We think when God says he's going to do something in our lives it's going to be easy, but it's
not.
It has to be hard.
A quick look at the history of the Bible shows you that God likes to do things the hard way.
It is his preferred method of carrying out his purpose.
Don't think you're weird if your life has been hard, and don't assume that you're doing
something wrong, because God will often allow life to cut you down to the stump.
He did it to Moses.
Moses was called to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt.
I won't take you through the whole Bible, but I do want to go to Exodus, because there's
this interesting Christmas verse that says, "Out of Egypt I have called my Son."
Jesus had to go with his parents to Egypt when he was very little, because Herod wanted
to kill him.
God doesn't birth his Son into the world into ideal circumstances but into a very chaotic
environment where Roman oppression was so common to the people they feared for their
very lives under the madman named Herod.
We think we have bad presidential candidates.
I mean, this guy was killing babies in Bethlehem when he heard Jesus was born because it represented
a threat to the throne.
So Isaiah is prophesying to a people who are under Assyrian oppression, and Jesus comes
into the world under Roman oppression, because God likes to come into hard situations.
He's not scared of that.
When he picks Moses he says, "Go to Pharaoh, the most powerful man in the world, and tell
him to let my people go, and when you tell him to let my people go, he's going to say,
'No.'"
Why would God tell me to do something and in the next breath inform me that it won't
work?
Because it had to be hard.
If it was easy for Moses, if he just walked up into Pharaoh's court and said, "Let my
people go" and Pharaoh said, "All right," Moses would dab on Pharaoh, walk out, and
think he was convincing.
Pharaoh had to say, "No," so that God could…
This is God's own wording.
I didn't make this up.
He said, "I will harden Pharaoh's heart so that I can gain glory."
In other words, if it wasn't hard, you would think it was you.
If it wasn't hard, you would trust in yourself.
You are not an adequate support system for the glory of God, so he has to allow some
things into your life that are impossible for you so you can know what Mary knew, that
nothing shall be impossible with God.
It had to be hard.
By the time the Israelites came out of Egypt…
They come up to the Red Sea, and instead of taking them around the body of water, watch
what God does.
God is kind of crazy.
God says, "I'm not going to take you around it.
That would be the normal way.
That would be the human way.
Let's do it the hard way.
I'm not going to take you around it.
I'm going to take you through it.
Stretch out your staff, and the waters will part.
About the time you get through, look back over your shoulder, and the Egyptians who
were ruling over you, you will see them no more.
I'm about to drown what's chasing you down, but I have to take you the hard way."
God likes to do it the hard way.
I don't have time to tell you about David and his slingshot.
God could have used an armed soldier to kill Goliath, but how would they have known that
he was the Lord if God didn't do it through something so silly as one rock?
God likes to do things the hard way, Gideon.
So if you have 32,000 men, he's not going to let you fight with 32,000 men.
He's going to get you down to 300.
Maybe that's why you've been cut down to a stump.
Maybe you were relying on the fruit too much, but this is a season where God wants to prove
your root system and show you real hope.
Sometimes you have to learn it the hard way.
He couldn't come into the world floating on a cloud looking like some superhero.
He couldn't have come with an S on his chest for "Savior of the world."
He had to come in weakness so that you would know that in your weakness he is strong.
I don't know if it's because I spend so much time speaking to young people that I think
in such simplistic terms, or maybe I'm just a simple man, but I started thinking about…
I texted Jess and said, "Give me a bouncy ball."
I didn't tell her why I wanted it.
Maybe she thought I was losing my mind or I hadn't bought Christmas for Holly yet.
That would be bad, wouldn't it?
I was thinking that it has the ability to bounce back.
That's exactly what it was designed to do.
That's exactly what it's meant for.
That's why it's called a bouncy ball.
They named it appropriately for the function it is intended to serve, for the potential
it has within its composite structure.
Now look.
Same ball, different surface.
It didn't work.
In order for this to do what it's meant to do, the surface it bounces
on has to be hard.
Maybe that's why in this season of your life things have been hard.
Maybe God isn't punishing you.
Maybe he's preparing you.
Maybe you've been cut down for a comeback.
As a believer in Jesus Christ, you have the ability within you to bounce back.
Maybe that's why they laid Jesus in a borrowed grave: because God had to show the world that
you can put me down at rock bottom, but you can't keep me from bouncing back.