The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Good Morning: 30,000 Second Chances!

Episode Date: December 6, 2019

If you live until you’re 82 years old, you will have 30,000 chances to turn toward God. Every morning, we can choose to put aside the failings of yesterday, and strive to be the person that God intends us to be. This Advent, Jeff offers seven things you can do first thing in the morning that will set you up to serve the Lord for the rest of the day. Snippet from the Show If we’re going to obtain the prize [life in Christ] everyday, we can’t dwell on yesterday, we must look to what lies ahead today. Get Jeff’s Shownotes by texting “jeffcavins” to 33-777 or email us at [e-mail]

You're listening to the Jeff Kaven Show episode 144. Good Morning, 30,000 second chances. 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.

And good to be with you again. Always look forward to spending time together. This is the 144th opportunity that we've had to spend some time together. And I encourage you to go into the backlog of the show and look for some things that maybe you're facing in your life. In fact, I think I'm going to have a show coming up on kind of reviewing 10 to 15 shows, different topics. that we've been looking at over the years, just a kind of jumpstart. You know, your curiosity when it comes to subjects to learn about and areas of our lives to tailor to the Lord's will. I really look forward to this every single week.

It's a repetition, repetition. And speaking of repetition, name of the show, good morning, 30,000 second chances. What am I talking about? Well, you know, in the morning, when you get up every single day, you get a new opportunity. You get a new chance at life. You get a kind of a life in miniature, don't you? A 24-hour period that is unique. It's a brand-new start. Yes, there's some baggage from yesterday, and yes, there's some challenges tomorrow, but you've got a day now to do something special with, and that if you only had one more day, and that was your whole life, How would you live that particular day? Now, how did I come up with 30,000 second chances? Well, it's very easy. If you live to be 82 years old, you will have had roughly 30,000 opportunities to begin anew. 30,000 mornings. And if you are 20 years old, if you're 20 years old, you've had already 7,300 mornings. 30 years old, 10,950. 40 years old, you've already had 14,600 new opportunities every day to do something new and

something fresh and to develop your relationship with the Lord. If you're 50, you've had 18,250 days. So the idea behind this show here is, what do you do with your mornings? What does a day represent? And I think that, you know, if we start looking at, well, I got 10 years left, you know, to live. I got 20 years. left to live. It's sort of a blur, isn't it, in a way? Because we, you know, well, you've got 20 years left to live or 30 years left to live. It's a blur, but if you start looking at it as individual mornings, it's a new opportunity. If you're like me, maybe you've had times where yesterday wasn't so good. Yesterday was messy. Let's just be frank about it. It was messy. relationships were messy. I wasn't feeling the best. And there were some things left unsaid,

unfinished in relationships with family or colleagues or neighbors, whatever, your spouse, you know, whatever your children, whatever it might be. And you go to bed at night and you don't sleep really well. Have you ever had a night like that? You don't really sleep so well. And about four o'clock in the morning, you wake up and you can't. get back to sleep, and you're kind of waiting for morning to roll around. It's that hour or two that you lay in bed before you get up, carrying the burdens of yesterday that it just bears, you know, it wears you out, and you feel so heavy-weighted, you know, with that on you. And then you get up, and there's something about getting up and spending some time in prayer, reading the word, a cup of

coffee, whatever it might be, that it's like it's a new day, and things start looking up. Well, every day, is a new opportunity. And I'm recently looking at each day as a time slot of 24 hours given to me by God as a gift unique from any other day of my life. And it's given to me as an opportunity to do something with it. And I cannot go into today thinking to myself, well, I'm not going to do anything with today. It's just going to be like yesterday. No, today's a new opportunity to put behind me some things and move forward, right? So often people, they go to bed with these heavy hearts, fearful expectations. Sometimes you can't sleep, and you're waiting for the first light of morning. Well, morning does come. Morning has broken, right? Remember that famous song by Cat Stevens.

Sanctify the first part of your morning. This is something that I want to encourage you to do, is that your day can be unique and it can be distinct. The word for that in Hebrew, is holy, right? Sanctified. It can be holy. It can be sanctified if you sanctify that first part of your morning. In other words, we want to separate it as time that is different. It's different than any other time during the day. It's a time where we kind of set the table for the day. This is key, is that we have to have a heart that says, I want my schedule, I want my schedule, and I want my life. I want the shape of my day to reflect the love of my life. And so I have to do something about that. Psalm 88 and verse 13, but I, O Lord, cry to thee in the morning, my prayer comes before

the prayer in the morning is great. And it's a wonderful way to start one of these 30,000 second chances is start it with prayer, start it with the Lord. A little bit later on here, I'm going to give you seven things to do in the morning, and one is incredibly practical. Psalm 130, by way of introduction here, Psalm 130 verses 6 through 8, says, my soul waits for the Lord more than watchman for the morning. This is what I was talking about. The watchman is waiting eagerly for the morning, just like you waking up at 4 in the morning, and you can't sleep, and you're burdened by yesterday or last week, and you're fearful about tomorrow and next month. Well, the watchman was eagerly anticipating the morning. And the psalmist said, my soul waits for the Lord

more than watchman for the morning. Oh, Israel, hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is plenteous redemption. And he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. I love that image of the watchman, you know, working all night, looking out for the enemy, protecting families, being vigilant. And when the morning comes, it also introduces this idea that danger will subside, and I will be able to get some rest. And there's something about a fresh new morning that reminds us that danger subsides. We're in the morning part now. It's a brand new, it's a brand new day. Have you ever, have you ever opened up a brand new deck of playing cards, and you have the cellophane around it, and you open it up, and it's just so slick,

and there's not one card bent. It's like a brand new deck, and you're going to play, you know, whatever you're going to play, what kind of games you're going to play with it. Well, every morning is sort of like that. It's a fresh new opportunity. Psalms 30 in verse 5 says, For his anger is but for a moment, and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning. It's important to remember that more morning will always overcome the darkness, right? It'll always overcome the darkness. No matter how dark your life might look, no matter how difficult your situation is, morning will come. Morning will come, and when morning comes, all darkness is dispelled. And so morning can become

precious in our spiritual lives, our spiritual mornings every day. How you start your day determines how your day turns out, doesn't it? Like the psalmist said in Psalm 90 and verse 14, and all these will be in the show notes for sure. Oh, by the way, let me just tell you this before I give you Psalm 90 there. If you want the show notes and you don't get them every week, you can do it easily by just simply texting my full name, Jeff Kavens. It's one long word, Jeff Kavins, and text to the number 33777. Say it with me, 3377. It's that easy. And just text my name. and you'll be signed up. Anyway, Psalm 90 and verse 14, satisfy us in the morning with thy steadfast love that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Isn't that great? Satisfy us in the morning with thy

steadfast love. Why? That we may rejoice and be glad all our days. And I think that you can take that scripture even and you can apply it to a single day if life is like a day. Satisfy us in the morning with thy steadfast love. In other words, we are spending time with God in the morning on this brand new fresh deck of playing cards, right? And that we may rejoice, what, all day long? And I have found a correlation between starting with the Lord and the rest of my day and not starting with the Lord and the rest of my day. The last thing you want to do is to get into a blur of living where one day bleeds into another, and you can't distinguish them, and it's the same old, same all, treat every day as a new opportunity. It's another second chance. It's another chance for you to

get right with God, to live your life right with God, to be that disciple he's called you to be, to be that husband, to be that wife, to be that son, to be that daughter, to be that employer, employee, to be that priest, to be that deacon or religious. So I'm going to give you seven things. to do in the morning. And one, as I said, is going to be very, very practical. I'll tell you what, let's take our break right now when we come back. I'll give you those seven things to do to make every day a new second chance. 82 years old, you're going to have, you're going to have how many 30,000 opportunities. You're listening to the Jeff Kaven show. What if you could go back and experience the very first advent and walk alongside Joseph and Mary as they

prepare to welcome the baby Jesus. Rejoice Advent Meditations with Joseph is an all-new Advent resource from Ascension. Experience that very first Advent journey through daily meditations in the Rejoice Journal and through a series of short, easy-to-access videos. Make Advent come alive this year. Visit rejoiceprogram.com. Rejoiceprogram.com. And welcome back talking about 30,000 opportunities. thousand good mornings and second chances. Every single day is a new life from the new part of the day when the sun comes up to the setting of the sun. It's like life in general, a baby being born and growing into old age and the light begins to fade. And we go on to be with the Lord. That's our life. But every day is like a life in miniature. And we don't waste days, do we? We don't kill time

as Christians. These are opportunities given to us. So I want to give you seven things to do in the morning. Number one, and these will be in the show notes for you, I'll give you the scriptures and connected to these seven points. Number one, make the first thing you do be the most important thing you do. Let me say that again. Make the first thing you do the most important thing you do. And what's that? Meet with God. Meet with God. Boy, when you get up in every morning, don't, don't introduce to this new canvas that's fresh. Don't introduce TV news, you know. Why? Why introduce Fox and CNN to this beautiful new opportunity that you have? Why not give the first part to God and meet with him? That means getting up out of bed, grabbing your Bible, grabbing your rosary. If you want your

cup of coffee, that's fine. Get your cup of Joe and sit down and start talking with God. Give you him the best time of the day. Give him the first, the first opportunity. I don't think there's going to be that many people who, when they're 82 years old, are going to look back and say, you know, I just wish I would have watched more news in the morning. They're not going to be thinking that at all, are they? They're going to be thinking, I wish I would have treated every day as a new opportunity and given God the best. One of the ways that you can do this, to be honest with you, is to keep a journal. I'm looking here, and I'm in I'm in the studio deep, deep in the woods of Minnesota right now, and I'm holding in my hands a paper journal that I use every day. This one is a moleskin journal, and I also use for my

ongoing keeper-tracker of our information, a lushterm journal. These are similar journals, but I use these on a daily basis, and I encourage you to use a journalism. well. When the digital revolution came about, some people stopped journaling. Some people stop keeping track of the precious things that were going on in their life as mile markers to keep them on track. Well, keep a journal in the morning. And I encourage you to write down in the morning some of the things that the Lord is showing you in scripture reading, perhaps Lexio-Divina. But the important part is wake up with Good Morning Jesus. Not Good Morning. America. Maybe that'll come later. Who knows if you have time for it. But ask yourself, am I going to

get more out of today by starting with Good Morning Jesus or Good Morning America? So start with making the first thing you do, the most important thing you do, and that is giving God the best. Give him the first. Number two, number two, Jesus is the model of morning prayer. In Mark's Gospel chapter 1 in verse 35. It says, and in the morning, a great while before day, he rose and went out to a lonely place, and there he prayed. You see, Jesus is the model for prayer, isn't he? He's the model for prayer, and there was something about his prayer life that even the disciples came to and said, Lord, teach us how to do this. And he showed them, and that's the Lord's prayer, our Father who are in heaven. You know that. You know that prayer. You know that prayer.

but we also have to look even more deeply at his prayer life, not just what he said, but where he went and when he went. When did he go to pray early, early in the morning? Where to a lonely place, non-distracted, and where he could listen to the voice of his father. Because it was in the voice of his father that he got the details of his daily agenda. And he went out and he lived that day according to the will of his father. That's a day well lived. And you've been given, if you're 82 years old, you've been given 30,000 of these days. 30,000 of them. 40 years old, 14,600. 50 years old, 18,250. Give him the first. But model your morning after Jesus. Go away with him and spend that time in prayer. I love this idea that what Jesus did and what he said was an expression of his time

in secret with the Father. That is such a beautiful, beautiful idea. Number three, substitute anxiety for prayer and thankfulness. That's right. Substitute anxiety for prayer and thankfulness. How many of us wake up in the day, early in the morning, and the first thing we do is we take a haunt ourselves the yoke of anxiety, the yoke of our responsibilities. And we think, oh, man, I'm overwhelmed. I don't know how I wish this day wouldn't have come. Well, substitute anxiety for what? For prayer. Listen to what Paul says here. This will be in the notes, show notes. I've got three scriptures on this one, really good ones. Philippians chapter four versus six and seven says, and this is for you. This is for you. Every morning, this is for you. Have no

anxiety about anything. Now, I looked that up in the Greek. Have no anxiety about anything. I looked up the word anything. You know what it means? It means anything. Have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication. Guess what? I looked up the word everything. You know what it means? Everything. So if you take these tremendous Greek studies that we've done, here we come up with this, have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. My friend, I don't know if you I don't, I do not know if you just heard what I said, and what kind of gold this is.

many times do we get up and we immediately go into our day after Good Morning America, a cup of coffee, whatever it might be. And what happens is that our hearts and our minds become fragmented and they become discombobulated, this big fancy word, and confusion sets in. And we are tired and worn out. What does Paul say? He says, have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer, supplication, with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God. What do you do at the beginning of the day? You pray. You offer up supplication. You offer up thanksgiving for what you have and what God has meant in your life. And it says, what's the result of that? Here it is. The result, Philippians 4-7, this is chapter 4 versus 6 and 7. Chapter 7 is what you're going to get, if you will give God.

God, the first, the prayer and supplication and Thanksgiving at the beginning of the day, instead of anxiety, here's what you're going to get. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Isn't that good? That's gold. In the Old Testament, Isaiah 50 in verse 4, the Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word, him that is weary. Listen to this. Here it comes. morning by morning, he wakens. He wakens my ear to hear as those who are taught. My friend, in the morning is the time where you need to be taught. In the morning is the time when your ears need to give themselves and your mind and your eyes to the Word of God to Scripture in the

morning. Before you get on the highway, before you're on the train, before you're on the bus, before that first meeting, give yourself to be taught the Word of God. Let him direct you, let him encourage you, let him give you your confidence, let him give you your strength and your healing. Man, this is good stuff. Psalm 143 in verse 8, let me hear in the morning of thy steadfast love, for in thee I put my trust. Teach me the way I should go. Isn't that beautiful? Teach me the way that I should go, for to thee, I lift up my soul. Again, it's a scripture about the morning, you know. It's interesting. It doesn't say, let me hear whenever possible, thy steadfast love, or let me hear when I have time, you know, of thy steadfast love. It says, let me hear in the

morning. That's because the morning is a new opportunity for the day. So use the morning for what the morning is supposed to be used for. It's setting up your day, right? It's setting up your day. It's like you're on-deck circle in baseball. You're on the on-deck circle, getting ready to bat. Your day is in that batting box. You're up there. You're playing now. But earlier, you were in the on-deck circle. You wake up in the morning, get into the on-deck circle and prayer. Make time to be with God. And then face that batter's box. Face the swings, the curve balls, and the you know, the knuckleballs and the sliders, face them, but you prepared for this, right? Number four, cast your cares upon the Lord. Cast your cares upon the Lord. I got one scripture

for you there, and it's a good thing to do in the morning is to cast your cares upon the Lord. Don't just think about and take upon yourself your cares. Cast them upon the Lord. Lord, I'm going to give you my cares. It says in 1st Peter chapter 5 and verses six through nine, humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you. Here it is. Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you. Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of someone, suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world. Now, I love what Peter says.

They're cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares for you. When you get into about two o'clock into your day, wouldn't it have been better to suddenly realize that you could have cast your cares on the Lord in the morning? To suddenly realize at two o'clock in the afternoon, you know, I didn't need to carry all of this today. Why did I go? go in today carrying all this. Why did I not start my day? As Paul said in Philippians 4, have no anxiety about anything but in everything by prayer and supplication. Well, take that prayer and supplication to a new level. Cast your anxiety on him. Have no anxiety about anything, but prayer, supplication, Thanksgiving, and a good old fishing rod. Cast your anxiety on

him. You can just hear that right now, right? Cast your anxiety upon him. On the Lord, why? He cares about you. And don't reel your cares back in. Don't reel your anxiety back in once you do that in the morning. And there you are at 2 o'clock. How did I end up with this again? No, cast your anxiety upon the Lord. Know that he cares for you. Be sober, be watchful. Oh, this is good. So that's number four. So what do we have so far? Number one, make the first thing you do be the most important thing you do. right? Meet with God. Number two, use Jesus as the model of morning prayer. Go early, go to a lonely place. God will meet you in that lonely place. Number three, substitute anxiety for prayer and thankfulness, and make a list in a journal of your prayers, the things that you might be anxious about,

and you're going to pray. You're going to give these to the Lord. In fact, number four, you're going to cast your cares upon the Lord. You're not going to just nonchalantly say, well, Lord, this is good. You know, I'm just going to mention this. No, be bold. Cast your care upon the Lord. Number five, let him be your strength. Let him be your strength, starting in the morning, yield to him.

Isaiah 33 in verse 2, Isaiah says, O Lord, be gracious to us. We long for you. Be our strength every morning, our salvation in time of distress. If you're 82 years old, you've had 30,000 opportunities to say, oh, Lord, be gracious to me. I long for you. Be my strength in the morning, Lord, and my salvation in time of distress. 30,000 opportunities.

One translation says, let him be your arm in the morning. Isn't that great? It's be our strength every morning. One translation says, let him be your arm. arm in the morning, your strength. Let them be your arm in the morning. I love this one, too. Lamentations 3, 22 and 23. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. Now listen to this. I know you've heard this before. You just didn't know the address. Lamentations 3, 22 and 23, the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning.

Great is thy faithfulness. That is the key scripture here, I think. Now that as I am talking about the topic with you today, I would say that that's the key scripture right there. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. New every, what's new every morning? His mercy. That's new every morning. His steadfast love, new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. What a way to begin your day, don't you think? Adopt that. I mean, write that down. I mean, do it, you know, when you get out of the car or when you end this time together today, write that down on a, on a, I got these right on my desk here. I got these note cards, what they call them, three by five note cards. Write what, write that down.

Lamentation 3, 22, and 23. Put it in your back pocket. Put it in your purse. Put it in the car. Put it in your notebook. It's a great one to stand. on. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. 30,000 new opportunities to start again. Second chances. It's new every

morning. His mercy is new every morning. Number six, forget about yesterday and look to what lies ahead. Hmm, it's a good one. You know, there's nothing you can do about yesterday, and you can't handle tomorrow. This is one of the aspects of being created in the image and likeness of God that I find, I find rather fascinating in that we are different than the animals, in that we can dwell on yesterday, and we can fear tomorrow. And if we do that, and we spend today dwelling on yesterday and fearing tomorrow, we never get around to living today. So do what Paul says in Philippians 3, verses 13 and 14, brethren, he says, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Isn't that beautiful? He says, I don't consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do,

I forget what lies behind. Now, he's not saying forget all the wisdom and the knowledge, obviously. He's talking about the prize of Christ, forgetting what lies behind, straining forward to what lies ahead. I press on towards the goal. What is the goal? It is the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. What does that mean? The prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. What are you called to. You are called to become like Christ, divinization. You are called to be a son, a daughter. The prize is walking as that activated disciple, walking in Christ Jesus. That's the prize. That's the prize. And if you're going to obtain that prize every day, then you have to do what? forget about yesterday and look to what lies ahead today as far as that calling on your life.

Are you called to be a father? You call to be a mother. You call to be a husband or a wife, a priest, a deacon. You need to strain towards that call. And you can't dwell on yesterday. And you only have 24 hours here. Let's make the most of it. We are created in the image and likeness of God. And man, that can be dangerous, but, boy, that can be a great opportunity, too. And number seven, this one is so practical. You would never guess I was going to put it in. But I think it's one of the important things as far as the physical aspect. And that is, I just took a sip there if you heard that.

Drink a big glass of water. What do you mean, drink a big glass of water? Do you know, we're created in the image and likeness of God, we are created beings. We are mostly water. There's a lot of other things to us, but when you really get down to it, it's a lot of water. We need to rehydrate our bodies. So drink a big glass of water. There are seven advantages to drinking a big glass of water that will get your day going a little bit better. One, it rehydrates your body. Coffee doesn't. Tea doesn't, even though my wife and I have tea every morning, we also drink a glass of water. But you need the water to rehydrate your body. Very

important. Number two, it increases your level of alertness. A lot of times when people are teaching others to take tests in school, they will literally, at the professional level, say that you need to drink a glass of water before you take your test. It will elevate your alertness. Number three, it fuels your brain. Kind of connected there, huh? It fuels your brain. Number four, strengthens your immune system. Number five, helps get rid of toxins. Number six, jump starts your metabolism and you lose weight. There's a good one right there. Why don't you have two cups of two glasses of water? Number seven, it's great for your skin and complexion. Now, you never saw that coming, did you? That I was going to give you, I was going to give you those. But if you start off in your spiritual life with

taking care of your spiritual walk with the Lord, we've got to be responsible with our bodies as well. Drink a great big glass of water. It'll help in the morning. So in conclusion today, just a reminder, God is so generous, isn't he? You don't know how many days you have ahead, but you do know this, that if you wake up tomorrow morning, you got another day. And what you do with it has everything to do with how your day is going to turn out. So I just wanted to encourage you today that to look at every single day as a new opportunity for you to live a full life, in a sense, to shrink a life down into a day and make it a good day. Make it a profitable day with your walk with the Lord. Make it a healthy day. Make it a fruitful day. And if you will start to stitch together one day and the next day and the next day,

what do you have? You got a week. You stitch together the weeks. What do you have? You got a month. You put those months together. You've got a year. You put the years together. What do you have? You got a good life. You got a good life. But every day has to be looked upon as a special treasure given to you by God and something that you, frankly, are responsible for. You're a steward. 24 hours, you're a steward. And we will give an answer to God one day as to what we did with these opportunities. And so once again, I want to just encourage you, good morning, 30,000 second chances. Let me pray for you. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Lord, I lift up my brother, lift up my sister to you right now. And Lord, I pray that you

would help us to reconfigure our thinking every day to the truth that we have been given a life in miniature today to do something with. Help us to get right with you. Help us to know you, to love you, to hear you, and to carry out your will in our respective vocations. Help us, Lord, to be faithful and to hear those words at the end of the day, well done, good and faithful, servant. We pray this, Lord, in your mighty name, in the name of Jesus, name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Remember, if you have any questions, you can email me at The Jeff Kaven Show. That's the Jeffcaven show at ascensionpress.com. And if you have anything you'd like to share with me, I'd love to hear from you. I really do. We read all of the email. Take it very seriously. If you have any prayer intentions, love to pray for you as well. And thank you, by the way, for listening to the show.

And thank you for going to iTunes and Google Play and ranking the show, leaving your comments. It really does do wonders for the ranking of the show. And that just says that other people will search for these topics and they will, they'll get to them quick so you and I can work together on that. All right. God bless you. I love you. We'll talk to you next week.