Latest / HOTLCAST / The Mind of Christ: Choosing Others Over Yourself

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The Mind of Christ: Choosing Others Over Yourself · HOTLCAST

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome back to the Hotlcast.
• 0:04
  This is Kyle.
• 0:05
  And Ryan.
• 0:06
  And Matt.
• 0:06
  And Mark.
• 0:07
  And we are here.
• 0:08
  It's uh it's June.
• 0:11
  Yeah, that's what I have to say.
• 0:12
  It's June.
• 0:13
  You're you're right.
• 0:14
  June 2nd.
• 0:15
  It's a great month.
• 0:16
  Yes, because your birthday's this month.
• 0:18
  We know.
• 0:18
  Oh, is it this month?
• 0:19
  Yeah, it is.
• 0:20
  It is.
• 0:20
  It's your favorite month.
• 0:23
  I like my birthday.
• 0:24
  So June 3rd's a great day.
• 0:25
  Uh that's tomorrow, just so you know.
• 0:27
  I'm having pizza.
• 0:28
  I think.
• 0:29
  He's accepting cards and gifts.
• 0:31
  Yes.
• 0:32
  Cards meaning trading cards.
• 0:35
  Don't get confused.
• 0:37
  There's a rift bound card game.
• 0:39
  That's the gifts.
• 0:40
  Yeah.
• 0:41
  It's a both end now.
• 0:42
  But uh my wife and my daughter are in Atlanta missing my birthday.
• 0:46
  My kids are gonna be busy all my birthday, so yeah.
• 0:49
  It's gonna be an interesting day.
• 0:50
  I'll spend it with Trevi.
• 0:52
  Um, it'll be awesome.
• 0:54
  But um I got a board game already for my birthday, so that's that's that's nice.
• 0:59
  Well, what'd you get?
• 1:00
  Oh, I I knew.
• 1:00
  I I thought it was fromage, but it was formaggio, the Italian version.
• 1:05
  Okay.
• 1:05
  So yeah, it's a cheese game.
• 1:08
  Patty asked me like two bits of little cheese.
• 1:10
  She's like, Do you like fromage?
• 1:11
  And I'm like, that means you're getting me a game for my birthday.
• 1:14
  So I saw this box, I'm like, oh, this is the size of fromage.
• 1:18
  It was, it's just formagio, which is the Italian version of it.
• 1:21
  So it's really really cool.
• 1:22
  Perfect, perfect gift for me.
• 1:25
  What's a perfect gift for you for your birthday, right?
• 1:28
  That's a great question.
• 1:30
  Um I don't know.
• 1:32
  I don't know.
• 1:32
  I also I I did just get a new Father's Day gift, though.
• 1:36
  Sunglasses, yes, but but because so what my wife does is she just buys them in bulk.
• 1:42
  So she'll buy me like 40 pairs of the same sunglasses because I leave them everywhere like I do my coffee mugs.
• 1:47
  Yeah, and uh so pretty soon you'll be seeing green, fluorescent green sunglasses everywhere.
• 1:53
  They're almost the same color as your mic, actually.
• 1:55
  Yeah, they do, they're good.
• 1:56
  Yeah, they're they're pretty damn cool.
• 1:57
  They match.
• 1:58
  What about you?
• 1:59
  I take a size five-day vacation to OBX is really my ideal gift.
• 2:05
  So I I love the I love the idea.
• 2:07
  I mean, you're rolling deep with your$5,000 gifts and campaign.
• 2:11
  So yeah.
• 2:12
  That's uh I was thinking like a small gift, like sunglasses or a board game.
• 2:15
  Yeah, five days without a bank.
• 2:17
  You said perfect gift.
• 2:19
  You didn't say a realistic gift.
• 2:20
  Okay, what's a weird perfect realistic gift?
• 2:23
  Uh honestly, like a gift card to a movie theater, because then I can go see whatever movies are coming out anytime soon.
• 2:28
  Okay, that's more more the the layman's layman's gifting capacity there.
• 2:33
  Yeah, you said perfect.
• 2:34
  You didn't say realistic.
• 2:36
  That's awesome.
• 2:37
  About you, Mark.
• 2:39
  Um, I feel like I want to go do something that would like a physical thing, a gift would be I feel weird with gifts, but like having something that somebody like surprises with her is like, hey, we're gonna go do this.
• 2:49
  I'm like, oh sweet, so take you on a marathon around.
• 2:52
  I mean, I guess so, sure.
• 2:54
  Doing something with people.
• 2:55
  Sounds like a great birthday, Mark.
• 2:58
  I mean, not a marathon, but like I don't know, like doing stuff with people.
• 3:02
  I love being around people, so hey, I rented this boat, we're gonna push into the middle of the lake, go have fun, it's an event.
• 3:08
  We're gonna cheer from the shore.
• 3:11
  Yeah, no, no.
• 3:12
  I mean, the perfect gift would be a trip to Italy, so yeah, that's see, it's not just me off the table, but like I think I was realistic, but you know, not all of us are rolling deep.
• 3:24
  You know, so if you don't know what I'm talking about, we we have a campaign video for our Vision 330, and so Matt's example was like, if you were gonna give five thousand dollars, and I'm like, why would you just say like a hundred bucks?
• 3:38
  Because it's over a three-year period, it's only like two hundred bucks a month.
• 3:42
  I was like, Matt's rolling deep, guys.
• 3:44
  He's giving some giving some cash to this campaign.
• 3:47
  But um, no, it's really funny, but um so yeah, I mean that I think that's fun.
• 3:53
  When are your birthdays?
• 3:54
  Share your birthdays for this for the stream.
• 3:56
  Uh my birthday's October, October 3rd.
• 3:58
  October 3rd, 3rd.
• 3:59
  It's a good day.
• 4:00
  Yeah, I agree.
• 4:01
  I it's not a bad day.
• 4:02
  March 27th.
• 4:03
  March 27th.
• 4:04
  Mine's February 15th.
• 4:06
  Yours is the same day as Carrick's.
• 4:07
  Yeah, Carrick and I share birthdays.
• 4:09
  Yeah.
• 4:10
  No, your birthday because it's Carrick's.
• 4:11
  So that's good.
• 4:12
  Well, cool.
• 4:13
  Um, so yeah, uh, we expect uh to hear more from people in the future, right?
• 4:17
  No.
• 4:18
  Um, see you guys tomorrow.
• 4:21
  For those of you watching this five years later, Marshall.
• 4:25
  Yes, exactly.
• 4:26
  When you get here, Marshall, let me know.
• 4:28
  This will be like in the future.
• 4:29
  It's like, yeah, I finally got there.
• 4:31
  It's 2020 30.
• 4:32
  You know, it's 2030 here.
• 4:33
  So he's actually pretty close.
• 4:34
  He's all the way up to December now.
• 4:36
  Wow, he's caught up.
• 4:37
  Yeah, of 2025.
• 4:40
  He's been going at it.
• 4:41
  I know, I know he told me you started right at the beginning.
• 4:44
  So he usually updates me when I talk to him.
• 4:46
  So we gotta keep doing these.
• 4:46
  So we went out to dinner last week, and he told me he's like, Yeah, he's like, I made it through December.
• 4:52
  He's like, it's actually been funny.
• 4:54
  He's like, You've been on it for a little bit now.
• 4:55
  He's like, and everything else.
• 4:56
  He's like, I'm I'm I'm catching up, I'm gonna get there.
• 4:58
  I'm like, you're dedicated, man, to go back and listen to all of them.
• 5:02
  Yeah, that's that's pretty wild.
• 5:04
  Well, um, let's jump into what we're actually here to talk about, which is Jesus.
• 5:08
  So this week and in Brooklyn, we talked about Philippians 2.
• 5:13
  We've been going through we've been spending the last four weeks going through or not last two weeks going through the book of Philippians.
• 5:19
  We're gonna do four weeks total.
• 5:21
  And uh we don't normally do a walkthrough, every every once in a while I'll do a kind of a walkthrough a book of the Bible, a short one.
• 5:27
  And uh just felt like I we we had kind of a space in the schedule and felt like a great thing.
• 5:31
  Philippians is such a good book about joy and un uncovering kind of the mind of Christ, and that's kind of what our first two set sessions have been about in the series.
• 5:40
  But um what do you think about I mean we talked about joy last week, but this week we really talked about the mind of Christ and and looking at the world with a Christ-like perspective, recognizing that others matter way more than we matter.
• 5:55
  I mean, it's a selfishness versus an others focus, a Jesus focus.
• 5:59
  So when you think about the mind of Christ, what does that look like or mean to you guys?
• 6:04
  Obviously, the first thing that comes to mind is being sacrificial, like where you're not just saying, Well, I'm gonna put others first when it's convenient, I'm gonna put others first whenever, you know, I don't it doesn't cost me anything, but to actually look at things and be like, I'm willing to sacrifice my time, my energy, my willingness, my desires, the things that I want to do in order to serve somebody else.
• 6:25
  That's the first thing that kind of comes to mind for me when thinking about how to do something like Christ.
• 6:30
  It's not just the idea of, well, yes, I'm gonna put somebody else first, you know.
• 6:34
  Like when you were talking about that the people are the mission, whenever you were going through everything about Side Quest Live.
• 6:40
  Same thing is true here.
• 6:41
  There's times where sacrifice needs to be the mantra that you follow.
• 6:44
  Right.
• 6:45
  Yeah.
• 6:46
  Yeah.
• 6:47
  I mean, I'm I'm with you, man.
• 6:48
  I mean, uh what I hear is like significance, right?
• 6:51
  What what do I give significance?
• 6:52
  Do I give myself significance?
• 6:54
  Do I do I look at the world and decide what makes Ryan happy, what makes Ryan comfortable, you know, what what is the easy now for me?
• 7:02
  Those are the things that are are moving me up and God down.
• 7:05
  Right.
• 7:06
  And and so if I'm if I'm if I'm following the 330 and I'm trying to make God less, then then I have to constantly look and go, no, how do I pour in the world?
• 7:15
  Right.
• 7:15
  Like how how do I make myself available?
• 7:19
  How do I make myself accountable?
• 7:20
  How how do I show up in a Christ-like way?
• 7:24
  Um not based on my comfort in my own understanding, but from a godly understanding.
• 7:31
  And and I think that for for me, that's why the word is so important and why it's so it's such a guiding light in my life.
• 7:38
  Right.
• 7:38
  Yeah, I I think for me, I I think we talk a lot in church about we're supposed to be selfless, we're like Christ, but we don't actually do it.
• 7:46
  We think we do, we convince ourselves we do, but we don't actually do it.
• 7:50
  I think people, Americans and cr kind of American Christians are super selfish.
• 7:54
  I think we're flawed and broken.
• 7:56
  And I think that the by just being innately humans living in this day and age, we're so selfish.
• 8:03
  And then our culture tells us to be even more selfish.
• 8:05
  Life should be about you, getting your best life now, um, having everything, having every experience, not missing out on anything.
• 8:12
  That just makes us so self-focused that we miss out on really God's intentions of bringing putting others first.
• 8:19
  And so we we read this in scripture over and over again.
• 8:21
  We're supposed to be self-sacrificing, humble, um, put others first, put the Lord first, yet we don't do it.
• 8:28
  And I think you know, we talked a bit in the service uh this Sunday about like practical ways.
• 8:34
  What does it actually look like to live a selfless life?
• 8:36
  And so some of my examples were silly, like don't announce that you put all the dishes in the dishwasher and admit that you were you know someone else was right and apologize first and let people merge in traffic.
• 8:47
  But what are some practical ways that we can be more selfless serving and loving people and giving them value and and not being so focused on ourselves?
• 8:57
  What are some some ways that you guys would say, if I was giving you practical advice how to live this out, what does that actually look like?
• 9:05
  I think one of the first things is you have to be less guarded with your time.
• 9:09
  Like that's one of the things where if you look at what people are the stingiest with in their entire lives, it's their time really more than anything else, even more than finances.
• 9:18
  I agree with you.
• 9:19
  If there's a person who says, Well, I could either write this check or I could go and serve, they're gonna pull the checkbook out and not even think twice about it.
• 9:26
  So if you want to start living that out in a practical way, you need to start saying, My time is valuable, sure, there's no question, but I need to be spending it for God, and that needs to be part of the conversation.
• 9:39
  Yeah.
• 9:40
  Yeah, no, I I'm with you.
• 9:41
  I mean, I just can't I can't help but think about like what I talked about in church on Sunday, you know, when I when I preached on Sunday, just this this idea of of expectations and and how we as people make up stories so we can justify our own behavior, right?
• 9:56
  And and I think we all do, you know, as humans, I think it's it's a natural thing to want to do that to say, oh well, here's all the reasons why I'm right, or here's all the reasons why I look good in maybe choosing myself and maybe choosing to spend my time making me comfortable, or take my money and make me comfortable.
• 10:16
  And and really I think that's that's where that like just on the other side of choosing God is everything I ever wanted.
• 10:24
  That's where all the peace and all the connection and and all the love that God has for me, I actually get to experience it.
• 10:32
  Right.
• 10:32
  That's good.
• 10:34
  I mean, yeah, you gotta make sure your heart's in the right place and you're checking yourself and you're going, where am I being selfish?
• 10:40
  What am I not thinking about?
• 10:42
  What am I defaulting to?
• 10:44
  Because we have defaults we automatically go to.
• 10:47
  We go to the things that feel comfortable that we're used to that we like.
• 10:50
  And a lot of times when you're being selfless, when you are trying to choose others over yourself, it's not always comfortable, it doesn't always feel the best.
• 10:59
  It doesn't always feel like an easy choice because you go like, Man, I just got home and now all of a sudden I have to go do this stuff.
• 11:07
  I'd rather just stay home and relax.
• 11:09
  And I think we all have to like battle that, fight that, combat that, look at our own hearts and our lives and assess that.
• 11:18
  Yeah.
• 11:18
  I don't think we're ever gonna get to heaven and Jesus is gonna be like, oh man, you did a great job really relaxing every night and just taking time for yourself.
• 11:27
  Good job.
• 11:28
  Like, I don't think that's I don't think that's gonna be the most relaxed award.
• 11:31
  Yeah, it's like, oh man, you really did a good job telling people no so you could just watch your shows on Netflix.
• 11:36
  Like, I I don't think that's ever gonna be the thing that that Jesus asked us to strive to do.
• 11:41
  So there's no crown for doom scrolling in the middle of the day.
• 11:43
  No, you are such a great doom scroller for two hours every day.
• 11:46
  Like, wow, I mean, that just good job, you like or like you did such a good job working hard all week.
• 11:52
  You did a great job protecting your weekends for yourself and your family so you can enjoy your time doing what you want.
• 11:59
  Like, that's just not gonna be how Jesus opens his arms to greet us.
• 12:02
  Like, I mean, I think those are gonna be negative things, like, oh, you you didn't you know value me.
• 12:07
  I think about this kind of stuff, you know, and I I love that in Philippians it talked about how we're to look to our own self-interest, but also to the interest of the other others.
• 12:16
  So like it's not like we can't have interest in life, but when ours supersedes everything else, it becomes so self-focused that we're basically creating us ourselves to be our own God that we worship because we want to make sure we have we have everything.
• 12:31
  And so having interests that go alongside of others or that support others or build others up, that's really what we're asked to do.
• 12:38
  And so we have to be careful.
• 12:40
  Um, I I had this moment back in college where I really I was a grudge holder in my freshman year of college.
• 12:46
  I was a super righteous, self-righteous Christian kid.
• 12:50
  Came into these heathens at the University of Michigan, all these sinners.
• 12:53
  And um, I know I I made I made good godly decisions.
• 12:58
  And so I, you know, and I knew when I was right and when they were wrong.
• 13:02
  I knew spirit scripturally I knew.
• 13:04
  So I had a friend that like, I forget what he did, I don't even remember what it was, but like whatever he did was wrong, I knew it was wrong.
• 13:09
  So I like held a grudge against him for like six months.
• 13:11
  I was like, I he'll he'll have to ask me to to forgive him.
• 13:15
  Like I didn't do anything wrong.
• 13:16
  And like after six months, we were we both were talking one day.
• 13:19
  He wasn't our football player, and we're like, what were we upset about?
• 13:22
  And I'm like, I have no idea.
• 13:24
  So he had no idea either.
• 13:26
  It had probably had something to do with a girl for sure.
• 13:28
  I mean, it was college.
• 13:29
  So but when it came down to it, like I I just thought about that afterwards.
• 13:34
  I I lost a good friendship because of my own self-righteousness, but it was all about me being right and me being the right person uh in the situation instead of being so others focused that I thought I need to save this relationship, I need to win this relationship with the Lord.
• 13:49
  And what I did was make this guy think, wow, Christians are just absolute jerks.
• 13:54
  And that was a really transformative moment in my life.
• 13:57
  I said, I don't, I don't want to be that way.
• 13:59
  So after that year, I made a lot of changes uh in my walk with the Lord to be a different, better person and get rid of that kind of self-righteousness.
• 14:07
  But then we do that a lot and we don't understand that that kind of focus, you know, believing that you're better because you follow Jesus, believing that your time is more valuable because you follow Jesus than others, believing your time is much more valuable because that's just how you see the world, is those things are not feelings that we're to get from scripture.
• 14:26
  Like that's not how we're supposed to live.
• 14:28
  I mean, how do you guys navigate that?
• 14:31
  Well, I mean, one of the things that I think is a recent example was whenever you and I were talking about me going and playing Riftbound, and I'm like, man, I I have to learn this game, I gotta figure it out, I've got to be able to be competitive, I gotta be able to do all of these things, because I was thinking about it as I'm going to play the game, I'm going to play the game, I'm going to play the game.
• 14:49
  And then when we ended up having people that were like, hey, we wouldn't be interested in starting to attend your church, I was able to actually say to you, Oh, so you're just using this strictly as an opportunity to do something you enjoy, but as a ministry outreach focus kind of thing.
• 15:05
  And you're like, Yeah, I use everything for that.
• 15:07
  And I looked at and I said, Well, had you told me that's what we were doing from the beginning, I would have happily gone and been losing this entire time.
• 15:14
  It wouldn't have mattered.
• 15:15
  And I think that's the mentality that you need to take is when you're putting yourself in a position, even if it's something you enjoy, be using it for the kingdom of God to be able to be having that focus and having that intentionality behind it.
• 15:27
  Yeah.
• 15:27
  And I think that's you know, we all go, you know, we all play card games now.
• 15:31
  Mark's even joining the card game world.
• 15:33
  But um, you know, the cool part of that is like you can you can lose every game and have fun and do ministry, you can win every game and have fun and do ministry.
• 15:40
  I've cut all this in the airside of that sometimes.
• 15:42
  But also just I'll let you know when I do the winning part of that stuff.
• 15:44
  You just keep losing for the Lord.
• 15:46
  Um but me too.
• 15:48
  You know, but when it comes down to it, like you guys know this, but people listen to I the people that own the game store that we've been going to for the last couple months, um, went on vacation, they were gonna close like down our Friday night gathering, but that's when we we spend time with basically non-Christian people, and we get to say that we're pastors, we get to do life together as a church family that goes in the midst of this community.
• 16:12
  And so, like, I just said, Hey, I'll I'll run this store for you.
• 16:15
  Like, I'll run the game.
• 16:16
  And because we're pastors and we should be trustworthy, they're like, Yeah, why not?
• 16:20
  Because we we've built a good rapport with them.
• 16:22
  So the two weeks, two weekends they were gone on Fridays, I went and ran it.
• 16:26
  I mean, it was like it took like no effort, like you know, you know up the one week.
• 16:31
  It really didn't take any effort, it was just like running a computer program and like you know, selling some cards for them, which uh and giving some some prizes away.
• 16:39
  But like it's transformative that like all of that is about like I we didn't have to do that.
• 16:44
  We could have we could have gone anywhere else to play the game, like other places on Friday night.
• 16:47
  It was just like, no, we're we're trying to we're trying to minister these guys as part of this community that we're building.
• 16:54
  And um, my kids, my boys didn't get to go this Friday.
• 16:57
  Uh you know, Matt, you gotta go.
• 16:59
  And um, but like I got home and I was talking about it, like how they're like, how was it?
• 17:03
  I was like, it was just so good.
• 17:04
  Like we had like 14 people there that we have been building relationships with for months, and it was just it was I was like, it was just good to like have conversations now.
• 17:14
  We're not strangers to these people, we're becoming friends in relationship, and they know the whole time that I'm a pastor and that you guys go to our church, and you know you're a pastor and your pastor, and um, and our kids go to church, and like they're just seeing the world, they're seeing church through a different lens, and it's exciting.
• 17:31
  And now some of them attend church, and like it's just really a transformative thing.
• 17:35
  So I think that's what it looks like.
• 17:36
  You can your kids can be in sports and you can hobbies, and you can go golf and you can go fish, but like what are you doing to make it intentionally about the Lord and building into other people?
• 17:46
  And so I mean you can take the things like you how you guys do it, you take the things that you do enjoy, and you don't have to cut out those things, you can do them with Christians, with other people, with believers, with people that don't believe too, and use it as an opportunity to reach them.
• 17:58
  I think because I think that's what some people also think is they're like, Well, I can't do anything fun that I like to do.
• 18:03
  Well, if it's a godly thing and it's a not a bad thing, you can do it with people, you can bring them into the circle with you and do that life with them and then experience that stuff with them.
• 18:14
  Yeah, as they say in the movies, you gotta bring them in the circle of trust, you know.
• 18:18
  So like it's just the way it is.
• 18:20
  But so yeah, it's uh just that sense of intentionality, right?
• 18:24
  Like we can we can make a make the most beautiful, wholesome thing a worldly thing if we want to.
• 18:30
  And we can make the most worldly wilderness thing a super godly opportunity for connection and community.
• 18:37
  Right.
• 18:37
  And it's all on on how intentional I am with with my time.
• 18:41
  As you're as you're talking, Kyle, I was thinking, Tara always says this thing, she'll say, you know, look for connection, not protection, and which really is just saying, hey, am I connecting with God and helping others connect with God and show up in a Jesus sort of way, or am I protecting my own ego?
• 18:59
  Am I protecting my own self-interest?
• 19:01
  And we use it a lot in like in and just being parents and and kind of checking ourselves on how we are showing up for our kids.
• 19:09
  And and I and I feel like it works that way even when we go play cards, right?
• 19:13
  Like, why am I here?
• 19:14
  If I'm getting all bent out of shape because I've lost, well, maybe it's time to stop and really check that ego and go, what am what am I protecting here, right?
• 19:22
  Like, why am I here?
• 19:23
  What's the main thing?
• 19:24
  Yeah, yeah.
• 19:24
  Like I admire Matt's match drive in it where he's like, Oh, I'm losing for Jesus.
• 19:28
  Like, I remember you're talking about that.
• 19:30
  And I'm like, I I love that.
• 19:31
  Like, because that it's not your goal, isn't to win.
• 19:34
  We look over every week and say, How'd you do?
• 19:36
  I lost them all.
• 19:39
  But you're still winning, is the cool part.
• 19:41
  Because for you, it's not a loss.
• 19:43
  For you, that's not the goal.
• 19:44
  Obviously, you hope to win, you play to win.
• 19:47
  I don't even expect it anymore.
• 19:51
  You tried to at least.
• 19:52
  There was one time that I had gone to an event and I won twice, and the first time I was like, whoa, what?
• 19:58
  And I'm like, yeah, I won that one.
• 20:00
  And then I won a second time that same night, and he's like, Man, you're on a roll tonight.
• 20:05
  I'm like, yeah, the next week lost everything again.
• 20:07
  So it's just it is what it is.
• 20:09
  Yeah, that's cool because you like most people would be discouraged by that.
• 20:12
  Like, I honestly probably I would at some point like be like, man, I just keep losing, but I I admire that.
• 20:17
  Like, you're like, no, there's a bigger reason for it, and it's not about winning.
• 20:21
  Yep, no, it's just about you know, it's about community, it's about connection, and you can do it with them.
• 20:26
  You can do it with anything.
• 20:26
  You can do it if you're in a crafting club, you can do it if you're you know, in any kind of hobby, any kind of interest.
• 20:31
  You can do it if you're in Kawanas, you can do it in your in Vets organization, you just think anything that you're in, you can make it about honoring Christ and you could pour into people for Jesus, and you can just be different.
• 20:41
  Like you can be doing life, you can be in your workplaces, and you can do it in the right way.
• 20:45
  And so it just requires self-sacrifice and recognizing everything that we're doing is is to point back to Christ, our time, our talent, our treasure, and you can be more intentional.
• 20:55
  And if you're not intentional in different ways, you're gonna miss out on the joy and the mind of Christ that that that comes along with knowing him and and making him known.
• 21:05
  And so I I challenge you really, if you're listening to this, like figure out in your life, like, is life just about me?
• 21:11
  And I think the problem is 90% of people, the answer would if I really if you evaluate somebody's life, their life is just about them, making them happy, their kids' lives are about making them happy.
• 21:21
  Like, because we we go watch our kids have experience, we want them to win, so we're happy that our kids are the winners.
• 21:26
  Like, you gotta think about it.
• 21:27
  Like, are you trying to to in every way, in everything you do, parenting as a spouse, as a as a as a child, as a friend, as a coworker, are you trying to like make Christ known by being self sacrificing, humble, or are you just trying to build yourself up so you can have the best experience in life?
• 21:45
  And I think I this is a war I think that wages all the time in all of us, and you always kind of I think it's a daily reevaluation.
• 21:53
  I think sometimes hourly reevaluation of our priorities and our passion for Christ.
• 21:57
  Yeah.
• 21:58
  Sorry, I just know sacrifices.
• 22:00
  Sacrifice, we often see it as you have to get rid of something.
• 22:02
  I don't think it's not just getting rid of something, it's lifting it up to God and letting Him decide what to do with it.
• 22:08
  Or like the things you have, like a living a life of self-sacrifice, that doesn't mean you sell your house and you sell your cars and you sell your things and you don't eat and you just suffer.
• 22:18
  It's about being like, alright, God, this is what I have.
• 22:21
  What do you want to do with it?
• 22:22
  Like that's that's the thing that I think people hear is they're like, oh, sacrifice, like I have to get rid of all this stuff.
• 22:28
  If it if God doesn't want you to have it, yes, but that that that's more about lifting it up.
• 22:33
  That's more about trusting him with it.
• 22:35
  It's more about being like, whatever God wants with this, whether it is for me to keep it, whether it is for me to get rid of it, whether it's to use it for this, yeah, I'm trusting him with it.
• 22:44
  And so like that's a thing I I try to talk to the students about.
• 22:46
  I'm like self-sacrifice does not mean you suffer necessarily.
• 22:50
  It means you trust God with the outcome of whatever you have and you give it to him.
• 22:55
  That's true.
• 22:55
  That's good, that's a good way to look at it.
• 22:56
  Like, and this is like we struggle with this.
• 22:59
  Well, like we we do ministry for a living on where you listen to this podcast knowing we're pastors, but like I I I told this in my sermon, at least one of the services, and I said, like Saturday, there was a card game event at at the auto house.
• 23:12
  There were 16 people scheduled to be here.
• 23:14
  It's not the card game that that that we play together, it's a different one.
• 23:18
  And um, and so I'm like, I used to play it, I I liked it 15 years ago.
• 23:24
  I I quit playing it, and now the game's changed, so I don't really overly enjoy it anymore.
• 23:28
  And so the event started at 4.
• 23:30
  At 3.20, I'm sitting on my couch.
• 23:33
  Like, my kids, my son's set scheduled to come.
• 23:35
  Both my boys were gonna come, and they're like, Are you gonna go?
• 23:37
  I'm like, I don't think so.
• 23:38
  I just I think I'm just gonna stay home and watch some shows.
• 23:40
  Like, I was like, I just don't, I don't really like the game that much.
• 23:44
  Um, I like it's changed, so I'm just gonna stay here.
• 23:46
  And I was, you know, I was just kind of doing like, yeah, just I'd hang out with Trevi, my dog, and just watch watch some shows.
• 23:51
  I haven't done that in a long time.
• 23:53
  And my my boys just like, well, you know, they would really like for you to come.
• 23:57
  Like those guys, they they love you and they would love you to come.
• 24:00
  And I'm like, you know, but I think one of them mentioned they don't care about what the people care about, care about.
• 24:04
  And I'm like, they're right though.
• 24:07
  They're right though.
• 24:08
  So like I'm hop the hope.
• 24:09
  And it was loving, you know.
• 24:11
  This is like a 20, this isn't like this is like comments over like a 20-minute period of like, should I go, should I not go?
• 24:17
  And then finally, like someone I think someone's like, care about what the people care about, care about.
• 24:20
  I'm like, yeah, you're right, I gotta go.
• 24:22
  And so, like, literally, Patty's like, You're going now?
• 24:24
  Like, yeah, and I'm like, I was like, I'm leaving, walked out the door, like, because I and then it was 15-minute drive to get 15 minutes.
• 24:30
  So um, and ultimately I I showed up and I had I mean I knew I'd have a good time because I I like the people and it's fun.
• 24:35
  It's just it's just like that war wages all the time.
• 24:39
  Is this for me or is this for he and how am I serving people through that?
• 24:44
  And so staying home would have definitely been for me.
• 24:47
  It would not have done anything to further my relationship with people or my walk with the Lord, it would have just been Kyle relaxing to enjoy some time with his dog.
• 24:55
  Um, you know, but ultimately I came and chose to spend time with people and I had a good time.
• 25:00
  I had a good time connecting people, having conversations, um, talking with people, laughing, and that I really think is the difference between priorities.
• 25:08
  Like, and I I have these questions like daily.
• 25:11
  I know everybody else should and try to be waging through these, what's the right decision for the Lord?
• 25:17
  And it's hard because there's a balance, and so I guess I have a question that people I'm sure would be asking this, and I'd like and I mean if any of you guys have this thought, like is it wrong to have those moments at all where you do have like a breather moment?
• 25:30
  Like where like where you're talking about, like where there's nothing going on and you go and like watch a show with your friends.
• 25:34
  I mean, if you take a breather, you're you're out of the game.
• 25:39
  It's a full run, don't stop.
• 25:41
  I mean, I don't know when you read the when the read the when I read the Bible, I find that when every opportunity Jesus gets, he takes a break, right?
• 25:48
  I mean, but caveat, right?
• 25:51
  When when somebody needs something along his way to go rest, he always stops and and and shows up.
• 25:56
  It's true.
• 25:57
  Like the woman at the well, like he was hungry and he still stopped and interacted with her first.
• 26:00
  It was inconvenient, yet he took the time.
• 26:02
  So a lot of times other people are inconvenient.
• 26:05
  And so in that inconvenience, you have to make room for the Lord and you gotta serve him.
• 26:09
  And so I the Bible's clear.
• 26:11
  You know, you I think creation gives us an example.
• 26:13
  We are supposed to rest at times.
• 26:14
  The problem is we rest way too much.
• 26:16
  We think we need daily rest, we need weekly rest.
• 26:18
  That you know, the the Bible out of seven days, there's one day of rest.
• 26:22
  I mean, that doesn't mean it means seven days, six days, you're sold out.
• 26:26
  Um, you're sold out for the Lord.
• 26:28
  I mean, that doesn't mean I come home and I can just rest all evening because I've earned it all because I worked all day.
• 26:33
  It's like, how can I use those those remaining hours for the Lord with my kids, with my friends, with my family, with the community, with I mean, like we, you know, we get that day and we need to take that time to rest.
• 26:43
  And Jesus, after big moments, he goes and has a spiritual time where he goes and has spiritual rest.
• 26:49
  But that usually is him communing with his father.
• 26:52
  That's the rest.
• 26:53
  He's spending time growing the Lord.
• 26:55
  Our rest is usually vegging out in a vegetative state for ourselves.
• 26:59
  It's not going away to spend time praying and seeking the Lord.
• 27:04
  So I think spiritual rest in the Bible for Jesus is way different than how our earthly 2026 uh American you know rest looks like.
• 27:12
  It's really about feeding our own wants and desires and not not really serving Christ more.
• 27:17
  And so I think we just need to be careful that we find that healthy balance.
• 27:21
  But I think it's it's not really balanced for most people.
• 27:24
  And I honestly think in many ways, at least this is what I learned when I was in college, is that balance in ministry is a myth, that it doesn't actually exist, that you are either on and using all of your time to serve Jesus or you're off.
• 27:39
  That there's not really because whenever you go through life and you're looking at the things that are happening, you can say all day long, well, I'm gonna set up, so I'm gonna do this this time, I'm gonna do this, this time, I'm gonna do this, this time.
• 27:50
  Well, even if we look at that, that's an unbiblical perspective.
• 27:53
  Because, you know, don't say that you're gonna go into this town and do this for this length of time and this town and do this for this length of time.
• 27:59
  Look at what you have in the here and now.
• 28:01
  How am I spending that for Jesus?
• 28:03
  To speak into your question is exactly like what Kyle had said.
• 28:06
  Yeah, there is time where you should be taking that break, but it should be focused and for a reason, not just again, you know, either doom scrolling or, you know, binging something on Netflix, you know, where it's I'm gonna take this time and I'm gonna maybe go to somebody else's Bible study, or I'm gonna go to this other church event where I can go to, you know, a concert or whatever and use this as a moment to kind of recharge my batteries and refill my pitcher so that when I am then called to pour it out for other people, I'm not trying to pour from an empty pitch empty pitcher.
• 28:41
  Like we're having an unhealthy rest.
• 28:43
  Like we're not actually resting properly when we rest and the way our culture rests.
• 28:47
  Yeah, it's like using the world to like recharge you.
• 28:50
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 28:51
  Yeah, but it should be Christ.
• 28:53
  And so I think that's a challenge.
• 28:55
  Make sure in your rest it's rest with the Lord, not rest with the world.
• 28:59
  That's probably a good sermon.
• 29:00
  Yeah.
• 29:01
  That's probably a good sermon in there.
• 29:02
  I gotta write that down.
• 29:03
  But um, yeah, so we hope this we hope this is informative.
• 29:07
  We hope that you think through daily.
• 29:10
  Are you taking time to make sure that your focus of your mind is Christ and not the world?
• 29:15
  Are you sacrificing humbly or are you are you fulfilling your own selfish needs and desires?
• 29:21
  So um, but we think about this often.
• 29:23
  I know we talk about it often, and we hope it's an encouragement for you to think about it more as you try to serve Christ.
• 29:28
  Thanks for listening.