The Importance of Remembering God's Hand in our History (Psalm 78:1-8)

Join Trey Overton and Lee Young as they reflect on Pastor Greg's Sunday sermon, continuing the Bible recap series. This week, the church celebrated the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. In our service, Greg emphasized the importance of reflecting and teaching the work of God to our children and grandchildren as instructed in Psalm 78. Trey and Lee spent time on this podcast providing insight into what that looks like and the importance of reflecting on the working hand of God. If we fail to teach our children and grandchildren the truth of the gospel and the active hand of God, we not only set them up for failure, but we negatively impact future generations to come. Constant reflection and teaching are important and vital to building a culture that seeks Christ. Join in and reflect with us as we discuss the sermon from First Baptist Church in Fort Smith, AR. 

Mavric Herrera - mherrera@fsfbc.org

Trey Overton - toverton@fsfbc.org

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Psalm 119.11 says that Scripture is a lamp for our feet and a light for our path. That means God gave us His Word to guide and equip us in practical ways as we walk through our everyday lives. Join us now for this episode of From State to Street, as our FBC staff and church members talk about how this week's Sunday morning message comes alive as we walk through the streets and moments of everyday life.

SPEAKER_02 0:28

Hey everyone, thanks for joining us. My name is Trey, and my co-host Maverick Herrera is not here today. They left yesterday to church camp. They took a bunch of uh, well, it's third grade through twelfth grade. So all scales, um, he's working with the youth uh over there at Camp Sylam. So um, if you think about them this week, if you think about the kids, be praying for them. You know, this is a big week. We got a bunch of kids uh getting to hear about Jesus, um, getting to just uh spend time in the Word and also together and work through that. Um and so if you've if you have time, think about it this week while you're praying, keep them in their prayers, pray for the God to move in mighty ways at camp, pray for God to just touch hearts on these students and to um and change their lives ultimately forever. Um, and keep that in the prayer. But today, I don't have Maverick with me, but who I do have um arguably much better. Don't tell Maverick I said that. Um, but we got Mr. Lee Young himself here. Say, hey, just the poor man's maverick. That's what I just the poor man's maverick. Um so I don't know if you were here, you know, this past Sunday we did a joint service. So Chaffee, uh, we didn't have to service out of Chaffee. What we did was it did a joint service at downtown, and this was to celebrate the 250-year anniversary of the signing of Declaration of Independence, right? Of Independence Day. That's right. And so everybody came downtown, and Lee, I thought I'd have him on the podcast today. Number one, he always does a great job when he comes on here, but also he was the man that was on stage that was giving a narrative of I don't even know what you call it, but like different facts and and and really um stages through history and and showing God's working hand and all of those things, and did a really good job. And and as I told Lee, I was like, you know, it actually looked like you may do that for a living.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

So um, well, anything that really looked good in there, all the credit goes to Jacob Jackson because I and I know Greg and and Jacob worked together on this, but gr uh, but Jacob had it all put together. He knew exactly what he wanted, and I said, if you'll tell me what you what would like me to do, that's what I'll do. And I thought, top to bottom, he and the orchestra, and then with Greg's reading of the uh Declaration of Independence, I thought the whole thing was sewn together in such a way that even though we were celebrating 250 years of America, which is my goodness, so awesome. Yeah, right. But we did not let that overshadow the goodness of God and his blessings that we were celebrating. Yeah, no, I'm not sure. So I thought it was perfect.

SPEAKER_02 3:06

I agree. Jacob did a wonderful job. And of course, you know, I'm speaking of Maverick, he was up there uh working the uh the bongos or whatever, I don't know, some kind of drum. And I'm not an instrumentalist, obviously. And uh, but he he looked like he knew what he was doing. Yeah, he knew he knew what he was doing. At one point of service, they did that those confetti cannons, and Maverick got to pull the confetti cannon cornered, and I've never seen anybody so happy. He was super excited.

SPEAKER_01 3:32

Can I be honest? I didn't know they were gonna do that, and it scared me to death.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

Well, and me too, because I was like right there in front of it. Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Before we get off that, could I just also kudos to Bobby Dyer and his team? You know, it's real easy. We see Jacob and we see the orchestra and the choir, and we all know what a great job they do, and of course we see Greg. But uh Bobby Dyer and his crew make everything work. And you never notice what they're doing. That's how good they are at what's that?

SPEAKER_02 4:01

That's right. Yeah. No, they do. I mean, i i and and it's not just sound, it's lights, it's microphones, it's switching from this to this. And if you're watching online, all the camera switches, that's him, he's doing all of that. All that's behind the scenes, and that's Mr. Bobby Dyer and his team. So I mean good, yes, yes, 100%. We need to give him credit and um recognize them for all the work they do. So that's a that's a good point. Um, speaking of which, this this service, you know, you know, and and I'm not, we were just talking about this before the podcast started. I I'm no historian and and I'm not well versed on a lot of the stuff. I mean, I I took history classes in college and high school, and and I've done my own fair share of studying, but I am by no means an expert in any of it. So uh while Greg did an awesome job reading the Declaration of Independence and bringing a lot of historical facts uh to the sermon, I'm not gonna try to dive into all that because I'm not gonna be able to do it justice. And and I, you know, and I could even get off base on all of it. So I'm not gonna try to do that. Um, but what I will say is during the service, just reflecting on the service itself, I think um you and Greg and everybody did a did a wonderful job of just pointing, like you you mentioned it, but pointing to God's hand in not only uh the start of our nation and signing that declaration of independence, but also God's hand on on what what led up to that and then what God's hand on this country since then, through through different presidents and through um different events and through revivals and everything else, God's hand has been on this country. Um and it's just been a wonderful, it was a wonderful service and a good time to to focus on reflection. And and to to kind of further talk about that, Greg used Psalm 78, uh one through eight to point to the importance of reflection and teaching um the works of Christ to our children and our grandchildren. I mean, he read the Declaration of Independence and in doing that emphasized the importance of reflecting on the work of God and the importance of teaching that so that, you know, and that was one of his points, so that uh we can point to Christ, so that we can point to his work, so that we can point to the work of God, so that we don't forget who he is and what he's done, so that we don't fall into traps. And and and we're gonna get to more of that in in a minute. Um I just kind of wanted before we get too far into this, I really kind of wanted to read that passage. So Psalm 78, and I'm reading out of the ESV, it says, Give ear, O my people, to my teaching, incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable, I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we have heard and known that our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from our children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord and his might and the wonders he has done. He has established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law on Israel, which he commanded to our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and rise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope on God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments, and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn, rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God. Um and so that passage really highlights and it speaks for itself, but the importance of reflection, importance of teaching, report the importance of uh of all of that, right? And and like I said, I love how he spent time, Greg spent time reflecting on the past and the work of God's hand and the growth of our nation. Um how important do you think, and let's just talk about reflection. You know, reflecting, how important do you think reflecting on God's work on a regular basis, not just once a year, but a regular basis is, and what effect do you see that make on on uh the ever you know the average believer?

SPEAKER_01 8:07

Well, you've said that word several times, reflection, and uh I think that's the key to everything we're talking about. You can only reflect what you've seen. If you aren't in the word, if you don't know and you don't understand what God has done for us, it's impossible to reflect it back. So it all begins with time in the word, but reflecting that back to future generations is very important. You know, history is a continuum that didn't start with the Declaration of Independence, it started in the Garden of Eden with God and Adam and Eve, and it's uninterrupted. And when we fail to understand that and we fail to see where we've come from and how we got here, it's really difficult to see where we need to go. So it's it's of the utmost importance that we reflect the values that God has instructed us to do, but we can only do that if we've spent time in the Word. And history is what history is, and we want to understand it. We want to know the failures in the past, we want to know the good things in the past, and then we want to do better in the future, and we want to teach that for our kids and our grandkids. And the beautiful thing about like what we're doing here today, it's not just my grandkids, and in my case my great grandkids, or your kids, but it's the ones that may be impacted by what their parents or grandparents hear now and they pass on. And as the scripture just read there that you said, I think it was like in the seventh verse, maybe, about those that are unborn. They're not even here yet, but they can be impacted by what we're carrying on.

SPEAKER_02 9:51

Yeah. Well, and I think what we're talking about is just a generational effect on teaching. And and um I think about that all the time when when we talk about evangelism and we talk about making an impact in somebody's life, you know, you we we go um and meet somebody new and we go share the gospel. Well, when I share the gospel with somebody, there's a good chance um the person that you're sharing the gospel with, if they don't know Christ, it's because they weren't taught it in the house. So if if that person comes to know Christ and turns their life around for Christ, not only are you changing the dynamic of that family tree, of that, you know, of the direction that family line was going, but you make a general generational impact on what happens to the future, right? No question. So that person then tells his kids and that who tells their kids, right? And so you make a generational change and an impact on what happened. Um, I I think about reflecting a lot, and obviously one of the biggest and most effective ways that we share the gospel is through what? Sharing our testimony, right? Sharing, or and it doesn't even have to be your full testimony, it could be even peep pieces. Sometimes I'll meet with talk, be talking with somebody, and they're going through something specific where I may have had a specific time in my life where I went through something similar or knew somebody who did, or I went through something that you know coincides with it, and I'm able to share how God took me through that, and that points them to Christ. Um didn't share my whole story, right, but just a piece of it. And so that's always a good um a good reminder on that too.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Um I think And people that we're around every day should see just in the way we conduct ourselves, how we react. You know, my greatest fear is that someone who doesn't really know me well, uh and I've thought about this like with the Connect class out at Chaffee. We know each other pretty well in there. So if you saw me at a weak moment uh in the week, you would probably uh a W E A K moment in the W E E K. If you saw me at a weak moment during the week, you'd probably extend grace because you know me, you know my heart. But someone perhaps that had just come to Chaffee for the first time, they don't know me at all, don't don't know anything about me. If they were to see me at my weakest moment uh uh during the week and I somehow gave them a bad impression of what we are and what God's family is and what we stand for, that really, really worries me. So I think our testimony before we ever really start to witness about Christ starts with just how we conduct ourselves. How do they see us react when we're in a stressful moment? Uh a waitress gets something wrong, or someone is ugly to us, and how do we react and how do we respond back to that? And I think just those things are the beginning of a good testimony.

SPEAKER_02 12:40

Yeah. No, I agree a hundred percent, and it's all about seeing the heart of whoever you're talking to and and the heart of people around you, and and just having the the eyes that Christ has. Um but you know, getting back to talking about reflection, reflecting helps us kind of stay on track with that. You know, when when we when we're talking here talking about keeping our eyes, you know, on on having the eyes of Christ and seeing people like he does, the best, you know, one of the one of the the best way and the one of the ways that, you know, there again scripture right here is telling us to do is to reflect on his work because it keeps us in that mode, keeps up in the us in that mindset. Um, you know, I used to coach football and as a football coach and and players, you know, do it too, but especially as coaches when we're preparing for a game. Um, well, let's just say, you know, on on, you know, we have a Friday night game, we you know, we get done. Well, Saturday morning, we're getting up and we're watching film from that game before. Um, we sit there and we watch the you know, watch the plays and we watch what happened. We're watching for weaknesses, we're watching for bad habits that are producing, we're watching for where areas that we can improve, and we're watching for maybe opportunities that we can grow and expand on if something went well. Um, we're looking for all of those things, right? And then we turn around, we watch film for the upcoming, you know, uh week, and we watch the other opponent and we prepare for that. And all of that is just reflection, right? We're reflecting on on the actions that we did and the other team did, and and so that we can prepare for the next game, so that we can be prepared for whatever happens next, right? Um, in the same way that we do that as football coaches and as players, as we do that, Christians, and that's what this passage is talking about here and teaching your great grandkids and your kids, the more that we time that we spend in reflection and looking at the hand of God, the more time that I look at how God has, you know, there again. I tell I say this all the time. I mean, if somebody would have seen me 15 years ago, 10 years ago, you know, that knew me and see me today, they're gonna be like, that's the same guy, you know, like they they they wouldn't, you know, and there again I can point them to how God, how powerful God is and what Christ does for you. Exactly, exactly. What Christ does for you, how Christ changed me from this awful person that I was and turned me and molded me, and I'm still obviously still a work in progress. But but my point is that the more time that I spend in reflection on that and how how Christ has changed me from that, and how his hand has been with me every step of the way, how he's been faithful to me, every time that I do that, it helps me see multiple things. It helps us grow. Um, it helps us see God's active, working hand because I've seen how he works, because I saw how he did this in my life before. I can I know that he works in this way, and I can look for that again in my life. I can also see him work in somebody else's life and how he used me in this time and know that and be able to keep my eyes open for that to happen again.

SPEAKER_01 15:47

And how he uses other people in our lives. I can you know I can think of uh, you know, I guess we all, I hope we all have an accountability partner, I is what I would call her, a friend that you know you're gonna get godly advice from. And sometimes how God uses other people in our life to keep us on the right track. And we hope to be that for other people. Absolutely. Yeah. But yeah, you can very definitely, if you're if you are reflecting on what God has done for you, you can very easily see his work in your own life, or I can certainly see him in my life, because it's definitely not me that gets some of the things done that happen that are good for me. You know, the most dangerous words I ever say is I've got this. Yeah. And I've learned to recognize that.

SPEAKER_02 16:36

Yeah, yeah. Well, and every time, and there again, in reflecting, every time I've decided that I can take control of that, it all goes bad, right? Yep. And so it and and Greg kind of talked about that a little bit um when he was talking about the um he was he was um I'm trying to think of the point here, he said, um the purpose of pursuit of Jesus, and and he he used it so that we don't fall into those same traps. And Ephesians 4 kind of paints this picture of of somebody who um is tossed to and fro by the sea, right? Um we as we reflect it, we we keep ourselves from falling into that person who wants to take control. We also there again, I was talking about um um seeing how God's working and how we can join them and all those things, but it it guides our decisions. Um I've made a lot of bad decisions in my life. This is me talking right now. I just uh Trey Overton has made a lot of bad decisions in his life. Um I've learned from those mistakes. Um, but if I don't spend time reflecting on that, uh there's a good chance I might make those mistakes again. Yep. Um, if I don't spend time reflecting on on the good decisions, you know, the the the where God led me in ways, how you know, I tell, you know, people ask for guidance. Sometimes they're going through a hard time and they're asking me um what they should do. And I and my my first thing that I point them to a lot of times is have you fasted? Have you have you spent time fasting and praying on it? And and and I say that because I went through some hard times in my life where we, you know, my wife lost her job. I was newly self-employed, so I was making no money, and we had to make a decision. And so we stopped, you know, the the church we were with happened to be fasting at the time, doing for a New Year's fast. And and because this happened right at Christmas. And so we just fasted with the church and we prayed hard and we met with people at the church every day um to pray. And God showed up in such big ways in that moment and made things happen that you only God can do. But He revealed to us in that time and gave us clarity on the decisions that we had to make. And so when people come to me and they're having a hard decision to make, I can say, Did you fast? Because I can tell you right now, this from my experience, and I'm reflecting on my past right now, from my experience God will show up and give you clarity on things whenever you do that.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

Anytime you make an intentional effort to get closer to God, whether it's by fasting, whether it's by prayer, you've got someone you're completely at odds with, you stop and you pray for them, and that sounds hokey, but it works. I'm just telling you, it does. I've been there. Any intentional act you make to get closer to the Lord and to be hearing his advice. You know, one of the things that Greg said about six or seven weeks ago, it's it's been a couple of months, but he said that we should all pray to have a heart that has an ear to hear the Lord.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

And there's so much wisdom in that simple little statement right there. We need to be listening all the time for what God is saying to us because he's talking to us if we listen.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

Yep, oh yeah, and he's working around us everywhere. Yes. You know, I had a guy um and this is just me telling on myself. Um, I had a guy, there was a guy that came to the church um a couple days ago, and I'm still just kind of thinking about him. He came to the church and he he dropped off, I think it was you know, dropped off some money. And he said he felt like God was uh had told him he needed to bring some money to church. Um and I was like, uh Man, you know, that's awesome, I appreciate it, you know, and and I I was in the middle of something, you know, obviously all like always I was on my way somewhere and he just happened to be at the door when I was walking by and so I took it and I said, Man, I appreciate it, man, God bless, and and then went on with my day. If you know it in that moment I was not looking where God was working. Because evidently God brought that guy here.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

It's so easy to let to for the God brought that guy here and put him in front of me.

SPEAKER_02 20:52

This is me telling all myself, so you know, it is what it is, but that guy God brought that guy here.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

If we don't recognize we have those moments where we don't see what God is giving us an opportunity to do, we're not really being honest with ourselves. Yeah, because we all suffer from that.

SPEAKER_02 21:09

Yeah, and I'm just I'm reflecting on that and just thinking, man, you know, God brought that guy here and and and he may have been going through something, I don't know why. But I I should have taken my time to figure out why. And I didn't. And that was a you know, that was a mess up on my part. Now, in reflecting on that, I can I can learn from that and be more open to that, and that's kind of the point and what we're talking about here. And and and looking back and taking this service where we're looking back to 250 years in the history of this country and how we should reflect and look how God's worked on this country and how how things that he's done and how people have failed in different ways and all of those things. Um it's just important to do that. It helps us guide our future decisions, help us keep our eyes open on where God's working, it helps us all of those things. Um, but it also helps us accurately teach our children and our grandchildren. Um If you were to you know and to t in teaching our grandchildren, our children like Psalm seventy eight says, what what do you think is the best way we can do that?

SPEAKER_01 22:11

Well, that's that's a really good question, and I probably don't have the perfect answer for it. I'm gonna be frank about it. But the way I see it with kids, particularly with grandkids and when they're impressionable, is you do it constantly, but you do it in small doses. You you don't try to make it something you're trying to force down their throat. You do it in a way that you're teaching them this is what God has done for me. This is why we're here. This is this is what we do. We thank God for everything we have. You know, when Greg first came here, he was he was talking about in one of his sermons that anytime his family took a vacation, he and Janet always pointed out to their kids we're able to do this vacation because of God's blessings. And I think that's the kind of thing that you just do over and over and over again. God's made this possible for us to go do this today. You know, we're gonna go to the zoo or we're gonna do whatever it is we're gonna do. God's made it possible. And everything that we have is because of God's blessing.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Yeah. I think that the biggest part of what you're saying right there, and I'm just I'm just thinking about what you said. It's really what I've been thinking on too. I think a lot of my life, I I reflect on the adults that taught me. Um the people that you know I came across and and um whether it was my whether it was parents or leaders in the church or whoever it was, um the most effective teachers, people that that taught me anything good were they were intentional and intentional to teach, I mean, um, but they were in they were intentionally teaching me verbally. Um I think I think too often that we rely on our kids and our grandkids to see how we live and just mimic us. I think I think all too often, and I I mean, and I'm guilty of this too. This is this is me reflecting on myself. Um all too often we rely on our kids and our grandkids to just see how that we live and just mimic what we do and exp it to to be good enough or justify anything.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

In other words, walk the walk, but also talk the talk. And I know we usually say that the other way around, but you do have to explain why you're doing what you're doing.

SPEAKER_02 24:38

I think we need to I think we need to be intentional to to verbally teach things, and it and it's all things. Um it's I was telling talking to Greg about this the other day, you know, just even me, you know, I never had anybody sit me down and and talk personal finances to me. Never had that. And um I wish I did, but I never did. And but me reflecting on my life, I'm like, I'm gonna do that for my kid now, I can promise you that. But things like that, you know, person budgeting, personal finances and budgeting. Um Well, it's certainly not taught in schools.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

I mean, or at least my experience.

SPEAKER_02 25:14

It's not, it's not. And if you're not teaching, and that's the other thing, too, is you're if you were you rely on your kids to see what you're doing and that's it, um, you're leaving the teaching up to the secular world. They're gonna teach them. Somebody's gonna teach them verbally something, right? And and you need to be the one that teaches them something good, something biblical. We need to be pointing them to the work got work of God's hand, and and and and to to kind of get to the point in this, not just the good things.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

True.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

I mean, Greg's Greg made this point on on Sunday, but uh, we've got to teach them both the good and the bad, and and the bad meaning our failures.

SPEAKER_01 25:52

If you if you start out with history and you take out the bad parts, and you just do it, let's start out with just American history. And he he got uh he he talked about several specific things, and I'm not gonna try to do that to do that. I've I've learned when when Greg delivers a message he's been delivered. He does not need my help to explain.

SPEAKER_02 26:10

That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:11

But if but the point is, if you're gonna start taking things out of a out of American history, the things you don't like, the the ugly parts, the bad parts, why stop with American history? Yeah, why not go all the way back? Look at the heroes of our faith. So we we think about David, one of the great heroes of our faith. You know, God, you talk about intentional. Uh God is so intentional in his word and it is so complete. We see all the bad stuff David did, and there was plenty of it there. Yeah. I mean, my goodness, look at what he did with Josiah. I mean, a loyal follower, and look how he repays him, has him killed after doing all sorts of other things. But if we take that out of David's story, a lot of the impact of the good that David did also gets lost. You can't take something out of history and pretending it didn't happen does not change the fact that it did happen, and it won't change the repercussions of it.

SPEAKER_02 27:04

Yeah. Yeah. So it's really important. And it helps us see how we've gotten to where we are.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

You know, we I mean he did a he did a beautiful job with that in the message, and I would encourage anyone to go back. If you didn't hear the message Sunday morning, uh it was a different kind of message, okay? I mean it was different. It was but let me tell you something, it's worth going back and listening to.

SPEAKER_02 27:27

Right. No, I agree. I and I come across that subject too. Like, um, for example, somebody will talk about, you know, of course, this is people debating Bible and Christianity and all that stuff, but they'll put they'll talk about polygamy, you know, or something like that, and they'll put it or they'll put you know, putting it Samuel for or uh um uh Solomon, I mean, for having 800 wives or 300 wives. Yeah, and I'm like, yeah, and you see, you see what happened, right? Well no, we could have left, you know, and and and but that's real though. We could have left that out. We could have left out that you know that he had 700 wives, and but the reality is is that a lot of those things need to be added because we need to see really what what happens from that, you know, the issues that you have.

SPEAKER_01 28:09

I love the I didn't mean to interrupt you, but I do love the fact to make to to expound on your point there. I love the the the fact that we're going through the Bible recap together as a church, and I love the thing Terry Lee Cobble said about this, about the very subject you're you're talking about. She talked about things in the Bible because people, you're right, they love to put the Bible down and point its flaws. There are no flaws in the Bible, trust me. Yeah. But she pointed out so articulately the difference between prescriptive and descriptive. And we see Solomon's errors there with his 700 wives and 300 concubine, and we see the things with David's adultery and and the murder that he had committed, and we see Abraham and the sins that he committed with Hagar and when he went to Egypt when God had told him to stay home. All those things that they did, they're descriptive. They're not prescriptive. In other words, they're describing what the greatest of our faith did. You know, even they had such great shortcomings. It describes what they did. It's not prescribing. And it points to the faithfulness and mercy of God. Exactly, because they are the heroes of our faith. So it's not prescribing that we should do any of these things, but you can't whitewash the fact that they happen.

SPEAKER_02 29:22

No.

SPEAKER_01 29:23

And I love the fact in God's word, and I do. I absolutely love this about the Bible. It's all in there. I mean the ugly and the beautiful. It's all there. But through it all, as you just said so accurately, you see the goodness of God.

SPEAKER_02 29:39

Well, and and I do that with and just kind of to bring it to context today, I it's something that I try to do with my my kid. As a matter of fact, I sat him down the other day and because Greg got done with that that that finances sermon. This has been what, about a month ago that he had that. And and I sat down with him after the service and I said, Look, man, you know, over the next few years, you know, you're still young and you don't really know what money is, much less a budget. I was like, but you know, I'm gonna, you know, I've been starting to teach you now, um, and the things that I'm teaching you are are not because I've done it well. I'm teaching you because I did not. I failed. I mean, I'm in the process now of, you know, digging out of some debt that I put myself in that was unnecessary. And if I had been been faithful, uh a good steward of what God had given me and been faithful in budgeting, that I wouldn't have put myself in. Right. And so I'm I'm these things that I'm teaching you now about budget are are I'm teaching you because I learned how to do them wrong, and I don't want you to do them that way. And I think that's what this Psalm 78 is highlighting a lot, you know, so that um our our kids and our grandkids don't repeat our mistakes. Right. You know, I I don't want you to fall into the same trap that I did where you've where I felt like I had to have all these nice fancy things, nice, you know, um toys and cars and all this other stuff, and all of a sudden I was in this debt because the world told me I needed it, but I'm sitting here telling you right now you don't. And so, and I can point to what you do need, and and and and that is your trust and faith in the one who provides all things. Um, and so by using my failures, I can point my son to the things that he needs to do. And so, and and my point in that is that, you know, we want to hide from our mistakes.

SPEAKER_01 31:26

That's the natural instinct. It's not the healthy instinct. It's not.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

Our natural instinct is to hide from our mistakes. I do something wrong. I don't want anybody to know about it. I do something dumb, like I'm not telling anybody that I did this. Like, you do you put what on a credit card? I'm just talking about finances, you know, like, and so like my natural instinct is to not, you know, is to hide my bad decisions. Um, but I think that's probably the broken part of our church right now, and the broach broken part of Christianity in general, is that we do want to hide those things. Um, but the more that we bring the, and not just teaching my kids, and you know, we're talking about that in this context now, but the more I bring them to broth fellow brothers in Christ and and being open with them, then that can begin to heal.

SPEAKER_01 32:10

It is amazing at how God uses everything, though. I mean, I I'm a big believer in Romans 8 28, but every bad decision that we ever made helped bring us to where we are today. I was telling Greg one day, I just made the comment that I'd been such a dummy for so many years, and he said, Well, it was all part of your journey to bring you where you are today. And there's so much truth to that because if I went back, I've made like you, I except maybe I've made some even more horrible mistakes. And uh if I went back and changed any one of those, it I probably wouldn't be sitting here today. Those bad mistakes were teaching moments, and God used them sometimes in a real, real painful way. Right. I mean, really painful. But he knew what he was doing. I don't have to worry about him doing his part. He knew what he was doing, and it's brought me to where I am today, and I feel really comfortable with that. So I, you know, I I've like you said a while ago, I'm a work in progress. We all are, and we need to never forget that. But those those uh those mistakes we made served a purpose.

SPEAKER_02 33:16

They did, and and they are still, even though they're not good, they can be used to teach our future generations, our kids and our grandkids, um what not to do, but who to focus on. Yes. And and because m so many of my mistakes at the end of the day are wrapped around selfishness. They're wrapped around me thinking about me, how to get what I want, how to be most effective at at being um selfish and how to um get what I want and whatever else, you know, go into that forever. But but all of it is wrapped around that. And at the end of the day, when I can point, whenever I talk to my kids and I tell my kids this and my grandkids, it's gonna point them to who they don't need to focus on. Exactly. And who they do. And and that kind of gets to that last point where where where Greg was talking about the so what, so that you focus on Christ, so that your kids and grandkids focus on Christ, so that the whole world is pointing to and thinking about and serving Christ. And I think I'm gonna close with that and just on on that reflection. And that's my challenge to you today. And and and I think a big part of what we should have taken from Sunday is is how much time are you spending reflecting, and how much time are you using that reflection to teach and not just rely on people, your kids, your grandkids watching? Um, how much time are you spending actually teaching them from your success, from your failures? Um, how much time are you reflecting on God's work so that you can recognize his working hand more and joining him? How much time are you doing that? And I think this this 250-year anniversary is a good time and a good remembrance on why we should do that so that we don't make the same mistakes, so that our kids and our grandkids don't make the same mistakes, so that the whole world points to Christ. I encourage you if you haven't been to First Baptist, I encourage you to come join us. We've got some uh um our evangelism training starts this coming Wednesday tomorrow. Um, and and so if you if you are curious and wanting to learn more about how to share the gospel, effective ways to share the gospel, um, tools and and and tricks and all those things, um I encourage you to come down and see us at six o'clock. And we have uh we do we we do have uh uh a dinner service that starts at 4 45. So if you want to eat beforehand, we do have that as well. And then we are having a cookout at Chaffee um out at our Caffey Cha Chaffee campus on the 19th. So um the 19th of July, we're having a cookout. I think Grant said he wants to do shish kebabs. So now Grant's the master of the grill. He's the master of the grill. So if he's doing shish kebabs, they're gonna be good.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

I'm glad you mentioned Chaffee because two locations, but very much one church. And and it was really a great reminder for me because like you, I'm at I'm at Chaffee every Sunday morning. But it was really great because being downtown Sunday, still the same church, still the same atmosphere, still the same worship. It's two locations, but it's one church.

SPEAKER_02 36:30

And we had a good well, we had a good number of Chaffee people that came and participated and and um and joined in on the service. So it was really good. I agree. I agree 100%. Well, all right, guys. Well, once again, I I appreciate everybody for for tuning in and listening. If you have any questions or concerns, or or if you need some prayer or or just um you know need some help and and and and putting into practice the things that we talk about or that Greg talks about, um our emails are in the bio. So feel feel free to reach out and and once again thank you everybody for listening.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

We are out of thank you for joining us for this week's From Seat to Street Conversation. This podcast is the Ministry of First Baptist Church Fort Smith. As a reminder, you can always listen to each of the messages we discussed here on our chapter and first sermon podcast each week. Thank you for listening.