The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Be Specific - A Key for Spiritual Growth (Bible & Prayer)

Episode Date: December 29, 2023

Are you ready to learn the fine art of being specific? Being specific is more important than you might think. How can you accomplish something if you aren’t specific? Jeff Cavins discusses how it is essential to master the art of being specific in order to accomplish spiritual growth. Snippet from the Show “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth” (2 Colossians 3:2) Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail]. Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit ascensionpress.com/thejeffcavinsshow for full shownotes!

Welcome to the Jeff Kaven Show, where we talk about the Bible, discipleship, and evangelization, putting it all together in living as activated disciples. This is episode 356, be specific, a key for spiritual growth, part one, Bible and prayer. Hey, good to have you with me once again. We've come together to talk about all things discipleship, reading the Bible, and praising God, learning how to witness to other people, today we're going to get into the fine art of being specific in our lives as to how we're going to grow spiritually. I think you're going to enjoy this. There's a lot of really good points here that I want to bring out that have been a

part of my life. And I know that they have also been a part of other people's lives who those people wanted to grow in the Lord, and they had so many opportunities, so many things on the menu as far as what to do for next steps in their spiritual growth. But many times they didn't take those steps. It just seemed like too much. And as a result, they didn't. They didn't grow. And I want to talk about that and be real specific here today. As I look over my show notes, wow, I have some show notes for you, lots of scripture for you. If you want the scriptures that I use on the show today, they're all yours, free. All you got to do is text my name, Jeff Kaven's, one word, J-E-F-F-F-Kavens, C-A-V-I-N-S, one word. You can text it to the number 33-777. That's

33-77. Well, how many times in your life have you sought out a book or a CD or a talk, you know, that was going on in your area that was helping you become more mature in your faith, making strides in your faith. There were areas of your life that you knew very well that you were struggling in. It might have been, you know, in the area of making a decision or getting back to reading scripture, becoming that great wife that you want to be or husband. Exercise, even things that we don't typically put into the spirit column, even though they are, because your life, you're life isn't secular and spiritual, your life is 100% spiritual. And that's one of the things that makes this walk with Jesus so powerful and appealing is that nothing escapes the purview of Jesus

when it comes to becoming more like him. So I have a number of different areas of your life that we might want to look at or you might want to look at. That's what I've been doing this week. And the name of the show, be specific, a key for spiritual growth. now I want to start off by giving you a quote that I have had in my database for so long and I don't think I've ever really talked about it although I think about it now and then and I had it on a card a three by five index card that I brought with me in the car my Bible and I would look at it you know from time to time until I memorized it and it just became part of the way that I was thinking as I thought about this quote that I'm going to share with you

I started to realize that this really applies to the spiritual life. That if you want to grow in Christ, then you really have to pay attention to this quote. Now, it's not in scripture, but it sounds like scripture. And I'm going to give you a lot of scriptures and texts that would really back this idea up. And here it is. This is the quote. You probably have heard it. Nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific.

That is gold right there. nothing gets dynamic in other words nothing gets going flowing moving you're accomplishing something you are you are making progress in this spiritual life nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific so if you if you look at that a you know a little bit more in detail you would have to conclude that we don't really enjoy the spiritual growth that we want to enjoy as long as we have just these great big targets to hit in our life, be a better husband. Yeah, I got that. I'm on board. I'm sure, okay. I'll focus on that this week. And I wake up in the morning tomorrow and I say, I'm going to be a better husband. Yeah. Yeah. And go down to breakfast. Yeah. I'm going to be a

better husband and throughout the day, when I come home. But unless I specify some detail, some aspect of being a better husband, or increasing my prayer life, making my prayer life more fruitful, unless I'm specific, it's very difficult to become dynamic. So I do think that's a great quote. Not in the Bible, but again, I think it's a great quote. I'd like to know if you heard that quote before, or you have used that quote before. You can write me, email the jeffcaven show at ascensionpress.com. Love to hear from you. Make some comments in the notes. Share the show. We'll work together. So nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific. Okay. So we start off by just simply looking at your life, a big picture. You know, you look at your life and you start to become specific.

One of the things that I have encouraged people to do is to go to a holy hour, which, man, a lot of things happen in the holy hour. Get your notebook, get your Insight Journal that Father Mike and I put together at Ascension, the Insight Journal, and go to a holy hour and begin to think about the areas of your life that you really feel as a result of prayer that God wants to do something in that area of your life. wants to fill in the blank in my life. God wants to fill in the blank with my family. God wants to fill in the blank with my prayer life. You name it. Whatever it is, you're the one that knows and you are the only one that knows that you might be in great need in that area. Your spouse might know too, but that's another show. So sit down in a holy hour, write down maybe six, seven, eight, different, you know, maybe up to a 12 if you want to, different areas of your life where you would think, I need to get around to that at some time.

I really do. Now, as you know, we talk about discipleship a lot here on the Jeff Kaven show, and the life of a disciple is one of discerning. It's one of discerning in every single area of your life. You make decisions all throughout the day, literally, every moment. Every hour, every day, every month, every year, you are constantly making decisions. You are constantly discerning the good from the bad, the holy from the unholy. And that's something that we do as disciples because Jesus asks us to do just that, to discern, make decisions, make prudent decisions with our life.

so you don't have to ask yourself then if you're making decisions all throughout the day what are the criteria that you hold to make decisions what are the criteria that you hold in your heart in your thinking to make those decisions as i said earlier i want to be a better husband but if i if i don't have any criteria on which to make decisions the chances of me becoming a holy husband or are far less or my prayer life or my Bible study life or evangelization. I'm not going to end up evangelizing people unless I'm more specific about, you could say learning the corigma, the proclamation of the gospel. Be specific.

Learn it. Be specific. How do you present that to people? Be specific. You're presenting it to someone at work. Be specific. You keep becoming more and more specific. Listen to what Paul said to the Colossians.

chapter three, verse two, one of many scriptures today, Paul says to the Colossians, set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth. So right away, Paul is kind of drawing a line, a horizontal line between what's going on here on earth and what's above, what's above. Now, the truth be known that what you do here on earth, affects what is going to happen up above. But the point that Paul is making here is that we should not be focusing on the things of this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. These are not the things that we should be thinking on. He's not saying, just think about heaven and make good decisions. That's not what he's saying. He's saying that the things that are above

the kingdom of God, the life in Christ, the Mass, the Eucharist that is going on in heaven. We are heavenly minded, but we're not so heavenly minded that we're of no earthly good. And so Paul says, look, in your day, you've got to have your mind somewhere. And your mind doesn't belong just on the things here on earth. It doesn't. It belongs on the focus of above, those things that last, those things that are each, eternal, those things that will accompany us after we die and we are raised with Christ. You know, Paul talks about that in terms of the difference between gold and silver and

hay and stubble. What do you want? And when you are judged and you stand before God and you go through the judgment of God, what's going to last, what's going to endure. So that's important to get there. And then Jesus, you know, he asks us to be so specific. And so let's take a look at some of these areas. We're going to start looking at the first one, which is the need to get specific when it comes to having your mind transformed. And we'll take a look at that first one right after this. Hi, my name's Father Mike Schmitz. I want to let you know about an exciting announcement that could revolutionize the way you listen to the Bible in the year and the Catechism in the Year. Ascension has released a new Bible and

Catechism app called the Ascension App. No, here's what you get. In this app, you get the entire text of the Great Adventure Bible. Just incredible. You also get the entire text of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, as long with the Catechism in Year podcast and the Bible in a year podcast and transcripts for each episode. If you're like, I'm tired of listening to that guy, I just want to read it. There's complete transcripts from each and every episode. One thing that makes this app incredibly unique is that it includes special features that make connections between the Bible and the Catechism so crystal clear through color-coded references and all these links. The hyperlinks are amazing. I tried it out and I'm like,

oh my gosh, it kind of has changed the way I read through the Catechism, kind of changed the way I read through the Bible. These features will help you navigate the Bible and Catechism even more seamlessly so you can get more out of your experience. Also, the app provides almost 1,000 answers to Bible questions, the people who listen to the Bible in the year, they wrote in with their questions. Almost a thousand answers. And those answers come in the form of audio clips, video clips, as well as resources excerpted from some of Ascension's published works. If you want to download this app for free, super simple. Just go to the app store in search for Ascension app. I am telling you, if learning about the Bible and the catechism is important to you, then this app will change

your life. Welcome back. Talking today about being specific And riffing off of that great quote, nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific. So where are you at in every area of your life? Are you still in the broad range or are you getting specific about the changes, the insights, the understanding that you really want? Are you becoming specific in your life? Let's look at the first area here. Number one, that we have a need to be specific when it comes to our,

are being conformed to this world versus being conformed to Christ and transformed. When you get up in the morning and you face the day, you're going to have a choice in the broad sense of being conformed to this world or being conformed to Christ in the kingdom of God. if your choice is to be is to be transformed and conformed to Jesus Christ, then you have to be specific about the decisions you're making in terms of being conformed to the world or being conformed to Christ. The Apostle Paul or the Apostle John, rather, in his first letter, talks about, in his first letter, he talks about this idea of if we say, say that we have not sin, we're fooling ourselves, we're lying to ourselves. And then he also talks about the things of this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of

life. He says, these are not, these are not of God. They are of the world. And so we have to make a decision. Do we want to be specific about dealing with those specific things? Now, back to Paul, When he writes to the Romans, he says in chapter 12 and verse 2, I love this. He says, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Isn't that great? This is a broad brush right now before I get into some of the details. and I think I've got 10 or 11 different ones.

Most likely we're going to have two shows here. So that's a lot of information. But, you know, it's going to be good. Okay, so do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind. So in the broad picture, when you get up in the morning, you've got a big decision to make. Am I going to become more specific about being conformed to this world,

or which means time, decisions, your money, you're what you're giving yourself to, or am I going to put it towards the details of being transformed by Christ? So that is a broad picture right there. Now, years ago, I gave a talk in Iowa. I think I was, I don't know, I think it was 21 years old, something like that. And I gave a talk called Philippians 4-8 versus rock and roll. Now, I'm not here to talk about rock and roll today, but what I did is I looked at Philippians 4-8 and matched it up to the lyrics in rock music just to be specific and to say, is this true? Is this not true? And I love this text. Philippians 4-8 says, Philippians 4-8 says, finally, brethren, now listen to this. This is specific.

Whatever is true. Whatever is honorable. Whatever is just. whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Now, right there, you've got to admit, Paul is really being specific. And what's he being specific about? He's being specific about your thought life. what are you going to allow yourself to think about throughout the day what are you going to dwell on throughout the day now i included this in uh the notes for today because wow do we we have a lot of

people who are good people holy people and what they're doing is they are giving a massive amount of time in their life to scandal to things that are impure in government or Hollywood or whatever it might be, podcast, TV shows, they are dwelling on things that are not true, not honorable, not just, impure, not lovely, not gracious, or excellent, or worthy of praise. And so if you give your time to those things, even if you call it kind of like informed viewing or listening, you're taking away from the specific time that you could give towards what is pure or lovely or honorable or just or gracious.

And you say, but Jeff, we have to know what's going on in the world. Yes, I think there is an advantage to knowing what's going on in the world. But I don't think that's the lion's share of our time. The lion's share of our time, pun intended, Jesus is the lion of the tribe of Judah, is that we make decisions and become specific about what we're going to give our minds to. Okay. And this leads to our conduct, as it affects our conduct. Peter said in 1st Peter 1, he said, but as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves. In all your conduct, since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy, says the Lord. Okay. So those are some scriptures

that kind of give you a broad brush on this whole idea of being specific. Nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific. And sure enough, if your mind is contrary to Philippians 4 or 8, and those are just the things you think about that are dishonorable, not true, not beautiful, not lovely, and so forth, then you're really going to have a hard time becoming specific and holy as God is holy. So before we even get to number one here, there's a decision that needs to be made.

am I willing to go forward with this and be specific, to be specific about my spiritual growth rather than to be a generalist on politics and social studies, you know? And I just know a lot of people are kind of stuck in that and they're frustrated because they want to be holy. They want to be holy. Okay, so let's take a look at a couple of these in this episode. then we're going to be looking at a lot of them in the second episode. So number one, Bible reading and study, Bible reading and study.

Now, if I take this quote, I take this quote that I think is really an amazing quote in a lot of ways. It's true. It's not the truth, but it's true. If you take that and you apply it to Bible study, nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific. So the Jews believe that there are 613 commandments in the Torah. Very important number in Judaism. And the reason that they want to know how many commands are in the Torah, the Pentateuch,

the first five books of Moses, is because they want to eventually get specific about obeying every single one of them. And that's what the rabbis would teach and people would study with one another and they would pray and and they would get involved in davening. Davening is a movement of your body back and forth as you're praying like a like a flickering of a flame on a candle and they want to get specific about it. So for us, what we should do is when we read the Bible and we are listening to God, maybe in Lexio de Vina or Bible in a year with Father Mike and myself,

whatever wherever you're at in the Bible I think it's important to harvest what catches your mind what catches your heart about a specific text and when you take that text and you begin to soak in it a few things typically I found this in my life maybe you have two they begin to rise to the top as wow this is really important I want this to become dynamic in my life I want me I want my life to be described as a doer of these points that I'm reading today. And so it's a call to become specific. So what I would do at this point with Bible reading and study is I would begin to take note of those things that are grabbing my heart, moving me inside for some reason. And I want to know why and I want to know what the Lord is saying to me. Why? Not just because I'm curious. I want to

get specific. I want to get her done, right? That's what I want to do. I want to get her done and I want to become more like Jesus. So I would suggest taking the things that popped out at you and writing down two or three things that are specific that you are looking for and that you want to grow in and begin to keep some kind of journal, whether it's an inside journal or whatever it is, a journal of some type. It could be on your phone that is an ongoing list of the things that we need to get specific about one time or another. Now, after a year, you'll say you have a thousand things you wrote down. Well, you're probably not going to get to all of them. And that's when a next step comes in. And that is, I need to start picking some of these things and really go

after it and grow and become like Jesus. So that's in the area of Bible reading and study and there is a difference between the two. Bible reading can be devotional, lexio divina, study can be something like the great adventure or a study that any fine producer of material has, but try not to stay on the broad, become specific. Now, here's the second one I want to share with you this week. The second one, when it comes time to be specific,

nothing gets dynamic until it gets specific, is prayer. is prayer. And by the way, I've heard this quote from Protestants and Catholics and non-denom churches. It seems like everybody is interested in it to one degree or another. So prayer. What about prayer? Well, we know that when Jesus encountered the two blind men in Matthew chapter 20, verses 30 through 34, he became very specific with them. In fact, he offered them the opportunity to be specific with him. In other words, asking them, the blind men, what do you want from me? And their answer isn't, we want everything. We want all we can get.

We want enough to have a better life. That's not what they're saying. Listen to it here. Matthew 20, it'll be in the notes. And behold, two blind men sitting by the roadside, when they heard that Jesus was passing by, cried out. Have mercy on us, son of David. And the crowd rebuked them, telling them to be silent, but they cried out the more. Lord, have mercy on us, son of David.

And Jesus stopped and called them, saying, what do you want me to do for you? There it is right there. That's the be specific. What do you want me to do for you? Now, Jesus is God, second person of the Trinity, wouldn't you think he'd know? wouldn't you think he would know that what they need it's it's it's right in front of them jesus couldn't couldn't miss it they're blind but it's not a matter here of what jesus sees it's a matter of what you need that's what he's asking what do you want me to do

for you now that calls on the time of thinking about it and then becoming specific and if you're going to be specific. It's good to get it down to the one thing that you really want. So they said to him, Lord, let our eyes be opened. That was it. It wasn't 75%. It wasn't 50%. It wasn't help me see, but I don't care about the colors or anything like that. They said it. Lord, let her eyes be open. That's what we want. And Jesus in pity, he touched their eyes. Guess what? Immediately they received their sight and followed him. I love it. That is so good. Well, my friend, we're going to be looking forward to the next episode, which is part two of be specific, a key for spiritual growth. That'll be showed too. And on that one, I'm going to just, I'm just going to muscle through all of these categories and give a couple of tips on how you could be specific as far as,

growing in your faith. Let me pray with you right now about this issue of being specific. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen. Oh, Lord Jesus, as we have come together so often, all of us here on the show, we're all growing. We all are looking for you. We all want to see you. But we really want to see you in us. And Lord, it seems so big to want to want to want to to become like you, where do we start? Lord, move on our hearts this week and show us what areas we need to be more specific in. Help us, Lord, to be specific in the areas that are going to have a tremendous fruitful gain for our families if we're married or in our teaching for teachers. Help us, Lord, to come to some decisions about being specific. We ask for the interstate. We ask for the

intercession of our dear mother, Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee. 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. I love you, and God bless you. Look forward to being with you next time.