The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - 3 Keys to Rebuild a Shattered Life!

Episode Date: November 2, 2018

It feels like your life is shattered and you don’t know how to rebuild it from the rubble. Does this sound like you? This feeling can happen to anyone at anytime. Whether it’s triggered by a catastrophic event or creeps in like a slow leak, we can take heart in knowing that we’re not alone. In fact, there are a lot of biblical stories where lives were shattered, and rebuilt. Jeff walks us through the exile of the Israelites to Babylon. They lived shattered lives as captives for seventy years until, “God stirred up the heart of Cyrus, king of Persia” (Ezra 1:1) who allowed them to return to Jerusalem. They returned in three waves. Each attempted to rebuild their shattered lives in different ways, and each one is vital to our own struggles. Go to media.ascensionpress.com/category/the-jeff-cavins-show/ for detailed shownotes and references.

You're listening to The Jeff Kaven Show, Episode 88, Three Keys to Rebuild a Shattered Life. Hey, I'm Jeff Kavans. How do you simplify your life? How do you study the Bible? All the way from motorcycle trips to raising kids, we're going to talk about the faith and life in general. It's the Jeff Kaven Show. Hey, thanks for joining me again. The Jeff Kaven Show.

I hope you're doing well. At the time of this show, it's the fall. And the leaves have all left the trees here deep in the woods of Minnesota. And the lakes are not frozen yet, but it is getting cold. And we've got some frosts and we've got the fireplace going. So one of my favorite times of the year, just to go out and walk in the fall and talk to the Lord and spend some time in prayer. So I do hope you're doing well. And I hope that your quest to become a disciple.

of Christ and to walk with him daily is fruitful. I've got a new book coming out in about three or four weeks. It's called The Activated Disciple, taking your faith to the next level, a whole new level, in fact. And that's going to be coming out. We'll be talking more about discipleship, I'm sure, in the weeks ahead. Hey, I want to talk about a topic this week that really does affect, and think a lot of people. And a lot of people will find themselves at points in their life, maybe in high school, college, in the middle of their marriage, their work, their health, where all of a sudden they realize that their life has been shattered and that things have been going very, very poorly, and they don't know what direction to turn to, you know, for help.

And I've been there, you know, a couple times in my life where I just felt like, wow, everything is falling apart. Have you ever felt like that? You probably have, you know, if you think back to different times, or maybe there's one or two times that are just blaring, you know, they're very, very much a part of your memory. Well, I'd like to talk today about three keys that I think are really important to rebuild a shattered life, three keys. And I'd like to talk about that, and because there is hope for you, and I want you to know that, that if you search for, you know, how to rebuild a shattered life on Google and came up with this show, God just might be leading you down a particular path to health and to restoration and peace

in your life. You see, God wants to give you peace. He wants to give you that shalom that you desperately are looking for in your life. But it doesn't happen just by accident. You know, we don't suddenly just wake up and say, wow, I don't know how I was restored. know, but it worked. No, it usually takes some work, and I'm going to talk about that today, three keys to rebuild a shattered life. And the story that I'm going to use from the Bible, which you can read in your own time, comes from the book of Ezra and Nehemiah. Now, those two books encompass a portion of salvation history that was a return from really the darkest period in Israel's history, when the kingdom divided. And I'm going to kind of tell you a little bit of

story as we move forward so that you have some context in which to understand. Let me tell you where I'm going. I'm going to talk about Israel going into exile and their life being totally torn apart in terms of their social structure, religious, their formation, everything gone, and they're in Babylon, but then God is going to bring them back from captivity. And he's going to restore them, and there are three major components to that restoration that I think you and I can both benefit from today. So let's go back for a moment and look at the history to kind of set the stage, shall we? As you look all the way back into Old Testament history, about 1,000 BC, we see that Israel asked for a king, and they got a king. They got Saul for 40 years, and David for 40 years, and then Solomon for 40 years.

but after Solomon, the kingdom split into two nations. Israel to the north with ten tribes, capital, Samaria, Jeroboam is the first king. And then we have Judah to the south, two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, with Rehoboam, the son of Solomon is the king. Jerusalem is the capital. Well, they both kind of went their separate ways. Of course, the bloodline, the genealogy line for the Messiah Jesus is through Judah, because he's from the tribe. of Judah. The north was split off from the temple, and as a result of that, Jeroboam had to reinvent the religion up there. Later, it would kind of morph into the Samaritans, but he had

to come up with his own feast days, his own priests. Of course, they didn't have a temple, so they had two places of sacrifice, Dan and Bethel, and they erected two golden calves, not good news at all, not good news. Well, they went on for a little while, for just a little while, and then in 722 BC, the Assyrians came down and took the ten tribes out of the north. Well, the South, that was a different story. Some of the same songs, though. They were disobedient, and the prophets began to speak. Well, they were warned, and they were warned that they were going to go into captivity if they didn't start turning to the Lord and obeying his ways, which they didn't. And they were taken into Babylonian captivity, because

the Babylonians were now the world power, not the Assyrians. And the Babylonians took them up into Babylon, and Jerusalem was destroyed. The word of God wasn't being taught, and the community was scattered and killed, murdered. A very, very, very sad time in Israel's history. We could basically say their lives were shattered. And the prophets even say they cried on the banks of the rivers of Babylon, you know, thinking about the former days back in Israel. Well, they were in captivity for 70 years, and that's where this takes over now in God's plan for restoration. They were in captivity for 70 years, and God moved on the new world ruler's heart, Cyrus, the king of Persia. They were now the new world rulers over Babylon in Nebuchadnezzar and that whole crew. And God

moved on Cyrus's heart. You can read about this in the book of Ezra, chapter 1, verses 1 through 4. He stirred up the heart of Cyrus, king of Persia. And in Isaiah 45, I'll put these scriptures in the show notes for you. Isaiah 45 in verse 4, it's kind of interesting because it says that God will use Cyrus, even though Cyrus doesn't know God. And I find that intriguing, don't you? That God can use even your enemies for his good, and he can also use your enemies to discipline you as well. But I think that's so intriguing to think that God can use those around me that may not even know him to affect my life. And of course, that's what happened. That's what happened with Israel. God moved on Cyrus's heart to allow them to come back, come back into the land of Israel after

70 years of living this shattered life. Now, there's an interesting side to this, return from a shattered life, and that is that some people definitely want to return from the shattered life, but others become complacent with that shattered life, and they don't want to go back from the hanging gardens of Babylon, you know, and life's getting pretty good here, and we're getting comfortable, and they stop longing for that place where they once were, and they settle for this subpar place in life. I hope that's not you. I hope that you long to be restored if you're going through a place of devastation in your own life now. So what I'm going to do is I want to talk about these three key things and relate

them to our Catholic faith in how I think they can contribute to your restoration. Now, when Cyrus allowed them to come back from Persia, he allowed them to come back to the land of Canaan, to the land of Israel, he did it in three waves. And those three waves are really important. In the very first wave, the first to return was a man by the name of Zerubable. Now I'm going to give you three characters here. Zerobabal is the first, and he comes back, and what does he do? And you can read about this in Ezra 3 in verse 7, all the way to chapter 6 and verse 18. He rebuilds the temple. Remember, the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians. And some of the furniture, according to Jeremiah, was hidden in a cave, but it was devastated, absolutely devastated, on the 9th of Av, the month of Av. So he allowed Zerubub

to come back, and what did Zerobab will do? He is going to rebuild the temple. He's going to rebuild the temple. And there are some obstacles to rebuilding the temple, though. So there are some big obstacles. Now, what does the temple represent as far as your life and rebuilding a shattered life? Well, the temple was the place of sacrifice. It was the place of worship. It was the place where the lambs were sacrificed, for example, in the Passover, and it was the center of their worship. We as Catholics believe that the Eucharist is the center of our faith. It's the greatest source of grace in our life. And so the temple is very similar to our sacramental life. We go to church, we receive the Eucharist, we go to confession, marriage, all the sacraments.

And so the sacramental life, and specifically the Eucharist, is key to beginning to rebuild a shattered life. Why is that true? Well, the Eucharist is the greatest source of grace. Well, what is grace? Grace is the life of the Trinity. It's God's riches at Christ's expense. It's the center of our faith. And if we're going to rebuild shattered lives, you need strength.

You need strength. and you need strength that goes beyond, you know, what you see on TV. You really need the actual life of God, the very blood of God, the body of God. And that's what we believe as Catholics is that when we receive the Eucharist, it's not just a sign, you know. It's not just a kind of a participation with the body of Christ. No, we believe that that bread and that wine have literally changed, and they are the body and blood of Jesus Christ. now we call it transubstantiation. Well, the sacramental life and your involvement in the sacramental life is so key to you getting out of this shattered life that you might be experiencing, right?

But there were challenges from without when Zerububel tried to rebuild the temple. There were challenges, right? And those challenges came from some of the people in the north. Later, we see them as the Samaritans, but these people had a syncretistic faith. They had a religion made up of many sources. As I said, there were people in the north that were taken away into captivity. The Israelites were, never really to return, but the king of Assyria brought five other nations and mixed them in the north, and that became this awful syncretistic faith, kind of a mishmash of this and that. So I really like what you see on TV, you know. And when you're building a shattered life, listen, you don't need every new age guru selling

you stuff, to be honest with you. And the challenge for Zerubbable in rebuilding the temple, or we'll say here in the New Testament, establishing the sacramental life is what? It is the challenges is from without, because you know what people said to Zerubbable? Hey, we'll help you build. We'll help you build. and the word desirable by the prophet Zechariah in this period, Zachariah 4-6 was, no, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord. And if you're going to recover from a shattered life,

you need the power of the Holy Spirit. You don't need every guru on television, and they're three o'clock in the morning packages that they're going to sell you to try to restore your shattered life. You need the Eucharist. You need the sacraments. Now he also had a challenge from within. When building the temple, there are obstacles from the outside, but also from within. And there's problems with building the temple. They start to abandon

building the temple. And guess what they do? They focus on their own homes. If you're going to, if you're going to come back from a shattered life, you've got to get your eyes off of yourself and your dreams and begin to focus on this house of God and the sacraments that he offers. us. The book of Haggai, written about 18 years after Cyrus allowed them to return, Hagiah, one of the 12 minor prophets, you know what he said? He said in Hagiai, chapter 1 and verse 9, he said they were focusing on their own dreams and plans rather than the temple, the church. His message, consider your ways. Stick to the work that God has given you to be, to do, be strong. And so this becomes a priority in your life if you're going to get your life back

together. Well, finally, the temple was completed. Not as glorious as Solomon's temple, granted, but Jeremiah's lamentation over destruction, or the first destruction, talks about that. But you know what? There's restoration. There is a glorious restoration. But the first part of that restoration for you is, it's the sacramental life, and specifically the Eucharist. Let me just conclude this first part by saying that if you are living now in a shattered dream, you need to get to the Eucharist as much as you can. You need to go to adoration and spend time with the Son of God as much as you can. Even if you don't feel like it, you really need to do that. I'm going to take a break when I come back. Let's go through the second and the third aspects of this return. We're talking

about three keys to rebuild a shattered life. And the first one is the sacramental life. It's the Eucharist. You're listening to The Jeff Kavan Show. And if you're looking for a way to learn more about your Catholic faith, I invite you to check out the Ascension Presents YouTube channel. You're going to find tons of free videos featuring Catholic presenters like Matt Frad, Leadero, Jackie Bobby Angel, and Emily Wilson. Go to YouTube.com slash ascension presents. That's YouTube.com slash ascension presents. And if you like what you see, please share and subscribe. welcome back talking about three keys to rebuild a shattered life and the first one is

you got to get engaged with the sacramental life when when god allowed them to come back by way of cyrus the king of persia the first thing they did with zirububel is rebuilt the temple and they withstood the attack from outside and from inside the second thing the second return from captivity, Ezra was in that return. And he came back to do what? To reestablish the word of God. To reestablish the word of God, the need for the law. Once the temple was built, they had to bring their personal lives into conformity to the will of God. They had some really wild marriages and a lot of different things going on because of their time in Babylon. And this is a time now of conformity to the will of God. And if you're going to be conformed to the

will of God, and you're going to come out of that shattered life, you've got to know what he has to say. You have to know how he's going to direct you, love you, affirm you, correct you in every way. And again, you aren't not going to get it. You're not going to get it on those daytime talk shows. It's just not going to happen. It might have some advice here and there, but in the words of Dr. Phil, how's that working for you? So we need the Word of God. And so God allowed them to return and Ezra was in the second return, and he teaches the law. They find the scrolls, and he begins to teach. That is key. The Word of God is key for you to be restored from a shattered life. If you don't know how to read the Bible, might I suggest the Great Adventure Bible? Go to our website.

We'll put that in the show notes and get yourself a great adventure Bible, complete with instructions right in on how to read it, so it makes sense. And then start to get to know about this love letter that God has for you. Isn't that a neat thought? Isn't that a neat thought that God comes to a shattered life with a love letter of consolation, comfort, joy, possibilities, unlimited life in heaven with him? This is amazing. You know what Ezra did? Ezra 710, again, these are in the show notes. Ezra said, as it says this, you know, this was one of my favorite verses from 34 years ago. Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach his statutes and ordinances in Israel. Isn't that great? I love that. He set his heart to study the law of the

Lord, to do it, teach it. Those are three things that are very important. Study it, do it, teach it. And studying it is actually an act of worship. We worship God when we study his word. and he speaks to us. Let me give you a little tip, and I've got a couple of shows on this in the backlog. Lexio de Vina, a way for God to speak to you every morning, and to comfort you every morning, direct you every morning, and if need be correct to you, every morning. And so in the beginning of the Great Adventure Bible,

we have an article on Lexio de Vina. How do you do it? I highly recommend that. In Nehemiah, Chapter 8, it says, that Ezra read the law to the people, and he tells them how they can give meaning and understand what is being read. That's amazing. I love that.

So the second thing that I encourage you to do is get into the Word of God. What are we talking about? Rebuilding a Shatter life. The sacraments are important, especially the Eucharist. Second, the Word of God. It's so important. it is so very important. You know, I remember a time I was flying back from Denver.

I was in my 20s, and I was going through a discouraging time, to be honest with you, about a four-month time of just darkness. It felt like, and I went out to visit some family members in Denver out of Minnesota, and just feeling down, and I was sitting there looking out the window at 33,000 feet, and I had my Bible with me, and I opened it up to the Psalms. And I just began to read and had tears in my eyes, and God just spoke to me in such a personal and beautiful way and a fruitful way. And I remember being so thankful that here I am in an airplane at 33,000 feet rising above the clouds, and God speaks to me. And then it read Isaiah,

where he has lifted me up on, like on eagle's wings, you know. And it really touched me. So if you are living the shattered dream right now, if you don't have a Bible, get one. you know of someone who's living the shattered dream right now and they don't have one, buy one for them. Seriously, get the Great Adventure Bible. I mean, it's all there. You'll teach him. But get them a Bible. And if you have an extra one, give it to them. Even if it's not the Great Adventure Bible, but get them the Bible. It's a love letter, a love letter from our heavenly father. Now, the third return and the third key to rebuilding a shattered life was that Nehemiah returned in the third wave, and what did he do?

Nehemiah rebuilt the wall of the city. Now you say, well, how does that play into this? Why is that a key to my restoration? Well, I think it's obvious that the Eucharist is key, and it's obvious the Word of God is key, but what about building a wall around Jerusalem? If you go to Israel with me, you go every January, you can come with. We say that in Minnesota come with. You can come with me, but we go around the walls of Jerusalem, the ancient city, and we walk there

early in the morning and go to the Holy Sepulchrist. It's just great, but we've got to go through the gates of these ancient walls. And the walls are interesting, because the wall around a city in antiquity, if a city did not have walls, it wasn't considered a community or a city, the walls were not only a protective barrier for the community in the wall, but it also said, we are a city. We are a city. And so Nehemiah is tasked with rebuilding the walls. Now, how does that fit into what we're talking about here today? Well, if one of the keys to rebuilding a shattered life is being part of the community. the church. It's being a member of the church and an active member of the church in relationship,

in solidarity with others. One of the tactics of the enemy, I'll be frank about this, and this has happened to me before, and maybe it's happened to you. But one of the tactics of the enemy, when you are going through a hellish time in your life, devastating experience, shattered dreams, is to isolate you. Woe is me. I'm going to eat worms. isolates you, and he makes sure that you are good and alone. Because when you're good and alone, your mind can run away with thoughts. You don't have access to that encouragement. And so one of the keys to rebuilding a shadow life is not running away from the action, but running to it. Think for a moment, Luke 24. Think. Remember that? He may as wrote experience. Remember, after Jesus was crucified,

put into the grave, two people walking away from Jerusalem, devastated, shattered, dreams overcome with grief. Life wasn't going to be the way they thought it was going to be. We thought he was the Messiah. We thought he was going to change the world, but they killed him and nothing happened. And then what happened? Remember, they're walking away from the temple, away from, we could say today, the church, the sacraments. They're walking away. But what happened? Jesus came to them on the road to Emmaus, and he began to speak to them, and their hearts burned inside of them, and then he broke bread with them, and their eyes were opened. It's the sacraments, my friend. It's the liturgy of the word, and the liturgy of the Eucharist.

And that's why we need the Eucharist. We need the word, but we need to be together. You see all three of those components in the Emaeus Road experience in Luke 24. You might be walking away from Jerusalem right now. You might be walking away from the church. Maybe you're devastated. Turn around. Turn around and go back to the sacraments. Turn around and read God's word.

Turn around and ask for help in the community of the faithful. You know, those who were rebuilding the wall and those who carried burdens took their load with one hand doing the work and the other, holding a weapon. It's really beautiful. You can read about it in Nehemiah chapter 4 versus 16 and 17. When they were rebuilding the wall, they still had their job to do. They still had to be on their toes. And what's interesting is that they, with one hand they were working, and with the other hand, they held a weapon. So they were ready to defend, and they were working hard. Kind of a beautiful, a beautiful picture there. I like that. So let me just wrap this up because we've kind of gone 25 minutes or so. I want to encourage you today.

I was sitting in church thinking about this, to be honest with you. I was sitting in church thinking about this on All Saints Day. And I was thinking about the Saints. And I was thinking about, man, I need them in my life. I do. I need them. And that's rebuilding the walls. That's community.

That's the third key community. And that's why, frankly, I have a posse. And I did a whole podcast on that, how to build your own posse. In other words, you get four or five of these saints, you know, from the past, who you're going to walk with today, and you are going to get to know their teaching. You're going to get to know their writings and the way they live their life. And it's not you alone anymore. Don't be alone in this.

The third key is community. And that means not only the people back at church, but the saints. those who have gone before us. I love it. I mean, I absolutely love this. So we got three major things, three keys to rebuilding a shattered life. The sacraments, the Word of God, and community, right? Communion of the saints.

Don't do it alone. And you need the power. and you also need his word. Let me pray for you, and I do hope that this message is of some encouragement to you today, because this week you can do all three of those. You really can. Make up your mind. Activate your will. You're going to do it.

You're not going to walk away from Jerusalem. You're not going to be isolated. You're not going to say, woe is me, and you're not going to look to daytime television for the answer. as they say in Greek it ain't there it's in the word of God it's in the church it's in the body and blood in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit Lord I lift up my friend of you right now and I ask you to bless them the shattered life only you know how deep this wound is only you know how many pieces the pain has become Lord I ask you I ask you now to risk restore my friend's life, draw them to the sacraments, and especially your body and blood

and a holy hour. Draw them to your word and draw them back to the community and the community of the saints. Lord, I thank you for restoring what has been destroyed. I thank you for causing once again the olive tree to grow when it's been cut down. And I pray that for my friend's life right now in Jesus' name. Amen. Name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. think with me, work with me just a little bit here. Maybe you know of someone who needs to hear this message. Pass it along to them as a little gift to say, I've been thinking about you and your situation.

And I was listening to this guy on the radio, and I thought I would share it with you. Again, you can get a hold of me, The Jeffcaven Show at ascensionpress.com. That is the Jeffcaven show at ascensionpress.com. I love you. I'm praying for you. And I am praying that this week will be the beginning of restoration

if you've been living the Shattered Dream. God bless.