Unexpected Exit | Plot Twist - Week 4 | June 7, 2026

Case File 4: Detective's Log
The city was hungry, and the mob was looking for a payoff. In Week 4 of our Plot Twist series, Pastor Geoff Eckart cracks open John Chapter 6 to examine the ultimate sting operation: the feeding of the 5,000. On paper, the setup was flawless. Jesus delivers a massive, miraculous payout on a sunny hillside, and the marks immediately try to corner Him. They wanted a patsy they could force onto a throne—a convenient king to do the heavy lifting against the Roman syndicate. But just as they moved to pin a crown on Him, the Target pulled an Unexpected Exit and split the scene, vanishing into the mountains alone. This file exposes the lethal difference between a genuine, God-given opportunity and a cheap spiritual shortcut. If you've been grifting for a quick fix or wondering why the Big Boss is taking the long route through the dark streets of your life, this investigation reveals the hidden protection hidden inside His direction. Learn how to stop trying to remodel the King into your own image, drop the stress of running your own numbers, and uncover the gritty patience required to wait out the clock on Psalm 37.

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Daybreak | June 7, 2026
Plot Twist | Week 4
Unexpected Exit | Geoff Eckart

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Scripture Referenced:
Galatians 3.28
Acts 2.17-18
Judges 4
Romans 16.1
John 6.1-15 
Psalm 37.1-7

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#DaybreakChurch #GeoffEckart #PlotTwist #Jesus #UnexpectedExit

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Good morning. Good to see everyone on this beautiful sunny Michigan day. I got news for you. School is out. I don't hear adults. I don't hear you clapping so much. Students in the room, school is out. Are you ready for the summer? Wow, okay. I don't know how to interpret that. Well, here we go. So we're in this series plot twist, and in a good plot twist, there's always like a cause and effect. So, you know, the cause this week was that school is out. The effect is some of you parents are already ready for school to start back next week. If you're ready, parents, you're already kind of wondering how this is gonna go. There's another uh little plot twist. How many of you all have been to a place here in beautiful Michigan called Sleeping Bear Dunes? Have you ever been to Sleeping Bear Dunes before? How many of you have ever descended the hill? You know what I'm talking about? Okay. Now, how many of you have ascended the hill? Okay. You know, the cause is wow, amazing view. I'm gonna go right down to the bottom, no problem. The effect is maybe sometimes some people their wallets like $3,000 lighter because they couldn't get back up. You know what I'm talking about? If you're from Michigan, you got to get the old rescue. I remember, I remember that, like going down that for the first time is wasn't long after we moved to Michigan, and it's breathtaking. But the effect of coming back up is intense if you've ever done that. Now, if you're a lions fan in the house here, the cause is yeah, you're still around in the summer, huh? So the the cause is you're a lions fan and this is the year it's all gonna happen. Yeah. And the effect is you're a lions fan and you believe that this is the year it's all gonna happen. We will see. But you know, there's there's there's different things that uh happen, and then there's a reaction, and what we've been talking about, and I've really enjoyed this series because Rachel kicked us off, one of our pastors, and then Ethan, one of our pastors, and the last couple weeks, we've just been talking about what is this idea of Jesus that's different maybe than what we're used to seeing or thinking about, or or maybe just the surface view of Jesus and what's deeper that we find in scripture that gives us an understanding so much so that it it could cause us to understand God differently and therefore ourselves and our relationship with Him. That's really what we're talking about. Now, I love what John Eldridge says about Jesus. He is uh an author uh known for a lot of his ministry with men, but he says this about Jesus. He is the playfulness of creation, scandal, and utter goodness, the generosity of the ocean, the ferocity of a thunderstorm. He is cunning as a snake and gentle as a whisper, the gladness of sunshine and the humility of a thirty-mile walk by foot on a dirt road. You see, there's almost this paradox in this quote and what we see in Scripture between what we think maybe Jesus is, but who he reveals himself to be in these very poignant moments when we can look at Jesus and realize he's not this sanitized caricature of a person that's shallow and nice and polite, but there's something deeper, there's something stronger, there's something greater within the life of Jesus. And it's powerful to think about. And that's what we want to talk about today is just this idea of plot to us. So we're in week four, and we're gonna talk today about an unexpected exit. But in the last few weeks, as I mentioned, we talked about these different ideas where Jesus had an unexpected instruction. When he healed someone and says, I don't want you to tell anybody about it. Why would Jesus do that? Or this unexpected response when someone asked him for help and he said no. And last week, this unexpected criticism when he was went nuclear on the religious leaders of his day. Why did he do that? And today we're gonna talk about what he does when he leaves the scene in maybe the most opportune moment of his life and ministry. Everything that he came to do seemed like it was delivered to him, and then he walked away from it. Why did he do that? That's what we want to talk about today. And that's where we're gonna go. Now, I don't know how many of you here have been following along. We've been doing this thing this week. I just kind of threw it out there, this listening tour of the Bible. And I don't know if any of you guys have joined in this week, but if you haven't, just let me throw this out to you. If you listen to the Bible about 12 chapters a day or so, you can listen to the whole Bible in 90 days between now and the end of August. It's just a little refresher, maybe, on getting the Bible in a more concentrated form. Maybe you've just read little verses here and there. Maybe you've never gone through the whole Bible, maybe you've never listened to the Bible, it's just a thought. But I want to just encourage you, if that's something you're interested in doing, to join us. There's many of us doing that this summer. We had our annual church meeting this week, and we elected our new uh board of elders, and I want to introduce them to you here, some great people, Roger Kelly, Don Newell, Jeff Moser, Steve Frodie, and Dave Beebe. And uh I'm excited about the year ahead and grateful for the spiritual leadership. Since I've been pastor at this church, God has blessed this church with some incredible spiritual leaders. And these people have been called by God for this year. So we vote every year. If you're newer to daybreak and you're what we call a stakeholder here, then we vote every year and we ask God to give us spiritual leaders for this year that can lead us forward, and these are our people. So let me invite you to pray for these people. If you see them throughout the halls or in different places, make sure you let them know that of your support and prayer for them as we move forward. Now I'm gonna do one more little side note today, because I mentioned something last week, and I really rarely do this, but I just felt kind of compelled to just talk to you real quick about something that's unique about our church, and that's this concept of women in ministry. Because I mentioned last week that we're part of the Wesleyan church, and that's been a foundation of our church. Now, this whole sermon is about, I just I know there can be confusion, there's different ideas, and I'm a person, I like to just focus on the majors, the orthodox beliefs about Christianity and God, that God came in the form of Jesus, he lived a perfect life, and he died for our sins, was resurrected, and ascended into heaven. But then we have other issues like this where there's a lot of maybe confusion or division. I just want to tell you what our stance as a denomination is, and this is my stance as well. Let me just show you a couple scriptures about why I believe this the scripture supports an equality of men and women in leadership and ministry. So let me show you a couple scriptures here. The first one's in Galatians, and it talks about who we are. It says there's neither Jew nor Gentile, slave or free, male or female. You're all one in Christ. There's a principle that's given to us there about how there's just this idea that we're all one, we're all equal. Now, Acts 2, at the beginning of the church, there's a scripture and there's a prophecy, and it says, In the last days I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see vision, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my spirit in those days, and they will prophesy. You see, there's kind of an equal share there. Now that's like New Testament, like new church after Jesus. But what about maybe even going further back? If you look in the book of Judges, God raised up a woman like Deborah who led the nation of Israel. God appointed and chose this woman to lead his people. And I believe there's a principle there. And then we see in Romans another example where the Apostle Paul, an early leader of the church, he commends Phoebe, who is a deacon. Another title for that is minister of the church. So there's lots of different support in Scripture, but I want you to know I don't try to make a big deal about things, but I do see that as a beautiful part of our church. I love the fact that we have both men and women here on our staff and in our denomination that are serving God in some powerful ways. So if that was ever a question for you, nobody asked me. I just felt kind of prompted to share that. I thought I would share that with you today. Now we're going to talk today about John chapter 6. And in John chapter 6, we see Jesus out with the crowds. And I want you to pay attention to what Jesus does here. It says, When Jesus looked up and he saw a great crowd coming towards him, he said to Philip, Where shall we buy bread for all these people to eat? Philip was one of his disciples, one of his twelve apostles. And he asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. And Philip answered him, Well, it would take more than half a year's wages to buy enough bread for each one just to have a bite. Another one of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up. Well, here's a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many? So Jesus said, Well, have the people sit down. And there's plenty of grass in that place, and they sat down. About five thousand men were there. Now that's how they would take roll. So that was the men with women and children. There's probably easily over ten thousand people there. Jesus then took the loaves, he gave thanks, and he distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted, and he did the same with the fish. And when they all had had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, Gather the pieces left over, let nothing be wasted. So they gathered them, and they filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten. Now watch this. After the people saw the sign that Jesus performed, he began, they began to say, Surely this is the prophet who is to come into the world. And Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and to make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself. So there's a lot happening here. But let's go back to that last part. He just fed thousands of people. And I want you to go back to when this is over and the people's reaction. After the people saw the sign that Jesus performed, they began to say, Surely this is the prophet who has come into the world. And Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and to make him by force, withdrew again by a mountain, to a mountain by himself. So there's some cause and effect happening here in this scripture. The first cause that we see is that Jesus initiated this miracle. Jesus was the one who had the idea. We saw it there where Jesus looked at the crowd, he assessed the situation, and he pulled one of his disciples over, probably the accounting type, because you remember he started doing the calculations, right? Well, Jesus, I figured out the crowd, I figured out how much it would cost just for everyone to have a bite. He called Philip over, but it said he already had in mind what he wanted to do. Jesus was the one that initiated this miracle. And I think that's important because of where we see the story going. It was his idea to show what he wanted them to see. Jesus invited them into this miracle. Now, here's the wonderful thing about following Jesus is that Jesus initiates our relationship. That Jesus is the one that initiates miracles. Now, I know there's we talk about prayer here a lot and we pray a lot, and when we pray, we often think, well, I have this idea, and I'm going to bring it before God in prayer. But you know what I learned years ago is that when you enter into a conversation with God, maybe formally, if you sit down in some formal way to pray, or even casually in your mind, and you're just maybe thinking and sending your thoughts to God in that way, just as you're driving, or it's just a more casual environment. When you do that, you're not actually beginning that conversation. You're entering into it. And I'll tell you, that was a paradigm shift for me as a follower of Jesus to think that I'm not initiating everything. It's not all on my shoulders. It's not like, well, if I don't think of that, God's not going to do it. Because in fact, he initiates everything. We see it here in this miracle, but we know that if you've been following Jesus for any amount of time, you realize once you enter into that new life with him, that he is the one that initiates it. And that is a wonderful thing because I think sometimes we have in our minds that we have to chase God down, we have to get his attention, we have to pray maybe in a certain way, or if we have to clean ourselves up before we bring ourselves to God. But that's not the case. That he's already initiated the conversation and we just simply enter into it. Remember when I first met my beautiful wife, and some of you saw maybe a couple days ago, it was our 33rd anniversary on Friday, which is pretty cool. And if you ever want to see me without a beard, there is a picture out there. Okay, you can you can see what that little boy looks like. Um but we had this thing when we first met, and she came to Indiana Western University where I was a student, and this was pre-cell phone days, prehistoric days. And we had phones in our wall on the wall, you know, in our dorms and apartments and things. And so there was a situation where we started kind of hanging out, and I realized she never calls me. Like, I'm always the one calling her. What's the deal here? And so one day I was like, hey, I noticed that you never call. She was like, Well, that's a rule. I was like, Oh, we have rules. Okay, I didn't know that. I didn't know we had rules, and she said, Yeah, my rule is I don't call boys. Now she was referring to me as a boy, which it's like, okay, we'll get through that. But she's like, I don't call boys, they just call me, and I was like, Oh. And I was a little kind of surprised by that. And as I thought about that more, I'm like, that's actually kind of cool, you know. Like, she's got kind of some boundaries. Maybe she's just, you know, a little old-fashioned that way, and she wants to be pursued. And sometimes we may feel like that, like we have to just chase God down. We have to be the one to initiate that. He never calls us, we always have to call him. But here's the reality. The reality here is that this instance reminds us that he initiates. And what does the crowd do? The crowd just simply enjoys it. That's the great part about following after Jesus that he has so much blessing for us, and all we have to do is receive it. But the story continues on because now that cause not just goes from him initiating a miracle, but him revealing his power. So Jesus here reveals his power to the crowd. He shows them what he can do. Now, when we see the response later, you can realize that this was strategic. And it probably appeared on the surface that Jesus here is maybe showing off a little bit and showing, hey, I'm the one you've been waiting for, because the people here have been waiting for a king. They've been waiting for a deliverer, they've been waiting for someone to get them out of the mess that we're in, not just necessarily even personally, but in their cultural, nationally, and religiously. They're waiting for the Savior. And Jesus comes along and he reveals his power. They've never seen anything like this. Someone that can just stand there and just with the word feed 5,000, 10,000 people miraculously, and there they were, and he revealed his power to them, and the effect was the crowd began to see the opportunity. The crowd began to say, Whoa, I think we've got something here. You know, we've been waiting for this king, and he's right here. Maybe he's not quite what we expected him to be, but you know what? We can change him. We can make him king, we can put him in a position where he can finally deliver us. Because you see, at this time the Roman Empire was at its full strength. They really ruled the whole known world at this time, and the nation of Israel, from which Jesus came up from within and came to lead, they were under the impression of this evil Roman Empire. They built their empire on the backs of slavery and bloodshed. And so it just seemed to be obvious to them this man, Jesus, is finally the one. We see his power, we see what's possible. Our bellies are full and our future's bright. This man will change everything. And so they began to see the opportunity. Now, in our growth guide this week, this is one of the most poignant questions that was posed to us on day two of our growth guides, if you have one of these. And the question was how do you recognize the difference between an opportunity and a shortcut? Wow. Think about that question. How do you recognize, how do you differentiate the difference between an opportunity and a shortcut? Because here they were and they saw an opportunity. Wow, Jesus is the one that can save us. But all of a sudden, Jesus didn't respond the way they thought he would. See, for Jesus, it wasn't just about the crowd, it was about his mission and his calling. Jesus came to lead his people, he came to rescue them, he came to show them the way. Ultimately, he came to be the perfect sacrifice for their sins and our sins. He lived a sinless life. He was the perfect sacrifice. He paid the price for all evil of all mankind for all time. And Jesus knew that he came to reveal himself as king. And for Jesus, you know, he'd actually settled this issue a long time ago, you see, because before his ministry began, he was led into the wilderness, and for 40 days he was tempted by the devil. And the devil gave him the opportunity and said, I will give you all the kingdoms of the world if you just bow down and worship me. I can get you there quicker if you just trust me. But Jesus knew the difference between an opportunity and a shortcut. You know, a lot of times we come to God, we come to God with our opportunities. God, listen, I have an idea. I have a prayer, I have a vision. Would you bless it? And we see ourselves going up into the right at our life all the time. But what happens if our life doesn't go up and to the right? What if right now you're going through something and you don't understand it and you're confused? And while you've seen God reveal his power to you maybe in the past, or you've seen it happen to other people, what about me, God? Why am I not seeing you do what you did with others to me now? I'm suffering. And you may think, God, if you just get me out of this, I could serve you, I could do this, you could fill in the blank, I could do this for you. But what if what you're going through is the long way around to an opportunity? Because if left to us, we're just like the crowd, we want to take the shorter, easier way. But it's not that always that easy with Jesus, is it? The crowd began to pursue him. But then Jesus denied their desire. Their desire was to force him to be king. Here's what's ironic They said, we can make him our king, but the reality was he already was king. He's king of all creation. Scripture says he's the king of kings. He's the lord of lords. And he denied their desire. Here's what they wanted. But Jesus said, I'm going another way. And what you see in the verses following what we read today was you see the crowd walk away. And for the most part, all those thousands of people that experienced the miracle man didn't want to sacrifice to follow him any longer because he wasn't what they wanted or what they expected. It is easy for us to form Jesus into our own image. I think that's one of the reasons why this series is so important for us is because maybe you thought you knew Jesus, but you didn't know him as well as what you think you did. Because I'm finding even in many years of following him, I'm finding that I'm still learning things about Jesus. The fact that he came to reveal himself as king, and here the crowd was right at his fingertips, and he wasn't willing to take a shortcut to get there. And so the crowd left. So my question for you is are there ways in your life that you're making Jesus into your own image, into your own convenient king, into ways where you think this would work out best. Jesus, let's just do it this way. It's easy, it's quick, it's efficient. And for those of us that are Americans, that's just the way we think. We'd rather have the microwave than the crock pile. Let's get there quick. Let me hit the button, say the prayer. God, you deliver the goods, and we're all good, and we'll get there. But that's not how it works. It's typically the long, difficult road that gets us to the place where we realize we're ultimately fulfilled when we follow this king, not when it's convenient, not when it only benefits us. And when it matters most, we'll find that the way of Jesus is the best way. You know, there's people have this idea, Jesus will always want to make me happy. If I follow Jesus, then he wants me to be happy, so he would definitely give this to me. But when he doesn't, what do I do? Or Jesus would never allow anything bad to happen to me, or Jesus is silent and therefore he doesn't care, or Jesus, he'll always reveal the answer before he calls me to obey. These kind of characterations of Jesus are not what we see when we look deeper and we think about how God really works. Because God sees what we don't see. What Jesus knew when he looked at that crowd is that they don't understand what I see. There's a movie that came out several years ago called Minority Report, and it's about this idea of seeing things before they happen. And there's these certain people that have kind of this psychological gift to be able to see what happens in the future. And you know, in a lot of ways, when we follow Jesus, especially into the difficult times when he calls us to do things that we don't understand, it's great to remember that he has a bigger and better picture and clear understanding. Because you may be going through something right now that's so difficult and so confusing and mysterious when God might be saying, This is not the way we're going. This seems easy, this seems convenient, but we're actually going this way. I want you to watch this clip and think about how God works in your life when he calls us to do things sometimes that don't make sense. Let's watch. So he's got this person that can see the future with him. Take it. Take it. Wait. So they're being pursued by the police. She says, we're gonna stop right here in the middle of this mall when we're being pursued and surrounded. Wait. What are we waiting for? Wait, wait, wait. Anybody? That's such a great picture of following Jesus. Because there will be times when he will call you to do something, to go a different path. There's a plot twist down the road, and you're not even aware of it. See, what I've seen is that there's protection in his direction. When God takes you a certain direction, he will protect you, he will guide you, he will take care of you. When God is calling you to go a certain way, and I just believe that there's some of us right now, we're heading in a certain direction, and it doesn't make sense and we don't understand it, but trust me when I say that God knows the perfect timing for exactly what you need when you follow Him. If you're going through a health crisis, if you're going through a financial situation, if there is a broken relationship in your life and it's not resolving, if you're trying to move at some place in your life and you just seem to be stuck, and you're trying everything you can, remember that Jesus will initiate the miracle at the right time and the right place. It's all about timing. He is protecting you, even though maybe you're going in a direction that seems the opposite of what you want, and that's where we need to trust him. There's a scripture in Psalm 37. And I hope you take comfort in this. It says, Do not fret because of those who are evil or be envious of those who do wrong, for like the grass, they will soon weather. Like green plants, they will soon die away. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Take delight in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart. Maybe you've heard that. I heard that scripture for many years. And I understood it. If I trust in God, then He'll give me what I want. He'll give me the desires of my heart. Let me share with you maybe a different way to understand this. Perhaps what this means is if you trust in God, he will take his desires and give them to you. Now, what a different life that would be. Maybe you're so stressed out because God is just not simply going the way that you want him to go. And I want to ask you, do you want to follow Jesus or do you want him to follow you? Because when you want God to follow you, that leads to a lot of stress and struggle and brokenness. But if you follow Jesus, he'll lead you towards a peaceful path. He will give you his desires. Commit your way to the Lord. Trust in him, and he will do this. He will make your righteousness reward shine like the dawn and your vindication like the noonday sun. And maybe you need this right now. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him. Do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes. You could look around at the world and go, why them? God, I'm trying to do what's right and I'm suffering. Jesus has the right solution at the right time. I would ask you today, have you surrendered your life to Christ? Have you ever said, I've been going my own way? Maybe you're even from a religious background and you've asked God to basically follow you rather than following him. And it's easy to mask that into religion. It's easy to mask that in a life where it looks good on the outside, but God knows your heart. And my question for you is is your heart desiring to follow Him? Is it taking the heavenly path? In a moment, we're going to receive communion. And as we do that, this is a way that we remember the sacrifice that Jesus made for us. Let me ask you today, do you know that sacrifice for you? Is it personal for you? Have you received Christ as your Savior so that he can become your Lord? That you can follow Him, that you can trust in Him. Maybe you found, like those of us that have made the decision that life is hard and my emotions can't be trusted. And I need something beyond myself. Jesus came to forgive us of our sins. Communion is a beautiful reminder that for us, He came to remove the penalty of our sin, to give us new life. And as we receive communion today, I can't think of anything more beautiful than maybe for some of you to receive communion with a brand new heart. Scripture says that for God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believed in him will not perish but have eternal life. Both on this side and the other side of eternity when we see him face to face. Let me invite you, if you've never made that decision right now at this moment, would you receive him? Would you receive him and realize he's got a better way than we do? We're about to take communion. This is something that scripture tells us to examine our hearts. If you're a follower of Jesus and maybe God is reminding you of something that maybe isn't right, this is a moment to stop and say, God, I confess my need, I confess this shortcoming to you. But if you've never received him, let me invite you to do that. I want you to bow your heads here with me right now. And I want to pray. And if your prayer today is, I want to receive Christ as my savior, let me invite you to pray this prayer with me as I pray. Father, right now I come before you and I confess my need for you. I've sinned, and I believe that you came to this earth to save me from my sins. And I turn away from my past and I turn towards you and I receive you in Jesus' name. And with your heads bowed, let me ask you this question. If you prayed that prayer for the first time, would you raise your hand and say, I made that decision today for the very first time. If you're here today, if you're here with us on Daybreak Live, if you prayed that prayer, raise your hand, let me know. I'm so grateful. Wow. For those of you here in the house, stand with me. If you prayed that prayer today, you need to know that this is new life. When we receive these elements, we do it with a grateful heart, knowing the sacrifice that Jesus made for us. The elements will be distributed, they'll be passed on your row for those of you here in the house. I want you to take each one of these elements if you want to participate. That's at your discretion. And parents, it's at your discretion for your kids. And hold on to those elements and we will receive them together. So you'll receive the cup and you'll receive the bread. Hold on to that. We'll receive that together in just a few moments. This represents the body of Christ broken for us. I want you to take this and eat and remember of his sacrifice for you. This cup represents his blood shed for you. He was broken, and his blood was poured out for the forgiveness of our sins. He took it all away. Thank you for the blood that was shed for us. Invite you to take and receive this remembrance again. Pray with me. Father, we thank you. We thank you for the blood. We thank you for your goodness to us. Thank you that salvation, eternal life is possible. Because you gave your life away for us. To be the King, not that we wanted, but that we needed. We worship you today in Jesus' name. Can we just sing that chorus one more time? Thank you, Jesus, for the blood. Let's thank him for what he's done for us. Let's sing together. Wow. So glad you're here today. What a great note to celebrate. That we are here. We're thanking God for all he's done for us. Aren't you glad you've been a daybreak today? So glad you're here. Man, have a wonderful day. Go and live the life that God has for you as your king. Amen.