Episode 44: O Come, O Come Emmanuel

00;00;02;15 - 00;00;25;19
Brenton
This is further a weekly show for the people of Harmony Bible Church, where we seek to revisit and expand on Sunday sermons with the goal of growing deeper in biblical truth that transforms our lives. Welcome back to Further and Brennan Graham. And today we have Chris Carr and also Christian Fry. How's it going, guys?

00;00;25;21 - 00;00;26;28
Chris
Great going well.

00;00;27;00 - 00;00;50;18
Brenton
Good. So we thought we'd do, you know, we're going to do a little sermon recap today, but I think mostly I think we're going to spend some time talking about our upcoming sermon series and really current one. As we started this last week, we're doing we're going through four different carols in four weeks to kind of lead up to Christmas Eve, which will be the last one.

00;00;50;18 - 00;01;17;13
Brenton
And I thought we'd just kind of spend some time talking about why we're doing this. You know, it's different than our normal kind of preach through a book of the Bible. But this is we're taking a break from Romans to do this. And so, yeah, Chris, why why did we decide to do this? And and what was the heart behind the series?

00;01;17;16 - 00;01;43;22
Chris
Well, we somewhat regularly do an event series. We don't do it every year, but it's a fairly regular occurrence. And so we thought this would be a certainly be a good year to do that, where we could take some time to especially focus on Christ's event, which is we already saw on Sunday, should also be pointing us to the second event.

00;01;43;24 - 00;02;08;14
Chris
And along with that, we thought it would be good for a little bit of a change of pace. You know, we've been in Romans, a really heavy, very deeply theological walk in verse by verse, if not even word by word. And so we thought it would be good to, you know, to again, to do something a little bit different.

00;02;08;16 - 00;02;39;08
Chris
But then also this just, I think, will help us to hopefully see the gospel from a different angle. And as it talked about on Sunday, we we hear these songs every year, every year of our lives, and we're very familiar with them. Just talking this morning with some of our staff members about how Hark the Herald Angels Sing, which is the one we're going to cover this week, is in the Charlie Brown Christmas.

00;02;39;08 - 00;03;07;27
Chris
That's where it ends with. And so but but how again are we actually hearing thinking about reflecting on the gospel truths in these songs? And we just thought, you know, this would be a great way hopefully to really be able to dive in to the gospel in a deeper way, which we believe here, that the gospel changes everything.

00;03;07;29 - 00;03;12;09
Chris
And so, yeah, we're hoping to see that happen this year.

00;03;12;11 - 00;03;34;29
Brenton
Yeah, that's good. Yeah. These songs can become you know, they have become very ubiquitous in our culture and they're kind of just everywhere all the time in this time of year. And so they, they certainly lose lose, meaning Christians. So we, we picked four songs. Uh, we, I'm going to let you because I'm going to forget where they are.

00;03;34;29 - 00;03;38;26
Brenton
So what songs are we going through here?

00;03;38;28 - 00;04;17;22
Christian
So we already did the first Oh, come on, come Emmanuel. And then we did. As Chris just mentioned, we're doing Hark the Herald Angels Sing this week. Then the following week is Go Tell on the Mountain, and then the final week, which will be Christmas Eve day, will be Silent Night, fittingly, yeah, Silent Morning. And there was a lot of intentionality behind those decisions because as anyone knows, a lot of Christmas carols out there, there are even probably even more Christmas carols that we don't actually know about or sing that are just kind of forgotten in the pages of old tattered hymnals.

00;04;17;24 - 00;04;40;06
Christian
So when Chris kind of approached me with this idea, I really liked it because of a lot of the stuff we've been saying. You know, I've likened it to a car like we've written in cars our whole lives. So the the miracle of of that technology and that accessibility is lost on us. Yeah. I get my car turned on, I go 60 miles an hour in a couple of seconds.

00;04;40;07 - 00;04;56;00
Christian
I don't think twice about how amazing that is yet. If if you were to have lived under a rock and experienced, you know, the wonder of a modern automotive, you know, as an adult or even more realistically, if you were in like a third world country brought over here, you get to experience riding in a car for the first time.

00;04;56;04 - 00;05;12;24
Christian
It would blow your mind. And so similarly, these carols that we've sung in our whole lives, they've been sung to us around us, our whole lives. So we forget how rich they are, how deep they are. And I'd like to think if joy to the world would have been written this year, churches would just be eating it up.

00;05;12;24 - 00;05;44;19
Christian
Oh my gosh, this is such a great song, great lyrics. And so, yeah, this is like, I see this is like a sermon series to reclaim some of the theological, theological significance to these songs. So I loved it from the start and but then once we figured out, okay, we want to do this, it was like, how do we how do we put some, some guardrails up so that we're not just like left to pick from these, you know, hundreds of carols that exist.

00;05;44;21 - 00;06;09;06
Christian
So I just kind of practically went through really the main story elements or narrative elements to the Nativity story, the story of Christmas, and kind of started with, yeah, week one. What we just what we just kind of walk through was the promise of Emmanuel. And then this week we'll be the angels. And we see that in Hark the Herald Angels sing.

00;06;09;06 - 00;06;28;16
Christian
You know, there are angels all over the Bible, specifically all over the life of Christ, even more specifically through his birth in, you know, the way they appeared to Mary and Joseph and the shepherds. They're all over the Christmas story. So the Angels are week two. Next week we'll move to the shepherds, hence, you know, go tell the mountain.

00;06;28;16 - 00;06;51;01
Christian
And then finally we have the savior silent Night. The Savior is born. And you know, God is is with us. So that's kind of how we steered the the series to be a bit more intentional and just yeah. Got more specific with with vision through the month.

00;06;51;04 - 00;07;03;03
Brenton
Yeah well that makes sense. You kind of go through it in a coherent way like that with the, the steps leading up to it. Were there any runner up songs that you were you were considering?

00;07;03;05 - 00;07;11;12
Christian
I don't I probably I mean, Joy to the World is a great one, but we've we've already spent a lot of time on that song in years past.

00;07;11;14 - 00;07;11;29
Chris
And it's not.

00;07;12;05 - 00;07;14;12
Christian
Actually a Christmas Carol. It's not actually Christmas Carol. Really?

00;07;14;12 - 00;07;35;26
Chris
That's right. No. Yeah, it was it was not written for Christmas. It was written to celebrate Christ's second return. Usually it comes from Psalm, if I'm remembering correctly, 96 or 98. They're very similar songs. One of the it could be actually both of them, which is looking forward to Christ second return.

00;07;36;03 - 00;07;37;16
Brenton
So yeah.

00;07;37;18 - 00;07;48;14
Chris
He comes to make his blessings film far as the curse is found. So it's looking forward to that time where the curse will be no more. The effects of the curse will be no more.

00;07;48;21 - 00;07;50;07
Brenton
So you preach on joy to the world.

00;07;50;07 - 00;07;50;23
Christian
But exactly.

00;07;50;24 - 00;07;54;24
Chris
And that's why I have feature on it at Christmas. But yeah.

00;07;54;26 - 00;08;06;17
Christian
Yeah. I don't think we any runners. I mean, for a hot set it was like do we go with the the magic, you know the the wise men. But that that would almost be anti the series because it's that's they didn't they weren't there at.

00;08;06;20 - 00;08;08;16
Chris
We three kings we said yeah.

00;08;08;16 - 00;08;12;12
Brenton
There you go That's the one song I can play on Fiona.

00;08;12;14 - 00;08;30;06
Christian
That I would love to hear that. All right. Yeah. I will say go tell on the mountain. Like I don't remember whose idea that was. It's probably mine. But once we once the dust settled, it was kind of like, do we really just pick that song? Because it's just kind of like goofy and it almost just feels like a, like a kids song.

00;08;30;08 - 00;08;47;24
Christian
But that ended up being my favorite on the on the album, so I'm glad we did it. And it it is all about the shepherds, which are a crucial part to the story. I'm looking forward greatly to not just singing that one, but hearing what what Chris has to teach us about the shepherds and their significance. So yeah, it took some time for sure.

00;08;47;26 - 00;09;10;21
Christian
There are a lot of great carols out there. There really are like hopefully this series encourages people to start with these four and just kind of rediscovering them, re-imagining them, but then have that trickle down effect through so many other carols. You know, the first Noel came upon Midnight Clear Angels from the Realms of Glory, and there are a lot of really rich carols because that's what these songs are.

00;09;10;27 - 00;09;29;01
Christian
They're they're worship songs. They were written for the church by the church, or they were written by these these songwriters, these hymn writers as poems originally. And then they kind of found their way into him down through the years. So yeah, hopefully the series is just a jumping off point for our people. That's kind of what it's become for me.

00;09;29;03 - 00;09;30;29
Christian
Yeah, and it's been really cool.

00;09;31;01 - 00;09;56;12
Chris
One one additional benefit of this is it. It helps us to see get ourselves connected to the historical church and how, you know, we can be reminded. We can see the church has been singing the histories for centuries and centuries. Centuries especially truth will come on, come Emmanuel. But now as well with with the other three that we'll be tackling as well.

00;09;56;13 - 00;10;18;02
Chris
I think that's important because today we have at times a lack of rootedness in the historical faith that has been passed down. And so hopefully at home you know, connect this more to those those gospel roots that have been going on for 2000 years now.

00;10;18;04 - 00;10;41;16
Brenton
So it's interesting. It's probably a little off topic. We're a lot off topic. But, you know, how do we kind of balance the idea of new doing new music on regular Sundays as opposed to, you know, doing hymns like what have we what's our thought been on that, how to balance those two?

00;10;41;18 - 00;11;02;15
Christian
Well, we certainly could do more hymns. That's something that Chris and I have been talking about even recently. Just how do we how do we maximize the hymns that we're currently doing and how do we find some or I guess reinstitute some that are forgotten or have maybe never even been a part of our of our church's catalog?

00;11;02;17 - 00;11;21;23
Christian
Because it's just it's all too easy to get swept up in what I call the rat race of, you know, contemporary Christian music. There's a new song being written pretty much every day, written and released on on all streaming platforms. And, you know, even outside of that, there are just these these waves of pop songs being written, pop worship songs.

00;11;21;25 - 00;11;49;05
Christian
And if that's all you're after, then then you're going to miss it. You're going to miss what we're talking about the history of the church, the history of singing, corporate singing, congregational singing, and the theological richness that follows that, you know, there are modern hymn writers that we're thankful for, and we try to to kind of honor that branch of of of hymn writing, people like the Gettys and City, like Matt Boswell.

00;11;49;08 - 00;12;04;01
Christian
But that even that is it isn't a substitute for getting back in touch with our roots as a church. So yeah, stay tuned. Yeah, we've got some yeah we've got some hope. Hopefully some things cookin in the new year that will pursue this topic.

00;12;04;04 - 00;12;26;28
Brenton
Yeah, well there, there is certainly something to being able to kind of sing the same songs over centuries. I think that that's, that's special and I think we should probably not neglect that. So it's exciting to see that we're we're doing and not that you know you talk about how we're a lot of churches are just keeping up with what's going on and I don't think we've been there at all.

00;12;27;00 - 00;12;36;08
Brenton
But it's it's rare that we pull a new song in. It's, you know, every once in a while it'll happen. But we're certainly not just keeping up with trends.

00;12;36;10 - 00;13;17;22
Chris
Well, my concern with the proliferation of song after song after song is that we don't have this this catalog of songs that we're familiar with and that we're rooted in. And, you know, one huge just blessing and really benefit to me even in my my walk and in my growth is that I have these songs that I sing growing up that come back to me and some of them are not the best, you know, like theologically or whatever, some of those, but there are a lot of them that are and they're just they, you know, music has a unique power to help us to to just to remember things and to speak to our hearts

00;13;17;22 - 00;13;39;13
Chris
in a way that just the the written word doesn't. There's just an added element of of something there. And so, you know, this going back and let let's say let's let's make sure we get rooted in some not all of them. Yeah we can't do that but but some of them so that these are things are getting passed down from generation to generation.

00;13;39;15 - 00;13;59;15
Chris
One of the things I love about the song convinced that our worship team produced and we've been singing now for several months is like it just comes right from the pages of Scripture, obviously from Romans, very theological, well done. And I am already finding myself. I think that's a song that's just is kind of in my heart.

00;13;59;15 - 00;14;00;19
Brenton
And.

00;14;00;21 - 00;14;26;14
Chris
Hopefully it will always be in my heart and our people's hearts. And I especially think of our young people as like they it as they go on throughout life and obviously as they encounter difficulties, challenges to their faith and all of that. These songs will help and the times that they really need it to, to bring them back to the gospel, gospel truth and the the Holy Spirit will speak to them through.

00;14;26;16 - 00;14;28;22
Chris
Do these these songs.

00;14;28;24 - 00;14;48;09
Christian
Sure. Yeah. Yeah. I as I think about hymns, I mean, I can I can hear my grandpa was a giant in my life in really every way, especially spiritually. He's with the Lord now, but I can hear his voice singing out Blessed assurance. And so when I say blessed assurance, it really connects me not only to the Lord but to my grandpa in a way.

00;14;48;09 - 00;15;08;20
Christian
And in hymns do that. You know, I can hear my grandpa sing in graves, in the gardens I have in a trip, but I can hear him singing and singing hymns. And so there's even this, this, like this earthly power to two hymns. And the way they connect is to the previous generations that, yeah, the new songs just don't do it.

00;15;08;20 - 00;15;12;15
Christian
So we need to honor that and yeah, continue to honor it.

00;15;12;17 - 00;15;37;29
Chris
I think it's important for for parents here too is, you know, our kids are saturated with with music. Most of them are. And more than any time in history, they just have it so available to them. A lot of it is garbage in my opinion, and not And I got to be careful here. There's there is a lot of good, you know, creativity and all that.

00;15;37;29 - 00;16;09;11
Chris
So a lot of good stuff being written. But the things that we really read. But but even more listen to are the things that stay with us. And so what do we want? Staying with our kids and so trying to do the best that we can to surround them, have have them listening to hearing, you know, music songs that have deep gospel truth in it.

00;16;09;13 - 00;16;30;16
Chris
It may not you may not think it takes a lot of root in them. Now, I'm pretty sure that my parents, when I was in, you know, elementary school, junior high and high school, weren't thinking I was really getting it. But I did. And it still is with me now, you know, 40 years later. And so I just think that's an important thing for parents to remember.

00;16;30;16 - 00;16;35;05
Chris
Why this ever devotional? I hope everybody is really diving in and using it.

00;16;35;12 - 00;16;46;01
Brenton
Yeah, that's good. Reminder Christian. So we've you guys have started to write some music obviously.

00;16;46;04 - 00;16;47;09
Christian
Yeah.

00;16;47;11 - 00;17;06;19
Brenton
And doing this new girl series, it's on Spotify now. It all sounds great. I'm I'm really happy that we're doing this but what, what's the reason behind it? Like what what's the goal here? How many Dove Awards do you anticipate winning?

00;17;06;21 - 00;17;07;26
Chris
Oh, we went Grammys.

00;17;07;26 - 00;17;09;22
Brenton
That was.

00;17;09;24 - 00;17;36;22
Christian
Yeah, certainly not doing it for the Dove Awards or the Grammys. That's good. Yeah, I would love to get picked up by Gotye Records at some point, but he fought tooth and nail. But yeah, if you know you know now. Yeah it's certainly not it's certainly not for anyone but our church and the way music distribution works, it just happens to be, you know, to get music out there.

00;17;36;24 - 00;18;06;21
Christian
It goes to the whole world. Yeah, sure. So there is just that sort of added detail. But know that as soon as Chris approached me with the idea, not only was I excited about it, but I wanted to to do it this way so that we were truly making we were truly reclaiming these hymns as our own and hopefully making them more compelling or fresh to listen to for our people by making them kind of not just for our church, but by our church as well.

00;18;06;23 - 00;18;35;27
Christian
And, you know, with. Oh, come on, come on, come on, Emmanuel and hark, they're going to sing. We even added some some bits lyrically just to kind of maximize what what we kind of see in these songs as they pertain to the series itself. So really just kind of putting our fingerprints on them and hoping that again, that that draws people to them in the same way that we've kind of been drawn to them as a staff over the last year, six months or so.

00;18;35;29 - 00;18;45;14
Brenton
Yeah. And so those for obviously covers, but you've also started doing some original stuff. And what do you see the future of that being?

00;18;45;16 - 00;19;01;01
Christian
Yeah, again, New Year, we've got plans to do to do more of it and to write more. This year's really been just kind of exploratory, like, Let's try this. Unfortunately, there's no textbook on like how to figure this stuff out. There are certainly YouTube.

00;19;01;01 - 00;19;02;29
Brenton
I'm sure there's a music production for Dummies.

00;19;02;29 - 00;19;27;03
Christian
Yeah, probably. Probably. But it's been it's been very much like trial and error. And you have to have you have to have some talent in place first. You have to have some resources in place first. And by God's grace, he's he supplied both those things to us. And so now it's just a matter of, yeah, pursuing it and in figuring out how to steward those gifts well, because that's really what it is.

00;19;27;03 - 00;20;01;21
Christian
It's a gift to be able to do this. And we want to to use it as a way to serve the Lord, ultimately bring him glory, bring his name, fame. And then the outflow that becomes a great ministry to our church. So, yeah, we're going to be writing more. And as I kind of already alluded to, we're going to be going to to cover, hoping to cover more songs that have already been written, whether they're they're hymns primarily, but even some stuff that might be new or that again, we just kind of want to put our own our own fingerprints on.

00;20;01;23 - 00;20;02;12
Christian
So it's exciting.

00;20;02;12 - 00;20;12;10
Brenton
Yeah, it is. Chris, What was your heart behind some of this? Is it would you just echo what he said or do you have any thoughts on that?

00;20;12;13 - 00;20;54;28
Chris
No, I think he's I think he said it. Well, I have I'm excited about what we've been able to do this year. And I think it holds a lot of potential for the days ahead. And obviously, Christian is the biggest part of that. And so we're we're certainly blessed to have him and we get some other great talented musicians and vocalists and tech people and and yeah, so, you know, we've kind of, you know, Chris and I have talked about this for years and, you know, like, okay, how how doable is this with the word have from all of us?

00;20;54;28 - 00;21;03;00
Chris
And I think honestly, I don't know what he would say, but this year I think kind of gone further than we probably thought that it would this this quickly.

00;21;03;02 - 00;21;23;22
Christian
So we'll see. Yeah. Chris, you were you were more gung ho about it than I was earlier on. Like you were kind of pushing the the envelope way before I was ready to, which was good because I felt supported by leadership and by you way before it ever became like a real thing that we were pursuing. And again, that's just such a gift.

00;21;23;22 - 00;21;41;00
Christian
And I try not to take that for granted because it can honestly become a point of contention for some churches. It's the vision is not there in unifying. Then it can be done for all the wrong reasons. And so, yeah, it's a big deal in there has to because of that, there has to be unity. And again, the Lord's blessed us with that, so we're really thankful.

00;21;41;01 - 00;21;47;25
Brenton
Yeah. Christian, I remember talking to you about this years ago and you were hesitant to start doing it. I think this is not something you want to.

00;21;47;25 - 00;21;48;19
Christian
Force, right?

00;21;48;25 - 00;21;55;27
Brenton
Absolutely. And so I appreciate the kind of weariness of getting into it. And let's let's take our time and make sure we're ready for it.

00;21;55;27 - 00;22;13;04
Chris
But I think it's important for everybody to understand and it's just a good reminder for us is like this is not about making a name for herself. It's not you know, like we joked about, you know, I get inside with a label, believe those don't.

00;22;13;04 - 00;22;13;16
Christian
Even really.

00;22;13;16 - 00;22;15;21
Chris
Like you, right? Yeah. Yeah.

00;22;15;23 - 00;22;17;17
Brenton
I don't think we fit on tooth and nail right now.

00;22;17;20 - 00;22;44;29
Chris
But in all seriousness, the point is it's about discipleship because in why I'm so looking forward to a guy are going to do in this series is that we so we've we've got these songs that we're singing and that's in conjunction with what we are preaching. We're walking through on Sunday mornings, but it's also hopefully we've got the whether it's in Romans or now the event devotional, we're providing material for people to use throughout the week.

00;22;45;01 - 00;23;10;00
Chris
And so we're just trying to reinforce as much as we possibly can and immerse ourselves in the truth of God's Word and specifically in the gospel. And and so bringing all of these things together, there's a real there is a strategy here. And the strategy is not about, you know, honestly, anything outside of harmony, Bible Church. And if God wants to use that in some way or whatever.

00;23;10;00 - 00;23;26;12
Chris
Okay, well, we'll we've got an open hand about that. But that's not the the goal. Our goal is to shepherd the people that God is God has given us. And so that's all about just helping people hopefully to grow.

00;23;26;14 - 00;23;27;19
Brenton
Yeah, well.

00;23;27;21 - 00;23;46;25
Christian
You and we've already seen it. I mean, I see it in my my son even he's two and even as far back as convinced, you know, he knows he knows Romans eight because of convinced. And now he knows these carols honestly better than I do. And you know, they're rich lyrics are dense lyrics, but he knows them. That doesn't necessarily know what he's singing yet.

00;23;46;25 - 00;23;59;28
Christian
But now he's got this theology written on his heart. And so you're already seeing the the discipleship side of this. And it's incredibly exciting and rewarding. That's what it really is all about. It's a good workers.

00;24;00;02 - 00;24;18;20
Brenton
Yeah, Yeah. Well, we're blessed to have, you know, resources and people and talent and things to be able to do this stuff. I think so often churches have to look outside of themselves to do so many of these things. And we, you know, we understand our context so much more than people that are producing content outside of our context.

00;24;18;20 - 00;24;23;07
Brenton
And so being able to kind of customize that to what we're doing here is I think is great.

00;24;23;08 - 00;24;26;23
Christian
Absolutely. Yeah. Okay.

00;24;26;25 - 00;24;48;08
Brenton
Well, let's move on to the sermon for a little bit. I don't I don't have a lot here. But Chris, one thing really did stick out to me. You had you had one of your points was feeling and your question really was, do we feel do we are we able to, you know, process our emotions in a healthy way?

00;24;48;11 - 00;25;08;07
Brenton
And you gave some some background on you and, you know, you're you're I'll let you speak into it, but it seems like your inability to kind of process some of that stuff led to some cynicism. And how does that process take place? And, you know, what are we what are you hoping to communicate through, through all that?

00;25;08;10 - 00;25;35;27
Chris
Yeah, it's a it's a big question and it's a it's a rather complex one. But we you know, sometimes we'll say that person is unemotional and that can be true if if we understand that in the best sense is that they they don't wear their emotions on their sleeve or they don't express them. But it's not true that people are unemotional, everybody is emotional.

00;25;35;27 - 00;26;12;09
Chris
And sometimes the people who are the most emotional are the ones who we would call an emotional. And I say that because we were made in God's image and God has emotions all throughout Scripture. You can just go through them. I won't today and so be made in God's image. We we have emotions, too. The question is whether or not are we going to really be aware of what they are and are we going to do something with them, do something healthy with them.

00;26;12;11 - 00;26;52;09
Chris
So just for an example, you know, in regards to men, there's one emotion. Seemingly many men only have one emotion is like anger, but anger is in many cases a surface emotion. And there's always something deeper behind that, whether it's hurt or sadness or loneliness or, you know, anxiety, fear, those kind of things. And so the question is, are we actually going to become aware and and embrace those emotions not known in the sense of like, okay, that's what it is.

00;26;52;11 - 00;27;20;29
Chris
Just embrace them to embrace them. I was getting we don't just feel the feel we feel too long and then are we going to actually take those emotions and offer them and bring them to the to the Lord. And because this is what the Scripture constantly calls us to do, especially we go to like the Psalms, the Prophets books like Lamentations, and we even see this in the New Testament.

00;27;20;29 - 00;27;47;16
Chris
And and we're going to we're going to bring them to because in doing that, that's where hope comes from and that's where healing comes from. But when we don't know what our emotions really are, when we ignore them, we run from them. We pretend that we don't actually have them. Then we end up can end up being hard because that part of us that that that inner part of us, it's really our heart.

00;27;47;16 - 00;28;15;07
Chris
What's going on. Our heart will die and it gets hard. And so we're just when we're not, we don't allow ourselves to feel, then that takes away our ability to be able to connect, to be connected God not only through our mind, but through our four heart heart, which includes our emotions. And then we also, you know, so he's talking about the cynicism, which I was a big, big time in my life.

00;28;15;07 - 00;28;43;19
Chris
I'm still wrestling with it, but I see this in so many people's lives. Is that just like there's no cynicism is really a lack of hope. It's like that's not going to change. And when we look at things and it's just like that's just kind of the way that's the way that it is. So so for me, it tends to be more of I will I will say I'm being a realist, okay.

00;28;43;21 - 00;29;16;21
Chris
You know, and, and, and really what it is I mean, being cynical, I use that, you know, like some people are optimists and like, no, I'm not. I'm just being realist. And but what it really is is that because I've I've not allowed myself to to feel sad or lonely or hurt, that that kind of thing is just is like there's no there's no hope that I'm not going to feel this way.

00;29;16;21 - 00;29;50;12
Chris
So I just become cynical about a lot of different things and the overflow of that. Then in terms of, you know, obviously because our relationship with God there, there's a big component there, but also in other people is like if you if you can't feel things like sadness on your own, how can you actually be empathetic with somebody who is feeling sad, who how can you if you you never allowed yourself to feel lonely?

00;29;50;12 - 00;30;09;07
Chris
Actually, you know, understand what this made you think about this. There's a major epidemic of loneliness in our culture, but how do you relate to that now? People feel, you know, they are lonely, but they don't even realize that they aren't really cause they're not feeling it. And so we can't help each other with with that. And I could go on and on and on.

00;30;09;09 - 00;30;33;14
Chris
But to get back to the text and maybe as a follow up, but the text, the point is, is like God encourages us to feel, you know, to be it's real to feel what's real. And with the end result is that then we feel like things are not the way they should be and that we turn to him because he's the he's the answer.

00;30;33;14 - 00;30;56;24
Chris
Both now and in the future. And that's where, again, we're hope and healing. But if we don't feel we won't long and if you don't long, you don't you don't rejoice. And so you know, for me what what it's also been it's not only this lack of like feeling what might be called negative emotions, but also a lack of feeling positive emotion.

00;30;56;25 - 00;31;39;00
Chris
So I don't rejoice. I don't have joy because there's there's there's two sides to this, too. If you if you're not going to feel know, you may not have the, you know, experience the lows or lows or at least let yourself do that. But you're also not going to be able to experience the highs of the highs. And so and I really think in the gospel story is as well, is that the greatest joy comes when we when we fully embrace the the difficulty in the sorrow and how even in the midst of this sorrow, God has rescued us, He's redeemed us, and he's going to restore us and make everything thing right.

00;31;39;02 - 00;31;40;08
Chris
Yeah. So.

00;31;40;10 - 00;32;00;15
Brenton
Yeah, there's a lot of directions we could go with this conversation. I think what one conversation we had kind of surrounding this a while ago that I remember was, you know, almost on the other side of that where where we see our emotions as almost arbiters of truth. Like that's we let our our feelings kind of dictate what we think is true.

00;32;00;15 - 00;32;22;26
Brenton
And I think this is probably the other side of that. But maybe I'll just go this direction. So say someone has kind of diagnosed that in themselves. Do they see that in themselves? What what's the next step to kind of starting a road to healthy management of these things? Hmm.

00;32;22;29 - 00;32;50;07
Chris
Yeah. This is certainly a big, big question that we're we're trying to issue here. And in some ways, we many of us may need actually help some somebody to come alongside of us. I guess where I would tell people to start is like learning to identify by what you what you are feeling and being able to put some words to the feelings.

00;32;50;07 - 00;32;57;23
Chris
And that might literally mean you have to like I have this people are going to roll their eyes at this, have a feelings chart.

00;32;57;25 - 00;33;00;29
Brenton
Okay, I'm not roll my eyes at all.

00;33;01;02 - 00;33;28;21
Chris
That list out what what some of the feelings are that we have. So so it allows and and so if you are depends upon where you are here. But if you're an emotional infant, as I am or was, and maybe I'm a toddler now, I don't know. But it you might really need help it like what what are the what are the emotions?

00;33;28;21 - 00;33;54;02
Chris
And I mean like, I need to know what they are and so that just you see that words like the sad, lonely, afraid, hurt and then the positive emotions, things like care for, excited on and on, it allows you to to have some words to to try to put to your to your feelings. So that's that's that's one place to start.

00;33;54;05 - 00;34;25;27
Chris
And then and this is another, you know, difficult step is then actually learning to speak those to people. So I'm feeling sad today and I'm feeling hurt. I'm feeling lonely. I'm afraid about this. And because when when you can get that out and you can verbalize it, then it's out in the open, it's not hidden. And now you're aware.

00;34;25;27 - 00;34;47;06
Chris
And then once you're aware, then you can. And this is what the Bible calls to do, is to take that to the Lord and present that, you know, like the Psalm when I'm afraid I put my trust in you, in God, whose word I praise, I will not be afraid. What can man looking flesh do to me? And so we can begin to speak.

00;34;47;06 - 00;35;01;04
Chris
But there's. So you'll only actually, you know, go to the Lord with your fear. If you are you recognize it. You're willing to, you know, bring that up, bring that out. I don't know if that's helpful. It's, you know, it is. Yeah.

00;35;01;10 - 00;35;37;21
Brenton
Yeah. I think there's been such a stigma around around this topic, especially for men for so long, that, you know, it's so easy to just bury it all. And I think, you know, one push I'll make is for our biblical counseling. Like, I think that this should not be a a taboo or scary thing. Like if you if if you've identified this in your in yourself and don't know what to do like that's I think that's a good first step for you to contact the church and talk to someone about it because I don't yeah I don't think you want to stay in that in that situation at all.

00;35;37;21 - 00;35;48;23
Brenton
And I think that this was a it was a good thing to bring up and not necessarily something I would have expected would have would have come up. Yeah, in our first Carol sermon.

00;35;48;23 - 00;35;59;12
Chris
But I do but I really do think that that is key to the carol. I think it's key to this time of year.

00;35;59;14 - 00;36;00;27
Christian
Yes.

00;36;01;00 - 00;36;20;11
Chris
I think it's it's key really to our to our Christian faith and in our walk, in our maturity. I do when emphasize you brought this up again, we're not it's just not about feeling. So that's it's not the end all you know like it's it's not a cul de sac. It's on a dead end. Like we're just going to feel so like I feel or whatever.

00;36;20;11 - 00;36;47;29
Chris
It's, it's we, we feel so that we can face life as it is, face reality. But but then you can only like so passage in and for Sean to if we walk in the light as he is in the light of blood of Jesus cleanses from all sin. So and the principle there is is we have to live in the light and in the truth of what really is going on.

00;36;47;29 - 00;37;16;07
Chris
And when we do that, we bring it to light. That's when healing actually occurs. And and so it's not it's not just to feel, to feel, it's to bring it to light. And the green light is bringing it to him. And and that is where we can actually begin to not only find healing, but but to actually become and experience life, the abundant life that we have in Jesus.

00;37;16;09 - 00;37;35;16
Chris
And so for, you know, just go back and give him, I think, maybe personal examples or the best way that I can be helpful here for me, what I've come to recognize over the last couple of years is that I've not been able to really because of of what I've described here, I've not been able to fully enjoy the life that I have.

00;37;35;18 - 00;38;08;17
Chris
And I've got a lot of a lot of blessings, a lot of great things, so a lot of hard things. But this is counterintuitive. But my embracing the hardness of my life has actually helped me to enjoy the goodness of my life, and that that is probably worth unpacking more some of some, some way. But as I've actually been been learning to embrace the the difficult t of life in a falling world in this specific pain that I've that I've gone through and am going through that.

00;38;08;17 - 00;38;28;08
Chris
So I personally open my heart to be able to feel the the the good emotions and the good the good of all the blessings that that God has given to me and to be able to celebrate these real unique and special things that he's doing, whether it's in my own life, my family, or in the in the church in particular.

00;38;28;11 - 00;38;59;13
Chris
Because if you don't if you don't feel the the the, the bad, then your heart's not you don't have a heart that's capable of really rejoicing. And so go back to feeling, longing and rejoicing as all the three things go together. And we need more joy in the church. But I would you know, my experience has been is is that joy is only going to come about as we're willing to embrace the difficulty and hardness of life.

00;38;59;16 - 00;39;36;15
Christian
You Yeah. And even as I just sit here and reflect on like American Christmas culture, these you know, Chris, you talked about joy and sorrow, this this paradox on Sunday. Really, it's really a paradigm as you're unpacking it. Like that's what makes life life, that's what makes being human being human. And that paradigm is I think it's I even see it baked into, you know, the green and red holly jolly American Christmas culture, like the songs we sing, even I'm not even talking about carols.

00;39;36;15 - 00;39;56;16
Christian
They're certainly there. But you know, even like, like last Christmas, you take that Wham song, it's like super popular. It's about loneliness, it's about heartbreak. But we just kind of tune it out. Oftentimes, that's our that's our band. And even, you know, the Christmas movies, the Christmas Carol, obviously there's there's a lot of depth to that in the character of Ebenezer Scrooge.

00;39;56;19 - 00;40;16;28
Christian
Incredibly complex. But even something like Elf, you know, like Buddy the Elf, he's experiencing this like identity shift crisis, this loneliness. Why don't people accept me? I just want to I just want to have people that want to be known. And so, yeah, this is this is a great time of year to allow yourself to feel like yourself to to wrestle with your emotions.

00;40;16;28 - 00;40;36;04
Christian
And I love the way you're kind of guiding us through that. Chris How you started to on Sunday, My prayer is that this will be really transformative. People similar to how you've kind of been on this journey for the last couple of years in seeing your emotional health and just emotional makeup be transformed as well.

00;40;36;06 - 00;41;06;27
Chris
To just think about Ebenezer Scrooge is an interesting example. He had some things that happened to him. Yeah, he got hard, right? And, you know, and he just he was dead, essentially. And even though he's incredibly wealthy. Right. Right. And you know, he's just not able to to enjoy life because of this. The cynicism, the hardness that he allowed to develop and in his life, instead of embracing the difficulty in and okay, this is hard.

00;41;06;27 - 00;41;15;28
Chris
And I'm going to I'm I'm going to sorrow over this morning over this. I'm going to learn to to I'm going to do something positive with this.

00;41;16;01 - 00;41;18;04
Christian
Yeah. The Grinch.

00;41;18;06 - 00;41;19;13
Chris
Yeah. I mean, I mean.

00;41;19;20 - 00;41;46;20
Christian
It really it's baked into the Christmas culture. Yeah. If you can see past what so many people just want to feel, they just want to feel the happy, warm, fuzzy, hot cocoa gumdrops like. And we skip past some of this, like real stuff again. It actually makes us human beings and that's that's yeah, that's that not only is going to enrich our lives as as humans, but that much more for for those who who know Christ.

00;41;46;21 - 00;42;18;02
Brenton
Mm hmm. Well guys that was, that was a good conversation. I didn't really expect it to go where it did, but that's, I think, really helpful to people. And I think just to get this topic out in the open a little bit and yeah, know that there's people there that that you can talk to. So. All right. Keep sending your questions in and keep keep going through your devotional.

00;42;18;05 - 00;42;32;13
Brenton
I think it's going to be a really good resource for your families and I think, yeah, the staff here is doing a lot of work to to bring all this stuff together. And so, Christian, thanks for coming in. And Chris, thank you. And we'll talk to you guys next week.