In “Keeping Negative Voices Out,” Pastor Steven Furtick teaches us how to rely on the Holy Spirit to quiet the negative voices. This is an excerpt from “Focus Your Faith.” To watch the full message from @elevationchurch , click here: 
• Focus Your Faith | Pastor Steven Furt… #faith #peace #hope #stevenfurtick #elevationchurch Chapters: 0:00 – Victory Is Coming 2:10 – Meditate On This Word 5:02 – What NASCAR Taught Me About Faith 8:22 – You Can’t Let Every Voice In 11:35 – Keep It Tight 13:57 – Who’s In Your Headset? Scripture References: Joshua 1, verse 8
You might be discouraged not because
of something you’re facing or feeling
but because of something you are
saying about what you are facing.
“So, here’s what you have to do, Joshua.”
“What do I do? Do I shoot them? Do I kill
them? Do I stab them? Do I choke them?”
“All right. Before we get to all that,
because we’re going to do all that…”
Verse 8: “Keep this Book of the
Law…” Joshua is jealous of you,
because he had the Book of the Law…Genesis,
Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, Deuteronomy.
You have the whole story. Hold up. Let me see
real quick. You have something Joshua didn’t
have. I just want to make sure real quick. Oh
yeah. You win. Spoiler alert. I didn’t mean to
mess it up for you, because I know you were going
to read it this week, but you win. We win. The
grace of God’s people be with you, amen. You win.
Come, Lord Jesus. We win. He’s already here with
us. You win. Wherever you step your foot, he’s
already there. You win! It’s like, “Oh, yeah!”
I read this one. This is a good one. We have
to fight a lot, but we’re going to have faith.
We’re not going to feel it every time,
and we’re not going to see it every time,
and we’re not going to always know how, but
he always makes a way. We know this by faith
because we have his Word, his exceedingly
great and precious promises. One author said,
“The living Word of God, which never
returns void, is in your heart.”
We thank you for your Word, Lord. I thank
you for your Word, Lord. I thank you for
the promises I have in spite of the
problems I face. I thank you, Lord.
Now, with Joshua, the instruction is simple. “Keep
this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate
on it…” “That sounds Eastern. Meditation… Isn’t
that Buddhist or something? Is this a yoga class?”
We need to quit giving our definitions of
words to the world and letting them take it
from us. The Bible is Eastern, dude.
I told somebody one day… I was like,
“I’m concentrating on breathing more
these days.” They were like, “Oh,
that’s New Age.” I thought God did that
in the garden, like, the very first page
of the story. I thought that’s what the word
for spirit meant…ruwach. God started this.
So, we need to take some of this stuff back,
just like success, when I read that, or prosper.
Oh god! Let a preacher say prosper…oh god! God
said prosper. If you think that refers only to
cars and places you can go on vacation, you just
need a bigger definition of God. It includes your
peace. It includes your freedom. It includes
the richness of your interior life…all that.
He said, “Let’s fix this script you’ve got going
on, Joshua. Before I take you into this place,
before I give you the strategy, before
I can get you the success I want you to
have…” Which is not necessarily the success you
imagine. It’s going to be much deeper. He said,
“Do this. Keep this Book of the Law always on
your lips, meditating on it day and night.”
That does not mean…hear me, please…to
quote Scriptures obnoxiously at people
when they’re going through stuff. Just for
a cautionary moment in this sermon. He said,
“Be careful.” Okay, I’m going to be careful.
This does not mean you walk around the house,
and your kid is like, “I had a bad day.” “Well,
all things work together for the good of them who
love God and are called according to his purpose.
For those he foreknew he also predestined,
and those he predestined he also justified,
and those he…” Shut up! Say, “I’m sorry you had a
bad day. Do you want to talk about it?” That’s not
what the Word always on your lips means. Somebody
says, “Man, I’m really struggling.” “Well,
Judas went and hanged himself.” Do you see
how it could backfire if you hear me wrong?
So, what does he mean when he says, “Meditate”?
I have a picture of it. I got the picture about
seven years ago, but I didn’t realize it was a
picture of meditation. At the time, I thought it
was a NASCAR race. I went to a NASCAR race to see
Joey Logano, the champ, the two-time champ. The
number on his race car is 22, like Taylor Swift.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling 22.” I
know we have a lot of drivers in the church, but
Joey is my guy, and I will always cheer for him.
He said, “Come out and see me race.” I said, “I
don’t want to.” I said, “I respect what you do,
but that sounds really boring.” He’s like, “Bring
the kids. They’ll like it. I promise. We’ll take
care of them.” They treated us so well. As soon
as we got there, they gave us these little… It
looked like a walkie-talkie. Shout-out Warren.
He gave each of the kids one, and we all had one.
On it we could hear… Show them the picture
of Abbey. We have one of Abbey holding it,
just to kind of bring you into the scene. They
gave me a hat and a shirt. I think those are Joey
Logano jeans, or something, Joey Logano underwear
somewhere in there too. Then those yellow Joey
Logano headphones, and all of this, because we’re
right by the track. We’re standing by the track,
and do you see that little thing Abbey is holding?
That thing is… Hand it to me. Thank you, baby.
She called, “Next sermon illustration is
me,” when I had Graham up here. She said,
“Hey, next sermon illustration is me.” So I’m
kind of multitasking parenting and preaching
right now. All right. So, we had this. I
promise you this is not a made-up sermon
illustration. It’s going to sound like, “Oh,
that’s just too perfect. You made that up,” but
I promise you. We had a video of it too,
but I didn’t want to show you the video.
Abbey is 5 years old, and she’s holding
this thing, and she’s standing there,
because on this you can hear the crew chief
of the driver and the spotter telling Joey
what to do. You can hear what they’re
saying to him. It’s amazing. It made it
really fun for me. It helped me understand
a little bit more what was going on. Abbey
thought Joey could hear her too. So, she’s
standing over there. It’s really loud.
There are cars going fast. That’s what they do at
NASCAR. She’s going (5 years old), “Joey Wogano.
Joey Wogano. Joey Wogano. Can you hear me,
Joey Wogano?” We let her do it for, like, an
hour because it was so cute. I know we’re going to
hell, because we let her sit there for at least 45
minutes, going, “Joey Wogano. Joey Wogano. Is that
you, Joey Wogano? Can you hear me, Joey Wogano?”
Finally, after I got the video and the picture
and we all laughed and laughed and laughed,
I said, “He can’t hear you, baby. This
is a one-way device.” But what if he
could? Just come with me real quick. From
Palestine to the Charlotte Motor Speedway.
I’ll take you on a journey right now.
What if Joey did? From Joshua to Joey.
What if he did? What if they met
every fan at the gate and said,
“Here you go. Now put this on. The driver
has a headset too, and you can put this on.”
Do y’all want me to put it on? It’s
going to mess my hair up. I should
have practiced this. Is it on wrong? Is
it upside down? What do you mean? Oh,
strap in the back. Thank you. Like that?
Is it right? I can’t really hear y’all.
It’s wrong? Okay, I tried! But you saw it.
Good grief. Okay, come back to the Bible.
He’s like, “Joshua, there are certain things that
need to be in your heart that will enable you to
fight the good fight when you are discouraged
and afraid.” Now watch this. What if Joshua,
when God spoke to him… Instead of verse 10 saying,
“He went around and told all of the people, ‘Get
ready. Get ready. In three days we’re going in.
Hey, officers, go around and tell the people,
“Get ready. Get everything packed. Get your
shoes laced. Get everything ready. We’re going
in in three days. I don’t know how we’re getting
across the Jordan. Joshua will tell us, I guess.
We’re going in. How are we going to get over the
walls of Jericho? I don’t know. Just get ready.
We’re going in in three days.”‘” Imagine if he had
gone around asking them, “What do you think?” Then
I remembered. They tried that 40 years earlier.
The whole nation started saying to Moses,
“We can’t do that. We can’t be that. We
can’t defeat that. We can’t beat them.” Now,
in your life this does not sound like Canaanites
and land. I understand that. It sounds like chains
you need to break. It sounds like impact you
know you can make. It sounds like that thing
you have been avoiding that you know God is
calling you to engage. You know what it is.
So, imagine Joey meets everybody at the
gate and says, “Here. Just tell me when
you think I should turn. Here’s your
device. Just tell me what to do.” See,
when you’re in the car… I’ve never been in
one, but this is what he told me. He said,
“You can only look forward. You
can’t turn your head at all.”
That’s why the spotter has to tell
him, “Here’s what’s ahead of you.
Here’s what’s behind you. Here’s
what’s going on around you. Oh,
they’re about to wreck up there. This is where we
need to be.” That’s why the crew chief… Now, the
crew chief doesn’t talk as much as the spotter,
but he can talk too. He can tell him stuff too.
Imagine if every single beer-drinking NASCAR
fan and 5-year-old girl got a device to talk
to the driver. Here we are, trying to steer our
lives in a season we’ve never been in before,
yet the first thing we do when
we wake up in the morning… “Oh,
what do they think? Oh, where are they
today? Oh, where are they vacationing? Oh,
what is this political party up to?” Shut it
down and look up and see what God is doing!
In times of transition, you have to keep
it tight. I’m not saying don’t make new
friends. I’m not saying don’t read books.
I’m not saying don’t take a class. I’m
not saying don’t have counselors. “In the
multitude of counselors there is safety.”
I know the Bible verses too. What I’m
telling you is God is your spotter.
Oh, I have a better one. Jesus is my crew chief.
There’s more to the story, baby. Joshua wasn’t
the only one God saps. Three days later, Jesus
said, “We’re going across this Jordan. We’re
crossing over this chasm.” From death to life,
from dead to alive, from law to grace! He did it!
“What do you think I should do? How do you
think I should raise my kids? What do you
think I should eat? Should I do Keto? Should
I do Paleo? I don’t know. What should I do?
How should I feel about it?” It’s so crazy
that we have so many voices. Some of them
aren’t on our phone. Some of them are from our
family from people who are dead who raised us,
still talking. I can make the message really
simple. Who’s in your headset? Who gets to you?
“I don’t want to be stuck up.” Then you’d rather
be stuck? I’m not saying don’t listen to other
people’s point of view. That is not this message,
but the Lord said in transition times, you only
need to listen to two. How many spies did Moses
send into the Promised Land? No, Moses. Yeah,
he sent 12. Too many. Joshua knew, “That’s 10
too many,” because Joshua was one of the two.
Y’all are never going to forget me up here
in this headset with a wire dangling around,
looking like I’m 5 years old, and I can’t even
put it on correctly. You are never going to forget
this sermon, and that’s just the way I want
it, so the next time you have 10 telling you,
“We can’t do it,” the next time you have
Twitter telling you who to hate and who to like,
the next time you have Facebook all
up in your face, sapping your faith,
making you afraid, you’ll remember that preacher.
You’ll remember, “Furtick was up there
telling me I just need two. I just need
my spotter. That’s God. I need my crew chief.
That’s Jesus. And if I have the Holy Spirit,
I have an engine that will never burn out. So
watch me make this turn. Watch me turn this
corner. Watch me do this thing. Watch me
reinvent in this season to serve a greater
purpose. Watch me be a mentor. Watch me
be a single mom. Watch me break out of
these chains. Watch me cross this Jordan!” “I’ve
been discouraged.” Then change the discussion.