Church of the Lakes Ohio
At Church of the Lakes our mission is to connect all to Christ to become healthy in God and courageous in love. In 2026, our focus is on Kingdom Building within our circles of influence. We hope you will join us throughout the year as we dive deeper into our Kingdom Conversations with our pastors and ministry partners.
Church of the Lakes Ohio
Conversation - with Pastor Jared about - Surrendering Worry - Altar'd Series
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Surrendering Worry | Elijah’s Altar | Kingdom Conversations
Why do we worry—even when we say we trust God?
In this episode of Kingdom Conversations, Pastor Robby and Pastor Jared continue the Altar’d Lenten series by exploring Elijah’s altar in 1 Kings 18. On Mount Carmel, Elijah challenges the people of Israel with a powerful question: “How long will you waver between two opinions?” (1 Kings 18:21).
This moment reveals more than a dramatic showdown between Elijah and the prophets of Baal. It exposes the deeper issue of divided allegiance—when we trust God but still look to other things for our security.
Together, Pastor Robby and Pastor Jared unpack how modern “idols” often disguise themselves as good things—money, success, control, approval, or status—yet they ultimately increase our worry rather than remove it. When our hope is divided between God and these substitutes, anxiety often follows.
In this conversation, they explore:
- What it really means to waver between God and modern idols
- Why we often try to trust Jesus “plus” something else
- How false sources of security create more pressure and anxiety
- Practical ways to identify the idols fueling our worry
- How Christian community helps reveal blind spots in our faith
- Why even powerful spiritual moments—like Elijah’s victory in chapter 18—can be followed by emotional struggle in chapter 19
Ultimately, this episode reminds us that surrendering our worry begins with surrendering our allegiance. When God becomes our everything instead of one option among many, we discover the peace we were actually looking for all along.
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Welcome to this week's Botus Podcast called Kingdom Conversations. At Church of the Lakes, our mission is to connect all to Christ, to become healthy in God, and courageous in love. In 2026, we're emphasizing a kingdom mindset in all of our ministries and missions by being more like Christ and countercultural in our living. Today's podcast highlights our Latin sermon series, Altar. As we study the altars found throughout Scripture, we're reminded of our call to surrender to God. In surrendering, we create space for Him to transform us from the inside out. Join Pastor Jared and Pastor Robbie as they unpack this week's message on surrendering worry and how it exposes the conflict of allegiance.
SPEAKER_03Welcome to another Kingdom Conversation. Pastor Robbie here, and today we're diving into our next altar in our sermon series, this time found in 1 Kings 18. This is the altar of Elijah on top of Mount Carmel. And it's at this altar that we see the vision and power of the one true God who demonstratively, I guess is a way you could say it, displayed power through fire that pours out from heaven. But uh obviously more so, we see how the Lord is to be our everything, and to be quite frank, our only thing. Well, Jared, we're gonna talk a little bit about Elijah. We're gonna talk a little bit of scripture, we're gonna talk a little bit about us. So, how are you doing today, brother? I'm doing well. Good, good. Well, I have to certainly launch off into today's altar conversation by asking you what you think about Elijah's declaration. He says in the scriptures, specifically here, we're going through 1 Kings 18, but he asked the people of Israel something kind of difficult to hear because I think we can relate to it today. He asks, how long will you waver between two opinions? What do you think, Jared? What is wavering between God and the modern idols that we see in Kings 18 actually look like in the everyday life back then and in the everyday life today?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I do like the the statement. I think this statement is it's a tough statement to swallow because it's a reality a lot of us have lived in. Um, the the word waiver there in Hebrew, it's maybe better translated as to limp along. We talked about that um uh in our service uh when we preached this particular sermon. And um it's kind of uh, you know, I gave the illustration of a person kind of walking awkwardly, favoring one leg and then favoring the other leg, then favoring one leg and favoring the other leg, so on and so forth. And uh so many of us, I think, do that when it comes to our relationship with the Lord. Um, you know, the the phrase that I would use is yeah, I like what you said, you know, God needs to be our not only our everything but our only thing. And so often what we do is it's it becomes not just Jesus, but Jesus plus something else.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's great.
SPEAKER_01And when when we do a plus something else, uh the challenge with that is is usually the plus something else becomes our functional savior. And um whether that's something else is maybe um uh money or status or power, power, uh reputation, yeah. It could even be another earthly relationship, uh, which earthly relationships aren't bad things, uh, but but i i it gets a little tenuous and those earthly relationships become greater. The plus earthly relationship becomes greater than the Jesus that we're supposed to supposed to be our everything and our only thing.
SPEAKER_03I do I do find it interesting, Jared, that you call it Jesus plus. Look, I mean you and I are both active people. I I I wish we could both say we're still runners, but probably at this age of our life we're both uh um has been runners.
SPEAKER_01And I limp along when I run as well. So that's what I mean.
SPEAKER_03Like the limping metaphor works for us because often we think about when you're limping while you're trying to be active, it's usually because you're carrying something that you shouldn't, or you're trying to power through something in your own power instead of relying on something else. And I, you know, that Jesus plus, you know, so often in life, I I I like that illustration from your sermon that you can listen to right here on the podcast feed. Um, it's like this extra baggage that actually weighs us down, but we think it's gonna, we think it's gonna set us free, but really no, it causes us to limp along, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and and oftentimes the plus, whatever the plus is, is actually I say functional savior, but maybe what we could uh speak more profoundly to to our listeners is it's an idol. You know, um the functional savior becomes an idol, it's something we've elevated above. And because we think we're going to find some type of contentment or satisfaction or help in that thing, that we maybe it's subconsciously, but we don't believe Jesus is actually going to come through for us. And the funny thing about that is is I've looked over my life's journeys, I look at the biblical witness, God's faithfulness is 100%. He never has wavered in his faithfulness. Perfect track record, perfect track record. Whereas the idols, they always overpromise and under-deliver every single time. Um, however, I I think the reason we struggle with with idols is because so often we think that um an idol offers us like instant reassurance. And sometimes with God, it's not instant reassurance like we think we want. And so um, you know, when it comes to like money feels measurable. Yes. So that's easy that the why that could be an idol.
SPEAKER_03If we can throw enough money at a problem, it's gonna solve it, right?
SPEAKER_01Status is visible, right? Um, control feels immediate. Um and so I can see why people, you know, myself being one of them, can gravitate towards a Jesus plus because those feel like more measure measurable outcomes than what faith in in the Lord um feels like. So often it's it's you know, Jesus plus financial stability, Jesus plus reputation, or Jesus plus control of outcomes. Um, but that plus always uh slowly becomes what we rely on most, and it becomes a functional savior, like I said a moment ago.
SPEAKER_03Well, these these functional saviors, as you call them, and I love that that illustration, that metaphor, because they're functional maybe for a very short period of time because they offer maybe uh reprieve and we mistake that for peace. Yes, right, but actually they end up creating something within us so much more devious, right? You illustrated as that it produced anxiety, yeah. It it increased pressure, it increased worry. Uh I think I think uh I'd love to hear you more talk about how that process happens. How does Jesus plus something that is of this world an idol? Yeah, uh, really produce that worry inside of us.
SPEAKER_01Well, going back to what you're saying, I you know, I think idols they promise peace. Um I do believe they just produce anxiety and pressure. And the reason I say that is because an idol always demands performance. Let me unpack that for a second. Um, going back to Elijah and the prophets of Baal in the great showdown in 1 Kings 18, I would definitely commend our listeners to read through 1 Kings 18. Because there's there's some great um contrasting going on here between the prophets of the false God Baal and the prophet Elijah and the living God. And so when the prophet of prophets of Baal get up on Mount Carmel to call, you know, to incite their God, quote unquote God, to bring down fire from heaven to swallow up their alt their sacrifice, um, he's not answering. And so what they think they have to do is perform in in in more demonstrative or greater ways. In which ways were that? Um shout louder, dance with more fervor, cut their own bodies to bleed.
SPEAKER_02So grotesque.
SPEAKER_01Uh perform all these ritual rituals. And as they're performing in their quote unquote God is not responding, I'm sure they're pretty anxious and worried because they they look like fools. They look like maybe their God isn't a God at all. And so you you take that and compare that to Elijah in the in 1 Kings 18. When it's Elijah's turn, all he does is he gets up there, he rebuilds the altar, he lays down the sacrifice, the bowl, and puts the seed, the grain offering uh up there on the altar as well. And he kneels and just prays. And the fire from heaven comes down and swallows up uh the sacrifice, which proves wait a second, Elijah's God's the living God. But these idols, again, they demand performance. Um, and when you have to perform, it always creates inside of you a pressure and anxiety that wow, I I hope I can perform well enough so I can show my worth, or so that I I can gain the approval, or so that I can um you know meet whatever uh uh criteria I'm called to meet in this moment. Whereas that's not our God. We we don't have to perform, you know, to earn his approval. God loves us unconditionally, so much so that God was willing to put God's self in the in in the person of his son on the cross to reconcile, to restore our relationship with him, which will ultimately be the last altar that we talk about in our series, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's uh it's these altars that foreshadow the coming of not only Christ, but the way in which he'd be broken for us. Um and Jared, I have to admit, you know, our theme for this year is certainly a challenging one. It's to live with a kingdom mindset day in and day out. And a part of that kingdom mindset is this idea of surrender. And so obviously, we've been going through these altars where people are surrendering physical things, yes, like the grain offering that Elijah did. Um but the way that the world operates, even some 3,000 years ago or you know, 2,800 years ago, whenever Elijah was around, um, the way the world operated even back then was through a wicked king Ahab, uh, even more wretched queen Jezebel. And and we're called to not live necessarily as the world lives, right? And so this idea of of surrender that frees us from all the anxiety and pressure. I where where do you think, Jared, the countercultural mindset comes in with the story of Elijah? Look, in our world today, isn't it often that it is a badge of honor to be worried? When we feel a sense of worry or anxiety, don't we begin to theorize, don't we begin to think that we're more important than the person next to us because we have more to worry about? Ah, you don't understand. My worry is more important than your worry, you know. Yeah. Do you feel any of that from Elijah's story? The pressure of that, that type of uh mindset?
SPEAKER_01I I think from the the prophets of Baal um perspective, I do. I I think Elijah had a had a mature faith and wasn't a God plus mentality. I mean, well, maybe even the Israelites, right? They were a Yahweh or a living God plus mentality because because Jezebel, uh, you know, when she married King Ahab, she brought into the Israelites' community, um, Israel's community, Baal worship. And you know, Baal was believed to be this the storm god, and Baal is the one who dictated um the harvest. Uh he was the god of fertility. And so really you could say he was the the God who um survival was contingent on uh uh um performing and being approved by that God. You know, would there be a harvest? Well, it's it's up to Baal. Would there be uh a womb that conceived a child? Well, it was up to Baal. So what do I have to do in order to be able to appease him so I can receive from him what I want or what I think I need? And that is just uh a recipe for anxiety and worry. And I I I think going back to your point, uh, it maybe uh there is a sense of it making us feel important, um the things we worry about, um but but ultimately the only thing that's important is our relationship with the Lord. And and we don't have to worry about the um the strength of our relationship with the Lord, it's it's not fickle. It's not contingent on our our fickleness, it's contingent on his faithfulness. Whereas in the prophets of Baal's story, the relationship was contingent on performance, right? Performance fit the fickleness of not only the the prophets, but also of Baal, right? And depending on what mood Baal woke up with was whether or not he was going to um you know uh concede one of your worries and bring you a sense of of peace. Um, you know, one thing about the idols too that I just want to mention real quick is uh again the idea that idols demand our performance. We see that with the prophets of Baal. Um and the the peace that we would receive from the idols, quote unquote peace, would have to come through achieving or appeasing them. Whereas when it comes to the living God, whom Elijah and we as the church believe in, uh our peace comes through his grace. And grace is this unmerited or undeserved favor. Right. We don't have to earn it. Yeah, it is just simply ours. We're like we are invited to embrace God's grace for our lives. Again, we do not deserve it. It is unmerited favor, and we'd be fools not not to take it.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_01Um but so often, we so often, because of the culture in which we live in, we think we have to earn it and we know we're not good enough to earn it, right? And so we we replace it with other things that we try to earn who become our functional saviors.
SPEAKER_03Well, you really encouraged us to lay down the plus part. How would someone do that necessarily, Jared? Like, look, that the idols that we see in the world today, and you've listed an absolute ton of them, and it's not an exhaustive list, right? We talk money, status, control, success, approval, so on and so forth. And that's just things off the top of my head. Uh, how how can we surrender those at the altar, not just today, but going forward? Because this is a continually daily thing, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01It is, yeah. You know, I you know, when Jesus said, for those who want to follow me, they must pick up their cross, deny themselves. That's a daily denial, a daily of picking up of a cross. It's it's not like a one and a done. Um, well, when it comes to idols, I I think the first thing we'd I'd want to tell the listener is is you have to be able to reflect and delineate what what are what's your plus? To identify right. And I think some some really great questions to ask yourself to determine what your plus is would be like call this a diagnostic questions. Okay. Uh what do I worry about losing the most? You know, what do I worry about losing the most? That that could be a uh could help bring some revelation as to what your plus is. Um, what do I run to when I feel stressed out? Could be another reason or another way to determine what your plus is, right? You're making me uncomfortable, Jared. Um another one is what makes me feel most secure about my future? You know, um, and and maybe another one would be what would devastate my identity if it disappeared tomorrow. These are all, I think, good diagnostic questions to help determine, okay, what is my plus? Let me put some feet under uh what my plus is so I can then daily surrender it and say, all right, Lord, you know, I know this is what I'm worried most about in my life. Um I need to lay this down to you today because if I don't, it's gonna continue to consume me with the worry and anxiety, and I'm gonna continue to work hard to make sure it's what I want it to be. Um I I think as a parent, I'm you know, a lot of my worry is in basically my children's safety and their their future.
SPEAKER_03It's only natural.
SPEAKER_01And so if that becomes my plus, and uh that's going to, you know, if they're safe, if they have a future that's prosperous, then I'm gonna be okay, I'm gonna have peace, then I'm going to do what I can to orchestrate that reality.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Here's the concern with that. When you tr kids get older and you try to force them into what your perceived prosperous future for them is, they do nothing but walk away.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, guess what? Now now my worry has come to my reality. It's a natural rebellion. Right. Yeah. Um, for some, you know, the that question of what do I run to when I'm stressed out? Uh, is it food? Um, you know, is it is it you know, some type of illicit behavior going online and going to websites you should be going to? Um, is it um you know, in engaging in an unhealthy relationship? Um I I don't know, um is it exercise? Uh, you know, uh being a compulsive exerciser. Uh, you know, and you do those things because you think, okay, I can find peace. Well, you can't. Again, they always overpromise but underdeliver. Because you're left just as empty as you were before you started when you chase the plus or whatever the idol is. Um, you know, Tim Keller, I have a quote here, uh, says, an idol is anything that if you lost it would make life feel not worth living.
SPEAKER_02That's indicative of the plus. Yeah, the plus. Yep. The plus.
SPEAKER_01So anxiety often grows where misplaced hope lives. And that's another Keller. Let me say that again. Anxiety often grows where misplaced hope lives. We have gotta um condition ourselves to place our hope in Christ in Christ alone. And again, the track record of God is 100%. You know, He's never He's never disappointed. He's he it's foolproof, you know? 100% uh He's never failed us. Not then, not now, and never will He.
SPEAKER_03Well, that leads in perfectly to our real question, real answer segment, Jared, because um one of the questions we had submitted, can you believe that? We have people submitting questions already. Um if you would love to do that, we'd love to answer your questions right here on the podcast. Send them to me at Robert at churchlakes.org. But here comes our question. It says, How can how can Christian communities help expose and dismantles the idols that we can't even see in ourselves? For instance, like, you know, Jared, sometimes we're ignorant to the way that we have the plus attached to us. Uh, I don't I that's not me. I don't put my hope in a certain thing or a certain thing, but when people actually see the actions of our lives or the things that we say, they see it within us. How can we help expose it? Because isn't exposing these things a good thing? It's not supposed to be done so that you point out somebody's flaws. It's supposed to be done so that we can help make it a surrendering point of that person's life, right?
SPEAKER_01You know, Paul and Ephesians 4 speak truth and love. Yeah, right. Um, we talk a lot at church like how we're the one another religion. Yeah. Um you know, 150 plus times in the New Testament, Paul gives us what I would call the one another commands, and just to name a few, it's to encourage one another, to love one another, to forgive one another, to admonish or correct one another, uh, to call one another out, to to build one another up. And and I I think um so often you know, we've privatized and individualized everything in America, including our faith in the Lord. And I like to say that you know, I have a very personal relationship with Jesus. However, however, it is not private. Yeah, it's always to be lived out in community. Um, so it's not just me and Jesus, it's me, Jesus, and the church. Right? And so I I think when it comes to idols, um idols thrive in blind spots.
SPEAKER_03Why?
SPEAKER_01Um I I think everything that's of the devil thrives in blind spots in darkness. And so I I think Christian community helps us uh b be able to to see the blind spots within one another that we ourselves can't see. Um we often can't see our own patterns clearly. Where we might be stumbling and limping, right, and wavering in going back to First Kings 18 in two different opinions. Um, but people who love us, they can, right? And so you know, I tell my children, um, they're teenagers now, and you know, they they have uh you know peer communities really big for them, huge. And I always tell them, I said, you are becoming your three closest friends, so choose your friends wisely, right? And but as they you know are continuing to to to to grow and develop as as human beings at that age, um, I know my kids pretty well, and I I I I can walk in and look at them and and I know if something's wrong or not. That needs to be Christian community, where we can have honest and candid conversations like a parent would have with a child to say, hey, you look a little off today. What's going on? And if I can put a plug in, that's one reason why we push anchor groups here at Church of the Lake. Absolutely. You know, we we need three to four people in intimate, um, transparent, vulnerable community to help us call out one another's blind spots. Because we want to spur each other on towards love and good deeds and toward continuing to grow in our relationship with the Lord. So blind uh idols thrive in blind spots. We need one another to to help um see each other's blind spots. Um, I think Christian community does uh in addition to that, does three important things. One, it reflects truth back to us. You know, I I think a brother and sister in Christ can can gently say, You seem crushed wherever whatever the area of life that's going wrong is going wrong. We can what what can I do to to to to to redirect you? Right? Um I I think when we can create safe space, it normalizes confession. Um I I can't say that the church in America America as a collective entity has created enough vulnerable and safe space where confession is normalized because we're concerned that if we confess X, Y, and Z, then someone might look at us differently or they might shun us. Look, we're all all filthy, rotten sinners that are that are broken, that need that need the grace of God to reform us into who God created and has called us to be. And so I think um anger groups in particular, they help us normalize confession because confession is such an important part. James 5. Uh confess your sins to one another, pray for one another so that you can be healed. Like healing is contingent on both prayer and confession, and we need to normalize that. Um, the last thing I would say is that I think also Christian community helps us redirect our hope together. It helps us recenter our our focus on the gospel. And where we've deviated or gone off course, we can kind of pull each other back in. Uh, we need one another, we are the one another religion. Amen. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, and then Jared, I have to confess with our next question here. Um, you know, first Kings 18, I love this passage. And I particularly am really passionate about the next chapter 19, because as uh perhaps our listener, if they want to uh add on an addendum to the reading uh homework that you got with chapter 18, take a look at chapter 19 because perhaps they're more familiar with that chapter where God uh reveals himself to Elijah on the mountainside. But it's so funny, Elijah is literally on the mountaintop right now. He's had this mountaintop experience, you know, just absolutely devastated the prophets of Baal. And he comes down from the mountain into the valley, and he gets threatened for his life. And it by Jezebel. Yeah, by Jezebel. And it's so funny, like they've been a drought for what is it, three and a half years, and the skies open, they see the clouds coming, and he thinks it's gonna be ha ha ha. I'm like, people are gonna start celebrating with me. And then he ends up getting uh uh then he someone tries to take his life as opposed to something. Yeah, so he gets out of town and goes up another mountain where God reveals himself. But I, you know, Elijah experiences that huge victory in 18, and then he falls into the fear and despair of chapter 19. Well, why do you think, Jared, that these spiritual highs that sometimes we see in scripture, or more importantly, that we sometimes feel in our own lives, get followed by the emotional lows. Like you think of Jesus, like Jesus had the spiritual high of the heavens opening during his baptism. Here the voice of God, here is my son with whom I am well pleased, and then where did he immediately go after that? To the wilderness to get tempted by Satan. And it's a spiritual high and then and then the low. What do you think about that?
SPEAKER_01Um, yeah, it's it's funny. You you're reminding me when I had my first church um after seminary, had my very first Easter service, and the very next day, one of my mentor pastors called me and he goes, How are you doing with the Easter blues? And I it was a sigh of relief when he said that. Because Easter Sunday, I'm at the top of the mountain preaching the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Monday morning came around. I felt depressed.
SPEAKER_03Well, Jared, you know, people often say to you or I or to Brian uh or Nancy or Tony, you know, Christmas, Christmas, Christmas. It's a Super Bowl, but our Super Bowl is when?
SPEAKER_01It's probably Easter, right? Yeah, Christmas is there too, but Easter, but the Easter blues, so you you know, you preach you're on a spiritual high preaching the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Monday morning comes, woof, you got the Easter blues. And I I think what's happening here, what I'm what I'm sharing is in terms of um my own experience, but also trying to connect it with with 1 Kings 19, is that Elijah just had this spiritually intense moment. And we're only human. And guess what happened? He was drained physically and emotionally after it. We're only human, right? Uh Mark Mount Carmel was not just a miracle moment, it was spiritual combat. He was, you know, at the heightened level of focus and energy in that moment. It's over, adrenaline fades, exhaustion sets in. There's gonna be a crash, right? And that's I think what's happening here with Elijah is there's a crash. He was high up, um, you know, all that adrenaline, all that, you know, a spiritual high and then spiritual low. And part of it, I think, also that played a part with Elijah is I think after that happened, he expected a national revival. Like the living God had just demonstrated that he is the living God and the only but there's no national revival. So I'm I'm sure there may have been a little level of disappointment for Elijah in that there was this grand spectacle that that just happened and it didn't move the hearts of of the people. It it feels like you know, when we preach a resurrection Sunday, uh they call Low Sunday every year to be the Sunday after Easter Sunday. And it's like if we really believe that Jesus Christ resurrected from the dead, shouldn't this be the most uh uh overpopulated Sunday in the church, the Sunday after Easter? But it's it's known as Low Sunday in the year. Uh and and and that kind of hurts the heart of a pastor because you really want people to own this reality that that resurrection is is the future of those who who are in Christ. Um I I I think too is because there was no national revival, Elijah still felt he was isolated, like he was the only one. And if you move one another, one another. Yeah, you need the one, you need community, and he didn't have it, he didn't think he had it. Well, that's that's the key, isn't it? Because when he gets to that mountain in 1 Kings 19, he's lamenting to God saying, I'm the only one, and God's like, No, you're not. There's this mount of people that have been that have not bowed the knee, bent the knee to bow. It's not only you, you there is community.
SPEAKER_03But we feel so isolated and alone because it's in the dark where Satan likes to push us. We think we're alone.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And because isolation can lead us to despair. Yeah. And and I felt I think Elijah in that passage was was was teetering on despair. And that's where the devil wants us. And that's what makes community so important. Uh, that we are not in this alone. Um, that we can and we that we can hold each other's arms up, you know, when we're tired, when we're weak, uh, regardless of why we're tired and weak. We we need to be there to hold each other's arms up.
SPEAKER_03Well, Jared, if I could give just a little bit of encouragement to our listener, we know that um as we begin to reveal through loving care to one another what maybe our Jesus plus is, these idols that certainly are thrust in front of our face, whatever it may be, as we reflect on our own lives, lives, or someone reflects uh for us or sees something. Um, when we surrender those over to God, it's amazing what He can do. He can pull us out from the pit and bring us back together to one another. But at times we will feel the lows that Elijah feels here, won't we?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And it's, I mean, you know, uh faith ebbs and flows. And I just think we gotta be prepared to help hold each other up in the lows. You know, Paul Paul says in Romans, you know, 12, we rejoice with those who rejoice and we mourn with those who mourn, right? I mean we we need to be with one another in all different seasons of our spiritual journey. Um, and I think in all of those moments, God is trying to teach us something, whether it's a high or a low. And some of that has to, you know, in the lows, it's you need to rely on me. You need to lean into me. Um, you need to continue to go back and remember my past faithfulness that so you can be carried through this low uh to the to the to the next season in life that that's gonna invariably come.
SPEAKER_03So this is this is certainly uh uh you and I see it in the scripture, but it takes a little bit of experience to see where worry really comes in here. And it's certainly that tension between the Jesus and the plus, whatever we want to add. So we want to encourage the listeners to really take a look at 1 Kings 18 and 19 with this uh God goggle on of worry and anxiety and see how not only God encourages Elijah in the moments of despair, but also, Jared, if I could put words in your mouth, that there is great power when we trust our living God enough that we hand over the plus and say, It's only you, God. Yeah, it's only you.
SPEAKER_01Um yeah, I would say too, you know, you read first Kings 18 and 19 and hold that up against um Matthew 6, where Jesus gives that in his Sermon on the Mount that that pastor about Consider the lilies, consider the lilies, consider the birds of the air, you know, and do not worry. Or Paul in Philippines, where he talks about, you know, um, do not be anxious or worried about anything, but by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, make your request known to God. And then he goes on to say, and when you do that, the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will will guard your heart and mind in Christ. Um yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, thank you, Jared. That's that that'll do it for our podcast today. I just I'm so thankful for uh how you helping us illuminate these passages a little bit deeper um after you give this sermon, because you know, once someone hears the story for once, we want to encourage them to go back and take a look at it harder. You know, and that's kind of how our small groups are designed here, right? I would encourage anyone if you're enjoying this podcast, but not in a small group, uh, we have online options, we have in-person options. We'd love you to take a look at churchalakes.org, a best way that you can help chew on the word together as we go through it, not just on Sunday morning, but um after that, because what good is it if you leave your faith, if you leave the scripture, if you leave your prayer, your praise to Sunday morning for an hour, right? More than just one hour a week. Um, and I'm so excited next week. We're kind of going back in time a little bit. We're gonna be taking a look at an altar that's found in Joshua, in which this covenantal promise, this promise that you've said over and over again, Jared, that um never lets us down. Uh our God constantly comes through. We're gonna be taking a look at how Joshua and Israel in that moment uh renews the covenant before the Lord uh with the ark. Uh, mind you, my kids got excited because they were thinking of, of course, Indiana Jones, but it's it's it's hard, it's hard to make the Bible sometimes come true in Joshua's case. That that certainly brings a little bit more to life. But I before we go, I just a big thank you once again to Betsy, our director of communication, to the fantastic Len Brown, who's our editor in chief, our encourager, to be honest with you, and of course to my wife Stephanie on our social media, uh, getting this podcast up and running. And once again, if you want to reach out to me, submit a question, please, please, please, please send me an email at robert at church the lakes.org. We'll read your question right out here. And we'd love to hear from you. Uh, certainly uh we want to offer you the blessings. And remember, it's our mission as followers of the one true Lord to connect all to Christ to become healthy and God encouraged us in love. And until next time, God bless.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for listening to this bonus podcast from Church of the Lakes with Pastor Jared Presett and Pastor Robbie Strapp. If today's message encouraged you and helped you grow as a devoted follower of Christ, we invite you to subscribe so you never miss an episode. You can also help others discover this podcast by leaving a five-star rating or review and sharing it with your friends, family, co-workers, and others in your circle of influence. We're also very grateful for your generosity, which helps make messages like this available to more people. If you feel led to give, please check the link in the description. And if you're in the North Kenton, Ohio area, we would love to invite you to join us in person on Sunday and worship together. To learn more about Church of the Lakes, visit churchofthelakes.org or visit the website link in the description. Until next time, stay encouraged and keep walking in faith.