Breathing Room • Part 1┃"Ex-Squeeze Yourself"

hi I'm Andy Stanley if you're like most people and your attempt to get the most out of life you run the risk of losing control of your life you run the risk of trading your piece for the sake of progress if that's you you've come to the right place stick around [Music] this is a four part series and we're going to talk about something that is appropriate and applicable to all of us the whole idea of finding room to breathe you know for your for your basement or for your the trunk of your car or for your attic or for your closet to look something like this I know this is gonna ruin the entire day for some of you just looking at this during the message okay for for and for some of you it's like what okay so for its it's one thing it's one thing for your closet it's one thing for the trunk of your cards one thing for your attic or basement it's one thing for for the places where you put things to look like this that that's okay God made us all different we're all fine you know for me before I can do any work I clean up the room I'm working in I mean that's just the way I am other people you can just work in a mess and you don't see the mess and if you don't know which kind of person you are just go look in the back seat of your car okay and if you have to move stuff around for people to get in the back seat of your car this does not bother you okay if you look in the back seat of your car and there's nothing okay but the point is it is it's okay for your closet that look like this it's okay for your trunk that you for your attic for your basement look like this but here's what we're gonna talk about for the next few weeks it's not okay for your life to look like this it's not okay for your schedule to look like this it's not okay for your finances to look like this where there's absolutely no room for error you have squeezed everything in and there are no discretionary dollars and there's no room for error financially it's not that it's not okay for your relationship to look like this to where everybody is so busy and you've crammed so much into your schedule that you get to the point where you don't really even enjoy any of the stuff you do and your kids don't even enjoy all the stuff they do and you've got everybody running a hundred different directions and I know how you feel we're gonna spend four weeks on this so don't discount me yet you feel like you don't have any choice it's no fun to watch a mom and or dad's you know shuffle their kids around to everything they feel like their kids need to be involved in and after a while they don't really feel like they know their kids there they're just carting them around it's no fun to watch couple who's so maxed out every single dollar every single dollar is accounted for there are no margins and then there's a financial bump and the relationship takes a hit that's just it's not funny at that point and the clutter and the claustrophobic sense of how we do our schedules and how we manage our budgets becomes problematic so we're going to talk about that because at the end of the day life is better with breathing room with space to breathe breathing room is you don't have to drive 80 miles an hour everywhere you go because you get places early now for the sake of for definition and clarity here's what here's what we're gonna say breathing room is for the next few weeks it's simply this breathing room is the space between our current pace and our limits breathing room is the space the distance between our current pace financially or with our schedule or relationally and those are the three areas we're gonna camp out on breathing room is the space between our current pace how hard we're charging how much money we're spending how well we're relating and our limits and here's the thing that you know because some of your gonna push back on the series and I understand that you're gonna argue with me in your mind I understand that here's the deal all of us have limits there is a point at which you redline your life financially or relationally or your schedule and you just can't add anymore in at some point you just can't cram anymore in everybody has limits you may have extraordinary capacity you may have three times the capacity that I have or the people in your family but everybody has limits and if you live your life at the limit at some point you quit enjoying life in your attempt to get the most out of life you lose control of your life in your attempt to make as much progress as possible you trade progress in for you trade your piece in for progress you trade peace in for prosperity and there's an adrenaline rush and some of you are adrenaline junkies and I understand that but at some point along the way for you to enjoy the life that God has given you lead and as we're gonna discover in order to lead a life of faith in order to lead a life of trust if you're a Christian if you're a Jesus follower you don't have any choice because Jesus has addressed these things directly but to be a God follower or a Jesus follower there has to be a sustainable pace financially relationally and in terms of schedule and it becomes an issue of faith and it's that distance between your limit and your current pace now you know this the next part of what I want to talk about you know all this but just to get us all in the same page you know this when there's no breathing room several things happen the stress levels go up right I mean you you know that awful feeling of sitting in your car and you're late for work or you're late for a meeting or you're late for an appointment or you're late for something really really important and I used to say you know we watch the big hand move toward the twelve but nobody has big hands anymore and why do they even call them hands I don't know but anyway as you watch the clock in the second to the minutes tick away and you you know that feeling of your stress builds as the time runs out you know you're later and later and the traffic won't move there's been an accident or you just got a late start or one of your kids you needed something or your husband or wife just had to talk to you about this or you know whatever happened and you know the stress of watching the time run out and the stress levels just build and that's true in every area of life when there's no breathing room relationally when there's no breathing room financially here comes another bill here comes you know end of your staff that you weren't expecting there's just there's just stress when there's no breathing room the other thing that happens you know this is that our focus narrows well in some ways we become my optic that when there's no breathing room your tendency and you can't help this this just happens you get so focused on the area where there's no margin you get so focused on the area where there's no breathing room that in focusing on that one thing are those two things you lose awareness of the other things around you an example is this you know what as long as I'm four or five feet back from the edge of this platform I don't think about it but as I'm gonna make the front rows really nervous okay at all of our churches as I get closer and closer and closer suddenly I'm distracted and I can't concentrate on everything I need to concentrate because suddenly my focus goes to how close am I to the edge and I need I'll see my even my eyes go down and when there's no margin when there's no breathing room our focus narrows and it narrows oftentimes in an unhealthy way now granted we're going to talk about this there are stages of life and there are seasons of life and there are moments you know during the week when we have to be super extraordinarily focused but if you live your entire life that way you become so focused on the areas that in some ways you've neglected that you accidentally and unintentionally but necessarily begin to neglect the things that you would say later and that you would even admit today are important and so consequently the other thing that happens is that our relationships suffer mom you're always on the phone dad you're always on the computer all you guys ever talk about is money all you guys ever argue about is money I feel like we're doing a lot of things but I'm not enjoying the things we're doing I don't get along I don't like to come home I don't like to talk to you about that every time money comes up I just you know lock up every time you pull out the calendar I just lock up and all ultimately relationships suffer and again this isn't new information this is a religious thing this isn't a Christian thing this is just a thing thing isn't it that when there's no breathing room when life looks a little bit too much like this and a little let to last like them that then ultimately there's more stress our focus narrows we begin to tune out things that are important but we just don't have the bandwidth the emotional bandwidth for him and ultimately the thing that really brings joy to life our relationships suffer you say well you know it's just the nature of the industry I mean it's just the nature of the business I'm in well that's part of it well it's the season I'm in that's part of it some of you be so transparent as to say well honestly part of the reason my schedule and my finances and my relationships are so cluttered that I don't enjoy most much of it as Andy I'll admit it I'm I just lack discipline I think disciplines part of it but I think there's a more fundamental thing that drives us for many of us and I think if we're willing Christian or not religious or not I think if we're willing to focus on this fundamental driver this current that you know at first we're gonna push back against I think we'll make some progress because understanding the underlying thing that drives a lot of our behavior and spending and lack of relationships and our attempt be efficient with relationships Steven Covey taught us years and years and years ago you cannot be efficient in a relationship we try to be but you can't I think if we were ever willing to embrace the real driver behind a lot of this we'd make progress and until we do we won't so here's what I'd like to suggest that a big part of what drives our schedule drives arts even our spending and the pace and our attempt to make relationships efficient it's fear it's fear we fear something in fact that let me turn it around I can say this I could say why don't you stop why don't you gear down why don't you and you it might even start the sentence this way well Andy if I do that I'm afraid that well Andy if I if I backed off I'm afraid that I'm afraid if I if I told them that I can't come I'm afraid that if I took my kids out of those events I'm afraid that if I told my daughter you can do gymnastics but not gymnastics swimming softball and dance I'm afraid that I'm afraid that I'm afraid that I'm afraid that it's fear that drives so much of the activity and the spending and the relationship less lives that we lead you know we fear I think some of us fear missing out we fear that our kids will miss out if we don't have them and everything and have them doing everything they're gonna miss out where they do we fear that you know somehow we're gonna miss out you're single and your ear you know you have more time than you'll ever have you have more flexibility than you're ever gonna have for the rest of your life and you drive yourself crazy with all the activities and there's this if you're honest there's a fear of if I don't go if I don't say yes if I don't sign up if I don't if I don't as I don't I'm gonna miss out I think the other thing is we fear falling behind this goes back to what we talked about some time ago with the comparison trap you know we look around at what everybody else is doing we look around at what everybody else is accomplishing and we compare ourselves to what they live how they live how they drive what they wear where they vacation how they spend their time and there's there's this thing of I'm afraid I'm gonna I'm gonna fall behind will fall behind who fall behind what and maybe you're not afraid of falling behind but you married to someone who's afraid of falling behind it so they're pushing you pushing you pushing you and so one of the things that we're gonna talk about in this series especially in section 4 is this that our fear because this is a big deal that our fear of not mattering much has the potential to draw us away from what matters the most now here's a really interesting thing especially if you're Jewish and or if you're Christian and if you're not either and you're kind of looking in from the outside this is this is a great this is a great message to be here for when you open the pages of Scripture this will take you by surprise when you open the pages of the Bible God speaks to this issue and he speaks to this issue in a very unusual way you're not gonna find the phrase breathing room if you go to your concordance breathing room it's not even in the Bible why are we talking about this you don't find it that way what you find it in instead is this ongoing conversation that God has with his people in the Old Testament and very very practical ways as we'll see and then in the New Testament through Jesus and not seemingly as practical away but certainly thematic this contrast between fear and faith fear and faith what we're gonna discover is that if your life not your closet your trunk your attic your basement I'm fine with clutter in all those areas but if your life looks like this there's no room for the people you love there's no room for the things that are most important and there's no room for failure there's no margin for failure financially that this is actually is we're gonna discover a faith issue this is an issue really of how much do I really trust that God knows my name and cares for me as an individual this is interesting back a long long long long time ago when the nation of Israel was delivered from Egypt they were a slave state and this is impossible for us to completely understand but they were slaves they everybody who left Egypt with and followed Moses into the Promised Land to begin this brand-new society really all they knew was slavery every day had been slaves for 400 years so everybody who had not been a slave had died many many years before so this is a group of people who understand you work 24/7 and you do whatever you're told and if you don't you die and if you get sick you're discarded because people don't waste good medicine on dying slaves so their mindset was of such nature we cannot even begin to get our arms around it and so God leads them out of this slavery takes them into this land establishes them and now he has to give them rules to live by because the only rules they know are slave rules and you know you're you know familiar with the ten commandments and as many of you know the Old Testament has many more Commandments than ten there are 600 and something laws that God gave him and the reason there are so many is because he was establishing imagine this a brand new country a brand new way of thinking a brand new way of living brand new values he had to renew their mind to everything and in these laws that God gave them god this is so cool God built in breathing room into this society breathing room into the pace that his people were to live and one of the big ones the one that you're most familiar with actually made the top ten which is known as the Sabbath now this is again we're so familiar with this we think Sabbath nothing I get Saturday and Sunday I don't just get Saturday I get a two-day weekend I'm an American and by golly I deserve I was born in the USA two days or European you know we just assumed two days here's what's impossible for us to understand the idea of taking an entire day and doing no work was completely foreign in fact it was dangerous this is pre refrigeration okay if you didn't work you may not eat and God says to this brand-new nation who understands 24/7 work you wake up work and you go to bed work and you just work work work work work because that was the culture they lived in the Gripen imagine this god says to them one of my top ten rules for you one of my top 10 rules for you thou shalt take a dais office I mean who how can you not love a god that one of the first things that comes to me and it comes out of his mouth is take a day off that's amazing now to us we're so accustomed this of course you take a day off I've got to tell you this had to be staggering this was like no one can take a day off take and we'll starve we won't have enough food to eat there's so much to get done I mean if you think you have a lot to do okay most of you don't have to milk the cows and get that the eggs from the hand you know you didn't have to build your own roof and I mean the world they live in and we can't even imagine and God says you will take a day off one out of seven days you won't do any work and by the time Jesus rolls around the Pharisees have taken taking this to the extreme you know very unhealthy extremes but in the ancient times of Israel this idea was simply this when the Sun Goes Down on Friday night all work ceases whatever you didn't get done you don't do it'll wait and when the Sun comes up you know 24 hours later you know you can begin to work again but no work none it is a imagine this it is against the law to work everyone and my culture in this nation will go you know why God did that because God understands the way that we're wired and God understands the way he created us and this was his will but it was even more than that because by instituting the Sabbath God began to teach his people at the most elemental elementary level that they had to trust him but God what if it doesn't get done trust me but what if we didn't finish trust me but what if we hadn't brought all the crops in trust me but what if but what if but what if and God was saying trust me the Sabbath was an expression of faith when Jesus came around he said something interesting about the Sabbath he said the Sabbath he said people weren't created for the Sabbath the Sabbath was created for people the Sabbath was created for mankind that God gave this as a gift the other thing he did was instituted the tithe now this is not a giving lesson so take a deep breath this is about giving here's what the tithes did they didn't have banks so here's what would happen in the Hebrew home in these ancient times they would actually store the money that they were going to give for the sake of creating a religious system they would store the money in their homes in a jar or a box so every single Hebrew family knew we can't live on everything that comes in because we're going to give 10% or 20% to society to help with the poor and to help with the religious institutions so they visibly saw money come in stored in a box or a jar that they could not or would not or should not spend and it built into the ancient Hebrew culture a sense of financial margin but God what if we don't have enough and what if there's a famine and what if what if what if whatever it was God's Way us into the nation look I'm gonna provide for you but I want you to trust me so basically they say this so so if I don't do if we don't do all we can do you're going to multiply the work we did do so how this works if we don't if we don't do all we can do you're gonna multiply or somehow fill in the gap of all the work that we did do God says that's exactly right I want there to be space and in the space you have to trust me trust me then to make matters worse Jesus rolls around you know hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years later now he walks into a culture that understands everything I've just taught you this was just part of their culture and here's Jesus insensitive synopsis of all that for those of us who live in the New Testament agent when you read these verses and these are so common many of you've read them you've memorized them if you're new to church you'll hear them a whole lot you know going forward these are such popular verses or popular things that Jesus said but when you when you hear this there's something in you that's like that just doesn't work in the 21st century that doesn't work in my family that doesn't work with my schedule that doesn't work in my industry that doesn't work in the world I live in but Jesus is drawing upon this same idea of wait a minute wait a minute I want you to trust me I'm not against working hard I'm not against setting goals I'm not against progress I'm not against any of that but when you find yourself getting to the limit when you find yourself maxing things out in terms of schedule in a relationship and money it's because perhaps you're afraid and when you find yourself afraid what if what if what if and I'm afraid that I'm afraid that I want you to step back and say can I trust God in the gap in the space and so here's what Jesus says and this is infuriating I'll let you know up front okay here's what he said so do not worry so do not worry saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink what shall we wear for the pagans this is such a slap in our face for the pagans a pagan is a person that thinks there's a God who could care less about them pagans did not believe in God pagans believed in the wrong God pagans believed in the pagan gods pagans believed in Jupiter and Zeus and those gods could care less about people that you could never get their attention you never knew what they were gonna do he says for the pagans run after all these things and then he says something that I think is the issue for you and for you for me this is the issue every time we tense up and what if we don't get our kids involved and what if we don't go to everything and what if we don't and what if we don't what if we don't he says this for the pagans run after these things and your heavenly Father knows that you need them and your heavenly Father knows that you need them your heavenly Father knows you want your kids too you know max out their potential and be the best they can be your your heavenly Father knows your kids need to go to school college your heavenly father knows you need to eat live indoors your heavenly father knows the pressures you have at work and the pressures you have in society your heavenly father knows that you're single and you want to get married you're thinking if you don't drive this and do this and look this way nobody's ever going to ask you out and everybody knows it's gonna go out with you here your heavenly Father knows what what if you really believed that your heavenly father knows that what what happened to all of this what would happen - come on come on what would happen to your fear but what happened to your I got to measure up and I got to make a difference and what if and I'm gonna fall behind what would happen all that if you woke up every single morning and you said God you know I know what my limits are and I gotta breathe you know I and there's a lot that won't get done I'm not gonna get all the way to the edges of my field there's gonna be some grapes on the around there's gonna be some wheat that just gets left out there and I'm just gonna trust you with that because I know that you know what I need can you imagine living a life of that kind of faith did you know that is exactly what your heavenly father is inviting you into and when you learn and when you find that pace there will be breathing room and in your effort to get the most out of life you will not lose control of your life and you will not trade your peace for progress or prosperity and then he ended it this way one of the most famous verses in all the New Testament but seek first something else but seek first something else but seek first something else but seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things that you're huh will be given to you as well now here's what I know about you we're gonna wrap up okay ready here we go here's the conclusion something or someone is going to determine the limits that you live by okay you have limits you have time limits and you have money limits and you have you already have limits and you will either allow culture and or fear to drive you to the limit of your limits or you will learn to trust that your heavenly Father loves you and you will learn to walk in accordance to his pace for you and your life financially relationally and in terms of just your schedule I know I've heard it all this is the world I live in nobody calls me to say things are going great just checking in okay we don't get those calls okay we don't spend our time in those conversations right we're in the ministry but here's what I know I know there are men who didn't have time to invest in their marriage because they were so busy until she decided to leave and suddenly he was spending hours and hours and hours and hours and hours trying to save his marriage and I know that if he were here he would tell you you know what I wish I'd taken those hours and hours and hours and hours and hours I spend to save my marriage investing in my marriage but it took a crisis to get my attention and I talked to too many moms and dads because they were busy and you know they love their kids and they're trying to provide for their kids they want their kids to go to the best school and they had no relationship with their kids and then one of their kids spun out of control and they spent hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and lots and lots and lots and lots of money trying to rescue somebody they genuinely loved but the schedule look like this and if they can tell you their story they'd say you know what I wish I'd taken those hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and invested it on the front end instead of having to fight it and I didn't think I had two hours to give but you know what when things begin to fall apart well what do you know I found the hours that I needed here's what people who are 60 and older would tell you they would tell you I would go back to being 30 and 40 and 50 and I would trade some prosperity and I would trade some progress for the sake of more peace if I were you they would say I wouldn't go back to where you are you're so fortunate because you haven't eaten up your 30s you haven't eaten up your 40s you haven't eaten up your 50s some of you haven't even eaten up your 20s I would go back and I would create breathing room because what I traded my breathing room for just wasn't worth it so for the next few weeks we're gonna talk about your schedule we're gonna talk about your money and I'm not gonna ask for any of it this has nothing to do with giving this has everything to do with margin and I'm gonna talk about your relationships and your homework assignment between now and next week is simply to answer this question where do you need some breathing room and I have a feeling you've just did your homework assignment as soon as I put the question on the screen right this isn't uh I don't know I really need to think about if you really need to think about it you ought to be up here teaching the lesson okay but here here's the thing where do you need some breathing room and if you're in a small group or a community group and your group this week if you're discussing these messages I want you to answer that question out loud with your group if you're not in a group if you go to fine breathing room calm you can download the questions for this for today's message you can also rewatch this message if somebody in your group or your husband or wife wasn't here one of your kids or your parents you can take them to this website you can watch this message again but I want you to think between now and next week about where you need breathing room and here's what I really want you to think about is there a relationship because maybe I got it wrong don't take my word for it is there a relationship between your incessant desire and need to be right on the edge in every area of life is there a relationship between that and your lack of faith or trust in God and what would it look like in that area where you need breathing room if you were convinced that your heavenly Father knows what you need and can Pro vited without you driving yourself crazy in your effort to get the most out of life don't lose control of your life let's create some breathing [Music] you

Channel: Your Move with Andy Stanley

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Keywords: Andy Stanley, Your Move with Andy Stanley, Your Move, better decisions, fewer regrets, Ex-Squeeze Yourself, control my life, my life is a mess, smart goals, out of control, life, stress, anxiety, limits, capacity, prosperity, Motivational, hacks, Happy, People, panic attacks, work-life balance, money, dave ramsey, fix your life, stephen covey, fear, fear less, FOMO, Fear of Missing Out, comparison trap, how to matter, stressed out, stress relief, faith, anxious, fear of future

Id: yYhw93Mi8TM

Length: 28min 1sec (1681 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 02 2018