Changing Faces Ministries Podcast
It's time to move on!
If you can see yourself the way God sees you, you will have a changing face. Here is your host, Pastor Jeff Landrum. Good morning, good morning, good morning. I want to welcome each and every one of you to our Changing Faces Ministries Podcast. I'm your Pastor Jeff Landrum where we do believe if you can see yourself the way God sees you, you will have a changing face. Once again, it's another blessed and exciting morning that God has given us and I want to thank each and every one of you for coming back again on this Friday morning to join us again for another Word of God and we're so super excited to have each and every one of you. So, if you could please do us a favor like, subscribe, subscribe, support, share. To get the word out there about Changing Faces Ministries, we just want everyone to become a part of the message of God so that everyone can have a new outlook. We want to give people hope through the Word of God so every chance you get we want to ask that you like, share, and support our ministry. Also we want to thank One Voice Radio for giving us this awesome opportunity to come to you each and every Friday morning. So thank you so much to One Voice and to each and every one of our listeners. From the bottom of my heart we want to say thank you and we thank you for your support. Let us get into this Word that God has given us this morning. I want to look at something and I'm going to ask this question because some if not all of us have tried to stay in a place longer than what we should because of things that had changed. We should have been moving and changing how we operate but instead of moving and changing with where we should have been moving it we tried to stay in a place. Let me show you what I mean. Wouldn't you think it would be strange for someone in the dead of winter to be wearing a bathing suit? Nothing wrong with the clothes, everything wrong with the season that you're in. Or somebody wearing a big old trench coat in the middle of summertime, nothing wrong with the coat. It's just a different not the right season of where it is. And sometimes we ask people when seasons change and seasons will change. We try to operate in a season when we should be just moving alone with the plans that God have. See, we can't control the seasons how they change but we can control how we adapt to the seasons that we're in. I want to look at that today because far too many people are not paying attention to what God is doing and they're still trying to operate the same way they used to when God had a different plan for their lives. And we're going to see that today in this message because when God gets our attention and God has a way of getting our attention, you can look all throughout scriptures and see where God has gotten our attention and the changing of seasons is a way of getting our attention to let us know that we need to be operating differently because we can't, you don't dress and do some of the same things you did in summer that you're doing winter and fall that you're doing spring. So as the season change, you make the adjustment so as God gets ready and doing things in your lives, it's going to be important for us. One to know that it is God's plan for our lives and two is to ask God's direction for our lives because God always has a plan. Jeremiah 29 and 11 says, "For I know the plans that I have for you is for your well-being for a future and a hope." So he knows the plans that he has for us but because he has the plans for us, we've got to make sure that we adhere into his plan in moving according to the plans that he has for and the only way to do that is according to the Bible it says acknowledge him in all our ways and he will direct our paths and so as he starts to direct our path, the seasons that we're in going to change because he's moving us and we're going to get a chance to see that today and I don't want you to be foolish and not recognize and overlook when God is trying to get our attention. God has ways of getting all of our attention back in the old days he sent plagues to Egypt to get their attention. He had Paul on the Damascus Road, a sighting that he was blinded by the sighting to get his attention. The parting of the Red Sea to get the children of Israel's attention and the closing of the Red Sea to get Pharaoh and his army's attention, the burning bush to get someone's attention. The old people, Sarah, Abraham, past childbirth, barren age, he got their attention and oftentimes in this life that we're in now, God does things to get our attention and we're going to talk about that today because God loves us so much that when he's getting our attention it's out of love and again in order to move us into the next phase of our lives. We're going to take a look at that today so if you got your Bible don't you determine me to 1 Kings chapter 17 and we're going to read 1 Kings chapter 17, we're going to read verses 1 through 8 and it reads, "An Elijah, the Tishpite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab as the Lord God of Israel, liveth before whom I stand that thou should not be due nor reign these years, but according to my word." And the word of the Lord came unto him saying, "Get thee hence and turn thee eastward and hide thyself by the brook chariot, that is before Jordan, and it shall be that thou shall drink of the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there." So he went and did according unto the word of the Lord for he went and dwelt by the brook chariot, that is before Jordan and the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening and he drank of the brook and it came to pass after a while that the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land. And the word of the Lord came unto him saying, and we'll read verse 9, "Arise, get thee to zerafat, which belongs to Zion, and dwell there, behold, I have commanded a whittle woman there to sustain thee." For a subject this morning we're going to talk about it's time to move on, it's time to move on. Dear Heavenly Father, God Almighty, we thank you so much once again for allowing us this opportunity to come together, Lord. We're asking you that you prepare hearts of mine to receive what it is that you have for us on this morning. Lord, and just I ask right now that you remove me, that they hear none of me, but hear all of you and let your word go full with power to make us better than war before we came. And we will be so ever grateful to give you all the praise, all the honor and all the glory and your son Jesus Christ name we do pray and we all said, Amen. It's time to move on. We're going to look this morning at this man Elijah, a prophet, and he was given a message from God about no rain in the land, but it was going to be a drought. And he shared this message with the King Ahab and told him about this and in this season that Elijah was in the despite it was going to be a drought. He was able to hear and he got a word from God and the word that he got from God was in preparation for the season that he was in. The season that he was in was going to be a drought and we know what a drought is. It says no rain or no do, so it was going to be a dry spell for a period of time and in that dry spell and we know who controls the rain, we know controls to do, we know control that. So God allowed a dry spell to come on the land, but in the midst of the season of this dry spell that Elijah had, he got instructions from God on what he needed to do to be able to make it through this dry period in his life, this dry season that he was in his life. Matter of fact, the instructions that he got took him to a place by a brook by Jordan and not only was he going to be sustained, he was going to be by what he least expected it. He didn't have no idea to determine how God was going to do what he was going to do. He just trusted that God will do what he said he was going to do. I wonder what our life would be like if we could stop wondering what God was going to do but just trust that God was going to do what he promised us he would do and he said I will never leave you nor forsake you and if he said that, that means even in a drought, he promised that he would never leave us nor forsake us. So if he promised that we don't have to wonder about how he's going to do it, we just got to trust that he will do it. And if we learn to trust that he will do it, we're going to see some amazing things happen and this is what happened to Elijah. He trusted that God was going to do what he said he was going to do well past how do you know he trusted. He did according to what the instructions that God gave him said. See you're going to tell that somebody trusts the one who said it when they act upon what they heard. When we learn to act upon what the word of God says, we're going to start moving because we walk by not what we see, we walk by faith not by sight. So if we trust the word and we trust from where the word came from, we're going to move in the direction that the word give us and the word according to what he was told, it says get the hence and turn the east word and hide ourselves by the brook chariot. That is before Jordan. Now that's the first time that we're going to do is one of the first things we're going to look at today is we got to have faith in whatever season that we're in. And when we learn to have faith no matter what the season is, we're going to see some amazing things happen because my Bible says over in Ecclesiastes that for everything there is a season. So there's going to be times in our lives to where things might just dry up. Sometimes in our lives where we don't know what the moral holds, some relationships in our lives that just come to a dead end, some things are going to happen in our lives. So in the midst of things drying up, in the midst of us being in dry seasons of our lives, we got to have faith and the way we have faith is we got to be able to know that the one who was instructing us is going to guide lead and direct us because he said he would and the way we know that we have faith, it was going to start moving in the direction that the one who told us to go in. So faith is going to be one of the first things that we need to know that we're going to look at and faith will determine how you see the seasons in your lives. See because sometimes in our lives we're going to look at things and we're going to start having pity parties, we're going to start thinking, "Oh, it's me, this time, Lord, why are you taking me through this?" But we have to understand as a child, as a man, a woman, a child of God, the only way that things can get to us, it has to go through the very hands of God to get through us. Either he allowed it or he allowed it or he brought it, but either way it's working for our behalf. And when we know it's working for our behalf, the first thing we got to have is faith and our faith is going to determine how you see the season that you're in. Elijah saw this season and he had the faith. He had the faith because it says, and after the instructions he got to go eastward, then he was told, "It shall be that thou shall drink of the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there." So this is going to determine how we know he had faith because he said so he went. He had faith because he's not walking by what he sees. He is moving based on the instructions that he was given. So he had faith. It says, "So he went and did according unto the word of the Lord." So in a season that you're in, when the drought is in, when things are looking funny and the money has gotten funny, the job has closed and you don't know why they did what they did. You was just not climbing a corporate ladder, you was being all that you could be. You have been studying, you have been praying, you've been paying your ties, and you've been living right to the best of your ability and doing all the things you could in a dry season came in your life. I'm here to tell you, just because we serve and we trust in God, don't mean that we won't have dry seasons. Seasons are going to change, things are going to change, but don't let the dry seasons mess you up because sometimes in those dry seasons God could be drying things up because he's getting ready to open some new doors to your life. He's getting ready to do some major things in your life. So he sometimes he allowed things and situations to dry up. He allowed a drought in your land. He would allow things in your life to dry up and situations that come in your life because he's getting ready to show you something. He's getting ready to do something amazing and he can't, you can't see it the way you need to see it unless you go through something, unless you in a drought. Things that got fishing, situations that got funny, and we know how it is. As long as things are good, we might see God once a week. When things get a little scary, we might see him twice a week, but when all hell breaks loose in your life, you on your knees saying, Lord, have mercy all the time. When God had to allow things in our lives to dry up situations and circumstances to come upon us, to open our eyes, to see what we need to see, will Elijah in the midst of him knowing that there was going to be a drought? God instructed him to go to a place eastward by a broke and that he was going to have some food and water that was going to be there, that was going to be provided for him day and night. I want you to think about how good our God is. He dried up a situation, but in the midst of a dried up situation, he gave instructions to Elijah to go to a place eastward gave him directions. Now, this is the other thing that we will determine how you handle the situations of your life is obedience. He had the faith and he heard the word. So, obedience took him eastward and based on his obedience, he's going to see some transform, he's going to see God working a mighty way. Faith, obedience, the hand of God, faith, obedience, the hand of God. So the faith allowed him to hear and he didn't lose hope even in the drought. The obedience took him eastward and planted him by a brook where he got flesh, where he was told that he was going to be can drink from the brook and a dirty bird was going to feed him, old raven was going to feed him, transformative power, the hand of God. He saw it when everything that he was told was in action. The obedience in our lives, the only way we're going to see some amazing in God's hand at work is when we have the faith to hear and the obedience to go. The whole duty of man is to keep to love God and keep his commandments. So when we can learn to do that, to have the faith and the obedience, we're going to see the hand of God do some amazing things in our lives. But that only came that in the season that he was in, that things was going to be dry. I want you to think about that in our hardest times when life then got to toughest and people to turn their back on us and the friends that we thought we had was there, the relationships that we thought that was powerful, the things that we were looking to be with us and to take us to that next level. How God allowed those things to dissolve, doors to be closed, friendships to be broken. He allowed those things to happen and when he allowed those things to happen, it wasn't because he didn't love you. It was so that you can see his hands in action. When Elijah did what God instructed him to do, not only did he drink from the brook, but a dirty bird, if you read the scripture it says, and the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening and he drank of the brook exactly what his instructions said would happen was going to happen. I'm going to pose this till you could it be, you're not seeing the hands of God because you don't have the faith and you're not following the instruction. Could it be? I'm just asking, I'm just going to throw that out there, could it be? Because there is no way that our God can lie and if God cannot lie, could it be? I'm just asking, could it be? We don't have the faith and we are not obedient to do those things that we've been instructed to do. But even as God, one season there was a drought and then the blessings that God had for Elijah dried up. Now, I want you to look at what Elijah didn't do. Elijah didn't have a pity party and Elijah didn't go on and ask God to supply more rain. What Elijah did was look at what it says and it came to pass. So this came to pass this happen and it says, the same source that provided it before that gave him a word and instructions before is the same God, even when the brook dries up. Even when the blessing, this blessing came to an end, it says, and then the word came. And it says, and it came to pass after a while, the brook dried up because there was no rain. Who controls the rain? God, if God controls the rain, that means God could allow the rain, but because God didn't allow it to rain and he allowed the brook to dry up, that must mean God has the next thing in action. And it goes back to that cycle again. You got to have faith and trust that the word of God is coming, that the same God who did it once before, he can do it again because he says I'm the same yesterday, today and forever. So if he's the same yesterday, today and forever more, he does not change. So if he gave you instructions that got you through the drought, even when the thing that he took you to dry up, that must mean he's moving you to a different direction. And if he's moving you to a different direction, if he did it before he'll do it again, so we learn to trust in the word of God and trusting in the word of God is going to take us to the next move of God. And if he didn't take us out and didn't allow us to, to, if we still got breath to breathe, when we wake up this morning, we praise him and we think him even in a dried up brook, even in a dry season we think him because if he did it once, he's going to move us to this next season of our lives. If he close one door, the same God that closed the door, he can open many more doors because he's a God that can do anything but fail. So when we look at this and we see this, and as we start to understand this, it doesn't matter if it rain or not. When you have faith in your Lord, you are not shaking during this season. But if your faith is in a job, a job of fail, if your faith is in man, man will leave you. If your faith is in, in people, places and things, that all let you down. But I know a God that hadn't failed us yet. So in the seasons of your life, notice I didn't say see done. I said see zones with an S, your faith need to be in the one who created you. I read somewhere it says I waited patiently on the Lord and he heard my cry. I read somewhere where it said if the Lord be for me, he's more than the whole world against me. I read in my Bible where it says trust in the Lord with all that heart and we need not lean on our own understanding in all our ways, acknowledge him. Those will change our faith need to be in the one who controls the seasons. Even though it was not going, even though it hadn't rain and there was no do, Elijah got the word originally, went to the brook and went and stayed there until the brook dried up. And when the brook dried up, another word from God came, I want you to understand God is not a man that he should lie. God has a plan for your life. And if he has a plan for your life, that means it's much bigger than we can even see or think. It says eyes have not seen, ears have not heard, it haven't even entered into your thought the things that God could do. And if that is the case, we need to learn the trust and the pin on him and as we learn the trust and the pin on him, we're going to see some amazing things happen in our lives. Elijah followed God's instructions. The first time. So now it says, when the brook dried up, it came to pass and the word of the Lord came unto him saying, arise, now get up, don't have no pity party, don't cry, don't do these things. He says, arrive, get thee to Sarah fat, which belongs to Zion and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee. Unbeknownst to Elijah, even though the brook had dried up, God had already worked it out. How many of us right now is dwelling in meditating on things right now that God had already worked out? God, God, don't you, you can't wake up in the morning and God and God going to be surprised what problems and troubles you got. But as God knows everything, he knew you before you was ever created. It says he knows the hairs on your head, a number, he knows all these things. So what do you think that we can go through or be thinking about or dealing with that God don't already know? So Elijah, it says the instruction came arise and get thee to Sarah fat. The first time it told him to go eastward. Now let's tell him to rise, get thee to Sarah fat, trip you long to Zion and dwell there. Now, go, now think about this, look at this, it goes back to he having the faith. The brook was dry now, but I have the faith, even though the brook is dry, the same God is God. I often, I sometimes when I have time to sit and think, you know, Noah, 120 years, building, didn't see no rain, everybody else having fun, Noah had to have faith in God to keep on building, even when you don't see nothing. This obedience allowed him to start building and this obedience allowed him to finish because he wasn't finished until it rained. See sometimes we want to stop because we don't see no rain, but Noah was told to build an art because God said, I'm going to allow it to rain. Sometimes in your life, all the time in your life, you got to do it until God says so until the next move come, you do what God instructs you to do. Now that's a word for somebody because somebody right now is on the verge of throwing in the tile and giving up, but I'm going to ask you, have God told you because Noah, when people probably ask him, know why are you building this art and his response was, if you're never going to Noah's art, we've been there a couple of times up in Kentucky and they was dramatizing the whole scene and people was asking, know why are you building this art? As a matter of fact, they put a part in there where they had a reporter interview and came in interviewing Noah and asked him, why are you building this art? And this answer was simply because God said so. In your life, sometimes you do things simply because the word of God said so, simply because God said so and that's why you do it. You may not understand it, you may not know what's going to be next, but simply because God said so. God told him to go because he had already put something in place for where he was taking them. See, sometimes we don't see the hand of God because what God has already put in place does requires an act of faith and obedience before we can see his hands move, an act of faith and obedience. Faith is a substance of things hoped for and evidence of things not seen. So based on the act of faith by us moving, by Noah building, by Elijah giving up and moving towards the place where God told him, you got the faith and now your obedience put your faith into your feet and now that your faith is in your feet because you're actually moving towards the point, you're going to see the work of God because God said, I've already commended just because something has dried up. That must mean it's time to move on if you have the faith and trust and believe in God. I worked your all the way to that point because sometimes we stay in things and situations and places too long and God then dried it up and we try to dig and dig and try to dig for water and God then dried it up. He dried it up for a reason because it's time for us to move on and when it's time for us to move on, I don't care how deep you dig, I don't care what you do, I don't care where you find God has dried it up because he's time, it's time for you to move on. Let's have the faith to trust in God, have the obedience to move when God tells you to move and just know and expect the hand of God to show up in your life. And when you do those things as Elijah did, we know the end of the story, he said he went and when he got there was a whittle woman picking up sticks, she was preparing to eat her last meal for her and her son so they can eat it and die. But when Elijah showed up on this scene, not only did she feed him because he requested for her to feed him first, she had more than enough. Sometimes when your brook and your life dries up, it's not about you, it has nothing to do with you, God needed to dry that brook up so he can move you so that somebody else could be blessed. What blessings are you holding back, what things are you holding back because you crying over a brook that dried up, allow the brook to do, allow the brook to dry up, allow God to do what he do. And when he instructs you, you have to have the faith and you got the obedience and you got to expect the hand of God to move in your life. When you can do those things, we can be like Elijah. Not only did we eat, but it says the lady and her son ate for many days because the meal of the flower didn't run out. What this message is all about is time to move on. When God drives things up, that's a message for us to move on because it's much bigger, it's much greater than where we are. Sometimes God will allow jobs to close, sometimes God will allow people to walk out of your life, sometimes God will do things because it's much bigger than just about you. It's about transforming and changing somebody else's life. What season are you in that you're trying to force to work? But the season has changed and God is ready for you to move. Now is the time for you to move. Now is the time to move on. Now is the time, and you got to have the faith in the one. And when I think about time to move on, we look at our Savior, Christ, came from heaven to this world and he reached a point that he had to give up his life for you. For me, they didn't take it. He gave it up because he knew if he didn't move on, we wouldn't have no hope. It hurt it and he found himself in a garden saying, "If this cup should pass from me. If I don't have to go through this, God, my Father, let it pass from me. But nevertheless, not my will, your will will be done." Then you have the faith and you know that God is in control of all things. You're going to trust and believe you're going to see the hand of God by you having the obedience to move on. When Christ moved on, they took him off that cross and put him in old bar or tomb. But when it was time for him to move on, he moved on and returned back to the Father that sent him. And when he returned, when he returned back, that gave us hope to know that we have a chance. Him coming, giving up his life wasn't about him. It was about you. It was about me. It said, "God so loved the world that he gave it's only begotten Son that whosoever believing him should not perish but have ever laughed in life." Today will be a perfect opportunity for you to put your trust in the one that knew it was time to move on in order for us to have an opportunity. And that's our Lord and Savior. If you've never trusted him, today will be a perfect opportunity to do that. It is very simple to say, "I'm a sinner. I need a Savior and I choose you." And if you prayed that prayer sincerely, and you're ready to operate in the new seasons of your life, today will be a perfect opportunity for you to come and receive him and receive him sincerely into your heart. If you've done that, I want to say welcome to the family. I want to say this ministry loves each and every one of you and we want you to know that anytime you need us, we're here. God bless you and God keep you is our prayer. This will end our podcast for this week and we want to say, "When you can see yourself the way God sees you, you will have a change of faith." God bless. Thanks for tuning in to The Changing Faces Podcast. Be sure to download the podcast as well as like, subscribe, and share. [music] (upbeat music)