeting with you outside the city walls. We want to talk with you by the plane of Ono and then Nehemiah says but they didn't really want to talk. Their intent was to harm me. The invitation sounded sincere but Nehemiah refused to leave the city and make himself vulnerable. I was reminded of Psalm 55 and I just couldn't help it. It came to my mind when that moment where David realizes a friend of old is seeking to deceive him. You remember this is a great verse. This speech was as smooth as butter yet war was in his heart. His words were softer than oil, yet they were drawn swords. Back to Nehemiah, verse three. When they told me, hey, let's come and talk outside the gates and the plane of Ono, I sent messengers to them. I said, I cannot go. I am doing great work and I cannot come down to you. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you? Nehemiah replies, he cannot pull himself away from such a great work and he says he declines their offer. But they are relentless. Look what it says in verse four. They sent to me how many times? Four times in this way and I answered them the same way. I answered them in the same manner. So four times they say, hey, we want to talk with you. We want to talk with you. He mentioned four specific times where there are, I mean, there's a certain relentlessness to it. And this is so good for us because in the same way that Nehemiah stubbornly refused to place himself in a vulnerable position, we must remind ourselves, and this is a key principle for staying power, for overcoming. And one of the keys for overcoming is not to place ourselves in positions of spiritual or relational jeopardy. There is a wisdom in not even playing around with things. And that usually is one of the enemies plays is to get us to dabble with things that the Lord doesn't want us to get anywhere near. This means at least in part, you and I, and I am saying this is a lot easier said than done, but the Lord wants to help us. But this means that at least in part, you and I, love ones, are going to have to be honest about our unique vulnerabilities and weaknesses. It's very important that we know where we are most vulnerable at a spiritual level. It's very hard to create a defense system and to stay healthy if we're not aware of our vulnerability. Sometimes, and I ask if they could put this up, sometimes we may have to say no so that we are not drawn into a spiritual or an emotional trap. And I added something else, I think you can see it. I want to let that linger for a moment. It's a technique that I try to do in my own life with the Lord over these decades now. But I try to create hurdles. So we want to try to create hurdles for ourselves checkpoints to buttress our good intentions. It's very important, right, so that we are creating certain things in our lives, practices, protection zones, ways that keep us from getting ourselves falling backwards into places where we've struggled in the past. Also, I may add, part of buttressing our good intentions, strengthening our good intentions, our God intentions. How do I strengthen what is right in me? One of the ways we do that is through accountability. That's another thing. But hurdles means that I'm creating steps that preclude me from falling into patterns that will really damage me, that have damaged me in the past. So practically speaking, it can be regards to how we react in certain situations, what happens when we're tired or feeling under a tremendous amount of pressure, or how we begin to respond when we feel triggered by certain things, or when we're afraid, or when we start to speak, or we get ourselves falling backwards towards a didded patterns that we know this is not the Lord's will for me, ways of being within our family dynamic, that we go, this is toxic. It's what I grew up with. I don't want this in my life with Jesus. This is not the Lord's will for us, right? These kinds of things, we have to have a strategy to prevail for the long haul. This race is not a sprint, spiritually speaking. It is a long haul run according to Jesus. And I'm, someone say, "Wow, you're just talking about stuff." I'm going to check this verse out. Some of you obviously know this, but not everyone necessarily does. And I don't want to come across as paranoid here. It's like, this is not what I'm trying to do at all. But in 2 Corinthians 2 11, look what the Apostle Paul says. He says, "So that Satan will not outsmart us. For we are familiar with his evil schemes." Another version implies that the original word there is "strategies." That there is a strategy of hell that is uniquely designed and neutralizes us as a follower of Jesus. And to damage the things that we love the most in our lives that God has given to us. That he would love to rob us of our inheritance spiritually speaking. And this is very important. Just one more time can you put that back up so that Satan will not outsmart us. For we are familiar with his evil schemes. So here's my question. How familiar are we with those evil schemes and strategies? How familiar. Are we even aware? By the way, I have come to realize, not that I have always overcome them. Sometimes I've come to realize through failure. But there is usually a pattern of attack at a spiritual, emotional level. And we're all different. And we all have different backgrounds. And we all have different experiences. And we all have different demeanors and personality types. And we have ways in which we've been harmed before spiritually. There have been things we've allowed to happen in our lives that harmed us spiritually. There are patterns that sometimes we've brought from our youth or our upbringing. Things that are avenues that the enemy can use to get into us in such a way that we fall backwards into patterns and do damage to ourselves. And if we don't correct it over time to the people we love the most, it will happen. So what I want us to do, so when we're looking at what happens with the Nehemiah here, remember this is the second-to-last message that I'm sharing on Nehemiah. What we watch, what, watch the method, watch the technique, watch the way in which his opponents did, even with the victory that he's already won still are trying to maneuver and go, wow, Lord, this is real because it's real for us too. Okay, remember, how we thought about our pattern, what is the typical pattern of the attack? How does it come? How do we oftentimes fall backwards? How do we get stuck? Now the Lord is with us, never gives up on us. Okay, look what it says here. In the same way, now, back to Nehemiah, watch how subtle and relentless the opposition was. Once they realized that Nehemiah was not going to be manipulated, that he suspects their motives, they decide to shift their tactics. This is all, this is a fascinating thing in the letter that he writes. He says in the same way, Sam Belat, look at this, verse 5, "For the fifth time," remember, four times they tried to get him to come out, he said, "No." So the fifth time he sent a servant to me with the open letter in his hand. It is written, it is reported among the nations, in Gisham, also says it, "that you and he was talking about the Jews in Jerusalem, the Jewish people there, intend to rebel against the king." Right? You're trying to lead a coup against the king of Persia. This is why you are building the wall. Remember, Nehemiah had the blessing. And according to these reports, this is what we've heard. Your real motive in this is that you want to be king. And you've also set up prophets to proclaim concerning you in Jerusalem. There is a king in Judah, and now the king will hear of these reports. So now, come and let us take counsel together. So they come to Nehemiah fifth time, but this time they do it in public and make no mistake about it. It was designed to disparage Nehemiah and undermine his credibility. What they were doing was questioning his motives. They publicly declared, "We've heard a rumor that you are simply using the people because you're power hungry." And you want to be king, but that's your real motive. Now, we're not sure if that's true or not, but that's what we heard. And that your real motive here is to eventually lead a rebellion. And additionally, they said that Nehemiah had appointed prophets to proclaim him king at the right time. And then, Samvelat via his messenger, graciously offered Nehemiah as a concerned friend, the opportunity to clear his name. Once again, something designed to lure him away from his focus to a place of vulnerability. And this reminds us of another principle, doesn't it? Again, alluded to it earlier. A key for staying power and overcoming spiritual resistance in our lives is not to lose our focus and be lured into a place of vulnerability. This was a hard ball. This was clever. It was diabolical and it was shrewd because if Nehemiah came, they could end this thing quickly. But if he didn't, it would bring doubt and suspicion into the heart of the people concerning his leadership and trustworthiness. So for his enemies, it was a win-win and either direction. We undermine him in the people's eyes if he doesn't come. If he does come, we finish him off. That was the fifth time. And look what Nehemiah does. Nehemiah responds and we need to try to lure him from it. Look at this. "I sent to him saying, 'No such thing as you say have been done.' No such things." You're just inventing them out of your own mind. You're making this up for the all-wanted of frighten us, Nehemiah says, thinking their hands will drop from the work and it will not be done. But now, oh God, strengthen my hands. Nehemiah responds by dismissing the rumor as a desperate, blatant lie. He says your purpose, he says, is to weaken our hands and stop the work just as we are finishing it. Are you crazy? Forget about it. We're not doing that. And the phrase that I love and it's a prayer that I have prayed on more than a few occasions when I've needed courage to do what is right or to stay with what is right is, oh God, strengthen my hands. Oh God, strengthen my hands. First off, that's an instant prayer. It's, you know, I look at that, I go, "Mah, Nehemiah is not a request to silence his enemies." That would have been legit. But it was a prayer for, listen, his first prayer under this tremendous, just force is coming against him. His first prayer is, "Lord, give me strength and help me to have a firm grip. Give me strength and help me to have a firm grip." And there are times when we need to ask the Lord to strengthen our hands, to help us hold our line and stay fixed in our focus, to not quit when we are weary or we feel that hell is breathing down our neck. That our prayer needs to be Lord, strengthen my hands. Strengthen my hands so that I may do what is right. Strengthen my hands so that they may not react in this situation and make things worse. Strengthen my hand, Lord, so that I may honor you even when everything in me wants to run away from this or just go off the wagon and be reckless. Strengthen my hands, Lord, fix my focus, help me, oh God, right? And I just love that. And in Szanverse 10, when I went into the, and then, oh, and here's the final one. Look at this one. Check this next move. You think, "Okay, finally they're going to leave me alone." No, no, no. In the end of the Emeas, it says, "Now, when I went to the house of Shemaah, Shemaah, the son of Delayah," and you can see these names here, who was confined to his home, basically, Shemaah was a friend of his. And he said, "Let us meet together in the house of God within the temple. Let us close the doors of the temple for they are coming to kill you, Nehemiah. They are coming to kill you by night." So now we see another obstacle, though at first glance it may not seem so. This one comes from a leader, a supposed ally named Shemaah, who proposed a secret and secure meeting with Nehemiah in the temple. Now, it's true the temple was considered a sacred and secure place. However, Nehemiah, not being a priest, would have been violating the law by entering the temple's inner sanctum. It says, "If Shemaah was saying, in light of the desire they have to kill you and for your safety and well-being, I think the best place for us to meet is in the temple of the Lord." And so it really was here a question of integrity. It's almost like his friend was saying, "Surely the Lord will be fine with this." It was a very subtle temptation for self-preservation that came from a friend. and yet it would have pulled me. a lie into the direction of compromise. Isn't that interesting? It was a subtle temptation for self's preservation that came from a friend and yet it would have pulled him in the direction of compromise. It was a direction that Nehemiah would not go and I love his answer. It is so good and maybe one of these times when you're under the heat of battle and you're feeling that temptation, you pull it out because look what he says. But I said, should such a man as I run away and what man such as I could go into the temple and live, I will not go in. No, you know fear. Fear can easily lead us to compromise our convictions but God has not given us a spirit of fear but of power and of love and of soundness of mind. How many times out of our fear do we do foolish things? This morning I was thinking about another verse. This is perfect love casts out all fear. When we are finding ourselves struggling with fear because oftentimes anger is connected to fear. But a lot of times if we can say what does that mean even perfect love casts out of fear? The more I can center myself in the love of Christ the less powerful with the fear will be over me. Oftentimes our fear is connected to what we're going to lose, what they're going to do to me, what's going to happen, how's this going to work out. But the more I can you me, we embed ourselves, center ourselves, secure ourselves in his love. The more power we have, the less power fear has over us. I'm centered in your love word. I live as one loved. My greatest, my greatest gift is your love. I will not fear. I will not fear. God has not given us a spirit of fear but of power and of love and of soundness of mine. And come on, I mean some of us we may need to say, well such a man as I run away, well such a woman as I run away. Is this the time for me to cave in and quit? No, no, no, no. I've come too far. I may struggle, I may stumble but I am not quitting nor will I give up the ground that Christ has given me. That is taken so long to get this ground. I will not give it away. I will not run away. I will not quit. No, sir, no, I will not. Well such a man as I run away. I was neomy as response. And then neomy as and we'll close with this. He says and I understood and I saw that God had not sent him. He was pretending, he was my friend but he was not actually the Lord wasn't using him but he had actually pronounced the prophecy against me because Tobiah and Sambollat had hired him. For this purpose he was hired that I should be afraid and act in this way and sin and so they could give me a bad name in order to taunt me. In other words it was all about manipulation. Using a friend someone who cared about him to try to get him to do something that would allow them them to say, look, look at him. He talks a big game but he doesn't really live it. And then neomy says Lord remember Tobiah and Sambollat. Oh my God, according to these things that they did. And then he asked there was another woman. I didn't know much about her and also the prophet is Noah and the rest of the prophets who wanted to make me afraid. So the watch this one, look at this. So the wall was finished on the 25th day of the month of Elul in 52 days. And when all the enemies heard of it, all the nations around us were afraid and they felt greatly in their own self-esteem for they perceived that this work had been accomplished with the help of our God. So the wall was finished in 52 days. It was a huge achievement and Lu corresponds to our August September that would be where the time frame in a year at corresponds to that. The bottom line is that their effort had been so swift that it had caught everybody off guard. And they're success to two other things. One it disheartened their opponents. Kind of shocked them and took the fight out of them. And two Neomyah says it brought great glory to God because the surrounding regions were astonished at the stunning accomplishment. Remember what had been unaddressed for 150 years was accomplished in 52 days. I mean you want to talk about again generational breakthrough. About what God can do and is doing among us. This is it. Lord help us to be builders. Help us in our generation to achieve breakthrough and break out what you desire for us. Some of you are meant to break things that have been in the family way for generations. That there are certain things that have been passed down that are unhealthy and hard and sometimes not just dysfunctional but actually damaging and hurtful. And the Lord would say I want you to move into dimensions of health and strength and wholeness and what has been unable to happen for generations I want it to happen with you. And then the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob sends down blessing in the same way that cursing dysfunction sin was passed down before. But many times the battle zone, just like it was with Nehemiah, has to do with allowing the Lord to help us. So I mentioned that so much of this to me has to do with what the Lord is calling us to be. He wants us to build. He wants us to build our lives for him. He wants us to be blessed. And the evil one wants to neutralize our capacity to bless. First goal, destroy you. Me too. Really, that's what please pray for me. Because he hits the shepherd, he damages so many, I've seen this. But it's true for all of us. So once I've decided, Lord, I'm not, I'm with you. I'm going to die with you. If you allow me, my last breath will be, Lord, I love you, Lord, I'm with you. Jesus. Or I will speak the blessing over those I love if I'm allowed such an opportunity. But between now and then, am I going to accept the limitations? Because remember, that's the goal. Then let them, yeah, you could be God's people, but just live vulnerable. It's just, not able to compound the blessing. Always being plundered. Never getting strongholds that you establish. Right? So when we, and I know, I knew, I knew this message was going to have a sort of serious tone. And so I wanted to end it in a different way. So I'm going to have the band come up now. And then I'm going to explain how I would like us to end. Because many of us, if you haven't, by the way, in a moment, we're going to just double check if you didn't get a communion cup on your way. And that's in a moment. In fact, you know, let's just all stand together. And we'll move into this next few minutes together. But the communion cup, if you need one, the usurers will be walking down and they'll just give you one. But if you have one, we're going to do something a little bit different than we would typically do on our second Sunday of the month. And I'm going to talk about this song. It's called the same God. And part of what same God declares is that the Lord who has moved in the scriptures and in the Bible is still moving today. So we're, we might say, the God of Nehemiah is still the God of today. And that the same Lord that has given himself for us so that we might live in the victory of Jesus. So, you know, when we even take the cup and when we do the open the bread and we take it, it's a reminder of the victory that was obtained by Jesus for us, that he was broken for us, that he is our savior, he is our human, he is our provider. And if I were bringing it all together, I would say somewhere along the way here in these closing minutes, as we're singing, think about what it is that the Lord is wanting for you. And also think about what is seeking to be stolen from you. And how that the Lord, he gave himself so that we might live in the fullness of the inheritance. like we would live with dimensions of freedom in Christ. He doesn't want us bound up. He whom the sun says free is free indeed. That's what Jesus said. I have come that you might have life and have it abundantly. Now that is going to be challenged, right? That's going to be challenged. The blessing, the dynamic of blessing, it's just not going to be given to us without some level of opposition. But our glory is in Christ. Oh, captain, oh, captain of my salvation. So as we sing, this is what we'll do. Rather than just taking the communion at the front end, and there's by the way, there is no pressure on anyone to take communion. If fact, it'd be better not to take communion if you have not yet made a commitment to Jesus in your heart. That's not perfection. That's just saying, when I take this, I am saying, "My imperfect me is yours." I'm following you. You are my Savior. You are my Lord. And your broken body that that bread represents, and that blood that this cup represents, is what I want in me. Like I am yours, Lord. And by grace, I will follow you all the days of my life, right? The same God wants to live in us. The same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead, alive in us. You can take this little, you can take the communion anytime along the way, as we sing. There's a particular spot in the song where we start declaring that Jesus is the healer. And some of us may want to wait to that moment. But what is it? So Lord, even now, as we bring this time to a close, like this becomes our worship and our communion moment with you, we're asking you to give us breakthrough and break out. Break through and break out. The brokenness, the breakdown that leads to the breakthrough and the breakout. We ask that you would give us not just a little ground, but a lot of ground and frustrate the plans of the enemy. Frustrate those plans that the kingdom of Jesus, the king of love prevailed in us, in our homes, in our lives, in our hearts, and in our minds. We give no place to the enemy. We welcome you, King of kings, in the spirit of the living God, the blood of Christ, that cleanses and renews. You are welcome in our hearts as we sing this song to you. So here we go, a sing this together church. And again, anywhere along the way you want to take communion, you take it as the Lord leads you.