Speaker 1: Father, I pray that those aren't just words out of my mouth, but the truth of my heart.
Speaker 1: Then we would come to you, the great creator, King of the universe, and surrender our little stories to your great, glorious, eternal, infinite story.
Speaker 1: And so I pray for this time as we simply walk through your word.
Speaker 1: We believe it's true and it's good.
Speaker 1: And father, as we look at anxiety and we look at the peace of God that surpasses all comprehension, um, I feel like I'm the last one there should be speaking about that because you know, I'm not good at casting my anxieties on you, but thank you that by your grace I am growing in it and thank you for opportunities to repent.
Speaker 1: And so I pray that you would use your word to set us free from anxiety and worry and stress that we would actually obey your word and run to you and cast all of that on you knowing that were your personal concern, that you love us, that you're for us.
Speaker 1: So I pray you would use your word to strengthen, encourage, and equip your body through your spirit for your glory.
Speaker 1: In Jesus' name.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: Well, as you're grabbing your seat, uh, let me start out just by telling you that I love you.
Speaker 1: I am so grateful for you.
Speaker 1: Uh, and these aren't just words.
Speaker 1: When I think about you, the body of Christ, your my heart just fills up and overflows with love and so grateful for Christ in you, your lives, how you invite neighbors and friends and, and broken people like me to come here about the hope in Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: My heart literally just jumps and lbs harder because I see Christ in you and I love you and I don't think I tell you that enough.
Speaker 1: So thank you.
Speaker 1: Uh, second tomorrow's veterans day and I just wanted to tell the vets we love you and thank you for, uh, for your service.
Speaker 2: [inaudible]
Speaker 1: in fact, let's do something different.
Speaker 1: We typically have vet stand, but you guys have stood for us long enough.
Speaker 1: Let us stand for you and just say thank you.
Speaker 1: If you stand for the vets that should just stay seated.
Speaker 2: [inaudible] yeah.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 1: Uh, third, uh, it's November 10th.
Speaker 1: Tonight's the super duper meeting.
Speaker 1: Don't miss it.
Speaker 1: If you miss it.
Speaker 1: I just, I saw the first printout of all the information.
Speaker 1: You're going to love it.
Speaker 1: It's not a town hall.
Speaker 1: It's not going to be lame.
Speaker 1: It's going to be super duper.
Speaker 1: That's why we called it as super do for meeting.
Speaker 1: And so come here where Jesus is leading us next steps as we do facility updates and improvements so that we can fit more people in to hear about the great news of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: And so now visitors, guests, I've met a bunch of you your first time here.
Speaker 1: So glad you're here.
Speaker 1: My name's Dave.
Speaker 1: There's nothing special about me.
Speaker 1: Uh, this is hillside.
Speaker 1: There is something special about this place.
Speaker 1: We believe Jesus changes everything.
Speaker 1: And so every week I just get the honor of reading the scriptures and we encourage everyone everywhere, every day to follow the one who changes everything.
Speaker 1: His name is Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: And so no cards hidden under the table like no slight of hand.
Speaker 1: I want you to know, follow, serve, worship, obey and enjoy Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: My name is Dave.
Speaker 1: I'm a recovering alcoholic and addict and Jesus has changed me.
Speaker 1: And so I find a lot of hope and help just preaching the gospel.
Speaker 1: And we love encouraging other people into that.
Speaker 1: So no hidden agenda.
Speaker 1: Just Jesus.
Speaker 1: I want you to know him because he brings help, hope, healing, and life.
Speaker 1: And you can look around and see people nodding and crying at that because he's changed us.
Speaker 1: None of us are awesome.
Speaker 1: We gathered together to celebrate the one who is awesome.
Speaker 1: His name's Jesus.
Speaker 1: And we've been looking at where joy is found flipping's all about joy being found in Christ.
Speaker 1: So if you'll open up the Philippians chapter four, I'll read it.
Speaker 1: This is one of the most convicting, challenging passages in all the Bible to me because I'm not good at obeying it.
Speaker 1: Um, I, from the earliest age I can remember, I was afraid.
Speaker 1: And so I was afraid to get out of bed at night.
Speaker 1: So I would, I would wet the bed rather than get up and go out.
Speaker 1: I was afraid to be alone.
Speaker 1: So I spent a lot of my life just panicked and anxious.
Speaker 1: Um, I was afraid to stay at other people's houses, so I would just stay at my house.
Speaker 1: I was afraid of school, so I'd run away.
Speaker 1: Alcoholism was never my problem.
Speaker 1: It was my solution to the internal spiritual issues that I had.
Speaker 1: So even now at 44, I find myself anxious and worried pretty much from the beginning of my day.
Speaker 1: So I'm not good at this, but I am growing in this.
Speaker 1: Jesus has given me grace and I am growing in this.
Speaker 1: But even as I stand up here on stage, if you could see me the way God sees me, you would see my heart pounding.
Speaker 1: You would see my thoughts racing, you would see anxiety and worry.
Speaker 1: And so even as I speak, I have to whisper, Lord Jesus, forgive me and give me courage.
Speaker 1: And strength.
Speaker 1: So I tell you all that because this is not something I'm good at that I'm going to say follow my lead.
Speaker 1: I have to repent probably at least a thousand times a day just as the anxiety to worry, the stress and the fear come and I have to say, Jesus, give me, give me strength and forgive me.
Speaker 1: I want to grow and trust in you.
Speaker 1: So now let me read that to you.
Speaker 1: Having laid it all out there, God says, Paul writes in Ephesians chapter four verse one through seven therefore my beloved brethren, whom I have long to see my joy and my crown in this way, stand firm in the Lord my beloved.
Speaker 1: I urge Yoda and I urge Senta key to live in harmony in the Lord, indeed true companion.
Speaker 1: I ask you all.
Speaker 1: So to help these women who have shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel together with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the book of life, rejoice in the Lord always again, I will say rejoice.
Speaker 1: Let your gentle spirit be known to all men.
Speaker 1: The Lord is near be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God and the peace of God that surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: So very simple text, very beautiful text.
Speaker 1: We'll we'll walk through it.
Speaker 1: Let me give you a big theological perspective before we jump in.
Speaker 1: If you read straight through the Bible, the truth that you, one of the main major truths over and over and over and over that you would walk away with is that God is a God of all peace.
Speaker 1: That he created us for a place of peace, of garden, of peace, Shalom, wholeness, completeness.
Speaker 1: That when we rebelled, he sent his son the Prince of peace to purchase peace through his blood, the spirit of peace, that we might be a people of peace and peacemakers and we might know the peace of God and that piece might guard our hearts and minds.
Speaker 1: So pieces are big, big theological truth and subject in the Bible.
Speaker 1: But here's the small picture.
Speaker 1: Sin separated me from the peace of God.
Speaker 1: And now most days, I don't know the peace of God.
Speaker 1: I know problems, pain.
Speaker 1: I know conflict and concern now because sin separated me from the one who is peace.
Speaker 1: So now any given day, if you talk to me, I would know conflict and concerns, and this is I think true for all of us.
Speaker 1: If we're in tune with reality, everyday we have conflict and every day we have concerns.
Speaker 1: Anxieties, worries.
Speaker 1: In fact, if we were honest right now, how many of you had conflict with your spouse on the way out to church and it just happens now?
Speaker 1: Nobody wanted to be seen in that.
Speaker 1: If you could see what I saw, you would see this.
Speaker 1: It was just really quick, really low.
Speaker 1: It's true.
Speaker 1: We live in a world at war, at war with God at war with one another.
Speaker 1: Today's scripture is just so beautiful and so helpful that peace of God that surpasses all comprehension really will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: We want peace.
Speaker 1: Jesus.
Speaker 1: When he came said, if you only knew the things that make for peace and we just don't because we live at war with God as we try and write our own stories and we live at war with one another.
Speaker 1: As our stories collide and conflict, Paul wants us to mature.
Speaker 1: He's been saying this over and over and over.
Speaker 1: He wants us to grow up.
Speaker 1: Part of growing up means that we know how to deal with conflict and we know how to deal with concerns.
Speaker 1: That is, we know how to enter into conflict and walked through conflict for the glory of God and we know how to deal with our concerns and cast those out like like trash from our house.
Speaker 1: We get rid of it.
Speaker 1: So today Paul is going to walk us through that through conflicts and concerns so that we might grow in Christ.
Speaker 1: Now I'm going to walk you through it.
Speaker 1: We're going to enjoy it together.
Speaker 1: If you don't get the first verse in the first verb, you're going to miss you get, we're going to miss what Paul has for us.
Speaker 1: So let's, we'll jump into verse one after I start at the end of the story.
Speaker 1: I tried this last week and I totally messed it up, so I wanted to try it again so I could learn.
Speaker 1: Here's where we're going.
Speaker 1: Verse seven is at the end, and this is, I think what we all want that I think because some people don't want peace.
Speaker 1: War is very profitable for some people.
Speaker 1: Conflict is very needed for some people.
Speaker 1: So I can't say everybody wants peace because if I'm ever in my addiction, I need conflict to justify my addiction.
Speaker 1: So if I'm in my addiction, I don't want peace.
Speaker 1: But for the normies regular people, I think we want peace.
Speaker 1: And Paul promises it right here.
Speaker 1: Watch.
Speaker 1: And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: Now, typically we just quote the promise, the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: But notice verse seven it starts with a connective conjunction.
Speaker 1: This is a promise, but it's a promise with a premise.
Speaker 1: And if you don't follow the premise, you're not going to get the promise.
Speaker 1: You with me, if you've got your J B Phillips Bibles or new living Testament Bibles, I love what they do because it clarifies it.
Speaker 1: If you do these things and pointing up, if you do these things, then the peace of God that surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ.
Speaker 1: I just want the promise.
Speaker 1: I don't want the process.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: That is I think the peace of God is some mystical magic.
Speaker 1: Start us that he just sprinkles on me is like, Dave, here's the peace of God because when I'm in conflict, I just want peace.
Speaker 1: I'm like, do away with the conflict.
Speaker 1: God, give me peace.
Speaker 1: He's like, I totally will.
Speaker 1: If you'll do these things, you'll experience the peace of God that surpasses comprehension, but if you don't do these things, guess what he had?
Speaker 1: There's no peace.
Speaker 1: I'm not just going to magically give you peace and not allow you to deal with the things that are leading towards the conflict.
Speaker 1: He's going to walk us through the things that lead towards the conflict.
Speaker 1: He's going to clarify a whole bunch.
Speaker 1: Watch.
Speaker 1: Start in verse one.
Speaker 1: If you missed this verb, you'll miss.
Speaker 1: You'll miss the point.
Speaker 1: Therefore, my beloved brother and whom I long to see my joy and my crown in this way.
Speaker 1: Stand firm.
Speaker 1: There's your command.
Speaker 1: Stay put, stay right where you are.
Speaker 1: Stand.
Speaker 1: But it's prepped positional in the Lord.
Speaker 1: So there's one place that pieces to be found.
Speaker 1: It's in the Lord.
Speaker 1: Now he uses a very interesting word here in the Greek curiosus.
Speaker 1: Lord Paul doesn't use terms haphazardly or randomly.
Speaker 1: He says there's one person who's writing a story that you can trust and the story that the Bible tells us, very simple.
Speaker 1: Let me give it to you.
Speaker 1: In three seas, God created everything.
Speaker 1: God controls everything.
Speaker 1: He's the Lord and God's going to complete and culminate everything that he completed in controls.
Speaker 1: So you can totally stand firm in his story because he's going to carry it out.
Speaker 1: Now, if I don't juxtapose that to the story of the world is telling, you're not going to get it.
Speaker 1: So let me tell you this story that I got probably from about eighth grade on the world.
Speaker 1: Story goes like this.
Speaker 1: You're an accident.
Speaker 1: Something blew up.
Speaker 1: Then there was some goose somewhere and then there was a zoo and then there was you.
Speaker 1: But you're an accident so we can't tell you what to do with your life.
Speaker 1: It's going to be pretty aimless.
Speaker 1: So just figure out what you want to do, do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life like all kinds of ridiculous like, but it doesn't matter what you do because you work goo crawled around.
Speaker 1: Then there was you and it's aimless, so you need to be anxious and freaked out because this whole thing is very poorly.
Speaker 1: There is no story.
Speaker 1: This world has that ends well.
Speaker 1: Every story ends with anxiety.
Speaker 1: So you are an accident, you're aimless.
Speaker 1: You should be anxious because it's a mess.
Speaker 1: You see the story that the world is telling in the story that the Lord is telling are very different, very, very different.
Speaker 1: We're actually in the middle of the social experiment.
Speaker 1: They don't tell us when they do these social experiments, but in the seventies and eighties it was like, Hey, you're an accident.
Speaker 1: Figure out what you want to do with your life and we hope everything goes well.
Speaker 1: Eighties nineties 2000 2019 why is everybody anxious and freaking out?
Speaker 1: We don't get it.
Speaker 1: What's wrong with you?
Speaker 1: Well, when you remove all purpose from life and you expect people to build their life on a scaffolding of nothingness over a deep, dark black hole, yeah, you did this.
Speaker 1: This is a profound social experiment that isn't going well at all.
Speaker 1: We're all freaking out now in that, I call it my HEB shopping cart race car principle.
Speaker 1: It's a long one.
Speaker 1: When I go to HEB, my kids love it.
Speaker 1: Especially my four year old, my six year old, I put them in the race car shopping carts.
Speaker 1: You ever seen that at HEB?
Speaker 1: Awesome.
Speaker 1: It's got lightning bolts.
Speaker 1: They had lightning McQueen.
Speaker 1: My kids love it.
Speaker 1: You get my three or four year old daughter in there and she thinks she is Mario Andretti up in that mug, but here's the interesting thing.
Speaker 1: She actually thinks that she's in control and steering and she'll begin to fight with Paxton who thinks he's in control and steering, and I'm telling them guys, there's no rack and pinion.
Speaker 1: There's no connection here, but they will literally freak out when they see the candy aisle or they're spinning, laughed, literally and freak.
Speaker 1: It's not journeying.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, because you're not in control.
Speaker 1: Daddy's in control.
Speaker 1: And then they'll begin freaking out, but we want to go that way and then they'll start freaking, no, I want to go this way.
Speaker 1: And I'm, I just said, be quiet.
Speaker 1: Daddy's in country.
Speaker 1: Daddy's actually dairy.
Speaker 1: You're not in control.
Speaker 1: You see, many of us are trying to write our own story.
Speaker 1: We've gone off script and we're not standing firm in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: We're like little kids in a shopping cart freaking out because it's not turning.
Speaker 1: It's not turning because it's not.
Speaker 1: You're not in control, bro.
Speaker 1: There's somebody else steering the cart.
Speaker 1: His name is Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: He created everything.
Speaker 1: He's in control of everything and he's going to complete and culminate it.
Speaker 1: If you want to know verse seven the peace of God that surpasses all comprehension.
Speaker 1: Write this down.
Speaker 1: If you want to know the peace of God that surpasses comprehension, you've got to know your place.
Speaker 1: If you want to know his piece, you've got to know your place.
Speaker 1: You're not in control.
Speaker 1: Think about how much you're not in control of.
Speaker 1: Let it freak you out.
Speaker 1: I'm not in control of anybody else driving around me.
Speaker 1: I'm not in control.
Speaker 1: My heartbeat, I can't control anything that goes on inside of me.
Speaker 1: I could die right now, right?
Speaker 1: I'm not in control.
Speaker 1: He is, and he says, stand firm in me.
Speaker 1: If you want to know his peace, know your place and stand firm in Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: He's good.
Speaker 1: He loves you.
Speaker 1: He's riding a glorious, beautiful story and you can trust him.
Speaker 1: Your dad's in control.
Speaker 1: He's got this thing.
Speaker 1: I took a road trip to Dallas.
Speaker 1: You ever heard of backseat drivers?
Speaker 1: I've got children, backseat drivers, and they are convinced.
Speaker 1: I don't know where I'm going first couple of times, super duper cute from a little blonde, blue eyed girl.
Speaker 1: Daddy, we're lost or not.
Speaker 1: Sweetie.
Speaker 1: Daddy knows exactly where he's going.
Speaker 1: Then the amped up daddy, we're going the wrong way, so I start trying to explain to her, sweetie, we're still on Google maps.
Speaker 1: We're okay where the blue dot weren't going.
Speaker 1: She doesn't understand.
Speaker 1: She doesn't even know North, South, East or West.
Speaker 1: She starts crying.
Speaker 1: We're going the wrong way.
Speaker 1: I finally just told her, sweetie, I can't explain to you because you couldn't comprehend North, South, East, West Google maps.
Speaker 1: Anywhere we're going, I 35 daddy knows how to get to Dallas and daddy's going to get you there safe.
Speaker 1: Trust me.
Speaker 1: See, here's the truth.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace God, trust in the Lord with all your heart.
Speaker 1: Don't lean on your own understanding.
Speaker 1: You can't write a good story in all your ways.
Speaker 1: Acknowledge him.
Speaker 1: He will make your paths straight.
Speaker 1: Don't go off script and write your own story.
Speaker 1: Stand firm in the Lord.
Speaker 1: There's 0.1 is that clock right?
Speaker 1: Just take it off.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter anymore.
Speaker 1: Watch what?
Speaker 1: That's verse one.
Speaker 1: Watch what happens here.
Speaker 1: Now while we're in that shopping cart, listen y'all, I love you.
Speaker 1: I'm for you.
Speaker 1: While you and I, while we are in that shopping cart, it matters how we travel through HEB.
Speaker 1: It can be an awesome trip or it can be an awful trip.
Speaker 1: It can be a trip that, that we enjoy in this, in this life, or it can be a trip you have to endure or daddy's got to light you up because you're throwing fits, but it matters how we travel.
Speaker 1: My kids will fight over nothing, literally nothing.
Speaker 1: They'll fight over the crack, which is definitionally nothing is the area between two things that has nothing.
Speaker 1: Watch if you want to know the peace of God that surpasses comprehension.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to walk you through a series of things that Paul models for us because I think we want peace.
Speaker 1: I think we do.
Speaker 1: If you want that, watch where he starts out.
Speaker 1: First word I now he's going to urge DOD and center key to live at harmony in the Lord.
Speaker 1: If you want peace, if you want peace, that peace that surpasses all comprehension.
Speaker 1: It begins with a willingness to walk the plan that God has.
Speaker 1: It begins with a willingness.
Speaker 1: Paul jumps into this huge mess that we'll talk about in just a minute.
Speaker 1: Yoda and[inaudible], they were fighting Paul.
Speaker 1: He wants peace for the body of Christ, so he is willing to jump into conflict.
Speaker 1: Write this down.
Speaker 1: Conflict never resolves itself.
Speaker 1: I'm going to say it again.
Speaker 1: Conflict never, ever, ever resolves itself.
Speaker 1: The only way through conflict is to face it.
Speaker 1: Time will not heal all things.
Speaker 1: Saints, many of us believe that I'm on a fight with my spouse.
Speaker 1: I'll just give it some time.
Speaker 1: Time heals all things.
Speaker 1: It's actually not true.
Speaker 1: If time healed, all things, I would never ever go to the doctor.
Speaker 1: I'd just sit at home.
Speaker 1: Well, I've got high blood pressure and high cholesterol.
Speaker 1: I'll just give it some time.
Speaker 1: Then I had cancer.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to give it some time.
Speaker 1: It'll go away.
Speaker 1: Time doesn't heal all things.
Speaker 1: Time allows gangrene to grow.
Speaker 1: That's what time does.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: No, the plan of God.
Speaker 1: Here's the plan of God.
Speaker 1: He has given you in Christ the ministry of reconciliation.
Speaker 1: You are an ambassador for Christ.
Speaker 1: It is as though God is making an appeal through you.
Speaker 1: We begged you on behalf of Christ Jesus, be reconciled to God because God made his son, Jesus Christ, who knew no sin to be made sin for you so that you could live at peace with God and live at peace with one another.
Speaker 1: That's your ministry.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: Join the plan of God.
Speaker 1: He's req.
Speaker 1: Clawson's chapter.
Speaker 1: You go through cautions, chapter one verse 20 he's reconciling this whole broken mug to himself and he wants you to be part of that plan.
Speaker 1: Paul jumps in.
Speaker 1: You want to?
Speaker 1: I wish we had more time.
Speaker 1: You want to know why we avoid conflict?
Speaker 1: It's always messy.
Speaker 1: There's always friendly fire.
Speaker 1: There's always shrapnel.
Speaker 1: It never seems to go well.
Speaker 1: There's always just spiritual slime.
Speaker 1: It's like we spiritually sneeze on each other.
Speaker 1: It's a mass, so we just go like spiritual turtles.
Speaker 1: You ever seen two turtles fight?
Speaker 1: Yeah, they don't.
Speaker 1: They just go into their shell.
Speaker 1: That's why there aren't turtle cage matches.
Speaker 1: At least not that I know of.
Speaker 1: Maybe there is with snapping turtles, but I think they still just withdraw pastas.
Speaker 1: Don't withdraw.
Speaker 1: Listen, some of you are like skunks.
Speaker 1: You ever seen two skunks fight?
Speaker 1: You don't want to.
Speaker 1: Everything stinks cause they just spread and then you smell it from miles.
Speaker 1: When two skunks fight, everybody knows Yoda and Centacare like two skunks.
Speaker 1: They are fighting.
Speaker 1: Everybody knows.
Speaker 1: Everybody wants to avoid it.
Speaker 1: Paul says, you want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: Join the plan of God.
Speaker 1: He's reconciling us to one another.
Speaker 1: So there's point to watch this.
Speaker 1: Then he said, this is so funny.
Speaker 1: You may not think so in the English or in the Greek, and this may just be a Greek geek joke pod here.
Speaker 1: One verb is enough.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: Like per a sense subject, verb, direct object that you go to.
Speaker 1: Paul goes, I urge Yoda and I urge he double verbs this mug.
Speaker 1: It's totally bizarre.
Speaker 1: You know why it has to do that.
Speaker 1: If he only put one verb in there and said, I urge Yoda and Cinta key.
Speaker 1: You know what Cintiq Q would say, he put the verb in front of your name.
Speaker 1: Yo, your the issue here.
Speaker 1: Even Paul knows you're the issue.
Speaker 1: Girl, look where the verb is placed.
Speaker 1: Isn't that?
Speaker 1: That's what happened.
Speaker 1: You.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: Then he says, be willing to fix the problem, not the blame.
Speaker 1: If you want to know the peace of God, be willing to fix the problem.
Speaker 1: Here's how you fix the problem in America right now, all we do is fix the blame.
Speaker 1: That's all fixed.
Speaker 1: The blame.
Speaker 1: We put it somewhere.
Speaker 1: Just watch things.
Speaker 1: How many, I'm not going to go there.
Speaker 1: Many of us watch the news.
Speaker 1: Even this morning.
Speaker 1: The news isn't news anymore.
Speaker 1: It's a blame slopping contest.
Speaker 1: It's their fault.
Speaker 1: It's the Republican's fault.
Speaker 1: It's the Democrats followed as the president's fault.
Speaker 1: No, it's the Congress's fault.
Speaker 1: We seek to fix the blame of fix the blame somewhere, but we're not willing to do the work and fix the problem.
Speaker 1: This happens.
Speaker 1: I see it in marriages.
Speaker 1: We spend the majority of our time fixing the blame on our spouse, but we're not willing to fix the problem.
Speaker 1: Paul says, I'm not playing that game.
Speaker 1: I urge Yoda and I earned Syntech key.
Speaker 1: Own your own stuff.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God, man.
Speaker 1: Own your own stuff.
Speaker 1: Matthew chapter seven Jesus would say it.
Speaker 1: Take the telephone pole out of your own eye before you fix the speck in somebody else's eye.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God.
Speaker 1: Then do the work of God and own your own stuff.
Speaker 1: Focus on fixing the problem, not the blame.
Speaker 1: It'll change everything.
Speaker 1: Most of us have just gotten used to blame casting and blame shifting and putting blame on.
Speaker 1: It's not new.
Speaker 1: It was in Genesis chapter three Adam and Eve, we just began to blame everyone and we quit fixing the problem and sought to fix the blame on someone else.
Speaker 1: Paul says, you and another the peace of God focused on fixing the problem by owning your own stuff.
Speaker 1: Watch.
Speaker 1: Watch where he goes.
Speaker 1: Next.
Speaker 1: Verse three totally beautiful.
Speaker 1: This.
Speaker 1: This is shocking to me.
Speaker 1: I did not see this coming, but when you, when you graph through this, watch the words Paul uses after verse two I urge Yoda, I you urged Cintiq G live at harmony in the Lord.
Speaker 1: Watch verse three indeed true companion.
Speaker 1: We don't know who that is.
Speaker 1: I asked you also to help these women who stop breathing, help these women who have messed up my life.
Speaker 1: I'm in prison and they're making things harder for me.
Speaker 1: Totally skunks to quit fighting.
Speaker 1: They're, they're messing up the gospel advancement.
Speaker 1: Tell these women who are a total pain in my neck to quit it.
Speaker 1: That's what I would expect to read.
Speaker 1: Listen, because you may not know man.
Speaker 1: When there's conflict, you want to know the scariest words that I face.
Speaker 1: We can and we count.
Speaker 1: When Brooke says to me, Dave, we need to talk, and I think this is true for all men because I'm being invited into vulnerability and I tend to react, not invite, pause there, but watch what he does.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God, then then begin to talk like God, watch what Paul does here.
Speaker 1: Help these women.
Speaker 1: I have shared in my struggle.
Speaker 1: These women have helped me.
Speaker 1: They're friends of mine.
Speaker 1: I love them.
Speaker 1: I am for them help these women who have shared my burden and shared in my struggle, in the cause of the gospel.
Speaker 1: They're out advancing the gospel, help them live at peace because they're friends of mine.
Speaker 1: I love them and they've helped me in the gospel together with Clement also and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the book of life.
Speaker 1: You want to know that piece of God.
Speaker 1: You've got to know precious.
Speaker 1: You are to God.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: I need this just to settle on you and sit on you.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God, learn the words of God and learn how precious you are to God.
Speaker 1: What this did in my mind, it rattles around and took me to Psalm one 39 Oh Lord, you've searched me.
Speaker 1: You know me know when I sit down, when I rise up, you understand my thoughts from afar.
Speaker 1: You scrutinize my path.
Speaker 1: He goes on and on to say, even before I was, you wove me together in my mother's womb, you would expect David after all of that to conclude by saying, therefore, I understand why you hate me because you know all of my sin and you see all of my sin.
Speaker 1: I understand why you reject me God, because you see and know all of me.
Speaker 1: Even the things that I don't say, you know, but that's not where Psalm one 39 goes, is it?
Speaker 1: He says, and how precious are your thoughts towards me?
Speaker 1: Oh God.
Speaker 1: And how vast is the sum of them?
Speaker 1: If I would count them, they would outnumber the sand on the seashore and when I awake, you're still with me.
Speaker 1: You want to know the piece?
Speaker 1: God man know how precious you are to God.
Speaker 1: And Paul just models this for us.
Speaker 1: Help these gals, because I love them.
Speaker 1: I'm for them.
Speaker 1: Oh man.
Speaker 1: Help them get along in the Lord.
Speaker 1: Just I would write this down.
Speaker 1: Um, word spoken offensively will always be received defensively.
Speaker 1: It's okay.
Speaker 1: You don't have to write it down, but it will actually save you a lot of money in counseling.
Speaker 1: So you might just want to like try C most times it's not what I say.
Speaker 1: It's how I say it.
Speaker 1: Like Brooke will come in and listen to sermons and say, Dave, you really need to dial it back.
Speaker 1: He looked angry it words spoken offensively will always be received defensively.
Speaker 1: You don't believe me.
Speaker 1: I had a buddy flying, hadn't seen him in a long time.
Speaker 1: He loved me.
Speaker 1: He did an intervention on me back in Oregon.
Speaker 1: Just love me.
Speaker 1: I want this guy to know Jesus.
Speaker 1: I want him to love Jesus.
Speaker 1: I want him to meet Jesus.
Speaker 1: He's a good friend of mine.
Speaker 1: We went down to scoot around on those bird scooters in town.
Speaker 1: There was some convention going on at the Gonzalez convention center, so as we were scooting around, he knows I'm a pastor.
Speaker 1: We saw these guys out there holding signs and we Christians were super creative.
Speaker 1: Psych, repent and turn or burn and fry and die while we go to the sky or something like that.
Speaker 1: We're all, we're sitting, we can come up with a little coffee mug, things about people going to hell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so he said, is that one of yours?
Speaker 1: Are they one of yours?
Speaker 1: Very interesting to me because I sat and listened to the guy.
Speaker 1: He had a red face.
Speaker 1: He was yelling.
Speaker 1: He looked angry like many of us pastors do.
Speaker 1: I figured he was probably overworked and but he was taking his anger out on the people.
Speaker 1: Now, theologically, I agreed with them.
Speaker 1: We really do need to repent.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: But I don't imagine Jesus that way.
Speaker 1: In fact, when he said the wages of sin is death, I bet his heart was broken.
Speaker 1: He said, guys, you don't understand.
Speaker 1: Sin is death.
Speaker 1: Come to me and I'll give you life.
Speaker 1: You see, words spoken offensively will always be received defensively.
Speaker 1: Nobody got saved that day.
Speaker 1: In fact, there are arguments breaking out because word spoken offensively will always be received defensively.
Speaker 1: He says, I love these gals.
Speaker 1: Their names are written in the book of life.
Speaker 1: Use your words.
Speaker 1: Well, words matter how you use the matters you want to be part of receiving the peace of God.
Speaker 1: Know how precious you are to God.
Speaker 1: Paul models this to EOD and[inaudible].
Speaker 1: Watch what comes next out of the blue.
Speaker 1: Verse four, rejoice in the Lord always again.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say to you, verse four, rejoice.
Speaker 1: Now, how many of you, when you're in the middle of conflict, just take away your spouse or whoever and you're in the middle of concerns and anxiety?
Speaker 1: How many of you naturally rejoice?
Speaker 1: It's like, you know what I need to do right now?
Speaker 1: It's just rejoice like I just sing and dance and be like, Hey, every your spouse, see, see, you're crazy.
Speaker 1: You lost it.
Speaker 1: It's just over the edge.
Speaker 1: Let's reframe this and recast this if you will.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God again, get in line with the plan of God.
Speaker 1: Collagen's one 20 God is reconciling cautions.
Speaker 1: One 20 everything back to himself.
Speaker 1: I don't know how he's going to do it.
Speaker 1: He's super duper powerful though, and if he's able to speak all things into creation, he's also able to subject all things to himself and reconcile this broken mess.
Speaker 1: Now, here's the truth.
Speaker 1: You and I typically just want resolution, not reconciliation, and we just need to own that.
Speaker 1: I just want the problem to go away.
Speaker 1: I don't really want reconciliation.
Speaker 1: I want my husband to stop messing with me.
Speaker 1: I want my wife to stop me.
Speaker 1: I want resolution, not reconciliation that's not in line with what God is actually doing.
Speaker 1: He's reconciling, reconnecting all things to himself so you can rejoice anytime you're willing to take a step towards reconciliation.
Speaker 1: Now, typically we say, well, the meeting didn't go that well.
Speaker 1: We didn't reconcile.
Speaker 1: It wasn't, there wasn't all kinds of Valentine's candy and Valentine's flowers.
Speaker 1: There wasn't this deep reconciliation.
Speaker 1: Listen, y'all.
Speaker 1: Reconciliation is hard work and takes a lot of time.
Speaker 1: If you want to know the peace of God, begin to walk in the plan of God and watch the power of God.
Speaker 1: You see David?
Speaker 1: Well, how do you rejoice when you're trying to reconcile?
Speaker 1: Listen, I rejoice at first steps, little steps in any step that anyone will take towards reconciliation.
Speaker 1: You're like, well, it's not gonna make a difference.
Speaker 1: Who told you that you want the peace of God experienced the power of God?
Speaker 1: He can reconcile relationships.
Speaker 1: It's totally what he's been doing for thousands and thousands of years.
Speaker 1: He did it with you and the father.
Speaker 1: He can do it with us, any each other.
Speaker 1: See, many of us don't get this.
Speaker 1: So let me give you a quick, uh, illustration.
Speaker 2: [inaudible]
Speaker 1: whenever my children took their first step, you would think that you would've thought we were crazy.
Speaker 1: You would've thought, Brooke and I just watch our children.
Speaker 1: When the, uh, the gold medal at the Olympics, and you, you probably did too.
Speaker 1: I've got some of it on film.
Speaker 1: When Katie would take that first step and it was just wobbly, you know, she looks like Gumby up in that mug, just in jello.
Speaker 1: She took her first step and we've got it on camera.
Speaker 1: We were just like, yes.
Speaker 1: Anybody looking at this would have been like, why are you so excited?
Speaker 1: It's chest one little step.
Speaker 1: And then she fell afterwards.
Speaker 1: Well, it might've been one little step to you, but to us it was huge because we knew that many other steps would follow after that as she grew up and matured.
Speaker 1: You see, you want to know the peace of God.
Speaker 1: Know the power of God to reconcile relationships and rejoice at first steps, small steps, any step in the direction that God is going.
Speaker 1: As you begin to rejoice in what God is doing in reconciling relationships, man, you'll never ever again Mark Little steps that people take even just in a willingness to reconcile.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God, get to know the power of God and rejoice in those little steps.
Speaker 1: Watch what comes next.
Speaker 1: Verse five.
Speaker 1: This one, one of the only times Paul uses this word, we don't even know, quite frankly, how to translate it.
Speaker 1: Let your gentle spirit is supplied in the English.
Speaker 1: Let your gentle spirit be made known to all men.
Speaker 1: Some of your Bibles probably have your forbearing spirit, your equitable spirit.
Speaker 1: Um, let your flexibility, your equitability, your equal.
Speaker 1: See, we don't really, he's saying don't be a jerk.
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 1: There's nowhere in the Bible that says be a jerk for Jesus.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: He's like, you can be fair and equitable and flexible.
Speaker 1: Man, do we need some flexibility?
Speaker 1: I have people come in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is the no one in here.
Speaker 1: I've got nothing in my mind.
Speaker 1: So if you came in and you were the one said,[inaudible], there's just Dave, we're just, we're incompatible mountain.
Speaker 1: My husband and I were just incompatible.
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, I can't ever, nah, I just, I don't see it in there.
Speaker 1: In fact, we're all incompatible.
Speaker 1: That's what the Bible says.
Speaker 1: Not one of us are compatible.
Speaker 1: Sin is broken.
Speaker 1: All of us.
Speaker 1: The problem is not in compatibility.
Speaker 1: The problem is immaturity and inflexibility.
Speaker 1: You want what you want and you want it now.
Speaker 1: Hey you, you know what helped me out a lot with my anxiety.
Speaker 1: I realized that you guys don't think that much about me because I don't think about you.
Speaker 1: I think about me.
Speaker 1: And so if I put myself in your spot, you don't think or you don't go home thinking about me, you go home thinking about you and I go home thinking about me.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't matter if my hair's messed up or the sermon doesn't go well.
Speaker 1: You go home thinking about you because you love you some you, as much as I love me, some me right now, none of us want to admit this like, no, Dave, I would never ever do that.
Speaker 1: Well now you're thinking about you and how offended you are.
Speaker 1: C only serves to prove my point.
Speaker 1: And some of us are like, Dave, I just tell it like it is.
Speaker 1: You're telling me be flexible and be equitable and be gentle.
Speaker 1: I just tell it like it is maybe or you might be a jerk.
Speaker 1: Honestly.
Speaker 1: Now, if it helps you to go to sleep at night and say I'm just outspoken and I tell it like it is okay, then I'm glad that helps you go to sleep.
Speaker 1: In actuality, you probably have just learned to shut everybody down and you don't want conversation.
Speaker 1: So you're just a jerk and you're not being a jerk for Jesus.
Speaker 1: Paul says, let your gentle spirit be made known to all men.
Speaker 1: You want to know that peace of God that surpasses all comprehension?
Speaker 1: He says, then you've got to know the patience of God.
Speaker 1: Listen, God has been very gentle and equitable with you.
Speaker 1: Has he not?
Speaker 1: And let me say this, Jesus Christ in the gospel has been very, very gentle and equitable and fair and flexible with me.
Speaker 1: He says, now go be patient with other people.
Speaker 1: Just go share that fairness and flexibility.
Speaker 1: You need to know this.
Speaker 1: You're never ever persuasive when you're abrasive.
Speaker 1: You're never persuasive.
Speaker 1: You may think you are because you can get people to do what you want.
Speaker 1: You're never ever persuasive.
Speaker 1: When you're abrasive And he says, let your gentle spirit be made known to all men, And here's why.
Speaker 1: Here comes the commands.
Speaker 1: The Lord is near.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have put that period there.
Speaker 1: It's not there in the Greek.
Speaker 1: This is verse six actually goes back.
Speaker 1: If you want to know the peace of God, you've got to know the presence of God.
Speaker 1: He says,"the Lord is near, therefore, don't be anxious for anything." Read verse six with me.
Speaker 1: Be anxious for Where's the wiggle room in that?
Speaker 1: Is there any wiggle room in that?
Speaker 1: See, this is what kills me day in and day out.
Speaker 1: I'll wake up.
Speaker 1: I woke up this morning, 5:01...Anxious."Lord, I'm going to need help.
Speaker 1: I can't do this.
Speaker 1: I don't know..."And then this verse comes,"Be anxious for nothing." You see it this concern, this anxiety, this worry is actually useless.
Speaker 1: I want you to write this down.
Speaker 1: It's actually useless For me, it burns up a whole bunch of energy and it can't change the past.
Speaker 1: The past is the past.
Speaker 1: That's what happened.
Speaker 1: It is And worrying, anxiousness?
Speaker 1: It doesn't change that.
Speaker 1: And my anxiety can't control the future.
Speaker 1: All my worry and anxiety does is kill the present.
Speaker 1: It crushes me Right here, it ruins every single day.
Speaker 1: It's useless and there's no wiggle room.
Speaker 1: You want to know the peace of God?
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 1: The presence of God.
Speaker 1: Jesus is right here with me and he loves me and he strengthens me and he gives me hope and he gives me help and he gives me healing and he says, come on Dave, let's go be anxious for nothing.
Speaker 1: Why should this be anxious for nothing?
Speaker 1: Then he juxtaposes it, but in everything by prayer and supplication, don't worry about anything.
Speaker 1: Pray about everything.
Speaker 1: He should probably talk to God.
Speaker 1: It's very useful.
Speaker 1: He actually is Lord, he's again, he created everything.
Speaker 1: He controls everything.
Speaker 1: He's going to complete everything.
Speaker 1: You should talk to him about stuff.
Speaker 1: He loves you, he's for you.
Speaker 1: He says, come speak to me.
Speaker 1: My girls don't get the hot potato game.
Speaker 1: We'll say, Siri, play hot potato.
Speaker 1: Shall I play hot potato?
Speaker 1: Micros love the hot potato.
Speaker 1: Katie loves it.
Speaker 1: When we toss it to her, she'll stand up and run off with it.
Speaker 1: If we take it from her, she'll cry.
Speaker 1: That's my potato.
Speaker 1: Anxiety's a hot potato that kills you.
Speaker 1: Don't run off with it.
Speaker 1: It's dumb.
Speaker 1: He says, cast all of your anxieties on me because I care for you and everything by prayer.
Speaker 1: And supplication with Thanksgiving first festival in chapter five, 16, 17 and 18 in all things give things.
Speaker 1: Um, the cure for my depression ended up being gratitude to wake up everyday and say, Lord Jesus, thanks for today.
Speaker 1: I got a new life.
Speaker 1: I get a new chance and thanks for a home and thanks for a wife and thanks for kids.
Speaker 1: And I just began to say thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: And it changed my perspective.
Speaker 1: You want to know the piece of hide, you've got to know his presence.
Speaker 1: Oh Lord Jesus.
Speaker 1: Thanks for being here with us with Thanksgiving.
Speaker 1: Let your requests be made known to God.
Speaker 1: And then there's the promise first seven now and with this and the peace of God.
Speaker 1: If you do these things, I guarantee you the peace of God that surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: First Peter chapter five verse seven.
Speaker 1: I love again how the the living new living and J B Phillips puts it, casting or throwing all of your anxieties and cares upon Jesus Christ because your his special object of affection, a love that casting all your anxieties on him because you're his special object of affection.
Speaker 1: He loves you.
Speaker 1: He doesn't want you to be stressed out and worried.
Speaker 1: We in a world of conflict and concerns, I love how Hudson Taylor said it.
Speaker 1: Hudson Taylor trying to feed many miles in inland China mission as he cared for orphans and sick people.
Speaker 1: He said, bear not a single burden yourself.
Speaker 1: One is too much for the, the work is mine and mine alone.
Speaker 1: Your work is to rest in me.
Speaker 1: What burden would Jesus Christ have you to cast on him today?
Speaker 1: What burden did you carry in with you that he is saying, give that to me.
Speaker 1: Give that to me.
Speaker 1: Don't run off with that hot potato y'all and I'll kill you.
Speaker 1: Throw it on Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: Let's pray.
Speaker 1: Father, God, thank you for this time to look at your word and then I do ask that you would give us freedom from, from our conflict in our concerns.
Speaker 1: Not that you would just remove them, but that you would allow us to fix our eyes on Jesus Christ, the author and perfecter of our faith.
Speaker 1: And Lord, as we walk into that conflict, would you buy your grace for your glory?
Speaker 1: Bring about reconciliation.
Speaker 1: We know you've given us that ministry of reconciliation, and I pray what began here with us in marriages and families as we begin to walk out the gospel, would you allow us to walk in newness of life and know that peace that surpasses all comprehension?
Speaker 1: I pray in Jesus' name.
Speaker 1: Amen.