Don't Pack Light

So, fun fact about the Furtick family, we are not light packers. When we travel, we just like to have our stuff with us. So everybody kind of has their thing. Stephen cannot leave home without at least one Bluetooth speaker. Sometimes more than one. Abby likes to travel with her full size bottles of cosmetics. And she's 13, so you can imagine how much that is. I this thing with my feet, so I have to take slippers everywhere I go. And the boys, they don't necessarily. They're not necessarily like heavy packers, but they don't fold their clothes, and so they need bigger bags. And when we go on vacation, we like to go somewhere that we can drive so that we can take everything we want. We take our own pillows, we take our own bikes. We take our own beach chairs. We take our own snacks. And when I start to. When I pack, I start to stress because I just think of all of the things that I might need. Like, what if I want to wear my hair straight? Well, I got to pack my flat iron. What if there's a pool? Okay, so we're going to need bathing suits, flip flops, sunscreen. What if we run out of sunscreen? So let me pack some extra sunscreen. What if it gets cold? We need jackets. What if it rains? We need rain jackets. What if we can't go outside? Puzzles. What if I decide on vacation that I want to work out? Okay, I need some running shoes. What if someone gets sick? We need a first aid kit. And let me just tell you, my first aid kit is not just band aids and cold medicine. I have some serious stuff in there. Like things that start with a Z, like Zofran and a Z pack. Just in case. I brought one of my favorite suitcases to show you just so you can, like, get a visual. Okay, here it comes. Here it comes. This guy has traveled many, many miles with us. It's large and in charge and obnoxious. And you can fit so much stuff in this bag. And I realized that in this confession of mine that all the light packers in the room, like all the carry on, only families are judging us. But here's the thing. If you need something, you're gonna ask me. I'm the one that brought the extra sunscreen. So, look, today I have good news for you. You don't have to pack light. And I want to look at this passage, and I want to show you that even though you don't necessarily get to plan your destinations in life, you do get to decide what you pack. And when you're faced with A situation that you did not originally plan for. If you are a child of God, you never have to go into it unprepared, no matter how unprepared you may feel. If you dig a little deeper, you will find that God has been preparing you for this season all along. You see, God is not TripAdvisor for your life. You don't get to go on Heaven's website and explore all the exotic destinations and choose where you want to go based on reviews about the accommodations and the restaurants for when you get there. God is the travel agent, and God is the pilot, and God is the tour guide. And when you sign up for this journey called life with Jesus, you get to pack your bag and follow where he leads. And the backstory of the passage of scripture that I read for you today is that the Israelites have been captive in Egypt for 430 years. And God sent them a deliverer named Moses. And Moses goes to Pharaoh and he says, let my people go. And there's a series of plagues on Egypt. I forget how many there were. There were a lot. There were flies and frogs, and the water turned into blood. And the final one that broke the Egyptians was the plague on the firstborn. And Moses goes to Pharaoh and he warns him, and he says, if you don't let my people go, God is going to send an angel of death to kill all of the firstborns. And of course, Pharaoh is stubborn and he doesn't listen. And so God does what he says, and he sends the angel of death. But Israel, God's children, they're all protected by the blood of the lamb that they put over their doors. And the angel passes over them. But the nation of Egypt is wrecked. Every firstborn is killed, even every firstborn animal. And the Bible said that not one household went unaffected. And in the night, Pharaoh calls Moses and he says, go. And so the Israelites find themselves packing in a hurry for the desert. What do you need in the desert? Everything. And they're in a hurry. So they're like some of them are gathering their animals. And the Bible tells us that they're. They didn't even have enough time to let the dough rise for their bread. So they took the dough with no yeast and they wrapped up their kneading boards into their clothes and they put them on their backs. And then Moses told the people, go and ask the Egyptians for silver and gold and clothing. Anything you need. And the Egyptians are so distraught over the deaths that they've experienced that they give them anything that they ask for. The Bible says that the Israelites plundered the Egyptians. That means they took everything of value that they wanted and that they could carry. And in large droves, they head out into the wilderness. There are not going to be houses to rent when they get there. There are not going to be grocery stores to stock their pantries with. They have to take everything they can with them. Now, obviously when they get there, there will be things that they need. In the desert when there's no water, God's going to supply water from the rock. When they run out of food, he's going to send manna from the sky. But there was still preparation required on the part of the children of God. How do you prepare for a wilderness season? You take everything you can. You don't pack light. God has given you everything you need for the season you're in, but sometimes he gives it to you in the season before the season. Everything you're going through right now is building something, something in you for your future. So maybe you lost your job, but you're learning how to manage your money when there's nothing coming in. Maybe you've had your ideas rejected, but you're learning humility and resilience. Maybe you have young children and you're in a season of little sleep, but lots of prayer. There's something to be gathered from every situation that you go through. You may learn consistency. You may learn discipline. You may learn love, grace, compassion. If we do it right, all of these things are things that we gain when we choose to grow in what we're going through. Hey, thanks for watching. I hope that encouraged you today. Make sure that you, like, subscribe and hit that bell to turn on notifications so that you don't miss out on other videos just like this one. And I'll see you back here next time.