Go at God's Pace

All right, well, good morning, guys. We’ll go ahead and start to find our seats. I want to just kind of extend the gratitude again. Thank you all for our special guests that are joining us today. And if this is your first time with us and you have no idea what’s going on, then welcome to the party. Yeah, I’m just trying to make sure I don’t get caught up in one of the skits as a benefactor or victim. I’m not sure which way to go there. So awesome.

Well, if you are new with us, then this will be a little different for you. But as we have been doing over the last couple months, we’re going to begin this portion of our service with some corporate prayer. So what we’ve been doing is we’ve just been buddying up with the neighbor and praying about something that’s been given from the front. And it feels incredibly appropriate for us to ask God’s blessing on that playground over there. You know, we don’t we don’t just want that to be a spot where a lot of kids get to play and have a good time. It’s going to be that. It’s already that. But we are asking the Lord to use that playground as a way for families to honestly become followers of Jesus. You know, we believe that God could take anything we offer Him and do something incalculably better and bigger with it than what we could ever ask or imagine. That’s what Paul says in Ephesians 3:20-21. So we’re going to offer that playground to Him and trust that He’s going to do something bigger and better with it than what we could ever ask or imagine. So we’re going to spend a few moments just grabbing neighbor and pray that God would use that to make a spiritual impact in our community. Thank you. And I’ll wrap us up here in a moment.

Father, you have you have a strong history of doing credible things with our meager offerings. Lord, the life of Claude Newton was not meager and the money spent on the playground certainly is not meager. Father, we offer it to you and we ask, Lord, that you would do something different with it than what we could ever ask or imagine. Father, this morning, I feel like the boy that brought five loaves of bread and two fish to hear Jesus preach on the mountainside. There was no food anywhere to be found. There were thousands of hungry folks that Jesus wanted to feed. So He took five loaves and two fish and He fed thousands. Lord, would you take our five loaves and two fish and would you spiritually feed thousands, please? Lord, would that play system, would that mulch, would that fence, Lord, would that just a little footprint on our soil, Lord, would it be something that would change the spiritual lives of families in the low country for eternity, please? Father, for me personally, as I transition now to the sermon, God, I hear the rain out there and I’m reminded of your promise from Isaiah 55. Just as the rain comes from heaven, it does not hit the ground and immediately go up. No, it stays and it brings produce. It brings blueberries. It brings corn. It brings stuff that feeds us in the same way your word goes out. It does not just hit our ears or our hearts and bounce back off. No, God, your word, it always accomplishes your purpose for it. And God, as I am going to preach your word this morning, I beg that you would accomplish your purpose, whether I get to see it or not. Lord, for those in the room that don’t know you yet, I pray this would be the morning where the spiritual eyes of their heart would open, the light bulb would come on and they would see you and your greatness. For those who are here this morning that do know you, I pray that they would just enjoy you a little bit more. Father, we thank you for today and it’s in your great name that we pray. Amen.

Well, I want to take you back to a night that I had back in November of 2021. You see, I did not grow up in a city. I did not grow up in a suburb. I grew up in an area that actually looked more like Ravenel than what some of y’all assume of me. And that’s totally fine. That’s I’m cool with that. But something that I never got to do growing up was go hunting. All right. I would now call myself an aspiring hunter. So On November, I forget what date it was, 2021. I’m in a buddy stand and that’s the product right there. I’m really glad I didn’t get my first deer and take it to Michael because I think I’d be a little more wet than that. And I’m going to refrain from showing you the behemoth that put all that on me. That night came me sitting in a deer stand because I had a good buddy. His name is Rick. And Rick is a buddy of mine. He’s not that Rick, a different Rick, but I like you too. I didn’t even know you back then, man. A good buddy named Rick. And he finds me at church one day and he said something to me that I will never forget. He said, Jeremy, you look tired on the inside. You want to come and sit in a deer stand with me?

You see, something about my personality. I don’t have an insatiable appetite to win. I’m not the type of guy that is going to work from sun up to sun down to get anything accomplished. That’s my wife. What I have is an inability to recognize when I need to stop. Now, at my old church, my job was largely based off of product. What can I produce? And I had a system for getting that product happening. I had a process for making this work. And I was just around the clock working this process. And I was driving myself into the ground. Rick, he was part of that system for me. I was a groups pastor at my old spot. And I loved that role. I loved that church. And I’m incredibly grateful for what that did for me as a man, what it did for our family. But I got so obsessed with producing new groups and new group leaders, I was not recognizing some early signs of what may have ruined my ministry later. Rick, older gentleman, wiser gentleman, he was able to look and see what was going on underneath the surface.

So one night we’re at church and Rick comes up to me. This is a guy I’ve had countless lunches with. This is a guy that I’ve talked with on the phone many times. And he said, Jeremy, you look tired on the inside. So he puts me in a deer stand a couple weeks later. That first night, I don’t see anything except for some squirrel and some birds. I thought it was automatic. I thought if I sit in a stand, I’ll see a deer and I’ll be able to eat venison the next day. That’s just not how it works, apparently. God was after something so much better in my heart. And I got to just watch the sunset for like the first time in my life. And man, it was beautiful. It brought tears to my eyes. And it was one of those moments where I realized I am hurried. Hurried. I’m busy, but not in the right ways.

And I wonder if we’re being honest, how many of y’all are sitting in here right now and you’re in a really similar situation? You are tired on the inside. You are hurried. You are busy. You feel restless even right now because you’re wondering, when is this guy going to finish? When can I go to the dedication? When can I have lunch so that I can go sit on the couch and I can continue to work by scrolling Instagram or Facebook or watching TV and not actually getting the rest that I need? Because tomorrow morning is coming and I’ve got to rush to work. I’ve got to rush through my day. And so the hamster wheel just keeps going.

I think if we’re honest, so many of us live in a posture of hurriedness, of busyness, and of restlessness. And the world doesn’t really have a whole lot to offer you there. Because the world might say, okay, you just need to do more work but in less time. And they give you productivity books that just actually make you more busy. The world might say, you should just stop doing anything at all. Just avoid your problems. Problems don’t go away, especially when they’re mouths to feed, right? The world might say, just do nothing differently and get over it. And that’s not cool either. The world might even say, just find an escape. A hobby, get a new relationship, none of that stuff satisfies. We live in a hurried, anxious age, and whether you work a nine to five or not, it’s on you too. That’s the swimming pool that we are all dipped in. That is our lives, and there are Some ways to remedy that hurry, but here’s the only truth that will really help you. God is the one that satisfies hurried hearts. So that’s what we’re talking about this morning. God satisfies hurried hearts, and if you’re like me, then you need this. You need some rest, and I hope that this morning as we walk through a passage of scripture, God will offer you the rest that you need.

If you will, go ahead and open up your Bibles to Luke chapter five. I’ll be there with you in a moment. Luke chapter five. So far in the gospel of Luke, at least in this telling of it, Jesus has been born, obviously, as the long-awaited Messiah. Way back in the book of Genesis, God made a promise to Adam and Eve, and He said, “I’m going to send a child, and that child is going to conquer Satan. He’s going to conquer the evil one. He’s going to deal away with what has hurried you and what has thrown you into sin.”

So Jesus arrives on the scene. He is born, and then He just grows up as a regular Jewish boy, but with some asterisks. Jesus grows up. He grows in wisdom. He grows in stature. He’s memorizing the Old Testament like any Jewish boy would. He’s taken up His daddy’s trade of carpentry. He’s just grown up. And then at about 30 years old or so, Jesus is announced as the Messiah publicly through a baptism where John the Baptist dips Jesus under the water. A voice from heaven says, “This is my son with whom I’m well pleased.” The Holy Spirit comes and is descending on Him in the form of a dove. And you got the Trinity right there in this baptism moment, and hardly anybody gets it.

And then Jesus immediately is led into the wilderness for 40 days of fasting. 40 days, four zero, 40 days of fasting where He would just be with Himself and the Father tempted by Satan the entire time. And then after that, Jesus begins His public ministry. And He has regional public acclaim. He’s getting fame. He’s getting popularity everywhere except for His hometown. His rescue mission is underway. He was sent for the purpose of rescuing and redeeming mankind. There is work to be done. If anybody in the entire history of the universe could be busy and have a reason for it, it’d be my man, Jesus Christ. Jesus was busy. Jesus had a mission. Jesus had work to do.

And that’s where we find Him in Luke chapter 5, starting in verse 12. It says this: “So reaching out His hand, Jesus touched him saying, ‘I am willing, be made clean.’ And immediately the leprosy left Him. Then He ordered him to tell no one.” Joke’s on Jesus. Jesus says, “But go show yourself to the priest and offer what Moses commanded for your cleansing as a testimony to them.” But the news about Him spread even more and large crowds would come together to hear Him and to be healed of their sickness. “Yet, yet, Jesus often withdrew to deserted places.”

Man, Jesus does it again. He heals the leprous guy. What we need to understand is a little bit about leprosy before we get to feel the full weight of this passage. You see, in Jesus’ time, leprosy, what we might call Hansen’s disease now, devastated your health, your life, even your worship. Leprosy was an uncurable disease that oftentimes was a death sentence for somebody if they contracted it. It would slowly take over their body. They would start to lose appendages and limbs. They would just kind of be left to kind of wither and pass away. They would devastate their health.

It would also devastate their life socially. Nobody wanted to contract the disease, and they didn’t necessarily know how to prevent that from happening. So if you get leprosy, you are immediately outcast because nobody wants to deal with that. Nobody wants to take your disease onto themselves. So you would be devastated socially, but you would also be devastated in your worship in a spiritual sense. Because God had some certain laws in the Old Testament about what governs purity in the body. And He said, “If there’s a leprous person among you, you got to keep them separate.” So nobody would want to touch the leprous person or intermingle with them, because that would also mean they can’t go to the temple, which means they can’t offer their sacrifices, which means they can’t have their sins taken care of, which means the gap that stands between them and God just gets further and further and further. If you’ve got leprosy, you are devastated.

And Jesus then heals and restores this man to wholeness, not just by speaking, but by reaching out and grabbing the guy. So Jesus heals him. What would that naturally produce? Oh, the word would spread. It’s just like what it’s written right here. The news about Him spreads even more. Because who could contain a story like that? No one could. So Jesus then gets inundated, flooded with ministry potential. He heals this guy and then people come to Him. And that’s where we’re at in this story. Jesus is busy. He’s busy.

So there’s a few observations I want to make about this passage. The first one is that the word was spreading. Look in verse 15. It says, “The news about Him spread even more.” Some of your Bibles might say the report about Him. Some of them might say the fame of Jesus. Others might say the news there as mine does. But that word news is actually the Greek word logos. It’s not the words fame, which is a report. It’s not echos, repeated reports. It’s not even euangelizo, gospel news. It’s none of those words. It’s logos.

For some of us that have some interaction with the Bible on a different level, we might recognize the word logos as the word, John chapter 1. In fact, if you’re a note taker, I want you to write this down. Later this afternoon, go read John 1 verses 1 through 5. And read what God has to say about the word. The word was spreading. In John chapter 1, the author there says that Jesus is the word. He’s the logos. He is the emanation and the articulation of God. So it’s not just that news about Jesus was spreading, but the impact of the word, the impact of Jesus is going out. News is going out. Jesus’ ministry is bearing fruit and His impact is spreading.

In our eyes, Jesus is well on His way to accomplish His mission, to seek and to save the lost, to redeem mankind, to make all the wrong things right, to make all the dark places light, to undo the curse of Satan. Jesus is doing it. He’s busy, but He is doing it. He’s got His system and He is making it happen. My man, Jesus, He is moving up in the world. Word is spreading.

What happens to your work when word spreads at your company that you’re doing a good job? Any of your bosses ever say, “Hey, you’re doing a really good job. I’m going to take some off your plate.” No! Your boss says, “Hey, you’re doing a good job. Let me give you a little bit more you don’t feel like you’re really good at.” That’s what happens.

Jesus, as the word spread, number two, the second observation is that success begins building on itself. Look at the increases of verse 15. News spreads. Large crowds gather. Sermons then are preached. And more sicknesses then are healed. And Jesus gets caught in this vortex of busyness and ministry. Word spreads. People gather. He preaches sermons. He heals people. Which means more word spreads. Which means more people gather. Which means more sermons are preached. Which means more sicknesses are healed. Do you get it? Jesus is busy. He’s busy.

He’s beginning to make this regional impact. People all over the area, they would have been saying, “Man, I don’t really understand all of what this guy has to say. But my cousin is no longer leprous. My sister no longer has a demon in her. We have got to go and hear what this Jesus guy has to say. We might even get a free lunch out of it. I don’t know.” That’s what’s happening.

The greater impact Jesus had means greater demands, which means greater distractions. Jesus is busy. He’s hurried. I’m just curious. If we pop out of the story for a moment, I’m really interested to know if we were to have a one-on-one conversation. I’d ask you, how would you respond to this type of success? How would it hit you if the word about your good job was spreading so much in your company that the VP came in from out of state just to talk with you? What would you do if everybody in our town got to hear about how good of a whatever you are, and they started giving you all the work, all the opportunities, what would you do? How do you respond? I know how I respond. I get caught up in a situation where I need somebody to look at me and say, “Jeremy, you’re tired on the inside, buddy. You need to go home. You need to come sit with me.”

in a deer stand and spend some time with your wife and your daughter. That’s what I needed. And Jesus, though, He’s different because He was after something better than success. The craziest word in this entire passage starts verse 16. It says, “yet.” What do you mean yet? Jesus has all this success. He’s getting popularity. He’s getting fame. He’s getting opportunities. He’s accomplishing the mission that God sent Him for. Yet. So, okay, whatever. Yet. Success was not final for Jesus. No. Jesus was after something better. He was there not for influence and fruit, which is crazy to think about. Success and busyness and work was not ultimate for Jesus. It just wasn’t. Getting His name out there wasn’t Jesus’ concern. He was after something better. And I think if we’re honest, we struggle with that.

Why would Jesus come to the world, this promised, awaited Messiah, this Savior of all mankind? And why would He disengage from the mission? Why would yet happen? Verse 16, if this is the Jeremy-inspired version, would say, “so, He leaned in harder, He preached more, and He did more activity.” If I was writing this, that’s what I would say, because that’s what I would assume Jesus is doing. But this instead says, “yet. He often withdrew to deserted places and prayed.” That’s Jesus’ response to all the success, all the fame, all the busyness, all the hurry. Jesus says, “I will not be hurried by anything. You may not rush Me.”

The fourth observation that I want you to take away is that connection with the Father was ultimate for Jesus. Success wasn’t ultimate for Him. It doesn’t matter. The word is spreading, which means He has more success building on itself. But Jesus was after something better than success because He was after connection with the Father. Connection with the Father was ultimate for Jesus. He would withdraw from the success. He would pull out from the busyness. He would disengage from the hurry. It says, He withdrew. He retreated. He escaped. He got away. Man, how good does that sound? How good does it sound to be able to say, “I don’t need it. I don’t need more work. I don’t need more influence. I don’t need more popularity. I don’t need more respect. I don’t need more money. I don’t need more opportunities. I don’t need longer work hours. I don’t need that stuff. I’m going to withdraw by myself. I’m going to pull back from it. I’m going to say no to the hurriedness. I’m going to say no to the busyness. I’m going to say no to all that.” That’s what Jesus did.

There’s actually a real life application that I want to invite half this room to. Coming up in October, we have an opportunity for the women. We have an opportunity for you to do this. For you to withdraw. For you to disengage from the hurriedness. For you to disengage from the busyness. Just for a couple of hours, really. If there’s any woman in the room that’s walking in this morning and you feel a little rushed or a little hurried, I’m talking straight to you. I want to invite you to at least consider joining our women and going away for a couple of days in early October for a retreat to hear another lady in the area come and talk about what God has for you. If you’re interested in just the slightest in that, talk with me or Donna or Becca after the service and we will get you there. But God really is offering all of us that. He’s offering all of us the opportunity to withdraw.

And I think it’s wild where Jesus withdraws to. It says, “No, Jesus withdrew to mountain cabins.” No, He doesn’t say that either. Where does Jesus withdraw to? Lonely places. Deserted places. He goes to where people aren’t. We don’t set up vacation resorts where there aren’t things to do. Unless you’re, you know, Kenneth and Kristen, you guys just went out west of the Badlands. Like that’s a little different. We don’t set up our Airbnbs and our hotels in the middle of nowhere. No, but Jesus said, “I’m going to withdraw to the deserted place.” It is fascinating to me that the God of life, order, and goodness would regularly inhabit the uninhabited deserted places and fill them with Himself.

You see, here’s the deal. Jesus did not lose sight of the fact that He needed time with the Father. Jesus needed quiet times. And I say that word need intentionally because Jesus, fully God, does not need anything. Fully man, subject to every temptation you have, subject to your entire experience. Jesus had to eat. He had to sleep. He needed a hug every now and then. Everything you need, Jesus needs. Not in the same way. And He would never give in to the temptation because He’s fully God. But Jesus had to back away from the hurry. He had to back away from the busyness. And He had to maintain this relationship with the Father. So He would withdraw to deserted places. Naturally, Jesus would feel hurried by the demands of His ministry and work. Jesus came for this. Jesus is God, which means that He was part of this group plan to design this salvation of mankind. Jesus is fully in on the plan where He says, “I’m going to go and I’m going to inhabit space and time as this man named Jesus Christ. And I’m going to affect this salvation for people. I am going to heal people. I am going to preach sermons. I am going to live among them. I am going to be sacrificed for them.” Jesus is fully aware of the plan. He’s fully aware of the stakes involved. He understands if I don’t do this the right way, there’s no hope for people. If I don’t accomplish this without sin and perfectly, then there’s no second option. There’s no plan B. Jesus understood the ultimate mission impossible. He understood the stakes. He understood what had to happen. And it’s starting to work. And He withdraws.

Anybody else staggered by that? We get caught up just in making ends meet. We get caught up just in the nine to five. We get caught up just in maintaining our hobbies and our social life. And we say, “If I’m not at the restaurant by such and such time, then they’re going to reject this business offer. And my life is going to go off the rails.” Newsflash, man. Probably not. Honestly, in the grand scheme of things, in the face of eternity, there’s very little riding on how well you do tomorrow. God is going to have His way regardless. What really matters in the face of eternity is what Jesus Christ has done for us. He fully understood the stakes involved. And even He would back away sometimes. He said, “You will not hurry me. You will not rush me.” Time with the Father was fuel for Jesus. Nothing else.

Some of y’all are wondering, where is Jesus, where is Jeremy going with this? I’ll get there in a moment, but I just want to recognize something. Verse 16 says Jesus did this all the time. He often withdrew. Imagine how frustrating that might be if you’re one of the disciples. And you’re like, “Hey, where’s Jesus? The crowds are gathering again. Hey, where’s Jesus? That leper colony is back. They’re looking for some more healings. Hey, where’s Jesus? We have this group of people that are ready to be sent out to take His message somewhere. Hey, where’s Jesus? There’s some hungry folks over here.” And they can’t find Him because He’s withdrawn again. Like, “Oh, Jesus is out in the woods again. We’ve got to go find Him. Okay, fan out. And let’s make sure we don’t get too far away from each other. He’s pretty good at hiding. Okay. He made the rocks. He can look like them if He wants. Where’s Jesus?” He would do this all the time. He would often withdraw.

Luke 6 says that Jesus prayed all night before naming His 12 special disciples. Matthew 14 says that when John the Baptist was beheaded, Jesus went and He prayed all night again. Jesus often withdrew. He often slowed down just to be alone with God. And that’s an invitation that God is making all of us today. The God of the universe is inviting you to slow down and be with Him. We’ll get to that in a second, but I want to make you think about something. We’re sitting here in Luke chapter five, where Jesus has all this success. He’s riding this wave of popularity. He’s beginning this ministry. There’s one more time where Jesus would withdraw to be with the Father. Not at the beginning of His ministry though, but at the end. In Luke chapter 22, the scene will be very different. In Luke chapter 22, Jesus is not loved by the crowds, but He’s hated by them. In Luke chapter 22, Jesus is not riding in a wave of earthly success. No, He’s under the crushing weight of heavenly wrath. In Luke chapter 22, Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane. Not a place that was deserted by itself, but a place where He would be deserted for you. You see, in Luke chapter 22, Jesus in the garden would Start to be left by the Father. Jesus is getting away to have a last few moments with God before He undergoes what He knows is about to happen, which is the most difficult moment or period in the history of mankind. And He does that for you. He does it for you and for you and for you and for you. He does it for us. After the garden on the cross, where Jesus is surrounded by a crowd of people, but He is definitively alone by Himself. He looks into heaven. He quotes Psalm 22 and He says, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? God, why’d You leave me? Where are You, Father?” Jesus would undergo the ultimate desertion for you. He prepared for that moment with this catalog of getting away by Himself, not being hurried, and just being with the Father.

You see, Jesus so loved you that He came to this world, that He would give His perfect life in place of your imperfect one so that your sins could be forgiven by His righteousness and His goodness. So that the debt that you should pay to a heavenly God who loves You, but is also holy and perfect and blameless. Jesus took that debt that you owe onto His own shoulders and He gives you His own perfect credit instead. The God of the universe says, “I love you so much. I’m going to give my boy for you. All you have to do is embrace this, to trust in this, to accept this, to call on me as Lord and Savior. That’s all you got to do. Just give me your life.” The ultimate rest that you could ever have is a rest from striving to trying to pay off a debt to God that you can’t pay off.

Our work lives match or mirror our spiritual lives. Here’s what I mean. When Paul says in Romans that the wages of sin is death, what he’s articulating is that what you earn through your sin is death. It’s not life. You go to work, you clock in, you clock out, you make a little bit of cash so that you can live and you can play. Paul is saying in that moment, the same thing happens with us spiritually. We live our life, but we just sin. And every time we do that, we’re just more and more dead. And you take a lifetime of that, a lifetime of this wage with this compounding interest, and you get to a place where you are on your deathbed before the Lord. And there’s this eternal debt that you owe to the God of the universe. And the natural desire or the natural solution in your mind is work. So I will work at being a Christian. I will read my Bible to make Jesus love me more so that I could pay off this debt. I will pray some so that God will love me so that I could pay off this debt. I will get baptized so that God will love me so I could pay off this debt. I will hurry. We do this spiritually with God. And we try to think or we do think that we can somehow earn life with God in the same way that you’re going to leave here tomorrow morning if you work a nine to five. You’re going to show up at your work and you’re just going to work. We make our spiritual lives the same way. And we hurry and we reject rest. And we don’t just embrace the grace that God has for us. And God is saying, “Be done with that.” He’s saying, “Be done with that.”

You see, slowing down and being satisfied in the Father were critical for Jesus. Here’s what that means for you. If you’re a note taker, I want you to write this down. Recognize you aren’t God. That’s okay. You need rest. You aren’t God and you need rest. If Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, got away by Himself, stopped work, engaged, disengaged from the crowds and the noise and prayed with the Father, if God rested, then we to rest. You see, here’s the thing. God satisfies hurried hearts and He wants to satisfy yours. He wants you to rest in Himself, not try to rest in how good of a worker you are, not rest in how good of a parent or a friend you are, not rest in your 401k, not rest in what you can produce, not rest in how liked you are, not rest in any of that stuff because that stuff is fleeting and does not provide true rest. What provides true rest is a relationship with God that you regularly engage in, where you get away by yourself. So if you’re not God and you need rest, then that means this: you must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. Hurry is an enemy to your life as a follower of Jesus. It’s an enemy for you.

You see, Jesus told us what the most important commands are. It’s not the 10 commandments. The most important commandments, you know this: love God, love people. When Jesus was asked, what’s the most important thing I need to do? What’s the best commandments? What are the most compelling commandments for your followers? He didn’t go to some Levitical law. He didn’t go to a Mosaic law. No, He said, love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, strength, and love people as yourself.

You cannot love if you are hurried. Anybody ever tried to love somebody while you’re walking past them? You know, like you’re greeting somebody, maybe on a Sunday morning. Hey buddy, how are you? Okay, cool. Good to see you. Or maybe you see somebody in the neighborhood. Hey man, how’s the thing? Okay, cool. And you just keep walking. It doesn’t work that way. You can’t love people if you’re hurried, which means if you’re hurried, you got to get rid of that.

Hurry destroys your relationship with God and with other people. And Jesus would not allow the most important mission that the world has ever known to hurry His heart or destroy His relationships with God and people.

The natural question is what hurries you? What makes you feel hurried or tired on the inside? I could take a couple guesses. It might be sitting on your lap or sitting in your pocket right now. Our cell phones do not help us rest. I am deeply ashamed of how much screen time I’ve had the past couple weeks. I get a notification every Sunday morning about my average screen time use of my phone per day. And that’s like, it usually causes some weeping and gnashing of teeth for me. And I’m like, how in the world did I get duped into using this thing for this many minutes every day this past week? What have I been doing?

Those phones are designed to keep us hooked to them like appendages that we can’t put down by the door and walk away from. And if you’re a parent, your kid knows it. Man, one of the most convicting moments of my early fatherhood was when Annie, who was barely able to walk, found my phone at the kitchen and brought it to me. It wasn’t ringing. I didn’t need that. I didn’t ask for it. She just saw dad doesn’t have her phone or dad doesn’t have his phone. Something must be wrong. I’ve got to fix this situation. That was incredibly embarrassing and convicting for me as a dad. It made me think, man, how much time does she look at me and I’m just sitting here doing this? Because that thing is not designed to help me rest.

Our TVs don’t help us rest either. Our need to produce, our lack of physical exercise, and even just sunlight does not help us rest. There was deep wisdom when my friend, Rick said, Jeremy, you need to get into a deer stance because he understood that’s going to force me to be outside. I’m going to see the sun. I’m going to see the moon and I’ve got to sit still and I’ve got to be quiet, which means I can’t take anything with me.

You got to ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. And finally, you’ve got to regularly schedule time to slow down and be with God. You’ve got to. Moments of slowness throughout the day, a day of rest every week. People look at Sundays, what we might call the Sabbath. And I think that some people say, man, why would God give us this rule we’ve got to keep that we have to rest on Sundays? How lame of God to give us the Sabbath. How lame of God to tell us that we need to gather with our church and to be disengaged from work. How good of the Lord to give us a day of rest.

I take you even back all the way to Genesis chapter one, after God had created everything in six days. On the seventh day, what did God do? He worked? Did He produce more? Did He assess what He did and have a whiteboard session with anybody else and say, this is how we can really make this good now? No. What did He do? You said it kind of quiet. I want you to say it proud. What did God do? He rested. God rested. Why don’t we? We might be too busy for God. Or maybe we’re just busier than God. Oh, maybe we’re engaged in something more important than what God’s got to do. Y’all, this sermon is coming straight to me before it’s getting to you guys. It is clear. I need to rest. It’s obvious. I’ve got to regularly take time to slow down and disengage from stuff. I have got to remind myself that only God will satisfy my hurried heart.

So I don’t stand before you as somebody that’s got it all figured out. I am standing before you as a beggar who is telling another beggar where to get the free meal. I am standing before you as somebody saying that I need help to not be hurried. And I think you do too. This is where it’s at. It’s in God. Jesus Christ Himself would disengage. He often withdrew. So I’m inviting you to withdraw as well. God wants to satisfy your hurried heart.

We’ve been going through this series called The Life You’ve Always Wanted. I’m curious, does anybody want to feel rested on the inside? Does anybody want to feel anxious? Anybody want to feel troubled? Anybody want to feel burdened? Anybody want to end your life knowing you’ve lived for something that counted and mattered and you didn’t step on somebody’s face to get there? Resting regularly with your heavenly Father is the path forward.

I believe that God’s posture for us this morning is like a dad inviting his child just to come and sit on his lap and take a nap with Him. Becca freed me up yesterday to have some one-on-one time with one of our kids, and the delight on this child’s face after an hour of just one-on-one time. And it’s clear, it is so clear, this child wants so much more of that with me. But something happens in our lives where we get too old to be alone with our heavenly Father, where we get too old to rest with Him, where we get too old just to be with Him. The God of the universe, hear this, the God of the universe wants one-on-one time with you.

So what’s standing in the way? If you’ve been with us for some time, you’ve experienced this already. If this is your first time with us, then you have a free pass not to follow my lead. But I think that there are things in all of our lives that are hindering us from resting with God. There are things that are hurrying us on the inside. And if you’re interested in hearing from the Lord about what that might be, I invite you to do this with me. We, I just call this an open hands prayer where I put my palms out. And I am asking the Lord to help me see, Lord, what is stopping my rest in You? If you’re going to follow my lead, just show me your palms. And you take those, you just put them hand down in your lap. And I’m just going to lead us in a prayer that I want you to pray with me in your mind and in your heart. A prayer of asking God to reveal what we need to eliminate so that we can spend time with Him.

Pray with me now. Lord, God, I confess, as ridiculous as it sounds, I get too busy to have time with You. Nothing else. My heart feels that way sometimes, Lord, from the pace that it beats at to how hard it is, how frantic I feel. God, I believe that You want one-on-one time with me. I believe that You just want me to be with You. I believe, God, that You love me so much that You would give up anything to have me, including Your own Son. So God, how could I not spend time with You? Lord, can You show me what gets in the way? God, can You show me what hurries my heart? Father, what fights my rest in You? Lord, I beg that we would be known as a church that rests in the Lord, that the souls of the folks here would rest deeply in You. Father, we would let that fuel our true work that matters. Lord, the work of spreading Your kingdom by sharing Your gospel, by praying for people, by bringing healing to the broken and bringing light to the darkness. Father, I pray that me as a pastor, I would lead this church in regular rhythms of rest, that we would confess corporately that we don’t have to work and strive all the time, That You are the builder of the house. You are the one that watches over us. So Lord, for the person that’s here this morning, I beg You would give them rest, please. Father, we love You. I trust that You have spoken. Father, if there is something beginning in my way or in the way of somebody else here this morning, You will reveal it. You will give us the courage and the strength to remove it so that we can have time with You.