Skip to content Simplicity of Life: Part 2 Sep 8 · 34 min ...more
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Rev. Paul Jeyachandran leads the Intentional Disciple Making Church (IDMC) Movement, which is all about calling churches back to its disciplemaking roots. Visit us at idmcmovement.com
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0:09 Shall we give the Lord a clap offering church? Hallelujah. It is always a joy and a privilege for us to study the word of God together. Today, we're gonna be talking about simplicity of life,0:21 part 2. Last week, we touched on the simplicity of life. We explored the spirit of simplicity and the spheres of simplicity. In the spirit of simplicity, we0:33 mentioned that we need to cultivate a singular inward focus. In other words, there must be a singleness of heart. Because the inward reality of0:44 singleness of heart will result in the outward lifestyle of simplicity. And so we need to have that 1 thing that Jesus speaks about.0:56 Seek first the kingdom of God. That 1 thing, this 1 thing that is needful, Jesus says to Mary and Martha. Paul says, this 1 thing I do. Psalmist David says, this 1 thing1:08 I ask of the Lord. Your life and my life should be characterized by that 1 thing. That's the spirit of simplicity. The spheres of simplicity, last week we talked about1:20 simplifying your pace. Today, we talk about simplifying your priorities. We need to do things,1:32 but we need to evaluate the kind of things that we do. Because there are things that are urgent, that requires our immediate attention. And then there are things1:44 that are important, that we sometimes neglect until it is urgent. So think about this. Have you noticed this? There are things that are important but1:55 not necessarily urgent. There are things that are important but are not urgent yet. But there are things that are urgent but they are not necessarily important. There are things that are2:07 priorities in life, but they are often important, but they are not urgent. So as a result, we ignore them. Let me give you some2:18 examples. Can you think of examples that are important but not urgent? You know, my time alone with God is important, but it's never urgent.2:31 My time alone with my wife, I need to date her to keep her. I dated her to marry her. Now I date her to keep her, to stay married to her. Now that is important, but it's not urgent.2:44 Discipling my children on a regular basis, having time alone, and building the family altar. These are important, but they are not urgent. But if you2:56 only fall under the trap of doing things that are urgent, that are screaming for attention, what would happen is we would tend to ignore the things that are important.3:08 So 1 of the core things that you and I, we need to pay attention to is, how do you simplify your priorities? You know, in Mark chapter 1 verses 16 to3:20 verse 34, if you read the gospel according to Mark, gospel according to Mark characterizes Jesus as the servant, isn't it? It's the3:32 suffering servant. That's why the 1 word that will be repeated throughout the Gospel of Mark when you read it is that sense of urgency. It will say, immediately, Jesus did3:43 this. Immediately, Jesus went there. Immediately. The word immediately appears so many times. Why? To characterize Jesus was serving the people as3:55 a servant. He was the servant of the Lord. And that 1, you can read in the book of Mark. Now, Mark chapter 1 is where Jesus calls his disciples. Now, you have your Bibles,4:07 open it to Mark chapter 1, and just look at the headings. You know, in some Bibles, they give you headings. It will talk about the headings of call of the disciples where he called the 12. Then it will4:19 talk about how Jesus was ministering to various people that required healing. And the Bible says many were brought to him, and he had a long4:31 day of healing people, ministering to people, casting out demons, and doing all that. Do you know you will find in Mark chapter 1 that Jesus4:42 healed the mother-in-law of Simon Peter? No wonder Simon Peter denied Jesus. That's just a joke, people. The reality is4:54 this. It was a busy day. He was healing the sick, and there were multitudes of sick people that were brought to him. And he healed them. He ministered to them. And he cast out demons. Now I'm5:06 not sure if you ever have an experience of casting out demons. Demon possessed people and you cast out the demons. Now I have experience in this, and I can tell you5:18 from experience that when you do just 1, it already drains your energy. Because it requires an intense warfare.5:30 Now Jesus was doing this the whole day. I'm sure he was depleted in his resource, in his energy. But the reality was this. That night he went5:42 he goes to bed very late. But the next day morning, the bible says in Mark chapter 1 and verse 35, while it was still dark, Jesus rose and went for a went to a solitary place5:54 to pray. Now if you and I had a long day of ministry, the next day you wanna sleep in. You wanna just take it easy. But Jesus knew the6:05 sense had a sense of priority. What was of greater importance? And he did that. He kept to it. And from that place where he had an encounter with the father, he comes down6:17 with a clarity to say, we are moving to the next village. And I'm sure it would have puzzled all the disciples because the disciples would have gone, but there are so many people who are coming here to see6:29 you. They need healing. They need deliverance. Why are we going to the next village? See, you and I, we need to stop and ask this fundamental question. Why did Jesus come into the world?6:41 Of course, if you are looking at a man centered perspective, you would say Jesus came into the world to save sinners. To save sinners, to die for my sins.6:53 That's what you and I would say if you look at it anthropocentrically. But you know Jesus always thinks theocentrically. In other words, he came to this world to fulfill the7:05 will of the father. To glorify God. To to bring about salvation of mankind for the glory of God. That's why he came to do7:17 the will of the father. So when he has done a whole day of ministry, he goes before God in the father the very next day, and there he receives the fresh mandate to go to the next village. He carries7:29 on. He lived with a higher sense of calling and a sense of priority. Otherwise, we will be caught up with what is urgent and neglect7:40 what is of importance. So 1 of the core things you and I need to learn from Jesus' life is this. He was never dictated by the tyranny7:52 of urgency. He lived with a clear sense of priorities. You never read in the gospels Jesus ran.8:04 It always says he walked from place to place. He was never in a rush because he knew that he was in the center of the will of the father, and whatever he did,8:16 he already said, I only do what I see my father do. Hallelujah. So when Jesus says this to us, in Matthew chapter 6 and verse 19 all the way to8:28 34, the whole summary of that is in verse 33, isn't it? And he culminates everything and he says here, seek first the kingdom of God8:40 and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. So when Jesus says, seek first, what does he mean by that? He means this, that8:52 you put God as the top priority in your life. Isn't it? That's what many people will say. But can I humbly say this? It is not9:04 just about putting God as the top priority in your life. He is calling us to have God as the only priority in our life. Listen to me carefully. God9:15 is not competing with your wife or your children or your work or your ministry. He's not competing with you for allegiance. He wants your allegiance, your loyalty, your pledge completely,9:28 Holy, totally. He said love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your might. Why? Because he wants your loyalty completely.9:42 And then he dictates the terms upon which you live your life. That's why when you read this text, seek first. That seek first is not about a sequence of priorities, it is about a9:53 statement of purpose and a statement of preoccupation. Be preoccupied with Christ and his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall10:05 be added to you. So listen carefully. What do we learn from this? He says seek first. Whenever the Bible talks about seek first, you've got to ask yourself,10:17 what does it convey to me? It conveys a sense of urgency. See, when you read in the English that word seek, it's the word for search,10:29 isn't it? Now Mary and Joseph in the Bible, they brought Jesus to the temple, and then they went back to Nazareth. There10:41 was a 3 day journey. And after 3 days, they discovered that their son was not with them, so they rushed back. So they went in search of10:53 Jesus. Now you pause and think about this. If you are a parent and you lost your child, how would you search? There will be a sense11:05 of urgency. There will be a sense of preoccupation. Nothing else matters until I find my child. Now that is the same thing11:17 here. What Jesus is communicating to us is seek first the kingdom of God. Not just it's 1 of my top priorities. It is my only priority. It is my only11:28 preoccupation. Nothing else matters. Everything else can wait because I need to go find Christ and his kingdom and his righteousness.11:40 That's what we've been establishing. Simplicity is about to will the will of the father. To be simple means to will 1 thing. And Jesus' model is to will the will11:52 of the father. And so he says, how do we do it? We do it by simplifying our priorities. You know life coaches, and executive12:04 coaches, and leadership coach, in all day coaching, they will always say to the mentors or disciples that you can't have too many priorities in their life. You can't take a sheet12:16 and write down 10 priorities of your life. You have to focus on only the top 3, they say. I know because I coach a lot of people, including12:27 businessmen in the marketplace. So we always give them a top 3. What is the top 3 priorities for this quarter, for the next 90 days? What is your top 312:40 priorities? For the whole year, what's your top 3 priorities? For the next 5 years, what's your top 3 priorities? Because we need to focus on only a few key things. But you and I, we need to12:51 ask ourselves who determines the few key things that you need to focus on? Because it's not a matter of my will. It is a matter of his will.13:04 It is not my choosing, it's his choosing. That's why you and I, we need to understand that when you when you prioritize, you're coming before the Lord. See, in13:16 my previous study, I shared this as a illustration, but that's my practice. At the end of every year, I go before the Lord. And I say, Lord, here is my life as a13:28 blank sheet of paper. And I place before the Lord everything that I'm involved in. The commitments that I have said yes to. Maybe it's a13:39 international conference that I need to speak in, or men people that I'm mentoring, senior pastors that I'm journeying with. There are people that I need to walk with, have to start13:51 walking with. So I bring everything before the Lord, and say, Lord, these are the commitments that I have. These are the things that are on my plate. Now I want you to help me14:03 to discern what are the things I need to remove, and what are the things I have not even thought about to put on my plate. As14:15 as you know that we walk with 8 to 10 groups of people every year. My wife and I, ever since we went on the journey of moving the church towards14:27 intentional disciple making, we started with about 7 groups of people that we mentor. And that has continued even today. And we continue to do. And so on an14:38 average, within the church, I have about 5 to 7 groups. And outside of the church, as part of the global church, we have many groups of pastors14:50 that we journey with. And so when you have all this, there's so many competing agendas and and pursuits that you have. So how do you discern who gets your time?15:02 What do you do? And what is the priority? It always comes back to this, to come before the father and to say, Lord, help me to recognize what needs to be strengthened, what needs to15:14 be let go, what do I need to remove, what do I need to place in my schedule, what do I need to do? And I've always experienced this By the grace of God,15:26 when you seek for that clarity, God gives you that clarity. I said to you, how do you simplify your pace? You simplify your pace by not slowing down,15:38 but centering down. That was our last study. It's true. You don't cut down for the sake of cutting down so I have manageable schedules. All my15:50 mentors are people who are international speakers. They speak in conferences worldwide. They do things globally. They are very busy people.16:02 And when I look at the scripture, people like apostle Paul, Jesus, and all the other apostles, they were very busy people. They had so many things that they were concerned about and they16:14 were drawn to. So how do you live a centered life? How do you live an anchored life? How do you live a rested life? You do it because you're not16:26 seizing from work, but you're working from rest. You're not resting from work, but you're working from rest. Listen carefully.16:38 That is why we need that sense of priorities. So we go before God and we examine this. And 1 of the tools that have really helped me in my life personally is this.16:51 The art of planned neglect. What do I mean by planned neglect? There are things that are in our priorities. But life17:02 is not so neat. Life is like a a There's a rhythm of life. You need to be able to prioritize certain things right now. And then it can take a back burner. So that means we need to17:14 have an understanding of planned neglect. Let me give you a practical illustration. Like I said, in the in the early days of our ministry, we used to have a lot of17:26 groups come through come to our place for meetings. And so 1 of the things that I usually tell them is if I have a group coming in on a Saturday, I tell them when look around17:38 in my house, it'll be messy because I have 2 growing children and they create a mess And we haven't had a chance to tidy it up. So on17:49 Saturdays, I don't spend time cleaning and putting things in place. My wife and I, we wait upon the Lord and we prepare our heart and our spirit for service on Sunday.18:01 So usually when people come in on a Saturday or even on a Sunday afternoon when we have mentoring groups, I usually say to them, please ignore the mess in the house. If you18:13 come on a Monday night, it will all be perfect and clean. But today, no. Why? Because Saturday for me is sacred. I need to prepare my body, my soul, my spirit18:25 to serve God's people, God's word. So we wait upon the Lord. We pray and we study the scriptures. We we contemplate upon things. And we are We wanna we wanna wait upon the Lord for18:36 his unction, for his timely word. So I'm not going to be busy doing other things on Saturday. So we we plan our neglect of looking after the house on Saturday.18:49 But on Monday, if you come in, everything will be in place in order. Why? Because now we are free. We can do that. So this is a planned neglect. You know, the19:00 story was told of a famous concert violinist who was asked the secret of her success. And she revealed when she was in school, she used to live in the19:12 hostel. Every morning, she would make her bed, dust her room, wash her dishes, then rush to practice. She found that she was not progressing.19:25 Then she decided to go for practice first, and ignore all the rest until she finishes. And as a result, she improved, and she became the best19:36 violinist, and she was the famous concert violinist. Now, she was practicing planned neglect, and success followed her. So listen carefully. Sometimes19:48 we need to know what are some of the things that can be neglected for some time, not all the time, but then you come into that rhythm of life so you know how to19:59 prioritize. The only way you and I know this is by waiting in the presence of God and being led by the spirit of God. The Bible says in Romans chapter20:11 8, the sons of God are people who are led by the spirit. You and I, we are called to walk in step with the spirit. Walk in the spirit. In other words, we have the20:23 resident Godhead with us. We have the Holy Spirit in our hearts. He is the 1 who is able to influence us, nudge us, prompt us, give us the inward20:34 witness of what we need to be focused on. And when we do these things well, there will be a sense of priority about our life. Now20:46 as I bring this message to a close, I want you to listen to me carefully. Os Guinness said this. Do you live a20:58 saturated, overloaded, fragmented life? Are you pulled around by the nose through appeals to need? Are you frustrated at yourself over the times the best in your life is21:10 diverted by the good? Do you long to know the overriding passion and purity of heart of willing 1 thing? Listen to Jesus of Nazareth answer his21:22 call. In other words, when you come to Christ, you would have that sense of purpose restored, that sense of preoccupation21:33 restored, that sense of passion restored, and as a result there will be a sense of clear priorities. There are 5 things that usually21:45 help a person to grow in their spiritual walk. And these 5 things should become a priority in the life of a disciple. Now, in our church,21:58 this is something that I often say in our mentoring of our leaders. 5 things. What are those? Number 1, private disciplines practice daily at home.22:11 Do you know this is 1 of the things that get neglected? What are some of the private disciplines? To read your bible. Do you know that many people don't have a regular habit of22:22 reading the bible? See, I I mentor pastors and sometimes I'm saddened to say this. They only open this in order to preach a22:33 sermon. They don't open this to feed their own soul. In other words, we neglect this. We are people of 1 book. If there's 1 book that needs to be mastering our22:45 lives, we need to be mastered by this 1 book. Read it. So have a plan to read it. Don't just read it. Let it read you. How? By22:57 reflecting upon it. So when you reflect, you record the things that the Lord is saying to you through the scriptures. And then you respond in prayer. So you read, you reflect, you23:09 record, and you respond in prayer. Right there you have spiritual discipline of silence and solitude. Spiritual discipline of study of scripture.23:21 Spiritual discipline of surrender before God because you're yielding yourself. You're surrendering yourself back to him. You're responding to his word. And right there, you have a mandate to serve him. So there is23:33 a discipline of service. Lord, I wanna serve you today. I wanna serve my family. I wanna serve the ministry, the people that you've called me. So you get that priority, that sense restored back.23:45 Spiritual disciplines. How often do you find that neglected? Develop that. That should be a priority. The life of Jesus, that was a priority. In our23:56 life, it should be a priority too. So private disciplines practiced daily at home. See, if I don't read the bible for 1 day, no 1 will know, only I know, the Lord24:08 knows. If I don't read the bible for a week, my family will know. If I don't read the bible for 2 weeks, my whole church will know. Why? Because24:21 in in people around you will start to pick up. You haven't been in the presence of Jesus. People around you will know. You're getting irritable. You're getting annoyed. You're getting frustrated. You're getting24:33 agitated. You're getting flustered. You're getting angry. All these are signs of the flesh dominating a person's life. So if you want to be spirit empowered24:44 and spirit controlled and spirit led, then the whole thing is you develop private disciplines at home. Don't ignore it. So that's the first thing. The second thing is24:56 personal involvement in your local church. We always say, where your treasure is, your heart will follow. Your treasure, the most important treasure in your life25:08 is time. Where you involve your time, where you invest your time, your heart will follow. So 1 of the core things is, get your hands engaged, personal involvement25:20 in the life of your local church. What do we do in the local church? How do you engage in the local church? How often do you go and be part of what's25:31 going on in your local church? I hope you do it weekly through the Sunday services. I hope you do weekly with your small groups where you are either in an IBM in between meetings25:43 or you are in a meeting to study the word of God together. That you have a regular time of accountability to be able to get your life accountable with somebody. Now these are important personal25:55 involvement in our local church. In other words, it's also to be able to serve. Not just to receive, but also to serve. To serve in a local church, in a26:07 ministry, to do things, that's a personal involvement. I usually tell people, you may say that I don't have a heart for the young people. No. No. No. Start getting involved.26:18 The heart will follow. Oh, I don't have a heart for outreach. No. No. No. You start doing it. The heart will follow. I don't have a heart for missions. You go on a mission trip. Your heart will follow. In other26:30 words, start getting engaged, then everything else will flow. And here, in this sense, this is an important priority because without this, you won't grow in spiritual maturity, and you26:42 will not have that time to be able to say, I have that inner restedness. Thirdly, practical teachings received through active listening. What is practical teaching? What you're receiving26:54 today is a practical teaching. But I hope you're doing an active listening. What is active listening? Taking down notes as you listen. Engaging yourself, your faculties, to be engaged while you're27:06 listening and you're seeing, you're writing, you're you're you're keeping them, storing them in your heart. Practical teachings will help you to grow. Number 4, pivotal events27:18 that are reflected upon to gain wisdom. What are pivotal events? Pivotal events are stuff that happens in life. Maybe you lost a job.27:30 Maybe there was a relational crisis. There was a breakup. Or there was a person who was offended by you, and their relationship got strained. Or it27:42 ended up in divorce, death of a loved 1. All these are pivotal events. These things will alter the course of your life. These pivotal events need to be reflected upon, and27:53 we need to gain wisdom. How do you gain wisdom? So when you're journaling, you're exploring. What was God doing in this? What is my responsibility in this?28:05 How could I respond better in this? How did I contribute in this? It's exploring these things so that you can gain wisdom so that you will be better in your future relationships. Listen28:17 carefully. Pivotal ex events need to be need to be reflected upon so that you won't repeat the same mistake twice. You won't go through that same necessary28:28 journey again and again because you have gained wisdom. Now, this is where I will ask you, do you have the habit of28:40 journaling? Are you a reflective practitioner? That you're not just hearing things and studying things, but you're able to write down in the journal what God is saying to you,28:52 what life is saying to you. So through a process of time, as you are writing down things, you're able to look back and see how God has spoken, how God has led, and what God is doing29:04 in your life. You can always see the trajectory, isn't it? If you are a journal, if you are a person who keeps a journal, I'm so thrilled. Share from your journal sometime29:15 in your life group. Share what you have written in your journal. 1 day just take time to just share your journal entries so people will be edified and God will be glorified. Fifthly, providential29:27 relationships that must be valued and nurtured. What is a providential relationship? A providential relationship is a relationship where God has brought you into that29:38 divine destiny relationship. There are many providential relationships in life, and we need to pay attention to them. Some of29:50 them come into your life as your mentor. Some of them come into your life as your friend. Some of them come into your life as your30:02 pastor. And you need to value these things. Don't be nonchalant about relationships that God has brought into your life. In my preachings you would have heard me say30:14 this. Let me repeat that again. There are destiny relationships that you should not ignore. For Jacob's welfare and prosperity, he only became prosperous30:25 and he became the man that God called him to be only when he stayed in the house of Laban. In other words, there was a destiny relationship.30:38 Only when Ruth made that decision to say, your God will be my God and your people will be my people, and she followed Naomi even though there was no certainty30:50 of her future, Her future was shaped, and her destiny was guaranteed. Listen. It's a destiny relationship between Ruth and31:02 Naomi. Same thing I can say of so many relationships. Paul would not be a writer of the episodes, the most number of episodes in the New31:13 Testament, if it was not for a destiny relationship with Barnabas. It was Barnabas who reached out to Tarsus, who went to Tarsus and reached out to Paul, and he brought him to31:24 Antioch where the spirit of God then spoke and sent them out on a missionary journey. We would have missed Paul if Barnabas did not play that role. There are providential31:36 relationships that needs to be valued and nurtured. And based on those connections, you will be blessed and released into your future. So value them. Most31:48 importantly, pray for them. That's why I'm asking you humbly, how often do you pray for your pastor? You could have thousands of people on your Facebook as friends. You could have32:00 thousands of people on on Instagram or Twitter as followers. But you can only have a pastor who's overseeing your soul before the Lord32:11 and stewarding your life before the Lord. Pray for them. This is important. Why? The Bible says in Hebrews chapter 13 and verse 17, obey your32:23 leaders so that they will do it with joy. Whatever they're doing, let them do it with joy for they give an account of your life. Let them do it with joy. So let your pastors, your32:35 leaders that are responsible for your soul, let them be joyful in their service to you when they think of you because you value and honor and nurture the pivotal, the providential32:46 relationships in your life. As I bring this message to a close, want you to listen to me carefully. What are the top 3 that you are working on right now? Out of that top 3,32:58 is that top 3 that you've decided based on your own carnal thinking, or is it something that you went before the Lord and the Lord has placed those things upon your plate? Build your life33:10 upon Christ and his kingdom, and he will bless you. The word of God says, seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things33:22 shall be added to you. Let's pray. Heavenly father, we thank you so much for this moment. I pray that you continue to speak to our hearts and give us grace to discern the priorities that we need to be engaged33:34 in. I pray that our hearts will long for Lord Jesus and seek his kingdom and his righteousness. That he will become our all consuming33:46 passion, all consuming preoccupation. And he will He alone will dictate the priorities upon which we live our life. For your33:58 glory and for our good, we pray. In Jesus name. And people of God said, amen and amen. God bless you. We love you.
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Unfettered - Overcoming The Lure of Offences - Part 2 Paul Jeyachandran Apr 18
Paul Jeyachandran
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