Trusting God In The Transitions (40th Anniversary) | Daniel Bentley

And one of the reasons so many of us are struggling right now in the current season is because we keep dragging the old us into the new place that God is wanting to bring us, and the old you can't sustain the weight of what God is now asking you to carry. It could be that the way he provided for you in a previous season is going to look different than the way he's providing for you in this one. That's why we've gotta learn how to navigate and handle these transitions well. [00:30:54] (29 seconds)  #LeaveOldYouBehind

And that's understandable. But what I found is that sometimes we can be in such a hurry to get to the other side of our current season that we can miss out on the miracle that we find ourselves in the middle of right now. And God didn't want that to happen with Israel. He didn't wanna just bring them through it. There were some things that he wanted them to take out of it. And so for them, he says, grab some stones that will help you remember what I did for you. [00:35:54] (28 seconds)  #DontMissTheMiracle

Now, hopefully, you realize what an important role remembering plays in the life of every believer. I mean, this is a dominant theme in scripture. And just to kinda underscore underscore that that point, point, did you know that the command to remember shows up more in the Bible than do the commands such as obey or to do or to not do or to go or even to pray. God says over and over and over again. I want you to pause, and I want you to reflect on my goodness and my faithfulness in prior seasons. [00:37:23] (38 seconds)  #RememberHisFaithfulness

And that could be what the Lord is doing with you right now. You don't see a way forward in your story, and God says, I haven't brought you here to drop you. I've brought you here to provide for you, to bring you over, because he's the God of transitions, and he can be trusted to get you through it. If he brought you to it, you can be sure that he will see you through it. Amen. [00:33:39] (25 seconds)  #GodOfTransitions

You know, faith isn't genetic. There are a lot of things your kids will inherit from you automatically without you having to do anything. It might be the color of your eyes or the the shape of their nose or the, you know, the way that they laugh or their sense of humor or the contours of their personality. They're just gonna get these things via the transfer of DNA. But one thing they can't pick up genetically from you is is your faith. That's something that has to come as a byproduct of you living it out and then grabbing a hold of it for themselves. [00:51:17] (38 seconds)  #ModelFaithForKids

It's not only about reflecting on what was, but it's laying hold of what God did back here to inspire my future faith and my present trust. The idea is this, when you look back and you see how faithful God was in a previous season to another generation, it infuses you with fresh confidence that the same God who met them will carry me through my current season. And that's what it means to remember. [00:41:42] (27 seconds)  #HistoryBreedsFaith

In just one generation, the faith was failed to be passed on. The knowledge of God was lost. Where did they go wrong? They weren't intentional enough about passing on and stewarding the legacy that they had been entrusted with. And consequently, the next generation was lost. And I think that's what makes moments like this one so profound and so important. You know, we've got, I think, our fifth graders and above are in the room today, and that is by design. I I need, [00:46:51] (34 seconds)  #PassTheFaithIntentionally

This is a powerful moment in the lives of God's people. It's a transitional moment in their story. And what the overarching theme of this story is is that God can be trusted in the transitions. God can be trusted in the transitions. That's the first point in our outline if you wanna go ahead and fill that in. And what we have here is a story of God's faithfulness. [00:23:17] (27 seconds)  #TrustedInEveryTransition

Why does he tell us this over and over again? Because it's only natural for us to forget. And to prove that point, how many of you have seen God provide for you in a season of your life in the past? You came upon some financial situation, and God showed up. Amen. Look at all those hands. Okay. Subsequently, how many of you found yourself in another tight jam financially after that? First one. Okay. Same amount of hands. How many of you still freaked out the second time? Okay. Amen. [00:38:26] (28 seconds)  #DontForgetHisProvision

Because when I think of Tower 32, I think of the baptisms we've held there over the previous decades and the thousands of lives that have been forever changed as they went under the waters of identification with Jesus, and they were submerged one person, and they came up a brand new person. And so it's a sweet and sacred place for us. Amen. But you need to have your own memorials. [00:40:18] (25 seconds)  #CreateYourMemorial

There ought to be memorials that you return to in your heart. You know, in that t shirt that Madeleine and Lucas were wearing, it's our fortieth anniversary t shirt. Of all the images that we could have used to to reflect the work that God has done here at Maranatha, we chose the symbol of Tower 32, a lifeguard Tower. Why would we do that? Why not, like, a cross or a drawing of this place? Well, for us, that tower, it speaks of something far more than just, you know, sunny days at the beach or sand and and the seashore. No. No. No. For this church, that place is a memorial. [00:39:41] (38 seconds)  #MemorialsThatSpeak

And so too, in the middle of your situation, it might be, I don't know, a new perspective that God is wanting you to take with you into the new season he's bringing you into. It might be a deeper understanding of his grace, a greater appreciation of his love, or a stronger fortitude in your character or in your soul that is going to be needed to walk into the new that God is bringing you into. [00:36:22] (28 seconds)  #MiddleTransformsYou

You know, my only job as your pastor is to get you to fix your eyes on the good shepherd who is still going before us. He is the senior pastor of this church, and our only job is to follow him as he leads us out. Can somebody please say amen? Amen. [00:19:36] (19 seconds)  #FixEyesOnTheShepherd

You see, might have been in a hurry, and and there were future battles that awaited them, and the walls Of Jericho stood before them. But before they moved on to the next thing, God said, it's important for you to reflect on what I've done in this season, and I believe there's something there for us. You see, as they were going through it, God tells them, I want you to take something from it. Does that make sense? [00:34:35] (26 seconds)  #TakeLessonsFromTheSeason

Perhaps you too find yourself in a transitional season right now. Maybe you've recently changed jobs, and you're transitioning from one vocation to another, or or maybe you recently moved across the country. I I've talked to several people that have recently transitioned from the East Coast, and now they find themselves living here, and they've found Maranatha. Or maybe it's the other way around, and you're getting ready to move out. Others of you are transitioning from adolescence to adulthood. There's changes happening. [00:29:41] (31 seconds)  #EmbraceLifeTransitions

So that kinda brings us to this present moment. You know, I I feel like the Lord has gone before us, and he's led us into a brand new season. And it's so exciting to see the things that are happening around here and all the incredible things that God is doing. But as we move into this new season, it's important that we don't lose sight of our past. [00:19:55] (22 seconds)  #MoveForwardRemembering

Because just like Joshua, I was a newly appointed leader, and I had no idea where we were going or how to get there. But what I did know instinctively is that it was going to be absolutely critical for us to fix our eyes on the presence of God, and that he hadn't made a mistake, and that he was going before us, and that he would lead us into this new season. You know, that was almost three years ago that I shared that with our staff. And a lot's changed in those years, but Joshua's words still ring true. [00:19:02] (34 seconds)  #LeadByFixingYourEyes

After forty years of wandering in the wilderness, the Israelites are now finally taking their first steps in the land of promise. Think about that. Forty years spent wandering and living a nomadic lifestyle there in the desert. The desert is a dry place. It's an arid place. It's a hot place. The desert is a place where there is not much life. And so to be sure, [00:23:44] (28 seconds)  #FromWildernessToPromise

You see, in the desert, in the wilderness, God met his people in profound ways, and he provided for their needs supernaturally. He sustained them during that time with water from a rock. Think about that. Every morning, he would rain down manna from heaven so that when you woke up, you would unzip your tent and step out onto your front patio there. And all over the ground, they're like the dew covering the earth. There would be these little wafer like things that you could that were edible, and it was God's provision for his people. [00:24:17] (33 seconds)  #GodsDailyProvision

Whatever transition you find yourself walking through today, God has given us this story to remind us that he can be trusted in life's transitions. Can you say amen to that? Amen. Now in our story, God decided to mark this significant transitional moment in the lives of his people by doing something dramatic, and that's often the case. For Moses, it was the burning bush. For Jesus, it was his baptism. And here, we have the crossing of the Jordan. [00:31:26] (31 seconds)  #GodMarksTransitions