Bucket List (Week 1) (Teaching Only)

all right man so good to see you guys and glad you're here with us today and wow central but the worship wasn't that just incredible to be able to pause and just open our hearts up to God was awesome it's great to be with you man the last several weeks around here at Central across our locations have just been remarkable I was listening to and dialing in to Pastor Sean's teaching he did such an incredible job this summer just pointing us to Jesus and was so rich and meaningful and I'm grateful for all that he did as well as everything else on his plate I had a few weeks off this summer thanks to our board for that and it was really good for me just to be off the platform I was working many of those weeks laying out the teaching calendar really spending time trying to get the teaching framework laid out for our church over the next year and just coming back really refreshed and excited and honored to serve as your pastor so thank you for that privilege and opportunity and thank you for that time I want to say a special shout out to our central family locations the central Summerlin and sunrise mountain of Southern Highlands Kingman central Newcastle family joining us this weekend as well as those who are joining us in our partnership with God behind bars and different prison facilities around the country and those who are watching online thank you guys good to have you well you know as you get older time flies come on man as you get older time flies my daughter is gonna be a senior in high school how can that be I'm a teenager man how can that be Wow crazy right and you have it with your families your kids your friends you see it it happens so fast how many of you were born in the 1990s or earlier 1990s or earlier okay alright I'm about to make you feel really old if you were born in the 90s earlier think about this kids born in the year 2000 are basically graduating high school I mean kids born in 2004 what you think about us kids born in 2004 they're teenagers I mean I was trying to pick out a movie with my daughter she's gonna be a senior this year and we're trying to find a movie and I'm like you know what about this one I think it was like die hard yeah or something and she looked at it she goes it's from the nineteen hundreds that's what she said like it's so far back it's the dark ages back there Wow there are things that people born in the 2000s will just never experience personally things like dialing up to get internet didn't you remember doing this yeah you would take the phone cord and you plug it into the computer right and plug it into the phone outlet thing and then then you would dial it up and it took forever and you would just hope it would connect and it would sound like this [Applause] [Music] and it took forever I mean forever to finally connect to the internet kids today they're likely internet just it's like air it's just they're know we've set the dial into that thing I've got something that could be worth a lot of money this is a vintage Blockbuster membership card and this is something that kids born in the 2000s will never personally experience Rob telling you when I was growing up this was the thing man this is what you did on the weekend right you went to Blockbuster where you rented a movie on a VHS tape be kind please rewind you took that home you watch that movie you know and then when the movie was over you had to drive all the way back to the Blockbuster and drop it off and then you usually go in to see if the movie you really wanted which wasn't available has now been brought back so it is available and if it's not on the shelf then you go ask one of the workers if they can look through the movies that came through the slot and see if they can dig it up fast enough so you could watch it some of you have no idea what I'm talking about it's okay it's alright it's okay here's one more thing that kids born in the 2000s will never really understand or experience let's show a picture here this is a manual window crank in case you're ever wondered you probably have them but if you ever wonder like why do they call it rolling down the window you just hit the button whether it's rolling down the window because this is how we used to have to do it you reached over and you grabbed the the deal and you rolled the window down listen grandpa may have walked uphill both ways to school in the snow but we had to roll the windows down manually people so there's a lot of things that that people born in the 2000s will never experience and that's just part of life that's okay if you're like me time just flies it's moving fast your kids start getting older or your family starts growing up or you start moving up through school and then into college and then in a career and thing just start coming at you faster and faster faster and it's really easy to just get in this mode that we all find ourselves in well you're just you're working you're taking one task after the next you're just trying to survive in the grind of life I was talking to some parents right before service and we were all just celebrating the fact that school skills back school is about every parent's especially of younger kids is like oh thank you God thank you it's like a worship moment you know it's like I mean you love it you love them when they're little in there and you know it's like hey they're gonna be school's out they're gonna be home it's gonna have all these great plans it's awesome and then in a week you hear I'm bored right and by the end of summer you're like go back to school so I don't injure you so this is the dynamic but it flies time goes so fast and if we're not intentional about our lives we can start to take it for granted and I think this is something I've been personally very convicted with this summer just taking a few weeks to step back from the pace of everything and realize I'm letting too much slip by I'm missing too many moments that are important I'm taking too many things for granted so we're gonna look over the next few weeks at the power of what we might just call a bucket list or having goals or having written down things that you'd like to accomplish in your life before you die a bucket list is just what you hope to do in your life before you kick the bucket that's what a bucket list is and there's something powerful about just writing it down just putting it on paper and getting it out there and praying it through and committing it to God and then beginning to go after it I think you'll be amazed at how it can give your life even more sort of definition as you move forward now I went to bucket list dot org to see what some people were putting on their bucket list and there's some interesting things out there people want to like swim with dolphins I'm like nope I'm good people want to skydiving's a big one people want to travel right that's it that's a lot of it people wanna travel one person said they want to take a map and put it on the wall and take a dart and throw it and travel to wherever the dart hits map randomly on the wall and I'm thinking like I hope it's not Antarctica right the Pacific Ocean would be like I'm doing another throw all kinds of different sort of goals and aspirations people hadn't but there can be power and realizing that life is limited listen to what the psalmist says actually Moses is said to have written Psalm 90 it's Psalm 90 beginning in verse 12 and just let's read this and when we get to the read word read it out loud here read words read them out loud here together with me let's bring it up Moses says to God he says teach us to what number our days teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of what wisdom teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom turn the person next to you say your days are numbered lots of pointing going on when you your days the idea of this passage isn't that we would specifically have a number of days that we're counting down because none of us know how many days we have right only only God knows how many days we have but the whole idea is of numbering your days is living with an awareness that this earthly life isn't forever that every day is a gift and it could be our last just own awareness a clarity that today matters don't take it for granted teach us to number our days that we may have a heart of wisdom and I think part of a heart of wisdom is realizing that there are certain ways to spend our days in certain seasons that we may been it be in some of you are in a season as a student or a college student and you're working hard and you've got jobs and you've got school and you've got classes and you got hours and and you barely have enough time to get the church you barely have enough time to do anything in your life and that's okay that's the season don't beat yourself up about it do what you can it's a season but you want to say God give me the wisdom to number my days right in the season that I'm in and to live with an awareness that every day is a gift some of you you're you know you're in midlife you're in a career your kids are growing up things are moving back life's life's changing you're in a different season some of you have grandkids you've entered in to a different season so have you moved into retirement you're in a different season God give us the wisdom to live in the season that we're in as well as possible and I think part of this prayer of Moses is God you teach us to live with this sense of awareness like I want to suggest you this idea number your days so you don't waste your days number your days so you don't waste your days in other words live with an awareness that life is short that this is finite that things will eventually come to an end and I think when you live with that awareness it can be a resource for you in your life well if we're in a number our days so that we don't waste our days here's a few thoughts first is to remember what lasts remember what lasts in your life one of the shows we've watched over the last couple weeks this summer is an HGTV show I think it's called flip or flop Palm Springs flip flop Palm Springs I don't if you ever watched it do not watch HGTV HGTV is dangerous for your contentment and mental health I'm telling you because first of all you watch all these people they go in and they flip these houses right and they make it look so easy you know like they may life's like oh yeah we're just gonna take that wall out and then I promise you this what I started doing walking through our house I'm like you know it is a little dark in here I have this and I look over and I'm like maybe we just take that wall out like it's gonna be easy and not gonna cost you a jillion dollars you know because they're like and they're like we're just gonna redo this bathroom you know the bathroom was the bathroom by the bathroom be three grand I'm like no bathroom I ever tried to redo was three grand you know like it's a male so it can mess you up plus if you watch these shows what do you do I start walking around our house I walk in our bathroom I'm like oh man I thought this was okay but this is really dated man this is really bad how can we live like this HGTV messing me up all summer long I get back to work we got to get back to ministry I got to stop watching HGTV convinced me I can't afford HGTV but things are always changing styles are always changing looks are always changing clothes are always changing the great news is is if you live long enough was fashionable at one point comes back around I was wearing my favorite leather jacket on the way out a while back and my daughter looks at me and she goes dad really she's like you look like Danny Zuko from Greece and she's like and it's not cool and I'm like hey someday I'm gonna miss that I roll someday I'm gonna miss that sarcastic attitude someday you're gonna be gone and my jacket is still gonna be around I'm tellin ya comes back around over time just hang with it everything changes though when it comes to our bucket list when it comes to our goals when it comes to us looking out at this next year we need to remember ultimately what last look at what Psalm 90 verse 1 says help me we'll get to this read where it says Lord through all the generations you have been are what you got you have been our home I just find that passage beautiful you've been our home God you've been the safe place when the world was crazy and out of control you've been the place in our individual lives when we didn't know where else to turn that we could always run to you have always been our home look at this before the mountains were born before you gave birth to the earth and the world from beginning to end you are God and it goes on to say you know we're mortals we come from dust we return to dust but you remain God is what lasts and so when we start thinking about what's most important in our lives we start thinking about our own bucket list the first priority we need to keep in mind is that God and the things we do for God to please God in relationship with God that's ultimately what lasts that's what's most important in our life God doesn't change he isn't going away he isn't surprised by her problem he isn't frustrated with your core level of frustration he sees the bigger picture and so we trust him and we lean into him and we realize he's big he's strong he's powerful listen he has been your home in the past and he will be your home in the future and he can be your home today the safe place the place where you find encouragement and strength where you realize you're not alone in this world God is our home and then the psalmist is going to go on he's gonna say something that to our ears might strike us is a little more but look at this you get down to verse 10 Psalm 90 verse 10 he says seventy years are given to us some even live 280 but even the best years are filled with pain and trouble and soon they would disappear and we fly away man aren't you glad you came to church today wow how uplifting is that sometimes especially in the West we we struggle with talking about death or even thinking about death you know it's sort of like we don't we just want to kind of close that door and be like yeah well not today but I think the biblical writers understood that there is a resource in having a healthy appreciation for death the resources it motivates you this looks through 70 years 80s look we don't have forever time is limited and if we will let death be a resource it can help us get the most out of life there's some guys that did an experiment called the Buried life and they went around it started with this question the question was what do you want to do before you die what do wanna do before you die now these were young guys originally they were right out of university they'd grown up in a small town together there's four guys and one of their friends was on a camping trip and tragically drowned on this camping trip and it sort of rocked their worlds and made them kind of come to grips with the fact that life is short that the time is flying by and so they began to ask each other this question what do you want to do before you die they were just leaving University they weren't sure what they were gonna do or they're gonna move into a job where their career like what was gonna happen and so they decided to make a list they wrote out a hundred things they wanted to do before they die and then they got this old rickety bus and they had two weeks before the next semester started a few of going back to classes and so they took those first two weeks and they begin to go on a road trip and go after their bucket list the whole idea was that they were gonna do as many of these things as they could and then every time they were able to fulfill one item on their bucket list they were gonna ask a stranger the question what do you want to do before you die and whatever they said they were gonna try to help them experience that in their life and so this began a journey now they had some crazy goals they wanted to be a knight for a day they wanted to be on Oprah they wanted to play basketball with the president you know like all these different things all of which they did and more back tears a picture of them playing basketball with then President Barack Obama shooting whoo and people got excited about their story kind of word got out they wanted to help them and so these guys have just continued on with this journey they've done it for the past eight years and I was watching a TED talk that they just did about their kind of whole experience and one thing that blew me away is they said the most meaningful aspect of this was helping other people realize things that they had wanted to do in their life they said they were in Dallas and there was a street art vendor and they walked up to him and they just said sir what is it that you would like to do before you die and they said he reached in his wallet and he pulled a picture out a little baby he said this is my son I haven't seen him in 17 years because after he was born he said I walked out and I left him and he said I think about him every day and he said before I die I want to tell him I'm sorry and I want to explain to him what was going on in my life and why I left and so these guys took that on as a mission now it took them three months to find the son and they eventually found him and after they found him they had that awkward conversation of like hey so were these guys and you know could you imagine that conversation right and then they help this father and son begin to reconnect and they met and not only did they meet they spent the last three plus Christmases together they've started to interact as a father and son this is a picture of the father and the son that they helped reunite all from the question what do you want to do before you die and so I've always been a little I've always been that guy some of you're gonna relate to this I've always been that guy that when somebody tells me you should have a bucket list you should go write something down I'm like yeah whatever I got it in my head right you know I got some ideas up here you know I don't ready to I'm just gonna tell you and I get it some of you're gonna be that way that's fine I get no problem but for me some things change when I started to write some things down and so let me give you some of my bucket list things that I'm working on new one right now okay here's some of my bucket list things that I begin to write down God teach us to number our days aright that we may gain a heart of wisdom I remember writing down a whole list one of them was to Mary Laurie that went pretty good I remember one of my bucket list items was to baptize a thousand people I used to thank God if if my entire life is a pastor you know if you let me do this for years and years and years if I could just see a thousand people be baptized in my life that would be amazing and I actually have a book with most of their names I used to write them all down every single one and keep that one of my goals was to see was to have kids one day and then that my kids would come to faith and be followers of Jesus to baptize my kids which I got to do which is amazing one of my goals was to see Westminster Chapel the reason I wanted to see Westminster Chapel is because I read this biography of a guy named Martyn lloyd-jones who preached at Westminster Chapel for I don't know 30 years plus in the last century and reading his biography was what inspired me to become a pastor in the first place and go in to ministry so it's always had a special place in my heart so a couple years ago Laurie and I went to London we went to Westminster Chapel I got to wear his robe that he used to wear they wore robes he probably scandalized by me I got to wear his robe and I got to stand in his like pulpit thing which was ginormous and I got to look at his Bible well that may not mean anything to you but to me that was like a bucket list item that I'd always wanted to do one of my bucket list items is to see the Cowboys win a Super Bowl now I can't do anything about this one right like but but I've had it on there for over 20 years you know and in over 20 years we've only won two playoff games just saying so my new bucket list and I'm working on right now I can promise you I'm adding the Raiders to the Cowboys to up my odds somebody win a Super Bowl anybody but the Patriots right here you know anybody but the Patriots like they got enough for a lifetime they're good I don't know what your bucket list would be but those are just some ideas but there's power in writing it down and what I realized when I was looking back through my older bucket list is that most of those things that seemed like such huge dreams happened and I think in part because I prayed them through I wrote them down and when you write them down studies say there's an over 42 to 45 percent chance you'll actually follow through with it because you write it down I looked at it kept going back to it added to it took things away and that focus I think kept me moving forward some of you have done that you made a bucket list a goal list whatever you want to call it years ago and you've already fulfilled all that you've done a lot of those things well listen I see a lot around here it's central you're not dead yet so what so you're not done yet maybe it's time for a new list maybe it's time to dream again maybe this list looks different than it used to look right maybe it's it's more personal and interpersonal and about kids and grandkids and family I don't know but whatever it is there's power in writing it down and numbering our days and then another principle is just to fill your bucket list with fun and with faith fill your bucket list with fun and with bait I think you can start to fill this tension a little bit like okay I'm gonna have this sort of list of things that that I that I'm gonna do and so there's things that I want to do and then there's things that I probably should do you know there's there's fun things and then there's like god things and I would just suggest that we can kind of get a false dichotomy sometimes you think some people think look I really want to I want to see you to play in Ireland I want to travel I want to I want to go here go there but but those things don't seem very spiritual so I don't know if it's okay for me to like write them down they seem trivial and here's what I would suggest like a lot of times we think about the word Christian as an adverb like a descriptive word people talk about Christian movies or Christian music or Christian colleges or Christian schools right we talk about it like it's an adverb and it might be helpful I think to just step back and view the word Christian more as a noun it's about who you are right I mean because if you think about it not not everything like we may talk about Christian music or Christian schools but we don't talk about Christian golf clubs nobody says hey man I have that great Christian Pizza you know like we don't talk about like right I mean now I guess there is Christian chicken if chicken in there I'm not sure of it you know like but for the most part like if we're kind of hit and miss in how we apply it and I think really Christian is about who we are as followers of Jesus it's a noun and I would just say like from that standpoint it's less about you know Christian music versus non Christian music and it's more about good music versus not-so-good music it's less about Christian movies versus non Christian movies and more about like good and uplifting and empower 'full movies that tap into the human emotion and other movies that aren't so uplifting or good or tap in to human emotion and I say all that because I think when you step back and realize that that secular sacred distinction is kind of a false dichotomy we set up you realize everything that you engage in outside of sinful activities can be good and holy because you are committed to Christ in your life fun things golf concerts music I don't think you should I think the sky's the limit put on there whatever you think's gonna give you life in fact I've found that when I put things on the bucket list that man are really more should do kinds of things that that's not very inspiring but I have a lot more chance of going after things that I really wanted to do that doesn't mean they're easy one of the things I started my bucket list early I'm not ready to like roll it out yet I'm still working on it but I started it early this summer one of the things was I'm gonna do strength training this year cuz I'm getting up there and I'm weak I can run for miles but I'm weak right so I've been for the last three weeks under a barbell three times a week old school plates the whole deal like learn how to squat deadlift and it's scary people your pastor down under the and there's like these little plates on the barbell it's not impressive you know I'm not ready for Instagram right it's like there's there's nothing on that dude yellow that dog got its weight though it's coming see you in March I don't know what your goal is it may still be hard but that's life giving in the sense that it's gonna help me be healthy to do the things that I feel like God's calling me to do in my life here's some real practical ideas for a bucket list first is to just write it down I've already talked about that I think it's powerful I think it's important just write some thoughts down take over the take some time over the next few weeks and begin to do that so I got starts small doesn't have to be like big huge things maybe it's little small goals even just for the next year the next few months just something you want to see accomplished and even if you have big huge things it can be powerful to have small things on there as well categorize this can be this can be helpful maybe you can categorize about like places you want to go people you'd like to know friends family celebrities heroes like people you'd love to know what was the other one ways you'd like to grow you know maybe take a class maybe you read a book maybe you get through the Bible this next year I don't know what it could be and then things you'd like to so good that you want to do maybe jump in and serve maybe volunteer maybe make a commitment to be a generosity rock star maybe say you know we're gonna I'm gonna pray for my neighbor I'm gonna I'm gonna buy a burger for you know a homeless individual I don't know what it is but I know there's power and thinking through both fun and faith oriented things in our lives and beginning to write it down look at this Psalm 37 beginning in verse 4 I love this Psalm 37 verse 4 when we get to the red word here read it out loud with me says take what delight take delight in the Lord and He will give you your heart's desires take the line now we all want the God to give us our heart's desires right we're like yeah that's I like that that's a good verse I like my heart's desires but kind of hinges on the first part of that verse take the light in the Lord and when you take delight in the Lord first of all the heart your heart's desires do begin to change you start to value different things your heart begins to align more with the God's heart and God can fill your heart's desires and this has been the message that I feel like God has laid on me in my heart and life personally over the last several weeks I've just sensed God through my reading of the Bible just sometimes you just sense God and nudging you you just kind of feel like this is what God's saying to me I feel like for me he's been saying Judd all you need to do is this just take the lie to me just take the lie to me and I'm gonna talk a little bit more about it next week but I think the identity journey is one of the most powerful journeys we all go on the older you are the more significant sometimes it gets Who am I why am I here what's my purpose what am i doing right and that identity journey the biggest piece of it at least for me has just been realizing that I'm God's kid that at the core that's who I am and so are you we're God's kids and He loves us like his kids and when I can rest in that with nothing to prove and nothing to earn and nothing to lose when I can rest in that man it opens up so much more freedom to face my fears to move forward in faith to realize look I'm loved as God's kid I'm gonna talk about that more next week but that's what I think has come out of my own life of just trying to focus on delighting and God celebrating who he is so every good gift comes from God so you're at a football game it was on your bucket list and it's amazing and you can give thanks to in worship God at that game you're at a concert it was on your bucket list it's amazing that becomes a moment of worship right there for you with God your you know having a reconciliation with a family member or a friend it was on your bucket list it's a moment for worship take delight in the Lord he will give you your heart's desires number your days so you don't waste your days and let death be a resource so my question to you is simple what do you want to do before you die give us some thought this week maybe take some notes maybe even though you're a rebel write a few things down and come back next week and we're gonna talk about it some more especially around the identity piece and next week we're gonna look at some of the top regrets that people had when they were dying and we're to learn from that and some biblical principles to empower us to avoid those regrets while we're living I think it's gonna be a blast maybe you're here today and maybe you've not crossed the line of faith in your life and I just love to invite you to reach out to God and to allow him to move and work in your life so if you'd like to be a follower of Jesus today you can begin that journey by repeating a simple prayer after me just opening your heart to God and asking him to move and work in your life with all of you please bow your heads and close your eyes you could begin that journey by this repeating after me to say dear God I thank you for loving me thank you for sending Jesus into the world I believe he died on the cross for my sins I believe he rose again forgive me for my sins give me the gift of eternal life help me face the challenges I'm up against God I surrender my life to you in Christ's name friends with every head bowed and every eye closed if that's your prayer today if it's your commitment but I asked you to just slip your hand in the air just reach out to God today just acknowledge that you're gonna follow him in your life wherever you're at if you're watching online if you're in our partnership with God behind bars whatever location you may be yet just slip your hand in here [Music] got a thank you for each person just reaching out to you today and I pray you'll just fill them with your mercy your compassion your goodness your forgiveness your spirit God restore them and renew them and may they leave even today lighter more encouraged filled with hope because of who you are we thank you in Jesus name Amen [Music]

Channel: Central Church

Views: 1,570

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Id: 2Y-w1OFiRrU

Length: 33min 11sec (1991 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 12 2018