Rick Warren - Relaxing in God’s Goodness—Part One

Hello, everybody, This is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren.

I'm really glad you're here today. We're continuing our series

from Psalm twenty three called living in the Goodness of God.

It's all about how God's goodness meets you right where

you are and brings hope even in difficult seasons. So

let's get to it and open with part one of

a message called Relaxing in God's Goodness.

One of the big myths in Southern California is that

everybody here is laid back and easy going. Yeah right,

you know that Southern California vibe.

The beach boys. It's all copasetic. Yeah.

It's also a haven for workaholics. And surveys have shown

that Southern California residents would actually rather work than pray, play,

or pray for that matter. And studies actually have shown

surveys show that we actually prefer employment over enjoyment. And

all this good weather, it creates a lot of workaholics.

And the truth is a lot of people don't know

how to relax. We are addicted to adrenaline. We don't

know how to slow down. And that's true of actually

all of Americans. Studies have shown that the average American

today is sleep deprived, that the average American today gets

two hours less sleep a night than we did fifty

years ago. We don't know how to relax. We don't

know how to rest. We love to work. A lot

of Americans are like job twenty verse eighteen. Here on

the screen, it says message paraphrase. They are unable to

relax and enjoy anything. They've worked for so busy getting

more to you A little quiz to see if you

are a workaholic.

Be truthful, no cheating. Now you don't have to raise

your hand on this. Okay?

Are you always in a hurry? Is your to do

list always unrealistically long?

Me? Yeah, that's me.

Do you use day off days off to catch up

on unfinished work? Has more than one person ever told

you to slow down? Do you feel guilty when you relax?

I've got so much to do.

Do you have to get sick to get time off?

You know you're a workaholic when all your Christmas cards

come back.

From business associates.

You know you're a workaholic when you head out for

back to school and you don't know which one your

kid attends. You know you're a workaholic when your family

refers to you as occupant. And you know you're a

workaholic when you take business related reading material into the bathroom.

I remember many times, many years ago, a lady said

to me, she said, you know, Pastor, I tried to

call you all day Monday. And I said, well, I'm sorry,

but Monday it's my day off.

It's my Sabbath.

And she said, well, the devil never takes a day off.

I said, yeah, and if I didn't, I'd be just

like the devil.

So you want me to take a day off.

I'll never forget the first year of Saddle Backed Church,

I really was working eighteen hours a day and K

was two to begin this baby church. And the first

two years of Saddleback Church, actually twice a week, cake

cooked meals to have people in our home.

From the church.

We had every member of our church in our home

at least once the first two years of saddle Back Church.

That ain't gonna happen anymore, friends, not all thirty five

thousand of you. But I remember she cooked the same

meal Tuesday and Thursday twice a week for two years.

I learned to like it, but We were working hard, hard, heart,

eighteen hours a day. And at the end of the

first year, I stood up to speaking the last thud

of the year and fainted.

And I was just worn out.

From exhaustion, physical, emotional, spiritual, relational in every area. And

over the next year God had to teach me some

things about balance in life, which I actually have had

to learn over and over and over again. I don't

think you ever permanently learned these things. But God gave

me a verse at the end of the first year

of Saddleback.

It's up here on the screen.

It's Exodus twenty three, and this is what God said

to the Israelites when they were going to go into.

The Promised Land.

He said, I'm not going to give you everything I've

promised you in a single year, because you're not prepared

to handle that much blessing and it would be too

much for you to manage. Instead, you'll take possession of

what I want to give you, little by little so

that you can grow. Then you'll be strong enough to

handle it. All. That verse changed my life. It's what

I call pacing growth. Rome isn't built in a day,

and neither as a church or anything else worthwhile, And

God doesn't want you to accomplish it all at once.

He wants you to learn pacing growth, little by little,

that while God is growing your business, he's growing you.

And while God is growing your children, he's growing you.

And while God is growing your career or whatever else

is in your life, it's important to you growing you,

And He says, I want you to learn this little

by little, pacing growth. The fact is God considers rest

as important as work. Some people think only God smiles

on them when they're working or praying or doing spiritual things.

God smiles on you when you rest. Did you know that.

If you've ever, as a parent, gone in and watched

your children's sleep, and the joy that gives you just

watching them sleep. God enjoys watching you sleep. God rests,

God rests. Are you busier than God? The Bible tells

us this on the screen Exodus thirty one, verse seventeen.

One day a week, God says, will always serve as

a reminder that I made the heavens and the earth

in six days, and then on the seventh day I

rested and relaxed. Now, why did God rest and relax

on the seventh day? Well, He certainly wasn't tired, because

God doesn't get tired. God God never gets started. But

he was modeling for us what he wanted us to

do to rest and to relax, to keep a sabbath,

to balance and to relax in the goodness of God.

Now we're in this series we've just started called Living

in the Goodness of God, and we're looking at Psalm

twenty three, which actually models for us keen ways that

a good shepherd takes care of sheep, he feeds, he leads,

he meets their needs, and the ten ways God's goodness

wants to benefit you, how God wants to take.

Care of you.

And a lot of your worry and a lot of

your hurry, and a lot of your scurry, and a

lot of your restlessness actually comes from not understanding the

goodness of God in your life. And when you understand

what God has done for you and wants to do

for you in the future, you can relax. You can

learn to rest, you can learn to let down, you

can learn to let go. Oh, you can live in

the goodness of God. Now and that Psalm the Lord

is my Shepherd's palm. He gives us ten things that

the shepherd does. And one of the things that a

good shepherd does is they make sure the sheep get

enough rest in order to stay healthy. And that takes

us to verses one and two. Let's look at it again.

The Lord is my shepherd, Psalm twenty three. The Lord

is my shepherd, so I have everything I need. He

makes me lie down in green pastures and he leads

me beside quiet waters. Now you might want to write

this down. These images are actually a metaphor. They represent

rest and refreshment. When he makes me lie down in

green pastures, that's rest, and when he leads me beside

quiet waters, that's refreshment.

Now, notice I want.

You to circle the word he makes me. Has God

ever had to make you lay down for your own

health's sake? So because you wouldn't slow down, if you

won't lay down, God will make you lay down.

And sometimes the.

Only way God can get you to look up is

lay you flat on your back with an illness. And

God will do that because he's a good shepherd and

he cares about your health, your physical, emotional, spiritual, every

area of health. I want you to write this down

on your outline to give God my best requires rest.

To give God my best requires rest. If you don't

have rest, then you're going to be stressed. In fact,

the difference between being blessed and being stressed is often rest.

Isn't amazing how much better things look after a good

night's sleep. The difference between being stressed and being blessed

is often rest. The Lord is my shepherd. He makes

me lie down. Well, I don't even want to have

you ever seen a kid, a child frantically trying to

stay awake. You know what I'm talking about, and their

eyes are closed, but they're trying to stay awake.

Resistance to rest is immaturity. It's immaturity.

Now, I've got a confession to make because I always

preach every week. I always preach these messages.

To me first. If it doesn't hit me, I don't

figure it's going to help you.

But if it helps me, I go, okay, that'll probably

help somebody else. And so this message I need to hear,

this message on relaxing in God's goodness. I've had a

couple of very frantic weeks where I had eight outside

messages to deliver speaking engagements outside of the area I

told you last week, I was at the National Prayer Breakfast,

and I spoke five times at that and then I

went to another place and I spoke to the Coalition

of Christian Colleges and Universities, to all the leaders of

the Christian schools around America. Then I went and I

spoke to a youth pastor's gathering. And I have been

overstretched the last couple of weeks.

I need this message.

So if you get anything out of congratulations, but I'm

really preaching it for me.

Okay, So if you want to take.

A nap, you might get more benefit out of it.

Then just put your head on the shoulder the person

next to you, with their permission, and I'll wake you up. Then,

as I said, rest is often the difference between being

blessed or stressed. And when we look at Scripture, we

see that God rests. We see that Jesus rested many, many,

many times. He had advances and retreats, advances and retreats,

seven of them in his three and a half year ministry.

Jesus rested.

If you're going to be like God, if you're going

to be like Jesus, you got to.

Learn how to rest.

I have to learn how to rest, how to really

how to relax in the goodness of God. Now that's

what I wants to look at today. How do you

relax in God's goodness? Before we do that, I just

want to mention why do people overwork? I mean, we

need to get to the source of our stress. Why

do we overwork? Why do we not get enough rest? Well,

the Bible's full of many, many examples and reasons why

you get stressed instead of blessed because you're not at rest.

And the Bible gives us many many examples of reasons.

Let me just give you five from the Word of God,

and let's see if any of these might be causing

you to not get the rest you need to not

relax like God wants you to relax in life. There

are just some of the common reasons for the Bible.

Number one, the first reason the Bible tells us that

people don't relax is this misplaced identity, and that is

basing my worth on my work. Basing my worth on

my work. Now we fall for this all the time.

One of the reasons why people can't relax is they

confuse their work and their worth. They confuse their net

worth with their self worth, their value with their valuables,

and they think, you know, if I work real hard,

I succeed at work, then I am valuable. If I

don't work, I don't produce, I'm not productive, then I'm

not valuable.

And that's a total lie. It's a total myth.

But in Western culture, our identity often revolves around our work.

So we overwork and attempt to prove ourselves. And if

I achieve a lot, then I must be worth a lot.

I must be valuable, I must be important, I must

be significant. But your significance has nothing to do with

your job, or your career or your achievements. In fact,

Ecclesiastes ten, verse fifteen says this, only too stupid to

find his way home would wear himself out with work. Hmm,

that's pretty frank. You might want to put that on

a card and put it on your windshield there. Okay,

at least I, too stupid to find his way home,

would wear himself out with work. He says, life is

more than work. Yeah, it's important, but your life is

far more than the work you do. It's just a

portion of your life. But when we have a misplaced

identity and we think our worth is based on our work.

Then we're going to put all of our time, our money,

our energy, our effort into our work. Number two second

reason people don't relax is materialism. This is obvious, always

wanting more things. And when I got to have more things,

then I got to make more money. And when I've

got to make more money, I've got to work harder

and longer hours. And yet the Bible says not to

do this. Proverbs twenty three, verse four and five Warmans

warns us about materialism, and it says this, do not

wear yourself out trying to get rich. Have the wisdom

to show some restraint. Your money can be gone in

a flash, as if it had grown wings and flown

away like an eagle. You know you can lose your money.

Don't spend all of your life trying to get something

you could lose so quickly so you can fly away

like an eagle. Now, evidently America's founding fathers wanted you

to remember this, because they put an eagle on.

Every dollar bill as a reminder of this verse.

It has been my observation, having counseled thousands of people,

that we spend the first half of our life sacrificing

our health overworking in order to get wealth, and we

spend the second half of our life sacrificing wealth in

order to get our health back. Have you ever thought

about that. The first half of life you give up

your health in overwork in order to get wealth, but

in the second half you spend all that wealth trying

to get healthy again. This is not wise, always wanting

more things. In Luke twelve, verse fifteen, Jesus says this

watch out. Always be on your guard against all kinds

of greed, because your life is not defined by how much.

You make or how many things you own.

So materialism, just like misplaced identic, can cause.

Me to overwork.

A third cause in the Bible, it says that envy

can cause you to overwork, and that is wanting to be.

Like other people.

I'm trying to keep up with the Jones, I'm trying

to keep up with my neighbors.

I'm trying to keep up.

With everybody else, and that will cause me to do

things that I don't really have the time to do.

Too busy trying to keep up with others, And that's envy.

You know, their kids have dance lessons, so we have

to have dance lessons for our kids, and their kids

are involved in these five extracurricular events, and so our

kids have to be involved in these five extracurricular not necessarily.

You know, my girlfriend is on social media all the time,

so I better be on social media all the time.

And we do things we don't need to do because

other people are doing them.

Now.

Solomon noticed this problem of envy literally thousands of years ago.

In Ecclesiastes four or four, he says this, I've learned

why people work so hard, why they work so hard

to succeed, It is because they envy the things their

neighbors have. I want to be like them. I want

to have what they've got. I want to do what

they do. I want to go where they go. Well,

they may be under stress more than you, so make

sure you're following the right model.

Envy number four.

A fourth reason why people don't relax court in Scripture

is when we value achievement over relationships. When we value

achievement over relationships, and men we're more prone to do

this than women. But everybody can do this, where you

put your career above everything else, including relationships. We all

known people who've walked away from marriages because of their career,

or they've walked away from being a good parent or

just being a good friend because the career was more important,

the work was more important. And when goals are more

important than people in my life, or when goals are

more important than people in your life, you're skating on

thin ice.

What a special message from Pastor rec and now let's

hear how lives are changing through Daily Hope. Here's Rick

with a letter from one of our listeners.

Today.

I want to introduce you to Agatha, who's translating Daily

Hope into German for her husband. She writes, Pastor Rick,

your preaching is bringing many souls to God. My husband,

who is an unbeliever, is drawing closer and closer to

God every day. I translate what I hear on Daily

Hope into German because he can't speak and understand English.

Pastor Rick, your teaching has changed his life and I

can see his progress and eagerness to follow Jesus.

Agatha.

Well, Agatha, thank you so much for sharing your story

with me. This is a wonderful story to hear that

you're translating what you hear on Daily Hope for your

husband and that he's growing closer to Jesus. I'm so

happy for that. We're always looking for translators to help

us in new languages as we take the message of

God to more people around the world. So you will

keep praying for your husband and you keep praying for

us that God allows us to take the good news

of God's hope all around the world.

Hey, if you'd like to let Rick know how this

broadcast has blessed you, he would love it. Please feel

free to send him an email at Rick at pastorick

dot com. That's Rick at pastorick dot com. Be sure

to join us next time as we look into God's

word for our daily hope. This program is sponsored by

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