Turning Our Crisis into an Opportunity - Part 2

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Friday, November 12th. The Old Testament story of Joseph is a classic, but it's much more than an interesting historical narrative.

Today's program bridges the centuries, helping you connect the events of Joseph's life to your life today. We all are going to have crisis in our life. In fact, how many of you have ever experienced a crisis in your life? Come on, put them up. Everybody has.

I know they have. Well, how did you respond? You say, well, I didn't do very well.

Or maybe you said, you know, I responded right, maybe for the first time. Or the fact that I'm learning when crises come in our life. Well, the message today should be very, very encouraging because there is a proper way to respond. In fact, the truth is, in every crisis, there's an opportunity. And oftentimes we miss what God is up to in our life because we don't think about a crisis where it's maybe painful or suffering loss or difficulty and hardship. And it can be a crisis in your finances, in your relationships, in your health, in your vocation. It can be all kind of things that bring crisis into our life. The issue is, how do we respond?

And what's the basis of a right response? Well, in this passage of Scripture, the life of Joseph is a perfect example of the right kind of responses in time of crisis. And the fact, instead of focusing on the crisis itself, the issue is, what is my opportunity in the middle of this crisis? And today there are probably more people facing a crisis in our country than ever before in many, many years. So, how do we face it? How do we respond to it? We could be angry and bitter and hostile.

We could blame God or blame someone else. Is there a better way? Yes. Is there a way to profit in the midst of a painful crisis?

Yes, there is. So, with all that in mind, I have fifteen suggestions and I want to tell you this. I know they work. I've been through enough crises in my life to know they absolutely work. So, if you're going through a crisis, no matter what it is, I can tell you this'll work. If you're wise enough to write these down, put them to the test, try them, you will find yourself in any crisis, no matter what it might be, God bringing you through it with confidence and assurance. You may not start out with that confidence and assurance, but it'll be there. So, I want to begin with one. The basic one is simply this, I must see these crises, whatever it might be, I must see them, first of all, the way God would have me to look at it.

And that's this. He's working everything in my life for my good. Romans eight twenty-eight. You say, oh, I've been hearing that all my life. Well, but what have you done about it? Have you been practicing that? Well, I've been practicing that all my life. I've been practicing that all my life.

I've been practicing that all my life. In other words, if you believe that Romans eight twenty-eight is true, that God causes all things to work for our good, that is to those of us who are His children, that is the first step. When a crisis comes, the question is, not God, why did you do this? But I have to look and ask myself the question, do I really and truly believe that He's working everything for my good?

Well, the second very, very important truth is in Psalm one oh three, verse nineteen. And that's simply this, that God is in control of everything. If you're in a crisis and you don't believe that God is in control of all things and you have a reason to be wringing your hands and wringing your heart, He's in charge of everything. He's in control of everything. Therefore, when it comes to Romans eight twenty-eight, that He's causing all things to work together for my good, I may not understand it, He's causing all things to work together for my good. And it can only be true if He's in control of all things. The third thing, if you'll think about it for a moment, when you're going through those kind of things, you have to accept the truth of what is in Isaiah fifty-five, and you probably know this by heart.

But remember what He says? He said, my ways are not your ways. My thoughts are not your thoughts. My ways are higher than your ways, and my thoughts are higher than your thoughts.

That is, here's what God is saying. You won't always understand what I do. You won't always understand the way I go about things. You won't always understand why I allow you to suffer in certain situations and circumstances. So that don't lose heart because you don't understand why. That is, the big question when a crisis comes, if my first question is God, why?

Then I'm going to miss it. It's not why. I know that if He allows it, He says, for my good, He has a reason. So if I can get that in my thinking, that His ways are not my ways, His thoughts are not my thoughts, that is, because He's omniscient, watch this, because He's omniscient, He knows that what's painful for you today will be profitable for you tomorrow.

That what you just want to run away from today, you want to run to tomorrow. He knows that. And so, when a crisis comes, I have an opportunity to discover something about God that I've never discovered before. And that is that He is intimately involved in whether it's your pain or whatever it might be.

He's there. A fourth thing that's so very important, that's this. Don't make quick judgments when a crisis comes. Don't make quick judgments. First of all, we have revolving emotions, number one. And when a crisis comes, most of the time, we don't have any details or don't have any proper details.

If you start listening to your friends, you won't know where you are. And so, the truth is, you have to ask yourself the question, well, maybe God will, well, I don't quite understand this. Naturally, you'd ask that question.

But a quick judgment is always a wrong attitude. But God, what are You up to in my life? You can ask God and You can tell Him, Lord, I don't like this. I don't understand that You'd let this happen in my life. He understands that.

But you have to get over that fast. Because you said Romans eight, twenty-eight, I believe. I believe that He's in control of all things. I know His ways are not my ways. His ways are higher than my ways.

And if they're higher, that means they're wiser than my ways and much more profitable for us. And then, of course, focus on God instead of a crisis. In other words, all of us have faced crisis in life. And if you find yourself focused on that crisis and the pain of it and so forth, what happens is you get off track. And you lose the awareness of the comfort and the knowledge you know that God has of you and His unconditional love for you. And so, you say, but it's painful.

Sure, it's painful. But you can still focus on Him. And this is why somebody says, well, how can I focus on God when I'm hurt?

And here's how you focus on Him. Open the Word of God and start reading. You can read in the Psalms. You can read in the Epistles or whatever it might be. But what happens is when you get into the Word, God becomes your focus. And He's going to encourage you, challenge you, or bring something into your mind that needs to go in your life.

It shouldn't be there. And so, He's going to show you what that is. And you begin to understand, well, now God, I'm beginning to see what you're doing. But if you focus on the crisis, you'll lose something. And then, of course, avoid focusing on the pain. You don't focus on it.

You don't focus on the crisis. Back to the Word of God. I may still be hurting, and I can remember times in my own life when I felt that same thing, that hurt, that pain.

But when I get in the Word of God and start reading, it's like God would just, He would just calm my spirit and quieten my spirit. And it's like putting salve on a cut, and things begin to change in my thinking. And then, of course, recall the past crisis and the opportunities that followed them. Now, all of us said a while ago, we've had crisis in our life. So, I ask you, how did you respond?

Well, you say, well, just pick out the worst one. How did you respond? If you responded correctly, you can probably look back and say, well, thank God. It was a very difficult time in my life, but now I see what you were doing. You were preparing me for something else. And if you'll think about this, it is the will of God, He says, that He's predestined you and me to be conformed to His image. That means He is continually working in our life to shape us into the character of Jesus Christ. Then He is going to allow, He's going to send into our life whatever is necessary to shape us in character like His Son.

So therefore, when I look at that and I think about the opportunities and I look in my own life and think about things that have hurt me deeply or a real crisis in my life, I can look back and see exactly what God was doing. Now, if you ask me over here in the middle of it, what's He doing? Same thing, you'd say, I don't have any idea what He's doing. But on the other side, that's why if we respond properly, then what's going to happen? We're going to make progress even in the midst of that situation, circumstance.

And then little by little, we're going to begin to understand what in the world was God doing in the process. So, I think about dealing with our anger immediately concerning it. In other words, you say, well, I thought you said you shouldn't be angry. I didn't say you wouldn't be angry at first. In other words, the Bible says don't let the sun go down on your anger. Don't take it to bed with you. So, the truth is, when certain things happen to us, our natural, normal response may be anger.

But you can't let it stay there. You have to say, okay, God, I'm angry about this. I don't appreciate this.

I don't like this. I don't know how to treat me this way. But I'm asking You to forgive me for my anger, and I'm moving on, God.

What are You doing? I want to take advantage of this opportunity of being able to be hurt without being angry but a few moments. Because I know that it's not going to get me anywhere. We're all going to face crisis. And when you respond immediately as we said, and when you let anger just lie there, it's going to cause you some problems that you could possibly miss God's whole purpose.

And there are people, and I've met people, who have lived and are still living in anger over something that happened years ago. And then, of course, submit yourself to the will of God in this situation, whatever it is. Now, that's not always easy. You see, all this boils down to whether I believe Him or not. He says He's working it for my good.

Do I believe that? He says He's in absolute control. He says He understands why we don't understand.

He says He loves us unconditionally. If I believe those things, then I'm going to be able to look at them and ask, what's my opportunity in this given situation? My opportunity to grow spiritually? Or my opportunity that God may send some other way? That all this is just getting us ready for? Everything that happened to Joseph until the day he met Pharaoh face to face, all of that was preparation for what God was going to do.

He was always growing, always being submissive to the situation in which he found himself because he believed God. God had given him a dream. You say, well, I've never had a dream like that. You've got something better than a dream. You have the written Word of God. Listen, how many of you can interpret your dreams you have at night? They're useless.

They're just a mixture of something and you think, where in the world did that come from? You can't trust a dream. Listen, you and I have the Word of God. We can trust His Word.

We're far ahead of where Joseph was when it comes to truth and understanding what God is doing in our life. Then, of course, you have to demonstrate, I believe this is an important part, to demonstrate a sense of gratitude. You say, now wait a minute, you mean to tell me when I'm hurting, I feel rejected, I mean the whole world's falling apart, and I'm to express gratitude?

Yes. Only can you do that on the basis if you believe the first one of our principles. And that is that He is working something good in your life. And that He is in control. And that He understands why you don't understand.

In other words, if I really and truly believe the truth of the Word of God, which you and I read and we pray over and we talk to God about, if we believe it, we'll be able to say, Lord, I don't like it. It hurts. I wouldn't do it this way.

I think you ought to do it some other way. But I know that you know better than I do, so I'm going to thank you in spite of it. Gratitude always works because what you're saying in essence, I don't understand it, but you must love me enough knowing that I don't understand it that you let me hurt because you know something good is going to come out of this. And then, of course, determine in your life to view the crisis as an opportunity. Determine to view it as an opportunity. It's a choice we make. You say, well, I don't feel like it.

It has nothing to do with feelings. It has to do with in this given situation, I'm going to determine in my heart that God is giving me an opportunity. I may not understand it today.

I may not like it today or tomorrow, but here is an opportunity for God to either teach me something or put me in a position that I would never have believed that He put me in. You see, watch this. What you and I don't see, we don't see all of the background. We don't see all the things that God is doing in our lives that nobody sees. We don't see it.

Nobody else sees it. He's working things in our attitude in our life, the way we view things, the way we treat people, the way we respond to people. He's working in all of these things to do what?

To get us where He wants us to be. And then watch this one. Refuse to listen to unscriptural interpretations by other people of what's happening to you.

This is very important. You can't afford to listen to other people's interpretations of what God is doing in your life. Now, sometimes there'll be somebody wise who'll give you some good advice. But for the most part, they'll say, well, if I were you, here's what I'd do.

Remind them that they're not you. And secondly, they don't know what they did if they were in your particular position because you are where you are because God has allowed you to be there for God's purpose. And listen, God isn't going around telling everybody else you're a business. He's not telling somebody else, well, here's what I'm going to do with him and her. No, I have to trust Him and I can't trust other people to tell me how I'm to respond in a given situation unless I seek real wisdom from somebody whom I trust who knows and loves God and walks in His ways.

Before you start getting advice from anybody, here's the first thing you do. Watch the way they live. If they're not living a godly life, don't listen. If they're living a godly life, then that's a possibility you ought to listen.

Then, of course, remain in constant prayer listening to God's instructions. You say, well, God has never spoken to me. And as I always answer that question, yes, He has. Do you think God, would God isolate one of His children and say, I'm not going to listen to Him. I'm not going to speak to Him.

Yes, He does. If I don't believe He speaks to me, I'm not going to hear Him. And it may be that God may knock on your door over and over and over and over again until finally you listen.

But He's speaking to you. He wants to give you direction. He wants you to take opportunities. He wants you to take advantage of the situations and circumstances in life that make it possible for us to grow and be conformed to His likeness.

That's what He's up to in our life. But if somehow I don't think He's going to listen, then more than likely I'm not going to pray. And then of course, refuse to give way to your changing emotions.

And this is what happens. You pray and things don't change for all you think. You know, I don't, watch this, I don't feel like God's listening. I don't feel like God loves me. I don't feel like circumstances. Feelings oftentimes are the enemy of obedience to God. Because I may not feel something, but God doesn't operate on feelings and He doesn't want us operating on feelings. So, think about all of these. Now, I just have one more. It's the bottom line. Obey God and leave all the consequences to Him.

You see, if I believe the first one I gave you, I can do that. He's working all things for my good. I leave all the consequences to Him. If I believe He's in control, I leave all the consequences to Him. Obey Him, leave all the consequences to Him.

No matter what crisis you face in life, these fifteen suggestions, that's what they are, and I know they work, they will help you through them no matter what that crisis is. What you have to decide is this. Do I believe that God is who He says He is? Do I believe that God loves me enough to personally involve Himself in my life? Do I believe when I don't understand, He understands me? Do I believe with all my heart that God has a plan and a will for my life?

Yes. Do I believe with all my heart that in every circumstance there's an opportunity for me to grow in my Christian life or to prosper in other ways? It all boils down to the fact, do I believe what is true is really true?

Because that's the way we're going to respond. And no matter what crisis you face, if you follow those fifteen suggestions, God's going to bring you through it. Now, I didn't say He wouldn't bring you through with tears or no tears.

I didn't say it'd be easy, but I know He will bring you through it no matter what. And Father, how grateful we are that You have planned for each one of us in such a fashion that You have the best for us. And I pray the Holy Spirit will speak to every single listener and enable them to understand that it all begins with trusting Jesus Christ as their Savior and then following Him and practicing these things that we've spoken about today. And we pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. Thank you for listening to part two of Turning Our Crisis Into an Opportunity. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.