Teachability
Notes
Transcript
Handout
A Custom Training Program
A Custom Training Program
American Approach = Learning facts and knowledge
The only shortcut to life is teachability
Learning everything by figuring it out on your own - Long approach
Learning from the experience of others - Short approach.
Piano Instructor
Piano Instructor
Less like learning facts to prep for a quiz.
More like learning from an excellent piano teacher or coach.
Might resent the teacher: “He didn’t make me feel good.”
Encouragement has it’s place.
Real progress is made by correction.
Praise and encouragement are a part, but “a good teachers goal is to help their students develop their skill.”
For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life,
“Discipline” - Correction which results in education. God uses it to develop wisdom and character.
God is using your life situations to train you.
Navigating the River of Life
Navigating the River of Life
The ideas we gather are like sticks and logs.
We pile them up in our minds.
A wise person knows which ones are right and true.
The wise person knows how to tie them together to use them like a raft to float them down the river of life.
Wisdom is then learned to navigate through this river in the most successful way.
Ways we Dodge Instruction
Ways we Dodge Instruction
Our own sound bites: Our excuses for not being teachable:
“I can’t change”
“It’s too hard”
This is how I’ve always done it.”
“I’m not the problem — my situation, or that other person is the problem.”
“Any reasonable person would do the same wrong thing I do.”
“This is the only way to actually make it in life.”
Correction Stings: Corrective instruction does not feel good.
We put too high a value on “self-esteem.”
If we focus on self-esteem at the expense of listening to instruction, our self-respect erodes because are are not doing what we know to be right.
Serlf-respect: Grow as we listen to advice and decide to get it right.
Story: David calling us out for rolling up late…
We are wise in our own eyes
We are wise in our own eyes
“My way will work just fine. I don’t need instruction.”
Story: Girl in my youth group pulled me aside. My defenses went up.
The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.
We ignore instruction
We ignore instruction
I don’t need to listen to that.
Poverty and disgrace come to him who ignores instruction, but whoever heeds reproof is honored.
We resist instruction and harden out heart to it
We resist instruction and harden out heart to it
“The instructor just doesnt understand.”
He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.
Ex. A horse who stiffens his neck and will not turn in the direction it’s rider is pulling.
God wants to train us
Blessed is the one who fears the Lord always, but whoever hardens his heart will fall into calamity.
We scorn or reject with disdain
We scorn or reject with disdain
Shake your head.
Mock it.
Despise it:
“So old fashioned.”
“I think it’s wrong.”
Whoever despises the word brings destruction on himself, but he who reveres the commandment will be rewarded.
The Mindset for Teachability
The Mindset for Teachability
Example: Athletes mentally prepare for a competition.
Being prepared for instruction is crucial.
Admit that handling life your own way has not been working
Admit that handling life your own way has not been working
Deciding to obey God before you know the specific steps he is going to ask you to take.
Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.
Admit that you have a lot to learn.
Admit that you have a lot to learn.
You will learn in propertion to the degree in which you acknowledge your need to learn.
Often, you aren’t aware of how much you need to learn, because your situations haven’t required you to learn it yet.
As I child I often asked:
“Why do I need to go to school?”
“Why do I need to learn this?”
Later on I often wished I payed better attention.
In my twenties I tried to make up for it.
My son, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh.
Three ways of Learning
Three ways of Learning
By Learning God’s Precepts
By Learning God’s Precepts
Read or hear God’s precepts (His commands, his ways) and then live by them.
The best way to learn.
The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple;
By Observing Examples of Others
By Observing Examples of Others
Video Tutorials: DIY
Watch the lives of other godly men and women.
Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.
These are people who have already gone through the trouble of learning God’s Word and figuring out how to put it into practice in life.
We can be mentored by them.
By Pain (aka. Experience)
By Pain (aka. Experience)
This is a major way God develops maturity in us.
We will all go through this to some degree.
but man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.
However, the more we learn by the prior two ways, the less we need to learn by pain.
A teachable person:
Listens to advice.
Let’s it sink in.
Listen to advice and accept instruction, that you may gain wisdom in the future.
So we must learn be eager to learn and apply what you learn to your life.
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
