Dale Partridge - July 21, 2021


Real Christianity #155： 3 Biblical Principles To Consider Before You Move


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Transcript

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00:00:00.000 Welcome to this episode of Real Christianity. My name is Dale Partridge, where each week I
00:00:12.620 offer 15 to 20-minute answers to tough theological and pastoral questions. This is a 100% listener
00:00:19.920 supported audio ministry of relearn.org. And for those who don't know, our mission at relearn.org
00:00:26.820 is to educate and equip ordinary Christians to plant biblical, confessional, and missional
00:00:32.700 house churches. For more information, just visit relearn.org forward slash house.
00:00:39.780 Welcome to Real Christianity. My name is Dale Partridge. As many of you know, you can find
00:00:44.420 the show notes for these episodes at our website at relearn.org. Our mission at relearn.org is to
00:00:50.200 bring the church back to the Bible and to increase biblical literacy among Christians.
00:00:57.480 Welcome to today's episode titled, Three Biblical Principles to Consider Before You Move.
00:01:05.400 We have so many people. As COVID has changed the landscape of our culture and made it clear
00:01:13.600 that most modern jobs can be carried out remotely, and this cultural shift really has granted
00:01:20.400 millions upon millions of families the ability to relocate to a more desired location. But
00:01:25.260 as Christians who are slaves and servants of the Lord Jesus Christ, how are we to think about
00:01:32.760 relocation? Are we to just use the same criteria as the rest of the culture? I mean, are we to just
00:01:39.700 move because we want to be closer to family or to have better political leaders or to make more
00:01:45.600 money or to be in a different climate. Now, there's nothing necessarily sinful about those
00:01:50.900 reasons for relocation, but are they the guiding criteria that Christians should use when planning
00:01:57.240 to relocate their family? And so in this episode, I'm going to explain why I think Christians should 0.96
00:02:03.560 use a different set of principles, and we'll be sharing the three overarching criteria that our
00:02:10.040 family used to choose our family's new location. But before we begin, just wanted to mention a few
00:02:16.920 things. If you have not heard, I did a pretty big life update post on Instagram. If you don't follow
00:02:24.680 our ministry on Instagram, it's just at relearn. You'll find it, or just type in relearn.org on
00:02:29.580 Instagram. I post it on Facebook as well. You can find it there and get a quick update on our life
00:02:36.540 and our move and why my health. So that's one thing. The second thing is I've shared several
00:02:44.680 times now on social media, but for those of you who are looking for a playlist of biblical worship
00:02:52.360 music. I have personally curated a playlist on Spotify. If you just type biblical worship
00:02:59.300 into the playlist search bar or to the search bar on Spotify, you'll likely find it. You'll
00:03:05.440 find my name there. And I also did one called biblical hip hop. Yes, I do love hip hop. And
00:03:13.320 you guys can find that there. I'm still working on that one. It's only got maybe 20 something
00:03:19.880 songs on there, but an incredible way to learn and consume theological truths through song.
00:03:29.180 So hopefully that's a helpful resource for you guys.
00:03:33.020 So as a preface before I begin, I want to make a few points.
00:03:37.300 Number one, each family must take their request to move to the Lord.
00:03:43.880 And in speaking to how God organizes the local church, I'm going to use a reference here from
00:03:50.220 Paul. He says in 1 Corinthians 12, 18, but as it is, God arranged the members in the body,
00:03:58.040 each one of them, as he chose. In other words, God is sovereignly moving his people to places
00:04:05.100 which will carry out his redemptive plan throughout his church. And so every family
00:04:10.900 is different, and these are principles that I'm going to share, not direct commands.
00:04:17.980 You have a unique story, and you have a unique journey the Lord has you on, and these are
00:04:24.400 just principles. 0.99
00:04:25.380 My next point is, if you're a Christian, your body is not your own, your time is not your 0.69
00:04:31.420 own, your money is not your own, your family is not your own, and your life is not your 0.81
00:04:35.220 own.
00:04:35.400 In 1 Corinthians 10, 26, in a reference to Deuteronomy, it says,
00:04:40.560 For the earth is the Lord's and all it contains.
00:04:44.980 Everything, including you, is the Lord's.
00:04:50.900 He owns it all. He's the maker of all.
00:04:53.700 Earlier in the same book, we're still in 1 Corinthians talking here,
00:04:58.200 Paul writes,
00:04:58.980 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you,
00:05:02.220 whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? 0.70
00:05:05.400 For you have been bought with a price, speaking to Christians, therefore glorify God in your body. 0.88
00:05:12.620 Essentially, as a born-again Christian, you are not a free agent, but you're a slave to the king. 0.71
00:05:19.420 And slaves don't make decisions without the permission of their master.
00:05:24.260 What I'm saying here is you must seek Christ first to verify even if you've been called to move,
00:05:31.840 let alone where to move, when to move, and why to move.
00:05:36.540 My third point that I want to preface is before I get into these three principles
00:05:44.400 that we've used in our personal life,
00:05:50.500 I just want you to know that these principles require big boy and big girl faith.
00:05:56.120 They require you to have an established understanding of God's sovereignty, of his redemptive purpose, and how his children are involved in his mission.
00:06:09.140 And I say that because these three criteria are deeply self-sacrificial, and they demand a heart that's yielded to God and feet that are willing to walk even when you can't see.
00:06:23.960 And lastly, I would never preach on anything that I have not embraced myself.
00:06:31.560 Not to say that preachers don't preach on things that they struggle with, but the reality
00:06:37.120 is this is something that I've actually walked out with our family and am sharing the fruit
00:06:45.720 of it, and hopefully it will be fruitful for you as well.
00:06:49.700 So I will admit, at first, we almost embraced the process for moving that I think almost
00:07:00.500 everybody else embraces.
00:07:02.280 We almost moved because of our personal reasons and not the Lord's.
00:07:07.520 And it was God's mercy and grace that he convicted my spirit and brought me and my thinking
00:07:13.920 back in alignment with the scriptures.
00:07:16.860 So I'll give you the short version of the story.
00:07:18.920 When we felt the call to relocate for a variety of reasons, my health was a major driver for that.
00:07:27.980 We first looked for the best state with the most conservative politics, with the strongest homeschooling communities, and with an abundance of biblical churches and being nearby a great seminary.
00:07:40.280 We also looked at places close to people we love, with a low cost of living, somewhere we could make some money.
00:07:47.440 and ideally places of geographic beauty, right, and outdoor recreation, something that we could
00:07:53.140 live by. And we even went on a 10-week family RV trip to scope out several of these locations
00:08:02.660 under this guiding criteria, which is, again, what most people use when they
00:08:09.160 try to relocate their family. However, after returning from our trip,
00:08:15.060 we felt deeply conflicted. And after much prayer about some of the places that we had desired,
00:08:23.820 we actually even put down a deposit on a spot, on a piece of land somewhere that we actually
00:08:31.220 had to lose our deposit over. And we ended up choosing a completely different state. That state
00:08:39.160 is Arizona. And it was the last state that we wanted to move to and the last city we wanted
00:08:48.500 to be in. And I'm not going to share the specific city because we are deciding between two or three
00:08:55.960 local cities in this area, all within the same area. So I just don't want to share that quite
00:09:01.460 yet. But the state is politically moderate. The city we think we're going to go into is
00:09:08.620 politically liberal. And there's not even one homeschool group in the area. There's only one
00:09:14.680 tiny biblical church. It's got about 15 people in it. It's probably the most expensive area to
00:09:20.680 live in the entire state. And we don't know a single person there. Now, was it hard to trust
00:09:26.480 the Lord with these circumstances? Absolutely. Veronica even cried over it. We had several
00:09:34.080 difficult conversations as a family. We went to prayer, even asking the Lord for a change.
00:09:39.840 But finally, we just yielded over the past several months, and we've come to a sweet contentment and
00:09:47.900 even a joy over the adventure that the Lord has set before us in this new location. So here's the
00:09:54.520 three criteria that we used that brought relocation or the decision of relocation into alignment with
00:10:03.000 biblical principles. Number one, move for commission, not comfort. So I recently saw a
00:10:12.460 tweet from a young mom who said, quote, my husband asked me what I wanted for my birthday.
00:10:18.940 My response was, the same thing any Christian mother wants, to move to Florida or Texas.
00:10:26.020 Now, as funny as that may be, it reveals a way of thinking that Christians need to be careful with. 0.90
00:10:34.680 And look, there's nothing wrong with Florida or Texas.
00:10:37.640 We actually, the place that we bought land and to put a deposit was Texas. 1.00
00:10:42.360 but lots of Christians, you know, move there and will move there. And God has called many
00:10:49.600 of his children to move to these very places. So I'm not anti-Florida or Texas. But as Christians,
00:10:55.880 the politics of a certain place shouldn't be the driving factor for why we relocate.
00:11:02.840 It's an important factor, but it shouldn't be the driving factor. If this was the case,
00:11:07.620 then the gospel would never make it to politically hostile countries or areas or states.
00:11:12.640 And we're starting to see many hostile states toward Christianity.
00:11:19.740 And while some are called to leave, we do need men and women who are bold enough to come
00:11:24.580 and be missionaries in some of these states and some of these cities 0.95
00:11:29.640 that are basically being completely abandoned by Christians left and right. 0.85
00:11:37.620 The truth is, we really just need to have a heart to move to places where Christ is not named. 0.97
00:11:44.260 I'm going to say that again.
00:11:45.520 We need to have a heart to move to places where Christ is not named in an effort to really witness to the lost in that community.
00:11:56.080 And I know that we are at varying degrees of callings.
00:12:00.820 We all are under the Great Commission, which we'll speak about in a second.
00:12:03.700 And then some are called as evangelists and are called as missionaries and pastors.
00:12:09.240 So you get to take this within the bounds of your specific calling.
00:12:14.960 But again, as a modernized, westernized American, our first inclination when choosing a place
00:12:22.960 to live is centrally comfort.
00:12:28.440 And, you know, where are we going to have the most fun, the least amount of stress,
00:12:33.120 the maximum income and opportunities, the greatest amount of relationships. But again,
00:12:37.420 these are not the questions that Christians should be asking. We must start to remember 0.53
00:12:41.920 that as Christians, the Great Commission is not the great suggestion. Therefore, I should say,
00:12:51.280 we can't think about relocation without thinking about how it'll affect our faithfulness to
00:12:56.680 our Christian duty. If our first criteria is comfort, then we are not evaluating our relocation
00:13:05.740 through our identity in Christ. J.D. Greer, in his book Gaining by Losing, had a really great quote
00:13:13.000 that captures what I'm saying. He said, the Great Commission is not a calling for some.
00:13:20.100 It is a mandate for all, all Christians. When it comes to a calling, we don't need a voice. We have
00:13:26.560 a verse, Matthew 28, 19. It is now our responsibility under the direction of the
00:13:32.100 Holy Spirit to evaluate how we are best suited to fulfill that call. We see every member of our
00:13:39.040 church as a potential missionary to be equipped and mobilized. Our goal is not to send some or
00:13:45.600 even our best, but to send all into the mission, to our city, across the country, or to the other
00:13:52.380 side of the world. You have to realize that that's how Muslims and Mormons and Jehovah's 0.97
00:13:58.460 Witnesses actually think. But sadly, that's not true of Christians. I believe it was James White
00:14:05.900 who once said, the cults have more passion for a lie than Christians do for the truth. 0.88
00:14:11.700 We really do need to start putting Great Commission thinking above our comfort. So 0.96
00:14:17.020 ultimately, if you're a born-again believer, you're not an inactive soldier. You're a gospel
00:14:21.560 worker who is to be trained, equipped, and sent to bear the testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ
00:14:27.420 in the community in which he has called you to live. Okay, number two, move for people,
00:14:34.960 not places. Let me begin just by talking about the local church for a moment.
00:14:40.740 There is no such thing as a churchless Christian, and true Christians will not be unchurched for
00:14:48.100 long, and they have a deep desire to be in regular fellowship with God's people. And I have a point
00:14:53.660 that I'm trying to get to here first, so just let me give you a quick analogy. How close could a
00:14:59.460 person be to me if he or she didn't want to be around my wife? In fact, let's just say that they
00:15:05.460 actually wanted to avoid my wife. Could we become intimate friends? Of course not, right? No way.
00:15:12.540 The same is true of Christ and his bride, the church. We have to remember that the local church
00:15:17.560 which is the very bride of Christ and the place God designed for his children to be strengthened.
00:15:23.480 And therefore, here's my point, when considering a relocation,
00:15:28.060 we shouldn't simply scope the schools and the restaurants and the recreation
00:15:34.600 and just expect God to miraculously bless us with a thriving, fruitful, and biblical local church community.
00:15:42.760 Now, unless we are, again, missionaries in the biblical sense,
00:15:46.140 we should really be seeking specific locations where there already is an established church or
00:15:53.380 church community in which we can become faithful members. So that's really important. So my point
00:15:58.380 is, don't move to a place because it's beautiful or scenic or has good food or is by the beach or
00:16:05.840 has conservative politics. These are great benefits, but a far greater benefit and reason
00:16:11.140 to move somewhere is because of who is there and where your family is going to find genuine
00:16:17.460 Christian fellowship and spiritual maturity for years to come. Point number three, move for
00:16:25.060 commitment, not curiosity. We live in a transient culture that comes and goes without much resolve
00:16:33.000 to remain in long-term faithful relationships. Veronica and I just left Bend, Oregon after
00:16:38.560 seven years. Now, that's not a long time, but it's not a short time either. And it was enough
00:16:45.440 time for us to establish deep relationships with several families, establish a local church,
00:16:51.160 show our kids how to remain still in the face of moments that make you want to leave,
00:16:58.380 and also how to stay put until the Lord genuinely calls us elsewhere. In other words,
00:17:06.200 And when praying about a place for your family to relocate, pray you'll find a place that
00:17:12.620 permits your family to establish roots.
00:17:14.460 Think five to 10 years minimum.
00:17:17.640 Pray the Lord permits you to have the time to become deeply involved in your local church
00:17:22.700 and where you can minister thoroughly with people and even model commitment and consistency 0.99
00:17:29.260 to a generation of detached and independent Christians.
00:17:33.700 That's vital. 0.94
00:17:35.280 And so, all in all, we have to start thinking like slaves and not free agents.
00:17:44.180 And I said this in the last podcast, but I'm going to say it again.
00:17:47.200 The word doulos is the most common New Testament Greek word to describe believers,
00:17:53.200 and it's translated as slave or servant.
00:17:57.700 We're not entities unto ourselves.
00:17:59.820 We're men and women of the cross.
00:18:02.620 And therefore, we must learn to think about the Great Commission and our personal ministry
00:18:09.700 and our plan for relocation.
00:18:11.800 We must learn to value the local church and seek fellowship before seeking secular benefits
00:18:16.440 of a particular area.
00:18:18.020 We must figure out how to fight to move to places where we can be committed long-term
00:18:27.980 and not just bounce from one place to another
00:18:30.480 when our preferences or our comforts
00:18:32.540 or we have conflict when those things change.
00:18:37.900 And I understand for those who are hearing this
00:18:40.120 and you have plans to move
00:18:41.200 and you maybe want to reevaluate those plans
00:18:44.540 through these criteria and take them to prayer,
00:18:47.380 I understand that this might put a stick
00:18:49.340 in the spokes of your family's plan.
00:18:50.980 It absolutely did with ours.
00:18:52.220 We lost several thousand dollars over it actually.
00:18:54.240 Um, but this may also send you to a place that maybe you didn't desire to go to, but
00:19:05.500 if you're in the Lord's will, doing the Lord's work, walking by faith, trusting in him, I assure
00:19:13.820 you that wherever the Lord puts you, it'll be the safest and most rewarding move that your family
00:19:20.600 can make. So may God give you wisdom in that journey. Hopefully this episode was helpful
00:19:27.080 for you guys in edifying in your walk with Christ. Thank you for listening to the Real
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00:19:52.720 Also, if you want to find out more about our ministries at relearn.org or also
00:19:58.060 reformationseminary.com, our house church planting school that teaches people how to
00:20:04.800 plant biblical house churches, we would love to have you over there. On that note,
00:20:09.520 thank you for joining me on this episode of Real Christianity. My name is Dale Partridge,
00:20:13.680 and I'll see you next week.
00:20:16.040 thank you for listening to this episode of real christianity if you're a regular listener to this
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00:20:53.820 this episode of Real Christianity. We will see you next Wednesday.