Latest / PAMOJA PODCAST | PAMOJA MINISTRY, A LIFE OF CHRIST INTERNATIONAL MINISTRIES / THE MYSTERY OF DIVINE INTERVENTION-Conversation III: When God Carries You

Transcript

THE MYSTERY OF DIVINE INTERVENTION-Conversation III: When God Carries You · PAMOJA PODCAST | PAMOJA MINISTRY, A LIFE OF CHRIST INTERNATIONAL MINISTRIES

• 0:00
  Welcome to Pomoja Ministry. There is something
• 0:02
  about divine intervention that we often misunderstand
• 0:05
  because when we ask God to intervene, we usually
• 0:09
  already have an idea of what His intervention
• 0:11
  should look like. If there is a Red Sea in front
• 0:14
  of us, we expect Him to divide it. If there is
• 0:18
  an enemy pursuing us, we expect Him to defeat
• 0:21
  that enemy. If there is a closed door, we expect
• 0:25
  Him to open it. If there is a storm, We expect
• 0:29
  Him to calm it. If there is a sickness, we pray
• 0:33
  for healing. If there is a battle, we pray for
• 0:36
  victory. If there is a mountain, we ask God to
• 0:41
  move it. And there is nothing wrong with any
• 0:43
  of those prayers, because throughout Scripture,
• 0:46
  God reveals himself as the God who opens doors,
• 0:50
  divides, sees, defeats armies, heals diseases,
• 0:54
  calms storms, moves mountains, breaks chains,
• 0:58
  and makes a way where there seems to be no way.
• 1:01
  But there is another dimension of divine intervention
• 1:04
  that we do not talk about enough. Sometimes God
• 1:07
  does not remove what you are facing. Sometimes
• 1:10
  he does not immediately change the environment
• 1:13
  around you. Sometimes the sea remains deep. Sometimes
• 1:17
  the wilderness remains long. Sometimes the valley
• 1:20
  remains dark. Sometimes the fire remains hot.
• 1:24
  Sometimes the storm continues blowing. Sometimes
• 1:27
  the prison door does not immediately open. And
• 1:30
  yet... God has intervened because divine intervention
• 1:34
  is not only God changing what is happening around
• 1:38
  you. Sometimes divine intervention is God sustaining
• 1:41
  you through what he has not yet changed. And
• 1:45
  perhaps that is one of the greatest mysteries
• 1:47
  of our journey with God. There are moments when
• 1:50
  God delivers you from something and there are
• 1:53
  moments when God carries you through something.
• 1:56
  Those are not the same kind of miracle. When
• 1:59
  God delivers you from something, you can often
• 2:02
  point toward the moment when everything changed.
• 2:05
  The door opened. The diagnosis changed. The enemy
• 2:09
  disappeared. The answer arrived. The battle ended.
• 2:13
  But when God carries you through something, the
• 2:16
  miracle can be much harder to recognize because
• 2:19
  the circumstances may look almost exactly the
• 2:22
  same. The fire is still there. The water is still
• 2:26
  rising. The wilderness is still stretching before
• 2:29
  you. The night is still dark. And yet somehow,
• 2:34
  you are still here. Somehow, what should have
• 2:38
  destroyed you did not destroy you. What should
• 2:41
  have broken you did not finish you. What should
• 2:44
  have swallowed you did not swallow you. What
• 2:47
  should have caused you to abandon your faith
• 2:49
  somehow drove your roots deeper into God. And
• 2:53
  when you look backward, You cannot fully explain
• 2:56
  how you made it. Maybe that is because there
• 2:59
  are seasons of life that were never survived
• 3:02
  by your strength. You were carried. Part One
• 3:07
  There are miracles we only recognize afterward.
• 3:12
  One of the difficulties with divine intervention
• 3:14
  is that we often expect to recognize it while
• 3:17
  it is happening. We expect something dramatic,
• 3:21
  something unmistakable. something that announces
• 3:24
  God has arrived. But scripture repeatedly shows
• 3:29
  us that some of God's greatest interventions
• 3:32
  are only understood when people look backward.
• 3:35
  Joseph did not understand the pit while he was
• 3:38
  inside it. He did not understand slavery while
• 3:41
  he was serving in Potiphar's house. He did not
• 3:44
  understand the prison while the door remained
• 3:47
  locked. There was no visible throne in the prison.
• 3:50
  There was no royal robe hanging outside his cell.
• 3:53
  There was no announcement saying, Joseph, do
• 3:57
  not worry. This prison is actually a corridor
• 4:00
  leading toward Pharaoh's palace. All Joseph could
• 4:03
  see was the season he was living, but God could
• 4:06
  see where he was carrying him. And years later,
• 4:09
  Joseph could look backward and say to the brothers
• 4:12
  who had sold him, you intended to harm me, but
• 4:15
  God intended it for good. Notice when Joseph
• 4:18
  understood it. Not in the pit. Not while being
• 4:22
  sold. Not in Potiphar's house. Not while falsely
• 4:25
  accused. Not necessarily during those long nights
• 4:29
  in prison. He understood it from the other side.
• 4:33
  And there are things about your life that may
• 4:35
  only make sense from the other side. There are
• 4:38
  places where you are asking God for explanations
• 4:41
  while God is giving you preservation. There are
• 4:45
  seasons where you are asking God, why am I here?
• 4:49
  while heaven is saying, just keep trusting me
• 4:52
  because where you are is not where your story
• 4:55
  ends. This is why we must be careful about interpreting
• 4:59
  God's presence according to our circumstances
• 5:02
  because difficulty does not mean abandonment,
• 5:06
  silence does not mean absence, delay does not
• 5:09
  mean denial, and suffering does not automatically
• 5:12
  mean that God has stepped away. Sometimes God
• 5:15
  is closer than you realize precisely because
• 5:18
  the road has become harder. Isaiah 43 gives us
• 5:22
  one of the clearest pictures of this mystery.
• 5:25
  God says, When you pass through the waters, I
• 5:28
  will be with you. And when you pass through the
• 5:30
  rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you
• 5:33
  walk through the fire, you will not be burned.
• 5:36
  There is something extraordinary about those
• 5:39
  words. God does not say there will be no waters.
• 5:43
  He does not say there will be no rivers. He does
• 5:46
  not say there will be no fire. He promises something
• 5:50
  deeper. I will be with you. We often want the
• 5:53
  promise to read, when you approach the waters,
• 5:57
  I will remove them. But sometimes the promise
• 6:00
  is, when you pass through the waters, I will
• 6:03
  be with you. We want, when you see the fire,
• 6:08
  I will extinguish it. But sometimes God says,
• 6:12
  When you walk through the fire, you will not
• 6:15
  be burned. That means the miracle is not always
• 6:18
  the disappearance of the fire. Sometimes the
• 6:21
  miracle is that the fire cannot destroy what
• 6:24
  God has decided to preserve. Shadrach, Meshach,
• 6:28
  and Abednego discovered this. God could have
• 6:31
  prevented Nebuchadnezzar from throwing them into
• 6:34
  the furnace. He could have changed the king's
• 6:36
  heart. He could have extinguished the furnace.
• 6:39
  He could have sent rain. He could have caused
• 6:42
  the soldiers to drop them before reaching the
• 6:44
  flames. God had unlimited possibilities available
• 6:48
  to him, but he allowed them to enter the furnace.
• 6:52
  And then something happened that nobody expected.
• 6:56
  Nebuchadnezzar looked into the fire and asked,
• 6:59
  weren't there three men that we tied up and threw
• 7:01
  into the fire? They answered him, certainly your
• 7:05
  majesty. And then the king said something astonishing.
• 7:09
  I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound
• 7:13
  and unharmed. Do you see the mystery? God did
• 7:18
  not keep them from the fire. God met them in
• 7:22
  the fire. The environment did not have to change
• 7:25
  for God's presence to become real. And somebody
• 7:29
  needs to understand this distinction. You may
• 7:32
  have been praying, God get me out. And perhaps
• 7:37
  God is saying, I am going to get you through.
• 7:41
  You have been measuring divine intervention by
• 7:43
  whether the furnace disappears while heaven may
• 7:47
  be measuring the miracle by whether the furnace
• 7:49
  can destroy you. You have been waiting for God
• 7:53
  to remove the water while God has been giving
• 7:56
  you supernatural strength to cross it. You have
• 8:00
  been asking why the wilderness has not ended
• 8:02
  while God has been giving you manna every morning.
• 8:06
  You've been asking why the valley is still dark
• 8:09
  while the shepherd has never stopped walking
• 8:12
  with you and this brings us to Psalm 23 David
• 8:16
  does not say though I see the valley of the shadow
• 8:19
  of death God will give me another road He says
• 8:23
  even though I walk through the valley of the
• 8:25
  shadow of death I will fear no evil and then
• 8:29
  he gives the reason for you are with me not because
• 8:33
  the valley disappeared Not because David suddenly
• 8:36
  understood everything. Not because there were
• 8:39
  no enemies. Not because there was no shadow.
• 8:42
  But because presence changed the meaning of the
• 8:45
  valley. A valley without God is terrifying. A
• 8:48
  valley with the shepherd becomes a passage. Fire
• 8:51
  without God consumes. Fire with God becomes testimony.
• 8:57
  Deep waters without God can overwhelm you. But
• 9:00
  waters with God become something you pass through.
• 9:03
  The wilderness without God feels like abandonment,
• 9:08
  but the wilderness with God can become the place
• 9:10
  where you discover that man does not live by
• 9:13
  bread alone, but by every word that proceeds
• 9:16
  from the mouth of God. And perhaps this is why
• 9:19
  there are seasons where God does not immediately
• 9:23
  change your surroundings. Because there is something
• 9:25
  you can learn about God while being carried that
• 9:28
  you could never learn if every difficult road
• 9:31
  disappeared before your feet touched it. There
• 9:34
  is a revelation of God that belongs to the valley.
• 9:38
  There is a revelation of God that belongs to
• 9:41
  the wilderness. There is a revelation of God
• 9:43
  that belongs to the fire. There is a revelation
• 9:46
  of God that belongs to deep waters, and there
• 9:49
  is a revelation of God that only becomes visible
• 9:52
  when your own strength is no longer enough. Because
• 9:56
  as long as you can explain your survival by your
• 10:00
  intelligence, your resources, your connections,
• 10:03
  your experience, your strength or your ability,
• 10:06
  you may never recognize the hands underneath
• 10:09
  you. But eventually, life can bring you somewhere
• 10:12
  where you know I could not have carried myself
• 10:15
  through this. And that is where another mystery
• 10:19
  of divine intervention begins. Because sometimes
• 10:22
  God does not simply walk beside you, sometimes
• 10:26
  God carries you. Part two, the footprints you
• 10:32
  misunderstood. And that brings me to a story
• 10:35
  that came back to my heart recently. It is a
• 10:39
  story many of us may have heard in one form or
• 10:42
  another. But this time, I did not hear it merely
• 10:46
  as a beautiful story. I heard a revelation inside
• 10:50
  it. Imagine with me for a moment. A man is walking
• 10:54
  with God. At the beginning of the journey, the
• 10:58
  road is beautiful. The sun is shining. The path
• 11:02
  is visible. The ground beneath his feet is firm.
• 11:06
  And whenever the man looks behind him, he sees
• 11:09
  something that gives him tremendous comfort.
• 11:11
  Two sets of footprints. One belongs to Him. The
• 11:16
  other belongs to God. And those footprints become
• 11:19
  evidence to Him that the promise is true. God
• 11:23
  is with me. God is walking beside me. God has
• 11:27
  not abandoned me. But as the journey continues,
• 11:30
  the landscape begins to change. The beautiful
• 11:33
  road slowly disappears, and before Him rises
• 11:37
  a wilderness. The wilderness is dry. The path
• 11:41
  becomes uncertain. The distances become longer.
• 11:45
  There are days when the man does not know how
• 11:49
  much farther he must travel, but he continues
• 11:52
  walking because he remembers the promise. God
• 11:55
  is with me. Then the wilderness leads him toward
• 11:59
  a valley. The mountains rise around him. The
• 12:03
  light begins to disappear. The shadows become
• 12:06
  longer. The valley becomes darker. And suddenly
• 12:11
  the words of David are no longer something he
• 12:14
  merely reads in Psalm 23. He understands them.
• 12:19
  Though I walk through the valley of the shadow
• 12:22
  of death, now he knows what a valley feels like.
• 12:27
  There are places where you can no longer see
• 12:29
  very far ahead. Places where yesterday's confidence
• 12:34
  is not enough for today's road. Places where
• 12:37
  you know God made a promise. But everything surrounding
• 12:41
  you seems to contradict what God said. Still,
• 12:46
  the man keeps walking, then the valley leads
• 12:49
  him into water. At first, the water reaches his
• 12:52
  ankles, then his knees, then his waist, then
• 12:56
  his chest. The current becomes stronger, every
• 13:00
  step becomes more difficult, and the words of
• 13:03
  Isaiah suddenly become personal. When you pass
• 13:07
  through the waters, I will be with you." So he
• 13:10
  continues, but after the waters come mud. Heavy
• 13:14
  mud. The kind of ground that does not simply
• 13:18
  make the journey difficult, but seems determined
• 13:21
  to hold your feet where they are. Every step
• 13:25
  requires strength. Every movement becomes a battle.
• 13:29
  And then, beyond the mud, he sees something he
• 13:33
  never expected. Fire. Now the journey is no longer
• 13:37
  merely uncomfortable. It is frightening. The
• 13:41
  heat becomes unbearable. The smoke obscures his
• 13:44
  vision. Everything inside him wants to turn around.
• 13:48
  But there is nowhere to go except forward. So
• 13:52
  he walks through the fire, through the wilderness,
• 13:56
  through the valley, through the waters, through
• 13:59
  the mud, through the darkness, and eventually
• 14:03
  exhausted, wounded. Confused and barely understanding
• 14:08
  how he has survived, the man stops. He looks
• 14:12
  backward. And that is when he notices something,
• 14:16
  something that troubles him deeply. At the beginning
• 14:20
  of his journey, there were two sets of footprints,
• 14:23
  his and God's. But somewhere along the wilderness,
• 14:28
  there is only one. Through the valley, one. Through
• 14:32
  the water, one. Through the mud, one. Through
• 14:37
  the fire, one. And suddenly, his exhaustion becomes
• 14:42
  disappointment. Because the evidence seems obvious.
• 14:46
  When the journey was easy, God was there. But
• 14:49
  when the journey became unbearable, God's footprints
• 14:53
  disappeared. And perhaps, this is where the story
• 14:57
  becomes more than a story. Because there are
• 15:00
  seasons when we do exactly the same thing. We
• 15:05
  look backward at our lives and begin interpreting
• 15:08
  God through what we can see. God, when everything
• 15:12
  was going well, I could feel you. When my prayers
• 15:17
  would be an answer quickly, I could recognize
• 15:20
  you. When the doors were opening, I knew you
• 15:23
  were there. When the promise seemed close, I
• 15:27
  could see your hand. But when everything changed,
• 15:31
  where were you? Where were you when the night
• 15:34
  became long? Where were you when I cried and
• 15:38
  nothing changed? Where were you when people walked
• 15:42
  away? Where were you when the door closed? Where
• 15:47
  were you when I did everything I knew to do and
• 15:50
  still found myself in the valley? Where were
• 15:53
  you when I prayed and the fire became hotter?
• 15:56
  Where were you when I obeyed you and still ended
• 16:00
  up in deep waters? Where were you when I could
• 16:03
  no longer understand what you were doing? And
• 16:07
  the man finally turns toward God and asks the
• 16:10
  question that has been growing inside him throughout
• 16:14
  the journey. Lord, you told me you would never
• 16:18
  leave me. You told me you would never forsake
• 16:22
  me. You told me that when I pass through the
• 16:25
  waters, you would be with me. You told me that
• 16:29
  when I walk through the fire, I would not be
• 16:31
  burned. You told me that even in the valley of
• 16:34
  the shadow of death, I should fear no evil, because
• 16:37
  you would be with me. And at the beginning, I
• 16:40
  believed you, because I could see both sets of
• 16:43
  footprints. But look, Lord, when the wilderness
• 16:47
  became difficult, yours disappeared. When the
• 16:50
  valley became dark, yours disappeared. When the
• 16:54
  waters became deep, yours disappeared. When the
• 16:58
  mud became heavy, Yours disappeared. When the
• 17:01
  fire became unbearable, yours disappeared. Why?
• 17:06
  Why did you leave me exactly when I needed you
• 17:08
  the most? And God answered, My child, look again.
• 17:14
  The man looked backward. The footprints had not
• 17:17
  changed. There was still only one set. And God
• 17:21
  said, You are right. There is only one set of
• 17:24
  footprints. But you have misunderstood what you
• 17:27
  are looking at. Those footprints are not yours.
• 17:32
  They are mine. When the road was easy enough
• 17:35
  for you to walk, I walked beside you. When you
• 17:39
  had strength, I strengthened you. When you could
• 17:43
  see the road, I guided you. But when the wilderness
• 17:47
  exhausted you, when the valley became too dark
• 17:51
  for you to navigate, when the waters became too
• 17:55
  deep for your feet, When the mud became too heavy
• 17:59
  for your strength and when the fire became too
• 18:02
  hot for you to endure I did not disappear. I
• 18:07
  picked you up The reason you cannot see your
• 18:10
  footprints is because your feet were no longer
• 18:13
  touching the ground You were in my arms You thought
• 18:18
  the single footprints were evidence that I had
• 18:20
  abandoned you They were evidence that I had carried
• 18:24
  you You thought you crossed those waters. I carried
• 18:29
  you. You thought you survived that fire. I carried
• 18:34
  you. You thought you found your way through that
• 18:37
  valley. I knew the way. You thought you somehow
• 18:41
  endured the wilderness. I sustained you. Enduring
• 18:46
  those nights when you wondered how you would
• 18:48
  make it until morning. I carried you. During
• 18:52
  those mornings when you woke up without enough
• 18:55
  strength for another day, I carried you. When
• 18:59
  your faith became weak, but somehow did not disappear,
• 19:04
  I carried you. When you could no longer pray
• 19:07
  the way you used to pray, but something inside
• 19:10
  you still whispered the name of Jesus, I carried
• 19:14
  you. When you could not understand my plan, but
• 19:17
  somehow could not walk away from me, I carried
• 19:21
  you. You were looking for my footsteps beside
• 19:24
  yours while you were already resting in my arms.
• 19:28
  And church, there is a revelation here that I
• 19:31
  do not want us to miss. Sometimes what looks
• 19:35
  like the absence of God is actually a form of
• 19:39
  divine intervention you have not yet learned
• 19:42
  to recognize. We think intervention must always
• 19:45
  change the scenery, but sometimes intervention
• 19:48
  changes nothing about the scenery. and everything
• 19:52
  about whether the scenery is able to destroy
• 19:55
  you. The wilderness remains, the valley remains,
• 19:59
  the water remains, the fire remains, but you
• 20:03
  remain too. And perhaps somebody listening to
• 20:06
  me right now has been asking the wrong question.
• 20:09
  You have been asking, God, why haven't you removed
• 20:13
  this? But perhaps tonight, heaven is asking you
• 20:16
  another question. How do you think you are still
• 20:18
  here? How did you survive something you were
• 20:22
  certain would destroy you? How did you continue
• 20:24
  believing after what happened? How did you get
• 20:27
  back up after losing the strength to stand? How
• 20:30
  did your mind survive that season? How did your
• 20:33
  family survive it? How did your faith survive
• 20:36
  it? How did your calling survive it? How did
• 20:39
  the enemy throw everything he could against you
• 20:42
  and yet something inside you refused to die?
• 20:45
  Maybe you have been calling it survival. Heaven
• 20:48
  calls it grace. Maybe you have been calling it
• 20:50
  resilience. Heaven calls it sustaining power.
• 20:54
  Maybe you have been saying, I don't know how
• 20:56
  I made it. And God is answering, because you
• 20:59
  didn't make it by yourself. And this is not merely
• 21:02
  poetry, this is scripture. Because Moses looked
• 21:06
  back at Israel's wilderness journey and said
• 21:09
  in Deuteronomy 1 .31, the Lord your God carried
• 21:13
  you, as a father carries his son. All the way
• 21:16
  you went until you reached this place. Listen
• 21:20
  carefully to those words. Until you reached this
• 21:24
  place, there were places Israel walked. There
• 21:27
  were battles Israel fought. There were mornings
• 21:30
  Israel gathered manna. There were nights Israel
• 21:34
  slept beneath the wilderness sky. There were
• 21:37
  days when they complained. Days when they doubted.
• 21:41
  Days when they became afraid. Days when they
• 21:44
  wondered whether Egypt had been better than the
• 21:47
  uncertainty ahead of them. But when Moses looked
• 21:51
  backward over the entire journey, he gave them
• 21:55
  another interpretation of their history. You
• 21:59
  thought you crossed the wilderness. God carried
• 22:02
  you through it. And maybe one day, when you reach
• 22:05
  the place God promised you, you will look backward
• 22:09
  at the season you are living right now. and finally
• 22:12
  understand something you cannot understand today.
• 22:16
  You will see the fire. You will see the water.
• 22:19
  You will see the valley. You will see the wilderness.
• 22:22
  You will see the nights you cried. You will remember
• 22:26
  the prayers that seemed unanswered. You will
• 22:29
  remember the moments when you almost gave up.
• 22:32
  And then you will see those footprints, only
• 22:34
  one set. And you will finally understand. Those
• 22:39
  were not the days God abandoned you. Those were
• 22:43
  the days God carried you. And perhaps the greatest
• 22:46
  evidence of divine intervention in some seasons
• 22:50
  of your life is not that the fire disappeared.
• 22:54
  It is that after everything you have been through,
• 22:58
  you are still here. When God carries you, and
• 23:03
  perhaps this is where we need to stop for today,
• 23:05
  Not because we have exhausted this revelation.
• 23:09
  Actually, we have barely begun. Because once
• 23:13
  I started looking deeper into scripture, I discovered
• 23:16
  that the language of God carrying his people
• 23:18
  appears again and again. Moses looked backward
• 23:22
  over 40 years of wilderness and told Israel,
• 23:25
  the Lord your God carried you as a father carries
• 23:28
  his son. Isaiah speaks of a God who says, I have
• 23:32
  upheld you since your birth. I have carried you
• 23:35
  since you were born. Even to your old age and
• 23:38
  gray hairs I am he. I have made you and I will
• 23:42
  carry you. I will sustain you and I will rescue
• 23:45
  you. And then Jesus gives us the picture of a
• 23:49
  shepherd who discovers that one sheep is missing,
• 23:53
  leaves the 99, searches until he finds it. And
• 23:57
  when he finds it, he does not simply point toward
• 24:01
  the road. and tell the exhausted sheep to find
• 24:04
  its own way home. He places it on his shoulders,
• 24:08
  and he carries it. There is something much deeper
• 24:12
  here that we need to explore, because perhaps
• 24:15
  being carried by God is not merely an emergency
• 24:18
  response to human weakness. Perhaps it reveals
• 24:22
  something about the very nature of our relationship
• 24:25
  with Him. Perhaps God carries us not simply because
• 24:29
  we have become weak, but because we belong to
• 24:32
  Him. And that is where our next conversation
• 24:35
  must begin. Because there are still questions
• 24:38
  we have not answered. What does it actually mean
• 24:41
  for God to carry a person? How does God carry
• 24:44
  us when we cannot physically see His arms? Does
• 24:47
  He carry us through His Spirit? Through His Word?
• 24:51
  Through supernatural strength? Through people
• 24:53
  He sends into our lives? Through doors He closes
• 24:57
  without explaining why? Through dangers he prevents
• 25:00
  us from ever seeing, through grace that keeps
• 25:03
  our minds together when circumstances should
• 25:06
  have broken us, through prayers being prayed
• 25:09
  for us when we do not even have enough strength
• 25:12
  to pray for ourselves, and what happens when
• 25:14
  God carries you through something but does not
• 25:17
  tell you where he is taking you. Because there
• 25:20
  is another dimension to being carried. When someone
• 25:23
  carries you, you are no longer controlling every
• 25:26
  step. You have surrendered the road. You have
• 25:29
  surrendered the pace. You have surrendered the
• 25:31
  direction. You have surrendered the timing. And
• 25:34
  now you must trust the one whose arms are holding
• 25:37
  you. Maybe that is why some seasons are so uncomfortable.
• 25:41
  We are asking God to explain the road. While
• 25:44
  God is asking us to trust his arms, we want to
• 25:47
  know where this is going. God says, trust me.
• 25:51
  We want to know when it will end. God says, trust
• 25:54
  me. We want to know why he allowed it. God says,
• 25:58
  trust me. We want to know what waits beyond the
• 26:01
  mountain. God says, you do not have to see where
• 26:04
  I am taking you in order to know who is carrying
• 26:07
  you. And maybe that is the word somebody needs
• 26:10
  tonight. You do not know where this road ends.
• 26:14
  You do not know how this situation will turn
• 26:17
  around. You do not know when the answer will
• 26:20
  come. You do not know when the wilderness will
• 26:22
  become a promised land. You do not know when
• 26:25
  the night will finally become morning. But perhaps
• 26:28
  God has not asked you to know. Perhaps he has
• 26:31
  asked you to trust. Because a child being carried
• 26:34
  by his father does not need to understand the
• 26:37
  geography. He only needs to recognize the father.
• 26:41
  And if you recognize the one carrying you, you
• 26:44
  can rest even while the landscape is changing.
• 26:47
  You can rest while passing through the valley.
• 26:49
  You can rest while crossing the waters. You can
• 26:52
  rest while walking through territory you have
• 26:55
  never seen before. Because your security is no
• 26:58
  longer in understanding the road. Your security
• 27:01
  is in knowing the one holding you. So tonight,
• 27:04
  before we close this conversation, I want you
• 27:07
  to look backward. Look at the valleys you survived.
• 27:10
  Look at the fires that did not consume you. Look
• 27:13
  at the waters that did not sweep you away. Look
• 27:16
  at the doors that closed and somehow redirected
• 27:19
  your life. Look at the nights you thought would
• 27:22
  never end. Look at the moments when you were
• 27:24
  certain you could not continue. And then ask
• 27:27
  yourself one question. If I truly had no strength
• 27:30
  left, who carried me? Maybe those footprints
• 27:34
  you have been looking at all these years were
• 27:36
  never yours. Maybe the evidence you interpreted
• 27:39
  as abandonment was actually evidence of intimacy.
• 27:43
  Maybe the season where you felt God the least
• 27:46
  was the season where his arms were holding you
• 27:48
  the closest. And maybe the testimony is not simply,
• 27:52
  I made it. Maybe the testimony is, he carried
• 27:56
  me. He carried me when I could not understand.
• 27:59
  He carried me when I could not see. He carried
• 28:02
  me when I could barely pray. He carried me when
• 28:05
  the fire became hot. He carried me when the waters
• 28:09
  became deep. He carried me through the valley.
• 28:12
  He carried me through the wilderness. He carried
• 28:14
  me through the night. And if I am standing here
• 28:17
  today, it is not because I was strong enough
• 28:19
  to survive everything that came against me. It
• 28:22
  is because the God who promised never to leave
• 28:25
  me was faithful enough to carry me. And we are
• 28:28
  not finished. In conversation four of the mystery
• 28:31
  of divine intervention, we are going to continue
• 28:34
  this revelation and go deeper into what scripture
• 28:37
  means when God says, I will carry you. We are
• 28:41
  going to explore the father who carries his children.
• 28:44
  The shepherd who places the lost sheep upon his
• 28:47
  shoulders. The God who sustains us from birth
• 28:51
  to old age. And the mysterious ways divine intervention
• 28:55
  can be operating in our lives even when we cannot
• 28:58
  recognize it. Because sometimes God changes the
• 29:02
  battle. Sometimes God changes what is coming
• 29:05
  against you. Sometimes God opens the sea. Sometimes
• 29:08
  God closes the mouth of the lion. Sometimes God
• 29:12
  steps into the furnace. And sometimes, God does
• 29:15
  something far more intimate. He picks you up.
• 29:19
  So until our next conversation, if the road becomes
• 29:22
  difficult, if the valley becomes dark, if the
• 29:25
  waters become deep, and if you look backward
• 29:28
  and suddenly see only one set of footprints,
• 29:32
  do not immediately assume God disappeared. Look
• 29:35
  again. Those footprints may not be yours. You
• 29:40
  may have reached the part of your story where
• 29:42
  God started carrying you. This is Pomoja Ministry.
• 29:47
  One conversation, one story, one revelation at
• 29:51
  a time. And I will meet you again in our next
• 29:55
  conversation as we continue exploring the mystery
• 29:58
  of divine intervention.