No Other Part 4 "The Idol of Distraction"

Welcome to the River City Church Podcast.

Our prayer is that this message would inspire and encourage you

build your faith and point you to the life changing love of

Jesus. May you enjoy the goodness of

God as you follow him today. Welcome River City.

My name is RJ Strouch. My family and I have been

attending River City for probably about.

Nineish years now I've been part of the teaching team.

I've been fortunate enough to to be part of the teaching team

last three or four years. I've worked with the youth and

taught in youth for for many years as well.

So it's just a blessing and an honor to be up here first time,

the new place for me and it's exciting.

Wow, so, so really just so thankful and so blessed to to be

able to share some words with you today.

Wow. Before we get going, that

worship set I'm always. I'm always an awe of things like

just artists. I'm the worst artist in the

world. I Can't Sing it all like that.

That's just awesome. And the last words, some of the

last things that that Alyssa was saying.

Don't look to the left or to the right.

Just keep your eyes on me. That's pretty much my message

today. So y'all have a good Sunday, but

but for real right, don't look to the left or to the right.

Just keep your eyes on me Through the tough times, through

the good times, through the mundane times.

Don't look to the left or through the right.

Keep your eyes on me. Wow, what a great way to start.

So we are. Before we get to our confession,

I just want to you know, a couple reminders.

Maybe you are aware of this or not.

But but please just keep your keeping your prayers this week.

Kids. OK, the children they just got

back from kids camp. They just got back yesterday.

They were there since I believe Wednesday.

But but keep the, you know, all the volunteers, all the people

on staff that help put that together.

Just, you know, prayers of thanks and prayers of recharge

for them for sure. And then for those kiddos, just

that they keep that fire lit as they as they approach school

this year that they keep that fire lit that was hopefully put

into their bellies and that they will just be on fire for the

Lord. And then we also were kind of

smack in the middle. So tomorrow our youth take off

for camp. So again.

Keep them in your prayers this week.

The staff, the volunteers that again put that together and are

going with them and and it's going to be an awesome time but

just pray that they really hear that spirit and then are led to

do just amazing things. So I know my daughter just got

back from from kids camp and we're driving home yesterday and

she's in the back seat and lost another one.

I am free and I'm like there you go that's what I'm talking

about. So yeah we got a kids camp

volunteer in the back. Heck yeah, so.

So, so keep them in your prayers for sure.

So we are going to, we're going to say our our confession here

here in a second, but before we do.

And then if you're new, here is your first time, you're like

confession. What are we talking about here?

So, so every week we kind of start ourselves and and and kind

of ground ourselves and the fact that we're badly broken, but

we're also deeply loved by an infinite God, right.

And then so we'll go through that.

But but more than ever, and we've been in this series for a

few weeks now. Of no other, right.

We've been talking about counterfeit gods.

We've been talking about this idea of false idols and other

things that we put on the throne of our lives instead of King

Jesus. And it's been heavy, right?

I know for me it's been a lot of soul searching and you know last

week with Rebecca the the successes and the idea that.

Success in an instant can change.

What you define as success in just one second can totally be

changed. So why not hang our success on

what Jesus calls success And then Jason with identity.

You know, just always looking to find our identity in Christ.

And you know, I know begin. Personally, I'm always looking

at other things to find my identity and it was such a good

reset. And then, Aaron, setting it all

up is just what a counterfeit God is, and the idea of these

false idols in our lives. So it's been heavy, is what I'm

trying to say. And and for you, maybe it has

been too. So when we say our confession

today more than ever, let's really remember and believe that

second part, that no matter how many times we're putting

counterfeit gods in our lives and putting them up top, no

matter how much badly broken this we have.

That we are loved. So when we say that confession,

let's make sure all our neighbors here in Creekside hear

just how loved we are. So we are badly broken.

We are deeply loved. Yes, indeed we are.

Grace and peace to you. And that was awesome.

So as I said, we're kind of right smack in the middle if you

haven't seen some of the other other teachings on on this idea

of no other. You know, they're on the YouTube

page or on the on the web page. Definitely go check those out.

You don't want to miss them. They're they're really awesome

and and every week we've been kind of setting the setting the

stage with this idea of what even is a counterfeit God.

And the teaching team, you know we kind of one of the books we

studied to prepare for this was Tim Keller's book entitled

Counterfeit Gods. And so to take the definition

that he. Came up with is probably a lot

better than some of us coming up with it cuz he's a pretty smart

dude. So the idea what what he comes

up with is it says this anything so central.

So this is the definition of a counterfeit God.

Anything so central and essential to your life that

should you lose it, your life would feel hardly worth living

so. No matter where you are in our

in your journey, right. Whether they again, this is your

first time in church, first time even hearing about Jesus, or

you've been following the Lord for 50 years, every single one

of us struggles with this idea of counterfeit gods.

Nobody has it all figured out. So that's, I think the first

thing to understand is there shouldn't be any guilt.

It's not like, oh, and everybody else has got it.

And I keep putting this thing up on top.

We all struggle with it. We all do.

Okay. And and so in knowing that I

kind of struggled on okay, well, there's so many counterfeit gods

and I know I personally battle a lot of them.

So like which one? What am I, What am I going to do

my teaching on right. And it came to me in the best

place to to find a sermon, the pediatrician's office.

So. I have just a maybe just a touch

of white coat syndrome where I get a little bit nervous around

doctors and whatnot, even when I take my own children to the

pediatrician. Yes, a little bit.

So I think it was one of my kids was like having to get a shot or

something. And of course I'm not looking

away. Hey, you got it, man.

Here. Good job toughing up, buddy.

And I'm looking away and I'm looking at the door of our

pediatrician's office. Has all these things on the

backside of the door to kind of keep you entertained while

you're waiting for him. Okay.

And one of them was a prayer. And I noticed this prayer and

I've seen it a couple times. And the last time we were in

there recently, a few months ago.

And again when we're kind of getting ready for the series, I

read it again. And man, it was such a gut punch

to me. And it really got me thinking

about a very sneaky counterfeit God.

That I know I struggle with and I think we all probably struggle

with at times. So let me read the prayer.

It'll be on screen. But let me read the prayer and

we'll kind of mush it together to see what what we're looking

at here. Okay.

So the prayer says this. It says, Father, we confess that

we are satiated and bored. Creation has bored us.

Work has bored us. Family has bored us.

Friends have bored us. Our homes bore us.

Television bores us. Redemption has bored us.

Truth has bored us. You have bored us.

No generation in history has ever had so much to entertain

it. We are jaded and cynical.

We think the world is our servant, so we're not thankful

when things go well for us. And we're not patient when they

do not. We believe every desire should

be satisfied. So we're not delighted when they

are, and we're not humbled when they're not.

We laugh, but we don't know joy. We're captivated but are never

really awed. We celebrate, but we don't

worship. Have mercy on us and forgive us.

Amaze us with grace Incarnate. Blood stained, resurrected

messianic grace. Oh, that's a lot, right?

But I count myself reading that. And man, how many times just do

we get caught up in this mundane life and the idea of distraction

as an idol? We're distracted by so many

things in this modern world that it kind of becomes.

Comfortable. It kind of becomes the norm.

Whether it's the distraction of our busyness, whether it's

distraction of the noise, just the noise in our life, it seems

like it's never ending or the distraction of technology, the

endless and mindless scrolling day in and day out.

But it just becomes the norm and we don't open our eyes.

To what God has intended for us and the relationships He's

intended for us in the world that he built around us.

Even in our modern day of buildings and skyscrapers, he

inspired someone to have that architecture in mind.

We can be awe inspired all the time.

Yet I know I find myself caught up in the idle of distraction.

So that's what we're going to kind of look at today.

It's a sneaky 1, right? It's not the the money or

success that I think is a little easier to define.

I think distraction is going to mean something to maybe

everybody did a little bit different to everybody in here

and that's okay. Hopefully you can hear something

that you going to catch on to maybe realize and then we'll

look at some strategies at the end to okay.

How can we combat this idea of this idol of distraction?

And even how can we combat this idea of counterfeit gods in

general? So maybe that prayer spoke to

you, or maybe you're more of a visual person.

I'm an old educator. I like to, you know, different

modalities of of learning. So maybe this visual here will

speak a little bit more to that idea of distraction.

No interaction, just busy staring at phones, walking, no

looking again. Maybe it's like a nice, crisp 65

day degree day and nobody's, you know, thank you Lord, for this

awesome weather. Just Boo, Boo, Boo, Boo all in

there. Just busyness, distractions all

around, right? I read this this quote in a

Devotional 1 morning and I think it was just one of those.

Kind of devotionals that there wasn't like an author attached.

So I'm not going to take credit. But this really spoke to me.

And again, whether you've been following Jesus for a long time

or or this is your first time in a church, I still ask.

I go, you know that that question okay the the Christian

walk. What what like what do we what

is what is the end game what are we doing here?

Right. And I know Jason talks about it

sometimes it's not just so we die someday and go up on a cloud

and strum a harp, right. That's not what it's about.

Okay. So this really spoke to me and

it clarified like okay the Christian walk, here we go.

In a nice little sentence, it says being a Christian means

becoming who God intended me to be.

Being a Christian means becoming who God intended me to be.

That's a lifelong process, right?

And how easy and and it's no wonder the enemy wants to try

and use distraction. The busyness of noise, of

technology now to try to stop us and hinder us from becoming who

God intends us to be. So instead of constantly, you

know, scrolling through massive media and worried about the busy

schedule and all of that, what if there was something truly

new, something truly refreshing we could have?

That sounds pretty nice, right? Well, these are the words of

Jesus and how he wants your daily life to feel like.

So I'm going to read out of Matthew Chapter 11.

Matthew 11 · chapter mention

It's going to be verses 28 to 30.

You've probably if you've been in church for a while or been in

church at all, you might recognize this.

But this is the message version. I usually, when I read, I think

this is ESV. Yeah, NIV.

But the message version, I think it's on the app or somewhere.

Man, this spoke to me. So let's read this and let's see

what Jesus wants our daily lives to feel like.

These are Jesus's words. So he's talking here, he says.

Are you tired? Worn out.

Burned out on religion? Come to me, get away with me and

you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real

rest. Walk with me and work with me.

Watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of

grace. I won't lay anything heavy or

ill fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll

learn to live freely and lightly.

Think about that video up there. Do those people seem like they

were living freely and lightly? Not to me at least.

And how many times in my life am I just running ragged?

Or find myself just scrolling away and Oh my gosh, an hour

just went by. What am I doing?

He wants us to live freely and lightly, learning those unforced

rhythms of grace. That's what he wants our

day-to-day to be. So we're going to keep coming

back to that verse as we go through.

But I think I mentioned, you know, I'm an exeducator, right?

And I was never one in the classroom to have big surprises,

right? Kids are supposed to learn this.

Here's what you're supposed to learn.

It's not like, you know, you hear kids all the time.

We had a review and none of it was on the test.

Well, my reviews was literally a video where I would just pretty

much go over the whole test. And if they watched the video,

hey, we're going to be good. I wanted them to know where we

were going. Right.

I want you to know where we're going to.

So, spoiler alert, there's no magic bullet to the Counterfeit

Gods in our life. But I got that Tim Keller book,

and I knew we were going to study through it.

I, like, flipped to the end. And I was like, all right, Tim

Keller, here's a smart theologian.

You're going to have an answer, right, for counterfeit gods.

You're something simple that I can just make sure I do that

every day and I'll stay away from those counterfeit gods.

There wasn't anything. There wasn't anything.

There's no magic bullet. Just like becoming who God

intends us to be is a lifelong thing.

So is combating these counterfeit gods in our life and

especially the idol of distraction, especially in this

day and age. So as we go through this and we

start looking at some scripture and breaking some things down,

we'll talk about some strategies.

But just remember it's not just about a six or seven week

series. It's a constant conscious effort

that we have to battle these counterfeit gods in our lives.

It can't just be the month of July and a little bit of August

and OK, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna keep focus on that.

It's got to be. It's a constant walk every day

where we try and take steps forward.

OK, So the scripture we're really going to kind of hang

into for a little while today is it's a famous parable of Jesus.

It's the parable of the sower, so it comes out of Matthew.

Matthew 13 · chapter mention

Chapter 13 is where I'm going to be and verses one through 9 and

our scripture you'll see here in a second when we get to it.

It it starts with the words that same day and I always love, I

love when there's that same day or something about and then

Jesus, because I love to go back and look at like OK.

Like what else was happening cuz you know, the idea of the sewer

is it's a pretty big story and I would read that if it was alone

and just think man, that's a pretty good day for Jesus.

He taught a ton of people and maybe he slept late and but now

there was a lot more going on that same day.

So just to kind of give you the background, the behind the

scenes of what else was going on, so.

This was a Sabbath day. So it was a it was a Jewish

Sabbath. Okay, meaning no work, right?

Not supposed to work at all. No healing people, no working in

the fields, None of that. Well, his disciples were hungry.

They were traveling around as always.

They were walking through a field, and they picked some

grain. Pharisees saw this.

They're like losing their minds. They're working.

Jesus, your disciples are working on on the Sabbath.

Jesus calmed them down a little bit, or at least rebutted to

them. And then Jesus heals a man.

So his disciples are working in the field.

Technically, he's healing someone.

I mean, the Pharisees are losing their minds by this point.

They even go so far as to say that Jesus is under Satan's

power. I mean, that's pretty heavy

stuff. So if I was Jesus, I'd be like

battling them and then go take a nap.

But he decides to withdraw and do what Jesus does best.

Teach people, Teach people the the way, right?

And so he goes into this parable of the sower.

And so let's read that story together here.

And it says, this says that same day Jesus went out of the house

and sat by the lake. Such large crowds gathered

around him that he got into a boat.

And Saturday while all the people stood on the shore, then

he told them many things in parables.

Same. A farmer went out to sow his

seed. As he was scattering the seed,

some fell along the path and the birds came and ate it up.

Some fell on rocky places where it did not have much soil.

It sprang up quickly because the soil was shallow, but when the

sun came up, the plants were scorched and they withered

because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns

which grew up. And choked the plants.

Still the other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a

crop 160 and 30 times what was sown.

Whoever has ears, let them hear. Now before we start breaking

down the scripture and kind of how that molds into this idea of

distraction as an idol, that last sentence, you hang your hat

on that one again. That's what these weeks are all

about. I know you know, I can sit there

next week or I can sit there and and hear, but am I really

hearing, Am I taking it in? Am I understanding the message

and then changing how those idols affect my life?

He who has ears let him hear. So keep that in mind as we keep

going through this series. Some of it's hard to hear.

This was hard to prepare for cuz I struggle with all of this

distraction idea. And so I get that, but have

those ears have that open mind. Go to Jesus and let him take

care of those counterfeit gods. So the first one he talks about

is the path, right? And he says that he says that

that birds came and ate the seed even before it could even start

sprouting, right. Is that the noise in our life?

Maybe We have so much noise in our life sometimes that we get

the message. We hear the seed.

The seed is planted, but it doesn't even the birds come and

Peck, Peck, Peck, and it's gone. Maybe the birds of those people

that you work with or in your neighborhood, they're just

constantly negative. They're just constantly pecking,

pecking, pecking, pecking, stealing that seed before it

could even get planted. Or maybe the birds sometimes are

even wooing you, right? Maybe they're Why do you need

small group? And you're a great guy.

What do you need to go to small group for again?

They're wooing you away from that message.

Just Peck, Peck, Peck, taking it away.

There's a guy in the Bible, in the Old Testament named

Nehemiah. He had a lot of birds in his

life. So Nehemiah, he was taken out of

Jerusalem. He was in Persia.

He was working for the king of Persia, and he heard that the

wall surrounding Jerusalem that fortified the city had been

destroyed, and by fire and enemies that destroyed the wall.

And So what he felt God intended him to be, was the person to go

and rebuild this wall. So he got permission from the

Persian king, went back to Jerusalem, started working on

the wall, and then the birds came.

The people in his life trying to steal away that seed, came and

telling him, you'll never finish this wall.

Why are you even trying? What are you doing?

Stop. There's no time.

And then other birds came and started stealing the seed,

trying to woo him off the wall. Oh, Nehemiah, come on, you've

worked hard enough. Come on down off that wall.

But he stuck with it, kept focus on God, and became that person

that God intended him to be. And remember, back in Matthew,

when there's so much noise in your life and the birds are

pecking away at that seed, remember Jesus's words?

Are you tired? Are you worn out?

Come to me, get away with me, and you'll recover your life.

The second example that Jesus uses is rocks.

He talks about the rocks and how the rocky soil wasn't very deep

and the roots couldn't really form.

And so the sun came and scorched it out.

And to me again, just personally, most of the time

when I'm teaching, I'm talking to myself the whole time.

It's technology, Technology In our life of the rocks, maybe we

have good intention. Maybe we have the Bible app and

we open it in the morning and then two minutes later we're

scrolling through Facebook or we get an alert from Instagram of

somebody made a post and we're scrolling mindlessly.

Or maybe it's Twitter is your thing, and then oh, and do

somebody's new tweet. And now I've got to respond to

that. And it's on and on.

And you have good intentions but then there's just too much other

distractions on that device. So good timing So oh I did

forget one and I have got to give a little shout out to to I

don't. I do have a lot of apps.

I don't have TikTok, but and my second oldest son he attributes

it to TikTok made some of the best smoked ribs I've ever had a

couple weeks ago so maybe that was is 1 we can pay a little

attention to. But but let me give you some

some statistics. You might have heard things like

this before but it's always eye opening right when you hear some

of these things. So so like this on average.

And there were lots of different studies so I went with the

lowest average to give us all the benefit of the doubt.

But on average, Americans have a screen time of 4 1/2 hours a

day. In 2011, only 35% of Americans

used a smartphone. Today, 85% from 2011 to today.

That's how much that's grown. The average American touches

their phone 2617 times a day. Now hold on, because when I was

talking to my family, they're like dad.

No, no way. But if you think about it,

touch, unlock, touch, send a text.

Touch, touch, touch, touch. That's 10 times just to say hi

to somebody so easily. If we're counting every single

touch 2000 / 2000 times a day. Bank of America found in a study

that 91% of people value their smartphone as much as they value

their car or deodorant. It's pretty valuable thing

there. And here's where it gets just in

all honesty, scary and even I've got to take a hard look at

myself, right? But let's before I read this

last statistic, let's go back to Tim Keller's definition.

Remember his definition of a counterfeit gun?

Anything so central and essential to your life that

should you lose it, your life would feel hardly worth living.

So USA TODAY did a study that found almost half of US adults

report they can't live without their smartphones.

That kind of sums up the idea of a counterfeit God right there.

And I know for some of us in here, maybe this isn't your

struggle, and that's awesome. But I know for a lot of

Americans, half according to this study, I mean it.

It's a reality that we face. But remember what Jesus has for

us, and I'll share with you my own struggles with technology I

had, I had to have. It was years ago.

Maybe like 10 years ago. I had a simple, easy little

surgery day in, boom go day out. But remember my white coat

syndrome? I was a nervous wreck.

I was anxious weeks leading up to that.

But instead of going to Father and praying and talking to

father about my my anxiety and how nervous I was, or talking to

my wife or my family, that would have supported, Nope, downloaded

shooties guys and played a little game on my phone all the

time just to take my mind off of worrying about the surgery.

So I get it. I totally get it.

But remember what Jesus wants to offer us instead of that

technology, that tool or torture device?

I don't know, he says. He wants us to learn the

unforced rhythms of grace. And how can we learn the

unforced rhythms of grace with our heads down all the time,

instead of our eyes up looking to him and thanking him?

The last one Jesus talks about in this parable is the thorns,

right? And the thorns come and they

choke out the the, the, the plant.

They choke out the crop and I feel like that's the busyness in

our life, the distraction of busyness, that again, maybe we

sit here, we have good intentions, and then Monday hits

and the busyness just starts rolling in.

The kids activities and the work activities and the trying to

battle and climb the ladder and all of that.

The busyness just chokes out who God intended us to be.

The Mayo Clinic did a study on cortisol.

Cortisol is a hormone that is released when we're under

stress, OK? And busyness tends to lead to a

lot of stress for all, for all of us, right?

And it says that this too much of this cortisol can lead to

anxiety, depression, headaches, heart disease, sleep problems,

and even memory and concentration impairment.

But all those physical things aside, let's think about for a

second Jason's message since Easter.

And again, if this is your first time here, spoiler alert, it's

been about love. Since Easter, we've been talking

about nothing but love. And if you have been here, you

remember talked about love of God and loving each other and

all Love has been the theme since pretty much Easter.

And the Christian author John Ortberg says this though about

busyness and love and hurriedness and love.

He says love and hurry are fundamentally incompatible.

Love always takes time, and time is the one thing that hurried

people don't have. So the distraction of busyness

is keeping us from what God intended, right to love each

other, to love him, to let him love us.

But that distraction blocks it out.

So fertile soil is the last one he talked about.

That fertile soil is needed for those deep roots, those deep

roots to make it through adverse times, to keep taking steps

forward of becoming the person that God intended us to be.

So even in our busiest moments, go back to Matthew, remember

Jesus's words, how he's calling to us.

Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and

lightly. I can't go back to that message

enough. We're not alone in our

distraction, though, right? Jesus went through distraction,

and he was preparing for his ministry, and the devil took him

out to the desert. That was a lot of distraction in

that, too. So we're not alone.

Jesus understands how distractions can creep in and

block out what he intended for us.

And really, you know, this idea of distraction, it comes down

again for me about selfishness, but also about my neediness.

I think we're all needy by default, right?

The need to be accepted, the need to compare.

The need to live up to expectations and think about how

the noise of people trying to please those around you and

please the noise Okay. Comparing nothing more than

technology to compare each other with and living up to

expectations. The busyness.

You're expected to be busy, you're expected.

It's just the norm of society. Why?

We just read what Jesus wants us to have.

Keeping focus on that can help keep taking steps forward of

becoming who God intended us to be.

So remember I said there's no magic bullet, right?

That was that. Spoiler alert, there's no tada

moment here. But I do want to go through some

things here at the end of just some strategies, right?

Just maybe some tools that we can put in our toolbox.

Maybe one of them will help you to kind of keep those

distractions at Bay in your life and keep your eyes focused on

King Jesus. So the first thing is identify.

It's important. And Aaron touched on this a

little bit too, right? But it's important to identify

where these distractions are in your life and what the

distractions are before we can kind of combat them.

So when your mind has nothing else to think of, where does it

wander? What does it get distracted by?

Is it straight to your phone when you have free time and

there's nothing else to think? Is it straight to your phone and

you're scrolling? Is it straight to the 100 things

you have to do at work? Straight to maybe the drama of a

relationship and the birds that are pecking at you?

OK, insert Jesus into these moments of your daily time.

Instead of picking up your phone and mindlessly scrolling through

social media intentionally to go through a Bible study instead of

multitasking to try and get the job done and be the first done.

Pick one task and go through that and remember who you're

truly working for in the 1st place.

Second thing, prioritize. Prioritize.

It has to. We have to prioritize if we're

going to combat these distractions.

An example in the Bible of making sure Jesus is first is

there's a story in the New Testament where John the Baptist

and Jesus, they were actually baptizing people kind of at the

same time in the same area. And John's disciples, all the

people are going over to Jesus and John the Baptist disciples

run up to him and they're like, dude, all the people are going

to Jesus, what are we going to do?

And John just tells him calmly, look, he must become greater.

I must become less. And if we can just keep that

mantra in our head of prioritize, he must become

greater. I must become less.

That's going to keep those distractions at Bay.

I know it will for me because my distractions are all about

selfish reasons. Just personally, He must become

greater. I must become less.

Prioritize that relationship with Christ.

The next one is spiritual disciplines.

So spiritual disciplines, They're tools, right?

They're tools to keep stepping forward on that way and becoming

that person that God intended us to be.

I'm not very handy. I'm not very handy at all.

My dad, my fatherinlaw, my neighbor.

They can all tell you how unhandy I am because pretty much

anytime something goes wrong, I'm calling one of them with the

house, like, hey, can I borrow this?

But a few years ago, a few years ago, I inherited a big set of

tools for my grandfather. My grandfather passed away.

He left these tools. They were in my dad's garage.

My dad's an electrician. He's got more tools than he

knows what to do with. And he asked me one day he's

like, hey, do you do you want these tools?

It's like 4 big old tool boxes. I was like, yeah, sure, I'll

take them. And I've found since I have

these tools at the house, I'm a little bit more handy, at least

because I have the right tools. And the same thing in our

Christian walk, when we're trying to take steps forward to

the person that God intended us to be, having the right tools is

a big thing. And so I'm going to share just

two tools that help me sometimes.

Again, I'm no one, no one's got it all figured out, but these

help me to stay focused and prioritize.

The first one is, and I always give this a shout out whether

I'm teaching in youth or here, but it's it's an app.

I know technology, but get an app.

It's called it's called Through the Word, OK, Through the word.

It's it's a Bible app, but it's a pastor in your ear and then a

message. So it's a chapter of the Bible a

day. A pastor gives you the

background of it, breaks it down for about 8 or 9 minutes.

Love it, it's awesome. It makes it again.

I love kind of the behind the scenes of the Bible and what's

going on and give you some ideas to think about.

It's a great way if you're like me and you struggle with Bible

reading because again you open some of this and it's like makes

you go cross eyed through the word is awesome because it

really helps kind of break things down and and walk you

through some of the scripture. So there's one and then the

second one if you're if you're old school physical type of

Bible person, life application Bible.

He's actually a pastor but a guy I coached with gave me this

sheesh 20 years ago probably and it is great tool as well to to

make you more handy in your walk with Christ.

The life application Bible, it's a regular Bible, has scripture

but then underneath it has again kind of teaching points almost

or breakdown of maybe historically what was happening

at that time or it gives you again the behind the scenes or

little points to think about. It really is a great companion

and a great tool to put in the toolbox.

So spiritual disciplines next one bring Jesus.

I said earlier I teach in youth sometimes I love teaching in

youth. I love teaching in here too.

Don't get offended, but in youth we it's a conversation a lot of

times, right? It's not just me talking for 30

minutes. Usually I'll have them do

something. I'm sure they love an

assignment, right when when they're not in school.

So I'll have them like do something and we'll share out

and we'll talk a little bit about it because I love to hear

their voice. They have a lot of awesome

things to say. And so I was kind of

workshopping this over with, with youth a few months ago.

And we were talking about counterfeit gods and we were

brainstorming some ideas. Okay.

Well, how can we combat the counterfeit gods in our life?

And this one gentleman raised his hand.

He was like, well, just bring Jesus.

And I was like, what do you mean by that?

He said. Like, I love to hike.

And so when I go out on a hike, I just, I stopped for 30

seconds. And before I go out on the hike,

I just thank Jesus for the beautiful scenery and the

awesome nature that he created and that I'm able to go out on

this hike. So I just bring Jesus into the

things that I love to do. Like, man, you got to figure it

out. That's pretty awesome.

And it sounds simple, but how? How many times do we go and do

the things that we love and we're not bringing Jesus along

for the ride. So bring Jesus.

You love to play Shooty Skies on your phone.

Spend 30 seconds saying Lord, thank you so much for inspiring

some app developer to make this game that I love.

You're an awesome God. Help me get to level 20 today or

whatever it is, right? But for real, we can bring Jesus

into all these moments with us. So bring Jesus.

I like that one. Thank you, youth.

Two more. Take five, take 5.

This is a great strategy that I think can kind of ground us and

keeping our focus on Jesus and keeping those distractions at

Bay. So when we find ourselves

distracted, maybe we started that scroll in or we've, you

know, the the the birds are pecking at us and on all that

things, the busyness, right? Deep breath.

Just ask yourself these five questions Will this matter in 5

minutes? Will this matter in five days?

Will this matter in five months? Will it matter in five years?

And does this matter to the five most important people in my

life? Take five.

If the answer is no, well then maybe we shouldn't stress over

it, right? Maybe we shouldn't let that

cortisol build up and we should put the phone down for a little

bit and go interact with people and see the world that God has

intended us to see. So take five.

And the last one. I love this one, right?

It's feels like a little bit of a cop out.

But perseverance, It just takes perseverance.

There's no magic bullet, right? It's a baby steps every day to

keep those distractions at Bay. Not one person in this room has

it all figured out right? We're all in this together.

But keeping that perseverance, getting those spiritual

disciplines in place take 5 All prioritize.

All of them will help us to become more and more the person

that God intended us to be. I love hoops.

I love basketball. I'm an old basketball coach, and

Tim Duncan's my favorite, favorite player.

He just, he just did it right. Like went out fundamental boom,

just did his job. And he says it like this.

Good, better. Best.

Never let it rest until you're good is better and you're better

is best. Isn't that kind of the Christian

walk in a nutshell? Especially when we're talking

about counterfeit gods and this idea of distraction.

And some days it feels like I'm never going to, I'm never going

to make it. Keep taking steps forward.

Don't lose heart. Have that perseverance.

Good, better. Best Don't let it rest.

Don't get discouraged, keep taking steps forward.

Because as we walk through this, we're going to be shaped and

molded into something, right? And the more we keep our eyes

focused on Jesus and not to the left or to the right, the more

that he can mold us into that person that he intended us to

be. So this week, as you're

scrolling through or the noises of life is too much, or you feel

that the busyness is just crushing you down, go back to

the basics. Go back to what Jesus said in

Matthew. Are you tired?

Worn out? Burned out on religion?

Come to me, get away with me and you'll recover your life.

I'll show you how to take a real rest.

Walk with me and work with me. Watch how I do it.

Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.

I won't lay anything heavy or real fitting on you.

Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and

lightly. Let's pray Lord, thank you so

much for wow. Just an opportunity to to be

together in in this space and just to learn more about you and

and to love on you and to let you love on us.

Lord, Lord, when when the distractions of life try to

creep in and sneak in and and steal who you intend us to be.

Lord just help us to to combat those and keep our eyes focused

on you. Lord, gosh we love you.

We just thank you for your message.

Thank you for your word. Help us to to be there for each

other in these tough times when the counterfeit God seemed to

just be coming from all angles. Help us to focus on you.

We love you, Lord, We thank you for our blessings.

Amen. Thank you for joining us today.

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