Latest / St. Paul Podcast / Choosing Why 10.4.26

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Choosing Why 10.4.26 · St. Paul Podcast

• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hi everyone and welcome to the St.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Paul Podcast.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Mark Needhammer, Senior Pastor at St.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Paul Lutheran Church, located in Davenport, Iowa, part of the Greater Quad Cities area of Iowa and Illinois.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Right here, each week, you will find beautiful music and a message of hope and good news to guide your life.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm hopeful that this podcast can inspire you and help you on your journey of faith as you grow in love and trust in our God.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_06: It was written by Paul, who was a traveling pastor and teacher.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_06: Paul is one of the apostles sent by God to share the story of Jesus with the whole world.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_06: Paul took this direction seriously.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_06: He went all over the Roman world, beginning churches, telling people about Jesus, baptizing people, and drawing them into the life of Jesus.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_06: After Paul left one of those communities, he'd stay in regular touch with them, writing long letters about Jesus and faith, about how to live together and how to navigate conflict, or just to encourage them when things got hard.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_06: The purpose of this letter was mostly one of gratitude and encouragement.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_06: Paul wrote this letter from prison, and the people of Philippi had sent him money to support him.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_06: So he wrote back to say thank you.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_06: In many ways, this letter is a long, extended thank you note.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_06: So, as you hear these words, think about how they were first written from a man in prison to a community he loved.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_06: Think about how this man in prison had experienced so many struggles and joys because of his commitment to Jesus.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_06: So here they are from the third chapter of Philippians.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_06: Paul writes If anyone has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_06: Circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews, as to the law, a Pharisee, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law, blameless.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_06: Yet whatever gains I had, I have come to regard as lost because of Christ.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_06: More than that, I regard everything as lost because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_06: For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_06: I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_06: Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal, but I press on to lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of me.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_06: Brothers and sisters, I do not consider that I have laid hold of it, but one thing I have laid hold of, forgetting what lies behind, and straining to what lies ahead.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_06: I press on toward the goal, toward the prize of in the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_06: So let's hear some more about these words from Paul to the community in Philippi.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_06: Now we turn to God in prayer, saying those words Jesus taught us in the Lord's Prayer.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_06: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_06: Give us today our daily bread.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_06: Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_06: For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_06: Amen.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_06: Now receive this blessing.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_06: The one you are seeking has already found you.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_06: The one you are longing to embrace has already embraced you, and the one you wish to know already knows you, forgives you, and loves you.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_06: And because of this, we can spend our lives continuing to become like Christ and is living and is dying.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_06: And as you do so, trust that you are blessed and loved by God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_06: Amen.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_06: And I I'm sure you have learned this, but if you want to learn anything, you can turn to the internet.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_06: Perhaps you can, as I have recently had to do, fix anything in your house.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_06: If the refrigerator is dripping, there's repair, you can find out.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_06: You can become a refrigerator repair man just because of YouTube.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_06: Um, if you want to learn how to bake a six-tier chocolate cake, the internet can teach you.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe you have yet to learn how to boil an egg, the internet can teach you almost anything.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_06: And plus you can find lectures from historians and economists, scientists, all kinds of things.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_06: Are, of course, there's a lot of rubbish on the internet, but lots of incredible things.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_06: What a gift that we could sit at the feet of brilliant people without having to pay tuition.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_06: Well, I recently found this series of webinars about teaching, and there's a uh lecture by an anthropologist, a professor named Dr.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_06: Mike Welsh, who was talking about teaching.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_06: And the one important things he learned about becoming a teacher.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_06: He began by just wanting to be engaging and entertaining, to get all this great information into his students' brains to gain influence and affluence.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_06: I'm not sure how he expected affluence as an anthropologist, but nonetheless, uh he was trying to gain as much prestige as he could.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_06: But something shifted for Dr.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_06: Wesh when he overheard some of his students talking about the one thing they learned in his class was really just the silly things he taught them, the funny stories he shared.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_06: And so he asked, What is the goal here?
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_06: Why am I doing what I'm doing?
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_06: And as he sorted through this great question of why, he discovered what was most important for him.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_06: That at the end of the day, it wasn't actually about influence or prestige or even entertainment.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_06: But he wanted to help these students learn how to really live, how societies lived and how they could be shaped into better humans in the world.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_06: And so it shaped how he put energy into his work about what he cared about, what he could let go of.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_06: All because he simply started to ask this question: why?
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_06: Not why as in the letter why, of course, but the question, why?
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_06: Why do we do what we do?
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_06: Why do we make the choices we make?
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_06: Why do we live how we live?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_06: And this question can be really clarifying and life-giving.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_06: Regardless of how we spend our days, it's helpful to think about our purpose, about the meaning for the choices we make, what motivates us.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_06: It's easy, after all, just to get stuck like that professor did.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe we get caught just going through the motions or forgetting why we started to do the thing we are doing in the first place.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe we find that the stuff we're doing are just simply things we're doing to get ahead or to prove ourselves, or we're just going through the motions because it's easier than changing.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_06: Well, 2,000 years ago, there was this guy, Paul, and we know him now as Saint Paul or the Apostle Paul.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_06: It's the man for whom this church was named.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_06: And we heard this letter he was writing to his friends in a community called the Philippi.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_06: And in this letter, Paul writes about how he'd spent most of his life with his purpose misplaced.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_06: He'd been accumulating a great deal of prestige.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_06: He'd been driven by this need for more power and to be as right as he possibly could.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_06: He was at the top of his class in this world of faith, but then Jesus entered his life and flipped things completely upside down.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_06: Paul discovered that all those things that used to drive him, that gave him purpose, were no longer quite so important.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_06: Those things that were the source of his identity no longer mattered quite so much.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_06: And then Paul writes with such clarity about what his purpose is now.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_06: He writes this answer to his question.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_06: If we were to ask him, why are you doing what you were doing?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_06: What is the purpose of all this?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_06: His answer would be, I want to know Christ.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_06: I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection by becoming like him in his sufferings, like him in his death, if I may somehow attain resurrection from the dead.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_06: For Paul, his life was motivated by this longing to know Christ and to become like Christ in all things, which led Paul to do some bonkers things.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_06: Led him to go all over the Roman world to share the story of Jesus with all kinds of people, to endure suffering and go to prison multiple times, and to experience incredible joy and deep community.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_06: But through all of this, he persevered because he was clear about why he was at it.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_06: I want to know Christ by becoming like him in his living and in his dying.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_06: I think these words might help us to clarify our purpose too.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_06: Paul invites us to think about what might motivate us.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_06: And while we went turn our lives around 180 degrees like Paul did, still asking ourselves why might mean that we find renewed energy in our daily endeavors.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe it helps us to remember why we started doing the thing we were doing, or maybe we why we ended what we had been doing.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_06: We can't have a foundation to persevere when things get hard.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_06: Finding clarity in those whys gives us joy when we wake up to know that the day ahead is a day where we get to do this thing that we have been called to do.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_06: It also helps us to endure when things get hard and when the days are long.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_06: But even more, it helps us to find some clarity in our life, to help us figure out what fits and what doesn't, how we can live in alignment with who we feel we are called to be.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_06: Someone once told me, especially when you feel like you're juggling a lot, many people juggle a lot, you're juggling all kinds of things.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_06: That when you feel like you're juggling too much, the key is to know which one of those balls can bounce and which one of them is too fragile.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_06: That if you drop it, it will break.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_06: And so when it feels like there's too many balls in the air, simply to drop the ones that bounce and to make sure that you tend to those fragile ones.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_06: If we continue to follow Paul's lead, our asking why very quickly leads us to ask how our faith is going to invite us, how we're going to juggle, what balls we'll keep and which ones we'll let go of.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_06: Not all the answers to that question, why, are consistent with who we are as people who are seeking to follow Jesus.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_06: Upon closer examination, maybe there are things that are part of our lives that are not consistent with who we want to be in Christ, that are no longer in alignment.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe it's a little bit too selfish.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_06: Maybe they cause harm to other people or cut us off from being the people we're know we're meant to be.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_06: And those are balls we can simply let drop.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_06: Let them roll away.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_06: Paul invites us to ask why.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_06: And for Paul, it meant I want to follow Christ.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_06: I want to know Christ by becoming like him in his living and in his dying.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_06: And that why can be not just a why for Paul, but a North Star for each one of us.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_06: No matter what we do with our lives, no matter how we spend our time, no matter how we define ourselves, no matter our age, our occupation, or our ability, each one of us can come to know Christ and become more like him.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_06: In many ways, ninth graders, as you make your confirmation today, you're saying to yourself, to this community, that you want to know Christ and become more like him in your living.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_06: It's a bold proclamation, and we're here to cheer you on as you do so, as we too seek to make that same why a part of our lives.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_06: And the beautiful thing is there are as many ways to embody this goal as there are people in this room, as there are human beings in this world.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_06: In the midst of our daily lives, we can come to know Christ, to be known by Christ.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_06: Even without changing a single thing in your daily calendar, you can become more like Christ by the ways you treat one another, by how you understand yourself and this world, by simply paying attention to each beautiful moment of this life we're given.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_06: And this goal might move us to try something new, maybe to give something up.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_06: It might lead us, like it did for Paul, into new and interesting adventures and connections and relationships and opportunities.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_06: No, maybe this goal might feel impossible.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_06: After all, none of us regular old Joes, regular old Janes, is going to know Christ by Friday.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_06: But Paul writes, I want to know Christ and become more like him.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_06: But then he adds, it's not as if I've already reached this goal, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has already made me his own.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_06: We set this goal to know Christ, even as we trust that we're already known by Christ.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_06: We don't have to earn this love.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_06: We don't have to achieve it.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_06: We are already embraced by the one we are seeking to embrace.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_06: We've already been found by the one we are seeking.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_06: We are already held by this one we are seeking to hold on to.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_06: We don't have to prove ourselves to earn God's love, to demonstrate how great and capable we are.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_06: Christ has already made you his own.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_06: We are seeking the one who loves us.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_06: And so we have this hope in our lives.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_06: We can trust this hope in our hearts and our hands.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_06: We can live with bold and courageous and risky love to the world.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_06: To live and to give ourselves away as Paul did.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_06: Or maybe to put it this way, we can trust in all that we do that we are loved and held.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_06: And we can trust this because of Jesus.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_06: Jesus had a why of his own, of course, but his ultimate why was this desire to redeem and to bless and to save this whole world to grant us to pour grace into our lives.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_06: In everything Jesus did, his sole purpose was to draw God's people, to draw you, to draw all of us into Christ's love and this life that is now and forever.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_06: Christ lived and died and rose to make us his own.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_06: And so we get to live in response to this incredible gift we receive because of Christ's great big, beautiful, life-saving why, world-changing why.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_06: We can say, I want to know Christ and become like him in all things.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_06: And I want to because Christ has claimed me as his own.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_06: Now we turn to God in prayer, saying those words Jesus taught us in the Lord's Prayer.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_06: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_06: Give us today our daily bread.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_06: Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_06: Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_06: For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_06: Amen.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_06: Now receive this blessing.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_06: The one you are seeking has already found you.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_06: The one you are longing to embrace has already embraced you.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_06: And the one you wish to know already knows you, forgives you, and loves you.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_06: And because of this, we can spend our lives continuing to become like Christ and is living and is dying.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_06: And as you do so, trust that you are blessed and loved by God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_06: Amen.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: We hope that in a good way you feel a part of that reach.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: Tune in next Thursday for another edition of the Saint Paul Podcast.