A Resource to Ask For

Welcome to part two of The Art of Survival. You know, we are living in a global pandemic with huge implications, economic, emotional, financial. Churches are shut down; businesses are shut down. It’s not just difficult. For many, it’s devastating. And what we want to ask and answer is: God, where are You?

When you don’t feel like there’s hope, when you need to know what to do and how do you hang in there when it feels like you just can’t? What do you do? That’s the art of survival. And God has an answer.

The early Church was birthed in a time just like we are experiencing. And God gave a word to Jesus’ half-brother, James. And we are going to talk about that in just a minute. But as we talk about when you’re stuck and when it’s difficult and when you literally don’t know what to do, sometimes a micro-story gives sort of a macro-understanding.

I want to tell you about a man that I got to know very, very well. We became very close friends. When I met him, he was in a wheelchair. He was very strong and muscular. And I would learn a little bit later that he was a world champion, Olympic gold medalist in the wheelchair on the basketball team. He was a gold medalist in the Paralympics in the marathon. He was a fabulous athlete. And we got to know each other and then I heard his story. Jerry was a phenomenal athlete who had a future in football.

I mean, millions of dollars in his future. Absolute, unbelievable. He was walking downtown with his girlfriend and on a downtown street, two guys came out of a bar and they were fighting and one of them pulled out a knife. And Jerry instinctively stepped in to try and break up the fight to save one of them. It looked very, very bad. And as he pulled them apart and got them away, he said, “All I heard was two loud bang! Bang!” And then searing pain as two bullets lodged in his back.

Jerry was paralyzed from that moment forward. As I talked to Jerry, I thought, If anyone, anyone sort of would have a right to say, “Why me? I tried to save someone’s life, I’m trying to do what is good, and I get two bullets in the back.”

And his career was one of those that would be fame, millions and millions of dollars, he was the star that everyone wanted to play on their team. And he’s devastated. It’s gone. When Jerry first had this situation, I would call him nominally Christian.

He believed in God, did not have a close or personal relationship with God. And his whole world was falling apart and he confessed to me over and over and over, “I just said, ‘Why? Why me, God? Why? I don’t understand.’”

And then he went to rehab and he watched two sets of people. And he said, “I watched people whose lives crumbled. All they did was ask why and they wallowed in self-pity and their focus was inward. They made little progress and their lives were a disaster.”

And he said, “Then there were a few people, just a very, very few people that weren’t asking, ‘Why?’ they were asking, ‘What do I need to do in this situation to get better? What can I control? How do I make it through today? And where can there be hope? Because as of right now, my life is devastated.’”

And I learned some things from Jerry that I want to share with you. And God shared some things with me that were a great help as Jerry became a great friend and God really transformed his life.

James chapter 1, here’s the principle: don’t ask “why”, ask “what”. Survivors, people that make it through the most devastating personal times or even global times ask three questions. Question number one: what can I control? Answer: my attitude. Question number two: what must I do to make it through today? Answer: endure. Remember? Hupomeno. I mean, don’t give up, don’t give in, hang onto the promises of God.

And third, what hope do I have for tomorrow? Answer: an all-powerful, all-knowing, sovereign God who is good promises to take the very worst that you experience in this life and turn it for your best and will either allow you to experience that in this life or in the one to come with Him in heaven.

Jerry stopped asking, “Why?” And he started asking, “What?” And as he did, he began to focus on: I’m going to consider this an opportunity. I’m going to consider that maybe God has a plan for me. And He’ll use me in ways that are not about fame or fortune or money, but He allowed this to happen. He didn’t cause it.

And Jerry went into training. And Jerry became a world-class athlete again, but this time in a wheelchair and won gold medals. He traveled all over the world, all over the United States. He then went in and became a marathoner where he won the gold medal in the marathon in a wheelchair. Twenty-six point two miles. You would meet Jerry and he shared his testimony of how the supernatural power, the Spirit of God inside of his life in the midst of the most devastating thing actually changed his life to the point where I remember having a very private conversation.

He said, “Chip, if I could do it all over again, I wouldn’t change a thing. Do I like sitting in this chair? No.” He said, “But I thought money and fame and prosperity were my ticket to the life that is really life.” And he said, “I was famous, and I had a big future.” He said, “But I have experienced an intimacy with Jesus Christ, a peace and a joy and a power, and God has used my life all around the world to change people’s lives because I wasn’t a victim, I was a survivor, because He gave me hope. He gave me the grace to endure when I didn’t think I could and it changed me from a nominal, I-kind-of-believe-in-God, to a dedicated follower of Jesus. And then He used my difficulty to share the love of Christ with other people whose lives will be different forever and ever.”

Now, here’s what I want you to know. Jerry got stuck. I didn’t share that part of his story. You know when you hear a story like Jerry’s, it sounds almost like a fairy tale. This happened, he made a few great choices. If I told you the long version, I would tell you about when he was in rehab and was depressed. I mean, clinically depressed. When he wallowed in self-pity. When he was ready to give up. When he didn’t care. Jerry got stuck.

Here’s what I want you to know. When things are happening the way they are in our life – you don’t have a job, maybe someone close to you has died of the virus, maybe the ministry is completely shut down because the churches are closed, maybe you can’t travel from country to country, maybe your mental health – you are depressed. You are discouraged. Maybe your marriage wasn’t going well and now it’s a train wreck; it’s a mess.

Maybe one of your kids has been impacted. Maybe you have no idea where you’re going to get food tomorrow. You don’t have any money. Or the business that you built has evaporated.

I don’t know where you’re at, but I know many of you, you’re stuck. And you’re saying, I want to consider it all joy. I want to allow God to test me and I want this endurance to make me mature and complete. I want a story like Jerry’s, but I’m stuck. I can’t get there. I’m trying hard but am I just supposed to pretend that I have joy? God understands and He knows that we get stuck.

And in verses 5 through 8 of chapter 1, he is now going to shift. And early on he said, “Don’t ask ‘Why?’ ask ‘What?’” And he told us that the key is first your attitude. Now he is going to tell you that you need a resource. And it’s a resource more valuable than money. It’s a resource even more valuable than a friend, as important as that is.

There’s a resource that He wants to give you that when you get stuck, when you don’t know what to do in your circumstance, you don’t know what to do in your relationship, you don’t know what to do in terms of your geography – He says, “I have a resource that will show you exactly what to do and I promise to give it to you one hundred percent of the time.”

Follow along as I read. Remember, “Let endurance have its perfect result that you might be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” Look at verse 5, “But,” and by the way, in the Greek text, this is the strongest word used for a contrast. I mean, it’s, “But if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith without any doubting. For the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that person or that man or woman expect that they will receive anything from the Lord, being double-minded, unstable in all your ways.”

And in this little passage, he is going to teach you and he’s going to teach me: what do you do when you’re stuck in your pain? What do you do when you’re stuck in this virus? What do you do when emotional, financial, relational issues are flurrying around and you want to follow God and you literally don’t know how?

Here’s what I want you to know, number one, is that God understands when we get stuck. God wants to help you when you’re stuck. God gives you a condition that if you will fulfill this condition, He promises He will show you exactly what to do. And now, let’s break this down to understand: God’s offer of supernatural wisdom, that’s the resource.

By the way, wisdom here isn’t being smart. It’s not intellectual. This is the Hebrew sense of wisdom. Hebrew wisdom means the skill and the ability to know what to do, when to do, and how to do it in the midst of any situation or relationship.

God’s wisdom, literally, from the Old Testament and James is writing as a Jew to these Jewish Christians. He is saying God has a design for life and He wants to bring about the best possible ends by the best possible means for the most possible people for the longest possible time.
And there is a way, there’s a way to think, there’s a way to do decisions, there’s a way to do relationships. There’s wisdom, there’s this skill that God wants to give to those who ask.

And so, what he’s promising to this early group who find themselves, “I believe in Jesus the Messiah. Fifteen years ago, He was raised from the dead. He showed Himself to over five hundred witnesses.” They believe. Their lives have been transformed. They have seen miracles. And now the world is falling apart.

And they say, God, what do we do? He says, “Consider it all joy.” But we’re stuck! Now what do we do? He says, “Ask God for wisdom and He will give it.” But I want you to know this, he says, “You have a responsibility.” This isn’t about trying hard, figuring it out your own way. He says, “Let him ask,” it’s a command.

And the idea of this word is: let him ask for a gift in prayer. This is a word for prayer that is not just “I’m praying,” or, “Lord, help me.” This is coming to God and saying, I don’t know what to do in this pandemic, about this relationship, about money, about housing, about location, about a big decision. I don’t know what to do. God says, “If you lack wisdom, number one, ask.” And here’s the promise, “He will give it generously and without reproach.”

I have been a pastor for over thirty-five years, and I have seen people stuck in health issues, relational issues, financial issues, legal issues, criminal issues. And it has always amazed me that there are times when a Christian will get stuck and they will do almost anything in the world to figure out what they ought to do except go to God in genuine humility and ask Him what to do.

And for years, that used to puzzle me, but it doesn’t puzzle me anymore. See, I think many people have a very warped view of God. I think many people feel like God is arms crossed and when we want and really need His help, we tend to think, “But I lied and I have stolen,” or, “I have not been the kind of Christian I know I should be,” or, “I have some areas of immorality in my life,” or, “I haven’t obeyed what I know and how could I go to God now when I have messed up, when I know I’m not the person that I should be?”

And did you notice what it says? “Ask of God who gives to all men,” the word means generously. In fact, literally this phrase is: come to the gift-giving God.

God loves you. And like a Father who understands when His kids mess up, His desire isn’t for you to get everything cleaned up before you come to Him. His desire is just: come. You just come as you are. It thrills your Father’s heart when you say, I can’t do this. I need Your help. I don’t understand. Yes, we all have some issues where we have done some things that we know are wrong.

But He says He gives generously. And then I love this word, “without reproach.” It means that His arms aren’t crossed. He is not pointing with a finger and saying, “Well, you want help, but what about this or what about that?”

No, this is when Jesus says, “Come unto Me all of you that are heavy laden, that are burdened, that are overwhelmed. Come, I will give you rest.” You serve a God who is kind and good and loving and understanding.

It’s why Jesus, when He taught the disciples to pray, He introduced a foreign concept. In the Old Testament, there’s not a lot of references to God as our Father. And Jesus would say, “When you pray, pray, ‘Abba.’”
I think many people feel like God is arms crossed and when we want and really need His help, we tend to think, “But I lied and I have stolen,” or, “I have not been the kind of Christian I know I should be,” or, “I have some areas of immorality in my life,” or, “I haven’t obeyed what I know and how could I go to God now when I have messed up, when I know I’m not the person that I should be?”

Ask of God who gives to all men, come to the gift-giving God. You serve a God who is kind and good and loving and understanding.

It’s why Jesus, when He taught the disciples to pray, He introduced a foreign concept. In the Old Testament, there’s not a lot of references to God as our Father. And Jesus would say, “When you pray, pray, ‘Abba.’”

It’s a term of endearment, of a small child connected to his papa or his father. And I just want to remind you, when we go through difficult times, some of us blame other people, can blame the government, can blame circumstances. But down deep, many of us blame ourselves.

And God would want you to know that, “I want you to come and I want to help you.” But did you notice there’s a condition here? He says, “I want you to ask, but let him ask in faith without any doubting.”

There are two conditions. It assumes that you lack wisdom, because of the construction in the grammar here. But then he says, “We only receive God’s wisdom if we, one, ask in faith. And, two, without any doubting.”

So, what’s that mean? Let’s figure out what it means to ask in faith. What it means to ask in faith is trusting and believing and having confidence in God’s character and His Word that you’ll do whatever He shows you, right?

Ask in faith. In other words, it’s not, Oh Lord, I would kind of like to know Your opinion on what I ought to do in this devastating situation. This is, Lord, I am believing You’re the all-knowing, all-powerful God. You’re the sovereign God of the universe. I can trust Your Word; I can trust Your character. I am asking in faith. And then notice, “Without any doubting.”

Some people get tripped up on this. This word for “doubting” means without judgment or wavering. This is not that feeling that we all have at times like, God, are You really there? Or, Do I doubt that You might show up? Or, Are You really going to take care of me? God knows we are human. He knows that we will have struggles at times and have some intellectual doubts. This passage is not saying that.

This passage is talking about the kind of doubt that has disloyalty. Because notice what he says. He explains it later. He says, “Come to Him without any doubt, for the one who comes with doubt like that is unstable in all his ways. In fact, is double-minded, two-souled.” We get our word schizophrenia. It’s a picture of someone who says, God, I really want to know what You want me to do, but I’m not really committed to doing it. I just want to know what Your will is so I can evaluate whether I will obey or not obey.

And then notice he says, “Let not that person expect that he’ll get anything from the Lord.”

So, here’s what I want you to get. I know some of you are going through really, really difficult times. And I know that God wants to work in us before He works through us. And so, come to God and ask. And then here’s what you need to do. You need to come to God, think of it as a contract or a blank check.

And what God wants you to do is sign the bottom of the contract and say, Lord, will You show me what to do in this pandemic? What should I do about where I should live? What should I do about this problem relationship? What should I do about the business that is lost? What should I do about the ministry that churches are closed? What should I do because I can’t travel? What should I do to make it through today?

And God says, “If you will come to Me and ask in faith and then say, Lord, whatever You show me, before I know what it is, I’ll do it,” He says, “one hundred percent of the time, I’ll show you what to do.”

Let me picture this for you, because these are great concepts. Let me personalize. Early in our marriage, I married my wife and we shortly went away to prepare for ministry. And my father was an alcoholic and her father was an alcoholic. We came from very dysfunctional families, but we loved Jesus and we loved each other, and we thought everything will be great.

Within six months of being married, while I’m preparing in seminary to be a pastor, our marriage is not working at all. We can’t resolve conflict, we have anger, the person I love makes me crazy, I am making her crazy. You all understand what that’s like.

And I’m feeling this guilt because I’m preparing for ministry and my marriage is not working at all. And I am trying hard, trying to be good. No matter what I do, it doesn’t work. And I came to this passage. And I said, Lord, will You show me what to do?

I can’t fix this. I bowed my head, lifted my hands, and I heard the Spirit say, “Chip, go to a good Christian counselor.”

And I thought, Oh no. No, no, that’s for people with real needs and if I walk into one of those counselor’s offices, it’d be embarrassing and people will know we have a problem. And I heard the Holy Spirit whisper, “So, what is the problem? Is it your pride?” And I realized it was.

See, sometimes when you say, Lord, show me Your wisdom, we unconsciously have a box that says, “As long as it fits inside of this.”

In another time, I needed God’s wisdom and He said, “I want you to relocate from this side of the United States to that side of the United States.” And then it was, Oh, Lord, no. My wife doesn’t want to go, this won’t work, it’s going to cost a lot of money… I had all these reasons.

But when you want God’s wisdom, He says, “Come,” and you sign up and say, I will do, Lord, whatever You want me to do. And here’s what He promises. He will do it one hundred percent of the time. I can’t tell you how many times, whether it was a big decision, a financial decision, there was a time we literally – and some of you are there – we had no food.

I had worked, our money was taken away, we had no food. And we sat in the middle of the living room and we prayed and we asked God, We need food. We ate fruits and vegetables that we got for just five U.S. dollars and we combined with some other couples and we could eat fruits and vegetables for a week.

And I’ll never forget asking God for wisdom. I told Him I would do whatever He wanted me to do. And I was working unloading trucks and doing odd jobs and wondered how we were ever going to make enough money.

And I’ll never forget the day, my wife had dropped our children off to school and she came back and there were five bags of groceries on our front porch filled with meat and cheese and a type of flour to make bread. We never told one person, not one person that we had any needs. We had ten dollars, ten U.S. dollars. That’s how much money we had.

And as she opened those bags, it was the kind of flour she used to make bread for our family every day. We had not eaten meat in about fifteen or twenty days and it was filled with meat and cheese and things that we longed for. And my only explanation is when we are really desperate, God shows up in supernatural ways.

I have not met a lot of angels personally but the only explanation, because we told no one and no one in the world knew how she baked what we had, I mean, we whispered to no one. And God provided.

On another occasion, like many of you, we were completely out of money. And, Lord, we can’t pay our rent.

I went to the mailbox and there was a check, a check from a man I met six or seven years earlier who later played sports in college, later on a professional team, and God woke him up in the middle of the night with my name on it. I taught him when he was in high school one time for one hour. And he sent me a check, he was a quarterback in the NFL, for a thousand dollars.

I could tell you story after story after story after story after story of God’s miraculous provision. And it’s not for special people. It’s for needy, desperate people. I am telling you, come to God. If He says, “Relocate,” relocate. If He says, “Forgive your enemy,” forgive your enemy. If He says, “Apologize to your wife,” apologize to your wife. If He says, “This is your job, but your new job needs to be this,” you come to God with no expectation other than, Lord, whatever You show me, I will do.

He may show you through a book, through His Spirit, through His Word, through counsel, through a friend, through a prompting of the Holy Spirit. But here’s what you need to know: if you’re one hundred percent willing to get God’s wisdom, He will show you what to do.
Will it be easy? Probably not. Will you be comfortable? Probably not. God directs our steps, directs our paths, and reveals His power when we are at the very end of our rope, when we have nothing. We are at the bottom. We’re in absolute desperation.

“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and He saves those who are crushed in Spirit,” Psalm 34. God is for you. He loves you. If you’re stuck and you don’t know what to do, here’s His invitation: “I will give you supernatural wisdom. I will show you exactly what to do, how to do it, when to do it, with whom if you will come to Me with open handedness and commit to do whatever I show you.”

These are the times where God’s people see great power, where there is great testimony. I look back now with my older children and they remember sitting around in the circle, a circle at a time when we didn’t have a car that would fit our family and we prayed. And God delivered.

A time when we didn’t have food and we prayed. A time when we didn’t know what to do and we were asked to relocate. Most of the things that were difficult to do, what I can now look back on and realize it was the good hand and the kindness of God. Some of you will never change. Some of you will never get on the path that has your highest and your best and God’s greatest favor apart from a crisis like this that caused you to reexamine your life, your role, your relationships. And that God redirects us through times like this.

The early Church was doing very, very well. I mean, just read Acts chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 – thousands of people. There’s favor. There are miracles happening. I mean, they are exploding. Acts chapter 8, “And then a great persecution came upon the Church.”

Well, Jesus told the Church to go into all the world and make disciples, right? Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the uttermost parts of the world. Well, for about the first fifteen years, they didn’t go anywhere. And God allowed a persecution.

And now, James is writing to them and as they are going all across the world, God uses this crisis to take the gospel to the ends of the earth. God, in His wisdom, who knows what is happening, who didn’t cause but has allowed this pandemic to occur, is going to show you and show me and every single person exactly what to do, when to do it, and how to do it in the midst of all the special details.

It will be different for you than for me. That’s why this is the ART of survival. It creates a dependency like never before. It creates a desire and a thirst for His Word like never before. It means we have to depend on each other, forgive one another, look through new eyes at our circumstance and say, Lord, show me what to do. I need Your wisdom.

And He says, “I would love to give it to you. Just ask. And no double-mindedness. Ask without any doubting. Let Me fill in the top of the check. Let Me fill in the top of the contract. Let Me say, ‘This is what to do. This is where to go. This is how.’ You just sign your name on the bottom that says, ‘I am willing.’”

You know, it reminds me of our Savior. And the greatest moment that occurred in His life and ours. Yes, Jesus was fully God, but He was fully human. And there was a moment where He said, “Lord, if there is any other way, let this cup pass from Me. Nevertheless, not My will, but Yours.”

And He endured excruciating suffering and pain and He actually took on your sin and my sin and in that cataclysmic moment, the Father would turn away, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” And your sin and my sin were placed on Jesus for our forgiveness because He said to the Father, “Not My will, not My way.”

And that’s how you get God’s wisdom. It’s in these moments of absolute surrender. It’s at a level like never before, because of what is happening in the world where we say, Lord, I offer my body as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to You. This is my spiritual service. I will do whatever You want. I will go wherever You want. The money in my bank account, little or much, is Yours. My future is Yours. My family is Yours. Show me what to do and I want You to know, Holy Father, I will do it.

That’s how you survive a crisis. That’s the greatest, most important resource in all the world. It’s the wisdom of God.

Lord, I pray for my brothers and sisters because it is a journey to come to the point where we can fully, completely surrender and be willing to do whatever You want us to do. But, Lord, You have told us very clearly the condition to get this kind of supernatural wisdom is our absolute and complete willingness to do whatever You show us.

And so, I pray for a movement in people’s hearts. I pray that they could believe how good, how kind, how all-knowing, that You want to give us the best, even when some of the first steps are very, very difficult. That’s our prayer, Lord. Now, lead us. Give us Your wisdom. In Jesus’ name, amen.