Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Let's pray.
[00:00:04] Heavenly Father, I thank you so much for everyone that's here today.
[00:00:10] I thank you that you are live and moving in this room, that we get to stand and worship you.
[00:00:17] God, I pray whatever is on our hearts today, Lord, that we can just give it to you, put it aside and really hear what you're trying to tell us, really hear the call that you have on our lives.
[00:00:31] God, we want relationships with you. We want to be stronger in our faith with you. We want to love you better. We want to be better people.
[00:00:39] And God, I pray this over all of us. I pray that today that my words are not from me, but they're from you.
[00:00:47] That everything that I'm saying is directly from you, and you're speaking through me. Goddess, I thank you for your goodness in this message today. Amen.
[00:00:58] So we're about halfway through the summer of CC midweek. I just thank you all for being here. I feel the halfway point. I ought to share something personal about myself, let you in on a little bit of my life. I am an avid skincare routine follower. It's a lifestyle now. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yep. Yes. Oh, thank you.
[00:01:21] I love my skincare routine.
[00:01:24] Every morning, every night, I'm doing it. I will not miss it. I will not skip it. But it wasn't always like that, okay? It started, probably my freshman year is when I decided I should probably start washing my face before in bed and things like that. It's when acne became a reality. Okay? I was like, dang it. I probably need to start washing my face more and putting on my spray every day, and I won't miss it now. It was a chore at first, for sure. That skincare routine was, like, another thing I had to add to my list. I hated getting the soap and my hair, and it was dripping down my arms. I hated it. But now it's something I love. I really do enjoy it. It's just like five minutes by myself in the bathroom that I'm, like, crimping.
[00:02:03] And it's not something I'll ever miss. I won't skip it. I'm on vacation. I'm going to do my skincare routine. I'm at a sleepover. I'm going to do my skincare routine. I fly to college, and I'm, like, spraying my face on the airplane, and everyone next to me is like, what is she doing? I won't skip it.
[00:02:17] And it's because I know that it's going to pay off. You know what I mean? And it's one of those routines in my life that it's so ingrained that I won't miss it. I do it every day, and I just wish that there were other things in my life that I did like that, too, you know? I wish there were other things in life that were just as easy to pick up and do every day and never skip, and that when you miss it, you can tell you missed it, so you have to do it anyway. I wish there were more things like that because I really struggle to keep a routine. I really struggle to pick up those healthy habits. My planet fitness membership says that enough. Okay.
[00:02:53] Yeah, I bought that membership intending to work out every day, but I failed to follow through on that one.
[00:03:02] And I think we're all like that.
[00:03:04] I think we just fail to follow through sometimes. We have really good intentions. We have our desire set on something big. I think we all want to be better people. We want to be healthier than we were the day before, just a little bit better than we before. We have good intentions. We have our eyes set on a vision that's worth it.
[00:03:23] But those habits that make us get there seem so hard to follow, and we fail to follow through.
[00:03:30] So, for an instance, an unhealthy habit of mine would be just, let's say, scrolling on my phone for hours. Okay? I'm scrolling until at some point I, like, get off my phone, and I'm like, what day is it? What time is it? Why am I kind of sweaty? I lose track of time.
[00:03:48] That's an unhealthy habit that I want to quit, okay? I don't want to waste my time on my phone like that. And I want to have these healthy habits. I want to go on a three mile run every day, but I just can't. I'm not a follow through on that one. Let me tell you. My gym membership, that hasn't been working out for me, that can tell you that enough, right?
[00:04:07] I think we're all like that.
[00:04:10] We have healthy habits that we're trying to commit to and unhealthy habits that we're trying to quit, but we failed to follow through for some reason, right? Maybe your unhealthy habit, like me, was scrolling on your phone, or maybe it's wasting time. Maybe it's sleeping in or failing to wake up to your alarms. Maybe it's over committing yourself.
[00:04:29] Maybe your unhealthy habit is falling into the temptations, falling into the temptations of the outburst from the emotion, or falling into the temptation to go to the website or that substance. Maybe you have the unhealthy habit of falling into the temptation to talk about those people in a way you know you shouldn't be.
[00:04:49] And maybe you so badly simultaneously want to get those healthy habits. You want to get them and nail them down right?
[00:04:56] Maybe your healthy habit is drinking 70oz of water a day because for some reason, that's how much I'm supposed to be drinking. I don't do that either, but maybe we'll try it. Maybe your healthy habit that you're trying to do is morning walks or daily reading. Dare I say your healthy habit is a gym membership to planet fitness. I mean, and you have these healthy habits that you're trying to pick up on, but you just fail to follow through.
[00:05:22] I mean, I think Ann should get back up here and start preaching again, because what he said was so true that we want to have this relationship with God. We have our eyes set on this vision for what it would look like for us to have a stronger relationship with God than the day we had before, right? To love him better, to be a better girl, to be a better man.
[00:05:42] And we fail to follow through.
[00:05:44] It's hard to follow through on the prayer and the reading of scripture and the spending time with him and setting that time aside.
[00:05:50] And for some reason, we just fail to follow through with it. We just seemingly can't carry it out.
[00:05:57] And I'm going to quit talking my own words because I think Paul says it better than I ever could. He writes in Romans, for I know that nothing good dwells in me that is in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.
[00:06:16] For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.
[00:06:23] So all of those things that you want to try to be better at, and you want to try to be better than the worry, oh, I'm going to restart that sentence one more time. Let me try again. You want to be better than who you were the day before, and so you try to pick up these healthy habits, but you just can't commit and you can't carry them out like he says. And there's these things in our lives that we want to quit, that we want to walk away from, we never want to turn back to. And yet the next day, there we are, turning back to him again.
[00:06:53] And the more we do this and the more we have this tension, the more we keep failing and feeling like we just can't get it right. We grow into this idleness.
[00:07:03] We have this idleness in our faith where we stand still. It's a complacency and a comfortability in where we are. It sounds like these thoughts in our head that say, I know God, and he knows me, so I'm good. We're chill. You know, I go to church every Sunday, so I think we're good.
[00:07:20] I already know what's in the bible. I don't really. I know the story. It doesn't change much, you know? And we grow comfortable with where we're at, and we stop pushing for more, we stop training for more.
[00:07:34] But just because we stop moving doesn't mean the enemy does, too.
[00:07:39] The enemy keeps working even when we aren't.
[00:07:44] So when we grow idle in our faith and we stop moving and we stop working, and we think, hey, this is all that's in me. This is all I can give. The enemy is waiting around the corner for that. Peter calls him the prowling lion, and he's waiting to devour.
[00:08:01] And when we grow idle and we just sit and stand complacent in our faith and where we're at, and we think that the time that it takes to work into that relationship isn't worth it, when we're sitting in this spot, we let the world start to shape us.
[00:08:17] We're sitting away from him, out of God's presence, and we allow the world to start shaping us, because I promise that the thing that gets most of your attention and your focus is what's going to start shaping you.
[00:08:29] So when you sit idle in your faith, the world is going to start to shape you.
[00:08:34] But when you're proactive and you sit in the presence of God, he is going to be what shapes you.
[00:08:41] And so we want to commit to these healthy habits, and yet we're standing complacent in our faith, letting the world shape us, letting the prowling lion come with trials and temptations.
[00:08:53] Paul is describing this battle between the flesh and the spirit.
[00:08:59] He's saying that the flesh seemingly always wins.
[00:09:03] No matter how hard I want to do the right thing, no matter how hard I want to walk away from that thing, I can't follow through with it. And the flesh wins.
[00:09:14] But it doesn't have to be like that. We are given the holy spirit in us that will fight in that battle for us, because our willpower alone will never be enough.
[00:09:28] Our willpower alone is not enough to fight that battle between the flesh. Okay? Because let's say, for example, I'm sitting in church on Sunday, doc says something and I'm like, darn it, that's right at me. He's talking to me. I know I got to do that. So Monday morning, I'm going to be a new woman. I'm going to wake up at 06:00 a.m. and spend an hour with God. And then I'm going to go on a hike and pray to him. I'm going to sit in silence and solitude and then I'm going to fast through lunch. Monday doesn't see me until 08:30 a.m. okay, yeah. And I fail to follow through. And no matter how hard I want to try to be better, it seems like I just can't. And the flesh keeps winning.
[00:10:08] But we can break free from this idleness, okay?
[00:10:12] We can break free from this feeling that we're trapped in always doing the wrong thing.
[00:10:19] And it starts with a training.
[00:10:21] Our willpower isn't enough. So we need to train our spirits.
[00:10:26] We need to train our spirits to choose him every time.
[00:10:30] Being reactive in your faith means that you sit idle and let the trials and temptations come at you. And then you react to them. And a lot of time that's out of impulse, and a lot of time the flesh is going to lead that.
[00:10:43] But when you're proactive in your faith, you've already decided what you're going to choose. You've already decided who you're going to choose every single time. When you're proactive in your faith, you're organizing your life and positioning yourself to be in his presence so he can transform you. So when the trials and temptations do come, you already know what you're going to pick.
[00:11:05] The more time we spend training our spirits, the more inclined we are to be like Jesus.
[00:11:13] These habits, they position us before God so that he can transform our spirit. See, Paul uses this really interesting word when he talks about spiritual health. He talks about the spiritual health like it's physical health. He says, to train or to exercise your spirit, which seems really odd to us, but just like how my planet fitness membership isn't going to make me fit, I actually have to go to the gym. You know what I mean? You can tell I have a lot of emotion about this membership that I bought.
[00:11:41] It's unresolved.
[00:11:43] It's not what's going to make me fit, right. You have to put in the work and the training and the effort and the dedication.
[00:11:52] Our spiritual life is the same way.
[00:11:56] We need to be putting in the same effort and obedience and training and discipline that it takes and the spiritual training is what's going to take us out of the world, out of this state of idleness and in the presence of God so that he can move in our hearts and our spirits and transform us to something better than we were before.
[00:12:18] These spiritual exercises are going to put you in the presence of God so that he can move and make you a better person, a better man, a better woman, a better wife, a better husband, a better son or daughter than you were the day before.
[00:12:37] Three years ago, I started to try to read the Bible by myself. I had just gotten one, and I remember thinking, I'm going to do this every single day. This is what is going to make me a better christian. I'm going to do it every day. And I remember I woke up the next day and I sat with my bible and I just held it and I was like, okay, now what do I do? I had no idea what to do. I had no idea where to start. So I'm just like, flipping through and I'm doing the thing where I'm like, God, lead me somewhere. And then it ends up being the genealogies that I was talking about, and I'm completely lost.
[00:13:07] My streak of reading the bible back then was probably like three days, which I think was a pretty good starting effort. I had no idea what I was doing.
[00:13:16] And every time I read, I just felt more confused, like it didn't make sense. I feel like nothing resonated with me. And so it was really easy for me to give up, really easy for me to quit reading.
[00:13:28] But a couple months later, when I had this new desire, I had some people in my life who were willing to help me read the bible, who were going to read it with me, answer the hard questions that I had. When that time came, I had a new passion about reading it. I had a new motivation about reading it, and I was able to stick to it way better than I did the first time on my own.
[00:13:51] And I started training my spirit to read the Bible every day. And what's interesting is once I missed a day, I noticed it.
[00:13:59] Once I missed a day out of reading that scripture, out of reading the word, I really noticed it.
[00:14:06] But after I read it for those first three days, that whole month period, I didn't really notice. But it wasn't until I got into the habit of reading it, until I started my train training my spirit for it, that I started to notice when I skipped.
[00:14:21] When you are in relationship with God, you get to taste and see how good he is.
[00:14:26] And so when I'm reading his word or when I'm sitting in prayer or when I'm sitting in his presence, I get to taste and see what a relationship with him is like and how it satisfies and fulfills my soul better than anything else could.
[00:14:38] The one who created and saved my soul is the one who will fill it better than anyone else could ever fill it.
[00:14:46] Augustine of Hippo wrote this book. Well, he wrote many books, and this is a compilation of them. And he says this really awesome quote in it he's actually talking about. He shares this conflict he has in his body, in his self, of the flesh and the spirit.
[00:15:01] And he says this, although my real need was for you, my God, who are the food of the soul, I was not aware of this hunger.
[00:15:11] I felt no need for the food that does not perish, not because I had my fill of it, but because the more I was starved of it, the less palatable it seemed.
[00:15:22] And so all of those words, basically he's saying that the longer you spend outside of the presence of God, the less appealing it seems.
[00:15:32] Have you felt that the longer you spend not at church, the longer you spend out of fellowship, out of the word, out of prayer, the less enticing it seems.
[00:15:44] You don't even recognize that your soul is hungry for him, that your spirit is so hungry for him, and there's pains in your soul that can only be satisfied by him. You don't even realize it anymore, and so you sit idle and you don't think there's anything else for you. But I promise you there is, that he can fill your soul and satisfy it in a way that nothing else can.
[00:16:08] Because when I'm out of his presence and when I spend time away from the word and away from him and away from prayer, my soul is hungry for him. And I start to not even recognize that it is. I feel these pains, and I try to fill them with things in the world, but they will never satisfy them the way he does.
[00:16:26] Because when I'm in his presence, my soul is where it's designed to be.
[00:16:32] Have you felt that before, that you've been apart for him for so long that it doesn't even sound palatable? It doesn't even sound enticing anymore.
[00:16:49] It's important to spend time with God. I know that might be, like, the simplest thing I could say, but if that's the only thing I could say, that's what I would say. It's important for you to spend time with the one who created you and saved you. And loves you more than anyone else, and so you might be feeling like, well, why?
[00:17:09] Why should I take time to spend with him? Or why would he ever want to spend time with me?
[00:17:16] And I'm just so lucky because God gave me the best analogy in a person.
[00:17:22] My mom is the best example for this. I'm probably going to embarrass her now, but my mom is a curly headed cutie up in the front, and she's just the best mom I know. A lot of people probably say that. I win. Okay? Should I have the best mom?
[00:17:40] And God really helped me understand this through my relationship with her growing up. My mom always, always supported me. She was my number one supporter. I was in dance, I was in musical period of time. I was in band, I was in all these clubs, academic, whatever, whatever. She was going to be there. Okay. 06:00 a.m. my mom was there probably 20 minutes early, to be fair.
[00:18:03] 11:00 p.m. she was there probably with snacks to make sure I'm well fed. Okay. She supported me, and she encouraged me through it all. And so when I felt like giving up, she said, no, no, baby, you're not done. And she pushed me to be better. She pushed me when I wanted to give up, she said, there's more left in you. And my mom provided for me. My mom always made sure I had breakfast or lunch or dinner, even when I forgot it. And every single day at school, it seemed like I was calling her to bring it to me. She was making the drive to bring it to me. And she provided for me in my clothes, she provided for me in my school. Things, the things I needed for my dance and my other extracurriculars, my mom was there to provide. And more than that, my mom just loved me. And so when I messed up and when I didn't treat her right, she still loved me.
[00:18:47] And to paint a picture, if you knew me in high school, it might not seem like I was super grateful for her, though, in high school, I don't know. Has anyone seen the inside out two movie yet? You don't have to raise your hand. Oh, okay. Thanks. Awesome. Let's go. I thought it was pretty good. Okay, awesome.
[00:19:05] I thought there was one scene specifically that just really hit me. It was super, super funny, but also so true. You know that well, you see, the main character, these emotions are, like, leading her brain. I have a really hard time explaining movies, so I really hope I explain this in the best way. The emotions, they lead her brain, and at one point, they show all of what they call the islands of personality. And basically, it's these things that make up a person. So that's an example of one right there.
[00:19:31] There are these islands that make the main character who she is. And so the thought is each of us have these islands in us, okay, that make us who we are. And so this is the main character's friendship island.
[00:19:43] And it's beautiful and it's shiny and it's bright, and it makes me want to ride a roller coaster on it.
[00:19:49] But then it also shows us Family island. Can we look at that? Yeah.
[00:19:54] And it's really small, and there's not a lot going on. And when it did that Panover, I was cackling, okay?
[00:20:02] But it was also so true. And for me, in high school, that's what my islands of personality looked like. I was really focused and driven by my friends. I wanted to spend all my time with them. I wanted to do everything they were doing. I felt like a cool high schooler finally.
[00:20:16] And my mom just wanted me home with her. For her, it probably felt more like she was running a bed and breakfast. Yeah, I was there for dinner. I was there for sleeping, and I was there for breakfast. And then I was gone the rest of the day.
[00:20:29] And for me, it felt like she was being selfish, like, mom, I just spent 13 years with you. You've had enough time. Now it's my friend's turn. You know, it felt like she was taking me away from what I really wanted to do. But in reality, she loved me and cared for me and supported me and encouraged me, and she just wanted to spend time with me.
[00:20:50] She just wanted me to be there, and she didn't want me to be there to do the chores, right, to clean the dishes or do the laundry or mop the floor. It would have been nice, but I wasn't doing it. You know, she didn't want me to do all of those things. She just wanted me to sit with her, to be with her. My mom knew what I was doing at school already. She knew my classes. She knew what kinds of dance I was doing. She knew my friends and where we hung out.
[00:21:15] But she just wanted me to hear me say it. It wasn't going to be necessarily a surprise, but she just wanted to hear me talk to her, to sit with her, to be with her, because she loved me more than any of those friends could have ever loved me. And she provided for me and she cared for me, and she just wanted to be with me.
[00:21:35] And that's the image of our father in heaven, the one that created you, the one that calls you, the one that has saved you, that loves you and cares for you and provides for you more than anyone else would ever be.
[00:21:54] He wants time with you, and he doesn't need you doing all the things. He just wants you.
[00:22:02] And when we sit with him and we're able to just sit and exist with him, sit and talk about our days with him, we start to be transformed, brings out these things. There's this natural light that comes from God, that brings out this darkness within us, in us, and it reveals it to him, and he starts to transform us within, and we become more like Christ. And that's our goal.
[00:22:29] We want to be better people because we want to be more like Christ. Christ.
[00:22:35] And there might be some of us that feel like, well, why would I ever want to be more like Jesus?
[00:22:40] Why is that? The image that you're painting, Jesus is our perfect example of what faith looks like.
[00:22:48] He was fully man and fully God, and he was perfect in every way. And he is the example that we get here in this book and here on earth that we get to live up to, that we get to try to be. He's our example for why we want to be better in this world. And when we're transformed to be more like Christ, the flesh doesn't always win.
[00:23:11] And when we're transformed to be more like Christ, we stand out of this idleness, and we start saying yes to the things that we know are good for us, and we start leaving behind the things that we know aren't for us.
[00:23:22] When we say yes to following Christ and we begin to be transformed into his likeness, we are filled in our souls more than anyone else could ever satisfy our souls or fill it.
[00:23:37] And I really believe that we want to be more like Christ for a greater calling.
[00:23:44] It's really easy to feel like, well, I want to be a better me for me, but I also want to be a better me for the people around me.
[00:23:51] And that's because we have a higher calling on our life.
[00:23:55] God has something bigger for us. The last chapter of Matthew, he says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Like I said, jesus was fully man and fully God. So he has all authority of heaven and earth, and this is what he tells us.
[00:24:13] Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age, most of us might be familiar with this. And if you're not, we often call it the great commission. It's this great calling that we have on our lives, not just for the people who were there to experience it, but for all of us in this room.
[00:24:43] That's a call in all of our lives to go and make disciples and teach them in the ways of Jesus. So we must reflect him so that they can see who he really is.
[00:24:54] A disciple is just a person who follows the teachings of a leader.
[00:25:01] And so Jesus had his twelve disciples, and we read about them.
[00:25:06] They all just followed the teachings of Jesus. They even called him rabbi, which meant teacher.
[00:25:11] Jesus is still our teacher today.
[00:25:13] So the more we're willing to train our spirit to sit in his presence and be in front of our teacher, the more we'll learn from him, the more we'll become like him, and the more we'll want to represent him and reflect him in the right kind of way.
[00:25:28] I think there are people who represent Christ in the wrong kind of way.
[00:25:32] I don't want to be that disciple.
[00:25:35] I want to be the kind of disciple that goes and makes more and invites them into the salvation of their souls in Jesus Christ.
[00:25:44] And it's only out of ourselves, right? Only out of our own spiritual health that we can invite people into this.
[00:25:52] If I'm not spiritually healthy, then I can't properly reflect Christ.
[00:25:57] So I need to make sure that I'm sitting with him, that I'm learning from him, that I'm being filled by him in the way that only he can fill me, so I can properly represent him and invite other people to him.
[00:26:12] This call is so awesome. It's so cool because he's inviting us to something big.
[00:26:19] We were made for something more than just bettering ourselves. We were made to partner with him in the saving of souls.
[00:26:28] God wants to partner with you in the saving of other people's souls.
[00:26:33] And the Holy Spirit is in us and is equipping us and is working through us.
[00:26:39] But you have to give him something to work with, and that comes through our spiritual training.
[00:26:46] We give the Holy Spirit something to work with when we're willing to sit with him and have our spirit trained to be more like him. And so I wanted to make it super practical.
[00:26:56] I wanted to give us a couple of examples of how we can apply this to our lives. I think, like, these habits feel like so much work, right? But it doesn't have to be. We make things too complex. Loving Jesus is really simple. Okay.
[00:27:09] And so one of the things that we can do, one of these healthy habits, is prayer. That's just a conversation with God.
[00:27:17] I want to challenge you for all the things I'm about to say, for all of the habits I'm about to talk about, all of these disciplines that I'm about to mention. I want you to pick one. So if you could pull out your phone, pull out notes, whatever you want, and write down one thing that you're going to do this week, one thing that you're going to commit to training your soul. Okay? Most of you are just going to memorize it. That's good, too. Whatever you need.
[00:27:39] One thing we can do is pray.
[00:27:42] It's a conversation with God. It's talking to him about the life that you're living with him.
[00:27:47] It's talking to your very best friend.
[00:27:51] Prayer is what we were designed for. It's where we were designed to be in constant communication. If we think back to the garden, right? Adam and Eve walked in the garden constantly talking with God. That's how we are meant to be. And Paul tells us first, thessalonians 517. He says, pray without ceasing, meaning pray always. So if this is the discipline you want to practice of prayer, pray before things. Pray in things and pray after things. Invite God into everything you're doing this week.
[00:28:19] The next one is scripture.
[00:28:22] Scripture is his holy, living word that we get to hear directly from him. This is how I hear God the clearest, and this is the one that I needed some people to help me out with. So if this is the one you want to try this week, if this is the habit you want to train your spirit in this week, to sit in his presence and be transformed like him.
[00:28:41] Find a partner. Find someone you trust that will be willing to do it with you. Maybe it's someone who's brand new, or maybe it's someone who's read it before and they can help you along the way.
[00:28:51] Find a partner to read it together with, and I want you to look for one thing to take away. So every day you're going to set a timer. You're going to set a specific time to read with this person or separate, but you'll still talk about it and find one takeaway. And I want you to ask this question. What does this show me about God?
[00:29:11] I think a lot of times we read and we're thinking, well, what does it say about me? Take your eyes off of you for 1 second and ask, what does this show me about God? The next one you can practice. Is silence and solitude this one I'm really, really bad at. Okay, so maybe this is the one I'm picking. Silence and solitude can be super uncomfortable for me because I'm someone who likes noise. Always got music on, always got tv on, always got a podcast in always on FaceTime with someone, never alone. I don't like silence and solitude, but that means it's a practice I desperately need, that my soul is hungry for.
[00:29:41] Silence and solitude is avoiding the noise and the distractions of this world. It's stepping away from the busyness and slowing down. And so if this is one you want to practice, I recommend you step away where no one can see you. Maybe that's a closet. Maybe that's your bedroom. Maybe it's an office. Maybe it's outside in the backyard or a park. I don't know. Wherever it is, go where people don't see you, where you don't feel like eyes are on you, where you feel completely alone, just with God.
[00:30:05] And position yourself however you need to position yourself. Your arms stretched out wide, sitting, doing yoga poses. I don't know, whatever you need, but spend time with him, just being. He doesn't need you doing all the spiritual chores. He just wants you.
[00:30:21] Another one you can practice is maybe confession. That can seem scary, but it's being willing to sit with trusted people. Make sure it's with trusted people.
[00:30:30] And confessing the failures you had, which sounds super scary, like, I would never want to do that. Find someone you trust more than anything and talk to each other about the things of being a human, about the times that the flesh might have won the battle and how you're going to not let that happen again. And the spiritual training that you're going to do.
[00:30:49] We're told as believers that we can confess to one another and then pray for each other. So if confession is one you want to take this week, spend time with people you trust when you're confessing, and pray for each other constantly in it, we have celebration.
[00:31:06] Celebration is one that Jesus practiced often. We get to celebrate the people in our lives. We get to celebrate their accomplishments. And most of all, we celebrate what God has given us. Pick one person each day to celebrate their service.
[00:31:20] Where we get to represent Christ. Christ tells us he came not to be served, but to serve. And so in service, find one person each day that you're going to serve.
[00:31:32] Maybe it's the same person for a week, but put their needs above your own.
[00:31:39] We have worship ascribing worth to the one who deserves it most this week. Spend time thinking each day, Lord, how can I worship you properly? How can I ascribe worth to you? Whether I'm at work, whether I'm in the car, whether I'm with those people? How can I ascribe proper worth to you? There's countless other ways you can practice these habits, even if you look up the spiritual disciplines. I know disciplines sounds a little scary, but so many ideas will come up.
[00:32:08] Try one this week. Think how fast cc midweek comes, okay?
[00:32:13] And just see how your soul is transformed into these, into the likeness of Christ.
[00:32:19] See these habits. I want to make it super clear. I know I'm going over and I'm just talking, talking, but I have one thing I really want to say. These habits, they don't save you. They're just what's going to train you.
[00:32:31] And so think for 1 second that I'm telling you. If you don't do these things, then you're not going to be saved. If you don't do these things, then you're less righteous. If you don't do these things, then God looks at you differently. That's not true.
[00:32:42] This is just for all of us in here who want a better relationship, who want to be a better person than we were the day before and fulfill a calling we have on our life. That's all it's for. It's so that you're organizing your life around Jesus and not letting your life already be organized and trying to fit Jesus into it.
[00:33:00] This is ensuring that Jesus gets the first spot he gets the first thought of every time.
[00:33:09] And these habits, they encourage us to be with him. They encourage and position us before him so he can transform us. The one who loves us, the one who saves us and created us, and the one who cares for us more than anyone else will, the one that satisfies our souls.
[00:33:27] We become more like Jesus, and then we can stand before him and say, Lord, send me out as the disciple you want me to be.
[00:33:39] I want to be able to spend my time with Jesus every day. And before I go out into my day, say, Lord, send me out into this world as the disciple you're calling me to be.
[00:33:51] Let's pray.
[00:33:55] Heavenly Father, you are the satisfier of our souls.
[00:34:02] God, you fill us up in a way nothing else can. And I pray this week that we all dedicate time to you, that our life isn't organized already, but our life is organized and centralized around you, that our thoughts are fixed on you alone, that we can train our spirits not to be idle, but be proactive in the faith that we train ourselves to sit with you. And when we sit with you, you transform us to be more like you. You. God, I pray that you would transform us into. Be the disciples you're calling us to be. That the person in this room that feels like a relationship with you makes no sense, that you would touch their heart in a new way. And this week, they would try something different. They would step out in faith and try one of these habits and just spend more time with you, not doing, just existing alongside of you because you love them and you've called them.
[00:34:54] Lord, I pray over all of us that this would be a different kind of week, that it would make us taste how good you are, and we would never want to turn back.
[00:35:06] God, I thank you. I thank you for the relationships that we all get to have. And I pray that we are better and stronger people than the. Than we were the day before.
[00:35:17] Thank you, God. We love you and we praise you. Amen.
