Wonderful Counselor: Reframing Life Through Christ’s Wisdom

Dec 03, 2023

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“And so we have to be a people that reframe correctly to what Christmas is really about, that Jesus is the reason for the season, and that we could not get to heaven. Like, there was nothing. For thousands of years, man had tried to find a way to get to heaven, whether it was the Jews with the law and practicing the law and trying to find a way to get to heaven, whether it was Buddhism and meditation, whether it was Islam and it's trying to, you know, martyr yourself into heaven. There's all these attempts to get to heaven, and no one could ever get there. And so what God decided, since we couldn't get to God, God decided to get to us.”
“And in life, we don't need a better government. We don't need a better president. We need a better king. And this prophecy is all about the king that was going to come. And this king was going to be like unlike any other king. Where most kings come from the top down. And they show you what the kingdom is going to be like. And they force the kingdom on you. And they take over enemy territory. This king was born to a little 14-year-old virgin girl. On the backside of the desert. In a manger. Surrounded by animals. In poverty. And grew up in wisdom and stature. And began to show the world what heaven looks like.”
“Jesus is more than just what you need him to be. He's more than just a counselor. He's more than just a prince. He's more than just a father. He's actually wonderful. He's wonderful. And the word wonderful means incomprehensible. Like there's no words to describe what he is like. And anytime somebody had an encounter with God in the Bible, they never say God is this. They always say God is like this. Because there's no words to describe his love. There's no words to describe his power. There's no words to describe his authority. There's no words to describe his beauty.”
“It's Christmas season is a season that allows us to have the wonder again. You see the wonder in kids that they think anything is possible. You see the wonder in families that they come back together. You see the wonder in hoping it's going to snow. You see the wonder in actually thinking Alabama is going to make the college football playoff. You're full of what is wonder? It's when your mind is amazed and astounded and has no words to express it. And to me, one of the saddest things that happens is you watch children who are full of wonder.”
“Like wonder should be the baseline of a Christian. It should be the baseline. Even one person said, wonder is the precondition for any wisdom. I would say wonder is also the precondition for any joy. That to the level in which you wonder about God and his abilities and his promises, to that extent is what your joy is. And if that is the case, then the joy of the Lord is your strength. Then the wonder you have about God is the strength that you have. And so my question would be, when did you lose the wonder?”
“When did you stop looking up at the stars and wondering how crazy it is that God created all of that, yet he spoke to you and saved your soul? When did you lose the wonder that when you see somebody get saved or somebody get baptized, you realize there's a miracle taking place, that somebody's going from eternal death to eternal life? I can tell you. I can tell you how we all lose our wonder. Life happens. And when you start getting responsibility as an adult, when you start having situations come up and life starts to happen, you start trying to think logically instead of full of awe and wonder and faith.”
“I believe Jesus as a counselor, one of the things he does, he brings back the wonder into our lives so we can begin to reframe our lives around the power of God, the presence of God, the promises of God, the character of God, so we can reframe our lives to see life through an eye full of wonder. And the more full your eyes are of wonder, I'm here to tell you, I believe the more faith you will have in our eyes up. Because he is a wonderful counselor. He's actually the best counselor there's ever been. And he's also the best counselor you could ever have. And he's free.”
“You can go to a counselor and they may have been through a similar situation before. But they've never been right where you've been before. They may have seen similar situations in life, but they don't have been right smack in the middle of what you've been through. Jesus did not just come from heaven to earth to pay the price for your sins. He came to experience what you experienced. The 40 days in the temptation was him to experience our pain, our trauma, our shame, our everything. He felt pain on the cross. He felt betrayal. He felt sorrow. He felt grief. He's experienced every single human emotion that can be experienced.”
“So we have this counselor who has been where we've been and experienced what we've experienced. And yet he tries to guide us and give us advice with compassion and mercy. And so it always amazes me when Christian people are scared of counseling or scared of therapy. Because we have a counselor who's been through what we've been through. And he wants to guide us through those moments.”
“They discovered that Jesus is the wonderful counselor. But he's only the wonderful counselor if you actually go to him. He's only the wonderful counselor if you actually go sit in a session on a daily basis with the great therapist, the great counselor, the great psychiatrist, who knows what you've been through and wants to guide you and lead you out of that into something better.”
“For one, Jesus is wisdom. It's not that he has wisdom. He is wisdom. He is the epitome of wisdom. He is the definition of wisdom. In 1 Corinthians 1, it says this, To those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Colossians 2, 3, And Jesus are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. He is wisdom. If you need wisdom, you don't have to go to your Aunt Susie. You can go to Jesus. James even says, If you need wisdom, ask him. Why? He is wisdom.”
“Why is it that the world many times pursues and seeks after Jesus more than the church does? Why is it the world knows that counseling is a gift of God, but the church looks at it as a weakness instead of a strength? Why is it that we have access to heavenly wisdom on a daily basis in our prayer life, that so many times we refuse to even get up five minutes early to pursue and seek after wisdom manifest on earth in Jesus. But the world will pursue after him at all costs.”
“He literally, when Jesus came down, he came to show us what heaven's like. It's almost like when you see drone footage of something. If you go to a parade and you look at the parade, you only have this small glimpse of whatever's passing by you at that moment. But if you put a drone up in the air, the drone gives you a whole full picture of what the parade is, the length, the width, what all floats are in the parade, who all is marching in the parade, all what's going on. So Jesus came down to give us this droned footage of our lives, droned footage of eternity, so we have a better perspective, so we can see life correctly.”
“And so what I want to help you with today is just understanding that there's more to what you see than what you actually see. In Philippians 4.8, Paul's trying to get the Philippian church to reframe their thoughts. He said it this way, finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there's any excellence, if there's anything worthy of praise, is think about these things. And so as a counselor comes in, I learned this from my counselor. He helped me reframe things I was going through to see them differently.”
“And so Jesus can counsel you by reframing what you're seeing to a better perspective. And so reframing is just changing how you see things to include God in the equation, and you see it through God's perspective. See it through God's perspective. Here's how you're going to reframe your thoughts. Step one is this. You must identify your negative thinking. You must identify your negative thinking.”
“And I would say many of us, when it comes to our thought life, if we have the option to look at what God's Word says about our situation, or we look at our situation for what it makes us feel like, our emotions, our worry, our concerns, our fears, we will dwell on our emotions and fears instead of dwelling on God's Word. And so you must learn to identify this is a negative thought. This thought is contrary to what God has said. This thought does not produce life.”
“Filtering is when you focus exclusively on the negative parts of situations, and you disregard what is positive. So your filter is already negative. So when somebody tells you, hey, it's not the end of the world, I know your boyfriend broke up with you, you only dated for six hours, it's going to be okay. No, no, no, no, this is not going to, this is, I'm never going to date again. Well, I promise you, you probably will. No, no, no, your filter is negative. And so you can't see anything otherwise. So filtering is a negative thought process.”
“And I can help you with this, that any time you place any thought in a framework of these four things, it's always going to produce negativity. It's always going to produce doubt. It's always going to produce anxiety. It's always going to produce more fear. Because you're looking at it through a framework that excludes God from the equation. And so what Philippians 4.8 is trying to say is that Jesus, the counselor, he can help you reframe your thought life that maybe you have the same thoughts, but you see those thoughts differently if you have a different framework to see them through.”
“I believe Jesus shows up to show us what the character of God actually looks like. That he's full of mercy and grace. His love is unconditional. His mercies are new every morning. He shows us God's character. He says, if you want to see what the Father looks like, look at me. He shows us what God's presence looks like. He says, it's not just peace I give you, it's the peace of heaven I give you. He shows us that God's promises, even if it was 800 years previously, he still fulfills his promises. And his promises are yes and amen in God.”
“So when I have issues with my finances, I'm not filtering through my past shame, my past family, my past failures, my emotions, my worries. I'm processing them through God's character, his power, his promises, and his presence. The unknown. I don't know what tomorrow brings, but I do know the God that's with me today is already in tomorrow. I do know that if God's with me today, he's the same God yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and forevermore. He's the same God. His presence has never left me. He has never forsaken me, so why would God not show up tomorrow?”
“See, when the framework is correct, you can go through the same thing, but you have faith while you go through it. And part of the Christmas story is Jesus came to earth to give us a new framework to see what life is actually going to be like in heaven. In heaven, your framework is perfect. In heaven, you are looking through God's presence. In heaven, you're looking through his character. In heaven, you're looking at his promises fulfilled. In heaven, you're looking through every single thing God has done. So the question would be, why don't you just start doing it today?”
“You say, why is that important, Pastor? It's because Jesus didn't just die to save you. He died to change your perspective. And when he changes your perspective, he changes your life. People say, well, Pastor, you know, I love Jesus. I just, you know, my life hadn't changed that much. It's because your perspective hasn't changed.”
“When you get saved, you become a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. And as a citizen of the kingdom of heaven, there's promises that are yours, but there's also realities that are yours. And there's a way to operate in the kingdom of heaven. And one of the primary ways to operate in the kingdom of heaven is to see through the lens of the kingdom of heaven. That's why the disciples were just like, you know, when's your kingdom coming? Jesus said, it's in the midst of you. What was he referring to in the Holy Spirit? It's in the midst of you. What does that mean? That I get to live in the kingdom of heaven now by having a heavenly perspective to see my life through.”
“And so he is your wonderful counselor, and he can reframe your thoughts if you allow him to change the way you see. If you allow him to change your perspective. Some negative thoughts is like this. This will never change. When you reframe that thought, this is only a season. Negative thought, I can't do this. Reframe thought, I can do anything God calls me to do. Negative thought, this whole thing is an absolute, complete failure. Reframe thought, I'm learning a lot, and God is growing me and changing me.”
“If you see yourself as a Pharisee, that God is only pleased with you when you're satisfying his every single waking judgment and need. You'll always have a negative fear-based relationship. If you realize that literally the Christmas story is about God emptying heaven of its greatest resource. Jesus. Literally, it's whatever the price. If you want gold streets, you can take them. If you want this, you can take it. If you want the sea of glass, you can take it. But the price that was demanded for us was God's most prized possession. Which isn't golden streets, which isn't a sea of glass. It's his only begotten son, Jesus.”
“He grows, he turns the water into wine before his time had even come. Then he spends the rest of the time teaching, preaching, and healing every single disease. Then he comes to the cross, he's betrayed. He's abandoned. He's left by himself. He takes 39 stripes on the back with the whip to pay the price for our healing. He goes to the cross. Even on the cross, he's telling, Father, forgive them. They don't even know what they're doing. What were they doing? And they're killing the payment for their own sin. He breathes his last breath. He goes into the grave. Three days later, he resurrects.”
“That you can reframe that and put God's character. God's power. God's presence. And God's promises. As the lens or the framework in which you see things. Could you imagine how much better your life would be if your cognitive bias was God's character, His promise, His presence. Rather than your emotions, your worry, and your fear.”
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