In this devotional‑style vlog, M.t. Clark opens with a personal anecdote about walking his dog Harley, using the image of a leashed yet sometimes‑free dog to illustrate the balance between trust and responsibility. He then shifts to a testimony from a participant in his Celebrate Freedom recovery ministry who, despite early success in sobriety, fell back into addiction by relying on his own strength and neglecting a deep, ongoing relationship with God. Clark frames this relapse as a classic case of self‑deception, introducing the twelfth way people deceive themselves: the belief that they must earn the approval of certain people to be happy. He cites Galatians 1:10 to argue that true approval comes only from God, and references Jean‑Paul Sartre’s “hell is other people” and Dan Newhart’s article on narcissistic double standards to describe the impossible demands of people‑pleasing and narcissistic relationships. Clark warns that people‑pleasing can become idolatrous, turning others into false gods, and urges setting healthy boundaries. He then moves to a biblical meditation on John 9:1‑3, explaining that not all suffering is a direct result of sin, but can serve God’s purpose. He briefly mentions A.W. Pink’s teaching on the Holy Spirit’s drawing (chapter 15, “It Is the Spirit Who Draws”). Throughout, Clark emphasizes the need for continual reliance on Christ, disciplined spiritual practice, and discipleship, concluding with a prayer for listeners to seek God’s wisdom and reject the lie that happiness depends on pleasing others.
Chapters
To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of my canine pal Harley looking over the plains in the directions of the rising sun off of Waite Road comes to us from yours truly as I captured this scene yesterday morning while out on our stroll to rejoice over the coming of a new day. Although technically I take Harley for a walk We have developed a relationship of limited trust in which we begin our journey tethered to one another with a leash, but as we go, I allow Harley the opportunity to run and walk free up and down the road with the understanding that he won't stray too far from me and that he remains responsive to my commands to "come" or "stay" when directed and that he will surrender to getting back on the leash. Leash before returning home because he has a history of running buck wild around our neighbor's property. I enjoy seeing Harley run free, but just because I trust him in some regards doesn't mean I trust him completely, because I know he acts on instinct and sometimes is taken away in the heat of the moment, or because— becomes so focused with his attention on one thing that he doesn't realize that there are other things to be aware of. —like speeding automobiles—that would send him to doggy heaven. So, although I let him loose, I know that his safety and well-being is still my responsibility, and I continually recall his attention to where I am and where we are going as we make our way from "out there" to back home. Well, it's Monday, and it's back to another work— week of work before my scheduled 2-week vacation, so I'll be focusing on getting through the next 5 days safely. So I can spend my vacation getting rest and relaxation rather than recovery. Speaking of recovery, I was reminded over the weekend that although we can accomplish a measure of peace and even sobriety on our own through our own efforts and will, if we don't put our trust in the Lord and ask Him for— ask for Him to help change us from the inside out, it won't be long before we lose our attention and go running buck wild into the things we were endeavoring to be free of. Reminds me of a man that attended our recovery ministry, uh, Celebrate Freedom, in the past, who, who had attended a few meetings and reported how he was so glad to be free of his addiction and how he was enjoying the simple pleasures of family life now that he was free. However, even though he had some history in recovery circles, he seemed to be lacking the one thing I know is absolutely necessary for a sustained life of victory and freedom. An intimate relationship with the Lord and a commitment to follow him always. So even though this man was happy to be "in church" and to be around "good people," he basically decided that he didn't need to bother with going to the recovery meetings and could just focus on his family. But the problem is the identity of a quote-unquote good dad and husband come with continual stress and frustrations of meeting others' needs. And if you are used to pleasing your needs with substances, unless you're getting your needs met— needs for peace met by God— it won't be long before you decide that you quote-unquote need a break and go back to the things that destroyed your happy home in the first place. So that happened. He walked away from a community in which he could have had support, and he didn't invest in receiving strength and wisdom in God. And now his strength and seemingly his sanity has given way, and he is suffering loss as his addictive appetites have been satisfied, but they have consumed everything else in their path. He believed the lie that he could do it himself, that he didn't need help. Didn't need God and that he could sin in secret with no negative consequences. In a few months, he went from free and restored to frantic and broken. And I wish I could say that I only know of one person who did something like this, but I am afraid I have seen this tale play out more than once, sometimes with tragic, life-ending results. So I know how important it is to be a positive voice for the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the life transformation that is possible when one surrenders to his wisdom and ways for living. In order to live free, we have to live with and for him. We have to renounce the lies of the world and live in his truth. That brings us to our current series on self-deception, where we have decided to investigate some of the ways we deceive ourselves by walking through step 2 Deception vs. Truth of the Steps to Freedom in Christ to see what ways we have been deceived by the world and ourselves, and in what ways we have wrongly defended ourselves. So we present the 12th way you can be deceived by the world. Number 12: Believing that I must gain the approval of certain people in order to be happy. The scripture reference for this point is Galatians 1:10. Which says, obviously I'm not trying to win the approval of people but of God. If people pleasing were my goal, I would not be Christ's servant. In his play No Exit, Jean-Paul Sartre said that hell is other people. And when we come into a relationship with someone who demands to be made happy throughout— through your efforts, we can experience a real hell on earth. When I started to Google the words narcissist demand, Google filled in the blanks with apologies, loyalty, respect, and attention. So if you find yourself trying to gain the approval of certain people that demand these things, or are one of these certain people, or you are one of these certain people, uh, you may know a narcissist very, you know, It's like Jeff Foxworthy, you could be a narcissist, or you might know a narcissist. Anyway, in psychologist Dan, uh, in psychologist Dan Newhart's article, The Frustrating Double Standards of Narcissists, he highlights 8 ways that narcissists attempt to take advantage of others and how they seem to have a double standard when it comes to how they treat you and how they expected to be expect to be treated. His article speaks of how narcissists are almost impossible to please and how they are walking contradictions, as they can be grandiose but brittle, antagonistic yet indignant at questions or opposition, desperate to be heard yet uninterested in listening, emotionally entitled yet indifferent to others' feelings, swift to blame yet loathe to to own their part. They're image-conscious yet woefully self-unaware. They can be charismatic in public yet ill-tempered behind closed doors, and they could be demanding of absolute loyalty yet quick to betray others. You may have noticed that I purposely highlighted the narcissist attributes on the blog above because it is all about them, after all. But this is— this blog is not about them. This is about us people pleasers as we bend over backwards to try to make others happy in hopes that it will make us happy. Unfortunately, this is often a losing proposition as we really can't control people's emotions to make them or make them feel contented. This people-pleasing strategy also goes against the word of God, as we take Christ's command to love others to an unhealthy extreme and make other people's happiness or good opinion of us into an idol. Instead of honoring God, our people-pleasing makes other people gods. So we have to realize when we have wrongfully put our sense of self-worth into someone else. And we have to repent and develop our relationship with God to gain the wisdom of how to love one another without becoming a victim of abuse. Toxic people need to be quarantined by boundaries, and our tendency to serve others needs to be tempered with wisdom. The only one whose approval we need is God, and he gives us gives it to us freely when we put our faith in Jesus. So don't believe the lie that you won't be happy unless you please other people. That type of thinking is idolatrous and wrong and only creates a vicious cycle of pain, codependency, and abuse. Today's Bible verse— verses— comes to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Kruis. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on Affliction, Discipline, Chastisement, and Trials. Today's verses are John 9:1-3 from the NIV. The Word of God says, as he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Neither this man nor his parents sinned, Jesus, but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. Today's verse is the second verse, uh, set of verses that falls under the first point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on Affliction, Discipline, Chastisement, and Trials. That point is: Not all affliction is for specific sins. God often sends affliction to purify and strengthen our faith His glory. Today's verses challenge the belief that the neg— that the negative circumstances we face in life are always the result of someone's sin. Jesus, Jesus's disciples, seeing the man blind from birth, wrongly assumed that his condition was a result of this man's parents' sin, or somehow from him. Really, guys? He was blind since birth. Did this man sin in the womb? Did in some way? Or did God preemptively punish him with blindness for something he hadn't done yet? But Jesus puts them straight with the, with a truth that may be harder to swallow than a God that doled out punishments for sin to the next generation. Jesus attests to the truth that not all bad conditions are caused by sin, but he instead indicates that God allows suffering to come into our lives to allow the works of God to be displayed in us. Jesus teaches the hard lesson that our suffering may be a part of God's divine plan for us, that our suffering has a purpose. While our faith can be simple in some aspects, it never tries to soft-soap reality, as Jesus taught that we would be persecuted and suffer, and although we will die In Christ we will live. As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from A.W. Pink's The Holy Spirit, and we're in chapter 15, The Spirit Drawing, and today's section is entitled It Is the Spirit Who Draws. So If you want to know how the Holy Spirit draws, uh, go to mt4christ.org and you'll see what A.W. Pink has to say about that with the resource at the end of today's blog post. As always, we encourage a life of Christian discipleship because it leads to eternal life. You know, our faith in Jesus Christ gives eternal life and allows us to live a life that's defined by the fruit of the Spirit of peace, love, joy, goodness, kindness, patience, gentleness, kindness, and self-control. When we follow the Lord, you know, this is what we experience. But when we go it our own way, that's when we suffer. We, we make ourselves God or make other people gods and and, um, we're not living according to God's word. So let's choose this. And so as we've said, you know, sometimes suffering isn't, isn't, uh, a direct response to sin, although you could make a case that a lot of it is because we live in a world broken by sin. So any of the conditions, you could, could make a case that it's for sin, but But, but, maybe not in the way we think, you know, in terms of a direct response, a consequential action, you know, for our— the first, first cause of our sin. So, but what we try to do is reduce the suffering in our lives by choosing to do what's right and choosing to seek God's wisdom and how to go through life, to, to not walk on the extremes and to walk in God's truth, to, to be— to have a balanced life where God is, is at the center of it all and where we follow his wisdom and experience his grace. So as we go into Monday You might be a little disconcerted over what's happened over the weekend, or maybe you had a great weekend and just, you know, don't want to go back to work. But let me encourage you that, you know, the responsibilities that we have are good ones, that they provide for us, and they give us a purpose in life. And if we're discontented with that, we have to figure out, you know, We could ask God for wisdom, but we would have to figure out how to change things. And if we trust in the Lord and develop plans and goals, we could actually change things. So as much as we muddle through and suffer through some situations, we do have the ability to change our course in life. And using the Lord to guide us is the way to go. So. You know, ask me how I know. Years ago, I was in a situation where I was trapped, and I was gonna have to work twice as hard to get out of my trap, to develop a new life. But it was worth it, and I was willing and able. And although it was a time of great suffering because I was walking with a limp the Lord, even in the midst of the suffering, I had peace and moments of joy as I never left the Lord's presence. And He was there to help and guide me along the way until freedom and victory became a reality in my world. As I, I have a lovely home down by the river in Stuyvesant now where, where I live according to what the Lord would have me do. And I reap the benefits for faithfully following him. And I can't think of any other way to go. And this is what this podcast and this vlog is all about, to tell people that you need to let go of the world and follow what the Lord says. Of course, you do that in balanced, a balanced way as well. We need to grow our capacities to live a life of faith. Faith. So we have to develop a daily spiritual practice where we can commune with the Lord, gain his wisdom, gain his strength, and, you know, learn, you know, and to see the truth that's gonna be hard to see sometimes. But when we do that, the Lord blesses our efforts, and the best thing is he blesses our efforts with his presence. So seek his presence, seek his wisdom, and seek to do his will. Surrender to the Lord and and, uh, he'll show you the way to go. So let's pray for that today. Um, we invite you to check out our discipleship teachings on YouTube, our Bible study on YouTube, uh, if you need, um, additional resources. Um, we'll certainly try to provide them for you. But for today, let's just pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for all that you've done in our lives and how you've shown us how to rightly walk through this world, and that's to follow you and not to make other people's pleasure or happiness our idol, or even our own happiness our idol. And we've decided to surrender to you and follow you and do your will and to seek it in all ways. Lord, we pray for anyone listening today, today's message, or reading today's message, that you you would would come alongside them and their prayer requests, and that you would encourage them in their walk. And Lord, we just ask for you to go before us today, open our eyes to what you want us to see, show us what you want us to know, and to lead us into the things we can— we should do. Because Lord, all we want to do is represent you and your kingdom on this earth and share the truth. That you've shown to us that Jesus is Lord and that his way is the way to go. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, and we love you. And we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.
