Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Many of us have faith. We have a belief in something.
[00:00:04] But the critical part is, where do you place that faith? Where do you place that hope? We're going to talk about it today.
[00:00:19] God doesn't design us to fit. He designs us to be impactful.
[00:00:26] I'm Ryan. Welcome to Shifts and Ladders. Just going to jump right in today. We have been focusing on priorities of God, and God being the priority. We have so many great things going, great things going on in our lives. Excuse me, that are insightful, they're loving. We have family, friends, all those kinds of things. But if we put those items in front of God, we actually turn them into idols. And the Bible says that God is a jealous God. He wants to be the number one. And once he is the number one, everything else will fall in line. He will make sure that everything is arranged just the way we need to, that is right for us.
[00:01:10] And I was feeling led to go to Matthew chapter 14, which is a critical example of faith. Now, many of us know the scripture of Peter walking on water, right? We know he got out the boat, all that kind of stuff. But what I want to do is I want to really break it down a little bit, because I want to go on this journey of faith with you.
[00:01:33] Faith has a very interesting component to it because you can have faith, but the faith needs something to be anchored to.
[00:01:47] So I'll give you an example.
[00:01:50] If you have belief that today is going to be a good day, it has to. If you believe that today's gonna be a good day, there has to be something out there that you believe in. Like, hey, I just woke up. I got a good feeling today, right? I didn't wake up on the wrong side of the bed, which I don't know how you could, but you just feel like, you know what? Today's gonna be good. I feel. Feel good. Therefore, because you feel good, you believe that things are going to be good, you're going to have a good day. You hope to, right? Or at least you'll be able to believe that.
[00:02:21] Deion Sanders had this great.
[00:02:24] This great quote. He said, look good, feel good, play good. He always want to make sure he looked good when he played ball. When he looked good, he felt good about it. And when he felt good about it, he played good about it, right? So that is, again, that's in that area is faith. So depending on what you decide to believe, you could bring about that in your heart.
[00:02:50] And the Bible always talks about this, but we don't really put it in. In Context Matthew chapter six, verse 33, which we started on several weeks ago, says, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all of these things shall be added unto you. See, seeking is a sight word. It means to find, to discover.
[00:03:13] And in order to do that, you have to focus on what that is. But God is a God that is not material. He is a spirit. Therefore, we have to believe that we can find Him.
[00:03:26] Therefore we're like, is God over here? You get curious. Is God over here? Is God in my job? Is God at my place of worship? Is God in my relationships? You start looking for the thing that you cannot see because you're looking for the evidence. And Matthew chapter 14 brings about this incredible example and image of what it looks like when we put our faith in focus.
[00:03:51] All right, so I'm going to read.
[00:03:53] So we're going to go to Matthew chapter 14, and then I'm gonna bring a couple other scriptures in here about faith and all of its components. But Matthew chapter 14, and we'll start at verse 22, says, Then Jesus commanded his disciples to get in the boat and go ahead of him to the other side.
[00:04:14] While he went to. Went away from the crowds. When he sent the crowds away, he went up into a mountain by himself to pray.
[00:04:24] And when evening came, he was there alone.
[00:04:27] But the boat was now in the middle of the sea, tossed by the waves, for the wind was turbulent. During the fourth watch of the night. Jesus went to them walking on the water. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, it is a spirit.
[00:04:47] Some translations say it was a ghost.
[00:04:50] And they cried out in fear.
[00:04:52] But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, be of good cheer. It is I. Do not be afraid.
[00:04:58] And Peter answered him and said, lord, if it is you, bid me to come to you on the water.
[00:05:05] And he said, come. And Peter got out of the boat, and he walked on water to go to Jesus.
[00:05:11] But when he saw the strong wind, he was afraid. And be began to sink. And beginning to sink, he cried out, lord, save me. Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him and said to him, o you of little faith, why did you doubt?
[00:05:30] And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased.
[00:05:35] Then those who were in the boat came and worshipped him, saying, truly, you are the Son of God.
[00:05:41] Okay, there's so much in here. I'm gonna just. I'm gonna try and get something here that will help us at least anchor ourselves to. To the scripture we are finding ourselves. And this I'm gonna say some Personal stuff.
[00:05:59] I've struggled with faith sometimes.
[00:06:02] Yeah, I'm a preacher. We all struggle with faith. There are parts in your life where you just believe God to just do what God does.
[00:06:10] If you believe that God can be a healer, he can be a healer. I've seen it, I've heard it. I've talked to people who have been healed, period. If you believe that God can regulate your mind, that he can be a person who just orchestrates relationships, all that kind of stuff, I believe it, I've seen it. But the part about faith for many people is that there are areas of faith or areas of our life that we don't have faith.
[00:06:40] People think that faith is this 100%, this hundred percent that. That there aren't areas that you aren't challenged in.
[00:06:49] You have areas of faith where you're challenged sometimes. Relationships that you have, whether you're married, best friends, whatever. You may find yourself struggling in a season that you don't think is going to get any better.
[00:07:05] You may find yourself.
[00:07:07] Sorry, you may find yourself in situations where you think God, you want God to provide for you, but you need to do something yesterday, you need to do something.
[00:07:20] And while I believe that God is a healer over here in my life, and I don't have any doubt, there are areas where you can say, God, I don't know if you're going to do that.
[00:07:32] That. That may be how you gonna provide for me.
[00:07:37] I don't know that. I don't know if someone in my family is going to get healed. I don't know if fill in the blank for you specifically.
[00:07:53] Faith is so potent that it can cause us to focus on the very thing we either do have or the very thing that we don't have.
[00:08:05] This is something that David said, oh, magnify the Lord with me and let's exalt his name together.
[00:08:13] This doesn't mean that God isn't big. We already know that God is big. And we're not saying we're making God bigger.
[00:08:20] What we're saying is we're making God bigger to us in our perspective.
[00:08:28] So our perspective in that moment is I'm gonna make God bigger than my problem.
[00:08:34] I'm gonna make God bigger than any issue that I'm running into.
[00:08:39] So your perspective of God and where you place that focus on in him is what you get the most of in your life.
[00:08:49] Most people find that faith can work the other way.
[00:08:52] If you're thinking that things will never get any better, don't be surprised when things don't get any better because we've placed our faith and our hope in something that we really don't want.
[00:09:06] So we find ourselves self sabotaging ourselves because we have placed hope in something other than God and a negative thing. In fact, that's why it's so critical for us to have our faith in Him. So I want to get to an example here.
[00:09:26] I'm going to start at verse 25. There's a lot of stuff before that I read, but I do want to say this. God knows when you're wrestling with stuff.
[00:09:36] Jesus went to a high mountain to pray, but he still from the mountain saw that his disciples were struggling in the middle of a storm. I don't know if you've been on a boat before, but when you're in the middle, you can't see a thing.
[00:09:57] You can't see where you left and you can't see where you're going, which is a great depiction of faith because sometimes you are smack dab in the middle. You don't know your left from your right, your north from your south, your east from your west. You literally don't know where you are residing in. And this is where Jesus finds his disciples.
[00:10:21] Okay? And it says during the fourth watch in verse 22, or, excuse me, verse 25.
[00:10:27] The fourth watch is about three or four o' clock in the morning.
[00:10:33] So not only are they exhaust, they're exhausted and traumatized by whatever the seas have brought to them, tossing them to and fro. They're also exhausted.
[00:10:46] They're exhausted 4am in the morning. I don't know if you wake up at 4am in the morning, but it's really one of the most quietest times of the day. There's a whole thing with that.
[00:11:02] It's one of the most quietest points of the day. Nobody's calling, nothing's happening. People might be up, but people around, things around you are quiet. And this is the time when Jesus comes out and starts walking on water and they think it's a ghost. They think they're hallucinating because they've been that exhausted, they've been that tired.
[00:11:27] But Jesus decides to meet us in moments where it's the most quiet.
[00:11:34] And then Peter says, hey, Lord, if it's you. They thought it was a ghost, by the way, but Peter's like, hey, let me. If it's you, tell me to come out.
[00:11:44] So Peter does it and he starts and this is. Peter says something very clear here. He gets out the boat to focus on Jesus. He says, if it is you bid me to come out.
[00:12:01] And he's like, oh, it is all right. So he gets out the boat with his target to get to Jesus, okay?
[00:12:12] His target is to get to Jesus.
[00:12:15] Faith has a way of making us lock in on the very target that we want.
[00:12:28] Hebrews 11, and we'll get to this soon.
[00:12:32] But it says by faith, the worlds were framed, were framed. So what you do when you have faith is you frame out exactly where you are going.
[00:12:44] So g God, when he created the earth, it says, by faith, the world was framed. So essentially, what we're in is a frame of focus.
[00:12:55] When you get your eyeglasses, what do they give you? What do your lenses?
[00:13:01] What are you? What holds your lenses?
[00:13:03] A frame.
[00:13:05] And when you look through those frames with the correct power, you're able to see clearly.
[00:13:14] How often have we misaligned our frames or have the wrong power? Because we have not focused on the very thing we need. But we brought all kinds of distractions. We made the frame so big that things from our periphery, from behind us, get into the frame that really have no point or no, they really have no point to our future.
[00:13:45] They don't have any.
[00:13:47] Frames are designed to get you looking forward, not looking to the side, not looking behind you, but looking forward.
[00:13:54] But there's one thing that was said here that I think we need to lock in on.
[00:13:58] On verse third, he says, but when he saw the strong wind. Now let me say this, I don't know if you can do this, let me know, but I cannot see the wind.
[00:14:15] I can only feel it.
[00:14:18] I can only feel it.
[00:14:22] So what happened?
[00:14:23] Something got in Peter's face frame.
[00:14:29] He saw something that is not visible, but felt what it is.
[00:14:41] So most of the time, guys, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm.
[00:14:45] I want to get this right here.
[00:14:48] Some of the things that inhibit our faith aren't things that we see, but things. Things that we feel.
[00:14:55] And what we feel, we turn to something real.
[00:14:59] So he saw wind, but wind can only be felt. Therefore it impacted his faith.
[00:15:07] What you feel can impact your faith.
[00:15:14] I ain't got nobody down here.
[00:15:16] But what you feel can impact your faith.
[00:15:21] And it can be just as real as what you're focusing on.
[00:15:26] And you still need to keep your eye on Jesus.
[00:15:32] We are going to be distracted by all kinds of things.
[00:15:38] If any time in the history of the world. We are probably the most distracted and have the least amount of attention these days.
[00:15:48] Thanks, Instagram shorts and reels and TikTok.
[00:15:54] We don't have the attention.
[00:15:56] So we easily lose focus on the very thing we need to have our eyes on.
[00:16:03] But what happens here is that Jesus says immediately he pulls him up out the water. He says, oh Peter, O ye of little faith, why did you doubt me?
[00:16:15] And Peter has no response.
[00:16:18] The Bible clearly just says, why did you doubt?
[00:16:24] Because some of the things that we think are real are just figments of our imagination.
[00:16:30] They're distractions that keep us from getting to the main thing.
[00:16:37] And honestly, we've got to declutter what's in our vision and in multiple places in our lives.
[00:16:47] I want to close with this. Here you will find in the show notes today and going forward an ebook about decluttering your soul. And a part of this is faith driven.
[00:17:04] Most of the time we have so many things in our life that it actually impairs our vision to focus.
[00:17:10] We have spiritual things that we've put into our lives, mental, emotional, relational and physical clutter that we have to deal with.
[00:17:22] But God is asking you. God is desiring to declutter the things that keep you from Him.
[00:17:33] Whatever you've put in priority, whatever you have in the way, whatever you have accumulated, whatever accolades that you are still holding onto from 15 and 20 years ago, it's time to do a decluttering of your soul.
[00:17:54] It's time because God's best is yet to come.
[00:18:01] But he can't bless you beyond the room that you have for Him.
[00:18:08] So get your vintage memories. They were great.
[00:18:13] If you got, I don't know, stuff that you need to deal with, deal with your stuff, grieve it, say goodbye.
[00:18:27] Because God has more and better for you in the future. So you will find in there a link to an ebook called Declutter the Soul.
[00:18:39] And I put it together. I think it's something that I've personally gone through. I didn't think I have personally gone through this from all types of of situations, but really it started with this.
[00:18:55] Putting my faith in focus and realizing I had too many things impairing my vision to keep my eyes on Jesus.
[00:19:04] So with that said, we're gonna keep going on this one. I think there's so much more for us to explore.
[00:19:12] But link is down in the bio or in the show notes description. If you're on YouTube, download is free.
[00:19:21] It's free 99 so check it out.
[00:19:26] And it's a resource that is designed to help you put everything in order so that you have room in your soul for the greatest and best and only being that loves you from the foundations of the Earth.
[00:19:43] All right, we'll catch you in the next pod.
