15 Lessons to Learn in your 20s
Catch the fire
Catch the fire. Catch the fire. HOLY SPIRIT FIRE. Do not let your life fly by you without you having ever had that radical encounter with Jesus.
And by that I don’t just mean SALVATION—there’s going to be many people that pray the Lord’s prayer once in their lives, but they don’t spend that time with Jesus to CATCH THAT FIRE.
When you catch the fire, it’s going to transform your life because Jesus will transform other lives through you. What breaks my heart is that you guys will be content with just quiet, boring, normal Christianity. You go to church, you go home. You don’t think about him anymore after Sunday. The only time you pray is when you need something, and the minute that you get it, you forget about him.
Catch the Fire like my friend Benjamin out in Seattle who leads a ministry called “Make Jesus Known” where they preach the Gospel to people in the Pacific Northwest. They just had an atheist guy give his life to Jesus, last year they prayed for the mayor of Seattle on the steps of City Hall. At the end of this month, their ministry is going out into the streets and preaching the Gospel to World Cup Fans, and doing a worship event out in Seattle.
Catch the Fire like my friend Lily who at 27 years old made the decision to move out to Uganda because she had a heart for the lost. Ten years later she has a health clinic, a school, an orphanage, and two adopted African babies.
Catch the Fire like my friend Tia who God saved from suicidal thoughts and gender confusion and turned her life around so radically that she know goes and serves at an Indian Reservation and does camp & life with the poorest people you’ve ever met here in America.
How do you catch the fire? You go to your room, you grab your Bible, you draw a circle around yourself and pray “Lord, send revival, and let it start with me”. And you keep going back to that room and that circle until the Lord meets you. And I promise he will meet you.
2. You have one identity: Beloved by God
For the guys: Can anyone guess what a life insurance company thinks a person in their 20s is worth?
The Federal Government estimates it around $11-15 million
Most life insurances say anywhere between$ 500,000 to $2 million
The value of a human life to a sex trafficker is $90.00
What is the price that GOD thinks a human life is worth?
That price is the life of his only begotten Son.
John 3:16
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, so that whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.”
God’s unimaginable love for us is the foundation to our identity….and all of our problems with identity stem from us not understanding his love for us.
Once you understand that you’re beloved by him, then the natural next step is salvation, and after that is living a life of mutual love and relationship with your Heavenly Father.
3. Embrace the Furnace
Jesus says, “in this world you will have many troubles…but take heart for I’ve overcome the word. (John 16:33)
You will face suffering, you will face hardship, you will face death, grief, health troubles, ALL OF THESE THINGS, because we live in a fallen world. This is not me prophesying, this is a guarantee we can see in Scripture.
But the question I have for you is….when you go through the furnace of suffering….are you going to let it deform you or transform you?
You can choose how you let bad things shape you. You can choose to put on a victim mentality and blame everyone else, and always see the bad side of things.
You can choose to suffer with bitterness, hatred, and envy…and in the end it will deform you from the inside out.
Or you can choose to suffer well, and learn the way that Jesus suffered.
You can choose to learn from your suffering
You can choose to forgive others,
You can choose to be gracious and to take the punches as they come by giving it over to Jesus
And this will transform you into a more glorious, more resilient, more Christlike person.
4. Read your Bible & Pray Every Day
John Piper has a great quote that says, “Read your bible until it makes sense”.
By that I mean…don’t read for quantity…read for quality. Read it until it makes sense for you that day. If you’re stuck on two verses, stay on those two verses until you understand what you’re reading. If you’re in a story, read the story until the end so you understand what that story is saying.
Same goes for prayer, get past your laundry list and get to the part like that circle that Anca shared with us yesterday. Pour out your heart before God, share with him your day and your troubles and your victories like you do with a friend.
5. Be honorable, stay teachable
Be a man or woman of integrity, someone that others can respect.
In your life the temptation to cheat is going to come. To fudge things a little bit…maybe at your work…be honorable and don’t slide into cheating and lies.
In our community a “good name” means a lot, and there are men that I know of, who others speak with respect about.
But when you make a mistake….be humble and learn from your mistakes, and strive to always be teachable and to always learn, to always improve.
6. Root out sin early
Has anyone seen baby tigers in person? They are the cutest little things. You want to hold them, and play with them. They’re adorable!
Sin is like a little baby tiger that you take home with you, and at first it’s cute and easy to manage….but one day you’re going to turn around and realize that behind you is a grown wild animal, and it will devour you and devour those whom you love.
Sin seems small at first, but if it’s not repented of and rooted out early it will one day grow up to devour not only you, but it will deeply deeply hurt the people you love and care for the most.
7. Keep timelines & expectations flexible
God has a plan and purpose for all of you, but that means that it’s going to look different for all of you. You might have your whole planned out and then suddenly something stops and pivots you in a whole other direction.
“Comparison is the thief of joy” – don’t compare your life, your expectations, your timelines to others. God will get you to where he wants you to go but it will look different than other peoples.
It’s good to plan things out, but stay flexible in your expectations for what life will bring your way so that you can pivot when God tells you to pivot.
Some of you will go off to do engineering school, others will be nurses, I know of one young man here who wants to enlist in the Marines, all of your lives will look different.
Don’t be depressed that you’re 22 and not married yet, trust me God will work it out.
8, Find your tent-making hustle
And by that I mean, develop useful skills that can help you make money.
Did you know that Paul the Apostle wasn’t just a missionary? He was a tent-maker too. When he needed to make money, he made tents and sold them.
Jesus was a carpenter and the disciples were fishermen—they all had useful skills that you can fall back
Find useful skills that can make you money, especially if there’s situations where you fall on hard times.
Some of you girls want to be stay at home moms…but what do you do when your husband loses his job?
Some of you guys want to become pastors…but how do you support your family when the church that hires you can’t pay you?
Get a degree, or if you’re good with your hands join the trades: electric, plumbing, hvac, carpentry. For the girls: esthetician, hair, massage therapist, there’s lots of options.
9. Beware of lifestyle creep
Once you find your tent-making skill, you’re going to start earning some money…but here’s where I’m going caution you…as you start making more money beware of letting your lifestyle costs also go up.
Lifestyle creep is where your spending increases hand in hand with your income
Kory is a financial coach—she can personally tell you about people who are making 250,000 a year and are in debt and living paycheck to paycheck. How is that possible?
Because first you really wanted that $200.00 Coach purse…then you want that $8,000 Chanel bag…well now you’re competing with that rich family over there…now you want that $100,000 Hermes Birkin.
Same goes for the guys…you keep buying more and more expensive things, you keep accumulating more debt…beware.
10. Find your friends of the soul
David had one best friend…his name was Johnathan. Naomi had Ruth. Even Jesus had a disciple that he was closer to than all the others…that guy’s name was John.
These are friends you do life with, who you share the deepest part of your heart and soul with.
- A friend of the soul takes time and trials to discover,
- Only time will tell if you guys stick together, and it’s only through different trials that you guys go through that you’ll find out whether you will stay together.
Having true friends of your soul is so vital and important to your overall well being…we live in an epidemic of loneliness and anxiety. We don’t learn how to make friends or how to be good friends back.
Learn how to be a good friend, and find friends who will be good back to you.
11. Honor the Sabbath
We don’t live under the old laws of the covenant…but God knew what he was about when he said that one day a week Man needs to rest from work.
You won’t quite know the meaning of this until you get older and you’re actually working. But you need a day a week where your body takes a break, where you enjoy time with your family and your friends, when you can get out a bit in nature, and where you spend quality time 1:1 with God too.
12. Marry well
After salvation this is the next most important question. Marry a person who loves Jesus, who is someone you can get along with and who you enjoy their company.
A good marriage will be the making of you, a bad marriage will be the ruin of you, so choose wisely.
13. Be interested in others–find their story
“Love the Lord your God, and Love your Neighbor as yourself”. God made us all in his image, that means we all have a story. Be curious about those around you, find their story, love on them just as Jesus commands us to do.
14. Your body is a temple–treat it as such
Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that Christ dwells in you? - 1 Corinthians 3:16
By that I mean…treat your body well. Eat well, sleep well, exercise. You only have one body, and your quality of life is going to be hugely dependent on how well you take care of it.
15. Control that tongue
On January 7th, 2025 a fire broke out in Los Angeles County that later went on to burn 23,000 acres
It was the 10th deadliest and 3rd most destructive wildfire in California history. Caused by one guy who was mad that he didn’t have New Years plans.
James 3 has some strong words to say about your tongue:
How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell
James 3:5–6.
Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruits.”
What does that mean?
You have the power with your words to tear someone down or to build them up. Choose to build up as a fellow person made in the image of God.
Understand that God is also a god of Justice, and you will be judge for every careless word that comes out of your mouth…so use that mouth for GOOD.
Amen.
