From Seat to Street
The leaders of First Baptist Church Chaffee Campus dive deeper into the topics of Pastor Greg's Sunday morning sermon. The goal is to give you the tools necessary to take the message you hear on Sunday and apply it in your everyday lives.
From Seat to Street
The Primacy of the Gospel (Deuteronomy 3)
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Join Trey Overton, Mavric Herrera, and Sam Beavers as they reflect on Pastor Greg's Sunday sermon, continuing the Bible recap series. The church started reading the Bible chronologically together, and this sermon continued the series that dives deeper into the readings. During this episode, Trey, Mavric, and Sam shared some insight into their reading and reflected on Greg's sermon, that pointed out the fact that the Gospel is primary and that is seen through this experience with Moses and the rock. Trey, Mavric, and Sam discussed different points within the reading last week, along with recapping the sermon that Greg provided on the topic. Join in and reflect with us as we discuss the sermon from First Baptist Church in Fort Smith, AR.
Mavric Herrera - mherrera@fsfbc.org
Trey Overton - toverton@fsfbc.org
Psalm 119.11 says that Scripture is a lamp for our feet and a light for our path. That means God gave us His Word to guide and equip us in practical ways as we walk through our everyday lives. Join us now for this episode of From State to Street, as our FBC staff and church members talk about how this week's Sunday morning message comes alive as we walk through the streets and moments of everyday life.
SPEAKER_01Hey everyone, thanks for joining us. My name is Trey Overton, and I'm your host today, along with my good friend Maverick Carrera. Good afternoon. We have a special guest today. He's been on the podcast before and has been requested time and time again to rejoin us because, you know, they say you have a great radio voice.
SPEAKER_02Well, I don't I don't have a TV face. You usually get one or the other.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so this is my friend Sam Beavers here. Say hi, Sam. Hi guys, good to be here. I appreciate you guys having me on. Oh, yeah. Welcome back. And uh, but yeah, no, so we've had uh you ever since you came on last year, like, who is that guy? His name is Sam on the podcast, and he has like a great voice. Very good. That's like the most common comment. Like, they didn't say anything about the good stuff you had to say, just that your voice was great. No, I'm just kidding. Yeah, no kidding. Yeah, but but the voice spot on, right? So now um you know, Sam is Sam is uh kind of a newer member here, I guess. I mean he's been here a little while now, I guess, but um been uh he's a Chaffee campus goer um with me and Maverick. Um he's involved in the young adults um program and uh with Maverick. I'll call it a program. I don't know why that's okay. It's it's ministry ministry area. Anyways, so he's involved out there. Um he is a jack of all trades. Um if you need some insurance, this is your guy. Uh shameless plug. Shameless plug. It's all loud. Yeah, today it is. Uh I'll bill you later. Um so then this this past week, Greg used Deuteronomy three. Um just jumping straight into it. Use Deuteronomy three. Um, and and to point to number one, the primacy of the gospel, um, but this this overarching, like Moses, you know, got God punishes Moses, right, for um striking the rock instead of speaking to it. And um I think sometimes this this one right here is overlooked a lot, right? Uh we we did, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_01Uh there's a lot of people that do. We kind of overlooked this, and um, you know, Greg stopped and used this and looked, you know, took a second to look at it and like, why was this, you know, punishment so severe? Um, and so he took this opportunity to talk about uh what this represented and all that stuff. So, like before we get any further, what are some initial thoughts on uh the sermon on Sunday?
SPEAKER_02Well, I think Greg did such a wonderful job outlining the the purpose of the text, which is the instructions of Christ are important, the instructions that God give us matter. We are not allowed to take liberty with those. And and he outlined the importance of the gospel, that this is the primary thing that we do. We do a lot of stuff as a church, but at its core, our goal and our job is to make sure the gospel gets to as many places as we possibly can. And and Greg did such a wonderful job explaining that, uh, and almost challenging us as believers, you know, uh in what we do in our daily lives and how that impacts the the the things that happen for the kingdom. And are we doing God's work the way God says he wants it done, which is outlined in this text.
SPEAKER_01Right. No, I uh yeah, 100%. I mean, the gospel comes first and everything, and he and Greg says this often, you know, but his his statement is there's people dying in the river valley every day and going to hell, all over the world, every day and going to hell, and and we don't make that a priority in our lives. Why? Why? I mean, and and and we're overlooking God's our overarching plan for his people, just as Moses did in this moment, like God gave him specific instruction, why so that so that he could God could take this moment and point to Christ, but Moses didn't take that moment, right? Um, so I 100% agree with that. Um Maverick, what were your initial thoughts on all this?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I really liked the call, the call to it, the call to evangelism, the call for everything that we do, and just kind of recentering us and refocusing us to remind us of like why we're going out and chaffing in the first place and why we're not just starting a church over there because we have the money, you know, and because we have the space, and oh there's we know there's a there's a big building over there, there's a big plot of land, so let's go make a church. It's like no, it's the the purpose of it was not even just to make a church on the land, it's to share the gospel with the river valley and making sure that everyone has a place where they can grow and be discipled and can be then be sent out and again further the gospel even more. Like I hope that's I hope that's really clear from that to from Sunday's message. Right. Um, is that everything that we do, everything we do in our lives, in our daily lives, and how especially like if we go to work, like it's not the the gospel is not just for the professionals of working in ministry and sharing it with other people, it's for the layperson that is working in in insurance, selling insurance like Sam. And there's ways that Sam can share the gospel while selling insurance. You know, it's by the way he conducts himself, by the way he does his business. People will notice that there's something different about him because the gospel frames all of his work. Everything he's doing is for the gospel, and so I think having that mindset um was the big thing that that hit me today was just in everything I do, not just during office hours and not just on Sunday mornings, everything I need to be doing it should be framed by the gospel.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, and and I think you're spot on there. I I've been I'm not gonna say confronted. I've had some questions, you know, here recently about like, especially as we work through this Bible, Bible recap, as people are reading their Bible, it's an awesome thing. We're we're seeing people's relationship with Christ grow, their understanding of God and and who he is, he's revealing himself more, and this is this is a great thing. And as people do this and as the relationship's growing, God's stern in their hearts and they want to do more in ministry, right? They want to be able to do more. There, they feel like, man, I'm ready in my walk with Christ to go that step further. Um, and I think so many people want when they think that, when they go through that experience with God, they all of a sudden want to go into the ministry, right? And it's like, um A, only so many, you know, there's God calls certain people, like it's a specific thing to go into vocational ministry. But B, I try to tell people too, like, when I was growing up, that was kind of my thought too, right? I wanted, you know, and and I did have a specific call into vocational ministry, but you know, that's what I wanted to be, I want to be able to, you know, share the gospel the rest of my life. Like that was my goal, right? Still is. But once you actually get into vocational ministry, you don't realize like when you work in a church, 95% of people I talk to on every day, interact with on a every daily basis are churchgoers. I don't, I don't get to, I I I I don't interact with people of this world anymore very often. Like I'm I'm surrounded, which is a great thing. I'm able to work with people that go here, but I as far as evangelism goes, I mean Maverick, you can you know, you're you're right there with me. Like we yeah, we interact with people that go here, and so our evangelism is limited. Whereas like if you have a job like Sam has where you're able to talk to um literally, you get to talk to people for a living and get to talk to different people who are likely, I mean, you know, a good chunk of them are not believers, you have the opportunity to share the gospel. Um, and so and this is just me going on a rant right now. So, you know, take that for what's worth. But if you're listening right now and you've been going through this Bible recap and God's stirring on your heart to do more, um, don't think of that do more as, oh, I've all of a sudden got to I've got to do something with someone. I've got to go, or I've got to go and I've got to go on a mission trip to go to Africa to share the gospel. No, like God wants to use you where you are. You know, are you an insurance salesman? Are you a um do you wait tables at a restaurant? You know, do you work in a hospital as a nurse? Do you what do you do that God has you placed where you are where you can share the gospel and represent him? Because take this, you know, in this text is Moses, where he's God gives Moses this opportunity to point to Christ in the future, right? Um, and he has this opportunity to speak into the rock and and do this. Well, God's placed you in a rock in front of you, right? Christ. We have Christ. He's already come, resurrected, all that stuff. You know, we have that to share with people the gospel. And he's presented us with opportunity, whatever your opportunity is, you know, are you using your platform? And so I think this this sermon this week kind of just highlighted that very well. Like, just as Moses had an opportunity here to point to Christ, you have an opportunity right now, wherever you are. It doesn't, you don't have to go to Africa to share the gospel, you don't have to go do this vocation, you know, like where does God have you placed right now? Yeah, he may He may move you eventually, He may put you in a ministry, He may do something eventually, and that He may lead you in that direction. But right now He has you somewhere. Don't overlook that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And for the like listeners who missed the Sunday sermon, can we kind of explain why, like why Moses striking the rock or spee versus speaking to the rock either does or doesn't point to Christ?
SPEAKER_02Well, first Corinthians chapter 10 makes it very evident as the story's retold in the New Testament. Uh it's it's explicitly stated the rock was a picture of Christ. So God has this master plan, and he's gonna use the rock to teach the people of Israel about the coming Messiah. Um Moses becomes impatient with the people of Israel. He's already struck the rock once. Christ doesn't need to be struck again. We don't have to put him back on the cross. He was crucified once for all, and that's the idea. The next time we go, we don't strike the rock again. God says, speak to the rock. Moses is in a bad place mentally. He lets his emotions get the better of him. His emotionalism crowds out the obedience to the gospel, which is what God said, and how often do we do that also? God not only wants us to be obedient and to do what he says, but to do it how he says to do it. This is why we we must take a regulative view as opposed to a normative view of the things that we do, of worship, of everything. Do what God said do, the way God said do it. The consequences of that are Moses is now no longer allowed to enter the promised land. Yeah. This great thing that he's worked his whole life for. He's brought these people up, and God said there's consequences there. And to what you were saying earlier, um, the the question is, is God evil? Is is God harsh for drawing down such a hard judgment upon Moses in the moment? Right.
SPEAKER_01Well, and and let's just let's take that a step further. Like, do you think I mean I obviously we shouldn't be like it's what who are we to question God on how severe his punishments are? So like this just I I I'm aware of that when I ask this question, right? But let's look at the severity of this punishment, right? Does it seem out of character for God at all to be this harsh after him being so um lenient on the Israelites themselves, you know, in this whole time and Moses being an intercessor, right?
SPEAKER_03So forgiving, yeah. Right.
SPEAKER_01Does it seem a little out of character for God in this moment to punish Moses?
SPEAKER_02Well, I think we falsely look at that, right? And in reality, what we should say is, oh my goodness, the grace of God. That A, Moses walks away from this rock. And B, water still flows. Yeah. I mean, God, God shows that, hey, I'm still gonna make water flow. I think the warning here is that if you do work in ministry, there's a there's a sensational warning that the standard you are held to is a little bit higher. God's details matter. Um it it this the misrepresentation before the people is a serious offense to the Lord. Yeah. And the fact that Moses isn't struck down immediately shows God's immense and incredible grace. Right, right.
SPEAKER_01100%. Yeah, I mean, uh we have to look at what the title of this sermon kind of points to to this the primacy of the gospel, like how it is primary to everything we do. And it was primary, not just after Christ came, right? It was primary, like it was it was comes first even in this point in Moses. That's how important this was to God that Moses come and speaks to the rock. And why was it important that he speaks to the rock? And for those of you that didn't hear the sermon or are questioning that, it was important that he speak to the rock because you know, just like we speak, we speak that we believe, right? We believe in Christ as the rock.
SPEAKER_03It's almost the same idea as the bronze serpent.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, exactly. So I mean, like, just right, and this so let's take this. This is the second time, right? Or this is you know, a second time second prophesied. Right of of Jesus. And so in this 40 years of them being in the wilderness, there's two times, right, that that that we see here, and I think you know, we we could even go a stretch further than that, more than that, but there's two primary times in in in the 40 years they're in the wilderness that God points to Christ. That's kind of interesting, right? In in the the couple thousand years that we have, you know, in a span between between then and and and when Christ comes, it's like in the 40 years in this small span, God points to Christ twice. Isn't that interesting? And and and uses like real imagery. Real in, you know, we have the we have the serpent, and that's pointed to whenever obviously in the New Testament reference, we have the rock that's pointed to, but you know, speak to the rock just as like we can call out and confess Christ as our Lord and Savior, and then we have everlasting water that He, you know, as is reference. Um so like that's how important. And it's interesting. Why do you think, and and this is this is kind of I I didn't have y'all ready for this, but why do you think that is? Why do you think God spent that time and while they're in the 40 years in the wilderness, why choose that time to use this imagery like the imagery like that for Christ?
SPEAKER_02Well, I think part of it is because at this time the people are the people are beat down and they're weak, which typically makes you more receptive. When things are going well, I'm not as receptive to the to the things that God has for me as I am when I'm pretty broken. I think that's probably part of it. Um I think another part of it is that just in the in the lifeline of church history, this is a pivotal moment. As the people are about to enter into the the promised land that God has has promised them, they've been walking around for all this time. Um this this is a major a major point in history, and it's a good time for God to interject and say, Um, let me show you a little bit about what's coming because you you're gonna have to have faith in that. Yeah. And and it's gonna propel you through.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah. I think it's interesting that like it may I know I'm might reading too much into it, but you know, it's two times instead of three times, and oftentimes we see any time there's a reference to Christ, it's usually like in threes. God lurks a lot in threes. So I think it's interesting that it's done in twos to show like the that that this promise is still yet to be accomplished. Like this is I can see that you know it's not quite there yet, but it's it's still pointing to two usually points to three, you know.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, we could stretch, I mean, you could stretch I'm not gonna say it's a stretch, it's not a stretch at all. Um, but a third imagery would be the Ark of the Covenant. I mean, that's there's a three there. I mean, really, I mean, if we if we you know, you could bring that in too.
SPEAKER_03And the Ark was but the Ark was like the presence, you know. Like this is God with us here now, so it's almost like that was the completion right could say.
SPEAKER_01Um, but I definitely I I could see what definitely where you're going with that too. Um I think there's a lot of when I look at it, I'm like, man, there's the Ark of the Covenant comes in, you know, you have the sacrifice and the blood, you know, all that stuff, and then that's all imagery that points to Christ, right? Um and he's the because he is the final sacrifice, right? Um, and then we have the snake that you know that comes in, and we have this, the rock that comes in, and then all this imagery that is pointed to Christ in this small period of time, that short, you know, 40 year span. Um I think number one, the law is introduced, so I think that's pretty important, right? So so the law is introduced, um, and the cut, you know, what the Ark of the Covenant comes in, and so I think it's important that he introduced Christ because he's introducing the law. Like, we're gonna need Christ. I mean, you're giving you the law, under, you know, and and I'm just thinking in my head, like, you're not gonna be able to fulfill all of this, you're not gonna be able to do all this, you're gonna fail, and this is why all this sacrifice is needed. So I'm gonna point to Christ and I'm gonna go ahead and show you what's gonna come so that this is this is what I'm gonna give you for now until Christ comes. Now, obviously, that's not there, but it is there, you know. We know later. I'm just talking about it's not there in Deuteronomy. Um, but uh the other thing too, I think I just I'm like, man, as I look and and he's putting all this imagery and this 40 years, and it's like um I think another way he could be pointing to it is is like I'm sending you, you know, I promised Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, like I'm sending you to the promised land. I'm you know, we're giving you, you know, I promised your uh these I have this covenant and all this other stuff. Um I'm sending you into the promised land, but this is only your temporary promised land. So like they're thinking short-sighted, I'm going to this promised land, land flowing of milk and honey, we're gonna have all this, we're gonna do everything's gonna be great. Big grapes, big grapes, yeah, big grapes, my favorite part of it, but this is just a temporary promised land, right? Right. Um, and and I'm gonna send you somebody that's gonna give you an eternal promised land. Um, so I don't know. So that was some that was some thoughts I had on that. Um so what do you think in this moment in this rock, you know, what do you think he was truly trying to accomplish? You know, we've kind of pointed to the gospel, we've kind of talked around it a little bit. What do you think specifically he was trying to accomplish through Moses? Who's he? Oh God.
SPEAKER_03Yes. Um, I think he was trying to accomplish like well, it's kind of hard not to make it about the gospel.
SPEAKER_01Um no, I'm not saying you can make it about the gospel, I'm just saying, like, we've talked around it a little bit, so let's just hit the nail on the head.
SPEAKER_03What it what what is he trying to accomplish through Moses? Yeah, so God is trying to show the people, you know, point to Christ, Christ being the rock and being the source of everlasting life. He's trying to show that through through Moses, um sorry, through Moses, he's trying to show the people where their everlasting life comes from. Yeah. You know, it's still coming from God at at the end of the day. And so and so my God using Moses to to try and explain that into point two that we can see that God's faithfulness is never gonna change and God's still gonna be sending somebody, God's still going to be taking care of them all throughout this all like just like he has, he's going to eventually then send a savior who's going to bring, like we're talking about, that everlasting life and that that flowing water that you drink, you're never thirsty again.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Um I well, if if you if you go down this hole where you have the rock as the imagery of Christ and it's struck once and it's spoken to the second time, that's at least the idea. Um I think what it's what it's trying to show the people of Israel is that your salvation, the water, comes from the rock. Yeah. That this comes from one place and it's done one way. Yeah. There's not multiple ways to do this. It's done one way. Moses' sin was not merely striking the rock, his sin was striking at the character of God and saying that I can do this thing however I want. And that is the sin. So I I think what he's showing is look, just rely on my words, rely on the gospel and nothing else. Yeah. And the sin is relying on something else.
SPEAKER_01No, I I think I think that's spot on. I think that's spot on my question is do you think if Moses would have spoken to the rock, you know, we can only obviously speculate at this point. But if Moses would have spoken to the rock and water would have came out, do you think God would have prophesied, literally prophesied Christ at that moment?
SPEAKER_03You're talking about like had spoken been like, I'm talking about Jesus Christ. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Like, um, maybe clearly Moses interrupts the plan that God has. Right. However, whatever God's plan was, it's interrupted by Moses. Right. Um, I I think we could come up with a whole lot of questions about what would have happened, the hypotheticals around it.
SPEAKER_03I mean, we again see that sin leads to death. That's right. Like on like Moses' death. Moses' the the perform the promise not being given to him anymore. You know, like that's kind of a death in my head.
SPEAKER_01Well, instead of the imagery, and and I think that and and I'm gonna answer my own question here, but you know, I I think we see an imagery here that maybe was the could have been the intention the whole time. I I don't know. But when Moses struck the rock, there was a rejection of the rock. And if you reject Christ, you were rejected from the promised land. So at the end of the day, you know, you know, God's not gonna allow Moses to go into the promised land. Why? After he's at the end of the day, Moses is now the imagery of what happens when you don't speak when you don't profess the name of Christ, right? Right. Um so I don't know.
SPEAKER_02I think I think this is a case study in where responsibility lies. We see this a lot. Um if if you are a a pastor, if you're in a a position of authority, okay, the gospel does not create margin, it removes it. Yeah, the standards a little bit higher. So you have to answer that, you have to live up to that. Public sin has public consequences, which uh Moses uh has here. Um and and I think the responsibility For us, is as lay people, for me, is you know, I sit under godly teaching on a weekly basis. So if if the teaching is incorrect, then Greg has to answer for that before God.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02But his teaching is correct. Yeah. Therefore, I'm now responsible for its obedience. Moses didn't mishear God. No. He didn't misinterpret it. No. He just blatantly ignored it. And when you ignore the very words of the true and living God, you have to answer for that. Yeah. And so I think the that there should be a great amount of humility as we approach the text as lay people, as well as people in positions of authority. How often do we see this that pastors, you know, they sin and this becomes a major public event. Yeah. You must guard yourself. You must be careful.
SPEAKER_01Right. So so that that kind of leads me to my next question. You know, we we are presented with opportunities all the time to present the gospel, right? We're presented with opportunities again. God instructs us, number one, to do that, right? We we are committed as followers to share the gospel. Like that's just if you think that you're just gonna accept Christ and just live a life free of sharing that, like you're missing out on what the God or what the Bible tells us that we're supposed to do, right? We are we are instructed to share the gospel, to make disciples of all nations. Um and when we don't, we're a lot like Moses, right? We're rejecting what God tells us to do, right? Am I wrong? You're spot on. So how do we prevent prevent ourselves? And so well, well, let me let me just stop a second before I finish this question. And Moses here, when he strikes a rock, he doesn't, he's not going out there, and I there's speculations and people that say all kinds of different things and crazy things, but at the end of the day, Moses was emotionally upset, right? He was angry because the Israelites, once again, are not trusting God, right? And once again, the Israelites are not listening to him, not listening to God, and they're still they're once again whining. Now, I we were in a meeting yesterday and I was talking about the story, but you know, my kid, he he I I think it was a baseball tee the other day, you know, he is telling me that it's not working, it's not working, he's not being able to get it to work right, you know, whatever. And I will and I I'm yelling, I'm working, I was I was put I was messing with fish and reels in my shop and I was working on something, and I was like, dude, uh you've done it a million times, I've showed you how to do it. Just go in there and like like pull it up, you need to adjust it right, whatever. And he wasn't doing it, so I go out there and I pull on it and then I break it. Because I'm frustrated. I break it. Yeah, like it may have already been broken a little bit, but I truly broke it. So then I had to spend the next hour refitting a new base for this baseball tee, right? And and because of my frustration, and this is this is Moses in this moment, right? He's like, dude, I'm super frustrated. Like he's missing the detail that God gives him because of how frustrated he is. Um, we miss things all the time, and not because we're frustrated, maybe sometimes because we're frustrated, but because we're selfish, we're busy with our own things. I'm I'm thinking that I'm supposed to be over here when God has me where I am, and I'm supposed to speak to this person, right? And and we're we we miss opportunities all the time to share the gospel. We do, we truly do. Like, I don't I if you sit here and you're listening right now and you say, No, I shared every opportunity, you miss opportunities. You get busy, you get frustrated, you get one-tracked minded, whatever, and you miss opportunities to share the gospel. How can we begin to work harder and how can we be intentional about not missing these opportunities like Moses did here? Can I give you something real practical?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, okay. That's what I'm looking for. This is this is the biggest thing that I see, and we do the exact same thing Moses did. God said, uh speak, Moses struck. Okay. We do the same thing. The greatest, most clear, concise commandment that God gives Christians today is in the Great Commission. He says, go and tell. Somewhere along the line, man, I don't know when we did this, but at some point we took go and tell and switched it into come and see. Yeah. Oh, 100%. We want to we want to ship off that responsibility. Hey, I don't need to go and tell you because hey, I don't really know it, yeah, which is the first problem. Yeah, but there's a pastor over here, Greg knows it, so why don't you just come and see and we'll invite you to church? Yeah. And I'm not I'm not against inviting people to church. I think we should do that. But you must be capable of going and telling. Yeah. And you don't have to know much, man. Greg talked about this someday. Oh, yeah. Just repeat what he says at the invitation. I I think about the man who is demon-possessed, and Jesus took the demons out and cast them into the pigs, and then he said, Let me follow you. And Jesus said, No, you go back to the Decapolis where you're from. You go tell people what just happened. Yeah. What does that guy know about the gospel? Right. He knows that he was in a bad spot and then he met this guy named Jesus, and now everything's better. Right. So he's more than equipped. You don't have to have a seminary degree to obey the gospel and to go and tell I can't encourage people enough. You know enough. Just tell people about Jesus.
SPEAKER_03It's your story. There's a reason that God has given you your story, and you are the only one that can communicate your story. Yeah. You know? And so like there's a reason. There's a reason you have like I oftentimes look at my own story and I'm like, I don't want to tell people that. Yeah. That's so boring. I didn't get demons cast out of me. I was raised in church. Yeah. I didn't get demons cast out of me. I wasn't healed miraculously. Like I was raised in church with my dad being a pastor, and I didn't even follow Jesus until I was 18 and realized that I was living my life for crap and not actually lit following Christ. And one day I was like, you know what? I need to start doing that. And then I started doing that, and everything has been, you know, amazing.
SPEAKER_02And so I'm like, Well, we act like the gospel is miraculous.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02We act like the fact that that I was a sinner destined for hell from the moment of my conception. I was born in sin. I was raised in sin, and for whatever reason, God saw fit to reach through the the depth of eternity and and pluck me. We act as if that's not incredible because I didn't have X happen to me before. And how incredible is the gospel, regardless.
SPEAKER_01Well, and even you're just you your small testimony you gave there at Maverick. It's good stuff. That small, that small testimony right there, you are proof that Christ works in our lives. Like that's proof. Even if I all I have to say is that, man, I had a void in my life, I decided to follow Christ, and he gave me purpose. That's proof. Before I even present the re the truth of the gospel, before I even present the truth of the gospel, that small piece is that a proof that he exists, he is living, and he is working. Boom.
SPEAKER_02It's pretty good.
SPEAKER_01That's amazing. Okay. Now let's just share. Okay, and we because I follow Hibbin, or hop hippin, and because I follow him, I get to have eternal life with him.
SPEAKER_02That's right.
SPEAKER_01And and then I I in ten seconds there, you shared the gospel. Yeah. Like it and you're no matter what your testimony is, no matter what it is, it it has you are proof. If you are a follower of Christ, no matter where your testimony is, no matter what what happened, you know, whether you know you were a terrible person and then you found Christ and became a great person, or or maybe you came to know Christ at a young age. No matter who you are, before you knew Christ, before you were a follower of Christ, you lived life without purpose. Yeah. And then once you found Christ, you live with purpose. Period. And you are living proof.
SPEAKER_03I was once a child of wrath, and I am a slave to righteousness.
SPEAKER_01That's right. And so you are living proof that he exists and that he is alive and working. And so use that. I mean, it's that simple. I mean, we want to make this, you know. I grew up, you know, I grew up in church. I tell people that I was a drug baby. My mama drugged me to church every Sunday, every Wednesday. Like I oh, that's not a few minutes. Yeah. So I grew up knowing the gospel, right? And and just because I grew up knowing going to church and knowing who God was, you know, obviously I had to come to my own realization and and submit it to him. But even though I grew up in all of that, that doesn't mean, and just because I didn't grow up with this crazy story or whatever, this and have this crazy testimony, that doesn't mean my testimony isn't just as powerful. Right. My testimony is powerful because my mom taught me, and now I can tell my kid, and I have a generational um uh testimony to how Christ works in our lives and how he's living and he's breathing. And and so, anyways, I see all that say.
SPEAKER_02Reminded me of a uh Spurgeon quote if sinners be damned, uh at least let them leap to hell over our dead bodies. There you go. I like it. How how serious are we gonna be about this thing? Let's leap over our dead bodies.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, oh a hundred percent. Like and and there again, it it's that simple, guys. And and uh I know it can be intimidating. I know it can be intimidating because you feel like, well, they're gonna have questions and I don't know that I can answer them. It's okay. Then you invite them to church, then you say, hey, let me figure that out. Hey, I don't know. It's okay to not know everything. The fact that you don't know everything means that you're searching. And if you're searching, you're looking for truth, and the truth will be revealed to you. Now we're in the time to come. So um I want to thank everybody for listening. I want to encourage you if you don't have a church home. I would love for y'all to come visit us. Um, Sam does not try to sell you an insurance policy on your first handshake.
SPEAKER_02I promise I won't do that.
SPEAKER_01It's the second one where he usually starts to try to throw that in. So the second one will get you. Yes, the second one will get you. So um don't don't be nervous that we're all of a sudden gonna start trying to sell you some roll-ups. So um no, it if if you don't have a church home, I encourage you to come come see us. Um I want to uh just extend that invite. If you're curious on how to share your testimony, if you want, if you have questions about that, um I'm gonna put me and Maverick's links in the uh emails in the bio. Um reach out to us. Reach out to us, ask us, you know, how maybe maybe ask for some advice on on what's the best way to share your testimony. We'd love to get with you. I mean, we we I'm not gonna pretend to be an expert, but I'm gonna be an expert at trying. You know, I'm not you know, I'm not gonna say I'm batting a thousand, but I'm gonna put some effort out there, right? And that's all we're asking. So if you have any questions, um please reach out. Um, and uh, we would love to see you on a Sunday. Um we want to thank everybody for listening, and we are out later.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for joining us for this week's From Seat to Street Conversation. This podcast is the Ministry of First Baptist Church, Fort Smith. As a reminder, you can always listen to each of the messages we discuss here on our chapter and first sermon podcast each week. Thank you for listening.