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The God who gives Hope // Episode 50 // #Faith4TodayPodcast · #Faith4TodayPodcast

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The world is desperate for hope, and everyone is putting their
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trust somewhere. Some trust money, some trust
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control, some trust success. But today we're uncovering the
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truth that only one hope can truly satisfy.
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That's the hope found in Jesus Christ.
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We're talking about how greed quietly steals our trust in God,
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replaces it with fear, and chokes out the spiritual life.
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And how humility, surrender, and abiding in Christ restore our
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real hope. If you've ever felt anxious
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about your future or tempted to look to things instead of God, I
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think this episode is for you. Are you ready?
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Let's go. Hey, well, welcome to episode
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#50 man, we are almost one year into this podcast, the Faith for
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Today podcast. Welcome.
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My name is Matthew I'm your host and we are man we're we're we're
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we are coming up on a year of bringing you content almost on a
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weekly basis, releasing on Thursdays because our desire is
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to help you have faith today not just be inspired on a Sunday,
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but be loyal to him on on Thursday.
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And so man, we're jumping into a recap of a recent message We're
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going to share some bonus content then I'm going to
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respond to some questions that came in.
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This is what we do each week. And for those of you that are
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new around here, welcome if you've been listening for a long
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time and thank you. And regardless, would you make
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sure you're subscribed, share this with a friend, post this on
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social so that it helps the word get out.
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Because at the end of the day, we we all need encouragement and
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we all want to grow in our loyalty and faith in Jesus.
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And this week we are looking at the Advent theme of hope.
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And we had a panel of 2/3 of us and myself and then two other
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pastors, our 2O2 of our overseeing elders were in town
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and we shared the stage and just kind of talk through just what
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does it mean to have biblical hope?
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What does it look like? You know, our world really is
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crying out for hope. They're seeking answers,
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guidance, and comfort through all of our life challenges.
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However, there's only one true hope that can really satisfy the
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deepest longings. It's the hope found in Jesus
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Christ. In the ancient world, hope was
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synonymous with trust, offering a deeper meaning than our modern
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understanding. Our hope comes directly from
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God, who is unchanging and trustworthy.
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And because God has made promises of care, protection,
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guidance, and direction, we can trust him for a better tomorrow.
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Importantly, this hope is a gift, a gift that the devourer
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loves to wreak havoc upon. We discovered this hope through
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Scripture, learning to believe in God's promises and simply
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because he's made them. Our hope is fundamentally about
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trusting God's word and God who gives the hope.
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But greed robs us of hope. Greed steals away our hope, but
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by creating a destructive cycle of fear and misplaced trust that
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undermines our spiritual well-being, greed has a way that
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to fundamentally and and misdirect our love that turns
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our passion away from what is truly valuable.
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It replaces meaning. It replaces meaningful
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connections with meaningless material possessions that cannot
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love us in return. Greed makes us misplace our love
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when when people lose trust in God's sovereignty and love, they
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become insecure about their futures and their attempt to.
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And then we attempt to control that future by grasping onto
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possessions, which becomes a substitute religion, providing a
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temporary sense of meaning and security.
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Greed friend frantically tries to eliminate all uncertainty by
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constantly vigilantly hoarding and and despising the
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uncertainty of the future. Whereas genuine hope requires
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vulnerability and a reliance on God's grace.
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Despite being socially accepted, greed has a way of
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catastrophically damaging well, ultimately causing people to
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trade their humanity for quote UN quote, mere bubbles destined
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to pop. The cure for greed is
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reconnecting with God, shifting our focus from possessions back
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to the divine Giver, and recognizing that history belongs
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to the Lord and His promise of salvation will satisfy the human
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desires in the fullness of time. Our hope is a gift from God
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causing us to trust in God. And that's what we talked about
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on Sunday. Let me share just a couple
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thoughts and ideas from some bonus content, some stuff that
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maybe I didn't get to share in the message.
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It was a fantastic time getting to hear from Pastor Dale Jenkins
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and Pastor Brandon Dearman. Just share some of their
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perspective, some of the things that God has taught them about
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hope and trust and believing in him and, and relying on him.
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And you know, we talked about windows of heaven.
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We talked about the blessing of God, how his face is towards us,
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how ultimately he draws us close to him.
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All of these things are really good.
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And what I want to say is maybe just point out that any gift
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from God can become distorted and it guides us then away from
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God. There are things that can occur
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in our lives that lead us to a place where we we stop longing
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for eternity and we actually shift and we start longing for
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the things of earth. In fact, First Corinthians 7 is
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an interesting thing. The apostle Paul talks about the
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gift that is marriage and any gift that God gives us can
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become an idol that distorts our love and causes us to misplace
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our trust. And our hope in God gets kind of
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eerily linked to the circumstances of our world.
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But hope in God is not linked to circumstances of our world.
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And in fact, first Corinthians 7.
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This is what I was saying. The apostle Paul is talking
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about the gift that is marriage, and he says something
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interesting in First Corinthians is and he says, here's the thing
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about marriage is that it's it can easily cause you to stop
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longing for eternity and stop longing for a renewed hope and a
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life. And you get fixated and consumed
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with what happens here on on the earth, because a good husband is
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one who is really does care about their their spouse, right?
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He loves his wife, he loves his family and and that becomes a
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high, high priority as it should.
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But Paul warns and says, man, this is maybe why some of you
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ought to just ask for the gift of singleness because you won't
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be tempted to to to hold and long for the things of the
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earth, because there's a a satisfaction of relationship
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that comes from God and you begin to long and have a have an
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easier time perhaps grasping eternal, eternal perspectives.
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I think about myself. It's some of the times I get
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most consumed about money and I and I start trying to trust in
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my effort or I start trying to trust in the economy, my bank
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account. It it's because I have people
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that I care about that I'm trying to take care of and it's
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easy to to fix my thoughts on what I need to do and how I need
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to and, and and stop trusting in God.
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In fact, you know, just in the idea of marriage, one of the
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shocking things that for many people, we, when you read the
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words of Jesus, when he says in the next life in heaven that
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there are, we are neither married nor given in marriage.
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And for those of us who are married, married, it's really
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hard for us to think of life unmarried and the eternal life,
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like it's, it's been such a thing that we've, we've, we, we
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are so integrated and consumed by it in our life that, that our
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thoughts of eternal significance and the things that are eternal,
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it's, it's really hard to not equate them to the things that
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we're seeing here and now. Like, how is this even better?
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And, and of course, there's, for a lot of us, it's the, the
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physical intimacy that we experience.
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Like how is that kind of longing and satisfaction going to be
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found? How are those desire?
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What, what, what about those desires?
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So they're not even going to be here because those, those
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intimate desires and physical desires that we have, like those
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cravings, they, they seem to be given by God too.
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And so like how, how in the next life are those not even going to
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be here? And Paul actually says in first
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Corinthians 7, like marriage can cause you to stop longing for
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eternity and to put more stock in the physical earth here and
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now than is healthy and necessary.
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Matthew chapter 13 and verse 22, Jesus is telling the the story
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of the parable of the sower, and he says that some of the seed
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that's soon among the the soil of thorns is that it's the one
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who hears the word. But the worries of this age, the
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the, the physical, the the here and the now, not the eternal,
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but the worries of this age and the deceitfulness of wealth
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choke out the word and it becomes unfruitful.
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Any gift from God, financial, relational, all of the gifts
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that God gives to us are are to be stewarded.
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Your marriage is a stewardship. Children are stewardship.
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Your skills and ability are stewardship.
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Finances and resources that are in your care or in your
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possession. Those are stewardships.
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And everything that we steward is something we give an account
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to God for how we use them, how we handled them, how we manage
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them for his name's sake on this earth.
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And anything from God that is a gift from him can become
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distorted in a way that we, we, we start trusting more in that
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and it guides us away from, from God.
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And God doesn't want us to be guided away.
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He he wants us to think about him to see him to love, love him
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in in Matthew chapter 6, when Jesus says in in the heading in
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my Bible, I want to, I want to look at it here real quick,
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because in Matthew chapter 6, it, it Jesus is kind of talking
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in the Sermon on the Mount and he's talking about don't be
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worried or don't be anxious about anything.
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But in everything like, like men trust the Lord to take care of
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you because if he takes care of the lilies of the field and the
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birds of the air, he's going to take care of you.
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He's going to clothe you, he's going to feed you, he's going to
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house you. But the beginning of it, that
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section in verse 25 right before Jesus says, therefore, I tell
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you, do not worry about your life.
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Don't worry, don't be anxious. The heading in the CSB says the
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cure for anxiety in in other words, the cure for anxiety is
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is not worrying, but trusting in God and and one of the ways that
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we do that is by seeking the Kingdom of God first and and in
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the before that in Matthew 6. Let's see what is it verse verse
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22. Jesus says this.
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He says the eye is the lamp of the body.
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If your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of
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light. If your eye is bad, your whole
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body will be full of darkness. So if the light within you is
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darkness, how deep is that darkness?
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I think when it comes to some of the realities of our life, you
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know, we feel that deep, deep darkness.
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Isaiah 9. This is kind of the the main
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text from Sunday Isaiah 9 in a light shined in the deep
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darkness. So Jesus is using some language,
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but he's he's talking specifically of a of a Jewish
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idiom that had to do with your perception.
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How you perceive something determines whether you are
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seeing it in the light or seeing it dark.
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Like, like your, your eyesight is full of light and you're
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seeing it. Well, if you have a healthy
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perspective, but if you have an unhealthy perspective on
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something, then then your eyesight is dark and there is
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deep, deep darkness within you. Jesus is specifically talking
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about money and he's saying your eye is seeing it and it's deeply
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dark because your perspective is unhealthy on this subject.
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And anything that God gives us that that guides us away from
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him, it ultimately begins to guide us away from him and it
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and it distorts our hope in God simply because our perception of
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God or our perception of that thing is unhealthy.
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One of the things that gets into our heart is pride, and pride
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corrupts us. It brings us towards greed.
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Greed corrupts us and leads us towards pride.
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Both are expressions though of unbelief in God.
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When you're walking in pride and you're walking in greed, both
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corrupt us and both lead us to to the other.
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And both of them are expressions of unbelief or not believing in
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God. In Hebrews, it talks about how
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we don't enter the rest of God because we don't have belief in
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God. There is an unbelief.
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In fact, it's not that we don't believe things about God, it's
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that we are believing the wrong things about God.
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So the belief in the wrong things the Bible refers to as
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unbelief because it's not good belief.
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It's it's like a negative belief.
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It's a net negative of belief. First, Peter 5 verse 5 through 9
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says this. In the same way you were
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younger. Be subject to the others.
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All of you though, clothe yourself with humility toward
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one another, because God resists the proud, but He gives grace to
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the humble. So humble yourselves, therefore,
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under the mighty hand of God, so that He may exalt you at the
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proper time, casting all your cares on Him because He cares
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about you. Be sober minded, Be alert.
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Your adversary, the devil, is prowling like a roaring lion,
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looking for anyone he can devour.
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Resist him firm in the faith, knowing that the same kind of
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sufferings are being experienced by your fellow believers
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throughout the world. In other words, number #1 all of
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us who are believers experience some of the same kinds of
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suffering. We experience things because we
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don't resist the enemy firm in the faith or because there are
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things that we're being, we're experiencing where we're, we're,
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we're the enemy really is wreaking havoc on our heart, on
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our soul, on our hope and God. And he tells you got to be sober
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minded and be alert. Be aware of how the enemy is
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trying to deceive you, to distort you and trying to get
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you to walk in pride or walk in in greed.
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I think greed is an expression of pride because pride says I
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don't need God. I am my own God.
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I'm sufficient in myself. Greed says I don't need God, I
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have money. It's it's an expression in the
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in of the same kind of the same variety.
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It's a, it's an incorrect belief about, about God.
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And Peter tells us that if we're walking in pride, then we are
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not walking under the grace of God like we are left unto
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ourselves. I think This is why first, Peter
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5 is a kind of a New Testament parallel to Malachi chapter 3.
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Malachi chapter 3, Jesus, Jesus says this man, you're robbing
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me. You're not trusting me.
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You're trusting in yourself. And as a result, the enemy is
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devouring you. You've rejected me.
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In Haggai chapter 1, Jesus says you're planting a lot but
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reaping nothing. You so a lot in your crops, like
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you put the seed out there, but you're not reaping really any
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harvest. And it's because God says,
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because you've said I'm going to build my house instead of
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building God's house. It was about generosity towards
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God, towards the priorities that God has about the life that God
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was building. And they were living selfishly
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in that way. They were living kind of more
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confident in greed and confident in their own selves, which is
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what that's pride. And Peter says that when we are
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walking a pride God, God resists the proud.
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And when God resists you and isn't giving you grace, when you
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cannot come close to God because of your pride, you know where
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you are at. You're left out on your own.
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So the devourer can come and and get a hold of you In Malachi 3,
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Jesus says, but, but if you'll, you'll honor me with the tithe
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and you'll return the tithe into the storehouse, she said, or the
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scripture says God, God tells the people, I'm going to rebuke
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the but in other words, I'm going to protect you from
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allowing the devourer to come and wreak havoc in your life.
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So it's not that if you don't tithe, God curses you.
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That's not the point. It's that when you aren't
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tithing, you aren't trusting in God, which leaves you to trust
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in yourself, which then leaves you to live in a way that allows
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the enemy to devour you. That's all.
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That's all the lament of of Malachi chapter 3 is.
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It's got lamenting the fact that man that the enemy is coming to
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devour them simply because they're living in, in, in some
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pride that's being expressed through selfish, selfish greed.
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And I think that as the people of God, we want to recognize
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that like our hope is in God, our trust is in him.
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And, and the enemy comes like a roaring lion.
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And when the enemy comes, here's the thing he does, he typically
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gets us to believe the wrong thing.
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The enemy works through lies that play to disordered desires
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that are on the inside of us, that are normalized in a sinful
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society around us. That this is a framing that that
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Joe Mark Comer gives us in his book Live No Lies.
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I, I think it's brilliant. It's a great articulation of how
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deceit works, a little whisper of a lie that seems to resonate
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in the disordered reality of our sinful desires.
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Then, then we look around and say, well, everybody else is
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kind of trying to hoard themselves.
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Everybody else is being greedy. Everybody else is me first.
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Everybody else says, look out for #1 everyone else says giving
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is stupid. Everyone else in the world says
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that that God just wants my money.
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And I don't, I don't want to be generous.
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And, and then I don't really need to do this because I'm
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fine. And the devourer's not a real
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thing. Like, and we, we just look
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around at our normalized place and before we know it, we're, we
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are consumed in, in the wrong ways and we find ourselves
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outside of the grace of God in areas of our life when he's
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trying to bring us in where he says, man, you can cast your
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cares on me. I want to hear your cares.
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I want to listen to your concerns.
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I want to be there and help you so that when you're planting,
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you're actually harvesting. When you're, when you're
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building, it's not being destroyed.
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When, when things in your life are in motion, then, then you're
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protected and you're moving in a good, good way.
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This is resistant, firm in the faith.
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James 4/6 through 8. This is James sharing the
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similar thing that Peter is sharing.
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He says God gives greater grace. Therefore he says God resists
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the proud, but he does give grace to the humble.
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Therefore submit to God. Can I, can I just say any area
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of your life? Marriage, parenting, scheduling,
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money, hobbies, mindsets, eating habits, sleeping habits, any
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area of your life? That is not submitted to God is
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an area pride is growing, which is an area you are not receiving
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the full grace of God in your life.
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Where there is pride, God resists and does not give his
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grace. That's why he says verse 7.
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Therefore, submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from
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you. How do we resist the devil?
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Go away, devil. Go away, devil, go away.
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We resist the devil by doing embodied acts of spiritual
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protest that move us toward God, toward the truth, toward
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trusting God, and away from self, away from the war, away
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from lies, and away from unbelief.
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Resist the devil. He'll flee from you.
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Draw near to God, he'll draw near to you.
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Cleanse your hands, you centers, purify your hearts.
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You double minded. In other words, if you are
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thinking one thing and living another, you're double minded.
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If you have one thought of truth and you're following God, and
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another thought of self and you're following God, you are
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double minded. The way in which we become
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wholly devoted and wholehearted toward God, whole minded towards
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God, is by living with spiritual acts of protest, the spiritual
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acts of physical protest that move us intentionally toward God
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and away from the enemy. So in other words, when I
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intentionally live by returning the tithe to the Lord, I am, I
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am doing an act not of an old covenant, not out of obligation,
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not out of some legalism. I I tithe and return.
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Actually, we, the percentage we give is more we, we have tithe
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plus. So our percentages is personally
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more than more than that. I don't say that out of
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arrogance. I'm, I'm just saying that
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because tithing is, I think the, the baseline of the percentage
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that that God kind of helps us start with.
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But, but we've been tithing for a long time.
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We've been returning to God the 10th and giving generously
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beyond that for, for a while in our lives now.
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And so when my wife and I, when we tithe, when we give to God
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first, we are physically doing something that is a protest
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spiritually against greed growing in our heart.
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We are doing an act that causes us to resist and push away from
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materialism and greed that naturally wants to grow on the
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inside of all of us. And greed has a way of grinding
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out our hope. Greed has a way of of distorting
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our perspective and trust of God.
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What? What is?
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What is? What is hope?
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Hope is rooted in trust. Hope is rooted in a proper
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imagination about God, a true imagination of God shaped by his
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word. That's what hope is.
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That's the biblical hope, is to to trust God for the good that
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he has promised to, to actively wait for that.
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And so when I'm resisting the enemy, I'm doing so through
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spiritual acts of protest. When I choose to fast, I am
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doing a spiritual act of protest against my fleshly desire that
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wants to control my appetite. I'm saying no.
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I am disciplining myself as a way of spiritual protest.
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Say no, food doesn't control me. No, my desires of my flesh do
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not control me. That's an act of protest against
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the flesh, just like giving as an act of protest against greed,
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just like orienting your mind, just like humility is a
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spiritual act of protest against pride or submission to God as a
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spiritual act of protest against pride in your life.
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Like the spiritual acts of protest are how we resist the
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enemy, draw near to God and experience greater grace.
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As James Ford says, Let me read it again, but God gives a
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greater grace. James four and verse 6.
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Therefore he says God resists the proud, but he'll give grace
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to the humble. So therefore submit to God,
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resist the devil, he'll flee from you.
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Draw near to God, he'll draw near to you.
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Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you
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double minded. This is why we give these
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spiritual acts of protest towards God, why we want to move
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towards God, draw near to God. Listen, God's desire is to be
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close to us. God.
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God does want to open up all of heaven toward us.
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He longs for his face, His goodness, his presence, and His
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good nature to come towards us. God wants all of us.
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He wants us to be close and he longs for us to be in rich union
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with him. I mentioned earlier Matthew
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chapter 13 where Jesus kind of tells the the parable of the
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forced soil. It's called the parable of the
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sower. And in the parable of the sower,
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the sower sows some seed, which he says is the word of God.
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Some falls on the wayside and the birds come and eat it.
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Some falls on rocky ground and it it doesn't, it's not able to
25:40
grow deep roots and so does the the heat of the day comes and it
25:44
just burns it away, which happens in all of our lives.
25:47
We don't have deep roots of our faith.
25:49
When we get under pressure and the heat of our life is cranked
25:54
up, we often wilt in our loyalty and our faith to God.
25:57
And then he says there are some that are sown among thorns and
26:00
the crowded soil, like the cares of this life, the deceitfulness
26:04
of wealth, come and choke out the word.
26:06
But then there's some that's that's sown on good soil and it
26:09
produces A produces a harvest, some 30, some 60, some 100X in
26:15
return. And this is the good soil that's
26:17
sown in the good, good place where the word is sown in the
26:20
good place. The parable of the sower is not
26:27
about materialism. The the parable of the sower is
26:31
not well, if I have the right kind of faith, if I give, you
26:35
know, $10 to the Lord that I'm going to get a 30X return from
26:40
the Lord. And if I have a good faith, I'll
26:41
get a 60X return or, or if I have great faith, then I'm going
26:45
to get 100 X. This is this is how we're going
26:48
to have compounding interest in the Kingdom of God and and
26:50
guarantee returns on our investment in the Kingdom of
26:53
God. That's that's not what the
26:54
that's not what the parables about.
26:56
The parable is not about materialism.
26:59
It's not about the American upward mobility of every
27:02
everything going up and to the right, always getting better and
27:05
better and better and better. That's that definition of
27:08
success is not a Kingdom mindset at all.
27:11
It's actually a parable about the your heart and soul and body
27:18
and mind flourishing in the word and the truth of God.
27:22
So as you allow God's word to get into your heart, it shapes
27:27
your hope and it causes you to draw near to him.
27:30
It's about your whole life producing God's goodness.
27:33
It's about all of who you are growing.
27:35
It's about being in a place where you're aware that there
27:38
are things. Sometimes it's a lack of of
27:41
depth in the soil and sometimes it's the cares of this life and
27:45
the deceitfulness of wealth that are choking out what God is
27:49
trying to do in your life. There are different things that
27:51
are coming to disrupt your life from flourishing.
27:57
Pride and greed will disrupt your life from flourishing.
28:03
And one of the ways it does it is by getting us to perceive God
28:08
incorrectly. So our hope and our imagination
28:12
and the picture we have about God, about who he is, is
28:16
disrupted. It's distorted and ultimately it
28:20
causes us not to put our faith in Him.
28:23
And we put our faith in other things in other places.
28:27
And we take the good things that God provides and we trust in
28:29
them more than we trust in him. And the whole idea is that we
28:34
would be healthy and remain planted in him.
28:36
And the abiding life of Christ, where we are continuing to trust
28:40
in him, continuing to fix our mind and our hearts on him,
28:43
continuing to, to put him first, seeking first the Kingdom of God
28:48
and his righteousness, making sure we're not, we're not
28:51
trusting in mammon and greed and materialism, but we're trusting
28:54
in God and we're living with spiritual acts of protest that
28:58
keep our trust in the direction of God.
29:01
And we're not allowing fear to grip us.
29:04
We're not being anxious about anything because our perspective
29:08
about God is that he really does care.
29:11
And, and, and when we forget, when, when we're having trouble
29:14
remembering and imagining that God is good, that God cares or
29:19
that God provides. Jesus told us we need to look at
29:23
the birds and look at the flowers.
29:26
You need to look at the birds, be a bird watcher.
29:28
Start looking at the birds around you and be like man,
29:31
They're, they're flying here and they're flying there.
29:34
They're taken care of and look at the flowers.
29:36
How beautiful are those flowers? Men tended, growing, flourishing
29:42
God, that's me. God's going to take care of me
29:45
just like he takes care of the flowers.
29:46
God's going to take care of me just like he takes care of the
29:48
birds. And it helps us have a physical
29:53
picture that inspires our imagination to properly perceive
29:58
God, to see him as good, to see him as present, to see him as
30:03
caring, to see him as available, to see him as somebody that
30:06
wants to protect us from the devourer.
30:08
If we'll if we'll draw near to him, he can protect in that way.
30:12
He wants us to see him in that way as someone who cares.
30:16
So he says, cast your cares on me.
30:18
Why he does care. Look at the birds, look at the
30:21
flowers. These are the things that help
30:24
create proper imagination and a picture of God that's healthy
30:30
and true and allows us to trust in God.
30:33
And those are just some of the ways that God gives us hope.
30:38
And now let's get into some question and and responses.
30:41
Had a had a couple question comes in.
30:43
And so I'm going to do my best to answer them and and go from
30:46
there. Let me get grab a swing of water
30:48
here. Here's the first question.
30:54
What words of advice can you offer to a believer that is
30:58
trying to help someone that's going through a hard time?
31:01
Maybe death of a loved, 1A terminal disease, divorce,
31:05
etcetera, and the individual is blaming God not because of John
31:11
1010 I which says the thief comes to steal, kill and
31:14
destroy. I actually get a little annoyed
31:17
with those who blame God for what the devil did.
31:21
Yeah, so first we need patience. But annoying.
31:28
Being annoyed is is understandable.
31:29
I get it. For me, it usually grieves me
31:34
more than annoys me. And it grieves me because that
31:38
helps because I recognize that people have built their life on
31:43
a faulty understanding of God. Now in the moment when people
31:50
are grieving, people are facing, you know, a loved one on a
31:54
deathbed divorce. They're reeling.
31:57
They're they're really emotional.
31:59
They're disoriented at best. And I, I think my, my response
32:06
to, to them directly is usually one of love, one of just
32:10
patience. And I listen.
32:13
Sometimes people just need to talk.
32:16
I don't have to respond. In fact, when I respond, I, I
32:20
try to be very measured in how I respond with other things that
32:23
affirm them and help them or, or even asking questions.
32:26
Why do you think that and, and why do you think that God, God,
32:30
God's mad at you? Well, because this, this, this
32:33
happened. Well, why, why is that?
32:35
And what you get to normally is an understanding that they're
32:41
probably living their life in a secular worldview than in a
32:45
biblical worldview that, that we have built our lives and our
32:49
hearts. And I don't see that without
32:51
compassion. I'm just saying that that there
32:53
comes a moment in time where we have to recognize that, that
32:59
somewhere along the way we've probably bought the secular lie,
33:04
the secular world view that says man, God, like, like the chief
33:08
aim of life is for me to be happy.
33:10
Like that's, that's what it's all about.
33:12
And so if I'm not happy or I don't get what I want, then
33:16
therefore God is bad and the world is wrong and something is
33:19
broken. And I, I would agree the world
33:22
is broken, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you're
33:24
wrong or you did bad or any of those other things.
33:27
I think we find ourselves in that way.
33:29
And, and I, I take a lot of solace and cue from Job, who in
33:34
moments of great disorientation, he experienced the death of a
33:38
loved one, personal terminal disease, lost everything in his
33:43
life, great despair. And he and his anguish kept
33:48
trying to process and talk it out and people tried to
33:50
rationalize it and reason with it.
33:52
And what he really needed was the presence of God.
33:55
And eventually God's presence showed up.
33:58
And when the presence of God showed up, Job, repentance says,
34:01
man, I, I, I, I had no idea what I was talking about.
34:06
I had heard of you before, but now my eyes have seen you.
34:10
I think when people are in a season like that, it's good for
34:14
us just to bring the presence of God with us so they can
34:17
experience the goodness of God. Will there be a time to process
34:21
it and understand something? Yeah.
34:22
But in the moment, you're not going to.
34:24
That's not the time. That's that's not the time or
34:27
the place. But when they're at, at a place
34:29
when they're really asking questions and they're really
34:31
wanting to explore and they really want to understand on the
34:34
backside of the chaos, on the backside of the crisis, on the
34:39
backside of the tragedy. I, I think we can lovingly walk
34:43
them through the truth, walk them through what it looks like
34:46
for, for God, because it's, it's, it's not necessarily I, I
34:51
mean, again, I, I don't believe that, you know, God caused the
34:54
divorce. I, I actually think it's too
34:56
selfish people who are imperfect and decide stop drawing near to
34:59
God and stop drawing near to each other, that there's some
35:02
deeply fractured things there. It's we didn't bring our whole
35:05
heart and our whole self. And there are a lot of reasons
35:07
for it and, and very few of them have to do with God because a
35:12
lot of times what we do is we blame God because we prayed one
35:14
prayer, but we never actually changed our actions.
35:17
We never really resisted the enemy.
35:19
We just prayed hopeful wishful thinking rather than hope in
35:23
God. And so I, I know the tendencies
35:26
to get annoyed. I know the tendencies to get
35:27
frustrated when people accuse God.
35:29
I, I get kind of like shaking my head when I'm scrolling in, you
35:33
know, Instagram and people are saying things about God that I'm
35:36
like, man, I don't, I don't think you even know God to be
35:38
able to say that or ever knew God to be able to say that or,
35:42
you know, you just kind of know that God's going to sort it all
35:44
out in the end. But if there's somebody you
35:46
deeply love that you're in real relationship with that is on the
35:49
backside or the the exit side of a tragedy and a crisis, you can
35:54
lovingly walk with them and teach them through and help them
35:58
there. But when somebody's in the
36:00
moment of the pain, man be like, be like God with Job and just
36:04
show up, be present, bring love, bring goodness, be there and let
36:11
the steadiness and the goodness of God's love in you and flow
36:14
through you to them. And I think that's the best
36:16
thing to do. But you know, when people really
36:19
start to blame God, I think you need to ask why a few times.
36:23
Why do you blame God And, and why is that and why is that?
36:27
To really get to the root of it. And I think most of the time
36:30
what we find is that we have a secular view, not a spiritual
36:33
one. And as a pastor, I deeply lament
36:39
that so many people who call the name Christ are biblically
36:44
illiterate. And I'm giving my life to
36:48
helping people understand Scripture and to understand God
36:50
and the story of God. And God's not annoyed by them
36:59
blaming him. God still loves them too.
37:02
And I think it's important for us to not be annoyed, but to
37:07
love people the way God loves people.
37:09
He's patient with them. He loves them.
37:11
He's going to walk with them. And I think God's going to open
37:14
their eyes. And so I'm I'm continually
37:15
praying that God you would I'm praying Ephesians one a lot for
37:18
people like that, that their eyes of their understanding
37:21
would be opened that they would see God and see the hope of his
37:26
good calling and that that we wouldn't be deceived anytime we
37:34
remember anytime something tragic happens, the enemy who
37:38
comes to steal, kill and destroy his primary mode of doing that
37:42
isn't isn't through natural circumstance.
37:48
Certain natural circumstances eventually come, but it started
37:52
well before with deception, with lies, with disordered desires,
37:56
with pulling away from some things.
38:00
And it's in that place. That's why we're deceived even
38:06
to the point where we would blame God that there is some
38:08
deception that has occurred in our hearts and our minds.
38:10
And so, and we want to be able to help people see God clearly,
38:13
help him see where he's at and what he's done.
38:16
And there is a real dissonance right when when our expectation
38:20
and our experience, what we expected from God and what we
38:24
experienced in life don't line up, often times it creates
38:29
crisis and disorientation for us because our hope was more in
38:33
outcomes than in God. And we can find ourselves in in
38:37
a dangerous, troubling place where where it's easy to blame
38:40
God. So I understand how and why and
38:42
where, and I'm really rambling here and I, and I don't mean to,
38:46
and I'm certainly not trying to sound overly simplistic or
38:51
reduction airy and trying to reduce because it's not that.
38:58
But when people are walking through those times, it takes a
39:00
lot of patience and it takes a lot of willingness just to love
39:03
them like God loves them. And, and God begins to sort that
39:07
out as we help just lovingly and patiently and kindly process and
39:13
listen and learn. Here's the next question.
39:16
Sometimes or or maybe all the time, it seems like surrender
39:20
leads to trust and vice versa. It is and vice versa.
39:25
And both of those are a lot of work, a constant readjustments
39:30
to focus on Him and allowing Him to guide us.
39:33
Like how do we do that though? It's a good question.
39:37
I'm going to come back to spiritual acts of protest.
39:42
I, I, I think when we sit in silence with the Lord, we are
39:46
acting in protest against the noise of our world that is
39:50
coming at us, giving space to think and contemplate in the
39:54
goodness of God. I I think it's second
39:56
Corinthians chapter 2 that talks about beholding the glory of
40:00
God. There's this understanding, I
40:03
think in that verse that that means that we have to stop, to
40:06
consider, to contemplate the very face of God.
40:12
So when we sit and we contemplate, imagine the very
40:16
face of God in silence, What what are we doing?
40:18
We're we're resisting the noise of the world to give our
40:22
attention to the wrong things. That's an act of protest that
40:25
helps us trust in a correct picture of God.
40:29
When I give, it's a spiritual act of protest against greed and
40:33
materialism. So it moves me towards God and
40:36
away from greed. It's just in God I'm doing
40:39
something physical to remind me of my hope and trust in God.
40:43
Period. When I'm praying, I'm not
40:46
worrying because I'm praying. I'm talking to God about what
40:49
concerns me, and when I cast my cares on God, I begin to
40:54
recognize that he cares for me. It's an act of protest that
40:58
helps me go there. Is it some work?
41:00
Yeah. Because the way of the flesh and
41:02
the way of the world do not want us to do that.
41:05
In fact, the way of the world wants us to resist God and draw
41:08
near to our own self. That's what the world wants you
41:11
to do. But James says to resist
41:13
yourself, to resist the devil and submit to God and draw near
41:18
to him. So it does take some work.
41:20
It does take work. It takes some discipline, it
41:23
takes people, it takes being vulnerable.
41:25
It's it's, it's about recognizing the proclivities of
41:28
your heart and soul and requires you to move in a direction.
41:31
I think it really does matter. And yes, it really does require
41:35
surrender to trust God and it requires trust to surrender to
41:40
God. And minor adjustments each and
41:43
every day are a lot better than having to overcorrect when when
41:49
you're driving in your car, you are constantly making little
41:53
adjustments with the steering wheel just staying in the right
41:56
place, which is better than drifting so far over that you
42:00
have to overcorrect or dramatically correct something.
42:03
Let's that's that can be a lot more dangerous.
42:06
So little corrections along the way.
42:08
And so every day we wake up, surrender to him.
42:11
Every day we we speak something. Sometimes man, one of the best
42:15
things to do is keep quoting scripture out loud so that it
42:19
helps our mind and our imagination correctly hear the
42:23
truth and imagine the truth, which then puts our trust moving
42:27
in the direction of God when we want him to guide us in the
42:31
right direction in the right ways.
42:33
Man, that and drawing near to God is how do I say this?
42:40
Drawing near to God is not void of heart or love.
42:45
It's it requires that, but it is absolutely physical.
42:50
But you can't draw near to God without doing something
42:54
physical, which is spiritual. I think physical things and
42:58
spiritual things are much more synchronized or Siamese.
43:06
And then what we think like we think of spiritual and physical,
43:10
I actually think they're more like, boom, they're together,
43:12
they're sewn together. And when we do physical things,
43:15
it's a spirit. It impacts spiritually what we
43:16
do spiritually, impacts physically, motivates
43:19
physically. And I think that there is like
43:23
that inward, outward, if you will, all of those things I
43:27
think are, are there and present.
43:29
So yeah, it is, it's, it's not always easy.
43:31
It's, it's going to be a lot easier just to go with the way
43:33
of the world. It's going to be a lot easier to
43:35
get greedy. It's going to be a lot easier
43:36
just to go into more debt. It's going to be really easy to
43:39
trust in yourself and to trust in what you see rather than
43:42
trusting in, in the person of God, trusting in his character
43:45
and his goodness. It's going to be a lot easier to
43:47
see or a lot easier to you know to to trust in and looking out
43:55
for yourself rather than trusting God to look out and
43:58
care for you. It's always easier to go the way
44:01
of self, but it is never satisfying, never ultimate,
44:07
never long lasting and satisfaction, satisfaction might
44:10
be for a minute. Sin is always pleasurable for a
44:12
moment, Scripture says, but in the end it leads to destruction.
44:16
So I think we have to be willing to say, am I willing to resist
44:21
what I want now for what I want most later?
44:26
Am I willing to to live on less so I can be generous now so that
44:31
I can experience satisfaction and trust in God?
44:34
Man, Can you imagine what it would be like to not have to
44:38
tingle with greed in your own heart with anxiousness around
44:43
money? Then you might be sitting there
44:45
saying, well, I I just need more money and that's going to solve
44:47
the problem. No, no, it it really won't.
44:50
It'll just make you more stressed about more of the money
44:54
to to be set free from the slavery of that would be to
44:59
trust God more fully and all of those things.
45:02
That's why God says you can't. You can't love God and money.
45:05
You can't serve both God and serve money you got.
45:08
It's one or the other. You're either serving money or
45:10
you're serving God and, and, and there's really only one test to,
45:16
to, to one key test in it. And that's do we look at what we
45:19
have as ours to control or is it all that we have a gift from God
45:23
that we're to steward, including returning and honoring him first
45:29
with those things. Same, same thing with your
45:31
family. Is my family mine and I'm trying
45:35
to control my family, or is it a gift from God that I steward?
45:39
It belongs to him. So I'm going to make sure our
45:42
family does the things that honor him first and most rather
45:48
than live our family life just like the rest of the world
45:52
lives. I think that's why Peter and
45:58
James and their passage that we read earlier talks about being
46:01
sober minded. Be vigilant, be aware, keep your
46:04
eyes open. Know these things therefore like
46:08
it it's trying to awaken us to the reality of all of those
46:12
things to cleanse our hands to purify our hearts how spiritual
46:18
acts of protest and repentance. That's how because we don't want
46:22
the enemy, the devourer to be be be wreaking havoc on the hope
46:27
that we have in Jesus and the spiritual things.
46:32
Our spiritual hope is shaped by our physical actions.
46:37
They say it again, your spiritual hope is shaped by
46:41
physical actions. Are you doing things to grow and
46:45
increase your trust in God or to the trust in your own outcomes?
46:49
All right, where's your trust? Where's your hope?
46:51
We want to trust in him in in those ways.
46:55
Those are really long answers to two really short questions.
46:58
And today, I hope the episode has been helpful for you, that
47:02
you've grown in your trust in God.
47:04
Remember, trust is the hope or hope is a trust that we have in
47:08
God. It's the blue pin and the
47:10
picture of God in our minds and and the picture that we need of
47:14
God in our minds is God loving us, God caring for us, God
47:18
coming towards us, God's face shining on us, God wanting to
47:23
open all of heaven so that our life and the seed sown in our
47:29
life produces 3060 and 100 X which God has intended for you
47:36
and for me. Friends,