00:00:00 Thanks for joining me on Episode 5 20 seven of the inspired Stewardship podcast. I'm David Smith, author of Who's Got Your Back Making In Keeping Great Friendships among Men, I encourage you to invest in others, Develop your influence an impact the world by using your time, your talents and your treasures to live out your calling. Having the ability to build riel lasting friendships as a man is vital to doing this. And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this. The inspired stewardship podcast with the leadership provided by Scott Mayor Thing is what this can mean to our family and to ourselves see one of the things we do a lot of times as many as we put ourselves in this role of,
00:00:58 we have to be the protector. We have to be the provider. We have to do everything right. We hold ourselves to an impossible standard. I think women do it as well, too, in a different way. But men way struggle with this at times. Welcome and thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcasts. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, Then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired Searchie podcast will learn to invest in yourself,
00:01:34 invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the way and today spiritually Foundation episode about developing your influence.
00:01:48 I talk with you about how we should have intentionality in our focus on God. First, why not?
00:01:56 Focusing in this way can often lead to a wrong focused on wrong action and what this can mean when it comes toe family.
00:02:06 You know Two different passages have been bouncing around in my head this week, and the 1st 1 is from First Timothy.
00:02:13 Chapter five. Verse eight is one of my favorite passages, and it says. But if anyone does not provide for his relatives,
00:02:20 and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith in his worse than an unbeliever. You know that resonates with me this idea of how I,
00:02:31 as a man should provide for my family, and I've had a whole series of coaching calls in the last couple of weeks where I've been working with men who are struggling in this area because,
00:02:42 you know, things have happened. They've had difficult times, they've had problems, they've had challenges and they're not feeling the full worth of themselves as a provider.
00:02:53 And then the other passage that came it came to my attention has been bouncing around is for Matthew. Chapter 10 versus 34.
00:03:02 Through his 37 I had ah, church member come up to me and asked me about this passage and kind of how I interpreted it.
00:03:12 What did I think it was talking about last Sunday? And it's kind of been bouncing around in my head ever since.
00:03:18 And that passage says, Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the Earth. I have not come to bring peace but a sword,
00:03:25 for I've come to set a man against his father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter in law against her mother in law and a person's enemies will be those of his own household.
00:03:36 Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever love son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me,
00:03:48 you know? And these two passages at first glance seem like they're contradictory. One is telling us to take care of our family,
00:03:54 and the other one is telling us that our family is going to become our enemies, that out of our family will come.
00:04:01 Problems and hatred and and warfare, at least at first glance. And what I began to think about him was talking with this Paris trainers.
00:04:11 We were bouncing it around and trying to think about. Well, what does this mean to us? How can we interpret this?
00:04:17 What? What What am I supposed to do with this kind of passage? Is I pointed out that I think part of what's going on here is we're talking about intentionality of focus in one passage.
00:04:31 I think we're talking about when we focus first on our family or exclusively on our family, and then the other were putting it where we focus first on God and out of that focus on God comes and flows,
00:04:46 taking care of our family, taking care of other serving, others having a servant heart. But the funny thing is,
00:04:52 if we focus first on our family and taking care of ourselves and providing for our family and being a good provider and all of these sorts of things,
00:04:59 then that incorrect focus tends to lead us astray and often causes problems within our family and and friction and struggle and strain.
00:05:10 It's this very indirect focus and lack of intentionality on putting God first. That often creates the very problems that we then blame on God.
00:05:24 When in reality it's because of this. This in focus, this unfocused and un intensive and unintentional life not focusing first on God can lead to this indirect problems that we have.
00:05:40 This is what this can mean to our family and to ourselves see one of the things we do a lot of times as many as we put ourselves in this role of,
00:05:49 we have to be the protector. We have to be the provider. We have to do everything right.
00:05:54 We hold ourselves to an impossible standard. I think women do it as well, too, in a different way.
00:06:01 But men we struggle with this at times, and when we do it, it ends up devaluing the very thing that were there to provide our family.
00:06:13 We begin to measure our worth by our paycheck when our worth is so much Maur than that. Providing for your family doesn't just mean how much you make.
00:06:24 Providing your for your family has to do with being there. Providing for your family sometimes mean making the hard decisions and telling somebody in your family no for their own good,
00:06:36 as hard as that can be. And you can only do that when you keep your focus on God first.
00:06:44 When you look at the wider kingdom, when you realize that it's out of that faith, at least for me,
00:06:50 this is where it comes from, its out of that faith and following what I feel God is calling me to do that gives me the strength to do the things,
00:07:00 even the hard things, and do it without a hard heart. Do it without it, it being held against somebody,
00:07:07 Do it without it, creating fear and friction down the road. Do it in a way where I can forgive and move on both myself as well as others,
00:07:19 and I will tell you I struggle with this. This is an area where I have struggled for years and continue to struggle.
00:07:27 I think a lot of us do. And yet it's also an area where each and every day I pray and remind myself that my job is to look to God and do what I'm being called to do today,
00:07:42 and that's it. That's my only job. And if I do that and I take that intentionality and I do that with purpose and with clarity,
00:07:53 with prayer and with worship that everything else will fall into place. Thanks for listening. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship Podcast.
00:08:11 As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen. But act on what you've heard and find a way toe live your calling.
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00:08:53 your talent and your treasures develop your influence and impact world