What Breaks Your Heart? Finding Purpose By Losing Yourself

``And it's because so often Jesus spoke in paradoxes. One example is Jesus said, hey, filling is achieved by emptying. Like, it's by emptying yourself of yourself that you find that your life can be filled. You're you're only going to get full if you empty yourself of yourself. Gaining is achieved through giving. It's not achieved through getting, it's through giving. It's when we give our lives away. It's when we give our time away. It's when we leverage our relationships for others. It's when we give our finances away. It is through giving that we gain. Gaining is achieved through giving. Jesus said, winning is achieved through losing. It's when we lose ourselves, when we let go of ourselves that we actually win. And Jesus says these things and we kind of scratch our heads. But the reality is that following Jesus is characterized by self denial, not self improvement. That's a paradox. That's that's a little bit counterintuitive. The the the reality is that when we focus on self improvement, we don't actually get a better version of us. It's when we're willing to deny ourselves that we get a better version of ourselves and when the world benefits from us. [00:51:02] (89 seconds)  #EmptyToBeFilled

we wanna pursue happiness because we just wanna feel satisfied. We wanna feel like, you know, we we we want the relationships to be happy. We want the things in our lives to just work out. We want fulfillment to come from this sense of, like, I'm stepping into a room and you know, you walked into a place and, like, everything's in just where it should be. It's such a peaceful thing. Right? You walk into a place where it's ordered and it's peaceful and you think, oh, this is I just wanna sit here in this space for a little bit. And this is this idea that we pursue this. We think that there is this place in our lives where we're gonna get to that kind of space relationally and financially and and and physical fitness wise and and all of the things that drive us. We think there I'm gonna get to this place where I'm just gonna be able to rest. And then then I can know that I'm enough. Right? Because at the end of the day, we're all we're all just wanting so badly to feel like we're enough. [00:46:16] (64 seconds)  #PursuePurposeNotPleasure

Where what do I feel like really breaks my heart? This is the question that when you look at the heroic stories of the Bible and you see that the people have met the occasion, maybe it's David fighting Goliath or Esther going in to speak to the king, it's this idea that there was something that broke their heart. It was something where they they felt like something has to be done about this. And no one else seems to be stepping up. I am going to step up, and I am going to be the one who steps up and does something about this. And the rest of us look at that, and we say, wow, that's heroic. That is the kind of life that I I wanna aspire to. I wanna I wanna model my life after that kind of life because it's so compelling when someone sees something that breaks their heart and they move toward it. [00:37:58] (48 seconds)  #WhatBreaksYourHeart

In other words, to say it differently, those who devote themselves to themselves eventually lose themselves. If you devote yourself in 2026 to just being a better version of you, that won't be enough. That won't fill you. That won't fill the emptiness. Because you are not enough to live for. I am not enough for me to live for. Your life is much too valuable to be spent on you. Your life is meant for something greater. Your life is meant for something more. You were created on purpose with purpose. [00:56:54] (52 seconds)  #LoseYourselfFindYourself

The the the question to add to that, I think, is not just what breaks my heart, but what breaks God's heart. And and how do these align? What is it that breaks my heart that also breaks the heart of God? This is the mentioned David a minute ago. This is the question like, when David hears what Goliath is saying to the nation of Israel, he's not insulting David. Goliath was not David's problem. Goliath was insulting God. And David was like, yeah, I I I can't just stand by and let that happen. I've gotta step up. I've gotta move into this. I've gotta move toward this. I've gotta be a part of the solution here because I'm not just gonna stand by and allow this to happen. [00:38:46] (44 seconds)  #AlignWithGodsHeart

If you're willing to lose your life, if you're willing to give your life away, if you're willing to have your life poured out for the sake of Jesus and for the sake of the good news, you'll save it. You'll save it. You will save your life by giving it away. [00:58:54] (21 seconds)  #SaveItByLosingIt

What's the possibility? Like, what could be if I address this problem? And then this is the big one, what is what is my passion? Like, what should be? In other words, when you look at things that are in the world the way that they are, is there something you think, you know what? That could be better. Like, you might even be the kind of person that you you just always see opportunities for improvement. Like, you you probably go through the Chick fil A drive through and you're like, this could be better. And the rest of us are like, I don't know how. How could it possibly be better than the Chick fil A drive through? But you see opportunities for improvement. But even more than just what could be, what we're talking about in this series is what is my passion? What should be? Like, what is what is wrong in the world? What grieves me? What grieves me? What grieves the heart of God? We one way we say that around here and the question we've introduced is, and this is the better question to ask this week, the better question is what breaks your heart? Not just what do I need to do about me, but what breaks my heart in the world? [00:36:51] (66 seconds)  #PassionForWhatShouldBe

Now, we see we say here all the time that making a decision to follow Jesus will cost you nothing. It's free. It's free and it will cost you nothing. But actually following Jesus, getting up every day, making a decision that you're gonna be someone who follows Jesus, it costs us something. It will cost you something. And it may be that what it costs you is yourself. [00:52:31] (33 seconds)  #FollowingCosts