Welcome to better today with your host Shawn Maguire and with over 25 years of counseling experience, this is the Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond podcast. It inspires you to create both an amazing family and marriage. This is the Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond podcast that helps you to navigate the challenges of modern life. In this Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond podcast, you will be given the same tools, techniques, and stories that Sean and his team have used to help thousands of people to transform their lives. If you’re ready to make real progress, that will change your marriage, your family, and your life. Then get ready because better today starts now. Every. Sean, how are you doing this morning, brother?
What else, Shawn? Oh Man. I’m excited. Let’s jump in this thing. I know, you know, talk about some good stuff.
Yeah. Today we’re going to talk about how to overcome anxiety. The secret to a life well
lived. Wow, this is so timely. I know me. I struggle with anxiety on so many different levels at so many different times, so I’m looking forward to even seeing what, what happens through this with the content and the excitement
can be good. You know, one of the things our kids just got back last night from church camp, it was the first time we let them go overnight without seeing them at least every other day. God. And it was hard. We were worried the whole entire week for them it was tough. It was tough. We prayed for them, we loved on them. And just through our prayers, and I know that a lot of you guys listening out there can relate to this anxiety if you have kids, if you have a job, if you are even in America today, there’s a lot of things that we’re pressured to worry about. You know, one of the things I think would be helpful is if you guys listening, we’re just really sit back and relax cause we’re going to go into some stories and how they relate to anxiety, how our anxieties and the way we act betray our beliefs.
Cause our actions will always betray our beliefs. It’s good if you haven’t listened to the Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond podcast before. This the first one, jump back in and listen to it because I tell the story and I’m gonna Retell it again just in case you may not have heard it. It’s about my son and I, when we went to do this rock climbing walls, the biggest rock climbing wall we’ve ever done. And the guy starts the story and he goes into saying, hey guys, I’ve done this for 20 years and I’ve all these things I’ve done and this, this Caribbean or this can hold a bus, this rope here, this, this rope could pull, you know, the space shuttle or a guy out of the ocean and he goes through all these things. Use a lot of different analogies. Yeah, we’ve been to lots of rock climbing situations and they all use different ones and he says now, now, and he goes through all these things and we’re thinking in our mind, we know, we know, we know.
We already know, right? We’ve heard this, we know, we know, we know well. This one was really tall. And when we got up to the very top, my son, you know, he’s kind of looking at them as like, come on buddy, you can do it. Yeah. And when we got to the very top, the guy says, all right, now you’ve got to lean back, lean back and let go. And my son froze. Wow. He froze because on the ground on the ground, he believed the guy and he knew he, he knew and he was comfortable. He was safe. But when his feet left the ground and he was several stories in the air, he froze because his actions portrayed his belief that he really didn’t trust that the Caribbean or that the rope that the belay guy letting him down, he didn’t trust them enough to release.
And so he froze there. And you know, in my mind part of how I conquered that fear, cause I had the same fear coming halfway up because it was a really, he climbed the smaller one that was easier and they were both as high, but it was easier. The rocks were closer together and I called him the one that was hard and I had the same fears, but I thought, I need to show my son courage, so I need to press through these fears. Well, when he had to lean back and let go, that’s when he really needed to employ, you know, put that faith to action that he trusted the mechanisms holding him. And I think about, oh, funny. In our lives. Yeah. How many times did we get caught in situations where it’s just like that, or we say we trust God when there’s no storms and we say we trust God when our bank account is full of money, or when our kids are doing great, they’re doing great in school. Their sports are great, their friends are great. Yeah. But when we face adversity, how do we handle it?
Wow. I love how you said he had to let go and lean back. It reminds me of Peter where we’re, you know, it says the book of Peter Says, cast all your cares and anxieties on him now that he cares for you. Like, you know, a good God, what we are able to surrender our everything. We have everything that we are, everything that we’re facing, this struct it, destruct, distrustful. Things are desirable. Things like [inaudible] to him and just trust that you know, he cares for us. Like, Hey man, we faced here is, it doesn’t seem like that. You know,
I know available for us. No. What are the other things that I think I was a great transition to our next to that is how many of you guys out there have kids now? If you love your kids, raise your hand. My hands in there. If you could see the video of this, you would see, or Shawn and I are raising our hands because we love our kids. Yeah. Yeah. Now, how many of you have ever gotten angry at your parents? Raise your hand. Yeah, my hands in the air too. How many of you have ever questioned, do your parents really know what they’re talking about? I remember when you were kids. Some of you may have to remember a lot longer than others. Like me, I have to remember decades of when my mom had the authority to determine what I did. And you’d be in trouble.
Yeah. There were a lot of times for me, I know that I really didn’t trust that she knew the best situations for me to be in. I didn’t trust that her decisions were right. I questioned the fact that she was on point and didn’t Adam and Eve do the same thing in the garden of Eden? True. Yeah. That’s very easy. And again, I’m going to say this phrase again and again. Our actions betray our beliefs. Wow. And, and if you’re right there rather, do your kids trust you every time that you discipline them do, do they say, oh thank you father, you have bestowed upon me the pearls of eternal wisdom and they just get down and they’re just thankful and incurred. No, no kid likely ever has had that conversation with their parents. Why? Because from their perspective and from when we were young, our perspective, we did not trust that our parents knew what the best things for us were.
Wow. We may even have questioned if our parents even love us. Depending on the way you were raised. You know, one of the things that I say to my kids often as in a lot of nights yeah, is I say, what can you do to make me love you less? Yeah. Why don’t you say nothing? What can you do to make me love you more? They say nothing. And I say, because I love you all the way forever and always for all time and eternity. Amen. Or some version of that, right? Buzz Lightyear in toy story were big and they were watching it. Again, it’s coming back towards story four. They would say, I would save to infinity and beyond. I love you. Yeah, and one of the things I just got with my daughter for father’s Day, he got me this book and she had 52 different things about me that she loved and about our relationship.
Super Amazing gift. Probably one of the best gifts I’ve ever received. One of them in theirs. She said that she feels safe or she loved me or she loved about me was that phrase, what can you do to make me love you less? What can you do to make me live in more of a lawyer now that that doesn’t mean that she didn’t say, I know. I know. I know. I Know Dad. That just lets me know that I’m doing things well because I’ve said it so many times. It’s wired into her belief system and I think the same is true of our relationship with others in our kids. Yeah. Is that we need to be really mindful of what we’re allowing ourselves to hear, what we’re, what we’re wiring into our mind over time. What do you think?
Okay. I believe that’s definitely the transformation that’s happened in my life has been definitely from the content that I’ve been consuming, which is literally the word of God in worship and prayer, like literally allow myself to sorta quiet the world and being tuned with God. That’s changed the trajectory of the course of my life over the past five years and I can’t help but to thank God, but it goes back, I think to the one of the scriptures in the proverbs one, those humble beginnings Scriptures I was reading of trust in the Lord. Lean not onto your own understanding, but acknowledge him in all your ways in. He’ll make your path straight. See when I’m picking myself back when I used to lean on my own, I understand it. It was like leaning on plywood, but when I think about leading, Oh God, it’s like leaning on stone. You know what I’m saying, man. So I rotten. Yeah, true. Yeah. Yeah. So that’s changed the trajectory of course of my life, knowing that he’s a strong foundation that won’t ever been fold or give out. So versus the whole
fragile physical life I’ve lived before, coming back twice. So plywood, unsupported snaps easy. It’s not able to sustain pressure. It’s not able to sustain wind or water. Over time, the water will corrode it. It will become soft stone don’t give me in anything. Yeah. Truthfully, granted crazy. And it’s expensive to have in your bathroom. That’s what I recently heard. What our buddies, Ellis. Yeah. You know l. So think about it though. When we get angry at God because he’s disciplined us, just like we used to get angry at our kids, all right, our parents and our kids get angry at us. It creates this distance and then the enemy is able to move into that distance. And why are in all this, you know, they don’t care for you. They don’t know what’s best. That starts to fracture our relationship. And with that fracture comes a mistrust.
And when we don’t trust somebody, we’re certainly not going to take their Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond. And we’re not going to go out on a limb or jump off a cliff or do something that requires faith. Yeah. We need to be aware, just like with our own kids, when they get angry at us, they’re not typically receptive to what we’re about to say. God. Now, most parents present, company included, are tempted and have even lectured while our kids are angry at us, which they don’t listen. Yeah. You know, they don’t listen. They’re not available. They’re body language is really clear. Their eyes are rolling. They may be looking down, looking away. Their lip may be really, you know, one or two feet out from their faces. Yeah. Cause they’re just puffed up and mad. That just creates rager pushes away the relationship. And I know a lot of people can relate to that.
Yes. I definitely, definitely can relate to that and not just think if we take it more from the stance of our heavenly father in us being children of God, I think there’s instances in times where our hearts can go cold towards God because of, you know, you know, just we grow in our pride. There’s things that are quieting his voice and you know, we can tend to do that as well. Not wanting to be receptive to God, not be dependent upon God, but sort of go our own way. Uh, and I just think about it in that sense as well. The way you were explaining that, because it can be so real in our lives, like our spiritual lives as well. Well, we’re finite. We have a limited understanding. We have a time and space in which we live. God is infinite and eternal and he’s not limited by time, by space, by a just a capacity to remember or think through.
She knows the past, the present, the future. It all happen simultaneously in the eternal world that God lives in. So I think that just like with us and our children, because the parallels are so beautiful, we have been living longer than that. My daughter’s 12 my son’s 11 my daughter will be 13 this year and they really, as they get older, strikingly begin to think they know more than me. And so one time we sat down on the carpet and we had these, these domino looking sticks and when he talked about, hey, this is how many years you’ve been alive. And so my daughter had 12 my son had 11 and it say, so when you make decisions, when you think about things that you get angry about, when you worry, when you decide if something’s good or not, you’re making it from this many.
And then I said, now mommy is this many. And it was like, you know, it was, you know, a lot more than theirs. God. Yeah. And then mine was in the forties wow. So yours was the way I said no. Who would you listen to? Who has the most years of experience? Years of understanding years of getting to know God and having good and bad outcomes by the decisions they made and it really just put onto paper or put on the carpet. The reality of you would be foolish. Like proverbs talks about the fool doesn’t listen to fool this to fool that the wise listens to council wise lists and it goes on. Wow, this person has all this experience and I think we get so caught up about worrying that we’re missing out on something that God may not know what’s best for us. Like Adam and Eve did.
Abraham did, he thought he might’ve been missing out on a kid. So we had sex with his, you know, his hand, his wife’s handmaiden. You know, Hagar. Instead of just trusting the Lord that God was going to provide a child an air through Sarah, he went with the handmaiden and settled because he didn’t know. He wasn’t sure that God was going to provide. Now, let’s not think or be under the condemnation that we don’t all struggle with this because we all, we all have to make these decisions. Jesus, even he had a point where he came to and he said, Lord, if there’s any way, take this cross from me, but if but not my will, but thy will be done. And so he acknowledged the struggle that we all have. Yeah. Then he validated the faithfulness of God through his actions because our actions betray our beliefs.
Amen. That’s it. Come on now. That’s a good word right there. So think about why this is so important in your life. Why is it so important? Because when we say, I know, I know to God when he says he loves us. When we read the Bible, he say, Oh, I know for God’s who love the world that he gave his only begotten son. Yeah, that’s who whomsoever should believe in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. What will you say? I know too. I know God loves me. I know God is love. I know first John says, perfect love drives out fear. Yeah, well then we dismiss the power of God because of familiarity. Familiarity can breed discontent. Yeah, familiarity can blow you to sleep, but if we go to that first, John, what does it first, John Four set four seven, six and eight.
First John Four seven and eight says, dear friends, let us love one another because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God, whoever does not love does not know God because God is love. And so the more that we allow the truth of scripture and the words that God said to penetrate our hearts, and we refused to be prideful and say, I know, I know, I know just like my son and I who got caught on the very top of this feeling like a skyscraper rock wall and we were paralyzed and he was paralyzed a little bit longer than me. We get caught, we can push out. Cause you know when you, when you’re released down from that high, you got to push out and let go of all that you’re holding onto. True to go back down.
It’s crazy. Like literally get the push out from the wall far or you’re going to jam up your legs, you’re going to hit your knees. It’s how you get down. Yeah. And the same is true of our walk with God. This is how we start to get free is we put in the word of God. We put in the truth of God and if we feel like they’re familiar, received, Lord, move us past the familiarity until we can have the intimate understanding that this word is for my life. That’s really good. That’s a word right there, Sean Perry.
Yeah, it’s so good, man. So if any of you are listening right now, I just wanted to speak this over as well as Sean was speaking about breaking you free. God wants you to be free from worry today, and Jesus said, come unto me all who are wary in Laden and I will give you recce, but to enter his rest, you must cut off the stress, the sores of your own power, your own belief and rest and assurance that God is able and he’s faithful to see you through.
Amen brother. That’s a great word. And in our next Christian and premarital counseling in Edmond podcast we’re going to jump into two things that mark somebody who lives a life of faith. That is that is overcoming and moving forward through anxiety because I don’t think there’s a way to avoid anxiety this side of heaven because it’s through the bridge of faith that we connect to God. It’s not because we can go reach a person in the name of Jesus Christ. That’s, that is walking with us that has long hair, good skin, big muscles. We don’t have that right now. We don’t want to have that availability. And we looked at, even if we did, most of the world chose to reject him even as the Su slowly a few chose to come back and live out so good if this so true. So guys, we just are so thankful that you’ve listened.
We pray that you would put these trues into practice and really resonate in your own life that God wants to meet you right where you’re at. Yeah, and we really value as well. If you could share this message with people that need it, this is why we do it. And if you can rate and review us, that helps get the word out, that God can change your life through good choices through rewiring your brain. You’re talking to others through putting scripture into practical steps to make great decisions, and then you have a great life as the outcome. Hey man, hey man. So and this, this may or may not have been enough if it’s not been enough. We have a team of counselors at news and counseling consulting that will love to talk to you about how to bridge gap and we help you discover what better looks like for you and then equip you with the tools to create it. But do that through cutting edge biblical principles married to the Bible and scripture, and we help you apply these truths to your life in a practical way. It literally changes your life. Woo. A bit.
So already I’m going to call, did you ever been to counseling dot or live in live? You got to live in big one live. Make sure you got to live in counseling dot. Live Org is not alive. Go to live so you can live now. That’s fine. Dot Live. You can find both of the moment going forward with our new videos. Food, well, Hey, God bless, and also just have this per just linger and meditate on this. Lord, help my unbelief. Help mom belief. Hey
Man. Hey Man. Well guys, God bless and we will see you again really soon.