Gaining Perspective on How God Works — Michael Catt

I hope that one of the things that we are always thankful for is the gifted and talented people that he has put in our midst who play and who sing and who use their gifts and their abilities for the Lord because it is a blessing to us that they do that and God inhabits praise and God loves to be in the presence of praising people and when we praise God whether it's through instruments or through vocalizing that or listening and just absorbing it's a wonderful moment because we're going to be singing praises to God in all eternity so we ought to get used to it while we're here.

Gaining Perspective Through the Old Testament

I want you to take your Bibles and turn to Joshua chapter 1. We're continuing in this study of pressing on coming out of our refresh conference how do we continue to press on and tonight is on gaining perspective on how God works.

Gaining perspective on how God works. I think one of the sad things that happens in many Christians lives is that once we are saved we kind of begin to focus on the New Testament and we forget a lot of what the Old Testament has to say to us.

The Old Testament is rich in teaching and in perspective and in guidance and direction and the New Testament is the completion of that picture. You really don't understand the New Testament until you've gained some understanding of the Old Testament because so much of the Old Testament is fulfilled in the New Testament.

Oftentimes you read and the scripture said or it was said of old or that the scriptures might be fulfilled. The Old Testament teachings gain new meanings and new understandings as we study the scriptures and see them fulfilled in the New Testament passages.

Christ as the Fulfillment of Old Testament Promises

Now there's two things in your notes that that you need to see. First of all is the resurrection fulfilled all the Old Testament prophecies. Obviously I'm not talking about the second coming prophecies but every prophecy related to Messiah has been fulfilled in one person.

It was not fulfilled in Mohammed. It's not been fulfilled in Joseph Smith or in Buddha or in anyone else. Only one person has fulfilled all the prophecies. Many will come saying that they are Messiahs.

Many will come proclaiming that they have the truth but only one fulfilled the promises of God and that was Jesus Christ. Secondly the resurrection released all the promises of God. The resurrection released the promises of God so we can stand on the promises of God because God was faithful to fulfill the promise of resurrection.

He is also faithful to fulfill every other promise and everything in the Bible whether a promise or a warning is there for a reason. It is there to remind us. It is there to teach us, to warn us, to assure us, to equip us.

God's Word is given to us so that we can learn and we can know how it is that God wants us to walk. Now why is it that we need times like refresh? Why do we need times when we get alone and prioritize our lives and re-examine our schedules and refocus our lives?

It's two reasons. One is sometimes we have periods in our lives that we don't heed the warnings of God. Sometimes it's like you know when you're trying to teach your children something they ignore you until you either get to that certain level where they know you're serious or you use their full name when you call them and they know when you use their full name that means stopping your tracks, dad's serious.

Now sometimes we don't heed the warnings and so God needs to give us times when we come back and adjust our lives based on the warnings that He's given us but another reason is sometimes we don't take God at His Word.

We don't really believe His promises. We may say we believe them but we don't act on them. Now here's something you kind of need to hang your hat on tonight, alright? You can believe that the Bible is inerrant but not live as if it is sufficient.

You can believe that the Bible is inerrant. The Word of God without apology, no mistakes, no errors, but not live as if the Bible is sufficient. In other words, you'll begin to act on your own sufficiency rather than on God's sufficiency and the great disparity comes in our lives between what the promises of God say and the poverty of most Christians.

One of my favorite quotes is by Stuart Briscoe who compared the average Christian to an old iron bed frame and he said we're firm on both ends but sagging in the middle. Got saved over here, I know I'm saved, I know when I die I'm going to heaven but in the middle I'm kind of sagging.

Did you ever sleep on one of those beds at your grandmother's house where you kind of, wherever, whatever the weight was it all kind of rolled to a spot and you kind of, you needed a winch to get out of it.

Any of you ever sleep in a bed? I mean you just, you just had to tie a rope and hold on to try to get out because that old bed frame, it was iron and it was solid but those springs man, they were sagging and you just kind of go and you just kind of end up in the middle of the bed and you felt like you were being surrounded by the mattress.

Well that's a lot of Christian lives. We know we're saved, we know when we die we're going to heaven but we're kind of sagging in the middle. The Bible talks about fullness but when you look at our iron bed frame we're kind of empty in the middle and while the Bible admits defeat it never assumes it.

The Bible does not assume that you will live defeated. It will admit that you can live defeated but the Bible assumes that we understand what we have in Christ and that we live up to that level and so God's given us a word here and what he wants us to see I think is that what we have walked through in recent months is not to be special, it is to be the norm.

Perpetual Revival and the Christian Life

And how do we live with an outpouring of God and full altars and people being saved and people being baptized and lives being changed, how do we live with that as the norm? Well I think Joshua's got some secrets and we're going to go back and forth in the Old Testament a good bit tonight but first of all God's plan is for perpetual revival.

God's plan is for perpetual revival. In fact the word revival should be unnecessary in our Christian vocabulary because we should be living a vived life. We shouldn't have to be revived. Doctors in emergency rooms have to revive people.

We shouldn't have to be revived. We should live. I'm not talking about on an emotional high but we should live on a level of spirituality that maintains a consistent walk with God. Now there's several things about this.

One is that God has saved us from something to something. God saved us from hell to heaven. God saved us from being dead in trespasses and sin to being alive to God. God saved us from living for ourselves to living for his glory.

That's the first thing he did. God saved us from something to something but secondly God sanctifies us to bring us out of bondage and into victory. God's sanctifying process, God's process of making us like Christ and making us holy as he is holy is to take us out of the bondage of our past because we can be saved from the penalty of sin but sometimes we're still struggling with the power of sin.

Out of bondage and into our heritage in Christ and then God revives us so that we can renew our walk because we've gotten off the path, we've gotten out of the light, we've gotten out of the truth, we're not walking in the fullness of the spirit and so revival time comes into our lives to remind us where we're supposed to be and how we're supposed to be there.

God Brings His People Out to Bring Them In

Now I want you to hold your place in Joshua and I want you to turn to Deuteronomy chapter 6 and then after Deuteronomy chapter 6 we're going to go to Exodus chapter 6. Deuteronomy 6 and Exodus 6. You see God wasn't just interested in getting his people out of Egypt.

He was trying to get them into Canaan and so Deuteronomy chapter 6 in verse 23 he said he brought us out from there in order to bring us in. That is a crucial verse in understanding God's purpose with people.

He brought us out to bring us in. He didn't bring us out to just get us out. He brought us out to get us into something else. He brought us out to bring us in and to give us the land which he swore to our fathers.

What we have to remember there is that after verse 23 you could put a note, a whole generation got out and never got in. A whole generation because of unbelief, because they would not act on the promises of God, they got out but they never got in.

Now you see that can easily happen. To get out and to not get in. Now look at verse 24. So the Lord commanded us to observe all these statutes to fear the Lord your God for our good always and for our survival as it is today.

It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the Lord our God just as he commanded us. Now I want you to see that you would think people would get out and get in on based on one little phrase in verse 24 for our good and for our survival.

You would think that that would be enough. Oh let's see if I get out and if I get into where he wants me to be that'll be for my good and for my survival. But they stopped short of it. Apparently they weren't interested in their good and their survival.

They were just interested in just living for the moment. And so they missed the blessing and died in the wilderness. Now turn to Exodus chapter 6. Exodus chapter 6. God told them to leave Egypt. He told them to take the land in Exodus chapter 6 and verse 6.

Exodus chapter 6 and verse 6. Say therefore to the sons of Israel I am the Lord and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians and I will deliver you from their bondage. I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments.

Then I will take you for my people and I will be your God and you shall know that I am the Lord your God who brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians and I will bring you to a land which I swore to give Abraham Isaac and Jacob and I will give it to you for a possession.

I am the Lord. In other words he says I'm telling you I'm going to do this and the reason I can tell you and the reason it's true is because I'm the Lord. So Moses spoke thus to the sons of Israel. But look at what they did.

God has said I'm going to bring you out. I'm going to deliver you from your burdens. I will bring you to the land. And Moses said this is what God has said. But they did not listen to Moses on account of their despondency and cruel bondage.

In other words they let their circumstances rule their faith instead of their faith ruling their circumstances. They looked at their cruelties. They looked at their despondency. They were depressed. They were discouraged and they said yeah God may have said that but I don't think it's for me.

And how many times have you and I heard a sermon or sat in a Sunday school class or listened to somebody on the radio or on television and we've heard a word from God and we think immediately that's true for other people but it could never be true for me.

That's exactly what they did. They wouldn't believe because their circumstances they were under their circumstances which you never have any business being under your circumstances. You should always live on top of your circumstances not under them.

God said I will and I am. Now you don't need any more than that. I will and I am. I will do this and this is who I am. But they didn't listen. They didn't listen in Egypt and they didn't listen in the wilderness.

They were hard of hearing. That's why I know they were the first Baptist. They didn't get it. They didn't listen. It didn't matter how many times God said it, how many ways God said it. You think of all the miracles.

You think now if God could do what he did in just the plagues in Egypt just to show himself strong and to destroy all those Egyptian gods. Whatever God said that he could do I believe he could do it. You know if I'm standing at the Red Sea and all of a sudden it parts and I mean and it just says the waters just divided.

If I'm standing at the Red Sea and the water parts I've never seen water part my life and and this sea parts and and I go through on dry ground and then all of a sudden I'm on the other side and here comes the Egyptian army.

Ewell Brenner's leading them and so I'm coming all the way down through. Some of you got that. And and and I'm watching him come down and all of a sudden the water comes in and and there's Moses. He looks just like Charlton Heston and he's standing there and he he says that you know the we'll never see them again.

When I would think whatever God tells us we're gonna do it because that's a big God that can do that. But it wasn't a matter of days before they were complaining again and despondent. You see it's very easy folks no matter how many miracles you've seen no matter how many blessings you've seen no matter how many answered prayers you have it's very easy to go back and to slip back into your old ways and your old patterns.

And that's exactly what Israel was doing. Now the first five books of the Bible tell us about the history of God's people and God trying to establish them as a nation. But then you add to that Psalms 106, 1st Corinthians 10, Hebrews chapter 3 and 2nd Peter chapter 1 and they all give us the account of this time in Israel's history.

Apparently God wants us to learn a lesson about his provision for us. These are truths that God wants us to learn or he wouldn't have given it so much attention. He wouldn't have taken up so much space with this because this wasn't truth just for the nation of Israel.

This was truth for us today in 2003 for us to hear and for us to learn from what happened to them what do we need to learn. Now God got them out but boy they they did it the hard way. He got them in but they took the hard path.

The Cost of Unbelief and Spiritual Drift

Turn to Deuteronomy chapter 1. Deuteronomy chapter 1. One of the most indicting two verses in all the scripture are found at the beginning of Deuteronomy chapter 1. Now I am directionally dysfunctional but this is the most directionally dysfunctional group of people I've ever seen in my life.

Deuteronomy chapter 1 in verse 2. It is 11 days journey from Horeb by the way of Mount Seir to Kadesh Barnea. Pause. In the 40th year on the first day of the 11th month Moses spoke to the children of Israel according to all that the Lord had commanded him to give to them.

Now you know that a committee must have planned this trip. They took an 11 day trip and turned it into a 40 year journey. Only God's people could do something that dumb. They had it all figured out. God said I can get you there in 11 days.

They said no we just rather take 40 years. We just rather take the long way around. I remember when Ron Dunn drove here one time and he and I joked about this almost until the day he died and I said look here's the way you need to come.

You need to come you know across from Dallas and you need to go through Shreveport and through Jackson through Meridian and then you cut down across and you go through Selma and you know there's no good way to get across the state of Alabama.

There's just not. There is no straight line across the state of Alabama. You've got to go down and up and across and get to Tulane and get to a smaller Tulane and get to Tulane that's not really a Tulane and then you got to get around a tractor and I mean it's worse and worse in South Georgia.

I mean it's terrible. It takes you forever to get there and I discovered that I can go down and hit I -10 and go up from Mobile on a four-lane and get there quicker than people that go straight across.

So I but I told Ron I said you just go across this way. Well about 10 o 'clock that night he called me from Selma. He said Michael I'm in Selma. It's the first place I've been able to get a signal on my phone.

I'll be there sometime in the middle of the night. So when he got ready to leave I said now which way you going back? He said I'm not telling you. I said well you know you may want to. He said I'm not telling you and I don't want your directions.

I don't I don't want to know the way you want me to go. I'm going to go my way. You know what he did? I know what he did. He went to Columbus. He went up and hit the interstate. He went almost all the way to Atlanta and came back down just so he could drive on the interstate.

He said I just want to be on four-lane road. That's what these people just said hey you know I'm gonna drive the way. They turned an 11-day trip into a 40 40 year journey. It's incredible. God's plan was to bring them out and to take them in but they rebelled and they whined and most of all they did not believe.

They didn't believe that what God had said was for them. God's redemptive plan was not to get them out of Egypt and into the wilderness. God's redemptive plan was to get them out of Egypt and into Canaan.

He was trying to get them into the promised land but they settled for less than God's best and their reaction to God's promises is their history. What do we think about when we think about this generation of people who were a people of God?

They didn't believe God. They didn't trust God. Their epitaph is they didn't believe God. Their epitaph is they died in the wilderness. Their epitaph is as they fell short of what God had planned for them and you see our spiritual biography is not so much what happens to us is how we respond to what God says to us.

Now you need to make a note of that. Your spiritual heritage and your biography and your legacy is not so much what happens to you but how you respond to what God says to you out of his Word. Our character and our history is carved out in the bedrock of our experiences.

There was a land of milk and honey but they accepted defeat as normal. Now they did three things. First of all they resisted God's warnings. They just resisted the warnings of God. Don't do this. Do that.

Don't you know they just resisted God's warnings. Secondly they ignored God's man. I mean Moses was God's man and they said we're not going to listen to Moses. You know we want to get somebody else. Where is Moses?

I mean here he is. He's gotten them through. He's delivered them. He's taken them through the Red Sea. He goes up on a mountain. He's gone for a few days and he's on the mountain with God and they say where is this Moses?

Who is he? Let's go back to Egypt. Let's build a golden calf. You talk about a fickle and forgetful people. They just ignored God's man and thirdly they insisted on their own way. They insisted on their own way.

Israel as a Warning to the Church

Now let me read Psalm 78 and verse 41 and 42. Psalm 78 and verse 41 and 42. Time and again they pushed him to the limit and provoked Israel's holy God. How quickly they forgot what he had done, forgot their day of rescue from the enemy.

You know why people are active in church and faithful in church and then they become unfaithful? They forget their day of rescue. They've forgotten the day they got saved. They've forgotten the day that God answered that prayer.

They've forgotten the day when God intervened and did what they wanted. They just forget. They just forget. They forget the goodness of God. First Corinthians 10 .10 says now these things happen to them as examples and were written for our instruction.

Not for their instruction. They'd already messed up. For our instruction. God wrote all these things down for our instruction. What God has given us is black and white warnings about the consequences of not following through on our commitment and not following through with God.

They remind us that we are not above failure. Now Paul in 1st Corinthians 10 says let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. Paul, it is interesting to note, didn't say let you who think you stand.

Paul doesn't exclude himself. If you read 1st Corinthians chapter 10 and he says these things were written for our example, not your example. For our example. What Paul is saying is hey nobody's immune from this.

You never get to a point in your life where you've arrived and you can put it on automatic pilot and coast into the kingdom. Every one of us are in the middle of a battle and if you think you've got it all figured out, if you think you're on top and you're in a position where you've arrived, then you're about to fall.

Don't get in that position. We're in a battle and you know what we have? We have what one writer calls the drum major instinct. We want to lead the band and God says I'm the one who's in charge. And you can call it what you want to.

You can call it the flesh. You can call it self. You can call it the will. You can call it the old nature. But whatever you want to call it, you're in a battle. Paul calls it the flesh in Galatians 5 24.

He calls itself in 2nd Corinthians 5 15. He calls it the old man in Romans 6 6 and in Colossians 3 9. David said in Psalms 51 5, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin. My mother conceived me. How many of you, somebody had to teach you how to sin?

Anybody have to teach you how to sin or did you just kind of come by it on your own? Everybody's selfish, right? They don't consider that you need to sleep, you've got to go to work. If they wake up and they're hungry in the middle of night, they don't look over in their crib and go, hmm, dad's got to go to work at 8.

I think I'll just be quiet tonight. No. Selfish, self-centered. I heard about an old preacher who somebody brought their baby to and the man and woman brought their baby to the old preacher and said, what do you think about our baby?

He said, well, it's a cute baby. He said, which one do you think he looks like? He said, I think he looks like his father the devil. And that's what we all look like. We're all sinners. We're born in iniquity.

We are totally depraved. There's none righteous. No, not one. We're all sinners and we're all fighting a battle. And just because we're saved doesn't mean that that sin nature and that desire just kind of goes away and disappears.

We battle with it every day to pull us back and to pull us down. And we may have been set free from Egypt, but I tell you, some of us are still trying to figure out how we're going to get to the promised land.

And so there's this constant battle, Galatians 5, 16, that says, walk by the Spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh.

For these are in opposition to one another. See to it that you may not do the things that you please. That word sets its desire is the word lust. It is the strongest word for lust in all the Greek language.

There's a conflict going on. There's a battle going on. But I want you to see something. Turn to Exodus chapter 1. Exodus chapter 1. And you're probably wondering where we're going to get to Joshua. We're just about there.

Spiritual Bondage and the Power God Provides

But this is all introduction, basically. Point one in introduction. Exodus chapter 1. Now, I don't want to build a theology on what I'm about to say. All right? This is just a thought. As Ron would say, it's a profound thought.

And I'm going to tell you that because if I don't tell you if it's a profound thought, you might miss it. You'll get that sooner or later. Now, we typically, in the Christian life, refer to Egypt as, I was over in Egypt, I was lost.

The wilderness is the carnal Christian life. Carnality. And the promised land is the Spirit-filled life. And that's what I believe is the primary teaching of Scripture. But I want you to see another possibility.

All right? Exodus chapter 1 and verse 6. Joseph died and all his brothers and all that generation. But the sons of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly and multiplied and underlined the next three words, became exceedingly mighty.

So that the land was filled with them. Now, a new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, behold, the people of the sons of Israel are, next five words underline them, more and mightier than we.

Do you see what the king is saying? The king of Egypt is saying, Israel is now more in number and not only that, they are stronger than we are. Look at the next verse. Come, let us deal wisely with them or else they will multiply and in the event of war, they will also join themselves to those who hate us and, underline the last part of the verse, fight against us and depart from the land.

Now, I've read that before but when I was studying for this message, I realized something when I read that. They had become exceedingly mighty. They were more and mightier than we. They had the potential and the possibility and the power at that point to fight and to depart from the land.

Now, here's the truth. They could have gotten out of bondage. They could have left Egypt but they didn't know the power that they had. They didn't realize the power that they had and they let the enemy deal with them wisely and subtly, just like the devil deals with some of us, to convince us we don't have the power and God doesn't have the authority and his promises aren't true and we begin to think, oh, well this is good for somebody but it's not good for me and you see they didn't appropriate the power that was available to them so what happened?

They lived in bondage and they got further and further and deeper and deeper into bondage because they didn't realize what the enemy realized. By the way, there are a lot of Christians that live that way, that don't realize what the devil knows, that greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world and yet many Christians live like they're dependent on welfare.

They're not walking in the power and the resurrection of Jesus Christ and so God is saying to us in this passage, you know, there are some people that just, I mean, you're mighty and you're strong and you have authority and you have power through the Holy Spirit of God but you've let the enemy deal wisely with you and cunningly with you.

He's the father of lies and he's the deceiver of the brethren and he tries to accuse the brethren. He tries to deal in subtleties and all of a sudden you find yourself believing and listening to the devil and his lies more than you listen to the truth in God's Word and so you get in bondage and we've become cowards and we let these things rule us and we believe the devil's lies and the tragedy is is that people can have a season of revival and a season of rejoicing and they can come to the altar and and God can just pour himself out on them and they go man this is great this is incredible.

I cannot. I didn't know that the Christian life could be this way this is wonderful. And then before you know it they've gone out into the world and they've gotten off track and they begin to listen to those lies again and all of a sudden they're back in the same old rut they were in before committing the same sins defeated in the same areas and so I want to give you a lifestyle test to see how you're doing now about two and a half months since the refresh conference these are all on scripture.

Testing Spiritual Progress by Peace, Joy, and Blessing

I'll just give you the scripture verses and then you can see if you pass or fail. Philippians 4 7. Lifestyle test number one. I am walking in the peace that passes all understanding Philippians 4 7 first Peter 1 8.

Lifestyle test number two. I have joy unspeakable and full of glory. Lifestyle test number three. Ephesians 1 3 I've been blessed with every spiritual blessing and live like it. I've been blessed with every spiritual blessing and I live like it.

And Romans chapter 8 in verse 37 I am an overwhelmingly conqueror through Jesus Christ. Romans 8 37 I overwhelmingly conquer through Jesus Christ. For most Christians those verses would not be true. This past week somewhere somehow we get off track and so we come back and we need seasons revival.

God's Promise of Victory in Joshua

Now the longest point is the first one and you'll be happy with that number two. God's promise of victory. Joshua chapter 1 verses 3 through 5. God's promise of victory. Joshua 1 3 through 5. Joshua chapter 1 verse 3.

Every place on which the soul of your foot treads. I have given it to you just as I spoke to Moses no man will be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I have been with Moses. I will be with you.

I will not fail or forsake you. He didn't say I might not. He said I will not. Now there's a future assurance here every place that your soul treads. Joshua you're about to go somewhere where you've never been before.

You're about to do something you've never done before. But every place that you go I'm going to be with you. That's a future promise. But there's a past assurance. I have given it to you. God says that you're going to experience it for the first time.

But I've already given it to you back here before you've ever crossed over before you've ever taken that first step into that River. I've already given you the victory. And so there's a future assurance and there's a past assurance.

And and I want you to see the key to all of this. Because it this is kind of one of those phrases that sneaks up on you. He says every place on which the sole of your foot treads. Now what's interesting about that.

Well he didn't say every place that your tennis shoes or your patent leather shoes or your high heel shoes or your sandals. He said every place that the sole of your foot treads. Now why is that significant.

What did God say to Moses when he stood at the burning bush. Take off your shoes. You're on holy ground. What God is saying to Joshua is Joshua when you walk in holiness and when you walk in humility with me then every promise is yours.

The shoes off and the soles of the feet indicate holiness and humility. And he says when you walk that way when you live that way then I'm going to be with you and I'm going to fulfill the promises. And the victory is going to be yours.

Why. Because you're walking in holiness and you're walking in humility. Now look look at the promise verse 3. It is for every place. And in verse 5 it's for every day. He says all the days of your life.

That kind of covers it. It covers it for me every place and every day. You know what that means in Hebrew. Every place and every day. That means today and tomorrow and the next day and five years from now and 15 years from now and 20 years from now wherever you go whatever you do every day of your life God says I'm going to be with you and I'm going to give you victory.

Ron Dunn said there is no reason why every Christian cannot live a life of victory. Because it is not attained by struggling and striving. It is part of your birthright as a child of God. Victory is assured and accomplished.

Every step that Joshua took was on conquered ground. Joshua the land is yours. Act like it. Paul said in Romans 8 29 we've been predestined to become conformed to the image of his son in Ephesians 1. For that we should be holy and blameless before him.

Colossians 1 as Christ in you is the hope of glory. 2nd Corinthians 2 14. Thanks be to God who always leads us in his triumph. Listen folks the victory is not based on my ability. It's based on God's promises.