We think it’s our circumstances that make us anxious but God’s trying to teach us something more.
Here are five ways we create our own storms
sometimes.
See, some waves are God-ordained in our lives,
but some waves are waves we make.
Sometimes we create our own anxiety, and then
we ask God for peace.
How can he give you peace in a situation you’re
currently creating?
I have five things for you just really quickly.
I won’t take long on them.
First, often we create anxiety and waves in
our lives with…
1.
The words we speak.
Just write that down.
Words.
Words!
Have you ever made unnecessary waves with
your words?
Words you speak out of anger that you then
have to go back and fix.
It takes a week, two weeks, three weeks.
Words of doubt.
Some of you, just you frame your day with
the wrong words.
Then you’re disappointed with the world you’ve
built, but your world is created by your words.
Sometimes we make waves.
You know, we create choppy conditions in the
morning just by the way we get up talking.
“If it’s not one thing, it’s another.”
My grandmother used to say this phrase all
the time.
She’d say, “Y’all about to worry me to death.”
She’d say it about anything.
You know, the TV is too loud.
“Turn that TV down.
Y’all about to worry me to death.”
She was a wonderful lady, but do you know
what?
As a result of her saying all the time, “Y’all
about to worry me to death,” she was worried
a lot, because she said she wanted to be worried.
We read a teaching one time in a book.
It said after anything you say in your life,
don’t say it if you can’t follow it with this
phrase: “And that’s just the way I want it.”
That’s just the way I want it.
Try it out on the things you say.
“Y’all about to worry me to death.
And that’s just the way I want it.”
“I’m just running around like a chicken with
my head cut off.
I’m so stressed out.
And that’s just the way I want it.”
You have your own phrases, but the words we
speak create waves of anxiety.
Check your words.
2.
Your approach.
Sometimes it’s not what we’re going through;
it’s the way we’re going through what we’re
going through.
Some of us live with no margin, and so we’re
always nervous.
It’s our approach.
We’re anxious about money because we spend
too much and don’t make enough.
No margin.
It’s your approach.
You start your morning frustrated with people
in traffic.
You know there’s going to be traffic.
You’ve never adjusted the time you get up
and leave your house.
Now you’re wondering why your job is so stressful.
Your job is not stressful.
The way you got to your job was stressful
because of your approach.
I’m going to help a student.
Your class is not stressful.
The fact that you knew about the assignment
for three weeks before you thought to look
it up…
It’s the approach that made it stressful.
“She is just so mean.”
She is not mean!
You’re just a procrastinator.
You’re making your own waves.
Can I get a parent to back me up in the house?
That’s the second one.
3.
The wrong voices.
The wrong voices can create unnecessary and
needless waves and anxiety in our lives, can’t
they?
Man, if you check the news or your Twitter
feed on your phone before even getting up
to use the bathroom in the morning, and you
wonder why the outlook on life that you have
is so dark…
I think 24/7 news stations and news is one
of the worst things that ever happened to
our peace of mind as people.
No offense to media!
No offense to a journalist but, I mean…
I was reading through just some headlines
the other day.
Do you really need to understand the dynamics
of every disease?
Every disease?
Do you really need to understand the dynamics
of every conflict in all these countries you
can’t pronounce?
Do you need to meditate…?
No wonder you’re merimnate.
You’re marinating in the wrong reports, the
wrong voices.
They’ll come in and tell me from time to time
about a problem in the church.
When they get to a certain point, I’ll say,
“Thanks.
That’s all I need to know.”
What am I doing?
I need good information to make a good decision,
but I don’t need so much information that
it clouds my outlook.
So I can’t let the wrong voices just keep
on playing, keep on going.
“Then they said this, and then they did that.
They might do that, and it could be that.”
You know, at some point you just have to say,
“I’m creating waves by all the voices I’m
listening to.
I listen to depression.
I watch depression.
The people I hang around are depressing.
I’m making my own waves.”
Hello.
Hello.
Hello.
4.
Our expectations.
Our expectations can create waves.
Sometimes you go out in your life, and the
anxiety you feel is a result of the expectations
of others that you created by not being willing
to manage your own energy.
Sometimes the anxiety we feel is because we
get up in the morning, and we don’t expect
any battles that day.
We feel like it’s a surprise attack when something
hits us wrong.
Why are you surprised?
He said put on the full armor of God.
That suggests you’re going to be in a fight.
He said take up the helmet.
He said take up the shield.
He said take up the sword.
He said you have to get dressed for battle
when you get up in the morning.
Don’t be surprised!
You need to learn to expect some storms.
I think the fact that it’s unexpected is often
the reason it’s so difficult.
Then there’s the master wave maker in our
souls.
It’s called…
5.
Shame.
You walk around anxious because you’re hiding
stuff, and you wonder, “When are they going
to find out about my secret?”
Maybe because you’re tormented by something
God already forgave…
See, there’s a difference between conviction
and shame.
Conviction is good.
It shows you what to fix, and it gives you
God’s power to help fix it.
Shame tells you that because of what you did,
who you are is now fundamentally changed.
It makes you walk around paranoid.
It makes you walk around feeling helpless.
It makes you walk around feeling like people
don’t love you who do love you and people
are judging you who aren’t judging you.
You have to learn where to take your shame,
or it will just rock you.
Waves.
They wake Jesus up, and they say, “Don’t you
see the waves?
Don’t you care if we die?”
Verse 39: “[Jesus] got up, rebuked the wind
and said to the waves, ‘Quiet!
Be still!'”
He got up, and he said, “Quiet!
Be still!”
Three words.
“Then the wind died down and it was completely
calm.
He said to his disciples, ‘Why are you so
afraid?'”
“Don’t you know that when I tell you we’re
going to the other side, we’re going to get
to the other side?
Don’t you know that I command the wind and
the waves?”
See, they didn’t yet.
They hadn’t seen enough yet.
They hadn’t experienced enough yet.
After you’ve been through a few storms, it’s
interesting what you learn.
Look at it.
“Do you still have no faith?”
Then verse 41.
It says, “They were terrified and asked each
other, ‘Who is this?
Even the wind and the waves obey him!'”
If you thought they were scared of the storm,
they really freaked out when they found out
that with three words, he could shut it off
like a showerhead.
Whoa!
I want to suggest something to you today about
the storms of anxiety in your life and the
waves and the winds that are blowing in your
life.
Because, man, the winds will blow.
They will blow, absolutely!
The waves will break, and they will crash.
There’s no doubt about it.
In those times when Jesus is sleeping in the
stern and he doesn’t take action and he doesn’t
fix your situation, it can be easy to deduce
what the disciples deduced: “We’re going to
die, and God doesn’t even care.”
You start planning out all the way to the
end.
“Man, this is how I’m going to die right here.
This is how it’s going to end right here.
I’m never going to get another job.
I’m never going to…”
Anxious for nothing.
They eventually got to the other side.
See, I wondered all week why Jesus would send
them into a storm, just like we wonder in
our lives why God doesn’t do more about the
chaos in our world.
Why doesn’t he fix situations before they
get that bad?
We celebrate when God heals somebody of cancer,
but silently we wonder, “Why did they have
to have cancer to begin with?”
We celebrate when somebody’s kid comes back
to God, but we wonder, “Then why did God let
the kid wander away to begin with?”
We celebrate that somebody went to heaven,
but we wonder, “Why did God have to make it
so people die and we feel pain and sorrow?”
“Don’t you care?”
Jesus was upset about that.
Do you know what?
I don’t think he was upset that they woke
him up.
I think they were supposed to wake him up.
I think he wanted them to go wake him up.
I do!
I think it’s the way they woke him up that
bothered him.
See, they woke him up thinking, “You must
not care.
You don’t care.”
He said in Philippians 4:6, didn’t he, “In
everything, make your requests known to God”?
You’re supposed to ask God.
You’re supposed to go down to the stern and
say, “Lord, I need a little help right now.
Lord, this doesn’t feel good.
God, it’s pushing against me.
God, it’s getting cloudy, and I don’t know
what to think.
The sky is growing black.
Would you help me, Lord?
Would you come, Lord?”
Don’t assume he doesn’t care.
Don’t assume that!
See, because I believe (you don’t have to
take this view if you don’t want to) Jesus
put them in the storm not to test them but
to teach them…
I can explain.
See, Jesus wasn’t going to be with them forever.
We don’t have Jesus in physical form.
We have the Spirit of God inside of us as
believers, but we don’t have Jesus in our
boat.
What a cool picture.
Just like Jesus was in the stern, the Spirit
is inside of you.
We don’t have Jesus anymore in physical form
in our boat.
When he stood up and he said, “Quiet!
Be still!” and the wind and the waves died
down, do you know what I think Jesus was doing?
I think he was using the wind and the waves
like a whiteboard to draw a lesson plan for
the disciples.
Follow me.
Follow me.
Follow me.
The real waves that take you down in your
life are not the ones out there; they’re the
ones in here.
See, you think the circumstances are making
you anxious.
They’re not.
You think it’s the other person’s reaction
that’s…
How do I know this?
James, chapter 1, verse 6.
He says, “But when you ask [God], you must
believe and not doubt…”
Watch what doubt does.
“…because the one who doubts is like a…”
Did you see it? “…like a wave of the sea,
blown and tossed by the wind.”
That’s why God lets me experience winds and
waves in my life: so he can teach me to calm
the wind and the waves within.
See, the real waves are within.
You’ll never have peace until you learn how
to speak peace to the waves within.
Watch this.
Jesus said, “Be still!” and the waves shut
up.
He said, “Now it’s your turn.
What I just did to the sea, I want you to
do to your anxious heart.
The next time the winds of ‘what if’ start
blowing and the winds of imaginary scenarios
and negative emotions start blowing, I want
you to get up and wake up your faith from
the stern of the ship and get out and hold
up your hand and say, ‘Quiet!
Be Still!'”
The waves within.
Come on.
I’m preaching about the waves within.
Because as you learn how to calm the waves
within, you can ride the waves without.
I found out that if you learn how to calm
the waves within, it’s about the atmosphere
of your heart.
Everyone standing, no one leaving.
The waves within.
You think the problem is that God won’t calm
the waves without.
The real problem is you haven’t learned to
calm the waves within.
We’re going to learn how to be peace-speakers
to our own souls.
See, I thought it was random the order of
this stuff.
Jesus in Mark, chapter 4, is talking about
the sower and the soils.
Then we go straight into the storm, and I
couldn’t figure out why Mark edited those
two together.
I realized that both are about atmosphere.
Every heart has an atmosphere.
I wonder today, what is the atmosphere of
your heart?
Can I tell you that nothing good develops
in an atmosphere of anxiety?
Nothing!
Jesus said, whether you’re thinking about
a farmer and the soil (that’s the atmosphere
of the earth) or a storm in the sky, you have
to learn how to take command of the atmosphere
of your heart.
Here’s what’s happening.
You’re creating an atmosphere of anxiety all
around you because there’s an atmosphere of
anxiety within you.
You’re taking it out on people, and you’re
frustrated with people, and you’re short with
people.
You’re withdrawn from people, and you’re blaming
people.
You have to get up and wake up your faith,
Peter.
Jesus said, “Do you see what I did?
Now you do it.
Speak.
Speak!
Awaken your brave within.
Here’s what I do.
Do you want to know what I do?
Check this out.
When the waves start in my life, the first
thing I do is I breathe physically.
Some of y’all are like, “Yes, the breath of
God.”
No, no.
Just I physically breathe.
Do it now.
Do you feel it?
Do it again.
Do it again.
They’ve suggested the reason the Hebrew name
of God is Yahweh is that the very name sounds
like a breath.
Yahweh.
So when you breathe, every breath is a prayer
reminding you that he is inside of you sustaining.
Here come the waves, but I know how to breathe.
“Let everything that has breath praise the
LORD.”
I breathe in his grace, and then I breathe
out.
Breathe.
Breathe, dawg, breathe.
Breathe!
Then I remember.
I remember that he told me we’re going to
the other side.
I remember he started this.
I tell God all the time, “You started this!”
I remember like David did when he was standing
before Goliath.
“Wait a minute.
Just like the lion and the bear, God is about
to take this joker down too.”
Breathe, and then remember.
Trigger something in your mind that reminds
you of the faithfulness of God.
Watch the waves die down.
Then I ask.
He said, “Make your request known to God.”
“Lord, would you help me here?
I’m up on a choppy sea.
I just got a report about my mother’s health.
Lord, they just did that thing again that
you know sends me off in that direction.
Help, Lord.”
You don’t have to say a lot sometimes.
Just, “Help, Lord!”
He’ll hear you.
With thanksgiving, though.
“Thank you, Lord.
Now help, please.
Thank you.
Please.
Thank you.
Please.”
Get in that rhythm of asking.
“Ask, and it will be given to you.
Seek, and you’ll find.
Knock, and the door will be open.”
I ask, and I visualize, because the storms
can wreck your visibility, can’t they?
They can cause you to lose sight of everything
God has put around you, and you can’t see
anything but what’s flashing right in front
of you.
I ask, and then I open the eyes of my heart,
and I try to get an awareness of, “Hey, look.
God is here!
Hey, look.
There is strength.
Hey, look.
I am standing!
Hey, look.
There is help.
Hey, I see you now, Lord.
I have opened the eyes of my heart.”
Then you have to elevate.
You have to elevate.
You’re going to love this if you’re a nerd.
I found out that atmospheric pressure gets
less as elevation increases.
Think about that spiritually speaking.
Something hangs heavy over your life.
You can’t make what’s hanging over you less
heavy, but you can get up higher in your perspective
if you will elevate and worship God and lift
your hands and begin to praise him in the
storm.
When the waves come…
I have a cheat sheet.
Did y’all see this?
I have the Words and the
Approach and the Voices and the Expectations
and the Shame.
Remember we talked about this just like 25
minutes ago?
That’s the WAVES.
You didn’t know I was spelling anything.
I snuck it in.
I’m tricky.
When the waves come up, I need to check this
wave and see if I made it or if God made it.
Okay.
Okay, here comes the wave, but watch this.
Just as soon as the wave comes, Breathe, Remember,
Ask, Visualize, Elevate.
Oh, that’s the BRAVE.
Here it is in the series.
When the WAVES come…because they will…get
your BRAVE stirred up in your spirit, and
wake up your faith in the stern of the ship.
Here comes fear.
Here comes panic.
Here comes dread.
Here comes embarrassment.
Here come words.
Here come actions.
Here come voices.
Here come expectations.
Here comes shame, but here comes BRAVE.
My God has given me the breath of life, and
his Spirit is stronger than any storm.
I’m pushing back waves.
Come on, lift your hands.
Lift your hands!
Worship pushes back waves.
Let the wind blow.
There’s a stronger wind.
Come worship.
Elevate your praise.