SoulFit: Full Access Pass

We talk about the difference between loving people and giving them access, using an all-access backstage pass as the picture for time, energy, emotional space, and influence. We ground boundaries in Matthew 22 and Proverbs 4:23, then lay out practical ways to guard your heart without quitting on love. 

• the backstage pass metaphor for relationship access 
• love as a commandment while access stays a choice 
• Matthew 22:34-40 and loving God and neighbor 
• Proverbs 4:23 and why guarding your heart matters 
• why we struggle to set boundaries through guilt and fear 
• how Jesus models boundaries while still loving everyone 
• four levels of access from public to all access 
• signs someone should not have inner-circle access 
• gentle ways to pull back when access is unhealthy 
• reflection questions to name where you feel drained

https://aarondegler.com/

Transcript

Welcome And Live Call Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome, Sulfit. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us. If this is your first time here, welcome. Each week we just take a little scripture from the Bible and share it and with the message and how do we apply that to our everyday life. So let's join our live call for Sulfit. As most of you know, Kim likes the new kids on the block a little bit. A little bit. Maybe a lot a bit. Like some of you might have a band or a singer that you like that much. Like I do not. There's a group that I like, I like all their songs, but it's not near what Kim loves New Kids on the Block. Besides how much you love New Kids on the Block. Yes, I mean, yes. But that's really your love, and I just get to go along. So one time she went to Colorado. Yes. And with some friends to see New Kids on the Block and got one of those backstage passes. You know, you got to, you know, meet and greet them, take your picture with them, all that kind of stuff. And if any of you have gotten a pass like that, are they about the same price as just a general seat? No. No. They're way more. They have a bigger cost associated with them. They're not just your mosh pit prices. They're not even your no nosebleed prices. They are like way more. And so when we get that, we go, hey, I mean, and they even give you a little necklace thing to wear or a band to wear. Like, I mean, I mean, and you're strutting around there like you're some big stuff because you got an all-access pass or backstage. It says that on there. All access. It says all access or it says backstage. I mean, you feel like as you're walking by the uh, it's kind of like if you go to uh Six Flags or Disney World and you have the Flash Pass. You're walking by all those losers, peons, peons in the line, sweating to death, waiting in line for Magic Mountain as you walk by them and like, oh, I just get to go right in. So we all kind of desire that. Some of us are saying, hey, I'll pay the extra dollars. Some of us, like, nah, I'm good in the back. I'd like to, but I'm not gonna do that. So we are gonna talk about all access pass, and we're gonna talk about those people, those people, you know what what happens when we say those people that have an all access pass to you. And we're gonna talk a little bit about that. But first, we kind of have to talk about the difference between love and access. So you can love someone, you can care about someone, and you can pray for someone. That's love. Love them, care about them, pray for them. Love. Without giving them access. So, what does the access part look like? It looks like your time, your energy, your emotional space, your influence. It's kind of like new kids. We would love for you to come if you want to hang out in the very back. That's super. You can still be a part of the environment, but you won't get to see us, like up close and personal, like touch us. Even though your hope is out in the audience that if you're wearing that shirt, they're gonna notice you out of all those thousands of people because you wore it, thinking they're gonna see me, and I won't have to pay for it, they're just gonna ask me backstage. But again, love is we can do it from afar without giving them the time, energy, influence, or emotional space. So, how does that look in scripture? So in Matthew 22, uh 34 through 40, it says, Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, I really practice that word, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question said, Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law? And Jesus replied, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second, the second is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself. All the law and the prophets hung on those two commandments. Love your God, number one, with all your heart, soul, and mind. Heart, soul, and mind. I think we forget the mind part. And the second, love your neighbor as yourself. And then if we were to look at Proverbs 423, so we think we gotta love everybody. Then if we look at Proverbs 423, it says, Above all else, guard your heart from everything you do flows from it. We have to love our neighbor as ourself, but guard your heart. So love is commanded, access is a decision. So as we love our neighbor as ourselves, we can do that by loving them, caring for them, praying for them. But access, if we give them access, that's a decision. It's not a commandment. So when we talk about access, why do we struggle with boundaries? Because really, access, isn't that boundaries? Like, because if you don't have on that band, what do you get? You get you get the big bouncer dude that goes, nope, you're you're not coming through. Or or you get the person that just has a security jacket, so they seem important because they say security. And they say, you're not coming through. You don't have the right credentials to get through. You don't have the right stuff. Man, I should have been faster on that one. The right stuff. That's a good one. So why do we struggle with those boundaries? Because that security guard has no problem saying, uh-uh, not through here, you're not. There's no way you're getting to see your boys through me. Actually, they'd probably say my boys, but but anyhow, why do we struggle with that? A lot of times, because of guilt, because of fear of hurting others, because our fear of rejection, our desire to be liked. We all want to be liked. We have those people-pleasing tendencies, and so we think, well, if I say no, I'm gonna look selfish. If I create space, I'm mean. If I pull back, I lose them. And so all those things go through our mind when we try to create boundaries. But when we say yes to everything, what would happen if your favorite concert gave everybody in the audience backstage passes? What would be the difference than just going to the concert? There really wouldn't be any. And if everybody had the same access, I mean it's not different, it's just as if we were here. So saying yes to everything often means saying no to our peace. Because not everybody needs that access. So, you know, when we talk about the Bible and we talk about the first commandment, second commandment, and we we try to be, you know, that does anybody one of the greatest things I learned this from Alan Hugate when we were doing our podcast on the road travel, we had an episode called the B I B L E. And he broke it down to this what does the Bible stand for? And we could say all kinds of things, but what does B-I-B-L-E stand for? It stands for basic instructions before leaving earth. How about that? Basic instructions before leaving earth. And with those instructions, how does it talk about boundaries? Guess what? Guess who modeled some boundaries? Jesus, the one that loves everybody, had boundaries. Wow, how about that? He loved everyone, he served many, but he gave close access to few. He walked away from crowds. He didn't answer every demand. He rested when needed. And we're gonna next week we are gonna talk about rest and and we're gonna talk about how Jesus rested. He often in the Bible, many times, he withdrew to quiet places alone by himself. I mean, we're gonna talk about that next week, but he also chose his inner circle intentional. Has anybody heard of the disciples, the 12 disciples? Wouldn't you say that was his inner crowd? His inner people? And he created boundaries. And we're gonna talk about if Jesus did it, just as we we talk about other things Jesus did and how we're supposed to act towards people, we'll go out, you know, meet people where they're at, all those different things. Still, we should create those boundaries for ourselves. Because just as Jesus pointed them out as he was here on earth, they were important to human, to mankind. Why did he take a human form? Because he experienced some of the same things we experience, and he needed rest. He was tired. So we're gonna talk about just real quick four different levels of access. Think about it if you're going to the concert, and these are the different price levels, okay? These are the different pricing levels. The first level, everybody, I mean, come on in. You have at it. It's the public access, it's open for everyone. That's our casual interactions. That's hey, how are you? That's a nod at the grocery store. That's you know, if you're down on country road, that's the country wave, you know. You know, it it's open to everybody. Everybody, come on, come all. It's the surface conversations. How are you? Wow, that's some weather we've had. Yep. It's every everybody that's public. So that's the come on in, come watch the free concert. Then we have level two, which is personal. There's just some people that are gonna be in level two. That's our friendships, that's our shared experiences with people. That that's a little bit more close-knit. You're not gonna talk with necessarily the same things as the person checking you out at Walmart. Unless you're self-checking, then you're talking yourself and you can have a great conversation. And then the other people around you just wonder what's up with this crazy nut. So though that's level two. And I think, you know, I mean, you think, okay, I have I have quite a few level twos, I have friends. And then we have level three, which those are the private. Those are the those are getting a little fewer now. Those are ones you're a little more vulnerable with. Those are the ones you trust, those are the ones that begin to start having some emotional access to you. In other words, you share some things that are vulnerable that you trust them with, that you can allow them to see some, they they get into your feels a little bit, and you share your feels a little bit. So that that you know, we're narrowing the group down. And then level four, that's where we have that all access pass, that inner circle, which is very few. Those are the ones you have deep trust with that deeply influence you, that really hold you accountable in those inner circles. And and and I think sometimes we think that we're supposed to allow people at every level, but everybody that we come in contact with has a certain level. Not everyone gets an all-access pass. Because, you know, what does that look like? Because sometimes I think we do. I think we sometimes give people that all access pass. And when we do, what what are some signs that maybe they shouldn't have that pass? Maybe they're they drain us emotionally. We go, man, I love them. And you know, and so because sometimes we think since we love them, we need to give them all this access. And and and I'm talking about maybe it's family, maybe it's some people in our family that we love them and we feel like we need to give them all this access. Maybe they don't deserve that access. Maybe we need to give them boundaries because maybe they drain us emotionally, maybe they disrespect our boundaries, maybe they create chaos, drama, they create drama, maybe they lack some trust trustworthiness. Maybe they now here's a big one. Think about this that somebody has an all-access pass to you. And think about this. They constantly take, but don't pour in. They're constantly needing, hey, I need this emotional support, hey, I'm needing this from you, I'm needing that, I'm needing all these different things. And they're never saying, What can I do for you? Hey, I'm here for you, hey, I'm just showing up. What what kind of are they taking, but they're not pouring back in. And that and that is a really a sign that someone doesn't need all access pass. And again, that may be a family member. That's really hard. We are meant to love them. Love everyone, love thy neighbor as yourself. It's you know a commandment, do that. But it doesn't mean that all access has to be ground granted. Access is the decision. So if if there's someone in one of these four levels, um really probably the three or the four, that's private or inner circle, that really you're thinking, man, I don't, I don't, I love them, but I don't really think they they get the access. I don't think they get the bracelet that says, come on in. Maybe, maybe you need to be the security guard that's standing at the at the gate and go, nope, you don't have the right credentials. You don't have you don't get access. Now, if if you put it like that, it may not go so well. So you may have to find a tender way. And and maybe that means when when you know you're trying to take back the access, maybe it means just stepping back a little bit, pulling away a little bit. Maybe it's a little less engagement in that conversation, a little less conversation in the text. You start to pull back a little bit. Maybe there's not as much information shared, maybe that's held on to a little bit. Because yes, we are supposed to love them, but we don't have to grant them access. Just as it said in Proverbs, above all else, guard your heart for everything, everything you do flows through it. So if we are not guarding it, what happens? What happens? I have this really good spot. I got the all access pass, I got a good spot. And then all the other people start coming forward and rushing it. What happens? My experience isn't as good, right? Because now I'm surrounded by all these people, and what did they do? It it they flowed into that space, and so now my experience with the time I was enjoying watching my favorite boy band just got interrupted. My my bliss and my peace got interrupted because all these people came flooding in that didn't have access, but thought they had access. They're family, they're friends, and I should love them. You should, yes. But you get to decide who gets access to you and at what level. That's very important to remember because it is not it is not wrong to have boundaries. It is not wrong to say, it is not going against the Bible, say you don't have access to all of me. To some of me, sure. I'll be playing, it'll be nice, yes, but you don't have full access to me. Um that's really only limited or granted to a few people, a small circle. Just as Jesus had a small circle in his inner circle that he gave all access pass. And then the questions are maybe where do I feel emotionally drained? What boundaries am I avoid setting? What would protect my peace look like? What would that look like? We talked earlier about what would success for your life look like. What would boundaries for your peace look like? Because you kind of have to have an idea of those before you set them. Um, if you don't know, it's pretty hard to set boundaries. If you don't know how far out you want your dog to go, you don't know how far to set that chain or how far to set that electric little dog collery thing that it runs over and buzzes them. It means if you don't know how far out, you don't know where to set it. The same thing is true with our own personal boundaries. If we don't know where those are at, we can't set them. But then we get upset when people come past them. Well, we didn't even know where they were set. How do we expect other people to know where they're at? Again, we have to take some ownership on that. So maybe the simple question is that, and if we don't have that set, maybe we just it's an easy prayer that says that we ask God to give us some wisdom to love well and set boundaries. We ask him to the wisdom to love well and set up access. Who has access? And there may be some people that keep trying their card in the near future and go access denied, access denied, access denied. And that's okay. That is okay. So the challenge is simply that. Where where some where are some spots, some points that some access needs to be denied? Access needs to be pulled back a little bit because it is not wrong, it is not a sin. It is there's nothing wrong with setting those boundaries, setting those access. So that's that's really a challenge because we need to love people, but we don't have to grant all the access. We have to guard our heart because everything flows through it. So and then next week we will talk a little bit more about uh rest. Um, so many of us in this day and age have some real uh trouble with rest. And we're gonna talk about and I'll show you some points in the Bible where rest is important, it's biblical, Jesus did it. So we're gonna talk about that. So um I'll just finish us up in prayer and then we can go on with our phenomenally fantastic fun Friday. Dear Hellen Father, thank you for bringing us all together today. Um, Lord, I just pray that um watch over each one um as they go out into the the day, the weekend. I mean, just just help us, Lord, to love each one that we come into contact with and guard our heart in that that we allow that access in. We just pray for that wisdom, we pray for that knowledge that we can go out and and love others unconditionally, love them with with big love and guard the access that they do get. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank y'all very much and have a fun Friday. Thank y'all, and thank you to each of you for joining us on today's Sophie. Look forward to seeing you right here next time on Sophie.