I Will Choose Growth

My name is René, and that is one of the pastors here at Twin Lakes Church. It's great to have you here. And I have another very special announcement to make. This last week, we had five new grandchildren. Just kidding, that is a joke. We did not have five new ones. But each of the last two weekends, I preach, I've got to announce that we have a new grandbaby, and it is such a blessing and such a joy.

We were able to be with all of our five grandkids yesterday at a very special birthday party. And as I was watching our three kids with their little ones, I was just struck by just this flood of nostalgia, thinking back on them when they were younger. And specifically, I'm looking at our youngest son, David, who they just had that, the little girl Wilhelmina, one month ago now. And I was thinking of him back in 2013 when he was 15 years old. There's a picture of him with my mom. She's 80 years old in this picture. Rosemary, some of you remember her. And this picture was taken right around the time that something happened in our family.

My mom's Alzheimer's disease had gotten very severe. And my wife, Lori, said, you know, honey, it's I think it's time for us to bring mom into the house or at least consider doing that. And we knew that would be quite a challenge for us. Some of you know what it's like to take care of somebody in your house. It's a 24/7 job as the dementia gets worse and worse and worse.

Now at the time, our two older kids were grown. They were out of the house. It was just David, who's quite a few years younger than the other two. And he was still in our house. He had just turned 15 when we were thinking about doing this. But we didn't want to do it without talking to him first, because she'd be living in the bedroom right next to his. She'd be sharing his bathroom. He would really honestly be part of taking care of her.

And so we sat him down and we explained what was going on. And the way we framed it was we really feel like we should do this for your grandma. And without hesitation, and I'll never forget this, David looked at us and said, well, mom, dad, I think we should do this too, but not just because it'll be good for her. I think we should do this because it'll be good for us. Because we're going to end up growing in ways that we never could have grown if we didn't have this challenge in our lives.

And honestly, my jaw just went, because here's this teenager showing that kind of maturity. You know, this inconvenience, this suffering is going to cause us to grow in some very unique ways that we couldn't have been able to grow otherwise. And I told David yesterday, by the way, that I was going to tell this story. And he said, well, dad, you can tell that story. That's fine with me. But please don't make me sound like I was a teenage saint.

Because he said, you'll remember the very next day. I told you and mom that I was philosophically opposed to school. So he was a normal 15 year old. But I did see that growth happen in him as at 15 years old. He learned how to help take care of an 80 year old with Alzheimer's disease in the bedroom next to his. And it's that attitude that I want to talk about this morning.

Grab your message notes that look like this. If you're joining us online, you can get them at TLC.org/notes. These will help you try to make some sense of what I'm going to say this morning. Choosing a good year is the name of our series this month. The concept behind this is this. Many things will happen in 2022 that you will have no control over, that you cannot now anticipate, that you will not like. You have no choice over that. But you do have a choice. You have a choice about how you're going to respond.

And that choice will change your experience of those unwanted, unanticipated, undesired events. Quick recap. Every week's been building on the next. The first week was all about how I will choose humility. I will be teachable. I'm going to swim against the current of I am right. And don't you dare to tell me that I am not right. Arrogant culture tide that's happening all over the world and in our country right now. I'm going to choose humility this year.

And we too last week was I will choose my story. And we talked about how you can take the same events in life and one person can tell a contamination story, right? And all my whole this is just one more evidence. My whole life's being contaminated. You know God's against me and the world's against me and it's all going to hell in a handbasket. And the next person can take those same exact events and write not a contamination narrative, but a redemption narrative and say yes, those things are bad. But God is redeeming those. The gospel is being spread. He's forming my character.

And this week builds on that it's I will choose growth. I will choose growth. Stanford University researcher Carol Dweck wrote a groundbreaking book a few years ago. It was called Mindset: how we can learn to fulfill our potential. And this is all about her research as a PhD research psychologist because she noticed that people tend to think about life in one of two different ways.

The first one is what she called a fixed mindset, fixed as in static, unchanging. And this plays out in a lot of different ways. A person with a fixed mindset says, for example, I was just born with my flaws and I cannot change that. It's just the way I am. You know, I got a bad temper because you know, I'm Italian, you know, hot blooded. By the way, I've noticed how every single nationality has been used as an excuse for why people have a bad temper. Have you noticed that?

Well, you know, I'm just Spanish, got that hot blood. I'm just Irish, you know, got that temper. I'm Russian, got the thing, you know, I'm French apparently it can all be used as an excuse for temper. So fixed mindset says things like that and also this is my opinion. My mind's made up. I cannot change. I will not change. It is fixed. In fact, what they're basically saying in so many words is I would rather be confirmed as right than discover that I'm wrong and change my mind. That's a fixed mindset.

And then when things do go wrong, if I have a fixed mindset, my attitude is I hate it because it messes with the status quo, which I want to return to as soon as this interruption of my beautiful life is over. That is a fixed mindset or you can have what she calls a growth mindset. A growth mindset is I can grow. My flaws aren't fixed. I can change. My opinions aren't necessarily all right and unchangeable. I can learn through trials and tribulations.

And in fact, a growth mindset understands setbacks and inconveniences are actually one of the essential paths to personal growth, right? So do you want to choose to have a good experience of 2022? No matter what happens to you, one mindset choice will change how you experience the year when you choose to say, I will choose growth. Say this out loud with me. Let's make it an affirmation. I will choose growth. Say it again. I will choose growth.

Here's our key verse today. It's from the book of James chapter one, verses two, three, and the beginning of four. Would you read this out loud with me too? Here we go. Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, stop there for just a second. Troubles of any kind. Say that out loud with me. Troubles of any kind. Troubles of any kind. Troubles of any kind.

Does that include waiting in a long line at the grocery store when you're in a rush? Does it? Yes. Does that include a baby's crying in your row when you're at church? Does that include that? Yes. Does that include there's a line? Yes, the baby says amen. Does that include a line at Costco when you're in line to get gas? Yes. Does that include having to wear face masks when you don't want to? Oh, I don't hear as many people saying yes. Does troubles of any kind include that? It troubles of any kind.

Let's start over with all that in mind. Dear brothers and sisters, let me hear you. When troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. Opportunity. He's not saying you have to like it. He's not saying you have to agree with it. He's just saying it's happening so you can choose to frame it as a what? An opportunity for great joy. Why? What's an opportunity for?

You know, what can what can the seemingly endless health mandates be an opportunity for? What can the COVID dragging on and on possibly be an opportunity? Look at it an opportunity. It's just a drag. It's a rockin' road construction that makes my commute a half an hour longer be any kind of an opportunity. I hate it. What's an opportunity for? Well, he goes on. Next verse. For you know, let me read it. Let's read it together. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow. Endurance. Say that with me. Endurance.

Even seemingly pointless things. Even things that are just an irritant that you don't like. You can frame as an opportunity to develop endurance. It's kind of like this. I've told you before when I was in high school I ran track, right? And in fact, this morning I went through my high school yearbook and I saw this, hadn't seen this in years. There I am, the only member of the track team who's not looking at the photographer in this picture that probably had something to do with a girl.

But anyway, when I ran track, so my main event was the half mile. Now it would be 800 meters and that is two times around a track, right? That's not that far, right? Just two times around a high school sized track. Well, three days out of five, what our coach would typically do is to tell us when we're there to work out for our track and field meet, he would say, "Okay, I want you guys to run three, four, five, six miles on the boring suburban sidewalks of San Jose, California where my high school was." And we hated that, having to plot along past strip malls and boring track homes for miles on end.

And as is typical with teenagers, we would tell our coach, "This is pointless. This has nothing to do with real life. I need to learn how to run twice around the track. I don't need to learn how to run past a hundred driveways today. I hate this." And the coach would say, "I know it seems to have nothing to do with your race, but all those miles are producing," go back to that verse in James, "endurance." Endurance.

And sure enough, when it came time for the race, guess what? After all those miles on sidewalk, running on a nice track surface two times around was a breeze, a snap. Because we'd learned endurance through things we didn't like that seemed pointless, that seemingly had nothing to do with our real lives. That is the key. That is how traffic jams, lines at the store, face mask mandates, pointless bureaucratic red tape forms you got to fill out for something or another. That's how long TSA lines at the airport. Something like that can have value in your life.

You can see it as an opportunity because it's there to develop endurance in your life. Now think of who James is riding to here when he says this. He is riding to first century Christians in the Roman Empire. They're enduring all kinds of horrible persecution from the Romans. They're being burned at the stake by Nero and they're being arrested and they're being ostracized and they listen to this and they're like, yeah, yeah, he's right.

And if you read any kind of literature from the first century where other people who aren't Christians are commenting on the Christians, they talk about Christians like they got some kind of a superpower because the Christians went, you know what? Do your worst to us because our faith is about how crucifixions turn into resurrections. Our faith is about how God can use even this to spread the gospel. Our faith is about how any little inconvenience in any major persecution and even any oppression can be used by God to develop our character and to spread the word so we don't care what you do with this. Go ahead.

The superpower that they had for approaching suffering is a path to growth. Now compare that to the attitude of modern Christians to a lot less trouble. When somebody, when I am in a rush and I see an empty parking spot and somebody takes my parking spot, I'm all, God, why? Right? I'm writing a sermon. I'm doing the Lord's work and all of a sudden the internet goes really slow. How can you allow this if you're a loving God? You know, we're supposed to wear face masks for another two weeks. Life is absurd.

What is wrong with us? We have forgotten to see even things we maybe disagree with, maybe don't like, maybe really bother us, or maybe you do agree with it. That's not the point. The point is you can see every kind of trouble as an opportunity for growth and endurance. Amen? The problem is this. Suffering can produce growth. But this is not inevitable. Have you noticed that? Suffering can produce growth. Suffering can lead to an increase in endurance, but this is not inevitable.

Somebody once said, "If all suffering produced growth in all the world would be wise." Because everybody suffers. Suffering can make you better or bitter. Going through all those inconveniences, we all know people who go through any one of the things I've just mentioned, and instead of going, "Okay, I don't like it, but it's an opportunity for me to grow my endurance for other trials further down the road in life," instead of approaching it like that, they go on to a next-door neighbor or Facebook and just, "I hate this, it's terrible." Suffering can make you better or bitter.

And Jesus pointed this out. He said, "You know what?" In one parable, he said, "Christians are like seeds. Some grow and bear fruit, but others, like seeds sown on rocky places, hear the word and once receive it with joy, they're into it at first, but since they have no root, they last only a short time when trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Trouble doesn't make them better. Trouble shrivels them up.

Still others, the message is crowded out, but the worries of this life or the lure of wealth, the desire for other things, they don't grow through trouble either, they just die. Why? Why don't we always grow in trouble? Well, Jesus implied four reasons right there. First, we're too distracted. Growth gets crowded out by the lures of this life, the worries, the distractions. Second, we're too shallow, no roots. Third, because we have no root, we're too tired. He says we quickly fall away, there is no endurance, there is no stamina and certainly everybody is just feeling exhausted right now.

And the fourth one is more subtle, but he talks about seed that falls outside of the furrows with the other seeds away from the other seed and that speaks to the idea that we're all too isolated right now. And when we're too isolated, we get discouraged. So what can we do about these four things? If we're not able to grow in the midst of trouble, if you look at Christians today and they're encountering all sorts of things that they maybe don't necessarily like and all they're doing is cursing the trouble instead of going, "It's an opportunity to grow in endurance." Right?

If that's the way Christians are responding, it's probably because of these four things. We're too distracted, too shallow, too tired, too isolated to really see it from a biblical paradigm. So what are we going to do about that? Well, I want to suggest four very simple points that address each of those four bullet points I just mentioned in turn, because I've observed as a pastor, the people who typically grow through trouble have incorporated the four factors I'm about to give you as daily habits in their lives.

So listen, you're going to have trouble this year and triumphs. So if you want to prepare in advance to have a healthy attitude toward the trouble to go, "Don't like it, but you know what? I'm going to see it as an opportunity," you got to prepare for that. And the way to do that biblically is these four things. You can choose not to do these four things, but then you're probably just going to get all mad when trouble happens instead of growing through it. These are the foundation for that in advance.

Just to the problem of being too distracted, look up, look up to God. The Bible says in Psalm 46, "Be still," still, not a lot of that going around these days, "and know that I am God." Spend time in prayer and meditation every day. I love the way C.S. Lewis put it. He said, "Do you relate to this? The moment that you wake up each morning, all your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals." And the first job each morning consists in shoving it all back, in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in.

In fact, let's do that right now, because maybe you rushed into church today and you're feeling a little bit distracted, or maybe you're joining us on the live stream and you're watching but also you're checking stuff on your phone and what's my email, you're making coffee. Let's all just stop. In fact, I'll even stop talking. For some of you, that's a 20-year answer to prayer. And let's just look up to God for a couple of minutes of silent meditation.

I just feel a little more relaxed now. By the way, what an appropriate verse I chose that verse days ago, but a verse about the mountains quaking and falling into the sea and the oceans surging. Man, the word of God is living and active, isn't it? But you can do this every single day. It doesn't cost any money. It doesn't even take a lot of time. We just took two minutes and it really made a difference, didn't it? It just takes intention.

I recommend the moment you first realize you're awake in the morning, don't even check your phone. In fact, I've gotten to the point where I charge this up in another room, not my bedroom, so that I'm not tempted to snap it up and look at it first thing in the morning. Lay in bed with your eyes closed if you want. And there's one Bible verse that you probably know from memory, pray through that Bible verse. Just pray through it. And if you don't know one from memory, choose one of the ones in the notes this weekend.

Or you can do what I do every single morning. I've told you before, I've done this for a year now. I pray through the Lord's Prayer from memory, very easy to memorize. That's why Jesus taught it that way. And I just pray through it every morning. It centers me, it relaxes me, and it has this benefit. The Bible says of people who do this, watch this, they will have no fear of bad news. It doesn't say they will not hear bad news. They'll have no fear of bad news. Why? Their hearts are steadfast, focused, and they've learned to trust in the Lord.

So look up, because we're too distracted in our culture and also we're too shallow. And for that I need to read up in God's word, the Bible. Put down roots there, really get to know it. So often these days, again, I love these things for some reasons, but they can be so distracting. And so many of us Christians, you know who you are, we're playing our dots game, we're a wordle game instead of like spending some time in the word.

I'm not saying those things are wrong, but they can take up all your time if you're not careful. Check this out, it's Martin Luther King Junior weekend and I was riveted by an article I read this past week in Vox by Brandon Ambrosino. How Martin Luther King Junior's faith drove his activism. It's all about how people these days often leave out what was the most important thing to him. You know, how is he able to stand in the face of so much trouble in his life?

Well, in the article he interviews leading experts on Dr. King like Dr. Jay Cameron Carter, a professor at Indiana University, who says the key to understanding this figure, Dr. King, is his faith. He was a churchman from beginning to end. For example, modern notions of love cannot bear the weight of what King was talking about. The love King preached in practice was lifted straight from the New Testament's teachings on agape, the Greek word used for the love of God.

And in the article, and again, this is a secular magazine and so this is why it fascinated me. It's not like Christianity today, but it's all about Christianity. He says, for example, how was King able to continue to speak out for love to a nation overflowing with hatred? Well, let's hear that the voice of Dr. King rushes toward us from the pulpit of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. And here's a quote from one of his sermons. There is still a voice crying out in terms that echo across generations saying, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you that you may be called the children of your father, which is in heaven.

He was rooted in the word of God. And so if you want to have that kind of a backbone, if you want to show his kind of courage, if you want to fight evils in this world without burning out, you need those same roots. As Jesus said to the Pharisees, well, you're in error because you don't know the scriptures or the power of God here, the power, there's power associated with knowing the scriptures.

I was reading a book, an older book called In the Presence of Mine Enemies. And I just was captivated by one section of it. Here's what this book is about. This book about Howard Rutledge. Howard was in the U.S. Air Force during Vietnam and his plane was shot down over North Vietnam. And he was a POW for seven years, many of those years in solitary confinement, enduring incredible deprivations. How did he endure?

Well, look at this paragraph. He says, I was trying desperately to recall what snatches of scripture or hymns. And most of my fellow prisoners were struggling like me with each other's help. We reconstructed some verses from memory, but how I struggled to recall those scriptures. And he realizes I'd spent the first 18 years of my life in Sunday school, regrettably, I had not seen the importance then of memorizing Bible verses because I'd never dreamed that I would spend seven years in a prison or that one memorized verse could make the whole day bearable.

Finally, he says, some of our POWs laid down in a fetal position and just died. Now, listen, he says, all this talk of scripture may seem boring to some, but it was the way we overcame the power of death all around us. It makes a difference to know it. Many of you know, Dick and Marilyn Jordan, Dick was a pastor here for many years. They recently moved to Nashville and you may have heard that Marilyn, our beloved Marilyn, passed away Sunday night.

I've been on the phone with both her son and daughter and without prompting, they both told me, René, you know what's helping us get through this? The promises in God's word about what Marilyn is experiencing now and about Marilyn's glorious future in the presence of Jesus Christ at the resurrection. This is what the Bible is talking about in Psalm 119 when it says things like, my comfort in my suffering is this, your promise preserves my life. What promise?

Listen, we talked about this last weekend. The whole Bible is one long redemption narrative, right, of how God takes you and me in our sin and the world and all its suffering and evil. And one day he's going to redeem us and the whole world through the sacrifice, the crucifixion and resurrection of our of his son, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. What a great story. What a great narrative. That is the truth.

And when we place our lives in the context of that story, then we find comfort and promise no matter what happens to us in our lives. And so you've got to get rooted in the word of God. There's nothing more important than that. The Bible says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. What this means is not just I come to church on Sunday morning and I'm inspired for 20 minutes, then business as usual for the rest of the week.

Or I read some verse, you know, in Sunday school, dwelling you richly means it becomes part of the fabric of your life. It becomes part of your DNA. Like when you get cut, you bleed promises from the word of God. How do you do that? You know, you hear people talk about this, but how is that actually done? You know what? It's just like prayer and meditation. It's not hard. It's actually easy.

Let me give you the best tip I've ever heard on this. It came from Billy Graham in many ways, kind of one of my heroes. And he said, here is what I've learned is the keystone habit to getting the Bible into your lives. You want to know what his secret was? Here it is. I never close my Bible. He said, I just always leave it open. He said, I haven't closed my Bible for decades. It's open on some table that I'm going to walk past every day because here's the hardest part of getting into your Bible. Watch this. Here it is. Opening it up.

So don't close it because here's what I found. When you leave it open somewhere, you know, you're walking past and you're like, oh, well, that's kind of interesting verse. I wonder what that and before you know it, you're reading it. So never close your Bible. And we try to help you get into the word to help you get into the word. We always put questions, reflection questions always in your sermon notes. They're always on the back page. We have midweek classes for more details. You can go to TLC.org/midweek.

Often I put further resources at the back of your notes like I did today. And most of the time those books are available at our bookstore because the good news is there's never been a time in human history when there's more resources available for you to get into the word of God, for you to read up.

So how do you grow through trouble? We're too distracted. So look up prayer and meditation every day. We're too shallow. So read up. But third, we're so tired. So rest up. Build Sabbath rest into your life. Let me read you a paragraph from a newspaper editorial. It's actually magazine editorial. And let me ask you if you relate to this. There's too much going on. Try as you will. You get behind in the race and spot yourself. It's an incessant strain to keep pace and still you lose ground. Everything's high pressure. Human nature cannot endure much more. Anybody relate to that?

That was in the Atlantic in June 1883. You know what that tells me? That tells me that it's not about the external pressure. It's about how we handle the external pressure because the same thing was felt two thousand years ago in Jesus' day. One of my favorite plots in the gospels is in Mark chapter six where there's so many people crowding in on Jesus and His disciples. Wanted to get healed, wanted to get some teaching, wanted to get some advice, questions answered. And it says, "Because so many people were coming and going that they didn't even have a chance to eat," He said to them, "Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest."

Now when Jesus said that, that meant He was saying no to people coming to Him for healing. But I love time management expert Drew Scott Decker's advice, saying no more frequently. And number two, do it daily. Now believe me, I know this is hard. Some of you remember last year I asked my friend Herman Hamilton, who's pastor of a great church over in Palo Alto, to speak here at TLC. And he said no! Why? Well he was noticing the signs of stress in his life and he went on kind of an emergency sabbatical for a couple of weeks.

And I was actually so impressed that he told me no, that I asked him about it. And I just want to replay part of that conversation for you. Watch this. I was pretty impressed that you said no when I asked you to speak because I know you want to speak. But one of the reasons you said no is you just have a lot of stuff on your plate and you can't say yes to Jesus and say yes to everything else. That means saying no to even some good stuff.

You know Jesus' time away from people, time with the Father in prayer, he really understood it as life and death. He understood that he needed to do that as almost as much as breathing. I think even for me, I haven't always seen it that way. And I realized several weeks before I pulled away that I was empty. You know my cup was getting emptier and emptier and emptier. And that the emotional and intellectual and spiritual resources that I needed to preach effectively week after week after week to lead effectively was drying up. Was just drying up.

So one, I was honest with my executive team. I do think that we have to be aware enough of what's going on in terms of our mental health and spiritual health and de-stigmatize that stuff. Don't see it as weakness. It is strength to be acutely aware of your situation and be able to articulate it. Say it out loud to some other folks. I said it out loud to my wife. I said it out loud to my executive team. I said it out loud to some of my elders. They were aware that this is kind of how I'm feeling and I'm looking.

So then the exec team joined me in trying to figure out how do we create some space for you. Talk to the guy who's working two jobs. Talk to the person who is trying to get through school and they're like, "Take a break. I wish I could." Well, first of all, I would say to the mom, to the dad, the guy who's working, first give yourself an emotional break. Don't be so hard on yourself. A grace filled break. Secondly, I look for small pieces of rest. I call it Sabbath moments. You may not be able to take off three or four days. You got all this, but can you find some Sabbath moments?

Can you do it in the course of your workday? Can you carve out 10 minutes or 15 minutes throughout the day where you're stepping away from work? Sometimes it's prayer. Sometimes it's just a walk with an apple and a banana and cut that phone off. Turn that phone off. Get this connected. Leave it at home. For 10 minutes, they will survive. Just go for a walk for 10 minutes. Oh, I feel free. It's freedom.

So those are some small things. Get up a little early before the family gets up. You feel refreshed after your two-week break? You know, I did. As a matter of fact, somebody told me, boy, you must have needed that break. And when I came back and preached for the first weeks, I don't know how I should take that. You got better. But yes, yes, yes. No, I came back. I felt rested. But after about a week or two back, I could begin to feel the stuff. And I know that I've got to make sure that I'm still taking time to rest, that I'm still pacing myself, that I'm saying no to stuff just because.

Like saying no to me. Which I hated to do because I really loved to come do that. No, what a good role model. That is still good. Hey, Herman. Ask me if I'll speak at your church. Will you speak at my church? No! Actually, I have spoken at his church a couple of times since then. It's a wonderful congregation. And Herman speaking here later on this year during my sabbatical this year. Herman's going to be here for three straight weekends. It's going to be great.

But if you long to grow through trouble, you need to be intentional about ways to look up, read up, rest up. And finally, what about that fourth bullet point? Remember, we're too isolated, so meet up. Meet up. I was fascinated by this. The BBC Loneliness Project, a large-scale global study, recently published its much-anticipated results. I usually feel lonely. Was expressed by 61% of Americans. We were one of the loneliest nations on the planet. And it goes up as you get younger. 79% of people in the Gen Z age group said, "I don't feel like anybody knows me. I feel lonely."

And this is bad because loneliness kills. One study found that it's worse than smoking 15 cigarettes a day. It has a greater impact on your health than obesity. Multiple studies have linked loneliness to heart disease, stroke, dementia, immune disorders, anxiety. In other words, loneliness makes trouble even worse. So the Bible says, "Let us not neglect our meeting together," as some people do. "But let us encourage one another." So if you'd like to learn how to connect here at Twin Lakes Church, just go to tlc.org/connect. That's the place to go.

We have home groups, zoom groups, men's groups, women's groups, recovery groups, youth groups, college groups, mothers of preschoolers, groups, mental health support groups, grief groups, cancer support groups, car groups, and much, much more. What I'm saying today is this. Trouble will happen. And so this year, choose to look at it all, even if you don't like it or necessarily agree with it, 100%, as an opportunity for growth because you're learning endurance.

But you have to have a foundation. As a daily habit, listen up, prayer and meditation. Read up, get into the Word, rest up, have a Sabbath rhythm to your life, and meet up, stay connected. Because you can stay in a fixed mindset, "I just want the status quo. I want things back the way they are. I don't want change." And you're just going to end up being frustrated all the time. Or you can choose a growth mindset and say, "Let's choose growth this year." Which will it be for you?

Lord, this year we want to choose to grow. You told us in this world we will have trouble, but we can take heart that you have overcome the world and your resurrection power through the Holy Spirit is in us. Your grace empowers us and changes us. So we will choose to see every delay, every cue, every time we're put on hold, every traffic jam, every new health mandate, even if we don't like it, as an opportunity to grow.

Because that's the attitude your Word instructs us to have. We kind of want that to be our superpower, like it was for the early Christians. And we know that's not a matter of our willpower. Your Holy Spirit will empower us to live this way if we so choose. So we choose it. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.