[music] Welcome to the Craig T. Owens Audio Blog with Craig's blog posts in audio format to go. Craig's new book, When She Butte, is available now at CraigTowens.com Getting uncomfortable with staying comfortable. God has gifted us to soar, but we have mostly limited ourselves to our comfort zone. God is calling us to get uncomfortable with staying comfortable by confronting the lies that have kept us trapped. This is part one in our series called Living in Your Gift Zone. If you'd like to watch the video of this sermon, I've shared that link in the show notes. Well, I have some bad news to start off with this morning, but I'm going to follow up real quickly with good news. So, you're not going to have to languish too bad on the bad news, and it's probably not going to be a shock to you. I don't think a lot of people will push back on this, but I think the bad news is that we as a church, and when I say church, I'm not talking about Calvary as some we've got. I'm talking about the Capitol Sea Church, all of the Christian faith. I think we're far underperforming of what we should be doing. Clearly, we're not living up to the picture that Jesus pointed out to us in the Gospels when he said, "This is what my church will be doing, what my followers will be doing." When we go through the book of Acts and we see how the first church is conducting itself, we're not living up to that. I want to give you just two pieces of evidence. The first one is when Jesus says, "By this, all will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another." Now, he said this right after he was kneeling down to wash his disciples' feet. He says, "I've shown you this act of love, and this is how people are going to know that you're following me, is when you're following my example of loving and serving other people." Sadly, what Jesus says in this verse is people will know who you are because of what you stand for. What's sad is that most people, when you've stopped them on the street or you're talking to them about Christians, they will tell you what Christians are against. Not what they're for. Oh, yeah, Christians, they don't stand for this, they don't believe in this, they don't support this. They'll tell you that they don't. But seldom do you hear people say, "Oh, yeah, I know what the Christians are about. They're about loving service. They're about selflessly getting down even if it has to be in the dirt to be able to kneel down and to serve other people." That means that we're underperforming what Jesus has said. Or how about where Peter said, "Be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have." It doesn't happen very often that the rest of the world is wringing their hands. "Oh, what am I going to do?" And then they spot a Christian and go, "Hey, you're hopeful. You're peaceful. You're not bringing your hands. You're not all caught up about this. Can you tell me what it is that you have? What's the difference in your life?" That's where we're underperforming. That's the bad news. But the good news is that I don't think that it takes a whole lot for us to turn this around. And it starts not with the Capitol Sea Church, but it starts with the individual Christians. It starts with the person that we see in the mirror every morning. It starts with us making those changes. Now, one of the changes that I want to unpack a little bit is the way that the devil distorts, lies, uses half-truths, takes things out of context to keep us in the place where we're underperforming. This is what he loves to do. He's like, "I'm fine. You want to call yourself Christians? You want to call yourself the church and underperform? I'm totally fine with that." And there's lies that he'll tell to keep us there. Now, that's kind of his native language is what Jesus says. We'll look at that verse in just a second. His native language is lies. But one of the things that we see, and this is actually we go all the way to the last book of the Bible, in Revelation, John is getting a glimpse of the reality that exists before creation, before this world is created, and after the world is created. He gets a chance to see that. Like for instance, he talks about Jesus. He said, "I could look back and see him as the lamb that was slain before the world even began." I already saw that picture. But one of the things that he sees is about the devil, Lucifer, who loses his place in heaven, partly because he's telling himself a lie by his pride, saying, "Oh yeah, I'm as good as God. There's no reason why I couldn't be on the throne, why I couldn't be receiving the same kind of praise." And as a result of that, he leads some other angels astray and he's kicked out of heaven. Here's the warning that comes to us that John records in Revelation chapter 12. He says, "Woe to you the earth and the sea because the devil has gone down to you." He's filled with fury because he knows that his time is short. The dragon was enraged with the woman and went off to make war against her offspring. Specifically, those who obey God's commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus. He's out to make war against us. Now just a couple verses before this, in verse number 10, it tells us that one of the way he makes war against us is to slander. In fact, that's even what devil Diablos, that's what it means, is to slander. He wants to slander God. He wants to make God look bad in your eyes. But he also wants to slander you and make you look bad in God's eyes. That's how he wants to... he's just throwing that mud all the time and he's throwing all this out. Look at what he says back in his first temptation of humans, how he's trying to get him to question what God said. Did God really say, "Come on, did he really say this? You must not eat from any of the tree in the garden. You will not certainly die. There's an outright lie now. For God knows that when you eat from it, your eyes will be opened. And you will be like God knowing good and evil." He just wants to distort what God says. He wants to get you second guessing. He wants you to not really believe that this is what God said, that we have it recorded here. Now Jesus contrasts this. He says, "I want you to hear what the native language of the devil is. And I want you to hear what my native language is. And I want you to discern it." So in John chapter 8, he says, "Jesus said to them," he's talking to the religious leaders here. "If God were your father, you would love me, for I came from God, and now am here. I have not come on my own, but he sent me." "Why is my language not clear to you?" He says, "I'm speaking the truth. Why is this not clear to you?" Here's the answer, because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth. For there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language. For he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell you the truth, you do not believe me." He says, "So I'm speaking the truth, but you've become so comfortable listening to the lies that now when you hear the truth, it upsets you." You get mad at the fact that I'm speaking truth to you, but the one that has been lying to you all along, that's the one that you've bought into, and you become very comfortable with this. Now, one of the things that you probably have seen in the Bible, and I'll show you even an example in modern times as well, is the devil is willing to buy this time. We looked at that verse where Peter said, "Be prepared to give an answer." Just a couple of chapters later on, he says, "Part of the reason why we got to stay aware and stay alert to be prepared as well is because of the attack of the enemy." He said, "He prowls like a lion. He's willing to buy this time. Just wait. Is there an opening? No, not yet. All right, I'll wait." He's willing to wait, and what happens to the prey? They haven't been under attack for a while. Everything's fine. I can kind of let my guard down a little bit. And now they said that Peter says, "Be prepared." He's still out there prowling like a lion. He's still, like we saw in that verse of Revelation, he still wants to make war and take down anybody that he can that's trying to hold to God's Word. But he'd love for us to just kind of lower our guard. You know what? Things are going pretty easy for me. I haven't had any attacks. I must be bulletproof now. I'm pretty good. And then that's when he's going to attack. But seldom does the devil like to do any outright attacks. Because you know what usually happens when he shows himself as it usually causes people to turn to God, not run from him. We see this picture in Job where God is having a conversation with Satan about Job. But he says, "You see how Job follows me?" Satan goes, "Oh, it's only because you've protected him. You've blessed him." You remove that. He'll turn from that, and he'll turn his back on you. God says, "Okay, let's try it. Let's see what happens." Well, look what happens at the end of Job when he sees this attack. At this Job, God up, tore his robe, shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship, in worship. And he said, "Naked, I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart." The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away. May the name of the Lord be praised. And then the writer of Job adds this comment, "And all this Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing." Think about it in our not-too-distant history as a nation. After the terrorist attacks on 9/11, our churches were packed the next couple of weeks. Kind of diminished after that. "Oh, the terror is passed. I can just let my guard down now." But the outright attacks usually make people turn toward God. So what the devil would love to do is just keep you feeling comfortable, feeling like, "Oh, you're fine where you are right now." That was the reason why in John chapter 8, these people got so upset with Jesus because Jesus said, "Hey, I know you've been believing it this way for a while, but that's actually a lie. This is the truth." And they said, "Oh, we don't want to hear that. We were comfortable with where we were." I like C.S. Lewis wrote a book that was called "The Screwtape Letters." It's called that because there is kind of an advanced demon, a demon that has some skill whose name is Screwtape. And he's training his nephew, Wormwood. He's kind of helping him learn to be a good demon, a good little devil. And C.S. Lewis said this was one of his hardest books to write because he had to put himself in the mindset of like, "What does the enemy really think?" And he says, "I just found it very distasteful." But Screwtape always talks about whatever person is being tempted at the time he calls him the patient. So he says to Wormwood, he says, "If your patient starts to get excited about something, starts to get a little worked up, starts to get a little energized, just calm him down. We don't want him excited. Remind him about lunch plans. Or remind him that, you know, all you're getting upset is it really going to make a difference? Just calm down a little bit. You're never going to be able to change anything. So just kind of let it go. And that's the counsel. Just stay comfortable. Just keep him as comfortable as he possibly can be. Because when he gets fired up, he's going to be like Job or like the people after those attacks. I'm going to turn back to God. I'm upset about this. Let me go to God for help as a result of this. We see another picture of this in Israel's first king. King Saul comes to the throne. And you remember, even though Samuel has given him all these signs and said, "This is what's going to confirm that you're going to be the king." When the day actually comes for him to be presented to all the Israelites, they can't find him. Where's Saul? Oh, he's hiding over there. But Saul finally, he comes forward. Okay, you know, reluctantly, I'll take this position. But then God's spirit falls on not only Saul, but there's these valiant men that says that their hearts were moved. God moved on their hearts and they are going to be the follower of King Saul. Well, right on the heels of that, they hear about one of their villages that is being oppressed by the enemy. Saul gets fired up and he takes all of his warriors and says, "Let's go relieve this village. Let's go defeat these enemies." And he defeats the Ammonites. It's feeling pretty good about himself. And he goes and he kind of hangs out with his army and life is good. He's surrounded by these valiant men and they're all well-armed and well-provisioned. And as you read over the next couple of chapters, something has happened. See, King Saul is hanging out in a comfort zone. It's a place that's safe, it's familiar. It's a place where there's not a lot of trouble. Nobody's bothering me. I'm not bothering anybody. I can just hang out there, but I can tell you that the comfort zone is a lousy place to stay. Because we read over time that not only does Saul's army go from these 3,000 valiant men that are surrounding him, it slowly starts dwindling down to 600 men. The Philistines slowly start removing all of the blacksmiths from Israel so that the only two people that have swords that are ready for battle are King Saul and his son Jonathan. 600 men that apparently are just going to have to use harsh language at this point because they don't even have a sword to swing. And other Israelites, they're living in holes on the ground. They're literally hiding from the Philistines that have slowly started surrounding and constricting them. That's what happens when we start living in a comfort zone is we start saying, you know, this is fine. I don't have any trouble around here, but we don't realize that slowly that comfort zone is getting smaller and smaller and smaller. That's why the comfort zone is a lousy place for us to stay. In the comfort zone, we don't have any problems, but we don't have any adventures either. In the comfort zone, we don't have any problems, we can tell some stories, but we're never experiencing God's provision for us firsthand. We hear what people are, oh, God's using them. That's fantastic and we can applaud that and, you know, I'll pray for you. I'll send some money to help you, but we're never doing anything ourself. We never have a story to tell about when we confronted the enemy because he's perfectly fine with us just sitting there and then shrinking back, shrinking back. You see, God has created all of us with a gift package. We have gifts. We are gifts, but I promise you, it's true for me. It's true for you, too. Your comfort zone is a lot smaller than your gift zone. The comfort zone that God has given you is much bigger, but we have boiled it down into these small spots. We see it throughout the Bible. Moses is out in the wilderness. God says, "I've got a plan for you, Moses. I've gifted you. I've equipped you. I've used your education in Egypt and your training out here in the wilderness. You are uniquely prepared to go back and lead my people out of Egypt and to the Promised Land." And then Moses says, "Oh, wait a minute. I'm kind of comfortable here. Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out? Don't rock the boat back here. I'm fine back here." And God says to him, "Listen, I have provisioned you for this. I have made it possible for you to do this. And so when you go, you're not going in your own strength. You are going in the strength of the I Am. I am. All that I have, I've given to you, and this is what you're going to take to lead the people out." What about King David? King David was pastoring sheep. He's working out as a shepherd and nearly even at the end of his reign as king. He has to still say to God, "Who am I? You would pick me to do this." And God said, "Yes, I saw you out there. I gave you opportunities to defeat a lion, to defeat a bear, to learn what it is, to lead and organize." And look what he says in the book of Psalms then. He chose David, his servant, and took him from the sheep pens, from tending sheep. And then he brought him to shepherd his people. David said, "I'm comfortable out here." And God says, "No, I have so much more for you." Jeremiah is listed as just one of many of the priests that are serving in the temple. And he apparently is very comfortable just being sort of an anonymous face in the crowd. And God says, "I've got a message for you to deliver to my people." It's a crucial time for you to do that. And Jeremiah says to God, "I don't know how to speak. I'm too young. I don't have the experience. I don't have the words." And God says to him, "I don't want you to talk like that before you were born. I set you apart and appointed you as a prophet. And I'm going to give you the words to share as you go forward." Think about Saul. In Saul's day, after the first church being birthed and launched into existence, it was a lot more comfortable to be a Pharisee, a Sadducee, a religious leader in the Jewish community than it was to be a Christian. That was the comfortable place to be. But God had a plan for Saul's life, and he looks back and says, "I was the worst of sinners. I persecuted the church because they were kind of making me feel uncomfortable in my comfort zone." But he said, "But the reason why Jesus called me to do this is Jesus said to me, "I have shown mercy to you that I might display my immense patience as an example for those who would believe in me and receive eternal life." That's what happens. So what the devil is really happy to do, like I said, is to keep you in a place where you just believe the lies that will keep you in the comfort zone. It might have been apparent. I have a friend of mine that he works as a chaplain in the prisons, and he says, "Almost universally, every inmate that he deals with had a parent or some kind of a guardian that was working with them that told them, "You're never going to amount to much. You'll be in trouble someday. You stay on this path. You're going to end up in jail." And they ended up in jail. They believe that lie, that they were destined for that. There's been some people that they were at school and somebody told them, "Well, apparently you're just not going to get that subject. You're just slow. You're not going to be able to learn that." And they've bought into that lie, or a friend, or somebody close to them said, "You know, you're kind of weird. You're kind of odd that you think that you believe that, that you live that way." And they listened to that. Or maybe it's even been the devil himself with his lie when you start to get excited about something. And he says, "You know, what difference can you make in the world? You're just one person, and that is such a huge problem. How could you ever even make a dent in that?" And if you try, you're just going to end up frustrated because you're not moving the needle at all. It would be far better if you just sat here and just relaxed. Stay comfortable. But friends, what I'm saying is that it's time for us to become uncomfortable with being comfortable. We need to be uncomfortable with saying, "What lies have held me back here?" So we have to start speaking the truth. Remember Jesus said, "I've got the truth for you to hear. We need to start speaking the truth to those lies." "The truth like this, for you created my inmost being, God. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be, to say to the lie that's keeping me comfortable. I've been created on purpose and for a purpose." Oh, okay. Well, maybe I have been, but I don't have the skills. I don't have the talents to do what needs to be done next. Well, I rewrote this verse a little bit to make it a little bit more like first person like God speaking to us. "Your divine power has given me everything I need for a godly life through my knowledge of you who called me by your own glory and goodness. Through these, you have given me your very great and precious promises so that through them I may participate in the divine nature." Now, when we step out of our comfort zone, by its very definition, when I step out of my comfort zone, I step into an area that is uncomfortable. And when we are uncomfortable about something, because we don't know exactly how this is going to play out, one of the emotions that can follow really quickly on the tails of that is fear. Well, maybe I stepped too far. Maybe I shouldn't have gone this far. Like I said, we have a much bigger gift zone than we have a comfort zone. God's never - He's going to call us to stretch out of our comfort zone. He's never going to call us outside of our gift zone. So I light an Isaiah. God says it multiple times. Do not fear. He repeats it. Do not fear. I am with you. Do not be dismayed. I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. You read over the next couple verses. He'll repeat that phrase three more times. Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid, because I am with you. That's the truth that we need to speak to the lies. I love this quote from Charles Spurgeon, "The extent of power that God can infuse into a person is immeasurable." When divine strength is granted, human weakness ceases to be a hindrance. When he says, "I've gifted you to do this," this is what we're able to do. So, it's time for us to get uncomfortable. We're staying comfortable. You know what? My life seems like every day. It's just kind of day in, day out. Kind of copy-paste. Copy-paste. It's the same. That's how I think that King Saul felt. Now, this is pretty good. I'm sitting here with my army all around me. We won a battle. Won it pretty decisively. Nobody's attacking us right now. I didn't even realize that in that spot where he felt comfortable that his comfort zone was starting to get smaller, smaller and smaller. His men were slowly melting away from him. They didn't have weapons left to use, and all of a sudden they find themselves surrounded and pressed in by the enemy. That's where the devil would love to keep us. Just stay comfortable. Stay comfortable. You're fine. Don't get too excited about that. Don't get angry at that injustice that you see, because what could you possibly do? You couldn't make a difference about that. So just pipe down a little bit. Don't need to rock the boat. Ah boy, if you step out, you might lose some friends. You might have some people looking at you sideways here. That's going to feel really odd, isn't it? It's going to feel really uncomfortable. Just stay right here. You're fine. You're a good Christian. God knows what your heart is. You're good. Just stay here. You'd love to keep you comfortable. So what I want to talk with you about over the next few weeks is what does it mean to live in the gift zone that God has for us? What I want you to see in this real simple graphic is that we all come in different shapes and sizes. Some of us have more gifts. Some of us have fewer gifts. But we all have a comfort zone. Our comfort zone is never as big as our gift zone. Some people's comfort zone is a little bit bigger. Some people's are a little bit smaller. That's all that's different too. But what God is calling us to do is to stretch into all that He has for us in our gift zone. And we have to start by reflecting that same Psalm 139 where David says I'm fearfully and wonderfully made and you knit me together. He concludes that prayer by saying I need you to search me God. Is there a lie that I'm believing? Search me and see if there's any offensive way in me. That doesn't necessarily mean it's a grievous sin. No, Saul wasn't sitting there with his army. He just wasn't doing anything. He wasn't living up to the potential that God had for him. So part of our searching might be, have I believed a lie? Have I just stayed too comfortable when there's more that God has called me to stretch into? And so what we need to do is we have to start by asking the Holy Spirit to search us with that question. Have I become comfortable? And I'm not soaring into the gifts that you've given me. Or maybe even saying what are my gifts? Maybe God will show you that here's one that I gave you and it started to get a little dusty on the shelf. You haven't used it. But this is what we're going to explore over the next few weeks is how do we discover the gifts that God has given us and then how do we start using those in a way that is going to push out of our comfort zone. Like I said, by its very definition, as soon as you take the step forward out of the comfort zone, it will be uncomfortable. And your first reaction will be like, I'm just going to go back here where this was fine back here. I felt good back here. Out here, I kind of felt like a failure because I tried something new and it didn't go very good. I'm just going to go back to the way I was doing it before. That's going to be our first response. But what we should do is say, okay, I'm willing to trust you. I'm willing to trust you. If you're calling me, you're not going to call me out into something that I'm not gifted to do. You're going to call me away from my comfort zone. Craig's new book, When Sheep Bite, is available now. To order, go to CraigTowens.com. [MUSIC]
