Let me get on to our last talk here about practicing the way. So there I was in South Beach, Miami, which sounds really kind of exotic and cool. For me to go, I was in South Beach. It wasn't all that exotic, and frankly, it wasn't all that cool.
Joan and I and our kids, along with Joan's mom and dad, we were taking them on a trip with us. We had flown down to Miami the night before, because we were going to take it was a three or four night cruise out of the port of Miami. So we had flown down the night before, stayed in a hotel, and the boat was leaving on at three o'clock, and it's probably 10 or 11 o'clock in the morning. We're walking along South Beach, just in that strip of you've been there.
There's a strip kind of a park between the beach and the restaurants, the kind of iconic restaurants and bars on the avenue. And so there we were. Joan and I, kids in tow, in-laws following beautifully behind. And as I walked, I noticed, and it was fairly loud, a confrontation going on.
There was an agitated, I think, an agitated homeless man, that appeared to be a costing an older gentleman who was walking like a little small dog, tiny little white dog. And the aggressive guy was kind of a vagrant looking character, was just up in this old guy's face, cursing him out, threatening to kill him, over and over to his face. And the older guy was clearly intimidated and was trying to get away and just walk his dog away, and the guy would not get out of his face, kept stepping in front of him, stepping in front of him, wouldn't let it go. And so I see this and I hear this, and I, you know, I decided I was going to get involved.
So I walk over to the two-room, and I try to play peacemaker after all, I'm a pastor. And at first, my peacemaking attempts seem to be received fairly well. From minute or two, the homeless guy, he played like I was his friend, he let the older guy alone, and he began to walk with Joan and I and our family down the beach, and telling me what a great guy I was to do that, and how I had saved that man's life. And then he turned around and got in front of me and said, and now I am going to kill you, you blankety blank.
And he then started doing to me everything he was doing to the older guy. And so I tried to calm him down, that was not working. And then I, you know, let's not let this leave the room. Then I began to try to match his aggressiveness back to him, peacocking a bit, if you will, as they say, that at least got him to back off a little bit.
So he, instead of being in my face now, he was just walking a couple of feet away from us, telling me what he was going to do to us, and eventually gave up and walked away. So we, by the way, not a police officer anywhere. And so we finally get to, you know why? There wasn't a police officer anywhere, because there was a modeling shoot going on in the park.
And all the police were protecting this gorgeous model that was getting photographed. So I go up to the police officer and I say, hey, I just want to let you know, and I told him what happened. And he says, well, it's a good thing you didn't get into with that guy. He carries a knife, he would have stabbed you.
And I'm like, well, isn't there something we should be doing about this, right? Like, but that is a very true story. Now, why do I tell it to you? Well, first of all, because I want you to know why you'll never see me in South Beach, Miami again.
This is what happens when I leave my condo in Ocean City, Maryland and try to get all fancy with the fancy people down in Miami. But the second reason I'm telling you this, and I'll phrase it in a question. Why did I do that? Like, what made me get involved?
Why did I just mind my own business, right? Why did I, when I maybe keep my distance and just call 911, which by the way, I might do going forward. This morning as we put a wrap on practicing the way, I want to close with that question for you. Why do you do what it is that you do?
Because every day, all of us, every single one of us, is faced with hundreds, if not thousands, of choices and decisions which we will make, right? And when faced with that choice, and any given particular set of circumstances, why is it that you will do? And you will do most of these things without thinking about it. I did not think about this when I did this.
I just, it just, I just did it. Why do you do what you do? This morning, whether it was terrible, right? I looked out the window and I'm like, it is miserable.
And you all got up on like the crudiest day, it's a four day weekend, like a crummy day. You all got up and made a very conscious decision to be here. Why did you do that? Right?
Some of my friends are home today. Why did you do that? These decisions, right? They begin literally as soon as the alarm goes off.
When the alarm goes off, you have an immediate choice. What's the choice? Hit the snooze. My wife, she's out of town.
Probably watching right now. However, this is what happens when you're out of town. My wife will set the alarm for like 40 minutes before she wants to get up and just keep hitting snooze. Just keep hitting snooze.
Some of you are shaking your head and keep hitting snooze. I never understand. I set the alarm for five minutes after I need to get up. And then I'm like scurrying because I wanted to get every ounce of sleep I could out of it.
On the way home, you're gonna decide what to get for breakfast. You're gonna get the egg white veggie omelette, right? Or you're gonna get the tailor hand-making cheese. You're gonna have a choice.
Jones not, I mean, I was thinking about my day. And in fact, as I thought about this, I thought I'm not gonna get the bagels today because that's not good for me. And as I left this morning, my mother-in-law who lives with it says, in case you're thinking of getting bagels this morning, I would like. So now I gotta get bagels, right?
I'm gonna work on our budget that I have sometime this afternoon. I have to make choices regarding our budget. Will I prioritize the things of God in that budget? Will I spend up to all of my available income?
Will I save any of it? Will I, is there a cruise in the future? Decisions, right? Decisions create my days and my days create me and my life.
Why do you do what you do? Why do you do it? Craig Rochelle in his book, The Power to Change, Mastering the Habits that Matter. He tackles that question and he introduces a final.
And I think very practical, spiritual discipline or spiritual practice for people that want to follow the ways of Jesus, that I heard him recite this at least a decade ago. And it's has stuck with me for at least 10 years. Remember, when we started this series, I said to you, we started on the first Sunday of the New Year. You were not gonna be the same person next year that you are this year.
You are going to be different. You are gonna change. And the question that underlie the whole series was, will we make the choices that will form us? Or will we allow the world and our circumstances, the news and people and our culture to form us?
We have to make that choice. So introduce you to introduce you to this final. And I think very practical practice. Let me get back to this morning's question, which is why do you do what you do?
James Marsh wrote a book. It's not a spiritual book. It's a, I believe it's a business book. It's called A Primer on Decision Making, How Decisions Happen.
And in it, he used various studies to explore the complexities of decision making. For his purposes, it was within organizations. And he used insights from psychology, from political science and from economics. And he challenged quite convincingly the conventional rational choice model.
In other words, our decisions, as much as we like to think we are rational creatures, our decisions many times are not made purely because it is the well-reasoned thing to do. Instead, he emphasized that decisions are actually influenced by factors beyond pure logic. According to Marsh's studies, decision making is often driven by perceived, this is so interesting. Decision making is also often driven by perceived identities, rather than rational calculations.
This perspective is based on the idea that individuals make choices, not just by way and cost and benefits, but by asking themselves, what does someone like me do in a situation like this? In fact, he highlighted a study that shows before making a decision, individuals follow what's called a logic of appropriateness approach, rather than strict rationaleing. They make choices based, their choice is based on who they are and what is expected given their identity in any given situation. According to Marsh, people typically ask three questions when confronted with a decision.
Most of the time, they go through your brain instantaneously. You do not think about them like me in the park in South Beach. I did not sit there and go, well, let's think this out. I just, I did these things.
It wasn't even maybe a good choice. Here are the questions. Identity-based decision making. Here's the first question you automatically ask yourself.
The first is what kind of situation is this? What is happening right now? We quickly interpret the context. We recognize familiar patterns and norms that exist.
Any expectations that might be associated with the situation? For me, right? What was happening? Well, a somewhat older man was being threatened by a young, clearly not mentally well person, right?
And so I'm looking at that and that's the situation. Then the next thing that comes to our mind is who am I? Here's the situation. Who am I?
Marsh writes people define themselves based on their identities, their roles and their affiliations as a professional or a team member, a leader or a citizen. Again, I did not think consciously about this in that moment in South Beach. It was not like I slowly opened my Superman shirt and the cape dropped out. But in that moment, without thinking, my brain somehow processed that I am the kind of person who doesn't let old men get beat up and do nothing.
I'd like to tell you that's because that's just me. I'm heroic. But it's not. Like I didn't weigh that out or anything, right?
There was, if I knew he had a knife, I probably would have taken a different approach, right? There was no cost-benefit analysis. If there was, I might have walked away. Something bigger, deeper was going on.
It was in here somewhere. And then the final question was this. One was what kind of situation two, who am I? And three, what does someone like me do in a situation like this?
Rather than calculating the optimal choice, individuals rely on social norms, past experiences, and identity-based expectations to guide their behavior. His example? Think the 911 fireman right now. A firefighter in an emergency doesn't calculate risks mathematically, but he acts based on their identity as a protector and a first responder.
Why do those men go up those stairs? Because that's who they are, and that's what they do. Three questions. It's in almost all of our decisions, processed by you in thousands of times a day, and they will determine what we do and eventually they'll determine who we are.
Or as Grishel summarizes this concept in his book, quote, you do what you do because of what you think of you. Remember when you were in school and you didn't know an answer to a problem, and you were sitting by the smart kid? You had two choices, right? I can get it wrong, or I can look over and get the answer from the smart kid.
I don't know what you did, but what you did was predicated on who you think you are. Those are somewhat innocent decisions. What happens when you're on a business trip and you're in the hotel bar? A beautiful woman sits down next to you.
What you will likely do will be predicated on who it is that you think you are. Conversely, right? Conversely, it works the same way. You might hear of a need and you might rush to meet it.
You might give ridiculously generously and sacrificially to make sure that it's met. Perhaps somebody hurts you, and instead of putting, you know, plotting your revenge and training for karma, maybe you regularly choose to believe a generous narrative about the person instead of assuming the worst, and you move in a posture of forgiveness towards them rather than pulling away. What you do in those moments is predicated on who it is that you think you are. Why you do what you do?
You do what you do because of who you think, what you think about you. One business consultant that was on their LinkedIn profile, he was trying to teach this, and I'm not sure he knew the WWJD moniker, but his acronym for decision-making was W-D-A-P-L-M-D-I-A-S-L-T. Literally, a big letter is on his LinkedIn. I think just what does a person like me do in a situation like this?
What does a person like me do? What does a person like me do when the alarm goes off? I thought I was working on this this week, and we had a beyond the walls meeting, Tuesday morning, board meeting, the board meeting started at seven thirty. I am old now, so I need to get up and get myself moving.
That means I need a lot of time, unfortunately. So the alarm went off very early. It was pitch black, freeze and cold. And my first thought was, ugh, I don't want to get up.
Why am I doing this? And then all of a sudden, another thought came flooding in. You're getting up out of bed because you're going to business, the true story. You're getting up out of bed right now because you were about to have an opportunity to meet with friends and serve and help poor children.
I got right out of bed. I got right out of bed because that's who I am. So I'm trying to convince myself that's who I am. It's going to be under every look at the weather this week.
It's like 13 inches of snow coming Thursday. I think the high many days is in the teens. Some of you know that I've been trying to walk a lot. So I'm already like, oh, this is going to not be good.
But I'm already going, what is a person like me? You're doing weather like this. So my son-in-law drove my byme in his neighborhood the other day. I went to pick my granddaughter up.
And I purposely drove there early because I needed to get a couple miles in. So he drives up and he's like, what is your problem? I'm just walking through his neighborhood. He goes to your car break down.
I'm like, I got the walk in. You do what you do because of what you think of you. What do you think of you? Where's the Bible puts it?
For as a man, think it's in his heart. So he is. If you've heard that before, raise your hand. As a man, think it's in his heart.
So he is. Do you know the context? I didn't. I didn't know the context.
It's a proverb. It's from this ancient book of wisdom in the Old Testament, kind of in the center of your Bible. Solomon, often said to be the wisest man to ever live. Here's what Solomon wrote.
Here's the context. He said, do not eat the bread of a miser, nor desire his delicacies, for as he thinks in his heart, so he is. Eat and drink, he says to you, but his heart is not with you. The more so you've eaten, you'll vomit up and you'll waste your pleasant words.
In other words, the miser is telling you, oh, come on in. Sit down. Have your fill of my food. And the whole time while you're eating it, the cheap state is just sitting there going, I can't believe it.
I can't believe it. I can't believe it. Do you know how much that? That state costs a lot of money.
Once you realize what he's thinking, you're going to want to spit out the food and all your kind compliments, all your table talk was just wasted. What the miser thought, not what he did, is who he really is, and ultimately determines what it is. So that's all true. Then doesn't the opposite side of the equation have to be true, which is if you want to change what you do, you need to change what it is that you think about you.
Which sounds really easy, right? Like if I want to change, then I just need to change what it is I think about myself. But here's the problem for most of us, what we think about ourselves is so deeply rooted. It's really deep in here.
Oftentimes, I talk about it as the voice, this other that seems to live within me. It's constantly telling me and maybe telling you that we're not all that great. This week, I was just driving. I had to go right and I went left.
I'm driving left and all of a sudden, I'm like, have you done that? We're like, oh, you're saying you realize where you're going? You're like, I don't know what the next thing that the voice says to you. I go, oh.
And every time I go, oh, I immediately hear, you're such an idiot. Every time. You're such an idiot. I tell myself that 100 times a week.
When you tell yourself you're an idiot 100 times a week, do you know what you start to believe about yourself? You're an idiot. You tell yourself 100 times a week. Well, I'm being a man in around my 30s.
You tell yourself this 100 times a week for 30 years. It's pretty deep in there. I mean, there's all kinds of things. There's mild cases.
You know what I say to myself 100 times a week? You know what the voice says to me? Why can't anything ever be easy? Why can't anything ever be easy?
Say to myself all the time. What am I telling myself? I'm the kind of person that things never go right for. Some of you, I shared the other day at our mental health awareness seminar.
I was part of a seminar with pastors. And they were asking a pastor. And a pastor was sharing with one of the spiritual counselors what this voice in his head was doing to him. And so they sent him home.
And they said, I want you to every time the voice speaks to you this week, I want you to write it down. Right down what it said to you when you come back, we'll talk about it. He came back a week later. And the guy said, did you write it down?
He goes, I wrote it down. He says, what did it say? I mean, it's not for total. It's not even one of consumption.
But essentially it was, why are you such a blanking blank hole? That was what was going on in his head. Where did that come from? You do what you do because of what you think about you.
Where did that come from? Where did we get these messages about ourselves? These negative dark things. Where do we pick them up?
Well, research shows a couple of things. We tend to define ourselves by what we believe influential people in our lives think about us. Psychologists call it the looking glass self. We see ourselves through the eyes of others.
We let other people, especially in our formative years, define us. But that's not who you are. You're not what your parent or your coach or your teacher or your grandparent or the bully or the mean girl at school. You're not what they made you.
You are not what they made you feel like. But how many of us are still operating out of high school rules? We're victories. We can also define ourselves by our worst days, our sins, and our habits.
And so you might think, I'm just so fat. Everybody looks at you and goes, what? Or I'm just so scrawny. Or I'm an addict.
I'll never get clean. I'm a lazy. I'm a loser. That is not who you are.
But we are often tempted to define ourselves by our worst days. Can't get past with you. Jesus actually addressed this in these deeper spiritual issues behind these lies. All of us have believed to one degree or another.
Heck, the studies even show that narcissists, right? People who identify as we go, oh, he's a narcissist. He's just so full of himself. Do you know what the studies show about narcissists?
They're the most insecure people. They appear super confident and deeply inside. They're just this voice that's telling them that they're not enough. Why?
Because you do what you do because of what you think about you. John, one of Jesus' 12 disciples, he was there when Jesus said this. He wrote it down. Jesus said to the people that believed him, that'd be many of you in this room.
You are truly my disciples, which is what we're trying to be in this series. We're trying to be learners of Jesus. You're truly my disciples. If you remain faithful to my teachings, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.
The truth will set you free. Now, you and I have heard that so many times. Our curiosity about Jesus, what he was saying to them, has been muted. But the first listeners asked what you and I might ask if we heard that for the first time.
In this case, it was a Jewish audience. And so they looked at Jesus and they're like, essentially, what are you talking about? Set us free. They said, we're descendants of Abraham.
They said, we've never been slaves to anyone, which is interesting because there were slaves in Egypt for hundreds of years. But we're gods chosen. People were not slaves. You and I would say, we're red blood on Americans.
Do you know who we are? We're not slaves to anybody. What do you mean they said will be set free? Jesus replied, I'll tell you the truth.
Everyone who sins is a slave of sin. You wind up serving it. You think you're committing it. But eventually you wind up serving it.
And Jesus gets into it with them. They claim their children, and because they're the chosen people of God, they are the children of God. And Jesus says to them, if God were your father, you would love me because I have come to you from God. I'm not here on my own, but he sent me.
Now listen to what he says. Why can't you understand? Why can't you understand what I'm saying? And he gives them the answer.
It's because you can't even hear me. Powerful words, right? Why can't you understand what I'm trying to tell you? I'll tell you why.
It's because you can't even hear me. Because you're listening to somebody else. For you are, he says, the children of your father, the devil. And you love to do the evil things he does.
He was a murderer from the beginning. Now friends, I know that in the 21st century to talk about the devil seems like a bit of archaic folly. But for me, rather than getting into the teachings about it right now, what I'd like to do is ask you to consider two things. The first is that Jesus said this.
And Jesus said he was going to be crucified dead, buried, and rise again on the third day, and he did. And so Jesus talks about the devil. We should probably take Jesus seriously. The second thing is that if you're in a church this morning, no matter where you are in the faith spectrum, it would say to me that you are open to considering that there is in creation beyond what we can see, right?
With our eyes. There is some kind of personal being that embodies love and goodness. And you know that because you can see the out workings of his love and his goodness in the world. I would say then why would you not also be open to considering that there might be in creation beyond what we can see with our own eyes, personal being that embodies hate and evil.
And you too can see the out workings of his hand in the world and in your life and in your ears. Jesus says of this evil that he was a murderer from the beginning and do you know how he kills? Do you know what his number one tool in his toolbox is? He always hated the truth because there's no truth in him.
And when he lies, it's consistent with his character. For he is a liar and the father of lies. And then listen to this from Jesus. And so when I tell you the truth, you just naturally don't believe me.
You and I are so used to believing the lies that have been told about us and to us that over us they replay over and over and over and you're such an idiot. You're such an idiot. You're never gonna be able to kick this. You'll never be able to stop.
They're never gonna accept you. The lies we believe are about ourselves. We're so used to believing them. Jesus says that when I tell you the truth about who you are, you don't even believe me.
You can't even hear me over that voice. You're too fat, you're too skinny. You're not that smart. You'll never win.
You'll always fail. Your siblings are better. You're not tough. You're a terrible mom.
You'll never kick this addiction. You'll never change. So just stop trying. It becomes so easy to believe those lies when you hear them every day.
And they're literally killing you. They become slaves to them. We do the bidding of the lie. We act out who it is that we think we are.
Young girls start believing the lie that they're not all that attractive and so in order to be popular with the boys, I guess I'm just gonna have to give my body away more freely. That'll prove to all the other girls, you know, who I am and that I'm desirable and it'll maybe prove it to me. And it's killing. Guys, all of us somehow still trying to impress our fathers.
Always feeling like we never quite measured up. A little bit of a chip on our shoulder. Oftentimes, it meant it works its way out in anger, right? And you take it out on your coworkers and the guy on route 80, you come home and you kick the dog and you yell at your wife.
Maybe even worse, you just abandon your wife and your kids to work in the office just so you can prove to somebody that you've got what it takes. And it's a lie. And you will waste your entire life on a lie. And if Jesus is right, man, as your pastor, it's my duty to encourage you to believe that he probably is.
And that lie takes deeper root in our subconscious and in our hearts. Again, oftentimes we're not even aware that they're there. The lie shapes the identity. It shapes who we are.
At least who we think it is we are. And it gets deeply embedded and believed and we act out of the broken identity. So if you want to change what you do, then you have to change what it is that you think about you. You're going to have to practice listening to a different voice, not the voices of others and not the voices of evil.
We have got to allow the voice of Jesus to reform, reshape and rethink who it is that we are. We like the miser and the proverb. We think that we can just change ourselves by changing our actions. Sure, the miser says, come and eat of my fair.
What I have is yours. Eat up. All the while, I was helping the costs. And he's raging with anger internally.
Why? Because he simply tried to modify behavior. Never transformed who it was. If we want to change our behaviors, you have to start from the inside, from the heart.
That is what God sees and judges. It is our hearts. So if you want to change what it is you do, then you have to change what it is you think about you. If that's true, then these three words underpin the entire series.
You have to begin with. You have to start with. It always has to be the who before the do, the who before the do. Instead of focusing on what you do, you start with focusing on you.
Who it is, you will be different next year. Who do you want to be? Who do not? What do you want to do?
You can do all kinds of things that won't change you who you are. Who do you want to be? You start with identity. What kind of man or woman do you want to wind up being by the end of this year?
So he's rewrapped this up. This is what you and I need to choose. Who do you want to be? I was thinking about my daughter, Courtney, this week.
Courtney has a two-year-old and she has two four-month-olds. I go over to her house. It's a... I mean, it's something else, right?
And it's so easy to be Courtney and Ryan right now and just go, this blows. Like, this is horrible, right? But somehow, like I watch the two of them. Like Ryan is unbelievable.
I go over there. He's got two kids on his hands. He's feeding two and playing with Lander with his foot. And it's almost as if you watch these two say, I'm going to be a great mom.
I am going to be a great dad. I'm going to prioritize my children over the craziness of this situation. That's who I am. I'm that kind of person.
I'm the bad in the morning when the alarm goes off. I'm either kind of person that hits this news five times and gets up a grudgingly and goes, I can't believe I've got to go to work again today. Or you get out of bed and go, who do I want to be? I want to be the person that gets up every day and doesn't waste one because I am excited about what my good and heavenly Father might have for me today.
We talked about this concept of habits and that book of atomic habits that recommended to you. Here's what he wrote. He said, every action that you take is a vote for the type of person you want to become. No single instance transforms your beliefs.
But it's the votes build up. So does the evidence of your new identity. Here's how Paul tried to explain the concept of the church and Ephesus. The idea of how they used to live, the out of these fake identities.
Here's what Paul said, this however is not the way of life. There it is. We're practicing the way. This is not the way of life you learn when you heard about Christ and you were taught in accordance with here it is the truth that is in Jesus.
You were taught with regard to your formal way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires and to be made new in the attitudes of your mind by the way you think. And then when you change who you think you are, you put on the new self created to be like God and true righteousness and holiness. How do you put on the new self? You're made new in the way you think.
He goes on, he goes, for though we live in the world, we don't wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with aren't the weapons of the world, on contrary. They have divine power to demolish strongholds. You know what the strongholds means here?
The word in Greek is Akuroma, Akuroma in the news testament. It is used metaphorically to describe mental or spiritual. Listen to this. Mental or spiritual strongholds, patterns of thought or belief that are resistant to the truth of God.
It's exactly what Jesus said. You can't even hear me. You don't believe me because you're listening to somebody else. You've got a stronghold.
Paul says, we demolish arguments and every potential that sets it up, it's up against the knowledge of God and we take captive every thought and we make it obedient to Christ. We take captive every thought. I'm not stupid. Stop it.
I'm not just simply the sum total of my past. Stop it. We silence the voice of the evil one in our head and we listen to the voice of Jesus. I could do this with you all day.
You need to do this every day. Practice it. But I'd like to tell you who you are. Can I, can I give you a minute?
I know I got a wrap up. But I just want to tell you God says you are. Maggie's going to pop some of these up. You know, the scripture says you are sought after.
God told Isaiah they'll be called holy people, the redeemed of the Lord and you will be called sought after, the city no longer in Missouri. You know, God sought you. He told Isaiah that you're precious in his sight. Since you were precious in my sight, you have been honored and I love you.
Do you know who you are? Can you even hear him anymore? You are a new creation in Christ. The oldest passed away, the new has come because of Jesus's love for you and his sacrifice for you.
Therefore, despite that voice, despite where you've gone and what you've done, there is now no condemnation. There is no, I don't know where that voice is coming from in your head, but it ain't from God. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You are not condemned.
You are forgiven, loved, accepted, a child of God. Jesus is friend. He would like to spend time with you. You are free.
You are the temple of God. You carry him with you where you go. You bring God. You are his treasured possession.
You're complete in Christ. You're chosen, called. You're the masterpiece of God. You're able to do all things through Christ who will give you the strength and you are more than a conqueror through Jesus who loves you.
That is just a case of who you are. Imagine if you believe that every day, if the voice stops saying you're such an idiot and starts saying, man does he love you? Ah, he's so proud of you. We have to practice it.
We have to take every sort of captive. Grab it and tell it the truth, but you've got to make time for it. Grishel recommends the most transformational spiritual discipline that he practices. This is the one that I struck me for over a decade.
He calls him his personal declarations. It's a spiritual practice he gets and gets up and does every day. They're a combination of the who before do principle. Who do I want to be first and take every thought captive principle?
The truth of who he is in Jesus. I'm going to read you his. His is better than mine. It's all I read you his.
I'm working on mine. I hope you'll work on your personal declarations too. And practice them every day. Here's what he gets.
He gets up every day. Here's his personal declarations. Number one, Jesus is first in my life and I exist to serve and glorify him. I love my wife and I will lay down my life to serve her.
My children will love God and serve him with their whole hearts. I will nurture, equip, train and empower them to do more for his kingdom than they could imagine. I love people and I believe the best about others. Imagine saying that to yourself every day.
I am a discipline. I am disciplined. Christ in me is stronger than the wrong desire in me. I am growing closer to Jesus every day because of Christ.
My family is closer. My body is stronger. My faith is deeper and my leadership is sharper. I am anointed, empowered, equipped and called to reach people far from God.
It's a statement of purpose. I'm creative, innovative, driven, focused and blessed beyond measure because the Holy Spirit dwells within me. He has a personal calling here. I develop leaders.
That's something I do. It's who I am. My words, thoughts and imaginations are under the power of Christ. I take all thoughts captive and make them obedient to Christ.
I wake up with purpose, direction and meaning every day of my life. How about this? Pain is my friend. I rejoice in suffering because Christ suffered from me.
I bring my best and then some. It's what I bring after I do my best that makes the difference. And finally, the world will be different and better because I serve Jesus today. That's my final discipline for you.
I pray that you'll take on because you've been lied to for a long time. You're living out alive. It's killing you. We've had a bunch of disciplines here.
We don't pick them up daily. Audio Bible. I just love hearing so many of you. We had to be on the wall of the other day.
Everybody was laughing about using all of Brian's words about a bright, sparkly new week. My buddy Dan Reardon said it's like putting on an old shoe, listening to Brian every day. I love how he's using the scripture to be a mirror for us, right? To look at ourselves.
I gave you Lectio 365. If you don't have time for daily audio Bible, try Lectio 365. There's a short time of just reflecting on one verse in the morning and the afternoon in the evening. Man, if you have not done Lectio 365 before you've gone to bed at night, please try it out and think about putting it into practice.
We've talked about the power of confession to God and one another. We spent an entire Sunday on learning how to create habits and to reorient our habit loops. Go grab that book, the atomic habits or the power of habit. And when you put it all together, what puts it all together, I don't have time to go into today, but it's in your book.
It's in the small group of material and it's online. It's something called a rule of life. It is a pattern you create for yourself because you have a rule of life, right? Oftentimes my rule of life is I work, I come home, I fall on the couch, I self-medicate, and I get up tomorrow and do it again.
You have a rule of life. Choose a different one. Incorporate into your weeks. Classic, classic disciplines.
Sabbath and solitude, prayer, fasting, scripture, community. You did that today when you made the choice to be here. Generosity, service, witness, integrate these things repeatedly into your life. Create a plan for practicing spiritual growth.
I'm going to go home and work on a financial plan. You all have a financial plan. You're saving for retirement because you want to live differently then. I go to the gym.
I watch people carry around a notebook to write down how much weight they lift so that they want to be able to change. How can we think we're going to change spiritually without a plan? I encourage you to put together a rule of life. If you want help, this is an incredible resource here.
It's free. Practicing the way.org. Go to rule of life builder. I wrap up the way I began.
Who will you become this year? You're changing. You're morphing. What you choose today is going to impact who you are going to become tomorrow.
You have that choice. You can let the world and the news and other people and the devil decide. Or you can let Jesus decide. The first Christians did not call themselves Christians.
They called themselves followers of the way. May we all be so brave as to be and to do the same. Let's close this one.