Pastor Aaron Cordeiro
August 21, 2016 - W1634

Have you ever been at a place where you had to display a powerful expression of faith in the time of doubt? I think everyone of us have been in this place, so let us call these places the crossroads in life. These crossroads can be various seasons of life or it could be troubles or trials we are facing which are unexpected things that pop up. Maybe some of us are at crossroads as we deeply contemplate about our lives and realize we are not at a healthy place and something has to change. But, mostly, these crossroads are the changing seasons in our lives.

Maybe it’s not a seasonal change, but maybe it’s a trial that we’re going through. It could be an unexpected injury or maybe a loss of a job, or an unexpected hardship. It could even be that someone you love deeply got very sick or that a loved one died.

Pastor Jon Burgess was giving out brownies last week. A lady in the back raised her hand and mentioned that her husband just recently passed away and as she was sobbing, she went on to say that brownies were her husband’s favorite dessert. That illustration was to her as if God truly was embracing her and letting her know that everything will be okay. God loves us so much that He knows exactly what we need.

Maybe our seasons or crossroads are in things that we need to change because it’s not in a healthy situation, like in our relationships. As we will read in Jeremiah 6:16, we find that God’s advice has been going on for a long, long time. Some 400 years before Christ, Jeremiah was speaking to the people of Israel because they were at a major crossroad in their lives. They drifted off away from God and were into all kinds of stuff contrary to the Word of God. In fact they were on the wrong road entirely as they worshipped other gods, committing idolatry, and adultery. They were lying to each other and oppressing not only foreigners, but also, oppressing the orphans and widows.

Accordingly, Jeremiah said, “This is what the Lord says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.’ But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’” (Jeremiah 6:16)

As you can see, it says at the very beginning, “This is what the Lord says…” When we are going through that season of change or facing that unexpected hurt or pain or suffering, which voice will we hear and will we choose that voice which will take us down that right path?

If we follow what God has for us, though it may not be the easy path, God will grant us peace. But we have to be committed to following God at the crossroads in life, and be willing to apply certain qualities of faith that Jeremiah talks about.

When at the Crossroads: 1) Don’t rush in.

Jeremiah says here, to “stand at the crossroads”, meaning to stop and look. He goes on to say and “ask for the ancient path, ask where the good way is”. How many of us, when we are at those crossroads, rush in and make an impetuous decision? Our mind starts rationalizing all the worst case scenarios then our anxiety levels go through the roof and our lives are in full unrest. Jeremiah says here to stand at the crossroads of life, contemplate the ancient ways which were good and simply don’t rush in.

Isn’t it just like us when we get excited about wanting to do something? We rush in to do it. Then along the way we realize that we are in way over our heads. Maybe it was an impetuous decision financially or relational, but, we find ourselves trapped and we wonder, “What do we do now?” Jeremiah says to stop and look to the ancients, to see what was good and navigate our faith to determine the best path to peace.

In Ecclesiastes 5:2 it says we don’t want to be impetuous even in our words before God:

“Do not be quick with your mouth, do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God. God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your words be few.” (Eccles. 5:2)

Sometimes we can be filled with emotions in a bad way and we speak out about things irrationally or impetuously and jump into things we shouldn’t jump into. On the other hand, we can get so excited about serving God, but, like Peter whose enthusiasm got him into all kinds of difficult situations, we too find ourselves drowning.

A few years ago I contemplated over who would be a great Godly choice to lead the Life Stages Ministries. It would have to be someone who has been faithful and has a great love for our Lord and who loves kids. I came upon a person who loves God so much and always wants to do God’s will and everything she does she does to glorify God. Her name is Pua Palakiko. I would like her to share her testimony about the time she faced a crossroad in her life and realized that she needed to ask the right questions.

Pua Palakiko:

“It is so true that when we are at the crossroads in our lives, don’t rush in. I found that when we are faced with decisions in our lives we either tend to go all the way or we don’t. It could be a business decision or maybe it’s moving to a different location or jumping into a relationship or even just something that needs to end.

About two years ago I faced one of the most frustrating transitions in my life. Before I became the overseer of our One Generation Life Stage ministry, there were two amazing pastors leading it. They were Pastor Micah and Sigrid Simpson. When I was lost in the world, I remember that they were the ones who invested in me, encouraged me, corrected me and brought me back to church. They invested their life, money and time into me and I am so thankful for them.

But, there came a point when Sigrid said that they were leaving Hawaii. I started to think all kinds of thoughts in my head. What’s going to happen? Where am I going to go? These people are like the mother and father of my faith and they invested into my life for the past 7 years.

I remember I just started crying and the tears would not stop falling. After they left, I went through a phase of confusion. I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know if I should continue in ministry. And then I started to make irrational decisions off of my own emotions, and I was thinking, I should go to another church or go to where they had moved. They went to Montana and were doing a great ministry there so I was wrestling through all these things.

I had to really ask a lot of questions before the Lord, and these are the questions I asked God, “Pua, are you basing your faith off of them or are you basing your faith off your own self” And I remember it was like the Lord placed His hand upon me and said, “Pua, I’ve called you right where you are” And I remember saying “Lord, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry that I was trying to run off in another direction where You have not called me to.”

This leads to the next point:

When you are at the crossroads

2) Ask the right questions.

When Jesus was resurrected, He came to visit the disciples and “Doubting” Thomas wouldn’t believe it. And so Jesus comes to visit him and what He does is tells Thomas to poke his fingers into His pierced hands and that’s when Thomas believes.

In John 14 Jesus comforts His disciples and He gives them this awesome Kingdom perspective that He was going to be with The Father and The Father is in many dwelling places. He tells His disciples, that He needed to go in order to prepare a place for them.

Now the room was probably very quiet as everyone was thinking “What was Jesus talking about?” But Thomas, he raised his hand and he asked, this question in John 14:5 “Lord, I do not know where you are going. How do I know the way?” And I love how Jesus responds, He says, “I am the Truth, the Way and the Life”.

It’s true, Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. I wonder if Thomas had never asked that question and just stayed quiet like everyone else, if he would have gone the other way. That’s what I love about this, when we go to ask Jesus the right question, He will always point us to His Kingdom and that it always points to life. This is what Proverbs say:

"There is a way that seems right to people, but its end is the way of death." (Prov. 16:25)

Now let me ask you this, how many of you like to fight to be right? But how many know that we can fight to be so right, but we can also be so wrong at the same time. I am glad that I slowed myself down in order to hear the Lord and to ask Him the right questions. And I like the fact that Thomas did not go to ask the Pharisee or ask another disciple but instead went to Christ Himself.

And another thing, we should go to people of Godly counsel, people that mentor you or people that you have given permission to speak into your life. Here is what it says in Proverbs:

“Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.” (Prov. 15:22)
 
So I hope that at that crossroad that you always bring Jesus into the center of it. I hope that whenever you tend to go into another direction, that, oh man, I hope that you get to add in other people of Godly counsel also in your decisions, but mainly as you face that crossroad, that you will ask the right questions. 

Pastor Aaron:

Economist Edward Deming said, “If you do not know how to ask the right question you discover nothing.” Albert Einstein said “If I had an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes.”

Our third point is

When you’re at the crossroads and once God has spoken or once you have received the Truth:

3) Don’t wait, take the steps today.

As the Bible says, “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.” (Col. 2:6-7)

In other words, thanksgiving comes when we actually follow God. How many of us believe in God, but, when it comes to putting that into practice or putting faith into action, become disconnected? Peace will never come if we don’t actually walk with God.

So when we are at the crossroads in our lives we need to remember not to rush in on our decisions because we need to ask the right questions, and then when we are given God’s truth for us we need to be willing to take the first steps.

Let me end with this story:

When I got my first job, my family and I were very thrilled. I was a good worker and even got the employee of the month with high marks. But as Christmas approached, finals also came up for college and I needed time to study. So I asked my boss if I could have some time off in the two weeks prior to Christmas as there was a lot of activities to prepare for at church and I had a lot of studying to do for finals. But my boss did not like that and instead she fired me. I was very distraught and thought this was something like a wrongful termination and even had thoughts of suing her, but my dad asked me, “Do you want to do the right thing?” and I said yes.

He said, “Okay this is what you do, son.” He gave me a piece of paper and said, “I want you to write a letter of appreciation to your boss thanking her for the opportunity of giving you this job which helped to develop your character and work ethic, and so on and so forth.”

This for sure didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.

Then he said, “Then I want you to take $20 of what you earned and buy a dozen roses and give her both the letter and the roses”.

I was mad but I finally conceded and went to my boss’ office and pounded on the door with the flowers and letter in hand and feeling dumb. But I mustered up a smile and handed her the gifts and said, “Thank you. Have a good day,” and left.

After about 5 years of not seeing her, one day, my mom said she saw my boss. Uncaringly I acknowledged, “Really”. Then she unfolded this story:

“She came up to me and the first thing she said to me was ‘You have raised the most amazing son in the whole world. 5 years ago when I fired your son, it was probably the worst point of my life. I was battling breast cancer. I’d just had a miscarriage and I was really mad at God. And you, know your son was the closest thing to God and I took it out on him. And I was so convicted about it after he gave me that letter and roses and I went home and cried. I started attending New Hope Windward and I received Christ. My family started coming to church and I got pregnant, had another baby and got healed of my cancer and I’m doing great, I just wanted to let you know that you raised the most amazing son.”

But, you see, there was a point there when I really did not want to do the right thing, I kept thinking how unfair that all was. To me it was the worst thing that could ever happen, but in faith I did what my dad said because it was the right thing to do.

We are all going to be at those crossroads, and sometimes we will just rush in or make those impetuous decisions especially when we don’t ask the right questions. And sometimes even when we have the truth or when God has spoken to us, we choose not to take the right steps.

Can I just encourage you that if you are willing to take the right steps God will flood our life with the peace of God because with the Prince of Peace is with us and anything we go through is possible. I leave you with these scriptures to encourage you further:

“For He says, ‘In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you. ’ Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Cor. 6:2)

“Return to your rest, O my soul, For the LORD has dealt bountifully with you.” (Ps. 116:7)

1) What kind of crossroads are you facing in your life right now?

2) What kind of voices are you hearing in your head right now?

3) What kind of questions can you ask God that will help you make the right choices?

4) What will you do when God has spoken to you?