"Finding Rest in the War" RESCUE RADIO with Marjorie Cole

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I have an emergency, what is your location?

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Rescue radio, cause there's a war for your soul.

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Yes, Father God, indeed, the war goes on, but so does your victory.

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We praise you and thank you, Lord God, that your kingdom come, your will be done,

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O God on earth, in and through us, as it's being done and declared in heaven.

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We thank you, Father, for the people that you're waking up,

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Lord God, are coming alive, that are understanding there's something more to this life

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than what they've been told. And I thank you, Jesus, that you

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settled and secured our salvation by taking

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the death sentence on yourself, paying in full the penalty

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that Satan demanded of us, death, sin, and

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Satan demanded of us. Lord, thank you for not only sparing us and saving us,

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but also preparing us and using us and appointing us

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to do things for you and in regard to your kingdom as it's being brought

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to this earth. I thank you, Lord, for giving us power over all,

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the power of the enemy, to bind the spirits of discouragement and despair and defeat

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and disease and all the rest of the things Satan is trying to do to kill us.

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I thank you, Lord God, you said whoever sins you forgive, they're forgiven.

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Whatever you bind is bound. And Lord, we thank you, Jesus, that we do take

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authority over the powers of darkness that have tried to crush our spirits, crush our lives,

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crush the listeners. We bind and forbid these enemies that have

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attached themselves to their lives forever to be now exposed

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and removed by the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and the truth of your

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gospel, Lord God. And we thank you for giving us now eyes to see, ears to hear,

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a heart to rejoice and receive the revelation of hope and peace

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and freedom. And we also bind the powers of darkness. You said no weapon formed

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against us will prosper. That no word said, deed done, or action taken

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will be able to be used by the enemy to bring forth any shame, trouble, or reproach.

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So cover us, keep us, and instruct us now, Father, in Jesus' name.

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Amen. So, you know, there's a lot of people who are struggling

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with feelings of loneliness and anxiety, all kinds of

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heavy burdens, all kinds of things that have overtaken our lives, Stephen.

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And when things seem to even be going okay, there's still so many things that can

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overtake us. And the word of God is really clear in what

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that burden of life looks like

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in Lamentations. You know, in the book of Lamentations, chapter 5, beginning with

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verse 1, remember, O Lord, what has come upon us.

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Behold our reproach, or our shame. Our inheritance

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has been turned over to aliens, you know, foreigners.

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Stuff that really belongs to us has now been taken by other entities.

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And our house to foreigners.

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We have become orphans and waifs. Our mothers are like

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widows. Orphan and waif is like just a poor

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servant. Homeless child. Yeah, basically.

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Verse 4, we pay for the water we drink, and our wood comes at a price.

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They pursue at our heels. We labor

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and have no rest. We labor and have no rest.

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That's really a picture of what many people are facing these days.

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Yeah, Jesus in Matthew chapter 11, verse 29,

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28, 29, and 30 says, gives us an invitation.

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He says, come unto me, all you

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that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

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Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart,

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and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden

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is light. This concept of rest, freedom from fear,

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freedom from anxiety, is so foreign to most people,

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and even most believers. We're anxious, worried, worried about

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either maybe we've not done it right, not done enough, made God upset, you know.

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Whatever all it is, we just don't seem to be ever in that place

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of abiding in his peace. And so we're going to look at that today.

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He said, my yoke is easy, my burden is light. In Hebrews

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chapter 3, he talks to us, he goes back, takes us back

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to our identity. And he says in verse 4 of 3,

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for every house is built by someone, but he who built

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all things is God. And so he's talking about the Lord

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building us as a house, as a fit habitation

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for us to dwell in with him, a place for the two of us to dwell.

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But he says this is contingent,

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dependent upon if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing

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of this hope firm to the end. So there is going to be a battle

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over your hope. Despair, defeat, discouragement, setbacks,

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wilderness journeys, all these things are going to be used by the enemy to

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test your faith, your endurance, your ability to continue

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to believe what God says.

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He uses the example of Israel in the wilderness

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when they'd come out of Egypt and were wandering around.

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And it says, verse 17 of Hebrews chapter 3,

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now with whom was he angry 40 years?

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Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness?

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And to whom did he swear that they would not enter into his rest,

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but those that did not obey? So we say that they could not

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enter in because of unbelief.

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So there was a resistance to God, which

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God was promising them rest, a place of

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a life of refreshing and peace,

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but they didn't have it because they were in almost a constant

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fear, unbelief.

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So the unbelief became the barrier to entering into the rest of God.

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The fear, the unbelief, the what ifs, the oh noes.

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And then he goes on to say in verse 12 of Hebrews 3,

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he says, beware, brethren. So be aware.

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There's something to be concerned about here.

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Lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief and departure

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So there's a tendency, there's a fear, there's a danger

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of departing from the faith of God.

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Departing from the promises of God.

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Whose report are you going to believe? Are you going to believe what God says or what the devil says?

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We're in a tremendous conflict because

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Satan has set everything up in this world to

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sustain his narrative. His narrative of it's up to you,

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it's up to you to take care of yourself. No one else really cares about you.

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You've got a dog eat dog kind of fight your way through everything.

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And he really kind of tries to silence the words of God's comfort

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and creating that barrier

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through unbelief and fear and departing from the living God.

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It's interesting. Doubt is more like, okay, I want to believe,

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but I'm not sure if I can. Like the man that had the

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son, the epileptic son, he says, I believe, Lord, I believe,

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but help my unbelief. He confessed his doubt. He says, I believe,

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but there's some doubt here. Unbelief is more like, I'm not

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going to believe. I refuse to believe. I will not believe.

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Well, and it's, I think our faith is eroded away

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by the everyday circumstances of life. And we don't really

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rebuild our faith through the word of God or through meditating

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on the word of God or speaking it or in our own hearts or in our

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conversations. But he says, beware, lest an evil heart of unbelief

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bring forth the deceitfulness of sin.

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So the more we live in this place of

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sin or feeling alienated and

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separated from God, the more that creates a deceitfulness or

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deception that hardens us. He says,

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so what is this deceitfulness of sin?

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What does it do to close off our hope, our freedom?

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What is this sin that separates us from the love of God?

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Well, anything really that separates us from the love of God and his blessing is

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sin. Sin produces that separation. It cuts us off.

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And when you're feeling cut off, then you're going to feel abandoned and alone and

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anxious. These are just absolute, that's going to be the byproduct of being cut off from

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God. And that's the devil's whole thing is to cut us off from God's peace and from

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his love. And so therefore we end up

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carrying these heavy burdens of life ourselves. Now, what are these burdens?

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Well, it can be a sickness. It can be infirmity. It can be someone else's sickness or

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infirmity. It can be the loss of a child. It can be financial hardships. It can be a breakup.

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It can be a broken marriage. We carry the trying to do

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life by ourselves. This is the problem. We try to do life

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by ourselves to prove that we can do it. And this is what the world promotes.

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It's up to you. Take control. Make your decisions.

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All these kinds of things. They throw on us the impossible task

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of living our lives by ourselves. And then they shame us

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and scoff at us for trying to do it because it doesn't

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work. We end up then in their institutions, in their hospitals, in their

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recovery programs, whatever all that looks like. And it just becomes a vicious

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recycling program. So trying to do life by

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ourselves carries with it a certain heaviness. Jesus is

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talking about, come unto me. Come unto me. How do we do that?

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Because otherwise that heaviness, that fear is going to open the door to

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trouble and sadness. But Jesus says

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rest and release comes from identifying

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the deceitfulness of sin. He says we have to recognize

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that before you can fix a problem, you have to realize you have a problem.

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Yeah. Well, sin promises

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what it doesn't pay. In other words, it promises

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you go this way, you live in anger

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or bitterness, you'll get revenge. You live

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in lust, you'll have pleasure. You'll have love.

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And it goes on and on. But

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sin is deceitful. This is why people

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go for it. They think sin is the way to go. Because it's an

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immediate gratification of something. And it's very deceptive

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because you don't see that at the onset. You

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use that remedy, whatever Satan offers you, and you have this instant

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relief from the anxiety or the fear or the moment. It's like

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the lure for the fish. It looks good.

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You don't realize there's a hook in it.

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Instead of getting lunch, you end up in a frying pan

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for somebody's lunch.

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Again, without guidance, without the word of God, we're

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trying to figure our life out on our own or with the

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advice of institutions and people that are not

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dedicated to God or interested in God. We're trying to figure out our life

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and so we become surrounded by all kinds of

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things that don't work. And we don't even realize

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there is One, the One, who gave us our

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life in the first place, who created us, who called us, invited us to come and follow

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Him. We miss the invitation because we're so busy, frantically

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trying to fix everything and do it ourselves and do it right.

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And so what happens is that burden, that heavy

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burden of life and hopelessness and despair

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and abuse and entrapment and sorrow builds up.

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It builds up in our life and pretty soon we're just buried underneath

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all of this until we can hardly find a place

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to surrender because

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surrender is actually the key. Surrendering to God is not giving up to the devil and

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killing yourself, but surrendering to God is actually the key to

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release from trying to do it ourselves.

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Well, God established the Sabbath day. He says, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

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So He knows that we need physical

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rest. He knows that we need that time of

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refreshing. But the thing

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is, if you think of what the Jewish religion did

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back in the day, they made all kinds of rules

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about the Sabbath. They worked hard to produce a whole bunch of rules

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about what you're supposed to do when you're resting.

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And Jesus said, listen, you got it all backwards.

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The Sabbath was made for man, not man

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for the Sabbath. So when He came along,

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Jesus came along, He was there to straighten that whole thing

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out. And basically, we're not just saying, okay, you can just

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hang out and rest and be lazy and take naps

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one day a week, that sort of thing. But He's talking about something much deeper.

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A deeper rest, abiding rest. Jesus says, I'm the vine, abide

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in me. And this is where our strength comes, our nourishment, our energy,

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our vision, our anointing, our direction. It all comes from the vine.

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But if you're not connected to the vine, then you're still on your own.

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So surrendering to God's will means we have to surrender

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to lay down our own will, our own ideas, the

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things we were born to believe or taught to believe. And so surrendering to God's will

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is not defeat. It is victory.

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Continuing to go on in rebellion and distrust and unbelief and doing it myself

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and concerned about what others are going to think and all of this

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that God is not for us. When life gets

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hard to begin, when it begins to collapse around us,

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our temptation is to prove I'm right and try

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harder or completely give up. But Matthew 11, 29 says

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Jesus says, don't do that. He says, come to me.

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Come unto me. So the first step to freedom and rest is to step

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down from what we're trying to do ourselves and step into God's divine

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destiny and purpose for our lives for which you were created. So finding your

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identity and your purpose and to stop taking your direction

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from all kinds of spirits of fear that dwelt within us

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and all around us. Those demons are not only around us, they are

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actually orchestrating their plots to take us down from within

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us. The spirit of fear, the spirit of the programming,

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the unbelief, the bitterness,

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the injustices. All of these things that we've experienced are all

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Satan's plan to build his case against our hope

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and take us down and cause us to go into that place of despair and defeat.

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Yeah, and really rest. You want to get a lot

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done, rest. Some people, you know, we get so hyped up about certain

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things. And the thing is, with this rest that the Lord's

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talking about, it's talking about unabiding, hanging out.

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Paul recognized that. He said,

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I was more labored more abundantly than

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all the others. And first Corinthians 1510, but

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by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace toward

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me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all

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yet. Not I, but the grace of God, which was with me. So he's

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saying we have to work harder than anybody else. But we have to

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choose. It was grace that was there. There was a rest thing.

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Sometimes we're so used to you have to get all hyped up to

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certain things. The way to accomplish great things in the

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kingdom of God is to rest. That doesn't mean you're lazy.

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It just means you let go. And it also might mean

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to defeat or cast out that spirit

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of drivenness, that spirit of fear, that spirit of condemnation, guilt, shame, that's always

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pressing you to prove your worth, to prove you know what you're doing.

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So that evil heart of unbelief is trying to take over your

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spirit. So our heart is full of fear. The Bible

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says, Jeremiah, the heart is deceitful above all else and desperately

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wicked. Who can know it? So what many people are living by, following their heart,

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trying to be true to their heart, trying to hear what their heart is wanting.

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But we really can't go there because the heart is deceitful. It's going to pull you into that

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place of torment and feelings like you're failing or like you

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have to try harder. And so ultimately, the evil heart of

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unbelief is really trying to suffocate us with

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defeat and death. So we must recognize that as a

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spirit and cast it out because otherwise it's going to be,

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it's me. I should do something. It's me. We're putting

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all this blame, all of this expectation on me

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and me is not I am. I am a little

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I am of the great I am. But Satan reinterprets

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the failure, the anxiety, the loneliness to being

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my responsibility. And so therefore he gives me lots of jobs

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to do to make it fix it and make it go away. And what it really does

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is it just keeps that vicious cycle going round and round. Yeah. And God

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never called us to be purpose driven. He called us to be spirit

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led, to hang out, to abide in Jesus and to

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be led by his spirit. And the thing is, too, is

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you know, on the cross, it was finished. Jesus said

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it is finished. The price has been paid. We're

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coming to believe in the finished work of Jesus

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Christ. That's the process, too. You know, I mean, it's a revelation, but it's also a

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process of laying down your own life and letting Jesus Christ finish the

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work in us. That's part of the rest. There it is

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because we're not striving to earn salvation or

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make our salvation better. Jesus. And sometimes

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this is just very, this is very close quarters here.

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You can be saying, you know, I want to grow in, Lyle says to grow

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in grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We're

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growing, we're moving, we're developing. God's enlarging our capacity

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for him and for service. At the same time we're

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resting. At the same time. It's like a little child who is growing.

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He's growing bigger and stronger and eating his yummy

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food and having birthdays. But he's in the process of

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growing stronger. He's also being.

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He's breathing. He's believing. He's not striving to grow. He is

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just being. And through that being, the process of growth happens. I think the same

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is true of us. We need to, we want to understand that

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the coming to that place of surrender often

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comes, there's a hard place that we come to before we surrender.

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It may have been a very difficult journey, a crisis,

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a calamity, whatever it might be. And that can turn you, that calamity can turn

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you bitter against God or it can bring you closer to God.

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So it just depends on how you're going to respond to this

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thing. Is it going to bring you closer to God or destroy you?

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And so a lot of people don't realize

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that there is an innate rebellion and resistance

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and we could call it fear or a desire to become afraid,

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turn back, to become, you know, to the

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weak, go back to the weak and beggarly elements of the world and its

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solutions instead of going forward and moving forward

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in God. So coming to the end of ourselves is actually

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a good thing if we surrender.

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We can be trapped with no money to make it,

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no one left to help us. We're in a corner,

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backed up against a wall. But at some point, at any point along that

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process or that downward spiral, at any point,

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if you ask God for help, he will help you in the most

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remarkable and tremendous ways.

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And basically rest, this rest, it's a peace that comes

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when we just surrender our fears to the Lord.

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Because this is what it is, surrendering our fear of failure,

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surrendering our fear of what's not working.

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And what happens is that when we surrender our fears to him

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and he delivers us, the Bible says, the psalmist

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said, I sought the Lord and he heard me and he delivered me from all

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my fears. And what comes there

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once you do that is the peace of God.

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Well, you know, it's really interesting that we all start out in very different places

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in the snake pit. Some people have advantage, it would appear. And some people are born

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on the deep end of the snake pit where it's abandoned, no parents in the whole

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nine yards. But, you know, it doesn't matter in a way

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how you got to that place where you are.

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Whether it's through family of origin or placement in the snake pit, it's the same

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invitation for all of us. There's, you know, come unto me.

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Come, believe, know the truth, know that God

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has never left us, that he's all about bringing us back to the place

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of crossing over. We are crossing over from Egypt

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into the promised land. That's what this whole life is. It's about crossing over

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and leaving behind the things that Satan says are going to be

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your friend and help you and believing what God says, even though

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at the time we're making those decisions, there may be no

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apparent blessing or fruit in what we're doing except

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simply that we're obeying God and obedience to God brings

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blessing. So if we're caught in the wilderness of bitterness,

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I think that's a big one. Bitterness. Bitter against God. Where was God? How come

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God didn't help me? Why did God let all this happen? When we don't understand the chasing

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of the Lord, it becomes a bitterness that Satan uses then

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to tempt us to go into a place of double-mindedness

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and go back to doing it on our own. And so we

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look for all the false comforts and the enchantments.

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There's a lot of places Satan has provided for us to escape

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and hang out until he gets around to offering us

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the suicide pill or whatever it is.

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There's a world full of false promises and fake reality out there that

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Satan is just waiting to introduce you to.

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The only way, what do we do? We go back to the Word of God. We go back to the

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promises. Lay hold of the promises of God.

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God wants the promises to

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enter into His rest and never leave us or forsake us.

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This brings glory to God. In a lot of ways, it's like dying.

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I've got to die to this world, give up my struggle

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and then enter into the rest of God.

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Yeah, he says in Matthew 11, 29,

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take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and lowly in heart

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and you will find rest for your souls.

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Take my yoke upon you. We pretty much all know what a yoke is, like a yoke of

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oxen. It's this wooden thing. They're hooked together where they used to plow

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and still do in a lot of countries.

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When you said take my yoke upon you, he's talking

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about like teachers did. In other words,

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if you were going to be the follower of a particular

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teacher, it was described as taking their yoke

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upon you. In other words, you're committing yourself

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to learn from them. That's what

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he's saying. You're becoming my student. What we're called to be

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students of Jesus. And Jesus said that's not hard.

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It's actually easier to follow Jesus and do what he said and let him

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do the heavy lifting than to make

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it all happen yourself because we're not going to make it happen. We're going to fall

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apart. But one of the bigger things, though, is to let go of the pride, the fear,

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the lies, let go of the influences of the evil one, let go of

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the expectations of other people and the bondages that we've been

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brought into because of those expectations. And somehow

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we're used to doing what we do and we're defending what we do because we think

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it's us when in fact it's just the enemy deceiving us.

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And we've been programmed. And that programming has been running

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almost every aspect of our life since our first breath. And we do

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not understand that. We do not understand that this spiritual war between God and Satan is for

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everything. It's fought on every level

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for what? For you. For you to become

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either the victim of Satan or the son of God.

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And so when we enter into the promise of his rest, his

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revelation, his peace, his embrace, we need to know that God is good all the time

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and we must come back to our own true identity as sons and daughters of God

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made in the image of God from the beginning of our creation, that he

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has known us and has chosen us for himself.

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But he had to let go of us. He made us and then he had to give us

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a free will to reject him if we so choose because

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he's not going to force us or anyone else just like he gave Lucifer

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the option of whether he wanted to be Lucifer

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the morning star or if he wanted to be

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whatever. And Lucifer said, I want to be God. And so every angel, every

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star, every son and daughter of God gets to choose whether they want

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to be who God has created them to be. And many, when you reject your own

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identity, you reject your origin, you reject

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your destiny, then you're living in a no man's land of fear,

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stress, anxiety, and all you can do at that point is hope you can find some

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demonic false comfort to get you to the next day. But it's not

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going to work for long. And so, again, knowing the

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love of God is how we can take that yoke. Because Jesus said,

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my yoke is easy, my burden is light. So if you're carrying a heavy backpack, whether it's

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condemnation or guilt or shame or not knowing you're loved or whatever it is,

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that backpack doesn't belong to you. It belongs to Jesus. He said, my yoke is easy.

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Follow me. So, again, some of us might need to

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sit down, lay down, let go of, let the Lord

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take those backpacks off of our lives so that we can

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walk in the rest and the peace and the love and the grace of

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knowing that it's going to be okay, I'm okay, I am loved, God is here.

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That kind of reason. Yeah, this rest comes about

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because we're trusting in his person and who he is.

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We're trusting in his power, we're trusting in his provision that he's going to

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provide for us. And it's a peace.

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This rest is a peace that comes to us when we surrender

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everything to him. And it's a

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security. This rest is like a security

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due to our awareness of his love

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for us, his presence with us,

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his protection over us, and his power to us

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and through us. It's knowing we're loved.

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It's knowing we're not alone. God is with us.

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And all things, Romans 8, 28, work together for good to those who love God.

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Knowing those things gives you courage to enter into that place

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of rest in the midst of the storm. We see the storms are just

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brewing and raging and just on the horizon, just under

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the surface, just all around us, ready to close in on every level.

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But know this, that God also is in control

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of all of these things that are terrifying us. And we can let

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God be God. And we can thank him, be grateful,

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thank him, and walk in the place he's provided for us, which is a place of

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safety and rest while he does what he needs to do to deal

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with this world. So that is our recommendation and our advice to you.

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And this is what the Lord says in Philippians.

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Philippians 4, 6, and 7,

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But in everything by prayer and supplication, supplication is specific

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requests. With thanksgiving, being thankful,

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let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God

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which surpasses all understanding. In other words,

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there's peace that's beyond anything you can reason

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or figure out. You've got it. Well, guard your hearts and minds through

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Christ Jesus. The peace of God which surpasses all

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understanding. You're in the midst of a situation that's very difficult,

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very crazy, but you have a peace of God.

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You have a surrender. You have a rest there.

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And it's a matter of just releasing. Sometimes it's so hard.

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We want to carry all this stuff, Margie. We want to carry bitterness,

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carry our fears, carry our anxieties, carry our problems.

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Well, he said, come to me.

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Drop your stuff off at me.

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Drop all your junk off at my doorstep, and he'll give us that

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rest. So, Lord, we ask that you would lift these heavy religious

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burdens, these relational burdens, these issues of health,

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confusions, conundrums, lack of finances,

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all these things that Satan is using to try to push us into the wall.

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We just give them to you. We let you take them, Lord. We surrender

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them. We lay them down. We don't even try to pick them up and carry them anymore.

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We thank you, Father, for giving us that extra strength,

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that reassurance, the revelation of your love and truth that you

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are with us, that you will never leave us or forsake us, that it is well

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with my soul, Father, that you will pour that spirit of revelation and

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peace upon your people, even as you are preparing us, Lord God,

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for your return, that we will keep our eyes on you,

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our hearts fixed on you, and you will keep us, Lord, as the

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apple of your eye, that we will not be afraid and that we will know that we

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are loved by you, Father God, in Jesus' name, amen.

466
00:31:20,000 --> 00:31:24,000
Amen. Amen. Well, you've got a lot of

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materials, a lot of books. Yeah, we do.

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You know, doing relationships God's way,

469
00:31:32,000 --> 00:31:36,000
so much of our stress and anxiety and lack of rest is because of

470
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strained relationships with ourselves, with God,

471
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and with other people. Yeah, difficult people, relationship with

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00:31:44,000 --> 00:31:48,000
men, but the relationships all come out or spring out

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of your relationship with yourself. Do you love yourself? Do you like yourself?

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Have you followed Jesus or are you trying to do it yourself? The stress, the

475
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bitterness, the injustices, all of these things, health issues, they all come

476
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,000
out of the peace or lack thereof that we have

477
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:08,000
in our relationships with ourselves, with God and others. And so, yeah,

478
00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:12,000
you can get that book on Amazon.com or

479
00:32:12,000 --> 00:32:16,000
recovery.com. And we encourage you also to go to Life Recovery to our store.

480
00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:20,000
There's a lot of things in the store that aren't on Amazon, like our

481
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:24,000
MP3s that have to do with MP3s, like

482
00:32:24,000 --> 00:32:28,000
Why Can't I Concentrate?, which has to do with the deaf and dumb spirit or

483
00:32:28,000 --> 00:32:32,000
When Life's Not Fair or The Keys to the Kingdom.

484
00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:36,000
Or Why Do I Keep Singing? Yeah, and

485
00:32:36,000 --> 00:32:40,000
Why Do Bad Things Keep Happening to Me? All of these things are on

486
00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:44,000
our website as MP3s and they can be downloaded. You can put them on your phone and listen to them on the way

487
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:48,000
to work. So we encourage you to check that out. LifeRecovery.com

488
00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:52,000
and those are very, very reasonably priced. I mean, it's like two, three bucks

489
00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:56,000
for an hour of teaching. And it's good

490
00:32:56,000 --> 00:33:00,000
stuff and you need good stuff. You need to keep pumping good stuff into

491
00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:04,000
you because everything around us is pretty much not good.

492
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And so, blessings to you all and we will look

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forward to seeing you, speaking with you, sharing with you again next time.

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Because there's a war for your soul.