I NEVER thought God would do THIS to me...

And now, for something entirely different, it's story time. Some of you know this, some of you don't, I was a pastor at a local church here in Las.

Vegas.

The church is called the Light Baptist Church. I served on staff at Life for over five years. The reason I joined the staff at Life was because I sensed God's call to be a pastor, and so I taught discipleship, evangelism, and apologetics, and I led the young adults group there, and I preached on Sundays, occasionally.

A Wilderness Period and a Dream of Change

Now, five years later, I am no longer on staff at Life Baptist Church, and some of you are probably thinking to yourself, well, what changed, right? What happened to cause you to leave life? Well, on September the 1st, 2021, I had a dream.

This dream was so vivid, it was so bizarre, it was so unusual that I knew immediately that this was not me, this was of the Lord. Now, I'm not a weirdo, I don't have prophetic dreams every Saturday morning, nothing like that, but this dream was significant, and I could sense it in my bones.

Very quickly, the dream, I was standing inside the lobby of the church, and I was looking out into the courtyard through the glass doors, but instead of seeing the courtyard, I saw the wilderness. I saw what looks, from people who live here in Las Vegas, what looks like red rocks.

You know, it's just a bunch of desert and shrubs, and in the background, foothills. And as I was looking at this scene, I noticed that water came over the mountaintops and came crashing down and covered the entire ground by a few inches, and then I woke up.

Now, back then, I didn't realize what the dream meant, but now I know that the dream was God calling me and my family into a wilderness period in my life. This was the beginning of a dramatic change that God was about to make in me, and ever since that dream, God has put me and my family on a journey into a wilderness period.

But the wilderness is a time of testing, and if walked through well, the wilderness is a time of great spiritual development. In this video, I want to share a couple of things that I've learned along the way about the changes that God makes in our lives, because here's the reality.

You will experience dramatic change in your life. If you are a child of God, a follower of Jesus Christ, God will bring change upon you. Whether it's happening right now or it's going to happen sometime in your future, you will experience change.

So let's think through this together so we can understand it and be ready for it when it comes.

Amen?

Isaiah 43 is a great anchor text to think through this concept together because, like I said, I had this dream, but no understanding as to what the dream was getting at or what it meant, at least not at first.

Take a look at Isaiah 43 with me. Verse 16 says, Thus says the Lord who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, who brings forth chariot and horse, army and warrior. They lie down, they cannot rise.

They were extinguished, quenched like a wick. Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing. Now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

The wild beasts will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches, for I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, the people whom I formed for myself that they might declare my praise.

God says these things at a time of great upheaval and confusion and uncertainty about the future of Israel. The nation of Israel didn't know what was going to happen to them. The pagan nations of the time were seeking to flex their own power and authority, and the leaders of Judah were ineffectual, they were a hot mess.

On balance, Israel was just not living in accordance with the God of their forefathers. By the way, if you put all these pieces together, right? The uncertainty of the future, not living according to the Lord as they should.

Is there anything here that we can relate to today? In the midst of all this, God spoke through Isaiah to relay his plans for his people. Now if you could summarize the entire book of Isaiah down to one sentence, I think it would probably be, God has a plan.

More than that, God will bring change to his people. You can count on that. The Bible says, for everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven. That's Ecclesiastes 3. What does that mean?

It means your life is going to change. Whether it's happening now, it's already happened, or it's going to happen. Change is one of the things that you can count on in this life. Again, take a look at Isaiah 43, verse 16.

Wait a sec, what does this remind you of? God is talking about the sea, he's talking about a path through the waters, and the armies that are coming after you that cannot cross over, what does that remind you of?

Exodus, right? The Israelites crossing the Red Sea and escaping the Egyptians. God is saying, I'm that same God, but wait, verse 18. In other words, I'm not going to do that again. I'm going to do something new.

Instead of making a way in the sea, now I'm going to make a way for you in the wilderness. But don't worry, I'm going to give you water there, I will give you drink, so that you can proclaim my name. This isn't the only passage that teaches change, but this is a helpful passage because I think that there are a couple of conclusions that we can draw from it.

And the first one is, get used to change. Change is the typical experience of God's people. It didn't just happen to the Israelites, it happened to Noah, it happened to Abraham, Joseph, Daniel, Elijah, Esther, Jesus.

By the way, what happened to Elijah? Does anyone remember this? Elijah was a prophet of God, giving great miraculous ability. He closed shut the sky so it wouldn't rain for a period of time, and then he opened the sky back up so that it would rain.

He famously went toe-to-toe against the prophets of Baal, he brought down fire from heaven. But then what happened after that? Does anyone remember? He ran away and he stayed in the wilderness for three years.

And he did so because he appeared to be frightened and discouraged at the time. Elijah is an example of dramatic change in life circumstances. He went from prophet to panicked because his circumstances immediately changed.

This happened to Jesus, right? Jesus went into the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights and he met the devil there, right? Change appears to be common among the people of God. If you pay close attention to the scripture, and we need to get used to it as it pertains to our lives.

I think it's very American of us, it's very self-preserving and convenient for us to imagine that our lives are going to be cushy and comfortable all the time. That we'll just get a career, a spouse, and a house, we'll settle down, we'll live as hobbits for the rest of our lives, and then we can retire at 55 and collect seashells until we're dead.

We can pull up our black socks on the beach and run our metal detectors over the sand to find old precious heirlooms, I'm pretty sure that's what old people do. That's not what God has called us to, ladies and gentlemen.

That's not his plan for your life. It's funny, I've heard this saying, it's cliche, floats around the churches quite a bit, and it goes like this, you know, God has a plan for your life. You ever heard that one?

It sounds really great, it's probably well-intentioned. I heard a better one though. It's not about God's plan for your life, it's about your life for God's plan. And if you understand what that really means, and the implications in that axiom, that the focus is not about your life, it's about God's plans, then you need to expect God to make a change.

If you think of it like a map, if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, you got saved at a time and place on the map, right? Then praise God, he saved you where you are, but that's not where he wants you to stay.

He has a destination for you, and it's somewhere else on the map. So you have to get used to the fact that he's going to invite you to pack up your things and go to this new destination that he has prepared for you.

Why would God say such a thing? Because he wants you to get used to change. The question is, why? Why does God want us to get used to change? What is the purpose behind change in our life? Here's the second point.

God Uses Change to Draw Us Into Deeper Knowledge of Him

God uses change. God gives us a reason for all the change that he's bringing upon the Israelites. Again, here, look at verse 20. The wild beasts will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches, for I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, the people whom I formed for myself, that they might declare my praise.

This is a repeat of something God says earlier in Isaiah 43. You can actually just look up here in verse 10 really super quick with me. Same chapter, God says, You are my witnesses, declares the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he, that I am God.

God uses change so that you will know him. Something interesting here, zoom in on this word know for a moment, and I'll read it again. God says, I chose you that you may know me and believe and understand that I am he.

What's interesting about the word is, it's the same root word in the original language that is used in Genesis 4 .1 to describe Adam making a baby with his wife Eve. So the Hebrew, and I've talked about this before, but the Hebrew language has much deeper connotation to it than a lot of our English words that we use in the language.

In Hebrew, the word know can refer to personal, intimate knowledge. The kind of personal, intimate knowledge where there are no barriers, there are no boundaries. Husbands and wives have this kind of knowledge with each other.

Nothing is held back, so much so that it leads to making babies. And similarly, this is the close-up, personal, intimate way that God wants his people to.

Know him.

There's actually a frightening passage in Matthew 7 where Jesus says, There will come a day when people come to him and say, Lord, Lord, did we do mighty works in your name and baptize people in your name?

And he will say, get away from me, for what? I never knew you. It's not that the omniscient God of the universe who knows all things is saying, I'm sorry, I didn't know you existed. What's your name again?

No, he's saying you and I never had a personal relationship with each other. That's the way God wants us to know him. That's why God brings change in our lives. But here's the reality. How many of us know God very closely?

Very personally? How many of us can say that we've allowed God to know us personally? How many of us make it a point every single day we create a space to spend time with God where the focus is on God?

Well, if that's God's desire, and that's not exactly your desire, or maybe you do this now, but you know that you could go even deeper in your relationship with God, that there are rooms in your heart, so to speak, that you are keeping God out of, then why does he bring change in your life so that you will change?

God changes the circumstances and situations in our life so that our mind, our character, our very souls will change, so that we will grow and mature in the Spirit. Because guess what? If we mature, then our love for the toys of this world will decrease, and our love for him and being obedient to him will increase.

That's why God brings change. I've been noting how behavioral science has recently caught up to the Bible, and there have been some recent insights that reflect what we know to be true from God's Word.

For example, recent studies show that our spirit changes in response to a change in our surroundings. So, for example, there's a study that shows that if you live in a highly polluted area, you have a higher chance of depression.

Did you know that? Likewise, if you live in a city where it rains more frequently, your chances of depression will increase. If you live in a home that is very cluttered, it will raise your levels of anxiety.

On the other hand, if you live in a tidy home, if you live in a tidy room, you will feel higher levels of calm in your life. One of my favorite screenwriters is Aaron Sorkin. To me, he's a creative genius, and he wrote a lot of great movies and TV shows.

Well, he says that during the writing process, when he's writing something, he'll often take six to eight showers a day. You're thinking to yourself, what the heck is that about? Does this guy have a B .O. problem?

No.

When he finds himself dealing with a mental block that he just cannot get through, he takes a shower, he changes his clothes, and then he comes back to the problem because there's something about changing the circumstantial pieces in your life that changes your spirit.

It changes your mind. And that's exactly what God will do to you. He will draw you into a wilderness of change so that you will change. So that your habits, your sensitivities, your submissiveness, your relationship with him will change.

He'll draw you out of your bubble because maybe he wants to use you in ways that would be impossible if you stay where you are. And that's why we need to get used to change, because God uses change. You still with me?

Be Ready for God's Changes and Trust His Sovereign Purpose

Finally, this is the last one. Be ready for it. Be ready for change. If we need to get used to change because God uses change, then we need to be ready for it, right? But then the question is, well, then how can we be ready?

Well, we need our perspectives molded and shaped in the right way. Because let's face it, very often the biggest obstacle to God making dramatic changes in our lives is ourselves. And why is that? Well, because our perspective is just all wrong most of the time.

God does something in our life and it wasn't expected. It invaded our calendar. It disrupted our routine. And now all of a sudden we're upset, right? What's that about? Well, it means our perspective was off, and it means that our perspective needs to change.

There are obstacles in our path that need to be dealt with. See, we think that we are in control when we are not, right? To think that we are in control when we're not is delusional, okay? And the delusion stems from pride.

So here are some clues that you probably suffer from the pride of wanting control, right? When you get upset when things happen that you don't like. When you get irritated with other people because of how they act, okay?

Instead, we should be waking up every single day and acknowledging to the Lord through prayer, God, you are sovereign, you are in control, and I am not. I am not the one who created the universe and made the earth.

I am not the one who created human beings. I am the created. I am a creature created by you to be in relationship with you and glorify you to others. Here's another perspective obstacle to deal with. We don't trust God easily when we should.

Trust is just another word for faith. And so then the question comes in, where does a lack or deficiency of faith in the Lord come from? Have you ever thought about that? Because the reality is, we were all made to worship something.

I was just talking to a young adult yesterday about this. A person really needs two things in their life for their mental well-being. They need to believe in something and they need someone to believe in them.

We were all made to believe in and worship God. Romans 1 teaches that if it's not God, then we'll worship created things. I would argue in this day and age, the thing we worship mainly is ourselves, which is probably a video, another video for another time.

So where does lack of faith in the Lord come from? The answer is, it comes from putting your trust in something else. So what's the solution? We need to return to putting the focus on God. Spending time with Him where the focus is on Him.

Because the product of your time spent with God is a deeper relationship with Him. We need to make it a point every single day to spend time with God and behold Him in His.

Word.

To spend time with God in prayer. To spend time in worship. There are just certain songs that just put us right in the presence of the throne room of God.

Amen?

We need to find those songs and sing them out loud. We need to go into nature and take in the awe and wonder of God's creation and give Him praise. We need to keep a journal of all the times God answers our prayers.

We need to keep God in the center of our thoughts throughout the day and we need to remove idols in our life that vie for our attention, that seek to steal our attention and our adoration away from God.

And if we do those things, our faith in Him will strengthen. And finally, what's another obstacle? We don't pay attention because we're too distracted. By the way, you see how these are all interrelated?

We control our lives in the name of comfort in a manner that surrounds us with objects and things and people that steal away our time and attention from the Lord. These are all distractions. And the bottom line is, when we're too distracted, we're not paying attention to what God is.

Doing.

So when He does move in our life and He makes a change, we either miss it initially or we are completely taken by surprise and then our emotions get all wrapped up and involved and we get angry and we get anxious and we fall into sin.

Isaiah 43 19 says, Behold, I am doing a new thing. Now it springs forth. Do you not perceive it? We should be able to recognize the hand of God as it moves around us for His purposes. This reminds me of the time that Jesus told His disciples, you know, the Son can do nothing of His own accord, but only what He sees the Father doing.

For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. That's in John 5 19. I think we're supposed to be like Jesus in this way. Not exactly, since He's God in human flesh, but principally speaking, we should be so close and personal with the Father that when He makes a change in our lives, not only will we respond in total humility and surrender, but we'll also not be surprised by it.

We'll be ready for it and glorifying Him the whole time.

Amen.

Conforming to the Image of Christ Through the Wilderness

Get used to change, friends, because God uses change. The reality is that God very often sends His people into a wilderness period in their lives and for very good reason, so that we will change. Romans 8 tells us the whole goal, the whole ballgame for the Christian is so that you will conform to the image of Christ.

God wants you to mature in your spirit so you can know Him on a deep personal level, and He wants that so much, He's willing to change your life. Change is coming, so let's be ready for it. I was not ready.

When I had the dream back in September of 21, I thought I would be a pastor at Life for the rest of my life. I had no idea that God was calling me into a wilderness. I didn't even appreciate that wilderness periods were a thing for Christians.

And I'm not even sure I'm out of the wilderness just yet. This is a pre-recorded video, but right now I'm probably moving my family out of Las Vegas and across the country to a place that I've never been before, to a place that I have almost no experience with.

And there have been all kinds of tests of my faith in growing periods leading up to this move. I had to learn some very hard lessons about myself that I don't like change, that I don't easily trust the Lord when things happen that are out of my control.

But nevertheless, this is exactly what I must do. It is why I was put here on this planet in the first place, and it's the same for you. This is what you must do as well. If you find yourself in a wilderness period right now, would you let me know?

You're amongst friends here. Would you share your story below? I'd love to hear it. I'd love to pray for you. If you want to send me something privately, send it to hello at wisedisciple .org. But whether it's happening right now or it's going to happen sometime in your future, change is coming.

And if you trust the Lord, I can promise you that on the other side of your obedience is God's blessing and his favor. Little bit of a different video for you. Thank you so much for sticking around to the end.

I've got more videos for you coming up, but in the meantime, I'll say bye for now.