Men, Be This Man

Oh, evangelists, so good to be back. Thank you so much. You may be seated. What an incredible weekend we had at the arena. And hey, listen, I know I don't have to tell you this, but I'm going to tell you this again. Whatever you do here, never take great leadership for granted. And you have some of the very best leaders right here. Come on. Can you show some love to pastors Josh and Jenae? Destin, I love them so much. Think so highly of them and just an honor to be with them and to be with you today. As Josh says, I currently work as a high performance coach specializing in mindset and behavior optimization. I work in the corporate space. I work with the U.S. military in the sports world. And basically what I do is I help individuals and teams close the gap from where they are now to where they want to be in the future. And we do that by identifying limiting beliefs, creating new beliefs, and then constructing mindsets, skill sets, and tool sets that open the door to new results and the next levels of life and success. And I really do believe that this is what the apostle Paul, a leader in the early church, was trying to do for us as Christians as well. He wrote to the believers in Rome. And in Romans chapter 12, this is what he says. He says, don't copy the behavior and the customs of this world. Another translation says, do not conform to the pattern of this world. And here's what you need to know. Out in the world, there are behaviors, there are customs, there are patterns. There are behaviors, customs, patterns, habits that create average, that create ordinary. But here's what he's saying.

God didn't create you to be average. God didn't create you to be normal. God didn't create you to be ordinary. Here's what God created you for. He says, let God transform you into what? To a new person by changing the way you, ah, by changing the way you think. If you want God to change your life, you have to partner with God and letting him help you change the way that you think, the way that you think about him, the way that you think about yourselves, the way that you think about others, the way that you think about what is actually possible in your future. And this scripture is going to be an umbrella of a topic that we are going to dive into today. And as Pastor Josh said, next week on Mother's Day, Pastor Janae is going to be preaching a message revolving around this topic, women be this woman. And I didn't want the men to feel left out here on the Sunday after men's conference. So I'm going to be speaking today on this topic of men, be this man, men, be this man, be this kind of man. Now, if you're like 22 year old female and you just came to church, you're like, oh no, no, listen, if you are a human, you can take any of these principles that work for you as well. Okay. Now, I need to tell you something up front, and that is that I am more of a practitioner than I am a preacher. I am a practitioner, meaning that I am here not just to get a shout on Sunday, I'm here to help you with solutions for your Monday. There are preachers that preach for an amen, but I teach for an oh man, because there's some truth that hits you and you just go, oh man, oh man. And because I am a practitioner, I want you to take some notes today because I'm not just here so we can have a great experience today. I'm here so that you can have better execution in your home and in your work and in your

life all week long. So I want you to take great notes. And after all, I mean, there's a, there's a theology we have here in North Dakota and the theology is this, the better notes you take, bigger your mansion in heaven. Okay. And so if you want a big mansion in heaven, you need to take good notes in church today. If you're a new believer, that is not actually in the Bible. Let me ask you a question. I don't want you to answer out loud, but I do want you to answer honestly. Where in your life do you know what to do, but you're not currently doing it? Where in your life right now do you know what you need to be doing, but you are not currently doing it? Maybe it's spiritually, and you know that you need to be reading your Bible and praying, but you find yourself every night watching more news than you ever needed to, scrolling on Instagram and Facebook. Maybe it's in your family. You know you need to be more present and active with your spouse and with your kids, but you come home and work continues to dominate your thoughts and time. Maybe it has to do with your lifestyle. Like you know you need to start exercising. You know you need to start eating healthier, but you just keep delaying that start date. At one time it was I'm going to start next Monday, and then it turned into I'm going to start next month, and now today it's like I'm going to start next millennium, right? I mean it just keeps on getting pushed further and further away, and here's what you need to be aware of. You need to be aware of that space, that gap between what you know you need to do and what you're actually doing, because in that gap, in that space is where frustration lives. I've had seasons of my life where I knew exactly what I needed to do, but I just wasn't doing it, and it's not because I didn't care, and it's not because I didn't have faith in God. It was just that something in my life wasn't aligned, and if you have ever felt that type of frustration before, trust me you are not alone. If you are feeling that frustration of like I'm not doing what I know I need to be doing, and maybe you're sitting in this place and you feel like you're the only one sitting in this place with that frustration, friends let me tell you, you are not alone. But hear me this morning, you are not alone, but you are responsible for fixing it. You are responsible for fixing it. Now let me give you the good news.

The good news is this, is that you are fully capable of fixing it, and you are fully capable of fixing it because you have the same spirit that raised Christ from the dead living and dwelling on the inside of you. The spirit of the creator is on the inside of you giving you all of the strength and the courage and the wisdom that you need to move from where you are today to who he created you to be. You are not alone in the journey. Other people in this room have experienced it, but more importantly you are not alone because God is with you in the journey. Now listen men, most of you in this room, you don't have a desire problem. You have a desire to be the best you can be. You have a desire to honor and worship God with your life. You have a desire to change and to become. You don't have a desire problem, instead you have a design problem. Your life is not designed according to your desire. Years ago I had a mentor tell me this, and I was having a conversation with him, and what I thought I was doing, I thought I was explaining my situation. Now looking back, I was actually complaining about my situation, and I never will forget when he looked me right in the eye and he said, Philip, your life is perfectly designed to give you the results that you are currently getting. That was simultaneously the meanest thing that anybody could have said, and the most helpful thing that anybody could have said. It was the most hurtful because it just reminded me that it was my actions, my design that was creating my results, but it was the most helpful because I realized that if I actually changed my design, I could change my results. I could get something different by changing what I do. And you see today, if you want to live the abundant life, if you want that life that God created you to have, living the abundant life comes from having an aligned life. Because when what you believe and how you behave don't match, listen, you will feel it, and then your life will reveal it. When what you believe and what you do, when they are not aligned, when they are not matched up, you will first feel it, and then your life will reveal it. You see, it shows up first as frustration. Frustration is an internal state. You don't know when I am frustrated. I can hide my frustration, but oh, make no mistake, you feel the frustration when you know what you need to do when you are frustrated. or not doing it, and if I don't do something about that, then my frustration will eventually be revealed to others and it becomes exasperation,

and exasperation is just visible frustration. It's when I let what is in me out of me and it shows up in anger, it shows up in rage, it shows up in hurtful words, or maybe it goes all the way to exhaustion and I burn out because I never dealt with the frustration, or maybe it goes all the way to the other end and it is depression. But I have to know that that is a dangerous space to be in. There's danger in that gap, and the Bible speaks to that gap in James chapter one. And James writes these words and he says, but don't just listen to God's word, you must do what it says, otherwise you are only fooling yourselves. You see, whenever you deceive yourself, you will betray yourself, and when you betray yourself, you fall into a cycle and a system that keeps you locked in an old pattern and an old way that will only continue to produce frustration because you're not moving into the man that you wanna be. For if you listen to the word and don't obey, he writes, he said, it's like glancing at your face in the mirror, you see yourself, you walk away and you forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.

See, this is the issue that we have as human beings. We look in the mirror, we see ourselves, and we recognize what needs to change, but then we walk away and we don't do anything about it and nothing changes. We look in the mirror and we have a desire that says, man, I wanna be a better husband. Man, I wanna be a better father. Man, I wanna be a better follower of Jesus. I wanna be better salt and light in the world. I want to be better. We have a desire, but then we walk away and we don't create a design for our life that will produce the desire that is actually in our heart. See, if you want change, let me tell you how real change comes into your life. Real change only happens when what you believe, what you accept, and what you do are all aligned. When you believe the right things and then you accept, that means that you allow the right inputs into your life. You allow the right influences. You allow the right voices and the environments and the atmosphere. When you allow the right things in, when you accept that, and then when you do the right things, when that is alignment, if you break that down, believe, accept, and do, B-A-D, it's a cross. It's bad, man. You a bad mamma jamma. Okay, whenever you get your beliefs

and what you are accepting and allowing and what you're doing, when those things are in alignment, hear me, men, you become an unstoppable force on the earth for God. So let's just look at a few things today. How do you become this kind of man? What does this look like to live this abundant life and be everything that God created us to be? Men, be this man. Here's the first kind of man that we need to be. Be the man who has hope. Be the man who has hope. Right belief creates right direction. Right belief creates right direction. Let me give you a little working definition for the word hope that I like to use. And I say that hope is the courageous act of choosing to believe that something better is possible. Make no mistake, hope is a courageous act. You have to have courage to believe that tomorrow can be better than today. You have to have courage to believe that my marriage in the future can be better than the marriage of my past. You have to have courage. It takes courage to believe that everything in my life can get better. God spoke to his prophet Jeremiah who was in a difficult place. God's people were in a difficult place.

Decades of oppression. And he says this in Jeremiah 29, for I know the plans I have for you. They are plans to prosper you, not to harm you. They are plans to give you hope and a future because before you can ever walk into a future, the first thing that God has to do is he has to reset your hope. This is why hope matters because hope is a prerequisite to step into future possibilities. Friends, please hear me. You will never step into what is possible if you don't have first, have a hope, a courageous act of believing that it actually is possible. actually is possible. So I tell my clients all the time, you have to see it in your mind before you'll ever see it in your life. You have to see it here before you'll ever actually see it there. And here's the reason why. Let me just give you a helpful tip of how your brain actually works. Your brain is not designed to show you reality. Instead, your brain is wired by what psychologists call confirmation bias, meaning that it naturally looks for evidence to support and confirm what you already believe.

It's how your brain works. Let me show you how this shows up in your life, how it shows up in my life. If you walk into your home believing that your spouse doesn't appreciate you and doesn't respect you, when you walk in with that belief, you know what, you're gonna find evidence to prove it. You're gonna notice the tone. You're gonna notice what she doesn't say. You're gonna notice what she doesn't do. But listen, if you walk into the house believing that they are trying their very best, you'll notice different things. This is why I always say, you will always find whatever it is that you are looking for. It's the same house. It's the same conversation. It's a different belief that creates what? A different experience. That is how your brain works. We don't see reality. We only see through our belief, which is very important because what does that mean for us? It means that if our belief is off, the direction of our life will be off. If my belief is off, I start to say things like this to myself. I will never be able to change that.

If my belief is off, I start saying things like, we won't ever have that level of relationship or that level of trust. If my belief is off, I start to say things like, that's just the way I am. And friends, hear me today. Once you believe that, you stop looking for another way. When you believe that it won't change, when you believe that it can't change, when you believe that you will never have, when you believe that's just the way I am, you stop looking for another way. And this is when things that actually are possible start to feel impossible. I love what Henry Ford says. He says, whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right. And if we're honest today, some of us in this room, we don't really believe that we can change anymore. We don't really believe that we can grow. We don't really believe that we can have something different. We don't really believe that we can become more. And listen, we believe it for good reasons because we've been so disappointed. We've tried before and it didn't work. We gave it our best and we failed. And so we're sitting in here today with beliefs, but listen to me, if you don't have that kind of hope, listen, your life will always stay the same

because where your hope goes, your life follows. And if my hopes are down, guess where my life is going in the direction of my hopes? This is why I always say, you gotta get your hopes up and you gotta get your hopes down and you gotta get your hopes up. You gotta get your hopes up because where my hope goes, my life follows. And if you want your life to begin to move in the direction that God created you to be, you have to say, I will take the courageous act of believing once again that better is possible in my life, better is possible in my relationships, better is possible in my spiritual journey, and I'm gonna get my hopes up so that I can begin to move in that direction. Be a man who has hope. Here's the second thing. You gotta be a man who pursues help. Not just a man who has hope, you gotta be a man who pursues help. Right input corrects wrong thinking. Proverbs 12, 15 says, Think their own way is right, but the wise listen to others Pursuing help is not weakness men. It's wisdom It's right there in the scriptures the wise Listen to others. I like to say it this way weak men avoid help Prideful men reject help but strong men pursue help And help is what separates men who want to change from men who create change There's a lot of people who want change

There's a lot of people who want things to be better But you have to create that and help is the secret sauce proverbs 1522 says plans go wrong for lack of advice You could you could trade out plans for desires that that your desire Once again, you want you have a desire to do things, right? You have a desire to please God my desire is that but it goes wrong for what a lack of advice but many advisors bring success Because every single person has blind spots There are things that you can't see and the reason you can't see them is your brain is biased Your brain naturally goes to protect your ego and justify your behavior And you know why that's a problem for us is because you cannot correct what you can't see So Your brain the way your brain is wired it is protecting your ego It is justifying your behaviors. It is biased and you cannot see here's a simple neuroscience insight your brain prefers stability over growth if I give my seven-year-old son an option to play with his toys or read a book. What is he going to take? Play with those toys man Because he's on autopilot But if he has to read he's got to think okay, what is this word right here, right? Say same same say he's having to work and the brain doesn't want to work Listen, it doesn't matter if you're seven or if you're 57 your brain prefers Autopilot it prefers stability over growth. So whenever truth challenges us. Here's what we tend to do We resist we rationalize and we defend We resist we rationalize and we defend What does that mean for you? And for me, it means that you will naturally defend the very things that are holding you back The very patterns in your life that are holding you back from the life that God created you to have

The very behaviors in your life that are holding you back from your breakthrough We will defend the things that are holding us back why because that feedback and that correction it feels so Uncomfortable because it is threatening our identity and our control So we resist and we defend but I love what Ken Blanchard says. He says feedback is the breakfast of champions Feedback coaching correction. It's the breakfast of champions Because champions Understand you cannot maximize your potential or optimize your output output without feedback Me and hear me clearly this morning. Sometimes you don't need more effort. You need better input It's not about you working harder, it's about you getting better input and better information And here's what I'll tell you if you're not pursuing help you won't find it because help is not something that comes and finds you It's something that you have to go after So be men who pursue help and then lastly Be the man who builds habits Be the man who builds habits right repetition constructs real results right repetition You know Paul the leader in the church He's writing to his mentee and spiritual son Timothy and this is what he says in first Timothy. He says train yourself To be godly He said you you want to be like God you want to be like Christ you you want the fruit of the Spirit you Want the fullness that God said you could have you don't get that just by coming to an altar or saying one prayer you have to train And for that, you have to embrace the discipline. I love this definition for the word habits. Habits are repeated actions that shape identity and produce outcomes. This is how important habits are in your life because they are shaping your identity. They are shaping who you are and they are producing the results and the outcomes in your life. Habits are so profoundly powerful.

But habits don't just happen. They come through what? Through discipline. But do you know that you can't separate the word disciple from discipline? They come from the exact same root word. So it means this, if I wanna be a disciple of Jesus Christ, what do I have to do? I have to adopt the disciplines of Jesus Christ. And you start putting habits. Why are habits so important? Because what you repeat, you reinforce and what you reinforce, you become. What you repeat in your life, you're reinforcing in your life. What you reinforce in your life, listen, that's what you are becoming. I love what John Maxwell says. He says, life is a matter of choices and every choice you make makes you. Every choice you make, it's actually making you. James Clear, the author of Atomic Habits, he writes these words, every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. Your habits today are your vote for who you want to be tomorrow. Don't get overwhelmed. Listen, I'm not asking you to change everything. Here's what I'm asking you to do. I'm asking you just to start something.

Just one habit that you can begin today. Be the man who builds habits. Be the man who starts small, stays consistent and fights to follow through. Be that man who fights to follow through. Be the man who doesn't quit. Why? Because there is a promise in the scripture for you found in Galatians and it says, so let's not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time, we will, everybody say will. Will. Doesn't say you might, it doesn't say you could, it doesn't say it's possible. It says you will reap a harvest of blessing if you do not give up. Keep building the habits. Listen, be this kind of man. Be a man who has hope even in the face of adversity. Even in the face of disappointment. Don't let the disappointment steal your hope. Your courageous act of believing once again that your future can be better than your past. Be the kind of man who's pursuing help. Because I've got issues and I've got struggles and I've got problems that I need answer to and I'm not going to find the answers if I don't go pursue the help that I need. Be a man who pursues help. And then be a man who builds healthy habits.

We got three questions I'm gonna throw up on the screen for you and here's what I want you to do. I want you to take a picture of it or write these down because I want you to take these questions home and I want you to answer them. Maybe with your spouse, maybe with a close friend, somebody in your life group or whatever. I want you to answer these questions. The first question is this, is where is my belief weak? Where have I let hope slip through my fingers? Second question, where am I resisting help? Where am I holding on to old ways that are preventing me from moving into a new life? And what habit must I build in my life right now? And listen, if you do that, what's gonna happen is that that hope is going to bring back the right beliefs. If you do that and you find out where you need help, what you're gonna do is you're gonna begin to accept and allow people to speak into your life. And then whenever you start to do the right thing, you're gonna start building habits and that's why I told you earlier, you will not change your beliefs. I told you earlier, you will not change until what you believe, what you accept and what you do all align. If you wanna be a bad mama jamma and you wanna be a bad woman jamma, and listen, if that's what you want, you get your beliefs, you get what you accept.

You get what you do and you get all in alignment and you will be an unstoppable force for God on the earth, for his kingdom, for his glory, for his purpose. But we gotta get aligned, come on, will you stand with me? Bow your heads just for a moment. Come on right now in this room, you say, Philip, I wanna be that kind of man or I wanna be that kind of woman. I wanna be a person who has hope. I wanna be a person who's pursuing help. And I wanna be a person who is consistently and constantly building healthy habits. Because I want my belief, my acceptance and my doing all in alignment. Come on, if I'm speaking to you and say, Philip, that's the way I wanna live all the days of my life. If that is your desire, come on, just lift up your hand right there where you are. Lift up your hand and say, that's what I want for my life. That's what I want for my life. Come on, with that hand lifted, I just wanna pray for you right now. Father, you see each and every hand that is lifted in this room. God, I pray that today we would move not just from the desire of a lifted hand, but the design for a life that brings about this desire. God, that we would not just look in the mirror this morning and realize what needs to change. But then when we walk out of these doors today,

we would begin the process of change. That we would begin to create a design that says, what is going to be my design to hang on to hope even in the midst of hard times? What is going to be my design that allows me to pursue help instead of backing down and walking away? What is going to be my design that helps me to build the healthy habits that I need so that I can have a healthy life and a healthy marriage and a healthy house? What do I need to do today? God, I pray that you would help us. God, thank you that we are not alone, but we are being empowered by your spirit throughout the journey. Holy Spirit, do what only you can do as we do everything that we can do for your kingdom, for your glory and your purposes on the earth. Come on, if you believe that today, put your hands together, give God some praise in this house. Thank you.