I think many leaders definitely and many people

in general

basically get crushed when they try to carry

someone else's load as if it were a burden.

I think a lot of it has to do with just how God

has wired us.

You know, we care for people. We have compassion

in our DNA.

We want to help people and that is good and we

should lean into that.

But obviously there is such a thing as too much

of a good thing.

Someone's desire to want to help can go too far

and you can get to a point where you feel like

you got to help everybody.

And I think the reason why many of us feel like

we're either overwhelmed,

we're tired, we're getting burned out in some

cases,

is because not only are we trying to share

burdens,

but we're also shouldering all kinds of

additional loads.

This is the Made to Advance podcast.

I'm your host, Brian Aulick.

We're here to inspire and equip you for your best

future.

Hey, welcome everybody. It is so good to be with

you today

and we are excited about this conversation today

on Made to Advance.

But before we get to it, I want to ask you a

favor.

Please rate, review, comment on Made to Advance.

It's going to help us get the word out.

It's going to help us bring on more great guests.

And you know what? Overall, it just encourages

our team.

We do have an upcoming episode where we're going

to tackle questions

that come from you, our beloved audience.

And so if you'd like to have one of your

questions considered for discussion,

I want to just encourage you to email us, madetoadvance@engeddychurch.com.

And if you shoot us a note, we're going to make a

great big old list of these questions.

And then on one day at least, we're just going to

sit and answer your deepest questions.

So that's the plan. Please reach out to us.

Today I have with me Josh Blum and Josh is Engeddy

Church's longtime executive pastor.

Josh knows how to play more instruments than I

can count.

And if you have an instrument that he doesn't

know how to play,

he will learn it if necessary. I found that out.

Josh loves competing at stuff.

He's done marathons, triathlons, Spartan races,

and even beatboxing competitions with me.

And so I'm really, really excited to have Josh

here today

and I'm excited about the conversation we're

going to have.

Josh, welcome to the show.

Hey, thanks for having me. You know, we got to do

that beatbox thing sometime.

That'd be pretty fun.

We do. It would be memorable. We've done it

before.

We have and it was memorable. So who knows?

Do you have anything you're training for right

now?

Well, I've got a bit of an injury that I'm

dealing with,

but when that is up and running, these Hi-Rox

races that are going on,

I know lots of people are doing them, but they're

just fun.

They combine a little bit of strength, a little

bit of running,

and that's kind of how I like to approach fitness,

you know, the strength side, the endurance side,

and they're just a fun atmosphere.

So they only happen maybe once a year, like races

like that,

but it's just something fun to train for.

You think you'll do it with, I know the first

plan was that you were supposed to do was with

Kevin.

Do you think you'll do it again with him or not?

If I can keep up with him, yeah, I would enjoy it.

Is he an absolute beast?

Yes.

So everybody, as we're talking about the

mysterious Kevin,

this is Kevin Rodrigo, who's been on the show a

couple of times.

So maybe in the show notes, we'll jot his episode,

but he was Navy SEAL for a long time.

I don't know.

Seems like he knows how to do some stuff.

Seems like he might have some endurance.

You got to throw him in like a deep pool of water

with weights around his, you know, like ankles

and see how he does.

I would be afraid of what happens when he comes

out of the pool and hunts me down.

So we'll see about that.

Well, I'm excited to have this conversation.

We were at a retreat, staff retreat, and had a

theme that we talked a little bit about,

which is talking about how we each are carrying

weight.

This carrying weight, sometimes that weight maybe

isn't weight we need to carry or we're supposed

to carry,

but we carry it and then it gets us real tired

because of how heavy it is.

And we were talking to leaders when this whole

subject came up.

And so I think probably a lot of our conversation

will have that theme to it.

But I'll tell you what, the more I think about

this topic, it applies to so many different

things.

It applies to work relationships, family

relationships, you name it.

But your role here at Enghedi as executive pastor,

a big part of what you're doing is having

conversations with our different team members a

lot.

And you get a first-hand kind of front row seat

on different kinds of weights that people are

carrying.

So I'd just be curious to hear when you think of

the weights our staff or our leaders carry, what

kinds of things do you see or hear about?

Yeah, it comes up a lot, both in the work context,

the church, but in life in general.

But I think a lot of it has to do with just how

God has wired us.

You know, we care for people.

We have compassion in our DNA.

We want to help people and that is good and we

should lean into that.

But obviously there is such a thing as too much

of a good thing.

And that's where I think you start to feel people

carrying others' burdens unnecessarily.

You know, in my role in particular, things that

we talk about, because again, I'm coaching

primarily church leaders.

So for them, they're carrying the spiritual

weight of those that they're interacting with.

When somebody is going through a really tough

time in their marriage, they're feeling that

weight.

Whether it be parenting or financial struggles.

The people that I coach directly are leading

within the church and leading departments.

So they carry the weight of their team's success.

They carry the weight of just the overall morale

and culture and the vibe.

And they want people to enjoy coming to work and

enjoy and find fulfillment in what they're doing.

And there's a lot of weight that comes to that if

you really think about it and really want to

strive to do well and work with excellence.

And oftentimes that can cause our minds to kind

of start to spiral at times,

but really feel the weight that other people are

carrying in unique ways.

And so this topic today is just, it's so good for

us to be talking about.

Yeah, and you think about all the things you just

shared that are really work-related.

And yeah, it's a church setting, but even leaders

I know in the marketplace are carrying all kinds

of,

almost like pastoral-level weight for employees

and staff.

But then there's all the personal weights people

carry.

You know, I've talked with families that have

kids who are struggling, kids who are locked up,

kids who are dealing with drug addictions, spouse

or marriage situations themselves.

I mean, so there's like all these work things and

then all the personal things.

One of the things that we talked about at the

retreat, and this is what we want to spend some

time on today,

is just really what things are we supposed to

carry and what not.

And we looked at a passage from Galatians 6.

I want to read it because I think it's a really,

really helpful passage, and then we'll kind of

unpack it a little bit.

So this is Galatians 6, and I'm going to read

verses 2 to 5, but verse 2 and verse 5 are

actually the key ones for today.

So the Apostle Paul's writing, he says, "Carry

each other's burdens, and in this way you will

fulfill the law of Christ.

If anyone thinks they are something when they are

not, they deceive themselves.

Each one should test their own actions.

Then they can take pride in themselves alone

without comparing themselves to someone else."

And finally, verse 5, "For each one should carry

their own load."

And what really is interesting to me about this

passage is it feels like there's like a

contradiction just straight up in the text.

Verse 1, "Carry each other's burdens."

Verse 5, "Each one should carry their own load."

And I was like, "Okay, which one is it?

Am I supposed to do my own thing, or is this like

I'm supposed to share it or what?"

But what was just absolutely eye-opening for me

is realizing that Paul is using two different

Greek words here very intentionally.

And so the word "burden" in verse 2 is "baras,"

and this is a crushing kind of weight, all right?

This is like, "I can't carry this alone," crisis-level

stuff.

The image that I think of when I think of a "baras"

level kind of weight of a "baras" level kind of

burden is if I've got a massive boulder in my

backpack.

I mean, just insane weight, and that sucker is

strapped on there, and it's like, "This is

painful, painfully heavy."

So that's "baras."

When you think of "baras," I mean, what comes to

mind for you on those kind of things?

Yeah, right. I mean, I'm thinking of like major

stuff.

You have like a death in the family, any kind of

just major crisis, major emergency, stuff that,

you know, just you're not planning for,

but it comes at you and usually shocks you,

usually surprises you, and that is just a heavy

weight that people carry, for sure.

Yeah, totally.

Like I even think of some of those examples I

just gave of personal weights.

If somebody hears, "Oh, my child got locked up,"

or something, I mean, that's, oh my goodness,

this is a huge deal.

Absolutely.

So that's the "baras" side.

Then there's a second Greek word used when it

says in verse 5, "Each one should carry their own

load," and that is the Greek word "phortion."

Phortion.

Yes.

If you were to... I imagine, you know, every

language has an accent.

Yeah.

If there was a Greek accent, what would you say?

I didn't go to seminary, so enlighten me with

what's the Greek accent?

How would you say that?

That's a good question, and because biblical

Greek is no longer spoken today...

You're gonna have to make it up.

We're gonna have to make it up.

I think that we should make whatever accent we

want up, and we can each... Hold on, let's get

each in our head here. Hold on.

Okay, I've got mine. Do you have yours?

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I was ready to go the minute

you said it.

Yeah, 'cause you brought the question up.

I did not think about it.

Okay, go for it.

Phortion.

Like it has like a command to it.

Phortion, like a little bit of Italian.

I like that.

I'm considering the region, you know.

I don't know. What came to your mind?

I was thinking more like, I'm not even sure if

this is French or not. I was like, "Phortion?"

Oh, here we go. Well, when you end with a

question, I think it's French. I think that's the

definition of it, so...

Well, here's what I feel like.

I feel like your pronunciation would be better

for the first one, because the first one is

crushing weight.

Okay, let's do that.

I'm like, "You got Baras," and I'm like, "Or you

could put a Phortion."

I think we're onto something.

Oh my gosh.

We're going to have to record this.

I'm taking my jacket off here today.

Justin's in the house.

I'm starting to sweat.

The humor level is high.

Oh, this is great.

All right, so Phortion.

And if the first one was this idea of like, "I am

carrying a boulder," I'm going to say the second

one is just my own personal backpack.

Yeah.

Very different image.

One is this massive boulder.

Another one is like the backpack I take to work

every day.

Normal life responsibility stuff.

So when I say that Phortion kind of a thing, that

backpack stuff, what's that normal stuff in your

mind?

Yeah, I think of it as like the things you're

trying to be about, the disciplines you have.

So your own spiritual growth, your own attitude,

the way that you kind of present yourself, your

obedience, your calling, the kind of things that...

You know, the kind of person you want to be about,

you're living out those things, and that's your

weight to carry to say, "Basically, I want to

model Christ.

I want to pursue Him, follow Him, and so that

responsibility is for me to bear."

Yeah.

And I think, yeah, it's kind of along those lines

with responsibility.

Yeah, that's good.

Two very different categories.

Mm-hmm.

So here's like, for me, here is the big insight

from this verse.

And this to me was like, you know, just kind of

an eye-opening thing.

I think many leaders, definitely, and many people

in general basically get crushed when they try to

carry someone else's load as if it were a burden.

Yeah.

I think what happens way too often is we have

that spirit of carry each other's burdens, but we

apply it to someone's load.

The load belongs to them.

Mm-hmm.

Your spiritual life is kind of your spiritual

life, but I think what happens is, and we'll talk

about motive a little bit later, but what happens

is I start like really carrying a burden for your

spiritual life, and really, that's your load to

carry, not my burden to share.

Mm-hmm.

That's good.

That's good.

And that's why many of us feel like we're either

overwhelmed, we're tired, we're getting burned

out in some cases, is because not only are we

trying to share burdens, but we're also shouldering

all kinds of additional loads.

And so I want our first-year leaders to kind of

think about that, and there's probably some

examples we could have on this.

Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, knowing we were going to talk about this

topic and just thinking about biblical examples

where you see this played out, there's a pretty

key one that people draw on often, but I just

think it really hits core to what this topic is

trying to get at.

In Exodus, Moses is leading the Israelites.

They're going through the desert.

Yeah.

And I mean, I was trying to remember, you may

know more, are we talking nearly a million people

here, right, that Moses is trying to lead?

800,000?

We're going to go with it.

And we're going to say...

Definitely north of seven figures.

Okay, perfect.

North of seven, good.

But that's a lot of people.

We can all agree.

It's a lot of...

Chat GPT right now.

Chat, we need your help.

Yeah.

Okay, so Exodus 18, Moses is leading these people.

Yeah.

And as you're leading, I mean, you're walking

through a desert, naturally, there are going to

be some issues that arise.

So I'm just going to read straight part of the

passage, and then we can talk a little bit of

some of the themes that we're seeing here.

But Exodus 18, starting in verse 13, it says, "The

next day Moses took his seat to serve as judge

for people, and they stood around him from

morning until evening."

Oh my goodness, I'm exhausted just reading that.

Yeah.

I can't imagine.

I come here from nine to five, so to speak, and I'm

like, I'm ready to go.

But him, morning to evening.

So then his father-in-law, which I think his name

is Jethro.

Jethro.

I did not get that part, but...

Great name.

Love that name.

Jethro.

We nicknamed Jared that early on.

Yeah, Jethro.

He's a Jethro.

We still call him Jethro periodically, actually.

Lucky guy.

So Jethro.

All right, so when his father-in-law, Jethro, saw

all that Moses was doing for the people, he said,

"What is this you are doing for the people?

Why do you alone sit as judge while all these

people stand around you from morning until

evening?"

Fair question.

Moses answers him, "Well, because the people,

they come to me, and they seek God's will.

And whenever they have a dispute, it's brought to

me, and I decide between the parties and inform

them of God's decrees and instructions."

And again, seven figures.

We got a million people coming to one guy.

If I had to guess, I'd probably think two to say

2.5 million.

Wow, okay.

Yeah, I mean, I'm just saying.

We'll see.

I may have done some research on this.

So wise.

Okay, so in response to that, Moses is saying, "Well,

because they come to me, and I gotta tell them

what God says."

So then Jethro says, "What you are doing is not

good."

I mean, he just shoots it straight.

"What you are doing is not good.

You and these people," so again, "You and these

people who come from you will only wear

yourselves out.

The work is too heavy for you.

You cannot handle it alone."

So you have Moses solving all of these people's

problems, and kind of a third party, so to speak,

comes in, says, "What are you doing?"

Kind of takes an assessment, and just his gut

feeling is, "This is not good.

You're going to get worn out.

The people are going to get worn out, and nobody's

going to be helping anybody after a while."

And I think you just have a theme here for Moses.

I mean, God called him to lead the people out of

Egypt, him and his brother Aaron, and that was

great.

But as now he's leading, he's feeling that weight.

It's going to burn him out.

It's going to burn the people out.

And his main reason for why he's doing it is

because people are coming to him.

There's just kind of this natural need and this

natural response that Moses has.

Again, people wired for care and compassion just

at their core.

And so he feels the responsibility and like, "Well,

I have to help him.

It must be my assignment.

This is part of God saying, 'Lead my people.'"

And Jethro says, "Yo, that's going to kill you if

you keep that up, man."

That's such a good example and so valuable to

have somebody like Jethro come into his life and

be able to look at it clearly and say, "Hey, this

is not good.

We need those people."

I want to spend a minute.

When we were first talking about this at staff, I

was really thinking about what some of those key

areas are that we tend to carry.

And here, Jethro's saying to Moses, "You need to—"

There's the big stuff, yes, but a lot of these

other things need to be distributed.

And so I want to just go through a few things I jotted

down when it comes to some of the burdens that we

carry that are not ours to carry.

And you've mentioned some of them already, to be

honest, but for the listener, I want to just kind

of make these clear.

One of them, we already said, is people's

spiritual outcomes.

And we think about that in ministry all the time.

Like, I need to be faithful to what God has

called me to as a pastor, but at the end of the

day, and it's frustrating in some ways, I can't

make anybody do anything.

And this applies especially, I think, even to

parents because parents really, really feel this.

Like, I am trying to do my very best to raise my

children in certain ways, but at the end of the

day, we do not control their spiritual outcomes.

Yeah, so good, especially when you have a view of

God's heart for the one.

You really do see individuals, and so at a pastor

level, you care about every single person and

their individual life and their spiritual walk.

Yeah, you can't care for everybody, you know? It's

the whole Moses thing. You have to let some of

that go.

Yeah, that's right. So that's one thing that we've

just got to recognize.

Like, I have some care about it, but I can't

control it.

People's emotional states, I feel like this is a

really big one.

We can, again, we can care about where people are

at emotionally, but I can't regulate their

emotions.

And we both know there are some people that tend

to get sad real easily or angry or they're really

pessimistic or fearful.

And man, I've just learned over the years, in the

old days, I don't know if you've had this much,

I wanted to kind of like cheer people up or take

the pessimist and try to say, "But look, here's

the sunny side of it," or whatever.

"Here's the silver lining." And I've just

realized, man, I mean, their emotions...

You know, somebody actually pushed back on this

when we were at the retreat.

They said, "Well, yeah, but people can do things

to make you mad."

And I go, "Yeah, that's true. People can do

something to make you mad or sad or whatever."

But I guess what struck me is thinking about it,

where you stay emotionally is your choice.

So yes, somebody can do something that really

frustrates you or even angers you or hurts you,

but are you going to live perpetually hurt, angry,

whatever?

So, were you going to say something?

Well, I just think so much of that comes to gauging

your thought life.

It's one thing to care and be with people, and

that's so good.

But if you find yourself feeling the weight of

that in the way that you keep thinking about it,

it causes you to worry. It causes you to have

fear. It stresses you out.

That's a sign that you might be carrying

something that's not yours.

But to get in there with somebody, to care for

them, to love on them,

but then at the end of the day, have a peace

about walking away and kind of going to your next

thing,

I think that's where you notice the healthy side

of compassion and really caring for somebody.

And a sign that maybe if that just lingers with

you and now you become the one with the burden

that's not yours,

that might be the sign that you're kind of overextending

there.

Yeah, that's good. That's really good.

You already kind of got at this with the example

from Moses, but every problem you hear about,

urgency does not equal calling.

And you and I both hear problems that people are

feeling like, "Oh my goodness, this is a big deal."

Sometimes it is, but every big deal or something

that people feel is urgent doesn't translate to,

"That is my problem to solve."

Fourth thing I wrote down was people's opinions

of us.

Oh, this one's good.

Yeah, I mean, this is to me one I love to try to

control and manage,

and I think over years now I've gotten better at

just releasing this.

But at the end of the day, we can be high-integrity

people.

We can do our very best to serve people, and yet

even then we just can't make people think certain

things.

Has this been something like, do you feel like it's

easy for you to not worry about people's opinions,

or do you feel like, "No, that's something I have

to think about and not let it take too big of a

role"?

Oh, yeah. No, I don't know what it was.

Something in just my wiring childhood, whatever

it is, I feel this one a lot.

Because people do matter to me, I love connecting

with them.

I love when people are having a good time and

they're interacting well.

Like what you were saying before, you want people

to be positive and happy,

especially in their opinion of me.

That is a really good reminder to just keep in

that headspace of,

"I can't control what other people are thinking.

I can't carry that weight."

I think that's a really good one.

Yeah, that's a burden that is not supposed to be,

or a load, I should say, that's not supposed to

be on our backs.

Then the last thing I just noted here was just

someone else's approach to life or ministry.

And I put this down because I think sometimes you

see people doing something that's different than

how you would do it.

Like loading a dishwasher?

Yeah, he has a great example.

Oh my gosh, that gets me every time.

We're 28 years in and we're still figuring that

one out, man.

But you just... and you have a view.

We all think our way is the best.

We all think our way is the most effective.

And so it's really tempting to want to have this,

"Oh man, I need to fix this. I need to straighten

them out. I need to coach them."

And at the end of the day, they're different than

you, which means they're going to do it

differently than you.

And it's just one of those things I have to

release.

Even between us, we talk about this regularly on

any given issue, question, whatever.

We talk a lot about ministry. We have many

similar views, but we differ all the time on

things.

And we just have to be at peace with like, there

are times where you're going to say, "Hey, that's

how Brian would do it. It's not how I would do it."

But that's his thing to... that's kind of his

load.

And there are times when you're doing something

and I'm like, "Well, I'd probably do it

differently."

But again, that's your load and I don't want to

like shoulder that myself.

So I think that's good.

I think that one of the... the deeper question,

all this to me, when we're trying to talk about

where are we supposed to carry each other's

burdens and share loads,

is digging deeper in our own hearts and asking

why do we tend to take on loads that are not ours

to carry?

Why do we tend to say, "Hey, I know that's your

backpack, but maybe I could put it on."

And I think that's really a deeper question for

reflection that we could spend some time on.

Yeah. I mean, it's a great question. And honestly,

I would guess most people don't ask that question.

By default, people just do.

But especially to that last point that you

mentioned about just different approaches to

doing things.

I think one of the big reasons is people just

genuinely want to help.

Like when I think about times where I've stepped

in to maybe tell somebody how I would do

something,

it genuinely comes from a place of I see them

either struggling or see like, "Hey, that could

be better."

Or that you could do that faster. I mean, I'm a

major efficiency guy, so I often have to throttle

this back.

But it comes from a place of genuinely wanting to

help.

However, I do think that someone's desire to want

to help can go too far.

And you can get to a point where you feel like

you've got to help everybody.

And that everybody's problems and situations are

dependent upon you.

And then you get a little bit of that like

Messiah complex thing where you feel like you're

the Savior that everybody needs.

And it's just not like that. So I think that

comes from a good place initially,

but we just got to be careful that that doesn't

get out of control.

I think pride, of course, is just woven

throughout this.

Wanting our significance, believing just that we're

better in some ways.

Again, to that last point of our way is better,

that's kind of rooted in pride at some level.

Sort of related, I would say this whole feeling

that we have of wanting to be needed.

Having purpose, having a place.

I bet Moses loved the fact that people were

coming to him saying, "Hey, I got a problem."

He's like, "Of course you got a problem. You come

to Moses."

Moses was Italian.

It always comes back to him.

It is a global podcast.

It is. We got to get some other cultures in on

this.

But I think there is a level that Moses is

feeling and that we all feel of it is nice to be

needed.

To be that person that people come to and/or if

you try to seek it out yourself.

And then the last one, I think, again, in just

the day-to-day situations where we're trying to

help people,

we're trying to shoulder their emotion, their

burden, I think we don't want to disappoint them.

If someone comes up to me and says, "Hey, I got

this thing I'm dealing with," I don't want to let

them down.

I want to help. I want to give my perspective. I

want to encourage them, whatever it may be.

And I don't want them to be disappointed.

I don't want to disappoint myself.

And if I feel like I didn't measure up to what

they needed or I could have done more.

So there is a little bit of that disappointment

factor that you're trying to avoid.

So, yeah, I mean, I'm sure there's more reasons

than that, but those are just a few that came to

my mind at first.

That's so good.

And so I'm just going to recap what you said,

because I think for those who are listening right

now,

just thinking about what's--if you find yourself

picking up some of those loads we talked about

earlier

that really are not yours to carry, they're that

person's backpack to carry.

What are some of those needs?

And, again, I think you said on the good side,

help, but that can sometimes turn into Messiah

complex,

so kind of almost an over-desire to help.

Pride, a desire to feel needed or important or

valuable,

and then finally fear of disappointing either

that person or yourself.

So those are the different reasons.

Now, I'll tell you, Josh, when we were at the

retreat,

it wasn't until this happens when you're teaching

on stuff and all that,

when we were going through all these things, and

we could tell our staff was connecting,

it was helpful, all that.

I realized afterward there was one key thing I

missed.

This is sort of like an opportunity to rectify

that,

because the thing I realized that we missed when

we were talking about it,

it was such a great opportunity to point back to

Jesus

and really recognize that all the things you just

talked about

are going to continually be losing battles unless

and until we have Christ in our lives

in ever-increasing kind of ways.

So I'm going to just go through exactly what you

just said.

I thought, okay, if I'm tempted to have a Messiah

complex

where I just have to help that person,

I'm always going to be tempted to be a Messiah

unless I have a greater Messiah,

and I recognize He is the Savior, He is the one

who's going to be the ultimate rescuer.

That's not my job.

I thought about the pride one, and we all deal

with pride of, you know, my way is the best way.

And I thought, man, once I know that Jesus had to

die on a cross

because my brokenness and yours is that severe

and that significant,

there's not a lot of room left for pride at that

point.

The cross is inherently a humbling thing when you

come to know Jesus,

so I feel like to deal with that, we need Jesus.

The whole idea of feeling needed and valuable,

you know, we're always--I think we're always

going to be trying to prove

that we're valuable through external means

until we really come home to our value comes in

being beloved children of God.

Yeah. So good.

We'll just constantly be like, "But look at this.

This is why I'm important.

This accomplishment is why I'm important. Look at

how my kids turned out."

And again, until in Christ we know I'm God's son

or God's daughter,

we're still going to be trying to prove it,

basically.

And then the last thing you said was

disappointing ourselves and others,

and this one I actually think makes us have to go

one even level deeper than that

because I'm like--to me at least, I think,

why are we so afraid of disappointing ourselves

or somebody else?

And ultimately it's because I feel like my

identity is in what either I think of myself

or what you think of me instead of my identity

being in Christ.

And so I guess I wanted to bring all those things

up to really highlight for those who are

listening,

if you want to overcome some of these internal

things

that are prompting you to take on people's loads,

man, you need to go to Jesus in ever, ever deepening

ways.

Yeah, that is so good. And again, we had talked

about it.

People don't ask themselves enough the why of how

they're acting,

but what you're getting at is ultimately the

thing I think people just need to go to the Lord

with

and just go deep on that stuff.

Coming back to one's identity is huge.

And so many things in life, like you said, we're

so distracted and kind of doing our own thing,

and if we would just come back to the root of who

we are in Christ,

man, it's just helpful. It doesn't fix everything.

Not like everything goes away,

but in processing some of the why that we're

doing things

and to just know who we are in Christ, it changes

everything.

So I think that's so good.

The last thing that I had thought about just this

topic in general

is you could actually flip this.

We've been talking a lot about how we carry other

people's burdens,

but I don't know, just started thinking about the

reverse of that,

like us giving our burdens to other people when

we shouldn't be.

The things that are ours to carry, when can we

sometimes pass that off to somebody else

or try to be like, "Oh, that's not for me. That's

for somebody else,"

when really, "That is for me, but I'm just gonna

give it."

So yeah, what do you think about that?

That's the next level uncomfortable question is

what I think that is.

Kind of the matrix of carrying burdens. You're

down to that next level.

Well, it's funny 'cause it feels really good to

say, virtuous even,

but what burdens of somebody else, or excuse me,

what loads, to stay with the biblical terminology,

what loads from somebody else am I taking on

because I'm just so benevolent

and I care so much and all that, but...

My alarm is going off on my phone.

[laughter]

That has never happened.

What do you say, Justin? Do we keep it in the

broadcast?

I said keep it.

Let's keep it.

Justin says keep it. All right. It's never

happened.

You know, it turns out that even after you

silence your phone, the alarm...

Alarm still works.

The alarm door still works.

[laughter]

Can't snooze an alarm.

Oh my goodness. Well, I just had a learning.

There you go. I love it.

Yeah, so I think that, yeah, it's funny because

it almost feels virtuous

to be like, "Oh, what am I carrying that I

shouldn't be?"

But it's a little bit more challenging to ask the

question,

"What am I trying to give away that I should be

carrying?"

Yeah, yeah. And a lot of times not even knowing

that you're doing it.

Totally, totally. So we'll see if we can come up

with some examples here.

I've thought a little bit about this question

already,

and one of the things that I've felt like is a

really helpful question to ask

is to even discern what an area might be is where

am I tempted

to just place blame on people?

Like any time I'm tempted to say, "Oh, I just

feel this because that person did--

Oh, I'm not doing this because blah, blah, blah.

Oh, the situation is the way it is in my life,"

because any time that kind of verbiage is coming

up, sort of blame verbiage--

we're going all the way back to the Garden of

Eden, Genesis 3 here.

It's like, "Oh, it's because of the woman."

Any time that language is coming up, I feel like

we possibly--

not guaranteed, but possibly--are trying to take

off our backpack

that God gave us to carry and say, "Maybe you

could take some of this."

So I'll give a couple examples. I'd love to hear

from you.

I'll start maybe with just a couple.

One is our own emotional state and our own

challenges that we're feeling,

problems that cause certain emotions in us.

I think we talked about this earlier, that if

somebody has an experience

that causes me to feel angry, I need to own my

emotional state for myself.

And I think what happens is sometimes people get

locked into a certain pattern.

Let's say I'm angry or I'm bitter, and the reason

why is because--

well, of course, because Josh da-da-da-da-da-da.

Yeah, Josh did this again or whatever.

Well, you can pull that card once or twice, but

after that,

you've got to start doing some work on maybe

where you're passing the buck

to somebody else.

Yeah, I would say I see this played out most in

probably marriages

or at least people you are really close to,

when you feel like, "Oh, I can just vent with

somebody."

"I can just vent with somebody" is kind of code

language for

"I can just dump my emotions onto someone else

and expect them to

empathize with me and carry that for me."

We've just got to be careful of what we're doing.

It's good to vent, it's good to process and all

that,

but if we do that in a way where we expect

something back or we expect that

they're going to carry that or do something for

it,

that's where we've got to be real careful.

Yeah, they're going to make us feel better.

Yeah, so I think that's one that we can tend to--again,

"I'm just feeling this," or "I'm just angry," or

"I'm just this because of so-and-so."

One of our staff members gave us that I thought

was really good

was he talked about how we can sometimes--you

mentioned our own calling

is the backpack God has given us to wear.

We've got to figure out, based on our wiring and

how we're hearing from the Holy Spirit,

we've got to figure out where God's leading us.

And he said earlier in his leadership journey, he

would look to bosses, coaches, mentors,

almost to tell him what his calling was.

And on the one hand, I thought, "Man, it's so

cool that you have people speaking into your life."

But I thought that was a really insightful

observation where,

"Man, your calling from God is yours to hear from

God.

That is squarely in your backpack, and other

people can maybe help you discern

what's in your backpack and say, 'Hey, it feels

like you've got some gifting here or there.'"

But you can't outsource discernment for your

calling.

I can't say, "Hey, Josh, can you put on the

backpack for God's calling on my life?"

No. You can say, "Brian, I see this in you." That's

helpful.

But ultimately, it's me and the Lord that have to

figure out what my calling is.

So those are a couple that come to my mind.

Anything come to your mind on this one?

Yeah, that last one I would say definitely to our

younger listeners.

My wife is a high school teacher, and I would say

that comes up a lot.

High schoolers, especially juniors and seniors,

are asking big questions about their future.

And there are some that are very--owning it, and

they're going after it,

and some that really are just waiting for people

to tell them what to do.

And I think that's a really good one.

One that I jotted down, just the idea of owning

your own spiritual development.

Especially we live in a church world, a ministry

context, and it can be easy,

whether it's ministry or in your job or in other

places too, where you show up

and you expect others to do the work for you.

Or you come like, "Oh, I go to church, and so

that checks the box."

Or, "I expect my biblical knowledge comes from

the teaching on Sundays,

so you're responsible for what I know because of

what you said."

And yeah, that's not how it works. You can't--

Yeah, that's a really good one, man. Particularly

as somebody gets further along in their journey.

We use this terminology sometimes in the church

that we want to help people become self-feeders.

And you hear people be like, about churches, like,

"Oh, I just didn't feel fed.

They just weren't feeding me."

And I don't know. I'm like, "Were they preaching

the Bible?"

And if you're like two, three, five years into

following Jesus,

I think you're exactly right.

Not that good biblical preaching is unimportant.

It is important.

But at some point, you got to migrate to becoming

a self-feeder with the Word of God.

You got a few more?

Yeah, I remember once--well, we were talking. I

may be quoting you on this one, okay?

Probably. You do it all the time.

[laughter]

I remember that you were talking about working

with somebody about getting something that was

supposed to get done around in Getty.

And they said, "Well, I emailed this person two

weeks ago, and I just haven't heard back."

And they were coming to you like, "So, what do

you want me to do?"

And as I recall it, I think you kind of did some

coaching in that moment of saying,

"Hey, you may have emailed them two weeks back,

and that's awesome.

But the ultimate--getting across the finish line

with this, completing the task, that's still, as

the leader, that's like your backpack."

And so you were saying, "Well, what have you done

since the email?

Have you texted them? Have you called them? Have

you--" this kind of thing.

So I think sometimes we want to outsource our job

responsibilities to somebody else.

I did my part, and now, hey, it's on them. Well,

maybe, maybe not.

Job satisfaction. I think that we want our

coaches and bosses and all that to be really good,

but ultimately, your boss is not responsible to

make you happy with your job.

And flip side, the boss, at the same, can't be

complaining about the people, saying,

"Culture is the way it is because these are the

people that we have."

Like, nah, that doesn't work that way either.

That's right. Yeah, it does. That's a good one.

That's good.

It does go both ways, because you're right.

If you're the leader and you're complaining about

whatever, the organization or its morale or its

culture,

you're the leader. Yeah, exactly. That's on you.

It's so funny. People talk about when they start

a new job as a leader,

or particularly when they start a new job, and

let's say they inherit a culture,

and for a little bit of time, you can say, "Oh,

my predecessor," or "This is what I came into."

But there's some number of years that pass when

finally it's like, people like to joke,

"Hey, you look around and you realize any

strengths in this place and any problems,

the buck stops with you. There's no more like, 'Well,

this is what it was like when I got here.'"

It's all that extreme ownership. This whole

theory is just that ownership,

owning what you can own, and setting the tone.

Yeah, I think it's good.

Yeah. Referencing the book, Extreme Ownership, by?

Jaco. Is that right? Jaco Willink?

Yeah, I don't know how to say it. What is his

last name? Willink?

Willink, I think. Yeah. Great book. Would you

recommend it?

Oh, yeah. Yeah? I think.

If there's any parts in there that are not good,

I don't recommend those.

(Laughter)

It's been a minute since I've read that one.

I think it's pretty straight up. I think so.

I think it is. Yeah, good combat scenes. I don't

think there's anything inappropriate.

But if there is, Josh doesn't recommend those

parts.

Let the record show.

Yeah, but great book on it. We took our team

through that book of just saying,

"Hey, we're done with--not that we really had a

problem with that,

but this is kind of one of those muscles you've

got to hit."

Again, back to Genesis 3, Adam blaming Eve.

We have this broken instinct in us to say, "My

mistakes are her fault or his fault."

And so, extreme ownership. And even this last one,

our financial situations,

I think there are a lot of people who blame the

company they're at

for where they're at financially. They blame the

government.

They blame this. They blame that.

What always just challenges me is when you see

people who have, like,

every reason to make excuses for where they're at

financially,

and they go, "No, I'm just going to change it."

And we have somebody who's part of our church

that she grew up,

you know, not in a particularly high-income or

big education-y kind of family,

but she said, "This is going to change."

And her family is now totally broken out of that.

I just think that's really cool.

That is cool.

Yeah. So, all just good examples of where we can

tend to try to say,

"Oh, it's their fault."

Right.

And they may be a contributor, but it's still our

backpack.

Yeah, that's good.

Well, I want to just close with what we started

with.

Started with the Bible, want to kind of end with

the Bible.

Galatians 6 to carry each other's burdens.

Galatians 6, 5, each one should carry their own

load.

And I just want to encourage everyone who's

listening

to really think about what loads you might be

carrying

that aren't yours to carry.

And if you discern that you are carrying some

loads that really don't belong to you,

I want to encourage you to release those.

Release those.

The interesting thing is that as you release

loads that aren't yours to carry,

you really get happier.

I mean, you just walk with some lightness about

you.

You don't feel like, "Oh, my goodness, I'm

constantly in energy depletion mode.

I'm constantly worrying about this person,"

because you're like,

"You know what their load is? Their load."

There's also, and this actually hits on a little

bit of a book

that you had put me onto,

but when we release trying to carry somebody else's

load,

it actually can benefit them.

We didn't plan on talking about this, but just

any reaction on actually,

if I release, if I let you carry your own load,

how does that affect you?

What do you think? You want to go there or not?

Thoughts on that? I mean, in the end, it's a

benefit.

I think it only empowers people to make their own

decisions,

to process their own feelings, to know how to

appropriately deal with

their challenge, their situation, their emotion,

whatever it may be.

By you coming in and swooping in and saving them

every time,

thinking I'm doing them a favor, you're not

really teaching them anything.

They're not learning. They're just going to

continue in the same problem.

Sometimes you just got to let people figure it

out and get through it

so that they're better for it on the other side.

Yeah, that's good. I would think too,

and I think we've probably both experienced this,

it changes the nature of your relationship too.

If your relationship dynamic is always you're

trying to fix me,

save me, rescue me, help me, if I'm on the other

side of that,

I feel that.

Now, just a quick caveat, parents, we have to do

this.

We have to figure out where are those key places

we're speaking in, obviously.

But if you're a grown adult with other adults

and the nature of your relationship is always,

"Oh, that person's trying to help me fix me,"

that is not--I don't know if that's the kind of

relationship

I want to be in indefinitely.

So I feel like if we pull that out of it,

it actually maybe makes us have a better

relationship.

Yeah, yeah, totally.

I think that's a good word, though, just that

idea of

so long as we are carrying burdens for people

that belong to them,

perhaps out of a good-hearted motive,

we're actually preventing them from developing

and maturing

the way that they're meant to mature.

And it feels like it's helping, in the long term,

it's hurting

because that person needs to learn to do all the

things you just said.

They need to learn to discern, they need to learn

to carry their own load,

they need to figure out how they're going to

process their own emotions,

they need to be able to operate without

constantly having to lean on other people

to navigate the daily strains and stresses of

life.

So it's counterintuitive.

Man, it's counterintuitive to go, "Yeah, I can

let that go,"

and believe that even if it feels like it's going

to be harder for them initially,

it's going to be better for them over the long

haul.

So this has been a good conversation.

Any final words or thoughts that come to mind on

this whole subject

of sharing burdens but ultimately carrying our

own load?

Yeah, I mean we kind of got at it from different

angles,

but it leads to good things, but, man, that first

step is not easy.

I mean you are in a pattern, you're in a rhythm,

you're wired maybe a certain way.

Again, back to Moses, I'm sure part of it for

Moses was really hard

to tell that first person, "You're not my problem."

I mean he wouldn't say it that way, but you think

about all the Israelites

coming to him, think about being the first person

that Moses is like,

"Okay, actually I'm not going to answer you."

That person is really going to be hurt.

They're going to be like, "Wait, what? You answer

everybody's questions.

Why not me?"

There is going to be a change, and that's really

hard.

There's kind of like a rip the band-aid moment

where you've got to make a decision,

kind of draw a line in the sand and say, "All

right, moving forward,

this is how I want to help care for people but in

a healthy way

and carry my burden, not others, that's theirs to

carry."

That first little bit, I mean it's really hard,

and it's not going to feel good,

and you're going to quickly, especially for some

wired to be more people-pleasing,

you're going to want to be like, "This is easier

if I just keep doing this."

And for Moses, the easy thing to do would have

been just keep doing what you're doing,

but those first few conversations for him had to

be hard, but so worth it.

You've got to do it. You've got to figure that

out, pray through that.

It's good to have friends, counsel, be processing

this with other people

because you're going to need the support.

You're going to need people to help you identify

maybe some of those bad habits you have

so that you can start to move forward in a

healthy way.

Yeah, that's a really, really good word.

I'm glad you mentioned the people-pleasing thing

because for those of us who are prone

to people-pleasing, this gets even harder because

you're just so like,

"Oh, I don't want them to be disappointed, and I

don't want them to be hurt,"

and all those kinds of things. That's really good.

Yeah, I think that the only thing that came to my

mind as we kind of wrap

is I was just thinking about different times I

have released things,

and it's really made--and this may be a

particular thing to ministry--

but you carry so much, you see so much pain that

people are dealing with,

and if I tried to not only just share the burdens

with people,

but if I try to carry their loads too, man, it's

just really hard to maintain joy.

God has called us to be joyful people, and I

think when I started early in ministry learning--

and it was a hard learning--when I started

learning I can't fix it all,

it's not even my job to fix it all. I could

really step into the space

where I'm encouraging someone, I'm praying for

them, but I'm able to then release it

and say, "Now that's your burden to carry with

the Lord," and I can have joy

when I go home at night and I'm with my family. I

don't still have your backpack on,

so to speak, and I think that's a really, really

important thing,

and it's a hard thing to do. That's where I'm so

glad for our faith in Jesus,

because it really lets me say, "Okay, this is a

legit burden,

this is a legit load, but again, Jesus is going

to shoulder it with them.

His yoke is the easy one, and I'm not the one

that's called to share it in the same way He is."

Well, it has been good to hang out with you today

and talk about this subject.

I hope it's encouraging to people. Oh, yeah.

Always a pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, thanks for coming in, and we'll have to do

it again. Sounds good.

Start working on a big topic that you're just

like, "We have to do a podcast on this."

Oh, it's going to be huge. It's going to be huge.

And I think we should use even more languages

next time. What do you say?

You know I'm down for accents. Yeah, I was going

to say accents is a better way to put it.

There have been no languages, and we've probably

only insulted--

All English. We've actually insulted the culture.

We've insulted one language. They're all like, "You

didn't build a bridge. You broke it."

Yeah, the Greek-speaking culture. But we had fun

doing it.

We did. It was a good time.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this conversation today,

and it's been helpful to you. It's been

encouraging.

And if that is the case, please do rate and

review Made to Advance.

This has been a production of Engedi Church. We've

got more great conversations on the way.

And so until next time, just know God made you to

advance.