It Was Always the Plan | Crossroads Daily

Hey, I'm Chuck. I'm Kirsten. I'm Caleb. I'm Chris. Thanks for being with us as we talk about Hebrews chapter 8. Again, just this theme of what is now permanent and real because of Jesus is so good. So I want to ask you guys, where has your faith moved from something that's more duty or obligation to something that's more real and personal? Do you have a specific example of how that's played out? I think for me, I've flip-flopped between duty and obligation and just a personal relationship with the Lord. I remember when I first started my faith journey in college, it was all new to me and I was obsessed. I could not get enough of reading my Bible, praying, journaling, serving, doing all the things because I was like, this is going to change my life and is changing my life. I remember there was no obligation there. It was all just out of pure joy and infatuation with Jesus. As I got more involved in church and church life, you just pick up things that you wouldn't get just from being alone in the desert following Jesus. You pick up like, oh, what does it take to get baptized and communion and all these things that we kind of put boxes around or quiet times, all the things. I find myself teetering back to like, oh, if I'm not doing this, I'm not doing it right or I'm not doing a good job or I have to ask all these questions before they fully accept Jesus. I'm so humbled whenever I interact with someone new to their faith. Baby believer is what I call them. My little baby believers. You instantly remember how there's no bar. It's just proclaim with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and that is that. I love that and it almost keeps me around people that are not in the church circles because they remind me of just the baseline that I started with, which was just like, can you just be in love with Jesus and who he is and flow out of that versus trying to keep everything buttoned up and compartmentalizing the checklist. I've been saying I'm in a rebellious phase right now against spiritual disciplines, which is not good. Being rebellious against spiritual disciplines is not good. I do not recommend it. I do and I'm having that conversation with God of like, help me with this, help me with this. So really I said a lot of words just to say I am actively wrestling with what that tension looks like in my life. It says in scripture that it's God's kindness that leads us to repentance and that's something that he's really been hitting me with because I aim to please. I like to know the checklist and I like to do the checklist and like now I know that we are good. But doing the checklist isn't relationship, right? It's not. It's religion, I guess. And I'm finding like God uses kindness to draw me in,

right? He's not like, I've got to wait till Caleb does all the things and then I can be near him. He's like the high priest that comes to us. I'm seeing that with my boys are playing baseball right now. They had a game early in the season where they were very distracted. Playing outfield is boring. There's a lot of grass there to pick. They're playing with their baseball chain, which they had to have, right? And so after the game I was like, guys, I came down kind of hard on them. I was like, guys, come on. Do you want to play this game or not? Your teammates are counting on you. Your coaches are counting on you. And I came down so hard on them that they were like, I don't know. It made it harder for them to play. And I was like, guys, I see your potential and I want you to do better. And I felt like God told me in that moment. He's like, I see your potential. Do I do that to you? I was like, no, this is about them. This is about their efforts. But seriously, since then, I've been trying to lead them in kindness. So after every game in the car, instead of me telling them what they did wrong, hey guys, what are you proud of that you did today on the field? Hey, what did you learn today that you didn't know? And in that conversation, I realized one of my kids didn't know what the strike zone was. We've been playing baseball for three years. You know what the strike zone is, bro? To be fair, umpires don't really know that either. That's true. Instead of me fussing at him though, we just had a conversation like, oh, I had empathy for that. Cause you don't know where the ball is. Try it, kids, why are you gonna swing, right? So anyway, God's teaching me kindness and his kindness draws me to him, yeah. It reminds me of something I always say. My kids, I believe one of their key reasons in my life is to be my best biblical teachers. I learn so much from my kids and that's just a powerful example of that, that's so good. It's great, like that, I relate so much to that, Caleb, because that's just the easier thing to do is check the boxes because you see the result instantly. But relationship takes a lot of time, it takes progress, it takes patience in a space where it's like,

well, you can make a living off of checking all the boxes in Christianity, and people will look at you and be like, you're doing a great job. And you can look at yourself and be like, I am doing a great job, but missing knowing God, which that's a lot of my story, and you get super bitter over time. If it's just about doing the right things, then you don't know God and you're like, why am I doing this anymore? This is not fun, why am I following God if it's just about this? And a scripture that I've only, this is the only scripture I've read the past couple weeks because it's just been destroying me is in John 12, when Jesus is in the Last Supper with the disciples and he says, if anyone serves me, they must follow me. And I think I probably read that a few times, but it felt like God was pulling it off the page for me, like, oh, I can do the serving part, I can do hard things, my brain can lock in and really do stuff I don't wanna do, but the follow me part, it's like, wow, that's, he doesn't want just the serving, he doesn't want me just to do a bunch of stuff. He's like, that's actually empty if you're not following me, you gotta have both. And that, I'm like, oh, the following is just hard because it's relational, it's vulnerability,

it's connection, stuff that takes time. Yeah, true. I was struck by this verse 10 in Hebrews 8 says, for this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days and he says this, I will put my laws into their minds and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God and they shall be my people. And I just love that idea of God saying, I'm going to put in you my law. It's gonna be so intimate, so relational that it's literally gonna be in you. It's not a thing that's out here to obtain or to study or to memorize, but it's in you. And I just think like, for me, that's been a place of really shifting the way that I think about my relationship with God. I have a mentor who says that following Jesus is about seeking and returning, seeking and returning. We seek, we get distracted, we return. We seek, we get distracted, we return. And I think about this with my own kids. God is delighted in our returning. That's right. We get frustrated, we think God has a checklist and after the 10th time that you distracted yourself, I don't have any more grace. God is delighted in our returning. He knows, I mean, think about your kids, right? Like, how old are your boys?

They're 10 and nine. Yeah, at 10 and nine, they're gonna get distracted in the outfield. That's gonna happen, right? And yet God is like, look, at 50, Chuck's gonna get distracted in the outfield. And what I delight in is when Chuck returns. I delight when he realizes, oh, I've been going too fast. I'm too busy. Hey God, I'm gonna slow down and be with you. Yes, here I am. I think that's the thing that I'm, I think I'm starting to believe it at a deeper level and it's starting to change, I don't know, my ease or comfort of returning, you know? Yeah. You see, I got that highlighted in my Bible. I see you do. Okay, make sure, make sure. Ladies and gentlemen, if we can get a close-up here. I do read that thing, guys. It's right there, it's right there, just wanna say it. Yes, this is a well-used Bible here. So, I mean, what else either struck you from this chapter or as you think about this verse today, how are you gonna live this out today? What's the today reality of this for you? I just love, over half of this chapter, at least in my Bible, is bold and it's a prophecy from Jeremiah,

which I didn't know this ahead of time I looked it up. Jeremiah lived like 600 years before Jesus, right? And so, again, this is just another way, like Melchizedek last chapter, where God highlights in bold, I got the whole thing. I got the storyline. I know where I'm taking you. I've got a plan. And so, there's some stuff in my life right now that feels like, is there a plan? Where the heck are we, what is going on? There is, there is a plan, right? And I can take control of what I can take control of today and can't control anything about tomorrow, right? So I gotta follow Jesus today. Yeah, I love it. I once heard trying to ask God for all the answers, which, let's be clear, we don't even want them. Even if we were given all the answers, what would we do with that? Nothing, like I'm not even convinced that we're ever gonna get all the answers, but it's like asking a new, I probably said this before, I'm obsessed with this saying, it's like asking a newborn baby. To take up some keys and start driving a car. It's like, oh, yeah, you're ready to take this car To do with a 16 year old teenager My son just got a three-year-old sized Excavator and the first thing he did with it was run over his brother. I'm telling it's gonna get that out of the way now

Like I yeah, I find so much peace in the same thing like why Just abide just be present. Yeah It gives me freedom to be patient with myself because I know God is patient with me first Like otherwise, I would not I'd have to strive if there's no patience from God It's like then I'm done for but I can be gracious and patient myself because God set that standard. Yeah, that's good, man Hey, you know what as we wrap up today? I think that's a great place to land Today today give yourself grace and today Receive the grace that God has for you. Thanks for being with us. We'll see you tomorrow