Episode Summary: This episode is all about enjoying the journey: A Fresh Start with Purpose and Momentum. We’ll explore how to appreciate the present, overcome negativity, and build momentum toward our calling. Through biblical wisdom and practical insights, we’ll discover how we are worthy because of Him. God gives us a fresh start every morning. Daily gratitude and praise while we work toward change, can transform our lives.
Enjoy the Journey: A Fresh Start with Purpose and Momentum
The importance of enjoying life, even in challenging times
How praise and gratitude can shift your mindset
Why fresh starts are a gift from God
Practical ways to live with purpose and momentum
Episode Breakdown:
[00:00] Introduction
Welcome to the podcast and this year’s theme: Enjoy the Journey
How this theme applies to personal life and The Tidy Tutor
[04:30] The Importance of Enjoying Life
Life is short—learning to embrace the present (Psalm 103:15-16)
Reflection on past disappointments and missed joy
Encouragement to live joyfully, no matter the circumstances (James 4:14)
[10:15] The Power of Praise
Gratitude as a tool to resist negativity (James 4:7)
Choosing joy in difficult moments (Philippians 4:4)
How a faith-filled mindset opens the door for blessings
[16:45] Fresh Starts and God’s Mercy
The beauty of new beginnings every day (Lamentations 3:22-23)
Letting go of imperfections and seeking God’s forgiveness (1 John 3:1-2)
[22:30] Living with Purpose
Understanding that God has a plan (Jeremiah 29:11-13)
Aligning desires with God’s will (Psalm 37:4-5)
Committing actions to God for lasting change
[28:10] Building Momentum
The power of consistent action and habit formation
Example: Learning to ride a bike with opposite handlebars
How momentum helps us push past setbacks and stay on track
Encouragement to embrace the journey
Recognizing challenges but staying committed to growth
Invitation to reflect on personal goals and faith
Connect, share experiences, and continue this journey together
00:00 Hello, and welcome to what does God say to you? For this year, my theme is enjoy the journey, a fresh start with purpose and momentum. 00:12 And each one of these things has a reason why I am holding on to this for this year. Now, I'm doing this in my business with my people, the Tidy Tutor, that's my business, and I'm doing this for my life as well. 00:28 And I was just led to do it for. What does God say to you too? So let's move on and I hope that you're going to like this because I certainly do. 00:40 So first we're going to go over a couple of verses for enjoy the journey. In Psalm 103, 15 to 16, it says, as for man, his days are like grass. 00:53 He flourishes like a flower of the field for the when passes over it and it is gone and its place knows it no more. 01:02 So what is that saying? It's saying that life is short. We only get one chance at it and God compares it to grass or flowers. 01:13 We know how long they last. It really is important to enjoy the journey regardless of what's going on. If we're disappointed. 01:23 If we wish things were different, if things aren't going the way we want them to go, still we're going to be living life anyway. 01:32 We might as well live it and enjoy it and thank God that we have this life that we're living. Because when we look back, we're going to say why wasn't I enjoying that time? 01:46 Why wasn't I appreciating the people that were around me and the things that were around me and the people that I loved? 01:55 Why did I squander that time because circumstances weren't what I wish they were? Time is going to come and go whether we like it or not. 02:05 We might as well like it now in James the book of James chapter 4 verse 14 it says, whereas we know not what shall be on the moral for what is your life. 02:18 It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. So let's take God's 2020 and say that we are going to appreciate what we have right now because it is fleeting and there are so many wonderful things and if at the moment you can't think of anything wonderful or good because times 02:44 are tough, then praise him, praise him because he inhabits the praise of his people. There's a verse that says, resist the devil and he will flee from you. 02:56 The verse before that says, submit yourself unto God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. So how do you resist the devil with the Word of God? 03:08 Praise you, Father. Thank you, God. If you can't think of anything to be thankful for, thank you that I have eyes, thank you that I have eyelashes, thank you that I have hands, thank you that I have a bed to sleep in. 03:20 And as we do that, it will dissipate the negative. And we will be flooded with joy and peace. Now it also says in the Bible that we are to offer sacrifice of praise. 03:35 A sacrifice is something we don't necessarily want to do. It actually is something we don't want to do. That's why it's called the sacrifice. 03:44 So it's okay to be praising and feeling like you don't want to. That's a right. Your flesh might be saying I don't want to but your spirit definitely does. 03:55 So we put down our flesh and we raise up our spirit, and we praise Him anyway. There's another verse that says, rejoice in the Lord always. 04:07 And again, I say rejoice. And that's Philippians 4-4. He says always, not only when things are good. There's a reason that God tells us to do this because answers are on the other side. 04:23 If we are in negativity and we stay in a place of feeling down, then there is no faith in that and we cannot receive anything from God without faith. 04:38 So we're going to move on to the next one and we're going to get it into our hearts that we choose to enjoy the journey. 04:48 The next part is a fresh start. Now, this is really necessary because each day we can really fall down. We can have bad moments. 05:00 We can say, I'm going to do this and then totally do the opposite or say, all right, I'm not going to do that anymore. 05:09 And then there we are doing it. Well, we're not perfect. And the things don't just happen. They take time and practice. 05:18 And we have to allow that, and God certainly does. He has a verse in Lamentations, it's Lamentations 32 to 23, and it says, the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. 05:36 His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness. So it's saying, God is faithful and He's telling us that His mercy is fresh every morning. 05:54 So what does that mean? That means that today or even moment by moment, maybe not so great right now. But your mercies are fresh every morning. 06:05 So I praise you God and I thank you God and I'm going to let it go. Now, we're going to look at other verses that see that we can let it go and we must let it go, because God does. 06:21 He wants us to stand in the righteousness of Him, because He paid a great price for us, His Son Jesus Christ. 06:31 We need to accept that gift and walk in it and live like it. Now, in 1 John, chapter 3, verse 1, we're going to read 1 and 2, we're going to read 1 John 3, 20 and 21. 06:49 You can read the whole chapter. It's great. I chose these verses because it goes perfectly along with our theme and, of course, for brevity's sake, 1 John 3, 1, behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. 07:06 For as John 3, 2 says, Beloved, now are we the sons of God? Look at how God was trying almost desperately, it seems, to get us to understand that we are His children. 07:21 When you have a child, if they come up to you and need something, and they just did something they shouldn't have done, do we say to them, oh no, I'm not helping you anymore, you just made a mistake. 07:34 No. If they need us, we're there for them. God is the same. There's another verse somewhere. I don't know exactly where because it just came to my now and I don't remember the verse, but it says that if we could as people do good things for our children, how much more would God in heaven do good things 07:58 to them, for them that love him. So there's that. He wants us to know that where is children and that he loves us. 08:07 Now we're going to jump down to verse 20 and 21 and he talks about the fact that we should not condemn ourselves that we're going to do things that aren't right. 08:19 We're not perfect. Don't put yourself down. He says, if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart. And he knows all things. 08:30 You hear what he's saying? He's saying, if you do condemn yourself, then God understands. He knows that we're not perfect and he knows that we're going to condemn ourselves anyway. 08:42 But look at the next portion. Verse 21 where it says, Because beloved, if our heart condemns us not, then have we confidence towards God. 08:54 We can stand before God without any sense of sin, guilt, or condemnation. And if we can do that, God says that that means that we have confidence towards Him. 09:08 And we can stand in the relationship that he wants us to have with him as sons, not feeling bad or putting ourselves down, but to stand in confidence, knowing that we are his children. 09:25 So to continue on with a fresh start, how we can have one every day in the book of Romans chapter 12 verse 2. 09:36 It says, and be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. 09:51 How wonderful would that be? Every day to prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Well, how do we do that? 10:01 He says not to be conformed of this world, but to be transformed. How are we to be transformed? Transform means changed. 10:12 So we aren't supposed to be or we can't, I guess I should say, can't be perfect every day. If we could be, we wouldn't have needed a savior. 10:21 We need to be transformed. So as we're living life and trying to do our best and blowing it because he knows that we will, we could know that it's okay. 10:36 He says that we can be transformed. How? By the renewing of our mind. He wouldn't say that something had to be renewed. 10:47 He would have said, new up your mind. No. He says renewed which means it has to be done many times over and over again. 10:57 It's our nature and it's okay. We're gonna go back now in the subject of feeling condemned putting ourselves down. Do you ever feel like you're not enough? 11:08 Do you put yourself down and feel wrong? More often than not. We've got to stop this. Here's no condemnation to them, which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 11:37 So let me just go over that for a minute. There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. 11:44 Are you in Christ Jesus? you are, if you are as child, if you are born again, if you confess to Jesus's Lord that he is the Son of God, then you are in Christ. 11:56 And it says here, who walks not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. So you can say to yourself, I am not going to condemn myself because I want to stand in the Spirit and not in the flesh. 12:11 And the next verse where it says, for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. What is it done? 12:19 It has made me free from the law of sin and death. Now in Romans Paul goes on to talk about that. 12:28 We don't just sin for the heck of it because we're saved by grace and because there's no condemnation, of course not. 12:36 This is about understanding that we're just flesh and bones and we are not perfect and he wants us to know that there is going to be sin there is going to be parts of life that we are just not walking as children of God or as we should be according to his word and he knows that he wants us to know that 13:01 he knows that and that it's okay where his children and we are to strive to be better, but forgive ourselves when we're not, so that we can move ahead with the relationship with God. 13:18 So now the next portion of it with purpose, I'm going to read Jeremiah 29 11 to 13, for I know the plans I have for you to clear as the Lord, it, plans to prosper you, and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future, then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I listened to you, you 13:45 will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. And in Psalms 37, 4 and 5 verse 4 and 5 it says, Delight thyself also in the Lord, and And he shall give thee the desires of thine heart, commit thy way unto the Lord. 14:04 Trust also with him, and he shall bring it to pass. That's the part of with purpose. We need to have purpose. 14:15 We need to know what we're doing and why. We know that God has plans for us. He wants us to prosper. 14:24 He has plans for hope and a future. And like it says in Psalm 37, 4, and 5, he gives us the desires of our heart. 14:34 That doesn't mean that he gives us all that we desire. It means that the desires that we have on our heart, they came from God. 14:46 If there's something that you want, that you long for, this is something that God has put on your heart. And if God put it on your heart, of course He'll make away for you to be able to receive what it is that you desire. 15:04 So there's so much here where we can see that we can live our life, we can enjoy the journey, we can have a fresh start every day with purpose, we can see what it is that we We want, based on the fact that we know that God has given us those desires. 15:27 And move ahead with the next part. The part where we really have to step up and realize that it's not the law of attraction. 15:38 It's the law of action. It's the law of action and momentum, and that's what we're on now. The momentum part. 15:48 momentum is the act of continuing to do, to work at, and to practice until the new becomes second nature. Change doesn't happen because we want it to, or even because we make a plan to follow. 16:07 It happens when we keep doing. Building momentum is about consistency. It can't be about perfection because it's not possible to be good at anything new until time passes, and we're practiced at it. 16:24 So often we go to God with prayer and we beg or we plead or we wish or we hope or we cross our fingers and expect, but there's more to it than that. 16:36 There's more to it than standing in faith. There's, what do I do now, God? What do I need to change? 16:45 What do I need to learn? What do I need to know? Now, one of the things that I learned recently that was really big for me, I heard a story about engineers that designed a bike where the handlebars turned the wheel in the opposite direction. 17:03 What seemed like a joke turned into a profound lesson on learning and habits. A speaker shared their experience during a meeting that I was at. 17:15 Now it took him eight months of daily practice on that bike that the handlebars went the opposite way to write it without falling. 17:24 He really thought that he would just be fine in it once he understood that oh all I have to do is turn the other way and of course be able to do it but he couldn't. 17:35 After mastering During it, you know what happened? After the eight months, he couldn't ride the bike the regular way anymore because his brain had been wired. 17:45 Don't you see how it's more than just wanting to change? We have to put in the time to do things differently until it becomes what we do. 17:58 Habits and thoughts are like riding a bike. their hardwired, rewiring our brains to do something differently takes deliberate, consistent effort over time, and there's no getting around it. 18:14 We can't do it any other way. Our brains will not allow it. It's a way that we have been created so that we're safe. 18:25 If we had to relearn, had to ride a car every time we got in it, then we would get into accidents. 18:32 If we had to learn how to walk down the stairs every time we got to the stairs we would always fall down it would take us an hour to get down them. 18:42 Habits are in place we're wired to do things that we've done over and over again easily because it's the best way to live life. 18:54 Unfortunately, things that we have done over and over again in the areas that God really would wish we didn't like condemning ourselves, putting ourselves down, thinking that we're not good enough. 19:08 Anything else that we do that we say, I don't want to wake up late every day. I want to get up early. 19:15 I don't want to lay around all day. I want to move my body. I don't want to eat junk food. 19:23 I want to eat healthy. If we have been in the practice of sleeping late, not moving our bodies, eating junk food, anything that we have been in the practice of doing, good or bad is going to be something that happens automatically. 19:40 If we want it to change, we have to deliberately take the action and this is all so godly. The word momentum is so important here because once we get moving there's no stopping us but isn't it easy to stop something that just got started? 20:02 Think about a locomotive. If a locomotive is just getting started and a cow walks in front of the train on the track it could easily stop and let that cow walk past. 20:16 But if that train has momentum, if it's been going for quite a while, it is not going to stop very easily. 20:26 And a lot of times what we do as human beings and as children of God is we give up, not realizing that it's normal to have bad days, to not get it right, to fall down, to screw up, it's normal. 20:46 We have to be aware that that's the way it goes and it's not a failure. It's the process. It's the journey. 20:56 God has plans for you. God has plans for us. There are things that he has deemed for the foundations of the world that you would do. 21:10 We need to get out of our own way. Stop thinking that everything's supposed to be perfect. Stop trying to be perfect. 21:19 Stop beating ourselves up. Stop thinking that if we didn't get it right today we've screwed up and we quit and then we start again and then we quit and then we start again no let's not do that let's say God you have a plan for me and right now I'm not realizing that plan in my life and so what I want 21:45 to do is I want to realize it so I'm going to put good habits in front of me I'm going to try to do what it is that I know that you've called me to do and I'm going to work at it every day. 22:03 Even when I don't want to, even when I don't feel like it and even when it's hard. Because I know that you're on my side and it doesn't matter how many times I fall down because that's normal. 22:18 I'll just get up and I'll keep going and I will gain momentum as I stand with you appreciating my life enjoying the journey knowing that you forgive me with a fresh start every day knowing you are planned for my life that it's good and you've given me the desire of my art that's with purpose and I'm 22:45 going to keep going and not give up understanding the process and loving you on the way, bringing me full circle to enjoy the journey. 22:59 So that's that for this. I hope you liked it. My heart for this podcast is something that I've been battling because I haven't done it in quite a while, even though I knew God had called me to do it. 23:15 Fear, doubt myself, so many things. And I said, I'm not going to do that and I will do at least one podcast in January and at least one every month in this year and then on until God tells me it's not time to do it anymore. 23:36 This happens to be the 31st day of the month. So while I am disappointed in myself that it took me this long. 23:47 I am going to take my own advice and let it go and be thankful that it's still January and it's up there. 23:57 I hope you'll walk with me on this journey in life to do God's will to answer his call and to live the life that Jesus came to give us a life that is more than abundant like he says in John chapter 10 verse 10, I have come that you might have life and that you might have it more than abundant. 24:20 Thanks so much for being with me. My name is Kathy Roberts. See you next time.