The Secret Place — Michael L. Brown

Recovering the Secret Place as the Foundation of Life

And I pray, God, that by Your Word, by the ministry of Your Spirit, You would pierce to the very depths of our being. Get us back to basics. Expose the folly of human activity that is not grounded in You.

Draw us in, Father. And give us grace to not be hearers only, but to be blessed and be doers of the Word. In Jesus' name, Amen. Amen. You can be seated. We're going to be reading from a number of Scriptures, but we'll start in Psalm 91, talking about recovering the secret place, the place of intimacy, the place of meeting with God alone as the foundation of our very lives.

Let me say categorically, without qualification, that if there is one thing in my life, one thing in your life that must be in order, more important than any other area, I can say this without any need to qualify the statement.

It is the fundamentals of your relationship with God. I don't care what's going on in your marriage. I don't care what's happening with your finances. I don't care what's happening with your health, although each of those things are very important and of importance to God and of importance to you.

I don't care what's happening with your church life. I don't care what's happening with your ministry, although that's important to God and important to you. The bottom line, the most fundamental question is how is your relationship with God?

How deep is it? How strong is it? How intimate is it? And more than that, how is your relationship alone with God? Excuse me. That's all right. We just had a perfect illustration. Thank you, brother. You're obedient to the Lord in more ways than you know.

In all of our sessions here, teaching, well over, I don't know, 100-something just day sessions in the revival, there's never been a single time that while I was speaking, someone had to come and interrupt me.

He's just doing something in obedience to something he was asked to do. But it's an illustration, so remember it, and we'll come back to it. How many of you will have no trouble remembering it? The most fundamental question, how is your relationship alone with God?

Just you and Him in the secret place. In that place where there are no other eyes watching you. In that place where there is no one to hold your hand. In that place where there is no one else to see what's really going on on the inside of you.

How deep are you really? How grounded are you really? How far do your roots go down really? How much intimacy and communion and relationship is there really? When the music stops. When the lights are off.

When the crowds are gone. When the moral support isn't there. When the challenge isn't there. When the need isn't there. When it's just you and God. Who are you really? Psalm 91 is a classic psalm. There's no authorship attributed to it.

Ancient Jewish tradition says Moses wrote it because he wrote Psalm 90. And ancient Jewish tradition says that if the psalm does not tell you who wrote it, and the psalm before does, then that means they wrote both of them.

There's no way of demonstrating that. It's just tradition. But the words are well known to many. And some have memorized the whole psalm and spoken it in times of danger and crisis and difficulty. I'm just going to read some from the Hebrew and translate and explain, and then go to some other Scriptures and come back to this.

It says, He who dwells. It's talking about where you live. It's talking about where you abide. He who dwells in the secret place, or you might say, the hiding place of the Most High. That one will encamp night in, night out.

In the shadow of the Almighty. Yoshei B'Seiter Elyon. Someone who lives in a particular area is called a Yoshei of that area. He's an inhabitant of that area. That's where he dwells. Right now, I've moved down to Florida with my family.

So I'm a Yoshei of Florida. An inhabitant of Florida. A dweller in Florida. This is talking about where you live. This is not just talking about something you do here and there. This is not just talking about part of a disciplined life.

This is talking about the fundamental place that you abide. And as I'm going to challenge you to enter into that place, it goes beyond entering into that place. There's a sense of living in that place.

The sense in which the psalm is speaking of is speaking of the lifestyle of being hidden in God. The lifestyle of taking refuge in God. The lifestyle of encamping, dwelling, lodging. Literally, lodging night in, night out.

Under the shadow of the wings of God. What I want to communicate to you is that all flows out of your time alone with Him. That all flows out of your intimate relationship with Him. When no one else is around.

And ultimately, that intimate relationship when no one else is around can be just as strong when everyone is around. You can be just as much in the hiding place, in that secret place with God, with a million people around you and a million eyes on you, as you can all alone because it's heart to heart.

There's one period an author said, the heart alone sees God. God alone sees the heart. That's where the communion is. Yoshei b'seter el yom. He dwells in the hiding place of the Most High. Will lodge night in, night out, in the shadow of the Almighty.

Amar l 'Adonai, I will say of the Lord, my refuge, my stronghold, my fortress. Elohai eftakvo, my God. In Him will I trust. I want you to go back with me to Exodus chapter 33. If you were up here ministering and the anointing of the Lord was on you, you would be able to turn and it would automatically turn to Exodus 33 even though it wasn't marked.

Joshua's Public Strength Came from His Hidden Life with God

When you think of Joshua, what do you think of? When you think of Joshua, don't you think of the warrior? Don't you think of the man of courage, the man of faith? The man who along with Caleb said, we can take the land when the other ten spies said we can't?

The man who led Israel into the promised land? The man who passed through the Jordan and split? The man who took the enemy kings and put his foot on their necks and said, this is what the Lord will do to all of your enemies?

He was a warrior, conqueror. True. Let me give you a picture. You look at a tree and that tree may stand 50, 60 feet tall and it's huge and that's what gets your attention. And the branches go out and the leaves just cover a beautiful shade and the tree is just, that's what you see.

Look at those branches or maybe it's a smaller tree but it's a fruit producing tree and that's what you focus on. Look at the fruit coming out of it. Look at all the activity. Look at the beautiful change in colors with the seasons and so on.

Look at that. But friends, the most important part of the tree is what you can't see. Those roots, if that tree is 50, 60 feet high, do you know how deep those roots go? Or do you know how widely spread those roots are?

Do you know how big and thick those roots are? I mentioned last night that my wife is a gardener. And I am not what you would call a gardener or even a gardener's assistant. One day I was helping her do some work where we lived before in Maryland and she knew.

I mean, in my mind, I'm writing books. In my mind, I'm inside studying and praying and she could see that I'm a little distracted. And she said, come on, come on, help me out for a while. She said, it would be good for your muscles.

I said, you mean it will be good for our marriage? Just a little time together. But she knows that this is not my specialty. In fact, shortly before we left, I promised her I'd help her do some things before we moved down.

And we had to do some weeding. And I went outside to work with her. And within five minutes of just, you know, using this little trowel and pulling things up and so on, I was amazed. You know, I felt this pain in my hand.

I had already blistered and worn away the blister. I mean, that quickly. I had to get these gloves on and keep working. You know, you don't get rough hands sitting at the computer and turning pages of books, you know?

But one thing I found out, man, I'm trying to pull these things up. There was so little, but there were roots on them. And then if you've ever had to dig up something bigger, man, it's unbelievable, the roots.

And I don't know whether it was a 50, 60 foot tree. I can't imagine how far out the roots would go, how thick and strong they are. We tend to focus on the branches. We tend to focus on the trunk. We tend to focus on the leaves.

We tend to focus on the fruit. But the real essential ingredient that feeds the whole thing and makes it what it is is the roots. And the reason that some people seem to have a dynamic ministry and suddenly topple is because they've got no roots.

They're dynamic. They're charismatic. They can do a lot. They've been given certain gifts, but there are no roots of character. And there are no roots of intimacy. And there are no roots of being tried and proven.

And there are no roots of having walked things through with God when no one else is around. And they can grow quickly and look good, but suddenly resistance attack comes, and man, they take a fall. Or worse still, they go on with this ultimately successful ministry in the eyes of man.

It's wonderful. It's great. They're great performers, but you get near them and their character stinks. You get near them and there's no grace about them. Why? No roots. What I want to say to you is that what we see of that trunk of the life of Joshua, what we see of those branches of the life of Joshua, that was real.

That was who he was. But what really made him who he was was his secret life of prayer. What really made Joshua the conqueror, what really made Joshua able to look out and see the enemy and not be scared was because he saw God.

Leonard Ravenhill often said this to me. He said, the man who is intimate with God will never be intimidated by man. If you're intimate with God, you won't be intimidated by man. If you see the face of God, no other face is going to bother you or faze you or strike you.

When I talk about seeing his face, I mean spiritually, knowing him, relating to him, experiencing him. Look at this account of Joshua. We read in Exodus 33, after the Israelites sinned with the golden calf, if anyone was going to meet with God, God would not dwell in the camp with the rest of the Israelites.

So if anyone was going to meet with God, they had to go outside the camp to a tent that would be put up. And it was called, because of that, the tent of meeting, because that's where people would go to commune with God and meet with him.

Now Moses, verse 7, used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the tent of meeting. Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp.

And whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose and stood at the entrances to their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent. And by the way, this is the strength of Moses' life, his intimacy with God, his passion for God, his jealousy for God.

To give you another Ravenhill quote, no man is greater than his prayer life. No woman is greater than her prayer life. I chewed on that a few years ago. Brother Len went to be with the Lord in 94. I chewed on that because I watched some ministries that seemed to be tremendously anointed and seemed to be doing a lot.

And I was convinced that God was working through these individuals. And yet, because of the busyness of their schedule and the intensity of their lifestyles, mainly ministry schedule, I understood that they spent very little time alone with God in prayer.

And I chewed on what Brother Len said. Is it true? Is it real? No man is greater than his prayer life. Look at the ministry this guy has. Look at how God seems to be using him. Look at this. Look at that.

And I believe it's all true, and I believe the fellow was sincere. Not a charlatan, not a showman in any way. Sincere. But then it struck me, that's not what Ravenhill was saying. He was saying no man, no person, no woman is greater than his or her prayer life.

Who are you, really? When you stand before God, a lot of the other stuff is going to get stripped away. One brother had a vision. In prayer, or while sleeping, he had a dream. In this dream, he heard the Lord calling him forward to give account.

And he was about to tell the Lord, Lord, You know everything I've done. You know I've never married, so I could serve You. Lord, You know this. You know the signs and the wonders in the mirror. He was ready to list all this.

Had it all in his mind in the dream. And the Lord calls him and says, Come a little closer. I want to see how much of My Son I can see in you. And the guy woke up from his dream in a cold sweat. Not how great is your ministry.

Not how big are your branches. Not how beautiful are your leaves. But who are you really? As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance while the Lord spoke with Moses.

What an awesome scene. What an incredible picture. I preach on this chapter about Moses and his cry, Show me, Lord, Your glory. Please show me Your glory. But I want to focus on Joshua. Whenever the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshipped each at the entrance to his tent.

And God was saying, Moses is one of My intimate ones. Moses is one of My boys. I talked to Moses face to face as a man talks to his friend. No, not Moses fully seeing the face of God. But that communion, God speaks, Moses answers, Moses speaks, God answers, like a man to his friend.

And all Israel knew it. There's a Jewish tradition that says when Moses died, God wept because He said, Who's going to intercede for My people now? The Lord would speak to Moses face to face as a man speaks with his friend.

Then Moses would return to the camp. But his young aide Joshua, son of Nun, did not leave the tent. That's it right there. Why was Joshua picked to succeed Moses? Why was Joshua picked to lead Israel into the Promised Land?

You might get other evidences of his character or other things of the way he served Moses or whatever, but to me, that's the whole thing right there. He went with Moses. He got a taste of God's presence, God's glory.

He'd leave. Moses, the man of God. Moses, awesome servant of the Lord. Moses, that was high enough in God's economy that he's compared to Jesus. Oh, Jesus is greater than Moses, but think of just being compared to Him.

Being compared to Jesus. Moses. And yet Joshua stays when Moses leaves. Caught up with God. Meeting with God. If there's any deep call that I hear from year to year from God, beyond any other call, beyond any other burden, beyond any other thing, it's come away.

Come away. Come away. Look with me in Mark's Gospel. First chapter. We could only weed out the interruptions and weed out the distractions and weed out the busyness and get back to basics. We could shake whatever nation we come from.

A man or a woman caught up with God, shut in with God, filled with God, led by God. We could shake the world, friends. And yet we get so busy working on, man, those leaves don't really look right. What should we do?

Well, let's paint the leaves. Those leaves don't look right. What should we do? Let's go to a leaf seminar. Those leaves don't look right. Maybe the problem is the roots are not getting nourished. I don't know.

What's the matter with this tree? There's just not much fruit. Maybe we'll plant different trees. Why not check the roots? Check the roots of your spiritual life. Listen, I am embarrassed by the simplicity of it all, by knowing that if I would spend more quality time with God on a daily basis, that I would see God work through me more wonderfully than I have ever seen a hundred times to one.

It is so simple. And everything else will fall out of that. My time alone with the Word of God would be deeper and richer. My ministry to people would be deeper and richer. My ears to hear correction and instruction from the Lord would be more in tune with Him, more acutely able to hear.

Family time would be more productive. Writing time would be more productive. My personal witness would be more vibrant. My whole life would be more Christ-like. I know the simple answer to it all. That's why everything in me is pushing, pushing, pushing more than I can think in years.

The secret place. Get back to that hiding place. Take refuge in God. Get alone with Him. Get alone with Him. Get alone with Him. It was Corrie Ten Boom who said this. I went into our ministry administrator's office the other day.

I just needed to check something that was on her computer. I walked in and there was the screen saver that she had. There are those words coming across it. The words of Corrie Ten Boom. I quoted them in my book How Saved Are We? The chapter on redeeming the time.

She said this. So simple. Beware the barrenness of a busy life. Beware the barrenness of a busy life. A few years ago, while preparing to preach in New York City, over for Times Square Church one night, I had a wonderful morning in prayer.

While praying, it was March 6th of, I think, 95. I just was stirred after my morning with God and wrote down what the Lord was saying to me. Too much time working for God. Not enough time waiting on God.

I'll repeat that. Too much time working for God. Not enough time waiting on God. Too much time attending to His business. Not enough time adoring His beauty. Just some prayer a few nights ago towards the end of the year.

Looking back at the year, reflecting, praying. Always try to take stock of things. I review my journal at the end of the year. Go through it. Look at things the Lord was dealing with me about. Look at things I recorded.

Ask myself, have I dealt with this? Have I changed this area? Have I grown in this area? What can I learn? Always trying to review. Always trying to take stock. Always trying to evaluate things before God.

I want to just race through my whole life and then at the end think, I could have done it all differently. I want to stop. I want to examine myself as the Word tells me to. I want to pray as it's prayed in Psalm 90.

Lord, teach me to number my days that I can gain a heart of wisdom. I want to know what it means to redeem the time. One thing that was just underscored to me again. God. Not ministry. Not activity. Not service.

Not revival. Not school. Not people. God must be the center of my life. Mark, the first chapter. Let me ask you a question. Does anyone here have more responsibility than Jesus had while He was on the earth?

Jesus' Prayer Life in the Midst of an Exhausting Schedule

You know, I've gone through every kind of organizational tool, organizational software on my computer and little organizational toys. I've been through all of them. And I try to use something, anything that will keep me motivated to stay on top of schedules and to-dos and so on because my life is scattered in so many different areas.

I don't mean it's a scattered life, but there's heading up to school and heading up our ministry and doing scholarly research and writing and then popular writing and then the involvement in the revival and outside preaching and ministry and going to other countries and ministering and having a family and so on.

That's just a partial list. You've got your list. I've got mine. It's a lot of different areas. And I'll try to keep myself motivated with this thing and that thing to stay on top of things I need to do and projects I need to stay involved with and promises I made to get this done and that done for people.

And I always think about this with a smile that in America, you know, we're big on time management. We've got all these, you know, executive classes and time managerial excellence and all this stuff and pastors and everybody's had to have their day timer.

I joke about this. You go over to India and day timers go out the window. You know, time management goes out the window. One of our favorite slogans in India is hurry up and wait. You know, come on, come on.

Everybody's got to get on the bus. Come on, we've got to go to the next city. You get on the bus and you sit for two hours and don't go anywhere. Or you get on the bus or in the car and you travel for 20 hours and go 200 miles.

We've done that kind of thing. And you get there when you get there. You know, time kind of takes on a different meaning. But some of us, man, we're busy. We're busy and we've got this scheduled and that scheduled and every kind of minute of the day worked out and planned out and budgeted out.

Or others of us are just chaotic but we're going. You know, from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep at night and it looks like the end of the day and hardly anything got done. And man, there's just so much to do.

Let me ask you. Does anyone here... I gave a little piece of my life. You could give me a piece of your life. Maybe you're married and you're home with kids and watching the kids and taking care of things and out working and all these kinds of responsibilities.

You're busy. I ask you, do any of us have more responsibility than Jesus did? Are there more demands on your time and my time than there were on Jesus? I don't think so. How many times is it that you can't even eat because the crowds of people are surrounding your house wanting prayer?

How often has that happened to you in the last week? Last month? This lifetime? That's not the norm, friends. We get swarmed to pray for people at the end of the night. That's nothing what happens here.

Think of everywhere you go being surrounded. You can't even get into a town or a village. Someone's healed. You've got to bring them outside to pray for them because you know the moment word gets out you won't be able to get near that place anymore.

That's how it was with Jesus. And think of all the villages he had to go to and all the people where he had to teach, preach, and heal. That was his pattern. Teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and disease.

That's an agenda. And then only a few years to do it because he's marching towards his destiny of dying for the sins of the world. What a schedule. And then he's got to disciple these guys so that when he leaves there'll be a core of men who can take this message to the ends of the earth.

And yet, with great regularity, Scripture paints the picture of Jesus getting alone to get with his Father. If he could do it, what's my excuse? Well, he didn't have a 9-to -5 job like I do. Friends, you don't have a 24-hour job like he did.

He doesn't have four kids screaming at him all day. You don't have hundreds and thousands of kids and people screaming at you all day. Look at Mark 1. Verse 35, very early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went off to a solitary place where he prayed.

It's almost like he's saying, you can take everything from me, but you can't take my prayer life. See, I came down from my Father in heaven. We communed eternally. We knew one another's glory. We knew unbroken fellowship in a perfect place.

Now I've come down here to this pigsty called earth. There's one thing you're not going to take from me, and that's my intimate relationship with my Father. And he knew that the only way he could accomplish the Father's will on this earth was by remaining in vibrant contact, fellowship with him.

He said, I can only do what I see my Father doing. How did he see what his Father was doing? Obviously, everything flows, time alone with God, and the lifestyle lived caught up with him. Do I mean that he had a vision every day?

I'm not saying that. He could have had a thousand visions a day. That's not the issue. He's the Son of God. But certainly he knew what his Father was doing. He knew when it was time to do this and when it wasn't time to do this.

He wasn't just flailing his way through life. But he started where he needed to start, alone with his Father. Still dark. Don't you think he had an exhausting day? Don't you think he pushed himself to the physical limit?

But he gets up early. Why? Because some things are non-negotiable. For most all of my believing life, and really before that, before I was saved, I was a late night person. And most of my books are written after midnight.

Most of my best time seeking God for years has been after midnight. Most of my best study time has been after midnight. For years. And if I'm really in the flow, God's moving on me to write, and I'm caught up with things, it's not uncommon for me to go to sleep at four in the morning.

When people will talk to me and say, you know, we've got 6 a .m. prayer. Would you like to come to our 6 a .m. prayer? I tell them I'd love to. It's just hard for me to stay up that late. That's my orientation.

You know, Steve was the opposite. Before Revival, he would get up between 3 and 4 every morning to seek God. For years, lived like that. 3 in the morning or 4 in the morning, he'd be up seeking God for a few hours in prayer before the day started.

When Revival broke out, he was getting home at 3, 4 in the morning. Or 5 in the morning. He'd get home and watch the sunrise as he got home. But to this day now, he'll go to sleep probably between 1 and 2.

He's still up 5 .30 or 6 to seek the face of God. He's an early morning person, and that's got to come first. His morning's with God, and he'll grab a little nap, maybe an hour if he can later in the afternoon.

I don't like to get up early if I can avoid it. I push myself. Trust me. If you come over to my home and stay with me, I'll be up way after you're up late at night. And if it's a ministry day or any responsibility, I'll be up before you're up.

But I don't like getting up early if I can avoid it. How many of you kiss the alarm when it goes off in the morning? But you know something, when I have a plane to catch, if I'm about to go overseas for an important, you know, three days of ministry, and I've got a plane to catch, man, I'm up probably every hour on the hour through the night looking at the clock.

I don't have time here. It's only 2 in the morning. You don't have to be up till 5. Look back again. It's only 3. You don't have to be up till 5. I'm up at 5. I'm up before 5. I've already had three dreams that I overslept and missed the plane.

Why am I up at 5? Maybe I just went to sleep at 2 o 'clock. Why am I up at 5? Because I have no choice. Because it's non-negotiable. Because the only plane that's going to get me to the place where I'm going for this national conference leaves at this particular time, and I have to get that plane.

Period. That's how you have to look at prayer. It's non-negotiable. It's not an option. There is no other way around it. There is nothing else that you can do to replace and substitute. There is no excuse.

There's no replacement. If you miss that, you fill in with something else. No, it's non-negotiable. Whatever you have to do, whether it's getting up early, which is the more biblical pattern. Steve's pattern would be the one you could argue for more biblically.

You know, getting up to get the matter before the sun comes out and melts it. Starting your day in that sense. Or if you're a midnight person, a late night person, and that's in the Word too. Whatever it is, you've got to make that a non-negotiable.

If Jesus, in the midst of His exhausting schedule, found it important enough to get up while it was still dark and pray, what is that telling me? Why do you think He fell asleep in a boat? Why did He fall asleep in a boat?

I have a deep theological question. I only want those who are really deep in the Word, who are really, you know, probably in ministry for at least 20 years, because this is a serious question. I see some of our students here.

I'm sorry you haven't been in school long enough to answer this. I'm sorry. But for those who are really deep, why did Jesus fall asleep in the boat? Wait, wait. We've got some guys that are deep over here.

They must be very humble because they're not ashamed to say that they're deep. The answer is, He was tired. He was good, man. I'm impressed. How long have you been saved? Since 75, and you knew that already in only 22 years.

Excellent. And you knew it also. It's amazing what God can do in a few short years, huh? He fell asleep in the boat because He was tired. You say, brother, now I see why I've come from around the world to Pensacola to just get this revelation.

Bob Gladstone, one of the faculty members at our school, a real gift from God to us here, he looked at things. He looked at his own life and he saw that his schedule was such between teaching classes.

He teaches 10 hours a week in the school. Between teaching his classes and feels committed from the Lord to be in revival every night. He and his wife just had their third child. They've got two little kids and now an infant just a little over... not even two weeks old, serviced with the baby last night.

He looked at things and saw there were certain things in his schedule that could not be adjusted and realized the only things that could be adjusted were eating and sleeping. And he figured that looking at Jesus, that Jesus lived in a similar way, that sometimes He didn't have a chance to eat because of the press of ministry, and that the fact He was sleeping in the boat meant He was tired.

I don't think that He got all the sleep He needed every night before that and just decided to sleep more in the boat. He fell asleep because He was tired. Why? Because maybe He'd gotten up early. What I'm trying to tell you is He's a man like we are.

He made decisions and there were consequences to His decisions. When I get up early, I'm tired. Yeah, but you got to meet with God. And in your time meeting with God you got some clarity to see you could cut away a few other activities so you wouldn't be so tired.

You say, but this is just an isolated instance of Jesus doing this. You know how many little isolated instances there are like this in the Word? Another time? Here, let's go over to Mark the 6th chapter.

There are enough isolated instances that it gives us a life path. Jesus feeds the 5 ,000. Verse 45, Immediately Jesus made His disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of Him to Bethsaida while He dismissed the crowd.

After leaving them, He went up on a mountainside to pray. He sends them off. Now He's got to get with God. He's got to get along with God. You know how some of you live? You ever hear the story about the man who lost his wristwatch?

And it's night time in a city. It's under a big light, street corner lamp there. And he's on his hands and knees looking around. And someone says to him, What happened? He said, I lost my watch. He said, Well, I'll help you look for it.

He said, Did you lose it around here? He said, No, but the light is better. Some of you spend your whole lives flailing, I mean the light is better here. This is easier. I can work better here. Instead of stopping and saying, Wait a second, what am I supposed to be doing?

Busy, active, moving, flailing. You watch your life and it's a whiz. Can't even keep up with you in a day, in a week, in a month. Whoa! Activity, busyness, ministry. God's saying, Why are you doing this?

I haven't called you to do this. Why are you living like this? There are people with far more responsibility to you than you have and they have far more peace. People with far more load to carry and they have far more grace about it.

John Wesley said, Though I am in haste, I'm never in a hurry. I may have said it backwards, trying to think. But his point was, as busy as he was, he was never rushed. As busy as he was, as intense as his schedule was, he was never rushed.

He was at peace. He would get where he was going when he got there. I'll find myself, you know, before I get into the driveway, you know, just as I'm getting close to home, the seatbelts are already coming off.

Why? You know, before I get to a place, if I'm going through a drive-through teller at a bank or something, I've already gotten everything out, even though there's going to be a line of cars in front of me, I've already gotten it out.

Why? I just started looking at habits as indicative of attitudes. You know, the plane arrives. It's going to be three minutes before it gets to the gate. Plus, you're supposed to keep your seatbelt on.