- Hello Saddleback. (congregation cheering and clapping) Really, really good to be with you. I am so glad that I get to
be with you this weekend. I want to talk to you today
about resilience and hope, because this is a world
in which it's really easy to become disappointed,
to become disillusioned, to even sink into despair. There is a lot going on in our world. Just even in our part
of the world, our part, where there's these storms,
and there's hurricanes, and there was an earthquake
off the coast of Mexico, and Monday is the 16th
anniversary of 9/11, an event that changed our nation forever, and in some ways changed the world. I mean there's an awful lot of storms, and people affected, and easy to become discouraged and live with despair. So for me, I want to
look at somebody who can show me how to get through
some of the hard times, and the apostle Paul is
one of those people that is just one of my heroes,
and in Romans 8:35, 37 to 39 on your outline, you can listen while I tell you, because he explains some of the things that he's gone through, and how he maintains hope. He says who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that
neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,
neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all of creation, will be able to separate
us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. If you were to pay
attention and underline, there are 17 different things
in just those few verses that Paul says here are
things that threaten to separate us, threaten
to take away our hope, threaten to knock us down. There's 17 things in just those few verses that he says I've faced these things. Second Corinthians 11 is another place where he gives us an
even more specific list of what he's gone through. He says I've been
shipwrecked multiple times. He said I've been beaten
with rods and stones. I've been starving. I've been abandoned by my friends. I've been homeless. I've been imprisoned unjustly. He says I've been persecuted. I've been accused of things I never did, and still he says nothing
is gonna separate me from the love of Jesus Christ, of God, that I found in Jesus Christ. He says these things
cannot drown out hope. So, I want to just think about you today, and give you an opportunity to make this very personal. I'm gonna share with you where these are personal things to me. There's a little list in the middle of your outline if you
haven't looked at that yet that lists about six things, not 17, but about six things that I think can lead us at times to feel hopeless, and helpless, and
overcome by circumstances. So, the very first thing
there is a traumatic event, and if you've experienced any of these, you want to just, might
want to put a little check by them, or at least a
mental check mark to say yep, that's me. A traumatic event, and by that what I mean is something that happened to you when you were a small child. Maybe you experienced
sexual abuse in your home, maybe there was physical abuse, maybe you saw physical
violence in your home, or you were a recipient of violence, maybe you saw your mom or
one of your siblings abused. Maybe you witnessed a traumatic event in your community, or a natural disaster. The psychiatrists and social scientists call that adverse childhood events, and we, they're not benign. They're not just oh, you know, that kinda stuff happens to everybody. When you as a child
experience traumatic events, you don't have the cognitive ability yet, or the language, or the words to be able usually to articulate how
those things affected you, and so over time they have found that when you've had traumatic things as a little kid, it can
affect how you do in school. It can affect your
emotional and mental health. It can affect whether you
abuse alcohol or drugs, whether you abuse sex,
whether you get into fights, get into trouble, end up in jail. I mean these adverse childhood events are powerful in our lives. For me, I was molested when I was about five or six by the son
of the church janitor where my dad was pastor. Pastored little churches in San Diego, and I still don't really
know how it happened that as a child that young I got separated from them at church long
enough for this to happen, but it did, and I know
that that childhood abuse scarred me, affected my
views of sex and sexuality, and my developing emotional nature, and was one of those things that I've dealt with all my life. Something that happened so long ago. And if you have experienced
a traumatic event as a child, make a little check by that. Second thing that I would say that, a category of things that
can cause us over time to maybe lose hope, or lose our ability to cope with things, are
strained relationships, and I'm thinking there
in particular of those really primary
relationships, a relationship within your family, a
relationship in a marriage, a really close friendship
that goes through terrible, terrible
conflict that's disruptive. We've told our story so many
times through these years. Rick and I've been
married almost 43 years, but they've not been easy years. We have struggled a lot,
and had a lot of conflict through the years. We're so very different,
so very different. (congregation laughing) Did I say that we're vere different? We are so very different, and of course that causes conflict in relationships, but also there've been, there's somebody in our relationship (clearing throat), (congregation laughing) who can be really
stubborn, and pig headed, and self absorbed, and
a little prideful, and (congregation laughing) you know, so not only are we different, but we bring into the
relationship our faults, and our weaknesses, and
our particular faults, my particular faults and weaknesses have caused us difficulty. So much so, in all honesty,
that if we did not, both of us, believe
that vow we took before our family and God nearly 43 years ago, we would have divorced. There've been so many times, honestly, that I have in my journal
written I can't do this. I can't do this. I can't say I'm sorry one more time. I can't ask for forgiveness one more time. I can't offer forgiveness. This is just, we are too different. Ah, I can't do it, and
that's the honest truth. So serious marriage problems
throughout the years. How about you? I mean, has there been in your marriage just a lot of difficulty,
or primary relationship, conflict in your family
with parents or siblings, or a deep friendship
that's just gone through some ruptures? If so, make a check there. Serious health problems
is another category where a lot of us have lived,
and are continuing to live. For me, I was diagnosed with
breast cancer and melanoma. I've had both, and
without early treatment, and the treatment that I've
gotten through the years, either one of those would have killed me. You know, breast cancer and melanoma, they're gonna kill you if you don't get the treatment that you need, and so I remember when I was, after I was diagnosed with breast cancer 14 years ago, standing in front of my mirror at home, looking at myself going
I look exactly the same. How can there be an alien inside of me trying to kill me? And if you've ever had a cancer diagnosis, or some other really
serious heart condition, I mean health condition, you can probably relate to that sense of I am in a battle for my very life, and it can be difficult, and challenging, at take you to the limits of where you've struggled
ever before in your life. Crushing disappointment
could be a category that you've experienced. For me, I would say this is the least of these categories that
I've struggled with. I wouldn't classify what I've gone through in some ways as crushing disappointment, but I'm talking about things like you planned your whole life. I mean, since you were
a little kid you knew the career that you wanted. You knew the direction you were headed. You dreamed of this career,
and it didn't happen, and you didn't get those opportunities, or it didn't come your
way, or maybe you thought you were gonna be a professional athlete, and then you worked so hard as a kid. You were preparing for this sports career, and maybe you got injured. Maybe you just didn't get the offers. Maybe it just didn't
happen, and inside of you there's that sense of dissatisfaction of something that was crushing
that you really wanted. Maybe you got married, and you thought within a few years we're gonna have kids. That's what happens, right? You get married. You have kids. This happens to everybody. Only it didn't happen
for you, and so there's that crushing disappointment
of dreams not realized. I don't know what that
might look like for you. For me, it was much simpler than that. It was I just wanted to be
somebody incredibly special, and I didn't have a lot
of confidence in myself, and saw myself as very inadequate, and really not worth a whole lot. My big career goal was (laughing) as a young child was to
be Ms. America (laughing). (congregation laughing) So, you know, I'm not totally crushed that it didn't happen, but
there was for some of you, man this is real. This is real for you. There is, you live a disappointment. You might check that off. An unchangeable circumstance. If you've been around here, you know that our son Matthew lived with mental illness, and he was diagnosed with mental illness with depression at seven. I didn't even know children
could have mental illness. I didn't even know that was
a real thing, but it was, and his lifetime then was just a constant, felt like series of another diagnoses. It was, you know,
depression, and then ADHD, and then panic disorder, and
then early onset bipolar, and then suicidal thoughts and ideation, and by the time his teenage years, major depressive disorder,
and body dysmorphic disorder, and OCD, and borderline
personality disorder. Oh my goodness. How he struggled and
suffered, and despite our best efforts to help
him, to help him manage, maybe could he be cured,
could something be done, it became an unchangeable
circumstance in our lives, and for you it may be a mental illness. It may be maybe you were in an accident, and you lost a limb, or
you lost the use of a limb, or you've had a stroke,
and you've been left with your body just doesn't
work the way it used to, or maybe there's been some other thing that maybe you're a caregiver of a child who has a serious physical illness, and it's unchangeable, and sometimes in those places of
unchangeable circumstances that just won't budge, we
can become overwhelmed, and lose our hope, and lose
our ability to keep going, and then serious, excuse me, painful loss. Matthew died by suicide
four and a half years ago. Mental illness finally took a toll that he couldn't do on any other day, and if you've never lost a child, you would probably look at somebody else who's lost a child, and say
Kay, four and a half years. Come on. You need to move on a little bit. Come on, you've got to rally here. You can't still be in deep grief, and I would tell you for
me at four and a half years it feels like the blink of an eye, and if you can say that maybe thinking you're saying the right thing trying to encourage me, I would just tell you, you don't know what it's
like to lose a child, and anybody who's ever lost a child knows it's a grief that you struggle for the rest of your life to get through, but maybe you didn't lose a child, but you lost someone so
dear to you, so dear to you, and that deep, deep pain, you wonder if you'll ever really be happy again. On my Facebook, sometimes
I'll talk about grief, and I'll talk about loss,
and people will comment, and when I've read some of the comments, it's not uncommon for
people to say in response to what I've posted, I'm
glad that you are able to live again, but when my mother died, my father died, my child, my husband died. They fill in the blank, or the loss that's so profound to them, and they say I will, I don't know that I will ever
get through this or past this. Those kinds of losses can
take you to the ground. So if you've experienced
a traumatic event, or events in your childhood,
or a serious health concern, or a traumatic, painful loss,
or a crushing disappointment, or something, check those
boxes, because here's what I want to say about this. How do we survive the hard times? In a room this size,
or if you're watching, you know, online right
now, there are some of you that checked every one of those boxes, and you could have checked
about 10 other boxes had there been other
options, because you've gone through a lot. Some of you only checked
one box, and maybe it was the one strained relationships, because I don't believe that you haven't at least had some
relationship in your life that was very strained, and
caused you some heartache. So whether you've gone through
a whole lot in your life, or you've gone through
something a little bit less intense, some people
will face those things and be tanked by the one, and over here there are people who may
face incredible difficulties, and they're able to get up. They're still standing. In these storms that are
happening in our nation right now, there are millions of
people who are going through literal storms where they
are losing their homes. They're losing their properties. There is some loss of life. The damage is really not
even calculable at this time. We don't even know how bad the damage is from Harvey, and Irma, and if Jose, Hurricane Jose comes along,
if those things happen. Man, there have been some people, and some of them are gonna be tanked. I mean, really they're not
going to be able to recover from what they're gonna
lose in these storms, and yet some of the people will be able to survive, and thrive again. What makes the difference? Well, studies have shown that the people who survive, but not only
thrive in the face of trauma, and conflict, and life
threatening illnesses, and crushing disappointments,
and circumstances beyond their control, and
painful devastating losses, are not necessarily the
people we might think. It's not the wealthiest. It's not the most affluent. It's not the most intelligent. It's not the most highly educated. It's not the people of any
race, or gender, or anything. It has nothing, or very little
to do with those things. It has everything to do
with how resilient you are inside of you, inside your spirit. You may hear resilience a lot, but here's the definition I'm working with. It's here on the screen for you. Resilience means able
to withstand or recover quickly from difficult conditions. Strong, tough, hard, buoyant,
floats, irrepressible, can't keep 'em down, flexible,
pliable, supple, durable. Able to become strong, healthy, or successful again after
something bad happens. These are the people who
can rise from the ashes. These are the people who can bounce back. These are the people
who are still standing no matter what has happened. Well, let me just give you a little story of resilience that you
can maybe relate to. A few Christmas's ago, my son Josh wanted one of those remote control helicopters that you see in like Sky Mall Magazine, or something, you know, that has all these weird little things that you can order, and so he really, really wanted this little remote control helicopter. So, of course his wife got it for him, and he's flying it around our living room, and it's so cute. This toy almost looks like just giant bee. You know, this thing's flying
around through our house, and it hit a wall, and it hit the wall, fell to the ground, completely shattered. I mean, that thing was not resilient. He got about five
minutes worth of pleasure out of this little
(congregation laughing) remote control helicopter,
but at that same Christmas our grandkids all wanted
Legos, girls and boys, and so there's Lego
sets all over the place in our house, and I just
want to tell you that Legos, I've decided, are the most resilient (congregation laughing) thing in the world,
because if you have ever put your knee on one of those Legos that's in the carpet as you're searching for all the ones that fell off the table, or stepped on a Lego with your bare foot, you know that you will never
be able to kill the Lego. The Lego will kill you. (congregation laughing) They are the most
resilient things ever made. Well, so scientists look
at this, and they say so is resilience genetic? Is it just the people who somehow in their genetic line have passed on resilience from generation to generation? And so those are the
people who can survive and thrive when things
get really, really rough, and the truth is even though there might just be a shade of an advantage to some people who have
a genetic predisposition to resilience, what they
really have concluded is that resilience is a set of skills that can be learned. Woo hoo, that means that the rest of us can learn resilience,
and I want to learn it. It can be taught, because
I want to bounce back and not be buried by life and by loss. I want to not only survive,
but I want to thrive again. I want to live a hope infused
life, not a hopeless life. Well, I can't say everything that there is to say about resilience
in the time that we have, but I want to give you
what I would say are three things that you need
to know about resilience, but I want to give you
the Biblical definition, which the Bible uses the term
perseverance, or endurance, when what you and I might call resilience. In Romans 5:3 it says this. We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering
produces perseverance, perseverance, character,
and character, hope. So there is this process
that we can all go through. It doesn't say here
that some people rejoice in their suffering, and
therefore they learn perseverance, and therefore hope. It says we. It's talking about all of us, which means it's within the reach of every one of us. To go through hard times and to develop perseverance, resilience, and through that develop character that allows us to become different people, and that
through that we have hope. That's a process I want to be a part of. So let me give you these three things that I would say about resilience that I think will help you in facing whatever you're going through today. The first is this. Life is harder than you ever expected. Life is harder than you ever expected. For those of us who live here in the west, or the western part of the world, we have somehow got it in our brains that life is supposed to be easy. It's supposed to be comfortable. It's supposed to be stress free. Everything is supposed to come naturally, and without a lot of effort,
and relatively painless. We have these amazingly high expectations of what life is supposed to be like, and when the wheels fall
off the bus in our life, when the carpet is yanked
out from underneath us, when we step on that banana
peel, and go sliding, and fall flat on our face, we are shocked. I mean, shocked, and then
from that shocked place we become angry, and from that angry place we end up with confusion
and disillusionment, as though life was supposed to be easy, and life was supposed to
be relatively painless, and life was supposed to be comfortable, and when it's not, we
don't know what to do, and we say things like how
could this happen to me? Why did this happen to me? Why did this happen to us? And we're shocked that life is hard. Well, our parents, and grandparents, and for some of you,
parents, grandparents, and great grandparents had a completely different viewpoint of life. They knew that life
was hard, and they knew that if they were going
to have any success, or achievement, if they were
going to make their goals, or if they were gonna
survive and thrive in life, it was gonna be because
they put in a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. They didn't have the
illusion that life was easy, and for the rest of the
world, for those of us who live here, we have it, like I said, in our minds that life is relatively easy, but for the rest of the
billions and billions of people around the
world today, they know that life is hard. Let me just give you
a couple examples here of what I would call first world problems, and third world problems. So a first world problem would be this. I go into my walk-in closet. (congregation laughing) And I look at the racks of shoes, and I'm not gonna tell
you how many there are, but I look at the racks of shoes in my walk-in closet,
and I say to myself, hm. I wonder which pair of
shoes is going to go best with my outfit today. That's a first world problem. A third world problem would be this. My one pair of shoes
was stolen last night. A first world problem
would be for me to say to the gals I work with hey,
let's go to Chick-fil-A, or In-N-Out, but I'm not sure which one. I don't know. Gosh, which will it be? I mean, 'cause In-N-Out's
got animal style, and it's got the pickles, and the relish, and I love that, or if
we go to Chick-fil-A they've got those peach
malts that I really. Oh man, I don't know
which one we should do. That's a first world problem. A third world problem is I'm not sure that I can feed my children today. Maybe tomorrow. A first world problem is you
know, I'm really struggling. Somebody told me recent,
I'm really struggling with my finances. I don't think I'm gonna
to be able to afford cable for the next couple of months. (congregation laughing) A third world problem is when someone who is an indentured slave says I wonder how long it will take me, how many years it will take me to pay off this $10 loan. You guys the Bible is crystal clear about how hard life really is. Job 5:7, the man who lost everything, who's the prototype for suffering says yet man is born to trouble as
surely as sparks fly upward. You think of a fire pit at Doheny Beach where you've lit your
bonfire, and the sparks, you know, they fly upward. That's just what they do. That's what they're going to do, and in that same way life is hard, and we're born to trouble. Jesus said in John 16:3, He says guys, in this world you will have trouble. He doesn't say, you know, some people are gonna have some hard times. Some people are gonna
really face some struggles. He just says in this life
you're going to have trouble. You're going to have problems. Sometimes people find life so hard, and so overwhelming, and so debilitating that they end up taking their lives. As you heard, today is world
suicide prevention day, and you probably don't know this, but about almost a million
people in the next year will take their lives around the world. 44,000 in The United States. It's the number two
cause of death for people between 10 and 34 in The United States. I mean, it's a problem,
and the people who die when they take their own
lives are not wanting to die. Most of the time it's just because things have gotten so hard
that they can't see a way out. They can't see any other
way for the pain to stop, and the Bible is so real about this, too. Job, this man who lost his
family, who lost his home, who lost his crops, who
lost his livelihood, was covered with boils on
his body from head to toe, in terrible pain, this
man, this in the Bible talks about being at that place
of just not wanting to live. Job 17, 11 to 13, he
says my days have passed. My plans have failed. My hope is gone. My friends say night is daylight. They really don't get it. They say light's near, but
I know I remain in darkness. My only hope is the world of the dead, where I will lie down
to sleep in the dark. Oh man, that's a man in
despair, and the first way to build resilience in your life, to rebuild hope again is to accept that life is harder than you ever thought it was going to be. Start setting more realistic
expectations for yourself. Just know that profound
difficulty is the way we roll on this broken planet. It is what life is. Don't get freaked out when
things aren't as easy, or as simple, or as
uncomplicated as you thought they were going to be. Anticipate change as our
normal human experience. Change is the normal human experience, and when you can start
from that platform of life is harder than I
thought it was gonna be, you're on your way towards resilience. The second thing is that God gives you resources to cope with life. God is so good to us. This is such great news, that God gives us resources to be able to cope with the fact that life is harder than
we thought it was gonna be. The first thing is He gives us a guide. He gives us three things. He gives us a guide, a mentor, a savior, because what we need
more than anything else is you and I need a savior. Jesus said in John 16:23,
this is the whole verse, I quoted it a little
bit in the first point. Now He says the whole thing. He says I told you
these things so that you can have peace in me. In this would you will
have trouble, but be brave. I have defeated the world. What's so great about this is it means that we're not alone in the universe. Sometimes when life feels bleak, when life feels hard, when
life feels overwhelming, you start to think you're alone, that you're alone in the universe, that you've got to figure
it all out by yourself, and that other people have close to them, but you're alone in the universe, and what we know, because
Jesus is our savior, is that we're not alone,
and He came to earth to bridge this irreparably broken gap in our connection between
God, who is our creator, the creator of the universe,
the one that made us, the one that loves us,
the one that longs to be in connection with
us, but our rebellion, our sin has made that impossible. We could never fix that
gap, but Jesus came, and by His death on the cross, by His resurrection from the dead, He broke the chains of sin that kept us out of a relationship
with God, and once we acknowledge that we need a savior, he not only saves us, but He
becomes our guide in life, our mentor, our friend. That is the best news I can think of. Then the other thing
that God has given to us to cope with life is He
has given us a new mind, and a new heart, one that aligns with His. When we come and accept Jesus Christ as our bridge to God, then
He gives us a brand new mind, and a new heart, and suddenly we can begin to think like God, and feel like God. Over time, we develop and transform. Romans 12:2 says this. Do not allow this world to
mold you in its own image. Instead, be transformed
from the inside out by renewing your mind. As a result, you will be
able to discern what God's will, and whatever God finds
good, pleasing, and complete. Now that's a more life changing verse than it might appear like on the surface, because, and we could
spend weeks and weeks talking about this, but in a nutshell, before we accept Jesus as our savior, our minds are a scary place. They really are, because the Bible says that our minds and our will,
we're controlled by Satan. I realize that can sound a little scary. We get a little nervous
when we hear talk like that, but it's what the Bible says about us, that we were a part of Satan's domain, and we were controlled by him, even when we weren't aware of it. Romans 8:6 says so
letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death. But letting the Spirit control your mind leads to life and peace. I'm not saying that if
you are not a believer in Jesus Christ today, or you haven't, He's not your personal
savior, I'm not saying that like you're evil,
mean, wicked, nasty, and you really just qualify for an episode of The Walking Dead. That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm just saying that the Bible says you don't have the mind of Christ yet, and what is so amazing about this is that the Bible says that the longer we are in a relationship with Jesus Christ, the more He can transform our minds, some of the thought patterns that have tripped us up our whole lives can over time begin to alter and change the way that we act and react. The third thing that God has given us to help us cope with
the difficulties of life is He has given us His Word. He's given us the Bible as a roadmap, and it's a far better map
than iMaps or Google Maps, or MapQuest, or Waze, mm, Waze. I'm not gonna spend any of
my precious minutes here to tell you about the
time that Waze took us 60 miles out of the way to go home through a two lane,
unlighted mountain road. I'm not gonna tell you
that, but thanks Waze. (congregation laughing) The Bible's not like that. Psalm 119:105 says by your
words I can see where I'm going. They throw a beam of
light on my dark path. Truthfully, sometimes
the path in front of us looks as dark as though we were, we might as well be in Carlsbad Caverns. We might as well be in some place that's pitch black, 'cause you've got your hands in front of your face, and you can't see the way
in front of us looks dark, but the Bible says that
it is a light to our path, and that we can see where we're
supposed to go through that. So when you read the Bible,
when you study the Bible, when you memorize the Bible,
when you meditate on the Bible, when you actually put Bible
principles into practice in your life, over time you change. You are transformed, and
some of the questions that right now are driving
you out of your mind about life, about God, about how He works, about how things go in this world, start to become clearer as the Bible becomes your roadmap, and it casts it's beam of light onto your journey. A few years before Matthew passed away, I was really just struggling, and mostly in the middle of the night. I don't know, if any, if I can't be the only one who's a middle
of the night struggler, but you know, sometimes you do okay during the day, and then it gets dark, and you put your head on the pillow, and all your worries and anxieties from the day come crashing
in, and you can't sleep, and you just get so anxious. I don't know if anybody
else will confess to that, but that's where, thank you. Honest soul, thank you. I love you. Some of the rest of you
could if you wanted to, but the point is that
sometimes you don't remember where that verse is. You know you read it, but where is it? And even pastor's wives don't remember where all of the verses are in the Bible. So, I started writing them out on cards, and putting them in this
box a friend got for me. It's a hope box, and it's
got the word hope in it, and I would write those verses,
and I would put 'em inside. You can get one, if you'd
like to, out on the patio, and at our campuses,
and if it's a little too froufrou for you, then
stick it in your tackle box. I don't care. Just put it somewhere. Somebody last service thought I said stick it in your taco box, and
it was like no, no, no. (congregation laughing) Tackle box, or taco box, I don't care, but just put it somewhere. Take those verses, write
'em on cards so that you've got them accessible when you are in those moments of
anxiety and hard times. So what we need to do to build resilience is we've got to accept life
is harder than we expected. Secondly, know that God
has given us resources to be able to handle
the hard times of life, and third, this is probably, I don't know, this is one that means so much to me. I get to choose my responses in life. You get to choose your responses in life. Let's just revisit
briefly that on the front page of you outline,
those little check marks that you made, or at least
mentally made those check marks. The thing is I didn't
have a lot of control over some of those things,
and you didn't either. I didn't get to control that
I was molested as a child. I didn't get to choose that. I was a victim of that. I was, something was done to me. You didn't get to choose whether you were sexually abused, or you
were abused with violence, or you witnessed things
that were traumatic. You didn't get to choose that. You were a little kid, and you didn't have the cognitive ability or the language to process that, but it has affected you. You didn't get to choose it. If there is a serious
conflict in your life, either between in your
family, or in a marriage, the truth is that even in our, as I said, in our marriage there's the
things that I bring into it. There's some of the
stuff that I bring to it, but there are other parts in some of these conflicts that you've had
it was the other person's decisions and thoughts
that have caused problems. You didn't get to choose
necessarily the health challenges. I didn't choose cancer. I didn't ask for it. I didn't ask for melanoma, and I didn't do anything that brought it on. It comes from living in a broken world, and you didn't have any
control over that, either, and you didn't get to choose
those crushing disappointments. You didn't choose infertility. You didn't choose that you didn't get the career that you dreamed of and that you longed for. You didn't choose those things. You didn't choose to
have a mental illness. You didn't choose where you were born, or your parents, or your intelligence, or your inborn abilities. You didn't have any control over the death of that deeply loved loved one. Your love wasn't enough
to keep them alive. You couldn't keep them alive. You didn't have any control, but you and I get to choose our
responses to those things. You and I get to choose. This is freedom, my friends. This is liberation, to know that I am not held captive to disease,
or disappointment, or disillusionment, or
depression, or even death, and neither are you. - [Woman Speaker] Amen. - Even those. (congregation clapping) That's just a thought
that you need to sit with. You don't have to clap, but
you just need to sit with that, that you are not held captive by what has happened to you. You are not held captive. You can be free, and even those who are living with a severe mental illness, or substance misuse
disorder, and they're just, man they're just clinging to
the bottom of the barrel today. They're barely, I mean a fingernail is slipping even as we
speak, and there's that sense of I can't think clearly. I can't make good choices. I don't even know how to do this. Even if the one choice
that you make is help me. It's a choice, it's a choice. Let me give you seven
practical choices quickly. Seven practical choices that
can give you hope again, help build resilience
in you, and those of you that are raising kids,
and you're thinking ah, how do I raise resilient children? I want my, I want to give
them that advantage in life to be a resilient person. What do I do? On our saddleback.com home
page there's a list of 10 things that you as a parent can do to help build resilience in your children, or on my website kaywarren.com. You can go there and find
that as a free download, but the seven things I would say to you is first of all choose to
expand your connections. Expand your connections. When hope starts to fade,
and we start going through those really hard moments,
there's this natural tendency in all of us to withdraw. That's the moment that we want to isolate. That's the moment we want to disengage. That's the moment we
want to pull back from family, and friends, and activities. There's just, the despair starts to build, and the natural tendency is to pull back, and I'm saying that's the moment to choose to press in to community. It's the time to press
in to relationships, to those people who are there for you, who love you, who care about you. Proverbs 17:17 says a
friend is always a friend, and relatives are born
to share our troubles. Some of you would instantly like to rewrite that verse to and relatives are born to cause our troubles. (congregation laughing) And, you know, maybe there's
a little truth there. This is like best case scenario. Best case scenario is that there are people who love you, and
who want to be with you, and who care about you, and I'm not saying that when you're going through despair, and you know that you want to isolate, and I'm saying choose to not isolate, you don't have to become the party person. If it's just even one
person, you send one text. You send one phone call
that says I (sighing) need something right now. Don't isolate. Expand your connections. Second, believe that you are
capable in God's strength of handling anything. Believe that with God's
strength you are capable of handling anything. I didn't have a lot of
confidence in myself early on, didn't, and so
those middle of the night conversations that I had with myself that were always so hard, I didn't really thought that I could handle tough things. I didn't, I wasn't sure
that I could survive if this happened, or that happened. I can remember as a young
mom in my bed at night, struggling with anxiety, and visualizing something happening to my husband, something happening to my
kids, and thinking to myself I couldn't survive. I couldn't survive. I couldn't do it, and then you know where you have those dreams
where something happens, and then you go (gasping),
and they wake you up, and you're like oh, it was only a dream. I had a lot of those,
and didn't really know that I could handle
anything with God's help. Philippians 4:13 says I can do, read this with me out loud. - [Congregation] I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. - It doesn't say that
you as the lone ranger, the strongest person ever
made, can do this by yourself. It says that you and God
together can do anything that comes your way. Third is to avoid expecting the worst. Avoid expecting the worst. You know, this is called catastrophizing, and this is where you take a simple event in your life, and you take it
to the worst possible outcome. Like this. I have a headache. I must have a brain tumor. (congregation laughing) Done that. Or the moment in which you say, you know, my boss wants to meet with me. I know I'm gonna get fired. I know I am. I know that's what's gonna happen. So we take the events that come. Anybody relate to this? I see a little, a few
smiles, a few elbows, a few shameful aha that's me. Yeah, because what some
of us do is we take the events of life and
we decide way over here that something terrible
will come from that. Avoid expecting the worst. Psalm 94:19 says Lord,
when doubts fill my mind, when I've got that certainty
that oh my goodness this is what's gonna end up happening, and you've already written the scenario, you've already written the
bad scene in your head, you've already gone there,
that's where you're living, now when doubts fill my mind,
when my heart is in turmoil, quiet me and give me
renewed hope and cheer. That's a verse that
might go in a hope box, or a taco box, or wherever
else you want to put it. Four, would be to practice self-care. Practice self-care,
because resilient people have come to understand
that unrelenting stress, that wave, after wave,
after wave of hard times can eventually warp your
perspective, warp it, and increase hopelessness,
and so they have learned how to practice taking care of themselves in the middle of the hard times. They're careful about their inner life. This is where The Daniel
Plan is such a bonus to us here at Saddleback,
because we know The Daniel Plan. We know those principles of eating well, of sleeping well, of resting, of moving, of enjoying the created
world that God has made. Psalm 23, two and three, the psalmist says You let me rest in fields of green grass. You lead me to streams of peaceful water, and You refresh my life. This is such an incredible principle of giving you resilience,
even if it only means you take 10 minutes in a day. Maybe your life is piled on right now, but maybe there's just 10 minutes that you can unplug, that you can walk outside, that you can be in the sun, that you can feel the breeze on your face, that you can look at a flower, that
you could do something. You could listen to some music. There's something that
pours life back into you, and helps you in that really hard time. The fifth thing that I
would say of an action step that you can take to build
resilience in yourself is to seek self-discovery. Seek self-discovery. Understand that in the
middle of this mess, in the middle of the difficulties that you're experiencing, it's likely that there's some things about yourself that are hidden in this mess that would be really important for you
to learn about yourself. One of the benefits of
trouble, if you will, is that it exposes where we're weaker than we thought we were. It exposes the holes, and
the gaps in our faith. Honestly, when I was
diagnosed with breast cancer I do remember thinking how,
because I was pretty angry at God at first, and I remember thinking I was shocked at myself,
and thought I thought my faith was stronger than that. I can't believe I'm shaking
my fist in God's face. I thought I was stronger. I thought I had more faith. I thought I had more
confidence in God's goodness, and trouble has that benefit of showing us where we need to shore up
some of the weak places. Even in conflict, as
uncomfortable as conflict is with the people that we love, if you are a resilient person, you
won't be afraid to take a look at yourself and see
is there something about me. In other words, here's
conflict, and I know what I think the other person has done. I know what I think the
other person has said, but is there something here about me that I need to take a look at? Is there a part of the
way I deal with conflict, is there part of the way
that I relate to other people that I need to work on? Trouble has a way for
those, of helping us, if we will seek self-discovery. I like Lamentations 3:30. I just think it's kinda this funny little verse in the Bible. It says we can also learn
from insults and hard knocks. Yes, so true. Six is practice gratitude. If you're gonna be a resilient person, you're going to learn how
to practice gratitude. To find hope again, you're going to have to practice gratitude. Not necessarily for the wound itself, or the disappointment, or
the loss, or the suffering. Those are hard things
to find gratitude in. There's a part of me that's just wrestling through a
concept, and because I'm wrestling through it,
I'm probably not gonna say it really well. I heard a podcast earlier
this week that it rocked me. It just rocked me, and it
was called beauty from scars, and I started thinking about my life, and I started thinking about all that was stolen from me along
the way, the beauty that was stolen from me with the damage that was caused by being molested, and struggling with
pornography as a result, and fighting for a strong marriage, and battling cancer, and losing
Matthew to mental illness, and I just kept thinking of the scars that resulted from those losses, and in this podcast the gentleman was talking about when we think about Jesus, and we think about what He
did for us on the cross, and the scars that were
inflicted on His body, He has scars in His hands and His feet from being nailed to
the cross, and the sword that pierced His side, all the torture, the crown of thorns that
was jammed on His head, the beating that He received in the trial before He was crucified. It's because He was scarred
that I have salvation. I wouldn't have Jesus as my savior if He had not been scarred,
and so the reality is His scars are beautiful. His scars bring me life, and I don't, I can't quite, this is
the part that's messy to me in my thinking. I don't have it all figured out, but in the dim recesses of my brain, I'm becoming aware that if I choose to, maybe some day as I blend my scars, 'cause Jesus and I, He lives inside of me, He's in me and I'm in
Him, that if some day I take those scars that
have so wounded me, blend them with the scars of Jesus, maybe at some point I
too will be able to say those are beautiful scars. I'm not there yet, but
somewhere in my mind I have an understanding that scars actually can provide
life for other people. (congregation clapping) And even though I can't
say that right now, what I can say is I am grateful
for the scars of Jesus, and I am grateful for the
good that still exists in this world, even
though I have had beauty taken from me, and I have
scars that have wounded me, and if you want to find hope again, in some ways you're going to need to be able to practice gratitude. Colossians 2:7 says plant
your roots in Christ and let Him be the
foundation for your life. Be strong in your faith,
just as you were taught. And be grateful. The seventh thing that you and I can do if we want to be resilient people, if we want to find hope again, is you can decide today that
nothing can destroy you. You can make a decision that you will not let anything destroy you. You can declare it. I'm declaring my, this
is my declaration to you as my church family,
that I made a decision several years ago when Matthew was in the depths of his illness, when we didn't know if any certain day it
could have been the day that he died. We knew that we lived
that closely on that edge, and as I thought about that as a mom, and the horror of that, and
the unthinkableness of that, I had to decide that I was not going to be destroyed even if the very worst thing that I could ever imagine at that time could ever happen to me. I would not be destroyed by it. I would be devastated. I am devastated, but I
would not be destroyed, and so years ago God and
I had a conversation, and I said God, I'm telling you right now that no matter what comes my way, I will grieve, I will
mourn, I will be devastated by the losses that have come,
and that may still yet come, but I will not let them destroy me. This problem, this pain, this agony is not going to win, and
if you are going to be a resilient person, and you are going to rebuild hope again, you
too will have to make, even if it's a feeble declaration, a declaration that says
no matter what comes, not only will God get me through it, but I will not let it destroy me. It has already stolen from me. Evil has stolen my loved
ones, my innocence, the beauty of that innocence,
but it cannot take you. It cannot take me, and resilient people who find hope again become
what the Bible calls more than conquerors. Look back at that first, those
first verses on your outline. Romans eight, thank you, I'm with you. (congregation laughing and clapping) Romans eight, oh you
just wait, you just wait. Romans 8:35, 37 to 39,
this now, read this again through the context of what
we've been talking about. Now listen to this through
Paul's words this way. Who shall separate us
from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? No, Paul says, in all
these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Paul says for I am convinced,
here's his declaration, I am convinced that neither
death nor life, nor angels nor demons, nor the
present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything in all
creation, will be able to separate us from the
love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. What does it mean to be
a conqueror you guys? What does it mean to be a conqueror? To be a conqueror, John
Piper, a great pastor here in The United States, John Piper says that the goal of our enemy, Satan, his ultimate goal is to separate us from our intimacy with God. You've got a relationship with God. You trust Him. You believe in Him, but
then there is this trouble, there is this loss, there is this stealing of the beauty from your
life, there is this pain, there is this unchangeable circumstance, and over time the temptation for us is to take a step back from God and say you are not who I thought you were, and I don't know that I can trust you if you let this happen in my life, God, I'm not sure that I
want to be close to you, and if that is your response,
and it stays your response, then the enemy has won. The trouble has won, the pain has won, the scar has won when it has separated you from intimacy with God,
when you have allowed that to separate you from God, and Paul says that you're a conqueror when you say no, no. Yes, this hurts. Yes, this has taken me to
my face time and again, but I will not be separated
from the love of God that I have through Jesus Christ. That makes you a conqueror. But here's the even better part. What does Paul mean when he says we are more than conquerors? He uses that phrase more than conquerors. Well, how can you be
more than a conqueror? How do you, you either conquer
something or you don't. How do you become more than a conqueror? To become more than a conqueror is when you make those wounds, and that suffering, and the scars, and the pain, and the loss, and what has been stolen from you, when you take those very
things meant to kill you, wipe you out, discourage
you, separate you from God, and you make them serve you. See the Bible talks
about how, Bishop Bronner talked about this last
week, and if you haven't heard that message, you need to download and watch that message,
but what he talked about is what God is doing
through these hard times, and these hard times that we go through are meant to make us more like Christ, and they hold within them the possibility of becoming, you becoming
a more loving person. Through the hardships
that have come your way, you've got the opportunity
to become more like Jesus, more loving, more kind, more gentle, more compassionate, more
merciful, more faithful, more hopeful, and when
those terrible things, you take them and you learn from them, you grow from them, you do not let them separate you from your intimacy with God, but in fact you use those
as the stepping stones to growth, to becoming
more like Jesus Christ, to becoming more of the way that He always intended you to be, you
are more than a conqueror. You become more than a conqueror, and you can laugh at the very thing that tried to bury you. You can say I'm still here. I'm still standing. I want you to watch a video. Some of you are really just hanging on. I know. If you could really be honest, some of you would say
here in this building, and those of you watching
online you look good from the outside, nobody would really know how close to that edge you
are, but you're really close, and you have this sense that if something doesn't change, you're not sure you can really make it through this. I want you to watch this. Here are the stories of some other folks, and then I'll come back and pray. (inspirational music) - My name is Regina, and I've experienced many struggles and losses in my life. The most devastating struggle I had in my life was when I was 22 my parents both died 12 days apart. They fought a long,
hard battle with cancer, and they left me with two siblings, both under the age of
18, and both suffering with bipolar disorder. Five months after my parents passed, my son has a seizure, and
was in a coma for seven days. I was looking out the window one day, and I cried out to the
Lord in my fear and doubt, and I asked Him not to take my son. It was not two minutes later that I heard my son calling my name. God had shown up in a big way, and left my son with me, and I haven't turned my back on Him since that day. Two years after my parents died my brother took his life in a manic episode. He really devastated me in that loss, but through it all God has been there. God has provided for me. God has made sure that He has placed His people in my life, people
that have provided for me, that have encouraged me,
that have strengthened me, and all of the things that God had, that He has shown up, but you know, you never know what life
is going to bring you. In the year 2005, I met and married a man that I thought was going
to be with me forever, and he was going to walk with
me and serve God with me, but that wasn't to be. Currently I'm going through
a very devastating divorce, and I can't believe the things
that he has said and done, but God, His people, the
things that He has provided for me, that things
that He has done for me, He has provided friends
that are encouragers. He even provided jobs,
and secret gifts of money. He has brought me to a point where I can truly rest in Him. He has been my rock. He has been my sustainer. My name is Regina, and I am still here. (congregation clapping) Because of the beautiful scars of Jesus, we're standing, we're standing. Because of His transforming
work in our hearts, and one final beautiful
day, we will see our Savior. We'll see His beautiful scars, and with His own hand He will gently, and personally wipe away
all tears from our eyes. The Bible says and there
shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain. All of that has gone forever. So my brothers and sisters,
until that day, hold on. Hold on. Yes you can through the
power of Jesus Christ. Through His love, through
His Word, through His Spirit, through His transforming of your mind, you can survive traumatic events. You can survive serious conflict. You can survive life threatening events. You can survive unchangeable circumstance. You can survive painful loss. You can still stand. You can still stand,
and will you say with us I'm still here? Some day, some day He will take our scars and they will be beautiful. Let's pray together. (congregation clapping) Thank you, Jesus, for allowing yourself to be wounded on my behalf. Thank you that it is your scars
that have brought me life. Father as we collectively
think of the wounds of our own lives, and we
think of our enemy's attempts to take us down, I thank you Jesus that you are our model and our guide, that you are our friend, and our savior. You show us how to go in
this really hard world, but to go with gratitude,
and to go with hope. Father I pray that you
would use each of us to hold each other up,
to remind each other when we think I can't do it, would you use us wounded
healers in each other's lives. May we live in our community as people who have scars, but who are willing to let those scars bring life to others. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. - [Congregation] Amen. (congregation clapping) (uplifting music) - Thanks for checking out this
week's message on YouTube. We would love to get you connected with our online community. There's three easy ways
to get you involved. First, learn about belonging to our church family my taking class 101 online. Second, you can join
an online small group, or a local home group in your area, and third, check out our Facebook group to engage with our online
community throughout the week. To take these next steps,
visit saddleback.com/online, or shoot me an e-mail at
online@saddleback.com. I hope to hear from you soon.
