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Beyond The Message is a weekly podcast that dives deeper into the weekend’s teaching. Released after each Sunday service, it offers thoughtful conversation, added insight, and practical reflection to help our community process and apply what they heard. Whether you're revisiting the message or catching up, this podcast is designed to help you go deeper throughout the week.
Welcome to Beyond the Message, the podcast where we take the weekly teaching at Christ Community Chapel and we bring it into your week. Each week we sit down together and we laugh a little bit, we reflect, and then we talk about how to live out what we've just learned. If you didn't yet hear the sermon, no big deal. Just drop down to the description where you can find a link to it, watch it, listen to it, and then come back and join in on this conversation. My name is Stacey, and today I'm joined by Jimmy Kozy, Mark Lyle, and Jamie Hewitt. Welcome, guys. Good to be here. Welcome. If you are listening, you don't know this, but we actually have a new set. So we feel like we're around a table. I'm a little unsteady right now. A little bit unsteady. It's very intimate. I could say anything. We are very close to each other around this table. It is. Yeah. Here we go. So we'll see how it goes. I'm out. But so to kick things off, Pastor Zach taught us this week, again, week. Is it week three of more life or four? Four. I'm throwing off, but it's, uh, single digits. I know it's single digits. It's gonna be single digits for a while. And he had a great illustration talking about a hotel room. And it got me thinking. He had some idiosyncrasies with that. His traveling, uh, just patterns. And so I thought I'd ask you guys anything weird or a pattern that you have when you travel. Like Zach blacking out an entire hotel room, every crack and crevice. Something weird. You do. Yeah, I do have something weird. This is going to out not surprise you, Jimmy. Well, I do a lot of weird things, but, uh, the books in all the world cannot contain how many weird things I do. Um, so when I travel for, like, if I'm traveling for work and I'm traveling with somebody, if this kind of is on brand with my personality, I prefer to be alone. I really do. Um, and so I often find myself trying to optimize, you know how with airlines on the app, you can change your. Your seats all the way up until basically when you get on the flight. Yeah. So I am trying to optimize the right time to change my seat so that I can sit alone so that I don't feel the obligation to make even. Even with a co worker who I might have a great relationship with. I just don't want to talk. Have you ever changed your seat multiple times? Because it's like, really I have done that. Because they're chasing you around. They changed their seat. Yeah. Notice that something happened and your, uh, seat moved. So I moved. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I do. So. Okay. And I've done it recently. Ooh, we could press into that. But we won't. We won't. Anybody else? Yeah. Mine's not nearly as traumatic. Okay. Bring it. Um, that's pretty traumatic for the other people who are now listening to this and pieces together having. Yeah. I may even have experienced that and never known it. Now I may have been on the other side of it. I missed you on a plane flight once. You could. Didn't get away from me. That was a traumatic flight. I, uh, always wait till almost the end to board a plane. I hate standing in the jetway. I like that. So, yeah, I just figured why sit on the plane? Or like, man, like rushing to get on the plane. Well, what if you have to fight for overhead bin space? I don't care. You don't care? You'll just take somebody else's bag out and put yours in. Sorry, guys. Yeah, Gay check. That's their problem. That's their problem. Getting my bag there is their problem. Not, um, mine. It's going to be your problem if they don't get it there. Jamie, do you have anything? I don't. I don't have anything that comes to mind a ton other than I'm. A lot of people are very aggressively a part of the no stops club when they travel and they're driving and I. I'm like, I'd rather. I'd rather. Take your time. If you need to stop, stop, stop as often as you need to. So. So, like every 20 minutes, Mark, you're never getting there. Going back to yours. One thing I've learned recently is that the zone thing with boarding planes, total, it's nonsense. They don't enforce it at all. So. So do you. So do you also do that? Do you just. Sometimes I'll border. It's like, I want to get on the plane. You just look them in the eyes. You go back. I just go scan my ticket. I'm like, I'll see you. Uh, they don't pay any attention. See you in the next city. It's good to know. Might try that. So you push the people who need special assistance aside. Well, I let them go. Yeah. I let them go. I do you. I. I don't do anything too weird. I was thinking about the hotel room in. In particular, and I do find that, like, whenever I Go to a hotel. I like take a tour of the hotel. Soon after, like a self guided tour. Self guided? Yeah, self guided tour of a place you've. Of a place you've never been. I did get lost once. I ended up like there were two hotels connected and I ended up like going in an elevator for the connected hotel and like got lost then in that hotel. But yeah, you just have an adventurous exploring experience. And I use the steps all the time. Like I find where the steps are and then I just go up and down the steps at the end of the hallways instead of doing the elevator because I get annoyed at elevators. Okay, that's it. Okay, let's jump in to talk today, um, about the teaching. So we were in John 8, ah, 12 again, another I am statement and John 8 12. I'm just going to read the passages. I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness. Uh, Pastor Zach can just kind of parallel, uh, darkness with spiritual confusion a lot in this. So just want to get that in our minds. Um, and then he says, well, not whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. Um, he kind of walked through the sermon with these three kind of guides. First an observation, and that was that Jesus is saying that with him is light, which then infers and implies that without him or separate from him, you are in darkness. Um, and then an invitation that Jesus gives by n. By nature making that statement. Um, and that's where Pastor Zach kind of did that hotel room parallel of talking about how he does black out the room and in so doing will kind of find himself in the middle of the night, either stuck there in anxiety. I think he was talking about having to use the bathroom or something. Right. I just, can I just, just to go straight there. I don't understand why you wouldn't just pick up your phone and use the flashlight. Wow, you're just, you know, you're ruined. Like, come on. Okay. In their grippling anxiety. Or the alternative is kind of running through life and then within darkness and you have all sorts of bumps and bruises and harm that kind of comes to us in that. But then the illumination where he just talk about the reality that salvation is in him, that Jesus will lead us to more and more into the light and that we can also in turn lead others. So, uh, to jump in, I wanted to start with a clip that might even be a little bit of a surprising one. Um, but just struck me as kind of maybe a great starting point for us to talk about how we know what it is that Jesus actually says. So let's watch that now. Friends, do you know what Jesus has said about the things that are happening in your life? Do you know that he says those things because he does not want you to run into the furniture. He does not want you to be covered in bumps and bruises. He does not want pain for you. He wants life. Do you know that? Well, will you bring your life into the light? Now, I've told you this before. 8 out of every 10 couples who apply for marriage at this church are living together other at this church. And I don't say that to condemn you. I say that to say, here's what that tells me. You don't believe Jesus knows how marriage or relationships or sex work best. Which means I know your story, like mine, is full of bumps and bruises and anxiety when it comes to sex and relationships. Jesus doesn't want that for, for you. Will you bring it into the light? Your money, your, your career, your parenting. You know what all the influencers say. But do you know what Jesus says? So Pastor Zach, he point paints just kind of a great picture of just brokenness and brokenness. I think that we all experience and connects it to the reality that we often do not know what Jesus says or don't listen to what Jesus says. Um, so I just wanted to talk about that a little bit. Like first of all, how do we know what Jesus says and what obstacles do we face in either knowing what it is he says or how can we position ourselves differently to understand what he says in a better way? Jamie, you want to kick things off, put you on the spot? Yeah. Why we don't know what Jesus says. Yeah. I mean, when I think in my life if, if I picked an area, it's because I'm not stopped to listen. I mean, maybe that seems too obvious and I'm um, and simple, but I think if I want to know something, I usually have to seek it out a little bit and so I have to look for it. And I just think some of us, we don't spend enough time listening to what God has said through his Word. Primarily. Yeah, yeah. It's like a two step process. There's. You have to know and understand what Jesus is asking of you. And you're going to the picture that Zach used in the message talking about the data, uh, on couples living together who apply to be married here. Of those eight out of 10, I bet there's a fair amount who know that they're not supposed to be doing what they're doing. They just don't trust Jesus enough. So it's two steps. You gotta know it. And then you have to trust Jesus enough to say, even if this is counter to what I think or what I want, I'm willing to set that aside for a second to see if he has a better way forward. Yeah. Uh, I wanted to ask this because I think I can think of myself, and I think a lot of just people I come in contact with regularly that walk in and out of this place that I know, they're. They're sitting in a seat where they're hearing the truth and the reality of what Jesus says, but it's not impacting their actions. And so I don't know if it is just a. You say this often, Jimmy. You often say, when is the last time something Jesus has challenged you? And, um, have you felt conviction? Have you been challenged by the truth of God's word versus your own sense of what you want to do? So, I. I just think there's so many of us that sit in a position where we do hear it, or we're sitting where we can hear it, but we're not actually listening and taking any steps to observe that we're being challenged. Yeah, I think that's a valid. That's a valid thing to think about. If you're feeling as if, I don't know if I can see the light of Jesus. But you also can't think back to a time where you changed what you were going to do, even though you really wanted to do it, because you knew it would put you more into alignment with the heart and mission of Jesus. If you can't think of a time that you did that you got questions to ask yourself. Right? Right. I don't think it would be hard for us to find the people that we talk to regularly. Friends, uh, within the church, friends outside the church. I think the whole idea of moral darkness and moral light is pretty, uh, foreign. I think we kind of think it's, uh, a world of light and lighter. You know, it's just a matter of becoming a little more educated, a little more. And Jesus is saying, uh, to the Pharisees, which is crazy. The most moral people of his day. You are in the darkness. Yeah. You know, it's interesting. Something, Jamie, you said a little bit ago, just about not stopping to listen, makes me think that, um, you know, that the darkness can come from one of two directions. The first, uh, Zach talked about in the sermon, he used the hotel room analogy with anxiety and just staying in the bed because you're afraid to step out. Uh, but then the other is just such a confidence in yourself and your own understanding that it doesn't occur to you that you would need to listen to somebody else. You know, it's almost like we have to toggle which one of those is our. More are we more wired for? And. And how do we mitigate that? By ultimately moving our trust to Jesus and what he has to say. Yeah, yeah. And I like what, too, Mark. What you said, that just resonates with me that I think a lot of people. Yeah. You see yourself as being in the light, and then it might get brighter down the road, but they don't see themselves in darkness, even if they're battling or all sorts of things. Even running blindly, like we're gonna talk about, and getting bumps and bruises. I love what Zach said, too. Uh, uh, being the seasoned member of the group, he went through the different diet fads. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, uh, and I remembered every one of those, which was wild. But, uh, just a reminder there that darkness also included, like you said, Stacy, confusion, the whole idea of, do we even know how to live? And I think, Jimmy, you mentioned the couples that are coming today and are going, yeah, we're living together. Well, it's really practical. We save a ton of money in rent and everything else. They've lost the whole idea that it's possible that there is a way to live that God prescribes. And, uh. And I want to be careful. It's easy to point out, oh, all these eight out of ten couples. I mean, that's my life every day. But on the other hand, like, what did Jesus mean when he said, uh, it's possible for a man to gain the whole world and yet lose his soul? There might be all these practical considerations that make sense. Absolutely. Setting that aside, there is he. He does have clarity on a lot of things in terms of how we are to live. And so we have to take that. But culturally, we've kind of gotten to a place where it's not good to say that something is not good. Yeah. And I think that's what you're drawn out here. Yeah. Let's jump and talk about the different things. The hotel room. So just jump to the hotel room. So, uh, Pastor Zach kind of talked about the two different aspects of darkness. One being crippling anxiety, one being running just blindly yourself, and then getting hurt along the way, having those bumps and the bruises. So, I mean, a little bit just vulnerable on this. Are there any of those that you really resonated with or things that you experienced or what do you think of kind of those two different avenues that darkness takes us? Yeah, I think. Well, I mean, anxiety. I've experienced anxiety. Absolutely. And it's the kind of thing where you do get paralyzed thinking, uh, is anything good going to ever happen? Am I really safe long term? Um, and so that. That in the darkness especially, there is no way out of that. It's horrifying. Yeah. I think, um, I've been a Christian a long time, most of my life. Um, and so I think I'm more in danger of the second one that comes from an assumption that I understand and know what to do. And so I think I'm like, can at. Sometimes I feel like I'm the guy who is in the hotel room and is less familiar with his surroundings than he thinks he is. And so gets up, just. Just roll it and bangs his shin on the, you know, whatever the thing in the hotel room is. Now I'm taking this analogy a little bit too far, but it's good as long as you don't bang the mini fridge open and, uh, have to spend the money. That's later. That's after. No. Well, and just even to press into that a little bit further. And Mark, you kind of started to hit to this a little bit like that. You know, um, Jesus doesn't promise that we won't have any anxiety. Right. There is the reality that he lived and had pain right through going ultimately to the cross, sure. But he is light in and of himself. So I think, what does it look like to realize, um, living in the light can mean we are gonna have suffering. Living in light can be. We're gonna struggle with negative emotion and different things. How does that look differently, though, when we are in the light versus being in the darkness and having anxiety? What do those two things? How does it look different? How can we help people think about that? I think Jesus is very directly honest. I think it's John 16:35, where it'll say, in this world you will have tribulation. And then his answer to that is, but take heart, for I've overcome the world. I mean, that's another maybe expression of I am the light. Like, I'm not in this confusion. I am above it, and I'm bringing light into that. But I think God's promise is always just to be with, uh, in the midst of us. And so I think in the midst of anxiety, we can know that the one who's overcome all darkness, who is Overcoming the world and has won is with us and, ah, next to us. And until he comes again to set everything fully and finally right, we can know that he's alongside us. Yeah, yeah. It's like in the, I think in the sermon, uh, Pastor Zach was challenging us to look to Jesus. Look to Jesus. And I think in this respect you also can take into account that, that Jesus experienced in the Garden of Gethsemane, for example, incredible anxiety to the point where he. He was asking out of the, you know, the plan at hand. And yet what he was modeling in that moment, he was saying, if it's possible for it to not be this way, can it not be this way yet if it's not, I trust you. And, you know, you balance that with other parts of scripture where he'll talk about, you know, he'll say things like, who. Who by worrying has ever added an hour to his life? And he'll say, you know, look at this sparrow. Look at this. Look how God keeps everything held together. And I think it's like that two sides of that challenge. On one hand, he has suffered anything that we've suffered, he's suffered it and has, uh, trusted God. And then he uses that to challenge us, to say, you can trust God. He is trustworthy. And that culminates in the resurrection, where it kind of brings everything due and saying, uh, look, I can make good on these promises. I can be trusted. Yeah. And the Bible said because he has experienced that, he's able to sympathize with us in our weakness and in our pain in Hebrews. And, and then I think it makes him as if, you know, it makes him that much more trustworthy. When we see what he went through at the cross, there's no reason that we could say, uh, and how could I not follow somebody who is willing to endure that alongside me? I'll follow alongside him as I go through my life. Yeah, and I think we've talked about this before on here, but I just always, uh, I've been pointed myself to the psalms where again, you, you see so much pain, so much negative emotion expressed and, and given to God, even directed at times towards God and, and knowing that, like in your pain, in our anxiety, in those things, again, he's with us and he can also handle us bringing that to him. And, um, you know, those psalms really always at some point take a turn because they are saying, you are with me. My hope is in you. Um, but there's a lot that, you know, can bring a comfort. I think also when you're in the middle of kind of feeling like you're in darkness, but clinging to the hope of Christ and clinging to the light that is in Christ because it is there even when it feels dark. Yeah, I love, uh, what Jimmy said, too. I think you said it really well, Jimmy. You know, Zach says Jesus is the light, so he's always in the light. That's right. And yet the description we get ultimately of Jesus is man of sorrow, is acquainted with grief. And, uh, that's kind of a. That's a wild balance. He was never scared. He was never distrusting that God existed, but he felt this world deeply and he walked obediently. It's remarkable. Yeah, Yeah, I was just encouraged. I love the. Just this statement in general that Jesus is the light of the world. And I think the light motif is throughout so much of the New Testament, probably Old Testament, too. You pastors can tell me all of that. Um, but I just wanted to point out a couple of other passages that are there. Um, and first of all, we talked maybe last week about John 1 being that epic passage describing Jesus, um, where it says, in him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness. Darkness has not overcome it. Another one for you, if you're listening to this, just to reference for later, is first John 1, 5, and 6. And I'll just read that one. God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. Um, if we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not, uh, practice the truth. If we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And the blood of Jesus his son, um, cleanses us from all sin. So we could probably go on and on. But I think even as we think about this week ahead, looking at more places in scripture where we see Jesus and light and the light that we have because of him, um, it's something we can press into. I don't know if you guys have anything to share, expand on. Yeah, I would even add in the book of Ephesians, it talks about taking no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. And I think I like the, the light and darkness motif. There's so many things that light does to darkness. And I think, you know, if anything for this week, based on what does. What Pastor Zach said in the sermon, I would say my challenge would be to, uh, really take a hard look at areas where I think I'm in the light, but I actually need the light to expose where I'm misaligned with. Because I think that that's what light does for us if we're followers of Jesus. It does a lot of things. One of the things it does is expose where we are out of alignment with what he has for us. And just asking God saying, like, show me where I am out of alignment with you. Show me where I'm in darkness and I might think I'm in the light. And yeah, about you guys. Anything else? I got to thinking, uh, I don't know why, but I got to thinking about Genesis and creation and the fact that all there was was darkness and the very first thing was let there be light. That's right. And then Paul also says Jesus is before all things. And I was like, I think there's kind of a cool correlation there that once Jesus is. Mhm. Darkness cannot and will not ever be able to swallow it back up into nothingness. And uh, I love that picture. And John, that's kind of where John goes with the logos in John 1 and. Yeah, it's pretty. Yeah, I love it. Yeah. I mean, I love the first John. And for me it's the idea that walking in life with Jesus changes the way that we walk with other people too. So that first John passage will talk about how we live with one another and how, uh, walking the light is something that we do holistically in all of our life. So love that. Well, thanks so much for joining today and thanks so much for tuning in to beyond the Message. Um, if all week long we love to provide content to you so that you could grow right where you are at. Um, so on our YouTube channel, on our app, there's different ways that you can connect in and learn more and go deeper, either with this message or with other resources that we have for you. Make sure to subscribe so that you don't miss, miss an episode and we'll see you next week.