Matt Edmundson: Welcome to this week's Crowd Church service.
We are a digital church on a quest to discover how Jesus helps
us live a more meaningful life.
We are a community, a space to explore the Christian faith, and a place
where you can contribute and grow.
Our service This will last about an hour and in a few seconds you'll
meet our hosts for our service who will introduce today's talk.
After the talk we will have a time of worship and reflection, after which
we head into Conversation Street where we look at your stories and questions
that you've posted in the comments.
Now, we want to invite you to connect with us here at Crowd Church, and we've got a
few ways in which you can do just that.
Firstly, you can engage with Crowd from any device during our live
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Church is all about connecting with God and connecting with others.
And one of the easiest ways for you to do that is join one of our mid week
groups where we meet all the time.
Online together to catch up and discover more about the amazingness of Christ.
You can also subscribe to our fairly new podcast called What's The Story,
where we deep dive into stories of faith and courage from everyday people.
More information about All of these things can be found on our website at www.
crowd.
church or you can reach out to us on social media at Crowd Church.
If you are new to Crowd or new to the Christian faith and would like to know
what your next steps to take are, why not head over to our website crowd.
church forward slash next for more details.
And now, the moment you've been waiting for is here.
Our online church service starts right now.
Hello and welcome.
Sorry, a little bit behind schedule there.
High professionalism.
Welcome to Crowd Online Church.
It is great to see you.
It's swell.
It's great to have you.
My name is Matt.
Beside me is the very beautiful.
Will Sopwith: Nice to see you all.
Matt Edmundson: Very talented.
Handsome, debonair even.
Will Sopwith: Thank you very much.
Enjoy the blueness of your office as ever.
It's a fab place to be.
And yeah, nice to
see you all.
Matt Edmundson: It is nice to be here.
Good evening.
Welcome to you.
Welcome to Crowd Church.
If you're first time here, warm welcome to you.
We're an online church.
Which just means we do church online.
I'm sure I haven't it just totally went out my head.
Right there.
It's fair to say you can't see it, ladies and gentlemen, but there is a
screen to your in front of me, where we might have been watching the the game.
Which is, spoiler alert's at three.
All right.
Now and so if all of a sudden will, and I shout out it is because we do have
the game on as well as the livestream.
Cause we're very obvi.
We were hoping, we were praying that Liverpool would've actually have won
it before the livestream started.
Absolutely.
. Will Sopwith: It was on the cards.
It looked
Matt Edmundson: like, anyway.
What can I say?
Very warm welcome.
This is a church by the way, it's not a football channel.
I just want to point that out.
So yeah, very warm welcome to you.
If you're new here, we are an online church.
Do say hi in the comments.
Let us know where you're watching from.
Be great to great to hear from you.
Let us know the comments.
are actually working which is always helpful and that you can hear us.
Okay.
Yeah, but welcome to Crowd Church.
We are in our series on becoming whole.
We're like week four, I don't know, week three, maybe we're new into it.
I've lost count already.
But tonight we have Pete Farrington.
Fantastic Pete Farrington.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, really good talk about being led by the spirit.
And we're going to chat about that afterwards.
So please do bring questions and comments all about the talk as well.
And we will have a discussion afterwards.
Matt Edmundson: No doubt we will.
No doubt we will.
It will be a heck of a discussion.
So yeah, I do leave your questions, thoughts in the comments.
Let me say before we bring the talk on though, one quick notice, if I can
alpha course, if you're interested in doing an alpha course, do let
us know, head to the website crowd.
church.
I'll put the main website up on there.
Go to www.
crowd.
church forward slash alpha.
If you're interested in joining, we are doing week two this week, so it's
definitely not too late to join us.
I'll send out a catch up video probably tomorrow.
If you didn't watch week one and you want to catch up I'm going to
send all that out on the email.
I would have sent it out today, but I've been wrestling with the email software
and so it will probably be tomorrow.
Technology.
Will Sopwith: Alpha is a fantastic opportunity just to come, talk,
question, very informal, very accessible.
Any questions you've got, Alpha is a great place to answer them.
So do get involved there.
Yeah,
Matt Edmundson: Great way to explore the Christian faith.
It is on Wednesday evenings at 8.
30pm here in the UK, which is I think around 3.
30 Eastern Seaboard time, although actually it's not, it is 4.
30 for the next few weeks because we have not gone into British Summertime yet.
Will Sopwith: No, and we feel it, although today actually was quite sunny.
It was.
I did feel a little hint of warmth in the garden this afternoon,
so spring is on its way.
It is on its way.
Spring is on its way.
Matt Edmundson: It is on its way, and we put our clocks forward, I
think, Easter weekend, don't we?
Yeah.
The last weekend of March, yeah.
But I know in the States, you've already changed your clock.
So it's, it messes things up.
Anyway, there's a little link on the website.
If you want to know what time that is locally for you, just click on that link.
Everybody is welcome.
It's always an education crowd, isn't it?
Yeah.
That's great.
Got to stay on top of these time zones, man.
Being, an online church.
Things you don't have to worry about at 11.
30 on a Sunday morning with in person church.
I don't need to know what time it is in America.
But apparently we do when it's online.
Yeah, if you'd like to join us, we would love to see you in there.
Sharon, my wife and I are running it.
You would be more than welcome to come and join in.
We had a great start.
It was great to meet some of you on Zoom.
Loved it.
So that's my quick notice.
So without further ado, we will play the talk from Pete.
I'm looking for the button.
There it is.
We're going to play the talk from Pete.
Like we'll said, we'll be back after this, having a conversation about it.
So make sure you write your questions, thoughts, ideas in the
comments and we will get to them.
So here's Pete.
Oh, I pressed the button and nothing happened, Will.
Let me
Will Sopwith: Oh no, dead air!
Matt Edmundson: I'm going to click the mouse, see if that one works.
Here's Pete.
Pete Farrington: Hello, thanks for joining me as we continue
in our Becoming Whole series.
So today we're going to be exploring what it means to be led by the Spirit.
But before we get stuck in, I want to begin by asking you the
question, who or what are you led by?
What guides you in life?
What is it that determines your steps and the decisions you make?
Because the thing is, being led by the Spirit implies
being submitted to the Spirit.
Submission, that's everyone's favourite word, right?
I'm sorry, Matt, the engagement stats on this stream have probably just plummeted.
I've started talking about submission, but the thing is, we can't really
talk seriously about being led without talking about submitting.
I think we find it hard to tolerate conversation around this because of the
water we've been swimming in for so long.
Like the modern mind thinks that submission necessarily
equals inequality or oppression.
In submission, one leads and one is led, right?
But the idea that a difference in roles necessarily signals inequality
is a totally unchristian idea.
Or to put it another way, the idea that In order to have equality, there must
be no difference in roles whatsoever.
This is totally antithetical to what we see in the very nature of God and
how he has chosen to order his world.
So let's just look for a second at the Trinity.
That's the sort of word we've given for talking about God
being three persons in one being.
That's the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
So before his arrest and crucifixion, Jesus in the garden of
Gethsemane prays to God the Father.
This is in Matthew 26 verse 42.
He says, My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless
I drink it, may your will be done.
We see submission there, even in the Trinity.
When Jesus spoke to his disciples of the promise of the Spirit, He said in John
16 verse 13, When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.
For he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever
he hears, he will speak.
And he will declare to you the things that are to come.
So there is total equality in the Trinity, but that does not mean that
there are no differences in the roles that the Father, Son, and Spirit have.
And God, in his wisdom, has given us human relationships to reflect this mystery.
But we'll come back to that later.
With submission, of course, there's no lack of horrible examples of
leadership, abuse of authority, and abuse of requiring submission throughout
history and in the world today.
But we must not throw the baby out of the bathwater.
We can reject the idea of authority and leadership and submission, but even then
We still have to come to terms with the fact that we are all led by something.
I ask you again, what are you led by?
It could be independence, or ambition, prestige, political ideology,
or public opinion, your peers.
It could be desire for a quiet, comfortable life, or just to try and do
good in the world by your own effort.
And we like to think that we are rational, autonomous, and
self determining creatures.
Master of my own fate, and captain of my soul, and all that.
With enough time, maybe our reason will lead us into utopia.
But look around you, look at the things that people do.
It's like we've learned nothing from history.
I haven't learned anything from my mistakes.
Hopefully.
But the more I look around, the more I think, yeah, we all have
capacity to reason and agency to make decisions, but it's not those
things that actually lead us.
Our choices are led by our loves.
Our choices are determined by our strongest desires,
what we find most compelling.
And I think probably the world's version of being led by the
spirit is something like this.
Follow your heart.
But the Bible says the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick.
That's Jeremiah 17 verse 9.
So this idea that we can choose anything we want, that our will
is not determined by any outside force or attraction, we could choose
anything we want at any moment.
I'm not sure that's true, I think it's more like we can only choose what we want.
And because of sin, our wants are corrupted.
And they deceive us.
But listen to this in Ezekiel 36 verse 27, God says this, he
promises this to his people.
And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you.
And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
And I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes
and be careful to obey my rules.
Now I think in talking about being led by the Spirit, there are two
wonderful passages that I really recommend you taking the time to read
through, Galatians 5 and Romans 8.
I'm going to pick out a few of those verses now to just explore
this whole idea a bit further.
In Galatians 5, Paul addresses two quite opposite but equally dangerous teachings.
Galatians There were those who said, Hey, in order to be truly saved,
you've got to be circumcised too.
Jesus's blood isn't quite enough and you've still got to follow all of
those ceremonial cleanliness laws.
All those ones that we weren't really able to follow for more than five
minutes, but you've got to keep doing it.
Paul responds to this in verse 11 of Galatians 5 he's Hey, if I were to go
around preaching that you've got to be circumcised to be truly saved, I would
be removing the offence of the cross.
Okay, so what's the offence?
The offence is that we will never be saved by human effort and you can contribute
nothing to your salvation by human effort.
He was saying, did you think that it was in keeping.
The Mosaic Law that you were saved.
Did you really think it was circumcision that made you righteous?
No, it was the Spirit's work from the very beginning, and
it will be his work to the end.
It's all the work of the Spirit.
He goes on later to say in Galatians 5, verse 25, if we live by the Spirit, let
us also keep in step with the Spirit.
So that the life that we have in Christ is owing entirely
To the work of God's Spirit.
And we have no ground for boasting at all.
It was all Him.
And if it began by the Spirit, then all our subsequent life ought to
be carried out by the empowering and enabling of the Spirit.
Now it is sometimes tempting in my pride to think, I'm getting used
to this whole Christianity thing.
I've been doing it for a while, cheers for that Jesus, really appreciate you giving
me a foot up there with the whole cross and giving me your righteousness stuff.
But I think I can take it from here, no, that we're to be, we're to be led
by the Spirit and that means being wholly dependent and reliant on Him.
Now, there were also those who were saying.
To the Galatians, way, the ceremonial law isn't binding on us.
It's not binding on us anymore.
So that must mean that God's moral law isn't binding on us either.
We can just do whatever we want.
That's perfect.
But the Holy Spirit empowers and equips us to live a life that is pleasing to God.
So let's have a bit more of a look at Galatians 5 verses 16 through 25 says
this, Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh,
for the desires of the flesh are against the spirit, and the desires of the spirit
are against the flesh, for these two are opposed to each other, to keep you
from doing the things you want to do.
But if you are led by the spirit, you are not under the law.
That's the ceremonial law he's talking about.
Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality,
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries,
dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.
So that list is not exhaustive, it's just a sampling.
But he continues and says, I warn you, as I warned you before that
those who do such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, self control.
Against such things there is no law, and those who belong to Christ
Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.
Now the word flesh that Paul used a number of times there, basically refers to human
nature that's been corrupted by sin.
For those who are Christians, we call this the old self.
In Romans 6 verse 6 it says, We know that our old self was crucified with him,
with Jesus, in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that
we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
In Romans 6 verse 13, a little bit later, it says, if you live
according to the flesh, you will die.
But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
Really key phrase there.
But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body.
So there again, he's talking about this reliance and dependency on
God, not doing things out in our own effort, but relying on him.
So what does following his need actually look like in daily life?
I think it means to live in such a way that the steps that we take, the decisions
we make the way that we prioritize our time, our money, our effort, are
those things producing the fruits of the spirit or the works of the flesh.
That's really the only two categories that, that Galatians five gives us.
It's those who live.
According to the flesh or those who live by the spirit.
I read something recently by John Piper, which I really liked.
He said, walking by the spirit is what we do when the desires produced
by the spirit are stronger than the desires produced by the flesh.
So when you are faced with a really difficult decision and you just don't
know what to do, or maybe you're faced with great temptation and you're like,
Oh, I want to give in, but I don't know.
I don't know what I should do.
We can hold up those two lists in Galatians 5 and use them as a way
of measuring what God's will is.
So is that particular action or decision going to result in
more self control or sensuality?
Is it going to produce more peace or more rivalry in your life?
So how does God lead us?
He has given us his word.
He has revealed himself to us.
Get into God's Word.
I used Galatians 5 there as a way, as an example of how the Spirit leads us
by enlightening our hearts to His Word.
Surround yourself with wise Christian counsel.
Try and find people who've been walking with God a little bit longer than you,
who can help you out when you're stuck and when you don't know what to do.
And as with anything, if anyone gives you counsel, take it back to scripture.
Does it align with God's word?
Does it align with what he has said?
If there's anything I've said today that doesn't, you can just toss it out.
And the spirit lives within you, so learn to recognize his promptings
when he's guiding you away from something towards something else.
So how can I trust God's guidance?
I mentioned earlier that God has given us human relationships
with submission built into them.
One of those is that of a father and a child.
Now I love going for walks with my little son I lead him and I
tell him which direction to go in.
Most of the time he's very good when we're getting ourselves ready to head
out the door, but there are days where he will suddenly just throw a fit
over something like put in his hat.
His scarf and his coat on and there are things that he experiences as suffering
like that, but they're actually part of my good plan to get him out the
door and safely to our destination.
When we're walking to the park, he, will often get distracted by something
like, I don't know, water dripping out of a drain pipe or something.
But I know much better than he does.
What he wants.
I know much better than he does what, what will make a good day.
So I'm like, come on, let's not get distracted for too long by the water
dripping out of the drain pipe.
Let's go to the park.
I know him much better than he does.
And we tell ourselves sometimes that, no one knows you better than
you, but that's just not true.
God knows us infinitely better than we do.
And that, that Leo and I, that my son and I have a difference in roles
is actually for his flourishing.
It's for his best.
And imagine if he turned around and said to me, no, I don't want to submit to you.
This happens and he doesn't put it in those words, but if I
were just to give into that and say, okay, yeah, you lead us.
It would just end in tears.
We'd probably never get out the door and it'd be a rubbish day.
Romans 8 verse 14 tells us this, For all who are led by the
Spirit of God are sons of God.
He goes on to say in verse 16, The Spirit himself bears witness with our
spirit that we are children of God.
Now there are some who will say, Oh, we are all God's children.
And this sounds nice and it makes for easy listening, but it isn't actually true.
There are two categories, there are God's children and there are
those who are led by the flesh.
And Christ died for you when you were not his own.
God sent his son to die for you when you were not his own to make you his own.
So I know that the word father can be a loaded word.
But he is a good father.
He sent his son to die for you when you were not his own.
And one of our biggest problems, maybe our biggest, is that we
all want Jesus to die for us, but we don't want to submit to him.
The thing is, you cannot become whole and you cannot find fulfillment and
true freedom if you're led by anything or anyone other than the Spirit.
My little boy was given a kite for his birthday and we went to
fly it in the park last week.
And the thing is about a kite is that, there's probably a technical term for
the string, but if that string is not taught, the flight just can't fly.
It will just flop to the ground and end up in a puddle and getting
torn in a tree or something.
And it's actually the restriction of the kite that allows the kite
to, to live out its purpose, to fly.
Like a kite who's flopped to the puddle might be like, yay freedom!
But it's no longer actually able to live as a kite.
Matt said on here a little while back, a free man chooses what binds him.
True freedom really is being able to choose what you will be submitted to.
He is to lead, we are to follow.
So thanks so much for listening and back to you guys in the studio.
Matt Edmundson: Welcome back.
Thanks, Pete.
I was just saying to Will there, I said, oh, he quoted me.
And you were like, yeah, he's gonna get another gig now, isn't he?
Way to win in life.
Quote Matt in your sermons.
But that was great.
Thanks, Pete.
Appreciate that.
That was good talk.
And so you've got some notes.
I took some scribbles.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, no, I really enjoyed that talk.
And I found myself asking lots of questions actually for Peter to start
just as I was just listening there.
But I'd love to start off with, I love that we are led by,
we're all led by something.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah.
Will Sopwith: And that is a truth that I think we probably don't Yeah.
We don't think about very often.
Or we may never know but it's true.
As soon as you start thinking about it, go yeah.
We are led by something.
And that answer of what it is that we are led by.
Yeah, I think that's really worth spending some time thinking
about what are you led by?
And you can do that on a kind of hour by hour, day by day sort of
basis and go minute by minute.
Picture your Monday, go what directs your decisions and your activity?
What is it that leads you?
And yeah, is there any space in that for God?
I think that's a really good thing to, to spend some time thinking about.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, really good point that whole walk guides you because it's
been true to say that you've had a bit of a week, I've had a bit of a week this
week, and just some bits of news that I was told, which you just, you don't
want to hear if I'm honest with you.
And at that point, you make some big decisions, don't you in terms of for me,
I had to, when I was told something that potentially was not going to be great,
I had to go and separate myself and I walked around the park and I'm like, God
I need to know what you're saying here, because I need your guidance, right?
Because if I do it my way, I'm going to go and probably punch somebody.
Or I'm going to, because, I can be quite an emotional chap.
But I didn't want to be led by emotions.
I didn't want to be led by my fear.
Was probably one of the key things that happened.
So I went away.
I knew I had to walk around the park and I had to go and pray and
I had to get my journal out because I was like, God, before I talk to
anybody else, I need you to speak to me here to guide me, to lead me.
Because that question, you are always led by something or that statement,
I think is a very true statement.
And we have to choose, even as Christians have been around for a little while.
So in
Will Sopwith: your walk around the park.
Did God give you three verses which answered your question?
Yeah, no.
Because I think that's a really interesting thing.
Some people think, oh, the Bible, so that's magic book that you're read
a verse and it'll be, do you know, that's exactly what I was thinking.
So how do you know then that it's God leading you in your reflections as you're
journeying in the decisions you make?
How do you know that's God?
Matt Edmundson: That's a really good point, isn't it?
And this is one of the key questions I think Christians wrestle with did I
hear God or actually I can't hear God.
God, I don't actually know what you're saying.
These are some of the sort of the key things that come out, don't they?
I can't say that after that walk around the park I had any clear Bible verses.
What I did come away with was a sense of something that I needed to pray into.
Okay.
If that makes sense.
Yeah.
And so Sharon, my wife and I the day after that happened, we
were praying about that thing.
And then I'm gonna say about three and a half hours after we
prayed everything turned around.
Wow.
It's one of the quickest answers to pray We've had a week and I was like,
faith things an absolute dole . But it was one of those things because I
think a good question to ask you when we're talking about being led by God.
And again, we're talking about this in the context of wholeness, right?
Yeah, being whole, what it means to be whole people to be complete people.
And the premise is if we're to be whole, we have to learn to be led by God.
And because, Pete's analogy with his young son, Leo who's as cute as a button.
He's a great little kid.
And his analogy about being You know I'm his dad, he needs to
follow me, not because I'm some kind of evil dictator, but because I
genuinely know what's best for him.
And so in the context of completeness, if we're going to be complete people,
we have to learn to be led by God.
And so
Will Sopwith: yeah.
And I really like that example of a father with a small child.
Spoiler alert, Peter they grow up and their opinions become a little
harder to judge as to what's right.
But the analogy is the same that God is our father.
Yeah.
It's not like with a toddler where it's this is what you do.
And if we don't do this, it's, it's going to be a rubbish day.
It's, it becomes a lot more nuanced than that.
And particularly for adults, we have to come to terms with the fact that,
decisions you make, they may be okay, but there may be something better.
There's not, I think people can get mixed up as Christians.
There's one right way.
And we must find that one right way.
But actually, as we learn how to listen, just as a child learns to trust their
parents, because they You know, hopefully they've got some kind of precedent.
They've got kind of stories they can imagine going, Oh, yeah,
when I did what mom and dad said, then that kind of worked out.
All right.
As we do that, we then always have a choice.
Yeah, To follow God or to follow our own way and God's not gonna leave us.
He's not gonna say, Oh, you got it wrong.
That's it.
Yeah, that's end of relationship.
Yeah.
He's gonna be with us in that decision.
Like it's a fork in the road.
We walk one way God just doesn't walk the other way and go, Okay, that's it.
I've left you.
I'm
Matt Edmundson: out.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, he'll walk with you.
Yeah.
But, and if we can keep listening, he might be saying, The other route,
there was something better down there.
And so it becomes, yeah, I guess I wanted to make clear that there's
not like one, there's a plan A and if you stray from it, you're finished.
God doesn't work like that.
He journeys with us.
It's a journey and we look back and go, yeah, I made some good decisions.
I made some bad.
I've got a fairly kind of trivial example, but I really enjoy planning holidays.
Do you?
I do, and I'm good at it as well.
I'm going to give you my dates.
I planned some fantastic holidays and I got to the point I think our kids were
probably quite small, and And the plans that I had, it's we'll go there, this will
work then, yeah, we'll stay there, we'll see that, the weather was just completely
pants, or, yeah, it was in England then, mostly, yeah or the travel was just a lot
more stressful because of whatever reason,
Pete Farrington: yeah,
Will Sopwith: and and I realised actually that, I'd become just very
self sufficient of yeah, I can do this, I'm gonna plan a holiday.
And my beautiful wife challenged me and said, we don't really pray about holidays.
Why don't we go on holidays?
It's a small thing, but from that point of view, okay, yeah, I need to lay down
my idea of what will work and and that kind of run of just real done holidays.
So we came back more tired than we went.
It stopped and like things that I wouldn't have even thought of,
that we just felt, oh yeah let's maybe go there or let's stay there.
And you'd meet somebody and you'd meet some amazing family and it just okay.
Yeah.
Just even the thing like where you go on holiday is something you can submit
to God and God has something better.
And that was a really good lesson for me.
And yeah, I think it built our faith and yeah, it's worth submitting stuff to God.
No, totally,
Matt Edmundson: especially because like I say, we're talking about wholeness.
How do you get whole, submit it to God and let God guide you?
Here's a question then, right?
If there's not one way and this is slightly off topic, but I think
this will be a good question to ask.
Let's talk about the biggest decision you'll make in life with
the exception of choosing to be a Crisbo, to give you a gift.
Down with the kids, be a Crisbo.
To be a Christian Nicola, Miriam, hi in the comments.
Yeah.
Here's a question, right?
You're married to the beautiful Kate, I'm married to the beautiful Sharon.
Your son is, he's not getting married, my son's not getting married,
but potentially it could happen.
It comes to you and says, Dad, is there only one person on the planet that
God's got for me to get married to?
What would, how would you answer?
That's a
Will Sopwith: massive red herring.
That, that is a rabbit hole right there.
So I would say, yeah, I don't believe there's one person.
If you get it wrong, you mess up.
I just don't think God works like that.
I don't think he's got this master plan and we must get every single step right.
Like kind of solving a puzzle.
And if we mess up, it's like I just, I dunno what to do with you.
Yeah, I can't work with you now cause you've straight off my plan.
I was watching actually, king Richard.
Okay.
The thing about Serena and Venus Williams.
Oh yeah.
Will Smith in.
Yeah.
And, and he had this master plan and all the way through it's this is my plan.
This is my plan.
And, most mostly it it, it went pretty well, actually.
But yeah, it really struck me.
God's not that sort of father, where it's like, there is the one road.
And if you stray off it, I'm gonna say, I told you so yeah, so in
terms of that kind of that choice of person, I think God's got a best plan.
And I think that's definitely something you need to submit to God and say,
okay, I want to just acknowledge that, the end from the beginning,
I don't, yeah, I'm hopelessly in love, and it feels great now.
If I spend the next 50 years with this person who knows what's going to
happen in that time, that is definitely something you need to submit to God.
But on that submission thing, and I wanted to ask you actually, because I
don't have a problem with submission.
I think I'm about In work, in other things, I think I
make quite a good number two.
I'm quite happy for someone to leave, to be honest.
I'm like, and I know, you're a serial entrepreneur, you own your own business.
I think there's a reason, probably, for the issues you have with authority.
But it's probably
Matt Edmundson: very true.
Will Sopwith: And I think the majority of people are probably a bit more like
me, that it's do you know, So, when you know someone's character is good
and you know they make good decisions, submission is not actually that hard.
But I wanted to ask you, because I think you are much better at leading
and I'm making the, I'm doing the decision yeah, how do you find that
whole kind of submitting to God?
You've given a great example there already, but is that
something you've had to learn?
Is that something that's naturally there?
Matt Edmundson: I think, yeah it's one of those things, isn't it?
Where I remember someone saying to me years ago, when I had just become a
Christian, I'd been a Christian a couple years, and they said to me, Matt, you
seem like a fairly competent person.
And I think the thing about fairly competent people is, it is really
easy to get in the mindset of, I'm just going to make the decision.
Because it will be the right decision.
I often joke with our lodgers actually when something happens in our house that
I would have made some kind of comment on, and it goes the way that I predicted.
I
Will Sopwith: can just see you're smug.
Yeah.
I just sit
Matt Edmundson: there and I have this one question.
It's not a good thing, but I have this one question I just say to them.
What can we learn from this?
So when they sit there and say, Matt, you were right.
That's generally my first question is what can we learn from this?
I'm amazed your nose is not more broken.
They throw their dinner plates at me.
But it's an interesting one, isn't it?
But I think it's easy if you are successful and competent to not think
that anybody really, one of the things that I've noticed with entrepreneurs
as an example of this is entrepreneurs who are Christians in church, there is
a disproportionate number of them who will go and set up their own charity.
I don't know if you've noticed this, but this is one of the
things that I've noticed, right?
Yeah, I was the same in the sense that a few years ago, the conversation.
Yeah, I'm like, I'm going to set we set up a charity called next chapter.
We set that up.
We're like, We're gonna put all our money into next chapter.
And next chapter we'll do X, Y, and Z.
This is the mission of the charity.
And so I was doing it.
Some friends would, they'd set up their own charity here in the uk.
So I'm in the States had done it.
And so I remember sitting there thinking, why have I done that?
Why did I set up a charity?
And if I was honest, brutally honest with myself, it's because I didn't trust.
The people in church, if I give my money to church, I didn't trust them enough
to do the right thing with that money.
And that I felt I could make better decisions about that money
that would have a bigger impact.
Does that make sense?
This is a very entrepreneurial thing.
So you go into entrepreneurs in church really struggle because they look at
things and they go I'd do that better.
That should be better.
This should be better.
That should be better.
Why don't you do this?
What's wrong with you?
And it's very hard to silence those voices.
I don't know if this is answering your questions, but I think it, it's one of
those things where it's, it Nicholas put in the comments, I remember that
question, I'll probably ask that Nicola, what can we learn from this Nicola but I
think it is one of those things where the more successful you are, the less reason
you have in your own mind to listen to or try and submit to the voice of good.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, but I think the word trust is absolutely key there.
And the reason I like the picture of the father and child is that Hopefully, in
a healthy kind of family relationship that the child begin puts trust in
their parents because they have lots of examples of where that has gone good.
And I think, and that's a real key element and, we call it faith in,
in Christianity and in religion, there's a faith in who God is.
And I think it's very difficult to submit if we don't trust who we're submitting to.
And to be honest.
The only way really to build that trust is to try it.
Yeah, so okay, like me with the holidays, it's oh, we pray about holidays.
Yeah, I'm a little bit scoffing about ideas that come or wherever we go, and
it's just like the best ever for whatever reason and it's as we step on that journey
of trust of just allowing ourselves to be a little bit vulnerable with God, let's
try and do this a bit, a different way.
Yeah.
That we learn that.
And that's where the Bible is so key.
Cause you can read in the Bible and say, okay, this describes a God who, who is
loving, who is gracious, who is merciful.
You look at Jesus, you look at the stories of Jesus and go, yeah I can trust.
But moving from what people say about Jesus, or what you read in the word
to actually your own experience of Jesus in your life, that's that's
really when that kind of journey with God, and that wholeness really
begins and, but it's a leap of faith.
When you put your trust in someone else, particularly on a decision
that you think you could do better.
That is faith, isn't it?
You're taking a risk there.
And there's an element, actually, of being whole in God that does need, does
taking a little bit of risk sometimes.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, I think you have to.
I don't think you can.
I think that's such a true statement.
That actually wholeness, you can't be whole with all the T's
crossed and all the I's dotted.
I see a guy once a week, sometimes twice a week, super anxious guy super anxious guy.
He's not a Christian, suffers a lot with anxiety.
When I talk with him, his whole thing is about control.
Yeah.
He wants some element of control over his life.
I don't understand why this is happening.
Why is this happening?
Why would God let this happen to me?
I want control.
He wants all his T's crossed and all his I's dotted.
But I don't think that's wholeness.
I don't think that's right.
I think there is an element of God is a very faithful God
and he is very trustworthy.
But his call is to live a life of adventure.
At least in my head, rather than live a life of just utter, no drama whatsoever.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, absolutely.
And I think, I like what Pete said about the offense of the cross and
that, that, that's a verse in the Bible, but what's offensive about
the cross, it's that very thing.
It's saying, your idea of that control and your plan might not be the best.
And that's offensive because we're like, particularly as adults, I
think we find it easier as kids.
I think we accept that we don't know everything as kids.
We're learning.
As adults, we particularly if we're competent adults, we lose a sense of
that and go, actually, my way is the best way, or certainly the most comfortable
because I'm in control, and that idea, and this is where that idea of submission
to God that we can't even see and gets a lot of bad press from lots of angles and
you know all the rest that can be quite offensive particularly where you've got
that now if I just control everything and that comes back to that sense of
that there is a right there is one right way there's a right decision for
everything yeah it's a lot more nuanced when we start walking with God it's yeah
there's best ways to go but actually The walking with God and the submitting
to God and allowing God to speak into our every decision bad and good.
Yeah, it's far more the point than whether we get it absolutely right.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, so true.
I was as you were talking, I'm thinking of, the game Tetris, that we almost
view it like that, that we have to get the, what God tells us to do, it
has to be in the right place at the right time at the right angle and If
it doesn't, it just all builds up and life just falls apart and, game over.
I don't think it's like that at all.
I think my experience is God leads you.
I remember coming to the revelation once that is actually, I think if you are
a Christian who, reading their Bible, praying, seeking God, genuinely heart of
humility, are in some kind of accountable relationships with godly people.
I think it is really powerful.
I think it's harder to miss the will of God than it is to hit it.
Do you see what I mean?
I think sometimes it's we make it much bigger than it actually is.
And actually just trusting God and believing that I'm in His will.
I tend to overthink it.
I tend to make it more complicated.
And actually I think it can be quite a simple thing.
And I think we can trust God with the fact that we might not know the end from the
beginning, and I might not have, seen the lightning across the sky and heard the
voices of angels and and all that sort of stuff, but I can trust God enough to know.
That my steps are ordered of him.
Yeah.
Do you know what I mean?
Yeah.
As it says in Proverbs, in the old King James Version my steps are
ordered or directed by God, that he leads me, he guides me, that the Holy
Spirit lives in me, I'm led by him.
Sometimes, that will be very specific direction, but most of the time, it's
just me going, God's laying down my life.
Before you do with it, what you will guide me,
Will Sopwith: yeah, absolutely.
And he's just commented can be freeing that you can only do your
best and trust God to do the rest.
And there's a sense of that, of I'm focused on, yeah, do doing the
simple steps and just trusting that God is behind it and it's working.
And yeah, and that's absolutely true.
And I think he does.
I really think he does.
Matt Edmundson: I do.
And I think there are sometimes actually when you can reason with God.
And I think sometimes God will put choices in front of you, where
it's well, what do you think?
I feel like I have these conversations with God, where
it's, what do you think, Matt?
What do you want to do here?
I think marriage is a classic example, right?
That when I married Sharon, could I have married anybody else on the planet?
Absolutely.
But as soon as I married Sharon, absolutely not.
Yeah.
Do you know what I mean?
Absolutely.
And I think there was an element of God going, Sharon is a
beautiful woman, very godly woman.
And I think if you two got married, it would be amazing.
This was the impression I got when I prayed.
I hope she's listening.
To send her the recording.
And I think part of that was my choice.
As well, but I feel like God was definitely in it.
We'll talk more about this when we talk about relationship when we get into
relationship health and how have a healthy marriage and all that sort of stuff.
But as soon as I was as soon as that decision was made, as soon
as we said I do, then I agreed.
I have to believe that she is the only person that I can be married to right now.
Otherwise, you go down this road of maybe I'm married to the wrong woman.
Yeah.
Do you know what I mean?
And that I've seen too many people do that in the sense of they get
married thinking it's the right thing.
Marriage becomes hard.
And so the conclusion is, I married the wrong woman, because there's
only one right woman for me to marry.
And obviously, she's not it.
Do you know what I mean?
Yeah.
And so you, that's the reason for divorce.
Or the other key reason for divorce is because people get married
who shouldn't have got married.
Do you see what I mean?
They weren't brave enough to break off the relationship at the start.
And again, we'll get into all of that.
But Peter says, yeah, trust is the big thing in any relationship,
as in any relationship.
Yeah, that's totally true.
You've got to trust and I think to be led by God fundamentally requires you
to be trusted by, for you to trust God.
Will Sopwith: Yeah.
And I think, building on what Andy said about trying our best one phrase that
I've found very helpful in my Christian life is that the decisions you make,
and again, as soon as you have kids, the sort of decisions you make become, it's
just a whole other order of pressure and importance, every decision I've made
before I had kids just feels really?
Decisions you make about your kids, it's oh, wow this is a
life I deeply care about, and I want to make the right decision.
And, but a phrase that's really helped me is, God will never judge us for
making a decision in it with the level of understanding and faith that we had,
and it's, as you say, if you're doing this stuff, if you're trying to walk
with God, if you're trying to pray, if you're trying to understand his word
and you make some bad decisions, but you make them in the light of how much
you had at the time, God is loving and he's most gracious and he will be
with you in that and he may guide you
afterwards and say, that wasn't the best but that sense of
it takes the pressure off.
Like I've got to find the right way.
No.
God gives us a measure of faith and understanding and that can be very small
when we first start out as a Christian.
It can stay small when we're very mature Christians, to be honest.
But with that level of understanding that we have, if we're working off
that and trying to truly submit it to God, He will always be with us
and seeking to bless us and guide us.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah, the way I'd say that is God can handle my failure much
more than He can handle my disobedience.
Will Sopwith: Oh, absolutely.
Do you know what I
Matt Edmundson: mean?
And so I think I'll include that in my next talk.
You go for that.
You just you can rub that you quote that in your talks.
If you ever do a talk crowd, just quote me.
It's fine.
No, but I think it's I think it's a really, again, I just remember thinking,
you know what, I want to be the person that feels like I've heard God and I will
have a go, rather than person that feels like , I've heard God and not have a go.
And if I get it wrong, like you say, which I've done in the past, as hard as it is
to believe Nicola, I know, I'm sorry.
When you get it wrong, I think God can cope with your failure.
And I actually think people can cope with your failure.
Friends, people around you, they can cope with your failure.
I probably am the one that struggles with it the most.
Yeah, that's absolutely true.
But I think God can handle that much better than he can handle my disobedience.
It's when we actively disobey God's leading that we have problems.
So sometimes I don't always understand it.
Sometimes I don't always have the right and across the sky.
But there are sometimes where I know God has said to do something.
And if I walk away from that, if I don't do that, I don't it's not like I'm losing
my salvation or anything like that.
I don't think that's true.
I just think that's when I have the biggest problems.
Will Sopwith: Yeah.
Yeah, I agree.
If someone's struggling with that then, and they're like, they've
got a decision, and they're saying, how do I know that God is good?
How do I know that God's for me?
What confidence can I have?
Why should I submit to God?
Because, I've got a track record of making decisions and look I'm doing all right.
I'm still alive.
Things are going well.
Why on earth should I start submitting to God?
What would you say?
How would you persuade someone that actually it's better to be submitting
to God as Peter's explained?
Matt Edmundson: Honestly, I just, I would use the same analogy that.
Pete used in with him and the child and I've known we've had these
conversations before, but I've worked with some of the wealthiest people
on the planet, flown on their private jets stayed in their ski chalets.
I have been wined and dined by the wealthy people of the world.
And what was always fascinating about them was they were hyper successful.
The top of the top, billionaires in more ways than one, but it was always
fascinating talking to them because fundamentally within inside of 30
seconds, 60 seconds of talking to them, you knew deep down, something
was missing and they knew it too.
And the chasing of success.
It's interesting.
Those that are hyper successful, I think they keep chasing
success, trying to fulfill a void.
It's the middle class that I think has the biggest problem because the
middle class are successful compared to most people, as in we're paying
the mortgage, we're eating okay food.
I've got the Volvo.
I've got the 2.
4 kids.
There's an energy crisis going on, there's, cost of
living crisis and I'm okay.
I won't go skiing in Aston this winter, but the rest of my life is okay.
I think they're the people that have the biggest problem because
I think they become numb and they become deceived by what they have.
Whereas the hyper successful they keep chasing because they've
experienced this hyper success.
They feel like they need to keep chasing.
It's when you're sat in the middle.
That you've got the biggest problem, I think, and if that's you, if you're
watching the live stream, you're in this middle class, my life is okay,
I've got the house, I've maybe got a holiday home, I've got my pension
fund, I've got all this sort of stuff.
I think it's very easy to get sucked into keeping that as a lifestyle, to feel
like that's all that God's got for you.
And actually when God calls you, yeah, into sort of his plans, I think
if you're, if you're not in that group and you're broken then the call
of God is just a beautiful thing.
Because what have I got to lose, right?
I
Will Sopwith: was going to say, it's really interesting that you look in
many parts of the world where the church is absolutely on fire and thriving.
Because the idea of heaven is beautiful, because life on earth is hell, like in,
these churches on rubbish dumps in Asia and that's a reality, and you can look
down on it a little bit sniffily and say, Oh of course, they're Christians,
because they haven't got anything else.
But actually, there's a real key there, because they really understand that what
they've received from God, they really understand that exchange of I love God
and there is a hope and there's joy.
There's real sincere joy and peace in a circumstance that most of us would go.
I'd hate to live in that.
And you're right, there's a kind of numbness where we
have it just all together.
But I'd say there is more.
There's more, there's a higher level of joy and a peace and fulfilment,
certainly, when we start to submit to God.
Matt Edmundson: Absolutely.
I think it's great.
I'd say to you, don't let comfort talk you out of the adventures that awaiting God.
Absolutely.
I think comfort is one of those things that we perceive to be
whole and it genuinely isn't.
And we'll talk more about this as we go through the becoming whole series.
It's fleeting
Will Sopwith: as well.
Come from Yeah.
Yeah.
And there's always a kind of a wake at night, what if my circumstance changes?
What if this changes?
Yeah.
What have I got?
And, yeah.
Very good.
Great comments.
Thanks all.
Yeah.
Matt Edmundson: Miriam, I always find guidance in God my comforter.
Jamie, first time here tonight and love this.
Thank you, chaps.
I'm gonna put that in the comments cause you called us Chaps.
, Will Sopwith: it's obviously English and lots from Matt Crew
about a red team of footballers.
Yeah.
I didn't know he was
Matt Edmundson: a Liverpool fan maybe.
Yeah.
When Stormzy leading Worship at Crowd, do you know about the Stormzy story?
Will Sopwith: Bits and pieces from my son actually but not
in any great detail today.
But did you
Matt Edmundson: know he retweeted.
or reposted Dan Orange's talk.
I didn't know that.
Yeah.
Wow.
Yeah.
We're talking about it last week on crowd.
So Stormzy , we have, we put on TikTok and YouTube, all this platforms.
We have these little 30, 60 second snippets from talks.
There's some of you on there.
Yeah.
Doing quite well.
But you didn't get reposted by Stormzy , but Dan did.
Dan walked about a foot higher when I told him Stormzy had reposted.
So he's got thousands and thousands of views of Dan talking
about prayer, which is great.
So goodness.
That's why the Stormzy are leading worships
Will Sopwith: from it.
That's very good.
Yeah.
A final thing about the question right at the beginning about did you get a verse
when you were walking around the park?
I think one of the key things that I've learned over my Christian life.
is that when you don't have a clear answer, you don't have a skywriting or
a verse that pops out and is perfect.
I think a sense of peace about a decision you make when you've prayed,
when you've submitted to God, I think is absolutely a real key guide for me.
When I feel a sense, just a peace, and that's the Holy Spirit.
That literally is the Holy Spirit.
We believe the Holy Spirit.
When we submit to God and become a Christian, the Holy
Spirit lives inside of us.
And there's a kind of communing with the Holy Spirit of God.
And where you get a sense of peace about a decision that you prayed
about, that for me has really stood the test of time as being, yeah, I
just feel peaceful about that decision.
And that I take very much as God's leading.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah very true.
There's this wonderful story in the book of Acts where which we've
been working through we finished working through it where Paul Goes
on one of his missionary journeys and he start, this is the aged Paul.
This is the Apostle Paul.
This is the man that wrote that, children of God are led by the spirit of God.
He knew God and he'd had some dynamic encounters with Jesus.
And he starts going down this road and it, and the Bible says as he went.
The Holy Spirit constrained him.
Love that phrase, that language, as in, I not got this sense of peace.
I've got a sense that something's not right.
And so Paul goes, hang on a minute.
Now, this is Paul, that surely he prayed about going on.
And he thought he was going the right way.
Even Paul, but on that journey, he could trust God and God got through
to him by this sort of sense of uneasiness by this constraining.
And he's maybe we should go this way.
Yeah, let's go.
And there was a sense of peace alongside that.
And I think listening to that voice, that sense of peace is so key that
sometimes things just seem right, even though they don't make sense.
And then some things just don't.
There's that constraining there's that kind of sense of unease about something.
Will Sopwith: Yeah, absolutely.
And that yeah, and I've felt that without even being able to really
understand what it is or rationalise it or explain it to someone.
It's just I just don't feel that's the right thing to do.
Matt Edmundson: Yeah.
Super powerful.
So hope you enjoyed this conversation about being led by
God and how it leads to wholeness.
I feel like we've just clipped to the top of the tip of the
iceberg here, so much more to say.
So many stories we could tell, isn't there?
But you know what, it's all part of the joy.
It's all part of the journey.
It's all part of the fun of being a Christian that actually, God will guide
you and you can trust him with your life and you can, whether you're living
in comfort, whether you're not you can trust him with everything that he's got
for you, because it's gonna be epic.
It's gonna be an adventure.
So hope you've enjoyed that.
What's happening next week?
Midweek stuff.
Yes, I've mentioned to you Alpha.
We do Alpha on Wednesdays at 8.
30.
If you'd like to join us on the Alpha group, where we explore
Christianity, come ask your questions.
We do it on Zoom.
Just head to crowd.
church forward slash alpha.
I'm looking for the button.
There it is.
You can go to crowd.
church forward slash alpha or reach out to us on social media.
Media will send that link to us.
Just put your name and email address in there.
We'll email you the link and all that sort of stuff.
Do come and join us.
It is not too late.
We also have midweek community groups, which you can of course come and join us.
So yeah, any of that kind of stuff, we'd love to hear from you.
Next week we have.
Do you know who we have next week?
I've no idea.
That's because I've not told you.
It's Dave Connolly.
So Dave is actually carrying on this conversation about the Holy Spirit,
talking about the gifts of the Spirit.
And there's a very definite order here.
So we've talked about how the Spirit of God leads us.
We're going to talk about the gifts of the Spirit, what they are next week.
Might get a bit Pentecostal, but it's going to be okay, bit charismatic,
we're gonna have some fun.
And then after Easter, we are going to spend nine weeks looking at the
fruit of the spirit, which Peter introduced today, things like love,
peace, kindness, all that sort of stuff.
So we're going to spend a week on each of the fruits of the spirit,
which I'm really looking forward to.
And then we're going to get into this whole conversation of
the Holy Spirit living in us.
What does that mean?
God in me, my hope of glory.
So we are focusing quite a bit over the next few weeks.
On the work of the Holy Spirit in us and through us and leadership and
guidance is one of those cool things.
Awesome.
Did I mention I'm sorry, Matt can't read that.
So I need to put my glasses on.
I just can't be bothered.
Will Sopwith: I've got my glasses on and I couldn't read anything.
That's because
Matt Edmundson: I've scrolled down too quick.
Thank you much for joining us tonight.
Really appreciate you being here, being with us at Crowd.
If you haven't done so already, wherever you're watching this
from, just and subscribe.
It would be great to connect with you.
You can head over to the website.
If you're putting your email, we'll email you out all the stuff once a week.
One thing that I would say is if you sign up to the email list on the website,
do watch out for an email coming back.
So I was looking through it earlier on.
We've got a lot of people who sign up to the email list.
But then it's just marked as pending.
In other words, you've got an email from us asking you to
confirm that you're subscribing.
I know it's a bit odd, but it's GDPR.
We want to get it all right.
So you'll sign up, we'll send you an email asking you to confirm that.
Once you've confirmed that we know everything is good to go.
But quite a few aren't confirming it.
So just make sure if you've signed up and you're not getting emails
from us, it's because of that.
Okay, so top tip.
But yeah, wherever you get this from, make sure you like and subscribe,
whether it's a podcast, whether it's on catch up, whether it's on
YouTube, I don't know, we're going to start a little known secret.
We're going to start live streaming on Instagram soon.
We're going to try and figure out how we can do that because it all goes vertical.
Just s squashed in together.
So we're gonna be starting Yeah.
, start doing that soon.
Thank you for joining us.
Anything else from you, bro?
No.
Will Sopwith: Fantastic to have you.
And just, keep adventuring.
It is an adventure.
It absolutely is.
Yeah.
And don't worry about messing it up.
Just keep going with whatever.
You are gonna miss it a point you have.
Keep walking with God.
Absolutely.
And he will show himself good and you will know that trust.
I absolutely have complete faith for that.
Absolutely.
Have a great week.
Matt Edmundson: Brilliant.
Alright, guys.
Love you loads.
Peace be the journey.
See you next week.
Bye for now.
Thank you so much for joining us here on Crowd Church.
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It's just a burden you have to bear, and hopefully we'll see you next time.
That's it from us.
God bless you, bye for now.