JESUS – THE WAYMAKER! - February 21, 2021

He makes a way!

DANIEL 7:25 – Then he will blaspheme the High God, persecute the followers of the High God, and try to get rid of sacred worship and moral practice. God’s holy people will be persecuted by him for a time, two times, half a time.

SATAN ATTEMPTS TO WEAR OUT THE SAINTS
HE HAS NEVER STOPPED TRYING

ISAIAH 43:1-2 (NLT) – But now, O Jacob, listen to the Lord who created you. O Israel, the one who formed you says, “Do not be afraid, for I have ransomed you. I have called you by name; you are mine. ² When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up; the flames will not consume you.

ISAIAH 43:16 – I am the Lord, who opened a way through the waters, making a dry path through the sea.

ISAIAH 43:19-20 – For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland. ²⁰ The wild animals in the fields will thank me, the jackals and owls, too, for giving them water in the desert. Yes, I will make rivers in the dry wasteland so my chosen people can be refreshed.

ISAIAH 43:1-2 (MSG) – But now, God’s Message, the God who made you in the first place, Jacob, the One who got you started, Israel: “Don’t be afraid, I’ve redeemed you. I’ve called your name. You’re mine. When you’re in over your head, I’ll be there with you. When you’re in rough waters, you will not go down. When you’re between a rock and a hard place, it won’t be a dead end—

HAVE YOU EVER BEEN IN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE?

TIMES WHEN SEEMS LIKE IT’S TOO HARD

TIMES WHEN THERE APPEARS TO BE NO WAY!

IT’S A DEAD END!

EVER BEEN AT A DEAD END?

EVER FEEL LIKE YOU CAN’T MAKE IT?

EVER FEEL LIKE YOU CAN’T, IT’S IMPOSSIBLE!

EVER FEEL LIKE YOU’RE IN OVER YOUR HEAD!

GOD CAN MAKE A WAY!!!

Sometimes tough times are the soil that the greatest crops come out of dirt graves piled over us by our adversaries, the demonic turmoil piled over us sometimes is the soil that grows the biggest victory, as God anoints us with miracle growth, He anoints us to move to overcome and by faith, we move forward.

Hear what God says to one of our foremost prophets in church history as God announces to who he is to his people saying…
- I can make rivers in the desert,
- I can make paths through stormy seas
- I can make a way through floods or flood times
- I can make a way through fire
- I can make it through the wilderness
- I can make a way through hard places
- I can make a way through dead ends
- I can a make a way through a stymied place
- I am the way maker!!!

Throughout scripture one principle is always constant – God CAN MAKE A WAY when there seems to be no way!!!

HEBREWS 11 – ^1-2 The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see. The act of faith is what distinguished our ancestors, set them above the crowd. 3 By faith, we see the world called into existence by God’s word, what we see created by what we don’t see. ⁴ By an act of faith, Abel brought a better sacrifice to God than Cain. It was what he believed, not what he brought, that made the difference. That’s what God noticed and approved as righteous. After all these centuries, that belief continues to catch our notice. ^5-6 By an act of faith, Enoch skipped death completely. “They looked all over and couldn’t find him because God had taken him.” We know on the basis of reliable testimony that before he was taken “he pleased God.” It’s impossible to please God apart from faith. And why? Because anyone who wants to approach God must believe both that he exists and that he cares enough to respond to those who seek him.

Before he was taken, he pleased God!
That is the goal!!
To live pleasing God
He is not hard to please!

⁷ By faith, Noah built a ship in the middle of dry land. He was warned about something he couldn’t see and acted on what he was told. The result? His family was saved. His act of faith drew a sharp line between the evil of the unbelieving world and the rightness of the believing world. As a result, Noah became intimate with God.

Sometimes you just got to do what you’re told.
You can’t see it!
You don’t think it was possible
Just have to do what you’re told to do!
By an act of faith! He didn’t see it!
As the result, his family was saved!!!
Noah became friends with God
That’s another goal!
To be God’s friend!

^8-10 By an act of faith, Abraham said yes to God’s call to travel to an unknown place that would become his home. When he left he had no idea where he was going. By an act of faith, he lived in the country promised him, lived as a stranger camping in tents. Isaac and Jacob did the same, living under the same promise. Abraham did it by keeping his eye on an unseen city with real, eternal foundations—the City designed and built by God.

He didn’t know the way.
He just trusted God

^11-12 By faith, barren Sarah was able to become pregnant, old woman as she was at the time, because she believed the One who made a promise would do what he said. That’s how it happened that from one man’s dead and shriveled loins there are now people numbering into the millions.

Is that easy?
Yes!!!
Just believe what He said!
She came to the conclusion, He’ll do what He said!
GOD WILL DO WHAT HE SAID!

^17-19By faith, Abraham, at the time of testing, offered Isaac back to God. Acting in faith, he was as ready to return the promised son, his only son, as he had been to receive him—and this after he had already been told, “Your descendants shall come from Isaac.

Abraham figured that if God wanted to, He could raise the dead. In a sense, that’s what happened when he received Isaac back, alive from off the altar.

²⁰ By an act of faith, Isaac reached into the future as he blessed Jacob and Esau. ²¹ By an act of faith, Jacob on his deathbed blessed each of Joseph’s sons in turn, blessing them with God’s blessing, not his own—as he bowed worshipfully upon his staff. ²² By an act of faith, Joseph, while dying, prophesied the exodus of Israel, and made arrangements for his own burial. ²³ By an act of faith, Moses’ parents hid him away for three months after his birth. They saw the child’s beauty, and they braved the king’s decree. ^24-28 By faith, Moses, when grown, refused the privileges of the Egyptian royal house. He chose a hard life with God’s people rather than an opportunistic soft life of sin with the oppressors.

He valued suffering in the Messiah’s camp far greater than Egyptian wealth because he was looking ahead, anticipating the payoff. By an act of faith, he turned his heel on Egypt, indifferent to the king’s blind rage. He had his eye on the One no eye can see, and kept right on going.
Sometimes your faith has to look ahead and anticipate a payoff
Payoff’s coming!!!
Faith arises and anticipates a payoff
Expects God to make a way even when there seems to be no way
There are times when life hands us situations and many are in them now with the atmosphere in our world.
Situations where our faith must rise and push us to keep right on going trusting God will make a way for us to pass through the difficult times, to pass through the trying time, pass through the unknown places, to pass through the unknown destinations times you can’t when you can’t see
Like Abel’s sacrificial time
Like Noah’s stormy time
Like Abraham, times when there are destinations before you that you can’t know, you can’t see
Like Sarah’s barren times
Like Elijah’s lonely times
Like Job’s painful times
Homesick times
Testing times
Deathbed times
Just plain old times when it takes faith to handle what we don’t know or see or feel or hear or understand
Times when we have to put our faith in the WAYMAKER

GOD DOESN’T MIND GETTING BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE AND CREATING WAYS FOR HIS PEOPLE!

HEBREWS 11:23 – MOSES’ PARENTS

Their faith was a desperate faith
It was a faith that’s hard to imagine, people having to exercise it
The hands of God were working in ways that at first were not readily seen
God was working on Pharaoh’s daughter, He had to make her heart tender towards having a baby boy that was not hers that was one of the Hebrew children
He had to work on her heart and her emotions and make her receptive to that
And behind the scene, God was preparing Moses’ destiny
It was not something that his family could possibly even see
But it would take an education for his destiny to be fulfilled it
It would take leadership skills
It would take management skills
He needs skills that he could not get in a slave camp
Skills a pharaoh’s son would receive
It didn’t look like it but God was working
It may not look like it!
But God is working!
He was making a way that others couldn’t see

JUST HAVE TO TRUST THE WAYMAKER!

TRUST THAT GOD COULD TURN THIS SOMEHOW FOR GOOD AS ROMANS 8:28 DECLARES!
In your life today – if you will trust Him you can find Him to be the waymaker just like everyone that we mentioned in the scripture
Unseen hands are working!
You may not see it but unseen hands are working!
Unseen plans are forming and unfolding!
You may not see it but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t happening
He’s working behind the scene to turn things for your good
To turn things around for your families
To turn things around for prodigals
To turn things around!
He’s working behind the scene on ways to bless you
He’s working behind the scenes on ways to provide for you
He’s leading others into your life you don’t even know about
He’s leading others into your life that will become answers to your heart cry answers to your prayers
He’s blazing a path beyond the dead ends
He doesn’t stop when it looks like it’s over
He makes a way!