Hello everyone and welcome to another podcast of Struggling Well. Jimmy usually gets the honors of starting it out, but he let me today. Isn't that cool?
Well, you know, I just realized this cuz I think I'm right on this when this one actually airs, you will have celebrated another spiritual birthday because August 7th,
1967. Does anybody even know what that year was? You know, if you're going to flip on that thing that you have to put your birthday in, you got to go all the way down.
Yeah. But no, another year of your walking with the Lord, which I think is really cool.
That's right. Well, thank you for letting me say hello to everyone.
Yeah, go ahead.
we're going to talk about we want to ask a question and we're going to just talk about a little bit. But the fun thing is we have invited our good friend Tim Briggs to join us again. in my mind, what Tim brings besides the fact that we really love him and his wife Jenny is that he brings a freshness from his life because he's in a different decade than we are. So, he's bringing a freshness from his faith that encourages us. and he's really I'm going to just blow him up here, but he really struggles well and honestly, and we love that about him.
Yeah, that's true. And so what we want to talk about is where do we find our satisfaction
in life?
and what
where are Yeah. And what where are we satisfied? What are we satisfied with right now? Like
sorry I interrupted. You know, I do that. I can't help it cuz my brain is like
oh like a power tool. It's just won't stop unless
So we want to bring Tim in at this point and ask him what brings
to mediate between you and me.
No, that's an impossible.
That's a tall task. I'm not sure I'm ready for that one.
To talk about for him where does
what are you satisfied with? Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. Well, if I were to struggle well and answer that, I think at the core for me, I want to be loved. want to be accepted and so there's a performative part of me.
So if I do all the right things, I don't do the bad things.
Then I have this sort of reputation with myself and with others that says you are a worthy person.
You are a good person. And if I'm checking all those boxes in my flesh, I'll think this is where life is at. This is satisfaction. I am loved. I am worthy because I have done something to be worthy. of course that's not the gospel. And when I came to Christ when I was 18, I had to do some serious reckoning with that. And that's why the gospel was so hard for me because here I am saying I can build a resume.
Yeah.
And it's going to look really good. And of course, God's look at that resume and say you are accepted. How could I not accept you? This isn't amazing. But the gospel is saying no, I can't build a resume.
Right?
Jesus, he has the resume. No, you have to admit that your resume is deficient. It is faulty and you can't build a reputation that's worthy of me. But here's the good news. Jesus did it. You're made in my image. You can be satisfied in me. And folks, that's why you should go to Steadfast Church because our dear friend Tim loves the word and knows the word and preaches it well.
So as you describe satisfaction for you of building a resume, doing the things that would cause people to be pleased with you and you find worthy that feels really fragile.
what happens when that doesn't take place for you?
Well, it's scary. it is fragile. It's threatening. Quite frankly, it's threatening.
do you find yourself does that compel you to do certain things so that you're going to get somebody to say, "Hey, Tim, your resume, whether it be the way you preach the whatever, does it compel you to look for that a lot?"
Yeah. And the, you know, the kind of the lie behind the lie is that I can do this. I can do this. I can be near perfect. I can do everything right. I cannot do wrong things. I can make things happen. What's interesting in pastoring and especially as church planting, this has just been a giant dose of humble pie.
God's laughing. He's rebuking me undoubtedly because I'm thinking I'm in charge. I can make this happen. I can bring about life and satisfaction in my life. I can make results. I can't. I can't. Only he can. But when it doesn't happen, in my flesh, I'm threatened
and I want to work harder. I want to dig deep because I'm good Midwestern stock. And that's what Midwestern folks do. We work hard. We grit our teeth. And God is saying, "No, that's not the way.
U find life in me. Find satisfaction in me. It won't guarantee results, but it is the only place that will sustain satisfaction."
Yeah. And I and as you know for you as you explain that Tim and I appreciate that as fragile as that is I think that's just a microcosm of everybody's place where they try to find satisfaction that is equally as fragile whether it's health whether it's you know monetary success whatever it may be we all pursue those things that then end up if we're honest with ourselves they don't bring the satisfaction that our soul really longs for. And as you said, that's a satisfaction that's found in Christ and him alone. How we weave that into our everyday lives is a challenge that we all face.
I can remember one time when you were preaching, Jimmy, that you said that when we come to Christ, we come with nothing. We're completely bankrupt. and another word would be broken. We're completely broken. and yet there's this thing in us that even in our brokenness, we're still we still think we got something. We still think that we have something that God's going to be impressed with. you know, I grew up in a denomination where what you did, the works that you did were the things that measured you as to how God was going to look at you and other people would look at you. And I think for any of us and Tim, I was thinking about you as you were talking is the point of you realizing that you had that your satisfaction with somewhere else other than in God was a place of brokenness of like I've got nothing. and I think that there's so many places we could go here because and I and you know my mind is kind of ping ponging but
I can't un I can't be satisfied with God until I realize that I bring absolutely nothing.
Yeah. And that's and that I was at a in a setting recently and a person said to me Do I believe in once saved always saved? And my response was, well, I do because I did nothing to earn that salvation. I didn't. I again, my phrase is I brought nothing to the table. And so, if I brought nothing to the table, then it's how can I do something that would cause me to lose that salvation? Cuz it's it rests completely in the finished work of Christ. And that's where I find great satisfaction that I can rest in that and I don't have to use your word I don't have to work hard to perform better to keep earning it.
It's so contrary to my flesh cuz my flesh goes, "No, Suzi, you've got this. You're a strong woman. You can do this. You love the Bible. You can teach the Bible. You can do all these things." And so what I'm really seeking for is I'm seeking for a satisfaction that is generated by me, by what I do, as opposed to being satisfied with who God is. and I think we saw that a lot. I may be a little jumpy here in my thoughts. But we've been to Africa and some other countries quite often. And what I have always been just wowed by is people who have nothing who are satisfied because they know God. They know Jesus. They've had a personal encounter with Jesus. They're filled with the Holy Spirit and they are satisfied with that. They have nothing. They live in with dirt floors and stuff and yet their satisfaction is in him. It doesn't mean they're not human and they don't want more. But what I find the struggle for me is I want more that I think I can generate and look to God less for my satisfaction.
Yeah. And then the where that ends up is if I had the more then I would be satisfied. And that's just not true. How does that work for you in everyday life and you're a pastor, you're a husband, you're a dad. You got lots of different things swirling in your world. So, how does that work for you to be brought back to the fact that satisfaction really comes from Christ?
Yeah. I just to kind of tie that answer to that question in with what Suzi was mentioning earlier is I was thinking about I think it's Philippians 4 maybe where Paul says,
"I've learned the secret of being content whether in plenty or in want."
There's it's a process.
I preached on Psalm 4 recently the people are saying Lord show us your face do something for us
and David's response is essentially God's enough is more than enough more than grain and wine abounding. So there's part of the secret of satisfaction and contentment is in the brokenness. It is in the emptiness. It is in the humility. It is in what Psalm 42 says, "As a deer pants for flowing stream, so my so pants my soul for you. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God." And so, if we don't acknowledge that we're thirsty and that we need God, we're going to have a hard time finding satisfaction. Just really quickly, practically, I think being honest before God, and saying, "I find in my soul I'm striving. I'm straining. I'm trying to earn. I'm trying to grasp hold of something that's not for me to take.
It's something to receive.
and I think just that sort of daily soul check-in and daily repentance of where am I at today, God? Well, I feel like I'm straining. I feel like I'm trying to take I'm trying to prove something. thing, but that's not the way you want me to live.
What's the way you want me to live? Okay. It's kind of that daily check-in, maybe momentary check-in of where my heart is at and trying to recalibrate it to what the gospel says.
Yeah.
And we are consumer people. So that means when you say God, what do you have to give me? we are takers. We love to consume and take and you know move heaven and earth. We think we can and to receive from God. I think first of all it means you got to be still enough to receive. You got to hear. You got to give your spa your life and your day space to hear and to receive from him. You have to be in his word. it's not just I mean it's not just by osmosis. We have to be in his word hearing what he has to give us and what he gives. gives us should be what satisfies us. And this is a conversation for another time, but it seems like the only times in my life when I really can receive from him is when I'm in the midst of struggle.
Yeah. And I love what this conversation has been about. And as you talked about, Tim, you know, you begin your day or you know, I grew up with you had your daily devotions and what that would mean was you'd have a good day that things would go the way you want them to go and if you didn't have your daily devotions that would explain the bad things that happened
when the truth of the matter is I want to come before the Lord whatever definition my daily devotions has I come before him to remind myself of who he is and the fact that life is centered around him not that my life is going to go the way I want it to not that the day is going to be a perfect day because I will struggle but I'm going to reenter my heart and reenter my soul on him and to find satisfaction in what he offers. And that really to me is key in finding where satisfaction comes from.
one of my many idiosyncrasies, well I only have like two, but one of the major ones is I'm a complete nerd when it comes to music and lyrics. And while we were talking about this a few lines from a song done by someone who is not a believer, a song by John Mayer called gravity.
The great theologian.
The great theologian. Sorry, John Mayer. That's right. He's He says, twice as much isn't twice as good and can't sustain like one half could. It's wanting more that's going to send me to my knees. And when I think about satisfaction and I think of what I think I want in this world, may it drive me to my knees to then say, I can't do any of this. I need him. That's where my satisfaction will be.
Yeah. So, have the courage this week or whenever you listen to ask yourself the question, what brings me satisfaction in my life? Have a great day.