Prioritizing What's Important

hey everybody happy new year and welcome to your move where we help you make better decisions and live with fewer regrets i'm andy stanley and i will be your guide as we begin this new year together i have a question for you what's the one thing what's the one thing that if you were to accomplish it this year would change everything maybe it's a habit to break a relationship to restore or maybe it's a relationship you need to retire anyway what's your one thing stick around and i'll tell you how to get it across the finish line right here on your move [Music] one of the things that we might have in common is that i'm very easily distracted um and in fact um i went to the doctor a few years ago about something just my my physical and in talking to my doctor he said have you ever been tested for add and i'm like i don't know that was kind of a joke yeah yeah i said no i have i have it he said well i suspect that you might be have my i said well i remember how i used to mow the grass as a kid and my dad would say look it's just a bunch of straight lines and i could do about four straight lines and then i just had to go do something else okay so i'm like like some of you i'm very easily distracted but the problem is this and you can relate to this the things that i get distracted by are never as important as the thing i get distracted from right isn't this true for you too the things because it's multiple things that i get distracted by they're never important i mean they're not bad and they might be marginally important but they're never as important as the thing i get distracted from and losing focus in some areas of our lives is not that big a deal all right and in some seasons of our lives it's not that big a deal but there are certain things that if you take your eye off that ball you wake up five years down the road ten years down the road and you realize oh no how did i get here how did i make such a mess in my life or not even a mess in my life how did i end up on this track that i never remembered choosing and i had another plan for my life and this this was not my dream you know this was not what i was imagining for my future so perhaps there's something that needs more of your undivided attention in this season of your life there may be that one thing and maybe this isn't true for you but for maybe a lot of us there may be that one thing that potentially impacts everything for example this may be the season or this may be the year where you've got to work on that habit there's there's that habit that you've got to break there's that project that you have to finish there's that relationship that it's time to restore or maybe there's a relationship that you need to retire or maybe there's a debt that you need to pay off or perhaps and some of you are going to really be upset for me bringing this up maybe there's a degree that you finally need to complete i don't know what it is for you but there's something that maybe that needs a little bit more of your undivided attention and you've gotten distracted because life is distracting and all of us understand that and here's the thing i i don't want what's urgent because every single day there's urgent stuff right i don't want what's urgent to distract you from what's most important for you and maybe most important for your family or as we're going to see what's most important for you in this particular season so if there's something that you need to get to the finish line this is going to help so 22 years ago or a little over 22 years ago sandra and i ran into an old testament narrative and there was one statement in this old testament story this old testament narrative that got our attention and kind of became a mantra or a theme or kind of a battle cry for us it got us through the early parenting years it kept us out of several ditches financially when opportunities came along and we're like no we need to stay focused on what we're doing we have a financial plan let's stick to it in fact barely a week goes by even in this season of our life that one of us doesn't reference this statement from the old testament it's found in the book of nehemiah and nehemiah was a jewish exile in ancient jewish exile who lived in persia serving king artie xerxes the first and the story takes place around 444 bc a little context to understand the significance of this story um when this story takes place the nation of israel or the area of judea had been a vassal state or had lost its sovereignty as a nation for almost 300 years so for about 300 years israel is in disarray began with the assyrians the assyrians conquered that region of the world the babylonians came along and conquered the assyrians and the babylonians stormed the city of jerusalem when the israel when the jewish king got kind of all uppity thinking hey we're not going to let anybody tell us what to do anymore the babylonians came along they invaded the city of jerusalem they destroyed solomon's temple they carted off the best and the brightest to babylon including the fab four shadrach meshach abednego and daniel okay that's when that whole thing takes place and then eventually persia conquers babylon and when persia conquered babylon cyrus the great the persian king or emperor cyrus the great said to the jews living in babylon hey if you want to go home you can go home you're welcome to leave so consequently several thousand jewish people left that area of the world and went back to judea jerusalem and many many others stayed in what would become persia because they had grown up there this was their home so now the nation is divided now the part the group of the people the exiles that went back to the city of jerusalem went back to the area of judea found it in complete disarray the walls had still were still torn down the gates were burned the temple had not been rebuilt things were tough so they did their best to kind of pull it together they rebuilt the temple but it was kind of the econo temple it was such a pitiful little temple compared to the temple that had been there so this goes on for almost 100 years about 90 years later is when our story picks up so nehemiah his family never left babylon or never left persia and consequently over time they became somewhat wealthy and somewhat well known and nehemiah became the cupbearer to king artixxerxes of persia and while he's the cupbearer to king arctic xerxes his brother who lived in judea because part of the family had gone back came to visit him and he asked them nehemiah asked his brother in this this entourage from from judea hey how are things going because he'd heard things weren't going well and this is what they said this is from the text nehemiah sort of gives us his diary they said to me that the remnant the group that went back who's been there now for over a hundred years the remnant there in the province who survived captivity are in great distress and reproach and this explains the reproach part and the wall of jerusalem is broken down and its gates are burned with fire so here's this capital city with no walls to speak of so many breeches in the walls people can come and go and there's no gate and when there's no wall and there's no gate this is both dangerous and for a city especially a capital city it's degrading it's humiliating i was trying to think of a good example and i came up with a bad example i don't know if growing up if your parents ever took the door off your bedroom anybody have this don't raise your hand okay or maybe you took the door off of one of your kids bedroom it's a it's a terrible thing to do it is so degrading not to you don't think about it but if you're a kid and you can't close your door you can't close out the adults you can't close out your brothers it's you just never feel safe you can't close your door well in sort of a microwave it represents this whole city this whole population they couldn't keep people out of their city and they couldn't protect themselves from the people or in the different areas when i heard these words nehemiah goes on when i heard these words i sat down and i wept and i mourned for days and i was fasting and praying before the god of heaven so nehemiah is many many miles away and his heart is broken one afternoon he goes in to serve king arctic xerxes he's the most powerful person in the world at this time and keenan king art exercise realizes something's going on with nehemiah and he says what's going on and nehemiah says my people and my people are in such bad shape back in judea and the walls have been torn down he tells king art exercise the whole thing and then he says um could i have some time off like a long time off like could i leave your service and go back and help my people this was so gutsy and art exercise says to nehemiah yes you can and in fact i'm going to make you the governor of judea because at this point judea was a vassal state of persia they were paying they were paying a lot of money for protection they basically had to do whatever the person empire said told it to do so the the the king says i'm going to make you the governor and i'm going to give you the resources you need to go back and kind of resurrect the city and help the city well this is a huge answer to prayer so nehemiah puts together a caravan of equipment he finally shows up into the city of jerusalem and it is worse than he even imagined i mean it's terrible the people are depressed economically things are bad the plants you know the the forest have overgrown the areas where they were supposed to plant their crops i mean everything's bad there's no military and basically um all the surrounding regions were taking advantage of judea so he does one night he goes out with some folks and he does a sort of does a reconnaissance of the entire area all the way around the city walls and he takes notes and then he pulls all the people together all the leaders together he's the governor now so they sort of have to do what he says and he says look and he then he cast this incredible vision he assigns every family a place on the wall to work and he assigns them the wall the area of the wall that's closest to where they live very smart so he gives everybody a work assignment then he sends them to work to repair the wall around the city and eventually to create gates for the city to bring back the self-esteem of the people and again protection for the people well this is good news if you lived in or around jerusalem but this was not good news for all the leaders living in the surrounding regions that had been taking advantage of the city of jerusalem and the people of judea they felt threatened because a walled city was a military threat a walled city was a military threat so they began to intimidate the workers then they begin to attack the workers they begin to attack the families of the workers who live outside the walls and the surrounding areas so nehemiah has to stop the work bring everybody inside the city which was a problem then he had to arm the workers some people would guard while other people's work other people work so this became a nightmare but the work continued day after day after day after day now the ring leader for the opposition to rebuilding the wall was a man named sand ballot and sam balot got so desperate as he saw that nehemiah was not going to stop because other people had tried to rebuild the walls and just a little bit of intimidation and they would just drop it and go away but this nehemiah guy he was committed to getting this job done so he decides the only way forward is to kill nehemiah so here's what happened chapter 6 of nehemiah the story continues now when it was reported to sand ballot tobiah and geshem the arab that the rest and the rest of our enemies that i had rebuilt the wall and that no breach or break in the wall remained in it although at that time i had not set up the doors of the gate so they're getting close to the end of this thing then sand ballot and geshem sent a message to me and here's the message saying hey let's get together let's have lunch let's have coffee let's let's chat you know we've been at odds and things haven't been going well but but let's let's let's meet together um at chief rim in the plane of ono but he got word that they were planning to harm me because they were going to pull him off the wall get him isolated from the people we're going to have a chat and then they were going to murder nehemiah and nehemiah knew this so i sent messengers to them saying and what follows is this statement that as i was studying through the book of nehemiah and sandra and i were talking about it together we ran across this statement this next sentence the message that nehemiah sends back to his enemies has been it's on our walls we've printed it we've quoted this a thousand times and here's when we quote it whenever we have been tempted and every family every couple every individual is tempted at some point whenever we have been tempted to opt for immediate over ultimate or want now over value most or opt for optional over what is essential when i was tempted you know many many times like we all are to work late and to miss dinner to work late and to miss times with our kids those strategic times this is the statement that brings us back to center it's like true north um we on one occasion we just moved into a rental house and we had three little kids two little they were all walking by this time and i had a very time consuming hobby and by the way i'm not knocking hobbies i'm not even knocking time-consuming hobbies i'm just telling you my story my time-consuming hobby was i had a music studio it was not a side hustle there was no money involved it was purely fun and enjoyable for me so we just moved into this rental house i'm in the basement of the rental house opening up my box is about to set up my little music studio and i'm hearing all little pitter-patter of footsteps running around upstairs and i'm feeling that tension that tension of here's something i enjoy here's something that's you know replenishing here's something that's kind of a part of me and upstairs is my priority and for me it was this idea that i'm going to share with you it was this statement that forced me or didn't force me it caused me to just stop i packed everything back up and i sold or gave away all of my music studio stuff it just wasn't the season for me to give that much of myself in terms of time and emotion to a hobby because i had three little kids running around upstairs and a wonderful wife who's doing her best to be a great mother so i packed it all up and gave it away i also gave away my golf clubs just kidding i didn't i've never owned golf clubs okay anyway so a little meddling there okay so the story goes on so i sent so i said nehemiah says i sent messengers to them saying now one more caveat before i give you the statement this is important when nehemiah assigned people to work on the wall he gave himself an assignment he's a great leader in fact the book of nehemiah is a great lesson in all kinds of leadership he decided i'm not going to ask these people to do something i'm not willing to do myself and even though i'm the governor he got out there and he worked on the walls so when the messenger from sand ballot showed up to say hey we want to have a meeting he's actually literally physically up on the walls or right where the wall connects to the gate working on the gates and so he shouts down he says send a message write this down and take this message back to send ballot are you ready i'm ready here's the message i am doing a great work and i cannot come down now real quick i want you to think for just a minute about what is most important to you right now in your life what is most important it may be a who or it may be a what what is most important to you right now now i want you to think about your biggest distraction from the thing that's most important to you nehemiah says the most interesting thing and there's so much application as it relates to all of us here's what he says he asked them a question and this is a question i think you should contextualize for your life as i've contextualized it to mine the question is this why why should the work stop while i leave it and come down literally physically the optics of this are amazing he's looking down why should i stop what i'm doing up here and come down to you i'm up here doing what's most important that makes the most difference to the people who are most important to me why would i lower myself to do something or lower myself for something of less importance and that's a great question why would you do that why would i do that we know what's most important we know what's urgent but we know what's important so they write down nehemiah's answer they go back and they tell sam ballot well he said you know i'm not coming to the meeting well these there they are committed to getting him off that wall so they send messengers back with the same request trying to wear him down in fact here's what the text says they sent messages to me four times in this manner hey what about next weekend what about the weekend after that hey what about two thursdays from now hey find a nehemiah just find an opening on your calendar and when you have time just let us know we're flexible but this was not a scheduling conflict and this is so important for somebody here today or listening today this was not a scheduling conflict because this was not about schedule it was a priority conflict there is always time to put the wrong thing on your calendar we can always find time to squeeze that thing in that takes away from or subtract from what's most important to us but nehemiah was so smart this was not about trying to find room on the calendar this was all about priority and nehemiah had pre-decided what was most important they sent the messengers to texas to him four times in this manner and he answered them he look at this and i answered them the same way and what was his answer all together i am doing a great work and i cannot come down i told you that the first time i'm telling you the second time tell you that the third time told you that the fourth time now um when our um children were super young we decided that in order to really be focused on what we needed to be focused on when our kids were young that there were certain things that we just had to say no to ahead of time whole categories of things in fact we came up with a list of these things and different and through different seasons of life this list has changed but i think all of you regardless of what season you're in may need a list like that we called it this is kind of corny we call it our no for now but not forever list it's not a no forever it's just a no for now and this season we don't do that we don't participate in that we don't go to those things we don't say yes to those opportunities it's not know forever because these aren't bad things these aren't wrong things these are just time-consuming things and at this particular time in this particular season we want to give our undivided attention to the things that we feel like are most important to us and it could be that you need a no for now but not forever list and the reason this is important is because there are so many invitations and so many opportunities and they're all mostly good and there's no this isn't good versus bad this is wise versus unwise and this isn't throughout your life this is during a season of your life you have to pre-decide and think about it within the context of nehemiah story if he had said yes to this invitation they would have killed him and even though the results aren't as extreme with you or with me there is a parallel that there are certain hobbies that if you continue to say yes to if there's certain pastimes you continue to say yes to if there are certain kinds of relationships you continue to say yes to if there are certain invitations that you continue to say yes to those invitations will kill your chances of experiencing the future you envision for yourself and they may destroy or undermine or kill your the opportunity of a lifetime that's coming along that you're preparing for because you won't be prepared so parents every night when you're tucking your kids in or they're coming in from middle school or high school you just need to look at them and you just need to say to yourself i am doing a great work and i cannot come down and husbands when you're traveling you have to look at that picture you know of your kids and your family and your wife and you just need to look at the picture say i am doing a great work and i cannot come down wives you need to look at your husbands and you say he's a piece of work and what would he do without me just want to see if you're paying attention right no you do the same thing you look at your husband you look at your family you look at what's going on right now and you say to yourself you know what i'm doing a great work and i cannot come down i saved the best for last singles listen listen what is the most direct route what is the most direct route to your preferred future what is the most direct route to your preferred future because you have a picture of what you want the future to look like don't get distracted don't trade ultimate for immediate because here's what i know about you even though i don't know you you are doing a great work or i should say this there is a great work you should do and here's how i know that because you're writing the story of your life and the story of your life is a great work and it's the only story you get to write so you got to write a good one this is the only story you get to write this is the story write a story that you want to tell because every decision you make and every time you prioritize correctly you are writing a story you want to tell and maybe more importantly i don't know you're writing the story that's going to be told about you well nehemiah's enemies when you read the story they are relentless he has told them no we're not going to have a meeting but they don't give up so they decide they're going to start rumors about him and the rumors they start is that nehemiah wants to be a king the reason nehemiah is fixing the city and putting gates on the city is he's re-establishing israel as a superpower and they're going to rebel like israel always rebelled and they're going to rebel against persia and they start this rumor hoping artixerxes is going to hear this rumor and bring nehemiah home and get him off those walls so they can have their way with the region again and nehemiah ignores the rumors because some of us have learned the hard way criticism can be a distraction can it criticism criticism can get you off center as you try to chase down all of your critics and answer all of your critics nehemiah completely ignores him the text continues and says this so the wall was completed on the 25th of a low in 52 days they rebuilt the walls of jerusalem and when all of our enemies heard of it and all the nations surrounding us saw it they lost their confidence why because they recognized that this work had been accomplished with the help of our god now here's one of the coolest things about the book of nehemiah there are no miracles god never shows up there's nothing supernatural it's kind of like the lives that we live the day-to-day lives that we experience the day-to-day criticisms and distractions we experience but nehemiah knew in his heart this is the thing i must do this is the job i must complete there are no miracles there's just dedication to a job there's hard work there's good leadership there's confidence that god wanted him to do this and then there's success all because he stayed focused so here's my question for you as you begin a new season or as you think about your future as you consider what's most important what is your wall what is your wall what is the thing you dare not come down from until the work is done what is the thing that you have to stay focused on until it changes or until it's restored whether it's all year or whether it's an entire season of your life maybe it's that habit that you finally need to break maybe it's a business that you know you need to start maybe it's a relationship that you need to rebuild and every time you hear me or somebody else talk about you know restoring a relationship you think in your heart yeah i need to do that but it never feels urgent it's extremely important but it's never urgent and it just never gets done but maybe restoring that relationship is the key to unlocking somebody's heart somebody's bitterness that allows them to forgive you or forgive somebody they need to forgive maybe it's restoring a relationship maybe it's retiring that debt maybe it's a degree that you need to complete and then this is part of the equation as well what are the distractions what's distracting you because you know the answer to that too right you know what needs to be done you know what you need to focus on and you can look at your calendar you can look at your daily routines and you know what's distracting you what are the obstacles that you need to remove um i i didn't own a television until i was 30 years old and i just knew that a television was going to be extraordinarily distracting to me sometimes people ask me they say andy when do you have time to write books i've written 27 books i can't believe i've written 27 books they said when when did you write those books i said while you were watching tv i just decided a long time ago i only have so much time and i'm not against television i'm on television i've never stayed up to watch my program you know and my mom she passed away about five years ago she used to stay up and watch it at one in the morning i'm like she says no but i want to watch it live i'm like mom i'm asleep it's not live okay everything on everything on television except you know headline news and you know sports is all pre-recording she says yeah but i like to watch it live i said okay you watch live anyway so what do you need to eliminate i mean there are obstacles and there's just some things just some categories that i'm telling you no for now but not forever no for now but not forever no during this season and then in another season of my life i'll pick it up and then here's a difficult question but i have to ask it who do you need to eliminate and let me be clear not literally okay yes these are the kinds of statements people take a picture of and put on the internet and there goes my reputation who do you who do you need to eliminate off your schedule or out of your life in other words let me ask you a different way who this is important who is keeping you who is keeping you from becoming who or what you want to be they're just not a good influence on you and let's be honest you're not all that good of an influence on them either they may hear or listen to this message they may be listening now and they're thinking about you just like you're thinking about them okay so there may be someone just during this season that you need to back off from because they're not going to help you get to where you ultimately want to be you have a great work to do i know you do because you have a story to write and i know you want to write a good one and you're writing it every single day decision by decision by decision you are doing a great work you dare not get distracted and for most of you not all of you but for most of you somebody else is depending on you to stay focused on your great work so there are many things you will do this year and there are many things you can do this year but what is the one thing you must do this year what is your wall and are you willing to stay on it until the task is complete you are doing a great work so don't come down [Music] you

Channel: Your Move with Andy Stanley

Views: 30,375

Rating: 4.8907437 out of 5

Keywords: Andy Stanley, Your Move with Andy Stanley, Your Move, better decisions, fewer regrets, how to, how to be better at life, depression, depressed, self help, how to be happier, how to have a good life, how to make better choices, choices, decisions, regret, motivation, inspiration

Id: Fo0SqZTbnSk

Length: 27min 46sec (1666 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 01 2021