Today we are going to take a posture of peace by trusting our teacher and loving our learning.
Posture is a short audible fist bump to remind you God is with you in everything.
Together we're going to be emboldened to take a daily posture of perfect peace.
In John 14, verse 26, Jesus said,
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name,
he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
So just a quick recap.
Last week's episode, episode 178, we talked about how to live in peace in troubled times.
Really, what we talked about was how to live in peace all the time.
The key was making all of our life situations
first about God instead of making it about yourself.
You know, when you come into a hard circumstance, instead of asking why,
first ask who.
Place your focus, your attention on who is God.
Who does he say he is?
What is his nature?
What is his character?
What is he really, really like?
And then ask who am I becoming in him?
Genesis 126, we are being made in his image and likeness.
So who he is, is who we are becoming.
Isn't that so exciting?
We are constantly learning and becoming from glory to glory,
and there is grace upon grace as we learn and become.
So the real treasure is found in the journeying with God
through all of life's situations and seasons.
It's not a treasure that we only discover or only enjoy
at a destination somewhere when we finally arrive,
when we finally learn the lesson.
No, the process, the learning, the practicing, the becoming,
that is where we experience the presence of God so rich and powerfully,
and it's where we discover more and more of what he is really, really like.
Colossians 3 tells us that we have been brought to fullness in Christ.
We have been brought to fullness.
It is done.
John 1 16 says, for from his fullness, we all have received grace upon grace.
So Christ's fullness is our starting point.
It's where you're standing right now, today,
in every situation, in every season of life.
And all of life is really about discovering just how full that fullness really is.
And that truth alone should just have you loving your learning.
It should have us all delighting in the process that we're in right now.
But often, the way that we approach learning produces pressure instead of peace.
I mean, think about even the language we use in the world around learning.
Like, I hope you learned your lesson, or you better learn your lesson.
Or we give tests, you know, and it's like you get one chance to pass or fail.
Or we teach just to the test.
You know, this used to be a huge issue for me.
I would learn a new revelation.
I would gain more understanding of scripture.
I would get a sense of just how full fullness really is.
And I would get so frustrated with myself.
Because I would think, there is so much to learn.
And there is so much I don't know.
And this would really challenge me, especially in hard circumstances.
Because I would think, I must have done something wrong.
Or I must have missed something.
Or I must have not fully understood.
If I did understand, if I did know, then things would not have gotten this hard.
Or an old struggle would emerge.
Or I would be triggered by something.
And I would think, well, I guess I'm not as far along as I thought I was.
Or I must have missed it.
I must have lost it.
I would lean on my own understanding.
I would make it about me before making it about him.
Instead of resting in his nature, I was leaning on my lack.
I've had several conversations with friends in the past couple weeks.
And they've included phrases like, I just don't want to miss out on God's will for me.
Or I don't want to get it wrong.
I don't want to miss out on what God is trying to teach me right now,
in this season, or through the circumstance.
Have you found yourself in that place as well?
Maybe saying some of those things?
I mean, we just all want to get it right.
We just want to get it right.
And while that desire to wanting to get it right, it seems so right.
But it actually places our focus on the wrong things.
It has us paying attention to what's not there instead of who is there with us always.
It has us leaning into the scarcity around us
instead of leaning into the abundance of God's presence in us.
You know, that wanting to get it right.
just get it right and get it right the first time.
I don't want to fail at this, you know.
It has us living these lives powered by pressure,
powered by stress instead of powered
by peace and his presence.
It places our focus on achieving instead of abiding.
Abiding in the Lord is where we practice
the presence of God in all of our life situations
so that we become fully focused, fully engaged with God.
It's not that we just have a relationship with him,
it's that we have fellowship with him.
We're learning, we're practicing speaking his language
over our situation.
We're learning to see our circumstances
through his perspective.
We're practicing thinking about our lives and ourselves
and the world around us with the mind of Christ.
This is the process of becoming.
And it's really about being and becoming
based on our heart's experience,
not on doing and demonstrating a skill or behavior
based on head knowledge.
Your heart represents that inner place
where Christ and you abide together
in relationship, in fellowship.
Let me read Ephesians three.
It really illustrates what I'm trying to say here.
It says it much better than how I could say it.
Ephesians chapter three, I'm gonna start in verse 16.
It says that according to the riches of his glory,
he may grant you to be strengthened with the power
through his spirit in your inner being
so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith
that you being rooted and grounded in love
may have strength to comprehend with all the saints
what is the breadth and length and height and depth
and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge
that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
You have everything you need to live emboldened,
empowered, and equipped in every situation.
And every situation is an opportunity
to practice living emboldened, empowered, and equipped.
And the good news is we get a lot of practice.
And the good news is we are not alone in the practice.
You have a helper, you have a teacher, the Holy Spirit.
Okay, true confessions.
Even recently, like within the last few weeks recent,
I became so frustrated with the process
that I am in right now because I was believing
that my lack of knowledge was keeping me stuck.
And I heard the Holy Spirit say,
Lindsay, do you not trust me to get through to you?
Don't you think that I know what it is that you need
in this circumstance, in this process?
And don't you think I love you enough
to make sure you get what you need when you need it?
Do you think I'm gonna let you stay stuck?
I just began to feel all the pressure release
in that moment and peace began to rise up within me
because I trusted my teacher
and I started to love my learning again.
You will love your learning.
You will savor the process you are in
when you trust your teacher.
So today, remember, you don't have to know everything.
You just have to know God.
In everything, you already have the Father's love,
Christ's fullness, and the Holy Spirit's help.
You're not gonna stay stuck.
The presence of God is in you today, right now,
in this circumstance that you're facing.
And you are becoming, you are being made
into the image and likeness of God.
So I wanna encourage you,
trust your teacher and love your learning.