No Reserves, No Retreats, and No Regrets
I was sitting in my office here in Southeast Missouri this week, scrolling through some “Scripture Jazz” (don’t knock it until you try it), and a line from Revelation 21 hit me like a freight train.
It says the old heaven and the old earth disappeared. It was just gone.
It made me think about a man named William Borden.
You might not know the name, but in 1904, he was the heir to the Borden Dairy estate. He was a multi-millionaire before he hit twenty. He was the guy who had everything: prestige, a massive inheritance, and a “successful” future mapped out by the world’s standards.
But when he graduated high school, his parents sent him on a trip around the world. He saw the brokenness of humanity and did something that made the “sane” people in his life think he’d lost his mind.
In the back of his Bible, he wrote two words: “No Reserves.”
He gave away his fortune. He turned down high-paying jobs. He headed to the mission field. Later, as he faced a terminal illness at only twenty-five, he added two more words: “No Retreats.” And finally, right before he died, he wrote: “No Regrets.”
Borden understood something most Christians spend their whole lives trying to grasp: He wasn’t living for a victory; he was living from one.
The Survival Trap
Most of us wake up in “Survival Mode.”
We view our faith like a performance review. We think if we can just grit our teeth, confess enough sins, and attend enough services, we might finally earn a “win” from God. We treat the Christian life like a ladder we’re desperately trying to climb while the devil shakes the bottom.
That is a lie from the pit.
The sermon this week was about one thing: The War is Over.
Jesus didn’t come to give you a set of religious chores or a better set of “sugar cookies and rainbows.” He came to restore the intimacy that was ripped away in the Garden of Eden. He came to break the “rain of depression,” the “rain of anxiety,” and the “sting of death.”
When William Borden wrote “No Regrets” on his deathbed, he wasn’t being brave; he was being logical. He knew that his “old earth” resume had already disappeared and been replaced by the victory of Christ.
Change Your Mental Aggression
If you are living in fear of the future, you are living as if the old earth is still in charge.
You have to stop “attending services” and start “being alive.” You need a new “mental aggression” that looks at your pain, your past, and even death itself to ask: “Where is your sting?”
You aren’t a loser trying to become a winner. In Christ, you are a champion who occasionally forgets who he is. If you need a tactical roadmap to drop the performative act and walk in raw honesty in your marriage, look through The Covenant Standard.
Your Mission This Week:
Stop boasting about your struggles, your stress, or your “good behavior.” Instead, start boasting about your Rescue.
When anxiety knocks on the door this Tuesday, don’t try to “fix” it. Declare who Jesus is in that situation:
- Call Him your Hero.
- Call Him your Righteousness.
- Call Him your Truth.
Open your mouth and speak the victory until your heart actually believes it. You’re a new creation. Act like it.
See you Sunday,
Pastor Jeremy