Habits | Practical Tips for Developing Habits | Part 4
We are there in Isaiah 28 and we’ve been going through this series on Habits. We will actually be finishing the series this morning. We started this series talking about the Power of Habits. We looked at what habits are and how they can be very powerful. In the 2nd week we talked about how to develop good habits. And we looked at several ideas in regards to developing good habits in your life. Last week we talked about how to break bad habits. Today we’re going to look at this idea of how to dial in your habits. What I want to do is I want to give you eight practical tips for forming habits. And these are kind of just eight tips that I didn’t really know where to fit them in any of the other sermons. However, they’re important. I think they can help you. And I want to give you these eight ideas. And like I said, we’ve been talking about habits. A habit is defined as a routine or behavior that is performed regularly and in many cases automatically. The potential of a habit is that though it is maybe a small behavior that’s done, if done on a regular basis over time, it produces great results.
In Isaiah 28, we see a couple examples of this. I showed this to you earlier in the series but I want to show it to you again. Isaiah 28:10 “10 For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:”. That’s really how we produce, that’s how we create, that’s how we grow in the Christian life. You don’t come to Church one time and learn everything you need to learn and then go home and you’re fine. No, it happens precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little there a little. Look at verse 13. “13 But the word of the Lord was unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little; that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.”. A habit is something that is done routinely, regularly. And it produces great results.
Like I said, this morning I’d like to give you some practical tips for habit formation. I’m going to give you eight tips. I would encourage you to write these down. For each tip, I’ll give you the scriptural reference and read a little anecdote or article or story to illustrate it. Hopefully you’ve been thinking about habits and thinking about your habits and forming some good habits and breaking some bad habits. These are just kind of eight things that could help you in regards to that.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual.
When we’re talking about habits and forming habits, it happens over a period of time. We just saw that in Isaiah. “here a little, there a little, precept upon precept, line upon line.”. As you are making progress with a habit, the first tip that I want to give you is to make the progress visual. The Bible says in Lamentations 3:51 “51 Mine eye affecteth mine heart…”. We are visual people. We are people who are affected by the things that we see. Jeremiah says “51 Mine eye affecteth mine heart because of all the daughters of my city.”. Of course he’s referring to the fact that he’s seeing the judgment of God come upon his nation. He says that what he is seeing is affecting my heart. But the principle is true that your eye always has an effect upon your heart. So when we talk about habit formation or developing habits, one thing that you should do is to make the progress visual.
Let me read to you just a little story here to kind of illustrate the idea. “In 1993, a bank in Abbotsford, Canada, hired a twenty-three-year-old stockbroker named Trent Dyrsmid. Abbotsford was a relatively small suburb, tucked away in the shadow of nearby Vancouver, where most of the big business deals were being made. Given the location, and the fact that Dyrsmid was a rookie, nobody expected too much of him. But he made brisk progress thanks to a simple daily habit.
The Paper Clip Strategy
Dyrsmid began each morning with two jars on his desk. One was filled with 120 paper clips. The other was empty. As soon as he settled in each day, he would make a sales call. Immediately after, he would move one paper clip from the full jar to the empty jar and the process would begin again. “Every morning I would start with 120 paper clips in one jar and I would keep dialing the phone until I had moved them all to the second jar,” he told me.
Within eighteen months, Dyrsmid was bringing in $5 million to the firm. By age twenty-four, he was making $75,000 per year—the equivalent of $125,000 today. Not long after, he landed a six-figure job with another company.”.
And that little story just kind of illustrates that sometimes what you need to motivate you and to help you is just to see things, to be able to visually look at the progress that you are making. You say why? Because mine eye affecteth my heart.
Go to Proverbs 24. So the first tip is to make the progress visual. One thing I like to advise people as I counsel and try to help people maybe in regards to breaking bad habits like drinking or smoking or things like that or in developing new habits like daily Bible reading or daily prayer or waking up early, I like to advise people to get a calendar. And I advise them to put a calendar somewhere where they’re going to see it every day. Then they should take a big black sharpie or a big red marker and just mark a big x for every day that you don’t perform the bad habit that you’re trying to break or that you do perform the good habit you’re trying to start.
So if you’re trying to quick smoking, if you go one day without smoking then you put 1 big X. If you go another day without smoking then you put another big X. If you’re trying to develop a habit of getting up early or develop a habit of Bible reading every day, every day you accomplish that you put one big X. Your goal becomes very visual. You can visually look at it to see your progress. Then your goal is that you don’t break the chain but continue to do what you want to do. Obviously we live in a world of technology today and maybe you can use some sort of a calendar on your phone or different apps that can help you with these things. But whatever you do, I would encourage you to make it visual. Why? Because mine eye affecteth my heart. It can be something as simple as paper clips in a jar. You make the progress visual. It’s something that you can look at and you can see how well you’re doing whether it is with breaking a bad habit or developing a good habit.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual.
Number 2 – When you fail, rebound quickly.
Proverbs 24:16 “16 For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.”. What does that mean? It means that we’re all going to fail at times. We’re all going to mess up at times. We’re all going to not do what we said we were going to do. Remember the Apostle Paul taught us that in Romans 7 “The things that I want to do I don’t do. And the things that I don’t want to do I end up doing.”. We’re all going to give in to the flesh at some point and we’re going to mess up. You say well what’s the difference between someone who succeeds and someone who fails? The difference between a successful person and a failure is not that they mess up. Everyone messes up. The successful person gets back up and tries again. The only way to fail is to quit.
Maybe you are here and you have a desire to go into the ministry and be a Pastor. Well being a Pastor can be very difficult. But I can tell you that the only way to fail is to quit. The only way to fail in your marriage is to quit. The only way to fail in the Christian life is to quit. The Bible says “16 For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again:”. Yes it happens sometimes. We fall. We fail. We mess up. We sin. The difference is whether you rise back up. When you fail, rebound quickly. If you want to develop good habits or break bad habits, realize that you’re going to fail. But when you fail, rebound quickly. Let me read to you an article about this.
“I want to discuss what to do when you fall off the wagon. Every habit streak ends at some point. Perfection is not possible. Before long an emergency will pop up. You will get sick or you’ll have to travel for work or your family needs a little more of your time. Whenever this happens to me, I try to remind myself of a simple rule. Never miss twice. If I miss one day, I try to get back into it as quickly as possible. Missing one workout happens but I’m not going to miss two in a row. Maybe I eat an entire pizza for lunch but I’ll follow it up with a healthy meal. As soon as one streak ends, I get started on the next one. I can’t be perfect but I can avoid the second mistake. Generally speaking the first mistake is never the one that ruins you. It is the spiral of repeated mistakes that follows. Missing one is an accident. Missing two is the start of a new habit.”.
See, your goal like we talked about in point number one or tip number one is to make the progress visual. Make sure you can see your progress. And your goal is to not break the chain like we talked about. But when you do mess up, when you do sleep in, when you do fail, when you don’t do what you said you’re going to do or you do what you said you weren’t going to do then the goal at that point is never miss twice. Start the streak again. See, successful people that develop good habits, not only do they make the progress visual but they realize that when they fail they’re going to rebound quickly. This is often something you find with people that are struggling with habitual sins or addictions like drugs and alcohol. They’ll have a streak where they’re doing well and then something happens and they mess up, they get backslidden, or they go back and they drink or smoke or do drugs. Then they develop this attitude “I already messed up so I might as well just give up.”. Your goal is not to break the chain but if you do break it then don’t break it twice in a row. Get back on track as soon as possible. The first mistake is never the one that ruins you. It is the spiral of repeated mistakes that follows.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual
Number 2 – When you fail, rebound quickly.
Number 3 – Make the reward or punishment immediate.
Proverbs 3:28 “28 Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, and to morrow I will give; when thou hast it by thee.”. Here in the Proverb, Solomon tells us that when you give somebody a task, don’t tell them to come again later and then pay. Pay them right there and then if you can after they have done the task. Why? Because when it comes to habit formation, you want to make the reward immediate or you want to make the punishment immediate. If you’re trying to break a bad habit, you want to make it immediate. Let me read this little excerpt for you.
“The vital thing in gaining a habit to stick is to feel successful even if it’s in a small way. The feeling of success is a signal that your habit paid off and that the work was worth the effort. In a perfect world, the reward for a good habit is the habit itself. In the real world, good habits tend to feel worthwhile only after they have provided you with something of a benefit. Early on it’s all sacrifice. So for that reason, in the beginning you need a reason to stay on track. This is why immediate rewards are essential. They keep you excited while the delayed rewards accumulate in the background.”.
See, the problem with habits is that you often don’t see the rewards immediately. You have to be faithful at that exercise routine that you started. The healthy eating habit that you started, you have to be faithful for a long time before you start seeing the results of that diet or you start seeing the results of that exercise. You have to put in a lot of time. And the problem with that is that we often want immediate results. We want the path of least resistance. We want to do things that are easy. We want to see effects immediately. See, we live in a drive-through microwave society. Everything happens fast. We want it fast. We don’t want to wait for anything. We don’t want to wait to develop a relationship. We don’t want to wait to develop success as a career. We don’t want to wait for anything. We just want to do it now. The problem is usually when we move quickly, we mess things up. We need to realize it’s going to take some time for this habit to pay off. It’s going to take some time before you see the results. If you start working on your debt now, it’s really going to take some time before you actually start seeing the impact that you’ve made. Or if you start saving money for a purchase, it takes time to save up that money. There are things that you have to do before you see that result.
So what you want to do, and this will require some brainstorming, how do you make the reward as immediate as possible? One way to do that like we said in tip number one, make the progress visual. Now depending on what the habit is that you’re trying to accomplish, these things are going to be different. But let me just give you kind of an example. How can we make the reward immediate? For example let’s say that you’re trying to break the habit of eating at restaurants. Maybe you’re just eating out too much. Maybe you’re trying to cut back on expenses on frivolous things. Something you could do is open up a savings account and give that savings account a name of something that excites you. Maybe call it “family vacation” or “get out of debt” or “down payment on a house” or something like that. When you pass on going to a restaurant, put that extra money saved into the Savings Account. When you pass on morning Coffee from Starbucks, pass that money on to the Savings Account. Even just a little bit will be a visual reward that will help motivate and keep you going. The trick often is to make some sort of a small, visual reward that will help motivate you.
On the flip side of that, not only do you want to make the reward immediate for good habits, you also want to make the punishment immediate for bad habits. In Ecclesiastes 8:11 we get some insight into why crime can get out of control. Ecclesiastes 8:11 “11 Because sentence against an evil…”. What does that mean? A sentence there is referring to like a sentencing or judgment. An evil work is referring to like a crime. It says “11 Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.”. Here’s what the Bible is telling us. When punishment is not immediate, it motivates people to do wrong. Now you can apply that to a society where you live. In a society like ours where people maybe perform some sort of a crime like murder, they will be in prison for 20 or 30 years before they ever actually receive the punishment that they’re supposed to receive. But the Bible tells us that the punishment must be given immediately or it will motivate people to do wrong. By the way, we can apply that to the criminal justice system. But we can also apply it to your home. When you discipline your kids, it should be immediate. You need to punish them immediately when they do wrong.
Kids will do something wrong and they don’t take the parents seriously when the parents tell them to stop. Why? Because they think that the parents are just full of talk and won’t actually punish. They think their parents won’t get off of Facebook and actually come across the room and spank me because they are too lazy for that. So the kids think they can do whatever they want and get away with it. Here’s what I’m saying “11 Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.”.
When it comes to reward or punishment, it should be immediate. When it comes to good habits, the work or the difficulty is immediate and the reward or results take time. Whether that is eating healthy, getting on the treadmill each day or whatever it is. With bad habits, and this proves that we live in a fallen state, with bad habits the reward is immediate but the consequences are delayed. You smoke and the reward is immediate and you get cancer 30 years down the road. Unhealthy eating results in the reward immediately and the punishment down the road. The diabetes and obesity come later. Whether it is drugs and alcohol or spending too much or not saving or sleeping in or being lazy, the reward is immediate but the consequences are delayed. With good habits it is the opposite. The sacrifice is immediate and the consequences are delayed. So we must make the reward if possible as immediate as we can. And if possible we should make the punishment immediate for a bad habit. Let me read this to you.
“Just as government uses laws to hold citizens accountable, you can create a habit contract to hold yourself accountable. A habit contract is a verbal or written agreement in which you state your commitment to a particular habit and the punishments that will occur if you don’t follow through. Then you find one or two people to act as your accountability partners and sign off on the contract with you.”.
Now go to Matthew 4. Let me just kind of illustrate. You say what does a habit contract look like? Well there’s different ways to do it but let me just give you a very simple illustration. I’ve heard lots of people use something that they call a cussing jar. Some people develop a bad habit of using cuss words. By the way, I’m not trying to hurt your feelings. But let me just explain that they have done research on people that use a lot of curse words and usually those people have a very limited vocabulary. So just let me let you in on a little secret. If you can’t think of any word to use besides the S word or the F word then maybe you should sign up to dictionary.com for a word of the day or something like that. It doesn’t make you cool or sound intelligent when you curse. I’m not trying to hurt your feeling. I’m just trying to help you out a little bit. It says something about you.
I was at a business recently. I was there taking care of some things that need to be taken care of. I told my wife that I’m never going back there again. She said “Why?”. I told her all the employees are just cussing at each other and yelling at each other. Now if they do that in their free time then fine. But they shouldn’t be doing that in front of a customer. I’m paying these people to provide a service. They’ve lost my business. I’m just telling you this is how people look at the world.
Some people use a cussing jar to help with their bad habit. Every time they get caught by their kids or spouse or whatever using foul language, they have to put a dollar bill in the jar or they have to put a 5-dollar bill in the jar. At the end of the week, the money is used to buy ice cream or whatever. That’s an example of a habit contract. Then you put some sort of punishment in place in order to keep you from doing that.
I read of a guy who wanted to develop a habit of getting up at four in the morning every day and he somehow figured out how to set up an automatic message to go out through his twitter account. He had all these thousands of followers and that would go out every morning at 4am and it would say this. “If you are seeing this message it’s because I failed to get up early today and the first 10 people to email to or respond to this will get five dollars through his google play account or whatever.”. Every day he had to stop the message from going out because otherwise that would go to all of his Twitter followers. That’s an example of setting up some sort of a habit contract to bring some immediate pain. Just a little bit of pain into your process for developing good habits or breaking bad habits.
Look at Matthew 4:4. “4 But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”. Jesus equates reading the Bible to eating. He says man should not live by bread alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Of course he’s making a reference back to the Old Testament where God had manna come down from heaven every day and the children of Israel were to go out every day and pick manna off the ground and eat it. Remember they were supposed to go out every day and pick the manna off the ground. They weren’t allowed to pick more than was needed for the day. In fact, if they tried to get more than was needed for the day it would go bad. They had to go out every day and pick out the manna. God was teaching them a lesson. He told them this is an illustration of Bible reading. Because the word of God is the bread of life, the Lord Jesus Christ. He wanted us to develop a daily habit of consuming the word of God. Just as physically we eat bread daily, spiritually we should consume the word of God daily.
Number 4 – Utilize habit stacking. What does that mean? Let me read to you this article to help explain.
You probably have very strong habits that you take for granted each day. For example, your brain is probably very efficient at remembering to take a shower each morning or to brew your morning cup of coffee or to open the blinds when the sun rises or thousands of other daily habits. You can take advantage of these strong habits to build new habits. How? When it comes to building new habits, you can use the connectedness of behavior to your advantage. One of the best ways to build a new habit is to identify a current habit you already do each day and then stack your new habit on top. This is called habit stacking. The idea with habit stacking is that you develop a new habit by adding it to an already established habit.
See, God was trying to help the children of Israel with this when he was trying to get them to develop a habit of daily Bible reading. Jesus said “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”. He’s showing them that they eat every day so stack eating spiritually on top of that. So the idea would be that if you drink coffee every morning, start reading the Bible while you are drinking coffee. See, habit stacking is looking at your life at things that you already do every day and then adding a new habit to it.
I’m sure all of you have some routines that you do at your house. Before I go to bed, I walk through the house to make sure the windows are shut, all the doors are closed and locked, the dogs have been brought in, the lights are off and the alarm is set and a few other things. I also go to my girl’s room to make sure their night light is on and a few things are situated. I started adding a routine of saying a quick prayer for them to grow up to be Proverbs 31 women. And I walk into my son’s rooms and I say “Lord please help my sons to grow up to be men of character and integrity that they’ll love you and they’ll follow you.”.
What I’m saying is that there are things that you do every day and you can utilize this habit stacking. Because what happens now is that when you go and pick up that cup of coffee, your mind connects coffee with Bible reading or doing the rounds of the house with praying for my family or whatever it might be. So man shall not live by bread alone. Let’s stack that to the word of God. “but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God”.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual
Number 2 – When you fail, rebound quickly.
Number 3 – Make the reward or punishment immediate.
Number 4 – Utilize habit stacking.
Number 5 – Make sure the best choice is the most obvious choice
Matthew 6:22 “22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. 23 But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!”. Here again the Bible is emphasizing that we are visual people. Let me read this little anecdote for you.
“Anne Thorndike, a primary care physician at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, had a crazy idea. She believed she could improve the eating habits of thousands of hospital staff and visitors without changing their willpower or motivation in the slightest way. In fact, she didn’t plan on talking to them at all.
Thorndike and her colleagues designed a six-month study to alter the “choice architecture” of the hospital cafeteria. They started by changing how drinks were arranged in the room. Originally, the refrigerators located next to the cash registers in the cafeteria were filled with only soda. The researchers added water as an option each one. Additionally, they placed baskets of bottled water next to the food stations throughout the room. Soda was still in the primary refrigerators, but water was now available at all drink locations.
The image below depicts what the room looked like before the changes (Figure A) and after the changes (Figure B). The dark boxes indicate areas where bottled water is available.
What happened?
Over the next three months, the number of soda sales at the hospital dropped by 11.4 percent. Meanwhile, sales of bottled water increased by 25.8 percent. They made similar adjustments—and saw similar results—with the food in the cafeteria. Nobody had said a word to anyone eating there. People often choose products not because of what they are, but because of where they are.”
When the choice is obviously in front of you, you will often make that choice. In fact, major brands at grocery stores or places like Target or Walmart pay top dollar to have their product placed at high level shelves. They put all the generic stuff at the bottom and they put all the expensive name brand stuff right at eye level. Why? Because the light of the body is the eye. Because sometimes the choices we make are not conscious choices. We just choose whatever happens to be in front of us. People don’t choose the product based on what it is. They choose it off of where it is. So with that said, when it comes to habit formation, you should make the best choice the most obvious choice. You should try to think through where do you go, what do you look at. If you walk in the kitchen and there is always a plateful of cookies then you will eventually eat those cookies. So make sure the best choice is the most obvious one. And make sure you realize that as a visual individual, you’re going to often be affected by what you see.
When it comes to Bible Reading, if you struggle with it then put it in a place where you will see it all the time. If you want to develop a habit of morning exercise then get your workout clothes and shoes ready the night before so you see it when you wake up. Make the best choice the most obvious choice.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual
Number 2 – When you fail, rebound quickly.
Number 3 – Make the reward or punishment immediate.
Number 4 – Utilize habit stacking.
Number 5 – Make sure the best choice is the most obvious choice
For number 6, let me read to you this anecdote first. This one is lengthier.
Many people are familiar with Michael Phelps who is widely considered to be one of the greatest athletes in history. Phelps has won more Olympic medals not only than any swimmer but also more than any Olympian in any sport. Fewer people know the name Hicham El Guerrouj. But he was a fantastic athlete in his own right. Guerrouj. is a Moroccan runner who holds two Olympic gold medals and is one of the greatest middle-distance runners of all time? For many years he held the world record in the mile, 1500 meter and the 2000-meter races at the Olympic games. In Athens, Greece in 2004, he won gold in the 1500 meter and 5000-meter races.
These two athletes are widely different in many ways. For starters, one competes on land and the other in water. But most notably they defer significantly in height. Guerrouj 5’9 tall while Phelps is 6’4. Despite the 7-inch height difference, the 2 men are identical in one respect. Michael Phelps and Hicham El Guerrouj wear the same length in seam on their pants. How is this possible? Phelps has relatively short legs for his height and a very long torso. The perfect build for swimming. Hicham El Guerrouj has incredibly long legs and a short upper body. An ideal frame for distance running.
Now imagine if these two world-class athletes were to switch sports? Given his remarkable athleticism, could Michael Phelps become an Olympic caliber distance runner with enough training? It’s unlikely. At peak fitness, Phelps weighed 194 pounds which is 40 percent heavier than Hicham El Guerrouj who competed at an ultra-light 138 pounds. Taller runners are heavier runners and every extra pound is a curse. When it comes to distance running against elite competition, Phelps would be doomed from the start. Similarly Hicham El Guerrouj might be one of the best runners in history but it’s doubtful he would ever qualify for the Olympics as a swimmer.
Since 1976, the average height of Olympic gold medalists in the men’s 1500-meter run is five feet 10 inches. The average height of the Olympic gold medalist in the men’s 100-meter freestyle swim is six feet four inches. Swimmers tend to be tall and have long backs and arms which are ideal for pulling through the water. Hicham El Guerrouj would be at a severe disadvantage before he ever touched the pool.
The secret to maximizing your odds of success is to choose the right field of competition. This is just as true with habit change as it is with sports and business. Habits are easier to perform and more satisfying to stick with when they align with your natural inclinations and abilities like Michael Phelps in the pool and Hicham El Guerrouj on the track. You want to play the game where the odds are in your favor. Embracing the strategy requires the acceptance of a simple truth, people are born with different abilities.
Now hopefully that makes sense when we talk about this physically but this can also be applied spiritually. And it can be applied to pretty much any habit. It can also be applied to your career. 1st Peter 4:10 “10 As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.”. Now I want you to notice what the Bible says here. The Bible is saying that every believer has received a gift and this is talking about the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Spiritual gifts as every man has received the gift even so minister the same. Whatever gifts God has given you, use those to minister one to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. God has given you certain gifts, talents, abilities. And you should steward those gifts properly.
Verse 11 “11 If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God;…”. Here’s what he’s saying. If God has given you the aptitude to speak, to communicate, to preach then you ought to do that well. Let him speak as the oracles of God. “if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.”.
I want you to notice that little phrase there “let him do it as of the ability which God giveth”. The truth is this, God has given you some strengths, some talents, some abilities. And you ought to work with the ability which God giveth.
Number 6 – Work within your strengths.
When it comes to habit formation, you ought to work within your strength. I was recently listening to a business leader give a speech about business and managing people and leading people and things like that. And he said “Sometimes you have to realize that you can’t send a duck to an eagle school. A duck is a duck. People often think about their strengths and don’t worry about those because they believe they are good to go. Then they seek to increase their weaknesses to bring them up to a strength. That is a mistake. Instead of working on your weaknesses and frustrating yourself on your weaknesses to try to bring your weaknesses up to your strength, what you should be doing is working within your strengths. Don’t try to be a runner when you’re built like an orangutan. The idea is that if you have certain strengths, if you have certain abilities, if you have certain talents, if you have certain gifts that God has given you, then don’t try to work on your weaknesses. You ought to work within your strengths.
Here’s what often happens. People will look at someone else who is maybe accomplishing great things in an area and people want to do the same. But that might not be your strength. For example, let’s say your strength is public speaking. Sometimes people have been given an aptitude or the ability to be able to speak and communicate in front of people. And people think “I have a talent for speaking so I’m not going to work on that. I’m going to work on this other weakness and try to bring that up.”. You’ll have preachers that are just winging their sermons because they’ve got an aptitude to teach and they’re trying to work on all these other weaknesses. What they should be doing is realizing “God gave me a gift to speak publicly so let me work on that and get better and work within my strength.”. Then they should find other people to help with their weaknesses.
Sometimes people ask me “How do you know what your spiritual gift is? How do you know what your talents are? How do you know what your strengths are?”. Here’s how you know. When you’re doing something that other people get drained from but for you it energizes then maybe that is your strength. That’s your gift. That’s your talent. Now some people would be terrified if they had to get up on a Sunday morning and preach to 200 people. That’s not their strength. For others, that might energize them.
For me, one of my strengths is organizing. I like to organize things. I like to structure things. I like to run things. I love the verse where it says “Let all things be done decently and in order”. I like calendars. I like to be able to look at things and see what the events are coming up and plan them out. For many people though organizing and preparing drains them. However, it energizes me. When I am just winging things I get drained. Whatever I am doing, I like to plan ahead and be prepared. So here’s the thing, for me that is a strength. I don’t delegate that because that drains other people while it energizes me. Now obviously you can delegate people helping you in those things. But the point is that you need to figure out what’s your strength. What do you do well? What energizes you? And work within your strengths and then have others help you with your weaknesses.
Number 7 – Have an accountability partner
Have an accountability partner to help you with developing good habits and specifically to help you withy breaking bad habits. You ought to have an accountability partner.
2nd Samuel 11 is the famous story of David committing adultery with Bathsheba. He’s about to have a major moral failure in his life. The Bible says “2nd Samuel 11:1 “And it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried still at Jerusalem.”. Now notice that the Bible tells us that this is a time when kings go forth to battle. This is what David should have been doing. He should have been going forth to battle.
Instead, here’s what David did. And David sent away Joab and his servants. He should have gone with them but instead he stayed back and he sent them away. Now who did David send away? He sent away his peers. He sent away his equals. He sent away the people that are closest to him, the people that are closest to him personally, the people that are closest to him in rank. Obviously he’s the King. Joab is the general of the army. He sends him away. He sends away the mighty men. He sends the people that he’s been fighting with for years and pretty much his entire adult life. And David sent Joab and his servants with him and all Israel.
“And it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried still at Jerusalem. 2 And it came to pass in an eveningtide, that David arose from off his bed,…”. He can’t sleep at night. I’ll tell you why he can’t sleep. He’s not working. He should be battling. If he was on the field fighting then he’d probably be getting a good night’s rest.
“2 And it came to pass in an eveningtide, that David arose from off his bed, and walked upon the roof of the king’s house: and from the roof he saw a woman washing herself; and the woman was very beautiful to look upon. 3 And David sent and enquired after the woman. And one said, Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”. Notice the words in this verse “and one said”. This is one of David’s servants. I want to give credit to this guy because this guy tried. Now this guy was not one of David’s mighty men. This guy was not one of David’s generals. This guy was a servant who did not get sent to war with the rest. He’s not even close to being close to the king. But he tries. This guy is trying to kind of tell David that this is a married woman. But David disregards this.
2nd Samuel 11:4 “4 And David sent messengers, and took her; and she came in unto him, and he lay with her; for she was purified from her uncleanness: and she returned unto her house. 5 And the woman conceived, and sent and told David, and said, I am with child.”. And of course we have a major problem in David’s life. What was it? Why was it that David failed? One of the reasons that David failed is because he failed to have people around him that could keep him accountable. Now I want you to compare and contrast that with another guy in the next chapter that confronts David.
2nd Samuel 12:1 “And the Lord sent Nathan unto David. And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor.”. Nathan will go on to say this parable to David. But I want you to notice the boldness of Nathan in verse 7. “7 And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul;”. See, here’s the thing. Nathan is a good accountability partner. He’s in a different field as David. He’s playing in a different field. David is a king with an army. He’s a politician. Nathan is a prophet. He’s a spiritual leader. He’s an equal in some ways to David. Nathan with boldness tells David that he is the one guilty.
You see, David needed Nathan in Chapter 11 before he messed up. He needed Nathan to tell him that what he wanted to do was wrong. But what David did is remove anyone from his life that could really get in his face and correct him and confront him. And look, I have seen men over the last 11 years of ministry do this time and time and time again. There are men who don’t want accountability in their lives. They don’t want a Pastor that’s going to pull them aside and say “What are you doing with your wife? What are you doing with your kids?”. A lot of people don’t like that accountability. All of us need somebody in our lives that can keep us accountable.
When it comes to habit formation, you ought to have some accountability partner. Now this can be done in a very structured way obviously, especially if you’re trying to break the habits of drugs and alcohol. It’s good to have a weekly accountability partner you meet with every week and you talk about your progress and how things are going and when you mess up. They can ask you how are you doing, did you drink this week. That can be done in that way but it can also be done in a very informal way.
My wife and I were recently sitting at the table and she got a phone call from one of the ladies at our Church. I saw an accountability situation take place. Because by the way, let me just say this. Be careful about the people that are trying to give you unsolicited advice. There are two types of people in this world. Those always telling you what you want to hear and those willing to tell you the truth. Those who tell you what you want to hear are called yes men. You need to be careful with those people. Why? They may be a bad person. They may be buttering you up just so they can stab you in the back. They may also be a good person who does bad things. We call those enablers. They actually like you but they have no character or not enough character to tell you the truth. So they’re constantly telling you “You’re great. You’re wonderful.”, while you’re just destroying your marriage and your children and your life. So be careful about the people that are always just telling you you’re the greatest thing ever.
But also be careful of people who always just trying to make you feel like you’re the worst thing ever. Because those people are often just insecure and they’re often just pulling you down so they can make themselves feel better. So what do we need in our life? Someone who’s going to tell you the truth. Someone who’s going to tell you that you are doing great when you actually are and going to tell you that you’re doing wrong if you are doing wrong. They’re not trying to make you feel bad. But they are honest people.
This is why oftentimes you need a Pastor and a Pastor’s wife. Because your little buddy can’t be your accountability partner. You need someone in a different field, someone playing in a different league. Joab could not be the kind of accountability partner that Nathan could have been for David. Sometimes you need somebody to be able to come into your life and speak the truth and know that there’s no agenda. They’re not trying to butter you up. They’re not trying to bring you down. They’re just speaking the truth in love and they’re telling you what you need to hear.
Number 1 – Make the progress visual
Number 2 – When you fail, rebound quickly.
Number 3 – Make the reward or punishment immediate.
Number 4 – Utilize habit stacking.
Number 5 – Make sure the best choice is the most obvious choice
Number 6 – Work within your strengths.
Number 7 – Have an accountability partner
Number 8 – Work out of duty
Luke 17:10 “10 So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.”. This is a verse about a servant serving their master and we are called to do right as it is our duty. Romans calls it your reasonable service, what’s expected of you. When you have responsibilities that are given to you to do and you do those, you haven’t done anything special. You’ve only done what was expected of you. You’ve done your duty. You haven’t gone above and beyond. We are unprofitable servants. We have done that which was our duty to do. And by the way, I’m not saying that in a negative way. I’m just saying this. Sometimes you have to realize in life you just do things out of duty. You just do it because it’s what you are supposed to do or the right thing to do.
Let me read to you this little article. This is the write talking about when he was an athlete in college. He’s talking about working out at a gym and meeting a special coach. They brought a coach and he says this on this particular day. “There was a coach visiting who had worked with thousands of athletes over his long career including some nationally ranked athletes and Olympians. I introduced myself and we began talking about the process of improvement. What’s the difference between the best athletes and everyone else I asked? What do really successful people do that most don’t? He mentioned the factors you might expect. Genetics, luck, talent but then he said something I wasn’t expecting. At some point it comes down to who can handle the boredom of training every day, doing the same lifts over and over and over. His answer surprised me because it’s a different way of thinking about work ethic. This coach was saying that really successful people feel the same lack of motivation as everyone else. The difference is that they still find a way to show up despite the feeling of boredom.”.
Let’s pray.