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September 25 – God in First Place · The Daily Ripples Podcast

• 0:03
  Hey guys, this is the Daily Ripples and today is September 25th.
• 0:08
  We got Michael here and me and man, we've had a good week and man, I'm sorry.
• 0:15
  I'll apologize if I've come off a little harsh too this week.
• 0:18
  It might not have ended until tomorrow, but I might still be there.
• 0:22
  We'll see.
• 0:23
  But, um, today is September 20th for the morning.
• 0:26
  God in 1st place.
• 0:28
  Well, God holds 1st place in my life.
• 0:31
  Everything else found its proper place.
• 0:32
  Practical.
• 0:34
  Today I'll examine what has my attention, affection, and trust.
• 0:37
  Good things can become unhealthy when they take God's place.
• 0:40
  Keeping 1st things 1st helps me live with greater clarity, peace and purpose, spiritual as I keep my eyes on the Father, the Holy Spirit gently reorders my priorities when they begin to drift.
• 0:55
  Following Christ's example of seeking the Father's will above everything else, I discovered that a rightly ordered heart leads to a more faithful life.
• 1:06
  And man, you know, when I was reading that, I was thinking like, well, what's the proper order?
• 1:10
  How's the proper order and what does it look like in my life?
• 1:14
  And my big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, um, I'm sure everybody else is on page 19 says, we fill that elimination of our drinking is about a beginning.
• 1:26
  A much more important demonstration of our principles lies before us in our respective homes, occupations and affairs.
• 1:34
  And you know, that's my order for me today.
• 1:36
  Oh, you know, I've always thought it's kind of strange when people are like, man, I couldn't do that job because I couldn't go to my meeting. Have you heard that before?
• 1:46
  No, I hadn't really heard that.
• 1:49
  Really?
• 1:49
  I've I've heard.
• 1:50
  I guess I've been hanging around with the wrong people.
• 1:51
  I've heard people saying they can't go to a meeting because of their jobs.
• 1:54
  Oh, yes, it, yeah.
• 1:55
  Oh, yeah.
• 1:56
  Well, man, you know, like, what am I, like, I, but I also go to a lot of noon meetings, which is right. I know, look, Ray, hire people that don't work anyways.
• 2:03
  Well, there's some of that, but then there's a lot of people that are there.
• 2:06
  I mean, you'd be surprised how many people are there on lunch breaks.
• 2:09
  Right.
• 2:10
  Which is what I always do.
• 2:11
  I'm not retired, Corey.
• 2:13
  I know.
• 2:14
  I wish I would.
• 2:15
  But like, you know, people like you kind of live like on like, I know you're not.
• 2:19
  Now, look, don't start this crap about it.
• 2:21
  I only work one day a week, okay, Corey?
• 2:23
  That is not what the life of a preacher is, all right?
• 2:26
  But no, but like, when I see, I get jealous, like, well, I'm like working and driving the lunch, and I see like a family in a car together.
• 2:35
  I'm like, what do y'all even do for work?
• 2:39
  Or school?
• 2:39
  If it's a family?
• 2:40
  Yeah, you're like, what are you, you know, just up at Starbucks hanging out with the peoples.
• 2:44
  Anyway, it sounds, my parents never let me skip school anyway.
• 2:47
  But, um, you know, it's less by me uncle.
• 2:50
  But yeah, a much important demonstration is in our homes, occupations and affairs.
• 2:55
  And it says, you know, in the practical, today I'll examine what has my attention, affection and trust.
• 3:01
  Good things can become unhealthy when they take God's place and, you know, I think the Bible and I could be, you could kind of, you probably direct this to this, you know, where does God tell me to practice how to do this in my home, right?
• 3:17
  And I think you probably, anyways, because I know I'm thinking of like 2 different places in scripture that it talks about this, but I'm not the Bible thumper over here.
• 3:26
  Um, anyways, but I do think probably the same places, the places that I'll, that I'll come to are probably the same places that you're thinking of.
• 3:35
  Right, Lesley.
• 3:36
  Because, like, God tells me, man, I can't think of the words, but, like, same with occupation, right?
• 3:44
  Because who owns that company, is it God's kids or just a normal person? Because, you know, and this is what we were talking about the other day, man.
• 3:51
  One thing I've been trying to practice.
• 3:53
  And I got it in front of my computer, in my house, in my office, it says my goals for this year.
• 3:58
  You know, one of them is one of my goals is to become a little bit more financially state.
• 4:04
  Yeah, that's one.
• 4:06
  Another one is to be able to see in real time that everybody is God's kids.
• 4:12
  And what that looks like to me is different than like, you know, just the words that looks like as I'm interacting, good, bad, or indifferent, right?
• 4:20
  with somebody else.
• 4:21
  That I'm looking at them in the present time as God's kid.
• 4:26
  Usually I can only see that in the past, like, you know, before I approach the situation or after their situations approach, right?
• 4:34
  But I want to be able to see that in real time.
• 4:36
  And every, and every thing, or I go through, and I know that sounds a little bit much, but, you know, in the, in the New Testament of the Bible, there's a lot of, a lot of passages, especially in the, in the epistles and the letters, and especially in 1st and 2nd Timothy, about the proper order, you know, of a household and things of that nature.
• 4:55
  It talks about, you know, who's the head of the church, you know, and who's the head of the home and, you know, all these different things.
• 5:00
  But I, I, you could take it all the way back to almost the beginning of the Bible as well.
• 5:06
  Back in the book of Deuteronomy.
• 5:09
  And Deuteronomy is the, you know, I'll just be perfectly honest.
• 5:13
  Deuteronomy is the boring book of the Bible in the Old Testament that lists out all the rules and regulations of the early faith, right?
• 5:20
  The mosaic law.
• 5:22
  But in Deuteronomy 6, 6 through 9, it's talking about that law and it says, keep these words that I'm commanding you today in your heart.
• 5:30
  Recite them to your children and talk about them when you're at home and when you're away, when you lie down and when you rise, bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead and write them on the doorpost of your house and on your gates.
• 5:44
  So, in other words, the way that God wants you to live, yes, teach your children, do it at home.
• 5:51
  You know, the scripture affirms throughout it that, you know, there's the passage in the Bible about, um, you know, bring up your children and the way to go, and, you know, when they're when they're grown, they'll not depart you, you know, that kind of thing.
• 6:04
  And so it is very important.
• 6:06
  But the main thing that I was thinking about with this for today, you know, about keeping God in the 1st place is I was thinking about how, Man, I can learn from people and people can influence me who did not quite, in my opinion, get it even, but they still had wisdom to share.
• 6:24
  So, and who I'm thinking of specifically is there's a fairly well-known gentleman that was around the recovery community where we live for a long time.
• 6:37
  He actually was a recording artist as well.
• 6:39
  He had albums that he put out that were released and all that kind of stuff.
• 6:43
  But he, and then he was also, you know, a Methodist pastor.
• 6:47
  So he had a lot of things going on, right?
• 6:49
  So he was musically inclined.
• 6:51
  He was, yeah, I met this pastor and he was in recovery.
• 6:53
  Three things that could also be said about me by other people, right?
• 6:58
  But he'd been in it for a while.
• 7:01
  And I remember one of the things he had albums.
• 7:04
  Yeah, you got albums?
• 7:05
  No, I don't have albums, but I'm musically inclined.
• 7:07
  Shut up, Corey.
• 7:07
  Uh, anyway.
• 7:09
  I've got crazy raps that I put together on a podcast and TikTok, but let's not talk about,
• 7:15
  Lets not worry about that. And don't go try and find them on TikTok.
• 7:17
  But anyway, uh, so, but this guy, one of the things that he always said was that we all have a god size hold in our heart, and we try to fill it with something other than God, and that creates all of our calamity and and strife in life.
• 7:32
  And so his point was through recovery, through our faith, through doing God's will, we keep God in its proper place, which is right centered into our heart.
• 7:43
  And then everything else finds its proper place.
• 7:45
  And why I say that even somebody who didn't quite get it can still teach a lot because he came to a tragic end on a relapse.
• 7:53
  And but he was always an example for me of what can happen if I do not keep God first, my recovery right up there, and then allow everything else to fall under that. Because God and recovery are not, that is not, that does not conflict with my home's occupations and affairs.
• 8:15
  I have to keep God and recovery principles with me in my home, occupations and affairs and all the things that I do.
• 8:21
  And so it all kind of goes hand in hand and ties in together for me.
• 8:25
  You know, some thoughts I was, yeah, well, you know, and uh, what is it, the uh, Golden Key by Emmett Fox.
• 8:35
  I think it's called the Golden Keymans.
• 8:37
  There's going to be a couple people that are mad at me for, I think it's the golden key of Emmett Fox.
• 8:42
  It was a book that was written back in the 1930s and his thing, right?
• 8:46
  The golden key was, hey, when this comes up, go to God.
• 8:50
  When this thing comes up, go to God.
• 8:52
  And, you know, that it's like this thought of like, when I go to God, is, but I don't like how the presence's wrapped, right?
• 9:02
  There's something along the lines of that.
• 9:04
  But like, you know, keeping eye first.
• 9:06
  Well, on page 84, right?
• 9:08
  It says, at once, you know, right off the back, we ask God to remove it at once, right?
• 9:13
  And that's me bringing God into her.
• 9:15
  Me bring in, you know, so directing my attention to God.
• 9:18
  Because, like, and they'll let a God, the young man, like, oh, God's, you know, to me, there's a lot of things.
• 9:24
  But one thing I think primarily is God has a lot of love too.
• 9:28
  And so when I look at that and I think, but man, yeah, I think, you know, for the most part, I'm talking to a friend of mine, and they've kind of gotten a little bit off their, their meditation and their prayers, and we've kind of talked a little bit about this and we talked about meditation, right?
• 9:45
  So if I do get off track a little bit, right, a lot of people want to beat themselves up, what do you mean if?
• 9:52
  Man, I always get off triple with a trip.
• 9:54
  It's more like when I get off track anyway, for this guy.
• 9:57
  Well, off track, meaning like off my prayer stuff and off that.
• 10:03
  Yeah, I mean, and stop doing the things that you know are working.
• 10:06
  Right.
• 10:07
  Yeah.
• 10:07
  And so, you know, in Revelations.
• 10:10
  chapter two, verse four.
• 10:13
  It says, yeah, I hold this against you.
• 10:17
  You have forsaken the love you had the at first.
• 10:20
  Consider how far you have fallen.
• 10:23
  Repent and do the things you did it first.
• 10:26
  If you do not repent.
• 10:27
  I will come for you and remove your lampstand from its place.
• 10:31
  And that's the light, right?
• 10:33
  That's your light.
• 10:34
  And so yeah, but what's cool about the 12 and 12 and it, you know, goes into this too, and it kind of connects to this.
• 10:41
  It's talking about prayer.
• 10:42
  And it's on the last page of step 11, it says, is talking about prayer, meditation, and all this stuff, and it says, all this should be very encouraging news for those who are cool from prayer because they don't believe in it, or because they feel themselves cut off from God's help and direction.
• 10:58
  And sometimes I'll come into that place, right?
• 11:01
  And I'll feel like I'll be cut off in God's direction.
• 11:04
  I will just feel dull that day.
• 11:05
  But don't let up, right?
• 11:07
  Because I think that's where the the beautiful stuff happens is in those lull periods.
• 11:13
  Man, staying staying to the discipline, even in the walls.
• 11:17
  But you guys want to say, all of us, without exception, pass through times when we can pray only with the greatest exertion of will.
• 11:25
  Occasionally, we would go even further, further than this.
• 11:29
  We are seized with a rebellion so sickening that we simply won't pray.
• 11:35
  When these things happen, we should not think too ill of ourselves.
• 11:39
  We should simply resume prayer as we can doing what we know for us to be good.
• 11:43
  Kind of like, you know, lines a little bit.
• 11:46
  Just get back to it, right?
• 11:47
  And just get back.
• 11:48
  Don't beat yourself up, man.
• 11:49
  Because like, you know, and it's like meditation.
• 11:52
  When I'm in the breath, when I'm in that, I can get out a little of sorts thinking about army men's over here and this over here and penguins on, you know, penguins on sleds, right?
• 12:03
  Why would a penguin be on a sled anyways, because it can do, it's got its built-in sled, Michael.
• 12:08
  Anyways, but, you know, but I just, we just witnessed your thought pattern going spirals live on air this morning, yes.
• 12:17
  But then he was on sleds.
• 12:19
  So, yeah, coming back to thy will be done, now, Maya.
• 12:22
  Yeah, it comes brings me back to center.
• 12:25
  So a couple of things.
• 12:28
  that I was thinking of with that, you know, when I have felt cut off from, you know, God's direction, as we say sometimes in church, where I'm not feeling the sunlight of the spirit, right?
• 12:41
  Well, what's the solution to that?
• 12:42
  For me, it's keep praying.
• 12:45
  You know, Matthew 7 and 7.
• 12:46
  Jesus said, asking, she'll be giving you, seek, and you shall find, knock, and it shall be open unto you.
• 12:51
  That tells me I got a role to play.
• 12:52
  I got to ask, I got to seek, and I got to knock.
• 12:54
  Those 3 verbs on my part were in that one little short verse.
• 12:59
  Ask and it'll be given to me, seek and I'll find.
• 13:02
  Knock and it'll be opened unto me.
• 13:04
  But then I was also going back to, because I was kind of, you know, I always kind of chuckle a little bit when you bring up the Emmett Fox materials, you know, you were talking about the golden key because a couple of months ago after you had been talking about the Sermon on the Mountain Book.
• 13:16
  It's one that I never read, and I bought it, and I started reading it, and I immediately found things.
• 13:21
  I don't agree with this, and I don't agree with that, and oh, what have you.
• 13:25
  But that golden key that you mentioned was a pamphlet in 1931 that led to the development of the Sermon of the Mount.
• 13:31
  And a lot of those same thoughts were included in that, and that came out in 1934.
• 13:35
  And it does have a heavy, you know, influence on, you know, the AA because it was part of that new thought that they called, you know, movement at the time, the new thought engine, and his core claim, Fox's core claim in that book was that God was the only power and only real presence.
• 13:51
  So anything wrong in your life has no substance on its own.
• 13:54
  It exists only as long as your thoughts keep it in place.
• 13:57
  Right. You know?
• 13:58
  But if you change what you hold in your mind, the condition dissolves because your mind is the coping mechanism of the universe.
• 14:05
  So in other words, if I'm when I have problems, if I'm praying, I'm turning my thoughts to God in a way from my problem, which God uses that time together with me to minimize those problems in my mind.
• 14:19
  And so it's a very collaborative thing, and I can get down with that point, you know, the MOS trying to make in the book, is that, yeah, absolutely, because it kind of goes back to all the way back to when I was a kid.
• 14:29
  And my mama said, 2 things.
• 14:32
  Be careful what you watch and listen to, and be careful who your friends are.
• 14:36
  Why?
• 14:37
  Because that's the information that I'm filling my head with, and that's driving my thoughts versus if I keep my thoughts on other things, better things, more things that are going to lead me to life and not to death or consequences, then those are the things that are going to give me life today.
• 14:54
  Um.
• 14:56
  You know, I don't know if you got this far in the, in the Emmett Fox, Sermon on the Mountain Book, but it talks a little bit about being waterlogged with, it's talking about prayer and it's like, hey, if you find yourself waterlogged and prayer.
• 15:10
  Um, then I had to look up the word waterlogged force because I'm not.
• 15:15
  Anyways, it's kind of like, you know, not in the right space, you know?
• 15:18
  Yeah. And, uh, man, like, you know, it was a really interesting thing, like, because I, I told you like my 1st year, you know, being sober, man, I was a nutcase.
• 15:27
  I mean, not as dumb with me the 1st year.
• 15:30
  Just, man, I'm asking us at the piece, I'm still in that case, but no, I'm really not, man.
• 15:34
  I mean, you know, comparatively to who and what I was.
• 15:38
  Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 15:39
  Um, I mean, my 1st or to my 1st 1st year.
• 15:44
  Completely lost going in all directions, but you know, this this 1st year was a little bit different because like, I was just scared to death, man.
• 15:54
  I was full of fear.
• 15:55
  I didn't know where I was going to end up and what was going to happen and man, I was just all over the place.
• 16:00
  But so I would sit at night and man, I was really, man, I was meditating every night for 20 minutes.
• 16:07
  I was praying for people at night.
• 16:09
  You know, baby would be asleep right there on the couch and I'm just on the floor, you know, having these like crazy experiences, babies, a stitchell crisis.
• 16:19
  I mean, they were, but like, you know, it was so cool at the moment that time I spent with God through.
• 16:24
  Um, It was really a journey, man, because, like, you know, it would be in meditation praying.
• 16:30
  And like, you know, I don't know if, well, you're probably familiar with this, like, you know, when you're in meditation, being choir.
• 16:36
  This thing tells you to, you know, it's it's cool.
• 16:39
  This thing pressing inside of you, telling you, you know, get out.
• 16:43
  But you're like, what's further?
• 16:44
  You push further.
• 16:46
  Now it would push further.
• 16:48
  And man, like it was just a ride and it was, man, it was so cool, those experiences, but, you know, I would try to get into those things, those experiences when my head was all crazy.
• 17:00
  I would still prey, obviously, but like, I wouldn't be where I wanted to be and had these spiritual experiences, and man, I was like, you know, I was about it, though, because like, man, I needed that at that time, and God was giving me this full blast of this like, I don't know what I could, I don't have anything I can relate it to, but it's hard to describe a spiritual experience.
• 17:23
  Yeah, it really is.
• 17:25
  And I think you can, you know, from a, from different experiences, I think, man, I mean, I don't think for me at least, man.
• 17:33
  I, uh, if I want to, if I really want to go get somewhere and get quiet, I get in prayer, and I get quiet, and I get on my knees, and I close my eyes, and man, well, I've told you what I do.
• 17:47
  I open it with the 3rd step prayer.
• 17:49
  I get quiet.
• 17:50
  For some time, and I'll breathe in.
• 17:53
  I love you and breathe out from God.
• 17:55
  I love you.
• 17:55
  Anyways, it is, uh, I, if I, if I'm in there 15 minutes, uh, over 15 minutes, it's a, it's an experience, isn't it?
• 18:04
  Oh, but that's the whole deal.
• 18:06
  You're a goddess button the number one thing.
• 18:07
  I think that brings it.
• 18:09
  Yeah, it's right back to the beginning.
• 18:10
  God held us for God in 1st place in our family, right?
• 18:14
  And and at the rest of going long.
• 18:17
  I mean, that's one of the things that I think has made, you know, my marriage successful all these years is because my wife and I both at, well, we met through church, which is not the only way to do it, but we both knew from the very beginning that we would keep God in our marriage, right?
• 18:33
  You know, and that's the way, and so for me, that has provided such a sense of relief and comfort in that, because we've had problems, we've had conflict.
• 18:42
  We've had blow ups and fights and all that stuff, but I've never been afraid for very long anyway of losing her because we have both kept God in the marriage.
• 18:56
  And that's just a microcosm of keeping God at the forefront of every aspect of my life.
• 19:01
  So it works if you work it.
• 19:04
  Prayer.
• 19:05
  Father God, help me keep you 1st in every part of my life, through your Holy Spirit, reorder my heart, whenever it begins to wonder.
• 19:13
  Shade me through the example of Jesus.
• 19:16
  Amen.
• 19:17
  Amen.