Fear of Missing Out

A message on comparison, contentment, and community, exploring how comparison turns life into competition, steals joy, and causes us to forget who we are in Christ. Through 2 Corinthians 10:12, Psalm 139, and Paul’s example of learned contentment, this message invites us to step away from measuring ourselves against others and return to gratitude, intentional friendship, and the peace of knowing we are fully seen, loved, and placed by God on purpose.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Ki Odefano. I am really happy to see you here, Erin, because I was thinking about this men's group that you've got and how you went away, men of God, away for the weekend, and then how none of them were here today. It was crazy. But then you walked in and I thought, oh, that's awesome, leading by example. Names, names or no names? No names. No names. Fair enough. Yeah. We we thought as much. Yeah, yeah, because the women aren't slackers, eh?

unknown 0:36

No.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

I'm sorry. That's that's just that we were just having fun. It's fine. Everything's fine. Everything's okay. Hey, um it was really great to meet Kalani and Kalani. Can you imagine having the same name as your spouse? Exactly the same. And it's an unusual name. Kalani and Kalani. I just a Hawaiian surfer. That's amazing. They drove all the way from Fungamatar to come and be a part of church today. They did it last week too. Was it last week? The week before. First Sunday, eh? Had a good feed. Came back. Sorry, we've got no food today. We got these weird green-looking buns out there that we've been trying to figure out what are they? Are they matcha? We don't know. We're just thinking that they're flavor green. Yeah, yeah, give them to the kids. Alright. Um, I have a tendency to write too much in my messages. I'm just kind of prefacing that. And uh Levi said to me, Um, you know, when you preach this Sunday, why don't you just not have any notes? And I think he was in a roundabout way trying to kindly let me know that I preached too long. And it's true, it is true, because I always have too many notes. And so what I did today is I've still got too many notes. And so I'm gonna try and um, you know, get through everything, but I'm looking forward to preaching this message. We are diving into 2 Corinthians 10 verse 12. If you've got your Bible with you, um Anna Grace said that last week we should bring our Bibles, and I felt convicted. Actually, I just felt convicted the whole time she was preaching because I feel like she's just one of those holy people who gets up and I'm like immediately feeling like I should go and pray. I don't know. Did anyone else feel that? Yeah, thank you, thank you. A few honest people in the room. Um, 2 Corinthians 10 verse 12 says this it's a bit of a tongue twister, but we'll get there. For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves, but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise. I'm gonna read the second part again, but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise. Let's pray and then get into the message. God, we thank you for this opportunity to be together today. We pray that you would speak. We ask, Lord, that you would build this community, continue to guide us, to lead us, continue to speak to us. And we're looking forward to all that you have to reveal to us through your word today in Jesus' name. And every person said, Amen. I wanted to talk to uh today about friendships and community, and I am going to touch on that, and we are going to talk about that, but recently um just chatting with people and talking and kind of having those live chats, one thing that has has kind of been coming up on the regular in those chats has been this word comparison. And I don't know, for those of us who have been around in church for a while, I feel like um probably about a decade ago, we heard kind of every week about comparison and identity, those kind of topics. But I feel like we've kind of shifted from that a little bit. We're diving deeper into scripture, and all of that is really good. But as I was thinking about today, I actually really felt like we needed to uh kind of dive back into and address comparison because it is such a thief of our joy, and it's there, and sometimes we just don't talk about it enough. And so I want to talk about it today. Um, I'm an avid people watcher, I love it. Um, and you say that and you sound a bit creepy, but I know that most of us are like that. We all like sitting and watching people, and um, I like it because I find people really interesting. I will look at someone and I'm like, oh, I wonder what their story is, I wonder what they do. And I I find myself doing this in particular in small town New Zealand. You know, when you're driving through small town New Zealand and you might see a little house and you just think to yourself, I wonder who lives there. That's an interesting looking house. Or when you go to second-hand stores in little towns and you meet the people there, I find myself being like, How did you get here? Why are you here? This is what do you do when you're not here? And I I'm just drawn to it. Actually, this uh this week we were driving back from Auckland. Levi handed over his um thesis to the Laidlaw Library, which was pretty cool. It was a cool moment. So if you go to the Laidlaw Library, you can go and there's a there's a whole book there by Levi. His thesis. That's cool, eh? Give it up for him. But on the way back, we chose to escape the Auckland traffic and we stopped off at a place I've been wanting to stop off at for quite a while. I think it is it the Rangi Uru Hotel? Rangi Uru Hotel? Is that ringing your bell? Because when you're on the Waikato Expressway and you see it, it just looks iconic. And you look at it and think, I bet you there's lots of stories from that place. So we stopped there. Turned out they had no um chef, so we weren't able to get any food. So that was a bummer, so we walked straight back out again. But there was this random ass little ice cream store, and Hugo was fizzing over it, so we went over there, and I was thinking to myself, it was a cold day. Rangi Uru is like one street, and there's an ice cream store. And we went in there, and this man comes out, it's all kind of really interestingly decorated, and this man comes out in a woolen blazer with a scarf, and he looks like he's about to produce a play of some sort. And I just found myself being like observing him, you know, and just thinking to myself, how did you get here, friend? Why did you decide to start an ice cream shop? Um, and that that in the past has been our way of observing, of observing people has been kind of seeing the people around us, wondering what they do, and maybe sometimes comparing. But I think that now, and probably with a post-COVID world as well, that all of that observing has started to change. Because we're not just observing the people around us, we have all of this access to global information and people just on our cell phone that we are daily finding ourselves comparing. As observation has increased and our opportunity to observe has increased, so has our level of comparison. And we need to recognize that it's become fairly difficult to not be confronted on the daily by someone who seemingly looks better, lives better, has more, is more liked, is more successful, and the list goes on. We find ourselves not just comparing friendships that we might see in church, we're comparing friendships of people we don't even know. I do it all the time with uh Victoria Beckham. We compare marriages, we compare homes, we compare opportunities, we compare bodies, we compare influence, we compare spirituality, and it is so cliche and yet awfully true that we compare our behind-the-scenes lives with everyone's highlight reel. It just is true. Social media didn't create comparison, but it certainly gave it a microphone. What used to happen quietly in our human hearts, you know, surrounded by our little community, now happens 24-7 in our pockets. And comparison has become so normal that we kind of like created a whole word to joke about it, FOMO, fear of missing out. But beneath the humor is something much deeper: a restless soul, a soul that has forgotten where its worth comes from. And comparison is dangerous because it doesn't just steal our joy, it distorts our identity. Comparison convinces you that someone else's blessing is proof of our lack, that someone else's beauty diminishes your own, that someone else's friendships means there's no room for you. And that God somehow missed you when he handed out purpose. You know, we think about the conveyabout of um creation, and sometimes we feel like God's like, you know, like with a little, I don't know, almost like a um a paint gun is like developing other people's lives and giving everybody else all of these natural abilities to have amazing friendships or do amazing things, and then it got to you and he got distracted for a moment and then you went off, and he's like, oh, sorry, sorry about that. Good luck. I hope you do well. But the gospel says opposite. The gospel says you were intentionally formed, intentionally placed, intentionally loved, and fully seen by God. And so I want to talk about a couple of things around comparison and then get to the end and try and leave us with some practicals so that we can walk out of here overcoming comparison in our lives. Because I think it's rampant, I think it's difficult to deal with, I think it's very real, it's right on our pockets, in our phones, every single day. We're surrounded by it, and we need to be able to deal with it. And so one of the first things I notice is that comparison has a tendency to turn life into competition. One of the saddest things comparison does is it stops us celebrating people, celebrating others. Instead of being able to say, look at what God is doing in them or for them, we think, why isn't that happening for me? Comparison quietly turns community into competition. And the danger is that we can be surrounded by love and still feel lonely when comparison is shaping our thoughts. Someone gets invited, someone dresses better, someone's kids behave better. That happens to me all the time. Your friends get engaged, someone buys a house, someone's life appears easier, and suddenly our hearts start to measure. But scripture says comparing themselves among themselves is not wise. Why do we do that? Why do we do it? Comparison was never the measure God intended for your life. Jesus never asked Peter, why aren't you more like John? Imagine that. It'd be great. He simply said, follow me. The kingdom of God is not built on a competition. Our lives are marked out, it says we have a race marked out for us and us alone. And it's not a competition. If anything, the only competition we are facing is the competition with the sin that is on the inside of us that is constantly trying to get us off track. That's really the only competition we are experiencing. And when comparison enters friendship groups or church communities, we stop seeing people as brothers and sisters and start seeing them as benchmarks. I want to talk for a bit about friendship because I find that in a church community and catching up with people, we often talk about what is community? What does that look like? How do we have friends? How do we we all want to find our people? We all want to connect with someone. Comparison in community can cause us to remain lonely. One of the lies that comparison tells us is everyone else here has deep friendships naturally except for me. I'll say that again. One of the things, the lies that comparison says is that everyone else there has deep friends naturally except for me. But real friendship, and this is something I talk to women about all the time, real friendship really happens instantly. We gotta stop thinking that connection and friendship happens instantly. It's built slowly, real slow, over time, through consistency. If you've been wanting to have people who are your friends listen up through consistency, through showing up, through vulnerability, through shared meals, through awkward as conversations, through invitations, not just from others, but from yourself, through doing life together. We often compare someone else's 10-year friendship to our 10-year connection, a two-week connection. It's shocking. We could, and especially in the church, we can be so bad with that. We walk into community wanting community and we almost demand it. It's like, where is it? I want it. And we look at someone's 10-year friendship and expect the same thing, but in a very short period of time. And instead of building slowly, we withdraw quickly because people are uncomfortable with that. It's not um healthy to expect those kinds of connections so quickly. We see people laughing together and we assume they already have their people. There's no room for me, they don't want me there. But often, and we have to catch this, often what you're witnessing is not exclusion. It's simply history. People have history together. It's not exclusion, it's just history. And healthy community doesn't happen accidentally, it's formed intentionally. Friendship takes responsibility from each other. I remember when I first became a Christian uh at high school, I was 16 years old and I was not hanging out with the right crowd. And I have to, I I feel a little bit um uh insecure saying this actually, because my auntie's here, so she's gonna know my stories, but I was smoking a lot of weed and um was not doing, was not, I'm so sorry, Auntie. Um, I was not uh, you know, on the straight and narrow, and I certainly didn't have very good friends who were impacting my life. I was out drinking, I was smoking weed, doing all the fun things that teenagers did back then, but not anymore a writer. Um, and so uh anyway, then I became a Christian and I knew that I just needed different friends in my life. And um, I'll never forget sitting there one day looking for someone who was because back then you'd call them a loner, you know, in high school. Oh, that chick, she's a loner. So I became that person. I was the loner, and so what I did was I just looked for another loner, and and that that was what I did. And I literally went up to her, her name was Mandy. I went up to her and I was like, Hey, so looks like we're both loners. And um, do you want to be friends? And she was like, sure. And we ended up becoming best friends. I remember going along to church, and I didn't have any friends at church except Levi, and um actually everybody thought we were brother and sister, and then that got real weird when we got married, and people would be like, Oh, how's your brother Levi? And you'd be like, Oh, we're married, you know. Um, I remember going to church, and there was this girl, her name was Natalie, and she was she was kind of hanging out, and I didn't have any friends. And so again, literally, I just went up to her and I was like, Hey, I don't have friends. Should we be friends? And we became friends. But you gotta put yourself out there. You've got to believe that who you are is worth knowing. You've got to believe that what you have to offer is going to be something really special to someone in the room. Um, sometimes we want community without contributing to community, we want deep connection without vulnerability, we want belonging without consistency. That one is a big one. We want belonging without consistency. If you want to walk into a church and feel like you belong, but you only show up every now and then to the point where people are trying to remember your name, that's not just the other people's fault. There's responsibility there. Belonging without consistency. We want people to pursue us while never pursuing anyone else. If you haven't invited someone to something recently, but you've just been waiting to be invited, why don't you mix it up? Why don't you change it up? Invite someone, tell them to come along. Um scripture paints a very different picture of community, a table where people make room, a body where everyone carries something, a church where we don't just wait to be invited, we become the inviters. Um, I was so encouraged by Tyler and Hannah last week. Was it last week, Edna? Yeah. And um, man, that was hard, eh? That was so hard. They did a um a gentle Pilates for the woman. So they invited all these women to come and do gentle Pilates. First of all, lies, absolute lies. It was not gentle. It like I was there, me and Edna, we were laughing so hard because we could not do the things that they would, and she'd I think she'd have the audacity, you'd be halfway like doing some kind of random thing, and then she's like, now gently do this next thing on top of the thing that you're already doing. It was really rude anyway, but I did appreciate it. I appreciated the fact that they put themselves out there, they did the inviting. I got invited to something, it was awesome, and I went along and they ran the whole thing, and I got to watch these two amazing women pull together community because they decided to invite. Some of the deepest friendships in your future are probably sitting on the other side of a coffee invitation, a shared meal, a conversation after church, or simply choosing to show up consistently. Don't compare your beginning to someone else's history. And don't allow insecurities to convince you that there's no place for you. There is always room at the table. The second thing I see about comparison is comparison can cause you to forget who you are. Psalm 139 says, I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Notice that David, when he said this, he didn't say, I praise you because I finally became someone else. But that's sometimes that's us. We're kind of wishing that we were a little bit like someone else. But that's not what it says. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Comparison makes us reject the craftsmanship of God. Comparison makes us reject the craftsmanship of God. You are a masterpiece. It convinces us our personality is wrong, our body is wrong, our friendships are wrong, our season is wrong, our life is behind. But God is not up there mass-producing humans without intentionality. God is a very intentional God, He has intentionally created you. You are not some mistake that God tolerated amidst all his other masterpieces. You are someone that he knit together really carefully. And some of us need to hear this. You do not need to become more impressive to become more lovable. Culture says craft yourself, brand yourself, perfect yourself. Jesus simply says, abide in me. And when your identity is rooted in things like appearance and approval and popularity and success or possessions, your soul will simply never rest because those things are in stable foundations. Looks fade, trends fade, algorithms shift, popularity moves, but your identity in Christ will always remain. The third thing I see is that comparison destroys, absolutely destroys contentment. Paul says, and remember that Paul is writing these words, it's so frustrating, but it's true. Paul is writing these words after he's been shipwrecked, beaten and flogged. I'm assuming they're the same thing, because I don't know what flogged means. Beaten and flogged, bitten by a snake, and now kind of just, you know, hanging out in a jail. And he says, I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want, I can do all this through him who gives me strength. Can you imagine the audacity of the guy to tell us, after all these things that he's been through, that he has learnt the secret to contentment? And here's the thing: he says, learned, learnt. Contentment is learned, which means comparison can be unlearned. One of the great lies of comparison is if I had what they had, I'd be happy. But comparison feeds discontentment. And discontentment for all of us is exhausting. If your soul is feeling exhausted, not just your body, but your soul is feeling exhausted, perhaps it's because it's been having to carry discontentment for far too long. We start living with restless souls when we're always wanting more, always needing someone's validation, always chasing the next thing, always feeling left behind. But Jesus never lived hurried or anxious or desperate to prove himself. He could sleep in storms, serve quietly, wash feet, disappear from crowds. But comparison destroys that kind of peace. Because there will always be, unfortunately, news for us someone wealthier, someone more charismatic, someone more uh successful, someone more talented, someone better looking. There is an ever-moving goalpost of satisfaction. Comparison says when I become that, then I'll be happy. When I have that, then I'll be happy. But the problem is once you get there, the goalpost of comparison moves again. We think if only I could do this to my house, we do it, and then we're like, what's the next thing? We're like, if only I had that car, then we get it, and we're like, all right, now I need the boat. We think if only I had this or did this and then we do it, and then we're like, all right, what's the next thing that I want? The the goalpost of comparison is always moving. The gravitational pull of this world is to want more even when we have enough. And we have to recognize that advertising, all advertising is, is turning a want into a felt need. That's the whole point. We want something, and advertising convinces us that we need it, and we fall into this trap. In the church, we teach about what you should do with 10%, and we we barely touch on it really here. But we should also be living biblically with how we manage the other 90%, and that's about not getting caught in this consumer-driven world. John Wesley, after watching his friends fall into the trap of deeply desiring affluence, decided back then that he would live off 28 pounds a year. At the time, he was earning 30 pounds a year. Years later, after he sold books and all of those kind of things, he was earning 1,400 pounds a year. Guess how much he lived off? He kept it to 28 pounds a year. He said that this was one of the greatest keys to his happiness and his contentment. Then we have the opposite with John D. Rockefeller, who at the time was the richest man in the world, when asked how much money is enough, his famous reply was just a little bit more. Two very different stories. One living in contentment and one just needing a little bit more, even when he was the richest man in the world. Someone once said there are two ways to get enough. One to accumulate more and more and more, the other is to simply desire less. Some of us are emotionally exhausted not because life is too heavy, but because comparison is too constant in our lives. Comparison, we have to ask ourselves, has it become compulsive in our lives? The fourth thing I want to chat through, and it starts to we start to come on the up now, like good news. The antidote to comparison is gratitude. It's gratitude. Comparison focuses on what's missing, gratitude focuses on what's present. Comparison is always focusing on what's missing from your life. Gratitude focuses on what you already have. That's why Paul says, rejoice in the Lord when you have enough. No. Rejoice in the Lord when you feel like you've made it. No. He says, rejoice in the Lord always. Gratitude interrupts comparison because it's hard to envy someone else's life while thanking God for your own. I'll say that again. Gratitude interrupts comparison because it's very hard to envy someone else's life while thanking God for your own. And gratitude changes how we see people too. Instead of resenting others, we begin honoring them. Romans says, outdo one another in showing honor. Imagine if we were that kind of church. Just where we celebrate each other genuinely, where people speak well of one another, where beauty or success in others doesn't threaten us, it's simply celebrated. Where friendships aren't viewed as cliques because they've got history but are seen as inspirational for the rest of us. Where someone else winning doesn't mean we are losing. That's gratitude. That is kingdom culture. Outdo one another in showing honor. You know, I um I think this one's important because uh, and we talk about it a little bit, but in New Zealand we've just got this shocking ability to pull people down and not celebrate each other. Or we celebrate each other and then make sure that we throw in a little bit of sarcasm just to make sure that they kind of come back down to earth. And when we lived in Canada, I remember um I really offended a whole bunch of people because they just don't have um sarcasm at all. And so I'd make a joke and someone would be like, Oh, do you is that how you feel? And I'm like, no, no, no, no, it's a joke. And they're like, but how's it funny? And I'd be like, no, because you know, it's like sarcasm, like, ha, kind of thing, and they're like, but that just hurts. And I remember being kind of going, huh? And I was like, wow, are we so like emotionally immature that we can't just say what we say and mean what we mean? We have to find little ways to, you know, just to have a little stab. And it was amazing to sit with this person who just did not get it, and they just said to me, I just don't know why you would communicate that way. And it was like, Yeah, well, I was raised that way, so you know, go to New Zealand and and and see. It it thickens your skin, you know, and I'll be like, but what's the point in that? It's just amazing, but we have this incredible ability to pull people down, make sure that they're not too celebrated, and it's sad, guys. It's not actually something that we should be proud of as a nation. We need to get better at celebrating one another and being real about it, and it should start here in the church. It should absolutely, we should be full of encouragement. It says, outdo one another in showing honor. Why can't we do that? There's this cultural thing on the inside of us that is like, I will not encourage. Do not make them feel too good about themselves, you know. It's like we just can't help it. How about we break that? How about we change it up? How about we actually follow this and go, you know what? Actually, community is about outdoing one another and showing honor. It should be that when people come through the doors of this church or of any church, that people go, man, so weird there. Super weird. And people go, why? And they go, so that's so encouraging. I've walked in and they just encouraged me. It was amazing. That's what this community should be known for. So, what are some practicals when it comes to comparison? How do we fight comparison? How do we be the kind of people who are not allowing comparison to rob us of our joy? And the kind of people who are having enough self-control where we're not allowing the little phone in our pocket to dictate how we feel we are doing in our lives. The first thing I think is I think we should audit our inputs. Audit our inputs. We audit our finances. What's more important? We need to audit what we put in. Some of us are more discipled by social media or trending self-help gurus than by Jesus. If something is constantly making you feel inferior or jealous or restless, why are you looking at it? Why are you still connected to it? Cut it out, limit it, do something. You have the power. You can have boundaries in your life to make sure that you don't feel that way. I remember one day I was talking to my clinical psychologist in Canada, and um she said, Nadia, you know you've got no boundaries. And I was like, Yes, I do. I'm amazing at boundaries. And she's like, No, no, you've got what I call rubber band boundaries. And she said, We're talking about how busy your week is, and you've got all these different meetings, and you know, you said to me that this one meeting at the end of the week with a woman who doesn't come to your church, just someone that you've kind of met, that you're a bit stressed about it. And I was like, Yeah, yeah, it makes me feel exhausted. And she said, Um, get your phone, got my phone, and she said, Um, now message her and cancel it. And I was like, Well, I can't do that. And she's like, Yeah, you can. And I sat there and it was like, ooh, it was really difficult. And I argued with her, I'm not gonna do that because that's not, you know, this and that and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And she said, You have got rubber band boundaries. And she said, boundaries are supposed to be wooden. Message and say that you can't catch up. And so I messaged her, like, you know, and uh I'm like stressing out about it, sent it off, put my threw my phone away, you know, like and uh she said, How do you feel? I was like, Oh my gosh. I feel like I'm looking forward to my week. And she said, Those are boundaries. Boundaries. If there are things in your life making you feel inferior, maybe you got some rubber band boundaries, my friend. Time to make them wooden. The second practical thing I think we can do is practice gratitude daily. Gratitude has become this like thing that gets put in front of a notebook, you know, with little happy theme things. It's so much more than that. You know, we jump on social media and say, have gratitude, gratitude daily. Um, and it just seems like this soft thing that, you know, is just a word now. It's so much more than a word. We need to have gratitude. Be grateful. Think of the things that you can be grateful for. Write down what God has already given you. I think the third thing we can do is celebrate people intentionally. Be intentional about it. Audit how often you encourage people. If you look back at your week and you haven't encouraged anyone, come on now. That's a moment where you have to go, oh, okay. I need to grow in that area. Stop narrating yourself negatively. Some of us speak about ourselves in ways Jesus never would. Build deeper, not broader. You don't need everyone to like you. I actually um I actually don't trust people that are liked by everybody. Just a full confession. I stay well away from them because I worry that uh if you're constantly liked by everybody, who are you? We shouldn't be everybody's cup of tea. We should be kind, we should have all of the fruits of the Holy Spirit absolutely. But we shouldn't be everybody's cup of tea. I think at the heart of comparison is this fear, what if I'm not enough? But the gospel answers that question. Jesus did not go to the cross because you were impressive. He went because you were loved. He did not go to the cross because you impressed him. He went because you were loved. And while the world keeps saying, become more, Jesus says, Come to me. Comparison says you are behind. Jesus says, follow me. Comparison says you are not enough. Jesus says, my grace is sufficient for you. Comparison says you need their life. Jesus says, I have given you yours on purpose. Today, maybe um if everybody, if you just want to kind of take a moment, close your eyes. Today, maybe you've been living exhausted from comparison. Maybe you've been trapped in envy. Maybe you've been secretly resenting others. Maybe you've hated your body. Maybe you've been feeling left out. Maybe you've questioned your purpose or even your life. Maybe you've believed you are less valuable than everyone else around you. Today I want to encourage you that Jesus is inviting you back to rest. Back to identity, back to contentment and back to peace. Because there is no fear of missing out in the kingdom of God. There is room for you, there is purpose for you, there is grace for you, and there is a seat for you at his table. God, we thank you that you have made us on purpose with purpose. That you were incredibly intentional about the personality you put inside us, about the body that you created, about the people around us, the life that you've given us. You have been so intentional and we are grateful for that, Lord. I pray that today we would be the kind of people who can rest in that contentment, who can step away from comparison and allow your words to reign in our minds and in our hearts. Give our souls rest from the constant need for more. Let us get off that conveyor about and rest in your presence, God. Help us to be people who have discovered the secret like Paul to contentment. In Jesus' mighty name. And every person said, Amen. Amen. That was awesome.