The Dr. Lee Warren Podcast

(Note: I'm taking a short break to ramp up for season 5! I'm going to re-release some old but valuable episodes for the next few days, and I'll see you back here with new content on June 6th!)

There are some things you need to settle if you’re going to be happy. What are those for you? Write them down. Start praying for peace around them. Start clarifying the true things in your life, and disavow yourself from the notion that you need to have a pain-free life in order to be happy.

The degree to which you couple emotion and circumstance in your life is inversely proportional to your ability to be happy.

And what kills us, is the unwillingness to accept the quantum duality that life is hard and we can be happy anyway. We focus on the but and the and and the woe and the oh no and we forget the tho and yet.

John 16:33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

John 10:10  The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

Mark 9:28-29 After Jesus had gone indoors, his disciples asked him privately, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” 29 He replied, “This kind can come out only by prayer.

Luke 18:1 Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.

Matthew 5:30 And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.

Hebrews 12:1-4

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. 4 In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

Psalm 34:18 The Lord is close to the brokenhearted     and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

Do you ever feel sorry for yourself? You know, my life is so hard and no one understands and I'll never get that job or he took my sale or whatever?  

Here's the thing friend: self-pity is one of the most toxic and limiting things we can allow into our lives. And it is ALWAYS within our power to change. Always. 

I wanted to share a small idea with you this week. Like many small ideas, this one can grow if you nurture it a little. It's like a seed that, if you plant and nourish it carefully can become something larger and more wonderful than you ever imagined.

That's tragic in investing, but it's a disaster in the rest of your life too.

Here are some principles to help manage our minds and behaviors when life seems to be handing us big losses. We'll look at the psychology of investing, and apply it to the rest of our lives. And we'll see God as the God who can give us late-market rallies, 4th quarter comebacks, and who makes a way where there is no way.

PLUS! A story about my friends, Rested Ronnie and Sweaty Sam!

Morgan Housel, The Psychology of Money

David Richo, Five True Things: A Little Guide to Embracing Life's Big Challenges

Psalm 77

The book of Habakkuk

Isaiah 43:19

Get the MessengerX App from Messenger International

Tommy Walker Ministries

Do It Again by Elevation Worship

Faith, doubt, and the things we think we know are the left and center of a line we all move along at different points in our lives. It looks like this:

KNOWLEDGE ---------- FAITH ---------- DOUBT

But this is far too simple. Because faith is not the opposite of knowledge, and doubt is not the opposite of faith.

In this episode, we learn how to move along the spectrum from fear to hope. 

Hope is a verb: there’s two consistent things about biblical examples of when people feel hopeless, and what they do next, that are important to flesh out: Any time we’re faced with a seemingly hopeless situation, there’s movement and there’s memory. There’s action. There’s a choice made.

You have to fight for hope, friend, because life doesn’t always make it easy. We’re going to learn how hope is a verb, an action word, and we’re going to start today.