#192 Will COURAGEOUS Men Shape the Future of the Church?

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What does the future of the Church look like? Will it be shaped by courageous men who stand strong in their faith, or will it be led astray by those who compromise? In this thought-provoking video, I address some of the lasting impact of the last generation of soft men on this current generation. I also address the looming catastrophe headed for an unprepared church.  We'll look at some relatively recent events that serve as evidence of weak leadership in the church of recent past. Join me as I dive into the importance of bold, faith-filled leadership and what it means for the Church's future. 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Reflecting on Truth and Engagement
• 4:26 Society's Strength and the Church
• 9:13 Influence and Leadership
• 20:08 Upholding Biblical Truth
• 24:23 Male Leadership and Society
• 26:01 Discernment
• 29:01 Cultural Commentary on Preaching
• 39:03 Authority and Obedience
• 45:06 Our Responsibility in Interactions
• 51:29 Christianity and Cultural Influence
• 58:29 Biblical Authority
• 1:02:18 A Call for Strong Leadership in the Church

Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to black and Blue Brandon here. In pure black and blurred fashion, we're going to talk about some things that are relatively old now, but I want us to think well, I want. Us to take our time. Because. Even for people today who are for the truth and the people who say they're for the truth, I don't think we're doing the due diligence on how to properly defend what's true. What we're doing is we're jumping on social media, we're on YouTube, we're binging, we're scrolling just to be in the echo chambers of the people who agree with us to make us feel better. That will ultimately get us that. That dopamine hit, right? And. One, it's good to be around people you agree with, but to what? To what end? Right to what end we want truth to prevail for the benefit of the souls here on this earth, to the glory of God. And when we come down to all these different arguments and all these things that are just existing today in. In society today. Are we actually doing what's necessary to learn how to defend what's true? How to actually disseminate truth, to teach people to train up people, and what's true? Or do you just know that you disagree with one side and you and all the people you watch on YouTube or the people you follow on social media are people who agree with you? How do we become disciples of the truth and therefore make disciples of the truth with the truth, biblically speaking, being a person Jesus Christ? So I want to talk about some things that are completely out of the news cycle now. It doesn't take long for things to get out of the news cycle, but before I touch on that. If you want to help me, there's a link in the description of this video on YouTube and of this episode on podcast where you can fill out a survey for me. I'm actually there are some brothers who actually reached out to me for my last episode. I was asking for help. I was asking for people who wanted to lend their their skills and their time. To the benefit of this podcast, and I got a few brothers who reached out and I'm currently planning and setting things up with them now. And one of those things that I've set up is a survey. Where I can actually get some insight from those who are listening and those who are following on social media to learn how to better target you as the listener. Some things that you'd like to hear and some things you'd like to grow in, some things that really excite you about this podcast to make sure that content is finding you more and more and more. And this is not a way to. Allow you merely to drive this podcast, but as you are the listener and you, you contribute to the existence of this podcast, and I want to honor that. And that doesn't mean telling you what you want to hear. It means targeting you who you. Are and so if there's a lot of men, I wanna make sure that I honor that by doing some things that encourage men that admonish and love men and the same for women. Mostly, this is Christians. This is a Christian podcast. I want to encourage and monish and love Christians. I want to exhort Christians to live lives that glorify. Lord, especially in a world where that that's offering a lot of different fraudulent identities for you to root yourself in. So please do me a favor if there is anything that you can do to help me, it is just take the time to fill out this survey. It's not a 30 minute so. Survey, but it will take some time. It's probably takes 3 to 5 minutes. Because I want to get this information from you. So please would if you mind if you're not driving or do anything, just stop right now and click that link and fill out the survey. And that would be a huge help to me. The more people who fill out this survey, the more information I can get on this podcast on this YouTube channel and be able to dedicate my efforts and the content to those who are listening and and what would encourage you most? So thank you for that. Please take the time. OK. So let's jump in. One, there was a session that Voddie Baucham  had at the Haddon Institute. Where he discusses. This idiom that maybe a lot of people are probably very familiar with. I want to play this clip. Really, briefly and then. I wanna touch on it. Yeah, let's play this clip. Let's play this clip first. Take a take a listen to this.

"Hard men... Bring good times. Good times. Makes soft men. And soft men bring bad times. You say that again. Hard men bring good times. Good times. Makes soft men. And soft men. Make bad times."

 I I think for example of my.

Now really quickly. Just to reiterate, I have it speed up for the sake of time. Hard men bring good times. Good times bring soft men and soft men bring bad times. He was sharing that as saying a lot of his military buddies have said that he's picked up along the way of having relationships with a lot of guys in military that hard men bring. Good times. Good times bring soft men and soft men bring bad times. Now, why am I highlighting that? Because when we look at our society today, we look at the state of the church here in America, that it's mostly like a Country Club. It's like like people use. The gospel and churches as this kind of like members only thing, even if we don't use this language, the expectation is for the church to cater to your needs and give you what you want and provide for you. Offer you coffee, Donuts, watch your children, the preacher. And or say the things that you want them to say or her to say for that matter, people who don't want to acknowledge what Scripture teaches about preaching. But. We we have completely lost our way in regards to what it means to even be the church and that we have all of these desires. And I'm going to let body finish here, but. When we look at the times that are coming, if not already here, things are hard. If you're in ministry and if you're a pastor and if you are wanting to serve biblically, the times are going to be difficult even more. So. As time progresses, you just have to be so. Reminded about that. And one of those causes is the result of soft men. I obviously this is not going to be true for everybody who's listening to this. This is general. There are people who exist in local bodies where there were hard men, good, faithful biblical men. And that is to say that they. Looked at the duties given to them by God. And they held them in high regard, no matter what the culture said about it. And they stood firm, unwavering. That's going to bring good times for that local body, but in a larger scale, when we look at our country and we look at the stuff that we're fighting against, we're fighting against the proliferation of killing children. What an oxymoronic statement. The proliferation, a word that has at its root pro-life. The the proliferate as A at its root pro-life, but what we have proliferated is the killing of children, the destruction of family, the. I guess the. Completely confusing and obfuscating of biology and sexuality and sex in general. This is what our society celebrates and proliferates, and obviously it's a sinful and fallen world. Sin is the root cause of this. It's proliferation, especially amongst people. Who would identify as Christians as a result? Of soft men. Soft men once again, not only the result of soft men, but it is because men are meant to be heads and leaders in society. So if you want to fight for the biblical view of headship and patriarchy and manhood, then you have to accurately assign the the, the, the, the degradation of society as an indictment on soft men. That's that's the reality. Let's say vote Balcom finish.

On training. And in my own training, I went to seminary in 92. And when I think about my training through my MD and my doctoral work, the most popular voices during that time. Were bill hybels. Rick Warren and George Barna. Those, those were the most popular voices. Ministry was all about finding out what people wanted. What flavor of music they liked? What flavor of communication they liked and then and then giving them that. These men were coasting. On the backs of the hard men who brought good times, where people were not in opposition to the gospel, where churches were flourishing because of the predisposition that people had as a result of this fruit of the gospel and and we had mega churches that were growing around the world. I. Remember as a.

So really quickly, so let's let's recap. So he said Bill Hybels Rick was. Warren and some other person just rewind and listen to that, but, you know, depending on your context and Christian contexts, you're familiar with those names. I was slightly familiar with those names growing up, but I also grew up in a Presbyterian Church. So. There were some people who knew, but I was like, I knew about the purpose driven church or purpose driven life. I think it was the first one. That's Rick Warren. And when I came to Christ, our church actually had started going through that and I came to Christ in college. So this is towards the back end of my time growing up in the church that I grew up in. And I remember after coming to Christ and reading a purpose driven life, I'm thinking I was not a Bible scholar. I'm not. I'm. Still not a. Bible scholar. But I was not well versed in my Bible as I am now, and reading a purpose driven life. It felt like it was talking to the Brandon that just died. That Brandon that did live for himself, the Brandon that was promiscuous. Obviously purpose driven life does not promote promiscuity. But what I'm saying is the purpose driven life was talking to the Brandon that was living for seeking out what he wanted. And the purpose of life was speaking to that, Brandon. And it rubbed me the wrong way. I didn't like that. Because that Brandon had just died, and I willingly let him die and let the Lord kill that Brandon so that it is not a Lord I who live But Christ, who lives in me and the things that I live, I live unto him for his glory, whether or not I like it, and in the moments where I don't like it, I sit with him to have my heart shaved. Of the fleshly sinful aspects of itself, so that I can be conformed to an image of my king that does desire good things. And when you look at the teachings of these men that were listed, they did away with all of that. Kind of what vote Baulkham just highlighted. The times that create soft men. The ease lacking discipleship, motivational talks, no hyper focus on the gospel or biblical truth, but on a hyper focus on charity rather than the truth. These produce soft men, so much so to the point that when you preach God's word in an unadulterated fashion, you'll have to feel emails about people saying you're not being nice because they think that's the role of a preacher. To be nice. We've also lost what it means to genuinely be hateful. And mean. We don't know what it means to be kind. So you have people who profess as Christians on social media who genuinely espouse hateful, bitter rhetoric. But the moment you talk about the sinfulness of sexual immorality, they think you're being mean. Not loving. Soft men have created this atmosphere. I'm gonna let him. I'm gonna let him continue.

A young minister was at the end of my seminary training, I believe, and I was on staff at the church. That was flirting with this sort of secret, sensitive model. Back then it was a secret driven model and that was full on all out pedal to the metal. Everything that we do is is your. Seekers, which is a term I reject because the Bible rejects it. There is none who seek God. Amen.

That's important to distinguish. He's not just being petty. I think it's important to to to know that there is none who seek after God. I'm going to explain that later.

But anyway I digress. But and then it was a secret sensitive model. Like we're not going to go all out. But you know, we'll adopt what we need to in order to be more sensitive to this and. So our whole. Staff went to the Willow Creek. Our whole staff. And we spent several days there at Willow Creek. And it was basically it was a sales and marketing conference. We left with this big folder right? With everything that you know, they were teaching us about, you know, how to to to operate within this. This model, of course they were constantly saying we don't want you to just go and reproduce this, but everybody there was just going to reproduce this. Those were weak men, theologically. Weak men, biblically. With me and mythology. And that era, not just those men that I name. But that whole era, they were the most popular names and and I believe that they're sort of the personifications of that era. If you allow me that. But the weak men of that era have led to some bad times for the church.

I agree. I agree. You know all of sin and fall short of the glory of God for the to all have sin and fall short of the glory of God. But even those of us who are saved are currently being sanctified to be conformed to the image of Christ, and there are parts of us that need to grow. But that's a very different thing when we're highlighting weak men. We're not talking about men who have failed that that's me. That's vote. Welcome for the men listening to this right now. That's you. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about men who have exchanged the glory of God for the glory of the world. The desires of God's heart to the desires of their listeners. And their parishioners and their congregants, those are weak men, men who have bowed the need to the men's of those who have itching ears and demand those ears be scratched. I I preach the sermon some years ago. And I I gave this illustrate. And the illustration was that my family. This is true. My family growing up was the house you watched football at. We we were the Ravens House. If they were, especially if it was a prime time game. Because back in the day, the Ravens weren't always on prime time. We had a lot of defense. We had a lot of characters on defense, and they did not like us. We were called thugs and bullies. Bad stuff. I'm not gonna get into that, but you would come to our house to watch the games, and anybody was welcome. Anybody. Anybody was welcome. I have some friends now who are too stupid to be Ravens fans. I love y'all. But you can come over and watch. Kick off your shoes, relax. Get some food. We would buy some food. My mother would make some food. You can enjoy. This is your home. While this game is on, you are welcome. Do not ask us to change the channel. We watch the Ravens here. That's what we're doing here. We're watching the Ravens play football. And if you come here demanding we change the channel without respecting the fact that this is our home and this is what we do here, then you can't be here. If someone comes after that and tells us that our family is being mean and mean spirit and we're not loving like Jesus, then it is our responsibility in that moment to ignore them. Wholeheartedly, you are ignored. Why do I give that illustration is because it is weak. Soft men who have taken the Lord's house that is prescribed by the Lord when it comes down to how we behave in that house, what we discuss, and that house what we read in that House, and what we ought to look like. In that house. And guess what? In that house, anybody's welcome to come and watch us behave and read and live this way. To the glory of God, anyone is willing to come in and watch us. Do not ask us to change the channel. This is the Lord's house. This is what we do here. And we so love it. And so love him. And so recognize what he has called us to do, to be beneficial, that we want you here. And we want you to benefit from what he is called us to do and live for him. Because the thing that you're doing in this world that's destroying you is just you frivolously seeking after him. And we're here to tell you that he's here. Soft men. Will allow you in the House. And they'll allow you to change the channel in the name of love. Quote UN quote. They'll allow you to flip the pages of Leviticus and say, hey, look, I don't like the language here and then go over to the pages of Romans and say I don't like the language here. Then they go to Ephesians. And they go to marriage and say, I don't like the language here submission just rubs me a wrong way. Hey, I don't like the language here. Loving my wife. No matter what you mean. She can do. She can cheat on me and I still AM. Called to love her. I don't like that language. Let's talk about slaves. Obey your man. I don't like that language. Change the channel. And soft men say. Yeah, let me see what I. Can do about that for you. Obviously the response is not. To be a harsh 1. But is to be a stern 1. That submission is not disgusting. It's actually quite beautiful. And the reason you have an adversity to it is 2 reasons 1 you believe submission to be what the world says submission to be #2 you have the heart of the world. When you have the heart of Christ, you'll see submission for what it is, and you'll find the beauty in it. It will still be difficult because you're a flesh and dwell human being, but you'll see the beauty of it. That's what sternness does it. Disciples in what's true and what's good. And we've had a generation of soft men that have led this generation that are in churches now, comfortably, comfortably in churches, hating what is good. Hating what is pure hating, what is noble, what's morally upright, what's morally excellent, what's praise worthy. They hate these things and don't realize they hate them. Until their prayer pastor slips up and might say something biblical, and then they send an e-mail saying umm. That was a little bit too much Bible. In that sermon. And now we have pastors who are bending the knee to this. Completely lost on why they're in the role of a shepherd. To begin with. Soft men. Let me ask you this question in your church right now in your local church, are you at a church? Where you guys study the scripture, I didn't say do Bible devotions. Bible devotions is good. Don't don't take this as me slamming Bible devotions is good. I was actually just doing that last night with a group of men I've never met before. I was invited by a brother and it was a group of men reading a passage and just discussing it. And the beauty of the Lord. Praying for one another. Bible devotions is good, but do you promote Bible study? Taking time diving deep, bringing your critique, bringing your questions, bringing your doubts, understanding the depth and the beauty of a passage rather than just reading it on the surface and saying this is how it makes me feel. Do you promote elders? Elders who teach and correct and exhort and admonish who rule over the sheep in love. Do you preach or do you? Does your pastor or do the pastors of your church preach the whole counsel of God? The entire Council, that doesn't mean that therefore you preach the whole Bible. Every sermon that's just for black church. I'm joking. I'm joking. Y'all y'all know what? I'm talking about. But do they preach the whole Council of God? That what the Bible says in the text. That is what is preached. It's not distorted in any way. It's not this weird grotesque. I don't know. Obfuscated sermon for a very plain text. Do you see that there are passages being? Omitted, more and more. Are you leapfrogging over hard and difficult passages, or are you walking headlong into them, trusting that the Lord and the Holy Spirit Guide you in wisdom and truth regarding that? These are the things that we can lovingly hold ourselves accountable for when it comes down to Members. What type of church or member and when it comes down to shepherds, hey, well, how how are you shepherding? Because we are headed for times where people will need the truth of Scripture, not your motivational talks. We're in that time now. Things are still way better here in America than they are in Nigeria for Christians. They need the Bible. They need the scriptures. Find men. Elders, husbands, fathers. Who are willing? Because of their love for the Lord. To die alone. To the praise of his glory. I don't mean that they want to be single. I mean that they stand firm in the truth, no matter who sides with them. You know the 1st. Character trait of such a man is humility. Only a humble man will know that he's standing in the truth. He has to be surrounded by other humble men. You need to find those men in a church space. Need to find men who are willing to stand firm in the Bible even though they're going to be critiqued as being Bible thumpers. Find men who stand firm in the beauty of marriage and sex. Sex is an icky. It's beautiful. But what we do as sinful human beings is we take that which is beautiful, and we seek to destroy it for the sake of our own pleasure. I just had somebody ask me a question that's like yesterday. They said, hey, is drinking alcohol the same as smoking weed? And I'm like that question is very wrong. Hit it to begin with, but I'll indulge. And I asked him, I said. God made both of those things. God not only does God, the Bible is very clear about alcohol being used as a celebratory, joyful thing. Can alcohol be abused? Yeah, absolutely. I my beliefs, I genuinely believe this is objective, that met that marijuana, that plant is a medicinal plant. It is a medicinal plant, so why on Earth would it be sinful to take medicine? Now? The question I have to ask a lot of people in this country today is why are you recreationally using medicine? What are you looking for in it? And and the same thing I would ask of anybody who would take Nyquil and go to a party and be drinking Nyquil in their cup. Hey, why are you? Why are you drinking Nyquil? What exactly are you after? Because now it's a hearts desire that's transforming it into a sin. Obviously using Nyquil. It's not evil. I jump straight to Nyquil when I have a cold. I can't stand having a cold. But we need to be able to discern these things. We need to be able to. I don't know why. How I got there? I forgot how I got there. But being willing to stand firm and what's true? Bible discipleship, discernment. Male discipleship. The picture of the Great Commission is focused in the household, the microcosm of the Great Commission that is distributed to all believers is microcosmic in the form of marriage and children. It is not only there, I'm saying it's honed in there. That you have men and women coming together in holy matrimony in the name of the Lord and raising children in the name of the Lord, that they would grow as ambassadors of Christ and continue that process following after Deuteronomy 6. But that starts with strong biblical men. It's not more valuable because of men. Got my phone ringing. It's not more valuable because of men. But it does start. That that is the way the Lord has designed it and we are seeing our society cripple because the start point is soft and weak. We don't have men who commit to their families. We don't have men who commit. To a woman. And we don't have men who commit to what it means to shepherd a body of believers. To the praise of God's glory, we have men who are looking to build a bunch of babels towers of Babel to make a name for themselves, and in order to make a name in this society, you got to have people who like you in order to have people who like you. You got to say what people like. That's what we're seeing today and that's why we're voting, Balcom says. We see a lot of sales pitching. Lot of merchandising. We got a Society of soft men. I want to show you a symptom of that. Of softness. This could either be considered maybe the beginning stages or towards the middle. I think there have been a lot of concessions when you get to this point of this clip that I'm about to show you, this is Doctor Howard John Wesley. If you're unfamiliar with him, he's a pastor of Alfred Street Baptist Church. I believe I just said that right. I'm sorry, I forgot that wrong, but. He was not my cup of tea to begin with. I was introduced to him and I want to say 2016 maybe and he's not my cup of tea. However, even with that, I thought that he was an incredible orator and he did have some biblical teaching in some of it. But I would say overall I would not recommend. People to listen. To that. But I would say now that he's gotten worse since 2016, since when I first listened to him and I don't know what year this was, but I stumbled across this club and I decided to use it as an example here. But just listen to what he says in this sermon.

When you limit Sodom and Gomorrah to simply a lesson on homosexuality, you have missed three things #1, Sodom and Gomorrah is not about same gender love, it's about violence.

And really quickly. He starts off by saying homosexuality, he says when you limit Sodom and Gomorrah to a narrative on homosexuality, you're missing some things. Then homosexuality turns into same gendered love. I'm I'm highlighting that to say this. Sodom. And Gomorrah, literally, is the place where we get the word ****** from. Which unfortunately has a very visual image. When it comes down to it, that word, but that word has been sanitized to the word homosexuality, but now it's being even more sanitized in this preacher by calling it same gender love. What exactly? The same gender love. What is gender, even gender? We have layers and layers of lies that are sex. We have male and female. That's the truth. Now if I even want to concede on gender, what is same gender love? I love my father. I love my brother, I love a host of other brothers in Christ. Is that same gender? Love? Is that what he's talking about? Or will he need to elaborate? A mist in the pulpit will turn into a cloud in the pews. You have to be clear and concise on what you say.

And rape a mob of men. Mob of men about same gender love. It's about violence. And rape. A mob of men want to rape innocent men. This is not same gender love, this is violence.

Now my question to him would be this. My question would be. What's wrong with violence is violence. Innately wrong is an inherently wrong violence. Even that in and of itself requires teaching violence is not inherently wrong. I use this all the time. If men are entering into my home to cause my family harm, I am acting violently. That's actually good. Defense takes violence. Now. He does also say it's about rape. Now my next question would be this. Why is rape wrong? What's wrong with rape? You might be listening to me talk and say, Brandon, what are you even getting that? How are you asking that question? What's wrong with rape? Is it is rape wrong because it hurts people? Is rape. Wrong because it hurts people. Or is it wrong because it's a sin against an almighty God? And some of the fruits that we know, it's a sin against God is that it hurts people. That's that's a different type of thinking regarding who the Lord is. Right. This is why in the passage.

Where?

David is praying in repentance in Psalm 51. In Psalm 51. This is where we get a glimpse of David being a man after God's own heart. I want to show you this really quickly. In Psalm 51, let's get this out of here. Listen to this. Let me make sure you can see that where are we here? OK. UM. Let's do it this way. There we go. It says have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin, for I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. Now, before I read verse 4, this is David pleading for forgiveness before the Lord. After having at the very best had an adulterous affair with Bathsheba at the very worst grapping her. He was a person. He was the King of Israel. So he he very put, could have assaulted her. He did that and not only did that, but tried to cover it up by sending her husband to war so that he could die. And David says this in verse four against you and you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. Now, some people who have the posture of self, centeredness and self glory, they can read that passage and some people who are just learning about the Bible also can read that passage and say, whoa, that sounds wrong, man. David did all these things to other people. How dare he say against you and you alone have I sinned? And I say that when you have a proper reverence for who the Lord is. That should always be your recognition and sin. The only way you could ever recognize the wrong you've done to your neighbor is because you first recognize. Ultimately it is a wrong done to your neighbor's maker. That is what that is. So why on Earth is Pastor John John Howard, Howard, John Wesley? Saying or trying to make a distinction between homosexuality and grape. Why? Why is he doing that? Because if grape is only evil because it's evil in the eyes of the Lord, then the question is, is same gendered love also evil in the eyes of the Lord? Let's listen to him.

And when we talk about same gender love, if you equate same gender love to violent acts, you have disrespected the conversation.

The conversation has been disrespected. Not a wholly and righteous God. The conversation.

Him loving him is not the same as a mob. Of men trying. To rape somebody.

I'm sorry. I'll. I'll let it play. I'll let it play.

We would have open and honest conversation about human sexuality. We have to detach it from violence and stereotypes. This is not about rape. This is not about pedophilia. This is not about hypersexuality. This is not about spreading HIV and AIDS. You've got to dismiss the violence from the conversation.

Yeah, he goes through a host of a lot of things, and the fact of the matter is we have to begin to understand what sin is. Why is grape wrong? Why is violence? I guess out of hatred wrong. Why is the spread of disease an aspect of sin? I think it's the result of sin. I don't think having a disease is sin. Having a disease is a result of sin. But why are are are any of those things what they are? Is because it is. Up against the backdrop of who God is in his character and his prescription for this world that we determine what sin. Is. So why are you trying to differentiate between sexual immorality and violence? There is no need to differentiate between that. I think Saddam even more could be about a bunch of things, but I think a very key factor. In that is the. Proliferation of sexual immorality. We gotta be honest. We gotta be honest about that. This is that that's a symptom. What you're seeing him do in his pulpit is a symptom of weakness and softness. I don't say that to slander him. I don't know him personally, but that's the temptation of any person who claims to be a preacher on behalf of the Lord, that you, rather than preaching what the Lord has given you to preach. You preach what people want to hear. I'm sure over the years they've been people in his ear saying how hateful it is that the Bible says this. The Bible is hateful about this, and then he acquiesces and says, you know what, maybe that's not even what the Bible says. Let's let's see about changing the channel for you. I'll bring that up. To finally address this. I've addressed this a few times. Over the week, in the different posts, but I want to highlight it here on this. Episode if you're. Unfamiliar with 2819 church? You have Pastor Phillip Anthony Mitchell, who once once again, I'm not super familiar with. I've seen clips of him. I've seen one full sermon, which I thought was a good sermon, and I've also seen the way people respond to criticism. What? I don't. I'm not going to use Red Flag because I think that term gets overused a little bit, but it makes me perk up and it just makes me makes me say this to people that remember that every man is a man, no matter what you need to know that every man is a man, you know. And that's not to say that the men who lead you currently are going to fail. It means that you should be sober minded and be reminded that they're men. Be praying for them like they're men and that your hope and trust and foundation should be in Jesus and Jesus. So that if people are making critiques, you can objectively say, well, is that true? Is it false? If it's false, then I'll stay the course and just keep my eye out. If it's true, let me be able to objectively discern that it's true rather than be blinded to the fact that somebody said it. I mean, blinded to the fact that it's true merely because I'm upset that someone brought it up. And so that that that's what happens with cult followings. It's social media. You got a lot of popular things. You got clips out here with music to them. People get tied up emotionally into a lot of things. Don't do that with men. Don't. Don't do that with humans. Be tied up in Christ. Let that be. Let him be your foundation, but not nevertheless, I digress. He was, or not. He had preached A sermon and I thought that he made a very good argument or a case. A very good exhortation and loving. Admonishment. When it comes down to black Americans, I'm going to let you. Listen to it.

This was Christ creating the Christian ethic. Watch of being submissive to governmental authority, that what we all the government wants is taxes and compliance with laws and following ordinances like traffic laws like not parking in a handicap. If you're not handicapped, like not cheating on your taxes, not bending documents to get more money in your Pell Grant. This is what this this is Jesus teaching all of us. What followers watch? I want you to be. Watch this word. Model. Citizens, I want you to be the type of citizens under any government that you obey the government to such a degree that when people see you, they something different about that person. Like I remember when I was 15 and I was walking down the avenue. Hollis, I'm walking out and Queens and remember to tell you, officer man, he drove by me in his car. He looked in the eye and I looked in the we made eye contact and kept walking. He came around the clock, jumped out the car, grab me by my neck, smash me up against a brick wall, and he put his clock to the back of my head. Watch. And then he said to me. Watch say. No phones, no iPhones, no cameras, no recording, and his clock is pressed against my head. Say something. Watch now. Now, in that moment, I hear the voice of my mother all the time harassing me. All the son. She tried the old son obey the holy, small son. Obey God, old son. Obey authority, old son. Obey the cops. Old son. Stop getting trouble with the police. Oh, some obey your elders. Obey your elders. Obey authority. My mother constantly trying to teach you to obey authority. And in that moment I hear her voice. And in that moment, I gotta decide which one will be stronger. My ego or my submission? I could flex in that moment and not obey the authority because my ego will be stronger than my logic. I can submit and walk away with my life, and if I don't submit in that moment, man, I'm hurled into eternity by our tops bullets. And I know there's bad cops out there. We know that we know there's cops who's evil and there's evil people in every in every industry preaching all that stuff. But man, not every. Killing of a black man was because of a. Backup some of. That because we have that our children to be watch, obedient to authority. That comes up we that we we bring upon ourselves when we provoke authority. And what the Lord is teaching us in this moment is to be model citizens that obey the laws of the land, even when they hurt.

So now what you're seeing in this clip is 100% true, and I think there are a lot of people I'm going to show you a comment section. Uh, briefly, I'm not going to spend a lot of time because it's it's a bunch of trash, but. People are saying that that was insensitive and the only reason I'm showing that clip is because he came out and apologized for it. I don't know his heart and the apology. I don't know the men around him that led him to make that decision. My prayer. Solely is that he would not bow to the mob. But maybe there was something else that that trusted brothers around him brought him, brought to his attention, and he felt the need to apologize. I'm leaving that between him and the Lord. And I'm hoping all things with it. I'm hoping all things with that, but my prayer is that he would not bow to the mob because the people who are mad about what he said are not, they don't have a righteous indignation. They have a self-centered sinful indignation. The reality of the story that he told is palpable. You know the the story of the cop. When I moved to Silver Spring out of Baltimore in 2014, it was a different world. See the, the the mob narrative was not to hate police at that time. That was just my narrative going up in Baltimore City. I genuinely hated police. I had run INS like the one he just talked about. I've been in jail wrongfully. I have been stopped by police. I remember coming from a date that I was on and I had a cop get out of his car, bang on my window. He was an undercover cop and he thought that I was. Following him and he. Threatened me, yelling at me at my car door. I had the famed uh uh. What's the unit called? Whatever that task force in Baltimore, there's an HBO show on them. They stopped me and my cousin and stripped our car. And threaten to throw us in prison. And you know what? Those are moments with people who should not be in law enforcement. You can admit that. And Philip Anthony Mitchell. Pastor Anthony Mitchell recognizes that. And he said that in the beginning of his sermon, that there are times you need to disobey the laws when they tell you to go against the Lord. And they're also bad cops. That's real. But then he goes on to say that. Not every. Tragedy involving police is at the fault of the police officer. Or is out of front of the police officer. And he uses this situation to highlight the opportunity to be sober minded and disciplined. He uses the example where the police officer would be at fault if there was such a tragedy to show that even when the police officer is at fault, you still have. The spirit of power. Love and sound mind in you. And the reason I believe that I actually overcame those scenarios with police is because my parents taught me the same thing my father taught me how to articulate myself, how to respect the law, how to respect authority, how to argue a case respectfully. That I don't need to argue how to present myself when I am, when I am met with police officers. That I don't make sudden movements that I keep things where they can be easily be seen. Whatever it is he taught me that stuff and people hear that today. And they say, man, Nah, I ain't doing all that. And I'm. I'm sorry, I I forgot to add this, but I was saying that when I moved to sober spring and I had that disdain and that bitterness. For police, when I came to Silver Spring people, this is Silver Spring, MD, for those who aren't familiar and it's close to Washington, DC. I would tell. Stories about my runnings with police and why I had such bitterness towards police and people would respond to me saying, well, why don't you just do what they say? You know, if you just obey the law. You know what's interesting now? Because Maryland is deep blue, everybody would side with hatred towards the police because that's the narrative of the day. That's that's the narrative. No one's concerned with, actually. Doing what's true, what's objectively honoring to God.

But.

Today I'm someone who sees the job of a police officer as very difficult. It's a very difficult job. It is a very hard job, that is all the more reason why corrupt police officers need to be called out because they disgraced that badge. A badge that belongs to men and now women. But I I you know, that's a different conversation, but belongs to men and women who on a daily basis go out and go towards. Danger. They decide to go towards danger now. Here's why I also believe it's an honorable thing is because you aren't supposed to demand an applause as a police officer. I'm sorry. It's just like anything else. Fatherhood. Motherhood. Like to be a father, to be a mother is. Innately sacrifice. So when there are mothers and fathers who demand to be honored on like Mother's Day and Father's Day, that turns me off. I don't like that. And then the same thing as what a police officer you demand to be honored because you wear the badge, no part of the honorability of the badge is that you're willing to sweep a dungeon in silence. You're willing to do things without people seeing you and honoring you for and trusting. Hopefully that you would come to know God, but trusting that the Lord sees you do it and that that's good enough for you. And Pastor Philip Anthony Mitchell. He he exhorts and admonishes his flock at that church. Because of. The desire to pander to the culture with our actions and how that leads to death. It's leading to actual death. There was an incident in Kenosha where there was a black couple in a restaurant with their baby and they were confronted by police. Gently. The police confronted them and asked them, hey, we're looking for the suspects of a crime. Can you tell me, did you guys drive here? And then they got belligerent. The couple did. Why are you doing it? You know? And it turned to this big fight. The husband ended up getting slammed. He got sprayed, the wife got sprayed, they got separated from their child. All of this happened because they escalated the entire scenario just out of lack of respect for the human beings who were asking him the question. Now those cops were in search of people who had fled a hit and run, and they were told by eyewitnesses that it was a couple. And guess what? The very first question those cops asked was, did you drive here? I'm it's been a while since our that. But it involved their car. And that couple was sitting in a booth. Next to a window where right outside that window was their car and that couple, all they needed to do was point to the cops and say there's our car right there and that would have removed them from any potential suspect list. But they didn't do that. They weren't level headed, they they escalated the entire situation out of disrespect for the police because they, of course they were right as well. So that's doubly the disrespect. And and you know and and you don't have anybody you don't have. You don't have hard men who can disciple the next generation to say. Hey this is. How you ought to be a model citizen and now you have a hard man from a pulpit who did that and people jumped on his throat. So we're gonna spend our time the, the rest of our time just kind of looking at the comments section of that just to show the heart up behind it. Because I think that it's actually beneficial to know. I mean, biblically speaking, a gentle answer turns away. Wrath, but a harsh. Word stirs up anger and people get confronted by police and they only know harsh words. He told the truth, the biblical truth out of love, and it would spare the lives of many should they heed to it. But no, there are so many who are conditioned towards worldliness, and that's what they want. So let's look at some of this now first. I came across this. I came across this. Post. On the Instagram page of a woman named Lexie, and it seems like she's a gospel artist. I'm not familiar with her. This is her. Page. I'll let you see it and. This is this I I I'm going through the detail of showing you this because I don't wanna. I'm not slandering her, but we gotta use real situations here. Real situations. Lexie. Television is her name has almost 1,000,000 followers on Instagram. Her first thing in her bio is I love Jesus. And so one of the one of the fruits of soft men is creating a generation of Christians. Who hold to a. Form of religion, as Paul said, but deny its power. Hold to a form of religion, yet denied its power, and so when it comes down to holiness, when it comes down to a resembling of Jesus Christ, they don't realize that they that it's detestable to them to live for Christ's truly detested. Cool. To be called to holiness is truly detestable. Another question I would ask people to to know whether or not you have a healthy biblical ethic as a result of hard men is that do you welcome conviction? Do you welcome being cut by the scriptures? That is described to be a double edged sword. Do you welcome that knowing that it is for your good knowing that you are constantly on the spiritual operating table being conformed to the image of Christ? Do you welcome conviction, or are you merely looking for some type of growth that makes you feel good? Because the fast pastor, Phillip Anthony Mitchell, provided some conviction. Through the scriptures. And we have a sign here. Of soft men. In a Christian context. So I first thing I saw her page was this. It was this video of her advertising, a shirt that says I want the mind of Christ, but the body of a stripper. You don't need to slander a woman like this. All you need is a godly woman to train up this woman of God. To tell her. Hey, actually, modesty is an aspect of having the mind of Christ. Actually adorning yourself in good works is way better than having a body that turns eyes towards you. That makes them. Want to lust after you? All you need is an older, mature woman. To train her up. Do you know why you don't have a Titus 2 church? It starts at the softness of your men. And that's what we have. So this is the page of the person who disagrees and did dislike what Pastor Phillip Anthony Mitchell said. And so this is what she says to his clip. This is his clip playing here. I'm not gonna play the audio. You just listen to it. She says this quote just obey and you'll be OK. Theology is clown behavior, so she relegates with passion. Philip Anthony. Anthony Mitchell said to just obey and you'll be OK. He's preaching an entire sermon on obeying authority, and the only reason we obey authority is because it honors God. Against you and you alone, Lord, have I sinned. We see. You see how we neglect that reality, that Jesus really is just a mascot of our kind of behavior and our kind of songs that we sing and stuff like that, that this personal relationship and the recognition that he is Lord evades us. So she says, this black folks have been submitting, complying and minding our own melanin business and still getting killed. Philando Castile follow orders. Botham Jean was eating ice cream. A taciana Jefferson was babysitting. Elijah McLean was walking home. Tamir Rice was playing Ranisha McBride needed help. Amaud Arbery was jogging. Trayvon Martin was walking home with Skittles. Now I want to highlight this thing. There is a huge aspect of emotionalism and sentimentalism that goes into this narrative that's got black Americans following after lies. You know, there are still black Americans who believe that Kyle Rittenhouse, you know what? Who was the gentleman? I'm sorry the gentleman that killed another high schooler, Carmelo Anthony, the gentleman that killed. Told the Austin Metcalf in California, his families PR person or lawyer or whoever he is. He said that Kyle Rittenhouse killed 3 black people. And then said that he shot them in the back. Maybe I'm remembering that. He either said he shot them in the back or he killed 3 black people. But there are people who genuinely believe that Kyle Rittenhouse killed black people and it's because through emotionalism and the lies, people just jump onto false narrative trains. Well, I'm not. I'm not saying that everything she said in this list of people is false, but Ahmad Arbery was killed by civilians, tragic and they should be imprisoned. They are. Trayvon Martin was killed by a civilian. And what was his name? I forget George Zimmerman is not a police officer, so this doesn't fit. Now if you do put Trayvon Martin in there, if you do put Ahmad arberry in there who are killed by civilians, then her list would not be able to be contained on Instagram. When you think about the list of black Americans killed by black civilians. Because we don't respect authority. And we end up glorifying music that does that, that regurgitates the mentality of people being slain by other civilians, drug dealers, gang members, all of this stuff we proliferated. And so she's using this kind of racial narrative. To rebuke pass and pull up Anthony Mitchell for telling the truth. Biblically, she does not have the mind of Christ. And there are so many on this thread. That, that show that the Michael role says and just look at how y'all take them. White folks Bible and live by it. Now this is a gospel artist and her comments section she had. She's not responsible for people in her comment section but I don't know if Michael Rose knows this gospel artist but. He believes that the Bible belongs to white people. We are far away, far away. From what it ought to look like. Far away. This person hats off to him. Now that's major. I'm going to highlight his statement and just a couple more, he says. OK, so after commenting and being ****** by this clip, I watched the actual and full clips on YouTube and some key parts were edited out. That's unfortunate and dangerous. Talking to the point who posted this clip, you had key clips. That were edited out. You need to put it in context quote. With that considered his points, in my opinion are valid and biblical. Now I want to let this guy know in love. Your opinion doesn't matter. You could have left that out. Either it's objectively biblical or it's not. In the sermon he addresses the corruption of some parts of government and law enforcement, but at the same time he addresses our responsibility to be integrity our guests, to have integrity. Ohh and to be integrity LED in how we do life and how we do life from taxes to illegal parking and respecting authority and elders. It makes way more sense. In the actual video now, he goes on to say with that said, we must also know. Let me see here. We must also know the systemic imbalances and racial disparities in our constitutional structure. Now I'm going to go ahead and speculate on why he added that last part, because he knew that addressing that with Pastor Phillip, bathroom Mitchell said, was biblical. He's going to have the mob attack him, which they did in the comment section. So he had to get back on course and say, but, you know, America is out to get us y'all. He had to give the mob what they wanted. This woman says as a believer, some things really are just us not being slow to speak and using scripture to spiritually bypass practical actions. In this case, the practical action would be to mourn and lament with people enough to not sidestep injustice. With manipulation of the passage I I think that she's just far off base here. She's far off base, she says. Read the room. The pauses are my words here. When the pastor reads the room, you are literally putting the ears and the itching above, preaching the word in and out of season. See, when the wind looks like it doesn't want to hear what the scripture says, that's the out of season. You're still to preach the word. There was no tragedy that just happened at the hands of police. We did mourn and we continue to mourn those things. But when are people going to be trained? When are people going to be discipled? She's basically using an emotional argument to say stop discipling people so that they would live and flourish in this world. You can't listen to that. I'm going to stop there. But in addition to all of that, you had Israel Harton, who was a gospel artist. And he's like, Nah, that's a Nah for me. You had Jamie Foxx on there. That's like, what the F is this? And my question is. Who are y'all? Soft men. Hard men do not invoke themselves. They invoke the scriptures in the authority of Christ. Soft men invoke themselves. And say, hey, this is how you made me feel soft. We are the generation of soft men that came before us, and so we have hard times that are coming now. And my prayer is that in these hard times. The Lord brings us some hard men. Hopefully on the other side of that is the Lord's return. If it's not, it's going to bring some good times. But after those good times and I don't know the time frame of all these things. After those good times, the call of the church is to keep producing hard. Men keep producing hard men. That's our call. We follow after the hard guide, man, that's our call. Let's do it faithfully. Since thank you for listening to this episode of Black and Blue when you're guaranteed to hear one of two things. My humble opinion or the facts holler at Me.