Bad Advice: You're Missing Out | Part 3

Welcome to the Awakening Church Podcast.

We pray this message encourages you and provides the hope and light of Jesus Christ.

Thanks for tuning in.

My name's Chris.

I'm one of the pastors here on staff, and um just honored and excited to bring the word here.

We're in a series called Bad Advice.

We took a pause on this series last week.

How many of you were at church and were blessed by the mom premieres last week?

Yeah.

Yes, yes.

From our partners in Haiti last week gave us an update, a very well-worthy pause on this series.

But we're jumping back in.

This has been kind of our our thought with this series is like there's so much opinions about relationships out there, just whether it's dating, marriage opinions, um, friendships, how to how to be a good friend.

There's so we're inundated with opinions about relationships, but so often we're starved of relational wisdom, of like what it actually means to carry out healthy relationships with one another.

And we're not just talking about um significant others or marriages or stuff like that, although we are.

We're also just talking about being friends with one another.

And just our our our thought here is let's inspect some of the advice we've been hearing uh that might be good, uh, might be bad, might sound good at first, but upon further inspection, it's probably just bad advice.

So we've actually been taking some phrases that are pretty popular and just going, what does the Bible kind of have to say about this and inspecting this bad advice?

So we've done stuff like first week, live your truth.

Okay, it maybe sounds kind of appealing in this culture and day and age, but what does the Bible have to say about that?

Ryan gave this great message on the truth.

And uh, is truth like plural like that?

No.

Um, so is live your truth really a good thing that we should be giving as advice?

Probably not.

The other week we talked about you deserve happiness, our relationships primarily in our life to bring about happiness.

Um, a good nuanced answer in there uh from Ryan in week two.

Today we're gonna talk about this idea of missing out.

That at some level we think whether we're in a relationship or not in a relationship or in some kind of relational circumstance, there's this FOMO idea, the fear that we're missing out on something else.

And I want to inspect that.

You know, when I got thinking about bad advice, how much I've heard through my life, I think there's four seasons that you are prone, especially prone, to really, really bad advice, and just a lot of advice.

One of these four seasons graduating from college, starting to date somebody, marriage or engagement, or having kids.

If you've been through one of these four stages, you have received like a torrent of advice.

Some of it good, some of it bad, but it's always unsolicited.

Like you've never asked for it, but there it is.

Somebody launching into their opinion about your life and the changes that you have.

And you'll hear phrases through any of those times.

I know I've been through all those phases.

Graduated from college, dating, engaged, marriage, I now have a son.

I've been through those four stages, I've seen all the advice kind of come in.

It varies depending on which stage you're at, right?

But it's like people come up to you, you don't know them.

They might be a complete stranger, and they're just like, hear that you're, you know, the first thing they learn about you is like they graduated from college.

You're oh, I just graduated from college.

Somebody says, prepare for your life to change.

Welcome to adulthood.

Did any has anybody heard that?

You know, welcome to adulthood, right?

Or, you know, in other seasons, like you'll never sleep again.

I'm just gonna, you can guess which season people are talking about there.

Like, you know, say goodbye to sleep.

Like they they just say this to you and you've never really talked to them before, right?

Um, or just like, you know, vague things like say goodbye to your life or something like that.

I mean, they're what you really learn is how many people are unhappy with their life, you know.

That's really what I learned through hearing all that was like, are you really saying that to me, or are you saying that to yourself through saying it to me?

You know?

Um, you just start to realize that, you know, okay, like when I was first getting married, before, when I was engaged, right before I got married, so many people told me, oh man, the first year of marriage sucks.

Like it's really hard.

And I was like, thanks, you know, like is that is that advice?

Okay, when now that I've become a dad, it's like when you when you're like if you're a couple and you're pregnant or something, like people just launch into monologues about raising children for you, and they really want you to know what they think about it.

Um, you know, I remember people telling me, like, Ali was pregnant with Jude, and like I was like, oh yeah, like went to a concert on Friday night.

And they're like, enjoy it while you can, you know, enjoy that.

Enjoy that, because that's going by soon.

That's never gonna it's like, okay, geez, like I know my life's kind of gonna change, but like what's interesting, I don't know if you've gone through this with college or graduating or dating or whatever.

All this advice, it's like at some level, it's only half true, like partially true.

And it's not even that deep of advice of whatever sort.

It's like, okay, I know, yes, my life totally changed when I graduated from college and I had to get a job and I was paying rent.

Yes, I entered into adulting, as they say, right?

But like my life wasn't over.

In some ways, my life began, you know?

Uh, same with having a kid.

Yes, dude, my whole life is different having Jude, okay?

But it's so much richer.

Like, we just think when we enter into a new phase of responsibility, it will automatically mean something bad.

Because responsibility means limited freedoms, and limited freedoms is really bad.

And we just assume that in the limitations that we receive from the new phase of responsibility, that it's just going to be bad.

But I've actually found in each level of change, as I've gotten more responsibility, I think at some level I've become a little bit more helpful to this world and a little bit more humble and gained a little bit more perspective.

And yes, I have far less freedom than I had when I was 19 living in Northwest Portland.

But I think I'm a better person.

Man, I look back at that old Chris and I'm like, peace.

You know, I'm like, glad I'm not you.

Uh I don't miss out on those things.

However, that's the general consensus.

And this FOMO, this like fear of missing out, it bleeds into like every area of our life then.

It's like, now we're at our job and we have a really bad Wednesday, and Wednesdays always is really hard, right?

And you're like, okay, it's middle of the week.

I had a really bad day at work.

Should I be at another job?

Or that recruiter reaches out to you every two months, like, hey, are you interested in this opportunity?

And you're like, maybe I should be interested in that opportunity, you know, that person reaching out to you about that job.

Or like you visit a friend in like, you know, another uh city, and they have this friend group, and you're like, my friends aren't this funny and this cool.

Like, what am I doing with my friends back home?

You know, it starts to seep into every area of your life, or maybe you're married and you start to receive like a little bit more attention at work from this person, and you're like, this person gets me.

Like, am I missing out on something?

This person I'm married to doesn't even understand me.

It's like this missing out thing is like deep in every area of our life.

And what it's boiled down to, this lie, like you're missing out, this bad advice.

It boils down to contentment.

Like, are we content with where we are and who we are?

And um, like we live, don't don't we live in a culture that's actually kind of designed to make us discontent and fuels itself off discontentment?

I mean, that's kind of capitalism, right?

It's like if you don't, if you don't make more money or spend more money in this way, uh, you're not gonna receive this kind of life, and you're not gonna receive this these kind of privileges.

And so it constantly gets us looking forward.

Like just scroll through your phone, there's always these like impressions that all of us are not where we should be.

And um, I don't know, then the goalposts are always moving, aren't they?

Like everything's always changing about what we should aspire to.

Like, I just scrolled through my phone and I'm like, wait, I'm confused.

How why am I supposed to be discontented today?

Like, just open my phone, like, oh, what am I supposed to be unhappy with in my life today?

What is it that's moved, that's different?

Like, a while ago, I thought everybody was like moving into vans and like having van life.

Like, should I go do that?

But then instantly after that, it was like everybody's chipping Joanne and Gaines in their house.

So, should I stay home and redo my house or buy a van and move out into a van?

Like, I I don't know.

This is what white people are doing on the internet.

And I'm like, sh do I follow?

I don't know.

Like, that's what discontentedness looks like in every kind of area.

And then it just bleeds into our relationships because then we start to expect from other people.

Like, we're like, that they should be doing something to lead us to that contentment.

So our spouse is no longer the person we're given to like love, but the person, the means by which we achieve a life we don't have yet.

And we want to fight with that person because they're not the kind of person we want them to be.

They're not acting in the way we want them to be.

They're not acting like that couple on TV, or they're not acting like that Instagram couple, or whatever, right?

And so we use people or like our even our small group, right?

They're not our the kind of spiritual community we want.

Like we want a better spiritual community, or we want a better thing, right?

We want a better circumstance and a better situation.

Here's the question I'd love to have us answer today.

Is like, how do we find relational contentment?

How are we content in our relationships, the people that we know in such a discontent world?

How do we find relational contentment in such a discontent world?

I'm gonna look at a few passages.

I wanna start with one you've probably heard before.

Philippians 4 13.

You ever heard this verse?

I can do all things through him or through Christ who strengthens me.

How many of you guys have heard this verse before?

Okay.

Have you heard it when somebody dunks a basketball or like scores a touchdown?

Because that's usually when it's quoted, okay?

I love our kids' pastor, Ashley has this mug that I love.

It says, I can do all things through a verse taken out of context.

Uh that's why she's a pastor, man.

It's perfect.

Uh it's great.

Yeah.

That verse is often lifted out of context to mean uh I can have various abilities and skills that I do not currently have because Jesus is my homeboy.

That's like usually what that verse, like, because I'm a Christian, I can dunk or whatever.

I don't know, like score a touchdown.

Now, that's not at all the context of this verse.

Look at the context.

Philippians 4, starting in verse 10.

And before I even read this Bible verse, remember this is written by a real human being in the ancient world to other real human beings in the ancient world.

This real human being was named Paul of Tarsus.

He was an early missionary, he was imprisoned for sharing the gospel, for preaching the good news of the kingdom of God.

He was put in prison, and he's writing a letter to a Christian community far away while he is chained to a wall in a basement.

He's thinning, he's hungry, he's not in a good place, he's not in a place of privilege, he's in a place of destitution.

And he says this: I rejoiced in the Lord.

This is kind of just showing you the context of this verse.

I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me.

Uh you were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity.

Now, this is referring to Philippians as a thank you note.

It's a long thank you note.

Paul had received a gift, probably food, clothing, um, various supplies.

When you're a prisoner in the ancient world, you didn't get like food rations or anything.

You just like whoever gave you food was the food you got, right?

So um they probably sent him some supplies, and he said, you know, you just had the opportunity to give it, so thank you for bringing this gift.

Verse 11, he says, Not that I am speaking of being in need, though.

Now look at this.

For I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.

Whatever situation, I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound.

In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.

I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

Now look, that is not a verse about receiving new abilities that help us become a better person.

This is a verse about contentment.

Paul says, I can do everything, abundance and need, and everything in between, because of Christ.

And he says, look, he says, I have learned in whatever situation to be content later in verse 12, I've learned the secret.

I've learned the secret that wherever I go and whatever I experience, I can be content.

What is the secret?

Verse 13.

Christ, him.

I can do, the reason I can do all things, abundance and need, and everything in between, is because of Jesus Christ.

This is to say this.

Jesus Christ makes relational contentment possible.

Now I know that sounds like something a pastor would say.

I am a pastor, I am saying it.

I also really believe it's deeply true.

It's deeply, deeply true.

And I want you to notice, look at that sentence for a little bit.

Jesus Christ is what makes relational contentment possible.

A person, a living divine reality, Jesus Christ, God risen and embodied as a as the Holy Spirit through God the Father, like Jesus knowing God, knowing the person and work of Jesus is what brings relational contentment.

Not a set of advice axioms or healthy habits.

Those are great things.

But those are things that are not necessarily going to bring contentment.

As much advice as you might receive, as much healthy habits as you might adopt, Paul's argument is not that.

Those are fine things.

You can follow advice columns and follow advice stuff online, do that, whatever.

But that's not what Paul is saying.

Paul's argument is not that there is some kind of life you can adopt to become a content person.

He's saying there's a person you can know to become a content person.

There's actually a God revealed in Jesus that will bring you contentment.

Paul knew what he was saying.

I told you this was not a statement out of privilege, it was a statement written in prison.

When Paul writes in verse 11 of Philippians 4, whatever the circumstances he says, or whatever the situation, depending on your translation, that's what verse 11 says, what was Paul's situations and circumstances?

In another letter in 2 Corinthians chapter 11, verses 16 through 33, he's writing to another church in the ancient world, and he just goes on a laundry list of all the things he's endured over the last handful of years.

2 Corinthians 11:16–33

They include, but are not limited to imprisonment, poverty, beatings.

Paul was beaten, and sometimes we just glance over that like, oh yeah, he was beat up a little bit.

Like this dude was, rocks were thrown at him, he was clubbed, he was beaten, he was struck on the head, he was struck on the body, he was betrayed by close friends, he had near-death experiences like shipwrecks, physical assault.

He was robbed.

We also believe he had chronic pain.

2 Corinthians 12, he talks about this thorn in his flesh that had bothered him for a long time.

We kind of think he had some form of chronic pain over the years.

And anxiety is too numerable to mention.

He says at one point, and on top of this, I'm anxious for all the churches.

Well, he was a leader, so he had tons of people underneath him that he was constantly worried about, constantly filled with anxiety.

This is all to say.

When Paul says, I can do all things through Christ, we should probably listen to him.

Because for as much trouble as you and I have been in, and for as much as we are discontent with our circumstances, I would argue that Paul has faced more discontentment than many of us.

So for him to say this provides a weight to his claim that we should at least inspect a little bit more.

The Philippians passage is a general contentment passage, abundance and need, poverty and wealth, right?

Like it's kind of about everything in life.

And he says, I can do all things, I can be content with everything.

But in the relational context, he actually writes in another place to another church, 1 Corinthians 5 through 7.

He starts talking about um like marriage and singleness and relationships, and he argues with his church.

He's like, don't be quick to like switch up relationships.

In the Corinthian church, a lot of people were becoming Christians and they would make rash decisions.

They would quit employment agreements because they're like, now I'm a Christian, so I'm gonna quit this employment agreement.

Or they would um uh leave a spouse because they converted, but their spouse didn't convert, and so they would leave.

Or uh they would want to get married because they suddenly became a Christian.

And Paul says to them, in the context of this, you go read 1 Corinthians 5 through 7, three chapters, he says this, 1 Corinthians 7.17.

Each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them.

Now you'll notice a similarity of uh syntax in that that's connected to Philippians.

Whatever situation Paul says, you know, earlier in the passage in Philippians, he says, I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.

First Corinthians 7, he says, in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to you, God's called you there.

Be there, be content, find contentment there.

Find contentment in that space.

One of the scholars I read said this: Do not be in a hurry.

He's he'd summarized Paul's teaching this way.

Do not be in a hurry to change the external circumstances of your life simply because you're a Christian.

As Christians, we should be wary of changing our circumstances immediately, believing that by changing our circumstances, we would become the kind of person we long to be.

We should be wary of getting out from the limitations of our circumstances.

See, we believe if we're most free, God would be most free to work in us.

And Paul is questioning that, saying, No, I think by finding your contentment in your current circumstance is one way God will shape you, particularly with relationships.

Now, we're gonna get to it in a second.

Scripture gives many gracious conditions.

Some of some people need to leave relationships, and we'll talk about that in one second.

But for now, I want you to think the Bible is kind of teaching us that the way the reason people are in our lives are as instruments or tools that God can use to form his likeness in us.

I'm gonna say that again.

The people in our life, like our relationships, are primarily given to us and assigned to us to shape us into the image of Jesus.

We talked about it weeks before weeks before in the you deserve happiness thing.

It's not primarily to make us happy.

People are not in our life primarily to make us happy.

People in our life are not primarily there to help us achieve future goals.

People are in our life so that God might use them to shape us into the image of Jesus Christ.

So I know many of you are in difficult circumstances right now.

I want you to consider maybe I'm here and God is too.

God is doing something and shaping something in me, even though my boss drives me crazy, even though I can't stand this person, or even though this family member is creating difficulty in my life.

And we think if I'd be free of that difficulty, God could work in my life.

I think scripture teaches, no, that is God working in your life.

He's doing something there.

Like I know some of you might think, if you were in a different small group, life would be better.

Okay?

I know I'm the one of the pastors, you think, how does he know that?

It's plain, okay?

You think if I just was in a different small group, life would be better.

If I had a different leader, whatever, okay?

But consider, okay?

Consider that actually God is using that small group to make you into more of his likeness, okay?

Some of you are not married yet and you think you gotta be married.

And you you're like, you think that God is waiting to really work in your life once you get married.

But could it be that God is working through your singleness and in your singleness to make him into your likeness?

Well, on the reverse side, some of y'all are married, and you think if I just wasn't married, God would work in my life.

And God says, No, I'm gonna work in your marriage, in your spouse, in your relationship with your spouse, to create my likeness into you.

I'm gonna push my likeness so you become more humble, more helpful, more generous, more kind through this circumstance.

I know a sensitive thing I've I've been walking with many couples through this, through my time here at Awakening, is like people longing to have kids.

It's it's it's deep pain.

It's deep pain to want children and to be unable to have them.

But I've watched couples, you guys like a man say these are the circumstances God has given us.

And God shapes them and changes them into his likeness through that difficult circumstance, not by getting out of that circumstance, although we're praying that God would get them out of that circumstance because we would definitely want what they want.

But at the end of the day, God is doing something there.

On the reverse side, some of us have kids, and we're like, if I didn't have kids, man, my life would be better if these kids weren't ruining my life.

But could it be that God is using those children to work his likeness into you?

Do you see how no matter what situation you're in, you're bound to find discontentment, which means maybe in every circumstance of life you're bound to find contentment somewhere.

If discontentment is that common, shouldn't contentment be just as common?

But it's not.

It's not because, see, we need to have the knowledge and the awareness of Christ.

See, because you're missing out, quote unquote, like that bad advice.

It actually works both ways, does it not?

You're in that situation, whatever situation you're in, you're thinking, I'm missing out because I'm not there, okay?

Thinking I'm missing out.

But if you get there, might you be missing out on what God's doing with you here?

That's why Paul's like, don't be so quick to find a new circumstance, because God could be using the circumstance.

God could be working something in your life right now, doing something.

Be careful.

Have pause.

Be discerning about leaping to the next thing because you might actually be missing out on what God is doing right here.

If you go there because you're missing out, you might then miss out on the work of God.

You see, missing out works both ways.

It works both ways.

Scripture does give gracious conditions that I want to mention.

There's some of you that do need to get out of certain situations.

Scripture gives many.

I'll give you a few that are important for us to mention in this sermon.

The first is Christianity gives a gracious condition for divorce.

The Bible holds high, high esteem for marriage, but also recognizes the reality that some marriages must end.

Some marriages end.

Some marriages must end, some marriages end not by our choice.

Divorce is a gracious condition that scripture gives.

I put some passages that you can go read if you want more on that.

Healthy boundaries.

Some relationships need limits.

Some relationships need boundaries and healthy limits.

Great book by Henry Cloud.

It's just called Boundaries.

It's like the seminal book on this subject.

Helps you understand what relational boundaries you might need to have.

I would recommend that book to you and these passages of scripture.

Scripture does not say to open your life to all people at all times.

Some people are not good and need to have limits in your life.

Thirdly, Scripture gives us a gracious condition for staying far from dangerous people.

There are people that are not good.

They're evil, they're toxic, they're damaging to your life, they're abusive, and you need to be far away from them.

And scripture says it that plainly.

In fact, in one of the passages I quote, Paul lists some attributes of people, and he says, right straightly, avoid such people.

Just stay away.

There's people that if you're in that circumstance, you should be out.

Okay?

Again, these are gracious conditions in Scripture.

Other ones, disagreements.

We studied this in the book of Acts, these last two.

Disagreements that require division.

Sometimes people just cannot agree and they need to divide and leave and just be like, we can't agree on this, so we shouldn't work together, or we shouldn't.

Um yeah, whatever.

Uh the last one is seasonal changes in life.

In the book of Acts, it talks about like it seemed right to us and to the Holy Spirit that Paul and Barnabas should be sent away.

And that's one of the passages I gave you, or whatever.

Okay, there's this acknowledgement that like certain things just pass and things happen in life.

So, but aside from these gracious conditions, and actually, when you inspect these gracious conditions, you will see that for the most part, scripture is calling us to stay, to find contentment here and to not live there.

Wisely considering these gracious conditions and considering our circumstances will lead us to a path of contentment.

The lie of you're missing out has been phrased this way culturally, like the grass is greener.

You've heard that, right?

The grass is greener.

There's this great meme on online that's like, yeah, maybe the grass is greener because there's a lot of manure on the other side.

Umthough the internet doesn't use the word manure, but um, some of you will get that on the drive home.

Okay.

Um the grass is greener, things are better over there.

And what we dial into is something I call mental displacement.

Okay, I define mental displacement as living mentally in a place you are not circumstantially.

Living mentally in a place you are not in circumstantially.

Like social media showing you this life that you don't have, and you thinking, I need to be in that kind of life.

Or like some of us are ambitious and our ambitions about what we want to do in the next three to five years, like we're constantly living in the next three to five years that we ignore right here, right now.

We're so future oriented that we don't become much present good.

And we're constantly like damaging our current relationships because we're so focused on getting to the next thing.

Or we're living in the past.

We're like so focused on past stuff.

Like, I don't know if you guys have time hop or like Facebook memories.

There's times I look back and I'm like, man, that was a cool part of my life.

Then I think a little bit more and I'm like, I was super poor, you know, or like I was, I don't know, I just like, but it can make it seem like my life used to be way better, you know?

It's like, wow, look at me, I was at a concert.

I don't do that anymore, you know?

And like you can think that, like, oh, that was a better time, right?

In the past or something, or like movies and TV shows show us a culture or a city or a space, that like we think if we were there, we would be good.

But we're we we're practicing mental displacement.

We're constantly then inundated with these images that are not present, and technology has kind of suspended our limits of time and space that we think that we can just live there all the time.

But then we're not here, we're not there, we're not now.

And dreaming about another community or dreaming about another world or another spouse or another situation, it actually leaves you losing on both accounts when you think about it, right?

Because when you're in dreamland thinking about what if, and man, I'm I just feel like life would be better if, that means you're not actually in the present circumstance, right?

Like you're not actually there, but you're also not in the dream.

So you're actually nowhere, and you're not present to anything that's happening.

And you're constantly thinking while you're out with your friends, like, I wish these people were better, or you're with your spouse going, I wish my spouse was better.

Or like you're, you know, you're just constantly dreaming and thinking about something that is ahead that actually isn't really here.

And so you're nowhere.

You exist nowhere mentally.

And I've learned that mental displacement leads to spiritual discouragement.

And that mental displacement also leaves us to be spiritually absent to the circumstances around us.

We are no longer curious about what God could be doing in our midst.

Could God be working?

Could God be active in this time because we're mentally living somewhere else?

The lie is that the grass is greener.

The truth, this is the yard that God's given you.

Now I know some of you are like, hey, I kind of made my yard in bad ways.

And that's true too.

Some of you have made really bad decisions.

You've made unwise decisions.

And you're like, I don't know, Chris, I don't think God gave me this yard.

I think I've made this bed and I'm sleeping in it.

That's true, okay.

That is true.

A lot of us make unwise decisions that lead us down a bad path.

It's not like God is this master puppeteer constantly just controlling the robots of the universe.

We have a level of agency.

Um, but just because you made that space and got yourself into that yard does not mean that God isn't present with you in it.

And not, a little bit deeper theologically here, and not that he couldn't, that he couldn't be able to take that circumstance and rework it into something good.

That's what the whole book of Genesis is about, first book of your Bible.

Literally ends with Joseph saying, You, he says this to his family, you intended, they made evil actions to him.

He says, You intended this for evil, but God intended it for good and for the flourishing of many lives.

Genesis 50, 20, one of my favorite Bible verses ever.

Because that is just the nature of God, that God takes the yard we've been placed in.

Either he gave it to us or our bad choices got there, however, the mix works out, and he takes it, and in his hands, in his loving care, in his presence in the yard, he's able to create something you could never create.

Which is why Paul says, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

God shapes us, friends, inside our limitations.

He shapes us inside our limitations, not outside of them.

We think God would work if I was just outside of this limitation.

If I was married or if I was not married, wherever you're at.

If I had kids, if I didn't have kids, if I had this job or if I didn't have this job, we think outside of the limitations of our circumstance, that's when God would start working.

Friends, God works within the limitations of your circumstances.

And if we're constantly dreaming, we're gonna constantly think that God's failing us, even though it's really our dream, not really God's.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, he wrote, in my opinion, the best book on community.

A pastor in the 1940s who was vehemently against Hitler's regime, he was imprisoned and eventually killed.

He wrote this book, Life Together.

Near the beginning of Life Together, Bonhoeffer writes this.

He or she, who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself, becomes a destroyer of the Christian community itself.

Even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial, God hates this kind of visionary dreaming.

It makes the dreamer proud and pretentious.

He acts as if he's the creator of the Christian community, as if he his dreams binds men together.

When things do not go his way, he calls the effort a failure.

He calls the effort a failure.

We often think God has failed us because he has not delivered us from the limitations, ignoring the fact that what if God gave you those limitations?

What if God provided those limitations to invite you to become a more humble and helpful person in this world, to become a more generous person, to become, ah, a little bit more like Jesus Christ Himself?

So long as you're living in mental displacement, living in your dream, you're kind of missing out on God's What does God have for you here?

It's time to get curious, Christian.

It's time to get curious.

Why does God have me here?

What is God doing here?

Why is God leaving me in this job or in this relationship or has me in this space?

In a sermon that Paul gives to a bunch of philosophers in the book of Acts, a place called the Areopagus, he gives this beautiful sermon.

This is what he says in one of his sermons.

Acts 17, 24.

The God who made the world and everything in it from the one man, every nation of mankind to live on the face of the earth.

Look at this.

Having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God in hope that they might feel their way towards him and find him.

Because he's actually not far from each one of us.

That's a beautiful line in a sermon.

That God determined allotted periods and boundaries of our dwelling place.

Why?

So that we might feel our way towards him.

We might find him.

See, God shapes us through people, places, and time.

In other words, he shapes us through limitations.

Like God creates you to be the kind of person he wants you to be through the limitations of people.

Talks about every nation of mankind.

God gave nations, he made nations, he made ethnicities, he made these things.

These are types of limitations.

And still God created them to work through them.

God shapes us through a place.

It says that Paul says he gives us the boundaries of our dwelling place.

I've always loved that.

Like, he knows that you're in San Jose.

He knows that you're in Palo Alto.

He knows that He knows where you live and why you live there.

You don't.

But in relationship with Him, you might find out why.

And through time, the allotted periods.

All of us will die.

We all have an expiration date.

Not all of us will live in the same place for the same amount of time.

Not all of us will have the same number of years married or the same number of years single.

Like the allotted periods of your life and seasons that change, God uses that to shape you into becoming a kind of person.

Let me ask you this question.

Is providence a consideration in your pursuit for contentment?

Providence is a theological term that talks about God's interactivity with history and events.

That God is sovereign and providential.

That actually, for as much as human beings like make the road crooked, God straightens things out.

His providential hand is over history, and he takes evil and he redeems it, and he births good and perfects it.

And I am shocked, you guys, how many Christians do not consider that they were placed where they are.

That they don't think about God's activity and action, his providence, his work.

Or even that God is with them in the circumstance, which is a act of providence.

So again, you might have messed up your life or gotten into a bad situation, or you might have no idea why this relationship is going wrong.

But the question is, could you consider providence that God actually is working something in there?

So yeah, maybe he didn't place you there, but perhaps he's taking you from that spot because of your foolish decision making, he can still pick that up where you've left it off and rework it for his good.

And I'm shocked how many Christians don't have that imagination.

They don't have that way of thinking that's like curious about like where is God right now here?

What is he doing?

What's he trying to teach me here?

And the ones that do live incredibly satisfying and wait for it, content lives.

They leave, they lead really content lives.

They look like this.

Here's what a person content in Christ looks like.

They commit to whatever and whoever God has placed in front of them.

That's like Paul from Philippians 4.13, we started this whole sermon with.

Paul said, I can do all things.

I can do it.

Abundance and need and everything in between, I can do it.

Um, and I'm gonna commit to the abundance or I'll commit to the need.

But I've witnessed content people, they commit to whatever and whoever God has placed right in front of them.

There's also a concession that I see content people make.

There's a level of conceding to the circumstances God has placed them in.

The all things, the whatever the circumstances.

Content people go, okay, Lord, this has been brought into my life.

I'm curious how you're going to make this into my good.

And they find contentment.

It doesn't mean they don't cry.

It doesn't mean there's not pain.

It doesn't mean that there's not arguments.

It's just this posture of concession towards the providential hand of God that goes, God, you got me here.

You're going to get me through this.

And they're finally the whole time cultivating an interior life with the living God.

That's why Paul says, through Christ, through him who gives me strength.

You see, without Jesus, we're just going to be guessing about what makes contentment and what doesn't.

With Jesus Christ, contentment is possible.

It's actually possible.

Because, you know, that's the difference between the gospel and just every other kind of like world thinking, philosophy, mindfulness, and stuff, is that there's a person with us in this.

There's a God with you in the yard.

And God proved that by coming in Christ to the yard.

By coming to this earth, limiting himself into human flesh, and not just limiting himself into human flesh of having a good long life.

He died young.

He was betrayed.

He was struck.

He was limited even to the cross, nailed.

If cr God himself brought himself to those limitations, why?

To prove to you, I don't know what all things are going on in your life.

I don't know whatever the situation and circumstance God has you in your life, but I know this.

God came and met death.

And if he met death and was victorious and raised in resurrection life from death, he is with you in what you face.

He's gone to the extremes.

He's gone to the most needy place.

So if you are most needy right now, Christ is most present with you right now.

I want you to think, if I could summarize this, to just think about the word presence more.

Okay?

I want you to move, I want us as a church to move away from mental displacement to Christian presence.

And I'm using this term Christian presence to separate it from the mindfulness, meditative stuff that's out there.

It's somewhat valuable, maybe.

I don't know.

As a pastor, I have this to give you a value.

Christian presence knows this.

God has placed people in my life.

And God is in my life.

Christian presence knows for sure that that person we might have married and we were younger and we didn't know much about what we were doing.

But that person bears the image of God.

Image of God, very distinct Christian doctrine, that this person has the mark of the creator on them.

And they are there to help me become more aware of God Almighty.

And I'm also not alone with this person.

God is with me.

The Holy Spirit dwells in me.

God is active in the world.

He's in the midst of it.

And so might we move from mental displacement to Christian presence?

The keen awareness of the attention and presence of Jesus and the presence of other people.

I mentioned at the top of this sermon that when I became a dad, I got all that advice and uh I found it to be mostly wrong.

But it's not to say I haven't struggled through that.

This idea that my life might be better if I wasn't limited to child caring.

Um, but you know, I've been learning like how God is shaping me through like becoming a dad, you know.

When you become a parent, like one thing nobody really tells you is that a lot of your life is gonna be boring.

Like, you're gonna do a lot of repetitive activities over a long period of time.

People don't mention the boring nature of it.

There's like some level to which, dude, you're helping a kid fall asleep for the ninth night in a row, or like Jude wants the same book read 25 times, you know.

I've got Goodnight Moon memorized more than scripture.

Like it's crazy, you know?

But like, I don't know.

Then when I'm like away from my family, like I went to LA a couple weeks ago, went to go visit my brother, I was totally free.

What the whole time I was thinking about my family, you know, I'm FaceTiming Jude, I'm like, why?

Oh, because through the limitations of fatherhood, God is like crafting me to become crazily enough a more loving person.

Like He's making me to be more like Him than like me through the limitations of fatherhood.

Same thing when I was like 18 to 22, like I look back on that, I was like, I was so ambitious, I was so thinking about my future all the time.

I wasn't very aware of the people God had in my life or the situations God had in my life.

I was just constantly trying to get out of them.

And I look back, I think, I think I'd be a better person today and a better person then if I had practiced Christian presence in the midst of those years.

Because I was just constantly living in the future.

Well, friends, communion is our best next step because communion brings us to Christian presence.

Because on the night Jesus died, uh was betrayed, the night before he died, he gathered his disciples together and he took bread and wine, like limited physical things.

And he looked at them in the eyes, and he would look at you today and say, Take this, take and eat.

This is my body.

He took the bread broken for you.

And he took the wine and said, This is my blood shed for you.

And in communion, there's a beautiful uh groundedness to it that brings us to where we are in this moment.

You're at awakening church at the second service, having communion.

Here's bread and wine, God says.

And God gives you bread and wine to remind you, his body was broken for you, his blood was shed for you.

And because of that, when you feel broken and when you feel poured out, you know you're in Christ's company.

That's where he is.

And so the best thing we can do is take this bread and take this wine and receive the words of Jesus who says, This is my body, this is my blood, do this in remembrance of me.

Let me pray for you.

Almighty God, we ask you, through the power of your Holy Spirit, to reveal your presence to us.

Help us, God, become aware of your work in our life.

God, I I prayed this last service, and I'm I I do feel this again, Lord, that um there are people in this room, like I don't know their circumstances.

I just don't know everybody's circumstances.

And I I'm I'm just guessing, and maybe it's your Holy Spirit impressing this upon me.

Um people are in really, really tough places, and they would do want to get out.

And I wish I could sit down with everybody and and I can't, but you can.

Through the power of your Holy Spirit, through this act of taking communion, would you meet your people today in the circumstances they're in, and prove to us, Almighty God, what we know to be true.

You're in our midst.

And so we receive communion now as an active Christian presence to be aware of you.

We pray this in Christ's name.

Amen.

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