Building Back Better From the Inside Out

March 30, 2022 • Pastor Arthur Jackson III

“Building Better From The Inside Out” Learn The Lesson, So, You Don’t Have to Repeat It! I grew up in an era where children were heavily influenced by the creative genius of Charles M. Schultz. For those of you who aren’t familiar with that name, Schultz was an American cartoonist who was best known for creating the comic strip, “PEANUTS”. His most famous characters are names that I’m sure you’ve heard of:  CHARLIE BROWN, SNOOPY, LINUS, PEPPERMINT PATTY, LUCY, SALLY, MARCIE, PIGPEN, SCHROEDER, AND FRANKLIN One of the most memorable episodes in Peanuts history was the annual SAGA OF THE SWIPE: which of course involved Lucy, Charlie Brown, and that infamous football. This epic drama repeated itself every September for over 50 years and became the paradigm for the uneasy tension between trust and betrayal, hope and despair. To a kid of course, it was the continuous acts of failure that stood out the most. No single act better encapsulated a child’s feeling of powerlessness than Charlie Brown’s failure to kick the football, and I personally felt his frustration and disappointment. No matter how many times Lucy reassured Charlie Brown that she would not swipe the ball away, and no matter how many times she went back on her word, Charlie still chose to engage in the same behavior and ultimately kept paying the same price, over and over again. Charlie Brown constantly found himself torn between the obligatory trust that one should have in a friend, and the foreseeable consequences of trusting Lucy. And unfortunately, it was that conflict which prevented Charlie from learning from the experience and thus repeating that negative pattern. HOWEVER, WE CANNOT BE TOO HARD ON CHARLIE BROWN  We’ve All Had Some “Lucy’s” In Our Lives  There are “professional swipers”. Sometimes, we feel like Charlie Brown—doomed to keep repeating the same mistakes over and over again, however there is a way to break the cycle of repeated negative behaviors, and it starts by Learning the Lesson and Purposing Not to Repeat It. Certainly, it goes without saying we must go through life always looking forward, but we must understand our history (look back) to not repeat the mistakes of the past. I have seen too many instances where people continued to pursue wrong courses of action because they did not take the time to think critically about what has happened in the past. “THOSE WHO FAIL TO LEARN FROM HISTORY ARE DOOMED TO REPEAT IT.’ – Sir Winston Churchill ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR MISTAKES WITHOUT FEARING THEM  A healthy recognition of failure helps you grow Trust me, it can be hard to admit failure, but if you run from it, you’ll lose out on the chance to learn from it. Admit the mistake to yourself or the person it affected, so you can re-examine how it happened and do better next time. If facing your errors makes you anxious or frightened, remind yourself of a few things: • Every single person has had lapses in judgment. [e.g., Will Smith/Oscars] • Most failures are temporary setbacks, rather than absolute disasters. • People who achieve great things often had great failures along the way. ACCEPT THAT MISTAKES PLAY AN INVALUABLE ROLE IN YOUR LIFE  Mistakes are both unavoidable and useful  “FAILURE IS NATURE’S CHISEL THAT CHIPS AWAY AT ALL THE EXCES, STRIPPING DOWN EGOS AS IT MOLDS AND SHAPES US THROUGH DIVINE INTENTIONS.” – ANONYMOUS IF we never made mistakes and always avoided failure, we’d be less capable of showing compassion, having empathy, displaying kindness, and achieving great heights. Failure is a stepping-stone. In fact, there are four very powerful life lessons that failure helps to tech and instill in us. 1) Experience – The first important lesson gained from making colossal mistakes is experience. When we go through something and can walk away with firsthand experience, it helps us to develop a deeper understanding for life. 2) Knowledge – Failure brings with it important firsthand knowledge. That knowledge can be harnessed in the future to overcome that very failure that inflicted so much pain in the first place. 3) Resilience – Failing in life helps to build resilience. The more we fail, the more resilient we become. To achieve great success, we must know resilience. 4) Growth – Failure births maturity. Life is designed for us to grow and improve. Like fertilizer on grass, the mistakes we’ve made in life helps us to grow. IDENTIFY BEHAVIORS THAT LEAD TO MISTAKES.  Examine your life for behavior patterns you'd like to work on If you're caught in a loop making the same mistakes over and over, it's probably because you have a “BLIND SPOT” in how you're viewing certain situations and behaving within it. Accidents happen daily because an unsuspecting car was in a driver’s blind spot.  I Cor.11:28 – “But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup.” • Try to face the hidden motivations behind your behavior. • Why are you acting the way you are? • Why are you saying the things you do? • Why are thinking the way you are? GIVE YOURSELF TOOLS TO AVOID REPEATING MISTAKES. I vividly remember after purchasing my first home my father told me I needed to have some tools! He assured me that despite the house being relatively new, that eventually things were going to go wrong, and I needed to have the proper tools to fix them.  We Need Tools to Avoid Making Mistakes You can't just shout at yourself to do better and expect it to magically happen. Approach your difficulties with a realistic mindset and take steps in advance to stop old patterns from playing out again. Learn Your Behavioral Triggers.  Find out what triggers your behavior and adapt to it Very Few People Go-Off for No Reason at All! What situations or events lead to the behaviors you're unhappy with? Your mistakes don't just appear out of nowhere. They can be encouraged by other people, stressful events, and even little things like missing a meal. Identifying these patterns is the first step toward changing your response to them or preventing them from coming up in the first place. FIND A PARTNER IN SELF-IMPROVEMENT.  Trade encouragement with an accountability partner Someone you can check in with for encouragement can help you stick to your goals once the initial motivation wears off.: • Find someone who is non-judgmental and can give positive reinforcement. • The more seriously you both take it, the more helpful it will be. Choose someone who is willing to commit to scheduled check-ins, and not back out on them. PICK YOURSELF UP AFTER SETBACKS. There are two types of people in this world, people who take failure personally, see it as a permanent situation and give up, and there are people who use it as a lesson, do not take it personally but see it as a temporary setback. Setbacks will happen; what matters is how you respond to them. Changing old habits, unpacking your own trauma, facing your relationship to failure: all of this is valuable work, but it can also be difficult and draining on a bad day. It is completely normal to feel confident and motivated at one moment, and then fall into pessimism and regret. When you do make a mistake again, there are ways to get back on track: • While you're still feeling the negative emotions, seek support from the right people in the right environment—people who won't judge you, and places that won't trigger more negative behaviors. • After you're feeling a bit better, look back at how the setback happened. Maybe something unexpectedly triggered strong emotions in you—work out why, and how you could avoid that next time. • Think about how your coping strategies failed. Is there a way to make them easier or more accessible? • Finally, think about how you handled the setback during the worst of it. Is there a healthier and faster way to get through the dark times?

Building Back Better From the Inside Out

February 16, 2022 • Pastor Arthur Jackson III

“Building Better From The Inside Out” Practicing Powerful Self Talk James 3:1-12 (TLB) Dear brothers, don’t be too eager to tell others their faults, for we all make many mistakes; and when we teachers of religion, who should know better, do wrong, our punishment will be greater than it would be for others. If anyone can control his tongue, it proves that he has perfect control over himself in every other way. We can make a large horse turn around and go wherever we want by means of a small bit in his mouth. And a tiny rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot wants it to go, even though the winds are strong. So also the tongue is a small thing, but what enormous damage it can do. A great forest can be set on fire by one tiny spark. And the tongue is a flame of fire. It is full of wickedness, and poisons every part of the body. And the tongue is set on fire by hell itself and can turn our whole lives into a blazing flame of destruction and disaster. Men have trained, or can train, every kind of animal or bird that lives and every kind of reptile and fish, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is always ready to pour out its deadly poison. Sometimes it praises our heavenly Father, and sometimes it breaks out into curses against men who are made like God. And so blessing and cursing come pouring out of the same mouth. Dear brothers, surely this is not right! Does a spring of water bubble out first with fresh water and then with bitter water? Can you pick olives from a fig tree, or figs from a grape vine? No, and you can’t draw fresh water from a salty pool.  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” JOHN 1:1 Many of us tonight are familiar with this well-known Bible verse, however when we look beyond the religious overtones, we discover that there’s a message to be found in this particular verse for everyone, and it is…EVERYTHING IN EXISTENCE BEGINS WITH A WORD. Words consist of vibration and sound. It is these vibrations that create the very reality that surrounds us. This truism is important for us to embrace because if our words and thoughts are the very tools in with which we construct and create our reality, then surely WORDS ARE OUR MOST POWERFUL TOOL! Consequently, we should then only pick the very best words possible in order to create the very best reality possible. While it is true our thoughts also impact what we manifest in our lives, it can be argued that the real power though lies in our words. I say that because it is our words that provide a bold affirmation of our innermost thoughts. They are a confirmation to the world of how we see others, our lives and ourselves. It is this powerful affirmation that our words provide which enables our thoughts to manifest into a reality. So the question tonight is, “If our words are that which creates our reality, then why do we choose to misuse our most powerful asset?” Why do we choose to not utilize to the fullest our most powerful resource? Why are we not using our words to our advantage? The Christians that The Apostle James wrote to were apparently having serious problems with their tongue. I say this because prior to chapter 3, James dealt loosely with the issue of the tongue. He warned them (1:19) to be “swift to hear, slow to speak…” He also told them (1:26) that, “if any man seem to be religious but can not bridle his tongue his religion is in vain”. However, James had to readdress this issue of the tongue because these believers were not watching their words. • ONE OF OUR PRIMARY OBJECTIVE IN LIFE SHOULD BE WATCHING OUR WORDS…  The Apostle Paul put it like this, he said, “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it might minister grace unto the hearers”. Eph.4: 29 I’ve discovered that people will remember the things that YOU SAY just as long they are not longer than the things that YOU DO! Why? Because words are a powerful tool. WORDS CAN HEAL YOU BUT AT THE SAME TIME THEY CAN HURT YOU. WORDS CAN GIVE YOU LIFE AND THEN THEY CAN TAKE YOUR LIFE AWAY. WORDS CAN LIFT YOU UP…AND THEY CAN LET YOU DOWN. WORDS CAN MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE A HERO…AND WORDS CAN MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE A ZERO! James, in this third chapter has a lot to say about the power of the tongue. James says that the tongue has: 1. THE POWER TO DICTATE LIFE vv 1-4 “If anyone can control his tongue, it proves that he has perfect control over himself in every other way. 3 We can make a large horse turn around and go wherever we want by means of a small bit in his mouth. And a tiny rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot wants it to go, even though the winds are strong.” James speaks metaphorically of the power of the tongue. In fact he likens the tongue to a “rudder” on a boat or a “bit” in a horse’s mouth. What’s interesting is both the rudder and the bit are much smaller than the ship and the horse, but they give direction to both!  Our tongue has the power to direct/dictate our lives! The boat as well as the horse travel in the direction of the bit and the rudder, similarly our lives travel in the direction of our lips!  Where Do You Want Your Life To Go?  Where Do You Want Your Finances To Go?  Where Do You Want Your Relationships To Go? 2. THE POWER TO DESTROY LIFE vv 5-6a “So also the tongue is a small thing, but what enormous damage it can do. A great forest can be set on fire by one tiny spark. And the tongue is a flame of fire.” Again James uses another metaphor to describe the tongue. This time he likens the tongue to a “spark” or “flame”.  Prov.18:21 - “Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit—you choose”.  Michael Richards – Actor on Seinfeld. His tongue killed his career. During a live show in 2006, he was heckled in a club and hurdled racial slurs at an African American man and his career was over.  Paula Deen – Built a cooking empire. She was featured on Top Chef, Master Chef, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, but in 2012, her tongue killed her career. In her testimony, when asked if she ever used the N-Word she said, “Yes, of course”. 3. THE POWER TO DEFILE LIFE v.6 [Mat.15:18] “…It is full of wickedness, and poisons every part of the body. And the tongue is set on fire by hell itself and can turn our whole lives into a blazing flame of destruction and disaster.” James says one more thing about the power of the tongue; he says that it has the power to “defile” us!  Our words can change how we are viewed! How can we tame the tongue? We Need To T.H.I.N.K Before We Speak Before we speak, we should ask ourselves, “Is what we are about to say…”  Truthful – Prov. 6:16,17; Eph. 4:15  Helpful – Eph. 4:29  Inspiring – Prov. 18:21  Necessary – I Pet. 3:10  Kind - Ph. 4:8

Antioch Missionary Baptist Church