Disrupting a Spiritual Slump | February 8, 2026

Well, welcome to Super Bowl Sunday.

When Andy told me that I gotta preach

on Super Bowl Sunday, I was kind of

excited because I thought I'd break

down offense, defense, you know, relate

that to the Bible, talk about, you

know, who will win the Super Bowl.

And then I realized it's

already predetermined.

At least Derrick brought it out.

This is the 250th anniversary

of the of America.

Patriots are gonna win.

Super Bowl is scripted, but there's one

other reason why I know that's gonna

win because Andy actually predicted it.

I don't know you, you guys know

Andy is a huge Cults fan, but he

also has another love that I don't

think anybody really knows about.

Andy is also a Patriots fan.

If anybody needs this picture,

I'm happy to send it to you.

I have it.

I'm happy to send you the picture

that has Andy in a Patriots jersey.

So, um, no, but in all honesty.

If you remember back in 2024, Andy

had all the, the staff guys up here

and we all came up with a word and

he had us text him to him first.

And I sent him my word, which was slump.

And Andy's like, well, I think

maybe we need to have more

of a positive spin on that.

So what happens when you come out

of a slump, you go into a streak.

So my word then was streak.

I could use my real original

word right now, which is slump.

So I found a book, um, by one of

my former professors, in fact,

one of my favorite professors.

And it was Overcoming Spiritual Slump.

And it's by Dr. Lenny Chetty.

Uh, a story of Acedia and how

God can get you back in the game.

And this is an amazing, amazing book.

That I hate.

Why do I hate it so much?

Because it really made me

take an inner look at myself.

And I have been through a number

of spiritual slumps in my life,

and I found this book at a time

that I was in a spiritual slump.

And that's why it really, I

started reading it and then I put

it down because I didn't like it.

And I finally grabbed it and,

and finished reading the book.

And it is a, it is an amazing book.

And if anybody wants to borrow it,

I do have the book here for, for

you to borrow if you would like to.

But I'm gonna go through a lot of what Dr.

Chetty talked about.

And, um, Dr. Chetty, just to give you a

little information about him, uh, like

I said, one of my favorite professors,

he was the very first professor.

For the very first class that I

had in seminary school, he was also

the very last professor that I had.

So I got the opportunity to book

in, uh, my seminary degree with Dr.

Chetty.

And so I reached out to him, we're friends

on Facebook, and I reached out and said,

Hey, I'd like to do a sermon on your book.

Do I have permission to utilize it?

Didn't wanna plagiarize.

I still have that from

all those back in the day.

And he's like, absolutely,

use whatever you want.

Say whatever you want.

So he's got a really good, um,

he, he discusses how people go into a

spiritual slump and then what you can do

or what you need to do and how God helps

you get out of that spiritual slump.

So

first of all, let's talk about Acedia.

I had never heard of the term until

I started reading this book, but

then I'm like, Hmm, that's me.

So as he is spiritual apathy that causes

one to slowly drift from the divine.

And I was doing that.

I was, I was drifting from God

and I've realized that I had done

this a number of times in my life.

So it's, it's not a one and done.

This can happen to any of us at any time.

Um, it's also a lack of passion for God.

Did I still love God?

Absolutely.

Was I at a point where I

needed to do or be more?

Absolutely.

And like I said, it can happen to

anyone and it's not a one or done thing.

It's not like, oh, Scott, you get your one

time dude, I'm gonna have that early in my

life and then I am on a roll after that.

No, it, it can happen.

There are so many different things

that can occur that will put you, or

can put you into a spiritual slump.

So the five parts of this, and I know

normally we do a three point sermon, so

you guys get a bonus today you get five.

Um, so degeneration, root

word, degenerate, I was kind of

feeling like I was a degenerate.

So that's kind of where you're

going into the spiritual slump.

From there you've got disruption,

detestation, which I love that

word, just the way it comes out.

Disclosure followed by decision.

So we're gonna talk about each of these.

So the first word is degeneration.

And degeneration is a gradual

descent into spiritual, boredom,

complacency, and ultimately compromise.

And so through my life I have had.

Many times where I became bored one of the

times, right when I came outta seminary

school after four years, I was bored with

it because I had to read so many books.

I was forced read books

that were not my choice.

Now they had good information, but when

you're reading a book just to write

a paper on the book and then you put

the book in your bookshelf and that's

it, it's not as effective as if you're

going out and picking a book like I

picked with overcoming Spiritual Slump.

So it's also a change to a lower state

or level A gradual sinking, if I could

talk, sinking and wasting away of mind,

body, or spirit, a descent to a state

of low moral standards and behaviors.

One of my slumps, which a lot of people in

here know about was that right there and.

That's the worst, the worst of

it when you get to that point.

Um, the other ones that I've had

spiritual slumps have been more

of the boredom and not really

living to my fullest through Jesus.

And when you get into that,

you start feeling despondent.

And with despondency comes for other

nasty D words that I was feeling.

Depression, despair, discouraged

or discouragement and ejection.

I was discouraged, I was depressed.

Now, on the outside, you couldn't tell.

I was the normal Scot, but

inside I was depressed because

of what was going on in my life.

So there, and actually I wanna go back, I

don't wanna start with Jeff Foxworthy yet.

There's a guy that was at the highest,

basically the highest level

of his passion and love for

Christ and God and well for God.

Um,

and then he started the degeneration.

He was the king of his castle to say.

And then he found

a woman that was married.

And became very enamored with her

to the point that he had an

affair and she got pregnant.

So to cover it up, he

had her husband killed.

I was telling this to, to Sally

yesterday, and she's like, wow, there

was true crime in the Bible as well.

And if you know Sally, she

likes her true crime show.

So this kind of piqued your interest,

but what I'm talking about is David.

This is the story of David.

David was at the high, he was a, a

common shepherd boy who defeated Goliath.

You know, he served Saul, he became

king, and then he lost his passion.

He got bored and the boredom caused him to

do things that he would not normally do.

So how, what are some things that

can get you into a spiritual slump?

And when I was reading through

this and I was going like, man,

this sounds like Jeff Foxworthy.

So this is the Jeff Foxworthy

version of Spiritual Slump.

So if you are reading the Bible less

or not at all, because deep down you

doubt that you will receive the word

from the Lord, from the word of the

Lord, you might be in a spiritual slump

if you stop praying with fervor because

you are convinced God is too disappointed

in you or you are too disappointed in him.

You might be in a spiritual slump

if fellowship with other Christians seems

more painful than productive, like a trip

to Walmart on the eve of a major holiday.

Kids, you might be in a spiritual slump.

If you think about God less and

fantasize about sin more, you

might be in a spiritual slump.

And finally, where I hit, if you

stop believing, trying, and hoping

you might be in a spiritual slump.

So how do we get out of

this spiritual slump?

What happens?

Well, God sends people into

your life to disrupt you and to

disrupt the slump that you're on.

For David, it was Nathan.

In fact, after David kills Bathsheba's

husband, and you know they, in

that chapter in the Bible, it goes

into, and the very first words are.

David sent Nathan, I'm

sorry, God sent Nathan.

Um, God disrupted David's life.

So disruption is a major disturbance or

interruption that changes your plans.

All right, so I've had

disruptors in my life

back during the lowest

of lows that I was at.

God sent people to me from this church.

He sent Matt Sparks, he sent Robin

Christman to disrupt my life and

where I was at to turn me around.

More recently, when I've been, when

I was experiencing a spiritual slump,

God sent Jim Downs to me.

Jim texts me just about every single

day to see how I'm doing, to say hi.

He'll tell me good morning

at two 30 in the afternoon,

and I'm like, good afternoon.

But he sends encouragement to me,

and that's what a disruptor does.

They send encouragement and get

you to turn yourself around.

There are many things,

slump starters in how to get

disrupted in a Christian's life.

Past regrets, let me tell you, I've got

a lot of past regrets that I still think

about and dwell on to this very day.

And that's part of my slump starters,

just about every single time

present sin.

Um, this, you try not to, but

we are a sinful human race.

We were born into sin.

And so it's, it's easy to

say, I'm not gonna sin.

And then you're watching a show

that has that sin factor within it.

And future fear.

Future fear can blind you to the point

that you're afraid to step out and

be the person that you normally are.

I'll give you a little example

of this in my work life.

So when I worked at Schwab, I

worked at Schwab for over 20 years.

And during that time, I

maybe had two trade errors.

And a trade error is when you don't

do what a client wanted you to do.

And so the trade is wrong and

therefore it is a trade error.

At Schwab, it's called

a tear, a trade error.

Um, and I maybe had two

in the course of 20 years.

In 2024, I'm now at Fidelity and I found

myself with five trade errors in one year.

Now, a lot of you guys know

me, I'm a perfectionist.

That killed me to the point that we've

got a system at work that you can go

into to, to look at trade errors and

to see what happened, to see if, if

you've got a trade error or if somebody

else has a trade error to research it.

I was so, you know, looking at the

future, fear of it happening again,

that I would go into the system.

Two and three times every single

day that I was at work because I was

afraid I was going to have another one.

So instead of living in the moment

and doing my, what I'm trained to do

and what I've done for the last 30

years, I was so fearful of the future

that I didn't live in the present.

And that can be a slump starter when

you are so fearful about what's going

to happen in your life that you're not

letting God work in your life right now.

Like I said, God sends disruptors

and I kind of went over that.

I jumped ahead in this, but, uh,

disruption is not a nuisance.

It is grace.

When God initiates it,

disruptors don't stop the bleeding.

They are your lifeline.

They pull you up.

And they tell you the truth.

I've had a lot of conversations with

Jim, and Jim is somebody that can

be blunt with you and I love that.

And he has told me the truth about things

and, and it's allowed me to make changes.

And that's what God does.

Nathan, he sent Nathan

to David and Nathan.

Na Nathan was just flat out, if you

read it, he was flat out mean, but he

was giving the message of God to David,

letting him know that God knows what he

was doing and he needed to turn around.

So John one 16 For the, for his fullness.

For from his fullness.

We have received grace upon grace.

I grew up in a Lutheran church when I was

going old, so I went through confirmation.

And way back then, so 43 years ago,

and I still remember it to today, was

Grace is defined as God's unearned love.

So if we redo this, we've got

four from his fullness, we

have received unearned love.

Upon unearned love.

God is giving us the love, his grace,

his forgiveness when we don't deserve it,

and if, if we can just focus on that, that

in itself can help us start the process

of getting out of the spiritual slump

when you.

Look at this in a sports view.

'cause like I said, generally

with a slump, there's some

sort of a, a sports view.

Brody, when he was in fifth grade, um, we

were in the championship game for baseball

and he struck out to end the game.

And for a fifth grader that kind of

really crushes your spirit and he

kept saying, I lost the game for us.

I lost the game for us.

And I'm like, dude, you're one

at bat did not lose the game.

There were so many other things that

had occurred leading up to that.

So your, your, your strikeout

did not lose the game for us.

Go forward a couple of years and he tried

out for the seventh grade baseball team.

Sorry.

So yeah, seventh grade, they

didn't have an eighth grade team.

'cause of COVID.

He tried out for the seventh grade

baseball team and didn't make the team

and again, he was crushed.

So one day as a dad, when you come

home and you see your son in tears,

because he worked so hard to make,

to try to make a team, to see all of

his friends make it, and he didn't.

It was hard as a dad, especially since

I coached him a lot of his career.

But he didn't give up.

He didn't let that be his slump.

He took that and went

into Babe Ruth baseball

and he became one of the top pitchers

and offensive players in the league.

I've got a lot of video

of him hitting home runs.

It's kind of cool.

Um,

he didn't let that stop him.

And I actually became friends with the

coach that cut him in seventh grade

and we were down heaven some wings.

And he goes, that was one of

the worst decisions I ever made.

Don't let other people's

decisions impact your life to

put you into a spiritual slump.

Don't let that be your legacy.

David's legacy could have been the thing

that David had done, displeased the Lord.

That could have been his legacy,

but God forgives and it wasn't his

legacy, his legacy that we remember most.

Of David is God said he was

a man after his own heart.

That is what I hope for.

I'm not there, I'm not

anywhere close to there,

but that is my goal in life.

So let's go forward to the next kind of

step to get out of the spiritual slump.

And that is Detestation being

disgusted by what discussed.

God,

there's a lot of things that I detest.

Um, I

don't like Brussels sprouts.

Um.

I don't like sushi.

I detest both of those.

Um, I detest the Dallas Cowboys,

the Philadelphia Eagles.

Yeah.

Um, the Los Angeles Dodgers,

the New York Islanders.

I mean, let's just say that we

detested our sin and our slumps as

much as we detest common things.

Food, sports team, you know,

the list can go on and on.

And, sorry, Tracy.

I, uh,

the funny thing with Detesting, the

Eagles that I didn't realize is Dr.

Luchetti, um, and I found out the hard

way when I had my first class in seminary.

I thought, okay, I'm going

into seminary school.

I've gotta look the part I've got.

So I come in in a full suit.

The very first day, boy did I look like

an idiot with all these 20-year-old

kids, and they're coming in in

shorts and t-shirts and I'm like,

on, maybe I overdressed a little bit.

So the next day I came in

in Dockers and a golf shirt.

Yep.

And they're still in their cutoff shorts

and their t-shirts with their laptops.

And so the third day I come in, I'm

like, okay, I'm gonna wear shorts

and a shirt that's comfortable.

So I wore, wore shorts and I put on my New

York Giants shirt that I had that I love.

And I'm, I sit in the front row

because, you know, I'm a nerd, so I'm

gonna always sit in the front row.

Um, and Dr. Luchetti walks in

and literally he does this.

He goes.

Well, you fail.

Little did I know.

Dr. Luchetti is a huge Eagles fan,

which we have razzed each other

back and forth throughout the years.

Um, but it's, you know, it's, it's,

it's funny how things like that,

that, that you have, you don't

have in common with somebody can

actually build a stronger bond.

So when we

trying to detest the sin, a lot

of times we minimalize the sin.

And the church is actually really good

at helping us minimalize the sin because

the church will come in and like, oh, now

Josh, we love you just the way you are.

You don't need to

change, you just need to.

No, I'm sorry.

God wants you to change.

He wants you to do that 180.

So we minimalize sin and, and

minimalization of sin is, you know, human

sin leads to a minimalist, minimalist

appreciation of God's grace, which

leads to a minimalist Christian living.

If we try to minimalize what

our sin is, and that, you know

what, I'm gonna get God's grace.

I'm gonna sin as much as I want,

and then right before I'm about

ready to die, I'm gonna say, God,

I apologize, and you're good.

Now, are you good?

Yes.

God is going to absolve you

of your sin, but he doesn't

want from point A to point B.

He wants point A and point B to

be together so that you don't

have that sin that he has to,

that he has to, uh, forgive.

Now comes the part of the book

that I really, really hate.

Disclosure,

disclosure to the action of

making secret information known.

The good thing is, is it can heal the

deep wounds in the soul caused by the

spiritual slump, but it's the disclosure

part that is really, really, really hard.

A lot of people use fig leaves

to hide their sin.

They focus on their appearance, their

abilities, their accomplishments.

As a way to hide their sin.

Anybody know a trait of a fig leaf?

They're biodegradable, they

dissolve, they're gone.

So a fig leaf isn't going to hide.

All of these things that you're trying

to hide your sin with that you're not

disclosing is going to dissolve away

and people are going to see it anyways.

So in James five 16, therefore confess

your sins to each other and pray for

each other so that you may be healed.

Now, Dr. Chetty talks about this

and it's funny 'cause I'm like, Hmm,

I had the same thought about this.

The thing I focused on in this is pray

for each other and you'll be healed.

Get together with somebody

and say, and you know.

Praying for you.

You're gonna get out of this.

You're okay.

We're just gonna pray for each

other and we'll be healed.

The big part of this is therefore

confess your sins to each other.

And that's the hard part.

I mean, why is it easier for us to confess

sins to a sinless God than it is to

confess sins to someone who is like us?

I can tell you why.

For me it's because I can confess

my sins to God and it's going to God

and nobody else is going to hear it.

But if I confess my sins to Tracy, now

I'm not saying Tracy's gonna do this,

but I've got the worry that Tracy's

gonna share it with somebody else who's

gonna share it with somebody else who's

gonna share it with somebody else.

And now my sin is out there.

Well, here's the thing,

your sins already out there.

Back in the day, I thought

that I was hiding very well.

Some very big sin.

Nope.

It was out there for anyone to see.

People knew what was going on.

It was an illusion to me.

So what's next?

Well, now you've gotta make that decision.

You've gotta make that intentional

resolution to do what needs to be done.

I love Albert Einstein's quote,

and this is something that I would

say I try to live by, but I try,

but it's more the insanity part

that I live by than the rest of it.

Insanity is doing the same thing over

and over and expecting different results.

I am gonna say, okay, I am going

to start praying every single day.

I am going to read my

Bible every single day.

I am going to stop utilizing my computer

to look at pornography, to read things

that I shouldn't be doing, to, um, watch

things that I shouldn't be watching.

I'm going to stop that right now.

But if you don't disclose it to somebody,

your decision to do that is just that,

it's just one little decision that,

do I have to follow through with it?

No, I haven't told anybody.

I don't really have to

follow through with this,

but the great thing is, is

when you make that decision.

To actually turn the, the opposite way.

God will find a way to disrupt

your degeneration so that we

detest and disclose the slump,

but we have to make the decision

first and God will do the rest.

So the way to get out of a slump

is to make radical all or nothing

decisions in response to God's grace.

And what is grace again?

God's unlearned love.

We have gotta make that decision.

And when we make the decision in your

heart to offer the best that God to your

best to God, your heart becomes an altar

where your life is drastically altered.

This is one thing that Lenny wrote

inside his book that I want to.

On a post-it note or a card or

whatever and post at my desk at work.

Um, because that is something,

a motto that we should live by

altering our lives, not

A-L-T-E-R-A-L-T-A-R, altering our

lives, make our heart make our lives

as an altar to God to give him worship.

So instead of doing things

that are life altering, do

things that are life altering.

And I don't think I'm pronouncing

it right, but it's too hard.

It's a tongue twister.

So as we get ready to, as I get ready

to close and I'm doing better than I did

last night, the slump is not your legacy.

As Andy said before, you can be walking

away from God and all it takes is that

180 degrees and take one step back

to start your process of healing and,

and getting out of your

your own spiritual slump.

So I'm gonna end with a

reading of one of the Psalms.

Psalm 1 0 3 was written by David when

he was much older and if you, you

read through it and you listen, you'll

actually hear David talking about his

degeneration and then coming out of it.

And I had Rusty do 10,000 reasons to

tie in this part of the scripture.

Praise the Lord my soul, all my

inmost being praise His holy name.

Praise the Lord my soul.

And forget not all his benefits.

Who forgives all your sins

and heals all your diseases.

Who redeems your life from the pit and

crowns you with love and compassion.

Who to satisfy your desires with

good things so that your youth

is renewed like the Eagles.

The Lord works, righteousness

and justice for all.

The opposed, sorry, all the oppressed.

If I, he may known his ways to Moses,

his deeds to the people of Israel.

The Lord is compassionate and gracious,

slow to anger, abounding in love.

He will not always accuse, nor

will he harbor his anger forever.

He does not treat us as our sins deserve

or repay us according to our iniquities.

For as high as the heavens

are above the earth.

So greatest is love for those who fear

him as far as the east is from the west.

So far has he removed our transgressions

from us as a father has compassion

on his children, so the Lord has

compassion on those who fear him.

For he knows how we are formed.

He remembers that we are dust.

The life of mortals is like grass.

They flourish like a flower of the fields.

The wind blows over it and it is gone

and its place remembers it no more,

but from everlasting to everlasting.

The Lord's love is with those who fear him

as righteous children, as as righteousness

with their children's children and

with those who keep his covenant

and remember to obey his precepts.

The Lord has established his throne in

heaven and his kingdom rules over all.

Praise the Lord.

You his angels, you mighty ones who

do his bidding, who obey his word,

praise the Lord all his heavenly host,

you His servants who do his will.

Praise the Lord.

All his works everywhere in his dominion.

Praise the Lord my soul.

Heavenly Father, we just thank you

for, we thank you for your grace.

Father, for your unearned love.

We thank you for allowing us to

first of all see our spiritual

slump and understand that there

is change that needs to be made.

Father, that you send

people to disrupt our lives.

Father, that you send people to help

pull us out of the slump that we are in.

Father, as we disclose what it is that.

Um, that needs to be shared.

Father, that we come clean, father,

that we allow others to walk alongside.

So father, I don't know if there's

anyone in here right now that is

going into a spiritual slump, father

that is currently in a spiritual

slump or maybe just on the way out.

But Father, I just ask

that you be with them.

Father, send your angels, send

your disruptors, and Father,

just be with us as we continue

to walk along your path for us.

I just ask these things

in your son's holy name.

Amen.