July 23, 2025 • 47 mins
Join Pastor Joe Liles, Roseanne Bowen, and Pastor Tom Helmich as they dive deep into the challenging journey of trusting God when life's path seems foggy. In this raw and honest podcast, our hosts share personal stories of uncertainty, faith, and surrender.
Key Takeaways:
- Trust isn't just believing in God, it's surrendering to His plan
- Courage isn't the absence of fear, but facing challenges with trust
- God is the ultimate refuge, providing safety beyond our understanding
Memorable Quotes:
- "When I found the path was when I went back to God" - Pastor Joe Liles
- "Trust is the ability to see a character in someone that gives you assured confidence" - Pastor Joe
- "Courage is not the absence of fear, it is facing what God puts in your life with trust" - Roseanne Bowen
Perfect for anyone wrestling with life's uncertainties, feeling stuck, or seeking a deeper relationship with God. This podcast offers real talk about faith, vulnerability, and finding peace in God's plan.
Next week: Practical tips for leaning into God daily - you won't want to miss it!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pastor Joe Liles (00:00):
Guys ready?
(00:00):
Yep. Welcome to the TNC podcast.
(00:04):
We are recorded in studio, as wesay, every single week, which is
our worship center. It's not acrazy, fancy studio, unless you
call the entire Worship Center astudio for podcasting, and
that's where we're at. And weare three today, three hosts
today in the podcast. We aremissing Table. Table today is
not feeling well, and so he isout. And so we want to lift up
(00:24):
some prayers for him, definitelythat he feels better. Um,
there's something going around.
Tom, you said that your sonwasn't feeling
Tom Helmich (00:30):
well. Yeah, Connor had that day before yesterday,
and yesterday fever and justbody aches, headache, generally,
feeling
Pastor Joe Liles (00:36):
ick, but testing negative for everything.
Yeah, yeah, everything. So it'sjust an ick got something just
man, that's rough. So yeah,definitely praying for table
today. We hope that he feelsbetter, and we know that they
got baby in the house anddifferent things like that. So
that's hard, too. So that's justa moment, but we got three hosts
with us today on the podcast. Tomy left, the wonderful Roseanne
Bowen, Director of Operationshere at the neighborhood church.
(00:57):
And to my right,
Tom Helmich (00:58):
Tom, Pastor.
Pastor Joe Liles (01:00):
Tom, Yeah, whoa, whoa, he still doesn't
have it. You know, he said hewas going to struggle with it.
He's still struggling. I'm stillstruggling. Yeah, it's, what can
you say? Pastor Tom, Pastor Tom,that's great. So Pastor Tom
Helmut here as pastor of careand education, two weeks into
the role coming in, and saidthings started third week coming
in. This is week three. This isweek three. And so, so it's been
great, and we're going to getinto today to talk about one the
(01:22):
message series, which is calledMountain mover, and it's really
an identity of talking about,how do we learn to trust God
when the path is unclear? And Ithink all of us can admit that
the path and our life has beenunclear at times. I would love
to say that my role to becominga pastor was super clear. And I
just took every single step intobecoming that. And I can go back
(01:44):
into 567, 10 times in my lifewhen I was like, Oh no, I was
going to be an architect. At onepoint, I wanted to go into the
military, and I was going to bea lifelong career military
person. So that was a route.
Came back and sold cars for amoment. That was not a route.
Just in case anyone waswondering, I did not want to do
that. So, like all along theseways, I worked in construction
(02:04):
for two years prior to seminary.
So I was I was going up anddoing that so and all along
these points, I mean differentrelationships, different
careers, right, different pathsand learning to trust God again
and again and again. But I cansay the times when I found the
path was when I went back toGod. That's the times when I
found the path. And so thisseries is really learning about
to trust God, aligning thosepaths again and again and again
(02:28):
and again. And so we've beenwalking through we met with our
youth that went to on mission,and because their path is
developing, right? So we talkedwith them. Week One, we talked
about you of little faith, whichChrist often said to the
disciples, right? That was weektwo in the series, and this last
week, we really talked about theword Trust. And we talked about,
what does it mean to trust God?
And we define trust as thereally the ability to see a
(02:51):
character or trait in someonethat gives you an assured
confidence that you are willingto allow them to really control
a part of your life, right tohave something that could affect
your life, you're giving themcontrol over that because you
trust them. You have confidencein an assured confidence of
them. And maybe it's not thewhole part trust kind of you can
(03:13):
compartmentalize it. They canjust be one trait that you
trust. It can be a piece oftheir character that you trust.
I think as we talk about God,we're talking about holistic
trust, right, and what thatreally means. So wanted to jump
in and really talk through this,but we can't jump in without
doing our jingle. And so youguys ready a, one, a, two, it's
only me today. It's going to bea moment, I know. So you guys
(03:33):
ready for this? 479-367-2285,neighborhood neighborhood,
church. Yeah, there. Youappreciate that, you guys on
point. And so again, I like tosay harmony, but no, yeah, no,
that was definitely not aharmony, but at the same time it
was beautiful. It was, it wasbeautiful music to my ears. And
that is, that is a jingle rose.
(03:57):
And what happens when they callthe jingle?
Unknown (04:00):
I answer the phone.
That's exactly
Pastor Joe Liles (04:03):
right. What is your go to line when you answer
the phone?
Roseann Bowlin (04:06):
Thank you for calling the neighborhood church.
This is Roseanne. How can I helpyou today? I just
Pastor Joe Liles (04:10):
want to call her to talk. Doesn't it seem
like a person you just
Tom Helmich (04:13):
want to make a friend with us, hoping she's
going to say, you know, this isRoseanne, the hostess with
Roseann Bowlin (04:19):
the most Oh, but that works too. More
Pastor Joe Liles (04:21):
professional.
Oh yeah, hostess with the mostis okay, I don't mind that.
Yeah, that's nice. That could begreat. So one that is our
jingle. That is our phone numberat the church. You can call that
anytime we can talk to Roseanne.
But let's jump into a little bitabout trusting God. And so the
first question I wanted to kindof get to is that, what does it
mean for each of you to trustGod. So we broke this down in
(04:43):
the message a little bit. Italked through it, but before we
kind of break down the messagepoints. And now that we have the
definition of trust, what doesit mean for each of you to trust
God? I
Tom Helmich (04:52):
think there's a difference between believing in
God and trusting God, becauseyou can believe God exists, but
not trust God's. Character ortrust God's, God's plan, and
want to rebel against that, youknow, to try to have our own
plan. And so I think part oftrusting God is being willing to
to at least know that we need tosubmit to God's will, like I got
(05:14):
my own plan for things. Itdoesn't usually work out that
way. But instead of that beingthe whole world and everything
is broken. It's It's knowingthat, okay, I tried this, but
you know God's will is somethingdifferent, and knowing that no
acknowledging who's really incontrol of what's going on.
Pastor Joe Liles (05:32):
So you said four hard things in that
statement. You said, one is thatwe have to believe in God. You
started with that, right? Andyou have an understanding of
God, and believing isn'tnecessarily trusting, yeah,
because not trusting, that's agreat distinction. We'll talk
about that in a second. And thenyou said you have to acknowledge
God, right? So not only believebut you have to acknowledge God,
right? That God has control overour life and that you have to
(05:52):
trust in God's Will over ourlife. Those are four, to me,
unknowns in a trustingrelationship with God, which
Tom Helmich (05:59):
completely contradictory to my my own will
to have control of everythinggoing on me and know what's
going on, even through seminary.
The hardest part is startingseminary, like I spent, I know,
several months detailing, Imean, I talked to the lady at
Wartburg, I don't know how manytimes like she recognized my
voice when I called. She justknew who it was, right? Because
I want everybody
Pastor Joe Liles (06:19):
knows your name,
Tom Helmich (06:21):
I know every little detail how this is going to
work, but it got hard becausecertain steps along the way,
even the advisors like, yeah,we'll figure it out when we get
there. Yeah. It's like, okay,how are we going to do this?
Because this isn't going to workthis way, and this is how the
catalog says you have to dothis. But I can't do that
because I want to know before Igot started, yeah, what the end
game was going to be, yep, inour in our faith, trusting God
(06:43):
is saying that. I have no ideawhat the end game is going to
be, what the end result is goingto be, but I know it's going to
be, you know, it's going to beGod's will, whatever it is. And
I know that that's where itneeds to be. And just be willing
to submit to going, going alongwith that. You know, it's like
saying, hey, jump in the car.
We're gonna go on a road tripwhere you'll find out when we
get there, yeah, I'm not goingto get in that car, yeah, but
you'll get that car with God.
(07:06):
Well, I don't really have achoice, because this is the
other reality, is, if, if God'swill is that I will buy free
will, do whatever, then I'mgoing to do it by my own free
will. Because there's adifference. We can't, we can't
equate ourselves with God'sauthority, right? Well, that's
what I was
Pastor Joe Liles (07:18):
going to ask, is, like, how do you know God's
will? I mean, if this is a partof trusting God, and you're
saying it'd be and you're
Tom Helmich (07:23):
singing so much easier, if we could, it'd be so
much easier, yeah, but then wemight be wanting to try to pick
and choose which we were okaywith, yeah, and because, I mean,
a lot of problems in my lifehave been when I've rebelled
against God's will,
Pastor Joe Liles (07:36):
you know? And would you say, rebelled against
God's will, rebelled against
Tom Helmich (07:40):
God, against God's will. I mean, for me, I always
like the idea of, you know, ofbeing obedient to God, yeah,
when it was what I wanted Godto, want me to be obedient in
but there's times that, youknow, it's like that knock on
the door. And if you knock onsomebody's door and they ignore
it, they start knocking louderand louder and louder. And you
don't want God knocking on yourdoor incredibly loud. Yeah, it
(08:02):
just God will get our attention.
And so I think being able to bewilling to go into God's God's
plan for you is great. The hardpart is knowing what it is,
yeah, and it took me, I don'tknow, 20 years to figure out
about the seminary thing. Maybeit was like a time, but
discerning God's will, that'sthe whole point of why you
(08:23):
can't, like getting in aseminary, you don't just say,
Well, I feel called, okay, let'sdiscern that a little bit. And
it's a process they go throughto try to figure out if, if this
is really what it is. Because wedon't, we don't know, and
there's not a signature line on,you know, God's messages to us
always. So we don't, we don'tknow. That takes a lot of prayer
and discernment and peoplearound you to discern if that's
really what it is and notsomething else. This is
Pastor Joe Liles (08:45):
why trust is so hard to me. Is because you
said we don't know. But thefirst thing you said is, we
needed to believe in God, whichis knowledge of God. It's our
understanding of that. And thenyou said, we don't know, right?
And so it's, it's trust is thishighly contradictory. It's
Tom Helmich (08:58):
like, it's where most Christians fail, like
they'll believe in God, yeah.
But so often we want our will tobe done rather than trusting
God's will. And and there's,that's, that's part of the, part
of the breakdown, you know,with, you know, I know God
exists, I know God's in control,but I'm, I'm dead set on doing
it this way. This is the way Ithink it needs to be my will, my
will be done instead of Thy willbe done. So
Pastor Joe Liles (09:21):
I want to get back to this idea of belief and
faith, right? Because I thinkpeople interchange belief, faith
and trust, right? And they arenot interchangeable, right? They
are very distinct. And I thinkwe need to help people
understand the distinctionbetween belief, faith and trust.
And I made that distinction inthe message, and I tried to make
it clear, it's hard, because Icould do a whole series on
(09:43):
belief in faith, right? And dofour weeks on just what is
faith, four weeks on what isbelief, four weeks on what is
trust, and how that works out.
So let's come back to belief infaith and trust. But Roseanne, I
want to hear from you like, whatis it that that you believe?
Mean? Is to
Roseann Bowlin (10:00):
trust God. Well, I wanted to add to something
that, I guess it's maybe the agedifference, but I know what the
end is. The end result is said,age difference. What do you
mean? Age difference? You guys?
Okay, great. I know at the end,I'm super
Pastor Joe Liles (10:14):
old. I'm not even there yet.
Roseann Bowlin (10:18):
Let's just put it out there. I'm the oldest one
here, but the end result of mytrust in God is eternity with
Him. Yeah, right. So, so I knowthat as I make decisions, as I
discern God's will for my life,I put my trust in Him, in all
(10:42):
the chaos, in all the doubt, inall the anxiety in the situation
I put I have peace knowing thatGod's plan is way better than
mine. You know, it's and it'shard sometimes, because it's not
the plan I wanted,
Pastor Joe Liles (11:01):
right? I think it's very important. It's
actually the distinction I madein my message, right, between
prayers a plan, right in thepromise. And I just said, you
know, when we say we trust God,and I think this is where we get
stuck. We get stuck in beliefacknowledgement. We can start in
God's will. We can second,understand, like all these
different places that we can getstuck in trying to trust God,
(11:22):
but the trust is not in God'severy action, right? The trust
is in the promise. The trust isin the kingdom, right? And what
you said is, hey, I trust thatthere's an eternity waiting for
me, like, if you want to let meknow how I get through
everything in my life. And Isaid this on Sunday too. I said,
Look, there's been enough thingsthat happened in my life. And
the only reason I stay a pastor,and this is a true statement.
The only reason I stay pastor isbecause the promise is true, and
(11:43):
if the promise is true, then Iwill keep on working for the
rest of my life to serve thekingdom because I believe in the
promise. It doesn't mean I'mgoing to do everything right. It
doesn't mean people around meare going to do everything
right. It doesn't mean that mylife is perfect and that nothing
goes wrong right. What it meansis that the promise is greater
than every single circumstancethat I go through, and I can
lean back into that promise atall times. And so I love that
(12:04):
you said that, because I thinkthat really encapsulate what's
trusting God is. It's trust inthe promise, right? Knowing and
having knowledge that there is aplan. I don't know what the plan
is. I'm not included into theplan all the time. At times, I
just breathe by the Holy Spirit.
Now my Holy Spirit seems likeyou're doing something there.
Cool. Imma keep on walking mydirection, you know, like I'm
going to keep on walking overhere and I just breeze by it.
And so there's a really greatreality about trusting in the
(12:26):
promise and what that means too.
So I love that. I thought thatwas really good. Now, walk me
through Roseanne, when is a timethat, when is the time in your
life that you specificallytrusted God, you know? So a time
in your life that we're thinkingabout, maybe a moment that
trusting God was challenging toyou
Roseann Bowlin (12:47):
on April 10, 2017 I woke up an ordinary day.
Mm hmm, got ready for work, andI got the phone call, that my
husband had been in an accidenton April 29 I walked into the
(13:07):
hospital a wife and walked out awidow. Yeah. It so the future I
thought I was going to have onApril 10, shattered the future I
thought I was going to have onApril 29 shattered. Yeah, I
didn't know what my futurelooked like, and that was
(13:30):
extremely hard to trust inbecause, and I still, I still
deal with it, because growingold with this person wasn't
going to happen, right? And sojust trusting that God's got me
(13:54):
sometimes be hard. Yeah? Oh man,yeah. Go ahead and there are
more challenges that I mean,both my sisters are living with
me now. Both would be homelessif they weren't in my home,
right? So there are challengesthere. Now, do I trust that it's
God's plan? Yes. Do I trust thatGod's got me Yes? Is it hard?
(14:19):
Absolutely yes.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:21):
Would you say that you maintained your trust
the entire time through thosechallenging circumstances?
Roseann Bowlin (14:31):
No, I tried, but there were times when it looked
really bleak. I mean, you know,I yeah, I'd like to say, Oh yes,
I had trust all the way through,but no, it waned.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:51):
Yeah. Can I ask you one more, a little bit
harder question, yeah, whatbrought you back into trust?
Having. Uh, such a life changetwice, right? They April 10 and
the 29th so kind of thisdramatic shift in life, little
bit of a recovery, and then, youknow, kind of the final notice
that we're going to be gatheredtogether again, right? Hope in
(15:13):
the future, right?
Roseann Bowlin (15:14):
Right? I think that, um, prayer. Yeah, that
Okay, God, you're walking withme. You are beside me. Yeah,
you're not carrying me. I can dothis, but you're walking beside
me and knowing that I hadfriends who represented God
(15:37):
walking with me, yeah, becausewe have to be God's hands and
feet on Earth, and that's whathe calls us to do. And so the
friends that surrounded me, thejust the way looking back, the
way God answered prayer, eventhough it wasn't my plan
(15:58):
originally, that was not what Iplanned, I accept God's plan for
my life and path. And so there'snot one particular moment when I
went, Okay, I've got this. God'sgot this. It's just that blessed
assurance. Mm,
Pastor Joe Liles (16:15):
hmm. I love that statement, Blessed
assurance, because it's anassured hope, absolutely. And I
think when, at least in my life,when I have gotten this places
where it's hard to trust God,right, I can only live into an
assured hope, right? It can onlylive into the hope of the
promise to be true, right? Andthis is what I'm moving forward
towards, and it carries methrough the tough times when
(16:38):
it's dark and it's bleak and Idon't know what's going to
happen and and anything that Iknow, that I put out there is my
will, will not accomplishanything more to change the
situation that I'm in. Thesituation has changed. I
recognize that. How do I trustGod again? I cannot go back to
the way that it was, right.
Specifically, even in thesituation you're talking about
losing a husband, a belovedspouse, right? I cannot go back
(16:58):
to the way that it was, yep. Sowhat does it mean to walk
forward, right? And the onlything we can do is hope into the
next step and trust that. And Ithink, too, our trust breaks
down all the way to a spacewhere, like, we just trust that
God is present. I don't need theplan, I don't need the prayers,
I don't need thing. I justpurely need to know that God is
(17:18):
present with me, becauseeverything else is too much.
It's too much. So, like yousaid, God walking with you, I
think is that beginning stepback into a trusting
relationship when our situationsare really challenging. So, and
we'll continue to pray for youtoo well. Thank you. Yeah. Love
David. He was he was a saint. Tothat guy. Was awesome. Yeah?
Pretty good guy. Yeah, he wasabsolutely Tom What about you?
(17:47):
Yeah,
Tom Helmich (17:50):
and thinking about the the trust thing, it's like,
really, it's not necessarily,and I would think maybe it's not
necessarily a lack of trust inGod, but a lack of trust in what
the consequences are going to beon Earth, like what the details
of God's plan are for us onEarth, you know, because, like,
when do you experience death?
It's this separation from theloved one. We know God still
(18:10):
exists in that. We know that youknow, For God so loved the earth
that sent his only son. And weknow these things, but the
consequences for us on Earth arebeing separated from those
people. So really, like some ofour lack of trust is trust in
the details of what God's planis going to look like for us on
Earth as we experience it,because our I mean, only thing
(18:33):
we have any kind of ability toto understand or comprehend is
the things that we canphysically touch around us and
see around us and see around usin our life. You know, where
we're going to live, what ourjob is going to be if we're
gonna have enough money. Yeah,you know, tangible things. These
are the tangible things in ourlife. And some of the times
where I think we feel distrust,and we feel distrust for what
those tangible things are or arenot going to be, rather than,
(18:54):
you know, the trust in the end.
You know, like when, when mygrandfather died and when my
grandmother died, like the trustof the end, I knew, you know, I
knew that end, well, the trustwas going to be in the end of
the being gathered together withthe saints in the light and the
the final, end of times and theresurrection. But it's the stuff
(19:14):
in between, yeah, that we'regoing to experience in life that
brings fear, you know, like andfor me as a parent, and you're
getting into this phase a littlebit with your kids, the very
difficult, harsh reality thatGod has given my children, the
exact same free will that he'sgiven me both have, yeah, and I
no longer have any control overthe choices they make. And a lot
(19:36):
of times, I'm more emotionallyinvested in the potential
consequences of their choicesthan they are, because I've got,
you know, my youngest doesn'thave he lacks the part of his
brain yet to be able tocomprehend consequences. I love
these. That's great. He'd beabout another six, seven years
before he gets there. Right?
Absolutely. And so it's like aroller coaster you didn't sign
up for. And so I know that Godhas a plan for my children. You.
(19:56):
What my children's choices aregoing to be along the way, with
their consequences that they'regoing to suffer from their
choices, and the consequencesthat that Amy and I are going to
suffer from their choices, yeah,we don't know. And so it's like
the lack of the areas where mytruck, my trust, uh, fails a
little bit, or Wayne's is in thethings in between now and the in
(20:18):
the end, yeah, and it's, it'sthe time, it's, it's tough to
trust God, because I have my ownidea of what I want my kids
lives to be and the choices Iwant them to make and and they
don't always choose that. And Ididn't look back at me as a
parent, you know, like me as meas a kid. I'm like, I didn't
always make those choiceseither. Yeah, right, yeah. But I
(20:38):
have to have that trust that Godhas a plan for my children and
that and that Christ's, youknow, action on the cross was
for my children also. So I don'tfear that, really, I'm fearing
their consequences on
Roseann Bowlin (20:53):
Earth, yeah, for their choices. You don't want to
see your children go throughpain, no? And
Tom Helmich (20:58):
I don't want them to have to do stuff the hard
way, right? Despite my bestefforts. Oh, I know it's like my
Roseann Bowlin (21:02):
daughter did.
Yeah, it was an obstacle to putin her way. She threw it up
Tom Helmich (21:07):
there. Oh, yeah, my kids, I think, go off their
rails sometimes looking forthem, you know, but they come
back around. You know? It's justthose tough times of life where
I have to entirely, justcompletely trust God in my
children's lives, which is adifficult thing for me to let go
of when they were little. Icould pick them up, put them in
their car seat, buckle them in.
Now, I mean, Connor's at homewith us for another couple
weeks, and then he moves to, youknow, to Conway, yeah. And then
(21:30):
they're all just on their own,doing their own thing, and until
there's an issue and they needto call mom and dad for help on
stuff, you know, but we're notthere to see the choices they're
making, or who they're hangingout with, or, you know, who you
know choices they're not making,and we just have to trust them
and trust God that that God'sgot a plan for them, yeah, and
(21:50):
just know that there's going tobe consequences, and there's
nothing I can, I can do aboutthat. So it's tougher, like the
toughest moments for me andtrusting God right now is with
with the kids,
Pastor Joe Liles (22:03):
yeah, right now, I think it's very
interesting. The point you bringup about trusting God is
trusting God in other people'slives too. I had actually not
even conceptualized thisidentity, like I know it, have
knowledge of it, did not thinkabout it when I was crafting
this message, that I wasthinking very personal. And
that's part of my message, wasthat the first part was that if
you want to begin to trust God,you have to have a personal
(22:25):
relationship with Jesus Christ.
There's no other way to begintrusting God and try you in God
outside of a personalrelationship with Jesus Christ.
So it was a very personalidentity of a message. But I
think you were 100% right whenyou say that if we are to trust
God, we trust God in wholeness,which means that we have to look
at other people who areChristian in our lives, and our
kids, especially that we areraising a Christian in faith in
life as a responsibility anddiscipleship, to look at them
(22:46):
and say, whoo. You're makingsome choices, but God is with
you too. You know, like God hasa will for your life and a plan
for your life, and is in thosemidst. And I think our heart
breaks, and it's gotta be truewith God also, when they do
something and we're like, wetold you, like, we literally sat
you down and said, Don't go downthis path, because it could end
up like this. And they're like,they're like,
Tom Helmich (23:09):
nope, one of those hard conversations just the
other day, like, oh, well, thisis your choice, but this is a
very bad idea, and here's why,yeah, and it's your
consequences, and I can't saveyou from that, yeah, man, all we
can really do is just pray
Pastor Joe Liles (23:24):
for him, yeah, right? And I think it's
important and understand thatGod is still with them, right?
But then also, I think we havean action as disciple makers to
continue to pour into theirlife, right? We don't stop
pouring in because they've madea bad choice, right? And I think
this is a beautiful nature ofhow we trust God. God pours into
us still, when we make a badchoice, God's like, ooh, not the
path ahead, you know. Like,that's okay. We're gonna work
(23:44):
with it, you know. We're gonnawork with it, and we'll move
these things. And I think we dothe same thing with our
children, same thing with ourfriends. When we see someone
that goes off the rails a littlebit, it's not that we back away
and go, ooh, distance. Can'thave that right now. No, it's
most are like, we step in and wesay, hey, saw you. Went that
direct. Like, still here, stillwilling to walk with you. Hey,
let's, let's try to bring itback this direction a little
(24:04):
bit. And I think it's animportant narrative to see that
in trusting God, we trust thatGod is in other people's lives
also. And that goes back to lastweek's message, not this, just
last Sunday, but last week, whenwe said that we really have to
understand that if seeds arebeing planted, and it's a small
amount of faith that, yes,you're planting seeds in others,
and God's planting seeds in you,but there's other people
planting seeds in you. Like,God's working in other people's
(24:26):
lives to be in ours too, wherepeople are watching us and
going, ooh, wouldn't have you dothat? Like, that's not the route
right where we go. So I thinkit's a really profound point
that we bring forward. So let'sopen up scripture. Let's go open
up scripture and take throughthe we read three different
readings on Sunday from Psalmsand Proverbs, and we wanted to
take this through and they'retruly about what it means to
(24:47):
trust God. So Roseanne, couldyou start with this by reading
your
Roseann Bowlin (24:50):
scripture, Psalm 62, eight, yeah. Okay, trust in
him at all times. Oh, peoplepour out your heart before Him.
God is. Refuge for us, Selah.
Mm,
Pastor Joe Liles (25:02):
it's beautiful. And then Psalm 56
just a couple chapters back,verses, verses five and six, and
it says this, oh, sorry, versesthree and four. And it says
this, When I'm afraid I put mytrust in you, in God, whose word
I praise. In God, I trust I amnot afraid. What can flesh do to
(25:25):
me?
Tom Helmich (25:27):
And Proverbs, chapter three, verses five and
six, trust in the Lord with allyour heart, and do not rely on
your own insight in all yourways. Acknowledge Him and He
will make straight your paths.
Pastor Joe Liles (25:42):
Proverbs that hits, well, I mean this, it sure
does.
Tom Helmich (25:45):
Well, this is Proverbs five and six here. I
mean this. This is thecommandment in Deuteronomy,
yeah, the Lord your God with allyour heart, soul strength and
might, yeah. And this is when,you know, Jesus is asked the was
the first and greatestcommandment. And he said, Love
the Lord your God with all yourGod, with all your heart, soul,
strength and mind, you know. Andanother one is like it, but
that's what it's been. Proverbsare saying that trust in the
(26:06):
Lord with all your heart, and Ithink that trust and love are
are intrinsically tied. We cantrust God because God loves us,
yeah, and that's what allowsthat, that trust to be there.
Well, I
Pastor Joe Liles (26:18):
think the important part in Proverbs too,
like, lean, not on your ownunderstanding, oh, yeah, not on
your own insight, as it said.
But that word is alsounderstanding, and understanding
is also belief, right? So itsays, lean, not on your own
belief, trust in God, right?
Like, how interesting is thatlike? Because
Tom Helmich (26:32):
then when you look at Faith, faith is like, there's
a there's a point between trustand knowledge, Yeah, correct?
That faith kind of kind ofbridges you, I think of
knowledge of like anintellectual thing, and we're
not, you know, we're not savedbecause of a right knowledge of
God or the or the scriptures.
Like, there are maybe plenty ofpeople in heaven that had it
completely wrong. Yeah, probablyall of us, to some extent right.
(26:54):
But that trust in God comesthrough faith, or maybe faith
comes through trust. Those arekind of, kind of tied to each
Pastor Joe Liles (27:02):
other. Yeah, it was so that belief is exactly
right, is and understand, it's aknowledge, it's an understanding
of God, right? People canbelieve in God without having
faith in God,
Tom Helmich (27:11):
right? And that's the big problem when people,
like people, talk about, likethe, you know, if God, if, if
faith is a free gift given topeople, and then how, how can
anybody not be saved? Well, youcan, you can believe that God
exists, but then turn your backon God and say, No, I'm not
going to do that and rebelagainst that. That's that
rebellion against the HolySpirit
Pastor Joe Liles (27:32):
that, I mean, they'll quote Scripture too,
that even the demons believe inGod, right? Like, that's what,
yeah,
Tom Helmich (27:36):
that's what. That's what the devil used to attempt
Jesus was with scripture. Yeah,right. You know that's the
knowledge. Knowledge doesn't getyou there, right? You know, you
can have the entire Biblememorized, but if you, if you've
not, if you don't have that giftof faith, and you're not turning
into that, if you, I don't thinkturning into it's right, because
it puts too much of an impetuson on us, like there's any
turning into faith. But ifyou've been given that gift of
(27:58):
faith, and you intentionallyturn away from it because it
doesn't fit your idea of whatyou want for your life. Then,
then you obviously don't haveany trust in God, or you're
refusing to trust, right? Sohaving that, that knowledge
isn't enough. You have to thatfaith has to bridge that gap to
trust,
Pastor Joe Liles (28:14):
right? And trust is really an identity of
like, an actionable faith, like,when you trust in God, you're
you're kind of putting faithinto action, right? You're
saying, great, I've been giventhis gift of my trust in God.
Says, Now I I fully give my lifeover and surrender, right? A
relational surrender to God,right? I just have faith that
you've given me, and I justoperate however. Yeah, I have a
relational surrender. Now, if
Tom Helmich (28:35):
you got that one friend that where I teach,
teaching teenagers to drive,right? We have the knowledge
that, that maybe they've gone tothe driving school, they've got
the permit, and we may havefaith in what their desired
outcome, you know, what they'rewanting to try to do. But do you
really trust them behind thewheel entirely?
Pastor Joe Liles (28:52):
Tom I did not realize how scared I was in
teaching my daughter how todrive until the first time I got
in so confident, and I was like,this is going to go great,
right? And now, mind you, I'mdriving myself right now
trusting another driver. That'sthat's a moment. Oh, yeah, even
in your marriage, dear spouse,like trusting another drivers,
(29:12):
the whole moment, Jess hasentered in a new phase right now
where she doesn't necessarilytrust my driving. Like the other
day, we're sitting there, she'slike, you're close to the right
line. And I'm like, Oh,interesting. And that's like,
what's going on right now? Andshe goes, Oh, you need to stop.
Quicker, you know? And I waslike, What? What? Like, we've
been driving together for 20years. Like, what is happening
that doesn't get better. No, itdoesn't. I'm like, where are you
at right now? Yeah. So, I mean,when
Tom Helmich (29:33):
I was I was a field training officer, teaching new
police officers, you know. Sothey you go through the academy,
and then you have fieldtraining, like, three, three or
four months of field training,and you ride with a more
experienced cop and like that.
Would take them with me thatride in the passenger seat for
the first four weeks, yeah, andthey would just watch, and
they'd follow along everything,and they'd start gradually doing
more and more and more. In phasetwo, they drove, Oh, nice. And
that's when you had, that's whenyou eliminated the people that
(29:54):
decided they didn't really wantto be FTOs. Oh, interesting.
Because when you got a 21 year.
Kid who's who's, you know, atthat time, most of them have
been had a license for fiveyears. Now, a lot of them have
only had a license for two orthree years. Yeah, because
people don't want to drive asoften. And now you're in busy
traffic, and now you get somekind of a hot call that requires
a code through response, andthey turn on the lights and
(30:14):
sirens and start passing on theleft to go through
intersections, and that's alevel of blood pressure change
that I can't really think how Ieven articulate, yeah, like,
there, there were, like, rubmarks in the floorboard where
I'm like, just cramming that,that, that non existent pad down
there, up underneath the dash.
Yeah, I don't have any freakingterrifying
Pastor Joe Liles (30:37):
Oh, yeah, no, I can't even imagine. I'm with
Kaylee driving normal speeds onback roads. Oh, and I'm like,
This is scary, and it's notgoing wrong. I just lack
control. Well,
Tom Helmich (30:49):
right? And that because we don't lack control,
right? It's hard to it's hard totrust we don't have control,
right? Like, I had no fear ofdriving 100 miles on the
interstate if I had 200 miles anhour running code three to like
an officer needs assistance callor something, riding in the
passenger seat with somebodyelse doing it whole another ball
game. Yeah, even if it's with amore seasoned officer, there's a
(31:10):
little bit of level of anxiety,because we often want to only
trust our own, Oh, absolutely,our own decision making. But
being a passenger in the carwith somebody else, that's when
you know whether or not you youmay believe that they're a good
driver, and you may have faithin what they want out of that,
and that they're going to beattentive, but do you really
trust them behind the wheel? Andthat's the thing with with
because reality is, God's behindthe wheel. We're not, yeah, and
(31:32):
when we get past pretend Jesus,right? And just the knowledge,
we're kind of along for theride. It's tough to trust. It's
tough to trust, you know,
Pastor Joe Liles (31:44):
I think there's something here about the
pace of life, right? And youspoke about how quick this was
from 10th to 29th earlier,right? Like this, 19 days,
right? And you just spoke aboutthe pace like, hey, I can get in
and drive with it, you know, thesecond phase officer, right? And
we're driving, that's fine. Soonas you hit the code three, the
lights are on, right, and you'rezooming through intersections,
there's there's pace andpresence, right? Like now, all
(32:05):
of a sudden, these decisions arebeing made with other people who
can be impacted. Now I trust youless. The decision is made at a
speed which I'm comfortablewith, but not comfortable with
you. And there's a speed thing,right? So now here's another
level of trust. It's almost asif the way that we trust not
only is it not out of ourcontrol, if it's not in our
timeline, right or not aroundthe people that we also do like
(32:26):
those, all have factors in ourtrust. And so when we say
holistic trust, we're saying,God, I trust you and with the
people in my life. I trust youwith the pace of my life. I
trust you with the plan for mylife. And then God, in a really
interesting way, says eternity.
And if I'm just drawing thisconnection now, during the
podcast, answers thosequestions, God says, Hey, you
don't have to worry about time Igot you for eternity. God says
(32:47):
you don't have to worry aboutpeople, because we'll all be
gathered together again. Youknow, you don't have to worry
about the plane because I hadthe promise. It's almost like
all the questions where we havelevels of trust get answered in
the game,
Tom Helmich (32:59):
and I think that's in looking at the Lord's Prayer.
You know when Jesus said pray inthis way, and part of that is
thy kingdom come? Thy will bedone?
Roseann Bowlin (33:08):
Yeah, I always emphasize that word when I say,
Tom Helmich (33:11):
I do too. I can't Thy will be done,
Pastor Joe Liles (33:13):
because you guys are old school. You just
like the word thy
Roseann Bowlin (33:15):
Yeah, it's true.
Tom Helmich (33:17):
Guilty, guilty. A little bit of poetic nature too.
But that's he's telling us topray for God's will. And I think
that's when you're doing likepastoral care, you're praying
with somebody. You know, Ialways try to include that, that
to give us peace with God'swill. Yeah? Because, you know,
prayer is not a magic spell,that we can just pray for
something and that's going tohappen, yeah? Because part of
what Jesus taught us in theLord's Prayer is, is not just
(33:40):
how to pray, but what to prayfor. Yeah, because we pray that
for the wrong thing, that meanwe're going to we're going to
get it. It's not a like a magicwand or magic spell to control
God's will. He's teaching us totry to pray for God's will to be
done in our life. And I thinkwith that comes some acceptance
of God's will and a greaterdegree of trust
Roseann Bowlin (33:56):
and trust, yes, yeah. And he says, In all your
ways, acknowledge him. Soglorify God in all that you do.
Pastor Joe Liles (34:04):
Mm, hmm, yeah.
What ways can we move thecongregation, like the church
now, from like a believingmoment, understanding, right,
having knowledge of God, intotrusting God. How do we move the
whole congregation in that way,
Tom Helmich (34:19):
man, as it takes time in this relationship. Yeah,
right, you know, I mean, becausethey've got to be able to see
those little moments in otherpeople's lives, to be able to
recognize them in their ownlives. Yeah, and move what I
think part is what they whatpeople look for in their faith,
yeah, if you're looking forsomething that you're not going
to get, it's hard to move tothat point of trust. You know,
it's because that's why Jesus,you know, we can pray for
(34:40):
everything, but he taught us topray for for certain things and
to things, and to to help peopleunderstand, you know, what the
fruits of the Spirit are andwhat the outcome of faith is.
That it's not, you know, it'shelping people steer away from
the tendency towards, likeprosperity gospel, you know, to
God's kingdom. Yeah, gospel. Andyou know, us present in God's
kingdom. Kingdom gospel, becauseit if they, if their faith is is
(35:06):
pursuing something that is not apromise of the gospel, then
they're going to feel thatthat's not being fulfilled, and
they're not going to build thattrust. Yeah, you know, so it's
been an honesty of of what it isand what it is and what it
isn't, and what God's desire andwill for us in our lives is, and
helping them to discern thosethings and to build tell the
(35:26):
difference for for the wantsthat they have desires, yeah,
their own wants and desires thatthey may be praying for and may
or may not get with God's willfor their life, because it's not
the same thing, like, it's notgoing to be God's will for
anybody's life for them to geta, you know, a new sports car,
or this or that. It may happenas an aside, but if that's
(35:47):
those, are the things they'repraying for. It's helping them
to get a deeper relationship andpraying for things that are, you
know, more closely tied to God'swill. Yeah, not just, you know,
a luxury
Pastor Joe Liles (35:57):
on Earth.
Yeah, absolutely.
Roseann Bowlin (36:01):
I think that God is the most worthy of trust,
right?
Tom Helmich (36:07):
Probably the only one worthy of complete trust.
Roseann Bowlin (36:09):
So I think for us to help the congregation
move, wait,
Pastor Joe Liles (36:13):
hold on a second. That's I wanted to stop
on that statement. I really likeit. I want, I want us to think
about it for a second. Repeat itone more
Roseann Bowlin (36:24):
time. God is the most worthy of trust.
Pastor Joe Liles (36:31):
So I was processing that. As Tom said,
the only one worthy of ourtrust, the only one worthy of
complete trust, of completetrust. And watch this moment, I
disagree with you. Tom, and Iwas thinking, it's a really
powerful statement, Roseanne,and that, you know that God is
the only you know, God is onlyone worthy of our trust, right?
(36:52):
Like the statement that reallyit's it's true God, God is
faithful. I said that my messageon Sunday, God is faithful.
Like, if we want to understandthat God is faithful. That means
God is faithful to us. You know,like it. It's this reciprocal
relationship where we think thatour faith only responds to God,
but God is faithful, which meansthat God is faithful to the
promise, to the trust, to thebeing with us, to sending Jesus
Christ. Like over and overagain, we see this and then. But
(37:15):
part of one of the things I saidin my message on Sunday Tom was
that when we're thinking about,who do we trust? That the world
would look differently if theway we trusted people was the
way we trusted God. Right now,the world is broken and sinful,
which means that this is aresult, but I think, like, it
would be incredible, and maybethis is the heavens opened hope
(37:37):
is that it that God isn't theonly one worthy of our complete
trust. Like, yes, we trust God.
And because we trust God, weextend that complete trust to
everyone around us right now.
Get it every time someone deniesthat trust, betrays that trust,
we take it back, and then we putup a wall that takes to complete
trust right, every part everytime in our life. But I look at
like my spouse, Jess, and I lookat my kids, right, and I think I
(38:00):
have complete trust right now.
Mind you, there's been doubtsand there's been things like
that, right? So that's hard,because I have walls there. But
man, shouldn't we be able tocompletely trust people in our
life and understand that? And Ithink the answer is sadly no,
because we're broken and sinfuland at the same time, faithful
and hopeful. But gosh, I reallywould hope that God's not the
(38:21):
only one we can completely
Roseann Bowlin (38:24):
trust. Okay, so to finish my statement,
Pastor Joe Liles (38:28):
yeah, like, sorry I interrupted. It was such
a good statement I hadinterrupted in the middle, um,
Roseann Bowlin (38:33):
so I'm going to butcher this saying. But there's
a saying out there that said bethe Bible for people, and
sometimes use words Yes, right?
So to bring people in ourcongregation from simply
believing yeah to absolutelytrusting. We have to be trust
(39:00):
worthy. Yeah? That means we haveto met match our worthiness of
trust. Yeah, to God's
Pastor Joe Liles (39:12):
yep, that's beautiful. I believe that 100%
and I believe it's one of thehardest things that
Roseann Bowlin (39:18):
it is very hard, yeah, because we're human,
that's right, and we fail. And Ithink that people who are
believers but not trusters cansometimes be judging,
judgingtons. Oh,
Pastor Joe Liles (39:34):
okay, great.
And
Roseann Bowlin (39:37):
are very, oh, that is a church a hypocrite,
yeah, well, no, we just all needhealing.
Pastor Joe Liles (39:46):
But that's great. I agree with you
entirely, right? The church isnot a place for perfect people,
right? It's for people, placefor people who acknowledge that
we're on a path that's healing,a path that's growing, a path
that's deepening, um. That's theacknowledgement of being a
church body, right? There arenot perfect people in this
church, right? Nor in any
Roseann Bowlin (40:04):
church. It's really a hospital for broken
Pastor Joe Liles (40:06):
souls. You know, a lot of it's there,
right? But yeah, in thehospital, it sends people back
out. Thank you for being herewith us. You go back out into
the world, right? We hope thatwe filled you. It's great. And
so, yeah, I think there's areally, really incredible
reality as we think throughthat. So, you know, I wanted to
bring this up. I love that youhave notes from Sunday, because
you get to sit in a church andlisten. And that is a segment
(40:27):
that we have here on thepodcast. Tommy, ready? You have
to sing the segment with me.
It's Roseanne notes. That's howit goes. You guys ready? Okay,
and the segment is called RoseTom. You have to go with me.
This is a very important ready?
Roseanne, no notes. Oh, man, so
Roseann Bowlin (40:45):
further on that you have to be trustworthy. Say
what you mean, mean what yousay, even when it is unpopular
and yet it is Biblically sound.
Ooh, that's good, and sometimesthat's hard. Yeah, trusting God
breaks us and makes us truly newto him. He breaks us from our
pride, our ego, our selfishness.
(41:09):
And the Bible sums it up in apositive way with the
Beatitudes, which is Matthewfive, three through 12, and in
First Corinthians, 13, fourthrough seven. So when you look
at First Corinthians 13, fourthrough seven, and you can put
your name in the place of love,if you can replace your name of
(41:31):
love, and really, truly mean it,that's our trust in God.
Pastor Joe Liles (41:40):
That's great.
Yeah, I love that. And to takeit back to the Beatitudes, this
is wonderful also, I mean, tothink, but I think this is the
hardest part about trust. It's afull and complete relationship
with God,
Tom Helmich (41:53):
and that's also the thing with with trust, and that
who we put our full and completetrust in, yeah? Because any
person will eventually breakyour trust to some degree.
They'll disappoint they'lldisappoint you, right? I will,
like, if people have known melong enough, I'm going to do
things to disappoint them. Youknow, there's what we consider
(42:16):
trustworthy in a human nature,but we know there's a there's a
point that every human being isgoing to have a moment where
they're going to disappointsomebody else or or break trust
to some degree. Because of this,the sinfulness there makes all
of humanity we you know, any themost trustworthy person can get
to like maybe 99% but not 100%trustworthy, because sin is
(42:37):
present in there, whereas Godbeing without sin. That's why I
say is the one that is the onlyone worthy of complete and total
trust, because of the theabsence of that selfishness and
of that sin, we can trust in Godin all things, and we can trust
God entirely. We don'tnecessarily mean we're going to
get all the consequences wewant, but if we put our faith
(42:59):
and part of that, that trust andfaith relationship, yeah, in
other human beings, likepeople's brokenness with the
church, you know, people'sdisappointment with because they
put their faith in the churchinstead of in God, a person, a
person and a pastor, the pair ofpeople in the church, the church
will disappoint and and willfail, but where God won't, you
(43:20):
know. So you can get to that ahigh level of trust with people,
like we'd have with our spouse,but we, even if you put all your
faith and trust in your spouse,there's going to be times when
you're, you know, there'll be abreak there, yeah, you know,
because selfishness exists inall people, but, but not in God.
We put that total faith andtrust in God, and look, you
(43:41):
know, for that from God alone, Ithink kind of helps, help set
that stage for starting to beable to have that right
relationship.
Pastor Joe Liles (43:50):
You know, I wonder if in trusting, in having
a full and complete trust,heart, body, mind and soul with
God, that we get to a placewhere we are truly not putting
ourselves in a trustingrelationship to the people
around us, but we are constantlyre putting ourselves in a
trusting relationship with God,into a relational surrender that
says, hey, I believe that you'removing in the lives of people
(44:10):
around me too. So my trust isextended to the people, because
I have trust in
Tom Helmich (44:14):
you, right? And that's why I think to have that
full trust in God makes iteasier to have a higher level of
trust with each other, yeah,right. And I think that's the
reason why that's, you know,Jesus, that's the first and the
greatest commandment, you know,and the other ones like it, to
love your neighbor as yourself.
If you're going to be able tolove somebody else, we have to
be able to love and trust God,yeah, you know. And give, give
God our full, you know, our fullcommitment, full love with all
(44:35):
of our heart, soul, strength andmind, or the best as we can as
fallen, sinful creatures, and inthat we are empowered to be able
to love somebody else,
Roseann Bowlin (44:47):
right, right? So a couple more thoughts, trust.
You have to have courage to havetrust. Yeah, agree. Courage is
not the absence of. Fear, it isfacing what God puts in your
life with trust in him that hiswill, his plan, will be
(45:07):
fulfilled even through yourfear. Mm, yes, and your feel
fear will diminish as you trustGod more deeply.
Pastor Joe Liles (45:14):
Mm, hmm, yeah, absolutely. I mean, that was
that psalm text that we read in62 right? Or 56 right? It says,
I will not fear because I havetrust in God, and I trust the
word, right?
Roseann Bowlin (45:23):
And then God is a refuge. So the definition of a
refuge is a condition of beingsafe or sheltered from pursuit,
danger or trouble. I can't thinkof a better refuge than God
Almighty.
Pastor Joe Liles (45:36):
Mm, hmm, but let's reiterate it. You named
where the refuge is thatearlier, it's in the kingdom and
eternity, amen, yep, I think weconstantly look for that refuge
daily, right? And we're saying,bring the kingdom now, which is
the right statement, faithfully.
But what we're really saying isthat I have an assured hope in
the kingdom, right? And becauseof that, I trust you, God. And
without that trust in theassured kingdom, there's no
(45:58):
reason for us to go onsometimes,
Tom Helmich (46:00):
without that, that hope, without having that, that
promise, I don't know how you gothrough life, right? I don't
need it, right? This is just
Roseann Bowlin (46:08):
it, like, knowing the Christmas present
you're gonna get and you want it
Pastor Joe Liles (46:13):
now, yeah, but you know you have to wait, but
you gotta, but you gotta wait,right? And it's wrapped and
under the tree, and you can seeit, and you're like, This is not
right. Like, I just want towait. That's great. That's
great. So I mean, this is allabout relationship with God, and
I think that's why I love thisseries, is because we're really
talking about adult discipleshipin this mountain mover series.
What does it mean to continue tobe a disciple as an adult? And
(46:34):
we're going to continue thatnext week in a unique way, and
we're going to talk about,really, what we call, kind of a
lights out in the summer campstyle of discipleship, but it
was really that end of dayconversation, like, it's not a
Sunday only faith, it is aneveryday faith. And how do you
come back into relationship withGod with every day? So we're
going to actually give kind ofthe tips, tools, techniques that
you should use every day to goback into relationship with God
(46:55):
throughout every single moment,not just on Sunday. Don't just
come here on Sunday to getfilled up. You should go out and
actualize this right back on thecommunity. And I told people
this week, I said, go out andask the people that you trust,
you know. I said, you know. Isaid, here's why I trust you.
Here's when I started trustingyou. And then I said, ask him a
third hard question, do youtrust me, right? And get the
real honest answer, becausethat's going to give a great
(47:17):
honest answer of how we trustGod. Now let's lean into getting
to God daily, right? So we cancontinue to build those
relationships. So that's themountain mover series, um
talking through the message,right? We'll be back here next
week as we talk about how welean into God daily, And all
God's people said, Amen.
Guys ready?
(00:00):
Yep. Welcome to the TNC podcast.
(00:04):
We are recorded in studio, as wesay, every single week, which is
our worship center. It's not acrazy, fancy studio, unless you
call the entire Worship Center astudio for podcasting, and
that's where we're at. And weare three today, three hosts
today in the podcast. We aremissing Table. Table today is
not feeling well, and so he isout. And so we want to lift up
(00:24):
some prayers for him, definitelythat he feels better. Um,
there's something going around.
Tom, you said that your sonwasn't feeling
Tom Helmich (00:30):
well. Yeah, Connor had that day before yesterday,
and yesterday fever and justbody aches, headache, generally,
feeling
Pastor Joe Liles (00:36):
ick, but testing negative for everything.
Yeah, yeah, everything. So it'sjust an ick got something just
man, that's rough. So yeah,definitely praying for table
today. We hope that he feelsbetter, and we know that they
got baby in the house anddifferent things like that. So
that's hard, too. So that's justa moment, but we got three hosts
with us today on the podcast. Tomy left, the wonderful Roseanne
Bowen, Director of Operationshere at the neighborhood church.
(00:57):
And to my right,
Tom Helmich (00:58):
Tom, Pastor.
Pastor Joe Liles (01:00):
Tom, Yeah, whoa, whoa, he still doesn't
have it. You know, he said hewas going to struggle with it.
He's still struggling. I'm stillstruggling. Yeah, it's, what can
you say? Pastor Tom, Pastor Tom,that's great. So Pastor Tom
Helmut here as pastor of careand education, two weeks into
the role coming in, and saidthings started third week coming
in. This is week three. This isweek three. And so, so it's been
great, and we're going to getinto today to talk about one the
(01:22):
message series, which is calledMountain mover, and it's really
an identity of talking about,how do we learn to trust God
when the path is unclear? And Ithink all of us can admit that
the path and our life has beenunclear at times. I would love
to say that my role to becominga pastor was super clear. And I
just took every single step intobecoming that. And I can go back
(01:44):
into 567, 10 times in my lifewhen I was like, Oh no, I was
going to be an architect. At onepoint, I wanted to go into the
military, and I was going to bea lifelong career military
person. So that was a route.
Came back and sold cars for amoment. That was not a route.
Just in case anyone waswondering, I did not want to do
that. So, like all along theseways, I worked in construction
(02:04):
for two years prior to seminary.
So I was I was going up anddoing that so and all along
these points, I mean differentrelationships, different
careers, right, different pathsand learning to trust God again
and again and again. But I cansay the times when I found the
path was when I went back toGod. That's the times when I
found the path. And so thisseries is really learning about
to trust God, aligning thosepaths again and again and again
(02:28):
and again. And so we've beenwalking through we met with our
youth that went to on mission,and because their path is
developing, right? So we talkedwith them. Week One, we talked
about you of little faith, whichChrist often said to the
disciples, right? That was weektwo in the series, and this last
week, we really talked about theword Trust. And we talked about,
what does it mean to trust God?
And we define trust as thereally the ability to see a
(02:51):
character or trait in someonethat gives you an assured
confidence that you are willingto allow them to really control
a part of your life, right tohave something that could affect
your life, you're giving themcontrol over that because you
trust them. You have confidencein an assured confidence of
them. And maybe it's not thewhole part trust kind of you can
(03:13):
compartmentalize it. They canjust be one trait that you
trust. It can be a piece oftheir character that you trust.
I think as we talk about God,we're talking about holistic
trust, right, and what thatreally means. So wanted to jump
in and really talk through this,but we can't jump in without
doing our jingle. And so youguys ready a, one, a, two, it's
only me today. It's going to bea moment, I know. So you guys
(03:33):
ready for this? 479-367-2285,neighborhood neighborhood,
church. Yeah, there. Youappreciate that, you guys on
point. And so again, I like tosay harmony, but no, yeah, no,
that was definitely not aharmony, but at the same time it
was beautiful. It was, it wasbeautiful music to my ears. And
that is, that is a jingle rose.
(03:57):
And what happens when they callthe jingle?
Unknown (04:00):
I answer the phone.
That's exactly
Pastor Joe Liles (04:03):
right. What is your go to line when you answer
the phone?
Roseann Bowlin (04:06):
Thank you for calling the neighborhood church.
This is Roseanne. How can I helpyou today? I just
Pastor Joe Liles (04:10):
want to call her to talk. Doesn't it seem
like a person you just
Tom Helmich (04:13):
want to make a friend with us, hoping she's
going to say, you know, this isRoseanne, the hostess with
Roseann Bowlin (04:19):
the most Oh, but that works too. More
Pastor Joe Liles (04:21):
professional.
Oh yeah, hostess with the mostis okay, I don't mind that.
Yeah, that's nice. That could begreat. So one that is our
jingle. That is our phone numberat the church. You can call that
anytime we can talk to Roseanne.
But let's jump into a little bitabout trusting God. And so the
first question I wanted to kindof get to is that, what does it
mean for each of you to trustGod. So we broke this down in
(04:43):
the message a little bit. Italked through it, but before we
kind of break down the messagepoints. And now that we have the
definition of trust, what doesit mean for each of you to trust
God? I
Tom Helmich (04:52):
think there's a difference between believing in
God and trusting God, becauseyou can believe God exists, but
not trust God's. Character ortrust God's, God's plan, and
want to rebel against that, youknow, to try to have our own
plan. And so I think part oftrusting God is being willing to
to at least know that we need tosubmit to God's will, like I got
(05:14):
my own plan for things. Itdoesn't usually work out that
way. But instead of that beingthe whole world and everything
is broken. It's It's knowingthat, okay, I tried this, but
you know God's will is somethingdifferent, and knowing that no
acknowledging who's really incontrol of what's going on.
Pastor Joe Liles (05:32):
So you said four hard things in that
statement. You said, one is thatwe have to believe in God. You
started with that, right? Andyou have an understanding of
God, and believing isn'tnecessarily trusting, yeah,
because not trusting, that's agreat distinction. We'll talk
about that in a second. And thenyou said you have to acknowledge
God, right? So not only believebut you have to acknowledge God,
right? That God has control overour life and that you have to
(05:52):
trust in God's Will over ourlife. Those are four, to me,
unknowns in a trustingrelationship with God, which
Tom Helmich (05:59):
completely contradictory to my my own will
to have control of everythinggoing on me and know what's
going on, even through seminary.
The hardest part is startingseminary, like I spent, I know,
several months detailing, Imean, I talked to the lady at
Wartburg, I don't know how manytimes like she recognized my
voice when I called. She justknew who it was, right? Because
I want everybody
Pastor Joe Liles (06:19):
knows your name,
Tom Helmich (06:21):
I know every little detail how this is going to
work, but it got hard becausecertain steps along the way,
even the advisors like, yeah,we'll figure it out when we get
there. Yeah. It's like, okay,how are we going to do this?
Because this isn't going to workthis way, and this is how the
catalog says you have to dothis. But I can't do that
because I want to know before Igot started, yeah, what the end
game was going to be, yep, inour in our faith, trusting God
(06:43):
is saying that. I have no ideawhat the end game is going to
be, what the end result is goingto be, but I know it's going to
be, you know, it's going to beGod's will, whatever it is. And
I know that that's where itneeds to be. And just be willing
to submit to going, going alongwith that. You know, it's like
saying, hey, jump in the car.
We're gonna go on a road tripwhere you'll find out when we
get there, yeah, I'm not goingto get in that car, yeah, but
you'll get that car with God.
(07:06):
Well, I don't really have achoice, because this is the
other reality, is, if, if God'swill is that I will buy free
will, do whatever, then I'mgoing to do it by my own free
will. Because there's adifference. We can't, we can't
equate ourselves with God'sauthority, right? Well, that's
what I was
Pastor Joe Liles (07:18):
going to ask, is, like, how do you know God's
will? I mean, if this is a partof trusting God, and you're
saying it'd be and you're
Tom Helmich (07:23):
singing so much easier, if we could, it'd be so
much easier, yeah, but then wemight be wanting to try to pick
and choose which we were okaywith, yeah, and because, I mean,
a lot of problems in my lifehave been when I've rebelled
against God's will,
Pastor Joe Liles (07:36):
you know? And would you say, rebelled against
God's will, rebelled against
Tom Helmich (07:40):
God, against God's will. I mean, for me, I always
like the idea of, you know, ofbeing obedient to God, yeah,
when it was what I wanted Godto, want me to be obedient in
but there's times that, youknow, it's like that knock on
the door. And if you knock onsomebody's door and they ignore
it, they start knocking louderand louder and louder. And you
don't want God knocking on yourdoor incredibly loud. Yeah, it
(08:02):
just God will get our attention.
And so I think being able to bewilling to go into God's God's
plan for you is great. The hardpart is knowing what it is,
yeah, and it took me, I don'tknow, 20 years to figure out
about the seminary thing. Maybeit was like a time, but
discerning God's will, that'sthe whole point of why you
(08:23):
can't, like getting in aseminary, you don't just say,
Well, I feel called, okay, let'sdiscern that a little bit. And
it's a process they go throughto try to figure out if, if this
is really what it is. Because wedon't, we don't know, and
there's not a signature line on,you know, God's messages to us
always. So we don't, we don'tknow. That takes a lot of prayer
and discernment and peoplearound you to discern if that's
really what it is and notsomething else. This is
Pastor Joe Liles (08:45):
why trust is so hard to me. Is because you
said we don't know. But thefirst thing you said is, we
needed to believe in God, whichis knowledge of God. It's our
understanding of that. And thenyou said, we don't know, right?
And so it's, it's trust is thishighly contradictory. It's
Tom Helmich (08:58):
like, it's where most Christians fail, like
they'll believe in God, yeah.
But so often we want our will tobe done rather than trusting
God's will. And and there's,that's, that's part of the, part
of the breakdown, you know,with, you know, I know God
exists, I know God's in control,but I'm, I'm dead set on doing
it this way. This is the way Ithink it needs to be my will, my
will be done instead of Thy willbe done. So
Pastor Joe Liles (09:21):
I want to get back to this idea of belief and
faith, right? Because I thinkpeople interchange belief, faith
and trust, right? And they arenot interchangeable, right? They
are very distinct. And I thinkwe need to help people
understand the distinctionbetween belief, faith and trust.
And I made that distinction inthe message, and I tried to make
it clear, it's hard, because Icould do a whole series on
(09:43):
belief in faith, right? And dofour weeks on just what is
faith, four weeks on what isbelief, four weeks on what is
trust, and how that works out.
So let's come back to belief infaith and trust. But Roseanne, I
want to hear from you like, whatis it that that you believe?
Mean? Is to
Roseann Bowlin (10:00):
trust God. Well, I wanted to add to something
that, I guess it's maybe the agedifference, but I know what the
end is. The end result is said,age difference. What do you
mean? Age difference? You guys?
Okay, great. I know at the end,I'm super
Pastor Joe Liles (10:14):
old. I'm not even there yet.
Roseann Bowlin (10:18):
Let's just put it out there. I'm the oldest one
here, but the end result of mytrust in God is eternity with
Him. Yeah, right. So, so I knowthat as I make decisions, as I
discern God's will for my life,I put my trust in Him, in all
(10:42):
the chaos, in all the doubt, inall the anxiety in the situation
I put I have peace knowing thatGod's plan is way better than
mine. You know, it's and it'shard sometimes, because it's not
the plan I wanted,
Pastor Joe Liles (11:01):
right? I think it's very important. It's
actually the distinction I madein my message, right, between
prayers a plan, right in thepromise. And I just said, you
know, when we say we trust God,and I think this is where we get
stuck. We get stuck in beliefacknowledgement. We can start in
God's will. We can second,understand, like all these
different places that we can getstuck in trying to trust God,
(11:22):
but the trust is not in God'severy action, right? The trust
is in the promise. The trust isin the kingdom, right? And what
you said is, hey, I trust thatthere's an eternity waiting for
me, like, if you want to let meknow how I get through
everything in my life. And Isaid this on Sunday too. I said,
Look, there's been enough thingsthat happened in my life. And
the only reason I stay a pastor,and this is a true statement.
The only reason I stay pastor isbecause the promise is true, and
(11:43):
if the promise is true, then Iwill keep on working for the
rest of my life to serve thekingdom because I believe in the
promise. It doesn't mean I'mgoing to do everything right. It
doesn't mean people around meare going to do everything
right. It doesn't mean that mylife is perfect and that nothing
goes wrong right. What it meansis that the promise is greater
than every single circumstancethat I go through, and I can
lean back into that promise atall times. And so I love that
(12:04):
you said that, because I thinkthat really encapsulate what's
trusting God is. It's trust inthe promise, right? Knowing and
having knowledge that there is aplan. I don't know what the plan
is. I'm not included into theplan all the time. At times, I
just breathe by the Holy Spirit.
Now my Holy Spirit seems likeyou're doing something there.
Cool. Imma keep on walking mydirection, you know, like I'm
going to keep on walking overhere and I just breeze by it.
And so there's a really greatreality about trusting in the
(12:26):
promise and what that means too.
So I love that. I thought thatwas really good. Now, walk me
through Roseanne, when is a timethat, when is the time in your
life that you specificallytrusted God, you know? So a time
in your life that we're thinkingabout, maybe a moment that
trusting God was challenging toyou
Roseann Bowlin (12:47):
on April 10, 2017 I woke up an ordinary day.
Mm hmm, got ready for work, andI got the phone call, that my
husband had been in an accidenton April 29 I walked into the
(13:07):
hospital a wife and walked out awidow. Yeah. It so the future I
thought I was going to have onApril 10, shattered the future I
thought I was going to have onApril 29 shattered. Yeah, I
didn't know what my futurelooked like, and that was
(13:30):
extremely hard to trust inbecause, and I still, I still
deal with it, because growingold with this person wasn't
going to happen, right? And sojust trusting that God's got me
(13:54):
sometimes be hard. Yeah? Oh man,yeah. Go ahead and there are
more challenges that I mean,both my sisters are living with
me now. Both would be homelessif they weren't in my home,
right? So there are challengesthere. Now, do I trust that it's
God's plan? Yes. Do I trust thatGod's got me Yes? Is it hard?
(14:19):
Absolutely yes.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:21):
Would you say that you maintained your trust
the entire time through thosechallenging circumstances?
Roseann Bowlin (14:31):
No, I tried, but there were times when it looked
really bleak. I mean, you know,I yeah, I'd like to say, Oh yes,
I had trust all the way through,but no, it waned.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:51):
Yeah. Can I ask you one more, a little bit
harder question, yeah, whatbrought you back into trust?
Having. Uh, such a life changetwice, right? They April 10 and
the 29th so kind of thisdramatic shift in life, little
bit of a recovery, and then, youknow, kind of the final notice
that we're going to be gatheredtogether again, right? Hope in
(15:13):
the future, right?
Roseann Bowlin (15:14):
Right? I think that, um, prayer. Yeah, that
Okay, God, you're walking withme. You are beside me. Yeah,
you're not carrying me. I can dothis, but you're walking beside
me and knowing that I hadfriends who represented God
(15:37):
walking with me, yeah, becausewe have to be God's hands and
feet on Earth, and that's whathe calls us to do. And so the
friends that surrounded me, thejust the way looking back, the
way God answered prayer, eventhough it wasn't my plan
(15:58):
originally, that was not what Iplanned, I accept God's plan for
my life and path. And so there'snot one particular moment when I
went, Okay, I've got this. God'sgot this. It's just that blessed
assurance. Mm,
Pastor Joe Liles (16:15):
hmm. I love that statement, Blessed
assurance, because it's anassured hope, absolutely. And I
think when, at least in my life,when I have gotten this places
where it's hard to trust God,right, I can only live into an
assured hope, right? It can onlylive into the hope of the
promise to be true, right? Andthis is what I'm moving forward
towards, and it carries methrough the tough times when
(16:38):
it's dark and it's bleak and Idon't know what's going to
happen and and anything that Iknow, that I put out there is my
will, will not accomplishanything more to change the
situation that I'm in. Thesituation has changed. I
recognize that. How do I trustGod again? I cannot go back to
the way that it was, right.
Specifically, even in thesituation you're talking about
losing a husband, a belovedspouse, right? I cannot go back
(16:58):
to the way that it was, yep. Sowhat does it mean to walk
forward, right? And the onlything we can do is hope into the
next step and trust that. And Ithink, too, our trust breaks
down all the way to a spacewhere, like, we just trust that
God is present. I don't need theplan, I don't need the prayers,
I don't need thing. I justpurely need to know that God is
(17:18):
present with me, becauseeverything else is too much.
It's too much. So, like yousaid, God walking with you, I
think is that beginning stepback into a trusting
relationship when our situationsare really challenging. So, and
we'll continue to pray for youtoo well. Thank you. Yeah. Love
David. He was he was a saint. Tothat guy. Was awesome. Yeah?
Pretty good guy. Yeah, he wasabsolutely Tom What about you?
(17:47):
Yeah,
Tom Helmich (17:50):
and thinking about the the trust thing, it's like,
really, it's not necessarily,and I would think maybe it's not
necessarily a lack of trust inGod, but a lack of trust in what
the consequences are going to beon Earth, like what the details
of God's plan are for us onEarth, you know, because, like,
when do you experience death?
It's this separation from theloved one. We know God still
(18:10):
exists in that. We know that youknow, For God so loved the earth
that sent his only son. And weknow these things, but the
consequences for us on Earth arebeing separated from those
people. So really, like some ofour lack of trust is trust in
the details of what God's planis going to look like for us on
Earth as we experience it,because our I mean, only thing
(18:33):
we have any kind of ability toto understand or comprehend is
the things that we canphysically touch around us and
see around us and see around usin our life. You know, where
we're going to live, what ourjob is going to be if we're
gonna have enough money. Yeah,you know, tangible things. These
are the tangible things in ourlife. And some of the times
where I think we feel distrust,and we feel distrust for what
those tangible things are or arenot going to be, rather than,
(18:54):
you know, the trust in the end.
You know, like when, when mygrandfather died and when my
grandmother died, like the trustof the end, I knew, you know, I
knew that end, well, the trustwas going to be in the end of
the being gathered together withthe saints in the light and the
the final, end of times and theresurrection. But it's the stuff
(19:14):
in between, yeah, that we'regoing to experience in life that
brings fear, you know, like andfor me as a parent, and you're
getting into this phase a littlebit with your kids, the very
difficult, harsh reality thatGod has given my children, the
exact same free will that he'sgiven me both have, yeah, and I
no longer have any control overthe choices they make. And a lot
(19:36):
of times, I'm more emotionallyinvested in the potential
consequences of their choicesthan they are, because I've got,
you know, my youngest doesn'thave he lacks the part of his
brain yet to be able tocomprehend consequences. I love
these. That's great. He'd beabout another six, seven years
before he gets there. Right?
Absolutely. And so it's like aroller coaster you didn't sign
up for. And so I know that Godhas a plan for my children. You.
(19:56):
What my children's choices aregoing to be along the way, with
their consequences that they'regoing to suffer from their
choices, and the consequencesthat that Amy and I are going to
suffer from their choices, yeah,we don't know. And so it's like
the lack of the areas where mytruck, my trust, uh, fails a
little bit, or Wayne's is in thethings in between now and the in
(20:18):
the end, yeah, and it's, it'sthe time, it's, it's tough to
trust God, because I have my ownidea of what I want my kids
lives to be and the choices Iwant them to make and and they
don't always choose that. And Ididn't look back at me as a
parent, you know, like me as meas a kid. I'm like, I didn't
always make those choiceseither. Yeah, right, yeah. But I
(20:38):
have to have that trust that Godhas a plan for my children and
that and that Christ's, youknow, action on the cross was
for my children also. So I don'tfear that, really, I'm fearing
their consequences on
Roseann Bowlin (20:53):
Earth, yeah, for their choices. You don't want to
see your children go throughpain, no? And
Tom Helmich (20:58):
I don't want them to have to do stuff the hard
way, right? Despite my bestefforts. Oh, I know it's like my
Roseann Bowlin (21:02):
daughter did.
Yeah, it was an obstacle to putin her way. She threw it up
Tom Helmich (21:07):
there. Oh, yeah, my kids, I think, go off their
rails sometimes looking forthem, you know, but they come
back around. You know? It's justthose tough times of life where
I have to entirely, justcompletely trust God in my
children's lives, which is adifficult thing for me to let go
of when they were little. Icould pick them up, put them in
their car seat, buckle them in.
Now, I mean, Connor's at homewith us for another couple
weeks, and then he moves to, youknow, to Conway, yeah. And then
(21:30):
they're all just on their own,doing their own thing, and until
there's an issue and they needto call mom and dad for help on
stuff, you know, but we're notthere to see the choices they're
making, or who they're hangingout with, or, you know, who you
know choices they're not making,and we just have to trust them
and trust God that that God'sgot a plan for them, yeah, and
(21:50):
just know that there's going tobe consequences, and there's
nothing I can, I can do aboutthat. So it's tougher, like the
toughest moments for me andtrusting God right now is with
with the kids,
Pastor Joe Liles (22:03):
yeah, right now, I think it's very
interesting. The point you bringup about trusting God is
trusting God in other people'slives too. I had actually not
even conceptualized thisidentity, like I know it, have
knowledge of it, did not thinkabout it when I was crafting
this message, that I wasthinking very personal. And
that's part of my message, wasthat the first part was that if
you want to begin to trust God,you have to have a personal
(22:25):
relationship with Jesus Christ.
There's no other way to begintrusting God and try you in God
outside of a personalrelationship with Jesus Christ.
So it was a very personalidentity of a message. But I
think you were 100% right whenyou say that if we are to trust
God, we trust God in wholeness,which means that we have to look
at other people who areChristian in our lives, and our
kids, especially that we areraising a Christian in faith in
life as a responsibility anddiscipleship, to look at them
(22:46):
and say, whoo. You're makingsome choices, but God is with
you too. You know, like God hasa will for your life and a plan
for your life, and is in thosemidst. And I think our heart
breaks, and it's gotta be truewith God also, when they do
something and we're like, wetold you, like, we literally sat
you down and said, Don't go downthis path, because it could end
up like this. And they're like,they're like,
Tom Helmich (23:09):
nope, one of those hard conversations just the
other day, like, oh, well, thisis your choice, but this is a
very bad idea, and here's why,yeah, and it's your
consequences, and I can't saveyou from that, yeah, man, all we
can really do is just pray
Pastor Joe Liles (23:24):
for him, yeah, right? And I think it's
important and understand thatGod is still with them, right?
But then also, I think we havean action as disciple makers to
continue to pour into theirlife, right? We don't stop
pouring in because they've madea bad choice, right? And I think
this is a beautiful nature ofhow we trust God. God pours into
us still, when we make a badchoice, God's like, ooh, not the
path ahead, you know. Like,that's okay. We're gonna work
(23:44):
with it, you know. We're gonnawork with it, and we'll move
these things. And I think we dothe same thing with our
children, same thing with ourfriends. When we see someone
that goes off the rails a littlebit, it's not that we back away
and go, ooh, distance. Can'thave that right now. No, it's
most are like, we step in and wesay, hey, saw you. Went that
direct. Like, still here, stillwilling to walk with you. Hey,
let's, let's try to bring itback this direction a little
(24:04):
bit. And I think it's animportant narrative to see that
in trusting God, we trust thatGod is in other people's lives
also. And that goes back to lastweek's message, not this, just
last Sunday, but last week, whenwe said that we really have to
understand that if seeds arebeing planted, and it's a small
amount of faith that, yes,you're planting seeds in others,
and God's planting seeds in you,but there's other people
planting seeds in you. Like,God's working in other people's
(24:26):
lives to be in ours too, wherepeople are watching us and
going, ooh, wouldn't have you dothat? Like, that's not the route
right where we go. So I thinkit's a really profound point
that we bring forward. So let'sopen up scripture. Let's go open
up scripture and take throughthe we read three different
readings on Sunday from Psalmsand Proverbs, and we wanted to
take this through and they'retruly about what it means to
(24:47):
trust God. So Roseanne, couldyou start with this by reading
your
Roseann Bowlin (24:50):
scripture, Psalm 62, eight, yeah. Okay, trust in
him at all times. Oh, peoplepour out your heart before Him.
God is. Refuge for us, Selah.
Mm,
Pastor Joe Liles (25:02):
it's beautiful. And then Psalm 56
just a couple chapters back,verses, verses five and six, and
it says this, oh, sorry, versesthree and four. And it says
this, When I'm afraid I put mytrust in you, in God, whose word
I praise. In God, I trust I amnot afraid. What can flesh do to
(25:25):
me?
Tom Helmich (25:27):
And Proverbs, chapter three, verses five and
six, trust in the Lord with allyour heart, and do not rely on
your own insight in all yourways. Acknowledge Him and He
will make straight your paths.
Pastor Joe Liles (25:42):
Proverbs that hits, well, I mean this, it sure
does.
Tom Helmich (25:45):
Well, this is Proverbs five and six here. I
mean this. This is thecommandment in Deuteronomy,
yeah, the Lord your God with allyour heart, soul strength and
might, yeah. And this is when,you know, Jesus is asked the was
the first and greatestcommandment. And he said, Love
the Lord your God with all yourGod, with all your heart, soul,
strength and mind, you know. Andanother one is like it, but
that's what it's been. Proverbsare saying that trust in the
(26:06):
Lord with all your heart, and Ithink that trust and love are
are intrinsically tied. We cantrust God because God loves us,
yeah, and that's what allowsthat, that trust to be there.
Well, I
Pastor Joe Liles (26:18):
think the important part in Proverbs too,
like, lean, not on your ownunderstanding, oh, yeah, not on
your own insight, as it said.
But that word is alsounderstanding, and understanding
is also belief, right? So itsays, lean, not on your own
belief, trust in God, right?
Like, how interesting is thatlike? Because
Tom Helmich (26:32):
then when you look at Faith, faith is like, there's
a there's a point between trustand knowledge, Yeah, correct?
That faith kind of kind ofbridges you, I think of
knowledge of like anintellectual thing, and we're
not, you know, we're not savedbecause of a right knowledge of
God or the or the scriptures.
Like, there are maybe plenty ofpeople in heaven that had it
completely wrong. Yeah, probablyall of us, to some extent right.
(26:54):
But that trust in God comesthrough faith, or maybe faith
comes through trust. Those arekind of, kind of tied to each
Pastor Joe Liles (27:02):
other. Yeah, it was so that belief is exactly
right, is and understand, it's aknowledge, it's an understanding
of God, right? People canbelieve in God without having
faith in God,
Tom Helmich (27:11):
right? And that's the big problem when people,
like people, talk about, likethe, you know, if God, if, if
faith is a free gift given topeople, and then how, how can
anybody not be saved? Well, youcan, you can believe that God
exists, but then turn your backon God and say, No, I'm not
going to do that and rebelagainst that. That's that
rebellion against the HolySpirit
Pastor Joe Liles (27:32):
that, I mean, they'll quote Scripture too,
that even the demons believe inGod, right? Like, that's what,
yeah,
Tom Helmich (27:36):
that's what. That's what the devil used to attempt
Jesus was with scripture. Yeah,right. You know that's the
knowledge. Knowledge doesn't getyou there, right? You know, you
can have the entire Biblememorized, but if you, if you've
not, if you don't have that giftof faith, and you're not turning
into that, if you, I don't thinkturning into it's right, because
it puts too much of an impetuson on us, like there's any
turning into faith. But ifyou've been given that gift of
(27:58):
faith, and you intentionallyturn away from it because it
doesn't fit your idea of whatyou want for your life. Then,
then you obviously don't haveany trust in God, or you're
refusing to trust, right? Sohaving that, that knowledge
isn't enough. You have to thatfaith has to bridge that gap to
trust,
Pastor Joe Liles (28:14):
right? And trust is really an identity of
like, an actionable faith, like,when you trust in God, you're
you're kind of putting faithinto action, right? You're
saying, great, I've been giventhis gift of my trust in God.
Says, Now I I fully give my lifeover and surrender, right? A
relational surrender to God,right? I just have faith that
you've given me, and I justoperate however. Yeah, I have a
relational surrender. Now, if
Tom Helmich (28:35):
you got that one friend that where I teach,
teaching teenagers to drive,right? We have the knowledge
that, that maybe they've gone tothe driving school, they've got
the permit, and we may havefaith in what their desired
outcome, you know, what they'rewanting to try to do. But do you
really trust them behind thewheel entirely?
Pastor Joe Liles (28:52):
Tom I did not realize how scared I was in
teaching my daughter how todrive until the first time I got
in so confident, and I was like,this is going to go great,
right? And now, mind you, I'mdriving myself right now
trusting another driver. That'sthat's a moment. Oh, yeah, even
in your marriage, dear spouse,like trusting another drivers,
(29:12):
the whole moment, Jess hasentered in a new phase right now
where she doesn't necessarilytrust my driving. Like the other
day, we're sitting there, she'slike, you're close to the right
line. And I'm like, Oh,interesting. And that's like,
what's going on right now? Andshe goes, Oh, you need to stop.
Quicker, you know? And I waslike, What? What? Like, we've
been driving together for 20years. Like, what is happening
that doesn't get better. No, itdoesn't. I'm like, where are you
at right now? Yeah. So, I mean,when
Tom Helmich (29:33):
I was I was a field training officer, teaching new
police officers, you know. Sothey you go through the academy,
and then you have fieldtraining, like, three, three or
four months of field training,and you ride with a more
experienced cop and like that.
Would take them with me thatride in the passenger seat for
the first four weeks, yeah, andthey would just watch, and
they'd follow along everything,and they'd start gradually doing
more and more and more. In phasetwo, they drove, Oh, nice. And
that's when you had, that's whenyou eliminated the people that
(29:54):
decided they didn't really wantto be FTOs. Oh, interesting.
Because when you got a 21 year.
Kid who's who's, you know, atthat time, most of them have
been had a license for fiveyears. Now, a lot of them have
only had a license for two orthree years. Yeah, because
people don't want to drive asoften. And now you're in busy
traffic, and now you get somekind of a hot call that requires
a code through response, andthey turn on the lights and
(30:14):
sirens and start passing on theleft to go through
intersections, and that's alevel of blood pressure change
that I can't really think how Ieven articulate, yeah, like,
there, there were, like, rubmarks in the floorboard where
I'm like, just cramming that,that, that non existent pad down
there, up underneath the dash.
Yeah, I don't have any freakingterrifying
Pastor Joe Liles (30:37):
Oh, yeah, no, I can't even imagine. I'm with
Kaylee driving normal speeds onback roads. Oh, and I'm like,
This is scary, and it's notgoing wrong. I just lack
control. Well,
Tom Helmich (30:49):
right? And that because we don't lack control,
right? It's hard to it's hard totrust we don't have control,
right? Like, I had no fear ofdriving 100 miles on the
interstate if I had 200 miles anhour running code three to like
an officer needs assistance callor something, riding in the
passenger seat with somebodyelse doing it whole another ball
game. Yeah, even if it's with amore seasoned officer, there's a
(31:10):
little bit of level of anxiety,because we often want to only
trust our own, Oh, absolutely,our own decision making. But
being a passenger in the carwith somebody else, that's when
you know whether or not you youmay believe that they're a good
driver, and you may have faithin what they want out of that,
and that they're going to beattentive, but do you really
trust them behind the wheel? Andthat's the thing with with
because reality is, God's behindthe wheel. We're not, yeah, and
(31:32):
when we get past pretend Jesus,right? And just the knowledge,
we're kind of along for theride. It's tough to trust. It's
tough to trust, you know,
Pastor Joe Liles (31:44):
I think there's something here about the
pace of life, right? And youspoke about how quick this was
from 10th to 29th earlier,right? Like this, 19 days,
right? And you just spoke aboutthe pace like, hey, I can get in
and drive with it, you know, thesecond phase officer, right? And
we're driving, that's fine. Soonas you hit the code three, the
lights are on, right, and you'rezooming through intersections,
there's there's pace andpresence, right? Like now, all
(32:05):
of a sudden, these decisions arebeing made with other people who
can be impacted. Now I trust youless. The decision is made at a
speed which I'm comfortablewith, but not comfortable with
you. And there's a speed thing,right? So now here's another
level of trust. It's almost asif the way that we trust not
only is it not out of ourcontrol, if it's not in our
timeline, right or not aroundthe people that we also do like
(32:26):
those, all have factors in ourtrust. And so when we say
holistic trust, we're saying,God, I trust you and with the
people in my life. I trust youwith the pace of my life. I
trust you with the plan for mylife. And then God, in a really
interesting way, says eternity.
And if I'm just drawing thisconnection now, during the
podcast, answers thosequestions, God says, Hey, you
don't have to worry about time Igot you for eternity. God says
(32:47):
you don't have to worry aboutpeople, because we'll all be
gathered together again. Youknow, you don't have to worry
about the plane because I hadthe promise. It's almost like
all the questions where we havelevels of trust get answered in
the game,
Tom Helmich (32:59):
and I think that's in looking at the Lord's Prayer.
You know when Jesus said pray inthis way, and part of that is
thy kingdom come? Thy will bedone?
Roseann Bowlin (33:08):
Yeah, I always emphasize that word when I say,
Tom Helmich (33:11):
I do too. I can't Thy will be done,
Pastor Joe Liles (33:13):
because you guys are old school. You just
like the word thy
Roseann Bowlin (33:15):
Yeah, it's true.
Tom Helmich (33:17):
Guilty, guilty. A little bit of poetic nature too.
But that's he's telling us topray for God's will. And I think
that's when you're doing likepastoral care, you're praying
with somebody. You know, Ialways try to include that, that
to give us peace with God'swill. Yeah? Because, you know,
prayer is not a magic spell,that we can just pray for
something and that's going tohappen, yeah? Because part of
what Jesus taught us in theLord's Prayer is, is not just
(33:40):
how to pray, but what to prayfor. Yeah, because we pray that
for the wrong thing, that meanwe're going to we're going to
get it. It's not a like a magicwand or magic spell to control
God's will. He's teaching us totry to pray for God's will to be
done in our life. And I thinkwith that comes some acceptance
of God's will and a greaterdegree of trust
Roseann Bowlin (33:56):
and trust, yes, yeah. And he says, In all your
ways, acknowledge him. Soglorify God in all that you do.
Pastor Joe Liles (34:04):
Mm, hmm, yeah.
What ways can we move thecongregation, like the church
now, from like a believingmoment, understanding, right,
having knowledge of God, intotrusting God. How do we move the
whole congregation in that way,
Tom Helmich (34:19):
man, as it takes time in this relationship. Yeah,
right, you know, I mean, becausethey've got to be able to see
those little moments in otherpeople's lives, to be able to
recognize them in their ownlives. Yeah, and move what I
think part is what they whatpeople look for in their faith,
yeah, if you're looking forsomething that you're not going
to get, it's hard to move tothat point of trust. You know,
it's because that's why Jesus,you know, we can pray for
(34:40):
everything, but he taught us topray for for certain things and
to things, and to to help peopleunderstand, you know, what the
fruits of the Spirit are andwhat the outcome of faith is.
That it's not, you know, it'shelping people steer away from
the tendency towards, likeprosperity gospel, you know, to
God's kingdom. Yeah, gospel. Andyou know, us present in God's
kingdom. Kingdom gospel, becauseit if they, if their faith is is
(35:06):
pursuing something that is not apromise of the gospel, then
they're going to feel thatthat's not being fulfilled, and
they're not going to build thattrust. Yeah, you know, so it's
been an honesty of of what it isand what it is and what it
isn't, and what God's desire andwill for us in our lives is, and
helping them to discern thosethings and to build tell the
(35:26):
difference for for the wantsthat they have desires, yeah,
their own wants and desires thatthey may be praying for and may
or may not get with God's willfor their life, because it's not
the same thing, like, it's notgoing to be God's will for
anybody's life for them to geta, you know, a new sports car,
or this or that. It may happenas an aside, but if that's
(35:47):
those, are the things they'repraying for. It's helping them
to get a deeper relationship andpraying for things that are, you
know, more closely tied to God'swill. Yeah, not just, you know,
a luxury
Pastor Joe Liles (35:57):
on Earth.
Yeah, absolutely.
Roseann Bowlin (36:01):
I think that God is the most worthy of trust,
right?
Tom Helmich (36:07):
Probably the only one worthy of complete trust.
Roseann Bowlin (36:09):
So I think for us to help the congregation
move, wait,
Pastor Joe Liles (36:13):
hold on a second. That's I wanted to stop
on that statement. I really likeit. I want, I want us to think
about it for a second. Repeat itone more
Roseann Bowlin (36:24):
time. God is the most worthy of trust.
Pastor Joe Liles (36:31):
So I was processing that. As Tom said,
the only one worthy of ourtrust, the only one worthy of
complete trust, of completetrust. And watch this moment, I
disagree with you. Tom, and Iwas thinking, it's a really
powerful statement, Roseanne,and that, you know that God is
the only you know, God is onlyone worthy of our trust, right?
(36:52):
Like the statement that reallyit's it's true God, God is
faithful. I said that my messageon Sunday, God is faithful.
Like, if we want to understandthat God is faithful. That means
God is faithful to us. You know,like it. It's this reciprocal
relationship where we think thatour faith only responds to God,
but God is faithful, which meansthat God is faithful to the
promise, to the trust, to thebeing with us, to sending Jesus
Christ. Like over and overagain, we see this and then. But
(37:15):
part of one of the things I saidin my message on Sunday Tom was
that when we're thinking about,who do we trust? That the world
would look differently if theway we trusted people was the
way we trusted God. Right now,the world is broken and sinful,
which means that this is aresult, but I think, like, it
would be incredible, and maybethis is the heavens opened hope
(37:37):
is that it that God isn't theonly one worthy of our complete
trust. Like, yes, we trust God.
And because we trust God, weextend that complete trust to
everyone around us right now.
Get it every time someone deniesthat trust, betrays that trust,
we take it back, and then we putup a wall that takes to complete
trust right, every part everytime in our life. But I look at
like my spouse, Jess, and I lookat my kids, right, and I think I
(38:00):
have complete trust right now.
Mind you, there's been doubtsand there's been things like
that, right? So that's hard,because I have walls there. But
man, shouldn't we be able tocompletely trust people in our
life and understand that? And Ithink the answer is sadly no,
because we're broken and sinfuland at the same time, faithful
and hopeful. But gosh, I reallywould hope that God's not the
(38:21):
only one we can completely
Roseann Bowlin (38:24):
trust. Okay, so to finish my statement,
Pastor Joe Liles (38:28):
yeah, like, sorry I interrupted. It was such
a good statement I hadinterrupted in the middle, um,
Roseann Bowlin (38:33):
so I'm going to butcher this saying. But there's
a saying out there that said bethe Bible for people, and
sometimes use words Yes, right?
So to bring people in ourcongregation from simply
believing yeah to absolutelytrusting. We have to be trust
(39:00):
worthy. Yeah? That means we haveto met match our worthiness of
trust. Yeah, to God's
Pastor Joe Liles (39:12):
yep, that's beautiful. I believe that 100%
and I believe it's one of thehardest things that
Roseann Bowlin (39:18):
it is very hard, yeah, because we're human,
that's right, and we fail. And Ithink that people who are
believers but not trusters cansometimes be judging,
judgingtons. Oh,
Pastor Joe Liles (39:34):
okay, great.
And
Roseann Bowlin (39:37):
are very, oh, that is a church a hypocrite,
yeah, well, no, we just all needhealing.
Pastor Joe Liles (39:46):
But that's great. I agree with you
entirely, right? The church isnot a place for perfect people,
right? It's for people, placefor people who acknowledge that
we're on a path that's healing,a path that's growing, a path
that's deepening, um. That's theacknowledgement of being a
church body, right? There arenot perfect people in this
church, right? Nor in any
Roseann Bowlin (40:04):
church. It's really a hospital for broken
Pastor Joe Liles (40:06):
souls. You know, a lot of it's there,
right? But yeah, in thehospital, it sends people back
out. Thank you for being herewith us. You go back out into
the world, right? We hope thatwe filled you. It's great. And
so, yeah, I think there's areally, really incredible
reality as we think throughthat. So, you know, I wanted to
bring this up. I love that youhave notes from Sunday, because
you get to sit in a church andlisten. And that is a segment
(40:27):
that we have here on thepodcast. Tommy, ready? You have
to sing the segment with me.
It's Roseanne notes. That's howit goes. You guys ready? Okay,
and the segment is called RoseTom. You have to go with me.
This is a very important ready?
Roseanne, no notes. Oh, man, so
Roseann Bowlin (40:45):
further on that you have to be trustworthy. Say
what you mean, mean what yousay, even when it is unpopular
and yet it is Biblically sound.
Ooh, that's good, and sometimesthat's hard. Yeah, trusting God
breaks us and makes us truly newto him. He breaks us from our
pride, our ego, our selfishness.
(41:09):
And the Bible sums it up in apositive way with the
Beatitudes, which is Matthewfive, three through 12, and in
First Corinthians, 13, fourthrough seven. So when you look
at First Corinthians 13, fourthrough seven, and you can put
your name in the place of love,if you can replace your name of
(41:31):
love, and really, truly mean it,that's our trust in God.
Pastor Joe Liles (41:40):
That's great.
Yeah, I love that. And to takeit back to the Beatitudes, this
is wonderful also, I mean, tothink, but I think this is the
hardest part about trust. It's afull and complete relationship
with God,
Tom Helmich (41:53):
and that's also the thing with with trust, and that
who we put our full and completetrust in, yeah? Because any
person will eventually breakyour trust to some degree.
They'll disappoint they'lldisappoint you, right? I will,
like, if people have known melong enough, I'm going to do
things to disappoint them. Youknow, there's what we consider
(42:16):
trustworthy in a human nature,but we know there's a there's a
point that every human being isgoing to have a moment where
they're going to disappointsomebody else or or break trust
to some degree. Because of this,the sinfulness there makes all
of humanity we you know, any themost trustworthy person can get
to like maybe 99% but not 100%trustworthy, because sin is
(42:37):
present in there, whereas Godbeing without sin. That's why I
say is the one that is the onlyone worthy of complete and total
trust, because of the theabsence of that selfishness and
of that sin, we can trust in Godin all things, and we can trust
God entirely. We don'tnecessarily mean we're going to
get all the consequences wewant, but if we put our faith
(42:59):
and part of that, that trust andfaith relationship, yeah, in
other human beings, likepeople's brokenness with the
church, you know, people'sdisappointment with because they
put their faith in the churchinstead of in God, a person, a
person and a pastor, the pair ofpeople in the church, the church
will disappoint and and willfail, but where God won't, you
(43:20):
know. So you can get to that ahigh level of trust with people,
like we'd have with our spouse,but we, even if you put all your
faith and trust in your spouse,there's going to be times when
you're, you know, there'll be abreak there, yeah, you know,
because selfishness exists inall people, but, but not in God.
We put that total faith andtrust in God, and look, you
(43:41):
know, for that from God alone, Ithink kind of helps, help set
that stage for starting to beable to have that right
relationship.
Pastor Joe Liles (43:50):
You know, I wonder if in trusting, in having
a full and complete trust,heart, body, mind and soul with
God, that we get to a placewhere we are truly not putting
ourselves in a trustingrelationship to the people
around us, but we are constantlyre putting ourselves in a
trusting relationship with God,into a relational surrender that
says, hey, I believe that you'removing in the lives of people
(44:10):
around me too. So my trust isextended to the people, because
I have trust in
Tom Helmich (44:14):
you, right? And that's why I think to have that
full trust in God makes iteasier to have a higher level of
trust with each other, yeah,right. And I think that's the
reason why that's, you know,Jesus, that's the first and the
greatest commandment, you know,and the other ones like it, to
love your neighbor as yourself.
If you're going to be able tolove somebody else, we have to
be able to love and trust God,yeah, you know. And give, give
God our full, you know, our fullcommitment, full love with all
(44:35):
of our heart, soul, strength andmind, or the best as we can as
fallen, sinful creatures, and inthat we are empowered to be able
to love somebody else,
Roseann Bowlin (44:47):
right, right? So a couple more thoughts, trust.
You have to have courage to havetrust. Yeah, agree. Courage is
not the absence of. Fear, it isfacing what God puts in your
life with trust in him that hiswill, his plan, will be
(45:07):
fulfilled even through yourfear. Mm, yes, and your feel
fear will diminish as you trustGod more deeply.
Pastor Joe Liles (45:14):
Mm, hmm, yeah, absolutely. I mean, that was
that psalm text that we read in62 right? Or 56 right? It says,
I will not fear because I havetrust in God, and I trust the
word, right?
Roseann Bowlin (45:23):
And then God is a refuge. So the definition of a
refuge is a condition of beingsafe or sheltered from pursuit,
danger or trouble. I can't thinkof a better refuge than God
Almighty.
Pastor Joe Liles (45:36):
Mm, hmm, but let's reiterate it. You named
where the refuge is thatearlier, it's in the kingdom and
eternity, amen, yep, I think weconstantly look for that refuge
daily, right? And we're saying,bring the kingdom now, which is
the right statement, faithfully.
But what we're really saying isthat I have an assured hope in
the kingdom, right? And becauseof that, I trust you, God. And
without that trust in theassured kingdom, there's no
(45:58):
reason for us to go onsometimes,
Tom Helmich (46:00):
without that, that hope, without having that, that
promise, I don't know how you gothrough life, right? I don't
need it, right? This is just
Roseann Bowlin (46:08):
it, like, knowing the Christmas present
you're gonna get and you want it
Pastor Joe Liles (46:13):
now, yeah, but you know you have to wait, but
you gotta, but you gotta wait,right? And it's wrapped and
under the tree, and you can seeit, and you're like, This is not
right. Like, I just want towait. That's great. That's
great. So I mean, this is allabout relationship with God, and
I think that's why I love thisseries, is because we're really
talking about adult discipleshipin this mountain mover series.
What does it mean to continue tobe a disciple as an adult? And
(46:34):
we're going to continue thatnext week in a unique way, and
we're going to talk about,really, what we call, kind of a
lights out in the summer campstyle of discipleship, but it
was really that end of dayconversation, like, it's not a
Sunday only faith, it is aneveryday faith. And how do you
come back into relationship withGod with every day? So we're
going to actually give kind ofthe tips, tools, techniques that
you should use every day to goback into relationship with God
(46:55):
throughout every single moment,not just on Sunday. Don't just
come here on Sunday to getfilled up. You should go out and
actualize this right back on thecommunity. And I told people
this week, I said, go out andask the people that you trust,
you know. I said, you know. Isaid, here's why I trust you.
Here's when I started trustingyou. And then I said, ask him a
third hard question, do youtrust me, right? And get the
real honest answer, becausethat's going to give a great
(47:17):
honest answer of how we trustGod. Now let's lean into getting
to God daily, right? So we cancontinue to build those
relationships. So that's themountain mover series, um
talking through the message,right? We'll be back here next
week as we talk about how welean into God daily, And all
God's people said, Amen.
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Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!