Sunday, March 1, 2026 - Beneath the Surface (10:45am)

A vivid Titanic story opens a picture of danger beneath the surface: what people see represents only a small fraction of a person’s life. The iceberg metaphor underscores how the visible actions, reputation, and appearances often hide deeper motives, fears, and unresolved emotions. Emotional health and a slowed-down spiritual life must intertwine; emotional immaturity blocks genuine spiritual growth. Scripture’s call to love God with all heart, soul, and mind demands attention to the inner life, not merely outward behavior.

Emotional awareness becomes the first practical step. Naming sadness, anger, fear, or joy allows reflection and response under God’s truth, rather than burying feelings in a metaphorical basement. A short assessment categorizes emotional development from infant to adult and highlights common symptoms of emotionally unhealthy spirituality: using religious activity to avoid pain, denying the past’s impact, dividing life into sacred and secular compartments, and covering brokenness with performance.

Two biblical portraits show consequences. Saul exemplifies an emotionally unaware leader whose surface success hid fear, jealousy, and a craving for approval; disobedience flowed from an untended inner life and ultimately severed his favor with God. Samuel’s rebuke — “obedience is better than sacrifice” — exposes the moral and spiritual cost of prioritizing image over heart-work. By contrast, David models emotional honesty: he brought joy, guilt, anger, and repentance into God’s presence, wrote candid prayers in the Psalms, and matured through being with God in every season.

Developing a slowed-down spirituality proves essential. Being with God requires intentional quiet time, daily attentiveness, and the willingness to bring subterranean emotions into God’s presence. Slowing the pace opens space to process feelings, submit motives to Christ, and reorder priorities away from people-pleasing toward obedience. Lent provides a timely invitation: relinquish preoccupation with the visible 10% and cooperate with God on the 90% beneath the surface. Practical resources and group pathways exist to help move from spiritual activity as escape to a disciplined, vulnerable life that aligns inner reality with outward devotion.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. Tend the 90% beneath surface Hidden motives and feelings shape decisions more than outward actions. Attending to the buried parts of the heart prevents the slow build-up of unresolved pain that correlates with poor spiritual fruit. Naming and processing emotions with God and trusted others creates the conditions for true transformation and sustained obedience. [29:21]
• 2. Emotional maturity enables spiritual maturity Emotional development functions as the soil where spiritual growth takes root. Without facing fear, shame, and longings, religious practices become performance rather than formation; real discipleship requires inner integration. Growth demands honest inventorying, humility about past wounds, and a willingness to receive inner transformation over time. [34:30]
• 3. Slow down to be with God A rushed life muffles God’s voice and buries emotions in the basement of the heart. Deliberate rhythms of silence, prayer, and reflection make space for God to reveal motives and heal brokenness. Slowing cultivates presence: daily attentiveness turns ritual into relationship and action into obedient response. [62:33]
• 4. Obedience over sacrifice and ritual External offerings cannot substitute for a surrendered heart; religious activity can mask disobedience. Samuel’s rebuke to Saul exposes how image-management corrodes intimacy with God and leads to self-justifying behavior. True worship aligns will and action under God’s commands, not under public approval or personal glory. [51:39]

Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [27:24] - Titanic iceberg illustration
• [29:21] - Surface vs. hidden heart
• [30:38] - Emotionally Healthy Spirituality premise
• [34:30] - Big idea: maturity linked
• [36:30] - Emotions as God-given gift
• [41:11] - Emotional health assessment categories
• [42:05] - Saul: a cautionary portrait
• [51:39] - Samuel’s rebuke: obedience
• [62:33] - Slowed-down spirituality and David
• [68:33] - Lenten invitation to dig deeper
• [83:16] - Resources and closing prayer

Bible reading
1 Samuel 15:20–24 (ESV)
20 Saul said to Samuel, “I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. I have gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me. I have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and I have devoted the Amalekites to destruction. 21 But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.” 22 And Samuel said, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams. 23 For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.” 24 Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned, for I have transgressed the commandment of the Lord and your words, because I feared the people and obeyed their voice.

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Observation questions

1. What excuses did Saul give Samuel for not fully obeying God’s command?
2. How did Samuel respond to Saul’s claim that he had obeyed the Lord?
3. What reason did Saul finally give for his disobedience in verse 24?
4. What does Samuel say is “better than sacrifice” in verse 22?

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Interpretation questions

1. Why do you think Saul was more concerned with what the people thought of him than what God commanded? [53:04]
2. Samuel says rebellion is like the sin of divination. What does this comparison reveal about God’s view of a disobedient heart?
3. How does Saul’s response to being confronted differ from true repentance? [07:43]
4. In what ways can religious activity, like sacrifice, sometimes be used to cover disobedience or emotional unhealthiness? [57:16]

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Application questions

1. Where in your life are you most tempted to care more about what others think than what God says? What would it look like to shift your focus from reputation to obedience? [53:50]
2. Samuel said, “To obey is better than sacrifice.” What’s one area where you’ve been doing things for God instead of truly being with God and obeying Him from the heart? [03:18]
3. What’s one emotion—sadness, anger, fear, or even joy—that you tend to bury or ignore rather than bring to God? What would it look like to honestly talk with Him about it this week? [37:17]
4. On a scale from emotional infant to emotional adult, where would you place yourself right now? What’s one step you can take to grow in emotional health this season? [41:11]
5. Which of the symptoms of emotionally unhealthy spirituality resonated most with you (e.g., ignoring anger, denying the impact of your past, covering brokenness with performance)? What would it look like to invite God into that area? [56:45]
6. How can you intentionally “slow down” your pace of life this week to create space to be with God and attend to what’s happening beneath the surface? [01:02:33]
7. What would it look like for you to move from being a person who focuses on the “10%” others see to someone who lets God tend to the “90%” beneath the surface? [01:09:22]