Bobby Bosler: Welcome to the Thee Generation podcast. I’m Bobby Bosler, and I’m speaking to you today from Taylor’s, South Carolina. And you know what? I’m super pumped about this episode.

You know, if you’ve been following my episodes here for any length of time, you’ll know that we’ve been on a journey. We’ve been in the midst of many difficulties. In fact, the last 12 months for us have been some of the most difficult months of our entire lives. We have pretty regularly found ourselves dying.

Not physically speaking though, sometimes it felt like it, but dying to our plans, dying even to the provision that God has given to us, and just dying. And yet in the midst of the dying, we’ve experienced the life of Jesus in some pretty remarkable ways. We’ve seen God answer prayer, we’ve seen souls saved, we’ve seen God’s hand upon us, and we have seen His provision in the midst of it all. Well, I’m really delighted to be here today to share with you the answer and honestly young people God’s answer is always so incredibly good. As I think those of you that have been following us know back in August.

The truck that we thought was the answer went bad and a whole series of things and I wrestled very much with anxiety. I wrestled very much with just not knowing what to do with the natural disappointment of what had happened. And yet, even though I didn’t know what to do, even though I didn’t know many times what the next step was, God taught me lessons of how to find His leadership. God taught me how to lean on Him and not just even on people around me. God taught me that He was able to do far above what I could ever imagine. And you know, those are things that I know, I’ve known. Those are verses we all know He’s able to do exceeding abundantly above. But at the same time, it’s so funny, we find ourselves encountering a trial, a new trial, a new challenge, a new opportunity, right? And we just wonder if it’s possible for God to deliver. And that was me. And over the fall months, again, I believe I’ve shared some of this with you all along the way. We placed an order for a brand new 2024 F-350 truck. And God had been providing, we got to a point where as far as the money that had come in, we felt like we could justify using a large portion of it for a down payment.

On the truck and just last week now I believe that truck was delivered in Menomonee up in Wisconsin the Milwaukee area and I put the money down and drove out and I just have to say I am so grateful I’m so thankful to the Lord.

Who from the very beginning of this trial when we were going up that mountain in North Carolina and our truck blew up, left us stranded on the side of the mountain. I am so thankful that God had this deliverance in mind. We prayed years ago that God would provide a new truck and even the way I remember a service, particularly the Lord stirring in my heart, not just a new to us truck, a brand new truck, and at that point it looked completely…

And entirely impossible. There was no way that could happen from a human standpoint. There’s no way we could afford it. There was just no way. And so, to see God go from that moment of that transaction of faith in the aisle on my knees at Falls Baptist Church at the conclusion of a service where God had stirred my heart to see it actually in hand, in living person, is an unbelievable encouragement to me. And I really hope it’s an encouragement to you, young person. You know, I’ve heard stories even along the way of God’s provision for others, and it’s always like, oh yeah, that’s nice, but, but maybe I’m the exception to the rule. Maybe it’ll work out differently for me. And no doubt, young person, our journeys are all unique and they are different. But God is the same for all of us.

I want to share a verse, and this is a verse I’ve preached on a number of different times, but as I thought about what I knew I needed to share, I just couldn’t get my heart away from this verse. 2 Corinthians chapter 1, he’s talking about the principle that in our affliction God shows himself strong, and he says in verse 8, “For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, in so much that we despaired even of life.”

But we had the sentence of death in ourselves. And here he’s describing the living example of the theory that he just talked about. And again, I don’t have time to go through all of the context here, but he’s saying, “Listen, we were in Asia, that’s probably Ephesus, Asia Minor, right? And we were here and things went bad. They went really bad and it looked horrendous. I felt like I couldn’t handle the pressure, right? This was beyond my ability to bear.

We despaired in the midst of it and I can sure identify with those three phrases. There were numerous times over the last six months, particularly where I despaired. I didn’t know what to do and I didn’t even see how there was a solution possible. He says we had the sentence of death in ourselves. Again, I’ve podcasted about this. I preached at the TGYS about this, how many times God brings us to moments of death.

Right? Moments where we’re dying to ourselves. I actually don’t think this is a death to self here. I think he’s saying we literally thought we were going to physically die. But there was a lesson embedded in all of this. He says we had the sentence of death in ourselves. This is verse nine of 2 Corinthians one that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God, which raiseth the dead. You know, when we find ourselves in a moment where we feel like there is no going forward.

You’re going to die. This situation is dead. There’s no pathway. God delights in creating a path where there was no pathway before. But here’s what I want to get to here. He says we had the sentence of death in ourselves. God was teaching us to trust in Him. God is able to do the completely impossible. Verse 10, who delivered us from so great a death.

Now I want you to recognize here when he says so great a death as much as sure the great death that he delivered us from is death in hell forever, right? Jesus died and paid the price for our sins so that we don’t have to suffer in hell for all eternity. You know that. But I don’t.

Actually, in the context, think that’s what he’s talking about. I think he’s talking about the trial, the tribulation, the affliction that he was just describing here. He said, we had the sentence of death in ourselves. We thought we were going to die and God delivered us from that terrible situation. God stepped in and he did a miracle.

Now, the thing that I want you to see here is I think most of us have experienced God’s deliverance in some way, shape or form. Maybe for you it was deliverance from the consequences of your sin. And it was a miracle and it always is a miracle when God rescues a lost soul from the clutches of his own sin and the clutches of the consequences of those sins. But you know, young person, as much as that is a miracle and it’s the biggest miracle of them all, we face other.

We’ve experienced other miracles too. Maybe it’s small, maybe it’s an answer to prayer, some other impossible situation where we prayed and we asked God to do something and he did it. And maybe you can say, “Oh, maybe it was a coincidence, but I’ll tell you, if you prayed about it and it happened, it wasn’t a coincidence. But you know, in my life, I’ve experienced a lot of those clear, unexplainable answers to prayer. And you know, it’s so funny, I was just talking to somebody the other day.

And we were talking about the fact that you know, you can see an amazing deliverance and yet the next time you need an amazing deliverance, it’s so easy to quickly doubt God, right? Again, maybe you’ve seen a large answered prayer going out soul winning and God delivered you and yet the next time you’re going out soul winning and you’re wanting to pray for God to help and to lead you to a divine appointment or something like that, it’s so easy to doubt. And I’m telling you young people, as much as I had seen God do many things.

There was this part of me that just wanted to doubt. And here’s the thing, he says here, who delivered us? But he doesn’t stop there. He said, not only did he deliver us, he says, “and doth deliver.” In other words, God’s deliverance isn’t just something in the past, it’s something that he does. It’s something that he does continuously. He does it right.

Now, listen young people, you may have a situation in your life you’re staring at and you think there’s no way. Can I tell you? God doth deliver. He does deliver. He still delivers. You might say, “But it’s different than the circumstance I faced five years ago, two years ago, whatever it was. Listen, your circumstances may be different, but your God is the same. He doth deliver. He still delivers. You know, if I’ve learned anything through this trial is that.

God is able to provide us everything we need to do what He’s called us to do. And He’s able to do it in a way that just so exceeds, so exceeds what I feel I’m worthy of, what I feel is possible. You know, I, uh, I had seen the Lord provide for things in my past, for my school bill, um, even before that, even God supplying for.

Going to Christian school, my senior year of high school, I saw God’s supply. And then I went to college with $2,000 in the bank and nothing more than the will of God. Knowing God wanted me to go to Bible college and God supplied, he supplied. And then when I found myself near the end of my Bible college education and where I went at Baptist College of Ministry, you weren’t allowed to walk. They just started this rule like the year before.

I graduated her a couple years before then. You aren’t allowed to walk and get your diploma until you pay your entire education. No student loans hanging over your head for decades on end, you know. And here I was my senior, my final year of college and didn’t have the money to complete it. And God did a miracle. And I had a relative pass away who unbeknownst to me had left me some money and God used that to help supply for that need.

You know, again, I could go beyond that to our first truck and how the Lord clearly not only provided, but even brought down the price in direct answer to prayer. I could talk about our trailer. Somebody had given us a personal, our first trailer, that is somebody had given

us a personal loan for that trailer. And then two payments in said, “Don’t bother paying the rest of it.” I could go to God’s provision in meetings, in team members, provision even in the trailer that we had. And again I’m not going to go into all the details here today but as many things as I have seen and as many things as you have seen when you get to the next trial, the next difficulty, it’s so easy to just think well maybe not this time. But Paul is saying here we had a really difficult moment. We thought we were going to die. And we once again, God was teaching us this lesson, not to trust in ourselves, but to trust in him. He’s able to do the impossible and he delivered and he’s still delivering. He still delivers young people and he goes on and he has one more phrase in here. He says, “in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us.”

You know, um.

It’s funny, you’d think I wouldn’t have a care in the world on the other side of getting this truck in hand. And I’m going to let my hair down a little bit here and just share with you in a candid way. I flew from Greenville, South Carolina up to Milwaukee. And the plan was to be there for a few days, get the truck, hook up the trailer.

Drive from Wisconsin down to South Carolina, where my family’s staying and where we were gonna do our training before we head to Texas for our first meeting. And we got everything packed up earlier than anticipated and so we decided instead of leaving like five or 6 a.m. in the morning, that Friday, we would leave at midnight that Friday, so earlier.

So I had some time I and my teammates we went out for lunch and I had a soda at lunch Which I don’t normally drink soda, but I had a soda. I had a mellow yellow And the plan was you say why are you telling me what kind of soda you got? Oh, trust me. It’s important We got we decided. Okay, we’re gonna grab lunch and then I’m gonna go back to the room I’m staying in and I’m gonna lay down and I’m gonna try to sleep from like say 3 p.m. Until 11 11 30

and then we’ll get to the church, hook up, and go, go, go. Well, I had the Mellow Yellow and it has a good amount of caffeine in it. And I got back to the room, I was staying in it, and I lay down in bed and I couldn’t sleep. I could not sleep for the life of me, young person. Oh, and it wasn’t just the caffeine. The caffeine kept me awake. But you gotta understand, I hadn’t driven my trailer anywhere in months.

Young person, why do I share these things? Why do I say these things? Because I like to talk about myself. No, no, because I’m on a journey. I may be a few steps, maybe a decade ahead of some of you all, but I want to be transparent and candid with you about what you may be in for as you live a life of surrender to God and dependence on his power, believing that he’s able to do which you could never do in your own strength. We have an image in our mind of what that might look like.

our image is often very different than God’s image. God wants you to lack nothing, right? I think the girls are talking about that here this year. And in the pursuit of Jesus, in the aim to see His will done on earth as it is in heaven, as you pursue souls and preach the gospel, just know that God will never change.

He’ll always be your deliverer. And though you may not understand how or when, God will, He will, He does deliver. And you can trust Him that He will yet.

Continue young people to surrender your life to Christ. Continue to depend on Him to do the impossible. Let’s reach the world with the gospel. Thanks so much for listening.