Living From Sunday 2 Sunday
Living From Sunday 2 Sunday
Faith in Turbulent Times
Welcome to the Living From Sunday to Sunday podcast with your host, pastor B. This podcast is designed to help you walk faithfully with God through the various trials and challenges this life presents. The truth of who we are is revealed in our lives in between Sundays. You will be inspired, challenged and equipped to live a victorious life that will bring glory to God himself. Come on, let's get started. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Living from Sunday to Sunday podcast. I am your host, pastor D. I want to thank you so much for listening to today's podcast. I believe this is the best 15 minutes of the day, because real team chapters 15 minutes at a time. So do me a favor Please make sure that you like, share and subscribe to the podcast. Share this with your family and friends. Let them know that this podcast is blessing them. Of course, it can be found everywhere where our podcasts are available. Make sure that you like and share and subscribe to the YouTube channel as well.
Speaker 1:So it's been a number of weeks since I've recorded a podcast, but I wanted to kind of get back into the swing of things until a lot has happened since the previous episode, and so much has happened from an emotional standpoint in the world that people are. People have a lot of a wide range of emotions. I think Some people have felt really apathetic to everything and just kind of want to bury their head in the sand and just say wake me up when this is over. Even some in religious circles right, they are choosing not to really voice their opinions. Um, and the world, I think, is looking for an answer, looking for some kind of a solution, looking for a way to deal with the turbulent times that we're dealing with. And I think one thing that I've kind of learned and seen over the last few years is that when the church is silent, the world really just kind of eats itself, like it kind of kills itself whenever there isn't any type of guidance, whenever there isn't any reliable example in the world. And so the question that I had when I was thinking today is you know there are people who really ask the question.
Speaker 1:Thinking today is you know there are people who really ask the question does this have anything to do with me? Does prayer really work? Does faith in God really work? Is it possible that I'm believing in a lost cause? Because it appears that, no matter how much I pray, it appears that, no matter what I believe in, that the good guys are always losing, that this evil, crazy president is getting away with leading us into these pointless wars and impacting so many innocent people. And one of the responses that I know is that God, we have to trust in the sovereignty of God, we have to trust that God has the final say, and the one way that we trust in him is that we just we prayed that God gives us peace and he gives us a resolve to keep going, because one of the things about this is that there are things that happen in this world that we never understand, ever. So if I can't understand why things happen, then the only piece, the only resolve that I have in my mind that will help me go to sleep and to help me sleep peacefully is to know the character of God, know that God is not really the cause of all of this stuff that's happening.
Speaker 1:Right, many people who are experiencing disappointment in this season, especially from a political point of view. Some of it is because they were blind to some of the red flags of the leadership that was running for president. Some of it was pretty obvious If you had a skeptical point of view on both sides. Right, I mean, nobody was completely perfect, but many people are waking up to the reality that they chose the wrong course of action and because, now, you know, the hens are coming to roost and some of the harvest of bad choices is now impacting him personally, and so now it's like man, I can't believe that I was naive. I can't believe that this person that I trusted did not come through in the way that he said that he would. Right. And so there's chaos, there's confusion, right, there's calamity.
Speaker 1:And so, as believers, what is it that we're supposed to do? How do we handle chaotic times? How do we handle disappointment? How do we handle being a light in dark places, when we were once confused, or when we don't even know and don't see the light in front of our eyes and the light at the end of a tunnel? Well, the first thing I think we really have to make sure that we do is we have to remain engaged with God. We can't disconnect, right? We have to keep praying and I know I mentioned earlier, sometimes it can feel like, um, our prayers aren't producing, uh, what, what we want, and many times that's our problem. Many times we want.
Speaker 1:Whenever we pray, we pray from a personal, selfish point of view. We don't always pray that god's will be done, because the danger in that prayer is that sometimes god um chooses to do things that don't directly benefit us, like it benefits other people, right. But the word tells us, um, in james 5 and 16, that the effectual prayer of a righteous man avails much. God hears our prayers right, and the strength of your faith in God results in your constant prayer, your unshakable resolve that God is going to make things right. Whether it's today, whether it's tomorrow, whether it's next week, I believe that God is going to make things right, and so we have to continue to do that.
Speaker 1:We have to not lose faith right. Our posture must be one of praying not only that we benefit, but pray that those who are innocent pray that justice comes their way, pray that protection comes, that the hand of the enemy and the evil spirits that are trying to destroy so many families in this country that they are saved from the hand of the enemy. Because I believe that, even though there is a lot of evil happening in our country right now, I believe that God is more than able to protect those who are innocent. I truly, truly believe that. So we have to make sure that we don't lose faith in God. Secondly, and this is something that I think those who are a little immature and a little confused about their standing with God and their standing with people they get quiet a lot of times. Get quiet a lot of times, um, they view their associations with those in power, um to have greater importance than their relationship with god. God knows who we are, um, and he values who we are more than what people say and think. We are right, so we should speak truth to power, even if it costs us something. An interesting verse pro Proverbs 31, 8 and 9, it says speak up for those who can't speak for themselves.
Speaker 1:Right, one of the things, interestingly, that's happened many, many months ago because of some rulings by our country about dei, diversity in um, iniquity and inclusion, or diversity, equity and inclusion, excuse me, um, there were a couple of businesses that removed their dei programs, right, and so Target was one of those businesses, and so, for a number of months, many people in the Black community boycotted Target. Because if you pull your programs, especially after there are so many Black business owners and creators who have contracts in your stores right now and, as a demographic, we really supported and bought many, many items at Target. For you to remove those programs, it was basically saying that you didn't value the black dollar. So we boycotted Target and many of us are still doing that. However, very, very recently, there were some black church denominations who met with Target and agreed, andalled for a very minor amount of money, believing that Target was going to do and make changes. And to me it just felt like they didn't really value the people who were impacted by these policies. Because, you know, $300,000 is the amount that Target paid these denominations and for many of these denominations they have enough numbers that if they needed to raise $300,000, it wasn't going to be too difficult of a thing to do. It wasn't going to be too difficult of a thing to do.
Speaker 1:But where is your resolve and how much do you love people? Because in some cases, you have to stick to your guns, no matter the temptations of of the enemy, no matter the temptations to appease yourself. Right, the truth will always last longer than lies. So it's up to us to speak truth to power and not give in when we're tempted right. One of the beautiful things about jesus, um, I believe is john, chapter 4.
Speaker 1:When he's tempted I believe is John, chapter four when he's tempted. In the wilderness, satan tempts him with so many things, naturally, that Jesus needed naturally Right, he had passed it for 40 days. And then Satan comes and tempts him with food. Right, his natural man is hungry and yet he resists because he says man shall not live by bread alone. Right, our lives should not be, should not evolve around just satisfying our flesh, but by every word and doctrine that comes out of the mouth of God. Right, we should have a stronger hunger for the things of God and the character of God and the righteousness of God and what this world can appease us naturally, right. So that's something we have to always be able to overcome.
Speaker 1:It's a, of course, but god has called us to, um, to love, not the word, right, don't, don't fall in love for the things that the world can, can, give us, right, but we should always honor god and everything that we do, right. So then, um, the last thing is, man, we just gotta. Gotta stay consistent, we gotta stay present. Um, sadly, things won't get any easier, right, um, I believe that get any easier, right, I believe that all of this evil, all of this chaos, all of this trouble and confusion in the world that's happening right now. I really believe it is exposing the hearts of evil men that people once put on pedestals and it's giving people an opportunity to come back to God, to say anything prophetically in terms of like the war.
Speaker 1:You know, the one thing about about Christians, especially American Western Christians, is that we are quick to to call everything a sign of the end of days, and I really hate that. As a culture in this country, we are so end times related. I don't have enough time to really dive into it, but what it's done is it has created our country. Oddly enough, our politics and our evangelical leanings they're meshed together right now and it's just not even cool, it's not even right and it's taking our country in a direction that I just don't think is really, really great. I really don't, because it's being led by people who say they believe God, but their actions are completely opposite of that.
Speaker 1:So what do you do? What is your responsibility as a believer? Keep hope alive, keep believing in God. We talked about prayer, we talked about standing up and speaking out, and we talked about staying focused. Right.
Speaker 1:Two things can be true at the same time, the enemy does create huge distractions to keep us from seeing some of the things that are happening on the ground up, but also those distractions are real events that need our attention, that need our prayers and our focus. So what I want you to do and this is something that I'm doing as well ask God what should I be paying attention to? What is it that I have the spiritual capacity to hold? I have the spiritual capacity to hold, and whatever I don't have the ability to handle, lord, don't allow me to get distracted by trying to carry something or to focus on something that I have no business focusing on. Some of us have the ability and have the capacity to handle multiple things, but there's so much happening right now that I believe, if we try to mentally absorb something that we just really shouldn't be worried about, we become fearful, we become depressed and we're unable to do and to handle the things that we have the capacity for. Trust and believe is going to get better. I believe that God is going to, he's going to come through for us man, he hasn't failed us and he won't, even when things get darker. All right, all right.
Speaker 1:So thank y'all so much for listening to today's episode. It got a little rantish at the end, so I apologize for that, but yeah, I just I want to encourage everybody just to hang on in there, all right, and so this podcast, living From Sunday to Sunday, is available everywhere where podcasts can be found. Sunday is available everywhere where podcasts can be found Good pods, apple podcast, spotify you know the drill Like, share, subscribe, share it with your family and friends. If you're watching via YouTube, make sure that you subscribe to my YouTube channel, and so next time we'll see you, don't forget to like, share and subscribe to our channel, as well as this podcast, everywhere where they can be found.
