Prioritize: Prior-Ties with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at MetaChurch.

And my hope is that today's podcast finds you at the perfect time in your life that God uses it to inspire and enlighten you.

I hope that you enjoy today's message.

So good to see everybody here.

It's good to be back with you guys.

I want to thank Noel and the team for just putting on a great two-week series called Family Tradition.

Did you guys make some noise for them?

That was such an inspiring series.

Yeah, if you if you missed that, be sure you go online, metachurch.tv, get caught up.

If you're new with us, my name is Clayton.

I'm the lead pastor here at MetaCurch, and we're starting a brand new five-week series where we're gonna talk about how to properly prioritize your life.

We start with a core assumption at MetaCurch that you were created on purpose and you were created with purpose.

You were created on purpose.

That means that it's no accident that you are on planet Earth.

God put you here with a job to do, and you were created with purpose.

That means that you were made to have an impact on the world around you, that you have a potential that is probably unimaginable, that God has placed some things inside of you.

And the closer we get to Him, the closer we get to the fruitful life that we were created to live.

A fruitful life is a life that brings more life, that lends life to people around us who are so desperate for us.

And we have to talk about priorities because the truth is you can have all the right passions and all the right strategy, all the right intentions.

And if you don't know how to properly prioritize your life, all of that can be sabotaged.

When your life is organized correctly, you maximize that purpose inside of you, you minimize your distractions.

We have plenty of distractions in life, and you multiply your impact during your time on earth.

We're gonna dig in for five weeks on what it looks like to prioritize correctly.

And we're gonna start with a message today called prior ties.

Prior ties.

Would you pray with me?

Father, we love you and we thank you for loving us.

We thank you for Jesus.

We thank you for the overwhelming opportunity to join with what you are doing on the earth.

At the deepest part of who we are, we have a longing, God.

A longing that maybe we have spent years trying to fill with all of the things that the world offers us.

And God, we believe that it is only you who can bring that peace, only you who can lead us to not just a successful life, but a significant life.

And we believe that priorities are critical in this endeavor.

And so I ask that you would speak to us today and throughout this series.

We pray it all in Jesus' name.

And if you're ready to get your life prioritized, say, Amen.

Amen.

We're gonna start in Luke chapter 10.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

It says, while they were traveling, Jesus entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home.

And she had a sister named Mary, who also sat at the Lord's feet and was listening to what he said.

But Martha was distracted by her many tasks.

And she came up and she asked, Lord, don't you care that my sister has left me to serve alone?

So tell her to give me a hand.

And I love Martha.

Because Martha's like, look, I know, son of God, all that stuff, but you're in my house right now.

And I need you to tell her that she is completely forgetting her place in this house.

And the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but one thing is necessary.

Mary has made the right choice, and it will not be taken away from her.

Here's what Jesus says in those last two verses.

He says, You are worried and you're upset about many things, but one thing is necessary.

One thing goes above and beyond the rest.

Many things, one thing.

This is a statement of prioritization.

Mary had properly prioritized her time.

Jesus Christ, God and human flesh, was in their house, and nothing was gonna separate her attention from him.

But it's worth noting that in any other scenario, if there was anybody else in the living room, anybody but Jesus, Martha would have been right.

There's no doubt about it.

Mary should have been helping.

Martha was cooking and cleaning and setting the table and vacuuming the floors and washing the windows.

She was getting it all put together.

And at that place and at that time in history, that was an expectation for the women of the house.

Mary completely left all of her responsibilities aside.

And if it was anybody else, Martha would have been right.

And that really leads to the first point about priorities.

Priorities are very, very difficult to get right.

And what we see in the difference between Mary and Martha is Martha just falls in to the expectations that were set for her, and Mary does something different.

And if we're going to learn to properly prioritize our life, we have to start by becoming intentional.

And maybe that sounds obvious, but it's so deep and it is so critical.

And the majority of people are not intentionally prioritizing their lives.

You might not actually think a lot about how you prioritize the people, places, and things in your life.

And the story Martha was not intentional about her time.

And one of the problems we run into with priorities is that people assume it is much simpler than it is.

It's like I just kind of go with my gut.

I know how to prioritize.

It's like whatever's most important, you do that first, and then whatever's kind of second, and then whatever's in the middle, and then all the rest of the things you kind of put at the bottom of the list, but it's just not that easy.

For example, think about how you prioritize your time.

How you really spend the precious and very limited time you have day by day.

And you see, we want things to be simple and we oversimplify them at our own peril, and so we say, well, of course we know.

Family first, right?

That sounds, that sounds right.

Maybe it is right.

Family first.

So family goes to the top of the list.

But what does that actually mean?

If family is the number one priority, then maybe we just are supposed to spend 100% of our time with family.

All of it, you know?

And spoiler alert, the first problem with that is if you spend 100% of your time with family, you will kill each other.

You're not gonna make it out of that alive.

But there's more problems, you know?

Like one of our jobs is we have to provide for our families.

And if we never leave our family's side, how are we going out and gathering resources for them so that we can thrive?

If our kids are always, always with us, when are they getting educated?

If we want adults who can thrive, they have to leave us from time to time and get educated.

And if you want a really good marriage, then you actually need some good friends because you know, a little bit of distance makes the heart grow fonder every once in a while.

And you need some hobbies in your life, and if you want to like live to see your grandchildren, you gotta exercise from time to time.

You have a career, you have all of these things to wrestle with.

And how do we know how to get it right?

And so we start working and we prioritize our work time because our work is what builds our wealth and helps our kids and pays for college.

But then we fall into the trap of working so much we never see the kids that we're trying to support.

Or seeing our kids so much and prioritizing on the wrong side that we don't make enough for our family.

It's very difficult.

Think about how you prioritize your resources.

How do you spend your money?

How much debt is too much debt?

How many credit cards are too many credit cards?

Where should you spend your money?

What should you spend your money on?

How important is it to buy now?

How important is it to save for the future?

These are very, very complex issues.

And they're made exponentially more complex by the fact that most people are not being intentional about their priorities.

Here's what's true: you don't get to decide whether or not you will prioritize things.

You have to.

You are prioritizing every moment of every day.

Right now, you are either fully engaged in this sermon, you are half and half daydreaming and listening, or you are like fully making plans for the evening right now.

Depending on what falls where in your prioritization of this moment depends on how you're receiving this message.

Every moment we decide what is most important to us.

It's not about whether or not we prioritize, it's whether or not we are intentional about it.

Are you prioritizing on purpose?

Most people are simply allowing life to happen to them, and they would probably tell you they understand prioritization, and at the same time they are struggling, struggling in their relationships, struggling in their careers, struggling with their mental health, struggling to make friends or to keep the friends that they have, struggling with their parents, struggling in their parenting.

Over and over, we are suffering and struggling.

We are like swimming in peanut butter, we're not making any movement in our life or towards our future.

We are unfulfilled, dissatisfied, and all at the same time we feel like we have a grasp on a life that seems to be happening to us instead of being decided by us.

Because most people are not intentional in setting their priorities, life is setting their priorities for them.

And so, how does that happen?

What filter does life use at this subconscious level to determine how we prioritize our life?

What we're gonna see today is before we can take our first real step forward in proper prioritization, we have to take a very real and intentional look backwards.

The truth is, our past has created the process for non-intentional prioritization.

There are key moments in all of our pasts, the part of our life that we have already lived, and we end up tying ourselves to key moments, people, places, and things in our past that become anchors for us, holding us back from the life that we could be living.

Past hurts in your life become future filters.

They set your priorities, and you might prioritize your life based on a past hurt in a way that no matter what you do, say, think, whatever actions or decisions you make, you will make them to ensure that you'll never be hurt the same way again.

Our past regrets become a future filter for our life.

They set priorities in our life to make sure that we self-protect and never put ourselves at risk again.

Harmful words spoken into our lives in the past create future filters for us.

Create insecurities where we become experts at numbing, escaping, or neglecting the parts of our life that have been damaged.

If we are not serious about getting intentional about prioritizing for our future, our pasts will set our life's agenda.

The pain of what of what has happened in our lives can actually cause us to forfeit what our futures could be.

And your future, because you are connected to the God who holds it, holds unimaginable potential for you.

The way we're gonna say it today is that we prioritize prior ties.

This is what we do as humans.

We prioritize prior ties.

There are key moments, people, places, and things from our past that we have tied our life to.

Normally, at a subconscious level, these things in our past become anchors that are keeping us from our future.

We're gonna look in scripture today at three different stories that show us how people, places, and things from our past can actually be setting the agendas for our future.

First, we're gonna look at people.

In Luke chapter 14, it says, Now great crowds were traveling with him, and so he turned and said to them, If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, his own wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

Luke 14 · chapter mention

Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

These are the words of Jesus himself.

And this is a passage that has tripped people out for like 2,000 years.

Jesus is like the love guy, you know?

Love your neighbor, love your enemies, love your family.

Greater love has no one than this, that they would lay their life down for a friend.

What is Jesus talking about?

Hating my mama now?

Like, is this really how we're supposed to live?

And of course, always we have to take scripture inside of its context.

At this point, Jesus was the biggest celebrity that Israel had ever known.

There was no hotter ticket in town than being a disciple of Jesus himself.

People were desperate to travel with him, to stand in his shadow, to listen to his words of power and authority day after day, day after day, to see the miracles that he would perform.

There is a truth that is foundational to what we believe at MetaCurch.

And it goes something like this: believing in Jesus is absolutely free.

He has done all of the work, he has paid all of the cost.

Believing in Jesus is absolutely free.

Following Jesus will cost you everything.

Jesus wants this crowd of people to know the level of intention that it takes to walk in Jesus' footsteps.

The last verse is the key.

If we're not willing to take up our cross, then we aren't actually prepared to follow after him.

In essence, Jesus is saying that your prior ties to people will hold you back from your purpose and your potential.

He's using this extreme exaggeration to say your passion and dedication to following after me should, in comparison, make everything else look like hatred.

There are a few things as powerful as the relationships in our life.

Remember Mary and Martha.

Martha had expectations set on her by her parents, by the other women in the community, by the leaders, by the people even in her own home.

She couldn't break these prior ties of exactly how life is supposed to work.

And we all have people in our past.

There are people who have shaped us and molded us, impacted our life, many of them positively, but we also have key relationships, key people in our past who have left such negative marks on our life that whether or not we're willing and ready to admit it, they are still calling the shots long after our relationship with them have ended.

In a very real sense, we approach relationships in our life and we become tied to them.

We tether our life to other people's lives.

And it's not just one relationship.

For all of us, we have lines of people all the way back to childhood, the friends who we thought that we could trust and they completely betrayed us, the first people who rejected us, the social circle that we couldn't get into, the first person to really break our heart.

We are tied to prior relationships.

Some of you had wonderful parents, and it's difficult because it's like no one else will ever live up to that.

That's played a mentorship role in your life.

And some of you had very, very difficult family of origins, and there are huge mother and father wounds that you carry around with you.

If we aren't intentional about setting priorities for our future, our past relationships will.

Some of you are in marriages that are right on the brink of disaster, not because of who each of you are, not because of your personalities, not because of the future ahead of you, but because of a previous relationship behind you.

And we get tied and we wonder why it's difficult to move forward.

And it's difficult because we are dragging along with us a whole line of relationships that act as anchors, keeping us from the potential of our future.

And if you want to get serious about your intentionality, you have to start by asking, who are my prior ties?

Who is it that I am still allowing from my past to call the shots for my future?

And it's a heartbreaking thought that we could have physically escaped from toxic relationships.

And yet, we are still allowing those same people, many of whom might have already forgotten your name, to create a pain inside of us that we are fighting to fix today.

Your life is far too important to allow your future to be directed and dictated from people in past relationships.

Your life is too important to forfeit your destiny.

The relational piece is pretty easy, and maybe you're already thinking of people from your past that, if you were brutally honest with yourself, are still playing a role in your life today and are still setting part of the agenda for your tomorrow.

But we don't just prioritize people, we also prioritize places.

And the way that places affect us in life is not quite as obvious to us as the way that people affect us.

However, we see a great example of this in Scripture.

In Numbers chapter 14, to kind of set the scene, the Israelites, God's chosen people, are right on the edge of the promised land, and that they had a huge journey to get there.

Numbers 14 · chapter mention

They were in 400 years of Egyptian slavery and tyranny, and God came and rescued them.

He sent plagues, he displayed his power, he split a seed so they could walk across into freedom.

He fed them every day manna, miracle food from heaven in the wilderness.

And finally, they're right on the edge of the promise.

God has guaranteed them victory, but when they saw the size of the armies, they were up against.

They got scared.

In Numbers 14, it says, Then the whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night.

And all the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, their leaders.

And the whole community told them, If only we had died in Egypt, if only we had died in the wilderness, why is the Lord bringing us into this land to die by the sword?

Our wives and children will become plunder.

Wouldn't it be better to go back to Egypt?

And so they said to one another, let's appoint a leader.

Let's go back.

Let's go back to the place where we were enslaved, go back to the place of tyranny, back to the place where we were a free labor force, back to the place where we were second and third class citizens.

Let's go back to what is comfortable because we are so scared of our potential.

And this is what the places that we have prior ties to do in our life.

They cause us to prioritize our comfort ability over the potential of our future ability.

And maybe you question the legitimacy of how powerful places are in your life.

And I would challenge you to physically go back to a place where you have experienced trauma and just experience what happens.

Experience the emotions that well up inside of you that you have no way to account for.

We all have places that we have been tied to.

We can't just ask who are my prior ties, but where are my prior ties?

For some of you, you grew up in an incredible childhood home.

And it was so good, and you have such great memories, and you've just blocked out anything negative from that experience, and now you're a full-grown adult.

Maybe you're even married, maybe you even have kids, and it's like there's nowhere that you can go that lives up to what you experienced as a kid.

For some of you, you lived in toxic childhood homes.

Homes of abuse and neglect, homes that were filled with tension and conflict.

And now you are an adult, maybe married, maybe with kids, and every place you go, you are waiting for the shoe to drop.

You just know that chaos will ensue.

And if it doesn't, more than likely you will create the chaos.

Because if you're honest, that's what you're most comfortable in.

Anyway, where are the places that you are tied to?

It's so heartbreaking to see people in their 20s, 30s, 50s, 60s who truly believe they peaked in high school, they peaked in college.

Like nothing they experience in life will ever measure up to being the captain of the team or throwing the touchdown pass or heading up to cheerleading squad or being voted most popular.

You'll hear people, full-grown adults with a future in front of them that they cannot even imagine a potential placed in them by God Himself.

And they'll say, I just wish I could go back.

We grow up and we start our careers, and some people have this just astronomical rise, you know?

It's like a hand in a glove, man.

They were meant for it.

And sometimes you can have so much success so early that the rest of your career, the next 30 years, you're just trying to live up to the first measure of success that you had.

Some people get into the job for And it is such a struggle, man.

You lose all confidence in yourself, and for the rest of your career, you're just spent questioning yourself based on what could just be a fluke in your first job.

The places, the seasons that we find ourselves in.

These environments, they shape us, they mold us.

If we are not intentional, they will show up to set the priorities for us.

Studies show that while our places that we are tied to vary, we all statistically share one in common.

It goes back to the first place we were really socialized, an elementary school.

And socialization isn't easy for everyone, and in fact, it can be very difficult at some level for everyone.

And everyone goes back to some tie at age 10 and below, because that's the first place that you actually experience rejection.

It's the first place that you have a goal of socialization that isn't met.

It's the first place that someone makes you feel like you aren't good enough to be in the group.

Some people really struggle to get involved, and that can lead to two different areas.

Maybe you grow up to be antisocial and you just assume that you aren't meant for people and people aren't meant for you.

Eight years old was the last time that you really trusted anybody with your friendship.

On the other side of the coin, some people struggle to socialize early, and so they grow up and they become adults who prioritize whatever it takes to get the acceptance of the people around them, even if they have to compromise on what they believe.

And it's tough because we're talking about like elementary school, you know?

And I get it, it's like, bro, you're talking about when I was nine.

Like, let's just all grow up, let's all be adults, let's all get past it, and that's great.

Don't intentionally look back at your past, what it caused in you, the insecurities that it that buried deep into your soul, and live with that pain setting the priorities for the rest of your life.

And this is what it's like.

We're tied to people and we're tied to places.

And our future and our purpose, the potential in our life, it's all out in front of us.

And we're just struggling, and we just can't figure out why in the world is it so difficult?

Like, why is every day at every job so hard?

Why is every relationship so frustrating?

Why can't I get friends or keep friends?

Why is parenting so hard?

And it's hard enough anyway, and when you put on top of that, anchoring ourselves to events in the past, it almost assures that we won't make it to the future that we were meant for.

You have to ask, who are my prior ties?

You have to ask, where are my prior ties?

People, places, and last, and maybe most obvious are our things.

In Matthew 19, it says, just then someone came up and asked Jesus, teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?

And Jesus said, if you want to be perfect, go sell all your belongings, give it to the poor, you will have treasure in heaven, and then, and then come and follow me.

And when the young man heard that, he went away grieving.

And he went away grieving because he had many possessions.

This is the story of the rich young ruler.

And remember, Jesus is the biggest celebrity, and being one of his disciples is the hottest ticket in town, the ultimate source of pride.

It's like you are attaching yourself to the man.

This rich young ruler wants to be a part of it.

And context is everything because the same way some people read our first passage today and say, if I'm gonna follow Jesus, I have to abandon everyone in my family, hate my mother and father.

The same way they do that, many people throughout history have read this, taken a vow of poverty, sold all of their stuff, completely misunderstanding the context of the verse.

Jesus is challenging a prior tie.

This man has many possessions.

He has built up his wealth.

He is so attached to it.

And instead of giving it up, he forfeits his opportunity to be a part of what Jesus is doing.

And we all have things.

And our things are a direct result of our wealth.

And the last question we have to ask is what are my prior ties?

And this is a deep question because it's so much more than how do I handle my money?

Okay?

It's not how do I handle my money, it's why do I handle my money the way I handle it?

And we all have prior ties.

And you see a few different things.

Someone who has come up and in their early life they did not have enough.

There were nights where they weren't sure whether or not there would be dinner on the table.

That creates something inside of you, a real fear and a real need.

And so maybe you eat out six nights a week.

And I'm not talking about Taco Bell.

I'm talking about you sit down, you get an appetizer, you get a meal, a margarita, a dessert at the end, you go out, and yeah, you're not saving any money for your future.

But you know what?

You will never have that feeling again of not having food.

You see what's happening?

A prior tie is now setting the priority for how you're managing your money.

And some people grew up and they took public transport.

Maybe that's you right now.

And as soon as you get some money, chances are you'll go in a two-year lease every single two years.

You will always drive a new car because you will never be insecure about transportation again.

So you're not saving for college, you won't have any wealth in the future, but man, you are really scratching that itch that comes from your past.

Some people grow up with more money than they know what to do with.

Oftentimes, those who come up with wealth have no idea how wealth is actually generated.

They just live as if they are entitled to money.

Of course they have money.

They can't understand why someone wouldn't have money.

Because it's there and they're entitled to it.

Good luck getting any from them.

They shut off all forms of generosity.

Why should they give it away?

It's theirs.

They are meant to have it.

Maybe you grew up and you didn't wear named brands, you know.

You got clowned on at school for your off-brand shoes, your Walmart shirts.

Shout out Walmart shirts right now.

You know, it's like you don't really have the money for it, but you will go into debt to wear named brands because you will not repeat the pain from your past.

It's not just how am I managing my money?

It's why do I view my things the way that I view them?

How are the people, places, and things in my life pointing me towards the future that God has for me?

If you are not intentional about how you prioritize your life, your past will prioritize it for you.

You will live your life not moving towards the future God has for you, but battling a past that God has already covered for you.

And what we wanted to do today is we wanted to make the invisible visible.

And this is ridiculous.

I barely have circulation to my hands right now, you know?

It's like this is crazy.

And we wanted it to be crazy because it is crazy for the people of God to struggle towards their future, struggle towards their purpose, suffer through life unnecessarily anchored to things in the past that God has given you the authority to overcome.

Martha had Jesus, God and human flesh in her house, and she missed it.

So distracted by the many things, her own expectations, her own prior ties, that she missed the one thing that was most important.

How many people have missed out on the adventure of a lifetime following after Jesus because they are tied to toxic relationships from their past?

How many times have we forfeited the potential ahead of us to go back to the places that are comfortable behind us?

Who knows what kind of disciple the rich young ruler could have been?

Who knows what would have happened if he could have severed the tie to his things and instead pursued the creator of all things.

Your future is far too important to allow your past to set its agenda.

And I know that we're busy, but this is so critical.

It is so critical that we take the first step today to getting rid of our prior ties.

And so we want to give you some space right here in the room to think through these three questions.

If you would, right where you're at, just close your eyes.

Nothing magic about it, just create some space for you and for the people around you.

And I want to ask you to seriously contend with each of these questions.

The first question is: who are your prior ties?

Who are the key people from your past that affected your life so tremendously?

The ripple effects are still being felt today.

What people from your past still have their fingerprints on your future?

Who are the people that you prioritize who you are, what you're becoming, the decisions that you make, the actions you take, just so that hopefully someday you can tell them, I told you so?

Who are the people that you are trying so hard to impress that if you're honest, they might not even remember your name.

Who is that person that your greatest priority in life is figuring out a way for them to finally love you?

Who are your prior ties?

The places in our life play way more significant of a role than we normally give them credit for.

Where are your prior ties?

Where are the places and spaces, the seasons and environments that shaped who you are today?

It could be the house that you lost in the divorce, it could be that you moved from a different state.

Where are the places that, although they are in your past, are still calling the shots in your present and for your future?

And last, what are your prior ties?

How do you think about your things and why?

What hole in your life are you trying to fill with material goods?

What pain are you trying to escape every time you swipe a card?

How much of your financial future are you forfeiting today because of fear created in your past?

Your life is too important, and your future has too much potential to stay anchored to the things in your past.

And we pray for you.

Father, we love you and we thank you.

We thank you that you have given us authority, you have given us the power to be intentional about how we are living our lives.

I pray as we continue in this series that you would build out a framework for us of how not just to get rid of the past, but how to plan and prioritize for our future.

God, I pray that your people, the people here at MetaCurch, would take seriously the call to take an intentional look back.

Not to stay stuck in the past, to get free of it, to move forward what you have for us in our futures.

We love you.

And we pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thanks so much for listening to the message today.

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Man, I love you guys, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.