What Does It Mean to Be Blessed? | The Book Of Psalms Week 3

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- These six verses break down really

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into four big spheres of life, right?

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It's the individual, it's the family,

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it's the church, and it's all of society.

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And we're going to see what a life of walking

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in the ways of the Lord actually looks like.

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- Where are we in the Bible?

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Let's begin at the beginning, shall we?

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The Bible begins in the Old Testament,

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written around 3500 years ago.

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The first five books of the Old Testament:

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Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy

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are known as the Pentateuch, or books of the law.

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The next 12 books: Joshua, Judges, Ruth,

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1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings,

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1 Chronicle, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther.

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Whew. That's a lot.

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These are known as the historical books.

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This brings us to the books of the Bible

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known as the Wisdom Literature.

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It starts with Job and then into

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a collection of 101 poems known as the Psalms.

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- There's a chapter in the Book of Psalms

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that has really unlocked for me a way to drown out

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all that chaotic noise

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and instead find something better

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that I can actually vibe and live my life doing.

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Today, I want to show you where that is

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and how that exactly works.

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But first, quick question for you:

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What did you want to be when you grew up,

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like when you were a kid?

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Like what did you want to be?

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Did you want to be like an astronaut,

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a teacher, a firefighter?

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Me? I wanted to be all those things.

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But as I got a little older, I started to realize

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what I really wanted to do was I wanted to be a DJ.

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Yeah, that's right.

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I wanted to be on the turntables,

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making great noises,

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you know, doing the whole thing.

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[scratching] You hear that? That's fun.

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Now, these turntables and this rig is interesting

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because the technology has, like, evolved over time.

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So I'm going to try to turn this thing on

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and see if it actually -- Oh, it works.

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Oh, look at that. It works. It really works.

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Let's see if I can actually, like, scratch.

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I don't even -- I don't even -- [scratching]

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Oh, you hear that?

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Oh, look at that.

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Let's try something.

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Let's try this. [song changes]

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It worked. It work --

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I'm not going to play with these too much

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because my DJ friends will actually

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be in the comment section making fun of me.

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But I wanted to be a DJ as a kid, right?

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And I had friends around me at the time,

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we had like a little crew or whatever.

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And my good friend, he wanted to be a public speaker.

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He wanted to inspire people through his words

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and through speeches. Right?

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I had another friend who was in culinary school

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and he wanted to make incredible foods

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and that sort of thing.

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And then had another friend

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who was like a really good rapper. Right?

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Well, as life progresses, my rapper friend,

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he actually became a school principal.

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And so he's still inspiring people through words,

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but not necessarily ones that rhyme. Right?

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So he's leading thousands of kids at a high school, right?

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And my friend who was in culinary school,

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he actually became a really good rapper.

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And he's written songs for artists

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that are Grammy winners and, you know, doing his thing.

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And my friend who wanted to be a public speaker,

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he's actually traveled the entire world deejaying.

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And well, me, I'm here with you. Right?

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It's funny how life works.

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There's one thing I've learned,

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it's that life is complicated and it's messy

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and it's super intertwined,

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and it never goes as planned.

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But I got to be honest with you, I tell you this,

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I am at peace.

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I am at peace with God. I'm content.

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And I believe that I am blessed

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beyond what I could ever imagine.

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And as life never goes as planned,

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one thing we can plan for is that

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when we take God seriously and we walk in His ways,

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there are benefits.

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So as we unpack Psalm 128,

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I want you to see this as a snapshot of

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an ideal society, church, family, and individuals

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who are experiencing peace and contentment.

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Let's read it together, Psalm 128:

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Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord,

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who walks in His ways!

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You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands;

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you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you.

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Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house;

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your children will be like olive shoots around your table.

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Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord.

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The Lord bless you from Zion!

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May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem

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all the days of your life!

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May you see your children's children!

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Peace be upon Israel!

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Now, I know, before you go all wild on me,

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a few things to note about this.

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The word fear in this passage

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is not what we talk about when we talk about fear.

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The word fear in this passage is really

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about respect, reverence and awe.

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You and I have this weird thing like fear equals horror movie.

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That's not what the writer is talking about here.

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They're talking about respect and reverence

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and taking seriously.

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And this chapter shows us what a thriving family

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and society and individuals and all aspects of life

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looks like in a specific snapshot in history.

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It's different today, we all know that.

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We don't live in ancient Israel.

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You probably don't even like olives.

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And most of us, right now,

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we don't pick our grapes off of a vine.

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We drink our wine out of a box. Right?

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This Psalm is an ideal, and it's okay

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if your life doesn't look exactly like that right now.

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But this can be something for us to strive for.

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And in the same way,

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we strive to be more and more like Jesus.

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Every day we can strive for ideals.

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So what does it really mean to be blessed?

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What does it really mean for it to be well with you

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and walk in the Lord's ways?

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How do we actually get there?

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Well, these six verses break down

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really in the four big spheres of life, right?

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It's the individual, it's the family,

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it's the church, and it's all of society.

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And after the break,

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we're going to unpack each of those four

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and we're going to see what a life of walking

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in the ways of the Lord actually looks like.

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- Hey, I'm Hannah. - And I'm Kyle.

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- We're hoping that this message is connecting with you.

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And if it is, we'd love for you to go to Crossroads.net/give

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to support videos being made just like this one.

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- That being said, let's get back to the message.

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- Okay, so this deejaying thing is pretty sweet,

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but we got to watch out for the bots, right?

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So I'll give you just a little bit of --

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remember this one? Classic.

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You're not going to catch us bots.

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We're not doing it. Not going to happen.

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This is how deejaying works. Right?

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This rig right here back in the day,

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they would they would DJ on these things called records,

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right, vinyl. Right?

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And so if you were doing an event,

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you'd have to walk in there with like giant crates,

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like milk crates stacked to the ceiling

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to be able to pick songs out of.

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Now, it's a little bit different, right?

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With technology and whatnot,

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we've got playlists that you can pull from.

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You can pull the songs out of here,

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so you have to walk around

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and load up a plane or whatever, or a car or a van.

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And then from there, from the software,

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it comes into these these turntables here. Right?

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And so these turntables,

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I learned on on these right here.

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I learned on these guys right here.

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But now DJs are getting smart.

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They got a smaller, more condensed pack.

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It does all the same great stuff, right?

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It does all the awesome stuff,

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but it's just a little bit smaller.

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And then from there,

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the sound goes into like this mixer, right?

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And so this mixer right here is, like,

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where the central point

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of all the different noises coming in.

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And then you get to take the sound out of the mixer

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and you send it into the speaker.

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And the speaker is what the world hears

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or what your listeners hear, right?

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So let's read Psalm 128 with that framework in mind.

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Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord,

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who walks in his ways!

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You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands;

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you shall be blessed and it shall be well with you.

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Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house;

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Your children will be like olive shoots around your table.

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Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord.

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The Lord bless you from Zion!

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May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem

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all the days of your life!

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May you see your children's children!

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Peace be upon Israel!

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Six verses, but unpack a lot of insight

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on what a blessed and peaceful world looks like.

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And we're going to unpack those four spheres.

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But I want to do it in a way

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that's been really helpful for me

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as I've been reading Scripture, right?

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And that's reading it backwards.

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Like not backwards in like this word

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and this word in reverse order.

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But I mean, taking the verses, and reading them in reverse.

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All right?

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So the four spheres in reverse order, right?

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We're going to pull it back.

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We're going to pull back a little bit here

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and unpack these.

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The first one, right, verse six.

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Verse six is talking all about society.

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And when we think about society,

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it really is interesting to me that

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the noise that is coming out of the speakers

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of Culture right now,

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it really strikes me as uncomfortable, right?

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Like hear how loud this is.

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It could be a loud. It could be annoying.

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It could be frustrating. It could be ugly.

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It could be angry. It could be divisive.

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We've got a lot of things coming out of the speakers

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right now that need to be addressed. Right?

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But the way we're going about it,

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it feels like the speaker itself might be broken.

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I think we all agree that a long life,

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a peaceful life is something that we want.

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A peaceful nation is more ideal than a non peaceful one.

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And if we're going to change

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what's coming out of the speaker. Right?

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We can't just move the speaker around and tip it over

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or or throw it out the window.

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We have to look at the other components

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that make up what's happening in culture,

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because just like what's coming out of a speaker,

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it's comprised of all the different elements.

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What's coming out of society is comprised of

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a lot of different elements.

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I told you that the mixer sends the sound of the speaker.

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Right?

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Well, that really takes me back to verse five,

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it talks about being blessed from Zion.

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Like what's Zion, right?

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Not just the basketball player.

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Like what is Zion?

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Zion was referred to as the holy city of Jerusalem.

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And often times, like the temple that sat on the hill.

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Right?

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It was a place where all of the Israelites went.

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It was the place where they met, and they worship God together.

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There's an ideal in this passage

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that everyone who is blessed

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and is walking in God's ways

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is connected to a body of believers.

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And for us right now,

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where the body of believers meet is the local church.

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And I encourage you to get connected to a local church.

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And this mixer is a lot like the local church, right?

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If you think about this mixer as the place where

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all the different people come together

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and they all try to work together

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to impact what's coming out of the speaker.

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There are a lot of different components to this, right?

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If you turn one side on too loud, it's super annoying.

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But if you don't turn it on at all,

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you don't hear it, right?

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You get nothing.

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Now, if this side tries to fight with that side

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and you get like all of this back and forth going on,

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all that jazz, it becomes annoying

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and nobody enjoys it, right?

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No one is blessed by it.

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But when both sides of this mixer

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are working the way they're supposed to,

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something is created, right,

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that wouldn't normally be there.

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And then the people who are listening, they're blessed.

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Society is blessed by the church working together,

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the body of believers.

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But a church is not just where it where it stops. Right?

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Because the church is made up of more

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than just people coming together.

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It's made up of families.

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And that takes me to verse three. Right?

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Verse three is all about the family.

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And it's important to remember in the culture

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that these people were reading and studying this,

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men did a lot of the studying and reading

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and women did not.

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And I want to encourage you,

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if you look at your your home life right now

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and you're like, "Ah, I hate it when we talk about this stuff,"

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because, you know, your home life doesn't look like

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that or you don't have to two parents in the home

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or, you know, you might even

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live with your birth parents or whatever that might be.

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I want encourage you with this. Okay?

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Families are like turntables. Okay?

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They come in all shapes and sizes. All right?

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I learned on this, this is what I had growing up.

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Today I'm using these.

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There have been times where I've used

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different models of turntable and in the same way

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God uses families that look like this,

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that looks like this, and that look like

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something that we don't even have on this table. Right?

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Every family is different.

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And if if you read this, and you automatically feel shame,

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I want to take a quick pause and talk to you real quick.

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Like, I know traditionally in Christendom

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it's been like a one size fits all for women

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and men are like, yeah,

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you can do all these other things.

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Women, you are called to just do this one thing, right?

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And when you read a verse like that,

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it can automatically trigger that feeling.

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And so if you're a mom or wife or a woman right now

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and you are called to be in the home,

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if that's where you find your family situation,

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I encourage you.

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You are being fruitful.

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You are not missing out on all the stuff

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that is happening outside.

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You are being fruitful.

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You are a fruitful vine in your home.

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And I also want to encourage moms

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who are in the workforce and doing their thing,

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the single moms, the moms who have decided to work,

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the moms who are running businesses

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and doing the whole thing.

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I want to encourage you too.

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You aren't failing your family.

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You are being a fruitful vine.

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See, what fruitful means is that

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you are not just providing wine,

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you're providing shade, you're providing nutrients,

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you're providing covering over your family.

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And what that looks like

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changes depending on your situation.

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You are being fruitful

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if you are taking care of your family

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and you are taking care of your home,

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whatever that might look like.

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In my house, it's probably not the same as yours, right?

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Like my wife and I, you know,

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we decided a few years ago that my wife would stay home.

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Now, let me just stop you right there.

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My wife's earning potential is, like,

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way higher than mine.

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But we made a decision that

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it would be more fruitful for our family.

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She decided she wanted to stay home.

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All good. You know what that means?

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That means she's being fruitful

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as she cares for our kids every single day.

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That also means that I'm going to have to be fruitful

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in getting some stuff to bring home. Right?

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Getting some money.

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It also means that we can say yes to some things

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and we can say no to some things

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based on what we were called to do

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to be fruitful in our home.

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And then I also want to stop here real quick

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because we're talking about family and stuff.

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There's a lot of different emotions that can come up.

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There are folks out there who are maybe you're single,

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maybe you've been single for a long time

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and you're like, "Man, I can't wait to make that,

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you know, have to deal with those problems or whatever."

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Or maybe you don't have children

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or maybe you don't have a biological family.

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Be encouraged with this.

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We are all spiritual children of someone.

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Everyone has a family, that's not a biological family.

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Maybe you have a spiritual family.

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And if you're following Jesus

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or you're a part of pursuing who he is,

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you are the spiritual child of someone.

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I'm the spiritual child of Kevin and David

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and the guys who had led them.

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You are the spiritual child of someone.

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We all have a family. We're all part of a family.

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But families, right, families are made up of what?

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Of individuals. Right?

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And that's where I think the the most confusion comes

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when we talk about a blessed world

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and a thriving world and a thriving church

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and a thriving family, we miss a really important part,

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and that is the individual.

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And we think about a DJ rig,

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the individual is a lot like this software right here.

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This software right here, if this isn't functioning,

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none of this stuff works, nothing comes out.

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This is one of the most overlooked parts

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of a thriving world is the individual.

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Because a thriving society

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is made up of a thriving church,

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that's made up of thriving families,

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that's made up of individuals

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who are taking God seriously and walking in His ways.

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You can't have a thriving world

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without people who are thriving,

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and you can't have a godly world without godly people.

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It blows my mind how we get so surprised

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when chaos hits, when chaos ensues,

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when we're not taking God seriously.

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It blows my mind that we think that we can just,

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you know, blame this, that and the other

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and and make all these changes

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without changing what's happening with us.

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And lastly, I want to talk to the people

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who maybe you don't know God, right?

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Maybe you're like, "Yeah, this whole God thing,

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I don't know if I really am into it or whatever."

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Or maybe you're a little scared.

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Maybe you take that word fear and you're like,

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"Yeah, I'm actually scared of what might happen

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if I actually get to know God,

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if I actually make myself known to him

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and get real around him."

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I want encourage you with this, when you do know God,

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when you do know God and walk in His ways,

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you eventually realize that He wants good for you.

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He has a future for you.

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He's actually invested in your success

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and your family's success and your church's success,

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and your place in society's success.

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He wants all of those things to thrive.

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But it's got to start with you.

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We need more people walking in the ways of God.

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We need more people who understand what it's like

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to take God seriously,

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to bring it to the people closest to their lives,

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to let that impact the local church,

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to let that impact a society, not the other way around.

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So my challenge today is that

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you would examine your life,

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take a hard look in the mirror

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and see if there's anywhere in your life

00:18:03

where you aren't taking God seriously

00:18:05

and see if there's anywhere in your life

00:18:07

where you need to get to know God more,

00:18:09

you need to get to know more about what He says

00:18:12

about you, what he says about your future,

00:18:15

what it says about your life.

00:18:17

Because you can thrive.

00:18:19

Society can thrive if we take God seriously.

00:18:23

Let me pray for you.

00:18:25

God, I pray that we would walk in your ways

00:18:27

every single day and that we would see the fruit

00:18:30

of that decision in our daily lives,

00:18:33

with our families, with our friends,

00:18:35

with our churches, and with the world around us.

00:18:37

God, we don't want to throw our hands up

00:18:40

and give up and say, "Yeah, it is what it is."

00:18:43

No, God. We want to we want to pursue.

00:18:45

We want to bring your ways to the world.

00:18:48

We want to do what you've called us to do, God.

00:18:50

So I pray for every person watching this

00:18:52

that they would be renewed in their walk with you,

00:18:56

be renewed and their understanding of who you are

00:18:58

and they would see you for just how amazing you are.

00:19:02

You are good and we trust you. Amen.

00:21:23

- We're hoping you enjoy the message today

00:21:25

and hopefully you were able to get something

00:21:27

out of us going deeper in the Book of Psalms.

00:21:29

- That's right. This entire series is all connected

00:21:31

with an initiative that we've been doing

00:21:32

this whole year called the Bible Challenge.

00:21:34

- That's exactly right.

00:21:35

We as a community are going through the Bible

00:21:37

in the Crossroads App all week, reading,

00:21:40

diving into Scripture.

00:21:41

I'm there, Kyle's there, Brian's there.

00:21:43

- Everybody's there. Your mom might be there.

00:21:45

- Everybody's there. - A lot of people are there.

00:21:47

If you want to jump in,

00:21:48

just download the app and you're all set.

00:21:50

- That's right. So that's all we got for today.

00:21:52

We'll see you next time on Crossroads

00:21:54

and happy 4th of July.

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