Biblical Manhood - Week 2 (The Manhood Journey)

morning how are y'all doing my name is trey wilbourne i've i've aged i've aged a lot this week you know it was interesting listening to to keith yes uh last week i was actually in a phoenix uh hotel room but listen and tim talk about like how much this uh how the world has changed in the last seven eight years and uh you know that is so true this is my third time to take uh biblical manhood i'm still trying to figure this thing out um but it has changed so much in fact i was this last week y'all know who noah trevor is he's on he's on the daily show on i don't get my news from that i give all my i'm more of a printed word kind of guy newspaper guy uh but anyways i uh he said this week he had a joke that he was talking about the california wildfires and he joked you know about he you know those they were started about a gender reveal party and he joked that uh that everyone's all mad that the fire started from a gender reveal party but they should be mad is that that kid's not gonna be able to choose his own gender and he says it jokingly but you know culture you know is kind of jacked up and that's how they use humor to kind of kind of make uh things uh the way that they should be i guess so i've decided i don't know if you guys my name my real name is john garrett but i have three daughters three teenage daughters and the first thing i just want to do is give a shout out to these young men that are here learning about how to be a be a man yeah let's do a clap for them because as a dad of as a dad of three teenage daughters that okay they don't know this yet but i've decided i'm going to arrange their marriages and so um keith is really kind and he's going to let me read each of your stu each of these students manhood plans and i'll kind of sort through them and see which one of y'all are good and if you guys have young daughters just know i think it's week 16 keith talks about arranging marriages uh so be prepared for that i'll give you any of the leftover ones that i don't think really kind of uh you know aren't good enough maybe you guys could do something about those those guys obviously i'm just kidding uh but i'm really thrilled to be here with you guys and uh going through this series to just remind me and to teach me about what it means to be a man in a world where the the world is telling us so many different things uh all it's all over all over us and so it's great to be with you guys to look at the what the bible says about what a man is and um and to be able to encourage each other and share each uh other struggles and our hopes and dreams as well so i'm gonna start us with prayer and then mr keith ferguson is going to come in here and teach us some stuff so let's pray father i just want to thank you so much for this morning lord it is early but you gave us air in our lungs and we are thankful that we get to breathe today and it's a new day and father i just want to pray that you would just be here be with those that are watching online let them know let us all know how much you love us and you love us unconditionally no matter what we're junk we're bringing this morning you love us and you want us to be more like jesus and lord we need a lot of help we need a lot of instruction we need a lot of reminding we need a lot of encouragement we just need it lord so thank you for giving it to us in this format we uh give this time to you it's yours lord we're we're choosing to be here to meet with you so lord meet with us it's in jesus name i pray amen amen thank you john all right well good morning you're back for week two you made it week two of 70 weeks so we're so glad that you're here you've got two handouts on your table if you're watching online you should have gotten the email from me yesterday that had these two attachments in it one is the outline for today's talk and discussion questions so that's called week two the manhood journey and then the second is a five page uh document template called your manhood plan so i introduced this to all of you uh last week and this week what we're going to do is we're going to walk through uh the three main parts of your manhood plan and what i'm going to do is i'm going to give you a a target date during the study to kind of finish each part of the manhood plan and so uh what you don't want to do is wait all the way until the end of the study to start working on this you like because you'll forget stuff that god's showing you in the early part of the study and so you kind of want to work on it as we go through there okay so uh if you weren't here last week if you were out of town this is your first week with us i do encourage you to go back and watch last week as we just kind of established the the nature of the challenge the problem we have today and that is that confused men cause problems they settle for less and they live only for the moment not for the eternal and so what we said at the beginning is we need a higher vision of manhood than we can get from our culture and our goal during this study is to to really understand what god's perspective is god what do you tell us what is the biblical definition of manhood how do we pursue it together with other men because that's a big part of the study as well and how do we get an action plan so just remember and the reason the plan is so important and this is true not just about church stuff this is true about anything in life for us as men you will not do what you don't plan to do right you won't do what you don't plan to do as men okay and so a big part of this study is to say real men have a plan and now let me add this statement to that to really challenge you not just for their career most men that i talk to have a very detailed plan for their career i'm going to do this training i'm going to get this degree i'm going to do this internship i'm going to go on and do this professionally and i'm going to get this promotion and this is how my career is going to go and then i'm going to put this in retirement and i've got it all mapped out but if you ask them what's the parallel plan for the rest of their life their family their walk with god their eternal pursuits blank stares right and so part of the beauty of this study is to take some of that same intentionality that we have with our career into the rest of our lives there's three parts of the manhood plan and this will really show you where we're going this ministry year and also you'll see it there in the document in front of you okay so here's where we're going first question we're going to answer together is we are going to look back with clarity we're going to look back with clarity okay the first page in your manhood plan is making sure that we deal with the past many of us in this room many of us watching this online don't understand how our past has impacted us but it has the hebrew word for remember is the word zakar when i was in seminary i wrote my master's thesis on this word zakar it's just fascinated me how much god tells his people in the old testament remember remember remember such an important part of our walk with god is to remember in fact when you get to the new testament and jesus is leaving us the things he wants us to do as his followers the sacraments one of them is the lord's supper and what is that about do this in remembrance of me like every time we do the lord's supper we're remembering something that happened in the past and its importance for us today if you have your bible i want you to go with me to deuteronomy 8 2 deuteronomy 8 2. remember what we said last week as we go through the manhood study you're writing down these manhood verses right and you are highlighting them underlining them in your bible and you're collecting these verses from the word of god that give you definition and clarity and direction on what manhood means uh here's a key verse when it comes to remembering and that is deuteronomy 8 2. the scripture here says remember there's that words the car remember that the lord your god led you on the entire journey these 40 years in the wilderness so that he might humble you and test you to know what was in your heart whether or not you would keep his commands now there's several things in this verse that i love but one of them is did you notice the phrase entire journey remember that i the lord was with you not just at one moment not just when you were in church or in a high point spiritually but i was with you every step of the way through this journey that you've been on i want you to remember that and remember that the reason that i've been with you all on the way he says that has been to humble you and to test your heart and to show you who you really are are you a man a woman who would obey my commandments so think about that for a second god has been with us all along the way in our journey and as we look back there's good stuff there's bad stuff there's there's high points there's low points there's all that stuff but here's the truth from the very beginning god has been in the middle of all of that all of that in your journey and you need to understand how real men look back with clarity they see and understand the things that have shaped them they see god's faithfulness they see how god has worked through their story and they see clearly what they need to do in response men need to do two things with their past number one men have to deal with unfinished business in their past unfinished business in their past every man this room has a story a journey that has shaped you and most of us have two problems with our past okay when i talk to men there's usually two problems one they don't know it very well i just talked to a lot of guys and i would use this phrase who have an unexamined life an unexamined life they don't really know the things that have shaped them so if you ask them well why do you do it that way way why do you think that way why do you respond to your spouse that way why are you parenting that way why do you think that way about your career why do you have that identity as a man a lot of that is connected to their past and yet most men have not taken a moment to examine the past and understand how that impacts their present and why they're doing what they're doing psalm 139 23 and 24 psalm 139 23-24 a great prayer right in the psalms search me and know my heart o god test me and reveal if there's any wicked way within me why does the psalmist need to pray god search me and know me because there's things in his heart he doesn't understand there's things going on in him that he's not aware of he's got struggles and battles and he doesn't know where they come from and so there's this prayer god revealed to me first problem we have is a lot of us don't really know ourselves very well the second is even when we do know ourselves well this is huge we don't know what to do about it we don't know what to do about it it just feels like this is just me this is what i grew up with this is what i've experienced is what i've walked through and it's just me so why bother but men have to deal with unfinished business from their past unreconciled relationships past sins foolish decisions wrong ideas things that we started and didn't follow through on come on now things that we committed to that we failed to follow through on we need to finish we need to resolve things of the past if you guys listen to me if you don't this unfinished business will eat you alive in the present and the future second thing that men have to do is they've got to heal the wounds that impact their lives today we all have wounds from our past there is no man who's listening to my voice there's no man free of wounds we all have them okay some wounds we carry are inflicted by other people there's things that are done to us in our story and when those things happen the challenge for us is can we extend forgiveness we've talked about that many times at city view it's a challenge for everybody right colossians 3 13 forgive as god in christ has forgiven you so that is when other people have done things to you you carry that wound with you and the challenges have you truly forgiven now not have you said the words i forgive can we be honest as men sometimes we say the words yeah i forget i've forgiven that many years ago and yet we're still walking around with a seed of bitterness in our heart that impacts us so first have we forgiven the wounds against us and then two some of the wounds are self-inflicted right some of the wounds are not things other people did to us it's things we have done and i want to tell you something that's huge huge for men you ready for this okay one of the things that has got men stuck is shame is shame walking around with things that we are wounded by that we have done that we have not told anybody about that we're afraid to be honest about and that shame is eating us alive and we have not released that shame to jesus christ listen to second corinthians 5 17 this ought to be one of your life verses if anyone is in christ he is a new creation the old is god the new has come if you're in christ in the past things you have done do not define you christ has not just taken your sin and the penalty for your sin but listen to me christ has taken your shame he's taken the shame one of the things that he did when he went on the cross is he so he hung there and all the shame that he took on wasn't his shame it was my shame it was your shame and he took it on so that we don't have to walk around with that anymore we've been freed by it by what christ has done amen so how do we find healing real men don't ignore the wounds of their lives they deal with them they find healing they learn they grow and they move on in a healthy way so the bible gives us this directive remember the past but don't live in the past remember but don't live there remember god's faithfulness remember his grace remember his work and your story remember remember remember remember but then the bible also says forgetting what lies behind i press on to what is before me so there's this interesting tension in the scripture i need to remember but i need to not live there i need to understand what's in my past and i need to deal with it so the first thing we're going to do in this study is we're going to work on the past with clarity so in your manhood plan the first page in your manhood plan there is called a look back we're going to spend the first third of this study together looking back with clarity and we're going to understand the forces that have shaped us into the men that we are today on the first page there can i ask all of you to write down the date december 1st write down the date december 1st okay today is september 17th all right you got about two months to get this first part done but i want to encourage you over the thanksgiving break when we have that week off for thanksgiving to get this first page done right you're going to have heard me talk through the wounds you're going to have heard me talk about how to deal with the past and then during that thanksgiving break i want you to write out and finish this first part it takes some really hard work can i be honest with you of all the three parts this is the hardest it's the most painful it's the most difficult but it's also the most important you have to deal with the past openly and honestly and understand how it shaped you and what god is calling you to do with it unresolved wounds of the past unexamined pain here's what happens here's what men do i see it every day in my ministry every single day they take all that stuff from their past they wrap it together with their flesh with their sin and they wreak havoc in their lives so if you don't understand how all this stuff in the past is impacting you you won't understand how your own sin nature is taking that stuff and twisting it and using it as justification for the things you're doing to rebel against god it's so important for us to work through these issues so part one looking back with clarity all right part two we're going to define manhood with conviction we're going to reject the confusion in our culture around manhood but we are then going to define manhood with conviction as we said last week we need a clear definition of what we can hold onto from the scriptures that we can understand we can remember and we can repeat we need to reject cultural definitions of masculinity that are always changing because if you tie your manhood identity to the culture you're going to feel like a boat that is just being tossed back and forth on the waves right it's this thing this year it's this thing next year you need an anchor that you can put down that will help you understand who you are a definition that doesn't change this is the second part of the manhood journey it addresses two needs okay first of all men have got to see masculinity from god's perspective we need to know how mis masculinity was originally designed by god and what we're going to do when we get to this second part of the study is we're going to do a deep dive into the book of genesis and i just can't say enough how much that part of this study is going to make you feel like you are in a different world than the world you're in right now as you read genesis you're just going to be like this is material that is not taught anywhere by anybody today and that's why we so desperately need it we need that deep dive to get grounded in what god says you won't ever see manhood the same in your life after that study and so here's what you got to do you got to have a masculine vision definition that goes beyond physical strength money in the bank sexual promiscuity all the things that are kind of in our culture that's not it what we're going to do is we'll contrast biblical masculinity with cultural masculinity and then we'll also contrast it with conventional masculinity because there's a lot of alternative definitions in our world that we need to confront and what we need is we need god's perspective god what do you say about this the second thing and this is so challenging today is men have to root their identity in scripture we need an identity as men that is deeper than our performance amen then our performance this is a big part of what we do as men especially as americans is we tie our identity to our performance okay how are we doing with our metrics how are we doing with our money and all those things kind of define our manhood real men root their identity in god's word not just what god tells us to do but here's the key who god says we are god says we are do you know your identity in the light of who jesus is and what the bible teaches you you are write down this verse this is key galatians 2 20. galatians 2 20. this is a verse i come back to often in my own life as i struggle with my own identity right as i struggle with my identity as a husband as a father as a as a pastor as a friend all the different roles i have in my life i come back to this often galatians 2 20 says this paul writes i have been crucified with christ and i no longer live but christ lives in me the life i now live in the body i live by faith in the son of god who loved me and gave himself for me now here's paul who in other places in the new testament gives you the long list of his biography and all the things that he could have found his identity in right since i was a hebrew of hebrews i was a persecutor of the church i had i was a pharisee of pharisees i did all these things i could put my identity in all of that but then what i realized when i found jesus christ is all of that was rubbish and what i discovered was building my identity on those things that the world says was important was not a solid foundation and i needed something else and here's what he says in galatians 2 20. what i found is my life is not my own my life is hidden in christ now let me tell you why that's so important men you listening let's get very practical because if you build your identity on a job and you lose that job you will not just be disappointed you will be crushed you see the difference if you build your whole identity around your spouse and who you are as a husband and your wife does something to disappoint you and she will then you're not just disappointed you're crushed because now it's not just the fact that she's let you down it's that she's messed with your identity who you are and so the only way to be a man who can function in all those different roles in a way that is secure and not reacting in a way that is not productive is to make sure your identity is not in those things but my identity is in christ and the only way you can do that is if you have a clear definition of what it means to be a man and this is one of the reasons why when you don't have clarity you start putting your identity in all these places this is why so many men today their whole identity is built on how well their kids perform in sports and so this is why when i go with my son to watch one of his basketball games there's the dad over in the corner with his son and not just encouraging him or cheering him on but berating him driving an eight-year-old boy into the ground and the kids crying and the dad who's like six foot four is like putting this three foot six boy into the ground what is that about it's about the dad who has built his identity on the basketball performance of the eight-year-old boy how ridiculous is that and so what do we need to do to be real men we need to build our identity on christ so then we're not putting all this pressure on everybody around us our co-workers our kids our spouse our friends to tell us who we are we don't need that because we know who we are in christ [Applause] the third part of our study oh i'm sorry on that second part that second page in your manhood plan write down the date january 1st january 1st so you're going to get a definition you're going to understand your identity here in the second part okay this this look at who i am now what's my definition of manhood and on that second page there i want you to work through that over the christmas break okay so first page you do during thanksgiving second page you get done during our two week christmas break and you have that page done all those questions answered and and written up january 1st the goal of that section is that you can give a clear succinct biblical definition that you can own and you can repeat to others especially other men one of the things that we talk about a lot in this study is the idea that we as fathers grandfathers need a way to tell the next generation what it means to be a man and that's why if you don't have some language around this this is why so many of us say why my dad never told me what it hey he didn't tell me when i was a man we talked about that last week but second he never told me what a man was i i didn't know and so then i start to pick up all these cultural clues of oh that's what a man is what we want to do is we want to throw all that out and we want to say biblically and you can tell you can tell a three-year-old four-year-old boy this is what god says it means to be a man and give him that definition and help him with it part three is looking ahead with confidence looking ahead with confidence this is where we talk about where we are going as we said earlier do you have a plan and do you know your destination do you know what you will be remembered for one of the words that we're going to wrestle with during the third part of this study is the word legacy right we want you to think about your legacy what kind of legacy are you going to leave behind one of the exercises at the end of your packet is there's a tombstone did you see that on the last page of your manhood plan and so it's kind of this idea like when you're long gone what are people going to say about you what is the two sentences that they're going to say this is what this man was all about and what's so interesting about that exercise is it really moves a lot of the fluff out of the out of the way because you realize a lot of the things that you think are important nobody's going to talk about it nobody's going to remember like i spent all my time and energy on this and that's not significant part of the legacy that i'm going to leave so what's really important it's an interesting exercise so you don't have to fill that out now that's toward the end of the study but you want you to start thinking about that what is the legacy that i want to leave this is so important biblically okay if you have your bible with me go with me to exodus 20. i really want to just talk about this vert these two verses for a minute uh if you're new to the scriptures exodus is the second book of the bible exodus 20 is the first listing of the ten commandments okay ten commandments uh god has given to moses here's the the law that i want the people of israel to live by and he gives them the ten commandments in exodus chapter 20. all right everybody know where we are now in exodus 20 uh we start with the first commandment have no other gods besides me there in verse three okay and then verse four the second commandment don't make an idol for yourself right first one no other gods second one don't make an idol for yourself to bow down for but i want you to focus in on verses five and six so this is kind of inside the second commandment and i want you to think about this question of generational legacy and it's just fascinating to me to process here's god giving to moses the ten commandments and within the second commandment he's addressing this issue of legacy think about that for a minute the second commandment this is not like some random verse that's like buried in the 600 laws of the old testament this is the second commandment in the big ten and here's what he says to him in verse five do not bow and worship to them do not serve them for i the lord your god am a jealous god punishing the children for the father's iniquity to the 3rd and fourth generation of those who hate me but showing faithful love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commands isn't that powerful here's what that means if you build your life on an idol if you build your whole life and identity and pursuit around something other than god there are generational impacts from that now that's not like you know an amazing revelation because all of you in the room you know the struggles you've dealt with because of the idols of the generation before you the things that were passed on to you from your parents from your grandparents your gravegrammers who said this is what's important this is what you live for this is what makes you a real person this is what defines success for you an idol and here god is saying is those things go on three and four generations and if we don't understand that personally we don't understand the things that we're battling many of you are battling generational issues in your own life right now and you have no idea that's the source of it and then second of all what is the legacy we want to give to the next generation and honestly most of this room even if we're thinking that way we're thinking too short term we're thinking about our kids i hope my kids grow up and they do okay when they go to college that's too short term listen the decisions you're making right now the the way that you're living your life right now do you understand that has generational impact we're not talking about your kids getting into college we're talking about your great great grandchildren the legacy that you're leaving that your kids will adopt that they will pass on to their children that they will pass on to their children and you all of a sudden be long gone and you'll have three or four generations from now that are doing things the way you decided to do your life this year the things that you write down in this ministry year in this manhood plan the definition you pass on to the next generation do you understand the impact of that you understand that one day your grandson your granddaughter will be talking to your great-grandchildren and they'll be using language that you gave to their parents this is huge what legacy do you want to leave this is called reverse engineering your life think about the long term and then back it up and say where do i want to be today so i can pass this on in the future part three is all about concrete action steps it's all about concrete action steps we want to leave this study with a plan for the future this is the part of this study that i get the most pushback from men on because they like talking about this topic in theory right they like sitting around the table discussing manhood as an idea but as soon as we say i'm going to do this thing by this date okay wait a minute now keith now you're messing with my calendar you're messing with my priorities you're telling me i have to actually do something with this yes that's what i'm saying right when you write down on your manhood plan i'm going to do a getting away to get it together with my wife on june 15th now all of a sudden a you've become concrete two you've put a date on this thing and three you've told somebody so you're accountable for what you're gonna do oh man now this is getting hard and that's the kind of stuff you have to do to think about the future too many men think primarily about the future i said this already but i'll just make the point again through the lens of financial legacy right financial legacy in other words how much money am i going to leave to my kids my grandkids how am i going to plan for their future and on and on we think a lot has been through the financial legacy what i'm challenging you to do in this study is to be intentional in the same way about your spiritual legacy your mentoring legacy your manhood legacy and that all goes beyond finances you guys do realize you can leave your kids and grandkids a lot of money and they can be really screwed up that doesn't guarantee anything our news is full of people that have billion-dollar inheritances from their parents whose lives are a total train wreck so just think about that for a minute obviously that's not the most important part of the legacy that we want to leave so what do men need we need to develop a manhood plan i wrote my first plan i had that same document that you have in front of you i had that same document 2006. i wrote my first manhood plan and it still guides me today now for those of you in the room who have done a manhood plan in the past okay one of the benefits of redoing this study is updating your manhood plan okay when i first wrote my manhood plan in 2006 right i had two kids now i have six children okay my health was different now i have type 1 diabetes like my marriage was different right so as you grow as life changes as the church has changed all this stuff has changed in my life right and so it's important this is not a static document it's not you wrote it one time boom you're done you write it and then several years later you need to review it you need to update it this would be like in your career saying well i wrote a business plan for this year i'm good to go for the next 20. none of you would do that in the room right because the market changes you change your company changes the expectations so what would you do you would update it so let me challenge you don't get comfortable here stay on top of it at the end of the study you're going to turn in your manhood plan you're thinking what i have homework keith i haven't done homework since college yes man up and do the work get over it do the work why i don't know i don't ever type anything up okay get your grandson to sit next to you who knows how to do all this backwards right on the phone and say hey help me type all this up get it done man up and take responsibility do the hard work of becoming a man and get something down on paper we all know the truth we don't do what we don't plan to do the goal of this study is not for you to check the box and say i finished the manhood study the goal to study is to write a plan of action of how you're going to be the man of god god wants you to be so you need to get that done the second reason it's so important is you got to find accountability you got to work out your manhood plan with other men they need they need to know what's in your plan they need to know how to help you pray for you hold you accountable who's going to ask you hey did you did you take your wife on that thing you said you were going to do okay it's too easy if it's just between you and god right it's just too easy you say i'll get to it later but if you've got a group of brothers around you who you've told and you've put dates on and you've committed to do it who you know are going to text you and say hey how did it go that just helps all of us doesn't it say i mean okay i've got to follow through on this listen to first thessalonians 5 11 first thessalonians 5 11 therefore encourage one another and build each other up as you are already doing that's all accountability is it's just encouragement from other people to do what's right the third page of your plan right down february 15th the last page third page there right down february 15th as your deadline okay page one december first do it over thanksgiving break page two get it done by the first year get do it over the christmas break last page have it done by february 15th and then here's what we're gonna do you're gonna turn it into your table you're gonna turn it in you're gonna make enough copies to give to the other guys at your table and you're going to share it with each other by the end of february now here's what's so important when we meet together for our very last meeting march 11th wednesday march 11th our last meeting in this study okay you're gonna have your final draft done now here's why that takes some steps because what you give to the table to your table is not your final draft what you give to your table is your first draft and you give to your table say hey this is what i've been working on all through this study and i want your feedback on it what am i not seeing what have i got messed up here what's not clear what am i missing that i need you guys have been with me through the study you've heard me talk about my issues what am i missing here and somebody at the table might say well you know you've talked a lot about uh your relationship with your mom being really dysfunctional but i don't see anything on here about resolving that with your mom oh yeah yeah i need to add that okay i i see you know you don't have anything you don't have a date here on what you said you were going to do with your son doing that trip with him and kind of helping him understand as a young teenager what a man was you said you were going to do that but there's no data on here like you get that feedback from your group right and it gets better and you work on that final draft and then the last week that you come you bring your final draft i've taken all that input it's gotten better and better and now i'm done i turn that in and when you turn it in you get your man card from us right that says you got a manhood plan you got a manhood plan and you understand the definition of what it means to be a biblical man and you can articulate that so that is the arc of the study when you get into all of this process with your table you've got to learn how to share your story and i want to give you just a few principles real quick and i'm going to turn you over to your discussion this morning of of how to share your story and these convictions have grown over time this is really really important okay so just stay with me for five more minutes all right there's three key components to you telling your story to your table okay the first is the people who has impacted you in what ways you gotta think through the people your parents grandparents aunts uncles cousins your friends your teachers your coaches at school your pastors your youth pastors your mentors at church your romantic interests authors speakers professors a coach you had in a sports team you were on a musician entertainer who are the people that are influential in your story okay you got to think through that second you got to talk about the places what are the places that define who you are right where are you from where is your family from because that shapes who you are what's the kind of culture that you grew up in that's located in that place how did that place impact you okay maybe your grandparents uh are rooted in a certain place but you were rooted in a different place and that's shaped your experiences because you heard stories of one place but you have a different place even though maybe culturally you're similar but the place is different what places have shaped you third the experiences the experiences what experiences did you have that really shaped you what stories do you tell over and over and over again right when you're introducing yourself when you're meeting guys for the first time what stories do you tell what's most memorable what victories and defeats stand out to you what are the highest highs the lowest lows of your journey what do you most regret a lot of men would live with a lot of regrets experiences where they wish they had done something that they didn't do those are experiences right so just process as you're starting to get to know one another you got to be able to talk about the people the places and the experiences that have shaped who you are now as you do that three key ingredients okay this is really important first is your honesty as you talk about the people places and experiences you have to really face down reality not a distortion of reality we have to be honest brutally honest about what we remember brutally honest about the things we share looking at your pain in your life looking at your past looking at the people places and experiences that have shaped you can be very difficult and some men just will not engage and i want to just tell you at the beginning of this study you can get all the content down but if you won't open the door of your life to other men you will miss a huge component of this study are you willing to be honest my prayer for you is you can get honest but here's the second one and that is your transparency you say aren't those the same things no honesty is telling the truth transparency is telling the whole truth you understand the difference you can share honestly but not share the whole story now we are pros at this with our wives if you're married in the room right you know how to share honestly but not share the whole story okay and i want to just warn you in this study this will kill you in this room this will kill you in your online group if you don't get to the whole story if there's some part of your journey that you hide and we all in this room be tempted to do this myself included okay you are going to miss out on a huge blessing of where god wants to grow you my challenge my encouragement to you is listen the men at your table the men in your group love you they are not perfect they are sinners just like you everybody in this room has got stuff in their story that is hard for them to share every one of us so my challenge to you and transparency is can you get to the one percent in marriage ministry we call it the one percent meaning most of us will share 99 of our story and we feel like we've shared a lot when we share 90 99 and we have but you want to know where freedom really comes from you want to know where breakthrough really comes from it's when you get to the one percent it's when you get to that part you're really ashamed of it's it's it's the this is how it comes out it's when you're able to at your table with other men go i've never told anybody this i've never told anybody this but i need to share with you blank that's the one percent and if you can get to that one percent you will experience massive transformation because satan he works best in darkness and he will keep men trapped who are unwilling to open up their lives to other men and my prayer for you is be bold be courageous this year i said man i i and be honest i'm terrified telling you guys this just be honest i'm terrified telling you this i don't know if you'll like think i'm crazy after i tell you this if you'll still be my friends but i need to tell you and here's what here's what you'll experience you experience acceptance and love and and and a group of guys who are who are rooting for you that you've never experienced before and it is so transformative finally we need god's grace this is crucial to looking at the past and sharing with others we gotta have forgiveness on two levels we need to give forgiveness to others and we need to receive forgiveness from others god's grace makes this healing possible let me pray for you guys as you think about this and what you what i want you to really focus on this morning as you get into your discussion is beginning the process of sharing your story beginning the process of opening up about who you are right as we get into the first part of the study which is looking back with clarity it only works if we as men will begin to open our lives to others let me pray for you god thank you so much for these men thank you for the encouragement today of where you're taking us on the study on this journey together i pray holy spirit that you would come that you would really fall on our tables and our online groups this morning and that wherever men are god they would just sense your spirit prompting them to open up and to be honest and be transparent about who they are the hurts and the wounds they carry and god what you've been doing in their story and father i pray against the the lies of satan that would hold us down i pray against the lies of the enemy that would keep us in darkness keep us bound up in the sins and the habits and the things that hold us down and god i pray that this year that this study would be a year of freedom god i pray we find who we are in christ and god we'd find freedom in the spirit as we begin to walk as men that you want us to be i love you god i thank you for these men i love them so much i pray that all of them would really experience you in this study in jesus name amen all right y'all enjoy your discussion time together this morning you

Channel: Cityview Bible Church

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Length: 48min 25sec (2905 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 17 2020