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Practical Steps For Dealing With Disappointment In Your Life
84 Plays2 years ago
Welcome back to Grove Hill Church, where we dive deep into topics that matter to our everyday lives. I'm your host, Dan Sanchez, and in today's episode, we are going to tackle a subject that we all face at some point: disappointment. As a parent, I recently witnessed my kids experience disappointment on the soccer field, and it got me thinking about the valuable lessons we can learn from these challenging moments. Joining me today is our senior pastor, Ridley Barron, as we explore the topic of disappointment and how we can navigate it in a way that aligns with our Christian faith. We'll discuss whether it's realistic to expect less disappointment as Christians, why it's important to learn how to deal with disappointment, and how aligning our minds with God's will can impact the way we handle disappointments. So, if you've ever found yourself grappling with disappointment and are looking for practical insights, you won't want to miss this episode of the podcast. Let's dive in.
Timestamps:
[00:02:04] Grove Hill Church discusses disappointment; Ridley defines it.
[00:05:21] Listen to wisdom, avoid disappointments, repeat.
[00:09:38] Sports disappointment, job rejection, big disappointments.
[00:10:35] Phone call confusion, life's unexpected twists, desperate prayers.
[00:16:34] Step away, pray, and check your perspective.
[00:19:32] Sharing feelings and seeking support is counseling
[00:23:04] Broken dreams can be used by God.
[00:24:52] Scripture memorization is powerful during disappointment.
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Transcript
Children's Soccer: Emotional Growth
00:00:03
Speaker
This weekend, I was at a soccer games. My kids are in soccer season and sports season's all consuming, right? As you're out there, you're out there twice for practice on the weekdays and you're there for multiple games on Saturdays and my kids are in it, man. They're playing soccer. I love watching them. And I was sitting there this weekend watching Noah play and work through a tough game. This was like a game where it's like he was on one best team and this was the other undefeated team and they're going at it, working through it, falling behind.
00:00:31
Speaker
And I was reminded of how helpful sports can be, especially from a young age. Not because it's important to get good at it and win scholarships, though most parents would say that's the thing they're going for. But to me, it's a sports game, or any game for that matter where you're really emotionally tied and invested into it, is really a practice ground for learning how to control your emotions.
Sermon Preparation: Lessons from Joseph
00:00:59
Speaker
You see it and that's the fun of watching games too is you're watching like the NBA or the NFL of watching the players like work through like Psychological blocks they get in or they get into a funk or they finally break through and throw that touchdown You know, it's like it's such a game of the mind
00:01:15
Speaker
I remember trying to explain that to Noah before the game. I'm like, hey, bud, you're in some stinking thinking. You're going to do great. Maybe you didn't sleep so well the night before, but you just got to change it in your head and be like, you know what? I can dominate even with half a night of sleep because I'm good. It's all a mental game. So to watch it play out even with just a bunch of elementary school kids on the soccer field reminded me of that.
00:01:36
Speaker
But it was the story i thought about as we were thinking about preparing for today's episode around disappointment. Which was the total topic for the sermon this week the dungeons of disappointment in the story of joseph so if you're listening welcome to the second.
00:01:54
Speaker
episode we're having of like a sermon recap series. I'm still kind of kicking around names for it. You know, sermon slice or maybe the leaders cut or something like that. But I'm here with Ridley Barron, our senior pastor at Grove Hill Church. And we wanted to dive deep into this topic of disappointment. Well, you covered it really well in Sunday's sermon. So if you haven't listened to that, go back to the last podcast episode and listen to that full like re unpacking of the story of Joseph and how it applies to us.
00:02:25
Speaker
I wanted to dive a little bit deeper into this one aspect of it. So to kick it off, I wanted to actually define the Google definition of disappointment just to make sure we're all on the same page.
Disappointment: Christian Perspectives
00:02:37
Speaker
And if I Google it, you'll see that it is sadness or displeasure caused by the non-fulfillment of one's hopes or expectations.
00:02:46
Speaker
And first, I'll kick that over to you, Ridley. Do you agree with this definition? I know people or companies like Google like to change definitions a lot lately. You think this one's pretty good? I feel pretty solid with that one. It's a pretty good definition, kind of encapsulates the mind side of it, the mental side of it, and the passion behind it, our emotions. Yeah, it's a good one.
00:03:09
Speaker
So to launch into our first question after that, often think like, is it reasonable to expect to have less or no disappointment as Christians? So really, I think that question can be answered. It's really two questions. Is it a good expectation that we would never have any disappointment? No. We live in a fallen planet with human beings all around us that make mistakes, make bad choices or selfish things.
00:03:37
Speaker
Because of that is our lives cross paths with everybody else as we rerun into those things that disappoint us. To have less disappointment, yes. I think that's possible. And as we impact this a little bit more, I think the key to this is how we align our will with the will of God. That determines how much we are disappointed. Yep. I've been in some circles where it's like,
00:04:00
Speaker
It's almost like there's an expectation that less bad circumstances would happen to you and almost like a name it claim it like nothing bad will happen to you. Yes. Um, so do you think it's going to be like, we can expect to have less disappointment as Christians because less bad stuff will happen to us because of, I don't know, the Lord's protection from bad things or that we just deal with bad things differently.
00:04:23
Speaker
Now, I do think there's an element you read through the book of Psalms very carefully and even Proverbs. It talks a great deal with Proverbs talking about, you know, a man of righteousness will be protected by God. His way will be protected. He won't let you stumble, those kinds of things. Those are general rules. There are no guarantees. It doesn't mean that if you follow Christ, you'll never have disappointment or problems. But I do think, again, going back to the mental side of it, when you learn to align your mind and your will with that of God, you can
00:04:51
Speaker
you can expect that disappointments are either going to be fewer or maybe less severe because there's a different perspective with which you approach life.
00:04:59
Speaker
Makes a lot of sense. I mean, if you read, I mean, through the book of proverbs, it's kind of like, Hey, like over here, like wisdom speaking. Like if you follow my ways, these bad things won't happen to, you know, you won't, you won't be caught in the snare. Like in the, and it's just full of warnings. Like, Hey, like if you walk with wise men, you'll probably be wise, but if you're a companion of fools, you're going to be destroyed. Just saying.
00:05:21
Speaker
And if that sounds familiar to you and you've never read the book of Proverbs, then you probably heard your mom and dad say, you know, if you listen to mom and dad, you won't experience the heartache that you have to go through. So we all have versions of those Proverbs that we've heard from different people in our lives. And the reason it keeps getting repeated throughout the ages because it's true. When you listen to wisdom, it protects you against these kinds of disappointments.
00:05:43
Speaker
So to a great degree, walking in God's ways saves us from a lot of disappointment because we're walking according to wisdom, we're walking rightly. And that saves us from a lot of unnecessary heartache, a lot of unnecessary dashing of our hopes and our expectations of what is to be, because we all hope that good things happen to
Breaking the Cycle of Disappointment
00:06:02
Speaker
us. And more of those will happen just from aligning our walk and our way of living to how God's created and ordered creation.
00:06:11
Speaker
Yeah, and you know the fancy word we like to use for that is worldview. When our worldview is a Christian worldview or a divine worldview, then it helps to put in perspective. It doesn't make the pain necessarily go away, but it helps to put it in its proper place. Helps us to understand that there's a point to the pain, that there's a point to the sadness, or in this case, as we're talking today, a point that's being made for the disappointment.
00:06:35
Speaker
So that kind of leads into my next question here on the list. Because while walking in wisdom will save us from some disappointment, or maybe a lot of disappointment, there's still going to be disappointment somewhere. There's still going to be hard things that happen. There's still going to be times when you expected this great mountain peak and you still ended up in a valley. And I wanted to ask, why is it important to learn how to deal with disappointment correctly? I think it's because disappointment
00:07:02
Speaker
added on top of disappointment creates a downward spiral for us. So at some point you kind of have to break the chain. There comes a place where you have to learn to put the disappointment in its right place. Learn the lessons that you need to get from it, but don't just keep carrying it around and don't ignore it because what you do is you just set yourself up for even greater disappointment. Like I said, it's just kind of the spiraling down thing. So
00:07:25
Speaker
You have to make a determined and intentional effort to learn the lessons and put a stop to what could be an ongoing problem of disappointment. You know, that actually reminds me of like the opening example of like games and how they're useful for teaching. I'm a big board gamer. I love, and there's a particular game I've played more than any other. It's called Settlers Catan. If you're into board games, then you've heard that even if you're not into board games, you've probably heard of this one because it's like one of the most popular games now.
00:07:50
Speaker
Right. It's a wonderful game. It's always different, but I've found it's a game of strategy and just luck because there's a roll of a dice element to it. Right. And sometimes in that game, I found I get disappointed because it's multiple times. It didn't matter how I set it up. It's like the dice just never rolled in my favor. The winds were never blowing in my sails. And I found that I can, from disappointment, just check out. Mm-hmm.
00:08:14
Speaker
But I found that if I'm like, wait a second, if I stay engaged, the dice can roll in my favor at any
Resilience through Failure
00:08:20
Speaker
moment, it can change. But if I've already checked out, then I'm definitely not gonna win. And I remember thinking like, dang.
00:08:27
Speaker
how often do I do this in life? Where it's just like things are down, the game's not going well for you, your job's not going well for you, but because you're not expecting that that dice might start rolling for you, because life, the Bible says it, it rains on the wicked and the righteous, so good things happen to both sides. Probably a little bit more for the righteous, because of wisdom, but bad things happen. You gotta stay engaged. You can take this all the way back to the very basic levels of our life.
00:08:57
Speaker
As kids, when you first learned to walk, your parents are there encouraging you saying, come on, you can do this, but yet you fall. Well, you're disappointed because your parents told you you could do this, but if you gave up at that first disappointment and didn't get up and try again, you'd never learn to walk. 16 years old, first time you try to drive a car on your own. Your parents believe you can do it. They give you the keys and you get that fender bender. Well, you don't quit and walk away. You just go, okay, learn the lessons and let's figure out how to get back in the car seat, you know?
00:09:27
Speaker
So what is the proper response to disappointment? So we're going to experience it and I'd love to hear like, what's the proper response? Then give me some examples, like maybe a small example from your life and a big one. Well, um, a couple of small ones I would throw out, obviously I've played sports all my life and you've mentioned sports several times. I remember my senior year of high school playing in the quarterfinals of the state tournament in football. I mean, we had just run right through every,
00:09:53
Speaker
opponent all season long, got up to play against a big school up in the northeast part of Georgia, where I lived at the time. Everybody was saying we've got this in the bag and we got killed. And I remember walking off that field that night going, man, what happened to we got this in the bag? You know, and it was it was a huge disappointment that night. More realistically, I know a long time ago, probably 20 years ago, I was interviewing with a church that I really had my heart set on that I wanted to be a student pastor at.
00:10:23
Speaker
I was really excited about the opportunity and man, every interview had gone so well. And I just really even felt a connection with the pastor and the staff and phone call rang one day and they said, we've gone a different direction. And I remember hanging up the phone going, okay, God, what was that all about? I thought I had this all figured out. I thought I had prayed, thought I felt good. And yet for some reason, this isn't where you've taken me.
00:10:47
Speaker
On a much larger scale, I think some of the people, some of the listeners may know my story, but years ago, 19 years ago, now at this point, coming home from a spring break trip, my family was in a car accident. And that spring afternoon, as my wife was breathing her last breath, and I was watching that, I was praying the hardest I had ever prayed in my life for anything. I was praying out loud, screaming at the top of my lungs at God, do not let my wife die. Do not let my wife die.
00:11:17
Speaker
Before our sense, I can tell you there's never probably been a more sincere prayer than that one that day. And obviously I came away disappointed that God didn't answer it the way I thought He should, you know, not just that He would, but that He should have answered it that way. And so what unfolded in the months after that was how do I deal with disappointment with God when He doesn't
Coping with Severe Disappointments
00:11:36
Speaker
do it? I think it's the right thing.
00:11:41
Speaker
So what would be the proper response? Let's just say somebody else was going through it now that you've been through it. Like obviously there's a very different response for losing a baseball game to like living through a car accident where your loved ones passed away. Well, I think essentially the answer, the solid answer is you just keep coming back to God.
00:12:01
Speaker
You keep coming back to him and don't give up on the fact that, as scripture tells us, his plan is always going to succeed. He's never going to fail. The book of Isaiah chapter 46, he says, you know, I have spoken and this will come to pass because I will make it happen. So there's this constant reminder all the way through scripture that nothing that happens in our life is a surprise to God. So I have to keep coming back to him, not so I can say, okay, God, you need to fix your perspective.
00:12:29
Speaker
But God helped me fix my perspective, helped me to understand what you're up to. And I think going back to the story from Sunday with Joseph in the prison, that's where Joseph was entirely different than what most of us would have done and reacted in that situation. He just kept going back to the guy that his father and grandfather had talked about. You know, while he was growing up, this God who heard and saw and knew every hurt that he experienced and kept saying, OK, God, you're up to something. Let me figure out what this is.
00:12:57
Speaker
Do you think it's wrong to feel the disappointment? No, I don't. I mean, again, I think every emotion that the human being has is given to us by God. Uh, even anger, even bitterness, all those are emotions that are put in us by God. The difference between right and wrong and how we deal with that is what we do with those emotions. And so for me, I think that the proper perspective is that when you have disappointment with God, do you go right to God?
00:13:25
Speaker
say, okay, God, this is how I feel. This is what's going on. I mean, he already knows your heart anyway. So go back to the source of the one who created you and let him help unpack the ifs, the whys, the what ifs, all the things that have gone wrong and get you back on the place where you are exactly where you need to be in your perspective of God. So it's okay to feel it. And I wonder almost if
00:13:50
Speaker
I almost imagine a first step is one, recognizing it. Sometimes people are disappointed and don't even really fully comprehend that they're disappointed. They feel it intensely, but they never actually process it. Actually, I don't know if it's helpful for some people. I know it's helpful for me to label it. I'm disappointed right now. Yes.
00:14:10
Speaker
Right right because if you can label it and identify it then you can actually Do something about it, but I think you're right like bringing it back to God is the big step I almost feel like I don't know like it depending on how big the disappointment is like obviously you probably with with grief you want to take a moment Days or weeks sometimes depending on how big it is to feel it and grieve Otherwise that could probably lead to some problems Even a moment for a baseball game is probably okay to feel the grief
00:14:40
Speaker
But then the big thing the one that you were pointing out the most and hitting hardest in the sermon That I love is like you got to realign with truth, which is coming back to God right because oftentimes we can The emotions can create a different truth in themselves, right? We can tell ourselves a different story about why Which is where I find it gets dangerous for myself I'm disappointed because of something with my wife and I come up with a story about why I shouldn't be disappointed
00:15:09
Speaker
or something, right? And I love what you said a minute ago, Dan, because I think it's so true. You have to put a label on it. You have to know what it is you're really dealing with. There are times where my wife and I will have conversations that don't go according to what we thought we should. It's a nice way to put it. And the best thing for me to do is step away, take a walk in the backyard and go, OK, why am I feeling this way right now? Why am I so irritable with her? Is it because she's really done something wrong?
00:15:37
Speaker
Or am I blowing out of proportion something that she's done because I'm disappointed in something in myself? Or is there some other emotion? Is it just because I'm physically tired or mentally stressed? So I think it is really important that we label what we feel and are regularly bringing our emotions back to the word of God because the Bible describes itself as a mirror to the man. And that way we can look in that mirror and go, okay, here's where things are out of line and it's time to get them back.
00:16:06
Speaker
And to do a full circle, last week we were talking about the temptation of the enemy. I imagine that's probably the best time for the enemy to sneak some lies in there and try to interpret this disappointment for you, which is why it's so important to bring it back to God. Because if you don't, the devil's going to come in and he's going to remind you of that quote from a movie you watched that had that lie in it, or that book, or that thing your friend said that actually was a lie from Satan in justifying it in a weird way.
Emotions and Spiritual Growth
00:16:35
Speaker
Part of the reason I know today that it's better for me to step away from conversations with my wife or with anybody, quite frankly, and take some time to pray is because early on when I was still very immature, even as a minister, very immature and handling my own emotions, I would respond and not go to God and check my perspective. And what would happen is I would sit there and listen to the enemy as he would tell me, they did this wrong. This is their fault. They should have been responsible for this and this.
00:17:03
Speaker
But as I step back and take myself to the word of God in prayer, as well as just reading the word, what happens is God lets me see the error in my own ways and go, you know, yeah, they did this, but if you had done this first, then this would have never happened. So, yeah, it's a good check on your soul.
00:17:21
Speaker
Yeah. Do you think there's a proper way to recognize disappointment? I'm trying to think of other emotions that might be mistaken for it, but I think it's a pretty common one because we all have goals. Right, right. I think in those quiet moments that we're talking about, yeah, it becomes easier to recognize, but in the midst of the chaos, for instance, in the aftermath of my wife and son's death back in 2004, there was a storm of emotions going on inside of me.
00:17:50
Speaker
There was grief, there was anger, there was shame. There was the whole, the whole survivor's guilt thing. You know, what if I had been driving the car and not her? There were all these emotions in there and deep inside was also disappointment with God. So to your point in a minute ago, I had to spend several months just kind of sorting through those feelings, kind of taking each one and properly dealing with each one. Some,
00:18:16
Speaker
was a matter of just recognizing it and going, Oh, there's no reason for that feeling and pushing aside. Others took weeks and long conversations with friends and even ministry partners to kind of sort through those things. It is helpful. It is clear when you're not in the, in the storm of emotions to recognize sometimes what's going on. And this is one of those areas where we need objective friends in our lives to people that we can go to who can be honest with us, to sit down and have an opportunity for you to look at me and go, Hey,
00:18:43
Speaker
You're not really feeling this. I think you're just a little disappointed with God right now. Yeah. I often find that's one of the most important things. And I find that the people who actually seek out help are usually the people that do well. I always get a little like, it makes me like kind of smile and just like shake my head because the people who actually need it the most are usually the people who don't ask for help.
00:19:07
Speaker
If you're the kind of person, so be that kind of person. If you're listening to this and you're nodding your head now, I'm trying to get you to like psychologically commit to be this person already. That when it happens and it will happen eventually, you go and seek that kind of help because it's so important to get the second or third voice. And if it's a really big decision in your life sometimes, even coming to for pastoral council or elder council from the churches.
00:19:32
Speaker
And, you know, it's really important people understand counseling is a word that kind of carries with it a lot of taboo, which is not fair.
Scriptural Guidance and Memorization
00:19:40
Speaker
Counsel doesn't even have to come from professional counselors. Counselors sometimes are your best friends who just know you very well. Sometimes it's your spouse who you do everyday life with, who sees you, knows you, understands your behaviors. Counsel is just sharing your feelings so that somebody can share back with you what they've heard and listen, you know, to what's going on in your life.
00:20:00
Speaker
You don't have to pay big bucks to go see a counselor, just find a good friend. Yeah. More likely put is just advice or someone to listen and give some remarks on what you've been going through. Yep. Because you're right, counseling even has legal...
00:20:16
Speaker
I don't know, legal complications sometimes in that word. It does. You're right. Yes. So to finish, you've said multiple times now, and I want to unpack it just a little bit more that like run to the word of God, like go to scripture when you're feeling disappointed to realign yourself to truth.
00:20:33
Speaker
What does that mean exactly? What does that look like? Does someone listening to that, it's like, well, like, what do I, what do I start? Do I just go to Genesis one, one and start reading through? Is there certain, do you point people to certain scriptures or maybe to stick with their, their reading plan or to start a reading plan? Um, if sometimes just starting out with reading the scripture and they haven't picked it up or haven't picked it up in a long time,
00:20:55
Speaker
I always take them back to the gospels. I mean, always reading the biography of Jesus's life and his teachings. I mean, he is the master teacher. So going back to him, but if I had to summarize it all in three words, it would be die to self. That's what Jesus talked about. You know, he said, take up your cross if you're going to follow me and die to yourself. And what that means practically for us in this conversation today is I put to death my desires and goals and expectations and aligned them with what Christ is talking about. When he says,
00:21:25
Speaker
you know, died to self. He's not talking about physical death because later in Romans Paul talks about us being living sacrifices. What he's talking about is bringing everything we think and feel and submission to who he is. And so that means aligning every part of our lives with the expectations of Christ.
00:21:42
Speaker
It's funny as I hear a lot of people throw out the words, trusting God, like trust God, trust God. And sometimes I'm like, trust him with what? Trust him with what? It's really trusting him. Once you read the truth and maybe it's like, Hey, like if you do these things, it'll go well for you. Like it's, and it's counterintuitive a lot in the Bible. It's like, Hey, you have to die to live. You're like, uh, sometimes we don't want to listen to it, but then that's where the trust part comes in. Right. Trusting God, because trust that what he's saying in the word to you as a promise.
00:22:11
Speaker
Is actually going to take place because it's hard. It's hard to like lean into that that I have to die to myself I have to keep serving even though I don't want to serve even though I'm angry or whatever the thing might be To trust that actually this is a better way to go
00:22:28
Speaker
And that's when you have to remember Isaiah 55 nine, where God's speaking through the prophet, he says, my ways are higher than your ways. My thoughts are higher than your thoughts. Um, our goal, our end goal when we come to meet Jesus in the scriptures is not to necessarily understand and know everything about him, but it is to walk away every time with a greater understanding of him and what he desires for us because his desires for us are always what's best.
00:22:57
Speaker
What's a scripture that's brought you a lot of comfort when it comes to disappointment? Strangely enough, if you get to the end of the very popular story in John where Jesus feeds the 5,000, this was a verse that just kind of jumped off the pages of me. At the end of the thing, he tells the disciples, get the baskets, can go around and collect the leftovers after he's fed all these people. And he says to them, go pick up the pieces, let nothing be wasted.
00:23:25
Speaker
And I've always applied that to my dreams because that's, that's the image we think of when our dreams are broken on the floor, when they're shattered on the floor, it's pieces, you know, but the pieces that come from our broken desires, our broken goals, our broken dreams are pieces that God can take and use and put back together in this beautiful mosaic that would look like nothing we ever thought it could. Um, there's so many things about my life today that I can trace back to the day I lost the state championship to the day I lost my wife and son.
00:23:54
Speaker
to the day I got the phone call that said, I'm sorry, Ridley, we're going to go in a different direction. Every one of those disappointments lined up to get me to where I am today. But it's because somewhere along the way, people taught me, you got to give your pieces back to God. That's powerful.
00:24:11
Speaker
That's powerful. I've never considered that one as something to wrestle with disappointment, but now having heard it, I get to carry it with me and think about that. Good. One of my favorite verses is just Psalm 23. It's one of those like super popular Psalms, like the Lord is my shepherd, shall not want like that whole thing. And I think it's just a well-rounded piece of scripture. So like it can be used to like help you through so many different seasons of circumstances, but yeah.
00:24:34
Speaker
And it was probably one of the earliest chapters I memorized in my walk. So I've just leveraged that one the most of reminding myself the truth. He's with me in the pastures. He's also with me in the valley of shadow death. He also prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies. There's so many promises in it that you're like, oh, God's good job. And you just brought up an incredible thing too, Dan. And I think this is a great reminder as we're wrapping all this conversation up for people today. Don't underestimate the power of scripture memorization.
00:25:03
Speaker
Because when disappointment hits, that's what's going to come out of you is the stuff that you've put in, you know? So versus like the two that we just talked about, some of the others we've coded here, people who are listening probably have some of their own favorites, but it's the old adage, you know, whatever's on the inside when life squeezes you is what's going to come out.
00:25:21
Speaker
So
Faith, Community, and Transformation
00:25:22
Speaker
to summarize, Christians, if you're walking in the Lord's will, you probably experience less disappointment, but you still will experience disappointment. Luckily, if you're staying close to God's truth, you can work through it and even get more out of it. And God, we have that wonderful promise that God will work for the good of those who love him.
00:25:46
Speaker
Uh, trying to remember who were called according to his purpose. I'm glad it was purpose. That's what it is. You got it. Thanks for finishing it for me. And thank you for listening to this episode. If you've been enjoying this new series, uh, let Ridley or I know, um, so we can continue to producing it and do more things like this. And until next week, see ya close it out. I'm just going to leave that in there too. Bye. Bye.