How To Not Get Lazy

Welcome back. It's Michael Coughlin again. This is a special edition of the Be a Berean podcast on the Bible Thumping Wingnut Network. I have with me a few of my friends who are going to help me discuss a question that I received. We'll call it a from the mailbag question. And we're going to go through this question that someone I know asked, and I think that the answers to a question like this are something that could help all Christians.

And so I've got my buddies with me. All of them I met in Ohio. One of them has now moved away, but they're all Ohio kids to me. And so first I'll introduce my friend Andrew Beebe from Radnor Baptist Church. So say hi, Andrew, so people know your voice. Hello, Michael.

It's nice to be here with you. Thank you for coming, buddy. And my friend Caleb Hackworth from Redeemer Covenant Church. Caleb, how are you doing this morning? Doing good, Mike. And I've got Corey Bailey, who used to be, well, we won't get into this too much, but he used to be a Methodist pastor here in Ohio.

But he repented, and now he is a Baptist down in Mississippi training to plant a church in Scotland. Say good morning, Corey. Good morning, y'all. And Corey is going to be going to plant a church in Scotland with 20 schemes. And so that's a cool thing. Maybe we'll talk about that on another episode.

Actually, that's a pretty cool idea. But let's get into the topic. I have a friend who was just baptized in the past year, maybe even the last six months. And his baptism came within six months of him supposing he was born again. And so we have a guy who is somewhat recently born again. He's an adult.

He's got a wife who's a Christian woman. He's got six kids. And this is his question he sent me. He said, brother, I have a question. I need to figure out how to not get lazy when it comes to God's word. He says, even I think we could all confess we've been there.

And so I thought this would be a good discussion to have and try to get some ideas for what would cause this to happen and then for what are some practical steps that we ought to take to try to alleviate this situation. So Andrew, B.B., why don't you start? Why don't you tell us what are your initial thoughts here about this? yeah um it's as a new christian i remember having the same kind of concern because my my life was filled with certain things that wasn't beneficial for a relationship with the lord and so i had to kind of realize okay what do i need to get rid of what do i need to start doing and i remember coming to the conviction that this is i realize this is a marathon this isn't like a everything needs to happen today and my reading of scripture understanding the scripture better doesn't need to happen today all together the journey of knowing it more and more and more each day is part of what glorifies christ and so when i realized that it took a lot of pressure off to sit there and feel like i needed to read like 20 000 chapters of the bible if in order for me to be holy um i realized that it's more about meditating on scripture and and trying to understand it and then trying to repent in it and really what I do with it.

And so I remember really just being convicted that it's not about how much time, so to speak, it's about why am I here? Why am I doing this? And am I doing the things I need to be doing for me to glorify Christ throughout the day with what I understand about him? And so that really helped me to not get too legalistic about it. And the time that I did spend with the Lord, which I think at first was about 20 to 30 minutes, was really beneficial for me for those beginning steps of my Christian walk.

And then it just sort of grew from there. And so each situation is going to be different. But one thing I tell new Christians is you don't feel like you need to spend over an hour a day in order for you to be holy. It just doesn't work that way. So basically, quality over quantity is one way to think about it, you're saying. Just make sure it's good time with the Lord.

Yeah, certainly. Not necessarily legalistic, minimum quantity or anything. Like, I've got to read 10 chapters, or I had a bad day. Yeah. And personally, me coming from a very like, I felt like in order for me to go to heaven, I needed to do this, that, and the other. And so once I realized that's not the way Christianity works, it was actually freeing.

And so I realized I need to be in scripture is repenting and realizing where I'm falling short of really reflecting who Christ is because I love him. And so that doesn't necessarily mean I got to spend an hour doing so. A very good point. Caleb, what are your thoughts? You know, one of the first things I thought about when sitting down this morning to come on video was Albert Martin, a very well respected pastor.

I have his pastoral theology book, I couldn't find it, but he says in there that as a 80 year old man, that he has struggled every day of his life to wake up early and to read the word of God And so that encouraging for me because this man has been used by God in so many different ways and and he struggles to get up every day and spend time with, with the Lord. And I think that one of the first things we have to do is just realize that, you know, it differs from person to person, but there, there's going to be a struggle to discipline ourselves in spiritual disciplines. I mean, In 1 Timothy, in chapter 4, we all know this text where he tells Timothy to train yourself toward godliness.

For while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way and holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. It takes work. We have to realize it's going to be difficult. And it's a process, like Andrew said, of disciplining ourselves to spend time with him, even when we're tired. Yeah, good point. So some of it's just being comforted that this is a shared struggle.

So we're not talking here. And this was my first thought, was that this reminded me of the apostles in the garden when Jesus told them to watch and pray, and then they fell asleep. And he came back, and Jesus didn't say, wow, you guys are probably unregenerate. you didn't watch and pray. Jesus said, wow, you know, the spirit's willing, but the flesh is weak.

There was an acknowledgement of that battle between our spirit that wants to do good and the flesh that's pulling us in another direction. So I find comfort when other Christians, like a guy like Albert Martin, who I would look up to, confesses that he has a similar struggle that I face that I'm ashamed about. And I don't want to tell people like, oh, did you know there was a couple of days I didn't read the word last week?

I don't want to admit it. And then I find out other people struggle and it's hard for them too. It makes me more comforted. Good point. Corey, what were your thoughts on this? You were the former Methodist, so you probably have like a step-by-step guide for how to solve all this.

Yeah, just submit to God's word. No, if I could just pick up some of the crumbs. I think the first thing that came to mind was motivation. What is your motivation in reading God's Word? Because I think there's two paths you can follow. You can follow.

It's the Christian thing to do. As you guys said, it can be checking off the box to go to heaven. I have to read my Bible five times a day or five times a week or whatever it is. And so I think if you begin with the motivation of, I need to check this box, it becomes very daunting, and it becomes undesirable to do because it becomes legalism. and I think for us it actually is warring against our flesh because we don't want to do the things of the spirit because we are still living in the sinful flesh and so we rebel against this idea of having to do this because God commands it and so avoid the idea of legalism of checking off the box and start understanding that the Bible is the word of God.

If you want to hear God speak to you, read your Bible out loud. It is God speaking to us. And so when you start understanding and switching your mindset to this isn't a box I have to check off. This is me hearing from the God who created all things, the God who has this plan of redemption from before the foundation of the world. And this plan plays out in scriptures and then this scripture has a practical application of how i can live in the spirit i think you start wanting to do the things of god you start wanting to hear from god you start wanting to read the bible more because it's no longer hey let me check off this box because i have to rather it's let me dwell in the presence of the lord yeah that's a good point you and we start to think about it as a relationship with god and and i was thinking when you're talking about checking off boxes i was thinking if a guy called me and said hey how how could i love my wife better if i if i just gave him a list of five things to do and and then he went and just did those things for his wife she you know the the wife would figure out like look you're just you're just trying to like follow some procedure to please me.

And the wife wants you to love her from your heart. And then she wants the actions to flow from that heart motivated by love. And it's even more so with God that we should flow that way. But for some reason, it does seem like God is easier to ignore. And so I find that it's, well let me ask you guys why why do you think that is and it seems like god's easier to ignore than the things that are in front of us the things we see what andrew do you have any thoughts on that what i'd say to that is i i think it's it's very easy for us to get caught up in the physical and the physical matters and we need to address the physical it's it's it truly will be judged by what we do in the physical, but the spiritual underrides it all.

And it's very easy for us to get sidetracked and just focus on the physical and ignore the spiritual when what we do in the physical should be directed by our relationship with our Heavenly Father. And so it's very interesting how we can do that in the flesh. We can ignore God, and then we can live this life in that indifference, to God. And it's so important for us to, I would say, even wake up in the morning and just spend a few minutes meditating even on a psalm or somewhere in scripture And so in realizing that while we have this being while we in this physical life we are to do it for the glory of God And so it doesn become a compartment anymore to where am I ignoring God or not I doing all things because of God I doing everything I doing in my job, everything I'm doing with my family because of who God is and what he's declared himself to be.

And so it is easy to ignore because the very nature of God being not of this world and not being in this world in that respect. So it's easy for us to ignore him, but we are to do all things through him. We are to do it because of who he is and we are to do everything for the glory of his name. And so we are to do the very opposite. And that struggle there is what gives him glory, I think, in this cursed world.

The fact is, it is a struggle and it's a struggle on purpose. And we are to actually be thankful for the struggle because if we didn't struggle, we'd just be ignoring him, but we want him. And that's something that we need to be thankful for and fight for him each day. And I think that gives him glory while we're in this flesh. Am I muted? Now am I muted?

No, you're not now. All right. Well, good. Caleb earlier you mentioned disciplines yes and to a lot of people who you know understand that Christianity is by grace through faith not of works the concept of disciplines is is it's just legalism it's just pharisaical legalism and so what do you mean when you're talking about spiritual disciplines like for the benefit of of you know situation we're talking about yeah and you know I I totally agree with Brother Corey that we don't want to have a mentality of checking off a box.

That's antithetical to what it means to have freedom in Christ. But at the same time, we're called to walk a balance. I'm glad that I just don't do things when I just feel like doing them. We don't go to church just when we feel like doing it. We have an idea that there's a discipline involved to that. The Lord calls us to be obedient, and so we go.

And so there's a common pattern even throughout Scripture. We see it in Daniel with him praying three times a day. We see it with Peter and John going to the temple at the hour of prayer with Paul saying that he beats his body. You know, there is a constant flow throughout Scripture that people were trying to discipline themselves to love the Lord more because it's not natural for us. because we are in a process of progressive sanctification.

I was much like Andrew, I think, if I'm understanding his story correctly, listening to a lot of Leonard Ravenhill when I was first saved and thinking that I had to spend multiple hours every day praying to the Lord or else I wasn't going to be accepted by him. but the Lord used my false doctrine to cultivate in me just a desire that I don't do anything in the morning before I read God's word. And that's helpful. It's helpful to have a pattern of life that even when we're feeling spiritually dry, we're going to God's word.

And when God, by his grace, invigorates us once again, we have that process in place. So I think it can be helpful, even though we have to guard against viewing it legalistically. I hope that makes sense. Yeah, it did. I was thinking about it as you were talking that, you know, when I used to play football, I loved football. And I still had a schedule of the things I was going to do to prepare for football.

It wasn't a problem that I picked the days I was going to work out, what I was going to do that day, all those kinds of things. And just because I love God, that doesn't mean I'm going to always feel like doing the right things for God. A discipline helps me because I became very convicted on one occasion when I wanted to wake up early in the morning and read God's word.

I had a plan. I was going to wake up at a certain time. And I'd recently listened to a sermon that talked about how we should be able to make some sacrifice, maybe lose a little sleep to read his word. And I'd missed a couple days where I didn't wake up on time. And it just didn't bother me much. And then one day that week, and the memory isn't clear to me anymore, but I had to wake up early to be at a doctor's appointment or something like that.

And my alarm went off and I just popped out of bed and I got ready to go. And it just hit me. Like, wow, when I had to be somewhere at seven for a doctor's appointment that I thought was important, I had no problem being there. But when I had made a commitment that I was going to wake up at a certain time, the same time that I had to wake up for the appointment and I was just going to go and spend time just reading the Bible, that somehow the snooze button was just easy to hit. and I was really convicted that I needed to acquire the discipline to be able to do that kind of thing.

Yeah. And so I think that was a good point, bringing that up. So, Corey, now that we've kind of discussed the fact that we want to have the right motivation, and in this conversation, we're not questioning people that are struggling. Somebody that abandons God's word or doesn't go to church at all, we would start to wonder, hey, like, you know, maybe we have to deal with the salvation issue. but for the person who's just really fighting this like hey you're tired you have a job where you work hard and your body's tired you have a family that has a lot of needs um there there was a lot of things you absolutely have to deal with throughout the week do is there any practical advice we can give people that that helps them to acquire these spiritual disciplines Yeah absolutely there are What you brought up is that you wanted to wake up and read God word and you struggled but when getting ready for the day, you didn't struggle.

And I think there's a spiritual application to that. We have no problem waking up on days and getting our physical bodies ready for the day. you shower you shave put on deodorant do your hair put on clothes walk out the door but are you really preparing your spiritual body for the day for all the things that you could run into uh disgruntled co-worker disgruntled boss kids wife financial problems how are you going to deal with those things so i think deuteronomy 6 is one of those great uh spiritual application passages where it says, on your gates. You look at a passage like this, and what you see is in every aspect of your life, the word should be there.

The word should be there. So Jews would wake up early in the morning, and they would say, hear, O Israel, Yahweh is God, Yahweh alone. Love him with your entire being, and write these words on your heart. Teach them to your children to pass them on, and then talk of them when you sit in your house. So as you are with your family, talk of them. When you're traveling, think of them.

When you lie down, think of them. When you rise, think of them. So in every aspect of your life, we should sit there and be infusing the word of God into them. And one thing that really stuck out to me when you and I traveled to West Virginia and Pennsylvania together last year is just how much of scripture you have memorized that we sat there in the car and yeah i think it was first john you you cited all of first john and i think scripture memorization is one of those disciplines that is most overlooked but essential to the person that when you start memorizing scripture you it's not it's not just sitting down and reading your bible and that's the only part of scripture uh interaction you get in a day but that you actually can interact with scripture throughout the day and throughout the week and that you can sit there and speak scripture into your own life so for me i think the application is is that we need to think of preparing our spiritual body for the day but also like it's not just one set time throughout the day that you have to read your Bible in a legalistic way, but just get into the Word of God so that the Word of God can get into you.

I think you bring up a good point about spending the day meditating on these things, because a lot of people, maybe they, you know, we'll say they don't have time. I think some people have more time than they think they have if they evaluated that. Maybe we'll talk about that more, but would you rather be a person that prayed for 15 minutes every morning or that was that you knew you were praying throughout the day you know i'm not it's a bit of a false dichotomy but but i i want to be someone that throughout the day is thinking about god that's thanking god and relying on god and praying to god and i think that one of the traps we can fall into is like okay i got my prayer done, I got my reading done, and now I can do my day, and then the God part's done with, and I think we can compartmentalize it too much as well, and that's one of the things that Scripture memory has really taught me, is that Scripture memory allows me, it's actually a gift from God that causes me to actually meditate on His Word day and night, and when I'm trying to memorize a passage, I don't just work on it for a couple of minutes in the morning and then forget about it.

The way it becomes memory is by focusing all day on it. That's a really good point. I'll toss in there that for me, one of the things I've had to just learn is my personality, my body makeup is I am fresh in the morning, and I am alert, and my brain is working. and then at night I don't have the same brain my son the other day even called it mush or something because it was like 9 p.m and I said something like we were playing euchre and I just made this you know classic blunder and and my son's like yeah you just your brain just turns to mush at night because he knew I knew better than the mistake I'd made and so so that's another thing is for me, what I've learned is, hey, instead of working all day, and then when I'm tired at night, and my brain's a little tired, and then expecting myself to not only feel like picking up God's Word, but then studying it in a way that's meaningful, I've learned, hey, I really need that morning time.

And I need to tell my family that I need this. I need you to help provide it at times. My wife needs to know that that's the time for me and things like that. So that's what helps me have a little better time of those things. Andrew, any practical advice for somebody that's struggling with this? I think most of the time, it's just a matter of what you said, Michael, that it's a matter of we have time, we're just not utilizing it right.

And so if that's the case, then it's it's a matter of utilizing it, right? Realizing that you come to God because you are in need of Him because you're in a dry and desert land here in this world that's cursed. And so you need to spend time with the Lord. And so you get up early because you need the Lord, just like you eat breakfast, just like you eat lunch and dinner.

And so I think most of the time, it's just a matter of just getting up a little bit earlier and knowing why you're doing it. And if you get up and you don't want to do it, then repent to the Lord and say, you know, and you say, I'm sorry that I would not desire to spend time with you. It's a great time. Repentance is a beautiful thing that can really open up your heart to the Lord.

So don't just, you know, you don't feel like doing it, so you don't do it. Get up, you don't feel like doing it, repent to the Lord and then pray and cry out to him. But I think there are times where people need to change what they're doing. In other words, they're working too much. Their desires or their focus is to make money and provide for their family material wealth, but they're not able to do it spiritually.

And so they need to change their lives in order to actually be obedient to the Lord and obedient to his commands to take care of the family. And so there are certain times, I think, where that needs to happen. I think most of the time, though, it's just a matter of just utilizing your time more wisely. Whether you get seven hours of sleep rather than eight, right, that kind of thing.

It's just a matter of building up those disciplines. But again, as we already said, the motivation needs to be out of a love and desire for the Lord Jesus Christ, knowing that without him, you are bankrupt. And so you need to just fall at his feet each morning. And if that's the case, and if you keep on repenting when you don't feel like it, he will. He'll comfort you.

He'll raise you up. And so, yeah, that's to be the practical thing. I think it needs to be in the morning. When I was a young man, when I came to Christ, I didn't have children. I didn't have a wife. I was able to do it in the evening.

But I realized very quickly that that had to change. And it did. By God's grace, he helped me to become a morning person when I never had been before. But it was all because of repentance, crying out to the Lord. And he's been faithful and he'll always be faithful. That's a promise that he has in scripture.

And so we are to grab hold of that, utilizing what he has given us as a comfort, as his spirit and continue confessing, continue repenting. And he's just so kind to us. I think we utilize those things. It's remarkable how willing we are to rearrange our lives and our schedules for the things we want to do or the things we think we need to do. and then we find the things that we don't fit in.

And I think times like your financial budget, if suddenly your financial budget changed because you had a larger bill that you had to pay, you would instinctively, I mean, and if not instinctively, at least by discipline, you'd cut something out that you'd realized wasn't as high a priority. And it's the same way with time. John Piper, I think, is the one credited with saying Twitter and Facebook will be used on the day of judgment to prove that we all weren't too busy to pray.

And I think about that. And Paul said, look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise. I'm in Ephesians 5. Making the best use of the time because the days are evil. So making proper use of the time is written in the context of being wise. And so there's a wisdom that we're supposed to employ that by testing, we may discern what the will of the Lord is, what's good and acceptable and perfect.

So we test. We wake up and we say, okay, I'm going to try to wake up at 5 o'clock every day. And you try it, and then, well, maybe it doesn't work for your family. Maybe you're a night person. Whatever it happens to be, you try different things, I think, until you start to figure out what works. You talk to your family, your wife, the people who have an effect on you and the people who benefit from you being a godly man.

I've told my wife a few times she wants to spend time with me. And I said, you know, your life will be better the more time I get to spend with the Lord. I need to have private prayer. I need to have private study. And so I try to sort of persuade my wife that way, that that's part of how she actually helps herself is by supporting me becoming a more godly man.

So I think you brought up a good point there. I think it's funny how different we can all be, though. And stuff comes up and we have to deal with that. And we have to be able to be somewhat adaptable as well. so I guess my advice I thinking about it is if you if you saying I tired at night then my initial thought is wake up in the morning and do something in the morning And so we now eliminated the I tired at night problem And then find ways, depending on what kind of job you have, find ways that maybe you can focus on God's word throughout the day.

Because my question for somebody that thinks they're too busy is, I'd say, okay, well, just show me your browsing history and show me your TV watching history. And I think from your browsing history on the Internet and your app use on your phone and your TV watching, I could probably find some time for you that you could be doing something else. And I know it's not easy all the time.

It's easier to check Twitter and read 15 things real quick and then just maybe just move on. if you're just taking a break in the day than it is to maybe study the scripture. But there's some pretty short psalms that I think if you just read them over and over, you'd be comforted by them, and you'd probably accidentally memorize them. And I think that a lot of us should be convicted of how much more time we actually could spend thinking about God's word, listening to God's word preached.

A lot of jobs don't require the kind of mental use where you couldn't just listen to sermons all day or, you know, or listen to a podcast people, you know, even a podcast like this one. Sometimes you don't have to listen intently to pick up what people are saying. You could be doing this while you're, you know, hammering a nail or any number of other tasks. so I just hope that I just I don't want to come across legalistically like okay we have to quit everything that's non-spiritual and you know but I think that there is a point where we can be more honest about how we can structure our lives just like if I lost my job I'd have to really take a hard look at the budget and cut out everything unnecessary and then I'd add it back in as I started to accumulate savings I think it's the same concept.

So I want to, I'll shift gears slightly. James, or Caleb, sorry, I go by Caleb, but your name is James on a lot of your Twitter thing or your Zoom thing. But Caleb, if you want to talk about any disciplines, that's fine. But then if you also will just move into how will maybe persistent or besetting sin in a person's life affect this? And how would a person maybe root that out if maybe they don't even realize that they have it?

Sure. I think in somebody coming to us and asking us how they can be better about their prayer life, I mean, the first thing that I think of as a pastor is how refreshing that is to hear that somebody is wanting to do that. And And so as we talk about spiritual disciplines and how to be better, I think the first thing that I want to do is to encourage them first with James.

That James chapter 5 and verse 16 says, Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. So if we have a besetting sin, if we have something keeping us, The Word of God tells us that the ordained means that God uses to defeat sin often is confessing to brothers and sisters and to ask for prayer. That's a God-ordained means.

And if we're not confessing this to other Christians and asking them to pray for us, I don't think that we can have a true assurance that we're going to defeat it because God gives us the means. and just the second scripture I would bring up. This is my favorite counseling scripture to bring up. When somebody comes with me convicted of sin, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

This is a Christian attribute that has been given to all born again believers that we are spiritually poor and that we hunger and thirst after righteousness. So I would say that anybody coming to us with this question is on the right path And they need to be greatly encouraged because there's much evidence the Lord is working in them. Amen. Corey, do you have any thoughts about if somebody's struggling about maybe there's hidden sin or maybe they need to, you know, David says, he asked the Lord to reveal to him any hidden faults, right? and to keep back his servant from presumptuous sins Is there any thoughts about about that yeah i think uh two things first if you reading scripture it not driving you to repentance why are you reading scripture i know that sounds sounds a little presumptuous but in reality what we should see in scripture is we're sinners, a holy God, holy God comes to redeem us.

And the whole process of sanctification is the removal of the power of sin in our lives so that the power of God grows in us, that we become more like Jesus. And so when you're reading scripture, I think it should drive us to this idea of constant repentance. That and then drawing from my Methodist background. But... Hold on, let me find the mute button.

The idea of accountability. So within Methodism, there's this thing called band meetings. And essentially, you just get people in your lives where you confess your sin, confess your temptations, confess how you've been delivered, confess if you're unsure if there's anything in your life, whether it be sin or not. And then you confess if there's anything that you want to hide.

I think that would be a good practical thing for a lot of us in the idea of we get it, such as Caleb said from James 5, 16. We confess our sins to one another so that we hold each other accountable so that we can grow in godliness together. And so I think the two ways that that happens is fellowship with God through his word and fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ.

Yeah, very good. I think this has been a good discussion, and I think it should be helpful to people. I would say so in summary, we really want to focus on the quality of our devotion to God more so than the quantity. And we should think about some practical ways that we can remain devoted to God. It's not necessarily the chunk of Scripture reading all at once.

It's not necessarily an hour of prayer on your knees. You have to be hurting afterwards to have really loved God through it. It's about having that devotion to God throughout your day, the heart that's ready to pray. I know I had a friend tell me years ago, when the Bible says pray without ceasing, he said it's not so much that you're constantly praying and you're never doing anything else, but he said it's almost like when you have a cough and you know it can always come.

You never know when you're just going to cough, and that's how he described it. I thought that was pretty sweet. And then I'll just toss a joke in there. Somebody brought up Paul beating his body, and I have a good friend who every time we go out to eat, he says, Paul buffeted his body, so we're to buffet our bodies. I always like that one. Well, I think we've gone about a half hour here, So I'll just real quick, you know, we're proud of anyone, you know, in like a good sense.

We're proud of anyone that comes and says, hey, I'm having this struggle. The confession of the struggle is actually evidence that the Holy Spirit's working in your life to give you good desires and that you're fighting this evil flesh that is still corrupted by the original sin of Adam until we're glorified. and so we're very happy that somebody would be at this point. It actually gives us great hope for that person in particular, my friend who brought this up.

And so with that being said, Andrew, do you have any final thoughts? Yeah, be thankful. Going along with what everyone's saying, be thankful. Whenever you are feeling frustrated because there is a battle, be thankful for the battle because the alternative is there is no battle because you're just of the flesh in the world. be thankful and give God the glory in the struggle of trying to spend more time with him.

And if that's your heart's attitude, then you will avoid sin. You will want to repent of sin. Table Talk Magazine says, I think November edition, it would talk about gratefulness. And it said the root of all sin is is a lack of being thankful so it's just being thankful in the struggle and giving god glory in the struggle and um that's that's why i would close with yeah that's that's romans 121 right for although they knew god they did not honor him as god nor give thanks to him right but became futile in their thinking james any final third caleb i sorry man you confused me with the two thing You not the only one that gets confused by that Caleb any final thoughts My final thought again something I love to tell the people in counseling, when we look at the scripture and we see pictures and illustrations of spiritual growth, we almost always see agricultural illustrations, right?

A plant growing and that slow growth, right the lord grows us slowly that is his normal chosen means to do it and so keep plotting along forget what's behind reach forward to what's ahead and and strive after christ as he laid a hold of you and in philippians chapter 3 he made me think of isaiah 53 like a root out of dry ground and for he grew up before him like a young plant you made me think of that agricultural reference there to Jesus growing, right? Thank you. Corey, any final thoughts from you?

Yeah, we worship a God who has spoken, and it's through his word that we are called to repentance, that we are called to faith and eternal life in him. And so it's the life-giving word that we are to dive into. And so when you look to the word of God, the Holy Bible, that is what gives us life it is our spiritual food and so we should desire to be in it we should desire to listen to god and we should desire to glorify him in what we do and what we think and what we say so dive into the word of god get the word of god into you until we're in the presence of god for all eternity worshiping glorifying him let's get a little flame reference there I'll toss in one final thing in the ring especially for a family man is having family time where you're reading the Bible I read the Bible to my little boys before bed we don't always have like a formal let's sing a hymn and we don't always have a formal family worship time with the little boys but we read morning from Charles Spurgeon book every morning with them.

And I'm hoping over the years, that'll just sink into them, even though I'm sure they don't understand it sometimes. And then I'll read the Bible to them pretty much every night while they're in bed. And what I realized some days is, oh, wow, I'm reading the Bible too. And I'm asking them questions, and I'm inspecting the text a little bit, and then they asked me questions, and last night my son, I read him Psalm 44.

It was just on my reading plan. I just thought, well, I'm on my reading plan. I'll just read my plan to him, because I didn't do my plan in the morning, and somewhat ironic with this discussion, but I read Psalm 44, and he started asking me questions, and all of a sudden, I'm like practically preaching to him, and of course, that's the Psalm that Paul talks about in Corinthians when he says, you know, all the day long we're being killed.

And so I'm trying to explain to my son what God was really trying to say in that psalm because that psalm really is, if you remember it, you know, they're kind of accusing God of not taking care of him. And I was explaining to him, you know, why God would have had that happen and why that psalm was written. And it was really cool. And I had like an impromptu devotion to God, and it caused me to have to think about something.

And that was just from just reading scriptures to my son. And frankly, it was because I didn't feel like reading Genesis 26. Whatever the next one was, was kind of long because I'm reading my kids Genesis. And so it was just an easy way to be in scripture myself is to do it with my family and especially little kids. They love that stuff. They're interested in the Bible stories.

So, well, thank you. Thank you, Pastor Andrew Beebe and Pastor Caleb Hackworth and ex-pastor, but future pastor, Corey Bailey. My buddies, I appreciate you guys coming on and talking about this. So I hope everybody who hears it is blessed in some way. Thank you for listening to Be a Berean with your host, Michael Coughlin. I am a writer at thingsabove.us. and I also have a personal website michaelcoghlan.net You can contact me by emailing me michael at thingsabove.us I hope that you have been encouraged to search the scriptures.