Andy Mason (00:01.048)
Hey, do you want to level up? I'm going to unpack for you truth about the self-help industry growth and what you may not know of its roots. So I'm Andy Mason. Welcome to the Heaven and Business podcast, where we help you navigate the messy intersection of faith, family and business. And just recently, I got to go to a fantastic Christian self-help program. But my question is, is it rooted and grounded in Christ or
is that a bunch of systems independent and would run independent of him. So it got me stirring and thinking because the world is obsessed with self help. Did you know it's a 50 billion dollar industry growing and it's 12 billion dollars in the United States? You'd think for that amount of self help, surely we would have been better by now. Maybe not. So it just got me stirring. Is where where is the root of this?
Do I wanna level up? Yes, I wanna grow. Actually, I feel a responsibility to steward it, but there's some flaws in this if I don't get it right. So what I did is I was pondering and processing this and went back to the beginning. I read back in Genesis chapter one, in the beginning, God created the world. You were made in the image and the likeness of God. And then it says, he blessed them.
affirmation and validation before they did anything. And then he gave them an assignment. And where I have a disconnection from God, I jumped straight to assignment, level up, get better, do more, do better. But if it's absent of connection with the Father, nothing satisfies. So I was looking at this and I suddenly stumbled on Genesis chapter three. Did you know that the first ever self help
program was in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve in the garden. They have perfect access, perfect union with God and with one another. They've got assignment. They've been blessed. Their identities are anchored and rooted in their relationship with God. But the serpent comes, the first coach, the first self-help life coach comes and says, do you want to be better? Do you want to be more? Do you want to level up? Well, here's how.
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because you're not enough as you are. You're not enough in your workplace. You're not enough in your marriage. You're not enough in your fitness and in your finance. You need to do better. So here it is, cause God's, He's not the one that's helping you. He's way too slow and He's hiding things from you. So what you need to do is come over here and eat of the fruit of the knowledge, of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and you will then,
be like God, it's a shortcut. And Adam failed to reconnect and check in with God, failed to say, hey, is this true? Failed to say, hey, you made me. He actually committed treason, bypassed God and tried to obtain, do better, level up, be more without God. The original sin wasn't come and be a nefarious and let's do Dr. Evil together and take over the planet.
He already had the planet. It was all about do it independent of your relationship with God. Independence of submission, independent of stewarding something that is not mine. Independent on my own by myself, it's classic four year old. Me, myself and my own. I've referred to Oswald Chambers, he wrote,
my utmost for your highest. And he says this, sin is way more than evil or morally wrong. At the core of it is the dispensation or the claim to my life, my way. That was the fundamental problem. Here's the lie. You can become who you were made to be by doing it yourself. You will never be satisfied.
Why? Because you are made to have relationship with God. Adam is in a perfect garden. Everything's incredible, union with God. And yet he tries to obtain something of himself. No surrender, no stewardship, no sacrifice. It's by me, on my ways, on my term, with my version of success. And what do we get? We get a problem.
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So why is that such a problem? It's because Adam was already made in the image and the likeness of God. You are already perfect and complete and lacking nothing. He was already blessed, affirmed and validated. He already had an assignment. He was given purpose, but he believed lies that you are never enough. You're not enough. You need to do more and be more, become more, give more.
be skinnier, be fatter, be whiter, be thinner, all of these things. That is the lies of the devil. No, you already are. You already are more than enough. And actually God delights in taking the foolish things of the world, the weak things of the world, the ignoble things of the world, to shame that which is strong and wise and looks great. Why? That no flesh would glory in his presence.
because the glory of God will only rest on that which is holy and true, which is not you and me. I can only do that in Christ. So let's come back, I'm jumping ahead of myself. This is the choice today. I can have self-help, independent, or I can surrender, listen, follow, and grow. It's not the absence of discipline and discipleship and focus and systems, it's just that systems serve a relationship. And the moment that I leave that relationship,
yielded to Him is the moment that I start to drift into my life, my way, my body, my fitness. It goes on and on. So original design, let's jump into this. What was it? Genesis 1 28, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. What is that? What does even that look like? Well, firstly, you're made like God. That's wild.
You have the creative power in you and it is God who gives you the power to create. But when He makes you increase, it adds no sorrow. When I do it of myself, it always produces heartache, brokenness, dysfunction and disconnection. I grow in my finances, but I leave my family behind. I grow in my spirituality and then I run off the cliff because it feeds my ego. Anything that is not submitted and yielded to a walk with God.
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Jesus himself put it this way, of myself, I can do nothing. What does that mean? Does that mean he couldn't do anything? No, he's actually far better than you and I. He says, of myself, of my independent self, I choose to do nothing. I do nothing independent of what I see and hear the Father do. Does that mean he woke up every morning and got instructions from God? No.
I believe actually he heard, he saw, he sensed, he felt, he'd been trained in the ways of God to know the voice of God. So he lived in this real time union with God. That's what we see in the scripture. So again, I'm jumping ahead of myself. What does this even mean? What is the assignment? Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it. You are already blessed. You are already affirmed and have your identity rooted and grounded in Christ. Jump onto lay.
Hitlin's content resources and books at healing the orphan spirit. Why? Because you believe the lie that you're separated, broken, never enough. No, when you're reconnected in Christ, you're a new creation. You're plugged in again. You're now abiding into a life force that flows from within you, Christ in me, the hope of glory. That's this whole plan. I heard it this Sunday when I was in a church in Dallas, it talks about number one,
I confess my sins to God who is faithful and just to forgive me and cleanse me from all unrighteousness, but I also need to confess my faults to one another and then I will be healed. So I've got this union with God and this right relationship with others. Jesus put this in John 17. This is eternal life. It's not independent of God. Eternal life is to know God, to actually experience.
experientially walk with Him. We see that in the life of Brother Lawrence in the 1600s. He wrote about this, practicing the presence of God. This is not something new, people. I get to level up, how? By walking deeper and deeper in my union with God. So what is your assignment? What does it even look like? Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Number one, be fruitful. Develop the character and the capacity on the inside of you.
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James puts it this way, add to your faith, hope, love, perseverance, kindness, goodness. I'm working on this internal world, so be fruitful, multiply, take what's in here and expand it and cause it to fill in Adam's day, it was the garden before he got kicked out. So I'm causing what's in me to expand in and around me, so it's influencing outside of me. And what's the next thing? To reproduce it, to expand it.
and then to subdue, so be fruitful, multiply, the earth and subdue it or have dominion. It's not dominion in the way that you and I might think to control something and to shut it down. No, it's dominion in the sense of the way that Jesus did it, which is to lay your life down and cause things to thrive and flourish all around you. So I grow capacity.
I expand that to the world outside me, and then I go beyond that and make chaos into something beautiful. I love it how Reverend Timothy Keller put it, God made the world not as a warrior who digs a trench, but as an artist who creates a masterpiece. And here's the shortcut, it's impossible. You cannot do this by yourself. What? But how do you even do this? Because of your union with God.
John 15 abide in me and my words abide in you. Obey me, obey me and walk in my ways and you will produce fruit that remains that last. Physical fitness is of some value, but spiritual fitness, union with God is so much better and so much more. Does that mean I allow myself to turn into a fat, frumpy, fluffy old man? No, I discipline myself.
knowing that if I'm gonna teach others, I don't want to disqualify myself, but I know that my union with God is first, is the first priority, and everything else comes secondary to that, because that's the life force within me. Jesus taught us to pray this way, our Father who art in heaven, hallow be your name. What's he saying? My source of supply is not independent. It's not some good book or program or system or structure.
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My first calling is not to accomplish something, to do something. It's to be with the Father. It comes out of that place. Why do you think it was in the call of the day? Because in the Hebrew calendar, the day starts and there was an evening and there was a morning and it was the first day. When's he walking with God? In the call of the day. It's the first part of the day in their culture. Now for you and I, I don't know what that is for you. For me, it has to be in my day.
Cause that anchors me, I'll wake up, God, what do want me to know today? How do I lock in on you? How do I flow from, I'm already made in your image and likeness, I'm already blessed, highly favored, affirmed and validated. What's your assignment for me today? Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it. What do we want? What piece of chaos do we wanna make beautiful today? What broken thing is my invitation to fix?
What challenge is actually an opportunity to grow and to really hear the voices and the strategy of God to make things beautiful. So we did a breakdown. Adam didn't fall because he lacked ability. He failed because he chose independence. I will do it my way. That is broken, broken, broken. You fast forward, Moses and the Israelites. Moses knew
the ways of God, Israel just knew the acts. They didn't want to have a union with God. They wanted to be independent. And they said, Moses, just give us the system. You go God, and then tell us what to do. People, it's so much more than that. And Jesus modeled something different. in a broken system, Adam was in a perfect garden, in a perfect place, perfect rhythms, perfect union with God.
and yet he screwed up real bad. You and I, we get to model what Jesus came. Here's the cool thing. Jesus came into a world that was broken, dysfunctional, a bunch of Israelites in a land under Roman occupation. It was brutal, it was harsh, it was dry, but he modeled all of these things. John 5, of myself, I can do nothing. That's wild. The creator of the universe,
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inhabits the earth in bodily form, he came and dwelt among us. And he says of myself, I choose to do nothing independently. I only do what I see the Father doing. I'm living from my union, the word of God, wise counsel, I'm walking his ways that I may know him. And he grew up into the fullness of the stature of measure that God has in him. It says in the Bible that he grew
in wisdom and in his stature and favour with God and with man. So that's being fruitful and multiply. That's the piece on the inside of That's Me, to fill the earth subdued. He expanded it by bringing a kingdom and then he released a kingdom that's going way beyond his lifetime. But he did it, how? Not by conquering. We wanted him to conquer. We wanted him to bring the smack down and destroy the Romans, and fix the woman-man problem, take care of the slave problem.
He didn't, he laid it down, he laid his life down and released a kingdom now that you and I don't have a set of rules. That's kind of like, man, wouldn't it be so easy? No, because we wouldn't have relationship. He released the Holy Spirit on the inside of us to teach us and show us and guide us, comfort us and lead us into all truth. Where is that in a book? Well, you find it in the whole book, it's called the Bible.
and Jesus modeled what it looks like. So where am I with that? Jesus restored the original mandate and he modeled, tend and keep. Do you know that? Gets to the end of his life. He says to the father, I have kept those, all of those that you have placed into my care. Who's got placed into your care? Is it possible? It's people more than things, more than toys, more than play.
more than more houses and more businesses or more people. That's what it is, how do I serve better? So what changed because of Jesus? Matthew 28, 18, all authority, heaven on earth was restored. So what Adam messed up, Jesus restored, why? Because he lived in perfect union with the Father. He restored the authority and he restored the intimacy, the union so that you and I get to do the same.
Andy Mason (16:34.4)
Now the original mandate is back on, but this time restored union, restored authority. So what's the real level up? It's not more strategy, more hustle and more self effort. What it really is is deeper surrender, stronger union and greater impact. I'm seeing this with people around me. It doesn't make sense, but as we will surrender our lives and live more yielded to Him, we just see God do more and more and more.
I heard it said one of the richest men in a particular Muslim country is actually a follower of Jesus. And a pastor, well-known pastor was meeting with him and said, what is your secret? And how did you get to be the most successful in terms of rich, wealthy? How did you get that? And this man says, I spend an hour to an hour and a half each day sitting and listening. What's he doing? He's going, that I may know.
You may hear your voice. I know that it's not of my strength that we can accomplish this, but it's yours and yours alone. Isn't it amazing? Go back to the story of Gideon, how he starts with 30,000. 30,000 men gets whittled down to 10,000 men, gets whittled down to 300 men. And then God says, that's enough. Lest that you would say when victory happens, that it was by your hand that you accomplished this.
You know what, if I can achieve what I'm doing in my own ability, where's God? It's the independence. What I wanna see is let's see what God will do. Let's see what the kingdom of God can do in this situation. Are you just living in your own ability? What's the level up? Greater surrender, greater union, greater dependency on God, greater risk that comes out of that, and then tied into Matthew 11.
Are you weary? Are you worn out? Are you tired because of your own self-help, independence, trying to make it happen? Come to me is what Jesus said. Learn from me. Walk with me and work with me. Learn from me the unforced rhythms of grace. That's the invitation to you and me. So, practical. How do you actually do this? Three keys for you. Step number one, check your surrender. When was the last time you actually paused and said, not my will, but yours be done?
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When was the last time you had a decision to make and you just ran with it with your own independent momentum, success, you just grabbed your favorite book and just went with that rather than pause and say, Jesus, if I call myself a follower of Jesus, when was the last time that I followed? Or you're actually leading and asking God to bless where you're going. No, stop, pause. God, I humbly come back to your knowledge that you know more than me.
I wanna live your way. I wanna walk with you in all of this. I wanna experience your proximity in every aspect of the day because it's your presence that's the only thing that transforms and changes. And so I just humbly submit all of these things to you. I trust in you with all my heart. I lean not on my own understanding. In all my ways acknowledge him and he will direct or establish my path. And then step by step I grow.
I'm still, I've shared with you already. I gotta please slow down. I gotta sign, baby. Why? Because I need to, because I just run with the momentum. Thankfully, I've got my anchor with God and then through the day, and I've got a wonderful spouse that when I say, hey, what do you think about this? She go, well, have you asked Jesus about it? Oh, yes. I know, I get so excited and I run ahead all the time. But here's the good news. There was 12 disciples. One of them was a dad.
betrayed, so you're probably going to have that in your life sometime. But look at Peter, look at James and John, those guys that actually were closest to Jesus, it wasn't that they were passive, they were overly zealous as well. Peter says, Jesus, I got a better solution for you. You don't need the cross. Let's just take you and change the world. I got the best Tony Robbins self-help system and program. We can launch you. And Jesus says, get behind me, Satan. As in no.
The only way is to lay my life down. And if you truly wanna follow Jesus, it's gonna be the same. But here's the thing, Peter is zealous, overly zealous. James and John going into a village ahead of Jesus, the village rejects Jesus. James and John say, let's call down fire and burn them. Jesus like shaking his head. Guys, guys, guys, you still don't get it. It's a different way that we have dominion. It's not calling down fire, although obviously they could.
Andy Mason (21:30.806)
It's about how do I steward what God has given in me in step-by-step growth. So number one, check your Serenity. Number two, reestablish daily union. Walking with God in the cool of the day. You know what, that's a constant thing. We got a friend, Bill Jobe, he talks about it. I he talks about a six minute cycle. I'm just like, wow, how do you train yourself to do that? Number one, lock your day. I don't know, I don't care. It's morning, night, middle of the day.
but lock a consistent time. There's nothing that takes away from a consistent time that you're spending listening, journaling, writing, reading the Word. Did you know that one of the names of Jesus is the Word of God in Revelation 19? It talks about Him, Jesus, whose name is the Word of God. So if I'm struggling to read the Bible, actually, here's probably a good time to tell you. With a good friend of ours, we're gonna launch a 30-day, I don't know what we're gonna call it, but for 30 days,
We're gonna unpack for you 30 minutes a day during, just during the week of how to read the Bible for a business context, a business, how do you do this? How do you read it? Why? Because it's the word of God. I know there should be, and there should be a hunger and a desire for me to read it, but how do I do that? What does it look like? How do I unpack it and apply it to my life? We're gonna give that for you. So if that's you.
either click on a link below or just shoot us an email, support at heavenandbusiness.com and we'll make sure that you hear about that so we can invite you in. So reestablish daily union. That's the time, if I've got a relationship with my wife Janine and all we ever do is little bits on the way, that's not gonna build something. I need dedicated time where it's just her, just me, nobody other, no distractions, no phone Andy, put the phone away.
and actually no distractions, be with her, I need that. Same with your walk with Jesus. Secondly, is through the day, touch, touch, touch, touch, Janine works in the basement, I work in the office, so there's a whole floor between us. It's like basement and I'm the second floor. You know, it's during the day, I can text her, I can walk downstairs, knock on the door, don't just interrupt Andy. Over lunch, in the afternoon, it's so cool, I can do that all the time.
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Same with your relationship with Jesus. Some people talk about sitting in the lab 15 minutes to remind you, I don't know what you wanna do, but there's something about establish this rhythm of connection throughout the day, a tenderness that I can turn aside, turn aside, turn aside and listen. You train yourself to do that. And then finally, build from that place. Ask daily, this is where I find journaling is so helpful.
journaling and then having people ask me the same things is ask the questions. Jesus, what are you doing today? Not what I'm doing and I want you to bless what I'm doing, but what are you doing and how I can do that? I heard Larry Randolph talk the other day. He starts the morning. He doesn't pray for himself. He says, Holy Spirit, who would you like me to pray for today? Who's on your heart? And my wife, Janine.
says, I'm not inviting Jesus into my conversation. I'm recognizing that he's already have a conversation. There's something bigger going on. And I want to be part of what he's doing, because that's way cooler and way more exciting. So ask the questions, what are you doing? Where are you leading? What matters to you today? And you'll be amazed at what starts to unfold. So maybe today, it's not about doing more. Maybe it's about greater surrender. Maybe the level up is actually a level down.
get on your knees and say, Jesus, I'm sorry, I've done the original self help program independent of you. Does that mean I don't have self problem? No, I got some great books. I just picked up a book the other day. These are great things, but I want to do that in connection with him. Holy Spirit, what are you showing me through this? Before I just jump in and execute on a program, pause, listen, and then follow. Look for the life of God on everything.
which is what Jesus did. I only do what I see the Father do. How do I know what the Father's on? Well, there's clues. Isaiah 55, 12, you go out with joy led forth with peace. They that are led by the Spirit of God. How do you know you're led by the Spirit of God? Number one, am I listening? Am I surrendered? Number two, am I looking for joy and peace? Colossians 3, 15, let peace be your governor. If you want to level up,
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and you're hearing of the voice of God, grab a hold of ListenUp, Hearing God at Work. It's a great resource that will help you in hearing the voice of God. And finally, keep your eyes out for that, I don't know what we call it, maybe a course. It's gonna be really helpful. At 30 days, it'll be just during the week, but it's gonna help you unpack and apply and develop a rhythm of hearing and reading the word of God.
that I heard it this way, I'm reading the word, the word is reading me. How do do that? So I bless you, I bless you to find, to experience His presence. pray like it says in John 17, Jesus says, I pray that they may be one as we are one, that you would experience the same love that Jesus had with the Father in the beginning. Mind blowing. And I pray.
that you may know Him. This is eternal life that you may know Him. And we just knock off all shame. We knock off all of the never enough and the never satisfied. We just come back to Father, thank you that I am already loved, adored, connected. I'm already fully embraced by you that you paid the ultimate price, not for a workforce, not for a self-help program, but for relationship.
that anchors everything that leads to life. Father, thank you that I'm made in your image and likeness, that I value, that I have significance, that you blessed me. You said be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. You've given me an assignment and a purpose. have value. for every person watching and listening right now, Lord, let your presence just flood them, validate them, strengthen them, knock off that never enough, that
poverty of thinking that often a mindset that would constantly drive them to achieve and not come back to. I'm already seated, rooted and grounded in love, seated with Christ in heavenly realms. And I bless you to experience that. Hey, if this is of value to you, make sure that you comment below and then share this with somebody. And we love to see your upcoming events, heaveninbusiness.com slash events.
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And no doubt we will see and hear from you soon.
