July 5, 2025 • 25 mins
Have you ever felt like Moses—called to something greater but weighed down by insecurity or a sense that you're not qualified? In this first episode of our "Planning for Your Purpose" series, we unpack the profound truth that God has designed you with intention and purpose before you were even born.
We begin by reframing the familiar story of Moses through a modern lens, revealing how his journey mirrors our own search for identity and purpose. Despite his speech impediment, his mistakes, and his insecurities, Moses became one of history's greatest leaders because he ultimately surrendered to God's direction. Your story might look different on the surface, but the principles remain the same.
Through practical exercises, we guide you to identify your God-given strengths, passions, and the things that bring you genuine joy—all potential signposts toward your unique calling. We explore critical qualifiers to test whether what you're pursuing truly aligns with divine purpose: Does it align with God's will? Does it use your gifts? Does it transform you to become more like Christ? These questions cut through the noise of well-meaning but potentially misguided ambitions.
Perhaps most importantly, we address the challenging reality that your calling might require you to operate in areas of weakness, make significant sacrifices, or experience periods where progress feels painfully slow. Brandon vulnerably shares how following God's call meant uprooting his entire life from Minnesota to San Diego and joining the military—a difficult transition that ultimately aligned with God's greater purpose. Your purpose journey will have both moments of celebration and periods that feel like "pushing a truck uphill," but the key is persistent obedience through both.
Whether you're just beginning to explore what God might be calling you to or you're seeking confirmation about a direction you've been sensing, this episode provides both biblical foundation and practical next steps toward living with divine intention. Download our accompanying resources at our Instagram (@ontrack_official) and join us next week as we dive deeper into adopting God's attributes as you pursue your unique purpose.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Essentially, moses was a man that followed the
direction God wanted to take himand, ultimately, god had
purpose over his life before hewas even born, despite him not
knowing his identity.
Hey guys, welcome back toOnTrack Podcast with your host,
(00:25):
brandon and Isabel Diamond.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hey guys.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
We look forward to inviting y'all into these
upcoming episodes.
As we previously took the timeto outline our desires for where
we want to take this podcastMoving forward, we'll be
breaking up various conceptsinto multiple part series in
order to be as thorough aspossible and to allow the
information to be digestible.
The five-week series we arediving into first is called
(00:52):
Planning for your Purpose.
This will ultimately leveragegreater personal awareness of
your own God-given purpose andoutline practical steps and
tools to implement to make thatpurpose come to life.
In today's episode, we'll bediscussing the plans that are
set before you in accordancewith what the Lord says in
scripture how to realisticallyapply the things taught and grow
(01:15):
into the man or woman he iscalling you to be.
We hope you are able to sitback, relax and enjoy this
week's episode.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
I want to share a portion of my friend Sarah's
story because it highlights whatwe want to dive into on this
episode.
So my friend Sarah, she camefrom a family that didn't have a
ton and they were kind of in alot of various crises growing up
, and so when she was born, sheended up being put for adoption
(01:58):
very early on after she was bornand she was adopted into a
family of wealth and power andshe was never disclosed ever,
even as an adult, that she wasadopted, and so throughout her
life she kind of felt this likeidentity crisis, where she knew
she was out of place but yet shedidn't have any information or
(02:20):
evidence to believe that sheshould feel out of place.
And because of the wealth thatshe was born into, she actually
got a position in hergrandfather's company and her
grandfather basically ran thismassive company overseeing so
many different employees.
And, yeah, sarah had a lot ofdifferent responsibilities
(02:42):
within that.
But over time she started torealize that there was just kind
of a lot of corruption withinthe company and she didn't care
for that at all, and so sheended up doing something that
put a target on her back andactually ended up getting an
employee injured in some waysand a lot of the people within
(03:03):
the company, not recognizingwhat she was doing, ended up
just like, yeah, not having it,and she felt like she had to
leave the city because of theissues going in or occurring
within this company and hergrandfather was very upset at
her as well and so she ended upjust leaving everything that she
(03:24):
knew and shortly after sheended up meeting her husband and
having a family and just kindof having this sequestered life
until the Lord powerfullyencountered her and she had
never heard the Lord's voice theway that she had in this moment
and nor did she ever reallyunderstand what having a
relationship with God lookedlike.
(03:45):
But God made it very clear whather calling and her purpose was
in this season, and it was to goback to that city that she was
born in and to basically shutdown her grandfather's company
because the company was justreally bad for the employees,
really bad for the city.
It was just, all in all, yeah,not good, and so she felt
(04:05):
incredibly ill-equipped.
She had a speech impediment andso that enabled disenabled her
from feeling confident in likestanding up for herself and also
taking on this big task.
But she ended up, confidentlyto some degree, going back to
the city and talking to hergrandfather and trying to
(04:25):
convince him to shut down hiscompany.
But every time her grandfatherdenied her request, and whenever
that happened, there was justsomething like eerie.
That happened within the cityor within the company where,
like, either a lot of people gotseverely sick or there were
just like severe weatherconditions that put a lot of
people in closed down quarters,or some people ended up dying as
(04:52):
well in some instances, and hergrandfather ended up getting
personally affected whenever hewould deny Sarah's request,
would deny Sarah's request, andso after a while, it just became
super taxing and the citybecame just like less, like not
well off, and just started todepreciate, and so eventually,
(05:16):
sarah's grandpa allowed thecompany to shut down and a lot
of the employees were able toleverage freedom that they had
never experienced before, andthey ended up leaving the city
entirely because they justneeded to get away.
And this led Sarah on her nextjourney, where she was basically
(05:37):
, in a lot of ways, shepherdingand leading all of these people
for a very, very long time, andthe Lord actually gave her some
instructions on how to leadthese people that allowed just
more order and more wisdom, andit took some time, but
eventually a lot of these peoplefrom this company were able to
(05:58):
get to a completely differentplace, and that place was called
the promised land.
And my friend, sarah is not areal person.
It's more of an illustration ofthe story of Moses.
So Sarah is Moses in the Bible,and if you've never heard of
the story of Moses, you just did.
And Moses was a really, reallyincredible human being.
(06:24):
But he was also very much sosimilar to you and me.
He was very normal and heexperienced a lot of things that
we all experience Lots ofpersonal doubt, lots of
grappling with his walk with theLord and navigating and hearing
his voice and leading out thecalling over his life.
He had to make so manysacrifices to be obedient to God
(06:45):
and he had a lot ofinsecurities as well, like the
Lord told him to let all thesepeople free, let all these
people free.
Moses had a speech impedimentand he felt ill-equipped to lead
and speak, to leverage this,and so, yeah, there was just a
lot in and through that.
But, all to say, god still usedMoses, even though he actually
(07:08):
ended up killing one of theEgyptians out of rage because he
just saw how the Israeliteswere being treated as slaves.
And so, yeah, moses did a lotof things that he wasn't proud
of and he did struggle withidentity because he was adopted
and he wasn't an Egyptian, hewas an Israelite.
And so, yeah, there's a lot ofthings to relate to in this
(07:30):
story and we'd highly encourageyou to explore it in scripture,
but we share it just to reel youin to say, hey, there's a lot
of things to relate to inscripture and there's a lot of
similarities with these bigpeople that we think are beyond
what we could be.
You know, moses, god used Mosesto part the Red Sea, to part an
(07:51):
entire ocean for people tocross.
Like that's insane, but thosestories and those stories can
still happen today and God isstill as powerful.
So, yeah, we just want to segueinto kind of how that relates
to what we want to share today.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Essentially, moses was a man that followed the
direction God wanted to take himand ultimately, god had a
purpose over his life before hewas even born.
Despite him not knowing hisidentity, he was able to walk
and listen to the Lord's voiceand continue down this direction
.
He felt incapable of achieving,and I think that's what a lot
(08:33):
of us feel when we are goingafter our purpose or not really
understanding what it is we'remeant to do within this lifetime
.
So I think it's crucial for usto understand the story of Moses
in order to then understand thedifferent qualifiers but we'll
go through that later in thisepisode of what qualifies me to
live out my purpose and how am Igoing to understand the desires
(08:58):
within my heart that are fromthe Lord.
So here's the definition of apurpose.
God-given purpose is not aboutpersonal desires or achievements
, but aligning one's life withGod's plan and contributing to
his kingdom.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
That's great, and I think it's always valuable to
look at scriptures thathighlight this even further.
So we have our classic Jeremiah29, 11, for I know the plans I
have for you, declares the Lord.
Plans to prosper you and not toharm you.
Plans to give you a hope and afuture, and this verse is often
cited to show that God has aspecific, intentional plan for
(09:34):
each life Ephesians 2, 10,.
For we are God's handiwork,created in Christ Jesus to do
good works, which God preparedin advance for us to do.
This clearly states that wewere created for a purpose To do
good works.
God has already planned InProverbs 19.21,.
Many are the plans in aperson's heart, but it is the
(09:55):
Lord's purpose that prevails.
And again, this shows that,even though we make plans, god's
greater purpose for our livesultimately stands.
And it's important to recognizein all of these scriptures and
even with us having an ultimatepurpose, is that work is good.
God created work before the fall, and what that means is that,
(10:16):
before sin entered the world,god actually gave Adam and Eve
the task of attending to theGarden of Eden and taking care
of the agriculture and theanimals, and that was a great
thing.
You know, a man without apurpose, a man without good work
to do, is a man that'ssusceptible to falling into sin
(10:38):
and falling into things that arenot good for their soul, and so
I think it's just important, aswe move forward, to not just
fall into this pit of like oh my, nine to five is atrocious, or
how can I get out of work, orhow can I work less, or how can
I do something with my life?
That's going to make me feellike I can just relax, so to
speak.
But it's like if you can findsomething that aligns with your
(10:59):
purpose, that is good work, thenthat's exactly what we're
trying to pinpoint.
All right, brandon, so you'regoing to walk us through a
starting exercise that we can doto kind of just explore this
idea of identifying purpose.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
Yeah, so basically, this exercise is just going to
be a brainstorming exercise tosee your strengths, weaknesses
and the different things you'reskilled or passionate or want to
learn about, in order to reallybegin to understand what it is
that the Lord is calling you to.
And I think he does that, hasthat ability through
(11:35):
understanding your own heart andthe things that really bring
you joy, and he really wants usto be joyful.
And so we're just going to take10 to 15 minutes and, whether
you're driving or at the gym orwalking, if you're in a quiet
space, if you have the ability,either just think through it
mentally or put your pen topaper and just jot down the
(11:59):
things that you believe you'reskilled at, or ask a friend and
or ask yourself what you reallyare skilled at, what you're
passionate about and or what youwould really be joyful to learn
and to understand.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Yeah, that's good, and I think I love doing
exercises like this because itreally helps me reflect.
I think sometimes I'm in theseperpetual cycles of doing things
that I don't enjoy and then I'mtrying to convince myself that
I do enjoy them, and so it islike a good pause to be like, oh
, actually there's some thingsthat I've put to the side that I
think could really be more inalignment with my calling,
(12:39):
because ultimately, we're allcalled to different things and
the Lord wants you to discoverthat he doesn't want you to fall
within a career or within a jobfor many years that is not
ultimately aligned with who hecreated you to be and what he
created you to do, ultimatelyaligned with who he created you
to be and what he created you todo.
And I didn't mention thisearlier.
But the greatest commandmentthat God has ever given us is to
love him and to love others.
(13:00):
So, again, there's all thesenuances in careers and jobs and
things to occupy our time, butultimately those things will or
should align with our jobs andour careers and things like that
.
And so, yeah, we're going todive into some qualifiers that
(13:20):
Brandon's going to step intojust to kind of help us
understand a little bit like oh,I'm excited and joyful about
this, but does it actually alignwith what God has for me?
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Yeah, so some qualifiers to understanding what
the Lord is calling you to.
The enemy is going to reallytry to wiggle his way in and try
to break you down in the thingsthat you really do find joy in
and the things that are yourstrengths.
But the things that arestrengths is where the enemy
wants to work the most.
(13:51):
And so there's just threequestions you should ask
yourself is when pursuingsomething?
And the first one is going tobe living in alignment with
God's will.
This involves allowing God toguide and direct your life
rather than you feel the need todirect your own.
And the second thing isutilizing your gifts and
(14:14):
strengths.
God gives individuals uniquetalents and abilities that are
meant to be used for his kingdomand ultimately giving him glory
, rather than you taking thecredit for the things you're
doing yourself.
And the third thing is going tobe coming like Christ.
(14:45):
God's purpose for believers isto be transformed into the image
of his son.
God's purpose for believers isto be transformed into the image
of his son, which was theliving testimony of what're
passionate about.
Aren't allowing you to be morelike Christ, then that's not
necessarily a good reflection,or those desires may not be
(15:05):
reflective of God's heart foryour life.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Yeah, that's great to just have some baseline points
to look back on and say, okay,like is, that are the things
that I'm excited aboutultimately aligning with, yeah,
some qualifiers for what Christwants for our lives.
And then, kind of on the flipside of that, you know, there's
some things that we need to keepin mind.
Your calling actually mightrequire you to operate in your
own perceived weakness.
So, for example, going back toMoses, you know Moses had a
(15:40):
speech impediment and so he wassuper insecure about his ability
to speak and his ability tolead people.
Yet God told him to talk toPharaoh and to let his people go
, and that was extremely nervewracking.
But you know why God asks us tooperate in our weakness?
Because that's how God's gloryis really revealed.
(16:04):
And, like Brandon said, it'slike if we were just operating
completely in our strengths,then people from the outside
might be like, oh yeah, they're,they're just talented or
skillful in that, so that's whythey're successful.
But if we're able to be usedwith our weakness, then people
kind of look at that person andthink, how are they, you know,
doing that thing so well?
(16:24):
And then we can say, oh, it'sbecause of God working in and
through me.
And so that's just something tokeep in mind where sometimes
you might say, oh, this isclearly not aligned with my
purpose because I'm not good atit.
But it's like, well, actually,you know, God might want to do
something in and through thatand then your calling might
require you to sacrifice a lotup front.
You know, sometimes, you know,on a more extreme end, like if
(16:51):
God asks you to be a missionaryand to like completely uproot
your life, you might have toquit your job and move your
whole family and sell all yourthings right.
And for Moses, I mean, he hadto sacrifice a lot and at one
point he left everything that heknew to discover God in a
completely different environment.
And sometimes you're going tohave to do that, but the upfront
costs and the upfrontsacrifices are going to be so
worth it because God ultimatelyhas the best plan for your life.
(17:14):
So if you find yourselfpanicking because you're like,
oh, I think I discovered mypurpose, but it's going to
require me to move out of a cityor to make these like big,
drastic changes, one thing isjust to consult people that are
walking with the Lord to reallygain clarity on that.
But it might not be completelyout of the picture, because God
(17:34):
often does that for people andasks people to make some really
big decisions.
And then another one is juststraight up.
You know, being Christian ishard period.
It's full of a lot of deep joys, but there are, yeah, just a
lot of difficulties being aChristian.
Christians are the mostpersecuted.
The enemy doesn't like usbecause we're on the winning
(17:56):
team and of course we'll diveinto that even more within
further episodes.
But it's just important torealize that knowing and
identifying your purpose doesn'tmean that your life's
automatically going to seemright or seem easy or start to
make sense.
It will make more sense onceyou identify your purpose, but
that doesn't mean that it'sgoing to be entirely easy.
(18:16):
Another piece of the puzzle topay attention to is that once
you get to a place where you'relike, okay, I've identified my
strengths, I know you know someweaknesses that the Lord wants
me to press into and I haveconfirmation, you can get super
excited and let's just likecelebrate for you.
(18:36):
But there's also going to be apoint where you try to implement
or you make these changes andit just feels like trying to
push a truck up a hill right.
Or it might even feel like adumpster fire or something like
that, and you're like, oh, look,why isn't this happening the
way I had envisioned it tohappen?
Or why aren't things movingfast enough?
And I think there will be like atesting period of like okay, do
(18:57):
you trust the Lord, that he hasspoken, and will you be
diligent in moving forward withwhat he's called you to do?
And so, yeah, just keep that inmind.
And also, things take time.
Things are gradual.
Change happens does not happenovernight.
And yeah, you just have to bekind to yourself and say like,
okay, if this is what God'scalled me, to ask the Lord to be
(19:19):
clear with you in terms of,yeah, what does today look like,
what does this week look like?
In terms, of, yeah, what doestoday look like, what does this
week look like?
And we're excited to explorejust more practicals in the
future when it comes to planningout your purpose diligently,
day by day.
But, yeah, just keep that inmind that things might feel
discouraging after you get tocelebrate and get excited about
(19:42):
what it is that God's called youto do.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, that's really good, and something that we just
previously discussed is lifeisn't going to be sunshine and
rainbows all the time, and Ithink, to some degree, we expect
that to be the case when we'restarting something new, but it's
(20:04):
going to take hardship.
It's going to take hardship,it's going to take failure.
It's going to allow us tocontinually attempt to learn,
which is what failure stands foris first attempt in learning,
and I think that's just a goodcontinual reminder to keep in
the back of our mind is thatfailure is just going to
continue to allow us to keep inthe back of our mind is to that
(20:25):
failure is just going tocontinue to allow us to press
into the things that we may notbe 100% confident in.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
That's so good.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, just one example from my personal life is
moving to San Diego fromMinnesota and joining the
military and getting out of thecircumstances I was in.
I didn't necessarily understandthe plans and purpose he had
for my life.
I didn't feel confident in myability to uproot my entire life
and restart all over again.
(20:57):
It was one of the mostdifficult times of my life and I
was away from family.
I was away from friends, orquote unquote friends that I had
at the time, which is verylittle of few, but besides the
point, I think it was reallychallenging to restart and
(21:17):
that's what the Lord had calledme to, so I just obeyed and
really started to press into mypersonal relationship with the
Lord, rather than it just beinga exterior shell that I was
putting on.
And, um, I think it's justreally important, uh, when you
have a word from the Lord, uh,to listen and think through and
(21:39):
get wise counsel and, um, justask those around you whether or
not it's a good idea.
But that could be good or itcould be bad.
It could be really damaging ifthe people within your life are
spiteful or don't necessarilywant the best for you.
So just be cautious in thatarea.
But it was something that Ipersonally didn't get wise
(22:02):
counsel on and I just reallyfelt the Lord calling me to the
military and I just bit thebullet and obeyed, and that's
how I want to live my life.
I don't want to be questioning,necessarily, but, yes,
obtaining wise counsel in thethings that are impressed on my
heart.
But when it came to getting outof the situation I was in, that
(22:27):
just wasn't the case.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
Yeah, that's really good and, honestly, like
sometimes we don't have wisecounsel at our, you know, right
hand, and so you know we talkabout scripture a lot.
We talk about Moses' story andwe bring up some other
scriptures as well, and that isa focus of this podcast, because
the living word is full of yeah, full of green flags of what to
(22:54):
do and also red flags of whatnot to do.
And if the Lord truly doesspeak to you and make it clear
to you what it is he's calledyou to do, you could read
scripture and the Lord willguide you in that process and
will allow you to gain clarityand confirmation through
scripture.
And if you can, if you findconfirmation through scripture
(23:17):
and, in addition, you like waiton it, pray on it and seek wise
counsel, then that gives you allthe more confidence to move
forward in making those changesin your life that are more in
alignment with what God createdyou to do.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Yeah, I think that's a great place to leave it off
with and we just want to plugreal quick our new Instagram.
It's going to be on trackunderscore, official, and we
want to incorporate within thenext coming weeks a link that
you're able to go to and finddifferent PDFs that we want to
create for you guys thatcorrelate with each episode and
(23:55):
allow you the ability to pressinto practical tools within your
life in order to maintain ontrack.
We hope you guys enjoyedtoday's episode.
Stay tuned for next week, wherewe'll dive deep into part two
(24:16):
of planning your purpose,dissecting the attributes of God
and what it looks like to adoptthose.
As you grow in exploring yourunique purpose, the more
spiritually anchored your lifeis, the more your purpose will
become apparent and made clear,and with that we will
additionally be providing aclear breakdown of some of the
most common ways the enemy triesto ruin the plans and purpose
(24:38):
that is set over your life.
We hope you guys enjoyedtoday's episode and have such an
amazing and blessed week ahead.
Essentially, moses was a man that followed the
direction God wanted to take himand, ultimately, god had
purpose over his life before hewas even born, despite him not
knowing his identity.
Hey guys, welcome back toOnTrack Podcast with your host,
(00:25):
brandon and Isabel Diamond.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hey guys.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
We look forward to inviting y'all into these
upcoming episodes.
As we previously took the timeto outline our desires for where
we want to take this podcastMoving forward, we'll be
breaking up various conceptsinto multiple part series in
order to be as thorough aspossible and to allow the
information to be digestible.
The five-week series we arediving into first is called
(00:52):
Planning for your Purpose.
This will ultimately leveragegreater personal awareness of
your own God-given purpose andoutline practical steps and
tools to implement to make thatpurpose come to life.
In today's episode, we'll bediscussing the plans that are
set before you in accordancewith what the Lord says in
scripture how to realisticallyapply the things taught and grow
(01:15):
into the man or woman he iscalling you to be.
We hope you are able to sitback, relax and enjoy this
week's episode.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
I want to share a portion of my friend Sarah's
story because it highlights whatwe want to dive into on this
episode.
So my friend Sarah, she camefrom a family that didn't have a
ton and they were kind of in alot of various crises growing up
, and so when she was born, sheended up being put for adoption
(01:58):
very early on after she was bornand she was adopted into a
family of wealth and power andshe was never disclosed ever,
even as an adult, that she wasadopted, and so throughout her
life she kind of felt this likeidentity crisis, where she knew
she was out of place but yet shedidn't have any information or
(02:20):
evidence to believe that sheshould feel out of place.
And because of the wealth thatshe was born into, she actually
got a position in hergrandfather's company and her
grandfather basically ran thismassive company overseeing so
many different employees.
And, yeah, sarah had a lot ofdifferent responsibilities
(02:42):
within that.
But over time she started torealize that there was just kind
of a lot of corruption withinthe company and she didn't care
for that at all, and so sheended up doing something that
put a target on her back andactually ended up getting an
employee injured in some waysand a lot of the people within
(03:03):
the company, not recognizingwhat she was doing, ended up
just like, yeah, not having it,and she felt like she had to
leave the city because of theissues going in or occurring
within this company and hergrandfather was very upset at
her as well and so she ended upjust leaving everything that she
(03:24):
knew and shortly after sheended up meeting her husband and
having a family and just kindof having this sequestered life
until the Lord powerfullyencountered her and she had
never heard the Lord's voice theway that she had in this moment
and nor did she ever reallyunderstand what having a
relationship with God lookedlike.
(03:45):
But God made it very clear whather calling and her purpose was
in this season, and it was to goback to that city that she was
born in and to basically shutdown her grandfather's company
because the company was justreally bad for the employees,
really bad for the city.
It was just, all in all, yeah,not good, and so she felt
(04:05):
incredibly ill-equipped.
She had a speech impediment andso that enabled disenabled her
from feeling confident in likestanding up for herself and also
taking on this big task.
But she ended up, confidentlyto some degree, going back to
the city and talking to hergrandfather and trying to
(04:25):
convince him to shut down hiscompany.
But every time her grandfatherdenied her request, and whenever
that happened, there was justsomething like eerie.
That happened within the cityor within the company where,
like, either a lot of people gotseverely sick or there were
just like severe weatherconditions that put a lot of
people in closed down quarters,or some people ended up dying as
(04:52):
well in some instances, and hergrandfather ended up getting
personally affected whenever hewould deny Sarah's request,
would deny Sarah's request, andso after a while, it just became
super taxing and the citybecame just like less, like not
well off, and just started todepreciate, and so eventually,
(05:16):
sarah's grandpa allowed thecompany to shut down and a lot
of the employees were able toleverage freedom that they had
never experienced before, andthey ended up leaving the city
entirely because they justneeded to get away.
And this led Sarah on her nextjourney, where she was basically
(05:37):
, in a lot of ways, shepherdingand leading all of these people
for a very, very long time, andthe Lord actually gave her some
instructions on how to leadthese people that allowed just
more order and more wisdom, andit took some time, but
eventually a lot of these peoplefrom this company were able to
(05:58):
get to a completely differentplace, and that place was called
the promised land.
And my friend, sarah is not areal person.
It's more of an illustration ofthe story of Moses.
So Sarah is Moses in the Bible,and if you've never heard of
the story of Moses, you just did.
And Moses was a really, reallyincredible human being.
(06:24):
But he was also very much sosimilar to you and me.
He was very normal and heexperienced a lot of things that
we all experience Lots ofpersonal doubt, lots of
grappling with his walk with theLord and navigating and hearing
his voice and leading out thecalling over his life.
He had to make so manysacrifices to be obedient to God
(06:45):
and he had a lot ofinsecurities as well, like the
Lord told him to let all thesepeople free, let all these
people free.
Moses had a speech impedimentand he felt ill-equipped to lead
and speak, to leverage this,and so, yeah, there was just a
lot in and through that.
But, all to say, god still usedMoses, even though he actually
(07:08):
ended up killing one of theEgyptians out of rage because he
just saw how the Israeliteswere being treated as slaves.
And so, yeah, moses did a lotof things that he wasn't proud
of and he did struggle withidentity because he was adopted
and he wasn't an Egyptian, hewas an Israelite.
And so, yeah, there's a lot ofthings to relate to in this
(07:30):
story and we'd highly encourageyou to explore it in scripture,
but we share it just to reel youin to say, hey, there's a lot
of things to relate to inscripture and there's a lot of
similarities with these bigpeople that we think are beyond
what we could be.
You know, moses, god used Mosesto part the Red Sea, to part an
(07:51):
entire ocean for people tocross.
Like that's insane, but thosestories and those stories can
still happen today and God isstill as powerful.
So, yeah, we just want to segueinto kind of how that relates
to what we want to share today.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Essentially, moses was a man that followed the
direction God wanted to take himand ultimately, god had a
purpose over his life before hewas even born.
Despite him not knowing hisidentity, he was able to walk
and listen to the Lord's voiceand continue down this direction
.
He felt incapable of achieving,and I think that's what a lot
(08:33):
of us feel when we are goingafter our purpose or not really
understanding what it is we'remeant to do within this lifetime
.
So I think it's crucial for usto understand the story of Moses
in order to then understand thedifferent qualifiers but we'll
go through that later in thisepisode of what qualifies me to
live out my purpose and how am Igoing to understand the desires
(08:58):
within my heart that are fromthe Lord.
So here's the definition of apurpose.
God-given purpose is not aboutpersonal desires or achievements
, but aligning one's life withGod's plan and contributing to
his kingdom.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
That's great, and I think it's always valuable to
look at scriptures thathighlight this even further.
So we have our classic Jeremiah29, 11, for I know the plans I
have for you, declares the Lord.
Plans to prosper you and not toharm you.
Plans to give you a hope and afuture, and this verse is often
cited to show that God has aspecific, intentional plan for
(09:34):
each life Ephesians 2, 10,.
For we are God's handiwork,created in Christ Jesus to do
good works, which God preparedin advance for us to do.
This clearly states that wewere created for a purpose To do
good works.
God has already planned InProverbs 19.21,.
Many are the plans in aperson's heart, but it is the
(09:55):
Lord's purpose that prevails.
And again, this shows that,even though we make plans, god's
greater purpose for our livesultimately stands.
And it's important to recognizein all of these scriptures and
even with us having an ultimatepurpose, is that work is good.
God created work before the fall, and what that means is that,
(10:16):
before sin entered the world,god actually gave Adam and Eve
the task of attending to theGarden of Eden and taking care
of the agriculture and theanimals, and that was a great
thing.
You know, a man without apurpose, a man without good work
to do, is a man that'ssusceptible to falling into sin
(10:38):
and falling into things that arenot good for their soul, and so
I think it's just important, aswe move forward, to not just
fall into this pit of like oh my, nine to five is atrocious, or
how can I get out of work, orhow can I work less, or how can
I do something with my life?
That's going to make me feellike I can just relax, so to
speak.
But it's like if you can findsomething that aligns with your
(10:59):
purpose, that is good work, thenthat's exactly what we're
trying to pinpoint.
All right, brandon, so you'regoing to walk us through a
starting exercise that we can doto kind of just explore this
idea of identifying purpose.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
Yeah, so basically, this exercise is just going to
be a brainstorming exercise tosee your strengths, weaknesses
and the different things you'reskilled or passionate or want to
learn about, in order to reallybegin to understand what it is
that the Lord is calling you to.
And I think he does that, hasthat ability through
(11:35):
understanding your own heart andthe things that really bring
you joy, and he really wants usto be joyful.
And so we're just going to take10 to 15 minutes and, whether
you're driving or at the gym orwalking, if you're in a quiet
space, if you have the ability,either just think through it
mentally or put your pen topaper and just jot down the
(11:59):
things that you believe you'reskilled at, or ask a friend and
or ask yourself what you reallyare skilled at, what you're
passionate about and or what youwould really be joyful to learn
and to understand.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Yeah, that's good, and I think I love doing
exercises like this because itreally helps me reflect.
I think sometimes I'm in theseperpetual cycles of doing things
that I don't enjoy and then I'mtrying to convince myself that
I do enjoy them, and so it islike a good pause to be like, oh
, actually there's some thingsthat I've put to the side that I
think could really be more inalignment with my calling,
(12:39):
because ultimately, we're allcalled to different things and
the Lord wants you to discoverthat he doesn't want you to fall
within a career or within a jobfor many years that is not
ultimately aligned with who hecreated you to be and what he
created you to do, ultimatelyaligned with who he created you
to be and what he created you todo.
And I didn't mention thisearlier.
But the greatest commandmentthat God has ever given us is to
love him and to love others.
(13:00):
So, again, there's all thesenuances in careers and jobs and
things to occupy our time, butultimately those things will or
should align with our jobs andour careers and things like that
.
And so, yeah, we're going todive into some qualifiers that
(13:20):
Brandon's going to step intojust to kind of help us
understand a little bit like oh,I'm excited and joyful about
this, but does it actually alignwith what God has for me?
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Yeah, so some qualifiers to understanding what
the Lord is calling you to.
The enemy is going to reallytry to wiggle his way in and try
to break you down in the thingsthat you really do find joy in
and the things that are yourstrengths.
But the things that arestrengths is where the enemy
wants to work the most.
(13:51):
And so there's just threequestions you should ask
yourself is when pursuingsomething?
And the first one is going tobe living in alignment with
God's will.
This involves allowing God toguide and direct your life
rather than you feel the need todirect your own.
And the second thing isutilizing your gifts and
(14:14):
strengths.
God gives individuals uniquetalents and abilities that are
meant to be used for his kingdomand ultimately giving him glory
, rather than you taking thecredit for the things you're
doing yourself.
And the third thing is going tobe coming like Christ.
(14:45):
God's purpose for believers isto be transformed into the image
of his son.
God's purpose for believers isto be transformed into the image
of his son, which was theliving testimony of what're
passionate about.
Aren't allowing you to be morelike Christ, then that's not
necessarily a good reflection,or those desires may not be
(15:05):
reflective of God's heart foryour life.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Yeah, that's great to just have some baseline points
to look back on and say, okay,like is, that are the things
that I'm excited aboutultimately aligning with, yeah,
some qualifiers for what Christwants for our lives.
And then, kind of on the flipside of that, you know, there's
some things that we need to keepin mind.
Your calling actually mightrequire you to operate in your
own perceived weakness.
So, for example, going back toMoses, you know Moses had a
(15:40):
speech impediment and so he wassuper insecure about his ability
to speak and his ability tolead people.
Yet God told him to talk toPharaoh and to let his people go
, and that was extremely nervewracking.
But you know why God asks us tooperate in our weakness?
Because that's how God's gloryis really revealed.
(16:04):
And, like Brandon said, it'slike if we were just operating
completely in our strengths,then people from the outside
might be like, oh yeah, they're,they're just talented or
skillful in that, so that's whythey're successful.
But if we're able to be usedwith our weakness, then people
kind of look at that person andthink, how are they, you know,
doing that thing so well?
(16:24):
And then we can say, oh, it'sbecause of God working in and
through me.
And so that's just something tokeep in mind where sometimes
you might say, oh, this isclearly not aligned with my
purpose because I'm not good atit.
But it's like, well, actually,you know, God might want to do
something in and through thatand then your calling might
require you to sacrifice a lotup front.
You know, sometimes, you know,on a more extreme end, like if
(16:51):
God asks you to be a missionaryand to like completely uproot
your life, you might have toquit your job and move your
whole family and sell all yourthings right.
And for Moses, I mean, he hadto sacrifice a lot and at one
point he left everything that heknew to discover God in a
completely different environment.
And sometimes you're going tohave to do that, but the upfront
costs and the upfrontsacrifices are going to be so
worth it because God ultimatelyhas the best plan for your life.
(17:14):
So if you find yourselfpanicking because you're like,
oh, I think I discovered mypurpose, but it's going to
require me to move out of a cityor to make these like big,
drastic changes, one thing isjust to consult people that are
walking with the Lord to reallygain clarity on that.
But it might not be completelyout of the picture, because God
(17:34):
often does that for people andasks people to make some really
big decisions.
And then another one is juststraight up.
You know, being Christian ishard period.
It's full of a lot of deep joys, but there are, yeah, just a
lot of difficulties being aChristian.
Christians are the mostpersecuted.
The enemy doesn't like usbecause we're on the winning
(17:56):
team and of course we'll diveinto that even more within
further episodes.
But it's just important torealize that knowing and
identifying your purpose doesn'tmean that your life's
automatically going to seemright or seem easy or start to
make sense.
It will make more sense onceyou identify your purpose, but
that doesn't mean that it'sgoing to be entirely easy.
(18:16):
Another piece of the puzzle topay attention to is that once
you get to a place where you'relike, okay, I've identified my
strengths, I know you know someweaknesses that the Lord wants
me to press into and I haveconfirmation, you can get super
excited and let's just likecelebrate for you.
(18:36):
But there's also going to be apoint where you try to implement
or you make these changes andit just feels like trying to
push a truck up a hill right.
Or it might even feel like adumpster fire or something like
that, and you're like, oh, look,why isn't this happening the
way I had envisioned it tohappen?
Or why aren't things movingfast enough?
And I think there will be like atesting period of like okay, do
(18:57):
you trust the Lord, that he hasspoken, and will you be
diligent in moving forward withwhat he's called you to do?
And so, yeah, just keep that inmind.
And also, things take time.
Things are gradual.
Change happens does not happenovernight.
And yeah, you just have to bekind to yourself and say like,
okay, if this is what God'scalled me, to ask the Lord to be
(19:19):
clear with you in terms of,yeah, what does today look like,
what does this week look like?
In terms, of, yeah, what doestoday look like, what does this
week look like?
And we're excited to explorejust more practicals in the
future when it comes to planningout your purpose diligently,
day by day.
But, yeah, just keep that inmind that things might feel
discouraging after you get tocelebrate and get excited about
(19:42):
what it is that God's called youto do.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yeah, that's really good, and something that we just
previously discussed is lifeisn't going to be sunshine and
rainbows all the time, and Ithink, to some degree, we expect
that to be the case when we'restarting something new, but it's
(20:04):
going to take hardship.
It's going to take hardship,it's going to take failure.
It's going to allow us tocontinually attempt to learn,
which is what failure stands foris first attempt in learning,
and I think that's just a goodcontinual reminder to keep in
the back of our mind is thatfailure is just going to
continue to allow us to keep inthe back of our mind is to that
(20:25):
failure is just going tocontinue to allow us to press
into the things that we may notbe 100% confident in.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
That's so good.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, just one example from my personal life is
moving to San Diego fromMinnesota and joining the
military and getting out of thecircumstances I was in.
I didn't necessarily understandthe plans and purpose he had
for my life.
I didn't feel confident in myability to uproot my entire life
and restart all over again.
(20:57):
It was one of the mostdifficult times of my life and I
was away from family.
I was away from friends, orquote unquote friends that I had
at the time, which is verylittle of few, but besides the
point, I think it was reallychallenging to restart and
(21:17):
that's what the Lord had calledme to, so I just obeyed and
really started to press into mypersonal relationship with the
Lord, rather than it just beinga exterior shell that I was
putting on.
And, um, I think it's justreally important, uh, when you
have a word from the Lord, uh,to listen and think through and
(21:39):
get wise counsel and, um, justask those around you whether or
not it's a good idea.
But that could be good or itcould be bad.
It could be really damaging ifthe people within your life are
spiteful or don't necessarilywant the best for you.
So just be cautious in thatarea.
But it was something that Ipersonally didn't get wise
(22:02):
counsel on and I just reallyfelt the Lord calling me to the
military and I just bit thebullet and obeyed, and that's
how I want to live my life.
I don't want to be questioning,necessarily, but, yes,
obtaining wise counsel in thethings that are impressed on my
heart.
But when it came to getting outof the situation I was in, that
(22:27):
just wasn't the case.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
Yeah, that's really good and, honestly, like
sometimes we don't have wisecounsel at our, you know, right
hand, and so you know we talkabout scripture a lot.
We talk about Moses' story andwe bring up some other
scriptures as well, and that isa focus of this podcast, because
the living word is full of yeah, full of green flags of what to
(22:54):
do and also red flags of whatnot to do.
And if the Lord truly doesspeak to you and make it clear
to you what it is he's calledyou to do, you could read
scripture and the Lord willguide you in that process and
will allow you to gain clarityand confirmation through
scripture.
And if you can, if you findconfirmation through scripture
(23:17):
and, in addition, you like waiton it, pray on it and seek wise
counsel, then that gives you allthe more confidence to move
forward in making those changesin your life that are more in
alignment with what God createdyou to do.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Yeah, I think that's a great place to leave it off
with and we just want to plugreal quick our new Instagram.
It's going to be on trackunderscore, official, and we
want to incorporate within thenext coming weeks a link that
you're able to go to and finddifferent PDFs that we want to
create for you guys thatcorrelate with each episode and
(23:55):
allow you the ability to pressinto practical tools within your
life in order to maintain ontrack.
We hope you guys enjoyedtoday's episode.
Stay tuned for next week, wherewe'll dive deep into part two
(24:16):
of planning your purpose,dissecting the attributes of God
and what it looks like to adoptthose.
As you grow in exploring yourunique purpose, the more
spiritually anchored your lifeis, the more your purpose will
become apparent and made clear,and with that we will
additionally be providing aclear breakdown of some of the
most common ways the enemy triesto ruin the plans and purpose
(24:38):
that is set over your life.
We hope you guys enjoyedtoday's episode and have such an
amazing and blessed week ahead.
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