The Power of Ordinary

Hey, welcome to Self Talk. I'm your host, Dr. Ray Self this is a podcast where I expose the schemes of the enemy and I give you hope and real answers. That's- it's always been my, my job, my hope, I just want to assist you in overcoming the obstacles of life, the attacks of the enemy, and living in freedom and living in peace, so I thank you for listening to my podcast. This is Dr Ray Self and I'm praying for you. Hey, please, if you have an idea for a show, email me at drrayself, d-r-r-a-y-s-e-l-f@gmail.com. Tell me what you think or if I can help you in any way. So God bless you, and thank you for listening to a very important show coming up. In this show, I want to talk to you about the power of ordinary and get some stress off of you, uh, the stress of having to always be radical. Let's talk about that and see what that looks like.

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Hey, it's Dr Ray Self. Thank you for listening to today's show; I appreciate everyone. Again, if you have any ideas for a show, a topic you want me to talk about, email me at drayself@gmail.com. d-r-r-a-y-s-e-l-f@gmail.com. So, what do I mean by the power of ordinary? I was reading a newsletter just recently by a dear friend of mine named Bruce Lingaman, and he was discussing this as well so I do want to give him some credit for inspiring me for this podcast.

As long as I can, have been filled with the Holy Spirit, I've had this pressure upon me, and maybe you have too, that I need to be radical for Christ. Now, and by that I mean doing extraordinary things for Christ, all of us have friends and we know of people who, they travel to the mountains of Tibet and ,and live in primitive conditions to, to minister and bring healing to, to unreached people or maybe they're in the uh, in Liberia or maybe they're over in Indonesia or they're in some radical place reaching uh, the lost in, in sacrificing so much or holding revivals and signs and wonders and miracles or they're on the streets, uh, constantly on the streets ministering, doing street ministry and preaching to the lost and feeding the homeless and doing remarkable things for Christ. And, and that's all fantastic and God bless it but sometimes, I feel there is a pressure on us to be radical.

And, and I love my radical Christian friends and I think that that's fantastic. I have a friend of mine who goes to a foreign country and has planted church after church after church after church in a nation that is very hostile to Christians which is absolutely amazing. I mean, I've done a few radical things. I remember years ago I was way up in the mountains of Guatemala at this village that uh, I was informed on the way to this village after driving eight hours on a dirt road on the side of a mountain which is maybe one of the most dangerous roads I've ever seen in my life. Um, it was awful, and get to this village and find out that my missionary friend that I'm with, the last time he was there they tied him to a pole, poured gasoline on him and told him that if they ever came back they'd be burned alive.

So here I was with this same missionary, going back to the same village that threatened to kill him last time he was there, and I'm at that village preaching the gospel which is to me pretty radical. I'm scared, it was uh, scary, absolutely, but do you have to do these wild radical things to be in the will of God? Let's, let's talk about that. And you know, I want to be, I'm passionate about God. I know many people that are passionate about the Lord which is a fantastic thing, but scripture sometimes tells us some things are a little bit different. 

So in um, Romans 14:7, the scripture says “for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit”. So the kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, okay? Um, in Romans 15:33, “now the God of peace be with you”. In Philippians, it talks about the peace that passes all understanding so we should never belittle the concept of living a peaceful, satisfied life with communion with God, led by the Spirit, that is all over scripture.

Jesus talks about bringing peace. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you. So this is God's will. Yeah, being radical and doing these amazing things, that's wonderful stuff. But you can also be a radical wa- well let me put it this way: an obedient Christian, by living an ordinary life, living in peace and living in contentment and at the same time, being aware of divine appointments… My wife Christy is an amazing woman and a matter of fact, she tells me all the time that God's just called her to sit at his feet and she loves just to spend time with the Lord, and she lives an ordinary life although she's very athletic and very busy and does a lot of things. But her ministry she'll talk about is divine appointments. She might be at the grocery store and she strikes up a conversation with someone. Next thing you know, she's praying for them, you know, at the grocery store. And these divine appointments, she seems to have them all the time but then she has this ability just to live in peace.

One of the greatest things we can do for God is to live in peace. Romans 5:1 says “therefore, having been justified by faith we now have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Time and time and time and time again, we see the word peace. Peace be unto you, you know, peace. This is Christmas time when I'm recording this podcast. Peace be unto you. You know, the peace on earth, good will to men, and so living in peace and Paul talks about living content with what you have. So living in peace and living in contentment can be and most likely is the will of God for your life. It doesn't mean we don't do the wild and crazy radical stuff but what I believe is sometimes we're pressured to do this stuff and it's just not who we are.

I’ll give you, I’ll give you an example. I have a dear friend of mine, and I live in Orlando, and my friend, he's, he's a radical Christian. I love him much and he likes to, when he's in town he likes to go to downtown Orlando on a Saturday night where all the bars are. And you know, if you've ever been around a bar scene there's a lot of ungodly stuff that happens around bars, but he will set up a little microphone PA system outside of a bar and preach the gospel to people coming out of the bars on a Saturday night. Sometimes it's late, it's two o'clock in the morning and he's been hit, he's been spit upon, he's been yelled at, but he keeps preaching the gospel. 

Not too long ago, some years ago there was a gay pride parade here in Orlando. And my friend goes to the gay pride parade to preach the gospel, the, the, to the marchers as they come by. That's pretty radical stuff, and he wants me to come do it with him and I don't always have peace about that. It's not really who I am. I do evangelize, but do you have to be that radical to be in the will of God? No. The Bible says “the mindset on the flesh”, again, in Romans, “the mindset on the flesh is death but the mindset and the spirit is life and peace.” 

Time and time again we see God talking to us about abundant life, and abundant life is to me, is peace. When you are fulfilled in living in peace and contentment with what you have, you're living an abundant life and you are in the will of God because time and time again, um, Romans 15:13, “may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace.” May God fill you with joy and peace. So yeah, radical Christianity is fantastic and necessary but also you can be in the perfect will of God when you're living in joy and peace, you're living in joy and peace. Uh, First Corinthians 1:3 Bu- again, Paul writing, “grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” 

Okay?

Uh, in First Corinthians 7:15 it says “God has called us to peace”, that's the second part of that verse. So Romans 2:10, “glory and honor and peace to everyone”. Um, Romans 1:7, Paul’s greeting to the beloved of Rome, called the saints. “Grace to you and peace from God”. So, living in peace living fulfilled, living satisfied, in tune with the Holy Spirit can absolutely be the perfect will of God for your life and you don't have to feel this pressure to do something crazy and radical, uh, and you know, I love my radical friends who do a crazy radical stuff.

Um, got a dear pastor, a friend of mine up in Buffalo New York, I don't think he’d imagine, uh, you know, mind if I mentioned this, but every December, and you know, Buffalo New York's a very cold place. Every December, he'll, he goes out and sleeps for, I think either a week or two weeks, with the homeless. He sleeps with the homeless people to bring attention to their plight and of course. then he goes out and of course he feeds them and ministers to them and all kinds of stuff. That's radical stuff. I'm talking, this pastor goes and sleeps under a bridge with the homeless guys, um you know, I like to hand ‘em a little money from my car sometimes. That's radical. 

And that's fantastic but you don't have to be radical to be in God's will because God loves you and He wants you to have peace. He wants you to have the, Philippians, the peace that passes all understanding. Time and time and time again we hear the words contentment, peace, joy. This is being wished upon you, prayed upon you, proclaimed upon you over and over and over in the word of God. Jesus proclaimed this over us, um, talking about peace and blessings in his sermon on the mount. Paul proclaimed this, Peter proclaimed this, and so to live in peace, to live fulfilled, to live content can be and most likely is the perfect will of God for your life. Now, out of that contentment and out of that peace you can do some wild and crazy things but the pressure to perform amazing feats, radical stuff, is pressure. We don't need that pressure.

Now, my radical friends will tell you they don't feel any pressure at all. They just, literally, they go out and they do it and they're happy doing it. Me, sometimes, and I mean, I've done some radical things but I know I have pressured myself to perform and maybe you have too. Maybe you have pressured yourself to perform radical deeds for Christ, but never forget that living in peace and contentment and satisfaction is all over the scripture, okay?

The kingdom of God is not, let me, let me…think about this: the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness. The kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit brings you that, okay, um, Romans 8:6 “the mind set on the flesh is death but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace”. So over and over and over and over again, the scripture talks about us living in with, with life, living in peace, living in Joy, living feeling fulfilled because the Holy Spirit meets all of our needs and God meets all of our needs according his riches in Christ Jesus. And so when we, when, we're content living at peace full of the Holy Spirit, that can be the perfect will of God for you. 

You don't have to do wild and crazy stuff because I, I guess I'm being transparent here. I pressure myself sometimes, like, you know, I'm having just a peaceful day and a content day but then I need to go do something wild for God; something radical for God; and I get pressured. And I've done some radical things, but don't minimize being, having an ordinary life because in an ordinary, peaceful, content life, God will still use you in many ways. And also in those ordinary, peaceful, content times, that's where God starts to download to you. He starts to talk to you, he starts to transform you, he starts to give you your vision, your purpose for your life. All those come; in those quiet, peaceful, content moments.

So ordinary, being ordinary, is fine. Be ordinary by living in peace and living in contentment and living with the joy that only God can give and don't pressure yourself. Don't pressure yourself that you have to be like anybody else because there is great value and great worth. And just living, living peaceful, living content, living with joy; that's, that's more than happiness. That's, that's the will of God. That, that's, that's fine when you're content and joy and, and at peace. And let me just say, this is, I'm getting ready to close. I've struggled with, when I'm living just having an ordinary, peaceful day, I start pressuring myself to perform. I've got to write, I got to work on my new book, I've, I've got to, to, to set up some new ministry, I, I, I've got to plan my next sermon in front of a thousand people and…but you know, sometimes, many times, having that peaceful, ordinary day and that peaceful, content, ordinary life is the perfect will of God. You do not have to feel pressured to be radical.

The Bible calls us to peace, to, for joy, for contentment. And critical in those moments of quietness, we're in tune with God. You know, God wants this relationship with you more than anything. He wants you to come to him. He wants that intimacy with you first and most of all, and in those quiet, ordinary life moments, that's when God speaks and that's when you're close to him. So being radical for Christ is fantastic, but being ordinary is also fantastic and I just want to encourage you that, that, take the pressure off of yourself and know that having a peaceful, quiet, ordinary day is perfectly fine with God. Amen, amen.

Again, I want to thank my dear friend Bruce Lingaman for inspiring me for this podcast. Heavenly Father, I thank you for each person listening to us. And Father, I know that uh, we're human beings, not human doings. So many times, Father, we seem that we, we get our worth in what we do and we feel like we have to perform and we have to measure up and we have to uh, you know, do this and do that and accomplish this and accomplish that when sometimes you just want us to be still and be at peace. And Lord, you want us to be content, Father, with what we have and, and just to fellowship with you and live that peaceful ordinary life and out of that, many wonderful supernatural things happen. So Father, I pray and proclaim over everyone listening to this podcast the peace of God, the favor of God, the blessings of God and the peace that passes all understanding, and the contentment of an ordinary Christian Child of God's life. Ah, God bless you, thank you so much for listening to this show, it means a lot to me.

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