The Good Father | The Good God Journey Week 2

00:00:01

The best way to watch Crossroads Church is on your smart TV,

00:00:05

because that's where your family hangs out

00:00:06

and plus taking a break from your phone and tablet

00:00:09

feels good.

00:00:11

Download the Crossroads TV app on your smart TV

00:00:14

and your TV becomes your church,

00:00:17

your community,

00:00:19

your new rhythm,

00:00:21

your "I finally went to church this week."

00:00:25

Set a time to experience church on your TV.

00:00:28

See, you've already made your TV smarter.

00:00:30

Download the Crossroads TV app.

00:00:33

It'll give you the boost you and your family need for your week.

00:00:48

- Hi, everyone, and welcome to week two of The Journey,

00:00:51

The Journey is a five week series.

00:00:53

We're going to be talking about the goodness of God.

00:00:55

- Because it's a little bit hard to see in today's world,

00:00:58

it's often filled with pain.

00:00:59

And so we've got a plan to spread a little bit of joy

00:01:01

Let them see the goodness of God.

00:01:03

We've come prepared.

00:01:04

- Here we go.

00:01:07

- We've got helmets, because safety first.

00:01:09

We don't want to spread the joy of God without helmets.

00:01:11

We've also got some masks here to put on.

00:01:14

We don't want to spread anything there.

00:01:16

- Mask up.

00:01:17

- Perfect.

00:01:18

Scooters, yellow, just like the streets of heaven.

00:01:22

It's going to be great. And --

00:01:24

- Oh, my helmet.

00:01:25

- I got it. I got it. There it is. Put your helmet on.

00:01:29

I don't know if you noticed, but we've got a couple --

00:01:31

Oh!

00:01:33

I don't know if you noticed,

00:01:34

we've got a couple of balloons.

00:01:36

Just a couple to give away. Let's go.

00:01:37

- Let's do this!

00:01:39

- Joy. Spread joy. Spread joy.

00:01:45

- Ok.

00:01:46

- All right.

00:01:48

Let's go find some people who need a little bit of joy in their day.

00:01:50

- Hi, how are you?

00:01:51

Hey, life's hard enough. You deserve this.

00:01:54

- You're so welcome.

00:01:57

- Oh, yeah you do. Hold on, I got you.

00:01:59

- Here you go, buddy.

00:02:00

Hey, did you have a rough morning?

00:02:01

Did you have a great morning?

00:02:02

You deserve that, man.

00:02:04

Have a great day, guys.

00:02:05

- Now you do.

00:02:08

- Have a great day.

00:02:11

- This is just to remind you,

00:02:13

no matter how hard life has been in 2020,

00:02:15

it can get better.

00:02:18

Do you need a balloon?

00:02:19

Yeah, you need a balloon, here you go.

00:02:21

Just enjoy that balloon, baby kale.

00:02:23

I'm sure you're going to love it.

00:02:25

Don't let go, don't drop it.

00:02:26

OK, you're dropping it. I'll take it back.

00:02:27

That's -- That's kind of on you.

00:02:29

I don't know why you dropped that.

00:02:30

Here today, ma'am, would you like a balloon?

00:02:32

You don't need a balloon.

00:02:33

Okay, you're already happy. That's good.

00:02:35

- Have a good one.

00:02:37

- You guys want a balloon back there?

00:02:38

_ There you go. Thank you so much.

00:02:40

I hope you have a good day.

00:02:41

- Here we go.

00:02:42

You're having a meeting.

00:02:43

Do you want to balloon for your meeting?

00:02:46

This woman's about to fly away.

00:02:51

Do you need a balloon? - Oh, thank you.

00:02:55

- How about that?

00:02:57

There you go.

00:02:58

- Thank you.

00:02:59

- Would you like a balloon?

00:03:00

We're just spreading joy around the store.

00:03:02

- That's awesome, thank you.

00:03:03

- Yellow balloon. You want a balloon?

00:03:06

Yeah, there you go.

00:03:07

- Yay!

00:03:09

Thank you for being here.

00:03:10

We love your service. Have a great one.

00:03:14

- I wish we had more balloons.

00:03:19

- Man, we just had so much fun.

00:03:23

And I think we did a little bit of good there. I do.

00:03:26

We spread some goodness of God inside Kroger

00:03:29

with some balloons. Unbelievable.

00:03:31

- And that's what this week is all about, so let's get started.

00:03:35

- Is God good?

00:03:37

Is He good on day one of working from home?

00:03:39

How about day 180?

00:03:41

Is God good when school is online?

00:03:44

Is He good when your business is struggling?

00:03:46

Is He good even when everything in the world

00:03:49

makes you want to scream, "Good God, what is going on?

00:03:52

And where are you?"

00:03:53

That's a fair question and actually a great prayer

00:03:56

because we believe there is a good God with good answers.

00:04:15

- Hey, welcome to Crossroads. My name is Brian.

00:04:17

Welcome to week two of The Journey of The Good God.

00:04:22

You know, I'm here right now in my house.

00:04:25

This is my house.

00:04:26

I've got so many memories in this house.

00:04:29

Most of the memories revolve around family.

00:04:33

This is the place where my family comes to have meals.

00:04:36

They come to visit dad.

00:04:38

A lot of good memories.

00:04:40

I know there's a lot of us right now

00:04:42

that really have no interest in going home

00:04:45

to be with our parents

00:04:46

or we're living with our parents right now and it's awful.

00:04:49

It's difficult and we don't like it, do we?

00:04:53

We want to have a place to go and have a good time

00:04:56

at Christmas, Thanksgiving, even Halloween.

00:05:00

We wanted to have a dad or a parent that would

00:05:02

walk us around the neighborhood holding our hand

00:05:04

to feel that sense of closeness.

00:05:07

And unfortunately, too few of us have any warm memories

00:05:11

inside of a home with family.

00:05:13

And that's why many of us have a really hard time

00:05:18

referring to God as Father

00:05:20

or Him being a good Father or a good God.

00:05:23

It's because if our family life wasn't right,

00:05:27

it likely was because our dad wasn't right.

00:05:30

He was physically absent or if he was physically present,

00:05:34

he might have been physically abusive.

00:05:36

He was emotionally absent,

00:05:37

or if he was emotionally present,

00:05:39

he might have been emotionally abusive.

00:05:42

I believe the struggle we have with understanding God is good

00:05:47

or we have a good heavenly Father is the struggle

00:05:49

of reconciling that with the only father figure I had

00:05:54

that isn't much like God at all.

00:05:56

We'll we're going to park off to the side

00:05:59

our family of origin garbage.

00:06:01

And I want us to see who the real God is,

00:06:04

who the real Heavenly Father is.

00:06:08

Jesus tells a story about that God.

00:06:12

Jesus tells a story that's very, very well known,

00:06:15

but it's really not known.

00:06:18

Like a lot of church people have heard this story,

00:06:20

but they don't really know the fullness of the story.

00:06:24

Let's read it and talk about it today.

00:06:27

It comes from the Book of Luke, Chapter 15, here's what says:

00:06:47

This is known as the Prodigal Son,

00:06:51

it's the Parable of the Prodigal Son.

00:06:54

We know it as that, but Jesus never called it that.

00:06:59

In fact, that's not the main thrust of the parable.

00:07:03

If there was a title, it would be summed up

00:07:05

in the very first thing we had: A father had two sons.

00:07:10

It's about a father and two sons.

00:07:12

And both of these sons struggle with the concept

00:07:17

of their father, their dad being good.

00:07:21

The younger brother goes to his dad and he says,

00:07:26

"Dad, give you my share of the inheritance."

00:07:29

What he's saying to his dad in ancient middle culture speak

00:07:33

is, "Dad, I wish you were dead.

00:07:36

Dad, I don't want to wait for you to die.

00:07:39

Dad, I don't want you; I only want your money.

00:07:42

Dad, I don't want to be with you.

00:07:43

I just want to be with the stuff that your richness affords.

00:07:46

Dad, I'm not really interested in being relationship with you.

00:07:49

Dad. I just want to kind of have an unruly life,

00:07:51

have a self-centered life.

00:07:53

I wish you were dead.

00:07:54

How about we make this clean?

00:07:56

You give me my share of the inheritance right now."

00:07:58

This is -- this is utterly stunning to me.

00:08:02

This younger son is like many of us.

00:08:07

And this father represents God.

00:08:12

Many of us are going to God and we're saying,

00:08:15

"God, I don't want any of you.

00:08:17

I'm not really interested in being with you.

00:08:19

I just want the perks of who you are.

00:08:22

I want your perks. I don't want your presence.

00:08:25

I want the riches. I don't want relationship."

00:08:30

And I'll tell you what, if my son came to me

00:08:33

and told me that, you know, I'd say to my son?

00:08:35

"Well, screw you, dude. No, sorry.

00:08:38

No, no inheritance for you, in fact, ever.

00:08:41

Not with that kind of attitude.

00:08:42

No inheritance for you ever."

00:08:44

And fortunately, my Heavenly Father, our Heavenly Father

00:08:48

isn't like me in that way, because this dad

00:08:51

accommodates this selfishness, the sinfulness,

00:08:56

and he says, "OK. If you want it, you can have it."

00:09:01

And he gives it to his son and away he goes.

00:09:08

So let's keep going, let's continue on. Verse 13.

00:10:12

So his dad gives them all of his inheritance.

00:10:14

He divides his estate in half, gives him early inheritance.

00:10:18

Says, "There you go, son."

00:10:19

And he gets up and he takes off.

00:10:23

And he goes off to a far land, Jesus says.

00:10:27

And when he gets there,

00:10:28

he spends all of his resources on wine, women and song.

00:10:34

He buys the best drinks he can have.

00:10:37

What were the best drinks you would have?

00:10:40

Would it be lemonade, margarita on the rocks?

00:10:43

They wouldn't have done margarita on the rocks,

00:10:44

because they didn't have ice back then,

00:10:46

but whatever his favorite beverage is

00:10:48

or maybe your favorite beverage is,

00:10:50

if you have tendencies like this younger son,

00:10:54

you just spend it.

00:10:55

You just do it. Whatever you feel, you do,

00:10:57

whatever you want, you do it,

00:10:58

whatever would bring you satisfaction, you do it.

00:11:00

And that's what he does.

00:11:01

Blows it on women, women of the night.

00:11:04

And he finds himself partied himself out

00:11:07

and spent himself out financially to have nothing.

00:11:11

To the point where he's now going to find people

00:11:13

who he's partied with

00:11:15

who may have businesses to work for them.

00:11:19

And one of the jobs he has is feeding these pods to pigs.

00:11:23

Now, Jesus is Jewish.

00:11:26

He's speaking to a Jewish culture.

00:11:28

They understand that feeding pigs,

00:11:31

being around pigs is a no-no.

00:11:34

Pigs in the ancient Jewish customs were known as unclean,

00:11:38

actually, not ancient Jewish custom,

00:11:39

modern religious kosher Jews

00:11:43

understand pigs as being unkosher.

00:11:47

They're not things that you can eat.

00:11:50

Let's -- let me just say, for those of you who are kosher

00:11:53

or Jewish in nature, man, God bless you.

00:11:56

I don't want to make you stumble,

00:11:58

but I'm telling you, bacon is freaking awesome.

00:12:01

It's not just bacon, but bacon wrapped shrimp.

00:12:04

Oh, amazing.

00:12:08

But sorry to cause you to stumble.

00:12:10

He is feeding unclean creatures.

00:12:13

That's how far he's gone from God.

00:12:17

He's run away from God, who the father represents God.

00:12:21

And now he's doing something

00:12:22

that he would have previously never dreamt of.

00:12:24

Sometimes we get to the end of our rope,

00:12:25

we do things that we will never thought that we were would do.

00:12:30

And he's doing it.

00:12:31

And he starts to come to his spiritual senses,

00:12:33

going, "What am I doing here?

00:12:36

I'd be better off working for my dad."

00:12:39

So he works out this script in his mind.

00:12:41

"I know what I'm going to do.

00:12:42

I'm going to go back to my dad and tell him,

00:12:44

"Dad, I've offended you. I've sinned against you.

00:12:48

Could you just take me back as a hired servant, as a hired hand?

00:12:52

And that's what I want to do."

00:12:56

He basically says, "I know I can't be a son of yours anymore,

00:13:01

but I hope I can be a slave to you right now."

00:13:07

This is the relationship

00:13:08

and the understanding many of us have with God.

00:13:10

We think that we have to work our way to God.

00:13:13

We think that we have to do the right things for God to have us.

00:13:16

We think that God will only have us in His presence

00:13:20

as long as we're not drinking, so long as I'm working out,

00:13:22

maybe if I work out then God will like me more.

00:13:25

Or if I don't have caffeinated coffee

00:13:27

or if I go to church or if I have morning time with God.

00:13:31

All these things may be fine and good to do,

00:13:34

but if we're viewing God as a slave master,

00:13:38

as a task master, we're going to be drawn

00:13:40

to slave our way back to God.

00:13:42

And that's what this younger brother thinks.

00:13:44

He thinks his dad was standing in the way of his joy before

00:13:47

and he thinks the way to get back

00:13:48

to some sense of happiness is to do enough

00:13:52

to satisfy his dad and slave away for his dad.

00:13:57

So he decides to go back.

00:13:59

And by the way, as he goes back,

00:14:02

he's not expressing a desire for his father.

00:14:06

He's not expressing a desire to be in a relation with his dad.

00:14:09

He just wants his life to be a little more comfortable.

00:14:12

And as he walks back, we get this picture of the dad

00:14:18

who has been longing for his son for a long time.

00:14:22

We get this picture of this dad

00:14:24

who's been scanning the horizon,

00:14:27

looking to see if the son will come back.

00:14:32

A good father never feels good

00:14:33

when a child is separate from him.

00:14:36

I believe the father is longing

00:14:39

for reconnection with his child.

00:14:41

He's looking over the horizon every day,

00:14:43

just looking to see if there's just a turn,

00:14:46

if just maybe that is the day that the son comes home.

00:14:51

This is the way God is with you.

00:14:52

He wants to see a turn.

00:14:53

He is looking and he is longing for you to be with Him

00:14:56

because that is what's good.

00:15:00

So the son makes his way home.

00:15:02

And I've got to think that he's not excited about this walk.

00:15:05

It's literally a walk of shame.

00:15:09

He is thinking about

00:15:12

the stupidity under which he's operated.

00:15:15

He's regretting his choices.

00:15:17

He's regretting how he squandered the money.

00:15:19

He's probably thinking through what his dad's reaction

00:15:22

was going to be and what his dad's reaction is going to be.

00:15:25

I've got to think he's just rehearsing

00:15:26

the lines in his mind.

00:15:27

He's going, "Father, I've sinned against you.

00:15:34

Would you give me a job? Would you --

00:15:36

Would you please accept me back as one of your hired hands?

00:15:39

I don't need much. I just need, dad--"

00:15:40

As he's rehearsing this painful monologue in his mind

00:15:45

and wondering how is going to work out,

00:15:47

he has no idea of the goodness of the father

00:15:51

who's not just waiting for him, looking for him.

00:15:57

Because here's how the story continues:

00:16:38

This father sees his son coming.

00:16:42

And we get this picture as if he's coming off the porch

00:16:45

and he actually runs to him.

00:16:47

He doesn't sit there and go, "Well, here he comes.

00:16:51

I hope he's come to his senses.

00:16:53

Well, it's about time he understood

00:16:56

he had a good deal living with me."

00:16:58

It's not that at all.

00:17:00

He sees his son and he takes off after him.

00:17:03

He would have had a long garment back then.

00:17:05

He would have taken it up and bunched up between his legs

00:17:07

in what's known as a girding your loins.

00:17:09

He would have tucked it into his belt,

00:17:11

which is very unbecoming for an older man

00:17:14

in the Middle East, actually very unbecoming for me.

00:17:17

I wouldn't want to do that.

00:17:18

You'd see my bird legs.

00:17:20

He sticks it in there and then he runs. He runs to him.

00:17:25

This is a picture of what your Heavenly Father does.

00:17:29

All He wants to see from you

00:17:31

is the slightest of bit movement towards Him.

00:17:34

All He wants to see is if you want to be back around Him.

00:17:41

All He wants is us to want Him to be in relationship with Him.

00:17:46

And he cuts him off, cuts him off.

00:17:48

He says, "Hey, that calf you've been working on,

00:17:50

that calf we've been fattening up to make a huge,

00:17:53

bring him in.

00:17:54

We're going to -- we're going to have a celebration.

00:17:56

He gets a robe. He wraps the robe around him.

00:17:59

That calf represents I'm going to throw a party for you.

00:18:03

This robe he wraps around him

00:18:05

represents I'm going to give you my identity.

00:18:08

We're going to talk about that in just a moment.

00:18:10

And he takes his ring off his finger, sticks on this ring.

00:18:12

It would have been a signet ring,

00:18:14

a ring you seal things with that represents his credit.

00:18:17

It represents his wealth.

00:18:19

He gives it to him.

00:18:21

It's like he again cuts his estate in half for him again.

00:18:28

All the father wanted was to see his son coming.

00:18:33

Now, you think that it's over right now, but it isn't over.

00:18:39

In many ways, it's just getting started.

00:18:44

As he runs and as his father embraced his son

00:18:48

and as this son enjoys the generosity

00:18:53

and the favor of his dad, the older son gets wind of this.

00:19:00

Friends come and say, "Hey, did you hear what your dad did?

00:19:03

Did you hear what your dad did?

00:19:05

He's creating quite a scene with your younger brother."

00:19:12

Actually, here's how the verse reads:

00:20:20

Everybody can relate to something in this story

00:20:24

because everybody in this story is either

00:20:26

a younger brother or is an older brother.

00:20:31

Everybody there's roughly seven versus

00:20:33

describing the younger brother

00:20:34

and seven versus describing the older brother.

00:20:36

There's actually 861 words in the English language

00:20:41

describing and translating

00:20:43

what happened with the younger brother

00:20:46

while there's 971 words for the older brother.

00:20:52

Actually, the older brother gets more space here.

00:20:57

And I think this is important for us because the kind

00:21:01

of people that generally watch church services online,

00:21:08

the kind of people that are drawn to spiritual content,

00:21:12

are generally older brother types of people

00:21:16

vs. younger brother types of people.

00:21:19

There are two types of people who are with us today though,

00:21:20

both are being equally addressed.

00:21:23

There is the younger brother, there's the older brother.

00:21:26

There's the partier and there's the rule follower.

00:21:30

There is the immoral and there is the moral.

00:21:34

There is the rebel and there is the religious.

00:21:39

Two different personality types, but the same core problem,

00:21:43

a misunderstanding of the character of the father.

00:21:47

This older brother is not happy

00:21:50

that this younger brother is getting grace.

00:21:54

That's what he's getting, he's getting grace.

00:21:56

He's getting forgiveness. He's getting a second chance.

00:21:59

He's getting love when he doesn't deserve it.

00:22:02

And he's not happy about it at all.

00:22:05

Is it because he recognizes that

00:22:07

half the estate has already gone to him

00:22:09

and now what's his is going to be eating into?

00:22:13

Is it because of that or is it just the principle of it,

00:22:15

of, "Oh, you've done this and now you're getting this?"

00:22:18

This is the way older brothers are

00:22:21

who are filled with churches and watching church streams

00:22:24

and watching things on YouTube all over the place

00:22:26

right now, we're drawn to things that verify

00:22:29

and validate our worldview.

00:22:31

And our worldview says if I do the right things,

00:22:37

then God will reward me.

00:22:40

And if someone does the wrong things,

00:22:42

then God will punish them.

00:22:44

And yet here we have a younger brother

00:22:47

who does the wrong things and they aren't punished.

00:22:52

They're actually given grace.

00:22:55

And here we have someone who is doing all the right things

00:22:59

and actually there's some huge, massive cracks

00:23:03

in their characters.

00:23:05

If you want to dig deeper into this topic,

00:23:08

I think the best book ever written on it was by Tim Keller.

00:23:11

And he says this:

00:23:43

We have the free spirit and the religious spirit,

00:23:46

the partier and the scholar,

00:23:48

the irreligious and the hyper religious.

00:23:52

I like this story for so many reasons.

00:23:54

Part of it is I see myself in it.

00:23:57

And I see myself in both sons at different times.

00:24:04

I grew up and going to church.

00:24:05

My mom played the organ, dad sang in the choir

00:24:08

and I was just a church-y kid.

00:24:10

And the older I got, the more I rebelled against it

00:24:14

and the more I just had zero interest in church

00:24:16

or anything God.

00:24:17

I, in high school, turned into your classic partier.

00:24:20

I don't know what your high school was like

00:24:22

or what your high school is like right now,

00:24:24

but if there's a kid in your high school

00:24:25

that it doesn't matter what the party is,

00:24:27

he's at that one, that was me.

00:24:30

If there's a guy in your high school that everybody

00:24:33

had a story every Monday about what so-and-so did

00:24:37

or how much so-and-so drank or -- that was me.

00:24:40

That was me. I was that guy. I was the rebel.

00:24:42

I just wanted to enjoy life

00:24:45

and enjoying life for me meant getting wasted

00:24:48

and doing all the things associated with that.

00:24:51

And I ended up coming to understand who God was.

00:24:56

I ended up coming to want Him as my dad.

00:25:00

And I had a profound, boy, gosh, you could call it

00:25:03

a conversion experience. A profound experience

00:25:06

that really changed my trajectory.

00:25:09

Unfortunately, years later, I find myself in seminary

00:25:13

and I find myself to be the older brother.

00:25:18

I find myself to now be the religious son.

00:25:21

I was the rebellious son.

00:25:22

I now find myself to be the religious son.

00:25:25

I was priding myself, just like this son was in Jesus parable,

00:25:28

he was priding himself on how diligent he was

00:25:31

working the fields

00:25:32

and how diligent he was doing the right things

00:25:33

and how he wasn't squandering the father's money. And how --

00:25:36

I found myself priding myself on, yeah,

00:25:38

but I could be going after a career that made more money,

00:25:40

but I am going into the ministry.

00:25:43

And I found myself being prideful

00:25:45

for the theological terms that I knew

00:25:47

and how I was learning original languages

00:25:50

and how I was doing certain things.

00:25:53

And, you know, I used to when I was a rebellious son,

00:25:56

I used to chew tobacco and I was like,

00:25:57

"Now, I don't, I don't smoke. I don't you chew.

00:25:59

I don't date the girls who do. None of those things.

00:26:01

I am a good person."

00:26:03

I found myself incredibly impressed with my theology

00:26:06

and my standards.

00:26:08

There were people I went to school with who would tell you

00:26:10

about the time how I argued one time, I'm ashamed of it.

00:26:13

I argued how Mother Teresa wasn't going to heaven.

00:26:18

Yeah, I had my problems.

00:26:19

I had massive, massive, massive problems

00:26:22

and so does and so did this older brother in Jesus story

00:26:28

had a massive, massive problem.

00:26:30

Now, he had all kind of -- Part of it was his lack of love.

00:26:37

He talks about this, his brother.

00:26:40

He doesn't even say,

00:26:41

"Now this younger brother of mine comes home."

00:26:45

He says, "Now this son of yours."

00:26:48

He doesn't want to even identify that he shares DNA with him.

00:26:52

He's completely separated from him.

00:26:55

Now, both of these folks, both these brothers,

00:26:58

actually have some things in common.

00:27:01

We're going to use this triangle a few times here.

00:27:05

And this triangle is actually an arrow.

00:27:10

I want my life to get some place. I hope you do, too.

00:27:13

If you want your life to be on the move,

00:27:14

if you want your life to get some place,

00:27:18

you have to be firm in the goodness of God.

00:27:22

You have to be aware that there is a good Father

00:27:26

who loves you and cares for you and is for you.

00:27:30

Here's how this works.

00:27:31

There is a God who is above and beyond us, our Father.

00:27:37

That's one element.

00:27:38

Another important element to understand is who we are,

00:27:42

what is our identity?

00:27:43

And then another element is our works

00:27:48

or how we obey, the things we do,

00:27:52

the good religious things that we do,

00:27:54

the good moral things that we do.

00:27:56

Both of these brothers, what they were trying to do

00:27:59

was the older brother, "Hey, I've been doing the works,

00:28:03

I've been doing my works.

00:28:04

I've been doing the things I should do around the house

00:28:07

and so therefore, I am your son because of those things

00:28:11

and therefore I should get to you and your riches."

00:28:17

At the same time, we have the younger brother

00:28:20

who once he's rebellious, he thinks,

00:28:22

"OK, I've got to get back to my dad.

00:28:24

I've got to get back to my Heavenly Father.

00:28:27

I've got to be a servant.

00:28:28

I've got to be a servant, because I'm not worthy

00:28:30

to be called your son, a servant. I'm not worthy.

00:28:33

But maybe someday if I do these things

00:28:36

and I work these things, then I'll be able to be there.

00:28:38

And maybe someday I'll get back in my dad's graces."

00:28:44

This is the path of slavery.

00:28:48

This is the path of religion.

00:28:52

This is the path of duty.

00:28:55

This is the path of wearing yourself out.

00:28:59

This is the path of God being some far off distant entity

00:29:03

that I may get to someday, but I'm not worthy of right now.

00:29:08

This is not the path of understanding the Good Father.

00:29:12

Here's actually the way this works.

00:29:15

The way this works is exactly the opposite.

00:29:20

God tells us who we are.

00:29:23

He gives us our identity.

00:29:26

When Jesus gets baptized, it says in the Bible,

00:29:30

"The spirit descends upon Him like a dove from heaven,

00:29:32

and the Father says to Him,

00:29:34

"This is my son in whom I am well pleased."

00:29:36

God tells Him who He is.

00:29:38

Today it seems so enlightened for us to allow our kids

00:29:42

to discover who they are.

00:29:44

That's not a good parents do.

00:29:46

Good parents don't allow their kids to discover who they are.

00:29:49

Good parents tell their kids who they are.

00:29:53

No kid at two years old has any idea who they are,

00:29:56

let alone even 12 years old.

00:29:58

Good fathers, good mothers, love, build into,

00:30:02

notice their kids and they tell them who they are.

00:30:06

You are a Tome.

00:30:08

You are a leader.

00:30:11

You are a good person.

00:30:13

You are a good man in the making.

00:30:16

We tell them who they are and out of that comes our works.

00:30:22

When Jesus was told who He was,

00:30:23

out of that came his teaching and His miracles.

00:30:27

He has no teaching record in the Bible,

00:30:29

no miracles that are recorded in the Bible

00:30:33

until this happens and this comes out.

00:30:36

This is the way it works.

00:30:38

I'm rooted in the goodness of God.

00:30:41

I'm rooted in understanding and out of this goes --

00:30:44

Friends, I'm tell you, this is massive. This is huge.

00:30:47

The number of people I know who believe that,

00:30:50

"Man, I've just got to --

00:30:51

I've got to be in constant self-improvement mode

00:30:54

and God will be happy."

00:30:55

Where does it say in the Bible

00:30:57

you have to be constantly improving yourself?

00:30:59

Where does it say in the Bible

00:31:00

we have to be constantly trying to lose weight,

00:31:03

constantly trying to eliminate caffeine from your life,

00:31:07

constantly trying to add more volunteer

00:31:09

opportunities in your life?

00:31:11

It may be good to volunteer more,

00:31:12

it may be find a drop some pounds,

00:31:14

maybe caffeine's starting to jack you up,

00:31:15

but don't think for a minute that what you do impresses God,

00:31:20

says, "Oh, now they're doing it.

00:31:22

Now they're separating their recyclables. Oh-ho-ho.

00:31:24

I've got to start saying yes to some prayers that they ask.

00:31:28

Oh, my gosh.

00:31:29

Now they just helped a little old lady across the street.

00:31:33

OK, now -- now I'm going to start listening."

00:31:36

It's not the way it works, friends.

00:31:38

We all have our own morality we slap on us.

00:31:40

We all have our own systems that we're trying to operate.

00:31:43

And this system, this backwards system is not--

00:31:48

This is God's system.

00:31:49

This is God's.

00:31:50

There is an entity that wants you and I

00:31:54

to work this backward system

00:31:56

that just wears us slap out and doesn't work.

00:31:59

Here's how Jesus refers to this opposing entity

00:32:03

or this opposing father in the Book of John 8:44, he says

00:32:07

to a bunch of religious people who are older brothers, he says:

00:32:33

There is an evil one, there's an evil entity

00:32:35

that speaks lies to you and he tells you,

00:32:38

"Work, improve yourself

00:32:40

so you can earn the right to get to God.

00:32:43

Work and improve yourself so God will love you.

00:32:46

Work, improve yourselves

00:32:47

so that God might actually care about your life."

00:32:49

Friends, this is a lie. It's a lie.

00:32:53

That your brother did nothing,

00:32:55

did nothing of his own accord. Nothing.

00:32:58

All he did was make a turn and go in the direction

00:33:02

of his father and his father ran to him.

00:33:07

You do not have to work for God's approval.

00:33:10

You do not.

00:33:12

And you don't have to do X, Y, Z

00:33:16

to make you be secure in the love of God.

00:33:19

God does care about our work. He does.

00:33:22

He cares about whether or not we obey Him. He does.

00:33:26

But He mostly cares about it because

00:33:29

it's an indication of whether or not we're in

00:33:32

an abiding, loving relationship with Him.

00:33:35

He wants us to lean into His goodness.

00:33:37

He wants us to lean into His presence.

00:33:39

He wants us to be satisfied with Him and Him alone

00:33:43

and then as a national outpouring

00:33:46

to be a blessing to those around us and pour into those.

00:33:49

My kids. Do I want my kids to be well-behaved?

00:33:53

Yeah, I do. I do.

00:33:55

But I want them to be well behaved because

00:33:58

they feel confident in my approval.

00:34:00

I want them to naturally want to do chores around the house

00:34:03

because they understand what it's like to be at my table.

00:34:06

They understand how many blessings I've given.

00:34:09

I want them to enjoy to be around me,

00:34:11

come around to be around me,

00:34:13

not, "I've got to come to Dad's house to do some chores."

00:34:17

And when they want to be around me, everything falls into place.

00:34:21

And when you want to be around God,

00:34:23

things just starting to fall into place.

00:34:25

Now, there's one final twist to the story, a fascinating one.

00:34:31

The older brother, not only was he messing up

00:34:33

and not getting his way to God,

00:34:36

trying to get his way to God the wrong way,

00:34:37

but the older brother had missed the plot a lot earlier.

00:34:42

All ancient cultures understand that the oldest son,

00:34:46

the oldest brother, has a responsibility for the family.

00:34:50

He's not only going to be in charge of the family later on,

00:34:52

but therefore he has a responsibility for the family

00:34:54

now, and should act that way.

00:34:57

That older brother should have gone out

00:35:00

after that younger brother.

00:35:03

That older brother had a responsibility

00:35:05

in the cultural context of that day

00:35:06

to go out after his younger brother.

00:35:09

That older brother doesn't do it.

00:35:12

During the Vietnam War there was an American GI

00:35:15

who was lost and they couldn't find him and know where he was.

00:35:20

And there was an older brother that flew to Vietnam

00:35:25

and went in search of his younger brother.

00:35:28

And according to the story, the Vietcong heard about this

00:35:33

and allowed this brother to do what he needed to do,

00:35:35

going in search of because Vietnam of the '70s

00:35:38

was closer to an ancient Middle East culture than we are today.

00:35:42

And they understood this value of the older brother

00:35:46

going out to look.

00:35:47

He was featured on the front page of Life Magazine.

00:35:51

Here's what's really wild with this.

00:35:53

While Jesus is communicating to us

00:35:57

the true identity of our Good Father,

00:36:00

He at the same time is the older brother.

00:36:03

The Bible refers to Jesus as the first born of creation.

00:36:08

He's the oldest brother, He is the first born.

00:36:10

What does he do? He goes after us. He comes after you.

00:36:13

You know what? You're here right now.

00:36:15

You're listening to this right now.

00:36:16

You might be understanding this right now

00:36:18

because Jesus is coming after you,

00:36:20

because He wants you to see, He wants you to understand.

00:36:24

He's wooed you into watching this.

00:36:26

He's wooed you into hearing these life-giving words.

00:36:31

It's not by accident.

00:36:32

It's because Jesus is chasing you down.

00:36:35

And He's chasing you down because He wants you

00:36:37

to understand the goodness of your Heavenly Father.

00:36:43

He's good and cares for you, He loves you.

00:36:48

He just wants you to be around.

00:36:51

He's created you and He has plans for you

00:36:54

to be in his family. That's a Good Dad.

00:36:58

Let's pray about that right now.

00:37:01

God, I'm astounded by Your goodness,

00:37:03

not just Your goodness to be one who blesses,

00:37:06

but Your goodness to come after us,

00:37:12

Your goodness to bless us with grace

00:37:15

and forgiveness and a second chance.

00:37:19

I thank you for that and for the person

00:37:23

and grace of Jesus, you are Good. Amen.

00:37:30

- Man, I really love what Brien said

00:37:32

about God being a Good Father.

00:37:34

- It's a Journey for sure,

00:37:35

this idea of trusting God is a Good Father.

00:37:37

As I've become a father I know it's become clear to me

00:37:40

that's not just an automatic thing

00:37:41

that kids trust their parents.

00:37:43

It's a process and it involves every single part

00:37:46

of our lives, including our money.

00:37:47

- Absolutely.

00:37:48

And we can trust God with our money because

00:37:51

He's a generous Father and so He wants us to be generous, too.

00:37:54

And you can practice generosity right now

00:37:56

by going to Crossroads.net/give.

00:37:59

- I don't know where you are in your journey

00:38:00

of trusting God as a Good Father,

00:38:02

but we're about to catch up with a friend of mine

00:38:04

who has an incredible story about learning to trust God

00:38:07

as a Father despite having an earthly father who let her down.

00:38:31

- Hey, Dawn, how are you?

00:38:33

Good to see you. Thanks for having us.

00:38:35

- Woo, it's hot. - It is, it's a little bit hot.

00:38:43

- Just a little bit.

00:38:48

- Well, hey, Dawn. - Hey, Kyle.

00:38:50

- It's so good to be here.

00:38:51

Thank you for for talking to us today.

00:38:52

We're talking about God as a Good Father,

00:38:56

which I know can be a really hard concept to grasp,

00:38:58

particularly if you've not had the best relationship

00:39:01

with your earthly dad.

00:39:02

Which I know is kind of where your story starts.

00:39:04

So take us to the beginning. Talk about you and your dad.

00:39:08

- Well, mother and father divorced

00:39:10

when I was really little.

00:39:11

I don't remember my dad being in the home.

00:39:14

My dad was very abusive.

00:39:17

He beat my mom a lot.

00:39:21

And actually, I believe it was the last beating.

00:39:26

He beat her while she was pregnant with me.

00:39:29

My mother after that ran for her life, ran for our lives.

00:39:33

So my father would blow in, I would like to say,

00:39:35

like every seven years or so.

00:39:37

I talked to him on the phone on occasion.

00:39:39

- What did that feel like as a kid?

00:39:41

You had to have like friends and see them with their dad

00:39:44

and you don't have a dad. What did that feel like to you?

00:39:48

- Yeah. I was jealous and envious.

00:39:51

I wanted a dad so bad.

00:39:53

I wanted to have this relationship.

00:39:56

I wanted to be able to sit down and talk to my dad,

00:39:59

sit on his lap.

00:40:00

And I wanted him to say to me, like, "You're my baby girl."

00:40:03

And I longed for that

00:40:05

and that was something that I didn't have.

00:40:07

And the way it manifested itself was in a lot of anger.

00:40:11

And the way that manifested outwardly is

00:40:15

I got involved in a gang.

00:40:18

I started smoking and drinking when I was really little

00:40:21

and just really doing things that I shouldn't be doing.

00:40:23

I got into a lot of fights in school.

00:40:25

My dad was not big on affirmation,

00:40:28

so I didn't get it from my dad,

00:40:30

so I would look for affirmation from other people.

00:40:34

And if a man told me, like, "Oh, you're good looking,"

00:40:37

or whatever I was, "Oh," you know, I really took that in.

00:40:42

And that cost me because the first year of my marriage,

00:40:45

I committed adultery

00:40:47

and I carried that secret for 17 years.

00:40:50

And it was torment.

00:40:52

I remember like somebody told me like

00:40:55

I could have this relationship with God.

00:40:57

And I really wanted to cultivate that.

00:41:00

And I remember it was during a time of just prayer

00:41:04

and fasting for me and I was reading this book.

00:41:07

And in this book, I felt convicted that

00:41:14

I was carrying this deep, dark secret

00:41:17

that I needed to share with my husband.

00:41:20

And I really didn't want to do it because

00:41:22

I knew it was going to cost me.

00:41:25

But I also knew, like, I wanted to get closer to God.

00:41:28

I wanted this relationship that I heard people talk about.

00:41:32

And this was the boulder that separated us.

00:41:36

And I felt convicted that I had to tell.

00:41:40

And I did and it was rough,

00:41:42

but the person who I was at the point of sharing it,

00:41:47

I was a very different person.

00:41:50

I had repented to God first and asked Him to help me

00:41:55

to not do that again and to help me to know,

00:41:59

like, how did I get there?

00:42:01

Because I believe if you don't know how you get to a place,

00:42:05

you're destined to be there again.

00:42:06

And I needed to know how did I get there?

00:42:10

And what He let me know is that

00:42:12

I was looking for love in wrong places, wrong faces.

00:42:16

It has been miraculous.

00:42:18

I can say my husband and I had been married for 37 years

00:42:22

and that is to God be the glory.

00:42:25

So God has done just a redeeming work in our marriage.

00:42:31

And then God saying, "You are my daughter

00:42:34

and I'm well pleased with you."

00:42:36

And it was a time of weeping

00:42:40

and really just receiving God's truth

00:42:42

that I am who He says I am.

00:42:45

And so all of the other things that I've dealt with

00:42:49

just really just washing over and just washing out

00:42:53

because they've been replaced with some truth,

00:42:57

the truth that I need it so desperately in my life.

00:43:00

I now see myself as a daughter.

00:43:04

And I am a woman that I never thought that I could be

00:43:07

because I have a dad that I never thought that I could have,

00:43:10

and that's my Heavenly Father.

00:43:12

And while I don't have my earthly father here,

00:43:15

I still wish that I had him, but that's not the case.

00:43:19

I have a Heavenly Father who loves me despite anything.

00:43:23

He loves me unconditionally

00:43:25

and that has been transforming for me.

00:43:28

So if I get up and my hair is turned to the other side

00:43:32

or whatever, He loves me just the way I am.

00:43:36

And that's the kind of dad I want.

00:52:35

- Thanks for being with us today.

00:52:37

Don't let your experience stop here.

00:52:38

The Journey has three critical parts to it.

00:52:40

- And the first part is to watch the weekend service,

00:52:43

and you already did that, so congratulations.

00:52:45

The second part is to do the individual personalized work.

00:52:48

And the third part is to get into a group.

00:52:51

- And the group part is absolutely critical

00:52:54

to your experience

00:52:55

and it's incredibly easy to jump into one.

00:52:57

Just go to Crossroads.net/journey

00:52:59

and we've got online groups, in person groups for you.

00:53:02

We'd love to connect you with the right people for you.

00:53:04

- Like I said, that individual work is such a critical piece

00:53:07

and you can get that work by downloading the Crossroads app

00:53:11

wherever you download your apps.

00:53:13

- We will see you next week for the third week of The Journey.

00:53:16

Between now and then, me and Hannah,

00:53:17

we're going to keep rocking the yellow onesies just like this.

	Kyle and Hannah Spread Joy	0:39
	Searching For A Good Father	4:04
	Dawn's Story	38:14
	Worship: Good Good Father	43:44
	Worship: Never Let Go	48:46

Recent Series