Skip to content Jim Graff on Sunday Service May 21 · 30 min ...more
May 21, 2023 · 30 min · Pray Radio
...more Show the full description Show less Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Support this leader
Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Give
Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
277K followers
Jim Graff is a respected pastor, leader, and author who loves helping people fulfill their unique
potential while finding their significance in Jesus Christ.
277K followers
0:01 Are you searching for a life that means something? Most of us wrestle with our significance. Pastor Jim Graff understands, and in his book, A Significant Life, he shares extensive insight and0:13 inspiration that can help us change the course of our life and live in the purposes God placed in our heart. For your gift of any amount, we would love to send you your own copy of A Significant Life. Contact0:25 us today. Visit asignificant life dot com. That's asignificant life dot com.0:38 Hello, and thanks for joining us. Today, our dad, pastor Jim, is gonna be kicking off a new series called He Cares About That. We'll be talking about how Jesus was human and how God understands our0:49 humanness. And in that, he cares about the things we deal with as people.0:53 Pastor Jim will be talking about hope. Hope is so important. Right? It keeps us moving forward with passion and purpose, and God cares about us having hope. In fact, he says in Jeremiah 2nine 111:05 that he has plans to give us a hope and a future. So God wants us to know hope. Again, we're so glad that you joined us, and we pray that you're encouraged by the message today.1:34 Well, so far we've had a service that's been really uplifting. The worship has been reverent and celebratory, and it's really strengthened my heart. And during the Lord's Supper, I'm reminded of the fact1:46 that Jesus will never forsake me, his love will never fail me, and his leadership can take me places I could never go without his love. But this morning, I'm getting ready to take you down into1:58 a valley. And the reason I'm gonna take you down into a valley is because we're going to study a psalm, Psalm 88, and the author basically takes us down into a valley, and the2:10 reason he takes us down into this valley is because he wants us to understand that for many believers they go down in the valley and they never get out of that valley into the next mountaintop2:22 that God wants us to experience in our lives. And so Psalm 88 has been called 1 of the 2 saddest psalms in all the Bible by scholars, and it's written by a man named2:33 Haman and it's called Amascal, and it starts this way, it says, Lord you are the God who saves me. Day and night I cry out to you. May my prayer come before you. Would you2:45 turn your ear to my cry? Now these 2 verses are like lots of the Psalms in that that, you know, the book of Psalms literally addresses every human emotion that we have as people,2:57 and in this text, the psalmist is saying that I'm praying not just in the morning, but I'm praying morning and evening, and I'm talking to God about my trouble because I want God to turn his ear towards3:09 me, and I want him to make a difference in the midst of this trouble. But after this verse, the psalmist goes down into a valley that he never comes back out of, and I'll just read you parts3:21 of it. He says, I'm overwhelmed with trouble, and my life draws near to death. He said, I'm counted among those who go down to the pit. And then if if you read the the end of verse 5, he says,3:33 God, it feels like you're remembering me no more and I'm cut off from your care. Now in my early days as a pastor, I probably would have been tempted to say to somebody talking like that, now do you not3:45 realize that the Bible says we're to rejoice in the Lord always, and Paul said again, you need to rejoice. And I probably would have been tempted to say something to them like, you need to be3:57 careful about the words of your mouth because you're gonna have what you say. And I don't want to lessen the importance of those spiritual principles because they're important and they're gonna play out in your4:09 life and God has us do those things for a reason, but there are also times in our life whenever we look into the eyes of somebody who's done everything that we know to do right4:21 and they're fighting a battle that is incredibly difficult in their life, and the most important thing we can learn to do is to be silent and to help them get in touch with4:33 the presence of God in their hearts. And that's what this psalm is really all about. It gets even worse. Basically, if you read verse 6 to 8, he talks about how God's taken his4:44 closest friends from him, and he says, God, I'm confined and I can't even escape this trouble. So basically, the first 8 verses, he tells us that he's cut off from the care of God and4:56 that all of his closest friends have abandoned him, and he feels like he's in trouble that he can't escape no matter what he does in his life. So the question becomes, why then is this psalm5:08 even in the Bible? Well, we can answer that question by by seeing 2 things in the psalm's inscriptions. Number 1, this Psalm is called a mascul, and a mascul is a5:20 psalm that advocates or supports wisdom and enlightenment. So when we see that a Psalm's a mascul, we can always know that this is talking about something that many believers don't5:32 know what to do, they don't know how to handle things, and the psalmist is trying to help us handle things that a lot of believers don't really handle very well in their life. The other thing we5:43 can see from this song is it's written by someone called Haman, and Haman wasn't some, you know, sorry dude. I don't know how many of you watched Hee Haw when you were young. If you watched Hee Haw when you were young5:55 and you're willing to admit it, would you raise your hand this morning? Well, if you watched it regularly, you remember that there is a song that used to be on Hee Haw pretty often and it went this way, Gloom despair6:07 and agony on me, deep dark depression, and excessive misery. And why would people tune in week after week? Well, it's because, listen, when we're in misery, we like to know6:20 that there are other people who are imperfect, there are other people who have problems, and maybe we're not such a bad person in spite of the fact that we're going through the problems that we're in. And that's what6:31 this psalm is about. And when you study the biography of Haman, listen to what the Jewish encyclopedia wrote about him. It said that he was the grandson of the prophet Samuel. So Haman6:43 had quite the heritage. Samuel was the most prominent spiritual leader in Israel of his day, and first Samuel 19 says that God let none of Samuel's words ever6:55 fall to the ground. So in other words, every prayer that Samuel, Haman's grandfather prayed, God answered that prayer. But not only did Haman have an incredible spiritual7:07 legacy, he also lived an incredible life. And we're told that he was 1 of the 3 chief Levites that David appointed to superintend the musical services in the7:19 temple, and also he was called the king seer in in matters of God. And so when we're reading this psalm, we're reading the psalm that's written by a guy who the people came and they7:30 enjoyed the anointed worship that he probably had written and that he had overseen and produced, and not only that, King David so respected this man's spiritual walk with God7:42 that when he was seeking God's will about something, he would go and he would seek Haman who was the king's personal adviser. And yet he writes this psalm that makes us wonder why in7:54 the world would something be so raw? Why would it be seemingly even negative? And I know this morning that I'm speaking to people who believe what Paul wrote to Timothy in second8:06 Timothy 3 verse 16 where he said, all scriptures God breathed and it's useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in right eousness so that the servants of God may be thoroughly equipped8:18 for every good work. So the question becomes, what is it that Psalm 88 is equipping us to do? And here's the answer, it's teaching us that God alone is to be trusted with8:29 our deepest heartaches and with our deepest hopes. The reality is you can read the Bible and you can see that some incredible people went through some very, very dark times8:41 that made them say some really, really raw stuff. For instance, Samuel anointed Saul to be the first king of Israel, and after he did, Saul did such a terrible job8:53 that Samuel began to wonder, God, did I miss you? God, did I mentor him wrong? And then Samuel, all of his sons, the people looked at his sons, and they didn't even want Samuel's9:05 sons to be in spiritual leadership. And Samuel got so down inside that God had to say to him, now Samuel, I want you to take this this oil and I want you to9:17 anoint your horn with oil and I want you to go on to the next thing that I've called you to do in life. And in the Bible, the horn represent the callings that we have.9:29 Whenever 2 animals fight, they fight with their horns. Right? And God's saying, don't want you to lose the fight in your heart because when you're going through difficult times, I want you to know I've always got another9:41 mountain that I want you to climb. So what can we learn from this psalm that Haman wrote? Well, 3 things about going from heartache into the hope God has for our life. And the first thing is9:53 there has to be an admission. You say an admission of what pastor? Well, an admission that God's promises are true even when I don't feel like it, an admission that God's presence is true10:05 and it's real even whenever I'm not feeling like God's doing a lot in my life, maybe an admission that you're an imperfect person and God's not surprised by the fact that10:16 we're imperfect people, maybe an admission that we're disobeying God in some part of our life, but admission is an important part of us climbing the next mountain that God wants to lead us10:28 to in our life. Maybe today you feel like it's so hard to forgive somebody. Well, listen, that's why we choose pallbearers, so people can let us down 1 more time. Can you say amen? And10:40 listen, life's hard. And Haman again was this incredibly spiritual person who was saying, it's okay for life to be hard. It doesn't mean that God's not going to work in10:52 your life. I wanna tell you 3 stories this morning that I believe will inspire you to really seek God if you're feeling really dark and if it feels difficult inside11:04 because here's the reality that Haman helps us with, and he helps us real realize there are really 2 types of darkness. There's 1 darkness that's external darkness that I deal with, and that's a darkness11:16 I deal with because I live in a world where demonic power works, and it seems like the devil can always find people right who are gonna make life difficult on us. But there's a more serious11:28 darkness, and that's the internal darkness that can happen when we're in the midst of a very difficult trial. And the interior darkness brings things like doubt and fear and grief11:40 and bitterness and things that cause us not to stand up to the darkness so that God will do what he really wants to do in our lives. Let me tell you the first story. I don't know if it's true, but11:52 I know it's happened to lots of people that 1 night I was watching a movie with Tamara. And in this movie, this young couple fell in love. He was an air force pilot. She was a beautiful waitress.12:04 They were living in bliss and he would fly missions, come home fine, and she would, you know, feel like he was her hero. But then 1 mission he went and he never came back, and12:16 she found herself getting angry at God. Why would you bring this man in my life? Why would you let this happen to him? And why would you let this happen to me? And she wondered if she could ever be12:28 happy again in her life. The second story I want to tell you is a true story, and it's about a man who grew up in Quarrel, and his dad was a pastor. And he too got married when he12:40 was young, and he and his wife Brenda felt like life was just happiness and bliss. Then 1 day he got drafted into the Vietnam War, and he kissed his beautiful bride, and he said,12:51 baby, don't worry. I'm coming back for you. But 1 day in a riverboat, he was getting ready to throw a hand grenade, and a bullet hit that hand grenade, and it exploded and this13:03 phosphorus grenade burned most of his body and he would never be physically the same again. He said he can he'll never forget laying in the bed and seeing soldiers13:15 who were in similar conditions have their spouses take their wedding ring off and place them by the person and say, I'm sorry, I can't walk through this with you. But his wife Brenda was a believer13:27 and she said, no, I can walk through this with you. And you know what they've done? They've helped tens of thousands of military people get on the other side of their pain. They've led hundreds of thousands13:39 of people to Jesus Christ. You say why? Because they knew how to stand up to the inner darkness that tries to keep us from that next mountain. And that's what Haman is trying to help us13:51 do. He's saying, first of all, you've got to admit some things to yourself. You have to admit that the anger has to go. You have to admit that God loves me even though I'm imperfect. You have to admit that14:03 just because I don't feel God, it doesn't mean that God isn't with me during this difficult time in my life. As a matter of fact, Jesus taught something that I found really helpful in Luke 10 verse14:15 19. He was talking to his disciples and he said this, I want you to remember I've given you authority to overcome all the power of the enemy and nothing is going to harm you.14:27 Now we could read that verse and we could think, Jesus, I've been abused as a child or I've gone through this difficulty in my life. What do you mean that nothing is going to harm me? Well,14:39 Jesus is saying, want you to learn to live in authority over the darkness so that things don't harm you as much as they could harm you in life. And we're all gonna have some14:50 scars because of the outer darkness, but can I tell you when you learn to stand up to the inner darkness that's on the inside, you're gonna start reaching mountaintops that prove to you that it's worth standing up to the15:02 inner darkness? So Haman tells us first of all that we've got to admit some things. The second thing he reminds us of is that we have to really treasure the access that we have to15:14 God. And it's interesting that in this psalm, the psalmist closes the psalm this way. This is the last line. He says, God, you've taken from me my friend and my neighbors, and now15:25 darkness is my closest friend. So he's clearly talking about those times where it feels like we're closer to darkness and we're closer to pain than we are to God. He wrote this in15:37 verse 9, he says, I've called out to you Lord every day and I spread out my hands to you. And then he says, God, do you show your wonders to the dead? Do their spirits rise up and15:49 praise you? Has your love declared in the grave and your faithfulness and destruction? In other words, he's saying to God, God, am I gonna have to wait till I get to heaven to see how much you love me or16:01 are you going to do something in the nasty now and now of my life? And then it continues. He says in verse 13, but I'm gonna cry out to you for help, Lord. In the morning, my prayer is gonna16:13 come before before you, but Lord why do you reject me and hide your face from me? And again, if we weren't careful, we could think that Haman was somebody who was so negative he wasn't16:25 gonna get his prayer answered. But here's what he's doing in the psalm. Remember, he's the guy that that he'd write songs and people would say, man, was so anointed. And he would, you know, pray16:37 and what he heard, the king would talk about what he and Haman heard whenever he prayed and they go, wow, they're really close to God. And Haman is teaching us that listen,16:48 even when you're close to God, it doesn't mean that life's gonna be all rainbows and butterflies in life. And he's saying to us, I want you to know that just because you go through dark17:00 times, it doesn't mean that God isn't with you. Just because you don't feel God right now, it doesn't mean that God isn't with you. And I don't want you to give up on what you know17:12 is true because there's a mountaintop out there that God wants you to reach in life. Can you say amen? I think maybe the next part of the message is the most important part of all because17:24 James, the Lord's brother who pastored in Jerusalem, he told us the 4 things we should do if we're going through very very difficult times in our life. And he starts in verse17:36 13 and he says, is anyone among you in trouble? Then they should pray. And so I want to encourage you that the first thing we do if we want God to get us through the darkest of times is we17:47 make sure in our heart we know how to live close to God no matter what time we're going through. Sometimes you'll see people and they'll say, you know, I just didn't know what to do and so17:59 I prayed. And let me encourage you, if prayer is your last resort instead of your first response in the midst of life, then you're never gonna have the confidence to get through the tough times18:11 that you're gonna go through in your life. And so it's important that we learn to pray when we're in the midst of trouble because if not, we're gonna live a life where all we do is handle trouble the best that we18:23 can. And all we do is handle trouble the way that our parents did. And for the person who learns to let God's word deliver them from trouble, man, love for God comes in their18:34 heart. How many of you are glad for Psalm 1 0 7 20 that says God sent his word to heal me and to deliver me from destruction? I'd be living in if it weren't for God. Right? And then the person who18:46 learns to truly pray in the spirit in trouble, you develop a confidence like John talked about when he said, this is the confidence that we have in approaching God, that if I ask18:58 God anything, he hears me. And if he hears me, I know that God is gonna do what he promised. He's gonna get me through this trial. He's gonna heal my marriage. He's gonna teach us to have the family that we've always19:10 wanted to have because those are the promises that God made us in his word. And then he says, is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. In other words, our mode of19:22 life should be that we treasure what it means to experience the presence of the Lord in prayer. And when good things are happening to us, they're not just happening because of our hard work and our19:33 diligence or our parents, but they're happening because of how the Lord's working in our life as we go to church and we read his word and we have fellowship with the right people. But then19:45 James brings up the third thing and he says this, are any among you sick? And that word sick means, are you overwhelmed? Are you fainting? Do you feel like you don't know what to do?19:57 And sometimes we get there because we're not strong enough to stand up to all the darkness the enemy brings into our life. We're not wise enough to overcome every scheme and strategy that he has20:09 to to come against us. And James says, when you find yourself in that place, I want you to call the elders of the church to pray over you and to anoint you with oil in the name of the20:20 Lord. And I want you to know the prayer offered in faith is gonna make the sick person well, and the Lord's gonna raise him up. And if they've sinned, they're gonna be forgiven. And he said, I want this20:32 environment to be in the church where you confess your sins to each other and you pray for each other so you might be healed. Now what's the alternative to this? Well, I see it all the time. The alternative20:44 is people who are spinning everything all the time. And they're not, you know, they're not somebody who's praying regardless. They're asking, they're acting like things are fine all the time. How are doing?20:56 Fine. How's your day? Fine. And then you go home and you've got this deep darkness that you're battling inside that you really need God's help with. Or I find people who get so happy21:07 whenever life's going good because of their own strength. And that's not good because God doesn't want us just to be happy, he wants to get glory through our life because of how he's working in our life. Can you say21:19 amen? And then there are people that whenever they really mess up, I see it all the time, they'll say, oh, I'm doing great. Listen, God's just he he's just healed me, he's just fixed me, but they've21:30 never admitted their problem, they've never come to the leaders of their church. Many times they go to another church so they can look like everything's okay, and James is saying, listen,21:42 there's some real darkness you're gonna deal with and I'm gonna tell you the way to to to climb the mountain and to get to the other side of this darkness. Number 1, you learn the value of prayer. Number21:54 2, you you you stay in praise and let God work in your life. Number 3, I want you to be in a church where people love you and they're gonna help you reach the mountain when you go through the weak22:06 times of life. And that's what Haman's talking about when he says, listen, you know why I'm talking about all this darkness? Because you're gonna go through some darkness in your life. And when you do it,22:18 you're gonna have to admit some things. You can't be an avoider, you can't ignore it and act like it's not there. I always liked the line I heard a preacher use, he said, if you bury your22:30 head in the sand and act like the devil doesn't exist, the devil's gonna attack your behind. Can you say amen? And so you gotta admit some things and then in dark times you gotta22:42 realize this is what access is for. And then Haman makes us a promise, he says, you're gonna ascend to a new place. So I've taken you through the valley, now we get to go22:53 into the good stuff. And you know what ascend means? It it means you get to go up or you get to rise to a higher place. Now again, Haman closed this particular psalm23:05 by saying darkness is my closest friend. So he's saying, I feel closer to darkness than I feel to you right now, God. I feel like it's hopeless, I feel like there's nothing I can do.23:17 So Tamara asked me between services, she said, so where's the hope in the psalm? And here's where the hope is in the psalm, the hope is in Haman himself who wrote the psalm.23:29 The hope is in the fact it's a masculine, which tells us that a lot of Christians don't understand this, a lot of Christians don't apply this very well in their life, a lot of believers, people who even know God23:41 whenever they'd like to believe that no evil can ever happen to them. They'd like to believe they're never gonna have their day in the ring with darkness. And trust me, Jesus will keep you from a lot of darkness and a23:51 lot of difficulty if you serve him well. But the problem is you are in a place where demons have a lot of power. Can you say amen? And you're also an imperfect person who sometimes is gonna go through the24:03 darkest trial of your life. And during that time, how you handle the inner darkness in your soul is gonna mean everything. Because if you give God his24:15 way, you're gonna start climbing up a mountain into another place of beautiful blessing that God has in his heart for you. How many of you are glad that God says,24:27 I know the plans I have for you and their plans to to prosper you, not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future. Amen? So let me take you back to my24:39 third story as I close. A beautiful, athletic, 17 year old girl. It's a little bit hot 1 day in Maryland, and she decides24:51 that she wants to jump into the Chesapeake Bay to cool off. She jumps in. She doesn't realize that the water was more shallow than she thought. And in seconds,25:03 she goes from being a beautiful, athletic, intelligent 17 year old girl who feels like she has life by the tail into a girl who's a paraplegic for25:15 life. She said she got so angry at God, at herself, at everybody. She had doubts. She wanted to commit25:26 suicide. She was so depressed. But she was a believer, and she thought, I can't do that. I need to let God get glory out of this situation that I'm in. And she was25:38 an artist. You know what she learned to do? She learned to paint with her mouth, and she made beautiful pictures. She was an author. You know what she did? She wrote 4025:50 books, not with her hand, not with a typewriter, but with her mouth. She wrote 40 books. She became an actress and a feature film was made about her life. And you know who starred in26:02 the film? She did. And you know what she ended up doing with her life? She helped tens of thousands of quadriplegics. She helped them find the love of God. She helped them find26:13 emotional and spiritual peace. She started a foundation and she helped bring wheelchairs into poverty stricken nations where people who were quadriplegics would26:25 have wheelchairs to help them. How many of you know it's it's worth getting through the heartaches into the hopes that God has for our lives? Can you say amen?26:41 Well, thank you so much for joining us today on A Significant Life. I hope you're encouraged that no matter where you are today, you have hope in Jesus. And he wants to lead you into that hope as you press into him. He26:53 cares about that, and he cares about you. I know there have26:56 been times in my life where this has been such an important truth to hold on to, and that message today was such a good reminder of that. We count it such an honor to be able to share God's word with you guys and can't27:06 wait to continue the series next week. If you were touched by the program today, we'd love to know about it. Also, on top of releasing content every week, we have a bunch of resources and on demand content both on the27:17 pray dot com app and on our website at asignificantlife dot com. So you can check that out at any time if you'd like. God bless, and we look forward to being together again27:38 understands, and in his book, A Significant Life, he shares extensive insight and inspiration that can help us change the course of our life and live in the purposes God placed in our heart. Drawing on biblical27:50 models such as David, Esther, and even Jesus himself, Pastor Jim gives us practical ways to step into our full potential. A Significant Life will help you understand your own worth28:01 as given and anointed by God. You'll learn to embrace the ways God has created you, experience transformation in your own life, and help others in your relational circles to do the same. Pastor Jim28:13 provides practical guidance that will enable you to live as a person with eternal significance, offering 5 c's that will direct you along the way. Developing confidence, being a person of character,28:26 concentrating on God's will, cooperating with God in carrying out his mission, and participating in community. For your gift of any amount, we would love to send you your own copy28:37 of A Significant Life. Contact us today. Pastor Jim Graff's A Significant Life Ministry invites you to28:49 be a part of what God is doing around the globe. Partnering with several local agencies in our hometown of Victoria, Texas, our mission outreach exists to share God's love by providing meals to the29:01 homeless, restoring lives through our women's shelters, and working directly with our schools to invest in our next generation. Internationally, we continue providing food and supplies for29:13 Ukrainian refugees in Poland and building homes for those who lost theirs in the ongoing devastation of war. Our work in Syria offers church planters ongoing training and resources29:25 to be successful and effective. And in India, children forced into sex work are receiving a first class education and an understanding of redemption through our House of Palms. For29:37 over 30 years, our ministry teams have been a huge part of blessing the unreached, marginalized, and forgotten through prayer, financial support, and training. But we cannot do it alone. Won't29:49 you consider joining us? To be a part of what a significant life is doing worldwide, visit asignificantlife dot com.
Comments No comments yet. Start the conversation.
Comments
Keep it kind. Comments are public.