The Struggle Is Real

We're kicking off a brand new series today. Everybody that we're calling In God we trust. So here's what we're gonna do for the next few weeks. We're gonna be talking about money. Somebody say money. Whoa. Sit Sit down. Sit down. You cannot leave even though we're going to be talking about money. Look at your neighbor real quick and say, Stay in your seat. This is going to be good. Tell them. It's going to be good. Tell them. Tell them. Tell them. Tell them. Some of y'all are angry already. You've already checked out. I can see it on your face, you're already checked out. Here's what we must understand about money. Is money is one of the leading causes in our culture of stress, anxiety, depression, divorce and suicide in our country. Let me just share a few statistics with you that absolutely alarmed me when I studied them out. Credit card debt in America has skyrocketed, reaching a staggering $1.14 trillion 66% of Americans say that they're living paycheck to paycheck, including the 36% of Americans who are considered high income earners of more than $250,000 a year. That's a bad day, everybody. 37% of Americans report not being able to pay an unexpected bill of $400 if it were to come in today, 50% of married couples with credit card debt report money being the primary source of argument. Nearly two thirds of all marriages start in debt, and 1/3 of the people who argue about money as the top source of contention report hiding expenses from their spouse so as not to further the argument. How many of y'all know the struggle seems real. In fact, it got so quiet in this broadcast location that I know the struggle is real. I know nobody's looking around right now, but the struggle is real, and that's the title of this morning's message. The struggle is real. And while that struggle is real, one of the major issues, I think, is that most churches don't talk about the struggle our church included. And so I'm here today to own up to some stuff, and we're going to step into some things that many of us try to shy away from. We've been quiet when it comes to the issue of money. But here's the issue with it, the Bible isn't quiet. Jesus isn't quiet when it comes to talking about money. In fact, he talked about money a lot, and the Bible talked about money a lot. So we say a lot, and you can check these facts if you want to, Jesus talked about money more than he talked about heaven and hell combined. The Bible references money more than 2300 times, which is double the amount of references to faith and prayer. Somebody say, Shazam, if money is causing so many issues in our lives and in the lives of the of our loved ones, and it's an issue that the Bible addresses as much as it does, then I believe that it's our responsibility to address it in our church as well. I believe that God wants to address money because, well, he addresses money in the Bible, and I think he's done with his kids, his sons and daughters being lied to, cheated and stolen from. And I believe that during this series, God wants to help us uncover some lies and reveal some truth about money. Many of us have lived our lives bamboozled, thinking that money or our financial situation is going to get better or worse depending on who's elected in November. Can I tell you something ain't happening? Because as much as we would like to blame our issues on the officials in office, the reality is, the problem, the struggle, is within us. Yeah. It's within us. It's a real struggle, and I believe that it's time for the church of Jesus Christ to settle the struggle and align our lives according to the Kingdom of Heaven and the promises of God. I believe that it's time for us, the Church of Jesus Christ, to put our trust back in God, because I believe that God wants us to settle the struggle. In fact, Psalm chapter 12, verse five, says this, But the Lord says, Now I will arise. The Lord, I will arise, and I'll defend the poor, those who are plundered, the the oppressed and the needy who groan for help. I will spring into action to rescue and protect them. How many of y'all know that's a good day when God says, I will spring into action and come to your aid? That's a good day. Some of y'all are saying, Well, Pastor, man, I don't have any money issues. Imma, I'm going to talk to you in a minute. Everybody is involved here. We truly believe that this is a season where God is wanting to come through on behalf of his people, and as a church, we wanted to be a part of that as well. So what our kingdom builders came together and did is we want to provide a free gift for every single family in the life of our church, because we don't want to just talk about something. We want to put our money where our mouth is. And so our kingdom builders came together, and we decided we want to get everybody in the life of our church a gift, a free gift, anybody like free stuff. Okay, so we're not just going to talk about it, we're actually going to do it. We're going to provide it for you. So on your way out today, you'll receive a card just like this. It's got a QR code on one side, a QR code on another side, and what you'll have access to is Financial Peace University. You'll have access to the every dollar app, and you'll have access to Ramsey. Plus, if you were to go and purchase these on your own individually, it would exceed 220 ish dollars per year. Okay, if you decided, hey, I'm going to package them together, Imma get them all together. It's around 130 $140 a year. But here's what we're going to do. Our Kingdom Builder said, we want to cover the cost for every year for the people who will use it in the life of our church. How many y'all know that's a good day? Everybody that's a good day. That's a good good day. But they didn't stop there. They said, Pastor, Matt, let's, let's provide something so that we can get people going. Okay, so here's what we're going to do. We're going to host a dinner on Friday, October the fourth for everybody who is available to come, okay? Childcare will be provided. It's limited, so you're going to want to sign up soon, and what we're going to do is we're going to have a session that evening to teach you. How do we use these apps? How do we how do we begin to budget according to the kingdom, what does this look like? And again, some of you might say, Pastor, man, I don't need that help. Maybe you're the one that needs to be in the room to provide some help for somebody else. Then don't count yourself out. You are not. You still have some responsibility. Let's just say that, because I'll tell you one of the greatest things that ever happened in my life. I was 19 years old. I had moved from Hastings, Nebraska, to Rockford, Illinois. I was, I was staying at a host home that opened their home for me while I was doing my internship program, my ministry program in Rockford. And I remember I went shopping, grocery shopping with with the mother of the house, and she said, Matt, you pick out whatever you like, and you know, just get whatever you want. And so I picked out a few little things, and I thought, I don't have any money. I had no money at the time, and my only experience up until that moment was you had to be real careful what you got off the shelf and what you didn't. You know what I mean. And I remember, 19 years old, I had never one time been to the grocery store where my mom wasn't either checking like looking at her check register, thinking, oh, man, is this gonna how's this gonna do? Or she wasn't saying, hey, take this and put this back. Hey, take this and put this back. Anybody familiar with that? Not one time in 19 years, and I watched item after item after item after item scan. Miss Sherry didn't even give it a second thought, she just pulled out her checkpoint and wrote a check. Covered the whole cause. We didn't have to put one thing back. My mind was blown. My world increased so much. I realized for the first time in my life, people live like that. They don't have to put items back. They don't have to say, no, they don't. There's money in the account that covers the cost. And I was like,I believe that there are some Jimin and Sherry kitzmills in this church that have the means and the ability to show people what it could look like to. Live under the blessing of God in their lives, and so you not. You need not count yourself out from this opportunity that we have on Friday the fourth I would love for you to be a part of it. Maybe, maybe, just maybe, you'll end up being a financial mentor for somebody so that 10 years from now, they are not strapped in debt. They're not holding out hope for the next elected official to change their circumstance, but the principles of God can be their trust. Come on, everybody. You believe that isn't that amazing. So on the way out, you'll get those free gifts, and all of that will be made available to you. Thank you, Kingdom builders. We honor you and are grateful for you. Okay? Let's pray. I felt all the air leave the room. It got hot in here. It's like stuffy people like, money, money. Oh, hey, can I say one more thing, if it's your first time? Obviously, I think all of our location leaders told you we don't want you to give if it's your first time here. But I'll say this, if you've been coming for any amount of time, and today just happened to be the first time you gave, and you're like, Man, I don't want to go to a church that talks about money like this. Do us a favor. You can email our operations director. Her name is Robin, R, O, B, y, N, Robin at Mercy city, dot church. If today was the first time you gave and this doesn't sit well with you, please email her and ask her for a refund, we will issue you a check. Okay, does that sound good? Everybody, come on. We do not want your money. We do not need your money. We want you blessed, and we believe that the kingdom of heaven needs you blessed. Okay, that's the bottom line. Does that sound good? R, O, B, y, N, at Mercy, city, dot, church, let's pray. Father, we love you. We're so grateful for the wonderful opportunity we have to be in your presence. God, we don't take it lightly. It's a big deal. So we pray today that by the power of your Spirit, you would help us identify the truth of the matter where the struggle really lies, that you would help us see Jesus in a more real, clear and powerful way than we've ever seen him before, because we know it's upon. We know it's upon revelation of who Jesus is that you'll build and establish your church. So God, build your church, establish your church in a way that only you can in Jesus, Mighty Name, Amen, amen, amen. Come on. Everybody give Jesus a big hand clap. Come on. Come on, somebody say the struggle is real. And while I believe that this statement is true, I do not believe that the struggle is what we think it is. I know I just spent, you know, the last seven minutes talking about money, but the struggle isn't actually money. It's not dollars and cents, it's not mortgages, rents, gas, electric bills. It's not about insurance or retirement or taxes. It's not about any of that. That's not what it's about. Although those things are as real as the chair that you are sitting in, they aren't the struggle. The struggle is where we put our trust. Matthew, chapter six, verse 24 says, No one can serve two masters, for you will hate one and love the other. You'll be devoted to one to despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money. Somebody say the struggle is real. Here's the struggle. Everybody. Do I trust Jesus Christ? Do I trust God as my master, or do I trust my money or myself or my motive, patience? The struggle is real, and if I'm honest, the enemy doesn't care whether or not you put your whole trust in your career, your business, your endorsements, your GPA, your future hope. He just cares that your trust is divided. You could give 1% of your trust to your business venture. You could give 1% of your trust to your bank account, your retirement, you can give 1% of your trust, and the enemy is okay with that, because he knows if he can get your trust divided, whether it's 1% 50% or 100 he knows if he can get your trust divided, he can make you fall. In fact, the Bible says in Matthew chapter number 12 that a house divided against itself cannot stand, and the kingdom is divided will surely fall. And I know that most of us in this room today would say this race we're running with Jesus. Man, we want to finish strong. We want to see it through to the end. Right? Of course we do, but the struggle is still real, and even while the struggle is real, I'm here to tell you that there's a light at the end of the tunnel. His name is Jesus. We simply need to fix our eyes on the truth. Love of who he is and where he is. The only way to do that is to fix our trust. See, I don't know if you need me to share a bunch more statistics, but the reality is, as Americans, our trust is divided. Many of us put our trust in ourselves. We put our trust in all of these different things, and it's why we've gotten ourselves in the position that we're in. What we need to do is train our trust. See, like when we receive Jesus, we think that all the blessing of Heaven is just going to fall out of the sky. Well, I put my trust in Jesus, so automatically, I'm just going to trust I'm going to wake up tomorrow. Imma trust him. No, you're not. Trust. And no, you're not. You're probably going to trust in your ability. I'm going to wake up in, you know, three weeks, and I'm going to put all my trust. No, you're not. No, you're not, because where God reveals Himself, the enemy will attack you, just like anybody who's ever been married before. You know that that honeymoon might last a week, but when you get home, the real world sets in, baby, it's time to work, and the only way to really work is to work. And work is spelled T, R, U, S, T, trust, trust, trust. Somebody. Say, trust. So here I've got three tips to training your trust, because it's going to require training. Trust isn't going to fall out of the sky tomorrow. You didn't just show up to city impact today, and now, boom, trust is on. You know you're going to have to wake up tomorrow and you have to train your trust. Y'all ready for it? You want to see what they are, train your trust. Here we go. Step number one, tip number one, trust in the Lord. Somebody say, duh. I mean, we're at church, right? This seems pretty basic, pretty elementary. Like, okay, Pastor Matt. Like, you're gonna go do the little Bible Study Lesson with the kids. Trust the Lord? Yes, of course. But why is it so doggone hard for us to trust the Lord? Why is it so hard? Proverbs, chapter three, which is where we're going to be today. If you have a Bible, you can open there. We'll look at verse number five. First. It says, Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not depend on your own understanding. Somebody say, all your heart. Oh, my goodness, you know what this word all means? Very good. You guys, wow. We got a church filled with scholars. Man, yes, it does mean all, but it's used specifically to refer to the whole, the whole. Now we say all, and I think it's easy for us just to think, well, all of it, like all of it, all of it, the whole thing, the whole quad, I'm talking about the whole 100% I'm talking about not 1% in my business, not 2% in my endorsements, not 5% in My GPA. I'm talking about whole, the whole 100% do you do? I trust in God with all the whole 100% of me, this word heart, you want to know what that means, the center of you, the center of life, in fact. So it's the way that you think, it's the way that you feel, and it's the actions that you take. Do you do i This is a question we've got to ask ourselves. Do I trust in the Lord with my whole being, or is my attitude? Well, rise and grind. Because if your attitude is rise and grind, then you are putting your trust in somewhere someone else, other than Jesus. Now if Jesus leads you into that grind, guess what? You're going to say, rise and shine. It's Jesus time. Y'all hear what I'm saying. Come on, everybody, you don't have to work an extra day to make up the to make ends meet. You don't have to do the extra next thing. No, no, you put your trust in the Lord and in your in the Lord alone, nothing more, nothing less. It's your trust in the Lord Jesus. That's it. And do not depend on your own understanding.Trust in the Lord somebody. Say, trust in the Lord. When you trust in the Lord, verse six goes on to say, seek His will in all the whole. Thing. Seek His will in all that you do, and he will show you which path to take. Come on you want to know which path to take. Seek His will in all you do. So many of us as believers, we're well, I don't know what God wants me to do. I don't know where he's leading me. I don't know what he's saying right now. It's because we seek our will before his will and we put our trust in our stuff before we put our trust in his stuff. Is it wrong or bad to have stuff? No, it's not, but it's wrong or bad to put our trust in anything other than Jesus, seeking anything other than Jesus and His will first, there's confusion. It's probably an indication that you're not trusting the Lord somewhere, the enemy is okay with you. Even if you only gave 1% of your trust to your budgeting, even if you only gave a half percent to your job. He's okay with it, because he knows if he can keep you divided, then you'll stay off the path that God has for you. Trust in the Lord. Let me say, Trust in the Lord. The second thing, the second tip to training our trust. Second tip to training our trust is, inquire of the Lord. Inquire of the Lord. Proverbs three, verse seven says, Don't be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil. Look at this word impressed. Can I tell you something? What you're impressed with is an indication of where you might put your trust. So every time I find myself impressed with something, someone, I've got to slow down and I've got to ask the Lord. I've got to inquire of the Lord, Lord, am I impressed with them? Or am I impressed with you? Am I impressed with the amount of money I was able to save, or am I impressed with you? Am I impressed with what I was able to purchase? Or am I impressed with you? Am I impressed with the thing, the stuff, the deal, or am I impressed with you? And I've got to honestly look myself in the mirror and see where my impression lies. Don't be impressed with your own wisdom. Well, my wife, when we had that argument, man, I said, this got her shut her up. Are you impressed with that? That means you've put your trust in someone other than the Lord that deal, that business, that church you planted 10 years ago, is going really well, launching multiple locations. You're proud of yourself, patting yourself on the back. Are you impressive? Or are you impressed with the impression he's made on you? Dog God, I know that's tough stuff. Man, in city impact, it's not always, yeah, it is. It's always like this. It is. It is, because here's the deal, we ain't coming to church to play games. Man, we are coming to church to be transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are coming to church to be changed so that our life is different today than it was yesterday, so that I become the man, the Son, the husband, the father that God's called me to be, and so that you can too. And if we're not willing to look ourselves in the mirror and wrestle with the questions, what impresses me, why am I so impressed with this? It's not that it's not okay to be impressed with things or people or places or accomplishments, it's just not okay to be impressed with them. First, y'all hear what I'm saying. So inquire of the Lord. Inquire of the things that impress you. When you find yourself impressed, you say, Okay, Lord, is this from you, or is this me? I need to know, because I don't want to move forward with anything that is not impressive to you. I don't want to lean into my own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil. This word evil, it's tied to everything that's not impressed with the Lord. First, dog gone. Well, what about if it's not too bad, if it's not the Lord first, it's evil.Do my own ideas, my own ideals or idols impress me, or even as bad, do other people's ideas, ideals or idols impress me? Are my wants and desires being shaped by someone else's life, maybe projected by the image that they display on social media? It, or what a news anchor might say, or a news outlet or a TV show tells me that I should want based on what they want or what they believe. We all have to be willing to inquire when we find ourselves impressed, to slow down, be with the Lord and ask him. Why am I impressed? And will this slowing down? Will this test withstand the voice of God? Then the Bible says, then slow down. Don't be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear God. Turn away from evil. Then you'll have healing for your body and strength for your bones. I believe that this is a season where God wants to supernaturally heal people's bodies, and it's when we get our trust straight. I know that theologically, some of y'all don't believe that God can heal anymore, but I'm here to tell you he can, and he does and he will, but he can't protect and guard and guide us. He wants to arise on our behalf, but he can't do it if we're putting our trust in anything other than him. I believe God wants to supernaturally heal bodies. I believe that God wants to supernaturally heal minds. I believe that God wants to supernaturally heal us in our soul. The things that have vexed us and kept us, you know, turn up and just kind of crazy and, ah, in turmoil. God wants to heal us, and this is how it happens. Don't be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord. Turn away from evil. Then you'll have healing for your body. Hear me. Hear me. Hear me. Hear me. I didn't say when you bring your money to the church. I said when you put your trust in the Lord, when you're not impressed with your own wisdom, that's when it happens. Don't twist the message. Don't hear something that I'm not saying. This is not $1 and cents issue. This is a trust issue. Inquire of the Lord. Last, but certainly not least, number three tip for training your trust is honor the Lord. Somebody say, honor the Lord. Honor the Lord. Verse nine says, Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything you produce and go check your Bibles. Don't just, don't just trust what I'm putting on the screen. Go check your Bibles. Make sure it says that because I did not write this, I'm just reading it. As cool as that would be, I did not write the Bible. I just read it. Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the best part of everything that you produce. Pastor, man, I don't have any wealth,
or I've got so much I feel like that might be flippant, and it goes against every business practice and wisdom that I have. Ah, what's that indicate? Trust Issues? Trust in the Lord don't depend on your own understanding. Honor the Lord with the best part of everything that you produce. You know what you're doing when you honor the Lord with the best part of everything you produce, you're telling him, I trust you. I'm making more money than I know what to do with, but I'm trusting you first, and God, you tell me what to do, and I'll just make it happen.
I don't have any money to do anything, and you never will if you don't learn how to trust the Lord first, honoring Him with everything that you produce, then He will fill your barns with grain and your vats will overflow with good Wine. See, the enemy tries to convince us that if we withhold and hoard, then our barns and our vats will be full. That's count of the kingdom culture. God says when we honor him first, that's when we're full and overflow, and that's why so many believers are living in this place where we're vexed. See that happen for some people, but not for other people. I don't know what what you're doing God, and the enemy's just sitting back having a heyday with life. Did. He knows, if I can keep them divided in their trust, they'll never flourish along the path that God has formed to flourish. Don't, don't get this twist. It's not about money. It's about trust. It's about trust. Where have you put your trust? For some of us, the struggle has been so real. Some of us, the struggle has been hard. Others of us, the struggle has been in the blessing. There was a season, a long season, where the struggle for me was just hard. Many of you know my story, man, I didn't grow up with any means. My parents divorced when I was 12, lots of just lots of dysfunction. I told you that story. When I turned 19, my eyes opened, and I just began to see things a little bit differently. And I just began to wonder, God, do you want to do something different with my life than what I had always experienced growing up in the trailer park? And God said, Yeah, so for the next 20 years plus, we just battled through this thing trying to break the cycle of poverty that was attached to my life. Learning as we step along the way, God, I trust you. I trust you. I trust you. Fast forward to the point now where we're celebrating life. Everybody. We just had three kids move out of the house, yay. It's a partial celebration. It's a little teary, too. Those of you who have kids move on. I wouldn't say that with them in the room, though. So pastor Carrie and I looked at each other a couple of months of months ago and we said, hey, we got a little money we could do some stuff with, but we wouldn't be able to do all of what we wanted to do. So we want to do some updates to our house. We're not necessarily living in our dream house right now, but, but we want to do just a little bit better with the house we're living in. Uh, be nice to go home and not feel like I was taking a step back in time to 1993 you know, and and so we're just kind of looking at each other and and thinking, Oh, be cool if we were able to do X, Y and Z. So we started looking at a few little things, and we got a lot of equity in our home because we bought it in 2020 right? You know, the whole, the whole deal with, like, yeah, you know, so, so, so we were thinking about just pulling a little bit of equity out to do some handful of little things. One of them that I wanted to do is, I want to make it at home office so we can free some more office space up here for our team that's growing. And I thought, Wow, that's a that's a good thing. And so we just started looking at it. And we thought we could totally do this within our means. We're not stretching too far. We're not being flippant anything like this. And so we asked the Lord, Lord, what do you think about this? Crickets? Man, didn't say a thing. And so we did what all solid believers did. We just pushed right past and said, Okay, we're gonna start finding out what it takes to do this. God didn't say anything. He must not care. How many of y'all know that God speaks to the things that he cares about, and if he's not speaking, he probably doesn't care about what you are putting value on. So we pushed past and there was nothing on paper that would have indicated we wouldn't be able to do what we were trying to do. But came back a couple of times. Now I can't do can't do this. We need this. We need that. We need this. Like, okay, starting to be pretty hard. What are we doing? So we keep pushing and keep pushing. We're like, let's do this further. We get into it. We're just continue to push. Continue continue to push. Man, we had a series of crazy things just happened. Our washer and dryer both broke at the same time crazy. Our water softener broke, and it sent those little salt pellets through every water pipe in our house. So we had to call the plumber out in the tune of a lot of flipping money to clean the pipes out so we could have water. I had to come up here for five days and shower just to get a just to get a dang shower. Thank God for that. But anyway, we had two emergency room visits. We never go to the doctor. I was walking out the door one morning to go to work, and pain hit me in such a way that I was doubled over. Could not stand up and guys, I'm telling you, I don't go to the doctor. I told my wife, I got to go to the doctor. To figure out what's going on. They ran all the scans and did all the stuff that doctors do. Doctors are amazing. They could not find a thing wrong with me. Pastor, Matt, did God break your washer and dryer? Did God make you sick? No, that's not how God works. God works by covering us when we trust him, but when we don't trust him, we have to cover ourselves. So God looked at me and said, Son, this is what it looks like when you have to cover yourself. I don't know about you, but I don't want to cover myself. I want to be covered by the shadow of his wings, and I want to honor him in all I want to trust the Lord. I want to inquire. I was going to all my friends' houses, and they had nice stuff. And I thought, finally we get to have nice stuff. Our kids aren't going to tear everything up. And God said, now's not your time, because I said two things to you at the beginning of this year. He told us personally. He said, I want you to give radically, and I want you to save aggressively. He didn't say anything about updating our house. Come on, God. But how many of us have gotten outside of what God wants from us and not kept our trust in Him? First, here's what this morning is. This morning is a call to come back into alignment with trusting God. First, inquiring of God most and honoring him always. I'm standing because I'm preaching, but I'm standing because I need to respond to this call. And I'm going to ask those of you who would say, You know what, Pastor Matt, my trust has gotten out of alignment from God, and I want to put my trust me back in alignment today. Just stand with me. If that's not you, you don't have to stand. But if that's you, would you stand with me in all of our rooms, in all of our rooms, in all of our rooms. Angelique and the team are going to lead us back into this song. It's called I trust you, and I just want you to lift your hands. Just declare this over your life. Declare this over your family. Declare this over your legacy. Declare this over your household. Declare this God, I thank you for the people who are responding and trust today, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ that we would see you for who you are, that we would surrender our lives and that we would always and forever operate and trust God. Thank You that you're so good. You don't hold this against us. You just said, come back into alignment with me. So God, show us what it is to come into alignment with you in the way that we trust, that we might put our trust.