2020 In Review - Three Key Lessons — Sandeep Poonen

Spiritual Vision and Leaps Toward Christlikeness

I wanted to start by bringing up a message that I spoke at the beginning of this year. And as we began 2020, I shared a message at the beginning of the year about two words to keep in mind for 2020. That word 2020 is a word that we use when we think about vision.

Somebody has 2020 vision and such a person probably doesn't need glasses. But that 2020 vision is a statement of one's ability to see clearly. And as we thought about the year 2020, we wanted to have 2020 spiritual vision, which was the eye of our body should be clean.

Jesus said in Matthew 6, that is the eye of the body is clean, the whole body is full of light. And he was referring, as we've been taught, to a conscience that is clean, with which we can live with God and in which we can serve God.

And you can look up the message, there's different verses that point to that. But to walk with a clear and a clean conscience, as we walk in the light of God's word, in the light that he's in the light.

And the other word for 2020 that we talked about was a leap year. Because 2020 is a leap year, comes every four years. And so we were looking at that word and said, look, if 2020 is a leap year, we want God to move us forward to become more like Jesus by leaps, not just steps.

We don't want to just move forward one step at a time. It's the time is near for Jesus to come again. We want to move forward with leaps. So those are just two words for us to remember. And I thought that I would share some of my reflections.

I wonder how 2020 is working out for you, at least with those two words in mind. Have you been able to live more consistently with a clear conscience before God? Have you been able to see marked progress in the only thing that matters, which is becoming more and more like Jesus?

God's Shaking and the Call to Spiritual Strength

And another thing that happened, though, after we spoke this message was that COVID happened. And in the pandemic, there were also two verses that we had shared at that time, that I thought I'd also bring up.

One of them was Hebrews chapter 12, verse 26 and 27. And I highlighted the parts that were, the message was, God wants to shake everything that can be shaken so that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.

And we also heard from Daniel chapter 11, verse 32, the people who know their God will display strength and take action. Three kind of words in there, knowing their God, displaying strength and taking action.

And I wanted to ask myself, as I was thinking about this, how does that look? How has that been? And I realized that in order sometimes for God to move us forward by leaps, He has to do something different than He's done in past years.

So we pray, Lord, we don't want to just move one step at a time. We want to move by leaps and bounds. Well, then we should expect something to be also very different in our circumstances that can provoke or make and create that need, the necessity for us to take a leap forward rather than just a step forward.

So shaking all that can be shaken is not a bad thing if we see it as God's way of creating the environment in which we can leap forward to a greater love for God, a greater dependence on God, a greater love for other people.

So that's how we should look at the shakings that might have happened to us this year or shakings that have happened in our lives. And so I was asking myself, Lord, as these shakings happen, I asked you for leaping.

And the way you sometimes do create these leaps in which we can move forward in the Christian life is by shaking everything that can be shaken, loosening things that are supposed to be loosed. But there's some things that should remain no matter what shaking happens.

And I wanted to share a few things that I feel must remain. And the Lord is reminding me, not only must they remain, they must grow deeper and stronger in our relationship with the Lord. And the first one may come as no surprise to those who know me speak.

God as the Loving Heavenly Father

And that is that God is my loving heavenly father. I want to ask you to turn to Matthew chapter three, verse 16. At the end of this verse, at the end of Matthew chapter three and Matthew chapter four, I want to show you the life of Jesus.

This is when Jesus is about to begin his public ministry. And Matthew chapter three, verse 16, Jesus hears the greatest commendation you can ever get. And that was the compliment that God the father gave Jesus when he said, you are my beloved son, and in you I am well pleased.

And that was not just any compliment that was given through a feeling, it was an actual voice. I don't know if any of us have ever heard a voice loud, out loud, and I don't know if we've ever heard a compliment like that.

It's the highest of all compliments and it's as sure as it gets. But what happened after that is what I wanted to point to, which we know the story where Jesus is driven to the wilderness by the spirit of God and he's tempted by the devil.

But what I wanted to underline in there is what the devil started to shake in Jesus's life to see, I want to see if I can shake it. That's what I wanted to point it out. What the devil said in the first two of those temptations were, if you are the son of God, the devil was trying to shake Jesus in something that Jesus had heard vocally out loud just 40 days earlier, just a few weeks earlier.

Jesus had heard the greatest commendation from his father in heaven saying, you are my son. Not only you're not my son, you are my beloved son and I'm well pleased with you. And just a few weeks later, 40 days later, the devil has the audacity, the devil has the boldness to come to Jesus himself and tell him, I'm not so sure.

I'm not so sure if God is your father. And there were many reasons why he may have given, why God may not have been Jesus's father because he's been not eaten for 40 days or he's being tempted by the devil for 40 days.

Could have been different reasons. But the devil was trying to shake even Jesus of this truth that God is my father. And he started the temptation with, if not because God is your father. No, no, no. I'm not even going to give you that Jesus, that God is your father.

If God is your father, this is all these things should happen. So if the devil is going to do that to Jesus, who had heard a voice audibly from heaven and heard the greatest commendation ever given, you can't get more clear than that.

If the devil had the guts to do that to Jesus and to question that, how much more will he test us through that? And he can take many different ways. And we all know the ways in which we can test it through afflictions, sicknesses that our loved ones have.

Some of us may find out that our loved ones have only weeks or months to live. Some of us may have lost loved ones suddenly where we didn't properly have a time to say goodbye. Others in the world have definitely felt this way because of COVID and the restrictions.

And we're not able to still get over the pain of loss and grief. It feels like everything's going to be shaken. The question is what's left standing? Is God still my loving heavenly father? Is he still sovereignly in charge of every single detail in my life?

And it could be physical, it could be mental, it could be psychological, it could be emotional. Being shut in because of COVID can increase our loneliness. I've heard that depression and mental health has gone up by 20 -30 at least.

There are challenges of living in close quarters with your family. And so if there was dysfunction before, it's going even bigger. And sometimes the hearts of the parents are supposed to be getting closer to the children, but the cracks are getting bigger.

Wives can find it harder to live with their husbands because the husbands are always at home now. Children can find that it's harder to live with the parents because the parents are always at home and there's no separation between work and home.

No matter the situation, whether you're a child or an adult, the question is, all these situations are trying to shake one truth. And the question I have to ask myself is, am I leaping forward? Have I grown so much more sure that God is my loving heavenly father?

And the trials and the situations in my life were designed to strengthen that reality that God is my loving heavenly father. That's the point. Not do you know that fact, not that you know that truth, but has that tree, the roots of those tree grown deeper?

Is that pillar been cemented even further deep into the foundation? Every single thing that has happened and is happening in my life has been allowed by God because He wants me to know Him more and more totally as a loving heavenly father.

Every single thing. It's only trying to deepen the roots of that tree that He's my loving heavenly father. And what that means for me is if He's my heavenly father, not an earthly father, and He's the heavenly father, He rides in majesty and He's got sovereign control over everything.

Sovereign control over everything. That news I that's gone from bad to worse in the last one week, that difficult co-worker or whatever it is, all sovereignly allowed by a loving heavenly father. He was in full control and He said, yep, let that pass through to my child, to that child of mine.

And He's not just a sovereign king. He's not just a heavenly king. He's a heavenly father. So it's not just sovereignly in control. I can crawl onto His lap and find my identity and my value and my worth there, not based on what people think or what I do.

And in all of these shakings that you've experienced, that I've experienced, that's what the Lord is telling me. How have you done in that, Salip? There are many things that can be shaken. A lot of things can fall by the wayside, but this is non-negotiable.

God must be my loving heavenly father and must, it must be growing deeper with that, that I can say in September 2020, compared to January 2020, when I said that message, Lord, I've lived, tried to live with a clear conscience, 2020 vision, spiritual vision.

And I am also trying to leap forward to be more like Jesus, who was so utterly convinced at all times that God was His father. The only time Jesus didn't call God father was on the cross. And that was because my sins were on Him.

To prove to me that for the rest of my life, there is absolutely no reason why God will not always be my father or that all those nots were confusing. Every single situation in my life, God is still my father.

And that must be an unshakable root and pillar in my life. The question is, is it so? And God wants it to be so in our lives. That is how we can leap forward and say, Lord, many other things I may have failed in, but I want to make sure that that one pillar I've leapt forward in that.

Jesus said in John chapter five, I never do my own will. I only do what the father is saying because the father loves the son. And so my obedience, my ability to take up my cross daily and die to all sin is the way Jesus did it, which was, I don't do my own will because the father loves me.

And he was so utterly convinced of it that he was willing to take up any cross. And so that is what God wants me to leap forward in. That's the first thing. The second thing is this one. And I don't know how you think about this.

Each Day as the Best Day of Life

I don't know how often you have thought about today. And what do you think about today? What do you think is the best day of your life ever? And whether you think today is not, yeah, not bad, but do you really believe that today is the best day of your life?

I'll give you an example. My daughter Ariana just had her birthday yesterday. You know what happens on a birthday when you're a child, you get presents you've made to feel very special in our family. We say, okay, what kind of food do you like to eat?

And all of her siblings and her parents are trying to be extra specially nice to her. And we try to make her feel very special on her birthday. But sadly, it comes only once a year, right? And then you have to give way to other children's birthdays and things like that.

But I was telling her the same thing that I tell myself. September 12th was her birthday. September 13th is a better day than September 12th. Who cares if you didn't get as many presents? Who cares if you didn't get any of your favorite foods?

Today is better than yesterday. Because for the Christian, God is trying to make us more like Jesus. We're one day closer to seeing Jesus. We're one day closer to all our tears being wiped away. We're one day closer to where we can see Jesus as he is.

And we will be like him. We're one day closer. So today is far better no matter what happened in my life today. Whether I got a bonus, whether I had a baby, whether it was my birthday. So I can't tell you how important and massive it is.

And this is true even if it's a time of tragedy. Even if there's hard, hard news in my life. Even if I've just discovered that something evil was done to me. Even if something horrible looks like from an earthly standpoint.

If God is my loving heavenly father and he plans all things for good and he wants me to be like the sun that's rising from dawn to become like the noonday sun. Why isn't today the best day of my life?

Why isn't it better than yesterday? The best day of my life does not mean the happiest day of my life. The best day of my life does not mean the easiest day of my life. The best day of my life means I live with more hope than I lived with yesterday.

More hope and more potential of what God can do. More faith. The assurance of things hoped for. The evidence of things not seen. That's what I live with when I say today is the best day of my life. Tremendous faith.

Tremendous hope. Today is the best day of my life because God woke me up with loving kindness today. Psalm 90 verse 14 and others. As we've heard Psalm 148 and some other verses like that. Today is the best day of my life because his mercies are new every morning.

Lamentation 323. As if mercy had never happened before. Today is the day when I got this big present at the bottom of my bed that said mercy. Today. Today is the best day of my life because all of my sins, all of sin and fallen short of the glory of God.

Romans 3 23 and 24. But they have been cleansed in the blood of Jesus as I repent of them and I forsake them. I stand before God justified as if I've always obeyed. Totally righteous. And today is the best day of my life because I can use all of the mistakes and the failures of whenever to help me do it differently today.

2 Corinthians 6 2. Now is the time of salvation. Now is the best day of my life. Now is the best time of my life. This beautiful passage in Romans chapter 8 verse 23 to 25 that says this. We groan within ourselves.

That word says that we groan within ourselves having the first fruits of the spirit waiting for our adoption. But then Paul says in hope we have been saved and that which is seen is not hope because you don't hope for what you've already seen but if we hope for it we with perseverance we wait eagerly for it and it's that waiting with eagerness that strikes me about today that there must be massive hope as I think about today.

I've talked in the past about there being only three days on my calendar. I stole that from Martin Luther who said there are only two days on my calendar. This day and that day. I just added another day to that which was yesterday which was the day Jesus died for me.

Yesterday was the day Jesus died for me. All of my sins that I've done even five minutes ago can be under the blood of Jesus and I stand before him now if I've repented justified totally righteous and so today is the best day of my life and tomorrow is not promised to me.

Tomorrow I'm going to be with him in heaven. Tomorrow I'll be with him for all eternity. Today is the best day of my life. Dear brothers and sisters, easier said than done. Much easier said than done.

So much easier to put it in a nice little phrase but so important to live in this reality every single day and especially today because otherwise we're wasting the best day of our lives. The best day of our lives we're wasting it.

Dear family chosen of God holy and beloved as Paul said let me add the rest of the sentence can you think of one good reason why today should not be the best day of your lives? Did Jesus not die for us?

If God is for us who will be against us? He who did not spare his own son but freely gave him up for us will he not along with him freely give us all things? Can you think of one good reason why today can't be the best day of your life?

I can't. I honestly can't. Let's make today the best day of our lives and dear brothers and sisters you don't know my life but I'm not speaking theory here. I'm telling you what I actively tell myself.

This is the pathway to how I've seen God deliver me from a life that was tripped up here and there by discouragement. I've shared this before and difficult trials are coming in your life difficult trials are coming in my life and it is not an easy thing but it is a very important thing for me to grab a hold of the truth that Jesus died for me and now is the appointed time now is the day of salvation and because of that to say with conviction to the face of all the trials and all the things that may come into my memory today is the best day of my life and today the rest of this day will prove to be the best day of my life because I'm going to live with him.

The secret to living a fruitful life is to abide in him abide in me and you will bear much fruit so today is going to be the best day of my life because I'm going to abide with him and he'll take care of the fruit.

Sustaining One Another Through Prophetic Words of Hope

Third point the last point I want to say is sustained by sure prophetic words of hope as I said when everything is shaken what remains God is my loving heavenly father has to become more deep-rooted within us and nothing should shake the reality that today is the best day of my life.

All of the mistakes all of the challenges of yesterday have all been so that I can make today different and that I can live with him. I can stand where I've been giving in to sin. I can fight and put on the armor of God and I can crucify my flesh where I have been giving in to bad moods or anger or gossip or bitterness.

But we're not alone in this and we've got the word of God that comes to us through the Bible but we're also sustained by the sure absolutely sure rock-solid prophetic words of hope. And I was reminded by the story of Ruth and the book of Ruth.

The story of Ruth is a story could also be interestingly talked about in the beginning and the end is introducing somebody else called Naomi and if you want to turn with me to Ruth chapter 1 verse 19 this is after Ruth and Orpah come to Naomi and Orpah goes away but Ruth says I want to be with you.

And the beginning of this is how Naomi has a very sad existence that two sons die and she says to the women don't call me Naomi in verse 20 but call me Mara because God has dealt very bitterly with me.

I went out full but the Lord has brought me back empty. I used to have a great life. I used to have a great career. My children were doing great in school and then COVID happened. Now I feel empty. Now I feel constrained.

Why do you call me Naomi. Since the Lord has witnessed against me the Almighty has afflicted me. That's the beginning of the story of Naomi. Now at the end of the story of Ruth you see chapter 4. So turn a couple of pages over to Ruth chapter 4 verse 13 through 15 Boaz and Ruth get married.

They have a baby. And then they don't say something specifically to Ruth but they say something Naomi interestingly enough. And they bless Ruth but they say blessed is the Lord who has not left you without a redeemer today and may his name become famous in Israel.

May he also be a restorer to life and a sustainer of your old age for your daughter-in-law who loves you and is better for you than second seven sons has given birth to him. There's a difference dear brothers and sisters between Naomi and Ruth chapter 1 and Naomi and Ruth chapter 4.

She was calling herself bitter and saying don't women don't call me Naomi call me Mara. At the end of the story she's saying. And the women are saying you're blessed. Your offspring is going to be called famous in Israel.

What was the difference Ruth. Ruth was the personal difference. She didn't come as a prophet to speak a good word and walk away. But she changed the story of Naomi for one of weeping to one of joy. And I just wanted to point out that first prophetic word that she gave Naomi.

Ruth chapter 1 verse 16. Ruth you read this verse. We probably know this. Ruth told Naomi. Even the orpah said look I gotta go back. Ruth said do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you.

For where you go I will go. Where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your God my God. That was hope. That was a word of hope. Nothing magically changed in the situation. Ruth had to go through a hard time of going into the fields and gleaning and connecting with Boaz and all of the challenge of getting married to more Boaz.

But she gave a word of hope and she said Naomi don't give up. They're a family of God. Everyone needs hope. There's a great need for hope in this world. Love is kind. We ought to be kind for everyone maybe fighting a very hard battle.

So we can't be critical of others. We can't start nitpicking at false. We should be rooting for the church of God the brothers and sisters here to succeed. And we should seek to have prophetic words of encouragement.

2nd Peter 1 says you know I was up in the mountain of transfiguration with Jesus. But I don't care so much about that. What I'm holding on to. What's not unshakable. What's totally unshakable is the sure prophetic word.

And I as a husband my wife is in need of a hopeful word. A prophetic word of hope. Even if she's struggling with anxiety or worry about this or that wives your husbands even if you think they are irritating or difficult they are in need of a prophetic word of hope.

Fathers and mothers your rebellious teenage children are in need of a prophetic word of hope. That's what changed my life when I was a teenager. Brothers and sisters we need to encourage one another in our midweek groups with prophetic words of hope.

We all need others to come by and say we're in this together. My God your God. Same God. We have the same father. We have the same enemies. You're not my enemy. God isn't deserting you and neither am I the people of Daniel like Daniel being exiled into Babylon going to a hard time with Shadrach Meshach and Abednego.

The weeping prophet Jeremiah said you're a good basket of figs in Jeremiah 24 and said God has plans for you in Jeremiah 29 to give you a future and a hope as they were getting shackled and taken to Nebuchadnezzar.

Paul 2nd Corinthians 7 says God who comforts the depressed comforted us by sending Timothy. Doesn't matter how many years in the faith we are doesn't matter whether we're the senior elders or the junior elders or the ones at the very bottom or apostles or ones closest to Christ.

It doesn't really matter what it is we all need hope. Paul the greatest apostle at that time said I need to be comforted by Timothy. So we all need a place to play in this and that should be. That's what won't keep us firm.

The sustained by the sure prophetic words of God. God has not left us without a witness and believe it or not. Dear brothers and sisters that witness may be you in the Tuesday meeting or the Thursday meeting or the Friday meeting.

Somebody may need to have a word and that may be from you. I've told some of you the prophetic words that God has spoken for me personally through words that you have shared in midweek groups that you had no idea and even this year as I think about some of the challenges that I've been going through I remember words very specifically given spoken in a midweek group that prepared me for what I had to go through was a clear word from God that I knew God was telling me this is for you and I've drawn strength from it over and over again.

Many times I'll end with Romans 15 4 for whatever is written in earlier times was written for our instruction so that through perseverance and the encouragement of God's word whether it is through the apostles whether it is written God's word or what God speaks through brothers and sisters in the body of Christ through the perseverance and encouragement of scriptures we might have hope.

Closing Exhortation to Persevere in Hope

Dear brothers I hope that 2020 will end better than it started. I hope it'll be a leap year where we leap forward to know God better as a loving heavenly father. That we will end knowing that every day God gives us the best day of our lives.

One day closer to knowing Jesus seeing Jesus and being like him. One day to take all of the lessons and failures of yesterday and make it different today. To be more like Jesus today to overcome sin where we haven't to die to ourself where we haven't and knowing that we have a part to play in the body of Christ that we ought to sustain others like Ruth did that we can transform stories of Naomi's in our lives from weeping to joy and that we can be roots to them through simple words of saying I'm with you in this journey your God my God are the same.

Don't give up. God said he'll never leave you nor forsake you. I am also part of the body of Christ that has been called to you in this place. We won't give up. On this we will finish what it started until Jesus comes.

These are the sure prophetic words of hope God wants us to speak in our midweek groups. I hope that our midweek groups will become more and more powerfully spirit anointed spirit filled as each of us come and take a personal take it personally on ourselves to share what God is birthing in us and rooting inside of us.

May God help us.