Focus on the Fruit // Looking Forward to Normal – Steven Furtick – Elevation Church

Steven Furtick’s Introduction

• Release weekend
• The day we declare the life of God in every situation
• If you have breath, shout “I’m alive”
• Nothing is impossible for God
• We put our focus on You, worship You, and honor Your presence
• We’re grateful that he turns graves into gardens and mourning to dancing
• Welcome to Week 3 of “Looking Forward to Normal”
• What you focus on determines whether or not you will go forward
• God’s presence is not limited to a physical location
• Maybe this is a training ground for us to have church wherever we are
• What if normal isn’t back there? What if it isn’t stressed out? What if it’s something you’ve never known? A joy unspeakable in the Holy Ghost?
• Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen
• The kingdoms of this world and the kingdom of our God doesn’t have much in common
• Offense is an event; offended is a decision – God’s kingdom, the renewing of our mind says you can bring me and offense, and I don’t have to get offended

• What was weird about Paul is that he could communicate uncertainty and confidence in the same breath.
• This message pairs well with the message, “Choosing Your Chains”.
• As your life changes, your perspective does.
• You can look at a situation that felt like the worst week of your life, then look back and wouldn’t trade the lessons you learned for anything.

Scripture

Philippians 1:22 New International Version (NIV)

22 If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know!

• Are you in a position where you don’t know how something will turn out?
• We know Paul was in prison, but saw a purpose in it
• Most of us are trapped inside of what we don’t yet know, in this transition
• Paul is waiting to find out if they’re going to kill him, or let him live
• He says, “If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know!”
• Sometimes, the four greatest words/statement of faith you can make is, “I don’t know”
• Paul’s congregation loved him. He’s backing up to give them a report on how he’s doing. Now it’s taken a turn for the worse and it’s uncertain

Message Title: Focus on the Fruit

• You have to focus on the fruit
• Paul starts with telling the church in Phillipi about the events that started
• It would take a while for them to get the correspondence; they have to wait to receive it
• The man of God is trying to give them a message, but they have to wait to receive it
• While you’re waiting, learn to worship
• Your worship will prepare your heart for the message
• We can be so anxious for God to do something, but He can break up our hearts in waiting seasons as we praise him by faith

Philippians 1:12 New International Version (NIV)

Paul’s Chains Advance the Gospel

12 Now I want you to know, brothers and sisters,[a] that what has happened to me has actually served to advance the gospel.

• There are certain things that are apparent, but they might not be actual
• Physically speaking, he’s in chains, unable to preach out of this
• Advance:- Make headways despite severe blows
• The most productive part of your life will not be the prettiest
• The biggest miracles will come in the middle of the biggest mess
• He doesn’t go into a long list of events
• Paul doesn’t even give them a sentence on his condition in prison; why? Does he have his priorities straight, to know that what’s happening in him is more important than what’s happening to him?
• Paul is past “felling” to believe
• Instead, he focusses on the fruit. What has happened to him beneath the surface; God is growing something greater than our minds can imagine
• Something is happening in the soil
• In this season, God is giving you a root system and teaching you to focus
• We’re looking forward to normal; God is pruning stuff out of your life to make you ready for next
• God is establishing you so that you can bear more fruit
• Roots aren’t attractive on the surface; we all want the other side, i.e. the flowers
• The spirit of God lives in you
• We love to shout over fruit; fruit without root doesn’t last long; it’s not sustainable
• There’s a time for everything; a season to mourn (the root), and a season to rejoice (the fruit)
• Focus on the fruit
• Out of this great season of uncertainty, you are allowed to say “I do not know”
• Knowing that you don’t know makes you open to wisdom
• When Steven talked to Craig Groeschel, he asked what his outlook was on when church would reopen. Finally, Steven said the smartest thing said on the call was, “I don’t know”
• We are all idiots at the same time; we are all equally ignorant of what comes next; nobody has a crystal ball
• Paul didn’t know
• Nobody knows when school will be open/remain open, or when the economy will bounce back

Rom 11:33-Rom 11:36 NIV Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay them?” For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.

• We don’t know the mind of the Lord, not me, not you, not Paul
• Paul was often wrong, but seldom in doubt – he always knew
• The truth is in the tension
• The presence of faith doesn’t eliminate uncertainty; it operates by uncertainty

Philippians 1:13 New International Version (NIV)

13 As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard[a] and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ.

• His clarity is not about the outcome, it is about God’s presence in the process
• He is focused on what God is doing in him right now
• There is something outside of his control
• The only thing you can really control is your focus – you can’t make people nice, make it sunny, pray away the virus – what you can control is your focus
• It’s not about physical focus, but emotional and spiritual focus. Focusing your priorities
• The fruit of the spirit is joy, but the root of the spirit is priorities, what you are planted in, what matters to you
• Paul is writing back to the church he founded, the same people who only had a church because Paul was thrown in purpose
• There’s only a book of Philippians because Paul was thrown in prison, e.g. Philippians 4:19
• He says he doesn’t know it ends, but his God will supply all his needs

Philippians 4:19 New International Version (NIV)

19 And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.

• You don’t need to know how it ends to know that you will see the glory of God in the middle of it
• Some things you don’t need to know
• Limit your intake of the news; you don’t need to know everything up to the minute
• You don’t need to know all the details to take your next step
• Releasing the need to know can be hard, because you think information is the key
• There’s a confidence that goes beneath knowledge (per Paul)
• Often, because of my chains, we can be more fruitful

Philippians 1:14 New International Version (NIV)

14 And because of my chains, most of the brothers and sisters have become confident in the Lord and dare all the more to proclaim the gospel without fear.

• That’s because our roots are going deeper; you’re humble, open, and God can sow seed and bring forth something that our minds can’t conceive when we’re not closed systems

Philippians 1:15 New International Version (NIV)

15 It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill.

• These are all the things Paul can’t control
• It’s crazy how we can focus on the one negative thing said about us; we can snuggle up to nasty behavior – it’s immaturity – we’re not rooted in love enough to know if God is for me, who can be against me
• Steven almost called this message, “Prison Sentence”, because we hang up Philippians 4:14 in a weight room, but Paul wrote that in a prison
• You don’t know how long you’ll be here, but you know how wide and deep, and beyond comprehension the love of Christ is
• There’s more fruit, favor, and faith
• Ignore what you can’t control
• You don’t get informed by watching the news
• You don’t get informed by receiving fragmented information; focus on the fruit
• You will know a tree by its fruit

• Let’s go back a couple thousand years, back to normal, back to Adam and Eve, naked in the garden with the ability to eat whatever they want – it was normal
• We can be so used to scarcity that we can reject abundance when God sends it because we don’t recognize it
• Abundance doesn’t feel normal to us; God will send someone to love us, then we push them away because we’re not used to receiving fully
• Adam and Eve got in trouble because they lost focus of all the things God gave them to eat
• We have a choice about how we spend this time
• You could be watching Netflix, but instead, you’re watching (or reading), and planting yourself with streams of water – you’re getting your roots right, your mind right, priorities right, what matters right now
• Our need to know is what keeps us from receiving
• That tree was the tree of knowledge
• Nobody even knows what fruit they ate
• Message Option #3: When Naked was Normal
  • Didn’t have to be anything that you were not
  • I am who God says I am
• Now it’s more normal for us to hide
• It’s more normal for us to cover ourselves and compare ourselves
• What God asked Adam was, “who told you that you were naked?” (when Adam felt shame)
• Who told you that you had to do something else, or be someone else, or it took something extra to be accepted, that life had to be perfect for you to have a praise?
• Who told you that you weren’t good with money? Or good with girls? Who told you that? Who told you that you were an introvert
• This is the time to prune ourselves of perspectives that didn’t come from heaven
• This season requires focusing on His word, not conformation to the situations and world
• Focus on the fruit, not the frustration
• He said, no I’m going through stuff, but show me what I can do, because Christ is in me
• “I don’t know”
• He’s so used to calling the shots that he still speaks as though he has a choice
• Paul is waiting on a verdict of life or death

Philippians 1:17-18 New International Version (NIV)

17 The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. 18 But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice. Yes, and I will continue to rejoice,…

• Steven cares more of the message bearing fruit in your life
• Paul went through the, “this isn’t fair” – he was trying to do right
• What if this season is fast-forwarding us into the correct priorities? Would it be worth it?
• What if we’re going to get 50 years of wisdom, of fruit, of a season of frustration
• Focus on the fruit – or focus on the things you don’t know, with everybody else, the UFOs and the unknowable faith outcomes
• In the meantime,

Romans 8:18-28 New International Version (NIV)

Present Suffering and Future Glory

18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. 19 For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

• What do you want to focus on? The frustration or the fruit?
• God is setting you free from everything that doesn’t look like Him
• Focus on the fruit
• That’s why we still tithe in a recession, because we give him back what he gave us
• Hope is a focus
• Focus on the fruit
• Faith, hope, and maturity grows within the things we don’t know
• “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose”
  • That’s the fruit; focus on the fruit or you will die in the frustration as you wait
• Paul still had a choice; you still have a choice; the choice is your focus
• How are you going to start this week? How are you going to start this day?
• Peter fell down because of broken focus, when he took his eyes off Jesus
• If God is squeezing you right now, something good is coming from it
• “For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.” – this doesn’t look like certainty. This is a hope that can’t be described
• There is some fruit that can only be born when you’re going through it – you have to choose your focus
• Declare that you’re not going to dwell on what the world is saying
• You’ve got to focus forward to the fruit on the other side; look forward to glory on the other side, to a greater anointing, a brighter day, a peaceful heart
• Know that all things work together for the good of those who love him and have been called according to his purpose
• You are in a season where you must focus on your fruit
• All you need to do is yield your fruit and you will make it, and you will see it
• If you focus on your fears, you can die on the other side of something God had for you
• We’ve been preaching about Egypt, that generation of Israelites died in the wilderness by focusing on what they had left and lost

Numbers 13:28 New International Version (NIV)

28 But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there.

• They were so focused on the people that they didn’t even eat the fruit they were carrying
• Are you really going to let what you don’t know, become greater than the God that you do?
• God show us the fruit, the blessings, and enlarge in our minds, the reasons we have to have faith
• We can stretch our faith
• We thank you lord, even if you are pruning our branches, we will be more fruitful on the other side.

Link to full video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QED4Oqd202c