00;00;02;16 - 00;00;16;27
Brenton
This is further a weekly show for the people of Harmony Bible Church, where we seek to revisit and expand on Sunday sermons with the goal of growing deeper in biblical truth that transforms our lives.

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Brenton
Welcome back to Further. My name is Brenton Grimm, and today I'm here with Chris Carr and we have another new guest, Leon Allen. Alien.

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Leanne
Hey.

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Brenton
Leon is is currently the assistant director of the Danville campus, but for about seven years, she was the director of children's ministry here at Harmony. She's had such a large impact on our kids here and not only our kids, but our families as well. So really appreciate you coming on today to to talk about legacy and kind of what you've learned over the years.

00;00;51;19 - 00;01;15;10
Brenton
I do want to start, Chris, with something from Sunday. So you talked about spiritual habits and you brought up some specific ones on Sunday. What would you say to someone that would call these things legalism, especially with something like Bible study that isn't explicitly commanded in Scripture?

00;01;15;24 - 00;01;49;16
Chris
Well, I think you can certainly go about spiritual habits in a legalistic way, but they can in and of themselves are not legalism. They are all good things. But once again, it all comes down to what's going on in our heart. So if we pursue them in order to gain merit with God, we're thinking that because we say the Bible, because we pray, because we go to church gatherings on and on fast.

00;01;50;16 - 00;02;27;27
Chris
Any of the number ones that we can mention and that those things are actually either in and of themselves saving us or making us godly by just simply the doing of them, then that that is legalism for sure. And there are definitely people who do it pursue it in that way. Think about it in that way. I can say that even for my own sake, that has been a challenge for me in the past, and it probably even still is to to some degree, just thinking that I got to do this because this is the thing that makes me spiritual and if I don't do this, my Bible study this morning, God's displeased with me

00;02;27;27 - 00;02;54;24
Chris
or something like that. But if we have a heart that says, I'm doing these things, I'm pursuing these things because I love God and because I want to please him, and that these are the things that the Holy Spirit uses to produce godliness in me. That's not legalism at all. And so I would say, you know, the Bible never necessarily comes out and says, you need to do a Bible study every morning.

00;02;54;24 - 00;03;19;19
Chris
But but the Bible does say over and over again about how we should love the word and and give ourselves to the word. And we can again mention prayer, fasting, a whole host of other things. But again, it's the it's the end that we are after. And really, I put it this way are we after God or are we after simply, you know, checking a box?

00;03;19;19 - 00;03;27;26
Chris
Because that makes us feel good about ourselves and makes us think that now I've arrived, I've made it, God's God's pleased with me.

00;03;27;29 - 00;03;49;23
Brenton
I think especially when you're talking about the kind of checking boxes, I think that's a good recipe for not sticking with something as well where we we do it for a while just because we feel like we need to and it's not it's not necessarily going to become a habit of ours if it's just something we feel like we need to cross off.

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Brenton
So having having the right the right motive and knowing that this is how we become more godly and how we get closer to God, I think is a much more motivation for us.

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Chris
Yeah, I mean, it is tricky though, because there is some truth to it that at times you just need to make yourself do it. And if that's always your, you know, the mode that you're in where you you always have to say, okay, I'm going to do this because I got to do it. Well, that's problematic. But if we never have this, if we never do it when we don't want to do it, there's a lot of a lot of times that we won't do it.

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Chris
We probably won't consistently do it where it becomes actually a habit. I think any good habit that we have, there's there's times, especially at the beginning, where we have to say, I'm going to get up and do this, you know, And again, if that's always what it is and it's just like checking off the box, I've got to force myself to do it then, then that's a that's problematic.

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Chris
And this is why the gospel is so important, is because we've got to go to the gospel over and over again, because that's what gives us the heart to to want to do it for the right reason.

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Brenton
Yeah, it's good. It's good. That's LeAnn. So you have quite the family legacy. I remember getting invited to one of your family reunions one time, and it was unbelievable how many people were there.

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Chris
And how did you get an invite to that?

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Brenton
And I can't say.

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Leanne
I think there was a connection with Nate and Hannah.

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Brenton
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I've.

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Chris
Yeah, I've heard about these things for a long time. I've never.

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Brenton
Ever been there. Interesting.

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Leanne
You can come to church on Sunday morning.

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Chris
I know. Well, I hear they take, you know, like lots and lots of people from our church on the Sunday morning that they had this week.

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Leanne
So.

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Brenton
Yeah. So just looking at the at the amount of people there and the just the focus on on living a godly life in your family. Can you talk a little bit about how your family influenced you through through your childhood and after into adulthood?

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Leanne
Yeah, for sure. Well, God put me in a home with believing parents. And I'm I believe that I'm at least a fourth generation Christian. So lots of aunts and uncles and great aunts and uncles and grandparents that followed the Lord lived for the Lord. But my parents were actually pretty young Christians and yet I have it be my great aunt and great uncle that really took my parents under their wings when they were dating.

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Leanne
And early on in their marriage and just really poured into them and just spent a lot of time with them, disciple them. And so even though my parents were young believers, they I would say they did a lot of things right as parents. They were attending this church at that time. So they of course, we're getting a lot of great teaching there as well.

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Leanne
And in my eyes, they they really were the same people through out the week as they were on Sundays. So there was no inconsistency there as far as I was concerned. They were a great example of faithfulness to me. They both taught Sunday School here at Harmony for many, many years, year round and weekend and week out. And so they were always studying their lessons.

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Leanne
During the week, their Bibles were open and they really are just an example of faithfulness to me. And God definitely used them to bring me to faith and grow me and my faith. But I would also say that he used all of these extended family members that I just mentioned. They would play a part really in in my faith individually in some cases, but in a collective sense as well.

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Leanne
I'm mostly talking about the relatives on my dad's side of the family through his mom. She was one of eight children. And of those eight children, I think at least five were believers and three of them attended here at Harmony. And so I had a lot of contact with a lot of extended family members that knew the Lord went to church with them.

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Leanne
I grew up right next door to my grandparents, spent a lot of time with them. And the Memorial Day reunion that you referred to, Brenton Memorial Day is coming up again, and we're looking forward to that. Every year on Memorial Day weekend, this side of the family gathers for the entire weekend. And this is like a three day feast filled with games and fun and bonfires and, hey, rock rides and all of that kind of stuff.

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Leanne
And it really left a big impact on me as a kid. So not just all of the fun and games, that was definitely part of it, but also, you know, having church together in a in a machine shed. And when it rained the the noise, you could barely hear someone talking. But having church together, singing hymns together, hearing testimonies, hearing aunts and uncles talk about the Lord just very impactful, joining hands at the end of the weekend before the final meal and singing the docs ology, you know, three days a year doesn't sound like a whole lot.

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Leanne
But when you string all of those days together and all of those godly impressions that were stamped on my heart through that period of time, through those weekends, it really was a lot. So God definitely used my my parents, my extended family. And I would say he also for sure used this church to establish my faith. I was literally born into this church family.

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Leanne
And there are so many individuals that have poured into me over the years. But the thing that I think is neat is they yes, they taught me God's word. Obviously, that is important, but they also served as examples to me, really, of what it looks like to be a follower of Jesus and what it looks like to walk with him and serve him faithfully and not just for a short time, but really over a lifetime.

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Leanne
And I think that's something I really appreciate about attending the same church all my life. Essentially, I get to see the same people still serving and still walking with the Lord for decades, and that has been a huge encouragement to me to, I think just to to boil down the legacy that I've received. I think it really just comes down to a lot of people in my life that were really faithful.

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Leanne
They weren't spiritual superheroes. They were just faithful. I think about my mom teaching my kindergarten class, and I can still picture that little corner of Room 100 down in the basement. And, you know, she didn't know at that time that a future pastor of Harmony was in her kindergarten class. She didn't know that a future director, Children's Ministries was in her class, but she was faithful, even though she didn't know what impact she might have.

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Leanne
But I'm thankful for that. And that's an example to me. And that was true of so many people at Harmony, I would say, over the years too.

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Brenton
That's really good. Yeah. One thing that sticks out to me is there's a lot there. But I think what comes to my mind first when we think of family legacy is the nuclear family, right? So the people that we live with and are most connected to in most situations, but to think about extended family and aunts and uncles and nephews and nieces and like, yeah, just being intentional with with even our extended family and knowing the impact that we can have on those on those people is a big thing.

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Brenton
And I think at least in my mind, probably gets overlooked a lot.

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Leanne
Absolutely.

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Chris
Who's who's the driving factor behind the whole family gathering there? Who?

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Leanne
Oh, boy. Well, it sort of evolves. We kind of have a group of ladies that organize it, shop for it, plan. Yeah.

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Chris
Okay. Is there like a patriarch or matriarch or.

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Leanne
Okay, well, there's only one of the original seven siblings that's still living. The youngest one, my uncle Randall. And he was instrumental in both of my parents coming to know the Lord. He's just led dozens of people to the Lord and has been a big part of me understanding how the Bible fits together and the big story of the Bible.

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Chris
Yeah. So I think as you're you're talking about that you think about, you know, spiritual habits, which is we're going to talk more about here in just a little bit. But that's that's kind of a spiritual habit that somebody in your family or somebody said it, we're going to do this. And it's not just a family gathering, right?

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Chris
I mean, it's it's literally there's spiritual purpose in it, too. Yeah.

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Leanne
Yeah, sure. And always have church. And then there's the spontaneous stuff that happens to, you know, just the music and the sharing and the one on one conversations that happen and it's just a lot of good, clean fun and a lot of spiritual encouragement. And yeah.

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Chris
Well, I just want to emphasize that. But most of us have family gatherings, I would guess for for holidays or some of the holidays. But there's another level to it here. When there's some sort of intentionality. The purpose is that we're actually going to look to the Lord in this and try to focus on on him. It's a whole different ballgame.

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Chris
There. So, yeah.

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Brenton
It's good. Listen, and in your experience as children's director, how important is the role of the parent in the life of kids? Like, what's the effect of of parents counting on the church to disciple their kids instead of them actually taking the responsibility to do it?

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Leanne
Yeah, well, hopefully most of us recognize at this point that the parents role is absolutely vital to the development of a child's faith. That's not to say that a child from an unbelieving home can't come to faith. Of course we know that's possible. But I think what I'm saying is that it actually can be detrimental, I believe, to a child's faith if they go to church and they're taught from God's word, but they don't actually see any of that lived out in the home.

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Leanne
When I was young, I think my parents did do a good job of providing a biblical worldview for my sister and I. In other words, you know, church and God wasn't just one segment of our lives. It was at the very center and everything else revolved around that. So as Chris said on Sunday, church wasn't just a hobby.

00;15;31;06 - 00;15;57;27
Leanne
It wasn't my parents just going through the motions. Like I said, they really were the same people during the week as they were on Sunday. There was there was consistency there and already talked about the example that they provided for me. But for all those reasons and more, if I knew only one thing, it was that this stuff mattered to my parents and therefore it didn't matter to me.

00;15;58;22 - 00;16;27;06
Leanne
On the other hand, I think if we're never asking our kids what they learned in Sunday school or talking about that, talking about spiritual things in the everyday moments of life, if our Bibles are rarely opened at home, if Jesus isn't central to what goes on in our homes, I just think our children may conclude that this stuff isn't really all that important to mom and dad, and so why should it matter to me?

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Leanne
So yeah, I would just encourage parents maybe some are listening and they are recognizing the importance of discipling their kids, but they feel overwhelmed and they don't know where to begin. I would say for one thing, please reach out to someone on our family ministry staff or a pastor or myself. There are definitely resources and things that we can offer and people that can come alongside and help and encourage.

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Leanne
But I also just want to say, you know, there isn't a certain formula that we have to follow. There aren't certain resources that we have to use aside from God's word. Of course, and we don't have to have all of the answers. But I think we just need to center our lives on Jesus and be faithful and connect with other believers and let our kids see that we love the Lord.

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Leanne
Because ultimately, you know, they tend to love what we love.

00;17;29;12 - 00;17;49;19
Brenton
So I know a few years ago, Harmony kind of went through a shift with with children's ministry and really wanted to to make it clear that the first priority is the parent in that. And it goes back to what you're saying. But what did that what did that shift look like and what was the motivation behind that?

00;17;50;15 - 00;18;13;07
Chris
Well, I think maybe both of us can speak into this. I would just say that one of the big things is we just through discussions and and some things we were we were reading and hearing, just kind of realize that the parents have maybe 100 or more hours a week more than the the corporate church gathering does tend to pour into these kids.

00;18;13;07 - 00;18;38;17
Chris
And so we have 2 to 3 hours a week at the most. Parents have a lot more than that, depending upon the age of the kids and depending on what's going on in life. And so along with that is that the the clearly the responsibility, biblically speaking, is first and foremost mom and dad and and not the church.

00;18;38;17 - 00;19;05;19
Chris
Not the church of responsibility. Sure. But that's in many ways to come alongside of the parents to help them in disciplining their children. We have no commands in this scripture at all for the church to disciple children any more than anybody else in the church. But we do have plenty of them commands for the parents to do so.

00;19;05;19 - 00;19;32;04
Chris
And from my standpoint, I just kind of come to the realization that sometimes the church is the parents use the church as a crutch and they're like, okay, we've got children's ministry at one point AWANA, and so we're going to make sure our kids are there. And then that's, that's our responsibility to get them there. And so we just kind of had to rethink that.

00;19;32;04 - 00;19;47;05
Chris
And and LeAnn led the way in this. And we great to hear what she has to say. But but how do we actually come alongside the parents more And in some ways just even saying, hey, this is your responsibility and we're going to support you, not the other way around?

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Brenton
Yeah, yeah.

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Leanne
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it just really isn't realistic to think that the church on its own can disciple kids. I remember going to a conference several years ago and everybody was running around with these t shirts that had a big fraction on the front of them and it said it was one over 168. And the theme of the conference that year was one in 168.

00;20;13;02 - 00;20;47;12
Leanne
It's not enough. And 168 is the number of hours in a week and one was the number they were using to represent the amount of time that the church gets to speak into a child's life. Probably best case scenario on Sunday mornings. And, you know, I think about like if if a child was learning to play a guitar and the parent took them to a lesson once a week for an hour and then took them back home and they never opened up the guitar case, they never picked up the guitar during the week.

00;20;47;22 - 00;21;13;24
Leanne
They wouldn't be much of a guitar player, right? And I and I think that's kind of how it is. We can't expect the church to do in one hour what what the parents need to do the rest of the week. And yet I think sometimes we forget that that that's the case. But we can't forget when it's something as vital as discipling our kids.

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Brenton
That's you know, it's really good that.

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Chris
Yeah. And I would just add here another soapbox thing for me. And but research shows that by far it's not even close. The number one thing that impacts whether or not a child is going to walk with the Lord when they become an adult is the father does whether or not the father only professes faith in Christ, but actually makes it a priority.

00;21;43;11 - 00;22;10;27
Chris
And I don't want to minimize here at all the roles that mom has in that mom has a huge role to. But in I'm truly I'm not making this up. I'm just going by what research shows over and over again is if Dad decides that he's going to follow Jesus and he's going to bring his kids along with that, that makes just the biggest difference by a long shot and anything else.

00;22;10;27 - 00;22;37;11
Chris
And ideally, it's mom and dad together or doing together. And when we do that, we give our kids a real huge advantage. And so certainly bringing them to the church Sunday morning, bring them to community group, hopefully that's involved there with our high school and junior high students. Wednesday night, you know, and all of that. Great, wonderful. We want to do all of that.

00;22;37;26 - 00;23;01;08
Chris
But the parents have to take the responsibility and dads in particular and say this is this is where I'm going to I'm going to lead and where I'm going to go. And if that's the case, it actually shows that in most cases, the children actually will come along. So there you know, there's the verse and proverbs that we all probably learned growing up.

00;23;01;26 - 00;23;22;23
Chris
You know, bring your child up and the nurture and ammunition of Lord. And when they're older, they will not depart from it. Actually, just what you're that I combined New Testament and an Old Testament just by but yeah and but that's it's not a it's actually not a guarantee some people take that as a guarantee like that. It's not a guarantee.

00;23;22;23 - 00;23;42;22
Chris
It's like this is the way that it normally happens and this is a principle here. And, and we see that we actually see that playing out is that when parents do prioritize that and in a majority of the time the children will walk with the Lord to not not always not foolproof, but a lot of the time in this case.

00;23;42;24 - 00;24;12;26
Brenton
Yeah. Yeah. And you're kind of talking about the efficacy of of parents in the in the lives of the kids. But we you brought it up earlier. I mean we have scriptural commandments. Deuteronomy six comes to mind that we should train up our children and it's the fathers role. And so I don't know, I kind of feel like this Sunday, what we what we do, our children's ministry is, is supplemental at most to to what we should be doing at home.

00;24;13;10 - 00;24;20;16
Brenton
And so, yeah, I think it's a matter of just prioritizing who who should be in charge and who should be kind of supplementing.

00;24;20;16 - 00;24;48;12
Chris
Right. And it's not an either or. Yeah, it's a both. And and because the parents do need the church and the church needs to be discipling adults and sharing into them and pushing them and providing them resources. And our children's ministry and Lianne was really the biggest part of that, has done a fantastic job over the last close to a decade really of of of, you know, kind of figuring this out.

00;24;48;12 - 00;25;10;18
Chris
How do we come alongside of parents, how do we provide resources, how do we promote that and what we're trying to grow in that even still today and we you know, we've got this legacy workshop just this week and we're going to talk about this more and how do we help and all this kind of stuff. And and so it's a partnership that we're working together.

00;25;10;18 - 00;25;22;29
Chris
And but you're right, Brian is like the parents have to just decide, like, this is this is our responsibility. We're going to own it and then we're going to lean into the church to help us to to be able to do that.

00;25;23;04 - 00;25;54;14
Brenton
Yeah, Well, and one one thing, just as a parent of someone that is of kids that have been in the children's ministry, it's such a good jumping off points for for conversation with the kids to that they come out of Sunday with these stories or whatever they're going over that week it's been it's been really good to have solid teaching happening there where it's not just fluff, It's not it's not just that the kids are coloring things to keep them busy for an hour.

00;25;54;14 - 00;26;22;27
Brenton
They've really been intentional, especially through the big story that we did. I think that that was so, so beneficial for the kids to go through. Yeah. So appreciate that. Chris touched a little on false teaching on Sunday, or as our passage put it, irreverent, silly myths. LeAnn, how important is it for us to give our kids proper theology at a young age?

00;26;23;08 - 00;26;25;23
Brenton
And what are the consequences if we don't?

00;26;27;01 - 00;26;40;05
Leanne
Yeah, well, maybe before we dig into that, we can just define theology because that can be an intimidating thing for, for parents to think about. I think and Brett.

00;26;40;06 - 00;26;42;29
Chris
Brennan really needs this definition because he said to me.

00;26;43;05 - 00;26;44;21
Leanne
Brennan, would you like to go ahead and help.

00;26;44;24 - 00;26;45;03
Brenton
You do.

00;26;45;03 - 00;26;48;09
Chris
It? He's a little questionable this, but.

00;26;48;09 - 00;27;16;06
Leanne
Well, I mean, to put it simply, theology literally just means the study of God. And I think when we talk about teaching our children theology, where we're really just talking about teaching them what the Bible says about God and about mankind and sin and God's plan of redemption through Jesus. So, you know, clearly theology isn't just for pastors and theologians.

00;27;16;15 - 00;27;44;28
Leanne
It's for all of us. And these are the truths that we want to pass on to the next generation. So if we want our children to understand God's plan of redemption and understand that salvation is by grace, alone through faith, alone in Christ alone, they need theology if we want them to be discerning and grounded in truth so they don't falter when they're confronted with false teaching or other worldviews.

00;27;45;07 - 00;28;12;20
Leanne
We need to teach them theology, and if we want them to center their lives on the gospel, we've got to do that. And I know the idea of this sounds kind of intimidating, but it really isn't as scary as it sounds. And contrary to what people might think, you do not need a seminary degree to do this when I was young, no one ever just sat me down and said, We're going to have theology class now.

00;28;12;20 - 00;28;40;18
Leanne
You know, it was woven into my life, I would say, in various ways. And I think that's that can be a great approach for for families, too. I would say a good share of my instruction in theology really just came from the scripture that I memorized as a child. I learned a lot of of verses through the AWANA program when I was young, and that was great.

00;28;40;18 - 00;29;04;17
Leanne
But there are other ways to memorize scripture, too. I was thinking about this, just wanting to offer a few ideas there. We have Bible verses that the kids are memorizing on Sunday morning, so parents can always work on those verses, but the kids are learning. I was even thinking how parents could pull verses from the Sunday sermons that they hear.

00;29;04;17 - 00;29;26;23
Leanne
You know, we're going through Romans right now and it is obviously chock full of great theological verses to memorize verses like Romans 310. Not as righteous. No, not one, Romans 323 four. All have sinned and fall short. Five God demonstrated his love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us and we could go on and on there.

00;29;27;10 - 00;29;53;05
Leanne
But those are amazing verses for us to memorize. You can even go online and get the Ohana scope in sequence if you wanted to, and that lists a lot of those core verses that are so good to commit to memory. So I think scripture memorization is a is a good place to start. I think another way that we can feed theology to our kids is just in the music that we listen to.

00;29;53;24 - 00;30;19;13
Leanne
I had a lot of exposure to hymns when I was young, and I love hymns because I grew up singing them and playing them on the piano and they are very rich in theology and the words stay with you, of course, because they're set to music, but it doesn't have to be hymns. There are other songs that have a lot of theologically rich content too, and so this is easy.

00;30;19;24 - 00;30;43;27
Leanne
We can play songs in the car and at home and then talk to our kids about what what those things mean and some of the big words that maybe they hear in there. And then the last thing I was just going to mention is in regards to teaching theology to our kids is through books. We we often read books to our children or with our children.

00;30;43;27 - 00;31;10;05
Leanne
And there are so many great resources available today. This is something you're already doing anyway. So maybe work in some books that introduce some theological themes. And with this one in particular, I would really encourage you to talk to our Harmony Kids staff. We have a lot of really great books and I know those are there for you to thumb through, even borrow.

00;31;11;03 - 00;31;36;03
Leanne
And so that's another great way to teach our kids theology. For me, I think the bottom line is just to infuse it into everyday life and the things that you're already doing, not that it couldn't be more structured, but I think that a lot of that we can just do that way and it is sure to spark a lot of meaningful discussions with your kids too.

00;31;36;19 - 00;32;06;24
Leanne
They're going to have questions and you may not always know the answer, but hopefully that doesn't. You don't let that scare you. We don't have to have all the answers as parents. We just need to be willing, I think, to learn new things even alongside of our kids and find the answers together sometimes. So again, I think using the Harmony kids, staff and family ministry staff as a resource and in teaching theology to our kids too.

00;32;07;15 - 00;32;24;18
Brenton
Yeah, I love that. That's a lot of really good practical information of how we can approach this. So that's great. One thing that we did not not too long ago was the big story, and I brought that up a couple of minutes ago. But what.

00;32;25;08 - 00;32;32;09
Chris
Five years ago now is he doesn't believe that.

00;32;32;09 - 00;32;52;03
Brenton
But really, I mean, the point of it was to show that Jesus is is throughout the whole through whole and throughout the whole Bible, that everything ultimately comes back to him. What was that like with teaching and teaching the kids that and and what kind of impact did you see on the kids through through doing that?

00;32;52;09 - 00;33;16;19
Leanne
Yeah, well, we use chronological curriculum in Harmony kids now anyway and have for some time we did on Wednesday nights and we do on Sunday mornings. And so really we were already doing it. And that particular year we sort of aligned and what we were teaching the kids with what, what the Sunday sermons were for the adults so that it went together.

00;33;16;19 - 00;33;35;27
Leanne
But I am so thankful for the curriculum nowadays that we have that that does teach the Bible as one big story. I don't know if I was just asleep in class when when they taught that when I was a kid, or if I just missed that.

00;33;35;27 - 00;33;40;04
Chris
Pastor was distracting you. The future pastor of Harmony history?

00;33;40;12 - 00;33;40;19
Speaker 4
Yes.

00;33;41;02 - 00;33;43;23
Leanne
Probably referring to Matt.

00;33;44;26 - 00;33;47;22
Chris
And his twin brother. My great. We probably shouldn't leave him out either.

00;33;48;09 - 00;34;34;14
Leanne
Yeah, but I really do think that the curriculum nowadays is is so I shouldn't say as if it's all of it. But the particular curriculum that we use does a wonderful job of weaving scripture together. Genesis to Revelation, God's redemptive plan throughout history. And, you know, growing up, like I said, I didn't get this. Somehow I knew a whole lot of Bible stories and a whole lot of Bible verses, but I was actually a young adult before things really started to click for me and before the big story of the Bible actually just came together.

00;34;34;14 - 00;35;00;22
Leanne
And in a way that made sense. And when it did, it had a really profound effect on me. For example, I suddenly realized that the story of King David and the fellowship wasn't just a lesson on kindness. King David showed mercy to my fabricius, who was actually an enemy of the crown and he was helpless cripple, who had nothing to offer.

00;35;01;06 - 00;35;29;12
Leanne
And King David invited him to dine at his table, at the King's Table, and I realized that is a story about Jesus showing mercy to us. I had never seen it that way before. Another example, suddenly I understood that there was so much more to the story of Joseph. He was his father's beloved son. He was rejected, despised, betrayed, falsely condemned.

00;35;30;12 - 00;35;54;22
Leanne
He wasn't put to death. He was sold into slavery. But then he was raised from a pit to sit on a throne, and he used his exalted position to forgive and save. That sounds a little familiar, right? That isn't just a lesson on Joseph showing kindness to his brothers or being honest when it was hard or forgiving people who've hurt you.

00;35;55;09 - 00;36;28;22
Leanne
I realized that was a picture of Jesus. Something else that made a big impression on me when I suddenly realized that you know, in the New Testament, there's all these stories of Jesus healing people, a helpless paralytic that can't make their way to Jesus, an unclean leper, a blind person, a dead person. And I realized, you know, that's a picture of the spiritual healing that Jesus offers to us before Christ.

00;36;29;02 - 00;37;01;29
Leanne
I was helpless, I was unclean, I was blind, I was dead. And so when I started to see those things in the Bible and see how stories fit into the big story and just recognize that it really is all about Jesus, the moral lessons kind of that that I kind of grew up learning. Those kind of took a backseat because for the first time I could see not that those are not important, not that there aren't things that we can learn from those from a moral perspective.

00;37;01;29 - 00;37;37;15
Leanne
But I could see for the first time God's plan unfolding, and in that I could see his sovereignty and his faithfulness and his love. And, you know, somewhere along the way, all of these stories that had filled my head since childhood were now really making their way into my heart. And as God kind of took what was so familiar to me and just flipped it upside down and used used it to really reveal more about himself.

00;37;37;15 - 00;37;53;21
Leanne
So I think when we when we begin to understand the Bible that way, that's when it truly impacts our hearts. When we understand, as we say in our in our Harmony kids mission statement who God is and what He has done.

00;37;53;21 - 00;38;20;17
Chris
Yeah, that's that's really, really good there. And I would just add along with it, we're roughly the same age I won't mentioned who's the older one. Liane But it was very similar to me. You know, we grew up pretty similarly, at least in regards to church and so knew all the stories. And it wasn't until I was a young adult that it actually started to kind of come together for me.

00;38;20;17 - 00;39;07;27
Chris
And the passage that Unlocked is the Luke 24 passage, where Jesus is on the road to to me as he meets the the two disciples there. And they're, you know, he interrupts their conversation and I won't go into all of it, but he basically says, you know, in Luke 24, 27, and beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them and all the scriptures, the things concerning himself, and so that the whole Bible is about Jesus and it's all meant to point to Jesus, and specifically it's meant to point to His incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension and his return.

00;39;08;20 - 00;39;27;11
Chris
And when we have it, we look at it from that perspective. It just all the stories and all the parts of the Bible take on a whole new meaning and whole new depth. And that's where, like you said, the transfer. A formative effect of the Bible in the Gospel can really take hold of our our hearts.

00;39;27;19 - 00;39;42;05
Brenton
Yeah, yeah, yeah. We stop we start looking at those stories as kind of examples of of behavior modification. I mean, that's, that's how I grew up, right? I mean, those the stories are we need to do what David did in this situation.

00;39;42;16 - 00;39;44;11
Chris
We need a dare to be a Daniel.

00;39;44;12 - 00;40;12;07
Brenton
All right? And so you yeah, you start seeing the text a very different way when when you see that it's all building up to the climax of the gospel. So it's good. I think maybe we'll end on this one. Chris You gave a really good list of practical spiritual habits on Sunday. You mentioned things like Bible study, prayer, fasting and celebrating.

00;40;13;02 - 00;40;38;16
Brenton
And I think we all know that forming these habits can be really hard to do. We may have some success for a while, but it's way too easy to stop. And then and then we get discouraged. What would you suggest to someone that that's in that spot right now, someone that's discouraged about not doing these things consistently? What would be your message to them?

00;40;38;16 - 00;41;03;27
Chris
Well, the first thing I would say to them is that they've always got to remember that God is gracious and start from a place of there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus and be careful not to beat themselves up over their their failure to be disciplined. And that doesn't mean that we don't need to be convicted about it.

00;41;03;27 - 00;41;26;26
Chris
But there's a difference between condemnation and conviction. And again, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And so God is pleased with me, regardless of what I do or don't do. And what I mean by that doesn't mean that he's pleased with with my behavior, but it means that I have the favor of God upon me.

00;41;26;26 - 00;41;50;09
Chris
And regardless of whether I have a good day or I have a bad day, one book I would actually encourage really everybody to read This is top three books. That's, you know, for me is called The Disciplines of Grace by Jerry Bridges. Just it's fantastic. It addresses this very issue. But so there is room for for conviction. Sure.

00;41;50;09 - 00;42;31;17
Chris
That, you know, I need to be more disciplined in Bible reading prayer or all of these spiritual habits. But I would begin then by reminding them of God's grace to them in Jesus because here we go again, Second Corinthians Chapter five. Okay, the love of Christ compels me and and the only thing that is ultimately going to compel us and the only place that we're going to actually find the motivation and the heart that we need to pursue the spiritual habits is in reminding ourselves of the love of Christ and the grace of God.

00;42;31;22 - 00;42;53;09
Chris
So that's that really is the first thing that I would say. The second thing I would say is I really do think you have to in many ways start small and remember that habits are not formed in a day and they're not reformed in a day either. If you if you get out of the habit, it takes time.

00;42;53;09 - 00;43;15;06
Chris
And so some of that means you need to start small. And I mentioned on Sunday, if it's if it's about Bible study and prayer, take five, start literally start with 5 minutes a day and just say this is I'm going to commit to doing this. And it might be difficult and you might miss a day or you might miss two days or whatever, but you're going to commit to doing an edge becomes a habit.

00;43;15;06 - 00;43;41;15
Chris
It just will become in some ways something that you just naturally do. And so give an example here. When we leave the office today, all of us have a, you know, 15, 20 minute drive, maybe a little bit shorter than that. But I'm probably not going to think too much about the way home. And most of the time I end up at home and I'm like, okay, not sure how I even got here.

00;43;41;16 - 00;44;06;24
Chris
I don't even remember the turns because I'm kind of on autopilot because it's just, you know, that that's the way we're kind of wired and made is like, after we do something enough times, it just becomes second nature to us. That's what in some ways we're after with these spiritual habits. But you have to you have to do it consistently and again, you got to start small and you got to build those things up.

00;44;06;24 - 00;44;27;21
Chris
I think this is also it's also important to have people in your lives who can encourage you in this and who can, you know, be asking how you're doing and who can, you know, spur you on to a loving, loving good deeds and trying to go it alone when it comes to really any type of discipline is pretty hard.

00;44;28;09 - 00;45;02;12
Chris
You know, I found like with with exercise it it's much easier when I have somebody doing it with me. And so that's in many ways a spiritual habit so that people coming alongside you in regard to that. And then maybe the last thing I would put here is I think we've got to start by thinking about the kind of people that we want to become and then trying to reverse engineer our lives so to speak, in this way.

00;45;02;17 - 00;45;26;05
Chris
So what I mean by this is that we have to decide if we want to truly be a godly person or not. And then if the answer to that is yes, I do, then we've got to put things into place that are going to enable us to be that that kind of person. So I use a running example.

00;45;26;05 - 00;45;47;22
Chris
I could not just use it again because it's so easy for me, but if you want to be a runner, then you got to say, okay, what are the kind of things that do people who are runners, what do they do? And then you guys start doing those kind of things and you can, you know, like, here's another like if I want to be a beau hunter, well then going to say and I know people who are both Beau Hunter's, what do they do?

00;45;48;00 - 00;46;16;15
Chris
And then, you know, get the equipment and start practicing and learn and all these kind of things. And I mean, it's really the same thing is true is like I, I want to be a godly person. Well, these are the the characteristics of the things that a godly person does. And I'll finish with a quote by Tom Landry, who one time coach of the Dallas Cowboys and my oldest daughter is actually named after him, believe it or not.

00;46;16;15 - 00;46;45;25
Chris
And that's largely because my wife is a huge Cowboys fan. And he he wants her say to this. He said the job of a football coach is to make men do what they don't want to do in order to achieve what they always wanted to be. And so in the same way we Christians were called to make ourselves do things that we don't naturally want to do, pursue these spiritual habits in order to become what we've always wanted it to be.

00;46;45;25 - 00;47;13;05
Chris
And that is like Jesus Christ. And so to be a Christian is to desire to be like Jesus Christ. He is our hope. So that passage first Timothy, we've set our hope on the living God. He is our hope. And so that means in order, if we're going to be like him and we're going to have him and know him, that we have to at times give ourselves things that we don't naturally want to do.

00;47;13;08 - 00;47;28;09
Chris
And I guess to circle back again, I really want to just want to encourage people. It's not natural in the beginning, but you can get to the place where it becomes a natural part of your life. It becomes second nature to you.

00;47;28;14 - 00;47;53;15
Brenton
Yeah, yeah. I really like your point about kind of reverse engineering our lives and, and you're using the example of running and bow hunting. But I mean, that's, that's one big reason why we read biographies of people that we are, that we admire or that have lived godly lives. So even looking backwards to some of those people is just really important.

00;47;53;24 - 00;48;14;02
Chris
So let me speak to actually to you or even ask you a question, but this goes back to what Liam was talking about earlier. You know, about a child learning to play the guitar. So let me put it this way. I won't use guitar. I'll use drums. Since you're a drummer who's like the greatest drummer of all time.

00;48;15;12 - 00;48;22;00
Brenton
That's a good question. I don't know. I would have said for a long time Danny Carey, but I don't think anyone's going to know who.

00;48;22;00 - 00;48;48;14
Chris
Dana Garrett I do not. Do you with Yeah. And so but he, he, he got became a great drummer because I'm sure he could practice hours on on end. And really my, my point there is if you if you want to be a great drummer, you are even just a drummer or a guitarist. You have to commit to the kind of things that will lead you to you to be that.

00;48;48;17 - 00;48;52;04
Brenton
Yeah, yeah. And you have to look for inspiration to to want to do this.

00;48;52;12 - 00;49;17;27
Chris
In the passage. And suddenly again, it's like it the spiritual habits have value in this life and the life to come. So there's value in becoming a great drummer, great guitarist, even runner, I'd say Bo Hunter. I mean, you can list of all these different things. There's a there's immense value not only in heaven, but even in in this life.

00;49;17;27 - 00;49;49;05
Chris
And if I can just add something, one more thing. And I said that already, so but I will end on this thing. I really want to encourage everybody that being disciplined right now is hard, but it's actually harder not to be spiritually disciplined. And just to drive this point home, I just use an example of pornography. It's hard for us.

00;49;49;29 - 00;50;12;24
Chris
Maybe not everybody, but but it's hard. And certainly in the world that we live today to pursue purity that takes some discipline not to look at things that are going to lead us to lust and to watch things to to look at things, whatever it may be. That's hard. It requires discipline. It just made us speak for me personally, because it is hard for me to.

00;50;12;24 - 00;50;34;01
Chris
But one of the things that I do is I remind myself it's harder not to be disciplined. You know. What I mean by that is that if I'm not disciplined in that and I do allow myself to consume something like that, it's going to impact my relationship with God. It's going to impact my relationship with my wife. It's going to impact my relationship with my kids.

00;50;34;01 - 00;51;03;22
Chris
It's going to impact my relationship with my church body. And it has the potential to literally blow up my life and I could use this in so many, so many different ways. But we've got to remind ourselves that, yes, it's hard to get up five, ten, 15 minutes early. It's hard to commit to being at the church, gathering every Sunday, to going to community groups, serving to be gentle, all of those kind of things.

00;51;03;22 - 00;51;40;00
Chris
And I don't minimize any of this that it's not hard because it is hard, but it's actually harder not to do it. And of course, instant gratification world in the devil in our flesh are all screaming out, just do whatever you know, feels good in the moment and we just got to preach ourselves with. That's while it might be better, you know, since he says sin is pleasurable for for a moment and in the long run and a lot of times not even in the long run, in in in very quickly it's going to be catastrophic for us.

00;51;40;10 - 00;51;41;11
Brenton
Yeah, it was.

00;51;41;23 - 00;51;43;28
Chris
There's an extra message for you today.

00;51;44;01 - 00;52;23;07
Brenton
And I go, Yeah, here you go. You get a free one. Well, I appreciate it, Leon. Thanks for coming. Thanks for the wisdom that you were able to give. Thank you. Yeah, Thanks, Chris. And we will talk to you next week.