Vitals | Week 4 | Full Service

got my hot tea instead of water today. I'm a little sick. So hopefully, this makes sense when I'm preaching because my brain doesn't often work when I'm preaching.

And before you say it, I know most of you are thinking, what's your excuse the rest of the time? But that's that's another story. So yeah. Hey. We're in this series on vitals about about health, and today, we're talking about emotional health. And when I when I think about the idea of emotions and feelings and health, I mean, you can't help but think about marriage

because it involves a lot of that. And I I I realized I'm coming up on my thirty fourth wedding anniversary with my my my my wife, you know, yeah, thirty four years. Yeah. All all in a row too. It's fantastic. It's been good. And and

and and the one thing that we've definitely learned in marriage is that whenever you end up in a in a in a fight or conflict or something, you know, because that's very feeling oriented. We've discovered that whatever you're fighting about is never really what the fight's about.

That that's that's it's it's always something more going on. Especially,

you can tell by how quickly it escalates depending on what the original start was. If it kinda escalates to something more really fast, then you know there's a lot more going on than what you're fighting about. And then you get sucked in because of emotion and feeling. You end up fighting about all kinds of stuff. It becomes like inception movie of of of conflict. It's like now you're in a fight within a fight within a fight. You almost need to have a court reporter to come in and keep track of where you're going. You know? Someone gets hysterical because someone gets historical.

That's this is how it happens. And and the truth is that idea that what you're fighting about isn't really what the fight about is the heart of emotional health, about when it comes to feelings and emotions and how we react and what we're doing. What we usually are wanting to do with emotion

is not really what we should be doing with emotion. What we're in this about is not really what it's about. What we're feeling is usually not what what we think we're feeling about is usually not what we're feeling for.

And and and so we're gonna unpackage that today when what we're gonna be talking about. And the big idea is simply this. Emotions are the dashboard, not the destination. See, oftentimes, we got we think that emotions, feelings are a destination. I need to get away from this feeling, and I need to get to that feeling.

And we think of them as the ones that control where we're going. It's like the GPS.

But the reality is they're they're the dashboard light. They're indicator lights. They are just telling you something's going on that you need to be aware of that you might need to do something with. They're they're not a goal. They're they're they're not the guide.

They're they're they're they're the ones. They're just telling you stuff. And that's what we're gonna unpackage here today. And we're gonna be in a passage in first Samuel 25. Before we get there, let me give you some definitions so I understand what we're talking about when it comes to emotional. Because last week, we looked at mental health,

which looks at how you do how do you think about things. And and how we look at God really controls how we see everything else. And mental health is asking, hey. Is there something clinically wrong? Is there something going on in the way I'm thinking?

Emotional health is how well am I handling what I feel day to day? And by definition of emotional some simple definitions is is can I recognize emotions, understanding what they're signaling, responding wisely instead of reacting automatically? Can you and you can be mentally healthy and still emotionally unhealthy.

You could be high functioning yet reactive, overwhelmed, and emotionally shut down. What the data shows about us, our culture, and stuff about emotional health well-being right now in our culture is, fewer people describe themselves as emotionally thriving. More people report chronic stress and emotional burnout.

The dominant issue today is I can't even no. It's burnout is the I just said it that way. Loneliness and emotional disconnection are now common. Even among people with families, jobs, and full schedules, people look fine externally, but they feel very worn internally. Maybe you're one of those.

And says, and and the real key to emotional health is is is in the world, they call it this, and the Bible actually talks mainly about this. It doesn't say it in this way. But we have this thing called emotional intelligence they talk about now, EQ. You know, you have IQ, and they have EQ.

And an EQ is this idea that you can notice what you're and what you feel and understand why you feel it. You can choose how to respond. Research has consistently showed that higher emotional intelligence equals better emotional health, stronger relationships,

lower stress, better decision making. They've even done studies that correlates it to higher income. They could predict your income level based on your EQ. So apparently, I have terrible EQ, but my IQ is so high.

Said health, EQ means that health doesn't really come from feeling less. It comes from handling feelings better.

And here's the problem in our culture and our world is and and this is what's beautiful. The Bible, people that studies all this stuff, helping counseling is all catching up to what the Bible's been talking about for thousands of years, is that most people were never taught what do you do when emotions show up.

We we live in a world that we think that, that's what we we go after those. We we try to go to the good emotions, avoid the bad emotions,

and that's not true. And that's the struggle, and that's what we're talking about. And so, what we're gonna do is we're gonna look at this story that's last week, we looked at mental health. We looked at the first king of Israel, Saul, and and how what he thought took him down a road to destruction.

This week, we're gonna look at the next king, David, and a story that happens right in the middle between last week and this week when we were looking at all those chapters in first Samuel. And this story happens with David right in the middle at the time when Saul's trying to kill him. So Saul's mental health breakdown

is is leading to an emotional moment for David and and how it's handled and what happens. And I just wanna read that. What I wanna do is since it's a narrative story, I just wanna read the whole thing. It's 35 verses. Just kinda read it like story time here.

And just to set it up, as David is on the run, like I said, king Saul's trying to kill him. He's got 600 men that have stayed loyal to him. He's hiding out in caves. He's out in the wilderness. He's doing this. And in this story, he's camping out next to a rich guy that that has a bunch of sheep and all that, and his men kind of ended up in inadvertently kind of protecting

them.

They didn't they didn't bother them. They didn't steal anything. They actually end up actually protecting them, And he's in a moment where he needs to feed his guys. So, you know, he's on the run. He's trying to take care of these 600 men. And so he writes a letter to the to the guy. And and then what happens with that? It all becomes very much we're gonna talk about some feelings here that that come out. And so here we go. So in in chapter 25 starting in verse two,

it's it says, then David moved down to the wilderness of Maon. There was a wealthy man from Maon who owned property near the town of Carmel. He had 3,000 sheep and a thousand goats, and it was sheep shearing time.

This man's name was Nabal, and his wife, Abigail, was a sensible and beautiful woman. But Nabal, a descendant of Caleb, was crude and mean in all of his dealings. When David heard that Nabal was shearing his sheep, he sent 10 of his young men to Carmel with this message for Nabal.

Peace and prosperity to you, your family, and everything you own. I'm told that it is sheep shearing time. While your shepherds stayed among us near Carmel, we never harmed them, and nothing was ever stolen from them. Ask your own men, and they'll tell you this is true.

So would you be kind to us since we have come at a time of celebration? Please share any provisions you might have on hand with us with your friend David. David's young men gave this message to Nabil in David's name, and then they waited for his reply.

Who is this fellow David? Nabil sneered. It's funny. He's, like, acting like he doesn't know who David is. He says this to the young man. Who does this son of Jesse think he is? You say you don't know who he is, but you know who his dad is. Okay. You you know who he is.

And he goes, there's lots of servants these days who run away from the masters. Now he really knows who he is. He knows that he's running from Saul.

And so he obviously knows this is the guy that defeated Goliath. This is the guy that Saul killed his thousands, but David's his tens of thousands. He's a great warrior. And, you know, he he knows exactly who he is. He's just being disrespectful and angry like like what it describes.

He goes, should I take my bread and my water and my meat that I've slaughtered for my shears and give it to a band of outlaws who've come from who knows where? So David's young man returned and told him what Nabal had said. Look. Three words.

I don't know if he said anything else before this, but the Bible reports, this is the next thing he said. Get your swords. And it's like he's like, get your guns. We're going to town. David's mad. I mean, so mad. Instantly says, get your swords, was David's reply as he strapped on his own.

Then 400 men start off with David and 200 remain behind to guard the equipment. That's pretty extreme, ain't it? He's like, this guy was rude. He won't give us food. You know what? Let's strap on and go to town, man. We're we're we're gonna go. We're gonna go kill some people. It it sounds pretty ridiculous.

I don't know. As a man, I get it. I I I get it. I don't know why. It's like, I I I don't know about you ladies, but I know men, we tend to process almost every emotion eventually through anger. And and I could see that. I I can get being so frustrated in a moment of disrespect that you you might want to consider

using a sword. I get it. I have three kids. I raised them. I know. But but still, this is extreme.

It says, meanwhile, one of Nabal's servants went to Abigail and told her, David sent messengers from the wilderness to greet our master. But he screams insult he screamed insults at him. These men have been very good to us, and we never suffered any harm from them. Nothing was stolen from us the whole time they were with us. In fact, day and night, they were like a wall of protection to us and the sheep.

You need to know this and figure out what to do for there's gonna be a trouble for our master and his whole family. He is so ill tempered, no one can even talk to him.

Abigail wasted no time. She quickly gathered 200 loaves of bread, two wineskins full of wine, five sheep that had been slaughtered, nearly a bushel of roasted grain, a 100 clusters of raisins, 200 fig cakes. She packed them on donkeys and said to her servants, go on ahead. I will follow you shortly.

But she didn't tell her husband, Abel, what she was doing. As she was riding her donkey into the mountain ravine, she saw David and his men coming towards her. David had just been saying, a lot of good it did to help this fellow. We protected his flocks in the wilderness and nothing he owned was lost or stolen,

but he has repaid me evil for good. May God strike me and kill me if even one man in his household is still alive tomorrow morning.

That's kinda interesting. Now, might be extreme getting mad and gonna go kill a bunch of people, but it started off, he just said, get your swords, we're gonna go. And he originally was just gonna kill the husband. But now all of a sudden on his way,

he's talking about it out loud, and now he's gonna go kill every man in the household. Have you ever noticed how that's how emotion will do? That'll do especially anger when you feel hurt or you feel betrayed and you're mad at something.

The more you talk about it and let it out and then when you think about it incorrectly and and you're you're frustrated, frustrated, you start exaggerating.

You go further than you even originally intended to go. He starts off, I'm gonna go take care of this guy. Now he's like, you know what? I can't believe that did us no good. No good. Then this guy talks to me like that. You know, by tomorrow morning, we're killing every guy in that household.

That's one of the things to pay attention to that's the problem with when you just chase emotions. Emotions take you to the wrong place, and they take you further than you ever intended. And so here he goes.

It says, when Abigail saw David, she quickly got off her donkey and bowed low before him. She fell at his feet and said, I accept all the blame in this matter, my lord. Please listen to what I have to say. I know Nabal is a wicked and ill tempered man. Please don't pay any attention to him. He is a fool

just as his name suggests. Nabal in Hebrew means fool, which his parents must have known something was up when they when he was born. Only he came out sideways. I I don't know. But whatever. He's like, he's a fool.

He says, now my lord, as surely as the lord lives and you yourself live, since the lord has kept you from murdering and taking vengeance in your own hands, Let all your enemies and those who try to harm you be as cursed as Nabal is. And here is a present that I, your servant, have brought to you and your young men.

Please forgive me if I have offended you in any way. The Lord will surely reward you in a lasting dynasty, for you are fighting the Lord's battles, and you have not done wrong throughout your whole life.

Even when you are chased by those who seek to kill you. She's talking about she knows the deal with Saul. She knows what's going on. Your life is safe in the care of the Lord your God. Seek urine his treasure pouch,

but the lives of your enemies will disappear like stones shot from a sling. When the Lord has done all he has promised and has made you the leader of Israel, don't let this be a blemish on your record. Then your conscience won't have to bear the staggering burden of needless bloodshed and vengeance.

And when the Lord has done these great things for you, please remember me, your servant. So she actually brings food for him to solve his real initial problem, but then also says, hey, don't don't kill my husband because he's an idiot. He's a fool.

But she takes it and turns it more about not just keep my husband alive. It's more about she brings wisdom of don't do this because of who you are. In other words, she says, you realize this isn't who you are in God's story for you. That's pretty wise. And it's interesting because you know what Abigail means in Hebrew?

Wisdom. Wisdom. And she brought wisdom. So then David replied to Abigail, praise the Lord, the God of Israel, who has sent you to meet me today. He knew that this was wisdom from God. He goes, thank God for your good sense.

Bless you for keeping me from murder and from carrying out vengeance with my own hands. For I swear by the Lord, the God of Israel, has kept me from hurting you, that if you had not hurried out to meet me, not one of Nabal's men would still be alive tomorrow morning.

Then David accepted her present and told her, return home in peace. I've heard what you have said. We will not kill your husband. It's crazy. Story gets crazier if you read it. She goes home, tells her husband what David was about to do, freaks him out so bad he has a stroke and dies.

And then David marries her. So he listened to wisdom, and then he married wisdom. Basically, that's my story. I listened to the wisdom of my wife, and then I got to marry her as well. And and and and so this story shows you, in a nutshell, all about this idea of emotions are a dashboard, not a destination. And it literally,

right there, tells you the steps of what we're supposed to do for emotional health. Real emotional because health is wholeness in scripture. You can't just go, I'll be emotional. I'll be physically healthy, but not mentally healthy, or spiritually healthy, but not so, emotionally healthy.

They all wholeness means altogether. Meaning, if you're not emotionally healthy, that's affecting you spiritually. It also affects you physically. All of that. All of it. It's all tied in together. And so in this, there's three things I see

that's helped me, that's in this story that what David went through to show how he handled this and and how, you know, he got emotionally. He's about to do something stupid. It's not like he's perfect, but he had this process.

And the three things I think we need to do just happen in this story, that if we're struggling, if we really wanna be emotionally healthy, the first thing we have to do is we need to face our feelings, not chase our feelings.

So you need to face your feelings. Don't chase your feelings is the first point. In other words, what am I feeling? You have to be willing to face them without chasing them. Because the idea is is is you don't just ignore them. I mean, Proverbs twenty nine eleven says a fool vents all his feelings,

but a wise man holds them back. That seems to act like you you it's saying you don't you don't acknowledge. You press them down.

And and then a fool just, you know, just just yells about it and talks about all. That's not what that's saying. Vent means don't go where they want you to go. It doesn't mean not face it, and to hold back doesn't mean to ignore it. That's talking about don't chase your feelings is what it's saying. A fool chases after feelings,

but a wise person will let them well, they'll face them without chasing them. Meaning you acknowledge that they're real. You acknowledge they exist. You you you you have to talk about them. You have to be open. Just suppressing them ain't gonna do you any good.

That's not gonna do good anyways because he's gonna come out sideways. A really wise philosopher, theologian who happens to be very, very pretty said this. I got that on the screen there. A little, there you go. Feelings are real, but not always true.

The reason she's I said pretty, that's my wife, by the way. If you didn't know, like, what's he talking about? Why is he talking about how pretty some philosopher is? Feelings are real, but they're not always true. My wife used that with her our kids growing up, with me constantly, and that is the idea that they're real.

David, the feeling was was real. He was offended. This guy did kinda act like a jerk. He does feel this certain way. You you you don't act like they don't they're real. They are a real thing. It's just they're not always true.

See, that's where we get the problem is is we'll either try to ignore them and suppress them as the answer doesn't work, or we try to own them as, like, everything they say is true.

I like to say it this way. Feelings are real, but they're not always right. Meaning you don't have to follow it out. You don't have to go where it goes. Because the problem is when we live that way, when we start doing that way, the truth is we don't just chase what feelings tell us to do. We all sudden start chasing feelings as a goal.

And that's what where I think most in our culture think that's the problem. Even cultural, talking about emotional health, says how do you handle these ideas? It's really they're trying to give you ideas of how to get rid of the bad feelings and get to the good feelings. That's not scriptural.

That's not gonna help us. That's where the bible goes deeper on this idea of emotional health. Feelings are never a goal because they're not always true. See, when we start chasing feelings, we start making them goals. We start making them the destination. And if you're gonna go you're gonna go on a vacation,

a destination. You know, aren't you gonna pick some place nice and pleasant and beautiful? Not not not not like like like, who goes, you know what? I wanna go spend a month in Yuma

or Seattle, you know, someplace like that. Actually, come to think of it, break. Seattle fans, just get out of the way. Let's hear it. Just whoop it up. I if you're a Seahawks fan, go for it. Yeah. Here we go. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I like your quarterback.

So don't let anyone else ever hear that I said this, but I'll say it one time. Go Seahawks. How's that sound? Does that make you happy? Now you know that I just like to give you a hard time. So there you go. Now I forgot my point because I'm sick and I talked about too many things. Oh, chasing feelings.

If you end up wanting we end up by our nature than saying feelings have a list, good feelings, bad feelings. And we think the goal of our life is to feel the good ones and avoid the bad ones. And if we're having the bad one, do whatever it takes to get to the good one as quickly as possible. The

problem with that is that makes us make a lot of stupid decisions. That is really fundamentally if you go to recovery. If you end up addicted to something, you have hurts, habits, and hang ups, you end up chasing after unhealthy coping mechanisms

because what you're really doing is I'm gonna medicate the bad feelings so I don't feel it. I'm trying to deaden it and maybe feel the good thing. The problem is all of those decisions lead to more problems.

They don't help. And then here's the thing. Even if you're not doing that, it affects your relationship with God and how you view God because you suddenly sit there and go, why is God putting me in scenarios that I have the bad feelings?

Does God not love me? Because if he loves me, I should have all the good feelings all the time. See how that works? Now you're now it's emotional health was driven by your mental health is off because we talk about mental health is really what you think about, and how you think about God affects everything else.

And now you're getting mentally and emotionally kinda skewed. And then you get angry, and then you're mad. That's what's happening to David here. You know what? He he has more going on than than what you think. When I said what the fight's about is never what the fight's about, what his anger's about

is never what his anger's about. If you look over to to Psalm 13,

David wrote a lot of these Psalms, and they're these praise, so they're prayers to God. They turn them into songs. And he was very honest in these because that's where they The Psalms are people talking back to God. He inspired them to say this, and it and it's it's it's he's talking.

And we know when what seasons when he wrote these, it says, this is during this period. Psalms 13 was written about this exact period of time when he's running from Saul, hiding out, has these men trying to feed him, trying not to die, trying not to and and look what he starts off in this prayer to God. The first four verses is what I wanna read. He says, oh, Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever?

How long will you look the other way? How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart every day? How long will my enemy have the upper hand?

Turn and answer me, oh my God. Restore the sparkle to my eyes or I will die. Don't let my enemies gloat saying we have defeated him. Don't let them rejoice at my downfall. See, he's facing his feelings, but look what his feelings were. Look what he was already dealing with and wrestling with and struggling with.

He was already surrounded. He was already, this this fugitive period. He feels surrounded. He feels tempted to believe God won't rescue him. He's slandered. He's being chased.

He's actually gotta feed his men. He's trying to figure out how to feed his men because they're all he has left. And what if they decide, hey, you can't even feed us. We're out of here. Or what if they turn on him? He's got all of these other things down on him, and then this idiot, this fool named Nabal says, who the heck are you? I don't know. Blah blah. I'm not giving you nothing. After he actually sat out there and protected

his flocks.

What do you think he's gonna do in that moment if he's already wrestling with all these other fields? All these other fields that are starting to make him think incorrectly about God. Are is God even care about me? I know he anointed me. Maybe he doesn't care. Maybe he doesn't know me. Maybe and then all a sudden this guy says that.

He's like, well, I can't kill God, but you know what I can kill? I can kill Nabal.

How about you?

Is that describing where some of you are right now in your life? In a relationship, in a job, and just something going on that you're getting really reactionary because there's a lot of other stuff, all the feels.

And you're feeling like, does God even care? How long is this gonna last?

When you pile that on,

what you're fighting about is never what the fight's about.

You might be so mad at stuff out there when you really are wrestling with something between you and God and the way you see it. And that's what's going on with David. So what do we need to do? We need to face our feelings, not chase them.

But when you face them, that's saying, what am I feeling? Second is you need to filter them. You need to filter your feelings. Don't just follow them. So if you said, I'm facing them, now you have to say that's what what am I feeling? Now you gotta start saying, why am I feeling this way? Instead of just reacting,

you gotta stop and say, why am I reacting this way?

Like I said, with with with with my and it can start it's simple. There's always it's never the same thing with with my wife. We were we were

I said the fight's never what the fight's about. Just the other day, this is just a minor example, but it still shows it even in a minor sense. We were watching the the net the the the the about the dynasty of the the Patriots

back when Belichick and all of them and Tom this guy, Tom Brady, who's that? You know? And and and and and and after we watch it, we're sitting there. And and my wife asks me, she just says, so

how many times did Tom Brady he retired twice. Right? It was the she she knew. She goes, so wait. No. She didn't say how many. She knew. She goes, he retired twice. When was the first time when did he retire once and then come back and then retire again? She just was trying to figure out the year it was.

And and I said, he didn't retire twice. And she goes, yeah. He did. I go, no. He didn't.

And and she's like, yeah. He did. I go, no, man. He said he wanted to play till he was 50. I think he got to 45, won a Super Bowl and realized, I don't think I can play it on 50. I'm gonna quit while I'm ahead. I I I think you're thinking of, like, you know, that's what, like, Brett Favre did that. He's the guy that kept retiring and unretiring.

And she's like, no. He retired and then came back. And I go, I think I know history and sports better than you.

And then she got mad at me because I was like, I I just said, no. I think it's this way. I think it's I was like, why are you doing that? You're gaslighting me. And I go, I don't even know what gaslighting means. She goes, I just know that he did it before he did it again. I go, no. I don't think he did. I don't think he did at all. I think you're wrong. I think I'm right and I know better. And she goes, that's what gaslighting

means. I go, oh, I guess we both learned something right now. I guess I am gaslighting. If being right is gaslighting, then I just gaslit you.

See, I'm just telling you guys, I don't get this right all the time. I I come up here preaching the principles. You know how I know how to say these principles? Cause I've already blown my leg off stepping on these landmines a million times. Don't ever say that, especially when you're wrong.

Cause then she goes back and she goes she look got quiet, which is scarier. And she looked up on her phone, and then she read straight off. At this date, Tom Brady retired. And then forty five days later, he unretired signing with the newly the with the Buccaneers,

and then he retired again after, you know. And I was like I'm like, oh, that, and I doubled down.

I was like, that's not a real retirement. Guys do that all the time. It's not like he had it's not like he really retired, like, press conference and everything. She goes she goes, you talk too fast. The next paragraph. In a press conference, as he retired, he announced,

I feel like I could still play, but I need to focus on my family and my marriage more. And she goes, and remember, that's partially why he probably ended up divorced because his wife wanted him to stay home. And forty five days later, he said, I can't handle this, and he went back to playing football.

Yeah.

I had to stop, and I was like I had to admit to her, you know, I think I just felt embarrassed that you knew history and sports better than me in that moment. And she goes, once again, that's kinda gaslighting. And I go, I'm sorry.

And and and so it's that whole idea that you gotta filter it. I mean, why did I decide to argue that? Why why did I keep arguing it? It's because I had this dumb other feeling going on for some stupid reason. I don't know why. Filter. That's just a little one. That was easy to catch. We laughed about that,

you know, after I apologized.

Filter it. And here's here's a good way to to to help filter is is this. You need to filter through God's word, but we also need to filter with his people. That's what happens here. Abigail shows up. Abigail means means wisdom. God's plan a most of the time is people.

Yes. We have our own time with God. He speaks to us clearly through his word. But many times, especially when it's emotional health, when it when it when you are getting pulled into this emotional moment, we need other people that can help us see clearly. And and that's what happened with with with with with Abigail.

He wasn't seeing clearly. That's when we need other people. And that's why the Bible talks about community. That's what Sabrina's video was with her testimony, was she needed community. She needed other people.

It's why God says for us to get in circles, not just roses. Why I always talk and we're always preaching. We're always pushing, hey. Have you found community? Who's your Abigails? Who's your Abigails? You need these advocates that can help you see clearly when you need to. And and and we can't do it alone.

It it's kinda like in a the car illustration. It's kinda like if if feelings are the the the dashboard, like, community is like windshield wipers.

You know? Because when when windshield wiper when it starts raining, you know, feels and problems, you can't see where you're going anymore. And you you need those windshield wipers to to to help you see clearly.

They don't tell you where they don't make you where they go. They just help you see clearly, and that's what you need. And community is that. It's do you have windshield wiper people in your life that they're close enough to you that they and they they're and they'll they're willing to be in front of you, they're willing to to to to wipe away the the the water and the stuff so you can see clearly again. Do you have that?

Or because we we need those. Those are advocates. Advocates are for you, but they're willing to be in front of you. They're willing to to to speak truth and bring wisdom. Allies, on the other hand, are people that just tell you what you wanna hear.

They're sitting in the car next to you. They're there's just as, yeah, this is great. Just keep doing where you're going. It's fine. I don't care. You know? And and and you know that. We all have those. You have some you might not have advocates. You might just have allies. Sometimes you have both. You know the people.

And you know what you're thinking feeling wise. You where where you whether you're really gonna filter it or you're just gonna go where you wanna go based on who you go talk to when you're struggling. Which which group do you go to? Your allies or your advocates?

You know, the allies are gonna tell you what you wanna hear. The advocates are gonna tell you something you already know what they're gonna say, but you don't wanna hear.

That's and you know it. When you're like, why didn't you talk to this person? Well, I already know what they're gonna say. Well, if you say you didn't talk to someone because you already know what they're gonna say, that means you already decided what you're gonna do. So you want your allies, your entourage.

That's like having windshield wipers that, like, they they they they don't work. Like, I just discovered a couple months ago when it started raining, you know, this thing fell from the sky. You know, God's crying. You know? And

and it was raining hard, I was coming home from something one night, and it started raining. I turned my windshield wipers on. They did it one time. And then stopped.

And I'm like, this is weird. I'm like, god. I thought old trucks on hitting stuff because that's the only thing I know how to do to fix a truck. He's like, hit it. Maybe it'll work. Didn't work. So then I I I get home. I survived.

I get up the next day. It's early in the morning, and there's kind of that foggy stuff on it. So I just forgot about the windshield, and I turned them on again. And and it surprised me because they actually worked.

They started working. And I'm like, oh, wait. They didn't work. I go, oh, they work again. Fine. So I didn't do anything. I go, my windshield wipers work. And then about three weeks ago, when it rained really hard in the afternoon, I had to go one mile. It was like it was one of those deluges that was like, I should build an ark right now. It's raining so hard.

And and I had to drive a mile home. I come out of this meeting, and it was sunny when I went into the meeting. Now it's pouring. Go, my gosh. You're getting home. I jumped in the car and go, oh gosh. My my windshield wipers. And I turn them on and and and they didn't work again.

And I'm like, they were working. What's going on? So I was so mad. I drove home, almost died. And and and and then I get home, and I go, I gotta do something about this. I get up the next day. I get in the car. I turn them on, and they're working fine again.

And and and so I realized something about my windshield wipers. They actually work fine as long as it's not wet outside.

So I gotta go see my friend here who works on my truck all the time. That's how I just told him I need my windshield wipers fixed.

But I didn't know it because they kept working again. It's like, what good are windshield wipers that only work when it's sunny outside and there's no moisture? What good is what you call community that won't get in front of you and help wipe away the feelings and the distractions and help you see clearly again?

We need other people. We try to help you find community easily, but it's not easy to be in real community. It's a commitment because you have to be that for someone else too. Because that is look at how David said, praise God, he sent you to me. A lot of our struggles is because you're doing it alone and you need other people

to help you filter. So we need to face our feelings.

We need to filter our feelings. But you know what? You could get to that point, and a lot of us do. We'll get to this point that you do it. I go to it all the time. And you're still not getting anywhere because you think, I've done it. I went. I talked. Filtered. The person wiped the windshield wipers off. It's clear. I feel like, oh, good. I feel so relieved. I've been heard. I've talked to.

But what if you just once you see through the windshield, you're like, I'm still gonna keep driving the direction I wanna drive.

A lot of times we get to these first two, and we think we've had victory. These first two mean nothing if you don't do the third step, and that is you follow wisdom. Not your whims, not your wants, and not your wounds. This sounds ridiculous. Sounds like we all know this, but so many times we'll get this far,

and then we will follow the whim, the want, or the wound anyways. And it's it's you're right back to square one. David chose to say he had that moment when when he sat there and he and he and he listened. He could have said, great, and then went on and killed

know, or he does a lot of his partial obedience. You know what? You're right. I was overreacting. I'm just gonna kill Nabil. I'm not gonna kill everybody else. Partial obedience is no obedience. You have to follow the way of wisdom.

And when he did, look at the rest of 13. Chapter Psalms 13 is like the first four is the first four verses is up until he met Abigail on the road. And then after he met her, he's writing the last two verses. But I trust in your unfailing love.

I will rejoice because you have rescued me. I will sing to Lord because he is good to me. Nothing has changed yet in his circumstances, but he's changed his direction and let wisdom take the wheel. That is what you have to do

despite how you feel. But these people say, well, I get it. I get what you're saying. It makes sense. All this. But I just feel as if that's the whole point. You need to not listen to that. Emotional maturity in scripture doesn't mean you stop feeling. It means you follow wisdom despite how you feel.

And the problem is we get stuck in the things that usually grab us and make us to, even when we do the first two steps, still go the wrong direction that leads to more problems is what I said. It's whims. It's wants and wounds. What do I mean by that? First of all, whims. What are the whims? They're impulse, reactivity,

the urge to respond right now. When you're about to write a comment on on social media, when you're about to that's the problem with stuff. We can hit send instantly. Abraham Lincoln used to write when he wrote a letter that was tough or brutal or something, he just felt like he might have wrote it just out of frustration.

He would always write the letter, put it in his drawer, and wait a day or two. And then reread it and then decide, was this the wisest thing to say right now? You know, that those whims, what do we need to do with whims when they're just so, like, just wanted this impulse, just gotta do this. You redirect them.

You redirect them. What do you do with wants? That's a desire. Like a desire for comfort, for control, for respect, for real for relief. You release them.

And then what about wounds? The unhealed pain that keeps talking louder than the truth. You resurrender those. Now how can you go about this? How can you do this? Two questions you can ask yourself to help filter to even get to the point of knowing this. There's two questions you you should ask yourself.

I think I'm gonna throw the first one. The first one, some filtering here that you can go back to help when you're going through this. Why am I feeling this so strongly? This will help you get to is this a whim? Is this what is this coming from? And and and and and why? Is is is why am I feeling physically?

You can ask, am I exhausted, under chronic stress, not taking care of my body? Do I or maybe it could be hormonal. There could be brain chemistry stuff. That's why I said physical stuff. Don't hear what I'm not saying. A lot of people, when you come to church, they go, okay. He said all this emotional mental stuff is just prayed away. No.

You might need to see a doctor or a counselor to unpack some stuff. There could be brain chemistry things going on. Start there. Or it could be you just need there's incredible spiritual value in in a snack and a nap sometimes. Just ask Elijah. Go read his story. Started with snap and snacking.

In your own story, does this poke an old wound? Rejection, disrespect, betrayal. That's what was happening in David in this story.

Or the heart. What am I craving? Control, respect, safety, approval. You can ask yourself that. And then the next question you do that helps you in order to redirect, release, and resurrender these things is is you ask yourself, what truth am I missing or misreading about God's character, my identity, or my future?

And and in God's word, what does scripture actually say about this? What's the spirit nudging? Peace or a warning? Who's God's people? Who's your Abigail's? Who can help you see what you don't see?

Allies just get beside you. Advocates are for you, but they're willing to get in front of you. That's what love is. That's the truth. When I preach, I believe that I am advocating for every one of us in this room because I love you guys. But if I just told stupid funny stories

and told encouraging things and told us all what we wanted to hear, I'm not being an advocate like I'm supposed to be. Because one of these things on here, these where we gotta be challenged that don't follow the whims, the wants, or the wounds. And the wounds is the hardest one. Unhealed pain, it can be so loud.

It's louder than truth. You gotta resurrender that. What do I mean by that? For many of us, some of the struggle you're having is because someone has hurt you. It's real. It happened. But the reason it's still affecting you is you don't forgive them. Now don't hear what I you're gonna wanna hear what I didn't say.

I didn't say reconcile with someone. Reconciliation takes the other person who's hurt you to confess, recompense. If it's really bad, maybe they need to answer under the law for it, you know, and they need to confess to you. There needs to be that. And then there would also need to be

a a time of trust building again, depending on what it was. All of those would have to happen for reconciliation. What I'm talking about is forgiveness only takes one. You don't have to talk to him. You don't have to see him. This could be someone who's already dead.

You just need to get alone before the Lord and say, Lord, I'm not gonna let this hold me back. I'm letting it go. In my end, I forgive it. And what you're doing is you're letting yourself off the hook. Here's the lie. It says, what are you not what's the lie? You struggle with that

because we end up stuck, and that wound becomes your precious, like in Lord of the Rings. My precious. It's destroying you, but you're also making it be your identity. And then you're mad at them, and you are exaggerating like like like what David did.

Every time you retell it in your heart, every time you're frustrated again, every time you're saying they've done this to me again, they they have not done it to you again. You've done it to yourself again by keep reliving it and not releasing it and resurrendering it.

Forgiveness from your end is for you. And if you can't let it go because you're like, no way. I will never do that. You are believing a lie that says me holding onto it somehow is making them pay. It's not making them pay one iota.

It's only costing you.

Why let that happen over and over and over and over again? And this, if you're really struggling with this, this is one of the things that you can go to a recovery thing. You can go to our Monday nights. You might get a counselor. You might just need a small group. You might just need one or two Abigail's to talk to this about.

I'm telling you, some of us in this room right now, what keeps repeating problems in your life emotionally is the grudge, the hurt that you will not just let go of because you have a lie that you're believing that you have to keep that or somehow they got away with something. If you let yourself off the hook,

you then place them on God's hook. And he's the God of justice, not us. So that's the truth that would help us.

Because in the end, emotions are a dashboard. They're telling you something. They're not telling you somewhere to go. And that's why if you need more help with this or you want to look at this, here's my challenge to go.

You can tap the the the thing on the back of the seats again. And last week, I wrote a had a SOAP for the last week's sermon. SOAP scripture observation application prayer just walks you through to help you think through and actually have some time before the Lord would self to to go through this. Well, where there's another one in there for this sermon, but then I added five more. I broke this sermon down into five different pieces

that you can do a whole week's journey through this stuff. And you can read through some other scriptures. You can pray through them. It'll ask you some questions. It'll help you filter. It'll help you do all that. I would say do it. I would say if you got your whatever you're doing in a home group right now, if you'd like to set it aside,

and maybe for the next several weeks, you just take one of those a week and come in and you discuss that together. You you do something with that to try to get back to that kinda health.

Because guess what? You know what? I I'm telling you. I may have you know, what the fight is about is never what the fight's about in a marriage. Well, I've had worse fights with my wife. We've had fur worse moments.

And I'm telling you right now, if we had not used this, we figured out the hard way. I'm trying to give it to you the easy way straight up. But in in our lives, we loved each other, and we fought for it. And there's times in marriage that that the feelings kinda take over, and we had some tough moments.

The three toughest moments we had in our marriage was every time we had a kid. It turned out my wife would just I would start to go down this road of feeling abandoned, neglected.

I'm not even on the list anymore, let alone the top of the list. You know, this God, then I was hoping it was me, then kids, but it was more like, you know, God, kids, whatever else. And then I'm, like, not even on the page anymore.

And then if you asked her, she felt like, you know what? He's really not I'm struggling here, and he's not given enough. He's not given enough. And and every time we would try to unpack our emotions, it came like, you've you've you've you've just neglected and don't care about me. She's like, no. It's you that's doing that. And and and and it would fight, fight, fight, fight, And you know what? The feelings were real, but they weren't right. They weren't true. Because the truth was I was giving everything I could, and my wife was trying.

But there was other issues going on that would just is were overwhelming us. And if we didn't learn unpackages, we would have never got through it, and we did. We got through it each time. It was very difficult. It would take six months, eight months, and then it got worse with each kid.

Now the last kid, it was a little easier because guess what? My wife went and found out about something they never talked about back then, didn't even realize about this thing called postpartum depression that has a physical cause of hormonal just craziness to that has driven women to actually become suicidal.

We didn't know any of that. We just went through it on not knowing. I mean, a lot easier knowing. It's it still was hard. Still had the same feelings, but at least we knew where it was coming from the last time. We had the GI Joe. Now we know, and knowing's half the battle. But I am telling you, it was so hard that I

could not love my God and surrender enough to love her enough to make that feeling right. She could not love God and choose to love me enough to make my feeling right. Couldn't happen because of everything else going on. And I am standing before you telling you that some of you with emotional need to go after this

because if we didn't three different times, we wouldn't be married today. How about you? Some of you in this room, you've lost a marriage for this very same thing, and you thought it was just if they just loved me more or if they just cared more, and it might have been something deeper. Deeper.

Some of you have lost a job over this emotional health stuff, lost a friendship,

or you're just living, losing that love of God in your life and you just feel like he doesn't care about you over and over and over again because you're seeing it wrong, because you're listening to the feelings. What would happen if you just went through this process?

What would happen if we chose the way that David went down the road on this day? I just wanna pray for us, and I'm just gonna quickly I'm gonna close. I'm gonna pray Psalm 13 as our close. I'm gonna pray it like it's for all of us. I'm gonna convert the words and just pray this Psalm for us. So let's pray. Oh, Lord,

how long will you forget us? Forever? How long will you look the other way? Lord, I especially pray for anyone that is feeling that so strongly right now. How long must we struggle with anguish in our souls, with sorrow in our hearts every day? How long will our enemies have the upper hand?

Turn and answer us, oh, Lord, our God. Restore the sparkle to our eyes or we will die. Don't let our enemies gloat saying we have defeated them. Don't let them rejoice at our downfall, but we will trust in your unfailing love. We will rejoice because you have rescued us. We

will sing to you to the Lord because you are good to us. Amen. Amen. Hey, Rock Point. Thanks for joining us online this weekend. Make sure to head to rockpoint.io or our Rock Point social media to stay up to date with everything happening here at Rock Point.