SPEAKER_00: Johnny Cash song today in church, right?
SPEAKER_00: Um, for those of you who are under the age of 30, that was just Johnny Cash, and it was part of a song called Hurt.
SPEAKER_00: It's one of Johnny Cash's last songs he ever sung.
SPEAKER_00: It was recorded in 2002 when Johnny Cash was 71 years old, and eight months after he finished recording this music video, he passed away into eternity.
SPEAKER_00: It's reported that his daughter was on set, and on the final day of shooting, she says to him, Dad, it sounds like you're saying goodbye.
SPEAKER_00: And reportedly he said, That's because I am.
SPEAKER_00: When he sings that line, and you could have it all, my empire of dirt.
SPEAKER_00: It's a it's a reckoning on his life, which is a surprise because, in all conceivable measurements, he had it all.
SPEAKER_00: Johnny Cash sold over 90 million records.
SPEAKER_00: One of the most recognizable musicians in all the world.
SPEAKER_00: He had wealth, influence, fame, and an empire that most people can only ever dream about.
SPEAKER_00: People to this day, 20 years after his death, still visit museums to hear the story of his life, still buy his records.
SPEAKER_00: But by the time he reached the end of his life, standing at the edge of eternity and looking back on everything that he had built and done and everything he accomplished, he called it an empire of dirt.
SPEAKER_00: I want to ask us something.
SPEAKER_00: Why does that line just hit so hard?
SPEAKER_00: Why does a song like Hurt really it just stops people in their tracks and makes them consider?
SPEAKER_00: I think it's because deep down all of us are afraid of that.
SPEAKER_00: All of us are afraid of living a life and working and toiling and saving and scrimping and working and achieving and getting and getting and more and more and more.
SPEAKER_00: And by the time we reach the end of our life, looking around and realizing I've wasted my life.
SPEAKER_00: That's what a lot of us are afraid of.
SPEAKER_00: Does my life matter?
SPEAKER_00: Is anything that I'm doing, is it is it worth anything?
SPEAKER_00: Is my life more than what I have or I haven't accomplished?
SPEAKER_00: Is there anything out there that makes this all mean something?
SPEAKER_00: Those are not modern questions.
SPEAKER_00: Those aren't Johnny Cash questions.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, those are some of the oldest questions that humanity has been able to ask themselves since our beginning.
SPEAKER_00: And did you know that there was a character in the Bible that wrestled with those questions too?
SPEAKER_00: 3,000 years ago, there was a king in Israel who looked like he had it all.
SPEAKER_00: A king who had more wealth and more power and more influence, more achievements than anyone before him or even after him.
SPEAKER_00: His name is Solomon.
SPEAKER_00: You might know him as the wise king, the king who built the temple.
SPEAKER_00: But the book that he wrote at the end of his life is the story of a man who tried everything that the world had to offer him and how he came back up with empty hands.
SPEAKER_00: It took him until the end of his life for him to find his purpose, his significance, the reason why he was here.
SPEAKER_00: By the time he reached it, though, it was too late for him.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not too late for you.
SPEAKER_00: Because you can know that your purpose is never found in what you do, it's found in who made you.
SPEAKER_00: Open up to 1 Kings chapter 11 because this is where we're going to get started.
SPEAKER_00: As you're turning there, though, in 1 Kings 11, uh, just a little context on who Solomon was and why his story matters.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon is the son of David.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that David, the David and Goliath, David, the David, we heard a great message last week about how he lived a life of genuine repentance.
SPEAKER_00: That David.
SPEAKER_00: And he was next in line to be the king of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And even before, even before the crown got placed on his head, God appeared to him one night in 1 Kings chapter 4.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to turn there, but uh it says that because of the favor that David had with the Lord, the Lord appeared to his son and said, Solomon, you can have anything you want, anything you ask for, no strings attached.
SPEAKER_00: Like imagine that.
SPEAKER_00: It's not like a genie situation or like a monkey's paw type of thing.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: It's like you can ask for anything you want.
SPEAKER_00: What would you ask for?
SPEAKER_00: Some people would say, I want a new car, I want the Tesla.
SPEAKER_00: Some people would say, I want a billion dollars.
SPEAKER_00: Pastor Nate would probably say, I want to be six inches taller, I want to be a big boy, all right?
SPEAKER_00: But what did he ask for, right?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: But what did he ask for?
SPEAKER_00: He asked for wisdom, the ability to apply knowledge.
SPEAKER_00: And God was pleased with that request, so he gave him wisdom beyond anybody who had ever lived.
SPEAKER_00: And what follows from that is one of the most remarkable reigns in the history of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: It's just incredible that Solomon was able to build the temple, the permanent dwelling place of God's presence in the nation of Israel, something that David could only dream about.
SPEAKER_00: He wasn't able to do it, but Solomon was.
SPEAKER_00: He established trade routes and made Israel a power, a superpower in the Middle East of those times.
SPEAKER_00: Did you know that in Solomon's reign, the borders of Israel expanded to a point where they have never been before or since, 3,000 years later, they have never been bigger than in the time of Solomon.
SPEAKER_00: He established trade routes, and there was an economic powerhouse in Israel now.
SPEAKER_00: It says that silver and gold were like common as stones in those days.
SPEAKER_00: Because of his wisdom, people from all over the known world would come and sit at Solomon's feet just to hear him talk, just to hear his wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: His name and his fame had spread around the world.
SPEAKER_00: By every measurable standard, he had it all too.
SPEAKER_00: But even with it all, with more money and power and influence than you or I or anybody else will probably ever have.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of his life, Solomon said, I wasted it.
SPEAKER_00: I wasted my life.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon is one of the most tragic figures in all of the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: Let's find out why today.
SPEAKER_00: Because in 1 Kings chapter 11, we see that the world's answers will always leave you empty.
SPEAKER_00: We follow Solomon's story.
SPEAKER_00: From 1 Kings chapter 1, all the way through chapter 10, we learn and we read about everything that we've talked about to this point, about how he climbed higher and higher and higher, how he's done so many things.
SPEAKER_00: He had building projects, he he brought in so much for Israel.
SPEAKER_00: His name was known around the world, really.
SPEAKER_00: But in 1 Kings chapter 11, in one singular verse, it all starts to come crashing down.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse one.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says King Solomon loved many foreign women.
SPEAKER_00: And that's how it starts.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a moment of big failure.
SPEAKER_00: This is not like a David and Bathsheba type situation.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't have like a big moral failure at first.
SPEAKER_00: It just says he loved.
SPEAKER_00: He had a desire.
SPEAKER_00: His heart yearned for, he wanted, he had a hunger for many foreign women.
SPEAKER_00: And look, I get it.
SPEAKER_00: You might have heard this statistic out there somewhere.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon had, and I'm in this might shock you if you've never, he had 700 wives.
SPEAKER_00: 700.
SPEAKER_00: But it didn't start with 700.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't just go off and get married all of a sudden.
SPEAKER_00: It started with one.
SPEAKER_00: And actually, his first wife was the daughter of Pharaoh of Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: And if you remember the history of Israel and Egypt, it's pretty dicey, right?
SPEAKER_00: They got out of there out of slavery.
SPEAKER_00: And so when he marries a foreign princess, you know what happens between those two nations?
SPEAKER_00: They handshake and they say, We're not going to invade each other because Pharaoh's not going to invade the nation where his daughter is living.
SPEAKER_00: So there's trade routes, there's security, there's influence, there's power there.
SPEAKER_00: And so it didn't just stop with one.
SPEAKER_00: He kept on going.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure he justified it in his head and said, This is going to be great for Israel.
SPEAKER_00: So he kept on marrying and marrying and marrying until he had 700 wives.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you thought that you, remembering your anniversary date, was tough.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine this guy, right?
SPEAKER_00: But he kept on going.
SPEAKER_00: He had a desire, he had a hunger.
SPEAKER_00: It just wouldn't stop.
SPEAKER_00: But the book of Deuteronomy explicitly says that the kings of Israel were not supposed to do this.
SPEAKER_00: And on top of it, I mean, marriage is between one man and one woman.
SPEAKER_00: That's that's the Bible right there.
SPEAKER_00: So he went away from that because with marriage comes influence.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 4 says, When Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart, notice that, his heart away to follow other gods.
SPEAKER_00: He was not wholeheartedly direct uh devoted to the Lord his God as his father David had been.
SPEAKER_00: He grew old.
SPEAKER_00: This was not a young man's mistake.
SPEAKER_00: This was a lifetime of accumulation of decisions.
SPEAKER_00: This was something that he kept on going back into.
SPEAKER_00: It didn't just start with 700 wives.
SPEAKER_00: He kept on marrying and wanting more and more power and influence and love.
SPEAKER_00: It just wouldn't stop.
SPEAKER_00: So he kept on trying to look for it, for significance, for meaning, for something else that he thought could add to it.
SPEAKER_00: But he ended up worshiping Ashtareth, the god of the Sidonians, and Molech, the detestable god of the Ammonites.
SPEAKER_00: He built high places for these false gods in the hills east of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: And it was so, so that when you walked up Mount Zion and you saw the beauty, the beautiful majesty of the temple.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine in those days just seeing a big golden building.
SPEAKER_00: It was literally covered head to toe from gold.
SPEAKER_00: And you would see the place where God's presence, like a cloud, descended, and it was so beautiful and so mighty.
SPEAKER_00: And it was like, this is the place where God is, right here.
SPEAKER_00: But then you look over to your right and you look at the hills that are east of Jerusalem, and you would see people killing their babies in the name of a false God.
SPEAKER_00: And it's all because Solomon just wouldn't stop.
SPEAKER_00: And it's all because Solomon just wouldn't get satisfied.
SPEAKER_00: He wanted more and more and more until he was in this place.
SPEAKER_00: So God's response is in verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who appeared to him twice.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the most important thing that I want us to really look at in this passage is that Solomon's problem was not that he had too much.
SPEAKER_00: It was that he was looking for meaning, for significance, for purpose in the things in his life.
SPEAKER_00: He was looking for them in things that were never designed to carry that weight.
SPEAKER_00: His problem was that he started treating the blessings as the point rather than the giver as the point.
SPEAKER_00: He wanted to look for things, accomplishments, achievements, women, building projects, economy.
SPEAKER_00: He wanted all those things to fill that hole in his heart.
SPEAKER_00: And so he tried and he tried and he accumulated and got more and more and more.
SPEAKER_00: But those were never the point.
SPEAKER_00: The giver of those blessings was the point.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon had everything that the world says should satisfy a person: wealth, influence, achievement, wisdom, all of those things, but none of that could answer the deepest questions that were in his heart.
SPEAKER_00: So let me ask us right now where are you looking for significance right now?
SPEAKER_00: Is it your career?
SPEAKER_00: If I get that, if I get that promotion, I'm finally gonna feel like that's enough.
SPEAKER_00: Is it your family?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, if I'm a good parent, is it the next thing you're gonna get?
SPEAKER_00: Is it the next milestone you have?
SPEAKER_00: Look, don't get me wrong.
SPEAKER_00: None of those things are bad things.
SPEAKER_00: A job is a blessing from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Having a family is a special blessing from the Lord, too.
SPEAKER_00: That's a that's a thing right there.
SPEAKER_00: Being driven and motivated to have goals in your life, that is a blessing from the Lord, but those are not the point.
SPEAKER_00: Those are not the reason your life is significant.
SPEAKER_00: That's not the purpose by which you are right here on this earth.
SPEAKER_00: None of those things are wrong, but none of those are meant to answer the questions that your heart is asking right now.
SPEAKER_00: Because Solomon had it all.
SPEAKER_00: He had everything that you could possibly imagine, and none of it answered the deepest questions in his heart, which is this why am I here?
SPEAKER_00: And does any of this actually matter?
SPEAKER_00: Solomon tried everything, and everything left him empty.
SPEAKER_00: But this is where the story turns because Solomon didn't just search for the answer to this question and give up.
SPEAKER_00: No, he searched and he kept on searching until he found the answer.
SPEAKER_00: And the answer is in the book of Ecclesiastes.
SPEAKER_00: So turn there as we open up to it.
SPEAKER_00: Because in Ecclesiastes is where it's going to get good.
SPEAKER_00: We see through this book that the answer is not a thing, it's a person.
SPEAKER_00: Ecclesiastes really is one of the strangest books in all the Bible, really, honestly.
SPEAKER_00: Like if you think of Psalms as like springtime and like meadows and still brooks and peace and all those things, Ecclesiastes is like wintertime seasonal depression.
SPEAKER_00: That really is what it is, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because it's a lot like the Johnny Cash video that I showed at the beginning.
SPEAKER_00: It's an old man, Solomon, reflecting, sitting at the edge of eternity, reflecting on his life and looking back on all the things he did, all the things he got, all the things he accomplished, all the things he experienced.
SPEAKER_00: And he's giving you an answer of what he thinks of everything.
SPEAKER_00: Ecclesiastes 1-2 is where it starts, and he just he runs out the gate with this one.
SPEAKER_00: This is what he says meaningless, meaningless says the teacher.
SPEAKER_00: Utterly meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: Everything is meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: That word meaningless just carries so much weight behind it.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you might have seen other translations render it as vanity, vanity, all is vanity, or futile, futile, all is futility.
SPEAKER_00: The word literally translates to a vapor or smoke or a breath, something that you see for a moment, something you see in the air, and it looks like it has substance.
SPEAKER_00: It looks like it's solid.
SPEAKER_00: It looks like you could reach out and you could grab it.
SPEAKER_00: But as soon as you open your hands, what do you have?
SPEAKER_00: Nothing.
SPEAKER_00: To show you a different shade of what I'm talking about, I'm gonna show you guys this.
SPEAKER_00: You guys see it, right?
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna try catching them.
SPEAKER_00: That didn't work.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, last chance.
SPEAKER_00: You guys you guys saw them too, right?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not I'm not tripping.
SPEAKER_00: They were there.
SPEAKER_00: They were around, they were reflecting the light.
SPEAKER_00: There was a couple of them.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I tried.
SPEAKER_00: I tried, and and as soon as they were in my hands, what was I left with?
SPEAKER_00: Nothing.
SPEAKER_00: I thought, I thought they looked like they had something there.
SPEAKER_00: They looked like I could grab them, they look like they would fill my hands, they look like they would fill that void.
SPEAKER_00: But as soon as I got my hands on them, nothing.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it left me with.
SPEAKER_00: And look, I'm passionate about it because I I know what Solomon's talking about.
SPEAKER_00: This Hebrew word, Havel, it means that.
SPEAKER_00: All of the knowledge, all of the wisdom, all of the things he did, the building projects, the economy, the roles, the fame, all of that stuff, it left him with nothing but empty hands.
SPEAKER_00: Because I remember when I when I graduated from Bible college, I had a very clear expectation of what my life was going to look like.
SPEAKER_00: My first thing right off the bat is I wanted to use my degree, I wanted to use my calling as a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: And after ups and downs, after getting uh some maybes and some interviews and some no's, I finally found it.
SPEAKER_00: Seven months after I graduated, I found an associate pastor role in Vacaville.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember it was a July, it was a summer um Sunday in July, and I went with Tyler and we sat in the car, and I was like, yeah, oh my gosh, this is my first Sunday as like an actual pastor.
SPEAKER_00: And we went through this Sunday, and when I got home, I thought I would feel more than what I did.
SPEAKER_00: Because I thought, I thought that it was gonna make me feel like somebody, but it it didn't.
SPEAKER_00: My heart wanted more.
SPEAKER_00: So I moved on to the next thing.
SPEAKER_00: I shifted my focus.
SPEAKER_00: Me and Tyler, we got married shortly after that, and we set ourselves up.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna hit a financial goal.
SPEAKER_00: We want a certain number in the bank account.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like an extravagant thing.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like it was gonna take something that like we needed to save intentionally for.
SPEAKER_00: So we did.
SPEAKER_00: We saved, we scrimped, we worked hard.
SPEAKER_00: There was blood, there was sweat, there was tears.
SPEAKER_00: It meant we're not gonna go out for sushi.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna go out two for one coupon at Burger King, right?
SPEAKER_00: It meant that some days in the summer, we're not gonna turn on the AC.
SPEAKER_00: We're just gonna turn on like four fans and blow them right on us, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so we did.
SPEAKER_00: We worked hard for years until one day it was the first of the month, and I knew our paychecks were gonna hit, and I woke up early.
SPEAKER_00: I woke up early to open the Bank of America app and I wanted to see that number on the screen because I knew it was finally going to come.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember I woke up before Tyler did, she was still sleeping.
SPEAKER_00: It was like 5 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: I was just so excited to see it.
SPEAKER_00: And when I saw it, I didn't feel I didn't feel like it was it was enough.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I felt accomplished.
SPEAKER_00: I felt like this was a big thing, but like I thought it, I thought I was gonna feel more from that.
SPEAKER_00: So I shifted focus.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't, I did the next thing, right?
SPEAKER_00: We me and Tyler.
SPEAKER_00: Just to be clear with you guys too, I have never been much to like care a lot about like traditional status symbols for that set.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I know you guys know, but like I've never cared about like my clothes that I wear or like my hair or whatever, right?
SPEAKER_00: I I drove a 2003 car for years, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because I just don't care, right?
SPEAKER_00: But there's one thing, one thing ever since I was a little kid that I like was like a status symbol to me that resonated with me.
SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately for me, my parents lived in California.
SPEAKER_00: That's what they chose, so it seemed like an impossibility, but I wanted to buy a house.
SPEAKER_00: That was gonna be like my big thing.
SPEAKER_00: I thought, like, if I buy a house, if I buy a house, that's finally gonna make me feel like I'm somebody.
SPEAKER_00: So I saved.
SPEAKER_00: I saved and I saved and I saved and we worked hard.
SPEAKER_00: And two years ago, we started the process.
SPEAKER_00: We worked with realtors, we talked with people, we toured houses.
SPEAKER_00: It was a whole month-long process until finally in November two years ago, we went up to Caldwell Banker, we went up to Vacaville, we signed the papers, we got the keys, we put down the deposit, and finally, Tyler and I went in front of the house that we own now.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Jesus, for that.
SPEAKER_00: But I remember clear as day.
SPEAKER_00: We unlocked the door.
SPEAKER_00: Tyler was giving a tour to like some of our family there in the other rooms, and I went into where it was going to be the master bedroom, and I looked around.
SPEAKER_00: I was expecting to finally feel it.
SPEAKER_00: I was, honestly.
SPEAKER_00: I was expecting to finally feel like I was accomplished, like this was it.
SPEAKER_00: This was the one thing I wanted to do for years.
SPEAKER_00: And as I stood in that master bedroom, did I feel accomplished?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Did I feel did I feel happy with the circumstances?
SPEAKER_00: I did.
SPEAKER_00: But did I feel satisfied?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: No, my heart still says, what's the next thing?
SPEAKER_00: What are we gonna work towards now?
SPEAKER_00: That's the human condition.
SPEAKER_00: That's really what it is.
SPEAKER_00: And honestly, we are built for a longing that this world can never satisfy.
SPEAKER_00: A career, a family, success, financial security.
SPEAKER_00: Those are good gifts from God.
SPEAKER_00: Those are blessings from the Lord, but those were never meant to carry the weight of our purpose, our significance, our meaning behind life.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon realized this by the time he reached the end of his life.
SPEAKER_00: Look how the book ends in Ecclesiastes.
SPEAKER_00: After 12 whole chapters of honest elimination, of like, I tried this, I tried this, and it never worked.
SPEAKER_00: After a lifetime of searching, Solomon arrives at his conclusion in Ecclesiastes 12 13.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us this.
SPEAKER_00: Now all has been heard.
SPEAKER_00: Here is the conclusion of the matter.
SPEAKER_00: Keep his commandments for this is the whole duty of all mankind.
SPEAKER_00: This is Solomon saying, I finally done it.
SPEAKER_00: I found it.
SPEAKER_00: After every avenue I've explored, I found the thing that actually answers the question.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what you are made for.
SPEAKER_00: You weren't created to accomplish.
SPEAKER_00: You weren't created to get and get and get.
SPEAKER_00: You were created to know God, to walk with Him, to reflect Him, to enjoy Him, to live with Him, to glorify Him.
SPEAKER_00: And every other purpose flows out from that singular purpose.
SPEAKER_00: The restlessness that Solomon describes, how he walks across 12 chapters of it, the hunger that never gets satisfied, the striving after the wind that he's never able to catch up with, the bubble that pops in his hand.
SPEAKER_00: Those are all meant to point us to this: that you were built with a longing that only God can satisfy.
SPEAKER_00: That emptiness that you feel when you hit that goal and your heart says, What's the next thing?
SPEAKER_00: That's not a sign that you're broken.
SPEAKER_00: That's not a sign that there's something wrong with you.
SPEAKER_00: That's a sign that you were created for something greater than that.
SPEAKER_00: He built you on that way for a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: So that when that appetite that only he can satisfy, when you try to fill it with something else, and it when you when it falls short and it always will, you know exactly who to go to look for.
SPEAKER_00: I describe my version of that.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm sure everybody in this room today has their own version of it.
SPEAKER_00: Because the wisest, wealthiest, most accomplished human being who probably ever lived, after exhausting every other option, concluded that our purpose, our meaning, our significance behind this life, the reason why we're here is to know God, to walk with him, to love him, to de to understand that the one who created us fully knows us and fully loves us.
SPEAKER_00: That is the purpose.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the things in our world, it's not the blessings he gives us, it's solely him who is the purpose.
SPEAKER_00: He strove for a lifetime looking for that.
SPEAKER_00: And by the time he reached the end of his life, he wasted it and it was too late for him to change anything.
SPEAKER_00: But today, that answer is available to you after not after you've tried everything else, not after a long lifetime search, but right here, right now, you can know that your significance is not determined by what you achieve.
SPEAKER_00: It's secured by the God who sent his son so that you can know him.
SPEAKER_00: Because 3,000 years ago, God answered the question of what is why am I here for?
SPEAKER_00: Not with a commandment, not with a word, but with a person, his son Jesus Christ, who said, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
SPEAKER_00: He is the purpose.
SPEAKER_00: That's the reason why.
SPEAKER_00: It's not anything else, it's just him.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it is.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what Solomon found at the end of his search.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what's been waiting for you all along.
SPEAKER_00: Because your purpose isn't something that you achieve, it's someone that you know.
SPEAKER_00: Johnny Cash, he stood at the end of his life and he called his empire dirt.
SPEAKER_00: What Solomon would have told him is that your empire was never the point.
SPEAKER_00: You were created for more than just an empire.
SPEAKER_00: You were created to know God.
SPEAKER_00: And the moment that you find your purpose there, everything else is gonna fall in place.
SPEAKER_00: Those achievements are still good.
SPEAKER_00: Your family and your home are still a blessing, your career still matters.
SPEAKER_00: Those are all good and great things, but those are not the point.
SPEAKER_00: Those were never meant to carry the weight of your significance, of your purpose, of your meaning.
SPEAKER_00: And when you give it back to God, you're gonna feel that weight drop off your shoulder, and you're gonna see that He was the one who was meant to carry that weight all along.
SPEAKER_00: So today I just want to close off with two real quick things.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, ask God to help you identify what you've been asking to give your life meaning.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's your career.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's your marriage, maybe it's success or money or recognition or even being a good parent.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is, be honest enough right now and say, God, help me find what I've been looking for.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you know it right now.
SPEAKER_00: But if you don't know it, you could ask yourself, what am I expecting to finally make me feel like I'm enough?
SPEAKER_00: What is that one thing that you think that if you have it, that's gonna finally make me feel like somebody?
SPEAKER_00: Once you name it, you'll begin to see that it was never, that it was never meant to carry the weight of your life.
SPEAKER_00: Then once you've identified that, I challenge you to have one honest conversation with God this week.
SPEAKER_00: Just one.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe today, maybe tomorrow, sometime this week, after you've done step one.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not asking you to do like a formal prayer, I'm not asking you to do like a religious ritual.
SPEAKER_00: Just talk to God in the same way you'd talk to somebody you trust.
SPEAKER_00: You could say something like this God, it's not what I have or what I do that gives me purpose.
SPEAKER_00: It's you who gives me purpose.
SPEAKER_00: You're not asking God for a blessing, you're not asking God to change your circumstances, you're just asking him to help you realize that he was the point all along.
SPEAKER_00: Let this be the week that you stop chasing after something and you start seeking him.
SPEAKER_00: Because Solomon spent a lifetime looking for what you're looking for right now.
SPEAKER_00: He searched farther than any one of us are going to be able to search.
SPEAKER_00: And after all of it, he left us with one sentence Fear God and keep his commandments.
SPEAKER_00: For this is the whole duty of man.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to spend your whole life learning what Solomon learned too late.
SPEAKER_00: That your purpose was never found in what you do, it's found in who made you.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.