Transcript
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and I'll see you next time.
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Don't get down when you're seeing the worst
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Cause the last will be the first
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What a day I'm telling you
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All things will be new
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Living up in a down world
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Yeah we're living, yeah we're living
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Living up in a down world
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Oh
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This is Jimmy and NadaNet today
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We have our special guest back by popular demand
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Pastor Brian Manning. Hello.
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Welcome to Living Up in a Down World.
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Hey Pastor Jimmy, thank you for having me back for round two.
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I'm excited to talk about some big things today.
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So what y'all don't know is that
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Pastor Brian and I just did the best show we ever did
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and I didn't hit the record button.
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Let's just tell them the real truth.
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We did 30 minutes worth of knock down drag out.
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I hope we can...
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We got a preview of the show and we can just tell you in advance
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it's going to be great.
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So you stay with us today.
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Welcome to Living Up in a Down World.
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Hey, do go to our website, livingupinadoworld.com.
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You can pick up our daily blog
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which is a daily devotional that I write every day
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hot off the press, right out of my quiet times in the morning
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and it is fresh and it's kind of...
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It can be in your face.
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It's about building you up and encouraging you
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but also challenging you to live the life.
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So livingupinadoworld.com
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You can subscribe there.
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You can join and support us through PayPal.
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Everything is there and all of our...
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All 61, today we're on episode 62.
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All those episodes are on there.
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You can listen to them by title
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and pick them as you would and we would love
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to have you as a guest on the website.
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Check it out. Welcome Pastor Brian.
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I'm ready to talk about big things.
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Let's get into it.
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There is a lot of low hanging fruit out there
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and what I mean by that is there is so much
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happening in this world right now
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that there's so much to choose from.
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When we were talking about,
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what do you want to talk about today?
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You wrote me this morning.
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What do you have in mind?
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And I'm like, what do I not have in mind?
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There is so much happening in the world.
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We want to address some of those things.
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Obviously not all of them.
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But one of the things I want to bring up
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is what is happening right now prophetically.
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It appears that things are lining up
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in terms of what's happening with Russia,
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what's happening with North Korea, China.
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The world seeming to turn its back on Israel.
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There are a lot of things
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prophetically lining up.
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It is possible.
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I've heard some very well respected
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men, pastors, prophets
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in this world today
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that I'm saying are not the kooky type.
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They are not flaky.
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They are solid.
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They are saying we are at a point
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right now where the church
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could be raptured at any point.
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There are other things that need to line up
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in terms of setting up the tribulation,
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setting up the Gog and Magog invasion of Israel.
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There are a lot of things happening.
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That's Ezekiel 38.
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But Ezekiel 37, the coming together
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of the dry bones, that's already happened
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in 1948 when Israel
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was reestablished as a nation.
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We are not going to go deep into eschatology today.
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I'm saying this is just
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setting things up
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because these are both the best and worst
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of times. How does that hit you?
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I am actually
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excited in a weird way
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by the totality
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of all that we are seeing happen right now
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because A, it's right
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on time with God's plan.
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There is nothing happening, first of all.
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If you are a believer in Jesus, there is nothing
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happening that is outside of
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God's awareness and outside of
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what he planned and knew was going
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to happen all along.
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He loves us and he is going to take care of his people,
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number one. Secondly,
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when you look prophetically
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at what we are told in Scripture
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is going to happen, if you look in
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the book of Malachi in chapter 3 and chapter
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4, it talks
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about how, yes, there is
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going to be an apostasy,
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there is going to be a falling away, there is going to be
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turbulent times and difficult times,
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but before Jesus returns, it also
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talks about that there is going to be one
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of the greatest revivals
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that the world has ever seen.
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It is going to happen in the midst of the darkest
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darkness that we have ever seen
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in the world. And that is what gives
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me hope and encouragement is that when it
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gets bad, when things get dark,
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Jesus shows up,
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God shows up, and he shows up through
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his people, through the Holy Spirit
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in his people, for those
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who will be faithful and who will hold
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on and continue to
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do the things that he is calling them to do
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in the midst of the darkness.
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I so agree with that. In fact,
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you reminded me of something historically
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speaking that the first great
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awakening that happened actually
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gave way to the American Revolution.
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It was a setup
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for the American Revolution. And by the way,
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only 50% of the pastors
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or less were actually in favor of
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that. It was a nation
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at that time. We were divided.
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The colonies were divided,
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the states were divided. They were at
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war with one another, they were debating
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morality and issues,
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and sometimes people have these ideas that these
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great revivals were times
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of great unity and great,
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we are all one singing kumbaya
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around the fire. That is not
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how it happened. It was messy,
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it was sloppy. There were horrible
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things going on. Slavery was
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entrenched at that time, and
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a lot of terrible things were happening,
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and yet in the midst of that, God showed
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up and began to move in miraculous ways.
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The second great awakening,
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what did that give rise to?
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That is what brought us through
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the Civil War and out of
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slavery. There you go.
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Now you had another great awakening
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again in wartime.
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See, it is so interesting because I think
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we have these ideas that when we talk about
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spiritual awakening and revival,
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we are talking about wonderful altar calls.
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Wow, what a great day at
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church. The worship team sounded so anointing,
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and Pastor Brian was just off the rails
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preaching. He is on fire.
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Let's go eat. Let's go have lunch.
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Let's go over to Backwoods Barbecue and have
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some barbecue at AJ's place.
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We just have this
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laxadaisical,
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nonchalant,
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indifferent approach to what is
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going on, and we miss the fact
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that it is actually in times of
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great upheaval, great
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division and disunity,
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great debates over morality
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and issues. When God shows
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up the most, why? Because we are
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sin abounds, grace abounds,
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all the more. I think
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we are set up, just as you were
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saying, out of Malachi, Malachi if
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you are Italian, right, out of Malachi,
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that we are set up for one of
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the next great awakenings right now.
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Well, I believe that. It talks about
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in Malachi 3, the refiner's
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fire, and that is where
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the church is right now. We have really
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been there probably for the last two or
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three decades. There was a
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period through the 1980s where
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you were seeing
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the power and
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the healing and the
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moves of God in big ways,
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but what happened was, a lot
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of the church did not steward it very well,
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and instead they marketed
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it, and they tried to make money off of
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it, and they made it about themselves,
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and about growing big churches
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rather than making it about drawing people
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into the presence of God. What
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we have seen in the church is a bit of a
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wilderness that we have been in over the last
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20 or 30 years, but it is
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in the wilderness that God prepares
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His people for what He wants to do
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next, and I believe that the church is
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poised to come out of the wilderness, and I think
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we are going to see God move in big ways.
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Absolutely agree.
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I think another piece of that was
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we got excited about making converts,
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and we missed what Jesus told us to do.
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He did not tell us to make converts.
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He told us to make disciples.
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And what happened was, we dropped the ball
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on discipleship. So then
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you have a whole generation of Christians
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who can get excited
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over the presence of God and great worship
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and great preaching, get all stirred up at a conference,
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but when the winds of adversity
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grow, they do not have roots
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that go down deep enough to support
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their pain and support what is coming
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against them. Yeah, and that is what we need.
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We need foundations. We need deep
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roots of discipleship,
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because it is to
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obey what God is calling us to do.
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It is not going to be easy. There is
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going to be difficulty involved. He said,
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in this world you will have trouble.
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And some of that trouble is
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brought intentionally by God upon us
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to grow our roots,
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to refine us, to prepare us. So camp on that for a minute.
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Let's riff on that, because
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a lot of people have this idea that
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God is just this big, benevolent
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grandfather sitting in an old, big old
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rocking chair, just waiting for
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his kids to come sit on his lap. And I have
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heard people use those
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metaphors, or something like those
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metaphors, to where it is just this
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sloppy agape, as
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Pastor Alan Jackson says. Wow.
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Sloppy agape,
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just sit around the fire saying kumbaya,
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because it is just all about love, brother.
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It is just all about, just love
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each other. Yeah.
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Well, and the love of God isn't to be
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taken lightly. The Bible says that God
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is love. He doesn't have it. He is love.
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And love is defined by him.
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That is part of where we have gone wrong
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in our conception of love,
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is we have tried to redefine the idea of
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love outside of who God is
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and what He says it is.
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And so we slap the love label
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on things that aren't really
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loving. We are calling
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love things that are actually destroying
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people, things that are tearing them
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down. And we are saying it is loving
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because we are making them
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feel good in the moment. We are telling them
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something that tickles their ears or what they
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may want to hear or that is comfortable
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in the moment. But ultimately,
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it destroys them. It doesn't
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help them, and that is not love.
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Man, you nailed that, brother, because
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we think that love means
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being silent towards
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someone's sin because we don't want to impose
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our beliefs upon them. So we are going
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to love them by not saying anything.
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And that is what you said. That is
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the opposite of love.
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Love means you speak.
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Love means you speak the truth.
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And you speak the truth in love, but you speak
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the truth because of love. And I think
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that is where we miss it. It is easy to quote
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that scripture, speak the truth in love, brother.
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Speak the truth in love. You know, gel cap
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it with love so it goes down okay.
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Soften it, dumb it down.
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But it is really not just that.
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It is speaking the truth because you love.
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My dad had no
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problems speaking the truth to me.
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Sometimes it was with
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a belt, and sometimes it was with
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a boot. And he never abused
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me, never once. But you know what?
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He got my attention. And I knew
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I was loved by my father.
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And I am all the better for it.
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And by the way, I earned every one I got.
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I earned it. Absolutely.
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And so he was just in that sense.
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And I understood that.
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The scripture even says he, like
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a father, God disciplines
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those whom he loves. Absolutely.
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But yet we think that if something
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not so comfortable is happening
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or if something is inconveniencing
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us, that we are either A, being
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persecuted by the devil,
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or being persecuted by others. By the way, the Bible
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does say that those who desire to live
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Godly in Christ Jesus will be
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persecuted. So if you are
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living Godly in Christ Jesus, expect
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it. And I am not talking about some
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keyboard warrior out there making a bad
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comment on their social media link.
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I am talking about real deal, in your
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face, persecution.
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Absolutely. Well you know, I was
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a youth pastor for a long time. And I
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know you were too. And I have
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yet to meet a young
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person who grew up,
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who had parents who
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didn't discipline them,
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and didn't teach them righteousness,
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and hold them accountable,
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who then grew up and said,
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that was awesome.
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In fact, I have met
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many young people who are now in their
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20s and in their 30s,
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one of their biggest regrets is
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the fact that their parents just let them
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do whatever they wanted. And
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they wandered off into all kinds
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of error and sin
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and painful experiences that they are
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now reaping the consequences
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for, for the rest of their lives.
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And they go, man, I wish my mom or my dad
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had disciplined me,
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had shown me what was
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going to harm me. And if we know that
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instinctively as mothers and
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fathers and about when we think
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about our kids, why would we think that
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God would treat us any differently?
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That comes from Him.
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Let's take that back into what's happening
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in our culture right now.
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Is that things look bad
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out there. It looks like
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God may be judging
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America right now.
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And we don't like to talk about that in the contemporary
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church. We don't want to talk about God
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being wrathful or
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just. You need to read your whole Bible,
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not just the Old Testament.
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You need to read the whole Bible. It's all through
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the New Testament as well. That God's
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just. That there is a wrath against
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wickedness. And He will not
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strive with man. I was looking at the latest
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statistic.
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63 million abortions
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since 1973.
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Roe v Wade. Oh my gosh.
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63 million abortions.
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I was telling Annette last night,
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literally with tears in my eyes. I got really
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choked up about it. About how
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ambivalent I have been about that.
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I've gone on with my life
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knowing that this stuff's
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happening. But
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either it just wasn't
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in my realm
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at that moment. It wasn't right in front of
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me. And I was
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really feeling sorrow, godly sorrow
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last night. And repentant
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that I haven't stood
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for 63
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million children who have been murdered.
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And it was getting on
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me. Not in a condemnation way.
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By the way, this is not a bad thing.
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This was godly conviction.
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This was where I was feeling the weight and gravity
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of how dark
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our sin is. And I told
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Annette last night. Now I think you would agree
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if we have done
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everything right as a nation.
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Man, we preached God in the school classrooms.
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We kept prayer in schools.
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We've
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taught kids the Lord's Prayer all through
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K through 12. And we've
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got godly
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school boards. And
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00:14:19,000 --> 00:14:21,000
we've kept secularism out. We've kept
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Marxism out. Which we need to talk a little bit about
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00:14:23,000 --> 00:14:25,000
Marxism and Trans-Maoism. We'll talk
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00:14:25,000 --> 00:14:27,000
a little bit about that. But if we
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did everything right, except
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63 million
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00:14:31,000 --> 00:14:33,000
babies murdered on our
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watch, that's still enough
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to be judged for. And how
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can we think?
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How can we even imagine
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that God will not judge
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our nation for those murders?
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When we get all incensed about
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Hitler and 6 million
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Jewish people, which is horrific
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and terrible, other
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atrocities in other nations like Africa
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and others that were even more
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than that have been lost
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to sickness, terrorism,
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all these things, we'll judge
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them, but we don't look at
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ourselves as a nation because we've grown silent
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about this. Well, I think
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a sin
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that's as great as the sin
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00:15:13,000 --> 00:15:15,000
of 63 million murders
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is the church's
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indifference towards it.
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To turn
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a blind eye,
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to turn up the volume of our worship,
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to drown out the news and
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00:15:27,000 --> 00:15:29,000
the cries. Tell that story about
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the train headed
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to Auschwitz. Yeah, so
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Dietrich Bonhoeffer in that time when he was
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trying to wake the church up to
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saying, hey, we're getting embroiled
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in something evil here, and
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we're becoming complicit in it.
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We're not standing
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up and being the voice of truth and
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righteousness to stop evil.
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And as one
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pastor says, evil never stops
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itself. Evil
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00:15:55,000 --> 00:15:57,000
is only ever stopped by
470
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God's people and the presence
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of God, a greater power.
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And so, you know,
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while the church may not have been directly
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participating in the murder
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of Jews and the people that were being
476
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rounded up, they were being
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silent in the face of it.
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And there's one story
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anecdotally that was told of
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a church that was near the train tracks
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where the trains would pass by that were full
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00:16:21,000 --> 00:16:23,000
of the Jews being taken to the concentration
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00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:25,000
camps and all those other people that
484
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the Nazis had begun to round up.
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And you could literally hear the cries
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coming out of the trains as it was passing by
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the church, and you could hear it in the church.
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And so, rather than
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addressing it, the pastor's direction
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at the time was, you know, let's sing louder
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00:16:39,000 --> 00:16:41,000
so we don't hear this.
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Yeah. And what a
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we, I got incensed when
494
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I read that story. And I'd heard
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that story a long time ago, but recently it came
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back up and I remembered it. And
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it went all over me. I had a
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visceral reaction to that story.
499
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That how insensitive
500
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can we be? And yet,
501
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I'm beginning to see that we're doing that
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00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:03,000
in America today.
503
00:17:03,000 --> 00:17:05,000
We have a responsibility as those
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00:17:05,000 --> 00:17:07,000
who carry light and life
505
00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:09,000
and the truth and the very
506
00:17:09,000 --> 00:17:11,000
presence of God. If we fail
507
00:17:11,000 --> 00:17:13,000
to share that,
508
00:17:13,000 --> 00:17:15,000
to declare it accurately and
509
00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:17,000
openly, regardless of
510
00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:19,000
the cost of speaking truth,
511
00:17:19,000 --> 00:17:21,000
then we've abandoned
512
00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:23,000
the faith. We're complicit.
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We don't really believe what we say
514
00:17:25,000 --> 00:17:27,000
we believe. It's an easy believe
515
00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:29,000
that we've embraced, as you've talked about
516
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before. Yeah.
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I was commenting on a friend's post
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and he was talking about lordship
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and about holiness. And I said
520
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we have
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wherever we have embraced easy
522
00:17:41,000 --> 00:17:43,000
believe-ism, it gives way to
523
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easy leave-ism. Yep.
524
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Because there's no skin in the game.
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If we just make these easy
526
00:17:49,000 --> 00:17:51,000
onramps to come to Jesus, oh yeah, just come
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00:17:51,000 --> 00:17:53,000
and get your sins forgiven
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00:17:53,000 --> 00:17:55,000
and go live happily ever after in heaven
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00:17:55,000 --> 00:17:57,000
without challenging people.
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00:17:57,000 --> 00:17:59,000
This also means, in the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer
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00:17:59,000 --> 00:18:01,000
to quote him again,
532
00:18:01,000 --> 00:18:03,000
Jesus bids a man
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00:18:03,000 --> 00:18:05,000
come and die.
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00:18:05,000 --> 00:18:07,000
And we've got to get to a place
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00:18:07,000 --> 00:18:09,000
where we actually let people
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00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:11,000
know this, that
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00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:13,000
salvation is a free gift,
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00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:15,000
but the price that was paid for
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00:18:15,000 --> 00:18:17,000
it was a life. That's right.
540
00:18:17,000 --> 00:18:19,000
And that your expectation,
541
00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:21,000
albeit free,
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00:18:21,000 --> 00:18:23,000
your expectation is to come
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00:18:23,000 --> 00:18:25,000
and die too. You have to die to your sin,
544
00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:27,000
die to your carnality,
545
00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:29,000
die to your primal drive,
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00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:31,000
your flesh. And
547
00:18:31,000 --> 00:18:33,000
literally you can't be born again
548
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unless you're dead. That's right.
549
00:18:35,000 --> 00:18:37,000
How are you born again unless you're coming
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00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:39,000
out of, you have to be birthed
551
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from something. It just,
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it's a prerequisite.
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00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:45,000
What did Jesus say? He said,
554
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a servant is not greater than his master.
555
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If the master had to
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lead in this way, and we're
557
00:18:51,000 --> 00:18:53,000
going to follow him, then we're
558
00:18:53,000 --> 00:18:55,000
following him in the way that he modeled
559
00:18:55,000 --> 00:18:57,000
for us, which was death to self.
560
00:18:57,000 --> 00:18:59,000
Wow. Nailed it.
561
00:18:59,000 --> 00:19:01,000
So,
562
00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:03,000
so this last
563
00:19:03,000 --> 00:19:05,000
Sunday, Annette and I were
564
00:19:05,000 --> 00:19:07,000
blessed to travel to Nashville,
565
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:09,000
Murfreesboro actually,
566
00:19:09,000 --> 00:19:11,000
World Outreach Church, with Pastor
567
00:19:11,000 --> 00:19:13,000
Allen Jackson. We were able
568
00:19:13,000 --> 00:19:15,000
to sit at the feet of
569
00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:17,000
Eric Metaxas talking about
570
00:19:17,000 --> 00:19:19,000
Letter to the American Church and his newest
571
00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:21,000
book,
572
00:19:21,000 --> 00:19:23,000
Religionless
573
00:19:23,000 --> 00:19:25,000
Christianity. It's a hard, he even said
574
00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:27,000
it's a bad title, but it's a quote.
575
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:29,000
It's actually a term that Dietrich Bonhoeffer
576
00:19:29,000 --> 00:19:31,000
used. That's why he used it as the title,
577
00:19:31,000 --> 00:19:33,000
knowing it was not the best title in the world,
578
00:19:33,000 --> 00:19:35,000
but he wanted it to convey what the
579
00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:37,000
book is about. And
580
00:19:37,000 --> 00:19:39,000
we had to hear Kaylee McAnally talking
581
00:19:39,000 --> 00:19:41,000
about the abortion issue.
582
00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:43,000
She's really pro-life, all in pro-life.
583
00:19:43,000 --> 00:19:45,000
That's her big thing.
584
00:19:45,000 --> 00:19:47,000
We got to hear last week
585
00:19:47,000 --> 00:19:49,000
on Thursday night, you and Naomi got
586
00:19:49,000 --> 00:19:51,000
to be a part of that. We heard Abby Johnson
587
00:19:51,000 --> 00:19:53,000
speaking about the
588
00:19:53,000 --> 00:19:55,000
issue of pro-life and
589
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:57,000
just the decimating statistics
590
00:19:57,000 --> 00:19:59,000
of all of that.
591
00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:01,000
So, I'll just have to say, we've come out
592
00:20:01,000 --> 00:20:03,000
of a few days of some heavy weight, heavy
593
00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:05,000
lifting, so to speak. And
594
00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:07,000
you had the privilege,
595
00:20:07,000 --> 00:20:09,000
and our church was blessed, to hear you
596
00:20:09,000 --> 00:20:11,000
preach on Sunday. And
597
00:20:11,000 --> 00:20:13,000
you stayed right in that lane
598
00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:15,000
when you talked about these
599
00:20:15,000 --> 00:20:17,000
guardrails and the narrow
600
00:20:17,000 --> 00:20:19,000
road and the wide road or gates,
601
00:20:19,000 --> 00:20:21,000
whichever translation you used.
602
00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:23,000
Talk a little bit about that, because
603
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:25,000
that factors right into where we're going today.
604
00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:27,000
Well, there was a man who came
605
00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:29,000
up to Jesus in the book of Luke
606
00:20:29,000 --> 00:20:31,000
and said, Lord,
607
00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:33,000
will only a few be saved.
608
00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:35,000
And Jesus' response
609
00:20:35,000 --> 00:20:37,000
to that wasn't, hey, hey,
610
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:39,000
don't worry, I got you covered.
611
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:41,000
I'm about
612
00:20:41,000 --> 00:20:43,000
to go die on the cross, and once I
613
00:20:43,000 --> 00:20:45,000
do, you guys are all
614
00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:47,000
off the hook. That's not what he said.
615
00:20:47,000 --> 00:20:49,000
He said, there's a narrow road
616
00:20:49,000 --> 00:20:51,000
and it's difficult to travel,
617
00:20:51,000 --> 00:20:53,000
and there are few who will choose
618
00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:55,000
to travel on it.
619
00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:57,000
And he said, conversely,
620
00:20:57,000 --> 00:20:59,000
there's a wide road that's broad and
621
00:20:59,000 --> 00:21:01,000
it's easy, and many will
622
00:21:01,000 --> 00:21:03,000
travel on it. He said, but it
623
00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:05,000
leads to destruction and eternal
624
00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:07,000
judgment. And he said,
625
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:09,000
so, strive.
626
00:21:09,000 --> 00:21:11,000
He literally said the word strive. Strive
627
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:13,000
to travel down the narrow
628
00:21:13,000 --> 00:21:15,000
path. He said, make every
629
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:17,000
effort to find yourself
630
00:21:17,000 --> 00:21:19,000
on this narrow road.
631
00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:21,000
And what's narrow about it? Well, first
632
00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:23,000
of all, it begins with Jesus is
633
00:21:23,000 --> 00:21:25,000
the way, the truth, and the life. Nobody
634
00:21:25,000 --> 00:21:27,000
comes to the Father except through him.
635
00:21:27,000 --> 00:21:29,000
But Pastor Brian, what about,
636
00:21:29,000 --> 00:21:31,000
you know, what about Muslims?
637
00:21:31,000 --> 00:21:33,000
What about Baha'i faith? What about
638
00:21:33,000 --> 00:21:35,000
Buddhism? Which, you know, Buddhism is a peaceful
639
00:21:35,000 --> 00:21:37,000
philosophy
640
00:21:37,000 --> 00:21:39,000
slash religion. I mean, what about
641
00:21:39,000 --> 00:21:41,000
them? I mean, aren't there many
642
00:21:41,000 --> 00:21:43,000
rivers that lead to the one large
643
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:45,000
Great Lake? Well, the message
644
00:21:45,000 --> 00:21:47,000
of Jesus is there's nothing we can do to make
645
00:21:47,000 --> 00:21:49,000
our peace with God.
646
00:21:49,000 --> 00:21:51,000
God had to come and make peace with us, and the
647
00:21:51,000 --> 00:21:53,000
difference between Jesus, Christianity,
648
00:21:53,000 --> 00:21:55,000
and every other attempt
649
00:21:55,000 --> 00:21:57,000
to connect with God in every
650
00:21:57,000 --> 00:21:59,000
religion ever is that
651
00:21:59,000 --> 00:22:01,000
he came to us. We didn't come to him.
652
00:22:01,000 --> 00:22:03,000
He did for us what we could not do
653
00:22:03,000 --> 00:22:05,000
for ourselves. There's no
654
00:22:05,000 --> 00:22:07,000
one righteous, not a single one,
655
00:22:07,000 --> 00:22:09,000
the Bible says, that our greatest
656
00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:11,000
attempt at being good is like
657
00:22:11,000 --> 00:22:13,000
filthy rags before a holy God.
658
00:22:13,000 --> 00:22:15,000
But God wasn't content to leave us in
659
00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:17,000
that place decimated by sin.
660
00:22:17,000 --> 00:22:19,000
He came to do for us what we
661
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:21,000
couldn't do for ourselves, and he died for our
662
00:22:21,000 --> 00:22:23,000
sins, and he rose from the dead.
663
00:22:23,000 --> 00:22:25,000
And he sent us the Holy Spirit that if we will
664
00:22:25,000 --> 00:22:27,000
follow him and we will become disciples,
665
00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:29,000
if we will choose his narrow way,
666
00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:31,000
it's narrow because it's his
667
00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:33,000
way, not anybody else's. There you go.
668
00:22:33,000 --> 00:22:35,000
You just nailed it. You know, he's
669
00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:37,000
the one who's calling the shots here.
670
00:22:37,000 --> 00:22:39,000
And that's really the sticking
671
00:22:39,000 --> 00:22:41,000
point for every human in all of
672
00:22:41,000 --> 00:22:43,000
history is to decide if they can
673
00:22:43,000 --> 00:22:45,000
submit their heart to the understanding
674
00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:47,000
that God is in charge, not me.
675
00:22:47,000 --> 00:22:49,000
It's not my life. My life belongs
676
00:22:49,000 --> 00:22:51,000
to him. It started with him
677
00:22:51,000 --> 00:22:53,000
knitting me together in my mother's wound.
678
00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:55,000
And if I'm going to follow him, he
679
00:22:55,000 --> 00:22:57,000
has ownership, lordship over
680
00:22:57,000 --> 00:22:59,000
my life. But that's not a
681
00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:01,000
scary thing. That's not a sad thing.
682
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,000
That's the greatest news in the world
683
00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:05,000
because the Bible says he is a God who
684
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:07,000
loves us. He's our Father.
685
00:23:07,000 --> 00:23:09,000
He knows what makes us and fixes
686
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:11,000
us. He also knows what breaks us
687
00:23:11,000 --> 00:23:13,000
and his heart for us is good.
688
00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:15,000
It's beautiful, brother.
689
00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:17,000
Man, so much about what
690
00:23:17,000 --> 00:23:19,000
you just said I could riff on because I'm like
691
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:21,000
there, no there, no that
692
00:23:21,000 --> 00:23:23,000
one. I mean, it was so
693
00:23:23,000 --> 00:23:25,000
full just bringing the Gospel
694
00:23:25,000 --> 00:23:27,000
into this. There are
695
00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:29,000
people who have struggled, particularly people who
696
00:23:29,000 --> 00:23:31,000
have not embraced Christianity
697
00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:33,000
or they see it as a philosophy
698
00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:35,000
as opposed to a long list of philosophies
699
00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:37,000
and world views. And they
700
00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:39,000
would say things like, well, you know
701
00:23:39,000 --> 00:23:41,000
the problem with Jesus is that
702
00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:43,000
he made himself exclusive.
703
00:23:43,000 --> 00:23:45,000
That he is the only way.
704
00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:47,000
And I'm like, the truth hurts.
705
00:23:47,000 --> 00:23:49,000
I mean, actually
706
00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:51,000
the truth doesn't hurt. The truth
707
00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:53,000
heals. That's a good truth.
708
00:23:53,000 --> 00:23:55,000
And the fact that
709
00:23:55,000 --> 00:23:57,000
he says that if you will become a follower
710
00:23:57,000 --> 00:23:59,000
of him, if you will embrace him
711
00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:01,000
and you will heed his words
712
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:03,000
you will become what is called a disciple,
713
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:05,000
a learner, a student.
714
00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:07,000
One of the things that we as the Church,
715
00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:09,000
again, here's a broad stroke,
716
00:24:09,000 --> 00:24:11,000
one of the things we as the Church have done
717
00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:13,000
poorly since
718
00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:15,000
the 80's, 70's, 80's,
719
00:24:15,000 --> 00:24:17,000
90's and we had the Charismatic renewal come
720
00:24:17,000 --> 00:24:19,000
through in the 70's, the Jesus movement.
721
00:24:19,000 --> 00:24:21,000
And all these people
722
00:24:21,000 --> 00:24:23,000
were getting saved. This whole generation
723
00:24:23,000 --> 00:24:25,000
got really impacted by the Gospel.
724
00:24:25,000 --> 00:24:27,000
And what happened out of that
725
00:24:27,000 --> 00:24:29,000
was that we got so excited
726
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:31,000
about conversions.
727
00:24:31,000 --> 00:24:33,000
And my background is Baptist,
728
00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:35,000
Southern Baptist. So it was
729
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:37,000
all about evangelism. Get people
730
00:24:37,000 --> 00:24:39,000
saved. Get them saved. Get them saved.
731
00:24:39,000 --> 00:24:41,000
Get them saved. Get them to church. Get them saved.
732
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:43,000
Get them to training union.
733
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:45,000
Get them to the potluck dinner.
734
00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:47,000
Get them to the... It was come to church,
735
00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:49,000
come to church, come to church, come to Sunday school.
736
00:24:49,000 --> 00:24:51,000
Got to grow our Sunday school classes.
737
00:24:51,000 --> 00:24:53,000
And that was what it was all about.
738
00:24:53,000 --> 00:24:55,000
And listen, that was good. I mean, it was...
739
00:24:55,000 --> 00:24:57,000
It trained me. It was good
740
00:24:57,000 --> 00:24:59,000
for me. I did all of that.
741
00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:01,000
But the thing that we didn't
742
00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:03,000
do well, and I'm just going to...
743
00:25:03,000 --> 00:25:05,000
I'm talking about Southern Baptist, but I would
744
00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:07,000
go broader now and say, is that
745
00:25:07,000 --> 00:25:09,000
we got so focused
746
00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:11,000
on conversions, people accepting
747
00:25:11,000 --> 00:25:13,000
Christ, getting born again
748
00:25:13,000 --> 00:25:15,000
and baptized, that
749
00:25:15,000 --> 00:25:17,000
we missed the discipleship
750
00:25:17,000 --> 00:25:19,000
component, which is the
751
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:21,000
very thing that makes people
752
00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:23,000
resilient, and it's
753
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:25,000
called the fruit of repentance.
754
00:25:25,000 --> 00:25:27,000
It's actually the sign
755
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:29,000
that you are truly a follower of Jesus. Let me give you
756
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:31,000
this quote. Bonhoeffer knew
757
00:25:31,000 --> 00:25:33,000
that God demanded everything
758
00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:35,000
of us, and when one doesn't
759
00:25:35,000 --> 00:25:37,000
live out of one's faith,
760
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:39,000
or when one doesn't live out of...
761
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:41,000
Let me say it again.
762
00:25:41,000 --> 00:25:43,000
When one doesn't live out one's
763
00:25:43,000 --> 00:25:45,000
faith, it only proves that
764
00:25:45,000 --> 00:25:47,000
one had no faith to begin
765
00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:49,000
with. Wow.
766
00:25:49,000 --> 00:25:51,000
That's heavy. Well, you nailed
767
00:25:51,000 --> 00:25:53,000
it, and the truth is we
768
00:25:53,000 --> 00:25:55,000
needed what happened through the Jesus movement.
769
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:57,000
We needed what happened in the 70s, because we were
770
00:25:57,000 --> 00:25:59,000
coming out of a period in the church
771
00:25:59,000 --> 00:26:01,000
of a lot of legalism, a lot
772
00:26:01,000 --> 00:26:03,000
of lifeless religion that was
773
00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:05,000
devoid of relationship with God,
774
00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:07,000
that was outwardly pious.
775
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:09,000
It was kind of like where Jesus would
776
00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:11,000
admonish Pharisees. He said, hey, you
777
00:26:11,000 --> 00:26:13,000
clean the outside of things,
778
00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:15,000
but the inside is like
779
00:26:15,000 --> 00:26:17,000
dead men's bones.
780
00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:19,000
We had become that way a lot as a church.
781
00:26:19,000 --> 00:26:21,000
It looked good, had a nice veneer
782
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:23,000
on it, but inwardly, we lack
783
00:26:23,000 --> 00:26:25,000
this relationship with God. It was
784
00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:27,000
driven by the fact that we had lost
785
00:26:27,000 --> 00:26:29,000
sight of how much God loves us.
786
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:31,000
That He's daddy, He's
787
00:26:31,000 --> 00:26:33,000
father, that He meets us out in
788
00:26:33,000 --> 00:26:35,000
the middle of the road when we're even
789
00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:37,000
trying to come back to Him and wraps
790
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:39,000
His arms around us and kills the fatted calf
791
00:26:39,000 --> 00:26:41,000
and puts His robe on us because He
792
00:26:41,000 --> 00:26:43,000
loves us so much. That is a needed
793
00:26:43,000 --> 00:26:45,000
truth, and it rescued us out of the
794
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:47,000
ditch of legalism.
795
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:49,000
That was a ditch we needed to get out of
796
00:26:49,000 --> 00:26:51,000
to be on that narrow road that Jesus talks
797
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,000
about. The problem was, and what you're
798
00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:55,000
driving at now is that we ran over into
799
00:26:55,000 --> 00:26:57,000
the other ditch on the other side.
800
00:26:57,000 --> 00:26:59,000
We overcorrected. We overcorrected as we often do.
801
00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:01,000
We fell into the ditch
802
00:27:01,000 --> 00:27:03,000
now of what the Bible
803
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:05,000
calls lawlessness and
804
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:07,000
sin, and really just a
805
00:27:07,000 --> 00:27:09,000
license that Scripture and God
806
00:27:09,000 --> 00:27:11,000
doesn't give that
807
00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:13,000
makes us feel as though
808
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:15,000
we will just be excused
809
00:27:15,000 --> 00:27:17,000
for whatever we currently are,
810
00:27:17,000 --> 00:27:19,000
however we currently think,
811
00:27:19,000 --> 00:27:21,000
whatever we currently want to do because
812
00:27:21,000 --> 00:27:23,000
God's grace just covers it all, and He
813
00:27:23,000 --> 00:27:25,000
just loves us so much. Does He love us?
814
00:27:25,000 --> 00:27:27,000
Yes, He is love.
815
00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:29,000
But He's also empowered us, and He's
816
00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:31,000
called us to travel down this narrow road
817
00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:33,000
to follow Jesus and to obey Him.
818
00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:35,000
And the guardrail that gets us
819
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,000
out of that ditch of sin and
820
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:39,000
lawlessness and license and cheap grace
821
00:27:39,000 --> 00:27:41,000
is what the Bible calls the fear of the
822
00:27:41,000 --> 00:27:43,000
Lord. And the fear of the Lord is
823
00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:45,000
really learning
824
00:27:45,000 --> 00:27:47,000
to cling to God and depend
825
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:49,000
on Him over and above anything and
826
00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:51,000
anyone else. It's to recognize our great need
827
00:27:51,000 --> 00:27:53,000
for Him. You know, in Matthew chapter
828
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:55,000
5 and verse 3, in the Sermon on
829
00:27:55,000 --> 00:27:57,000
the Mount, Jesus said, blessed are those who
830
00:27:57,000 --> 00:27:59,000
are poor in spirit who
831
00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:01,000
recognize their great need
832
00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:03,000
for God. Theirs is the kingdom
833
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:05,000
of heaven. And that's what the fear of the
834
00:28:05,000 --> 00:28:07,000
Lord is at the end of the day. It's when you have
835
00:28:07,000 --> 00:28:09,000
the sober recognition of,
836
00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:11,000
man, I don't want to take one
837
00:28:11,000 --> 00:28:13,000
step away from the one
838
00:28:13,000 --> 00:28:15,000
who saves my life and who
839
00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:17,000
makes me whole. I'm terrified
840
00:28:17,000 --> 00:28:19,000
to be away from God. I'm not scared of
841
00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:21,000
God. And that is
842
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:23,000
the greatest, or the essence of
843
00:28:23,000 --> 00:28:25,000
humility, which is the sermon you preached a few
844
00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:27,000
weeks ago. Kind of, these
845
00:28:27,000 --> 00:28:29,000
really tag along with each other. I could
846
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:31,000
see this thread going through
847
00:28:31,000 --> 00:28:33,000
each of these. And so this idea
848
00:28:33,000 --> 00:28:35,000
of humility will re-recognize
849
00:28:35,000 --> 00:28:37,000
who God is. You see Isaiah
850
00:28:37,000 --> 00:28:39,000
standing before the throne. And
851
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:41,000
he's overwhelmed. I mean, because he's
852
00:28:41,000 --> 00:28:43,000
seeing God high and lifted up. He's
853
00:28:43,000 --> 00:28:45,000
seeing the glory.
854
00:28:45,000 --> 00:28:47,000
And the word glory has
855
00:28:47,000 --> 00:28:49,000
many facets to it. One of them
856
00:28:49,000 --> 00:28:51,000
is God's manifested presence. And so
857
00:28:51,000 --> 00:28:53,000
he's beholding the presence of
858
00:28:53,000 --> 00:28:55,000
God. He's seeing it.
859
00:28:55,000 --> 00:28:57,000
He's overwhelmed. And his first word
860
00:28:57,000 --> 00:28:59,000
out of his mouth is, whoa.
861
00:28:59,000 --> 00:29:01,000
Whoa is me.
862
00:29:01,000 --> 00:29:03,000
I am undone, for I'm a
863
00:29:03,000 --> 00:29:05,000
man. I'm a man of unclean
864
00:29:05,000 --> 00:29:07,000
lips. And I live among a people
865
00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:09,000
of unclean. He recognized, and
866
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:11,000
really that's the essence of humility, is
867
00:29:11,000 --> 00:29:13,000
to recognize in comparison
868
00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:15,000
to a holy God,
869
00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:17,000
we're a hot mess.
870
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:19,000
And we need help. And we need saving.
871
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:21,000
And that's the thing is he
872
00:29:21,000 --> 00:29:23,000
wants to bring that to us
873
00:29:23,000 --> 00:29:25,000
to save us.
874
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:27,000
To literally change
875
00:29:27,000 --> 00:29:29,000
everything about our lives.
876
00:29:29,000 --> 00:29:31,000
And
877
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:33,000
he's given us a gift to
878
00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:35,000
participate in that process. And that
879
00:29:35,000 --> 00:29:37,000
gift is a word that we've
880
00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:39,000
shied away from in the church. It's called repentance.
881
00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:41,000
It was the message of Jesus. It
882
00:29:41,000 --> 00:29:43,000
says the gospel of Jesus Christ began
883
00:29:43,000 --> 00:29:45,000
with him preaching, repent
884
00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:47,000
for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
885
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:49,000
You want to know what Jesus
886
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:51,000
was saying? That's what he was saying. He's saying
887
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:53,000
turn around. Change the way you think.
888
00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:55,000
Make God's ways your
889
00:29:55,000 --> 00:29:57,000
ways. Learn to love what he loves and hate
890
00:29:57,000 --> 00:29:59,000
what he hates. That's repentance.
891
00:29:59,000 --> 00:30:01,000
That word repentance is so powerful. Turn
892
00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:03,000
around. Change your mind.
893
00:30:03,000 --> 00:30:05,000
Another one is realign your thoughts with his.
894
00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:07,000
Which is again changing your mind. But it's
895
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:09,000
not just changing your mind. It's changing your mind
896
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:11,000
to his. It's embracing
897
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:13,000
this thing called the mind of Christ where we say
898
00:30:13,000 --> 00:30:15,000
I want to align with,
899
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:17,000
I want to agree with what
900
00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:19,000
God, whatever God says is sin
901
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:21,000
I'm going to agree with that.
902
00:30:21,000 --> 00:30:23,000
Whatever God says is off limits. I want to
903
00:30:23,000 --> 00:30:25,000
agree with that. And that's
904
00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:27,000
where you realign yourself with
905
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:29,000
him. And you turn.
906
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:31,000
And when you do he's right there.
907
00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:33,000
He didn't leave you.
908
00:30:33,000 --> 00:30:35,000
He didn't walk away from you. We walked away from
909
00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:37,000
him. But when we turn around he's right there.
910
00:30:37,000 --> 00:30:39,000
And Peter's first sermon
911
00:30:39,000 --> 00:30:41,000
he preached when the Holy Spirit came.
912
00:30:41,000 --> 00:30:43,000
The people were saying what must we do to be saved?
913
00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,000
He says repent and be baptized
914
00:30:45,000 --> 00:30:47,000
every one of you. But then
915
00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:49,000
he makes a great promise from the way he says
916
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:51,000
that times of refreshing may
917
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:53,000
come from the presence of the Lord.
918
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:55,000
Repentance has become a dirty word and there's no need
919
00:30:55,000 --> 00:30:57,000
for it to be. It is literally
920
00:30:57,000 --> 00:30:59,000
the door. It is the door
921
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,000
to the narrow way that brings
922
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:03,000
you into the presence of God. And God's saying
923
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:05,000
hey I want to refresh you. It's beautiful.
924
00:31:05,000 --> 00:31:07,000
I want to bless you with my
925
00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:09,000
presence and here's the access and the entrance
926
00:31:09,000 --> 00:31:11,000
into that. And what happens
927
00:31:11,000 --> 00:31:13,000
is because people think in terms of
928
00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:15,000
okay so I got to die to myself.
929
00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:17,000
I got to carry my cross.
930
00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:19,000
This sounds like I'm going to be dragging
931
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:21,000
my faith around like a ball and chain.
932
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:23,000
Like this is just something
933
00:31:23,000 --> 00:31:25,000
heavy lifting all the time and
934
00:31:25,000 --> 00:31:27,000
I'm going to go around in sackcloth
935
00:31:27,000 --> 00:31:29,000
and ashes. I'm going to be sullen.
936
00:31:29,000 --> 00:31:31,000
But that's actually
937
00:31:31,000 --> 00:31:33,000
the opposite. I've
938
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:35,000
never been more free in my
939
00:31:35,000 --> 00:31:37,000
life when I have learned
940
00:31:37,000 --> 00:31:39,000
the value of restraint of my
941
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:41,000
flesh. That frees
942
00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:43,000
me. That's right. It's because we move
943
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:45,000
past chasing elusive happiness
944
00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:47,000
and we experience something much
945
00:31:47,000 --> 00:31:49,000
deeper that the Bible calls joy.
946
00:31:49,000 --> 00:31:51,000
Joy that emanates
947
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:53,000
from your heart and your soul
948
00:31:53,000 --> 00:31:55,000
that's irregardless of your circumstances
949
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:57,000
and there is no replacement
950
00:31:57,000 --> 00:31:59,000
for true joy. That expresses
951
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:01,000
itself. I just thought about myself. I walked out
952
00:32:01,000 --> 00:32:03,000
on the back porch last night
953
00:32:03,000 --> 00:32:05,000
and we live across this beautiful
954
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:07,000
cross up on the hill across the highway
955
00:32:07,000 --> 00:32:09,000
from where we live. We live out in the country and it's
956
00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:11,000
actually a wedding venue that
957
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:13,000
has this massive cross. It's lit up at night
958
00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:15,000
so when I walk out on my back patio
959
00:32:15,000 --> 00:32:17,000
to let Chevy go do his business at night
960
00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:19,000
before we go to bed I always
961
00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:21,000
walk out and stand
962
00:32:21,000 --> 00:32:23,000
out there and just look up at that cross.
963
00:32:23,000 --> 00:32:25,000
Man, it's had some crazy
964
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:27,000
beautiful views. Full moon coming up behind
965
00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:29,000
it a few nights ago last week
966
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:31,000
or I see fog up on the hill because
967
00:32:31,000 --> 00:32:33,000
it's pretty high and it's just
968
00:32:33,000 --> 00:32:35,000
a stunning view. I walk
969
00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:37,000
out and here's how
970
00:32:37,000 --> 00:32:39,000
it plays out for me. I
971
00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:41,000
always say good evening Holy
972
00:32:41,000 --> 00:32:43,000
Spirit. Good evening
973
00:32:43,000 --> 00:32:45,000
Lord Jesus. Good
974
00:32:45,000 --> 00:32:47,000
evening Abba Father.
975
00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:49,000
All three of those descriptors
976
00:32:49,000 --> 00:32:51,000
Holy, Lord and
977
00:32:51,000 --> 00:32:53,000
Abba are very meaningful to me. They're
978
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:55,000
very powerful to me and I'm very
979
00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:57,000
intentional when I use those, that
980
00:32:57,000 --> 00:32:59,000
terminology
981
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:01,000
and those descriptors.
982
00:33:01,000 --> 00:33:03,000
What I'm realizing is that
983
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:05,000
I know that I'm walking in
984
00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:07,000
joy and holiness
985
00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:09,000
and purity when I'm smiling
986
00:33:09,000 --> 00:33:11,000
and nobody's looking.
987
00:33:11,000 --> 00:33:13,000
I mean think about it.
988
00:33:13,000 --> 00:33:15,000
We usually smile because somebody smiled
989
00:33:15,000 --> 00:33:17,000
at us or we're smiling at somebody.
990
00:33:17,000 --> 00:33:19,000
We're trying to convey something. Whether
991
00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:21,000
it's walking through a grocery store and just nodding
992
00:33:21,000 --> 00:33:23,000
and smiling at somebody or talking
993
00:33:23,000 --> 00:33:25,000
to who's checking you out. How's your day going?
994
00:33:25,000 --> 00:33:27,000
Hey, what are you most thankful for? You know, whatever you're
995
00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:29,000
doing, which I did a few of those
996
00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:31,000
on the trip as well. Good
997
00:33:31,000 --> 00:33:33,000
responses. Awesome. Great opportunities
998
00:33:33,000 --> 00:33:35,000
for God conversations. But anyway, it's another
999
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:37,000
story. But I'm finding
1000
00:33:37,000 --> 00:33:39,000
that I am smiling
1001
00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:41,000
and there's nobody around.
1002
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:43,000
Nobody's looking. And I, it's
1003
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:45,000
almost weird to me a little bit like,
1004
00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:47,000
why are you smiling?
1005
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:49,000
It's because my buckets are overflowing
1006
00:33:49,000 --> 00:33:51,000
with the joy of the Lord. Why?
1007
00:33:51,000 --> 00:33:53,000
Because I've crucified the flesh
1008
00:33:53,000 --> 00:33:55,000
and I'm growing. This is always
1009
00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:57,000
an ongoing thing, by the way.
1010
00:33:57,000 --> 00:33:59,000
There are setbacks. There are moments. There are like
1011
00:33:59,000 --> 00:34:01,000
moments where you pull what
1012
00:34:01,000 --> 00:34:03,000
Pastor Duane Sherriff calls a big piece of stupid.
1013
00:34:03,000 --> 00:34:05,000
You know, you just pull these
1014
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:07,000
and go, where did that come from?
1015
00:34:07,000 --> 00:34:09,000
I got mad if they got driving or whatever.
1016
00:34:09,000 --> 00:34:11,000
But I'm finding that
1017
00:34:11,000 --> 00:34:13,000
part of the outflow of that in just
1018
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:15,000
a natural way is when I catch
1019
00:34:15,000 --> 00:34:17,000
myself smiling for no reason
1020
00:34:17,000 --> 00:34:19,000
whatsoever and nobody's
1021
00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:21,000
around. That's amazing. It sounds
1022
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:23,000
simple, but that's
1023
00:34:23,000 --> 00:34:25,000
joy that's overflowing.
1024
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:27,000
It's just coming out of you and you can't even help it.
1025
00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:29,000
Well, real freedom at the end
1026
00:34:29,000 --> 00:34:31,000
of the day usually means freedom
1027
00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:33,000
from ourselves. You know,
1028
00:34:33,000 --> 00:34:35,000
we're often our own worst enemy.
1029
00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:37,000
No doubt. And whether it's
1030
00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:39,000
through our own thoughts and
1031
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:41,000
motives and desires and things
1032
00:34:41,000 --> 00:34:43,000
like that. And when God, we begin to
1033
00:34:43,000 --> 00:34:45,000
allow God to reshape those things in us
1034
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:47,000
and that deep
1035
00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:49,000
joy begins to emerge out of our hearts, you
1036
00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:51,000
can't help but smile. I love that.
1037
00:34:51,000 --> 00:34:53,000
So let's connect this now to culture
1038
00:34:53,000 --> 00:34:55,000
because I went to a
1039
00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:57,000
conference called Culture in
1040
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:59,000
Christianity and it was all about
1041
00:34:59,000 --> 00:35:01,000
engaging culture. And
1042
00:35:01,000 --> 00:35:03,000
then you're preaching sermons that talk about
1043
00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:05,000
the holiness of God, the
1044
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:07,000
fear of the Lord, guardrails on our
1045
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:09,000
lives, the narrow road. I mean, these
1046
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:11,000
are heavy, heavy topics. And yet
1047
00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:13,000
what does that
1048
00:35:13,000 --> 00:35:15,000
have to do with real life? What does that
1049
00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:17,000
have to do with the culture we live in
1050
00:35:17,000 --> 00:35:19,000
or the politics that's
1051
00:35:19,000 --> 00:35:21,000
happening all around us and what's happening
1052
00:35:21,000 --> 00:35:23,000
in the world today? What do any of those things have
1053
00:35:23,000 --> 00:35:25,000
to do with anything in life? Should
1054
00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:27,000
we just keep this in the church? Everything
1055
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:29,000
to do with all of it. Wait, I thought this was
1056
00:35:29,000 --> 00:35:31,000
just for Sunday morning. Oh my gosh.
1057
00:35:31,000 --> 00:35:33,000
Well, that's where we've gone wrong, isn't
1058
00:35:33,000 --> 00:35:35,000
it? I mean, it's
1059
00:35:35,000 --> 00:35:37,000
confusing and it doesn't even compute
1060
00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:39,000
in people's brains and hearts
1061
00:35:39,000 --> 00:35:41,000
to try to live a,
1062
00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:43,000
it really becomes a double life of
1063
00:35:43,000 --> 00:35:45,000
I've got my life of faith that's
1064
00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:47,000
relegated to a
1065
00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:49,000
couple isolated times during the week
1066
00:35:49,000 --> 00:35:51,000
and then I've got my job
1067
00:35:51,000 --> 00:35:53,000
and my family and I've
1068
00:35:53,000 --> 00:35:55,000
got my politics
1069
00:35:55,000 --> 00:35:57,000
and all these things happening in the world.
1070
00:35:57,000 --> 00:35:59,000
It's like we've been sold this lie
1071
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:01,000
that those all have to be separate arenas
1072
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:03,000
and yet our faith
1073
00:36:03,000 --> 00:36:05,000
and truth and our relationship
1074
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:07,000
with God is meant to inform our
1075
00:36:07,000 --> 00:36:09,000
response to all of those areas
1076
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:11,000
and in fact we are
1077
00:36:11,000 --> 00:36:13,000
mandated with a responsibility
1078
00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:15,000
to bear light and to
1079
00:36:15,000 --> 00:36:17,000
bear truth and to be salt
1080
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:19,000
in every arena of life.
1081
00:36:19,000 --> 00:36:21,000
And if we don't do that,
1082
00:36:21,000 --> 00:36:23,000
then we are failing
1083
00:36:23,000 --> 00:36:25,000
in the very mission for which
1084
00:36:25,000 --> 00:36:27,000
we've been sent as believers.
1085
00:36:27,000 --> 00:36:29,000
From the very foundation
1086
00:36:29,000 --> 00:36:31,000
of our nation, they always
1087
00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:33,000
look to God, they call it in providence
1088
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:35,000
or the God of nature, nature's God.
1089
00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:37,000
They were referred to in
1090
00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:39,000
the Declaration of Independence.
1091
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:41,000
I love this statement from Benjamin
1092
00:36:41,000 --> 00:36:43,000
Franklin because in
1093
00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:45,000
order to say that we have a right
1094
00:36:45,000 --> 00:36:47,000
to speak into culture
1095
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:49,000
and a call, we need to go back to
1096
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:51,000
our original documents, our founding documents
1097
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:53,000
and say, in the original
1098
00:36:53,000 --> 00:36:55,000
documents, we're talking about the doctrines of
1099
00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:57,000
these things. In our original
1100
00:36:57,000 --> 00:36:59,000
documents, was
1101
00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:01,000
the idea that this
1102
00:37:01,000 --> 00:37:03,000
nation was founded on
1103
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:05,000
biblical principles and biblical values.
1104
00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:07,000
And a lot of revisionist
1105
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:09,000
historians and secular historians
1106
00:37:09,000 --> 00:37:11,000
are trying, they're not trying, they're
1107
00:37:11,000 --> 00:37:13,000
writing God out of history.
1108
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:15,000
So the students being
1109
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:17,000
taught in federally and state-funded
1110
00:37:17,000 --> 00:37:19,000
schools are not being taught
1111
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:21,000
the actual original documents
1112
00:37:21,000 --> 00:37:23,000
that when you go back into the documents and look
1113
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:25,000
at the handwritten notes,
1114
00:37:25,000 --> 00:37:27,000
they're saying things like Benjamin Franklin
1115
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:29,000
was a deist and an agnostic, he wasn't
1116
00:37:29,000 --> 00:37:31,000
a Christian, which is not true by the way.
1117
00:37:31,000 --> 00:37:33,000
In fact, let me read this to you, this is from Benjamin
1118
00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:35,000
Franklin who by the way was one of
1119
00:37:35,000 --> 00:37:37,000
the framers of the Constitution of the United
1120
00:37:37,000 --> 00:37:39,000
States of America. He said this
1121
00:37:39,000 --> 00:37:41,000
as he was aging, he wrote to
1122
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:43,000
a friend, the longer I live,
1123
00:37:43,000 --> 00:37:45,000
the more convincing proofs
1124
00:37:45,000 --> 00:37:47,000
I see of this truth that
1125
00:37:47,000 --> 00:37:49,000
God governs in the affairs of
1126
00:37:49,000 --> 00:37:51,000
men. That doesn't sound like a deist to me.
1127
00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:53,000
Or an agnostic.
1128
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:55,000
And if a sparrow cannot
1129
00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:57,000
fall to the ground without his notice,
1130
00:37:57,000 --> 00:37:59,000
is it probable that an empire can
1131
00:37:59,000 --> 00:38:01,000
rise without his aid?
1132
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:03,000
We have been assured, sir, in the
1133
00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:05,000
sacred writings, i.e.
1134
00:38:05,000 --> 00:38:07,000
the Bible, that except
1135
00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:09,000
the Lord build, they labor
1136
00:38:09,000 --> 00:38:11,000
in vain that build it.
1137
00:38:11,000 --> 00:38:13,000
That's Benjamin Franklin
1138
00:38:13,000 --> 00:38:15,000
saying, giving credit
1139
00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:17,000
where credit's due, and saying,
1140
00:38:17,000 --> 00:38:19,000
understanding that even the older he
1141
00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:21,000
gets, he realizes more and more how God
1142
00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:23,000
governs the affairs of men.
1143
00:38:23,000 --> 00:38:25,000
The reason I bring that up is because
1144
00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:27,000
we're living in a day now
1145
00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:29,000
where people are,
1146
00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:31,000
secular culture is saying, you keep
1147
00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:33,000
your religion in your church.
1148
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:35,000
You stay in your lane over there.
1149
00:38:35,000 --> 00:38:37,000
And yet there are pastors
1150
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:39,000
beginning to stand up and realize
1151
00:38:39,000 --> 00:38:41,000
that we've been sold
1152
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:43,000
a bill of goods. We bought a lie
1153
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:45,000
started in 1954
1154
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:47,000
when Lyndon B. Johnson, as
1155
00:38:47,000 --> 00:38:49,000
a legislature before he was president,
1156
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:51,000
drafted a bill that said
1157
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:53,000
that anyone that had a non-profit
1158
00:38:53,000 --> 00:38:55,000
organization, aka
1159
00:38:55,000 --> 00:38:57,000
churches and non-profit organizations,
1160
00:38:57,000 --> 00:38:59,000
could not endorse
1161
00:38:59,000 --> 00:39:01,000
political candidates.
1162
00:39:01,000 --> 00:39:03,000
And that got extrapolated and
1163
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:05,000
expanded to say you can't even talk about
1164
00:39:05,000 --> 00:39:07,000
politics, which isn't what it said.
1165
00:39:07,000 --> 00:39:09,000
But it got interpreted
1166
00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:11,000
that way. So much so
1167
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:13,000
that a whole generation of preachers,
1168
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:15,000
pastors, and leaders came up
1169
00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:17,000
through the church being told
1170
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:19,000
in school, I was told this,
1171
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:21,000
do not talk about politics
1172
00:39:21,000 --> 00:39:23,000
in the pulpit. You will risk your
1173
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:25,000
501c3 status. You could lose
1174
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:27,000
all your benefits. You could lose
1175
00:39:27,000 --> 00:39:29,000
all your tax exemptions.
1176
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:31,000
You'll get in trouble. The ACLU
1177
00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:33,000
will come after you. I mean we were scared.
1178
00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:35,000
And so
1179
00:39:35,000 --> 00:39:37,000
all of us graduating from these seminaries
1180
00:39:37,000 --> 00:39:39,000
and schools, getting our masters,
1181
00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:41,000
degrees, and ministry
1182
00:39:41,000 --> 00:39:43,000
came out
1183
00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:45,000
emasculated.
1184
00:39:45,000 --> 00:39:47,000
We came out anemic.
1185
00:39:47,000 --> 00:39:49,000
Well, what we've
1186
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:51,000
done without realizing it is
1187
00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:53,000
we've actually abdicated
1188
00:39:53,000 --> 00:39:55,000
positions of leadership
1189
00:39:55,000 --> 00:39:57,000
and authority in
1190
00:39:57,000 --> 00:39:59,000
every sphere of
1191
00:39:59,000 --> 00:40:01,000
government, politics,
1192
00:40:01,000 --> 00:40:03,000
and even
1193
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:05,000
corporations within our nation
1194
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:07,000
over time. I mean, if you look at
1195
00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:09,000
things like our university systems,
1196
00:40:09,000 --> 00:40:11,000
the vast majority of them,
1197
00:40:11,000 --> 00:40:13,000
the Ivy League ones now that
1198
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:15,000
where crazy stuff is happening, they were
1199
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:17,000
founded by pastors. Exactly.
1200
00:40:17,000 --> 00:40:19,000
To proclaim the gospel.
1201
00:40:19,000 --> 00:40:21,000
To equip young people
1202
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:23,000
to be missionaries to take the
1203
00:40:23,000 --> 00:40:25,000
gospel around the world. And yet now
1204
00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:27,000
those have become the very places
1205
00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:29,000
where Christianity
1206
00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:31,000
is most rejected.
1207
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:33,000
I mean, whether it's our hospital systems
1208
00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:35,000
that were created out of a
1209
00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:37,000
desire, a Christian biblical
1210
00:40:37,000 --> 00:40:39,000
desire to care for the
1211
00:40:39,000 --> 00:40:41,000
hurting and the sick,
1212
00:40:41,000 --> 00:40:43,000
now have become, you know, for-profit
1213
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:45,000
corporations. Greed and lust.
1214
00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:47,000
Greed. Power. Our government
1215
00:40:47,000 --> 00:40:49,000
was founded by a group of
1216
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:51,000
people who left a place
1217
00:40:51,000 --> 00:40:53,000
that had
1218
00:40:53,000 --> 00:40:55,000
prohibited them from the free
1219
00:40:55,000 --> 00:40:57,000
practice of serving God and speaking
1220
00:40:57,000 --> 00:40:59,000
truth. And they said, we want to go to a place
1221
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:01,000
where we can establish things the
1222
00:41:01,000 --> 00:41:03,000
right way, where we can openly worship
1223
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:05,000
and openly serve God and speak
1224
00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:07,000
truth to one another and
1225
00:41:07,000 --> 00:41:09,000
lead based on these principles.
1226
00:41:09,000 --> 00:41:11,000
That's why this whole experiment began.
1227
00:41:11,000 --> 00:41:13,000
So now what happens is
1228
00:41:13,000 --> 00:41:15,000
when we as pastors, you,
1229
00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:17,000
me, others in our sphere of
1230
00:41:17,000 --> 00:41:19,000
influence and other friends who are
1231
00:41:19,000 --> 00:41:21,000
pastors and leaders, when we
1232
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:23,000
start speaking out
1233
00:41:23,000 --> 00:41:25,000
into culture, it sounds
1234
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:27,000
foreign. And yet
1235
00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:29,000
historically through the church, especially
1236
00:41:29,000 --> 00:41:31,000
in America, pastors
1237
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:33,000
were always speaking out
1238
00:41:33,000 --> 00:41:35,000
into culture. In fact, those
1239
00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:37,000
that framed the original documents,
1240
00:41:37,000 --> 00:41:39,000
whether it was the Mayflower Compact, whether it was
1241
00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:41,000
the Connecticut
1242
00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:43,000
Constitution, whether it was
1243
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:45,000
the Declaration of Independence Bill, all of them,
1244
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:47,000
all of the topics
1245
00:41:47,000 --> 00:41:49,000
in those were preached
1246
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:51,000
in churches before they were ever drafted
1247
00:41:51,000 --> 00:41:53,000
into documents. And the
1248
00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:55,000
drafters of those, many of them were
1249
00:41:55,000 --> 00:41:57,000
pastors, many of them were deacons,
1250
00:41:57,000 --> 00:41:59,000
many of them, all of them
1251
00:41:59,000 --> 00:42:01,000
attended church for the most part.
1252
00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:03,000
And when they drafted that, it all
1253
00:42:03,000 --> 00:42:05,000
came out of the sermons that had been
1254
00:42:05,000 --> 00:42:07,000
preached prior to that. But you won't read
1255
00:42:07,000 --> 00:42:09,000
that in your history books in the public school.
1256
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:11,000
You won't get the truth.
1257
00:42:11,000 --> 00:42:13,000
Pastors were often governors
1258
00:42:13,000 --> 00:42:15,000
and mayors and statesmen
1259
00:42:15,000 --> 00:42:17,000
and senators. William Bradford, one of the
1260
00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:19,000
first ones, first colonists,
1261
00:42:19,000 --> 00:42:21,000
was a governor. That's right. And
1262
00:42:21,000 --> 00:42:23,000
he led his, his,
1263
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:25,000
this became the state
1264
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:27,000
of Rhode Island, but he led his
1265
00:42:27,000 --> 00:42:29,000
with, he would preach
1266
00:42:29,000 --> 00:42:31,000
on Sundays and he would govern
1267
00:42:31,000 --> 00:42:33,000
throughout the week. And he didn't see
1268
00:42:33,000 --> 00:42:35,000
a difference between being a governor and a preacher.
1269
00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:37,000
I mean, a pastor. But what's
1270
00:42:37,000 --> 00:42:39,000
happened today is pastors have been
1271
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:41,000
scared and they've been threatened.
1272
00:42:41,000 --> 00:42:43,000
And by the way, in the last 70 years
1273
00:42:43,000 --> 00:42:45,000
since that bill came out in 1954,
1274
00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:47,000
do you know how many lawsuits
1275
00:42:47,000 --> 00:42:49,000
have been brought against churches
1276
00:42:49,000 --> 00:42:51,000
for preaching politics in the pulpit?
1277
00:42:51,000 --> 00:42:53,000
Two, right? Two. Guess how many? One.
1278
00:42:53,000 --> 00:42:55,000
Zero.
1279
00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:57,000
In other words, this isn't going to happen.
1280
00:42:57,000 --> 00:42:59,000
It's an empty threat. It's an empty threat.
1281
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:01,000
And there are lawyers
1282
00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:03,000
standing by to protect pastors
1283
00:43:03,000 --> 00:43:05,000
right now. I know this for a fact,
1284
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:07,000
that if they are to stand and speak
1285
00:43:07,000 --> 00:43:09,000
into what's going on in culture and they were ever
1286
00:43:09,000 --> 00:43:11,000
to be threatened by ACLU or anybody
1287
00:43:11,000 --> 00:43:13,000
else, there's a
1288
00:43:13,000 --> 00:43:15,000
large army of attorneys
1289
00:43:15,000 --> 00:43:17,000
ready to go to war.
1290
00:43:17,000 --> 00:43:19,000
We do not have to be afraid.
1291
00:43:19,000 --> 00:43:21,000
And we need to re-embrace our
1292
00:43:21,000 --> 00:43:23,000
calling to be culture shapers,
1293
00:43:23,000 --> 00:43:25,000
difference makers, and world changers.
1294
00:43:25,000 --> 00:43:27,000
You know, and I think an important
1295
00:43:27,000 --> 00:43:29,000
statement to make too is that in doing
1296
00:43:29,000 --> 00:43:31,000
this, this does not
1297
00:43:31,000 --> 00:43:33,000
mean that we are here as the
1298
00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:35,000
church to prop up a man or a woman.
1299
00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:37,000
Exactly. You know what I mean?
1300
00:43:37,000 --> 00:43:39,000
This isn't about a political candidate at all.
1301
00:43:39,000 --> 00:43:41,000
This isn't about saying,
1302
00:43:41,000 --> 00:43:43,000
Donald Trump is great, or we like
1303
00:43:43,000 --> 00:43:45,000
Joe Biden, or it's all about
1304
00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:47,000
Robert Kennedy. You name the
1305
00:43:47,000 --> 00:43:49,000
person who is out there right now. There is
1306
00:43:49,000 --> 00:43:51,000
a lot of fallible, broken
1307
00:43:51,000 --> 00:43:53,000
people who are attempting to
1308
00:43:53,000 --> 00:43:55,000
step into positions of
1309
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:57,000
leadership, and none of them have the capacity
1310
00:43:57,000 --> 00:43:59,000
to do things God's way
1311
00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:01,000
fully. None of them do.
1312
00:44:01,000 --> 00:44:03,000
And none of them are the hope of our future
1313
00:44:03,000 --> 00:44:05,000
or the hope of our salvation. Only Jesus
1314
00:44:05,000 --> 00:44:07,000
is. But we have a responsibility
1315
00:44:07,000 --> 00:44:09,000
as God's people
1316
00:44:09,000 --> 00:44:11,000
to speak openly
1317
00:44:11,000 --> 00:44:13,000
and loudly about truth,
1318
00:44:13,000 --> 00:44:15,000
about righteousness, about what is evil,
1319
00:44:15,000 --> 00:44:17,000
and what is good, and demand it from
1320
00:44:17,000 --> 00:44:19,000
our leaders, regardless of who
1321
00:44:19,000 --> 00:44:21,000
they are, and refuse to
1322
00:44:21,000 --> 00:44:23,000
put people in power to whatever
1323
00:44:23,000 --> 00:44:25,000
say we have in it, who are
1324
00:44:25,000 --> 00:44:27,000
going to openly do things that
1325
00:44:27,000 --> 00:44:29,000
God says are evil and wrong.
1326
00:44:29,000 --> 00:44:31,000
The Church has always been the conscious
1327
00:44:31,000 --> 00:44:33,000
of the state. Always.
1328
00:44:33,000 --> 00:44:35,000
You go back in the history of the Old Testament,
1329
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:37,000
the prophets spoke to kings.
1330
00:44:37,000 --> 00:44:39,000
They counseled kings.
1331
00:44:39,000 --> 00:44:41,000
They brought God's Word to kings.
1332
00:44:41,000 --> 00:44:43,000
They returned nations
1333
00:44:43,000 --> 00:44:45,000
to the Scriptures.
1334
00:44:45,000 --> 00:44:47,000
And so, we think
1335
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:49,000
now, for example,
1336
00:44:49,000 --> 00:44:51,000
you and I are supposed to be
1337
00:44:51,000 --> 00:44:53,000
experts on the first century history,
1338
00:44:53,000 --> 00:44:55,000
culture, everything about what was
1339
00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:57,000
going on, but in the 21st
1340
00:44:57,000 --> 00:44:59,000
century, we're expected to be quiet
1341
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:01,000
and not know anything, not engage,
1342
00:45:01,000 --> 00:45:03,000
not do anything. I mean, the hypocrisy
1343
00:45:03,000 --> 00:45:05,000
of that. No, you stay in your lane,
1344
00:45:05,000 --> 00:45:07,000
pastor. You preach your
1345
00:45:07,000 --> 00:45:09,000
sermons on Sunday. In fact,
1346
00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:11,000
Adolf Hitler told,
1347
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:13,000
I can't remember
1348
00:45:13,000 --> 00:45:15,000
his name, but he was a contemporary of
1349
00:45:15,000 --> 00:45:17,000
Bonhoeffer. He was a pastor who
1350
00:45:17,000 --> 00:45:19,000
was, he thought he was a friend of Hitler.
1351
00:45:19,000 --> 00:45:21,000
Hitler had met with him and said,
1352
00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:23,000
look, when I rise to be chancellor,
1353
00:45:23,000 --> 00:45:25,000
churches are going to be safe.
1354
00:45:25,000 --> 00:45:27,000
We know he was a liar, a narcissist, a
1355
00:45:27,000 --> 00:45:29,000
liar, psychopath.
1356
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:31,000
The churches are going to be safe, but y'all
1357
00:45:31,000 --> 00:45:33,000
stay over there. Mind your business.
1358
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:35,000
And we're not going to touch you.
1359
00:45:35,000 --> 00:45:37,000
And so, it started with an N.
1360
00:45:37,000 --> 00:45:39,000
It was no Mueller or no Hewler
1361
00:45:39,000 --> 00:45:41,000
or something like that.
1362
00:45:41,000 --> 00:45:43,000
He was saying,
1363
00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:45,000
so he kept his head down, whereas Bonhoeffer
1364
00:45:45,000 --> 00:45:47,000
was speaking up, and they were friends.
1365
00:45:47,000 --> 00:45:49,000
And
1366
00:45:49,000 --> 00:45:51,000
after
1367
00:45:51,000 --> 00:45:53,000
Hitler came to power,
1368
00:45:53,000 --> 00:45:55,000
this guy, this pastor,
1369
00:45:55,000 --> 00:45:57,000
tried to meet with him. It took him 12 months
1370
00:45:57,000 --> 00:45:59,000
to get a meeting with him. When he finally got a
1371
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:01,000
meeting, you got it there? Martin Niemoller.
1372
00:46:01,000 --> 00:46:03,000
There it is, Niemoller. Got it. Thank you.
1373
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:05,000
So, when Niemoller finally got
1374
00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:07,000
an audience with Hitler,
1375
00:46:07,000 --> 00:46:09,000
he brought him into the room. When he entered
1376
00:46:09,000 --> 00:46:11,000
the room, there were men waiting
1377
00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:13,000
there, these cronies of
1378
00:46:13,000 --> 00:46:15,000
the Nazi regime of Hitler.
1379
00:46:15,000 --> 00:46:17,000
They were waiting for him, and they had
1380
00:46:17,000 --> 00:46:19,000
pads with things written down on it.
1381
00:46:19,000 --> 00:46:21,000
They had recorded his phone calls.
1382
00:46:21,000 --> 00:46:23,000
He didn't even know it. This is
1383
00:46:23,000 --> 00:46:25,000
back in the 30s.
1384
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:27,000
They were recording his phone calls and
1385
00:46:27,000 --> 00:46:29,000
said, on this day, you said this
1386
00:46:29,000 --> 00:46:31,000
about the Nazi,
1387
00:46:31,000 --> 00:46:33,000
about the Reich, the Third Reich.
1388
00:46:33,000 --> 00:46:35,000
You said this. You chuckled when you
1389
00:46:35,000 --> 00:46:37,000
said this. And they so
1390
00:46:37,000 --> 00:46:39,000
disarmed him before he even walked in
1391
00:46:39,000 --> 00:46:41,000
to talk to Hitler about what was going on,
1392
00:46:41,000 --> 00:46:43,000
that he was... And then
1393
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:45,000
Hitler ran it on him for 30 minutes.
1394
00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:47,000
Oh my gosh. And then
1395
00:46:47,000 --> 00:46:49,000
one of the things Hitler said to him, he said,
1396
00:46:49,000 --> 00:46:51,000
I made the Third
1397
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:53,000
Reich. He said,
1398
00:46:53,000 --> 00:46:55,000
you go make your sermons.
1399
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:57,000
I mean, that was it. He was saying, you have
1400
00:46:57,000 --> 00:46:59,000
no part in this. And he
1401
00:46:59,000 --> 00:47:01,000
left berated. Then he got arrested,
1402
00:47:01,000 --> 00:47:03,000
and then he served in a concentration
1403
00:47:03,000 --> 00:47:05,000
camp for eight
1404
00:47:05,000 --> 00:47:07,000
years for this.
1405
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:09,000
Because when he came out of that meeting,
1406
00:47:09,000 --> 00:47:11,000
he realized he had been lied to.
1407
00:47:11,000 --> 00:47:13,000
He realized he had
1408
00:47:13,000 --> 00:47:15,000
bought the lie, and he flipped
1409
00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:17,000
and he started speaking against and speaking
1410
00:47:17,000 --> 00:47:19,000
into culture. And then he spent
1411
00:47:19,000 --> 00:47:21,000
eight years in prison for it.
1412
00:47:21,000 --> 00:47:23,000
He survived. Coming out,
1413
00:47:23,000 --> 00:47:25,000
he wrote a really well-known poem
1414
00:47:25,000 --> 00:47:27,000
that basically says this.
1415
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:29,000
You may remember this. I'll just give you the gist of it.
1416
00:47:29,000 --> 00:47:31,000
He said,
1417
00:47:31,000 --> 00:47:33,000
they came after the Socialists,
1418
00:47:33,000 --> 00:47:35,000
but I was not a Socialist,
1419
00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:37,000
so I said nothing.
1420
00:47:37,000 --> 00:47:39,000
They came after the Communists, but I was not
1421
00:47:39,000 --> 00:47:41,000
a Communist, so I said nothing.
1422
00:47:41,000 --> 00:47:43,000
They came after the Jews,
1423
00:47:43,000 --> 00:47:45,000
but I'm not a Jew, so I said nothing.
1424
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:47,000
And then they came after us.
1425
00:47:47,000 --> 00:47:49,000
And there was no one left to speak up
1426
00:47:49,000 --> 00:47:51,000
for me.
1427
00:47:51,000 --> 00:47:53,000
It's a famous poem
1428
00:47:53,000 --> 00:47:55,000
by him. But anyway, all that to say
1429
00:47:55,000 --> 00:47:57,000
is this idea that
1430
00:47:57,000 --> 00:47:59,000
preachers, pastors
1431
00:47:59,000 --> 00:48:01,000
shouldn't speak into culture,
1432
00:48:01,000 --> 00:48:03,000
and yet what we see is preachers and
1433
00:48:03,000 --> 00:48:05,000
pastors to actually shape the
1434
00:48:05,000 --> 00:48:07,000
foundations of our nation as we
1435
00:48:07,000 --> 00:48:09,000
know it. Greatest nations ever
1436
00:48:09,000 --> 00:48:11,000
been here, which now is being
1437
00:48:11,000 --> 00:48:13,000
undermined by Marxists and Neo and
1438
00:48:13,000 --> 00:48:15,000
Trans Maoism,
1439
00:48:15,000 --> 00:48:17,000
where they're trying to destroy three things.
1440
00:48:17,000 --> 00:48:19,000
Faith, family,
1441
00:48:19,000 --> 00:48:21,000
and freedom. And the truth is
1442
00:48:21,000 --> 00:48:23,000
none of this means that
1443
00:48:23,000 --> 00:48:25,000
we need to stand up and be belligerent
1444
00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:27,000
and angry and abusive or
1445
00:48:27,000 --> 00:48:29,000
violent or any of that stuff.
1446
00:48:29,000 --> 00:48:31,000
None of that stuff is going to produce the righteousness
1447
00:48:31,000 --> 00:48:33,000
of God. Exactly. Agreed.
1448
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:35,000
But what we do need to do is be bold
1449
00:48:35,000 --> 00:48:37,000
and courageous
1450
00:48:37,000 --> 00:48:39,000
and open and truthful
1451
00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:41,000
and open our mouths and
1452
00:48:41,000 --> 00:48:43,000
speak. And things
1453
00:48:43,000 --> 00:48:45,000
that should not be permitted,
1454
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:47,000
we need to say these things should not be
1455
00:48:47,000 --> 00:48:49,000
permitted. For example,
1456
00:48:49,000 --> 00:48:51,000
we need to show up at a school board meeting.
1457
00:48:51,000 --> 00:48:53,000
Not to be violent,
1458
00:48:53,000 --> 00:48:55,000
not to be rate,
1459
00:48:55,000 --> 00:48:57,000
not to
1460
00:48:57,000 --> 00:48:59,000
be belligerent, but to
1461
00:48:59,000 --> 00:49:01,000
show up to say we are concerned
1462
00:49:01,000 --> 00:49:03,000
about what we're seeing, what we're
1463
00:49:03,000 --> 00:49:05,000
hearing. We love you.
1464
00:49:05,000 --> 00:49:07,000
That'll never change.
1465
00:49:07,000 --> 00:49:09,000
But we need to speak into what's
1466
00:49:09,000 --> 00:49:11,000
happening here.
1467
00:49:11,000 --> 00:49:13,000
I think we've lost sight
1468
00:49:13,000 --> 00:49:15,000
of the authority that we carry
1469
00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:17,000
as believers
1470
00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:19,000
who have the Holy Spirit of the
1471
00:49:19,000 --> 00:49:21,000
Living God on the inside of us.
1472
00:49:21,000 --> 00:49:23,000
I think it's in 2 Thessalonians
1473
00:49:23,000 --> 00:49:25,000
chapter 2. It
1474
00:49:25,000 --> 00:49:27,000
refers to the Holy Spirit.
1475
00:49:27,000 --> 00:49:29,000
One of His functions and roles within us
1476
00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:31,000
is as the Restrainer.
1477
00:49:31,000 --> 00:49:33,000
And the Bible says that
1478
00:49:33,000 --> 00:49:35,000
the presence of God through the Holy Spirit
1479
00:49:35,000 --> 00:49:37,000
in His people literally
1480
00:49:37,000 --> 00:49:39,000
restrains evil by
1481
00:49:39,000 --> 00:49:41,000
God's power. Just the fact
1482
00:49:41,000 --> 00:49:43,000
that we are here and that
1483
00:49:43,000 --> 00:49:45,000
we are standing and not leaning,
1484
00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:47,000
that we are
1485
00:49:47,000 --> 00:49:49,000
our allegiance is
1486
00:49:49,000 --> 00:49:51,000
firmly with Jesus and we're not afraid to say
1487
00:49:51,000 --> 00:49:53,000
it. Just that fact alone,
1488
00:49:53,000 --> 00:49:55,000
the presence of God
1489
00:49:55,000 --> 00:49:57,000
inside us will restrain
1490
00:49:57,000 --> 00:49:59,000
and hold back evil. And so, a lot
1491
00:49:59,000 --> 00:50:01,000
of times we just need to be present.
1492
00:50:01,000 --> 00:50:03,000
We just need to show up and we just
1493
00:50:03,000 --> 00:50:05,000
need to realize we do have a place in
1494
00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:07,000
these arenas and we do have
1495
00:50:07,000 --> 00:50:09,000
authority that we carry that extends
1496
00:50:09,000 --> 00:50:11,000
beyond the natural.
1497
00:50:11,000 --> 00:50:13,000
Extends beyond what would even make sense
1498
00:50:13,000 --> 00:50:15,000
logically. That when we pray and when we
1499
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:17,000
speak truth and when we show up,
1500
00:50:17,000 --> 00:50:19,000
the Spirit in us will restrain
1501
00:50:19,000 --> 00:50:21,000
things from happening.
1502
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:23,000
Interestingly, we talked about the End Times earlier.
1503
00:50:23,000 --> 00:50:25,000
One of the things that's going to happen
1504
00:50:25,000 --> 00:50:27,000
when the Church is raptured is the Restrainer
1505
00:50:27,000 --> 00:50:29,000
is going to be removed and that is
1506
00:50:29,000 --> 00:50:31,000
what is going to allow for the Antichrist
1507
00:50:31,000 --> 00:50:33,000
to finally come on the scene.
1508
00:50:33,000 --> 00:50:35,000
He can't do it until the Restrainer is removed.
1509
00:50:35,000 --> 00:50:37,000
And there are different thoughts
1510
00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:39,000
on who the Restrainer is. Is the
1511
00:50:39,000 --> 00:50:41,000
Strainer of the Holy Spirit or is
1512
00:50:41,000 --> 00:50:43,000
the Restrainer of the Church when the Church is
1513
00:50:43,000 --> 00:50:45,000
raptured? See, there are various
1514
00:50:45,000 --> 00:50:47,000
I think it's both because they are one
1515
00:50:47,000 --> 00:50:49,000
and the same. Yes, they are. Right? Yeah, exactly.
1516
00:50:49,000 --> 00:50:51,000
You can't really separate the two.
1517
00:50:51,000 --> 00:50:53,000
Two weeks ago, I love what you said there,
1518
00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:55,000
the word that I would say is
1519
00:50:55,000 --> 00:50:57,000
the word jurisdiction. That's good.
1520
00:50:57,000 --> 00:50:59,000
And so I met this guy, his name is Bill Jack.
1521
00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:01,000
He is a prolific
1522
00:51:01,000 --> 00:51:03,000
he founded an
1523
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:05,000
organization that teaches apologetics
1524
00:51:05,000 --> 00:51:07,000
to gap year
1525
00:51:07,000 --> 00:51:09,000
students and young people and
1526
00:51:09,000 --> 00:51:11,000
sends them off to school before they get
1527
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:13,000
obliterated by the secular humanists
1528
00:51:13,000 --> 00:51:15,000
that are running our schools. Wow.
1529
00:51:15,000 --> 00:51:17,000
And ripping away, ripping
1530
00:51:17,000 --> 00:51:19,000
to shred people's faith. So they
1531
00:51:19,000 --> 00:51:21,000
do these camps all over
1532
00:51:21,000 --> 00:51:23,000
and they go to public
1533
00:51:23,000 --> 00:51:25,000
state colleges.
1534
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:27,000
They rent a room and they do these camps
1535
00:51:27,000 --> 00:51:29,000
like for a week and they just
1536
00:51:29,000 --> 00:51:31,000
fill them full of
1537
00:51:31,000 --> 00:51:33,000
who they are, what they need to know,
1538
00:51:33,000 --> 00:51:35,000
how to defend their faith.
1539
00:51:35,000 --> 00:51:37,000
And his name is Bill Jack.
1540
00:51:37,000 --> 00:51:39,000
He was in our church two weeks ago.
1541
00:51:39,000 --> 00:51:41,000
His daughter attends here.
1542
00:51:41,000 --> 00:51:43,000
She is one of our Bridgers. And
1543
00:51:43,000 --> 00:51:45,000
he lives in Colorado. So he shows up
1544
00:51:45,000 --> 00:51:47,000
and he made a beeline to me after church.
1545
00:51:47,000 --> 00:51:49,000
And he is like,
1546
00:51:49,000 --> 00:51:51,000
Pastor, this is rare.
1547
00:51:51,000 --> 00:51:53,000
I can't believe I came to church
1548
00:51:53,000 --> 00:51:55,000
and you are talking about these things. This is what I
1549
00:51:55,000 --> 00:51:57,000
do. And he said, you don't know
1550
00:51:57,000 --> 00:51:59,000
how rare this is. How many churches
1551
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:01,000
I go to and no pastors ever
1552
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:03,000
address what is going on culturally.
1553
00:52:03,000 --> 00:52:05,000
Never speak truth to power.
1554
00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:07,000
They are afraid to say anything.
1555
00:52:07,000 --> 00:52:09,000
He said, this is what I do.
1556
00:52:09,000 --> 00:52:11,000
I train and equip the next generation
1557
00:52:11,000 --> 00:52:13,000
to go out there and stand their ground, stand
1558
00:52:13,000 --> 00:52:15,000
firm. And he gave me the word. He said,
1559
00:52:15,000 --> 00:52:17,000
let me give you a word that may help you think
1560
00:52:17,000 --> 00:52:19,000
this or frame or reframe
1561
00:52:19,000 --> 00:52:21,000
what you are thinking. He said,
1562
00:52:21,000 --> 00:52:23,000
it is the word jurisdiction.
1563
00:52:23,000 --> 00:52:25,000
So I did a little study on that word
1564
00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:27,000
and the idea of jurisdiction
1565
00:52:27,000 --> 00:52:29,000
is that it is a conferred
1566
00:52:29,000 --> 00:52:31,000
space.
1567
00:52:31,000 --> 00:52:33,000
It is a conferred realm.
1568
00:52:33,000 --> 00:52:35,000
It is a conferred place
1569
00:52:35,000 --> 00:52:37,000
of authority. Where you
1570
00:52:37,000 --> 00:52:39,000
have authority, not in
1571
00:52:39,000 --> 00:52:41,000
yourself, but it has been conferred to you.
1572
00:52:41,000 --> 00:52:43,000
It has been delegated, maybe a better
1573
00:52:43,000 --> 00:52:45,000
word. It is delegated authority.
1574
00:52:45,000 --> 00:52:47,000
When you think about what Jesus did during
1575
00:52:47,000 --> 00:52:49,000
the Great Commission, what He did before
1576
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:51,000
He sent the disciples out two by two
1577
00:52:51,000 --> 00:52:53,000
to give them authority,
1578
00:52:53,000 --> 00:52:55,000
exousia, over
1579
00:52:55,000 --> 00:52:57,000
demons and spirits
1580
00:52:57,000 --> 00:52:59,000
and all that.
1581
00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:01,000
Jesus was constantly taking
1582
00:53:01,000 --> 00:53:03,000
His exousia,
1583
00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:05,000
His jurisdiction and giving it to
1584
00:53:05,000 --> 00:53:07,000
us and saying, now go.
1585
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:09,000
It is the idea of being an ambassador.
1586
00:53:09,000 --> 00:53:11,000
Exactly. Diplomatic
1587
00:53:11,000 --> 00:53:13,000
immunity, right?
1588
00:53:13,000 --> 00:53:15,000
They speak on behalf of the
1589
00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:17,000
government that they represent.
1590
00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:19,000
Bingo. When He said that word to me, it
1591
00:53:19,000 --> 00:53:21,000
went off in my chest like a bomb.
1592
00:53:21,000 --> 00:53:23,000
I was like, that is thunder in my soul
1593
00:53:23,000 --> 00:53:25,000
right there. Jurisdiction,
1594
00:53:25,000 --> 00:53:27,000
I have been mulling that over.
1595
00:53:27,000 --> 00:53:29,000
Sitting here over the weekend,
1596
00:53:29,000 --> 00:53:31,000
Eric Metaxas,
1597
00:53:31,000 --> 00:53:33,000
Pastor Alan Jackson,
1598
00:53:33,000 --> 00:53:35,000
Chad Rubino,
1599
00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:37,000
Kaylee McAnally, Kurt Cameron,
1600
00:53:37,000 --> 00:53:39,000
hearing all these speakers,
1601
00:53:39,000 --> 00:53:41,000
the word that kept pinging
1602
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:43,000
is jurisdiction. We have
1603
00:53:43,000 --> 00:53:45,000
insulated our jurisdiction.
1604
00:53:45,000 --> 00:53:47,000
It is time to take it back.
1605
00:53:47,000 --> 00:53:49,000
But again, not through violence, not
1606
00:53:49,000 --> 00:53:51,000
through belligerence, through wisdom.
1607
00:53:51,000 --> 00:53:53,000
Through wisdom and through
1608
00:53:53,000 --> 00:53:55,000
confidence in who we are in Christ.
1609
00:53:55,000 --> 00:53:57,000
Not in who we are ourselves.
1610
00:53:57,000 --> 00:53:59,000
We don't go in beating our chests.
1611
00:53:59,000 --> 00:54:01,000
We go in, we suit up, we show
1612
00:54:01,000 --> 00:54:03,000
up and the Holy Spirit
1613
00:54:03,000 --> 00:54:05,000
goes before us
1614
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:07,000
and massages atmospheres
1615
00:54:07,000 --> 00:54:09,000
and changes
1616
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:11,000
atmospheres when we walk in a room.
1617
00:54:11,000 --> 00:54:13,000
You know what Jesus told his disciples
1618
00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:15,000
when he sent them out? He said,
1619
00:54:15,000 --> 00:54:17,000
don't worry about what you are going to say
1620
00:54:17,000 --> 00:54:19,000
when you go. He said the Holy Spirit
1621
00:54:19,000 --> 00:54:21,000
will give you what to say
1622
00:54:21,000 --> 00:54:23,000
when you are there. The key is
1623
00:54:23,000 --> 00:54:25,000
that you have to show up and you have to be
1624
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:27,000
willing, you have to be ready and you have to
1625
00:54:27,000 --> 00:54:29,000
position your heart in such a way
1626
00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:31,000
that God can cooperate
1627
00:54:31,000 --> 00:54:33,000
with you and speak through you.
1628
00:54:33,000 --> 00:54:35,000
I love that.
1629
00:54:35,000 --> 00:54:37,000
What if, we have in our
1630
00:54:37,000 --> 00:54:39,000
church on a given Sunday, we are between
1631
00:54:39,000 --> 00:54:41,000
600 and 650. That's our pretty
1632
00:54:41,000 --> 00:54:43,000
average attendance. But in a
1633
00:54:43,000 --> 00:54:45,000
given month, you are looking more at like 800
1634
00:54:45,000 --> 00:54:47,000
people that come through
1635
00:54:47,000 --> 00:54:49,000
at various times because everybody
1636
00:54:49,000 --> 00:54:51,000
comes at the same time. If we all showed up at the same time
1637
00:54:51,000 --> 00:54:53,000
we couldn't keep, we didn't have room for everybody.
1638
00:54:53,000 --> 00:54:55,000
But think about the power
1639
00:54:55,000 --> 00:54:57,000
of that in a community.
1640
00:54:57,000 --> 00:54:59,000
Of 800 people
1641
00:54:59,000 --> 00:55:01,000
who decided to together
1642
00:55:01,000 --> 00:55:03,000
wake up
1643
00:55:03,000 --> 00:55:05,000
and to stand.
1644
00:55:05,000 --> 00:55:07,000
I don't care how large a community you have,
1645
00:55:07,000 --> 00:55:09,000
that's powerful.
1646
00:55:09,000 --> 00:55:11,000
We are a small community. That's close to
1647
00:55:11,000 --> 00:55:13,000
that's not quite 10 percent.
1648
00:55:13,000 --> 00:55:15,000
But that's 8 percent
1649
00:55:15,000 --> 00:55:17,000
of our community
1650
00:55:17,000 --> 00:55:19,000
give or take.
1651
00:55:19,000 --> 00:55:21,000
The power of that showing up to
1652
00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:23,000
a meeting, whether it's a school
1653
00:55:23,000 --> 00:55:25,000
board meeting, whether it's
1654
00:55:25,000 --> 00:55:27,000
a city
1655
00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:29,000
council meeting, whether it's
1656
00:55:29,000 --> 00:55:31,000
some kind of meeting in terms of the community.
1657
00:55:31,000 --> 00:55:33,000
Not to protest,
1658
00:55:33,000 --> 00:55:35,000
but I will say we
1659
00:55:35,000 --> 00:55:37,000
do need to resist.
1660
00:55:37,000 --> 00:55:39,000
We are representing
1661
00:55:39,000 --> 00:55:41,000
the kingdom that we are
1662
00:55:41,000 --> 00:55:43,000
a part of. Yes. Exactly.
1663
00:55:43,000 --> 00:55:45,000
In these arenas. If we don't do it
1664
00:55:45,000 --> 00:55:47,000
who will? And we are reclaiming
1665
00:55:47,000 --> 00:55:49,000
ground and territory.
1666
00:55:49,000 --> 00:55:51,000
I said this in a sermon two weeks ago.
1667
00:55:51,000 --> 00:55:53,000
Ground lost is difficult
1668
00:55:53,000 --> 00:55:55,000
to regain. It's hard
1669
00:55:55,000 --> 00:55:57,000
to get back. But it's doable. I believe
1670
00:55:57,000 --> 00:55:59,000
that. And so though we
1671
00:55:59,000 --> 00:56:01,000
have capitulated territory
1672
00:56:01,000 --> 00:56:03,000
over the years and we bought
1673
00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:05,000
lies, particularly
1674
00:56:05,000 --> 00:56:07,000
1954's law about
1675
00:56:07,000 --> 00:56:09,000
jurisdiction. Now we
1676
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:11,000
need to regain that ground.
1677
00:56:11,000 --> 00:56:13,000
We need to reestablish our jurisdiction
1678
00:56:13,000 --> 00:56:15,000
and be unapologetic.
1679
00:56:15,000 --> 00:56:17,000
Not be belligerent, but be
1680
00:56:17,000 --> 00:56:19,000
firm. Absolutely. This is who we are.
1681
00:56:19,000 --> 00:56:21,000
We have the original documents. We've got
1682
00:56:21,000 --> 00:56:23,000
the receipts. We don't have to be ashamed.
1683
00:56:23,000 --> 00:56:25,000
And the
1684
00:56:25,000 --> 00:56:27,000
stakes that are at play here go beyond
1685
00:56:27,000 --> 00:56:29,000
what policies
1686
00:56:29,000 --> 00:56:31,000
are being enacted and
1687
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:33,000
what things are being brought into law.
1688
00:56:33,000 --> 00:56:35,000
Are those things important? Absolutely.
1689
00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:37,000
But what's at stake even above and
1690
00:56:37,000 --> 00:56:39,000
beyond that is just
1691
00:56:39,000 --> 00:56:41,000
the ability
1692
00:56:41,000 --> 00:56:43,000
for truth to reign
1693
00:56:43,000 --> 00:56:45,000
in the land and for our children
1694
00:56:45,000 --> 00:56:47,000
and our children's children to
1695
00:56:47,000 --> 00:56:49,000
live in a place
1696
00:56:49,000 --> 00:56:51,000
where they're going to
1697
00:56:51,000 --> 00:56:53,000
have the greatest opportunity to know
1698
00:56:53,000 --> 00:56:55,000
who Jesus is.
1699
00:56:55,000 --> 00:56:57,000
Wow. What you just said
1700
00:56:57,000 --> 00:56:59,000
really resonates because the
1701
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:01,000
reason why we need to be doing this
1702
00:57:01,000 --> 00:57:03,000
is not for us. It's for
1703
00:57:03,000 --> 00:57:05,000
the next generation.
1704
00:57:05,000 --> 00:57:07,000
I think about the reason why we
1705
00:57:07,000 --> 00:57:09,000
have been given, the reason
1706
00:57:09,000 --> 00:57:11,000
why hundreds of kids can show
1707
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:13,000
up on college campuses and pitch
1708
00:57:13,000 --> 00:57:15,000
tents and protest
1709
00:57:15,000 --> 00:57:17,000
and hatred against Israel as
1710
00:57:17,000 --> 00:57:19,000
vile as that feels
1711
00:57:19,000 --> 00:57:21,000
to me, as demonic
1712
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:23,000
as that is and satanic as that is
1713
00:57:23,000 --> 00:57:25,000
because it is. But the reason
1714
00:57:25,000 --> 00:57:27,000
they can do that is because
1715
00:57:27,000 --> 00:57:29,000
people laid down their lives,
1716
00:57:29,000 --> 00:57:31,000
sacrificed their temporary
1717
00:57:31,000 --> 00:57:33,000
comfort so that a
1718
00:57:33,000 --> 00:57:35,000
generation after them could walk
1719
00:57:35,000 --> 00:57:37,000
in freedom and have
1720
00:57:37,000 --> 00:57:39,000
the freedom to speak even if it's wrong.
1721
00:57:39,000 --> 00:57:41,000
Even if it's wrong. Even if it's bad.
1722
00:57:41,000 --> 00:57:43,000
I've been hit on social
1723
00:57:43,000 --> 00:57:45,000
media a lot lately. I'm getting crushed.
1724
00:57:45,000 --> 00:57:47,000
We sent that reel out.
1725
00:57:47,000 --> 00:57:49,000
It's gotten over a thousand views, that one
1726
00:57:49,000 --> 00:57:51,000
of me going there.
1727
00:57:51,000 --> 00:57:53,000
And I've had some really ugly stuff
1728
00:57:53,000 --> 00:57:55,000
come up because we sponsored it. So
1729
00:57:55,000 --> 00:57:57,000
it went out broader than our typical
1730
00:57:57,000 --> 00:57:59,000
band of people. And I've
1731
00:57:59,000 --> 00:58:01,000
gotten a lot of hits back. And
1732
00:58:01,000 --> 00:58:03,000
every one of them is a reminder
1733
00:58:03,000 --> 00:58:05,000
for me to pray for that person by name. So hey,
1734
00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:07,000
do your worst. Say what you need to say.
1735
00:58:07,000 --> 00:58:09,000
You're just getting on a prayer list.
1736
00:58:09,000 --> 00:58:11,000
I'm praying for those individuals.
1737
00:58:11,000 --> 00:58:13,000
Now I have your name. Now I have a target.
1738
00:58:13,000 --> 00:58:15,000
So you just exposed yourself
1739
00:58:15,000 --> 00:58:17,000
by... You can't make us not love you.
1740
00:58:17,000 --> 00:58:19,000
Exactly. I love you. You can't do anything
1741
00:58:19,000 --> 00:58:21,000
about it. But what that's telling
1742
00:58:21,000 --> 00:58:23,000
me is that
1743
00:58:23,000 --> 00:58:25,000
I said, do you think I should
1744
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:27,000
delete these comments? Because some of them are bad.
1745
00:58:27,000 --> 00:58:29,000
They're ugly.
1746
00:58:29,000 --> 00:58:31,000
Like really ridiculous.
1747
00:58:31,000 --> 00:58:33,000
And Annette said, no.
1748
00:58:33,000 --> 00:58:35,000
Because what we're talking about
1749
00:58:35,000 --> 00:58:37,000
right now, they have a right to say that.
1750
00:58:37,000 --> 00:58:39,000
And I said, you're absolutely
1751
00:58:39,000 --> 00:58:41,000
right. I'm going to leave them be. I'm not going to
1752
00:58:41,000 --> 00:58:43,000
answer them because I don't want to just...
1753
00:58:43,000 --> 00:58:45,000
The Bible says if you speak to a fool,
1754
00:58:45,000 --> 00:58:47,000
you become a fool. So you become as
1755
00:58:47,000 --> 00:58:49,000
a fool. So I'm not going to do that. But I will
1756
00:58:49,000 --> 00:58:51,000
pray for them. And by leaving those comments
1757
00:58:51,000 --> 00:58:53,000
up there, it helps...
1758
00:58:53,000 --> 00:58:55,000
It's a reminder to me that
1759
00:58:55,000 --> 00:58:57,000
not everybody thinks the way I do.
1760
00:58:57,000 --> 00:58:59,000
Not everybody believes that Jesus is who He says He is.
1761
00:58:59,000 --> 00:59:01,000
And I have to have
1762
00:59:01,000 --> 00:59:03,000
compassion, not empathy, but compassion
1763
00:59:03,000 --> 00:59:05,000
for that. And so you know what?
1764
00:59:05,000 --> 00:59:07,000
They know not what they're saying.
1765
00:59:07,000 --> 00:59:09,000
And now I've got their name and I can pray
1766
00:59:09,000 --> 00:59:11,000
for them and there's nothing they can do about it.
1767
00:59:11,000 --> 00:59:13,000
So...
1768
00:59:13,000 --> 00:59:15,000
If nobody has a
1769
00:59:15,000 --> 00:59:17,000
bad word to say about anything we're doing,
1770
00:59:17,000 --> 00:59:19,000
I don't know that we're doing much. Exactly.
1771
00:59:19,000 --> 00:59:21,000
If you're moving the needle,
1772
00:59:21,000 --> 00:59:23,000
you'll know if you're over the target.
1773
00:59:23,000 --> 00:59:25,000
Yeah. Man, brother, we could
1774
00:59:25,000 --> 00:59:27,000
solve the rest of the world's problems, but hey,
1775
00:59:27,000 --> 00:59:29,000
we got to get going. I got a lunch date
1776
00:59:29,000 --> 00:59:31,000
soon. Oh my gosh, I really do
1777
00:59:31,000 --> 00:59:33,000
have to get going. Hey, bro. Thank you again for
1778
00:59:33,000 --> 00:59:35,000
letting me join you today. Thank you for being here today.
1779
00:59:35,000 --> 00:59:37,000
For our friends, thank you for writing into
1780
00:59:37,000 --> 00:59:39,000
our website. Thank you for supporting us through
1781
00:59:39,000 --> 00:59:41,000
Value for Value on the Fountain app, sending
1782
00:59:41,000 --> 00:59:43,000
in Satoshis. And just such a blessing
1783
00:59:43,000 --> 00:59:45,000
to hear from you, getting those boosts.
1784
00:59:45,000 --> 00:59:47,000
But also we have several that support us on an
1785
00:59:47,000 --> 00:59:49,000
ongoing basis through PayPal. So thank you
1786
00:59:49,000 --> 00:59:51,000
for signing up. Go to our website,
1787
00:59:51,000 --> 00:59:53,000
Living Up in a Down World.
1788
00:59:53,000 --> 00:59:55,000
And subscribe.
1789
00:59:55,000 --> 00:59:57,000
Hit that subscribe button. Let us know you're
1790
00:59:57,000 --> 00:59:59,000
out there. Love hearing from you.
1791
00:59:59,000 --> 01:00:01,000
Pastor Brian, thank you so much, bro.
1792
01:00:01,000 --> 01:00:03,000
Thank you and have a happy Tuesday, everybody.
1793
01:00:03,000 --> 01:00:31,000
God bless. We're out.
1794
01:00:33,000 --> 01:00:35,000
Thank you.
