Key points
1Growing in Christ, not happiness or success, was God's priority for you from the moment you believed.
Pastor Linn states plainly that the instant someone said yes to Jesus, God's number one goal became maturing them in Christ — not making them famous, rich, or happy. This reframes the whole series on the confusing 'in between' seasons of life.
A story from life
Story about grandson Caleb's flag football game and his reaction to only touching the ball once
2We get so fixated on what isn't happening that we miss what God is teaching in the isn't.
Using his grandson Caleb's flag football story — the team won big but Caleb wept because he only touched the ball once — Pastor Linn shows how being consumed by what didn't go our way blinds us to what God is doing in the moment.
Illustration
Illustration contrasting two fictional characters, Stephanie and Phil, pursuing the same worldly markers of success
3Believers often chase the exact same things as people who don't know Jesus, and that will always disappoint.
Through the contrasting characters Stephanie (not yet a believer) and Phil (a Christian), Pastor Linn shows both are chasing the same house, car, and lake house dreams. He challenges Phil directly: why look for fulfillment in the same place the world does, when the world is 'a ravenous mistress' that always demands more?
You can never satisfy the hunger of the world and the world can never satisfy the hunger in you
If you spend your life chasing the wrong thing, you will always regret it
A story from life
Story about stealing pea-stained golf balls from a zoo enclosure as a teenager
4Chasing the wrong thing, especially the wrong way, always ends in disappointment.
He tells the story of stealing pea-stained golf balls from the zoo's oryx cage as a teenager, only to find they were permanently yellow and unusable. The image of a golf bag full of yellow golf balls becomes his picture of a life spent chasing things that can never satisfy.
When you chase the wrong thing, especially if you do it the wrong way, you end up with a golf bag full of yellow golf balls
5God works all things — including struggles and failures — to conform us to the image of His Son, and that is the best thing that can happen to us.
Pastor Linn walks through Romans 8:28-29, pointing out that most people quote verse 28 about God working all things for good but skip verse 29, which defines that good as being conformed to the image of Jesus. He argues the best thing that can happen isn't a promotion or bigger house, but becoming more like Christ.
“the best thing that can happen in your life is not that next promotion, the best thing that can happen in your life is not the bigger house, the best thing that can possibly happen in your life is that you become more like Jesus”
6A church that asks 'what would Jesus do' in every circumstance becomes remarkably transformed.
He recalls the WWJD bracelet era and tells about a staff member, Tom Stone, whose life was so marked by seeing God at work that staff began asking 'what would Tom do' — illustrating how letting Jesus show up in us becomes a reference point for others, even our own kids.
A story from life
Story about a staff member, Tom Stone, regularly sharing how he saw God working through him
7James tells us to decide trials are for our joy, not to feel joyful about them.
Pastor Linn works through James 1:2, noting the text says to 'consider' or decide it's joy, not simply to feel happy about hardship. He illustrates with his high school basketball coach forcing him through brutal wind sprints, which he later realized was training, not punishment, for the real game.
The greatest success you can have as a Christian is less and less of you and more and more of Jesus on you
A story from life
Story about a demanding high school basketball coach requiring a six-minute mile and wind sprints
8God used seasons of joblessness and unfair treatment to teach him to trust and obey even without understanding.
He tells of pushing a lawnmower in the Phoenix heat after Bible college when no church would hire him, and later being treated harshly by unfair elders at his first church job. He connects this to Jesus in Gethsemane praying 'nevertheless your will be done,' showing obedience under authority even when it feels wrong.
A story from life
Story about a period of unemployment pushing a lawn mower after Bible college
A story from life
Story about a difficult early ministry job under an unfair church leadership while the senior pastor was dying
A story from life
Story about disciplining a teen named Joel on a youth trip and the resulting conflict with his mother Aurelie, later reconciled
9Loving unlovable people, like a boy named Joel and his mother Orly, is how God actually forms Christlikeness in us.
Pastor Linn tells the extended story of banning a disruptive teenager named Joel from a youth trip, the resulting anger from Joel's mother Orly, and his supervisor's instruction to 'love on them' anyway. Years later Joel wept and hugged him, later becoming one of Cornerstone's founding 24 members and his own son's Sunday school teacher.
I thought I was changing them. God was changing me
Application
Pastor Linn's charge is to spend the next thirty days asking, in every circumstance, what would Jesus do in a moment like this.
Take the 30-day WWJD challenge
Wear the bracelet handed out at the doors and for thirty days, in every unfair or frustrating circumstance, choose to ask what Jesus would do and live that way.
Stop fixating on what isn't happening
Like Caleb missing the joy of his team's win, notice when you're consumed by what didn't go your way and look instead for what God may be teaching you in it.
Quit chasing the same things the world chases
Examine whether your pursuit of success, houses, or possessions is really an attempt to find fulfillment the same way people who don't know Jesus do, and redirect your focus toward becoming like Christ.
Decide trials are for your growth, not just endure them
Follow James's charge to consider it joy when facing trials — actively decide the struggle is forming you like Jesus rather than waiting to feel good about it.
Love the people who are hard to love
Like Orly and Joel, keep pursuing reconciliation with people who've hurt or frustrated you, even before they apologize, trusting God is using it to shape you.
Take it into your week
Rewind AI contributed study material from the sermon transcript; church-authored wording and verified sermon quotes keep their own source. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI
