Genesis chapter 16 is where we find ourselves today. We finished Genesis, obviously, 15 last week. And today's sermon is Detour Ahead. Detour Ahead.

I know on phones today you've got all these apps. You've got the Waze apps. Anybody got the Waze apps on your phone? There you go.

So if you run into a traffic jam, you can hit Waze, and they tell you the detour to get around. Sometimes that detour is like, great, okay?

Sometimes it takes you way out of the way, and you end up back out onto the interstate, and you're like, wait a minute, I was ahead of that car, and now they're ahead of me.

How does that happen, you know? Detours don't always work out the way that you think, the way that you plan, do they? Nah.

We're going to see that today, and in chapter 16, Abram and his wife Sarai take a detour when it comes to the will of God.

And it's not going to work out so well. Once again, this great man of faith, the father of those who believe, displays a shallower kind of faith than we might expect from him, okay?

Taking the long way around, and it cost him, and actually still today, we are still feeling the ramifications of his detour.

We still have, in effect, the ramifications of Abram's detour.

You know, some people don't, how many of you don't like to fly in airplanes?

Just don't like to fly, okay, yeah.

I think, was it John Madden? He was the coach and analyst for years.

He would never get on a plane, never.

He would take a bus, a bus, because he hated to fly.

And most people don't, it's not an economical thing, they're just scared.

They're scared to fly.

But the funny thing is, it's actually safer in an airplane, statistics say, than it is in an automobile.

It saves, you know, you may feel like you're a lot safer in the car than you are in the airplane, but statistics say you are safer in the airplane.

Studies show that, what is it, seven times safer than being in a car.

So actually, being in a little tube going 600 miles an hour, careening through a metal tube in the air, 35,000 feet above the ground,

is safer than being in an eight-cylinder vehicle here on this earth.

It's crazy, it's crazy.

And I've seen some of you drive, and for me, that's hard, that's not hard to believe, okay.

But I share that because there's a parallel with that, with the will of God.

There's a parallel.

Sometimes, when we trust the Lord, it just feels scary.

It feels scary when we say, it feels unsafe.

And the reality is, we would rather live by sight than faith.

That's the reality.

You know, I'll trust God when I can see it.

You know, I want to say I trust, but when I start seeing it come into fruition, man, God, you've got all my trust.

I'm yours.

I'm fully submitted to you.

How many of us have been there before?

I mean, I've been there before, absolutely.

But the safest way to navigate through your life is to live by faith, trusting in the Lord rather than trusting what you actually see.

Because how many of us really understand and really know that really what we see sometimes is not really what's going on?

We see things in the natural, but God's doing some things in the supernatural that we don't see.

And therefore, we miss out on the full blessings of the Lord sometimes because of that.

So let's see what happens here in our text today.

This is going to be shocking to you today, but we're going to get through the entire chapter of 16.

And we're not going to have a super long message today, but we're going to see what God has to say to us.

Now, Sarai, Abram's wife, had bore him no children.

She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar.

And Sarai said to Abram, Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children.

Go into my servant.

It may be that I shall obtain children by her.

And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.

That was a big mistake.

That was a huge mistake.

It's not always a mistake to listen to the voice of your wife, gentlemen, okay?

There are many times you need to heed the voice of your wife.

But in this instance, this was a huge mistake, okay?

They were unable to have children.

We know that.

It was revealed to us in chapter 11 when they were introduced to us, okay?

But, you know, you ever remember the old saying?

Maybe you heard the old saying, God helps those who help themselves.

God helps those who help themselves.

I remember growing up as a young man, my dad used to always say,

Well, in the Bible, son, it says God helps those who help themselves.

And I'd be like, okay, okay, I get it, Dad.

And I remember later on in life, I'd become a believer.

fleshilonians. I don't know, but come on. Is that good, Joe? Yeah, no, no, no. Okay. Oh, I changed that three times this week trying to come up with something funny in there. Okay. I laughed, but it's just one of those phantom verses. It's a phantom verse. Okay. And it's not a part of any, any of the, any of the scriptures. And it's just a verse that people impose who don't know exactly what the, what the Bible says. Actually, you know,

who said it? Ben Franklin. Ben Franklin maybe lost his Hogan's goat. Okay. But there you go. I don't know that for sure, but there you go. Okay. But we get this mistaken notion that if we set the gears in motion, if we put things into action and we get, and God sees how serious we are about it, man, I'm just going to do this.

And when God sees how serious I am about it, then he's going to come along beside me and he's going to bless what I'm doing. Cause God helps those who help themselves. He's, I'm going to, I'm going to make him, once he sees how serious and, and how, how hard I'm working at this. And here's a case right here of people who are trying to help themselves, or should I say, trying to help God out.

I'm going to help God out, help God fulfill this promise because God did say, you're going to have a child. You're going to have a child, Abram. And, and, and we see right here that his wife, Sarah decides that she's, we're going to do it. We're going to accomplish it this way.

Now, before we throw and completely throw Abram and Sarah completely under the bus and trash them, let's assume for a moment, the highest. All right. Let's assume the highest here. Let's imagine that they had really good intentions to begin with. All right. And here's the conversation. Think about the conversation that's going down one night.

They're in their tent. They're in their tent. The candles burning. Stop. The candles burning. They're eating a little bit of lamb, olives, pita bread. I don't know. Whatever you eat on a romantic tent dinner or dinner or whatever. Okay. And so they're sitting around there talking and she, and, and Sarah looks at Sarah at the time, looks at Abram.

And she's past 75. Okay. She's over 75 years of age at this point. And she says, sweetheart, sweetheart, I know you're really into this kid thing. I get it. I know you really want a kid and I'm at, you know, but baby, look at me. I'm over 75. It ain't going to happen. It ain't going to happen. And so now Abe, baby, what exactly

what exactly did God tell you in that problem? Can you remember what God told you in that problem? Oh, absolutely. I remember exactly what God said. I remember, remember like it was yesterday. Okay. Um, okay. That helps, Abe. That helps. Do you tell me, what did God exactly say to you in his promise? Okay. God, you know, because God said, I was going to have a child and it's going to, it's going to have a, I was going to have a son and he's going to come from my own body. Okay. All right. That helps. You're going to have,

okay. Because God said, okay. Because God said, it's going to come from your body. God said nothing about it coming from me. You know, he's nothing about that. So because it's going to come from your body and not necessarily mine, I propose that we just help God out a little bit. You can see how this conversation could take place. It makes sense, right? Sarah, let's not. And listen, you know, I have Hagar. She's an Egyptian, my Egyptian maid. She's much younger. She's able to bear children.

You go spend the night with her. You have a child. We'll adopt this child and we'll say that this is God's fulfilled promise. Okay. And it says that Abram heeded the voice of his wife. And now you just have to imagine, okay, what it was like for 11 years, 11, they've gotten the promise. He's waiting 11 years, 11 years. It is hard to wait. Can I get a witness this morning?

It is hard to wait on the Lord to wait and wait and wait on the Lord. Josh, you can't read your hand. You're, you're 10 years old. You know, nothing about waiting on the Lord yet. You will know what it means to wait on the Lord. It is hard.

that they should. Then we tend to push a little bit. We need to push a little bit and we tend to make it happen. And we impose our scheme and our designs. And we produce something of the flesh rather than something of the spirit. And I can give you four verses to back up the decisions I made to help God out. Because I'm tired of waiting. I'm tired of waiting. They've been waiting 11 long years since God first said, I'm going to make you a

great nation. I'm going to make you a great nation. And I imagine that every time Sarah had a twinge or walked a little bit. You're pregnant. No, I'm not pregnant. Stop asking me that. Stop. I'm not pregnant. Now you are. No, no, I'm not pregnant. And so now this, now this, and this is crazy. You know, she's like, this is correct. Let's get on with our lives. You just have the child. It's okay. Go get with

Hagar. I know you don't love her. It's okay. Okay. And so, and we'll have the promise. You know, we'll fulfill the promise that it's going to come through your body. It'll be his son. He didn't say anything specifically about me. So just take Hagar. Makes sense, doesn't it? All right. Verse three.

So after Abram had lived 10 years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar, the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram, her husband, as a wife. And he went into Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress.

Now where did Hagar come from? Egypt. Yeah. Egypt. So they must have picked up Hagar when they were down that little soiree that they had down in Egypt. Remember? They go into the land of promise. We went over this a few months ago. They finally get into the land of promise. But what's going on in the land of promise? There's a famine. There's a famine. So, so what does Abram decide? I'm deciding for everyone. I know God's told us this is where we're going to, we're going to Egypt.

We're going to go to Egypt, and we're going to have all these things. We need to go down there where there's plenty of food and all this other stuff. And so, so it was at that point, when Abram leaves Egypt, he had a lot of spoils, and he took a lot of people with him. He took some of those people with him. It was in that time of disobedience. Now Hagar is in his household. You know, your past has a way of catching up with you.

Don't just think that decisions you make have no ramifications. You may have think you've gotten away with something. Your past has a way of catching up with you.

God has a way of flushing things out.

God, because he's a just God, he's a righteous God, and he wants his very best for you, for you. And sometimes the dross has to come to the surface in order to be scraped away.

But she becomes pregnant. And so now we understand what the real problem is. You know, it isn't with Abram. It's with Sarah.

You know, because for a while, there are a couple. They're trying to have kids, and they can't have, they don't know. Is it my womb? You're not virile? What's the problem?

But obviously, she can't have, she's infertile. She can't have a child.

So what that also does in that culture, in those ancient cultures, it says that for some reason, Sarah is also cursed.

So now everybody knows this. You know, they know that they've been trying to have children. The whole camp knows.

For 11 years, you're going to be a great nation. Oh, father of none. You and Sarah, I keep trying and trying and trying.

Okay, now all of a sudden, Hagar's pregnant. You are with her. Okay, we figured that out. Guess what? Sarah is cursed.

That's the language that begins in the camp. Has to be. Has to be.

And moreover, Hagar despises Sarai, her mistress. It says, and when she saw that she conceived, she looked with contempt upon her mistress.

And we know this problem all too well, I believe, you know, because in Galatians 3,

i'm telling you gets you in trouble every stinking time every stinking time you know

how many times in your situation my own situation that we have thought you know we need to help god

out to fulfill this promise and there have been times in my life when god's revealed something

in my life that he's going to do in my life something in my ministry i know it i know it i

know it i know it okay but it hasn't come into fruition yet so i push the envelope at times

i've been guilty that god gives me a vision so that i know he's with me he's going to do something

but i need to learn to wait on him because it grows me it grows me in my faith it grows me in my

maturity it grows me in my relationship with him because every day if that promise is unfulfilled

before my very eyes i still have to have a new trust in the lord and belief in the lord

you will complete it in your time in your way lord i trust that i trust that but so many times you know

i mean how many times have you even counseled the lord you're going to give him you're going to give

him counsel as if he needs it you know you may not have said it out loud but you may have thought

things like this god i know you're busy running the universe you've got all these things you know

my little stuff over here doesn't matter a whole lot to you but i need you to step into my office

because there's some things going on that just aren't right and we need to get some things right

i mean i've been to college you see my degrees on the wall i've been to school hard knocks i need

to help you out with this situation because it's not panning out the way i need to help you a little

bit here lord and and and we might step in with an agenda and with a plan simply trying to fulfill

god's promise by a work of our own flesh and we need to understand this morning how dangerous

oh hear me church how dangerous it is to depend upon our own wisdom that is a dangerous place to be

i mean the scriptures tell what proverbs 3 says what trust in the lord with all your heart and lean

not on your own understanding but in all your ways acknowledge the lord and he will what direct your

path that's not just something we put on a cute card or on a plaque on your desk

that is medicine for your soul trust in the lord with all your heart lean not on your own understanding

but in on most of my ways no in all your ways acknowledge him and he will direct your path

they're not doing that here abram and sarah are not doing that here there's also there's an old

jewish proverb about when i was uh studying it i read it was so interesting it said that um it's better

to ask it's better to ask 10 times where the right road is than to get on the wrong road once

that's the word for somebody here this morning

you know i would always say okay i don't care how you ask i will always give you the same answer

my answer will be the same if to the best of your mother's ability of my ability we are going to lead

you from the word of god are you asking me to give you approval something in your life that that

differs from the word of god it's not going to come from my lips i love you but i don't care what

road you're asking me to help you walk down i'm not taking you down that road

i'm not doing it they take the wrong road and as i said earlier the repercussions are still being

felt today um i'm a bible turns pages i'm in the wrong chapter here we go verse verse five

let's move move on here and sarai said to abram may the wrong done to me be on you

i gave my servant to your embrace and when she saw that she had conceived she looked on me with

contempt may the lord judge between you and me holy cow

do you not think god has a sense of humor whose idea was this to begin with

now it's my fault yes yes

and it said and i bet you kissed her all night long yeah come on you know what goes through the mind

come on

yeah well who was it um victor hugo hell hath no fury like the scorn of a woman there you go abram

you're all in it you're all in it right now so here's abram you know okay honey whatever you say

dear okay then it happens now it's his fault now it's his fault verse six but abram said to sarai

behold your servant is in your power i'm gonna put it back on you woman you know do with her as you

please then sarai dealt harshly with her and she fled from her you know according to ancient customs

she was she was property of sarai okay that's what it meant by your uh your servant is in your power but

you know wow you know look at this you know here's abram and sarai they have a plot they have a plan

and they succeed but they succeed miserably they succeed miserably at helping god out and what i mean

by that is it's been 4 000 years since this and we are still experiencing the arab israeli conflict

that's still going on today the seed of ishmael and the seed of isaac continue to be at war with one

another there are suicide bombings there's problems in gaza there's the 9 11 ball bombings there's

america's policies concerning israel and it seems year after year after year the focus gets put on

this and it all began right here i'm gonna help god out you think about that next time in your heart

that you decide you're going to help god out to speed up the process or to bring about something in

your life that you want they just sang a song up here a minute ago and jill just said

the declaration is i am that declaration is that you am

you am not in control you am not the lord of your life i am i am he says but we like to rewrite the

scripture okay okay where were we verse 7 then the angel of the lord found her by the spring of

the wilderness in the spring on the way to sir and so she's trying to get back to egypt

kick me out i'm going back to egypt but there's nothing she's in this barren barren wilderness

she would have died in this world she would not have made it she would not have made it and she's by

this spring of water in the wilderness and we pick it up in verse 8 and so the angel of the lord

comes in and and he said hagar servant of sarai where have you come from and where are you going

she said i am fleeing from my mistress sarai the angel of the lord said to her return to your mistress

and submit to her this is i know we talked a lot about as we've gone through the book of genesis all

the first mentions and the first mentions are important you see a lot of first mentions in the book

book of genesis but here's the is the first mention in the entire scripture of the term

the angel of the lord and so and you're going to read about it a lot in the new testament and there's

conjecture as to who this who this person is um a lot of theologians believe that it's gabriel the

one who announced to joseph and mary and zacharias you know the events and the surrounding events of

the birth of jesus christ but this is the first mention of the angel of the lord okay but this is what i

love about this story okay this is a story of failure fumbling bumbling stumbling failure all over

the place and yet in the midst of this we see the mercy and the grace of god in the midst of this we see

the overriding overruling intervening hand of god being merciful and being just and being i am in this

story not letting them go through you know not letting them sarai and abram decided they were going

to do their own thing they put they put the wheels in motion god didn't stop that but they're god's not

going to let them just do this without his overriding hand stepping in and doing something

he's going to step in and do something the movement of his own hand verse 10 and the angel of the lord

said to her i will surely multiply your offspring so they can not be numbered for multitude

to um

but to um

god hears god hears hey god hears you call his name ishmael because the lord has listened to your affliction he shall be a wild donkey of a man his hand against everyone and everyone's hand against him and he shall dwell over uh against all his kinsmen so rather than just letting her go and return home maybe die in the wilderness the

kinsmen this angel brings brings brings brings brings bringing her back to abram and ishmael is going to grow up in the household of sarai and then the household of abram god's overruling hand is at work in this you know somebody once said that when when god god can't rule because we won't let him at times in our life god will always overrule

there will be times when you will be so stubborn

and you will try not to allow God to rule

but he loves you so much

that he will overrule at times

the sovereign hand of the Lord

and that's why I love that scripture

in Romans 5

that says where sin abounds

grace abounds even more

can you not see that taking place here

sin is abounding

but grace is abounding even more

God didn't give up on Sarah and Abram

he could have said forget it

I told you you won't trust me

I gotta find someone new

you know what this child is not what I predicted

and what I wanted

boom we're gonna take him in the womb

no

no none of that

none of that

and so his grace and his mercy overflowed

and here's an example of God's grace

to this woman

and to her son

and so verse 13

so she called the name of the Lord

who spoke to her

you are a God of seeing

for she said truly I have seen him

who looks after me

therefore the well was called

Ber Lahairoa

and it lies between Kadesh and Bered

in case you were wondering where that well is

you can go there and look for it

okay there you go

and Hagar bore Abram a son

and Abram called the name of his son

whom Hagar bore Ishmael

Abram was 86 years old

when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram

when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram

we're gonna end with just one verse in chapter 17

because

between chapter 16 and chapter 17

there's a gap of 13 years

because by the time we get to chapter 17

Ishmael's now a teenager

he's 13 years old

Abram now is 99 years old

and he's raising a 13 year old kid

somebody have some pity on this man

seriously

99 and he's got a 13 year old in the house

and Sarai is 90

okay

she's pushing 90 years old

okay

raising this child

but it's not over yet

this is just the beginning

because the son of promise

has yet to be born into the household

that's Isaac

that's Isaac

so

and so

Abram isn't going to

he said

well I've done it

I've got my kid

I'm gonna go off and retire

I'm gonna go offshore fishing

for the rest of my life

no you're not done having children

you're not done

you are not finished

he's gonna have more children

verse 17

chapter 17 verse 1

I'm sorry

when Abram was 99 years old

the Lord appeared to Abram

and said

to him

I am God Almighty

walk before me

and be blameless

you know

somebody once said

that one of the great things

about being 99 years old

is you don't have a lot of peer pressure

anymore

you don't have any peers

you're 99 years old

I mean seriously

how many peers you got

you gotta search the earth

to find a peer

okay

but listen

this is the first time

this is the first mention

of this title

okay

first mention

God Almighty

and the name is

El Shaddai

El Shaddai

El Shaddai

book and the book of Job is around this point in time to this patriarchal era but El Shaddai it is thought to come from an old Akkadian word that's from that whole us Semitic Syrio Babylonian time or whatever that region and it's an old Akkadic word that means mountain or breast but the idea is that some of the ancients would look at some of the hills up in the distance and they would say from the earth as the hill stuck up it was God

flexing his muscle God flexing his muscle it represented the buff muscle coming up out of the earth and so here's God saying I am the God the eternally sufficient one the divinely buff one okay who I am the God who can do anything you can't do it okay I am strong you are weak I am God you are not that's how he introduces himself so why does he call himself

El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El Shaddai El

I can do what no ruler could ever do.

And the interesting thing here is that he says, I am God Almighty.

Walk before me blameless.

Walk before me blameless.

What does it mean to walk before God blameless?

The idea is this, is that you live your life, you walk or literally you live your life

knowing that you are living your life in plain view of God.

How many of you have really allowed that thought to captivate you in your daily walk?

That you are living your life, every aspect of your life, in plain view of God.

Everything, your entire thought, everything that you do is in plain view of God.

That's what he's calling him to do.

I need you to live your life in plain view of me.

You know how it is.

When you were a kid, you acted one way with your friends.

And once your mom and dad walked in, you acted differently, didn't you?

You knew mom and dad was watching.

You acted differently.

I remember back in the day, back in the day during basketball practice, we'd be running suicides at the end of the week.

But we practiced for two and a half hours, and now we're running suicides.

Okay?

We're running suicides.

And so, everyone's dragging tail, man.

So we're dragging tail the last suicide.

But if you knew the coach was watching, oh man, you've got a little more step in there.

You've got to finish strong because the coach was watching.

You acted differently because you knew the coach was watching.

You live your life in plain view, knowing that God is watching everything.

I want you to walk before me blameless, he says.

Walk before me blameless.

Abram, you're 99 years old.

It's time for you to grow up.

Finally.

After all this time.

Time for you to grow up.

Time for you to learn how to walk.

Finally.

Walk before me.

To live your life, knowing that I'm watching everything you do.

Be upright.

Be upright in the way that you live.

Be blameless.

Be pure.

Be a man of integrity.

Be a man of integrity.

I think God tells him this because of Abram's, his history.

Look at the history that he's had.

Abram, he goes to Haran for 15 years.

God says, I've got a land that I'm going to show you.

And I want you to leave your home and go.

Remember, we went through this a few months ago.

I'm not going to unfold all this again before you.

But he doesn't go to the land of promise.

He doesn't stop where God tells him to stop.

He stops where his dad says he wants to go.

His dad was from Haran, okay?

So he wasn't walking before the Lord.

He was walking before his dad and before his family.

that's who was leading him

his dad was making decisions

okay

Sarai's stuff. He wasn't, in that point right there, he could have said, no, God has made

a promise, and he will fulfill the promise in his time, in his way, you are my wife,

I will wait on the promise of the Lord. But he wasn't walking before the Lord, he was

walking before his wife. So God says to him, I want you to walk before me, to walk blameless.

But here's what's awesome to me, is Abram is 99 years of age, and God still comes to

him, and he says, I want you to walk with me. I want you to walk with me. You know, a new

walk with the Lord can begin at any age. Any age. A new walk with the Lord can begin at

any time, in any season of your life, and someone needs to hear that this morning.

God is not finished with you. God is not done with you. It doesn't matter who you

are, what you've done, how old you are, what you have been through. This morning could be

the beginning of a brand new relationship between you and the Lord God Almighty. El Shaddai.

El Shaddai. The one who has prominent muscle to take you through anything. He's not just

your defender. You know why he's your defender? Because he's El Shaddai. He's El Shaddai.

And so he reveals his name to him, El Shaddai. And this is after 13 years. He's had Ishmael.

And after Ishmael, we have what? 13 years of silence.

silence. You think God was mad? No, I think his heart was broken.

Abram, why do you got to always try to fix things yourself, man? You have such a history

of trying to fix your own junk. And then saying, God, bless my meth. You know I love you. I

know you love me. I just need you to be obedient. I need you to be obedient. 13 years. 13 years.

And then God says, I'm El Shaddai. I'm all powerful. I'm all sufficient. I'm all you need.

So he brings about that revelation. But you see, with revelation comes responsibility.

With revelation comes responsibility. Every week as we unfold the Word of God before you,

as I take you through this systematically, verse by verse, through the Scriptures,

I pray that the Holy Spirit is bringing revelation to you. And it's not on me anymore.

I've thrown it out. I've showed you the heart surgery God's done with me all week long as I

lay it out before you. It's on you now because you have revelation to the Word. There's a

responsibility. The Scriptures tell us that Enoch and Noah walked with God. Abram was to walk before

God. Before God. And that word blameless, okay, walk before blameless, or maybe your version says

perfect. It does not mean sinless because that's an impossible goal. That's an impossible goal. The

word means single-hearted, sincere, to be wholly devoted to the Lord. It's the same word that's

used in Exodus chapter 12, verse 5, and refers to a sacrifice that is without blemish. It was a call

to integrity. It's a call to integrity, to walk blameless before the Lord. And the secret to walking

blameless before God is a personal worship of God. Do you have that personal worship? Do you have a

personal? John touched on that late yesterday morning in our men's prayer breakfast. That

personal worship. Your pastor can't have that for you. Your mama and daddy can't have that for you.

Your sisters can't have that for you. I don't care what evangelist you watch on TV or listen to on

podcast. They can't have it for you. Do you have that personal worship with God?

Every believer, just like Abram, has to fall before the Lord and yield everything to him.

El Shaddai. El Shaddai. God Almighty. And if he is El Shaddai, if he is El Shaddai,

God wins. Okay. God wins. God wins the ultimate battle. God wins the battle for your soul. God wins the battle in your life overall. God wins. Stop struggling with him. Because he is El Shaddai. He is El Shaddai. Listen, Satan wants you to think. Satan wants you to think.

That all of your disobedient detours. That that's the road that you're called to live on for the rest of your life. And that's a lie from the pit of hell. We have all taken disobedient detours in our lives. But that is not the call on your life. That's a lie from the pit of hell.

You know, all of us, like Abram and Sarah, must come to a place where, you know, 1 John 1.9, that if we confess our sins, if we confess our sins, he is what? Faithful and just.

He is faithful and just. He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all what? Unrighteousness.

That's the key right there. That the conviction of the Holy Spirit would fall upon us when we go on these disobedient detours.

Because we all take them from time to time. We're not perfect. We're not perfect.

When you find yourself on that.

And it's in that, as we confess our sins, that we accept God's cleansing.

We accept the cleansing of the Lord.

And we learn to live with the mistakes that we have.

And we don't have to own them, but we understand that those mistakes don't define us.

That's my past.

I'm redeemed.

Behold, all things are new.

I'm a new creation. I'm not a better Curtis.

I'm a new creation in Christ.

You are not a new Judy in Christ.

You are a new creation.

A new creation.

A new creation in Christ.

You know what?

As the worship team comes up.

Come on up, guys.

Let's end this way this morning.

With a word of encouragement to each other.

Let's everybody stand.

We turned to each other earlier today.

We gave each other a high five and said,

I hope you hear from the Lord today.

And so, I hope you've heard from the Lord today.

Not from me, but I hope the Lord has spoken to your heart today.

About the detours that we tend to take in our lives.

And that in the disobedient detours we take,

that God is faithful and just to cleanse us of those things.

For He is a righteous God.

He is a merciful God.

He is full of grace.

I want you to turn to somebody who's close to you.

Turn to somebody on one side of you,

because we're going to turn back the other way or in front of you or behind you.

Turn to somebody and face them right now.

I want you to say this.

You ready?

All right, here we go.

I want to hear you.

The victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings.

The victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings.

Now turn to someone else.

Turn right there.

There you go.

There you go.

Here we go.

The victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings.

One more time.

The victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings.

Yes! Let's give one! Amen! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!

Thank you.