My Friend, if your life is drifting the buck stops with you and it’s time for you to do something about it; the alternative … well, the alternative is getting to the end of your days here on this earth and looking back at a life-long missed opportunity.

Weighing Up the Past

There are so many people walking around on planet earth today whose failures and disappointments of the past are ruining their present and robbing them of their future. Can I ask you a question? Are you one of those people?

I remember a time in my life when my past was weighing me down, a time when in fact my past became such a burden, such a huge load, that it was completely unbearable. It was so bad that I came very close to taking my own life. I remember standing on the 8th floor balcony of that hotel seriously considering jumping over the edge. I’ll share with you a little bit later what it was that pulled me back from the brink.

We’re kicking off the year with a series of messages which I have called, ‘The Art of Living’ because if we’re going to realise the hopes and the dreams that we have for this New Year we need to spend some time thinking about our lives. Most of us don’t do that. We kind of know the hurts, the things that aren’t working so well. A lot of people brood about the negatives in their lives, but mostly we just think about the symptoms. So today and over the coming weeks we’re going to go a bit deeper than just the symptoms. We’re going to be chatting about exactly how we live our lives and the best place to start is with our past.

We each have a past, and as I’ve said there are just so many people for whom their past is ruining their present and robbing them of their future. Now in a very real sense, unless we let go of the past we simply can’t enjoy our lives today. We simply can’t look forward to our future without that sense of hope and anticipation. Let me give you an example.

I know a man who has had a very difficult life. He was abused when he was young and for many years people told him that he just wasn’t good enough. Instead of encouraging him the people around him, his work colleagues, even his family, kept telling him what was wrong with him. They focussed on his failures and his faults rather than on the good things about him. Now come on, we’re all something of a mixed bag aren’t we? We each have certain strengths and certain weaknesses and it’s really sad when people just focus on our weaknesses. And that’s exactly what happened to this man.

So today he looks at his world through that set of eyes, through a mindset that’s deeply affected by his past. He can’t really enjoy who he is and what he has, and he has rather a lot, when he looks forward to his future he doesn’t have a sense of anticipation, even for tomorrow and the next day let alone for rest of this year and the rest of his life. We can talk about all sorts of wonderful things that this year might hold, but unless we first let go of the hurts and the disappointments of the past then none of that means anything.

You’ve probably heard that old saying, “Don’t cry over spilt milk”. Now there’s a reason for this for once the milk is spilt you can’t un-spill it. You can clean up the mess, you can apologies to someone if it hurt them or inconvenienced them, you can even learn the lesson that might stop you from doing it again but you can’t undo it. None of us can change the past and for some people today it’s time to let go of your past.

When I was standing on that balcony on the day almost 20 years ago now, it was the past that was pulling me over the edge. Even though I had many successes along the way I’d made some mistakes, some big mistakes and I just didn’t know if I could live with the consequences of those mistakes. It seemed like the present wasn’t worth living; it seemed like the future was bleak and hopeless and when we lose hope, hey what’s the point of living.

I know there are some people who are thinking that way today and what makes it even harder is that everybody else is out there focused on starting off the new year and looking forward to what the year has to hold. The thing that pulled me back from the edge on that cool, sunny morning was something that I’d read the night before. For some reason someone had put a Bible in the top draw of the bedside table in my hotel room. I’d taken it out and I read something in it that night. It said this:

Don’t be afraid for I am with you; don’t be afraid for I am your God. I’ll strengthen you, I’ll help you and I will uphold you with my victorious right hand. (Isaiah 41:10)

That’s what gave me hope; the hope of a present where I wasn’t alone; the hope of a future that just might be worth living. None of us can change the past but on that day on that hotel balcony began for me the process of letting go of my past. The future begins today, the past has gone and while we should learn lessons from it, it has no right to rob us of the days and the months and the years that lie ahead.

And can I tell you, the very reason that God sent us Jesus His Son, the first time that Jesus stood up and spoke in public he read these words from Isaiah Chapter 61. He a said:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour, to comfort and provide for all who mourn to give them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the Spirit of praise instead of a faint spirit. (Isaiah 61:1-3)

My friend, Jesus has a future for you. He understands how the past has battered you and bruised you. He knows the baggage that you’re carrying around just as he knows all the baggage that I’m carrying around and what He wants to do is lighten the load, to lift that burden. Since that day when I stood on that balcony my life has changed completely. It’s not that some days things aren’t hard, of course they are. They’re hard in everybody’s life. But you know somehow I look forward to each day, each month and each year with a sense of hope and anticipation because Jesus has healed me of my past. My failures and my hurts no longer rule my life, He does and that makes all the difference.

So as you stand on the threshold of a brand new year I want to leave you with this fantastic truth: Jesus came to set you free from your past and to give you a present and a future that truly are worth living.

Is Your Life Drifting?

Now imagine for a moment that you are on a sail boat in the middle of a large ocean. Your sails are down, your rudders out of the water and you’re just drifting. How soon do you think you will get to where you’re going? In fact, will you ever get to where you’re going at all?

Alright, let’s put ourselves in that drifting boat for a moment out there on this massive great ocean. No sails, no rudder. It’s frankly no way to get to where you’re going and eventually unless you do something about it you’re going to die. With the oceans covering 71% of the earth’s surface and with the way the tides and the currents travel the chances of making landfall that way are somewhere between Buckley’s and none. Stay in that boat, your rudder out of the water and the sails down on the deck and eventually you’re going to die.

And the tragic thing is that back here on dry land, back here on terra firma many people, way too many people are living their lives that way – just drifting aimlessly. And on top of that their expectation is that they should be getting to where they want to go. Don’t believe me?

Last night on the news they interviewed a 16 year old girl who had just had triplets. Now she and her boyfriend were unemployed relying on the Government to keep them afloat. When the interviewer asked them whether they were planning on getting a job they both answered ‘No!’. Their plan was to stay on Government Welfare and have more children. Now that’s by no means an isolated case. Extreme? Yes, but not unusual.

Whether it’s in our lives or in our jobs, drifting aimlessly along is not a recipe for success. Not that I’m suggesting that we should all be chasing after this success ‘thing’ – the big salary and the big house and the big care – and nor am I suggesting that all the positive outcomes in our lives have to do with hard work alone, but there are many people just drifting their way through life wondering, Why is nothing happening?; wondering why they’re not getting to where they want to go.

This week being the beginning of the New Year we’ve kicked off a series of messages which I’ve called ‘The Art of Living’. It’s about being deliberate in planning and living our lives here on this earth. One of the mistakes I see people making – can I say, particularly amongst the Christians that I have so much to do with – is that somehow they over-spiritualise their existence: “Well you know it’s all in God’s hands; I have to wait for Him to do everything”. Others might rely on something else – on Karma or whatever they rely on.

Please don’t get me wrong, I am a Christian; I believe in God, I believe in Jesus and I know that many of the big things that have happened in my life have happened not because of any brilliance or hard work on my part but because God’s mighty hand was on it in the first place. But I also know that laziness doesn’t bear fruit. Have a listen to these:

Laziness brings on a deep sleep. An idle person will suffer hunger. (Proverbs 19:15)

I passed by the field of someone who was lazy, by the vineyard of a stupid person and see, it was all overgrown with thorns; the ground was covered with nettles and it’s stone wall had been broken down. Then I saw and considered it. I looked and received instruction. A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest and poverty will come upon you like a robber and want like an armed warrior. (Proverbs 24:30-34)

Well, I don’t know where you’re at in life but humour me here. Imagine that God is God, that He loves us like a father, would you expect this God to bless laziness, to bless idleness, to bless a lack of planning and a lack of vision and a lack of a sense of direction? Well the answer is kind of self-evident. We live in a world of cause and effect – planning, diligence, hard work, application, dedication, focus, persistence, those things tend to yield good results most of the time. Idleness, laziness – those things tend to yield bad results most of the time.

So let’s come back to this boat we were drifting on. If your life is like being in that drifting boat I’m going to ask you a question here. Now you may not like but I’m going to ask you anyway. Whose fault is that? Well, we can blame our parents, we can blame our circumstances, our education or lack of it, our looks, our physical weaknesses, perhaps even our disabilities. But none of those things really cut it do they?

If your life is drifting the buck stops with you; if my life is drifting the buck stops with me, it’s as simple as that. We’ve all seen people with incredible disabilities achieve amazing things, haven’t we? And we’ve all seen people who were born into a fantastic family, had plenty of money, good looks, intelligence to go with it make a complete hash of their lives.

Now you see it’s not our circumstances that determine the direction of our life. Look at Nelson Mandela, 27 years in prison, look at Mother Teresa amongst the poor, look at Mahatma Ghandi and look at the dozens of very ordinary people that you know in your life who’ve achieved extraordinary things despite their circumstances. It has nothing to do with our circumstances. Adversity is no excuse.

If your life is drifting, it seems to me that you have a couple of options. Option 1 – well just let it drift on by and one day you’ll die out there in that drifting boat. Option 2 – is doing something about it; deciding here and now that this status quo, this endless life of drifting is simply no longer an option; that life can’t go on like this. It’s time to do something about it. It’s time for a new start, a new beginning and what better time to come to that conclusion than at the beginning of a new year.

My friend, if your life is drifting the buck stops with you and it’s time to do something about it. The alternative … well, the alternative is getting to the end of your days here on this earth and looking back at a life-long missed opportunity. That’s not such a happy thought, is it? And let’s just take this one step further.

You may remember the parable of talents that Jesus told of the three servants, each left with a huge amount of money by their master to invest in order to get a return. Two of those servants did really well. On the master’s return they gave him the original capital plus a 100% return and those guys got a huge pat on the back. But one of the servants was afraid so he hid the money to keep it safe. He returned the original capital to his master when he came home but without any dividend. Now you might think, well the master should be happy, at least he got his capital back. But listen to what Jesus says in Matthew Chapter 15 beginning at verse 26:

You wicked and lazy slave, you knew, did you, that I reap what I didn’t sow and gather where I didn’t scatter, then you should have invested the money with the bankers and on my return I would have received what is mine with interest. So take the money from him and give it to the one who has lots of money, for to all those who have more will be given and they’ll have abundance but from those who have nothing even what they have will be taken away. As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Jesus doesn’t mince His words, does He? He’s made a huge investment in our lives and He expects us to live our lives in such a way as to deliver a huge return. He’s not calling us to live a life of missed opportunities and excuses; He’s calling us to live a life that counts. No ‘ifs’, no ‘buts’, no ‘maybes’.

You Can’t Juggle Chainsaws

Have you ever tried to juggle two balls – easy; three – not so easy; four – well that’s impossible for most of us. Now imagine juggling four chainsaws with their blades spinning around – now that’s scary. So why do some people try to live their lives like that.

So let me ask you, are you one of those crazy people who are trying to juggle four chainsaws with your bare hands? Is that how you’re living your life? You may be wondering, “What on earth is Berni talking about?” Well this week on the program we’ve kicked off a series of messages that I’ve called ‘The Art of Living’ because as we look forward to the year ahead, one of things that a few people need to get sorted out is how they’re living their lives.

And before the break, just to recap if you missed it, we were chatting about the fact that many a person’s life is just drifting aimlessly, like a boat on an ocean without the sails up, without the rudder in the water. Now we can sit back and whinge and complain; we can wish that things were different or that things were better; we can blame other people; we can expect others to do it all for us, including God, but at the end of the day a whole bunch of this is up to us.

Sometimes the reason that we are not happy with life is that we have a wrong self-image. The hurts and disappointments of the past have put like a negative spin on our outlook, on how we see ourselves. Some people live their whole lives under this sort of oppression. Sometimes the people around us or the social structures tell us that this where you fit; this is the box you belong and that’s it. And yet all along you have this potential, this creativity, this dream that’s not being realised.

Some people are just plain in the wrong job. There are so many jobs on this earth given who I am, given how God made me, that I simply am not suited to; I could never make a good accountant. You would never want me as a personal carer of the elderly. There are so many things that I can do, but there are plenty that I can’t. See, some people spend their whole lives doing a job they were never cut out to do, a job that they don’t enjoy and a job they are never going to be any good at.

And we’ve seen so far today on the program that for some people it’s the relationship that’s robbing them of the joy and contentment in their lives. For others it comes down to their finances and resources and what I want you to do is to really think about your life strategically, beyond the symptoms and right down to the root causes, because it’s when we deal with the root causes that we can begin to think about what we can actually do to make the thing better.

That’s how a doctor works. Hopefully the doctor doesn’t just give you a painkiller for a persistent headache. They use the technology available to them to figure if there is something more sinister going on beneath the surface that they need to treat. And I continue to encourage you to do that in your life. As you look at the year ahead, what is it that is robbing you of the satisfaction and contentment that you’re really looking for? And what are you going to do about it?

Today I want to talk briefly about focus because for many people there is no doubt a raft of issues that are robbing them of the life they want to live. Perhaps the things going on your life are all kind of mixed up together in a way. You have low self-esteem which leads to problems at work and so you bring those tensions home with you and that in turn leads to arguments with your wife or husband. And that drags the children in because they sense the tension, they hear the arguments so now they’re on edge and they resent you and so that brings even more tension which in turn causes you to blame yourself pushing your self-esteem to lower levels. And if any of this seems vaguely familiar, you are not alone. That one scenario plays itself out over and over again in lives and families and workplaces across the globe.

But here’s the mistake that people often make; listen carefully to this. They try to fix all the problems at once. And that right there is like juggling chainsaws: a) its incredibly difficult; b) its dangerous; and c) you have a very high chance of failure. What is needed is focus, a sharp focus on the one thing that’s at the bottom of it all, the one thing that is the root cause; the one thing that you need to get sorted out before you can address all the flow-on impacts. Have a listen to this story from the New Testament of the Bible. Mark Chapter 18 verses 35 to 41:

As Jesus approached Jericho a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. When He heard the crowd going by he asked what was happening. They told him, ‘Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.’ Then he shouted, ‘Jesus! Jesus Son of David have mercy on me.’ Now those who were around, they sternly ordered him to be quiet but he shouted even more loudly, ‘Son of David have mercy on me.’ Jesus stood still and ordered the man to be brought to Him.

And when he came near He asked the man, ‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ And the man said, ‘Lord let me see again.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Received your sight for your faith has saved you.’ And immediately he regained his sight and followed Him, glorifying God. And all the people when they saw it praised God.

See this man had a lot of problems. If you were blind in the 1st Century that had a lot of flow-on effects. He was poor, he was a beggar, he was isolated, he was unemployed, he was shunned by society, he was probably smelly because he hadn’t had a bath. This man had multiple dysfunctions in his life but he knew that the one root cause of it all was his blindness which meant he couldn’t go to work. If he could only go to work he could rejoin society, he could earn money, he wouldn’t be begging. So when Jesus came along, this Jesus who’d apparently been healing a lot of other people, the one thing that the guy begging by the side of the street focused on was the one thing he needed.

That’s how it is with us when it gets down to the one thing, the most important thing that He’s doing in our lives. And you know, in my experience this Jesus is always ready to oblige. Sometimes it happens quickly and miraculously like it did for the beggar. But other times, most times Jesus address our problems and meets our needs over weeks, and months and years and even over a whole lifetime. Some of the things in my life have been fixed really quickly by Jesus and other things seems to drag on and God uses this experience to teach me this, and that experience to teach me that.

It’s a remarkable thing, whenever you see Jesus touching people’s lives in one of those four gospel accounts of His life and His ministry – Matthew, Mark, Luke or John, take your pick – He always focuses on the one thing that needs doing, the one infirmity that needs healing, the demon that needs casting out, the sin that needs forgiving – just one thing. He doesn’t try to get people to juggle chainsaws; He touches them and heals them of that one thing.

Let me ask you, are you in that place? Because if you’re in that place in your life where the problems and the dysfunctions and the alienations are overwhelming you, everything seems to be against you, everything seems to be not going quite right – here’s what I’m going to encourage you to do.

Go to Jesus and ask Him to heal just one thing. And if you don’t know what needs healing, ask Him. He already knows and He’s already there, He’s already here waiting to touch you, to heal you, to forgive you, to give you a fresh start in your life. How do I know? Because I’m not teaching you a theory lesson, He’s done exactly that in my life, and in fact He still is doing that in my life. And from my own experience, now I know why it is that they call this ‘the Good News’. We have so many problems in our lives – friend, the answer is Jesus.

Every hurt, every pain, every argument, every flash of anger every desire for revenge, the only way to defeat those things is with the steadfast love of the Lord our God.

I’m Angry

With all my heart I believe that you and I are created to live an extraordinary life, but one of the things that robs many people of that sort of life is negative emotions, and today on the program we’re going to chat about three of the most common ones – anger, the desire for revenge and fear. So let’s kick things off. Let me ask you, how much is your anger robbing you of your extraordinary life?

Anger is something different to annoyance. We can be annoyed by little things and some people sadly spend a lot of their life in the state of annoyance. It’s something you may have heard me talk about recently on this program. But anger is a much bigger thing.

Let’s imagine for a moment that someone says something nasty about you or someone consistently fails to meet your expectations of honesty and loyalty. Or someone speaks lies about you behind your back. There is every chance that those things are going to make you angry right? When is the last time that you were angry? Maybe you’re angry right now? Or it happened earlier today or just yesterday? With the way this world is, it’s probably not that long ago. Can you remember how you felt?

It comes on quite quickly doesn’t it? It kind of rises up within you. Sometimes we want to shout or hit out, sometimes we just want to glare the person down, above all things we want recompense an apology and sometimes even revenge. Anger is a complicated emotion. And so often when we experience anger we make stupid decisions; we say something or do something that destroys a relationship or hurts someone, sometimes ourselves and sometimes other people.

Ok, back to the last time that you were angry, can you still remember it? Then here is my question. How long were you angry at that particular person? Was it a minute or two before you calmed down? 5- 10 minutes perhaps? A half hour or an hour or all day? Overnight perhaps? A week, two weeks? Are you still angry with that person? I know a people who have been angry with each other for years and literally haven’t spoken to each other for all that time, because somehow they couldn’t let go of anger.

The fullest and most horrific conclusion to unbridled anger is of course murder, and murder, Jesus said, begins in our hearts. Anger is something that happens deep down in our hearts and unless we learn to control it we can end up doing some terribly destructive things in life. There are many people whose marriage, whose families, whose careers are laying on the scrap heap right now because they didn’t learn to control anger. I’m sure you probably know one or two people just like that. So, there are two aspects of anger that we’re going to chat about today – how quickly it happens, and how long it takes to get over it.

First of all, how quickly. Remember earlier I said that anger can rise up very quickly indeed, especially if that person has already made us angry before; especially if that person has hurt us in some way or has been dishonest in the past. I want to encourage you today to be someone who is slow to anger. This God I mentioned earlier, the one who sent Jesus His Son to pay for my sins and yours, well his Word the Bible says this about God’s anger. Psalms 103 verse 8:

The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

God gets angry but He’s slow to anger, because he’s abounding in steadfast love. Love is the key. Caring deeply for other people is the key. If we can become servant-hearted then we can show grace and mercy. I happen to believe that there is a God and that you and I are created by him in His image, and so it makes absolute sense that we should be like him, prepared to show mercy.

Can I ask you, when you do something stupid, something that with the wisdom of hindsight you knew was wrong, and we all do that don’t we? Would you like others to cut you some slack? To show you some mercy? To be gracious and forgive you? Of course you would, me to! And that’s how we should be; slow to anger and full of mercy and grace. When that’s how we live our lives we become angry fast less often, we accept the limitations that other people and we even compensate for them instead of getting angry with them.

And the second part of anger I’d like to chat about right now is how long we stay angry because that’s a huge issue. The quicker we get over it, the quicker we forgive, the quicker we move on, the less destructive our anger is going to be. So how does God handle it? Well let’s have a look at the very next verse in that same psalm in the Old Testament and what it says about God’s anger. Psalm 103 verses 9 and 10:

He will not always accuse, not will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor does he repay us according to our iniquities.

It other words, God gets over his anger, instead of hanging onto it and he doesn’t pay us back quickly. So, how do we minimise the damage that anger can course. Here it is again. Be slow to get angry and when we do forgive quickly. Not bad hey? And what is it that allows God to behave that way? Again it comes back to this one simple thing, the next few verses in that Psalm. Psalm 103, verse 11-17:

For as the heavens are high above the earth so great is his steadfast love towards those who fear him. As far as the east from the west so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion for his children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him.

For he knows how we’re made, he remembers that we’re just dust as for mortals their days are like grass. They flourish like a flower in the field for the wind passes over it and it’s gone and it’s place is known no more. But the steadfast love of the Lord is forever lasting to ever lasting on those who fear him.

And that one simple thing, his steadfast love his rock solid love, a love that goes on and on and on. Let me ask you, is that a love that you have experienced? If it is, imagine asking God to give you the power to show that kind of love to those around you. The sort of love that a good father has for his children. And if it isn’t a love that you’ve ever experienced, I want to encourage you today to go to God and ask him to show you that love, just a quick simple love. “God I heard about you today, I heard about your love today and I want some. Will you please pour that love out on me. In Jesus name.”

Every hurt, every pain, every argument, every flash of anger, every desire for revenge, every dark and evil thing that wants to grow in ou hearts and inflicts itself on those around us, the only way to defeat those things is with the steadfast love of our Lord our God. And when we experience that love poured out on our lives, when we live in that love, when we have our being in that love, it’s the power of His love that curbs our anger. When we experience the mercy of God it becomes so much easier to show mercy. When we lay hold of the power thing that happened on that cross 2000 years ago when Jesus bought anger and punishment that you and I deserve it is so much easier for us to suffer in order to forgive. It hurts sometimes to forgive. Be slow to anger and quick to forgive just like God and my friend the only place I’ve discovered the power to do that is in Jesus Christ. No where else.

I want revenge

We each have some people in our lives who have hurt us deeply. Sometimes they do something really, really bad like abusing you when you’re a child, or a wife or husband cheating on their spouse or a business man swindling you out of money. Other times it’s not that there’s any particular big or bad thing they’re done, it’s funny how the little things can really hurt as well.

One of my greatest memories of growing up as a child is that I was never really one of the ‘in’ kids. I was always different somehow. All the other boys were good at sport or running or jumping or football and cricket, and I wasn’t. Instead I came from a musical family. I was almost always at the top of my class, I was a keen learner but I couldn’t play sport for nuts. And in the sports mad nation of Australia as a kid growing up that was a big deal.

So the other kids would poke fun at me or pick on me. That affected my own view of myself, it affected what they call my self esteem. And it only got much worse when after finishing school I joined the military and that whole negativity was reinforced, so they don’t have to be big things.

I remember wanting to take revenge on the kids who made fun of me and picked on me, I’d plot sinister things in my mind. Whenever I hear about one of those high school massacres it brings back those dark and difficult days and I can still remember quite vividly my feelings of revenge. Of course I never seriously contemplated anything like a massacre but I have some small understanding of how the pressures of the other kids can cause someone to snap like that. It’s a terrible thing.

Many people spend much of their time thinking about revenge. Wars are about revenge. It doesn’t restore things, it doesn’t make things better. Revenge may appear logical, but it’s the worst thing we can do. The opposite of revenge is forgiveness. The opposite of revenge is reconciliation. One of the great marvels of the ending of the apartheid in South Africa was the leadership of Nelson Mandela who, having spent something like I think 27 years in prison, took on the presidency of that nation with a heart to seek healing instead of revenge. Jesus had this to say about revenge:

You’ve heard it said, and eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth but I say, don’t resist an evil doer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek turn the other one also and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give them your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go the second mile as well. Give to everyone who begs from you and don’t refuse anyone who wants to borrow money from you. (Mathews chapter 5:38-42)

So my first reaction to that when I first read it was that this was about being a weakling. What? I should just roll over? I should just be a door mat for people to walk over and wipe their feet on? But as the years have passed its more struck me that turning the other cheek is a huge act of courage. It takes a lot of strength to not lash out in revenge; it takes a huge amount of courage to refuse to take revenge. If someone offends you and you just want to say something harsh back to them, holding you tongue staying silent is really hard isn’t it?!

Letting injustice pass and simply forgiving it without having your say, without getting restitution, without at least taking a swipe back, is so difficult. And yet, as we see in Mandela’s case, as we see in Gandhi’s case in recent history, there is a greatness in choosing to break the cycle of revenge. There is a greatness in reconciliation, there is a greatness in being the person who says, “no I will not take revenge”. It takes courage, it takes character, it takes the ability to forgive. And that right there is maturity in greatness.

I wonder how different this world would be if you and I would learn to be people who turn the other cheek? How much less conflict would there be? It seems to me that turning the other cheek well it’s going to cost us something in the shot term but it’s the one thing that will break the cycle of abuse and revenge. When we refuse to strike back, it takes the wind out of your assailant’s sails. It turns the opinions of those around you against the person who’s doing wrong. It brings goodness into a difficult situation. We’re never going to overcome evil with evil are we? The only way to over come evil is with good because evil begets evil.

Let me encourage you, the next time you want to take revenge, try something different. Turn the other cheek you might just be surprised at the result. You know, words are cheep. It’s easy for Jesus to say these things but it’s another thing entirely to live them out. But you know, that is exactly what Jesus did. It isn’t just say things about turning the other cheek, he lived it! On that night that he was betrayed by one of his own to be crucified they came to arrest him in one of his favourite places, the garden of Gethsemane. And Peter one of his disciples, decided to draw his sword and cut off the ear of one the assailants. Luke chapter 22 verse 51:

But Jesus said, “No! No more of this” and he touched the ear of the man who had been struck and healed him.

And having done that, Jesus allowed them to arrest him. To falsely accuse him. To beat him. To humiliate him. To nail him to a cross. I mean he took this turn the other cheek thing to such an extreme that it cost him his life, his everything! And whilst at the same time it appeared to be the greatest defeat in all of history, the Son of God nailed to the cross it turned out to be the greatest victory of all. Revenge never wins, but turning the other cheek does. Forgiving does. Love always defeats evil and good always defeats evil and that’s what the apostle Paul wrote many years later:

Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thoughtful for what is noble in sight of all. If it’s possible so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with everyone. Beloved never avenge yourself but leave room for the wroth of God. For it is written Vengeance is mine and I will repay says the Lord. Now if your enemies are hungry feed them, if they’re thirsty give them something to drink. For by doing this you’ll be heaping burning coals on their heads. Do not be overcome by evil but over come evil with good. (Romans chapter 12:17-21)

So are you challenged by that? Yeah well me to! No it’s not always easy, it’s counter intuitive. But then in a world full of evil, goodness and righteousness so often are. I just want to encourage you today though the simple and powerful example of Jesus himself to have the courage to be different; the courage to turn the other cheek. I’ve taken revenge before in the past and its’ something I’ve always regretted, but turning the other cheek, even though it hurts at the time, is something I have never regretted doing. Ever.

I’m Afraid

When was the last time that you were afraid? I’m not just talking about a little bit nervous; I’m not just talking about being a bit anxious about something; I’m talking serious fear – the sort of gut-wrenching debilitating fear that we all go through from time to time. When was the last time you felt that cold-bladed fear piece your heart?

I have no doubt whatsoever that you know exactly what I’m talking about. We’ve all been there in that place and I have no doubt that you can remember great fear in your life as though it was yesterday; the sort of fear that grips every cell of you body. Perhaps it was during the time when one of you children was gravely ill? Perhaps you travelled through divorce as many people have and you know the fear and the uncertainly of the future? The terrible thing about fear, aside from the how it makes you feel, is that it’s a totally debilitating emotion.

It does one of two things, it either causes us to lash out and do stupid things, things that aren’t in our best interest, things that are only going to make our situation worst instead of better. Or the other thing that fear does is that it makes us freeze. It’s as though we’re totally immobilised: incapable of thinking straight, incapable of taking any actions that will make things better and keep us safe. A bit like that rabbit on the road at night caught in the headlights of an on coming car. It freezes and unless it moves quickly it’s going to get run over.

Over the last little while on the program, we’ve been talking about how to live an extraordinary life in this series of messages that I’ve called, ‘The Art of Living’. See, my theory is this. We only have one crack at this life here on earth. We can either waste that life completely or we can live a mediocre life that never amounts to much, it never impacts others lives and that’s what most people seem to do, or we can live an extraordinary life. And part of living that extraordinary life is knowing how to get through fear, how to deal with fear and cope with fear because it doesn’t matter who you are, what your position or status is in life, you and I are going to experiences fear at some point.

Now I’m a very strong person emotionally, it’s just the way I’m wired. My personality type has some downside but one of my upsides is my strength. But still there are times when I’m afraid, and the only place where I’ve been able to deal effectively with fear, the only place where I’ve been able to discover the peace of God in the middle of the storm is in God himself.

Have a listen to what God has to say about fear to you and to me today. Isaiah chapter 41 verse 10:

Do no be afraid, for I am with you. Do not be afraid for I am your God, I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand.

This God who sent Jesus His Son to suffer and die for you and for me is a God who loves us, a God who doesn’t want us to be afraid and the truly awesome thing about that is that we only really discover the power of his love and his faithfully to us is when we are afraid.

I have no idea where you are at in your life, it may be that you simply don’t believe in this God and okay, that’s completely your decision I’m not hear to ram anything down anyone’s throat. But what I’ve discovered in my experience is that it doesn’t matter how fearful I am, it doesn’t matter how overwhelming my circumstance are, this same God of whom I speak is prepared to step into our space, to walk with us, to be with us, to protect us, to provide for us. I don’t care what it is a tsunami a earthquake, God is right there in the middle of it with us. Psalm 46 beginning at verse 1:

God is our refuge and our strength a very present help in time of trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth should change, though the mountains should shake and fall into the ocean, though the water should roar and foam and though the mountains should tremble with the tumults. And it doesn’t matter which way you look at it, no matter what angle you come at that from hey that is great news, that is fantastic news an the only way to discover if it’s true or not is to try it the next time you’re afraid. To pray, to commit your situation into his hands and to wait on him to see what he is going to do. There is no other way to find out if it’s’ true.

Someone asked me recently, “But Berni is it the right thing for me to do in a sense to just assume that God wants to help me, to rely on God in this way? Isn’t that wrong to just expect God to just show up when I’m afraid maybe he wants me to be afraid? Maybe he’s too busy, maybe…I don’t know! Am I being presumptuous?” Ah I guess I can see where that person was coming from, they don’t want to seem presumptuous so is it right to depend on God in this way and my answer is just quietly….ABSOLUTLY IT IS! That’s exactly what God wants you to do. Have a listen to these few Scriptures; let God write them on your heart. Joshua chapter 1 verse 9:

I hereby command you, be strong and courageous do not be frightened or dismayed for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

Psalm 23 verse 4:

Even though I walk though the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for you are with me.

Romans chapter 8 verse 15:

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear but you have received the spirit of the adoption as children by whom we cry Abba father!

Hebrews chapter 4 verse 16:

Therefore come boldly before the throne of grace so that you may receive mercy and grace right in the time of need.

Hebrews chapter 13 verse 6:

So we can say confidently the Lord is my helper, I will not fear what can man do to me?

2 Timothy chapter 1 verse 7:

For god hasn’t given you a spirit of fear, but of love and power and of a sound mind.

And my friend that’s just a handful of the scriptures that’s just a smattering of the many, many passages in God’s Word when He tells us, that He doesn’t want us to wimp about fear He wants us to boldly and confidently rely on him. He wants us to – listen to it again – boldly and confidently rely on him.

My friend when you are afraid I encourage you to turn to Jesus to cast all your fears and your cares on him and to trust in him and the peace of God which passes al understanding will guard and your mind in Christ Jesus.

As long as you hold onto that thing from the past, it has a hold over you, and as long as it has a hold over you, you can’t take hold of the blessings that are coming your way.

Who’s in the Driver’s Seat?

Imagine you’re driving along in your car one day, and you see a car swerving all over the place. Why? Because behind the wheel in the driver’s seat is a gorilla with a crazed look on his face. Would you be shocked? Yeah, me too. Driving a car is a serious business. The moment we get behind that wheel, we’re in control of a lethal weapon. But how often do you actually think about that before you unlock the car-door, hop in, strap your seatbelt on, and turn the key in the ignition?

Most of us don’t think about it at all, and to be honest, I’ve been driving now for almost thirty years and until March last year, I didn’t think too much about it either. I’d just hop into my car, turn the key, and off we’d go. I was an aggressive driver because of my personality-type; I want to get where I’m going as quickly as possible. I’d tailgate people; I’d blast the horn; still do now and then; I’d zig in and out of traffic, without really thinking too much about the consequences.

But in March last year, everything changed. I attended an advanced driving course. Now somehow in my head I imagined that I’d be learning how to drive faster still – how to zip in and out of the traffic more effectively, but instead, they taught me about the consequences of driving like a lunatic. The morning was spent in the classroom, and the afternoon on the racetrack. By the end of the day, I came to the realisation that for the past…well…thirty years of my life, there’d been a lunatic behind the wheel of my car. Me! A bit like that crazy gorilla I was talking about earlier.

It’s not that I’m an overly bad person, per say; it’s not that I was intentionally being a lunatic about my driving – and in any case, my driving wasn’t all that outrageous; plenty of people drive like that – but once I listened to someone who knew what they were talking about, an expert; once I hopped into my car and participated in some controlled tests at what were in fact relatively low speeds, and I discovered the consequences of the way I’d been driving, I was confronted with the reality that my behaviour behind the wheel, unwitting though it may have been, was putting my life at risk; the lives of the people I love most – my family; and the lives of other people on the road.

It was a shock, I can tell you, and that shock – being confronted with the deadly consequences of my behaviour – resulted in an instant change in the way I drove my car. In fact, these days, I see people doing what I used to do and immediately I think: ‘How can you do something crazy like that? Ah, yeah, I remember how.’

Now if driving a car is a serious business, living your life is even more of a serious business. What we believe, how we see ourselves, what we think, what we say, what we do, our relationships, our loves, how we cope with adversity, how we cope with success, how we live our lives, that’s a serious business. Steering our lives through all the obstacles and hurdles this world throws up at us from beginning to end. Let me ask you a question: “Who’s in the driver’s seat of your life? Is it a lunatic, or is it someone with a good heart, a wise head, a steady hand?”

Let’s say, a bit like going to an advanced driving instructor, you paid a forensic psychologist to review your life – your attitudes; your successes and failures and how you handle them all; the depth and the effectiveness of your relationships; your whole life – what might they find? What sort of a scorecard would you end up with? If someone brought you face to face with the consequences of some of your wrong attitudes towards others – perhaps your own perception of yourself, your foibles and insecurities and all that stuff – how would you go?

The sort of life we end up living comes back to who or what is in the driver’s seat. It comes back to the skill and the wisdom and the integrity and the insight of whoever’s driving our lives, and the whole thing of educating us on how to drive our lives is left somewhat to chance.

Some cultures handle it quite well, but others (in fact, the more affluent cultures where people see themselves primarily as individuals, rather than members of a family or members of a community) we don’t handle this life-education stuff that well at all. So where do you go? How do you get the sort of input into your life that sets your course in the right direction? Here are the words of the very first Psalm in the Old Testament. Have a listen to this:

Happy are those who don’t follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers. But their delight is in the Word of God, on which they meditate day and night. Those people are like trees planted by streams of water that yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves don’t wither. In all that they do, they prosper.

The wicked, on the other hand, aren’t like that. They are like chaff that’s blown away by the wind.

Academically, I’m a pretty smart guy. But when it came to actually living out my life, I didn’t have a lot of wisdom. Being smart and being wise are two entirely different things, and so unwittingly, I wasn’t living the sort of life that I had the potential to live. I wasn’t taking what I was smart at, what I was good at, and using it with wisdom and compassion, and so, I wasn’t all that happy.

The turning point came when I let someone else take the driver’s seat. The turning point for me was when I let Jesus drive for a while, for a long while; when I started to listen to His words – what He has to say. Then, all of a sudden, my life started yielding the fruit it was always meant to yield.

Just stop and think about this: God made you and me who we are. He knows exactly what He made us good at, and the things that we’re not so good at. And when we stop taking the advice of the wicked, when we stop treading the path that sinners tread, when we stop sitting in the seat of the scoffers as though somehow we’re in a position to judge people, something awesome happens. We discover the freedom that we’ve always been looking for. We discover that we were made with a purpose.

We’ve been given some gifts and some abilities that are absolutely unique and special, and when we live out who God made us to be according to His wisdom, His ways, when we drink in His words and His wisdom the way a thirsty tree sends down its roots into the soil to draw up the water, then you can’t help it. Fruit starts to appear. We end up producing the goodness and the yield that we were designed, handcrafted to produce.

And look, maybe you know something that I don’t, but there isn’t one thing on this planet that I’ve found to be more satisfying, more fulfilling, than being who God made me to be; doing what God made me to do; producing the fruit that others get to eat – the fruit He always planned for me to produce. But it only started happening when I got out of the road, and let Jesus hop into the driver’s seat. Can I ask you this question again? Who is in the driver’s seat of your life?

What’s Driving You?

Ok, so the alarm clock goes off again in the morning. Great! You switch it off, into the bathroom, get dressed, have breakfast, and then you’re off and running. For some of us, it’s off to work. Perhaps you have a long commute ahead or maybe you work from home. You get to your workplace and the day begins, or perhaps you’re a stay-at-home mother. Other people think: “Man, wouldn’t it be great to be able to stay at home and not have to go to work!” But kids are hard work, right? Housework is boring and no one seems to appreciate all that you do. Maybe you live on your own. A lot of older people do. The day is going to be lonely and empty, so you’d like to sleep in for as long as possible, but somehow you seem to be waking up much earlier these days.

Some people seem to have such exciting jobs. I remember when I was a consultant, almost every week I was flying off somewhere here or there, and people would look at me and say: “Wow! I wish I had Berni’s job”. Little did they know how sick I was of taxies and airports and hotels and planes and landing and scrambling to get to the next meeting … There’s a hotel in Wellington in New Zealand, where I’ve stayed one hundred and eight times. That’s a hundred and eight return-trips between Australia and New Zealand. Even what appears to be glamorous or desirable really ends up being a grind, so I’m going to come back to it.

Whatever your lot in life is – however you spend your day, however glamorous it may appear to others or however boring – what motivates you to get up out of bed every day? Is it just that you have to? You have to get up. You have to go to work. You have to do that long commute and sit in that cubicle and do that job, ‘cos that’s what pays for the mortgage, that’s what puts food on the table, and that’s the way it’s always been, and that’s the way it’s always going to be.

The tragic truth is that that’s precisely how it is for a lot of people. They’re stuck on this endless merry-go-round of drudgery and pressure and stress, that has precious little in it to be motivated about. I lived a lot of my life just like that. There was nothing in it to motivate me and to give me satisfaction. Now let me say, I did have some motivations. I wanted to make a lot of money, and I was on the way. I wanted to be successful and to some degree, I was. I wanted to be a recognised leader in my industry, and to be sure, people knew who I was and my consulting services were very much in demand.

Those were my motivations, but there was no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. They’re motivations you’d think that if realised would bring a great degree of satisfaction and contentment. Well, there was a bit of that, but it was all too fleeting. It didn’t last. Deep down, at the end of each day, when I laid my head on that pillow, that sense of achievement and satisfaction at what I had achieved that day simply wasn’t there. And of course, in just a few hours, that alarm clock would be going off again and, hey presto…

Come on, what are your motivations, your hopes and your dreams that get you out of bed every day, and most importantly, are they the sort of motivations and hopes and dreams that are going to bring you the sense of satisfaction and contentment and fulfilment that you’ve been spending most of your life looking for? Well, are they, or aren’t they?

You know that Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, but that’s how many people live; can I say, most people live. ‘Well, you know, I’m not content. I’m not satisfied, but if I just keep doing it, if I just keep working harder, maybe it’ll come.’ Can I be really direct here? No, it won’t! Because 99% of that sense of satisfaction and contentment and fulfilment that everyone’s yearning for has to do with what’s going on inside your heart. And there’s a simple yet profound switch that each one of us can flick on the inside that changes everything. Would you like to know what it is? Well, here it is – the words of Jesus. Matthew 23:11-12:

The greatest among you will be your servant, but all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.

That switch is turning our lives around from filling ourselves, gratifying ourselves, satisfying ourselves, to using who we are and what we have to serve others. It’s turning our lives around from dreaming about how successful we can be, to harnessing our hopes and dreams to impact other people’s lives. And when we do that, here’s what happens.

The things that we’ve been doing that seem mundane all of a sudden have a purpose outside themselves, and that purpose is to help and to bless other people – to use who we are and what we have to make their lives better, and that is where the satisfaction and the contentment and the greatness are. What’s greatness? Greatness lives in the hearts of the people whose lives we’ve impacted, doesn’t it? All of those who humble themselves to be servants will be exalted because their greatness will live on in the hearts and the lives of those people whom they’ve served. It’s a simple switch.

‘Oh, Berni, you don’t know how boring, how terrible my job (my life) really is, do you?’ I have no idea, but God does, and this is what His Word for you today is. If that’s what you’re going through right now, have a listen to this. Colossians 3:22:

Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything, not only while you’re being watched and in order to please them, but wholeheartedly, fearing the Lord. Whatever your task is, put yourself into it as though you’re doing it for the Lord and not for your masters, since you know that from the Lord, you will receive your inheritance as a reward. You serve the Lord Jesus Christ.

Serving God ultimately means serving people. When we love Him and we want to serve Him with all our hearts, He often calls us into difficult places; dark places, to be that one light that shines there; to be, in effect, His light shining in the darkness, and that is what brings meaning into the reality of our mundane existence. That’s what brings purpose to our lives – a focus to serve Him, and then impact others with His love.

No, people won’t always be falling over one another to come and thank us. We won’t always feel appreciated and some days, it’s going to be a tough gig, but that’s ok, because when we do it for Jesus, then it’s from Him that we receive His inheritance as our reward. When we’re in the business of serving Jesus, that’s the only place so far that I’ve been able to find the peace, and the contentment, and that sense of fulfilment and satisfaction I’ve been looking for.

A Change of Direction

Probably one of the most devastating things that could happen to us in life is when we lose our soul-mate. A wife loses her husband or a husband loses his wife. There are many widows out there because we men have a tendency to die a bit younger than our wives, and depending on what country and culture you live in, there are plenty of men out there whose wives have divorced them. It’s hard to imagine something more devastating than losing your soul-mate, except perhaps losing a child.

Now none of us wishes those things on anybody, right? We certainly don’t wish them on ourselves, but here’s the one thing I know. At some stage, my beautiful wife Jacquie and I will be separated because for one of us, our time here on this earth will be over. I’ve seen people react to that sort of loss in a few different ways. First of course, there’s a time of grieving, and that’s so normal and people should be allowed to grieve. And that’s followed by a sense of emptiness and loneliness – a void that it doesn’t seem that anyone else can fill. But after that, there are basically three different ways that people can handle that sort of a loss.

Some will never recover. They never get over the loss and they pine away, and often they pass away soon thereafter. Then there are those who never quite recover. They live a kind of a half-life, never really enjoying the rest of their lives. And then there are those who (whilst they will always miss their soul-mate) get on and live this new stage of their lives in a different way.

It may not be a loss of a soul-mate. Maybe you lose your job; or your house burnt down; or all your possessions, all those things that you were sentimental about, are gone. Perhaps you suffer an injury that stops you doing what you were once able to do. The thing is that we never know what’s around the next corner and what’s over the next rise, do we? Life’s going along just fine, and then bang! It seems to blow up in our faces.

Okay, so now what? I know with absolute certainty there are people today listening, thinking: “That’s me! That’s where I am in life”, and I also know that there are people listening who next week or next month or next year are going to be hit by one of these terrible, life-changing events, and who’ll be left reeling, wondering what to do. So, what do you do? What’s the answer?

I’ve been through a couple of those in my life, and as I look back on them, I would never wish them on anyone – not even my worst enemy – and yet those tragedies (which have left their scars) in a sense are part of who I am. They’ve changed me and moulded me and shaped me into a person that I would never have been but for the tragedies, in a good way.

Of course I grieved. Of course I struggled for a time, and I needed the help of friends and loved ones around me, but there came a point where I had to make a decision – a three-way decision. Do I just give up on life altogether? Do I live this kind of grey half-life that some people seem to live? Or do I get on, and grab life by the horns and get on with it, and live my life to the full? What am I going to do?

Tragedy has a way of immobilising us, but I’m naturally your glass half-full kind of guy. That’s how I see the world, and so the couple of times that my life has taken a twist that I would never have dreamt of or wanted for myself, what I’ve discovered is a world full of new possibilities. Does that make sense? Tragedies take away someone or something that we love. That’s why it’s a tragedy, but with the benefit of hindsight, they also tell you that when the dust settles, when the grieving’s over, tragedies remove limitations and boundaries, and open up new possibilities.

There’s a man by the name of Job, who lost everything. It’s a long and tragic story. I mean, the guy lost all his wealth, his possessions, his family, his friends, his health – everything; his status … and he was really a good guy. He was a man who honoured and obeyed God – He was devastated. His friends criticised him, he went to God and asked God why and God refused to answer him, but at the end of all those trials, this is what happened to Job. Job 41:10:

And the LORD restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends, and the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before.

Sometimes we’re so busy holding on to that which we’ve lost that we can’t take hold of the new blessings that the future holds. When Job was struggling through all his devastating trials, he could never have imagined that he’d end up with double for his trouble.

Can I ask you, what are you grieving over? What is it: Something that you lost, something that hurt you, something that left you feeling worse-off? As long as you hold onto that thing from the past, it has a hold over you, and as long as it has a hold over you, you can’t take hold of the blessings that are coming your way. As long as we’re grieving over the past, that grief displaces the joy that we can experience today and in the future.

Sometimes things happen that aren’t fair. Sometimes things happen we would never have chosen for ourselves, and that we wouldn’t even wish on our worst enemy, but I know with all my heart, with every fibre of my being, that there are new blessings waiting on the other side of that. The only question is whether you’re prepared to take hold of them.

The simple yet profound truth is that God is a God of blessing. Suffering and blessing visit our lives. Jesus wasn’t immune to either. Do you remember how He suffered and died, and yet through it all, God was with Him and at the end of his story is this. Ephesians 1:20:

God put His power to work in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the age to come. And He has put all things under His feet.

Jesus is the name above all names. Yes He suffered; yes He died, but yes, He rose again, and everyone and everything is under His dominion. Earth is His footstool, and it’s the perfect hope that we have in this Jesus that gives us back our future after a tragedy. Let’s finish with God’s Word about hope. 1 Peter 1:3:

By His great mercy, God has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you. Rejoice in this! Even if now for a little while you have to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith (which is more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire) may be found to result in praise and glory and honour when Jesus is revealed.

Sure. We’re created to be an individual, but not in isolation – in community, and community doesn’t work if it doesn’t accept and love and value the uniqueness of each individual in it.

Is Your Life Going to Count?

Each minute that slips by is one less minute that you and I have to live on this earth. How we spend this precious time has everything to do with the sort of life we’ll have lived when it comes to an end. And so today, we’re chatting about living a life that really counts for something.

Now, when we’re young children, most of us don’t think about dying. We pretty much have this mind-set that we’re going to live forever here on this earth, but as time slips by, our own children come and then they go, and before you know it the grey hairs start appearing, and the thing that really surprised me? The body doesn’t work quite as well as it used to.

At first I was really surprised and then annoyed, and then a sense of my own mortality crept in. At some point, the stark reality that our life on this earth isn’t infinite becomes real in our consciousness – in our hearts. And that, my friend, is a sobering realisation.

Perhaps you’re at that point or maybe way beyond it or perhaps you’re not, but at some point many, most come to the realisation that the end is a lot closer than it used to be. At that point, how will we look back at our lives? Come on, how will you look back at your life? And just as importantly, how will others look back at your life? A life well-lived? A life with impact? A life with purpose? A worthwhile life? Or maybe not so much.

I remember being confronted by those questions when I read a book in my mid-thirties called, ‘The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People’ by Stephen Cody – a business bestseller. One of the habits, the second one in fact, is to begin with the end in mind. In other words, to set your life on a course that gets you to where you actually want to go. He begins that chapter by taking you to a funeral – your funeral, as though you have a chance to listen to what other people will say about you when you’re gone. And the question that he asks the reader (me, as I read it) is this: Will the people say about you the sorts of things that you’d really like them to say, or not? And that right there is an incredibly confronting question because it speaks directly about the gaps, small or large, between the sort of life you’d really like to be living and the one that you’re actually living.

Are you really living the sort of life that you’d like to be living? Is it having the results, the impact, the outcomes, that you’d really like it to be having, or not? Because if it’s not, then the only way it’s going to change is if you change. The only way that your report card at the end of the day is going to be different is if the attitudes, the desires, the motivations and ultimately the things that you say and do become different. And with life slipping away with each tick of the clock, my friend, do you really have time to waste?

It was that very question that brought me to a complete turning-point in my life at aged 36, because I decided that there was a huge gap between what I wanted my life to add up to at the end of the day, and what it was going to add up to if I kept heading in the direction that I was heading. I was living my life by and large for me, me, and me. And that, as it turns out, is no way to get the results that I was really looking for, because the results that I was looking for from the people who would one day stand up at my funeral were about the positive impact that I’d had on their lives’ journey.

Some would call that maybe a mid-life crisis; I don’t know, but at some point we each need to ask ourselves whether our lives are headed in the right direction. So without putting too fine-a point on it, can I ask you quietly, gently, respectfully, is your life headed in the right direction? Jesus once told this story about a man. Luke 12:16:

The land of a rich man produced abundantly, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do if I have no place to store all my crops?’ Then he said, ‘I’ll do this. I’ll pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods, and I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, and be merry.”

But God said to him, ‘You fool! For this very night your life is being demanded of you, and the things that you prepared, whose will they become?’ So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves, but are not rich towards God.

That story had a huge impact on me because I was that guy. I thought it was all about what I could build; what I could have.

We’ve no doubt all heard that saying: “You can’t take it with you”, to which I would rather stupidly respond: “Well, you know what, if I can’t take it with me, then I’m not going”. Right; like that’s an option! At some moment in time, we’re all going. We’re all going to breathe our last breath. My heart will stop; your heart will stop; and within just a few short minutes, every cell in our body will be dead. If I had the opportunity to look back on my life in the weeks, the days and the hours leading up to that event, I decided that I’d like to be able to look back on my life with contentment and satisfaction.

Every life has mistakes and regrets – yours does, mine does. Things that we wish we could unwind; things that we wish we would have done differently, but the greatest tragedy of it all would be to get to the end and to look back on it all with way more regret than satisfaction. The greatest tragedy of all would be a wasted life. So is your life headed in the right direction? And if not, what are you doing about it? Well?

There’s something that the apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Colossians in the New Testament that had a huge impact on my life. It was the thing that God used to turn my life around, and just quietly, it’s still turning around. It’s still a work in progress. None of us is there yet; at least, I don’t feel that I am. Have a listen to these amazing words. Colossians 3:1-3:

So if you’ve been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on the things that are above, not on the things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ.

And then, just a little further down in the same chapter, verse 16:

And let the Word of Christ dwell richly in you.

For me, change didn’t happen (I mean real change, radical change, the sort of change that set my life on the course that would give it the impact and the results that deep-down I was secretly hoping for) until my perspective changed. Once I stopped focusing on this life, what I could get out of it, what I could build, and once I lifted my gaze – set my mind on heavenly things, the things that are above, the things that will last, rather than the earthly things that seem to satisfy today but in reality are as fleeting as the morning mist – what I wanted actually changed. What I desired changed, and my life started to turn around and head in the right direction. Up until then, I tried everything – I mean, everything! The only thing that worked was following Jesus Christ; setting my heart on Him.

And so if I died tonight, would I be content with the life that I’ve led? Well of course, there are still some things that I’d love to do and love to achieve, but if the Lord called me home tonight, if this is it, you know what? I’m content with the life I’ve lived. You can’t ask for much more than that.

Impacting Your Community

You see, in the west, we think as individuals – individual freedom, individual belief, individual rights, individual this and that. Now to a point, it’s of course great to have individual freedoms, but in eastern cultures people think far more collectively – as families, as communities, and that brings in a strong component of mutual responsibility and respect. Take either of those to the extreme (individualism or collectivism) and that’s not a good thing, but I guess the point I’m trying to get to is that if my life and your life are going to have a real impact, if we’re going to leave a lasting legacy, then a part of who we are needs to be serving our communities – serving other people.

I want to come to the western concept of church, and whilst a lot of good things happen in church, yet I see so many people struggling to find genuine connection; genuine belonging; genuine community in church scenarios. And whatever you may believe, whatever faith or belief-system you may ascribe to, come on; community is really important.

Have you ever wondered what community really is? To me it’s not a complete subjugation of the individual. We’re all individuals. No two people look alike, except maybe the very rare sets of identical twins, and even then, no two people have the same abilities, skills, outlooks, and experience. Each of us is unique, and uniqueness was never meant to mean isolation, which is what individualism leads to for many.

Do you see the kind of paradox that emerges here? Sure. We’re created to be an individual, but not in isolation – in community, and community doesn’t work if it doesn’t accept and love and value the uniqueness of each individual in it. That doesn’t mean that we have to say that everything someone does or believes or thinks is right. Clearly, there are times when in a community, people do do the wrong things, and that’s where community brings a sense of mutual obligation into play.

Can I ask you something? What part do you play in your community? How do you contribute to your community? Do other people benefit from your uniqueness in the relationship of genuine family and community? Because if not, then I don’t believe you’re living the life you were made to live. None of us was ever made to live in isolation, yet I see so many people bruised, hurt, injured by others, withdrawing into their shells a bit like a hermit-crab, as though that’s a solution to anything.

Come on; community is laughing and crying together. Community is sharing the ups and the downs. Community is serving each other, and benefitting from each other, and benefitting from serving one another. The most beautiful picture that I’ve ever come across of community is a picture that I find in God’s Word (the Bible) in the New Testament. 2 Corinthians 12:15:

If a foot would say, ‘Because I’m not a hand, I don’t belong to the body’, that wouldn’t make it any less part of the body. And if the ear would say, ‘Because I’m not an eye, I don’t belong to the body’, that wouldn’t make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would our sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them as He chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members in the one body.

The eye can’t say to the hand, ‘Look, I don’t need you’, nor again the head to the feet, ‘I don’t need you’. On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are actually indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honourable, we clothe with greater honour, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect, whereas our more respectable members don’t need this.

But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honour to the inferior members that there may be no dissension within the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. Because if one member suffers, all suffer together with it. If one member is honoured, all rejoice together with it.

Can I ask you, what part are you playing in your community – this beautiful picture of a body – your church, your local neighbourhood or your block of apartments? Do you serve the person in need next-door? Anyone who wants to have an impact in this world needs to be part of their community – serving it, and benefitting from it.

The problem is that too often we’re too busy worrying about us. Too often we’re too concerned about who’s on the top of the heap; who’s got the best reputation; who’s going to get the accolades; the most money; the nicest house; the most well-adjusted children; wealth … and so it goes on. Greatness isn’t about winning; it’s about losing.

Being the first is really about being the last. That’s what that picture in the Bible is talking about. That’s what Jesus said. In setting straight the religious leaders of His day, who for the most part were hypocrites who manipulated the common folk in the name of God and religion, this is what Jesus said. Matthew 23:11-12:

The greatest among you will be your servant. All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.

Do you want to live a life that will have people remembering you when you’re gone – with fondness, with a sense of gratitude for the impact you had in their lives? Then my friend, it’s time to focus on your community. How can you serve? How can you make a difference? Is there sacrifice involved? Yeah. Absolutely, but at the end of the day, there’s nothing so satisfying as using your unique gifts to serve others, even when that serving is hard.

That’s what community is. God made us not as loners, not as hermit crabs to live in isolation; He made us to be social beings. Community creatures. And if perhaps you’re one of those people who’s forgotten what community is, whether in a church setting or frankly in any other setting, maybe today is the day to repent that. Maybe today is the day to engage, to become part of, to serve, to sacrifice for your community. That’s what it means to live a life that counts.

Tearing Down the Walls

That picture of the Berlin Wall is a powerful one. Germany, you may recall, after World War Two was separated into east and west by the allies. Berlin was in the soviet zone, so as part of the arrangement between the allies, Berlin itself was divided so that the soviets controlled one part, and the democratic government of West Germany controlled the other. The wall was a terrible thing: Separating families, parents from their children, husbands from their wives … It was a brutal thing of division and suspicion. I wish we had time to chat about the events that culminated in its destruction in 1989. It was a fascinating time in history.

Nevertheless, walls are always damaging. Sometimes they exist as physical structures, but most often they live in the hearts of people. We saw it for centuries in Northern Ireland where historically, peace is a relatively recent phenomenon. We’ve seen it for centuries in Israel; in many parts of Africa; tribal, national, international wars continue to rage. We see religious divisions. We see it sometimes even in violence over sport. Somehow our capacity to divide people, to set one against the other, to live in suspicion and fear of one another, is incredible, but it’s not the macro perspective that I’m so much interested in today. It’s the micro; the individual; the personal.

Many people live their lives with walls in their hearts, rejecting loved ones over all sorts of reasons; being suspicious of people in the workplace – of their motives. Sometimes we build walls around our hearts for protection after being hurt. You see that a lot, sadly, in marriages, where husband and wife have their own Berlin Wall running right through the middle of a relationship – a wall that each of them built, brick by brick, over many years until they find themselves living on either side of it. Do you recognise any of that in your life? It’s just as destructive in our lives and relationships, tearing us apart, as the Berlin Wall was in tearing a community, families and lives apart.

What walls do you have in your life? What unforgiveness, fears, suspicions are you carrying around in your heart? Because these are the things that rob us of life. These are the things that stunt our growth, that give us an outlook on life that just ruins everything. I want to share with you today, as you look forward to the rest of your life, how you can tear down your walls, brick by brick. The Germans tore that wall down literally with their bare hands – this wall that had limited them for too long, and what followed was a united single Germany.

And in a real sense, that’s what I’m talking about here – tearing down the walls that divide us, brick by brick, by hand. I don’t care what you believe, or what you don’t believe. There’s really only one way to do that, and that’s through forgiveness and reconciliation – not through religion. This is how Jesus put it. Matthew 5:23:

When you’re offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come back and offer your gift to God.

He’s talking about putting reconciliation before sacrifice to God. He’s saying here: ‘Look, you can’t have a right relationship with God when you’ve got an argument going on with someone else. First, go and be reconciled with that person; then, come and make your peace with God’.

As I said, I don’t care what faith you belong to; what belief-set or values you have: We all need to deal with these issues in our lives. Just picture that mighty Berlin Wall that divided families and communities for so long. The change happened when the mood of the people swelled up. ‘Enough of the division! Enough of this separation! Enough!’ I remember at that time on television, seeing people tearing that mighty wall down with their hands. That would have been hard; that would have been painful; that would have left some hands bruised and bloodied, but they tore the wall down.

Who are the people on the other side of your walls? Perhaps it’s a family-member, a mother, a child that you haven’t spoken to for years. Perhaps it’s a wife or a husband, whom you’ve isolated. Who knows? Perhaps it’s someone in your community who believes something different, or lives differently to you. I’m not saying that we have to say that anything goes. I’m not saying that we have to say that wrong is right – just that it’s time to forgive; just that it’s time to lay aside fears and prejudices and angers and animosities … Listen. Love is always better than anger. Forgiveness is always better than unforgiveness. If you and I want to live the life we’ve been made to live, love is the answer. Tearing down the walls is the answer.

What walls need tearing down in your life? I’m not talking here about something that is so hugely complicated. It’s simple. I love the way Paul puts it in his letter to the Ephesian church (4:32):

Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

And there’s the key. God’s forgiven you and me everything the moment we believe in Jesus, and He did it at a huge cost – the torture, the death of His Son. Unforgiveness eats away at us like a cancer. It rots our souls. It robs us of an outlook on life that could be so full of anticipation of what the future holds. Do you believe in God? Do you want to live the life He always intended you to live? Then my friend, unforgiveness simply isn’t an option. Let me say this again: Forgiveness is not an optional extra to our relationship with God; it’s a vital element. Mark 11:25:

Whenever you stand praying, forgive if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father will also forgive you.

Colossians 3:12-13:

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, bearing with one another, and if anyone has a complaint against another, forgiving each other. As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

The list of those Bible-references about forgiveness goes on. It is not an optional extra. Trust me. As hard as it may appear, forgiving those who’ve wronged you is the most powerful thing that you can do to get a fresh beginning for your life. Friend, let me ask you this again: What walls is God calling you to tear down in your life today? Well?