The Breakthrough Series:
Breaking The Status Quo Barrier
I Chronicles 14:8-17
Main Ideas:
• Breaking through the status quo barrier is a cyclical process not a one time event.
• This process consists of 4 distinct but necessary phases God takes us through on the road to the next level in our spiritual lives.
As we read I Chronicles 14:8-17 together, I want you to see if you can notice a pattern floating to the surface of the text.
Read I Chronicles 14:8-17.
THE PATTERN OF A BREAKTHROUGH
There is a pattern that emerges here.
It’s a pattern with 4 identifiable phases.
I call this the PATTERN OF A BREAKTHROUGH.
I want to walk you through these 4 phases.
PHASE #1: I GO THROUGH A CRISIS.
This is the first phase on the road to reaching the next level in your life.
God allows a crisis to come into your life that pushes up against your belief in God.
Something takes place in your life that puts your back up against a wall.
It’s called a crisis.
How many of you have ever experienced a crisis?
I want you to notice David’s crisis in verses 8-9.
V.8 – “Now the Philistines heard that David had been anointed king over all Israel, all the Philistines went up to search for David. And David heard of it and went out against them.”
V.9 – “Then the Philistines went out and made a raid on the Valley of Rephaim.”
David was anointed king over Israel.
He’s promoted and things are going well when all of a sudden a crisis comes into his life.
David’s crisis had a name.
It was called the Philistines.
The Philistines are mentioned 286 times in the Old Testament and their land is mentioned 8 times.
What I’m saying is that God gives the Philistines a lot of air time in the Old Testament.
They’re mentioned a lot.
And when they are mentioned it is usually because they are opposing something God wants to do.
Here we see them opposing God’s leader David.
David’s crisis was a military crisis.
Just like a gigantic chess match, the Philistines in verse 8 came up to search for David to kill him.
David countered with his own move in verse 8 by coming out against the Philistine army.
The Philistines, in a strategic and defiant move, raided a valley in Jewish territory, a valley it turns out that was a direct route to the Capital city of Jerusalem, David’s stronghold.
David was stunned. David was scared. David was smack dab in the middle of a crisis.
Experiencing a CRISIS, that’s the first phase in experiencing a breakthrough in your life.
God allows you to face a challenge or daunting obstacle that pushes up against your belief and faith in God.
Everybody faces different kinds of crisis.
I made a list of crisis that people sometimes face and I want to read them to you and see if you’ve faced any of these in your life.
COMMON CRISIS PEOPLE OFTEN FACE
1. The loss of a valued relationship…such as breaking up with a boyfriend of girlfriend, or divorce. The dissolving of a longtime business partnership
2. Failing a class in school or failing an entire grade.
3. Losing one’s job
4. Bankruptcy
5. Declining health of you or someone you care about. Health issues usually send us into crisis mode.
6. The death of someone close to you
These are just a few but they are some of the more intense kinds of crisis we can face.
QUESTION!
Why does God allow us to go through a crisis in order to break through to the next level?
The reason is because life on the average daily tone is not enough to break us out of our status quo routines, our status quo ruts or our status quo mind-sets.
So God allows us to feel the heat.
THE CRISIS TAKES YOU OFF AUTO-PILOT.
IT WAKES YOU UP…SLAPS OUR SPIRITUAL SENSES BACK TO REALITY.
Sometimes we ask for these things by decisions we make and sometimes we don’t ask for them.
I like how one author describes this kind of experience.
He says:
“They are voluntary and involuntary. These proving moments come to us, ready or not. Sometimes we make decisions that invite them; and other times we are surprised by them. It is the difference between starving and fasting. One is voluntary, and the other is involuntary.”
David’s crisis was involuntary. He’d done nothing to bring this on himself.
It came into his life and David didn’t ask for it.
He didn’t want it, but one thing is for sure, he had to respond to it.
The most difficult crisis I’ve ever experienced came at around 12:00am midnight on March 31st, 2003.
Nicole was pregnant with our first child Ethan.
We arrived at Christiana Hospital at around 11:30 once Nicole’s contractions were close enough and intense enough to go.
Upon arrival we were told she wasn’t dilated enough but that they were going to admit her because they were noticing an irregularity in the baby’s heartbeat.
I recall how my palms started sweating and my pulse sped up.
We were ushered into a room where things went form bad to worse.
From 12:00 midnight until 4:00am Ethan fought for his life inside Nicole’s womb.
Evidently the umbilical cord had wrapped itself around his little throat and his heart was working hard to keep up.
His heart beat would raise to the 140’s and then drop to the 40’s.
And every time Ethan’s heartbeat dropped my heart sank.
Time out from the story for a moment.
This was my crisis.
I didn’t ask for it. Didn’t want it. But there was definitely no ignoring it.
I’ll come back to my story in a minute.
Let’s go back to David’s story.
And allow me to share with you the next phase of the breakthrough pattern.
PHASE #2: I GO TO GOD.
FIRST I GO THROUGH A CRISIS.
THEN I GO TO GOD.
Notice verse 10 with me:
“And David inquired of God, saying, ‘Shall I go up against the Philistines? Will you deliver them into my hand?’ The Lord said, ‘Go up, for I will deliver them into your hand.”
The way that you and I respond when we’re in a crisis is important to God.
Our response often determines whether we go up or whether we give up.
How we respond determines whether we’ll be able to break the status quo in our life.
Dr. John Maxwell says:
“These experiences are like tea in hot water: They bring out the true colors inside.”
A crisis simply reveals what is on the inside of you.
This crisis that David went through revealed a dependence on God.
This crisis motivated David to call on God for Divine assistance.
Now, not everyone responds this way to a crisis.
Some people just get angry at others or at God when a crisis comes into their lives.
But not David, at least not on this occasion.
This time, he simply prayed.
I can tell you that as I was watching my wife lying flat on her back trying to give birth to Ethan, I prayed.
I prayed and asked God for help.
What else could I do? I was in a crisis and I had no where else to turn.
The doctors were doing their best but it was beginning to look like their best wasn’t going to be good enough.
So, I cried out to God in my heart and begged for his help.
Have you ever been there? Have you ever been at that point in your life?
I’ve been there.
David was there.
Now, let me share with you phase 3.
After you go through a crisis and go to God…
PHASE #3: I GO ON FAITH.
God answered David in verse 10 and said to him:
“Go up, for I will deliver them into your hand.”
God answers David’s prayer.
God speaks into David’s life loud and clear.
There’s no question that it is God who has spoken and there’s no question about what God has promised.
God has promised David victory.
Now, at this point, David has a choice.
Will I believe what God has said, or will I go with my gut?
Will David go on faith or go on his feelings?
Dr. Henry Blackaby, co-author of the book Experiencing God, describes David’s crisis this way:
“David was a faithful servant of the Lord’s. David refused to rely on human wisdom for guidance. He asked for God’s direction. Was this a crisis of belief since God said he would give David victory over the Philistines? Yes! David still had to decide what he believed about God. He had to trust God to do what he said he would do.”
What did David do? How did he respond to God?
Look at the end of verse 10.
It says:
“The Lord said to him, ‘Go up, for I will deliver them into your hand’.”
And notice what David did in verse 11:
“So they went up to Baal Perazim, and David defeated them there…”
God said “Go up.”
David said, “I will.”
David obeyed the Lord and did exactly what God told him to do.
David was going on faith.
Standing in that hospital room with my wife laboring and my little unborn baby fighting for his life, I made a decision.
I was going through a crisis.
I was going to God.
And now, like David before me, I needed to go on faith, trusting God to do what he knew would be best.
Right then and there I made a decision.
My prayer went something like this:
“God, this little baby is yours. I give him to you. I take him out of my heart and give him to you. And I ask you to please spare his life. I trust you Lord.”
Some things in life you can’t talk your way out of.
Some things in life you can’t work your way out of.
Some things in life you can’t buy your way out of.
Some things in life you can only trust your way out of.
Some of you are going through a crisis today and you have a decision to make.
In fact, the word crisis comes from a Greek word that means decision.
That same Greek word sometimes gets translated judgment.
A crisis is a turning point, a moment of truth in our lives when we make a concrete decision to follow God and trust Him or not to trust God and walk away from Him.
Now, let me share with you the 4th phase in this breakthrough process.
PHASE #4: I GO UP.
I go up to the next level.
I breakthrough into a new realm; a higher dimension of living.
I BREAK THE STATUS QUO BARRIER.
I graduate from one grade to another.
After David went through the first 3 phases of the process and had come to Phase 3 and decided he was going to go on faith, look what happened to David in verse 11:
“Then David said, ‘God has broken through my enemies by my hand like a breakthrough of water.”
David experienced his much needed breakthrough.
After I made that decision to trust God in that hospital room, it wasn’t long after that the doctor came in and said they were going to do an emergency c-section.
They wheeled Nicole over to the operating room and performed the surgery.
As those doctors delivered Ethan God delivered me and took me up to a higher level of faith in Him.
Just like David I had gone through all 4 phases.
Not one phase was skipped.
After we took Ethan home you’ll never know how thankful I was that God had spared him and that he was healthy.
Well, some time past, and we’re not really sure how it happened, but once again Nicole became pregnant with our second child Wesley.
I’m a slow learner, I know.
9 months went by and it was time to go to the hospital.
This time they had schedule the c-section ahead of time.
When we went into the hospital and had Nicole checked, the nurse once again noticed an irregularity in the heartbeat.
It was like déjà vu!
Our nightmare was happening all over again.
Time out!
Look with me at verse 13:
“Then the Philistines once again made a raid on the valley.”
Wait a minute I thought David had just defeated them?
He had. But they reared their ugly head again.
Problems often do that.
Have you ever faced the same problem more than once?
Do you know anybody that has ever gotten more than one speeding ticket?
Do you know anybody that has had more than one DUI?
I do.
Sometimes we face the same crisis more than once.
The first time David faced this crisis, he was inexperienced.
The second time, he was a veteran.
He knew what to do.
Verse 14 tells us:
“Therefore David inquired of God…”
I go through a crisis, I go to God, I go on faith and I go up.
It’s a pattern you’ll see repeated all throughout your life as a Christian.
It’s just the way God works.
I go through a crisis, I go to God, I go on faith, I go up…
I go through a crisis, I go to God, I go on faith, I go up…
RAWHIDE!!!!
So I’m standing in the hospital looking at the heart monitor that’s checking baby Wesley’s heart beat and thinking to myself…
“I’ve been here before. I know what to do. I’ve got to go to God.”
I fully expect that in a few weeks or months I’m going to be going through another crisis and I’ll have to go through all 4 phases again so that I can continue to graduate to a higher level of living with God.
What are you going through today?
Have you made a decision to trust God with it?
