The Real Reason You Can't Slow Down | Crossroads Church

the prison director at Crossroads Church. And we've reached the final weeks of a series, Well Played. The game planned for a light of low. For the last few weeks, we've talked about the gentle heart of Jesus, letting go of control and learning to carry the yoke that he offers instead of the burdens that the world puts on us. Today, we're talking about rest. I just physical rest, the kind of rest that reaches deep into your soul. I know that's given poetic right there. I know it is. But at the end of the day, look, it's true. Because the truth is, you can be sitting still and still feel exhausted. You can get eight hours of sleep and still carry anxiety or fear or worry that weighs you down. Jesus gives us this promise though. In Matthew 11, he says, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. That's the invitation. Not to figure everything out on your own, but to bring our birds to him and trust him with the weight that we're carrying. Today, Chuck Mingo, Chuck E. He's going to help us explore what anxiety does to us and what it looks like to accept Jesus' invitation to true rest. After the message, we'll also have the opportunity to take a million again as we remember the hope and peace and we have in Christ. Let's get started. Every day we roll the dice, another decision, another responsibility, another space to move. We keep chasing the next thing, hoping we'll finally arrive. But Jesus offers something different. He doesn't promise to take away the hard stuff in life, but he does show us a different way to play the game. In Matthew 11, Jesus says, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." How are you doing Crossroads family? So good to be with you. If you're new, we're around here and haven't met yet. My name is Chuck. I'm one of the teaching pastors here and we're going to wrap up this well-played series which has been so, so good. And before we do that, I want to invite you to one of those groups that you heard. You talked about being better together and there's something that God has wrecked my heart for and given us a vision for as a church and that is to have a church that literally looks like heaven. What do I mean when I say that? At the end of the Bible in Revelation 7, we see a picture and it is people from every language tribe and tongue. Every ethnicity is together as one collective family joyful before God. We might speak different languages. We might look different ways, but we sing the same song. And that is a part of the thing that God has put on me and as part of my ministry around here. And that's why I want to invite you into a group called How to Heal Our Racial Divide.

This is a group that we've done a couple times already and it's been an incredible experience of belonging. So here's the thing. You're being formed on how to think about race and ethnicity, whether you know it or not. The question is, are you being formed to the heart of Jesus? And this is a group where we don't want to be misinformed and we don't want you to be malformed. We want to be conformed to the heart of Jesus on this topic. We've had over 500 people do this group already. We had 100 person waiting lists, but because of so many leaders at all of our sites, we've got room for everybody to join this thing that wants to at sites and either online. Man, it's amazing. And it's already a group where marriages have been transformed, new friendships have been formed, and people are growing closer to Jesus. Somebody put it way better than I could. They said, healing our racial divide has changed this from something I believe into something I'm responsible for living out. I'm learning to look for Jesus and expect to find Him in everyone. And I just love that for us as a church. And so with love for you to be a part of that, you can find out more clicking that QR code and join us to be a part of this incredible experience on how to heal our racial divide. All right, so it's week four of Well Played. We're looking at this soul-satisfying promise of Jesus. And every time I teach, I want you to get to know me a little bit too. And so I want to take you guys back. Is that all right? I'm going to take you back. The year is 1990. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This is me with a high-top faith. Mine was never that high-top. I wish it was. I probably had a decent faith, but it was never that high-top. But I was an insecure, acne-laced high-schooler, freshman, nervous about making friends. And in the midst of that, I experienced a lot of peace through a particular group and a particular song. The group is take six. Six part harmony, think gospel, R&B, amazing. And they had this song that's based on Matthew 1128, the scripture we've been looking at. And actually, I just want to play a little bit of it for you because it just takes me back. Let's play a little bit of that right now. Yes. See your evil labor. And I... - They were looking for a seventh member, I was down. ♪ I will love you ♪ - Oh, I love this song. ♪ You at the heart of me ♪ ♪ Or I will be ♪

♪ Can only in heart ♪ - All right, that's enough. That's enough. Just wanted to give you a little taste of that. Man, that song, I'm telling you, that song, got me through a lot of really insecure days in high school. And I thought about it. I'm like, what if we have some fun with that? You guys up for doing something fun? All right, we're gonna do something fun. We're gonna make some music together based on that song by Take Six. I need a little help for this, though. So would you join me in welcoming to the stage, my friend Regis Jones. A.K.A. K-Drama. Grammy nominated hip-hop artist from our very own 513, Christian hip-hop artist. And while he's setting up, I'm gonna tell you that, we've actually had a secret mission in this series. I don't know if you caught it or not. But we keep showing that verse, right? Matthew 11, 28 through 30, that's because secretly, we hope that you would accidentally or maybe purposefully memorize these words of Jesus. When he says, come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me for I am gentle and lowly in heart. And Jesus says, you will find rest. Everybody say, rest for your souls.

He says, for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. So we're gonna have some fun with this. First of all, Regis, tell people a little bit about yourself. - All right, so I go by K-Drama. I've been doing Christian rap since I was in high school. I was one of those Acne Field kids as well, you know what I'm saying? Name's greatest when I started. And since then, I've also been doing music production. I produce a lot of my songs. And full circle moment, now I teach music production as an elective at Aiken High School. So I've been doing that for a few years, yeah. - I know when I was in high school, none of my teachers were this cool dressed one. So I'm just saying, just a blessing that you are investing in the next generation in that way. And speaking of investment, this is quite an investment. You got quite the machine here. In fact, we got a camera out. I want you guys to get a look at this. What is this thing? What is this? - Okay, so this is called the MPC, which stands for Music Production Center. - Okay, okay. - It looks like your traditional drum machine, but you can do more with this. You can hook up keyboards and play loops in here, or you could sample your very own sound. So like I got sounds, traditional sounds

that everyone's probably heard like this. Like, you know, your standard DJ sound. I even went back on YouTube, got one of your classic sermons. And I sampled that in here where you say something like this, like, "I like that, that's a lot." - Yeah, so. - Give me that very white voice. - Yeah, I like that very white voice. - Let's see if we can do that. Hold on, hold on, hold on. - Can I get an amen so? - Can I get an amen so? Can I get an amen? - Yeah. - And somebody, you could get lower, but yeah. - I like that. - Okay, so, but you were saying like, man, great production, Dr. Dre. - Kanye. - Kanye. - Lil Jon. - Usher. - Yeah, yeah. - That was produced all over me. - All on this thing. - Yeah, for sure. - All right, so we got the right guy. Can you agree? We got the right guy.

We got the right guy. All right, so we wanna, we wanna just like, you know, I was telling you this came back to me 'cause I was listening to some lo-fi and lo-fi is like old school hip-hop kind of smoothed out, you know, great study music. And so I kind of love listening to that. I read to that all I kind of think. So, if you were gonna do a lo-fi scripture memorization tool for our church, based on Take Six, in Matthew 11, 28, through 30, where would you start us out? - Wow, wow. - Okay. - All right, so, so we're gonna remix it. - Gotta remix it. - We're gonna remix it. - We're gonna remix it. - Let me, let me give my, my fingers straight first. All right, let's see, let's see what we'll work. So there's 16 pads and they each have something different. - Okay. Okay. ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ - Okay. Okay. ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪

♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ - Ooh, yeah. Put your hands together, y'all. Come on. ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay. - Okay.

- Okay. ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ ♪ Come on to me ♪ - Okay. - Okay. That's a little fire. That's a little fire. I can stay with that. I can stay with that, yep. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING] Now, where would you take it from here? [MUSIC PLAYING] Oh, yes! Yes! Yes! [MUSIC PLAYING] Alright, keep that going. We're going to join. You're singing this with me y'all. Come on, my body. Come on, sing it, wake me. My body is going to be my body.

You're a good boy, baby, come on. I'm here, you're burning. My body is going to be my body. That was so fun. That was so fun. And if you want a fully mixed version of that, you produce that. That's just a blessing to everybody. You can tap that stick on the front of your seat and you can get access to that. So if you want to study that, read to that, use that to memorize this verse. You can thank Regent Jones for that. Thank you, man. Thank you. Was that fun? That was fun, right? That was fun. Ask all your other Christian friends that they got to hear M.T.C. make music in church today. I promise you, I know the answer to that question. Awesome, but this is, I wanted to do that because all we're trying to do in this series, all we've been trying to do is just sit in this soul satisfying promise of Jesus. Just sit and let these words sink deep, deep, deep into our spirit. We're going to do more of that today. That's all we're doing today. So the first week of this series, Kyle talked about the fact that one of the things that gets revealed here is the heart of Jesus. If Jesus were going to define his heart, he would say it's gentle and lowly, and he talked about what does it mean to receive that. And then we went into the next week where Ali said we've got two operating systems working in our minds and in our lives. The operating system of control, but we can shift to the operating system of trust. And when we do, there's something good for us. And then last weekend, Brian Tome was back, our senior pastor, was back, had that backpack on. And he said the issue is not that we don't have any load to carry, but what Jesus wants to do is give us a custom fitted load, a load that is easy and light. And today, I just want to build on that with this big idea, which is you can reduce anxiety in your life, and who doesn't have a little anxiety in their life. You can reduce anxiety in your life when you find rest for your souls in Jesus. That's what we're going today. Let me pray as we get started. I thank you for the truth of your promise. Thank you, Jesus, that these aren't just aspirational words, but they're invitational words. You invite us into a relationship with you where we find rest for our souls. In the midst of our real lives, in the midst of our crazy lives, in the midst of hard things, we can still have rest for our souls. I pray today that you would do what only your Holy Spirit does, which is take my simple words and through them, translate them to life. May they, as imperfect as they're going to be, may you make them perfect for what every person in here needs to hear today. And I believe that you'll do that. I pray that in your name. Amen. So last week, we talked about this idea again of a yoke, and I don't always title my messages, but this one has a title, and it is a better yoke.

I want you guys to say this. Say a better yoke. This idea of a yoke is something that first century listeners to Jesus completely understood immediately, because they were used to seeing this image of two oxen. In this case, yoked together as a farming equipment that would help two animals kind of walk at the same pace. And what they would often do as farmers is they would take a younger, maybe a more anxious animal, and they would yoke them together with a more seasoned, a more calm, a more mature animal. So what Jesus is saying in this invitation to Matthew 11, 28, is if you would link your life to me, you will find rest for your souls. That's the idea that he's going to, and it has everything to do with how our anxiety can lower. Am I the only person who has these moments when you're talking to someone you care about, maybe a loved one, maybe a roommate, maybe a friend, maybe a parent? And you're like doing the thing. You're like, uh-huh, uh-huh, as they're talking to you, but your mind and your body is somewhere else. She's got words She's got sometimes a lot of words And so we're talking and she's kind of maybe tell me about her day or she's telling about something with the kids or something She's thinking about and I'm like doing the thing. Uh-huh. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes, but I am thinking about the email that I didn't finish at work I'm thinking about the conflict conversation that's coming up tomorrow I'm thinking about the fact that I gotta preach this weekend and I need more time to get this message finalized Right, and so I'm looking and nodding, but I'm not really there and it's easy for me to say oh, it's because I'm so distracted Yeah But I wonder if sometimes our distraction is really anxiety in disguise That underneath the distraction underneath the busyness There's actually anxiety that the data would bear out that we have anxious hearts I want to share with you some information that as I share it I just want to have empathy for people who like me have realized like man There's a level of this anxiety that is medical and I need to be on medicine for it So please don't hear me saying today if you just have enough faith You won't have to take anxiety and depression medications. That is not what I'm saying what I am saying is my own experience has been There is an invitation to mourn There is something about my anxiety that isn't about the medical reality. It's about a spiritual reality That's that's what I want to get into today So here my heart on that as we look at information like this So Pew did her study and they looked at millennials and Gen Z's and asked them to rate their mental health And I want you to see this because this is the most recent

47% of Gen Z and 41% of millennials rate their mental health as poor It's a lot of people It's a lot of our young people a lot of people in some of our sites a lot of our students would be in this category of rating their mental health as poor Even if they're showing up at church smiling And it's not just young people unless we think it's just a young person's problem This is another data point. I like this one because it's longitudinal They asked the same question of all Americans old young and what they found is from 2001 to 2019 The number was exactly the same 43% rated their mental health as excellent the number never changed We had a lot of stuff that happened in those years, right? We had wars in those years We had challenges as a country in those years. So you could say oh, it's the situation. No, no, no It might not be just a situation now in 2020. It drops Understandably so there was a little thing you might remember called covid that makes sense But what I want you to see is post covid we are not recovering back to 43% But in fact the percentage of Americans who rate their mental health as excellent is going down down down We have anxious hearts We have anxious hearts And if we're honest many of us in here even if we identify as followers of Jesus have anxious hearts There's an old saying that says anxiety doesn't empty tomorrow of its sorrow. It just empties today of its strength And maybe you feel that sapping of strength because of anxiety now I'm using that word I need to define it and here's the definition. I'm working with today Anxiety is persistent worry about things we can't control Can anybody identify with that definition of anxiety? That's what I'm talking about today, and there's good news if you do which is that Jesus offers you and I a rescue What is his rescue? It's a better yoke But we got to deal with the reality of our anxiety see I used to think my anxiety was a speed of problem If I would just slow down, you know if I would just take time on a Saturday to go and sit in a field with my journal and my Bible and pray That I would solve all my problems and guess what? It's really good to do that and I connect with God that way powerfully and yet There's a deeper question. We've got to ask which is why am I hurrying in the first place? Because let's be clear there's some things in life you and I do not hurry around

No one hurries to get back to the DMV You don't have a thing ticking down the days for when you got to go back to the DMV None of us are hurrying around that. How about this one? None of us are hurrying to pay our taxes Now hopefully you paid them on time or file an extension But you ain't hurrying to pay somebody else some more funds. We're just not doing that. We're not hurrying Nobody hurries when you get an email from HR that says can we have a quick chat? No, you pray first Then you respond to that text. I mean it's just true. There's some things we don't hurry toward and here's the reality You rush toward the things you're most afraid of losing That's what our hurry reveals and so the question to ask is what am I trying to run towards? Or what am I trying to run away from in my hurry, you know if you're is that what they call themselves, Lexingtonian? It's average Columbian wherever you're watching from. It's probably similar things. A lot of us, we hurry, but it comes to our career progression. Because we feel like, man, I just gotta get to the next thing. And that's a place where we hurry. A lot of us have our identity and our worth tied up in our work. And so we can get hurried and anxious around work. For a lot of us, maybe our hurry is around a relational status that we haven't yet attained. You're single and you wanna be married. Or you wanna be dating, you wanna be in a relationship. And there's a sense of anxiety. The biological clock is ticking. There are things that make us feel anxious about those things. For maybe a lot of us, it's financial security.

And we just feel like, man, I need a little bit more to not be as anxious. And then what you'll realize is when you get a little bit more, you know what you'll say? I need a little bit more to not be anxious. Like it's an ongoing process and cycle. And I actually wanna give you a hot take, which is when it comes to your anxiety, I don't think your primary problem is your busy calendar. Here's a hot take. I don't think your primary problem is your cell phone or your social media usage. I'm not saying those things don't play a factor, but underneath all of that, our anxiety is the fact that we have given someone or something else the power to determine our worth or our wellness in life. That's the thing underneath the thing that drives so much of our anxiety. I'll put it to you this way. Hurry is what it feels like or looks like on the outside when something other than Jesus is raining on the inside. And I know that from my own experience. 'Cause guess what? You can fix your schedule. You can give yourself more margin. You can regulate down your cell phone usage and your social media usage or maybe you should, but you'll just find something else to hurry about. You'll just find something else to be anxious about.

I had a theology professor put it this way. He's a Satan doesn't have to make you bad if he can keep you busy. And he's really good at keeping us busy about a lot of things, you know? And here's the lie. The lie is, well, if I just get to the next thing, if I'm a student, once I graduate, if I'm at a job, once I get this promotion, if I want a house, once I buy the house, if I want a relationship, once I get in the relationship, well, then I'll smooth out. Then I'll be able to be less anxious and it is a lie. It's a lie. I know it's a lie because I bought into the lie, hook line and sinker. I'll never forget the day that all changed for me. You know, when I was, call it from 18 to 30, man, I was doing the thing. Graduated top, you know, toward the top of my class in college, like I was crushing it, got a great job. I was on the promotion track with Procter and Gamble, taking more and more responsibilities. When I was 30, I had the company car, I had more money, I thought I would. I had the wife, I was living downtown Cincinnati, I was leading a sales team across three states, like I was doing the thing and it was working until it wasn't. Here's the day it all changed for me. I was actually leaving one of my sales reps in Akron, Ohio, driving back to Cincinnati,

it was 171 South and if you're familiar with 71 in the Columbus area for my crossroads, Columbus folks, I was at the Polaris Parkway exit and I'll never forget, being at that exit, driving, of course, in the fast lane and I blacked out. Thankfully, for only a second or two, I don't even know how long. But when I came to, I was drenched in sweat, my heart was beating outside of my chest, I was afraid, I didn't know what happened. I finally got to a point where I could pull over and I went into a restaurant, I'm like, well, maybe I didn't eat enough this morning, my blood sugar might have gotten low and so I eat and as I'm eating, I'm like, what in the world happened? And I remember calling my wife and this was one of many moments when I'm like, I married the right woman 'cause I called her and I'm like, babe, I don't know what happened, I almost blacked out in the car, my heart's beating, I don't know what's wrong. And she's like, why are you calling me? Call the doctor. (audience laughs) Yes, yes, I should call the doctor. Got myself together, got settled, called my doctor, they said, come in right away, I literally went from Polaris Parkway to my doctor's office. He looks at me, African American profile and he's like, man, I'm just concerned, maybe something happened with your heart.

And so he gave me a halter monitor for three days, came back, heart was fine. Maybe he had vertigo and so then he got me tested for vertigo, I didn't have vertigo. So he test after test after test after test. And so it's after all these tests, nothing showing anything and I come back to the office. And have you ever had a meeting with your doctor where they're extra nice? 'Cause they got bad news for you? It was one of those, he always had a good bedside manner, but he was like, extra nice. And so in his extra nice tone, he's like, man, all these tests came back negative. I think you're struggling with generalizing anxiety disorder. And he gave me some medication, he gave me some other things to do. But for like the next year, I could, I continued to have escalated anxiety attacks, literally waking up thinking I was about to die. I had more of those blackout moments. Like it was scary. And when I was at my lowest, my lowest point with my anxiety journey, what I realized is that there's an invitation God has for me here, if I'm willing to accept it. If I'm willing to not stop the medication and have more faith, that wasn't what happened. But if I'm willing to just examine why am I anxious in the first place,

there was something that God wanted to teach me. And the first thing God did was He said, "You've got to be clear about what this is." See, it's PC to say, "I struggle with anxiety." It's not PC to say, "I'm a fearful person." But my name is Chuck, and I'm a fearful person. This is fear. This is what I was dealing with. And in that, I think about the New Testament, the word for anxious, in the New Testament, the word for fear is actually a word that means to be torn into pieces. And isn't that what it feels like when fear is gripping your life? 'Cause it's not just one fear. You've got 12 fears underneath that fear, right? And I want to just stop and pastor those of us who follow Jesus and who struggle with anxiety because I think there's another layer to this for many of us, which is this. Not only do we feel the fear, but we feel ashamed for feeling the fear. Because we're like, "I'm a Christian, I pray. "I've asked God to take this away, "and I'm still struggling with this fear." And I just want you to give yourself grace, and I want you to know that God gives you grace. He knows our real lives. He knows what it's like to live in this world. And actually, Jesus does have a promise for you.

He has a promise for me when it comes to how to deal with this world. Here's his promise in John 1633. Jesus says, "In this world, you will have tribulation." Thanks, Jesus. That's not exactly what I was hoping for. But Jesus says, "Hey, expectations are everything." And if you buy into the lie that just because you follow Jesus, it's gonna be all up until the right all the time and happy, clappy all the time, that is not true. And can I just be honest and just tease a little bit? Church folks, we make it worse. We make it worse, 'cause you can come in here and you talk to a good Christian. How you doing? Oh, I'm blessed and highly favored. Okay, okay, wonderful, wonderful. And it's okay that you had a bad week. Two bucks to be stressed. Lucky you. (congregation laughs) Lucky you. Amen, I gotta amen on that one, right? (congregation applauds) We make it worse. We make it worse. Jesus says, "In this world, you will have tribulation, "but I'm so glad that's only part A of this verse." He goes on to say right after that,

"But take heart for I have overcome the world." See, when you follow Jesus, it isn't that you will have a trouble free life. It's that trouble doesn't get the last word. Fear doesn't get the last word. Grief doesn't get the last word. Difficulty doesn't get the last word, but it doesn't mean you won't have challenges. And so Jesus is inviting us to a different way to be yoked differently to him. And if I were to summarize it, I would say it this way. What Jesus says is, "We find peace." We find peace when we let Jesus reset our peace. That's what Jesus wants to do. He wants to reset your pace. I'm so glad. He doesn't want to just fix your calendar. I'm so glad. He doesn't want to just deal with your social media uses. No, he wants your whole life. He wants to give you rest for your souls. So here again, these words of Jesus is an invitation. Again, we're just dwelling on these same beautiful words over and over again. Jesus says, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, "and I will give you rest." Notice he doesn't say you'll work for it. He says, "I will give you rest. "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me "for I am gentle and lowly in heart,

"and you will conjure up rest for your souls. "You will engineer rest for your souls. "You will muscle your way to rest for your souls." No, you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. I love Jesus and I love his heart for us. Jesus isn't shaming you for being anxious. He's not somewhere where this arm's folded and disappointment 'cause you just don't have enough faith to figure it out. Now, you know what, his arms are open. And his invitation is actually practically begging. Would you just link up with me? Would you bring all the fullness of all your life and all the things that are out of control? Would you bring all of that to me because my yoke is easy and my burden is light. See, there was a second definition of that word yoke in Jesus' day. Not only did it apply to the animals that we saw earlier, the oxen, but spiritual guides in Jesus' day would say my way of following God is my yoke. who thought the way to follow God was to try to keep all the rules and judge all the people who don't. And they had what was called the yoke of the Pharisees. Hey, you wanna follow God? Do it my way. Read the Torah, the way that I interpret it.

Do the spiritual practices, the way that I do. And if you read chapter 11, this is the end of chapter 11 when Jesus says these words, he's been railing against the yoke of the Pharisees for the whole chapter. He's saying their yoke is a broken yoke. It's not a good yoke. You need a better yoke. So come to me, he says, because my yoke is easy and my burden is light. I think it's why I love this translation, actually a paraphrase of Jesus's words from the message version of the Bible was written by a pastor, Eugene Peterson, who puts it this way? He says, are you tired, worn out, burned out on religion? Come to me, Jesus says. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me. Watch how I do it. It's probably my favorite line. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly. This is what Jesus is offering, a free and light life in the midst of your real life. This isn't pie in the sky, you're ignoring the reality of difficult things.

It's that you've got something that transcends that because you're a yoke to Jesus. I had a unique experience a couple of weeks ago, unique for me, hadn't done it before. I got to do iron forging. Has anybody ever done that? Iron forging, like blacksmith stuff. It was cool. It was hot, actually, but it was really cool. And man, when I'm in an environment like that, I'm always trying to learn. Like what does this have to do with life principles or even spiritual principles? And I got some powerful connections as I had this experience. I think we have a picture of me at that experience. Well, it's not exactly what I looked like, but that's what I felt like working with metal. That's what I felt like. This is what I actually looked like. But I remember being there. I remember being there and the guy gave us some instruction before we started. He was like, hey, you're gonna have hot metal, you're gonna be banging on the end though. He said, let me tell you something. When you hold that hammer, do not grip it tightly. Do not grip it tightly because metal against metal has a rebound effect. And I've had a lot of people get that hammer right in their forehead.

So you wanna hold it loosely when you're hammering. And I thought about that and I'm like, man, anything I've ever learned in the physical realm, that principle always applies. I went repelling for the first time, kind of going down ropes down a mountain. Did that at Red River Gorge some years ago. And I'll never forget, they give you these thick gloves because you know, you can get rope burns. And they said, hey, but here's the way to not get rope burns. Resist the temptation to grip the rope tightly. While you're going down a rope, or else it's gonna burn your hands. And they're right. You might wanna ask how I know that. I'll let you figure that out. What I had to learn in repelling was the best way to repel is you're using the rope as a guide, great. But you really wanna sit back and trust the belayer down at the bottom who's supporting your weight. That's really the way to do that. When I learn how to ride a motorcycle, you do not wanna desperate your handlebars. You actually wanna have a little bit of give. No matter what in the physical realm, it never is right to grip tightly. There's no instruction that ever says, grip this thing as tightly as you can. That never works.

In the physical realm, the best way to approach these things is to release your grip. And guess what, in the spiritual realm, the best way to approach your anxiety is to release your grip. That's what Jesus is saying in these words to all of us. Maybe that's why when the Bible describes Jesus' role in the cosmos, the whole universe, it says this. It says, and he has before all things, and in him, all things hold together. How can we release our grip? We can release our grip because there is a God who's gripping everything. The person yoked to us has a grip on the entire world. So you don't have to figure out how to have a grip on your family. You don't have to figure out how to have a grip on your finances. No, you can release your grip to the one in whom all things hold together. Maybe that's why when Jesus died on the cross, one of his final words in John 19 is it is finished, which is actually a financial term. And what Jesus was saying is the debt has been paid. So if you think you've got to work your way to God, friend, it is finished. If you think you've got to be the way to figure out If you think you've got to be the one to secure your identity and your worth and how you matter in this world,

Jesus would say, "It is finished." Because of his finished work, you and I can release our grip. (audience applauding) We can release our grip. And it's in releasing our grip that we learn to live freely and lightly. So we're gonna finish today with a song, and play this at all of our locations. And this song is really an opportunity for you to do business with God. As you listen to these words, I want to give you an invitation, and here's the invitation. What is the thing you're gripping most tightly right now? What is the thing in your life that you are holding onto for dear life? If during this song, you want to say to Jesus, Jesus, I want to release my grip. I'm gonna ask you to just do that. I'm not gonna prompt you when, and I can tell you how. But if at some point you want to communicate to Jesus, Jesus, I want to release this to you. I just want to ask you to open your hands. For some of us, maybe we're releasing something that we've released many times before, but we need to release it again. Maybe for some of you, this is a first act of surrender to Jesus.

Maybe today you've heard something that's like, huh, I hadn't thought about a relationship with Jesus in this way. I thought it was just about religious rules, but what you're saying, Chuck, is it's about relationship? It's about him actually helping me to make sense of my life, and I can give that to him, and I can experience something through him in that relationship. Yes, that's what Jesus' invitation is. And so maybe today as you open your hands, it's a first act of surrender to Jesus. And man, if that's you, if this is your first act of surrender, can I encourage you, wherever you are, to connect with a prayer volunteer before you leave, so that they can just walk you through that choice and how to continue to follow that? I want to encourage you to keep coming around here and keep being a part of this community, 'cause we're all on the journey of learning how to release our grip. To the one who holds everything and promises that when we link up to him, he will bring rest to our souls. (gentle piano music) ♪ Oh Father, hold me ♪ ♪ Spirit, console me ♪

♪ That I may feel you ♪ ♪ In this place I am ♪ ♪ 'Cause I'm feeling so lonely ♪ ♪ And yours is the only ♪ ♪ Love that makes me whole ♪ ♪ Can this heart find rest ♪ ♪ Yes ♪ ♪ The spirit you come down ♪ ♪ Pursuing you home once again ♪ ♪ Father, you come down ♪ ♪ Pursuing to bring back my innocence ♪ ♪ And like a child I reach for you ♪ ♪ And always you welcome me back here ♪ ♪ Here I find rest ♪ ♪ Here I find rest ♪ ♪ Oh Father, hold me ♪ ♪ Spirit, console me ♪ ♪ That I may feel you ♪ ♪ In this place I am ♪ ♪ And tell me the story ♪ ♪ Of how I am glory ♪ ♪ And how you choose to mold me ♪ ♪ In this place I am ♪ ♪ Yes ♪ ♪ Oh Spirit, you come down ♪ ♪ Pursuing you home once again ♪ ♪ Father, you come down ♪ ♪ Pursuing to bring back my innocence ♪ ♪ And like a child I reach for you ♪ ♪ And always you welcome me back here ♪

♪ Oh here I find rest ♪ ♪ You ♪ I want to leave you with one tool to take in your pocket and actually you can literally have it in your pocket if you want this prayer that we're about to finish with. You can tap the sticker in front of you and you'll also get access to that. It's a prayer from St. Patrick, yes, the patron saint of Ireland and green beer. He's actually a deeply faithful man, follower of Jesus and he has a prayer that's been known as St. Patrick's breastplate. Think of it as a protective prayer that you can take with you in the time when life starts lifeing again because I know once you leave here life's going to start lifeing again but this is a prayer that I've found strengthened and for many centuries so many others. So I'm going to invite you to stand and we're going to finish by praying this prayer together. Pray these words with me, Jesus with me, Jesus before me, Jesus behind me, Jesus in me, Jesus beneath me, Jesus above me, Jesus on my right, Jesus on my left, Jesus when I lie down, Jesus when I sit down, Jesus when I arise, simple, powerful, take it with you and find rest for your souls. Bless you guys, we will see you next week. This moment of taking communion is for you right now too. I want you to find some sort of bread, it can't even be a cracker or a chip, me, I've got pretzels and I want you to find some juice or a coke, I've got grape soda. This moment isn't so much as about what it is you're taking, this moment is about remembering what Jesus did for you and the love he poured out for you. So what is communion? On the night that Jesus was betrayed, he met with his disciples and he gave them this picture, a meal holding up bread and wine before them and he helped the bread and said, "This is my body broken for you." Do this in remembrance of me. Then he took the wine and said, "This cup is a new covenant in my blood which is poured out for you." This picture with bread and wine was made reality the very next night as Jesus died

on the crux, his body broken, blood spilled. So as you eat the bread and drink the wine or the juice or Coca-Cola, whatever it is, remember that Jesus broke his body and said his blood for you. Recently a guy wrote me, he wrote a letter and said something about Jesus that I just have not been able to stop thinking about. He said this man, Jesus, allowed these people to kill him just so that they could be forgiven by his father. Like what kind of love is that he allowed them to crucify him so that they could be forgiven. He subjected himself to their hatred so that they could be saved by God's love. You know what? I want you to know this, I want you to remember this as we take communion that that love was for you too. Thanks for spending a few minutes with us today, my encouragement is simple, don't just hear God's word today, but take one step because of it. Maybe that's open to your Bible, maybe it's spending a few quiet minutes in prayer today, maybe it's forgiven someone, or maybe it's asking someone for forgiveness, or simply saying yes to whatever God has put in front of you today. What I would even encourage you is to take a next step and even check out our courses on our profile. We have a daily devotion that we do call the walkout that we've prepared just for you that you can lock in with every single day, and we also have cohorts there as well. You can check out the cohorts on the courses page and those are designed for you to actually do alongside friends or anybody that you're around. You can actually gather as a group and you can walk through those together. Whatever that next step is, take it, and if this message encourages you, we love to hear it from you. Send us a video gram or write to us at [email protected]. Our team reads every letter we love to walk alongside. Until the next time, keep pursuing Jesus, keep opening his word, keep saying yes to him

one day at a time. Let's see you soon. [BLANK_AUDIO]