The hideout game

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to "Try Jesus!" If this is your first time joining us, it’s great to have you with us. I would like to thank all the new members for joining "Try Jesus."

I would also like to welcome those in Florida, Arkansas, Alabama, Kansas, Maryland, Delaware, and Minnesota. It is a pleasure to have you with us today. The Lord continues to expand his word!

"I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the LORD."  (Psalm 122:1 KJV). The Lord is indescribable and uncontainable. We gather to seek him above all today. He is an amazing God!

Our Lord continues to pave the way for the righteous. Authentic born-again believers shall not be moved from his mighty guiding hand! The Lord is our rock and our salvation this morning! He is our defense against ungodliness.

Some of you may still believe this morning that life is hard from last week's message. However, many of you have realized that God's burdens are light and does all the lifting for the body of Christ. Cast your cares on him today.

Like the commercial says, "You're in good hands.." Let's pray. "Heavenly Father, thank you for being gracious to us this morning. Thank you for continuing to be faithful, even though we may blow it and stumble over you.

As we prayed last week, Lord, you still reign from your heavenly throne above all nations of the earth. Your name, power, and authority is unmatched. You are in control over all the affairs of man and beast. Nothing is hidden from you.

Thank you, Jesus for opening our understanding and how to apply your knowledge into the world's technical skills. Thank you, Jesus, for your many blessings you bestowed upon us from last week until this morning.

Your presence this morning is not limited by physical distance. Though we are gathered in different rooms and on different screens, we are united by your Spirit. As we open your word today, we invite you into our homes.

Lord, open our hearts, calm the distractions around us, and let your message speak directly to our lives. As we turn to the reading and preaching of your written word, we ask that you would quiet our souls.

Remove the noise of the world and speak words of life into us. Strengthen our faith and deepen our understanding so that we might walk away better equipped to live out your truth, in Jesus glorious name we pray, Amen."

All "Try Jesus" members have heard me speak about growing up in a home that was filled with board games. We had a special tall walk in closet full of games that brought fun and togetherness under our roof.

But many times, we also engaged in games our parents taught us to play outside as well. Of course, in my family, sometimes cheating and taking advantage of the rules always brought the games to a quick ending.

One of those games was called hide-in-seek. There's certainly no fun in the game when the person who's supposed to have their eyes closed is watching your every hiding place you look for.

The game also had boundaries of where you could hide. You couldn't leave the boundary of your homes property and hide out at your friend’s house up the street. After a while, you give up because the game is no longer fun anymore.

My parents would sometimes involve us in another game called "Hot and Cold." These games are the oldest games throughout history according to many. But hide-in-seek is not the oldest game, it's hiding from the one who created us.

Listen my friends, long before we learned to hide behind closed doors, we learned to hide behind fig leaves. Let's face it, we all are good at hiding. We'll say things like, "What they don't know won't hurt them."

We, as the human race, are always trying to conceal something. We try to conceal our deepest shame from the very one who wants to heal us. The Bible tells us that God is our refuge. The word refuge is used 12 times in the Book of Psalms.

The Hebrew word ("machăseh machseh") meaning a shelter, a place of refuge and trust from rain or storms of danger and falsehood. Please read the following verses into your spirit, family and study group. Two of my favorites.

"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." (Psalm 46:1 KJV).

1} "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. 2} I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust." (Psalm 91:1-2 KJV).

Do you see beloved how God being our refuge causes us to trust him? What can happen to God's children (John 1:12) when he protects like a fortified fortress? No one on this earth can pluck us from his hand of security. (John 10:29

But too often the world and those who live in it who reject God's mighty spiritual security measures, settle for the cheap shelters of our own making rather than the strong tower of his loving presence.

How many of regularly face insecurity issues? How many of you doubt your gifts and talents? Do you battle anxiety feelings about who you are? (Your identity). I hope at the end of today's message, you will hear, "Be confident!"

Not only be confident but step out in action. Imagine landing a new job, starting a new relationship, or stepping into a leadership role you prayed for. Instead of celebrating, you are gripped by fear.

You look at your phone, read the email, and think, "If they really knew my background, my track record, or how insecure I actually am, they would replace me immediately."

Many of us have dealt with different insecurities. I am in that number. I could never find myself communicating with anyone until Jesus introduced himself to me as an adult. (22 years old).

Before that, when it came to public interaction of any kind, I was like a turtle who never comes out his shell until the other turtles were not paying attention to me. In grade school, oral book reports made me urinate in front of the class.

This is why my testimony (Listen to the audio podcast on the drop-down page) has been so important to what the power of the Holy Spirit can do in our lives if we'll allow him too. This is why I love Gideon in the Bible.

I can definitely relate to all his internal insecurities. This man was threshing wheat in a winepress. You might say, "What's so insecure about that occupation?" Well, he was doing it (cramped down) in a subterranean hole.

This area was meant for stomping grapes, not thrashing around grain. He was hiding from some group of people named Midianites. (Judges 6:1-6). As it was, the Israelites brought this upon themselves. (Verses 8-10).

But because God continued to love them, the Angel of the Lord came unto, (of all people), Gideon. Here are the words the Angel of the Lord said to Gideon. Please read these verses into your spirit slowly.

12} "And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him, and said unto him, The LORD is with thee, thou mighty man of valour.

13} And Gideon said unto him, Oh my Lord, if the LORD be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt? but now the LORD hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.

14} And the LORD looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites: have not I sent thee?

15} And he said unto him, Oh my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? behold, my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house. 16} And the LORD said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man. (Judges 6:12-16 KJV).

Ok, I remember the first time I read this in my Christian walk with Lord, "Wait a minute!" The definition of this person doesn't fit the personality that is being seen by everyone around him.

It's like someone calling "Olive Oyl" "Wonder Woman." I mean, imagine calling Olive a woman of Valor?" I mean, she called Popeye for everything. If she hurt her fingernail, got a traffic violation, slipped on a blade of grass, she called him.

Of course, mostly it was protection from Pluto. (Smile). I immediately had to find out what Valor was in the Hebrew text. It is the word (chayil). It has a significant descriptive wording around what God called Gideon.

Gideon was described as a man of force, strength, power, valiant, might, and efficient. Like a one-man army. Again, someone out of the Bible I immediately think about having valor is Samson. But God has many abilities we don't have.

He can see past all the inadequacies that Satan has sifted in and around Gideons thinking of himself (Low self-esteem). Read verse 15 again. Know anyone or heard someone confess all the black sheep of the family stories to you?

I knew a friend of mine who suffered with this mindset. Gideon equated being poor with being the least in his family. Having that Charlie Brown mentality ("I'll never kick that football!"), only brings more negative narratives against ourselves.

When my friend would tell me whenever he entered a room, he would go in with his head down and mouth closed as to not bring to much attention to himself. But I always told him, "Look my brother, you are a "Man of God!"

"Let the redeemed of the Lord, say so!" "What God says to you in the secret place, shout from the rooftops!" I also told him to remember that when he walks in a room, he's in the majority, not the minority.

He has God the Father, Jesus as Lord, the power of the Holy Spirit, and God's warring angels by his side. I told him to read the story about Elijah and his servant in (2 Kings 6:15-18). I just want to put verse 16 out there for eyes to see.

"And he answered, Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them." (2 Kings 6:16 KJV). You see beloved, God takes care of his own. The world thinks they have defeated Christianity if they take a life.

They are so sadly mistaken. They fail to understand that Jesus defeated Satan and those who choose the way of the world. It is impossible to kill the word of God which resides in the souls of individuals that accept "Jesus as Lord!"

We all may have played the Gideon roll at some stage in our lives. Some Psychologists call this the "Imposter Syndrome." What is it? It's defined as having this constant, exhausting fear of being exposed as a fraud.

Fear doesn't come from God. Perfect love casts out fear and fear brings torment. (1 John 4:18; 2 Timothy 1:7). God gives his true believers power, love, and a sound mind. Did you grasp that?

But those who wrap themselves in fear try to protect themselves by building modern-day winepresses. They hide behind humor; they hide by staying quiet in meetings or hide by overworking themselves in exhaustion.

They continue to do this just to prove they belong. They try to blend into the background because they feel completely inadequate for the life right in front of them in the mirror. I knew a gentleman at a company like this.

He would make up things because he wanted to fit in with the other workers. One day the other workers set him up and used a fictitious part that they were adding to their motorcycles. When the person came downstairs, he took the bai

They immediately were acting all excited about adding this part to their motorcycles. Well, this person owned a motorcycle himself and started saying how he had already purchased this item as he was willing to ride with the others.

After the conversations had ended, they exposed him and started laughing at him. What a horrible thing to do to someone. When I met him outside his house one day, I encouraged him to be himself