Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to the Life Refresh podcast. My name is Ryan Robinson, and if you are looking for a podcast that is designed to uplift, encourage and revive your heart, mind, and spirit. You're in the right place. Welcome to the journey of Becoming the version of You God designed from the foundations of the earth. Now let's begin. Hello and welcome back to Life Refresh podcast. I'm so excited and delighted to have you with us today. Um, we're gonna continue picking up on living the lean life and we're going to talk about, uh, last time we talked about talking about the spiritual part of living a lean life. What does that look like? Storing up treasures in heaven so that we do not have the additional weight of the things that we have here on Earth because on earth it's susceptible to external circumstances like moth and berman or rain and chemical reactions that we don't see, uh, that take place internally and eventually manifest themselves externally, like rust on metal.
Speaker 0 00:01:13 I think it's a really necessary to, again, talk about the most important foundational piece to this, which is the spiritual part, the spiritual part, the faith part of this. Um, because you really can't start this journey or at least sustain the progress and process without having a strong spiritual life. And again, part of it, um, as it was for the y rich young ruler, was to put things in proper perspective. Meaning I don't think, you know, you can do your best to do and keep the commandments and all those kinds of things. But when we really get down to the matter, what really unlocks the opportunity for us is releasing our heart from what currently is keeping its attention. For the rich young ruler, it was his possessions cuz he didn't find or couldn't believe a way to be able to release it. Bible says he was sorrow for, he had many possessions after Jesus told him, get your items, sell all you have, store treasure in heaven and then come follow me.
Speaker 0 00:02:20 Nothing that had to do with a commandment, but everything to do with the posture of his heart and, um, what he was feeling led to do spiritually. So, um, again, very important thing. Again, we all, I'm not saying all these things are step by step, but I would say you need to have all of these things in many pro in progress. You need to have all these areas in progress in some form or fashion, but the solid rock by which you build on should be a spiritual foundation. So what we're going to start on today is we're gonna start on the, um, mental aspect of what it looks like to live a lean life. I am a, uh, I think I brought it up before, but um, I'm a Lean Six Sigma black belt. What does that mean? Um, I'm not proficient in karate even though I do have my black belt in TaeKwonDo, so don't mess with me.
Speaker 0 00:03:21 But, uh, what it means is I'm able to walk through, um, many places and identify waste and create processes, features, um, that uh, with the help of a team to be able to help create and reduce waste, increase speed and efficiency, um, in an organization. So really cool, fun stuff that, you know, you get to do. But, uh, most of the time what we find is that we have a lot of mental waste. What do I mean by that? There are things that we have in our head that distract us from actually thinking clearly. Um, we have thoughts of previous, uh, you know, previous relationships we have thoughts of food, dinner, all those kinds of things that could distract us mentally, but we need to be able to create and at least give us some form or common template by which our mind should be operating at, right?
Speaker 0 00:04:23 So, um, there's a very familiar passage, but most people know it. But I want to make sure that we clearly articulate this because it needs to be said. Um, I'm going, coming from, uh, Romans chapter 12, beginning of verse one, and we'll read to two, um, says, therefore, I urge you brothers and sisters in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. And this is the part here too. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you'll be able to prove, to test and approve what is, what God's will, is his good pleasing and perfect will. Okay? So this particular, uh, scripture is basically saying that hey, you can be a living sacrifice wholly and acceptable unto God for worship, but you need to do it with without conforming to the pattern of this world.
Speaker 0 00:05:28 Okay? So we don't necessarily, the pattern that we've grown up to be in that we have lived our lives our entire lives is actually a worldly model. Just like we talked about before as far as, uh, the rich young ruler in his possessions, his possessions had him. So this was the pattern that was provided to him from the world. But what he's saying is being transformed by the renewing of your mind, which means renewing, is a continuous improvement process, which is what my black belt was all about, was about continuous improvement. Meaning there was a plan and a process that you would rinse and repeat. You'd rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat in order to pro to in order to be able to create something new. First time it sucks because you haven't done it. Second time you get better. Third time you get better.
Speaker 0 00:06:23 Fourth time you get better. Fifth, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, so on and so forth. Every iteration you're gonna get better and every iteration gonna get speed. But this is the process by which God has to renew our minds cuz the way our minds are, they are designed for worldly patterns. Okay? If you wanna make money, people say, we gotta hustle, you gotta work. I get it, completely understand it, but no one's telling you in the world to give your first fruits to God and tithe. Ain't nobody saying that. Ain't nobody saying, oh, we make sure you give your money to the poor and make sure they have something to eat. Make sure they have something to, to dress. No, they're not saying that, oh, you can give to a charity and donate. No. Like, you can actually do some of that stuff yourself. They're just things that the world pattern just says like, oh, this is what you can do.
Speaker 0 00:07:19 This is what you should do based on what the world says works. But the Bible says, do not conform to the pattern of this world. Meaning do not adjust yourself on the worldly pattern of doing things, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. King James says that you may prove that good, acceptable and perfect will of God, right? So how do I shift my mind from one of the world, one being in the world to one that is being transformed in, into the image of Christ and God's will for my life. So, uh, we're going to go back to Matthew chapter six. That was the last scripture that we worked on, um, in the last podcast. But there's just so much in it that I wanted to dig into this. The Bible talks about a lot of things about anger, about frustration, about sexual immorality, about pride, about um, all kinds of things.
Speaker 0 00:08:33 The Bible is full and filled with the ways that we should live our lives and how we should think about it. And particularly all of these have to do and deal with a mental state of gratitude of, uh, thankfulness of faith. But I think in this crap, in this scripture here, it articulates the thing that gets us the most, I guess I would say ties us up the most. Um, it is a conduit or maybe a catalyst for fear, for frustration, for a quick, uh, do it yourself, uh, quick do-it-yourself project to get yourself out of a circumstance. This particular scripture nails it, and we're going to go to Matthew chapter six, beginning at verse 25, says, therefore, until you do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink or about your body, what you will wear is life more than food and the body more than clothes.
Speaker 0 00:09:42 Look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns. Yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they in any one of you be worrying about? Excuse me, can any of you by worrying add one single hour to your life? And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin, yet they tell. But I tell you, not even Solomon and all of his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothed the grass of the field, which are here today and tomorrow is thrown in the fire, will he not much more clothed you, you of little faith. So do not worry saying, what shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear for the pagans run after all these things.
Speaker 0 00:10:39 And your heavenly Father knows what you knows that you need them, but seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Okay? This is one of my, uh, favorite scriptures actually, uh, because I worry a lot and if we, if we are completely and utterly honest, furry is what hems us up and distracts us and actually leads us to other things. So if we worry about money, we start getting scared that we won't be able to pay the debt or pay for dinner. If we think about what other people think and worry about what other people think, we won't move toward what we feel we've been called to do. If we worry and think about how are we gonna get to point A to point B, uh, we will be limited in our thinking because we are just trying to survive.
Speaker 0 00:11:43 And, uh, what this scripture is saying is that mentally God has our best interests at heart. He's giving all of these examples of, um, you know, storing away food. God knows you're hungry. God has his creation is hungry, they need to eat, but they don't have a supply chain to provide themselves food. So what they do is that God provides a system that gives these animals the food that they need and that's it. He's thought ahead of the squirrels in your backyard. You, you see how how powerful that is. God has thought ahead about the squirrels in your backyard. How much so? How much more so does God not think about you? Now, I'm telling you this, I'm saying this as a person who struggles in this particular arena of worry. I'm speaking to myself as I'm speaking to you. It is so challenging to be able to think that you deserve or you could get exactly or what you feel like you're needing and God provide the, the, the, essentially the essence that you need in order to move forward toward whatever goal or whatever's going on in your life.
Speaker 0 00:13:11 Sometimes it's hard to believe that. It's hard to trust that, but that's what we learned in Romans chapter 12 verse two. It is a continuous renewing of your mind. Some days you're not gonna get it, but if we are continuously improving our mindset and not conforming to the pattern of the world, we then open up possibility. We open up an opportunity for God to prove and g for God to show us how he's always been providing for us all along. You know, he, he always provides through a resource. So for those who are employed or self-employed, you're good at what your job is, but you're not that good that you can get all your leads and you can do all the things that you were able to do and be and have the right words that unlock the opportunity for you to close the deal.
Speaker 0 00:14:11 That is something that is not of you. You might think so, but it is a connection. It is a valuable skillset of relationship building, which we'll talk about later. But you have a gift to do it. And it is important for us to understand that if you have a gift for it, God provided the gift. He provided these avenues for you. He provided the food you eat, he provided the clothes that you wear. And this is what gives me, is that Jesus uses the richest man of all time, Solomon, which we've talked about to illustrate that his clothes ain't all that great <laugh>. Like I, I I just, I love this what, what Jesus says, say Solomon and all his spinner wasn't as bad as flowers. Like, you know, how, how you got to be the son of God to be like, alright, Solomon, you the richest person that has ever lived.
Speaker 0 00:15:18 That's great, but the thing is, you not as bad as these lilies <laugh>, what an ego thing, what an ego boost or maybe an ego kill for Solomon. But what an ego boost for us to know and trust that God loves us that much. That he says, I'm a, I dress Lilly's better than I dress Solomon. And Solomon had all the things he, there was nothing that he couldn't get. So if I dressed the Lilly that's here today, that dies quickly depending on weather and all that kind of stuff, and that is better than what I dress Solomon in, you say, how much more than you, how much would I not clothe you? Oh, you of little faith. And that is the key to all of the mental lean activity, faith. Now I I, I know we've talked about this before, but I want to bring a particular aspect to this because sometimes we take faith and make it overly spiritual.
Speaker 0 00:16:23 It is a spiritual principle, but it has practical application. So it has to be exercised in some way, shape, or form to prove that there's presence there. Okay? Just like we talked about, living a lean life starts internally, having faith starts internally. So there's a heart posture that says, I believe that God can do this. So once you have a belief of it, you start moving your body or moving around circumstances that, uh, that lets you know you, that puts you in position to receive it. Um, I equate faith to something like this. There is a, uh, I believe it was X-Men two, this was like a while ago, um, when Hugh Jackman and Holly Berry and, uh, Patrick, the guy who played for the Fastback, I can't remember remember his name. Um, but Magnio is captured and is in this, uh, instructible magnetically free environment because Magnio, you know, is a mutant that can manage the, uh, metal <laugh>.
Speaker 0 00:17:37 I can't remember what else he manages metal, right? So, um, there's a long story short, uh, Magnio sensed that this guy has an abundance of, of iron in his, in his blood, pulls the iron out of the guy, the blood in his body, and essentially creates like this little pinball that gets him to point A to point B. Now, once they, uh, or gets him out of the, the shell or the, his containment prison, which is all either glass or plastic. So what they do at the end of this, they start pulling back the, uh, the tunnel that gets him to the end of the prison and gets him out. So one of the things that he does Magnio does, is he splits this little sphere of metal and as he's walking the, the metal starts to flatten out like steps, okay? And as he's walking, another step or another shield comes up and is being made a full.
Speaker 0 00:18:47 So if he's not walking, there's no need for it. But when he walks, the step appears. When he walks to the other leg, the step appears. When he walks to the other one, another step appears. So what ends up happening is Manino ends up getting out. But I saw this as an amazing illustration to faith because faith is not activated unless we are walking towards something that we have faith in. So the reason why we worry is because we have, uh, belief system that we think that God won't do it and God can't do it. And the thing is, y'all, there are areas that we believe God in and there's some areas that we have a hard time believing God in is. And the thing is, it is the process of here. It is renewing your mind that helps unveiled unto you. What is that blockage?
Speaker 0 00:19:44 Most of us, and again, I've had faith, I've seen, I know this may sound crazy, I've seen individuals healed personally from, uh, heart issues, breast cancer, knee injuries I've seen, uh, miraculously healed. I have have no <laugh> explanation for that one. Um, I've, I've seen a lot of people get healed. I have faith for that. I believe that God can heal. Ive seen it. I believe it. There's no doubt in my mind that God can't heal. But there are areas in my life that I have a challenge with. Like, I don't know God. If you can do that one, one, whether it be, uh, you know, financially, sometimes like, Lord, I don't know how you going to do this. And then this is, this is the, this is the evidence that lets you know that you are working in your own strength. How tired do you get trying to pursue your own will for your life?
Speaker 0 00:20:44 Something to think about cuz God will help you. God will provide for you if we have faith and put our priorities where they need to be. Here says, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And all of these things will be given to you as well. They don't list all these things, but what the Bible does is that the first thing is the most important thing, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. You have to do that by transforming the way that you think and not conforming to the ways of the world. It is such an important process for us to think about because if we don't have our spirit life together and our mental life together, because our spirit informs our mental capacity, what ends up happening is we end up having, we end up rinse, repeating the same thing and get caught in this loop of, of building out a lean life.
Speaker 0 00:21:44 And then when we get to a certain point, we start adding things back into our lives because we're like, ah, that was too soon. I wasn't ready for it. Uh, my identity is still tied to this object, therefore I need to keep it a little bit longer in order to feel a little bit better about it. And then that little bit longer turns to two weeks and those two weeks turn to a month and then a month turns to two months, and then two months turns to six months. So you catch me, you, you're tracking with me. You know what that's gonna look like. It's going to look like nothing's gonna get outta your house. But I'm telling y'all, I'm going through this process myself, that leaning your life mentally and creating the space, creating the margin in your life actually gives you the ability to make yourself available for the next thing and the next best thing that God has in store for you.
Speaker 0 00:22:39 But again, this is a mindset shift. It requires being able to be malleable and realizing that, you know what, at the end of the day, me worrying is not going to change much is just going to be me worrying about something I can't change. Verse 27 says, can any of you add any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? No. You actually lose an hour. So let's put this in perspective mentally. Yeah. And this is one of many areas of transforming one's mind, okay? But the one that gets us teed up the most is, is worry. Again, this is a big rock. There's multiple little peles of rocks and life experiences that, particularly in this podcast, we wouldn't be able to touch cause it's just so vast. But a lot of it is the fear of the unknown, which causes us to worry about circumstances.
Speaker 0 00:23:41 You look at the stock market, all those kinds of things, you're, what's happening? What's happening? I don't know what's gonna happen. Recession talks about, talks about recession, et cetera. You guys, the Bible says, not the worry, easier said than done. I get it. But let's get better at it because last time I checked, I'm a king's kid. I am wonderfully and fearfully made in the image and lightness of God. And if God is my heavenly Father, I should probably take my dad's words as he's he's told. And I read my dad's words, too much <laugh> in this Bible to not believe them. But you know what? We're human. So as long as we're progressing, continuously renewing, you will find that you'll get peace, at least better peace and start making yourself more available for peace as you start to just keep the main thing, the main thing. Thank you so much for joining today's podcast again, we're still in living a lean life here. We got about maybe two to three more episodes. So keep it locked here. Make sure you subscribe, share, and tell a friend. Until next time, peace.
