Real Life Radio

Jack Hibbs: And you know how you know what I'm talking about if it's happened to you. You know that when He puts love in your heart for some person in your life that you couldn't stand before, and you wind up having this bizarre internal impulse that you're wrestling with. What in the world am I thinking? Am I freaking out? Who am I? What is going on in my life? I actually want to do my enemy some good. I need my head examined. And the Lord is saying, "That's me. Just do what I'm telling you to do."

David J.: This is Real Life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J. thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's word, the Bible. What do you do when heaven feels silent? When you've prayed, believed, even begged, and still nothing changes? When the person you love isn't healed? When the worst actually happens? When it feels like evil is winning? Where is God in all of that?

This May, Pastor Jack Hibbs’ featured resource is *Why Doesn't God Answer My Prayers?* by Erwin Lutzer. It's an honest, biblical look at the questions most of us are afraid to say out loud. Not shallow answers, but real hope and real truth, the kind that meets you right in the middle of disappointment and points you back to God's greater purpose, even when you can't see it.

If you've ever wrestled with doubt, confusion, or silence from God, this book is for you. *Why Doesn't God Answer My Prayers?* is available for a gift of any amount at JackHibbs.com/RealRadio. That's JackHibbs.com/RealRadio. Get your own copy of the book of the month, *Why Doesn't God Answer My Prayers?* by Dr. Erwin Lutzer, at JackHibbs.com/RealRadio.

On today's edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues now in his series called Disciplines of Life and a message titled Disciplines of Detail. You know, even the smallest of details can matter to God. And when we're faithful in the little things, He's faithful to trust us with the big things.

You see, faith builds in us a strong and effective life that God can use. The way we live, our habits, our prayer life, even our attitudes help shape our character. When things get hard or inconvenient, we have a God that is interested in every aspect of our lives.

So today, Pastor Jack teaches us that even when it's hard to see God in our situation, He is in it. When we get to know Him by getting into the details of who God is, we can trust that no matter what, He is always good. He's always right there. Now with his message called Disciplines of Detail, here's pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs.

Jack Hibbs: God's in the good stuff not to be appreciated for the reasons that we seek appreciation, but God is into the good stuff because God is good. He's good. And people will say things like this, and we'll talk about it more in a moment, but God who is good says the Bible. A person will come back and say, "Well, if God is good, how can there be bad?" I don't understand that question. Honestly, I don't understand the question. You can't have bad without good.

And by the way, if you've had a class on logic and debate, bad is once or was once good that's gone bad. If a person is a real weirdo, just a real strange weirdo. No, I'm talking weirdo. I'm talking about a person who's dangerous to the society. They'll kidnap somebody and they'll drive around the country with them and talk to them, and then it winds up what happens? They wind up abusing them and maybe even killing them.

Why does that happen? People will say, "How can God be, how can your Christian God exist when that happens?" I don't understand your argument. The funny thing is, if I listen to what you're saying, you're actually upset with the God that you claim not to believe in, for in your opinion, not doing something about it. Your very criticism announces that you believe in the God and you think He should do better than what He's doing.

When in reality, the whole Bible has built in the answer to that. A person who is out kidnapping and holding captive somebody and then winds up molesting them or killing them, where does that come from? It comes from good gone bad. Did you know that? They want to have a sense of relationship with someone. Now, you’ve got to admit it's sick and wrong and dangerous and godless. But their desire is something that was good and it went bad.

Good always has to be in existence before bad. It was very good in the Garden of Eden and then it went bad. Why? God did the good stuff and man comes along and does the bad stuff. But then somebody will say, "Well, then God made a bad man." No, God made a good man who chose to go bad. And therein is your dilemma. Doesn't have to be, but it is.

No one in this universe appreciates anything that is preprogrammed when it comes to a relationship. You are a person of individual choosing. You have a sense of sovereignty. You can choose who you will love and who you will hate or who you will choose to be with or not be with. The Bible tells us that God is in the good. In Psalm 27:13, the Bible says, "I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living."

It's the psalmist that says God's good. That's what kept my feet on Earth. And He wants us, listen, yes, of course God wants us to speak well of Him, not because He needs to hear that. It's because it is true. In the details, listen church, are you speaking well of God in your life? Well, no. Well, it's because you're not focusing on the details of God.

It's the small things. Is it not the details when Elijah is in the cave and the thunder comes, and the earthquake comes, and the storm comes, and all that stuff is going on and Elijah says, "Well, I didn't find God in all that stuff"? And then came the still small—I like to substitute voice for this study—the still small detail. It was the Lord.

He always speaks gently. He's always speaking softly. And if you don't take the time to listen to His details, you'll miss Him and you'll get caught up in religion. You'll get caught up into fanaticism. You'll get caught up in a mass movement of people all running in the same direction and they're all flying down the path. God forbid somebody should stop and say, "What are we doing?"

And yet God wants you to stop and say, "What are we doing?" The Bible says in James 1:17, "Every good and perfect gift is from God or is from above and comes down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning." Isn't that awesome? God's nature never changes. You can trust Him. He is good and He's in the good stuff.

All the good that happens in life. And I’ve got to tell you, I confess, I'll be the first to tell you, I rarely think to thank God for all the good. We made it here tonight, people. And if you're hungry right now, you'll probably satisfy that after service. You won't starve to death. And if you're broke and you don't have a penny in your pocket, guess what? We're not going to let you go hungry. You have clothes on. There's a roof over your head. You're comfortable right now. Isn't God good?

Last night, you guys, on my street, just my street, all the power went out. It was out for hours and then it was out again this morning. And you know what you start learning? Neighbors are out there with candles and flashlights last night. You know what you start learning? "Wow. God, thank you for things like flashlights, candles." Isn't it amazing? And it's kind of fun because you know, all the neighbors have their own different thing.

My one neighbor, he comes out, he’s got his popcorn. He had just got done popping popcorn and all the power goes out. He comes out, he’s got his popcorn and he loves fires. He loves a campfire. And he goes, "Let's have a campfire!" And my other neighbor to the north of me, he runs out to his truck because he was in his garage watching the Angel game. He runs out to his truck and turns on the engine so he can listen to the game. And he's in his robe listening to the Angel game.

It's just funny how people respond. But listen, all those things, whether expressed or not, they're thankful. They're thankful. And we're hardly thankful enough. I need to slow down and appreciate the details. Why? Because God's in those details and they're good. 2 Thessalonians 2:13 says, "But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you," Paul said to them, "brethren beloved by the Lord, because," and he goes on and I stopped right there. Because what? Because what? God is so good. We could write a book on that.

And in 1 Thessalonians 5:18, the Bible says, "In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." Man, that right there, look at that verse. 1 Thessalonians 5:18. We could go home right now. If we stapled that onto our head and walked around, can you imagine if we walked around here, we would see it's on everybody's head? "Oh, yeah. In everything give thanks." Man, that will change a life. Give this to your kids tomorrow. Put it in their lunch bag, if they even eat lunch bags like that anymore.

Give it to your wife, your husband, your girlfriend, boyfriend. Give it. What a great thing that is. "In everything give thanks." That will change your life. "Oh man, someone scratched my car!" In everything give thanks. I know this personally and it's great to be older now and I've already gone through all that stuff.

I remember buying my first new car when I was a kid and I'd go to the South Coast Plaza and park a mile out in the parking lot so nobody would park next to it. I had to walk to the mall as long as nobody parked next to the car. And then I took it to church. And at church, somebody drug a key across it. Let me tell you something. I came out of church. "Praise the Lord, man. Hallelujah!" Then I saw it. "What?!"

I was in the flesh that fast. And you know what? When I calmed down, took a couple of weeks, when I calmed down, I felt the Lord. I've never heard God say, "Jack." But I felt Him say, "That car is too important in your life." And He was right. What do you do with that? You're right. You're right. He's good. And you give thanks and everything. Yeah, you know what? I didn't walk home from church. I drove home in the scratched car. But I had a car to drive home in. We get all crazy and weird about stuff.

I thank God for this economic peril. It's all evaporating. We don't have nothing much left anyway. Praise the Lord. It's just anchored to our hearts anyway. It's messing us up. Guess what? Americans can live. Okay? That's if we focus on the details.

God is good. And listen, He's in the bad stuff, too. God's in the bad stuff. We always have to think of bad stuff. If you know God, is it really bad stuff? Feels bad, looks bad, smells bad. And if I didn't know God, it would be very bad. But I know God. He knows everything that's going on, so it ain't that bad.

Many Christians today have a pagan view of God. We would never admit that, but we do. Because listen, when you're lightweight in faith, listen, thoughts like this go through your head. "God can only be involved in the good stuff. He's not involved in the bad stuff. He's absent. He's nowhere. He can't be there." God's not involved in Iran. He's not involved in North Korea. He's not involved in what? What?

He's the God of the whole Earth. Oh my goodness. He's what? What are you so—you have some little fragile God. What kind of God is this you're worshipping? He knows all about the bad stuff. And He uses it. Listen, He doesn't create bad. Man creates bad. Satan creates bad. But God uses the bad to bring about good.

One of the greatest ways to test your culture. I know right now this broadcast is going out over a billion cultures around the world right now. 162 different countries right now. Different cultures. Listen, test your God or your gods. When a calamity comes, how do you act? The God that you worship, what has this God or gods that you worship embossed upon your heart when calamity comes? And you'll see that in how a culture mourns and how a culture grieves.

In our American culture, we've lost sight of God. And so now when people lose control, get hurt, get upset, get angry, they riot. Why? Because the Bible says where there's no God in your mind, every man does that which is right in his own eyes. Our culture has removed God from the public place. So what do you expect?

Listen, it's a double whammy. You remove God from the public square, and then you've been breeding your kids with the knowledge they're just animals from a primordial mudhole. They're just a big tadpole. And then we expect them to be civil. It's the biggest ridiculous contradiction in history. You cannot tell a kid that he's an evolutionary byproduct and expect him to clean up his room.

No, I'm serious. Why should he? Who are you to tell him that? He's younger than you. He can run faster than you. He's going to start working out and playing sports and he can beat you up soon. And really, it’s survival of the fittest, is it not? No, you have to act civil. Why should I act civil? I'm an animal. I've been hearing that for 13 years in school. 13. Did you count? Now when I go to college, 13, I'm an animal.

It's amazing to me. No, you're not an animal. Bambi's an animal. You are created in the image of God. Okay? That's why you have that struggle down deep inside. God's even in the bad stuff. Romans 8:38 says, Paul speaks to the church at Rome, he says, "For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth," isn't this beautiful? "Nor any other created thing," man, fill that in, "shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Man, you can almost see him "in our Lord." Boom! Booyah! Right? I mean, it's like, "Yes!" You can hear all those Italians going, "Yeah!" It's amazing. He's on a roll there, man. He's just nothing can separate us from God. That implies bad stuff. This guy was shipwrecked, left at sea, beaten on Malta. Remember he got bit by the snake? Just as the snake comes out of the fire and he bites him. That enough right there would enough—that would have freaked me out. Bitten by snakes, beat up.

The Bible says he was attacked by false brethren. Stoned. Not with drugs, with rocks. Stoned. Left for dead. The Bible says he was left for dead. Paul gets back up, walks back into the same city that just stoned him with rocks. What would you have done? They think they killed you with rocks. Maybe he did die. I don't know. Gets back up. Walks back into town. "My third point was..." Can you imagine? How do you stop a guy like that? To live is Christ, to die is gain. He was in the details. He's a man who lived in the details.

He saw God in everything. In the good stuff, the bad stuff, in the ugly stuff. God's in the ugly stuff. When I talk about ugly, this is what I mean by ugly. I'm talking about the stuff that requires death to ourselves. This is something that no other religion on Earth even pretends to believe in. Death to self. Hey, I'm not talking about strapping a bomb onto yourself and I'm not talking about jumping off some building. Death to self. Only the Christian understands that this is our God who in the details is in the ugly.

I call it the ugly because you know what the ugly is? Maybe you won't appreciate it, but I like it. It's this way. Living the Christian life is the hardest thing on the planet to do. Maybe that's why Paul said, "To live is Christ, to die is get me out of here." Why? Because we have a keen understanding, man, this is tough. There's people—I don't even understand how this works.

You guys, you're looking at a guy who was raised by a Marine who was raised to hate. And then Jesus comes into my life. And I remember freaking out over people I didn't like and was maybe this far from hating. And then I got Jesus in my heart.

And you know how you know what I'm talking about if it's happened to you. You know that when He puts love in your heart for some person in your life that you couldn't stand before, and you wind up having this bizarre internal impulse that you're wrestling with. What in the world am I thinking? Am I freaking out? Who am I? What is going on in my life? I actually want to do my enemy some good. I need my head examined. And the Lord is saying, "That's me. Just do what I'm telling you to do."

You take all the religions of the world tonight, and if you're an atheist this evening, which religion would you pick if you wanted to have a good nice sleep tonight without worrying about who's sleeping next to you? You think about that for a minute. The guy next to you could hate you, but if he's a Christian, it's like, "Man, I have to love my enemies." That's the ugly. That's denying yourself daily, the Bible says, and taking up the cross and following Him.

Mark 8:34 says when He had called the people unto Himself with His disciples, He said to them, "Whoever desires to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me." What kind of a recruitment program is that? Isn't that amazing? Can you imagine Tony Robbins? "Hey, this is Tony Robbins. Pick up your cross, deny yourself, follow me. I'm asking you to come and follow me with a life that you're going to surrender all your rights and you're going to live for the glory of God. And it's not about you, it's all about others."

Jesus went on to say, "Whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it." He's not talking about dying. He's talking about dying every day. Not die once it's over. To live is Christ, to die is gain.

As a Christian, listen, it's easier, you guys, truly, truly easier if tonight we were to die and go see Jesus. That would be easier than if the Lord said tonight, "Hey all you guys at Calvary, I know you love me. Hang in there because I'm not coming back for 30 more years." What?! Tell me what's easier. To die for Jesus tonight or to live faithful for the next 30 years? It's easier to die for Him tonight. You can only die so long.

The ugly stuff in life is stuff like this. It's when it's hard to see God in the situation. That's ugly. That's reality, man. Are you going through something right now and you're wondering, you want to kind of pound your fist because you can't see God in it? That's the ugly stuff. He's in that. You want to cry right now? You holding back tears? He's in that big time. You can't figure out the answer? Seems like the heavens are brass? It's an ugly time. He's in it.

What about the stuff, the evil stuff of life? If God is good, as I said earlier, people will say, "Then why is there so much evil?" But you can't have evil without good. Why's all what's with all the sickness in life? The Bible tells us Jesus said that when sin came into the world, it was Satan coming to rob and to kill and to destroy.

And what about the pains of life? Life hurts. I heard someone say recently, "My life hurts. Why is God so angry at me?" Isn't that a heartbreak? You just want to hold that person. God's not angry with you. You need to understand that. God is in the ugly. But you'll never know that. You'll wonder back and forth, "Well, what kind of a God is He? Who are you?" You will always ask that question until you get into the details of who He is.

David J.: Pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs here on Real Life Radio and his message called Disciplines of Detail. And we're awful glad that you're here today. You know, this message is part of Pastor Jack's series called the Disciplines of Life. It's a series highlighting the disciplines of the Christ follower and the high cost of sharing our faith with others. And we'll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio.

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Hey, thanks again so much for listening. And if you'd like to hear or see more of what we do here, you can always go to JackHibbs.com for all the latest on what's going on with this ministry. And please, if you're ever in the Southern California area, come see us at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills. We'd love to see you there in person. It has been so good to be with you today and I pray you find yourself in the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. See you on the next episode.

This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at JackHibbs.com. That's JackHibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in His word. We'll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.