How do you tell the difference between the Holy Spirit challenging you to read the Word more and the enemy telling you that you aren’t doing enough?

When we have spiritual disciplines, we can fall into traps on both sides of the road:

1. You do really well and end up putting your confidence in your ability and discipline, or

2. You don’t do well, and you feel like a failure

“All spiritual disciplines lead us to the realization that we can’t do anything without Jesus.” They help us realize that we need God’s help to meet with God.

There’s a difference between conviction and condemnation.

Condemnation = shame. You aren’t good enough. Have a pity party.

Conviction = love. God loves me, and I love him, and I want to express that more.

Listen for the voice of a loving Father. He knows what we need and what we don’t need. He wants to meet with us.

The value of the discipline is to keep you coming to God. If you aren’t intentional, you can gradually drift away. There are tried and true ways to meet with God. If I don’t have every discipline through every season, that’s OK.

Don’t seek an experience, but seek to show up. He’s happy to spend time with us even if we don’t have a mountaintop experience. Even if it was so ordinary you don’t remember it, it’s keeping you alive.

There are many ways to meet with God. Learn them. Try them. Incorporate them all into your life in some way. Evangelism, service, fellowship, celebration, prayer, fasting, studying Scripture, silence, and more.

In “Sacred Pathways”, Gary Thomas explains that there are different ways that God relates to each of His kids. Those that help you feel close to God incorporate daily, and the others not neglected, but perhaps done less often.

I prayed with faith, and God didn’t answer. That’s so confusing.

Do we have the courage to pray big prayers for specific things? Or do we fear not being answered so we just keep it general?

We both share recent stories of praying for things we believe align with God’s will, that we’re confident that He can do, and yet He doesn’t. Instead, He invites us to surrender, to thank Him even when He says “No”, and to receive His comfort.

When it feels like trust has been broken, do we dare continue to ask God for more?

Psalm 86:17 asks God, "Show me a sign of your favor, that those who hate me may see and be put to shame because you, Lord, have helped me and comforted me."

For his anger is but for a moment, and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning. - Psalm 30:5

We have to choose to trust again. We have to recall His character, keep believing, and come boldly to our Father to ask in faith for great things (and small things).

Look at the prayers He has answered and keep praying. God Himself told us to keep banging on His door and asking for good things.

In this episode, we talk about how we deal with anxiety on a day-to-day basis, whether at work, at home, or in our relationship with God.

Matt starts by sharing that his job as a teacher isn’t just to hit standards and achieve objectives; it’s also to remember God’s presence and carry it with me. Meditating on and memorizing Scriptures like these helps a lot:.

Psalm 33

18 Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear him, on those who hope in his steadfast love,19 that he may deliver their soul from death and keep them alive in famine.

20 Our soul waits for the Lord; he is our help and our shield.21 For our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name.22 Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you.

Psalm 34:

19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.

Lance then shares about how Jesus is our peace. He’s the Author and Perfecter of our faith. So, why do we get anxious?

Matthew 6

28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

O you of little faith… How do we grow in faith?

People say, “Have faith.” How do we do that?

1. Looking back at what God has done for me in the past

2. Looking around at what God has done for others

3. Looking into God’s Word and up at His character

We end with discussing how returning to our first love doesn’t mean trying to get back to the “first date” feeling or the “Honeymoon” phase. Love in a marriage grows in daily choices and commitment. Returning to our first love means choosing every day to love Him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and loving our neighbor as ourselves.

When we know who God is, we know we can trust Him. We don’t need to manipulate God into manipulating our feelings. We are stable through the ups and downs of our emotions because His love is consistently stable.

We start this episode with a few reflections on the value of walking deeply with a community of people for a long time. It helps us connect with God, grow in Him, be encouraged, and have lots of fun.

Then we go real deep real fast. We both share about very sad things that happened to each of us recently. We wrestle with the question, “What do we do with disappointment and unanswered prayers?” It wouldn’t hurt so much if we didn’t have so much faith and expectation… “So many questions come up when we believe in a God that raises the dead but then He lets things die.”

When we can’t do anything and God has said “No”, what can we do? What follows is our unscripted response.

1. We can cry.

“Jesus, could you please just sit and cry with me.” - Make It Well, by MercyMe
2. We can trust.

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life,” John 6:68

If we give up on God, we still have our pain and suffering, but we lose all our hope.

3. We can hope.

“I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord

in the land of the living!” - Psalm 27:13

“Oh, how abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you and worked for those who take refuge in you, in the sight of the children of mankind!” - Psalm 31:19
4. We can receive God’s comfort.

The incarnation shows us that Jesus doesn’t watch our pain from a distance. He comes into our suffering. Today, in a way that surpasses our understanding, He comforts our hearts.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted

and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” -Psalm 34:18

“The best thing He can think of to give me is Himself.”

“I didn’t get what I want, but I have what I need.”

May our Immanuel comfort your hearts as you listen!

Join us in the living room as we honestly share our struggles with anxiety and ask each other for help to overcome. We come up with 2 good reasons to not be anxious:

1. God's Word

2. God's Track Record

Lance unpacks the challenge of Matthew 6:33 "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."

Matt reflects how remembering God’s faithfulness in the past can help build our faith, and then recounts the miraculous story of God giving his family a house.

"Faith isn’t based on our ability to believe, but on the Faithfulness of the One that we’re putting our faith in."

In this episode, we talk about the things that help us get through the ups and downs of our emotions in our Christian walk:

1. Standing on His Faithfulness. When going through trials, remember what He’s done.

2. Standing on His Word. Trust His truth about who He is and who He says we are.

3. Standing together with others. We need people around us to speak and pray truth over us.

Ever open your journal and read what God spoke to you a week ago and you just don’t feel it anymore? We have. It’s still true, but for whatever reason, we don’t feel it. Maybe we’ve sinned, or forgotten, or been distracted, or are just feeling off for a reason we can’t place.

Take every thought captive. My flesh is dead, so these thoughts aren’t my thoughts. This isn’t true about me anymore.

Zechariah 3:1-5 - Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, O Satan! The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?” Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. And the angel said to those who were standing before him, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” And to him he said, “Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.” And I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the Lord was standing by.

Joshua didn’t do anything. The LORD initiated it and finished it, and the enemy had nothing more to accuse by the end of it. You don’t have to white-knuckle wash your clothes. He gives you new ones.

Isaiah 42:3 reminds us of His character:

A bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.

He runs to us in brokenness and stays with us until we are whole.

Psalm 32:11

Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous,

and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!

We can choose to rejoice in truth even if we don’t feel it. We will feel it one day, so we might as well be dancing in the waiting.

Every year, Matt writes in his journal, “This year, I learned that I don’t need to worry about anything.”

That’s true for you too, even if you don’t feel it.

In this episode, Matt responds to the question, “Why did you become a Christian?” He shares 4 reasons why the Biblical Christian Worldview makes sense, and how a profound experience with God’s love and forgiveness in the midst of addiction and sin changed his life forever.

“It was the first time I started seeking God for Himself, not for what I could get from Him.”

We then discuss one of the secrets to getting through challenges in the Christian life: Asking for prayer. Sharing with trusted fellow believers can be so profoundly helpful in receiving God’s truth into our lives.

In this episode, Lance shares how his struggles with sin and addiction growing up caused him to believe society's lie: that you'll only be accepted and loved if you perform well. As a result, when he became a Christian and still struggled with sin, he'd hide it so he wouldn't be rejected by this new community. Like many others, Lance struggled with assurance of his salvation because of ongoing sin and addiction, until one day in a coffee shop, Hebrews 10:14 changed everything for him:

"For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy."

Then he points out the difference between these two verses on confession, how they are to different people and produce different results:

1 John 1:9: If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

James 5:16: Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

A "just me and Jesus" relationship doesn't cut it. We disarm the accuser and experience true freedom when we are connected both to the Head and to the Body.

The video for this episode had a technical issue, so enjoy the audio and look forward to videos in upcoming episodes!