Deciding a Better Future

We are entering into a new season and a new series, but I kind of want to do like two sermons today a little bit because, and I promise you it won't be double the time, okay? But before I introduce you to Better Decision, Fewer Regrets, we are entering in a season of fasting. We've been doing this for the last, ever since we started the church actually. So it's really important that we take time to pray and to fast for this new year. Many of us, if you're like me, and maybe you're not like me, maybe you're better than I am, but when you go through the year, you kind of misalign, or as a chiropractor would say, we've got a chiropractor in here today, she can confess to that.

We've got to do some adjustments because it's not necessarily to fix you, per se, on the spot, but it's to create, you know, to realign you so that God can work in you and through you. And sometimes we get off track, right? We get into our world and into our things, and if you're like me, sometimes I get too fleshly. I get in the world, I get away from the things of God, and I need to be realigned from time to time. So I take time to fast, and what that does is it allows my soul, or my spirit rather, to bypass my body, my flesh, and connect with God.

The spirit inside of us is what connects with God. So we do that during the year, and in fact, if you look at Joel 2, 12 and 13, it says, yet even now declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart. So God wants our hearts. So that's what he's doing. He's asking for our hearts with fasting and weeping and mourning, and in the context of this, they were going through a horrific time because they had gotten away from God, and they had lost what God had promised them, and God wants them to get back to them.

He says, rid your hearts and not your garments, meaning it's not your outward, it's your inward. The reason we fast is not so that we can be an outward presentation of, oh God, look at me. See, here's the thing. Fasting isn't about getting God's attention, but putting our attention on God. It's taking a season where we align ourselves underneath God that we're not, hey God, vending machine God, you know, give me this.

Vending, you know, I've got to have this, so I'm going to fast so that you can give this to me. No, that's not what it's about. God will give you what you need, and in some cases give you what you want, but that's not why we fast. We fast because we are wanting our attention to be on Him, that everything is on Him for a season, so it sets us up for the whole year. So, I invite you as a church, and we like to do this corporately because this is a good opportunity to come together and do this.

It's a good practice for you, you know, kind of setting up the training wheels of fasting and praying. If you want to pray this year, that's fine. If you want to add fasting to that, that makes it more powerful, but prayer and fasting is a season where we're going to set around 21 days, and we're starting on next week, the 9th through the 29th. 21 days is the amount of time it takes to build a habit, so we thought that three weeks would be a great time to do our first fruits of fasting and prayer during this season, the spiritual discipline, and I'm not going to tell you what to fast, and I'm not going to tell you how to fast because that's between you and God, but I do like to give you some instructions on how to do that, and there's four different types of fast. There's a complete fast.

Some of you might be ready for a complete fast. That's when you do away with all foods for 21 days. You can do a selective fast. Maybe you want to eat only certain things for a certain amount of days. A partial fast.

Some of you like to do Jewish fasts where you don't eat from sunup to sundown, or you take periodic days, intermediate fast, which you take a few days that you don't eat, and then you eat, and then you don't eat, whatever that looks like, or then a soul fast. A lot of people like to do this, and this is a great kickstarter to fasting, and that's fast something that you're addicted to that might not be life devastating, but definitely it's keeping you from God. That might be social media. Some of you are addicted to social media. Some of you are addicted to TV, things like that, so take that opportunity, and with better decisions and fewer regrets, I think the best decision that you can make this year, the number one decision that I think you need to make first of all this year is giving God some time to set up a year, and I promise you, if you make that decision, you'll have fewer regrets this year.

You'll have fewer regrets when it comes to fasting, so we'll have something up for that. In fact, we're going to be doing prayer meetings. We're going to have prayer online. You can join in online with us during this season. Last season was amazing, phenomenal.

We had people all over the place chiming in and being a part of that. We're going to do that again this year. We're going to set up this season, and we're going to allow God to be in control of Salt Church, not anything else. That Jesus Christ is our pastor, and He's leading us, and we're going to realign ourselves. We're going to do a spiritual adjustment this season to get us back on track after such a crazy holiday.

Amen? So, let me just start off with a scripture here in Proverbs 27, 12, and I'm going to set us up, and I just want to let you know this is a very practical series for this season. I felt like, you know, with the counseling and pastoring I do, that during this season, as we're resetting, as we're redoing another year, we always are thinking about things to help us get better, and the Bible has a lot to say about that. Proverbs 27, 12 says, the prudence see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and pay the penalty. So, hold on to that for a few minutes, and I just want you to track with me as I discuss in better decisions, fewer regrets.

This series is not my series. This is actually a series Andy... Stanley did with North Point Church. He wrote a book last year and I read that book. And a lot of this material is going to be from his book.

It just was so powerful to me. And it related to me so much. And even the way I pastor you and the questions that you asked me. And I thought it would be great to do this series. And it's designed to provide the content of this book.

But if you'll take a few minutes every, you know, or some time during this series over the next few weeks consuming and digesting these messages, I believe that it will change your life. I believe it will help you make better decisions and you will, in fact, have fewer regrets. And I want you to make good decisions. As a pastor, I want you to make good decisions. I want you to have the tools and some handles even to help your kids, to help your grandkids, to help your nieces, to help your nephews, to help the people around you make better decisions by virtue of you.

So the big idea of the series, and here's the set it up and get us started, and this is going to be kind of an introduction to the next five weeks, okay? The big idea of this series is often overlooked, the overlooked relationship between good questions and good decisions. Good questions and good decisions. Good questions set us up for good decisions. Good questions.

In some ways, our decisions are no better than the questions we ask or perhaps the questions we don't ask, right? And in this series, I'm going to give you five questions. I'm going to deal with a question a week, give you five questions to ask every time you make a decision of any magnitude, of any significance, whether it's financially, whether it's relational, whether it's academic, whether it's professional. And these questions can, in fact, change your life. It's phenomenal what they can do.

It will help you. It will give you a framework for your life, your relationships, for your marriage, for parenting, for your future kids, your future marriages, wherever you stand in life. These will provide a framework. It will provide handles for you to take as you ask questions and make decisions. So here's what I want you to do.

As we ask these questions, you need to do three things. You need to ask the questions. Pause and ask the questions whenever a decision arises, right? Pause and ask the question. Answer honestly, okay?

Don't just answer. You need to answer honestly and then act. You got to act on what you're answering. And I believe these questions will help decide and it will increase the odds that you will end up where you want to be or where you want to go if you ask these questions. And as importantly, the people who look to you, depend on you, that you work with, that are around you, you are not the only person that you impact.

You impact them. By the decisions you make, you impact the people around you. You have no idea ultimately the people that you will impact. Some of your decisions will impact descendants that you won't even meet. Some of the decisions that you make today will impact people that aren't even in your life or you're not even thinking about, right?

The generations after you. And it takes a lifetime and perhaps generations even to work out some of these decisions that we play out. Now, for example, George Washington. What if George Washington decided that he wanted to convince Congress that he would be a king rather than a president? Things would be dramatically different if he convinced Congress to allow him to be a king today, right?

His decisions impact where we are today. Dr. Martin Luther King, what if he decided to stay north and remain silent when what was going on in the south was taking place? Things would be dramatically different today. Now, I know that you're not George Washington or Dr.

Martin Luther King, but generations of people may very well be impacted by your decisions, the decisions that you make. And if you plan on bringing children into the world or maybe you've already brought children in the world, you know this personally. And if you don't, you can even look back and know how it's affected you, the people that are in your life, your parents, your grandparents, the decisions that they made in the past, the decisions they made somewhere along the way, that even if they were insignificant decisions, they affected you. They determined the trajectory of your life. And in some cases, they determined whether you would even have life, right?

And they weren't thinking about you. You weren't around during these times they were making the decisions. You weren't even thought about. You weren't born yet. But these decisions affected you.

Perhaps your father, if your father hadn't chose to keep picking up the bottle, your life would be completely different today. Or if your mom hadn't run off and left the family, maybe your life would be completely different. The opposite is true as well. Maybe your father decided to break that habit and keep the family together, and your life is dramatically different than what it would have been if he made the wrong decision. Or maybe your mother decided to stick it out and stay in when most women would have ran from that situation.

And your life is different as a result. The point is, things and people hang in the balance of your decisions. The decisions we make, people are affected. People all around us are affected. And private decisions do become public, okay?

Private decisions will come public. Your private decisions probably won't stay private. Your personal decisions will impact others. So, it's a big deal. It's a big deal for you.

It's a bigger deal than you think it is. It's bigger than you. It's bigger than me. And here's the deal, parents. Let me just say this.

The most significant thing you may do, the most significant thing you may do in this life may not be something you do. It may be someone you raise. You affect your children by your decisions. So, I love how Andy Stanley says it. This is a quote I've used and I've stolen many times because it's so good.

This is a quote I've used and I've stolen many times because it's so good. Decisions determine the direction and quality of your life. Your decisions determine the direction and quality of your life. Your decisions are like the steering wheel of your life. The way you direct your decisions is like the steering wheel of your life.

You are where you are because of some decisions that you've made or someone else has made. Amen? But let me just deal with that for a second, okay? Just a little more of a rabbit trail here about that. Before you push back too hard on blaming someone else, like your mother—my father did that—and the reason I'm like that today is because of something that they did—your response and your reaction to the people that influence your circumstances are decisions as well.

You made a decision to respond a certain way. Your response is a decision. We choose our responses knowing this is how you avoid the victim mentality, okay? That's what—if we live in a victim mentality—it's my father's fault. See, this explains how people are able to rise above things when they have dealt with a life that probably was unimaginable.

They were dealt a bad hand in life. They were able to rise over and above their circumstances because they made a choice. It's why people who have every reason in the world to be mad, to be cynical, to be bitter, to be self-destructive, avoid all that. This is why they decide rather than react their way into the future. In doing so, they create a preferred future.

And that's what God wants for you, a preferred future. A response creates a better pathway forward. And you rarely have to apologize for a response, okay? You almost always have to apologize for the way you react. If you're a reactor, you know, you react to a situation, you almost always have to apologize for that.

But a response, you don't have—usually don't have to apologize for, and especially a thoughtful response. A thoughtful, a well-thought response creates a bridge and a way forward with people. Your ability to respond rather than to react is a superpower, okay? Let me just say that. Your ability to respond rather than to react is like a superpower.

If we react, we become a reflection of what we despise and the people that we despise, right? When we react in certain ways, it relinquishes control of our own story. It's like handing a pen over to the enemy and saying, you can write the rest of my story. You're releasing control, but if we respond, it allows us to thwart the enemy and redeem pain. And in some cases, it empowers us to reverse our lives.

So your greatest superpower—let me just say this, your greatest—you can write this statement down—your greatest superpower is that of a measured response, a measured response. And that's how we write and decide our best stories. And if you'll pause and ask these questions that we're going to be dealing with over the next few weeks, you can respond rather than react because your decisions determine the story of your life. Your decisions determine the story of your life. The good news is this.

If you are where you don't want to be or you didn't plan on being, there's hope for you because you can start making decisions today to take you to where you prefer to be, where you want to be. You can begin today making those decisions. You can decide the rest of your story. You can make that decision today. Let me just set this up a little more.

If you don't already know, most of you may know this. You know my father, my earthly father, my dad, is a pastor as well. He's actually currently pastoring, and he pastors a very successful church in North Carolina. But what you may not know about him is he's also a professional counselor. He has a doctorate in counseling, and he's been doing professional counseling for years.

And it was very, very frustrating for me as a child and my sisters to be able to get an answer out of him that we wanted. Because we would ask, you know, Dad, what do I do in this situation? Dad, what should I do here? And his response was always another question. He wouldn't tell us what to do.

He would never tell us what to do. He would ask questions back like, what do you think you should do? What do you think is the wise thing to do? What do you think is the right thing to do? Why do you think the way you think?

Why do you feel the way, this way towards that person, the way you feel about them? Why do you think they feel the way? There was all these questions. I remember my baby sister, Shana, getting so mad one time. She was asking a question, and Dad started putting on his counselor hat and talking to her, and he says, Dad, just give me the answer.

Stop doing the counselor thing. Come on. Can you do, you know, just give me a straight answer. And you know what his response was? Why do you think you feel that way?

Like a good counselor. We didn't have the time to appreciate that as much as we do now, but now that we understand what he was doing, he was trying to teach us that he was more interested in teaching us how to make decisions rather than giving us the answer. He was teaching us something because he understood that good questions lead to good decisions. And if he wasn't there to help us make that decision, we could make it on our own because we know that good questions are, what are good decisions from him? Better, yeah, good decisions lead to better, I mean, good questions lead to better decisions, better decisions.

And perhaps better decisions lead to what? Fewer regrets. Fewer regrets. And we want fewer regrets. And on the back side of a decision, as you all know, it's usually not uncommon to hear somebody say, I should have asked more questions.

I should have asked more questions because the more questions we ask, the more information we have, and the more information we have, what happens? We are able to make better decisions. So pausing for a minute to think about some questions. But this is kind of hard. This is harder than you think it is, right?

I mean, the ask disruptive questions, and when people ask us questions, or we pause to ask questions that are potentially disruptive, most of us resist uninvited questions, right? The first thing we do is, in the moment, we feel that we're being questioned rather than being asked a question, right? Somebody asks us a question, why are you questioning me, you know? And we get offended. There's a big difference between being asked a question and being questioned.

And when we confuse one with the other, what happens is defenses go up, right? Defenses go up, don't talk to me, and our learning aptitude goes down, okay? Learning goes up, our defenses go up and our learning aptitude goes down. Because it's virtually impossible to welcome any new thing, any new idea, any new information or insight, when we're convinced that we're being judged, when there's judgment there, and we're being questioned. And this is especially true when you're making personal decisions, because they're personal, right?

They're nobody else's business, but as we know, most of our personal decisions eventually affect somebody, right? So it's their business, and the results of personal decisions often intersect with somebody else's life, and somebody else's decisions, and somebody else's business, and the folks mostly close to you. So that's why it's so important to ask good questions. Let me articulate it a little better. Well-placed, appropriately-timed, thought-provoking questions.

Well-placed, appropriately-timed, thought-provoking questions. Not just questions, questions that are thoughtful, questions that are appropriate, questions that are timed well. Because all professional counselors, and if we have any professional counselors in here, you're probably nodding your head right now, oh, this makes a lot of sense, because you know this. Good counselors get this. All professional counselors get this, and great counselors master the art of asking questions.

Good, well-placed, appropriately-timed, thought-provoking questions, because they know that we are far more likely to follow our own advice than we are the advice of even a counselor, right? So what they do is they leave breadcrumbs along the path to guide us, to help us make our own decisions. So they ask good questions to lead us to that aha moment. Well-placed, appropriately-timed, thought-provoking questions. Andy, in his book, talks about he and his dad, if you're familiar with Charles Stanley, In Touch Ministries, if you've been around the church world for very long, you know Charles.

Andy is his son. And they went through a really, really tough season. And he talks about that in his book, Deep and Wide, if you ever want to go back and hear about that story, where he started North Point. He was supposed to even take over his father's ministry one day and left the ministry to start his own church. And there was just a lot going on there during that time.

And there's a lot of other deeper things happening as well. And he was very, very frustrated. And frustrated is just a fancy word for angry. He was angry at his dad. And he would visit his counselor friend often and talk to him and get some counseling about that situation.

And he had heard the stories that Andy had to say about him and his father's relationship. He complained and put it out there. And he said, you know, there was this one point where he really got caught in what you call the counselor trap, right? So as they were talking, now as he was complaining, his counselor friend asked this, How do you think your heavenly father feels towards your father? And do you think his or your heavenly father is angry or frustrated with him?

The answer to that is no, of course not. And I know what you're doing. Of course not. And then he makes this profound statement to Andy says this, When you feel towards your father, what you think your heavenly Father feels towards your father, you'll know you're making progress and getting healthy. If you feel towards your father, what you think your heavenly Father feels towards your father, you'll know you're making progress.

You'll know that you're getting healthy. See, Andy walked right into that situation and got him into the counselor trap, as all good counselors do. But that trap ultimately was a method that set him free, that set him free, well-placed, appropriately timed, thought-provoking questions. So what if you had those questions up front? What if you had the questions, you had the filter, you had the grid there for you to begin to pause and ask those questions when you're stuck, when you're unsure, or when you're frustrated?

Imagine having a grid or a filter that evaluates all of those decisions that you go through, that you can ask, you can answer honestly, and then you can act upon that, that you could pause for a minute and take thoughtful consideration of how to make the right decisions. Five questions. But listen, you already have a grid in which you filter everything through already. Did you know that? Every decision that you make, you're processing through a grid anyway.

You're doing things like this. Will I enjoy this? Will this hurt me? Will this hurt somebody else? Will anyone find out about this, right?

Or what's my out if someone finds out? You're already doing this. And some of those are helpful and some of them may not be. But the point is, we are making decisions and we're just going to ask, and we're asking questions, so we're just going to ask five more questions. We're going to add five more questions to this grid over the next week, over the next weeks.

From week two to week six, each week we're going to deal with one of these questions. And next week we're going to deal with Jeremiah and the integrity question and what you need to ask, am I being honest with myself? So prepare for next week. We're going to ask the first question, am I being honest? You'll be amazed at what the Bible says about that, how it relates and applies to our life.

Am I being honest? But in between then and now, I want us, and as we close, I want us to commit a saying from the book of Proverbs to memory. I mentioned this at the beginning of the message. And it plays a big part. This is like our theme verse.

It plays a big part in where we're carrying this series. And you've got to be here. I'm telling you, if you follow the series and you honor the series and you take time to consider these questions, I promise you it will make your life better. Proverbs 27, 12 says, The prudent see danger and take refuge. The prudent see danger.

Who are the prudent? Who are the prudent? It means to be crafty, to be shrewd, to be sensible. The prudent connect the dots. The prudent see that life is connected, that the future is connected to the decisions we make today.

And that's today's decisions, that today's decisions determine tomorrow's results, right? That today's decisions determine where I'm going in the future. Their decisions show up and somehow smuggle themselves into tomorrow. The decisions we make today, this is so supremely important. The decisions we make today, the prudent sees them coming.

And today's reactions and responses have a way of working themselves out in the future. And when the prudents see and sense danger, they see something up ahead, they see something happening. When they see that, they don't allow it to rob them of their potential future, of their preferred future, of their hopes, of their dreams, of their future potential. They respond appropriately. How?

By stopping and pausing and considering and questioning. And they don't decide based on what immediately is in front of them. They decide based on where they eventually want to be financially, where they want to be relationally, where they want to be academically, what they want to be professionally, mentally, and most importantly, where they want to be spiritually. Spiritually. So Proverbs 27, 12 says the prudent see danger and take refuge.

But the simple, who are the simple? Those are the naive people. The people that believe today is today and I make my decisions today and I react today and I do them and they don't connect life. They only connect today with today. They spend money, they make decisions, they do things for today.

And you, they know better than to make those decisions so randomly and radically and spontaneously, but they do it anyway. They just make, that's the simple, they just don't stop to think about it and instead they what? Keep going and pay the penalty. They keep going, see this is so God. They keep going and paying the penalty.

In fact, some versions say, and they suffer for it. And if you will incorporate questioning, these things that we'll talk about, and you don't want to skip any of these. We're going to, I'm going to have discussion notes and things that we can talk with our small groups in, and we're going to really dig into this. But if you'll stop for a minute and ask these five questions and discuss them, you will have a decision filter. You will slow, it will slow you down and create a perspective you need to make better decisions and perhaps have fewer regrets.

Proverbs 27, 12, the prudency danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and pay the penalty. Get that in your hearts, get that in your souls. Let that be your verse this week as you're setting up this new year, as you're moving forward in this new year. Prudency danger coming and make space, make margins to make good decisions. They ask good questions, and they serve as a reminder that life, these questions serve as a reminder that life is indeed connected.

And you will make better decisions, and you will be better off. But one more caveat. As Christ followers, whether you're Christian or not today, here's what I want to say about us who are Christ followers, who are Jesus followers. As a follower of Jesus Christ, if you ask these questions consistently, not only will you have fewer regrets and better decisions, the people around you will be better off. Because salt always makes a difference.

Salt Church, you're the salt of the earth. They will be better off. And this is what love requires of us because we are reminded that it's not all about us. It's really not all about us. As Jesus said, love one another as I have loved.

Our decisions determine the direction and quality of our life. And we'll pick up this discussion next week with part two, the integrity question. But before we leave, I just want to give you some questions that you can kind of take home with you today. Okay. I told you this was going to be very practical.

I want to leave you with some things. I want to see these applications. Okay. And you want to take these. Okay.

And we're going to put these up online. You can go to our events page on Bible.com. You can go there and find us and you can go back to these questions and you can talk with your small groups about them and what they mean. Uh, but here, here's the first question.

Can you think of a decision that led to regret, that could have been avoided if you had either asked more questions or seriously considered questions someone else asked you? What makes the salesperson in your head so convinced? And we're going to talk about that next week, the salesperson in your head. You have a salesperson in your head. Why is it so convincing?

And why do you know better, but don't decide better? Right? And then on Proverbs 27, 12, have you ever seen trouble coming but kept moving in that direction anyway? Have you seen trouble coming and taking refuge? What made the difference?

So we'll pick up next week. Let's pray. Father, God, we invite you into our lives. We invite you into our situations. We invite you to help us.

Your Bible is a guide for practical life. It's a guide for better decision-making. It's a guide to give us the preferred future we want. But more than anything, it's the preferred future that you want. If we begin to ask these well-particulated questions that help guide us in our lives.

So, God, I pray today that this message would just carry with people as they walk out of this place and into the world and begin to think and begin to pray. And in their time of fasting, even as they're making decisions for the rest of the year, that you would just speak to them through this. But there's one more decision, Lord, that I think is supremely important. You know that that's the greatest decision. And I know it is.

And I know that's the absolute preferred future. And with heads bowed and eyes closed, I just ask today if there's somebody who hasn't made the decision of decisions today. The best decision that you will not have regret is that you make Jesus Lord of your life, that you confess, that you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth. And today, perhaps you're believing in your heart. The Holy Spirit has placed in your heart the reason you're here today is because it hasn't worked out for you.

But something's stirring your heart to know that there's God, there's something to him. There's Jesus that walked the earth, there's something to him. And that's the Holy Spirit speaking to you saying, come to me. He says, behold, I stand at the door of your heart and knock. And if you hear my voice and open that door, I will come in.

So perhaps today's the day to make a decision to walk with Jesus. The greatest decision that the fewest regrets. And you can say that by simply just praying this with me, believing it in your heart, confessing it with your mouth. You may already believe in your heart, but confess it with your mouth. Lord, I admit that I'm a sinner.

I admit that I'm far from you. And I confess that today, Lord. I confess it today. I believe that you are the Lord Jesus Christ who rose from the dead. I believe that you died on the cross for my sin and you gave me hope through your blood.

You have reconciled me to the Father. And today, I speak that. I confess that towards you, that you are God. Come into my heart. Come in.

And I make a decision for you today. In Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Hallelujah.

Hallelujah.