Letting Go Of Second Best For Something Better

Two words can quietly shrink your life: always and never. When we say “it’s always going to be like this” or “I’ll never change,” we turn a passing struggle into a permanent sentence. We pull those words apart and put them where they belong, not on our temporary feelings, but on God’s unchanging character: He is always God, always good, and never anything less than who He is. 

From there, we get practical and personal about spiritual growth and surrender. We talk about the moments when God asks us to set aside something familiar so we can receive something better, even when it feels like loss. Think of the simple picture: if you want a dog to drop the hot dog, you offer a steak. That’s often what change feels like in real life, letting go of what’s immediate so we can embrace what’s greater. 

We also open Scripture to Numbers 11 and the Israelites’ craving for Egypt’s food while God provides manna. It’s an honest look at cravings, nostalgia, and how easy it is to romanticize an old life while forgetting the bondage that came with it. Along the way, we reflect on addiction recovery, why our bodies make great servants but terrible masters, and how the Holy Spirit empowers us to lead our desires instead of being led by them. 

If you’re in a hard season, feeling stuck, or tempted to compromise, let this be a reminder: it’s temporary, and God can use it to bring you into something better. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs hope, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

You know, there are two words that probably need to be used sparingly. And those two words are always and never. Right? Always and never. Like it's always gonna be like this. Or I'll never be able to do that. Always and never. Now there are absolutes in which always and never do apply. And the

Why “Always” And “Never” Matter

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one absolute that I know of, and one that I'm anchored in on is this that God is always going to be God. God has never been anything other than God, and never will be anything other than God supreme. God reigns supreme. He always has, he always will be God, reigning supreme. And God is never anything less than God. Always and never can be applied to God. But to things in our life, we need to be careful what we use the words always and never to. When we apply those words, they need to have some meaning to them. And there are times in our life where we're going to be going through things, and I'm going through one right now where I'm being asked to set aside something in order to get something better. You know, if you want a dog to drop the hot dog, you present a stake, and more and more than likely, if the dog is smart, he'll drop the hot dog and he'll go for the stake. Well, in

Trading What You Want For Better

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our lives, the same can be true. There are times where we need to drop something that is not as good as what we're going to be getting in order to get something better than what we have. We need to let go of something less in order in order to embrace and receive something greater. And to say that we're always going to be experiencing something and it's always going to be like this sometimes can set us up for a real difficult time because things always aren't going to be the way they appear to be right now in your life. I know they're in my life, those things are very true. I'm not always going to be experiencing what I'm experiencing today when it comes to a difficulty. When I'm experiencing something that my physical body is giving some complaints about, because you see, our physical bodies, along with our soul, want to have their way. Our minds want to have their own way. We want things to go according to what will fit within our framework, within our brains, our minds. Also, within our physical bodies, our cravings, our appetites, the things that we put into our bodies physically. We like to have certain things go certain ways, and we tend to want them to go that way all the time. But God has things that are they're just bigger, they're larger, and He loves us just the way we are, but too much to keep us or leave us that way. And so there's a story that I want to read from the scriptures, and it's from the book of Numbers, and it's Numbers chapter 11. And it's a story about the Israelites and the rabble that were with them and their desire to have some of the things that they had when they lived in Egypt. And let me read the story to you. It's on a Numbers chapter 11, starting at verse 4.

Israel’s Cravings And The Manna Lesson

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It says, Now the rabble with them began to crave other food. And again the Israelites started wailing and said, If only we had meat to eat. We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost, also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite. We never see anything but this manna. The manna was like coriander seed and looked like resin. The people went about gathering it, and it was on the ground, and they could put it in a handmill or crush it in a mortar. They cooked it in a pot or made it into cakes, and it lasted, and I should say, and it tasted like something made with olive oil. When the dew settled on the camp at night, the manna came down and settled on the ground also. Now that manna was something that was different than what the Egyptians were serving up in Egypt. And God was looking to get Egypt out of the Israelites. Because he had something better in store for them than the lifestyle of Egypt, and he wanted to get the things that they had in Egypt out from them so that he'd give them something better. But they wanted what they had previously because that was what they were accustomed to. And in our lives, that's something that often takes place when our physical bodies are in a place where they want what they want because they have cravings. But those cravings are not necessarily there, and they're not necessarily, I should say, the cravings are there to put the body in control. Our bodies are designed to be servants. They make great servants, but they make bad masters. And our minds, our physical soul, is not meant to be in control, it's meant to be a servant. Now we are spirits who live in bodies, and we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to be in charge of what's going on. But when our bodies are in charge, when our physical bodies are in charge and they dictate what's going on, we run into complications, and that's where we start placing things and labeling things such as always and never. They're based upon our temporal desires. And God has something much larger in store for you and I than us just being slaves to the old way that we used to live. You see, we may look back on certain things fondly when we're going through a difficult time. Looking back at things and saying, man, it was a lot better then. I had it a lot easier. I didn't have these problems, and you know, I could do what I wanted to do, and uh, you know, I kind of miss doing it that way. Well, how soon we forget how troublesome it was to be in bondage to those ways of living that we once the way we used to live. I used to be a horrible drunk, but sometimes I get tempted to think about the times where it was enjoyable to share a few drinks with other people, and our times were light and they were full of laughter, and it was fun. But how quickly we could forget about the times where we are either so hung over that we are wiped out for days, or we just can't stand not having another drink, and we're literally

Nostalgia, Bondage, And Alcohol Temptation

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bound to that thing of alcohol as our master. Well, it was for me. But I could periodically I look back fondly at it, and that is very unfortunate because that was not a very fond time, but we can be fooled into thinking that was better than when we're going through difficult times now. And sometimes letting go of things is not always easy. I say that because that's what's going on. As I said, personally within me right now, I'm letting go of certain things that are hard. They're hard to let go of because I've been accustomed to living that way for such a long period of time that I've developed an appetite. And the appetite is not necessarily a bad appetite, it's just something that is not going to be the best suited for things that God wants me to be doing. And so I need to let go of those things. But the process of letting go of them is actually physically painful. It's like letting go of an old friend. But it's important to let go of them because it's an unhealthy relationship. Well, there are things that are taking place within my own life that are temporarily feeling uncomfortable, but and the temptation is to think fondly about the way things used to be. Or maybe I can just not give away these things that I'm doing completely, I'll just compromise a little bit. Playing that negotiating thing, you know, trying to uh you know compromise things with God, and we end up losing in the end, anyway, so it's really not worth it. But the point I'm trying to get at is this that always and never are very powerful words, and when we use those words, we can oftentimes limit ourselves because we trap ourselves into staying in situations that ultimately, in the end, aren't the best, and we settle for something that is

Don’t Trap Yourself With Absolutes

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second best and never really reach our full potential. And the Lord wants us to not only reach our full potential, but to take what we've learned now and apply it to what we're going to be how we're going to be functioning for eternity. And so putting always and never on things that are temporal, temporary is an unwise thing to do. And if you're going to place always and never onto someone, place it upon God and His goodness, because He's always good. Always. Even when it seems contrary. And the things that we go through are not always going to be this way. It's not always going to be hard. The good thing about feeling sick, when you're not feeling physically, when you're feeling ill, is when you feel better, it feels so good. Same can be said when we go through something difficult and we are letting go of certain things from the past. When we receive that benefit from going through them, and we see the the blessing of God on the other side, it's so worth it, man. It's so worth it. And that's what I want to encourage each of you with that whatever you might be going through right now, it's not going to last forever. It's temporary, and sometimes it's because God wants us to let go something that is second best in order to give us something better. Let's pray. Father, right now, we look to you and we look to you because we need you. We need your help, we need your guidance, we need your strength to carry us through to the other side, leading us through the valley of the shadow of death. And in so doing,

Prayer For Strength And Release

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we fear no evil because you are with us. You rod and your staff, they comfort us. Goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our lives, and we will dwell in your house forever, Lord. So we say you are always good, you are always God. You will never be anything different. There is no shadow of turning in you, and we honor you with that, and give our lives and give our lives to you because you're worthy of receiving all praise, all honor, all worship. And our lives are an expression of worship to you. Lord, take us to the other side, lead us to places that only feet can be can be achieved when we are hind feet on high places, Lord. So give us hind feet to go to these high places that you're taking us to, Lord. And help us let go of the things of the past so we can embrace the things that you're developing us into. And we stand here and we pray these things in the name of Jesus and we say, Amen, amen, amen. Amen. All right, folks, we love you. And if you have any thoughts, questions, concerns, please feel free to drop us a line at life are on the fire at gmail.com. That's our email address, or type in Life Around the Fire and look us up on the web. We would love to hear from you. In the meantime, God bless you. Adios, amigos.