Welcome to the Lion Within Us, a podcast serving Christian men who are hungry to be the leaders God intends you to be. I'm your host, Chris Granger. Let's jump in. All right, fellas, fun Friday time. Let's get right into it. Okay. So the scripture of the week this week has been in the book of Psalms, the 37th Psalm, the fourth verse, delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you desires of your heart. Now, again, I took some time this week to unpack that verse in our spiritual kickoff episode. So back up to in your podcast feed if you haven't had a chance to listen to it. And I'll try to give you some insights on how you could simplify and apply that to your life. As a quick reminder, we do the spiritual kickoff Monday through Friday in our line within us community. And I'm guys, I can't emphasize this enough. It's just encouragement for you. It's just a little encouragement each and every day to help you in your walk. There's nothing earth-shattering about it, but I just try to be truthful how how the scriptures, what the Holy Spirit is showing me on how well I can simplify and apply it to my life. So if you're looking for that, you know, again, a service on a Sunday is not enough, fellas. So we give you this every day, Monday through Friday. You can join us live while we do it, which is pretty cool. But if you can't make the live, we put the videos there every day. Okay, so they're there for you. We don't put them anywhere else. They're not going on YouTube, they're not going anywhere else. It's really there and there only, okay? So cool part is all that's free. We just offer that up because we just want to encourage you, all right? And that also it also opens up a prayer request board. So if you have prayer requests, you have things on your heart that you're that you just want some brothers in Christ to soak in prayer and not really put it out there like on social media. We have that for you guys. We have that directly within that. And it's all part of the daily spiritual kickoff. So head over to the lionwithant.us, start your daily spiritual kickoff today, okay? So the last episode, what a fun conversation with Mr. David Mack again, or J. David Mack, rather, right? Fun guy, lots of things to learn from him. 78 years old and on fire for the Lord, building resources, helping stuff to the level of intentionality that he has around discipleship, unreal. I mean, he mentioned discipling his eight-year-old granddaughter several times. So this is this is something that he's putting a lot of effort into because he recognizes that's a gap, and it's a big gap in the church for sure. Discipleship is not something that gets talked about. There's not formal training. It's usually, you know, it's just it's just ill forgotten. Okay. And so we have to lean in. We need to change that. So if you're looking for resources again, check out his resources there on his discipleship program on how that works. All right. So now we're going to focus on this week some discipleship tips to try to kind of just stick with the theme, okay, of the whole week. So for the lion on our fun Friday, we do a health, wealth, and a self tip. Okay. Health is again, how do we strengthen our mind and our bodies? Wealth, how do we become better stewards of our finances and our careers? And self is as a husband and a father, how can I incrementally get be getting better? Okay. So the health tip this week is maybe we should be exercising stewardship, uh, or view exercise rather as stewardship and not vanity. Okay. We have to remember, body's not just ours, it's God's temple. First Corinthians tells us that. So exercise shouldn't be about chasing a number on a scale or sculpting a physique to when you look in the mirror, like, yeah, that's me, and you're trying to impress others. No. It's all about building strength and resilience so that we can serve. Okay. So if you're healthy, fellas, think about this. You have the energy to play with your kids, you have the energy to provide for your family, you have the vitality to respond when God calls you to do something, right? So I don't know what it looks like for you. I just know it has to be something. There needs to be 30 minutes, an hour, whatever, whatever the number is. And this needs to be a consistent thing, not one day a week, not two. I wouldn't challenge, I wouldn't challenge you. This should be a daily something you do, something every day. That could be lifting weights, it could be running, it could be cycling, it could be walking, or it could be a combination of all, right? That's that's really the best. But frame the workout, the whole point of this tip is frame your workout as an act of worship, okay? Because if we strengthen our body, like then we can do what God's called us to do. But if we if we don't take the time to to truly uh fine-tune ourselves from a physical standpoint, we're gonna render ourselves obsolete, and we don't want that, okay? All right. Wealth tip this week, guys. Pray before you make key decisions at work. Okay, so think about this. Think about how fast stuff moves at work, right? And and pressure's building up, and pressure often makes us react instead of reflect. But James tells us James 1, quick to hear, quick to hear, rather, slow to speak, slow to anger. So before you head into a major meeting or a sales pitch, uh, or you're trying to make some personnel decisions, pray. Pray. It should be a 30-second prayer, but that's okay. Ask God for that discernment, ask him for the patience to make the right decision, ask him for the wisdom to truly uh understand the situation before you speak something into it, right? This is this is a a simple discipleship journey here. And if you do this, this little discipline will shift your focus from um proving yourself to now you're honoring God. And that's the definition of leadership, guys. And over time, if you do this regularly, you're gonna build trust, you're gonna build uh clarity, and you're gonna become a uh recognized as a leader who is steady under pressure. Not because you're awesome, which I think you're awesome, but because you're demonstrating that you're walking with the Lord. See how that works now. For the self-tip this week, going back to one-on-one discipleship, Mr. Mack proved this out. Lead your family in a devotion several times a week. You have to do this. Discipleship begins at home, guys. And we can't outsource it. You guys heard me talk about this for years now. You can't outsource spiritual leadership to someone who works at a church. No, it starts with you. Deuteronomy tells us that in the Shema. We have to do this, right? And you don't have to be a biblical scholar or a preacher to be able to do this. No, simply get your family around a table, open up God's word, read some scripture, and then ask maybe one question. That's it. And at the end of it, pray. And this consistent action here is the consistency is more important than the perfection. Please hear me on that, okay? So plant those little seeds, plant with your spouse, with your children. And over time, if they see that it's important with you, like the rhythm that you're that you're putting in place, that's gonna shift the culture. Everything's gonna shift. Make it normal to talk about God's word. Like just make it normal. And if you do that, uh you're you're modeling a heart that delights in God's word. And I'm gonna tell you what, that's gonna make a more generational impact over anything you could do, like on a Sunday morning. Now, I'm not saying don't go to church. For sure, you should be plugged into a church, right? That should be part of it. That just should not be the one staple a week that your family recognizes you uh as a spiritual leader. No, man. Like, come on, are you kidding me? Every day, every day, that's your opportunity. There are your three tips, fellas, your health, wealth, and self. Exercise of stewardship, not vanity. Pray before those key decisions at work, and lead those family devotions, right? If you have to start somewhere, just start twice a week. Whatever the number is, stick with it and commit to it, okay? Now, the book of the week, we're not actually going to do a book of the week this week because uh Mr. Mac actually doesn't print his out. He doesn't have printed resources. But I just want to encourage you again, J Mac. So that's J-A-Y-M-A-C-K dot net. Go there. Here's the thing: all his resources 100% free. Everything is free, okay? So go check this out, check out his resources, and hopefully you guys enjoy uh what you find there. Highly encourage you to check out the discipleship one for sure. I think you're not gonna be disappointed with that. And uh just give him some encouragement along the way. All right. So we got some dad jokes today, fellas. Dad jokes, we've got one of them. We'll submit it from one of our listeners, John. So this is the one he sent me. Uh koi fish always travel in groups of four. Okay, this is what they do, but they're attacked. Koy A, B, and C will scatter, leaving behind the decoy. All right, that's pretty good. Thank you, John, for submitting that one. When he sent me, he emailed me that one. I was like, That is a dog. That's a pretty good one, right there. So, John, I appreciate you, brother. Number two, my parents raised me as an only child, which really annoyed my younger brother. All right, so I can relate to that one. Just kidding. Just kidding, Matt. So that's it, fellas. That's number one and number two. Number one, koy fish always travel in groups of four. If attacked, koi A, B, and C will scatter, leaving behind the decoy. And number two, my parents raised me as an only child, which really annoyed my younger brother. So, guys, let me know which one you like. Number one and number two. If you have a dad joke that you would like to submit, go to support at thelionwithin.us, send us an email there. We'll use it. We'll put it, we'll we'll give you a shout-out on a show, just like we just did, John, and we'll try to hook you up with some resources and some encouragement along the way. Okay. So the question of the week this week is where are you confusing fellowship with true discipleship in your life? And again, they are not the same thing. Okay, then they have components of each other, but they are not the same thing. So this is we spent a lot of time and an exhaustive amount of time this week talking about it. So if you need help, if you need support in this area, please, please, please reach out. Let's have a conversation. We'll get you uh connected with some guys that actually want to help you in your discipleship journey and encourage you along the way, okay? So, guys, thank you for listening, for hanging out this week. It's always fun to hang out with you guys, just to try to bring you a little bit of encouragement along the way. Lots of things happening at the line within us for sure, with the book, with all the things that are that are coming up for for us. And it's just feel like God's just doing more and more, showing me more and more. I'm trying to be a uh diligent and listen to that. But I just want to say thank you guys for listening to the show, showing up week in and week out. Uh, I I know there's lots and lots of podcasts out there. There's lots of much better hosts, I'm sure, out there, fellas. I'm just trying to humbly bring you guys some encouragement each and every week. And I'm just very uh thankful for the ones that take the time to listen to the lion. And every anytime that you guys take an opportunity just to send me a note of encouragement or just something that, you know, from our weekly roar and stuff like that, it really just picks my day up. And I just want to say thank you. Just from the bottom of my heart, if there's anything that the lion can do to help you in your journey, please reach out. Again, we have probably now at this point 50 more Bible plans on the Bible app. So if you're not connected with this there, man, you're missing out for real. Just download the Bible app, the one from you version. It's the number one Bible app in the world. And then search for the Lion Within Us, and you'll find all our Bible reading plans, fellas. And there's just there's quick little studies. You know, most of them are five days. They range from three to five to seven. We even have a 30-day plan that's out there. So, fellas, we just want to try to encourage you in your walk and your journey. And along the way, if there's anything I can do to support, just reach out. Okay. All right, fellas, have a great weekend. Get after it. Give us a rating review if you don't mind. Again, thelionwithin.us is where you find all of our resources and you know it's coming. Keep unleashing the lion within. If you're tired of going at it alone, we understand every man needs wise counsel, but finding it can be quite the challenge. That's why we build our leadership masterminds. This isn't just more content, guys. It's real discipleship with a consistent rhythm, small cohorts of no more than seven guys, honest hot seat sessions, and biblical counsel that turns good intentions into action. You'll get accountability, clarity, and a circle of brothers who will challenge you and cheer you on. We open up new options regularly so there's room to find the right fit. It's not always easy, but it is worth it. The first step is simple. Take the leadership mastermind assessment. No pressure, no hype, just thoughtful questions to help you see where you are, where God is leading you, and whether this is a good option for your next step. Hey, if it's a fit, we're gonna follow up with details. And if it's not, we'll point you to resources to help you keep growing. Either way, you move forward. So if you're ready to take the assessment, head over to thelionwithin.us slash mastermind. So that's thelionwithin.uslash mastermind to get moving today.