Steven Furtick - Stepping Out In Doubt
This is an excerpt from: It's The Motion That Matters
How many of you are dealing with uncertainty right now in an area of your life where you are trying to figure out whether the doubt you have is something you should pay attention to as caution or step forward because God is calling you to have faith? This will help you. I can't tell you exactly right or wrong in this, but I can give you a picture. Here's the picture. Verse 10: "They cried out to the Lord". That sounds good. That's what you're supposed to do. Right? They're very emotional, and they should be. I'm not minimizing their situation here, but watch how quickly they forget what God just did in delivering them.
Watch how quickly fear can cancel out and make you forget how bad it really was where you were in an attempt to go back. "They said to Moses, 'Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt? Is not this what we said to you in Egypt: "Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians"? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.'"
Would it? Fear will make you think that. Depression will make you think that. Pressure will make you think that. All three of those things are present, so I get it. Now Moses, the great motivational speaker, is going to give the question and answer at the seminar. "What do we do now"? Moses stands up. He's not a very good speaker, but he's giving it his best right now. "And Moses said to the people, 'Fear not…'" Let me try that again. "Fear not"! Yeah, that's more convincing. "Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again".
If y'all don't shout over verse 14, I'm going to get a new church. "The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent". Hold on. Be silent. Don't shout, because he's wrong. It sounds good, but he's wrong. I wish it were always that way. Sometimes it is, but in this case it's wrong. There is a body of water called the Red Sea in front of you. You can't cross it. There are chariots from Egypt behind you. You can't outrun them. So, Moses' advice right here… One translation says, "You need only be still". We've all heard before, "Be still and know that he is God".
Sometimes this will be the instruction, but for this moment, for this Moses, for this nation, for this situation, being still will get you killed. Watch God. I love God. "The Lord said to Moses, 'Why do you cry to me?'" "Well, that's not very nice, Jehovah-Jireh. You're supposed to be my provider. I'm crying to you because you're Jehovah-Nissi, my banner. I'm crying to you because you're Jehovah-Shalom, my peace. I'm crying to you because I can't do this. I'm emotional, and I'm afraid".
Moses is old, and the people are angry, and the pace is very slow. Look. If you travel with five kids, allot an extra two hours to get across town. If you travel with two million… This isn't going to happen very fast. The Lord said to Moses, "I know you have a lot on you, and I know it seems impossible, but why do you cry to me"? "Tell the people of Israel to go forward". You are not going to fix this with emotions.
So, Moses, "Mosetta" (I want to preach to all genders and people and all that), whatever it is you're looking at right now, I want you to know something about emotions. They can be helpful guides to get us to a certain place, but sometimes sitting with the emotion endlessly just creates more of what you are asking God to take you out of. The only way to deal with it is to go through it. That's what God told Moses. He said, "You can cry about this all day. We could pray about it. You could study a verse about it. You can quote about it. You can do all of that, but the only way for us to deal with this is for you to tell the people to go forward".
Then there's one more instruction he gives Moses that I thought was significant and kind of silly in the face of the challenge at hand. He said (verse 16), "Lift up your staff, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, that the people of Israel may go through the sea on dry ground". "Oh, well, that will totally work". How we read the Bible with these cotton-candy eyes I'll never even know. We have this fake filter we put on all of the stories, like, "Yeah, that's the way it works. Put the staff and let them go. I saw the thing. He did it. I saw a thing. I saw a movie about it. Moses just put up his staff".
There's a difference between reading the thing and doing the thing. I guarantee you all of my scholarly confidence, as low as it may be, that Moses' hand was shaking because he was old and because he was scared, but the fact that his hand was shaking did not stop the sea from splitting. What I'm saying is you can do it with a shaky hand. You can do it with knocking knees. You can do it with a lump in your throat. Oh yeah, Taylor. I can do it with a broken heart. I can praise him with a painful situation. I can make progress in a cloudy condition. Yeah, just like that, give God praise. Some of you today just lifted your hands freely, but some of y'all… Your hands felt heavy.
I keep meeting people who say, "Well, when I really feel like it, then I'll praise God. Sometimes I don't want to fake it and come to church and sing, 'God, you've been so good to me,' because I don't really feel like he has been good to me". But I realized something in the Spirit. Praise is a pushback. Praise is how I tell the Red Sea, "You stand here. You stand there". Praise is how I tell my doubt, "You stand here. You stand there". Even if I stretch my hand shakily, it's the motion that matters. You think you need a better staff? The best staff can't split a sea. Stop thinking you need an external upgrade. All you need is an internal commitment to God.
"I will step out not just when I feel something, not just when something good happens to me, not just when I have a good idea. I'll step out with a bad idea and buff it until it shines". I'm telling you the most important skill is right here. I don't see anywhere in the text (maybe you do; you can go study it and write me an email about it) if their feelings changed. They're still mad at Moses. Moses is certainly mad at them. Everything I do for my kids that they don't thank me for I get mad at. This is a pretty big thing he did for them to get them out.
I think sometimes we stay stuck in resentment, and then we let what's called the root of bitterness keep us anchored to situations we could move through. Everything you feel God knows about. Everything you feel God cares about. Everything you feel God is comfortable in the presence of. But you have to let him move through you by moving through it. If you always surrender to it, you never gain strength or freedom, whatever it is. "But, God, what do you mean"?
Look at the verse. One whole word God gave me here that I think is going to be so powerful for somebody. He said, "If you be still, you get killed". (That wasn't the word. This is the word.) "Why are you telling me about this problem? Tell the people of Israel to go forward". I thought to myself, "Wait a minute. They're on foot. The chariots have wheels. They have children. All of the people chasing them are fighting age". Do you ever feel like there's nothing you can do to catch up now? Like, you are so far behind in your life… "Even if I run as fast as I can, I have to drag all this behind me". The Lord said, "Go forward". Watch this. Not fast, just forward. He said, "It doesn't have to be fast".
I know you're loaded down by a lot of things, and I know you're on foot. I know you didn't get that kind of training, and I know you've lost some years. I know you've wasted away some opportunities. I know you killed a few brain cells. I know you closed a few doors on some people who won't call you back. I know there are going to be some things you're going to have to navigate through. You feel like what's in front of you is too big and what's behind you is too fast, but you don't have to go fast. You just have to go forward. Why? Because after the water parts for you, it's going to close back over your enemies.
You're on foot, and Pharaoh has wheels, so it would seem like there's no way you can outrun him, but there's one thing your enemy didn't count on when he was chasing you with his chariots: wheels don't work in water. If Pharaoh was going to chase you, he should have brought a boat, because what he didn't count on is that when you do…
God said, "I'm not looking for you to be fast enough. I'm not looking for you to make up for time you lost. I'll make up the time you lost. I'll redeem the years the cankerworm has eaten. I'll deal with your past. I'll deal with your credit. I'll deal with your boss. I'll deal with the market". Wheels don't work in water. When you get out here in faith, there's not a thing the Devil can do to drag you back, because wheels don't work in water. I don't have to be fast; I just have to move forward, because your stuck wheel can't catch my slow feet.