Thank you you may be seated, it is good to be back home at Freedom Church
and I'm super excited about being here, I flew in on, Thursday. I don't even
know what day I got here. But, it all kind of runs together and super excited about
being here with you today and, and super excited about tonight. Let me just kind
of stop and say if if you're going to text somebody in the message today make
sure it's to invite them tonight you have permission to say I'm where you're
going to be tonight and you need to bring them here because I believe that
we're going to see salvation in this house tonight how many is with me on
that! How many, how many people have invited at least one person? Okay, invite
them and when they tell you no - listen here's the thing I've told people for
years don't invite them bring them just show up at their house and say you have
no choice and take a bunch of your friends with you so you can drag them
along if you need to. Hey, if you have a Bible today I want you to go to the
Gospel of Matthew Chapter 14 and I just want to
talk to you for a few minutes today on the greatness of God.
Now, I'm horrible at remembering people's names, I'm awful. Anybody with me?
You just can't remember names? Yeah, now I can remember numbers
but I'm kind of like Rain Man, I can't remember names. But,
years and years and years ago - and this is a slight miracle, I was flying on
an airplane and right before I was getting ready to get on this airplane
there's a really cool story because a friend of mine had a private jet and
yeah, if you're gonna have a friend find one that has a private jet. And so I
didn't have a private jet but my friend had a private jet and he was like hey
I'm gonna let you use my private jet. I was like this is obviously God at
work. So I showed up at the airfield and it was blue sky,
beautiful, absolutely amazing and I walked up to the pilot and the pilots
name is Travis, now that's a miracle. I don't remember people's names at all
but I'm gonna tell you why I remembered Travis's name. Travis I walked up to him
and he's got a chart in one hand and he's got his iPad and the other and he's
looking at the iPad and he's looking at the chart and he's looking at the iPad
and he looked at me and he said, "doesn't look good". I said well
let's not go then, I mean it just settles it right now. He said "no no no"
He said "it doesn't look good, there's a storm coming and it's a bad
one, but I think, we'll be okay." Well I'm like, I need you to do a little bit more than
think brah I need I need to know Travis. He goes "no no no, I've done this
before" and he's looking at the iPad he's looking at the chart and he said "I think
we're gonna be okay, here's what you need to know, I'm going to land this plane."
I was like okay that's awesome Travis, but, I had this thought
eventually they all land one way or the other they all land so I wasn't very
comforted. So I got in the plane and I looked at my friend who was with me and
I was like I think he's I think he's trying to pull a joke because there
wasn't a cloud in the sky it was beautiful I said I think he's just
trying to freak us out I just think he's trying to scare us I
just think he's trying to get us to use the bathroom on the plane that's it
because there was no bathroom. And, so we took off
and the take-off was smooth and it was blue sky and it was just gorgeous and
I'm just kind of diggin this plane ride it's just absolutely amazing I looked at
my friend I said that guy doesn't know what he's talking about.
Until, I began to notice the sky getting a little grey, and then we began to
experience this thing called turbulence. Have you ever been on a plane with
turbulence? Yeah yeah yeah, it's when everyone starts hitting the
little button, bing, because they all want to drink, right. There was no
stewardess on this plane there's no flight attendant on this plane and then
I started seeing lightning out the window when you see lightning out the
window you're like Amen come Lord Jesus I'm getting ready to leave and the plane
starts shaking all over and I'm shaking and the guy next to me is shaking and we
might have said a swear word or two but God's forgiving me we sing about it it's
nailed to the cross amen I mean but I was freaked out and as we're descending
rapidly - I might add, it's just a little bit too,
Travis turns back and looks at me and goes "I got this", I'm like dear god I hope
so Travis because I don't. And so we're shaking the plane and finally we
came out of the storm and landed on the runway just beautifully and Travis got
out of the cockpit and walked back and he looked at me and he said "told you I'd
land this plane" I said "Travis you're my favourite person
in the world". But it just reminded me that I've never forgotten
that experience and I've never forgotten Travis's name and the reason I haven't
forgotten that experience and the reason I haven't forgotten Travis's name is
because all of us that's my airplane story but for some of us that's our life
story, like there was a time in your life where things were going really good
where the takeoff was really good and there were no clouds in the sky but all
of a sudden things begin to get grey and you begin to experience maybe a storm in
your life maybe you didn't experience the storm in your past maybe there's
somebody here that's going through a storm today. Maybe
it's a relational storm, maybe it's an emotional storm, maybe it's a financial
storm. The thing I know about everybody in this room
is that we're either a) in a storm b) coming out of a storm or c) getting
ready to go in a storm. But the thing that I've learned just in my life and
the thing that I've learned in studying Scripture is this, that storms are a
stage where we can see Christ more clearly.
Sometimes it takes a storm for us to realise how great he really is and
sometimes in the good times we can celebrate who he is, but it takes the bad
times for us to be able to see who he is, and with that in mind I want to go to
the story today because Matthew chapter 14 there's two stories back-to-back that
we're going to talk to talk about, it won't take long, we'll just be here a
couple hours, and I'm gonna work through this text together, here we go. That was a
joke I'll get you out of here sooner than that. Now let me kind of set this up
Jesus and His disciples had just heard that John the Baptist had been killed.
John the Baptist was Jesus's cousin, he had his head cut off - bad day, and
Jesus and the disciples had just learned about this and the Bible says this,
in verse 13, when Jesus heard what had happened he withdrew by boat
privately to a solitary place.
Now I want to pause. How many of you just at some point
in your life you've just needed some time away, anybody in the room?
All the moms have two hands up, right? Mom's just be honest how
many of you have locked yourself in the bathroom for 10 minutes, because
you're tired of hearing "Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy", and you're
in the bathroom and you're just like dear God dear God I just need 10 minutes
and all of a sudden you see that little hand come under the door,
"mommy what are you doing there?!"
"I'm building a rocket get out of here!"
Like that's, I nailed it right? I nailed it.
Dad's like, "what are you talking about". You're out on the tractor you have
no idea what women go through. I'm preaching now right?!
But there are times we need
time away and Jesus, one of the things that I think I've lost sight of many
times, is he was fully God but he was fully man and he experienced sorrow just
like we experience sorrow. And so he heard that John the Baptist, his cousin,
had been killed and he knew he was next. So he wanted to get away. The Bible says
he went away to a solitary place, but the Bible goes on to say this,
hearing of this the crowds followed him
on foot from the towns
Like, they're chasing after him, he's like a rockstar.
When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd
- this blows my mind -
he had compassion on them, and healed their sick.
See if that was written about me,
it would say, when Perry landed and saw the crowd he went off on them. I mean I'd
be like, "do you people not have a life, go home!" But the Bible says, and I love this,
that Jesus had compassion on these people. Now I want to pause before I go any
further and I want you to know that if you're here today I don't know how
you've been treated in the past by people that say they know God
but what I know about God is this he sees you here today and he has
compassion on you, he knows your story, he knows where you are
he knows what you've gone through, and while other people may heap condemnation
on you, the Bible says, that in Christ there is no condemnation and while the
world may heap condemnation, Jesus see's us with compassion.
Aren't you glad?! That Jesus sees us with compassion.
the bible says, he had compassion on them and
healed their sick. That's awesome! So, it's one of those things where they
they're hanging out with Jesus and this is kind of early in the day
and the Bible says in verse 15
as evening approached, the disciples came to him and
said, "This is a remote place and it's already getting late.
Send the crowds away
so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some
food." Now I could just imagine this, like the Apostles are kind of hanging out, and
they're with Jesus and Jesus is teaching, and he's teaching, and he's teaching, and
his teaching. And they're looking at each other going, "is he gonna stop?"
Thomas is like, "I doubt it".
- Bible humour, Bible humour! - And, what are we gonna do and he's teaching I don't
know, and they're like well let's tell him we're concerned about the people,
because like, we're getting hungry, but if we tell
him we're hungry he won't care, but if we tell him the people are hungry, then maybe
he'll let them go. So Peter, maybe it's Peter I don't know, it's probably Peter.
Peter walks up to him and goes, "Hey listen, um, we've really enjoyed this entire
series of messages you've just preached for the past eleven hours. This has been
amazing, um, but we were thinking that the food trucks didn't show up and because
we don't have any food trucks the people are hungry, and, we could listen to this
all day because we love it, except for Thomas, um, but we have this concern for
the people". And watch what Jesus does, because Jesus is always
flipping the switch on the disciples, right? I love this,
Jesus replied, "They do not need to go away.
You give them something to eat."
Peter was like, "Hold on,
I think he's smoking crack, I don't know, I'm not sure,
but he told us to give them something to eat."
Now, here's where it gets crazier, verse 17.
"We have here only five loaves of bread
and two fish," they answered.
So they have fish and chips, right? The fish and chips thing right here in the scripture,
I'm making it English.
We know from other stories in the Bible, they didn't have it, they beat up a little boy
and took his lunch, right? Little boy had gone to McDonald's, got a happy meal,
they took his happy meal. Sit right here kid, Jesus needs this.
They said, "All we've got is five loaves and two fish.
This is it, this is all we've got, and this won't feed that many,
there's five thousand people, there's five thousand men plus women and children.
So we have a little and there's a lot,
and our little won't feed a lot". That's what they're thinking. But this is Jesus and
Jesus never does what we expect him to do, right?
And so Jesus says, "Bring them here to me".
In other words, "I see what you've got, put it in my hands".
"Take what you've got and put it in my hands"
And that's what we've been talking about for the past several weeks.
Take what we've got and putting it in the hands of Jesus.
Because, in our hands, we've got five loaves and two fishes.
But, in the hands of Jesus, he has a buffet that can feed thousands.
And I love how this plays out, I love this miracle. Basically because it has food involved.
"Bring them here to me", he said.
And he directed the people to sit down on the grass.
Taking the five loaves and two fish
he looked up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves.
Then he gave them to the disciples,
and the disciples gave them to the people.
They all ate and were satisfied.
This is the first buffet in scripture, I love it.
And the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of
broken pieces that were left over.
The number of those who ate was about five thousand men, besides the women and children.
Now here's what I love about this story,
the little boy had five loaves and two fish and he gave it all to Jesus.
He didn't give him three loaves and one fish, or one loaf and a half a fish.
He said, "This is all I've got but I think you are greater than me,
and because your greatness is better than my greatness,
I'm just going to put what I've got in your hands".
And the Bible says there's a couple things.
First of all, the disciples took up how many basketfuls? Twelve.
You think the little boy got his food back? I don't think he walked away from this hungry.
But the reason I see this particular story standing out so well is
because this is what I've seen right here in the life of this church.
There are campuses all over the world meeting today because somebody in Hereford decided
I'm going to bring five loaves and two fish because I want there to be a campus
in Cardiff. Somebody in Hereford said I'm going to bring five loaves and two
fish because I want there to be a campus in Chennai, in Kampala, in Cambodia,
in South Africa, in Mombasa, in Rwanda. And people in this church for years have
brought their loaves and fishes and placed them in the hands of Jesus and
had we held on to them they would have not accomplished anything but because
you have chosen to be generous with what Jesus has placed in your hands and
you've trusted him with it we are seeing salvation all over the globe every single week.
Because people take what they've got and they just put it in the hands of Jesus.
So in this series when we're talking about giving, I know what
some of you are thinking, "my little bit won't make a difference", and I would say
to you I'm really glad that this boy in the story didn't think my five loaves
and two fishes can't make a difference. Because when we put it in the hands of
Jesus, it just goes further.
But that's not the miracle. It's crazy, if you keep on reading,
in fact let me just say this, after this miracle, this particular miracle,
they would have said Jesus is, he's great, he's a provider, he's a miracle worker.
Butt there's a problem, there's a serious problem. Verse 22 says this,
Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat
and go on ahead of him to the other side
while he dismissed the crowd.
Now for years that verse confused me, because Jesus had so much popularity at this point.
But see the goal wasn't necessarily it to feed the crowd,
it was for the disciples to understand who he is.
Because in order for the disciples to understand, in order for the disciples to
fulfill their mission which was to take the gospel to the world, they had to see
Jesus as more than a miracle worker, and more than a food provider, and more than
a good person that does good deeds, and the miracle of the fish and loaves while
it was so amazing did not quite reveal who he was. And so he had to remove them
from the situation because, let me stop real quick.
The disciples were more than likely tempted to think they were awesome
because who did Jesus distribute the food through, the disciples. And so they
weren't Jesus but they were with Jesus and so that there could have been some
pride, there could have been some arrogance. I mean they were taking
selfies of themselves right and posted them on Instagram, like we are
awesome, and people were like hey you're not Jesus but you're the guy with Jesus
and we love you. So Jesus loved them enough to remove them from a tempting situation.
And let me pause and say that's the reason that some of you broke
up with your boyfriend it wasn't because God is punishing you it's because he's
preparing you for what's next and he removes you from that relationship, he
removed you from that job, he removes you from that situation, he removes you from those things,
not because he's mad at you, but because he has compassion on you and it has greater plans for your life.
So he made him get in the boat and and he said just go to the other side.
Now, this is not a trick question.
Did Jesus know the storm was coming? Yes or no?
Yes.
See, television preachers have the ability to make me angrier than anybody on the planet. I don't
know if you guys have really bad televangelist over here in the UK, but
you'll see people on television in America say, "Oh if you just trust Jesus,
if you just follow the Lord, nothing bad will ever happen to you". I'm
like well what about Jesus, because if he went to the place called Golgotha
which means place of the skull and he told me to take up my cross not my mattress.
Here's what I'm learning right now, there's always a purpose in the storm,
and it's not to punish us it's to prepare us to see Christ more clearly
than we've ever seen him in our lives. He knew the storm was coming!
So they're out in the boat the Bible says they're on the boat, verse 23.
After he had dismissed them, he went up on a
mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night
he was there alone and the boat was already a
considerable distance from the land
buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.
Can't you see the disciples, they're out there mad. "He knew this was going to happen,
son of God, he knows his stuff. We were out there with a crowd, we were getting our picture taken
I was signing autographs. He made us get in the boat. Now we're out here and we're
in the middle of this storm, and it stinks!"
Have you ever been mad at God?
Yeah yeah, I had like one honest person.
Everybody's like "Noo, I love the Lord with all my heart".
There have been so many times, that me, I'm pastor, I'm a preacher I work for God for a living, right?
Did you look up at God and go, "Are you kidding me, are you are you kidding me right now?!"
Like whenever I sit next to a chatty person on an airplane. I'm like, "you've got to be kidding me".
So then I'll fake like I'm going to sleep and if that don't work, I'll fake like I'm getting
sick and they'll leave me alone. I'll do what I can. But, in this story they're in
the middle of the storm, and so they went from being the center of attention
to the center of a storm. They went from a spiritual high to a spiritual low.
And every one of us in this room have had that experience. There are days when we
feel like we can move mountains, and then there are days we feel like we're being
crushed by one. But in either instance, we serve a great God who is going to use
that circumstance to reveal himself in ways we've never seen.
I'll prove it to you! This is great, I love the bible.
Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them,
walking on the lake.
Which, by the way is awesome.
I don't know if you ever tried this but it's impossible.
I met a nut one time that said, "I think I can walk on water". I was like, I'll bet you $100 that you can't.
"I have faith", I'm like, I'm about to have your money, "let's go, let's go to the lake right now. Idiot".
I said that in my heart not out loud.
When the disciples saw him walking on the lake,
they were terrified.
"It's a ghost," they said and cried out in fear.
Now, two things I want to say before I move on.
1) Don't judge the disciples, don't judge them.
See we read this and we're like "I can't believe they didn't recognise Jesus". If you were in a
boat, in the middle of a lake, in the middle of a storm, and you see somebody
walking towards you, none of you are gonna go, "Hold on, we are in the presence of Jesus.
It is okay." No. See they hadn't read the book of Matthew yet so they didn't
know how the story was going to turn out. So they saw Jesus and they said he was a
ghost. They did not recognise him and when we do not recognise Jesus we're
bound to stay in the storms that we're in. So they don't recognise him
they say, "it's a ghost".
But Jesus immediately said to them: "Take courage!
It is I. Don't be afraid."
Don't miss this. If you're in the middle of a storm today,
all you've got to do is look around, because he's coming to you.
I don't know where you are in your walk with God, but I know exactly where he is in his walk with you.
He is closer than you think, he is closer than you know, and he says I
see the storm that you're in, but do not be afraid. Now I love Peters reaction
because Jesus has just said "it is me" and then Peter says, don't you love Peter,
"Lord, if it's you". And Jesus is like, I just, I just said it was me.
I mean for the love.
"Lord, if it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the water." So Peters a
bit skeptical as we all would have been in this situation.
"Come," he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat
and walked toward Jesus. But when he saw the
wind he was afraid, and, beginning to sink cried out,
"Lord, save me!"
Immediately! I love this, I love immediately.
I love immediately, like as soon as Peter cried out, Jesus didn't say, "I don't know,
I don't know man. They got that whole denial thing coming up, I know about that,
I've read the end of the book. We're just going to let you sink, let you bob a little bit.
Bob up and down a little bit, see how that goes."
Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him.
"You of little faith," he said, "why did you doubt?"
Now, I want to just say this and this is on the side.
When he said, "you of little faith, why did you doubt?", I don't think he was talking to Peter,
I think he turned and he talked to the other two eleven disciples. Because
Peter's the only one that had the guts to get out of the boat to begin with. We've
always thought he was talking to Peter, what if he wasn't talking to Peter at all?
What if he was talking to the people that didn't even have the courage to
think he was great enough to sustain him in the middle of an impossible situation.
See Peter saw the greatness of God and when we see the greatness,
let me tell you something, when we see the greatness of God, giving is not an issue.
It's not. Infact this is my challenge, I challenge people with this all the time,
if he's not great, don't give. If he's not great, don't give.
But see I'm under the impression that he's great, because he reminds me of it.
I went running this morning, running, just went out running, and
I watched the sunrise and it just, it looked like the clouds were just,
they were cotton candy pink, and it was orange and it was beautiful
and it's like God got up with his paintbrush this morning said I'm gonna
paint something really awesome. I'd like to think it was for me but probably
wasn't for me it was probably like, for the world. I'm buddy.
He painted it and I was like, "oh he is so great!". Every time I hold a baby, I think
about the greatness of God. Do you know the odds of you being born were one and
four hundred trillion? Yeah, think about it if your mom would have had one
more glass of wine you wouldn't be here or in some cases because your mom had
one more glass of wine you're here. I don't know how that worked out, different
message different time all right. Now this is the key, this is the key right here.
This is the key to the message.
After the miracle of the fish and chips they would have called him good, provider, miracle worker, but they
didn't truly recognise who he was. But after the storm, after they went through
the struggle, after they had fought all night, after they had seen him show up in
a way they had never seen him before, after they had seen one of their own
attempt and accomplished the impossible and they get rescued when he fell and
after they got back in the boat, don't miss this, don't miss this.
And when they climbed into the boat the wind died down. Then those who were
in the boat worshiped him saying, "Truly you are the son of God."
They didn't recognise him after the loaves and fishes, they recognised him after the storm.
I've probably easily been on over 250 to 300 different airplane flights in the past five years.
I can only tell you one pilots name,
his name's Travis. And the reason I can tell you Travis' his name is because
he landed the plane in the middle of a storm.
And I think Travis is a great, I went later on to find
out that Travis is one of the only pilots in the history of the world
that have survived a mid-air collision between an airplane and a helicopter.
He's got quite a resume and if I ever had to fly on a plane through a storm I
would want Travis because Travis landed the plane. But while Travis is great
let's talk about Jesus, because he's got quite an extensive resume and we can
talk about his miracles but the one that gets me as as they crucified him and
they put him in a tomb and three days later - see he knows something about
storms, because he went through a storm but he came out on the other side
greater because when they killed him they said "he is a man", but when he rose
from the grave they said, "truly you are the son of God". And if you're in the
middle of a storm today I would simply challenge you to begin looking around
because Jesus is about to reveal himself in a way that you've never seen him before.
The storms are a stage where Jesus reveals himself more clearly than
we've ever seen him. How great, how great is the God we serve,
how great has he been to you personally. Now there may be some people here today and,
I understand if you're like this, "well he hasn't been great to me at all".
The very air you're breathing right now is a gift. How great has he been to you, what has he done for you.
And, listen going back, if he's not great then let's not give him anything
but if he is great, let's offer him everything.
Amen
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