May 6, 2026 • 40 mins
Your emotions can feel like they’re telling the truth, but they’re often just telling the loudest story in the room. We talk about why emotions make great servants but terrible bosses, and how Christians can stop living at the mercy of anxiety, guilt, fear, envy, anger, bitterness, and even sorrow without pretending those feelings don’t exist. The goal isn’t an emotionless life, it’s an anchored life where feelings enrich you while truth leads you.
We share a simple, repeatable process we call building “walls of truth.” Think of all the Scripture, sermons, worship lyrics, and spiritual reminders you’ve collected over the years like a box of Lego bricks. Most of us have more truth than we use. When you start pulling that truth out on purpose and “building” with it, your emotions stop running wild and start running into God’s promises. That’s where real spiritual growth, emotional health, and Christian maturity begin to show up on Monday morning, not just Sunday.
We also unpack a line that creates instant resistance: you can’t be a better Christian than you are right now. That leads us into grace, imputed righteousness, and the freedom of knowing you can’t earn more acceptance, more love, or more forgiveness than Jesus has already secured. If performance culture has followed you into your relationship with God, this conversation helps you trade striving for rest and self-punishment for gratitude.
Listen, then share this with someone who feels stuck. Subscribe for more, leave a review, and tell us: which emotion do you most need to build a wall against right now?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:08):
Welcome and thanks for joining us on this episode
of the Midweek Podcast, broughtto you by a Fresh Wind Church.
Each week, our team brings younew content to help you take
steps towards Jesus and discovermore in Christ.
Today's episode is hosted byPastor Ryan.
SPEAKER_02 (00:27):
Hey, welcome back to the Midweek Podcast.
Pastor Ryan joined as alwayswith Pastor Tim, and we are
wrapping up week four in oursermon series, uh, You're Not
the Boss of Me.
And um man, this is uh it's beena great series.
Um, I don't think I'll everchoose a title like this again.
My kids have been using itagainst me for a month.
(00:47):
Um, every time I tell themsomething, You're not the boss
of me.
And uh, I think Sunday, uh Tim,you wrapped up.
You're not the boss of me, Jesusis the boss of me.
And uh listen, I heard that allSunday.
You're not the boss of me, Jesusis.
I'm like, all right, well, I'mgonna have to start editing
Tim's sermons to make sure he'snot giving my kids ammunition.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Well, that's pretty exciting that your kids have
realized how important this is.
Uh one of the things that we doin our Christian life is get
wrapped up in uh our emotionsand and how they affect us, and
we don't we we don't think muchabout it, but they control us
and we don't even know what'shappening.
SPEAKER_02 (01:31):
Yeah, it's uh we preach a lot of sermon series
here, and about every four toeight weeks, um preaching a new
one.
This is one that I mean, justperson after person has come up
and just talked about howimpactful this series has been.
And uh man, one of the thingsthat that I uh I guess surprised
(01:53):
me the most is the it wasn'tjust the series but the timing
of it.
People like I needed this rightnow.
And you know, this sermon seriesyou and I started um praying
about as we were planning oursermon series uh last year, in
the last year.
Uh we we laid out the next yearand uh just praying, Lord, what
would you have us bring to thepeople?
(02:14):
And drop this one here right inuh after Easter.
Um You resisted it.
I did.
Um man, I think I talked aboutthat on one of the other
podcasts.
I had this kind of just uhresistance talking about
emotions, you know, or whatever.
Um, and man, Lord showed me.
(02:34):
He's like, shut up, right?
And I got stuff I gotta do insome people's life.
Um and man, it's I think it'simpacted uh a lot of people in
our church, man.
Um this has been a big deal.
Uh we've had we've just allowedemotions to to get the best of
us for for too long.
And we're saying uh in thisseries, emotions make great
(02:55):
servants, but terrible bosses.
And um, this isn't about livingin a an emotion-free life.
No, we want your emotions to toenrich your life and serve their
intended purpose, the purposethat God created them for.
And um in this series, we'vewe've been trying to help you,
you do just that.
And I think what turned thisseries for me, and I think what
(03:17):
turned it for a lot of a lot ofpeople listening, is it wasn't
just this self-help thing onmental health or emotions.
And that's I guess where myresistance to it probably comes
from.
And I think part of it's youknow, being a guy, you know, we
gotta stomp our feet down in ourboots, yeah.
Life sucks, move on, right?
Um, and so anytime you starttalking about emotions, there's
(03:38):
just this, I'm a man, we don'ttalk about emotions.
SPEAKER_01 (03:42):
Or get a grip on yourself and let's go.
SPEAKER_02 (03:44):
Right.
Um, but I well, I think whatturned it for me and for a lot
of people is no man, there'sone, these things are real, but
then we acknowledge just becauseit's real doesn't mean it's
true.
And then we took that to thethird step and said, let's not
just talk about it, you know,talk about our emotions, not
just no, what are we gonna doabout it?
(04:06):
And there was this deepapplication of and we what we've
been saying every week is weneed to start building some
walls around this.
Um, and so week by week, we'vebeen taking some some of these
emotions guilt and anxiety, uh,fear, envy, and saying, All
right, let's build some wallsaround these things.
(04:26):
And man, I we obviously it's toomany emotions we'd be here all
year long if we're talking aboutevery single one.
SPEAKER_01 (04:35):
Um and they're very complicated too.
I think it was brilliant the wayyou uh I just called Ryan
brilliant.
SPEAKER_02 (04:42):
Uh everybody clipped that posted somewhere.
No, how did that happen?
I just wrote it down in myjournal.
Tim said I was brilliant.
SPEAKER_01 (04:51):
How you took uh guilt and anxiety and how they
tie together.
So a lot of times when you'rethinking, all right, I'm gonna
build a wall against this guiltthat I'm that I'm feeling.
And once you really get intothat process, we need the Holy
Spirit to say, hey, it's notguilt, it's your anxiety.
(05:15):
And uh let's conquer that, andmaybe your guilt will go away.
And that that's important.
Same thing with fear and envy,which don't connect as easily as
um guilt and anxiety, but fearand envy, so much of missing out
is is comes from our envy, youknow.
(05:35):
I I fear my life is not gonna bewhat I I think it should be.
I fear my marriage is not gonnabe that comes, a lot of it comes
from envy, and I love the wayyou put that together because
I've been a pastor for a longtime, and one thing I can tell
you people are complicated.
And uh this this this series wastaking something that was very
(05:59):
complicated and using a verypractical way or a practical
procedure to build walls againstthose things that are out of
control in your life, and andand we just laid it out for you.
This is what it looks like, thisis what you're feeling, this is
(06:19):
how we build these walls, and wewant you to feel your emotions
it all the way.
We want it to enrich your life,we want it to boil up and roll
over, we want you to have anabundant life, and life without
emotions would not be abundant.
We want you to have all that,but at the same time, they got
(06:42):
to be directed by truth.
That's right.
And then we we sat them down andsaid, Hey, this is how you do
it.
And I think I think it I thinkmost people said, All right, the
I've been told this in differentways all my life, but this is
the first time someone said, Youneed to dig out the truth that
(07:06):
you have in your truth box andwrite yourself a sermon against
these out-of-control emotions.
And and I think people got it.
I think they finally realized uhwhat was going on in their life.
Yeah, I can hear about it, I canthink about it, I can give
mental assent to it.
Yeah, I need to do these things,I need to stop acting like that,
(07:29):
I need to stop feeling likethis, but I never got a how-to
stop.
unknown (07:34):
Yep, yep.
SPEAKER_01 (07:35):
And I think that's what the sermon sermon series
did.
SPEAKER_02 (07:39):
So we've we've challenged you.
Um you get a lot of truth.
Uh, you know, going to church,listening to sermons, uh digging
in the the scriptures, Biblereading plan.
Maybe you got a devotional youdo in the morning, you listen to
some worship songs.
There's there's trutheverywhere.
Um but we're saying we need tostart building some walls out of
(08:00):
it.
You gotta get it out of thatbox, and for a lot of us, it it
has.
We've just accumulated all thisstuff over the years, but we
haven't taken that next step tostart building something out of
it.
Am I confident that the HolySpirit can grab that Lego at the
right time, just when you needit?
Sure.
Absolutely.
But what how would your lifechange if if you weren't just
(08:24):
waiting around for something tohappen?
You said, Lord, I got a lot ofstuff here in this box.
Help me start building somewalls of truth out of this so
that I don't even get to thatpoint where my anger, my envy,
my my bitterness has just takenover, and now the Holy Spirit's
gotta reach in here to pull meback from the edge.
Right.
(08:45):
Imagine the freedom you couldlive in.
SPEAKER_01 (08:47):
I think the the I won't say the biggest, but the
main point here is we've got torecognize that God has given us
everything we need for godlinessand holiness.
He has given it to us.
Here's the crux.
Will you use it?
(09:08):
And I think not only do we notuse it, but we didn't know how.
But now through this series, wegot a chance to realize that,
hey, I can take, I'm I'mpetrified of tomorrow.
I don't know what's going to goon, but I can take um this
scripture right here where Jesussays uh for me not to fear, I
(09:29):
can take uh this other piece oftruth where he said, Hey, I take
care of the birds, I'll takecare of you.
I all those different things.
And as I as I start buildingthat wall of truth, then when I
fear, I actually run into thatwall and I see all the things
(09:50):
God has promised me.
That he's never gonna forsakeme, that he's always gonna be
with me, that if he takes careof uh if he numbers the hair on
your head, how much moreimportant it is for him to think
about you and your situation.
All those things confront menow.
And I have to turn.
(10:10):
I can't, I can't just say, well,I'm just gonna ignore all that
truth and I'm and I'm going tobelieve in my fear more than I
believe in God.
That's not what happens.
Truth takes over.
And uh we no longer believe inthat lie that God doesn't care
about you, or that uh uh you caneven fix anything in your life
(10:31):
by fear and anxiety or worry.
We we begin to realize that thetruth is all we have and we need
to cling to it, and then itturns us instead of reacting in
fear, it turns us towards Jesusand the author and finisher of
our faith.
That's right.
The man who paid it all for us,and and we get to we get to
(10:54):
confront him instead of ouremotion, which could be really
good or really not good.
SPEAKER_02 (11:04):
Uh, you get down there and that emotion is, you
know, you're whatever it is isleading you to the things of
God, he's gonna say, Come on,this is great, let's do it.
And then if it's not, you'regonna get down there and he's
gonna be like, Really?
What am I down here with youfor?
Right.
Um, you know, maybe you can geta ladder and try to climb up
(11:28):
over top of that wall of truth,but man, it it is gonna redirect
you.
You're either gonna have to takea right or a left, or you're
gonna have to climb up and overit and say, I don't care, I'm
still mad.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (11:38):
Um, which is And I'm not saying that that doesn't
happen sometimes, but you'llhave to climb a wall of through
a wall of truth to get there.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (11:47):
So these walls are are so important to to begin to
just keep our our emotions in aspot where they they can be
servants and not bosses and theycan enrich our lives.
And so um hopefully throughoutthis series, God's been helping
you build those walls.
There's a lot more emotions,like like we acknowledge that we
didn't have time to get through,but the the process is the same.
(12:10):
Whatever that emotion is foryou, dig down in that that Lego
box.
Uh fart start, I think I justsaid fart on the podcast.
Good job.
I apologize for that.
Start building those uh thosewalls of truth that are gonna
keep you from letting youremotions run rampant in in your
life.
Now, this past Sunday, you goton stage wrapping up the series,
(12:35):
and you said something that it'spretty powerful, but I think a
lot of us have, as soon as yousay it, there's this natural
resistance towards you said, youcan't be a better Christian than
you are right now.
A lot of us hear you say thatand go, okay, then that that
(13:00):
sounds good.
Preach is good, but you're notwith me on Monday morning drive
in the middle of rush hour.
You know, you you don't see mewhen, you know, that you know,
other teams' dads picking on mykid at the t-ball game.
Uh, you don't see me in thosemoments.
I if you came around and spent aweek with me, you would you'd
acknowledge there's some roomfor improvement here.
(13:23):
And so what do you mean when yousay you can't be a better
Christian than you are rightnow?
What what do you what do youmean by that?
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
There's a a doctrine that says just a simple phrase,
it says the already but not yet.
And when Jesus saved you, hesaved you completely.
And he says, I have made youperfect.
(13:51):
We are perfect in him.
That transaction that we talkedabout on Sunday is when when I
placed all my guilt on Jesus, heI was trying to think of the
word that uh old King James usedto uh uh use imputed.
Yeah, imputation he imputed hisrighteousness to us.
(14:16):
His righteousness can't beimproved on.
Once you are in Christ, you areperfect in God's eyes.
Now, in our own eyes and in theeyes of people around us, we're
like, well, he could he coulduse a lot of improvement, but to
God, you can't be improved.
You are perfect.
And you can't be a betterChristian than you already are,
(14:38):
you can't be more accepted thanyou already are, you can't be
more loved than you already are.
You just there's no there's noway around this, Christian.
I know you want to takeresponsibility uh for your
actions, stand up and be countedand all that kind of good male
macho-ness that we all have.
(14:59):
But the truth is only Jesuscould pay that price for you,
and he already has.
SPEAKER_02 (15:07):
I think that that's the resistance right there is I
need to pay for it.
You know?
Tim, if you followed me around,you'd see there there's room for
improvement, and you're saying,okay, yeah, but but God already
loves you.
Okay, God loves me.
But I still did that thing.
(15:30):
And I need to pay.
I need to pay for what I did.
And in every other area of life,that's true.
You know, you you get a speedingticket, you gotta pay.
You gotta pay.
Um, you show up late to workonce, twice, third time, well,
you you're gonna have to pay,right?
These things every area of life.
And then we come to God and wesay, All right, God, I
(15:53):
understand you love me.
I'm yours, I'm in your family,that's all great.
But I I did this thing.
And whatever that thing was foryou, you think, now I gotta go
pay.
I gotta do my time, you know,give my dues, whatever it is, I
gotta pay for this thing.
And the the Christian life sayssomeone already did.
SPEAKER_01 (16:16):
And the problem, I think, with us thinking in along
those lines is our justicesystem is not God's justice
system.
And when we think, yeah, I Ishould pay for that.
Yeah, well, you don't reallywant to pay the full cost of
that.
You want to pay what yourjustice is system says.
(16:39):
You need to be a littleembarrassed, it need to cost you
a little something, and thenyou'll be free.
No, Jesus says you can't paythat price.
What is the wages of sin?
SPEAKER_03 (16:50):
Death.
Death.
SPEAKER_02 (16:52):
So, yeah, you think no, no, no, no, no.
I mean, what I did isn't we'renot talking the death penalty,
you know, it's just this littlething.
And God looks at you and says,Oh no.
Kill 'em.
Yeah.
That's the penalty.
Death.
And so to say, you know, I gottapay, what you're saying is
right.
(17:12):
If we understood truly thedepravity of our sinful nature
and and how sick and awful sinis, if we truly understood that,
we'd be jumping out of the wayof paying that penalty.
We'd be like, no, no, no, holdon.
Jesus, he got it.
He's he's got it for me.
SPEAKER_01 (17:34):
If we knew the truth, and uh that's why Jesus
came and that's why he died,because I don't think we'll
we'll ever know the cost of oursin.
And uh maybe, maybe when we getuh to the end of time it'll be
revealed to us.
Uh but Jesus paid our pricebecause you couldn't pay it.
(17:58):
That's right.
And we have to first of all, wehave to to humble ourselves to
that point and understand thatthere's no way I could pay this.
You know, Jesus said uh toldthat parable about uh the one
who is forgiven uh less and theone who's forgiven more who
(18:18):
loves God more, and it's it'salways the one who's been
forgiven more.
And we see that in our own liveswhen you're a pretty good dad,
and uh you haven't divorced yourwife and you haven't cheated on
her, and you pay your taxes, andyou know you're a pretty good
person, and you think uh I loveJesus, uh, but it's not it's not
(18:39):
moving me anyway.
But then you see someone whojust gets out of prison and
meets Jesus for the first timeand he says, You're perfect,
you're clean in me.
And you see them live for Jesus,it's a different thing.
You know why?
Because you don't think you'rethat bad.
And that that is that is theplague on moral Christianity is
(19:06):
yeah, I'm I'm a pretty good guy.
You know, God probably likes me.
He's probably he probably likesthe fact that I chose him.
SPEAKER_02 (19:13):
Yeah, if he if he if he was getting a golf or some,
he'd probably invite me to bepart of the team.
SPEAKER_01 (19:17):
Right.
And that's all that is is pride.
Jesus paid the price that youcouldn't pay.
There's no way you could pay itwithout giving up your life.
And we need to praise him forthat.
And not it's almostdisrespectful to say, I need to
pay.
(19:38):
You know, it's disrespectingwhat he did for humanity on the
cross.
SPEAKER_02 (19:43):
Either what he did wasn't enough, and so I gotta
pay too, or insulting in theother direction to say, Well, I
didn't deserve death, but youknow, I'm I gotta do this little
thing over here.
Either one misses what what sinis um and what Jesus truly
accomplished for us on thecross.
And so it's man, imagine thatfreedom of I don't have to to
(20:09):
perform for this.
I'm I'm his, you know.
My kids, they're mine.
And sometimes they act likeknuckleheads, man.
Um but they're mine.
And God looks at you the sameway.
Sometimes, golly, he's an idiot,but he's mine, and he's holy,
(20:29):
and he's loved, and he didn'thave to perform for that.
Um if we could rest in that,man, I think we would the
Christian life would be so muchfreer.
SPEAKER_01 (20:41):
Well, we grow up in a a culture of performance.
You know, we're always trying tokind of climb to the top of the
ladder and wherever we findourselves, and uh, we get up in
the morning, we leave the house,and we go to work, and we want
to climb to that top of theladder.
And uh even in our um being athome with our family, we want to
be the best family man I can be.
(21:03):
I want to be the best husband,the best dad.
And those ladders uh make sensein life.
Yeah, you want to be the bestthat you can be, and there's
nothing wrong with that.
But when it comes to yourrelationship with God, he's the
best that you can be, and youlet you let him be that for you.
(21:24):
And that's that's the only wayyou can live in that context is
that you you are now, you youthat imputation when he put his
righteousness on you, you can'tbe a better you.
Now, one day you'll you'llrecognize that because uh we're
(21:44):
gonna be changed.
And just in a moment in the airor coming out of the ground,
you're gonna be changed, andyou'll be like Jesus.
SPEAKER_02 (21:53):
And you will be like him.
Like him.
SPEAKER_01 (21:56):
And it'll be the it'll be the the most freaking
and maybe that's That time whenyou look back and say, Oh my
gosh, praise God.
He saved me.
And I, you know, we use thatword saved all the time, and and
we get made fun of.
I mean, we had a a sitcom calledSaved on TV there for a while.
(22:18):
All the all the people who hateGod making fun of us and using
our words.
But man, for us as a Christian,that is the word.
You are saved.
SPEAKER_02 (22:30):
Makes me think of um oh his name just slipped my
mind.
Uh I just quoted him in asermon.
He he would go and confess hissins over and over and over
again.
Who was that?
Um Martin Luther?
Martin Luther.
Good night.
Spurgeon was the only thingcoming into my head, and I'm
like, that wasn't Spurgeon.
(22:50):
Um and you know, I've I've kindof joked a few times about his
story because literally he wouldgo and confess, and they'd be
like, please come back whenyou've actually done something.
But I think, man, the truth isthe the closer we get to Jesus,
the more we our imperfectionsbecome clear.
(23:13):
I mean, it's like if you couldimagine this, you know, if you
had something way out in thedark and it, you know, I don't
know, maybe it was your kid'ssoccer ball, he's left it
outside, and you know, theleather's peeling off, it's got
mud all over it.
You know, it's it's not adefinitely not a new looking
soccer ball.
But out in the dark, it justlooks like a soccer ball.
But you start bringing thatthing closer and closer and
(23:34):
closer to the light, and all ofa sudden you realize, okay, it
might be time to go get a newsoccer ball.
This thing's pretty messed up.
Um, and I think the same thinghappens with is the closer we
get to Jesus, the more werealize our imperfections and
and all the places where we'velet them down and we failed
them.
And so you get a guy likeLuther, and now he was a little
(23:57):
messed up in his theology atfirst.
Um, and he thought, man, I gotto go to confession over and
over and over again.
But I think he was right on thecusp of something.
He's like, Man, I the more Istudy, the closer I get, the
more I realize how how messed upI am.
The problem is a lot of us we'reliving our lives out in the dark
(24:18):
and we don't think we're doingall that bad.
We it looks like a soccer ball.
But you get close to the lightwhen when you stack our life up
against holiness and perfection,all of a sudden it becomes
really clear we're not that.
And I think Luther was sensingthat.
And his his thing was, man, I Igotta, I gotta perform.
(24:40):
I gotta do this stuff.
I gotta, I gotta, I gotta, Igotta.
And that's that's the culture weall live in today.
It's the culture our kids arebeing raised in.
I mean, from the moment they cankick a ball or swing a bat,
they're at practice every day.
Um, it's about performance.
You then they try to go tocollege and they're trying to
get in college, and well, man,we're you know, we got hundreds,
hundreds and hundreds ofapplicants, and and we're only
(25:01):
taking so many of them.
And it's all about performance.
How's your SAT scores?
How was your interviews and andall this stuff, and it's it's
performance, performance.
And so we come to God and we wetake the same exact approach.
And then the thing that Lutherfound is it's not that, it's by
grace through faith.
(25:22):
And when I do that, there's thattransaction that takes place
where I God takes all of my sinand he assigns it to Jesus, and
then the righteousness ofChrist, he assigns to me so that
when God looks at me, he doesn'tsee that old soccer ball laying
out in the yard.
He sees the brand new onesitting on the shelf that's
never been kicked, the perfectspotless lamb of God.
(25:44):
He sees his son when he looks atyou.
SPEAKER_01 (25:47):
I think we well, it's it's our culture that kind
of makes us that that way.
I think we look at well, how didJames say it?
We you're like a guy who looksin the mirror and sees faces
dirty and then forgets and justwalks.
Right, whatever.
And then we've spent our livesdoing that, thinking that we're
(26:08):
pretty good because we haven'ttaken a real good look at it.
But thank God for uh a freshwin, because we're about
discovering more in Jesus.
And if you focus not onperformance, but discovering
more of Jesus in your life.
If he is your uh in the sermon Iwas talking about, you need to
(26:29):
fix your eyes on Jesus and onthings that are above his
righteous work for you on thecross, um, what his resurrection
means for you, what is lovely,what is pure.
Paul went through all thosethings.
When we do that, we begin todiscover more in Jesus, and
we're looking through what Paulsaid, that glass darkly, but we
(26:51):
want to see him face to face,and we begin to see the things
in the glass that is obscuringJesus from us.
So we want to we want to fixthat, wipe that off.
What is that?
That's bitterness.
I need to get rid of that so Ican discover more in Jesus.
(27:12):
You know, this is I'm I'm justpetrified.
I can't leave the house.
And I'm not seeing, you gotta,you gotta deal with that.
Wipe that off so you candiscover more of Jesus.
And I I think that's that's whatwe're trying to teach people
here.
Listen, you've you've heard thetruth.
Now you gotta preach it back toyourself, and you gotta build
(27:34):
these these walls for theseemotions so they don't get you
in trouble.
Your emotions are not causingyou to sin, but they're
influencing you to sin.
What's the scripture say?
Be angry, but do not sin.
That means angry is not a badthing.
It's not a good thing.
(27:55):
It can be a bad thing, and itcan be a good thing.
It depends on the the hallway oftruth that it's going uh uh uh
existing in.
And that is something that everyChristian has to do.
They've they've got to takethose things that are blocking
their view of Christ in thislife and build truth walls
(28:18):
against them and wipe them offthat glass so you can discover
more in Jesus Christ.
That's what we're doing here atA Fresh Wind.
We want you to join with us anddo that and be a family, a
church of people that that arehelping each other do that so we
can discover more.
SPEAKER_02 (28:38):
When we live this way, it's no longer about
performance, right?
Of trying to to earn somethingor or get more of God's approval
or love.
You were teaching us he can'tget any more.
He can't love you anymore thanhe already does.
Um it becomes, man, I I want tosee him.
And whatever whatever would getin the way of that, I would
(29:01):
gladly get rid of.
I Lord, if is this keeping mefrom you?
Let's get rid of it.
I mean, yeah, the more youdiscover in Christ, the closer
you get to him, the moregrateful you are for what he's
done on the cross.
And then all this performanceculture that we all live in, it
looks silly.
You're like, man, there wasnothing I could have done.
(29:24):
Um and so then we just begin torest in that.
Man, he's already done it forme.
And I man, I want to go knowmore about him.
Why why would you do that forme?
You know, and anything thatwould keep me from getting close
to him, I'm gonna get rid ofthose things.
Absolutely.
And so we can't let things likeour emotions keep us distracted
(29:47):
and running around, chasing ourtails because this guy cut you
off on the highway, or or thatkid said something, you know, to
your kid.
And what yeah, you know what?
There's things we need to getmad about at times.
Sure, be angry, do not sin, butman, we we let them control our
lives.
We're saying, no, let it letthese truth walls take those
emotions and run them right tothe feet of Jesus.
(30:09):
And then when they get there,you're gonna confront them and
he's gonna say, Hey, really?
SPEAKER_01 (30:14):
What's going on here?
You know, it's it's if you thinkabout it, it is kind of funny.
He's forgiven you past, present,and future.
He can't forgive you any morethan he's already forgiven you.
And we're always saying, Oh,God, please forgive me.
And it's like, uh done.
Next.
Come on.
Are we gonna be here forever?
(30:36):
You know, I was wondering whathe's thinking about Martin
Luther.
Uh, okay, there's people allaround you that need to hear the
gospel.
And you're here in theconfessional again.
Let's go.
You know, and we we need to bewe need to confess our sins.
That's that's the way God pokesat us and and says, hey, look at
this.
(30:56):
And we need to confess them.
Um but he's already forgiventhem.
But we do need to confess themso that we can agree that this
is wrong in our life.
But he's already forgiven them.
When you when you called himLord and Savior and believe in
your heart that God raised himfrom the dead, this transaction
(31:16):
occurred.
You have the righteousness ofGod in Jesus Christ, and you are
forgiven.
And your sins have been paidfor.
It's an it's a past thing.
Even though you haven't donedone it yet, it's already taken
care of in the past.
He was crucified before thefoundation of the world, just
(31:39):
for you, if you're in ChristJesus.
And we need to live like that.
We need to stop.
Oh, I'm a lousy Christian, I'm alousy this, I'm a lousy that.
Sometimes I think that's justexcuses for us um not to live in
in peace.
And you say, well, that would bestupid excuse to not live in
(32:01):
peace.
Hey, one thing I've we talkedearlier uh today about humans
are very complicated.
You know how you took um how youtook envy and fear and put them
(32:21):
together.
That's complicated.
That's complicated.
How can your fear come fromenvy?
And once you dig into it, youstart to realize, hey, and
people are complicated.
But you know what I found in thelast 25 years of doing this is a
lot of people love their sorrow.
They love their hurt, they lovetheir depression, and they don't
(32:46):
they don't want to be free.
But Christian, in this room,when you're with Jesus and the
Father, you are complete.
And all this performance, allthis uh look at me, look how sad
I am.
Look how sad I am about my sin.
That doesn't apply to Jesus, itdoesn't apply to the Father, and
(33:08):
it doesn't apply to the HolySpirit who's trying to teach you
truth.
We need to grab the truth of theWord of God and live like it.
Live like it.
And that means you can't be abetter Christian than you
already are.
You have the righteousness ofGod in Christ Jesus.
You can't be more forgiven thanyou already are, it's already
(33:29):
been bought and paid for.
You are free and be happy.
SPEAKER_02 (33:37):
Not only are you free, scripture says God has
given us everything you need tolive a life of godliness, to do
what pleases him.
And so you get you you know, youlook in that Lego box and it's
full of all those truths and allthose little things that you've
picked up over the years.
This is God giving you some ofthat stuff that you need.
Um now we're challenging you godo the hard work, dig in that
(34:02):
Lego box, and start buildingsome of these walls.
Whatever that emotion is foryou, we didn't cover them all.
I know.
But we've given you theresources that you need and and
hopefully showed you someexamples of how you can do this
and start building those wallsup so that you end up right at
the feet of Jesus every singletime.
I'll tell you when it came toguilt and anxiety, fear and
(34:26):
envy, what was the answer?
The gospel.
Absolutely the answer, right?
And these things just look sillyin the face of the Savior who's
given everything for you.
What do you have to be afraidof?
What do you have to be anxiousabout?
He's given you it all, he's doneall of it for you, and so now we
(34:46):
we just take those things, weput those walls in.
Man, the Christian life, it'slike you just unlocked.
You talked about how the cagehas been unlocked, but a lot of
us don't walk out.
The doors open.
Go out, explore, live life tothe full, and it's gonna be
rich, it's gonna be satisfying,it's gonna be abundant.
(35:06):
Why?
Because Jesus said that's why hecame.
That was the purpose.
And even those heart emotions,you know, you talked about
sorrow.
It's like, who wants to dealwith sorrow?
But man, even sorrow is meant toenrich your life.
And and you take that and yourun it to the feet of Jesus
because you lost someone youloved, and you end up right
there at the gospel that says, Igot them, and you're gonna see
(35:30):
him again.
SPEAKER_01 (35:31):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (35:31):
And I get this rope of hope that's thrown down to me
so I can climb out of my sorrowand say, Man, thank you, Jesus,
that you have them.
And I can't wait to get to seehim one day.
That's even there, you can feelthe sorrow, you can feel that
emotion, and it doesn't takeover your life and and throw you
(35:52):
into this downward spiral ofdepression or whatever it would
be.
Because you know, man, I'm gonnaget to see him again.
How awesome is that?
How awesome is my God.
SPEAKER_01 (36:04):
I think we uh we should wrap it up right here
because you know, Corinthianstells us that it's the Holy
Spirit that teaches you the deepthings of God.
Now, we preach this whole seriesand we're really smart.
You know, we are we are thepreeminent pastors in this
little classroom that we're inat church right now.
(36:27):
And we are no one's smarter.
No one's smarter than us two inthis little classroom in the
back of the church.
But let me tell you this it'sthe Holy Spirit that's gonna
reveal these things to you asyou build these walls.
But you have to do that work andlet the Holy Spirit teach you
the deep things of God.
(36:48):
I'm afraid.
And the Holy Spirit says, let'sget into the word, let's build
these walls, and I'll show youthat you don't have to fear
anything but me.
That's right.
And that's this is this is thepracticality of what we what
we've taught.
And uh we'll probably have tobring this up next year or a
couple years from now becausepeople need to learn to do this
(37:12):
process.
And we're hoping that you youengage with the Holy Spirit and
uh and begin to build thesewalls and change your life.
SPEAKER_02 (37:21):
So, how do you start building them?
I would encourage you get aconcordance out or go to Google,
you know.
If some of you like aconcordance, we're getting old,
Tim.
We've been doing this a while.
Yeah.
Uh you can go to Google and youknow, give me verses about fear
and and start putting them,writing them down, or copy and
paste them into a a note app inyour phone or whatever it is,
(37:44):
and you and then startmemorizing those things, start
building that wall.
You can go, I I would encourageyou when you're here on Sunday
mornings, take notes, or at thevery least, take the notes that
we give you, download them andput them somewhere.
Right.
Um and now you can go and youcan look at those things.
Okay, oh, yep, that that onethat really means something to
(38:05):
me when it comes to fear.
Oh, that thing really helped me.
Even if you're watching a, youknow, I would say one of your
favorite preachers, but yourfavorite preachers are probably
right here.
In this little room.
In this little room, back of thechurch.
But if you're watching anotherpreacher who says something, you
can write that down.
If it's a lyric in a song thatthat sticks out to you, write it
down.
And I would you always want togo back to scripture.
(38:28):
His word is truth.
Absolutely.
So that's the basis foreverything.
But write those things down andthen start thinking on them,
chewing on them, and then say,Lord, that that ministers to me
in this area of fear or anxietyor my unforgiveness, my
bitterness, my rage, whatever itis.
Help me put this block here sothat when I when I that emotion
(38:51):
comes up, it doesn't take over.
I want it to run smack dab intothis truth of who you are.
And build those walls.
SPEAKER_01 (39:00):
And it's in it's important.
Listen, you know what you'redealing with.
You know, you know if it's angeror lust or or whatever uh
emotion, depression.
You know what you're lookingfor.
And when you hear it, grab it.
Grab it and hide it in yourheart and say, Holy Spirit, take
this truth from your word andchange me.
SPEAKER_02 (39:21):
That I might not sin against you.
SPEAKER_01 (39:22):
Pastor Tim, will you pray for us?
Father, I want to lift up ourchurch to you.
Thank you for this truth.
Thank you for um forcing me andRyan down this um tunnel to
preach on this, to give yourpeople a fighting chance with
your truth to discover more inyou.
(39:44):
Thank you that we don't have toperform for you.
Thank you that you did it allfor us on the cross.
Thank you that we're therighteousness of God in Jesus
Christ.
And let us live free.
In Jesus' name.
Amen.
Amen.
SPEAKER_00 (39:59):
Thanks again for joining us for this episode of
the Midweek Podcast.
We'd love to hear from you.
Let us know how God is usingthis resource in your life or
send any podcast questions ortopic ideas to podcast at a
freshwind.org.
If you would like to supportthis ministry financially and
help us continue offering newresources that equip you to
discover more in Christ, simplytext any amount to the number
(40:23):
84321.
We're so grateful for yoursupport.
Make sure to tune in next weekfor a brand new episode of the
Midweek Podcast.
Be blessed and have a greatweek.
Welcome and thanks for joining us on this episode
of the Midweek Podcast, broughtto you by a Fresh Wind Church.
Each week, our team brings younew content to help you take
steps towards Jesus and discovermore in Christ.
Today's episode is hosted byPastor Ryan.
SPEAKER_02 (00:27):
Hey, welcome back to the Midweek Podcast.
Pastor Ryan joined as alwayswith Pastor Tim, and we are
wrapping up week four in oursermon series, uh, You're Not
the Boss of Me.
And um man, this is uh it's beena great series.
Um, I don't think I'll everchoose a title like this again.
My kids have been using itagainst me for a month.
(00:47):
Um, every time I tell themsomething, You're not the boss
of me.
And uh, I think Sunday, uh Tim,you wrapped up.
You're not the boss of me, Jesusis the boss of me.
And uh listen, I heard that allSunday.
You're not the boss of me, Jesusis.
I'm like, all right, well, I'mgonna have to start editing
Tim's sermons to make sure he'snot giving my kids ammunition.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Well, that's pretty exciting that your kids have
realized how important this is.
Uh one of the things that we doin our Christian life is get
wrapped up in uh our emotionsand and how they affect us, and
we don't we we don't think muchabout it, but they control us
and we don't even know what'shappening.
SPEAKER_02 (01:31):
Yeah, it's uh we preach a lot of sermon series
here, and about every four toeight weeks, um preaching a new
one.
This is one that I mean, justperson after person has come up
and just talked about howimpactful this series has been.
And uh man, one of the thingsthat that I uh I guess surprised
(01:53):
me the most is the it wasn'tjust the series but the timing
of it.
People like I needed this rightnow.
And you know, this sermon seriesyou and I started um praying
about as we were planning oursermon series uh last year, in
the last year.
Uh we we laid out the next yearand uh just praying, Lord, what
would you have us bring to thepeople?
(02:14):
And drop this one here right inuh after Easter.
Um You resisted it.
I did.
Um man, I think I talked aboutthat on one of the other
podcasts.
I had this kind of just uhresistance talking about
emotions, you know, or whatever.
Um, and man, Lord showed me.
(02:34):
He's like, shut up, right?
And I got stuff I gotta do insome people's life.
Um and man, it's I think it'simpacted uh a lot of people in
our church, man.
Um this has been a big deal.
Uh we've had we've just allowedemotions to to get the best of
us for for too long.
And we're saying uh in thisseries, emotions make great
(02:55):
servants, but terrible bosses.
And um, this isn't about livingin a an emotion-free life.
No, we want your emotions to toenrich your life and serve their
intended purpose, the purposethat God created them for.
And um in this series, we'vewe've been trying to help you,
you do just that.
And I think what turned thisseries for me, and I think what
(03:17):
turned it for a lot of a lot ofpeople listening, is it wasn't
just this self-help thing onmental health or emotions.
And that's I guess where myresistance to it probably comes
from.
And I think part of it's youknow, being a guy, you know, we
gotta stomp our feet down in ourboots, yeah.
Life sucks, move on, right?
Um, and so anytime you starttalking about emotions, there's
(03:38):
just this, I'm a man, we don'ttalk about emotions.
SPEAKER_01 (03:42):
Or get a grip on yourself and let's go.
SPEAKER_02 (03:44):
Right.
Um, but I well, I think whatturned it for me and for a lot
of people is no man, there'sone, these things are real, but
then we acknowledge just becauseit's real doesn't mean it's
true.
And then we took that to thethird step and said, let's not
just talk about it, you know,talk about our emotions, not
just no, what are we gonna doabout it?
(04:06):
And there was this deepapplication of and we what we've
been saying every week is weneed to start building some
walls around this.
Um, and so week by week, we'vebeen taking some some of these
emotions guilt and anxiety, uh,fear, envy, and saying, All
right, let's build some wallsaround these things.
(04:26):
And man, I we obviously it's toomany emotions we'd be here all
year long if we're talking aboutevery single one.
SPEAKER_01 (04:35):
Um and they're very complicated too.
I think it was brilliant the wayyou uh I just called Ryan
brilliant.
SPEAKER_02 (04:42):
Uh everybody clipped that posted somewhere.
No, how did that happen?
I just wrote it down in myjournal.
Tim said I was brilliant.
SPEAKER_01 (04:51):
How you took uh guilt and anxiety and how they
tie together.
So a lot of times when you'rethinking, all right, I'm gonna
build a wall against this guiltthat I'm that I'm feeling.
And once you really get intothat process, we need the Holy
Spirit to say, hey, it's notguilt, it's your anxiety.
(05:15):
And uh let's conquer that, andmaybe your guilt will go away.
And that that's important.
Same thing with fear and envy,which don't connect as easily as
um guilt and anxiety, but fearand envy, so much of missing out
is is comes from our envy, youknow.
(05:35):
I I fear my life is not gonna bewhat I I think it should be.
I fear my marriage is not gonnabe that comes, a lot of it comes
from envy, and I love the wayyou put that together because
I've been a pastor for a longtime, and one thing I can tell
you people are complicated.
And uh this this this series wastaking something that was very
(05:59):
complicated and using a verypractical way or a practical
procedure to build walls againstthose things that are out of
control in your life, and andand we just laid it out for you.
This is what it looks like, thisis what you're feeling, this is
(06:19):
how we build these walls, and wewant you to feel your emotions
it all the way.
We want it to enrich your life,we want it to boil up and roll
over, we want you to have anabundant life, and life without
emotions would not be abundant.
We want you to have all that,but at the same time, they got
(06:42):
to be directed by truth.
That's right.
And then we we sat them down andsaid, Hey, this is how you do
it.
And I think I think it I thinkmost people said, All right, the
I've been told this in differentways all my life, but this is
the first time someone said, Youneed to dig out the truth that
(07:06):
you have in your truth box andwrite yourself a sermon against
these out-of-control emotions.
And and I think people got it.
I think they finally realized uhwhat was going on in their life.
Yeah, I can hear about it, I canthink about it, I can give
mental assent to it.
Yeah, I need to do these things,I need to stop acting like that,
(07:29):
I need to stop feeling likethis, but I never got a how-to
stop.
unknown (07:34):
Yep, yep.
SPEAKER_01 (07:35):
And I think that's what the sermon sermon series
did.
SPEAKER_02 (07:39):
So we've we've challenged you.
Um you get a lot of truth.
Uh, you know, going to church,listening to sermons, uh digging
in the the scriptures, Biblereading plan.
Maybe you got a devotional youdo in the morning, you listen to
some worship songs.
There's there's trutheverywhere.
Um but we're saying we need tostart building some walls out of
(08:00):
it.
You gotta get it out of thatbox, and for a lot of us, it it
has.
We've just accumulated all thisstuff over the years, but we
haven't taken that next step tostart building something out of
it.
Am I confident that the HolySpirit can grab that Lego at the
right time, just when you needit?
Sure.
Absolutely.
But what how would your lifechange if if you weren't just
(08:24):
waiting around for something tohappen?
You said, Lord, I got a lot ofstuff here in this box.
Help me start building somewalls of truth out of this so
that I don't even get to thatpoint where my anger, my envy,
my my bitterness has just takenover, and now the Holy Spirit's
gotta reach in here to pull meback from the edge.
Right.
(08:45):
Imagine the freedom you couldlive in.
SPEAKER_01 (08:47):
I think the the I won't say the biggest, but the
main point here is we've got torecognize that God has given us
everything we need for godlinessand holiness.
He has given it to us.
Here's the crux.
Will you use it?
(09:08):
And I think not only do we notuse it, but we didn't know how.
But now through this series, wegot a chance to realize that,
hey, I can take, I'm I'mpetrified of tomorrow.
I don't know what's going to goon, but I can take um this
scripture right here where Jesussays uh for me not to fear, I
(09:29):
can take uh this other piece oftruth where he said, Hey, I take
care of the birds, I'll takecare of you.
I all those different things.
And as I as I start buildingthat wall of truth, then when I
fear, I actually run into thatwall and I see all the things
(09:50):
God has promised me.
That he's never gonna forsakeme, that he's always gonna be
with me, that if he takes careof uh if he numbers the hair on
your head, how much moreimportant it is for him to think
about you and your situation.
All those things confront menow.
And I have to turn.
(10:10):
I can't, I can't just say, well,I'm just gonna ignore all that
truth and I'm and I'm going tobelieve in my fear more than I
believe in God.
That's not what happens.
Truth takes over.
And uh we no longer believe inthat lie that God doesn't care
about you, or that uh uh you caneven fix anything in your life
(10:31):
by fear and anxiety or worry.
We we begin to realize that thetruth is all we have and we need
to cling to it, and then itturns us instead of reacting in
fear, it turns us towards Jesusand the author and finisher of
our faith.
That's right.
The man who paid it all for us,and and we get to we get to
(10:54):
confront him instead of ouremotion, which could be really
good or really not good.
SPEAKER_02 (11:04):
Uh, you get down there and that emotion is, you
know, you're whatever it is isleading you to the things of
God, he's gonna say, Come on,this is great, let's do it.
And then if it's not, you'regonna get down there and he's
gonna be like, Really?
What am I down here with youfor?
Right.
Um, you know, maybe you can geta ladder and try to climb up
(11:28):
over top of that wall of truth,but man, it it is gonna redirect
you.
You're either gonna have to takea right or a left, or you're
gonna have to climb up and overit and say, I don't care, I'm
still mad.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (11:38):
Um, which is And I'm not saying that that doesn't
happen sometimes, but you'llhave to climb a wall of through
a wall of truth to get there.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (11:47):
So these walls are are so important to to begin to
just keep our our emotions in aspot where they they can be
servants and not bosses and theycan enrich our lives.
And so um hopefully throughoutthis series, God's been helping
you build those walls.
There's a lot more emotions,like like we acknowledge that we
didn't have time to get through,but the the process is the same.
(12:10):
Whatever that emotion is foryou, dig down in that that Lego
box.
Uh fart start, I think I justsaid fart on the podcast.
Good job.
I apologize for that.
Start building those uh thosewalls of truth that are gonna
keep you from letting youremotions run rampant in in your
life.
Now, this past Sunday, you goton stage wrapping up the series,
(12:35):
and you said something that it'spretty powerful, but I think a
lot of us have, as soon as yousay it, there's this natural
resistance towards you said, youcan't be a better Christian than
you are right now.
A lot of us hear you say thatand go, okay, then that that
(13:00):
sounds good.
Preach is good, but you're notwith me on Monday morning drive
in the middle of rush hour.
You know, you you don't see mewhen, you know, that you know,
other teams' dads picking on mykid at the t-ball game.
Uh, you don't see me in thosemoments.
I if you came around and spent aweek with me, you would you'd
acknowledge there's some roomfor improvement here.
(13:23):
And so what do you mean when yousay you can't be a better
Christian than you are rightnow?
What what do you what do youmean by that?
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
There's a a doctrine that says just a simple phrase,
it says the already but not yet.
And when Jesus saved you, hesaved you completely.
And he says, I have made youperfect.
(13:51):
We are perfect in him.
That transaction that we talkedabout on Sunday is when when I
placed all my guilt on Jesus, heI was trying to think of the
word that uh old King James usedto uh uh use imputed.
Yeah, imputation he imputed hisrighteousness to us.
(14:16):
His righteousness can't beimproved on.
Once you are in Christ, you areperfect in God's eyes.
Now, in our own eyes and in theeyes of people around us, we're
like, well, he could he coulduse a lot of improvement, but to
God, you can't be improved.
You are perfect.
And you can't be a betterChristian than you already are,
(14:38):
you can't be more accepted thanyou already are, you can't be
more loved than you already are.
You just there's no there's noway around this, Christian.
I know you want to takeresponsibility uh for your
actions, stand up and be countedand all that kind of good male
macho-ness that we all have.
(14:59):
But the truth is only Jesuscould pay that price for you,
and he already has.
SPEAKER_02 (15:07):
I think that that's the resistance right there is I
need to pay for it.
You know?
Tim, if you followed me around,you'd see there there's room for
improvement, and you're saying,okay, yeah, but but God already
loves you.
Okay, God loves me.
But I still did that thing.
(15:30):
And I need to pay.
I need to pay for what I did.
And in every other area of life,that's true.
You know, you you get a speedingticket, you gotta pay.
You gotta pay.
Um, you show up late to workonce, twice, third time, well,
you you're gonna have to pay,right?
These things every area of life.
And then we come to God and wesay, All right, God, I
(15:53):
understand you love me.
I'm yours, I'm in your family,that's all great.
But I I did this thing.
And whatever that thing was foryou, you think, now I gotta go
pay.
I gotta do my time, you know,give my dues, whatever it is, I
gotta pay for this thing.
And the the Christian life sayssomeone already did.
SPEAKER_01 (16:16):
And the problem, I think, with us thinking in along
those lines is our justicesystem is not God's justice
system.
And when we think, yeah, I Ishould pay for that.
Yeah, well, you don't reallywant to pay the full cost of
that.
You want to pay what yourjustice is system says.
(16:39):
You need to be a littleembarrassed, it need to cost you
a little something, and thenyou'll be free.
No, Jesus says you can't paythat price.
What is the wages of sin?
SPEAKER_03 (16:50):
Death.
Death.
SPEAKER_02 (16:52):
So, yeah, you think no, no, no, no, no.
I mean, what I did isn't we'renot talking the death penalty,
you know, it's just this littlething.
And God looks at you and says,Oh no.
Kill 'em.
Yeah.
That's the penalty.
Death.
And so to say, you know, I gottapay, what you're saying is
right.
(17:12):
If we understood truly thedepravity of our sinful nature
and and how sick and awful sinis, if we truly understood that,
we'd be jumping out of the wayof paying that penalty.
We'd be like, no, no, no, holdon.
Jesus, he got it.
He's he's got it for me.
SPEAKER_01 (17:34):
If we knew the truth, and uh that's why Jesus
came and that's why he died,because I don't think we'll
we'll ever know the cost of oursin.
And uh maybe, maybe when we getuh to the end of time it'll be
revealed to us.
Uh but Jesus paid our pricebecause you couldn't pay it.
(17:58):
That's right.
And we have to first of all, wehave to to humble ourselves to
that point and understand thatthere's no way I could pay this.
You know, Jesus said uh toldthat parable about uh the one
who is forgiven uh less and theone who's forgiven more who
(18:18):
loves God more, and it's it'salways the one who's been
forgiven more.
And we see that in our own liveswhen you're a pretty good dad,
and uh you haven't divorced yourwife and you haven't cheated on
her, and you pay your taxes, andyou know you're a pretty good
person, and you think uh I loveJesus, uh, but it's not it's not
(18:39):
moving me anyway.
But then you see someone whojust gets out of prison and
meets Jesus for the first timeand he says, You're perfect,
you're clean in me.
And you see them live for Jesus,it's a different thing.
You know why?
Because you don't think you'rethat bad.
And that that is that is theplague on moral Christianity is
(19:06):
yeah, I'm I'm a pretty good guy.
You know, God probably likes me.
He's probably he probably likesthe fact that I chose him.
SPEAKER_02 (19:13):
Yeah, if he if he if he was getting a golf or some,
he'd probably invite me to bepart of the team.
SPEAKER_01 (19:17):
Right.
And that's all that is is pride.
Jesus paid the price that youcouldn't pay.
There's no way you could pay itwithout giving up your life.
And we need to praise him forthat.
And not it's almostdisrespectful to say, I need to
pay.
(19:38):
You know, it's disrespectingwhat he did for humanity on the
cross.
SPEAKER_02 (19:43):
Either what he did wasn't enough, and so I gotta
pay too, or insulting in theother direction to say, Well, I
didn't deserve death, but youknow, I'm I gotta do this little
thing over here.
Either one misses what what sinis um and what Jesus truly
accomplished for us on thecross.
And so it's man, imagine thatfreedom of I don't have to to
(20:09):
perform for this.
I'm I'm his, you know.
My kids, they're mine.
And sometimes they act likeknuckleheads, man.
Um but they're mine.
And God looks at you the sameway.
Sometimes, golly, he's an idiot,but he's mine, and he's holy,
(20:29):
and he's loved, and he didn'thave to perform for that.
Um if we could rest in that,man, I think we would the
Christian life would be so muchfreer.
SPEAKER_01 (20:41):
Well, we grow up in a a culture of performance.
You know, we're always trying tokind of climb to the top of the
ladder and wherever we findourselves, and uh, we get up in
the morning, we leave the house,and we go to work, and we want
to climb to that top of theladder.
And uh even in our um being athome with our family, we want to
be the best family man I can be.
(21:03):
I want to be the best husband,the best dad.
And those ladders uh make sensein life.
Yeah, you want to be the bestthat you can be, and there's
nothing wrong with that.
But when it comes to yourrelationship with God, he's the
best that you can be, and youlet you let him be that for you.
(21:24):
And that's that's the only wayyou can live in that context is
that you you are now, you youthat imputation when he put his
righteousness on you, you can'tbe a better you.
Now, one day you'll you'llrecognize that because uh we're
(21:44):
gonna be changed.
And just in a moment in the airor coming out of the ground,
you're gonna be changed, andyou'll be like Jesus.
SPEAKER_02 (21:53):
And you will be like him.
Like him.
SPEAKER_01 (21:56):
And it'll be the it'll be the the most freaking
and maybe that's That time whenyou look back and say, Oh my
gosh, praise God.
He saved me.
And I, you know, we use thatword saved all the time, and and
we get made fun of.
I mean, we had a a sitcom calledSaved on TV there for a while.
(22:18):
All the all the people who hateGod making fun of us and using
our words.
But man, for us as a Christian,that is the word.
You are saved.
SPEAKER_02 (22:30):
Makes me think of um oh his name just slipped my
mind.
Uh I just quoted him in asermon.
He he would go and confess hissins over and over and over
again.
Who was that?
Um Martin Luther?
Martin Luther.
Good night.
Spurgeon was the only thingcoming into my head, and I'm
like, that wasn't Spurgeon.
(22:50):
Um and you know, I've I've kindof joked a few times about his
story because literally he wouldgo and confess, and they'd be
like, please come back whenyou've actually done something.
But I think, man, the truth isthe the closer we get to Jesus,
the more we our imperfectionsbecome clear.
(23:13):
I mean, it's like if you couldimagine this, you know, if you
had something way out in thedark and it, you know, I don't
know, maybe it was your kid'ssoccer ball, he's left it
outside, and you know, theleather's peeling off, it's got
mud all over it.
You know, it's it's not adefinitely not a new looking
soccer ball.
But out in the dark, it justlooks like a soccer ball.
But you start bringing thatthing closer and closer and
(23:34):
closer to the light, and all ofa sudden you realize, okay, it
might be time to go get a newsoccer ball.
This thing's pretty messed up.
Um, and I think the same thinghappens with is the closer we
get to Jesus, the more werealize our imperfections and
and all the places where we'velet them down and we failed
them.
And so you get a guy likeLuther, and now he was a little
(23:57):
messed up in his theology atfirst.
Um, and he thought, man, I gotto go to confession over and
over and over again.
But I think he was right on thecusp of something.
He's like, Man, I the more Istudy, the closer I get, the
more I realize how how messed upI am.
The problem is a lot of us we'reliving our lives out in the dark
(24:18):
and we don't think we're doingall that bad.
We it looks like a soccer ball.
But you get close to the lightwhen when you stack our life up
against holiness and perfection,all of a sudden it becomes
really clear we're not that.
And I think Luther was sensingthat.
And his his thing was, man, I Igotta, I gotta perform.
(24:40):
I gotta do this stuff.
I gotta, I gotta, I gotta, Igotta.
And that's that's the culture weall live in today.
It's the culture our kids arebeing raised in.
I mean, from the moment they cankick a ball or swing a bat,
they're at practice every day.
Um, it's about performance.
You then they try to go tocollege and they're trying to
get in college, and well, man,we're you know, we got hundreds,
hundreds and hundreds ofapplicants, and and we're only
(25:01):
taking so many of them.
And it's all about performance.
How's your SAT scores?
How was your interviews and andall this stuff, and it's it's
performance, performance.
And so we come to God and we wetake the same exact approach.
And then the thing that Lutherfound is it's not that, it's by
grace through faith.
(25:22):
And when I do that, there's thattransaction that takes place
where I God takes all of my sinand he assigns it to Jesus, and
then the righteousness ofChrist, he assigns to me so that
when God looks at me, he doesn'tsee that old soccer ball laying
out in the yard.
He sees the brand new onesitting on the shelf that's
never been kicked, the perfectspotless lamb of God.
(25:44):
He sees his son when he looks atyou.
SPEAKER_01 (25:47):
I think we well, it's it's our culture that kind
of makes us that that way.
I think we look at well, how didJames say it?
We you're like a guy who looksin the mirror and sees faces
dirty and then forgets and justwalks.
Right, whatever.
And then we've spent our livesdoing that, thinking that we're
(26:08):
pretty good because we haven'ttaken a real good look at it.
But thank God for uh a freshwin, because we're about
discovering more in Jesus.
And if you focus not onperformance, but discovering
more of Jesus in your life.
If he is your uh in the sermon Iwas talking about, you need to
(26:29):
fix your eyes on Jesus and onthings that are above his
righteous work for you on thecross, um, what his resurrection
means for you, what is lovely,what is pure.
Paul went through all thosethings.
When we do that, we begin todiscover more in Jesus, and
we're looking through what Paulsaid, that glass darkly, but we
(26:51):
want to see him face to face,and we begin to see the things
in the glass that is obscuringJesus from us.
So we want to we want to fixthat, wipe that off.
What is that?
That's bitterness.
I need to get rid of that so Ican discover more in Jesus.
(27:12):
You know, this is I'm I'm justpetrified.
I can't leave the house.
And I'm not seeing, you gotta,you gotta deal with that.
Wipe that off so you candiscover more of Jesus.
And I I think that's that's whatwe're trying to teach people
here.
Listen, you've you've heard thetruth.
Now you gotta preach it back toyourself, and you gotta build
(27:34):
these these walls for theseemotions so they don't get you
in trouble.
Your emotions are not causingyou to sin, but they're
influencing you to sin.
What's the scripture say?
Be angry, but do not sin.
That means angry is not a badthing.
It's not a good thing.
(27:55):
It can be a bad thing, and itcan be a good thing.
It depends on the the hallway oftruth that it's going uh uh uh
existing in.
And that is something that everyChristian has to do.
They've they've got to takethose things that are blocking
their view of Christ in thislife and build truth walls
(28:18):
against them and wipe them offthat glass so you can discover
more in Jesus Christ.
That's what we're doing here atA Fresh Wind.
We want you to join with us anddo that and be a family, a
church of people that that arehelping each other do that so we
can discover more.
SPEAKER_02 (28:38):
When we live this way, it's no longer about
performance, right?
Of trying to to earn somethingor or get more of God's approval
or love.
You were teaching us he can'tget any more.
He can't love you anymore thanhe already does.
Um it becomes, man, I I want tosee him.
And whatever whatever would getin the way of that, I would
(29:01):
gladly get rid of.
I Lord, if is this keeping mefrom you?
Let's get rid of it.
I mean, yeah, the more youdiscover in Christ, the closer
you get to him, the moregrateful you are for what he's
done on the cross.
And then all this performanceculture that we all live in, it
looks silly.
You're like, man, there wasnothing I could have done.
(29:24):
Um and so then we just begin torest in that.
Man, he's already done it forme.
And I man, I want to go knowmore about him.
Why why would you do that forme?
You know, and anything thatwould keep me from getting close
to him, I'm gonna get rid ofthose things.
Absolutely.
And so we can't let things likeour emotions keep us distracted
(29:47):
and running around, chasing ourtails because this guy cut you
off on the highway, or or thatkid said something, you know, to
your kid.
And what yeah, you know what?
There's things we need to getmad about at times.
Sure, be angry, do not sin, butman, we we let them control our
lives.
We're saying, no, let it letthese truth walls take those
emotions and run them right tothe feet of Jesus.
(30:09):
And then when they get there,you're gonna confront them and
he's gonna say, Hey, really?
SPEAKER_01 (30:14):
What's going on here?
You know, it's it's if you thinkabout it, it is kind of funny.
He's forgiven you past, present,and future.
He can't forgive you any morethan he's already forgiven you.
And we're always saying, Oh,God, please forgive me.
And it's like, uh done.
Next.
Come on.
Are we gonna be here forever?
(30:36):
You know, I was wondering whathe's thinking about Martin
Luther.
Uh, okay, there's people allaround you that need to hear the
gospel.
And you're here in theconfessional again.
Let's go.
You know, and we we need to bewe need to confess our sins.
That's that's the way God pokesat us and and says, hey, look at
this.
(30:56):
And we need to confess them.
Um but he's already forgiventhem.
But we do need to confess themso that we can agree that this
is wrong in our life.
But he's already forgiven them.
When you when you called himLord and Savior and believe in
your heart that God raised himfrom the dead, this transaction
(31:16):
occurred.
You have the righteousness ofGod in Jesus Christ, and you are
forgiven.
And your sins have been paidfor.
It's an it's a past thing.
Even though you haven't donedone it yet, it's already taken
care of in the past.
He was crucified before thefoundation of the world, just
(31:39):
for you, if you're in ChristJesus.
And we need to live like that.
We need to stop.
Oh, I'm a lousy Christian, I'm alousy this, I'm a lousy that.
Sometimes I think that's justexcuses for us um not to live in
in peace.
And you say, well, that would bestupid excuse to not live in
(32:01):
peace.
Hey, one thing I've we talkedearlier uh today about humans
are very complicated.
You know how you took um how youtook envy and fear and put them
(32:21):
together.
That's complicated.
That's complicated.
How can your fear come fromenvy?
And once you dig into it, youstart to realize, hey, and
people are complicated.
But you know what I found in thelast 25 years of doing this is a
lot of people love their sorrow.
They love their hurt, they lovetheir depression, and they don't
(32:46):
they don't want to be free.
But Christian, in this room,when you're with Jesus and the
Father, you are complete.
And all this performance, allthis uh look at me, look how sad
I am.
Look how sad I am about my sin.
That doesn't apply to Jesus, itdoesn't apply to the Father, and
(33:08):
it doesn't apply to the HolySpirit who's trying to teach you
truth.
We need to grab the truth of theWord of God and live like it.
Live like it.
And that means you can't be abetter Christian than you
already are.
You have the righteousness ofGod in Christ Jesus.
You can't be more forgiven thanyou already are, it's already
(33:29):
been bought and paid for.
You are free and be happy.
SPEAKER_02 (33:37):
Not only are you free, scripture says God has
given us everything you need tolive a life of godliness, to do
what pleases him.
And so you get you you know, youlook in that Lego box and it's
full of all those truths and allthose little things that you've
picked up over the years.
This is God giving you some ofthat stuff that you need.
Um now we're challenging you godo the hard work, dig in that
(34:02):
Lego box, and start buildingsome of these walls.
Whatever that emotion is foryou, we didn't cover them all.
I know.
But we've given you theresources that you need and and
hopefully showed you someexamples of how you can do this
and start building those wallsup so that you end up right at
the feet of Jesus every singletime.
I'll tell you when it came toguilt and anxiety, fear and
(34:26):
envy, what was the answer?
The gospel.
Absolutely the answer, right?
And these things just look sillyin the face of the Savior who's
given everything for you.
What do you have to be afraidof?
What do you have to be anxiousabout?
He's given you it all, he's doneall of it for you, and so now we
(34:46):
we just take those things, weput those walls in.
Man, the Christian life, it'slike you just unlocked.
You talked about how the cagehas been unlocked, but a lot of
us don't walk out.
The doors open.
Go out, explore, live life tothe full, and it's gonna be
rich, it's gonna be satisfying,it's gonna be abundant.
(35:06):
Why?
Because Jesus said that's why hecame.
That was the purpose.
And even those heart emotions,you know, you talked about
sorrow.
It's like, who wants to dealwith sorrow?
But man, even sorrow is meant toenrich your life.
And and you take that and yourun it to the feet of Jesus
because you lost someone youloved, and you end up right
there at the gospel that says, Igot them, and you're gonna see
(35:30):
him again.
SPEAKER_01 (35:31):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (35:31):
And I get this rope of hope that's thrown down to me
so I can climb out of my sorrowand say, Man, thank you, Jesus,
that you have them.
And I can't wait to get to seehim one day.
That's even there, you can feelthe sorrow, you can feel that
emotion, and it doesn't takeover your life and and throw you
(35:52):
into this downward spiral ofdepression or whatever it would
be.
Because you know, man, I'm gonnaget to see him again.
How awesome is that?
How awesome is my God.
SPEAKER_01 (36:04):
I think we uh we should wrap it up right here
because you know, Corinthianstells us that it's the Holy
Spirit that teaches you the deepthings of God.
Now, we preach this whole seriesand we're really smart.
You know, we are we are thepreeminent pastors in this
little classroom that we're inat church right now.
(36:27):
And we are no one's smarter.
No one's smarter than us two inthis little classroom in the
back of the church.
But let me tell you this it'sthe Holy Spirit that's gonna
reveal these things to you asyou build these walls.
But you have to do that work andlet the Holy Spirit teach you
the deep things of God.
(36:48):
I'm afraid.
And the Holy Spirit says, let'sget into the word, let's build
these walls, and I'll show youthat you don't have to fear
anything but me.
That's right.
And that's this is this is thepracticality of what we what
we've taught.
And uh we'll probably have tobring this up next year or a
couple years from now becausepeople need to learn to do this
(37:12):
process.
And we're hoping that you youengage with the Holy Spirit and
uh and begin to build thesewalls and change your life.
SPEAKER_02 (37:21):
So, how do you start building them?
I would encourage you get aconcordance out or go to Google,
you know.
If some of you like aconcordance, we're getting old,
Tim.
We've been doing this a while.
Yeah.
Uh you can go to Google and youknow, give me verses about fear
and and start putting them,writing them down, or copy and
paste them into a a note app inyour phone or whatever it is,
(37:44):
and you and then startmemorizing those things, start
building that wall.
You can go, I I would encourageyou when you're here on Sunday
mornings, take notes, or at thevery least, take the notes that
we give you, download them andput them somewhere.
Right.
Um and now you can go and youcan look at those things.
Okay, oh, yep, that that onethat really means something to
(38:05):
me when it comes to fear.
Oh, that thing really helped me.
Even if you're watching a, youknow, I would say one of your
favorite preachers, but yourfavorite preachers are probably
right here.
In this little room.
In this little room, back of thechurch.
But if you're watching anotherpreacher who says something, you
can write that down.
If it's a lyric in a song thatthat sticks out to you, write it
down.
And I would you always want togo back to scripture.
(38:28):
His word is truth.
Absolutely.
So that's the basis foreverything.
But write those things down andthen start thinking on them,
chewing on them, and then say,Lord, that that ministers to me
in this area of fear or anxietyor my unforgiveness, my
bitterness, my rage, whatever itis.
Help me put this block here sothat when I when I that emotion
(38:51):
comes up, it doesn't take over.
I want it to run smack dab intothis truth of who you are.
And build those walls.
SPEAKER_01 (39:00):
And it's in it's important.
Listen, you know what you'redealing with.
You know, you know if it's angeror lust or or whatever uh
emotion, depression.
You know what you're lookingfor.
And when you hear it, grab it.
Grab it and hide it in yourheart and say, Holy Spirit, take
this truth from your word andchange me.
SPEAKER_02 (39:21):
That I might not sin against you.
SPEAKER_01 (39:22):
Pastor Tim, will you pray for us?
Father, I want to lift up ourchurch to you.
Thank you for this truth.
Thank you for um forcing me andRyan down this um tunnel to
preach on this, to give yourpeople a fighting chance with
your truth to discover more inyou.
(39:44):
Thank you that we don't have toperform for you.
Thank you that you did it allfor us on the cross.
Thank you that we're therighteousness of God in Jesus
Christ.
And let us live free.
In Jesus' name.
Amen.
Amen.
SPEAKER_00 (39:59):
Thanks again for joining us for this episode of
the Midweek Podcast.
We'd love to hear from you.
Let us know how God is usingthis resource in your life or
send any podcast questions ortopic ideas to podcast at a
freshwind.org.
If you would like to supportthis ministry financially and
help us continue offering newresources that equip you to
discover more in Christ, simplytext any amount to the number
(40:23):
84321.
We're so grateful for yoursupport.
Make sure to tune in next weekfor a brand new episode of the
Midweek Podcast.
Be blessed and have a greatweek.
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