Inland Empire: Riverside
Discipline and the Heart of God - Audio
Well, we just returned from our annual International Campus Ministry Conference this year. It was held in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado at a town called Estes Park. It was an awesome time and it was so exciting. I know our Edge Ministry returning from beautiful Westin Mission Hills Resort and the incredible Elevation Conference, I know that in asking my mother-in-law how that went, Lin, she was even tearing up. It just reflected on some of the lessons and the time and some of the sharing that went on, just how impacting that conference was. I know it really elevated and at the end of my lesson tonight, we'll get to hear from some of the college students and some of the Edge Ministry as well. If you don't know, again, we changed the name of the singles to the Edge because that includes our young marriage without children and our singles ministry, so that's the Edge Ministry will be sharing as well. So the end of the lesson, those that I've asked to speak, you know, you can be prepared to come on up and each person will share just briefly about what hit them. But I don't have to carry share a little bit about really, you know, the overall experience of being at this conference, why we feel is so important and then I have a lesson for us tonight to really hope to take something away to compliment what whatever he's going to share as well. Okay, so how many of you are wondering what Edge stands for? Anybody? Okay. Well, there's several acronyms, actually, you can make up whatever you want, but we hope that it stands for every day God is enough, so there you go, singles, c'mon. Which really should be everybody's motto, right? So anyway, I had never been to Estes Park and it's high in the mountains in Colorado and Steve and I, the first day we were there, we walked out in the morning to go and pray and you cannot help but just stand in awe of God's creation. You know, you think of the scripture in the Psalms that talks about, "O Lord, O Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth." And I could have sworn who, you know, wrote that, was looking at these mountains. It was so amazing and so majestic being together. It was phenomenal being with all the students on the west coast of the U.S. and being able just to have our faith really inspired and lifted higher. That was the title. You know, higher. I didn't mean to rhyme, I just did. Anyway, but it was phenomenal being together and apparently from the west coast and the east coast, this was the largest number of college students ever attending a conference in the history of our churches. And so, it's really awesome because we are accomplishing the goal, you know, to reach as many as we can at all stages of life. So it was amazing. I'm really grateful to have been able to go. We weren't on vacation this whole time. I know a lot of you thought we were on vacation, but we were at a conference. We worked our tails off, but it was definitely wonderful. So thank you very much. You know, we had the edge ministry and the campus ministry reflecting on why we even go to these conferences last week at our mid weeks and our family group mid weeks. And you know, if you know in the Old Testament, God commanded the Israelites to return to Jerusalem to celebrate three annual festivals. And the idea of that is, you know, people would come from far and wide to remember all the great things God had done, to lift their minds and hearts higher. We need that over and over. You know, next year, what's exciting is that we all, the entire church, is being called to San Antonio, Texas for the first ever Jubilee of all our ministries across the world. It's a world Jubilee. And you know, the scriptures are very good. God calls His people to gather together, to celebrate and worship. And you just can't recreate the experience of thousands of people from all over the world coming together. You know, the highlights of this past weekend for us were just amazing, so many great things. You know, renewing great friendships with the other evangelists and ministers who lead campus ministry throughout the United States. You know, we got to have a great hang time with a couple that lead the campus ministry in Chicago. They're doing awesome up there with the lead minister up in Seattle. Alex Whittaker got some hang time. We co-taught a class together carrying on, he and some of his interns and got to just bond with all the Colorado people, got to hang out a little bit with Mike Tolliver, who helps oversee, and he's leading the conference in San Antonio, helps oversee the ICOC Hot News video program that we watch a lot and just hearing all the news was amazing. God is working on our campus ministries, and I want you guys to all understand something. There is a, we are a part of a fellowship that has a plan to evangelize the world. We have not stopped with our plan to evangelize the world, and it's a simple plan, okay? The plan is that we are going to put thriving ministries in every city of the world, but here's how we're going to do it. We're going to put thriving ministries on the college campuses, because every major city has a college campus, and college campuses are filled with open-hearted, free-minded people are like, I don't know how I want to live my life, and we introduce them to Jesus. And that is our plan, and our edge ministry compliments that. That's not to say that we don't need to have edge and singles, and teens, and campus, and married, and all those ministries and all those cities. We do. But they always begin. Even Jesus began with the 17 to 22-year-old crew. That's an estimated age of the apostles as he recruited them, as he made them into disciples. And many of us in here can attest, yeah, that was about the age. I was 23. You know, when I became a disciple, Doug was 27, but he was in college, when he became a disciple, or 26. God works like that. You know, Kerry was 19. She was an in-school. She was a professional. She was an edge ministry young, up-and-coming person, you know, but that's how God works. And you are part of a fellowship around the world with a plan to plant a church in every nation of the world, disciples of every nation, and we're doing it on the campuses. It's going on. You know, while we're out there. One of the highlights was we sent a mission team of six college students back to Bakersfield, California, where we've always had a small church there. But our churches have gotten weaker and they've needed encouragement. And the Antelope Valley Church, if you didn't know this, sent the money and a couple to Bakersfield to lead that, you know, they have about 30 disciples over there. They sent them there to help strengthen that church, lead the church. And we sent them six disciples from the LA campus ministries to strengthen them and kick that off. And as that campus goes, Cal State, Bakersfield, we know the church will grow. And they'll graduate. They'll get married. They'll have families. They'll become pillars in the church. That is what our plan is. That's why we're working so hard. We've been talking about that with Utah. And it's exciting. You know, Utah is about to have a football player get baptized in the campus ministry there. Kippin' Bethany Harms are leading it now. Joe and Lorien and Josh are out there. We saw all of them in Colorado and they're doing great and they're so excited and we're putting the call out. There's a one-year challenge that's been put out for all college students. And the reality is it doesn't have to just be college students, okay? Edge ministry. It can, you know, in prior, it really can be people who graduate from college. They have started college. You want to take it. You're off of college. It could be. And I want to put it before all the rest. You could take the one-year challenge as a family of four, if you want. We are putting the call out, though, for college students absolutely what we want at some point in their college days or right after they graduate to give one-year of their life to whatever need their local evangelist is trying to help accomplish. That means Doug and I are trying to help Utah. We're trying to help Sacramento. We're helping the Middle East. You know, we're building the Inland Empire. We have a lot of needs. And we're asking that every evangelist around the world has an area of the world they're trying to evangelize. We're asking the college students to say, okay, I'll give you one-year of my life. Wherever you want me to go before I get into a heavy career or really settle in, I'll give you one-year of my life to serve in a mission field of some time. And that's going on all throughout the United States. We have six different places. United States like seven places around the world. If you go to the Cyples Today website, there's a link there to the campus ministries and also a link to what they call the one-year challenge, you know, O-Y-C, one-year challenge. And this is catching steam across our fellowship. And I'm excited because we're starting to see that missionary spirit really coming out about, I know a number of people here are catching a hold of it and want to go on the one-year challenge in different places. And I really, you know, we have a vision that, you know, in years to come hundreds upon hundreds annually will go on this one-year challenge. I mean, the Mormons do the two-year thing, right? Then they come home and they're done. We make disciples our whole life. But, you know, it's time that we get the missionaries to say, we really will get up and go if need be. And I hope that you're catching a vision for that in the edge ministry, in the campus ministry. We don't want to leave it there. I mean, I want to commend the congregation and certainly we care about it when we do our annual missions giving. That does make a difference. It is really helping. I know right now what's exciting is Mike and Libby, and we have eight of our, I think, of our members in the Middle East, right? They just got some other conference in the Middle East. I spoke briefly to Mike. He said it was awesome. I read one of the emails from a sister in the campus who's over there as an exchange student right now. She was impacted by the conference in the Middle East that Mike and Libby are helping coordinate. So, it's exciting that we are part of something like that, and I hope your minds are lifted higher. And I hope you're planning to go to San Antonio so that you can be a part of this sense of just vision that God gives you when His people gather together from all over the world. Amen? Tonight, before we do our sharing, and we want to have some specific sharing from our edge ministry and our campus ministry, those that attended these conferences, just to share something, one thing that really hit them. And when you go to these conferences, you get impacted by so much. I mean, you actually get, you know, Carrie and I taught two lessons, but we were, you know, we were taught about 10 more lessons ourselves. And you can get overload. So, you really got to be disciplined and focus in on what's the one thing you're going to work on? What's going to hit you? And what are you going to really change? And there are a number of things that hit me, I would share, let me share one thing in particular. I heard a lesson on building relationships and what really hit me was talking about if you want to have great peer relationships, you have got to make the decision to initiate those relationships. You've got to initiate. If you want to have best peers, friends that you really count on, you can't wait for them to be your friend. This is a conviction that I learned long ago, but I was reminded of. I thought, that's right. I want to have these peers across the United States, not just in here, but in other places in the world. I have to make the decision to initiate, make that phone call, just to say, I am thinking about you. It makes a difference. It builds bridges. I know for me, Carrie and I have the opportunity to serve on the campus service team for all our worldwide fellowship, which is a really great honor. And so, we get to plan the conferences and we get to connect with these other ministers from throughout the United States and some of them foreign. But what hit me was, I realized, you know, I haven't done a really great job at initiating even emails or phone calls when there's not business to get done. You know, when there's business to get done, planning the conference, yeah, I'll make the email. But I realized I hadn't been doing that just to be a friend. I wasn't, "Hey, how are you doing lately?" You know, making a call to the guy that leads the church in Chicago, "Hey, how are you doing?" And it was great being with you and just talking. You know, a lot of times we have long lost friends that we really care about, and we want them to be closest, but we just don't, we don't initiate to build that peer relationship. Amen. That was just one of a hundred things that hit me, but I realized we've got to be disciplined to focus in on something that we're really going to begin to change. I know I need those relationships outside the United States and outside, you know, just the Inland Empire and outside of LA because it lifts my faith. God's working in different ways, in different cities across the United States and across the world, but we've got to be willing to push beyond the barrier like God did, right? He loved us first and initiate, and we all need those relationships. And I've just been convict. I've been telling Kerry about this for months that I feel like I've got to elevate and extend myself and really connect with people. I know so many have been in the church 20 years, but at times I don't make those calls. I bet you have relationships across LA, across different states, across other churches, good friends, but you know, it's so easy to forget. I got to initiate to keep that relationship going. We need each other, amen. We need these relationships. So for me, that was a huge thing, right? The discipline to go, I got to think that way. You know, I got home. I looked at my emails. I'm going to make sure I return all emails. I'm going to make sure I initiate with some people I hung out with and tell them how great it was. I'm pushing myself in that way. It makes I haven't done a great job at that in the past. I know I got to work on that. So tonight, what I want to talk about is I want to talk a little bit about in my lesson about, you know, discipline and the heart of God, being disciplined because the other thing that hit me in the conference was, you know, we're doing great things as a movement. Our churches are growing. England Empire is growing. Amen. The Latino ministry is growing. It's exciting. The campus, the edge. The mirrors. We're growing as a church. The LA church is growing. Our fellowship around the world is growing, but you know what can stop us in our tracks? A lack of discipline. A lack of discipline. You know, I'm 44 years old and, you know, I have a lot of strengths, but I have a lot of weaknesses. And I realize that, you know, some areas I have had victory in. In the area of sexual purity, I've had victory. I was a wreck before I became a disciple. You just filled with the spirit, help me get conviction and be pure and be strong. I have a big conviction of being pure and I fight hard for that, but you know, Satan knows I have other weaknesses, discipline, you know, falling through at times with things, timeliness, issues that I battle with and I realize, you know, Satan, he's not going to give up on us. And if there's something that can take our fellowship out, there's something that can take it down. It's discipline. I want us to have a little study on this and then I want to use this as a sort of a jump start into the discipline of being able to focus in on one thing we're going to work on. Right? So campus and edge ministry, you need the discipline of going, you know, you've heard so many things, but are you going to really focus in on one and really begin to make progress in that area? So that's really what I want those that come up and share to share about. But I want to talk now a little bit about this and God's message on it. We're going to look at some scripture and I believe we all need to be focusing on one thing in our goal to transform, right, and our goal to be transformed like Jesus. What are you working on? Isn't it exciting to see Doug getting skinnier? He's looking good, right? Doug is looking. He's been healthy. He's been making the effort. I want to be healthy. He had back issues. He's like, I got to straighten up my core. I got it. I got to be strong. He's turning 50 later this year. He doesn't want to be old and, you know, out of it. So he's, you know, but I'm, I, I, I, I'm inspired by that. He said, you know, here's one thing I had called him this morning. He was tired again because he got done working out. I thought that that is awesome. You know, and that's what we all need to figure out some things. Now there's a lot more, you know, spiritual training is more valuable than even physical training. But are you changing anything? Are you growing in any area? Are you making progress in any area? You got, you got to focus in and be disciplined. Amen. Let's begin reading the Genesis chapter two. Genesis two, let's turn there. Let's look in verse 16, says in verse 16, and the Lord God commanded the man. You're free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for when you eat of it, you will surely die. You know, God has set some standards for us to live by. He's given us the freedom to have an incredible life. But as he created us, there are some things we should be doing and some things we should not be doing. There are boundaries, there are expectations from God. There's things we should do and shouldn't do, or we will certainly die. You know, what's interesting is, you know, they were tempted by that tree. All right. Satan came in. The one thing God said, don't do Satan came in and said, oh, you will not surely die. Right in chapter three and tempts Eve to eat it. And I want to skip over in verse 16 of chapter three. After that, she had fallen and eaten it, actually a month, sorry, verse 12, not 16, verse 12. And God had, you know, he knew everything, so he knew they ate from it, right? And he confronts them and he confronts the man, the man said in verse 12, the woman you put here with me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it. So you know, neither side is immune here. Yeah, the woman was tempted, gave in and ate and crossed the line. The man, you know, sadly, he was standing by her side and he didn't, he didn't step up. All right. That's a good man lesson. But then he's making excuses, right, he's blame shifting. He's trying not to let the truth hit him. And that's how we are. We don't want to look at the, what's the one thing I, let's be honest, what do I really need to change? We don't want to look at it and admit it. See, I got to grow in this, I got to change this. You know, we don't, and we just don't fight for the discipline because we want to be comfortable the way we are and yet everything inside of us is aching saying, no, I know something, I got to grow. You know, you need to be growing spiritually, but you got to have the discipline. It's okay. Here's what I'm going to focus in on. Here's what I've messed up. Here's what I've not been doing. I need to be doing. Here's what I've been doing. I need to stop doing. Turn to Proverbs chapter one, see, we need wisdom to have discipline and we need to understand God's heart is always a heart of love, but he is a mighty God. He is the all-knowing, the all-powerful, he's all-loving, he's a God of truth and grace. And you see the majesty of his creation and it humbles you. You see the depth of his creation and your child being born and it humbles you. God's awesome. We need to have a heart to say, you know, God, I want to please you. I want to feel you. And Proverbs one, you know, I love this verse because it sort of just sums it up very clearly on how we're going to get wisdom and make good choices. It says the fear of the Lord verse seven, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. You know, God, he disciplines us to help us grasp the truth. And he disciplines us so we'll see our need for him. We feel guilt and pain and suffering so that we'll see, I need you, God. And he's there for us. We got to ask, do we fear God enough to have a humble spirit to respond to his message when no one else is watching? Do we respect authority? You know, we absolutely want our kids to respect us and if we love them, we are careful to discipline them because we know it's for their health, it's for their sense of right and it's if they won't respect mom and dad whom they can see, how can they respect a God whom they cannot see? You know, discipline is an expression of love. And God disciplines us like no one else, he goes after us to help us change. He loves us. And you know, we all undergo discipline. We read in Hebrews and we're going to also read it here in Proverbs three. You know, let's give it over to chapter three and I want to talk a little bit more about this. Proverbs chapter three and I want us to be seen here that we need wisdom. We need discipline and understand it's good for us and we got to focus on what are we working on to be transformed? What hits you, edge of ministry in this conference, that you're actually going to work on the change. Campus, you go to something like this, you can't just walk away and go, that was so exciting and then forget, yeah, I'm going to work on at least one thing to really change. Begin reading with me in Proverbs chapter one about the benefits of wisdom. Three, I'm sorry, three, verse one, my son, do not forget my teaching, but keep my commands in your heart for they will prolong your life many years and bring you prosperity. Let love and faithfulness never leave you, bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart, then you will win favor in a good name in the sight of God and man. Let's stop right there. This is a great verse to write in a card and encourage somebody in, you know, encouragement card if you have that or you can put this on a plaque. But love and faithfulness never leave you if you love others. And if you are a faithful person in all the things you say you will do or that you say you won't do and you're faithful, you're faithful in your workplace, you're faithful to your family and you're faithful to your God, you'll win favor in a good name. Life will go well with you. You know, you can give out as much love as you would like, there's no limit. No one ever says stop loving so much, man, you love too much, what are you doing? Right? And the other amazing thing is love comes from God and so we know love the more you give, God provides you more to give. You give, you keep giving. It's a one thing you can't run out of giving. If you choose to love, you'll be able to do it. A lot of times I just can't, yes you can, because love comes from God. You bind those around your, you wipe them on the tablet right back in those days, they would scribe, you know, inscribed things on actual stone tablets, right? That, you know, it wouldn't be easily, you know, wiped away. It was printed into your heart. Love and faithfulness, how are you doing with your commitment to that? Then he says in verse five, trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all your ways, acknowledge him and he will make your path straight. You know, sometimes we do things and we, we just don't realize, you know, whatever we do, it has to be for God, you know, my children, they, we're in the age of life where they play a lot of sports and we're going to practice and games and tournaments and it's exciting time. I remember doing the same thing, but, you know, sports are not your goal in life and we tell the kids that our goal in life is not just to be good at a sport. You know, you get a career going and our career is not our life. You go to college and you got to get a degree to get a career, but it is not your life. In all your ways, acknowledge him. Verse seven says, do not be wise in your own eyes. Fear the Lord and son, evil. That's a tough one for it. Do not be wise in your own eyes. In other words, we just think we're right and the bottom line is we often think we are right. Our standard thinking in life is I'm probably right about how I'm doing things and yet the Scripture says, do not be wise in your own eyes, you need to say, well, I might not be right. That's a healthier perspective to take, not, oh, I'm sure I'm right, but I might, you know, I might not be. I think it's a probably, you know, I think I have an idea, but let me check. Let me double check with some otherwise people, some friends who, whose lives demonstrate success in this area. Fear the Lord and son, evil. This will bring healthier body and nourishment to your bones. Life can cause us a lot of heartache. I mean, all kinds of problems. You know, we ran into trouble recently, I'll just share one thing that just caused me heart Had to book a room at UC Riverside for this big, uh, for the, the team camp, the seniors are coming down to UC Riverside tomorrow, we're teaching the seniors in high school how to evangelize and how to leave Bible talks. And they're going to be doing that right at UC Riverside, but I was responsible to get a room reserved and, you know, we talked to the club, people involved in that and tried to get that all set up. But in my heart, I kept having that voice in back, my said drive down, double check it, go look at the room, talk to the reservation person, make sure all the eyes are dotted, all the keys are crossed. You ever have that little voice telling you to do that? I kept hearing that voice. I'll, I'll do it. Yeah, I'll do it. And then I got an email from one of the sisters saying, yeah, it's all good. So I was like, okay, that's great. I still had that voice saying, no, no, no, no, you better go yourself and look at double check it. You can't drop the ball here, you know, and, and, you know, I just, I wasn't listening to that voice enough. I mean, sure enough, the room got kicked out of the system and canceled and I find out. I'm like, Oh, no, we don't have a room. And what I realized is, you know, I was sort of being prideful to that spirit. I was being wise of my own, yeah, it'll work out though. Yeah, it'll be fine. It'll be fine. No, won't. Dot your eyes. Cross your teeth. Do things right or heartache will come your way. I didn't have help in my body. You know, I wasn't nourished in my bones when I was thinking about, ah, I should have done that. I mean, I was freaking out. I was like, ah, I almost couldn't sleep. I wanted to go home immediately and I was in Colorado, so I couldn't solve the problems I got home. But you know, a lot of times that's what happens to us. We don't have nourishment or health because we're not doing the things we know we should do. We've not had a fear of God and follow through. We've not been faithful the way we need to be. That's what's causing pain in our system. It's just unwise. I realize that's unwise. It's wrong. Why do I keep doing stuff like that? It's not going to carry back. It's so mad at myself. I was like, I can't do that. That's what creates heartache, right? When we just don't listen to the spirit in that way. I don't know what it is for you, but there's something you got to change. You got to grow. I know. I told care. That's what I got to grow. Yes. Go in that. Don't ever forget stuff like that. Do that way ahead of time. Okay. I want to be known for just stuff that's done, it's planned a year in advance. I'm on it. Across the game. I want that. It's a battle. I got a lot of stuff coming at us. Where are you at with the stuff? Those little voices talking to you about getting stuff done. You know you need to get done. You want some pain inside your bones. Don't just ignore the voice. You know in verse 9 it says honor the Lord of your wealth with the first fruits of all your crops. Then your bars will be filled to overflowing and your vats will brim over with new wine. See this lesson on wisdom and discipline. Certainly the Lord talks about how we handle our finances and one of the main points at the conference was about finances for the college students. Because you want to know what will uproot the movement around the world, lack of discipline. In a slave to debt. You know in college is when they give you credit cards. You don't have to have any credit. You just have to have a full loaded units and be enrolled in a four year university and you can get a credit card in America. They give you a small little limit and they get you feeling how good it is to use that credit card. I did it when I was a young 20 something. I got my credit card, charged up my 500 bucks like in the first month. I was like oh my goodness, a lack of discipline in finances will destroy the church. It destroys us. See God owns the money he wants to use the framers and you know so many of us give first to God. But it's not just about giving first to God. It's about having a heart to be disciplined and wise and careful and prepared so that we use our money not just I've been on discipline but I still give you know sometimes that's where I'm at. I'm not as disciplined but I need to be that I always give first to God. I've always given the time, more than time, always giving my special, always giving more than is expected, always. And God I've always had everything I need I've been blessed. But you know at times I realize I could be a lot more wise with my money. I could have more to give. I always give more than the Bible says you should give. I could give a lot more if I was super careful with every penny, thoughtful, mindful, a good steward, thinking of the Lord and thinking about the Lord wants us to have a fun life. I mean he doesn't want us to be you know drudgery all day long and I don't think he's wrong with having some nice things here and there. I totally think the Lord he's our dad and I get my kids nice stuff you know and he gives us nice stuff when the opportunity for this. He doesn't mind that. But you got to look at the big picture. Are you disciplined, careful, living within your men, spending less than you make every month, saving, preparing, thinking about world evangelism you know you know I'm telling you that money helps us evangelize the world it really does it helps because we can send ministers and people and plant churches send out missionaries and we can help the needy and the poor and do so much with money. The more we have the more we can do for God and every time we've got it needs to be put in the hands of God. He lets you manage it but he owns it. You get to manage your money but he owns it and I think we should all try to make a lot more money. I think you should get better jobs and make even more money. I wish a few of us were making a million a year income and then we could give it. We could give it away. There's a lot of work to be done. There's a lot of churches to build there's a lot of new ministers I want to put in the ministry right in this congregation. We need money and you know we got to be disciplined in our finances. You know the church has been growing in that I don't want to say we're not. We have been growing. We're doing a great job but I know me and so I kind of have an estimation I know you. You need to do better. We're giving we love the Lord we're giving first but you could do better. You could sacrifice you could you can handle your money better and that will be a blessing to God in his kingdom amen you know he says in verse 11 he says my son do not despise the Lord's discipline and do not resent his rebuke because the Lord disciplines those he loves as a father the son he delights in that's encouraging right when you get convicted out of sermon it's God saying I love you son change you can do this you know when life goes difficult job changes house changes family changes tragedy there's a discipline there's a pain there but there's a love from God says I love you I'm making you like my son listen you know when we challenge each other and you get the discipline of a strong rebuke that's God saying I love you enough to tell you the truth in a strong way because you're valuable to me in a great to be in a congregation we actually we actually rebuke each other when we really need it we need it sometimes we need it none of us are better than anyone else but when we're messing up we got to hear the truth and repent and take the challenge life giving rebukes the Bible talks about we need that in here and God provides that through life situations we can provide that just through good talks verse 13 bless is the man who finds wisdom the man who gains understanding for she is more profitable than silver and yields better returns than gold she is more precious than rubies nothing you desire can compare with her anything you want right now whatever car whatever clothing apparel you want whatever new game system you might want whatever new thing how she want to live in whatever it might be nothing compares with the value of God's wisdom entering your soul long life is in her hand is in her right hand it says in her left are riches in honor you actually when you're wise you actually are fine in a financial way her ways are pleasant ways and all her past are peace she's a tree of life to those who embrace her those who lay hold of her will be blessed you know I want my life to just be at ease for things to go smooth for her life to not be and fear all the time you know look down in verse 25 I want to skip down there or verse 23 this is how I want us to live and we're when we're wise and disciplined and we listen to the heart of God and we're changing the thing we need to change looking verse 23 it says then you will go on your way in safety and your foot will not stumble so when you find wisdom you when you lie down you will not be afraid I wouldn't have been you know freaking out about that little issue this past week if I had to just had the discipline to follow through and do the things that voices telling me to do earlier a month or two months ago when you lie down you'll not be afraid when you lie down your sleep will be sweet doesn't mean life is perfect but you're changing your girl you're taking you're taking the steps to be disciplined the areas you know you need to grow in have no fear of sudden to have no fear of sudden disaster or of the ruin that overtakes the wicked for the Lord will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being snared amen that's what we need to be like I think how we need to live our lives we're not perfect but we're growing and we're going after the discipline in the areas that the spirits telling us we're gaining the wisdom of God we're just in the love of God and we're we're focusing on the one or two things that the spirits telling us we need to change amen and so I want to have a single the edge ministry come forward that the people that I've asked to come share or said they would a number of you guys come on up and then the campus as well let's go ahead and have the the campus ministry you got a people in a share over here and those in the edge ministry right over here so I a number of you said you're going to share come on up at this time (applause) You
Midweek lesson by Steve Lounsbury