 Howdy there, Radiant Church. So good to worship with you, not just in two locations, but now in hundreds and thousands of locations, all over the place, in our homes together. The presence of God is with us, uniting us. We're overjoyed to be with you. Jane and I, we love you, we've been praying for you, believing that God is showing himself faithful to you and to your family during this time. And we're excited that this weekend we're gonna continue in our series called Out of Egypt. And I wanna encourage you to grab your Bibles, grab your notebooks, make yourself comfortable so that the Holy Spirit can make you uncomfortable because he's taking us on a journey. He is the comforter who is constantly forcing us into situations that are uncomfortable to us, but he's doing it for our good. And I'm believing that God is doing good things in this hour in your life, in our church, our community, and really all over the globe. So grab your Bibles, open them with me today to Exodus chapter 17. While you are turning there, let me just answer a question that many people have asked, when are we going to worship together in our campuses? Again, and what I wanna say about that is this, I wanna let you know that, yes, we all wanna get together and we wanna worship in our services and both of our campuses and all kinds of other places that we gather, but Radiant Church is not waiting for permission to be Radiant Church. We are still Radiant Church. And we're not looking for permission or for somebody to press unpause so that we can continue or begin our mission. We are accomplishing our mission today. The church is adaptable, Radiant Church is adaptable. We are a wine skin and not a box. We take whatever shape you put us in. The history of the church is that over the last 2000 years, in any culture, in any situation, in any environment that you put the church of the living God in, the church adapts, it thrives, and it more than survives. And so that's the posture and the position that we have. And obviously, we're waiting to hear from our state leaders and our government in Washington about how to roll that out. But we are making plans. We just had a meeting with all of our team Radiant Volunteers, a family meeting this last Thursday in which we shared our plans of how we're going to, by stages, begin to meet again over the course of summer. We're calling it Radiant at Home. And it's going to be an incredible opportunity, not just for us to have kind of a second-class experience, but actually for us to step missionally in to what Jesus has always called Radiant Church to be about, which is to make radiant disciples of Jesus Christ. And so more to come on that. Stay tuned, but as it is right now, we are now not just one church with two locations, we are one church with thousands of locations, and Jesus is very much on the move. He is leading us through this journey, and we're praying for endurance and patience and joy in the midst of that journey together. So I wanna draw your attention to Exodus, chapter 17. By the way, I believe this is the 10th weekend that we have been online, and God is continuing to disbless and prosper that. And this is, I'm not sure what number this is of this series, but we're in a micro series under the big banner of out of Egypt called Lessons from the Wilderness. Because as I said, all of us, as we're going through this pandemic, are in a wilderness of sorts. All of us are on a journey. John Bavir shared that last weekend, which I thought was such a powerful, powerful message and an encouragement that God is with us in the wilderness. So today, the title of my message, as we're looking at Lessons from the Wilderness, is Between a Rock and a Hard Place. Look with me at Exodus, chapter 17, verse number one. It says, And Moses said to them, Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord? But the people thirsted there for water. The people grumbled against Moses and said, Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst? So Moses cried to the Lord, What shall I do with this people? They were almost ready to stone me. And the Lord said to Moses, Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff, which you struck the Nile, and go. And behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock and water shall come out of it. And the people will drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place, Masa and Meraba, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, Is the Lord among us or not? Is the Lord among us or not? As we have stated in previous weeks, that at every stage of the journey through the wilderness, God is testing, God is preparing, God is developing this group of 600,000 men plus additional women and children who have spent 10 generations as slaves in Egypt. The wilderness is about a time of preparation, development and revelation. We said in week number one of this small little series that the wilderness is a test. The wilderness is a revelation and the wilderness is a highway. It's a highway into the promised land, but it's not point A to point B. God is not taking us on a direct route. He has stages and pit stops along the way in which he is revealing aspects of who he is and also bringing to the surface the dross and the weaknesses and the spiritual diseases that are present because of slave mentalities that have to be removed from us. And the way that he does that is by testing. The crucible is for silver and fire is refined in fire or gold is refined in fire in order to purify it. And in the same way, God has taken the children of Israel through the wilderness and he's testing them. He's revealing aspects about who he is to them so that he can take them through the wilderness like a highway and prepare them to be ready to possess the promised land. And at this particular juncture, they have come through several different tests and now they're moving through the wilderness. The desert is hot. They're moving at a slow pace. The Lord is leading them out in front of them with a pillar of fire by night and a cloud, a shade cloud by day. And they're following the cloud and they're trusting that God is taking them someplace. They're leaning into the leadership of Moses but on this particular day, they get thirsty. I don't know if you've ever been thirsty on a hot summer day, but when you get thirsty, everything changes. Actually thirst is a physiological phenomena that takes place in our body in which our organs, our body, ultimately our brain goes into shutdown mode from being able to focus on anything else other than to get water into our system because as many of us know, our body is primarily made up of water, all of our organs function by water. Our brain is made up of water. Our body needs fluids and it needs water for it to function. If you don't get water, your body ceases to function. And so thirst is a mechanism that takes place within certain parts of our brain where when our body water levels become dangerously low, it triggers a flip switch in our brain to where everything else gets shut down and we think only about quenching our thirst. It's actually a survival mechanism. And in the same way, the children of Israel who are wandering through the wilderness, it's hot, it's dry, there is no water, they get to this place and they begin to complain to Moses and the Bible says that they put God to the test. And they're frustrated because now all they can think about is getting their natural needs met. Well, you and I know from the earlier stories that God has proven himself so incredibly faithful time and time and time again even when it comes to their hunger, when it comes to their thirst, God has miraculously provided for them. But yet here they are again and the switch gets thrown in their bodies, in their mind and in their spirit and they begin to complain again. Now I know that that's hard for us to understand how that certain people when they get thirsty or when they get hungry would complain because none of us do that. None of us get angry, none of us get thirsty, none of us get frustrated when our natural needs aren't met because we're all saints and we just walk in the spirit 24-7 and we know that Jesus is the water that never runs dry and continually quenches our thirst and so none of us ever get frustrated. So it's hard for us to read something like this and say, how is it that somebody or anybody or a group of people would ever get frustrated with God? How is it that they would complain against Moses? I think we all know that hunger and thirst are game changers, physically and hunger and thirst spiritually and emotionally are also game changers that God wants to confront so that he can adjust them in our lives and actually reveal himself to us. The very last part of this story we read was it says that their test, the way that they tested God was this, they said, is the Lord among us or is any? It was a test of God's presence, of God's abiding presence, of God's concern, of God's desire to meet their needs and the opposite of saying God is with us is to say God, you've abandoned us and that's exactly what they said. Moses, why did you bring us out here? God, why did you lead us out here? Us and our children and our cattle, do you bring us out here to die? What is that? It's an accusation of negligence. The real question that they were wrestling with is this, where is God in the wilderness? Here we are, God, we're out in the wilderness, we're out in the wilderness on a journey and there's nothing but rocks and there's nothing but sand and scorching sun and parched riverbeds underneath us. There's nothing for us here. Are you with us? Because it sure doesn't seem like it. And you know, one of the tests that we all have to pass when we find ourselves in wilderness is the answer to that question. Do we believe that God is with us or do we believe that God has abandoned us? A slave mentality will rise up just like a thirst will take over all other thought patterns in your brain when your body needs water in the same way your emotions, when you feel fear, when you feel doubt, when you feel frustration, those things will take over and immediately the question will be asked on the inside of us. God, are you here? Do you even care what I'm going through? It doesn't feel like you're here. I'm looking around and I don't see a lot of evidence of your presence. You know, it's easy to believe that God is with you when you are in a holy ground environment where you're surrounded by a thousand people who are worshiping the Lord and the corporate anointing of the Holy Spirit is present and somebody's there to say hi to you when you've been lonely all week and all of your friends gather out in the lobby and you drink really good coffee because you know that's important as well and you sing songs by the greatest musicians and the anointing is there and your kids are excited. When we're in a church environment and we gather in sacred space like that or you name the type of place that is a comfort zone for you, it's easy in that moment to feel the joy, to feel peace and to have your thirst quenched emotionally and even spiritually because you're drinking from water and you're drinking from these springs that other people bring in and that the Lord is obviously, he's present in those moments. But what do you do when you find yourself in an environment that's not at all like that? It's a wilderness and we're not worshiping in sanctuaries. We're worshiping in our living rooms. A lot of single people right now are frustrated and lonely because they're at home and they're just, you know, it's like I don't even have family here with me. God, this is a wilderness. This is my worst nightmare. Are you here? Got single moms right now are trying to wrangle their kids and homeschool them and keep them social distance from the neighbor kids. And it's like, in this moment, it's like, God, are you here? Where are you in this wilderness? The business owner who has worked for decades to build a business but day after day, week after week that they're not able to open and they begin to see the savings take a dive. Now, wonder what September is going to look like. Whether they're gonna be able to reopen. Is my job gonna be there when I come back? I've been laid off, am I gonna be brought back? Are things ever gonna be the same? Do you know what? For all of us, it's easy. In fact, it's natural for us in this moment of a wilderness to actually stop and say, God, where are you? Where are you in this wilderness? Because I don't see you. If we're being honest, maybe we would even say, I don't even feel you. I'm angry. I feel like, God, why would you bring me so far only to put me into a position like this where I'm about to lose everything, where I'm alone, where I'm frustrated? God, why would you do that? Did you bring me here to destroy me, to kill me? Or are you just indifferent to me? It's like, have you ever really cared? All of these emotions, let me just tell you, they are human responses to the wilderness and you are not alone if you have had them. Because we all ask these questions. The children of Israel asked them. We're asking this very question, God, where are you at? But God's answer, God's response, and in fact, the reason why God has brought those questions up in our heart and allowed us in some ways, I'm not saying God has caused it, but I'm saying why God has allowed us to stand in this position where the sun is scorching on us, where our minds are thinking about all of these things, where there's nothing in the natural that surrounds us that are indicators that God's favor and God's blessings are flowing in our life necessarily. He brings us here to show us and to reveal to us that he's not only with us, he's more with us than we could ever imagine. And he's with us, he's going before us, he's following after us, and he's a God who provides when we remember who he is. He's a God who makes a way where there is no way. He's a God that is not limited by our natural circumstances. He's a God who is always with us even when he is not always obvious. I wanna say that again, he's a God who is always with us even when his presence is not always obvious. Jesus said in John 14, he said, I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you. He said that to a group of disciples who that when Jesus began to talk to them about going to his father, their response was, are you leaving us? Jesus, you can't leave us. We wanna go where you're going because we don't wanna live here. We don't wanna be persecuted. We don't wanna think about doing ministry without you. They were disappointed because they had their strategies and their plans about their future. And now Jesus is talking about going to the cross, then going to the father. This doesn't make sense. And Jesus had to remind them, I'm never gonna leave you. I'll always be with you, but it may not be as obvious as you wish it was. This is a test of the wilderness. And when we are in this test, oftentimes we make mistakes that make getting through the wilderness hard. In other words, there's mistakes that we make when the wilderness gets hard, when it gets hard. And for a lot of us right now, the wilderness that we are in is feeling hard. It's hard ground, it's a hard journey. We're all ready to break out. A lot of us are like, I just wanna get back to normal and I get that. But if it's not this wilderness, can I just tell you it's gonna be another wilderness and the same patterns of human behavior come out of us when the wilderness gets hard. Here's three mistakes that we often make. Number one is we allow our discomfort to create discontentment within us. We allow our discomfort to create discontentment. You know that angst, that frustration, that friction, that anger that rises up within us when our comforts and our thirsts are not able to be quenched. I remember being thirsty when I was in school and played basketball. In the early days of training in basketball, our coach would make us get on the line and do suicide sprints. You know, to the free throw line, back to the baseline, to the three quarter, back to the baseline, half court, back to back to back to back. And you would do those, get back on the line, do them again, we do 10, 12 suicides. And then he would make us do layup drills. We'd go for an hour of just running and running and running and you get so thirsty. All you can think about is, when are we gonna get a water break? And then he would blow the whistle and say, go get some water. Everybody would sprint for the drinking fountain. There was no social distancing out the drinking fountain. People are slobbering. You didn't care who was there before you. You'd put your mouth on that thing. Who knows how many germs you got, but you did not care. And you would slurp the water out and you would just absorb as much water as you could get on the inside of yourself. And you knew, listen, you knew you were gonna go do some more suicide sprints. You knew you were probably gonna throw up, but it did not matter. You just wanted your thirst quenched in that moment. And there were several occasions where he would blow the whistle after we've done several of them and we'd think to ourselves, okay, now we can go. And he said, I didn't dismiss you. I'm blowing the whistle for another reason. I want you to go do something else. Nothing would make us matter. It's like, you blew the whistle. That's water. He's like, no, not now it isn't. And that thirst can become overwhelming to where it actually steals our joy. It steals our peace and our discomfort or our thirst. And that thirst shows up in a lot of different ways. It shows up as our fears, shows up as our doubts, shows up as our irritations, shows up as demonic images of a future without God. It begins to create on the inside of us discontentment where we just cannot be consoled. Second mistake that we make is we challenge the character of God. See, we test God instead of seeing that God is testing us. We put God to the test. That's what Israel did. They tested God. How did they test God? God, you don't even care about us. God, did you bring us out here to kill us? God, where are you? We didn't, this whole trip wasn't our plan. It's your plan. And now you're not here. You've brought us out into the desert to just leave us to die, our children to die, our cattle to die. And I'm not saying that when you go through difficult times that it's wrong to ask God why questions, but it's a whole different thing to test God. And what the Bible means when it says putting God to the test means to actually challenge his character. And I want you to know that challenging God's character is not the response of a son or a daughter. It's the response of a slave. Because it's rooted in fear. And Romans chapter eight says that we have not been given a spirit of slavery that is rooted in fear, but we've been given the spirit of God. We're led by the spirit of God so that out of our spirit cries, Abba Father. In other words, sons and daughters, when we are in need, we know when little kids are in need, they just say, dad, dad, Abba, Abba, but not a slave. A slave is motivated out of fear. A son is motivated out of confidence. Confidence in who their father is. Confidence that if I'm thirsty, you're gonna get me a drink. How many of us as parents, you've gotten comfortable in bed, you're half asleep, and you hear that little voice from down the hallway that says, dad, dad. It's like, what? I'm thirsty. I'm thirsty. And you'll get up out of bed and you'll go and get them a glass of water. Why? Because you're dad. And you love them. Now, if your neighbor knocked on the door at the same time and you opened up the window and looked out and saw your neighbor standing on the front porch and the neighbor says, hey, I'm thirsty. Can I come in and have a drink of water? You would tell them, no, I have a hose on the side of the house. Help yourself. I'm going back to bed. There's a difference between how we relate to sons and how we relate to others. There's a difference between how slaves relate to God and how sons and daughters relate to God. See, sons and daughters are rooted in confidence because we know who he is. We know his heart. We never question his character even when we don't understand. But a slave, and this is what Israel was struggling with, is their mentality was this. It's like all of their lives, their parents, their grandparents, their great grandparents had trained them. You need to be careful. You need to watch your step because you can't trust your taskmasters. You can't trust those who are in authority. They're gonna use you as soon as your body gives out and you're no longer any use to them. They're gonna bury you in the sand. You need to keep your mouth closed. Don't ask for anything. And they walked around with a burden on their shoulders, with a chip on their shoulders that they had to be self-sufficient and they had a distrust of anybody who was an authority in their lives. And now here comes Moses, here comes Aaron, and here comes God. And the first time they encounter thirst and they can't meet their own need with the strength of their own hand or the wisdom of their own mind, the first time they're confronted with their lack of ability to actually take care of themselves, they immediately turn in accusation to the one who brought them there. They begin to relate to God as Pharaoh instead of a father. They begin to relate to God as a taskmaster instead of Jehovah Jireh, the God that provides. And they say, God, I know why you brought me out here. You brought me out here in the same way that the taskmaster said I had to make bricks without straw. You knew it was impossible. You knew I would fail. Now you're seeing me destroyed and I'm angry and I'm frustrated and we begin to test God. Instead of sitting back and going, why, why would God who said that he's gonna bring me into the Promised Land? Why would God who overthrew all of my enemies, parted the Red Sea, turned the waters of Mara from bitter to sweet, rains down Manna every morning for me to eat? Why would that God bring me into an environment to let me die and to watch my kids die and to let everything go to waste? This is inconsistent with this character. So, because I know that God is going to bring me through into the promises of God the same way he brought me through the Red Sea, then I'm looking around here going, I don't see any way, but it's not up to me because it was never my purpose in the first place. It was never my desire in the first place. It was all his. And so if he's brought me here, he obviously is going to do something miraculous in the same way he did it two weeks ago, two months ago, two years ago. And instead of challenging the character of God, we actually look through the eyes of faith for God to show up in a miraculous way. The third mistake we make is we fail to see what God is trying to show us about himself. The question that they asked, is God with us or not? Is God with us or not? Well, God was trying to prove to them is that I'm more with you than you can ever imagine. I am more with you than you know. Psalm 78 verse 14, looking back on how God led them through the wilderness says in the daytime he led them with a cloud and all night with a fiery light. He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep. He made streams come out of the rock and he caused water to flow down like rivers. How much water does it take to quench the thirst of two million people? I read something one time. I don't know if I can validate it, but they said the amount of water that it would take to quench the thirst of two million people would be a river at least four and a half miles long and a half a mile across and 20 foot deep in the center. God brought that out of a rock. But you know when we get to the New Testament and Paul is writing about how they tested God's character and challenged God and what God was doing in the middle of this whole situation, we see something that I think we need to pay attention to. First Corinthians chapter 10 verse 10 says, Paul writes, I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud and they all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and the sea and all ate the same spiritual food, manna. Listen to this and all drank the spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, underlined that in your Bibles, that followed them and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them, God was not pleased for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things took place as an example for us that we might not desire evil as they did. There's so much in that chapter in that little section that we just read but here's what I want you to pay attention to. When God commanded Moses, Moses said, Lord, what am I supposed to do? These Israelites, these, these are your kids, your people. They're thirsty. What am I supposed to do? God says, I want you to see that rock right there. Yeah, I see that rock. There's lots of rocks. The Lord pointed out and said, that rock, okay. I want you to take the staff that you used in Egypt to strike the Nile River and turn it from water into blood. I want you to take that same stick, staff, and I want you to strike the rock, that rock. And water's gonna come out of it. And that's exactly what happened. Moses, when he took Aaron, the elders, they gathered around, told all the people to be quiet for a minute. He took the staff, he struck the rock, and water is split into, water comes rushing out of it. I want you to imagine a river, like the Grand River begins to flow out of this rock. And now there are streams in the wilderness where there was no water. And the people, I'm sure that they didn't stand back and wait for anybody to give them permission. They ran to the water. They began to lap it up just like us, basketball kids running to the drinking fountain and they're slurping it up and they're drinking, God had provided for them. But in the provision, there was also a lesson. And we don't see the lesson described in detail in Exodus, but we see it in 1 Corinthians and it's this. It's the rock that Moses struck was Christ. It was God. It was a spiritual rock. And as I just told you to underline, it says that that rock followed them. That blows my mind throughout all the days of their wilderness journey. There was a rock that literally followed them everywhere that they went. This rock followed them. Literally, Jesus was the original rolling stone. I can hear you laughing right now. Jesus is the rock that follows them. So here's the picture I want you to get. Here they are in the wilderness. God is leading them by fire and by the cloud, by day and by night, out in front of them. When the cloud moves, they move. When the pillar of fire moves, they move. God is leading them. But that's the obvious presence of God. That's the obvious leadership of the Lord. But what they are unaware of is that God is also following them from behind. He's in front of them and he's behind them. Even when they are unaware of it. And it took God speaking to Moses. And by the way, this rock will come back on the scene in Numbers, the book of Numbers right before they go into the Promised Land. And this time, God will tell Moses, I don't want you to strike the rock, I want you to speak to the rock. And Moses got into trouble because in his frustration and his anger, he struck the rock instead of speaking to it. And God honored it and water came out of it. But Moses was not allowed to go into the Promised Land because of his disobedience. What is God trying to show us? He's trying to show them, look, I am with you when it's obvious and I am with you when you are oblivious. I am your shelter under the cloud. I am your warmth by the fire. I am leading you by my peace. I am leading you in the obvious ways. Listen, there's obvious ways that God leads us. He leads us by his word. He leads us by leadership. He leads us by his people. He leads us by peace. Colossians 315 says, let the peace of God rule or reign in your hearts. So he leads us out front. But what we oftentimes miss is that he's also not obvious in how he provides for us. The point of the rock following them was the rock is Christ and when Moses struck it, God was speaking about his intentions of who Jesus would be to us. He would be the stricken rock. Jesus was stricken on the cross for our redemption. And he was also the rock that hears that if Moses would have spoken to the rock, God would have responded. It's talking about our relationship with God. It's talking about the provision that we have in Christ because he was stricken and the provision that we can gain from Christ in times of need, in wilderness experiences if we will just cry out and call on his name. Here's the thing about this. God is with us. I want you to hear that church. God is with you right now. And I think all of us know that's like, I know God's leading us, God's speaking to us, but I'm still frustrated and I'm thirsty. I'm thirsty. I'm thirsty maybe physically, but I'm thirsty emotionally. I'm thirsty to move on. I'm thirsty to grow. And God says, I'm with you, but I'm not necessarily going to be completely obvious in everything that I'm doing in your life. Why? Because I'm the rock that follows you. You know, here's what's significant about things that follow you. You have to look back at them to see them. You have to look back at them to see them. And there is a lot of God's leadership in our life. A lot of his presence in our life that you will not see right now in the wilderness until a little ways down the road, you actually look back. And you see that God was providing everything that you needed in this season. Hindsight is always prophetic. We look back and go, there was God. God was working. He was with me. I didn't know it. God was there. He was following me. I didn't know it. I want you to know that God is not just leading you by his word. He's not just leading you in the obvious things that we know God's leadership. God is also following you. He's your shield and your buckler. He's behind you. His provision is following you because Christ is the rock. David talked about the rock. Lord, you are my rock and my salvation. I will never be shaken. You are my fortress, my God in whom I trust. Jesus is that rock. And out of him flows everything that we need to quench our thirst. The way that we access it is by remembering, remembering. God told Moses, take the staff. Remember? Remember, Moses, the staff that you have. Do you remember the time when I turned the Nile into blood? Do you remember that? Yeah, wasn't that a miracle? Yeah, did it produce deliverance? Yes, I want you to take that staff. And I want you to strike the rock, which is Christ. I want you to remember what God has done for you before so that it actually releases the provision that is in Christ for you now. It's the difference between walking in fear and walking in faith. God is with us. The answer to the test is God is with us, even when we don't see it. When my kids were little and they wanted to learn how to ride bikes, say, Dad, I want to take the training wheels off. Okay, you're ready for that? Yeah, take training wheels off. And they would get up on their bike, I would hold the back of their seat. And I'd say not pedal and they had not developed balance yet. But it's an important milestone in a kid's life to learn how to ride a two-wheeler. And so I'd say, now you pedal now and you steer and I'm just holding on. And I would hold the back of their seat. And they're wobbling all over the place. They don't have their balance and they're kind of leaning this way. You'd kind of correct it from behind. What are you doing? From behind, you're giving them balance so that they can learn how to pedal and steer and look forward in time and trust you that you have them from behind. You have the seat, you're holding on to them. You're not gonna let them fall and you begin to let them go a little bit, but, and then you grab back ahold of it until they eventually get it. And you know, sometimes kids when they're doing that are like, Dad, don't let go. Dad, don't let go. And you're just like, no, I got you. I got you. And they pedal and sometimes they'll turn around and look at you. When we turn around and we look because we don't trust, we lose our balance. But I would say to my kids, go ahead, you can pedal. Go ahead, I got you. And I would let go for a little bit. Then I would grab a hold when they begin to lose their balance. Then I would let go for a little bit and then let them pedal and then grab back hold of it. And then eventually they get the balance. They begin to get their equilibrium and I just let them go and they're riding their bike. But as long as they keep looking back because they don't believe or trust me to hold on, they'll never learn how to ride a two-wheeler. Listen, God is following us. He's got a hold of us. And it's a test, but it's a test that we can pass. It's because we believe and we know that God is with us. Wherever you're at right now, I just, I want to invite you, put everything down. Don't, don't turn this off because the message is over because I believe the Holy Spirit is ministering and it has something He wants to do in our lives. So I just want you to put everything to the side and if you would, would you just buy your heads, close your eyes and make this a sacred place between you and God. Because believe it or not where you are right now, He is with you. He is with you. It may not be obvious, but He is with you. And today you may be listening, watching, and you have never opened your life and received the gift of God's forgiveness and salvation. You may have believed in God, may have acknowledged God, but you've pretty much always done things your way. You've never had a defining moment in your life where you recognized I'm a sinner and I've made a mess of things. Only God can save me. You've never had a moment where you invited Jesus Christ, the son of the living God, who went to the cross to pay for your sins. Rose again on the third day, He's alive. He's king of all. One day He's gonna return to rule and reign. You've never had a moment where you have bowed the knee to Jesus and personally repented and said, God, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for my doubt. I'm sorry for the sin in my life. I'm sorry for the things that I've done that have offended you. I'm sorry for trying to be my own master of my own life. Today, Jesus, I believe in you and I need you. I wanna be right with God. I want my sins forgiven. I want a new beginning. I want peace. I want you with me. Jesus, come into my heart and be my Lord and Savior. You see, if you will invite Him in, Jesus said, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone invites me in, I will come in. He will come in. You have to invite Him. So today, if you are listening and you know you are not right with God or maybe you've served God in the past but you've walked away and in the middle of this whole wilderness experience, it's awakened you to your need for God. Don't wait today right now. If you know you're not right with God, I'm gonna say this prayer. I want you to repeat it with me and I want you to invite Jesus Christ in to your life. Say this with me. Say, Heavenly Father, I come in Jesus' name and I confess I'm in a wilderness and in this wilderness, I'm realizing that I am a sinner. I am broken. I've made a mess of things and I wanna be right with you. I wanna know you. Lord, I repent today. I'm sorry. And I ask you to forgive me of all of my sin, cleanse me, give me a new heart. Jesus, come into my life. Be my Lord and my savior. From this day forward, I will follow you. I will follow your leadership and trust your heart for me. In Jesus' name, amen.