Chaos Can't

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Welcome to The Masculine Journey. I am so incredibly excited that you're with us this week, and I do realize I say that every week, but I did add the word incredibly to it that we're getting ready for Christmas Eve, Eve, Eve, you know what I'm saying? Oh yeah, we've got a bunch of Eves coming up, so Robby will be practicing up his Eve kind of stuff when we get there. But no, I'm really excited about today's show because we have something we don't normally have. We have a guest on the show, right?

We do that on occasion, but on very rare occasion. And so very glad to have Alan Arnold with us from the Wild at Heart team. And he's going to be talking with us about his new book, Chaos Can't. And Alan, welcome. We're really glad to have you. Thanks, guys. I'm looking forward to the conversation. Yeah, what a time for this book to come out.

I know that wasn't what you intended. I listened to your podcast with John on Ransomed Heart. You know, this is a really good podcast. And I will ask you, what was your motivator, if you don't mind? I know you talked a little bit about Kelly, if you wouldn't mind sharing that here in a minute, if you'd be okay with that and kind of her encouragement for the book on how it came about. But what a good podcast.

I recommend that because I'm sure it'll go over different stuff than what we talked about. It's called Wild at Heart, Sam. Did I say Ransom Heart? You did. I already told you I was going to do that, and I turned around and did it. It's okay. Wow. That took like – Yeah, it was prophetic. It was like 20 seconds. Yeah, I got to quit doing that.

I do that like every week. Yeah, anyway. But anyway, yeah, Alan, tell us about, you know, that story. Well, yeah. You know, our wives are sometimes, many times, the greatest influencer for good in our day-to-day walk at home.

And Kelly is my wife, and it's absolutely that. And she made the comment to me, this was a couple of months ago, where the world had gotten quite a bit stormier than it had been with the outbreak of COVID. It was in the lockdown.

Everybody was home. Social unrest. The political campaigns were heating up. And at that time, she just told me, you know, Alan, when things are chaotic, I've noticed that you become more chaotic instead of calming things down. And so when things are calm, you do really well, and you're fun and you're steady, but when things get a little stormy or chaotic, you become more chaotic and actually make things worse because of that. And that was the first time that I had had to look at myself in the mirror that way and say, wow, like, right, I can't use as an excuse. Things are crazy out there, so I'm going to now be a little more chaotic.

And I didn't like what I saw. And that was the instigator or kind of the spark that led to this book was a journey of what's going on with chaos. Why does it affect us like it does?

And how can we be free of it? Yeah, that was awesome. When I was listening to that on that podcast, I started thinking about, you know, for me personally, it was almost a tale of two different people. I could be calm and collected at work if chaos was going on, but I sure couldn't do it at home.

You know, and so you're talking about your story with Kelly. I'm thinking, man, how many times have I demonstrated to my kids that, you know, I have a hard time holding it together when personal chaos is going on? Because it seems like it's so much more at risk.

There's so much more at risk there when it's such a personal place. Oh, I think you're absolutely right. Like it works. We've gotten really good most of the time at, you know, either not saying what we're thinking or rolling with it or just kind of gritting our teeth and going through it. But then when we get home, that's when we let our defenses down. We're weary. We are far more comfortable and just kind of letting our guard down. And so oftentimes the people we love the most get the worst from us because all that chaos that's been building up all day feels over. Like we already have very little resistance, I think, in our world right now. So we don't have much buffer. We don't have much margin. And if we hold it together at work, you know, then oftentimes it fills out to our kids or our wives.

It doesn't have to, but that tends to be most men's situations, I think. Yeah. If you could look around the room, you would see people shaking their heads because, I mean, you add, you know, COVID was one thing, then the riots were another thing. Now this election thing, I mean, you want to just destroy your heart, you know, listen to Rush Limbaugh for an hour, you know, or or or the regular news. When I come home, my mother in law has it on and I'm forced to listen to NBC for 20. And by the time you get done with that, you know, just try to think straight for a minute.

It's it's it's it draws the life right out of you. Yeah. But even before 2020, I mean, chaos didn't originate in 2020.

Right, Alan? I mean, it originated long, long before that. You even write about that in your book.

Right. Like one of the most fascinating things to me, guys, was I knew the impact chaos had on me. But I wanted to know the origin of chaos. And so I really started this quest, this journey with God, where I asked him to take me into what's really going on. And, you know, Jesus, what I love is Jesus is so upfront and he's so clear on this world we live in. And you look at John 16, 33. And what he says is, I've told you these things so that you may have peace in this world.

You will have trouble. And I think we could put the word chaos there. But take heart. I have overcome the world. And as I read that, I'm like, wow, that's so counterintuitive because the way Jesus begins, I've told you these things so that you may have peace.

You kind of think, well, he's going to say something really calming or really that settles me. And then the very next sentence is, in this world, you will have trouble. And so he just names our reality. It was happening then. It was happening from the time of the Garden of Eden when the serpent came into the garden. There was trouble and there's been trouble and chaos ever since. And so I love that Jesus just gives us that heads up. He orients us to the situation that we're going to wake up into every day.

You will have trouble. But again, he's telling us this. So we'll have peace amidst the trouble. And I love how he ends that verse.

But take heart. I have overcome the world. In other words, I haven't just overcome this moment or this demon possessed person or this particular storm or this particular riot that Jesus was in the middle of. He's saying, I've overcome the world. I've overcome everything from creation through today and tomorrow and forward. So when we remember that, it gives us that orientation of, don't be surprised, you're going to have chaos, but you can be with the one who's overcome it and you can actually overcome the chaos. And that's why, you know, the subtitle of my book, it's overcome what comes against you in the shaken world, like the world is shaken.

But we can actually be chaos free in a world of chaos if we understand God's approach to chaos. So even in 1966, they were overcoming chaos, Sam. You know, you might remember Maxwell Smart? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

And sometimes he would try to overcome that. That's where I first learned about chaos is right here. Well, listen to what Maxwell Smart has to say about chaos. Sounds like the chaos organization is back in action, chief. Right. Max, it seems to me that- Just a minute, chief.

Isn't this top security? Well, shouldn't we activate the cone of silence? The cone of silence? Yes. All right, Max.

Hodgkins? Yes, sir. Activate the cone of silence. The cone of silence? How much do you know about chaos?

What did you say, sir? Chaos. What? Chaos.

Oh, chaos. Yes, of course. Well, that's an international criminal organization that was founded, oh, I think in 1957.

How's that? What? In 57. Agent 57 is in Hong Kong. Hong Kong. What about Hong Kong? What? Hong Kong.

Why are we talking about Hong Kong? Why? Hodgkins, raise the cone of silence. What? Raise the cone of silence. Perhaps we could just talk softly, sir.

So that's a little chaos for you from Maxwell Smart back in the day where he fought that constantly. But Alan, I love, you know, your first book that was the story of With, which had these beautiful, I guess you'd call them allegories, but this one starts out with The Last Snow Globe, which itself was, you know, you really have a gift for bringing a story to help things come to life. And I know our listeners would enjoy a little bit of The Last Snow Globe, not word for word, but at least to get you kind to that word that I love comes out at the end of the story.

Absolutely. Well, I do believe stories are a shortcut to the heart, whether that's the parables of scripture or, you know, just modern day stories that we tell each other and that have been through time. And so I did begin the book with it's just a short four or five page allegory short story, but I call it Beast on Island. And it's about a small island in the Mediterranean, and most folks don't even realize it's there, but there's a family on that island, that small island that creates snow globes. And they're really different snow globes. They're not like the normal ones in that these snow globes, no matter how much you shook them, what's inside remained calm. And it was filled with this unique substance of living water, and it's dancing light, light that was the color, some of the colors we would know, but some colors the world doesn't even have a name for yet.

And so the story basically goes into this family's creativity in making these snow globes. But on the island itself, there was a lot of fear. And so the people around the island were consumed with this fear about a beast on the island. And it was something that people just felt like they didn't have much hope. And so they would hide, they would kind of shut themselves in. They would try to track the beast, they would get consumed with the beast, or they would be scared and not even want to get near it. And so nobody ever saw the beast, but that was the fear on the island.

And ultimately, as that fear grew, the water that was in this cave where they created the snow globes, slowed down. And so the whole story goes into, without revealing the end of it, what this family did to counter the fear, to counter the beast on the island. Hey Alan, can we pick that up right after the break? Sorry about that. I'd love to hear the rest of that. Go to masculinejourney.org.

You can download any of the past podcasts. You can look at any upcoming events that we're going to be having. We'll be having a boot camp this spring. We don't have a date yet, but as soon as we do, it'll be there, masculinejourney.org. Now what do we do? Just be yourselves.

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Box 550, Kernersville, North Carolina, 27285. Welcome back to The Masculine Journey. That is the theme song from Get Smart, right? And he was driving an Opal GT, just saying. I would not know that. I'm not a car guy. I know you are.

Obviously, the Christian car guy. Alan, sorry we had to cut off the story. We didn't manage our time great right there, but we definitely want to hear what's happening to the family.

If you could kind of set it back up. We have the island of the snow globes and the fear that's really consumed the people. Correct. And so really, it's just a story that gets us going in the book on we all live in a world that is shaken with fear and that we all are kind of the beast on the island or the chaos around us. And this one family was struggling to make sense of it. And so the story goes on just to show the contrast when we choose either to focus on the beast on the island or we choose to be astonished by what God's up to. And I just thought that it was a great opening to say things aren't always as they seem. And so we can either choose a path in our world of fear over the chaos and over the craziness and we can be fearful and anxious or we can choose to be astonished.

And if we do that, we're keeping our eyes on what God's up to. And we're actually back to the Maxwell Smart clip, like we're either agents of chaos or agents of change. And the choice is ours. We can either be reactive and surprised by chaos and overcome by chaos. And unfortunately, when that happens, we become chaotic ourselves.

And so we become agents of chaos, whether we mean to or not, or we can see how God pursues life in the midst of chaos and we can become agents of change with God. So that it's kind of that there's two real choices. There's two roads and most people don't even know they have a choice.

So the book, I wanted to start with that story to say, heads up, wake up. There is a choice. There is a better way. We don't have to be shaken. We don't have to be reactive, but we will be if we just wake up and fall into our days unaware. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it gets back to that old adage, whatever you feed grows, right? So if I feed that astonishment that you talk about, that's going to grow. But if I feed the fear, then it's going to consume me. So focus on what we're feeding.

Yeah, it's amazing. One of the things that you talked about is how inner dialogue, you know, self dialogue opens up the door to chaos. Can you share some more on that? Because I think a lot of people do it and don't even realize it.

Absolutely. Well, I mean, you know, the way we talk to ourselves is often based on the use of wilder heart language that John has. It's based on agreements that we're making, that the enemy loves when we make and the enemy kind of sets us up throughout our life to believe lies about ourselves, about who we are, about what's going on. And so in the book, I just often, you know, help people, I think, by going, listen, the way you talk to yourself is actually a way of letting chaos in. And some of the things that we say in those times are like, you know, I always am alone or it's all up to me or how much can one person handle? There's never enough time, never enough money. Life isn't fair.

I always get the rod of the dill. These type things we say and we start embracing it as, well, it's true like this. I'm just naming the way reality is. But it's not reality. It's the lies that we start to believe.

And when we start to believe those lies, it's like we open the door wider and wider for chaos to come in. And I use this example, a true example in the book, kind of a funny story that wasn't funny in the moment. But I had recently gone through the car wash near my house. And most of you guys probably have been to the ones that it's like a Star Wars laser light show. You know, you're in there in the car wash, your car's going through, you're in neutral and you're just watching the foam and the light and the water. It's like a it's like a very cool thing.

Right. But I'd forgotten to roll my windows up quickly. It was like a massive, you know, shower chemical sporting everywhere, water all in the interior of my truck.

And it was not a pleasant experience at all. But what I learned from that, I was writing the chaos book at the time. What I learned was, man, this is just like life. If I roll the windows up, I don't have to let the chaos that's out there in in me, in my heart, in my mind. But if I'm not guarded, if I start having those thoughts, like I just mentioned, and I start going, yeah, that is true. I do always get the wrong to the deal or, well, man, if the world is chaotic around me, of course I'm going to be chaotic or who wouldn't be fearful?

Those kind of thoughts are like rolling the window down and everything out in. And once chaos comes inside of us, then we become more chaotic. And, you know, you can't really have less of something that you're becoming more of. And so if you want less chaos, but you're letting chaos inside of you, you're actually becoming the thing you want to get rid of. You're becoming chaotic. You're becoming an agent of chaos. So one of the first kind of principles of the book is, first, recognize what's really going on. In this world, you'll have chaos.

Don't be surprised by it. Don't be caught off guard. And second, don't let it in. You don't have to let the external chaos in.

Proverbs 4 23 is pretty clear. We're to guard our heart above all else. You know, we're to watch what we let in. We're to guard it from the external chaos around us. The external lies around us that the enemy is trying to get us to agree to. So when we do those things, when we understand the reality of what we're facing, we're not surprised by chaos.

We're not letting it in. Those are like the very first steps to changing how we live. There's a lot more beyond that about how we can change the chaos around us. But it starts with something as simple as don't believe the lie that you have to become more chaotic when things around you are chaotic or fearful or anxious.

You don't. We can actually be chaos free in a world of chaos. Yeah, and you're exactly right. It starts with not making those agreements. You know, that's something our listeners would be familiar with that you talked about is you make that agreement and you give the enemy a foothold, which gives him access and gives him somewhat of a free rein to press on those fears that you talked about and really start putting pressure on you. Well, if people, you know, are listening and are like, yeah, I don't think I really like chaos and all that much. My question would be, well, what is your typical response when something pushes your butt? Whether that's screaming kids in the minivan or whether that's a blow up at the office or whether that's an unexpected bill in the mail, whatever it is. What is your response when chaos hit? And for most people, they either get spun up or they shut down or they try to wait it out. They, you know, they either get agitated, spun up or they just shut down and kind of numb their heart and check out or they decide they're going to just wait it out.

And when they wait it out, you know, they just lower the bar on all of their hopes and dreams and expectations for what could be and kind of just sit on the sidelines. And all of those things are not great responses. All of those things will play in the hands of the enemy and of chaos because they're reactive, they're passive and they're reactive and they're not the right way. Chaos will never go away or you'll never be free from it with those responses. And so I think it's important for everyone listening to go, yeah, how do I respond personally when chaos is and do I feel like I'm doing a really good job or is it spilling out to the very people I love or in my own self-talk or just I can't sleep at night or I have to have an extra, you know, beer or two at night just to take the edge off or whatever else is. You know, I just binge on Netflix series instead of facing what's going on, whatever it is, if you're not happy with how you're dealing with chaos. The answer isn't well, let's just wait till 2021 and hope it changes because I hate to say this, but I think 2021 is probably going to be more chaotic than 2020. And if we're waiting for a new year with the hopes that it will be less chaotic, that's not a very good strategy, that's a passive strategy. The better thing is to change who we are in our approach than hope something changes externally. Yeah, that's a great point.

You know, I want to ask you about something that the term spun up. I think for some people, though, they may look at that and make their own conclusion, but that can look very different to different people. That could be a controlling type personality. I'm going to control every other aspect of my life if I can't control this or rage or it could be lots of different reactions within that spun up, couldn't it?

Oh, absolutely. And, you know, if you agree, you're making such a good point and a great way to see it as every response we make, every approach to an issue in our life, I believe is either love based or fear based. And so if it's fear based, it's not love or hate, it's love or fear, I believe.

And hate is a subset within fear. And like you're saying, those responses of a fear based response can look very different. It can be very passive. It can look very aggressive. It can look like rage.

It can look like a guy that just glazes over and just kind of checks out. But all of those, if you get down to the root of it, is a fear, a lack of trust in God, a fear of what's going to happen to them, a fear of anxiety over their children or the family and situations going on with their job. So, you know, the question is, we want to look at motive because it's always a great check to look at motive. A motive to your response is, is it fear based? Is it love based? If it's love based, you're probably doing a pretty good job of staying calm in the storm. If it's fear based, chaos is going to take you out every single time. You might be able to hold your tool for five minutes or five hours or five days, but eventually, if you are responding from a fear based, you know, reactionary mode, you're gonna lose the battle against chaos and the enemy knows it.

Yeah, he does. We're coming to the end of our first show. Alan, can you stick around and do the after hours with us? We'll do that here in just a few minutes. We'd love to talk to you more about some of that and realizing that you're not alone in this, that you got somebody on your side. But would you stick around and be on the after hours with us? Absolutely. Love to.

Okay. In the meantime, go to masculinejourney.org. Look for any of our contact information. If you'd like to reach out, maybe we said something on the air you'd like to know more about. Maybe you'd like to know more about Alan and his ministry and we'll give you information on that in the after hours, but you can also get it from our website. Or if you want to just reach out to us and say, hey, have you seen this movie? Have you thought about this clip? What about this topic? We'll talk to you next week. This is the Truth Network.