Stop Doing The Things You Love. Start Doing The Things You Hate.

is I don't have like a list. I haven't prepared these questions. I don't have a list in front of me that has good, you know, witty answers. I don't have a bunch of quotes. We're just gonna We're gonna have a conversation. So let's have a conversation. First question comes from to coda and the subject client says, correct me if I'm wrong parentheses. God's spirit not talked about. Hey, grangeer Mo. Name is Dakota from Iowa. Excuse me, Ohio.

I've listened to like a River in chapter seven and eight. There is something very special about that to me. I used to think that in order to get closer with God, I would have to do all the right things, and I would have to stop having fun, and that would make me to be a lukewarm Christian all the more. My question is this, should we be talking more about how it's not us individually that can change ourselves, but instead God's spirit inside of us that does the changing.

I feel like that is a I rarely hear it preached that way. It's usually preached to be better and quit your evil desires, leaning on all human ability, but nothing on our full surrender and the power of God's spirit. Ps After being re born, I now read the Bible every night and cannot stop. Only God did this to me. Praise him. Yeah, okay, great question to Coda, and yeah, I agree with you that it's it's it's not preached that way. It typically is be better and quit your

evil desires and lean on your own ability. It's not said in those exact ways, but that's a lot of times that's the intention that people preach. It's hey, man, you gotta you gotta do this and this and this, you got to stop doing this. Okay, there's a lot of nuanced nuance to this and this that really could take the whole podcast, and it's a good question, but it could really take the whole podcast to walk through this what what's happening. There's a couple of things that's happening.

One like me, your testimony, this is your ps here after being reborn, I now read the Bible every night and cannot stop. And you're surprised by this, saying, only God did that to me, And that's my story too. It's like, man, I was dead. God raised me from the dead spiritually, and now I crave things of him and only God did that. That's what you're saying. That's

where you agree with me. And you used to think that in order to get closer to God you would have to do all the right things and stop having fun. That's a key thing right there, stop having fun, right That's I'll come back to that. And then this whole idea. Your main argument here is this idea that should we be talking more, talking more about how it's not us individually that can change ourselves, but instead God's spirit inside

of us that does the changing. And then you say, I really hear it preached that way, So you know where I'm coming from, and I know where you're coming from from And the problem is the problem with your argument really is that the Bible says both. It says clearly that is it is God who does the changing. Clearly it is the spirit. And the flesh is of no help at all. So the Bible says, and we were dead in our trespasses made alive in Christ. If

anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Behold, the old has passed away and the new is here. So we could read an Ezekiel about the valley of the of the dry bones, and I think about this a lot. How God made bones and this is this is this is the analogy he gives to Ezekiel, essentially, and Ezekiel saw this. He makes dead, dry bones alive, and that is you know, he puts flesh on bones. And that is really a spiritual analogy to us that

we don't do it. John six is a really interesting chapter with this John six, Jesus is walking through some difficult teaching and a lot of people start leaving him, and there's these grump there's everyone's grumbling like, man, we're gonna leave this guy. We're going to leave this teacher. And Jesus doesn't appear to be desperate to save them or desperate to keep them listening. He's like, my sheep will hear my voice. In fact, that's in John ten.

John ten, he makes it's the big Shepherd analogy. He is the great Shepherd, and he is the gate, and he my sheep will hear my voice, and I will lose not one of them. And so take ten and six of John these chapters and kind of walk through them, and you'll see that Jesus has no intention of convincing anyone. He says all that the Father give me will come to me, and whoever comes to me, whoever comes to me,

and will never cast out. And then you have to contrast that to an equal amount of teaching in the Bible that shows human responsibility to respond and repent to the gospel. So here's the nuance. We are. We have a human responsibility to respond and repent to the Gospel, and we are held accountable one hundred percent to that responsibility. Right but once you have responded, and whoever comes, whoever, whoever believes, who is that granger, whoever believes? So might

that be you listening right now? It's whoever believes, he will never cast out for God, God so little, God so loved the world, that whoever believes in him right. So there's a lot of there's a lot of whosoevers, there's a lot of whoever there's there's a lot of everyone who believes in the Bible. But once again, this is this, This is an entire conversation we could have on a podcast, and trust me, I love it and I have this conversation quite a bit. But we are

not capable of responding unless the spirit awakens us. And then we're not capable of living out these good works on our own, the good stuff that you said in your email, stop doing all the bad things and do all the good things. We're not capable of stopping the bad things and doing the good things without being enabled by the spirit. But there is a nuance there that it's it's I've said this before in a sermon. It's it's like a imagine a butterfly that comes out of

its cocoon. And the reason we encourage each other and there's something about telling each other to do this, and don't do that, do this, don't do that. It would be like telling a butterfly, an old butterfly telling a new butterfly. Hey, stop eating leaves on those branches, on those twigs, hanging out on the twigs. I think I said, with all those caterpillars, you are made for so much more right. And by the way, that craving you have, that's not for twigs and leaves anymore, that craving that

you can't really describe. Let me tell you what that is. That's for nectar. And you need to be in the garden drinking this nectar. And those things you have on your arms that used to be used to have caterpillar arms, but now you get these big things. Those are wings and you could fly, and in fact, that's how you get to the flowers. You use those wings and you fly, you drink nectar. So that's a Christian, an older Christian

telling a younger Christian, don't do this. Do this. But you know what I like about this butterfly analogy that I'm made up is that if you would think of it in terms of stop doing things that you love, like hanging out on twigs, and start to do things you hate, like drink nectar. And in that scenario, you have no idea what nectar. Nectar is so much better than twigs. Nectar is so much better than dry leaves. Stop hanging out with caterpillars. Spread your wings and see

where the real fun is. The real joy is in on the flower, the nectar. That is the sweetest thing you could have. You just don't know it yet. So I say it in that way because it is really never about stop having stop having so much fun, and live a boring life of obedience to God. Because you see, just like butterfly that doesn't know about nectar yet, that obedience is not made to be your prison. It's made to set you free. It's made to live in your

created purpose, and that is where the joy is. Matthew thirteen. I say this parable all the time. The Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field that a man finds and covers up. Then in his joy, he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. That's tough selling all you have in that scenario for that parable, It would be tough selling it. But the joy that he had and the treasure in the field

is so much greater that it doesn't matter anymore. You see what I mean, that's the nectar above these little leaves that you used to have as a caterpillar. So long story short to wrap this up, we have a human responsibility to respond, and God sovereignly chooses. Those two things are like two parallel lines that intersect only in heaven. They both and that is most evident at the Cross where God predestined Jesus to go to the cross. God the Father predestined Jesus the Son, to go to the

cross to die for sin. That was always the plan of redemption, to reconcile God himself to his people. That was always the plan. But humans have a responsibility for sending Jesus, the Son of God, to die. They are guilty of murder. To be held responsible is all on humanity for killing the son of God. And yet it was always planned by God. So if you don't believe in one of those two things I just said, you're

literally not a Christian. If you don't believe it was man's responsibility for the murder of Jesus, you're not a Christian. If you don't believe that God predestined the death of Jesus and had it always planned, you're not a Christian. Those two things work together in a missious way. The Bible teaches both. It also teaches our responsibility to respond, and it teaches that God sovereignly chooses and saves. It is all the spirit. The flesh is of no help

at all. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I'll never cast out. These are all truths that exist together. And let me wrap it up by saying one last thing. If I were to die today and God said, why should we let you in? The only answer I have is you shouldn't. I'm undeserving to be in the presence of God. But because you provided away through your son Jesus, I've believed

in him, so I would lean first on. It's all you God, before I ever said, aren't you so happy God? That I responded and made this decision. I'll leave it at that long time ago I started grangersmith dot Com. When I say a long time ago, I'm talking decades ago. Started grangersmith dot com for the purpose of mainly tour dates and you know, getting my music out there. And the last thing that was on my mind really was selling merch or much less. How in the world do

you sell merch like practically? How does that work physically? How do people click on something and then end up buying something and it charges their credit card? Well, you know, fast forward all these years and now I have ye Ye apparel. Literally, that's what we do from Yee dot com is sell apparel, and we do that by using Shopify. See.

Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you sell at every stage of your business, whether it's from the launch your own online shop stage or the first real life store stage to do we just hit a whole bunch of orders stage. Shopify is there to help you grow, whether you're selling scented soap or outdoor apparel like we are, Shopify helps you sell everywhere. Basically, they are an all in one e commerce platform, so it does all the

work for you and selling whatever product you want. They have a really good way of turning browsers into buyers too. They have they have the internet's best converting checkout that's thirty six percent better on average compared to the other leading commerce platforms. That's really good that you could sell more with your business with less effort thanks to Shopify Magic that is your AI powered all star. Look. I'm the first to admit I'm not a techie person. I

can't program code. I'm just not the kind of guy to do that. I am the guy to go, hey man, this is a good hoodie or this is a good hat for fall fishing, you know, But I don't want to get into the nitty gritty of how do I actually make the program to do this. And that's why Shopify has been so great for me and Tyler and Parker, my brothers. For so many years. Shopify powers ten percent of all e commerce platforms in the US, and so

it's not just me. They have millions of entrepreneurs of every size across one hundred and seventy five countries, plus Shopify's award winning help is there to support your success every step of the way. Because businesses that grow grow with Shopify sign up for a one dollar per month trial period at shopify dot com slash granger all lowercase. Go to shopify dot com slash granger right now to grow your business no matter what stage you're in. Shopify

dot com slash granger. Next question, the subject line says easy question. I'm up for that. It says, hey Granger. My name is Ava and I'm from Allendale, Michigan. We haven't met before, but I hope you come and speak at our church in the future. My question is this, I'd like to stop for a second and thank you for being so kind and honest. I admire how you genuinely care for others and are striving to be more like Jesus, but I love that you also encourage others

to do the same. I read your book and I want to thank you for being so vulnerable. Many of those reading Like a River are people that you've never met or barely know, and I hope you realize the amount of lives you've influenced. That God, God did that. I have a pretty open ended question, but I'm curious when do you think a person is ready to date? And can you elaborate as to when you think I should date? Sorry, I have a little bit trouble reading your question, but I think I get the gist of it.

And then you say, what should be seen in a guy as well as a gal? What should be seen in a guy as well as a gal? Okay, Ava, thank you, thank you for emailing, And once again, it's a good question and probably could be a question I answer on an entire episode to talk nothing but about this, but dating really is only the purpose of getting married. That is the only purpose of dating, and there is

no other purpose of dating. You can't make an argument that I would believe if you said there is a purpose of dating and it ends up being good, it only ends up hurting you in some way, And you could say it this way, it only ends up hurting you in more ways than it ever is helpful to date, and to date a bunch of people, and to date a bunch of people for a long periods of time.

That's really what we're talking about here. I'm not talking about going to have coffee, going on a few dates, learning that that person is not for you and you move on. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about you have declared each other boyfriend and girlfriend, and you are officially going steady and months are going by. That's what I'm talking about, And I think that's what this question is. When are you ready to do that? So maybe we should say the first scenario, maybe we should

call it courting. Like courting is getting to know someone in preparation to decide if you're going to marry them. And that's fine, and you should do that obviously, But what hurts us is the long term dating, and I don't think there's any reason for it at all. Like I said, if you sit here in this blue chair across from me, I think we could have a great discussion. But I don't think there is a single argument of why it's better to date a lot of people for

long periods of time and then get married later. I probably met some people mad with that, that's okay. I firmly believe that. So a long time ago and for most of humanity, there were arranged marriages, and you know what, surprisingly for our twenty twenty four brains to understand, arranged marriages worked pretty well. They were, you know, two families decided that these two people should come together, and it just really proves the fact that they were so successful

for so many years. And of course there's bad examples, of course, of course, but I think the reason they were so successful for so many years proves to us that love, really wholly is a decision. Who l y fully, it's a decision, it's not. It's not some mystical spiritual feeling. This Pixie starred us cupid stuff that happens to us.

And I've talked about this before and I don't want anyone to think I'm not romantic, because that's anyone that knows me, and my realation with the Amber would say, no, that's not the case at all. I love Amber passionately. And I'm trying to make a point here that on those arranged marriages, and there was so much success in that because eventually, no matter who you're dating, you have to decide that you love them, and you have to decide past the butterflies and your belly that say, oh,

I'm like, I'm so attracted to this person. And once you get past that and hard days set in or the newness wears off, then you rely on the decision, just like you make when you say your vows and you say through sickness and through health, rich and poor, you better or worse. That's a decision. When you say vowels like that traditional vows, you're saying, I decide, not my heart, not my gut, not my feeling, not my spirit. I decide that for better or for worse. I'm sticking

with you. That's what that means. It's a decision based on your brain. Your brain, your cerebral cortex makes a decision, goes I decide right now, and I make a vow to you, I make a promise to you, a covenant with you. Let's pinky swear, let's shake hands on this that I will stick with you for better, if for worse. It's crazy if you think of it that way. How many people decide that they don't want to do that anymore.

I'm backing out of this. You're not living up to what you promised, and so I'm going to back out of what I promised. Last week I had Marv Miller, a pastor, a Mennonite pastor. And it's interesting as we're talking about the Mennonite culture, because divorce really doesn't exist in that culture. They don't have a superior culture to anyone else. And he would be the first to admit that they don't have superior marriages to all other cultures.

That's not what he's trying to say. It's more about in that culture, they make a decision and they stick with it. Imagine that they decide, we're not going to accept divorces as a natural course of what we do. We're gonna make this this thing we call marriage something we actually stick with. We're going to do it regardless of what happens regardless of sickness, regardless of if this person is not serving me that the way that I wanted them to. You know me me, I want this,

I want this, and they're not doing it. And if both of you thought of it in that way, then it's a great marriage. And so back to this question about dating, when do you think it's appropriate to start dating? I don't think that. I don't think you expected this long answer from me on this, but it's really interesting if we think of it in terms of this dating. This courting is just it's really just to see are you attractive to me? Could we have good conversations? Do

you love Jesus like I do? Because that's a major problem If you don't. All kinds of implications will happen if you don't, These all kinds of religious fallout. What do we do with the kids? What are we doing on Sunday mornings? That's just a given a presupposition. I hope that that's understood. You love Jesus or I could also make the argument, or you don't love Jesus because I don't, right, because if you do and I don't,

that's another problem, but a different question, different discussion. But I think you get my point. You need to be on the same page. They're not a project. They have good references. I'm not saying they have great parents, or they've brought they were brought upright, or they have a lot of money. That's not what I mean. I mean there are people around them in their lives that go, this person is truly a good person for you. So you've got references. So it's not just all on you. You've

guarded your heart. You're not just diving in and going head over heels and you haven't really thought about it with a clear brain. So those are things the courting process should do. But I'm against dating long term. So whatever that means to you, I'm assuming Ava that you're pretty young and you're like Grangeer. I didn't want all that. I just really wanted to know I'm fourteen and when can I start dating. I'm thinking that that's more about

what this is about. And so the reason I kind of set it up with all that is a little bit of a fatherly aspect to this, because I have a girl, a little girl that's twelve it she'll be thirteen in October, and dating is not going to be a thing in our house unless you're with a group, and whatever you want to call it, you can call it whatever you want. But unless you're in a group of of several people, there's not going to be one on one dating while you live here. And it's kind

of like the last question. We're talking about telling me things I don't want to do, and I got to give up what I love and do what I don't want to do. That kind of thing. It's like, no, No, I'm trying to talk about what your creative purpose is because there's so much damage that can come from not

being prepared, and so much damage could come from bad dating. Everyone, including me, everyone that has done this has a terrible story about some kind of breakup or some kind of problem that happened, or some kind of purity that they lost in a vulnerable time, and you can't get that stuff back. This is bag that you carry with you and people go no gradeard. That's good because you learn from your lessons and you move on. But you can't know who you really want unless you date all the

people you know you don't want. That is not true. That's just not true. That's just something we tell ourselves to make ourselves feel better. But that's why I made the argument about arranged marriages, because love's a decision. You find someone you're attracted to, someone that loves Jesus, that you could have good conversations with, you can agree on basic fundamental parenting and living together roommate types things right, and they're genuinely a good friend. And then at some

point after the attraction. Of course, you need to be attracted at the beginning, but then you make a decision. I'm gonna love this person and I'm not gonna stop. That's it. Next question, subject line says long lost Love. Hey Granger, my name is Lane. I'm twenty six years old. My son's mom and I have been separated for five years now, and I can't seem to shake the love that I had while we were dating. I don't feel like I can block her on social media because she

posts pictures of our child. What advice would you give me in this situation? All right, Lane, thanks for the question, buddy, and man, I love you and I don't want to use you as an example against your will, but I think I could do it in a way to help not only you, but other people because I want to say with your email, I want to say, look to the last email. Or about dating, I want to say,

look look at the fallout. Really, just from this podcast alone that I deal with every other question, it seems like there's some kind of fallout from bad habits of dating, from people falling out of situations that they should have made a decision and stuck with it. Lane, Not on you, buddy, That's not what I mean. This isn't a knock on you. I'm just saying, look look at this. For all the

people that go what's wrong with dating? I say, look at Lane twenty six years old, probably not married, but had a baby with son's mom, and now he's struggling so much to shake it the original love that he had, and he so much so that he's like debating blocking her and he doesn't know what to do. I mean, she literally post pictures of his child. Let's dive into this. That's Lane. That stuff's done now, so we can't. We can't go back and fix things that have already happened.

But let's kind of unpack your life a little bit. As much as I know, and I wish we were in a cap of a truck together but let's talk about twenty six years old, separated for five That means we're talking back when you're twenty one. You had a little baby boy. I don't know how old he is now. Maybe he's four three, maybe he's five, I don't know, maybe he's one. I don't know. I'm assuming it happened around this before the separation, so we could say five

plus and that means you were dating before that. So this goes back like a quarter of your life. Okay. The problem always is, this is the dilemma. So that this doesn't become generational and your son doesn't pay the price for this whatever it is, you have to act

self lesslie instead of selfishly. And the dilemma is I want to say, I'm sorry, dude, that you're twenty six and you gotta you have to be self less now in a time when you probably want to like go get life or whatever, but you can't because of this. I mean you can, but I I would think it would be really tough, really tough on your boy. Here's a scenario. A good friend of mine, another podcaster, went through a divorce and separation with kids. She moved back

with her parents all the way across the US. He was on the East coast. She moved all the way to the West coast. He made a decision, and a good one, I believe he made a He manned up Lane, and he said, I'm moving with him. He left his work in all that he knows on the east coast and moved, shadowing the mom back to the West coast and literally rented a house on the street the same neighborhood as where the mom moved in with the parents, not in like a weird Stocker way. I mean, she

knew it. They had the discussion, but he decided being there for my kids, being the dad that they need so close that they could just go out the front door and go to dad's house, is more important than whatever else I have going on in my little world. I think in a bad situation, making it good is about as good as it can get in that way.

So how does this apply to you, Lane? But if I was in the cab of the truck with you, I'd say you need to be there for that boy, and so reconciling this relationship is of utmost most importance. And whatever you did to cause this separation, and you say time out, man, and it was mutual. I didn't say what she did because I'm sure she did something, but that's okay. I'm saying whatever you did, because it's always there's always two sides of the street here, there's

always two stories. Whatever you did or didn't do to cause and keep this separation, you need to fix it. And if she is with someone else, she's dating or married to someone else, then and this is all about the boy, you need to be close to that boy, and to be close to that boy, you love his mother in a righteous way, and you have to learn to love whoever mother is with, because that is the way to get close to that boy and to be there for him. And you don't talk bad about mama.

You don't talk bad about new boyfriend. Look, I hope that that's not the case, and I'm not advocating for that. I'm just I'm giving you your only options. If she's single and she's not dating or married, then you need to do everything you can to reconcile this relationship. If not anything for the sake of your boy, because you have to stop this generational problem because he will grow up to think that's okay, and he probably will fall into the same mess. I'm assuming you will unless you

stop it. And that's up to you. And that's up to you being selfless, that's up to you swallowing your pride. That's up to you saying, look, I'm so sorry. I was twenty one years old and I was an idiot. I want to earn a new chance with you. And she goes blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. She just you know, bark sets you and you just go, I'll take it. I'll take it. I'll take it. I deserve it. I'll deserve it. I deserve it. I'm about

serving you, not myself. People here, I say this stuff on the podcast and people are like, man, no way, man, you're advocating a verbal abuse. Okay, if that's how you want to hear it. But but what I'm advocating is humility, pouring out yourself, counting others more worthy than you are. Right, So this is about your boy now, it's not about your love and the love that you need to rekindle this old flame that would be a byproduct of you

only you rekindling the relationship with your son. Hey, real quick, if you want to get a hold of me. Did you know that that's easy to do with cameo dot com slash Granger Smith. Log in there. You could find me and ask me to send you any kind of message you want, and I do that on a phone and I send you a video of whatever a phone message you want. It could be happy anniversary, making some kind of baby announced, happy birthday, a word of encouragement,

whatever that might be. You just tell me in the comments how you want me to do it, and I'll shoot it over to you super easy. You could also download that app Cameo Cimeo and search for me Granger Smith. I'll shoot you a video message. It's a great way to stay in touch. Next question, subject line says feeling a little lost. Hey, Granger, just found your podcast recently and I can't stop listening. In a way, it makes

me feel a little less alone. Life is tough, and sometimes I think I'm the only one going through something specific and I'm not. I've opened my heart to God after pushing him away, shutting him out for many years, and I know I can't do this myself. I'm craving his word right now. I've gotten into a good routine of starting my day off that way, I still feel like there is just something missing. Am I missing something?

Am I doing something wrong? I feel my faith is stronger than it ever has been, but I still feel a little lost. Sarah. All right, Sarah, thank you so much for emailing and being sincere and vulnerable in this situation. These I love how some of these questions will connect with each other, and I think this kind of connects with the first question of this podcast. First of all, I just want to say, your faith is stronger than

it ever has been. That's amazing. Sometimes we have to just stop right there and go, Sarah, amazing, Praise God. Your faith is stronger than it ever has been. It's I understand that you want it to be going faster, and you want things to clear up and be better, better, quicker, but sometimes you just have to step back and go, Praise God. My faith right now today is stronger than it ever has been. It's great. That's really great. And if you're asking me how do I make it even stronger?

Let's talk. Okay, after I say congratulations, you're in a good place. What we need to discuss here is spiritual disciplines. Another subject that I feel like I could talk about it every episode, and maybe I do sometimes, but it's probably worth it. It's that important. But our spiritual disciplines are the way that we contribute to growing our own faith. Now, of course, that the faith is a gift from God, and you know that the Disciple asked Jesus in the Bible,

or he says, increase my faith. I have faith, but increase my faith help my unbelief. Right, that's basically the idea. And so there's an aspect where we need to trust in that and trust trust God's work in his gift of grace in our faith. But the way that we contribute to that to growing it, that responsibility we have is through our spiritual disciplines. Reading is great. Reading the Bible is the most important spiritual discipline. That's in taking

God's word. That's God speaking to us. Prayer is important, very important, but that's us speaking to him, and when he speaks back, he speaks through the Word. If you're not reading the Word at all, if you don't have a routine of reading the Bible at all, in any way, that's a serious problem, and you're in serious jeopardy of losing anything you've ever built, especially if a hard time hits. But it's not always just about reading it, because there

needs to be a component of meditating on it. Otherwise you're just going through the motions, checking a box, reading the Bible. That's it. It doesn't matter. Just read read, read, read it. Okay, done, got my morning reading done, Time to start my day. And then a couple hours go by and you go, do you even remember at all what you read this morning? And the answer is probably no, I was just reading. I was just distracted, but at least I read right. No. This is where meditating comes in.

And I'm not talking about Eastern meditation where you empty your mind. I'm talking about Biblical meditation, where you are pouring God into your mind. You're taking captive of every thought to Christ and so taking a scripture captive in your mind and living with it, thinking, dissecting it. There's a lot of ways to do this. Memorizing it is a way. Different apps that you can memorize scripture with is a great way to meditate on scripture. Meditating through memorization.

Journaling is another way to meditate on scripture. Reading you read the scripture and then you journal a little bit of your thoughts on it. And that journal is for you and you alone, So it doesn't really matter what you say, but it's about processing through what you just read. I've done the journal thing and the memorization thing for a long time, and the journaling has helped me tremendously after my mourning Bible read, which I never ever, ever,

ever ever skip my Mourning Bible read. No matter what I'm doing or how busy I am, I don't ever skip that. In fact, I did four I skipped four days this year because I was in Pakistan and it's illegal to have a Bible, so I figured that was the only time when I could. I could not read in my plan, and then I had to just catch up and get caught up and read double four times in a row. That's it. So what I've done over the last several years is read, journal, memorize, and then

from the journal, I make a social media post. And some of y'all might know that that I've posted a scripture and maybe a little bit of my own thoughts about the scripture. But I'll post it on social media. And that is not really for anyone to grow or learn or it's really a part of my own spiritual discipline that I know I need to read, journal and then post because that's like completing completing my job in

journaling and thinking through things. If I don't post it, then I haven't completed my spiritual discipline of the day. One Timothy four to seven says train yourself for godliness, and some like the King James. I believe it. It says I forgot which one, but discipline. Think it might be King James. Discipline yourself for godliness. So this is something we're called to do, something we're required to do, and

something that is so helpful, so Sarah. Other spiritual disciplines are prayer or listening to sermons, fasting time alone, solitude in the wilderness like Jesus did. Jesus is actually the greatest model for all spiritual disciplines because he did all these things minus the journaling. That's kind of a we added that kind of later, but you could understand how it would make sense to journal. But Jesus, I mean,

his memorization was like perfect. We see so many times him quoting scripture, including his time on the Cross, quoting scripture. So how much if Jesus did it quote a scripture in his time of suffering on the cross. What does that say to us about why it's important to memorize or to have good Bible intake from our reading and not just mindlessly read through it. What does that tell us? What does that tell us that Jesus was constantly taking time and leaving and going into the wilderness time of

solitude and prayer. How does that model for us? Like, what does that tell us that Jesus goes out in fast so that he could he could be completely filled with the spirit and not distracted by fleshly desires like food. What does that tell us If we see Jesus modeling these things for us, that's really a good thing. We could ask ourselves, Sarah is like, what do I need? Because you're saying, am I doing something wrong? Better? Said?

I think you could have better said that by saying, am I should I be doing something else in addition to this right? And the answer would be, let's look at what Jesus was doing in this kind of scenario as far as spiritual disciplines, fasting, meditating, solitude, prayer, Bible memorization, Bible reading. We know he was reading, We know he

was sitting under sermons. Can you imagine Jesus so many times sitting in the synagogue listening to someone else preached to him about his word, and yet he did it as a spiritual discipline. So this is what we need to crank up, Sarah, and this is what I would do. In addition to this, reading next question, subject line says being a man. Hey, sir, my name is Brent. I'm from Kansas and I'm twenty years old. I'm engaged. I'm in the Air Force and i've been in just about

a year and I've been deployed. All that to say that sometimes I struggle with being a man and not viewing myself as a kid. I don't act like a child. I just make childish decisions. However, I struggle with viewing myself as a man. When do I go from being just a kid from Kansas to the man God wants me to be. Thanks for your time to read this. I hope you have a great day, Brent. Thank you.

Brent had great question, and man, I love how this connects to the guy that was saying Lane, who was twenty six saying, what do I do about this girl, my baby mama, my little boy at home? What do I do about this girl, and I put so much emphasis on the baby boy, not the girl, because Brent, I hope there's no disrespect in saying this, but I would I would just guess by not knowing you. And

I want to say this. I want to say this as politely and sensitively as I can, but I have a feeling, Brent, that your dad wasn't there in the way that he could have been. Because typically when someone is questioning, when an adult man is questioning themselves on how to view themselves, Like you said, Brent, I struggle with viewing myself as a man, typically that comes from someone that was never verified. It was never told this

or reinforced this. They were They were never taken under the under the wing of a man as a child, as a boy and said this is how to be a man. And when they became of age, no one ever said you are now a man, my son. No one ever did that to you, I'm assuming and if they did do it, it wasn't intentional. The fact that brings up an idea. There was a book called The Intentional Father. Great book, Brent. It would be for you Lane, It would also be for you the Intentional Father. There's

also a poem I want you to read. It's called if I want you to read that Rudred Kipling book or poem. If this is so good about manhood, I think I could say this, but yeah, I think I'll say it. Most people on this podcast know my friend Bernie, who's been a guest many, many times. Well, yesterday I went with Bernie and his son who just turned thirteen, and several other of Bernie's Christian brothers, brothers in christ and we all went through a right of passage for

his son. And each of us men had a virtue that we taught to Bernie's son with scripture and prayer, and then we acted on that virtue in a way to teach him how to adopt that virtue. Now, Bernie's going to go through this whole thing with his son, and eventually it'll end up, because he's thirteen, it'll end up in a place where Bernie says, you are now a man. It's going to take about five years until he's eighteen, but it starts now. This is the right

of passage begins now at thirteen. We trace back history, almost every culture and tribe and heritage, all of them had a right of passage in some way about this age for a boy so that he knows. Unlike Brent, you don't have to ask the question when did I go from being just a kid from Kansas to the man God wants me to be? That is something God doesn't speak down through the clouds. That is something God

provides us the answer with through community. And God provided the ultimate community to us through church, through his church. And so Brent, this is a little late for you, so that part of this can't apply. But to anyone else, fathers and even young teenagers listening, Church provides God's way of community for us, so that through community we are

given the affirmation that we are man. There's a great book called Wild at Heart, and that I read that book as a teenager, and then I read it again when I was going to to be a father, and Wild at Heart is great for understanding this kind of affirmation. There are specific times in Wild at Heart John Eldridge is their author when John walks through these specific scenarios

with his sons. As you find these moments when they need they need to be told that they're either on the right track or that they are affirmed in growing into a man. So, Brent, none of this is answering your question because you are past all that. I'm hopefully just kind of building up a little information for everyone

else that might be heading towards this. But Brent, what do you do now if you haven't had that affirmation, if you're making childlike decisions and one you're struggling with viewing yourself as a man, You're still twenty and you're still super young, and you will make dumb mistakes as a twenty year old. I certainly did way past twenty. Okay, So being in the Air Force, being deployed is can be a huge plus because you're going to be around

older men. But having the affirmation of older godly men will come ultimately from being an active member of a church, a god fearing Bible teaching, expositional preaching. Church sized proportionately to the amount of sheep to the shepherd. If there's too many sheep and not enough shepherds, and it can't be healthy in that way. Instead, if you have a lot of sheep in your church, you gotta have a

lot of efforts. Basically, it's easy math think about in proportion to how many people, how many pastors can be directly involved with the lives of the congregation. That kind of church. That's what I'm advocating for, Brent. Being a member active in that kind of church will provide you with older men, younger men, toddlers, babies, men your age, men that have been through what you've been through, men that are grandfathers that you can go I'm having trouble

just being a man. I'm making stupid, child boyish decisions and I need some accountability from you. And there are so many godly men in these churches, planted in these churches that just live for that live for a twenty year old Air Force kid to come in and say this to them, and they go, come under my wing, my son. Let me show you not only the pitfall that I don't want you to step in like I did, but let me show you in some places I actually

made the right decisions. And let me show you those two. Let me step in for maybe what your father didn't do, and let me fill that gap. The only way, Brent, for you to feel like a man and be affirmed as a man is to be around other godly men. You can't do this on your own. You can't do it outside of community, Read your Bible, increase your prayer life,

Increase your spiritual disciplines. Like the last email, plant yourself in a good church with godly men that can keep you accountable and tell you, yes, Brent, you are a man. We love you, guys. Let's see you next Monday. I thanks for joining me on the grater Smith Podcast. I appreciate all of you guys. You could help me out by rating this podcast on iTunes. If you're on YouTube, subscribe to this channel. Hit that little like button and the notification spell so that you never miss anytime I

upload a video. If you have a question for me that you would like me to answer, email Grangersmith Podcast at gmail dot com.