I Am, Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. I'm not trying to make you feel small. I'm trying to tell you that you are small.

And that's a big old difference. And any preacher that stands up here and tries to motivate you by making you feel big is actually being against what the gospel tells you. He doesn't want you to see that you are. He wants you to see that he is. And that's why he said, my name is I am not you're going to be. Welcome back to Summit Life with pastor, author and theologian J.D. Greer.

As always, I'm your host, Molly Vitovich. You know, I think we all have days when we feel insufficient. We don't feel smart enough, not strong enough, talented enough, whatever the case may be. But did you know that the Bible says in our weakness, God is especially strong. That's good news. And that's our subject today as Pastor J.D. concludes a powerful study we've been in called The Name. If you've missed any of the previous messages, you can hear them all free of charge at jdgreer.com. Now here's Pastor J.D. with the second part of his message titled, I am.

All right. So Exodus 3, as you're turning there, I'll explain that Exodus 3 opens up with Moses as a pretty discouraged, defeated man. Insecurity is a voice inside of you that whispers, I am not blank enough. Here's a question for you. What is most often going in that blank for you?

What's most often gone in that blank? I'm not blank enough. I'm not good looking enough. I'm not athletic enough. I'm not smart enough.

I'm not young enough, funny enough, spiritual enough. In the age of Instagram, these feelings of insecurity are heightened because no matter what you do, it's always easier to find somebody doing it better. Here's a statement by A.W. Tozer that we've looked at every single week.

That's sort of kind of been a core here for our series. What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important and the most defining thing about us. The most determining fact about any man or woman is not what he or she at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives of God to be like. The most shaping determining factor on the trajectory of your life, on your emotional stability, on where you go and what you do is what you conceive of God to be like. It's not how much you work out.

It's not how much education you have. It's not even the family that is around you. It is what you think of God to be like. You're going to see that that phrase is especially true when it comes to how Moses is going to deal with these insecurities that he has. Notice how God, by the way, deals with Moses's insecurities. He did not reinforce Moses with positive thoughts.

He did not say, Moses, you've underestimated your talent. Moses, here's a mirror. Look into the mirror and repeat after me, my name is Moses.

I am a bad man. Now close your eyes, Moses, and visualize yourself walking into Pharaoh. Experience the feelings of taking Pharaoh down. None of that pop psychology garbage. Simply, I will be with you because real confidence in life comes not from competence. Real confidence in life comes from the assurance of God's presence.

You want to know how you can go confidently in the next phase of your life. It's not that you're uber awesome. It's that God is omnipresent. Verse 13, Moses said to God, suppose I go to the Israelites and they say, I say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you. And they say, well, what is His name?

What will I tell them? Verse 14, God said to Moses, I am who I am. That's what you're to say to the Israelites.

I am has sent you. He was there before it started. If you could go back to the beginning of the universe, however it began, you would see that He would be there. He is eternal.

He is unchanging. He is always and forever. He is the source that gives life to everything else. He is there in the middle of it, holding it all together, and He will be there when it all ends. I've told you every once in a while, we just need to try to wrap our minds around, even though we can't do it, try to wrap our minds around the size of God.

And I believe that God, not accidentally, gave us an open theater where we could think about it every single night. The I am, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, that God has sent me to you. This is my name forever. This is the name you shall call me from generation to generation. You ever, ever just call God I am? Hello is, you are, you will be, you always are. Moses said to the I am, but I am, I've never been eloquent.

Neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue. We have this image of Moses being like Charlton Heston or Christian Bale, and he speaks with a deep Val Kilmore-esque voice. That is not true. That either means that he had a speech impediment, he stuttered, or he had a really small mousy voice like Pee Wee Herman for you children of the 80s.

It was not impressive. And the Lord said to him, who gave human beings their mouths? Moses, who makes them deaf or mute?

Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the I am? The revelation of God's name as I am is going to show you three vitally important things about your relationship to God. First, I'm going to explain it. It shows you how you encounter God.

I'll show you that. And the second thing is the I am, the name I am is going to give you a ground rule, an important ground rule that's very counter-cultural for Americans, and how you know God. And then the third thing is I am shows you what knowing God will actually do to your sense of self-identity.

Okay? Number one, I am shows us how we encounter God. Typically, we do not encounter God through a lifetime of philosophical reasoning. Instead, we encounter God through an experience that we have where we're simply confronted by the fact that He is and that He is speaking.

He just is. Many times that encounter begins as it did with Moses, like with an unanswered question. Moses had it with the burning bush.

He turns aside. It says to investigate it. God did not resolve the mystery of the burning bush. Instead, God spoke out of the bush and says I am. A burning bush today is an unanswered question that leads you to ask questions out of which God begins to speak and say I am. For some people, it's the mystery of the cosmos. That's a burning bush that asks a question that you then go to. It's not enough in itself, but it leads people to ask a question that God then says I don't necessarily resolve the issue, but I'm going to tell you I am. For other people, the question is less philosophical. It's more a longing they feel in something like the birth of a child.

And you look at that and you say that's not just a group of colliding chemicals. That's a burning bush that suddenly He speaks and says I am. Here's my question for you. Have you had this kind of experience? Maybe it wasn't this dramatic, but see the book of Ecclesiastes says that God has put eternity in your heart which means He's put a restlessness.

He puts unanswered questions. Those rest feelings of restlessness, those questions, they're burning bushes. You look upward and you have questions. You look inward and you sense longing. That's Him.

And you know there's more to life than just in love and consciousness than just biology and colliding chemicals. When you turn aside like Moses did and you listen, you'll find Him, the great I am, speaking out of that. So it shows you how you encounter Him. He is and He speaks. Here's the second thing. I am, the name I am gives us the ground rule for knowing God.

It gives us the ground rule for knowing God. I am who I am means by contrast I am not who you define me to be. I am who I am means this is who I am.

I'm not who you think you want me to be. That's what kids do. My daughter, my second daughter is of the more imaginative variety let's say. And when she was five or six years old she had, we always called it Ali's world because at any given point she was just you know kind of, and in her world everything was perfect. In fact there was a guy over at our house and he was kind of messing with her and he says, hey I'm in Ali's world. And she's five years old.

She looks up and she says, how did you get in here? Everything in her world is like she wants it to be but it's what a kid sees. It's not real.

It's not real. You are kind of like that with God as you've got this God that makes you feel like oh I'm comfortable but it's not real. The theology from above means I am who I am and that God who is cannot be reshaped or edited or debated or refashioned. You either receive him for who he is or reject him. All right third, knowing God's name.

Knowing God's name as I am, number three, transforms your identity. As I mentioned to you Moses was really insecure. He had personal disabilities. He had a speech impediment. He had personal failures. He killed an Egyptian and been rejected.

Because of those things he had a lot of personal doubt. In fact scholars say that when Moses says in verse 11, who am I? They say that in Hebrew you can see that that is a reflection of the same question that the Jewish people threw back in his face in Exodus 2 the first time he come to deliver them. When he showed up they're like who are you Jack?

What are you telling us what to do? Right and so their doubts about him when he repeats that question shows that the doubts they have put upon him he has now taken into his own identity. Has somebody criticized you for so long that you've actually started to believe it about yourself? Maybe it was a mom or a dad. Maybe it was a sibling.

Maybe it was a boss or a friend. But you started to believe it and so you are someone who feels I am incapable and I am insecure. Interestingly Moses's insecurities kept him from seeing that God actually had prepared him quite well for this task that was in front of him.

I mean think about it. Moses had spent the last 40 years in the wilderness leading sheep. That was the same wilderness he was going to lead the children of Israel through and they were going to act like sheep.

And he was going to know every water hole and every danger and he knew that place like the back of his hands. Plus he'd spent all that time in the Egyptian palace which meant he knew about laws and codes and obviously knew how to read and write and that's how we get the first five books of the Bible. God had done a pretty doggone good job of getting Moses ready. But Moses couldn't see that because he didn't realize that the I am God had been with him every step of the way. There are some of you that are so consumed with your failures and your disappointments and doubt and because you're not sure that God has been with you that you can't see that God has actually worked very carefully in your life in every disappointment, every pain, every tragedy because he's been preparing you for something. And my challenge to you is what if you just look back through the rest of your life and said everything that happened for good or for bad whether it felt wrong or right that there was a God in that who was shaping me for something he had prepared me for.

You would find it would change you. But here's what's interesting. God doesn't use that line of reasoning with Moses.

It's true. He just doesn't bring that up. All God says to Moses when Moses says, but God who am I? God just looks at Moses and says, who are you? It doesn't matter who you are. It matters who I am. Moses said, but I'm not eloquent. I'm not smart.

I'm not successful. And God says, I got enough of all those things for the both of us. I didn't choose you because you were those things. In fact, I don't really want the guy who says, oh, I know why God chose me because I'm awesome because you're just going to clog the line. God wants an open vessel that he can pour his power through and an open vessel that'll give him the glory. So he chooses people that are broken. He chooses people who feel insufficient because they're the ones who are the ones who will allow him to work through them.

And they're the ones who will give him the glory. You're listening to the final message of our study titled The Name here on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. If you've missed any portion of this teaching series, be sure to visit jdgreer.com and catch up right away. And while you're there, you can check out a daily email devotional from Pastor J.D.

that's delivered straight to your inbox. Couldn't we all use encouragement first thing in the morning to remind us of God's love for us? I know the busyness of life can quickly choke out any joy we feel in our walk with God. So why not cut those weeds away each morning with a word from the Lord? The devotionals even follow along with our current teaching here on the program so you can stay plugged in regardless of your schedule.

Sign up for this free resource right now at jdgreer.com slash resources. Now let's return for the conclusion of our teaching series. Once again, here's Pastor J.D. Paul said in the book of First Corinthians, it's not many mighty, not many wise, not many strong, not many wealthy that God chose to build his kingdom through because if he chose the mighty and the wise and the strong and the wealthy, when it was all done, they'd say look how awesome we are and look at what we did for God. And God said, I ain't having none of that. I want somebody who's going to give me the glory so I am the God of very unpromising unpromising material. Feeling inadequate is a prerequisite to being used by God, which means you feel adequate, you feel awesome, you feel like I'm confident. Hey congratulations, you just earned yourself a seat off of the bus of the people that God is going to use because God chooses the weak.

He chooses the unpromising material. You may not be, but he says I always am and my amness will overcome your notness. But God, I'm not very good. I am. God, I'm not very skilled. I know I am. God, I'm not sure.

I'm not a confident or a steady person. I know I am. Oh, but God, I'm not able to live a victorious Christian life.

I didn't ask you to. In fact, there was only one person in history who ever lived a victorious Christian life and he was so good we named it for him. And now that one has come to take up residence in you and it's not about you living it for him, it's about him living it through you.

It's not about who you are, it's about who he is. I know that you bring into this place all kinds of inadequacies and deficiencies and worries and insecurities and scripture says, yep, and you know what? You don't even know the half of it.

Oh yeah, you don't know that. You're so weak you cannot even guarantee that you'll be around tomorrow. So weak and so small and so frail, the book of James says, that it's a sin for you to speak over confidently about tomorrow because you're like a wisp of smoke, James chapter four. You're like a blade of grass, James chapter five.

The slightest shift in wind direction, the slightest change in temperature and you're gone. In the scope of the universe you are so small and insignificant and frail and pitiful that you don't amount to a grain of sand on the ocean floor. I know you're thinking, man, I am so glad I came to this talk. Man, JD, thanks for making me feel like nothing. Thanks for making me feel small. I'm not trying to make you feel small. I'm trying to tell you that you are small, okay?

And that's a big old difference. And any preacher that stands up here and tries to motivate you by making you feel big is actually being against what the gospel tells you. He doesn't want you to see that you are, he wants you to see that he is and that's why he said, my name is I am, not you're gonna be. You know what it means?

It also means you don't need to sweat anything because the one who's calling you is named I am. Who could possibly be smart enough to figure all this out? I am.

How am I supposed to know which way to go? I am. Who can I trust? I am. I'm not really sure who's on my team. I am. Nobody's listening to me. I am.

My marriage is crashing and I don't know where to turn. I am. I had always hoped for a marriage and kids and a family by this point in my life but it seems like that time has passed me by. I am.

I'm 50 years old and I feel like I'm starting all over. I am. Everybody thinks I can't do it. I am.

What if I fail again? I am. I'm not sure I believe anymore. I am. I've given all I can give and it's not enough. I am.

I'm pouring into everybody and nobody's pouring into me. I am. I can't hold on. I am. I'm tired. I am.

I quit. I am. I need a drink. I need a fix.

I need a hit. I am. I need a lover. I am. I need a fresh start. I am. I just need somebody to hold me and tell me it's going to be okay. I am.

I am. In the Gospel of John you see Jesus do the most curious thing with the name I am. He takes it. He starts applying it to himself in all these strange ways.

He makes things that simply don't make sense. You know before Abraham was, I am. But then throughout the Gospel of John he takes that same name and he starts declaring it whenever we have a point of weakness and he starts attaching something to it. So to those who feel in darkness he says I am your light. To those who thirst I am the living water. To those who feel lost he would say I'm the way.

To those who feel confused I'm the truth. To those who feel under the curse of death I am the life. To those who feel insufficient I'm the good shepherd.

To those who need a fresh start I am the door. To those crushed by guilt I am the resurrection and the life. And so to the unrighteous he says I am your righteous covering. To the powerless he says I am your defense. To the empty I am your fullness. To the dead I'll be your resurrection.

And to the defeated he says I'll be your hope. Now listen knowing that you know now what God's name means, knowing what it is, I want you to think about a command, one of the 10 commandments that you've always known but you probably never have applied in the full sense of which God wanted you to apply it. It is the third commandment where God commands us not to take his name in vain. That was always taught to me growing up as don't say oh my God or don't write omg because we know what that means. Don't say good Lord or don't say Jesus Christ as an exclamation and that's true. But a friend of mine points out that this is not just a command on how to use God's name. The command specifically is about how to take God's name.

And here's the example. In times past there was a girl named Veronica Marie McPeters and on the greatest day of her earthly life she became a career. And when she took my name she became a part of me. She became one with me. And everything that I had became hers. All the possessions I had became hers. My future became hers. My earning potential or lack thereof became hers. My future family became hers. Everything that was mine by past, my present, my future became hers. So there was no more your and mine.

It was simply ours. When you became a Christian, think about this, you took God's name I am. Which means the properties of the I am became yours because you became one with him. And that meant that what he has you now have. You became literally Peter says a participant in the divine nature itself. That nature is now inside of you. You became the apostle Paul said an inheritor of all the divine promises.

All the promises of God Paul said are yes in Christ Jesus because Jesus earned them all and he became one with you which means they all became yours. And that means that when you feel fear and when you feel insecurity or you say no to God or falter in obedience or cower before an assignment because you think but I am not blank. You are taking his name in vain because though he you are not he always is and you are one. And when you say but I God I'm so stupid. God I'm a loser. God I'm such a failure.

God I know I'm a terrible mom. God says I'm not any of those things. And if I am in you then you are not either. What I am you now are because you and I became one and there's no more your mine it's just ours and I'm not those things so stop taking my name in vain.

When you feel fear when you feel insecurity when you feel insufficient you are violating the third command because you are trampling on his name and you say I am not therefore you must not be either. And God says yep you are not that's why I chose you but I am. You say but God I'm so dysfunctional. He says yet I am so complete. You say I am so deficient. He says but I am so sufficient.

You say I am so doubtful. He says but I am so faithful. You say I am so sinful. He says I am so graceful. I am so weak but I he says am so strong. Whatever you're not whatever you need whatever you didn't get from your parents or your teachers or your boss whatever you're not getting from somebody else he says to you I am. And that means that when the pharaohs in your life say to you who do you think you are you say I don't think I'm anything but I know the great I am. And when the haters in our own hearts whisper to us you are not we shout back you are right you are right but he is and now I am in him which means that all the promises of God and all the possibilities are mine in Christ Jesus.

So my challenge to you is name your security in your insecurity and write it out I am not blank but then you write right under that but in Christ I am blank and you put the opposite of it. I am sufficient. I am fully supplied. I am more than a conqueror.

I am undefeatable. I have everything I need for the task that is ahead. Which leads me to one final correction I want to make in this series on a statement I've given to you every week. We started this message with it. The statement that A.W. Tozer made that what you think about God is the most important thing about you.

C.S. Lewis read that about 50 years ago read that statement that A.W. Tozer made and he said this I've never seen this a friend of mine pointed it out to me look at this C.S. Lewis I read in a periodical the other day that the fundamental thing is how we think about God he's talking about A.W. Tozer's quote because A.W. Tozer and him were born a year apart so they were contemporaries by God himself it is not so not every day you get a C.S. Lewis A.W. Tozer smack down listen how God thinks about us is not only more important it is infinitely more important indeed how we think of him is of no importance except insofar as it is related to how he thinks about us I'm not telling you that it doesn't matter what you think about God obviously that's the whole series but I'm saying the most important thing that you understand about God is not just who he is but who he has become to you the fact that he is glorious not just in the heavens but he is an I am that has given you all the things that belong to him and united himself with you that when you were a sinner and you had no righteousness and you deserve to be cast out of the presence of God he said I will be your righteousness and Paul said the same God that gave us his righteousness when we were his enemies will now give us the power that we need for every assignment he puts in our path which means that if I'm not a great dad it's okay because he is and he'll be that through me it means that if I'm not a great moral Christian it's okay because he's going to learn to live that victory through me it means that if I'm not a great preacher and teacher it's okay because he takes a willing and a weak vessel and he pours his power through it the gospel is not that you are awesome the gospel is that you are lost and the gospel is that he is and so his amness overcomes your notness because the two of you unite what it means to walk with God is not that you become somebody that is superman it means that you learn to yield yourself to the I am who begins to work through you so Paul would say even when I am faithless he is faithful because he cannot deny himself because the work that he has started in me is his work and he will do it and I'm not dependent on the awesomeness of Paul I am leaning on the grace of Jesus Christ the great I am and with that we've reached the end of this important study called the name you're listening to summit life with JD Greer and if you'd like to hear any part of this series again you can find all the messages online at jdgrier.com we'd love to send you a very encouraging new resource today it's a set of three small guides that will help you to pray for your kids your parents or your community in 21 different areas and situations there are five different things to pray for in each of the 21 areas so you can use each of these booklets in a variety of ways you can pray through the set of five things each day over the course of three weeks and then start again or you can take one of the prayer themes for the week and pray one point every day from Monday to Friday we'll be glad to send you this resource bundle to express our gratitude for your financial support when you give to summit life you make it possible for us to deliver these daily bible teachings and all of the other resources on our website donate by calling 866-335-5220 that's 866-335-5220 remember you can also request our resource when you give online at jdgrier.com while you're there you can also get a variety of digital resources including a free downloadable prayer resource you can get instant access to one of the prints just by signing up for our weekly email list be sure to join with us and subscribe right now by visiting jdgrier.com i'm molly vidovich and we'll see you again friday when we're kicking off a short but brand new teaching series about prayer don't miss friday on summit life with jd greer today's program was produced and sponsored by jd greer ministries