229: Charles Crawford - Exhortation: Fullness of Joy

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1. 0:13

   Welcome to good for selfie and talks. I’m Levi and I’m Chris and I’m Brian, thank you for joining us this week. On this podcast, we select one taco week to help us get the Bible in our daily news feed. We post a new episode of the start of each week with a short intro. Hand to kind of set the stage for the talk. You’re about to listen to and now let’s talk more about this week’s talk.

2. 0:49

   This we talk is an excitation by Brother Charles Crawford. That he gave at the Halifax achalasia in the UK last October. He doesn’t really have a formal title But he says right at the beginning that the main theme is the fullness of joy and Charles does a really great job, kind of studying joy and teasing out the difference between joy and happiness and how Joy should be a permanent attribute.

3. 1:17

   A permanent thing that we enjoy while happiness and sadness by Nature, kind of come and go but we have a hope and a promise that should in Install, a permanent joy in us. I thought his delivery in this education is excellent. I’m very succinct, doesn’t feel like I was stationed with a wasted word in it and I really appreciated the brothers thoughtfulness and work in this talk and I’m excited to share it. How this was a suggestion, so thank you to the to the person who sent that in and thank you to all of you who send in suggestions, it is such a huge help for us. Please keep that coming.

4. 1:57

   I also before we go, wanted to just do a quick Shout out for my friend Brother, Sam, Taylor’s podcast, pause to consider. Sam took a break, but his back and his most recent episode is absolutely excellent. So wherever you listen to podcasts, look for pause to consider. That’s another really great. Chris, Duffy and podcast but it’s so, here we go with brother.

5. 2:19

   Charles Crawford, the fullness of joy. Good morning, everyone. It’s a great Community. This afternoon, it’s also particularly nice. I feel because of the message that we have to share this morning from clippings because the overall summary of our excitation this morning is to be full of joy.

6. 2:42

   Paul was obsessed with joy. He was absolutely captivated by it so that he crowbarred it every opportunity into this letters will. We’ll see the first of all and period of self-reflection because I feel that for significant part of our Lives, we spend our time searching for the hits of happiness that come from endorphins and dopamine and little tiny chemicals in our brains.

7. 3:12

   That say you’re happy. Now, these can come from all sorts of situations, you can get these chemicals from exercise, nice, nice and healthy. You can also get these chemicals from unhealthy things, for example, gambling. Both of these trigger, the release of the chemicals that make us feel that spike in our mood, we say you’re happy.

8. 3:35

   So Kate social media, very similar. If you get lots of likes to your post, hit of endorphins, you feel happy, and so these things can be addictive. But there are problems with chasing these hits not least is because they are superficial. They are dependent on circumstances. I’m contingent you. Might be used to getting your hips of chemicals from an exercise and pick up the injury. Not only can do the exercise.

9. 4:05

   You Nolan no longer get the happiness, you’re sad. The horse is will always lose more than they win. So you’ll always find that these bubbles of Happiness pop and end in disappointment. And chasing these hits can lead to unhealthy behaviors. So we get hits of Happiness from food and the fatty and sugary more sugary, the greater the hit but if you keep chasing those hips it needs to be an unhealthy and our well-being is wrecked. So it’s important to recognize in ourselves that we all to a certain degree chase after this happiness. Putting contrast. the joy that Paul is effervescent about, Does not depend on circumstances, and you can’t have an unhealthy level of the joy that grips Paul so much. In the opening of chapter 3, which you read together, we read how Paul is almost apologetic about bringing this up so much. She says, in chapter 3 verse 1, finally my brother’s rejoice in the lord.

10. 5:21

    It’s no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, a safeguard to you, so he knows he’s going on about a lot, it doesn’t apologize. And uses interesting Fame phrase which is to say, this is for your safekeeping and this is the power of Joy, it keeps us safe. The opposite is true that if we lose the joy, then we’re at risk.

11. 5:48

    Are at risk from dangerous things. That’s how important it is to be full of joint. Let me give you an analogy just to try and an image to help picture where the two different sources of happiness and joy picture yourself on a Somewhere and the tide is rolling in there’s ever wins. There’s a lot of waves and they come crashing in getting closer and closer and closer to you on the beach. So you can feel the direction of the ocean is coming towards you. What you’re unaware of is that there’s another current in the ocean a deeper current, which is actually going in the exact opposite direction to the one that you’re aware of. That’s the undercurrent the undertow, which goes away from the shore.

12. 6:36

    Runs opposite counter to the main flow, big Rivers have them too, but the point is were only aware of what’s going on. The surface were only aware of the surface. Currents were not aware of what’s going on deep down. So the analogy on to give you is that Joy comes from a different current to happiness and sadness.

13. 6:57

    Happiness and sadness are affected by the surface conditions. Whether they be choppy waves or beautiful Steel Mill Pond with nice, gentle breeze moves, because affected by the tossing and turning of those surface currents where they’re a team wins or loses and moves, affected by these superficial things. But joy comes from the deeper current a stream of Living Water that’s headed in a different. Direction.

14. 7:21

    And it’s much deeper to that which is going on around us. So in some ways, it’s a test of our spiritual well-being is how aware are we of the deep currents that bring joy and conversely? How much we affected by the circus and tossing. Turning waves in his book, surprised by Joy, which is kind of Memoir of his journey from atheism to Christianity. C.s.

15. 7:45

    Lewis writes that Joy must be sharply, distinguished from happy. – our pleasure, I doubt that whether anyone who has tasted Joy or exchange it for all the pleasure in the world. So everything all the happiest will Pleasures. Here, experiences is younger life as an atheist. We’re not in any way comparable to the Deep Joy.

16. 8:10

    He got from his Christian faith. So what is it? That hole is so joyful about being through all I think there are three categories of where A joy comes from, for the first is from his brothers and sisters, he describes them as His Joy In This Crowd. The second is from his faith, the deep love. He has the gospel, which is spreading from place of blanks. And the third, and this shows you how deep we’re talking is from service, even service that brings us to suffering. So the first joint is the joint brothers and sisters. If you look at the opening of chapter 4 verse 1 therefore my brothers you whom I love you and long for my joy and crown that is how you should stand firm in the Lord. Dear friends.

17. 9:09

    This Joy comes from his brothers and sisters, there’s no doubt. That’s the pandan we’ve all been through has emphasized isolation. It’s made introverts out of extroverts. It’s wrapped up anxiety about being in social situations and contrast to previous National crises, which have brought people together. Think, for example, about the blitz, various, if you like this crisis, has blown apart and had catastrophic consequences that we are where we are. Actually it’s quite a striking parallel when you think about it to Paul himself because this letter was written from the ultimate social isolation goes chapter 1. And 47.

18. 10:04

    Well rights, it is right for me to feel this way about all of you. Since I have you in my heart for whether I am in Chains or defending the one confirming, the gospel all of you share in God’s grace with live as you drop down to verse 13. As a result is become clear throughout the whole Palace guard.

19. 10:24

    And to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ because of my chains, most of the brothers, in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and Fearlessly. So Paul was locked up the ultimate social isolation but he was still gaining Joy from mowing the fellowship. He has with his brothers and sisters.

20. 10:47

    But he longed to be with them in person so he has been fantastic. I don’t know how we would survive without it, but it’s not the same as face-to-face Fellowship. It doesn’t have the same power and she’ll always remember that when I was learning to be a dentist and we did. We had a clinic where we make Dentures for all the elderly of Manchester and see you. Make this false teeth.

21. 11:16

    Give them to the the Not incur Wheatley, study back. He just suggest that can we ought to go? We’d like to be back into the just list off. You go off you go. This is gone five six seven times, but then the formidable, dr. Jill Hubbs ready. We’re going to be cuter and she would sit down and she would take the teeth and banging table with that either. She was talking to go.

22. 11:41

    Mrs. Jones, these teeth are these Dentures are not a replacement for our teeth are our placement for no teeth your Trying to realign the patients patients expectations. The dentures not replacement for teeth, but there is a substitute and in the same way, Zoom is not a replacement for Fellowship its replacement for no Fellowship. We so benefited it from it for all these years but we don’t have to make sure we don’t forget Halls longing. If you like to be with his brothers and sisters face to face.

23. 12:22

    Being actually physically present makes it easier to properly support each other. Some of positive influence in sugar to give advice to share a laugh. If you scan around all the conversations that happen when we finish this service into lunch, they’ll be all sorts of things. Discussed spiritual matters, practical matters, the joke, all of this that happens to face to face. And it’s so important.

24. 12:47

    The writer to the Hebrews emphasizes this, if you want some quick, look at 10:24. Let us consider how we may spur one, another on toward love and Good Deeds. Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing. Let’s encourage one another and all the more as you see the day approaching.

25. 13:15

    By being together, we encourage each other to love and Good Deeds. We’re all imitators of other people to some degree, and if you see someone else showing love and compassion that inspires you to do the same, but if you ever sing it, you’re less likely to do it. So, being together is so important, the second area where Paul games is Joy from what from the gospels itself in a letter, he describes the Believers as having the same love, and it Message was spreading. Now seems obvious to say it stating the apps obvious, but the gospel is supposed to be good news. Encountering.

26. 13:57

    The gospel is supposed to feel like a blessing, like a lifting of burdens the lightness, that can come from anywhere else, something which cannot be replaced by any other source, a relief that only comes from meeting the grace of God. So if ever doesn’t feel like that, it’s probably our fault. As a pictures and lovely picture that Charles Dickens provides and Great Expectations, has this this minor character called mrs.

27. 14:27

    Joe and just a few short lines, absolutely captures what I’m getting at. Mrs. Joe was a very clean housekeeper but she had the Exquisite art of making her cleanliness more uncomfortable and unacceptable from the dirt itself. Cleanliness is Next to Godliness. And some people do the same by their religion. This is the opposite of the joy of the gospel. And often comes through legalistic approaches to faith in this is the Jesus warns about in his ministry. For example, in, in the woes against fire season, Which chapter 11 talks about, how they put heavy legalistic burdens creating misery for ordinary people and the great irony He is that these teachers, who put these burdens on other people can actually carry themselves.

28. 15:24

    So we have two to always maintain that. The gospel is good news. We read about human brain and how it works a little differently in left side. And right side, it’s quite fascinating, really experiments showed that the left side of the brain. Really likes Bulls and the right side of the brain is really good at putting things together. So there’s the strange experiments. I don’t have a digital could activate an actual, a different part of your brain.

29. 15:53

    So if you ask someone to draw a flower and you inactivate, the right side of the brain to the just using the left side of the brain, They would draw if you’d like a flower by rules Circle, petals rounder, okay? So obviously, if you talk, if you said to a computer was a flower look like it’s a yes, circle flow around it. If you do the opposite, if you inactivate the left side and just allow the right explain to work, then you’ll draw a flower with a stalk and leaves coming off it, even though leaves technique out the flower.

30. 16:27

    That’s the big picture and so there’s advantages to both ways of working but a healthy mind but some both together for the rules in the proper context. Maturing faith is one that never lose sight of what we’re maturing. In is love, Philippians chapter 1 verse 9. This is my prayer that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight. So that you may be able to discern. CERN what is best and they may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, that war in Praise of God. So I’m much of a nation is to grow in love, being able to discern, how to act in love in our world and in our circumstances.

31. 17:19

    So the third and final source of Paul’s join demonstrates. Why this current were talking about is such a deep current. It’s not superficial, it’s not frivolous. Paul’s Joy comes from service even if that means suffering 2:17. He says, even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice, you service coming from your faith. I am glad and rejoice with all of you and so you two should be glad and rejoice with me.

32. 18:02

    I’ll say, even though I’m looks like I’m finished. I’m on the way out every away. If you like, you should be joyful with me and I heard you we’ve not come as a surprise to the believes in Philippi that this is what Paul would do. Because when the church in Philippi was set up in Acts chapter 16, if you want to go there, they saw this attitude in action. That’s chapter 16 there in the area of put a pie in there. They’re doing their thing and they came across a very difficult situation.

33. 18:41

    They came across the abuse of a vulnerable, young girl in First 16 of Acts 16. Once when we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by slave girl, who had a Spirit by, which she predicts the future. And she had a great deal of money for her owners by fortune telling.

34. 18:59

    So here we go. Someone being in slavery and being abused for the Cold Hard Cash. The situation escalates. Because Paul, he’ll set of her mental illness. I’m so the owners of this young girl, lose the cash cow verse 19. It says, when the owners of the slave girl realized the in that their hope of making money was gone.

35. 19:26

    They seized Paul and Silas and drag them into the marketplace to face your authorities. They brought them before the magistrates and said, these men are Jews and are throwing our city into uproar by a Locating Customs unlawful for Romans to accept or practice the crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas and magistrates. Ordered them to be stripped and beaten. After they’ve been severely flawed, they were thrown into prison and the Jailer was commanded to guard them. Carefully upon receiving such orders, he put them in the in a cell and fastened their feet in stocks. So the people of the Philippine Judge Philip I had first-hand Witness.

36. 20:07

    What it is to suffer for doing the right thing to do the right thing and beaten and flows to do the right thing to Apple integrity, and be thrown in jail. They have first-hand experience of that. They also would have heard how or responding to that verse 25, about midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them and you can imagine that the spread like wildfire this deep Joy.

37. 20:42

    This deep joy that comes from knowing that you’ve done the right thing. We’ve been working and acting in a different currents to the rest of the world. To integrity. It’s interesting to look at different religions and get different insights. If you like us to as to, which I think I find it Illuminating Illuminating for myself. So this year I’ve been reading the teachings of the Buddha and on the subject of suffering, it’s actually quite fascinating to compare and contrast because one of the objectives of the Buddhism is to be free from suffering. There are four mobled trees described in Buddhism, which are the truth of suffering, the truth of the cause of suffering the truth.

38. 21:24

    The end the suffering and the truth of the path that leads to the end of suffering. So the idea is you get to this point where you’re free from suffering, sounds attractive, how do you do it? The goal is to be free from attachments, okay? And the loss of this which is actually quite helpful to think about how much suffering in the world comes from in touch attachment to land to property to power to consumption of stuff.

39. 21:53

    All these Attachments bring about suffering, they spring jealousy arguments and never never ending sense of dissatisfaction with life. So there’s a lot in this to be free from various things is a very helpful thing, but here’s a significant contrast. Our most significant attachments in our life with people, there are relationships to reduce attachments, is actually to reduce love to be free from suffering, is to be free from Love.

40. 22:28

    And so here, the Christian faith has a stark contrast with what is mmm. We’re actually increase were actually encouraged to increase our attachments to the right things to other people. To enlarge our hearts. As the song says, Christ was the most attached person ever to live, not to wealth, not to stay to us, not to power but to people, Paul saw that and he wants sticks to experience that more and more event in chapter 3.

41. 23:14

    There’s seven, he says whatever was to my profit. I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. So here he is, discarding worldly. Attachments, what is more? I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ. Jesus, my Lord, for which sake, for whose sake? I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ. So there, he’s describing the wealth, discarding, the power to starting the status Discarding those attachments. But look, invest 10.

42. 23:46

    I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. Oh, Lovejoy was to give up his life Falls. Joy was to sacrifice himself for Joy was to serve other people, whatever the consequences he was. Not a man floating on a line, low robbed around by the waist and whatever was happening on the surface. He was a man who dive deeply into the ocean and swimming different currents.

43. 24:27

    And that’s where he found joy, finally. If he describes what this Joy is in 4:4 rejoice. In the lord always, I will say it again. Rejoice, let your gentleness be evident to all the Lord is near, do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and petition with Thanksgiving, present your requests to God and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ.

44. 24:57

    Jesus finally, Brothers, whatever is true. Whatever is Noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about these things. So if you’ve learned or received, or heard from me, or seen them, me put into practice and the God of Peace will be with you. Thank you for listening to the good christadelphians talks podcast.

45. 25:48

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46. 26:06

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47. 26:29

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