Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. This is
Speaker 1: the Bible teaching ministry of Rick Warren. Hey, we're so
Speaker 1: glad you've joined us. Today. We're continuing a powerful series
Speaker 1: called radicalis Developing Spiritual Roots. And in this series, Rick
Speaker 1: will show you how to grow deep in your faith,
Speaker 1: stay grounded in God's word, and become everything He created
Speaker 1: you to be. And now here's part two of a
Speaker 1: message called radical Faith.
Speaker 2: You know, one time when I was preparing for this message,
Speaker 2: I asked, hey, honey, can you ever think of a
Speaker 2: time that you obeyed God when he told you to
Speaker 2: do something even when it didn't make sense? And she
Speaker 2: said yes. When you asked me to marry you, I said, okay,
Speaker 2: in hindsight, was it a good thing? She said yes.
Speaker 2: I said, you're a babe. Tom's gonna do the third
Speaker 2: facet of radical faith?
Speaker 3: What does it mean to have radical faith?
Speaker 4: The third thing is persisting when I don't feel like it,
Speaker 4: persisting even when I don't.
Speaker 3: Feel like it.
Speaker 4: There is a belief in our culture that is so
Speaker 4: strong every one of us are influenced by it. Whether
Speaker 4: we want to be influenced by it or not, we
Speaker 4: all know this belief. The belief is if it feels good,
Speaker 4: that's the belief. If it feels good, I should do it.
Speaker 4: If it doesn't feel good, I shouldn't do it. And
Speaker 4: whether I want to be influenced by that or not,
Speaker 4: I am. And when I allow myself to be, I
Speaker 4: become manipulated by my moods instead of living a life
Speaker 4: of faith. And God wants you and I to live
Speaker 4: a different kind of life, a life of faith, not
Speaker 4: just a life of feeling.
Speaker 3: Truth is, I don't always feel like doing the right thing.
Speaker 3: I don't know about you. I don't always feel like.
Speaker 4: Being nice to people like I see you out in
Speaker 4: the store or something. I don't always feel like being
Speaker 4: nice to you most of the time, but not always.
Speaker 3: You're never going to know now whether I felt like
Speaker 3: it or not when I smile at you.
Speaker 4: But I just don't always feel like, Hell, my wife,
Speaker 4: I really felt like washing the dishes, or Luke comes
Speaker 4: down and says, hey, could you read through this homework
Speaker 4: paper eleven o'clock at night. I don't feel like reading
Speaker 4: through the paper at that moment. I just don't always
Speaker 4: feel like doing the right thing. But God can give
Speaker 4: you a kind of faith that persists above feelings.
Speaker 3: And the truth of the matter is, if you look.
Speaker 4: At all of life, anybody who's successful at anything does
Speaker 4: things that they don't feel like doing that other people
Speaker 4: don't feel like doing. An Olympic athlete practices.
Speaker 3: When they don't feel like it.
Speaker 4: A great musician exercises practice and understanding how to do
Speaker 4: their craft even when they don't feel like it. If
Speaker 4: you're going to be a great salesman a great saleswoman,
Speaker 4: that means you make calls that other people don't feel
Speaker 4: like making.
Speaker 3: And if you want, if you want to get.
Speaker 4: Closer to God in your life, deep in your relationship
Speaker 4: with him, that means you spend time with Him sometimes.
Speaker 3: Even when you don't feel like it.
Speaker 4: You find somebody who really enjoys spending time with God,
Speaker 4: that means they spend time with God sometimes even when they.
Speaker 3: Didn't feel like it. Faith is being persistent. Faith is
Speaker 3: refusing to give up no matter how tired you are.
Speaker 4: Now, that's great to say, but the big question is
Speaker 4: how do you become persistent?
Speaker 3: Because I don't know about you. I don't always feel
Speaker 3: like being persistent. Is that true about you? So how
Speaker 3: do you get there?
Speaker 4: The Bible talks about how you and I can begin
Speaker 4: to develop persistence in our lives.
Speaker 3: For the example of a guy by.
Speaker 4: The name of Moses, Hebrews chapter eleven, This hall of
Speaker 4: fame of faith. Bible says in Hebrews eleven twenty seven,
Speaker 4: it was by faith that Moses left Egypt, and he
Speaker 4: was not afraid of the king's anger. He held to
Speaker 4: his purposes like a man who could encircle these last
Speaker 4: three words.
Speaker 3: Would you see the invisible? That's how you get there,
Speaker 3: That's how you persist.
Speaker 4: You begin to see the invisible. You see what God
Speaker 4: can do in your life. The invisible is God, and
Speaker 4: only those who see the invisible can do the impossible.
Speaker 4: Only those who see who God really is can persist.
Speaker 4: In the most difficult times of life, you realize there's more.
Speaker 3: Than you can see, and it's who you can say.
Speaker 4: It's God being present in your life.
Speaker 3: Now, some of you, you need to.
Speaker 4: Hear this right now, the Bible says the Hebrews eleven one.
Speaker 3: What is faith.
Speaker 4: It is the confident assurance that what we hope for
Speaker 4: is going to happen. It is the evidence of things
Speaker 4: that we cannot yet see. But some of you right now,
Speaker 4: you don't have any confident assurance. The truth of the
Speaker 4: matter is, instead of feeling like persisting, you feel like
Speaker 4: you want.
Speaker 3: To give up. Christmas can do that to us.
Speaker 4: I love Christmas almost everything about it. The one thing
Speaker 4: I hate about it is that sometimes it turns up
Speaker 4: the volume on our pain.
Speaker 3: You had a bad year.
Speaker 4: It feels worse at Christmas time, our relationship's not going right.
Speaker 4: It feels like it's even going more downhill. At Christmas time.
Speaker 4: You messed up this last year. All you can think
Speaker 4: about is how you messed up this last year. Right now,
Speaker 4: let me ask you, let me ask you to have
Speaker 4: a kind of faith you've never thought of having before.
Speaker 4: Let me ask you to have the faith right now
Speaker 4: to believe that God loves you no matter what, no
Speaker 4: matter what happened last year, no matter who isn't loving
Speaker 4: you right now, no matter how you messed up in
Speaker 4: your life, God still loves you. Faith is persisting even
Speaker 4: when you don't feel like it, Even if you do
Speaker 4: not feel like God loves you. He loves you, even
Speaker 4: if you don't know the confidence that God is with you.
Speaker 3: He is with you. So right now I want to
Speaker 3: invite you in your heart in your.
Speaker 4: Mind say I don't feel it, but God, I accept it.
Speaker 4: You love me no matter what, no matter how much
Speaker 4: I messed up, Hang on because.
Speaker 3: God will make a way.
Speaker 4: First Christmas, there are a lot of things that people
Speaker 4: did because they didn't feel like it.
Speaker 3: I mean, think about Joseph and Mary.
Speaker 4: You think that Joseph felt like keeping his wife a
Speaker 4: virgin after they were married and tell Jesus was born.
Speaker 4: I don't think so, but he did. Think of them
Speaker 4: traveling to Bethlehem when Mary was nine months pregnant. Ladies,
Speaker 4: you think Mary felt like getting on a donkey at
Speaker 4: nine months pregnant and going to bethlamb.
Speaker 3: I don't think so, but they did it anyway.
Speaker 4: And because they did what they didn't feel like doing,
Speaker 4: you and I get to benefit from their faith and
Speaker 4: you when you make the choice to have faith, it
Speaker 4: not only benefits you, it benefits everyone around you. That's
Speaker 4: what happens when you have the faith to persist when
Speaker 4: you don't feel like it.
Speaker 2: The fourth facet of radical faith announcing it in order
Speaker 2: to experience it, Announcing it in order to experience it.
Speaker 2: Faith is believing when I don't see it, obeying when
Speaker 2: I don't understand it, persisting when I don't feel like it,
Speaker 2: and announcing it in order to experience it. In other words,
Speaker 2: sometimes you have to say it in order to sense it.
Speaker 2: You've got to state it in order to feel it.
Speaker 2: It is the power of your words. It is speaking
Speaker 2: in faith. If you've kind of lost that love and
Speaker 2: feeling for your wife, you know how to get it back.
Speaker 2: Start saying it. Start telling your wife I love you.
Speaker 2: Just say it. You say I don't feel it, don't
Speaker 2: wait till you feel it. Say it to sense it.
Speaker 2: And you start saying I love you, I love you,
Speaker 2: I love you. You know what, the feelings will return. You
Speaker 2: want to learn to love God. You said I don't
Speaker 2: feel like I love God. Start telling him it. Maybe
Speaker 2: you've never said God, I love you, Father, I love you.
Speaker 2: Maybe you've never said Jesus, I love you. You know,
Speaker 2: if you start saying it, the feelings will come. It
Speaker 2: is the power of your words. You say it to
Speaker 2: sense it, you announce it in order to experience it.
Speaker 2: Now that's radical faith. One of the examples of this
Speaker 2: there in the Hall of Fame in Hebrews eleven is
Speaker 2: the illustration of Joseph.
Speaker 3: It says.
Speaker 2: It was by faith that Joseph, when he was about
Speaker 2: to die, confidently spoke of God bringing the people of
Speaker 2: Israel out of Egypt. And he was so sure of
Speaker 2: it that he commanded them to carry his bones with
Speaker 2: him when they left. You know the story how Joseph
Speaker 2: got sold into slavery, went into Egypt. Things were downhill
Speaker 2: for him. Eventually, through the experiences of God, became number
Speaker 2: two in command under Pharaoh, saved the nation, saved Israel.
Speaker 2: But after that Pharaoh died, the Jews were enslaved, and
Speaker 2: for four hundred years they were enslaved in Egypt. But Joseph,
Speaker 2: long before they went back to the promised land, four
Speaker 2: hundred years for it, he announced. He says, I know
Speaker 2: one day God's going to let us go back home
Speaker 2: to Israel, and so I want you to promise me
Speaker 2: that I'll be dead. I want you to take my
Speaker 2: bones and bury them in Israel. What's he doing He
Speaker 2: is stating it in advance. He is announcing it in
Speaker 2: order to experience it. In fact, this is how God
Speaker 2: creates everything. God creates by the spoken word. God created
Speaker 2: the entire universe by speaking it into existence. Let there
Speaker 2: be light Bam, there's light. Let there be a sun
Speaker 2: and moon. Pam, there's a sun and moon. God doesn't
Speaker 2: have to go through long things. He could if he
Speaker 2: wanted to, but he could just speak it into existence.
Speaker 2: In fact, here's what the Bible says, Hebrews eleven three.
Speaker 2: By faith, we see the world called into existence. God
Speaker 2: spoke it into existence, called into existence by God's word.
Speaker 2: And what we see created by what we don't see.
Speaker 2: And then soa I'm thirty three right underneath that on
Speaker 2: your atlant it says for he spoke and then it
Speaker 2: came to be. Now, this is no contradiction to scientific theory.
Speaker 2: I mean people talk about the Big Bang. Believe me,
Speaker 2: when you think God spoke the universe of existence, there
Speaker 2: is probably a big bang where you Wherever you got
Speaker 2: a creation, you got a creator. Wherever you got a defect,
Speaker 2: there is a cause. If I'm walking down the mountain
Speaker 2: and I see a rock out of place, I can say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's an accident. If I'm walking down the mountain and
Speaker 2: I see a rolex, that is evidence of design. And
Speaker 2: it is stupidity for me to say it just all happened.
Speaker 2: That rolex is evidence of design. You see, I don't
Speaker 2: have enough faith to be an atheist. It takes far
Speaker 2: more faith to believe something came out of nothing than
Speaker 2: to believe that creation was made by a creator. Far
Speaker 2: more faith. You see, we disproved spontaneous generation in the
Speaker 2: Middle Ages. Nobody believes that anymore. Things don't just come
Speaker 2: to life out of nothing. Now, if you do happen
Speaker 2: to believe that, then you need to be intellectually honest,
Speaker 2: because if you say, I believe something could just happen
Speaker 2: out of nothing, there was no cause to it, it
Speaker 2: just happened out of nothing, then you would have obviously
Speaker 2: no problem believing that when Christ died he could come
Speaker 2: back to life, because it would take less faith to
Speaker 2: believe life can come back to life than to believe
Speaker 2: life came out of nothing. For intellectual honesty, you couldn't say, well,
Speaker 2: I believe in one but not the other. God spoke
Speaker 2: it into existence. And what the Bible says is that
Speaker 2: God gives us that power in our words too. We
Speaker 2: announce it in order to experience it. And the Bible
Speaker 2: makes a direct connection between your words, what you say,
Speaker 2: and the quality of the life you live. You don't
Speaker 2: realize how much your words affect you, affect everybody else,
Speaker 2: and affect the environment around you and even history. In fact,
Speaker 2: the Bible says this on the screen Proverbs eighteen twenty one.
Speaker 2: Death and life are in the power of the tongue.
Speaker 2: You can slice people, you can kill them with your words.
Speaker 2: You can add life and vitality with your words. You
Speaker 2: know this to be true. People today have had their
Speaker 2: lives ruined by a single sentence. Some people today are
Speaker 2: still remembering and acting on something one sentence that was
Speaker 2: said to them by their parents, or by their peers,
Speaker 2: or by their partners. Are on the playground, and years later,
Speaker 2: one simple little sentence still haunts their memory. Their death
Speaker 2: and life is in the power of our words. You
Speaker 2: have enormous power in your words, And the Bible says faith,
Speaker 2: what you say and what you receive from God is connected.
Speaker 2: Our words and faith are together. In fact, Jesus said
Speaker 2: this here on the screen, Matthew eight ten eighteen. I
Speaker 2: tell you the truth. Whatever you bind on earth will
Speaker 2: be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth
Speaker 2: will be loosed in heaven. What's he talking about there,
Speaker 2: He's talking about the power of our words, the power
Speaker 2: of our words to bless people, or the power our
Speaker 2: words to put them down, to curse them, the power
Speaker 2: words to give life or death in people's lives. Now,
Speaker 2: sometimes speaking in faith appears foolish to people of not faith,
Speaker 2: because when you're announcing it in advance, when you're announcing
Speaker 2: it in order to experience it, it looks like you
Speaker 2: don't know what you're talking about, like you're out of
Speaker 2: touch with reality, and it seems foolish to other people.
Speaker 2: For instance, God often changed people's names in the Bible
Speaker 2: to indicate where they were going, not where they were
Speaker 2: at at that moment. God took a man named Abram,
Speaker 2: and he changed his name to Abraham. Now Abraham means
Speaker 2: father of many nations. There's only one problem. Abraham had
Speaker 2: no kids. So at ninety nine years of age, his
Speaker 2: name is Abraham. And somebody comes in and says, what's
Speaker 2: your name, father of many nations? Oh, it's great, how
Speaker 2: many kids you got none? How old are you? Ninety nine? Oops,
Speaker 2: it's a little embarrassing to have your name be father
Speaker 2: of many nations. You're ninety nine years old and no kids.
Speaker 2: What was God doing? He was announcing it in order
Speaker 2: to experience it and the Bible says this on the
Speaker 2: back of your outline Romans four to eleven. God said,
Speaker 2: I have made you a father of many nations. God
Speaker 2: who gives life to the dead and calls things that
Speaker 2: are not as though they were. And see that's faith, friends,
Speaker 2: Faith is calling that which is not as though it is,
Speaker 2: is announcing it in order to experience it. In fact,
Speaker 2: look at the Living Bible translation of this verse. God
Speaker 2: speaks of future events with as much certainty as though
Speaker 2: they were already past. He's announcing the future in the
Speaker 2: present as though it's passed. And that's faith. The friends,
Speaker 2: if you want to understand your pastor me, you need
Speaker 2: to understand that I have the gift of faith. We
Speaker 2: all have different gifts. Everybody's got different gifts. You have
Speaker 2: spiritual gifts to people. Next, do you have spiritual gifts.
Speaker 2: One of my spiritual gifts is faith, and I have
Speaker 2: this in a strong measure to announce it in order
Speaker 2: to experience it. I live in the world of faith,
Speaker 2: in spiritual reality. In other words, I'm always talking about
Speaker 2: what it can be, not what it is, and I'm
Speaker 2: always visualizing the future for people. Now, this is why
Speaker 2: the way I preach here at Saddleback is different than
Speaker 2: maybe you have heard from some other pastors. Sometimes you'll
Speaker 2: hear pastors say, well, I just believe in telling it
Speaker 2: like it is. Well, that's a good thing. At least
Speaker 2: it's the truth. But there's a far better way to
Speaker 2: teach than tell it like it is. Tell it like
Speaker 2: it could be. Telling it like it is never changes anybody.
Speaker 2: Labeling only reinforces the present. Telling it like it could
Speaker 2: be is teaching and preaching for faith, and that causes
Speaker 2: people to change. When you label somebody and you just
Speaker 2: tell them what they are, it doesn't motivate them to change.
Speaker 2: When you tell them what they could be, that's preaching
Speaker 2: for faith. It's calling things that are not as though
Speaker 2: they were. If somebody comes to me and says rick A,
Speaker 2: you're a lousy father, my tendency would be to say,
Speaker 2: I start thinking of all the ways I could have
Speaker 2: been a better father. Well, I could have done that,
Speaker 2: and I could have done that, and I could have
Speaker 2: done that and could yeah, and you're right, I'm a
Speaker 2: lousy father. I could have been a better father. That
Speaker 2: doesn't change me. But if somebody comes to me and says,
Speaker 2: rick I see in you the potential to be a
Speaker 2: great father, a great dad. I see in you, with
Speaker 2: your life committed to Christ and God's spirit living in you,
Speaker 2: you could be an incredible godly man. You could be
Speaker 2: a man of God that your kids would love and honor,
Speaker 2: and that your wife would cherish. You could be the
Speaker 2: kind of godly man that the neighborhood and community would respect.
Speaker 2: And I see in you that spark, that potential if
Speaker 2: you'll just let Christ control your life, that motivates me
Speaker 2: to change. Tell it like it could be. Not the
Speaker 2: way does nagging work? Has it ever worked on you? Nagging? No,
Speaker 2: it doesn't work from the pulpit either. That's why I
Speaker 2: don't nag you every week. It's why I don't not
Speaker 2: get up here every week and do sin of the week.
Speaker 2: You're blowing this, you're doing this, you're doing And there's
Speaker 2: a lot of stuff I could say about you, really,
Speaker 2: but I don't, because why just telling you all the
Speaker 2: things you're doing wrong? Hey, come back next week and
Speaker 2: I'll tell you ten more things you're doing wrong. Yeah,
Speaker 2: In fact, bring a friend. You don't get that kind
Speaker 2: of teaching it saddleback, Why it doesn't change anybody. It
Speaker 2: is faith that wells up in our heart that changes,
Speaker 2: not telling it like it is, but telling it like
Speaker 2: it could be, and doing it the way God says,
Speaker 2: calling things that are not as though they were. You
Speaker 2: can do this, friends. Every single major milestone in Saddleback
Speaker 2: Church's history, I spoke it into existence. I announced it.
Speaker 2: This is what's gonna happen before anybody else believed it.
Speaker 2: Every single time nobody else believed it. When I was
Speaker 2: held the very first service of Saddleback and sixty people,
Speaker 2: the little trial run service before Easter, and I got
Speaker 2: up and I read a vision called the Saddleback Vision.
Speaker 2: Some of you seen that stateton where I outlined the
Speaker 2: kind of campus have and what the buildings would look like,
Speaker 2: and that we were gonna have twenty thousand members by
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, and that we would have fifty acres of land.
Speaker 2: And everybody lacked. Oh yeah, who is this twenty five
Speaker 2: year old kid who's saying we're gonna want to have
Speaker 2: fifty acres and twenty thousand members. The only problem with
Speaker 2: that vision it was too small. God wanted us to
Speaker 2: have one hundred and twenty acres, and we hit the
Speaker 2: twenty thousand mark in the year two thousand, not twenty twenty. This,
Speaker 2: by the way, is how we're saved by speaking and
Speaker 2: advance our salvation by confessing our faith in Christ. That's
Speaker 2: an announcing in advance. Look at this verse the Bible says,
Speaker 2: for it is by our faith that we're put right
Speaker 2: with God. It is by our confession that means we
Speaker 2: speak it that we are saved, which, by the way,
Speaker 2: is why I lead into prayer every week at the
Speaker 2: end of the service, and I say, I want you
Speaker 2: to pray this prayer. Why I'm causing you to speak,
Speaker 2: to confess your faith. I'm helping verbalize for you your faith
Speaker 2: in God. That's why we always have a prayer at
Speaker 2: the end of this prayer. If you've never invited Christ
Speaker 2: in your life, I'm going to invite you to do that,
Speaker 2: to follow me in that prayer. And when we're baptized,
Speaker 2: we're publicly confessing our faith, saying to the world I'm
Speaker 2: not ashamed to say I'm a believer.
Speaker 1: Hey, did you know that tomorrow is Giving Tuesday? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a global day dedicated to generosity, and starting today,
Speaker 1: you have a powerful opportunity to share the certain hope
Speaker 1: of Jesus Christ with people all around the world through
Speaker 1: Daily Hope. Thanks to some generous friends, every gift that
Speaker 1: you give today and tomorrow will be doubled up to
Speaker 1: twenty five thousand dollars through a special Giving Tuesday matching grant.
Speaker 1: Now time is of the essence because we'll lose any
Speaker 1: part of the Giving Tuesday grant that isn't matched by
Speaker 1: midnight tomorrow. So please act now by going to pastor
Speaker 1: dot com. That's pastorick dot com, or just text the
Speaker 1: word hope to seven oh three to oh nine. That's
Speaker 1: the word hope to seven oh three to oh nine.
Speaker 1: Be sure to join us next time as we look
Speaker 1: into God's word for our daily hope. This program is
Speaker 1: sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial support.