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Transcript

When Life Doesn't Go Your Way · B1 Podcast

0:00
Blake: Hey everybody, it's great to have you here.
0:01
Blake: I'm Blake.
0:02
Blake: It's wonderful to have you to the B1 podcast.
0:05
Blake: We're just grateful to have you.
0:06
Blake: I'm here with Mark and my boy Daniel Barrett is in the house.
0:10
Blake: So we have a guest all the way from Costa Rica.
0:13
Mark: Costa Rica.
0:14
Blake: Yeah.
0:14
Mark: He said hola.
0:16
Blake: Yeah.
0:16
Blake: He's one of our missions partners here.
0:18
Blake: And so whenever I go to see him, I've been how how long have I known you now, Daniel?
0:22
Blake: A decade.
0:23
Blake: Yeah.
0:24
Blake: So old friend.
0:25
Blake: How did y'all meet?
0:26
Blake: Mutual friend introduced us, yeah.
0:29
Blake: Yeah.
0:29
Blake: Dear friend of mine, Doug Hudson.
0:30
Blake: Hi Doug, if you're watching this, uh he he introduced us, brought me down, and then I just fell in love with the Barrett's Horizon Church that they have down there.
0:40
Blake: They have a halfway house.
0:41
Blake: Do you want to explain that?
0:42
Blake: What's it called?
0:43
Daniel: Well, first of all, let me say ten years ago when I first met Blake, um we had this well, I had this vision of him coming.
0:51
Daniel: We needed a worship leader desperately.
0:54
Daniel: And he plays, he plays guitar, his girls all sing, and I think he sings some too.
1:00
Daniel: And uh and I was doing both.
1:02
Daniel: I was leading worship and preaching every Sunday.
1:04
Daniel: And I thought, man, if you wanted to lead worship one week and I preach, and then the next week I'll lead worship and you preach, I thought it'd be a great team.
1:11
Blake: But and there is a real thought of me to move down.
1:14
Blake: There was we really considered uh how we came down several times from praying about and just never felt the calling.
1:21
Blake: Yeah.
1:22
Blake: It was never the Lord's will to do that.
1:24
Blake: But I just can't tell you how much I believe in the work that he's doing.
1:28
Blake: And he also does help with, you know, in Costa Rica, it's legal to have prostitution.
1:35
Blake: And so a lot, there's a lot of sex trafficking, and it's a massive problem.
1:39
Blake: So they have a ministry to help women that are can you explain that ministry?
1:44
Daniel: Yeah.
1:44
Daniel: Well, we have several different ministries.
1:46
Daniel: Uh we do have a prenatal center on our campus.
1:49
Daniel: Um but uh for years my wife has tried to work with girls that are on the streets.
1:55
Daniel: They've done different things uh from going out and painting nails and doing hand massages in the park to uh just walking the streets and praying for girls.
2:03
Daniel: And and uh it's really, really hard to get these ladies to come off the streets.
2:08
Daniel: And uh so we've put a lot of more efforts in the last few years into kids' clubs and children's ministries, trying to raise up a new generation of girls that that know their identity in Christ, know who they are, have uh self-value and worth, and and hopefully never go into that trade.
2:23
Blake: You can't really understand until you're there and see like the parents, the uncles, the grandparents, everybody encourages you to do it because the women can make ten times the amount of money than a grown man.
2:36
Blake: And so all the men, you know, doing trades and working really hard labor, they all encourage their, you know, wit daughters to go and do this because they can make so much more money.
2:45
Blake: So it's very difficult to change an entire culture's thinking.
2:48
Blake: Uh and and the women enjoy it.
2:51
Blake: They don't want to get out, right?
2:52
Blake: They they're I don't know if they enjoy it.
2:54
Daniel: You know, prostitution, I think anywhere is is an exploitation of vulnerability.
2:59
Daniel: Yeah.
2:59
Daniel: These girls are vulnerable because of lack of education.
3:02
Daniel: They're vulnerable because of of uh of poverty or uh uh abuse that they suffered.
3:10
Daniel: I mean we've heard girls.
3:12
Blake: What they enjoy is having the money, having nice cars, having a house, the the lifestyle that it gives them a lot of times, you know, a lot that it can't get in anywhere doing anything else.
3:23
Blake: Yeah.
3:24
Daniel: And a lot of the girls are not from Costa Rica, they're from Nicaragua, they're from Colombia, and they're sending money back, they're supporting families, you know, thousand miles away.
3:33
Blake: Yeah.
3:33
Blake: So it's a very difficult life.
3:35
Blake: And so it kind of goes into what we're gonna talk about today because we we just talked on James chapter one.
3:41
Blake: And so if you don't mind, I'm gonna start by reading the very first three or four verses here.
3:45
Blake: James chapter one, verse two says, Consider up your joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance, and let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
4:04
Blake: And so those verses for for me and my walk with God have been pretty transformational verses.
4:12
Blake: I think if you've been a Christian very long at all and study the Bible, most people do believers know those verses, right?
4:19
Blake: Um but you talk about the trials that people face in Costa Rica, it's heavy poverty, all kinds of sexual exploitation, there's there's all kinds of sin.
4:29
Blake: But it's not different than Americans.
4:31
Blake: We we also have our battles with all kinds of trials.
4:35
Blake: And so it's when you say trial, it can be anything.
4:38
Blake: It can be sickness, it can be financial struggles, it can be marital challenges.
4:42
Blake: And so, like you were saying, er everybody has something that we all are battling with.
4:47
Blake: And so while you're listening online today, I just want you to kind of, you know, in your own life, ask God, like, what is it that I'm that I'm working through right now?
4:56
Blake: Some trial struggle, because here's what I want to kind of build on and talk about today.
5:00
Blake: Trials don't automatically make us better, they sometimes make us bitter.
5:06
Blake: And I think we all know the person that the horrible thing happened to, and they were never the same afterwards.
5:13
Blake: Right?
5:14
Blake: Somebody went through a horrible divorce and then they became bitter.
5:20
Blake: And and you couldn't seem to get past the, you know, anger, the hatred that they had, whether it was hatred towards women or hatred towards men, they never kind of the, you know, they just always talked poorly after that, they became negative.
5:34
Blake: Uh the train wreck happened, somebody died, you lost a spouse, you you fought cancer, and you've met the people that after they fought that, like, I don't understand God, I don't know why he did this to me.
5:45
Blake: And there's real questions that I I understand.
5:48
Blake: Like, I, you know, I have in my own family people that have, you know, lost babies.
5:55
Blake: And there's real questions that I think, you know, that are like, I it's hard for me to pray right now.
6:00
Blake: It's hard for me to hear, yeah, I'm praying for you.
6:03
Blake: Oh, good.
6:03
Blake: Well, thanks.
6:04
Blake: You know, I'm uh that's doing a lot of good.
6:06
Blake: And I think everybody has probably felt that before.
6:08
Blake: Of like, yeah, I feel like I've prayed most earnest prayers I've ever prayed in my life, and they have not been heard.
6:15
Blake: Like my biggest desire was not hurt.
6:18
Blake: And I think all of us can resonate with that.
6:19
Blake: So it's like, okay, thanks.
6:21
Blake: Yeah, whenever you face trials, it's gonna be testing of my faith is what produces perseverance.
6:25
Blake: Well, I don't want the perseverance.
6:26
Blake: How about that?
6:27
Blake: I don't want to be mature and complete, lacking in nothing.
6:31
Blake: I just really wanted you to answer my prayer, whatever that is.
6:34
Blake: And so um I think this this really brings up a lot when it comes to Christians and our our battle, our war in the faith, our spiritual war of like what it looks like to actually go before God.
6:46
Blake: Um, but I so we know the people that have gotten bitter, but we also know the people that have gotten better.
6:52
Blake: Right?
6:52
Blake: That that you told that story about a friend that fought cancer, right?
6:56
Daniel: Yeah, yeah, a friend of mine years ago in Costa Rica, he was Costa Rican, 38, 39 years old, I think he was, and found out he had cancer, uh a really uh aggressive form, didn't look uh good for him, didn't look like he was gonna make it, and uh went through all the treatments, and it was years of of battling for his life, and uh he pulled through, he made it, and he'll tell you today cancer is the best thing that ever happened to him.
7:21
Daniel: And I I know that's not everybody's story, but that's his story.
7:26
Daniel: He saw people in his family come to faith through it.
7:28
Daniel: Uh it it uh brought him back to faith and strengthened him, and he he truly is living this.
7:35
Daniel: But he'll say it's because what he cling to what he clung to during that.
7:39
Daniel: Because when we go through trials, we cling to something.
7:41
Daniel: Right.
7:42
Daniel: Sometimes people cling to their anger, their bitterness, like you're saying.
7:44
Daniel: Drug abuse, alcohol.
7:49
Daniel: Um, but he clung to the Lord and he brought him through it.
7:52
Blake: That's so good, Daniel.
7:53
Mark: It reminds me, um, was it experiencing God Bible study in the 90s, I think.
8:00
Mark: Uh but it started.
8:01
Mark: Um, I think one of the key questions was um don't ask what, ask uh uh don't ask why, ask what.
8:09
Mark: You know, what are you doing?
8:10
Mark: Why not why is this happening to me, but Lord, what are you doing, you know, and how can I join you in it?
8:16
Blake: That's so good.
8:17
Blake: Yeah.
8:17
Blake: What are you what are you trying to teach me to make me mature and complete, right?
8:21
Blake: Yeah, I think uh I just met with a guy today, and in his, you know, for up till he was like 30 years old, he was uh peddling drugs, he was, you know, chasing after women and uh uh abusing like drugs really bad.
8:37
Blake: I'm talking meth, cocaine, heavy stuff, right?
8:40
Blake: And and he said that when he met Christ and he got married, it's like he completely it was a whole new creation, right?
8:48
Blake: And so he he but he looks back at that and he's grateful for the years in darkness.
8:53
Blake: He's grateful for the years that he was, you know, rebelling against God and living in because now he looks back at that, I want nothing to do.
9:01
Blake: He he had all kinds of money, you know, he had uh all the women he wanted.
9:06
Blake: He was, you know, all the material possessions and you know, the dream of what this world has to offer.
9:12
Blake: He was like, I went after it hard.
9:13
Blake: He had the devil had a hold of him and he lived for, you know, he was a hedonist, just chasing after his own desires, you know.
9:20
Blake: So this this passage really talks about the process of temptation, how you're lured in, you're enticed, you're dragged away, and then you know, you can you can face death.
9:30
Blake: Well, he's grateful that he did it.
9:32
Blake: It's like reminds me of the story of cancer.
9:34
Blake: Sometimes it takes death, looking death in the eyes to make you wake up to go, hold up.
9:41
Blake: Like, you know, death has this tendency to kind of make you realize what you want to live for and and what what how much life is so valuable and what I really want what matters.
9:51
Blake: And so that's what happened to him.
9:53
Blake: He's just like he's completely changed, he's a new creation, and now he just wants to live for God and he's in love with the scriptures and he loves our church.
10:01
Blake: And um, he was just you know thanking me for for the way that it's you know encouraged him to be a part of this church, and he just loves being here and loves worshiping.
10:10
Blake: And so better or better, bitter or better.
10:14
Blake: You know, James talks about being double-minded.
10:17
Blake: And it's almost like you have like a divided loyalty.
10:21
Blake: And when you when you're unstable in the following after God and you're not sure you want to, you know, be all in, then you're living for, you know, and we have to choose am I gonna live completely for God, or if I'm gonna live for my flesh and my desires and carry out all the cravings of of my you know sinful flesh.
10:38
Blake: And so I I think that's such an important part of this passage when you study, you know, trials and temptations.
10:44
Blake: He kind of goes all over the place in this text because he starts off kind of going into like being rich versus poor.
10:50
Blake: And, you know, if you're if you're poor, you know, you then you should be grateful for your high standing, you know, which is kind of an interesting thought because it's like a lot of times people think of you know being poor is like you don't, you know, you you're not blessed when you don't have money and success, right?
11:06
Blake: But that's not what the Bible says, right?
11:09
Daniel: You've been to Africa.
11:10
Daniel: I've been to Africa, you've seen the poorest of poor.
11:12
Daniel: And and maybe there's other nations that people have been to where they've seen poverty in that extreme as well.
11:18
Daniel: And I remember being in Ghana in in 2000, I think it was, and and I saw these children and they were playing with trash.
11:25
Daniel: I mean, we were in a trash dump doing ministry, and they were playing with trash.
11:29
Daniel: I mean, they'd taken like 10 cans and stuck thimbles on the sides and make like a little car, and they were so content.
11:36
Daniel: Yeah.
11:36
Daniel: And so uh satisfied.
11:39
Blake: Yeah.
11:39
Daniel: And yet I think about so often, you know, here in the first world, kids that don't have the newest PlayStation or this or that, and they're so discontent.
11:48
Daniel: Bro.
11:50
Mark: I have grandkids now, and you try to take an iPad away from a grandkid and they lose their mind.
11:55
Mark: That's like But I I have a similar story.
11:58
Mark: I was in this hut in Uganda and I walked in, and she, you know, it's like literally a mud hut.
12:02
Mark: And on the wall is a picture of Taylor Swift.
12:06
Mark: Like one picture of Taylor Swift.
12:07
Mark: And she loved that picture.
12:08
Mark: We walk into her house, that's all that there is.
12:11
Mark: She's literally sleeping on the mud, right?
12:14
Mark: That's she she has nothing except the sh dress that she's wearing that was ratty and you know, dirty.
12:20
Mark: And then on the wall is this Taylor Swift.
12:22
Mark: We walk in, we're Americans, and she's so glad that we're there.
12:25
Mark: She takes that one picture off the wall and tries to give us her picture of Taylor.
12:28
Mark: Like, no, we don't want you.
12:29
Mark: That's okay.
12:30
Mark: But the that you talk about being rich.
12:33
Mark: Yeah, yeah.
12:33
Mark: You know what I mean?
12:34
Mark: Yeah.
12:34
Mark: And she was so filled with joy.
12:36
Mark: Yeah.
12:36
Mark: So grateful, you know, just love the Lord.
12:39
Mark: Yeah.
12:39
Mark: And and we she wanted to give us the one thing that was valuable to her.
12:43
Mark: I had a similar experience, and we just mentioned to the people that lived there, hey, we're praying for you.
12:50
Mark: And they were like, We're we're praying for you.
12:53
Mark: You get and literally mentioned, like, you guys have so many distractions, you know, and just they they didn't want we were praying for them to be more like uh, you know, be economically sound and stuff.
13:05
Mark: And they were that was like, we don't want that.
13:07
Mark: We hope that you guys become impoverished so that so that you can know the Lord more.
13:14
Daniel: Well, and that's that when you talk about the the divided mind, you know, that divided loyalty.
13:19
Daniel: Yeah.
13:20
Daniel: Um, I think today the enemy does that th through distraction.
13:24
Daniel: It is our mind is so distracted.
13:26
Daniel: It used to be that he was trying to destroy us.
13:29
Daniel: It used to be he was trying and that's still how he operates, but uh or he was trying to disqualify us or discourage us.
13:37
Daniel: But I think distraction is his his greatest tactic today.
13:41
Daniel: And and we're we are dyst distracted people.
13:44
Blake: Yeah.
13:45
Daniel: And if we're distracted, then we're we're not uh being productive for the Lord, that's for sure.
13:50
Blake: Let's let's name some of the distractions.
13:52
Blake: So our devices, screens, obviously.
13:56
Blake: Yes.
13:56
Mark: I mean we talked about last week's sports.
13:59
Blake: Sports.
13:59
Blake: Um Especially in the fall.
14:01
Daniel: It's constant entertainment.
14:02
Daniel: Entertainment.
14:03
Daniel: Entertainment, yeah.
14:06
Blake: Yeah.
14:07
Mark: I mean, I think we uh we kind of touched on it last week too, a little bit, but I mean, even kids can be a distraction if if you make your kids your God idol, you know, idol.
14:16
Mark: Yeah.
14:17
Mark: I mean, even so even a blessing can become a distraction.
14:22
Blake: Yeah.
14:22
Blake: Fitness people can make their bodies something that they only think about, right?
14:29
Blake: Focused on the flesh, right?
14:31
Blake: There's all kinds of things that we can be obsessed with on in this world when the Lord wants us to be, you know, focus your mind on the things above, except set your mind on the things above, like being so there's this quote from D.A.
14:45
Blake: Carson.
14:46
Blake: He said that stretched faith develops perverance, perseverance, and perseverance is necessary if you're to become mature.
14:52
Blake: And so you think about this the way we strengthen ourselves is because of perseverance.
14:58
Blake: And so what are ways in y'all's lives that you've had to realize, gotta are you are you pushing, are you am I having to sit under the resistance of this weight right now because you're growing something, you're asking me to persevere through something?
15:11
Blake: And you know, is there something in your life that you've experienced that with?
15:16
Daniel: Well, our first three years in Costa Rica were really hard, really difficult.
15:20
Daniel: I mean, if I was a youth pastor in South Carolina prior to going down there at year three in Costa Rica, if my pastor would have offered me my job back, I would have taken it.
15:29
Daniel: Yeah.
15:29
Daniel: I was ready to go.
15:30
Daniel: It was just a tough season.
15:32
Daniel: It was tough, it was hard.
15:33
Daniel: I remember that people had spoken over us.
15:36
Daniel: We had the we felt like the Lord had confirmed some things in his scripture that he had um immeasurably more than we could ask or imagine, that he was going to do a great thing.
15:44
Daniel: And we were just waiting on it and we were getting discouraged and thinking, maybe we we just missed it somehow.
15:51
Daniel: And um, but I know that if we hadn't experienced those three years of just really difficult, tough tri uh trial times, we wouldn't have experienced the next 15 years of prosperity.
16:02
Daniel: What God has done in the last 15 years of our time there has been incredible.
16:06
Blake: I'm proud of you for being there 20 years.
16:08
Blake: A lot of missionaries leave the field early on.
16:12
Blake: And so to make it through those first three, but then five, not 20 to be.
16:17
Blake: You've really you talk about perseverance, right?
16:21
Blake: And but and now his church, I don't know if you know this, but Horizon's running like 500.
16:26
Blake: The school, how many kids are in the school?
16:28
Blake: About a hundred students.
16:29
Blake: That is amazing.
16:30
Blake: How many teachers now?
16:32
Blake: Oh man, probably twenty staff with us.
16:35
Blake: And then you said fifty-two men are in the
16:38
Daniel: Finca de Esperanza, the Farm of Hope.
16:40
Daniel: It's a one-year discipleship program.
16:43
Mark: Yeah, tell us about that.
16:44
Daniel: Um it's it's something we've had a heart for for years.
16:46
Daniel: We started uh feeding the homeless in the in town probably 10 years ago.
16:51
Daniel: And um just every week ministering to them, wishing we could do more, seeing the need for more.
16:57
Daniel: And uh a couple years ago, the Lord allowed us to buy a 500-acre farm, or actually it was given to us 500-acre farm.
17:04
Daniel: And on that uh farm we were able to um build a couple homes.
17:08
Blake: And our church was a part of that.
17:10
Daniel: Yeah.
17:10
Daniel: Your church came down, actually did a uh a Christmas uh offering.
17:14
Daniel: Yeah.
17:15
Daniel: And I remember your goal was fifteen thousand dollars to help us buy a dorm.
17:19
Daniel: We accidentally Well, you called me and said, Hey, um, we didn't raise fifteen thousand dollars.
17:24
Daniel: And I'm like, hey, that's all right.
17:25
Daniel: You know, like whatever is still a blessing.
17:27
Daniel: And you're like, we actually raised $30,000.
17:29
Daniel: And uh and we're gonna send a team of guys down there to help you build it.
17:33
Daniel: And you guys did it.
17:34
Daniel: It's been amazing.
17:35
Daniel: Yeah.
17:36
Daniel: So there's 52 guys there.
17:37
Daniel: We have over 20 guys that have finished the one-year program, still walking with the Lord, walking in sobriety.
17:43
Daniel: Yeah.
17:44
Blake: That to me is the definition of persevering through, right?
17:48
Blake: You're watching people growing through their hardest seasons of life, facing demons.
17:53
Daniel: Yeah, and and finding freedom.
17:55
Blake: Right.
17:55
Daniel: They they were in bonds.
17:56
Blake: Battling addiction.
17:57
Daniel: Yeah, yeah.
17:58
Blake: Yeah, yeah.
17:58
Blake: That's got them like by the strongholds, you know, like Yeah.
18:03
Daniel: But a big part of our focus, like I said, it's a disciple.
18:05
Daniel: We don't call it a rehab, we call it a discipleship center.
18:08
Blake: Oh, wow.
18:08
Daniel: And uh because that's we use the teen challenge curriculum if you're familiar with that.
18:13
Daniel: It's a really great um one-year discipleship program.
18:17
Daniel: And uh, as we walk through that with them, we find that our our focus is not behavior modification, our focus is transformation.
18:25
Daniel: Yeah.
18:25
Daniel: Because that's the thing is is sobriety is a byproduct of a faith in Christ.
18:30
Daniel: As they really truly learn to walk with Christ, they find sobriety is a byproduct of that.
18:40
Blake: You know, um this reminds me of a story.
18:44
Blake: I'm not sure I should tell this or not.
18:46
Blake: Here we go.
18:47
Daniel: Well, uh we were saying before, when in doubt, leave it out.
18:50
Daniel: And I remember telling him that one time, and he said, Well, I always had this, I thought the story was when in doubt, try it out.
18:56
Daniel: So here it goes, I'm sure.
18:59
Blake: Yeah, that's about right.
19:00
Blake: I am famous for messing up my words.
19:03
Blake: Yeah, I was I was thinking about this guy named Alan.
19:08
Blake: He came, he was working for me.
19:10
Blake: I had a business that would hire homeless addicts and they'd come and work for me at Legacy.
19:15
Blake: Yeah.
19:15
Blake: And he stole about a thousand dollars worth of tools from me.
19:19
Blake: And um, I knew it was him.
19:22
Blake: And then he didn't show up anymore.
19:25
Blake: He he just left.
19:26
Blake: And so I was like, no, no, no, this isn't how this is gonna work.
19:31
Blake: I've got way too much invested in this cat.
19:34
Blake: You know, like I've been porn into him for years.
19:36
Blake: So I went to his house and I'm like, Alan, I love you.
19:42
Blake: I know you stole from me, and I still want you on my team.
19:46
Blake: I know you have my compressor and my my guns, my I know I know you probably already hawked it and made money for it.
19:55
Blake: It's okay.
19:55
Blake: It's all right.
19:57
Blake: I love you.
19:58
Blake: I want you to come back to work for me because the way I see it, I have a thousand more dollars invested in you.
20:04
Blake: And I I want you to receive grace.
20:06
Blake: I want you to understand how much I love you, and I want you to know I'm not done with you.
20:10
Blake: Just because you messed up and you stole from me doesn't mean you get to walk away.
20:13
Blake: You know what I mean?
20:15
Daniel: Yeah.
20:15
Blake: And I think that's that's what it looks like to say, yeah.
20:18
Blake: You know, you can become bitter, and I can hate you, take you to court, and I can fight you, and we're gonna make this right.
20:25
Blake: You know, you're gonna do it and you can't steal from me, you can get bitter.
20:28
Blake: Or we can take the circumstance and go, no, we're gonna make this better.
20:32
Blake: And I'm gonna let you know how much I love you, and I'm not done with you, right?
20:36
Blake: Because I think most people you know treat people like trash.
20:39
Blake: You're worthless, and just throw you away.
20:41
Blake: But man, I I wasn't about to do that, right?
20:45
Blake: And so it comes down to knowing a human is more important than money.
20:50
Blake: Money can go away, but humans are eternal.
20:54
Blake: And if you treat them like they actually are, the the value of you know God's tr greatest treasure, then you're not gonna be you wiped out when some some somebody steals from you or they do something awful to you or say something bad about you.
21:07
Blake: You know, you're just like, it's okay.
21:09
Blake: It's all right.
21:10
Blake: I love you anyway, and we're gonna persevere through this together.
21:13
Blake: So, you know, God t tests our faith, but he never tempts us to sin.
21:18
Blake: Those that's part of the thing, is like it's not God that's doing this.
21:21
Blake: And when you start realizing this is just the world that I live in, this world is all filled with temptation, there's hooks everywhere, and the enemy's always trying to make something that looks good, and it it, you know, advertising pleasure, this is what I said in the sermon, but while hiding the cost.
21:36
Blake: And so you go after something, you bite into the apple, and you realize this thing's got me.
21:42
Blake: I'm not in control of it, it's in control of me, whether that's an addiction, you know, or you something in your flesh that you can't control.
21:49
Blake: And so he he goes pretty heavy into anger.
21:52
Blake: And I want to talk about anger for a little bit because it clearly hit a nerve with our church.
21:57
Blake: I got several emails from people talking about.
21:59
Blake: How anger in their house has been, you know, so prevalent that they lose it, they fly off the, you know, they can't control their mouths.
22:07
Blake: And the Bible talks about when you can't control your mouth, your religion is worthless.
22:14
Blake: And so I I think it's significant that we learn to rein it in.
22:18
Blake: Get control of your tongue.
22:20
Blake: Stop speaking without thinking, right?
22:23
Blake: And that's something I think our culture, especially when they're keyboard warriors, they just type such awful things and say you just attack, attack, attack.
22:32
Blake: And it's so disgusting and vile the way that we speak so poorly of other humans.
22:37
Blake: So do you guys have some like, yeah, I've experienced somebody yelling at me and I was in the middle of this fight or something happened, and you had to realize it like, man, they have no control right now.
22:48
Blake: They've lost it, you know.
22:50
Blake: Have you ever experienced that?
22:52
Daniel: No, I I grew up in a home that was very loving.
22:55
Daniel: I I can never think of, I can't remember at one time my parents yelling at each other.
22:59
Daniel: Wow.
23:00
Daniel: But I will say my dad um struggled with encouragement.
23:06
Daniel: And so where the words weren't angry and stuff, we never felt that like this was good enough or this was.
23:13
Daniel: And so I would say in my parenting, I've tried to um encourage my boys and give words of affirmation.
23:21
Daniel: I remember a guy, I was visiting a rehab up in Lynchburg, Virginia called Eagle's Nest.
23:28
Daniel: Uh, great program.
23:29
Daniel: If if you know anybody struggling an addiction here, that that would be a great opportunity, a great chance for them, is at Eagle's Nest up there.
23:37
Daniel: And uh they have a professional painting company.
23:40
Daniel: So after the men have been in the program for a bit, they put them to work in this painting company.
23:45
Blake: And we have a similar program in town called Better Way.
23:48
Blake: They do the same kind of work.
23:50
Blake: There's all kinds of stuff that they do.
23:51
Daniel: I met some of them here at church one time.
23:53
Daniel: Yeah, great.
23:54
Daniel: Yeah.
23:54
Daniel: And uh and so this guy, he told me his story.
23:58
Daniel: He's in leadership there now.
23:59
Daniel: He's been sober for years.
24:00
Daniel: And he said his breakthrough was one day he was painting a room.
24:04
Daniel: A guy walked in and he said, Sit down on that bucket right there.
24:09
Daniel: He said, I sat down and he looked around and he goes, You paint this room by yourself?
24:13
Daniel: And he goes, Yeah.
24:14
Daniel: And he goes, This is amazing.
24:16
Daniel: You are a really good painter.
24:18
Daniel: And he said, I broke down in tears.
24:21
Daniel: He said, No one's ever, in my whole life, in all like all 25 years of my life, no one had ever told me I'd done anything good.
24:28
Daniel: He said, I'd heard the opposite, that I was useless, that I was worthless, that I was good for nothing.
24:33
Daniel: And he said, for the first time I felt valued.
24:36
Daniel: And he said, those words built me up and got me to where I am today.
24:41
Blake: Yeah, so it's not just a lack of control to blow up in anger, but it's also a lack of control of having words that are are like a scapula that can open up the heart and say the words that you know you're supposed to say.
24:58
Blake: And it's also disobedience and worthless if you choose not to say the words.
25:02
Blake: Like you might feel this prompting to say, tell her she's beautiful, or tell him, you know, that you're proud of him, or speak the words of life over your kids or your wife, or you know, somebody that you work with, and yet you choose to hold I think it's just as sinful to keep that to yourself.
25:18
Blake: I'm like, no, I'm not gonna say that.
25:20
Blake: You know what I mean?
25:21
Blake: Yeah.
25:21
Blake: Like, why not?
25:22
Blake: Why wouldn't you get an opportunity to speak life, you know, and give somebody that man, at least he sees me, you know?
25:30
Mark: One of my favorite things that your family does is around the table during a birthday, you know, you'll sp you'll sit that birthday person down and just speak life over them.
25:41
Mark: You tell us about.
25:43
Blake: Yeah, it's called the birthday game.
25:44
Blake: And so every single time it's your birthday, you come over to our house and we have a big meal, and then we, you know, before we open gifts, we think that the best gift that we can give is the words that we have to speak as a family over that person.
25:56
Blake: And we we just go around the room, 15 people now, all saying something to you about what they love about you and what they see in you.
26:03
Blake: You know, and it's like usually gifts of the spirit, like you know, we talk about the fruit of the spirit, gentleness, kindness, joy, love, peace.
26:10
Blake: This is what I see in you.
26:11
Blake: And you start saying that, and here's why.
26:13
Blake: Man, there's always tears.
26:15
Blake: Yeah.
26:15
Blake: And and now that there's so many of us, it's like it feels like that happens.
26:19
Blake: Uh we have a lot of birthdays.
26:21
Blake: Yeah.
26:21
Blake: Yeah.
26:22
Blake: Yeah.
26:22
Blake: And it happens, you know.
26:23
Blake: And it's beautiful because like, you know, it's happening for our three-year-old, like our our, you know, now our little, you know, kid grandkids that are getting to be a part of that.
26:33
Blake: And so, yeah.
26:34
Mark: I think about thinking just holding withholding words and encouragement that you feel led to say.
26:41
Blake: Yeah.
26:42
Mark: Um, I think about we, you know, we get to experience a lot of memorial services and funerals and and hear people's living with regret of I I wish I would have told them, you know.
26:53
Mark: Um and I feel like what what James is saying is then tell them.
26:57
Mark: Speak the life while they're while you can.
26:59
Mark: Say what you need to say, you know.
27:01
Daniel: And I don't know if I got that from you, Blake, but we've been doing that as a church staff as well when we celebrate birthdays.
27:06
Daniel: We'll do words of affirmation.
27:08
Daniel: I think I agree with you.
27:09
Daniel: I think it's the greatest gift you can give someone.
27:11
Blake: Yeah.
27:11
Daniel: And I think something for your listeners, even to to incorporate that, incorporate that into their own families.
27:17
Daniel: Um I agree.
27:18
Daniel: You know, to make that a part of their their own traditions.
27:21
Daniel: And I do it now.
27:22
Daniel: If I'm out to dinner and it's somebody says it's their birthday, I'll just we'll do it wherever we're at.
27:28
Daniel: I'll just say, well, hey, let's take a moment and just, you know, if everybody there knows this person.
27:32
Daniel: And and we've done that a lot.
27:33
Daniel: And there is you're usually some tears involved with that because people um appreciate you, you know, and value you, so.
27:41
Mark: Do you have any conversations from your past, like even if you were a kid where somebody spoke life to you that you remember?
27:50
Blake: You know what immediately came to mind was I've always thought I was dumb.
27:55
Blake: My dad always told me Earth the Blake, and he always kind of you're such an idiot.
28:01
Blake: You know, he um you're so stupid.
28:03
Blake: Like I heard those kind of things my whole life, and I've always thought that I'm ignorant.
28:07
Blake: Really, I thought I was dumb.
28:09
Blake: And I had an English teacher my senior year, and uh I had done bad in English.
28:17
Blake: I wasn't good at writing.
28:19
Blake: And she told me, Hey, listen, because I was being considering going to college, and she was like, You you probably shouldn't go to college.
28:28
Blake: You you're not everybody uh should go to college.
28:32
Blake: You your dad's a carpenter, you should probably go into some sort of construction.
28:37
Blake: That's okay.
28:37
Blake: Go into a a field.
28:39
Blake: And I remember thinking, Really?
28:43
Blake: You think I'm I can't make it through college, right?
28:46
Blake: And so when I graduated from college with like a 3.8 GPA, and I had studied at Johnson, and now now I publicly I all I do is write sermons for a living, and I, you know, speak for a living.
29:01
Blake: It's like sometimes I want to go back to my English teacher in my senior year.
29:08
Blake: Right.
29:08
Blake: But like, hey, I just wanted to show you, you know, it turned out you were wrong.
29:12
Blake: You know what I mean?
29:14
Blake: Because yeah, so it's not just the words that you you hear that are affirmation, yeah.
29:17
Blake: It's the words that but those words again didn't make me bitter.
29:21
Blake: It made me better.
29:22
Blake: It pushed me to go, really?
29:23
Blake: Okay.
29:24
Blake: That's how you how you think I'm gonna use that as fuel to, you know, help me, you know, get through college and become something.
29:32
Blake: And so not to say, I mean, I you I'm the first to say that trades are are awesome.
29:37
Blake: I you know, I put in trade schools around the world.
29:40
Blake: I a hundred percent believe in the gifts to get God's place in people, but he had a calling on my life to be a pastor, and I I knew that.
29:46
Blake: And so it's like, thank you, but uh no.
29:49
Blake: And so, anyways, I I think that sometimes we hear like a scripture or someone speak over us.
29:57
Blake: And and the Bible talks about in James 1, it talks about you hearing something is different from doing something.
30:05
Blake: So you listening and doing is what the last part of that chapter is about.
30:08
Blake: Yeah, and so it he refers to the Bible as a mirror.
30:12
Blake: A lot of times when we study the word of God, it shows you who you are.
30:16
Blake: And he's talking about like the goal isn't simply to admire what it says, but to change what it exposes.
30:22
Blake: And I told the story of my wife I'm at Big Mark, something on her face, like, honey, I tried to tell you to get it off your face, but you're not listening.
30:29
Blake: I think a lot of times we do that.
30:30
Blake: We'll hear the word of God, and then we're like, oh, that's such a good word, Pastor.
30:34
Blake: You know, I wish so-and-so would have heard it.
30:35
Blake: I wish, I wish, you know, but we don't go, what does that expose in me?
30:39
Blake: And are you gonna do something about what you just now you see this?
30:42
Blake: Right.
30:43
Blake: And so I think it did hit a nerve because a lot of people in our church were like, man, I needed to hear that about my mouth.
30:48
Blake: I blow up at my kids, I blow up at my, you know, I it's gotta change.
30:53
Blake: And so I love it when the word of God does that, because he goes after your mouth in this text.
30:57
Blake: He's like, really, you gotta learn to control your tongue.
31:00
Blake: If not, you're really just worthless.
31:03
Blake: And so are you convicted of something in your life?
31:05
Blake: You're like when you're reading this James chapter one, like I I heard that, but I haven't really changed that about myself.
31:11
Blake: Or you guys are just pretty much perfect.
31:15
Mark: I'm pretty perfect.
31:16
Blake: Pretty perfect.
31:17
Mark: Yeah, I used to be sarcastic a lot.
31:19
Mark: And I I was just thinking as you were talking, um I think sarcasm, it it literally means I think cut flesh.
31:27
Mark: Um don't look don't look it up if because I might be wrong.
31:32
Mark: Yeah.
31:34
Mark: But I I used to be sarcastic a lot, and I I I feel like I just I hold back that.
31:40
Blake: You know, I was with a missionary in Dominican Republic, and he said the thing I hate about Americans the most is that they constantly come here with their sarcasm.
31:51
Blake: And their sarcasm is so cutting, it's so mean, and it just tears each other down, and you think it's so funny and it's a knot.
31:57
Blake: And the more I'm here in Dominican, we don't do that.
32:00
Blake: And it and it's just so it's disgusting the way that Americans constantly cut at each other and rib at each other and just, you know, can be vile and mean and and uh do you experience that in Costa Rica?
32:12
Blake: Do you have that same thing?
32:13
Blake: I'm kind of thinking of like seeing the sarcasm because you kind of love the office.
32:19
Blake: You love sarcasm, don't you?
32:20
Daniel: Uh I can be I can be a bit sarcastic at times.
32:23
Daniel: Yeah.
32:24
Daniel: Like waiting to I I have to be careful because, you know, I have three boys and um I I will often, you know, we'll tell them to do something and they don't do it right away, or you know, I've asked them to do the dishes or whatever it might be.
32:38
Daniel: And and sometimes my way of responding is like, hey, you did an awesome job on those dishes over there.
32:44
Daniel: And that usually doesn't have the this the effect I want it to have.
32:50
Daniel: That doesn't motivate them to go do it.
32:52
Daniel: You know, if anything, I'm exasperating them, you know, which scripture talks about that.
32:55
Daniel: Yeah.
32:56
Daniel: And so I I I can relate to that.
32:59
Daniel: I need to do better on that for sure.
33:02
Blake: Yeah.
33:02
Blake: You know, one one thing that's clear is when we're obedient to God's word, um, it's it's learning to say, God, what are you asking of me right now?
33:12
Blake: Right.
33:12
Blake: And sometimes, sometimes as you're listening right now, maybe for you, it's you know that hearing the word of God and hearing him speak to you, there's sometimes the Holy Spirit will say something in a sermon that's completely different than what I'm preaching.
33:25
Blake: And it's like I have a conviction I've got to go make an apology.
33:29
Blake: Um, because I was in this service, the Holy Spirit showed up and I I have a confession.
33:34
Blake: I have something I need to tell my wife, right?
33:36
Blake: Or there's this has spurred me on to have a conversation with myself about my own lack of discipline.
33:44
Blake: You know, I I've had people say I completely changed my eating habits and I got healthy because I just felt like I was not taking care of the temple that I'm living in, right?
33:53
Blake: Sometimes I've seen people uh go r lavishly um generous and and like I I left the sermon and I went and I gave an enormous amount of money away.
34:05
Blake: That's what the spirit does.
34:07
Blake: Sometimes there's just like this the spirit will reveal something as a mirror and go, I have to go do this thing.
34:13
Blake: It it spy inspires you to go, you know, like you were saying, not just um there's there's a heart transformation, not just behavior modifications.
34:22
Blake: Like I not just go do something.
34:24
Blake: However, it is in the doing a lot of times that it's it it's what the obedience is fleshing out that in you.
34:31
Blake: Like God's asking something of me.
34:33
Blake: I know I have to do this thing.
34:35
Blake: And so there's always this battle, as we'll get it later on in James.
34:39
Blake: It's like faith without works is dead.
34:40
Blake: It's we're gonna go in into that.
34:42
Blake: The the works are the living faith.
34:45
Blake: And so sometimes when you get a chance to be obedient, it's your way of saying, God, I love you.
34:49
Blake: I'm gonna respond in as a living sacrifice, all that I have, all that I say, all my money, all of it's yours.
34:55
Blake: And so therefore I willingly lay it down before you so that I can, you know, be, you know, build your kingdom and not my own kingdom.
35:03
Blake: And so I I just love how James is so raw.
35:07
Blake: You know, it's the gospel in blue jeans, it's how you put your faith on, wear it around.
35:11
Blake: I like the idea of my my grandpa was a farmer in Kansas and he had all these overalls.
35:16
Blake: Like, so I I love thinking of my grandpa's overalls.
35:18
Blake: This is how you wear your faith.
35:19
Blake: They're dirty, it's got you know grease everywhere because he's been out getting the work done.
35:24
Blake: And I feel like James is like saying, here's how you here's how you get it done.
35:28
Blake: You know?
35:29
Daniel: It's the how-to book of Christianity.
35:31
Blake: Yeah.
35:32
Daniel: Well, I mean, everybody's bought a how-to book at some point in life.
35:34
Daniel: I remember, I think it was in the 90s, I was in college, and I bought my first how-to book, and it was How to Fix Your MG.
35:42
Daniel: I had a 62 MG midget.
35:43
Daniel: And that book should have been a one-page book that said don't.
35:46
Daniel: Just end it right there, you know.
35:49
Daniel: But I used that book was so worn.
35:51
Daniel: I mean, every page of that how-to book, I remember going back, how do I dial in these side draft carburetors?
35:57
Daniel: How do I do this?
35:58
Daniel: How do I do that?
35:59
Daniel: And James is that book for Christianity.
36:02
Daniel: How do I live out, practically live out my faith?
36:06
Blake: Yeah.
36:06
Blake: Yeah.
36:06
Blake: And he goes hard after the tongue.
36:08
Blake: I mean, he has a whole chapter, chapter three, is that all about that.
36:11
Blake: It's like your mouth, man.
36:12
Blake: You gotta learn to rein it in.
36:14
Blake: And so I don't know if any of you feel convicted about your words and whether or not your your tongue is speaking death or whether your tongue is speaking life.
36:24
Blake: But I just want to challenge you today to really pray about God.
36:28
Blake: Who in my life do I need to speak words of life over?
36:31
Blake: And who in my life do I need to apologize for the words that I spoke death over?
36:36
Blake: And so I just want to say to you, thanks for joining us today.
36:39
Blake: I hope this podcast was a blessing to you.
36:42
Blake: It's always an honor to get to help teach the scriptures, hopefully help them come to life in our in our world, in in today's crazy, busy, distracted world, to make the word of God living and alive, like a two edged sword that you're actually able to wear and teach.
37:02
Blake: And so hopefully that helped you today.
37:04
Blake: Thanks for joining us.
37:05
Blake: We love you wherever you are.
37:07
Blake: Have a great day.