Don't Settle for Safe | Nate Hilgenkamp

Kylen Perry: Porch, how are we doing? Are we doing all right tonight? Great to see you. Thanks for making it out. To all of our Porch.Live locations, we're so glad you're streaming with us. Hey, I'm really excited for tonight. First, I'll just say this, because some of you in the room are here for the very first time, and you're probably wondering what this is, so it's helpful for me to look at you and give you a little background on who we are.

The Porch exists to call any and every young adult to see Jesus and surrender fully to life with him. That's who we are. That's what you're a part of tonight. When we say, "Any and every young adult," we mean it. We really do. I was talking to the Lord earlier this morning, and I was like, "God, I know your heart is one where you want saints and sinners and skeptics and seekers to all gather into this space."

So, if you're here and you have questions, you're in the right place. If you're here and you've been walking with the Lord for a long time, you're in the right place. If you're here by mistake, I promise you're in the right place. So, we're really glad you would join us here this evening, and I'm really excited for where we're going, because tonight we have a very special guest in the room with us. For the second time this year, we have Mr. Nate Hilgenkamp in the house. Give it up for Nate.

Nate is one of the teaching pastors at Harris Creek. He's a cohost of Becoming Something podcast, but way more than all of that…that's awesome…Nate is just an incredible human being. He's someone we dearly love here at The Porch whom I'm grateful to call a really good friend, and I genuinely believe (I need y'all to hear me when I say this, because I'm not just paying him empty lip service) is one of the leading voices when it comes to Bible teaching for our generation. So, we're really blessed to have you here, man. Thanks for making the time to join us tonight. Would y'all do a great job of welcoming Nate Hilgenkamp to the stage?

Nate Hilgenkamp: I want to start with this. Recently, my wife and I had a disagreement that's still unresolved. I thought there is no better way to resolve this conflict than to let you decide who was right or wrong, which is just great marriage advice. Whenever you and your wife disagree or you and your husband disagree someday, just ask other people who's right or wrong. So, would you help me out? I'm going to tell you what the disagreement was, and let me know who was right or wrong.

The disagreement was this. I saw a picture of a shoe online, and the disagreement we had over this shoe wasn't whether or not this shoe was cool; the disagreement we had was over the color of this shoe. I think we have a picture of it. Check out this shoe. Yeah. So, I have a question. How many of you, like me, see this shoe and see it as teal and gray? Yeah. Keep those hands raised. Those are the saved people in the room tonight. Now how many of you, like my wife, see that shoe and see it as pink and white? Crazy! This makes no sense to me. How can it be that all of us are looking at the same thing and seeing two different things?

Now let me tell you who's right, because I did some research on this, because I couldn't believe it. My wife saw one thing, I saw a different thing, and it just blew my mind, so I did a lot of research. I found out that Vans, the type of shoe that is, doesn't make a teal and gray shoe, so, unfortunately, my wife was right. They are pink and white. It just blew my mind. I think it just has blown yours. How can two people look at the same thing and come to two very different conclusions?

As I've been thinking about that, I've realized this happens all the time, that two people look at the exact same thing and come away with two different conclusions. The thing is most of the time it's not just about the color of a shoe. That's a very low cost to get wrong, but there are a lot of other situations where two people look at the same thing and come to two different conclusions.

For example, maybe you've had two people in your life each go through a breakup, and they each saw it very differently. One of them goes through a breakup, and they see that breakup and go, "This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I'm unlovable. I'm undesirable." The other person can go through a breakup, see that breakup, and go, "This is really, really hard, yet I know I'm still loved, I know I'm still desired, and I can't wait to see what happens next."

How can two people each see the same thing and come to two very different conclusions? Here's how. I'm just going to give away my message. It all comes down to who you trust. Who you trust changes the lens you view your life through. Who you trust changes the conclusions you will come to in your life.

I just want you to know tonight, Porch, most people will come to the wrong conclusion. Most people will see their life the wrong way. Friends, I don't want that to be you. So, tonight, we're going to do a little study of Scripture to try to figure out how we can see things in our lives the right way, and we're going to do that by opening up the Word of God to the book of Numbers. Kylen said I could teach on anything, and I was like, "Let's do the book of Numbers. I bet they haven't listened to that or read that in a while."

The book of Numbers is the fourth book in the Bible. Numbers 13 and 14 are where we're going to be. We're going to read a story where 12 men all saw the same thing but didn't all come to the same conclusion. Just to set up where we're at in the book of Numbers, because I bet a lot of you are like, "Man, I have no idea what's going on leading up to this point in Scripture…" Well, Numbers 13 is about a year and a half after the exodus.

When the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt, God appeared to a man named Moses and said, "Moses, I'm going to use you to lead my people up out of slavery and into freedom." So, Moses goes to Pharaoh and says, "Let God's people go," and Pharaoh says, "No." What happens next is God brings plague after plague after plague upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians until, finally, Pharaoh says, "Okay, fine. Get out of here."

As the Israelites are getting out of there, they come up against a sea. Once they're up against the sea, they think they're free, only to turn around and see that Pharaoh has changed his mind. Pharaoh and his armies are tracking them down, and they're up against the sea, and they go, "Moses, we're going to die." Then Moses goes to God and says, "God, have you brought us out here to die?" and God says, "Absolutely not."

So, he splits the sea, and the Israelites walk through on dry ground. The Egyptians pursue them into the sea, God closes the sea, and then they perish in that sea. The Israelites walk onto the other side of the sea only to appear in a desert. This isn't like some exciting type of freedom. They're like, "Man, we want to go back to Egypt because we have no food to eat here." So they go, "Moses, have you brought us out here to die?"

Moses goes to God and goes, "God, have you brought us out here to die?" God says, "Absolutely not." Then he provides manna, which was a form of bread, every single day for them in this desert. They continue to journey through the desert, and we pick up on this story when they are on the edge of what we know as the Promised Land, the land God had promised them way back in Egypt that he would eventually give to them.

So, they're standing on the edge of this Promised Land, looking over into it, and Moses decides to do one thing. He takes 12 men from each of the 12 tribes of Israel. In Genesis there was a man named Jacob, later renamed Israel. He had 12 sons. Moses picks 12 men from the 12 tribes of Israel and sends them into the Promised Land as spies.

He tells them, "Figure out all you possibly can about this land. Survey the people of the land. Survey the cities in this land. Survey the fruit of this land, the terrain of this land. We want to know everything we possibly can about this land." So, these men go into the Promised Land and spend 40 days in this land. They look at the people, they look at the terrain, they look at the cities, and they even cut down some fruit.

In fact, Scripture says in Numbers, chapter 13, that they cut down clusters of grapes, but the grapes were so large they had to carry them back on poles, which sounds like an exaggeration, but here's a picture of the clusters of grapes grown in this region today. It is the perfect region for growing grapes and other fruit. So, these are the types of clusters they're bringing back to the people of God. It also says they cut down pomegranates and figs as well. After surveying this Promised Land for 40 days, they come back with a report for the people of God, and they say this, starting in Numbers 13:26:

"They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land. They gave Moses this account: 'We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites live in the Negev; the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan.'"

So, they go, "This land is amazing. There are pomegranates and figs and grapes, and it's flowing with milk and honey. The land itself is phenomenal, but there are some really, really big bad guys there, and I don't think they want us to live there, so we shouldn't try to live there." The people of God, the Israelites, are all thrown into a panic, and then this happens next in verse 30: "Then Caleb [one of the other spies] silenced the people before Moses and said, 'We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.'"

Now, the other spies start to get nervous that the people might believe Caleb's report over their report, so they start to make stuff up about the land they've just seen. They say this next: "But the men who had gone up with him said, 'We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are.' And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, 'The land we explored devours those living in it.'" Not the people, but the land. "It'll just swallow you alive if you go in."

"All the people we saw there are of great size." Your translation may even say, "…are giants." "We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them." So, they go, "Guys, trust us. We cannot do this. Don't listen to Caleb. This land is going to kill us. The people will kill us. We've spent 40 days there. We've seen it all. We don't want to go into this land because this land is not best for us."

Now, my question after reading this text is…How can 12 men all see the same thing and come to two different conclusions? Ten of them see this land and come back saying, "We have a really, really bad report." Two of them, Caleb and, as we'll later see, Joshua, come back and say, "No, we have a really, really good report." How can it be that 12 men saw the same things…? They all saw the same people, the same cities, the same terrain, and the same fruit, yet they came to two very different conclusions. How is that?

Well, it's because they weren't looking at the same thing. You see, all the 10 men were looking at was a problem; all the two men were looking at was a promise. All the 10 men were looking at were the giants in the land; two of the men were just looking at the God who was overseeing this land. Here's how they came to two different conclusions, and it's the first thing we can learn tonight.

1. Who you trust changes how you perceive your problem. This is important for us, because all of us are going to have problems in our lives. Problems are inevitable. We're going to have health problems. We're going to have job problems. We're going to have relationship problems. We're going to have family problems. We're going to have financial problems. Problems in this life are inevitable. The right perspective of those problems is not.

These 10 men came to the wrong conclusion. I want to show you from the text again what it looked like. At the end of their report, after they saw all of these really big, bad people, they came to this conclusion. We just read this in verse 33. They said, "We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them."

They go, "In light of our problem, we seemed really, really small." They're going, "Y'all, we stood back-to-back against these guys, and we looked like grasshoppers compared to them. They're going to ruin us." Now, the thing is they were actually right in assessing the difficulty. History shows that the people in the land were strong. The armies were large. The cities were fortified. They technically came to the right conclusion. There was a real problem.

But why did these 10 men come to a different conclusion than the other two? It's because of this. They looked at their problem and compared their problem to their power while they should have compared their problem to God's power. This text says, "In light of our problem, we seemed like grasshoppers," when they should have gone, "In light of my God, this problem looks like a grasshopper to him, because while we stand no chance on our own against this army, this army stands no shot against my God."

They came to the wrong conclusion of this problem because they thought this problem was their problem to solve. It was never about them; it was about someone else. Just to illustrate it another way, let's imagine if today, rather than driving up I-35, I get on a plane from Waco to Dallas. I hop on an American Eagle flight from Waco to the DFW airport. Let's just say I get in my seat, 14B, and settle down before the flight takes off, and I get really, really nervous.

I start going, "Oh my word! This is going to be a nightmare. I've never taken a single hour of pilot classes. I didn't go to flight school. How in the world is this plane going to get from Waco to Dallas?" Why would that be a ridiculous thing to think? Because that isn't my job. My job is to sit there and allow the other person, the pilot who is there, to take me from one place to the next. I don't have to worry that I don't have what it takes because I know someone else has what it takes.

This is what's going on in this text. They're going, "How are we going to get from this place to another place?" Meanwhile, there's a God in this story going, "Hey, it's not about you; it's about me. I am the one who promised to take you there." In fact, this is how this chapter starts in Numbers, chapter 13, just to show you this.

"The Lord said to Moses, 'Send some men to explore the land of Canaan [to see if you can overtake it]…'" No, that's not what it says. It says, "Send some men to explore the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites." He's going, "You don't need to send spies in to determine whether or not you can do it. You don't need to take a vote. I've already decided what I'm going to do. This isn't up to you; it's up to me."

Then the spies go in, and they come back, and 10 of them say, "But, guys, the Canaanites live there, and the Hittites live there, and the Jebusites live there." God is going, "Yeah, I already told you they did." In fact, he told them this in Exodus, chapter 3. Just to read it for you, this is what it says. As he's promising them the Promised Land, he goes, "And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—a land flowing with milk and honey."

I think God is looking at these spies and going, "All you've done on this super-secret mission is figure out what I already told you. You came back saying, 'Hey, guys, it's a land flowing with milk and honey.' I already told you that. You came back saying, 'The Jebusites and Hittites and Canaanites live there.' Yeah, I already told you that."

They also go, "We cannot enter into this land," and God goes, "Oh, no, buddy. I already told you that you would." See, here's how Caleb came to the correct conclusion. Here's how his perspective differed from the other 10. He made a decision to focus on God's promise rather than his problem, and he decided he was going to trust what God said rather than what he saw.

Caleb goes, "Hey, guys, I see the same problem you do. I saw the same cities. I saw the same army. I saw the same people. I'm not ignoring your problem. I'm not ignoring this problem. The only difference, though, between you and me is I'm not ignoring my God. I just know that even though it seems like it would be really, really hard for us to overtake this land, he has told us we are going to overtake this land, so if he said it, I'm just going to believe it." That's what faith is. Faith is simply believing that God is telling the truth. That's how Caleb came to the right conclusion.

So, to summarize this point, there are two ways of looking at this problem. The first is "We are really, really small and this enemy is really, really big; therefore, we're going to lose." The second is "We are really, really small and this enemy is really, really big; therefore, I can't wait to see what God is going to do. If he said it, I'm going to believe it. I'm just going to sit back, put on my seat belt, and watch this thing take off, because I'm trusting him; I'm not trusting me."

It's the first thing we can learn from this passage. Who you trust changes how you perceive your problem. Okay. Let's flip over to chapter 14. We just finished reading chapter 13. Let's see what happens next. The people of God have just received a bad report from the majority and a good report from the minority. Let's see who they choose to listen to. It says this.

Chapter 14, verse 1: "That night all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, 'If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness! Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword?'" That right there is an accusation against the character of God. They're going, "God wants us to die. More than that, he wants our wives and children to be taken as plunder."

"'Wouldn't it be better for us to go back to Egypt?' And they said to each other, 'We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.' Then Moses and Aaron fell facedown in front of the whole Israelite assembly gathered there. Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had explored the land, tore their clothes…" In that day this was a sign of grief and mourning.

"…and said to the entire Israelite assembly, 'The land we passed through and explored is exceedingly good. If the Lord is pleased with us, he will lead us into that land…'" If you notice, the report of the other 10 makes no mention of God. Here, they say, "No, the Lord will lead us into a land flowing with milk and honey, and he will give it to us."

"'Only do not rebel against the Lord. And do not be afraid of the people of the land, because we will devour them. Their protection is gone, but the Lord is with us. Do not be afraid of them.' But the whole assembly talked about stoning them." That sounds extreme, but here's what's going on there. They're thinking, "Hey, we're going to kill you guys before you kill us. Caleb and Joshua, if we listen to you we're going to die, so we're going to put you to death before you put us to death."

Then this happens next. "Then the glory of the Lord appeared at the tent of meeting to all the Israelites." The Lord appears and is angry with the people, and he says, "How long until you trust me? What else do I have to do?" In your life right now, what else does he have to do? I mean, think about the history lesson I gave you before we jumped into this text. Think about it specifically for the Israelites. Think about what they saw God do.

They were enslaved in Egypt, thought they would die in Egypt, and God brought them up out of slavery and into freedom. God did it. Then they're standing on the banks of the sea, thinking they're going to get overtaken again, thinking they're going to die, only for God to make a way, and they walk through on dry ground. God did it.

Then they're in the desert, thinking they're going to die once again because there is no food, and then manna is provided for them every single day. God did it. Here, once again, they're going, "We don't think God will do it," and God is going, "What else do I need to do?" Friend, what else does he need to do for you for you to trust him? This time, he says their disbelief is deserving of punishment. Skipping ahead to verse 19, Moses goes to God and says:

"'In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.' The Lord replied, 'I have forgiven them, as you asked. Nevertheless, as surely as I live and as surely as the glory of the Lord fills the whole earth, not one of those who saw my glory and the signs I performed in Egypt and in the wilderness but who disobeyed me and tested me ten times—not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their ancestors. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it.'"

Since they disbelieved God, they were sentenced to wander in the desert for 40 years, and not a single person who disbelieved God got to see the power of God as he could have brought them into the Promised Land. This is the second point, the second thing we can learn.

2. Disbelief will make you miss out on what God can do. You see, if they would have just believed God, they would have gotten to see God bring them into the Promised Land, but since they didn't, they spent the rest of their lives in the desert and died in the desert. Their disbelief had consequences.

If we're to look at this story and learn all we possibly can about this story and learn all we possibly can about the character and person of God, I think we can learn this from this story: our disbelief has consequences. If we spend our lives disbelieving God, there will be things in our lives we will miss out on simply because we didn't believe they could actually happen, because our disbelief has consequences.

Now, I also want to be clear that I do not believe every single consequence in your life is a result of disbelief. Not every pain in your life or every challenge in your life is a result of disbelief, but I do believe disbelief has consequences, because disbelief will make you miss out on what God can do. Here, their disbelief had a consequence, and this consequence was for them to wander in the desert for 40 years.

Do you ever wonder why? If you grew up in church, maybe you've heard this story. You know, the Israelites were enslaved, then they got into freedom, but then they had to wander in the desert for 40 years. Why did God make them wander in the desert for 40 years? That feels like a really extreme punishment based on this scenario.

Why did God say, "Okay. You're going to have to wander in the desert for 40 years"? Here's why: because they asked for it. This was what they wanted. In fact, this is what we actually just read in the text. Let's read it again. Look at what the Israelites said to God. "All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, 'If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness!'"

So, God is going, "I want to lead you into a promised land," and they go, "We don't want to go into the Promised Land. We either want to die in Egypt or we want to die here," and God is going, "Well, you're certainly not going back to Egypt, so if you want to die here, go for it." He just gave them what they asked for. Why did they ask for this? What a lame request of the Lord. Why did they ask for the wilderness? Here's why they asked for the wilderness: the wilderness was safe. This is what they knew, and what they knew was good enough.

Porch, I don't know about you. I don't think we serve a God of the "good enough." I think we serve a God who's able to abundantly, more than all we ask or imagine. So, we don't need to go, "God, just keep me safe," because he can do still more. I want to show you two things that are really important here, two implications for this on your life.

See, not only did these 10 men, these 10 spies, miss out on what God could do through their lives; they caused many, many, many, many others to miss out on what God could do in their lives as well. You see, these 10 men came back with a report of disbelief, and this disbelief was contagious, and it got on the people of God. As they received this disbelief from these 10 men, it caused them to miss out on what God could do in and through their lives.

That right there has two implications in your life. The first is who you hang out with really matters, because what they either believe or disbelieve about God is likely getting off on you, because belief or disbelief is contagious. So, think about the people in your life. Are the people in your life the 10 or the 2?

Are they the people in your life who are coming back saying, "God can't do it. It's too big. It's too challenging. Oh, you're always going to struggle with that. Oh, that's never going to change"? Or are the people in your life the two, going, "Hey, God can do it. He said he would, and if he said he would, then I believe he can. Of course God would"?

Are the people in your life the 10 or the 2? Are they the disbelieving, critical, cynical people? If they are, I just want you to know they are likely causing you to miss out on what God can do in and through your life. If that's cool with you, keep hanging out with the 10, but for me, I want to be found with the 2, because I want to see all God can do in and through my life. So, the first is who you hang out with really matters.

The second is you're not just receiving belief or disbelief; you are giving belief or disbelief. As I was writing this message, I was thinking about a specific moment that happens in our house every single day. I'm married and have two girls. They're 3 years old and 8 months old. Every single day in our house we… I was going to say, "We make dinner." I have never made dinner. It's just how it works. My wife is amazing at this. She makes dinner. Then we sit down at the dinner table.

What happens every single time is I pray over our family and over the meal. When something happens at the same spot every single day, it can get really, really repetitive. I've found myself praying something like this: "God, thank you so much for this day. God, thank you so much for this food you provide, and I just pray you'd keep us safe. It's in Jesus' name I pray, amen."

As I was looking at this text and I was looking at my life, I was like, "Oh, I look like the Israelites, and, oh, I don't want my little girls to look like the Israelites." I was just thinking about what I've been passing on to my two little girls. I do not want their faith in God to be "God, would you keep us safe? Would you keep us right here in what we know? We're thankful for what we have, and would you allow us to keep what we have? God, just keep us right here in what we know. Would you keep us safe?"

I don't want my girls to believe that about God. I don't want my girls to pray that to God. Think about you. Think about when you get around the people in your life, when you get around the Community Group or the people you drove here with. When you're with your friends, what do they hear you say about God, and what do they hear you say when you talk to God?

Let's just picture this. Let's picture that you and your Community Group are sitting down for dinner and you're chosen to pray. Do your prayers sound like, "God, thank you so much for today. God, thank you for these people, and thank you for this meal. Would you bless this food to our bodies and keep us safe, Lord? In Jesus' name I pray, amen"?

Or do you sit down around that table to pray with your Community Group and go, "Father, I pray that you'd save every single young adult in Dallas, Texas, through the people at this table. Would sin be far from us. Father, may we never watch pornography, not just this week, but never again in our lives. May we never struggle with materialism ever again in our lives. May our struggle with body image be gone. May my friend who has an estranged relationship with his dad… May that be reunited tonight. God, may you kick Satan in the teeth through this Community Group, and may you be on the move in Dallas through us. In Jesus' name, amen."

I tell you what. That prayer sounds a whole lot different than this prayer. My question is…Which prayer are you praying and why? What do you believe about your God? I think your prayers say a lot about what you believe about God. One is a defensive prayer. "Lord, just keep me safe." One is an offensive prayer. "Lord, let's go! Let's storm the gates of hell, and let's see lost people be found. Let's see dead people come to life, and let's see sin not reign because the Spirit does."

So, my question is…What are you giving to the people in your life? Are you giving off faith or are you giving off fear? If it's fear, stop it. By God's grace and God's power, stop it. Let's pray bigger things, because we have a bigger God. So, the second thing we can learn from this passage is disbelief will make you miss out on what God can do. I want to finish this passage by rereading verse 23, and then we're going to read verse 24.

God says this about the people who didn't trust him. "…not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their ancestors. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it. But because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it." You see, since he had a different spirit, he had a different experience. Since he had a different belief, he had a different life. This is the third point, the third thing we can learn from this text.

3. A different spirit brings different results. Porch, I just want you to know… In fact, you probably already know this. Most people will complain. Most people will grumble. Most people will disbelieve. Most people will just want to stay safe, and most people will miss out on what God can do through their life.

I don't know about you, Porch. I don't want to be most people. I want to be filled with a different spirit. I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit, because I want a different experience. I want to see different things, because a different spirit brings different results. Since Caleb believed God would do it, he got to see God do it, because a different spirit brings different results. I could give you many examples of this. Here's one that feels the most relevant to me.

Some of you…in fact, maybe many of you…know about something called Passion Conference. It happens every single January. It was started by a pastor named Louie Giglio in Atlanta, Georgia. I have a picture from this previous year. They met in the Atlanta Falcons' stadium, Mercedes-Benz Stadium. This is specifically for college students. There are 65,000 college students from all around the country in this stadium, all to lift up the name of Jesus.

It hasn't always met here. It has grown year after year after year after year. They haven't always met in the Atlanta Falcons' stadium. One year, they did rent out the arena, and a few months before, apparently, ticket sales weren't necessarily where they needed to be. It looked like they had bitten off a lot more than they could chew and there were going to be a bunch of holes in the stadium. It was incredibly disheartening for the people who were putting on the conference.

A couple of months before the conference, they got together as a team. Pastor Louie walked into that meeting and said, "Guys, in two months, whenever we walk into the Benz, and whenever I see every seat full, I don't want my response to be, 'I can't believe God did it.' Instead, I want to be praying right now and believing right now so that when I walk into that arena two months from now and see every seat full, I go, 'Of course God did it, because I believed he could, because I've been praying that he would.'"

Friends, I've realized in my life there are two different types of believers in Jesus. God will provide in a miraculous way, and there is a group of Christians that will go, "I can't believe God did it." There's another group of Christians that will go, "Of course God did it, because I believed he would, because I've been praying that he would. Of course God did it, because I knew he could."

Now, Porch, I also want to make it clear I'm not trying to communicate, "Hey, if you just believe God more, you'll get all you possibly want." Like, "If you believe God more, you'll be engaged by 10:00 p.m. tonight." That's not what I'm saying. What I am saying is, as followers of Jesus, we have reason for great hope. As followers of Jesus, we have reason for big belief, and let me tell you why. It's because, as followers of Jesus, we have received a better report than the people of God did in Numbers, chapter 13.

Let me tell you what it is. Let me tell you what it is by showing you what's otherwise kind of an obscure verse. In the beginning of Numbers, chapter 13, it lists out all of the people who were sent in by Moses into the Promised Land as spies. It lists out all of the 12 tribes of Israel. In Numbers, chapter 13, it tells us who Caleb was. It's one of those verses you typically skip over. It seems like there's not a whole lot there. There's a whole lot there. Let me read it to you. "…from the tribe of Judah, Caleb son of Jephunneh…"

In Numbers, chapter 13, the people of God feared death, so Moses picked a man from the tribe of Judah. He picked Caleb, and he told Caleb, "Hey, go into the heart of enemy territory. Your job is to go into the heart of enemy territory and survey these people, to survey this enemy, and your job is to determine whether or not we should fear this enemy. Your job, as a spy, is to determine whether or not this enemy will put us to death."

So, this man from the tribe of Judah, Caleb, goes into the heart of enemy territory. He surveys the land, he surveys the people, he surveys the cities, and he comes back with a report for the people of God and says, "We need not fear this enemy. We need not fear death, for our God will win the victory."

A lot later in Scripture, once again, the people of God feared death from an enemy. This time, God, not Moses, chose a man from the tribe of Judah and sent him into the heart of enemy territory. Revelation calls him the Lion of the tribe of Judah. You know him by the name of Jesus. He chose this man and sent him into the heart of enemy territory. This time, though, he wasn't sent in as a spy but as a warrior.

He did not go in to survey our enemy; he went in to slay our enemy. He died on a cross and rose again three days later, and he came back with a report for the people of God and said, "You need not fear death, for death has been destroyed. You need not fear judgment, for your sin has been forgiven. Remember that snake back in Genesis, chapter 3? I just stomped on his head. You need not fear anything, for I am alive and with you and for you."

Porch, my question is…What report are you going to believe? What report are you going to trust? You see, we, as the people of God, have an opportunity. In Numbers 13 and 14, the people of God had an opportunity. They failed the test. May we not fail the test. There are going to be a lot of people… The majority of people are going to say, "Fear. Panic. Anxiety. We're going to lose." There are going to be people within the church who say that.

You don't need to listen to that report, because that report is not true. We've heard from the man from the tribe of Judah, the Lion of Judah, and he has given us a better report. The question you have to answer tonight is what report you are going to believe and who you are going to trust, because who you trust changes how you see your life.

I don't know about you. I just know, for me, I do not want to get to the end of my life and have it be said of me that I trusted God for too little, that I asked God for too little. I would much rather get to the end of my life, meet my Savior face-to-face, and have Jesus look at me and go, "You know, Nate, you kind of overshot some things down there. You thought I could do more than I actually could."

I would much rather lean in that direction, because I would much rather believe for things and pray for things that make me look like a fool in front of you than believe for things and pray for things that make me look like a fool in front of him. So, what I want us to do right now is to spend time in prayer, and I want us to do two things.

The first is I just want us all to repent of the ways in which we have not believed God in the ways in which we should. All of us, myself included, have not believed God in the way in which we should, so let's go to him and repent of that. The second thing I want to do is I want us to ask, "God, what's the one thing in my life that seems too big, that seems too hard, that seems too far gone? What's that one thing in my life that you want me to start praying for?"

I don't know what it is for you. Maybe it's that your mom would be freed from alcoholism. Maybe it's that you would begin to have a relationship with your dad. Maybe it's that you'd be freed from a certain sin. Maybe it's that God would provide financially. Honestly, I don't even want to keep giving options, because I would rather have the Holy Spirit bring it to mind than have me bring it to mind. So, right now, let's go before God and do those two things. Let's repent, and then let's ask him.

God, you are a holy God. You are a big God. You are so much bigger and so much stronger than what we know you to be. Father, I know that at least for me, I come before you right now with a repentant heart and a repentant spirit. I just want to tell you, God, I'm so sorry for the ways in which I've looked like the 10 and not the 2 and the ways I've just wanted to be safe and the ways I've just wanted to complain and the ways I've just wanted to stay stagnant.

Father, I'm sorry for the ways in which I've missed it. You know, God, we are a funny people as followers of Jesus. We can say things like, "We believe Jesus conquered death, but we don't think he can do this smaller thing." May that be far from us. Now, God, I just come before you right now on behalf of all of my friends here in this room.

I pray you'd bring something to mind by the power of your Holy Spirit, that your Holy Spirit would bring something to mind, a unique thing in every single person's life right now, something that seems too hard, too difficult, too big, too impossible, something where it's like, "Unless God moves, it can't get done."

Father, maybe it's something they prayed for years ago and stopped praying for years ago. Maybe it's something they've never even had the courage to pray or maybe it's something they've just thought for the first time right now. God, I pray that every single one of those things would happen tonight. We believe you can do it. We pray that freedom would happen tonight, that reconciliation would happen tonight, that salvation would happen tonight, that provision would happen tonight.

Whatever it is, Father, we know you can do it, so, God, we ask that you would do it now. By the power of God, we ask that you would do it now. God, if you don't do it tonight, may we still be found praying tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day, and may we be found, like beggars at your door, knocking on your door, asking for bread, day after day after day, asking for you to do it.

God, I also want to declare that even if you never do it, you've already done enough, because you sent your one and only Son because you loved us so much. He lived the life we should have lived, died the death we should have died, and three days later rose again so we can have life and freedom for all of eternity. So, even if you don't do another thing, we know you've done the thing that we need.

Father, we're here tonight for one reason. We want to worship you tonight for one reason. We have hope tonight for one reason and one reason only, and it's because of the fact that Jesus is alive and with us and for us. We want to worship him with all we have now. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.