The Healing Word

Pastor Jack Morris: Have you ever heard anybody say, it can't be done? God's that opens the Red Sea. He raises the dead. He moves mountains. But we have a problem. Can't be done. But it can be done when it's given over to God and it's in God's hands. How big is God?

I'm sure the answer to that question varies a great deal depending on one's thoughts, feelings, and attitude toward our Creator. But is there a way to measure that in our individual lives? Join Pastor Jack Morris as he reflects on the story of Gideon and analyzes key principles that can determine how much God is a part of our daily lives.

How big is God? Today, I'm going to help us to analyze our faith in God. I'm going to try to do it in the most practical way I know how, but each person as you listen, you can determine, if you think with me and keep thinking, keep your thoughts where I'm going, follow me, you can begin to determine or actually fully determine how big God is in your life.

We're going to use the example of Gideon, how Gideon was moved from a man who was a coward, who didn't believe. Well, he did believe to some degree, but not to the extent that God wanted him to. But God mercifully, gently, but very forcefully, moved him into a position where he could do great exploits in the name of God. So here the Word of God, hear His Word in your heart and be built up into the Most Holy Faith.

There was a group of people called the Midianites, who attacked Israel. They just descended on Israel, enslaved Israel, and brought Israel into subjection to their way of life. It was a devastating time. But you know, we all have Midianites trying to enslave us, bring us into a different way of life, other than the Christ Way of Life.

And God knows about the Midianites in your life. We all have Midianites attacking us. But the wonderful thing is, God is aware, He knows. Your Midianites are problems, difficulties, fears. These Midianites attack you and try to bring you down to a lower level, to their level, to the lowest level.

But God knows when you are attacked by your Midianites, and He's going to lift you and encourage you through His Word and through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit that brings Jesus to our hearts. So, how big is God? Well, that's impossible to know, isn't it? How big God is. Big enough to create the mighty universe, yet small enough to live in my heart.

How big is God? That's not the good question. Here's the good question. How big is your God? Okay, we're going to look at this today. A small God. If I wake up in the morning and I go out to face the day, and I have a diminutive God, a little God with me. I will live differently that day.

I'll live with fear. I'll just wonder, when I'm going to work, what's this day going to be like? Am I going to make it home okay in the evening? Are my children going to make it back all right? I'm just so concerned and so worried. Anxiety, I just feel unsafe. I just feel like everything depends upon me.

I'm not talking to anybody here today. You just feel that everything depends upon you, and you're about to break under it. You're a Christian, but you got a little tiny God. Your God, you're not letting Him do what He's supposed to do, what He wants to do, to be as big as He wants to be in your life. You have a small God.

Now, if I have a small God, I'm going to be reluctant to pray when difficulties come. I'm going to be reluctant to pray because I don't really think that prayer is going to matter that much. I really don't think that God is going to help me that much. I know God is in my life, but this particular situation, I think I've just got to weather it through.

Your God is shrinking. If you feel insecure when you go out in the day, you feel intimidated by people. That you are wondering if people are going to accept me. That you feel just inferior. You've got a little God. Still with me? Okay.

Now, if you have a little God, you are more apt to say things and do things that you wouldn't otherwise say or do because you do not think that God sees into secret and He's not hearing what you're saying. He's not seeing what you're doing. Your God is far off somewhere. And so I can I can flip out, say a few things that I shouldn't say, be un-Christian, think some bad thoughts. It really doesn't matter a whole lot because I don't think He really is looking at me that and paying that much attention to me. You got a very little God.

So you may say things and do things that you wouldn't otherwise say or do. And you would more likely pray without faith. You would worship without awe. You would serve in the church, but you wouldn't serve with joy. You'd try to get out of it as quickly as you can.

There wouldn't be any joy in Christian service, not very much. And you would suffer believing that you're always going to suffer. You would suffer without hope. Now, let's look at this man Gideon. He's one of the most spectacular men in the Bible. Gideon had fears.

The Israelites were conquered by the Midianites. That's their problems. When I speak about a Midianite this morning, you think that that's a problem, that's a difficulty, that's a fear, that's something that's getting you down, that's something that is hurting you. You and I all, we all have Midianites. But these Midianites were literal Midianites. They were an army of them, a whole nation of people.

They attacked Israel. The Scripture says they they descended on Israel like a swarm of flies. And the Israelites fled. They fled to the mountains, and they hid in caves. They dug holes and got down under the earth. You run from your problem because your problem is chasing you.

You're just being driven by it, and you can't get away from it. Your problem is so big, and you're just trying to cover up and hide somewhere. Your God isn't there to help you. You've got to do it all. Either you do it, make it work, or it just doesn't do and it doesn't work. Everything depends upon you.

Now, Israel felt that way. They felt, if we ever get out of this terrible mess we're in, we're going to have to do it ourselves. But we can't do it ourselves, so let's run and hide. So they hid in caves, and they hid in holes. For a long, long time, the Israelites didn't pay any attention to God. They just did their own thing, went their own way, lived their own lifestyle.

Yet they were the chosen people. Oh, God, you chose me to bless me above all the people of the earth? Yeah, that's exactly how they handle life. I'll live my own way, I'll do my own thing, I'll come and go as I please. I know what the Bible says. I know what the Bible teaches.

But I'm just not going to pay any attention. And that's exactly what Israel did. For years they lived paying no attention at all to God, and now the Midianites came upon them and conquered them. And now they cry out, "Oh God, we're living in caves, we're living in holes. Our life is a mess. Get us out of this slavery that that we are now living in."

So, this is what happened. God is so merciful. God came to them even when they ignored Him. So they said, some voices were coming up out of a hole in the ground where some Israelites were. Some voices were coming out of caves where some Israelites were. But God heard them, even though they they ignored Him when they were prospering.

But now they're not prospering, they're calling on God. But God is merciful. This is what God did. He chose a person. He chose a man. When God is going to do something big, He usually does it through a person. And He chose a man, and He chose the most unlikely man in all of Israel.

This this man was a nobody. He was a a no-thing. He was nothing. And here comes the Angel of the Lord. This is the pre-incarnate Jesus, before He was called Jesus. Sits down under an oak tree, and He looks over there, and there's this man who dug a hole in the ground, Gideon, and he's threshing wheat down there in that hole, hiding from the Midianites because if the Midianites saw him, they would go at least, the least thing they would do would to take the wheat and let him go ahead and starve.

And he wouldn't thresh the wheat on top the ground, on the threshing floor, because again, they they would see him. They would thresh wheat at a threshing floor on top the ground, so the wind would separate the chaff and the wheat. You don't do that underground, there's no wind there. But when you're afraid, you know there are some people they they live all their life afraid? They're just living with fear, so insecure.

And so the Angel of the Lord speaks to him and says, "Thou mighty man of valor, great warrior." Gideon is, "You talking to me? I'm scared to death."

I'm a coward. And he was. He was the biggest coward in all Israel. Now, Gideon's self-image, that's the view that you have of yourself. He begins to point out all of the reasons why he can't do it.

I don't have the strength. I don't have the time. I don't have the money. I don't have the know-how. I don't have, I don't have, I don't have, I don't have. God is not saying what you don't have. God is saying, "Look at me, what I do have. And what I do have, I'm going to give to you. That's what I'm going to do. I will be with you."

Well, you know, that's what makes the difference. In every problem in your life and my life, you and God always make the majority. Just the two of you. You're winners when you have God on your side, and God is indeed on your side. You see, what is unthinkable, what is unstoppable, God can handle it. God can do it because God is God.

Now, here was Gideon's first challenge. He had two of them. Here was the lesser challenge. Gideon was told by God, "First thing you need to do is to go strike down the altar to Baal. The Israelites are worshiping at the wrong altar. They're serving the wrong God.

They're servants to the, we become servants to our problems. We we serve the problem. We serve the difficulty. We serve the the broken relationship. We handle it altogether differently. We act different, we talk different in in those relationships." But so he said, "Go and tear down that God, that altar to Baal."

Now, Baal worship was a terrible worship. It it was sexual immorality. It was baby sacrificing. Hundreds, thousands of babies were sacrificed to Baal on that altar. It was an altar of superstition. And so God says, "The first thing you need to do, Gideon, you need to get to the altar yourself. Get out there and tear that altar down."

Whatever that is that's governing your life, that's causing you to be the man you are, get rid of it. Confess it. Repent of it. Strike it from your life. Tear down that. Now, here's the kicker. Israel built that altar to Baal. The Midianites didn't do it.

It is so alarming when Christians, serving the Lord, will allow things to become into their lives, almost imperceptibly, imperceptibly. And those things, those difficulties, those problems, begin to take front and center. The problem controls them all day long. The the difficulty has captured their thinking, and they can't think of anything else.

And and so, now something has come around and come between you and God. And you have allowed that to happen. You have allowed it, you didn't nip it in the bud. You just allowed that problem to continue to grow, to continue to grow, that difficulty to continue to grow. Some people, even people who are in poverty, are so concerned about money that they don't have it, but money is the focus of their life.

The focus of their attention. Whatever you dwell on the most, that has become your idol. So you've got to bring that thing down. Confess it to the Lord, this relationship, this problem, this difficulty, this fear, whatever it is, you've got to bring it down. You, you, you have to bring it down.

You can't wait. God says, "Go out there and tear the altar down." Now, the Midianites didn't build that altar. Israel, the chosen people of God through which the Messiah was to come, allowed that altar to be erected. So Gideon takes 10 men.

Now, here here here's even this is even worse. It was Gideon's own dad who built that altar to Baal. He wasn't a true Israelite. He wasn't one time. It was Gideon's own dad. Now, Gideon has to go against the family.

I've heard people say, "Well, you know, my family can't go to that church because my family was raised in this church. I I can't do that because that would that would disturb my family." Your family now has become more important than God. Where is God in your life? Is He first? Is He center? Is my focus on the Lord?

So Gideon had to go against his own father, his own family, and the men of the town that he lived in. You know, when God starts talking, God, listen. God will accept nothing but first place in your life. He will not take the crumbs from your table. He demands your heart, your all. And if you don't give Him that, He's not going to take anything.

Don't let anything, not even family, become between you and God. Put God first. Put God first. So Gideon said, "Okay, I'm going to give it a try. I'm I'm going to go out. I'm going to take two men, 10 men with me, but I'm going to do it at night when nobody can see me. I don't want people to see me going into that church. I don't want to see people carrying me carrying a Bible or saying grace at my meal where I work. What will those people think of me?"

Well, they curse and use four-letter words all day long in front of you, and they don't care what you think of them. Thank you, sir. You know I do better when I carry the Bible, don't I? So Gideon goes out at night. He didn't want anybody to see him. But you know, the next morning when he got up in the morning, and his dad saw what his son had done, tore down the altar of Baal.

Do you know what Mr. Gideon Senior said? He said, "Well, if Baal is really the true God, He's big enough to take care of himself. Let's see what he's going to do." Now, that was the first test. Now here here comes the big one. Here comes the big one. Gideon, are you ready for this?

The big test is deliver all of Israel now. Now that you've got the altar down, there's nothing between you and God. Your focus now can be upon God. This is the big test. And you know what what Gideon said? He still had a have a difficult time. Now, God's going to be patient with you. He's going to be gentle with you. He's going to grow you in a very nice way.

But you're going to have to make some sacrifices along the way also. And so when God spoke to Gideon, and God said, "I will be with you. I will strike down the Midianites as one man." Gideon said, "Well, let me put out a fleece. I want a sign. Not your word. Your word's important, of course it is, but your word isn't quite enough. I want a sign."

So he he takes a piece of hide of a lamb, and he puts it on the ground. And he said, "Now, God, let let there only be be dew on on this on the on the fleece. When I get up in the morning, the ground all around it, I want it to be dry, and I want only the fleece to be wet." He got up in the morning. He picked up the fleece, and he he wrung it out, and the dew just dripped out of it.

God said, "I told you I was going to do it." Well, God, one more thing. "Tomorrow morning, I'm going to put the fleece out." God said, "Gideon, get out of here!" Why did God mess with us like He does? But He will mess with us, won't He?

Gideon said, "I'm going to put the fleece down again. This time, I want there to be dew everywhere, but the fleece to be absolutely dry." So he he gets up in the morning, and the fleece was dry, he tries to wring it, nothing comes out. I mean, God takes us so gently. I don't know why He does, but He's a He's a Daddy to us all, isn't He? He's a He's a Father to us.

There wasn't there wasn't one thing that Gideon was doing that was positive, that had any faith in it whatsoever. Such such ridiculous praying that he prayed, not trusting the Word of God, but these little ridiculous Mickey Mouse signs. He's he's putting God to the test. And why God would along with it, I don't know, but God did go along with it.

So Gideon goes out and he recruits, listen to this, 32,000 men. He's got an army now, 32,000. He counts them, "I got 32,000." But the word came back, they have 135,000. Wow! 32,000 going up against 135,000. Gideon was outnumbered 4 to 1.

Bad odds. Bad odds. What we might say is Gideon had number problems. He had number problems. So God spoke to Gideon and said, "Gideon, I want you to speak to all your men and tell them, those of you who are afraid, go home. Just go home. It'll be okay. I'm not I won't get mad at you. Just tell them to go home."

22,000 went home. He only had 32 to start with, but when he started out and he said, "You had 4 to 1," well, you'd almost need an atomic bomb to to beat that those odds, 4 to 1. And then when it's 13 to 1, you'd need a hydrogen bomb. And then when he got it all the way down, Gideon only had 300 men.

They have 135,000. He didn't need an atomic bomb. He didn't need a hydrogen bomb. He needed God. God said, "I want you to see what I can do, Gideon. I want you to see what I can do. I'm not going to share my glory with another. I'm going to be glorified in this."

Still too many. 450 to 1. That's what it came down to. For every one Israelite soldier, the Midianites had 450 soldiers. 450 to 1. Impossible odds. Have you ever heard anybody say, it can't be done? God's the opens the Red Sea. He raises the dead. He moves mountains. But we have a problem. Can't be done. But it can be done when it's given over to God and it's in God's hands.

Guest (Male): Knowing that God is there in the midst of your problems and continually placing your faith in Him are keys to overcoming the troubles of this world. If you don't know Jesus and have not accepted Him into your life, I encourage you to pray and simply ask Him to come into your heart. He knows who you are. Before we go today, here is Pastor Morris with a word of thanks and an invitation.

Pastor Jack Morris: Hello friend. It's a pleasure serving the Lord with you in this healing ministry. The Scripture says, "He sent His Word and healed them." And it also says, "The entrance of Your Word gives light." Because of your prayers, just knowing that you're out there praying for me and sending offerings to keep this on the air, it brings me great joy and encouragement. God bless you for what you are doing.

Guest (Male): If today's message strengthened your faith, we invite you to stand with a healing word through your prayers and your generous support. Every gift helps us take the gospel to more people who desperately need to hear that Jesus still saves. Join us tomorrow for another healing word message.