Leftovers - Fitness (1 Corinthians 6)

Happy Monday. Pastor Matt's here.

Pastor Chris. Yep, I did it again.

Did it again. I'm not giving it up.

That's my bit. Now I'm just going to own the

bit forever. Great, so forever.

Forever. Fantastic.

We are here. This is the ERC Leftovers

podcast, continuing some of the leftovers from this Sunday

morning's message. We're in the middle of our four

FS series, Faith, Family, fitness and finances as we seek

to know Jesus and make him known in these things the way that God

has designed them to be in our life to most glorify him, but

also to make him known two others all for the sake of

reaching the one more. So week three it was fitness.

Yeah, kind of still feel like that's a weird word for what we

talked about. Do people talk about fitness

like in your your fitness to be a person, like to live a life?

I mean, I suppose like, you know, but we've, yeah, we've

made the word far too narrow. You know, when I, I think when

somebody typically talks about fitness in our context, yeah,

it, it is usually like the, oh, I go to the gym and I go this

many miles, I do this and, and it's like, no, like overall,

like life fitness is so much broader than can you run a 5K,

right. Like, that's not, that's not

what we're talking about. Not really.

We've, we've put it in this series and I feel like we don't

always equate fitness to like a disciplined life.

Like are you, are you fit to be a football player?

Are you fit to be so? I mean, we see it in scandal

like a political leader. You're no, you're no longer fit

to serve your constituency because of whatever moral

dilemmas. Like, I feel like we use it in

some of those contexts. I don't think we often talk

about it in Christendom like as as our are we fit to be

Christians? And even as I say that, it

sounds weird as a phrase, but that's really where the thrust

of this week was right? Well, and I think that makes

perfect sense. You know, so am I am I fit to be

a Christian? What does that mean?

So what do I have to prove or what do I have to do or all

these kinds of things? And it's like, all right, well,

if you really get to the get to the end of the book real fast.

Well, what I really need to be fit to be a Christian is to know

that I have a need. That's, that's what it's going

to take for me to be fit to be a Christian.

However, if I, if I stop there, if I say, well, I know I need

Christ for the forgiveness of my sins, cool, I'm forgiven and now

I will do nothing with the gift. That's not really being fit to

be a Christian, is it? Right.

So like in order in order to really be fit to be a Christian,

not only do I have to see the need, but then as that need has

been fulfilled by Christ, now all of a sudden, guess what I

get to do? I get to go out into the world

as his ambassador and I get to move about and and show people

what I've received. And yeah, I suppose that's a way

to describe it. Yeah, yeah.

So that at least that's what we I hypothesized in the the

message this week and we'll have we'll have some more thoughts.

I I have 2 pages worth of sermon notes, show notes here.

Any of y'all who would like that didn't pick them up at church.

They'll be LinkedIn the in the show notes here on this episode.

You can root through those because I really, I mean, of

these four areas and I kind of combined like mental and

emotional into the same thing. But I really do have like 4 or

five different passages for each of these four areas.

And we really only touched on one passage for each section.

So there's a lot more to go through here if you're either

curious for more or I didn't. It's kind of a.

Huge. Make the case well enough on on

Sunday that you want to dig into more of it for yourself.

There's there's a lot more material here.

Now, before we actually dive into all this kind of stuff, you

you had an illustration and you talked about getting ready for

like a 5K Sure like that might be a measure that might create

some measure of physical fitness understanding.

Sure, Again amongst all the other ones, is that the longest

you've run is a 5K or or. Successfully.

Well, OK, some points of clarity.

OK, we were, we were talking about what a good discipline or

or fitness question would be. And I just, I was just curious,

what's the longest you've ever run in one in one sitting, which

is what you're asking me here right now.

So no, the I've run further than a 5K in a like formal race

competition setting even even not even like whatever charity

5K setting. Yes, I've I've only ever like

finished race. That's the longest race I've

ever run. Is a 5K high school cross

country not incredibly good at it.

I think I was in the I don't think I was ever lower than like

the seventeens. I think 1730 is the fastest that

I ever ran 5K3 miles ish 3.1 miles.

But I did. At one point in college, Emily

and I were training together to run 1/2 marathon and she

finished that race. I did not.

I sprained my ankle around like mile 4 and got a.

And she left few behind. Well.

Now actually, this story just got really interesting.

Yeah, I mean, she, I told her to go and that I would catch up and

then realize the travesty of my situation.

We had actually. So this is the worst and this is

too much information, but This is why you come here.

We had so this is gosh, 1516 years ago.

Like we have cell phones, but we definitely weren't like running

with cell phones. Didn't didn't need them on our

person. For whatever reason, I hated

running. I just never enjoyed.

I always had. I felt like my stomach was like

always churning when I was running.

There was, there was always liquid, just like sloshing

around in my stomach when I was. Running that sounds really

uncomfortable. I know like whether whether I

ate before I ran or whether I'd starved myself before I ran.

Like I just my, my stomach is just constantly gurgling like,

well, I'm running and I'm a pretty regular.

Yes, they're pretty. I'm I'm pretty regular as it

comes to emptying the bowels every day.

And for whatever reason, the time of this race, like it

started before I had evacuated And so like 2 miles into the

race and the last thing I want to do is a is use 1/2 marathon

port a potty. I'm like, I was like, no way,

man, but I had to like I, I had to.

It was either that or evacuate myself while I was running.

So, so anyway, we had already that's, that's only that you

asked that question. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

We had already split. Like we we she did not wait for

me to do that. I was like, no, I'll it'll be

really quick. I'll I'll Sprint to catch up.

And somewhere in the middle, I never caught up to her.

But because within those two miles, I hadn't caught up to

her. And then I was just done.

My my ankle was not having it. So she finished the race and was

not happy with it. She got to the end and I was

like, where? Where did you go?

Like what happened? Why didn't you catch up to me?

Because I got like a police escort back to the medical tent

or whatever road now. Yeah, got it.

It just meant you were really important.

Oh my goodness. Well, that's just a limped to

the next checkpoint on the officer was like, I don't know

how you got 10, eight, 910 miles to go, but it like we're just

going to take you across town and yeah.

So anyway, that's a different kind of way to finish I.

Didn't do that, longest workout in like 1 sitting was probably

like 7 miles for cross country practice or I never even ran the

full half marathon before I did the race like.

Which that's a bold move too, by the way.

So not know if you can finish so.

So you're like, hey, you know what I have done?

I've done about half the distance, so let's just go ahead

and sign up like let's see that. I mean how much different is the

2nd 7 miles going to be from the first 7?

Like, doubly painful. Doubly painful.

Isn't it though I already? Did seven, I can do another 7.

I mean, that's that's. That that.

Logic is madness, isn't it? Because think about it like,

well, if I could run a half marathon, surely I could run a

full 1. Shirley.

Don't call me Shirley. Yeah, no, that that is that is

crazy. I can't.

That's it's remarkable that you sign up.

But then again, you were like, what, 2122?

Yeah, not even. I think it was probably 19.

Then you probably could have done it.

Yeah, not. Like I'm going to die.

No. No, you could walk that far.

If it comes down to it, I'll just walk.

That's true. That's true, yeah.

So well, I and then I couldn't. And then and then no, you

weren't going to do that. So yeah, I was AI was a sprinter

in high school. I did all the short races.

That was fun. Yeah, I like it.

They were great. I never ran probably in a

workout more than two or three miles, like honestly, because I

mean, if you're, if you're a sprinter.

So this is just for like light conditioning then because it's

not two or three miles is like much longer than any of your

sprinter races. So I think that's not really.

Helpful. No.

And the only thing that like you know, for for sprinters, at

least the way I was trained, it's like maybe you'll try and

run double the distance maybe at once.

So like hey, I'm training for the 100, I need you to Sprint 2.

100 meters. So it's kind of the opposite.

If you can do twice as much, you can definitely do.

Yeah, half of it and then you and then you're definitely not

going to get gassed out. But as an adult.

So I had a friend who just absolutely convinced me in my

mid 30s, like, oh dude, come on, you can do a half marathon.

Anybody. Those were his words.

Anybody. Can do a half marathon.

And I just, I thought that was crazy, but he, he was such a

good salesman. And then so he described me as

like, oh, come on, man, you only need like a couple months to

like be ready. And I was like, all right, dude.

And, and I mean, this guy was not like in super great shape.

And he's like, I've already done like 4 of them.

And I was like, and you know, and, and I'm just looking at him

like, OK, if he could do it, I could totally do it.

Well, wow. Yeah, yeah, I know, I know,

right? It's, you know, but but I did, I

trained for like 4 months and did finish the half marathon in

Fargo, Fargo, ND. Now here's what I learned.

I learned a couple of things about that.

A because I trained up to like 10 miles and then I was like,

OK, I can tack on three more, right?

So I hadn't done more than 10 miles before the race.

Here is the worst part. I did every single bit of my

training over those four months on a treadmill.

And then I got out on the pavement and like within the 1st

2 miles, everything hurt. Everything hurt.

Yeah, I believe that. Yeah.

And so like then like I could barely walk for like I finished

it, but I could barely walk for like 6 or seven days after that

because treadmill versus, you know, concrete is very

different. That's very interesting.

I never run on a treadmill. Like I will walk.

I will walk and like incline walk the thing.

But if I'm running, which I don't like running, I don't run.

To be honest, I don't run. I mean, you move pretty quick

sometimes. But again, sprinter like I'm I

like a dwarf, dangerous and very distance, like short distances.

Yeah, I like it. I like it.

So yeah, I can whatever. I can cover 40 yards really

quick, but anything with any length, I'm not really

interested in that. But like, I don't know if I had

to, if I like decided I was going to train and go for a run,

though it would be outside. I don't think I could do it on a

treadmill. It's just well, after like 2

blown Achilles it was just easier on my joints and stuff.

Because the treadmill gives. Because the treadmill gives, you

know. Sure, but OK.

But you're somehow still logically you're like, but once

I'm out there for the half marathon, like the Achilles will

be fine. I hadn't, honestly, I'll be

really honest, I didn't even really think about it.

Not really. OK, so I don't know.

So I mean so that. Means they were fine though

they. Didn't I mean that?

I mean they didn't split in half but it was hard to walk for like

a week after that. So it doesn't sound like either

you or I are signing up for 1/2 marathon anytime.

Soon 0 interest in that. Zero interest.

No. OK, 'cause I I would say that if

you were like, hey Chris, let's do this, I wouldn't be able to

turn you down. That if I said that to you or

like just general? Populist.

No, you, you. You would have to do it with me

and then I wouldn't turn you down.

What did you just do? You, you just invited everyone

to say hey, you guys need to sign up for 1/2 marathon.

But I mean anybody who suggests it has to do it.

Yeah, but there are people who are already runners here, Chris.

We have crazy people at church who run for fun because they

think it's fun. And now they're going to come

and be like, hey, running's fun. You guys should come run with

us. And I'm going to be like, this

is Chris's fault. Well, I'm just saying if you did

it, I would do it, but I'm not doing it otherwise.

What have you done? You're welcome.

You're welcome throughout this. All right, so yeah, what's the,

what's the furthest you've run or, or thought about running?

I did hear, I did hear from someone afterwards, after the

service, they came up to me and said, yeah, me and me.

And so and so they had a friend who were like, we're going to

start a fitness plan, but we're going to, we're going to start

not with a 5K. We're going to start with five

feet. All right, great.

Yeah, yeah. Tailored it for what?

What you feel you can handle. So yeah.

I do think, by the way, Speaking of that, on a more serious note,

I think that there are ways, and you talked about it during the

sermon. You're like, hey, this is going

to, you know, if we're talking about physical fitness, that

should look different for everybody based on age, based

on, you know, history and background and injuries and, and

there's a million different factors that you're going to

have to do that stuff on. But I also think that with, you

know, the Internet and stuff like in AI, you can you can

basically type in, hey, this is how old I am.

This is like my body type. This is how can I even get

started? Yeah, and you can get a pretty

good start. Off of.

That Internet suggestion. I agree because I mean even even

all those years ago, I don't know, it's probably 7-7 years

ago now since I ran the half Dude.

I, I, I was literally coming off the couch to do that prior,

prior to getting trained up for the half marathon, I had no

physical fitness. Every once in a while I'd go

lift weights, but like no cardio, no nothing.

So I did couch to half marathon and I mean.

Over the course of a couple months.

Yeah. And so I mean, I again, if we

are talking about the physical aspect of fitness, which again

that's narrow, it's only one part of it.

But if we're talking about the physical part and and you're

looking for help and you need help with that, like man,

there's so many ways to get started that are not going to

destroy your body and not make you feel terrible about

yourself. And you know there's ways to do

this well, so encourage you to look into that maybe.

Yeah, no. And, and that's what we're going

into some of the more practical things here too.

I felt like, yeah, the one thing I strayed away from in the

message was actual kind of like take home assignments for some

of the stuff because I think I think the list could be endless

in some of these situations for what what it could end up being.

But we can talk about some of those more practical things that

I think there are some, again, general simple solutions for

physical fitness, mental fitness, spiritual, some general

habits that people could practice.

It still looks different specifically in your life, but

we'll get into those. We are all over the place as far

as where we're at in the Bible today, which is a little more

confusing than usual. Usually we're in one chapter or

passage primarily leaned on 1st Corinthians 612 through 20, but

there's we're all over the New Testament back to Matthew 22 as

well as kind of our jumping off point of Jesus teaching on the

greatest commandment. You shall love the Lord your God

with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your

mind. That's where we're jumping off

from. So we we focused on 1st

Corinthians 619 and 20 do not know that your body is a temple

of the Holy Spirit within you whom you have from God.

You are not your own for you were bought with a price.

So glorify God in your body. Pretty straightforward physical

body taking care of it matters. You are a temple for the Holy

Spirit. OK, so one of the things I

wanted to pick up on was in in this set of verses, but earlier

you well, you just brought it up starting in verse 12.

OK, OK, let's go a direction here.

Let's go backwards for a second because again, we're we're in

the same section of text, OK, as you, you just brought out.

So glorify God in your body, OK, Before he says glorify God in

your body, Paul does something and he says all things are

lawful for me. And then he ends this idea with

glorify God in your body. So what is the balance?

How does this work? If OK.

And he's speaking specifically at this point.

I, I, I think if I'm remembering correctly about food laws and

all these kinds of things, OK, So all things are lawful for me,

but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful, but I

won't be dominated by anything. OK, so how can I take my

Christian freedom? This is an honest question.

How can I take my Christian freedom where even Paul says

everything is wide open. It's fair game to me because I'm

forgiven and redeemed by Christ. And then he says, but glorify

God in your body. Is there attention here?

Like help me out. Well, you're right that's that's

the bounds, right? All things are lawful while like

as long as it's glorifying God, right?

So because, but but not not all things are helpful is what he

says. All things are lawful, but not

all things are helpful, which means all things could but in

actuality, not all things do bring me to this end, right.

Not all things are helpful for glorifying God.

I have I have freedom potentially in everything.

It's kind of the and I didn't get into the specifics.

We have Donuts on Sunday mornings.

Fitness doughnut right in my mouth.

You brought that up. We were in the lobby and I just

started cackling, 'cause I was like, I, I love that.

Seemingly seemingly hypocritical right, to have to have those

things out there on a Sunday that we're talking about

fitness, right? I didn't talk about alcohol or

like, I, I enjoy a bourbon, enjoy a beer.

You, you enjoy a beer. Like, I did not get up there and

say a life of physical fitness is abstaining from these things.

I did not give anyone a list that was don't, don't, don't,

don't, don't. As far as what to cut out of

your life, why? Because of this verse.

They're all lawful, but not all things are helpful.

A food diet that is founded on centered on Donuts, Not helpful.

Lawful for me to yeah on Sunday morning have one.

And go about with my regular diet for the rest of the week.

Sure, that's that's fine, right? That's within the law and still

within a God glorifying picture of that.

But if if the temptation if if one leads to another or opens

the door for OK, well, I had I had Donuts.

So I'm going to chase it with this or that spikes a sugar

spree or or just whatever. Whatever it is, if it opens a

door for ending at a non God glorifying conclusion then you

shouldn't then then it's not lawful for you.

Yeah. And so there's some there's some

individual or not. Individualization.

Yeah, I think I was not going to get that word out there.

You have to have some discernment and know thyself a a

donut might trigger someone's terrible eating habits in a way

that doesn't yours necessarily. And that's just a different

measure of discipline and self-control that I think we

each have too. But that's well, that's why we

can't just prescribe a thing for every like I I definitely could

say don't eat Donuts, but that would come down really law heavy

for someone who feels like they have that in control in their

life. It might hit a little harder for

someone who's like, Oh yeah, I shouldn't have Donuts because if

I have one I'm going to have 6 like.

Oh yeah, yeah, no, I feel that statement.

I do no, but I think you're right.

Well, and it's it's cool to think about the fact that, and I

and I love this about the gospel is the fact that there is

honestly real, real freedom to be had.

But the the fact that that freedom needs to come with a

level of discernment and a level of discipline.

It it actually makes the thing so much more enjoyable.

So think about it this way. Like, well, I grew up eating

like so much junk food. I mean like a crazy amount.

I would just, I'm not even joking.

I would just eat a box of Swiss cake rolls before dinner.

Like a box, not a package. So yeah, I know.

And there are people who testify to that.

Like a box of Swiss cake rolls and a quart of chocolate milk

before dinner. That's not a brag.

It's actually terrible for you. And the fact that I'm sitting

here today is kind of a miracle. But anyway.

But The thing is like, I love the I love the fact that if I in

wanting to glorify God and say thank you for these good gifts,

man, you know what I could do? I could go to a birthday party

and have like a piece of super sugary cake and I could

celebrate with somebody. Or, you know, like I could go

out with a friend and have a drink and we could celebrate and

we could even in those things we could be glorifying to God.

But you're right, man, there's a line, There's a line there.

And I think one of the things that he brings out that Paul

brings out in verse 12 is like when I crossed that line, all of

a sudden, it's almost like it's not even me in control anymore.

I am being dominated by a desire that I am not controlling like,

and is no longer honoring God because it's not under control.

It's not under his Lordship. So I do think we, we, we have

this immense amount of freedom to choose and to and to enjoy

the things that God has given us.

But like, at what point, you know, we have to ask ourselves,

I think, what, at what point are we no longer in control and we

are being dominated by it? Right.

Everything's can be, anything can be lawful, but anything of

the world created by the world can be twisted to a point that

it it it dominates, saturates, takes over, twists our lives,

Right. So there needs to be discernment

and measure in there too. Yeah.

Measure is a good word. I like that.

Yeah. So that's kind of the, the

setting for physical, physical fitness here that as it relates

to our earthly bodies, we, we may not have the same triggers

or struggles or, or even benefits that that other people

have, but that's, we have to have discernment in that, right?

Like we have to, we have to have an individual relationship and,

and calling and following from God of how we're going to care

for that. Well, sure, there's some general

things we should like, yes, get out in sunlight, go go for a

walk. 10,000 steps a day isn't like a, it's not a crazy

suggestion. Like that's actually measurably

good for you to move that much every day.

Go go for a walk if you can, if you can lift weights, lift

weights. If it's push ups and sit ups and

jumping jacks or yoga, stretch like something physical movement

is good. We, we were, we were very

sedentary culture now compared to even even Bible like

especially Bible times, but even 200 years ago, we're a very

sedentary culture compared to that.

So. And I, and I think you have to

make those things fun. You have to find a way to make

it enjoyable because there are people who, you know, you'll

talk to or maybe you are that person where you're like, you

know what? I just hate everything related

to like physical exercise. Like I'm not, I want to go to a

gym. I don't want to wear the stupid

clothes. I don't want to have the

headphones on. I don't want to be on a

treadmill. I won't do any of that junk.

So it's like, where do we find routes then, you know, that make

this an enjoyable thing. You know what, actually, when

the weather's nice, one of the more enjoyable things that I

think, like I like walking my dog in nice weather.

And for my dog, she's just like sweet, let's do 10,000 steps all

at once. She wants that.

And so like, actually like that's kind of a fun way for her

for me to, to do some of those things because I, I have learned

about myself as an adult, for example, like I'm not going to

be outside just because like I don't do that.

I don't go, hey, let's go outside to be outside.

And I don't know why I'm like that.

I should be like that, but I'm not.

But the dog, for example, is like, let's be outside.

And so, yeah, there you go. I mean, so we got to find ways

to, to make this more accessible and more fun and more enjoyable

because God does want us to enjoy these things.

So, you know, get creative I guess.

Yeah, it's good. It's good for you.

It's if you have kids, it's good for your kids and it's

especially good for you if you have kids to keep up with them

in as you age, as as you get older.

And it's also just endorphins and all the things that like

from from moving well or accomplishing something like

it's, it's all around these again, body, mind and soul.

We talked about it on Sunday. These these things are linked

together. Love Lord you got with all your

heart, soul and mind. There's there's connections

between the health and fitness of all of these things.

So just a couple other practical things.

A diet is obviously a thing. Eat real foods.

Eat if If it didn't exist, like there's an ad, if it didn't

exist 200 years ago, you probably shouldn't eat it.

I mean, maybe I follow too. Many Dino nuggies Dino.

Nuggies. No, that's not.

That's not terrible. There's still some chicken in

them, but like Doritos Swiss cake roll like and again, not in

a get them completely off the list sort of way, but if they're

if those things are like a daily part of your diet.

Probably not awesome. Not awesome, not and and again,

I don't want this to be an illegalistic way.

I'm just trying to hypothesize this as like our our best state,

our our our most worthy, our fittest state as representatives

of Christ. Probably, like probably don't

include those things. Eat, eat vegetables, eat real

meat. There's dietary restriction and

all things like, again, I don't know your life.

I don't know your specific life, but I'm pretty sure that no

one's dietary restrictions are Doritos and Swiss cake rolls are

the only thing you can eat and chase them down with a Mountain

Dew. Like, that's not it.

I, I, I, I can't tell you exactly what it is.

I can tell you what it's not. And that is not the foundations

of a God glorifying diet. You're right, even if you're a

13 year old boy. Like, you're right, you're

right. It's, it's, I mean, it's

disappointing to come to that reality because I eat like a

child. But you're right, all right?

You know, you're right. You OK?

So you talked about eating Swiss cake rolls by the box.

Wasn't there a time, I can't remember if you said this on the

podcast before or not? Didn't you eat like 5 lbs of

cottage cheese or something like in a in a day?

Yeah, well, I did have a 10,000 calorie day once.

Oh. My goodness. 10,000 calories in

a day. And that was actually

legitimately difficult. That was really.

Really, legitimately difficult. Yeah, I mean, I finished at like

1156 at night and I started my day with a box of Donuts and a

quarter of chocolate milk and I still it was, it was that's.

Like 1000, right there it was. Weirdly difficult.

I, I, I would have thought it was going to be way easier, but

yeah, if you can learn anything from me, like don't do that, I.

Mean that's a part, yeah, that's like you'd have to, you'd have

to eat like 6 Big Mac meals in the course of the day to get

there, which doesn't sound like a lot, but I'm sure after like

the third one, you're like no more.

Well, you know, and the thing I didn't do this alone, I had AI

had a partner in crime who also ate 10,000 calories that day.

But you know, I, we, I just took it and it's really bad.

But like I took it as like an opportunity because I was, I was

working out pretty regularly at the time and stuff, but I took

that as an opportunity as like, Oh no, this isn't a cheat meal.

It's not even a cheat day. This is the equivalent of like 6

cheat days. And so I'm just going to do

every stupid thing that I ever wanted to do, whether it's like,

you know, an XL strawberry shake from Sonic and Taco Bell.

And I, I lost my mind that day. Yeah, and I also gained 6 lbs in

one day. Yeah, Yes, you did.

It took me like 3 weeks to work it off.

It was really bad. It was really bad.

I'm sorry. Don't do that.

Don't do that. 10,000 calories. Don't do that.

Yeah, yeah. Sorry about that.

So, yeah, just I mean general that we are not not fitness

Wellness certified people, but it it is fairly simple.

Move your body, eat real food. Meat and vegetables and and

protein are good healthy things. Processed fake cheese dust foods

are are probably you should stay away from those.

Yeah, but like that's food is God intended.

Go for it. If you want more specific diet

things, we have the the Daniel plan on the on the ERC pics on

the bookshelves out here in the atrium.

That's got some more like fitness diet, sort of biblically

rooted things if you want some more specific ideas.

But yeah, keep it simple. Real things, real movement

probably going to turn out OK. Yeah, it's.

Going to be great. Just burn burn more calories

than you then you take in. That's caring for your body.

Well, a couple of the passages quick.

First Corinthians later on, three chapters later in Chapter

9, from where we are. Did you not know that in a race

all runners run, but only one receives the prize?

So run that you may obtain it. I discipline my body and keep it

under control, lest after preaching to others, I myself

should be disqualified. Kind of what we were talking

about today, too. We don't want to be like

hypocritical examples for Christ either, right?

Like Paul's saying these things and he's saying, OK, I'm

preaching this, I am putting it into practice lest I be lest I

be disqualified from running this race or or at least leading

it well. Not proclaiming to do any of

these areas perfectly. Trying to strive after them

myself but also wanted to push y'all in in a godly God

glorifying example in this too. Well, and that's an important

thing too, because maybe you're raising kids or, you know, you

and your spouse are kind of trying to work together to get

better at some things. Man, it's awfully important to

be a attempt to be a model of that.

But even when you fail to acknowledge that, to acknowledge

it, just be honest, you know, and, and I think that's a huge,

that's a huge win. And and that is actually man, it

is really taking the wind out of the sails of, of Satan who would

love for you to not acknowledge it and just kind of be shamed

that, oh, I've done this so badly and now I feel like a

hypocrite. You know, I've seen it too many

times where we just maybe we fail at something but we never

start again because, well, I've already said I was going to do

this like 3 times, but I, I can't say that again.

So I'm just, I'm not even going to try.

And it's like, that's the devil talking to you.

That's him trying to keep you ashamed and try and keep you

down. No, we just, we acknowledge the

failure and we move on. I've heard it say, I can't

remember who said it this way, but like, you know what, we

might fail, but let's fail better this time.

Let's just fail better this time because if we fail, it will not

be at the same level. We're just going to keep moving

forward. And so whether that's like, OK,

so maybe you committed again talking about fitness, like

maybe I committed to spiritual fitness of reading the Bible

every single day. And I'm going to give you a very

real example. So on the Bible app, they keep

like a daily streak. Yeah.

So you can look on the app and, and maybe there's a day you got

super busy or you forgot or whatever, and you lose your

daily streak. Oh, no, Oh no.

Well, now, gosh, you're, you're kind of all is lost.

I'm despondent. I no longer am a good Christian.

I'm, I didn't read my Bible every day for, you know, 40 days

straight or what you know, And it's just like, man, that Satan

would love to keep you feeling bad and to keep you feeling like

a failure. But no, we confess and we move

on, and we fail. Better, better in the future.

Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot.

Let's let's fail better this. Time told that to my kids a

couple times. Like, it's fine, fail better

next time. I don't expect you to be

perfect, but let's keep going. Yeah, I like it.

It's good First Timothy 4-7 and eight.

Train yourself for godliness. For while bodily training is of

some value, godliness is of value in every way as it holds

promise for the present life and also for the life to come.

So within this we, we kind of see the, the body soul relation

here to physical exercise has benefits, but spiritual training

still takes priority. Both contribute to a

well-rounded life. We still have this and I and I

don't know, I don't know if you've ever experienced this.

I usually do if I'm, if I am like razor focused on one area,

whether I'm working on, I don't know, working on emotions or

working on fitness or, or things like that spills over.

I want to be better in other areas because I don't want to, I

won't, I don't want to destroy the work I'm doing in the one

area right by like ruining in another.

So there's obviously crossover here between these things.

We started out with faith as the foundation of a few weeks ago.

So that's still like the spiritual fitness in all this.

That's where that's where the rest of this stems from.

But outside of that, like our physical bodies are really the

first point of interaction really that we have with the

world of other than that, right? As far as people in our lives,

people we haven't met. So I, I think there's priority

here too for that. And you only have one body.

You only get you get one body, this life, and glorify God in

your body. So I'll tell you what, you used

your phrase just now and it it spurred something in my head

that I think is really appropriate for this talk too.

Here's a quote from Bruce Lee. OK, we're going to shift, but it

but it relates. I promise.

The successful warrior is the average man with laser focus.

Yeah. So what happens if, Yeah, what

happens if maybe I don't think of myself as like this again,

this great Bible scholar or like maybe I haven't always done a

great job of taking care of my physical body or something like

that. As soon as I start to put all my

attention and all my effort in, whether that's anger or

frustration, I'm going to pour it all into one spot where I

where I where I say from now on, I refuse to lose in this area of

my life. We're going through financial

peace University with people right now.

And Dave Ramsey will say it like you just got to get mad enough

to, to not live this way anymore.

And so like again, even with our spiritual natures, like man, if

I want that, if I want to like really grow with God in my mind,

body, soul, all these different ways you were talking about

yesterday, man, I can do that with some bit of laser focus and

it will change everything. It will just, it will reshape

how I'm living my life and anybody could do it.

Yeah. I believe that anybody could do

it. Couple more verses of practical

encouragement for physical fitness.

Isaiah 4031. Those who wait for the Lord

shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings

like eagles. They should run and not be

weary. They shall walk and not faint.

God renews physical vitality for those who rely on him,

encouraging endurance in daily demands.

It sounds crazy, it sounds silly, but the Lord give me

strength for today prayer like it's not silly You you can ask

for that you you can hope for and and request that from God.

You can lean on his strength in these things.

A sort of greeting from John third John one verse 2 beloved,

I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good

health as it goes well with your soul.

John even is is painting the connection of the of these two

things. Hey, prioritizing your soul, but

you're in Christ. So I know that your soul is well

by that. I also hope your physical being

is well as it relates to your soul being well rooted in

Christ. Amazing.

I love that. Well, and, you know, don't

forget, lest we forget that even in OK, so we, we allow ourselves

to be spiritually taken care of and we and we keep that health.

But there's also this sense that like God cares about the body.

How do we know that? Because Jesus Christ comes back

with a real body. So I mean, like, yeah, this all

works in concert with itself and and it's just fun to see all the

connections in the study guide. How like it just is flowing

through this thing. So yeah, by the way, I know you

already said it, but please pick one of these up because this

thing is terribly helpful to to make these connections.

Yep. And if you, if you're in a life

group already, this is I shared the study guide with all the

leaders. So like you will, you can get a

copy of that or see that from them.

But I'll have more at the connection Center too for this

week and next you can pick one up mental and emotional fitness

are they are not back-to-back in the study guide and but I kind

of lumped them together during during the talk during the

sermon Romans 12/1 and two do not be conformed to the patterns

of this world will be transformed by the renewing of

your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of

God. Mental fitness involves ongoing

renewal through God's truth, leading to wiser living.

Who doesn't want that right? If if I believe in asked do you

want wisdom? So let's seek wisdom, get wisdom

right by the word of God, by the by the strength of the of the

truth of God's word. There's measurable mental

clarity for things right like we we have a blueprint.

We have we have peace. We talked about in Galatians 5

the the peace that we don't understand, the also the all

surpassing peace. That's contained in the word of

God. Philippians 413 very familiar

life verse encouraging verse. I can do all things through

Christ who strengthens me. Sounds flippant and crazy, but

comes from like our mental resilience comes from Christ's

strength or as as believers it should that that should be the

thing that we lean on in times of despair and in times of

questioning of doubt should be turning to to Christ's leading

and Christ's empowering strength in that right.

By the way, you've keyed in on a verse that I think is well and

you would know like it's, it's one of the most misused verses

ever. Philippians 413 I can do all

things through Christ who strengthens me.

Like you know what I shouldn't do?

I shouldn't go to a hot dog eating contest with a big 413

shirt going. You know what I can do?

I can eat 47 hot dogs because of Christ who strengthens me.

Like that's a misuse of that. But I think we see that all the

time. But really what you're bringing

out in this guide, again, which is really nice, is we're talking

about like this, this mental resilience, this emotional

mental spiritual resilience to hardship.

And of course, what we know about this moment is Paul is in

prison when he's writing this. So he's not talking about a

basketball game, nor is he talking about bench pressing 400

lbs. He is talking about the mental

spiritual fitness it takes given to him by Jesus Christ to endure

difficult things. So that's definitely part of

your fitness. To endure challenge and

struggle. This, this versus about mental

resilience and, and fitness to face that.

So second Timothy 17, we talked about this in the message.

God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and

self-control. This relates to our, our, our

mental and emotional fitness. I talked about anxiety and worry

during the message and I, I, I brought it out a little bit.

It's stop it. I'd be right.

Stop it. Be a terrible therapist.

Oh, oh, you're doing that. Stop it.

It would have been great for you to say, OK, knock it off.

And then you just walk off the stage.

You're just like, all right, we're end.

End of thought. Finn, we're done.

So I understand that it seems like it's not that simple to

switch and I would I would push back a little bit for some of

you. I think it is that simple to

just stop worrying. I, I, I for some of you, I think

it is that simple. For others, there maybe is or

are deeper biological or, or psychological things happening

that either like, yeah, either intense therapy or maybe and in

some cases medication. I'm not, I'm not saying those

things aren't necessary, but I, I don't think they're necessary

in every instance. I I think for probably the

majority of us, there is some choosing here there there is

some choosing to not worry, some choosing to not be anxious, some

choosing gratitude, choosing joy, like choosing a glass half

full mentality of over a everyone's out to get me

mentality sort of things as it relates to our our mental and

emotional fitness in these things.

So I don't yeah, I don't want that to come out as harsh, but I

also, I think we also have more power over our minds and bodies

than we give our self credit for.

And I think God gave it to us like God gave us the ability to

choose to think on him to bring things to him even.

And that's what the rest of Philippians 46 says don't be

anxious, but instead of being anxious, instead of worrying, go

to God in prayer with Thanksgiving, go to him, let him

know what you need. Let your crust be made known to

God. I, I, I can't believe that if we

regularly in a disciplined fit way did that with all of our

worries and fears, I think we would worry less.

I just, I think we would. I am in 100% agreement.

And The thing is like God, God doesn't.

It's so nice that God doesn't prescribe something without an

answer, right, Right. OK, so you brought it out today.

It would have been, I would have found it highly entertaining if

you would have just been like, stop it and walk off the stage.

However, you wouldn't have been doing the Bible.

It's due service because it doesn't just say stop it and

leave you there as if it's a moral compass without also the

means to move you in the right direction.

So what's, what's part of the thing?

Well, part of the thing that we understand about addictive

behaviors. So maybe, and you wouldn't

necessarily always say it this way, but like some people have

addictive behaviors towards drama or towards finding crisis.

Some people have addictive behavior towards food.

Some people have addictive behavior, even towards feeling

down and depressed. And even towards fitness, I

would even physical fitness like could you could push that to an

extreme right, right, an unhealthy extreme.

You could go the wrong direction with that too.

OK, but here's the thing. The Bible tells us that in any

of these kind of addictive behaviors, or and psychologists

will tell you this too. You're not going to just ditch

that thing. No, it needs to be replaced.

So what you were just saying I think is spot on because I'm not

going to just like stop doing this negative thing and no, it

needs to be replaced with something.

Get filled with something. Else right and you've talked

about that before and so like let me fill that back up with

gratitude let me fill that back up with thankfulness I'm I'm

going to replace it I'm going to replace it and so.

You're so right. That's how the switch flips,

right? Exactly.

Feels hopeless. But if you're taking out this

destructive of thing, you're replacing it with good, pure,

perfect thing. From above, from from God.

That's how that begins to work. Right.

It's not just an absence of one thing.

And now there's nothing to fill the void.

We are switching, we're we're changing it out and and that's

so helpful. So I mean, you know, even for

me, like I'm not going to, if I need to, let's go back to

dietary habits. I'm not going to just stop

eating all together because that's stupid and I'm going to

harm myself. No, I just need to switch what I

was doing. I need to make a substitution.

So I'm going to substitute that thing that I maybe love a lot

was something that I can stand in is actually better for me.

Or I'm going to switch my social media time with maybe a podcast

where I learned something or a Bible app where I can like hear

something that's encouraging. So I'm just going to, I'm just

going to move some things around and find the better thing.

Yeah, no, I like that. Well said.

So yeah, that's kind of the mental emotional overview.

Psalm 16 and a similar passage in Nehemiah 8 emphasizes joy in

God's presence. We sing the song and that's in

some of the Psalms. The joy of the Lord is my

strength. And that's, and again, that's a

mental strength. That's that's a psychological

strength. If we've set our mind joyfully,

expectantly on, on God's goodness that that flips things.

I think I even saw, I, I saw this clip.

I watched too many stand up comedians to be honest with you,

but there's this one. He's not a Christian comic.

I can't even remember his name right now, but I definitely saw

he was, he was talking about a therapy session and, and his

crippling anxiety and he was just like, I had a breakthrough

last week, man. I was just like, man, what if I

just focused on one thing that I was like grateful for in my life

and I was changed the whole thing.

My brain was like, Oh yeah, life isn't so bad.

Here's some dopamine like, right, because because he, he,

he just, he made light of the fact that he was like, he was so

fixated on all the terrible things and that he'd switched

his mind to like the things that were good and fine and, and

right in his life and his outlook just kind of changed.

Like it just it did just kind of switch like.

Just a 180. Yep.

And isn't it funny that a secular comedian has found this

out? Quote UN quote, and the Bible's

been saying the same thing for thousands of years.

Didn't even need it from us, just even that God without the

spiritual aspect of it. If this guy isn't isn't a

believer like biologically God just created us that way when we

set our mind on good joyful things, our physical, biological

body just he is happier, right? Whatever is right and whatever

is true and whatever is lovely and on and on and on it goes.

Man, we really do have the power.

And again, it's not a Ted Talk, but we really do have the power

to change the way we're living in, to change our minds just by

simply making a small shift towards gratitude, towards

peace, towards things that are right.

And I mean, it's amazing. It is amazing how simple it is.

So the last kind of thing, and I didn't spend too much time on

spiritual fitness because I felt like that was a lot of the faith

week. Like we, we spent a lot of time

emphasizing faith fitness. If you want to, if you want to

go there. I did bring up the verse Hebrews

12/11. For the moment, all discipline

seems painful rather than pleasant, but later yields the

peaceful fruit of righteousness. I talked about how we don't we

don't experience the fruit of discipline ahead of the

discipline right. It it follows, it follows being

disciplined discipline upfront doesn't feel great.

It is that showing up to do the thing that's best for me, even

when I don't feel like I want to do it, just knowing that it's

best and doing it. That can be anything that can be

reading your Bible, that can be praying that can be going for a

walk that what do you want? The the question to ask would be

as it relates to discipline is, is tomorrow you going to be

happy with the choices that today you made as it relates to

any, any of these aspects, really any, anything in your

life. We're going to talk about

finances next week. Are is, is tomorrow you going to

be happy that you bought a boat today.

Like, I mean, think about it that way.

Like, I don't know, so. I don't know if tomorrow me

wants that payment. That's what I'm saying, yeah.

Like is is how's tomorrow? You going to view the choice

that you made today. That's that's discipline in a

nutshell. And it and yes, very difficult

to discern that in the moment. We much more readily feel the

hurt and pain of a wrong decision later, after, after

we've already made it. Then do we have the foresight to

be like, no, this isn't I can see right now this isn't going

to be good. So I'm not, I'm not saying that

simple, but just things to consider because we also like to

rush into things. We're very impulsive.

We like, we like immediate gratification.

That's why discipline is so hard because we want, we want the

results now. We we don't want to put in the

work to do the discipline forever.

So anyway, that's, that's the spiritual fitness.

You can go back and listen to the faith message from a couple

weeks ago for some more specifics on that.

But the final kind of concluding thought, and this is what we're

going to wrap up with here. I'd I found immense peace and

this was this was one of the verses that we had planned out

months ago when we were setting up this series, First

Thessalonians 523 and 24. May the God of peace himself

sanctify you completely. May your whole spirit and soul

and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus

Christ in all of these things. I, I am, we are suggesting it as

a response of godly holy, honoring Christian living.

Yes, we are. But it's still in God's strength

that it happens, right? It's it's not, it's not on you

to do alone. I would encourage you.

We've already talked about it community with others.

So, so absolutely and get some accountability from someone,

tackle one of these things together and don't do it all at

once. Honestly, it that's, that's

going to get if, if everything I talked, I talked about the

destroy of the jars and, and filling them with God's blessing

and 2nd Kings 4. Don't attack all of them at

once. Yes, God's blessing and

provision is there, but that's going to feel pretty

overwhelming if you, if you have deficits, if you have debts in

these areas of your life, tackle one.

And you know what, the second domino that falls it's, it's

going to be a little simpler than the first one.

And the third one's going to be simpler than the second one.

Like just fixate on, on one aspect and bring health,

Wellness, fitness to that or refine it.

I was, I was talking with someone else after and he's like

even talking about the discipline thing.

Even if you've got this thing in control, can can you can you

Polish the rock more? He kind of ran with the running

up the score analogy like is it is it really finished?

Is is the project really done? No, they can you can probably

bring some more shine out in that.

You can probably bring more. And that's where the running up

the score would bring more glory to to Jesus.

So even if there's areas that you feel like you got it, I've

got this sorted. I'm in a really good place with

this. OK, Razor focus that a little

more. I said razor focus.

It's laser focus. That's fine, they're both.

Sharp. They're both sharp and pointed

and they're spot on. But by the way, Speaking of that

illustration you gave of running up the score, I found that.

So I really enjoyed that because of what you said about it, which

was the game is actually already over the score.

The score is so lopsided already that you can't lose.

OK, so Jesus has already won the game for me.

So then how then do I run up the score?

Gosh, I think you named it really well.

I love like the idea of running up the score by bringing other

people with me and and by just rejoicing and reacting to the

already one game. I think that is so cool and that

is just such a good picture of the gospel and how that Jesus is

already he's already done it. So now we can respond enjoying

and freedom and and well done. I just I love that.

I thought it was really good. Well, you said, you said that in

a great way too. Thanks for that.

No, it's it was great. Glad you got that out of it.

Hopefully gave you some things to chew on and and be challenged

with church. We're always here, of course,

throughout the week, if, if you have some more convicting or

compelling conversations, we're here to help you through that

too. If you need to talk through some

of these things. This isn't a take it or leave it

sort of thing. We're we're in a relational

church as well. So of course, open to having in

person conversations with you. Hopefully this podcast was

helpful for some more thoughts and more specifics for from us

as well. But thanks for listening in.

Have a blessed week.