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[WW] Philippians 4: Finding Joy with Gratitude · The Wesley Word

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Wesley Ware.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: When's the last time you received a thank you note that just really meant the world to you?
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: I was talking with a friend of mine a few weeks ago.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: They own a house at the beach, and they were saying they sent a note, a thank you note to their cleaner, and they said, Hey, you know, thank you for being a part of this team.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: This has been incredible.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: We get some great reviews.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: They say it's the cleanest place I've ever been.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: I've had friends that went and stayed at my house and just want to say you're doing a jam-up job.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Keep it up.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: I love being you know that you're on my team.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is fantastic.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the person responded with a text back to the note saying, you know, I've been doing this for over a decade, and you are the first homeowner that has ever said thank you for what we're doing.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that we're on the same team.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: And they said it meant the world to them that they were seen and that their what they had, their contributions had been acknowledged, right?
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: Just by a simple thank you note, right?
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: When we receive those notes, right, it means something to us, right?
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: You've probably maybe you've been thanked by people.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, wow, this is great.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: They actually like noticed what I was doing, right?
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: At the same time, when was the last time that you wrote a thank you note?
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Not because you had to, or your parents made you, or you graduated high school, you had to do it, or like when we got married, we were backlogged for like six months.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, come on, we're already married, really gonna take the blender away, right?
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: But you had to do all the thank you notes, had to all the thank you notes.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: Like when's the last time you wrote a thank you note because you were truly touched or moved by the way in which someone acted, maybe towards you, or maybe you just saw someone doing something awesome and you just wrote a note say thank you for being a light in the world, right?
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: When we receive those thanks, it fills us up.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: And if you begin to practice writing thank you notes, not because you have to, but when you see things worthy of praise to be able to lift those up to folks, it does something within us as well.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: It brings toward other people, but also does something with us.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: I bring up thank you notes because that essentially is what the book of Philippians is, right?
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: We're wrapping up.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: This is chapter four.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: If you haven't been here, cheap.
• 2:11
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• 2:13
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• 2:13
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• 2:16
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• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: You want the whole thing so you could binge listen, right?
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's coming.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's coming.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: The Wesley word, it's coming, right?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: But we've looked at um chapter one, and we talked about how Paul, again, this is a thank you letter Paul writes to the Philippians.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: He's been in prison.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: They've helped him out.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: They've sent gifts, they sent Epaphroditus to go in to help him.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: Timothy was there.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And we looked at how might we find joy in the midst of our adversity, right?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Whether this is your first semester in school, whether that you're graduating, whether you're in grad school, whether you just started a freshman in high school, right?
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: Things come up and life gets difficult sometimes.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: And Paul writes this letter of thanksgiving while he sits in prison to people that have reached out and have helped him.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we looked at chapter one and we talked about ways that we might find joy in the midst of adversity.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: A couple of lessons, if you in case you a little quick catch up, right?
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: We talked about how maybe we might pray, even though we're going through the struggle or we're going through the stuff, maybe we should begin praying.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: God, this situation really stinks.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: But ring as much good as this as you possibly can, right?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: We said, we know you didn't cause this, God, but we also know that you can make good out of this.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so ring whatever good you can out of this situation, God.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: We talked about what it would look like if we were to be a Timothy or an apaphroditist as someone else.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if we looked around and found who are that one person, those two people, those three people that could use some joy, that could use some love, that can use some light, and how might we serve in that role?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: We looked at chapter T, right, and we talked about conflict when there's tension around us.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's roommates, maybe it's families, maybe it's friends.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like how might we not necessarily re enjoy the situation, but how do we make sure that tension and conflict doesn't suck the joy completely out of our lives?
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: And we looked at Paul's example reminding us to lean in and to be careful not to other dehumanize in the person that we're having conflict with, but to lean in to have some conversation, right?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: I quoted the great Julius Semino, I created the great the Ted Lasso, we talked to Paul, uh, right, and how maybe we should be more curious and less judgmental in our conversations.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't here last week, but Battle preached, I can't wait to listen to it.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: But if I were here, I would talk about how God says that you are enough and more than enough.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: At the same time, God also says that you're called to live on purpose, right?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: And that our lives mean something.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: They matter.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: We find joy in that, right?
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And this week we are looking at the last chapter.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: If you remember on week one, if you happen to be here, I talked about briefly, and I said we'll talk about it later.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: So that the practice of a joyous person, right, is prayer and gratitude, right?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And that without gratitude, without gratitude, it is incredibly difficult to find joy, right?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're gonna look at that here tonight.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: And Paul talks about this, right?
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: That that there is no dream without gratitude and prayer.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: There just isn't it's very difficult to find joy without gratitude.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: I went through all the writers, right?
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: And Paul talks about this, we see in other parts of scriptures, but I went this book, it's a it's a I say it's a modern uh classic uh called The Celebration of Discipline.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody read that before?
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody under the age of 30 read it before?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: All right, you should read it, right?
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um by Richard Foster, and it does, it takes you through, I think, 13 spiritual disciplines, right, that you can practice each and every week.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: The last discipline, and the one that said to undergirds all these other disciplines, is celebration.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: Is celebration.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you talk about you practice solitude, you practice prayer, you practice submission, all these things.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: But life should also, and faith life should also have celebration in it.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: Celebration for the things that God has done, celebration for the got things that God is doing, and celebration for the things that God will do because God is faithful to God's promises.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: I go to the book of Philippians, I'm gonna talk about that in a little bit.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I looked at this, this I've been in love with this, y'all, the Methodist book of daily prayer, right?
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you might be like, that sounds official, Steve.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: This is this is cool.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um I've been reading it for uh several months now, and each week it takes a different topic, and you have a morning devotion, the evening devotion, and you say the same prayer before and after each each session, right?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: All week, right?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Joy came up week four.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, that's cool.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'm we're preaching on joy, right?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is the prayer that you have to pray in each morning.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's a prayer of petition, right?
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it says, steadfast God, you call your people to joy in thanksgiving, but too often I am tempted by cynicism, yep, that's me, and a mindset of scarcity.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes, as I awake, this is for the morning, forgive me for the ways that I fail to see you at work and rejoice at your presence.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: And it says, Forgive me for when I for the people I overlook or take for granted, the blessings I do not recognize, the simple moments that I do not stop and soak up.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Sheesh, that's me all the time.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: Reasons for joy that I do not see or notice.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then the evening time, I love this, and we're gonna do this towards the end uh tonight.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: Played this prayer for the entire week, right?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: And this is a prayer of gratitude.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: You start off joy, but you have to do it with gratitude.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: The prayer each week, each each day was God of jury and singing, as I reflect on my day, may I notice the ways in which you continue to show up in my life.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: As the angels rejoice at the birth of Christ, may I learn to rejoice at your presence in my life.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: It helps you reflect.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: One way you opened my eyes today.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: One was a source of encouragement or comfort today, one opportunity you presented me today, one blessing that I perhaps overlooked today.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: And each day it called us to remember and to reflect.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's one way that God blessed me today.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's one way that I may have overlooked something that God put in my life today, right?
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um uh Max Lachato wrote a book, Anxious for nothing.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I'm anxious for everything, but okay, right, anxious for nothing.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: And um, and in it he talks about um, he uses great imagery, right?
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: He uses, he says that the the largest rivers in the world, right?
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the Mississippi River, South the Amazon River.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, yes, it is.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's not.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: He says it's the river of if only.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: And he talks about how we stand at the banks so often at the river of if only.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we we love to be content, we love to get rid of some of our anxiety, but we said, if only I could get through this week, if only I can get past this exam, if only I can get my relates to like me, if only I could get my parents on board with what I want to do in my life, if only I could find someone that maybe I could finally have a date, whatever it may be.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, our if-onies seem like this vast water before us, right?
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: He says, but if we can learn to express gratitude and look around us the ways in which God, not if only, but the ways in which God is, right?
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: And the ways that God has blessed us, in the ways that God is blessing us, I know the language says then we can meet up in the water of this if-only river parts, and we go to the fertile ground of already, where we begin to see that God is already at work, that God is already blessing.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: But it requires a posture of gratitude, right?
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: I know we got some psychology majors in here, maybe some sociology, so you can fact-check me on the fly.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't gonna call up, but good job, Hannah.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we there's tons of research that when you practice gratitude, it makes you physically better, it makes you mentally better, emotionally better.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Gratitude is one of those things that there's these certain shapers in life.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like you think about water solely going through a canyon, all of a sudden you have this beautiful land mass, right?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: Gratitude is one of those things that when practiced over and over and over, has the opportunity to shape who we are, to shape our hearts, to shape our minds.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: It requires us to indeed practice it, right?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Robert Emmons, who he apparently he's like the world leader on emotion of um gratitude and such.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: And he talks about how um, check me on this, right?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: That um for our emotions, right?
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: That the positive emotions tend to wear off quickly, right?
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: He says.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And we end up like chasing and this like chasing that new high, right?
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like we had this good experience, that was cool, that's fine.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now we want the next better one, right?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: The bigger and better, right?
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, you know, we won a game, against those come out, that's great.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: But can we get back to the playoffs for uh please?
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: One time.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but but we but we chase, we chase, we chase, we chase, we chase, right?
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: So what gratitude does, when we practice gratitude, we stop chasing, and instead, gratitude helps us to see the value in something and see the value of what it was.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And he says instead of adapting to goodness, where we try to get one up the good that we had, we begin to celebrate the goodness.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: When we celebrate well to last in the goodness a little bit longer.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, when we do that and take time to celebrate it, we also end up in some crazy way begin participating more in our life rather than just standing outside of it, right?
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: What you've heard over and over, hopefully you picked up on.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: I know sometimes it's a nice cliche, it looks great on a t-shirt, maybe that, you know, um, have an attitude of gratitude.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: What's your attitude?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: How's it shaped?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I've said that many times.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still a believer in it.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: But gratitude cannot simply be an attitude that we have.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: Gratitude is a discipline that we take on.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: Gratitude is something that we practice.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: And the middle we practice it, if it gets more gratitude, right?
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you start writing one or two thank you notes to people and like, oh my goodness, that was kind of cool.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: They love that.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you start writing more and you become the person that's known as a family people, right?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden things start to happen.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you have a practice uh around Thanksgiving.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you've done this, Julie Similar to do this in our family a few years ago, where we put in uh notes, everybody writes anonymous things that they're thankful for, right?
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: Thankful for my family, thankful that the turkey wasn't dry and we fried it and didn't bake it, right?
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: Then one time was kind of funny.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: We got to this one thing, we looked up, see what someone was thankful for.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: We opened it up and all it said was, me.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: To which the entire family, all 18 of us, looked over and said, Family, is that you?
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: She said, She was thankful for herself, right?
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, small practice, that's my daughter, by the way, right?
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: Small practices of gratitude are where we begin.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: But eventually, as we live into it, it allows us to do more and more.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: And the more that we practice gratitude on a daily basis, saying the prayer that I read out here, right?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: God, help me see one way in which you blessed me.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: Help me to see that one person that I overlooked.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: God, help me find one way that I might say thank you, that I missed the blessing that was there today.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: We begin to focus our energy, our practice, and our attitude, and things begin to shape us, right?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: So first one, there's no joy without gratitude and prayer.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: And the second thing Paul mentions uh gets on this, and I'll read the verses again in a minute and forward.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, he says, and focus your mind on whatever is pure, right?
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever is holy.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: All these things, he goes through this list of focus your mind on these things.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna read them because otherwise I'm gonna forget them all.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: Fun fact, I was in the wrong chapter the other day in my Bible study.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: It was really embarrassing, but I'm back now, y'all.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: He says, Follow that, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: If there's any excellent, there's anything worthy of praise, think about these things and keep on doing the things that you have learned and received, right?
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: Focus on the honorable, focus on the just, focus on whatever is excellent and worthy of praise.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: And what he's getting at there, I think also speaks to what we see in Proverbs 4.23.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: There's 10 translations there, but it just essentially says, like, like guard your heart, be careful of your heart, protect your heart, because life flows out of that, right?
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Almost another way said, Whatever you're putting in is what you're gonna export.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: Or another way, whatever you dwell on is what you become, right?
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: If I allow, you know, these I had a good friend, uh, you said, but don't let the truth of thoughts win, Steve, right?
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I would dwell on those, sometimes they would take over, right?
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: But Paul's saying, dwell, put your mind, put your energy on these things, whatever's commendable, whatever's worthy of praise, because you know that then are things that lift up and bring about joy, right?
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: That is what we're called to do.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: We become what we dwell, so let's dwell on the good so we find joy, right?
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: Then we're gonna like ramp up two little notches, right?
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's great, Steve.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm still like struggling with being anxious about this stuff, right?
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's great, but I'm not finding this joy.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's great, but I can't focus on this stuff, right?
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna give you one like acronym, which I hate acronyms in the church, but we're gonna do a quick acronym and then we're gonna go even further up, right?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and I borrowed this from Max Licato, he might have brought it from somewhere else.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: Preachers always borrow everything else, great, because you can't own grace and you can't own God.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: You gotta share God and share God's grace, right?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: Gave me reference.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: He talks about this process of calm.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: And Paul, he actually stood up from Paul because Paul talks about it in Philippians chapter four.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna go ahead and pull it up here so that I have it once again, right?
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Calm.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Anybody know what the C might stand for?
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: Good, sweet.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: The mic, right?
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're gonna be celebrating God.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrating God.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: Paul instructions, he talks about this.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: Now about you, but every time I read it, I'm like, okay, Paul, sure.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: He says, um Rejoicing Lord always.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Again, I say, rejoice, right?
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: And then he goes on to say, don't be worried about anything.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, okay, Paul, I'm worried about everything.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: But anyway, he staffs by saying, Rejoice the Lord always.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate the goodness of God.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate the things that God is doing all around you in other people.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate and have that mindset, dwell on those things when you feel the anxiety bubbling up, right?
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: Notice while I'm saying anxiety, I'm talking about the little moments that kind of make us anxious.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: I also know that anxiety is a very real thing and sometimes traps us so much that we need to go and get help that God has provided, right?
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: Through counselors and sometimes medication.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: If that's where you're at, do that and celebrate that God has provided those opportunities and those people who were trained to help you through it, right?
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: I still love acquaintance because sometimes we thought people in the church will throw this out and be like, you just need a little more Jesus and we'll be fine.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: You need Jesus, but sometimes you need the the people that God and Jesus has equipped to help you through those types of things.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: So hear that disclaimer there as well.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: We're called to celebrate.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: We celebrate God, right?
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then Paul says in that same chapter four, you can go home and read this afterwards, he says, but in everything by prayer and supplication and with thanksgiving, let your request be known to God, right?
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: What he's saying is, ask God, right?
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Ask God about it.
• 16:32
  unknown: Right?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: He gives this great example.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: You remember the um uh the feeding of the 5,000, right?
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: The disciples had seen Jesus heal all kinds of people, seen him done all kinds of miraculous things, and then they're left with this task to feeding all the people.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: And if you notice, like it took them a long time to get to being like, Jesus, what should we do?
• 16:49
  unknown: Right?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: They're scrambling, like, I don't know, man.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe maybe today we got to cheap out and do little Caesars Pizza.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: We can't do this, right?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: But now it took them a while to go and actually ask God.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: But Paul reminds us, Ken reminds us, right?
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate the goodness of God, but don't be afraid also to ask God for your needs.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then that L part there in the column, right?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: Celebrate, ask, and then the L is to leave what you have before God.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: Leave your concerns, let your requests be known to God.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then he goes on the M there, right?
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: That we might meditate.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Meditate on all the goodness, whatever is honorable, whatever is pure, whatever is just.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that leads us, right, to this famous verse that we see, because then Paul talks about in full way.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: I promise I'm getting towards the end here.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: He says, Um, um, before we get to verse 413, he says, I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: In any and all circumstances, I'll have learned the secret of being well fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Paul's like, I know what it is to be on top of the world, I know what it is to feel like I'm buried well beneath it.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: He says, the secret, and the secret that he has, and he says, He mentioned the secret here, is this idea of being able to bring your petitions to God, of meditating on the good, of finding joy even in the midst of adversity.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then we get to that famous verse in 13, I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't mean you can't go on the patio here and be like, well, I'm ready to fly.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's gonna happen, maybe.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: Call me, that'd be cool, right?
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: But he's saying, I can get through anything that life throws at me, whether I am starving or I am well fed, whether I am exhausted or I'm on top of the world, I can get through it all because I know that Jesus will not leave me, will not forsake me, will walk with me through it all.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: There's power that is there.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's a cool thing to know that God doesn't call the people who have their lives completely together.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: That God is not there just for the people that never filled out a chemistry exam, right?
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: And come bop it up to cookie job like I'm on top of the world, right?
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: That God isn't there for those that have every relationship perfect, right?
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: That God calls each and every one of us, whether we feel like we're in our prison that we created or that someone else threw us in, we're on top.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: God brings us all.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: So it's hard to find joy without gratitude.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: We want it to be a practice, not just an attitude.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: We become what we dwell on.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, remember the calm thing if you want.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't know about you, but sometimes, even with all those acronyms, even with all this advice, even with Paul talking, right?
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I should do this, I should play nonstop without ceasing, all this supplication, all this stuff, sometimes like, yeah, but I'm still not feeling joy.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe you haven't been there, I've been there.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: You lose someone, I lost my grandfather this summer, I will, I've never been no joy there, right?
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: You think you got the love of your life and then you're engaged, and all of a sudden that goes there, oh my God, where am I gonna find joy from?
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: We sing these worship songs, what do we do?
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: But even then, even then, even when we have a hard time finding that, even when we have a hard time practicing gratitude, God is still there.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: And God is still at work, and God is still shaping us and working us.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: The Wesley Word is a production of the Clemson Wesley Foundation.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: For more information about Clemson Wesley, check out our website or follow us on Facebook and Instagram.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, get out there and love your neighbor.