¶ Avoid Over-Spiritualizing Everyday Life
We're talking about over-spiritualizing everyday life . I think that it begins with the pulpit , and what I mean by that is because our shepherds are not teaching the sheep how not to over-spiritualize the text , and so people sit inside of a group , they read a verse and then they go around and they say what does it mean to you ?
What does it mean to you ?
Now , what does it mean to you ? No , no , no . There's one thing that you can extract from that when you put it in its proper historical context . Now , there could be different applications perhaps , but when we approach the Word of God , what did the original author intend for the original audience whom the letter was written ?
So , if they hear thunder from the pulpit , this is what it teaches , this is what the scripture means . We have to grab a hold of a text , put it in its proper context , lest it become a pretext with everything out of context . I don't know who said it and I don't even know if I worded that correctly , you just said it I did just say it .
My name is Mark Anthony Spence . So it starts with the pulpit that you must convince your people , you must continually share with your people when you open up the Word of God . We are going to try to extrapolate from the Word of God what it actually says , and that is called exegeting the text .
And what we don't want to do is the opposite , which is eisegeting the text , and that is putting into the text that which we hope it says .
And people do this all the time just one-on-one where we are going from person to person to try to find somebody who's going to agree with me , as opposed to somebody who's just going to give me the Word of God and challenge me .
according to the text , so it starts with the pulpit . That's so important , mark .
I think that's an excellent place to start , because I think , like you're saying , a lot of over-spiritualizing begins with a misunderstanding of what the Word is teaching and what the Word is saying , and so people will take certain texts and then just start to extrapolate from there that this is what that means , and so they get this , like you know , sense about
them . Where everything is , man , it's got to be , you know , talked about like this it's got to be approached like this it's gotta be . approached like this it's gotta be . And it makes them weird . I don't know , how else to put it I ?
remember hearing this analogy , this whatever you wanna call it by a pastor , and he was like you've probably heard it before . It's like there's this great flood that comes and this guy gets up on top of his roof and he's up there , he's praying God save me , god save me . And passes by a guy in a canoe and he's like , hey , get in , I'll save you .
And he goes , no , no , no , I'm waiting for God to save me . And so he prays again God save me , god save me . And a guy in a boat comes by hey , grab on , we're here to save you . And he's like , no , I'm trusting the Lord , the Lord is going to save me , the Lord is going to save me .
He ends up drowning and dying .
And the point is , the Lord goes before God and he says to him God , I prayed for you to save me . Why didn't you save me ? And he says I sent a canoe , I sent a boat , I sent a helicopter .
And so the point that you're making here , EZ , is that the Lord , through the common grace of modern medicine , through the common grace of tools and resources in our lives , provides ways for us to heal , to grow , to mature , to provide . Those are all common grace gifts that the Lord gives to
¶ Balancing Spiritual and Everyday Life
us .
That's the thing about not over-spiritualizing in the sense that people cast aside common means that God has given us to discover His will in certain ways . So it's like , no , no , I just pray and I need to hear God tell me what to do . Versus like God surrounded you with wise people . God has given you a brain to research . Is this good ?
Is this not God's given you common sense to say , if I get this job and move to this area , will I be away from the church family ? that I think , is more important for me , so that's really key .
There's a saying that Justin Peters came up with if you want God to speak to you , read his word . If you want God to speak to you out loud , well , then read his word out loud . Right , you don't need to over-spiritualize what's going on . You don't need a word from the Lord to do the simple things of life . Love God .
It was reported like this Love God and do whatever you want to do . There's the caveat right , are you loving God ? Right , should I go to Disneyland ? Are you loving God ? Right , should I go to Disneyland ? Are you loving God ? Are you doing what you should ? Yeah , go to Disneyland . You know you're going to get hate mail for that .
You know because you're talking about Disneyland . But there's just the idea of if you're loving on God , you're loving your family , you're a hard worker , you're providing and God's just enriching in His blessing . Listen , what do you want to do ? You know , don't overthink . Now , there's nothing wrong with committing a lot of things to the Lord .
I mean we should commit all things to the Lord , that we should be in continual contemplative prayer before the Lord as we do different things before God . But if you're asking , should I put on this shirt or this shirt ?
What about ?
this shirt , or what is this shirt ? I mean , the shirt is there stripes ?
What if I come ?
across somebody who doesn't like stripes on a shirt . Yeah Boy , listen , there is freedom for you , brother . There is liberty for you .
Yeah .
Unless it's overtly sinful . Listen , things don't have to make sense in order to be God's will . I remember fighting for certain things , whether it be at this job or different places , and going this only makes sense to do this ? I've thought about this through a million different ways . I've sought counsel , I've played devil's advocate in the midst of this .
There has to come a point when people perhaps are in charge of you that make decisions over you . Just trust the process , Allow people to be people , and then you'll look back and go wow , God was actually in control of that situation .
Even though it didn't make sense at the time , it makes sense now and let me just say I mean we're joking about getting hate mail about Disneyland and stuff . I do want to say on this note this is where it's important to recognize too , like that latitude within our liberties , like there may be some people in their conscience .
They can't do Disneyland or watch Disney movies . Obviously , we know that Disney has gone extreme on different things , right . So you have that liberty and you need to take it fully and freely .
What we're saying is don't now encroach on others , because I'll assure you of this , if you're going to be a stickler and be dogmatic and legalistic with other people on that , they can find a hundred things in your life that are not consistent with that , because you may not , you may not go there , but you may shop at Target .
Do you know what Target is supporting ? Do you know what they're funding ? Do you know what you know ? Someone else may say you know , I , I , I just it's something about Target and people going to the women's bathroom . Man , I just can't do it , okay , but I'm fine to go to Disneyland , you know , it doesn't bother me , whatever it doesn't always make sense .
So I have a little term . It's simple Leave people alone man . Leave people alone . Man Like just walk with God .
I think it starts back , way back , actually , with speaking of over-spiritualizing , with the Roman Catholic view of secular work versus sacred work . So , the Roman Catholics , what they did is they created a divide .
They would have people come into church and they say you see all the work the priest is doing , the liturgy , the baptisms , the preaching of the gospel , that is sacred . They are doing the Lord's work . And everything that you're doing out there , all of the shoemaking , all of the woodworking , that's secular work , that is not of the Lord .
And the only way you can participate in sacred work is through your tithes and offerings to support our sacred work . One of the things the reformers meant to do in the reformation was to redeem a view of work . It was a famous . There's this famous story and it's debated as to whether it's true or not .
Whether it's true or not doesn't actually matter , because it summarizes Luther's view of work . The story is that a shoemaker one day sends him a letter and he's like hey , I just got saved by one of your tracks . What do I do now , you know ? Should I quit my job and go into the ministry ? Should I put a cross in every single one of my shoes ?
Should I put a tract inside of every single one . What do I do ? And Luther's response is said simply make excellent shoes . The reality is that all work is sacred work . Why do we know that is that all work is sacred work ? Why do we know that ? Because work was assigned to Adam in the garden before the fall , to name the animals to care for the garden .
Why did God give Adam a job ? Because God himself is a worker . He is the one that created the world for his glory . In other words , work is beautiful and it is good . There's no denying that it has thorns and thistles . That's a part of the fall .
We experience work in painstaking ways , but we got to recognize that there is something beautiful about good work to God's glory . And so to your point , like to think to yourself I think some people over-spiritualize this version of life Like I need to be in Bible study all the time , I need to leave my job and go into ministry .
But , the Lord means to do sacred things through your everyday life .
And this is the thing you have to ask yourself Okay , if they stopped cussing , are they gonna be saved ? You don't wanna give them a misconception . You know , what I love is there's times when I've had unbelievers like I can tell they're trying to tiptoe around me and then they slip and they go . Oh man , I'm so sorry .
I go , man don't worry about that .
And you can feel they're like , relieved , like oh , because what you're ultimately going to do is get to the gospel with them at some point , hopefully if it's relational , and the Lord's going to take care of all that stuff when they get saved .
Another example in that regard is that you never say anything , you never shut them down hey , are you cussing whatever ? But they begin to notice you don't . Do you know how many testimonies I've heard of people saying dude , why don't you cuss Like teenage friends or guys at work or on the construction field ?
Dude , I know you never cuss , bro , what's up with that ? Well and then that's a gospel opportunity right there . All right , friends , boy , I was edified by that man . So good , and I hope you were as well . Friends , be encouraged and talk about this .
Look , sit down with your husband , your wife , your parents , your friends and just maybe ask them hey , do you feel that maybe I do some of this or not ? How do I come across ? Do you feel like I alienate the unbelievers in our lives ?
Do you think I make brothers and sisters feel like they don't really want to be around me because I come across as super spiritual or condemning or whatever ? It's really important and man , look , if that's where you're at , god's grace is sufficient . Cry out to him and allow him to mercifully guide you through it .
He sympathizes with your weaknesses , even in that area . Thank you for tuning in to this week's highlights from the Living Waters podcast . Friends , we value your time , so we've created a bite-sized version of our podcast for listeners who want to get equipped , without the jokes and fellowship .
Be sure to check out the full episode every Thursday , where we dive deeper into the topic . Until then , you can watch the full podcast episode available now on livingwaterstv .