[0:00] I hope you guys are buckled in. About to go for a ride. I was talking to Carlos last week. Carlos, you didn't know I was going to include you in this.
[0:10] We were talking, we like are pretty into like dietary supplements and diets and things like that. So then Carlos sent me this verse out of Hebrews 13.
[0:22] Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods. Which have not benefited those devoted to them.
[0:36] So I was like, thank you so much, Carlos. I really needed to hear that. But you just torpedoed my sermon on the sanctifying power of dietary supplements and diet and lifestyle changes.
[0:50] Well, because that was actually a joke. I get in trouble with my wife because she says that people don't know I'm joking. That was a joke. That was a joke. But in reality, what we're going to be talking on is meekness.
[1:03] A neglected topic at times. Specifically, I'm going to talk about meekness as it pertains to Christian women and Christian men. So you could also say just all Christians.
[1:16] Okay, that was the last joke. So I just want to start with the beatitude. Jesus says, which almost all of the beatitudes are ironic.
[1:30] They're ironic juxtapositions. But one of them, he says, the meek shall inherit the earth. Even louder. Oh my goodness.
[1:41] The meek shall. Seth's telling me I'm not loud enough. The meek shall inherit the earth. Which is a very strange characteristic for inheritance to follow.
[1:56] I think normally we would think of the passage in so far as inheritance is concerned of, let's say, the parable of the talents. Where the person that stewards what's given to them well, more will be given to them.
[2:09] And the person that stewards it poorly, even what they have, will be taken away. Isn't that more of the equation that creates inheritance? Is the stewardship, which obviously that's part of it.
[2:20] But Jesus is making the point that the meek shall inherit the earth. Which is a very strange. You normally think of meekness as some kind of reservation.
[2:32] Maybe not weakness. But some kind of a personal reservation. It requires a reserved disposition. How is it that inheritance comes through meekness?
[2:44] How is it that the thing that normally the conquerors achieve? Or the good stewards achieve? Or the wise people achieve? How is it that meekness gets you there?
[2:55] How is meekness connected to inheritance? Well, let's turn to Psalm 37, which is where the verse that Jesus is quoting is in.
[3:12] Starting in verse 1. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
[3:25] Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. As an aside, Chris actually read this verse last Wednesday, which is an awesome verse.
[3:35] This is totally a footnote. This is not the point of my message. But it is really cool that the Lord says, Delight yourself in him and he will give what your heart desires. Which it seems like there is a parallel here.
[3:48] When we want the Lord, he gives us himself. Okay, that's an aside. That's not the point I'm trying to make. To keep going. Commit your way to the Lord. Trust in him.
[4:00] And here's the emphasis. And he will act. He will bring forth your righteousness as the light and your justice as the noonday.
[4:14] Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him. Fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices.
[4:31] Refrain from anger and forsake wrath. Fret not yourselves. It tends only to evil. For evildoers, that's interesting. It says fret not yourself. It tends only to evil.
[4:44] For the evildoers shall be cut off. But those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land. In just a little while, the wicked will be no more.
[4:57] Though you look carefully at his place, he will not be there. But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace.
[5:08] So what's he saying here? How is he using the word meekness? Obviously, there's a lot of connotations to meekness. I believe distinctly that what he's referring to is when we are still and trust the Lord to act and do the work.
[5:25] There is a fruitful stillness that depends on the Lord's intervention. It is, so to speak, posturing yourself, anticipating the Lord's deliverance.
[5:40] It is to say he is the deliverer. I am not the deliverer. He is the deliverer. He is the deliverer. I am going to hop on down.
[5:54] Oh, sorry, not hop on down. I am going to move to Exodus 14. There are so many passages about this. There are so many passages about this. We are kind of going to do a tour through a handful. Actually, not a handful.
[6:04] Quite a few passages on this one topic. Exodus 14, verse 13. This is right after the children of Israel. They were delivered out of Egypt. They've come up to the Red Sea and the armies of Egypt are pursuing them and coming to kill them.
[6:21] And they're getting cold feet. And they're like, are we just going to die out here? Wouldn't it have been better if we just went back and were slaves in Egypt? Moses responds, do not be afraid.
[6:35] Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today, you will never see again.
[6:48] The Lord will fight for you. You need only be still. Once again, the Lord is the deliverer.
[7:03] The Lord is producing the inheritance. The Lord is producing the fruit. The Lord is the person who is acting. We are being still.
[7:14] He is acting. And truthfully, when we first come to the Lord, isn't this exactly the experience? Wow. Look at what the Lord is doing. Look at what the Lord is doing.
[7:26] So powerful. So right for just seeing the Lord in his majesty and deliverance. I am not the rescuer of my life. The Lord is the rescuer of my life. This is how it even says in the book of Hebrews that the gospel was preached to the Hebrew Israelites in the wilderness, which is such a mysterious thing to say.
[7:48] But they are experiencing some radical deliverance from the Lord. The Lord is absolutely saving them. They are absolutely experiencing. I mean, this is one of those circumstances where they have no hope.
[7:59] Talking to the Red Sea here and the army here. And they're not armed. They're just about to get wiped out. They don't have circumstantially. They really have no hope in their own abilities, which is always like when we finally surrender and we have no tricks up our sleeve.
[8:13] We're in a tight spot. Like, okay, Lord. Anyway, I'm going to keep going. Mark chapter 4. This is one of my favorite parables because it's kind of mysterious and kind of obscure.
[8:29] Mark chapter 4. This is about a farmer sowing seed, but it's not the parable of the sower. It's further down. It kind of gets overshadowed by the parable of the sower.
[8:43] Mark chapter 4, starting in verse 26. He also said, This is what the kingdom of heaven is like.
[8:58] The kingdom of God is like, is my voice okay? Can everybody hear me? We good? Seth, we good? We good? We good. Okay. This is what the kingdom of God is like.
[9:09] A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how.
[9:24] So whether he is asleep or awake, irregardless of what he's doing, the seed's growing. And it says he doesn't know how it's happening.
[9:39] So irregardless of his actions or irregardless of his ideas, the seed is growing all by itself, which is exactly what it says. All by itself, the soil produces grain.
[9:55] First the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it because the harvest has come.
[10:09] Okay, what's this about? I believe that what this is about is there is a fruitful growth that happens in the Lord's timeline, that happens irregardless of our actions, irregardless of what we're doing, and irregardless of our understanding.
[10:28] There is something that the Lord is doing. There is a fruit that the Lord is growing that is happening all by itself. And I think that there is a struggle that we have where we, what is it?
[10:46] We're more like rowboats. We want to keep on heading the direction we want to head. We're not so much sailboats. We don't like the whole like, you know, what does the sailboat do when there's no wind? It doesn't do anything.
[10:57] There's no wind. That's not really our timeline a lot of times. We're like, I'm more of a rowboat kind of guy. Not so much of a sailboat kind of guy. Michael's like, I'm more of a motorboat kind of guy.
[11:13] We don't like being sailboats. You know what I mean? We want things to happen and happen now in our own life and in the life of others. Right? Because think about this.
[11:25] I'm going to keep on going. There's so many passages about this. Think about this. How often are we like the children of Israel caught between the Red Sea and the chariots of Egypt?
[11:40] That's called a rock and a hard place. And we're there. And then we really radically cry out to the Lord. And wow. Some huge breakthroughs.
[11:51] We're confessing things. We never confessed to anybody. We're reconciling people we've never reconciled with before. All of a sudden there's like, instead of the cloud that follows you, there's like a grace that's following you every day.
[12:04] You know what I'm saying? Powerful. Lord's intervention. And then it's like, also maybe now you look like a basket of chips.
[12:15] Right? Because you're coming clean about everything. And this is not very convenient. And we're like, okay. Like, crisis. Thank you, God. Deliver me. And you're as soon as possible.
[12:26] Can we wrap up this crisis period? Like, I'm not saying that I'm unwilling. But can it be done as soon as possible?
[12:38] Right? There's actually, there's one of my favorite verses in Proverbs. Lord, give me food sufficient for me. Not so much that I forget you and not so little that I curse you.
[12:51] Which is awesome. But it's also like another way of saying like, Lord, can you please let me learn the like not really hard way? Like, can I learn the way that's not like really, really hard?
[13:02] You know what I mean? And I think part of that is our timeline towards fruitfulness is not the Lord's timeline.
[13:14] We don't like being a sailboat. We don't like being a sailboat. Right? We don't like being a sailboat. All right.
[13:26] Speaking of sailboats. Luke 10, 38. This is Martha and Mary. You guys already know the story. As Jesus and his disciples were on the way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened up her home to him.
[13:42] She had a sister called Mary who sat at the Lord's feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made.
[13:53] She came to him and asked, Lord, don't you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me.
[14:05] Martha, Martha, the Lord answered. You are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed.
[14:16] Or indeed, only one. Mary has chosen what is better. And it will not be taken away from her.
[14:30] Again, Christ is Christianity. Rock in the hard place. Find the crafts of the Lord. Lord's grace is upon you. You look like a basket case. Now, instead of being a put-together Christian, you are a bad Christian, should we say?
[14:46] That's what Carlos and I was talking about. Never losing, never graduating from being a bad Christian. You are very clearly not a put-together Christian. You are a mess. You're a hot mess. Okay.
[14:57] So much grace there. We want to escape that. Right? We want to escape the crisis of the Lord's intervention, shall we call it?
[15:09] What happens? When the Lord, when we lose our meekness, let's say, when we don't choose the one thing, what is life about?
[15:22] Is it about many things or is it about one thing? Mary believed he's about one thing. When we lose our meekness, life becomes about many things.
[15:33] Life becomes about many things. And how can we not strive? Because if the Lord is not a rescuer, then we got to do something about it. And it's all on us.
[15:43] Right? It's all on us. And that is a heavy yoke that Christians, that we, that me, are putting on all the time. Right? Because we lose it.
[15:54] We don't like meekness. It's actually one of those things. I'm not like, let's see. Meekness is not like, let's see. The only time meekness comes up is when, I don't know, like I'm fighting with my wife.
[16:06] You know what I'm saying? Which is like the best time to bring things up when you're in a fight with your wife. And then you want to bring up meekness. You know what I'm saying? Meekness is something in this regard that is so pertinent because we're so predisposed towards wanting to be the rescuer of our own life.
[16:24] Right? Right? We want to, I don't know. Maybe it does feel weak to be meek. I don't know. I'm speculating here. Okay.
[16:35] But think about this. Martha Mary. I'm getting derailed. Martha Mary. Martha concerned about many things. Mary chose the one great thing. It's so similar to the seed.
[16:48] Now this is the parable of the sower. The seed that fell in the weedy soil. It was choked out by thorns and thistles. In the interpretation, Jesus says that that seed was choked out by the cares and concerns of life and did not produce much fruit.
[17:10] Right? What is this? What is this? What is cares and concerns? Well, I think on the surface, it's just exactly cares, things you love and care about, and concerns, things that cause you stress and anxiety.
[17:21] Both of these things are opportunities for us to see the Lord as our provider and the Lord as our rescuer, or a temptation for us to satisfy our desires in other ways and be our own rescuer of our own anxieties and circumstances.
[17:46] You know, it's even like what Jesus said, you know, when he talks about not worrying about tomorrow, for today has enough concerns of its own. If it's all on us, we have so much to worry about.
[17:59] Right? But the Lord is our rescuer. The Lord is our deliverer. Like, the Lord is actually as powerful as he was to the Israelites when he split the Red Sea, which is what we discover in these crisis moments in life, how powerful the Lord still is.
[18:16] He can be the solution to our cares and concerns every day, every day. And this is what this is talking about. I believe this is what this is talking about.
[18:30] Psalm 127, verse 1. You guys all know this verse. Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain.
[18:41] Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain. So I think that the contrast here, the contrast here is stillness that produces the Lord's fruit.
[19:00] Right? That's what I'm calling meekness. There is a fruit that comes from stillness that the Lord is the one producing the fruit. I'm going to call that meekness. And then on the other side, when we are rowboats, that's called laboring in vain.
[19:16] That's called laboring in vain. And it's a really, man, laboring in vain. Okay, guys, I'm speaking from experience here. This is like an alcoholic talking about alcohol. Laboring in vain.
[19:28] The double whammy of laboring in vain is not only was that yoke really heavy and crushing you the whole time. In all of your efforts, you built a sandcastle and now it's gone.
[19:39] Right? Not only was it a really, really hard path, but everything you built was completely in vain. That's the double whammy because there's sacrifice involved there too. When you labor in vain, you are making sacrifices in vain.
[19:55] Right? And I think this is similar. This is similar to works of the flesh. It's similar. I mean, it is works of the flesh.
[20:06] But I think the nuance here is that, you know, there's like Galatians, works of the law, you know, trusting in circumcision and the ceremonial law.
[20:17] You know what I mean? You're trusting in maybe the religious practices. I think this is more broad. This is like every aspect of life. What do you do when things go wrong? What do you do when you're anxious about things?
[20:28] What do you do? Like, what's your deepest desire? You know what I mean? Like, what are the things you want the most? You know what I mean? Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.
[20:39] Is it the Lord himself that you desire? Do you remember that? Is it the Lord himself that's the Lord of your life? Or are you your own superhero?
[20:52] Superhero. Are you the person insofar as your conduct is concerned that needs to be rescuing things all the time? Both yourself and others and those under your, you know what I'm saying?
[21:06] All right. Keep going. Jeremiah 2.13. I'm going to talk about, there's a handful of passages that talk about this that I just read.
[21:18] And there's a handful of passages that kind of illuminate how we go astray. Jeremiah 2.13. So notice here, he's not saying all the people of the earth.
[21:51] He's saying my people. He's saying my children. This is in reference to people that you could say are in the family of God, or maybe not even say family of God, people who think they're in the family of God.
[22:05] Us. My people have committed two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters. The Lord himself is life.
[22:16] The Lord himself is the bread of life. The Lord himself is not only eternal life, but he is, you know, he is love. He is actually, all of these analogies, fountain of living water.
[22:31] These are all analogies you guys know that is to say what your soul deepest, most deeply longs for. The Lord's people here have forsaken him who was everything to them.
[22:46] And what have they done? They've hewn out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can't hold water. Oh my gosh. Aren't we leaky?
[22:58] I'm not to say, this is not to condemn everyone. Our souls are so leaky. Aren't there times where we partake of the fountain of living water and then we like go to other things?
[23:09] What do we become? Become Martha again? Or become a prodigal again? We just return to the other gods, whatever you want to call it. We return to a way of life that is a broken cistern that cannot hold water.
[23:24] Which is like, it's really an extreme, it's an extreme opposite here. Because you have a fountain of living water. This is infinite, life-giving water. And then you have something that, when it holds water, it doesn't provide water.
[23:41] But when it holds water, the water leaks out of it. It's literally the opposite. Just think of it. A fountain, a wellspring of water. Something you put water in and it just leaks out. These are extremes.
[23:52] These are extremes. This is our hearts. Hosea 13.6. When I fed them. This is such a condemning verse.
[24:05] Oh my goodness. To me, I'm not saying, this is just a very convicting verse. Hosea 13.6. When I fed them, they were satisfied.
[24:17] When they were satisfied, they became proud. And they forgot me. Right? Again. Crisis Christianity.
[24:31] You get stuck in the rock in the hard place. Finally, we have some meekness. Because, like, we're tied up in a straitjacket. It's like, okay, fine. I can't do anything. Right? The Lord delivers.
[24:43] What do we do? We're satisfied. Right? Crisis averted. It's like 9-1-1 God. Right?
[24:55] Only the please when you're in crisis. Crisis averted. And what do we do? We get satisfied.
[25:07] Satisfied is kind of an interesting term, though. Because the Lord is the only thing that's satisfied. But we're satisfied like a person who's thirsty and drinks liquor.
[25:23] Right? We're satisfied. Yes, we're falsely satisfied. Right? And then we become proud.
[25:34] We return to the autonomy of our own domain. Right? Thank you, crisis. God. Thank you, 9-1-1 God.
[25:44] I've got this from here. It's called pride. It's called pride. Like, us giving in to being the rescuer of our own life and the life of others is pride.
[25:59] And it's fundamentally us not being satisfied, independent on the Lord. We're abandoning our satisfaction and dependence on the Lord. We're trusting the power of our own hands.
[26:12] It's such an interesting thing, too, because we live in such a day and age where it's kind of like Babel 2.0, where we really are making some pretty powerful things, but only according to the eyes of man.
[26:26] Like, you know, cancer can still get any one of us at any time. At any time. You know what I mean? Anytime there could be an earthquake and everything just collapses. We're so shielded from the majesty and power of the Lord at times that we feel so much more powerful and in control than we really are.
[26:44] You know what I mean? You know? When I fed them, they were satisfied. When they were satisfied, they became proud.
[26:55] And then they forgot me. All right. John 6, starting verse 26.
[27:16] You seek me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.
[27:39] May we not be satisfied with the things that are supposed to. You know what I mean? May we not lose our longing for the Lord. You know what I mean? May we not be dissuaded. May we not be dissuaded.
[27:49] May we not be dissuaded. There is, I'm trying to think I'll say this. I think one of the consequences of us going astray in these ways is it really steals from our heart the treasure of the Lord.
[28:08] And what I mean by that is it's a double whammy. You're not partaking of the Lord, and so he's not winning your heart. But you're also not being rescued by the Lord, and so you're not experiencing his daily redemption.
[28:21] There's this quote from Augustine's Confessions that I read a little over a year ago that really impacted me. It's kind of a weird quote. It's phrased in a way that's not immediately clear what he says, but the meat of it is one of the most impactful quotes I've ever read.
[28:35] I'm just going to read it, explain it, and then tie it into what we're talking about here. What man is there who, when reflecting on his own infirmity, dares to ascribe chastity and innocence to his own powers, and by doing so, chooses to love thee less?
[28:58] What's he saying there? He's saying, when you ascribe chastity and innocence to your own efforts and own powers, and you take credit for it, you are covering the brokenness of who you are.
[29:19] He who is forgiven much loves much. When you're doing that, you're choosing to love the Lord less. When you choose to take credit for what the Lord is actually the only one who can do, or when you choose to be or appear more pure, more chaste, more innocent than you really are, you're covering exactly what the Lord is here to extend mercy and forgiveness and deliverance to.
[29:51] You're willingly choosing to love the Lord less. How do we love? Because he, while we are sinners, Christ died for us.
[30:03] We love because he first loved us. He who is forgiven much loves much. Our ongoing need for the Lord and being able to maintain meekness, the Lord is the rescuer, is what is constantly persuading our hearts to love the Lord even more.
[30:26] You know what I mean? And honestly, here's another thing. How much does the Lord have a longer timeline on redeeming us because he wants to win our hearts even more? You know what I mean?
[30:37] How much are we actually struggling in circumstances that are really hard and real suffering that the Lord is totally right there in that we want to get this right over with?
[30:49] When the Lord is wanting to get into the depths and the crevices of our soul. You know what I mean? Like, we're not talking, this isn't like superficial surgery.
[30:59] This is some, this is some deep stuff. Deep wells. Going to deep into hearts. It's even an analogy of the parable of the sower. However, the soft ground, the seed is able to grow deep roots.
[31:15] Deep roots. And the Lord is, I think the Lord's timeline is looking for more depth. And our timeline is looking for more convenience. Right?
[31:29] Another thing, this is, this is, this is kind of an aside, but with the whole rescuer mentality. So, uh, one of the things I did last year is I really nerded out.
[31:40] Amber, Amber and I have already talked about this. I really nerded out on the history of the, um, recovery movement. Alcoholics Anonymous. Narcotics Anonymous. Um, sexaholics Anonymous.
[31:51] This whole, you know, you guys have all heard these terms. Well, I was listening to a podcast and basically, um, I was listening to this guy, Russell Brand, who is a huge part of that. And then he recently came to the Lord.
[32:01] He's got a really radical testimony about coming to the Lord and stuff. But one of the things I realized by listening to one of these podcasts was it was actually a Christian revival that happened at Oxford University.
[32:15] And they called it the Oxford Group. And it was like a physician and a handful of professors, just a handful of guys that had incredible issues of bondage.
[32:26] I mean, like crazy alcohol, opiate addiction. One of the guys' wife has had left him because he had been sleeping around for many, many years. And these are guys who are really in crisis, really in crisis.
[32:36] And they all really had a radical encounter with the Lord. You know, they had their Red Sea chariot, you know, rock and hard place moment. They really cried out to the Lord.
[32:47] And the Lord really set them free. And the main two things, this is what's really intriguing to me. But actually, Amber, you can't answer. Who knows what the first step is? Does anybody know what the first step is? Anybody? Come on, somebody. Oh, you need to celebrate recovery.
[32:59] That's cheating. What is it? What is it? Tell me. So the first step is, I am powerless.
[33:14] The first step is, I am not the Savior. It's really a juxtaposition. I'm not the Savior. God's the Savior. Now, they've secularized it to, they say, a higher power.
[33:25] But it's surrendered to a higher power. It's to say, so sad. It's so sad. It was such a beautiful thing that happened. The little seedling of what happened in Oxford has been so secularized. It's so sad to see. But one of the main thing was, we can't save ourselves.
[33:41] We're trying really hard, and it keeps getting worse. You know what I mean? All the, I'm going to go clean for a dozen-so time. And it's just like a rubber band that snaps back every bit as hard the other direction.
[33:56] And it's just like this really vicious rollercoaster of a cycle. You know? They realized, when you radically surrender to the Lord, that there's something that happens.
[34:11] There's some freedom. There's some deep freedom there. And the second thing they did is, they confessed their sins exhaustively. They wrote history of sin.
[34:21] They would write out, kind of like we've done in deliverance sessions, they would write out very extensively. Not summarized confessions, exhaustive confessions.
[34:32] Those are really the two things they did. And it started a whole revival. A ton of students and professors on Oxford's campus came to the Lord and got incredible deliverance. And then the subsequent influence of that ended up becoming the secularized, anonymous, alcohol, all these movements.
[34:50] So disappointing. But one of the things that's really cool about that, I think, it's essentially what I'm talking about, about meekness. It's just maintaining the Lord is my deliverer. The Lord is my deliverer.
[35:03] I need the Lord to deliver me. Which he has over and over and over again. We're just, you know, sheep going astray. We like our rowboats.
[35:14] They do what we want. Or our motorboats. I don't know why I just decided Michael's the motorboat guy. If Michael was a boat, he would be a motorboat.
[35:24] Let's be real. Okay. One last, one last, actually not one last thing. Dang, I'm going way longer than I thought I was.
[35:35] I thought I was going to go short, guys. I'm sorry. I'm going to rush through this real quick. But one thing I want to share. I have these, I do 15-minute naps. And a lot of times when I do 15-minute naps, I'll have a dream during that short period of time.
[35:50] I must be behind on REM sleep. But one of the ones that happened like six months ago that really stuck to me. And I'm sure it's because I was probably playing about this as I was going to sleep.
[36:02] But one of the ones that really stuck with me is there was a boat. It was in the water. I've already told some of you guys about this. And there was a bunch of wreckage around the boat. And on one side of the boat, a lot of the sailors were jumping in trying to rescue the people who are drowning in the water.
[36:20] Good intention. But what was happening was they weren't actually able to. They weren't actually able to rescue the people. And they were drowning as well. And so on one side of the boat, more people were drowning because people were trying to rescue the people in the water.
[36:36] Okay? On the other side of the boat, in the dream, it was like the captain figure. It was like the authority figure or whatever. He told everyone, you cannot rescue them.
[36:47] You cannot get in the water. Yeah. And so he just is telling people in the water like, hey, there's an oar. Try to swim to that oar. For people who are kind of close, like, I know you're tired.
[36:59] You can do it. You can swim to the boat. And what ends up happening is gradually, instead of jumping in and intervening, people are finding things to float on. People actually who are closer are able to actually fully swim to the boat themselves and are able to get pulled out.
[37:13] And then finally, there's way fewer people that are genuinely drowning. And as they're losing consciousness, then he tells people to jump in and bring him out.
[37:25] And that's not exactly the point here. This is part of the point. What I'm trying to say, well, I think the reason I like that analogy or that dream is that it points to the fact of where we think that rescuing, I'm juxtaposing rescuing and meekness.
[37:41] We think that rescuing is the solution, but really, it can make things much, much worse. You know what I mean? In fact, it does make things much, much worse.
[37:51] In fact, some of the reasons why our struggles increase is because of our own impatience and inability to surrender because of our own pride. Right? Right? All right, last thing.
[38:10] I'm going to try to wrap this up. I'm going to skip some stuff. All right. I just want to say three things. These are the three todays. This is the only encouragement. This is the only thing you should do, which is basically I'm going to tell you to do nothing.
[38:23] But this is the only takeaway. This is the only things I want you guys to take away from this. This is the three todays. Today, his mercies are new.
[38:35] His mercies are new today. Every day, the Lord's mercies are new. Why? Because we need his mercy every day. We need his mercy every single day. We need to remember it every single day.
[38:48] May we remember it every single day. I'm tempted to ask you, do you remember it every single day? But I know we all don't remember it every single day. We need to remember it every single day. As the sun rises, the Lord's mercies are new. every day. Number two, the Lord is our daily bread. Every day, the Lord's our bread. Every day, the Lord's our bread. Not all the things in this world, all the incredible blessings in this world.
[39:13] The Lord is our bread every single day. The fountain of living waters. May we not forsake the fountain of living waters, as Israelites said. May we not forget it. May we not forget him. May we not forsake him. May we not be the ones who are satisfied when the Lord solves a crisis, but we return to our ways and forget him once the crisis is averted. And number three, strive to enter his rest. It's the only commandment to strive, to enter his rest. And you know when? Today. It says, today, if you hear his voice, don't harden your heart as the children of Israel did in the wilderness.
[39:55] And the Lord said, they shall not enter my rest. His commandment to enter, his commandment for us to enter his rest is a commandment that extends today. Today, strive to enter his rest, right? This is what Jesus is talking about, even when he talks about not being anxious about tomorrow, right? The Lord's very concerned about the unit of the day. He doesn't guarantee us anything. We just really have today. We believe we're more powerful than we are. We believe that more is certain than it is.
[40:35] We underestimate how much we desperately need the Lord until the crisis hits. We don't see it until the crisis hits, right? We don't see it until the crisis hits. All right. Isaiah 55 2. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me. Eat what is good and delight yourselves in rich food. Last thing for all of us we're living on fast food spiritually right now. Psalm 63 and then I'm done. God, oh man, I'm gonna cry if I read this.
[41:17] God, you are my God. Earnestly I seek you. My soul thirsts for you. My flesh faints for you. As in a dry and weary land where there is no water, I have looked upon you in the sanctuary.
[41:45] Beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you.
[41:58] So I will bless you as long as I live. In your name, I will lift my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food. My mouth will praise you with joyful lips.
[42:11] When I remember you upon my bed and meditate you in the watches of the night. For you have been my help. And in the shadow of your wings, I will sing your joy.
[42:22] I will sing for joy. My soul clings to you. Your right hand upholds me. But those who seek to destroy life shall go down into the depths of the earth.
[42:33] They shall be given over to the power of the sword. They shall be a portion for jackals. But the king shall rejoice in God. All who swear by him shall exult.
[42:46] For the mouth of liars will be stopped. For the mouth of liars will be stopped.