Lucas Gomes - Sin lucha no hay fortaleza.

Church by the Glades, who's excited to be in church this morning? For those of you who don't know me, my name is Lucas. I'm one of the pastors who works here in Church by the Glades. And I'm excited to be preaching this morning, to be in God's house. And like I said, my name is Lucas. And for those of you who don't know me, I grew up in this church. I've been a part of this church for a long time. When I started middle school, I went to the Wave Student Ministry. One of the best student ministries ever, the Wave Student Ministry. If you're in middle school or high school, you need to be there. And I want to take a second just to honor our pastor. I'm very grateful for the opportunity to speak this morning. I don't speak too often, but Pastor David gave me the call and asked me to speak today. And I'm grateful for our pastor's sincerity. So much of who I am as a person, the reason I am who I am, is because I grew up in this church. I grew up in this room. It was in the original Alabanza Preacher Center. And I heard my sermons for over 50 years. I was still a kid. And the value of growing up in the church is wonderful. And I'm grateful to my parents for raising me to church. One of the reasons I first started coming to church was my mother. I went to the Wave Student Ministry. He's a little bit older than me. And oh well, whatever I did, I did. I had a brother who did it. And we're best friends. I'll just say we talk all the time. I remember my brother went to the Wave one week without me.

And I was like, where's my brother going? I was trying to find him to go to the Wave. I said, if he's going to the Wave, I want to go to the Wave. Whatever my brother did, I did. I remember he got a skateboard. He started skateboarding. And I was like, if you're going to skateboard, I want to skateboard. When we got to high school, he joined the wrestling team. I was like, what time do we meet? If you're going to wrestle, I want to wrestle. Whatever my brother did, I had to do. I was always copying him. I was always following his footsteps. In my senior year of high school, my brother came to me. He said, look, I'm thinking about becoming a pastor. And I was like, do you think we would be good at that? And he said, do we have the skillset to do this? And he was like, what do you mean we? Like, you have to have original thoughts. You don't have to do everything I do. My brother's a pastor today in Vancouver. And he's preaching this weekend at his church. And the reason I'm a pastor is because my brother became a pastor. I thank God he didn't start selling crap. Whatever he did, I did. Now, one of the things we did to bond as kids, we watched a lot of movies together growing up. I love watching a good movie. My dad used to see a lot of movies. And grew up loving watching movies.

I love watching the space movie. That's my favorite. I love an outer space movie. I'm fascinated by space. So think of Interstellar. Anybody seen the movie Interstellar? Amazing movie. I remember growing up watching Alien vs Predator, Men in Black. I love all things outer space. And during one of my obsessive episodes with space, just reading about space, watching interviews with astronauts. I saw an interview with an astronaut who spent four months in outer space. He was one of the first astronauts to spend time on the international space station. He talks about his experience being in space and coming back from it. And he came back to Earth. Scientists and doctors were examining him. And they began to notice a pattern with people who spent extended periods of time on the international space station. These astronauts who were in their 30s, 30s, 40s, would come back to Earth. And they had the bone density of a 70-year-old man. I was studying them in space. They would come back to Earth. They had lost a lot of weight. They realized their muscle was just wasting away. And they realized that being in a zero-gravity environment was very bad for their bodies. Just imagine you have four months in outer space. Anytime you want to go anywhere, you just float. It's effortless to get where you want to go.

They realized being in a zero-gravity environment was dangerous. Why? Because there was no effort in your body. And when there was no effort, there was no development of strength. Say it louder. Say no struggle. No strength. It's true physically. It's also true spiritually. It's also true emotionally. It's also true psychologically. If you experience no struggle, you develop no strength. Without an obstacle, without something to overcome, you will never become the person that you used to be. No. I want you to imagine life with no struggle. I want you to imagine if you lived, so to speak, in a zero-gravity environment. Whatever you want comes to you effortlessly. The job that you've been praying for and hoping for. A great relationship with your kids. The perfect dream life came to you like that. No effort whatsoever. It might sound like you're praying. Maybe you've prayed for a life like that. Listen to me. It would be miserable. It would be miserable for many reasons,

but one reason is you would be weak. Without an obstacle to overcome, you would never develop the strength that you need. In fact, every positive characteristic that you want can only be developed through some type of accomplishment. So when you pray that prayer, now I pray this prayer, God, take this struggle away from me. I don't want to deal with this pain or this difficulty. And I also pray, God, make me a better character. Those two prayers are not compatible. Are you following what I'm saying? You cannot pray for a easy life and pray for a strong character. You cannot pray to have no obstacles and no difficulty and pray to fulfill your destiny for the person God has called you to be. The prayers are not compatible. Without struggle, there is no strength. The Bible has a lot to say about this. James chapter one, verse two through four says this. This is what the Bible says. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials in the coming. Because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish in work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. Romans chapter five says this. Romans five through four. When we do rejoice too,

when we run into problems in trials, we know that the illness develops endurance and endurance develops strength of character and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. What is it about this saying? Pain, difficulty, stress produces something. Your pain will always produce something. But what your pain produces will depend upon your response. Let me say that again. Your pain is going to produce something in your life. But what it produces will depend upon your response. I read a story about twin brothers that grew up in the same house, same family, the same school, got the same kids in life. These two twin brothers grew up with a father who neglected. Their father was alcohol. He could never overcome his addiction. And all their life, they dealt with this. They carried this pain. And when they became adults, it manifested itself in their childhood in some pretty negative ways. One of these twin brothers, in his early 20s, started drinking. He couldn't stop. He developed an addiction. And he drank and he drank and he drank. His life was a dysfunctional mess. He never got to see the family.

And somebody asked him, why do you drink so much? He said, because I don't drink wine. What else could you expect? His brother never touched a drop of alcohol. His brother got married and was a fantastic husband and a committed father. When somebody asked him, why did you never touch a drop of alcohol? Why are you the first floor? He said, well, the father liked mine. What else could you expect from me? Isn't it interesting? Two people can have the same experience and walk away with a completely different perspective. Isn't it fascinating? Two people go through the same thing and walk away and they tell you a totally different story about it. If I take a candle and I put it in the sun, what will happen to it? It will melt. If I take clay and I put it in the sun, what will happen to it? It will harden. The same stimulus has a very different effect on the two kids. What's the difference? What their man is. You are not a candle. You're not clay.

You're a human being made in the image of God. God has given you the ability to choose your response. You do not need to be a victim of circumstances that will happen to you. And here's the biggest question. I told you that your pain is going to shape you. Will you allow your pain to be an excuse for your behavior? Or will you use it as motivation for your transformation? You cannot control what happens to you, but your response is your responsibility. God has given you the ability to choose your response. So the question is, what are you going to choose? The story that you tell yourself about your pain will have a huge impact on the quality of your life. The story that you tell yourself about your pain. You know, as I was preparing to preach this sermon, I actually preached this sermon once before, and it didn't quite hit right. Something was off. I preached this sermon a little over a month ago. And I realized one of the reasons it quite hit right is because I was not vulnerable and transparent about me and my experience in the way that it's yourself. What does this kid know about me? What difficulty are these kids going to have to overcome? Admittedly, there are a lot of people in this room I have no doubt that can share stories of pain and difficulty, things I've never been through. But it was about seven years ago, my father was diagnosed with cancer.

It was a huge shock to my family. It was an extremely painful time for us. I watched my father battle cancer for four years. His death was difficult for me. But really, the last six to 12 months is when it was gone. And my family was crushed by my father's death. And I realized that I had a choice to make. I told you that the story that you tell yourself about your father will have a huge impact on your life. I realized I had an opportunity to decide what does this mean for me? When my father died, I took the time to think, what does this mean for me? My father was an amazing man. He was an amateur. He was a man of character. And when I lost my father, I was very tempted to be bitter. I spent a while pretty upset with God about what happened. I spent a while bitter about the fact that the miracles that I was waiting for didn't seem to be happening. And as I thought about what my father's death meant for me, I realized, because of the man that he was, everyone in my family consistently relied on him. He was fair. He was honest. He was great. I realized the family relied on him, and I decided that my dad was starting to be able to rely on me. I was tempted to be bitter as I started to have my own kids, realizing, I wish I could talk to my dad about what it would mean to me. I said, I wish I could ask my dad what he would do in this situation, how I could be a better father. And I said, my dad is not here for me to ask him, but he already showed me. Your kids won't do what you say. They'll do what you do. My father was a phenomenal example, and he gave me all the tools that I need to be the man that I need to be. You see, before my father passed away, there were a lot of responsibilities that I would drop, because I knew my dad would step in. There were a lot of things in my family that I chose not to comment on or step in on, because I knew he would have. And I realized that's what he was always trying to do, step in.

That's the story that I've decided to tell myself about what happened to me. Now listen, when I say the story that you tell yourself, I'm not talking about rewriting the facts. I'm not asking you to kind of twist what happened and make up a story. No, no, no, I'm not asking you that. I'm asking you not to separate your perspective, but instead to see it from God's perspective. Listen, God sees everything through a lens of redemption. Where you see disaster and that's an impossible situation, God sees opportunity for something incredible to come of it. Where you see pain and difficulty and things that can never be used for good, God sees an opportunity to take that and transform it into something great. When you surrender your pain to God, it's incredible what he can turn your pain into. So I'm going to break down a bunch of things. These are the things that God has turned pain into in my own life. And these are the things that God can turn your pain into when you surrender your pain. I wrote this down, God turns pain into compassion. People who have suffered themselves are always the ones who carry more compassion than somebody else. The most loving and caring people you know are usually the people who have suffered the most. God turns pain into humility. Struggle reminds us that we are not in control of our own life. When everything is easy, it's easy to rely on yourself. But when you have pain in that, that builds and you realize what you need to rely on God for. God turns pain into wisdom. Difficult experiences teach us lessons that success never could. There are some lessons we only learn when we experience pain. God turns pain into gratitude. The hard seasons of my life, deepen my appreciation for the good seasons of my life. The pain that I've experienced deepens the appreciation that I have for the seasons that I'm blessed. God turns pain into purpose. Many people discover their calling for the very struggles that they never would have chosen.

The things you experience that you never would have wished to happen to you are sometimes the very things that will lead you to your purpose. God turns pain into your testimony. Your story becomes evidence that God can redeem difficult circumstances. God can turn your pain into something great if you will surrender it to him. The choice is yours. You can't control what happens to you, but your response is your responsibility. The question is, what are you going to do with that pain? And the reality is, like I said, I was tempted to be bitter, but every time you experience negative results, you have an opportunity to be bitter or to be better. The same way I told you, the people who are most compassionate and adorable are the people who have suffered the most. It's actually true that in saddest of times, it's the people who are most bitter and the most deluded are the people who suffer the most, but ultimately it's what they choose to do with their suffering. The people who know later in life continue to be bitter and hurt. Instead of surrendering their pain, they choose to pay from his perspective. They focus on the loss. Listen, you can focus on what you lost, but you can focus on what remains. I'm not trying to minimize your pain or try to explain why it happened to you. But I will tell you this, if you lost something, I know you've got something left. Don't focus on what you've lost. Don't put so much on what you've got, not just things in your life, but require your attention.

Don't give up in your pain. Surrender your pain to Christ, and he can take eternity, or something great. The Bible is full of examples of people who have suffered tremendously. The Bible is filled with people who have always suffered. Christ suffered tremendously in his loss. And before Christ went to the cross, the Bible is very clear. He was not looking forward to it. He was not minimizing it. In fact, he was agonizing in this hole. to stress before he went to the cross. And before Christ went to the cross, he prayed this prayer. I want to read this verse to you in Luke chapter 22, verse 42. And I want you to read the highlighted words. This is Jesus praying before the darkest moment of his life. He said, Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me, yet not my will, but yours be done. Christ understood something about suffering. At the beginning of his prayer, his prayer is not prayed many times. Maybe you have to do it. If there's some other way, can we please do this some other way? God, I don't want to deal with this thing. I don't want to confront this reality. Please, take this from me. And he finished the prayer,

yet not my will, but yours be done. The spiritual maturity it takes to pray and ask God for what you desire, and to finish up by saying, yet not my will, but yours be done. I've done a lot of prayers, saying, God, please take this struggle away from me. In Jesus' name, amen. That's the end of the prayer. It takes a lot of boldness. It takes a lot of maturity. It takes a lot of wisdom to finish your prayer with God. Not what I want, but what you want. Christ knew that as a result of his suffering, something was coming. The darkest moment made way for the brightest moment. The greatest suffering imaginable made way for the greatest suffering imaginable. We got a resurrection, but only after a crucifixion. Christ understood that his suffering would lead to something. So even though he did not want to do it, he said, God, not my will, but yours be done. In Brazil, one of the biggest, in fact, the biggest rainforest in the world is the Amazon rainforest. Now, the Amazon rainforest is absolutely massive. Just to help you wrap your mind around this, I didn't realize this until I did research for this sermon.

It's about the size of the United States of America. The Amazon rainforest is Florida to California, all the way across. Do you have any Brazilians in the house today? Any Brazilians in the building? Listen, I know it's shocking. I am also 100% Brazilian, I know. I know, nobody believes me. Listen, I was shocked too when my parents told me. I was like, are you sure? The Amazon rainforest is filled with these rivers that kind of cut through. They're like channels of water. It's almost like a highway system that goes through. And a few years ago, there's a true story about a pilot named Antonio Sena. He was flying a small airplane by himself over the Amazon. He was playing a game of mechanical failure. At some point, he realized, man, I can't fix this. We are going down. And he began to crash. His plane lost control. And he crashed in the middle of the Amazon rainforest by himself. At that point, it was basically a death sentence. He survived the crash, had some minor injuries, and realized, I'm a goner. A few days turned into a few weeks. He ended up spending over a month and walked over 18 miles through the Amazon rainforest

by himself in a jungle full of things that could kill him. With very little food. And he said that as he was walking through the rainforest and praying, the first day that his plane crashed, it started to pour and pour and pour. And he woke the next morning, and it started to pour and pour and pour again and it rained every single day. He said after a few weeks of this, he said, God, it's too much. Like, I want to be able to build shelter. I want to know where I'm going. I just want to know where the Amazon rainforest is. He said, God, would you do me a favor? Could you please stop the rain so I can see how to find my way out of this jungle? And he woke the next morning and it rained again. He said, God, you know, if you're up there, if you're real, if you can hear me, I could really use some different weather. Could you please stop the rain? And he woke up the next morning and it rained again. He said, God, if it's going to rain, could it just rain less? Could you, like, just a sprinkle, instead of a downpour? Like, I can't even see where I'm going. I'm trying to find my way out of here. Can you please stop the rain?

And he woke up the next morning and it rained harder. And he said, it's the hardest thing to get to doubt God. He describes his experience there. In about 35 days, it had rained every single day. And he's describing, you know, picturing his wife and his daughter going on without him. Describing the pain of his stomach just going on without him. He was sobbing. And he said, you know, all of a sudden, he saw something dense. And he caught his attention because he had seen a jungle on the sign. He had never seen anything this color. He starts moving toward it. He thinks it's delusional. And he realizes it's a talk. And suddenly, he takes this as a sign of hope. He's like, this is a person this year. This is not naturally occurring. There's a tarp here. Maybe I'm near civilization. And he's like, beginning to become desperate. And he's looking around. And he goes off to the distance. And he sees someone pulling a bucket. And he shouts and he says, hey, help! And he starts moving toward them. And the person was somebody, a village.

afraid of it. And he says, help me, please, my plane crashed. I'm looking for somebody to help me. Do you have food? Do you have water? And the person who took me out said, like, what are you doing here? And he said, what are you doing here? He said, explain my plane crashed. It's been a long month. I need food. And sure enough, I bring him to a small group of people. They give him water. And they explain to him that they go deep into the Amazon to pick up certain foods that only come out there. And they've been going around for so long. And they said to him, yeah, we never go to this part of the Amazon. And he said, why are you here? And he said, well, the rain. Our boats normally only take us so far before the rivers dry up, which just wouldn't stop raining in the last month. And our boats went deeper and deeper and deeper into the rivers until we got here. And the rivers at the time were so high, and we were going to get to the deepest part of the river. It hit him like a ton of bricks. And he said, the realization of the very thing he was praying against is what God used to save him. The very thing he was praying against is what God used to save him. So here's my question for you today. What are you praying against? What have you been asking God to stop happening in your life? Because the very thing that he was asking God to change is what God used to change his situation. What are you praying against? Because sometimes the very thing you have been praying against is what God is going to use to pray about salvation in your life. You see, we like to try to make sense of our life. We like to see what's happening. We experience the rain, and we say, here's all logical reasons this makes no sense. You see through the corner. God sees around the corner. You're trying to explain what's going on, but God is using what's happening in your life. What are you praying against? And are you able to accept that it's possible that God may have a reason for what you're going through? Are you able to have the humility to say, even though this does not make sense to me, God is greater than I am. His ways are higher than my heart. His plan is better than mine is. And he can make something incredible even out of a disaster. What have you been praying against? Because the very thing he was praying against is what God used to save him. You know, it's a miracle that I've gone this far into myself and I've got to mention the fact that I have a wife and four beautiful children. You know, that's the first thing I talk about. You know, my wife is incredibly attractive. Also, my kids are so cute. They

look AI-generated, like if you put into a pod. Eight, eight, four adorable kids. So I had three kids under three years old, and then we gave them a little break for a year and then had another one. Honestly, I wouldn't recommend doing that fast. It was crazy. I haven't slept in six years. And man, I love my kids. And every parent in this room knows nothing kind of changes your life from having a kid. You know, there are a lot of big milestones in your life, graduating college, or getting married. Those are big changes. But you have to take it in a world that's upside down. And I will never forget that. Your son was born. I was very nervous. I was very stressed out about my wife going into labor. You know, just the fear and the uncertainty about what was about to happen. And she was nine months pregnant, and we had our heart go back and forth. We were talking about, you know, you're a matchmaker, you're running around, you know, and then it starts to go down. For a few weeks, my wife would sneeze. I'd be like, get in the car. She's like, no, relax. I'm like, no, no, no, no, relax. It's okay. It's a stretch. It's okay. Just taking them, right, I mean, they're just taking minutes to break. And it's like, if this starts now, I can't handle this. I'm not going to handle this baby. We're driving to the hospital, and the contractions are getting worse. And my wife is strong. My wife is German. She can get me up. And my wife is like, Lucas, this is fine. It's not bad. But I know she's going through pain. And right as we're getting to the hospital, she's been chatting with me the whole time. And she's like, hey, this is a little bit intense. She's been talking to me during the contractions. I'm like, you know, now I'm really scared. We get in the hospital. We get to our room. And I'm very nervous. I'm like, doctor, like, nurse, like, is this okay? Is this normal? And they're telling me like, hey, hey, hey, relax. You know, we're going to be here a while, probably. It's actually just starting. I was like, it's not over yet? And her contractions are getting worse and worse and worse. And I realize, I look at the faces of the nurses who are present at the hospital coming to check on her. They are so calm. They are so calm, almost like they see this every day or something, right? But they are so relaxed. They're not worried at all. Meanwhile, I'm very, very worried to see my wife experience this pain. I'm not liking what I'm seeing. I want the pain to stop. See, the pain when you're in labor is

not a sign that something is wrong. The pain is a sign that something is right. The pain is not a sign that something is wrong. The pain is a sign that something is coming. And that the more pain she experiences, the closer we were to something great. Some of you today are dealing with pain. You're dealing with emotional pain from your past. You're dealing with baggage from a past relationship, from something that happened to you, something that was done to you. Listen to me. Your pain does not have to be random pain. It's not pain that's bringing about nothing. I believe in Jesus' name that somebody's experiencing labor pain. Pain that can bring about something great. And the more pain my wife felt, the more they knew they understood what was coming. And in fact, when my wife's pain was the worst, she could not adapt once. Say, you know what? This hurts really bad. I quit. That's not how that works, right? No, you just quit it now. In fact, when she was in the most pain, the nurse said, hey, it's time to quit. The nurse said, hey, it's time to push. What her pain was the worst was when she was told to push, not to quit. Listen to me. Don't quit on your pain. Push through your pain. Something great can come as a result of your pain. If you don't quit, you push. And the more she pushed, she pushed and she pushed. And she pushed that pain to do something beautiful. Okay. In fact, it was such a great experience. She said, I want to do it three more times. Listen to me. Something good can come as a result of your pain. Something beautiful can come as a result of your pain. Something that will bring you joy in your life as a result of your pain. Don't quit on your pain. Push through your pain. Go to church just to hear this message. I don't want you to quit on your pain. Some of you are in the middle of a divorce. Some of you are in the middle of a cancer diagnosis. Some of you are in the middle of a pain or a difficult pain. You cannot make sense of it. Don't quit on your pain. God brought you here to remind you. He wants you to look for your pain. It's to surrender to him. Stop trying to make sense of the hurt you're feeling right now. God is asking for a lens of redemption. He can redeem what you are going through. He can redeem whatever people are doing to you. If you're good, don't quit on your pain. Push through your pain. He can still use you. He still has a purpose for your life. There's something you need to accomplish here. As long as you're alive, God's not done with you. Don't quit on your pain. Push through your pain. God has made you for such a time as this. Your pain is going to turn into your testimony. Your pain is going to turn into your purpose. Your pain is going to turn

into compassion. Your pain is going to turn into something great if you surrender it to him. Don't quit on your pain. Push through your pain. No struggle. No strength. God is developing in you today. God pray for you. Father God, we thank you. Thank you, Lord, for that word that reminds us that we can consider a joy when we face trials. That we can remember, God, that you're developing something in us. And Lord, I pray right now specifically for the person who is hurting. Lord, I pray right now for the person who's in the middle of their mess. Lord, I pray. And I ask that you would touch their heart right now. Lord, I pray that you would begin to heal someone. Lord, I pray right now that you would begin to help someone to see their pain from your perspective. Because you can redeem anything. Lord, we surrender our pain to you. We choose to let go of the way we want things to be. We say, Lord, down in the middle. In Jesus' name, in every voice, in the name of Jesus.