CEC - Pause Pray Ponder Proceed and Praise
Notes
Transcript
Focus
Focus
The title of this message is one of the themes that I try to practice in life on a regular basis.
The theme is very similar to our theme here at the Christian Entrepreneurs Club, that God is our CEO.
And I say it this way, that God must be first in all things.
Before we get into the practicals of my message this morning,
I wanted to make sure that you know a little bit about who I am
I'm a pastor. That's my master status, that's my identity.
All my business desires and priorities and purposes are secondary to that.
God is first in my life, my marriage, my business
Kind of Comes down to this.
If maybe you can relate to me
that many years ago I had a lot of plans, I had a lot of desires, but I was missing something.
I believe God made us all when we're first born, before we come to him, we had this hole in our heart
that we know that something's missing, that we need something more.
I believe in one way or the other, we probably all have a testimony--- that we needed to fill that void.
And we probably used things like alcohol and pride
and maybe even sex and relationships or money or our job status to get that.
But at the end of the day, something was missing.
We came to Jesus Christ.
Pie Chart of Life
Pie Chart of Life
If you looked at your whole life as a pie chart
and you made those little slices of pie
and maybe in one of them you had relationships and another one you had friends and another one you had work.
Maybe you got married and you moved your wife into one of those.
And then you came to Jesus and you added church in there.
Maybe you even at that time put your faith in another one, not seeing the relationship between church and your faith and walk in God.
But my point is that we all categorize our life.
Our life's a pie chart.
And I think we feel good about ourselves when we come to Jesus
and we start increasing that piece of pie and we get this mission, this purpose.
But I'll warn you, this purpose is wrong.
But the purpose that we come to so often as brand new Christians is we think linear, right, instead of holistic.
We think that it's a matter of pouring more and more things into our God piece of pie, that eventually our God piece of pie will be bigger and better, bigger and bigger.
In our whole scheme of our whole pie, we can start to boast a little bit like, look how big my slice is compared to your slice.
But the truth of the matter is that we have it all wrong.
The truth of the matter is that we all have this pie.
We all have all these multifaceted dimensions of our life.
We all have these slices, and some of us with a little bit of ADHD
and a group like this with a bunch of entrepreneurs in it,
we probably have a lot of slices in that pie.
When we start to add into that pie things like our future and our dreams,
our 401k account, the value of our business, maybe we even get to a place where we put something
in the pie called learning or seeking of wisdom.
But the truth of the matter is Christ needs to be in the center.
And Christ isn't a piece of our pie.
He's not a vending machine to come to when we want to get something to quench our thirst.
He's not a diner where we can go and order something off the menu to our liking to fulfill this hunger inside of us.
But Christ needs to be in the absolute center of our pie.
And where we need to focus on this is instead of God being a piece of that pie.
Because you see that the church should still be a piece of your pie.
Your knowledge and wisdom gaining should still be a piece of the pie.
But the focus needs to be to have Christ in the center and to be praying every day, to be working every day, to be moving him throughout all. Your pie, your pie is always going to be your pie.
But the truth of the matter is that Christ wants to be a part of everything.
And Christ needs to seep out. He needs to be drained into that pie.
We need to allow him to pour out his wisdom and his peace and his understanding.
I think the truth of the matter is when we were a young Christian, we wanted to make his piece of pie bigger.
But as we start maturing in Christ and we allow Christ into all aspects of our life, our pie changes.
Color, becomes filled with this color.
That's the glory and the magnitude of God that,
that he's seeping through all these things that your relationship with your spouse starts to,
to be filled with Jesus Christ. Your work starts to be filled with Jesus Christ.
Your business starts to be filled more and more with Jesus Christ.
You see, the truth of the matter is one definition of the word wisdom,
to be simplistic would be that wisdom equals knowledge and experience
. And knowledge is very different than wisdom.
We're not called to walk in knowledge, we're called to walk in wisdom.
We're called to walk worthy for the Lord.
The truth of the matter is we're called to live a life worthy of our calling.
We're not called to just make sure we have a bigger piece of church pie or business pie or Giving pie or using your gifts pie.
But the best part about this is that it happens through something that most of us entrepreneurs don't like.
And it happens through surrender. It happens to putting God in the first seat. It comes from seeking his wisdom and not ours.
The Bible tells us to lean not on our own understanding, but in all ways acknowledge him and he will direct our paths
Proverbs 3:5 “5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.”
If you're making notes, the truth of the matter is this is hard.
I think it's hard for two reasons.
One is even though we're called to not lean on our own understanding, if we're not in church and we're not in a community like this, that what choice do we have?
We have to lean on our own understanding.
But we need to drive to a place of walking in wisdom.
We need to drive to a place where we're in his word.
For it's the word of God that is sharper than a double edged sword.
It's the word of God that we need to rely on.
It's the word of God that is useful for all things, for encouragement, rebuking and teaching.
Right?
The truth of the matter is we need to seek knowledge.
We, we need to get the head knowledge.
But head knowledge isn't what we strive for.
It's wisdom.
That head knowledge needs to be combined with experience.
And experience only comes from, from doing.
And it's not about our works, these good works that we're called to do.
The good work that you're doing today in your business, that focus you have in your business, guess the be on him. I told you.
My master identity is a pastor.
I run a small church in a little town called Bosque Farms, New Mexico.
We prayed and prayed and prayed about what our mission should be.
And I was led to Colossians 1:28–29
“28 Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. 29 For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.”
over and over again
where Paul tells us that his mission is to bring all to full maturity in Christ.
So my church's theme is to glorify him by growing others in Christ.
And just like that piece, I have to preach, I have to do, I have to model to others. I need to share.
That's not a piece of pie. It needs to be my life mission that in all things that I do that my first goal is to glorify him.
It's to grow others.
And when I do that, my, my, my Jesus center starts to expand through all things.
Friends, I, I'd love to go on all day about this blows my mind.
The experiences I've had in my life where I find myself Leaning on my own understanding, even though it's very clear in Scripture
I find myself feeling proud of works that I did and forgetting that my works were because of the sacrifice of Christ,
because of the Cross,
because of his giving of Himself to others and to me.
I start to take credit for things that I have no right to take credit for.
The thing I wanted to leave you with today because I try to be a practical man of God,
to put what I know into practice so that I glorify him and grow others and put Christ first in all things.
And it's this theory, if you want to write it down.
It's become a mainstay of my church and the mainstay of my life.
And it goes like this that we need to pause. We need to pray, we need to ponder.
Then we need to proceed, and finally we need to praise
. Let me break this down for you as I close this morning, because I want to leave you with something that you can take with you.
But what I find is the best way to battle this leaning on my own understanding and focusing on using Christ as the center of my life and being able to have him pour out into all my areas is I need to pause.
Paul tells us that we need to take captive the thoughts in our mind.
And I pondered that for years.
But I find that chasing around every thought I have becomes futile.
Never get anywhere.
I just get frustrated.
But what I try to preach and what I try to practice is to pause.
Sometimes that pause is just to think before you speak.
Sometimes it's going away like Christ did to go be alone and to spend some time with God.
But here's my argument for pause.
When God says we need to pray before all things.
I think that he inferred that. That we needed to pause first so we could pray,
so we could set our minds of things that are noble and pure.
We could set our minds on his ways and seeking his ways so that we can be full of knowledge.
But we got to pause
. I'm going to argue that Jesus did it all the time
There's many verses in the Gospels.
It tells you that Jesus went away to pray.
Jesus went off to be by himself. He went up on the hill.
He went into the garden.
He paused his life to go seek the Lord.
It's my argument that we all need to learn that spacing, that stopping of the momentum that we're driving.
Maybe a good illustration if you're a runner. You go out and run and you see this beauty around you.
But what are you focused on?
Are you focused on not stopping running.
It's like watching a runner out for a deal, and he can't even stop at the intersection.
He just needs a jog in place because it's all about that run.
It's all about keeping the heart rate up.
The truth of the matter is sometimes that runner just needs to pause.
Sometimes it's for his own safety, like at that intersection.
Or maybe that runner needs to pause to take a look around at the beauty and marvel of God.
Or maybe he needs to stop to help somebody else, to help somebody across that street, to share a kind word.
But we need to pause.
And then, friends, the Bible tells us in Philippians that we need to pray before all things.
And I know we've all fell short of that. But the truth of the matter is we need to learn to pray.
We can use the model of the Lord's Prayer.
We can praise him for who he is.
We can lift up our needs.
We can pray for Thanksgiving.
We can pray in various ways.
I mean, sometimes my prayers are alone in the morning.
Sometimes my prayers are full of weeping.
Sometimes my prayers are full of joy and happiness.
I need to communicate because we serve a Lord who wants to have a relationship with you.
He wants to hear from you.
He doesn't want to be spic and span up on the shelf that you just come to when things have gotten too dirty or too soiled out of your control.
He wants to be there with you.
And then, friends, the other one that we struggle with so often is to ponder
. It's kind of real simple in my mind. I missed it for years.
But Isaiah 40:31 tells us that we should wait upon the Lord or hope upon the Lord, and then we'll be lifted up on wings of eagles.
And I don't know about you, but that's a great verse.
That's one I'd love to hear.
Because man just want to soar like an eagle in all that I do.
You probably want to soar like an eagle in your business, in your marriage, in your work, whatever you aspire to, you want to soar.
It tells us to wait upon the Lord.
We pause our life, our direction, to come to God.
We connect with God through prayer.
But then we need to ponder.
And some of those things that need to happen during that pondering as we need to discern.
We need to decide if what we're looking at is biblical. Is it scriptural?
Is it something that aligns with something that God has spoken as eternal truth? If you don't know the word of God.
You can't practice the word of God. I told you that wisdom was knowledge plus experience. And part of that experience needs to be involved in a culture like this one, where it's brothers and sisters supporting each other.
It needs to be your local church.
Do I think that going to church makes you a Christian?
No, but I think that being in a community and a Christ culture does. It's got to be church and community and culture
. So this pondering phrase, this third piece of the puzzle, this pondering needs to take different forms
. You need to think about the word of God.
You need to weigh this thing that you're praying about, that you're praising about.
And you need to take some time to see if the Holy Spirit has anything to give you directly.
Or maybe it'll be speaking to you through the word of God.
Maybe there'll be a devotional.
You have to. You open up that day and you're like, oh my gosh, it's speaking to me.
Maybe it's going to. Listening to a pastor give a sermon and during that sermon feels like something is speaking to you.
And that something isn't a thing, it's a person.
It's the Holy Spirit. Friends, don't miss the value of community.
That's what we got going on here with cec.
It's humbling ourselves to say, hey, man, I'm struggling with this thing.
Hey, hey, friend, I could use some advice on this. And we're not seeking their advice.
We're seeking their input on what we've been pausing and praying and pondering on.
We need to build a network of time with God, with time, with an accountability partner, time in a small group like this.
And then we, we need to have that fourth piece of the puzzle or the square put together by being in church and being in community.
And we need to tap each of those four things as we ponder.
We need to reach out to our church if it's a serious matter.
We need to reach out to godly men and women who are in our lives, that they can sharpen us but keep us on path, that they can remind us of scripture that maybe didn't come to our mind, that was blocked.
We need to surrender or to God to spend time with him.
Having that one person or couple people in your life that you can talk to, sort of like your board of directors that serves under God, the CEO.
You need to build that board so that you can ponder wisely to gain knowledge from others
. I mean, it's what the word of God is, right?
It's meant to be useful, to teach and rebuke and encourage.
We spend that time with pondering tells us that the Lord will make our path straight.
So it comes from pausing and praying and pondering and then we proceed.
I think the end of my message today is this
. It's that last piece. It's to praise.
But I have to ask you, is there something inside of you that drives you to hear that word praise?
After pause and prayer and pondering and proceeding and praise, we want to inherently praise God when it comes to good
The problem with that is that good so often is by our definition and our understanding and not God's.
We need to make sure that his purpose is always forefront, that whatever this thing is or this situation, this event that you're doing, that you've paused, you've pondered and you proceeded.
And if it works out the way you wanted it to, and praise God if it doesn't work out the way you wanted it to, then praise God because His ways are greater than your ways.
So friends, here's my conclusion today.
A couple things to ask you to pause about today and pray about what God wants you to take from this and then ponder this.
Is Christ truly the center of your life?
And by center is he pouring out into every and all things that you do?
The Lord is the God of all, not the God of some things.
He's not the God of sometimes he's not a way.
He's the way, the truth, and the life.
So friends, I hope that I encouraged you a little bit today to focus on Christ, to allow him to penetrate all these things and gave you some practical advice to change, to glorify God by growing others.
And in growing others, your focus is on being able to tell and show and model Jesus.
It's learning to not be reactive to things of the world, but to be submissive and obedient to the Lord our God and to remember that in all things we should praise him for God works for good, everything, all things to those that he loves and don't miss.
Today at the end of Romans 8:28 says, according to his purpose, not according to our purpose.
So God bless you today.
I thank you for letting me share with you today and I hope and pray for you that this blesses you.
Let's pray.