Foolproof Discernment [Part 2]

Allen Wright, pastor, Bible teacher, and author of his latest book, The Power to Bless.

If you want to trust God, the way you're going to do that is to wrap His steadfast love and faithfulness around your neck and inscribe it upon your heart. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series Foolproof, as presented at Reynolda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Allen Wright Ministries. So as you listen to today's message, go deeper if we're happy to send you today's special offer. Just contact us at PastorAllen.org, that's PastorAllen.org, or call 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. We'll have more on this special offer later in the program. But now, let's get started with today's teaching. Here is Allen Wright. And we went in, and there was nobody in the room, but there was obviously signs that somebody had been in the room. And the radio was on, and you could see some things. It looked like the bed had been disturbed a little bit. And she said, you need to call. You need to call downstairs right away and see what's going on.

I picked up the phone, and I've been married for two days, and I picked up the phone. I said, excuse me, somebody has been in our room. And as I was talking on the phone, I looked down, and I thought, how strange that intruders would leave mints on the pillows. And she said, it's just our nightly turndown service, or we'd be glad not to do that.

Oh no, we like mints. Never mind. See, if you've stayed in Motel 6 your whole life, and you finally go to your first nice hotel on your honeymoon, you don't have enough experience to know what's going on. You're calling up and complaining about the nightly turndown service.

I know they got off the phone and muffled their laughter, get off the phone up there, they're like, another newlywed up there, right? Lean not on your own understanding, because how much understanding do you really have? How could you possibly know the right path in life of your own limited perspective? So while the culture just crying out, all you need to do is believe in yourself, and trust your heart, and follow your own path, Proverbs 3 comes in and says, now the key to life is trusting in the Lord with all your heart, and leaning not on your own understanding. It becomes a matter of profound trust in God, and all personal, physical, and emotional health depends upon trust. God is more committed to leading you than you could ever be to either leading yourself or trying to discover the right.

It begins at verse 1, my son, this is a father speaking to a son, which is a picture of the father in heaven speaking to us, my son. You know, if you're a healthy parent, you love your kids, what you ask of your children, and the discipline that you bring to your children is not for your benefit, it is for theirs, right? I mean, I didn't do this perfectly, I mean, there were times as a dad that you're tired, you're frustrated, you're exhausted, and you're spent, and you tell your children to do something, and it's not really for them, it's just for you, and sometimes you discipline out of frustration. But on the whole, though, because I love my kids so dearly, I could truly say that at every juncture, I just absolutely wanted the best for them, and I think they understood that. They understood dad's not perfect, but he absolutely wants the best for us. When you do understand that, then trust can be born. This is the heart of God towards you.

I'm just saying as an earthly father who has his ups and downs, I wanted that for my kids so much. How much more does a perfect heavenly father who has all power and authority and all wisdom and all insight, how much more so does he want to make your path straight? He does not grow weary or faint, but he gives power to the faint. To him who lacks might, he increases strength. He is the giver of wisdom to all who call upon him, and he is teaching you all the time. Jesus called the Holy Spirit the parakaletos, the helper, and said he is the spirit of truth, and he will teach you, and he will remind you of all these things. In other words, God is so committed. Beloved, listen to this. He is so committed to taking you on the straight path that he has come to take up residence in your life mystically so that as you are yielded to him, you live a spirit-led life.

Hallelujah. It means that when you mess up because he is the one who came to save you rather than condemn you, he is very quick to help you get back on the right path. I remember when the GPS systems first came out, and a preacher friend of mine had the beautiful comparison.

This is the way the Holy Spirit is. You know how you can get the directions you're driving along in the car, but maybe you're a little preoccupied, and the voice comes on and says, Turn left and 500 feet, and you're just kind of cruising on, and you're fiddling with the radio or something, and turn right, turn left here, and you just drive right past it. And, you know, it'd just be funny if they'd come back on like they should and say, You are an idiot. You're on your own now.

I gave you fair warning, you know. But instead, the voice comes back and says, Rerouting. And the thing about being rerouted in the GPS system is you don't have to go back to where you started and then start all over again. Instead, you get rerouted from where you are.

It might not have been the originally scheduled route, but there's a new route that'll get you to your destination. I used to think of God much more as one who was like, You know, I'm going to give you a couple directions, and if you miss it, then sorry you know about that, but you really blew it. And instead, I just see Him now as my Father. You know, my kids messed up so many different times, and they stumble, you pick them back up. If they're taking the wrong direction, you help them get going in the right direction, because you love them, and you want them to have a straight path in life.

You don't want them wandering needlessly. And this is the heart of God. God is so committed to you that He's got a Father's affection. That's Alan Wright, and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. Ever feel like something's holding you back, as if you lack an important key that could change everything?

Is there someone you love who seems stuck? You'd like to help them, but how? What's missing? Blessing. We all need a positive, faith-filled vision spoken over our lives. You can learn how to embrace the biblical practice of blessing through Pastor Alan Wright's new book, The Power to Bless, which quickly became an Amazon number one bestseller after its recent release. Until now, the hardcover book has only been available through retail sales, but this month, Alan Wright Ministries wants to send you the book as our thank you for your donation. When you give this month, you'll not only receive the bestselling book, but you'll also receive a free five-session video course in which Pastor Alan teaches how to bless and covers content not found in the book.

The video course includes a detailed study guide perfect for personal growth or small group discussion. Make your gift today and discover the power to bless. The Gospel is shared when you give to Alan Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org. Today's teaching now continues.

Here once again is Alan Wright. I think that for so much of my life as a Christian, I thought that trusting him was more like I've got to do something to overcome my pitiful, fleshly tendencies and my feeble faith. I've got to somehow battle against that and come up to be one of those more trusting people, like one of those great saints of the faith that has all that trust in God.

And I realize it's just not really that way at all. Trust is a much simpler process than that. The only thing you don't realize is how much trust is in every day of your life.

You know, when you shake somebody's hand, the origin of that gesture was from ancient times when people would put out their hands to show that there wasn't a weapon in it. And so every time you shake a hand, you're just saying there's a gesture of trust that's taking place here. We trust people in astounding ways. Anybody's ever gotten on an airplane?

Do you have any idea how much trust you have with strangers that are going to take you up into the air? The funniest of all, of course, is going to the doctor. It's amazing how much we trust the doctor. Somebody puts on a white lab coat, walks in the room, and they say, I would need you to take off your coats. We say, okay, take off all my clothes, all right. They'll tell you to get in certain positions that you'd rather not get in. And we say, okay, doc. Sometimes people go in there, and you're going to have a procedure done, and they say, we're going to give you just a little bit of this medicine, and it's going to make you feel a little sleepy. And then you're not going to remember a single thing that we do to you for the next hour.

We'll be in complete charge. And we're like, okay, how much do I owe you for that? It's an interesting study that was done. Two strangers are in the study, and the first one is given $100 and told you can give it to stranger number two. And if you give it to them, it quadruples, and they get $400. They will be advised that you gave them the $100 so that theirs would be $400, and they have the option of giving you half of it back, which would be $200. So you could end up with $200, but they're under no obligation. They could just take the $400 and walk.

According to every normal economic principle, the person who received the $400 would just walk. But you know what they found? Interestingly, most people didn't. In the first place, most people gave the $100, and most people sent back $200 of it. We're surprising really how much we do trust people. In order to trust someone, I believe that at least three things are essential.

One, you have to believe that person is for me, has my best interest in mind. If you don't believe that, you won't trust anybody, and you shouldn't trust them. If you don't think they have your good in mind, I wouldn't trust them. You have to believe that person in some way has something to offer me, is better at something than me, has some skills, some knowledge, some experience, or something.

If I'm going to submit to them, they have some wisdom, or they have some skills, or this doctor can do something, or whatever it might be. And thirdly, you have to believe that person is reliable, that they don't have some fundamental flaw that will distract them from being able to carry out what they would like to do, and that is to help you. And so it means if you're having a hard time trusting God, that is probably one of those three things, and almost all spiritual warfare in one way or another is attacking one of those three beliefs. And maybe you just have a hard time believing that God is good, and that He's really for you because you've been through a lot of difficult things in your life. Or maybe you've been kind of reared in the notion that God's more like one who just wound up the world, and He doesn't have much to do with it, so He really can't help you.

Or maybe you just think He's just unreliable. But until you understand that God is for you, and how much He's for you, and that He is actively pursuing your best interests, and that He is utterly and completely consistent, until you understand those things, you can't really trust God. So the key to trusting God is to come to a greater and greater revelation of the goodness of God. I think at verse 3 in our text today, it says, Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you, but bind them around your neck and write them on the tablet of your heart.

I think it's a key to this text. And the majority report from the commentators would be this, that this is referencing you and your own steadfast love and your own faithfulness, and that you should really cling hard to this as principles of life. But there's a minority report, and I'm certainly in it, that says no, this is referring to God's steadfast love and His faithfulness. And the reason I believe this is the case is because these are two of the most important covenantal concepts in the Hebrew Old Testament. Steadfast love is chesed, chesed.

It is without description in the English language because it means unconditional, covenantal love that is seated in choice and rooted in a self-generating love, not because of the performance of the recipient. And emeth is the truth and faithfulness that is found in a covenant. And I think what the Proverbs are telling us here is that if you want to trust God, here's the way that it's going to happen. You take the steadfast love of God and the faithfulness of God and let it just be like a necklace you wear.

Let it be something that gets down into the deepest place of your heart. Well, meditate upon, fill your life with the good news of the steadfast love of God. In other words, what Proverbs is showing us long before Christ ever came is that the key to trusting God is the good news of the gospel, that the way in which you will have your trust for God grow is not by some technique of your own, but instead the meditation upon what God has done for you.

In fact, the more that you can fill your life with the awareness of what God has done for you through His cross and His resurrection, not only the more will you love Him, but the more you will trust Him because what it means is that you are in a relationship with Him and trust is born out of relationship. This is where trust is fostered. Duke University researcher explained this succinctly in an interesting TED Talk when he said you can just imagine like as a parent what your most precious possession is, your kids.

And so let's imagine this. He says that you got to get some babysitters. I mean, you got to get a babysitter for a night for your kids. And there's a 16-year-old girl that lives down the street that you know, but she doesn't have any babysitting experience. And then there's a 32-year-old woman that's been recommended to you. You read about, but you don't know it all.

And you don't really have any references on this, but she's got 15 years babysitting experience. Who do you choose? Well, most people don't choose the 16-year-old. They don't even know that they know, but doesn't have any experience.

Why? Because relationship trumps it. Have you ever noticed this like this strange phenomenon? Like maybe you've been in an airport or something before where you're sitting there and you might just talk to somebody for about two or three minutes and you got all your luggage sitting there and you go, I need to run to the restroom. And you can just turn to the person and say, would you mind watching my stuff for just a minute or two? Well, you've known them for like 30 seconds, which is strange to say to them, will you watch my stuff until I'm getting ready to go away? Because what you're basically saying is, if you want to steal my stuff, now would be a good time for you to take it. But we actually would trust them a little bit. And you know what actually happens? People tend to watch your stuff and feel like you got.

Why? I'm just saying even the smallest relationship begins to build trust. But as your relationship grows, trust grows.

Proverbs 3 is talking about a relationship with God. It's talking about a trust relationship. And the more trust that you have, the deeper in the relationship that you go.

Right? Intimacy is born out of our trust. And then the more intimacy there is, there's more trust.

Nothing will build trust more than recognizing that someone is for you. Like imagine that you're at a dinner table, this one Duke University researcher said, speaking about trust in this TED Talk, and he said, imagine you're at a restaurant at a table and the server comes and one person says, do you recommend the chicken or the fish? And the fish is a lot more expensive than the chicken. And imagine the server says, well, honestly, the fish is pretty pricey, but it's really not that great.

He said, but this chicken dish here is excellent. And you realize that he's not trying to pad his own tip, but he's just being honest because he cares about you getting a good meal. What happens, they do some research on this, the other people at the table immediately begin to trust the server for other recommendations. Because if you would put your own interest aside on behalf of someone else's interest, I can trust you.

So what would happen if you came to know a person who had laid all of his own interest to the side in order to benefit you? I tell you what would happen, you'd become like the apostle Paul in Romans 8, who says, what then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? What Paul is saying is, if you want to trust God, the way you're going to do that is to wrap his steadfast love and faithfulness around your neck and inscribe it upon your heart so it becomes the meditation of your life, it becomes the glory of your praise, it becomes the inspiration of your day, it becomes the food for your spiritual life every single day to think much of the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We do not base our decision on the goodness of God, on whether we're having a good day or a bad day, whether the medical report was a good one or a bad one. We base our belief in the goodness of God in Jesus Christ, because he did not spare his own son from death on my behalf.

And nothing can ever change that. And because nothing can ever change that, it means that I am forever loved, even when I don't understand what's going on in the life around me or the things that I might go through, I know this, that I am loved by God because he came in the person of Jesus Christ. That's what Paul is saying. Therefore, he says, who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It's God who justifies us.

He's not the one who condemns us. He says, therefore, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

For I'm sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ the Lord. That's a man who just trusts God. And what happens is that when your trust grows, your yieldedness to God increases. And in that, you hear his guidance. Trust in the Lord with all your heart.

Lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him. And he'll make straight your paths. And that's the gospel.

Alan Wright, in today's teaching, foolproof discernment from the series, simply titled, Foolproof. We've got more with Alan here in the studio as he shares his parting good news thought for the day. I invite you to stick with us here back in just a moment. Ever feel like something's holding you back, as if you lack an important key that could change everything? Is there someone you love who seems stuck? You'd like to help them, but how? What's missing? Blessing. We all need a positive, faith-filled vision spoken over our lives. You can learn how to embrace the biblical practice of blessing through Pastor Alan Wright's new book, The Power to Bless, which quickly became an Amazon number one bestseller after its recent release. Until now, the hardcover book has only been available through retail sales, but this month, Alan Wright Ministries wants to send you the book as our thank you for your donation. When you give this month, you'll not only receive the bestselling book, but you'll also receive a free five-session video course in which Pastor Alan teaches how to bless and covers content not found in the book.

The video course includes a detailed study guide perfect for personal growth or small group discussion. Make your gift today and discover the power to bless. The Gospel is shared when you give to Alan Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support.

When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org.

Alan, we're here in the studio and with our parting good news thought for the day at the conclusion of this teaching, but the series is going on. I want to kind of hone in on that last thought there about trust. I mean, so somebody says, I trust God.

I got that part. How do I really hear and know I'm hearing and being guided by God? I think so much of the answer to that, Daniel, is that our capacity to hear from God is so intimately related to trusting God that the two are inseparable. That to say when you trust in the Lord with all your heart that he makes your past right, God is more for you walking in the right direction than you could ever be. And so the invitation is not to get this esoteric skill of hearing God and following God and learning his, you know, and discerning his will. All these things that I spent so much of my life trying to accomplish, but I think instead it's much more rooted in the good news of the gospel wherein we are invited into relationship with God, not according to our merits, but according to Christ's. And there in that relationship, as we grow in intimacy, there is where we really find direction. So I would encourage listeners, and instead of trying hard to discern God's will, draw close to God by focusing on the gospel. And in the midst of the greater and increasing trust, you'll hear him learn more.