Brenda (00:03.775)
Get that little chuckle in, don't we, Alex? Nobody knows that Malia's waving us goodbye. Take it away. Well, hello.
Alex (00:07.054)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Yeah.
Alex (00:15.963)
Hello and welcome to our 60th episode. I know it doesn't seem real. I know.
Brenda (00:20.287)
Woohoo! That's amazing! 60! Good night!
this.
Yeah, that's a quite, I don't know. I just, I can't believe it. You know, as I was thinking about us recording our 60th episode, I just thought Alex, one of our reasons for recording this was to build our own library. So we've talked about a little bit of the selfish motivation behind the podcast. It's like, we keep saying the same things over and over again to everybody we meet with. So maybe we should record something to give people. But also in hopes that it would be a tool for people to counsel themselves and then,
Alex (00:42.542)
Mm -hmm.
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (00:58.738)
resource for whether you're in a professional setting or you're just meeting with a friend to have a resource to point people to to begin what we want to say are really good conversations about life and connecting life with the Word of God and the person and work of Jesus. So we just want to give God all the glory today and thank him and thank all of the wonderful people that have gotten us to this point. Of course we love Armalia and we wouldn't exist without her and Jesus.
Alex (01:10.127)
Hmm.
Alex (01:28.243)
Yes.
Brenda (01:28.594)
But it is true, Jesus did provide her. And then, you know, we've had a lot of other wonderful people, engineers and people behind the scenes that do our bookkeeping and all the things that we need to produce this. So we're just super grateful and thankful. And we really hope it's been a blessing. And if it has been a blessing, we would ask that you like, share, post, give, do all the things. You know, it's just a shameless plug right here, right? We try not to do too much plugging.
Alex (01:48.623)
There you go. Right? Yeah. Yeah.
Brenda (01:57.056)
but I'm just gonna be shameless right now and say it really does help us get the word out and hopefully we can continue to create content that is a blessing for other people and that we can continue to use as well.
Alex (02:08.975)
Well today is our last episode in the series that we're doing on the sacred struggle and we've been talking about the Gospel Waltz, the steps of confess, believe, and love and today we're going to talk about love which is really talking about obedience and so before we get into this last step of love and what that looks like in the Gospel Waltz we wanted to talk about
It's been hard, I think, for both of us in some ways to strike the right balance in talking about sin. And even today, as we talk about how to make a plan not to sin, we wanted to start with the question of are all sins equal? Is that true? Yeah. Yeah.
Brenda (02:54.657)
Mm -hmm. We hear that a lot. We do hear that a lot, like all sins are equal. And I think that there are some things we need to understand that will help us see God rightly and see ourselves rightly if we answer that question truthfully.
Alex (03:09.518)
Yeah, and I think really simply we would say all sins are equally wrong, but not all sins are equally bad. In other words, we would say that God sees some sins as particularly grievous. If we were going to compare, even in the Ten Commandments, murder versus lying, we know that the consequences for murder are going to be a whole lot worse, a whole lot greater than the consequences for lying.
Brenda (03:32.482)
Yep.
And we also just want to say that, you know, God doesn't just look at our behavior. He is looking at our heart, particularly paying attention to the motivations for our sin. And I think as we look at our own sin or even look at the sin of other people, we can fall into two ditches. We always talk about our two ditches, right? A legal license and then that love road. But we can either minimize our sin, which then makes us indifferent to sin or causes us to ignore our sin, or we can maximize our sin.
Alex (03:51.149)
Right?
Alex (03:58.349)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (04:03.445)
And a lot of times that will lead to, you know, undue burden of guilt and shame. And so we just want to, we want to say that in no way are we saying that God is soft on sin.
Alex (04:08.685)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (04:16.355)
He's not, but he is gentle and compassionate toward the sinner. And even though sin is not excusable, it is understandable with our humanity. And as we're interacting with ourselves and with other people to really remember, yes, the grievous nature, the heinousness, the holiness of God, all of that is super important, but also to balance that out with a God who is kind, compassionate, and bidding us to come to him in our sin and to walk and to dance this dance of repentance.
is that he wants to dance with us, right? And this really became so clear to me a little while ago, or maybe it was a few years back, I was meeting with a woman who was, just came in, she could hardly lift her head, she was loaded down with such guilt and such shame due to her history of drug addiction. And she just, you know, pretty much in her own words was like, I just can't get over the fact that I have been such a dirty rotten sinner. Well, as she began to share her story, I learned that this very tender,
Alex (04:47.853)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (05:02.061)
Hmm.
Alex (05:08.524)
Hmm.
Brenda (05:16.116)
hearted woman had been in a very abusive marriage with a very evil man who had just destroyed her personhood. And then after her first child was born, the stress of her marriage took its toll and she began to have these severe migraine headaches. Her doctor had prescribed Tylenol 3 and shortly after starting to take Tylenol 3 for her headache, she realized that the medicine not only numbed her head, but also her heart. Right?
Alex (05:33.708)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (05:45.972)
It made it bearable for her to stay in this marriage. But as a result, she began abusing the Tylenol and eventually became addicted to opiates. And then, you know, her husband was always telling her what a dirty, rotten person she was, that she was all of these terrible things. And so, once she got into this addiction, she just began to believe that lie, that she had become who her husband had accused her of being now. And, you know, Alex, as I listened to you,
Alex (05:55.372)
Mmm.
Alex (06:09.612)
-huh.
Yeah.
Brenda (06:15.827)
to her, my heart ached with compassion. This woman had sinned. You know, she had run to the wrong comfort and comfort her, but it was really not to a defiant heart. It was rather due to a broken heart, and the destructive influences on her heart had left her vulnerable, seeking comfort in harmful ways. And I just remember as we sat there and unpacked God's view of her sin, we saw that what led her into sin was not, again, this like rebellion.
Alex (06:35.596)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (06:40.524)
Hmm.
Brenda (06:45.684)
and scorn or mock her, but a woman seeking to survive in this terrible evil. And I just, you know, I just never forget just looking at her and just being able to say, I want you to know that I'm not excusing your sin and you should not excuse your sin. But I also want you to understand that your sin came in the context of great suffering and that God has such compassion for you. And in understanding God's compassion toward her, it really
Alex (06:46.316)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (07:05.996)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (07:10.348)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (07:15.54)
really allowed her then to begin to lift her head toward Jesus and seek both His comfort and His forgiveness. And that's why we just wanted to, you know, we, it's important when we look at ourselves and we look at ministering to other people that, that we do look at the kind of sinner or the kind of sin or kind of what's the motivation behind somebody's sin that we don't paint with such a broad brush that we just put everybody in the same category.
Alex (07:23.372)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (07:43.085)
Yeah, I'm reminded of two scriptures while you're talking. The first one being Psalm 103, you know, talking so much about the compassion and the tenderness of God. And there's a verse in there that I've always loved that he remembers our frame and he knows that we're dust. And it just reminds me of like...
God knows our humanness even more than we do. He understands our frailty even more than we do. And then the other scripture, when we're thinking about the different motivations of sin, I think it's 1 Thessalonians 4 of encourage the feeble and comfort. I can't remember them all now. I have to help the weak.
Brenda (08:20.801)
Yeah.
Help the weak, admonish the unruly. I think it's first SESLA means 514.
Alex (08:27.436)
And that's the only one we admonish is the unruly, the rebellious and be patient with all. And so I think that's kind of the spirit of what we're talking about here when we're looking at influences on the heart that there are some things that make it harder not to sin. And first Thessalonians is even kind of shown us like we have to take that into consideration when we're talking to someone and they're not excuses to sin, but they are mitigating facts.
factors for sin. And like you said, one of them might be the weakness of your client who is in pain or the weakness of being hungry or tired, sick, and that that weakness can often put us in a position where we are more likely to sin. And one might be our temperament. Like we come into this world and we have a certain personality and it may make us prone to certain sins. We may be prone to gossip or slander.
We may be prone to anxiety. We may be prone to a lot of different types of sin.
Brenda (09:34.083)
Yeah, I'm giggling because one of the first verses I had to memorize was, when words are many, sin is not absent. But he who holds his tongue is wise, because my temperament has definitely always been to be a chatterbox. And so if you're a little chatterbox, you might say things you shouldn't say and find yourself talking too much. And so that has to be reeled in. And you have to take that into consideration.
Alex (09:41.547)
Soon about.
Alex (09:58.348)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (09:58.915)
Another reason just might be seasons of life. You know, it's just obvious to us that young people tend to have more bravado a lot of times and struggle with that. A lot of times younger people have more struggle with sexual sin. You know, there's just some seasons of life. You know, married people struggle different than single people, struggle different than having young children versus older children. So, you know, again, not excuses to sin, but some things that are unique to those seasons that put pressure on the heart.
Alex (10:27.691)
Mm -hmm. And then another factor in sin might be just our ignorance that we don't always know what God says. We both kind of grown up in cultures that are very church and Bible saturated, but I think more and more we're meeting with people who aren't and who don't and they really don't know. Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (10:51.171)
They really don't know. And I think sometimes it can even be shocking for us, but we have to realize, particularly in the culture we're in, that is...
Yeah, where truth is relative and where people are involved with behaviors that nobody's ever told them that it's wrong. It's a sin that is destructive. I think about just exploitation, you know, kind of like the lady I was talking about. Some people are groomed into sin. You think about, you know, just how somebody can end up in a really bad place because somebody has come along and led them astray or has dominated them in a way like that just looks so different. We're not going to hold these people to the same.
Alex (11:09.131)
Yeah.
Brenda (11:30.038)
standard that we are somebody who is willfully, knowingly set off. And again, we could talk about, you know, the state of that person's heart. We could talk about the age of that person. There's going to be a lot of things that will play into that.
Alex (11:43.435)
Then the last two I'd say sometimes we just have people who are just foolish. They just go along with the you know with others to be liked. They're gullible. They're curious and they just make foolish decisions and that's kind of contrasted with like the the rebel who is going to really
shake their fist at God, scorn and mock God and turn from him. And I think it's important for us as we're talking to people to consider these different factors because it will shape the way we talk to them. We think about this often as parents. We do this with our children sometimes maybe without even thinking that if our child has a temper tantrum, we're trying to think about what are the factors that led to that? Are they sick? Are they tired? And we don't handle that temper tantrum in the same way as when
they're just looking at us and taking us on and like, no mommy. Because we know that, because that fatigue, the sickness is really driving the behavior. So the behavior still has to be dealt with. We don't turn away, but we do that with a different understanding because we know the motivation. And we, I think we change the way that we respond and the way that we discipline when we understand the motivation.
Brenda (12:36.1)
Hehehehehe
Brenda (13:04.549)
Yeah, and that's kind of just what we're saying here is that, you know, as the perfect parent, as the one parent, as the Father who knows us inside and out, that God knows the consequences and the discipline that are appropriate for each sinful action and the heart behind it. So I think we've said enough about that, but I hope that that was encouraging and really to encourage people on both sides. Do not minimize sin. We are not saying that these are excuses.
Alex (13:20.939)
Mm.
Mm -mm.
Brenda (13:32.806)
But at the same time, you'll come to the Lord more readily when you also realize that God sees more than just the big glaring light that says you're sinful behavior, you know, you've broken the law, you've broken the law, that he sees more than that. He's not the judge, he's the Father.
Alex (13:44.491)
Right.
Alex (13:49.483)
Mm -hmm. Yeah.
Brenda (13:52.677)
So we want to just close out our time on the Gospel Waltz. We've been talking about this beautiful dance that God invites us into. And when you know when you read through Genesis to Revelation, we just see this invitation of God over and over and over and over and over with very sinful, stubborn, rebellious people, Alex. Not to mention any names, but there might be some of those people on this podcast who are listening to the podcast. But we've just talked about
Alex (14:09.387)
Mm -hmm.
Mm -hmm.
Mm.
Brenda (14:22.583)
about to begin with the first part of the waltz is that agreeing with God. That we tell the true story of what we did and to the best of our ability, you know, what led us into these situations, the influences of our heart in the way that God sees it, in the way that God would tell it by not maximizing but not minimizing. And then we just talked a lot about believing that because we tend to want to jump from confession like I did this bad thing now what do I need to do? We talked about we were really taught early on that you put off and put on.
Alex (14:37.899)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (14:52.438)
from Ephesians but you don't go through the gospel. You don't go to really believing what God has done for you in Christ and holding on to that. And so we spent an episode just talking about that, about anchoring ourselves in God's trustworthy character and His promises. And so today we want to talk about the third part of that dance and we're called this love. And love is really just choosing to walk in faith and demonstrate it through obedience.
Alex (14:52.843)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (15:19.879)
Well, I've been going back through Marty Solomon's podcast, Bayma. I think I mentioned several times that I was in Matthew last year and listening to Marty and one of the things that stuck out to me and I've just thought so much about is that Marty says that in Jesus' time, a rabbi's yoke,
was the grid through which he interpreted the Torah. And in Jesus' time, there were two main camps, Shema and Halal. And Shema taught that the greatest commandment was to obey God, and Halal taught that the greatest commandment was to love your neighbor. And so we see people asking Jesus this question, and we know that Jesus' response was that the greatest commandment was to love God and to love your neighbor. And so I just think it's great to frame this discussion about sin and about love.
and recognizing that Jesus's yoke, like the way that he interpreted God's Word was through the lens of loving God and loving others.
Brenda (16:20.389)
Yeah, that's so good and I don't know if I picked this up for Marty or someplace else, but interestingly enough, if you go through the scripture, Jesus almost always sides with the Hillel camp over the Shemaim camp.
Alex (16:30.635)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (16:32.677)
But the reason he does that is because loving our neighbor is a direct expression of loving God, right? It's that it's how we demonstrate. And so love is faith at work toward God and others. That's how we've been defining this idea of love. And we want to tease that out a little bit more today.
Alex (16:38.219)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (16:51.979)
Yeah, and one of the layers I want to add then is Dan Allender's definition where he says that love is giving delight and honor to another for their good. I love those two words, delight and honor, because delight is the affection part and honor is the action part. So we have to act in a way that honors God and honors his image -bearers. And God tells us how, you know, in the scripture he's revealing how we can be in relationship with him.
with honor and how we can be in relationship with other MHA's bearers with honor.
Brenda (17:27.653)
Hmm. I love that. So what you're saying then is that delighting in or honoring another by how we act towards them is what love looks like. That's beautiful. I really like that definition.
Alex (17:36.939)
Mm -hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
So if we're going to put all this together, we're going to talk about what does it look like then to take the steps towards love and how do we have just a heart change, we call it a root change. So we just want to talk about the different parts of the heart, break that down as we've been talking about through this series, but apply it specifically to how we respond in love.
Brenda (18:12.807)
Yeah, and I think we need to acknowledge that the heart is messy. And so we're going to go, you know, we're going to talk about cognition, affection, volition, those areas that functions of the heart and then how we wrestle practically with the heart. But understanding that we may not always go in this particular order and it may look a lot messier and it's constant, right? There's going to be, we're not, we're never a one and done. So one of the things that I really like to do is I do a lot of journaling and I give out a lot of journaling assignments when we're talking about, I know you do the same thing, Alex.
Alex (18:28.523)
Mm -hmm.
Right?
Brenda (18:42.712)
we're really talking about understanding the heart and beginning to understand how to bring change to the heart. And we're starting with the heart because the heart is the root. We're going to get to the fruit of like, okay, now what do you do to, you know, what are some things that help the fruit side of things? But I just want to talk a little bit about this idea of cognition or our thinking center or our beliefs. Like what does it look like? And so a journaling tool is great. I found in my own life that there's something about journaling that just helps me. And I think honestly, what it really is,
is it forces me to take the time and effort, right? Like if not, I just kind of run past these things. But if I sit down prayerfully with the Holy Spirit with pen and pencil on hand, I can really begin to evaluate. So what does it look like to change our thought patterns? Well, first of all, we want to identify specific thinking distortions. And then we want to replace those gospel gaps with gospel truths, right? Like we really want to know what the scripture says about our thinking, our beliefs, those things that are coming out of that, our cognitions.
Alex (19:15.147)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (19:29.515)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (19:42.487)
Center. And we can do that through scripture meditation, scripture study, scripture memorization. But simply here, I just want to know if I'm thinking this way, how does God think about this? I just want to give an example. Of course, this month is the month where social media is filled with beautiful family graduation ceremonies. And it's so lovely. And I do love to see it. But one family in particular caught my attention. And this family has four now adult children who are all walking
Alex (19:51.467)
Right.
Alex (20:00.811)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (20:12.343)
so faithfully with Jesus. And Alex, as I was looking at their post, rather than rejoicing and giving thanks to God, I really felt this this itch twinge of envy in my heart. It's a familiar twinge because envy is just one of those little things that the sin that's just so terrible and yet it you can go past it so quickly. When I began to unpack my thinking, I heard things like this and let me say when I do my journaling, I will write down in quotation marks exactly what
Alex (20:23.115)
Hmmmm
Alex (20:28.715)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (20:41.771)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (20:42.246)
I say to myself because one of the things we have to understand is this now is how I'm counseling myself. The conversation I'm having with myself in my thoughts is my self -counsel. So I had a lot of thoughts, but I would just thought I'd share two to not incriminate myself too much. But I heard things like, why did God bless them with the perfect family and not me? What did they do right and what did I do wrong?
Alex (20:47.147)
Right.
Alex (21:03.147)
Mmm.
Brenda (21:07.461)
And there are so many implications in just these two questions that I directed, by the way, at God, if you noticed. And I spent some time, you know, unpacking my thoughts and instructing my heart by what is true. So I really, as I sat with the Lord, I realized I had been blessed with the perfect family for me.
Alex (21:14.187)
Hmm.
Alex (21:28.267)
Hmm.
Brenda (21:28.708)
And the reason that is is because God allowed the struggles with one of my children who's been a prodigal to bring about the greatest blessing in my life of walking more closely with him. And that's a blessing Alex, I would not trade.
Alex (21:41.195)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (21:42.374)
And then I was also reminded that no amount of good parenting saves any child, just as no amount of bad parenting can keep a child from God's saving grace. And so, you know, just very simply taking the time to really write down my thoughts as I was saying them to myself and then coming back to say, what does God say about this? How does God speak to this? What is the truth about that?
Alex (21:50.347)
Hmm.
Alex (21:58.475)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (22:03.59)
automatically, I mean it was just amazing how this began to immediately change my outlook. And rather than being envious of this person, I was able to actually thank God and rejoice in His provision for me and my family and the salvation He was giving to me and the way that I know that He is going after my child.
Alex (22:23.051)
Mm -hmm. Yeah, that's good. Yeah, you're really good about writing down the exact words. I do it internally more than I actually write it, but I think there's so much merit in just writing it down. Making your... Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (22:39.045)
Yeah, well, I'm a verbal processor, so I have to either talk it out or write everything down.
Alex (22:45.323)
Yeah, and I think writing it in the specific words really makes you be able to see the error. And so that's why I think there's just so much merit in writing it down.
Brenda (22:50.597)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (22:54.981)
I agree.
Alex (22:55.371)
The other part of our heart that we want to address is the affection or wanting the desire center and thinking about how do we change our desires, which I think is the trickiest one because I'm not sure we change our desires. I think this is the work of the Holy Spirit. So what we're really talking about is how do we position ourselves to change our desires? So once we identify the root of the sin, I think we need to start to ask ourselves what is the legitimate or the God honoring desire? And that's where in a previous episode we talked about
Brenda (23:05.349)
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Alex (23:25.325)
about how our desires become over desires and so we tend to either look for ways to fulfill our desires outside of what God allows or we take a good desire and make it bigger and that's the over desire and so we looked at some creation desires and I think we're just good to be reminded that we'll take this over desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort and really the God -honoring desire is for rest and for beauty. We'll take a God -honoring desire for comfort
desire of purpose and identity and we turn that into an over desire, a twisted desire for achievement that honors us. And then we take a desire for agency, that stewardship and responsibility that God's given us, but we twist that and we turn it into desire to control everything, even things that God has not given us to control. And then we take a desire for belonging and connection that we were made for and that becomes this twisted over desire.
Brenda (24:14.918)
Hmm.
Alex (24:25.165)
for approval where we'll do anything to please people and we kind of forget about pleasing God. So we have to instruct our hearts to think by thinking and doing things that invest in the right treasure or the right desire to grow our affections and we also have to instruct our hearts by remembering to look to Jesus and behold Him is what the scripture says. We behold Him and we see how what He offers us is
so much greater and so much true. It's the true right and beautiful way to have that desire met.
Brenda (25:04.997)
Yeah, I think this is so good, Alex. I really hope our...
listeners will stop to really meditate on what we're saying about affections and even go back to our podcast on affections because I think of all the things we're teaching in this, this is the hardest one to grasp. And to your point, this is Holy Spirit work. We cannot produce God honoring desires on our own. That is a work of the Spirit. But when we position ourselves, it does allow us to treasure Him more. And we end up loving what we treasure and we treasure what we serve.
Alex (25:20.011)
Mm -hmm.
Mm -hmm.
Alex (25:37.931)
Yeah.
Brenda (25:39.272)
And so, kind of what you said before, like our thinking and our choosing is going to begin to instruct our heart what our treasure is.
Alex (25:48.203)
Mm -hmm.
We thought it might be good to kind of flesh out an example of this. We meet with a lot of women, a lot of women who keep getting involved in relationships with men, which lead to sexual temptation and failure. And we have to encourage people to look at their heart motivations. And often what we see is that there's just a deep desire, a good desire for belonging, for connection, for intimacy. And that has tempted her to compromise her own values and
what God instructs her to do. And so as a single woman, you know, in order to position herself for her desires to change, she's gonna have to seek out godly community with brothers and sisters that are gonna encourage her faith and do life together. But I think she's also gonna have to remind her heart that Jesus offers her a more faithful, true, powerful love than any earthly man's ever gonna give her. And that positions her
her heart to desire to want to please him to follow him.
Brenda (26:55.429)
Mm -hmm.
And again, we just go back to it can almost seem like, well, how is that really going to happen? That sounds good, but how are you really going to desire or be reminded of Jesus being more faithful? How is this really going to motivate you when there's an actual man in front of you? And we just say again, it won't in the flesh. This is where wrestling and praying and asking the Lord and the Holy Surrender to the Holy Spirit and in this air of affections is so important. So the last part that we want to look at of the
Alex (27:02.763)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (27:22.571)
Mm.
Brenda (27:26.552)
heart is just the function of the will because really before we step out and do anything, we make decisions in our heart. We make choices internally before they become expressions externally. So the question we want to ask is what does it look like to choose God's way by faith? And here's the kicker, especially when we don't feel like it or we doubt Him. Because, you know, you could have the right thinking and if you're going to wait for your affections to catch up, you might just cop out and say,
Alex (27:48.203)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (27:56.455)
well, you know, I'm not there yet. And I've had people say this, well, it feels hypocritical to move forward with the choice if I don't feel like it. And what the Bible would say is it's actually faith, not hypocrisy. So, and especially when we remember that love is not primarily a feeling in the Bible, right? Love is always tied to action. And so, so often when we're faced with a decision to either walk in the flesh or walk in the Spirit, to choose God or to choose our own ways, we come
Alex (28:01.963)
Right.
Alex (28:09.227)
Right. Yes.
Alex (28:15.563)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (28:26.33)
to you know what what I'd like to say like the Roman why in in the book of Romans Paul lays out kind of this this idea of choice and I love how the New Living Testament says this I'm gonna read this is it's Romans 6 12 through 14 do not let sin control the way you live do not give in to sinful desires do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin instead here's the why
Alex (28:37.099)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (28:52.295)
choose or give yourselves completely to God for you were dead but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God. Sin is no longer your master for you no longer live under the requirements of the law instead you live under the freedom of God's grace. And you know at the end of the day we can choose to do the will of God even when we don't feel like it because we can choose to trust God. This idea of
Alex (29:10.507)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (29:22.249)
over feelings.
Alex (29:23.307)
Mm -hmm. Yeah, as we said before, we want our love to be that combination of honor and delight, but often we have to move towards honoring behaviors even when we don't feel the delight.
Brenda (29:36.456)
Yes. Yep. Yep.
Well, you know, I think one example of this is, you know, in my own life, I think about a situation where I struggled and I've talked about this, I think particularly our forgiveness season about bitterness, you know, situation where there was a lot of bitterness in my life and I had to choose to pray for my enemy, whether I felt like it or not, like by faith, you know, to make a choice, even though I didn't feel like it, even though I didn't want to, even though I didn't think the person
Alex (30:01.515)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (30:10.281)
which obviously is a problem in and of itself of why I needed to be praying not just for them but for me. But yeah, I couldn't just say, well, I'm not going to do it because I don't feel like it. Like I had to wrestle through those feelings and I will just say God really blessed and honored that over time. He really did.
Alex (30:15.243)
Hahaha!
Alex (30:28.107)
Yeah, I love that you said that that doesn't make us a hypocrite. I remember somebody saying like we don't call somebody a hypocrite when they get out of bed in the morning when they don't want to. We call them an adult. Right?
Brenda (30:37.319)
Right? Yep. Exactly. Exactly.
Alex (30:43.083)
But when you're talking about the struggle with bitterness and choosing to love even when we don't feel like it, I always think of the Cory Ten Boom story where many years after she left the concentration camp and she was speaking on her experiences there of God's faithfulness, one of the guards who was in the camp who was particularly cruel to her sister came up to her, I cannot even imagine how she was feeling, and extended his hand and wanted to hold her hand.
to I guess in his way be reconciled to her and she had this internal battle of Lord no, I cannot do it and she said she chose to reach out as an act of forgiveness to him and shake his hand and that when she did literally when she touched his hand that forgiveness flooded her heart the feelings of forgiveness flooded her heart and it doesn't always work that way, but it was such a powerful example of
Brenda (31:36.23)
Hmm.
Alex (31:42.957)
great, great injury and harm that was done to her, her family, her entire race. And she is willing to act in forgiveness even when she doesn't feel like it and the Lord meets her there and gives her the affection.
Brenda (31:59.048)
Yeah, that's so beautiful. That really is. And God is faithful to do that. You know, I think that if you don't feel like you want to obey God right now, just trust Him. Because so often, I mean, He loves faith. And He loves, and the Holy Spirit loves to align our affections with the affections of God.
Alex (32:01.707)
Hmm.
Mm -hmm.
Alex (32:09.099)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (32:16.683)
Mm.
Brenda (32:17.703)
And then you really get to experience something, I don't know, like in just such a precious way like that. The pleasure of God, the favor of God, that identifying with Christ, right, is just really beautiful.
Alex (32:30.955)
Mm -hmm, yeah. So, all of this will lead to a fruit change. We said we talked about a root change of these areas of our hearts, but what we see on the outside is a fruit change where the behaviors of loving God with our whole heart and loving our neighbor begin to show on the outside. So when the heart is changed, right behaviors are gonna follow.
So what are some of the practical steps to consider when we are gonna plan not to sin? Like how do we do what Paul said of make no provision for the flesh?
Brenda (33:07.208)
Yeah, I remember one of my early mentors talking to her teenage daughter about an ongoing sin struggle and her daughter was just protesting with her that, you know, she had never planned to sin, in which her wise mother responded, but you never plan not to sin.
Alex (33:20.139)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (33:25.291)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (33:26.183)
And that one little phrase that's probably been 20 years ago, but that one little phrase has always stuck with me that there are ways that we can plan not to sin. And I can't remember what wonderful dead Puritan guy said, be killing sin or kin will be killing you. I don't know. It's one of those Puritans. They always have the best quotes. But yeah, be killing sin or kin will or sin will be killing you. That's a hard, that's like a tongue twister a little bit, I think. I'm having a hard time spinning that out.
Alex (33:51.051)
huh. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (33:56.137)
But yeah, if we're going to take sin seriously and we should for whatever the reason, whatever our motivation, then we really need to deal with it as the ruthless enemy it is in our lives. So one of the ways we can do that is we can set up safeguards against known temptations. You know, it's always interesting to me when I look at my own life or I talk to people about their sin and then you ask them about, you know, what led to their sin and the temptation is so obvious, Alex.
Alex (34:01.515)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (34:26.009)
But they're still like, I don't know how I got there. I don't know how to stay away from it. You know, and it's, I mean, the kind of that first step is so simple is whenever it's possible, remove the temptation. Like it doesn't have to be so hard. Like we're trying to figure this out and make it rocket science. Like, no, just if it's possible. But sometimes it's not possible.
Alex (34:26.027)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Alex (34:30.955)
Right.
Alex (34:38.667)
Right.
Alex (34:47.211)
Right.
Brenda (34:47.398)
Sometimes we're faced with temptation over and over again and we can't get out from under it. And that's when we just have to remember what Paul said about God will provide a way of escape. He'll provide a way to bear up under the temptation.
Alex (34:57.099)
Mm -hmm.
Mm.
Brenda (35:00.07)
And we see Jesus doing this in his life over and over and over again, right? Bearing up under and never giving in. So, you know, if the temptation cannot be removed, which is one way plain not to sin, then thinking through how am I going to deal with this the next time it comes? Going back to kind of that idea of like taking time and effort to think through what got me in this place? How can I back up the next time when this temptation comes and what will I do differently to not step into sin?
Why? How do I make that choice differently the next time?
Alex (35:33.035)
Mm -hmm.
You know, the other part of planning not to sin is being able to put others around us for help and for accountability. I think it's Paul Tripp that says change is a community project and so we need to remember that the church is a place that can offer healing and can offer support in our struggle against sin. And then we also have to remember just to remain prayerful and spirit dependent as we seek to change for God's glory and accept the limits that God has set for us.
placed on our lives. That's often a hard thing to do. And I think more and more I find myself reminding people of their limitations, not just physical limitations, but the limitations that God places on them. And then reminding people to go back to some of those creation desires and that some of our plan not to sin is making sure that we're engaged in fulfilling those creation desires in ways that honor God. So it's not just a
What we're not doing is also what we are doing to plan not to sin.
Brenda (36:40.807)
Yeah, I think that's really good. And I think even when we're talking about planning not to sin, you know, sometimes when I think when this the sin is just so habitual and repeated, we can't say we're caught off guard anymore because we're there all the time. Right. And and I think really to stop like you're saying and really think about replacing not just not doing the thing we were doing, but what does it look like to replace with the right actions, but even going like what you're saying to the desire, like what what is the desire?
Alex (36:52.331)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (37:10.712)
behind those actions. And going back just even to the heart, like all of our actions, our attitudes, all of these things are gonna flow from the heart. And so Jesus talks to the heart, but he also talks to very specific actions. Instead of lying, tell the truth.
Alex (37:25.899)
Yeah.
Brenda (37:26.661)
It's a pretty simple one right there. So, anyway, hopefully that's just been helpful. I think that somebody, you know, listening could add a lot more to their action plan of how they're planning not to sin. But maybe these are just a few beginning guardrails to think about what it looks like to have a plan. I think just even to have a plan is novel.
Alex (37:35.307)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (37:47.659)
Right.
Brenda (37:48.325)
Just that in and of itself is like take the time to think about what you're doing, what you're saying, how you're behaving, how you're interacting, deal with the heart, deal with the fruit and or the behavior and then go from there. So kind of as we begin to unwind or not unwind, wind down, I always get my little metaphors and sayings wrong. In fact,
Alex (38:01.355)
Mm -hmm.
Alex (38:08.267)
Ha ha.
Brenda (38:10.791)
Paul and I were working on these little, like, they're water bladders that go in our backpack for Turkey and we're filling it up and I was so happy I went, voila! And I don't know if y 'all caught that, but Paul's like, what did you say? And I was like, voila! And he was like, honey, it's voila.
Alex (38:16.299)
Yeah.
Alex (38:26.539)
Yeah.
Brenda (38:28.359)
This is like I have a German mother and so I always have these little sayings that I say wrong and get wrong. Anyway, little side note there, but anyhow, not voila, but voila. So as we voila here and wrap this thing up, not wind it up, because I think winding it up means we're going to keep going and we need to be winding it down. Yeah. Okay. I just, I think we can get really discouraged and we just want to speak into this a little bit when we don't see fast growth.
Alex (38:33.547)
Yeah, that's funny. Voila.
Hahaha!
Alex (38:45.867)
Yes, there you go.
Alex (38:53.771)
Mm.
Yeah.
Brenda (38:57.638)
When we see old patterns rear their ugly head. I mean, honestly, even this little envy example I gave, like, kind of put me out with myself. You know, it's like, really? I'm going to... Here I am again. I'm envying this. Like, what is wrong with me? Why am I not over this? But we know that all throughout the scriptures, we're told that we need to endure. We need to persevere in this race, in this Christian walk. Paul knew that the Galatians...
Alex (39:06.891)
Hmm.
Alex (39:12.075)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (39:25.702)
Christians like many other Christians were going to grow weary in doing what God called them to do, but he admonished them, encouraged them, loved them enough to really say, hey, the reaping and sowing principle is real, but you can and you need to continue to run this race well. And I love how he says it in the message. He says in Galatians 6, 7 through 10, don't be misled. No one makes a fool of God.
And this kind of goes back to what we're saying. We're not, you know, we don't want to make light of sin at all because God doesn't. What a person plants, he will harvest. And at the end of the day, if you don't plan not to sin, if you don't do the heart work, if you don't do the work of, you know, the fruit and the root work, then you're gonna reap from that. And then you're gonna be praying for a crop failure.
Alex (40:11.691)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Brenda (40:14.534)
The person who plants selfishness ignores the needs of others, ignoring God. And this goes back to kind of this hymnal Hillel and Shemail, like it's both. You can't love God and not love your neighbor. You can't love your neighbor and it really not be about loving God. They harvest a crop of weeds and he'll have to show for his life, all he'll have to show for his life is weeds. But the one who plants in response to God, letting God's spirit do the work in him, harvest a crop of real eternal life.
So let's not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time, we will harvest a good crop if we don't give up or quit. Right now, therefore, every time we get the chance, let us work for the benefit of all, starting with the people closest to us in the community of faith. And going back to just the idea of our faith being a community project and loving God and loving our neighbor.
Yes, this is about personal transformation. Our whole series has been about how do how are we personally transformed? But that personal transformation is going to impact and benefit the people that are closest to us as we're honoring God. And so we just need to be reminded fruits not produced overnight. And as we are connected to the vine of Jesus, the Holy Spirit creates growth in our hearts, which shows up in our lives is what he wants to do is what he loves to do is what he wants to do.
Alex (41:18.251)
Mm -hmm.
Brenda (41:34.184)
he will be faithful to do if we will let him.
Alex (41:36.139)
Mm -hmm.
I feel like we could say so much more about this topic of sin and obedience and faith working itself out in love and how to love God and others well. But what we hope that people remember is that true repentance is that three step process of confess, believe and love. And that that is the way that we dance with the spirit and come back into close relationship with the spirit. So today we talked about how to love God and love others.
and that delighting and honoring another.
is how we want to act towards them. And that means that we're often going to have to choose to love others even before we feel like it. But those acts of obedience are part of the wholehearted change that we've been talking about, our cognition, volition, and affection. And that means that we'll see the change that we want to see in how we think and how we feel and how we act. And we just wanted to sum up today, just remembering that I think often it's easy when we're talking about
to see the expression on God's face as being one of the stern, punishing judge. And we just wanted to remind people that because of Christ, the expression on God's face is one of a loving Father and is one of gentleness and tenderness. And I have to ask myself that question often. How do I think God is looking at me right now? And it's just so good for me to just turn my heart towards the true expression of God.
Alex (43:11.181)
God and not the one that I create and that he loves me and he remembers my frame and he knows that I'm dust.
Brenda (43:19.433)
So good, Alex. Well, we are going now to conclude our 60th episode. Woo -hoo! And we really do give the Lord Jesus all the glory and thank Him. And Alex, I'm thankful for you, for your friendship, for your partnership in ministry, for the impact you've had on my life. And I just don't feel like I could say that enough. So I want to say it again and be a little gushy, even though I think the last episode, you totally blew me off on my offer for coffee.
Alex (43:39.595)
No.
Alex (43:47.147)
she paused I didn't hear it I didn't hear it I think sometimes we do this just so we can be together don't we if other people enjoy it that's just a bonus
Brenda (43:49.521)
I know, I know, that's what you said. Any rate, any rate. I do love you.
Yeah, I know. That's right. Absolutely. Well, we hope our listeners have benefited from this series. We also hope that you'll find us on social media. After you listen to one, let us know what you think. Add your own thoughts. Teach us something. We've got lots to learn and lots of ways to grow. Give us your examples. We want to hear from you. We're trying to be better about engaging on social media. So if you engage with us, we promise we will engage back.
Alex (44:16.139)
Mmm.
Alex (44:25.867)
You promise. I'm not good at that.
Brenda (44:28.681)
on Alex, come on. All right, and as we have come fond of saying, and that's all we've got for now, that's all we got for now. See you next time.
Alex (44:36.075)
That's all we got.