Trusting the Holy Spirit's Truth in Life's Storms

They should ask us, how do you have such peace when everything is falling apart? And then we can get to the answer because we're not flying by sight. We know the teacher of truth and the pilot who commands the wind and the waves has promised to bring us home safely. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give you. Do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not be afraid. This is Christ's gift for you, for every one of us. He loves you. He's given you the Holy Spirit. So when you're filled with anxiety, open your heart to the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Listen to the word he speaks. [00:48:25] (62 seconds)  #PeaceThroughTheSpirit

Your heart is troubled, your feelings are screaming at you that this world is going down. But here's an application for you. Stop flying by sight. You have to learn to read the instrument panel. Jesus said the Holy Spirit will teach you all things and remind you of all that he said. Often, it's in the midst of our trials, a scripture verse is highlighted within our mind. When your anxiety says, you're entirely alone, you have to check the instrument panel of scripture where the spirit says, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. [00:39:29] (43 seconds)  #ReadTheInstrumentPanel

Every physical sense, every nerve ending in their back, bleeding. And it's telling them, God has abandoned you. This is the end. But what do they do at midnight? They don't listen to their feelings. They check the instrument panel and the holy spirit reminds them the truth of God's sovereignty. And because they have the truth, they find a peace that the world cannot understand. And in the midst of this darkest place, they begin praying and singing hymns to God in the dark. And God honors them with an earthquake that breaks their chains. [00:37:49] (46 seconds)  #HymnsInTheDark

And when that truth enters into your soul, guess what happens? He can make this promise, peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. You don't I don't I do not give as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not be afraid. Now, he doesn't say, I'm gonna give you a life without storms. He says, I give you my peace so that we can navigate within the storms. But what is his peace? His peace is the unshakable confidence that the father is in control. Even as he's going to the cross, god's got this. [00:32:24] (52 seconds)  #PeaceToNavigateStorms

This week when panic sets in, and I say this week because I I don't know about you, but seems like every week there's a moment of panic. I want you to practice a holy pause. Before you react, before you go online, before you spiral into despair, close your eyes. Hold your breath for a second. Breathe out like you're blowing on some soup. Maybe do it twice. If it's really bad, three or four times. Acknowledge the turbulence. Yeah. The turbulence isn't what it is. And then pray. Holy Spirit, teacher of truth, my feelings are telling me I have no hope. My feelings are full of anxiety. [00:44:58] (57 seconds)  #PracticeTheHolyPause

We need a source of truth that doesn't change with the weather and a peace that anchors us even when the turbulence is shaking the cabin of our life. We read John chapter 14, and just to put into context what's happening there, Jesus is sitting with his closest disciples. And in just a few hours, he'll be arrested and beaten and crucified. The disciples are gonna fly into the darkest, most terrifying storm of their lives. Their senses will tell them that evil one, hope is dead, that they're doomed. Jesus knows this disorientation is coming, so he gathers them together and to give them flight instruments. [00:30:25] (53 seconds)  #FlightInstrumentsOfFaith

The fall in Genesis three, humanity chose to distrust God's word. We decided that we wanted to be our own pilots. We listened to the serpent's lie. We flew our own lives into the cloud of sin, and the result was instant disorientation. Fear, blame, and anxiety entered the human heart. We lost our dashboard navigation, our to north, redemption. God refused to leave us in the storm. In an ultimate act of redemption, God sent his son. He descended into our storm, took the crash for us on the cross. He absorbed the chaos, the sin, the death that we deserved. [00:34:09] (43 seconds)  #FromFallToRedemption

Or if you curate the best, you know, good friends, good families, you have just a good circle around you, you won't get hurt. That's flying by flight, by sight. But the moment a cloud rolls in, the moment you get a devastating medical diagnosis, the moment someone who's part of your close circle betrays you, the moment there's a stock market correction, turbulence hits our hearts and we become deeply troubled, our instincts tell us that God has abandoned the cockpit. We need a way to navigate in a world full of these thick clouds of anxiety. We need to find an instrument panel for our souls. [00:29:32] (52 seconds)  #SoulInstrumentPanel