GROVE WOMEN LIVE // Summer Song Vol. 3 // Week 4

Good morning, ladies.

It is Tuesday, June 30th, last day of June.

I cannot believe that July 1st is tomorrow.

We um we're in my mind halfway through the summer.

I even though I have been retired from teaching for um eight years now, I still function on that mentality of the school year.

And so in my mind, when July starts, that means 4th of July is coming up.

And as soon as 4th of July is here after that, you know what we see.

We see all the back to school ads and things like that.

So in my mind, when July hits, I feel like the summer's almost over, but it is not.

This is week four of our summer song series.

We still have four weeks to go, which I'm very excited about.

And I cannot wait for us to get into um what we are gonna talk about today, and that is the song Goodbye Yesterday.

And I don't know if you were able to listen to the video that I posted yesterday.

Maybe you you know this song.

Maybe you were at church on Sunday when we sang this, but it repeats itself over and over.

But what is repeated, the words there um are just so good.

And we're gonna dive into those and we're just gonna see what um God has to say and just let the Holy Spirit do work on our hearts as we spend a couple minutes together today.

So let's open up in prayer and then we'll get right into talking about goodbye yesterday.

Dear God, we're just so um thankful to be able to come together again and just to look at the truths in this song and to look at scripture and and just to see how um we can say goodbye to things of yesterday and that we can have a new life in you.

Dear God, just please um just work on our hearts during this time and and just um just prompt us to be um just hearing the words that you want each of us to hear.

We ask all these things in your name, amen.

Okay, ladies, first of all, what I want to do is to start with a verse from scripture, and that is 2 Corinthians 5.17.

Now, this is a letter that Paul wrote to the church in Corinth.

And in fact, we're gonna spend a lot of time with Paul today.

Um, but in this letter in 2 Corinthians 5.17, it says this anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person.

The old life is gone, a new life has begun.

So just a couple phrases there: new person, old life, new life.

So kind of keep those in mind when we look at some words from the song Goodbye yesterday.

So the song starts with goodbye yesterday.

I'm living in the light of a new day.

I won't waste another minute in my old ways.

Praise the Lord, I've been born again.

So just some phrases there that kind of reiterate just what we read in 2 Corinthians.

We see new day, we see the phrase old ways, and then we see the phrase born again.

So it just kind of parallels what Paul had written in 2nd Corinthians.

And then the song goes on to say again and again and again and again, you rescued me out of the mess I was in.

And boy, that just just that little bit right there just hits me because I think how many times have I been in a mess and God has rescued me?

And I and I think about you know, God being our father.

And if you are a parent and you remember when your kids were younger, maybe some of you all, you've got younger children right now, and there were days that it seemed like all they did was make a mess and get into this, and you know, a mess here, a mess there, and all you did was go around and just clean up the mess after them.

And, you know, God is our father.

It's kind of like that.

And I know we all have seasons where we feel like it's just one mess after another, and that we've got to rely on our father to help us in all of those messes.

And then it goes on to say, you traded my soul for something to sing.

Now I'm dancing on the grave that I once lived in.

So just the the wording rescued.

When I think about rescuing and I think about a life being saved, a chance at life again.

So once again, we're still on this.

Um, we're still on the whole theme of a new life, the old gone, a new life.

And then it goes on to say, the spirit of the Lord is upon me.

I've got resurrection in my veins.

Praise the Lord, I've been born again.

And just that word resurrection, once again, it's new life, life given again, being resurrected.

So we can see from this song and from 2 Corinthians 5, 17, just this thing that we're looking at as far as once we can say goodbye to yesterday, this new life that we're going to have.

I want us to look at another scripture once again.

It's a letter that Paul wrote.

Um, this is going to be in Philippians chapter three.

So this is a letter that he wrote to the church at Philippi.

And Paul, um, if any life that we know about in scripture has been changed from the old way of living to the new way of living, it would be him.

And part of that is because he wrote so much of the New Testament.

So we see, um, we hear about his life.

He shares different things.

Um, if you have not read about Paul's conversion, it's in Acts chapter 9.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

I want to encourage you to read that.

It's just such um, just to see how God worked in his life.

And so Paul is sharing with um the church when he wrote this letter, he is addressing some issues, and he's like, hey, this is how my life was.

So in Philippians chapter three, um, we're gonna start the second part of verse three, and it says this we rely on what Christ Jesus has done for us.

So that's where our faith should be, our trust should be.

That's what we should rely on, what Christ Jesus has done for us.

We put no confidence in human effort.

And just think about that.

How many of us, even if we're followers of Jesus, how much confidence do we still put in our own human effort?

I know I'm guilty right there.

He says, though I could have confidence in my own effort, if anyone could, indeed, if others have reason for confidence in their own efforts, I have even more.

And Paul's saying this, he's saying, first of all, we cannot put any confidence in ourselves, in our own efforts, in our own works.

We have got to put confidence, our faith, and trust in Jesus Christ.

But he said, if anyone could, it's me.

And that's because Paul lived a life before he came to know Jesus.

He lived a life of checking all the boxes.

So let's look at what he said.

Let's look at some of these boxes that he checked.

And probably if we really look at these, these are ones that maybe we've hung our hat on or tried to hang our hat on, these and ones that we put some faith and confidence in.

So he said, I was circumcised when I was eight days old.

Now, that right there, he had no say-so of in that.

However, that shows how he was raised.

So he was putting confidence in his upbringing.

And how many of us, particularly if if you're a mom or if you're a woman who is helping to raise um a child, how much confidence do we at times put into that?

That we are parenting the right way?

Or maybe we ourselves as women, we think, oh, my parents parented me the right way.

They gave me a good beginning.

I was brought up the right way.

And that can be an area that we put our confidence in.

Um, those of us who are parents, particularly when you have adult children, you can know that you can raise them in quote unquote the right way, but that doesn't mean that's always going to be, you know, how things turn out.

So, really not a good place to put confidence in, but he's saying, I have confidence in the way that I was brought up.

And then he goes on to say, I am a pure-blooded citizen of Israel and a member of the tribe of Benjamin, a real Hebrew if there ever was one.

So, right there, that's confidence in his heritage.

And, you know, ladies, we can sometimes we can get hung up on our heritage.

And maybe, you know, we can't say we came from the tribe of Benjamin or whatever, but I think as Americans, we get so narrow-minded that we live in America.

You know, things we we do things right here, and and we can get hung up on that or just the area that we live in.

I I don't know our part of Kentucky if it would be considered so much the South, but it's not the Northwest, or it's not, you know, some more liberal kind of areas, but maybe we're putting our confidence in just where we were raised, our heritage.

And then he goes on to say, I was a member of the Pharisees who demanded the strictest obedience to the Jewish law.

So right there, his confidence was he was a member of this group.

He was a member of the Pharisees, and he did, you know, he did follow the strictest laws.

And maybe we have tried to put our confidence in just as social affiliations or our religious affiliations.

Maybe, you know, it can be as specific as this is the church I go to, or this is the denomination that I that I belong to.

And that is where our confidence is.

And then he goes on to say, I was so zealous that I harshly persecuted the church.

And as for righteousness, I obeyed the law without fault.

Wow.

I I know I could not say I obeyed the law without fault.

If I'm out here on the main highway and the speed limit's 45, I can't say that I've not ever gone 47 or 48.

I mean, that's not obeying the law, or maybe even faster.

I don't know.

But he he was a do-gooder.

He put a check in all of these boxes, but he's saying this is not where our confidence can be.

So then he goes on to say, and this is the key of everything that he's saying to the church.

I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done.

Yes, everything is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.

For his sake, I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage so that I could gain Christ and become one with him.

I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law.

Rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ.

For God's way of making us right with himself depends on faith.

And that's the key right there.

We can do all these wonderful things.

We can we can be a good person, but that's not where our confidence can be.

We have got to put our faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And, you know, if anyone could say that, because I'm sure culturally, socially, in the area that Paul lived in, he was seen as this person who had it all together, who did exactly what he was supposed to do.

And he's saying, all of this means nothing.

It is all garbage compared to what Christ has done.

And so he knows his confidence has got to be um in his faith and trust in Jesus.

And so just to go along with um with the words that we read, you know, this new life.

He saw the new life, his new life in Christ, what he had done before, this, you know, he was saying goodbye to all that, goodbye yesterday, to all that he had done, all these boxes that he had checked.

He's saying, This is where I need to have my confidence in Jesus Christ, and this is how my new life is going to be.

Um, Paul, like I said, back in in his time period, would have been considered doing the right thing, being a good person.

And I often think sometimes it's much harder for those who do the right thing, who put a check in the box, who who live right.

It's much harder for them to see their need for Jesus just because they are doing the right things versus people who maybe can say, you know what, I'm living this lifestyle, it's not right.

I know I need to do something different.

But it doesn't matter what we're doing.

We cannot earn favor with God.

And I will never forget, and this is something that plays in my head all the time, that our pastor, I think it was a couple years ago, made the comment that there's nothing that we can do or not do that's going to change how Jesus loves us.

So it doesn't matter what I do, it doesn't matter what I don't do.

He's still going to love me the same.

And I love that because, you know, right there we see that we cannot earn Jesus' approval.

We cannot earn his love.

And it doesn't matter how good you are, it doesn't matter all the good deeds that you do, we're still gonna, we're still not gonna meet the standard that that God has for us to spend eternity with him.

The only way to do that is to put our faith and trust in Jesus.

And in fact, in Romans 3, 23, it says that we've all sinned.

Even those people who do the good deeds all the time.

And even when we do the good deeds, we're still gonna be sinners, we're still gonna do wrong, we're still gonna sin.

And it said that none of us can meet that standard.

We can't do it because we're not perfect.

We're never gonna be able to meet the standard.

So that's where Paul's saying all of this stuff is garbage.

All of the stuff that I've done before, it's all garbage.

It means nothing.

It's it wasn't until I put my faith and trust in Jesus that that's where my new life began.

Um, this past Saturday, I was at Kroger um participating in a food drive, and I overheard a gentleman.

He wasn't talking to me, he was talking to one of the volunteers who um they were volunteering their time to work with us at this food drive.

And basically, he was justifying why he was not gonna purchase anything at Kroger to donate to us, which was fine.

I mean, it was definitely a no-pressure thing.

It was just, here's a flyer.

If you would like to buy these items and drop them off on your way out, we would appreciate it.

You know, simple as that.

But he felt the need to justify why he wasn't gonna participate.

And his reasoning just it was so sad to me, but it just really hit me, and particularly in the light of this song.

And he said, you know, for I've I've donated my time, I've donated money for all these years, I've attended church many times throughout this time period that he was talking about.

And he's like, I'm gonna take a break now.

And he's like, because I think I've I've I've caught up to where I can take, you know, a little bit of time off and not do these things, and then I'll start back again.

And I just started thinking about that and just thinking about this idea of trying to earn God's approval and trying to earn his love and trying to earn our acceptance into heaven and just, you know, to live a life like that, just so very sad.

You know, I just I don't even know that I could tell you what I had to eat two days ago.

So there's no way I'm going to be able to keep track of here's my good works, here's where I really messed up, and I need to make up for that because I need things to balance out, because I need to make sure that God has my approval.

There's no way I could keep track of that.

And to have that continually just spinning in your mind, just not a good way to live.

And good works are wonderful, but we have to think about what is our motivation.

Are we doing good?

Are we serving?

Are we showing love to others because we're trying to earn something?

We're trying to seek God's approval because we I just shared in Romans how it said we've all sinned, we're never going to meet that standard.

Or are we doing it because the great love that God has shown us just pours out of us to other people?

So, what is our motivation for doing that?

Now, also in the song Goodbye Yesterday, if you have heard the song, there are some phrases in there that might be very familiar to you, particularly if you grew up in church or maybe went to camp or went to vacation Bible school, just you know, were around um some type of church when you were younger.

And I don't know that I've even heard this song so much as an adult as I did when I was younger, but it is the song I have decided to follow Jesus.

And so one part of this song Goodbye Yesterday, we see some familiar words.

And it says, I have decided to follow Jesus, the world behind, the cross before, and I won't turn back.

And when I think about those words, to me, I just visualize it.

I visualize me standing and I'm facing the world, and the cross is here, and I do a 180.

And now I'm looking at the cross, the world is behind, but I do not want to turn back.

And I just have that visual in my mind, just facing the cross, facing Jesus, having my focus on the cross.

And this one I just was thinking about this, it reminded me probably, I don't know, a month, month and a half ago, one of my physical therapists, they were working on me, just getting my steps to be the same distance apart, um, just switching my weight when I step, just those kinds of things.

And so I had my cane in one hand and I was walking forward, and all of a sudden, this therapist stopped me.

And he's like, Lori, you're looking at the ground.

And I was looking at the ground.

I'm looking all around.

My attention was not straight ahead.

It was, oh my gosh, what's around my feet?

And there was nothing around my feet, but that's where my attention was on the ground.

And he's like, Your walk is going to be so much better if you focus straight ahead.

And that just struck me because it's so the Christian life.

Our walk with Jesus is going to be so much better if we just focus on the cross, if we just focus on Christ.

That's where our focus should be.

And just thinking about that visually, once again, just keeping our eyes on Jesus.

There's going to be all kinds of distractions and things around us, um, but that's not where our focus needs to be.

Our focus needs to be straight ahead.

So it says the world behind.

So what does that look like?

What does it mean to leave the world behind?

And I think we all know that even if we leave the world behind, if we do this 180, if our focus is on the cross, there's still going to be temptations.

There's still going to be things that come at us that we um need the help, obviously, of the Holy Spirit to help us overcome those things.

So we're staying with Paul here.

So another letter that Paul wrote is Galatians to the church at Galatia.

And in chapter five, I want to read verses 19 to 21.

It says, When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, so the old way of life, not the new way, not the new life, but the old life.

When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear.

Sexual immorality.

Now, some of you all right there might say, Well, wait a minute, I'm faithful.

I that doesn't apply to me, but just hang on.

There's more to it.

Impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these.

Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Now, let me just address that last part.

It doesn't mean that, you know, if we're ever jealous or envious, we're not going to inherit the kingdom of God.

That's not what it's saying.

But if these are characteristics of your ongoing life, chances are you do not have the Holy Spirit living within you.

You are not following Jesus because these are not characteristics of someone who has put their faith and trust in Jesus.

Doesn't mean we're not ever tempted.

We are, or Paul wouldn't even be addressing these here.

So just to look at a couple of these, idolatry.

We may be thinking, oh, I do not have an image in my house.

I don't have one on the mantle.

So I guess that doesn't apply to me.

And I know I've said this on here before, but idolatry is just putting anything in a higher precedence than God, just putting anything above him.

It could be our children, our family, our career, our activities, our social group, anything that we put above God, we are making that an idol.

Um, hostility.

Ladies, sometimes, and I'm speaking from experience here, we do not show outward hostility, but we have a very hostile heart.

Uh, we've got a lot going on inside.

We may not show it because that's not the right thing to do, but um, we we've got it inside.

And then quarreling.

And when I think about this, there are some people, and and I don't know that their intent is this, but there are some people I've been around where they might call it always playing devil's advocate, but really they have a spirit of quarreling.

They just want to argue and and just quarrel about things.

Jealousy, self-explanatory, outburst of anger, selfish ambition.

And ladies, this doesn't have to be ambition about ourselves, but it could be selfies, selfish ambition in regards to our children or our family or our friends, but it's still selfish because it's still something that we want.

We want this, we want them because they're part of us, to um to gain something.

And then um envy.

I envy, I think, with this comparison culture that we live in, envy, jealousy, such a prevalent thing today.

So these are things of the world that we need to live, leave behind.

And there's so many more, but this is just what Paul has laid out in this letter that need to be left to the side.

And when these things are present in our life, are present in the life of the church, the kingdom of God is not going to grow.

And think about it.

Why are we here?

We are here to grow God's kingdom, we are here to show his love, be the hands and feet of Jesus.

We hear that all the time.

But it's the truth.

We are here to be the hands and feet of Jesus, to serve others, to love others, and to grow his kingdom.

That is why we're here.

And if these things are present, that's not gonna happen.

Just think about it.

If you know people that these are characteristics of, they are not the people you necessarily want to become like.

They are not the people that you want to associate with.

So if we're gonna build God's kingdom, these cannot, these are things that we have to leave behind.

These are things of the world that need to be behind us as we focus our attention on Christ.

And just thinking about um just our focus on the cross.

I don't know about you all, but there are times in the morning, you know, I might spend some time in God's Word, I might pray, but it's not a one and done for me.

Like I can't just do that at the beginning of the day and think that's going to be all that I need throughout the day.

So when I think about focusing on the cross and I think about keeping my focus, my pinpoint laser focus on Jesus and not to be concerned about all these other things, to leave those behind.

I know that I'm gonna have to have an ongoing um communication with God.

I'm gonna have to depend on him many times throughout the day.

That relationship I have with him, it's got to be, it's not just a morning relationship.

Think about your spouse or a good friend or a parent or a child.

You know, just one time a day, you may need a lot more than that.

And I know I do because, you know, we talked about the messes that we're in again and again that he gets us out of.

I, you know, I don't want to end up like that.

And so many of these things that we need to leave behind, and our focus needs to be on the cross.

So many of these things we don't even realize we're in until we're like we're in over our heads.

And so if our focus is here and not back behind us and not all this trivial stuff that we tend to put our focus on, chances are, with the help of the Holy Spirit, we're not going to end up over our heads in all these messes over and over again if our focus is on Christ.

And, you know, having our focus on Christ, yes, it's about eternity because we want to spend eternity with him.

We want to put our faith and trust in Jesus because we do want that that's where um that's where we want to spend eternity.

But it's not just about that.

It's about life, it's about living every day.

And ladies, sometimes we need God every minute.

Sometimes we need to have, we're we're talking with him every hour.

And sometimes it can be in the morning, and you know, maybe that's just the time that we have to speak with him and to have fellowship with him.

But I think for most of us, it needs for that focus to be there, that focus on Jesus, that focus on the cross, it needs to be a ongoing thing throughout the day.

Um, so I want to leave you with a couple of questions.

And I want you to just think about these as we get ready um to end our time together today.

So the first one is what do we need to say goodbye to?

You know, the name of the song is goodbye yesterday.

What do we need to say goodbye to?

And I know that we all have things that we need to say goodbye to.

Maybe some of those things are in the list in Galatians that that I read to you.

Um, for me, I will share some things that I need to say goodbye to.

And I've been, you know, the Holy Spirit has just prompted um me to work on these, and he has helped me.

And some of these, I've there's been a lot of progress made.

Jesus is just continually always transforming um my heart and my life and my and just renewing my mind, but I still have a long way to go.

So I'm continually, and and this has been years of work, but I'm continually saying goodbye to feeling unworthy.

And maybe some of you all can relate to that.

Um, just that feeling of unworthiness.

And I know it's wrong because I know I am God's child.

I know I am made in his image, I know how important I am to him, how much he loves me.

But boy, Satan just loves just to continue those thoughts of unworthiness with me.

Another one is perfectionism.

I've come a long way with this one, but I got a long way to go because that desire is still there.

And and my area of perfectionism has changed through the years.

It used to be grades and performance at work and things like that, and now it has changed, but that just that need to be perfect, which is ridiculous because none of us are, but just that need to be perfect is still there.

And then another one, and I shared this a couple weeks ago when I talked with you all, but self-sufficiency, just depending upon myself.

And ladies, really, all of these can be summed up as pride because all of these things I'm focusing on me more than I'm focusing on God or other people.

So they're all it's a pride issue, pride issue within my heart.

So think about what we need to say goodbye to.

And then the other question, the other thing I want you to think about is how can we, with the help of the Holy Spirit, of course, because we can't do it within ourselves, how can we have a more clear focus on the cross?

How can we have a more clear focus on Jesus?

Um, how can we fine-tune that?

What can we do?

And once again, I even hate using the words, what can we do?

Because it's not, it's not about earning, it's not that action, but how can God work on our hearts so that we want to be more in relationship with him, so that we want to depend on him continually, and we want that ongoing communication.

So, how can we pinpoint that focus?

So, next week, um, Missy will be with us at eight on Tuesday, and she is going to be sharing with us just what God has laid on her heart about the song Lord, I need you.

And just the title there.

I think it's something we're all gonna be able to relate to.

So, ladies, give those questions just some thought.

Um, just ask the Holy Spirit just to show you how you can focus more on the cross and what do we need to leave behind?

Um, what needs to be the world behind us, and then how can we focus more on the cross before us?

So I'm gonna close this in prayer, and then hopefully today you're gonna be able to stay cool.

I hear the Heath index is gonna be triple digits.

So we're definitely getting into July weather.

Dear God, um I just want to thank you right now that, first of all, that you gave us the Holy Spirit to work on our hearts and just to um continually help transform us so that we do leave behind what needs to be left behind and we can say goodbye to those things that are not gonna further your kingdom.

And dear God, I just pray that you would just um continually keep our eyes focused straight ahead.

There's so many distractions in life, just so much going on, but we know that our eyes need to be focused on the cross.

They need to be focused on you.

Dear God, I just want to pray right now for our adults and young people who are at camp.

I just pray that just what we talked about today, that they experience while they're at while they are at camp, that um they find new life in you, even if they're followers of Christ, that they find those things that they need to leave behind and just to be more focused and um pinpointed on their attention being on the cross and on Jesus.

Dear God, we just want to thank you right now for the country that we live in as we get ready to celebrate Independence Day.

We are just so blessed to give the freedom just and and the safety just to just to share with you um just in person and online.

We just are so thankful for the country that we live in.

Dear God, just bless each of these women and we just look forward to being back again next Tuesday.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Ladies, make it a great day, and we will see you again next Tuesday.

Bye.