The Miracle of Right Now: Finding the Father’s Heart in the Valley

Welcome to followed by mercy with Austin Gardner.

This is where we talk about God's grace and mercy

that meets us and follows us even in our lowest moments

and lifts us to hope again.

No matter what's been broken, here's love still heals.

So let's move from pain to praise together

because surely goodness and mercy does follow me and pursue me

all the days of my life.

I'm very excited to talk to you as I always am.

I want to discuss with you the Father I never knew

and talk to you about my miracle of life and grace.

This is kind of the ulcer Gardner story.

I don't know how long I'll take today on this.

I'm aiming for at least five minutes at all.

But I'd like to talk to you about the miracle of right now.

You see, I was out walking this morning.

I don't make a long trip but I go out for about five minutes

and I do it all day long.

But what's an hour?

I walk and I just talk to my father.

I have found out that biblically, you know,

he already knows what I'm going to ask for.

He already knows what I need.

He knows it before he can leave my mind to get to my mouth.

He knows because he's my creator.

But he loves to hear us talk because he loves us.

And that's the relationship with him that's important.

And so I just talk.

I just walk and talk out loud just me and, you know,

and he's listening.

And here's what I really didn't expect to be here now.

I thought I was going to die.

I thought I could continue to get progressively worse from the cancer.

You know, I have cancer.

That's pretty severe case of cancer.

I mean, I've lost a testicle and both the adrenal glands of the kidney.

And I thought, you know, I mean, a few years ago,

I was extremely sick.

And there were times I had diarrhea.

15 times a day.

I couldn't even make it through the day without messing my pants.

And I was miserable.

I was so exhausted.

I could hardly move.

And so my life is a miracle.

It's a miracle.

And I didn't see this miracle coming.

So one of the things that's probably the greatest in my life right now

is how I realized so I was so wronged about our father.

You know, I grew up.

And I didn't know at all that I was a holistic.

I did do not always have.

You see, all I knew was that at home, I never measured up.

And I kind of felt like God had this thing like my dad did.

You're doing good.

And maybe some reward you're doing bad.

Maybe some not.

And I kind of lived with the idea.

I shouldn't preach on solveneness.

I've been on solvening because God will bless it.

If I did, if I hadn't prayed as much as I ought to pray,

God won't be happy about me preaching on praying.

And it was always like tit for tat, trying to make sure I was pleasing.

God.

No one, I'm not blaming anyone.

I'm not leaving Christianity.

That's for sure.

I love God.

Like I never have loved him before in my life.

God is not letting me die.

He's keeping me alive.

And so I was walking.

I just told myself, Lord, if you're not going to take me,

which there for days, I woke up every day thinking this is the day.

I will be gone.

This is it.

I'm not long gone.

I just, I passed out.

I just fell into the floor.

It's scared, Betty scared me.

I was like, good night.

What's happened to take me?

Maybe you're going to take me.

Take me.

Then I said, if you're going to leave me, I'm just going to start telling them about

how good you are and how wrong I've been.

You realize we preach such a man-centered Christianity.

It's always about what you're doing, what you're supposed to do,

what's expected of you.

Now, we don't preach that about salvation.

We're clear.

We preach salvation is by grace except the gift.

But once you get saved, you better.

And buddy, we can preach it hard.

The gospel is an announcement of what God did.

I'm in the book of Ephesians where I'm preaching right now.

Two churches.

It's amazing in how he spends three chapters in all it is.

It's about how good God is.

That's the entire story.

God's done this for you.

This for you.

This for you.

This for you.

This for you.

This for you.

Then in chapter four, God's giving you gifts and all.

And basically, it's like, why don't you just walk like who you are?

Figure out who you are and walk like who you are.

So Bible preaching is more about what he did that I don't deserve than what I'm supposed to be doing.

Jesus died and was buried and rose again.

It's about his work, not ours.

It just kills me.

I love it.

And Ephesians chapter two and verse 10.

He makes us bold statement.

Verse 8 and 9.

He said, not by works of verse.

I just, that's, that's tired of three, five.

Not by works of righteousness, which you have done.

And he said, but in Ephesians 2 and 9, he said, not by works.

But by grace.

Because I don't want to yell bragging.

And then in verse 10, he brags and says, actually, you're my work.

I'm not your work.

So we spent too much time braiding people from the pulpit.

We've spent too much time, you know, getting saved is a happy thing.

Living saved is often not so happy.

God's on a rescue mission to rescue us.

And we're failures in God's saving us and changing us.

And so I have moved away from the God is a boss and God is a judge.

God is a referee.

I was almost like at the eyes of the Lord everywhere watching you.

They're beholding you.

They see the good and they see the bad and God's watching you.

You know, watching me is watching me.

That's in the Bible.

But that's Old Testament New Testament.

You're not watching me.

He's living in me.

So every move I make every thought I have.

He knows all of it that he's I saw myself so long as a servant with Jesus.

I'll call you all servants.

I call you all friends.

Hmm.

That's crazy.

He calls us friends.

He says, you don't just work for me.

I love you.

And you know, when Jesus is explaining how his father is,

he talks about the older son and the older sons like,

I'm not like the prodigal son that left and we got drunk and waste all your money.

I'm your slave.

That's the word he actually uses in the Greek.

And you hadn't even let me have a kid to have a party and you're a hard man.

In a lot of ways, I think a lot of us see God like that.

We're like his servants and we're always unworthy servants.

We've not done enough.

The more than we seem as a judge, he'll get you for that.

What you fear will come on you.

What you sow your reap, God's going to destroy you.

But then I see him as a father.

Then I see him as Abba.

And I think it totally radically changed the way I see God.

Totally radically changed the way I even see myself.

We're called to respond.

Now, let me say this.

The Bible is very clear.

You ought to repent.

But repent means a radical change of mind.

From thinking, I know what I'm doing.

To knowing God knows what he's done.

To thinking I can make decisions.

Knowing God can make decisions.

It's a turning from me to turning to him.

We make it so much about sin.

But you know what the major sin is in the Bible?

Breaking fellowship with our father.

Like the prodigal son did when he ran away.

Well, he didn't run away.

He didn't walk out with his daddy's money.

Went out and figured out a way to live like he wanted to.

That's a pit of me of sin.

Everyone going their own way.

So we are called to a response.

And we are called to get things right.

And we are called to repent.

There's no doubt about that.

But the repentance is a radical change of mind.

It's not just stopping sinning.

We're so big on you can't be doing that.

It's a changing of your mind about who God is.

And we're no longer employees.

We're children of God.

We're his child.

None of us want our children living in guilt and fear.

You know, dodging when your dad comes near and we're ducking,

thinking you're going to get hit.

That would say something, wouldn't it?

Your dad goes to lift his hand and you go to duck.

We're not working for a paycheck.

And we're not working to keep ourselves safe.

So God won't take us out.

We're not trying to earn what he's given us.

I went through a time in my life.

I can remember it was a kid I was being told.

He's done so much for you.

What are you going to do for him?

How you going to pay him back?

You cannot pay him back.

We're just recipients.

And so you're going to say, yeah, but Austin,

you're so much grace.

You're not talking about how we're going to live.

But you see, we don't live to get the grace.

We live different because we got the grace.

We live from the grace.

We live from the love.

We live from what he's done.

We live from what he's done.

It's kind of like the slave girl getting married to the prince.

She moved out of her old life and she takes off the old clothes.

And she puts on the news clothes and she changes the way she thinks.

But we see a lot of it.

It's illustrated in the story of Ruth and Boaz.

You know, Ruth was basically, she's a morbidist.

So she's not in the people of God.

And she's poor.

And life is over for her and for no aim.

Naomi, Naomi, if you think about it, there are widows.

Everything's gone, even lost the land.

Boaz is going to have to redeem it all.

And so she goes from one day being a servant

and the fields picking up what's left over.

And what's just accidentally dropped until he tells him to drop it on purpose.

She goes from that position to being the wife

of a great or fanguous rich man, a happy man.

I meant it was in love with Jesus, in love with God.

And so we need to learn to believe who God is.

I wish I could get across to you how we've got to change what we think about God.

It's one thing.

I used to wake up and say, God, I know I'm no good.

I know I blew it.

I know I failed.

I used to end every day saying, God, forgive me.

I know I didn't live up to what I ought to today.

And it's because I looked at God differently.

I even think now I'm a dad and a granddad and a great granddad.

And I think about it.

If my children were to come in and say, Dad, I'm no good, I stink.

I know I don't live up to it.

I want to hate that.

I want my children to feel loved and embraced.

I want my children to know that I believe in them and I look to them.

And you don't think our Heavenly Father does more than that.

He actually makes the comment.

He makes the comment.

He said, if your kid asks for bread, you wouldn't give him a rock.

If he asks for fish, you wouldn't give him a snake.

If you think you're a good parent, don't you think I'm a better parent than that?

Sure he is.

So we change our behavior and response to his mercy and his grace.

We live a new life because we've experienced loving kindness.

We have experienced God's sweetness.

And holiness is being separated.

You know, holiness, we've come to almost play a game about what holiness is.

It's almost like it's the attitude of Ali of pure.

But holiness is separated under God.

And it's like a wife is holy to you.

She is separated from all the other men to you.

So I'm not going to quit.

Until he takes me home, I'm going to tell you over and over until you're ready to shoot me that he loves you.

And he is a good God.

And I live in a miracle time.

My body is a miracle.

I'm physically a miracle.

I'm emotionally a miracle.

God is just doing great.

But he's a better God than you think he is.

You need to learn to trust your father.

He has been with me through all of this.

But the sweetest thing is I have gone through some of the worst times of my life

and getting to be totally alone.

So I finally know who he is more than I ever have.

Hessen, loving kindness.

It is God loving us.

And he loves you.

Can I remind you that you were saved by grace and you know that?

Can I remind you you can never live up to it?

Actually, what you do is just yield and surrender.

Give your life over and let him live through you.

That's what we do.

So I want to thank you for listening.

But I was just walking and thinking about,

I was just walking and thinking about, I don't know why you don't take me.

I feel good today.

I feel good most everyday.

People look at me and say, you don't look like you got cancer.

I'm like, I know.

I don't figure it out either.

There was a time I was so tired I could already make it.

Now, by the time you hear this, I'll probably be in Utah.

I'm going to trip out and see a friend preaching the church.

Go see some of the Grand Canyon.

Things I've never done.

God's just good.

God's just good.

So as I close, let me just say this to you,

you have a father who loves you.

He adores you.

He looks at you and says, you're his beloved.

You're his beloved.

He says that he is very pleased with you.

And he does that because we're in Christ and because Christ changed us.

Because Jesus took all of our sin and put it on him.

Our sin passed present and future.

He put it on himself and he died on the cross.

And he took all of his holiness.

All of his perfectness and put it on us.

By the way, it wasn't like the father was angry and Jesus paid our price.

God was in Christ.

It's exactly the same for five.

And he loves you and he's paid the price.

And so I just want you to know he loves you.

Oh, thank you for listening.

Sometimes I don't know if anybody's listening,

but I just want you to know that you are loved.

And he doesn't expect anything from you except for you to receive his love.

I used to would have said, you need to love God.

No, now I say you need to understand God loves you.

Boy, it's harder.

It's easier me to love God than it is except that he loves me, isn't it?

So you have a good day.

And you meditate on this that you are loved and adored by your father.

He cares about you and he cares about you more than you care about your children.

I love my children.

I can't explain it.

They are my life.

God loves us.

And he loves us more than that.

Would you give this a like?

Would you subscribe to the YouTube channel?

Would you subscribe to the podcast?

Would you share it with some other people?

Would you leave me a comment?

I would love to hear from you.

How do you think about the father?

Do you think he loves you?

Do you think he loves you?

He likes you?

Do you?

Let's talk about it.

God bless you.

Thanks for listening to Followed by Mercy with Also Gardner.

If today's message spoke to your heart, share it with someone who needs to know God hasn't given up on them.

Remember, your pain isn't the end of your story.

In Jesus, it can become praise.

Thank you.