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(slow piano music)

- I have in my lifetime wrestled

with having high, high expectations

for all things under the sun.

I have wanted to have the best this,

the best that the best experience.

I wanted to have this when I got to that

and you know what I've had a thousand times

that followed those things

that I've had my expectation dashed.

As you do because when you're young,

how could you know what's coming next?

You really can't and yet we based so much of our life

and our energy in seeking hard to have ourselves

expect what's gonna come,

and then it turns out that we don't actually know.

We looked at this passage yesterday at Fives.

We began to talk about this because this is

where my head space was preparing for tonight.

But Luke 2:48 through 51

is the story of Jesus in the temple.

I just wanna put that out there without giving too much more

but you know the story likely is that Jesus when he was 12,

his family goes back and they go to Jerusalem to adhere

to the Passover rituals and they travel this great distance.

And a couple things to know before we think more about this

is it in ancient Israel, they were a strong group culture.

And what that is different than us is that

we are what's called a radical individualist culture.

It means that we have our fences right.

We have our people, we have our stuff

and those things are not yours they're mine.

And you have your things and I have my things

and we're cordial but we're radical individualists.

My stuff is my stuff.

And so as they're traveling.

They're traveling not as radical individuals

who have their carpools right, their caravans.

They're traveling as families who are extended families

and they all belonged to one another.

And so as they get to Jerusalem

and they go through the routines.

It's conceivable then that Mary and Joseph can turn back

around and go yeah I don't know where my son is

but I'm sure he's up in this group somewhere.

We're just going to start heading back

and get my son Jesus will know to come back

because he's with his larger extended family.

And so trusting that that was gonna happen.

They're like, well we'll find him along the way.

So they start heading back

after all the Passover festivities

and three days go by they don't find him

and they start to panic.

And so they do what you your parents told you

when you were young and went to an amusement park.

When you get lost just stay where you are,

we'll come back and find you.

And sure enough they come to the temple and they find Jesus

and so that's where we wanna pick it up.

It says this and when his parents saw him,

they were astonished and his mother said to him.

"Son why have you treated us so?

"Behold your father and I have been searching

"for you in great distress."

And he said to them, "Why are you looking for me?

"Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"

Right there one of those things is exposed here

is that Mary had a set of expectations.

And this is is the generous, gracious process of those

expectations, specifically here.

Expectations for being a mother,

but also for being a mother of the Messiah Jesus.

And so he continues and they did not understand

the saying that he spoke to them and he went down with them

and he came in Nazareth and he was submissive to them.

And his mother treasured up all these things

in her heart and it feels like that's a really polite way

of saying she registered, wow, what just happened?

What is this?

This is not what I expected.

I think that Jesus is actually quite in the business

of helping us admit that, oh you had an expectation for me.

Didn't you?

You had hoped I would fit into that box,

that set of categories.

You had hope that I would be perhaps a genie.

Oh listen I'm not a genie and since I love you,

you're not in trouble for thinking that I understand that.

But you do need to learn,

and I do need to dash that expectation.

See here's the thing about expectations.

Is that expectations are often under-informed by experience.

Just read that for a second,

expectations are often under-informed by experience

and that becomes a problem.

It means that we cannot trust our expectations.

Anybody in here ever had a friend or roommate

who their expectations were too high?

Just raise your hand, don't nudge anybody

but did anybody had, somebody who is in a relationship.

Just wow that is a really exceptionally

high expectation for this thing right.

What's that like?

That's stifling.

You can't be who you are.

It's a tremendous burden, you are not free to be you.

You're needing to please that person

or they get hurt or they're gone or they're sad

or they're depressed or worse they're suicidal,

or angry or addicted to something

and they are putting the burden of that on you.

I think that the same can be said about God in terms of us.

We're the ones who tend to have way too high expectations

or the expectations that just have nothing to do

with who he is and what he's all about

and we bring that to the table.

I think he is in the business of helping us see

that those expectations are under-informed.

Expectations makes us lose our perspective

on things that are really important.

Consider the first moment whether you're a senior

or whether you're a freshman.

The first moment you decided I am going to Biola.

In that moment you were filled with expectations

about what you thought was gonna be happening here.

Now for good or for bad, for good or for bad

those expectations have been dashed.

Yes, yes is this what you thought it was going to be?

It may be really good.

It's not to say just because it's not what you expected.

It's not to say that it was bad.

It's just to say that it was different.

It's not what you thought it would be.

On one hand Biola is exciting

and it's doctrinally unwavering and it's on message.

And it's about the classes,

and the resources here at the university.

You live and experience in this but on the other hand Biola

is a struggle maybe you're not best friends

with your roommate like you thought you would be.

You realize that you expected more.

Maybe you were in love when you came here

and you left somebody behind,

and it's not going as well as you had expected.

Maybe the Bible classes and the social life,

maybe the whole thing is not turning out like you had hoped.

I wanna talk specifically

about three identity-based expectations

that skew our understanding of God,

ourselves and about relationships in general.

And by extension then even our time here to Biola

and I think part of growth then is going to be for us

to be in the face like Mary has a face.

Oh I had an expectation there.

To identify the expectation

but then also to move through the expectation

so that you can move towards openness

and whatever comes next.

So these are three identity-based expectations

that skew our experience.

That's not the slide nor is that, nor is that.

Oh I'm going backwards.

Just two buttons and it's too hard for me.

There it is, the expectation

that spiritual feelings will deliver you.

That one's gonna crush you okay.

The expectation that relationships

romantic or otherwise will describe you.

In other words it's gonna describe to others who you are.

Oh you're the person whose with those people,

with that person, and the expectation

that great insights will define you.

And so for you at Biola, your quest is essentially this

that I will have, I will find great emotion for God.

That I will find a person, that I will find great insight

and those things are gonna be the things

that are gonna make me who I am.

So quickly to the first one.

The expectation that spiritual feelings will deliver you.

This statement that you would make to yourself

about this one is I am doing okay, because I feel God.

I'm doing okay because I feel God is a statement

that goes with this first one.

Yeah this is a dangerous one, this is a dangerous one

because as much as we want to say that the goal

is to always have a spiritual high.

You know that the Garden of Gethsemane

just for instance, is a time where Jesus didn't feel God

but he was still called to be right where he was at.

The early church is defined by martyrs.

You know who they are?

They're people who don't feel God,

and yet they were called to be right where they are.

It seems that God asks us at times to follow him

even if it's not easy, even if we don't feel him.

And so if our spiritual quest is to always be feeling God

to have a spiritual high then it is possible

that we are going to miss something

that he is asking us to pick up on.

A common experience is that we can worship,

go to worship or teaching and have great conversations

to give us that spiritual high.

And that's spiritual high becomes at times

our only gauge for whether or not their success here.

That's like the only thing that's giving me any feedback

is if I'm doing okay is if I feel really good about God.

If I feel something then it was success.

Listen let's just be honest here,

you will walk away from tonight and you'll go,

"Hmm was tonight good?

"Let's see, did I feel anything about tonight?

"Did I feel spiritually high about something?"

If I did then After Dark was off the chain.

If I didn't yeah, it was okay, it was okay.

And so we use the gauge of emotion for God to be

our gauge of success we bring this tremendous

set of expectations to God.

And what I would say to you is this.

What is you come to After Dark or Singspiration

or Fives or Midday or Morning Chapel.

And you don't have an expectation,

you know what you're doing, you know what you're saying.

You're saying God, you can show up and grow me however

you want to do it why because you're God.

I'm going to be open to you

if you wanna grow me through hard times

or a season of dryness.

God I'm gonna be open to you

and I'm gonna be obedient to you even

if I feel spiritually dry.

See what we do is we feel that dryness

and then we pull back from God

and say I don't know if I'm really gonna do this.

And I don't think that we want to be doing that

but often times that what's happening.

I talk to dozens of students who sense

that they're feeling spiritually numb.

And so they come here trying to manufacture feeling.

I understand this I want this but those feelings are a gift

and if you are getting them then open your hearts

wide open to God because he is giving those to you.

But if you're not feeling them, C.S. Lewis talks about this

brilliantly in the Screwtape Letters.

He says it's like a parent who removes his hands

so that the baby can learn to walk.

God is trying to grow us,

and he does it in a lot of different ways.

Sometimes he gives us spiritual feelings

in order to grow us and sometimes he takes them away.

Let's give him the freedom to do that.

Take away on this point when you walk away from here

asking yourself if you thought tonight was a good

based on whether not you felt God.

Catch yourself in that moment, just catch yourself.

Be gentle with yourself,

don't get in the whole cycle of guilt and shame

but ask a better question.

Did you learn anything about yourself or God

or His creation or others?

That's a better way to get at it.

When somebody ask you was it good,

don't ask a question you feel.

Often self-awareness is painful but it's necessary.

A second one that we looked at there

is that relationships romantic or otherwise.

I think I would probably lean more towards romantic

because that is a big deal

and it's pretty define my time here

trying to chase after that whole thing.

But the statement that you would say with this one.

The correspondence statement would be is I'm doing okay

because this person, this relationship is proof

that I'm loved and valued.

And so you have an expectation that a person can do that

and don't you know, don't you see that God would want for us

expectation for your own good.

Because no person can bear the weight of that

only God can tell you who you are.

And so this one is really hard.

This one feels like to me at least

when I was here everybody could say.

Everybody else was doing that whole putting expectations

and some relationship defining them but that's not me.

But it's everybody else is doing that

but privately I was doing that too.

If I wasn't dating somebody I was wanting to date somebody.

If I wasn't wanting to date somebody,

I was wanting to want to date somebody.

Biola, you know you're at Biola

when everybody likes somebody

but nobody is asking anybody out right.

You know you're at Biola when that's happening.

Family talk right, real talk.

I'm glad things haven't changed in 20 years.

I remember sitting at my graduation on Metzger lawn

looking at the speaker going,

"Huh I had really thought I would meet her here."

And I had, anchor yourself to this one.

To this relationship is like being anchored in a hurricane.

It's up and it's down and it spins you until you're dizzy.

I came to Biola with a broken heart,

in part of came here because I had a broken heart.

and wanted to kind of run from those feelings.

I tried dating but I was so anxious

and I was so in my head about these things.

I was concerned what others thought about me

and if I went on too many dates would I get a reputation.

For just going out with too many different people.

It's crazy, Biola at that time

was about half the size it is now.

And so just felt like if you feel like

you know everybody now.

When it was 2000 people it was way more.

People knew if you were dating on the scene.

This expectation is pretty hard to avoid.

I don't have a lot of advice to give

but I have some advice to help you cope.

And that is just this broaden your relationship for.

Have more relationship with more people.

Process this with people, have quality relationship

so that you are being fulfilled on multiple fronts

with multiple kinds of friendship.

Because your soul just need to be filled

with the goodness of God and that often comes

through your relationship with people.

Your healthy relationship with people

and so if this your quest,

just understand that this expectation.

God is trying to dash that expectation for a good reason.

The third one and the final one

is a great insight will define you.

And the statement you would make here with this one

is that I'm okay because

I finally realized something important.

We're constantly standing here.

We're going to class, we're going to chapel.

We're listening to sermons, we're listening to the podcast

and we're sort of suddenly

but not so suddenly just like waiting

for that one insight light bulb to just go off,

and then it's gonna deliver me.

Then I will have arrived at that.

Where, where?

Are we all life-long learners?

I think we're gonna be learning

when we get to be with God still.

Something more about him new everyday.

Why is this insight thing

and it's arrival insight so important to us?

But it is, it's important to me too.

For the sake of time I'll just say this

that Biola is an insight mill.

There are incredibly important ideas floating around here.

Daily we can feel the weight of those.

Professors they drop truth bombs,

and then pull back the curtain and show you what happens

if you or Society doesn't live those truth bombs out.

The devastation that will happen.

You can be overwhelming and you can feel like

it's a competition to see who can hold

as many of these types of truths as possible.

But due to the nature of the weight of those ideas,

the right answers cannot simply just be memorized,

and this is important.

This is a how we learn problem,

it's not what we learn.

If it was only about what we learned

then the whole project of life would simply be

to just memorize the right facts.

But memorization doesn't lead to wisdom.

When you're studying your Bible classes you're not simply

memorizing a periodic table.

The Bible scripture is the Living Word of God,

it's not multiplication tables to just gut it out

and just get it in ya.

You don't learn to pray to God

by somebody just describing it to you.

The problem with insight alone is that insight is not wisdom

as you are journeying here through Biola,

do not get insight confused with wisdom.

If you're setting your expectations

that you're gonna gain insight

so that you will be somebody important.

Listen, it's wisdom that makes you important not insight.

At Biola we have answers to questions

that we haven't even asked yet.

Let's learn to ask the questions

so that we can live into the answers,

and it could have meaning and we can have wisdom.

The hard thing is that we are learning from professors

who have a good bit of the wisdom

because they ask the right questions.

And then lived into those answers

and then they just get to the end,

and they give you the answers

but you never lived the journey.

The important piece for you is to live into the answers.

what might it take to run a marathon?

That's a great question.

You could look up the answer on the internet right now

and if you looked up the answers

and even memorize the answers.

Would you be prepared to run a marathon?

No, the only way to prepare yourself

is to live into the answer.

Ask yourself for this one is my posture in class

just hurry up and tell me the answer

or tell me what to think professor,

or professor what's your position on this.

I need to know so that I can have that be my position too.

If that's what you're doing

that's an expectation that you have

that is probably going to get toppled over.

Because God is asking you to learn wisdom,

not just insight.

I'm saying that we learn

through the rhythms that we live.

And I just wanna conclude with this,

Go back to the beginning of Luke 2.

Where Mary has some expectations

and she had to confront them.

Why are you searching for me Jesus, he said.

Jesus said that them.

"Why are you searching for me?"

What a great confronting question.

She's got all these answers right?

The right answers, well because you're my son.

No but he's asking a better question.

What expectations do you have of me?

I'll listen, listen I'll go with you.

I'll submit to you but mama I need you to know

that you got some expectations

and you need to confront them.

I love you Mom, let's go.

(uptempo piano music)

- [Announcer] Biola University prepares Christians

to think vividly about everything from science to business,

to education and the arts.

Learn more at Biola.edu.

(slow piano music)

Please choose the correct answer for each question below: