Phil Beach Jr. emphasizes the necessity of 'now faith'—a living, present faith that relies not on our own strength but on God's power, especially in times of hopelessness. He explains that true faith is birthed in impossible situations, where we learn to trust in God rather than ourselves. The sermon encourages believers to seek a deeper relationship with Jesus, recognizing that faith is not merely an emotional experience but a profound spiritual reality. Beach urges the congregation to confront pride and selfishness, advocating for humility and a willingness to acknowledge our faults in order to be transformed into Christ's likeness. Ultimately, he calls for a faith that can declare hope even in the face of despair, trusting in God's ability to perform the impossible.

Thank you Lord, thank you for your presence Father, we bless you because of your kindness and your love and your Holy Spirit Lord, we thank you Lord for your abundance of grace and mercy that you so freely and abundantly bestow upon us today Lord, how our hearts are so thankful Lord, we pray Lord that you would teach us this morning Lord, teach us Lord how to look to you, teach us Lord how to look to you, how to receive from you Lord, thank you Lord for all of the things that are going on in and around our lives, for we know Lord that you're teaching us how not to trust in ourself but in the living God who raises the dead, who works the impossible for those who trust him, thank you Lord that your deliverance is not because of our strength or our wisdom or our numbers or our plans or our competence but rather our deliverance Lord is because of you and your power and your might, thank you Lord that you diminish our strength, you diminish the things that we trust in, you diminish our resources, you delight in bringing us to hopelessness so that the God of all hope might be revealed to us, oh Lord your ways are not our ways, your thoughts are not our thoughts and we rejoice Lord with you this morning, we rejoice with you this morning, beloved I'd like to invite you to turn to Hebrews chapter 11 and we just want to read this word before we turn our attention to a few more of the divine virtues that Jesus possesses and he wants to work in our lives and I trust this morning the Holy Spirit will give us a grace to listen to hear as the word of exhortation came forth as we see Jesus were transformed and we must pray oh God help us to see Jesus that's our purpose of gathering together here that we might see Jesus because in seeing him we are transformed by the power of his Holy Spirit and so the greatest need of our heart now is seeing Jesus but in particular we need to look at something this morning that the Lord has brought to our attention Hebrews chapter 11 I would suspect that it would be true for me to say that almost everyone in this auditorium and possibly everyone has one time or more in your life prayed and you've said oh God I want faith I want more faith I want great faith whenever the children are ready just go ahead nice and quietly please but we've prayed and we've said Lord I want faith how many would agree that at least one time in your life you prayed that I want faith I want faith Lord I want to be able to believe you but I think we have failed to understand the nature of faith faith needs a certain kind of environment in order to work and when God prepares us to be recipients of faith we begin to despair because we don't recognize the environment necessary for true divine faith to be birthed in our heart first let's for a few moments look at this faith Hebrews chapter 11 now faith now that can be taken a few different ways that word now could possibly be connecting the thought of the previous chapter to the present exhortation I like to take it differently I like to take it just the way it says now faith that is present faith that is living faith now faith faith that is now not yesterday's faith not last year's faith but now faith this coincides with what Jesus said man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that is proceeding out of the mouth of God we need a now faith don't we yesterday's faith was wonderful yesterday's manna was wonderful but today we need a now faith now faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen let's go down to verse number six but without faith it is impossible to please God without faith it is impossible to please God but likewise faith is not possible unless there is something impossible we do not need the faith that comes from Jesus Christ if the thing that we are hoping for or the thing that we are trusting in is possible with our resources and our wisdom and our credentials and our know-how and our plans we don't need this faith and so true faith the faith that is birthed by the Holy Spirit that grows in our life and ought to be the quality that we live by is formed in our hearts as God entrusts us with impossibilities now an impossibility means your faith diminishes and dies your confidence withers and it's in that state where our hearts recognize their inadequacy recognize their poverty where the faith of God the faith of Jesus Christ is birthed in us and now the problem that we face beloved is that when we find ourselves in such situations we despair as though something is wrong when in fact when in fact we are standing at the greatest moment of God's glory the greatest moment of God's glory is not when man is walking erect with self-confidence seeing a possible way for this thing to happen that's not God's greatest moment that's man's greatest moment that's man's greatest glory the words of God to Gideon reverberate this morning in the Holy Spirit I cannot give into your hands the Philistines Midianites unless if I do you would say look at what our hand has wrought look at what our might has secured look what we did by our numbers and by our military skill so God diminishes the numbers down to simply 300 and makes listen he makes the odds impossible so that in the midst of impossibility it becomes possible for a faith from God to arise within the heart so that that heart can believe God to do what is impossible it takes impossible circumstances in order for the possibility of divine faith to be birthed within the house of God within your heart it takes impossible situations and this is why our father in his sovereign wisdom allows us to be tried to the extreme so that we would learn not to trust in ourselves the greatest display that heaven could ever behold and the greatest damage that could ever be done to the kingdom of darkness is to see God's people having been brought by the hand of God to the end of themselves to the end of confidence in anything other than God the greatest joy in heaven the greatest fear in hell is to see a people who in the midst of utter impossibility around about him begin to sing I will sing unto the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously the horse and the rider thrown into the sea the greatest fear within the heart of the kingdom of darkness is to see the faith of the Son of God arise within the church of faith that laughs at impossibilities of faith that laughs and says I believe God is it possible this morning that your heart has been prepared for such a faith is this to arise this morning is it possible would you like such a faith ask and you shall receive seek and you shall find let's bow our heart for a second father thank you for faith that comes when all hope is gone father thank you for letting our human emotions wither and dry up listen some of you folks think you're backslidden simply because you don't have the fleshly excitement you used to have it's not true you don't measure how well your heart is doing with God based on human emotion human emotion comes and goes like the dew in the morning human emotion is as fickle as water God is weaning you from having faith in your emotions this is this this thing of faith is much deeper than emotion this is this is faith this is a reality from God in the midst of a heart that it has fears within and fears without this is a faith that lives within the soul within the spirit of a man or a woman when he's being led into the lion's den they're possibly to be eaten alive this is the faith that carried the early martyrs into the Roman arena where they were cut in half and put and had corn put inside their cut open bodies so that the lions could come and eat them God help them if they had faith in their feelings at that time I don't think they would have marched triumphantly into that scenario I think they wrestled with fears I think their humanity was in convulsions but this thing goes deeper than our humanity this goes deeper than our feelings this goes into the depths of our spirit and it's from and by God it's the very faith of the Son of God Jesus himself father thank you for this faith I pray Lord that you will nurture this into our hearts right now birth it Lord you are able Lord help us to come into a new way of believing out of the old way of believing based on what we think is possible oh we're so quick to believe Lord we're so quick to make a good confession of faith when we still see there's a trace of hope when we still see that there's a plan a and we have plan B and we still are strong but all when everything withers and everything dies and all hope is gone and Lazarus is dead and he's stinking then Oh God we're found out the hour of our glory is over the hour of our boasting is over the hour of our confidence is over and there we lie defeated the Lord in our defeat we would see Jesus and come to know a faith that is born of his Holy Spirit that doesn't faint do this Lord I pray this morning by the power of your Holy Spirit Romans chapter 4 God's word to Abraham make him a father of many nations before him whom he believed even God who quickens the dead and calls those things which be not as though they were listen now who against hope faith that's what the word believe there is faith against hope faith that's what the Holy Spirit is saying against hope faith let me tell you what the human condition apart from grace does against hope the human condition your human heart my human heart in the face of hopelessness fails against hope unbelief no faith against up see we can have hope as long as we see hope but when all hope is gone we faint we fail but Abraham being the father of faith God demonstrates in him the pattern and the scripture says against hope faith against hope faith let God speak that into your heart this morning against hope against the hopelessness of the situation that you are wrestling with against that hope in light of that faith that faith arise from Jesus this is not an earthly plant this is a heavenly plan this is not something that comes out of this is something born by God's Spirit and this faith this faith declares hope when what I see with my eyes and what I hear with my ears tells me hopelessness that he might become the father of many nations according to that which was spoken so shall thy seed be and being not weak in faith in the faith that comes from Christ have faith of God the scripture says in Mark 11 have the faith of God he considered not his own body now dead you see faith that comes from God frees us from considering the circumstance faith that comes from God frees us from considering the deadness of Sarah's womb frees us from considering the age of our own body it frees us from being limited it frees us it lifts us it enables us to come into the bounty the plenty the omnipotence of God who is able to perform his word he didn't consider his own body when he was about a hundred years old neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb he staggered not that word stagger means to be divided you'll never find this condition present in your heart apart from God's grace you'll never find it there is a provision from God that the church that you and I individually must come into it frees us from the staggering that is present in our flesh the vacillation vacillating how many experience the vacillation in your humanity in your feelings in your mind brothers and sisters there's something that God can give us that can hold us steady in the midst of vacillation becoming spiritual does not mean that we cease from vacillating cease from being human cease from fears within or without but becoming spiritual simply means that in the midst of this human vacillation there is an anchor that's holding us in God and in his word that's what we want today this is what calms the soul this is what holds the soul in the midst of life's bangs and bruises he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief but was strong in faith giving glory to God and being fully persuaded fully filled that's what the word persuaded means it means to be filled he was filled with a confidence that God was able to perform what he has promised that's the faith available to us today if we will but ask first Corinthians chapter 13 that's the only faith brothers and sisters that will stand the test and come forth approved by God and I think it's quite remarkable that this little exhortation precedes what we're about to talk about because we need faith when we come to this subject of Jesus and our being transformed into his likeness we need a faith from God that will enable us to believe that will enable us to be persuaded that God is able to do the impossible father help us as we look at the next few divine qualities of the Son of God help us father we ask for the enabling of the Holy Spirit to come and plant this word deep in our spirits may it wake us up at night may it make us uncomfortable during the day may it trouble us Lord may it get into our the very fabric of our being Lord we know that your word says that in thy light do we see this is thy light O God this is the standard this is the standard Jesus Christ is the standard in in his light we see I pray O God that you were to produce a diligence in us and an earnestness O God that we would be empowered to follow hard after these things and that you would leave no stone unturned and that you would take the sword of your spirit dipped in the healing balm of Gilead and cut deeply into the very center of our being making room for the increase of the blessed Son of God in our lives Lord we declare war on all that is in us that is not in conformity to the Lord Jesus Christ we declare war against it by the grace of God we take our stand as being new creatures in Christ Jesus and our own life and all of the sin and corruption as having been crucified with Christ having been buried with Christ we align ourself Lord with what your word says and we ask for a faith that will enable us against the hopelessness of our human condition against the hopelessness of our corruption a faith that will say I believe God will transform me and enable the beauties of Jesus to be seen through this earthen clay vessel O God birth this faith in our heart I pray as we turn to 2nd or 1st Corinthians chapter 13 there's just one word I want to read out of 2nd Timothy verse 5 chapter 1 it says and for a second Peter I mean chapter 1 it says and beside this giving all diligence diligence there is a need in this current hour for God to birth diligence into our spirit diligence divine diligence that we might be hard after the things of Christ a diligence that will capture our heart capture our hearts affections a diligence that will free our heart from setting its affections on things on earth earthly treasures earthly kingdoms a diligence that will enable us to pursue after the treasures that are in Christ and as we look into 1st Corinthians chapter 13 brothers and sisters we are in desperate need of diligence we mustn't let these things slip from us as we've mentioned before every listen every single problem that we are experiencing has to do can be traced to a deficiency in our life a deficiency in these qualities that Jesus Christ possesses and so it would be reasonable to conclude that a divine diligence after these things would be the thing that cures us from the corruption of our own heart and the hurts and broken relationships in our life thus far we have learned in 1st Corinthians 13 that the Holy Spirit would want to produce in us a patience a long-suffering in particular that has to do with the ability to put up with the sins and faults of others secondly we saw that love is kind a kindness that is not based on condition you're kind to me I'm kind to you that's condition this is a kindness that was seen in Jesus Christ who became a man and demonstrated love and mercy to those who were not deserving of it not only did he demonstrate love and mercy to those who were not deserving but he went as far as dying for us that's kindness having the ability by God to be an encourager and to help and to comfort not simply those who are nice to us but those who are not nice to us and remember all of these qualities must start in the home a gentle warning from the Holy Spirit to all of us if your spiritual life does not shine brightest at home there is a danger light shining do not make it your chief goal simply to pray that these qualities will be in your life toward your brothers and sisters in Christ but pray that they might begin in your home with those that are closest to you and that know you closest with your children with mom and dad I pray the grace of God will come upon us and enable us to come to a deeper realm of brokenness in our life so that we don't resist the dealing of God in our home listen resolve in your heart right now by the grace of God in the Word of God say Lord my pride will destroy me my pride will destroy me my unwillingness to acknowledge my fault my sin is the leaven if not purged will ruin the whole lump we must pray Oh God work in me deep humility how many go to bed angry how many go to bed knowing you should have said I'm sorry and you don't you know what keeps us from saying I'm sorry pride rotten terrible sinful pride the thing that brought Lucifer down we ought to fear pride the beginning of wisdom is what to fear God and run from evil God needs to put a run in our life toward evil thou has loved righteousness and hated iniquity therefore God even thy God has anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows that's the words that were spoken to our blessed Lord there is a run in his heart toward evil he hates it and he loves righteousness young people the greatest snare in your life is pride pride pray Oh God help me see how ugly my pride is pride will cause God to resist us pride will cause God's face to turn from us pride is the ultimate expression of the sinful nature I don't need anyone I will not acknowledge my need for God I will not acknowledge my need to be forgiven I will not acknowledge my as having been wrong pride is always right in its own eyes and that's when we come to this picture of love in first Corinthians 13 the first thing that's gonna begin to ache inside of us it is the heart of pride we will have to let go of the heart of pride every single husband here needs to look at his wife and say sweetheart I am a proud man help me pray for me when you see this the way it really is you won't play with it it won't be a casual thing you won't put it on your schedule and say well if I have time tomorrow at 9 o'clock I'll talk about my pride for 10 minutes no when you see this when Jesus shows it to you you will grow within Oh God deliver me from my pride any moment the moment you see it will be the time that you deal with it don't put off dealing with this until an opportune time now is the day now is the acceptable time now is the day of salvation may Jesus help us to see may Jesus give us a revelation of his eternal perfections when you see Christ when you see Jesus truly see him you'll have the same heart response as Peter did Oh Lord depart from me for I am a sinful man have you seen that about yourself I know we want to get on talk about these things but I just feel that God I just feel the Holy Spirit wants us to be aware this morning that this is these things are veiled to us these things are hidden to us they turn into putrid theology God doesn't want to give us a theology lesson this morning I don't want to be a theology teacher and I feel this is just the heart of God the heart of God crying out to every one of us if you come and talk about these things if you approach these things you will have to be prepared to cry out for deliverance from pride pride pride pride pride is the exact opposite of everything we read in first Corinthians 13 the exact opposite you want to walk with Jesus you want you want his qualities to rub off on you you got to get low you got to say Lord bring me down into the lowness of what you are bring me down into the humility of what you are show me Lord how you serve your children how you serve them show me Lord how only your father's glory is your concern not your glory half the time Jesus doesn't get the credit for the work he's doing in our lives but does he stop doing the work he doesn't he keeps on why because he's selfless he's not he's not sinful you want to walk with Jesus brothers and sisters I'm not talking about religion I'm not talking about learning sermons I'm not talking about coming here and listening and getting some good ideas and then going around talking about him you want to walk with Jesus you want to commune with him watch out be prepared be prepared you'll never ever meet a man like him you'll never meet a man like him he'll not look on an unclean thing he's always grieved every time we speak a harsh word always not sometimes always and if we're close enough to him we'll stop dead in our tracks and begin to weep and say oh Jesus I'm sorry I grieved you didn't it he'll show you the way and it'll be himself so this is much more than just a theology lesson God knows God knows that it ought never to become just simply that this is fellowship with the Son of God this is sharing his heart and sharing his life this is devastation this is being devastated before a holy God and learning the way of Christ you see there's a resistance in us a resistance though there's only one cure for that resistance Oh Jesus have mercy on me why do we defend ourself why do we insist on being wrong and harsh and right and cruel why pride it's there the answer grace Jesus grace give me grace Lord everybody everybody together say this I'm sorry is that hard to say now get even more specific get even more specific say I'm sorry that I am so arrogant so often is that hard you see you see our condition see how terrible pride is why is it hard because we have to we have to see more of Jesus I'm sorry pin it right down I'm sorry for being so arrogant I'm sorry for saying that to you I'm sorry for being so short and unkind I'm sorry spell it out say it specifically that's good for the soul that's good for the soul don't ever get brothers and sisters don't ever get into the practice of putting under the carpet things don't don't I'm sorry I'm sorry forgive me I don't want to breach in the spirit I don't I don't want our hearts to depart from one another and then you know what we need to learn to do every day father against thee and thee alone have I sinned in so much as you have done unto the least of my brethren you have what done it unto me you see even though we wound one another and we must confess our false one to another and pray that we might be healed ultimately we're hurting and wounding the heart of our God are you sensitive to that have you been awakened to this reality have you come to realize that God is real and he feels and every time every time we grieve him he feels it are you sensitive to that I strongly recommend you ask God to make it a practice in your life not only to confess your faults to one another but also to learn to go to father and say father I know this grieves your heart I'm sorry thank you for thank you for the forgiveness that's in your son change my heart Oh God a few months ago the Lord put it on my heart to write a paper most of you have gotten it called wisdom for families and at the end of that I gave a little exhortation for families to get together and to talk about these things I gave an exhortation for husbands to look at their wives and say hon point out the blind spots in my life that I can't see or that I'm unwilling to see wonder how many have done it God wants us to be serious about these things we live in a culture where they don't take these things serious kindness we learned that pride it doesn't envy we learned that pride does not vaunt itself it's not a braggart pride doesn't brag or or love doesn't brag love doesn't speak of itself that love doesn't bring attention to itself love love doesn't need to be praised by men know how deeply that is in our heart how mad we get when we're not recognized huh how mad we get you know a lot of anger in our hearts is simply because we don't think we're getting the honor we deserve in our home some men have an unrealistic idea of what their wife is supposed to be and makes too many demands we get mad we get mad when we're not the king listen Jesus don't want you to be the king of your home he wants you to be the servant he wants you to take your crown off and wrap yourself in the cloths that he wrapped himself in when he went down and washed the feet but you're not going to manufacture that that's not a plant that grows out of earth that comes from Jesus who emptied himself as king of heaven and washed our dirty feet not only washed it but bore the wrath of his father not because of anything he did but because I cursed him because I blasphemed him ever tell you about the vision I had years and years ago as I was praying it was a foggy thing wasn't with these eyes it was the eyes of my heart I saw Calvary and I saw a man arise with a sword in his hand and he walked up to the Savior and plunged it in his side and as this man turned I beheld and lo it was me it was me and God said to me son always remember that's the best thing you can do for me apart from my grace working in you plunge a sword into my side oh I I would never do that brother Phil it's what Peter said huh you see God so wants to display these qualities listen closely he wants to display these qualities before us he wants them to be honey honey he wants them to be honey to our taste he wants to draw he wants to entice us but there's a difficulty you know what that difficulty is it's what we can't get off of its pride hard to be uttered hard to be uttered loves not puffed up is a word that means that through your your breath you inflate something you blow something up figuratively it represents inflating ourselves with our own words Proverbs let another man's lips praise you and not that of your own don't ever forget that you're nothing without him don't ever forget it the fatal flaw in Nebuchadnezzar was what God God gave him a big kingdom and he said one day look what I have done and look at the glory of Nebuchadnezzar don't ever forget the small beginnings where you've come from brothers and sisters the dirt the mud that God pulled you out of don't ever forget if God ever ever gives you a little bit of success in what you're doing don't ever forget that it has nothing to do with the one that you see in the mirror every morning nothing to do with it don't ever forget you know the word nerd or geek what does that represent someone that's square right we've got people pointing at one of you know what a nerd is like you're a nerd man you're not cool you're you you're you're you're a misfit well don't forget we're all nerds and geeks if you ever think you're the cool one and someone else is a nerd you're setting yourself up for a fall you're setting yourself up for a fall you're not cool you're a geek everybody should say I'm a geek I'm a nerd oh that's good for the soul don't ever forget don't ever puff yourself up because as quick as you puff yourself up God will drop a needle from heaven and his aim is perfect and it'll pop that thing and the explosion will scare you and everyone around you half to death you ever hear something pop that's just what'll happen and all those empty words will just be dispersed and then God will say in his love he that glorieth my son my daughter let him glory in this that he knows me and that I am God and there is none other there is none other love doesn't behave itself unwisely doesn't bring dishonor to itself doesn't act shamefully love seeketh not her own love is not selfish love is not listen listen carefully we're gonna close on this because we've run out of time but that's all right that's all right we've got as much time as we need until Jesus comes listen love does not say this what can I get out of this thing love is not driven by selfish ambition rather love says how can I help and the thing about the nature of love is this love true love is satisfied not when it seeks to get for itself but when it gives of itself that's the paradox of divine love you say well I mean everything in life has to do with me getting something for myself brother you will get all you need for yourself when you give your selfishness to God and let God produce selflessness in your life the greatest joy that a soul can know is the bliss and happiness and peace and satisfaction that it experiences when it exchanges selfishness for selflessness do you want a full life do you want a rich life do you want a satisfied life do you want a life where you could say oh God I'm so blessed I don't know what to do say oh God free me from selfishness and give me a love that doesn't seek its own love that pours itself out into the lives of other people a love that Jesus has in his heart father we thank you for your presence we thank you Lord for your word we sense Lord great eagerness within your heart to put on display before us the beauties of your lovely Son our Savior Jesus Christ but we also sense a difficulty because we cannot see when our eyes are blinded by pride we cannot see when our eyes are blinded by selfish ambition and so we pray by thy grace and mercy and thy Holy Spirit that you would free us from our pride so that the eyes of our heart can see clearly the beauties of Jesus Christ and by faith look to you to be transformed and changed that the image of the heavenly might be seen through these earthen vessels of clay I pray every single person in here Lord myself included would be given a grace today that will free us and overrule the law of sin that causes us to resist your truth and your word help us to say we're sorry help us to acknowledge our sin help us to talk openly and freely with the ones closest to us about the faults in our life about the sin about the things in our life that are not like Jesus as seen in 1st Corinthians 13 give us the courage to be vulnerable and transparent help us to stop defending ourselves and to acknowledge our guilt that apart from you we are most corrupt free us from pride Lord give us this quality and once it's raw in our life open up to us the treasures of heaven and let us see Jesus more and more and more do this Lord for your honor and glory we pray in Jesus name amen and amen