Just Ask: The Conversation We Skipped | Pastor Bryan Jarrett | Northplace Church

Hello, my name is Brian Jarrett, and my wife Haley and I have had the privilege of pastoring North Place Church in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for almost 20 years. We're one church that meets in multiple locations, even on multiple continents, and today you are one of those locations. The church is not about buildings, it is about people, and we have the privilege today of sharing the hope of the gospel with you right where you are. There is no way I can know exactly what you're going through or dealing with right now, but for almost 30 years I have preached about a God who I know, I am confident, knows you, your struggles, knows the very hairs on your head and the thoughts that you think before you think them, and He is passionately in love with you. And our prayer today is that in our time together you feel our love for you and His presence. And we pray that this time together gives you hope. Come on, can we just lift Him up? I'll take you as your way Cause if you don't follow you You'll fall And the chaos fell in white And I know Cause I've seen it in my life It's a narrow road that leads to the light But I wanna be on it It's a narrow road and the tide is high But you're part of the waters I'll take you as your way If you say it I'll believe you I've seen how good it was If you start it you'll come leaving I'll take you as your way If you say it I'll believe you

I've seen how good it was If you start it you'll come leaving I'll take you as your way Cause if you don't promise I'll take you as your way Cause if you don't promise You said your love will never give up You said your grace is always enough You said your heart will never forget or forsake me Sing you said You said I'm safe You called me yours You saved my future You gave me your heart You never fell So I know that you'll never fail me Come on can we sing it again You said your love will never give up You said your grace is always enough You said your heart will never forget or forsake me You said You said I'm safe You called me yours You saved my future You gave me your heart You never fell So I know that you'll never fail me I'll take you as your way If you said it I'll be leaving How sweet how good it was

If you start it you'll come leaving ♪ Come lead me, I'll take you as you're worth ♪ ♪ If you say it, I'll believe you ♪ ♪ I've seen how good it was ♪ ♪ If you're sorry, oh come lead me ♪ ♪ I'll take you as you're worth ♪ ♪ Cause you're good in promises ♪ ♪ I'll take you as you're worth ♪ ♪ Cause you're good in promises ♪ ♪ I'll take you as you're worth ♪ Come on, can we thank him today that we can take him at his word. We serve a God who is faithful, who is kind, who is present. And we can take him at his word, no matter what it is that we're facing. I wanna read today from John chapter 14, and I want us to read it together. They're gonna put it on the screens and it's a reminder that we can take him at what he says. And this is Jesus speaking. He says, very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing. And they will do even greater things than these because I am going to the father and I will do whatever you ask in my name so that the father may be glorified in the son. You may ask me for anything in my name and I will do it. This morning as we were praying for you, the team just felt the Lord sweetly remind us

to put our faith and confidence in him, that he can do the impossible, that he is a God who heals, he is a God who restores, he is a God who saves, who delivers. And we can come in with expectations today. And I'll be the first to tell you my lungs are tired and I am believing for a miracle in my body. And I am standing with confidence that he can do it, that he is our healer. And so today we're gonna sing songs about Jesus as our healer and put our faith in him. So maybe you're believing for a miracle today. Will you join your faith with ours as we sing about the goodness of our God and believe for him to do the impossible today. Amen. Come on, will you join us as we sing. ♪ Freely shed the smallest lamb of heaven ♪ ♪ Has forever conquered death ♪ ♪ Jesus is my king, he's everything I need ♪ ♪ He's everything I need ♪ ♪ He alone has triumphed over sickness and disease ♪ ♪ He who is your power over the cross is your defeat ♪ ♪ Jesus is my king, he has won the victory ♪ ♪ Oh, there's no greater love than yours, Jesus ♪ ♪ And you have made a love unparalleled with ease ♪ ♪ He walks with me through life, understands my suffering ♪ ♪ Every joy and every song, every triumph, every loss ♪ ♪ I know everything is covered by the shadow of the cross ♪ Come on, cast your hands and come in today.

♪ Oh, everything is covered by the shadow of the cross ♪ ♪ The cross of the cross, Jesus is my king ♪ ♪ Oh, he's everything I need ♪ ♪ He alone has triumphed over sickness and disease ♪ ♪ Beware, beware, beware, beware, beware, beware, beware ♪ ♪ And all the cross is for You, Jesus, Jesus is my King ♪ ♪ He has won the victory, oh, Jesus is my King ♪ ♪ He has won the victory, oh, there's no one like You, Lord ♪ ♪ He has won the victory, oh, there's no one like You, Lord ♪ ♪ And everything bows at His Name, everything bows at His Name ♪ ♪ Sickness, darkness, chains break at the Name of Jesus ♪ Come on, declare that today. ♪ Everything bows at His Name, oh, everything, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Everything bows at His Name, everything bows at His Name ♪ ♪ Sickness, darkness, chains break at the Name of Jesus ♪ ♪ Everything bows, everything bows at His Name, everything bows at His Name ♪ ♪ Sickness, darkness, chains break at the Name of Jesus, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ And everything bows at His Name, everything bows at His Name ♪ ♪ Sickness, darkness, chains break at the Name of Jesus, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Everything bows at His Name, oh, everything, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Everything bows at His Name, everything bows at His Name ♪ ♪ Sickness, darkness, chains break at the Name of Jesus, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Jesus, Jesus is my King, oh, He's everything I need, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ He alone I trust, oh, the sickness, death, disease, fear, and pain, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ His cares, His sins, His wounds, His pain, His strength is easy容易âlοί​ ♪ The path of the cross, the cross is mine, oh, yeah, woo, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Jesus, Jesus is my King, oh, He's everything I need, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Jesus, Jesus is my King, oh, He's everything I need, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Jesus, Jesus is my King, oh, He's everything I need, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Jesus, Jesus is my King, oh, He's everything I need, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪

Thank you, Lord. He's able. He's able. Our God is able to do immeasurably more than we could ever ask to thank you for that. Amen. I want to ask yourselves this. When did I start to forget all of the great things you did? When did I throw away faith for the impossible? And how did I start to believe that you weren't sufficient for me? And why do I talk myself out of seeing miracles? Let me tell you today, you are more than able. Yes, you are. You are. You are more than able. Yes, you are. You are more than able. You are more than able. Who am I to deny what the Lord can do? Thank you, Lord. Oh, Jesus. Oh, Jesus. Oh, thank you. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. ♪ God my confidence in me ♪ ♪ And I will my trust in the one who still does miracles ♪ ♪ You do miracles ♪ ♪ You are more than able ♪ ♪ I believe in your heart ♪ ♪ You are more than able ♪

♪ Yes you are ♪ ♪ You are more than able ♪ ♪ Yes you are ♪ ♪ You are more than able ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Ooh, can you imagine with all of the faith in the room ♪ ♪ What the Lord can do, what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ It's gonna happen just like the way you make it through ♪ ♪ It's gonna move, it's gonna move ♪ ♪ Can you imagine with all of the faith in the room ♪ ♪ What the Lord can do, what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ It's gonna happen just like the way you make it through ♪ ♪ It's gonna move, it's gonna move ♪ ♪ Can you imagine with all of the faith in the room ♪ ♪ What the Lord can do, what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Yes he's gonna happen just like the way you make it through ♪ ♪ It's gonna move, it's gonna move ♪ ♪ Can you imagine with all of the faith in the room ♪ ♪ What the Lord can do, what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ It's gonna happen just like the way you make it through ♪ ♪ It's gonna move, it's gonna move ♪ ♪ Anything is possible, anything is possible ♪ ♪ Anything is possible, anything is possible ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Anything is possible, anything is possible Jesus ♪ ♪ Anything is possible, anything, anything is possible ♪ ♪ Anything is possible, anything is possible Jesus ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪

Yes, Jesus. We declare. ♪ You are more than able ♪ ♪ You are more than able ♪ One voice we sing church, you're more than able. ♪ You are more than able ♪ We'll fill this place with faith, with worship this morning. ♪ Mm, say you are, thank you Jesus ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny what the Lord can do ♪ ♪ Who am I to deny, I'm no one to deny your power Jesus ♪ Come on, he's not giving up on you. Are you still faithful? ♪ Cause you're not done with me yet ♪ ♪ You're not done with me yet ♪ ♪ There's so much more to your story ♪ ♪ You're not done with me yet ♪ He's not done with me. Come on, do you believe in this morning church? He's not done with you yet. They've counted you out, but he's not done. ♪ There's so much more to the story ♪ ♪ You're not done with me yet ♪ One more time, he's singing. ♪ He's not done with me yet, no ♪ ♪ You're not done with me yet ♪ ♪ There's so much more to the story ♪ ♪ You're not done with me yet ♪ For the last several weeks, we have been in a series called Just Ask,

where we've talked about the art of asking better questions of God, of people, of ourselves. We learned that questions are the currency of connection, that holy curiosity is an act of love, that God himself is the master question asker, that Jesus asked over 300 questions in the Gospels alone. We finished the series last week, and I was preparing to move on to something completely different. I had a whole nother direction this week, but as I started praying about it, I realized we really only talked about half the conversation. We spent three weeks on how to speak, how to ask better questions, and almost no time at all on how to listen. If you learn to ask better questions, but don't learn how to genuinely listen, you've missed the point. You're in your own little monologue, and you're not involved in an authentic conversation. So today, I want us to circle back kind of what I'm calling a bonus week and see the conversation we skipped, learning to listen. Learning to listen is both spiritually and relationally transformative. It's spiritually transformative when you learn to listen to the voice of God. It's relationally transformative when you genuinely learn to listen

to the people in your life. Several years ago, people started asking me to teach on communication or public speaking, and in some cases on preaching, in college and in classroom conference settings. And when people would gather in those settings to learn how to communicate better, they were often taken by surprise when I opened with an inordinate amount of time spent on teaching them how to listen. As Christian communicators, whether you're serving in the marketplace or serving in the church in some capacity, before you ever learn about structure and before we ever learn about the use of illustration and before we ever learn about effective delivery, we have to learn how to listen to the voice of God. Because if you don't have direction from God when you get up to speak, wherever that may be, it doesn't matter how well you say it, it's not gonna change anybody's life, it's not gonna influence anybody for good. A gifted communicator without an ear in tune to the voice of God is just making noise. And to point out how emphatically I believe this, if I had to make a choice between having a voice to speak or an ear that could hear from God, I would choose the listening ear every time without hesitation. I would rather have an ear that could hear him clearly

than to be able to speak loudly because speaking without his direction is hollow and empty. As the wisdom of the Proverbs says, my child, pay attention to what I say, listen carefully to my words. We can learn to ask God the most meaningful questions in prayer. But if we don't slow down long enough to listen and receive what he says in response, then we're not really having a conversation, we're the one doing all the talking. So what does it look like to develop a listening ear to God and then to the people in our lives? When it comes to hearing from God, we can learn a lot from the prophet Elijah. 1 Kings 18, Elijah has just had the greatest moment in his ministry on Mount Carmel. He faced down 450 pagan prophets by calling fire down from heaven. Verse 39, and when the people saw it, they fell face down on the ground and cried out, the Lord, he is God. Yes, the Lord is God. It was supernatural, nation shaking. It was a career defining moment for Elijah. And then one threatening message from Queen Jezebel and Elijah runs. This is the man who stands down 450 pagan prophets and he calls down fire from heaven, but he runs from the threats of one woman.

Maybe there's a Mother's Day message in that. My better judgment says to skip that, I'll move on. All kidding aside, there is a sermon on what happens when you deplete yourself to the point of emotional, spiritual and physical exhaustion. And if you go back and study this in its context, that's exactly what was happening to Elijah in this moment. He was so exhausted to the point of extremes and totally depleted. that the things he could have easily defeated before start gaining the upper hand in his life. It's true for you and me. Because of an unhealthy level of exhaustion, Elijah gives Jezebel the upper hand. He runs. It says in verse four of chapter 19, then he went on alone into the wilderness, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. I've had enough, Lord. He said, take my life. This is the man who's just called fire down from heaven just 48 hours earlier. And now he's in the desert asking God to let him die. Now I point all of that out because I want you to see what happens next. God doesn't rebuke him. He feeds him. Verse five, then he laid down and slept

under the broom tree. But as he was sleeping, an angel touched him and told him, get up and eat. He looked around and there beside his head were some bread baked on hot stones and a jar of water. So he ate and drank and laid down again. God's first response to Elijah's exhaustion was not a sermon. It was a meal. He gives this exhausted man a nap and some food. And I know that doesn't sound very spiritual to you, but that's exactly what started healing Elijah's soul. Then God leads Elijah to a cave at Mount Sinai where the master of asking probing questions, God himself, asked Elijah, what are you doing here, Elijah? Doesn't that sound familiar to the question that God asked Adam in the very beginning? Where are you? Neither of these questions are rebukes. They are invitations. God was wanting Elijah to search his heart. God knows why Elijah is there, but he wants Elijah to think deeply about how he's come to this place. And Elijah answers the question by pouring out his heart to God. He's honest, he's vulnerable. He admits his loneliness, his exhaustion, the daunting odds that are in front of him. He tells God that he feels like he's the last faithful

person left on earth and nobody cares. Elijah is desperate for a word from God. He needs direction. He needs clarity. He needs to hear from heaven. And what unfolds in the next few verses can help all of us develop an ear that is more in tune to the voice of God. In verse 11, God says, go out and stand before me on the mountain. And as Elijah stood there, the Lord passed by and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake, there was a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, there was the sound of a gentle whisper. Wind, earthquake, fire. God was not in any of it. The voice of the Lord came to Elijah through the gentle whisper. The Hebrew phrase here for gentle whisper is kol domama daka. And it's almost untranslatable. It literally means a sound of thin silence. It was a voice of gentle stillness. The King James calls it a still small voice. Some translations call it a low whisper.

What it communicates is this, the voice of God in that moment was so quiet that if Elijah had not been completely, deliberately, intentionally still, he would have missed it entirely. The danger for Elijah and the danger for all of us is that we tend to look for God in the sensational. But if God had not been intent or Elijah had not been intent on listening closely, the wind would have drowned out the whisper. The earthquake would have overshadowed that still small voice. The fire would have been a distraction. But Elijah was so desperately leaning in and listening that he heard the whisper. And the whisper was the word from God. So let me ask you an honest question. When was the last time you were still enough and quiet enough to hear his whisper? We've filled every available silence. We wake up and immediately reach for our phones. We drive with podcasts and playlists. We exercise with earbuds. We fall asleep with the television on. We have engineered the silence out of our lives so thoroughly that the idea of sitting in quiet for 20 minutes doesn't just feel uncomfortable, it feels irresponsible because we always feel like we need to be doing something. Noise, noise, noise. But the God of Elijah is not in the wind

or the earthquake or the fire. He is in the thin silence on the other side of all the noise and the activity. And the only way to hear him is to stop. up, stand still and listen. The most transformational experiences with God in my life have come when I have purposefully stilled myself to hear his voice. If you've been around here long, you probably heard me tell the story of my first 40 day fast, which happened about 22 years ago. And because I've mentioned it so often, I won't go into the details, but on the 38th day of that fast, I was in a remote cabin seeking God for some of the most significant questions of my life in ministry, questions that Haley and I had been carrying for a long time the kind of questions that cannot be resolved in a 10 minute quiet time. These were critical life defining burdens that required sustained, unhurried, sacrificial seeking. On day 38 unannounced, a stranger barges in the door of that cabin. And the first thing he said to me was, God sent me here with a word from God for a man of God. And over the next hour, one by one, he answered with specificity, every question I had been fasting and praying over for the last 38 days, every single one.

And I don't tell you that story to make you think that if you fast long enough, that God's gonna send somebody to your front door. That's not the way it usually works. It's only happened that way one time in my life. I tell you this to make a simpler point. God is always speaking. He's always giving direction. His whispers to us are like the AM, FM and XM frequencies in this room. They're in here right now. If we had the right equipment and we were tuned in, in this room right now, we could hear music and news and weather, all of it. It's all in here, but we're not hearing it because we're not tuned in. The same is true with God. He's always guiding and speaking and prompting and directing, whispering to our souls, but we miss it. It's there, but we're missing it because we're not tuned in. We have to take the steps, sometimes drastic sacrificial steps to get ourselves to a place that we still our souls long enough to hear from him. Learning to listen is not passive. Getting there is one of the most active, intentional, costly things you can do. It requires you to stop the wind and the earthquake and the fire of your own life long enough

to hear what's being whispered. Like I said, this has been a pattern in my life that when I commit to silence the noise and stop looking for God in all the sensational things, I hear the beauty of his whisper. Repeatedly, God has proven this verse true in my life. Be still and know that I am God. About six years ago this month, the world was in the middle of a pandemic. I was at my wits end as a person and as a pastor. I had just led the church into the most aggressive expansion project in its history, costing millions of dollars, adding new campuses and building on large children's ministry buildings and spaces and launching our champions ministry for children with additional needs. And then the pandemic shut the world down. And I started questioning my own leadership. How could I lead the church into this, especially in this season? Did I not hear from God? Did I miss him? I mean, we can't even meet together right now. I don't even know how we're gonna pay our bills, much less fund and finance the dreams and the hopes of what God has put on our hearts. On a personal level, I felt like a failure. On a pastoral level, I was worried about the viability and the future of our church. So in May of 2020, I went on a fast.

I locked myself in a room for seven days with a notebook and a Bible. I was seeking God, not for personal things, for the church, for direction, for clarity, for wisdom about how to lead through something nobody had a map for. And God didn't answer a single one of the prayers I prayed, not one. Instead, he answered something I wasn't even asking him for, something that was incredibly personal, something that Haley and I had been carrying quietly in our hearts for a long time. We'd even, it's been so long, we had forgotten about it. We weren't even praying about it. I mean, it wasn't even on our minds. There was something far bigger to worry about in that moment. That's what we were interceding for, for the church. But unexpected, unprompted, unsolicited, right in the middle of my seven-day fast for the church, someone reached out to me and set some things in motion that met a very personal need in our life. It was so sudden, so unexpected, so personal that I sat in that little room with tears rolling down my face. He's asking God, why would you do this for us, especially right now? Why would you do something so personal when I'm fasting and praying about the church? And without hesitation, I heard this gentle whisper.

He said, because you're my son. And I want you to know that I haven't forgotten where you live. And if I'm this concerned about how your life goes, rest assured, I'm gonna take care of my church. I can't explain what that did for me. I was living in the most challenging season of my life and my leadership. I was drowning in fear and worry and self-doubt. And he didn't give me any direction for the church. He loved me as his son. I felt seen and known and loved. And I had the assurance returned to me that I had lost. That moment settled my heart and ignited my confidence. Before that moment, I was leading through the pandemic like the cowardly lion in the Wizard of Oz. After that moment, I came back leading like Churchill in the middle of a war. The staff will tell you when I returned from that seven-day fast, something shifted in my heart because I had this assurance. I didn't know any better than before what we were supposed to do next. I just knew that I was his son. He knew where I lived and this was his church, his bride, and he was gonna take care of her. If I would have just kept trying harder, striving more, I would have never heard the whisper because of the noise of the wind or the earthquake or the fire, but I heard him on that Wednesday

in the middle of the day, locked in a room in the middle of a seven-day fast. I heard him in the stillness, in the costly, deliberate act of clearing everything else away and making room for God in my life. Learning to listen, having an ear in tune to the voice of God will transform your spiritual life. At the same time, learning to listen, genuinely paying attention will transform your relationships. Here's a very raw and honest answer. I do better at listening to God than I do at listening to people. My brain is an idea factory and the more interested I am in what somebody is saying to me, the more my mind starts firing, it starts making connections, it starts generating responses, it starts building on what I'm hearing and out of a genuine fear of losing this thread that has started in my own head, I will often step on the conversation of the other person, interrupting them because they sparked all of this and I wanna get it out. It's not out of disrespect for them, but out of a genuine interest and excitement in what they are saying and I feel like I need to express what they've triggered in my mind before it disappears. And the older I get, the more this is a reality.

But Haley recently called me out on it. It was a moment of what we call genuine carefrontation in our house, carefrontation. She told me what it felt like to be on the other end of that, to be mid-sentence and to watch the person you love most, stop your, stop listening, stop your talking, tune you out and interrupt. And she had the honesty to say, I know your intentions may not be bad, but Brian, when you cut people off like that, you're being selfish and it's a tad arrogant because what you're basically saying is that you and your words are superior to the person that you're supposed to be listening to. And she said, I don't just feel like it's rude, it makes me feel lonely. And I thought, wow, those words lonely, that word echoed in my heart because she wasn't just pointing out a bad communication habit of mine, she was describing what it feels like to not be listened to, to not be heard. And I have been doing it to the person I love the most. The ear that we develop toward God and the ear that we turn toward people are the same ear. You can't cultivate one and neglect the other. Learning to listen is not a separate space that you enter for prayer and then you leave it behind when you go to engage with people.

It is a posture that you're supposed to carry into every relationship. James, probably the New Testament writer who understood the most in the connection between prayer and your community life in relationship says this plainly in James 1, understand this my dear brothers and sisters, you must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, the order is not accidental, quick to listen, slow to speak. He's not describing a communication strategy, he's describing a spiritual posture. The person that has learned how to be still before God, that has trained himself to receive from him rather than just produce for him, should be the person that carries something different into every room they're entering. They're not thinking about what they're gonna say next. They're genuinely present with the person and what they are saying in that moment. That's what Haley was asking from me. She's just asking me to stay engaged and listen long enough for me to actually hear her heart without jumping to conclusions, without crafting my response, but really listen. There's a term in counseling and spiritual direction for the posture she's describing. It's called presence, simply being present, not building a response, not managing the conversation, not just sitting there waiting on your turn to jump in, actually being there with them, for them,

totally tuned in to what they're saying. Presence is one of the rarest gifts one person can give to another, your attention and your presence. The most valuable thing that another person can give you is not their wisdom or their advice or even their questions. It's their full, unhurried, undivided attention. That's when people truly feel heard and valued. Think about the people in your life that have made you feel the most known, the most loved, the most seen. I would dare say those are not people who are known to you because of what they said to you, but how completely interested they were in you. It was about how completely there they were in your conversation. They didn't check their phone. They didn't story stack trying to one up whatever you said to them, turning the attention back on them. They didn't try to finish your sentences. They just stayed with you and really listened to what you were saying. They heard you. For three weeks, we studied and learned how to ask better questions. We needed at least one week focused on actually learning to receive the answer, learning how to listen, staying engaged,

resisting the impulse to fill the awkward silence, honoring the person who's trusted you enough to speak by giving them your complete presence. There's a powerful moment in John's gospel where Mary Magdalene races to the tomb where they placed Jesus. The Bible says it was early on the first day of the week. It was still dark outside. She finds the stone rolled away. The tomb is empty and she runs for the disciples and Peter and John come back with her. They see the empty tomb. They leave again, but Mary stays. In John 20 verse 11, it says, Mary was standing outside the tomb crying and as she wept, she stooped and looked in. She saw two white robed angels, one sitting at the head, the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. Dear woman, why are you crying? The angel asked her. Because they have taken away my Lord, she replied, and I don't know where they have put him. She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn't recognize him. Dear woman, why are you crying? Jesus asked her, who are you looking for? She thought he was the gardener. Sir, she said, if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him and I will go and get him.

She doesn't recognize him. She's looking directly at the risen Christ and she cannot tell that it's him. She's talking to him, but for some reason, she can't really hear him. Why? Because she's so blinded by her grief. She's so blinded by her assumptions. She is certain about what has happened, so filled with noise about her own sorrow and her own searching, that the voice that is speaking directly to her does not register to her as the voice that she has been longing to hear. Get this, she asked Jesus where he put the body of Jesus. She's talking to the answer, asking him where the answer is. How many of us have done exactly that? We've been in the middle of the thing we were asking for, surrounded by the presence of God, held by the love of God, being led by the hand of God, but our lives are so full of noise. We were so drowning in our sorrow and our grief and searching too full of our own assumptions that the answer didn't look like we thought it should, so we didn't recognize it when it was right in front of us. And then Jesus does something so simple, so subtle, but profoundly beautiful. And I can't read this any, I've read this so many times, I can't read it without feeling it. He just calls her name.

He said, Mary. She turned to him and cried out, Rabboni, which is Hebrew for teacher. She recognized him. The moment he spoke her name, Jesus said one word, her name, and everything opened. She had heard that voice countless times. She had sat at his feet. She had traveled with him. She stood there and watched on the cross as he died. She knew that voice, but grief and noise and tragedy had blinded her. But now when she hears him speak her name, all the walls come down. Every assumption is dissolved. Every grief gives way. That's what learning to listen will do. It's not for information gathering. It's not just about getting answers. It's for this, the moment you hear the voice you've been seeking speaking your name and something in you recognizes it, the moment when beyond argument, beyond theology, beyond performance that you know you are known, that you are found, that the one speaking is the one that you've been looking for. He knows where you live. He knows your name. And he's speaking in the thin silence, in the cold Damama Daka,

in the whisper on the other side of the wind and the earthquake and the fire of your life. But you gotta get quiet long enough to hear it. You gotta stop. Like Elijah, you gotta go to the mouth of the cave. Like Mary, you gotta stand at the edge of the tomb. You gotta let grief and the searching and the noise settle for a moment and listen for your name. Get still, silence the noise, make room because there will always be wind. There will always be fire. There will always be noise. There will always be the sensational. It's not gonna run out. But the whisper, the thin silence, the voice that knows your name, the answer you've been praying for, that requires something that noise can't give you. It requires your presence. You want his presence, give him your presence. You want somebody's love and intimacy and connection, give them your presence. There's a promise in Jeremiah 29. I put it in late. It's not on your screens, but I think this is what God is saying to us today. Jeremiah 29, 13, if you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me. Would you stand with me across this room today

and across our campus family? I'm gonna ask our prayer teams from all of our campuses and locations if they would to make themselves available at the front of the room. Some of us need to hear him say our name because of our own grief, own desperation, our own searching. We need to hear God knows where we live. He hasn't forgotten our address. Some of us need to hear him call our name because we need to be in a relationship with him. We've never been, or maybe we're running 100 miles an hour in the wrong direction and he's trying to call us back. Steal your heart. Listen for him to call your name. Your son or his daughter, there's assurances that come with that. We believe today is an environment for the miraculous to take place. We've sensed this from the beginning of the service. So if you have need, give us a chance to pray with you today. Lord, I know the greatest way you speak is through your written word. And if we're not engaging your written word, we can't honestly say we care much about hearing from you. So if our heart really wants to hear from you, would you give us a hunger for your word today?

Your spirit moves and whispers and directs our lives and we desperately need that. Always in connection, never in contradiction to your written word. We need you more than ever right now, Lord. And I pray that you will open our ears to hear, open our eyes to see. May we hear you call our names. Will you bless them, keep them and make your face shine down upon them? Will you be gracious to them today? Will you turn your countenance their direction and will you give them peace? In Jesus name, amen. These altars are open today. God bless you. Hey friends, I just wanted to spend a second with you at the end of this message today and just encourage you if in some way you've made a spiritual decision, maybe you've given your life to Christ today, you've recently given your life to Christ, you wanna talk to somebody about giving your life to Christ, our team would love to help you. We're on the Pando app and have several ministries into various prisons because God has called us to you. We have a heart for forgotten people and forgotten places. And that means we serve widows and we serve orphans and we serve special needs kids.

And God has given us a heart. for men and women in the prison system because I believe Jesus died for you. He has a plan and a purpose for your life and we want to help you know that and discover that. There is an address on the screen that you can communicate with us. We have a team of people that would love to hear from you, especially if you've made a decision to follow Jesus so that we can resource you and point you to tools that can help you grow. Just know that we're praying over you and we're genuinely honored that you've taken time to watch our channel and these messages from North Place Church.