Hope in Hard Places | Genesis | Full Experience

I want to invite you to stand with us, join in as we lift up the name of Jesus together. Come on. Join in as we lift up the name of Jesus together. Come on. Come on. Come on. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. Hasn't He been so good to us. Didn't He heal the broken. Didn't He freely give His life. Wasn't the veil thrown open. Doesn't He call the dead to rise. Awakes new creation. Hasn't He been so good. Opened it all for good. Hasn't He been so good to us. He's working. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. He's working. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. He's working.

Everything for good. He's working. Everything for good. We believe that today. We believe that today. He's still working miracles. Right here in this moment. We pray for the impossible. We believe that He will do it. Hasn't He made a way? Didn't He make a way? Oh, He made a way for us. Yeah. Hasn't He made a way? Didn't He make a way? Didn't He make a way for us? Yes, He will make a way for us. He's working. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. He's working. He's working. He's working. Everything for good. Oh. Oh. He's working. Everything for good. Oh.

Oh. He's working. Everything for good. He is working. He's working. Everything for good. He is working. He's working. Everything for good. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. The Bible says, the Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing. He's enough for us today. Let's sing this out together. I feel you in the sunrise. ♪ The heat upon my skin ♪ ♪ I see you in the night sky when the stars are glowing dim ♪ ♪ I hear you in the wind blows, the leaves are rustling ♪ ♪ There's nowhere that I could go that you haven't been ♪ ♪ There's nowhere that I could go that you haven't been ♪ We sing holy, holy. Come on. ♪ Holy, holy, holy, I cannot but to sing it out loud ♪ ♪ You alone are worthy, I cannot but believe it ♪ ♪ Take a look around, look at all you've done ♪ ♪ God has always been enough ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy, if this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ If this was it then that's enough, you're enough ♪ Sing I find.

♪ I find you in the details of everything we're planned ♪ ♪ The presence of a father is closer than a friend ♪ ♪ In the crying of a baby, the laughter of a kid ♪ ♪ There's nothing that I could find that you want already ♪ ♪ There's nothing, no ♪ ♪ There's nothing that I could find that you want already, yeah ♪ ♪ Yeah ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy, I cannot but to sing it ♪ ♪ You alone are worthy, I cannot but believe it ♪ ♪ Take a look around, look at all you've done ♪ ♪ God has always been enough ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy, if this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ You're enough, it's enough, cause you're enough ♪ ♪ It's enough, cause you're enough, if seeing was believing ♪ ♪ I've seen enough, it's enough, cause you're enough ♪ ♪ I'm living in the promise of what's to come ♪ ♪ It's enough, cause you're enough, if seeing was believing ♪ ♪ I've seen enough, it's enough, cause you're enough ♪ ♪ I'm living in the promise of what's to come ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy, I cannot but to sing it ♪ ♪ I cannot but to sing it, you of whom are worthy ♪ ♪ Yes you are, I cannot but believe it ♪ ♪ Take a look around, look at all you've done ♪ ♪ God has always been enough ♪ ♪ Holy, holy, holy, if this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ We trust in Jesus, if this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ If this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ Oh, if this was it then that's enough ♪ ♪ If this was it then that's enough ♪ Amen.

Let's keep working on this. God bless you this wonderful evening. And as our. Amen. We love you. God bless you. Come on, share it. Come on, keep this going together. Follow us, let's keep going. Let's get on with it, McDonald's is open. Fill your stomach at Mcdonald's right now. And you my friends, when we go to McDonald's at 20ths and 31st demand has increased by about 34,000 calories in a given year. ♪ A nation suddenly articulate ♪ That's huge. ♪ With a thousand tongues to lift one cry ♪ ♪ Then from north to south and east to west ♪ ♪ We'd hear Christ be magnified ♪ ♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah ♪ ♪ Were the whole earth echoing his eminence ♪ ♪ His name would burst from sea and sky ♪ ♪ From rivers to the mountaintops ♪ ♪ We'd hear Christ be magnified ♪ We join creation in heaven. We sing together, come on. ♪ Oh, Christ be magnified ♪ ♪ Just let his praise arise ♪ ♪ Christ be magnified in me ♪

♪ Oh, Christ be magnified on the altar of my life ♪ ♪ Christ be magnified in me ♪ ♪ When every creature finds its inmost many ♪ ♪ And every human heart its native cry ♪ Here we go. ♪ Then in one enraptured hymn of praise ♪ ♪ We'll sing Christ be magnified ♪ ♪ Oh, be magnified, oh, oh ♪ ♪ Christ be magnified, just let his praise arise ♪ ♪ Just let his praise arise, Christ be magnified in me ♪ ♪ Oh, Christ be magnified on the altar of my life ♪ ♪ Christ be magnified in me ♪ ♪ Oh, make us more like you, Jesus ♪ ♪ Make us more like you, Jesus ♪ ♪ More like you, less like me ♪ Let's pray. Praise for our Magnificent Lord. Why don't we pray together? A Person. A Mind. A Word. A Life. And an End. Praise for the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's include who you are in this. Let's praise together. Thank you so much. Let's pray. Oh, Christ be magnified. Let His praise arise.

Christ be magnified in me. Oh, Christ be magnified. The answer of my life. Christ be magnified in me. Christ be magnified in me. You all sound amazing. Thank you so much for singing. You can be seated. I want to welcome you again to CCV. My name is Travis Brown and it's such a powerful song that we just sang, right? Christ be magnified. You know the word magnify. It means to make something appear greater or larger or more important. But when we magnify something in the literal sense, it doesn't change that thing. It just changes how clearly we see it. It changes our perspective. And it's a reminder to me that Jesus. Jesus does not need us to magnify him in order to be significant. He does not need us to magnify him in order to be powerful and in order to be God. Just in case you're wondering, Jesus is doing just fine on his own without us, okay? But when we sing those words, Christ be magnified, it's not for his benefit, it's for ours. Because when we magnify Christ, it aligns our lives and aligns our perspective, and it reminds us of the only one who's worthy of all of our worship, and that's Jesus. I love what the apostle Paul wrote

in Philippians chapter one, verse 20. He says, I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always, Christ will be magnified. In my body, whether by life or by death. Every week here at CCV, we take part of our service and we take communion together where we take some bread and we take some juice as a reminder of the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross with his body and his blood that made it possible for us to experience forgiveness and hope and life. And when we take communion every week, it's our chance to magnify Jesus and to make him greater and larger and more important in our own lives. And for these next few moments as we're taking communion, I invite all of us to do just that. Let's pray together. Father, we're so grateful that we get to come to this moment and acknowledge who you are. Thank you for what you did for us. Thank you for what you're doing in us. Father, may our perspective and our worship align with who you are. We love you. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Amen. ♪♪ ♪♪

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ I moved out here in 2018 to go to college. And the easiest way to make friends for me when I went to college was to join a fraternity. There was really not room for Jesus or the church in that life. And I kind of just really lost who I was. Didn't have a purpose anymore. Was kind of jumping job to job, like small little jobs that didn't mean anything to me. The best way I always put it to everyone was I was a robot. I was just going through the motions and trying to get to the next drink that I could have or just like a bunch of empty things that didn't actually fill me. But it felt like for those couple hours that I could do them, it was enough that I could forget about everything else and not have to think about, you know, I'm not going to church anymore. I don't have much of a relationship with my family anymore. Those type of things that, you know, they hurt to think about.

I got a call from my oldest sister. And she just, she called me out of the blue one day for honestly like a week of just waking up every day either crying or just super mad at myself. And she was the first person that like I really opened up to. And I told her everything. I told her where I'm at. And she said, you know, I have a friend from law school whose husband is, you know, one of the best men that I've ever met. Like, I think it would be good if you just reached out. So I'm going to send you his number. And, you know, if you want someone to talk to, he'll definitely be there for you. And he immediately got back to me and he was like, you know, anytime let's do lunch, let's go get coffee. It was the first good conversation I had with someone where I wasn't miserable in such a long time. And he had talked about, you know, ever want to like join me for church. So we went to we went to church that night and I don't know if it was all the hands that I shook that night and the people welcoming me or if it was just you know the first time actually sitting in God's presence but like for the first time in probably five years I felt so full. That simple hey I'm going to church of my life on Saturday if you want to come like it it literally changed my entire life in a ten-word sentence like it it breathed life back into who I was as a person. I would not be walking with Christ right now if he did not invite me to church that day.

He said he said it a ten-word sentence changed his life. What a powerful story and the power of an invite and I can I can actually relate to that because that is my story. Over 25 years ago there was a teammate of mine who had the boldness to invite me to a Bible study and he had no idea how that would change the trajectory of my life and I would not be standing in front of you today if somebody didn't be bold and invite me into something better. And so let me ask you who is that for you? Maybe that's somebody in your family maybe that's somebody in your neighborhood or at work or on your kids team. Who needs to get an invite from you? Next weekend we have an amazing opportunity for you to extend an invite to somebody to come with you to church because next weekend is barbecue weekend. It's a chance for you to come experience a great service as we're kicking off a brand new series next week but after service or before service you can come early you can share a meal with somebody you can sit across with them have a great conversation and experience the essence of what our church is all about which is which is community. Because God can use in a powerful way one invite to totally transform somebody's life. So why don't you invite somebody to come with you next weekend and see what God does. This weekend we are wrapping up a series that we've been in for the last several weeks been a great series and today we're getting ready to hear just a really powerful message from our senior pastor Ashley Wooldridge. So whatever you use to take notes you can take out your Genesis books you can take those out or your open up your app but let's tune in as we wrap up this series Genesis. Anybody else excited to jump into the book of Revelation next week? It's gonna be an epic series. Don't come alone and next week I'm gonna answer this question. Are we living in the end times? You want to know the answer? You got to come next week all right. This week has been a really just honestly a really tough week for me and our family and not because the Seahawks won the Super Bowl all right. So I feel like you know for all of our Seahawks fans I kind of give them a hard time. I feel like we should give them a little love when the Super Bowl like congratulations. Yeah a little bit of love. We love you. God

loves you. God loves sinners. He does you know so I I wish I wish that's what made this last week tough. What made it tough is some of you saw last weekend on Saturday that a man had to get medevacked off Camelback Mountain and that man is someone that was so close to me and our family. We loved so much. In many ways he's he changed our lives. He changed our lives with his leadership with his kindness and that man took his last breath on Camelback Mountain. He went to go be with Jesus and it was it was so so so hard not just on us but on his family and so many people that that love him. In fact on Saturday night I was with his family in the hospital late into the evening and with his wife and a couple of his kids we we walked into the room and there he is on the table. and he's gone. And I'm praying with this family, I'm just praying for God to bring peace and comfort and hope into this situation. And then can I be really real with you? I know God can, but I don't know how he will. And it's those situations that it's really tough to find hope, isn't it? And in God's perfect timing, the topic for this weekend that has been planned since last year, the topic of this weekend is how to find hope in hard places. Isn't God good? And the more you live life, the more you realize that all of us need hope. Like we all need hope, why? Because when you look at your life, isn't it easy to kind of think life is gonna be like this,

it's gonna be up and to the rights because it's gonna be awesome. And how many of you know life looks a whole lot more like this, right? I mean, life is just all over the place, up and down and the question is, what do you do with these hard places? What do you do with the divorce? What do you do with the death? What do you do with the job loss? What do you do with the child and what happened with that child? What do you do with the betrayal? What do you do with the abuse? What do you do with the hardest places you're in? What's amazing is that today at the end of our Genesis series, there may not be a better man to study in all of Scripture on this topic than Joseph. Joseph's story is found at the end of Genesis. Actually, Genesis chapter 37 through 50 covers the life of Joseph. One of the most extensive covering of stories of anyone in all of Scripture. It's 14 chapters. I can't cover all 14 chapters in this message but this will be the longest message in CCB's history. Okay, so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna give you a summary of his life but what I really wanna do is I'm gonna laser in to answer one question

from Joseph's life and here's the question. Can God use our pain and transform it into something good? No, I don't ask that question in a trite way. That is only an easy question to answer if you're not in pain right now. That's the only way that's an easy question. In fact, that's a tough question and sometimes, like for example, you ever had someone walk up to you in the midst of one of your hardest places and they walk up to you and say, don't worry about it, man, it's gonna turn out for good. And sometimes they can say it in a way that's not helpful. You kinda wanna give them a little throat punch and say, let's see how that turns out for you for good. And sometimes when people say that, like it's all gonna turn out for good, they quote a verse in Scripture, Romans 8.28, very famous verse and sometimes this verse is actually misquoted. So I'm gonna read it to you right up front because we're gonna see at the very end of Genesis as we wrap up today in verse 50, Joseph is going to say something very similar about all the hard things, all the pain that he's gone through. Romans 8.28 says this. It says, and we know, we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who've been called according to his purpose. Verse 29 goes on to say, for those God foreknew,

he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. Now, the apostle Paul wrote this and he went through about as many hard times as anybody else in Scripture. In fact, after he got done writing this, Paul is likely beheaded by the Roman emperor Nero. So what Paul is not saying is that my death is gonna be good. Your divorce was good. The infertility you went through is good. The betrayal you went through is good. Watch this. What's he say? What's he say in this verse? He says, we know that not everything is good, but we know in all things, God works for the good. God can work things for good that aren't good. Even, come on, even your sin, the things you messed up, the really bad mistakes, God can still use all things for his good. Now, what's cool, watch this. This word works right here. This is the Greek word synergeo, which is where we get the English word synergy. What Paul's saying is that, this is cool. God can take all the things in your life, even the really tough things, and like a master artist, he synergizes all of them to bring good. Now, this promise in Scripture

is not a promise for everyone. Did you know that? Go back to the verse. Watch this. It's for those who love him. God works for the good of those that have decided to give their life to him, to follow him, of God's spirit. to transform their lives. And then he tells us that the good, he tells us what the good is. And sometimes it's a different definition than what we consider good. Sometimes we think good is sitting on a beach in our favorite chair with our favorite drink. But watch, he says, what is good? He says that the good is to be conformed to the image of Jesus. That God can take everything we've been through, even the hardest things, and he can use it for some good to make us more like Jesus, which, by the way, makes everything in our life better. And so the question, can God use our pain and transform it into something good? The answer is yes. And some of you, that's a hard thing to swallow because of what you're in the middle right now. So I wanna look at Joseph's life because hardly anyone went through more pain

or hard times than him. And I want us to see how God can use it for good. We're gonna pick up in Genesis chapter 37, starting in verse two, says this. This is the account of Jacob's family line. Now, we learned about Jacob last week. Jacob is also called Israel. His name was changed, so Jacob and Israel would be synonymous. And we learn about his family. It says, Joseph, one of his sons, a young man of 17, was tending the flocks with his brothers and sons, the sons of Bilah and the sons of Zilphah, his father's wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them. First thing we learned about Joseph, he's a snitch, right? He's telling on his brothers. Anybody else grow up with a brother or sister that would always like telling on you to mom or dad? Yeah, you probably felt like these guys feel about Joseph. So it's no surprise. It says that now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons because he had been born to him in his old age and he made him in an ornate robe for him. This is the coat of many colors, if you know the story of Joseph. And back in that day, the typical coat that would have been made would have been one piece of material

that had one hole in it that you put over your head, and that was kind of the typical coat. But this is an ornate coat, which means it was bougie, right? This one likely had sleeves, which wouldn't have been very normal back then. It was decorated really nice. In other words, here's how to think about it. Jacob took Joseph to shop at Scottsdale Fashion Square, and he took the brothers to Goodwill, right? So you can't, which Goodwill's cool now anyway. So anyway, which is why when you go on, it says now when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him, couldn't even speak a kind word to him. And then it gets worse. It says, verse five, Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more, why? Because the dream Joseph told his brothers, he had two dreams, and both of them, his brothers and the whole family was bowing down to Joseph. So what we see right up front is that no one's innocent in this. In fact, it's a completely dysfunctional family. Every family has some dysfunction, right? If you're like, not mine, that's because you're probably the dysfunctional one, right? Every family has dysfunction in it. And like, Joseph has pride. Like, if you had a dream tonight

that everyone at your workplace is gonna bow down to you, this is just free advice, don't walk into work and tell everybody, right? You're not gonna be liked. And Joseph is just, you can see the pride in Joseph. And then Jacob, his dad, is showing favoritism, which never turns out, which is funny to me, because did you know Jacob's dad, Isaac, showed favoritism to him and his brother? Remember Jacob and Esau? And that's what messed up their family, and now he's repeating the same mistake his dad made. And then the brothers are so jealous, they hate Joseph's guts. And they're gonna do something in a minute that spirals Joseph's life into one hard thing and painful thing after another. I'm gonna summarize all of Genesis chapter 37 through 50 for you in one chart, and I'd encourage you to read it all this week. It's so powerful. But let me just show you Joseph's life. Joseph goes from being the favorite son of his dad to he gets thrown in a pit. Now, what happened is he went to go visit his brothers one day, and because they hated him so much, they decided to kill him. They actually threw him into a pit, and they were going to kill him. And one of the brothers, Judah, calls time out and says,

"'Guys, let's not kill him, let's sell him.'" Like, how kind of him, you know what I mean? So literally, there's some human traffickers that were passing by that area going to Egypt, and they sold their brother into slavery. They took his coat off him, splattered blood on it, took it back to their dad and said, "'He's gone, he's dead.'" And Jacob is devastated. and so is Joseph, because now he's a slave. But in God's providence and love in Joseph's life, he goes from a pit to a palace. Because when he gets to Egypt, he is sold into a person's house called Potiphar. Potiphar is one of the most important men of all of Egypt. And Potiphar puts Joseph over his entire palace. He puts everything under his control, which is amazing because now Joseph is like in a palace in a really high position, things are going well, except Potiphar's wife is a cougar. She keeps, it says Joseph's really handsome, and it says she kept coming to Joseph and saying, sleep with me, sleep with me, sleep with me. And in an extreme act of obedience, he keeps saying no, no, no as a teenage boy. And because of her jealousy and because of her hatred towards him, because he keeps saying no to her and probably just feeling hurt and rejected, she accuses him of rape,

and he goes from the palace to a prison. He goes from a pit to a palace to a prison, and it's in this prison environment that it says, we'll come back to this, it says God was with Joseph. And actually he gets promoted to prison manager. And he helps a couple guys out that got thrown in prison by Pharaoh, the cup bearer and the baker. Cup bearer took care of drinking and making sure that Pharaoh wasn't poisoned and the baker made his food. And Joseph helps these guys, and when they get out of prison, the baker dies, but the cup bearer is promoted back to his position. And before they get out of prison, Joseph says to both of them, hey, I'm your bro that helped you out. They're like, yep. He said, don't forget your bro. And they're like, bros for life, man, we won't forget ya. And then what does the cup bearer do immediately when he gets out of prison? He forgets Joseph. Like some of you feel forgotten in your pain right now. And this may be, in my opinion, the lowest part of Joseph's life because now he has to spend another two years in prison. So he goes from prison manager, he goes to more prison, and then after two years of being in prison,

fate would have it, Pharaoh has a dream that he can't interpret, and the cup bearer goes, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, I remember. There's a guy that can interpret dreams. And so they pull Joseph out of prison. He interprets Pharaoh's dream that there's gonna be a famine in Egypt, but Joseph doesn't just say there's gonna be a famine. Then he presents a business plan for how to get the nation through the recession, and Pharaoh likes it so much. Watch this. He actually promotes Joseph from prison to the highest palace in the entire land. Now Joseph is second in command in all of Egypt just under Pharaoh. But this is a 13-year period, and when you look at this chart, what I want you to see is Joseph went from favorite son to the pit, to the palace, to prison, to a little bit of a promotion, back to prison, to a palace. He's experienced so much pain, more pain than we could imagine throughout his entire life. And in the very last chapter of Genesis chapter 50, Joseph has his Romans 8.28 moment. Through all of his pain, his brothers come to him, and we'll come back to this, and he looks at his brothers who put in motion all the harm he's been through,

and here's what he says to his brothers in chapter 50 verse 20. You intended to harm me, but God intended it. Say the underline out loud. God intended it. God intended all of that for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. I'll give you more context to that in a moment, but what I wanna do today is I wanna give you three lessons from the life of Joseph that if you want to have hope in the middle of your hardest places, we can learn from Joseph today. Here's point number one, if you're taking notes in your Genesis book, point number one is God does his greatest work in the hardest places. God would have never been able to get Joseph to where he really wanted him to be if he wouldn't have gone through the hardest places. Now, God didn't cause it, but God used those hard places to get Joseph to where he was, and if you looked at your life just like I look at my life, I wish this wasn't true, but God's done the same thing with me. The greatest growth I've had, it's the hardest places. My marriage, my marriage has grown the most through pain. I wish it wasn't that way, but Jamie and I, our first few years of marriage,

incredibly hard, in fact, I'd say it this way, if you ever wondered if you were selfish. Get married. You will see it immediately, like the selfishness inside of you comes out. And the same with your spouse. Now you see the selfishness in them more than you, right? But you're both selfish, and God's gonna strip you of that. He's gonna, and man, it happened. Like God just began to strip that. He's still doing it to this day. In my parenting, I've grown the most as a parent through the hardest times. We have three daughters. Our first daughter, we feel like we made so many mistakes with parenting. Jamie says the first child is like the first pancake. You know when you're making pancakes, and the first one, you're like, I didn't know when to flip it, and now it looks all messed up, you know? It's like, our first daughter is not messed up at all. She's amazing, praise God. But that's because God protected her in a lot of parenting mistakes we made. But I'm just telling you, the growth I had as a parent, it came through hard times. And now we're parenting young adults. Anyone else parenting young adults? Is it easy?

Nervous laughter. No, it's not, okay? As a leader, I really care about leadership, especially in our church. The greatest growth I've had as a leader, almost all through pain. In fact, I learned more over COVID than I did my entire MBA. I've learned more through betrayal than I have any book on leadership. I've learned more dealing with criticism than I have any conference I've gone to on leadership. And I wanna speak to a leader here today, and you're all leaders in your own right. You understand that God has made all of us leaders. But I want you to know this. You can have growth or you can have comfort, but you rarely have both. And God just has a tendency to grow you through the pain. In fact, Samuel Chan wrote a book called Leadership Pain, and in it, he gives us this formula. He says this. He says, growth equals change, change equals loss, and loss equals pain. Therefore, growth equals pain. Now, the ninja move is that you can go the other direction. Do you understand that if you will deal with your pain, if you'll accept it and not get so angry at God and angry at everyone else,

and you will begin to deal with the loss and say, I've gotta deal with this, and you accept the change that's gonna come from that, you can grow. In other words, pain can equal growth. But I want you to hear this, and someone should write this down today. Your growth is limited to the threshold of your pain. You will only grow to the ability you have to push through the pain in your marriage, in your life, in your workplace, with the hurts that people have caused you. You'll stop growing the moment you won't push through the pain. And it's so hard. I wish I didn't even have to teach you this. I wish it wasn't true, but I love you too much to tell you something that's not biblical. God works all things for good. So God does his greatest work in the hardest places. Now remember, God didn't cause your pain. Remember week two of the series? We looked at Genesis chapter three. Where did all the pain in our world come from? It came when sin entered the world, when Adam and Eve sinned and brokenness entered our world. We sin, other people sin against us, we live in a broken world. That's where the pain comes from. God didn't cause the pain,

but what we're told in Scripture is God can use the pain, even our own pain we've caused, the sin we've caused, and he can use it for good if we'll allow him. The hard part is sometimes you're in so much pain, you can't even fathom how God can use it. And that's where someone is. The second thing we learn from the life of Joseph is you may not see God's hand, but you can trust his heart. When you can't see God's hand moving in the midst of your pain, the thing you must do is you must trust his heart, that he's up to something that you can't see, you can't fathom. One of the most beautiful things about the life of Joseph, when I read through his story, Genesis chapter 37 through 50, one thing literally jumps off the pages of Scripture to me, and here's what it is. Through all of Joseph's life, every pit, every prison, every pain, every betrayal, we're told over and over again, four different times we're told this, the Lord was with Joseph. Now watch this carefully. Let me show you a second time it's said. Genesis 39 20. But while Joseph was there in prison, the Lord was, say it out loud, with him. And if you're like me, you're like, no, no, no, no. If God was with him, he wouldn't be in prison. And we're told that in prison, God was with Joseph. Which means the person that God brought today, because you are in the midst of one of the worst seasons of pain you're ever in, I just want you to look at me for just a minute. Just all eyes on me. I just want you to hear this. God is with you. God is with you. God is with you. And you may not see his hand, but you've got to trust his heart that he is up to something and working something that you cannot see and you likely won't see until it's past 20,

like hindsight's 20, 20, right? But even if you can't trust it in your own life, can't you objectively look at other people's lives and see how God has used their pain to transform them? Do you know what I'm saying? Like, do you understand Nelson Mandela? Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in prison, and God used that. When you read his biography, it's so powerful. God used those 27 years in prison pain to transform him. So when he got out, apartheid was pulled out of South Africa because of Nelson Mandela's leadership. That wouldn't have happened without those 27 years. Steve Jobs fired from Apple. Fired from the company he created. Do you know what Steve Jobs said after he was fired and later on in life? He said, me getting fired from Apple was one of the greatest things that ever happened to me. Why? Because he said, it opened up a level of creativity that I would have never experienced in my life. And that is why when he came back, they had to hire him back. Apple is what it is today. It happened through pain. Abraham Lincoln experienced maybe more pain than any president in history, and yet he transformed our country. And praise God that he did. Like, God used all the pain. So I don't know what you're going through, but I wonder what purpose God is going to use your pain for. Do you trust him? The hard part of dealing with our pain is holding on to hope enough to finally see it. And what we learn from Joseph's life—this is the third big lesson I think we learn from Joseph's life—is that hope grows when your obedience outlasts uncertainty. When you're in pain, there's so much uncertainty that you have a tendency to become disobedient to what God wants you to do next. You can give up on God. You can give up on his principles. You can give up on so many things. I mean, think about Joseph. I mean, Joseph is a teenage boy that is sold into slavery. He's in the greatest pit and prison in his life. I mean, do you understand when he was in Potiphar's house, how easy it would have been to cave sexually? You don't think he had needs? Do you understand when he's in the prison, how easy it would have been to say, I give up on God. I mean, look at my life. Look how painful it's been. And one of the most drastic things you see out of Joseph is he kept being obedient in the midst of the uncertainty. And I would say it this way. I think one of the quickest ways for you to get beyond the pain and the uncertainty is to keep taking your next step of obedience. Hope grows when your obedience outlasts your uncertainty. And I want to say to someone here today, listen, I don't know what your next step of obedience is, but for some of you, your next step of obedience is to keep showing up to church when it would be so easy to stay home because of your

pain. In fact, someone's watching this right now. You're watching online at home because it just feels too hard to show up with God's people in church. And I'm just telling you, God's gonna call you out right now. Like, I'm calling you out. It's time to come back to be a part of God's people. Like, that's your next step of obedience. Some of you, your next step of obedience is to not cave sexually even though you're so lonely. Some of you, it's that you stop turning to a pill or a bottle to deal with your pain, but you let God begin to deal with your pain. You can't move on from your pain medicating with a pill or a bottle. Some of you, it would be that you just keep showing up at that job and you keep doing the best job you can even though you feel overlooked. And you watch God use your obedience. You watch it. I've been there. Some of you, your step of obedience is just to keep hugging that teenager. You know what I mean? Hugging that teenager and saying I love you when they show you no love. No love. You keep leaning in. I know what it's like to have to take a step of obedience, even a small step, when you wanna give in. This isn't a pity party on being a pastor, okay? I know some of you have a lot harder things you're dealing with at work than even I would, but if you could just let me be raw for a minute.

Can I be raw? There's parts of pastoring a church that it'd be hard for me to describe how brutal it is. People are vile. They're nasty. They do things and say things that are, they treat you almost like a product. You're not even like a person anymore. They can lie about you, say the most horrific things about you. I've had people come after my family, my kids. In fact, I've been through so much pain like pastoring and there's only a few people in my life that even know the depths of it. And that's not pity on me, that's just being real. That there's been times as a pastor where I've thought to myself, is it worth it? Like maybe you just, and I'm just telling you what I have found in those moments is that if I will take even the smallest step, my next step of obedience, God will move. It doesn't happen overnight, but man, when my obedience outlasts the uncertainty, God opens up things that I was like, God, you were moving in ways I couldn't understand. And here's how it happens, watch this. It happens one small step of obedience at a time. I'm not talking about like, it might just be a really small step of obedience

God's asking you to take, because you have to be obedient. This is what got Joseph through all the pain and all the uncertainty. Hope grows when your obedience outlasts uncertainty. And when Joseph got through some of the uncertainty, you remember when he got to the highest palace? He's second in command over all of Egypt, that's epic. And now he face his greatest test of obedience. What happens if you read the whole story is that there's a famine, he controls all the food. So anybody that wants food in the famine has to come to him. Whereas brothers in Israel at the time, they're in the famine, they have to come to Egypt. They have to appear before him and ask for food. They don't know it's him, why? Well, this is about 15 years later, he looks like an Egyptian now, his head's probably shaved, he's over the age of 30, like they don't even recognize him, he recognizes them. And he looks at them and they ask for food and it says he breaks down and I think he has a decision to make. Will I take revenge, which would be so easy to do, or will I be obedient to what God asks and will I show forgiveness to people that don't deserve my forgiveness? Remember that question, hey, remember this question? Can God use our pain and transform it into something good?

Let me tell you the one thing that will limit God using your pain for good. It's your unforgiveness. When you withhold forgiveness from anyone in your life that's caused you pain, listen, you put yourself in the pit. They may put you initially, but you decide to stay there with unforgiveness. It's been said that unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. You're locking yourself in a prison that God cannot move you past your pain to your purpose with unforgiveness in your heart. So I'm just gonna ask very boldly, is there anyone here today that you are withholding forgiveness from? Or you feel like you've forgiven, but the pain's popped up again and you may need to forgive again and again and again. Let me just call it out. It might be a dad. It might be a mom. It might be a family member that abused you. It might be an ex that left you. It might be a child. that hurt you. It might be a friend that betrayed you. It might be a co-worker or a business partner that stole from you. I don't know who you need to forgive, but I just want to say this. Forgiveness may be your next step of obedience because you can never get out of the pit. You can never get out of the prison until you fully forgive. Now that may not be the issue for some of you. Some of you, you're just in the pain and you're not sure God can use it for good. So I just want to remind you today, God does his greatest work in the hardest places.

And you may not see God's hand, but you can trust his heart. You have to trust his heart. And hope grows when your obedience, whatever God's calling you to right now, that outlasts your uncertainty, the uncertainty of your pain. Do you remember that man I told you about that he lost his life this last weekend and it broke my heart. It broke so many people's heart. You understand he leaves behind five kids, grandkids. He leaves behind this amazing wife and so many friends and family members that love him so much. And when I was in the hospital, I've just been praying since that day, God, what do you want to do through this situation for good? And even though I don't know what God's going to do, can I tell you what I have with confidence? I just have so much confidence in this. God's going to do something good. And in the hospital, something happened that just gave me a glimpse into how God uses our hardest places and pain for his greatest work. Remember, this man has just been pronounced dead. We're in the room with his wife and a few of his kids, and we're praying. His body's there. He's gone, but the body's there and we're praying. And we walk out of that room and I watched the wife of this man walk up to one of her sons and she grabs him and she pulls him close and she looks in his eyes and she says these words, I lost my dad unexpectedly, just like what happened to your dad at the exact same age you are right now. And it hit me. God is going to use all the pain she experienced when her dad passed away to now love her kids and minister her kids who are around the same age she was when she was. I mean, now God's going to use that. Do you understand how God uses pain? We got to let him, and that may be one of the things that we're going to have to and that may be one of the reasons she's one of the strongest women I've ever met in my life. Why? Because I've seen her. I've seen her allow God to use her hard places to do his greatest work. And she can't see God's hand all the way. None of the family can, but they're going to trust God's heart. I know this family, they will. And their obedience is going to outlast the uncertainty, and we're going to see God do something great. Do you want the same thing in your life? Hey, do you want the same thing in your life? We got to keep trusting God. You got to hold on to hope today, and if you need that, here's what I'm going to invite you to do. I'm going to pray for you, but when I get done praying, at the front of every auditorium we have a prayer team. They'll have badges on, and you can just

come up to any one of them and ask for prayer. And they would love to pray for your situation right now and to give you some hope. It doesn't take long. If there's a line, you just keep waiting. They'll be there. But we want to pray for you because God moves when we pray, and I want to pray for you right now. Would you close your eyes? God, thank you for giving us hope when we need it most. And I think you brought someone here today, or maybe someone's watching online, that God, there's so much uncertainty. There's so much pain. They can't even see how you could use this. And I pray today would be the day that you instill in their heart that you're a God that takes all situations, and you can use it for good. We may not see it. We got to trust it, and we keep giving our lives to you and taking our next step of obedience. And would you keep moving, Father, in ways we can't even fathom or imagine for our good and for the purposes for our lives? We pray this in Jesus' name. We all said, amen. Hey, we'll see you next week for Revelation Barbecue Weekend. Have a good weekend, everybody.