Transition/transition7l

Okay, we've got a couple of hours left in our time together and, you know, we can talk on in the evening if anybody wants to, but I'd be tired of me by now, in fact, I pretty much am. But I live with me, so I'm going to spend the night with me anyway, so that's why Sarah enjoys when I travel, because he talks all the time, actually, anyway. Where would you like to go? Is there any questions, thoughts? I mean, I've got plenty in mind here, but let's just stop for a minute and see if there's some things that we've already talked about or some things you want to process a little more than I've processed them. Anybody? Yeah, over here. The question here was about Paul's statement of buffeting his body and making it his slave, and how does that coincide with a life not focused on abstaining from the flesh? Yeah, in the Greek that word, buffet is actually buffet, and Paul buffeted his body, which is easier to do. No, I'm kidding. Okay, that's not it, I was just kidding. I don't know that I reconcile the two passages. I think it gets to some of the discussion we had earlier about the discipline in Hebrews 12 that Father does, a discipline that we cooperate with him in, and I think what Paul's talking about, if it's consistent with his other use of it, we think of buffeting my body as he's out there resisting sin or something, which would be in conflict with Romans 8. But if him saying, you know, I don't want to run this race in vain, and I don't want to have done, you know, just talked about the Jesus thing and never lived it, and I think that's what he's saying. There's a real intentionality to living this journey. It's not by works, not by effort, but there is a discipline that God brings into our life for that to become a reality, and so I think Paul, Paul's language for the most part about this, he doesn't define it in Corinthians where you're referring to what that means, that he buffets his body and makes it his slave. But what he is saying is I'm not trading the journey of knowing God for the contentedness or happiness of my own self-indulgence, and I think that is a reality that comes in the journey. I don't think it comes backwards. I'm going to have more of God because I'm buffeting my body, but the more I know Father, the more of that life and discipline I want to enter into and enjoy and feast on the fruits of. I think we all recognize even his language with Philippians about, you know, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, and the fear and trembling is not directed at God because the end of that verse is, for it is God who is at work in you to will and do of his good pleasure. So it's not, oh God, I'm working out my salvation with my children. What it means is we all recognize that there's a part of us that would rather live by self-indulgence and temporal happiness than really follow Father's life and purpose in us. I think that's only true at the beginning of the journey, to be honest. I can't even imagine now the way Sarah and I have sorted this out in our lives. There's nothing the world has now that tempts me back. So I don't still think I'm beyond the point of falling because I think that could still happen maybe. But I don't have this enduring struggle with the disciplining of my body, but I have been through stages in that, stages in this journey, not defending my reputation when God asked me not to. That was definitely a chore, not what I wanted to do. And like I said, I tried to do it four times, just had a wonderful brother jump in my way and say, you can if you want to, but I think you're making a mistake. So I think those times of something God has asked us to do and we're doing it and it hurts like crazy, that's probably what Paul's talking about. Don't give in to the temporal desire for happiness and miss the long-term fruit of whatever's going on here. It's like it fits in that discipline, same kind of discipline passage. And that's really, I think we get to Jesus being the finisher of our faith. I had a brother who's heard me teach some of this for quite a while. He was a drill sergeant in the Marines and he could never, he couldn't get grace, he could not figure out grace to save his life. It was performance, performance and he would tell me, I hear what you're saying, but you know what, God has a will. He set it out there. He asked us to do it and he's just all over this thing. And I'm going, how's it working for it? Well, it's not working yet, but I can find a way to make this work. One day I was with that group again, I'm with them quite a bit. It's a group of folks that I hang out with periodically at California and so I was with them again one day. He came in and his face was euphoric and for a Marine drill sergeant, this was a deal. I don't know what happened to you. He said, I get it. I get it. So you get what? He said, the other night, I said, I knew you were coming. I'm thinking, I had a stupid guy again. Well, that's stupid gray stuff and because he said, you know, I know God cares that we get the stuff right and blah, blah, blah, God's got a righteous and holiness and all that stuff. He said, I really love woodworking. I love woodworking in the garage. I love making little knickknacks and things and frames and stuff that my wife really enjoys. And we had a couple over for dinner the other night and she was showing them the latest thing that I made that was sitting on the mantle. And they were all, oh, this is great. So I love it so much. It was awesome. He said, I was sitting there realizing I don't enjoy the product. For me, it's not about the product. For him, it's the job of finishing it. He loved making it. He loved polishing it. He loved finishing it and staining it and sanding it and all the stuff to make that what it was. And he just felt like God was here. Don't you think I love the process? And that changed everything for him because it was still God has a purpose. God wants to get to a place of holiness and righteousness and freedom. But see, his thought was God endures the process, can't wait to get to the product. His revelation was Jesus could, he asked me a question. Do you think Jesus could really enjoy the process of making you more his every day? And I'm thinking he loves it because he spends an awful lot of time doing it. Yeah, I think he does. That changes it for me. It just makes it all that much different. So that answer, what you're asking? OK, anybody else? Next, we had a question off the getting it brochure. The third section of that is embracing freedom. One of the quotes there is borrowed from Anne Lamotte. It said, unforgiveness is like drinking rat poison, waiting for the rat to die. And so we had a question about how we deal with forgiveness, particularly when people have been incredibly hurtful towards us. Forgiveness is a huge part. Well, we totally misunderstand forgiveness. I think that even tries to make that point. Forgiveness in religion is basically denial. Let's pretend it never happened. As far as the east is from the west, so far God's removed our sins from us and transgressions. And we really think that means that God doesn't remember things we've done or God forgets and so if I really forgive you, then I'm not holding it against you in a way that will be like it never happened. That's how we understand forgiveness. Totally wrong. Forgiveness is I'm going to take my hands off your throat for what you've done to me. I'm going to let God deal with you. Forgiveness is not about you, it's about me. It's about me realizing, boy, for all the things that God's forgiven me of every day, I'm not going to hold anything against you. Now, does that reconcile the relationship? No, it doesn't. See, dysfunctionality is described. I like this definition of dysfunctionality. You go and answer your door some afternoon at 3 o'clock. There's another brother there in Christ who's got a baseball bat and he hits you over the head with a baseball bat and then runs off. And the 3.30 comes over and apologizes, saying, I'm sorry. I'm just angry. I shouldn't hit you with a baseball bat. Will you forgive me? Yeah, forgive you. Next day, the bell rings at 3 o'clock. And I open the door. He's got another baseball bat, hits me in the head. Comes over at 3.30, wants to apologize. I have to forgive him. He rings the doorbell the next day at 3 o'clock. If I've forgiven him, I've really got to open the door because I don't hold it against him. And so I open the door and get hit with a baseball bat again. And that's why I think forgiveness is basically denial in the body of Christ. Forgiveness says, I'm not holding this against you. But if that teaches me something about you, I'm not answering the door at 3 o'clock. Spouses who say, if I forgive my spouse, I'm just going to keep living with an abusive husband or some other kind of problem with a spouse. Forgiveness is not reconciliation. Forgiveness is a one-way street. I can forgive you for anything. And I don't live in the bondage of your bondage. If we're going to have a relationship that walks together past your failure, that's a process called reconciliation. And I will not have that process with you until we are both ready to own our failures. Go to Jesus together and let Jesus restore the friendship, which he does. Jesus restores wonderful things through reconciliation. But reconciliation is a bilateral process. So forgiveness is not, I mean, I don't want to forgive them because they haven't said they're sorry yet. That's between them and God. I don't forgive them ultimately. I'm just not holding it. I'm taking my foot off their throat. And I'll let God deal with them. Does that make sense? It does, especially when they do. If they do, they do. But if you don't recognize that what you're doing is hurtful to me, then we'll not have much of a relationship unless God has asked me to keep having it with you. Because out of that love, your hurt might be healed. So that's why I think principles fail us here. Even the principle now, I was interviewed recently in Charisma Magazine on this house church thing and got in all kinds of trouble with people. But I don't mind. I didn't even know it was coming, to be honest. Guy had a half an hour interview with you. What do you think's positive about house church stuff? And I gave him that. And what do you think's negative about it? And I gave him that. And then he only quoted the negative stuff, which is fine with me because that's OK with that. But anyway, man, I'm getting old. What was that about? Yeah. OK. Oh, got it. Thank you. And then how does that. OK, you're basically you're hurt and offended by something. You're hurt. I'm hurt and offended when the person comes over, hangs out with you, just wants to be among you. I got it now. I got it. There we go. See, I have a basic problem with finding our answer for church in a principle. Whether it's not I see, as some people call it, I don't. I don't like the term. Or God's calling me to house church. Because that's a step away from I'm doing what Jesus asked me to do. If Jesus asked me for the next six months to hang out around brothers and sisters at the first Baptist congregation of Moorpark, I'm going to do it because there's people there he wants me to love. When we start saying, well, there's a better way to do church, we should be. And if I'm going to live relationally, even if I'm going to the first Baptist club of Moorpark, I'm going to live among them relationally. I'm going to love. I'm not going to sign on the dotted line. I'm not going to jump through all the hoops. I'm going to love there as long as I get to love. And when they ask me to get out of there, because I'm a problem, I'm not going to get out of there. But if God asked me to hang out in a house church thing with some brothers and sisters in Moorpark for the next six, eight months, I'm going to do that too. So we use those kinds of things. And forgiveness is one of those ritual things that we kind of work through. No, if God asked me to hang out with you, you can be the most abusive. And I do. I have hung out with some of the most abusive people in the world. And our relationship is horribly abusive. I don't mean physically, but it's not dinging on me. I know they're treating me a certain way, but I'm not responding to it. So I just keep hanging out with them and loving them. And finally, God shows them something, and they get free of it. Now, I don't mind doing that. But I don't do it as a matter of co-dependency. I can't get out of this. I'm going to hang out with you, even though you're a jerk kind of a person. When I'm hanging out with somebody that I perceive to be abusive, I'm doing it very intentionally. I'm doing it as an act of obedience to Christ. And I'm hoping my love will win them out of that. And I won't do it forever. I'll do it as long as God tells me to do it. And when He says, don't do it anymore, I don't do it anymore. And when I say God tells me, there's, see, here's how I think we've really taught people not to trust God to lead us. When you meet somebody, even in your hometown or whatever, don't you have a say, there's some people you meet where you feel like, man, I'd like to know them better. Yeah, and there's other people you meet, might have had a great time, you enjoy them, but you don't sense a real connection. And see our understanding of churches, well, you must have a connection with everybody. No, I hang out with the people God puts on my heart. And they're on my heart because, man, I wanna hang out with them. I have that sense that God wants me to. And I know it's God because it's not just people I would like from a fleshy, humanistic point of view. It's, sometimes it's very difficult people, but I'll go away, God, you want me to hang out with them. I know you do. There's a drawing to the doing of it. And then there's a time when that feels over. And one of the great joys of this journey I think is, we've got it, religion always focuses on rituals and callings. And I think the New Testament focus on tasks. I think the New Testament is not, you know what, we're called to be together. We're called to be together. Let's commit ourselves for the next 30 years to live and die together and sign covenants that we talked about yesterday and all that stuff. You know, it just doesn't work. People leave when they want to anyway. They get hurt and mad and leave in the matter. They got a covenant, not a covenant, signed it, didn't sign it, just, you know, it doesn't matter. When Paul and Barnabas come back from the first missionary journey, and one of the real awakenings to me, I was reading through the scripture, one of those verses just grabbed my eyeballs at, and I'd read it millions of times before, I'd never seen it. Paul and Barnabas come back to Antioch and gave testimony that they completed the work God gave them to do. What Christian have I ever heard completed anything? Because God gives us callings and he gives us assignments and you start doing it and you do it forever. Paul and Barnabas didn't go, hey, you're missionaries now. We're gonna start the Paul and Barnabas Evangelical Association and we're gonna go out on another trip just as soon as we raise enough money to go. It was like, we came back, we did what God asked, we're done. Now a couple years later, he asked them to go again. Ever, they couldn't even agree about going together again. Poor Barnabas, over John Mark. I wanna take him, I don't that lousy betraying no good for nothing fool. And you go, Barnabas, well, he's the forgiver. He forgives and Paul, he's bitter, he holds it in. God didn't have it for Paul to go with John Mark. It wasn't in his heart to. It wasn't Barnabas's heart to. The clarity of that was I'm not asked you to go again together. Now I get Barnabas and John Mark going out doing some wonderful things and I've got Paul and Luke going out doing some fun stuff. Then Paul and Timothy and then Paul and Silas and you know, it just, it's amazing the way God does that. We turn it into, because we wanna turn into rituals like Paul and Barnabas even going, well, we should go out. We have, we can't agree. So there's this horrible disagreement among them and it says that they're violently disagreed. That doesn't sound like they're all seeking Jesus but being brothers and well, they were learning this too. And they saw it as a power deal. I don't want him to go. I don't want him to go. He betrayed us last time. I don't care, God forgives. You can imagine what that conversation's like in the end, because they had such a sharp disagreement. I think if they would have been listening, he's better. I think they would have heard God, you know what, I think I'm supposed to take John Mark and Paul would say, I don't think I am. Well, then who might God give you to go with? Then let's pray for each other and go. Let's see, they didn't, they're still learning the stuff. And I think the average church in America splits every 6.7 years, do you know that? And so, God's multiplying things anyway whether it's usually over bitterness and hostility and people hate each other for years and they can't see each other in stores and which is horribly tragic. If we could just say, you know what, you feel free to do. What God puts on you. It's like, well, somebody's doing something stupid and it's the wrong thing. Let them do it, God'll show them. If I jump in every time and say, you know what, what you've got, it's not God. What they're basically learning to do is, I can't follow what's on my heart because I'm always wrong. Because I've told them they're wrong. It's my friend from Australia calls it his ice cream theology. So we do ice cream totally wrong with kids. We give them a scoop of ice cream and they want more and we say, no, one's all you get because you get sick if you get it and then you're the divine frustrator. You say, God gives us a scoop of ice cream. We say, ooh, want more? They say, okay. Well, I want more, okay. And finally, when you're puking your guts up, you're going, you know what, about one scoop of that's about all I need. And then God's not the divine frustrator. He's just saying, yeah, well, one scoop will do it because you learn in life. We really do learn in life. And so I do think God does that. You want more? Okay. You want more? Okay. That enough? No, want more? Okay. Eventually you'll have enough. And you learn and I think God's teaching us how to live this way. But yeah, I think forgiveness is a deal that we're up. And again, if I'm having difficult time forgiving somebody who's hurt me, forgiveness is not an act of obedience. Because if it is, you're just acting. Did Jesus come for a generation of actors and actresses? So I don't think he did. I don't think God wants you acting Christian. When I can't forgive you for what you've done to me, what do I do with it? Yeah, where else are you going to go? Okay guys, I want to kill that person. Well, what do I not know about your forgiveness of me that if I knew it, I wouldn't be holding this against them? The fact that I'm holding it says or something, that's the whole parable, the unforgiving slave. He gets forgiven. He goes out and doesn't forgive. And then he gets thrown back into prison. The point is when you're really forgiven, you'll forgive. And when you don't forgiving, what you know is there's something about forgiveness that you don't know for you. See, when I was a good Pharisee, I thought God earned me. I really felt like, boy, God, you've got a great prize here. And I can hide all my sins and exaggerate all yours. And I felt like, boy, God, God's really good to have me. He's just pleased to death. Now I wake up every morning very, I'm pretty real about where I still struggle, where I still have doubts and anxieties, temptations. See, it's not a morning I wake up now that I don't know what God overlooks in Wayne today to be in my life and to do good things. I know it every day I know it. So now it's a lot easier overlooking stuff in other people's lives, especially the world. Because I know what he's overlooking in me. I got no doubts about that today. It's that standing around attorney going, they need to save our butts over and over again from all those stupid things we were trying to do. Absolutely. So yeah, and then reconciliation is a two-way street where brothers just, okay, we've hurt each other. We've got to own each other's pain to get to reconciliation. Reconciliation, hey, look, let bygones be bygones. And it's gonna be a little more than that. Tell you own each other's pain. Even if you disagree about how it happened and what, but when you find that you know it, I know it hurt you. And you know when somebody's owned your pain and when they haven't. When they've owned it, it's over. Reconciliation is quick. Tell them it doesn't happen. Is that a hand? Or is that answer, were you asking them, were you gonna say that's the answer? Okay. I didn't mean an evaluation, I was just asking for the answer. Is it fair to say like you, next I was asked about rituals, like praying for meals or meeting in certain places at certain times. And the question was, does our observance of rituals keep us back from this journey? Yeah, and I don't know that it keeps us back. I think ritual is a lousy substitute for a relationship. No we don't. No, but I'm not. Yeah, Sarah and I pray over most meals, but I don't when my mom's there because it drives her nuts. She thinks we're gonna all die of food poisoning if we don't say a little prayer right above the meal. So let's just fun to torture your mom a little bit. I probably wouldn't do it. Love you mom, love you, but. Yeah, she was really raised in this thing that there's this, you know, what it says is receive whatever God gives you with thanksgiving. So you can say a blessing and not be thankful, and you can be thankful and not say a blessing. Most meals, Sarah and I pray over. It's a wonderful time to focus on God together and praying we do. But yeah, I think ritual is a lousy substitute for a relationship. I do think our flesh craves rituals. So I do think that's something I always have my eye on for me. I'm sorry, back here, you were trying to get on this way, right? Next I was asked about a phrase that I've repeated in my own prayer life in times of trouble, conflict or worry. God, what is it about you? I don't know that if I knew it, I would know how to walk this out with you. And they wanted me to flesh that out a bit more. Yeah, and I don't probably have a scriptural proof text for that as close as I would get would be, you know, John 15, apart from me, you can do nothing. So when I'm not living the way God wants me to live, my understanding of what Paul says through the whole book of Romans, through all of Galatians is life flows out of relationship. So if I'm not experiencing that life in this circumstance, it's because I'm not experiencing it in him and everything comes from him. So I'm gonna go back to him and saying, what is it I don't get? As a follow-up, I was asked then if I'm not bearing fruit in certain situations, would it mean that I'm not connected to the vine? Yeah, I know what you're saying. I probably wouldn't say that connected to the vine thing because that's something like you kind of fall off, fall on depending on how you're doing. I just mean this little branch is on that vine, but maybe only two little capillaries are sucking out of that vine. And when I noticed that I'm not thriving in some area of my life spiritually or a relationship or situation, yeah, I'm going back to saying, okay, God, the answer's in the relationship with you somewhere. So what is it that I need to know? What is it I need to learn? And then I find when God connects those things, when I'm having trouble forgiving someone else, it's because I'm really dealing with some condemnation in my own life. When God sorts that out, it's very easy to release this other person. The fact that I have it kind of alerts me that there's something between God and I we need to be talking about, and awareness. I think a big thing is awareness. So that everything, if I'm anxious, if I'm unforgiving, everything about my day, see this here, this pray without ceasing thing from Paul going, oh my gosh, that sounds exhausting. I mean, it's all I can do to get 15 minutes in the morning and not be bored with God and I'm supposed to pray without ceasing all day long. But I really think now it's just this ongoing conversation and everything wrong in my life makes me aware of him. I'm going, God, what about this? What we got to sort out here? And I don't get answers right there. I got to, okay, here it is, wait, boom, boom, boom. I just say, God, here it is. What do you want to say to me? And somewhere up the road, he'll make something clear to me about that. Sometimes it's six months down the road. But every time it comes out, I'm like, God, we're still thinking about that, aren't we? Because what I've, I guess what I've lost sense of is that I have any ability to make this life work in my own. Paul's Philippians three language. How much confidence does he put in the flesh? Zero. I put no confidence in the flesh. Now, religion teaches you to put confidence in the flesh, but we call flesh sin. We don't think of flesh as human effort. Religion defines flesh as human effort and it really does. Yes, God helps those who help themselves. 72% of Americans believe that's in the Bible. And a reason they do is not because we're the Biblically illiterate. No, that expresses what Christianity teaches. So when you hear the phrase, God helps those who help themselves, you're going, God to be in the Bible because that's how we live it. It's Ben Franklin. It's not in the Bible. How much confidence does Paul have in the flesh? Zero. When I say something needs to change in my life, I'm saying before God saying, what are you gonna do about this? And how do I participate with you? Because I don't have, and I used to think I could change anything. If just enough willpower, enough discipline, I could, and I don't have that. And I was a good, I want you to understand, when I say I'm a Pharisee, I was a good Pharisee. I wasn't a closet, had all this hidden horrible stuff. I mean, I lived outwardly pretty righteous. I mean, I got it down, but it was dead on the inside. It was just death. So when I say, gosh, I meet people that have the willpower of a wilting daffodil. And they really understand they can't do anything, that they have no confidence in the flesh. Me, I'm like, Paul, I could put an awful lot there, but God has just won me over. That's another point of, I can tell you the things I tried to fix that I could make look fixed, but weren't fixed. Then when God does it, and you look back, like I was talking about my anger yesterday, I fought that anger thing for 40 years in various ways of having victory over it, even having victory out here, exceeding on the inside. But discipline, I'm pushing, I'm good enough. Now I know when God's touched it, it's not there. I'm in the same situations where I would explode, and I'm going, why am I not exploding? I'm inside, I'm laughing at my, in the middle of this conversation with someone going, okay, this is not me. I don't know who this guy is, because I'd be taking this guy's head off. And I don't even feel like I want to. And I don't know. So yeah, I do think God wins that. And so I'm gonna let him win everything now. And I've seen more change in 10 years than I saw in the previous 45 tons. I've seen more fruitfulness in my life. I've seen more engagement with the world. I see things now that I only dreamed about 20 years ago, and was trying, fighting hard to get to, and couldn't get there. So I'm very content with this. But I could be nuts, you know? I go home tomorrow. You don't have to listen in and I say, but that's where I'm at on this journey. Here we had a lady comment on how fruitful her life has become since she kind of got out of the rituals of organized religion. And she said that's been surprising to her given the fact that people kept telling her, you're going to wither up and die if you don't stay here and live among us. And all your friends and family think you're gonna die too. And they're all trying to get you back in because, you know, we've taught people, you die out there. Why? Because Jesus can't be trusted with you. That's what religion teaches. Jesus can't be trusted. If you get out there, you know what? You're gonna get into error because all error has come from individuals loving father. All error has come in institutional movements. Let's get this straight. I wanna say where does error come from? It doesn't come from the individual. It comes from a guy building a machine and getting people to follow his perverted view of something. That's where error comes from. The person who loved, now do a lot of people do a lot of stupid things in Jesus' name that aren't Jesus, absolutely. But because people abuse it, are we gonna take it away from folks that can live in it? And what I love about this, when you live for three or four years outside that box and people are thinking you're drying up and blowing away and they're praying for you and trying to drag you back in, just keep living it. Cause when you get about six, seven years out, they're going, okay, how come you didn't die? What's up with you? And it's amazing the fruitfulness you get with your own family and friend. The people that kicked me out of the church I planted are the people who at their worst moments call me on the phone and say, how are you doing this? We thought you were going to die, and now I'm dying. Okay, let's talk. And that's just amazing. So I think that's really true. Just live the life, live the freedom, have got it. And don't live by not doing it. If you're reacting to something, you're still owned by that something. If you're a reaction to institutional church, you know what, that is still shaping you in some way. Don't be a reaction to anything. Live relationally, not even a reaction to religion cause that'll take us down the wrong road. Just father, every morning, if you get this, it's all you need from the whole weekend. You can sow everything else out. I'm going to wake up tomorrow and ask God to be in my life and watch for him during my day and follow whatever conviction I think he's putting on my heart. You do that, you'll be fine. You'll go through pain, oh my gosh, you'll go through some dark places cause there's some stuffing here. God's gonna rip out of you, you don't even know's there. But you're only gonna do it when you're secure enough in his tenderness to hang in there with him, to not see the pain as God saying, I'm gonna whoop you, boy, do you get this right? It's God saying now I'm gonna love you through this. And as we were talking to somebody at the break time, talking about God quieting us with his love. And I, you know, I think of that, I think of the little kids when they're about, you know, two-ish or so, and you try to pick up a kid that doesn't wanna be picked up cause they wanna go run through the store and you're trying to get them to go in the car, you pick up and you're screaming and pushing away. No, no, no, you just keep holding that kid close, close, close. I'm gonna do this with my kids until all that fight is finally gone. And I just finally go, that's what God quiet, that's what I'm gonna hold you. I know you're fighting, I know you think I'm your evil guy and I'm the guy trying to hurt you. I'm gonna keep holding you until all that just gives up. And then that's when life and freedom happens. I've got a wonderful email here. I've been trying to figure out how to read it. I got it and I didn't have a place to print it out, so let me try and edit this as I read it to you. This is from a brother I've known for about 10 years. He lives in the heartland of the U.S. somewhere. I'm not gonna tell you where, cause this will be on tape and, he's grown, grew up in religious stuff, tried to get this journey, struggled with it. Try to figure out where I wanna pick up reading here. And then he talks about in the last few years that God's really been, he's had the experience with his daughter. I went through a big thing with his daughter and he said it was like, she's a teenager, so that explains that. She should have been the human sacrifice at 12. He wouldn't have had to go through this, but. So the experience with my daughter was like a court blowing off a champagne bottle that had been shaken for a long time. I'm very thankful that you were there to help me find my way. He gave me a call at a critical moment and it wasn't about me, it was really about God. But anyway, wouldn't have read that to you if I knew what was coming. There was no one in my life at that time who gave advice that resonated with my spirit like that. It was in those moments that Father pulled back the curtain in my life of the hidden control and manipulation that had masqueraded as a godly thing that was going to help set my family free. It's so amazing how that stuff hides in us. I'm so grateful to Father, causing our paths to come. I'm gonna read you that. And then that, that, that word. So I wish I had this before. Learning, he talks about some of the recent podcasts that have helped him, the quest for significance, a one woman's view and the man Christ Jesus. This is learning to live free of this stuff feels so good. I hear Brad, that's my podcast partner in my head all the time now saying things with a laugh of his like, now that's really good news or that's really liberating. I couldn't agree more. And I was talking to another person the other day. Interesting, I wish I'd give you all the background on this, this galley's mentioned. If you listen to the podcast is Shelley, not her real name, but we called her Shelley, who's at a very dark, broken place right now in her life, very angry. And her, this man and his wife are helping Shelley get through this stuff. And so he said, I couldn't agree more. I was talking to Shelley the other day. She had just listened to one of them and said for the first time it seems so simple. It is simple. We've just made it so complicated and impossible to live. I'm sure the next several years with the girls growing up will have many more tense moments and at times feel like we're in a thick fog. But now more than ever, I'm learning to trust that father knows what he's doing and none of it all comes as a surprise to him. He can relate to our struggles, even crazy adolescence and his love is the only thing that will get us through and transform us out of the pit we all too often find ourselves in. What a awesome journey. And then he quotes this from a book he's been reading. He says, grace rarely ever makes sense to those looking in from the outside. And now he says I know this from experience. And if you can know this family, this family, I was with them a couple months ago. And it's just an amazing transition. So much tension. I mean, a few months ago calling me is ready to kill and my kids are not giving me respect. And he was like, I just said, brother, respect is not something that's given. You either have it or you don't. You can ask your kids for respect. They don't respect you, why? Because you're as angry at them as they are at you. They're only learning what you're doing. And all that stuff just opened doors into his heart that brought some neat freedom. And this journey does take some time, my goodness. I don't want people to think that, oh man, just walk out and follow Jesus tomorrow, all will be good. All will be real. And some of the real will be getting to the deepest stuff where you live in your own control and manipulation. Part of it will be there. Part will be other things. Institutions are not made to incubate relationships. Institutions are designed to keep us from relationship. God made us in the garden for relationship. He made us to live by relationship. But in our fallenness and brokenness, we realize that relationships hurt. People abuse us, people lie to you, people gossip about you. Relationships hurt. Institutions are trying to create the rules that protect us. I don't know how about just Christian institutions. Economics, politics, religion is all about managing people in the absence of godly relationships where we love each other more than we at least as much as we love ourselves. And because we don't do that, we create these systems that are substitutes for religion. So do I thought community work in any of my illusions of religion? I wouldn't say it ever worked well. I would say now, boy, when you watch a group around Dublin who have learned to live in Christ and learned to love each other, there is so much real community that just goes on in the course of life. It's just incredible. They're in and out of each other's homes. And it's not like normal in Ireland, like it's not normal in the U.S. We're just, you gotta call ahead, make an appointment. You know, we just don't have a sense of being community. And partly that the institution provides a safe way for us to really become to this building. There are rules that protect us. If you get bad, I'll run till the pastor, they'll throw you out. So now it's a safe place for me again. And the theology's safe and everything's safe. And God's made us for the wild wonder of relationship. And when you have community, with the brothers and sisters around where I live that I relate to with great regularity. Man, there is so much community there. You've got an issue, problem, something comes up. There are people in your house, not the visitation team assigned by the institution, but people who really give a rip about you, who really care, who are there. Man, when Sarah and I put out that we were moving, I'm thinking, gosh, we haven't lived this long in this area. And moving to me is the ultimate test of community. If you help somebody move or poor cement, I think that's just as big as it gets. And Sarah and I just put a little email saying, you know what, we're looking for some folks. If anybody's got some free time, help us move, we're interested. We had 20 people show up at our house to move us. And so I went, now, see, that's cool. This is the worst thing you can do. So I do think community works with friendships. I knew in our own, even in our home group, people would say, I'm moving this Saturday. If anybody can come and help me, please do. And then no one came. They were calling up saying, no one's here. We'll skate, sorry, I don't know what to say about it. I know everybody, this person's at soccer with their kid. This person's there. I understand all that, but, and I think when you're sick, you know, it says to call for the elders of the church. You know, I think what that means is, most of us, when we're sick, we hope people figure it out and come over and help us. When I need something from you, I'm gonna call you and say, Scott, gosh, Sarah's back is bad. And we're gonna put together people to pray tonight. Can you come join us? And if you say, no, I can't, I've got this work deal. You know what? That's fine. I've got some others I'm gonna call. It's not, well, stupid guy called you, man. Community, you come here, you stay over here. It's, see, I think the freedom of living in, see, the community in a religious context is always based on expectations of expectations of you. And when you disappoint those, then we're all upset and we all try to fix a new rule. So we accept people. Really God's kind of community is it's not need-based. I don't need you. I don't need another human being on the planet, brother or sister. I think that's, the community starts there. We really say, oh gosh, no, we do. The body's not complete without the whole body. No, God's complete without the body. And God is who I have. So do I need anybody? No. Does God give me other brothers and sisters to be part of my life in wonderful ways? Yes, he does. I like the way somebody said it on a website I have. One time he said, you know, we gotta get over the idea that community is mandatory. It's irresistible. And a real community is. Religious fellowship has got to be obligated or people won't go. It's boring, it hurts, and it doesn't help. Real community between brothers and sisters who are getting this journey and who share it. I crawl off planes all over the world with people I only met online and I have no idea what I'm in for. And within 15, 20 minutes, I know if I've connected with a brother or sister on this journey. And man, we don't have to work at fellowship. We don't get home and say, okay, what are we gonna do? And now we go. It's just blah, blah, blah, blah, yakking the entire weekend. I get on a plane, money, fly away. And I feel like I'm being ripped away from best friends. And I was just there a weekend. I've got people like that all over the world. Because community is not a chore. It's a gift. And we're gonna give you a community with brothers. For a while, God doesn't give. And I, no, it drives people nuts. I think for a while, because religion is based on, I'm trying to get from you what I'm not getting from God. Now, there's a place you wanna start meeting with. You know, I'm gonna get, so I got expectations. We need to be committed to this. When you disappoint me, I'm all over your face. And we have all these encounter meetings about how we're failing each other. Oh, we're gonna try harder and go. God forgive us and all that frightful stuff. Community doesn't begin until you're only looking to father for every need that you have. He will meet it. Will he often use others in the body? He will often use others in the body, but not necessarily the ones you choose. Oh God, I want Scott in on this. I don't want Scott in on this. I want Stephen on this. Or Bill in on this. The Holy Spirit distributes gifts among the body as he desires for the common good. That doesn't sound like they get put where I want them. Jesus building his body to get it pretty much sounds to me like the gift I need is gonna be in the hands of the brother I'm least likely to get it from. Because God's gonna want to heal the relationship at the same time the gift is being transferred. So if it's all in God, then it's okay God, how do you want to meet this? And how do you, and if that dependence isn't the same, some people, they spell out of religion. They're looking for another expression of church life to be their God because that's what they're used to religion being. They can't find it. They're incredibly frustrated. And I just say to them all the time, God will give you community when he's ready. Not when you qualify for it. My gosh, I'm not talking that kind of language. God will give you community when he's ready until he does what he wants you to know is that there are things about him. He wants you all to himself for a while. So you'll get this right. Then community flows out of this because now all my dependencies in him, when I'm with you, I'm not hooked to getting things from you. You may be a great blessing. You may bring great wisdom into my life. You might open doors to things I'm not seeing, but I'm not getting with you for that reason. I'm getting with you just to share the life that we're experiencing together. Does that make sense? This is what makes community, I think, thrive from me. Powerful stuff. And it's irresistible. Brothers and sisters, even a few couples at home start talking about getting together on a Friday night. Can we come too? If it travels fast, it's like, oh, boy, we have to come. Can we come too? We want to be there. We'll see what's going on. And communities like that, but there were years where we didn't have any of that. We didn't know anybody. We went to Oxley. We know a soul. We moved there. And we just say, God, you're going to have to connect us to the body. I'm just trusting you to do it. And over time, we know so many people, it's time to move again. And we just did. We moved eight months ago. So anyway, yo. Here, someone wants to know what I thought about spiritual warfare, particularly in the kind of intercession, prayer walking, going to high places, and interceding against principalities and powers in a given region. And so we took a look at that. OK, yeah, I'm probably not a good guy to ask. Yeah, most of my touches with spiritual warfare folks actually scares the daylights out of me. Yeah, not because I don't believe in spiritual forces. I've involved a lot of people getting cast out demons and praying for things, intercessory that have some impact. But most of what I've seen is, like most anything else, it becomes a ritual in which people find their life in intercession and prayer walks and rebuking principalities and powers. And I think real spiritual warfare, honestly, I mean, if we've got a demon-possessed person or something, we're liberating them great. I mean, if we're going to pray for some ruling spirit over an area to be destroyed, I don't think we have the biblical background for that. I really don't. Are there principalities and powers? Yep, we're told about that. Daniels often quoted his deal. He wasn't doing spiritual warfare. He was repenting. He's saying, oh, God, we're sorry for our sins. We're going to rescue us. Michael was doing some fighting. So again, I would come back to do whatever God's asked you to do. Just make sure it's not become more important than him. And I wouldn't sense that from you, but I was in a deal that I didn't even know was a group of prayer-roll warriors. And then when I got there, I'm telling you, I wanted to run for the highest hills, because they did two days of stuff that I would walk out. And I could be wrong, because I don't have all the insight and everything for sure. But I walked out and just said, talk about spiritually fruitless. Talk about wasting two days with people that are demanding all homosexuality in California stop by praying for this and going to the governor's original prayer mansion and praying for that. And I'm just going, you know what? If I had any hope that it was fruitful, I'd be in on it. But I just don't. That kind of stuff. That doesn't mean God doesn't at times ask us to do it. But even in scripture, it would be incredibly rare to take on a principality or power as an act of obedience to Christ. It wouldn't be a ritual we do in every town. Let's go to a high place. So that's where I'm at with it. And I probably jaded and cynical and going to hell, but pray for me. OK. Let me tell you what I think I'd want ahead. And there'll be more to talk about, I'm sure. But I'm really convinced of that God's doing in our day. Let me pick up one other thing I left out yesterday. I want to get back to this. I think this is so cool. They always talk about Jesus' older brother and Jesus' humanity alongside his divinity. You remember that? Some of you are nodding. I weren't even here yesterday, so I don't know what that means. But anyway, maybe you were filled in on it somehow. But anyway, OK, remember that? Scripture I left out, I wanted to give you with that. It's in Timothy, where Paul says there is one mediator between God and man. Who is it? Yeah, it's not Christ Jesus, Lord of lords. It's the man, Christ Jesus. I just comes back this lovely sense of his humanity, our older brother, who's got his arm on our shoulder, saying, come on. I'm going to teach you how to live all this life we're talking about is what he teaches us to do. Does he often use brothers and sisters to help in the process? Often. And joyously so. I don't mind learning from you what God's taught you. That'll help me even if I don't have to go through the lesson myself and get it directly. I'm OK with that. Absolutely OK. At the same time, I want to keep growing in my relationship as well and never let you be the substitute for it. There's been a lot of talk in the last couple of years in the national Christian magazines about people leaving more traditional congregational forms and how churches kind of focus to that are more relational expressions. And some of the language that has emerged from people reacting to that has surprised me. Even people who are outside of a traditional religious structure but they're vastly building their own outside and calling it something else. But one of the things I keep saying is how will the body of Christ ever be effective if we're not all under some leader that God gives that's coordinating our efforts locally or nationally or internationally to make an effective inroad for the kingdom of God? And I'm surprised that that keeps coming up, to be honest. I think what Scripture makes incredibly clear is that Jesus wants to be the head of the church, that he is the head of the church, that he is the only head of the church. I think the passion of Ezekiel 34, I'm gonna get rid of the shepherds, the bad shepherds, and what, give you good shepherds? No, I will be your shepherd and I will lead them to safe pasture and they'll never be afraid again. I think what God's doing in our day is stirring men and women to come and live deeply in who he is, be responsive to him daily like I just described you, every day doing what God puts on their heart to do. And we think, well, God said be pretty weak in terms of all that needs to happen to change culture, change the world. Thomas Friedman, the commentator for the New York Times, I know that's evil, in any case, he wrote a book a while back called The Lexis and the Olive Tree. Point of the Lexis and the Olive Tree is that book was that, this was like 10 years ago I think, there was a major shift, the internet brought a major shift in international politics, taking the power away from the elected leaders or even dictatorial leaders of any nation state. That the power of our culture now resides in the hands of day traders on the internet. The premise is this, and I think he's right, I wouldn't be sharing with anything he's right. He said, it doesn't matter now if you elect a Democrat or Republican in here or conservative or liberal in England, that politician has to create the kind of financial environment that will draw what Thomas Friedman called the electronic herd. It's this unconnected, uncoordinated group of people who wake up every morning and move money around the world to where they think they'll make the most money out of it. No one's coordinating that, but at the end of the day, that herd can be identified as having moved toward this economy, because it looks good, or moved when Indonesia tried to manipulate their economy a few years ago, all those people moved all their money out of Indonesia and Indonesia's economy collapsed, remember that? What caused that? It was people trading on the internet. It was investors, and not just internet traders, but also the major market people in New York and London and other huge financial centers. And I thought this was fascinating. As I read the book, I'm going to see what's fascinating about this is the power of a lot of individuals acting in their own self effort now have more control over what our economy is gonna look like, because whether it's Clinton, whether it's Bush, whether it's another Clinton down the road or McCain, their choice in policy is not that broad. If they do things that offends the herd, the herd's running off to China to invest, or Russia to invest, or anywhere else. So they're constricted to create this environment that allows people to feel free to invest and have confidence to invest here. The reason I told you all that is not because I'm gonna do an investment seminar, I'm not. I think that reflects a greater reality of the church is, imagine millions of people every day on this planet waking up, not acting in their economic self interest, acting in the interest of the king because God's taught them how to live without them at the center of their lives. And they wake up every day to live in what Jesus asks them to do. And when millions of people simply do that, what I would call the submitted flock rather than the electronic herd, it's not people acting in self interest, it's people acting in self denial and in the interest of the king. Can you imagine how our community would be shaped? We keep thinking we need a coordinated outreach in Harrisburg and we do stadium events and we try and draw the world and the world's not coming. But I always say to people, they were trying to get them into church and into building cities. Look, we might do a big evangelistic thing here and get 12 worldly people to show up to a Sunday morning event, maybe. And they'd be half nuts if they did. How many people, how many secular folks will all of us in this room be near in the next week? How many? A lot more than 12. And I'm gonna be going through airports, sitting in airplane seats next to people I have no idea who they're going to be. You know, that's just the next day for me. You, where you work, where you live, who you might pass in a store. Our freedom to live as God's kids in the earth. And that's what God's doing. I wanna teach you to live free. We should all do this this week. This is now the new expectation. You will go out and obey Jesus. Forget it, you're not that bright. I'm not that bright. But what if we live free enough? Let God teach us to live free. This whole, we're talking about this movie, book thing I'm working on. You can't believe the people God's related me to in the last 20 years of my life that are now part of me helping bring some people together to make, to get a book into print. Not when I wrote, one friend wrote and make a movie out of this book. I think it makes the most incredible presentation of God to a broken world I've ever read. I'm horribly excited about this. And I realize that every relationship, not every, a lot of relationships God's giving me may be part of this coming together. And we're not even sure who that all involves yet. But it amazes me, is actually annoying the number of people we are in touch with at this moment. I just go, God, individual people doing what you've asked them to do, puts, and then as they connect with each other, it puts that whole two degrees of that, six degrees of separation game they play with Kevin Bacon, yeah. I had no idea getting in this process. I am one degree removed, two degrees removed from Oprah Winfrey. I know a guy who knows a guy who's gonna put this manuscript in front of her face because the guy who wrote it really feels like she's one of the actors in the deal. I don't know if she is yet, we'll find out. I was meeting with a man yesterday who's, not yesterday, four or five days ago, before I came here, who produced the last five Mel Gibson move, including the Passion. We were pitching the story to him, talking to him. I just, I had no idea I knew these people, or I knew people who know these people. Lindsay's got a brother we hope to talk to. I don't know if he's involved or not, but he's the director. I don't know, we'll talk to him, we'll see. If it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen. But to me, I just sit back and say, wow, what God's connected us to. The connections you have that you don't even know yet. When God's ready to call them into play, millions of people of the world over living in the freedom of relationship and sharing community as brothers and sisters, without the bondage of religion, it's gonna touch a world and our local communities in ways we could never envision by all the program things we've tried to do to reach them. Because just like that woman at the well, Jesus spends an afternoon with his poor woman and a whole town gets touched. Now, Jesus goes downtown to Samaria and throwing a revival that afternoon. Is she coming? She's not coming, is she? One conversation at a well, a life is changed, a family is changed. They drag all their people down. I see that happen now. And people, you touch someone in the world and God really makes himself known to them. What they're saying is, can you come over? My family would like to meet you. Yeah, I'll come over. Will you be our pastor? No, no, and no. I'll hang out with you as often as God asks me to. But the most important thing is you're gonna learn to follow Him, does that make sense? I'm excited about this. I think there's something here that is gonna change this. And what do those people look like? These are the seven things that I kind of wanted to touch based on this afternoon. Are we about a break time? Not a court. You need a break? Okay, take a break and we'll come back and we'll do these seven things and see what happens.