Have you ever had a challenge knock you flat on your back and make you wonder if you would ever get up again? You thought you had the relationship stuff all dialed in. You fell in love, things were moving forward, you felt strong and then came the arguments, the betrayal, the change of heart, and that relationship now feels lifeless. Maybe your job used to be fun. It felt like a blessing and you felt lucky to have it. But then came the added responsibilities, the change of leadership or direction, and now it just feels dead—no more life. Or maybe it’s school. At the beginning you have all those fresh binders, a new backpack, a huge stack of new pencils. Then comes the homework. The projects. The crowds and the drama. The binder and backpack are looking all ragged. The pencils are all broken and the erasers are gone and finals are coming up. No life. There’s all kinds of things in life make us realize we are not as strong as we thought we were. All kinds of areas where we once felt alive, but now feel lifeless. Overwhelmed. Knocked flat. The Good News today is this: Jesus is alive again, so we can experience life again!

In my life, faith became the thing that helped me face the injustices of life and helped me pull through no matter what was happening. Faith empowered me to face addiction and to celebrate 28 years of sobriety. Being a person of faith doesn’t mean I think I have all of the answers, but it simply means I believe in the One who does and lean into Him even when life is hard. It doesn’t mean I walk around judging people and thinking I’m better. It means I’m empowered to love people, knowing I’m no better than anybody else, and I am forgiven in Jesus from my sin, my failures, and my past. Easter is filled with memories and family and candy and all kinds of things, but the most important for me is faith. Easter is about hope for everyone in Jesus.

You know what’s incredible? God tracked us down with His love. Wherever you are today, remember the cross. Remember what Jesus did for you. Let it change your perspective. Some of us are struggling with failure, and we feel so disappointed. But the cross reminds us that God loves us unconditionally, and we can recover from that failure. Some may be struggling at work or in relationships, but the cross reminds us of God’s care to help us. Some of you may feel like you are barely hanging on, but you look to Jesus and realize that if He can carry all that He did, we can handle what we’re going through. He went all the way to death for us. They put Him in a tomb. Hope seemed to be lost, but it wasn’t. As we look towards Easter, it’s time to celebrate. It’s time to celebrate that He is alive again.

When things are tough, remind yourself how God has worked in your life in the past. Remember how He called you, helped you, saved you. Remember how He rescued you. He did it before and He can do it again. Things may be unknown, but trust in the known God. Activate your faith in the future. Things may feel tired and familiar, activate your faith and step out in faith. 

The more we align our lives with God’s character and with His truth, the stronger our lives can become. So many of us are adjusting to pain in our lives—the pain of disappointment, the pain of feeling lonely and abandoned, or the pain of failure and setbacks. And while those are real issues, maybe all we really need is an adjustment. To get our priorities back in line with God’s priorities. To shift our hopes onto His shoulders. To live with His strength and with His joy. Sometimes this means we need to get bent up a bit. We need to be pushed and stretched, but in the end, a life aligned with God is the healthiest and strongest life we can live.

The first thing we need when we are in the dark is light. We need someone to bring us some hope. God wants us to be a light to people who are lost in the dark. If you know the love of God and the hope of God, then you have the light of God within you and around you. You are light that God wants someone to see. You are the light that is going to help someone come home to God and be free. You are the light that God will use to make an eternal difference in someone’s life. So you may have a lot of names: mom or dad. Brother or sister. Son or daughter. Wife, or husband. Employee or employer. Before them all is this: Rescued Rescuer. You have been rescued by God to rescue other people.

Central is a place where things change, but it’s also a place where some things never change because God’s purpose doesn’t change. Our mission is to introduce people to Jesus and help them follow Him. We want to share the grace of God, because we believe He is the solution to the darkness people face. He is the light. He is the truth. He is who our hearts were made for and His forgiveness knows no bounds. That is the gospel—that doesn’t change!

The important thing to see about emotions, even the ones we consider undesirable, is that they all have a purpose. Anger is what helps us deal with threats. Sadness is how we process loss. Fear keeps us out of danger. Disgust keeps unhealthy things out of our lives. Shame lets us know when we are violating important values. Joy, love, and surprise are great feelings that make it wonderful to be a human. We all want more of that, and I believe the place we ultimately find those feelings fulfilled is in a relationship with Jesus. So they all have a purpose. These emotions are important. We can’t ignore them, but we also can’t surrender to them. We can’t let them run our lives because they will run it into the ground. So acknowledging and even trying to name the feelings you are having is a vital step in becoming emotionally mature. Master your emotions or they will master you.

No matter your circumstances, and how far off or impossible your deliverance may seem, God is not limited by your limitations. He is not imprisoned by your circumstances. He can find a way to work in whatever you’re facing. You just need to trust Him and lean into what He is saying and doing. It’s like those words from Jeremiah, “Is anything too hard for God?” Usually, only our hearts are too hard. Too stubborn. Too fearful. Have a soft heart towards Him, even in hard circumstances. Don’t let your circumstances define you. Let God’s love define you.

If you struggle with your past, I want to challenge you with this: Be more concerned with what God has done in the past than what you have done in the past. If you are going to look to the past, you might as well look past your own past and into the life that Jesus lived on earth. Here is God in the flesh, and what do you see Him doing? He heals the sick. He gives sight to the blind. He has compassion for people at the end of their rope. He hangs out with prostitutes and tax collectors and other notorious sinners. He becomes good friends with them. Enlists them in a new future. Listen, when Jesus was nailed to the cross by your sins and my sins, you know what he said? “Father, forgive them; they don’t know what they’re doing.” Jesus died to save you from your past, not to condemn you for your past. He died to forgive you and make your past history. He died to give you a new story. He died to give you a new hope and full life. Never forget that. Your past does not determine your potential. God’s grace determines your potential. Put your faith in Him.

When you don’t hold tightly to people who share your hope, you eventually lose some of your grip on that hope. Think about the times you fell away from your faith or found yourself far from God. It most likely wasn’t a conscious decision. You didn’t say, “I think I’m going to lose myself in an unhealthy relationship.’ Or “I think I’m going to ignore God’s role in my life.’ Or even, “I’m not sure I agree with what the Bible says about what’s most important.” Chances are the reason you drifted away from faith is that you lost touch with others who share your faith. You started spending most or all of your time with people who don’t share your same hope in Jesus. They may be important friends, in fact the Bible says that Jesus died for everyone, but if you are going to hold on to the Hope of Jesus you need to spend time with His people, both in church together and in a smaller group format where you can know others and be known by them. How will you choose to connect with other people this week?

Every day we need to wake up, look in the mirror and say, “I am the well-loved child of an all-powerful God who has my best interests at heart. No problem is too big for Him, no situation too hopeless for Him, and not even my mistakes (of which there are many) can stop His amazing grace from flooding my life. He is already giving me good things to enjoy, and I am going to find them and give thanks.” Friends, that’s not just a good attitude, that’s a Godly attitude. It’s an attitude that gets God right.

Psalm 46: 6-8 (NLT) says: “Now I am deeply discouraged, but I will remember you…. Each day the Lord pours his unfailing love upon me, and through each night I sing his songs, praying to God who gives me life.” One of things we love about the Psalms is that people not only keep it real, but they keep it raw. Here you have a person who is deeply disappointed, talking to his soul and to God about how bad he feels. And he’s kind of stuck in a rut, coming back to this bad attitude again and again. He’s trying to break free but he’s not done dealing with his feelings. He is far from where he wants to be—feeling exiled and cut off. He is dealing with these people crushing his spirit and tormenting him. That image of the raging sea and crashing waves is used to convey the troubles of life. This individual is facing a sea of challenges and feels about ready to drown. Can anyone relate? It all kicks off with this phrase, I am deeply discouraged. The root word for discouraged means to “melt away,” or to “stoop.” It’s this idea of feeling bent and weighed down. Like you don’t have what it takes to face the day. You can’t get out of bed. You’re a mess—a melted mess on the floor. That’s where he’s at—and get this—God wanted these words in the Bible. He wants us to know that even people who love Him deal with doubt. People of faith can have deep feelings of discouragement. They feel let down by God. They feel forgotten. It’s all right here in the Bible, God’s word. 

Here are few good verses for a bad day. When you feel like God does not care, tell yourself Psalm 34:18 (NLT): “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; He rescues those whose spirits are crushed.” When you feel like God is distant, tell yourself Zephaniah 3:17 (NLT): “For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.” When you feel like all your troubles are going to wreck your life and ruin your future, tell yourself Romans 8:28 (NLT): “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose for them.” When you feel like no one cares, tell yourself 1 Peter 5:7 (NLT): “Give all your worries and cares to God, for He cares about you.” When you feel like everyone is failing you and leaving you stuck with the bag tell yourself Deuteronomy 31:8 (NLT): “Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord will personally go ahead of you. He will be with you; He will neither fail you nor abandon you.”

When things are awful or when you feel let down by God, don’t talk to yourself about this—talk to God. Take those feelings to Him. Some people get the idea that Jesus followers need to be happy and victorious all the time. Like their faith and their relationship with God is always on the upward swing. But that is not how real faith works. It’s an up and down journey. There are days you feel on point with God and other days when you feel worse than zero. Days He seems close and days He seems miles away. You read about the lives of saints and Jesus followers through the ages and this comes up over and over again—even the people closest to God have seasons of discouragement. Periods of time where it feels like all their prayers bounce off some glass ceiling and never make it to God. Times when you feel God’s absence more than His presence. It’s okay to have negative thoughts and feelings as a Christian. Don’t beat yourself up over doubt and discouragement. God can handle it. You just need to take those feelings to Him and trust Him with them. The first step to getting where you want to go is to admit where you are. It doesn’t do you any good to deny the awful and pretend it doesn’t exist. You can’t move past feelings you will not process. Don’t let a bad situation start to define your identity. Admit the awful so you can move past the awful.

Keep putting your faith into practice. Keep looking to the Bible. Keep praying. Keep loving your family and friends. These simple acts don’t always feel super meaningful in the moment, but added up over time they add up to huge meaning in your life and other peoples’ lives. They add up to the peace of God being with you. Pay attention to what God is saying. Is He nudging you to try something new? Maybe He’s nudging you to lead a Group or just be in a Group. Maybe He’s nudging you to give back in some new way. Central is full of people who need to be around you. God has brought you through hardships. It wasn’t pretty, but you made it, and now you know exactly how to comfort another person going through the same thing. A lot of times people ask, why do bad things happen to good people? That’s a tough question I really don’t think we can answer, but I know one reason is so that good people can happen to bad things. So that good people can come through those tough times and be strong for others who are going through them. You will never know just how much a call or a message from you might mean to a person struggling with something you’ve been through. Two of the most powerful words in the world are “me too.” Who can you say that to? Where is God leading you to be a comfort to others?

Sometimes in our lives we keep adjusting to the burdens and weights of life. We carry our hurt and pain from our childhood—from things said to us or done to us. We don’t ever really deal with it we just add a little weight and adjust to it. We carry words and labels that were spoken to us. We carry breakups, friends who’ve burned us, or tough work experiences. We carry the burden of a marriage that didn’t work out, a family that didn’t stay together, or a career that blew out. We carry the weight of unforgiveness, bitterness, and anger toward those who have wronged us. Some carry the weight of addiction—something that has gotten a hold of us that we can’t seem to get out from under. It weighs us down and gets heavier and heavier. In general we carry the weight of sin. Sin means to miss the mark, and the Bible says all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The solution to our sin problem isn’t simply one more thing, but it is new life that God gives from the inside out.

God’s goodness begins our relationship through grace, but then His grace also begins to produce new thoughts and new actions in us. As we partner with God in a new life, a new kind of happiness begins to grow within us, and we follow Him into new practices. New friendships form. We take on new habits. We learn new things, find new strength, and rest in a new meaning for life in His love. We aren’t immediate experts at this. We’re beginners. That’s why it’s called practice. We practice this new life day after day. Practice is never perfect. But over time, that practice moves you in the right direction!

What I have found is that when I’m looking for the awesome things in my life, they’re usually the simple things. I’m glad I’m forgiven. I’m glad that God, by the grace of what He did through Jesus, provided a way for me to be in a relationship with Him. I’m glad I’m over 20 years sober. I’m glad I’m part of a church community filled with love and hope towards one another. I’m glad and thankful that my kids are at home and under my roof. You find the awesome. Now it doesn’t mean that everything in my life is awesome. I could unpack it for you. It doesn’t mean that everything in the lives of every family in our church is awesome. They’re not. People are really hurting. But you can always find the awesome. This week, let’s choose to find the awesome!

Hebrews 13:5 tells us, “Don’t love money; be satisfied with what you have. For God has said, ‘I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.’” Don’t love money, but instead be satisfied with what you have. Most of us would agree that having a sense of sufficiency and satisfaction in our lives and circumstances is a big part of having a good life. The great news today is the Bible is saying we don’t have to wait for this to happen to us. Right now, in your present un-perfect circumstances, you can grow in this attitude and appreciate the gifts God has given you. A good life isn’t about our circumstances, but it’s about our God.