Real Men - Encouraging Others Through a Trial

great to have you guys so excited to see you so encouraged by you and uh and and you if you're new let me just tell you this you're surrounded with the best guys period these are the guys they're gonna walk with you pray for you encourage you and here's our big idea we're here to build men up and we know that the world we're in just beats you down and so if you've come here you've had a week been a little bit rough we're here to help if you've had a good week tell us about it we'd love to hear about somebody who's not depressed and we're here to encourage love and serve one another and thank you to everyone who's joining us online and uh if you'd like to come visit we'd love to have you and i'd like to make this appeal i'd like to tell the senior pastors online if you want to start a men's ministry or grow a men's ministry if you'll come out as a senior pastor we'll host you here at real men we'll invest in you we'll pray for you we'll send you back to your church so that you can invest in your men because let me tell you this once you get the men the men figure everything else out and that's why we're here and that's why we're here so the way this works uh there's also a study guide you can grab it on the way out or it's free online at realfaith.com help you go through a book of the bible in the book of the bible called james james is written by jesus younger half-brother and i like to call him the blue-collar scholar of the new testament how many of you grew up blue-collar family all right change your own oil it's cheaper you never really had real butter you or the margarine family uh you you know the multiple uses of spam um you know the difference you know between a roofing hammer and a finish hammer you're those guys okay and some of you guys grew up in white collar you know homes great you won so for the rest of us i grew up in blue collar houses my dad drove a truck my dad's name is joe toole belt construction worker union drywaller so james grows up in a family like that we tend to think of bible teachers and theologians and religious leaders as very very you know highly academic and spiritual and they live in libraries and and james didn't grow up in that kind of family his dad's going to work every day to put food on the table they got a bunch of kids it's a poor family and what would happen as soon as the sun's rolled enough they're going to work with dad to just like you would on a farm to make ends meet swing the hammer go to work son so how james views life with god is really taking your faith to work and he's going to work with his dad he's going to work with his brother james is one of those practical rich blue collar books and it's about getting stuff done there are certain guys that like to talk about ideas and they're other guys that are all about the actions get it built get it done and that's exactly how james operates he is the blue collar scholar of the new testament that being said the theme that we've looked at is trials and so what we like to do is we'll have a sermon on the weekend and then we do a short pivot and a leadership talk for you men to build you up as leaders and to encourage you to get some time building friendships brotherhood and then praying for each other and that's what we're going to do in our time together when it comes to this issue of trials most of the time people don't want to hear about it most of the time if you tell people you're having a problem they don't want to know about it because they've got their own problems and when the bible is talking about trials what it's saying is you're going to go through we're going to go through our trials we're going to have those really rough patches and seasons and that's the time that you need to activate your faith because ultimately if your faith doesn't work on your hardest day then what good is your faith and if god doesn't help on your most dark and difficult day then of what use is your god and so he's talking about trial so we're going to talk about trials but we're not going to do so in a way that is totally discouraging we're not going to do so in a way that is a bunch of grumpy guys just sort of complaining but trying to find god's will and to power through it so that we can become more like jesus because of it so uh the first we're gonna do three questions and i'll just sort of riff on these and then these will be your discussion points around your table what's your trial so this is the theme of james so when you guys get together and you talk what's your trial and you can't all say my wife you got to come up with something else something your wife is over in women's ministry and she's like my husband so you're equally yoked so great you're driving each other crazy but at the end of the day what is your trial and sometimes the trial it's a big thing so some of you guys it's a big thing how many of you guys right now you say my trial is a big thing and sometimes it's a pile of little things how many of you it's not one big thing it's a whole bunch of small to medium-sized things and and so we've each got our trial what is yours is it financial is it emotional is it spiritual physical sexual what is your trial right now the thing that when you get up in the morning you're like uh that's kind of the anxiety and my gut that's my frustration that's what i'm worried about when my head hits the pillow at night like that's the person or thing that's kind of kind of got me and it's it's the thing that i'm i'm kind of struggling with and then he says this as well in james 1 12 blessed is the man so we want that to be you men who remain steadfast under trial we've all seen it we've all seen it if you're a soldier in war everybody's tough in boot camp amen every guy is rambo in boot camp and then you go to battle and then certain guys have got urine stains and tears and you're like yeah that was quick there's a line in the old testament it's a it's an ungodly guy who says something that's actually very wise he says a guy who is putting his uniform on for the first time should not boast like the man who's taking it off and the point is this like everybody's tough until you're in a fight mike tyson used to say everybody's got a plan until they get punched in the face right that sometimes life just comes and it punches you right in the face you're like i had a plan and now i remember what the plan was and what he's talking about is steadfast under trial and that is you're not perfect but you're going forward you're not rebelling you're not quitting you're not freaking out you're not going into a fight flight or fright you're proceeding forward with faith and it doesn't mean you're doing it perfectly but you're doing it to the best of your ability so what is your trial and the goal is steadfast some of you are good christians when things are good you're bad christians when things are bad some of you are the opposite right when things are bad you're a good christian you're like my life is painful i'm going to read my bible you're like it doesn't hurt i'm going to go get drunk so what happens is some of you are good christians or bad christians depending upon your circumstances steadfastness is consistency through the good seasons the bad seasons the good days the bad days and when the trials come let me say this trials don't change you they reveal you okay who you really are comes out under pressure okay who you really are comes out under pressure i brushed my teeth this morning as i hope you did because we're gonna have discussions around the table and you guys would appreciate if you brush your teeth but when you squeeze the tube of toothpaste what comes out is what's already in what a trial does it just squeezes you and whatever's in that's what comes out if you're an angry person you're gonna be really angry if you're a scared person you'd be really afraid if um if you're a high control person you're going to be freaking out if you're a joyful person you're actually going to go next level joy so what a trial does it squeezes out of you what is in you and what god wants to put in you through the holy spirit steadfastness like hang in there and let me say this every guy has a day when he wants to quit his job true or false true even the guys that are here with their boss raise their hand they're like that's true yeah um if you are married at some point you're going to hit a day when you you just you want to get out of you're like i'm done i want to get out true or false true true all the single guys are like oh gosh it's coming brother all right uh because the single guys they they're cute because they have hope they're they're like uh you know they they read genesis once or they're like oh god made a girl she's naked and perfect yay well i'm telling you bro keep reading [Applause] they have a fight and she puts her clothes on it goes south right so um how many of you at some point you love your kids but at some point you're like i'd trade him for a ham sandwich and i don't even like ham you know i i love i just i don't know what to do with this kid right we if you're an honest man there no matter what your responsibility is you're gonna hit a day and the reason i'd say this is funny so one of my kids the other kids actually nicknamed him ham sandwich because because i shouldn't have said this the therapist has figured it out and helped the kid but um i was eating a ham sandwich and i was like man i i i won't even tell you what i said but they nicknamed the kid ham sandwich so what happens is at some point in your life you're like i'm done with marriage i'm done with parenting i'm done with my job i'm done with the in-laws i'm done with the outlaws i'm done with the church i'm done with the republicans i'm done with the democrats i'm done with the libertarians like i'm just done and in those days it's what does steadfastness look like what does it look like for your faith to carry you through a season that you otherwise simply are not going to you're just gonna that's it i'm done i just quit and what some of you guys have done you've lived your life you get into a trial you're getting squeezed and you are not steadfast you quit to relieve the pressure of the squeezing and then you get a little reprieve and then what happens eventually another trial comes you start getting squeezed again it's like if it's not this job it'll be that job right if it's not that gal it's going to be this calf it's not this church it's going to be that church at some point the squeeze comes and steadfastness endures through it trust that god will be with you and for you and he's going to use it to do some work in your soul so how do you remain steadfast how many of you guys struggle with steadfastness through trial how many of you guys don't struggle equally with steadfastness through blessing right like i won the lottery today and i retired and the hammock showed up in the mail i can do this steadfast right it's it's sometimes easier to be steadfast when there's no trial and it's like the lake has no waves on it it's it's really easy to be the captain when the storm comes and the swells rise up it's being steadfast and finding a way to navigate how do you do that and what he gives us is a clue in james chapter one and he says to look for the joy and the gifts and so uh joy is in james one two and three count it all joy most men don't start with joy a few of you guys you've got the gift of encouragement you wake up and you're in a good mood most men true or false wake up not in the best mood and through the course of the day you feel like you're a crash test dummy in a series of head-on collisions with no seat belt or airbag most men every day is just like who's going to hit me what's going to hit me what have i got to put up with what do i got to endure most men don't start with joy and when the trial comes it is very important for men to find some joy in it is there anything that brings you joy is there anyone that brings you joy is there anything or anyone that you enjoy count it all joy my brothers this is why we're here together james and jesus were literally brothers we want you to be brothers and sometimes you're close with your family but sometimes you're even closer with the guys that are in god's family and the reason that we're here so that you can find your brothers for the battle these are guys that think like me they love god they believe the bible they're trying to figure out what to do i need to find my brothers because you're going to have your battles and you have to have your brothers that's why we're here count it all joy my brothers when you meet trials of various kinds there's all kinds of trials some of you again mental physical emotional spiritual national political global local you've got other people that you know and love and they're going through their trials and your burden in it with them and for them and it's just all kinds of trials and you get through one kind of trial and guess what and there's another kind of trial and life is just filled with trials knowing that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness he keeps using that word steadfastness and what he's saying is this that life around you can have some deep swells but the spirit of god can maintain some consistency in you to navigate those storms and then he says in addition to joy he says in james 1 17 every good gift and every perfect gift comes from above from the father of lights what i love here his picture of god is that god is our father okay so let me just start with this there is far too little teaching on god as father if you grew up in church or been attention you hear a lot about jesus the son of god which is great he's our savior lived without sin died for our sin roses our savior is ruling and reigning coming again to judge the living and the dead he's the way the truth and the life no one comes to the father but by him we love jesus and you need jesus and most churches hear a lot about jesus if you go to some churches you hear a little bit about the holy spirit but you don't hear hardly anything about the father and when you tell men that god loves them and he told us earlier in james and he's going to tell us repeatedly that you are god's beloved that god loves you as men when we hear that word love it can be a little odd because we think of like hallmark uh movies or lifetime shows around the holidays um valentine's day you think of things you're like that's not super masculine the father heart of god is love for you but it's a father's love how many of you are dads and you get a father's love how many of you didn't even know what it meant to really love until you held your kid and then there's this whole kind of love that erupts in you how many of you you it was you went next level grandkid like i thought i loved somebody and then i helped my grandkid it was like a whole new kind of love when you understand god as father it unlocks in you into man and identity is son that's secure okay just like jesus is the son of god you are the sons of god you're in that position of love and affection and approval and what this means is you don't work for his love you work from his love i've got five kids three boys two girls i would never look at my sons and say okay here's your job description if you do these things at the finish line your dad will love you i start with love at the starting line i am your dad and i love you i'm here to help for the whole race okay god's heart toward you is a father you are a son and we are brothers and see this this what we're doing here is actually exactly what james is talking about god is the father jesus is our big brother we are sons of the father and little brothers to jesus and we are brothers to one another that's why we're here and what he says is god gives joy even in the trial and god drops gifts into the trial so you're in your life you're in your trial and the father is above it and he's dropping gifts of various sorts and kinds into your trial so i love what james does he says the trial comes how do you be steadfast find the joy find the gifts now the miseries and the complexities they're going to find you you don't need to do an easter egg hunt for the bad stuff in the trial it's obvious how many of us as men when the trial comes we just lose our joy and we lose sight of anything that is good because we're so overwhelmed by all that is bad is it just me okay and so i was talking to a pastor uh not to name drunk but pastor named rick warren just a loving godly man that i appreciate a lot some years ago and we were driving around this truck and he said mark he just said something just felt like saying it and it was it was brilliant and it stuck with me ever since and i've shared it before but i'll share it again he said i used to think this is back when i was a young pastor and i had bangs and hope so this was a long time ago but when i was a young pastor he said he said i used to think that life was seasons good season bad season good season bad season and he said so i just thought if you just kind of get through the bad seasons then you'll get into the good season how many of you have thought that how many of you have lived long enough you're like i haven't seen the good season this is where men get jaded discouraged and frustrated they're like man i just powered through i was grinding it out through the trial waiting for it to be over and then to get into you know kind of a good season of blessing and peace and joy and how many of you have lived that way i live that way for 18 years work work work work work work work work work work work work grind push grind push grind push and after 18 years there was never that season where it's like oh i don't need to go to heaven i'm already there every time i woke up there was something else he said what i realized now is that life is like train tracks some of you have heard this analogy every day there's good there's bad there's attack from the enemy there's blessing from god there's something to be worried about and something to be grateful for every day those two train tracks they're just are consistent and let me say life isn't good seasons in bad season in every season it's good and bad how many of you hearing that that makes more sense of the experience in your life so what he's saying here is when the trial comes to be steadfast and endured and persevered through it you got to pay attention look for invest some energy in that track where there's joy and gifts because the other track you're going to be well aware of it how many of you guys trial comes you're so focused on this track you lose sight of that track how's it going terrible here's all my problems here's my fears here's my frustrations here's what i'm dealing with here's drew drive me crazy okay but is is there any is there any joy are there any gifts and oftentimes the joy is connected to the gift that god sends a gift down and it awakens the joy that might be the presence of god the holy spirit so i want you as men to start asking this question not only what is your trial or what are your trials but where are your joy and gifts in your trial and i'll go through the who where why when and how so as you're going through the trial looking for the gifts and the joy who is in your life that they're a joy or a gift who is it okay and sometimes the people that you're just sort of dumping on they love you and the truth is they're there and they're listening and they care well they're a joy and a gift who or what in your life in the trial is a joy or a gift the what question what has god given you sometimes the gifts that god drops into the trial they're very practical here's a job here's a car you know here's a connection um you know here's something that you need sometimes it's a tangible physical gift actual gift something that god drops into your life who is the gift what is the gift where has god shown up how many of you it's in the worst seasons that god shows up in the most extraordinary ways uh there's a verse in peter that says as our suffering increases so does the presence of the holy spirit because as we need more he gives more okay and so sometimes when you're going through the worst god shows up in the best way and and and as a man you can almost feel a little unstable or bipolar you're like i don't know if i think about this i i just i i'm so frustrated angry depressed fearful sick of it and i think about this like i'm so grateful i'm so thankful i'm so blessed you're like welcome to life it's both and all the time and usually the worse this gets the best this gets usually there's a commence correlation between the two so not only who or what or where let me ask you this as you're looking at it why do you think why do you think that satan or the world has decided to bring this to you and what do you think god wants to use it for so there's a story in joseph where his brothers betray him in genesis they throw him in a hole they sell him as a slave they leave him for dead they tell his dad that he's dead and him and his dad got a really close relationship he then gets taken as a slave he gets falsely accused of rape he gets falsely imprisoned i mean horrific painful life and god shows up and it says that he's filled with the spirit of god and then god raises him up to oversee the economics of a whole nation and lo and behold who needs grace from him his brothers and he got gifts from god and he gave gifts to them it's one of those weird stories where it's like joseph had the most horrific and painful life and also satan was using it to destroy him to discourage him to frustrate him and instead he was steadfast and as a result god used it for incredible blessing and benefit to everyone so there's this uh situation uh just kind of verbal process and this just came to mind but in genesis chapter 50 joseph's brothers are still worried that because they were so bad to him that he can't really be good to them right like we were so awful to him why would he be wonderful to us so they're scared of him he's trying to give him gifts and bless them and be generous and they're scared and he asked this question in genesis uh 15 19 yes am i in the place of god the answer is he kind of is egypt is the most powerful nation on the earth the pharaoh ruled and reigned as god and joseph is his right-hand man he's literally sitting in the jesus seat the right hand of ruling and reigning over the kingdom and overseeing the wealth so he can have them killed he can punish them he can torment them he can imprison them he could do whatever he wants to them he kind of is in the position of god and he looks at him and what he says is this he says what you intended for evil god used for good and the saving of many lives what he says is you you guys were determined to ride this track and god just picked the card up and said i'm putting it on this track when you're in a trial know that god and satan are both in it and satan he wants you to ride this track and god wants you to ride that track the only way you'll be steadfast is if you find god and good in the trial that's the only way to stay steadfast how do you do that okay where's the joy where's the gift okay father you're up there you say you're gonna give wisdom you're going to give gifts it's going to come down and and it'll give me joy okay so you're looking for it but also being aware that god and satan are both at work in the trial what is satan trying to do what is god trying to do in addition how about this one the who the what the where the why when um when will you be able to take what you're learning through your trial and use it to help somebody else one way that a trial goes from this track to that track is you learn something and you help someone okay there are guys in this room they buried their wife that is that is the death trap but they have been steadfast through it and so then now they can minister to you and what that is it takes all the pain all the frustration all the loss from this track and it moves over to this track so now they're blessing others they're helping others they're giving a gift of wisdom and friendship and love and support and helping to create steadfastness in someone else sometimes the way that we find joy in the trial and a gift through the trial is we help someone else in their trial and let me tell you this is the key to being a dad this is the key to being a dad there are some things that i've gone through that i wished i would have never went through but if i can use those things to help my kids it goes from this track to that track it goes from the worst thing to at least i can use it to help my kid and to minister to others so part of the reason that we're here some of you guys you you've you've had major trials like you've done major miles on this track some of you guys have battled cancer lost jobs gotten fired been divorced seen kids go prodigal bury your own kid i mean you've been through it but the things that you've learned and the ways that you have through your failures and successes gained wisdom if you'll take it over and put an arm around the guy next to you and go i'm here to help all of a sudden you're the gift you're the gift that god sent down and you're taking what was your worst experience and you're using it to be a gift to someone else which brings you joy that's why it says of jesus he endured the cross for the joy set before him let me ask you this did jesus enjoy being crucified no nobody enjoys being crucified he's up all night the night before sweating like drops of blood in the garden of gethsemane praying father if there's another way to get people saved without me being crucified let's talk about that the joy wasn't in the cross the joy was through the cross because as he went through the cross the joy on the other side was that he would bless us and ministered us and so for us as we're going through it the joy isn't in it but the joy is on the ministry that we can use to love and serve others on the other side of it and then lastly when it comes to finding the joy in the gifts how is god using this bad to do his good in you anybody who's been into surgery is like it hurts like crazy and then it gets better anybody goes into physical therapy it's really painful and then slowly it improves how is god using this which is bad to do good that is in you and as christians we don't have to say well it's good is it no sometimes things are just bad they're evil they're wrong they're painful they're unjust they're cruel they're horrific they're confusing they're bewildering they're overwhelming they're horrible and god can use it it doesn't mean that it was good it means that he is good and some of you your deepest character work has come through your most painful trials okay so the first question in your table will be um what's your trial what's your thing number two where's the joy in the gifts where are the gifts that god is giving and and where are you finding joy and his men let me say we just struggle with this we don't see the gifts we see the lack here's what i need here's what i don't have here's what needs to happen we don't say okay father you've dropped these things into my life these people into my life we just see what still remains undone in addition we tend to think that we will have joy when everything comes together and or the trial is over the truth is it may never in addition what if it's a long time and all the people that are around us our wives our kids our friends our coworkers they just get this joyless cheerless grumpy curmudgeon virgin version of us okay now don't raise your hand if you're here with your dad but how many of you grown up your dad you're like he was just not a happy guy he was just a grumpy guy he just was a distracted guy he was an angry guy he was a sad guy he was a scared got joy not what a lot of joy coming out of dad fruit of the spirit is joy and the joy of the lord is your strength and dad talked a lot about what he didn't have and he didn't talk a lot about what he did have the way you overcome that spirit and the way you remain steadfast is you look for the gifts and you find the joy and when you do the third thing you can do is this who can you encourage through a trial all right who can you help who can you help and so in this james who's writing this he's seen his family go through a lot of trials so he's talking a lot about charles his mom was the virgin mary which sounds awesome unless you're the poor rural teenage peasant girl surrounded with religious people and you're pregnant and you're not married then your reputation is trashed her reputation was trashed and then you know joseph the engaged fiance he's thinking i got to get divorced i picked the bad girl she's not faithful and then jesus whole life they're picking on him in john 8 the religious people come out they're like at least we know who our dad is he's like yeah your father's the devil so he you know he's good on his feet that's a nice comeback so then james grows up in a family where his brother is claiming to be god and everybody thinks he's a cult leader and a madman well that's a lot of trial you go to school you're like oh who's your big brother jesus oh the guy who thinks he's god yeah not one it's odd and it's a lot to live up to if you're james and jesus is your big brother right he's perfect that's rough if you're the kid brother that's rough and then james sees his brother harassed and he sees his mother weeping and he sees his brother crucified and then risen and they return to heaven and now james becomes a pastor and he's leading the first christians and everybody who's a critic or an enemy knows let's just pound on james because if we can flip him we can undo christianity if his brother's like no my big brother's a liar con man he's not god he's evil i saw him up close he's a total charlatan then literally james can just be the use of the enemy to just undermine and just to topple christianity so his whole life is trials and then at the end they come to him they're like all right you you either deny your brother is god or we throw you off the temple that's a rough they threw off temple he didn't die so then they come and beat him up until he does die so the point is this james is he knows trial and he knows gifts and blessing right i mean the gift to him was god came down shared a bunk bed with him that's quite a gift that's quite a blessing that's a lot of joy what james is doing he's taking everything that he's learned through his trials and he's using it to encourage and minister to us so how can we do that as men okay most of you men do not have an encourager in your life and so what we think is well i don't have an encourager then we need to be the encourager okay even if you don't have the encourager and we want to be encouraging to one another for sure and encouragement is literally to pour courage into a man you're looking at the future like i'm having a hard time being steadfast or you're gonna need some courage let me pour some into you it's called encouragement the way we encourage one another and his men we could set a culture of encouraging praying so we're going to do that with your wife kids family friends just be praying with and for them sometimes meeting hey let's grab coffee let's go watch a game you know let's go watch the diamondbacks it's quiet there's no one there it's private i was there the other night there were more braves fans than there were uh it was sad uh but it was nice we had a whole section to ourselves my wife and i we could have very deep intimate conversation with no one interrupting us and it's not like anything is happening so we're not missing anything but it's just meeting with the guy and sometimes it's just checking in calling texts and emailing hey man i know you're in it i'm just checking in i called a buddy of mine he's a pastor out of state and uh they're kind of in it right now with the governor and all the nonsense and he said why are you calling i said oh this is a suicide watch you're like are you you're doing okay buddy you hanging in there i mean you know how are you doing sometimes it's just sending scripture and even as a group i had a buddy of mine he was battling a life-threatening illness he'd been a huge blessing to me in one of the worst seasons of my life and i just decided i said i'm going to send you an encouraging scripture every day until you're better or dead so alert for a year i got up every morning i'd pray i'd find scripture i sent it to him and i hadn't he lives out of state and i hadn't seen him in a while and when i saw him he said i printed out every single one of those and i've got them in a notebook on my desk and every day i just keep reading he's like thanks for i was like because that's the power of god's word sometimes when you don't know what to say you just tell them something god said let him do the talking also it's sometimes just by giving praise it's just saying hey this is encouraging you know let me bless you here let me just thank you let me just point something out sometimes the encouragement is just listening and sometimes that's what we're going to do around the table just like i'm just going to listen and then the ministry of presence just being there it's like i don't know what to say i don't know what to do i'm sorry but i'm here and i'm caring and i'm listening and i'm praying and i'm trying so um how many of you men really struggle when you're going through your trial to find joy to see the gifts and to encourage others okay i suck at this okay and if that word bothers you we just found the religious guys so so let me can i be real honest with you here at real men so i was a total jerk to my wife last night and we haven't had a chance to talk and patch it up so this is a message from a guy who has a great sermon and a frustrated wife um we call that a pastor and so um so what happened is we've been busy life is we had a rough season pretty good season you know kind of you know you know driving on the tracks and then uh i'm a guy who i tend not to get as frustrated by the big things it's the little things that continue to happen how many of you the big things you're like that frustrates me i think you're like big things i can handle the little things that keep happening those drive me crazy that's me okay um and so um this week um i threw in some other events with my wife and i needed her with me and how many of you are very scheduled very sequenced your cause effect everything is in order there's a plan everything is rolling according to plan and it's the little disruptions in the day or the life that kind of set you off and in that moment it may not be a big deal but it's a trial for you because if you don't respond well everybody around you is going to pay a price okay so my wife got jammed up with some things she made some bad decisions with her time and some emergencies came and i and all this so we got home late last night and my thought was here's what i'm going to do i'm going to go into my study and i'm going to prepare this talk for real men on how to persevere through trials with joy and with uh encouragement uh toward others and uh and i got done with a talk and it was late and i thought this is a good talk pretty good i mean for me it was pretty good talk and then all i thought was i'm done i'm done for today i'm going to go sit on the couch i'm going to give myself a break i've earned it been a good boy today ended my day studying the word of god and and i'm going to get a break and i go downstairs my wife likes to study on the couch [Laughter] we have one television near the couch and i tell her all the time you can't study on the couch i don't have any verses but i'm sure that's the will of the lord so the couch is where i rest and she's like no the couch is where i work i can't work you can't work where i rest that doesn't work for me because i can't rest so i came down she's got her books and commentaries my wife her name is grace and she's studying the bible and i'm ticked okay okay this is probably not her fault okay because she started her studying late and my wife is usually late and i'm usually early and so i spend that time being frustrated so that's how we roll i can be totally honest with you so i was like honey you can't study here you should already have this work done yeah that's a form of birth control right there that is that that is that did not work we'll take that off the internet but that you know that didn't work and so i got frustrated with i'm like hey i've worked hard all day you're disorganized this is my couch i got one i gave her the whole thing yeah good job okay so says the single guy who doesn't know why okay so so in that moment my wife she's in her trial trying to get her work done to love and serve the women i'm in my trial here's my trial am i going to be selfish that's my trial it's not a it's not a catastrophic thing in that moment am i going to serve my wife and encourage her or am i going to be selfish and discourage her in that little moment it was my trial i did pretty good all day i encouraged my wife all day so ah the holy spirit just remind me something so dang it okay so every week during james i schedule a meeting with god and i go hiking in the woods and i talk and i pray and this week i said lord is there anything you want me anything you want to say to me this was last friday and he said encourage grace by wednesday i forgot and i did the opposite i discouraged grace god spoke to me told me this is going to be your trial son something you're going to want to not encourage you're going to want to discourage your wife you're going to want to criticize her and not coach her and so what i did is i was grumpy with my wife nothing catastrophic but just so then i had two choices i could apologize or go to bed so i went to bed and just being honest with you how many of you are feeling better about your marriage right now like like i went in there feeling terrible so i heard that preacher and he's really screwed up i'm doing pretty good so so then uh i slept in this morning she came in to serve the lady she's been teaching all day i sent her a text apologizing uh and after this i'm gonna go apologize to my wife um because i was what can happen when you're in your trial we get selfish and the trial can be big and you're like oh i have a big reason to be selfish well but they're in their trial too and you know how can you encourage them and be the blessing to them and be the gift to them and bring joy to them and what i find is that when i'm in a trial that's when i'm the most selfish and in that moment my wife let me tell you this i married a great girl i mean she's still with me she has a high pain tolerance uh she's cute she's joyful she smiles she laughs a lot like her name is grace my initials are mad mark ellen driscoll my initials are mad and i always say when there's a fight between mad and grace it's probably not grace's fault okay but i just tell you that because this is something that is not a lesson that i learn i think it's a lesson that i need to relearn every day because every day there's another trial every day there's another wrinkle there's another variable and even and sometimes it's a big thing and what i find is i tend to do pretty good with the big trials and i tend to trip over my own feet in the little trials so if my wife would have came in and said you know i've got that you know i told my car something you know that's a thing i'd be like okay i'm good to go but the fact that she's sitting on the couch that's what gets me so i love you i don't teach because i'm there we're all in it together and i need to go apologize to my wife tonight uh because it doesn't do any good to preach a good sermon if you're a bad husband and last night i was a bad husband um so i'll pray for you and we want to encourage you but we want you guys to be honest we don't want this to be the place where it's like well you know that harsh accountability the bible says have you done it are you obedient like i don't know none of us have so let's walk together and do better by god's grace amen father thanks for an opportunity to ramble a bit and god thank you for my wife she's the best i love her with all my heart she's god there's a lot of gals i've met i could live with she's the one girl i met i couldn't live without and god i adore her she's been nothing but a blessing to me and and god she doesn't have malice in her heart but last night i had selfishness and i wasn't a servant and as a result i discouraged her rather than encouraging her and god i was thinking about me getting a break after my trials i wasn't thinking that she was still in her trial and as a result lord i failed my test holy spirit i thank you that you are gracious and let us retake the test and i thank you that i have a godly wife who will forgive me and work with me and god i just confess his men that we we sometimes pay a lot more attention to the bad track than the good track when we're in a trial we can be a lot more selfish than servant that we can lose our joy and we can overlook the gifts and as a result lord we miss opportunities to encourage others who are in their own trial and god i failed at this and i pray for these men to do better than their pastor in jesus good name amen love you guys thank you

Channel: Real Faith by Mark Driscoll

Views: 1,283

Rating: 5 out of 5

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Id: WhaghJYWpuw

Length: 46min 12sec (2772 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 22 2021