LW24 | Don’t use periods in your text messages - Charly Sommers

Leader Weekend Spring 2024
Don’t use periods in your text messages - Charly Sommers

Repentance is more than just feeling sorry for our actions - it requires a genuine commitment to change and obey God. The process involves stopping sinful behavior, turning back to God, taking responsibility, and making a plan for a new way of living. The gospel gives us the opportunity to live differently through repentance, experiencing freedom from our past errors. The Chiros circle provides a helpful tool for walking through the repentance process, enabling us to reflect, discuss, and take action. Those who refuse to repent miss out on a closer relationship with God, while those who embrace it, like Zacchaeus, find salvation and transformation.

Transcript

Go. We got extra time, so we're going to use it. My name's Charlie. How's it been so far? Did you guys got here last?

Yeah. So how's it going? Good conversation. Good. Is this your first thing?

I know you had an opener. Like, you got together and prayed and stuff, but is this your first, like, you got to do something this morning. Oh, this morning? Yeah. Cool.

Well, welcome. I'm glad you're here. You're going to need a pen or something to write with. Probably a flat surface. And I don't know if you've ever had props that do crank the blank, but we're going to do that today.

So I'm really glad you're here. I want all of you to introduce yourself to me at some point on your way in or out, tell me your name. I'll do my best to remember. I know a guy named Alex and I know Austin. Do you guys know those guys?

They're not in this room or they're not here at. Give them for. Give them hex for not coming.

That's great. So, my name is Charlie Summers. I'm on navigator staff. I have been on staff of the navigators with my wife Christina for 26 plus. No, 25 plus years.

We've been married 26. Met my wife right out of high school.

And we have five children and two of them are in college. One's a senior at Ohio State, one's a freshman at UC. I think about college students all the time and have for a couple of decades. I came to Christ in college.

I led navigator campus works up until a few years ago when I took over as the regional director. So in this new role, I oversee and lead the campuses in Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky. And so right now we have nine campuses and we're going to ten. So I love college students. How many of you are currently college students?

Okay. And how many of you are recent grads? Okay. How many of you know a college student? Okay.

And we love it. I also want to say I hope you get to meet my wife someday. She's the greatest person ever. And if you know how, you know Amy Shearer. Right.

She's the better part of Rick. My wife is very much the same. She's so much better part of the summer's marriage relationship, so hopefully you get to meet her one day. But we met right after she graduated high school and I was a college student. I'm a year older than her, but we love it.

And God has called us together to. How many of you all know two corinthians 514 and 15. Anyone don't? It's not quiz, but if you know it, say along with me.

Paul says, for I am convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again. So for us, that has been very early on, we decided that we wanted that verse to shape everything about what we did in our marriage and our work to go through that grid. Are we living for ourselves, or are we living for Christ? In the beginning of that verse, Paul says, christ's love compels me, and that has been the fuel. And, you know, the shears, I would say the same.

Christ's love compels them to live. And you guys are in this room, because long ago, those two who aren't just the best couple, and you would agree, they made that same decision to give their lives for students and to build Jesus'kingdom in northern Kentucky. So I am very good friends and colleagues with a guy named Evan Griffin. How many of you guys know him? Okay, he and Rick have been buds for, like, three decades.

So I have known Rick for, like, 20 years, indirectly through Evan, because Evan has reported to me about Rick's life. And then I've gotten to know Rick a little bit. But he asked me to come and share, and we're going to talk about something that I have been meditating on a lot over the last year, and topic of repentance, and we'll get into that. But I came to Christ as a college student. I was a senior in college, already dating my wife, or she, sorry, the girl who had become my wife.

We were dating, but I was not a believer. I grew up in church, but I had never heard the gospel in a way that I understood it. And I was living a life that was really radically just with girls and alcohol and drugs. And I was a musician, and so I was totally into just everything about myself. And I just couldn't stand people who I knew were christians.

They just nauseated me, the people that I knew up till that point. And then I met these guys, Nate, Jack, Chad, those three particularly. And then there were a couple of girls, too, that were around, but these guys befriended me. And there was something about their friendships that was took. And they were christians, and they took God seriously.

And when they talked about Jesus and they talked about the word, it was magnetic. And I couldn't understand what was happening to me. But what was happening to me is that I was beginning to develop a belief and faith. In Jesus. And when I came to Christ, it wasn't like a lightning bolt, like a moment that I could go back and say, oh, yeah, that was the moment.

It was actually more like being awakened in the morning by the sun. Does that make sense? The sun comes up, and you don't really know the moment where the sun comes through the windows and goes through your eyes and all of this. But suddenly I was awake, and I knew that everything that they'd been sharing with me about Jesus was true. And I knew I believed it.

And then I was like, what am I going to. It was crazy. What am I going to do? So those guys and those friendships, it was just magnetic. And that was when I believed I understood the gospel for the first time, and it totally changed my life.

How many of you know? Two Corinthians 517. Come on. Okay. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.

The old is gone, the new has come. And that's what happens when someone comes to Christian, when someone decides to follow Jesus. There's a verse. Write this down somewhere. Two Corinthians four six.

You can write it inside that booklet. Second Corinthians four six. It says that God makes his light shine into our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God's glory displayed in Jesus Christ. So when someone decides to follow Jesus, God turns a light on inside them, just like in the beginning, before anything existed. And what were God's first recorded words in the scripture?

Let there be light. And there was light. And when someone meets Jesus and the gospel comes in, God shines a light inside them, and they become a new believer, a new creation, the oldest gone, the newest. So. And that's such a critical part of my story, like the life before I met Jesus and then the life afterward and the transformation that continues to take place in the years.

So I'm going to go through here and let me pray.

Lord, we love you, and thank you. We are so thankful for the gospel and for Jesus. We are thankful for the people who have come before us and shared the gospel with us. We are thankful for how you use them to change our lives and to transform us. We also pray, lord, that we would continue to be shaped so that we could impact others.

We love you, God, and we're thankful for your word. And we pray all of this in Jesus name. Amen. All right, so in your booklet. So we're going to do some crank the blank.

There's two verses in there that I want to. These are really critical when we talk about repentance, particularly. But these are critical verses for me personally. But Philippians one six, someone read that. When I say somebody read that, I just need someone to jump in.

So we're going to do that a few times. All right? I'm going to call on grace. Where is she? There she is.

Would you read that? I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ. Great. So God is never. This is important.

God is never finished with us, ever, until the day that Jesus comes or we die. One of those two, right? This is also critical to think about when we think about other people. God is never finished with them. You can never give up on people.

You can never give up on yourself, because God will see it through to completion, okay? No matter what happens, and no matter how often it happens, God's mission is redemption. Okay, so next verse, Ephesians 210, somebody else reads out, for we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Very good. So as a follower of Jesus, God continues to shape you all of your life.

I want you to write that in there all of my life, not just this weekend.

So I, man, I want to remain open and humble before him while he's doing that. And I want to be right in the middle of that thing he has set aside for me to do. Ephesians 210. He's prepared something for me, and I'll say for you to be doing, and he did that before you were even created. And I want to be right in the middle of that all of my life.

So I'm going to tell you a story. I'll try to do this, and I want you to feel free to laugh at me, not because I'm funny, but because of what this story tells you about me, all right? Or exposes about me. So a little over a year ago, I learned this really critical life lesson. My family relocates in the summer, and we do a summer program, and we've done it for the last 17 years.

We'll keep doing it. But my whole family goes, and my older children work in the program, and I work in the program. It's in Michigan. And my oldest daughter is a class leader and she supervises a team. Last summer when this happened, she was supervising a team of about ten or twelve college students and some high school students, right?

But this story really spurred me on to start thinking about repentance and what it means. So it all started with a conversation with her. Her name is Grace, which. So it's awesome. She's the one who's a senior in college at Ohio State.

So I come home late, it's like 11:00 and I find my daughter sitting at the table, and she's working on making the schedule for the upcoming week. You know, those of you who work, you know how important it is to know what your schedule is going to be like better than the day before you're supposed to work. So she's putting it together, and she is texting back and forth with her boss, a woman named Christy, who's my age. And she's texting back, I don't know, just logistics about who to schedule and what that's supposed to look like. And all of a sudden, she gets exasperated, really upset.

And I start overhearing. She's kind of muttering under her breath, and she's texting back and forth. And then I'm like, so there comes a break. And I'm like, what's going on? And she says, read this.

She sticks her phone out. And so I look at it, and I'm looking at this conversation that she's having with Christy, and I couldn't see anything wrong with the said. And I told her, I said, what's going on? She says, what do you mean what's going on? You don't see anything wrong.

And then she says, she used a period in this message right here. And by this time, she was pretty hot. And by this time, my other teenage kids come in, everyone's wake, kind of in the kitchen and over kind of listening to our conversation. And so then I asked the question that really illuminated a lot of things for me, but also pointed me to think about repentance. And I asked the question, what is wrong with using a period in a text message?

Is that bad? And all of a sudden, all my kids just started unloading on me about why using periods is aggressive. It can be passive aggressive, manipulative. And I'm like, wait a second. What is going on?

I couldn't believe it. And then they said, yeah, dad, you're the worst. And I'm like, what do you mean? And then they started giving me all these examples of how I text, all of that and how it makes them feel. So we went to bed the next day, in the morning, I was working with my team, who were all college students, one high school student, and I said, so what's this deal with using periods and text messages?

And they all were like, whoa, whatever. And I said, is that a big deal? Do you experience that for me? I asked, and then they started like, yeah, of course. And then this one girl, she said, you know, before I started working here and I had met you and we were just texting back and forth about the job, I thought you were a jerk.

And I was like, what? She said, yeah, of course. I got here and I worked with you and I realized you're not a jerk. And I was like, I'm not a jerk. What's wrong with the way I text?

And then they gave me all these examples, and then I opened up my phone and I started looking at my phone. I always been really focused on good grammar, like punctuation sentences, using the right things. But then I noticed that I was doing that in my texting. And they really said I was starting to learn that I was way off when it came to texting etiquette. Now, this might not be a big deal to you, but at the moment it was really illuminating for me.

So I just decided I was going to start asking people about it. And over the next couple of weeks, I probably asked 100 people about how they use periods in text messages. And all of the high school and college students that I asked were like, oh, yeah, you don't do that. And I'm like, okay. And then I would ask, what happened when you get a message from someone with a period in it or something?

I said, how does it make you feel? She says, well, I look at it and you're either mad or you're old. And then I realized that a lot of young folks, and maybe you're one of them, they do what's called code switching. So if they get text from their parents or their grandparents or someone that they don't know, they actually have to. Like, if they have to code switch, which means decipher and then be able to communicate.

So you communicate over text differently with your grandparents than you do with one of your friends, right. And you interpret them differently. There was a kid, a high school kid, and this is important. I asked this kid that worked with me, he was 16, and I said, hey, were you taught this thing about periods and texting, by the way? Does what I'm saying make sense?

Oh, yeah. Look at you. You're all, yeah. And I said, did someone specifically teach you this? You learned grammar in school?

Like periods? I said, were you specifically taught not to use periods in your text messages? And he says, no, I've just always felt that way. I was like, how did you just feel that? Anyway?

So I probably talked to at least 100 people over the course of a couple of weeks. And I just said, hey, I'm learning about this. Would you? I did a ton of reading on it, and it was great. Now, that whole thing was very illuminating, and it shed a lot of light about how I interact with people, particularly my children and particularly younger navigator staff and other people that I have related with over the years.

And it was really shed a lot of light on how people, the interactions that I had. And I went back into my text threads, and I was looking at things, and I just tried to understand.

I'll tell you how that story ended at the end, but it just taught me a lot about repentance with that context. Let's think about. Want you to open up your scripture. We're going to get into the word together. Wow.

It took me eight minutes to tell that. It's like, four minutes longer than I wrote in here. So sorry about that.

One thing I would say is, be patient with people who use periods and text messages without knowing. That's what I would say. All right, Luke, chapter 19. Now, we're going to talk about Zacchaeus. Now, this passage in the scripture in Luke 19, this is one of my favorite stories in the whole bible.

It's these ten verses about the sky. Zacchaeus. Now, there's a song that I learned when I was in Sunday school about Zacchaeus. You guys know it. You're not allowed to do this anymore, by the way.

Zacchaeus was a wee little man we. Little man was he. You guys know this? Anyone? Okay, if you know us singing.

Zacchaeus was a wee little man a wee little man was he walked up to a sycamore he climbed up in a sycamore tree for the lord he wanted to see and when the lord passed by that way, he looked up in the tree and he said, zacchaeus, you got to shake your finger. Zacchaeus, you come down, because I'm going to your house. Tuesday. Anyone? Now?

Okay, so that's like old Sunday school tongue, and you're not allowed to call anyone wee little man. And we literally did this hand gesture. Okay, but I love this story. All right, now, Zacchaeus is a tax collector, and as we know, tax collectors were. The Jews hated them because they collected taxes for the Romans, who were oppressing him.

And not only was Zacchaeus a tax collector, he was the chief, which means that he was in charge of all of them in the area. I don't know how many it was, but it was. And tax collectors were known to extort money, be dishonest, and use aggression, intimidation, to collect. And if he's the chief, then he's basically like. He's like a gangster.

He's like an organized crime boss, so to speak. And he's in charge of all the guys who are collecting, and so that's who he is. And he apparently was short. But one thing we know about him is that he was very, very wealthy, and he was dishonest. And I would also say, besides being reviled, it was likely that he was feared, that people were afraid of him.

And that's important to keep in mind. Now, in the gospel of Luke, three times in the Gospel of Luke, you find a story about a rich man. The first one, Jesus, tells a story of the rich man of Lazarus. He tells a parable, and he tells a story about a rich guy. And then the second one is the rich young man who comes to Jesus and wants to know how to get into the kingdom of God.

And then there's this story about Zacchaeus. So Jesus is interacting with rich people, telling stories about them, talks about money a lot. And this story with Zacchaeus contrasts the other stories and Zacchaeus. The story doesn't tell us. I really, really wish there was some record about the interaction.

Okay. Like, what happened, but we don't get that. All we know is that Zacchaeus met Jesus and had dinner, and something happened. So let's get into pairs, and I want you to read that story. You guys can be pair up, read that story together, and I want you to make some observations.

Okay. And I want you to make some observations about Zacchaeus. All right? His response to Jesus will take a few minutes. I want you to do that right now and write down your observations in your book.

Come back, come back, come back.

What are some observational.

Yeah. Tell me your name. Tennyson. Yeah. Cool name.

Thank you. I said what I observed was, like, the lengths that he went at to see Jesus, like, climbing up the tree, like, just not giving up, trying to see Jesus in any way he could. Yeah. I love that. Perhaps there was something going on in him before he met him, like God was doing something right, and he's got to check it out.

Good. What else? The existence of Jesus, where? He didn't say, can I go to your house? He said, I must go to your house.

Yeah. Come on, dude. Let's go. Go. I love that the people were like, look at Jesus going off to have dinner with that sinner.

Right? I love that. That's such a critical thing that they say Jesus is going to spend time with that guy. Right? Okay.

More somebody else. Yes. What's your name? Sean. Sean.

Your name's cool too. Thanks. I said it was cool that knowing that Zacchaeus is, like, chief priest, rich guy, he probably didn't really listen to a ton of people. So for him to be so curious to see Jesus and expecting ultimately, Jesus probably wasn't wearing nice clothing or whatever, but Jesus is the key. It's like, come down.

I'm coming to your house. I'm staying there. For him to be like, this dude probably doesn't take orders from many people to be so submissive to that, and not only that, to instantly be like, I've done so many things wrong. He was just almost ready to repent or receive forgiveness or make up for it. Yeah, love it.

Awesome. Zacchaeus was probably pretty savvy, competent, smart, all the skills you need to be a good businessman. In addition to all the things I said about being dishonest and being intimidated, he's a big dude. Okay, who else? One more, two more.

What's your name? Joshua. Joshua. He wanted to see Jesus. That's awesome.

He won the zoom. Yeah. Good. One more. Were you going to say something?

Yeah. David, he. In verse eight or six where it says he received him joyfully, if he knew anything about Jesus, I think we all kind of bring our past and we're like, oh, we can't be accepted the way that we are. So Zacchaeus, a lot of other people may have stayed up in the tree. I can't talk to him.

But, like, that, Zacchaeus came down joyfully, was expecting of what Jesus could do in his life. Something was going on, and there was something about what was going on in Zacchaeus, which is important and something that Jesus brings to him that's really, really critical. Right. Anything else? What's your name?

Jacob. Okay, Joshua David Sean Tennyson.

Jacob. Jacob. We notice that was interesting in verse nine that Jesus calls him the son of Abraham, because with Zacchaeus being a chief tax collector, he's probably jewish, but he was immediate, so he didn't like to announce, those are his jewish things. So he hasn't probably heard or been called a son of Abraham in a while. And it was also probably a shock to those around who heard it because they're like, how could you call him this?

But then when in Romans, it says, like, not all who descended from Abraham are part of the promise, but those who have faith. So it's like, kind of an introduction towards salvation by faith. Awesome. I love that. That's really sharp observation, rich.

Okay, so good. We're coming back to Zacchaeus later. All right, now, I'm going to use the word repentance a lot today, so don't get bored with it. But it's one of the most important things. Maybe the most important thing that we do in our relationship with Jesus is repent.

Now, in your same groups for about 30 seconds, what comes to your mind when you hear the word repent? When you hear the word repent, what comes to your mind? Go ahead, quickly, share. I even chair, but, like, also times in my life. All right, good.

Go to page two in your booklet. Page two. I hope you talk about repentance all day long. Okay, page two. Ready?

Get your pencil. Following Jesus for a lifetime requires. Underline that word requires, or circle it. Whatever you want to do requires that you learn how to repent well.

Following Jesus for a lifetime requires that you learn how to repent well. And two, discipleship is really just helping others repent well.

I can end the workshop right there. Okay, so following Jesus requires that you learn how to repent well. And discipling someone is really just helping them learn how to repent well. Okay, so let's look at some definitions there on page two. Man, repentance sounds like an angry word.

Okay? You think about those guys that come to campus with the big signs, and they're like, repent for the kingdom of God. It's coming. It can be angry word, but it's also a beautiful word. You could write that in there somewhere.

Repent is a beautiful word.

The dictionary definition. Webster says that repentance is the action of repenting characterized by sincere regret or remorse. Now, that is partial definition. That's what Webster says. I think it's just a partial definition.

Theological definition says a heartfelt sorrow for sin, a renouncing of it, and a sincere commitment to forsake it and walk in obedience. That theological definition is actually more complete. It's not just feeling bad remorse, it's doing something about it. So it comes from the greek word metanoia, which means a change of mind, a new mental state, a transformative change of heart, conversion. Okay.

But it's not just the conversion that you make at the beginning when you start following Jesus. It's almost like your whole life is filled with little conversions. I'm going to show you something that will help you unpack that. There's a quote there from this guy named David Moiskins, who is a meditative prayer leader, someone that I study a lot. And he says that in repentance, we exchange the self centered mind for the mind of Christ.

We let go and receive divine forgiveness. We pray for the power of the spirit to free us from harmful practices and attachments.

Yeah. We exchange the harmful practices with a new mind in Christ. Now turn to page three. So I'm just going to give you three steps, and this is literally all it takes, three steps of how to repent. Well, all right, the first step is stop.

Write down in big capital letters, stop the behavior, stop the words, stop the thoughts, stop moving away from God. You can also write, observe, ask questions. That's the first. Ask this. God, what are you saying to me about this?

Ask man. God, what are you putting your finger on?

All right, now, all of you, I need you to think about this question. Look at me. Sorry. Not like I'm talking to my children. Everyone, look at me.

Is everyone looking at me? Is there something right now that God has been putting his finger on in your life that he wants you to repent of? Don't raise your hand and share. I'm asking that. Is there something that he wants you to stop?

What's he saying to you about that? Okay, number two, the second step is to turn.

Like, the literal definition of repentance is stop moving and turn back. So if you think, like, we're moving away from the Lord, he says stop and send them to turn. That's the second one. Now, turning, in order to turn, you need to write this down means taking responsibility, and taking responsibility requires two things of you, and this is thing one and thing two. I tried to be cute with the whole, like, Dr.

Seuss thing. So it requires two things. The first thing that it requires is humility. That's what I want you to write in there. And humility is being soft hearted, being open.

In the Old Testament, God's biggest complaint against his people is that they were stiff necked. You guys know what that means? Stiff neck. Stiff neck means there is no way I'm going to own up to this. There's no way I'm going to admit that I was wrong.

There's no way I'm going to change. That's his major complaint all the way through, and that they're unwilling to take responsibility and they're unwilling to turn back. So I want you to write Jeremiah 213. Does anybody in here by any chance have Jeremiah 213 from memory? Okay, if you don't, I would encourage you to memorize this.

This is where God says my people have committed two sins, they've turned away from me. The spring of living water and have dug their own cisterns. Cisterns that are broken and that cannot hold water. Okay. Jeremiah 213.

Write that down and memorize it. My people committed two sins. They turned away from me, and they started digging their own cistern. You know what cistern is? A big hole meant to collect water to drink.

And what God is saying. I got all the water you need and it's fresh and it's living. But you've turned away from me so that you could dig your own hole in the mud and drink that water. And whatever hole you dig isn't going to hold anymore.

So turn. Taking responsibility. What's the opposite of taking responsibility? Come on, what's the opposite? Blaming.

Blaming. Boom. You guys know what the word blaming? Dodging. Making excuses.

Like, how many of you make excuses for your behavior. How many rationalize. You can write that word in a rationalization.

I have been in recovery. Yeah, I think you're safe, people. You're safe. I've been in recovery for sexual addiction for about twelve years from porn and that kind of stuff, and it's changed my life. But one of the main things that keeps people from overcoming addiction is rationalizing their behavior and being unwilling to accept the responsibility of their actions and the impact that it has.

So if you're going to turn, you got to take responsibility. All right? Now, it requires humility, and thing, too, is saying it. So write that down. Saying it requires humility and it requires saying it, because when you say it, you own it.

When you say it, you own it.

Instead of dodging it, you own it. All right, now we're going to practice. Okay, I want you to repeat after me, I was wrong when I.

I was stupid when I. I was selfish when I was selfish when I. Yeah. Isn't that fun? Doesn't that feel like someone's washing your clothes?

Right? I was dumb when I did that. I was stupid when I did that. Would you forgive me? It means taking responsibility.

I remember the first time I heard somebody do that. I was at a wedding and the pastor had the bride and groom practice saying that to each other. He says, you're going to have to say this a lot in your marriage, so just practice it right now. And they were like, but there's something about it. If you say, man, I was wrong, I was wrong, I was wrong.

And naming it, so naming the action that you need to repent of man, that's so big. Instead of making excuses all right. Step three, take action. So step one is stop. Step two is turn.

And step three is take action. And I want you to write, words are not enough. This is actually changing your course. This is actually using different words. This is actually trying to change your thought patterns, your thinking.

You can write this, too. Repentance has to be demonstrated. Acts 26 talks about how Paul took the gospel to the gentiles in that chapter. Acts 26 in 20 and 21. This is what it says, first to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and then to all the gentiles.

I preach that they should repent and turn to God and demonstrate their repentance by their deeds. So your repentance has to be demonstrated by deeds. All right.

Demonstrate their repentance by their deeds. Okay. Turn to page four.

Any questions about that before we move on? It's certainly not that simple, but it also certainly is okay. It really is. Especially the more you do it.

If you start to do it, you'll realize. You'll discover, oh, it's a little easier to do it. And then you'll do it more, and then you'll discover, wow, it really is easier to do it, and it's really good to do it. Now, here's the beautiful part of the gospel, page four. This is why the gospel of Jesus Christ is awesome.

We have the opportunity ready to make decisions to live differently.

We have the opportunity to make decisions to live differently.

And number two, I'm not bound by my past. I'm living a new life now. We can make decisions to live differently because Jesus has made us a new creation.

If Jesus does not come in and buy us our salvation with his blood, there's no way that we can live differently. We will be bound by our sinful nature and incapable of living any other way. This is really important for you when you think about taking the gospel to people who don't know Jesus. If you have people in your family who have rejected God, there's no way that they can ever live in a loving, Christ like way unless Jesus transforms them. So it shouldn't surprise you about their behavior or the life that they live or the brokenness that they have.

That's one. And it should also spur us on to share Jesus with them as much as we can and leave it in God's hands, because there's no way. Because the beauty. And this is where man went. This is where the beauty of the gospel is that we get to live differently.

Meaning, like, I can make ten horrible things happen today, and I can seek forgiveness and repent. And tomorrow I can live to be like Christ. And I can do it as many times as it takes. Because remember, on page one, Philippians one six, what does it say? He who began a good work in you will see it through to completion.

No matter how long it takes. No matter how many times it takes. Okay.

There's some quotes there we're going to skip. I want you to go to the bottom of page four. Now, I'm going to make. This is my 100% money back guarantee, all right? I wrote this in here so I wouldn't mess it up.

Now, as you consider repentance and taking these steps, a thought or feeling will absolutely, definitely come. And it's this. You don't really need to do that.

It's not that big a deal. It doesn't really matter. That is the thought that will come in, right, when you're trying to decide whether you're going to repent or not. And that is straight from the devil, okay? That thought and from your flesh.

All right? So do not believe that lie. That it's easier to ignore or avoid repentance. Everyone. I think I wrote that in there.

Yeah, right. Circle that. Okay. Do not believe the lie. That it's easier to ignore or avoid repentance.

If you refuse. You set yourself up for more challenges, more difficult emotions, more broken relationships, and a much harder road. And I promise you that that's true.

Okay? Let's go to the next page. Now, I want to teach you something. How many of you do you guys know anything about the Chiros circle? Have they taught you that?

I see. Kind of. I remember it from, like, a summer thing. Okay, well, that's good. So I'm going to teach it to you.

And it's actually better if I draw now.

So you can fill this in. But the chiros circle is just a tool, okay? This is not a magic pill. It's just a tool to help you think through. But in Matthew.

Excuse me, in mark, chapter one, verse 15, it says, the time has come. Jesus said, the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news. So this is really important. Like a Kairos moment.

So Kairos is the greek word for time. Greek has two words for time. One is Kronos and one is Kairos. And Kronos is where we get the word chronological or chronology. Like a clock that's ticking around a clock face.

Right. So in 23 minutes, we need to be done with this workshop. Chronos, Kairos is a moment in time. Okay? We're a moment, like it says in Galatians, where it says Galatians three.

It says, when the time had fully come, God became a man. I botched that terribly. God was born of a woman. But what that means is that basically, like, time was pregnant, and when the right moment came, Jesus came in. So a Kairos moment is a moment where we have this interaction with the supernatural.

Now, it could be a song, it could be a word. It could be something stupid that you do. It could be something that someone does to you. It could be a death. It could be a moment.

But it's a jarring thing where we're like, wait a second. What's going on? Someone might come to your mind. It could be, does anyone relate to me when I say, has anyone ever had anything like that happen? Okay.

It could be when you're reading the scripture and all of a sudden you've ever had that moment where some verse will just come out and you're like, whoa. Right? That's a Kairos moment. That's the holy spirit kind of coming into this moment with you. Now, what do you do when you have that?

I'm going to teach you really quickly, really simply, and then we're going to move on. So it's like, here I am walking along. I'm happy as a clan or whatever, right? And then all of a sudden something happens. Don't know what it is.

My 19 year old son, who's a college student now, one of his closest friends, killed himself in high school. That was a heck of a Kairos moment for him and a bunch of other people, okay? And it made him. And he had some choices to do. So when that happens, we go, well, instead of just keeping going and ignoring it and being this guy.

Don't be this guy here. All right? Don't be that guy. Be this person when you do it. I'm going to draw it into a circle.

Okay? And the first thing you want to do is you want to stop. Does this look familiar?

We want to ask ourselves in this, we want to ask ourselves two questions.

The first question is God. What are you saying? You see that written up there? It's in there. What are you saying to me?

I just know God is saying, put on your glasses because you can't see. Okay. What are you saying to me? This is really important because when you can stop and you can ask this, you'll likely get a response if you're listening. Okay.

You also want to write the word observe.

Now, if you're looking at this, you actually have two blanks for number one. You want to write that in there on the circle. And then at the bottom, so you want to ask questions like, what the heck just happened? What are you saying to me? And this is where we begin the act of repentance.

Second thing you want to do is you want to reflect.

And this is where, man, how hard is it to reflect if you're constantly, sorry to be a curmudgeon, couch your phone out like you're so busy with stuff, classes or work or family when you don't have any time. So you got to create space to do this, to reflect. At the bottom, this is questions like, why am I responding to this the way that I am?

There's some other questions, like, what beliefs are being exposed, what memories, what patterns? Sometimes this is like, why? I think the reaction, why am I responding like this? You could ask someone. That's the next thing here is discuss.

So find someone and talk to them. Talk to God, but then talk to a friend. Maybe it's someone who's discipling you. Maybe it's a parent. Maybe it's a buddy.

Discuss what happened. What are you learning? So when I said about periods and text messages, this was me talking to 100 people about periods and text messages. Right.

For me, the moment was, wow, I really thought you were a jerk before I met you and we were just texting. But now that I know you, I realize you're not. And I was like, why would I be a jerk? That's the moment, right? So you go into this.

The next one, four is make a plan.

And this is the second half. So the first half of the circle is the turning. Repent. Okay. The other half is what we're going to call belief.

I didn't make this up.

I can't even remember. Viewed it so much, I can't even remember who it is anymore. If somebody knows, tell me. But I'm repenting and I'm discussing. I'm trying to understand.

And then on the way back up, okay, I'm going to make a plan. I'm going to make a plan for how to act differently, how to think differently. What will I do the next time this happens? This is really helpful, especially if you're in a situation where you have something that happens on a regular basis. Like you have a difficult friend or a difficult family member, and they sin against you on a regular basis.

This is a way for you to kind of engage in that and determine how you're going to respond the next time something happens or the next time your boyfriend gets a little too handsy, how will you respond? Or the next time we're alone together, how will I respond differently? Does that make sense? I don't want to get too, like, touchy feely, but you know what I'm saying. So making a plan for how to take responsibility and live differently.

The next one is account, and this is accountability. I hate that word. But it's talking to someone to say, hey, I just want you to know that I'm trying to live this way. Would you help me? You're not asking someone to make sure you do it.

Like, hey, make sure I don't look at that woman lustfully the next time. You're not asking for someone to do it for you, but what you're doing is you're asking someone to be in it with you to help you. You can do that for each other. So making account. And then the last one is act.

Their repentance must be demonstrated by their deeds.

And this is called the Chiroth circle. Now, here's the deal. You're walking along. Just pretend going to run out of time. Okay?

Someone got that? Good. Yes. Good. So here's the deal with this.

You guys got the clean board. The next time, the next group is going to be have a dirty board. So here you're going along, right? And you have, boom, a moment. Hopefully you can enter into this and do a circle.

And when you come back out and you start living differently, you're here. Sorry to be so, like, simple. It's not this simple, but it kind of is. So then you're going along and then you're going to have more, and then you enter in and you have another one. And then you're going to be here.

You might have another one and be here. Okay. There's no way to determine. You also could be in a circle and have another circle, which is weird, right? As you're repenting and thinking you could have another chiros moment.

Boom. But the idea is that this is what life looks like, okay? And that over the course of time, if this is life without Jesus, I'm trying to remember math class, this straight line or life with Jesus is this continuing escalation of I'm becoming more like Christ. If the goal is to get up here with each of these things that happened, I'm progressively becoming more and more like Jesus because I'm learning how to respond to what God is doing in my life, in repentance. Does that make sense?

I encourage you to use this. And I'll try to figure out the name of the guy totally lost. Next page. Page six.

All right. Too many blanks. We can do it. So the unwillingness to repent, to take these steps, is what keeps people selfish and stupid and stagnant and negative and unhappy in their relationship with God.

Here's where the blanks are. This is important. Most of the time, it's not that dramatic. Instead, it's a long series of small refusals.

Small refusals about small things.

And the collective effect of those small refusals is that you just wind up really far from the Lord, just like Jesus said, hey, if I can trust you with little things, I can trust you with big things. The refusals start with little things, and then the refusals become about big things, and then the refusal becomes about the thing. Right now, I want you to write the word. However, if we're willing and resolved to repent, the scriptures tell us that we will come to life. And that's true.

If we're willing and resolved to repent, the scriptures tell us that we will come to life.

John the Baptist, y'all know him, right? He came to prepare the way for the Lord, and his main message was repent. Okay? And he did a baptism of repentance.

So repentance prepares the way for the Lord. That's in the important truth. Repentance prepares the way for the Lord. It's the prerequisite for God to show up. Everyone wants God to show up, but not everyone's willing to turn back to the Lord.

And when we repent, it prepares us for what God wants to do in our life. But when we resist or refuse, we shut down the opportunity for God to work.

Now, over the years, I've seen a lot, especially last few years, I've seen a lot of people. This is not in your book, but I'm just kind of going, I have seen a lot of people, and some of them are close friends of mine. I've seen them walk away from Jesus. They no longer wanted to identify with Jesus or with the church or with Christianity. And it almost always comes down to the fact that they cannot have something or someone.

They cannot have something or someone if they're going to follow Jesus. You know what I'm saying? For them, following Jesus means that they can't do or have this thing or this person.

Now back to Zacchaeus.

I want to say that Zacchaeus is the perfect example of repentance, because it's not just about words, but he demonstrates by his deeds. It's what the Bible calls producing fruit in keeping with repentance. I love it. So you need to write generosity and honesty in there.

His life became marked by generosity and honesty. You could also write Ebenezer Scrooge in here if you like that story. Christmas Carol. Ebenezer Scrooge was visited by the three ghosts, right? And his life was transformed and he became a person of generosity and honesty.

And then Jesus says, I love it. Jesus says, salvation has come to this house today. Salvation has come to this house today. Okay, next page. I can't wait to meet Zacchaeus, by the way, because I want to hear about dinner with him, with Jesus, because something happened.

All right. Number one, final thoughts. Repentance. This is important right here. Ready?

Repentance pleases the Lord. Oh, this is so important.

Over and over throughout the Bible, we see this, that Jesus is so pleased when we repent. It pleases God when we repent.

So many people have a hard time believing that they can please the Lord, but repentance pleases.

It says that. Yeah, I'm not going to go off notes. I'll botch it. Okay. Repentance pleases the Lord.

Next thing. Repentance is demonstrated by deeds.

This is changed behavior and resolve.

And lastly, God wants to help us. I need someone to read romans 826 through 28.

God wants to help us. And then I got to let you go because you got to get to your next one.

Somebody read it out loud. A girl is then mostly dudes. Likewise, the spirit helps us in our weakness, but we do not know what to pray for as we are. But the spirit helps himself intercede for us.

And he searches the heart. And he searches the heart. And that is what is the mind of the spirit, because spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good. For those who are called according to purpose.

Thank you. What's your name? Carly. Carly, great reading. Okay.

I have been in the room, present and in the room at the birth of five human beings. Okay. My five children and my wife made a lot of noise during those births. And a lot of it was not words. It was groans that were too deep for words.

Okay. The same idea that the Holy Spirit is praying to the Lord on our behalf. This is. .3. God wants to help us.

So you have a holy spirit who is groaning on your behalf to the Lord. We need to remember that the devil wants us to think that we are alone. The devil wants us to think that our misbehavior our need to repent causes God to turn away from us. That is not true. Okay, last thing, application.

So a few things. Recruit a repenting partner. Someone in this room. Just say, hey, let's try this repenting thing. And then you get to practice.

I was wrong when I think. I was selfish when I. And here's what I'm going to do. You can practice this together. Two, pray that God would illuminate you.

We won't have chance to read this, but on the next page, page eight and nine, is a prayer by this person named Thomas Merton who was a monk, who was a catholic monk who studied his whole life. Meditative prayer. I encourage you to read this and it's going to shake you, shake you up. But pray that God will show you. Number three, memorize God's word.

Four and five, repent early and often. And don't just repent your behavior, but repent the roots of your behavior.