Latest / Madison Church of Christ Bible Studies / Analog Faith in Digital Babylon | Jason Helton | Week 09 Contentment

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Analog Faith in Digital Babylon | Jason Helton | Week 09 Contentment · Madison Church of Christ Bible Studies

• 0:00
  Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to God. If you're ever in the Madison area, we'd love for you to stop by and study the Bible with us on Sundays at 5pm or Wednesdays at 7pm if you have questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, you can find us online@madisonchurch.org be sure to subscribe to this podcast as well as our Sermons podcast, Madison Church of Christ Sermons. Thanks again for stopping by. I hope this study is a blessing to you.
• 0:37
  Alrighty. Last week we talked about sexual intimacy. We talked specifically how scripture addresses this topic. How perhaps in the past when we have talked about this in church settings, we've not always talked about it well. And some of the challenges and some of the even the harms that have come from not fully understanding how God has designed our bodies, the way the brain works, the way we bond through things like oxytocin, vasopressin. We talk specifically about how we were designed to bond with other people sexually, but with a singular person, not with multiple people. And specifically the impact of pornography and lustful content, how it cultivates things that hijacks what God has designed and uses that in ways that God did not intend. So if you missed that, be sure to go back and listen to it. It is riveting content.
• 1:28
  Tonight we're going to move forward and we're going to talk about the idea of contentment. And this one may be kind of low hanging fruit when it comes to technology, particularly social media, but I think it's an important topic for us to discuss. We live in a time where food is generally in a surplus. Believe it or not, 100 years ago you didn't always just go to the store to get whatever food you needed.
• 1:53
  Five years ago we understood that there could be some tension when we went to get something that was not there. For instance, you walked down the toilet paper aisle and it was gone.
• 2:03
  At that time we had very young children, one in particular, who was at the age that didn't fully understand inflation and like just took toilet paper and ran everywhere. So you'd come home or you come downstairs and our bathroom was just rolled. It was an inside job. And then he realized, we realized quickly, it's like $45 worth of toilet paper there, buddy. What you doing?
• 2:25
  You understand crisis better when you've lived through it. And you also understand the idea of scarcity oftentimes when you have to live through that as well, scarcity is not comfortable. So we don't usually go looking for that in our life. But what I hope you've picked up on throughout the course of this quarter is that living in an age of excess does not inherently cultivate holiness in our hearts. In fact, it typically does the opposite. When you go to the, We've used this, I think, illustration before. When you go to the buffet, you're typically not more discerning about what you're going to eat, right? The more I'm there, the longer I'm there, the more I'm going to consume. Because that means that whatever I paid, the value rises, right? I paid this much money, I'm going to eat as much as I possibly can.
• 3:07
  Well, today, entertainment has shifted to be kind of the center of family life.
• 3:12
  In most homes. When you walk into the living room, what is the centerpiece of the living room?
• 3:18
  Big screen tv, right? Flat. Now that they're lightweight, they can mount on the wall. They are the most prominent piece of furniture, typically, as opposed to being centered around just the fireplace or even in previous generations, around the radio. As each new innovation that is based around entertainment has come about and become more accessible, it has also become more central to our life. To the extent now where if we don't feel like we. If we don't have access to streaming or we don't have something prominent like that from an entertainment standpoint, oftentimes we feel like something's lacking in our home. We can now get in our cars and access WI fi, access video entertainment follows us everywhere. And then when, I don't even remember where it was when these little guys became both the phone and. And an iPhone and a personal computer, right? That was the Steve Jobs introduction of the iPhone, that now you can listen to your music on the same device that you also talk to people.
• 4:15
  Once we got to the true smartphone era, the world had really changed in terms of how we view entertainment. Entertainment then became kind of the central idol, I think, to a lot of people's lives. And it happens in a way that we don't often identify. When we read in Exodus about children of Israel leaving, coming out of Egypt and Moses is up on Sinai, and we look at Israel and all of a sudden they're like, hey, let's take all of our jewelry, melt that down and create a golden calf. It's like, well, that seems ridiculous, right? That's A weird response to Moses being up on the mountain for a few days.
• 4:49
  But the way it actually manifests itself, that same heart in our lives, is, I would say, subtle, but really it's not. If it's the most prominent piece of furniture in our living room, that's not so subtle, but it's subtle in the sense that it's all around us. You can't go to a restaurant now without looking at a screen, right? Most restaurants also don't just have menus on screens. They have televisions all around the restaurant. So this idea that entertainment is always accessible is now a part of normal. And I think one thing that Satan likes to do is that he likes to use the tool of normalcy.
• 5:22
  He makes things that are not meant to necessarily be normal appear normal. And if they're normal, then they're comfortable or they're at least familiar. Again, sticking with Israel, their response to Moses, why did you bring us out of Egypt to die? Surely we could have died back in Egypt.
• 5:37
  They were saying we should have just gone back to being slaves to the Egyptians simply because it was more familiar. It was a more familiar place to die because in that moment, they couldn't write a script of how God would save them.
• 5:50
  So this idea of always wanting more, of always being able to be entertained, the world in which we live becomes kind of central to our thinking. And consumerism, I think, is a big part of that. We talked a little bit about this last weekend. We're not designed to be consumers of sexual pleasure.
• 6:11
  First Corinthians 7. Paul says, Husbands, your body's not your own. Wives is not your own. Right. Your body's not your own for the spouse. So the idea there is giving of self is really the pursuit of sexual intimacy. Well, in our spiritual lives, we're not meant to be consumers of pleasure, consumers of entertainment, consumers really of anything. The things of this world. We are meant to be givers of self. That's the Christlike element. That's the separation. So when we look at this idea of consumerism and contentment, when the App Store came out, within, like, three or I think within four years, there were over a million different apps available on both Google and Apple app stores. It's a lot of opportunities to be occupied or to be entertained and sometimes to be more educated. But typically, those other two carry a lot more weight and a lot more popularity. I don't know how many of you guys spend time on Facebook Marketplace, but Facebook has really become a little less social media and a whole lot more like marketing. Media. For a lot of us, the great thing about Marketplace is that you feel like you're almost always getting a deal because it's used and it's not full price, but it's always there.
• 7:17
  In the past you would have to look in the newspaper to find when the yard sales were coming about and you'd get up on Saturday morning early to beat all the other early birds to the sale. Well now the yard sale is always available to you, Amazon to a whole other level who sells everything generally at its own discounted price.
• 7:37
  There's a podcast series called in the Land of Giants and it's. It kind of goes through the history of Amazon, of Apple, of all these big tech companies. I would encourage you listen to that sometime to understand how each of these companies have evolved and particularly Amazon, how it has created its empire, how Bezos has removed any kind of hesitation from what we desire to then what we can have.
• 7:58
  And that's what consumerism does. That's what happens when we are filled with this idea that because I can access stuff all the time, then I should access stuff all the time. Luke 18:24 reads how difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God. Take care and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. In Luke 2:12:15, first Timothy 6, we read, now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing with these, we will be content.
• 8:36
  For some folks right now, this is kind of an interesting time to talk about this. In the midst of a furlough with the government shutdown, whenever the things that we have grown really comfortable in our life, our job, our paychecks, our vehicles, our homes, whenever those big structures, those kind of pillars of consistency are taken away, we get real scared.
• 8:57
  And maybe that same fear is similar to what Israel felt when they left Egypt, because there is a certain, there's a level of uncertainty there that really, it took away not our control, but I think our perceived control.
• 9:10
  And perceived control is really valuable. Right? That's why a lot of people spiraled during the midst of the COVID pandemic, because control was taken away from them in ways that had been real familiar and we didn't know how to deal with that. For a lot of people, emotionally it was really, really challenging. Not just the physical part of the virus, but the emotional part of that, of figuring out now what control would look like.
• 9:32
  Matthew, chapter six. Turn with me. There in the midst of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus has this to say about stuff.
• 9:45
  In Matthew chapter 6, verse 25, we read. Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you, by being anxious, can add a single hour to his lifespan? Why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
• 10:17
  But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown in the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, what shall we eat? What shall we drink? Or what shall we wear? For the Gentiles seek after these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. All these things will be added unto you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
• 10:45
  When we live in an age, well, essentially when we live in the midst of heaven on earth, there is this sense that mentality kind of creeps in, that we have everything that we could want and we have most everything, everything that we need and most everything that we could ever want or at least have access to that that then becomes. That kind of cultivates this expectation that we're supposed to.
• 11:07
  And what we're supposed to have from an earthly standard oftentimes contrasts with what God promises on the spiritual side of things.
• 11:14
  So this whole. We've talked about this phrase a lot of seeing through the. Exclusively through the lens of the gospel.
• 11:21
  Really difficult in an age of instant gratification. Oh, I think it'd be nice to have that. A couple of swipes and it's on its way to my house.
• 11:30
  That's really, really powerful. That's a lot of power for a person to have at all times, to have access to. How many of you remember growing up qvc?
• 11:41
  QVC was like the Stuff channel, right? Especially at late night.
• 11:47
  People made bad decisions buying random stuff on QVC late at night. Sometimes you're bored, sometimes it's A coping mechanism. The whole retail therapy thing, it's kind of a real thing. Right.
• 11:57
  Whenever there's a sale, there's this, again, sort of a cognitive reaction to that. Our brain releases some of those same pleasure hormones and chemicals that give us a dopamine rush. Oh, I got a good deal on that. Kohl's has built their empire on making us think that we're getting a great deal with all of these extra things stacked on top of it.
• 12:16
  So many retailers, they're after one thing, and that's to make money.
• 12:22
  Maybe two things to make money. And the other thing they're after is us, because without the consumer, they don't have money.
• 12:30
  And so this idea of being a consumer is dangerous. The idea that we are being consumed by some of these companies and these platforms in particular is also a really dangerous concept that we have to think very deeply on.
• 12:45
  What should make us content?
• 12:46
  What should bring contentment in the life of a Christian doing good?
• 12:53
  Why should that bring us contentment?
• 12:57
  Okay. Because that helps make us more like Christ.
• 13:00
  What else? I always think of Ecclesiastes 12:13, because that whole book was written by Solomon, who had it all. And it says at the end, like, let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is man's all. And that was after he had just gone through saying, everything is vanity. Yeah, do that a lot.
• 13:22
  The original Scrooge McDuck. Right.
• 13:25
  What is the famous quote that is at Rockefeller, he said, how much do you know? What's your wealth? And he gave this big number. Well, how much do you need? $1 more. I don't know if it's true or not. I've heard it quoted by a bajillion preacher, so probably not, but that idea is certainly relevant. Right. And Ecclesiastes would run counter to that. What else?
• 13:46
  Feel free to reference any of those passages or any other passages. Scripture speaking, scripturally speaking, What? Food and clothing. Food and clothing.
• 13:55
  That's all we need, really. Okay.
• 13:58
  Does it feel that way?
• 14:02
  We're on social media, and somebody's looking like they're having a great time with a lot more stuff. Yeah.
• 14:09
  Yep. We were looking for a car a couple of years ago. And of course, you know, when you're looking for a car, you see everybody else that has the car. Right. We ended up getting the vehicle, not the one that we necessarily wanted. And so our running joke between Ellen and myself was, anytime we see that vehicle, like, oh, look, they're in that car. Well, they look happy.
• 14:28
  And they do because they're all in Subarus and everyone in Subaru looks happy. But yeah, like there's this idea of kind of the grass is always greener. Right.
• 14:36
  So how does social media play into that?
• 14:40
  It makes people's best days look like they're normal. That's right.
• 14:44
  Yep.
• 14:45
  There's a phrase out there that you can't compare someone else's highlight reel to your behind the scenes. I think we've mentioned that a few times in here. What happens when you do that? What's that? Envy. Envy. And what is envy?
• 14:58
  Coveting things that other people have using all the Bible words. Juju. I like it.
• 15:03
  Coveting what everyone else has. And so what is coveting? That's all right. You can phone a friend or anyone else can jump in there. What does it mean to covet? I want it. Is it wrong to want things? I don't mean to question my mother in public. I apologize. I am now regretting my decision. 14 year old Jason was really excited. I got her. Now that's a horrible idea. That's a great answer, Mom. Anyone else want to add to that?
• 15:26
  Yes, Ms. Sandy.
• 15:28
  Wanting what's not yours. Wanting what's not yours. That's right. Also a good answer. Not as good as the first answer, but a good answer as well.
• 15:36
  Yes. Desiring what you don't have but someone else has to a sinful level. Like there's an unholiness to it. Right.
• 15:45
  But have you ever thought about what makes it unholy?
• 15:49
  What do you think? Okay. No appreciation for what you do have. Let's dig a little deeper. Or desiring it more than you desire to know God, to have a relationship with. Now we're digging desire something else more than your desire for God.
• 16:04
  Can you think? Yes, sir. Go ahead. You feel entitled.
• 16:08
  You feel entitled that I should have that because God should give it to me. Okay. Feel entitled. Do you think sometimes that sense of entitlement can also come from feeling like if they got it, then I should have it too?
• 16:22
  So where is the comparison then in that situation?
• 16:25
  I think the comparison comes from this idea of I should be successful because I'm doing all the right things and success looks like that. And if I'm not successful, then it's obviously not my fault.
• 16:37
  It's God's fault for not giving it to me. Even if you're actually successful, you're just comparing it to the wrong bar of success. Okay, I like it. Yes, sir. Too much focus on worldly things. How so?
• 16:49
  Well, normally the Thing that you're coveting is not something that is of the things above. It's putting a lot of focus and a lot of your energy into wanting something that isn't necessarily Christlike. Gotcha.
• 17:03
  So putting maybe our hopes, our desires, some of those deeper feelings in stuff as opposed to him.
• 17:12
  Not only that, to me, a part of covetousness is when I think that what someone else has is what I'm supposed to need as opposed to looking to God for my fulfillment. Right.
• 17:22
  When we think about Christ and we read through the book of Hebrews, we understand we don't practice the Sabbath the way that Israel practiced the Sabbath, because our Sabbath, our rest, is in Christ. We don't sacrifice bulls, goats, grain offerings, because our sacrifice is all in Christ.
• 17:41
  When we look at the birds of the air and we understand that God provides them plenty of grass and twigs and reeds to make nests like on our porches and poop all down in our front porch, right? He provides for them clearly an abundance of things that they need.
• 17:57
  But then we, instead of looking at the bird and realizing God has provided, God will provide for me. Our gaze goes beyond the bird to our neighbor across the street to their new car or truck or their pool or their boat or whatever, and we think, well, they look happy as opposed to man.
• 18:14
  Every time this car has broken down, God has somehow provided funds for us. I wish he'd just provide like an in house mechanic, but that's fine. It's his prerogative. You know, we're getting better at picking cheaper mechanics that do better work. That's good.
• 18:29
  It's a little bit of just a perspective change, right.
• 18:33
  Do you guys remember the image we showed a couple of weeks where it was like a checkerboard and you had the cylinder there that cast a shadow and, and one square looked darker than the other, but the colors were actually identical. Our perception, our brain perceived that differently. I think that's at play here as well. The idea of what we choose to see, it's more than just glass half full, glass half empty.
• 18:54
  It's a matter of God's provision or thinking earthly.
• 18:59
  I think those are the options. I think that's what we saw in Israel when they were looking at the Red Sea in front of them and there's this massive body of water.
• 19:07
  I get it. I'm not looking to swim across that behind me. I've got the largest army on the planet bearing down on me. That's a rock and a hard place, right? It's really difficult to figure out A narrative.
• 19:20
  No script at that point in human history would say that God was going to do what he did.
• 19:25
  That's kind of the point, is that we are too busy writing our own script. Our scripts will only be written using earthly things because that's what we've known in this life.
• 19:36
  That's why Jesus invites us into this death to those things.
• 19:40
  We're no longer entrusting the script writing process to ourself. We're putting it squarely in the hands of God, who is the author and the perfecter of our faith. Right? The alpha, the omega, the beginning and the end.
• 19:53
  We're somewhere in between.
• 19:55
  So it's like saying that we're going to base all of our opinion off of this movie, of this movie based off of 15 second scene. Well, there's no context if you're in the middle of the movie, right?
• 20:05
  Outside of Lucas, no one writes a story starting in the middle, you know, because there's no context for the story. That's a Star wars reference. That's as far as I go for Star Wars. That and Jar Jar Binks and then I lose all of you.
• 20:17
  When it comes to our own lives, though, a lot of times our contentment is based off of that moment as opposed to taking a step back. Walking by Faith has a much broader view. There's this phrase I use all the time called relationship equity.
• 20:33
  When you've known someone for a long time, you build relationship equity, right?
• 20:37
  For elders and ministers. I've been here for 18 years now, I've got almost two decades. What I would consider relationship equity between those two dynamics, right? Those two groups at your office, you would have that between you maybe and your co workers or you and your boss. And Mark would tell me all the time at the bank of America, they're. Their phrase is assume positive intent. That's another way of saying that when somebody does something that bothers you, frustrates you, disappoints you, angers you, lean into that relationship equity. Give them the benefit of the doubt.
• 21:10
  Assume positive intent. Don't just go in one direction of you were hurt. Ask questions.
• 21:16
  Go into Ted Lasso, right? Don't be judgmental, be curious. Asking questions is a good way to find the actual intent. When we go online, it's really hard to do that because it's so instant, because we get that cortisol rush going. Our eyes dilate, the blood is flowing and it's like being there in the garden when somebody's about to get Jesus and we want to take out Our sword and we want to cut off the ear.
• 21:37
  But every time, if we were to be in the Garden, just like his followers, Jesus would have said, no, that's not how I fight this battle.
• 21:44
  My kingdom is not of this world.
• 21:47
  So our contentment cannot be found in the things of this world. And that's a really hard thing to do, particularly in a wealthy neck of the woods, Madison in particular. Madison City, Madison County, North Alabama. Like there's access to wealth here that other parts of the world can't dream of.
• 22:05
  Oftentimes it's good for us to get out of town and not to go for a comfortable relaxing vacation, but to stretch us a little bit. We actually don't even have to leave town for that.
• 22:15
  There's a book I read one time where a guy described that oftentimes the most broken are found in the the shadows of the empire. And think of New York City, this big massive wealthy island, right? Or peninsula, and then Manhattan. And if you walk down Manhattan, you can find people that absolutely do not make millions of dollars, that live on the streets.
• 22:36
  So there's people among us also that don't make a whole lot of money, but that live in our community.
• 22:43
  We tend to always compare ourselves to the next level up as opposed to just simply comparing ourselves. Well, there's no comparison. There's not meant to be a comparison.
• 22:53
  That's the struggle real quick just to pick on her because it's fun. She's very sweet. Anybody remember this wonderful lady, Marie Kwondo? Several years ago she had, she had a TV show and a book to help people get rid of the clutter in their life. And what was her, what was her phrase?
• 23:09
  Does it, is it what?
• 23:12
  Spark joy, Right? I'm here to tell you she was wrong. Alright?
• 23:17
  Just kidding. She was actually great. And she also built an empire off of telling people to throw their stuff away. Her whole thing was if this item didn't really spark joy, then you don't need it in your life. But I think what the Bible tells us is that the stuff is not necessarily supposed to spark the joy. Anyway.
• 23:32
  I know that's not where she went with that, but I do think sometimes we kind of lean into that. I am very nostalgic and I can find an emotional attachment with, with everything from the past, right? Like a cup from third grade. Well, I watched Alabama game and they won when I had that cup in my hand. So there's value to that. Like they need me, right? I didn't drink from it when they played fsu. So I'm a part of the team here. Like, we can assign some value to things that goes beyond just the stuff. It's a container, it's a piece of plastic, it's got some ink on it. That's it. That's all it is. But I then ascribe this other relational value, and sometimes that can be dangerous because then the things that I value most in this world are not the relationships and the people or the experiences, but the stuff.
• 24:18
  The stuff will go away.
• 24:20
  Every piece of stuff that I've held in my hand in my lifetime can be blown away by a tornado, swallowed up by fire, can be tossed out into the ocean and be gone forever. So I cannot put my contentment, my happiness, my identity, my joy.
• 24:37
  Marie Gotcha. My joy into these things. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
• 24:44
  Infinite is not the same as eternal. We have access to infinite stuff today. You can go to Walmart every day for the rest of your life and likely find something to purchase that's not the same as eternal.
• 24:55
  You can't purchase eternity. Remember, Simon in the Book of Acts wanted to purchase basically the Holy Spirit, the gift of the Holy Spirit. You can't purchase eternity.
• 25:04
  It was purchased. You were the one being purchased by Christ, right?
• 25:08
  By his wounds, we are healed. And we have to keep. We have to keep that in the right context. When we talk about social media specifically, how does social media cultivate the fruit of the Spirit in your life? It can create joy. You know, it can create. When you see some great event that's happened, someone you know, that you love or whatever, and, you know, it. It helps, you know, you know, maintain those relationships. Okay, it can bring about peace. Yeah, that's right. So you could. You could see a positive message that brings you some comfort in a difficult moment. You could rejoice with someone else. You can. You can be informed about those things. That is that fair summary.
• 25:54
  Just repeating it so folks at home can hear. All right, what else?
• 25:57
  Sometimes when I'm on the road, I can connect the TV in the hotel to YouTube and they have videos where you fall asleep to like anywhere from three to eight hours of just miracles of Jesus or reading Scripture to you. It's just like a nice background, and it's nice to just kind of put you at peace and have that be blasting on your mind.
• 26:21
  Sort of Deuteronomy 6, right when you rise up and when you lie down. That's great.
• 26:26
  What's another way it cultivates the fruit of the Spirit?
• 26:30
  I think a lot of people Use social media to develop relationships with other people or to continue their relationship with other people. If it's someone that you don't see very often or maybe you're separated from them, you can sort of use social media as a way to like stay connected with them. Okay, so for connection or networking, maybe another word. The danger to me is when I become, I gravitate towards the conduit as opposed to what's on the other end. Right. Like, I don't really have a problem falling in love with the landline that was attached to the kitchen that had the 40 foot squiggly cord, you know, that you could talk on the phone in every room. No one seemed to really struggle with, with that relationship because to some degree it was stationary.
• 27:16
  But it was very clear that the value of that phone was having someone on the other end of it. Right.
• 27:24
  Well, with these guys, I think it gets a little bit more muddied because that phone only cried out to me when someone else was trying to get in touch with me. This cries out to me when robots want to get in touch with me or when people want me to spend money and, and not just the people that I know intimately in my life, not just the people that I have an actual relationship with, but all these other distractions.
• 27:47
  There is a difference. Again, the phrase we used the last couple of weeks is technology is a tool, but not all tools are created equal.
• 27:56
  I think there's a better way to go about understanding how we use technology, particularly our phones, in our life. This is, I think this is good for social apps. I think this is good for anything that you're looking to purchase and incorporate into your life. The very simple question of contentment is how does this cultivate the fruit of the spirit in my life?
• 28:17
  How does this make me more effective for the kingdom of God?
• 28:21
  How can I use this to share with other people? How does it make me more like Christ? Would God consider this like a need, a kingdom need, or would he consider it just something that I desire, something that I want? And that may be the most important question.
• 28:34
  If we can answer these questions honestly, I think a lot of times it will steer us in the direction of clarity, of how worked up do I need to get about not getting it, or is it worth my money to spend on those things? When it comes to being a steward of this life and of the stuff that God gives us, I don't think it's wrong for us to have stuff. I think we see in the first century lots of people that had Stuff in places.
• 28:57
  They shared that with other people. I think part of that is understanding stewardship versus being a consumer and ownership. Yes, sir.
• 29:04
  Bring connection. Social media can bring connection. Yep.
• 29:08
  It creates a conduit. Again, it creates the opportunity for that connection. Especially folks that aren't in the same area. Turn with me to First Samuel, chapter eight. And in First Samuel, chapter eight, we've got an interesting reaction from God's people.
• 29:25
  In verse four, it says, then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, behold, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. It's also very bold. You're old man now appoint for us a king to judge us like all the nations.
• 29:41
  But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, give us a king to judge us. And Samuel prayed to the Lord. The Lord said to Samuel, obey the voice of the people. And all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but that they have rejected me from being king over them.
• 29:55
  Verse 19. But the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel and they said, no, but there shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations.
• 30:07
  This is where I think that comparison looking over the fence, that the grass is greener or the TV is bigger or the car is newer or the house is nicer or. Or the whatever, fill in the blank.
• 30:20
  And social media in particular creates a constant drip of that. Like a morphine drip in the hospital where it's just rhythmic. Right. You don't even know that it's happening and it's still flowing through your veins. That's kind of what happens here when we can constantly peer over the fence.
• 30:35
  Everybody else is going to Disney, everybody else is getting the job promotion. Everybody else seems to have this, everybody else seems to have that. We start sounding like young children who say, well, everybody else gets to do that. Why don't I?
• 30:48
  That sounds like all the adults of Israel too. Well, they've got a king. Why don't we have a king? No, we reject your words, Samuel. Even though God's provided food, God's provided leadership, God's provided everything.
• 31:01
  The more we have, oftentimes, the more difficult it is to see how God has provided all that we need.
• 31:08
  What we want is not the same as what we need.
• 31:12
  It's a hard question. It's even harder when you have the opportunity to get whatever you want.
• 31:18
  I'll be honest, I struggled with this a lot when it came to us building a new building.
• 31:23
  I know that's been a big discussion for a long time. I've wrestled with that.
• 31:28
  Should we take money and send it to other churches that have no building that feels right? But we're growing here.
• 31:35
  At some point, someone built our building. Okay, this is, you know, I go back and forth all the time. That's a real inward struggle.
• 31:42
  And what I've discovered is it just kind of. It comes down to wherever the line is of what something costs and how you're going to use it. Stewardship wise value is sometimes really difficult to identify. I don't bring that up for us to debate the building necessarily. I bring it up to just share with you transparently. Like, I struggle with this. I struggle to.
• 32:03
  To buy stuff for myself.
• 32:05
  The problem is I don't struggle to buy stuff for myself. I struggle feeling good about it afterwards. Like, ah, that was, that was just what I wanted. And I do that too often. How are my kids perceiving that? My kids have grown up with more stuff than I grew up with. And I grew up with more than I could ever imagine.
• 32:20
  And it's not because we were just completely wealthy rich. It's because we just, we had access to stuff. Most of us have access to stuff and way more than we ever need to the point that we don't take that next step of taking what we have and are willing to share it.
• 32:35
  We've had a big study on the church over the last several weeks on Sundays. And one of the big focal points of that study is there was not a needy person among them. People that had property, sold that property. Now, maybe Jerusalem wasn't quite the property hotspot that Madison county has been over the last few years, but imagine selling a piece of property, you have acres of land that you sold not to then go build somewhere else, but simply to give that money to someone else who had need. That's a huge undertaking. That's a huge, I would say sacrifice because for me that would be also sacrificing whatever plans I had with that, whatever dreams I had of building on that land or farming that land or doing whatever, passing that land along to my next of kin. Instead, I'm giving it to someone, possibly even a stranger, who I've only met briefly while I was in this town for Pentecost. That was a huge moment.
• 33:27
  That's our example.
• 33:29
  That's the kind of sacrifice, that's the kind of selflessness, that's the kind of.
• 33:35
  That's the lens change. Right. You know, if you go to the eye Dr. Number one or number two, number one. Number two, you go back and forth like the lens has changed and it changes how you see the world. Well, our lens has changed from earthly to spiritual. The physical is at war with the spirit.
• 33:50
  We will always side with the spirit. We have to because we've died to self. We've died to our own earthly carnal desires.
• 33:59
  This is a hard thing to understand when you go online. The other challenge here is when feedback like comments and likes and shares and hearts and all of that becomes a currency of approval. What does it do to our identity and belonging?
• 34:13
  Remember the three questions that we identified? Well, actually the Fuller Youth Institute identified as three questions that every teenager is seeking answers. Who am I? Where do I belong? What is my purpose? Identity, community, purpose.
• 34:26
  Somewhere along the way, algorithms changed and when the retweet button became an option on Twitter and when the like button became a thing on Facebook.
• 34:35
  Emotionally, collectively, our society took a big hit.
• 34:41
  And we've been in the midst of this calibration period to try to figure out now why are we trying to get all of our self esteem from other people?
• 34:51
  Well, it's because this line of identity has been blurred.
• 34:55
  When you say your identity is in Christ, it's a great thing to say. That's an easy thing to say. It's a really hard thing. Matthew and I were talking about this today over coffee. It's like, what does that mean that your identity is in Christ?
• 35:08
  If we've been telling our teenagers that over and over again, have we gone beyond just saying the statement and understanding what it means to die to self so that you may live as Christ?
• 35:19
  The life which I now live in the flesh, this physical, earthly life, I now live by the faith of the Son of God who loved himself and gave himself for me. The stuff I have is not my stuff, never was. It's what things in my life that God has blessed me with to bless other people.
• 35:33
  And if there's not a way for me to bless other people with it, then perhaps it's worth considering that maybe it's more of a stumbling block from the other guy as opposed to a gift from God.
• 35:45
  This is another one. It's a difficult one because should I buy the 50 inch or should I buy the 75 inch? Obviously the 75 inch, but why?
• 35:53
  What's the difference? Well, a little bit of money.
• 35:56
  Is it worth it? I don't know. These are hard questions. The fact that we can create our own little kingdoms, make them nice and tidy and comfortable, we can control the weather inside them, right? Make it Hotter, make it colder.
• 36:07
  We turn lights on, turn lights off again. How technology kind of it cultivates this like God likeness in humanity when we allow it.
• 36:18
  These are the hard questions that I think we have to wrestle with. But then we have to put them into action. They can't just stay philosophy. My fear is that the answers are actually a lot, a lot more.
• 36:30
  The answers are a lot more sobering than I want them to be.
• 36:34
  I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, including having less.
• 36:40
  The easy thing for Christ was to lash back out to those who were coming to arrest him. The easy thing to do on the cross was to never get up there in the first place. The easy thing to do was to settle and take the shortcut of turning those stones into bread in the desert when Satan gave him the opportunity. The thing about Jesus is that he had the opportunity to, to do all of that at all times, and yet he chose the lesser of those options.
• 37:09
  Sometimes it's really hard to choose the lesser of the options because everybody else has it and you choose not to have it. As a parent, right now, many of us are choosing for our kids not to have devices, to not have access to the Internet. Well, the hard thing there is not just telling them no, but understanding what they're feeling at school when they feel like they're the only ones.
• 37:31
  Israel felt that same. Like we want what they have.
• 37:34
  I get it, but it's not what's best for you.
• 37:37
  God then allowed them to have what they wanted and it was not what was best for them.
• 37:42
  This is the paradox, this is the challenge that we live in.
• 37:46
  We won't get through all of this. But this is a report I ran across.
• 37:51
  This one is from the American National Family Life Survey. So it's a little bit dated, it's back in 2021, but Gen Z reports more frequent feelings of childhood loneliness than any other generation. So if you look at this particular chart, Gen Z, the dark black, is at 12:16. It kind of goes those different, excuse me, the ratings there. So the silent generation, the older you get, basically the less you feel lonely at a younger age. So the younger age for silent generations in those first early years, those are much smaller, little. They're squares, they're not rectangles. For Gen Z, it's almost spread evenly. Of course, they're not in their 60s anymore yet.
• 38:36
  But what you see here is that as we get younger with each generation, loneliness is cultivated sooner in life.
• 38:45
  That's the challenge when you're at the school lunchroom and you feel like nobody's sitting beside you.
• 38:52
  That can feel very, very lonely. You can feel very, very isolated. And if that happens repeatedly, that forms you and shapes you.
• 38:59
  But when that loneliness of the lunchroom now follows you home and on the bus and in your bedroom and wherever you go through your phone, of that fear of missing out. The FOMO stuff is a real deal, and it's not limited to kids. Kids just have fewer tools in their toolbox to deal with that than adults do. But adults still don't deal with it great, as evidenced by people doing really horrific things to other humans, oftentimes because they themselves feel isolated and alone.
• 39:28
  In the church, in God's kingdom, in the body of Christ, we don't have this disembodied member.
• 39:34
  All of my body parts are attached to me. I don't have a pinky just floating out here, right?
• 39:39
  I'm not halfway headless. What's his name from Harry Potter, where you have these appendages like, we are all connected. Our bodies are all one.
• 39:48
  In the church, though, oftentimes we kind of move as these little groups, very similar to the lunchroom, cafeteria. Growing up, that's not the way it's supposed to be. We have a perfect example of that in the Book of Acts. Well, Galatians, where it goes into more detail. Paul says, I confronted Peter because Peter did that. Peter separated himself from this group in favor of that group.
• 40:11
  And when he did that, he undermined everything that he had been preaching, everything that Jesus died for, everything that Paul had been teaching. And so Paul gets into his face. To me, this is the King Kong Godzilla moment. Like these two stalwarts, right? These two very influential apostles. And Paul said, what are you doing, man? And of all places, Antioch.
• 40:31
  This beautiful, beautiful picture of ethnic diversity of age, diversity of Jews and gentiles coming together as the church.
• 40:40
  But when we find ourselves in these isolated groups and cultivating them, we have to fight against that. At a place like Madison, where we've got a lot of people, that's a wonderful thing.
• 40:50
  But we have small classrooms. And so by default, we have to kind of segregate when we gather outside of the auditorium, right? Even the auditorium, we have two worship services.
• 40:59
  That's not wrong. There's nothing about that, I believe that's wrong. But it does mean we have to then put more focus. We have to have a lot more observant eyes. We have to put forth more effort, more energy and more creativity to be in each other's lives. If I wanted to, I Could probably never speak to a member of the Young at Heart Connect group on a Sunday because their class is over there, my kids classes and my classes are over here.
• 41:24
  If I want to settle, I can do that. If I want to be content with separation, I can do that. But if I want to make sure that I am a part of the whole body, that my kids are connected to the whole body of Christ and have those other voices in their life, then I will take my kids and I will walk that direction.
• 41:40
  I don't have to walk super fast. They're not crazy fast either, right? You just got to be there. Right? You got to go and talk to them.
• 41:46
  We've got to put forth effort. Covid was difficult, but it was isolation, loneliness, it was sickness, it was death. We've all experienced those three things in different ways. It was all just packaged together. So we had to be more creative. We had to go out of our way more.
• 42:01
  A little bit more effort and energy.
• 42:03
  It's not too much to ask.
• 42:04
  I don't think when we settle for what the world offers, then we will have our reward. For this week, I want you to think about this question of what is community?
• 42:14
  What does it mean to belong?
• 42:16
  And then we're going to put that in the spiritual context. We've got a little bit more research to look at of kind of how people are feeling isolated directly as a result of social media, but specifically how the church can address all of the things that we've been talking about. We're changing our trajectory, trying to go more positive. We're still seeing the landscape for what it is. But understand that the gospel speaks to every bit of this because these are not generation specific questions. These are humanity issues. Let's bow and we'll be dismissed. Father, we thank you for the blessings you've given to us. We thank you especially for the stuff in our lives that you have equipped us with. Not just to be content, but then to use and to steward, to bless other people, to help other people to grow your kingdom and to introduce more people to who you are. Help us to never, ever, ever find our identity or our full satisfaction in the stuff of this world. Help us to understand why we have it and help us to leverage that to grow your kingdom and to glorify your name.
• 43:08
  We thank you for everyone in this room and in this building and those that are not here. Help us as Christians to be connected to one another, be devoted to one another, and to be devoted to you. Father, we love you and we thank you for hearing and answering our prayer tonight. In Christ's name. Amen.
• 43:21
  Love you guys. Have a great week. Thanks for joining us online.