Welcome to the Set Your Mind Above podcast, where every day, ordinary events teach us extraordinary eternal truths! I am your host BJ Sipe, and I’m so glad you’ve tuned in today! I am excited to share my life & my faith with you, and I sure hope you’ll do the same with me along the way.
Well, today’s podcast changed drastically from what I had originally hoped to talk about, but as I share this story with you it will make sense why I went a different direction. I have been absolutely swamped with work, so much so in fact I even had to move a few studies around today to next week which will be much lighter. I was up late working and up early working, and had planned on working through the whole day without stopping. That was until Ava woke this morning and said, “Daddy’s taking me to Cracker Barrel today!” That’s right…about a week ago we started really getting after potty training with Ava again. We told her that if she went a whole week with no accidents that she could go on a date with Daddy to Cracker Barrel (her favorite restaurant) and pick out a new toy. Well, I could not be more proud of her, because she had no accidents at all the entire week! Even when we would be out in public she would tell us that she needed to go. I had so much to do today, but I had made a promise to her and I needed to keep it, so we got dressed and headed to lunch. So originally, I had planned on talking today about the promises of God and how he never fails in any of them – making the connection with her just trusting that me as her father would keep mine. Well, that changed, because lunch did not go as we had planned. We were seated and my favorite waitress was going to be taking care of us. I ordered Ava an apple juice and me some coffee and we spent some time coloring while we waited for our food. It took a while for it to come out because they were busy, and by that time Ava had drank half her apple juice and I had finished my coffee. She started eating her fries and chicken while I started in on my breakfast when after about 10 minutes she says, “Daddy, I have to go potty.” I praised her for telling me and we quickly went to the men’s restroom to a stall so I could take her. After she was done she started crying saying, “Daddy, my tummy hurts. I want to go home.” “What’s wrong sweetie?” I asked, pulling her in close for a hug. That’s when it happened. Suddenly, I felt warm liquid saturate the side of my face, in my ear, and pouring down my shirt – it was vomit. I quickly tried to get her to the toilet but it was too late, she kept going and soon both of us were completely saturated down to the skin – her dress and my clothes. I’m so thankful that adrenaline kicks in during those moments, because I was just jumping into action and not worried for a second about the chunks of fries running down my face. I couldn’t help but feel awful for the poor guy in the stall next to us who let out the most sympathetic “Oh no” as I was frantically trying to clean us up. I did the best that I could before we walked out to get our ticket and leave. I’ll tell you what, if you want people to give you space, just walk out of a bathroom with a shirt covered in vomit – because that will do it. Cracker Barrel was so accommodating, they followed us out and gave us bags to put our clothes in as we got in the car. I called Kylie immediately and explained what happened. When we got home, and before Kylie even got her cleaned up the rest of the way said that she needed to check her blood sugar. I hadn’t even thought about that, I was just trying to clean up the mess of what happened, but Kylie was concerned about the underlying issue of why it happened. Sure enough, Ava’s blood sugar was at 78, while a normal range is around 100-180. What likely happened is she chugged that apple juice before having enough food and tanked, getting sick as a result. We will keep an eye on her blood sugar going forward, and now that we understand why it happened we can prevent it from happening again in the future. I’m glad she’s feeling better now, and I’m glad to be cleaned up, and let’s just hope that the next daddy daughter date goes a little better.
I’m sure that at this point you can understand why I needed to change the direction of the podcast for today, but there is still a very important lesson for us to understand. We all are sick spiritually, and as a result we often make a mess of things in our lives. However, rather than actually address the heart of the issue to actually fix the problem, we find ourselves just trying to tend to the mess. Let’s consider the words of Jesus, and then make some applications. He taught us, “But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person.” (Matthew 15:18-20) Jesus is trying to get us to see the heart of the matter when it comes to our sin. While sexual immorality, deceit, and murder are certainly awful things that people can do in their lives, these things do not “just happen”. They happen because of the condition of our heart. Murder is born from a heart full of hatred, sexual immorality is born out of a heart full of lust, deceit is born out of a heart full of greed & selfishness. Sometimes what happens though is when people sin, we immediately try and clean up the mess. It’s the porn addict who maybe deletes his history, or maybe even gets rid of his phone thinking that will fix it…but he doesn’t address the lust in his heart. As a result, he continues to struggle because he didn’t address the heart of the mater. It’s the liar who is found out in another deception, so he comes clean to those he lied to, but he doesn’t address the selfishness in his heart. As a result, he continues down his path of lies and manipulation. We could go on forever with different examples, but I want you to think about yourself. Is there a sin that you just can’t seem to shake? Something that continues to come up over and over again in your life? That no matter how hard you try to fix things, it comes back and hovers over you and creates more and more messes? Perhaps the reason for that is that you keep cleaning up the mess, but you’re not dealing with the real issue. Our thoughts & the condition of our heart is what determines our conduct. This is why Paul writes, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.” (Galatians 5:16-17) If you want to change your actions, you need to change your heart. Deal with the root issue, don’t just keep cleaning up the same messes in your life.
Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. Tune in, Tuesday-Friday’s, as a new podcast episode will be uploaded each day. Also, be sure to follow the Facebook page for the Set Your Mind Above podcast for future announcements and weekly video sessions that are uploaded on Saturdays. As you have the opportunity, share these thoughts with your friends and family, and share with me what important lessons you are learning from every day, ordinary events. Until next time know that I love you, that God loves you, and may we all each and every day set our minds above!