November 26, 2025 • 11 mins
Today, we dive into the powerful message of Ephesians 1:3-10, which emphasizes the importance of keeping an eternal mindset amidst the chaos of our daily lives. I share how this scripture has been a lifeline for me, especially during challenging times, reminding us of the spiritual blessings we have in Christ and our identity as His adopted children. With everything happening in the world, it’s easy to get bogged down by negativity, but focusing on the eternal can actually shift our perspective and help us navigate through life's ups and downs. I discuss practical ways to cultivate this eternal focus, like starting our mornings with scripture to set the tone for our day and using discernment about what we allow into our hearts and minds. Let’s explore how we can reset our mindset and truly live with an eye on the eternal, pouring into our communities and reflecting the grace we've received.
Delving into Ephesians 1:3-10, we unpack the incredible blessings we have in Christ, emphasizing the significance of keeping an eternal mindset. With the world feeling increasingly chaotic, I reflect on personal challenges and how the truth of this scripture has helped me navigate through tough times. One of my favorite lines from 'Living Water' plays in my mind: 'One life soon passed, only what's done for you will last.' It’s a call to prioritize what truly matters, especially when life feels overwhelming.
I share insights on practical ways to cultivate an eternal focus, starting with the importance of beginning our day with Scripture. This practice can radically influence our perspective and how we approach the rest of our day. I recount a recent experience of listening to the news first thing in the morning, which unfortunately filled my heart with despair. This serves as a reminder that we must be intentional about our inputs and choose to engage with content that uplifts our spirits and aligns with God’s truth.
As we close, the discussion highlights the importance of community and pouring into others as a reflection of our faith. By focusing on love, kindness, and the fruits of the Spirit, we can navigate the complexities of life with grace and purpose. This episode is not just a call to endure but an invitation to thrive by keeping our eyes on the eternal, reminding ourselves of the bigger picture that God has for us.
Takeaways:
- Keeping an eternal mindset is crucial, especially during difficult personal times, helping us maintain perspective.
- Starting your day with Scripture can significantly impact your mindset and overall outlook on life.
- Being strategic about your daily inputs, especially regarding news and social media, is essential for mental health.
- Focusing on the eternal allows us to pour into our community and help others in meaningful ways.
- We often need reminders to keep our focus on God and what truly matters in life.
- Even a simple morning routine of engaging with Scripture can yield profound transformation and clarity.
Links referenced in this episode:
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Daily Grace company
- YouVersion
- NPR
- The Pour over
- Shane and Shane
- True Grit Podcast
Social Media Links:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
If you only have a coupleminutes for scriptures today, I got
you.
Welcome to today's bite sized biblecast.
We've got a little bit longerof a section today.
We are in Ephesians 1, verses3 through 10 and I'm in the ESV.
Blessed be the God and Fatherof our Lord Jesus Christ, who has
blessed us in Christ withevery spiritual blessing in the heavenly
places, even as he chose us inhim before the foundation of the
(00:21):
world, that we should be holyand blameless before him in love.
He predestined us to ouradoption to Himself as sons through
Jesus Christ, according to thepurpose of his will, to the praise
of his glorious grace withwhich he has blessed us in the Beloved.
In him we have redemptionthrough his blood, the forgiveness
of our trespasses, accordingto the riches of his grace, which
he lavished upon us in allwisdom and insight, making known
(00:43):
to us the mystery of his willaccording to his purpose, which he
set forth in Christ as a planfor the fullness of time to unite
all things in him, things inheaven and things on earth.
I don't know about you, butthe world is a little bit crazy lately.
Both like the world at largeand my smaller personal inner world.
And it can be really difficultto keep an eternal mindset.
(01:05):
But this passage of scripturepopped up in my Bible study today.
I'm doing a scripture study onthe attributes of God through Daily
Grace company and today's was grace.
Funnily enough, Daily Gracecompany We're talking about grace
and this passion.
This passage really stuck outto me because something that has
been very helpful andbeneficial to me as I've gone through
some really crazy times inlife, particularly when I was fighting
(01:29):
multiple legal battles duringmy divorce, some not related to my
actual divorce.
Something that helped me getthrough it, like truly get through
it and survive it was keepingan eternal mindset.
One of my very favorite songsof all time is Living Water by Shane
and Shane.
And one of the lines in thesong is One life soon passed, only
(01:50):
what's done for you will last.
And that line would just playover, over and over and over in my
head because it's true.
At the end of the day,everything that we're dealing with
right here on earth is kind ofhitting us in the face moment by
moment.
It's what we see, it's what wefeel, it's what we experience.
But there is a bigger answer.
There is a finish line that wecan't see yet, and that is the eternal.
(02:12):
And keeping our mind on thatcan honestly Sometimes feel a little
bit irresponsible.
But at the end of the day,focusing on that eternal mindset,
focusing on the things thatare not yet here but are to come,
is the most productive thingwe can do.
We all know it's kind of likea common principle not to focus in
on yourself, but to focus on others.
Focus on the long term.
(02:33):
That's kind of general advice.
That's what we tell to ourchildren, right?
Don't be selfish, try to thinkabout others.
Focusing on the eternal givesus an actual reference point for
that.
Because when we focus on theeternal, when we focus on the things
of God, what are the things of God?
I mean, look at the fruit ofthe spirit, right?
We've got love, joy, peace,patience, kindness, goodness, faith,
faithfulness, gentleness, self control.
(02:55):
Those are all things that takethe focus off of ourselves and allow
us to pour into others.
And I think we can all agree,whether you are religious, whether
you are non religious, whetheryou prefer to say you have a relationship,
not a religion, whatever yourspirituality looks like, or lack
of spirituality, we can allagree that community is incredibly
important and that pouringinto our community, pouring into
(03:17):
those around us, is reallynever going to be a waste of time.
So focusing on the eternal notjust resets our hearts and our minds
for things that are going tobetter our immediate circumstances.
It also helps us to keep inthe forefront of our mind the things
of God and the things that areyet to come and the things that God
(03:37):
has already done for us.
The sacrifice of Jesus, all of that.
So this passage talks aboutwhat happens when we keep an eternal
mindset and why we need tokeep an eternal mindset.
But how do we actually do that?
That is the trick and that'swhat I want to talk about.
One of the absolute mosthelpful things I can recommend is
having a reset point in yourmorning that gets you focused on
(03:58):
scripture first thing.
So even when you haveabsolutely zero energy, when you
can't get out of bed, I wouldvery strongly recommend the first
thing you do when you wake upin the morning.
Whether it's grabbing yourBible, whether it's grabbing your
phone, because grabbing ourphone is pretty much muscle memory
for most of us.
Have the first input of theday be scripture.
I personally love theYouVersion app.
(04:20):
They've got a really awesomefeature where they will have a verse
of the day that has the verse.
There's like a two minutelittle talk on it.
If you have time for that.
There's some guided prayer on it.
There's a couple prompts.
It really can be as short andsweet as just opening the YouVersion
app or whatever.
A lot of different Bible appshave that feature.
I just happen to use theYouVersion app, opening it and reading
(04:42):
the verse of the day, or youcan get a little more in depth.
But having your very firstinput of the day, the scripture,
is incredibly helpful forhaving that little reset point and
getting your day off to agreat start.
Like yesterday, my husband andI, after we dropped our kids off
at school, we made the mistakeof listening to NPR's Up first, which
(05:03):
kind of recaps what's going onin the news.
Because I was like, oh, I feellike I heard something positive like,
let's see what's.
What's going on?
And that was a huge mistake.
Like, let's be so for real.
There's just not a lot of goodnews right now.
I even like, specifically, Iwas like, I'm gonna find some good
news.
And I read.
I. I also subscribed to thePour over, which is a Christian view
(05:25):
of the news.
They're.
They do a pretty good job ofbeing politically neutral.
And I was like, you know what?
The Pour over will have somegood news for me.
And it didn't.
And so looking back, I'm like,oh, honey, your first input of the
day was not scripture.
It was the hopelessness of the world.
What did you expect, dear?
(05:45):
What did you expect?
So something super, supersimple that can make all of the difference
in your day is starting yourday off with scripture.
And a second, like, mini pointto that.
You do not always have to be100% informed.
It is incredibly important toknow what's going on in the world.
And I think, especially rightnow, as Christians, we have a very
(06:08):
strong responsibility to havea voice, especially as our country
is turning more and more toChristian nationalism, which some
people view favorably.
We need to talk about that.
But that's not the topic ofthis video.
Especially as our country isdoing things supposedly in the name
of Jesus, we do have aresponsibility to speak up and say,
(06:29):
actual truth.
Share actual truth.
Because, fun fact, justbecause you can quote words from
the Bible doesn't mean you'resharing truth.
But that's another story foranother time, and I have plenty of
videos about that if you wantto go search on through.
We do have a responsibility toshare truth, but that does not mean
that the most productive thingwe can do is keep up to date on the
hopelessness of the world,learn to use discernment.
(06:51):
And I'm talking very much tomyself right now.
I I am famous for like seeinga headline, reading the article,
wanting to understand thesupport for the article, wanting
to find the truth and thenfalling down a rabbit hole of hopelessness
and being very dark place mentally.
We do not always have to knowall of the details of what's going
on, use discernment andstrategically engage in things like
(07:14):
the news, social media.
Those can be good things.
It's important to have an ideaof what's going on and to be informed
so we can have intelligentconversations and also have our view
of the world informed byscripture and the knowledge that
we have within us of God, thethings of God, what truth actually
is, all of that good stuff.
But choose strategically whereyou're going to place your energy.
(07:36):
You do not need to be up 100%on the news 100% of the time.
You do not always need to knowwhat that girl who bullied you in
high school is doing, how manykids she has now.
But the point is we do notalways need to know what is going
on a hundred percent of thetime with complete knowledge.
Oh my gosh.
Ranger so those are my tworecommendations for you today.
Find a reset point even if youalready have a morning scripture
(07:59):
routine of some kind of schedule.
Another check in for yourself.
God, during my quiet timeyesterday, let me pull up my journal
here and I'll read it to you.
So during my quiet timeyesterday, I was asking God how I
can support my husband throughsomething difficult that we're dealing
with right now.
And God said, eyes on me.
Sunup to sundown.
A little snack in the morningwill not sustain you during a marathon.
(08:19):
Woof.
So even when we have ascripture routine going, which I
am not great at, I have a good rhythm.
I but that rhythm getsdisrupted a lot of the time.
So even when I am in my habitof having that morning rhythm with
scripture, that's not enoughfor us to get through the day.
So even if you already havesomething, a reset point during the
(08:40):
morning, I want to encourageyou to add something.
Not as another item on your todo list, not as something you should
do.
If you've been following mycontent, you know how I feel about
the word should.
But as a refreshing point inyour day, we cannot run a marathon
subsisting on a little snackthat we had in the morning.
Scripture is here to feed us,to encourage us, to grow us, and
(09:05):
we get to take advantage of that.
It's not a matter of should.
Even if you don't have time toread more scripture Audio Bible Shane
and Shane makes a lot of theirmusic just based off chunks of Scripture.
So those are great options forgetting more truth into your heart
and your mind, even when youdon't have extra time to do stuff
during the day.
So quick little recap.
We need to focus on keepingour eyes on things above, on keeping
(09:27):
that eternal mindset, becausethat very much helps keep us from
getting mired down in howincredibly hopeless the world is
right now and really howhopeless the world is at large.
We need Jesus, and most of usdon't have Jesus.
Even those of us who fullybelieve that we are calling on the
name of Jesus, there are someof us who are going to get to eternity
(09:48):
someday and be told, go away.
I never knew you.
Matthew 25 is pretty clearabout that.
So keeping our hearts, heartand our mind, and therefore our actions
focused on things above isgoing to be incredibly helpful.
And two ways that you can dothat are by having a reset point
first thing in the morningwhere you are pouring scripture into
your heart and your mind in away that is accessible.
(10:10):
It does not have to look acertain way.
It does not have to have acertain depth or a certain intensity.
Even just the simple act oftaking in Scripture as your first
input of the day can be, andhas been for me, completely invaluable.
But then second, beingstrategic and using discernment with
what kinds of inputs you allowinto your heart and your mind.
(10:30):
After that first referencepoint of scripture first thing in
the morning, you do not needto be 100% up to date on the news.
You do not need to scroll onTikTok, on Instagram, on wherever
you're scrolling.
Use discernment and filterthings out.
If you start to getoverwhelmed, if you start to get
mired in hopelessness and kindof feel worked up like I was yesterday
(10:50):
after I made the mistake oflistening to npr, take a second reset
with scripture and retrainyour mind to focus on things above.
Now, quick little plug here.
I do post all of these videosas podcast episodes along with other
episodes on my podcast, whichis the True Grit Podcast.
You can find it on Spotify,you can find it anywhere.
(11:10):
You can head to the link in mybio and be directed there.
So if you would go subscribeand leave me five stars, that would
mean so incredibly much to me.
But let me know what you'restruggling with right now and I would
love to put together somecontent for you, so make sure you
follow for more.
Go subscribe to my podcast andlet me know what you're struggling
with.
And how can I encourage you lately.
I'll talk to you in the next one.
Bye.
If you only have a coupleminutes for scriptures today, I got
you.
Welcome to today's bite sized biblecast.
We've got a little bit longerof a section today.
We are in Ephesians 1, verses3 through 10 and I'm in the ESV.
Blessed be the God and Fatherof our Lord Jesus Christ, who has
blessed us in Christ withevery spiritual blessing in the heavenly
places, even as he chose us inhim before the foundation of the
(00:21):
world, that we should be holyand blameless before him in love.
He predestined us to ouradoption to Himself as sons through
Jesus Christ, according to thepurpose of his will, to the praise
of his glorious grace withwhich he has blessed us in the Beloved.
In him we have redemptionthrough his blood, the forgiveness
of our trespasses, accordingto the riches of his grace, which
he lavished upon us in allwisdom and insight, making known
(00:43):
to us the mystery of his willaccording to his purpose, which he
set forth in Christ as a planfor the fullness of time to unite
all things in him, things inheaven and things on earth.
I don't know about you, butthe world is a little bit crazy lately.
Both like the world at largeand my smaller personal inner world.
And it can be really difficultto keep an eternal mindset.
(01:05):
But this passage of scripturepopped up in my Bible study today.
I'm doing a scripture study onthe attributes of God through Daily
Grace company and today's was grace.
Funnily enough, Daily Gracecompany We're talking about grace
and this passion.
This passage really stuck outto me because something that has
been very helpful andbeneficial to me as I've gone through
some really crazy times inlife, particularly when I was fighting
(01:29):
multiple legal battles duringmy divorce, some not related to my
actual divorce.
Something that helped me getthrough it, like truly get through
it and survive it was keepingan eternal mindset.
One of my very favorite songsof all time is Living Water by Shane
and Shane.
And one of the lines in thesong is One life soon passed, only
(01:50):
what's done for you will last.
And that line would just playover, over and over and over in my
head because it's true.
At the end of the day,everything that we're dealing with
right here on earth is kind ofhitting us in the face moment by
moment.
It's what we see, it's what wefeel, it's what we experience.
But there is a bigger answer.
There is a finish line that wecan't see yet, and that is the eternal.
(02:12):
And keeping our mind on thatcan honestly Sometimes feel a little
bit irresponsible.
But at the end of the day,focusing on that eternal mindset,
focusing on the things thatare not yet here but are to come,
is the most productive thingwe can do.
We all know it's kind of likea common principle not to focus in
on yourself, but to focus on others.
Focus on the long term.
(02:33):
That's kind of general advice.
That's what we tell to ourchildren, right?
Don't be selfish, try to thinkabout others.
Focusing on the eternal givesus an actual reference point for
that.
Because when we focus on theeternal, when we focus on the things
of God, what are the things of God?
I mean, look at the fruit ofthe spirit, right?
We've got love, joy, peace,patience, kindness, goodness, faith,
faithfulness, gentleness, self control.
(02:55):
Those are all things that takethe focus off of ourselves and allow
us to pour into others.
And I think we can all agree,whether you are religious, whether
you are non religious, whetheryou prefer to say you have a relationship,
not a religion, whatever yourspirituality looks like, or lack
of spirituality, we can allagree that community is incredibly
important and that pouringinto our community, pouring into
(03:17):
those around us, is reallynever going to be a waste of time.
So focusing on the eternal notjust resets our hearts and our minds
for things that are going tobetter our immediate circumstances.
It also helps us to keep inthe forefront of our mind the things
of God and the things that areyet to come and the things that God
(03:37):
has already done for us.
The sacrifice of Jesus, all of that.
So this passage talks aboutwhat happens when we keep an eternal
mindset and why we need tokeep an eternal mindset.
But how do we actually do that?
That is the trick and that'swhat I want to talk about.
One of the absolute mosthelpful things I can recommend is
having a reset point in yourmorning that gets you focused on
(03:58):
scripture first thing.
So even when you haveabsolutely zero energy, when you
can't get out of bed, I wouldvery strongly recommend the first
thing you do when you wake upin the morning.
Whether it's grabbing yourBible, whether it's grabbing your
phone, because grabbing ourphone is pretty much muscle memory
for most of us.
Have the first input of theday be scripture.
I personally love theYouVersion app.
(04:20):
They've got a really awesomefeature where they will have a verse
of the day that has the verse.
There's like a two minutelittle talk on it.
If you have time for that.
There's some guided prayer on it.
There's a couple prompts.
It really can be as short andsweet as just opening the YouVersion
app or whatever.
A lot of different Bible appshave that feature.
I just happen to use theYouVersion app, opening it and reading
(04:42):
the verse of the day, or youcan get a little more in depth.
But having your very firstinput of the day, the scripture,
is incredibly helpful forhaving that little reset point and
getting your day off to agreat start.
Like yesterday, my husband andI, after we dropped our kids off
at school, we made the mistakeof listening to NPR's Up first, which
(05:03):
kind of recaps what's going onin the news.
Because I was like, oh, I feellike I heard something positive like,
let's see what's.
What's going on?
And that was a huge mistake.
Like, let's be so for real.
There's just not a lot of goodnews right now.
I even like, specifically, Iwas like, I'm gonna find some good
news.
And I read.
I. I also subscribed to thePour over, which is a Christian view
(05:25):
of the news.
They're.
They do a pretty good job ofbeing politically neutral.
And I was like, you know what?
The Pour over will have somegood news for me.
And it didn't.
And so looking back, I'm like,oh, honey, your first input of the
day was not scripture.
It was the hopelessness of the world.
What did you expect, dear?
(05:45):
What did you expect?
So something super, supersimple that can make all of the difference
in your day is starting yourday off with scripture.
And a second, like, mini pointto that.
You do not always have to be100% informed.
It is incredibly important toknow what's going on in the world.
And I think, especially rightnow, as Christians, we have a very
(06:08):
strong responsibility to havea voice, especially as our country
is turning more and more toChristian nationalism, which some
people view favorably.
We need to talk about that.
But that's not the topic ofthis video.
Especially as our country isdoing things supposedly in the name
of Jesus, we do have aresponsibility to speak up and say,
(06:29):
actual truth.
Share actual truth.
Because, fun fact, justbecause you can quote words from
the Bible doesn't mean you'resharing truth.
But that's another story foranother time, and I have plenty of
videos about that if you wantto go search on through.
We do have a responsibility toshare truth, but that does not mean
that the most productive thingwe can do is keep up to date on the
hopelessness of the world,learn to use discernment.
(06:51):
And I'm talking very much tomyself right now.
I I am famous for like seeinga headline, reading the article,
wanting to understand thesupport for the article, wanting
to find the truth and thenfalling down a rabbit hole of hopelessness
and being very dark place mentally.
We do not always have to knowall of the details of what's going
on, use discernment andstrategically engage in things like
(07:14):
the news, social media.
Those can be good things.
It's important to have an ideaof what's going on and to be informed
so we can have intelligentconversations and also have our view
of the world informed byscripture and the knowledge that
we have within us of God, thethings of God, what truth actually
is, all of that good stuff.
But choose strategically whereyou're going to place your energy.
(07:36):
You do not need to be up 100%on the news 100% of the time.
You do not always need to knowwhat that girl who bullied you in
high school is doing, how manykids she has now.
But the point is we do notalways need to know what is going
on a hundred percent of thetime with complete knowledge.
Oh my gosh.
Ranger so those are my tworecommendations for you today.
Find a reset point even if youalready have a morning scripture
(07:59):
routine of some kind of schedule.
Another check in for yourself.
God, during my quiet timeyesterday, let me pull up my journal
here and I'll read it to you.
So during my quiet timeyesterday, I was asking God how I
can support my husband throughsomething difficult that we're dealing
with right now.
And God said, eyes on me.
Sunup to sundown.
A little snack in the morningwill not sustain you during a marathon.
(08:19):
Woof.
So even when we have ascripture routine going, which I
am not great at, I have a good rhythm.
I but that rhythm getsdisrupted a lot of the time.
So even when I am in my habitof having that morning rhythm with
scripture, that's not enoughfor us to get through the day.
So even if you already havesomething, a reset point during the
(08:40):
morning, I want to encourageyou to add something.
Not as another item on your todo list, not as something you should
do.
If you've been following mycontent, you know how I feel about
the word should.
But as a refreshing point inyour day, we cannot run a marathon
subsisting on a little snackthat we had in the morning.
Scripture is here to feed us,to encourage us, to grow us, and
(09:05):
we get to take advantage of that.
It's not a matter of should.
Even if you don't have time toread more scripture Audio Bible Shane
and Shane makes a lot of theirmusic just based off chunks of Scripture.
So those are great options forgetting more truth into your heart
and your mind, even when youdon't have extra time to do stuff
during the day.
So quick little recap.
We need to focus on keepingour eyes on things above, on keeping
(09:27):
that eternal mindset, becausethat very much helps keep us from
getting mired down in howincredibly hopeless the world is
right now and really howhopeless the world is at large.
We need Jesus, and most of usdon't have Jesus.
Even those of us who fullybelieve that we are calling on the
name of Jesus, there are someof us who are going to get to eternity
(09:48):
someday and be told, go away.
I never knew you.
Matthew 25 is pretty clearabout that.
So keeping our hearts, heartand our mind, and therefore our actions
focused on things above isgoing to be incredibly helpful.
And two ways that you can dothat are by having a reset point
first thing in the morningwhere you are pouring scripture into
your heart and your mind in away that is accessible.
(10:10):
It does not have to look acertain way.
It does not have to have acertain depth or a certain intensity.
Even just the simple act oftaking in Scripture as your first
input of the day can be, andhas been for me, completely invaluable.
But then second, beingstrategic and using discernment with
what kinds of inputs you allowinto your heart and your mind.
(10:30):
After that first referencepoint of scripture first thing in
the morning, you do not needto be 100% up to date on the news.
You do not need to scroll onTikTok, on Instagram, on wherever
you're scrolling.
Use discernment and filterthings out.
If you start to getoverwhelmed, if you start to get
mired in hopelessness and kindof feel worked up like I was yesterday
(10:50):
after I made the mistake oflistening to npr, take a second reset
with scripture and retrainyour mind to focus on things above.
Now, quick little plug here.
I do post all of these videosas podcast episodes along with other
episodes on my podcast, whichis the True Grit Podcast.
You can find it on Spotify,you can find it anywhere.
(11:10):
You can head to the link in mybio and be directed there.
So if you would go subscribeand leave me five stars, that would
mean so incredibly much to me.
But let me know what you'restruggling with right now and I would
love to put together somecontent for you, so make sure you
follow for more.
Go subscribe to my podcast andlet me know what you're struggling
with.
And how can I encourage you lately.
I'll talk to you in the next one.
Bye.
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