Burnout // Your Brain In Your Bible

Welcome to the Movement Church podcast. We want you to know that God is

for you and so are we. You're about to hear a sermon from one

of our weekend services in Palmer Lake, Colorado. We pray that your faith

is provoked, your mind is renewed, and your heart is awakened as you

engage the Word of God. Stay tuned back from the message for ways to

get connected with us. God. Bless you. Thanks for tuning in.

I am so pumped to be with you, and thank you for inviting me

to come back again. I was here about a year ago. Last year

we went on retreat as a leadership team from the Movement Church and I had

the joy of getting to facilitate some of that up in Breckenridge. Last year

was a little bit more like a retreat. This year was a little more

intense. It is such a joy to be with you, and I'm so

excited about what God's doing at the Movement Church. Let me pray for us

as we begin and open God's Word together. Heavenly Father, we ask Lord

that you would have mercy on us. That Lord, in the areas where

we are hurting and aching. When it comes to mental health, that you

would pour out your spirit on us this morning and through this community, the

Movement Church, to the Tri Lakes region. Lord, would you have mercy

on your people that are in need of healing. Minister to us, Minister

to me, Lord, as we open your word and receive the gifts that

you want to give as our good Father this morning, and the name of

the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. I'm in. Fike said

something I was about to say at the beginning of my time with you,

which is that I really admire him for the way in which he has leaned

into his friendships and relationships in his first few years with you. I don't

know if you know this, but actually, for a lot of pastors,

that's not the norm. Leaning on a team and creating a team culture is

not always the norm in ministry. And I really do admire you as my

friend for doing that. And I didn't know that Brandenburg was going to be

here two weeks ago, three weeks ago prior to me, but the way

I met Richie Fike was actually at a preaching internship. Brandenburg was my first

mentor in ministry and in life, and so that's just super cool that he

was just here a few weeks ago. I want to talk with you in

this series about your Brain and your Bible. If you're new to the Movement

Church or you haven't been here in a few weeks, we're in this series

entitled Your Brain in Your Bible on the subject of mental health. And there's

a few things that we've already said. I'm just going to go through these

really quickly. First is this, We believe that the church, the local

church, the Body of Christ, should be a safe place for real people

with real needs. So if you've got some mess in your life, you

are welcome here. Secondly, we tend to think about the subject of mental

health as a me problem. If any of you are like me and you've

struggled with anything to do with that big broad category of mental health, it

often feels like, man, something's wrong with me, or you might think

it's a you problem, like you should go get help with that. But

what we know is actually the truth is it's a we. It's a we

problem, and it requires a we solution. Third, in spite of the

church's struggle we've struggled over the years, haven't we to speak about this topic

with courage and clarity? But in spite of that, one of the main

points of this series is to say that our mental health matters immensely to our

God. And the reason we can say that that that your mental health and

my mental health matters deeply to our God is as we look throughout the pages

of Scripture, from Genesis to Revelation, we see Him devoting incredible time and

attention to this topic. This morning, I get to talk with you about

a subject that is really significant for me. I may not get emotional,

but this might be one of those mornings where I'm going to need a little

help in some Kleenex by the time I get to the end of this message.

I'm going to talk to you about burnout. Here's an image of a

candle burning at both ends. Just a common sort of phrase that we'll talk

about about a person who's running so fast it's like they're burning the candle at

both ends, and kind of a picture of how we live life in North

America. Isn't isn't it so little time, so little margin. We're in

a hurry, there's so much noise. And what happens as we burn the

candle at both end is we gradually but surely start to feel a depletion of

our energy and our motivation and our joy, and we find that the flame

of our heart and soul gets extinguished, and we're just not able to take

the next step. And this problem of burnout is what I get to talk

with you about. It's what I get to testify to you about. I

want to tell you about its causes, what causes burnout, what are the

consequences of it? But most importantly, what I'm so excited to tell you

is that God can meet you and your fatigue and exhaustion. We're using this

framework heal H E A L. So let's dive right in H. Here's

the first question. How do we name what's out of place in us?

What's the harm? What is harming us? When it comes to burnout?

Just a quick definition, burnout is a state of emotional, mental, and

physical exhaustion that's brought on by prolonged or repeated stress. Though it's most often

caused by problems at work, it can also appear in other areas of life,

such as parenting, if you're caretaking your other relationships. This image to

me as simple as it is now that we all have smartphones, have you

ever had. They've gotten better about this. But remember when the batteries would

just start to wear out, and even though it would stay plugged in all

night, and it would sort of show like, hey, you took a

break, you charged it up, and now it should last you. You

have one hundred percent, but like two hours later, you're like on five

percent red. That is what burnout feels like. Even when I take a

break, even when I try to eat a good snack and take a nap,

I wake up and I still feel totally exhausted. That's what burnout is

like. You just feel empty. It's chronic, repeated stress that leads to

exhaustion, just like depression or anxiety, which we'll talk about next week.

I believe burnout doesn't really seem to care who you are, or how old

you are, or what you do for a living. And one of the

things that I know about a variety of vocations, my wife is in the

healthcare profession. If you work in the healthcare profession, this is a huge

industry that is experiencing terrible, terrible measurements when it comes to chronic burnout fatigue.

If you're a teacher, any teachers, raise your hand if you're a

teacher, actually, let me do this. Raise your hand. If you're

in the healthcare industry, we got okay, yeah, we know something about

burnout. If you're in that industry, teachers, raise your hand. Educators,

a few of you in here, you know something about burnout. If

you're a small business owner, you don't have to keep raising your hand.

If you're a small business owner or an entrepreneur, you know something about burnout.

If you're a single parent, you probably know something about chronic fatigue in

burnout, a caregiver to a high need family member. You may not know

this, but medical missionaries, you know what. The number one reason medical

missionaries don't stay on the field burnout pastors. I don't know a pastor who

has served for a prolonged period of time that can't tell you their own personal

story of burnout. Every vocation has its occupational hazards, like loggers lose fingers,

wrestlers have those really weird cauliflower ears. You know what, pastors have.

Pastors experience burnout. It affects people from all walks of life. But

it's not just a modern problem. It's actually an ancient problem. And God's

word has incredible wisdom for us to see? What are the warning signs?

What are the lifelines that we need to see? So? How do you

know if you personally are tiptoeing around the edges of burnout? I want to

tell you if you're really young and you have never ever you just you're like,

I don't even He might as well be speaking French. Would you lean

in and receive with the Lord? There's wisdom for you here because you won't

see it coming. How do you know if you are tiptoeing around the edges

of burnout? What do you do if you find yourself drained and empty?

No reserves for dealing with daily life? First Kings Chapter nine is where I

want us to go. First Kings Chapter nineteen. Excuse me, Chapter nineteen.

I will put up the verses on the screen, but if you want

to use your device or your Bible to turn there. There's this amazing story

about a man named Elijah. And this story is going to show us how

God meets us in our weariness and then he refreshes us. He shows us

the warning signs and the lifelines when we experience burnout. Let me tell you

something about this guy named Elijah. Elijah would have been the last person.

Had you and I been in and around the nation of it is Reel at

that time that we would have said, you know who a leader that I

think might be on the verge of burnout. We would never have picked Elijah.

We don't have time right now to go back into the first few chapters

before we get to nineteen, but let me summarize and tell you that prior

to chapter nineteen, Elijah is kicking button taking names. God is showing his

power over the entire nation, over all of the false gods. He is

in charge, and Elijah is the whole idea of a mountaintop experience. There's

a few scenes in the Old Testament that are the epitome of a mountaintop experience.

In Chapter eighteen is one of those, and Elijah is at the forefront

of it. God demonstrates his power over everything. Anybody else been to Mount

Carmel when you land in the modern day nation state of Israel, you land

in Tel Aviv, but you're very quickly on top of Mount Carmel, still

there to this day, and on top of that mountain, God does some

amazing things. But what we Texans learn, I'm from the flatlands of Texas.

I mean the town I grew up in as a child was called Plane

View. That's literally that's the name of the town. And what we Texans

learn when we come to these rocky mountains is that every summit is followed by

a descent. And I am not an experienced climber. I'm sure here there

are some really experienced climbers. I'm experienced in following Jesus, and I can

tell you I think there's a parallel. Every ascent is followed by a far

more dangerous descent. And we see this in Elijah's life. His ministry had

been amazing. His prayers had been miraculously answered. When he called for rain,

rain came down. When he called for fire, fire came down.

It's just was incredible. But now he's exhausted and he becomes the target of

criticism. In the moment of God demonstrating his power over all things, he

doesn't get a plaque from the King and Queen. He gets a target on

his back. Every leader experiences criticism. This is a whole other level of

criticism because the King and Queen don't just want Elijah like out of the way,

They want him dead and they tell him that, and something about that.

Rejection takes Elijah out at his knees. And when we get to First

Kings, chapter nineteen, he has gone down a dangerous descent, and we

are in the valley of his burnout, with him rejected, totally criticized.

He's lost perspective. Look at verse three of chapter nineteen. Elijah was afraid.

They said, we're going to kill you. He was afraid, so

he ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba and Judah, he

left his servant there. Take note of that. He leaves the one guy

who's for him, and he travels by himself a day's journey into the wilderness,

and he came to a broom bush and he sat down under it,

and he prayed that he might die. I have had enough, Lord,

he said, take my life. I'm no better than my ancestors. And

then he just laid down under the bush and he fell asleep. Prior to

this moment, Elijah always looked at the size of his God, the size

of his problems, and said, no problem. But here, in the

valley of his fatigue and exhaustion and rejection, he has lost connection to the

face of God, he can't see it. I want you to know that

this burnout, this fatigue is somewhat of a spectrum that matchstick. I don't

know if it was up here a moment ago, but like, there's sort

of stages that we go through. And I'm not a clinician that needs to

be diagnosing that. I just want to acknowledge that there are stages. And

as we walk through those stages zero to ten. Let's say Elijah's like at

a twelve. You heard it, and because of mixed ages, and I

don't know your particular story, I'm being careful. You see how dark of

a moment he's in here. He's beyond just needing a nap and a snack.

He's burned out. Have you ever been at a place before, Maybe

not quite as severe as what we hear Elijah saying, or maybe you have,

but you could borrow his words and say to the Lord, the most

honest thing you could say to the Lord today is I have had enough.

I brought this along. This is I'm so glad I actually physically have this

with me. Anybody else know what this is? Children of the eighties and

nineties, Stretch Armstrong, so Stretch Armstrong. They when I first thought about

this, after my own experience had burnt out, I've tried to get my

hands on it and I couldn't. But the Amazon Genie he was able to

deliver this last week before I came to you. So Stretch Armstrong. Here's

the tagline, the marketing slogan for Stretch Armstrong. Stretch him and he returns

to normal size. It's kind of amazing little toy, especially if you're like

a ten year old boy, so you know you can stretch them and then

you know you hold him out and he just sort of returns to normal size,

and that kind of amazing. I'll hold him upside down, it's kind

of cool. Stretch him and he returns to normal size. What happens in

our life is we just keep stretching ourselves. We overwork, we hurry,

we isolate, and we just keep stretching. And we keep stretching, and

we believe the lie that Stretch Armstrong's little marketing slogan, I don't remember what

company made him came up with. We believe the lie that you can stretch

me. You can stretch me and stretch me and stretch me, and I'll

just always return to the normal size. I'll be fine. I'll overwork,

I'll hurry, I'll push beyond my limits. I'll push beyond a pace that's

appropriate and healthy. I'll isolate from friends and family. I won't take care

of my body. I'll just keep stretching. But you know what, it

is a lie. And not only is it a lie for you, but

it was a life for Stretch Armstrong. I proved it when I was a

kid. I proved it. If you stretch this guy far enough, you

will find some really weird nuclear goop that will get onto the floor of your

aunt's carpet, and you will be in really big trouble. We did it,

my cousin and I. We stretch this guy. I don't want to

do it because I want to take this home to my ten year old today.

But I don't remember twenty feet something that he has a limit. Okay,

Stretch Armstrong has a limit, is the point, And so do you,

and so do I, and so did Elijah. And the New Testament

there's a guy named James that's talking about all these just heroes of the faith,

and he names Elijah, and then he says, but we need to

remember something Elijah was a man just like us. This is one of the

problems is that people who were followers of Jesus at times so we tend to

not be that honest, but were actually invited in the story of Scripture to

be really honest about our limits and limitations, and our needs, our hurts,

and our hang ups. Eventually your life starts to come apart. It

happened to Elijah, it can happen to you. It happened to me.

So just just a brief testimony. When I finally hit a wall, a

lot like Elijah's wall, there were some internal reasons for that. So internally

things weren't really well with me. I was in my mid thirties and I

had taken on a new assignment to help replant a church in North Texas,

and I was really believing this sort of lie that you could stretch me I

wouldn't have said it this way, and that I would return to normal size.

So I overworked. I hurried, Why was I doing that? Let

me tell you. Internally, I was doing that because I had outsourced my

identity praise that Pastor Tim Keller once said other people's approval of my work was

determining my worth. Other people's approval of my work was determining my worth.

And let me tell you, vocational ministry, whatever that means, being a

pastor, is probably one of the most dangerous vocations if you are not settled

on who you are in Christ. So there were some internal reasons why I

found myself constantly depleted, constantly tired, and exhausted. But there were also

some external reasons. I was invited by the system that I was working in

to overwork into hurry. There was just so much to be done, and

the system that I was in, and they're a lovely group of people.

I'm sure some of them will see this. I love them to this day.

We are connected to this day. But the system was broken. The

system was inviting me to overwork. In my first year, we were just

brand new. There was so much to be done, unlimited need, unlimited

opportunity, and so I overworked and I hurried. I remember I preached fifty

one out of fifty two weeks that year. That is really unwise. That's

the opposite of what fight is trying to do in your midst. I did

that, and then the one week I went on vacation. True story,

I wish my wife were here, because you would just see so many head

nods. The one week we went on vacation as a family. I had

one staff member at the time when we started, and her husband died while

my family was on vacation. I left my two young children and wife on

the one week we took off to go and tend to my friend and staff

member who had lost her husband. There are some occupational hazards to being a

lead pastor, and there were also real boundary problems in the system that I

was in. The system was okay with this lie. We just stretch him

and he returns to normal size. It took a community to solve that problem.

By the way, it took all of us as a church to solve

that problem. I overworked, I hurried, I isolated myself in this dangerous

pattern. Because I was young. I didn't think it would catch up to

me, but it did. The Greeks have a saying, if you bend

the bow all the time, it eventually breaks. And for me, I

started having what I think in the medical world they would call psychosomatic symptoms.

So I started having some twitching in my eye muscles, I started having shortness

of breath so bizarre. I've always been a decent athlete. I've never had

problems breathing well. I would have shortness of breath, not full on panic

attacks. By the way, these symptoms look different for everybody. For me,

this is what it looked like. I was having a lot of trouble

sleeping. As the problem got worse and worse, and that matchstick started to

burn and get crisp and darker, and the light started to go out.

I found myself with my physician wife in an ear visit finally, because I

was so short of breath and so clammy after one of our Sunday services,

we really thought something was wrong. I had lost perspective and I had arrived

at this place where I really thought this is my problem. I hadn't talked

with anybody, even best friends. I got ahead of myself a minute ago.

James five seventeen. Elijah was a man just like us. This is

really good news. Normal broken people in need of redemption. That's who we

are are. That actually wasn't the moment I was worried about. Okay,

here we go. That's the harm. How do we name the harm?

That's the harm? How does it show up. How does the the the

evidence, how does the signs and symptoms? Thank you sir, How does

it show up? How does it manifest itself? I think there's like ten

or twelve signs of burnout, honestly, but we have no time to cover

all of those. I've narrowed it down to four. Here's four. I'm

gonna run through them kind of quickly. The first warning sign the first evidence

that you are flirting and playing with something that will lead you to a really

dangerous place. The first one is overworking, where you push beyond your limits.

That's the first sign you overwork, and so much of our modern world

is going to invite you to overwork and invite me to overwork. If you

are at the top of your company in corporation, you are probably compensated fairly

well, and you are likely expected to overwork as a result. If you

are at the bottom of your corporation, or you're not in that kind of

executive level leadership where you're getting paid really well, you've probably got a few

side hustles or multiple jobs. Everything in our North American culture and system is

going to invite you to push beyond your limits. Technology, I don't have

my phone on me. But technology, because we can work from anywhere,

We work from everywhere. We overwork that point that I made about outsourcing our

identity. So if you're a student, or if you're in sports, or

if you're in a job, we have actually mistaken where the source of identity

comes from. And we're trying to find our identity and fulfillment in our performance.

And everything in our culture is inviting you to do that. From the

time you're a little taught man in North Texas, my son is on the

soccer field probably during the service back in North Texas, everything in our culture

is saying, prove to us that you matter performance based identity, and it

is inviting you to overwork instead of Hessid community that pastor Richie Fike talked about

last week. Instead of Hessid community being the place where you discover I'm beloved,

I'm seeing, I'm safe, I'm secure, I know who I am.

Why because I'm friend, brother, sister, father, mother, grandparent?

No, no, no. What do you do for a living?

What kind of club team do you play on? What's your major? What's

your GPA? Are you going to You're going to do something after undergrad?

It's everything in our culture is inviting you to overwork. Here's the truth.

Jesus didn't overwork. He didn't push beyond his limits. He accepted and he

maintained boundaries. Second, hurry. The first sign and symptom is overworking.

The second is hurry. We push beyond a healthy pace, and you and

I live in a hurried culture. There is a difference between having a full

calendar and being busy and being hurried. We are hurried for the most part

as a culture. It's a soul condition where the tyranny of the urgent sort

of comes to be the writing presiding principle of our life. And we have

difficulty prioritizing because we feel overwhelmed by all that there is to do. There's

an old phrase, and actually an old race called Devil Take the Hindmost Mile.

Anybody heard of this. It's a twelve lap race, Devil take the

Hindmost Mile. Thankful to your creative pastor he got you a picture of it.

Great picture. Okay, twelve runners, twelve laps. Every single lap

has drama all of its own because at the end of every lap, the

person who's in last is out done. So you know, after that first

lap you're jockeying for position. You don't really want to be worn out in

the head of the race, but you also don't want to be at the

end because then you're out. And so it goes around. And what happens

is man, Satan's gonna get you if you're letting the last place. So

you better run, you better hurry, you better press. What a picture

of life in North America. I know a lot about life in North Texas.

I got to believe it's not that different out here. This fear of

missing out, this hurry is fueled by fear. It says that Elijah was

afraid and he hurried into the wilderness alone. This hurry sickness means that you'll

start to overlook really basic healthy habits of good sleep and good food and good

friends. We overwork, we're in a hurry. The psychologist Carl Jung once

said, hurry isn't of the devil, It is the devil. Here's the

truth. Jesus wasn't in a hurry. Did you know that if you pay

attention to the life and pace of Jesus, he wasn't in a hurry.

There were multiple times that people tried to get him to hurry up, and

WoT he wouldn't hurry. He had regular rhythms of sabbathing, of being silent,

of slowing, And those practices are so foreign to us in our culture

because we're in a hurry third isolation. So we overwork, we push beyond

our limits. We're in a hurry, we push beyond a healthy pace,

and then we start to push others away. And you've probably heard the phrase

the lonely crowd. You may have a lot of people around you, you

may actually have friends, and yet you can internally really be pushing people away

and not letting people know what's actually going on with you. When you begin

to experience chronic fatigue and burn out, this happens we push each other's away.

Elijah leaves the one guy that's for him, his servant. But then

we get a little commentary from Elijah in verse ten and he says in verse

ten of that same chapter, I have been very zealous for the Lord God

Almighty. But the Israelites have rejected your covenant. They've torn down your altars,

they've put your prophets to death with the sword. Now look at this

phrase. I am the only one left, and they want to kill me

too. This is the goal of the one that we would call our enemy,

Satan, to isolate you and to make you feel like you're the only

one. One of the most haunting passages that I've ever read in the New

Testament is a moment where an apostle, a follower of Jesus named Peter says

to Jesus, even if all fall away on account of you, I never

will like your Jesus, I got you, and you know what Jesus says.

He says, Peter, Satan has requested to sift you like wheat whoa,

to isolate you, to separate you from your community, to separate you

from God. That is the goal of your enemy and my enemy, to

isolate you, to remove you from that beloved Hesid community. When you start

to think, man, I'm alone in this, nobody would understand what I'm

going through. Nobody would understand my failures and my hurts and why this is

such a problem for me. You are flirting with something not only that is

not true, but that will lead to a really, really dark place.

Here's the truth about Jesus. He didn't go it alone. Jesus pursued deep

friendship with a very select group of people. Lastly, I don't know how

else to say this other than to say that the last warning sign I want

to talk with you about is just feeling stuck. So we overwork, we

hurry, we isolate, and eventually get to a place where you just feel

really stuck. You feel stuck between two What are those two extremes, feeling

really guilty about all that there needs to be done and feeling really exhausted in

your own life about the resources you have available to you. Elijah felt stuck.

He felt like he was in this sort of bind in working with and

paying attention to the health of medical missionaries. I've come across this term called

moral injury. It's the term they would use, and they feel stuck in

between this bind between moral injury and exhaustion, between guilt. I think it's

more clear to say between feeling really guilty and feeling really exhausted. And one

pediatrician and a really undeeserved part of the world said this. He said,

every single day I wake up and I am confronted with a extremely long line,

like more than one hundred children who are very ill, and there is

no other pediatrician within hundreds of miles that can take care of them. And

he said, if I meet the needs of all of these patients every day,

seven days a week, I'm gonna absolutely burn out. But if I

don't meet their needs, I feel horribly guilty. I'll have moral injury,

he says. And so I guess this is my life. I'm just stuck

in between these two extremes of either feeling guilty or just totally burned out.

When you get to that place, when you feel like those are your only

options, that's a warning sign you're flirting with something called burnout. You know

that Jesus worked really hard. He healed entire villages, but he didn't let

demand dictate his actions. At times he sent away the crowds. At times

he left lines of people in need of his help. He just wasn't a

slave to those around him. These four things overworking, hurry, isolation,

feeling stuck, these are the warning signs of burnout. And Elijah gets to

that place where he says, I'm alone. I'm no better than my ancestors.

I actually think it would be better if I wasn't here. That's how

dark it got for Elijah. He began to think that the only way out

was a permanent solution to what we all know was a temporary problem. What's

the antidote? No matter how dark things might have become for Elijah, and

no matter how dark things may be for you, God intends to meet you

in your fatigue. What's the antidote? What does the story of scripture prescribe

to address our burnout and fatigue? I want to tell you, brothers and

sisters, there's three gifts that I think the Lord wants to give you.

There's three gifts he gave to Elijah, and I want you to remember them

for the rest of your life, not just today. R and R,

TLC and VIP, R and R. Well, actually, let's read verse

five, Chapter nineteen. Verse five, He laid down under the bush.

He fell asleep. We kind of left the story there. All at once,

an angel of the Lord comes and finds him in his fatigue, and

he says, interesting, look at where he starts. He says, Elijah,

wake up and eat. He looked around and by his head there was

some bread baked over hot coals, and there was a jar of water.

He ate and drank, and then he laid down again. The angel of

the Lord came back a second time and touched him and said, get up

and eat, for the journey is too much for you. So he got

up and he ate and drank. He was strengthened by that food. And

then he traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached another mountain, Horeb,

the Mountain of God. There he went into a cave and he spent

the night. Here's gift, one very specific gift. When I say R

and R, I'm talking about rest and relaxation for your physical body, for

your physical body. This is so significant. Please take no notice of what

God doesn't do. Now, Elijah, let's talk. Let's talk some things

through here. Let's get something straight. Elijah, you've lost your perspective.

Let me turn to Romans twelve. Maybe you haven't renewed your mind quite like

you need to renew your mind. He doesn't start there. Where does he

start with his body? He starts with R and R for his physical life,

for his body. Two different times he gives food and drink. And

on one level, we just have to say, never underestimate the power of

good food in a good night's sleep, a snack, and a nap.

We're not that different than the three year olds that we're hearing we need a

snack in a n app Sometimes we really aren't that different. And let me

also say, because when I talk about R and R for the body and

I dumb it down to a snack and a nap, I was at a

place that to experience the gift of the rest and relaxation that I needed from

my body was going to require radical change just to my life. I had

arrived at a place where a good weekend, a good week's long vacation,

maybe even a good sabbatical. I took three months off. I didn't feel

rested at the end. There's a phrase that I really appreciate on a whole

article entitled your body keeps the score eventually, the shutting down of the body,

the twitching, the sleeplessness, the shortness of breath, all other kinds

of symptoms. It's your body's way of trying to say, to pray,

to groan, I've had enough. You're not taking care of me like you

ought to take care of me. God starts with rest in relaxation for the

body. Any of you know of a guy named Dallas Willard, pretty famous

leader in the Christian world, and he's really well known for actually helping leaders

to get healthy and whole. As smart as he was in his faculty career

on the West Coast, what he's really known for now is helping pastors and

Christian leaders get healthy and whole. And when he would take them on retreat,

they would arrive at the retreat and what they would be invited to do

is this. He would say, Okay, everybody listen, especially pastors.

He would say, I want you to sleep until you can't sleep anymore,

and then we'll start. How cool would that be for those of you who

are at a place of chronic fatigue or burnout. What an incredible gift.

But what is Willard queuing in on. He's queuing in on the thing our

Lord already knows about us that it starts with taking care of our physical bodies.

It starts with R and R for the body. You can't hear God

in a hurry, you can't think deeply in a hurry, you can't love

in a hurry. You can't sleep in a hurry. The gift of rest

and relaxation for the body means you have to pay attention to your pacing.

You have to address the hurry of your life. Okay, gift too,

that's gift one, rest and relaxation for the body and we'll talk and Just

is like, how do you grab hold of it? Gift? Secondly,

TLC? What do we mean by TLC? I mean tender loving communication from

our father to you personally. You need to hear and receive the tender loving

communication, the tender loving voice from your heavenly father. You know, God

is just really gifted at asking good questions. Have you ever noticed that as

you read scripture that a major approach to Jesus's life in leadership was he he

asked really great questions. And when God asks you a question, he already

knows the answer. So why does he ask? Doesn't it show his tenderness

and care that he comes to Elijah in his fatigue after he's helped him with

his body, and this is what he says. He says, Hey,

Elijah, why are you here? Really open ended question he asked him at

twice in this chapter, Elijah, why are you here? All the best

fathers and mothers and teachers and leaders and professors know the power and the kindness

of asking the right question. It's an invitation to meet the person right where

they are. Tender loving communication here comes in the form of a question.

He softly and tenderly ask you this morning, why are you here? What

do you need? What steadfast love and patience God is showing is showing us

that He's big enough for our big feelings. Do you believe that about God?

The God of the universe, is able to handle the assaults of whatever

emotions you're feeling. This is why the Book of Psalms is so powerful,

which I believe you're going to be looking at alseemmer, because in the Book

of Psalms you've got virtually every human emotion just on full display, and God

is big enough to receive it. So this means in your fatigue or anger,

or fear or resentment, opening up the valve of that emotion. Part

of answering God's question, why are you here? You need to know you

have permission to just dump it all on him. He can handle it.

You won't overwhelm him. He won't he won't leave you, He won't leave

the table. Some of us we can't handle some of the emotions that are

brought our way when friends or family members are our own children, get to

a certain level. God, God never backs away. He's big enough to

handle all your big feelings. Yes, you need rest and relaxation for the

body, but you need a safe place to event one, Peter says,

cast all your cares on the Lord because he cares for you. God will

listen to you. But until you just totally run out of words. I've

really been drawn and helped by something in the mental health world. UH talk

talking about the four s's of attachment. That we are seen, we are

soothed, we are safe, we are secure. Have you ever thought about

that in your relationship to the Lord. God is the perfect father, and

that you are seen, you are soothed, you are safe, and you're

secure. So you convent. I get this image of a baby that can't

regulate. That's what I'm describing for me and this testimony of burnout. I

just couldn't regulate on my own anymore. And God is like that perfect parent

in the middle of the night while I'm screaming, swaying, singing. He

can handle it. So the Lord says to Elijah, go out, so

now, so I've told you that he can handle all your words. Why

are you here? And Elijah answers. But eventually God's got something to say

to you as well. He had something to say to Elijah, he had

something to say to me. So the tender loving communication is not only your

communication to him, but it's also receiving the gentle whisper from your father to

you. And he puts on this like crazy display of his power. Elijah's

in his cave, and it's on the screen, so let me read it.

Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord,

and the Lord will pass by. Then a great and powerful wind tore the

mountains apart, shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not

in the wind. After that, after the wind was the earthquake, but

the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire,

but the Lord was not in the fire. After the fire came a gentle

whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and

he went out, and he stood at the mouth of the cave, and

the voice said to him, what are you doing here, Elijah? And

he answers again. God puts his power on display. But eventually he comes

in this still small whisper, you need to receive the gentle whisper of our

Lord to you, and I'm going to tell you you're going to have to

quiet down to hear it. Notice nothing got Elijah's attention. And the list

we just had was quite exhaustive and quite majestic. It was epic. It

didn't get his attention, but the gentle voice of the Lord, Oh,

it made him wake up. I remember at the end of my sabbatical.

I remember exactly where I was, and I was so tired, and it

was time to get back to work. And I did not want to get

back to work. And it's not because I'm lazy, quite the opposite.

I didn't know what to do with my fatigue. And by that point I

had begun to realize I could talk about that with friends, with family,

with my father, and so I just said, God, I'm so tired,

and just a gentle whisper hearing the Lord say, I know, I

know you're fatigue, and then this little threefold phrase, he whispered, I

know what you need. I care about what you need, and I will

provide what need. Man, it meant so much to me. Getting unwell

took a long time for me getting well also took some time, but that

little whisper changed everything for me. What about you? The TLC, the

tender loving communication of our Father to you. Lastly, quickly VIPs. You

need some VIPs, very important people. He commands Elijah to go back.

We won't read it because I need to be brief on this. He commands

Elija to go back, and he says, you're going to appoint a team

around you because you're trying to do this thing alone. It's not going to

work, Elijah. You need help. So I suppose we could assume that

Elijah had been trying to go it alone as the prophet of the Lord,

this kind of image, and instead God says, go back and appoint a

leadership team, and he names very specific people to do very specific jobs.

And then he reminds Elijah this, Elijah, I know you fill alone,

but there's seven thousand people in Israel that are faithful, that are with you.

You are not alone. You and I have got to come to the

place where we are truly committed. And I'm especially wanting to speak to those

of you out there who are naturally prone. And then, because of circumstances

and fatigue to push each to push other people away, you must have a

team of VIPs. Every one of you need a team of VIPs. How

do you grab hold of these things? I'm gonna ask you three questions and

then I'll stop. So, these three gifts, how do you grab hold

of these lifelines? How do you access these lifelines? Of these three gifts?

What do you need the most this morning, this week, this year

in your life when it comes to rest and relaxation for the body, when

it comes to R and R, here's my question for you. What is

the Lord inviting you to say no to? That's my question for you,

and I do think that it will likely require pretty radical changes. What is

the Lord inviting you to say no to? He wants to give you this

gift. Radical change in your life might be required. What are you going

to say no to? Secondly, when it comes to tender loving communication this

week, this month, this year, how are you going to turn down

the noise? How are you going to turn down the noise of your life

so that you can hear the gentle whisper? You're gonna have to quiet down.

You're gonna have to find some space to quiet down, some space to

receive I had gotten to a place where even really lovely hobbies of mine were

no longer being nurtured. There was no space in my life where I wasn't

leading and caring for others. And I found out, Oh, that's not

how this works. There's a reversal that must happen. Where I'm in the

seat of the one receiving. I'm in the hands of the Father and he's

offering TLC to me. How will you turn down the noise? Third third?

Who are your three or twelve? But no more? In spite of

what your social platforms may say, you do not have a thousand friends that

know you. You cannot be known. One of the dangers even in a

church the size right now that movement is one of the dangers is that we

think we can be known by like two hundred people. You can't be known

and know two hundred people the way that we're talking about here when I talk

about VIPs, I'm talking about the pattern in Jesus's own life. The King

of the universe chose twelve very selective. He chose them, He picked them,

those twelve, and then within those twelve he had three p James and

John that were like super tight. Who are your VIPs? We need them,

don't we. We need them to be whole, to be well,

we have to experience the joy of the Lord in our lives. We have

to see the face of God, don't we. But in a way that

amazes me, Our Lord chooses to use the face of those around us for

us to discover that joy. That's why the VIPs are so important. And

one of my favorite books. I was just talking to Justice about this book,

Justice Fight, last night, a classic Mere Christianity. Many of you

probably know about it. If you don't, I would encourage you to read

it. C. S. Lewis says in Mere Christianity, he's trying to

get at and this is the last thing I'll say, and then we'll pray.

He's trying to get it. How do we get in on this life

that God has for us, this abundant life where we're not always running on

fumes? How do we access it? And as he's exploring that grand question,

eventually he says, you know what, I think Christ works on us

in all sorts of ways, but most of all, he works on us

through each other. You must have a team of the ips around you.

I'm so thankful to have experienced the face of God and the face of the

friends that God has put around me. You have to have that to experience

the rest and relaxation for the body the TLC, and you have to see

as we close and as we come to the table together and worship that Jesus

he forsook these three things that he sacrificed his body. He actually was cut

off from the tender loving communication of the Father that Mark tells us. Everyone

fled, He was separate and isolated. Why did he do that so that

you and I don't have to live that way? He has come that you

could have life to the fullest, which you receive by His grace and power.

As we worship and as we come to the table these three gifts,

Father, we are so thankful God that you meet us in our fatigue.

And for my friends, for my brothers and sisters that are here this morning

that can't see that light, Oh Jesus, would you whisper to them,

would you help them to experience rest and relaxation. TLC and VIPs this year,

May this be the year of jubilee for those that are here and that

are hearing this. We asked this in your name and for your glory.

I'm in So what's God leading you to do next and how can we help?

Would you send us an email to info at Movementchurch dot co and tell

us how we can pray for you and help you take the next step in

your spiritual journey. If you'd like to contribute financially to our ministry, text

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or look us up online at Movementchurch dot c. You can find the Movement

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follow God bless you, and remember God is for you, and so are we.