Episode 14 - The Internal Shift

Tension has a way of exposing what we’d rather keep hidden, but what if that exposure is actually mercy. We sit down as two fellow learners and talk through the shift we’ve been experiencing as we try to apply Jesus’ teachings in everyday life: first learning to see people the way Jesus sees them, and then letting that new sight turn inward so the Holy Spirit can reshape our motives, habits, and reactions.

We dig into the quiet ways we compartmentalize our lives, treating work, family, friendships, and “church stuff” like separate boxes. The problem is not organization; it’s leaving Jesus out of spaces where he wants to bring freedom. That shows up fast at work when productivity becomes the highest good and people feel like obstacles. We explore what it looks like to live kingdom of God values in the marketplace, where people matter more than projects and discipleship becomes visible in patience, attention, and compassion.

We also lean on Romans 12 to redefine worship as offering our whole selves as a living sacrifice. That kind of surrender can be hard, but it is deeply life-giving, especially when God starts transforming relationships. To make this practical, we close with questions you can sit with in prayer: where has tension exposed something in you, what feels threatened when things don’t go your way, and what might the Father be inviting you to surrender.

If you want Christian discipleship, spiritual formation, repentance, and inner transformation to become real in your Monday-through-Saturday life, listen now, then subscribe, share the episode, and leave a review. Where do you sense Jesus inviting an internal shift today?

Transcript

Tempo: 120.0

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Good morning, listeners. This is Scott again. Amy and I are here to uh continue our conversation with you about what we're learning about ways in which we're trying to apply Jesus' teachings into our life and live according to the kingdom. And so, real quick recap, last week we talked kind of the title of last week's conversation was seeing is being. And Jesus really desires to do a work in our life where we begin to see things as he sees them. Throughout the Gospel of John, Jesus says, look, I simply do what I see my father doing and say what I hear my father saying. And so for us to become disciples of his and living to become like him in every way possible, then I really believe that he wants to give us eyes to see as he sees things. And that changes so much of our life. Suddenly we begin to see people. I told a story about seeing someone that I did not personally find incredibly valuable in a moment. And then suddenly conviction came on me. And I just, the Lord led me to see this person that I kind of wasn't excited to be around, to being someone that Jesus loved deeply. And it just absolutely changed my perspective on how to look at people and how to view things in the world. And so this week we're continuing on. I would kind of say last week was part A and part B of this conversation, where we're trying to learn to live to become like Jesus in every way possible, to see as he would see. And as we begin to do that, we shift from the external view where we're seeing people, you know, in the world around us and beginning to see the things that God's wanting to do in the world and in their lives, that we can be, you know, agents of his work in the world, to internally. It doesn't take long when we begin to ask for sight that the Lord begins to show us things inside of us. And so that's what we're talking about this week is going from a seeing externally to an interior shift.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

Yeah. So the internal shift is what happens really when the spirit begins to reveal things about our own hearts. God shows us things that he already knows, but things we might not have noticed before. And when this happens, it's not condemnation and shame, but really it's a revelation. And ultimately it's gonna be an invitation, but the spirit is just lovingly showing us patterns or motivations or blind spots that we just may not have realized before. So really this is a very positive thing in its places where Jesus just we may not have realized to even invite him into in our lives. So it's a big thing, and we're really excited to talk about it.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Yeah, and one of the ways that I think I have lived most of my life, and probably still do quite a bit, is there's not something necessarily wrong in this, is that it's it's compartmentalization, right? I tend to compartmentalize things in categories and in neat little boxes and address one box at a time. Maybe that's you know a bit unique to the male species, but it is definitely very true. It seems to kind of organize and keep things cleaner in my mind. And I think what I discovered years ago, but I'm still trying to practice daily, is that I'm not ever compartmentalizing a box without Jesus in it. And what seems to happen in that is that he does a deep work in every place that I'm at, that I'm never trying to escape, you know, even in the ways that I escape of going to do some social activity outdoors, you know, fishing or golf or whatever, that I'm never trying to escape Jesus. I want to continue seeing Jesus and watching for Jesus and having Jesus be Jesus in me in wherever that place is. And I think that it's very easy and very common to compartmentalize aspects of our life and not even realize that Jesus, in order to be like him, everywhere that we are, we're desiring to be with him and to join him in that space. And I had breakfast with a gentleman just a day or two ago, and this was the very conversation. It wasn't, you know, coincidental that this is what I've been kind of chewing on in the conversation that Amy and I were going to have with you, and that here's a real life illustration is that, you know, he had been trained by his mentor that, you know, work is compartmentalized space that you just you have to perform, you have to get things done. And, you know, his mentor was not a Christian. And so here we are in this space, or necessarily living this out the way that we're talking about. And so here we are in this space where we're diving into recognizing that Jesus wants to be Jesus through you wherever you are. If you have a fellow employee, a person that comes to you, and you're just living in a compartmentalized space and you haven't invited Jesus there, well, it's all about the production and what this person is doing. And I don't have time or room for you to tell me about, you know, what's going on with your kids or what's going on with your family or what's going on in your life, unless it's like, you know, critically important because we got work to do. And that is not who Jesus would be if he were any of us in the workplace. Like he does not desire to have any compartment where he's left out of. And in fact, I would even go to the point to say, you don't want to be a part of anything or any place that Jesus is not invited into. And so for us in that conversation, it was like, oh, this is a work that Jesus is doing because people are more important than the projects. If we're going to live in accordance with what scripture teaches and we're going to live in the way of the kingdom, then there's something more important than the work to be done here when I go to work. That people and the people around me are valuable, more valuable than those projects. And so how do we let Jesus come alive in us and be his hands and his feet in those moments?

SPEAKER_00 7:02

Yeah, I can really relate to this because I'm a doer. So it's really easy for me to get focused on my to-do list. And before I know it, you know, I've kind of the one sitting on the throne. You know. But but this is what this hero loves to do. He gently reveals the places where where we do have those divisions. And he invites us to bring himself into those places. It's just how how he wants us to live our lives. So we are living abundant lives. And so this is what like that transformation actually looks like. It's not trying harder. It's just allowing a space for Jesus to live more through us. It's it's he's embodied it as to something differently, and it's kind of an invitation.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

Right, yeah. And it's it's not about guilt, it's not about correction, it's about awakening. Like it's a it's a place where literally we get to learn how beautiful living repentantly is, where we're where we're living life, desiring for Jesus to show us things and to change the way we think. And as we do that, then the kingdom of God, back to where we begin this whole conversation, you know, Matthew 4, 17, you know, repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. I'm making this available and I want to come in. But it's but the way in which this begins to happen is we begin to recognize and follow the Spirit as He is leading us to change the way that we see, the way that we think, and because He wants to be a part of all these things. And when that happens, this compartmentalization, not that the compartmentalization is bad, but that suddenly we begin to see how we've not been living to invite Jesus into the workspace or into the family space in the same way, or into the social space out, you know, that we're where maybe a lot of us are just really comfortable with Jesus in the Christian space, in that Christian box, but outside of that, we're not looking to live to become his disciple. And Jesus intentionally was living outside of that box, out into the world, out among those who are outside the camp in a biblical context, right? Those who are outside the walls of the of Jerusalem and meeting people in their place and bringing the kingdom there. So, you know, I think really just recognizing that that suddenly there are some questions to ask ourselves, you know, what is Jesus doing here in the space around me? But also, Lord, what is it that you're wanting to show me about things in me? And that's this internal, this internal, you know, reality that we're that we're diving into, this shift that that we're talking about today, that every part of who I am is being transformed to bear his image. You know, we see in Romans 12, 1 and 2, Paul says, you know, in view of God's merf mercy, offer yourselves as a living sacrifice. There's this is a holy and pleasing act that we do. This is true worship, right? And I think a lot of us, when we think about worship, we think about music. And that's not the that's not the biblical context that we're addressing when we're talking about worship. When we talk about worship, we're talking about laying ourselves down, as Paul is saying, as a living sacrifice. Like this is something that is costly. This is me laying myself on the altar before God, desiring Him, my life to be a fragrant offering to Him in every area. And we're not just putting a foot on the altar and saying, okay, you know, when I'm at church on Sunday is the part that I'm offering. No, you're offering all of who we are. And as Paul is describing, like this is a true act of worship. And so in that, we're that you can see, I hope, that people are beginning we begin recognizing that Jesus has so much more life to bring when we bring all of who we are. I have a friend who once said, you know, the hardest part about being a living sacrifice is not crawling off the altar, right? And I can identify with that. Like it's easy to want to kind of wiggle off or not be laid in that place, but when we're doing that, we're actually, you know, inviting the enemy to just kind of suffocate this light that the spirit is trying to bring and that Jesus died on the cross for us to have. And so there's this deep work, this sanctifying work that Jesus desires to do in us as we seek to have him be a part of our whole entire life. And he's going to reveal these internal things that he wants to address. So I was telling Amy earlier just that, you know, I was at church yesterday and a gentleman shared about this difficult relationship that he had with his father. Like his all his all his life, his dad was this incredibly hard person. They didn't get along, they butted heads on everything. And then, you know, here he is, a 40-something-year-old man. And he just, as a Christian, he's like, I just finally got fed up and I just came to God. My telling of the story, you know, came to God and just like, what is it? Like, I'm just so exhausted. And he just felt some conviction and started to begin to see his dad differently. He's like, Okay, I realize this is a hurt person, and why am I being so hard on them? Like, Jesus wants to be more kind and gentle to them. And I've been so hard that I need to see him as a broken person and treat him as I would any other broken person in my life. And it began to soften his rapport toward his dad. And then just a short period of time later, in a time of praying for his dad, he was he just suddenly this internal shift, it's like the lights came on. And he just began to realize you know what? I have followed in my dad's footsteps where I've been seeing him to be so hard. I'm actually the one who's been more mean than he has in our interactions. Like I've been so hurt that I've been mean. And so it went from this external shift that the Holy Spirit began to welcome, that he began to see his dad from a different place and see his dad as a hurting person who needed someone to love on him. That then the internal shift began to happen, and he could see how his motivation and his actions in the relationship were the opposite of who the Lord would have him be. And it just broke him. In this beautiful, life-giving way, he experienced a brokenness that has begun to transform their relationship. And that's what we're talking about in these two lessons is this invitation for Jesus to show us and to teach us to see and to become like him in every way that that affects the external world, our relationships with others. But it then it just like you know, an atomic bomb begins to create breakthrough after breakthrough in our hearts, to transform our hearts to be like Jesus. And it's a beautiful thing. It may be hard, but just because it's hard doesn't mean it's not life-giving. And so he begins to redeem and to reconcile things and relationships.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

Right. When we truly begin living this way, like really letting Jesus be in all of the parts of our lives. Maybe that's what we'll talk about another time, but I think like this internal shit that we're talking about. Last time we really talked about the external God showing us things that we didn't see, but this time it's more responding to that internally. As an invitation, he's giving us to do something different, then we find ourselves being different people, being more like Jesus in every way. So like last week and this week, really are that seeing is being peace. First, we gotta have it shut something shed us, and then we can receive the invitation to let Jesus in and really be internally changed. So but when that happens, we start singing worship differently, life is our lives, just the everyday things of life become worship, and it's not just on Sunday, it's not just when we're singing, it's not just when we're reading our Bible or meditating on scripture. It's how we're walking out.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

It's everywhere. It's it's it's in the grocery store, in the soccer field, in the coffee house. I mean, it's everywhere. Like Jesus, like Jesus may want to show up more in the in a coffee house conversation than he has in a month's worth of Sunday sermons, right?

SPEAKER_00 17:22

Right.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

It's just it's powerful at how much he loves us and wants to be a part of all these things in our lives. And and please hear that look, if if this at all sounds like we're preaching to you, no, the very title of our thing is we're in it together. Like the only way that Amy and I are having these conversations is because we're we're like having these conversations. Like this is real in our lives, like these are real life experiences that we're we're having and that we're learning, and we're looking at the scriptures and saying, okay, that there's so much more that Jesus had in store for us than just salvation. Like there's so much, like Jesus, yes, the Jesus' plan is to take us from down here up there, like in to experience the glory of heaven. But, you know, like we've talked about in the culture of the kingdom, like there is not just a plan to take us into heaven, into the glory of heaven. His plan is to prepare us for the glory of heaven while we're still here. Like that we are living and growing and becoming people that experience and see the glory of God and begin to glorify him through how we live our lives and preparing us for eternity of doing that. And that's this deep work that we're talking about. So we want to wrap up intentionally a little quicker than our typical podcast because we want to give you some time. If you're listening to this on a drive to work or whatever the case may be, we want to give you some time to consider a couple questions. Just personally alone with the Lord. Like, here's I'm gonna throw a couple questions at you. Lord, where has tension recently exposed something in me that you're wanting to address? Where has a tension in my life recently exposed something in me that you're wanting to address? Question number one. Question number two, what feels threatened when things don't go my way? What feels threatened when things don't go my way? And question number three, what might the father be inviting me to surrender in my life? What might the father be inviting me to surrender in my life? And maybe a couple of those sound alike, but let me just kind of wrap up with this. Like the internal shift is not about becoming more self-critical, it's about becoming more aware of the places that Jesus wants to bring life. You know, the Spirit isn't exposing those places to shame us, He's revealing them because He loves us and because His desire is very simple, that every part of our lives would become the place where His life is being expressed through us. Hopefully, you're hearing a real common connection back to that anchor of what it means to be a disciple, where we're living to become like Jesus in every way. And he's in the marketplace, as much or more so than sometimes he's in the temple of the sanctuary or the church on Sunday. And so he wants to join you in that place and lead you into a deeper life. So we hope you guys have a great week. Consider those questions and spend a few moments with Jesus, inviting him to teach you how to see and to invite him to lead this internal shift that transforms everything. Y'all have a great week.