Greg McKeown said that if you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will. It is one thing when this is some critic calling for our attention or some authority figure who doesn’t respect us. It’s tricky when this is the people we love and the work we care most about. There is so much that “should” come first, but if we aren’t careful, we may lose ourselves in the trying. Hence our message today, that in order for who is most important to come first, they must come second.
[00:00:01] Welcome, this is Josh Reeves with Mile Hi Church in Lakewood, Colorado. Thank you for tuning in to our podcast today. For more information about our church, please visit our website, milehighchurch.org. Henry Nowen, a Catholic priest, was once granted an audience with St. Teresa of
[00:00:26] Calcutta, Mother Teresa. And Nowen was having some struggles in his personal life, so he made a list of his problems. You don't get to talk to a future saint every day. And when he sat down with Mother Teresa, he shared grimacing of his problems and challenges and struggles. And she listened
[00:00:51] kindly and sweetly. And she had the following reply. Spend one hour a day in adoration of the Lord and never do anything you know is wrong. Follow this and you'll be fine. Give an hour a day to God.
[00:01:13] Try to do no harm. And you'll be fine. Some people may listen to this response and think that perhaps it lacks empathy. Mother Teresa, don't you see my problem? It's so big. Can't you validate it?
[00:01:35] I've got a problem this big and this is your excedrin for this? Give one hour a day to God. Try to do no harm and you'll be fine. Maybe sometimes the problem isn't as big a problem as our attachment and our story and our trapping ourselves in the problem. Some people may think of Mother Teresa's
[00:02:02] reply and consider it impractical, perhaps even a form of a term that we use here called spiritual bypass. But to me, this is based in the fallacy that God is impractical or ethereal or out there somewhere. In religious science, there is nothing more practical than God. There is nothing more practical
[00:02:26] than to approach any challenge, not turn away from it, but approach any challenge in awareness of a power greater than we are and to allow the light of this knowledge to transform ourselves and in that light transform the issue itself. There is nothing more practical than God for religious scientists.
[00:02:49] Give one hour a day to God. Try to do no harm and you'll be fine. Do you believe that? It doesn't have to be a whole hour at once. You can do 10 minutes of meditation here, 8 minutes of prayer here, 12 minutes of reading, 20 minutes of listening to the Mile High podcast
[00:03:16] with a minister's message, maybe 25 or 30 sometimes. Growing up in Los Angeles, we had a news radio station, KFWB, and their line was, you give us 22 minutes and we'll give you the world. If you give God 22 minutes, God will give you the wholeness of your life.
[00:03:43] The wholeness of your life. Do you have enough room in your life for reverence? Do you have enough room for reverence? Are you willing to prioritize it? Because it's that knowledge of the sacred that fills our life with wonder. Instead of feeling prisoners of time that keeps
[00:04:06] wishing by, we can find our true identity in a higher source. To put it another way, my message to you this morning, first things second, how putting God first changes everything. Now, my advice today is not to gather up your loved ones and to say, I want you to know how much I love
[00:04:31] you and that each of you comes second to me. It's not about the people we love and care for being any less important. It's recognizing that putting God first helps us put the people we care about, including ourselves first. Let's begin with ourselves. I'm here to challenge us today to recognize
[00:05:01] that as much as you love the people you love, as much as you love yourself, you've never served them by putting them first. God first. I know sometimes we need to make ourselves more a priority. And we may say to ourselves, I'm going to put myself first for a change. I absolutely support you in this if you've been putting everyone else's needs above your own. But to be honest,
[00:05:30] when I put myself first, I get myself into a little bit of trouble. Right? Putting myself first means action movie marathon, ice cream buffet, right? It means getting caught up in that problem consciousness that I was talking about. That poor is me and struggling and grappling with things.
[00:05:56] Because as much as I love myself, I know my perspective is always limited. And that's why the most important thing I do each day is to wake up in the morning and get to God as soon as I can. Wake up in the morning and get to God as soon as you can. There may be some self-care involved. I got to check on the kids. I got to get the coffee going. I got to have a bit of mouthwash and fear of
[00:06:21] my own morning breath. But as soon as you can, get to God. God is right perspective. God is seeing. And what I mean by getting to God in the morning is I consciously recognize my not knowing to open myself to an experience of the all-knowing.
[00:06:48] Courageous not knowing begets the wisdom of the all-knowing. And when we can just sit and recognize that there is a creative principle in this universe that is actively creating this universe beyond even our imagination of what it can be, if we can let go of the not knowing inspired problems, stories, identities, just for a minute
[00:07:16] to have that experience of the divinity, we can be informed. In opening up to God's presence, I lose myself so that I can find myself. In opening up to God's presence, I find myself so that I can lose myself over and over again.
[00:07:38] Speaking of God being practical, when we do this day after day, God no longer seems like a distant star, but your very anchor, the very marrow of your being, every cell, every hair, every fiber is awakened with that divine consciousness that was always there but becomes dormant
[00:08:05] as we enter in that practice of thinking we know exactly what life is, what it should be doing. When we open up to the divine, we become who we really are. But God first. First thing second. Putting God first changes everything. And we can apply this to the people that we love as well.
[00:08:33] We have to be careful with it because they may not understand. Baby, baby, I love you so much. I just want you to know that you will always come second to me. Baby, you're the second to last thing I think about before I go to bed at night. And you're the second thing I think about when I wake up in the morning. Baby, there's no decision, no choice that I make without thinking of you second.
[00:09:02] Don't do that. Because, baby, I put God first so I can put you first. So that I can cherish you. So that I can behold you. So that I can love you. Because God is how I see in truth, in reality.
[00:09:26] I wake up and get to God as soon as I can in the morning to the chagrin of my little girl. I have a beautiful little girl that lives with me. And she is not fond of my meditation practice. What does Daddy do for a living? He just walks around and says, let's breathe within us. But I have to get that meditation time. I don't lock myself in a room.
[00:09:53] There is a singing bowl that is a part of my meditation. Her name is Nancy. And she sounds like this. Dada. Daddy. Dad. It doesn't take me away from my meditation. I've learned to include it. Part of my meditation is putting an extra waffle in the toaster.
[00:10:19] It's matching up what show my daughter wants to watch with the right streaming channel. It's the practice of my favorite white lie. Just a couple minutes. I might need some advice because we're at that point where she goes, Daddy, how many minutes is a couple? Uh-oh. But what I do share with my daughter, and I think she's beginning to understand in her
[00:10:44] own making silence in her own time, is that as much as I want to give her my attention, as much as I want to watch her play her game or perform the new dance that she's choreographed, where I really meet my daughter.
[00:11:25] Where I really meet my daughter is in my solitude. What do you love, I want to choose? This is the great gift of affirmative prayer, the prayer in our teaching. It's the greatest gift that this teaching has given me. Prayer is not about, I want this to happen for so-and-so, and I want this to happen for so-and-so. It can be that. But it's that opportunity to behold the highest and best truth in becoming of the people we love the most.
[00:11:55] What a beautiful gift. What a practical gift to be able to remember, yes, you are that person that did not take out the garbage, but I love you so very much. Yes, you are that person who said that stupid thing last night that really hurt my feelings, and we need to talk about it. But I behold the beauty and splendor of who you are. What a talent. What a gift. What an opportunity for each and every one of us
[00:12:23] to take that time in our prayerfulness to not only know the highest and best truths unfolding for our loved ones, but to see them. Because that's what most of our loved ones really want, to be seen and be held in their truth and in their becoming. Homework assignment for you this morning, if you choose to accept it. I want you to pick seven different people that you love. Seven of them.
[00:12:53] One for each day of the week. You can write them down right now on your phone. And each morning, as part of your hour to God, just think on them. Just behold their sacredness. Behold their beauty and their good. Again, it's not about trying to control their lives. I see my son in this relationship. I see my daughter out of this relationship. I want this to happen for so-and-so.
[00:13:23] There's a place for that. But just behold them in their beauty, in their authenticness, in their wonder. And then, if you have the courage, tell them what you see. Tell them the who you are they see. This is what that prayerfulness is. I see my son in the radiant light of his heart, his courage, and his self-confidence.
[00:13:52] I see him radiating his creativity. I see him receiving and seeing how awesome he is in all things. I see him sharing his gifts with such clarity and beauty. What a gift. What a gift to be able to know that truth. Share it with them. My favorite television show growing up was Twin Peaks.
[00:14:20] And there's always been a scene in that show that really touches me. There's a character named Bobby. And Bobby is all about rebelling against authority. And he's making a lot of mistakes in this rebellion to the degree that it may get him killed. And he's not in a good state. And his father is a military man who's very ordered and is clearly disappointed in the choices his son is making. And one day,
[00:14:49] Bobby walks into the R R diner and his father, the major, is sitting there and invites him, come on, sit down, have a cup of coffee and a piece of pie because that's what you do in Twin Peaks. You drink coffee and you eat pie. And he shares with Bobby, can I share something with you? Yes, his son says. I want to tell you about a dream I had, a vision. I'm walking down a street and I'm walking up the stairs
[00:15:18] to a house that is unknown to me. I knock on the door and a man opens the door. There are two laughing children that come running outside. And he's married and his wife is embracing him. He has a smile on his face. I see that he is happy and fulfilled. We share a warm embrace and my heart is so filled with the love and the knowledge
[00:15:48] of his happiness. That man in my dream was you, son. And his son begins to weep and cry and it marks not only an arc in the change of his character, but it's a recognition of a teaching for each and every one of us. How much each of us is in our own way quietly calling out to be seen, to be recognized. Not just for who we've been, but for who we are and who we are becoming.
[00:16:19] Who is that person for the people you love? And if they don't exist, guess what? It gets to be you to know and to nurture those truths. In conclusion today, I want to apply this idea first thing second to our work. A lot of us love to get stuff done. We like having those long to-do lists and crossing off one after another
[00:16:49] after another and we can feel quite accomplished. But in that accomplishing, we can forget that our presence is always much more important than what we do. Baron von Hugel, his famous final words, caring is everything. Caring is everything. And when we get to God first, it doesn't accomplish our to-do list, but it sets us up in presence.
[00:17:18] It helps to remind us of what Viktor Frankl said, that true meaning in life comes from living for a cause greater than yourself or through truly loving someone. This can change your whole day when you realize that you're going to a meeting with so-and-so, but so-and-so is the most important thing in that room. Even as a minister at Mile High Church, I can forget this on a weekly basis. Always wanting to get things done, but forgetting
[00:17:47] that my presence is everything. And your presence is everything. When we ground ourselves in spirit first, everything we do can take care of itself, but we get to choose the virtues and the values and the love in how we show up in this beautiful world. When I put God first, I begin with grace. When I put God first,
[00:18:15] I allow for trust. When I put God first, I see who matters. When I put God first, I begin where I seek to wind up. One more time. When I put God first, I begin with grace. When I put God first, I allow for trust. When I put God first, I see who matters. When I put God first, First I begin where I seek to wind up.
[00:18:46] Give an hour a day to God. Scatter it throughout. Do your best to do no harm. It's probably going to happen anyway, so get right back to not doing it again. And allow yourself to be fine. When we give this hour a day to God, God gives all of itself, all of itself to us in the most extraordinary and beautiful ways. Moving into prayer this morning, I invite any of our incredible
[00:19:14] Mile High Prayer practitioners to stand and join me celebrating this one life, this one blessing, this one divine knowingness, ever giving it of itself. We do the work of opening ourselves to receive this life, this blessing,
[00:19:42] allowing it to manifest as healing, as abundance, as grace, as peace of mind. We allow ourselves to be touched by the wonderful. And we open ourselves to new and profound ways of being with ourselves, of being with the people that we love, of embracing whatever our calling is in the day with the calling to be a whole presence,
[00:20:11] to live passionately, to practice our kindness courageously, knowing again that as we surrender our not knowing, the wisdom of the all-knowing demonstrates itself in beautiful and profound ways. May each of us choose to embody this gift, to receive it, to receive it, and to celebrate it in all things.
[00:20:40] Allowing ourselves not only to behold the highest and best for those that we love, but to allow ourselves to be beheld as well. The precious, awesome children and expressions of the divine, each of us are. Receiving that blessing, we affirm that it is embodied, and it is expanded in incredible ways. And so it is. Thanks for listening to the Mile High Church podcast.
[00:21:07] This podcast is made possible by the generous contributions from listeners like you. To make a donation, please visit milehighchurch.org.