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You’re tired.
Not just physically; though yeah, that too.
You’re tired in your bones. In your soul.
Trying to be a steady husband, an intentional dad, a man of God… but deep down, you feel like you’re falling short. Like you’re carrying more than you know how to hold.
Dad Tired is a podcast for men who are ready to stop pretending and start healing.
Not with self-help tips or religious platitudes, but by anchoring their lives in something (and Someone) stronger.
Hosted by Jerrad Lopes, a husband, dad of four, and fellow struggler, this show is a weekly invitation to find rest for your soul, clarity for your calling, and the courage to lead your family well.
Through honest stories, biblical truth, and deep conversations you’ll be reminded:
You’re not alone. You’re not too far gone. And the man you want to be is only found in Jesus.
This isn’t about trying harder.
It’s about coming home.
Hey guys. Welcome back to the Dad Tired podcast. If you're brand new here, welcome. We're glad that you stumbled upon the show. We are a group of guys. There are thousands of us all over the world who are trying to figure out what does it look like for us as men to fall in love with Jesus, and then we want to help our families do the same.
We don't take ourselves very seriously, but we do take Jesus seriously. And so that's what we are. We are a podcast. We have lots of resources. If you go to dad tire.com conferences, one day, conferences, retreats, books, a free community that you can find. There we're a whole community and we, we've got resources and we've got this podcast, but we're also just a bunch of like-minded guys.
There are dad tire guys all over the country. There's likely some near you. And so we'd love to have you come be part of this community if you haven't. Been plugged in already. We'd love to get to know you. Just go to dads tire.com. You can get all the information you need about who we are as a ministry.
We are much more than just this podcast. I do wanna thank my friends over at Win Shape for sponsoring this episode. You may not be familiar with Win Shape, but Summer camp season is right around the corner. And, uh, your family. I wanna invite your family to experience the summer of a lifetime with Win Shape Camps.
Win Shape is actually founded by the founder of Chick-fil-A. And so everything, if you love Chick-fil-A, and even if you don't love Chick-fil-A, which you're that one person that doesn't make some weird kind of argument, that doesn't make sense. But even if you don't love Chick-fil-A, you can at least appreciate how they do things.
Their process is just next level. They. Are very good at experience and quality, and they bring that same type of excellence to their summer camps. And so they have overnight camps, they have boys and girls camps in North Georgia Mountains. They have day camps, they have family camps. Layla and I are actually hosting a family camp.
We would love for you to be part of that one in particular. That's gonna be on June 16th, um, that whole week. I don't know if it's sold out or not, but if there's any spots left for that one, I'd love to. Have your family come be part of that. But anyway, if you just wanna send your kids to a camp or you want to do a day camp or a family camp, they've got all kinds of stuff, but their camps are just next level excellence.
Really, really, really well done. We actually did partnered with them to do a dad tired camp for the family last summer, and we still have the families that are constantly talking to me about that and how that was one of the highlights of their. Life with a family. I mean, it's just so, so well done. So if you wanna learn more about these camps, go to Win Shape Camps.
That's WIN win shape camps.org. And you can learn more about that. You can get signed up for those. They fill up fast. So if you're wanting to send your kids to a camp or go to a family camp, they have 'em all around the country. They have 'em in Georgia. But to get more information about that before they fill up, make sure to go to WinShape Camps, W-I-N-S-H-A-P-E-C-A-M-P-S, WinShape camps.org to get more information on that.
That being said, let's dive into today's episode.
This last week, I had my brother-in-law in town, Layla's brother. He was coming to visit from out of town and staying us with us for the week and for the last four years he's been growing out this beard, just the most massive beard. I know a lot of you dad tired guys are beard guys. And I'm somewhat jealous.
Uh, I, I've tried, like my daughter told me the other day, she's like, daddy tried to grow out your beard. And I tried like for three days and my face started to itch so bad. I, I couldn't stand it. Anyway, so he's been growing out his beard for the last four years and it's just, uh. It's just a monstrosity of a beard.
Is that a word? I don't know. Just huge, huge beard. Like everywhere we go, somebody's gonna make a comment about this beard. And so the last few times he's visited us over the years, I've told him like, come on man, I dare you to like, let me shave off this beard right now. And I've tried all kinds of different bribes and and bets to try to get him to shave off this beard or to trim it up and.
He'll never do it. But for whatever reason, as I'm kind of joking around this time, he said, all right, let's just do it. Let's go for it. And I've got the best barber in town, like the guy is, he's from the Dominican Republic, and he's just, uh, it's a, I'm like, if there's anyone that can just do this beard for you, this trim up and shave it and just looks so good.
It's this barber. So I book an appointment with him and we get there and it's just, the whole shop is just vibey. You know? He's got like, it's a dude barber shop. It's like there's massage chairs, there's music playing. He's got sodas and drinks and stuff in the fridge. It's just like, it's just a cool, I like just hanging out there, like even if I'm not getting a haircut, I'd go there and just hang out.
I haven't, but I would. It's a cool place and the guy doing it, he's just like, he's got so much swag. I just feel. Even if he gives me the worst haircut, which he's never done, but even if he did, I'd be like, somehow I feel cooler being around this guy. So anyway, we go there. I take my brother-in-law and he said, we're just, we got a lot of joy, man.
I keep, and on the way there, I'm just telling him, I'm like, dude, this is a, you're turning over a new leaf last four years of your life, all the trials and tribulations you've gone through, as you shave off your beard, you trim off your beard, you're trimming off. I'm trying to give myself a little speech here, giving him a little speech.
It was so cheesy. You know, as you trim off this beard, you're gonna trim away all the negativity in your life, man, you're gonna get a new life, new beard. This is gonna be a great day. So we get there. Everyone's got everyone, you know. It's a joyful moment. It's a joyful day. We're having a lot of fun. And, uh, we're sitting there and he's, now, it's me, him, and my son.
And, uh, we're just taking turns. I'm getting a haircut. My son's getting a haircut and he's getting his beard tripped. And so it's finally his turn. He's sitting in the chair and me and my son are sitting in the little massage chairs in the corner, just kind of chilling out. Watching my brother-in-law shave off this 4-year-old beard.
It's a fun environment and as we're sitting there, my son kind of outta nowhere. I think he took my phone to like get a picture of his uncle getting his beard trimmed and he said something to the effect of when can I get a phone, which is a conversation. My son is about to turn 13. I'm talking kind of quieter now 'cause I'm in the room by myself, but I always feel like they're listening.
He says, you know, when can I get a phone? Which is a conversation we've had many, many times. We haven't like set an official day, but I'm like, dude, if I can make it until you're 18 without giving you a phone, I'm stoked. Like that's my personal goal. We've had this conversation with them. We're like, we have no desire.
We've got them watches so that we can get ahold of them, they can text us, they can call us. They got GPS, but there's no social media, there's no internet. It can't be browsing websites and all that stuff. It's just the basics, the necessities. We talked about this a million times, and so I'm like, you know, dude, I have no, no desire, no plans to get you a phone anytime soon.
And he's at a weird age because I know a lot of you guys still have younger kids, which bro, just when I started this podcast crazy enough, he was three. So it's just, it's insane. Well, maybe. He was five. I don't remember. He was young. He's basically grown up as I've done this Dad tired podcast and I remember having real, real young ones.
I still have a a 3-year-old and a five-year-old right now daughter. But just the fact how fast he's grown up has been insane. I. So I'm telling him, I'm like, dude, I, I have no desire to give you a phone. But he's in that weird state because all his friends do have phones and I get it for whatever their, their parents have their own reasons and, and we homeschool and they send their kids to school.
So I guess that makes sense, even though you could probably still do whatever you want on the watch, but I. They need to get ahold of their parents. They can call or whatever, but he's feeling the peer pressure subconsciously or not of, you know, he's the one kid left out of all his friend group that doesn't have a phone.
Just insane, by the way. I know all of us dads are like, dude, I didn't get a phone tell. I was like, in college, you know, so I, you're fine. He's asking me when I kinda get a phone, I say, no, I can tell he kinda gets grumpy about it. Like he, and that frustrated me when he got grumpy because I'm like, dude, why are you surprised?
Why are you acting like you're surprised right now? We've had this conversation. A million times. Like I, you're just springing this on me outta nowhere. We're having a great, like, shave the beard day with uncle, and here you are, like throwing out some weird attitude about a phone, even though we've had this conversation a million times.
And so he keeps, instead of just letting it go, he keeps like, pressing in. Like, why I, I wouldn't have any social media. I wouldn't, I wouldn't go on the internet. He's just giving me all his pre-teen answers to why he thinks he should have a phone, which all of them are stupid. And so I'm just like, you know, this is not the time and place to have an argument.
Especially when we've had this conversation a million times and he keeps pressing and he keeps pressing and he keeps pressing to the point where I'm like, I just get so frustrated. He said, he made some comment about his watch not being good enough. I'm like, dude. You are being so split. So I'll just be honest here.
I'm like, dude, you're being such a spoiled brat right now. I didn't have a phone until I was like, in college you have a perfectly capable, expensive watch that I saved up and bought for you. That's totally fine. And I just kind of went off on, I'm like, quietly, we're in this barber shop and I'm trying to have a, you know, good day with my family.
I'm just like, I'm all my frustration. I'm just getting so frustrated at him and I just kind of, I give him this long rant and I'm, he's now kind of shells up in his, he can tell I'm really, really mad. So he shells up in this massage chair, awkward place to be shelled up in. Uh, but he shells up in this massage chair.
I'm sitting in this massage chair, and then he just gets like super quiet and awkward and he's now not talking to me. He's clearly frustrated at me. I'm clearly frustrated to him. The whole vibe of the day in that moment just changed. And so my brother ends up getting done with his beer trim again, this is four years.
Like this is a monumentous day. I keep feeling like I'm making up words here. I don't know if that's word. It's a big day. And uh, he gets up and I now I'm like, I want to stand up and have full joy with him in this moment because I know he's feeling all kinds of emotions of just trimming off his 4-year-old beard.
And so I stand up and I just put on my happy face and I celebrate with him and it was just such this weird, in that moment there's like this. Juxtaposition, dude, I don't know what's going on. I don't know if it's the coffee I drank, but I'm trying to throw out these words that I truly am not qualified to be throwing out.
There is this big gap between me sitting next to my son and being like 10 outta 10 angry. It felt like probably not 10 outta 10, but big time angry. And then to stand up and try to give my brother-in-law full joy so quickly, I mean within seconds that happened. I remember thinking to myself in that moment, you know how you just have all these like split second thoughts.
I remember thinking to myself in that moment, I wonder what my son's thinking right now, like seeing me go from like full angry towards him to full joy with my brother-in-law. And I had the thought, I thought to myself I had I can two reflective questions in myself, like kind of in that moment and then also throughout the rest of the day I was thinking.
How often do my kids get to see my joyful side? That was one thought I had. Like how often does my son and the rest of my kids do they get to see my joyful side? Like my brother-in-law just got to see with him celebrating with him. And the other question I had was, could my son say, man, my dad has joy with everybody but me.
I don't think that that's true. Like I, even in, in me saying that, I've got all kinds of like excuses and thoughts and this was a unique circumstance, but I do want to just sit and like kind of camp there. Whenever those thoughts come in. I don't want to completely dismiss 'em. Even if there is a, a hint of being unreasonable or dramatic, there's probably some truth in there too.
And so I wanna sit in there in those moments and being reflective and be like, is any of that true? How often do my kids get to see my joy? And then could they say my daddy has joy with other people but me? My 5-year-old, I think I posted this on Instagram recently, but my 5-year-old said, this was like a couple weeks ago, daddy, how come you're never happy?
And my first thought was like, okay, first that's a stinger, like just punch me in the face. But my first thought was like to defend myself. And really try to explain to her, you know, what do you mean I'm never happy? You know, get mad. Are you saying I'm never happy? I'm always happy. I really did want to like, defend myself and be like, whatcha talking about?
Like, I'm, I laugh all the time and I, I'm always happy. But, but then I, I just thought like, it doesn't matter. Whatever. I try to explain her perception is true. Like her, what she is feeling right now is true for her. Like, she actually believes that I'm never happy and that, and so then I, again, I have to ask myself.
How often do my kids get to see the joyful side of me? And so I guess just brother to brother. Like I would just ask you to have a like a minute of just honest reflection and ask yourself, are you a joyful person? If you're like me, you probably feel like you want to quickly say yes or quickly defend yourself or give, tell me all the reasons why.
You are a joyful person. You do have joy, you are happy, but I guess. Maybe just ask yourself the same questions that I was asking myself, which is who gets to see that joyful side of you? Does your wife get to see that joyful side of you? Would your wife say you are full of joy? Would your kids say that you're full of joy?
Do your friends get the joyful side of you? Do your coworkers get the joyful side of you if you are saying that you are joyful? If you are gonna make the case, maybe you're just like, no dude, I'm, I'm, I'm actually, I'm not. I don't have joy, and that bothers me. Maybe that's your story or maybe you do say, I do have joy, but the people who get to see that joy are not my family and my wife gets, doesn't get my joy.
My kids don't get my joy, but my coworkers, maybe I'm laughing with them or my friends, I laugh with them. One of my best friends, he and I meet. Weekly with a small group of guys. I've told you about this. We meet in a garage together. We try hard. We are as intentional as I've ever been in any small group in my life to get together weekly, consistently to confess sin openly.
It is the most honest, raw, vulnerable group of guys I've ever been a part of in my entire life. Uh, we confess sin regularly. We pray for each other. We hold each other accountable, but we also laugh. Quite a bit Together we're dudes and we, I always say some of the best friends in the world are the guys that you feel like you can be your 13-year-old self with and also.
Super mature, like have the deepest conversations about life with, and these are guy, those kind of guys like I, we just act like little boys sometimes, which I think is fun and healthy to an extent. And then we're also, we're sharing some really, really, really deep vulnerable, just life giving, God glorifying stuff.
It's, it's been so life giving. But one of the guys in that group, uh, he's one of my best friends in the world. He was telling me. He was texting me and just saying like, dude, I feel like my kids never get the joyful side of me. Like I'm way too hard on them. And I told him I relate to that. Like I, I feel like, you know, I laugh with him, I laugh with those guys.
I've got other friends that I laugh with, but my kids like, how often do they get to see. The joyful side of me. And again, like one of the things we, we confess to each other was we feel like we're easier or we have more grace for other kids than we have on our own kids. And I think all of us, if you're listening and you're a dad, this just happened yesterday.
I have a bounce house, like a blow up inflatable little bounce house that I'll put up in my backyard and all the neighborhood kids will come and they'll bounce. And play in our backyard. And one of the neighborhood kids was playing in the backyard and she was asking me a question and she's the exact same age as my daughter, one of my daughters.
And I was finding myself being so gracious and like tender and patient with her and even thinking like, dude, I'm not that way most of the time with my kids now. There's a caveat to that because I have higher standards for my kids than I do my neighborhood kids. Like I'm much more deeply invested. I want more for my kids than I want the neighborhood kids, just quite frankly.
And I think that's reasonable and right. So of course you're kind of more gracious and lighthearted and all this stuff with other kids. But I do, again, I don't wanna be dramatic, but I also wanna find like, is there any truth in that? And is there somewhere that, you know, the Holy Spirit might wanna convict in me and teach me that I somewhere where I need to grow?
This friend of mine, uh, we both were just talking about like, dude, we, we need to be more gracious with our kids. We need to be more loving and tender and joyful with our kids. The scriptures say that. Let's talk about the fruit of the spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness. You've heard these things, but one of them is joy, like joy.
In other words, like evidence that you are a Christian. Is that you have joy. Like if you're new to the Christian conversation or you haven't thought about this, and it one way that you could describe it, if you think about fruits of the spirit, that phrase can be like, you know, what are we actually talking about here?
But essentially, if you just think of like a, how do you know an apple tree? As an apple tree? Well, it produces apples. How do you know that a Christian is a Christian? Because it produces love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. So a Christian, if I cut you as a Christian, you should bleed joy.
The Bible, the scriptures say that is one of the fruits of the spirit is joy. And so then you have to just ask yourself, am I a joyful person? If somebody looks at me and says, does he have the fruit? What kind of tree is that? Is he a Christian tree? Well then just look at the fruit. And is the fruit cut?
Like is, is he producing joy? And does my family get to see that joy? Who if I do have joy, if I claim to have joy, who gets to see it? There's this guy in the New Testament. Again, if you're new to the scriptures, his name's Paul and he just constantly, he wrote so much of the New Testament. He's constantly writing letters to these new churches, these new Christians, these new believers, these Christians, these new believers are in a state of persecution by the Roman Empire and by Caesar, and there's just, there's constant like oppression on them and.
Their new way of believing in the way or Jesus and this new kingdom, and it's very countercultural. And not only that, it's dangerous for them to worship Jesus as savior. It's very dangerous. And in the midst of that kind of culture, Paul is encouraging them constantly to rejoice, to have joy. You like. He wrote this letter in, it's called, uh, Philippians, and he says, rejoice in the Lord.
Always, and again I say it rejoice like that kind of repetitive nature, like he's really trying to emphasize, he wouldn't have had these exclamation points to write. That wasn't part of the culture or the the language. And so he has to say it again. Rejoice in the Lord. Always. Again, I say so. He is like, he's putting exclamation points on it.
I say to you, rejoice. And one Thessalonians, he says, rejoice, always pray without ceasing. Give thanks and. All circumstances for this is the will of God in Jesus Christ for you. And Philippians again, uh, later in Philippians, he'll, he'll say, rejoice in the Lord. And he says it in Romans, rejoicing in ho, patient and tribulation.
Continuing steadfastly in prayer. Second Corinthians as sorrowful yet. Always rejoicing as poor, yet making many rich as having nothing yet possessing everything. He's trying to give perspective there, like, and even in the midst of all the turmoil, you keep rejoicing, you keep having joy. Philippians again, the Philippians, he says this a lot, but I, I'm glad I rejoice with you, Colossians.
He says, even in the midst of your suffering, rejoice. And so he is always talking about like. For you as a Christian, he's telling the, the, the readers there. Like, I know you're getting persecuted. I know this is hard to understand. I know you're having these influences from outside perspectives and people trying to pull you astray in the midst of all that and your persecution and your suffering and your, and your oppression.
Rejoice, have joy. And if you read that and you're, you're not familiar with the passages or you're not, you're the context of the scriptures, you might just be like, okay, easy for you to say like, yeah, you're a Christian, you're a writer in the Bible. Like, who is this guy? Like, you know, he's got a bunch of joy.
He's telling everybody else have the joy. But oftentimes Paul is telling the, he's literally writing these Christians and telling them to have joy and to rejoice in the middle of getting like. Beaten or being imprisoned. This is a guy who was in charge of and responsible for murdering Christians before he became one.
So you would imagine he's got, like, he could have, it would be right for him to have a heavy conscience to maybe struggle with lifelong, what we would call PTSD, like really traumatic stuff that he's done, evil things that he's been a part of, probably living in a state of depression based on his own past and his history.
Now he's in prison, so it's not like he became a Christian life all of a sudden got all kinds of, you know, ways better, like now he's a Christian, he's. Beaten. He's oppressed, he's put in prison and he's writing letters from prison, getting beaten, all this terrible stuff. So his past, his present, his future doesn't look very bright.
Like the dude doesn't really have any reason to have joy, and yet he's telling everybody to rejoice and to have joy always, and in all things give thanks. I guess what I'm saying is he has credibility, you know, like there's nothing worse than somebody who's got their life completely together. You look at their life and it just seems like nothing.
Thing goes wrong in their life. If that person's telling you to have joy, you're like, okay, dude, like kick rocks. Like, what do you get outta here? But somebody who's suffering, who's gone through it, who has, you know, that person's got a pass. You know what I mean? Like, you know, like, dude, okay, that guy's gone through some stuff.
He's really experienced deep pain. He's done some stuff. He's now in prison, he's getting beaten. And that guy. That guy is telling you to have joy, and so then you just have to ask like why or how? Because I can use my excuse like I'm a dad, I'm busy. You don't know all the things that I'm going through all day.
I got four kids, man, they're young, and my daughter literally after 567,000 times of saying, don't grab the Sharpie. She grabbed the Sharpie. This is a true story. Yesterday, grabs the sharpie and colors hearts, and smiley faces all over our porch. I can feel my chest getting tight even as I'm recounting that memory.
I've got kids and it's, I'm trying to provide for my family and I'm married and marriage is hard and, uh, this is really hard. And so of course, like, I think it's reasonable for me to say I don't have a lot of joy right now, but Paul would say, yeah, dude, I've murdered some people. Oh. I've murdered some Christians.
Now I'm in prison and I've been beaten for the sake of the gospel. And I'm telling you to rejoice always. And so you just ask yourself like how, here's where I'm going with all this and I'll land the plane here. I'm sorry for all my rambling. I want to be a man. I. Who, when you look at me, if I am a tree and I claim to be a quote unquote Christian tree, a follower of Jesus tree, a man who's filled by the Holy Spirit, God lives inside of me.
Tree. That the fruit that comes out of this tree, one of them being. Joy. And so I'm asking myself, what do I need to prune in my life? What branches, dead branches need to be cut down so that more fruit of joy can be produced out of me so that my kids can say, man, my dad must really believe in that good news of Jesus.
Like my dad's messed up and he's sinful, and he's, you know, he, he does the wrong things, but he's got a lot of joy. And would that be one of the reasons that my kids are compelled to look on the face of Jesus? That they would say, okay, whatever my dad had, I want some of that because he seemed to have this deep internal joy.
I. That's one of the goals I want as a man. When I look at the end of my life. I don't want to be a grumpy dad and a grumpy man, and I'm not asking myself or you to put on this fake happy face where we just kind of smile through everything and it feels fake. I don't think that's what Paul was talking about when he was talking about rejoice always to have this joy.
It certainly was not his story. And so what does it mean for me as a Christian, as a man, as a husband, as a dad, to have real joy? In the midst of chaotic life, suffering hardships, bills, sharpies on the porch, kids disobeying fights in the middle of a barbershop, in the midst of all the circumstance. What does it mean for me to have joy?
And as I was thinking about that and meditating on that, I was trying to think what are the causes of my non joy? What are the things that steal my joy? And here are three things that I could come up with for myself that I want to toss out to you for something as something that you can chew on potentially.
Here are three things that I think cause me suck the joy out of my life. The first one is my sin, and I don't want you to underestimate. The power that your sin has to steal your joy. You may have those two things in two separate categories, like there's your sin thing that you're trying to deal with and you, you're trying to get under control, and then there's your joy.
And those two things probably feel different. But remember, friends, the scripture say that all sin leads to death including the death of your joy. And so your sin does have a direct impact on your joy, your overall peace, satisfaction, contentment in life. Your sin is directly playing. Into that joy bucket.
It is stealing from it. It is poking holes into that joy bucket, and it's letting it flow out. And so one of the ways that you seal that up is to repent, to confess your sin when you are a man that walks around with a light conscience. Because two things you know as the scripture say, if you confess your sins to God, he's faithful and just to forgive you of all your unrighteousness.
Praise God, that should make your soul a little bit lighter like dude. The God of the universe is not mad at you if you trust in Christ Jesus. His poured out his wrath, his justice on himself so that he could pour out his mercy on you. Dude, what in the world could possibly be more joy filled news than that?
That's insane. Out of all the things you can experience today, the biggest thing in all of eternity is that you will stand before the God of the universe one day and he will look at you and say, I love you, son. If you've trusted in Jesus, if you believe on him, if you confess your sins to him, he looks at you and says, I love you, son.
Come be with me for all eternity. How does that not bring you joy? So that's good news. And then the scripture say, confess your sins one to another and pray for each other that you might be healed. And so a lot of guys, this is a whole nother podcast. I've been meditating on this thinking about this a lot.
I. But a lot of guys are forgiven, but they're not healed. And so some of your lack of joy is actually coming from your lack of healing. You don't have healing in your soul because you're still dealing with sin because it's unconfessed to your brothers that you would find healing. This is just a gift from God.
It's just God saying, listen, I'm not only gonna forgive you. I want you to experience healing. And the gateway, the pathway to healing is confession to another brother and to each other and to pray for each other. And so finding other brothers that you can confess sin. Two and with often is actually gonna be a source of joy for you.
And as you try to hold that in and you keep that pent it up sin inside of you, it's going to have a direct impact on your joy. I. And so for me, how do I become a more joyful person? I confess my sins to God often. I confess my sins to my brothers often, and my soul becomes lighter, and my kids and my wife and my family actually get the fruit of a more joyful dad because I.
My soul is lighter. It's healed. And so that would be, I, I just don't want you to underestimate the power that your sin has to steal your joy. The second thing is, my stress is a sucker of joy. The other kind of s word I would put in there, if sin is the first one, stress is the second one I'd kind of put in there, uh, maybe in parentheses or next to it, or.
One B would be my scaredness. I know that's not a real word, but, um, my scaredness, like, I'm either stressed or scared about current circumstances or future circumstances. And so this could be all kinds of things for you. It might be your finances, your job, your career, the future of your marriage, the future of the world, the political climate, the country, like all the things that just contribute to your stress or maybe fear.
Scaredness, is it causing you to have less joy? And I think the reason Paul would say that he has joy or to rejoice in all things is because he knew how things would end. Like he, one time he said to live is Christ and to die is gain. Meaning for him. He is like, if I get to live, even if you're beating me, he, he talked about this, like, if you beat me, who care, I get to suffer for Jesus.
Like, you let me go, I'll go proclaim the gospel. You arrest me, I'll, I'll tell everyone in prison about Jesus. Like there's literally nothing you can do that will stop me from having joy and seeing being used by God and the expansion of his kingdom in this world. So like, who cares? You know? Like I have joy.
I have joy in that. And then, but then he said. To die is gain meaning even if you kill me, like also don't care because now I get to go be with Jesus for eternity. So literally you can't beat me. Like if I'm alive, I'm, I'm talking about Jesus, whether I'm imprisoned or I'm suffering for Christ, or I'm out free telling everyone about Jesus.
I'm living my life for the glory of God. Then you kill me. Even better like awesome, thank you. Now I get to go be with Jesus forever. And so he had this, you imagine he would have this kind of lightheartedness about him. Because he knew the future and he knew God's sovereignty. Like in all things Christ drains and he's sovereign and he's good.
And this, we know how this story ends. Imagine if you were on a boat. I use these kind of analogies all the time. If you've heard me speak, I apologize. I've just, I love water. I'm actually staring at water right now, and so it made me think of this analogy, but imagine you're on a boat and the boat sinks, and you guys are on a lifeboat.
I, some of you who've read my books, you're like, okay, we, I've heard this analogy before. I'm gonna go different angle here. You're on a lifeboat, uh, the lifeboat pops and now you got, you guys are just like kind of treading water. Let's tell you, there's a big group of you and you're all treading water in the ocean and you know that like this is inevitable.
We can't tread water forever. And some of you in that moment as you're treading water in the ocean, are in full fledge panic mode. Because you are looking at your circumstances and you cannot see outside of that circumstance, and you realize that as far as you can look into the future, it looks pretty grim and you're probably going to die.
And so you are in full fledged panic mode, 10 outta 10 stress. You got no joy in that moment. Now, what if one person knew like right behind you, I mean minutes behind you, you can't quite see it. It's just off the horizon, but just behind, like within minutes. There is actually a huge cruise ship. And the cruise ship is coming to save you.
And not only just save you, but they're gonna pick you up. You're gonna shower up. They got new clothes for you, you're gonna feast. And it's not even like a three day little cheap cruise. This is like a nice cruise. You're gonna spend the rest of the time just floating around the earth, living just your best life.
So much joy. If you're the one dude that knows that information, you're. Floating in the water and you got like this weird smile on your face. Everybody's panicking. They're screaming. It's a chaotic, grim like gruesome scene. And you're over here floating on your back, doing a starfish with a smile on your face.
I, this analogy is completely off the top of my head, so I apologize for all the reasons, for all the ways that it's breaking down or will break down. But dude, you're just laying there 'cause you're like, you know, the cruise is coming and like in minutes you're gonna be fine. And so you just think about that in life, like this is kind of Paul's attitude, like, yeah, dude, I'm suffering right now.
You're beating me right now. I'm in prison right now. I've gone through some hard stuff right now, but man, I. Eternity's coming, like it's coming quick. Whether I live another five years or 50 years, it's all quick. Like Jesus is coming to rescue me. And so yes, my daughter put Sharpie on the porch. Who cares?
Like really? In the grand scheme of eternity, like I am saved, first of all, the God of the universe. When I stand before him, I don't have to come with fear because he's not gonna pour out his wrath on me. He's gonna pour out his grace, and then I get to spend eternity. Not a couple years, not a couple days.
I get to spend eternity with the king of the universe. And so in the midst of the suffering and the sorrow, I'm starfish laying on my back. Starfish is a word I got from my. Two year olds, my three year olds swim lessons. So I'm star fishing on my back. I'm staring up at the stars or the clouds and I've got the smirk on my face.
'cause even in the midst of the suffering, I have perspective that man, I serve a good God and I know. How this story ends. How do you not have more joy, bro? When you have kingdom perspective, how do you not have more joy in the midst of whatever you're going through and literally whatever you're going through?
I'm talking about Sharpies on a porch, but I know some of you are going through some real, real heavy stuff, and I don't mean to make light of that by any stretch of the imagination. Some of you are dealing with sickness in yourself or in your family, or maybe one of your children. Some of you have dealt with.
And I get choked up even thinking about this, but miscarriages, death of your children. Some of your marriages are falling apart or have fallen apart. Some of you are deep in addiction and you are genuinely suffering. And I'm not trying to make light of that. And you pray, God, rescue me. Or maybe you pray to God, rescue me or save them or or rescue them.
And you in the moment, he didn't. And the pain that you're feeling is actually feels overwhelmingly deep. And you can't imagine having any kind of joy in this. I don't have a great answer for that other than the story isn't over. God will make all things new, and it may not be in this life, but we know that this life is the shortest place that we will spend anywhere.
If eternity is real, this is the shortest place that we will spend anywhere. And for some of you, you feel like. You are the one treading water and you feel like life is overwhelming you and drowning you and your death is coming soon. And, and I don't mean that like, um, literally, although for all of us, it is literally coming soon regardless of how long we live.
Life is so short. It's about a vapor as the scripture say. But I guess my prayer for you. Would be that the cruise ship is coming for way lack of better words and analogies like Jesus is coming, his kingdom is coming, and he will give us glimpses of his kingdom here on earth. I pray that you experience some of his kingdom here on earth in the midst of your pain, but the fullness of the kingdom is coming and instead of God having you suffer throughout your whole life and then to die and go into nothingness or even worse, die and go to hell.
He saved you. His eyes were on you, and he looked at you knowing full well, all the suffering that you would experience in this life. And he would say, I love you, son. Or if you're a daughter, I love you, daughter. I hear you and I see you, and it won't always be like this. I will come and I will make all things new.
I, there will be a new heaven and a new Earth. There will be no more crying or tears or pain or sadness or grief or anger. I will rescue all things. I will be your king. I will redeem all things and make all things new and for the rest of eternity, you will be with me and I will be with you and I will be your God.
Revelation talks about that. And so that is our hope, and I think that's the hope that Paul was talking about, which is why he says rejoice in all things. And when we have that kind of eternal perspective, it changes the way that we parent our kids, that it's hard not to have that kind of joy. That would go to my last and final point here.
The last thing that sucks my joy to takes away my joy is my own selfishness. Meaning I convince myself that the world revolves around me. In order to have an eternal perspective, in order to reduce stress or fear and sin, I need to spend time with Jesus. It's hard to spend a lot of time with Jesus and feel stressed, to feel fear and to feel like the world revolves around you.
It doesn't. When you're in the presence of a king, the couple things happen. Number one, you realize that you're not the king, and that's great news. The world doesn't revolve around you. It doesn't revolve around your comfort or your peace or your satisfaction, and so you don't become the king, the hero, the main character of the story.
And so when your kids bother you, instead of you feeling like, oh, you're such a bother to me, you're annoying me, you're frustrating me, the story isn't about you. It's about Jesus and him laying his life down and modeling that for us, and that we now under the ruling kingship of Jesus, we lay our lives down for the people around us and we sacrifice.
And we constantly put ourselves last for the sake of the family because that's what our king did for us. And then he told us to go do the same. And so when you're around Jesus, you recognize that he's in control. He's the king. I don't, I don't have to stress. I know how the story ends. I don't care about election years or political environments or even my bank account or even my health because I know how the story ends.
He's the king, he's sovereign, he's in control. He will make all things new again. And so I just find my soul begins to find rest when I'm near the king. And then I also realize I'm not the king he is. The story isn't about me. Why do I expect my wife and my kids and everyone to kind of make my life more pretty and more easy?
It's not about me. I'm not the king of the story he is. And so I need to spend more time with Jesus. And when I don't, I find myself having less joy. So as I reverse engineer my joy or my lack of joy. Those are the things that come to mind. Am I confessing sin because my sin sucks the joy out of my life and outta my soul, and it takes it away from my kids and my wife?
Am I stressed because I'm fearful of the future or my current state, or am I stressed about the sins of my past? When I'm around the king? I just recognize that my sins have been forgiven, my future has already been written, and it's good because I've been saved by Jesus. And then finally, when I'm with the king, I remember I'm not the king.
And that's great. I don't have to have my kids and my wife and everyone around me serve me because it's not about me. It's about serving them in the way that my king served me. He had no right. He should not have made himself so lowly. I. As to wash our feet as to lay himself down on the cross for my sins.
There's no reason he should have done that, and yet he did. And so how do I not get joy from that and then go serve the others around me with a ton of joy. Those are some of my reflections. I hope that that's helpful. I. I just love you guys so much. I'm so grateful to be on this journey with you. I'll see you next week.
Bye.