03: Heart - From Self-Expression to Real Identity

Good afternoon, Church.

Hear now the word of the true and living God, Matthew 16, starting in verse 24.

Then Jesus told his disciples, If any one would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?

Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.

Truly I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.

This is the word of the Lord.

Please be seated.

Welcome, each and every one of you.

There's like 15 of us here, so it feels very strange to be sitting on a stage like this, but it's not awkward if you don't mention it.

Welcome to church.

My name's James.

I'm the pastor here at Redemption.

Uh thanks for joining us this afternoon.

Uh we have a TV now, uh, so we're megachurch.

Um before we get started into the text, into our series, a couple of quick announcements.

Redemption groups have started, but it is not too late to get in one.

So if you would like to join one of our redemption groups, then uh you can do that through the app or through the website, just tap connect uh or groups.

So uh those are available.

Those just meet in each other's homes throughout the week.

Um and with that, let's go ahead and pray and jump into our sermon for the day.

Father, I pray that you would join us in this space.

Lord, would you move in our hearts and would you make yourself known and real to us?

Father, I pray that you would create in us hearts that are after your heart.

Lord, that's not something we can create ourselves, but it's something that you freely give.

Lord, would you move in us and would you apply your text today to our hearts so that we might see our lives through new eyes and see you more gloriously?

Lift us up in Jesus' name.

Amen.

So, welcome to church.

Uh, we are in our third week of our series that we're moving through this fall called Redemption Applied.

And the purpose of this series is to sort of take our theological perspective and say, how are we making this actually real in our congregation and then in our lives in our city?

So it's a series that takes place in three parts.

There's a part on the transformation of our hearts, a part on the transformation of our community or our church, and a part on the transformation of our city.

And it moves in that direction, we expect, which is that our hearts change, and as our hearts change, we get drawn together in community, and then like a city on a hill, the light spreads everywhere.

Uh so that's the picture that we're developing.

Last week we saw how the transformation of our hearts means nothing less than being born again.

So that means we actually become something new by our faith in Christ.

We are a new creation in Jesus.

Now, that's different from just having a set of facts that we now incorporate into our life.

Oftentimes Christianity is posed that way, where it's here's this list of bullet points, and you take these bullet points and you incorporate them into your life.

While that step is true, and that does really happen, the problem is when you incorporate something as foundationally shifting as God became a man and then he died, and now you can live with him.

Well, that type of fact can't just be brought into your life without changing everything else.

Um let me get a come on, amen.

Here, yeah, there we go.

We're gonna need some energy in here because uh you guys are gonna have to play the part of a larger congregation.

The uh uh so uh what we're gonna do, in fact, to make this work, where this is just gonna be a much more classroom style environment.

It's gonna be a lot of preaching, but I'm going to ask very direct questions because I look out and I know all of you, and you all know the answers.

So uh to begin with, so that's the difference between being born again and mere ascent.

Does that make sense?

Yes, great.

So as we're uh the problem is then, as we're gonna continue moving in how our heart transforms.

The issue is the gospel is something that's so novel, it's so unique, so utterly unlike anything else.

It's is it sui genere or sui generis?

Sui generis.

Is it Gaston or the uh sorry, I asked you, you helped me, and I turned on you immediately.

It has its own genre, and that means that it can't really be compared to anything else.

It can be something that's frustrating to study because you're always wanting to say, well, the gospel is like this thing, but there it has no analogy.

It is its own thing.

And so the problem with something so novel is that we're always sliding the gospel into some category that we already had that the gospel simply doesn't fit.

And we typically do this with two distinct categories.

We do this with legalism on the one hand, and with a sort of cheap grace on the other hand.

So these are the two pitfalls that we typically fall in.

So what is uh what are what are those, what do those words mean?

So legalism or uh uh religiosity or just religion, that is one category that we typically fall into.

And what that category says is I am the one who is able to earn my salvation before the Lord.

So what religion means is there's a set of rules and it's like a ladder that I can climb.

And if I become proficient at these rules, I'll be able to climb my way towards the Lord.

And this is more typical, you would uh expect, of like a conservative type of church.

If you grew up in a conservative church or a fundamentalist type of church, we develop a lot of rules and a lot of metrics that allow us to determine whether or not we're progressing in our own march up towards the Lord.

So uh both conservatives and liberals, uh, we say just liberals do this, but conservatives do this too.

But I could say uh liberals are always saying that all religions are the same, and they all teach the same things, that you just need to love each other and accept others and accept yourself and do no harm.

Uh, conservatives love to say that liberals are always saying that.

But conservatives collapse all religions into being the same thing too.

We just pick a different set of values.

We say all religions basically teach the same thing.

It's to take care of your family, it's to work hard, it's to you know make sure that you're own or cared for.

We do the same thing, just with different sets of values.

Um yeah.

We all think we're conservative and liberal by choice.

We're probably just publicly taking personality tests.

So that's religion on the one hand.

The other side of that would be irreligion, uh, which is that which is a complete ignoring of God or as anything that could add meaning to your life.

So irreligion or sort of cheap grace might describe the gospel like this: that Jesus died for our sins, and that becomes a sort of card that we use to say, so nothing in our life really matters.

So Jesus died for my sins, therefore I'm covered, it's clean, there's no real repentance required, there's no real heart change required, all that's required is that I know that Jesus died for my sins.

And when you're teaching something like the gospel, you can see how these ditches are always, you know, on either side of the road.

Because the gospel teaches that you are saved completely by grace alone.

Completely.

That Jesus accomplished 100% of what is required of you to be made right with God.

And when we really get that, it's easy for us to slip into this category of, okay, then nothing really matters of what I do into this cheap grace.

But then we understand that, but in Jesus' salvation, he gives us a whole new heart.

And we have become and are becoming a new creation.

And therefore, we must see real life change taking place to have any sort of confidence that we really are saved.

And you can see how that would that tendency would be always pushing us towards this sort of legalism, this I want to take my salvation into my own hands so that I know that it's a real thing.

Now, here's the difference, or excuse me, here's what's the same about these.

These are two different pitfalls, which are le uh religion or irreligion, legalism or cheap grace, but they're more like opposite sides of the same coin.

They are opposites of each other, but they are not opposites of the gospel.

The gospel is pseudo generis.

I'm just gonna keep butchering it because I don't know how to say it.

The gospel is its own genre, it's its own thing.

So, how can these be opposites and yet have the same basic root?

You see, one, the cheap grace, the irreligion, says, you know, Jesus doesn't really need to save us because we're we're not that bad anyway.

The other religion says, well, Jesus doesn't really save us because there's all these other things that we have to do in order to earn our salvation.

And both of them are wanting to say something like, God is either just or God is merciful.

Cheap grace is wanting to say, look, he's merciful.

We know that God is merciful because of the cross.

And so it doesn't really matter how I'm living.

Uh whereas a religious approach is saying, look, we know that God is just, we know that he has real demands on our life.

They could even say, because look at the cross, he had to die.

But at the root of our ignoring of both of these is saying to God, we don't need you in order to be saved.

Both at their hearts are saying to God, fulfillment, ultimate satisfaction, meaning, all of these things I can accomplish on my own.

The irreligious person says, I can accomplish this by the things that are in the world.

I can ignore you and I can garner my own satisfaction better through the things that are in the world, through my job, through partying, through, you know, the irreligious person you can sort of caricature like licentiously living.

And the religious person is saying to God, you know what?

It's not you that ultimately brings me satisfaction.

It's still the things that you can get me, and I can make you give me those things.

And the way that I make you give me those things is I do everything you tell me to.

I'll follow all your rules.

And you know why?

Because that will afford me some status.

I'll be kind to the right people in public.

I'll live I'll fold into this sort of culture that you've described that the church should live into.

And God becomes the means to the real end that the person is trying to afford themselves.

They both deny God's kingship.

They both say to God, I don't need you, I will be God of me.

Do you see that connection there?

Any questions?

Right.

For real?

Right.

So, how is it that we experience these pitfalls?

Look, these take place in every culture throughout all time and all of history.

These are conditions of the human heart.

But uh, you're not going to be like walking around in Denver, hopping your e-scooter from Galvanize over to the new speakeasy at the top of your favorite bouldering problem.

And hear someone saying, like, I'm I'm finding satisfaction by living irreligiously.

Or I'm really seeking my satisfaction by appeasing God so that He must give me all that I need.

No.

Uh that type of language doesn't really make much sense.

And so uh what we're I want us to get the concept and then see here's how we actually experience it.

This week we're just focusing on the irreligious side.

But it's important to know that this irreligious side is uh uh the way that we experience these is not an all or nothing sort of thing.

Both of these take place in your heart in different ways.

Both of these are always existing in you at the same time, simultaneously, but some in varying degrees, but sometimes in different categories in your life.

So you may have a very religious approach to your work, you may have a very irreligious approach to your rest, for example.

So, although both of these are in us, and that's important to know, to today we're just focusing on this irreligious side of the spectrum.

How is it that we ignore God by saying we can find satisfaction without Him?

That the gospel means that we don't really have to change?

That the gospel means I just get a get out of jail free card and I can live however I'd like.

Well, the way that uh I think the language that this often comes up in our culture is the language of self-expression.

Uh and having kind of living in such a way where we are able to authentically and genuinely express ourselves.

That is the height of uh uh that's sort of the height of meaning in our culture.

There's no better way that we could live than to live a life where we look back on our deathbed and we say, I really was me the whole time.

Now that's that's the value structure.

That's what we are worshiping in our culture.

And so nobody's saying like I'm living irreligiously.

What we're saying is it irreligious doesn't really make sense for us because there's we don't really consider religion often.

I think that's most true of Denver.

Religion is not on the radar, but we are living in a way that says I'm going to express the real me.

And that's what's important.

To live a life that expresses the real you.

So we want to move from this as our background assumption of what meaning is, which is authentic self-expression.

We want to move from that to what does it mean to have a real identity?

So the way that we're going to uh, so these are important things to work through, and they're they both involve paradoxes.

So the first thing that we're going to look at is what do what is this paradox of self-expression, and how does that result in kind of a self-defeating project as we authentically try and express ourselves.

Then we're going to look at the paradox of how we receive our identity in Christ.

Both are paradoxical.

Um so they don't have that on each other.

But one leads to a real identity.

Okay, so first let's get our terms.

So uh self-expression.

We're talking about it in purely negative terms today, so I'm sorry.

But self-expression, it's hard to wrap our heads around as a bad thing, as a pitfall of the gospel, because it seems so self-evidently good that someone would be authentically expressing who they are.

Like, I don't think anybody's walking around in the world and thinking, like, man, you there's too much authenticity.

People are being too real.

I feel like I've been able to get to know people, who they really are, too easily.

Nobody's frustrated by that.

You know, it's like we aren't scrolling through each other's Instagrams thinking, like, man, I gotta pray for them.

I scroll through your Instagrams and I think, I gotta pray for me.

Because they seem fine.

I scroll through my own wife's Instagram and I'm like, I want that life.

And that like is my life, but that's not my life.

That's Instagram.

So it seems so self-evidently good, and it you if there's one unquestioned ethic of our age, it's follow your heart, be yourself.

You know, you need to get in touch with who you really are, and you need to pursue that.

And you can't let all these external structures get in the way of you expressing who you really are.

As Christians, we would even say, like, who you were really made to be.

And that's just an unquestioned ethic.

Nobody says, yeah, but should you really?

No, we just take that for granted completely.

But it's important to see that this wasn't always the case.

So in the 17th and 18th century, we start to see a transition where this culture becomes more appropriate, uh becomes uh more normalized.

And so we see it, uh, one way to see that is uh this is where the autobiography becomes a real category of things.

So Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, uh, Rousseau's meditations, he's just sitting in a room and he's exploring who he really is, his internal life, what existence means based on him.

So this as a genre starts to, as a jammerie, starts to uh uh starts to grow in the world.

And the uh uh that that growth of autobiography is pointing towards something that's more fundamental that's happening in the culture.

Uh and this more fundamental shift is a shift from a culture of sincerity to a culture of authenticity.

So here's the way this is described in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which, if you ever get a philosophy major, um, this is how you cheat.

So uh it says uh during this period, human beings came to be thought of more as individuals than as placeholders in systems of social relations.

So the culture of sincerity is this position where you are a placeholder in a highly structured social situation.

So you can see this in so what it means to be a sincere person is if you're the cook, then you be the cook.

And you don't try and act like you're the candlemaker, and you don't try and act like you're the uh butcher, you just act like you're the cook.

And to be a sincere person means you you wake up, you know your role, you know who you are in the society, and you you sincerely live according to that role.

That's what it means to be an honorable, sincere person.

And you can see this, these identities tied to the roles that we fill in society just reflected in like some very common last names.

So if you were a Smith, then uh you your last name might be Smith, or if you were a cook, your last name might be, I can't remember that one.

And if you were a uh uh yeah, if you were a baker, then your last name might be Baker.

We hear these all over the place.

And it's a reflection of who you are sincerely.

To be a sincere person means you adhere to that construct.

If you worked in a quarry, for example, your last name might be Flintstone.

You all loved it.

So as society shifts from this interacting whole and it becomes more founded on the individual, then we shift in our values as well.

And we start saying, you know, we have these rich internal lives, and this structure that we're in, it's not liberating, it's oppressive.

And we start to make this shift.

Now, there's a lot of positives to this shift that we make towards the culture of authenticity.

We see uh, you know, simultaneous with this transition, we become far more innovative than history had ever become.

And that's because as it turns out, some coal miners should be rocket scientists.

And the only way you find that out is when there's a someone who's a coal miner and they're like, you know what?

I'm a rocket scientist, and I don't care what my family says, I'm gonna build rockets.

Yes.

Yeah, I'm referencing October Sky.

Uh as so there's no, I've never heard of that movie.

Um the uh so it's good when we get those uh types of people to kind of argue for the things that they are legitimately good at.

And then those things take place in the world.

So we get these incredible innovators that are all of a sudden freed up to be innovators, and we've all benefited from that.

So there's this huge leap forward, simultaneously with this age of authenticity, but that's not without some losses.

Because one thing that we lose from the age of sincerity is this certainty of who you are.

You get to know that you're the baker, you get to know that you're the cook, you get to know your role in society, and you get to know, look, this is who I am.

And it might be terrible, it might be terrible.

In fact, it often was terrible.

But at least you got to know.

And right now, what do we have to do to know if we're doing the right work, if we're doing the work that really lines up with exactly who we are?

We have to make these terrible free solo attempts up our own passions and try and discover from the inside out, I'm, oh man, as it turns out, I I really am a, I don't know, whatever it is we do now.

I was I was born to paint.

I was born to make ads.

I was born to do customer retention.

So we have this incredible pressure to discover something in us and then make that align with something outside of us.

And that begs this question constantly.

Who am I really being me?

Is the world that I'm in just constantly taking away from what I'm meant to be, or am I really freed up to be me in this place?

And so we get this overlap of the ages where the age of authenticity is also described as the age of anxiety.

And I think they go hand in hand because we no longer are told who we are.

So here's the paradox of self-expression.

Here's the way that it's supposed to play out in our hearts.

What we're in what we're supposed to do in order to be able to express ourselves authentically in the world, is it starts with a journey inward.

And you look inside and you see this is really me, this is my true self.

And then it it's a journey outward because it's expression, right?

So then you look out in the world and you have to find the categories that allow you to best express what's really in here.

Now the now, if you are lucky enough or fortune or uh, I don't know, if you're lucky enough, rich enough, if you happen to have the means to look inside and then look outside and say, oh, I can actually plug myself into that category.

Now you'd better not lose that category.

Because look at the weight that you've just given it.

If you look inside and you realize, man, I really am an investment banker, and you're able to work your life and you're able to get yourself into that position, but you better not lose it.

Because that's doing all the spiritual work in your life.

It's holding up your very identity.

It is being you.

I read this article in The Atlantic this past week.

Um, and it was it's the 25th anniversary of Friends.

Uh and this article was about Chandler Bing's job.

So Friends was a show.

It was on 25 years ago.

Don't have to explain that.

Chandler Bing is a character on Friends, and a running joke throughout the whole show is nobody knows what Chandler's job is.

So people uh are always asking, what is Chandler's job?

He inputs numbers, he does something, but he's the only one that doesn't have like a job that's spiritually fulfilling.

And what the person writing the article says is ultimately the show can't sustain it.

They have to give him a golden shining moment where he says, you know what, I'm not going to do this soul-sucking job anymore.

I'm going to cut out and do what I really am called to do and what I really want to do.

And so he goes and becomes uh a creative and working for an ad agency.

And it's like, wow, Chandler finally got through to who he was really supposed to be.

The lady writing the article, her name is uh Megan Garber, and she she describes this as an expression of what she says is this type of pseudo-religion called work-ism.

And she says it like this: she says, work-ism, it is the belief that work is not only necessary to economic production, but also the centerpiece, centerpiece of one's identity and life's purpose.

And the belief that any policy to promote human welfare must always encourage more work.

So do you see this paradox of self-expression is that it returns to the age of sincerity.

I looked into myself.

I had to find this right thing that really defined me.

Then what was still doing the work, well, as we've structured things, it's still your job.

That's responsible for bringing all this definition into your life, all these answers to these questions of who am I?

What really makes me me?

And so when you look out there, it uh of course it's an anxious time.

Because our work is just having to do too much.

It's having to explain too much of who we are.

So, why is this your religion?

Why is this paradox of self-expression?

Why are we describing this as something that's irreligious, something that's cheap grace?

The reason is because it uses everything but God to provide what only God can provide.

You could swap everything or anything, depending on the mood you're in.

If you're more of an optimist, you can use anything.

Uses anything but God to provide what only God can provide.

And what is this thing that only God can provide?

It's real identity.

Real answers to this question, who am I?

So Jesus approaches this and he approaches it by introducing another paradox.

He raises us one paradox.

So let's go ahead and jump into our text for the first time today.

We're going to look at how the paradox that Jesus introduces counters and perfectly addresses the paradox of self-expression, the paradox of our age.

So in Matthew 16, 24 through 25, it says, Then Jesus told his disciples, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

So that's probably a familiar verse.

You've heard something like that before.

Uh, but let's put it in a bit more of context.

So each of the synoptic gospels have the same turning point.

And that turning point is Peter's confession that Jesus is Lord and Christ.

So Jesus is asking them, who does everybody say that I am?

And they're like, they think you're a great prophet.

Some think you're John the Baptist raised from the dead, some think you're Elijah.

Um then Jesus says, Who do you say that I am?

And Peter says, You are Lord and Christ, the Son of God.

So this is an incredible uh confession.

And Jesus says, only God could have shown this to you.

So finally, for the first time in the Gospels, for the first time in every gospel, someone in the story says accurately who Jesus is.

And who is he?

He's the king.

He is the God man, he's the son of God, Lord and Christ.

Somebody finally announces who he is.

So what happens here after Peter's confession is the narrative shifts towards this march to Jerusalem.

And right after it's confessed who Jesus is, Jesus now starts telling his disciples, we're going to Jerusalem and I'm going to be crucified.

That's the journey that we're on.

Now that you know who I am, what I'm doing is I'm going to be crucified in Jerusalem.

And so he describes his discipleship in terms of what his mission is.

I'm going, I'm going to carry a cross, I'm going to be crucified.

That's called spiritual warfare.

And I'm going to be crucified, and he describes, he lays out his mission exactly after this.

So here's what's wild to see.

Who is more free than a king?

Kings are archetypes of freedom.

Whatever they say happens.

Whatever they desire, they receive.

Whatever they want in their life, they are given.

And so Jesus is just identified as the king of kings, the one who could search his soul and then express himself perfectly in the world so that he might be fulfilled.

And then what is his mission now that we know this role?

It's to die.

So put this in that matrix of how we're supposed to live authentically.

You search within yourself.

So Jesus searches within himself and he says, I'm the King of Kings, I'm Lord of Lords.

So how would I express that in the world?

Well, I'm going to be crucified like a criminal.

This is a very strange, authentic self-expression.

Put that in the matrix of your own life.

Turn inward.

Who am I?

Who am I really?

I bet you didn't think criminal.

I bet you didn't think, you know, if I'm going to really express what's in me, if I'm going to be fulfilled by self-expression, I'm probably going to have to turn myself in and find a way onto death row.

Because that's the only way to really make real what's happening in here.

And so Jesus is moving in that way, and then he's saying, uh, if we could pull up that last scripture, then he's saying, if anyone would come after me, you are called to die in this same way.

If you are going to find your life, you need to lose your ability to express it.

So we've found ourselves another paradox.

Jesus says, if anyone would come after me, you have to pick up your cross just like him.

You have to die just like him.

And if you lose your life, then you'll find it.

Okay, so how can this be?

What is Jesus doing here?

Now, it may feel like, okay, is Jesus just making another move towards this type of sincerity?

Right?

Where Jesus is now this external force who's coming to you and he's saying, look, it you just live within the confines that I'm giving you.

And if you live within these confines, then you'll get to really live.

Then I'll bring you your definition and I'll tell you who you are.

Now, the reason that that doesn't actually translate onto what Jesus is doing is because, as you know, as you might have noticed before, there's no place that you can turn when you're exploring your identity that doesn't require you to move out of yourself.

Our identity is not something that's meant to be discovered from within.

Our identity is something that's meant to be received.

So, do you remember this?

Do you remember right before you were born when you were deciding whether or not to exist, and you were deciding what color hair you were going to be, and when you would stop growing and what height you would be?

Right.

You don't remember that, right?

Because none of us did that.

Because even just this thing that we are is something that was just received.

All that we have in this life is just a gift.

Our first identity, the one that we would just like to express, was just received.

So then why can Jesus come say, die, and then you'll live again?

What Jesus is saying is that identity that you are trying to make for yourself in the world.

That identity in which you're using everything except your creator to establish.

That identity has to die.

The thing that says, what am I most fundamentally?

Well, I know I'm most fundamentally a baker.

And that has to die.

What are you most fundamentally?

That belongs to Jesus.

So when we come and we die for Jesus' sake, that is the only time that we actually receive who we really are.

So here's one of the crazy things about scripture is scripture says that there is a real you.

I know many of you, I I didn't for years think that was true.

And my life reflected it.

It's because any conversation that I was having with someone, it was, it, I was so, I, quite frankly, I was I was so easy to take advantage of.

Because I would just buy in to whatever.

Sure, that's probably right.

You're probably right.

There was no me.

I had no concept that there was a me that existed in the world.

Until I started to piece this together, until the Lord started to reveal this to me, that that thing that I thought was most me, that thing that I had made to be able to look at and say, I know I'm a real person, until God said, that has to die.

And that has to die because that's not what's lovely about you.

What's lovely about you to me, God, is you.

Does that make sense?

Jesus continues, he says, for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?

Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

Jesus is assuming this incredible value of you.

He's saying, look, you could get everything.

The whole world, all of it, all those things that you think would bring you meaning.

And if it cost you your soul, what would be there?

So what is this death that Jesus is calling us to do daily?

How does it feel?

How is it experienced in our life?

Well, there's this you that you've made to bring your self-identity.

This death is the constant experience of killing that.

One of the ways that happens is repentance.

There's the you that really has things together and is really caring for yourself and, or excuse me, and is really to you know, taking uh uh who really who really has their life together, and then but you know what you also have?

You also have a secret porn collection.

And no one knows about it, so it doesn't really affect your life, right?

So what does it mean to die?

It means the person who has it all together has to start living as who they really are.

And repenting to someone.

Saying, look, how am I really doing?

Here's how I'm really doing.

You see how the the death, the the death of the pursuit of authenticity, what does it lead you into?

Real authenticity, actual genuineness.

But that's only possible when we're dying for Jesus' sake.

Why is that?

Because Jesus calls us to follow him in the death.

He is the one who is carrying the cross.

And why is he carrying the cross?

For us, not for the person that you have created.

That is a life that is justified.

He's carrying it for you, for the real you, for who you actually are.

And he knows who that is because he's the one who made it.

So a life that dies for him will look like a real life.

If you were to meet somebody who would completely who who is like, wow, you really you're dying constantly.

We wouldn't meet someone in what in we wouldn't leave the conversation thinking like, wow, they were a bummer.

We'd probably leave the conversation thinking, man, they they seemed just completely comfortable with themselves.

How can that be?

How could that person have been seemed like such a whole person?

Like when I contradicted them in a conversation, they weren't crushed.

When I said something foolish, they just said that it was foolish, but it still seemed fine, still seemed like we were just fine.

This is the type of whole life, the type of living, type of real life that Jesus is calling us to when he calls us to die.

So I'd mentioned that uh autobiography started to really spike uh in the 17th and 18th century, but there was a first.

There was a first autobiography, and it was written by uh uh St.

Augustine, and it's called the Confessions.

Um, like a And he begins with this prayer.

And the whole thing is basically a prayer.

And he says this.

He says, You have made us for yourself.

And our heart is restless until it rests in you.

How do you rest in him?

We want to see this take place in our church in really practical ways.

We rest in him by not resting in the opinions of others.

We rest in him by not resting our identity on our career.

We rest in him by honestly scanning our lives and seeing what is it that is giving me the most feedback about myself.

That's a weakness.

We address it by saying, you know who really defines me?

It's Jesus.

Think of what this would look like just simply in terms of like fear of missing out.

When we're resting in Jesus, we know that we can never miss out.

We're never going to experience something and be like, man, if I had had that experience, then it would have made me this new type of thing.

No, Jesus is the one who makes you.

This is utterly transformative.

All right.

Let's take some questions.

See if there are any questions in this week's text.

So if we are following God and sincerely believing in the people he made us, then is it wrong to follow the path that you believe is right for you?

Okay.

We are following God and sincerely believing in the people he made us, like the like the person he made us to be, probably, then is it wrong to follow the path that you believe is right for you?

No, it it's it's certainly not wrong to follow the path that you believe is right for you.

The issue is that we we typically the things that I hear from people or the types of fears that I hear are uh like, man, I just don't know if I'm on the right path.

I don't know if I'm in the place that God wants me to be.

Like I feel like I've jumped shipped somewhere or I've marginally missed it.

And that's not the way that we're called to be living by faith in God.

Um it's it's not a matter of like, okay, I know that I am obediently right where uh right in the career that He wants me to be in.

In just the same way, because we know that God is providentially in control, the external factors that are shaping us are to be received by faith.

So you're given certain opportunities and you're not given to others.

You're married to someone and you're not married to a bunch of other people.

At least not happily.

You uh uh uh you have certain gifts and certain talents that are useful and and others that you would just be a it would be a waste of time for you to pursue.

And so uh the problem is uh I'm reading a book this week.

Um uh the book The Right Stuff by uh Tom Wolfe about the astronauts.

And they're so they're so just like achingly cool, all of them.

It's shocking how cool they are.

They drive fast airplanes and fast cars, and uh and I and so I literally like this week I was like, I gotta get a motorcycle.

Because who am I?

My life has none of this adventure, it has none of this, you know, whatever.

And so I was talking to my wife, and she was like, You've you've got a kid, and we live like in the city.

This is not safe, this is a bad idea.

If any of you have good counter arguments, please email her.

But what was what needed what did I need to do?

I needed to step back and say, look, I've been given this life.

The Lord has set his boundaries for me.

So what do you do?

You mourn the life you don't have, and then you return freely to the one that God has given you, and you receive it with gratitude.

So you kill that life you don't have.

And you say, I'm gonna live the one that you've given me.

Because this is completely a gift.

Does that make sense?

Does that get at the question?

I hope.

Okay.

Uh after this, we're going to take communion.

This is a great opportunity to consider what could I confess that would be this act of death, trusting that Jesus really did die for me, so he will bring me to life on the other side of this.

And consider what would it look like to live as though Jesus was the true source of your identity this week?

What would that really what conversations would you not avoid, but you'd move into?

What have you not been saying?

What have you been saying to yourself that you need to stop saying?

So let's consider that while we pray.

And then let's celebrate at the table that Jesus knows exactly who we really are.

Sin and all.

And he went to the cross, he went to Jerusalem, completely laid down his freedom that we might be free in him.

Father, we praise you for the glories of your gospel and how they can be worked into our hearts in these amazing, glorious ways.

Lord, would you repaint the way that we approach our lives, the ways that we ask ourselves questions and the conversations that we have with others?

Lord, would you take real stock of our fears?

Would you help us trace those down to see what is it that I'm not believing about who God made me, about what He's done for me in Christ?

Father, would you consider what are the things I'm not repenting of?

How could I die to that as an act of faith that you will bring us to life on the other side?

Father, we praise you for the freedom that we can walk in in Christ.

And we lift this up in Jesus' name.

Amen.