Finding Hope / Contentment / Waiting
Finding Joy (Letting Go of Control)
Speaking Truth Over My Life
Being Brave
Failure. Training vs. Trying.
Dreaming
Destiny
Vulnerability
Owning My Story / Sharing My Story
Using My Gifts
Helping Others on Their Journey / Serving
Restoring a Sense of Abundance
Cultivating Rest and Play
Embrace the Season—Waiting on God
If you are waiting on God, you can be fulfilled in the waiting. We were created to wait on God.
He created us to desire and long because He wants us to desire and long for Him.
How do you wait gracefully? Preoccupying myself or waiting on God as a waiter waits on a table of VIP customers? Most of the time, God doesn’t tell me what He’s going to do, but He tells me who He is.
Grace waits actively. Partly because we have an enemy and there is no neutral. Keep the birds of prey off of your sacrifice.
Invest where you are. Embrace the season. The Proverbs 3 woman probably didn’t do all of those things in one day. Stay flexible. Don’t define your life so narrowly. I need to keep myself open to possibilities.
Pursue margin. Don’t use up all your energy, time, and money till you are exhausted. It’s OK to say No. It’s OK to stay home for no reason. Leave a little margin in your life.
Honor the Sabbath. God know you need some down time. Create new neural pathways. Think differently than you do the rest of the week. Fresh thoughts, fresh settings. Put away thoughts till tomorrow that are worrisome.
Don’t try to make something happen or get too busy. Don’t choose the scene of your own martyrdom. Don’t be all about yourself and not about God. Your service is impure because it didn’t come from God. Be OK with being insignificant, fading out, being on the sidelines.
Let the Word trust you with His silence. He may want to wait and not be at your beck and call.
John 11:107 Jesus’ friend Lazarus was sick and He purposefully waits two days before going to him.
Soak in the silence. Let it become sweet to you. As you wait, you become the right person.
The Secret of Contentment
Text: Philippians 4:10-23, 1 Timothy 6:3-8, Proverbs 11:24-25, Acts 20:32-35
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I know both how to have a little, and I know how to have a lot. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being content—whether well fed or hungry, whether in abundance or in need.
– Philippians 4:12
Imagine you wrote a book about your life—let’s say it’s a spiritual memoir since those are my favorite and, obviously, I’ll want to read it. What would the title be? Would it be something dramatic and decisive, like “Tales of Triumph” or “Leap of Faith”? Or maybe it would follow more along the lines of “Carefully Calculated Efforts” or “Fully Vetted, Risk Averse, Partially Trusting Hop.” (I call dibs on that last one.)
I’ve never been much of a leaper myself. I’m actually more of an all-out leap avoider. I like to know where I’m going before I get there. If I sense God calling me to something, my ideal scenario would be to send someone ahead to see what I’m really in for. A faith scout, if you will. Someone to take a look at what’s on the other side and send a postcard back with a full report. Then, I could make a properly educated decision: is it worth the leap or not?
If you, too, are a partially-trusting hopper, I have good news! Philippians is essentially that postcard. Paul has gone to that most faithful, gospel-believing, Christ-trusting place where so many of us long to go, and he has sent back a letter to describe his panoramic view from the other side of the journey.
The end of Philippians is the close of what could, for all Paul knows, be his life’s last letter. He has witnessed firsthand the life-changing power of the gospel and the saving grace of Jesus Christ. He has endured sacrifice, struggle, and suffering. And, as he says in verse 12, he knows how to have a little, and he knows how to have a lot. Sitting in prison at the potential end of it all, Paul delivers his final sentiments with profound joy and certainty:
In Christ I have all I need. And, friends, so do you.
At the end of a life of audacious faith, the great apostle has two simple goals: to give glory to Christ, and to encourage his brothers and sisters in the gospel.
Tucked inside Paul’s beautiful litany of faith is the very verse we Christians like to use and misuse to talk ourselves out of those faith slumps we’ll likely write about in our book: “I am able to do all things through Him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13). Rather than tossing that single line out today and ending this study with a with a “Go get ‘em, Tiger” pat on the back, let’s follow Paul’s lead and zoom out a little. Read verses 10-14 again, focusing on the context of verse 13.
Notice: Christ’s strength in Paul produces something far richer than achievement; it produces contentment. Christ’s strength in me fuels something far more significant than my best efforts; it fuels my faith.
Like Paul, we will know what it is to have a little and what it is to have a lot. Like Paul, our story will include sacrifice, struggle, and suffering. And like him, we have been given profound joy and unending riches in the gospel and glory of Jesus Christ. The God who provided for Paul—and for the church at Philippi, as well as for generation after generation of believers who have come before us—also supplies all our needs “according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19).
May His strength be our contentment. May His grace fuel our faith. And may the message of our story be simply this:
In Christ I have all I need. And, friends, so do you.
You Were Made for Something Greater Than Yourself
By Rick Warren — Feb 28, 2016
“Only those who throw away their lives for my sake and for the sake of the Good News will ever know what it means to really live.” (Mark 8:35b TLB)
Why don’t we feel more fulfilled? Far too many people are asking themselves that question. We’re not happy, we’re not satisfied — in fact, we’re miserable.
Why? In his book Rich, Free, and Miserable, sociologist John Brueggemann shared a great story that illustrated why. Climbing Mount Everest is one of the challenges that inspire people to do something big. Lots of people try, even though nearly 10 percent of the people who do, die in the process. Many of the corpses still line the path up the mountain. Yet people still want to climb the mountain — though it has no real redeeming social value.
A few years back one climber, David Sharp, was clearly in trouble on the mountain. There were 40 climbers who noticed his obvious need but passed him that day. He died on Mount Everest because none of the other climbers were willing to put their personal goal on hold to help him.
That’s us. Our own personal drive to have more, be more, and do more causes us to lose sight of what really matters. But that isn’t how God wired us. Life isn’t about what you make, who you know, or what you do. Life is all about love — loving God and loving others.
Jesus tells us in Mark 8:35, “Only those who throw away their lives for my sake and for the sake of the Good News will ever know what it means to really live” (TLB). God wired you in a way that you’ll never be happy unless you’re giving your life away in his work. You were made for something greater than yourself. The Bible calls this your mission in life. Significance doesn’t come from status, salary, or sex. It comes from service. Only by giving your life away can you feel that your life has significance.
Finding Joy by Letting Go of Control
Our JOY level is directly connected to our need for CONTROL. Steve Fry, The Crucible
Exhaustion comes from trying to control the uncontrollable.
The question is not “why was I rejected”, but “what is God protecting me from?”
The question is not “why is this a no”, but “how much closer am I to a yes?”
God’s correction is fine-tuning you for your future happiness. Steve Fry, Belmont Church
God is the god of joy
Joy is found in the Spirit
Joy is a choice–it is a spiritual discipline
Joy brings healing, freedom, and strength
Joy is always birthed from the inside out (not the outside in)
Embrace the spiritual discipline of joy
The secret to joy is this: loving people the way that Jesus did.—Jen Hatmaker, , IF Gathering 2016
God’s peace is joy resting.
His joy is peace dancing.
- F. Bruce
The secret to joy is this: loving people the way that Jesus did.—Jen Hatmaker, , IF Gathering 2016
Share recklessly and watch your joy overflow.—Jen Hatmaker, , IF Gathering 2016
God is the god of joy
Joy is found in the Spirit
Joy is a choice–it is a spiritual discipline
Joy brings healing, freedom, and strength
Joy is always birthed from the inside out (not the outside in)
Embrace the spiritual discipline of joy
What was it like when the disciples experienced joy and the spirit?
Say God is for me!
God is working for my good!!
Memorize scripture about who you are and agree with God.
Paul’s Secret of Joy Phil 4:6-7 “Be anxious for nothing”
- “Be anxious for nothing” —the Spirit inspired this statement. Paul would not have written it, if he hadn’t already lived it. Either Christianity works or it doesn’t. (Usually things don’t work for a lack of application.)
- Paul uses the language of joy for more than the language of praise.
- We think of praise as giving God honor, but joy is about taking satisfaction from the Lord. For Paul, joy is against the backdrop of affliction—which is proof that it works. Joy in the midst of pain is a key way out of sin’s power.
- To rejoice is something directed toward the Lord. It is a command: declare God’s reality for you against your circumstances. Wants, needs, and suffering are temporary issues, not eternal. To rejoice is to re-infect yourself with God. As you declare reality, you are transformed; and transformed, you will experience new opportunities.
https://www.facebook.com/PastorDanScott/posts/10207529115080156
Let go of seasons that have ended
Dan Scott June 14 at 3:27pm ·
Yesterday, I went to make a hospital visit. An elderly church member had experienced what was expected to be a low risk operation. Complications during surgery required a drastic response resulting, five weeks later, in the death of his hands and feet. He was not sure he wanted to undergo further surgery to remove his hands and feet and so I went to try to help him and his family make a good decision. As it turned out, the doctor had already informed him that his body was very unlikely to hold up to the infection fighting drugs that would be required, even if he survived the operation.
I wanted to console him and his family. Instead, I found them at peace, even serene. As a trained and experienced mental health practitioner, I looked for depression and/or anger. But no. He was neither angry nor depressed. He had made a mature, rational, and spiritually-centered decision. He was ready to meet God, he said. Furthermore, he was curious about what is on the other side.
His family, standing around his bed, was supportive and at peace as he spoke.
What this good man and his family taught me yesterday is that because nothing is permanent, maturity is about knowing when to let go. We injure ourselves and others trying to hang on to old seasons, to our children as they once were, to our careers as we have experienced them, to positions of authority we have become accustomed to manage and to which we have become personally identified, and indeed, to reputation itself. Aging is often difficult but it becomes even more challenging when we insist on hanging on to the world as we experienced it in our prime, when we keep grieving over the loss of the body and abilities we once had, or when we rage against our diminishing place in the world. Paradoxically, by hanging on to these disappearing things, we grow increasingly ridiculous, embittered, and toxic; resulting in even greater loss to our life and our relationships.
Joy and influence lie in the opposite direction – letting go of seasons that have ended, of people we cannot please, and of dreams that drive us to ignore life, friends and God.
Yesterday, a man in one of the most dehumanizing situations I can imagine, handed me a map for walking through loss. When one has mature faith, he can surrender even life itself if he must, and do it with peace and gratitude.
After that, smaller changes, which, whether we like them or not must come our way, seem much easier to manage. Courage, as it turns out, is not always about grabbing hold of life and not letting go. Sometimes, courage is about doing the opposite. Wisdom is about knowing which response is right in a given circumstance.