The Gap (Part 3)

Well, thank you once again, Mr. Miller. Good afternoon once again, everyone.

It's a pleasure to be here with you today and to have the opportunity to finish up this series that we've been working on the last little bit. As we've, uh, so for those of you that are visiting us for the, for the first time today or in the last little bit or listening online perhaps for the first time, uh, this is going to be the third part of a three-part message, so it's not going to make much sense. And I'll just apologize up front. Um, also wanted to remind everybody, I looked at the time when we started. I have until 4-24. Can't start throwing tomatoes until 4-24. Okay? I'm kidding. But, um, as we've delved into this series of messages and as we've kind of considered this concept of the gap, the first message we took the time to define what this gap is. We, we talked about the idea that this gap is in existence between our expectations and the reality that we experience. And we talked about how the existence of this gap can cause a great deal of negative emotion in our lives. That it can exist and it can cause disappointment. It can cause anger. It can cause frustration. Because we have a set of expectations and a, and an assumption in some ways of how things are going to progress that is not being met.

And it's not being fulfilled in that regard. We talked about in that first message, uh, examples in scripture of individuals who experience this particular gap in their lives. We talked about John the Baptist. We talked about his doubt. We talked about Elijah and some of the despondency that he exhibited, uh, following the events on Mount Carmel. And we talked a little bit about Peter and his refusal in many ways to accept Christ's purpose in his first coming, where he pulled the Messiah aside and he rebuked him for what God's plan was and his, you know, uh, giving into the will of that plan. You know, as you examine scripture, the gap is prevalent throughout. You know, you go back and you look through most of the accounts. You can see it in, in many, many cases. And the reason it's so prevalent and the reason that we see it so frequently within scripture is because the gap is a fundamentally human condition.

The gap is a fundamentally human condition. And the characters that we read about in scripture, they are painfully human, just as we are painfully human. Now, they are people that God worked with despite their flaws, despite the fact that their humanity showed through at times.

But as humans, even today, we have a certain degree of expectation in how events are going to occur in our lives, how others will treat us, how others will interact with us, how love will be shown to us, or how we will show love to others. There are certain expectations in our lives that are in all of these aspects of life. Sometimes we have expectations about how we're going to guide our life toward the plans that we have. So we talked in the first message about the existence of this particular gap. And that second message, what we looked at was ways to close the gap, ways to kind of bring our expectations and our reality, perhaps, a little bit closer together.

We talked about reducing the distance between the expectations that we have and the reality, ultimately, that we experience. You know, we explored the challenges that we have today in society over things like this. We talked about how we have movies, how we have television, how we have social media, and how a number of these things paint for us incredibly unrealistic expectations of our own personal lives. How we're dealing at times in this concept of what is called cultivation theory, where we have these unrealistic expectations that have been put forth. And those unrealistic expectations, they affect our marriages, they affect our relationships, they affect our financial well-being by setting us up with this fictional view of what life should, quote-unquote, look like. And what this has done, as a whole, if you look around society today, is it has created an age of entitlement. It has created an age of entitlement in which individuals feel that they deserve the life that they have had painted for them in their heads. That life should look like Instagram does, or life should look like my friend's Facebook feed, because it looks like they're always doing awesome things. My life's so boring in comparison, or my life should look like, like we talked about in the last message, friends. I should be able to afford a, you know, 3500 square foot apartment in Manhattan on a barista salary.

Turns out I can't do that. I can't hardly afford a cardboard box in Manhattan for that price, right?

But we begin to believe that we deserve a life that is free of problems, is free of inconveniences, is free of difficulties, and when our reality is starkly different than that painting, whatever we got in our head, when that gap is larger, we experience negative emotion. We talked about how there are really only a few different options to us when it comes to closing that gap. We can either lower our expectations, right? If your expectations are really low, most of the time things will exceed them. So that's one way I live in your life, right? Lower your expectations drastically.

Give up on our dreams, give up on our desires, settle for something less than what we want for ourselves and our family, which we talked about. Is that what God wants? No. No. We can alter our reality. Put in the extra work. Take the time, the training, the education to be able to bring our reality closer to the expectation that we have in our heads. But we also talked about how there are times in life in which we have very little control. Very little control. These things can come about as a result of our own decisions and our own actions, or at times they can occur independent of our choices and our actions, like was discussed in the sermonette today, time and chance, so to speak. Right? Now, we understand that God is in control. We understand He is aware of the things that are happening. God is not asleep at the wheel. He is aware of the things that are occurring in the world around us today. He is aware of the difficulties and the challenges that we have in our lives. Folks, He knows every hair on our head. He's not asleep at the wheel.

These things are happening with His understanding and His approval.

And through that process, we learn and we grow. You know, the other unfortunate reality of being human is that at times we learn most effectively through adversity. And that's just reality. We learn most effectively through adversity. And there are some lessons, brethren, that we simply cannot learn in any other way. And so, as Mr. Kinsella pointed out in the sermon at this morning, we suffer. We suffer. So we concluded part two with this idea—sorry, my mask is acting up today—we concluded part two with this idea that there is this third option. Rather than lower our expectations or alter our reality, there's a third option to help us kind of close the gap, so to speak, between those expectations and reality. And that is this idea of bridging the gap.

Bridging the gap from reality to expectation. And so bridging the gap really consists of an acknowledgement of the discrepancy—kind of the distance between what we expected and what really happened—and acceptance of reality and of various methods of bridging that gap appropriately. And I want to emphasize the term appropriately. Today, with the time that we have left, what I'd like to do is explore this concept, get a better idea of how we can bridge this gap, and also better manage our expectations and our reality. So the title of the message, unsurprisingly, is The Gap, Part 3.

And the final, the end. It's going to be a little longer because I didn't want to go into Part 4. But when we talk about this concept of bridging the gap, when we talk about kind of what this looks like, to be honest, brethren, mankind has been attempting to bridge it for millennia.

Thousands and thousands and thousands of years, mankind has been attempting to bridge this gap in expectations and reality. But unfortunately, more often than not, what ends up happening is that their attempts in bridging that gap actually exacerbate the problem.

It makes it worse. You go far enough back in the historical record of mankind, you can find evidence for the use of addictive, psychoactive substances clear back thousands and thousands of years to the earliest records of human history. Some of the earliest evidence of alcohol production outside of scripture is in China, where a drink was produced ultimately from fermented grapes, mixed it with rice, honey, and some other fruits as well. Beer has been described in Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and other Near Eastern cultures. And of course, we see wine mentioned in both biblical and extra-biblical sources. But it wasn't just alcohol production. It wasn't just alcohol.

There were other psychoactive substances that were utilized by cultures all over the world as well. South American cultures used coca leaves. Choo coca leaves is a stimulant. That's a stimulant from which they derive cocaine. Eastern cultures utilized marijuana and opium, while North American cultures and Mesoamerican cultures utilized hallucinogens such as peyote or mezcal beans.

Now, these substances were used for religious ceremonies. They were used medicinally. They were used for a whole bunch of other cultural events. But it doesn't take man long to learn how to manipulate things for their own enjoyment. Sure, the initial use of these things was not necessarily intended for abuse, but it certainly wouldn't take long for somebody to realize, hey, if I had a couple more of these, I'd feel pretty good. Maybe I should have a couple more glasses of this grape juice concoction. Or perhaps a couple more jars of this mead or this beer.

We look... need look no further than the Bible, for examples of the loss of control that can come from increased intake of alcoholic substances. Genesis 9 records Noah's succumbing to the intoxicating effects of wine. Genesis 19 gives us description of Lot's drunkenness at the hand of his own daughters and the things in the aftermath that occurred in both of these situations.

Now, while those two particular biblical examples don't illustrate evidence necessarily of extensive alcohol abuse, so to speak, it does go to illustrate the dangers in the loss of control which can occur from utilizing these particular substances. Now, as time went on and his history went on, mankind found ways to distill and to make these substances more effective, more potent, and as a result, more addictive. The addictive nature of these particular substances comes about largely as a result of the hijacking of our dopamine reward centers in our brain. Dopamine's a neurotransmitter that's essentially released when we're doing things that we find enjoyable.

There's other chemicals released during this time frame as well, and it's not necessarily the dopamine that makes those feelings of happiness occur. The dopamine is associated with those feelings of happiness, and so what ends up happening is we desire the pleasure that came from those particular activities, and ultimately that spike of dopamine helps to associate those things. Turns out, addictive psychoactive substances release dopamine just like pleasurable activities do, and so the result is a reward system that is hijacked by the substance.

The substance itself is associated with euphoria, it's associated with pleasure, and so the person craves that release of dopamine further as time goes on, but the problem is that particular substance is kind of nefarious. Obviously, it doesn't have a mind of its own, so to speak, but the way that it interacts with our brain and the way that it operates, as you use it more and more and more, more and more dopamine is released as a result, and pretty soon your brain stops producing it to the same level naturally, and so regular life looks pretty miserable, because you can't find pleasure in regular life anymore. You need the substance to receive that dopamine, and so your brain starts to crave the substance, because it craves the feeling that it had, and before long we have lost our control to the substance. Some of the first extra-biblical literature that express concepts of pathological use of these substances can be attributed to the Greeks. Some of the first writings that explore what we would term as today what we would call addiction, kind of a loss of control to a substance or to a behavior, can be traced back to the 17th century. It's not just substances, it's behaviors as well that can be equally addictive and equally destructive. If a behavior is enjoyable, it releases dopamine, and you associate pleasure with this activity. Over time, the brain learns that that behavior is pleasurable, and that that person should continue to do it in order to continue releasing dopamine, and that same progression can occur, and a reliance can be built. Why are we talking about this? Fast forward to today.

Fast forward to today in the United States. We are in the midst of an opioid epidemic of crisis levels. We have parents OD'ing in their cars with their children still in the vehicle in the Midwest of the United States. It happens constantly. 17 states just this year have legalized recreational marijuana. Just this week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to decriminalize marijuana nationally. It is no longer a criminal act to have possession of marijuana here in the nation itself, which is viewed by many as a step on the road towards eventual national legalization. Oregon, in November of this year, voted to decriminalize a number of other drugs. Currently, if an individual is picked up on possession of heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, or hallucinogens in Oregon, they would be cited, similar to a traffic ticket, and would be offered an opportunity for treatment or to pay a fine. So it's been decriminalized at this point in the state of Oregon.

Alcohol remains a frequently abused drug. One in four Americans have admitted to binge drinking, which means drinking to the point of a .08 blood alcohol content in the past month in a 2019 study, while 6.3 percent in the same study reported they engaged in heavy alcohol use, which meant five or more days in a one-month period of that same binge drinking. Now, that was in 2019. Then, 2020 happened. I don't know if you've seen the statistics, but liquor store sales are way up!

People are definitely processing 2020 and its horribleness via a variety of alcoholic uses.

95,000 people die annually. In 2019, found 95,000 people die annually from alcohol-related deaths.

10 percent of children in the U.S. live with a parent with alcohol problems, which can develop into multifaceted generational issues. Legalization of marijuana here in Oregon has resulted in a number of unintended consequences. Many of the strains that are sold to the public in Oregon are high THC strains, because when people go to procure marijuana for usage, they are intending to get high. You don't use marijuana in moderation, quote-unquote. That doesn't exist. Your goal is to get high, to enter from not drunk to drunk. That is the goal.

And as a result of these high THC strains, studies are beginning to show that in particular, during the adolescent years, it can have absolute massive long-term and lasting effects on people's mental health. It can increase anxiety. It can increase frequency of psychotic episodes.

And there's some evidence that appears to show that it can even develop, kind of cause the development of schizophrenia and extreme paranoia at a massive rate.

Given all of these things, I mean, if you look at all of this in one big picture, in one big pile, it's not hard to see the connection between substance behavioral addictions and the gap.

It's not hard. People as a whole want to feel good.

They want to feel good. And when they don't feel good, they want to do what it takes to feel good.

People don't want to experience pain. They don't want to experience displeasure. They want to experience pleasure. Very few people, very few people, appreciate and enjoy negative emotion in their lives. Very few people appreciate it. Most everyone wants to feel good, quote unquote. And so what happens is people seek ways to numb the pain, to numb the negative emotion of our lives, to escape from reality, to escape from their reality. So we bridge the gap with something that helps us to forget our issues for a time. Something that gives us a chance to feel good, to temporarily relieve the pain of the negative emotions that we're experiencing. And as a result, people develop issues relating to alcoholism, drug abuse, pornography, sexual addiction, gambling, gaming addictions, internet addictions, shopping addictions. That's a thing. shopping addictions, binge eating, that's a thing. Or some people even become addicted to thrill-seeking behaviors in order to escape the boredom of their reality. But does it actually work?

Does it actually work? No. No, it really doesn't. When that person comes down from that experience, when they come off of that behavior, or they come off of that substance, reality is still staring them right in the face. The bridge is gone, but the gap is still there. Nothing's changed as a result of their actions. Nothing's changed aside from perhaps some temporary relief.

And in some circumstances, depending on the situation, the guilt, the shame of that experience, the the choices that that person made while they were intoxicated, for example, or while they were under the the influence of that behavior, causes them to think even less of themselves and widens the gap even more. And so that person comes out of that experience worse off than they were going in. But for a time, they bridged the gap with something else. Now the problem is, as we look at this concept, and as we look at these issues in life, and they're very real issues, you know, they're very real issues in society around us, they're very real issues in the church.

As we look at these things, and as we consider these things, we recognize these behaviors. They're not appropriate as a Christian. In fact, often they're either directly or by principle labeled in Scripture as sinful. We know the results aren't effective. We know they're not lasting in helping us to solve this issue of this gap. So what do we do? What do we do? Because unmet expectations is a reality in all of our lives. What do we do with it? How do we bridge that gap appropriately? How do we bridge it effectively and more permanently when we experience the challenge of unmet expectations? Turn with me, please, to the book of 1 Peter. We're going to start there today. We're going to turn over to 1 Peter to get started. And we recognize, as we talked about before, you know, a number of these expectations, they can be realistic, and they can be unrealistic. You know, they can be things that we see in the world around us and think that everyone is experiencing when they're not really. 1 Peter, if you want to begin turning over there, again, we talked in the last message, the context of the book of 1 Peter is interesting. You know, Peter's writing this epistle to the brethren during a time of, you know, a great persecution of Christians under the Roman Empire in the 60s AD. 1 Peter is written as an encouragement to the brethren who are receiving it. And this was written to those that were in the dispersion throughout Asia Minor. A number of the little congregations and things that he was writing to the dispersed among in the first part of the passage shows where this thing was headed.

But it's written as an encouragement. It's written as a message that is designed to encourage, but also to remind the brethren to maintain their focus in spite of the challenges that they face, in spite of what was going on in the world around them. 1 Peter 1, we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 13. 1 Peter 1 and verse 13. Just prior to this section, Peter had been reminding the recipients of these words of hope that they have been called to, that they have been called to an incredible hope. They can greatly rejoice in that hope. They can rejoice despite the trials that grieve them because of that hope. He says that their faith, which he characterizes, he says, your faith, it's more precious than gold. It's more precious than gold. He says that faith will be examined. It will be tested. It will be proved in the fire. In the fire of those trials, that faith will be proved. And that their result of that test and that proof, it will praise, it will honor, and it will glorify Christ, whom they have not seen, he says, but whom they love. He talks about, while they may not see him now, that they rejoice with inexpressible joy at the end of their faith, at the result of that faith, their salvation. Verse 13. This is the admonition he gives them.

He says, therefore, gird up the loins of your mind. Be sober. Rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. It says, as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance, verse 15, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all of your conduct.

All of your conduct. Be holy. So Peter says to the brethren that are receiving this letter, he says, look, be sober. And that doesn't just mean don't drink alcohol. That's not, it's not talking specifically about, you know, being sober, although that is an aspect of it.

But what he's saying is, be self-controlled. Have self-control. Maintain your control over your life, over your emotions. And as Mr. Miller brought out last week, remain reasonable. There's an aspect of this concept of reasonableness in this word sober. But maintain your control over your life, over your actions, over your words, over your emotions, and remain reasonable.

You know, it's not just substances and behaviors that can control a person.

We can be inadvertently controlled by our own emotions. We can be hijacked by our own emotions. And by the experiences that we had in our childhood, the traumas that we experienced, can hijack our logical thought processes. He's saying, don't be controlled inadvertently by your emotions. Take that extra step to step back logically. Maintain a degree of control. Peter actually says, gird up the loins of your mind. Now, anybody ever girded up their loins?

You might have not realized in what you've done. Those days, you know, we recognize men wore these long robes and tunics at that point in time. And so to gird up their loins meant to take those robes and tunics—I'll step off the frame here a minute—and pull them up so that they're about mid-side. And they would take all that extra fabric and they'd throw it back through between their legs and tie it off. Now they're wearing skirts, as they put it, or whatever those are called.

It's like a skirt and shorts at the same time. So now they can run. They can work hard. They can do hard labor. He says, gird up the loins of your mind. In other words, prepare your mind for a fight.

Or to do hard labor. To do things that are difficult and challenging.

Says, gird up the loins of your mind. Prepare it. Remain in control of yourself in these times of persecution and trial. And he says, rest your hope on the grace that is brought to you by the revelation of Christ. And he says, do so, do all these things, as obedient children.

Not being confirmed, not being conformed. In other words, being like behaviorally or societally similar, taken from the same pattern, so to speak, as the people in the world around us. He says, as your former lusts. Which he says, in your, which in your ignorance you are involved in.

But he says, as God is holy, then we too should be holy in our conduct. The Greek word there for holy is agios. H-A-G-I-O-S. And it says, we are expected then to be hagios or agios in our conduct.

That we are to be sanctified, we are to be set apart. Now, I read this during our epistles of John Bible study, because John uses this word pretty frequently as well in his first epistle.

I want to share it with you here today, though, because I think it's incredibly important for us to consider. And I think that there is a lot of value in understanding what this word means, and how it is shared here. Because it's shared in a method of encouragement and exhortation. Because all of us run the risk of being in this place. Barkley writes in his letters to John and Jude, pages 3 and 4, on this concept of agios. He says, in the first days of Christianity, there was a glory. There was a splendor. There was the good old days.

But now, Christianity had just become a thing of habit. It was traditional. It was half-hearted. It was nominal. He said, men had grown used to it, and something of the wonder was lost.

Jesus knew men. He understood man. He understood how men operate. And he says, in Matthew 24, verse 12, he says, most men's love will grow cold. John was writing at a time, again, late first century, when John was writing at least. This is the middle 60s A.D., when Peter's writing. But John was writing at a time when, for some at least, the first thrill was gone, and the flame of devotion had died to a flicker. One result was that there were members of the church who found the standards which Christianity demanded to be a burden and a weariness. They didn't want to be saints in the New Testament sense of the term. The New Testament word for saint is hagios, sometimes translated more commonly as holy, but its basic meaning is different.

Its basic meaning is different. The temple was hagios because it was different from other buildings. The Sabbath, hagios because it was different from other days. The Jewish nation was hagios because it was different from other peoples, and a Christian was called to be hagios because he was called to be different from other men, to be sanctified, right, to be set apart, to be holy. It says there was always a distinct cleavage between the Christian and the world. In the fourth gospel, Jesus says if you were of the world, the world would love its own.

But because you're not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. And that's in John 15 and verse 19. Feel like the world loves us these days?

I have given them thy word, said Jesus, in his prayer to God, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. John 17 and verse 14. His conclusion, he says all of this involved an ethical demand. It involved, or demanded, I'm sorry, a new standard of moral purity, a new kindness, a new service, a new forgiveness. It was difficult. And once the first thrill and the enthusiasm were gone, it became harder and harder to stand out against the world and refuse to conform to the generally accepted standards and practices of the age.

That's the end quote of Mr. Barkley in his letters to John and Jude. Peter is telling the brethren, break out of the mold of the world and its patterns. Break out of that mold. Be different. Do not conform or fashion yourself to it. So how is that possible? How is that possible in our lives? How can we become different? How can we become more like God? Let's turn over to Galatians 5.

Galatians 5. One of the ways that we can bridge this gap between our expectations and our reality is yielding ourselves to the mind of God, yielding ourselves to His Spirit dwelling within us, and allowing that Spirit to lead us and to guide us in our lives. Galatians 5, we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 16. When we consider what it means to be holy, when we consider what it means to be set apart, to be like God, as Peter discussed in 1 Peter 1, verse 13, we are talking about operating differently than the world around us.

We're talking about operating differently than the rest of mankind as a result of submitting ourselves to God's Spirit dwelling in us, allowing that Spirit to guide us as God directs us toward the fulfillment of His will in our lives. Galatians 5 and verse 16, I'm going to go ahead and read it in the New Living. It's got some more flowery description, I guess, for lack of a better term. But verse 16 of Galatians 5, it says, and you can read along in your translation whatever you might have, says, So I say, Let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants, and the Spirit gives us desires that are opposite of what the sinful nature desires.

These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your own good intentions. But when you're directed by the Spirit, you're not under obligation to the law of Moses. Now, sometimes people have trouble with that last statement. Christ is basically making the point that a house divided against itself—or I should say in this case, Paul's making the point—that a house divided against itself can't stand. God's Spirit is not going to ask somebody to move in opposition to God. It's not going to ask somebody to move in opposition to God. And so, in that fashion, by allowing His Spirit to lead us and not following our own carnality, we would operate within the law of God. Verse 19, again, in the New Living, when you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear. Sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery—which, interestingly enough, as we were talking about substance abuse earlier, it's a Greek word, pharmakea, which is where we get the word pharmacy from.

Often, many of those sorcery-type things that were taking place—divination, witchcraft—they came as a result of psychoactive substances and opening one's mind to demonic influence. And so, that kind of thing happened with pharmakea. Hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God. Paul makes it pretty clear in whatever version you're reading that if we are not yielding ourselves to God's Spirit in our lives, and if we are instead conforming ourselves to society and its standards, and kind of living the desires of our sinful nature, that the fruit of that life is clear. Sexual morality, putting other things in the place of God, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger and wrath, selfishness, selfishness, not shellfish. However, I just said that. I'd blame the mask, but it was my tongue that got in the way of my teeth. Dissension, division, drunkenness, envy. But in verse 22, Paul contrasts these fruits with a life that is aligned with God's Spirit.

Take a look at this description, and I want you to think about these things in light of the gap between our expectations and reality, and how we respond to that gap, how we deal with that gap. Verse 22, But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. And he says, There is no law against these things.

Those who belong to Jesus Christ have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to the cross and crucified them there. Since we're living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit's leading in every part of our lives. Let us not become conceited or provoke one another or be jealous of one another. How do the fruits of God's Spirit in our life bridge the gap?

How does it bridge the gap? Isaiah 55, verses 8-9—we won't turn there, but if you jot it in your notes—it describes how God's thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways are not our ways. As the heavens are higher than the earth, His ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. When we allow God's Spirit to lead our lives, it helps to take us out of that immediate situation. In some ways, it helps to pull us back a little bit and give us kind of a 30,000-foot overview of the scenario. It helps give us perspective. It helps give us a minute to breathe before we respond. But it provides us with the ability to see things less as man sees things and more as God does. And so, instead of seeing our expectations and seeing that our reality fell short of those expectations, it can help us to consider that God's expectations and His will for us—that we grow and that we develop spiritually to become more like Him—much of what we see and what we experience will be viewed with a different perspective. We can begin to see these things as opportunities. And that's a stark change and a stark difference in how we often view the challenges that we experience. Peter, for example, writes that love covers a multitude of sins. When we are mistreated by others, what's our human response? We go back at them just like they came at us.

That's the human response. Instead of strife and instead of anger as a result of the offense, if we yield ourselves to God's Spirit and we choose instead love and forgiveness, how does that help bridge our gap?

If we forgive the person and we show love to them in the process, it doesn't really matter where the expectation was at that point.

In circumstances where we experience great trials in our lives, if we can step above that situation in some ways with the help of the mind of God and choose to rejoice in those challenges, being thankful for the opportunity to grow spiritually, we can bridge the gap.

Instead of choosing strife or contention when we have issues with individuals, we can choose peace.

We don't have to get in every argument that is presented to us.

I could certainly learn that myself.

Instead of selfishness and dissension and division, we can choose kindness and we can choose goodness.

Instead of doubt, fear and anxiety, we can choose faithfulness.

Instead of pride and being overbearing, we can choose gentleness, meekness.

And instead of operating on emotion and instead of, you know, feeling, when we get into a situation, you feel that heart, your breath take, your breath catch, and your heart rate. You ever had one of those? Or you're trying to respond to somebody? I'll tell you, I had one of those at the last hotel we met at.

I had to walk away from that situation because I was going to say something stupid.

And so I took a moment, collected my thoughts, and emailed. And thankfully, the situation was dealt with.

May not have been dealt with in the same way had I responded at that point in time, while my emotions were running high. You know, God's Spirit provides us with prompts, but it's on us to listen to those prompts, to allow ourselves to be guided by them. And again, well, this sounds simple in principle. We know it's not. We know it's not simple.

It is incredibly challenging to quiet that human side of us and instead yield to the side that God has provided us. But like anything, the more we practice, the better we get.

Next time you have a gap in expectation and reality, try it. Try it. Purposefully try it.

Acknowledge the disappointment. Acknowledge the frustration. Acknowledge the negative emotion.

Recognize it. Ask yourself, was the expectation that I had realistic?

Because if it's not a realistic expectation, well, then maybe you need to adjust that.

Think about whether you can actually personally alter the reality in order to meet your expectation.

And if you can't, then it's outside of your control. Analyze it with the mind of God in place.

I know it's cliche, but ask yourself, what would Jesus have done in the exact same situation that I find myself in? Would he have punched that guy in the throat? The answer is probably no.

I'm just going to throw that out there. I don't have to turn to a scripture on that. I hope we can all agree. The answer is probably no. And so when we consider how we operate on these things, just even that split-second question of, is this realistic, or am I expecting too much? Can I change the situation I find myself in? If the answer is no, I can't. Well, then now I've got to bridge the gap somehow. I can't alter the reality. I can't change the expectation. Now I've got to bridge the gap, which means I've got to step back for a second and see what is God doing here? How is God operating in this? How do I need to operate as a result? What do I need to learn? What do I need to understand?

Because ultimately, when we talk about Christ's example, when we talk about his model, that's what we're working towards. That's the life that we're working to emulate in the way that he interacted, in the way that he operated with individuals.

What can we learn? What can we grow from? How can we grow from it? What's God trying to show us? Often, there's a greater expectation at work in our lives than the expectation that we have here in this life. We visited once in the series already, but if you want to jot down 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 3 into your notes, God's will—it specifically says 1 Thessalonians 4, 3—God's will for us is our sanctification. His will for us is our becoming agios, becoming set apart, becoming different, not being conformed to the mold of this world. That is God's will for us.

That we're thinking and that we're acting differently, that we're maintaining our zeal in his way of life like we used to, what we did when we first fell in love, so to speak.

That we're being steadfast, we're being faithful, we're not allowing ourselves to sway with the winds of this world and its poles, but we're right down the line, diligent, to make our calling in our election sure. Another thing we can do to help fill the gaps, another thing that we can do to kind of help bridge that gap between expectation and reality is to practice gratitude and thankfulness on a regular basis. You know, just again, because we can step back and see that situation from 30,000 feet doesn't mean we still won't experience negative emotions. When relationships are broken, there's pain. There's no way around it. When a relationship is broken, even if you can step back and logically look at it and go, yep, that's broken, it still hurts. It still hurts a lot.

Sometimes, though, those broken relationships and the pain in the breaking of that relationship give us an opportunity for growth. They give us an opportunity for God to work in that pain in our life, to show himself during that time. You know, again, God didn't keep Shadrach, Meshach, and Ben, and go out of the furnace. He was there with them in the furnace. And so it's being with them. It's working through that process. You know, sometimes we're struggling with financial situations or job losses. Even if we can step back and say, well, this is an opportunity for growth, that doesn't stop the bills from coming. That doesn't stop, ultimately, for the stress in all of that to occur. It doesn't take the pain and the difficulty away. But in these scenarios, we can kind of bridge that gap by practicing gratitude and thankfulness in other aspects of our life.

I don't know about you guys. I've noticed in my own life, it's really easy for me to focus on one negative thing and ignore all the positives. And I don't know, I think that's frankly a human thing. I don't think that's just a Ben issue, but maybe some of you don't have that problem. That's fantastic if you don't. I remember several years ago when I was still in the classroom, I had a really challenging group of kids. I was frustrated, I was upset, I had a terrible attitude about the whole entire scenario. And I would honestly, going back, it was the most challenging year of my teaching career. But interestingly enough, in hindsight, as I look back on it, it had nothing to do with the kids. It was the most challenging year of my teaching career because of my attitude and because of my approach to the situation. I self-sabotaged that situation up one side and down the other. Remember, we were sitting around with a few colleagues at one point after school, and as often happens in teaching, the discussion went from, it went into a quote-unquote staff meeting. And I say that in quotes because that's code for complaining about kids. And so we're sitting around and a lot of us had the same kids, and so we're sharing stories of what this kid did or what this kid did. And usually you try to one-up the last story because the kid did something even more outrageous in your classroom, and you can tell everybody about it. I remember one of my colleagues, Wise Beyond for Years, said, how many of your kids are really a problem? I thought for a minute, my first brain's like, all of them! Every last one of them! Which wasn't true. The more I thought about it, I kind of counted through my 180 or so kids. I concluded the number of kids that were challenging and truly problematic. About 10. 10 out of 180. And yet all I focused on were those 10 and how miserable I was because of those 10. Because of my attitude toward those 10.

What about the rest of my kids? What about all those ones that I focused on, you know, going wrong? I couldn't even focus on the ones that were doing it right.

I couldn't see the 170 kids that were there every day that were pleasant and that excelled.

My focus was on the 10 that I couldn't seem to find a way to manage. And in many ways, going through that process, I wasn't exhibiting gratitude or thankfulness for those 170. In any way, shape, or form, my focus was somewhere else entirely.

I was more frustrated that in some ways my life didn't look like dead poet society.

Because that was my expectation of myself as a teacher, that I could inspire like Robin Williams in dead poet society. Let's not focus on the ending of that movie, but during, you know, the portions of the movie in which there was some excellent teaching going on.

Let's go over to 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians.

The Book of Thessalonians is written to the church in Thessalonica. It's a city that's located in what's now northern Greece, kind of along the shores of the Aegean Sea. It was an important port city at that point in time. One of the earlier stops, actually, of the Apostle Paul's missionary journeys. One of the initial visits that he went to, or the initial visit, I should say, that he went to the city is in Acts 17, and it was during his second missionary journey. So at that point in time, he went, he reasoned, he visited with the Jews in the city, he taught them about Christ as Messiah. He left shortly after that visit. He was there, I think it says Three Sabbaths, before somebody started a riot and they bailed out for Berea. They escaped them away, him and Silas at night, and they sent them off to Berea as a result of the riot that occurred over the things that he was teaching. Now, he was prevented from returning to Thessalonica right away. He was able to go back later, but he was prevented right away. So he sent Timothy to report as to the status of the congregation and how they had fared since he left, and as a result of that report from Timothy, he wrote the book of First Thessalonians. So First Thessalonians came about as a result of the report that Timothy gave him on the congregation in Thessalonica. So the letter of Thessalonica is written, the First Thessalonians, is written as an encouragement to a group of newer believers. He's encouraging them and he's strengthening their faith, and in some cases he's defending his own authority against slander. He's correcting some challenging issues which cropped up in their midst. In First Thessalonians 5 and verse 16, Paul begins to talk about the importance of gratitude and thankfulness. He says, rejoice always. Rejoice always. Pray, verse 17, without ceasing. Verse 18, in everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ for you. Once again, we see an example here of God's will for us, but he encourages them to be glad always, to pray without ceasing, to maintain constant communication with God. But then he says, in everything, in all circumstances, as some translations have it, all circumstances, give thanks.

Now the Greek word for give thanks is eucharistio, which is a verb that describes being glad, giving thanks. It's formed from the same root word as the word rejoice in the first part of this, which is the Greek word kairo, to rejoice or to be glad. So Paul's message to those in Thessalonica is that this gladness, this gratitude, this thankfulness in our lives should be the state in which we operate. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances.

This should be the constant in our life. Rejoicing, being glad, praying always, and again in all circumstances giving thanks. Why? Why? Why should that be the state of our life? Because that's the will of God in Christ Jesus for us. That is His will for us as we live here on this earth and as we grow and as we develop spiritually. It is God's desire that in all circumstances in our life we are thankful, that we are glad, and that we are grateful.

You know, gratitude and thankfulness, especially in recent years, has been shown even by secular sources to be very powerful practices in our life. And we just got done with November. November is the gratitude month, and oftentimes people go through and they work on things that they're thankful for each day of the month of November. But gratitude and thankfulness help us to maintain our perspective.

They help us to focus on the things that we're appreciative of and help us to see that in many ways, more often than not, in our lives we have so many more positives than we have negatives. And again, it's easy to focus on the negatives, but there are so many more positives than negatives. The issue is they're just harder to see when we're in the thick of our trials. When we're stressed out or we're anxious or when we're dealing with this or that or we're hurt or we're, you know, have been offended, when we're in those things it is so easy to just persevereate on that thing and not focus on all of the other things that are going incredibly well.

You know, we talked earlier about the release of dopamine and how that release causes an association in our brain between pleasure and that specific action. Studies have actually shown that the receipt of gratitude or expression of gratitude, so providing gratitude to someone or receiving gratitude from someone, causes a release of dopamine and that associates that with a pleasurable activity. You can actually become addicted to giving thanks in some ways. You know, there's a dopamine release. There's a pleasure that is derived from that. Gratitude is defined by the Harvard Medical School as a thankful appreciation for what an individual receives, whether tangible or intangible. With gratitude, people acknowledge the goodness in their lives and as a result, gratitude also helps people connect to something larger than themselves as individuals, whether to people, nature, or to a higher power.

Dr. Robert Emmons asserts that gratitude is a two-stage process. It says there's first the acknowledgement of goodness in one's life, kind of really taking the time to acknowledge the things that we have that we might take for granted because of their proximity, but then also the recognition, too, that the sources of this goodness lie outside of the self, that they are from, often, others.

And so when we consider that concept that much of the goodness in our lives, much of the things that we have to be thankful for, are external, that they come from apart from rather than within, then we naturally must begin to think, who do we thank for these things? Who do we express that gratitude to? Who do we recognize made personal sacrifices on our behalf so that we can be happy?

And do we thank them? And do we show our gratitude and our appreciation to those individuals? Because gratitude really is so much more than just recognizing the things in our life that we're thankful for. Sometimes we want to take and just write a small quick list of the things that we're thankful for and leave it at that.

But the more important aspect of it is, why am I thankful for this? Why am I thankful for this? I'm thankful for these things. But why? Why do these things cause me value? Why are they intrinsically valuable to me? Because it's the expression of that gratitude and that thankfulness in specifics, in many ways, that can strongly impact others. Think about it with your children, for those that have raised kids.

You tell them, I'm very proud of you, and they go, okay, cool. If you say, I'm really proud of you because look how you dealt with this particular situation that was really mature of you. Given that scenario, you could have reacted in a very different way. I'm really proud that you handled that so well. That means so much more to them than just, I'm proud of you. Thanks, etc. Why are we thankful? Why do we value those things? You know, we recognize God does an unbelievable amount of things in our life, and I hope that we're constantly expressing our thanks and gratitude to Him for those things.

But that thankfulness and that gratitude can help us bridge those gaps between expectation and reality, because they can help us to see our life in a more holistic way, kind of as parts of the whole overall, and see how all the parts and pieces work together. I'm going to sign a homework assignment for the next two weeks. I'm going to sign a homework assignment. Two weeks. What I would like you to do is put a little notepad by your nightstand. And what I want you to do before you go to bed is take a second and jot down three to five things. Three to five things that you are thankful for. Two weeks. That's all I'm asking.

It's not that much. Not going to kill you. But two weeks. Three to five things each day that you are thankful and that you are grateful for. But why are you grateful for them as well? Not just the things, but why? Why do those things have value to your life? And I'm going to ask you to resist the temptation to do what a lot of people do in this sort of stuff and just write the same three to five things down every single day. Find different things. I mean, you can have some repeats. I don't care. But don't be like, uh, thankful for God. I'm thankful for my wife. I'm thankful for my kids. That's it. Next day, thankful for God. I'm thankful for my wife. I'm thankful for my kids.

That's a cop-out. Come up with some things, right? But look at and try to resist the temptation.

To just jot down the same exact things each and every time. But really, dig through your life. Look through your life and find the places that you are thankful for and you have gratitude.

And why? Why do you have gratitude for those things? And then, what I'm going to ask you to do—and this is the harder part. Yeah, I heard an uh-oh. It's true. The next day, after you've written those things down, pick one and express that gratitude. Actually, express the gratitude to someone. Thank them. Tell them why they mean so much to you. Tell them why you are so important, or why they are so important to you. Listen, here's why I'm really important. Point number one. I'm important because don't do that. But tell them why they are so important to you. Express that to them. Take the time to do it. Give it two weeks and see if it doesn't change your perspective. See if it doesn't shift how you look at the world and how you look at the people around you as a result of doing it. So give it two weeks. Give it a shot. See, ultimately, if you notice a difference or a shift in your perspective. Because due to that kind of regular practice of gratitude, you can absolutely bridge the gap between areas where you are having challenges between that reality and that expectation. But not only that, gratitude and thankfulness helps to bring us to the third way of bridging our gap, and that is contentment. Contentment. And in many ways, when you look at contentment, you look at gratitude. They're related. Mindset of gratitude kind of enables us to be able to approach this idea of contentment because we begin to look at our lives and we consider the things that we ultimately are grateful for. And we recognize sometimes when we're grateful and we're really focused on that aspect of our life, sometimes we don't need as much, quote-unquote. We realize what we really do have. Let's go over to the book of Philippians. The book of Philippians. Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians. The book of Philippians.

And we're going to pick it up in Philippians 1, but I want to mention here, because we're talking about two different sets of writings of Paul. We have first Thessalonians and then we have the book of Philippians. And between the two books that are written, between these two epistles, there's a lot of water under the bridge. There's a whole lot that's happening between first Thessalonians and the writing of the book of Philippians. Paul is writing this book to the Philippians while he is imprisoned in Rome. So he is in Rome, imprisoned at this point in time.

It's believed by most that this is his penultimate letter. This is the second-to-last epistle that he would write, and it's believed that he wrote Philippians and second Timothy very close to one another, with second Timothy being the last. And so there's similar language between the two. There's similar discussion topics. There's some similar aspects between Philippians and second Timothy. And so it's believed that those two books were some of his final letters that went out, you know, to the congregations and to Timothy, ultimately, as one of his close friends and like a son to him. But in the letter, he speaks very evocatively of his impending death. Very evocatively, with very colorful language in the way that he describes it. But he's talking of his own death.

He says that his life has come to a conclusion, ultimately, that he is being poured out as he describes it. He talks frequently in the letter of suffering and of challenge, given again the scenario that was going on in the 60s AD in Rome. It's understandable that he was talking about the different sufferings that were existing at that time. But he's also, interestingly enough, and this is where we get into this idea of contentment, he's also talking about the ultimate gladness that in all of it, Christ is being preached. It didn't matter that he's in prison. It didn't matter that he was going to die. It advanced God's work. And so he was thankful, and he rejoiced. Let's pick up Philippians 1 and verse 12. Philippians 1 and verse 12 says, But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the gospel. It says my getting arrested was great! Not in so many words.

But the idea here is that God worked it out as God so often works things out for good. He says, So that it may become evident to the whole palace guard and to all the rest that my chains are in Christ. And most of the brethren in the Lord have become confident by my chains, are much more bold to speak the word without fear. Some indeed preach Christ even from envy and strife, and some also from good will. The former preached Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my chains. Verse 17, the better example, for the latter, out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel.

He goes on in verse 18, he goes on in verse 18 and says, What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached, and in this I rejoice, yes, and will rejoice.

He continues in verse 19, For I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Verse 20, According to my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also with Christ, or also Christ, will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death. Verse 21, For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. In other words, both eventualities bring success.

But if I live on in the flesh, this will mean fruit for my labor, yet what I shall choose I cannot tell. For I am hard-pressed between the two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Nevertheless, to remain in this flesh is more needful for you.

He talks about how he is hard-pressed between the two, but he recognizes that God's will will be done through either scenario.

In Philippians 2, if you want to flip just forward a little bit, it might be on the next page over, he encourages those in Philippi to do all things without complaining, without disputing, without grumbling, that they might become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the middle of this crooked and perverse generation, that they might shine as lights in the world around them, and that he might be able to rejoice in the day of the resurrection that he has not run or he has not labored in vain. Verse 17 of Philippians 2 says, yes, and if I am being poured out as a drink offering on the sacrifice and the service of your faith, I am glad and I rejoice with all of you or with you all for the same reason you also be glad and rejoice with me. It says, even in the face of my death be glad and rejoice with me.

He gives a similar phraseology in 2 Timothy. He says, the time of my departure is at hand. I'm being poured out, that he's glad and that he rejoices with them because that he's being poured out as a drink offering on top of their offering of sacrifice and service to God. He continues as you go through the rest of Philippians and kind of just skim through between here and Philippians 4.

He continues this epistle talking about rejoicing in God, praising those who served the congregations, the servants that were helping him at that time. He talks about pressing toward the goal of the upward calling of Christ, not looking back but looking forward and striving forward.

Talks about our citizenship, talks about where it's located, talks about the resulting pattern of behavior that we must exhibit as citizens of the kingdom. And then we get to Philippians 4.

As he begins to conclude the letter, he encourages the brethren to maintain their focus on positive things, to meditate on the things which are lovely and are pure, things that are of good report, not on the negatives, not on the suffering that was so prevalent during the time of Nero.

But instead focusing on the positives and being grateful for all that God was doing in their lives, for the work that he was advancing through them, the light that they were shining to the world around them in that time in the 60s AD in Rome. Then in verse 11 he writes the following. Philippians 4 verse 11. He says, not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am to be content. I know how to be abased and I know how to abound. Everywhere, and in all things, I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. He says, I can do all things, verse 13, through Christ who strengthens me.

Now he expresses his gratitude to the church in Philippi for their care, for their concern.

He thanks them for sharing in his distress and for their care for him. But Paul alludes to his own personal experience with sufferings and difficulties in his service to God. He talks, you know, he doesn't specifically outline them here. He outlines them in 2 Corinthians 11.

But Paul was able to reach a certain place of contentment in his life because he recognized whatever the outcome that God's will would be done. The outcome didn't matter. I mean, yeah, I'm assuming, you know, death isn't fun. You know, there's nothing fun about loss. There's nothing fun about those things. But Paul had come to the conclusion that either way God's will was what would be done. He said he could do all things through Christ because Christ was all in all. Whether he lived, whether he died, he said it didn't matter. God could work through either of those eventualities and the ultimate result would be God's glory. The ultimate result would be God's glory. When he experienced pain, he experienced suffering, and he petitioned God for relief of that suffering, as Mr. Consello mentioned this morning, what was God's response? My grace is sufficient. The gift I have provided you, Paul, is sufficient. What was that gift?

Eternal life, someday, resting in the hope of that promise that at some point in time, he would no longer suffer. He would no longer hurt, and Paul set his expectation on that hope. Now, it isn't to say Paul experienced everything perfectly. He was human, too.

But his particular perspective and his acceptance of God's will in his life is an excellent example to us all. I'll reference this 2 Corinthians 1, verses 8 through 10. 2 Corinthians 1, verses 8 through 10, as we start to conclude here. 2 Corinthians 1, verse 8, says, We don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life.

Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us, in whom we trust that he will still deliver us. And there are times in Paul's ministry—I mean, we see the laundry list of stuff that he experienced in 2 Corinthians 11—I mean, that guy was absolutely beaten senseless. I mean, he was worked over. And he just—I mean, I've told you this before. My favorite story is they go out and stone him, and he rolls his sleeves up and goes, ah! I've been thrown out of better places than this, stocks back in to continue doing what he was sent to do. But Paul didn't face everything perfectly. There were times in his ministry in which he despaired. The word here for despair in Greek is exaporethinae, to doubt or to despair. He says this particular scenario was a burden beyond measure. It was above strength. It was too difficult to handle. He said they had the sentence of death in themselves.

Paul thought he was going to die. He thought he was going to die. And he talks about how they trusted not in themselves to be able to deliver their lives, but in God, who raises the dead. In other words, they looked at the scenario and they said, I don't think we're getting out of this one.

And we've gotten out of a few of the other ones. We've scraped our way through. We've been hidden in baskets and, you know, snuck out in the middle of the night, but I don't think we're getting out of this one. This is how it ends. This is how it ends. And the conclusion was, at least there's a resurrection. At least there's a promise and a hope that I can hang on and I can rely on, that I know God will deliver. Well, and at that point in time, God chose to provide Paul with additional time to continue his ministry, but Paul, it appears, at least from his words in 2 Corinthians, he was convinced in that moment that it was over. And despite the uncertainty, despite exactly what would happen, he accepted that eventuality. Being content again in whatever state he found himself in because of that grace that was promised to him. You know, in many ways, when you're in that position and you're experiencing contentment on the order like Paul had experienced, the ultimate details of his life didn't really matter.

Whether he was full, whether he was hungry, whether he was abased or abounding, his focus was on the promise to come and a recognition that that's not going to come in this life.

He was strengthened in those moments of adversity. He could rejoice in spite of the challenges because Jesus Christ was coming. The saints would be resurrected and God's kingdom would come to bear.

Rob Cuban writes in his book, The Christ-Centered Contentment, says, the Bible calls us to allow our convictions, not our circumstances, to govern our sense of contentment. True biblical contentment is a conviction that Christ's power, purpose, and provision is sufficient for every circumstance. We are to learn how to walk through all kinds of adversity believing in and experiencing Christ's sufficiency. We have to choose to rest on God's good promises despite what may be going on in our lives. Do we allow room in our expectations for God's will in our life? Do we allow room for God's will in our life? Do we trust in God's ability to take care of our difficulties and our challenges? Do we trust in his purposes for us and what he has planned for us? Do we trust in his blessings even if all of those things are opposite of what we expected?

Even if those purposes are 180 degrees different than what we thought was going to happen, do we trust him?

Brethren, that's what makes this all so very challenging.

That sometimes we see this example in Scripture. God operates opposite of our desires and our wants.

He fulfills his purposes for our growth, for our spiritual maturity, and at times his process of perfecting us requires us to learn through adversity. And as a result of that, we suffer.

And we experience challenges and we experience difficulties. And what that means is that there will be times in our lives as Christians where his will and our will do not line up if we are forcing our expectations on ourselves. If we are unwilling to consider that God may have a different plan, we may pray for an outcome. We may pay for a very specific outcome. And God's answer may be no or not yet. And we continue to pray and we continue to pray and we continue to pray. But sometimes what can happen in that process is we can create a discrepancy again between our expectation and reality, which if we are not careful can harm our faith and can harm our relationship with God. Whether this gap exists either spiritually or physically, we experience negative emotion. We can become angry, frustrated, stressed, anxious, depressed, and these negative emotions can have a massive effect on our relationships, on our families, on our jobs, and on our congregations.

It can also, unfortunately, damage our relationship with God. Abridging that gap is essential.

Bridging that gap is essential. Yielding ourselves to God's Spirit in our lives, recognizing and examining the expectations that we have in determining are these realistic or not.

And then stepping back from the emotion of that moment, which is hard, and choosing to respond in accordance with God's Spirit, it can help us build that bridge. It can help us bridge that gap and mitigate the negative emotions that we're experiencing from the discrepancy between those two things. When we're hurt, for example, when someone says something to us that is offensive and it just is like a knife in the gut, we can choose to forgive that person and love them, regardless of what was said.

When we're confronted with strife or we're confronted with conflict, we can choose peace.

When we're met with hostility, we can choose kindness, we can choose gentleness.

We can work to discipline ourselves not to respond emotionally, but to consider and ask the question, what would Christ have done in this circumstance?

What would He have done? How would He have responded in this circumstance and then endeavor to respond in kind?

Practicing purposeful gratitude, too, can help bridge that gap by taking our focus on the places or take our focus rather off the places where we're experiencing these negative things and putting them on the areas of our life that are incredibly positive blessings. Looking at those places in our life where it meets or exceeds our expectations and considering why that's important and valuable for us. Journaling these things can be very helpful. Expressing that gratitude, expressing that thankfulness in very meaningful ways can bring us great pleasure and great satisfaction and provide wonderful opportunities for somebody else as well. Gratitude is a kind of a two-way street in many ways. Lastly, we can use both of these strategies to bridge the gap in order to help us work towards contentment. You recognize that God has provided us with our needs. He cares for us. We may have a whole laundry list of wants, but when we take a look at our lives, more often than not, our needs are taken care of. God is working His will in our life, and we can be grounded in the hope of those promises and come what may. I hope that this series of messages have been encouraging. I hope that they've been helpful in recognizing the existence of this gap in our own lives. I hope that as experiences come down the line and as we have issues and we have negative emotions regarding things, that we're able to stop and we're able to say, wait a second, what were my expectations?

What is the reality here? Do I have any ability to change it? How can I bridge it? What method can I use to bridge it most effectively? And I hope that we're encouraged to focus on and to work on bridging that gap through the power of God's Spirit in our lives, through the practice of gratitude, and through a state of contentment in all things.