What is something we all have in common?  Stress.   It doesn’t matter who you are or how old you are; we all experience stress.  That’s what we are talking about.  More specifically, how do we deal with stress in a Godly way?  To do this, we are talking about stress on Sunday, but we want to give you more.  With our App, you can see the video of the sermon and the sermon text all week long.   Also, every day we will be giving you a daily discipleship to help process each talk.  How?  You will get a link to the Ready Heart podcast that daily brings scripture into your day to help deal with stress.

I want to say again because it’s very important to understand.  Everyone will experience stress.  Jesus even told us to expect it.

John 16:33 In this world you will have trouble [persecution; suffering].  EXP

It’s important to understand that if you are a Christian and you are experiencing stress, it doesn’t mean you lack faith.  It doesn’t mean you are doing something wrong.  It doesn’t mean God is punishing you.  It doesn’t mean you are failing at living out Christianity.  If you are experiencing stress, it means you are a human experiencing real human emotions.  The real question is not, Why do I have stress?  The real question is, How do I deal with stress in a Godly way?

Last week, Sam opened our series, and we learned so much from his talk.   He said stress is the fastest-growing disease in the Western World.  Studies show that one in three people in America say they feel "extreme stress." Nearly half of all people experience trouble sleeping due to stress.  And most people develop symptoms of stress before age 21.  Those stats are disturbing.  Something is very wrong, and we have to talk about it.

What is stress?  It’s when something bad happens or is about to happen, and we worry about it.  It creates tension in our physical bodies, our mental state, and our spiritual lives.  It can impact our sleeping and eating habits.  It can create headaches, muscle tension, and stomach issues.  It can make us feel overwhelmed, irritated, or sad.  It's stressful to move, to get a new job, to help a teenager learn to drive.

Last week, when Sam said that stress is the gap between the demands that are placed on us and the strength we have to meet those demands, it really impacted me.  It basically means we come up short.  

I have four questions for you.  Don’t raise your hands.  How many of you have put expectations on yourselves, and you feel like you can’t live up to those expectations?   How many of you have felt the expectations that others have put on you, and you feel like you can’t live up to those expectations?  How many of you feel like, spiritually, I can’t be who I am supposed to be?  Last question, when you can’t meet those expectations, how do you respond?  Chances are, you feel stressed.  That’s real, isn’t it?  

I want to start today with the verses Sam gave us.

Psalms 119:107 I have suffered much, O Lord; restore my life again as you promised. NLT

To begin, please hear me tell you, there is hope.  God knows what you are walking through.  He knows the pain and struggle we feel, and He wants to walk with us and restore us.   That’s why we are excited to give you a practical path on how to deal with stress.

Stress Intro: What It Is? Who Deals With It? How do we deal with it? Step 1: Letting God Lead Our Lives.  Step 2: Trusting God With Our Lives.  Step 3: What We Focus On Matters.  Step 4: Where Do We Take Our Stress?  Step 5: Our Choices - Where The Practical & The Spiritual Meet.  Step 6: Rest – Real Rest

Today, I start with Step 1: Letting God Lead Our Lives.  I want to read a story for you.

Luke 15:11 Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons. 13 “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. 14 About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. 15 He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. 16 The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything. NLT

What’s happening?  The son runs off to live life the way he wants to live.  And it turns out to be a train wreck.  He ends up in a bad spot.  He has no job.  He is starving.  You could say his plans for a better life failed.  He is so bad off that he has to convince a farmer to allow him to feed pigs. 

I want you to remember that stress is the gap between the demands that are placed on us and the strength we have to meet those demands.   That’s what’s happening in this guy's life.  He has no ability to make his life better.  He is stuck.  He now wishes he could eat what he is feeding the pigs.  What is interesting about this story is that up to this point, he won’t go home.  He won’t go back to his father.  

Does this story sound familiar to you?  I think it sounds familiar to us because it’s a story about us.  We go off to live the life that we want to live.  We can believe, I know better than God, I’m going to do life my way.  I don’t need to pray.  I don’t read scripture.  I don’t need a spiritual family.  I don’t have to be holy.  As we begin to live life, years go by, and we begin to face challenges and hard times.   Life wears us down.  Relationships can be broken.  Dreams can be shattered.  And for some, they can find success the way the world defines it.   Success, money, comfort.  But when they are alone, they can feel tired and empty.   Small hurts become big hurts.   Small family issues become huge emotional battles.  Our life, like the son who ran away, can end up in places we didn’t expect.

As we walk through the years of life, we face enormous stress trying to keep it all together because it isn’t exactly what we thought it was going to be.  Remember, stress is the gap between the demands that are placed on us and the strength we have to meet those demands.  And we know we can’t do it.  We come up short.  We have no ability to make our lives better.  We are stuck.  And we feel stress.  Can you connect with this?

What is interesting about us is that in the middle of our stress, we don’t go to God.  Like the son who chooses to feed pigs just to get by, we choose to live a life that just gets by.  Why don’t we go to God?  This is a huge moment here, please hear me.  We don’t go to God because we don’t like ourselves.  We know we have failed.  We know we have come up short.  We know our lives are broken.  We know we are a disappointment.  We know we can’t do anything about it.  And because we don’t like ourselves, we believe God won’t like us.  Let that sink in for a second.  Could it be true that in the middle of your stress, you haven’t gone to God because you have assumed, if I don’t like me, God won’t like me?  

I want to read this quote.

“Many Christians… find themselves defeated by the most psychological weapon that Satan uses against them.  This weapon has the effectiveness of a deadly missile.  Its name?  Low self-esteem.  It’s a gut-level feeling of inferiority, inadequacy, and low self-worth.  This feeling shackles many Christians.   Although they understand their position as sons and daughters of God, they are tied up in knots, bound by a terrible feeling of inferiority, and chained to a deep sense of worthlessness.” - David Seamands

Instead of going to God, what do we do?  We hide.  We hide who we really are.  We hide how we really feel.  We hide from our family.  We hide from our friends.  We hide from God.  We live fake lives.  Lives that look good on social media but are torn up on the inside.  We get busy, really busy.  We can’t stop working.  We won’t stop being busy.  We get addicted to anything that can numb our pain.  That can be alcohol, pornography, food, endless scrolling, vacations, me days, buying things, checking out on life and relationships, gambling, work, or anything that will help us ignore our pain.  And like the son feeding the pigs, we are just getting by.  The odd thing is, we accept this way of living and continue to just get by.  

What happens to us spiritually?  Because we hide from God, we become fake.  We do things that look good to others, while at the same time, our hearts are still far from God.  Publicly, we look good because we do good religious things and say nice things, but on the inside, that’s not who we really are.  

Listen to what Jesus said to the Pharisees.

Matthew 15:8-9 Frauds! Isaiah’s prophecy of you hit the bull’s-eye: “These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their heart isn’t in it. They act like they’re worshiping me, but they don’t mean it.” MSG

Spiritually, when we hide from God, we are comfortable going through the motions, but we don’t have a real relationship with Jesus.   We call that ‘being fake’ or an ‘imposter’ or a ‘false self’. 

Let’s read this quote.

“The imposter is antsy in prayer.  He hungers for excitement, craves mood-altering experiences.  He is depressed when deprived of the spotlight.   The false self is frustrated because he never hears God’s voice.  The false self flees silence and solitude because they remind him that… he is hollow.”  - Brennan Manning

Let’s jump back into the story Jesus was sharing.   

Luke 15:17 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, 19 and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’

20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. 21 His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’

22 “But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. 23 And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, 24 for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began. NLT

The son comes to his senses, and he goes home to his father.  What does he discover?  Does his father reject him?  No.  Does his father let him know how disappointing he is?  No.  It’s the complete opposite.  His father was looking for him, waiting to celebrate him.   His whole life immediately changed.   He is given a ring showing that he is no servant but a son.  New clothes.   Food.  All stress, gone.

That’s a story about us.   Jesus told this story because that’s what is waiting for you when you go home.  Our spiritual life begins when we come to our senses and go home.  It’s when we finally go to God and discover that all along, we were wrong.  Even though we don’t like ourselves, God has been looking and waiting to celebrate us.   

Let that sink in for a second.  Is it possible that you have been wrong?  Imagine the stress of being fake, gone.  The stress of trying to keep it all together, gone.  The stress of being busy, addicted, lonely, gone.  When we come to our senses, when we come to our father, we discover how much God wants to love and redeem us.

Is it true that there is a gap between the demands that are placed on us and the strength we have to meet those demands?  Yes.  We come up short.  We are a disappointment.  We miss the standard.  We have failed at being perfect.  That is true, and the stress will ruin us.  And it’s also true that Jesus came to fill that gap.

Romans 3:23-24 Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ. MSG

I want to answer two questions before I close.  First, how do we go home to our father? What does that look like?  Second, what does this have to do with the stress of real things like paying my bills?

Like the son, how do we go home to our father?  

This is step 1 in dealing with stress.   We have to let God lead our lives, and this is how.  

I said earlier, your spiritual journey begins when you realize you might have been wrong.   God isn’t disappointed in you.   God is looking and waiting to celebrate you.  You don’t have to carry that stress anymore.  

I am speaking to everyone, including the person who has been a Christian since forever.  Sometimes the person who has been a Christian for a long time is the worst at this.  We have years in and think we should know better.  We think we need to be a little fake to be a good example to others.  We think we need to muscle up and push through.   We think it is mature of us to be disciplined and miserable.  We think, “I already know what you are saying – that’s for new people.”  And you are wrong, that’s for you today, right now.  

"At the end of the day, if we aren’t running to our Father, we can’t wonder why we don’t have a close relationship with our Father."  

Listen, you can be a Christian while at the same time not like yourself.  And if you don’t deal with self-rejection, you won’t feel close to God.  It’s the enemy of your spiritual life because it leads you to be fake, busy, disconnected, and addicted.  Please hear me,

if you think you are a mature Christian and you aren’t running to God and enjoying a relationship with Jesus, you aren’t a mature Christian.

You have learned how to be fake.  Dear Christian, you need to run to God today as much as you did on day one.

How do we let God lead our lives?  Admit you might have been wrong.  Run to Jesus in prayer.  You are going to have to slow down in your life and have a moment when you are honest about who you are.  This isn’t a quick prayer in the car.  This is a, I’m going to the park to be by myself for a while type of thing.  You are going to have to bring who you really are to God and ask God to forgive you, heal you, and love you.  You will need to stop being fake.  You will need to stop being busy and filling your schedule with non-stop activity.  You will need to fast from what you are addicted to.  You will need to come to God and tell Him in prayer, ‘I can’t do this anymore.  I come up short, will You help me?’  And every day forward, you keep bringing yourself to God.  You continue to be honest and transparent with Him.  And make sure you get around people who you can talk to about it.  

What does this have to do with the stress of real things like paying my bills?  Everything.

If you have this question, it’s a good one, and I am glad you are asking it.  To answer, I want to start by asking you, if you have been ignoring God, how is it going without God?  Maybe you believe in God, but never find the time to be in a relationship with God. How is it going?  Has it led you to financial, relationship, and spiritual success?  Or has it led you to feel like the son feeding the pigs, trying to just get by?  Do you feel fake, busy, disconnected, or addicted?  

When I was fired from my job, Karen gave me these verses.  

Psalm 40:1 I waited patiently for God to help me; then he listened and heard my cry. 2 He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out from the bog and the mire, and set my feet on a hard, firm path, and steadied me as I walked along. TLB

I was so angry when she gave me those verses because I didn’t understand how those words on a page would pay my mortgage.  In that moment, I didn’t understand God at all.  Over time, I discovered that everything that was written was true.  I did go to God in my anger.  I did go to God in my hurt.  And a year later, I looked back and was able to see how God helped me pay my mortgage.  

God absolutely cares about the stress of real things in your life, like bills.  But God cares more about your character.  What matters most isn’t your real life, it’s your spiritual life.   When you get connected with God, everything radically changes, including your real life.  That’s why it says, ‘…set my feet on a hard, firm path, and steadied me as I walked along…’  Scripture is talking about your real life.

Let’s recap and close.   

The greatest stress in our lives is the gap between the demands that are placed on us and the strength we have to meet those demands.  That’s all of us.  We come up short, and we all know it.  

Step 1 in dealing with stress is letting God lead our lives.  Realize you may have been very wrong.  God isn’t disappointed in you.  God is looking and waiting to celebrate you.  You will have to slow down and be honest and transparent with God about who you really are.  You will need to ask God to forgive you, heal you, and love you.  

The verses to hang onto every day of your life to begin to shatter stress.

Romans 3:23-24 Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ. MSG