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The Coastal Church Podcast
Family Matters | Week 2 | Tom Cann
(upbeat music) - Hey everyone, my name's Jason Pirekirn and when I welcome you to the Coastal Church podcast, I'm super excited for you to hear this message. We believe that God wants to speak to us and we hope that you're open to hear what he has to say to you today. Enjoy. In a moment, I'm gonna welcome Tom from South Church and one of the beautiful things about us, hey, he's actually here right now. One of the beautiful things about our church is we are kind of one church in three locations. We partner together to embrace life with Jesus for the renewal of Southwest Nova and Tom's our pastor at South Church Campus to say that time times fast. And we're thankful for the work that Tom does. And tonight, this morning he preets at South Church. Tonight he's preaching here. And next week we'll kind of switch. I'll preach at South and preach here. And so I'm so thankful that we get to work together in the kingdom, amen? And so let's give Tom a warm welcome. (congregation applauding) - Thank you very much, Jay. And please, you don't know if I'm worthy of applause just yet, hold back. It is awesome being a part of a network of churches. You guys have cousins in the South End and you don't even realize it. We talk about a church family. We're in this series called Family Matters. This is week two, if you're just joining us. The month of October we are spending talking about the family because families matter. We live in an age of hyper-individualism where the individual is really praised but actually the family really matters. That's more than just an early 90s sitcom. Your family matters. Families come in all shapes and sizes. There are big families, small families. There are new families. There are old families. There are blood relatives. And then there are chosen families. You are sitting as a part of a chosen family tonight. Like I said, you've got cousins in the South End. You've got cousins in Yarmouth. We are a part of the family of God. The Apostle Paul actually writes in the New Testament that when you choose to trust Jesus, when you start to follow after him, you get adopted in to God's family. You get adopted in. You've got brothers and sisters in God's family. You're grafted in to his family tree. And so we're spending the month of October talking about family matters. Jay kicked us off last week. We were in the book of Ecclesiastes and we were looking at how there is a season for everything under the sun. And we kind of sent you out of here last week saying you need to go and sit with your family and figure out what time it is for your family. 'Cause every family, the timing is a little bit different. And just because it's a certain time for that family doesn't mean it's that time for your family. And kind of getting our heads wrapped around this idea that there are different seasons and different times for different families. And tonight, we're gonna talk about communication. I'm just gonna spill the beans right there, communication. And what Coastal Church did, what Jay did is he called me up and he was like, "You know what, to preach this sermon, "we need a communication specialist. "We need a communication expert to come in "and share with Coastal Church about communication. "The problem is my specialty, "my expertise is saying the wrong thing. "I communicate, I struggle with communication." And so they wanted to get me here as kind of a firsthand account to share with you why communication and communicating well is important. But I'm not here as someone to wag my finger at you or say if you learn to communicate the way I do, you'll be much better off. I come to you very humbly tonight as a student of communication, learning what it is to communicate well. My wife is in the room, she can attest to this. I'm not just up here telling stories. I struggle with communication. As a matter of fact, for the last two years, I have been a regular attender of Celebrate Recovery. I am a people pleaser and it has wormed its way deep into my being and it has caused a lot of problems with other people, it has warped the way I communicate with others. And waking up to that reality was the worst. But I will say, if you're like me here tonight and you struggle with communication, you struggle to communicate well, there is hope. I'm living proof that there's hope. I've got a long way to go. But over these last couple of years, learning to communicate well, I have grown a lot. Long way to go, but I have grown a lot. Here's the thing, the Bible has a lot to say about what we say. The Bible has a lot to say about what we say. And so if you're like me and you struggle with communication, the good news is, is that our words are close to God's heart and he wants to help us learn to communicate better. And so when we cry out to him, when we make this a matter of prayer, he actually helps us. His spirit actually helps us with the words that we say, with the way that we communicate with one another. And so tonight for a few minutes, we're gonna get into the book of Proverbs. The book of Ecclesiastes last week was wisdom literature. The book of Proverbs tonight is also wisdom literature. The Bible has all kinds of different types of books in it and Proverbs and Ecclesiastes are both considered wisdom literature. However, it's not just contained to the Old Testament. The words that we say and how we say them are found throughout the Bible. Old Testament and New Testament are words matter. And if this next season of life as a church family is learning to embrace life with Jesus for the renewal of Southwest Nova Scotia, we need to learn to communicate well. If this next season is all about embracing life with Jesus, I believe that God cares about what we say and how we say it, and we need to be a people who learn to communicate well. I'll pull a J, amen? Amen, okay. So here's how we're gonna frame this tonight. We're gonna frame this all in the book of Proverbs and we wanna investigate what it is to communicate with wisdom. If we're gonna be planted in wisdom literature, what does it mean to learn to communicate with wisdom? I'm gonna move pretty quick. We're gonna be jumping all over the book of Proverbs. If you have your Bibles, you can open them up to Proverbs, but if not, it will be on this giant megatron here behind me. First thing, wise communication requires us to be fully present. Wise communication requires us to be fully present. Proverbs 13.3 says, "Whoever guards his mouth, preserves his life, he who opens wide his lips comes to ruin." The word that jumps out there to me is the word guards. When we have something important, when we have something sacred, what do we do? Even to this day, we literally post centuries around it to protect it. We post people around it to stand on guard and what is their whole job to be alert and aware of what is going on with this thing that they're guarding. And the Bible tells us here in Proverbs 13 that we are to guard our mouths. We are to guard, we are to be aware and alert of what we are letting come out of our mouths because here's the thing, sloppy comments from half-hearted listening destroys relationships. Sloppy comments from half-hearted listening destroys relationships. Being fully present and fully on guard of your words requires a certain level of effort and intentionality. Healthy communication requires us to be fully present, genuine and honest because if we're not present, if we're not aware, if we're not alert to what we're actually saying, we are stacking the deck for a miscommunication and a misunderstanding. And I want to take just a minute, we're talking about families. For those of you with little kids at home or you grandparents with little kids that you see regularly in their lives, I feel like this point applies especially to the little ones in our lives. I don't know if you're worried, if you're wired anything like me, I have a real tendency to try to shrink down my kids' issues or try to shrink down and pretend it's not real, whatever is bothering them or whatever they want my attention for because I expect them to be a little bit more developed than they actually are. Do you follow what I'm saying? If a kid comes up to me with a concern or a worry or an issue or that kind of thing, I find myself, I mean I'm embarrassed to admit this, I've got four little kids at home, I'm embarrassed to admit that I am often dismissive because I think like, oh, that's not a big deal, why is that bothering you? And I only give them like half of my attention because I'm expecting them to treat whatever it is like I would treat it. And maybe I wouldn't find it a big deal. And maybe they won't find it a big deal in a year or five years or 10 years, but the reality is right there in that moment they do find it a big deal. And they are worthy of my full presence and my full attention. Communicating with wisdom, wise communication requires us to be fully present to the conversation that we are having. And I think we are living in probably the most distracted era in human history. These little bricks that we carry around in our pockets are not doing us any favors. And now they've moved them from our pockets, we're not just aware of the buzzings in our pockets, they've moved them right to our wrist. Now we feel the buzz on our wrist too. And so we're mid conversation and glancing down, just who's trying to get my attention. We're only half wherever we are. And the other half of us could be somewhere halfway around the world. Whatever the latest Facebook poll of your thumb down is, whatever the latest Twitter thing is, whatever the Instagram is, whatever YouTube, your channel you're watching, we're often these days only half present wherever we are. But if we're gonna learn to embrace life with Jesus and learn to communicate with one another well, we need to be fully present, fully engaged. Still with me? Okay. Second, wise communication seeks to respond. Wise communication seeks to respond. Proverbs 17, 27, and 28, whoever restrains his words has knowledge and he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding. Even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise. When he closes his lips, he is deemed intelligent. When I find myself in a tricky conversation, I am so prone to reacting. Anybody else? I am so prone to react. I feel this pressure to need to say something back to the person who is saying something to me. But Proverbs tells us that a cool spirit and knowing when to stay silent, when to stay quiet is actually vitally important. Sometimes we actually need to create some space to respond instead of just reacting in the heat of the moment. Instead of just reacting with whatever emotion is welling up when somebody is saying something that maybe we don't like or maybe we disagree with. Sometimes the correct response in a tricky conversation is I don't know or I need some space to collect my thoughts. Sometimes the best response is silence. I don't mean like the silent treatment, but knowing when it is appropriate to respond and when you need to recollect yourself. It is possible to bite your tongue even if what you are hearing is unfair or untrue. The older I get, the thing that impresses me most about Jesus is not the miracles, it's not the healing, it's not the incredible teaching, that's all wonderful. But the older I get, the thing that stands out most to me about the life and ministry of Jesus is that he stood silent before his accusers. As they stood and mocked him and lied about him and put him on trial, he stood silent. He's God. He could have done anything in that moment to change the situation, but he stood silent. Dr. Henry Cloud said it this way. If you're wrong, you don't have a defense. And if you're right, you don't need one. In a tricky situation, if you're wrong, you don't have a defense. And if you're right, you don't need one 'cause the truth will come out eventually. And what I'm telling you here tonight is that wise communication seeks to respond. So it is okay to move slow and need some time to process and collect your thoughts. That's totally fine. It's okay to need to set aside some time to get your thoughts in order. Maybe you need to process by writing some stuff down, getting your thoughts out. It's okay to pause a conversation and come back to it at a later date. But if you ask to pause, just make sure that you do actually come back to it. And if you're sitting there knowing that you have paused a conversation, that you have no intention of going back to, you need to go back to it. And maybe tonight, you have to send that text to that person that says that you want to re-engage with that conversation. But if you wind up doing that, if God gets your attention, if he's tapping on your heart and you know that that's an action that you need to take tonight, please do me a favor and do the person on the receiving end of that text message a favor. Please don't just text them and say, we need to talk. Is there any more anxiety-inducing text message that somebody could receive? Facebook message that somebody could, we need to talk. If you have been avoiding a conversation that you need to revisit, if you need to finally respond to a conversation, would you do them a favor and please, as you reopen that conversation say, hello, so and so, I would really like to talk with you about this. It will make everything go so much smoother, I promise. That's the second thing. Third, wise communication has boundaries. Proverbs 21, 23, whoever keeps his mouth and his tongue keeps himself out of trouble. And the people said, amen. Whoever keeps his mouth and his tongue keeps himself out of trouble. Boundaries are a wonderful thing. Just because you think it doesn't mean you have to say it. This is connected to the last point. Just because you think it doesn't mean you have to say it. And if you struggle with me, if your expertise is communicating the wrong way, if your specialty is saying the wrong thing like mine is, here's just a few healthy boundaries, okay? We'll go rapid fire. For tricky situations, stick to one issue. Maybe there's a whole bunch of issues that you could choose, but for a tricky situation, limit it to one. When in doubt, seek to understand by asking questions, not hurling accusations. Seek to understand by asking questions. If it's a particularly tricky conversation that you have to have, maybe the best thing to do is to set a time limit. My wife and I did this just the other day. Like we had something tricky that we need to talk about. Okay, we're gonna talk about it for 45 minutes. And at the end of 45 minutes, we're not even gonna make a resolution about it. We're not gonna decide anything, but at the end of these 45 minutes, we're gonna be done talking about this and we can talk about something else. Exaggerations help no one. Nothing is ever never and nothing is ever always. People are intricate. People are complicated. Nothing is ever never and nothing is ever always. So let's drop the exaggeration. I mentioned that I've been a part of celebrate recovery for the last couple of years and it has been just wildly beneficial, wildly helpful. God has used that ministry in my life in profound ways. And so if you've never been out to celebrate recovery on a Tuesday night, you really should at least go and check it out. I think you'll be surprised at what you find when you walk into that room. But one of the things that we do every single week at OpenShare is we read some guidelines. And one of the guidelines for OpenShare is that we use I and me statements. We don't use you statements. We keep our stuff about ourselves, not about other people. We try to limit it to ourselves. It's not about somebody else, it's about you. So instead of saying something like, you're not listening to me 'cause who hasn't felt that at some point in some kind of conversation? Instead of you're not listening, try saying I feel misunderstood. Boundaries are very important just because you think it doesn't mean that it needs to come out of your mouth. (clears throat) Fourth, we're almost done actually. Wise communication regularly restates the truth. Proverbs chapter 12, verse 25, anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad. A good word. Boy, we're in need of some good words, aren't we? We're at a place in history where it is really easy to find flaws, to find weaknesses. And if we're gonna learn to communicate well and with wisdom, we need to be very liberal with our good words for one another. Whether you're talking to your spouse, whether you're talking to a kid, whether you're talking to a parent, whether you're talking to an extended family member, doesn't matter, we need to get back into the habit of saying good words to one another, building each other up, stirring each other up, cheering each other up, speaking words of life and encouragement. I don't care what the situation is that you have to talk through. Whatever the situation is that you have to have a tricky conversation about it, the Apostle Paul wrote in the New Testament that our battle is not against flesh and blood. That person who is sitting down across from you that maybe you have strong feelings towards or they've done something that really upset you and here you find yourself having to have a really difficult conversation that you would really rather not have, Paul tells us if it's got flesh and blood, it's made in the image of God. And our battle as Christians, as followers of Jesus, is not against that person, it's against the dark powers and principalities. There are lies maybe that are being believed. There are falsehoods that are happening and your enemy is not the person sitting across from you and maybe you need reminded of that truth regularly. Maybe you find it very easy to believe the lie that they are the enemy, that they are the one with whom your problem lies but the reality is for the follower of Jesus, our eyes have to come up. It's not on them. They are a person that we are to be praying for and fighting for, not fighting against. (coughing) Excuse me, verbal assurance is crucial. Maybe, maybe if you're in the middle of a really difficult, challenging conversation, you need to stop and you need to verbally say out loud two or three things that you appreciate about that person. Two or three encouraging words to the person that you are having a complicated conversation with because wise communication doesn't just focus on the problems, it regularly restates truth. And finally, my fifth, how are we doing? Okay, we're doing okay. Wise communication is quick to apologize. Wise communication is quick to apologize. Proverbs chapter 16 verse 24, gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body. Hear me tonight, coastal church, seeking restoration and seeking healing in a difficult conversation is so much better, so much richer than just trying to win an argument. Seeking restoration and healing is so much better than just trying to win an argument. Now, I will confess, I have used the words, I'm sorry as I get it a jail free card. I'm sorry, please don't be mad at me. That's what I mean. I'm saying the words, I'm sorry, but what I mean is, well there, I've apologized, you don't have the right to be mad at me anymore. I'm sorry, and that's not what we're talking about here. Wise communication is quick to apologize, is quick to acknowledge our own fault, our own weakness, not try to hide it or stuff it or run away from it, even using the words, I'm sorry in the process. Wise communication is quick to seek forgiveness when we need it from somebody else, and it's quick to extend forgiveness when someone has wronged us. This is really the secret to wise communication, it's keeping short accounts, not letting things swell and grow, but being willing to own your shortcomings, being willing to own your mistake, being willing to own your sin. We gather here as a church in this gym, we also gather in a gym, by the way, yours is much taller than ours is, but I feel very at home preaching in gyms, we gather in a gym in the south end of Yarmouth, excuse me, we gather as the church in the name of Jesus because Jesus, the Son of God, came to this earth, taught and died a gruesome death on a cross so that we might be forgiven of our sins. And how could we who have been forgiven of much, not also extend that same forgiveness to others? This is the good news that we are to communicate to the world around us. This is the message that we have been tasked with spreading throughout Barrington, throughout Yarmouth, throughout this whole region that Christ died that we might be forgiven, and you can too. That's our message, that's our task, that's what we're here to do. Jesus is parting words before He went to be with the Father, was spread this message to everyone, to the ends of the earth, communicate this well. And so the Bible has lots to say about the words that we say, but the Bible has lots to say about the message that we carry through our actions as well. When we hang on to bitterness, when we hang on to resentment, when we let complicated conversations stop us from seeking resolution and healing and peace, we are actually conveying a message. And the message that we are to communicate is one of forgiveness, and one of grace, and one of healing, and one of restoration, because that's who our God is. I'm gonna invite James in the band to come back up, and Jay's gonna be up in just a couple of minutes. I'm not gonna spend much more time talking about forgiveness, because here's a little bit of a spoiler. That's actually what our entire service is gonna be on in the next couple of weeks. So stay tuned, we're gonna be talking forgiveness and a lot more broadly within the next couple of weeks. But maybe going from here tonight, Coastal Church, you know that maybe you have an issue with the way you communicate, or the way you don't communicate for some of us in the room. Maybe what we need to do tonight is to ask God for help. Maybe your action step tonight, when you're on your drive home, when you are talking about this with your family, whatever shape or size or age of your family, as you are talking about the way that your family communicates with one another, maybe you need to pause as a family and say, "God, we are not good at this." And we're finally willing to own it. And we need help. We need help from your Holy Spirit to actually change the way we communicate with one another. To help us to stop avoiding stuff, to stop running from stuff, to stop pretending something's not real, God, you need to give us the courage to learn to communicate with one another well. Maybe, I'm just going out on a limb here because people are complicated, maybe there's a person in your wider church family that God needs to give you the courage to make that long walk and say, "I think we need to have a conversation about this thing." That happened two weeks ago. That happened five years ago. That happened 25 years ago that we have been dancing around and that we have never actually had a conversation about. I think God wants us to communicate well. Maybe you're here tonight and you have not made up your mind yet on what you believe to be true about God. And we are so grateful that you are here. We are so glad that you are investigating this. But maybe if you're being totally honest with yourself, you know that over the last little while, God has been trying to get your attention and you've been playing a little hard to get. You've been kind of avoiding him, but you're sitting in church on a Sunday night on Thanksgiving weekend. Maybe for some of us in the room tonight, it's okay, God, I'm done running. Okay, God, you've got my attention. And maybe your action step for tonight is saying, "Lord, I want to learn to trust you. "I don't have all my questions answered. "I don't have this all figured out. "I'm not pretending to be a perfect person, "but I want to learn to trust you." Man, if you pray that prayer to God, he'll hear you and he will fill you with his spirit and he will start this transformation process in you. Maybe you're sitting there feeling really discouraged, like, "Oh, I have burned so many bridges. "I have ruined so many relationships "with the way I communicate." God can make something beautiful out of something real messy. God can do something incredible beyond your wildest dreams, maybe out of the ashes of the mess that you have made for yourself. (soft music) Maybe, this is the last thing I'll say, Jay, you can come on up. Maybe there is somebody in your life. It's not a complicated conversation that you have to have. Maybe you're just sitting on a word of encouragement and God's like, "You need to get that out. "You need to let that out. "You need to make that walk to that person "and it's gonna be weird and maybe even a little bit awkward, "but you just need to speak words of life into them. "You need to communicate well. "You need to encourage them at a soul level, "at a spirit level. "You've noticed this, you've appreciated this, "and you need to actually communicate it out loud. "Maybe before you leave tonight, "there is somebody in this room "that you need to speak a word of encouragement. "You need to communicate a word of encouragement to them "before you go." Would you pray with me? Lord, I will be the first to confess that I struggle with the way I communicate. But God, I am blown away with who you are and how you can change stories, how you help us grow, how you stretch us and grow us, and you change trajectories, you change what we might consider normal. God, I am sure there are people in this room tonight who had their definition of normal, and you have totally rearranged that. You have totally transformed it. God, would you give us the courage to communicate well, to not hedge or hide or avoid? God, give us the courage that we need to communicate well as we learn to embrace life with you for the renewal of this region. In your name we pray, amen. We really hope that this message is motivating you to go deeper in your relationship with Jesus. If you have any questions about the sermon, or if you want to know how you can get involved, send us an email at office@cosalchurchnets.com. We'd love to get connected with you. Have a great day. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [BLANK_AUDIO]