The Do-To-Be Tree — http://thegodjourney.com/wordpress/2008/10/31/the-do-to-be-tree/

It's now time to think outside the box of what we've always known. I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the sovereign Lord. I think that's a profound turning point in somebody's relationship with God. And our hope in starting this was that this would become an ever-expanding conversation. Just two real guys talking about life. That's a nice tagline. I'm Wayne Jacobson. And I'm Brad Gullings. And welcome to another edition of The God Journey. Here we are again and again and again. I just can't speak to you. Aren't you talking about grace? Aren't you getting tired of this? No, I'm not. You're not? I like our conversations. I really do. Would we talk about this stuff if we weren't sitting down in front of my colleagues? I'm pretty sure we would. I think every time we hang out, we kind of do. We kind of get off on this. You know what's fun though? I find a bunch of people that when all of a sudden you take all the rules off, they kind of end up like, huh, it's like you just strip them of their clothes. They don't know what to do. When you take away all the rules. When you strip my clothes off, I know what to do. Run! Run for the nearest board. I'm not sure I get the analogy there. But no, I mean, have you ever talked with some folks that it's like, you know what, they're kind of coming out of the whole institution thing. And you get them at that moment where it's like they actually realize it's safe to verbalize these thoughts I've been having. And you kind of help them sort of strip away all the rules. And they're sort of left with a sense of, oh, now I'm lost. You know what I mean? I'm totally lost. Yeah. It's like, I had a sense. And it just dawned on me the whole idea of, you know, unless you become like a little children, a little child, unless you become like a little child. What? What? How do you say that? You're going to get into trouble with a whole section of the country and a whole section of the group. Sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You're thinking about that at all. Okay. Well, stop it. Unless you become like a little child, you can't enter the kingdom. I'll be honest. You ever just sit and watch little kids? It's like, left to themselves, they just have the darnedest fun. Until people start making rules. Yeah. And everybody makes rules to kind of control them. And then sadly, some of them, they get caught too early, they start becoming the rule makers for everyone else. The bossy kids that no one wants to have a play date with. The Eddie Haskells of the world. Help me out there. Eddie Haskell. You never watched Leave It To Me? Yes, I did. Eddie was the guy that broke all the rules. He acted like he kept them all, though, when the adults were in the room. Oh, sure. He was always Mr. Cleaver. Yeah. But I look at the beauty of little kids. You don't have, I mean, the laws of nature and gravity and being reasonable, those just go right out the window when a kid's at play. His imagination, he can all of a sudden be in a spaceship and he can be on another planet and he can be, I mean, their capacity just to do stuff. We're just going like adults. Well, no, you can't do that. That's the best make believe it is. We kill their fun and we can't, we don't know how to just go with them. I'm just like, gosh. So we're going to play spaceship this afternoon? Sure. Why not? We got something better to do. Yeah. I'm not allowed to do this, but I just, I look at the joy and the wonder of a little kid and his imagination and you're just going like, you know what? I do think there's an entry point into the kingdom that is similar to that. People have lost their capacity to the times just play and if you don't tell them what the rules are, as opposed to calling hippie, they just are lost. That's what I noticed. I did a blog earlier last week into last week on this because people who kind of start seeing outside that system, they still want somebody else to tell them what to do. If they don't have a pastor anymore to go to, then they write me emails. And some of the emails I get are just what my friend did this and I'm thinking about doing this. What do you think? I'm going, I have a clue. I don't know you. I don't know that friend. I don't know what's really going on. I know your side of it now. I don't know their side of it. And bra verbs is pretty clear. As long as you've only heard from one person, you know one side of a story. And that usually isn't accurate because we all interpret stories based on our own self-interest kind of thing. So, and I do get a lot of that saying, somebody give me a new rule to follow. I lost my old ones. Yeah. Yeah. I think that. Mark from South Africa wrote this, you and Brad are busy destroying everything I have spent years learning, not to mention the amount of time and money spent on the process. Well, you're welcome. You're welcome. You're welcome. I guess. I guess that's what you mean by sorry. Someone feeling pants. Is that what you were? Someone feeling strict. Exactly. Yeah. That's it. He just pants them in public. That's not a good moment. Oh boy. Yeah. He had a hard time with it. He's saying, actually he said, you talk about living in God's purpose by just taking it one day at a time and listening to his nudges. My question is this, how does this work in the business world? I've been taught that to have a successful business, you need to have a vision for the future. The people who wrote down what wanted out of life have proven to be more sick. We, we didn't. We caught lightning in a bottle, you remember changes all the rules that you need to have your pictures of what you want to achieve in life placed on your fridge or wherever. Then you need to break your vision down into goals for yearly, monthly, weekly, monthly. Business world, there's no control. So throw that out. That's control. Don't you tell Mark? Throw that out? That's control and manipulation. Oh, if you are living under the illusion that you can accomplish all that, well then you'll do it. Great. I bet it's helpful. Well, some people actually haven't. They've written books and that's why. Right. Yeah. Right. That's why people think they need to. But now they make all their money selling those books as opposed to doing those things. Well, I can tell you. Like real estate investing. Is that kind of thing? No. That's too risky. It's here to make money and all you people that want to get rich quick. It is much easier to make money off of that than doing anything else of a productive nature. That's true. No, I do think to some degree I would come to this conclusion. You can plan all you want. It's just, I don't think you've got the power to pull that off. In a limited way. There's some basis for a business to strategize how much income are we expecting versus expansion versus. Yes. There are some business things. Basic responsibilities. Right. Which is very different from, I'm going to set a five year goal and I'm going to feedback to what I need to be in the fourth year, third year, second year, one year. If you can get that to work. I can tell you, I'm a pretty type A guy. I am a pretty much, I can write it down and get it done. I got to tell you, that process has never served me well. I know. I can work for years on something that was part of my five year plan. I can get all my side of it done and the other side of it didn't happen. That's why I gave up on that. It doesn't work for me. Do you play chess? I used to. I haven't played in a long time. Okay. I'm a great chess player. I really am. I really enjoy it. I think you've said that before on here. I know. I'm just puffing myself up. I hear you. I really enjoy it. I love strategizing. But you know what's true about chess? All those things that your brain just working all the different moves that you might make. None of them matter until the other guy makes a move. Then the way will open up. Or your checkmate. Oh yeah. You never saw it. It made true. Either way. It made true. It's like all the strategizing that you ever want to do, guess what? You're not playing by yourself. There is someone else and what they do. It's only in response to that that the way comes clear. And so I think it's wonderful to think through all your options. That means you're prepared for that moment. But you can't do anything until that next move happens. So it really does come down to one step at a time. There is a whole other business model. There's this one. The five-year mission statement and working out all the strategies. The other one is ... But you don't know all the other moves that other people are going to make that may make that null and void. No, absolutely. But this one has sold well. Okay. Marketed extremely well. Again, we're back to the illusion of control. So if I do this, then this is going to happen for me. And what you're saying is, well, if there were no unforeseen circumstances, and what year have we ever lived in which there were no unforeseen circumstances, the other business model is that real success is responding to an opportunity when it presents itself. Yes. Well, this is not on my radar screen, so I'm not going this way. My five-year plan didn't include this. That there is an even a better shot at success in, I think, even kingdom stuff. I don't mean externally in terms of money and all that, but I just mean in terms of doing what God asks us to do. I, as a type A, a former type A person, I find greater foodfulness in asking God each day how I'm responding to the moment and what's come my way. Am I involved, not involved? Those kinds of questions then skipping past a lot of open doors with people inside them screaming, hey, help us out. Because I'm sorry, you weren't on my five-year plan. I can't go in there now. I'm busy. Yeah. That's something to do. So he's grateful that at least we destroyed everything he spent years learning, not to mention the amount of time and money he spent on the process. So you take away the rules from people? Yeah. They no longer have a system to work. I didn't realize just how many people like having some handholds of a system to work. Even if it doesn't work. Even if it doesn't work, at least I got that. Because I've got the illusion of control and when it doesn't work, I get to be angry at somebody. I get to be angry at the world who's cheating me or God who's not being fair. Or that person that's in my way. The idiot who took my house from me because they bit more than we did. You can always blame somebody. You can be angry. Or the rotten culture that just sort of invited me to get way in over my head. Yeah. Yeah. It's not my job. Yeah. Not my responsibility. I put that stupid book and that guy told me to do a five-year plan and the whole thing didn't work. Hey, are we doing the Shack Bible? I don't know. Is there a Shack Bible? This is what it says. No, there's a Bible. And then there's the Shack. There's not a Shack Bible. No, there could be. We could do a Bible. No. With notes. No. We put the Shack on the cover. No. Everybody else is doing this. I got this article this week from my paper. Talks about the number of Bible editions that are out there now. Study Bibles. Bibles made to look like magazines. Bibles that are, it's, they're expecting it this year. Bibles to be a $795.2 million market, just selling Bibles. And every home. Everybody knows they need a copy of the book. Everybody has probably 10 copies in their house, even unbelievers. And if not, they're in, I stayed in the hotel the other day and had two Bibles in the nightstand. One from the Mormons. Gideons and who? Gideons and Mormons. Oh wow. God bless them. I didn't know. But they're expecting it to go up next year, 823.5. Why? Because market size has grown steadily over the past several years and is expected to jump because Bibles sell better in financially troubled times. Yeah dude, it's the magic elixir. Need a little bit of Bible. How can I have a fight some rules and work them? To push those blues away. Is that what it is? Yeah. Little Bible, do you? You know I was reading this article. It's a long article. All the statistics. You know I was trying to buy a new Bible today. I'd go through one because I just, the way it gets stuck in my briefcase when I travel it just gets devoured on the road. Drive over with your car. I was looking for a new one. I was looking for a new one and I tell you what, it just was impossible. I just sat there like, I felt like that, that Gal from Australia that visited us and she needed shampoo. So Sarah took her down to Costco to get her shampoo and she stood there. I could never use this but shampoo in my life. Absolutely. Oh, looking for the one brand she had in Australia which wasn't there. So then trying to figure out all the ingredients and where it went. She didn't. She ended up walking out without shampoo because she couldn't buy it. I almost felt that way with the Bible because, and I'm going, why are there so many study Bibles? Why are there so many? And then people started asking me, we need to do a God journey Bible because the way we look at scripture is really different from the way other people look at scripture. That way they don't have to write UNI every time they're having one of those prosperity scripture moments. They could just open the God journey study Bible and then they would have all the answers that they need. Yeah, I'm feeling the same way. Not in a million freaking years. We got a freaking out of that. Not that ever. But the other side of that, the thing that really got to me is, I'm talking about making these Bibles look like women's magazines or teenage girl magazines. So more likely to get read. So I don't know. See what I'm thinking of, I think the Bible has become a cosmetic accessory jewelry. That's what I'm thinking. What makes you look cool when you carry it around? You're not going to read it. Where does that happen? Not in this state. It makes you cool. Well, when you're going to the club, or yeah, or that's your witnessing style or that's your witnessing style. Maybe you carry this sweatsuit. Yeah, maybe carry this really cool looking Bible college class. There you go. I think it is an accessory now because I think the level of people who really read, understand and respond to scripture decreases in proportion to the number of gimmicky Bibles that are sold. Well, you know what all those bells and whistles do? It kind of gives you the hint that you got to have to be an expert to understand it. Well, not the girly magazine dumb down version. I think you'd have to be blonde to read it. With my apology to all you blonde listeners out there. You just stepped in that one. I mean, somebody sent us a copy of the Manga Bible. I know my kids think that's cool. The Manga Bible is produced in England. Manga. Oh, excuse me. So you don't know. Well, of course not. I've never heard the word Manga before. I've never seen it. I'm not certain it's English. It's not. It's a form of Japanese anime stuff. It's a graphic novel. This is scripture. Yeah. No, no, no, it's someone's effort summarizing. It says on the cover, raw edition. Yeah, it's raw. That's what we should have said about the Shaqs first printing. Raw edition. But it says, contains the full Bible, old and New Testament, plus extras. Yeah. And there's a whole dialogue here between Siku and Aiken. Who is Siku and Aiken? I've never seen it. I'm looking at this. The reason we were sent this, this is by our publisher in England. They want to do a Shaq version, a graphic novel Shaq version. And I'm thinking, yeah, maybe. I don't know about that. But I do know this from looking to the, I wouldn't do this to scripture. I wouldn't when you've got David looking like an old Chinese professor laying down. Dude, that's the whole style. You're missing it. You're not getting it, Wayne. You know what I love about this? Honestly, it's not that I think, oh, that's so amazingly done to every little accuracy. No, that's not my point. But there is a whole generation and a grouping of people that, you know what? This is what captures their attention. And this is somebody's effort to communicate God's love, his truth in a package that captures their attention. They're not reading it in another one. What I don't mind about the little girly magazine, Teen Whatever Bible is the fact that, you know what? Because you're blonde. Yeah, because I'm blonde. Yeah, the red-haired blonde guy. Just kidding. Is the fact that, you know what? In their little world where people are at, I love those people that go in and try to crawl into that space and to incarnate the truth there. It might not be done to all of my fine-tuning perfectionisms, but the very fact that they're trying, now, that may not be behind the publishers who are on that list of what you just showed me. But the heart of the guy behind this. Do you know him? I actually spoke with, not with him, with the publisher that he came up to was in Tears, having read The Shack. Right. And this is his world and he's king of it. He is the most sought after guy. And he, all he could think about was trying to bring the truth that was found in The Shack to an audience that desperately needs it and is captured by this stuff. But how can you say, this is what? Maybe 200 pages, maybe tops. Contains the full Bible. That's not true. I agree. I might not put that on the, but I doubt, I bet that has everything to do with the publisher as opposed to the guy. So this wasn't about somebody saw a way to make some money. There's an audience that'll buy the Bible this way. So let's do it this way. I have no idea about the mindset behind the marketer. But I do know something about the heart of the guy. I know he was touched by The Shack. I know that he got the email. Where you look at what's going on and I do think that there's a whole generation. I mean, I look at my kids and the things that they get captured by and, you know, they're part of pop culture, whatever. I could, I could say. Those little heathens. What, yeah, I could say whatever I want in terms of, well, that's good or that's not good. It's more like, what are they captured by and how can I communicate within those things that are their language? And that's, you know, I mean, as opposed to, oh, I'll just stop those darn video games. Why not play them with them? No, I'm all for that. I got no problem with what you just said. My struggle with the fact that we now have in English, 800 some odd different Bibles that people can buy, translations out the kazoo. There are people groups that still don't have a translation of the Bible. This is all about an economically driven trying to position a new Bible so we can have sales again that are gonna be, because everyone's got it. It may, but you and I don't know that. I've got 40 Bibles in here. Yeah, I'm sure I got a large collection of my own, but I look at the fact that I have, I have talked to some people that when their passion is to contextualize this and it really is with a desire that says, I understand a certain audience and I'm trying to find a way to communicate God's heart and the gospel and to package it in a way that gives me a shot at thinking they might read it. If that's what's behind it, I'm all for it. If it's just how do I merchandise this one more flipping way? No, not for it. I hear that, but then the other side of it is let me say, what kind of fruit is this bearing? For all the additional Bibles we have in our culture since I was 22 years of age, has Bible knowledge and reading and growth in the truth, capital T of scripture increased for all those new versions? I don't think so. I would say not at all. I think everybody says it significantly decreased. But you know what? I think when this thing is lost and not seen in the context of a story to be told, that's when it doesn't have the same power. It doesn't. Even the doctrine guys, I'll just say to the guys that read and study the Bible are so busy proof texting, this little thing from here, this little thing over here to draw out some weird kind of quote unquote truth rather than let the story say what the story says and come to know Jesus through the scriptures, the teachings of Paul. I think that's just, you know, the biggest mistake of the first like bunch of publishers was putting chapters and verses on them. Absolutely, you ruin the story. Yeah. Cause now I'm stuck with, oh, these are like propositions and I got an address for every little truth. It turned it into a legal document instead of a living story. It's exactly what I did. Nicely said they did. Cause that's exactly, you read a Supreme Court decision and they got numbers on the side. Little 26 colon two, it's such and such a court case. So you can find it. It's page and paragraph. So you can cite it again. So you can take the lawyer and zap them. So I can cite it and get you and you can cite it and get that and here we go. Now here's what George wrote. We started George's. It is wild. But it's what's ruined the story. It's why it has. So I can, when these doctrine guys write me and they'll quote three scriptures as proof of a point, but their point is undermined by the whole of scripture. If you let scripture be the story, yeah, I can quote this little's that little and that little and say, well, this is true. And I'll go, it's not. It's undermined by all that Jesus lived, taught and demonstrated. But you can't see that because I can't give you a corresponding proof text. But you know what I do like about this little manga thing? Okay. It's effort to put it back in story. Oh yeah. You know what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm really blessed by that myself. Okay, next, what did George have to say? King George II. No, I keep thinking the next thing is going to be really. Here it is. I'll go there. Just as what George had to say. We're going to put the entire Bible on a silicon ship and design it to be. It's planted in your brain. An earring. No, an earring. How about a nose ring? I have the Bible wherever I go. It's always there dangling from, and it's pretty. It's going. Okay, it'll be at the next ICRS convention, I'm sure. This is not totally unrelated. Yeah, better not be from windblown media. This is from old George. He wrote us last week about religion as divine tightly. We say this, asking people to tell me about their salvation experience or asking them to explain the gospel to me, even many postmodern young people I've met. I have come to the conclusion that many have never heard or do not understand what is the good news, which is the power of God for salvation to all who believe. So many have been converted to religious speech, various jargon. I've met very sincere young people who think it's about redeeming the earth, ecology, saving the planet, stewardship of the natural resources. It causes me to question if anyone is truly preaching the gospel, let alone living it. I am so disheartened. The Charismatics, many are boomers and beyond, are passing. He thinks that's a good thing, but new movements are taking their place. People are being converted to a form of entertainment called worship. I'm so disheartened that it drives me to my knees between have you been to Lakeland and Christian friends who either think Bush or Obama are the saviors of the world, I just wanna cry out. Soon the Rocks will. That's how he ends that. I'm all for the Rocks crying out. I think he's right. I'm not as disheartened as him. I'd be honest, I wrote him back and said, you know what? I think you're right. When I look at the whole religious landscape and even, you know, right in the last two weeks of our big election campaign, and you know, the emails I get to make Obama the Antichrist or McCain this or that, it just, it makes me sick that Christians are as gullible as they seem to be and that they're willing to respond to an election out of such fear instead of realizing that someone else wrote you this week, God's kingdom transcends all that. Doesn't matter who's elected in two weeks. Doesn't matter what's going on economically in the world, as we said about the kingdom being shaken. God's gonna have his way eventually. So I'm not nearly disheartened because I meet believers all over the world. I'm always hung out with some in Ohio and Michigan last week, headed off to Virginia. In fact, while this is up, I'm about ready to come home from Virginia, but I'll be in Virginia for 10 days. And I meet believers everywhere who are really getting this journey, who are really living in the reality of what the gospel is, who are finding ways to love their neighbors and people. I'm not near as disheartened, but I do agree with him. I think Christianity has become more and more a caricature of its own self and its religion and rituals than it's become a place where people really understand what Jesus accomplished for us. That is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Yeah, even when you talk about the gospel, it's the good news of salvation. Are you asked people about their salvation story? I would simplify it to what was it like when you met him? That is an unanswerable question for most believers. What was it like when you met him? When you read the gospels, what was it like when you met him? That's all that they are. When you look at our inherited religion, what do you mean? When did I meet him? I mean, that is missing. Was he a speaker at service last week? That's what's missing, which is why there isn't that sense of conversion or transformation or I'm changed. It's like, you know what? When you actually meet him, it isn't about my rules and my practices and my doctrines. It can't be. It's embodied in a relationship of someone you're kind of like tractor-beamed on and going like, I just want to hang out. But when it's removed from that, even our precious little Christian-ese language with which we sort of validate one another and our beliefs with, you're just going like it's void of the transformational substance. That's why it's not seen in our world as being different from any other special interest group. It isn't. It's a philosophy of life or religious expression. You're right, it's not. We've gotten to this, we'll define religion, we'll define Christianity as a religion and your participation in this has to do with whether you believe the right stuff or practice the right rituals. That's what it's come down to. And that keeps changing because new movements, as he said, new movements emerge. So it takes all the practices and new depths of this, that and the other. And it's like, at the end of the day, I want to be able to answer a question. What was it like when you met him? Yeah. I want to be able to answer that. I want to be able to answer that last week, yesterday and this afternoon. Yeah, I'm still hoping that happens this afternoon. No, but with that sense that it's not like, I don't want to live all of my life based upon a couple of glory stories. Yeah. If that isn't active and ongoing, well then what is it? I mean, who are your friends today? You want names? I don't know how would you answer it? Who are your friends today? Would they know who they are? Yes. And how would they know that? Because we've been together. We've had fun. We've shared life. If salvation is anything other, then are you guys friends? But it's not. I said a sinner's prayer. I went forward at a deal. I got dunked in a tank in front of a room full of people. And all you got was necessarily was wet. I sit in the pew on every Sunday morning at 10 o'clock. I mean, that's how most people think of it. I know. I think he's right. The whole broad landscape that we've painted for people, you become a Christian by coming in an adherent of the Christian religion. And even how that's defined, and the people in charge of that, are pretty scary dudes for the most part. Now, I'm not saying there aren't wonderful, legitimate people at a local level living this out well, because there are. But what it passes for Christianity in our culture, stinks. It just does. That's why many of us are saying, I don't mind being identified with Jesus as his follower. I don't really want to be identified. And I think this election bears it out. The email I'm getting from so-called Christian leaders telling me how I need to vote, and this whole election hinges in the balance of all that crud, is just shows I don't want to be identified with that. I don't. And when I'm on a plane, and some heathen is asking me, some atheist, are you a Christian? I'm like, I don't know. What do you mean by that? I'm not sure I want to answer that question. I don't mind identifying with Jesus, Locke, Stock and Barrel. But where has there been a time in history where being a Christian and being a follower of Jesus have been more two different realities than they are today? And even some of the negativity to some of the things that we're writing and putting up on the internet, it's the angry Pharisee we talked about last week. I don't want to be identified with that. When I'm standing alongside the world, I don't want them to think I'm part of that any more than Jesus wanted the people he was with to think he was one of those Pharisee guys. I'm not that guy. I know the father. I'm willing to introduce you to the father. I'm willing to introduce you right now, dirty and everything. Now you don't have to clean yourself up and run to the temple and take 17 baths and kill a heifer and stick a goat in a wilderness. Even without all that, I love you. That's why I like letters like this. This is from Mark in Georgia. Mark wrote us probably a year more ago and he was a pastor at the time but really seeing some wonderful guys. Finally dismantled all that, lives in a very different way. Here's somebody down the journey. He says, man, I'm grooving on the podcasts. Y'all's discussion of, he's from Georgia. Y'all's discussion of if you love me then you'll keep my commandments went dayglow for me. I'm not sure what dayglow is, but lit up for him. I now hear Jesus saying, Mark, if you love me, then you'll have the ability to keep my commandments. Rather than Mark, if you love me, you'd better keep my commandments. Folks ask me for advice on distance running. Often share with them the basics for becoming a successful distance runner. If you'll do these things, you'll have no trouble running a marathon. So this verse sounds differently to my heart now. It now sounds like this, Mark, by loving me and others through me, my love will equip you and train you to achieve the intent and heart objectives of the commands. Love is the training which frees you to run. Isn't that good? Yeah. And it says rock on splattering freedom everywhere. Woo-hoo. This guy must be like 12 years old. I'm kidding, Mark, I know you're older than that. But boys got all that juvie young youth language there. Rock on. You could do a manga Bible. You know, the whole dynamic of when our lives are captured by being loved. This stuff, all the questions you had prior to that moment aren't as relevant because it's reframed in the context of now there's something different. There's a presence of a someone as opposed to all these things I've got to achieve. And so I do think, yeah, it enables you to run. It enables you to do this. Without that, you can't. And I'm very sympathetic to all the hardworking folks out there that are so darn angry because when that's all you got going on. You're sympathetic to the hard worker, the anger. I'm sympathetic to both because I've been there. But I'm not thinking it's the best road to continue to go down. You might jump off that road and look for a little better. Part of me thinks that someone want to just say, hey, that cliff is coming and it goes nowhere. Because what do you do at the end of that road? It is a darn cul-de-sac and you got to walk all the way back. That road is not this life. And I want God to put gas in my tank, which is, I think when we're fueled by his love, then I'm able to actually do things in this world that seem like Jesus. Apart from that, I just get seriously tired. I do. I hear you. I hear you. I think the whole reality of living love, and that's why we're talking about this proof texting thing, be able to say, well, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments. There's two things that can mean, just as he pointed out. Either you prove the loving by the keeping. 12 foot tall if. Or you get to keeping by learning to love. And the whole of the text, all of John 14, 15, 16, shows you that what Jesus is talking about is not the performance proves the loving, but the loving gives you a way to live that's free. Someone else gave me that verse that says, if you keep my commandments, you'll remain in my love. And so I say, also it's performance again. I have to keep the commandments to remain his love. That's the whole religious box, how it sorts that stuff out. Is that due to be true? But it is. But the question I asked him is, well, go back to the prodigal son story. By not following his father's commands, he's not remaining in the father's love. Does that mean he's less loved? Does that mean the father has rejected him? Does that mean the father, no, it doesn't mean any of that. It just means when I obey Jesus today and I'm following him, I get to live in the reality of his love. And where I live like I'm not loved and I've gotta perform and make it up, then I'm not living in the reality of his love. So when he says, if you keep my commands, you'll remain in my love, it's not the precondition to being loved because you are already loved. If the reality is, am I gonna participate in that love today by following him, or am I gonna go get lost in my own stupid efforts to do what I think is best and need to be rescued by that love? Which is still fine. But rather than just keep being rescued by that love, I wanna live in that love. I wanna live and that's why no need to leave. And that's why I wake up every morning, not, okay, I gotta perform today, gotta get this right, so God, so I can remain in his love. But I wake up every morning going, Jesus, help me follow you today. Help me follow you, help me see where you're going. I wanna remain, I'm gonna be loved today either way. The issue is not are you loved. The issue is, do you live in the reality of that love or are you gonna live in the reality of Wayne's wisdom? And I've had 55 years to live in the reality of my wisdom as an always served me well. Fact that it probably has never served me well. But where I live inside of the fact that I'm loved and Jesus has a way through the circumstances I'm in and I yield to that way instead of demanding my own, that's where life is. I think that's what Jesus is saying in that. But you can read all that with that performance overlay and I think that's what exhausts people. Just what you say, it's exhausting. It's exhausting to live that way. When are you done? It's exhausting trying to get God to match your performance when he's dead set against doing it. And then you just end up with all that frustration and anger of, well, you're not doing your part. I'm doing my part, you're not doing your part. Yeah, you feel ripped off and like I was good but I didn't get my goodie. And how does that help anybody? It doesn't. True enough. You're off to where? Are you back? Who knows? I'm almost back. Place, and I'll see you again, Wayne, hopefully. Keep the traveling with us on The God Journey. You can be part of the conversation by visiting our website, thegodjourney.com.