CEP SEASON THREE EP: 09 - PAUL BENGER
By Dave Mckeown and Nathan Benger
Welcome to Season 3, Episode: 09 of the Church Explained Podcast with guest Paul Benger.
Join us in this behind-the-scenes (BTS) staff talk from Ikon Church with lead pastor Paul Benger. In this episode, Paul shares with some of the staff on how we can ‘Calm the Ego’.
This includes questions and discussions with staff members.
We hope you enjoy it.
SHOW NOTES
FULL TRANSCRIPT
CREATED BY AI - SO NOT 100% accurate.
David Mckeown 0:03
Hey welcome to the church explained podcast a conversation to grow your leadership and build your Church today. We have got one of our behind the scenes staff talk with our lead Pastor, Paul, bencher here IKON Church, we're looking at this theme of calming the ego. And so you'll be able to listen in and find out what we're talking about. And we'll post sharing with us in this staff talk today.
Paul Benger 0:31
Great, I thought this morning, I'd just talk a little bit more about something we chatted in Sunday night calm in an app called it calm in the ego. And just give us chance to talk about that a little bit respond to that. I guess that message, some of those thoughts, I'm thankful to some stuff that Tim Keller wrote around that. But we based it around the problem in one Corinthians chapter three, where there's factions in the Church, people saying, I'm a Paul, I'm of a polis. And these obviously, factions weren't trivial. Otherwise, Paul wouldn't have talked about them. They were serious. They were stuff that he felt was affecting the life of the Church. You know, it's not like somebody, you know, like, saints. Yeah. And I was going to use a trivial example there, but you never know where this is going. So I won't do that. But anyway, let me read some of the verses that he writes in one Corinthians chapter three, he says, he says this, he explains the problem. And then he says, You are still over the flesh. For as long as there is jealousy and quarrelling among you. Are you not of the flesh and behaving according to human inclinations? For when one says, I belong to Paul and another, I belong to a palace? Are you not merely human? So let no one boast about human leaders for all things, ers, whether Paul or Apollo Sefa. So the world or life or death, the presence of a future, all belong to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God. So he challenges them that their thinking is just and their responses are just merely human. And he expects more from them. And then as we kind of talked about a little bit on Sunday evening, he addresses the root cause, which is this boasting this pride, this ego, this view of self in verse 21, he says, Let no one boast. And up until the 20th century, traditional cultures and this is still true of most cultures in the world today, always believed that a high view of self pride was the root cause of all evil. So if you were to ask those cultures, what's the what's the reason for crime and violence? Why are people abused? Why are people cruel? Why do people do the bad things they do? Traditionally, the answer was hubris, pride. These people, you know, have this sense of pride. However, the modern Western world, so are part of the world as utterly flipped that and gone the other way. So we now think the reason all those things happen, the basis for our understanding and education on this, the way we treat prisoners, for example, today, the foundation of legislation, the starting point for most counselling is exactly the opposite. And so the belief today is, is that people have low self esteem. And that's the problem to be dealt with not pride, but low self esteem. The focus on both of those positions is the ego, whether it's over inflated, or deflated. And I think much of our modern preaching actually addresses it. At that level, you know, often we speak don't worry about low self esteem, or we speak of not thinking the way God thinks about it. But Paul comes from a completely different angle. And he says, it's actually ego. That's the problem, whether it's inflated or deflated, it's the ego. And so he he's trying to correct the Corinthians in this. And so then in chapter four, verses five and six, he says this, I've applied all this teaching that he's given to them, we're only reading snippets of it to a palace and to myself for your benefit. So that you may learn through as the meaning of the same nothing beyond what is written, so that none of you will be puffed up in favour of one against another. And he uses this word puffed up. And the normal Greek word is weird. discovered his hubris but he uses a different word. overinflated, distended five times he uses it in the book of Corinthians. And then also once in the book of Colossians, no other Bible writer uses it. It's an idea of Paul's, it means to be bloated. To be full of air, to the picture is of a distended organ part in the body that's full of air or gas that shouldn't be there, something shouldn't be there. And that image, that bloated image, of the ego, so suggest these four things about the human condition, and our ego, that one, our ego is empty, that there's emptiness, it's at the centre. Kierkegaard says, it's the normal state of the human heart, to try and build identity around something besides God, is spiritual pride. And we know there's an emptiness at the centre, so we try to fill it. And we believe that we're competent to run our own lives achieve our own sense of self worth, and find a purpose big enough, the second, it's painful. And, like, we mentioned on Sunday, about the fact that you don't really notice your body until there's something wrong with you. You know, nobody when we're walking around, thinking how fantastic our toes are, probably most of us have not thought about our toes at all this morning, because the parts of the body only draw attention to themselves when they're hurting. But the truth is, that is it's hard to go through a day without feeling some sense of hurt, or being overlooked disappointment or something. That's because there's something wrong at the heart of the human ego. The ego is busy as well. And Paul speaks about this, you know, quite clearly in these passages. It's always drawing attention to insert itself because it's comparing and boasting, always comparing. And somebody had said, didn't they Comparison is the thief of joy. And how true is that, because we're constantly and in fact, seems to me everything in our modern world is like based on a foundation of comparison. But Paul says to the Corinthians, I want you to get to the place chapter four, verse six, when you get to the place where you will not take pride over one man against another, you won't be comparing. And Lewis says this, that pride gets no pleasure out of having something only out of having more of it than the next person. We say that people would be proud of being rich or clever or good looking. But actually what they're proud of is being richer, clever, better looking than somebody else. So pride is that sense of being more successful, more intelligent, more good looking than the next person. So the ego is busy comparing and with other things, and then the last thing is the ego is fragile. So because it fears losing what it has. And this is where we quoted the great theologian Madonna, and which is a fantastic quote. And actually, I've got a bit more of the quote this morning than I used on Sunday night. So the first bit of the quote, which I use Sunday night was my drive in life comes from a fear of being mediocre. This is always pushing me. I pushed past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being. But then I feel I am still mediocre and uninteresting, unless I do something else. Because even though I've become somebody, I still have to prove to myself that I am somebody. My struggle is never ended, and I guess it never will. But then she and like I said Sunday madonn has not worse than anyone else. In fact, I think she's self aware. In this quote, she says this, my ego cannot be satisfied. My sense of self my desire for self worth, my need to be sure I am somebody is not fulfilled. I keep thinking I've won it from what people have said about me and what the magazines and newspapers have written. But the next day, I have to go and look somewhere else. Why? Because my ego is insatiable. It's a black hole, which is where the title of the message Sunday night came from thing Thank you Madonna black hole, ego. And I use the illustration is just like a balloon, isn't it up, down inflated deflated and that's the normal cell. So how Do we calm the ego? You know, in this passage, Paul's addressing the fact that because people aren't doing this comparison, they can't enjoy the brilliance and the beauty of what's there. So they don't enjoy the relationship with Paul, or Apollos. They're just using it for one upmanship. You know, then they're not enjoying it, thriving in it. So how do we come? The ego?
Paul Benger 10:29
Well, the first thing we said was stop judging, even ourselves. One Corinthians four, three, which is poor carrying on this argument, he says, I care very little, if I'm judged by you, or by any human court. Indeed, I do not even judge myself. There's nothing wrong with evaluation to improve and but judging is something very different, isn't it? It's actually that comparison. It's that judgement, is that harshness we have against our cell phone, I use the illustration of how sometimes when I've preached a message, and you don't feel it's gone, as well as you thought you actually did yourself. And you can even get to the place where you think, have I lost it? Like, have I lost it, you can have seasons in ministry, and ministry goes through all kinds of seasons, you know, seasons, where everything you touch turns to gold, and where everything you touch turns to something else, you know, and when you're in one of those seasons, you actually can feel all of our lost there, you know, but again, look where the focus is, Have I lost it? You're judging, you're judging yourself? So so the first thing is, how do we calm the ego? Well, don't judge don't judge people don't judge don't link performance to ego, don't link even feelings to ego. Whether or possessions that people have, don't link that to self worth, stop judging even ourselves. The second thing is a thought from CS Lewis, which I think is just genius. And that's think about self ourselves less. But he said, he does say that humility is not thinking less of ourselves, but thinking of ourselves less. So he's not saying have a low view of yourself. He's just saying, just don't think about self in this thing. And I love that. We talked about it again, Sunday night, I love that thought he has about if you met a truly humble person, they wouldn't tell you they were humble. They wouldn't be saying I'm a nobody, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm a little personal or whatever. Because that person is self obsessed, because they're, again, focused on themselves. The thing we would remember he says from meeting a truly humble person, is how much they were totally interested in us, the focus is somewhere else. So Miller, humility is not needing to think about myself not needing to connect things with myself not connecting feelings, to myself performance to myself criticism to myself, it's very hard to do this. And Paul actually, theologically calls it being dead to self, or dying to self. And Galatians chapter two, verses 19 to 20 says, I am crucified with Christ. So theologically, Paul sees himself united with Christ. When Jesus went to the cross, that I went to the cross, I died with Christ when Jesus rose from the dead, I rose from the dead to a new life, in the spirit, when Jesus ascended and seated at the right, and he's theologically says, We have been seated with Him in heavenly places. We are in Christ Jesus, I think in our Ephesians series, I think it was Nathan, you did that passage, where it was all about being in cry in Christ Jesus, that's where his focus is that I went to the cross and I died. I rose from the dead end to a new life in the Spirit, just like Jesus did. And I've ascended with Christ and seated in heavenly places. So the last thought then, and this is a thought, I didn't really bring out in the messages. In terms of practically how do we respond is this that we boast in Christ, that our focus is in Christ and towards Christ. I'm on a little bit of a roll where everything I'm thinking about links with my daily devotions or weekly devotions, you know, where I get a verse in that. So this week, the verse or the verses that I'm meditating. I'm monitoring him in the sunset for this one to three. verses one and two says this I will praise the Lord at all times, His praise shall continually be in my mouth, my soul will make hits boast in the Lord, the humble shall hear, and be glad. So I wrote in my notebook today, this little paragraph, I've been speaking recently about the human ego, how the human problem isn't low self esteem, or pride, but it's the ego itself. Whatever thoughts went sorry. While while have ever can't read my own writing, it's that bad. While ever thoughts are consumed with self, we will not find freedom. Only when our thoughts are off of ourselves and focused elsewhere. Comment on Jesus will our lives discover? Yeah, that's reflect discover, freedom, purpose, and true meaning. That's what I wrote this morning. So the answer to calm in the ego is the focus, and actually not self but Christ, focusing on what he has done. His victory, his glory, His sacrifice, humility, his power, redemption, obedience, faithfulness, focus on the faithfulness of Jesus and what He has done, focus on who he is, that is God, Lord, create a sustainer king. And, and then the answer for Paul, is that we are not merely human, but to be spiritual beings with resurrection life is to focus everything and to point everything on to Christ. So I thought, just in closing, I'd like to read another one of Paul's passages. It's from Colossians chapter three, quite a few verses. Because I think in these verses, again, he is, is is flipping that focus. And he's dropping that focus again on Christ, and then we can have thoughts, comments and discussion around it. So Colossians three, he says, So then if you have been raised with Christ, there's that view of I died with him and I've been raised with Him. Seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God set your mind on things that are above not on things on earth, for you have died, there is again, and your life is hidden with Christ in God, put to death therefore, because you died, put to death, whatever new is earthly fornication, impurity, passion, evil, desire and greed. On account of these, the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. These are the ways you once followed when you will live in the old life. But now you must get rid of such things. anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth do not lie to one another. Seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices, and clothed yourself with the new self which is being renewed in the knowledge according to the image of its Creator. In that renewal. There is no longer Greek and Jew circumstanced circumstance, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, and Savion, or Skillion, slave and free, but Christ is all and in all, as God chose as God's Chosen Ones, holy and beloved. clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, bear with one another. And if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other, just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you must also forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony, and let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you will call them the one body and be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and with gratitude in your heart, sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus. So even ministry, like it's not whether I'm did a great sermon or a bad sermon. It's if I did, did I do it in the name of Jesus? Whatever you do, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus giving thanks to God the Father through him. So, when I tell the story, those three messages the third message I want wasn't happy with instead of focusing on myself, I should have said Father God, thank You that even though that was terrible, you can do great things with it. In Jesus name, it wasn't really that terrible. But you know what I'm saying, I should have flipped the focus away from me on to God, as my thoughts this morning on calming the ego.
Nathan Benger 20:19
So after most staff talks, we just give an opportunity for maybe a little bit of discussion, and even some questions that might come about after that. And so we're going to do that now. And we're going to pass the mic around, usually, we wouldn't have a mic and it'd be free flowing. But we're going to pass the mic around, and you'll be able to sit in our discussion. So Alice is going to kick us off.
Unknown Speaker 20:39
And I just really enjoyed that last comment that you made about. It's not about whether I did a good job or not, but it's Did I do it in Jesus? And was Jesus with me and that, and I just really enjoyed that statement. And I think it gives you more confidence than when you approach something that you're doing, knowing that because you're thinking, Well, you know, Jesus has spoken to me about this. And so when I share that with some, you know, with others from a platform or whatever, I know that that's Jesus and speaking to me, and it's, it kind of takes the pressure off, and mate, and it's like, Well, Jesus got as big as Jesus work now. Like, it's him doing the rest of the work. And I know that I've done this through Jesus. So yeah, I really liked that.
David Mckeown 21:28
So but yeah, I was just thinking through that comment you made about the fact that there were so often thinking about ourselves. But I think one of the challenges we also face is not just the fact that we're thinking about ourselves, but we're often thinking about what the other people think of me. So it's the same sort of idea, really, but we're often stuck in that loop one way of what are people what do people think about me and what I think about myself, but it's all the same stuff. And I guess a lot of us spend a lot of our time in that space without even realising. And it would be good just to try and work out how to be in that space less, I guess.
Unknown Speaker 22:02
Yeah, my, my favourite bit was the same as Alice actually. And I know we've both been working on messages this week. And I've been questioning like, am I got anything to say? And actually, no, I haven't, but Jesus has, like, actually, it's not my words. It's not up to me to try and drag content, it's actually taking a step back and saying, Okay, right. Okay. What's God saying to me? What, what what is it that he's wanting to express the Roomie and just allowing the space rather than getting tangled up in? Is this good enough? Is My Story fun enough as all this and just actually taken a step back. So that's really encouraged me to do that, this week, actually, just to reflect a bit and is the message that God wanted to put across actually getting through,
Unknown Speaker 22:46
I really loved what you were saying about, about your message, actually, because I've experienced that loads as a worship leader, where you sort of get offstage and you go, that wasn't great. Or I've not done the best that I can. And I find it's such a difficult tension to balance between knowing that you are doing something really well. But also knowing that it's not just about that, like, it's about what God is doing through that. And I have a question really about? How would you help your team to understand that you can't use it as an excuse? Why cuz I've got a stage and it was a bit rubbish, but it doesn't matter, because God's gonna work through it. But also, what if they've not put the effort in? To actually make it really great? Like, I just found that a really difficult tension to balance?
Paul Benger 23:41
Well, I think two things. One is the evaluation, if judging is wrong evaluations not. And there's a, there's a subtle difference. And I was I was talking about the preaching evaluations with another Pastor recently that we do and he was like, our, we've never done them because like, we didn't, we didn't want to deflate people. We didn't want the people to feel, you know, like, they were terrible, etc. And so I said, Well, I'm, I'm sure, my hope, the way we do it, because it starts with self evaluation. And you're just asking the question, What could I do better? You know, what, what went well? What would I change? What could do better? And you're asking yourself that question, hopefully in a non judgmental way. I think that's one thing that's a positive, positive thing. So the he loved it, so that stealing that and making it and then you're going to use it for the Church. But the other thing as well as the spirit of excellence, because if I'm doing something in the name of Christ, I still want it to represent him well. And so I still give it my best answer, but it's if if it's, you know, I give it my best I prepare the best I can because that honours him because I'm actually doing it in the name of Christ. So if I am, then he is worthy of the best, but like, by far that even almost spurs me on to do even better. However, um, you know, I'm not going to get into that comparison and judging mode, you know, if actually having done that I've not delivered. If I evaluate and think Well, the reason that didn't go so well was I didn't really put the time in, or the effort or whatever, that's another that my response to that is, I'd actually spend more, you know, go more, give more time and give more thought on excellence in the future. But it's just moving away from that condemnation, that guilt and that judging, and, and learning and growing. But I do think in terms of, we don't, we don't want to foster foster a mediocre culture where people just Anything will do. Because if I'm doing it in the name of Jesus, then like, I want, I want to honour that game, as best I can. So those two things
Nathan Benger 26:09
are really good out. I was I was thinking on that as well. And then also I was just thinking about another passage of Paul's where he says to Church, follow me as I follow Christ. And thinking of the difference between this and that, and I was thinking, so in one instance, he's saying, don't, don't say I'm of Paul, I'm of polis. And then in another, another instance, is same follow me as I follow Christ. And as I was trying to think, well, like that they seem at odds and ends. But you know, in my interest in my thinking, in my head, I was just, it was like, where's your boasting? So I can follow another example. As long as I know that that example leads me to Jesus. Whereas maybe in this instance, that we're talking about, it wasn't that they were boasting in, you know, they were boasting, then I'm following this person, and it wasn't leading them towards Jesus. And so a very, you know, especially as people who are leaders in Church, we, you know, around youth and around young people, you would use that verse follow me as I follow Christ. It's like, let's be role models, let's be examples. But we've got to always remember that it's not Oh, I'm have Nathan I'm have Ben or whatever. Following Ben. I'm following Nathan. No, it's, well, if Ben's an example, Ben's an example, to follow Jesus Nathan's an example. Here's an example to follow Jesus. And it comes back to that, again, at the end where you were talking about we boast in Jesus, and the focus is on Jesus. And so when Paul, you know, and just going back to that verse, when Paul says, of follow me, as I follow Christ, the focus is actually on Paul, Paul's the example, to follow in Jesus, and to live in that life that Jesus is.
Paul Benger 28:03
Another angle to that is, so over the years, you know, people preach and people get on stage and do things often. You hear yourself in their preaching, so Ben might get up and preach, and I think all like he's nicked that from me. You know, and I never think, but I nicked it from somebody else, you know what I mean? But anyway, he's, he's, he's got that from me. And years ago, I used to feel about this, like, there's no credit, it's never mentioned, like two weeks ago, Paul said exactly the same things. I'm not. There's none of that. But, but now I have a completely different view. And it links back to this i Follow Follow me as I follow Christ is that what was revelation to me has now become a revelation for him. It's not my revelation is his is his now you don't have to credit me because he's his revelation. He's got it has spoken to him. So it's his revelation, but he got it. Through the followship followership, it came down the pipeline of follow me as I follow Christ, but it was Christ's revelation that just went that was just the channel that eventually made its way to ban so like, you know, never never feel as as that never feel a problem at using other people's thoughts, other people's ideas that have really spoken to you because if it's really spoke to you, it's now yours. It's all yours. You know, it's now your revelation that's come from Christ. There was just a conduit. That's, I mean, in the passage, we didn't read it today because of time But Paul says, here's how you should view as we're just servants of Yours for Christ's sake. You know, all servants of Christ for your Saint whichever way round he says it but you get the point. Oh, we're just, we're just there water carriers. You need the water. To where just the blessing carry as you need the blessing. So, so yeah, so that's that, that helped me with thinking about that versus well following person as they follow Christ,
Unknown Speaker 30:14
I was just gonna say comparison, that small point you made on that really struck a chord with me, and how you linked it with the ego being busy as well. And it just reminded me how, definitely, at least in my life, that can often be a daily battle. And it's often really small triggers even. And I think that the CS Lewis, quote, you mentioned, really summed it up about pride, being about having more of that thing than somebody else. And the opposite is true, you can easily look at someone and think, oh, gosh, I've got less of that thing than someone else. And I did want to ask as well, just just thinking about leadership and longevity and kind of your journey with that over the years, is that something that's been a struggle for you? And how have you kind of dealt with that? I guess,
Paul Benger 30:58
it still is, it still can be it still can be. And I think the only way to deal with to deal with it is to bring it to that place of saying whether it's daily or whenever it you're triggered, use that word. This isn't about me. It's about Christ, I surrendered my life to him, my life's now hidden with him. And so yeah, there's still all all of the above is still an ongoing challenge, because that's the normal callus is Keller's phrase where he says, this is the normal state of the human ego. It's, you know, he could say this is the fallen state of the human ego. So we're all in this. But Paul actually points a better way, the better way being in Christ. So I think it is just constantly, it's just constantly doing that, doing that work and bringing it to Christ, submitting it to Christ, coming back to him, pray in the prayers, Lord, I didn't think I did very well. But I know even you know, in, in, in my, whatever he word you might use, I might use the word mediocrity, in my mediocrity, mediocrity, you can do powerful things. With my weakness, you can show your strength, you know, with my mistakes, you can actually, you know, do incredible things. So it's actually, I think all Paul's doing is pointing us back to living Christ and live with Christ continually. And bring it into that place, which is the result of that is the peace of God. That passes all understanding. Because I'm often not at peace because I'm wrestling with all this stuff. I think that's the thing. So yes, continue.
Nathan Benger 32:43
Great stuff. Well, that's a staff meeting behind the scenes. Thanks for joining us on the church explained podcast and you can rate review, subscribe wherever you consume this content, and please check out IKON dot Church for such open for a load of free resources for you and your Church and we look forward to seeing you next time on the church explained podcast
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