Latest / The Woman at the Well Ministries Podcast / 671| Living in Obedience

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671| Living in Obedience · The Woman at the Well Ministries Podcast

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  Hello, friends, and welcome back to the Woman at the Well Ministries podcast
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  with Kimberly Miller, where we believe that every man, woman,
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  boy, and girl must come to Jesus just like the woman at the well in John chapter 4.
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  Our highest priority is helping you experience the reality of God in your everyday life.
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  Whether you're listening in our app, on your favorite podcast platform,
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  are on our website at watwm.org.
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  We invite you to sit down with us as we open the scriptures to learn more about
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  who God is and to strengthen your daily walk.
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  In this episode of the Woman at the Well Ministries podcast,
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  join Kim Miller and Erica Close in a conversation as we walk with Jesus.
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  In today's conversation, we're chatting about what life looks like when we choose
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  to live lives ready and willing to be obedient.
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  Well, hello, everyone, and thank you for joining us in today's podcast.
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  I am Erica Close, and I'm here with Kim Miller. Hello, and we're excited to
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  discuss with you the things we learned from Jonah.
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  We are. So if you are joining us today, I want to let you know that we are having
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  a conversation today, and that conversation is tied very closely to Monday's podcast.
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  So Monday's podcast was episode 670.
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  It was called You Cannot Run from God's Calling.
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  And in that podcast, Kim, you took apart Jonah 1 through Jonah 3,
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  4. So you covered a lot of territory in that podcast.
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  But you basically laid out the call that God had on Jonah's life.
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  And then Jonah's response to that, Jonah's repentance and sort of God's perfect
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  fulfillment of what he had asked Jonah to do.
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  Didn't look like his initial ask. But as I was listening to that podcast,
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  what really just struck me, well, there were a few things.
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  But number one, there's a call in all of our lives. Amen.
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  And, you know, Jonah had a big call in this account.
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  But there are calls on our lives that are big, overarching calls.
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  And then there are calls for action, immediate action.
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  And what just kept coming to my heart and my mind.
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  As you were preaching that message, Kim, was just this idea of instant obedience.
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  And consistent obedience. Instant and consistent. I love that.
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  Being prayed up, studied up. And ready. And ready to go.
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  And I think that's where I want to sort of take our conversation today,
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  the application of part of Monday's message, is that God calls us to be obedient.
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  And I think that sometimes in today's world, we get a little confused about that.
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  And we think that we are being obedient to God when we're doing sort of,
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  I don't know how to say it, other than all the Christian things.
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  Right. The general obedience, following his commands. But then it's not even those.
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  It's generally just the ones. Like you go to church, you're nice to your neighbor,
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  you pay your taxes, you take care of your kids, and you don't beat your dog.
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  And you don't say bad words. Right.
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  Right. A lot of people seem to have left that one out. Well,
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  no, no, no. You don't say bad words.
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  But that is a really good thing to say, the general obedience.
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  Nothing that really infringes on their person.
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  Right. Because we're not called to a general obedience. I mean, we're called to that.
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  But that is very reasonable. We are called to be a peculiar and zealous person.
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  And he says to make our body a living sacrifice in Romans 12,
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  1 and 2, which is your reasonable service. So before we ever really give him
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  anything, it's got to be beyond the little general niceties.
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  Because the general niceties, I mean, they're important, but God doesn't necessarily,
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  have access to our lives to be used.
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  In the general niceties. Because he's a gentleman and he does not force himself upon us.
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  And so his access is what we give to him.
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  And, you know, you can't show up for a couple hours a week at a church.
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  It's interesting. You don't want to be around him here, but you think you want
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  to spend eternity with him?
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  I don't get that concept. Well, yeah.
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  And, you know, when you think of like Jonah, right? Jonah was a prophet.
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  Jonah had been working as a prophet, right?
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  And then we hear this account of Jonah that we see in the book of Jonah is this,
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  one account of Jonah's life. Jonah has probably been being the voice of the Lord for a while.
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  And then we hear this very specific call. Because it went against what he wanted to do.
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  And I want to be very clear, that happens to all of us. All the time.
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  And the difference is, do we run 180 degrees west instead of east as he's telling
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  us to go because we don't want it?
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  And then the reason he didn't want to go was he was afraid of them,
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  but also because he thought they didn't deserve God's forgiveness.
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  And I don't know that any of us have what it takes to admit that.
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  But when you walk day in and day out or drive day in and day out past a homeless
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  person, past someone who is down and out, and you never stop or I never stop.
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  It's hard to believe that.
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  That we haven't just determined they're not worth the peace of God,
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  because you know they have no peace. Amen.
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  And they're not worth, you're saying they're not worth the love of God,
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  or they're not worth the time that God is calling to you.
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  And we say we're afraid, and it's smart to be afraid.
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  You know, women don't need to just be out there and many, but you could find
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  a group of people to go, or you could get somewhere where someone else can help.
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  You could have the gospel presented to them some way, somehow,
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  but instead we harden our heart just like he was asleep on the boat and we just go by.
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  You know, when you talked about obedience in that podcast about the book of
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  Jonah, you know, you talked about obedience, you talked about disobedience,
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  And the obedience part was.
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  To the point you just made, you're really having a heart for others, right?
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  Listening to the Lord's call and not placing a value of your own upon those
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  to whom God has called you.
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  Like that's a truly having a heart for others, seeing his heart for them.
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  And you also talked about...
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  About listening and the importance of listening to what God had called us to, called people to.
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  And then when you talked about obedience, you also talked about how we have
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  to remember, and we should not need to be reminded of this, but that our obedience
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  is to God and to his ideas,
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  not to our own ideas. Or any other man's.
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  Right. That tells you this would be the best to do.
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  God's assignment is yours personally. So the information needs to come from
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  God to you, not from others.
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  And you can, you know, seek others' help in praying or whatever,
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  but you need to seek God's word and your discernment of what God wants for you personally.
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  Because sometimes man will tell you what serves them best for you to be doing for God. Absolutely.
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  You know, one of the things that kind of came through the message from Monday
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  on Jonah is just how Jonah had such a rebellious heart.
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  Yet he was a prophet. And yet he was a prophet.
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  And so no one's immune to that.
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  Right. The devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he made a devour, 1 Peter 5, 8.
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  We have the whole armor of God, Ephesians 6, 10 through 18.
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  These are all in there for a reason. And they're all in there and we need to
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  hear them because we don't want to ever in any way admit that we have a rebellious heart.
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  We don't want to have one to have to admit to. But the reality is,
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  if we think about it, at some point in our life, if we are not living in full
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  obedience to him, we are rebellious. We are rebellious.
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  And that's not a term that we like to use.
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  And you know, the Bible says anything done without faith is sin.
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  And that lends.
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  But we're also quick to just say, how could you be a prophet of God in sin?
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  Because you won't do what he tells you to do. Well, he's a fleshly guy.
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  And what I love is in his deepest, darkest hours, in the middle of this great
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  fish's belly, God hears his prayer because God is accessible all the time, everywhere, always.
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  That's perfect. Yes. And that's perfect. So let's talk about that.
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  So I feel like the first step is sort of admitting that we have a rebellious heart.
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  But then let's talk about what God does for us when we are in rebellion.
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  He you made a statement on monday where you said that god will not hesitate,
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  to bring you to repentance,
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  as much as we are called to be instant in season and out of season god is always instant.
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  He's always present. He's in our past and he's in our future,
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  but he's in our presence.
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  And he's always ready to do whatever it takes to bring us to repentance.
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  And I think that's important. Because his love won't fail. Right.
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  That's the strength of his love is his discipline in our lives.
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  I never understood my parents when they would always say to me,
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  this is hurting me worse than it is you. I mean, it made no sense to me.
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  It just did not seem to me in any way until I realized as I got older it was breaking their heart.
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  That I wasn't where I needed to be. And God disciplines us because he wants
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  us to have the abundant life he promises in John 10.
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  So he gets us in a place, sometimes those dark days and troubles are to awaken us spiritually.
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  It's not always. Everybody who's in the horse weeds is not, you know,
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  in trouble, has not been in the horse weeds and isn't because of something they've
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  done. We learned that in 1 Kings 19 and Elijah, but sometimes it is.
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  I mean, when you openly and purposely reject God's call in your life,
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  you're opening yourself up for a world of hurt.
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  And he was clear that Jonah was to arise and go.
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  There was nothing left for Jonah's imagination to figure out what God was asking him to do.
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  And he was dying on his sword, those people didn't deserve him.
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  And they were mean. Something's going to happen to me.
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  And so many times, God will ask us to do some little things.
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  And we're like, well, they might make fun of me.
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  And with those old things, we don't think of it as rebellion.
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  No, we think of it as preservation. But it is rebellion.
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  It's also complete rejection of God.
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  It's rejection. Like I said, Monday's was a bit of a toe stomper.
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  Let's talk, though, about how God brings us back from our rejection.
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  And I think it's important that we pause for a moment and talk about how when
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  we realize we are rejecting God and we want to turn from that,
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  But God calls us to repentance, and we have to get through the repentance to
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  get to the place of obedience.
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  When we repent, he forgives. And we are turning away from the sin.
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  And repentance is obedience.
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  It's the quintessential say I'm sorry.
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  And it only matters if we stop doing what we were doing and start doing what he is asking us to do.
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  Because repentance means to turn away from the sin towards God's will.
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  One of the things that came out of Monday is that God will never hesitate to bring us to repentance.
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  He will not hesitate when we have cut ourselves off from Him.
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  And it's important that we realize we have cut ourselves off from Him because
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  we put something between us and Him. He is still there. He hasn't gone anywhere.
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  And I saw this thing on Max Lucado that said, if you're a thousand steps away
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  from God, all you got just takes one and he'll take the other 999.
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  I mean, draw near unto God and he will draw near unto you.
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  God loves you and he wants a perfect relationship with you.
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  He doesn't want there to be anything between you and him.
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  I mean, think about your closest relationship. If there's something going on
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  where there's tension and strife between you and you're uncomfortable,
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  you want to do everything you can to get over that.
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  God loves you more than anybody loves you. And he wants to be closer to you,
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  than you want to be closer to anybody.
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  And to that point, let's talk about just the power of prayer in that,
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  you know, we can be close to him no matter where we are.
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  Like, wherever we are, we're never in a place that we cannot pray.
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  Jonah's really the perfect example of that. I mean, he's in the belly of a great
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  fish, and he has a beautiful prayer,
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  of confession, repentance, and restoration.
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  So you can't go so far as God won't hear you, and you can't—he hears the prayer of repentance.
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  And you can't go beyond the reach of God.
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  He's in a fish's belly. in the middle of some unbelievable ocean or sea. And...
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  Though they're huge, they don't cover but a speck of that whole thing.
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  And he knows exactly where he is.
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  He knew exactly where the boat was. And he provided the great fish at just the right time.
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  But you know what I love about that account as well, is that it shows the sovereignty
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  and the all-powerfulness of God.
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  Because, you know, the way it's set up the world, the flesh,
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  God has said that the devil is the prince of the power of the air.
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  And people think that means he has all authority. Everything's under his feet.
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  I mean, and if you really are doubting that and wondering who has authority
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  and who truly is in control, you look at this account where casting of lots
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  was definitely not of God.
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  That's a gambling type thing. That's using chance.
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  That's putting your faith in something other than God. But God controlled that,
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  something that the devil thinks he has power over to reveal to everyone on that boat that,
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  Jonah was the God.
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  I mean, I almost think that's like, I don't know. I love that.
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  I love that he did that. He uses all the things. Because all things are understood.
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  And people think they're in control, but they're not.
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  It really is him. Now, he's a gentleman, but he is the one.
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  And I love that our mistakes are not our final chapter. Amen.
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  And that is so proven by Jonah when, in chapter 3, God recommissions him for the very same thing.
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  And he goes and he's incredibly successful.
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  His error and his mistakes, even the struggle he continues to have getting his
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  heart right on every single thing, he is now following what God said.
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  He did go do what God said.
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  He was just hoping it would go his way. Right.
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  But he did exactly what he said. And I love that the call didn't change.
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  I do, too. And I love the fact that just because he didn't embrace it didn't
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  mean he didn't do it right.
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  He clearly did it right because the people in Nineveh, you read in chapter 4,
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  they repent and they don't get destroyed.
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  And he still doesn't like that because that's not how he thought it should end. But he did it. Yeah.
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  And sometimes, I mean, it's a horrible thing to admit, sometimes I'm Jonah.
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  I don't get it. I don't understand it. But you better believe I'm going to do it.
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  Because you know that God said that's what you were supposed to do, which settles it.
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  Therefore, you need to go do it. And how often does the Lord ask us to do something?
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  And we don't understand, even have any concept of why we're doing it or what
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  his ultimate purpose is.
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  Jonah got to see those people repent. And so often I think God asks us to do
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  things and we don't know why we're doing it. We don't know how it's going to
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  turn out. We don't get to see that. I mean, maybe I believe in heaven we'll
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  get to see it on the other side.
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  But so often God just asks us to go do something to be his hands and his feet,
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  in this lost and dying world.
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  And we don't get to know the rest of it. And it's so interesting because God,
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  shows Jonah that his work was successful because they all repent.
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  But then Jonah doesn't like God's plan.
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  And what I love, we saw this with Elijah in 1 Kings 19.
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  We're seeing it here. We saw a bold prayer in Luke 8.
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  I love that God allows us to tell him what we're thinking.
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  But when Jonah doesn't agree with God, that's when you cross the line.
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  You can say, I don't get this. And then when he explained it to Jonah,
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  Jonah basically said, that's not right.
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  And Jonah paid a price for it. And we are someday, hopefully God will give us
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  a message out of Jonah 4, but read it.
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  Because God says, do you have the right to be angry?
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  After all i've done for you the compassion the love the mercy that i show to you you're mad.
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  But I'm not leaving a whole land and animals and people without my sovereign
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  care because of how they acted.
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  I didn't do that to you, and I'm not going to do that to them.
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  And I think that Jonah shows us something, especially in chapter 4,
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  that really hits those who serve the Lord a lot.
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  I think somehow, whether they admit it or not, I know a few people who think
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  they are just a little higher up on the rung than everybody else.
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  And so God's going to do special favors for them. And He didn't do it for His prophet.
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  He's not going to do it for us. He's no respecter of persons.
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  But oh, how He loves us all, unconditionally, completely, faithfully,
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  and forevermore. Amen, amen.
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  And I just want to close with this idea that it's all about our hearts, right?
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  We don't want to have a rebellious heart, but we're called to have hearts that are like God's heart.
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  How we respond to the calls of God upon our lives has to do with what our heart is like.
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  And we want to have a heart like God. I love that in Monday's message,
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  you talked about 1 Corinthians 13 and love and the love of God.
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  That's what we're called to.
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  And if our hearts are tuned to God himself and bathed in His Word,
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  right, and bathed in His love, I think then we'll hear the call and we won't
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  approach it with our own thoughts.
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  But instead of following His thoughts.
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  Well, I would invite you all to go back and listen to Monday's message,
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  You Cannot Run from God's Calling, on the book of Jonah.
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  We would love to have you reach out and talk to us a little more about that
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  book. It's, there's a lot in that.
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  What lessons there are in the book of Jonah.
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  And we just thank you for listening. We want you to remember that you are loved. Jesus loves you.
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  Thank you for joining us for today's podcast. You can find quotes and scripture
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  references from this episode in the show notes.
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