Live Free with Josh Howerton - Built to Stand Out | Ep. 20 | Friday March 3, 2023

Episode Date: March 3, 2023

To you, it could be just another day of living the life God has planned for you. To the world, your Christ-like lifestyle could make them wonder what it is you have that they don’t. In this episode, Pastor Mike shares a powerful testimony that serves as a great reminder to embrace being built differently and praise God for the miracles that come out of it.   For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.comit. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. Hey, thanks for joining us today from wherever you are, man, you might be starting your day, you might be ending your day, or maybe you're somewhere in between. My name is Mike Bro, and most people just call me Bro, so it's a privilege to get to hang

with you for a few minutes every day. And I thought for the next hour or how many days, weeks, I don't know, well, how long is this going to take. I just want to kind of walk through a chapter of the Bible that's been meant a lot to me through the years. It's even kind of provided a framework for the kind of life I want to leave. live. So at the start of this new year, I've been going back again, like reading it through. It's found in a New Testament section of the Bible in a book called Romans, which was actually a

letter written to brand new Jesus followers to encourage them on their new walk with God. And that's what it always does for me, and I really do. I hope it does the same for you. You know, there's a term that people sometimes use to describe, you know, exceptional things or people. they'll say, you know what? I can't explain it. They're just built different. You know, like the F-150 that built for tough. My brother-in-law, Danny, he's renovated in an old house,

he's got a foundation from the 1800s, real rough-hewn, real two-before's. They didn't get them at Home Depot. I mean, it was, I mean, it's just like, man, the thing's just built different. You may have, you know, one of those old, like, avocado-covered refrigerators in your garage from the 1960s, and it's still running while you've had your two-year-old stainless steel one fixed like three times already,

and the repairman passes through your garage. He looks at that old refrigerator and goes, man, that thing, that thing's just built different. They don't build them like this anymore. I mean, a lot of times someone will say about a certain athlete. I mean, they're special. You know, that drive, that endurance, that skill level, they don't let things bother them. They just play the next play. They want to take the big shot.

They want to be at the plate in the bottom of the knife with the game on the line. I don't know, they're just built different. Well, the author of Romans 12 is a guy named Paul. This guy was transformed by the supernatural grace of God. And he was chosen by God to spread the love of Jesus all over the known world. He planted or assisted in planting a bunch of brand new churches. And he writes a lot of the New Testament in forms of letters, most of which were written from a prison cell.

Yeah, he was locked up by the Roman Empire for simply talking about. Jesus. Paul was a guy who was, well, he just built different. And Romans is such an awesome letter of grace and hope and joy and unity and love and passion and purpose. I don't, maybe we'll do the whole letter later on this year. I'm not sure. But for now, I just kind of want to hang in chapter 12 of the book of Romans, specifically verses 9 through 21. You can start reading through that because we're going to spend a lot of time there. And what I like to do is just simply share with you what God's been teaching me through the years and recently from these verses.

I've written a whole lot of notes in the margin of my Bible all over this chapter. Did you know it's okay to write in your Bible? It really is. Underline stuff, highlight stuff, write things out on the side. Romans 12 is just covered with stuff in my old Bible. And God continually reveals and illustrates what it means for me and for you to be built different. Now, you know how Romans 12, it begins. with a pretty famous couple of verses.

We actually taught them out during our New Year's Walk This Way podcast. And the opening verses of Romans 12, he tells us something like, in light of the amazing grace of God, I just urge you to be different. Don't just go with the flow. Don't let this world squeeze you into its mold. Change the way you think, and God will transform you into his best version of you so that you can be built different.

And then it gets to verses 9 and following and says, and this is what built different looks like. So if you're up for it, we're just going to take a small chunk each day for about five minutes. Again, just sharing what God is teaching me as I try to adopt this mindset in my relational world. And by the way, I've had to revisit this passage a lot. So here we go. Let's just go a little bit with verse 9. It starts this way.

Love must be sincere. Now, the word for sincere here means authentic, genuine, real. In fact, I like the way the New Living Translation puts this verse. It says, don't just pretend you love others. Really love them. In the margin of my Bible, I have written out of the side, Derek, fourth grade. My son Derek is an awesome guy. Well, he's in a fourth grade years ago.

I went to eat lunch with him at school, And my wife was working in the cafeteria. And I walk in and there's a table full of kids. And then there's Derek at this other table by himself with a girl. So I walk over to Debbie and say, hey, what's going on with Derek and this girl? I'm thinking, way to go, Derek. Took me to fifth grade before I had a girlfriend. Fourth grade, way to go, man.

But I'm going, what's going on? Debbie goes, oh, man, I can't hardly look over there. He said, that's the girl that everybody in class makes fun of. they they don't think she's very smart they don't think she's very pretty she's she's kind of poor she wears old clothes and Derek is the only one

that will eat lunch with her and I got all choked up and I never went over there and sat down with him I thought I'm just going to I'm going to meet him after school when he gets off the bus so I met him at the bus stop gets off the bus and I put my arm around him walking down the sidewalk

I go no I'll never forget it and I said hey Dee, man, I came to school day to eat lunch with you. I saw you sit with that girl, man. I got to tell you, I'm so proud of you. I said, why did you do that? He looked at me with that innocent fourth grade look, and he said, well, dad, didn't you say in your sermon, you're supposed to love everybody? I said, yeah, yeah, I said that.

I didn't think you might do it, but yeah, that's what I said. He just figured it out. Don't just pretend you love others. really love them. Let love be sincere. You know, Jesus told us that they will know you're my followers by your love.

Scripture says, let love be your highest goal. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. And I'm just praying that my love today and your love today will be sincere. That today we won't just pretend we love others, but we really love

them. Pray, God, what today does love require of me. God let love to find my life today. Let love to find my day today because you see, we're just built different. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturdays at 6 p.m. and Sundays at 9.30 and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time. Also, if this podcast was helpful to you, would you be sure to rate, review, and share this podcast to help get the word out? For more information about all digital ministries of Lake Point,

visit lakepoint.compt.combe. Church slash daily drive.