SPEAKER_00: Well, good morning, everybody.
SPEAKER_00: It's good to be here with you today.
SPEAKER_00: Really good to be here with you today.
SPEAKER_00: As Pastor Ben said, my name is Pear Nielsen, and uh let's give a round of applause to Isaac and the worship team for leading us today, shall we?
SPEAKER_00: Um I'm so glad they sang the song Holy.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason I'm so glad is because I was able to record a snippet of it and then send it to my granddaughter Selah, who loves that song.
SPEAKER_00: And and hearing the joy, I mean, I can just hear her when she when she listens to this in the recording itself.
SPEAKER_00: But what's gonna even be better is that she's gonna be bugging her mom and dad all day long to listen to that tune.
SPEAKER_00: She will.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be absolutely fantastic.
SPEAKER_00: And I understand you just celebrated 110 years as Redeemer, correct?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: You don't look a day over 37.
SPEAKER_00: Really.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, but congratulations.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what that says you got a lot of years in front of you.
SPEAKER_00: You got more years in front of you than you've got behind you.
SPEAKER_00: And that is a massive, massive gift to the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: So take that and run with it.
SPEAKER_00: So, as Ben said, um, I'm connected to a lot of different things, but for today's purposes, I'm connected to the Master's Institute seminary where I was president for nine years.
SPEAKER_00: I now serve in the area of financial development and student recruitment.
SPEAKER_00: And um, Redeemer has had eight to nine students go through the process of seminary development at the Masters Institute from the congregation itself, and you've also hosted four or five interns from various churches that have come to Redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: And on behalf of Jeremy King, our president, and the entire staff at the Masters Institute, I just want to say thank you for pouring into us financially, spiritually, prayerfully, all of those different ways.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: It is so deeply appreciated.
SPEAKER_00: The text that I want to explore today from a biblical perspective has been a very important one in my life.
SPEAKER_00: And the beauty of this passage is that it weaves together a lot of different elements of who we are called to be as followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: It weaves together a sense of identity.
SPEAKER_00: It weaves together that identity with a sense of calling and the activity that God has for us.
SPEAKER_00: It brings together a sense of purpose and meaning for our lives in a significant way.
SPEAKER_00: So let me just read it for you, and then we're gonna unpack it over the course of the next 25 minutes or so.
SPEAKER_00: It says this, John 7, verses 38 and 39.
SPEAKER_00: As the scripture has said, out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive, for as yet there was no spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
SPEAKER_00: So let me ask this.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you are believers, if so say amen?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you're a believer, this passage is for you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is speaking directly to you.
SPEAKER_00: Out of the believer's heart, something will happen.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're here today and you're not a believer, let me just invite you to keep your mind open for the next 25 minutes or so.
SPEAKER_00: Because we're going to be talking about purpose and meaning and its association with faith and movement forward and living out our identity and our calling in life.
SPEAKER_00: And even if you're not a believer today, I believe God has something for you today.
SPEAKER_00: I really do.
SPEAKER_00: I believe God has something for you.
SPEAKER_00: Before we get there, um, let me just introduce my family a little more substantively.
SPEAKER_00: You heard all the mechanics of what I do, but but the most important thing in my life is my relationship with Jesus and my family.
SPEAKER_00: And so up on the screen you'll see a picture of my family.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and over on the very left is my son Christian and his wife Annie.
SPEAKER_00: On the right is my son Bjorn and his wife Rachel.
SPEAKER_00: Um, my wife Mary is right next to me in the center, and we've been together, as Ben said, for 40 years in marriage, and we started dating when she was 15 and I was 17 in high school.
SPEAKER_00: She's walked this entire journey of life with me, and I with her.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I am holding Saint, who is the grandson from Bjorn and Rachel, and they are actually expecting another child in December.
SPEAKER_00: And my wife is holding Sayla, who's the granddaughter that comes from Christian and Annie.
SPEAKER_00: And they also had another baby just two months ago.
SPEAKER_00: And this is Finlay.
SPEAKER_00: Take a look at Finley.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't she the cutest little thing?
SPEAKER_00: I know.
SPEAKER_00: She's absolutely awesome.
SPEAKER_00: And for those of you who are grandparents, let me just aren't grandkids the best?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they are just the best.
SPEAKER_00: They allow this childlike element to bubble out of you in remarkable.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you will be in public and you'll be going, and along with that, you you get to live out your your age-old rebellious spirit against parents through them.
SPEAKER_00: It's the best.
SPEAKER_00: No, you can stay up until whatever hour you want.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we'll have some ice cream, that's not a problem at all.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta pay the price.
SPEAKER_00: No, they're they're a beautiful gift.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and probably the most beautiful gift from those grandkids is that they really beg you to ask a deeper question about the meaning of life.
SPEAKER_00: What is it what does it actually mean to live?
SPEAKER_00: What is the purpose that God has given you?
SPEAKER_00: Now, the question of meaning and purpose is one that philosophers will tell you is uh historically the most important question that any given individual can ask.
SPEAKER_00: For example, um Victor Frankel asked that question in a remarkable way.
SPEAKER_00: He asked that question in in a significant way, and what he determined was that indeed you could find purpose and meaning in the midst of the most dire of circumstances, and and in finding meaning you could ex experience the most extraordinary suffering that you could ever imagine.
SPEAKER_00: That's a big deal.
SPEAKER_00: That's a really big deal.
SPEAKER_00: I know that the idea of purpose and meaning is even more substantive when you think about it through the lens of faith.
SPEAKER_00: Because our purpose and meaning when it comes to faith isn't just connected to what I like, what I dislike, what my hopes and my personal dreams are.
SPEAKER_00: It's connected to the God of all creation who is shaping you as an individual, who is pouring into your world, who is guiding you and directing you, and has his own purposes for your life.
SPEAKER_00: And part of faith is unpacking and living with those purposes and walking them out in the most constructive way possible.
SPEAKER_00: Um that's some of my journey.
SPEAKER_00: I started exploring, experimenting uh the meaning of life when I was young, and and then started doing it in a very unhealthy way.
SPEAKER_00: My wife was um going through some pictures here about three weeks ago, and she came across some pictures from various aspects of my life.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the very first one.
SPEAKER_00: Very first one's when I was 17 years old and I was drug addicted.
SPEAKER_00: I met Jesus in the basement of a drug treatment center, Twin Town Treatment Center, on University Avenue here in St.
SPEAKER_00: Paul when I was 17 years old.
SPEAKER_00: And over the course of the next year, my sense of purpose and meaning got completely shifted.
SPEAKER_00: Started moving in a different direction.
SPEAKER_00: In late November 1979, I gave myself fully to Jesus Christ at that point, and by God's grace, I've been sober ever since.
SPEAKER_00: It's been just about 47 years now.
SPEAKER_00: Meaning and purpose, yeah, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Your sense of meaning and purpose shifts when you move away from trying to find meaning in all of this crazy activity, self-absorbed, demonic environments, and all of a sudden God's shining light into your life, and you get to move in a different direction.
SPEAKER_00: So here's a couple of other pictures.
SPEAKER_00: They're six years apart.
SPEAKER_00: The first of them is when I was in flight school in the U.S.
SPEAKER_00: Air Force.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, I puked my way out of flight school, the U.S.
SPEAKER_00: Air Force.
SPEAKER_00: It was not uh not a fun gig at all.
SPEAKER_00: I got this little problem with my inner ear that just couldn't be overcome over time.
SPEAKER_00: And and that launched me into God's calling in my life uh into the ministry.
SPEAKER_00: And so I entered ministry in 1990 and and take a look at those two different haircuts, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, in the Air Force, right?
SPEAKER_00: I got this nice high and tight, and then in the ministry, I've got this all business in the front and party in the back.
SPEAKER_00: What in the world?
SPEAKER_00: Just wait, you've all got those pictures too.
SPEAKER_00: I know you do.
SPEAKER_00: They they point to places where I was searching for, looking for a sense of purpose and meaning.
SPEAKER_00: It's really important that we, as followers of Jesus, take that question very, very seriously.
SPEAKER_00: For followers of Jesus, this this whole question of purpose and meaning is actually central to who we are.
SPEAKER_00: Because part of what we believe is that God, by His grace, comes in to change our life and gives us a new identity, and He is the one who owns that identity.
SPEAKER_00: He is the one who shapes that identity, who moves that identity forward.
SPEAKER_00: So now all of a sudden, we're not just the sense of meaning and purpose is not just about us, it's about the God who has given us this new identity by his grace.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I'd like to assert to you.
SPEAKER_00: What I'd like to set before you today as our point of exploration is this statement.
SPEAKER_00: That a Christian's calling, a Christian's calling is to be a conduit and not a container.
SPEAKER_00: A Christian's calling is to be a conduit and not a container.
SPEAKER_00: Now let's wrap this all the way back to the idea of meaning.
SPEAKER_00: The question of meaning is not a new one.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you can look back at Aristotle and Plato and all kinds of philosophers, and you can find statements about meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: But as followers of Jesus, we want to look to God's word and see what God's word says.
SPEAKER_00: And actually, God's word from cover to cover talks about this idea of meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes in positive ways, sometimes in not so positive ways.
SPEAKER_00: For example, in the book of Ecclesiastes, written by Solomon, we find this right away, chapter one.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what it says: Meaningless, meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: Everything is meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: That's a great way to start a book.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, think about that.
SPEAKER_00: Meaningless, meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: And then the writer of Ecclesiastes starts walking through all of these different elements in life that we believe will give us purpose and meaning, like power and prestige and money and resources and significance and all of those things, and even wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, none of them will give you meaning.
SPEAKER_00: Then he closes up this way.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 12, verse 13.
SPEAKER_00: Now all has been heard.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the conclusion of the matter.
SPEAKER_00: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.
SPEAKER_00: For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it's good or evil.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, a passive approach to life is something that is not a part of the equation for followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: A nonchalant approach to living is not a part of the equation when it comes to living out our identity in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: Because we can never unpack, we can never find, we can never explore the fullness of meaning, the sense of purpose that God has planted in our heart if all we're gonna do is sit back and watch the world go by in front of us.
SPEAKER_00: I stated earlier, this really mattered for Victor Frankel as he found himself in Nazi concentration camps, and he determined that, in fact, the idea of purpose and meaning can get you through any point of suffering in life.
SPEAKER_00: Do you have a sense of meaning, purpose in life?
SPEAKER_00: Let's bring it from there, which is a pretty radical scenario for most of us.
SPEAKER_00: We can't even get our head around that.
SPEAKER_00: Let's bring it back down to the business world.
SPEAKER_00: Simple, simple stuff from the business world.
SPEAKER_00: One of the interesting things is that when workers in any given environment have a sense of purpose and meaning while they're working in that environment, their productivity skyrockets.
SPEAKER_00: So as a business owner or a business manager, it's incumbent upon you to help the employees that are under you find a sense of purpose and meaning.
SPEAKER_00: If you want your business to excel, you provide opportunities for a sense of purpose and meaning to grow and develop in the life of that business.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what's even more important: it doesn't happen by giving them more money.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't happen by giving them more responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't happen by giving them more power or more authority or putting more letters behind their name.
SPEAKER_00: Here's how it happens: it happens when you invite them into serving other people.
SPEAKER_00: There's a direct correlation between the invitation to serve other people, growth in meaning and purpose, and productivity in any given environment.
SPEAKER_00: For us as people who are involved in leading other people, finding meaning and purpose now becomes a non-negotiable.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to help people do that.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to press into their lives enough so that they will grow and understand their sense of meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: And for us as followers of Jesus, it's a non-negotiable as well.
SPEAKER_00: There's a beautiful series of scriptures that tie together all of this thought about meaning and purpose and gifts and strengths and talents and identity and activity and all of those things from 1 Peter in the fourth chapter.
SPEAKER_00: I want to read it to you because one of the things that it does is that it highlights the number of different roles that any given person can have in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: So often we separate ourselves from, well, it just doesn't matter much in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: And basically what this section of 1 Peter says is that, no, you're you're an administration, you're good at finances, you're good at physics, you're you're good at sweeping streets, you're good at cleaning toilets, you're good at hospitality, you're good at making food, you're good at art.
SPEAKER_00: They are all a part of the ministry of the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: That's that's you.
SPEAKER_00: Our task is to just ask the question: how is God's grace moving out from my life into this world?
SPEAKER_00: Let me read for you.
SPEAKER_00: 1 Peter in the fourth chapter, we're gonna start at verse 7.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what it says The end of all things is near, therefore be clear-minded and self-controlled so that you can pray.
SPEAKER_00: Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins.
SPEAKER_00: Offer hospitality to one another without grump grumbling.
SPEAKER_00: Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.
SPEAKER_00: If anyone speaks, he should do as one speaking, the very word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: To him be the glory and the power forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: Let's come back to verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna see that up on the screen.
SPEAKER_00: I'd like for us to read that together.
SPEAKER_00: Let's read it together.
SPEAKER_00: Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.
SPEAKER_00: Now, turn to somebody next to you and say, that's me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm the one.
SPEAKER_00: Go ahead.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna come up on the screen again.
SPEAKER_00: I've added a little something to it because this is one of those passages we just gotta take ownership of.
SPEAKER_00: Let's read it together.
SPEAKER_00: Each one.
SPEAKER_00: Whoop, whoop, whoop, pause.
SPEAKER_00: Let's just own that a little bit more, shall we?
SPEAKER_00: Let's start again.
SPEAKER_00: Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.
SPEAKER_00: Each one, that's me.
SPEAKER_00: That's you.
SPEAKER_00: That's us, every single one of you.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what's cool about some of the connections in this passage.
SPEAKER_00: You can't see it in the English language, but you can see it in the Greek.
SPEAKER_00: There are two words in this passage that are connected through the same root.
SPEAKER_00: The first of those words is grace.
SPEAKER_00: Grace is kara in the Greek.
SPEAKER_00: Then the second word is gift, and the gift word is karismata in the Greek.
SPEAKER_00: They come from the same root.
SPEAKER_00: And the assertion is that one leads to the other.
SPEAKER_00: When God's grace pours into your life, it naturally leads to God's gifts flowing out of you.
SPEAKER_00: When God's grace changes your soul, it naturally leads to God's identity and activity pushing from you.
SPEAKER_00: When God's grace enters your life, out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: And those gifts in the Bible are referred to the charismata, out of which we get charismatic.
SPEAKER_00: Grace and gift are intimately connected.
SPEAKER_00: You see, a Christian is a conduit of God's grace.
SPEAKER_00: Not a container of God's grace.
SPEAKER_00: Here's where I learned that.
SPEAKER_00: So I get sobered up back in November of 1979.
SPEAKER_00: That's a lot of years ago.
SPEAKER_00: I know that.
SPEAKER_00: Many of you probably weren't even born then, were you?
SPEAKER_00: 1979, I get sobered up.
SPEAKER_00: I've got a sponsor, his name is John.
SPEAKER_00: John is just a hardcore AA guy.
SPEAKER_00: And John looks at me and he says, Hey, if I'm going to sponsor you, here's what has to happen.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm 18 years old, mind you.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Um, you're gonna get up every morning and you're gonna do a devotional, and I'll tell you what you're gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: Um, you're gonna call me later in the day so that we can go over that devotional.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be doing the same one, so I'm gonna know whether or not you read it.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then you're not gonna make any big decisions without me.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and you're gonna go to AA meetings on Thursday and Friday night every week, and the rest of the nights of the week, you're gonna gather with all of us recovery people down at the local country kitchen so that we can support and encourage each other.
SPEAKER_00: And every Sunday morning, you're gonna be in the third row, right hand side at the church that we all worship at.
SPEAKER_00: That now, I'm 18 years old.
SPEAKER_00: I want some freedom in life.
SPEAKER_00: Johnny's saying, No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: You want to find freedom, you got to understand boundary.
SPEAKER_00: So one night John gives me a call and he says, uh, hey, meet me down at the old Federated Church, which is where the recovery meetings were, down in the basement, and musty old church, and we go down there and and I get there early because John wanted me to be there about an hour early, and he walks me into the back kitchen and he says, Uh, coffee's right over there, and the coffee pot is right there, and you put this much coffee grounds in the coffee pot, you put this much water in the coffee pot, and you roll it out there and you get it started, and you want it started right before 7 o'clock so that it's fresh when the people come in for the meeting.
SPEAKER_00: And I went, What?
SPEAKER_00: John, what do you what do you do?
SPEAKER_00: What's this about?
SPEAKER_00: I didn't I didn't get into recovery to make coffee.
SPEAKER_00: And John looked at me and he said, Pear?
SPEAKER_00: You don't learn to serve, you'll never stay sober.
SPEAKER_00: See, see, John knew something, he was espousing this principle that I'm a conduit and not a container, and if all I want to do is hold on to what's given me, I'm never gonna experience the fullness of what God has for me.
SPEAKER_00: Ever am I gonna experience that?
SPEAKER_00: John was really forthright about it.
SPEAKER_00: I am so glad he taught me that message.
SPEAKER_00: Serving, you see, is the outward movement of the inward transformation that we've experienced in God's grace, it's the administration of God's gifts in.
SPEAKER_00: In their various forms.
SPEAKER_00: And what's so beautiful about God's grace flowing to you and then flowing through you all the time is that you always feel refreshed.
SPEAKER_00: You're always cooled down.
SPEAKER_00: And moving water as it runs by anything changes that thing.
SPEAKER_00: So you always get to be a part of this transformative work that God is doing.
SPEAKER_00: Let's come back to the way that Jesus talked about this, because he's in the midst of the last day of one of the great festivals of the Jewish nation.
SPEAKER_00: And on this particular day, one of the things that they did was that they poured water out, and everybody got to look at the water being poured out, and they were asked to remember what God had done for the Israelites when they're walking through the desert and they ran out of water.
SPEAKER_00: God brought water from a rock, he pointed them to different locations where they could access water.
SPEAKER_00: And it's in the midst of that exact environment where Jesus says these words If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.
SPEAKER_00: We're remembering what God did to keep people alive physically.
SPEAKER_00: I'm here to keep you alive spiritually.
SPEAKER_00: I'm here to make a difference in your life spiritually.
SPEAKER_00: Then he goes on to say these remarkable words.
SPEAKER_00: Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is reminding us about the power, the potency of his water, his living water coming to us and moving through us out into the lives of the world.
SPEAKER_00: Please notice what this passage doesn't say.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't say, out of the pastor's heart will flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Out of the properly educated person's heart will flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Out of those who are in church leadership positions will flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Out of those of you who are aged will flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: No, it says, out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: Are you a believer?
SPEAKER_00: If so, say amen.
SPEAKER_00: That's you.
SPEAKER_00: That is you.
SPEAKER_00: You're a conduit for God's grace.
SPEAKER_00: Not just a container of God's grace.
SPEAKER_00: Let me let me define for you the difference in mentality between being a container and being a conduit.
SPEAKER_00: The container mentality says this I can't give unless I'm full and stuff is running out over me.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the container mentality says.
SPEAKER_00: When I'm filled to the brim, then you can have the extra.
SPEAKER_00: And we do that with finances and with time and with emotions and all of those things.
SPEAKER_00: That's the container mentality.
SPEAKER_00: The world gets the extra.
SPEAKER_00: God's mission gets the extra.
SPEAKER_00: God's purpose, God's sense of meaning gets the extra.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna come to me and it's just gonna, you know, every once in a while it'll it'll trickle out over the edges.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that, though.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that from the standpoint of Jesus' call for us to be servants.
SPEAKER_00: If the primary person is us getting filled all the time, how can we be the best servants to the world as a whole?
SPEAKER_00: How can we do that?
SPEAKER_00: Um, that that mentality actually has a scarcity mindset.
SPEAKER_00: And what it says is this is that God doesn't have enough to keep me filled, so I'm going to hold on to stuff until I've got enough, and then it's gonna trickle out over the edges.
SPEAKER_00: That's what that mentality says.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a huge challenge to us who are followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: On the flip side, a conduit mentality says we have an abundant God.
SPEAKER_00: We have an abundant God who controls time and heaven and space, who has more resource than we could even ask for or imagine in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And my primary task is to keep myself open to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and to allow his heavenly provision to pour down to me and to move through me out into the world.
SPEAKER_00: That's my that's my job.
SPEAKER_00: That's my calling.
SPEAKER_00: Now, does this mean that you're always doing stuff?
SPEAKER_00: No, it no, it doesn't mean.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, every pipeline has to come offline every once in a while.
SPEAKER_00: They get rusty, their seals break, they need to be cleaned out from time to time.
SPEAKER_00: So it doesn't mean that at all.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00: What I'm saying is that our the primary position of our heart is directed toward a God of abundance.
SPEAKER_00: And the primary position of our hand is to share the abundance that God has given us.
SPEAKER_00: And that's for everyone who believes.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone who believes.
SPEAKER_00: Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things that's really important about this mindset, this understanding, uh, is that there's a difference between a conduit and container.
SPEAKER_00: It's a really simple difference.
SPEAKER_00: The difference is a cap.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that we tend to do as people, and I've done it as well, and I've had to search my heart and go after a lot of these things in my life, is that we have a tendency to create our own caps for our spiritual life, for our relationship with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And those caps have to do with time and fear and and resources and and all of those kinds of things.
SPEAKER_00: Education.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's all kinds of caps that we create.
SPEAKER_00: But my challenge to you today is to really deal with those caps in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Identify them and then invite people in to helping you get them off.
SPEAKER_00: Because when when we cap things and we become a container, quite often what happens is that we just take stuff in, but but not a lot of stuff goes out.
SPEAKER_00: And and whenever nothing ever everything is pouring in and nothing is going out, honestly, what's inside of us gets musty over time.
SPEAKER_00: It really does.
SPEAKER_00: You can you can name illustration after illustration after illustration about that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know about you, but but I don't want to be a musty Christian.
SPEAKER_00: I just don't.
SPEAKER_00: I've run into enough of them.
SPEAKER_00: I stink.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, really.
SPEAKER_00: We don't we don't want to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I've been to the Dead Sea on a number of different occasions, and that's part of the problem at the Dead Sea.
SPEAKER_00: Dead Sea has inlet, no outlet.
SPEAKER_00: Dead Sea is built up with so many minerals that you can literally take a newspaper, hold it in your hand, you can sit down in the water, and it has enough buoyancy so that you can float and read the newspaper simultaneously.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the problem with the Dead Sea.
SPEAKER_00: It's dead.
SPEAKER_00: Ever anything's coming in, nothing's going out.
SPEAKER_00: That's ultimately what ends up happening long term.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what Christ wants for any of us.
SPEAKER_00: This is living water for living people and living things and a living kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Let me leave you with three things.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, uh, where do we start this journey?
SPEAKER_00: Because it's it's a hard journey.
SPEAKER_00: It really is.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to look at ourselves in a whole new way.
SPEAKER_00: Um, we start the journey by doing some deep points of investigation about who we are and how we are functioning.
SPEAKER_00: And the place we want to begin is by asking our God to change our mindset.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says that we're to be transformed by the renewing of our mind.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the biggest points of transformation is to move away from a scarcity mindset, which is natural to us as human beings.
SPEAKER_00: It's a part of our sinful condition into an abundance mindset.
SPEAKER_00: God, you can provide.
SPEAKER_00: I trust you, you're gonna fill me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just staying connected to you.
SPEAKER_00: Second thing, take off the caps.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what they are for you, I know what they were for me.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the easiest work to do, but but it's what God asks us to do, so that his living water can flow to us and through us.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, God's grace in your life is to become God's grace flowing out of your life, into the lives of others, so that they can have grace in their life, and grace can flow out of their lives.
SPEAKER_00: So it gives us meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: It's what uplifts our calling, our identity, and our activity.
SPEAKER_00: Final thing that I want to set before you is to step out in faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's never easy to do this work.
SPEAKER_00: We have to take some risks.
SPEAKER_00: But this is about God's kingdom and it's worth it.
SPEAKER_00: Really is.
SPEAKER_00: Take the risks.
SPEAKER_00: Step out in faith.
SPEAKER_00: Walk with people, find some friends.
SPEAKER_00: Ask the Lord to show you how his grace is meant to pour through you into your calling, your identity and activity, because when you hit that, that's where you're gonna find the greatest sense of meaning and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: Let's remember what that scripture says once again.
SPEAKER_00: It's out of the believer's heart.
SPEAKER_00: That rivers of living water flow.
SPEAKER_00: It's how the nourish or the earth gets nourished.
SPEAKER_00: That's how the spiritual lives of many get nourished and how we end up being transformed into the image of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Would you pray with me, please?
SPEAKER_00: Father, I thank you for this day.
SPEAKER_00: I thank you, Lord, for your living water, for the power of your word and the opportunities and the challenges that it brings.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, just remind us every day that we're your conduits, we're not your containers.
SPEAKER_00: So that we can just hold on to things tightly and give a little here and a little there.
SPEAKER_00: No, you've got so much more planned for us.
SPEAKER_00: So help us open ourselves up to you, Lord, so that your heavenly kingdom can pour down to us and through us into a dry, parched, withered, and weary world.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks, everyone.