March 31, 2022 6:00 am
Alexandra Kuykendall explores ways we can cling to and offer God’s goodness and love while interacting with others. She shares ways to find truth and moral courage in the tough moments and encourages you to lead with grace.
Receive Alexandra's book "Seeking Out Goodness" for your donation of any amount: https://donate.focusonthefamily.com/don-daily-broadcast-product-2022-03-31?refcd=1337202
Get more episode resources: https://www.focusonthefamily.com/episodes/broadcast/seeing-through-our-culture-to-find-god/#featured-resource-cta
If you've listened to any of our podcasts, please give us your feedback: https://focusonthefamily.com/podcastsurvey/
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
Our Daily Bread Ministries
Various Hosts
Growing in Grace
Doug Agnew
Made for More
Andrew Hopper | Mercy Hill Church
Our Daily Bread Ministries
Various Hosts
Kerwin Baptist
Kerwin Baptist Church
Do you feel called to serve God in your career? Check out some of the exciting job opportunities we have at Focus on the Family. We're looking to fill positions in marketing, IT, and marriage counseling. Work with other talented believers. Enjoy a meaningful Christ-centered work environment and use the skills God gave you to encourage others and help families thrive. To learn more, visit focusonthefamily.com slash careers.
That's focusonthefamily.com slash careers. It's very clear in Scripture. It doesn't matter if people are kind to us, polite to us, respectful of us.
We still are expected to be living through the Holy Spirit and believing the best in others because to love our neighbors well means we are doing our part in that prayer of thy kingdom come thy will be done. That's Alexandra Kuykendall and she's our guest today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. Thanks for joining us. I'm John Fuller. John, do you consider yourself to be a positive person? I am trying every day to be more positive, Jim. It's been a lifelong struggle. I tend to look on the brighter side of things.
You do, yes. I think that's just a byproduct of life and you know I can see how people in this world can be disheartened and discouraged. There's a lot around us that could pull us down especially the last couple of years. I mean it's been rough with the culture, with the pandemic, politics, division in our country, that 50-50 thing we always talk about. It's easy to get overwhelmed with that doom and gloom feeling but the good news is right there in the New Testament the book of John chapter 16 33 Jesus tells us in the world you'll have tribulation but take heart I've overcome the world. Isn't that a great statement? It's kind of like how you delivered. Don't fret. Those words are so comforting and today with our guests we're going to talk about leaning more in that direction rather than into the fear of this life.
I'm looking forward to this. There's some really good content in the book Seeking Out Goodness written by our guest Alexandra Kuykendall. She has been with us before. She's a wife and mom of four girls and somehow in between life she finds time to write great books like this one Seeking Out Goodness finding the true and beautiful all around you and we've got copies of that here at the ministry.
Call 800 the letter A in the word family or check the episode notes for the link. Alex welcome back to Focus. Thank you it's so good to be here.
Yeah it's great to have you. I guess that that kind of that opening salvo here is are you serious how can you be cheery in this kind of environment where we're at each other's throats and you know the country seems to be going you know where I mean seriously do you want us to be happy? Well I think it's not so much about happiness or cheeriness as it is remembering that God has not left us. So what is that called confidence maybe? Yeah I would say confidence walking through the world remembering that God is good and he is with us and he is still working in the world especially in those moments when we think where is he what is happening I only feel darkness or sadness or frustration or fear right now yeah to remember that God is good and he is with us. You know Alex so much of life is about expectations you know when we have failure in marriage it's usually around expectations he's not doing this or she's not doing that parenting is around expectations oh my goodness I thought you were a better student in that right right all that stuff and then when you look at our Christian walk and our relationship with God can be unfortunately about expectations what we expect God will do for us the country we live in the neighbors we have you know our pastor and how well he did on Sunday I mean it's a it's a just this never-ending expectation that we put on people so in that regard with your book and what you've been researching how do we how do we get a better grip on what we expect out of the Lord out of it feels odd even saying it but it's true yeah you know every day I wake up and I look out the window of my office and I live in Denver my neighbor across the street has a big tree and as the Sun rises I see the colors behind the tree and now especially in winter early spring the branches create this silhouette and I can either focus in on the branches or I can focus in on the color behind them and what I choose to focus in on is what then jumps out at me so as we're going through life through our days through our very ordinary conflicts boring moments frustrations to say okay God I want to see you I want to see you at work and when we put that lens on we are more likely to see evidence of him it's like the practice of gratitude right that the more we are grateful for how God is working in our lives the more we're going to see things to be grateful for so it's really about a mindset well I guess are we different than a hundred years ago two thousand years ago is humanity still basically the same it seems like there's more avenues to express our discontent more mechanisms more technology that we can write more public forums yeah I mean so I mean maybe it's not the heart of people has changed it's just our capability in our technology is it allowed us to be more demonstratively negative but you know what do you think in that the heart of mankind is still the same absolutely and I talked about in the book the big arc of humanity is that we had creation it was good we had fall separation then reconciliation and redemption that's our big arc and we see that pattern played out in the micro throughout our days throughout our own lives and stories yeah so the heart of the matter is the same I don't think that we have changed and honestly I don't think that the world has changed all that much we live in a sinful world yet the things that are available to us right now and the ways that we interact with each other are unique to this time so how do we as people take this big macro story and live out reconciliation and redemption within the context of the tools we have which could be technology could be within the context of a pandemic with technology could be at this point in history and for those living in the United States for this point in history right now it yes it's unique and it's not all right no I like that you know Jean I noticed her this morning my habit as I get up early and read the prep that the producers have created and go through the book and look for anything that sticks out but Jean had picked it up she really liked the cover of the title that caught her attention okay and I think I think even as a woman I think that idea of seeking goodness resonates with so many wives and moms right I just think women have a more natural bent to say that I've got to be experiencing more goodness in my life they yearn for it I'm not sure if men are as dialed in that way and I don't mean to be stereotypical but I like it I like the idea it's a battle but in that regard this idea of knowing truth has always been something I use here at focus in management you know that we as managers have to know truth as best as we can so we can correct issues and keep moving forward and honoring the Lord etc but boy knowing truth in your life outside of your vocation knowing who you are who God is who you are in relationship to God what your responsibility is as a husband as a wife as a mother or a father those are critically important things you have a somewhat amusing illustration of that but cooking bacon yeah but I love this idea of knowing truth again I'll say as best as you can as a human being in a sinful world and with a sinful nature but how do we go about doing that and use your bacon okay yeah I call it the burning bacon principle because I have burned bacon plenty of times and that's good too I would eat bacon bacon in my oven and I often will forget that it's in there right the smoke starts to indicate that there is a problem and I can either deny that it's burning or I can recognize that it is but often we want to deny we have new information about something that smoke yes that might show us a new truth that we don't want to believe because we are tied to the truth that we've been holding on to for a long time and I just want to encourage us as believers to walk into a pursuit of truth holding a posture of humility to remember that God is God and we are only able to understand this world with the human minds that we have he gives us some good information in Scripture he gives us these guidelines that we can live by and at the same time we are not God and so to walk into every relationship and every conversation saying yes I want to think on what is true and I don't have the full picture of the world I have the picture of my lived experience of what scripture tells me and maybe what good counsel has told me and with those three things we can walk into the world looking for truth but still holding that posture of humility right the difficulty is when we are observing that truth through a biblical lens and others are not the cancel culture is a great example and I I know people who have been fired from their jobs because they espouse Christian values for example traditional marriage and they lost their job over that it seems unfair to me that we can no longer even tolerate a diversity of opinion on things that to me it's more insidious than I use that example of China where they had the one-child policy but the people of China would look at the man government and say they're heavy-handed and they're forcing this policy on us in the United States to me it's more insidious because it's coming from the bottom up from the social classes that you need to behave a certain way and if you don't we're coming after you it's not from the government per se do you know what I'm saying and so in that whole cancel culture environment first describe what we think we mean by cancel culture if you would and then address that idea of knowing truth when I mean we can't even get it on the nightly news because it's all over the map yeah well it's interesting you know I call myself a kitchen anthropologist where I stand in my kitchen a lot and I look at the world and I try to make sense of it and so I was in the process of starting to write this book before the pandemic and cancel culture was a thing before the pandemic and by that I mean we take one person's opinion on one issue and we disagree with them on that particular issue and then we cancel all of who they are we disregard any good thing they might have to offer us any good wisdom they might have to offer us because we disagree on one topic and that's painful to have experience to us but I think as sinful people we have the propensity to do that as well too I can make assumptions about somebody because I know they voted a certain way or they think about a certain topic a certain way and I can instinctively cancel them myself and so I want to be sure not only that I'm protecting myself from cancel culture but then I'm not perpetuating cancel culture and that's that posture of humility right to say I want to give people the benefit of the doubt and part of that is believing the best in them and saying I believe that you've come to your opinion because you have been thoughtful about it and I am going to trust you to believe the same about me instead of going into conversations already ready for a fight yeah going in and saying okay let's believe we can have this kind of conversation yeah I'd like to push on you a little bit okay and I think the scriptural references will be obvious but maybe you can connect them for us because so often in that environment of the cancel culture it's a I'd say a fleshly response to say okay we'll just fight fire with fire an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth right so if that's how that side whatever it is is gonna pick on me and my side then I'm gonna pick on them the same way that is very non biblical right that's not what Jesus came to say I mean Luke 6 is pretty brutal and it's everything about how you love your neighbor those two paragraphs before that statement are very demanding if somebody asks you for your jacket make sure you give them your shirt if they ask you for money give it and don't expect payment back and don't just do it to those who love you everybody could do that even sinners but I'm telling you to do it to your enemies mm-hmm that is tough stuff and I think in this context of how we fight back spiritually it's very different than what my flesh wants to do exactly and I talked about an experience I had in the book I had posted something on Instagram something I thought was pretty innocent about a historical moment and I welcome to the booby-trap yes you know Instagram supposed to be nice and fluffy well guess what it's not I got all of these private messages and some of them were from people that I didn't know I thought people were taking it out of context or it wasn't what I intended they were taking the message in a different way but what hurt were people who knew me personally and who said I don't know that I can trust you anymore and I'm questioning your faith because of this post that you had right and one friend in particular I was very hurt and I really wanted to defend myself and I wanted to do exactly what you're talking about I wanted to say wait a minute and you're not a good mother yeah well and just come back with the comebacks right and and it took a lot of humility and it took me stepping back and saying I'm not going to respond in the energy of the moment I'm going to pray through this and I didn't do it perfectly because my instincts were to put up the fists and to fight but I knew that wasn't what peacemaking is about peacemaking is about that part of the process we had creation we had separation in our relationship how am I going to move towards reconciliation and then redemption with this friend and to do that meant to hold on to that posture of humility and to approach her as I would want to be approached if the seats were switched if I had been the one and it's just by God's grace that in that moment I wasn't the one who was going after her but I wanted to approach her like I would want to be approached which is with gentleness and self-control and goodness and but that meant that I needed to pause because my emotions in the moment weren't going to allow me to do that one thing that always corrects my thought life is Romans 2 4 that says don't you know it's God's kindness that leads one to repentance and that is so true if you're ever in a heated debate with especially a non-believer just remember that scripture who's come to Christ going you know you Christians were so tough on me and you treated me so harshly I decided to become one of you that's not a testimony you ever hear it's man I was mean toward those Christian people and they just kept responding with love and it caught me well you're listening to focus on the family with Jim Daley I'm John Fuller and our guest today is Alexandra Kirkendall and her book is seeking out goodness finding the true and beautiful all around you it really is a mind shift and we encourage you to get a copy of this book from us just call 1-800 the letter a in the word family or stop by the episode notes for the details Alex again with Philippians 4 8 Paul encourages us to think on whatever is right so this this complicates that idea of simply being kind because there is something true that we need to stand up for there is something right or righteous that we need to defend and so often that's always the complication right the the softer side of the church is simply expressing too much love and then the other end it's simply too much judgment and these are the contradicting issues within the body of believers right what is God's character here what do we do it's both truth and love and somehow God is the only one that can handle that successfully I think we as humans struggle with that but how do we defend what's right without being offensive in the process mm-hmm well I think two things come to mind I think of the Lord's Prayer thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven and so when we are faced with something that we feel is not right we can ask God okay what does it look like for your kingdom to come in this situation and often if I'm having a conflict with somebody a disagreement the question I ask myself and this is what I did with my friend when I felt offended by her comments is where would Jesus be standing in this conversation where would he be facing what would his posture be huh and that is a challenge it's really interesting to think of it in those terms because suddenly usually my heart softens towards the person I'm having a disagreement with but also Jesus isn't going to let up on what's wrong right he's still gonna push for what's right for that reconciliation and redemption to happen but he's going to do it in a way that offers gentle strength and kindness and so I think about that what does it look like for your kingdom to come God in this situation where would Jesus be standing where would he be facing and then I ask myself how does the fruit of the Spirit play out here because I can't do this on my own so I can say something is wrong but if I say it in my own voice in my own tone it is gonna come off as harsh because my emotion my feelings are going to be there those feelings aren't bad it's that instinct in me that says this something's wrong this isn't right and I want to stand up for it but I need to do it in a way that is palpable to be effective yeah and to be effective I need the fruit of the Spirit because that like you said for a non-believer is how they receive the good news that's how they receive God's goodness when it comes at them through the fruit of the Spirit well and I've often said you know we're not relying enough on the fruit of the Spirit because those are the things that thankfully Paul in the Spirit wrote down for us I mean that's so funny that the Lord knew we need to know what the list is yeah right so we've got it right there we just need to remember it and apply it but you know love joy goodness peace mercy kindness I mean it's all right there we fail I think to read right above it again in Galatians 5 19 where it's describing the fruit of the other guy here right Satan and you know once you get beyond sexual debauchery it cuts close division disunity lying conniving I mean those are things that we can all do and we can all be prone to so I try to memorize both lists one to know what God expects of me and then what not to do and we can easily lean into those things Alex let me ask you to your friend Rachel is a good example of balancing the right thing describe her and her husband James what they were facing and that example it gave to you hmm yeah so Rachel and James were experiencing secondary infertility and they thought okay well maybe we'd be open to adoption and so they went to a training at project 127 here in Colorado oh yeah and they were interested in fostering in order to adopt a child to be part of their family that was their goal when they went in so a good goal right that that's a good goal and as they learned about the foster care system and the needs of foster kids to have safe temporary housing they decided they would be open to that and as they got to know they their birth parents of their first placement they had two boys that were placed with them they realized these parents were working very hard to do the things they needed to do to create a safe home for the kids to return to and all of the sudden Rachel and James had a broader understanding of how complicated the situation was it wasn't just an easy right or wrong and they started cheering for the birth parents because they knew that in the end if these parents could get sober do the things they needed to do it really was in the best interest of these boys to return home to their birth parents and they have continued to foster and they are still open to adopting a child through foster care they haven't adopted a child yet but they have seen that there is a larger story at play that they can be part of and that they went in with a certain end to the story and they realized they might be part of a bigger story that God has orchestrated them to be part of and the thing that Rachel said to me that stuck out when I was talking to her about this to write about it in the book is she said we decided to give up the good for the sake of the best like their idea of going in and adopting kids out of foster care was a good idea their idea of then cheering for birth parents as they fostered their children and kept them safe while the birth parents did what was needed was best for those kids and so they were giving up their own dream of good for the sake of the best and that's what I think doing what is right is about and that's why I call the chapter having moral courage developing moral courage because it's scary and that's hard and they've experienced a lot of heartache as foster parents because they've grown attached to kids and then they've had to let those kids leave their homes and but they believe that they are doing good as a family and giving up their good plan for the sake of the best what I like about what you're saying is knowing the mission so they had an idea of what that mission is it's for us to potentially adopt and give this child we adopt out of foster care a beautiful life that's a good thing but they failed to realize and Jean and I were in the same boat so I'm speaking from our own experience we had probably 15 kids when we were fostering through the home and we had that same idea is there anyone we can adopt and so we went exactly through that same pain and realizing and that's not the mission the mission is reconciliation with their birth parents right but in that same context it's true culturally I want to bring us back to that what is the mission and what you're saying when you get down to it what is our mission as we engage people that really push our buttons and drive us the wrong way Alex I mean really is there a mission in here other than subdue conquer yeah right well I think Jesus is pretty clear about what our our big mission is right back to the macro plan yeah is give it to me is to love God with all of who we are and to love our neighbors as we would want to be loved ourselves and I don't like that mission so much it's hard especially if we are not feeling that same love right and you said it's very clear in Scripture it doesn't matter if people are kind to us polite to us respectful of us we still are expected to be living through the Holy Spirit and believing the best in others because to love our neighbors well means we are doing our part in that prayer of thy kingdom come thy will be done if we carry this posture of humility love people well show them the fruits of the Spirit that is about as good a life as we can live walking this planet as missionaries to the world because people will see God's goodness manifested in our lives not because of us but because of him working in and I think for the church Alex and I want to end here but it's a tough question we're at a crossroads where we take on the character of Christ and we fight with the fruit of the Spirit which one social warrior said to me one day who's not a Christian he's a Jewish gentleman and he said Jim don't you know you're in an alley fight and the other side has switchblades and I said yeah we're not stupid we get that but our weapons are love joy peace goodness he went wow those are bad weapons I mean that is exactly what the world would say when you're fighting hate with love that's not you know you got an eye for an eye back to that and we need to recalibrate and understand what the big mission is what Jesus has us here to accomplish and Alex this has been so good and I'm grateful thanks for writing down so much of what I've been thinking about you know the heart of it and trying to get people to remember what the main mission is and you've done a wonderful job in your book seeking out goodness finding the true and beautiful all around you thanks for tackling a really hard issue I appreciate it thank you and let me encourage you if you'd like to I'd say it this way get closer to the Spirit of God and make sure that you know what spiritual battle is all about I'd encourage you to get a copy of Alexandra Kirkendall's great book and you can do that right here through focus on the family get in touch with us and when you do if you can make a gift of any amount on a monthly basis or a one-time gift we'll send it to you as our way of saying thank you you know we've got lots of great resources and of course Jim as you said the book from our guest seeking out goodness finding the true and beautiful all around you look for that on our website we've got the link in the episode notes on behalf of Jim Daly and the entire team thanks for joining us today for focus on the family I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ oh hey Mike got here as soon as I could what's going on man hey I just wanted to give you an update on my marriage is it good news yeah our marriage is going great right now I couldn't be happier do that's awesome yeah it's like a solid five out of ten having a marriage that's just okay isn't where couples really want to live give yourself and your spouse an all-inclusive weekend where you'll slow your pace and focus on each other get more details at focus on the family comm slash getaway that's focus on the family comm slash getaway
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-05-13 20:30:38 / 2023-05-13 20:41:06 / 10