Death to Life podcast
A podcast that tells the stories of people that used to be one way, and now are completely different, and the thing that happened in between was Jesus.
Death to Life podcast
#227 Josh Newbegin: Escaping the Cage: A Journey Beyond Legalism
Josh Newbegin shares his powerful journey from living a party lifestyle to becoming a burned-out church worker to finally discovering true freedom in the gospel of grace. His testimony reveals how the most significant transformation in his life wasn't leaving his partying days behind, but escaping the performance-based Christianity that kept him in a spiritual cage.
• Grew up in church but left to pursue adventure and the party lifestyle in snowboarding communities
• Found emptiness in his dream lifestyle despite achieving everything he thought would fulfill him
• Returned to faith but approached it with a performance mindset, trying to earn God's approval
• Experienced burnout from working so hard in ministry while simultaneously battling secret shame
• Discovered through mentorship that his value is intrinsic, not based on performance or others' opinions
• Realized he had become like the older brother in the prodigal son story – doing the right things for wrong reasons
• Found freedom when he understood God already declared him enough and worthy of love
• Now helps other men find freedom from pornography addiction by addressing the underlying pain
• Continues practicing "gospel" daily, reminding himself of the truth that he is already enough in Christ
If you're struggling with feeling that you're never doing enough for God, remember that your value isn't based on your performance. The gospel declares you are already enough because of what Jesus has done.
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The world doesn't think that the gospel can change your life, but we know that it can and that's why we want you to hear these stories, stories of transformation, stories of freedom, people getting free from sin and healed from sin because of Jesus. This is Death to Life.
Speaker 2:And so though I guess my lens was very much looking down at those individuals could celebrate the, those who were on the outside and I'd come in until they come in, and then they didn't pull their finger out and start working as hard as I was. So it was resenting anyone who didn't seem to be carrying a burden like I was, maybe someone who felt a sense of freedom in their relationship with God. I'm like it's not meant to be like that, it's meant to be hard. And I would read Matthew 11, where Jesus talks about his yoke being easy and light, and I couldn't make sense of it.
Speaker 2:I'm like either jesus or liar, or this is like a mistranslation or something, because I, my experience was it is heavy and hard, and when I realized it's because I was carrying something that jesus didn't ask me to carry, that that made me angry as well. Because I'm like, like, is there no reward for all this hard work that I've done very much? That older brother mindset, like, like, is there no reward for all this hard work that I've done very much? That older brother mindset? Like you know, I've been here all these years slaving away for you, and then this son of yours comes in and you just give him freedom welcome to the death to life podcast.
Speaker 1:my name is Richard Young and today's episode is with a brother from down under. His name is Josh Newbegin and I met him through a mutual friend and have been watching from afar his life being transformed by the gospel, and I love it. He also has a heart for freeing young men from pornography addiction and he tells a story, kind of a prodigal son to older brother story. So buckle up, strap in. This is a great story. Uh, josh new begin love. Y'all, appreciate y'all.
Speaker 1:Okay, josh, uh, you and I have spoken on facetime once and I think you were driving across Australia and you were driving so you couldn't really say anything to me. You're like, oh, hey, man, I'm sorry that was my Australian accent hey, what's up? And I was like, oh, I've forgotten about that. Hey, yeah, and so I've known about you. But we've had that brief, brief encounter. And then, man, I've just been watching what you've been doing from afar and we I probably could have you as a guest on my other podcasts. I have one called free from porn I and we could probably do that at some other time.
Speaker 1:But, uh, it's been really cool to see what, what's been going on in your life, Uh, obviously, uh, from afar, on Instagram or Facebook like that. But it's been cool to see what's been going on in your life, obviously from afar, on Instagram or Facebook like that, but it's been cool to see what's been happening and I just I messaged you. What was it like? Three weeks ago? And I was like man, I got to hear the story. And so here we are, man, where are you taking us? Where are we going to start this thing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's good to be here, man. Thanks for the invite.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Where do?
Speaker 1:we start.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Where do we start? If you asked me that question several years ago, it would have been the typical answer of growing up in the church and the journey there, which I will share. But for a long time I thought my story was one of leaving the church for a little while, partying, finding that pretty unfulfilling, and then looking for God after that and then getting my life on track rah, rah, rah. But seeing that God's continued the journey, I think my conversion, my testimony, has been far more radical since being in the church and being in ministry compared to those early years. And so, yeah, I guess there's different stages to my journey and I guess it's one that's still being told. It's ongoing. It hasn't finished yet, which I think is the exciting part about walking with Jesus is that he continues that good work. All of us have a story that's still being written.
Speaker 1:That's like an amazing tease for this episode. You're like, yeah, it was bad, it was partying, and so many testimonies are like that where the guy's like I did it all, I did all the drugs, but you kids don't do it. And then people are like, man, why are you sharing that story? But the tease of the growth in the church. So what started you off in this? You grew up in the church. What had you running off with the Philistine life to check that out? Was that just shiny? Things looked fun and you wanted to try it out. Tell us.
Speaker 2:I'm the youngest of four, so I've got two sisters and a brother and so, observing them growing up, I saw them disconnect and we went to public school. We grew up in a household where mom was involved with her faith. My dad wasn't. Both my parents were raised by Adventist converts and so they've got their own stories there. But it was a mixed household in that dad was never active in faith but he encouraged us to be involved. So even as a young kid I remember just wanting to be at home just hanging out with Dad.
Speaker 2:But we had to go along to church and I was never really that keen on it. I was in between generations in a country church so I didn't have a lot of social connections there. Most of my friends were through public school and so as I got older I could see the pathway. My siblings were going on and just getting involved more with partying and that sort of stuff. I could sense myself going down that pathway as well, and I remember having moments at summer camps or big camps where having this connection with God. It's common to talk about those mountaintop experiences after those spiritual events and spiritual high, but I was never willing to fully commit because it's like I knew I was going to make decisions to go off the rails and I'm like, well, I don't want to make that decision, I don't want to get baptized if I'm planning on going to run amok for a few years. And it wasn't that I wanted to turn my back on God, I just wanted to have fun. I just wanted to have a good time, and my experience growing up in the church was very much rules-based of this is what you do, this is what you don't do. And it just felt like God just was keeping me from enjoying life and I just was hungry for adventure and hungry for pursuing that. So I just put God on the shelf for a few years.
Speaker 2:And I remember when I was in about year 10, I was doing a class subject called outdoor education. I don't know if you have that in the States and you just get to go hiking and surfing and all these great outdoor activities. And we had a teacher, a student teacher, that came through for a few weeks and she mentioned how she'd just come from Canada doing a snow season where she's essentially getting paid just to play in the snow for six months. And I grew up in a country town where I didn't even know that was a possibility, and as soon as I heard that, I'm like that's me, I'm going to be doing that. So I had this dream, that's me, I'm going to be doing that. So I had this dream. And so, 2009, I finished school.
Speaker 2:2010, I got a job here in Australia, at Mount Hotham, just working on the lifts, and that's when I fully threw myself into the party life. It was more just about having a good time and pursuing fun. And then, after that, I followed up with a snow season in canada, and I remember, you know, expecting this, this moment of arrival, this dream that I've been pursuing for several years, and it was a whole lot of fun, but it just left me feeling empty, and that that puzzled me. Hey, I, I didn't understand it. I thought this was going to be the experience that would fill me up and that would just be the point of life just good times, and it was fun. So, one moment, you're having a day shredding powder and then partying at night. And then I'd have a moment where I'd pause and I'm like is this it? It just left me hungry, hungry for something more.
Speaker 1:So who was this God? That was kind of just the fun police. What was the picture of God that you had in your mind besides that?
Speaker 2:I guess it was just a picture of someone was very controlling and distant. I didn't understand that I could have a personal connection with God. I thought you just have to keep in line, do the right thing, otherwise you miss out on heaven. There was no relationship involved and I recognise now that that was very much shaped by my connection with my parents, in particular my dad, and I learnt very early on that if I worked hard I would get affirmation. And just as a young fella just wanting those words of affirmation from from anyone, but in particular from my dad, and he's never been good at words, but I knew if I, if I worked hard, I got attention and so that very much shaped how I then approached God and that comes into the story later on. But it was just, it was just a distant figure who had all these lists of things that you, you couldn't do mainly the things you couldn't do and they, those things seemed fun and I just wanted some of that and I'm like, yeah, I'll come back to, I'll come back to god later.
Speaker 1:Just let me have fun for a few years there's so many people that believe in that god and they're they're kind of cool with it, which I think I was one of those people. I was just like, yeah, god's, he's like this and I mean he's like that. So I mean, you gotta, I mean he's, he's the Lord of Lord, he's the King of Kings, and uh, we didn't, I don't know, I didn't see. I saw Jesus was the cool version, but that God wasn't like Jesus. Maybe I had a little Trinity problem there, because you know, jesus isn't the cool version of God. So you're shredding the powder and hanging out at night doing your thing and it's hollow huh.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it just started feeling real empty. Funnily enough, when I was packing my bag to head to Canada, I grabbed my Bible. I can still see that moment and I was holding it in my hand and I just felt compelled to take it with me, which was a strange thing for me at the time because I wasn't spending time reading it. But for whatever reason prompted by God, I know now I'm forced like, oh yeah, I might need that, and so I just threw it in the top of my bag and didn't think anything else of it. And when I was over there in Canada I started thinking about spirituality and faith. But I struggled with the cringiness of Christianity and I don't know if anyone else struggles with that, but the portrayal of it, it's just so often so cheesy and lame. I'm like, oh man, I can't be a christian man, they're just not.
Speaker 2:they're not cool they're not, they're not the people I want to hang out with. And then I guess I've always been drawn to the countercultural. And then I had this idea. So I'm I'm immersed in snow culture, and at the time I was smoking a lot of pot. I thought, well, I can rebel against the subculture that I'm in by reading the Bible. And so I started framing it in this way that I would be rebelling against the rebellers by starting to read scripture. And so my first approach was to get high and then start reading Revelation, because I'm like man, there's dragons and beasts and stuff in here. This stuff's cool. It made no sense to me, I got nothing out of it, but I guess it was a step closer.
Speaker 1:It's hard when you're sober, that's it.
Speaker 2:But it was a step closer to pursuing God and so then if my friends were asking me what I'm doing, I could justify that it was still something that was cool and I don't know. I recognize now, looking at that younger self, I look at his mindset, younger josh, and like man, you're a dork. He's just trying to hide it. But that was the start of it and then-forwarding towards the end of the season and I was catching up with a friend and we had a really good chat and it was one of the first persons I was able to open up with on a deeper level, I think, just typical bloke who was superficial, have fun with people but never really go any deeper than that. And I could have DNMs when I was drunk, and that's a lot of the time when I'd talk about faith and beliefs was only when I was on the beers and then had this conversation with my friend Carlin. And it's an interesting part of the story which I don't know how to tell it in a way that doesn't glorify it, so I'll just tell it as it is.
Speaker 2:We, we went to stanley park in in vancouver to do magic mushrooms and just wander around the park, and so a couple of young hippie kids like, yeah, this will be cool and we had that experience and yeah, it was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:But once again it was like I had that peak experience of pleasure and then afterwards I'm left going, okay, what now? What's the point of this? And so each time I pursued something that was pleasure-driven, it just left me feeling more empty. And we had this conversation afterwards and I realised I just had this moment of clarity where what I needed was God, and I had a chip on my shoulder about Christianity, about Adventism in particular, and so I wasn't ready to just walk back into a church, but I knew in that moment, if I'm going to find any sort of meaning, fulfilment, it's going to be in pursuing God. And so that was 2011, and that's the point when I started looking, made a decision I'm gonna find god. But I moved back to australia. I didn't know what else to do, so I just did another snow season, um, but if anyone's familiar with snow culture, it's pretty, pretty loose, it's pretty toxic. And now I'm feeling pretty unsettled in that space.
Speaker 1:And I met a guy there what's the toxicity of the snow culture?
Speaker 2:uh, just just a party life. It's a space where, uh, living the life of an alcoholic is celebrated like you're drinking every night, um, partying on time, like it's it's just sex, drugs and rock and roll. It's oh, that's Pretty typical, that that's yeah, it just it's condensed in that space. And I met a guy out there, his name Yarny, last name Yarny Panayotokopoulos. Oh my, yeah, he's an Australian, greek fellow, and when I first met him I was actually trying to sell him some snowboards I brought back from Canada. I was trying to make some money and he told me later on, when we first had that interaction, he actually wanted to fight me. The connection wasn't there.
Speaker 1:Mercy.
Speaker 2:And he's trained in martial arts and that, so he would have towed me up, so I'm glad he didn't. Arts and that, so he would have towed me up, I'm so I'm glad he didn't. But then, after that he, we started, we started jamming, found out we're both kind of musos and we started jamming in the snow and I shared a song with him. I was writing and and he asked me I was like are you, are you spiritual or you got? Do you have faith? Are you christian? I'm like, oh, I kind of shared a little bit of how I was searching. It's like you can't say the things you're saying without having a connection with God. And so I'm looking at what I wrote. I'm like what am I saying? And I guess I didn't even realize how evident it was that I was hungry. I was searching, and then it turns out he's a Christian and Christians were pretty rare in the Australian snowfields. And then we start doing Bible studies together and he starts leading me to the cross. And I got to a point where, two-thirds of the way through the snow season, if I'm going to connect with God in a meaningful way, it's not going to be here. So I quit my job, moved south down to Torquay where I'm going to connect with God in a meaningful way. It's not going to be here, so I quit my job, moved south down to Torquay where I'm living now. It's just an hour and a half south of Melbourne and by this point I'd come to the conclusion that there was something about Scripture and I just wanted to follow what the Bible was saying. And I knew that if I went to an Adventist church they'd be studying the Bible. So I went in there with the mindset of I don't want any friends, don't talk to me, just teach me. So it very much had a chip on my shoulder that God's worked on over the years, but it was my nan. It was the church that my nan was actually going to, so my mom's mom and when I started going there she gave me a dvd series of herb larson. I don't know if you've come across herb larson.
Speaker 2:There's a so canadian businessman which may maybe the fact that he was canadian jumped out to me me because I just spent that time there. He shared a sermon series called the Search for Relevance. That's exactly what I was looking for, right, something, some meaning. Listening to his story, he was a high achiever, grew up in the church but was pursuing meaning elsewhere and everything he did he just he smashed it out of the park. So, him and his brother, they start off a business and it's super successful. So then he's rolling, rolling in cash. They can buy whatever they want and he's expecting okay, when I get to this point I'll have that that feeling that that didn't satisfy him. So then I think he went and studied, gets his degree, expecting when I do this, that'll bring that feeling, doesn't. So then he starts working on. I think he's an artist. So he gets paintings, they're selling them, gets a reputation there still no satisfaction. He's he's a fly fisherman.
Speaker 2:Writes an article for a magazine. He gets published. He's like he shares how he he opened up the magazine like this is the, this is the moment where I'll see my name there and I'll finally feel like I've arrived. He reads it and it's nothing, it's just not sinking in. He's reading it again. It didn't matter what he pursued, he just was left feeling empty. Then he's like I've got to do something spiritual. He plants a church and it ends up working really well, highly, just, you know this overachiever everything he put his mind to, he achieved, and so then this church is doing really well and he's watching all these people coming along and having encounters with god, and yet he's just feeling empty.
Speaker 2:And so he made this deal with God. He says I'm going to give you. He said, three months. I'm going to read my Bible for an hour every day. Pursue you in prayer and reading scripture. If you don't turn up in three months, I'm done. And so he starts diligently pursuing God and the days go past and he's just getting nothing. He gets to the end of the three months and he's just fed up. And then he felt compelled to pick up the Bible, read it. He's like why would I want to do that? I've just spent three months every morning pouring through it and getting nothing out of it. And just that conviction just kept pushing on his heart. And so he picks it up and starts reading. He said it was like the scales fell from his eyes and for the first time he could actually hear God speaking to him through his word. And he said he just starts weeping as he's reading. And that was that breakthrough for him.
Speaker 2:And I heard this and I went I want that. I just want to encounter God. And it was. Listening to Herb was the first time I heard the concept you could actually have a relationship with God, you could have a relationship with Jesus because, as I was saying earlier, my experience growing up it was just rules Do the right thing. God is distant. And so that was really eye-opening to me to hear that I can actually have a friendship with Jesusesus if I pursue it. And so I took the challenge up and and I started having a huge impact on me. I started connecting with god and I started filling that void and it wasn't long before I just went.
Speaker 2:I'm all in with this and, and once I'd made that decision, I felt impressed with, I guess, the conviction I had when I was really young seven or eight. I remember sitting in church and just feeling like god wanted me to be a pastor. And man, I hated the idea. Hey I, I didn't even like going to church at that time. And then feeling like god wants me to be a pastor and no one had ever said it to me I don't have any passes in the family. There was wasn't an idea coming from anywhere else and I'd forgotten about it. And then god started putting that on my heart again. It was like he was saying remember what I told you, as as a young fella, I still want that for you. And this time I was ready. And so I remember I was doing Bible studies with the local pastor and followed him out after our studies one night I hadn't even been baptized and said oh, can I ask you a question? He's like yeah, yeah, yeah. He's like what are you going to do to become a pastor? And I haven't actually baptized or anything yet. So I think I kind of shocked him with the question. And so I was ready to become a pastor before I was making the decision to be baptized. But I just wanted to respond to that call.
Speaker 2:As I went through that process and I guess this is the first part of my journey where I'd say externally, you know, I stopped drinking, I stopped smoking weed, I stopped partying, cleaned my life up, started doing the right things and got involved in ministry and was pursuing God. But what I hadn't grasped at this point in time was the depravity of my own heart. I think I was looking very surface level at behaviour and going, just don't do these things. And that was very much impacted by my upbringing. And so I'm like, okay, well, I'm sweet, sweet. Now I'll go out and share this message with others. I've got nothing else left to change within myself. I thought I had arrived. In that sense it was 2000 and 2015.
Speaker 2:So, 2013, I went up to Avondale, started studying theology. 2013, I felt I should go and do the Arise program, if you're familiar with that one. So it's the discipleship course there and Avondale. I wasn't getting the foundation. There was a lot of expected knowledge, and so I thought if I went went to arise, I'd get all that foundational stuff that I missed, and then I'd go back and finish my degree and my.
Speaker 2:My plan while I was there was just gonna do the three-month course, uh, travel the second half of the year, second half half of 2014, and then go back to Avondale. And then, when I was there, they started talking about this concept of Bible working. And when they start talking about it, like well, yeah, that's not me, I don't have to listen to this, I'm going to travel in the second half of the year. And then I just started feeling that same conviction again, the conviction of, like God calling me into ministry, but this time it was like God wanting me to stay on and do Bible work, and I was fighting him hard on it. Hey, I didn't want a bar of it, I had my plan. I just wanted, I guess, still that desire to just go have fun. And so it felt like God was trying to stop me from having fun again.
Speaker 2:And I remember having a conversation with one of the other students and even that was difficult because I thought, if I acknowledge it out loud, I can't plead ignorance, right, but I just like unsettled in my spirit. So I was talking to him about it and I realised this is what God wants me to do. Then I made a deal. I said, all right, I heard about them doing a church plant there and it sounded like a good opportunity. I'm like all right, god, if I can stay in the Kingscliff area Tweed Heads, kingscliff I'll do it, but I'm not going anywhere else. And then I got offered a position there and so three months turned into three years. I ended up staying in the area and that was a game changer, because it was in that season that I realised just how broken I really was and what led to that was.
Speaker 2:So I'm Bible working in the church plant and become like the young kid again. Just seeking that affirmation. I just wanted the pat on the back. So I'm working hard and people notice that and they're like, oh, you're a young person on fire. I'm like, yeah, getting it done, and people get baptized and the church is growing and you feel good about yourself. And I even heard about the possibility of getting offered an internship without finishing my degree and I'm like, oh, that's a pretty good challenge, I'm going to pursue that. And it got to the point where pursuing it to the extreme, to the point of exhaustion. I remember one Sabbath morning the phone was ringing and it was the pastor and just the thought of picking it up and answering it I just burst into tears.
Speaker 2:I sat down on my bed. I just it was just broken. I'm like I just can't do this anymore. I didn't answer. I bounced his call, sent him a text I can't come today. I just can't do it.
Speaker 1:This is just from working hard, or was it the mental overload, emotional overload? What was it?
Speaker 2:It was from working hard, but looking back on it now, it was from trying to earn God's approval.
Speaker 1:Mercy.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't have been able to articulate it that way at the time. But essentially, what I've come to learn is I didn't feel like I was enough for God and so I'm just grinding to try and hear those words like I'm proud of you and if you know, I'm doing Bible studies on grace with people and I understood, you know, saved by grace is a gift. Yeah, I get that. But does God like me? Is he happy with me? Is he proud of me? And so I'd compartmentalised the two and gone. Yeah, I know I'm saved, but am I enough? And I didn't feel like I was enough and that broke me.
Speaker 2:But that season, which is one of the hardest experiences going through mentally, has become the greatest gift and God really kept his promise from Romans 8.28 that God works all things for good for those who love him.
Speaker 2:And that experience wasn't good, but God's repurposed that and allowed me to understand my own behaviour, the behaviour of others, and that's been such a catalyst moving forward. It was I started catching up with one of the pastors up there, pastor david. Help he. He had a has a degree in counseling as well, so he's understanding of human behavior and then bringing that in in line with the gospel is really powerful, and I started catching up with him for some counselling sessions, and at the time I was wrestling with pornography as well, so that would have been part of what was burning me out too, that shame and the guilt. It takes its toll right when you're turning up as a leader at a church plant and then you've got this secret sin that you can't tell anyone, and I'd shared it with my pastor once and he never followed me up, and so then I wasn't game enough to go hey, I'm still struggling with this, just the shame kept it hidden. And so the perspective I had was that he probably thinks I should have dealt with this by now and so I can't bring it up with him. I remember I brought it up in the Arise program in a pretty unhelpful way in front of the whole class.
Speaker 1:Mercy.
Speaker 2:And asking for prayer and different things, and I guess it was a desperate attempt for like seeking support and not knowing how to move forward with it, and then that didn't help me break free from it. So then I couldn't go to any of those and ask for support because, well, I should have already had it dealt with, right? Yeah. So carrying that.
Speaker 1:So many people don't know how to handle it because they don't know how to break habits. They don't understand addiction, specifically porn addiction, because they don't understand how pornography has changed. And I mean, pornography is pornography, but when your dad and my dad had the chance to look at it, it was like a magazine in their sock drawer. And now it's like 12 windows open at the same time and the dopamine that's available. It's crazy. And so people, they still think of it as like, as like, oh you, you had to go look for it. Well, not really, you had it in your pocket the whole time. You don't understand like. And so people I had to explain this to someone. I'm like this is different, like when the tube sites came in, it changed everything and they don't, you know, they don't, they don't get it sometimes, and god bless them good for them that they haven't experienced that, but it's a it's wild wild west out there yeah, it's a, it's a super stimulus.
Speaker 2:Now the the way the brain reacts to it and it's the equivalent of like imagine an alcoholic or drug addict trying to break free when they've got it in their pocket.
Speaker 2:Because I'm an alcoholic's got a flask there like, yeah, I'm never going to drink again, but you've got it right there in your pocket yeah it's, it's, it's on that same same level and then, because of the shame around it as well, it's just not not spoken about, especially within christian circles. And so there's this assumption oh, you're fine, like you're a christian, you don't struggle with that. You look at the stats, man, it's um, the the barter group was. A couple years ago. They released it was 60 percent of christian men have either struggled with or are struggling with it, and that's probably on the conservative side in terms of the numbers, and that was a few years ago as well.
Speaker 1:Uh, yeah, no question.
Speaker 2:But but going going back to that conversation I had with, with david help, he, he shared this story with me. That had a huge impact and and so I finally I opened up with him with where I was at the experience of burnout and and also struggling with porn. And he said to me when he was a young fella, he was in South Africa and he bought this old Volkswagen. It's just this beater, this old rust bucket that's been parked in a paddock somewhere. It's just junk. But he loved it and it wasn't even working at the time when he bought it. And it turns up on a tow truck and everyone's looking at this old car, going man, what are you doing, dave? Like this is junk. And you look at him, he's grinning from ear to ear. He's stoked on it. He saw its potential right, and so they, they unload it from the tow truck and he goes to the garage where his dad's b is parked. He rolls up the door, drives out his dad's BMW and he pushes it into the garage. He asked me did it deserve to be there? Not really, it's junk. He said, well, how do I work on it? Then All the tools are in the garage. I'm like okay, that's a fair point. Let's say I've been working on it for a little bit and I get it. I get it running again, so the engine's running, but then it breaks down. When it breaks down, do I push it down the back, put it under the tree, down the back paddock? How do you fix it then? And it started sinking in.
Speaker 2:And then he shared romans 8 one with me. He said there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And it was in that moment I started grasping that there's room for growth in grace, that there's room for mistakes under this umbrella that God gives us. And when you're reading Romans, by no means is Paul that there's room for mistakes under this umbrella that God gives us. And when you're reading Romans, by no means is Paul communicating a message of cheap grace and something Bill Levisage communicated. He said there's three types of grace or three understandings of grace.
Speaker 2:There's cheap grace, which is grace without change. It's a weak and powerless gospel. And then there's salvation by works, doing it in our own efforts, trying to transform ourselves, and that's legalism, right. Then he said there's salvation by grace, through faith. That works, and when we're grasping the gospel, it leads to this transformation. It's seen, it's evident in people's lives. I was trying to do it myself, trying to change my heart myself. I became aware of this depravity that I had, that I couldn't bring about the change, when Dave was sharing that idea with me that there's room for growth under the umbrella of grace. That was a bit of a turning point for me then, and he shared the book with me, the Search for Significance by Robert McGee. I don't know if you've come across this one. I haven't.
Speaker 2:And the concept in this book is that our value is intrinsic. But the devil sold us this lie that he calls it. The satanic formula that your value comes from your performance plus the opinion of others and this is how the world generally operates is that it's what you do, what you have, and then what other people think of it. And we buy into that in the church as well. And I fully bought into that lie, hook, line and sinker. And so it was my performance as a bible worker. And then what other people were thinking of it.
Speaker 2:And when I was getting affirmation, I felt good. If I was getting results, I felt good. What about when I wasn't? I just felt, felt awful about myself. But the truth is is that our value is intrinsic and then, rather than living in a way to try and acquire that worth, we can live in a way that demonstrates it. It's like we're operating from that position and that's a complete game changer. So when I started grasping that, I like freedom. I like freedom to recognise that I was already enough that God saw my significance. And then you bring in Romans 12 too. There don't be conformed to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Paul's talking about neuroplasticity there.
Speaker 1:Let's go.
Speaker 2:We become what we think about, and so it's coming in a line with these biblical, these gospel ideas. Faith comes by hearing and hearing and hearing. It's meditating on the truth and allowing that to form new neural pathways. So when I started recognizing who I really am, like my identity as a child, as a son of God, and letting that be my motivation rather than working towards it and working from it, I started creating freedom internally, not just externally.
Speaker 1:Man, that's so beautiful, Shout out to David, that's a banger analogy. The car thing, I'm gonna steal it and just act like I. I made it up myself. But man, that's so beautiful. And uh, isn't it interesting that you, we don't know that we're legalistic. When we're legalistic, it's until we're out of it that we can look back and say, oh, because at no point were you like I'm getting my worth by what the head pastor and the congregation thinks about me, because if someone would have said that, you'd have been offended, but you don't know that until you're out of it, and praise the Lord that you got out of it.
Speaker 1:Okay, I wanted to take a minute to tell you this story that I heard this week that blew me away, and it was about a young kid who is working at camp and he saw online that one of his buddies was considering hurting themselves and so he called them right away and he spoke life over this kid. And this is a high school kid, a sophomore in high school, speaking to another high school kid, a high school kid, a sophomore in high school, speaking to another high school kid, and he spoke life and he said you need to watch this and he gave him Wave One. He sent the Wave One YouTube series to this kid who was struggling with self-harm and, wouldn't you know it, the kid turned out and it was okay. And I'm just sharing that story because the gospel is going out there all of the time and people are using resources from Love Reality to show what Jesus has done, how he has freed us from sin. And so I'm just saying partner with us, let's keep going.
Speaker 1:Every single donation that you give goes towards furthering this gospel message getting out there so you can go to loverealityorg slash give and, yeah, just pay this thing forward. If the gospel has changed your life, let's keep on going so that we can change the world. And so loverealityorg slash give. Let's get this news out here. Let's get back to the episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah, 100%. I was completely blind to it at the time and I think when you're entrenched in legalism, grace looks dangerous. Explain that.
Speaker 2:Explain that. Think of the parable of the prodigal son, which, if anyone's read the book the Prodigal God, tim Keller makes a point. It's probably the parable of the two sons or the parable of the prodigal father, because it's the father that was wasteful with his love. But anyway, in that parable you have the younger brother who lived in a way that I did. He went off and partied. But then his attitude towards the father he's essentially wishing that the father was dead, he just wants his inheritance and he wants to go off and enjoy life. And the expected response at that time would have been that the father would give him a hiding, would have been that the father would give him a hiding, and Deuteronomy 21 says that a disrespectful son could be stoned.
Speaker 2:So he would bring him to the elders of the city and say, look this son of mine. We've tried with him, but man, he's just unbearable and so legally they could stone him. Right.
Speaker 2:But this father doesn't do that, right. He, he divides up his, his, his livelihood, his identity. He carves it up so the son can have his inheritance and he goes off and parties. And then he comes to that point where he he returns home and he has that plan of of how he can pay it back himself. He's like I'll be a. He's not even being a servant, he wants to be a worker, my understanding. So he wouldn't even live on the property, he would be in town and slowly pay off his debt. And so he's got this little speech plan and he comes back to the father. He's like all right, this is how I'm going to do it. And the father sees him off in the distance and starts running. And it's interesting Well, if the father sees him off in the distance, that tells us that the father was looking.
Speaker 2:He's waiting each day. Like is today the day that my son comes home. And he sees him and he just starts running then and he takes the best robe in the house and puts it on the son. He was filthy, he's covered in pig crap and he's been living this life. He's just broken and humiliated. He would have been in a real state.
Speaker 2:The father takes the best robe the best robe would have likely been the father's robe he gives that to him. He puts a ring on his finger which is like having access to the family credit card. You're going to give the son who just wasted all this money access to the finances. That's what he did straight away. He doesn't even get his speech out and the father's like let's have a party. He's just straight back in and that's what I felt like as coming back into church. To start with, I was the prodigal son, son, but I quickly became an older brother and and the older brother mindset is that you do all the right things but for the wrong reasons, and and the the older brother was just as lost as the younger brother, but he didn't see it. He just wanted the possessions. But his approach to getting the possessions was to do the right things, and it's actually his good deeds, his righteousness, that keeps him separated from the Father in terms of a relationship which is wild to think about that your good deeds can keep you separated from God.
Speaker 1:Mercy.
Speaker 2:And so I've come in the door to the party and then quickly slipped out the side and became this older brother who was pursuing the father's things through my own, through my own efforts, and was completely blind to it would you, uh, look at people that had done something similar to you when you were now working at the church, when you were the older brother?
Speaker 1:Did you look down on them? How did you look at people who had experienced what you had experienced before from that position?
Speaker 2:I looked at individuals who weren't working as hard as me for the gospel. I looked down at them and like, can't I just pull their finger out and just contribute towards the mission? And so I guess my lens was very much looking down at those individuals, could celebrate those who were on the outside and had come in until they come in, and then they didn't pull their finger out and start working as hard as I was. So I was resenting anyone who didn't seem to be carrying a burden like I was, like maybe someone who felt a sense of freedom in their relationship with God. I'm like it's not meant to be like that, it's meant to be hard.
Speaker 2:And I would read Matthew 11, where Jesus talks about his yoke being easy and light, and I couldn't make sense of it. I'm like either Jesus is a liar or this is like a mistranslation or something, because my experience was it is heavy and hard. And when I realised it's because I was carrying something that Jesus didn't ask me to carry, that made me angry as well. Because I'm like is there no reward for all this hard work that I've done? Very much? That older brother mindset I've been here all these years slaving away for you and then this son of yours comes in and you just give him freedom. I was becoming bitter and angry, and angry at God, angry at myself.
Speaker 1:Sounds like you started to look like the god you believed existed like funny that like your dad, but your dad actually didn't really exist. Speaking of that god that you had in mind, it was the fun police. You started to look like him. Um and god's like it's wild son. That's not what I look like.
Speaker 2:Stop it, yeah, yeah. We become what we behold. Yeah. And I think you hit the nail on the head there. I was definitely becoming like the, the God that I was perceiving in my mind. But yeah, um, it was a book by pastor bill liversidge that started really cracking through. That it's, it's been this ongoing journey yeah that's a good one, man yeah, so the first time I read that, I hated it I got back here so get me onto that before I experienced freedom.
Speaker 1:And they're like you got to read this book and I was like whatever. And then I, I think I read a couple chapters before freedom and then after freedom, I went back to it.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh, shoot, this guy's on it yeah, first time I read that man it was you didn't like it it just rubbed. It rubbed me up the wrong way. I just I couldn't articulate why I didn't like it. I just didn't like it like this is something. There's something wrong and I made that comment before when you're entrenched in, entrenched in legalism, grace looks dangerous.
Speaker 1:I'm right now man, that's gonna be a facebook post sorry I'm gonna act like I came up with it too, when you're in trouble.
Speaker 2:I've given you a few gems for this episode, but I've just taken them from others, so you know, there's nothing new bro there isn't yeah.
Speaker 2:So when I, when I first read that, it just didn't. It unsettled me in my spirit, like it was uncomfortable, and I felt compelled to read it again and that you know, that's the mercies of god, right, holy the Holy Spirit. Just is like no, go back, read it again. And the second time I read it, that's when my eyes were opened, that I was just entrenched in this legalistic approach to God, and that was when I first started seeing righteousness by faith and I started grasping Ephesians 2, for by grace you have been saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is a gift of god, not of works, lest any of us should boast.
Speaker 2:But he goes on to say that where his workmanship and he's for good works yeah, which he prepared before him, that we should walk in them and that that workmanship poema in the greek, like where his poem and paul talks it as being like love letters to the world. Let's go.
Speaker 2:But that flows on afterwards right, and so when I started grafting, it's 100% a gift. And when I saw, okay, so we're saved by grace, 100% a gift Repentance. It's the goodness of God that leads to repentance. And the reason why I hadn't experienced repentance was because I wasn't seeing the goodness of God. You mentioned that before that I was becoming like this picture of God that I had. I hadn't seen his goodness, I hadn't fully experienced that repentance then, and after this, I started praying for repentance, like, well, if repentance is a gift, then give me that gift, lord. And then realizing, if we look at confession being part of it as well, we confess in response to who we see God as God's still the initiator there, he's the author and the finisher of our faith. It's 100% along the way, what he is doing, what he has done, the accomplished fact of jesus and I'm just responding to that, I'm just coming in alignment with what, what he's already done that's, that's true freedom when we're grasping that right and that that's became, became the game changer. I really remember I was having a chat with Bees and it was after he had his experience and coming and grasping the gospel with greater clarity. When we first met. We were just bouncing these ideas off each other and getting excited about it. It's practicing gospel, right? I love hearing other people who are encountering the gospel. It's just energizing and exciting. My friend, bill Knott he calls it practicing gospel, and Bill I'm blanking on the other pastor's name now wrote Victory in Christ. What's his? Bill Liversidge? Bill Liversidge, yeah, so Bill Liversidge would call it coming to the cross. It's just like coming and and recognizing what's already being accomplished there.
Speaker 2:But I was having this conversation with bees and I realized there was still part of me that was believing lies. And I remember having a conversation I I said can you ask me tomorrow what lies I'm still believing? And then I went and prayed that night. I just felt there was still something within me. And we had the conversation the next night and he asked me that question what lies are you still believing? And I'm trying to think of the actual lie itself. But I just remember this experience of sharing with bees, how I was actually feeling towards God and at this point in time I was still wrestling with porn and I think just the anger at God that I hadn't experienced full freedom from it yet. Anger at God that I hadn't experienced full freedom from it, yet Anger at myself. And as I acknowledged that I was overcome with this emotion and just being able to repent of that anger towards God, being able to repent of that anger towards myself and experience grace.
Speaker 2:In that moment I had this image of being in a cage, just in a cage I couldn't get myself out of. And God directs my attention, he says turn around. And as I turn around, the doors open. You don't have to be here anymore, you can walk out. You've got that choice.
Speaker 2:And there's that example if you look at Israel as a nation. They're liberated from slavery, right, but then they're in the wilderness and they start longing for those leeks and onions and all the good things of Egypt. They forget what it was like back there, they're just thinking of the pleasures of it, and so God's in this process of getting Egypt out of them. And so I've been on this ongoing journey where I am in freedom, from the moment I responded to the gospel, coming back into church in those early days. That was freedom then, but it's been this ongoing process of actually grasping it and realising it and learning how to live in freedom, just like the Israelites, and God's in this process of getting Egypt out of me and then going back to that image. God just helped me say I don't have to be in the cage anymore, I'm not a slave to that anymore.
Speaker 2:I think this was the part of Bill's book Bill Levisage, that really irked me when he references Romans 6.11, consider yourselves dead to sin but alive to God. That's pretty radical right Dead to sin and teasing that out, and we can look at what that means. But to be able to claim with boldness, because I've responded to the gospel, I've been baptized, I've accepted that Jesus died in my place as me, for me, my shame, my guilt is no longer mine to carry. I can therefore claim with boldness that I am dead to sin but alive to God.
Speaker 1:I think that that verse, as I've meditated on it, romans 6.10 has made 6.11 that much more powerful. In Romans 6.10, I think he says For the death he died. He died to sin once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God speaking of Jesus, and then he says so you also must consider yourselves dead to sin. He lives to God speaking of Jesus, and then he says so you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God. So we consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God. Why? Well, verse 10 says it. Because Jesus is dead to sin and Jesus is alive to God.
Speaker 1:And so, when you see, the gospel is like it's much more of an exchange life. Like Jesus condemned sin, he became sin and condemned it, and now he stands perfect with his father. And that's the reason why I stand perfect with my father, because Jesus is my advocate. Jesus's standing with God is my standing with God. Jesus's relationship to sin is my relationship to sin, and it probably took two or three years into freedom for Romans 6.10 to start speaking into Romans 6.11. And it's like it just gets better and better and it doesn't influence me to want to sin anymore.
Speaker 1:Like it's interesting what you've been saying, where you're like mad at God because he hasn't done this thing yet, and that's so funny. Because you're mad at the reason you're mad at him is because he actually has done the thing. He's given you a heart that longs to obey, but you haven't figured out how to think about it. You don't understand that and so you're mad at him and he's like bro, I, I, you wouldn't be mad if I hadn't given you the heart that longs to obey and the motive, the pure motive, and it's kind of like I don't know what you were saying. All this stuff, the story of the kid who falls into the river and he's like drowning. He's like dad, help, dad, help, dad, help. And his dad's in the canoe. He's like stand up. And he stands up. In the water comes to like his knees and he stands up.
Speaker 2:And the water comes to like his knees.
Speaker 1:It is just like oh, I was mad at him and he had already figured it out.
Speaker 2:Like God has already given me all these things that I've wanted? Yeah, 100%. And it was just coming to that realization and I guess it's similar to that prodigal son when he came to the realization like man why am I living like this when at home the servants are doing better than this?
Speaker 2:yeah I'm just gonna be a servant for my father. So he hadn't fully grasped in that moment the goodness of his father. But he, he knew he would be better off if he went back there. So when I realized that gate was open, it's like, well, why wouldn't I just walk out of it and and recognizing I don't have to go back there anymore? And man, that's just such a powerful idea, such a liberating concept to know who you are as intrinsically valuable, a son of God, redeemed and restored, transitioned from the old humanity to the new and then inheriting everything that comes along with that man that becomes powerful.
Speaker 2:Man like, imagine each day waking up and that's the thoughts that are in your mind, that's what you're moving in a rhythm with. No wonder the disciples turned the world upside down when, when they had that concept, jesus had overcome death and even thinking about what Paul talks about, like dead to sin. So what is sin then? And the first that comes to mind is in 1 John like sin is transgression of the law. Paul says love is the fulfillment of the law, right, so sin is just anti-love. I think sin is a state of rebellion.
Speaker 2:I heard explained one way that there's capital sin in terms of, like the state of sin, and then there's lowercase sins, the actions that flow from it. Yeah, and so when adam and eve rebel, you know, they enter into this state of sin, they're're disconnected from God, and then that flows into the actions. But when we respond to the gospel and we become a part of the new humanity, we are no longer in the state of sin. Capital S. We shift over to righteousness, right, because we inherit that from Jesus.
Speaker 2:Capital R, righteousness which flows into the actions of righteousness, the righteous deeds or the good works that Paul talks about in Ephesians 2. And so we've shifted teams, which is why we can then boldly say I'm dead to sin. It's not to say I don't fall short anymore, because a righteous man falls and he gets up seven times right, how can you be righteous and then get up? Well, because righteousness isn't to do with your behaviour, it's something that's attributed to us, right, that's justification by faith. We're given christ's righteousness regardless of our situation, and it's not taken away from us just because we slip up, and it's when we're like dwelling in that place and our mind is transformed.
Speaker 1:How are you going to get people to act right if you tell them that, bro I mean we try to get people to act right If you tell them that that's dangerous, they might not act right.
Speaker 2:And then you lose control over these people. We lose control. Hey, yeah, it's that fear response. Right. That fear response. But, man, the beauty it is is when you're entrenched in grace. There's new desires man like why would I want to live that old way, right? Why would I want to live in an anti-love way when I've got a connection with the being who is love? It creates these new desires. I don't want to borrow that old life anymore. Why would I go back to that cage? No, it wasn't good.
Speaker 2:But it's being in our right mind. And then going back to the Israelites when they were craving Egypt again, they weren't thinking clearly, they weren't in their right mind, they weren't really craving it, they were just broken and looking for a way to escape the discomfort that they were in. But it's interesting when we start talking about addiction it can get worse before it gets better. And if someone's using anything as like a pacifier to to mask their unpleasant emotions and whether it's a, you know, binging on netflix or just doom scrolling, food, substances, porn, whatever it may be if remove that all of a sudden, all those things that you were trying to escape and using that as a coping mechanism, they will come to the surface and that can be unpleasant.
Speaker 2:It can get worse before it gets better. But when you've got that grounding of knowing who you are, your identity in Christ, that God's grace is sufficient for you. It provides this safety net to actually process that. It brings to mind a prayer that David prays in Psalm like search me, o God, and know my heart. See if there's any wicked way in me. My paraphrase of that is search me, god, and let me know if I'm believing any lies. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because lies keep us enslaved right.
Speaker 1:It's cool that addiction kind of does some of that I mean mean, gotta be careful. Addiction, does some of that work? Right if you realize that you're going to x, y or z because you don't want you're coping, you don't want to deal with this thing. Uh, if you remove the cigarette or the alcohol or the porn, now you actually have to deal with the thing. And so when it comes up you're like, oh, I was escaping this feeling of not being enough and then you got to deal with that. Am I enough? I don't know, let's figure that out. Am I enough?
Speaker 1:I was escaping this pain from my childhood. Does that have to speak to me now? Like, is that a rule? And you actually have to deal with that underneath stuff. And I think people in their their rush to just get you to behave better, they don't understand that. No, they're like there's inner work that we have to do. We we do have to like see how god thinks about us, what he believes about us, how much he loves us, for us to actually grab a hold of of that freedom so that we don't need to cope like we used to.
Speaker 2:yeah, that's interesting. You made that comment in their rush to get us to behave better. It makes me think of this idea that Jennifer Schwerzer highlights in her book. I think it's called I've got it here in front of me it's 13 Weeks to Peace. I don't know if you know, dr Schwerzer.
Speaker 1:Oh, I mean I'm familiar with her. I've never met her, but I'm familiar with her for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So she's got this concept that she talks about the human in three aspects, so spirit, mind and body. And so the spiritual aspect of us is the deepest part of us that, according to design, that was the part that would connect us with the divine, connect us to God, and the spirit would inform our mind the Hebrews would say heart. So it's a conscious part where all our beliefs and that are where our thoughts are and how we make sense of the world around us. And then that flows into our body and we live all that out in our actions. But at the fall there's a severing between the spirit, so our deepest aspect of us is disconnected from the divine, and that's a traumatic experience, right. And so then the mind is trying to make sense of that, and so it undergoes a shift in beliefs and rationalization. And you see, adam and Eve their picture of God changed, their picture of themselves changed, they experienced shame, and then they express that in their body. And so what's happened is like you've got the body almost driving the mind and then the mind driving the spirit. It's been flipped. And then we come in and we see that people are behaving in a way that's not helpful for them. But the emphasis is on the body. It's like, okay, you just got to start addressing your behavior here, but it hasn't dealt with the heart of the issue and this wasn't Jesus' approach. He was looking deeper.
Speaker 2:And I think of the woman caught in adultery in John 8, where they accusers bring her to Jesus and it's like, well, she's being caught in adultery. The law says she needs to be stoned. What do you say? He just starts drawing in the dirt, says to them he who is without sin cast the first stone. It goes back to drawing the dirt and then, one by one, they all leave right. And just imagine her situation where she's head down, covered in shame, waiting for that first stone to just smack her in the head. She's waiting to die, she's not looking up. And then Jesus says to her where are your accusers? So she notices for the first time that they've actually left. There's no one. And then he says neither do I condemn you.
Speaker 2:The path to healing and wholeness as Sean Bray says, is the path to healing and wholeness has to go through the garden of non-condemning love. What transforms the heart is not condemnation, which ties back to Romans 8.1. God pointing his finger at me and saying Josh, pull your finger out, get your life together. You're a disgrace. That never would have changed me. It would have created more guilt and shame, but it wouldn't have helped change my heart. But when I grasped that non-condemning love, which was first extended to me through a pastor, through a friend, and when he accepted me, that like, started piercing through the callousness of my heart and helped me to start seeing that, goodness of god, it's, it's love that transforms amen Amen.
Speaker 2:Amen, so I think, as individuals until we're actually addressing that heart issue. So I guess a better question to ask if someone's struggling with something and if it's porn, it's not why the porn it's why the pain?
Speaker 2:Yeah, or what pain it's getting deeper. Until you deal with that, we're just going to be looking for other things to mask. Absolutely. The challenge is, I think we've got churches that are filled with people that are broken and struggling, but a lot of the time their masking is celebrated. Like me, as a young man withaholic tendencies, trying to earn God's favor, and that was celebrated and it's not no one's fault. It was just the reality of my brokenness. But it's not always destructive on the surface. It's not always a destructive addiction like the younger brother.
Speaker 1:Sometimes it's the older brother who yeah, his brokenness is hidden so you've had the uh, the best of both worlds, or, better said, probably the worst of both worlds. As you stand now, how do you see it? Where are you now? Would you say? You're not the older brother, you're just the younger brother who is wearing the ring and the robe and telling other people how cool your dad is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, where am I now? I'm just walking in a relationship with jesus let's go and and and walking with, with other individuals on this road to amaze, so to speak, and we're just talking about his goodness practicing gospel and inviting others to partake of that as well.
Speaker 2:I I recognize that there's still tendencies within myself like if I'm not mindful, I can fall, for both ways sure I can become an older brother, I could become a younger brother again, and so it's daily practicing and being mindful of the truth and abiding in that and seeking to have my mind renewed, transformed by His Word. It's the truth that sets us free, and the truth is I'm already enough. You asked that question before that some people wrestle with Like am I enough? 100% I am. The Word declares it. I've experienced it and I get to live it out.
Speaker 1:I don't know if Brene Brown knows the gospel. I feel like she has to know it some way, because that's the question. Someone asked her If she could tell the world something, what would she tell them? And she said you're enough, and she has to know something about God. So let me ask you this this is kind of how I ask the last question, and I don't know where I want you to go. If you're jumping into delorean and you're going back in time, do you want to stop by the older brother or do you want to stop by the younger brother? Who would you go visit to to put your arm around and be like, hey, uh, josh man, who would be more, who would be, who would listen more?
Speaker 2:I think I'd go younger. I'd go younger where it started, right, just as a kid trying to make sense of the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what would you tell that kid?
Speaker 2:That he's enough, yeah, that he's liked, that he's loved, that he's enough, like that's a huge thing. And I think for a long time it was just trying to earn those words and to be in a space where you don't have to earn it anymore. You've already got it and you're working from that, working from freedom. It's liberating, but it's liberating, but it's something that, because we live in a world that pushes back against that, it's something that needs to be practiced, and Paul talks about this concept, exhorting one another daily. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so it's conversations like this which I call practicing gospel, and so encouraging and uplifting to remind each other of what we have in Christ presently, right now, and also the goodness that is to come as well. It's life. It's so energizing to focus in on that, and that's what my younger self needed was someone just to be walking with him and to practice gospel with him and speak that truth over him.
Speaker 1:Amen. Well, hey, man, I see your good works and I'm glorifying our Father in heaven. I love that you have a heart for men who are stuck in a porn habit. I think it's the Trojan horse we act like we're just going to talk about. Oh yeah, just you know, change porn habits. But I know what you're doing. You want them to see the gospel, you want them to see that they're enough and what God has done for them through Jesus. And so, man, I love it and keep doing what you're doing. And, yeah, you're a testimony to us, man. So thank you for coming on and sharing your story.
Speaker 2:Thanks for the privilege to share what Jesus has done in my life and that's my hope that it impacts someone else in the same way that I've been impacted, because it's good news. It's not good advice, right. Let's go. It's already been accomplished. Advice is that if you read your Bible more, you pray more and get involved with church, life will get better. But the gospel is news Jesus has already done something and life is different because of that.
Speaker 1:Amen.
Speaker 2:Let's tell the world my friend, Amen, Cheers bro. Absolutely.