What Do I Do With My Cravings? | Indulgence, Self-Denial, and God's Third and Better Way

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- Hey, welcome to Crossroads.

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We are so glad that you are joining us online today.

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Now, as you might notice, I'm not in my normal spot.

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I am actually in La Paz, Bolivia,

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because as we often say around Crossroads,

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we're a community of people all over the world

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who are running after Jesus together.

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And we're going to see that firsthand right here

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from La Paz, Bolivia, because I'm actually

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visiting part of our Crossroads Anywhere community.

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We've got thousands of people who call our church home

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who are running after God together,

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and many of them meet in church buildings,

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but many of them don't.

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Many of them meet in dorms, in coffee shops,

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in prisons, and in La Paz, Bolivia.

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Today, we're actually doing

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something really, really special.

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We're going to be celebrating baptisms.

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And I recently heard baptisms described as

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sort of like crossing a border.

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It's like the stamp in your passport.

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It's like the thing that officializes

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and marks that moment that you have crossed

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a threshold in your life.

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You've gone from one place to another place.

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That's what we're celebrating today with baptism,

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that people have left an old place,

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an old way of living behind, and said,

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"God, I'm going to move forward with You."

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And I hope that as we do this you're reminded,

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and man, that we celebrate not just what God has done

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in a moment of someone going under the water

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and coming out and saying, "Hey, I want to follow Jesus,"

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but that that's one moment, that's one page

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in a whole story of what God has been doing in people's lives.

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And that moment of saying, "God, I want to follow You

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as best I can for the rest of my life,

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and I'm going to leave that old place behind

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and go to a new place."

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And that's not just their story,

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that that's your story and my story too.

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That God is always, always, always inviting us

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to go to a new place and that is worth celebrating.

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So as we worship and as we sing,

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you're going to see people at our sites

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and here in La Paz get baptized.

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And I hope that you'll join me in celebrating,

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because that is the story of a God who is

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always in the process of making old things new,

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broken things whole, and redeeming you and me.

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-Hands up, come on, let's celebrate.

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Come on, let's sing.

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- Come on. We sing this together.

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- Come on, we celebrate together.

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- Every one of these people getting in the water today,

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what stands behind them are tens or hundreds

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or maybe thousands of prayers for this moment.

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And they're choosing to say, "I trust in God."

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We sing together.

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- God, those words scream something

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that my heart is connecting to.

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It's that drive toward faith and hope

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that as long as I keep my eyes on You

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I know that You won't let me down.

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Yeah, sure, some things might not go my way.

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And on this path, some things might happen

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that I don't see, because You have a bigger plan.

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But it's because that I know that You are good

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and that You love me that I can follow You and say,

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"Show me what it looks like

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and I'll give You my life, I'll follow You."

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And that we learn to do that a little bit more today.

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In Jesus's name we pray. Amen.

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Come on, let's celebrate all the new life

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in this room and got baptized.

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Come on. It's amazing.

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It's amazing to see God at work in our church

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and in our community and in our friends.

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Maybe these were some of your friends up here

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and God is doing the work in them.

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It's an amazing thing.

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Hey, why don't you turn to a couple of people,

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make this place feel small. Give 'em a high five.

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Tell 'em your name if you don't know 'em,

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and then you can have a seat.

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- Hey, I want to give you a sense of some of

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the great things that are happening

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in our Crossroads community, and just for a moment,

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give you a sense of the scope and breadth

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of the Crossroads community as well.

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As we mentioned earlier, I'm actually here

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in La Paz, Bolivia, and we didn't just want

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to take a random trip, we wanted to actually go

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to where people are being served.

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That's who we are as a church.

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We're going to go to where there's a need.

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And so that includes here in La Paz, Bolivia.

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And we've been talking for weeks and weeks

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and weeks now about Go Day, where wherever we are,

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whether in La Paz, Bolivia; Cincinnati, Ohio;

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Columbus; Detroit; anywhere,

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there's a chance for you to serve

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and make an impact in your local community.

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And that's true of where you live,

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the same way it's true right here.

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We're actually meeting here in Cupini,

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it's a neighborhood on the west side of La Paz, Bolivia.

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Just over to the left here,

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there's a building that's yellow.

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This is where our La Paz community meets,

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and they gather, and there's actually two homes

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that are in the background right now

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that are actually going to be the sites of

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some of our go projects, going to be repairing a wall

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and a home that desperately needs it,

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and just seeing needs and meeting them.

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So I don't know what it's going to look like for you

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come Go Day, but I want you to join in

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and throw your weight behind the collective thing

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that happens when we serve people

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the way Jesus called us to.

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Where we don't just go to church or watch church,

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but we lean in and we be the church.

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All the information at crossroads.net/GoDay.

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I hope you don't miss this chance to be a part of

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the mission that our church is constantly running after.

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Now, whether it's Go Day, whether it's

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the community here in Cupini in Bolivia,

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whether it's Couples Camp, whether it's online resources,

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whether it's recovery work,

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the stuff that we do in prisons, all of it happens

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not just by default. None of it happens on accident.

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All of it actually happens because

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people are intentionally faithful and generous.

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And there's actually a group of those folks that

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I want to call out specifically called the Blue Team.

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The Blue Team is just sort of our name

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for the self-declared tithers.

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These are people who said, "Hey, God,

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I want to trust You and say, You can do more

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with 10% of what I have than I can do with 100.

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That's not an easy decision,

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but it's an incredibly important step of faith

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that God calls us to.

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So I don't know what you believe about church.

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I don't know what you believe about God.

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I don't know what you believe about tithing.

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And we're here to help you on your journey

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wherever you are on it.

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You can get more information and maybe take

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a step towards trusting God with your finances

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at crossroads.net/give.

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Just this past weekend, we had over a thousand people

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who were gathering as couples to invest

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specifically in their marriage, to say, "God,

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I want Your best for my spouse, and I want this to be

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the most important relationship in my life."

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And God did incredible, incredible things.

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We got to see lots of people baptized

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the same way you saw people get baptized today

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all over the map.

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And man, I want to give you a glimpse into

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what's happening and happened at Couples Camp

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and what God's doing

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in marriages all over our community.

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And maybe you were at Couples Camp,

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or maybe you right now don't want to wait 12 months

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until Couples Camp happens again.

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We actually have an ongoing marriage community

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specifically to invest in your marriage

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that actually my wife Rachel and I lead.

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It's incredible. We'd love for you to join us.

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We'll be interviewing experts.

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We'll be hearing from people who have great wisdom

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and experience to share to make your marriage incredible.

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I want to give you a glimpse into all the amazing things

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that God did at Couples Camp right now.

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- Life gets loud.

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Sometimes you just need the space to remember

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there's still a spark in there.

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Ignite is a day to step out of the noise

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and make space for whatever God wants to stir up in you next.

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It's a day that you are going to laugh, worship, learn,

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and just remember you are not alone

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in this life you're trying to live.

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Bring a friend and join us on June 6th

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for powerful teaching from me, Alli Patterson,

00:26:08

Annie F. Downs, and other women

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who will coach and encourage you toward what is next.

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You are the spark of revival.

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- Hey, Crossroads. Good to be with you.

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My name is Alli. Women, I want to see you at Ignite.

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This is a day designed for all of our women

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just to take a step toward the life

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that God is really sparking inside of you.

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And my team has been thinking about the fact

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that Mother's Day is coming up.

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Last week we had a bunch of young adults

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sign up for the conference, and this week

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I'm going to call all you moms

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and make it even easier for you to get a ticket to Ignite.

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There's a special code, Mom Ignite 2026.

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And guys or kids, if you're buying Mother's Day gifts,

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this is a way better one because

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she doesn't need another coffee mug.

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What she needs is some time, time with God,

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time with friends, time to really recover

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the spark that God has put inside of her.

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So women, seriously, I want to see you at Ignite.

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And anyone buying a gift for a mom,

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future mom is going to thank you

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that you sent her to Ignite.

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We've been spending a couple of weeks

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talking to our future selves,

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and we're going to keep doing that today.

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Today we're going to be talking about

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what we're doing today with the desires

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and needs and wants that we feel in our bodies.

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What we're doing with our bodies today

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is actually shaping and driving us toward a future

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that maybe we're not even fully considering

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how much is being impacted

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by what we feel in our bodies today.

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How many of you are getting nervous?

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You think I'm about to tell you to work out more,

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or talk about your sex life or something that

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you didn't come to church wanting to hear about today?

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No promises, maybe later.

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But first we're going to try to recover the vision

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that God originally had when He created our bodies.

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Let me pray for us.

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Lord, You're the Creator of all that we are,

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so today I just pray that we would understand

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Your original design and what in the world that has

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to do with the life that we're living in our bodies today.

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Help us to see and actually move according to

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who You are and the design that You have for our life.

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In Jesus's name, Amen.

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One of the desires that I feel in my body is that

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it would do some of the things that it used to do 20 years ago.

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Today is the day of marathon in Cincinnati.

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There's a marathon happening called the Flying Pig Marathon.

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I actually ran that marathon twice about,

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I don't know, 15, 20 years ago.

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And I kept thinking this morning,

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would my body still do that today?

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I have this craving for the things that my body used to do,

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and sometimes it doesn't lead me to great places.

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Like I've been -- I've had a tennis elbow thing that I got.

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How do you get tennis elbow from lifting weights?

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I really don't understand that.

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I have a hip thing that gets in my way of running sometimes.

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And it's because of my strategy.

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So what I do when I feel these things,

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and I really want to use my body in some of the ways

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that I used to use it, is I just do that.

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I just do whatever I want, and then I do it again,

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and then I do it again.

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And then a week later or a month later

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or like six months later, one of these nagging things

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starts happening and future me is not quite as happy

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as I was on the day that I forced myself into that.

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And I just, I kept thinking about the fact that

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this is really indicative of the fact that

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we have these pushy desires in our bodies

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and we feel them, whether we're conscious of that or not.

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How we respond is actually driving us

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toward a particular future.

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And I think we tend to do one of two things with our desires.

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We either completely indulge them.

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We just do what we want, when we want,

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and we do that thing and we, we listen and let that lead,

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or we put it away, we control it or discipline it

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or shove it down, and we completely starve that desire.

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Indulge or starve.

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Maybe we bounce back and forth.

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Maybe we do both with different kinds of things

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that our body really wants.

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But there's a third way.

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And I started thinking about this because I believe

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that God has something better for us than these extremes.

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And so I want you to actually be thinking about

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something in your own life as we talk the rest of the time.

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So I'm going to give you like 10 seconds,

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one deep breath, breathe in, breathe out together,

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and just ask yourself:

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what's my body really longing for right now?

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Let's do that.

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I think we tend to think immediately

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when we talk about these cravings our body has,

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we think about purely physical things like,

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you know, food or alcohol or substances or sex

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or something that's very obviously about our bodies.

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But what about the other things that we feel in them?

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I have for teenager, young adult types

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that live in my house or pass through my house

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on a regular basis.

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And they are craving -- I can tell you

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what each of them in different ways is craving right now.

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They're at the end of a semester.

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They're finishing final meets, co-op presentations,

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AP exams, they're all burning the candle at both ends

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and in their own ways I thought

00:31:50

each of them is craving rest and comfort.

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That's what I bet would be on their list of cravings.

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Maybe you felt a spark of anger in your body

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because you're craving respect from someone.

00:32:04

Or you feel the effects of anxiety

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and because you're craving control

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over something you don't have control over.

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And we feel these desires and they just seem

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to pulse through our bodies.

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And to figure out how do we not totally indulge

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or totally starve, what is this other way,

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we have to see the design that God intended

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when He created our bodies.

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So we're going to do a quick flyover

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of the story of Scripture, because I think

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you're going to find this really fascinating.

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The story of the Bible actually begins with a body,

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and it ends with a body.

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And it's really interesting to put that lens

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on the story of the Bible. So let's do that.

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Let's start in the garden.

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In the beginning, when God first created humanity.

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We're going to go to the very first chapter of Genesis,

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and it says this, Genesis 1:27-28.

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So God created man in His own image,

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in the image of God He created them.

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Male and female He created them, and God blessed them.

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And He said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply,

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and fill the earth, and subdue it,

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and have dominion over the fish of the sea

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and the birds of the heavens,

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and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

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As I think about what in the world

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these verses tell us about our body.

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First of all, you don't just have a body.

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You are a body.

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You were created, not just to exist inside of a body,

00:33:29

but as a body.

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I like to use the term embodied souls,

00:33:34

the material and the immaterial, one creation together.

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God created us with a body as a body,

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and it's inextricably linked to

00:33:47

the things that He made us to do.

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One of the most fascinating things to consider

00:33:51

is that your body was made to make God visible.

00:33:55

God is Spirit, and He created us with bodies

00:33:58

so that we could make Him visible on the earth.

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And not just visible, but but also to do some things

00:34:06

in His place over what He had made.

00:34:09

It says word of rule and reign

00:34:10

and have dominion over His creation.

00:34:13

And then He gave us a blessing, and He actually

00:34:16

gave us bodies that would bring forth the blessing

00:34:22

that He spoke over humanity: be fruitful and multiply.

00:34:26

And our very bodies were designed

00:34:29

to bring forward the blessing of God.

00:34:32

So you cannot separate the original creation of our bodies

00:34:37

with the things that it was supposed to do.

00:34:39

So we hunger to fulfill those things in our bodies.

00:34:45

You are not just a bag of bones

00:34:47

with the real you trapped inside.

00:34:50

Your body is absolutely part of what God

00:34:54

has created you to accomplish on this earth.

00:34:57

So it makes perfect sense that we would hunger

00:35:00

for those things, that you would crave, I don't know,

00:35:04

power because you were made to rule

00:35:07

or intimacy and connection

00:35:08

and that you would have attraction that would bring

00:35:12

forward the blessing that He spoke over us

00:35:15

and that you would desire beauty and joy

00:35:18

and perfection of your body because you were made

00:35:21

to make a beautiful, perfect, joyful God

00:35:24

visible to people on this earth.

00:35:28

All the things that our bodies like yearn for

00:35:32

are somehow connected to this Creator that

00:35:35

was actually supposed to be walking with us

00:35:39

to walk out this purpose that He had created us

00:35:43

to connect with Him as we did.

00:35:45

But see, the thing is, if you keep reading,

00:35:47

you really quickly get to the point where in Genesis 3,

00:35:51

where it all falls apart.

00:35:52

Now the Bible is really long.

00:35:54

We're only three chapters in, and this gets all messed up.

00:35:57

And the entire rest of the Bible, no kidding,

00:36:01

the entire rest of the Bible sets up a story

00:36:04

of God trying to return to the original design,

00:36:09

the original place where there's a Creator

00:36:11

that made you as an embodied soul

00:36:13

to actually represent Him and be blessed by Him

00:36:17

and walk with Him on the earth.

00:36:20

And we get a glimpse of this

00:36:22

in some of the rest of the story of the Bible,

00:36:24

as God creates a people that He eventually

00:36:27

calls the nation of Israel,

00:36:28

that's going to help redeem all this.

00:36:30

And He tells them some ways to connect with Him.

00:36:32

The first comes through a tabernacle.

00:36:34

He tells them build a tabernacle.

00:36:36

All that is is a set up/tear down worship center.

00:36:39

And in Exodus 25:8, it says:

00:36:41

Let them make a sanctuary for Me,

00:36:43

and I will dwell among them.

00:36:46

Here we have God trying to return to the design

00:36:49

where He could be with His people,

00:36:50

where He could live with them. Why?

00:36:53

So that they could fulfill the life that He had for them.

00:36:57

And then, as the nation of Israel got more permanent,

00:37:01

they go into the land that God has promised

00:37:03

and a temple gets built.

00:37:05

And in the book of 1 Kings we learn, it says that

00:37:08

in 1 Kings 8, the glory of the Lord filled the temple.

00:37:12

This was a permanent place in the nation of Israel

00:37:16

where the presence of God dwelled.

00:37:19

But He wasn't happy with that because His presence,

00:37:21

because of His holiness, was behind this curtain

00:37:24

only in a specific place, only to be approached

00:37:27

under specific circumstances.

00:37:30

And it was called the Holy of Holies.

00:37:33

But God wanted so much for His people to be able

00:37:36

to come and find Him and commune with Him

00:37:39

and worship Him and consult with Him

00:37:41

and get direction from Him.

00:37:43

And the temple was the permanent place

00:37:45

in the nation of Israel, but it was too distant still.

00:37:47

It wasn't all the way back to the original design.

00:37:51

And in just the right time, God sent His Son,

00:37:56

His eternal son to come to earth in a body.

00:38:04

And for the first time, God breaks through

00:38:06

into a human body.

00:38:09

He actually confines Himself to that space.

00:38:12

And John 1 says: the Word became flesh

00:38:15

and made His dwelling among us.

00:38:17

Guess what the verb in that sentence literally means?

00:38:20

It literally means He tabernacled,

00:38:21

He moved around with us.

00:38:24

He literally became God with us.

00:38:27

And as Jesus came to the end of His human life,

00:38:30

He began to imply that there was some way, some how,

00:38:33

that God was going to not just be present in His body,

00:38:36

but a new permanent presence with the people of God.

00:38:40

1 Corinthians 6:19 puts it like this:

00:38:44

Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit.

00:38:50

A temple, the new permanent place

00:38:52

for the presence of God to dwell

00:38:55

as close as He could possibly get.

00:38:59

The original design in the garden was God walking with us,

00:39:03

perfect, seamless relationship

00:39:06

so that we could experience the fulfillment

00:39:10

of all those desires and the life that He made us for.

00:39:13

And He took all this road back

00:39:16

to a permanent dwelling place for Him.

00:39:20

Our bodies. That is a wild story.

00:39:24

And that is absolutely the story of Scripture,

00:39:28

that God would make His way back closer and closer

00:39:31

and closer until your body could actually

00:39:34

be filled with Him, so that every desire

00:39:38

would be pointed in the direction of the life

00:39:41

that you and I were supposed to live.

00:39:44

But somewhere along the line, we lost this narrative.

00:39:48

We read the Bible and we don't even catch this.

00:39:51

We're like, Jesus, thumbs up.

00:39:53

No, Jesus actually can fill your body

00:39:56

through the Spirit of God

00:39:57

and all those things that we long for,

00:40:01

they can be filled by His Spirit.

00:40:04

It's a wild, wild story, and I want us to see

00:40:09

for a moment through a parable that Jesus told

00:40:12

what we do instead, because we've not only

00:40:15

lost the original design, you and I, we forget

00:40:18

that this is actually an option.

00:40:21

This is actually something that's real.

00:40:23

This is not a fairy tale for us.

00:40:26

This is the life that He's inviting us into.

00:40:29

But we do one of these other two things all the time.

00:40:31

I mentioned these earlier.

00:40:33

We either indulge anything that we want,

00:40:37

we just indulge it or we we starve it.

00:40:40

And you can see there's a parable Jesus tells.

00:40:43

And I've actually never read this parable

00:40:45

this way until recently.

00:40:46

And this light bulb went off and I thought,

00:40:48

"Oh my gosh, this is about the two different things

00:40:52

we do with the appetites and the needs

00:40:55

and the wants of our body."

00:40:56

It's called the parable of the Prodigal son,

00:41:00

and we find it in Luke 15. Here's how it starts.

00:41:03

There was a man who had two sons,

00:41:05

and the younger of them said to his father,

00:41:07

"Father, give me the share of property that's coming to me."

00:41:10

And he divided his property between them.

00:41:13

Not many days later, the younger son

00:41:15

gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country,

00:41:18

and there he squandered his property in reckless living.

00:41:22

Now, you and I, maybe we've had a phase like this.

00:41:26

We've had a younger brother moment.

00:41:28

Maybe you're in it now.

00:41:29

Maybe you do it with part of your life.

00:41:30

Maybe you did it for a decade of your life.

00:41:32

The younger brother lets his cravings lead

00:41:36

and he lets them lead to the extent that

00:41:39

he insults his father.

00:41:41

He actually says to his dad, essentially in that culture,

00:41:43

I wish you were dead.

00:41:46

Just give me what I need to fulfill the cravings of my body.

00:41:51

The younger son took the path of indulgence.

00:41:54

He wanted money. He wanted independence.

00:41:57

He wanted to leave.

00:41:58

He wanted satisfaction, payoff, comfort,

00:42:01

joy, power, whatever he was after,

00:42:04

he went and got it through the path of indulgence.

00:42:07

And the only way he could do that was to leave the father,

00:42:11

was to say to the father, "I wish you weren't even here.

00:42:14

Just give me what I want."

00:42:17

I've had eras of my life and moments of my life like this,

00:42:20

and I can tell you, and I'm sure most of us

00:42:23

have found this out the hard way,

00:42:24

that future you gets to the same spot

00:42:27

that the younger son got in this parable.

00:42:29

It says: when he had spent everything,

00:42:32

a severe famine arose in the country

00:42:34

and he began to be in need.

00:42:36

He comes up empty at the end of the day.

00:42:40

And if you read the full parable, you realize that

00:42:42

he starts begging to work with pigs.

00:42:44

In the Jewish culture he wanted something to eat so badly

00:42:48

that he begged to work with the most unclean animal,

00:42:52

the most degrading situation

00:42:54

that he could possibly have been in.

00:42:57

And he came up that empty, empty to the point

00:42:59

where he was willing to degrade himself.

00:43:05

My guess is some of us have been there.

00:43:07

Some of us are there.

00:43:08

We know exactly what this is like.

00:43:12

We're in craving and need that we feel in our body,

00:43:15

it runs the show.

00:43:21

If you battle an addiction

00:43:22

or you have battled an addiction,

00:43:24

my guess is you know this story intimately.

00:43:26

But what about those of you who are

00:43:29

always after the next achievement at work?

00:43:32

Does it ever really fill?

00:43:36

Or is it just out of your grasp?

00:43:37

Or if you're craving for a perfect body

00:43:40

begins to run your life to the extent that

00:43:42

it dictates everything you do, everywhere you go,

00:43:45

everything you eat, every workout you have

00:43:48

is all about the perfect body.

00:43:50

Are you ever really satisfied with that?

00:43:56

Isn't there a famine? Don't you come up empty.

00:44:03

The next move of the younger son is the key.

00:44:06

If you're younger brothering it right now

00:44:08

or you have in the past, here's what the younger son

00:44:11

does right now and it changes his whole life.

00:44:14

He gets all the way to the bottom and he says,

00:44:17

you know what?

00:44:19

Maybe things weren't so bad at my dad's house.

00:44:22

He says, "I will arise and go to my father.

00:44:24

And I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned

00:44:26

against heaven and before you.'"

00:44:29

And he arose, and he came to his father.

00:44:31

And he essentially asks his dad

00:44:33

to take him back as a hired hand.

00:44:36

Just, just pay me whatever you pay the servants.

00:44:39

I've hurt you and I'm back and I'll work it off.

00:44:42

But even though there was some things there

00:44:45

that the dad had to address, he did something

00:44:48

really helpful and really good.

00:44:50

He actually let his craving lead him back home.

00:44:55

When he was all the way at the bottom,

00:44:57

he actually just turned around and headed back home.

00:45:00

And this is the point where the younger son

00:45:02

actually gets it right.

00:45:04

Some of us are at empty right now.

00:45:06

We're all the way down.

00:45:07

Whatever we wanted, whatever we're craving,

00:45:09

whatever that indulgence was, we are down there.

00:45:12

And I have people say to me all the time,

00:45:14

"Alli, I can't just go back to God now.

00:45:18

How's He going to feel about that?

00:45:20

Or I'm ashamed of myself, or I'm not worthy or,

00:45:23

or I just don't think that's fair.

00:45:25

Like, I'm the one who walked away

00:45:26

and you're telling me God's just going to take me back?"

00:45:29

Yes, that's exactly what I'm telling you.

00:45:31

That's exactly what the parable says.

00:45:34

Here's what happens when the younger son goes home.

00:45:37

Listen to what the father says or does.

00:45:40

While he was still a long way off,

00:45:42

the father saw him, felt compassion,

00:45:46

and ran and embraced him and kissed him.

00:45:48

No scolding, no shame, no pay me back for what you took.

00:45:52

No guilt over the time that you weren't spending with me.

00:45:57

Nothing like that, just love and compassion.

00:45:59

And the father says to the people around him,

00:46:02

"Bring quickly the best robe and put it on him

00:46:05

and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet,

00:46:08

and bring the fattened calf and kill it

00:46:10

and let us eat and celebrate."

00:46:12

This father welcomed him home.

00:46:15

This father had no interest in reviewing

00:46:18

all of what he just lived.

00:46:20

My guess is he knew exactly what he had just lived,

00:46:25

and he wasn't the least bit worried

00:46:27

about the guilt and shame of that.

00:46:29

He actually threw a party for him

00:46:30

and completely restored his place in the family.

00:46:34

That's the kind of dad waiting for us

00:46:37

at the end of the path when we completely indulge

00:46:40

the craving or the need that we have

00:46:43

and we get to the end.

00:46:44

That is what's waiting for us at home.

00:46:48

That's incredible. That's an incredible story.

00:46:51

But that's not the only son in the parable.

00:46:54

That's not the only path that happened in the parable.

00:46:57

There's another son, the older son. Here's his story.

00:47:03

It says: Now his older son was in the field.

00:47:05

And as he came and drew near to the house,

00:47:07

he heard music and dancing.

00:47:08

And he called one of the servants

00:47:10

and asked what these things meant.

00:47:11

And said to him, "Your brother has come home,

00:47:14

and your father has killed the fattened calf

00:47:16

because he has received him back safe and sound."

00:47:20

But he was angry and refused to go in.

00:47:27

Some of us are older brothering it.

00:47:30

We have not taken the path of indulgence.

00:47:32

As a matter of fact,

00:47:33

we feel like we saw that for what it was.

00:47:35

We're not going to go that direction

00:47:37

and we did the right thing.

00:47:41

We stayed. We obeyed.

00:47:44

But when his dad throws a party,

00:47:46

when his dad is lavish with his resources,

00:47:48

when his dad wants him to come in and join the party,

00:47:52

he gets mad and he won't go in the house.

00:47:55

And the next part of the parable, we find out,

00:47:57

it's because of what older brother did

00:48:00

with the needs and the cravings and the longings that he felt.

00:48:07

Look, these many years I have served you

00:48:10

and I never disobeyed your command,

00:48:12

yet you never even gave me a young goat

00:48:15

that I might celebrate with my friends.

00:48:17

I'm the one that stayed.

00:48:19

I'm the one that did it right.

00:48:20

I'm the one that never disobeyed you.

00:48:22

And you never even gave me anything.

00:48:25

Have any of us ever said that to God?

00:48:30

That's what the older brother did.

00:48:31

What did he do with his cravings? He buried them.

00:48:38

He completely shoved them away.

00:48:39

He worked. He was disciplined. He obeyed his dad.

00:48:42

The whole time he was working in his house,

00:48:45

and he never went to his father and said,

00:48:48

"I have some desires.

00:48:50

I need some things. I want some things.

00:48:53

What do I do with that?

00:48:54

How do we work that out?"

00:48:56

He never did that.

00:48:58

He just expected his work would take care of himself.

00:49:05

And was he really better off?

00:49:06

Did he really actually, in the end,

00:49:09

get any different place than the younger son?

00:49:11

Both of them essentially did the same thing.

00:49:14

They wanted what they wanted,

00:49:16

not in connection with their father.

00:49:20

The older son thought he was going to get it one way.

00:49:22

The younger son wanted to do it the other way.

00:49:24

One of them looked a lot better on the outside,

00:49:27

I can tell you that much, but they both ended up

00:49:29

in the same place, disconnected from their dad,

00:49:33

outside of what they wanted.

00:49:36

And the younger brother comes home again

00:49:39

and the older brother can't partake in the party

00:49:42

that his dad is throwing because he's too mad,

00:49:45

he's too bitter, but he still encounters

00:49:49

a father that wants him to come home.

00:49:50

He says, "Son, you are always with me.

00:49:55

All that is mine is yours," this dad says.

00:49:58

And the parable ends here, kind of awkwardly.

00:50:02

The older brother never steps a foot in the house.

00:50:05

The father has come out and he,

00:50:06

the word used in the text is, begs him,

00:50:10

please will you come in and enjoy all that was always yours?

00:50:17

And at this point the heart of the older brother

00:50:20

is so cold, it's so hard, it's so mad that we never know.

00:50:27

The parable ends right here.

00:50:30

See, starving your craving also ends in death.

00:50:35

Pretending that you don't need anything,

00:50:37

that you're not desiring something,

00:50:39

that you don't have those spaces that long

00:50:42

for the things you were made for, the beauty,

00:50:45

the power, the love, the affection,

00:50:50

whatever your body desires,

00:50:51

to pretend you don't have those,

00:50:53

it ends exactly where indulgence ends:

00:50:55

in death, in the separating of our body and our soul.

00:50:59

That is the literal definition of death,

00:51:01

the separation of body and soul.

00:51:03

That's what both of these strategies tell us to do

00:51:05

in different ways, right?

00:51:08

One is like, "The right thing to do is just

00:51:10

put away all that body stuff and just do the,

00:51:12

you know, just, [grunts]."

00:51:14

And then the other side of it is just,

00:51:16

"Give your body all the things at once.

00:51:18

What's the big deal? The real you is in there.

00:51:21

Doesn't matter what you do with your body."

00:51:25

It separates what God actually made as one thing

00:51:29

and it leaves us empty, unfulfilled, unsatisfied,

00:51:33

and most importantly,

00:51:34

disconnected from the God who made us.

00:51:41

What if there was another way?

00:51:43

What if there's a road right in between here

00:51:47

that actually returns us to the original design?

00:51:50

It's not starving. It's not indulging.

00:51:52

It's going to our Father with those desires we have

00:51:57

and asking to be filled.

00:52:02

What if that was possible?

00:52:05

What if God's goal was never to eliminate

00:52:08

all the things that we need, all the desires that we feel,

00:52:11

all the cravings in our body,

00:52:12

everything from food to sex to power to whatever,

00:52:17

those things run amok, unless we bring them

00:52:20

to the God that created those spaces.

00:52:23

He wants to form them and fulfill them

00:52:26

and connect with your desire

00:52:29

to experience what He made in that space.

00:52:33

Do you believe you have the father of that parable

00:52:39

if you did that, if you named what that is?

00:52:42

What am I longing for?

00:52:44

What can I feel in myself?

00:52:47

What if you brought that to God?

00:52:52

Do you think you would find the father of the parable?

00:52:54

If you're the younger brother, I want to encourage you

00:52:56

with the words of the parable:

00:52:57

He sees you. He has compassion on you.

00:53:01

He wants to restore you to the family.

00:53:03

He wants to meet every need with the abundance

00:53:07

that He has in His Kingdom that will never run out.

00:53:10

That's what he says to your younger brother.

00:53:13

And you older brothers, Oh man, this is so me sometimes.

00:53:21

There's a dad that comes out and he listens,

00:53:24

and he's begging you to just come

00:53:26

into the joy that is already yours.

00:53:29

He says, "All I have is for you to enjoy.

00:53:33

You don't have to do it like this."

00:53:39

We have to learn who our Father really is.

00:53:42

I'm not sure we know.

00:53:44

And when we choose one of these other paths,

00:53:46

it just makes it obvious that maybe we don't know

00:53:51

who He actually is to us.

00:53:53

I was thinking about this with my --

00:53:55

I told you I had four I for, like, teenagers, young adults,

00:54:00

and, um, gosh, this time of life,

00:54:04

just the desire for connection, relationships, sex,

00:54:09

all of that just explodes onto the scene,

00:54:12

if you know what I mean.

00:54:13

How many of us have really positive memories

00:54:16

of our parents talking to us about that?

00:54:20

Anybody? Any hands?

00:54:22

Not a hand in the place.

00:54:25

Not a hand in the place.

00:54:26

Somebody said to me like, "Don't you think parents

00:54:28

should be getting better at this by now?"

00:54:30

I'm like, we're terrible at it. You know?

00:54:32

It's really hard to encounter just grace to all of us.

00:54:36

And if you're a kid who had a parent that did this badly,

00:54:39

it's really hard to recognize this desire

00:54:43

that's exploding onto the scene between like 14 and 20,

00:54:48

you know, and then it's so powerful that it has

00:54:52

the power to reshape an entire life, doesn't it?

00:54:56

Some of our lives have been shaped

00:54:59

by how that desire was handled.

00:55:05

And we recognize the power that our response to that has

00:55:09

in connection and intimacy,

00:55:12

in how we handle relationships.

00:55:14

And we know, as parents especially, we understand

00:55:17

that like, oh my gosh, current them

00:55:20

is going to make some calls here

00:55:21

and future them is going to be really, really impacted

00:55:24

by how they deal with that desire right now.

00:55:27

So what do we do?

00:55:29

Almost every parent I know does one of two things.

00:55:32

They either close one eye and kind of go like,

00:55:35

"Good luck with that."

00:55:37

And then the world fills in the blanks,

00:55:38

which is always going to lead to indulgent sexuality.

00:55:42

That's what's all around us in the world.

00:55:45

And we kind of go like, "I don't -- just figure it out."

00:55:50

And their friends and the world around them

00:55:51

fills in the blanks and that's where it leads.

00:55:53

Or we do the other thing.

00:55:57

Guessing some of us had parents like this.

00:55:59

They're like, "All right, here's all the rules around it.

00:56:03

This is what you're not going to do.

00:56:05

These are the things you can't ever say or think or feel.

00:56:08

Just put it away. Tuck it in.

00:56:11

Just move on. Just don't do it."

00:56:15

How many, honest -- How many had a parent more like that?

00:56:17

Yeah, right?

00:56:21

Indulge it or starve it.

00:56:23

Indulge it or starve it.

00:56:24

I'm guessing very few of us, maybe none of us,

00:56:29

had somebody who went, do you know that that's actually

00:56:32

a beautiful desire that God made you with that?

00:56:34

There's nothing wrong with that.

00:56:35

It's actually perfectly in keeping with the fact

00:56:39

that God has a design for your body and your life.

00:56:42

And what if we talk about what He meant by that?

00:56:45

What if you tell Him what you want,

00:56:48

and you gave that desire to Him and let Him form it

00:56:51

and fulfill it inside His story for your life,

00:56:54

inside His desire for you?

00:56:57

What if there was a way that not just like

00:57:00

shoving it down and waiting for the moment

00:57:03

that your mom says it's okay?

00:57:05

What if God can handle that?

00:57:09

What if He has a plan for that in your life?

00:57:12

And what if we dignified our children by affirming that?

00:57:16

Wow!

00:57:19

I think we accidentally do a lot of harm

00:57:22

in creating like older brothers and younger brothers

00:57:25

because we just we recognize the power

00:57:28

of our choice around that desire.

00:57:30

And it's not just that one.

00:57:33

It's not just intimacy and connection and sex.

00:57:36

It's not just that desire that

00:57:37

has the power to shape our life.

00:57:39

It's all of them.

00:57:42

And if we could figure out a way to lay that

00:57:44

at the feet of God and believe that

00:57:46

He might just be enough to deal with it,

00:57:49

He might just know how He designed you.

00:57:55

And I want to tell you so much

00:57:57

here's what's going to happen.

00:57:58

You're going to go to God.

00:57:59

You're going to say this prayer.

00:58:00

He's going to go, "Thanks a lot for bringing this to me.

00:58:03

And here's what you do."

00:58:04

Like I can't tell you because that's the whole point

00:58:06

of the parable that it happens in your relationship

00:58:10

with your Father.

00:58:11

Both of those sons could have gone to their dad,

00:58:14

and both of them chose not to.

00:58:16

And it leaves me wondering, what would he have said?

00:58:19

What would he have done? I want to know.

00:58:21

But you know what I do know,

00:58:23

it would have been personal.

00:58:24

It would have been connected.

00:58:26

It would have been because he knew his own sons.

00:58:29

Clearly they were wired with different tendencies. Right?

00:58:32

And so are you, and He knows you,

00:58:35

and He knows how to deal with you.

00:58:37

And He just wants you to bring that desire

00:58:39

and lay it at His feet in connection with Him

00:58:43

and figure out how can this shape my future

00:58:47

in a way that works?

00:58:50

1 Corinthians 6:19: Or do you not know that

00:58:53

your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you,

00:58:58

whom you have from God?

00:58:59

There's a way that your body can be filled up

00:59:03

with the actual Spirit of God.

00:59:05

And then those verses goes on to say:

00:59:07

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price.

00:59:11

So glorify God in your body.

00:59:13

Your body is not just for you, it's for God.

00:59:15

It's not just for you to live in;

00:59:17

it's for God to live in, that He could come

00:59:19

and dwell in all those aching longings

00:59:22

that we don't know what to do with,

00:59:25

they were made for Him to fill.

00:59:27

And you can glorify God, but you can only do it like that.

00:59:32

I don't give us a lot.

00:59:34

Honestly, I don't give us a lot of hope

00:59:36

with either of these other two methods.

00:59:38

The only way is to understand there's a path

00:59:41

to glorifying God in all of that,

00:59:42

and it's the Holy Spirit coming to live

00:59:45

in the spaces He was made for.

00:59:49

And you know what made it possible?

00:59:51

It says in these verses you were bought with a price.

00:59:55

What in the world? What? What does that mean?

00:59:59

I'll tell you the price you were bought with: Jesus's body.

01:00:06

The Son of God came to earth with His body,

01:00:08

and He handed it over to a good and loving Father.

01:00:13

And He bought you back, body and soul with it.

01:00:15

He allowed His body to be broken and beaten

01:00:18

and bloodied and put on a cross

01:00:20

so that you in your body could get back

01:00:24

to the original design, to live in connection

01:00:27

with a good, loving Father, body and soul,

01:00:31

fulfilled and satisfied.

01:00:32

That is the story of the Bible.

01:00:36

You were bought with a price and that price was a body.

01:00:39

And guess what?

01:00:42

Your story with Him, it ends in a body.

01:00:46

We learn in the Bible that Jesus,

01:00:48

He actually existed post-resurrection

01:00:51

in an embodied form.

01:00:53

Jesus is embodied today the Son of God.

01:00:57

And you will also receive a heavenly body,

01:01:00

a body that actually is fully satisfied, fully fulfilled.

01:01:06

No pain, no ache, no dissatisfaction,

01:01:09

no unfulfillment, completely able to live

01:01:12

in perfect union with the Father.

01:01:15

And I to leave you with a promise.

01:01:19

Current you, I want you to hear a promise from God

01:01:23

that anything it costs you to bring your desires

01:01:27

to Him and set it at your feet, that will become

01:01:29

the most beautiful thing about your life.

01:01:33

And I can say this confidently, because in John 20,

01:01:36

we actually see Jesus in His resurrected body,

01:01:40

and He still has the scars.

01:01:43

He has the scars of His physical body.

01:01:45

He has the scars of bringing that body

01:01:47

and laying it at the feet of His Father and going,

01:01:50

"Do whatever You want with this,"

01:01:51

and it becomes the most beautiful thing.

01:01:54

The most perfect thing about Him was the fact that

01:01:57

He laid his desires down at the feet of God.

01:02:00

And it tells the very simple story that anybody,

01:02:03

anybody given over to a loving Father

01:02:07

ends up fully alive again, fully alive.

01:02:10

That's the promise of that current you has to get ahold of

01:02:17

so that we choose the path to a thriving future self.

01:02:21

I want to give you one more second

01:02:23

to think about that longing one more time.

01:02:26

I'm just going to give you one more breath.

01:02:28

Let's do that together.

01:02:29

And I'm going to pray over you

01:02:30

as you just breathe that promise in and this prayer out.

01:02:38

Lord, thank You for the sacrifice of Jesus's body.

01:02:44

Would You fill us with Your Holy Spirit?

01:02:48

And would You meet and satisfy

01:02:51

the deepest longings of our body and soul?

01:02:57

In Jesus's name, Amen.

01:03:00

- Hey, I hope that you heard today that

01:03:02

God has good things for you,

01:03:03

that He cares for all of you,

01:03:05

that your spiritual life and your physical world

01:03:08

aren't separate things, that God created both of them,

01:03:12

and He wants all of you to experience health

01:03:15

and wholeness and to thrive.

01:03:16

If there's anything that we can do

01:03:18

to encourage you towards that wholeness,

01:03:20

towards that health,

01:03:22

towards that full life that Jesus describes,

01:03:24

that full life that He intends for you,

01:03:26

man, we'd love to do that.

01:03:27

You can text "Anywhere" to 301301

01:03:30

or just chat with us on the website.

01:03:32

We'd love to connect with you, pray for you,

01:03:33

help you find your next step in that life

01:03:37

and that journey of walking with God.

01:03:40

Now I'm in La Paz, Bolivia.

01:03:42

But substitute your city, your hometown,

01:03:45

your context, wherever you are,

01:03:47

and God has good things for you.

01:03:49

God wants you to thrive where you're planted.

01:03:51

God wants you to experience the joy of being on mission,

01:03:56

of experiencing His purpose for your life wherever you are.

01:03:59

And that's what Crossroads exists to do;

01:04:01

to help you uncover and discover more

01:04:03

of the fullness of what God has for you,

01:04:05

and to step into that.

01:04:06

Thanks so much for watching. We'll see you next week.

What Do I Do With My Cravings? | Indulgence, Self-Denial, and God's Third and Better Way

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