Frustrated by evil in the world?
Well, according to Dr. Michael Yusef, there's no reason to be discouraged. Because our God hasn't begun to show off his power and his strength and his might. Not yet. We live in a time when the prophets of Baal everywhere, they are dancing and crying to their God. Wait till Yahweh shows up. Wait till Yahweh begin to manifest his power. Wait till you see Jesus show up.
And you'll see the power of our God. Hello and welcome to Leading the Way with pastor and bestselling author, Dr. Michael Yusef. Today, Bible teaching giving you tools for defeating the enemies of success. Dr. Yusef reveals ways that Satan is looking to pour discouragement into your life and how you can defend against and defeat his attacks. Learn more about Leading the Way and the many ways that you can stand with Dr. Yusef as he passionately proclaims uncompromising truth around the world at ltw.org.
But wait until later because you don't want to miss one word of this audio episode from Dr. Yusef and Leading the Way. There is two ways of responding to crisis. You can respond to crisis with encouragement or you can respond to it with discouragement.
The root word that's in the middle of both words, encouragement and discouragement is what? Courage. And so we either face crisis with courage or lack thereof.
And this whole issue of discouragement has to do with courage. But what makes the difference between a person who faces challenges with courage and one does not? What makes the difference?
I want to tell you, listen carefully. What makes the difference is having the eternal perspective. What makes the difference is your perspective of who God is. What makes the difference is the God factor in your life.
Only the person who sees everything through the biblical prism will be able to face whatever crisis will face with courage. And courage will overcome discouragement every time. And before I get to the message that I want to share with you four things that I have learned through the years about this whole issue of discouragement. To defeat discouragement and not stay in it, the first thing you need to do is be realistic. Be realistic. Be realistic about yourself, your abilities and be realistic about others.
You see, high false expectations, perfectionism, not taking personal responsibility and always blaming somebody else for our problem. All of these are going to cause us discouragement every time. But being realistic about yourself and about others is going to help you beat discouragement. The second thing I want to share with you from my own personal life is this. Remember your identity, not your title, not your job, not your profession, not who you are, not your family's name, who you are in Christ. And remember this.
This is how I think about it. Of all the billions of people in the world, God called you. God chose you. God redeemed you.
God saved you. How can you stay in discouragement when you begin to think about your identity in Christ and the fact that you're going to be spending eternity with him? That will lick discouragement every time.
Third thing I want to tell you is this. Majoring on the major and minoring on the minors. Listen, majoring on the majors will defeat discouragement every time. If you want to fight every battle and if you want to die on every hill, if you want to champion every cause, I can tell you, you will be discouraged. Take it from me. We say, what can I do? Because that's just the way I do things.
Well, here we go. You start praying. Lord, help me to focus on what's important. Lord, help me to focus on what is near and dear to you. Lord, help me to focus on the strength and on the gifts that you've given me. Help me to focus in the area of my anointing and not to be distracted by my weaknesses. He will give you the courage every time. Fourthly, inward faithfulness to the Lord versus outward performance will get you over discouragement every time. And I know it's easier said than done, but listen to me.
Many times we as Christians put on our Christian mask and really try to let everybody think that everything is wonderful. But if your outward performance is more important to you than inward faithfulness, when nobody's around, then you will be discouraged every time. But learning to practice inward faithfulness to the Lord is going to give you victory over discouragement. Now I can get to my text in the scripture.
If you have your Bible with you, I want you to turn to 1 Kings chapter 19. Elijah's life provides us with a pattern of how discouragement can sneak up on even the most courageous among us. This man was called of God and he becomes so close to the Lord that even James, the brother of the Lord Jesus Christ, use him as an example. He said Elijah was a man like unto us. Mean he's got clay feet like all of us. But when he prayed, God answered.
Couldn't get a better commendation than that. This man prayed for rain and rain came. He prayed for the rain to stop and it stopped. Elijah saw miracles that probably all of us will never see in two lifetimes. He brought a supply of food that would fill a barn out of a drop of oil and a teaspoon full of wheat, flour wheat. He raised a boy from the dead.
I mean, that boy was dead, dead, dead. Elijah raised him up, but that's not all. He stood on Mount Carmel and he challenged the prophets of Baal who came from Lebanon, who came from the from Sidon, who came from the north. And they were menacing the people of Israel. They tempted them to worship a foreign God and the people of God were bowing to Baal. The God of power and might was replaced by a little statue of Baal. They were praying to Baal. And so Elijah said to them, I'll make you a challenge. We'll get the sacrifice here on the mountain and you call upon your God Baal and I'll call upon the Lord.
And the God who sends fire from heaven is the true God. They fell for it. That's the arrogance and the pride of the pagans. They fell for it. So the prophets of Baal came in first thing in the morning, put their sacrifice in there, and they began to cry to Baal.
Oh, Baal, hear us. And they began to cry louder and louder. And Elijah was making fun of them.
He said, maybe he's asleep. Shout a little louder. They were screaming. They were hollering.
They were cutting themselves with swords and knives and begging Baal, Baal, oh, hear us, oh Baal, hear us, Baal. Nothing happened. No fire.
No fire. Meanwhile, Israel at that time had a wuss for a king. I mean, his middle name is wuss wimp, Ahab. He married a pagan woman from Lebanon, a Baal-worshipping woman, and he made a queen, Jezebel.
The name becomes synonymous with evil. So when the prophets of Baal were just exhausted, at the end of the day were worn out, they're yelling and screaming, and nothing happened, Elijah gets up. And he said, boys, now let me show you what my Yahweh can do.
I'm getting ready to shout. Now, boys, let me show you my God. Let me show you my God. The reason we don't have people who are experiencing the power of God today is because we don't have too many Elijahs. Now let me show you what the true God can do.
Now, beloved, listen to me. There is no reason on God's earth for we, the believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, to be discouraged. In the face of this relentless opposition to the Christian faith, we are seeing this country, and I know I can get discouraged, but thank God that the closer I walk with the Lord, my times of discouragement get shorter and shorter and shorter. The other day I saw something in the news, and I said, oh, come Lord Jesus, I don't know what I can take anymore. And the Lord says, it's not your job, you just go and tell them to repent. There's no reason on God's earth for us to be discouraged by the evil that seems to be succeeding in our society every single day.
Why? Because our God has not begun to show off his power and his strength and his might. Not yet. We live in a time when the prophets of Baal everywhere, from the schoolhouse to the White House, they are dancing and crying to their God. They are making lots of noise. They're making parades and proud of their sin. They are getting all of the media's full attention.
They are yelling and hollering and screaming and parading. But don't be discouraged because our God hasn't shown up yet. That's why we need to call upon the Lord to show up. Wait till Yahweh shows up. Wait till Yahweh began to manifest his power. Wait till you see Jesus show up.
And you'll see the power of our God. Back to Elijah. At the end of the day, it was almost dark. It's getting darker, getting light. And he said, you finished? Are you done? Yeah, we're exhausted. Our God is not hearing us. He said, now let me show you. Make the wood under the sacrifice really wet.
No, that's not good enough. Soak the wood. Soak it in water. And imagine if you stood there, you understand what I'm talking about. You're right up in the mountain. You're going down into the mid-terrain and getting the water and then come back and say, no, go back and get some more. We want to soak the wood. I don't want anybody to accuse me of trickery. I don't even think that I just led a match and the wood took off.
No, no, no, no. He said, I want to show you because my confidence is in my God. I know that my God answers prayer. I know that God is a God of power and might. And he looked up to heaven and he said, a use of translation, Lord, do your thing. Do your thing, Lord. You won't find it in the Bible, but you'll understand it. And fire came from heaven, licked everything in sight.
Everything. And after that, Elijah took care of 850 of these prophets of Baal. He took care of them. But Satan was watching. You see, Baal is really the front store for Satan. And Satan was watching how helpless his little puppet is when it comes to the power of Yahweh. And Satan was furious. He was mad.
So what does he do? He goes to his emissary, Jezebel. I mean, I can imagine Ahab, this was, you know, standing there, seeing the fire coming from heaven. He said, ooh, what am I going to tell Jezebel about this? How am I going to go home and tell her that her God is a false god?
That Baal has failed, but Yahweh succeeded. What am I going to tell Jezebel? And he was shivering in his boots. And he goes down and he tells Jezebel. And Jezebel gets mad. She gets furious. And she determined that she's going to kill Elijah, threaten to kill him anyway.
What happens at this point? Listen to me, beloved. None of us can be discouraged at this point because when you think about it, this man called the rain from heaven and it came. He called for the rain to stop and stopped. This man raised the dead.
This man provided tens of thousands of pounds of food from a drop of oil and a spoonful of wheat flour. This man who called fire from heaven and fire came and licked everything in sight. That same man who took care of 850 prophets of Baal. As soon as he hears the threat of Jezebel, he runs.
He runs. Listen to verse 3, 1 Kings 19-3. Elijah was afraid.
Elijah was afraid. Are you discouraged today? Are you discouraged? You got that report from the doctor and you're discouraged. You got that news and you're discouraged.
You got that information. You've tried and failed so many times and you're discouraged. I want you to take heart because Bible and Christians, all stars, all of them face discouragement too. It is what they do with their discouragement that I want you to learn from.
So what happened? Why did Elijah run at this time when he was filled with courage before many times? Why is it this time? Now I want you to go home, read the scripture carefully. I'm going to tell you, I'm going to give you the answer but I want you to go and read it for yourself. Because the answer is there in the scripture and it's there for Elijah but it's there for every one of us to learn from it. In every step of his life, Elijah did two things. He listened to the Lord and he what? Obeyed the Lord.
Let me give you three examples very quickly. In chapter 17 of 1st King, verse 2. The word of the Lord came to Elijah. Verse 8, same chapter, 17. The word of the Lord came to Elijah.
Chapter 18, verse 1. The word of the Lord came to Elijah. And every time the word of the Lord came to Elijah, what did he do? He said, yes sir, he obeyed.
Every time. But when Elijah ran from Jezebel, there's one thing you notice was missing in the scripture. Have you guessed it? There is no, the word of the Lord came to Elijah and says, run for your life.
It's not there. Elijah did not wait to hear from the Lord. So he ran. Listen, he had been in danger before, yeah. But he was in God's protective program because of his listening and obedience. And when you're in God's protective program, you are in the hollows of his hands.
Nobody can touch you. You're in the palms of his hands. And you're hidden in the palms of his hands.
You need provision supernaturally, he'll do it. Elijah got blindsided. Have you ever been blindsided? I don't know how many times I got blindsided through the years.
He got blindsided. If you want to overcome discouragement and despondency, do not make decisions until you hear from the Lord. Do not move until he tells you.
You get into his word and you begin to sit with that word until you hear the Lord. And so Elijah ran. He just ran. But in running, he makes a second mistake. Vital mistake. Serious mistake. Now, men, I want you to listen to me because that's a mistake we make as men. Women are better at this than we are.
And they really are. Here's the second mistake. He isolated himself. In times of crisis, he isolated himself. In times of discouragement, he isolated himself.
Beloved, listen. The Bible said Elijah left the young man at Beersheba and then he went by himself to the desert. He left his colleague out in Beersheba. Now, there are some tradition that says that this young man that he was helping him was the young boy that he raised from the dead. Now, whether that's true or not, it's a Jewish tradition. Imagine if that young man was with Elijah and Elijah did not isolate himself. He would have said to him, oh, Elijah, don't you remember how you raised me from the dead? Don't you remember how you prayed and God answered? Don't you remember what God did in the past? Don't you remember Mount Carmel?
Do you remember the fire that came down from heaven, Elijah? But was not there to encourage him. Another thing happens in times of discouragement. When you are discouraged and stay in your discouragement, you're going to lose perspective. You'll lose perspective. Not only of your circumstances, you'll lose perspective of God. And Elijah did exactly that. He lost perspective both of his circumstances and of his God. Let me show you how that loss of perspective can be so illogical.
It doesn't make sense right here. He ran away from Jezebel, why? To save his life, right? So now he isolates himself and gets into that desert, sits under a tree, puts his head between his knees and says what? God, kill me.
Do you see what I mean by the loss of perspective? I mean, it just, I mean, it doesn't make sense. If he really wanted to die, why would he let God do the job when Jezebel could have done a much better job?
She would have killed him with passion. But when you're in time of discouragement and stay in the times of discouragement and don't get up and take courage in the Lord your God, you lose touch with reality. You really do. Verse 4, chapter 19, verse 4. Elijah said, I am not better than my ancestors.
What does that mean? His mind obviously raced back to all of his ancestors, Jewish ancestors, probably all the way to Moses. And he said, look at all these people. What did their faithfulness do?
Didn't help them, they're all dead. How you become illogical? What he was saying is faithfulness doesn't pay. And so he goes from self-protection, as I told you, withdrawing to self, to self-pity, and then to self-punishment. But here is the best part about Elijah's story and his discouragement. Listen to me.
The way God dealt with Elijah in the time of his discouragement. That's the best part. And I don't want you to miss it. Don't miss it, don't miss it. You'll miss the whole thing. The Bible said, and the Lord God called Elijah and said, you weak-willed, vacillating wimp.
I have given you an important assignment and you blew it. How quickly have you forgotten my power in the past? Is that what the scripture said?
No. In the times of discouragement, God comes and meets us at our point of needs. Every one of them.
Not just one or two, all of them. Even though Elijah did not seek the Lord, even though Elijah did not wait for a word from the Lord, even though Elijah refused human companionship, God met all of these failures with his grace and with his mercy. He did not wait for a word from the Lord. The Lord gave him a word anyway. He refused human companionship. God sent him an angel to minister to him. He was desperate in need of food and refreshment. God provided in the most supernatural way.
Because I can tell you, those ravens, they eat you for lunch, not bring you lunch. God met Elijah at every point of his needs in the time of his discouragement. And God is doing that to you.
Even though you may have a cloud in your eyes and you're blinded by your own circumstances and you can't see it. But the Lord knows that sometimes you need rest and sleep. Something else I don't want you to miss about God in the times of discouragement. He did not speak to him through the fire. He did not speak to him through the earthquake.
He didn't speak to him through the exciting things of life. He just spoke to him in a gentle whisper. Gentle whisper.
Beloved, listen to me please. Don't miss the gentle whisper of God. Listen carefully to the gentle whisper. Take time to hear the gentle whisper. Stay with the word of God so that he might speak to you through his word in that gentle whisper. Take time to hear his sweet voice. Take time to hear his word.
Thank you for joining Dr. Michael Youssef for Leading the Way. Now, if what you heard today has brought up some life questions, do remember that you can speak with a Leading the Way pastor or counselor when you fill out a contact form. Just go to ltw.org slash jesus. Hey, have you noticed that nothing is free anymore? Those things that used to be free or you could really ask for, long gone, like air at the gas station or water at a fast food restaurant. But here's something that is still free and that's really valuable at the same time. Leading the Way's monthly magazine is called My Journal. Yes, My Journal costs time and money for us to produce, but it is free for you because we want to provide you with encouragement from the pages of God's word. And we want to keep you up to date on how the gospel is overcoming darkness in the world. So if you'd like your free trial subscription to My Journal, give us a call. 866-626-4356. Or you can go online and use the subscriptions link right there at the bottom of the page.
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