Nudged Part 4
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Ha-Foke-Bah Hebrew
Ha-Foke-Bah English
Nudged Part 4
Introduction: We are in part of a series called “Nudged.”
We have said over the last three weeks that the big idea of this series is this:
The right nudge from the right source at the right time can get you to the right place, but the wrong nudge from the wrong source at the right time can get you to the wrong place.
First week we looked at the unseen world: the Spirit vs. Satan
Second week we talked about being nudged by God’s principles and not by expediency.
Last week we looked at the powerful nudge of shame and how faith in who God says you are and what he has told you to do makes all the difference in the destination you end up at.
Next week we conclude the series so please don’t miss this one.
This week, before we get into the text and before I really dig deep down into our topic I want to start with a question:
Do you really want to be like everybody else? That just makes you Average.
This year when you sat down to write out your goals did you write: I just want to be like everybody else.
Do you really want to just be like everybody else in your work place.
Do you really want your marriage, your kids, your future to be like everybody else.
Just for a moment. I want to talk about everybody else. Not us here in this room. Everybody else.
Everybody else wants their life to look like a beer commercial or episode friends.
But it does not.
But everyone else is worried, in debts, worried about being like their parents which actually turns them into their parents.
Everybody else is not happy with the stuff they got because there stuff really has them.
Everybody else is just so happy but what you don’t know is that there not really happy but chemically happen.
Everybody else who is single is worried if they will be single forever. Women will troll their bodies men will have the benefits of marriage without the covenant.
Everybody else of single men have the benefits of marriage without the commitment.
In the world everybody else a man is wondering if he can cheat because he knows someone who is or has and it has worked.
In the world of everybody else high-school students are deeply worried about what others think about them.
In the world of everybody else college students are worried about getting a job.
The Beer Commercial 2 Picture they hold it and pour it but never actually drink it.
The truth is
Everybody else takes their nudges from everybody else.
Let’s face it it is true.
Illustrate: The walking experiment done at the college campus.
You know it is true because you do it to.
If you take your nudges from everybody else, you will end up like everybody else.
The Big Problem: when you take your nudges from everybody else, you are taking your nudges from their highlight reel. You get that right.
You are just taking your cues from their highlight reel.
The only time you take your cues from the reel-reel is if they are a super-close friend. You will just always take your cues from their highlight reels.
You don’t know they are counseling, they are fighting, he is about to go into rehab, you don’t know they have not had sex in 9 months they just act like things are okay, you don’t know what they are taking, you have no idea what the relationship with their kids are like.
Then a strange thing happens when We take our cues from the highlight reel.
Outside vs. Inside
Problem we don’t see the Inside.
If you had known that living that on the outside would leave you feeling like this on the inside…
You embraced someone you should not have.
You bought something to impress someone.
You got a degree to be like someone else.
No you are empty, flat, and hate life.
Here is the thing you were nudged by what I have been talking about through this whole series.
The wrong nudge from the wrong source at the right time and it took you to the wrong place.
Let me bring it home.
Better to say it like this.
The wrong nudge from someone’s highlight reel at the right time took you to the wrong place because you wanted to be like everybody else.
This is the problem.
You abandoned what you knew in your own heart: this is not me.
Do really want to just be like everybody else?
Or maybe better, do you want to continue to just be like everybody else?
Here is the good news your perfect heavenly father does not want you to be just like everybody else.
Despite how many times you were just like everybody else your heavenly father is still with you and does not want this.
Your heavenly father does not want you to be just like everybody else.
Despite that you were nudged there, your heavenly father does not want to leave you there but nudge you back from there.
In order to do this, we are going to go back to the book of Joshua. Show Timeline of Joshua and Judges.
Pattern of Judges: Nudged: Disobedience: Disaster: Deliverance
Call the person you disobeyed to deliver us from the disaster.
Guess what God did, he answered the phone, drove to the police station and delivered us.
He is a God of compassion but He is also righteous. He will not impose His will on us. You want to be nudged by darkness, he will let you. You want to be nudged by shame, you want expediency. He will let you choose it and face the consequences but he will not abandon you.
Here is the thing this pattern could have been averted if, if they would have done something different early on. If they would have listened and acted upon the words of one Israel’s greatest leaders Joshua.
And, we too, we can also avoid the nudges to be like everybody else if we will just listen and hear. He gave them extraordinary advice that they either ignored or forgot.
It was like the best graduation speech ever but it just went in one ear and out the other.
But these instructions they either ignored or forgot and they stumbled over and over again constantly nudged into disobedience.
Joshua 23:12
For if you ever go back and cling to the remnant of these nations that are still remaining among you, and intermarry with them, and you associate with them and they with you,
Joshua 23:13
know for certain that Adonai your God will no longer drive these nations out from before you. Instead they will become a snare and a trap for you, a scourge in your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land which Adonai your God has given you.
they will become snares, traps, whips and thorns in your eyes..
this is what we have been talking about. These nudges take you to the wrong place.
If you don’t look away from these things what looks attractive to you will take you to the wrong place.
Isn’t tru Wouldn’t you like to
Un-see
Un-see some things.
Not just the sexual stuff but your friends new car, or new house. There car smells like leather and your car smells like family. Don’t you just wish you just never had seen. Because when we saw what we saw it changed our behavior because our body our behavior is just following our eyes.
Un-meet
some people we wish you could unmeet.
Some people I wish I would have just not friended, not gone down that road. Then you were drawn
For me, the fork in the road, the epicenter of the worst pain in my life was a relationship I knew I should not pursue but I did anyway because I was nudged by my eyes, I wanted to be just like everybody else.
Un-buy
Some of you got that instrument never going to play it,
Some of you got that car, can even afford to drive it,
That latest mac product, phone, etc.
Some of you it is house: in Dallas we called them bankrupt millionaires.
Un-See, Un-meet, Un-buy, Snare/Trap
Snare/Trap those things that captured our attention became a snare or trap in our lives. They take are attention and our direction.
The thing is the things that capture our attention will nudge your decisions and the thing is you will just be like everybody else.
Joshua 23:13
know for certain that Adonai your God will no longer drive these nations out from before you. Instead they will become a snare and a trap for you, a scourge in your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land which Adonai your God has given you.
...until you perish from this good land, which the Lord your God has given you.
They felt like God was trying to keep something good from them instead of trying to give something good to them. The nation of Israel could not help themselves. It just feels to us that if we say yes to you we have to say no to too many good things.
If you are considering this life…one of the things you will have to wrestle to the ground is this question:
Is God for me?
Is God keeping something from me?
Is God just asking me to suffer through this life and keeping good things from you. You just get a reward on the other side but in this life he is just keeping stuff from me.
You will have to wrestle this question to the ground.
The very first temptation was Satan trying to nudged humanity away from God forever by this one thing “Don’t you know that God is trying to keep something from you?”
You will have to wrestle with this question because the answer to it determines who and what will nudge you.
The nation of Israel was like Eve and Adam they thought God was just trying to keep something good from them and not give them something good.
Joshua pleads with Israel. You should really read the whole speech. He pleads with them to not believe that lie to not fall prey to that temptation. So he goes on to say.
Joshua 24:23a -
“Now therefore, get rid of the foreign gods that are in your midst, and incline your hearts to Adonai, God of Israel.”
up to “in your midst.”
If there is anything that has the potential to draw you away get rid of it. Extreme problem, extreme measures.
If there is anything get rid of it.
Here is the big statement, the one that screams at us.
Joshua 24:23b:
“Now therefore, get rid of the foreign gods that are in your midst, and incline your hearts to Adonai, God of Israel.”
yield your hearts to God
Yield your hearts to the invisible king.
The kingdom of God is a
Kingdom of Conscience
Inside out
If I see the world the way you see then what you ask me to do will make perfect sense.
If I see as everybody else then there view of the world is the only one that will make sense.
I don’t want to see as everyone else sees. If I see as you see when you nudge me it will make perfect sense. I want be nudged by what everyone else is nudged by.
That is what Joshua is pleading with Israel. The flip side. The kingdom of the world.
Kingdom of Covet
Outside in
These are two very different approaches to life. You are smart enough to know the first is true and better.
Joshua says, “I want you to be an inside out Kingdom. Don’t be like everybody else. If you see
You will have compassion but not conform. You will have empathy but not embrace. You will love them but not be led by them.
Isn’t true: Your greatest regret, my greatest regret would have been avoided if I had been living this way (Kingdom of Conscience) instead of the other way.
Have you yielded your heart to the Lord your God?
I don’t mean have you prayed a prayer, I mean have you yielded your heart to the Lord your God.
Are you willing to stop trying to be like everybody else so that you can live from the inside out instead from the outside in.
Are you willing to see the world as God sees? Then when He nudges you, you will not stall, wonder, debate, abandon, go into the usual path of
Nudged to be like everybody else: disobedience: disaster: deliverance.
Nudge to do as God has shown me: obedience: blessing: praise.
Paul used this metaphor of the body.
The path of blessing.
The path of belonging.
Prayer card “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”