[2023.6.1] The Basin: List Your Victories

I think it's crazy inspiring that in the word of God they listed the victories that God gave the Israelites. Let's start with the fact that it wasn't just Joshua who won these victories. When we start the book of Joshua, it's like you and all these people are going to enter the land. Nobody does it by themselves. Nobody who makes any progress or who sees any success or who gets forward momentum does it by themselves. And anybody who says that they do is delusional. And nobody does it without God. However, there's something that I've learned about myself in the last year particularly, and it gave language to why I get so discouraged, why I get so defeated feeling, and why I can even be winning in my life but feel weak inside. You know, God's done a lot of great things for me, things I can't take credit for. And I know he's done the same for you. If you look at where your life is today, there are some things that aren't where you want them to be. There are some things that are much further along than you ever thought they'd be. In some sense, you might say, man, I thought I'd be farther by now. But there's some sense in which you're like, I can't believe that I'm here. I can't believe that I get to be a parent. I can't believe that I get to be married to this person. I can't believe that I recovered from that devastation. I can't believe I've been 40 days without a drink. I can't believe it. I can't believe that I made it through, that that trauma, survived, lived to tell about it. I can't believe that even reading my Bible, studying my Bible today, praying I have a better relationship with God. For some of us, though, it's easier for us to see how far we have to go than it is for us to see how far we've come. It has a lot to do with personality. It has a lot to do with background. It has a lot to do with early childhood templates. I'm not an expert in that. What I came on here to tell you is that I got happy when I saw the list of victories that God gave Joshua, realizing that just before in Joshua 13, he starts dividing up the land. Because Joshua is really a book about battles, chapters 1 through 12, and boundaries, chapters 13 up until his farewell speech. Battles and boundaries. I want to teach that one day too. So I'll come back and do a session on battles and boundaries. I'M sure in next few sessions. But before we get to that, he goes, ho, ho, ho, ho. Before you divide up the land God gave you, I want you to record in the record. Now, I understand that this list was put in later. I know that. But it was put in for a reason. Before they started dividing up all the land that was conquered and giving each person their inheritance. They start with Jericho, they then go on to AI Remember I? It's spelled AI, not like artificial intelligence, but it's pronounced I. They were defeated the first time, but then they went back and beat them the second time. Where it's interesting, it says that Joshua and the Israelites conquered A.I. you see it? And it's nothing about the time that they got beat, because it's not talking about that. And this is a list of victories, and it goes on and on. And each one of these, the king of Jerusalem, who ganged up on them because they had made an alliance with the Gibeonites, and they weren't supposed to make an alliance with the Gibeonites, but God gave them the victory anyway. Well, this is a list of victories, remembering who they conquered, not a list of the conflicts, not a list of their vulnerabilities. There's a time for that. It's called self awareness. To know, like, this is where I'm weak. This is where I need to get better. This is how I need to be stronger. This is how I could have done it different. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. I got to list my vulnerabilities all day long. I like to say that if many of us who are more pessimistic in nature had been Ezekiel in the valley of dry bones, and the Lord said, can these bones live? We would have started listing the bones instead of speaking the language of faith and saying, bones live. So it takes faith to say to the bones, live. It doesn't take faith to list the kinds of bones that are in the valley. There's the patella. I remember when Abbey was learning all the bones in the human body, and she would just go through the list, and it was so cute because she had a little lisp. And she would talk about the patella, and it was so cute how she did it. But, man, it doesn't take any theology to list your problems. All that takes is anatomy to list the bones. All that takes is, hey, even honesty. Go like, yeah, I'm not good at that. I didn't handle that right. We can do that all day long. Confession is good. Confess your sins one to another, that you may be healed. You know, present your request to God, make your needs known to him. Cry out to him for mercy. A broken and a contrite heart you will not despise. I am not diminishing the value of coming before God in repentance when you get it wrong. But there are moments where you have to take inventory of your victories and say, look what God did for me. Look what he has given me. Look how he won the battle for me. List your victories. I'm trying to think of how to define this guy. I don't like to define people, but he does personal development. I mentioned him in one of my sermons and developed a friendship with him. His name is Brendan Burchar. And I like how he phrases this idea of listing your victories. He does it from a psychological standpoint. He talks about, integrate your wins. And maybe he says it different than that. That's how I remembered it. I didn't look at my notes before I got on here. Integrate your wins. He's saying, look at the things you have progressed in. Look at the things you have accomplished. And specifically, when somebody is a high achiever, wired for wanting to get better and better and better, which you probably are, if you're listening to me, teach the Bible right now, you want God to make you better. You're sitting there going like, oh, yeah, but I could have done it this way. Ah, yeah, but I just, you know, like, I had a 9.9, not a 10, you know. Oh, man. I just. I want to give you a little bit of an idea of how much of a perfectionist I can tend to be. So you don't think I'm just, like, fussing at you about this idea and telling you, you know, be more grateful, be more positive, make lemonade. This is not a cliche. It's, for me, a real. A real, really convicting thing. It's like when I don't appreciate the victories, I don't acknowledge the giver of. Of the victories. And to just move from battle to battle, to battle, to battle, to battle, to battle, and to never go, okay, hey, look what I did yesterday. I went to this meeting that was difficult. I showed up for it in a present way. Boom, boom. I actually sat and listened to my kid tell a long story. And I didn't act bored. You know, I did a deep breath when I wanted to say something and I bit my tongue. Or even bigger stuff. Like, this week, I got a song back that we worked hard on, and I had to take a moment and go, hey, hey, hey, hey. This is just like the final mix mastered version of a song that we're going to release soon. It was like, hey, before you release this to other people, before you send it into the world and like chart its performance, take it personally and remember the moment that you pushed through and set up the songwriting session and it got canceled. So you rescheduled it with the same people and you sat down and you pushed in and you pushed into this particular part to write this with these particular people. And you put it together and you weren't sure about it, but you tried it out and you moved it, you did it and boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And I was like, wow, man. That song belongs on a list of victories that God gave us that resulted from battles that we fought. I told you on one of these videos, I've told it in the pulpit. I track, I'm so embarrassed about this. I track every workout that I do with a little star on a chart. Because we used to have charts with your bench press and stuff in high school. And the idea of like a workout chart like that would hang on the wall. So when the volleyball team, the girls volleyball team be working out, they'd see the charts with the boy's name on it and how much we bench pressed. And I'm sure they never even looked at it. But as a 14 year old boy, you think that the bench press is the sum total of your masculinity. And so something about that's like a positive mental trigger for me. And now I got a star chart on the wall. Gold stars actually use blue stars. It's not important. The point is just that little thing of going light. Hey man, I did my workout today. I do a lot of check marks. I am better personally day to day when I make a list of things I need to do. But I also need just like I need a to do list, I need a God did list. You need a God did list. That's what I'm saying. You need a God did list. That's what this is. I promise you that if most of us read this little list right here, just if this came up our daily Bible reading, on our youversion Bible reading plan, we would go skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, skip. For the people who fought the battles, every one of these names, Irad, Libnah, Adullam, Makeda, Bethel, these kings of these places, the kings of Hazor and Ascaph, Meadow, you know, these are actual places. Some of them are named differently today. These were real kings, these were real battles this was real blood. This was real fear. This was real action. These were real swords. This was real heat. This was real endurance. This was real. This list for them. And your list is real to you. I made a meal for my family this week, put my heart in it. I burned the potatoes, but nobody even knew I threw them away. Smelled kind of funny in the kitchen, but I did it. You're like, well, that doesn't belong on the list. Doesn't it? There's 31 kings, Joshua defeated. There's 31 days in certain months. What's this month? Okay, February 28th. This different month. Okay, but that's not the point. There was 31 in January. Right? Is that right? Fact checkers out there, Is that right? Yes. Yes, it is. 31 days last month. I bet there was a victory every one of those days. Did you take it in? When Brendan, my friend Brendan, talks about integrating your wins, he talks about, stop, pause, feel grateful for it. And this is where I want to challenge our religious dogma. Can you list it? And without taking credit for it, feel a sense that God is proud of you for it, that he's not impressed by you because he knows without him you're nothing. But that he'd like a father over a child looks at you and says, yeah, put that on the list. Yeah, I'm proud of you. It's been three days and you didn't cuss. Put it on the list. Whatever. You know, I think we need little lists, big lists. I think we need mental lists, written lists. I think we need help with this, because if we don't list our victories, we don't have strength to fight our battles. Now you find yourself going into next month going like, okay, man, I'm going to work, paying bills, going to school, getting it done. I have to start many of my days from a baseline of feeling deficient. I've got to do enough today. I know not everybody's like this. I bet you know somebody who is. You love somebody who is. Maybe this will help you understand them sometimes by listing the things the Lord has done in my life. And can I say this? Listing the things that you have done because he was with you. Listing the things he did through you. Wow. God did this. He healed your body, but you went to the doctor, you did the rehab. Both are important. What's your God did list? I started praying a very specific way before I went out to preach each night at our last Elevation Nights tour. By the way, if you're watching this and you want to come Elevation nights Spring Tour 2023. Go to elevationnights.com Come to a city near you. I'm promoting Elevation Nights on a private video. That's. That's how much I'm into this. I love doing these. I would pray every time before I went out. God, tonight's going to be different than last night. I'm going to try to flow in the Holy Spirit and give everything I have to these people and minister the best I can. At the end of the night, I want to feel good about what you and I did together, and that felt really good. I want to feel good about what we did together. I want to. Please, God, I know you're not going to say the words. You're not going to pick me up and carry me physically to the stage. I'm going to say the words. I'm going to hold the microphone. It's going to be in my hand. I'm going to move my lips. I'm going to use my mind. We're doing this together. I need you. At the end of it, I want to feel good about what we did together. Isn't that a good goal for preaching? I love that. It helped me. I shared it with a friend or two. I'm sharing it with you now. God, at the end of this day, I want to feel good about what we did together. Now, can you build in some reflection to go, all right, I'm going to do it by hand. I'm going to do it by my computer. I'm going to do it on my phone. I'm going to do three right now. I'm not going to list everything. And for those of you who love lists, grocery lists, shopping lists, Amazon carts, this is a new list for you to make. List your victories. You're like, I know. Count your blessings. Don't count sheep. Talk to the shepherd. You're not hearing me. I'm talking about something a little bit different. There's a little distinction here, isn't there? It's owning the fact that there are victories God has given you that you haven't stopped yet to celebrate. I am the world's worst at this. So when I coach you or teach you or preach you or mentor you on it, I'm coming from a place of telling you I need to see that list. Just remember that. Yeah, man, we got to fight the battles, and we can't get complacent. There is a thing in football called excessive celebration. This is when you lose £2 so you eat a dozen donuts. That's the wrong Way to celebrate. I taught a sermon years ago called Win a Battle, Take a Bite. Put that in the chat. Win a battle, take a bite. That sermon was all about, hey, you need the strength of the savoring of this victory to build the faith to fight the next battle. So list your victories today. List them. When the devil tells you you're nothing, you'll never be and you never have been. No, no, no. I got some wins, man. I feel David coming in the room right now. Shepherd boy. David, you can't kill Goliath. Well, the God who delivered me from the paw of the lion, Paul of the bear. Ah. What are you doing? Listing your victories and let them become a part of you. I think we're so identified with our weaknesses that we are blind to our strengths. List your victories. Sometimes, yes, confess your we, but list your victories. List them. Thank God for them. Say them to the Lord. Thank you, Lord, that you brought me through. Thank you, Lord, that you gave me the ability today that felt good to do that. Thank you, Lord, that you helped me to organize this and that and to make a decision. Thank you, Lord, that I made a decision. Then let them become a part of your heart. Let them become a part of your sense of seeing yourself the way God sees you. He sees all the little victories other people won't. That's the problem. Nobody is going to come by and pat you on the butt. Good game. Because you showed up on time, that might be a big deal to you. Showing up on time, that might be one of the hardest things in your life. Showing up on time or leaving your phone in another room so you can actually focus on a conversation. Nobody's going to congratulate you for that. That's why you have to list it with God for yourself. I think this is a wonderful, wonderful thing for us to think about today. Not only the battles we fight and the blessings, but think of it in terms of this list in the book of Joshua, a book where he said, be strong and courageous. I'll be with you wherever you go. And then we get to chapter 12, and there's 31 victories in a list. And there's one for every day of the month of January, and there's one for every day of the next month and the next month and the next month and the next month. I want you to make big lists of things God has done in your life that represent a year, a season, a week. I want you to make little lists of things that God did, helped you through even. Even in the next hour of your day. I want you to begin to open that file in your mind, God, where am I winning? And then you can deal with and God, what do I need to work on? When you come from a place of God, where am I winning? It helps you appreciate his grace, tap into it and move forward by faith. You come from a place of what do I need to work on first? It doesn't really give you much momentum, does it? That's what I want you to do today. Listen, your victories. Put a few down right now. Hey, thank you for watching. Make sure you subscribe to this channel so you don't miss a single video or livestream. Share this video with a friend. And don't forget, you can join me live every Sunday. Thanks again for watching.