The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Amusing Ourselves to Death

Episode Date: August 17, 2018

You're listening to The Jeff Kaven Show, Episode 77, Amusing Ourselves to Death. Hey, I'm Jeff Kavins. 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, welcome to the show this week. I hope you're having a great week and walking with us.

with the Lord and learning how to hear his voice, do what he says to do, looking for opportunities to share Jesus with other people. Interesting times that we're living in right now, not only in the world, certainly politically, but in the church. And a lot of people have been getting very difficult news through the news media and are even writing and saying, what do we do, what's going on? And what do we do is we follow Jesus. What's going on? The Holy Spirit is going to lead us. I truly believe it. And the fact that there are difficulties going on in the church does not mean that our call to follow Jesus is erased. If anything, we need to come together and to be faithful to Christ and to walk with him with all of our heart.

And that's what we're hoping to do. And part of this show here is to encourage you and to take a look at becoming an activated disciple in your life. and you know I like what Mother Teresa said one time she said you know you don't have to look to leadership all the time just do it do what Jesus is telling you to do and we're going to have more to say about these types of things in the future on the show but this week I do want to talk to you a little bit about the fantastic week I had last week as I put on about 4,500 miles on my motorcycle rode around the country with six other guys and we stopped at churches and so spoke, and we shared Christ everywhere we went, tell you a little bit about that. But the title for the show this week is amusing ourselves to death. And I'm going to talk a little bit about the great amount of blessing that we have in the Western world. And even with all of that blessing, we can find ourselves starving to death spiritually. So we're going to take a look at

that. Real quickly, last week was so great. I left Minneapolis. This trip that we had last week was the third annual God Squad motorcycle trip around the country. And I went with six other guys that was headed up by Sean Lynn from the God Squad in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. And he's a great friend does a great job in men's ministry. And kudos to Sean. Thank you, Sean, for all the hard work that you put into this trip. My friend Tom and I left Minneapolis and we drove our motorcycles. We rode our motorcycles all the way through Sturgis, South Dakota, only spent a couple of hours, maybe an hour there, just not the kind of place I wanted to spend that particular day, but I went through Sturgis and went on to Gillette, Wyoming. And from Gillette, Wyoming, we went down to

Denver, Colorado, spoke at Our Lady of Lourdes. Wow. Father Brian, it was out of the park. We had somewhere around four, between four and 500, I think, young people, families who met outside at Our Lady of Lourdes, and we had a great night. a barbecue. It was so great to ride those motorcycles in there, get off and off the bikes and share with people and fellowship. We went on to Durango, Colorado, and then to Santa Fe, where we spoke in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Beautiful landscape and riding down there, and then onto Flagstaff, Arizona, just outside of Flagstaff, Arizona, went through a little town called Winslow, Arizona, had to play the Eagles, take it easy. And then on to Provo, Salt Lake City.

Idaho Springs had another great night of sharing there in Idaho Springs, and then on to Billings, Montana and home. The last day of the trip, I've always wanted to do this. Call me crazy, but I've always wanted to do this. There's a special society, and it's got a funny name, the Iron Butt Society for motorcyclists, and they have a special patch called the Saddlesore 1,000. If you can ride your motorcycle for a thousand miles in one day. And I had about 12 to 1,300 to go home. And I said to my friend Tom, let's do it. Let's try to go as far as we can. Let's ride. We'll pray. And he said, yeah, let's do it. So yesterday I got home. And in 24 hours, I went 1,000 miles. I actually went over 1,200. But we went 1,000 miles. And every 100 miles,

we prayed a rosary for the needs of the country, the church. the unborn, the bishops, our families, our own vocation, everything. It was so good. And it was just good to get away with these guys. And every night we fellowship and shared Christ with one another. And everywhere we went, we had opportunities to be witnesses for Jesus. I can tell you stories of talking to teenagers, talking to men and women at gas stations and all kinds of places, stores. Yeah, I noticed some tattoos, started up a conversation about tattoos, and really had interesting conversations. Everything that I've been talking about on the show, kind of put it into practice, you know, on that trip, and I wish you could have been with us. Next year, we're

looking at a major rally, and I'll have more to say about that with something like six or seven different Catholic motorcycle groups that are coming together, and I think that's going to be a great time. I'll tell you more about that as I learned more about the details. Well, I got a couple letters here. Julie writes, and she says, first of all, Jeff, I feel as if I know you, I have subscribe to your podcast and listen while exercising, taking long walks. And she's comments about the show about scooting in. She said, I find myself becoming annoyed as I walk into a partially filled church, about 10 to 15 minutes early to attend Mass, so that I may adequately prayer and prepare to hear the gospel, pray and prepare. And she said that I'm confronted with

someone who is sitting on the end of the pew. That person actually looks annoyed that we have asked if we might get by. Not to seem holier than thou, my husband and I choose to deliberately sit in the middle of the pew with lots of empty spaces on either side, hope to encourage others to join us. And that was relating to a show I did on show 75, scoot down the pew, please, about sitting on the aisle and people asking you to move in. Julie, thank you. Also, Dave writes, and he says, really enjoyed your podcast this morning on my way to work about scoot down, or rather, may we join you, I would love to get the additional notes that you mentioned about this and your other podcasts. And Dave and anybody, you can get all the show notes. You can get

those simply by writing me at The Jeff Kaven Show at ascensionpress.com and request them. You'll be put on the list and you'll get those every single show. Dave goes on and says, I also really enjoyed your Bible timeline study program. I completed that several years ago and recently re-listened to it as I am studying, discerning for the Deaccon. it. Fantastic, Dave. And I appreciate you writing. If you want to write me, it's The Jeff Kaven Show at ascensionpress.com. Appreciate all of your support and all of your prayers. Let's talk a little bit about spiritual hunger. Let's talk about amusing ourselves to death. You know, we in America, particularly, we got to thinking about this as I traveled around the country of

the embarrassment of riches that we have in this country, and we have all kinds of, of things, and we have all kinds of food, and we have all kinds of entertainment and services and insurance provisions. We have everything, you know, in this country. Yet there's such a hunger in our society today, a hunger for spiritual things. And oftentimes you'll hear people say, well, I'm spiritual, but not religious. Yet we remain an empty culture as far as our spiritual walk goes. I believe it was Mother Teresa said that we were experiencing a poverty that was worse than Calcutta. It's a poverty in the West because we are so preoccupied with riches and things and food that simply doesn't satisfy, counsel that doesn't satisfy, entertainment and

sports and so forth, and we find ourselves slowly starving. There's more of an emphasis put on amusing ourselves and being entertained than truly feeding ourselves. Years ago, this really came to home to me when I was a pastor before coming back into the Catholic Church, and I started to notice this repeated habit, you know, there you are, it's an hour and a half after dinner. You got the television turned on, and all of a sudden you think to yourself, you know, I could use a snack. And you get up and you go over to the refrigerator and you open it up and you look down the left door and then the right door and you open up a couple of the drawers and nothing really catches your attention. So you go back to the TV and you pick up the remote and you start going

through one of the 1623 channels that you subscribe to, you know, on your cable provider. But what's funny is, is about an hour later, you get up and you go back to the refrigerator and you start looking again. Now, no one's put anything in there, and you know that, but you think, well, maybe this time something will appear. There seems to be this hunger in our souls. You know what I'm talking about, this hunger in our souls to fulfill ourselves and to put things into our body, snack here, snack there. And I'm always struck by how many times a day we just look for something to snack on. Well, you have that physical hunger, but Along with that physical hunger, you have a corresponding spiritual hunger. And this isn't, this isn't

recognized as much publicly. This is more of the private starvation and the hunger that goes on in the heart, a hunger for purpose and a hunger for real meaning in life, you know, and a sense of peace and purpose in our lives. And oftentimes that doesn't get discussed very much, but the food, it's out there. obvious. We see people at the in and out, you know, burger. We, we see people snack and we see people, you know, filling their lives with all kinds of food. It's hard to hide, especially if you do it often, you know. So I want to talk a little bit about this physical hunger and in a corresponding spiritual hunger in our life, because I think that it's related to amusing ourselves to death. And this will make more sense as I get towards the end of this, of this show.

You know, Jesus said in John chapter 4 in verse 32, and I'll put this in the show notes, I have food to eat that you know nothing about. We look at the Lord and say, what do you mean you have food to eat that we know nothing about? Well, two verses later in verse 34 of John chapter 4, he reveals that he said, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. That was his food. Have you ever thought of doing the will of God? doing the Word of God as food, as something that would feed you and sustain you and encourage you

and fill you? Most people don't think about that. You know, they think about just simply consuming. Well, there is a side of consuming food that will nourish us if we eat the right foods. You have to have a balanced diet and you have carbohydrates and protein and so forth. And not too much. And you're going to have everything that you need to sustain yourself. You might even take some additional vitamins or supplements. In the same way spiritually, as we have a physical body that needs food, we have a spiritual aspect to us that is desperately hungry for food. And now there are people that they don't do anything about it. I mean, they literally don't, they don't feed themselves at all. And then there are others that eat junk food. You know, they're constantly looking for

kind of the spiritual adventure on television or the New Age movement, whatever it might be. And they slowly kind of amuse themselves and starve themselves to death. Well, Jesus was not really fed and nourished until he did what his father wanted. And I'd like to submit to you that if you are truly going to eat, you will have to not only listen to his teaching, but you'll have to do it. And when you do it, there's going to be a satisfaction in your life. and just exactly like Jesus, or as C.H. Spurgeon, a great evangelist once said, hunger finds no fault with the cook. We need to eat what is provided for us and provided for us by Jesus.

In John chapter 6, Jesus says that unless we eat his body and blood, we have no life in us. And ultimately, as Christians, we are given his word to eat. It is sweet, and we are given the Eucharist to eat. and time and fellowship with Jesus, the Father's Son, and the Holy Spirit. There is a whole in us, in our spiritual being, that only God can fill. And it will not be filled with New Age meditation. It will not be filled with crystals. Sedona, Arizona will not be Rome for you. You have to eat what Jesus gives you to eat.

And as we put the principles of our faith into practice, we nourish our souls and we come to know Jesus. But there's such a temptation out there, isn't there, to eat junk food, to not really sit down and prepare to eat solid food, meat, you know, the word of God in doing what he said. But the truth is, we're going to eat something. What will it be? And I know that many of you are really, really hungry for God. I think that hunger is a wonderful thing given to us by God. Hunger really is a very powerful thing that is built into us, and it's like an alarm that goes off saying, you need something. You need something. And so I know on this last week when

we were riding our bikes, one day was over 700 miles. Last day, a thousand miles plus, there were times where we would say to one another through our Bluetooth mic set in our helmets, we need to get something to eat. And everyone said, yeah, I'm hungry. And so as the alarm went off in all of our stomachs, we'd pull over and we'd get something to eat, hopefully something healthy, which, Emily, I did. I had salads and things like that, trying to eat kind of light. But that alarm goes off. Jesus said in Luke 621, blessed are you who hunger for you will be satisfied. Let me ask you a question before we move on. Are you hungry? Are you hungry for the Lord? Are you hungry for a deeper life? Are you hungry for purpose in your life and deep satisfaction?

I this week just feel like the Lord wants me to remind you, don't settle for junk food. Don't settle for the popular things on TV and the cute little saying. on the internet. You know, I'm finding more and more Christians who don't feast on Christ and don't feast on his word. But you know what they feast on? Twitter messages, little Instagram messages, cute pictures. How much of your day is spent in social media looking up speakers, little quotes, and pictures, and all these little things, you know, and little, uh, um, YouTube videos, they're okay. But that isn't what we feed on. You feed on his body and blood, you feed on his word, and you do it, and you are strengthened. That's how it is. And so often I think

we satisfy our bodies or try to with cotton candy and pizza and things like that when God wants to really give you nutrition in your spiritual life. And we walk around, just like we look at the television late at night, and we look at the refrigerator, we look in there to see if there's something to eat, and we don't see anything that's going to satisfy. I think we do the same thing with our spiritual life, whether it's going from church to church, or whether it is, you know, going from book to book. We're looking for that snack. We're looking for that. That's something that's going to fill us when all the time, Jesus said, unless you eat my body in my blood, you have no life in you, and to eat his word and to do it. That's the key right there. I'm going to take a break and

want to come back, I want to share with you an interesting dynamic that has taken place in Africa that starving children fall to, and I think it's happening in America, to people who are settling for spiritual junk food. You're listening to The Jeff Kaven Show. The Great Adventure Catholic Bible Study Program is the most popular and acclaimed Catholic Bible study out there, and it has helped hundreds of thousands of people find new meaning in their lives. If you want to encounter the power of God's word and better understand how your life fits into the story of salvation history, consider participating in a great adventure Bible study. To preview the first session of any TGA Bible study for free, create an online account at

ascensionpress.com. Welcome back to the show. We're talking about amusing ourselves to death. You know, watching sports and entertainment and movies and music and everything else. And we eat, eat, eat, eat, but our spiritual lives were starving. And we're finding that our lives feel more and more meaningless and we're empty inside. And today's show is all about, hey, eat the proper food. Start feeding yourself. Even if you don't think that the Word of God and the Eucharist is going to satisfy you the way maybe some new age book might. Trust me, God knows what you need to eat. And just like if we gave our kids when they were little, if they were five to ten years old, and we left town, let's say, and I said, here's $100 kids, we're going to be gone for three days,

get some food. What do you think they would have bought? You think they would have gone out and bought some tofu and some bean sprouts and some spinach and tomatoes and cucumbers and a little bit of free-range chicken? No, they would have gone out and got pizza and pop and, you know, all of that kind of thing. Donuts, that's what they would have bought, but it wouldn't have been that good for them. In the same way, you as a Christian in America have tremendous freedom. You can feed yourself spiritually, but what are you going to eat? My heart tells me, eat what God has provided for me. You know, children are more dependent on meal times and less tolerant of a lack of food because they have fast metabolisms and less capacity for storage. So most kids are

fairly lean, but they need to eat more and they're growing constantly. In the same way, spiritually, newborn babes in the Lord are the same way. They tend to eat and eat and they're reading and listening and going to conferences and so forth. And they need to. They're growing and they have to satisfy the demands of growth. But adults, on the other hand, who establish a pattern of missing a meal, such as lunch, don't miss it. Their bodies adapt to the new routine. You know, they might even be so busy that they have a little, you know, a bagel for breakfast, and then they skip lunch, and at nighttime they have a little bit, and they do that for a few days, and they don't look much different. But if they continue to eat that way, it's going to start

showing up in their energy level and so forth. Now, if several meals are missed, and we're talking about adults, you know what the body does. The body uses reserves of food, which have already been, you know, formed into tissue. And longer term reserves are stored in fat cells, which act as bankers to the body. You know, you've got some reserves there. And if, and if I had to go on this thousand mile ride home yesterday and eat absolutely nothing, I would have been okay. But if I had gone the entire week riding my motorcycle with absolutely nothing to eat, drawing from the fat cells, which, there's a few, I would have started to feel it. Now, in times of fasting, the fat cells give up their store into the bloodstream and shrink.

But if hunger is allowed to continue without eating, then a gradual change takes place. This is what I want to talk to you about this week here, and this is the key, is that if you at one time were really eating well spiritually, in other words, you were going to mass regularly. You're praying. You were reading God's word. You were doing it. You're healthy. You're spiritually buff. If you were doing that, but then a habit in your life, the busyness of your life has got you on this treadmill where you're not eating like that anymore. If anything, you're getting little junk food tidbits off of Twitter with little cute sayings and things, but you're really not eating. Well, in the physical realm, if the hunger is a lot of,

allowed to continue without eating, then this gradual change takes place. Number one, this is interesting. Now, the body sets up a strict system of priorities. Every system and every tissue is subjected to grading, which assesses its contribution to survival. Isn't that something how marvelous we are as far as how we've been made by God? Every system in your body, every tissue is subjected to a grading system if suddenly there's no more food. In other words, there's a priority. And the heart, the brain, and lungs must be maintained at all costs. And the muscles and the bones and connecting tissues may have to give up some of their substance to feed the essential parts of the body. Now, in reading a doctor's report about hunger, he said that one of the saddest

sites in medical practice is something called quashyokor. Quashyorkor. It's a condition first recognized in Africa. And they notice that a starving child is fed just starchy food. That's all that's available. But children need protein too, don't they? And all the reserves of fat, they're just eating starchy food, and all the reserves of fat, muscle, muscle tissue, connecting tissue, start to be used up. And then limbs are spindly. The stomach becomes bloated, hair, dry, and falling out. And then hunger, they get to a place, and this is what Korsiakar is all about in this condition in Africa, hunger, which used to drive the child to see. food, to eat food, just like the hunger in our lives. When we're riding on the motorcycles,

everyone says, we're hungry. We say, let's pull over, let's pull over to this car, you know, gas station, and let's seek food. That's what hunger does. But once Quashiorkor sets in, hunger no longer drives the child to cry. Quashi Orcatshi Orc sets in and hunger no longer drives the child to seek food. And as death slowly approaches, apathy has replaced hunger. Apathy is where you don't care anymore. And what I fear for so many people is that, whereas they were once very excited about the Lord and passionate about the things of God and were excited, they were a flame on fire in their community,

but they haven't been eating. And hunger has set in, and spiritual Kwasiorchiorch has set in, and as death's slowly approaches apathy, has replaced hunger. They're apathetic. They don't care anymore. They're not even seeking anymore. They're entertained by this world and neglecting their spiritual life. If that's you, my friend, reorient your life today. And even if the doctor, in these African cases, even if the doctor offers milk, you can see the child just slowly turning their head away. I recently met a man who at one time was very excited about God and very engaged and was eating spiritually really well. But bitterness set in and unforgiveness set in, and they started

to turn away from the church and turn away from the Lord, and they started eating spiritual junk food, and they got to the point where, as death slowly approached them spiritually, they just became apathetic. And even when we would offer them food spiritually, they just said, no, I'm not interested anymore. That is the state, Kwashi Orkor. That is the state of many who once walked with God, but have neglected eating. That is, learning and doing, and, you know, eating the Eucharist and God's word. They have used their reserves, and apathy is set in. Wake up. You're dying. Our problem is not necessarily a lack of spiritual food, but too much materialism, pleasures and lack of priorities, everything that will take us off our game and keep us from coming to

the family dinner and look at the way we're eating these days where oftentimes you know the family doesn't even come together to eat anymore and to share with one another but pick up something on the way to another activity pick up something on the way to church pick up something you know on the way to that meeting whatever it might be we need to eat but we're not going to pay much attention to it we just need to get something in our stomach and move on well spiritually speaking that's what many people do. I'm hungry. And I just stuck some new age stuff in there. I got some cute quotes off of Twitter from some popular speakers. I got this really cute little book about how I'm a flower or whatever. And they just, they don't realize, man, I'm hungry. And I need the real food from God. I need

the Eucharist. Well, our problem is not necessarily a lack of spiritual food, as I said, but too much materialism. And our priorities are out of sync. Do you know that researchers, this as interesting researchers have conducted experiments with rats. In these experiments, an electrode is planted, it's implanted, actually, directly into the part of the rat's brain that registers pleasure. If the rat is given the choice of two levels, one that releases food, these are levers, actually, and I guess in its little rat cage, one is a lever that releases food in one pleasure. So there's two levers. pleasure. The rat presses the pleasure lever until he dies of starvation. Isn't that interesting? All he has to do is press lever number one and he gets food and he lives. But then there's

lever number two and that's pleasure. And once he presses that lever, he gets pleasure and he keeps pressing it and pressing it and pressing it and pressing it until what? He dies of starvation. My friend, you have been given, and I have been given two levers out there. We've been given a lever for spiritual food that will truly satisfy us. And we've been given a lever for pleasure, amusing ourselves. Let us not go after lover number two and amuse ourselves to death. You don't need that.

The actual need for food has been separated with these rats. Get this. The actual need for food. has been separated from the sense of need. If you know of somebody in that condition, pray for them, tell them that you're concerned about them, invite them to come to church with you, invite them to your Bible study, take them out for a cup of coffee. The need for food is real, but the sense in need of pleasure, which is false, results in death, and a similar condition occurs in people with drug addiction as well. I wanted to do.

share that with you this week, and I wanted to encourage you that if you are restless, if you are sensing in your heart this dark area, this desert, this hunger, go to two things this week. Go receive the Eucharist. Don't wait till Sunday. Go to mass tomorrow. Or if you're listening to this early in the day, go today and receive the Eucharist. It is the body and blood. It is the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus. It is, according to the church, the greatest source of grace. What's grace? It's the life of the Trinity. You need that more than cute tweets. You need the grace of God and the life of God more than television, more than social media and cute YouTube videos. You need him. Will you go to him today or tomorrow? Will you go and receive him and say,

Thank you, Jesus, for feeding me. The second thing is the Word of God. Stay in the Word of God. Practice Lexio-Devina, the four stages of listening to God, talking to God, and hearing them for your life. You need that in your life. And develop that relationship with the Lord. I really encourage you to do that.

I don't know why, but I was thinking about this in the last couple of days and wanted to share it with you. If that's you, what I've been describing as you, reorient your life. In Greek, we would say metanoia, you know, repent. But reorient your life. Reorient your life. You want to know how to read the Bible. Go back to my show 17, how to start reading the Bible. I'll tell you all about how to read the Bible and how to get going there. Very, very important. and lots of other shows in the past that I think will feed you and get you on that right track to help you become strong in the Lord. So if your spiritual limbs are brittle and your spiritual stomach is distended and your spiritual hair is brittle and your spiritual hair is brittle and falling out,

change your diet and turn to the Lord. Let me pray for you. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen. Lord, I thank you today for my friend who's listening to this show right now. I lift them up to you, and I ask you, Lord, to bless them, and to draw them. Draw them with your grace. Draw them with your love and kindness. And draw them into your kitchen where you will feed them what they really need.

Help us, Lord, to wake up to what we're eating and what it's doing to us, and draw us to your fantastic banquet of your body and blood and your word. help us to be doers of your word as jesus said i have food to do that you know not of lord we want to taste that food in our lives so i pray for my friend right now in jesus name and ask for the the intercession of our lady hail mary full of grace the lord is with the blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb jesus holy mary mother of god pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death amen hey by the way i'm also going to put in the show notes, a picture of the guys I rode with and a picture at the thousand mile mark yesterday with all my receipts to prove it. God bless you. Have a great week.