Make Heaven Crowded

Paul's Letter to the American Church | Make Heaven Crowded Ep. 41

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In this episode of Make Heaven Crowded, we ask a challenging question: If Paul were writing a letter to the American Church today, what would he say?

Using Romans 6 as our foundation, we explore Paul's call to die to sin, live in the freedom of Christ, and become slaves to righteousness rather than slaves to sin. In a culture that celebrates self, comfort, and compromise, Paul's words are just as relevant today as they were nearly 2,000 years ago.

We discuss where the modern American church has drifted from biblical Christianity and what it looks like to faithfully follow Jesus in a world pulling us in the opposite direction.

We dive into questions like:

• What does it mean to be a slave to righteousness?
• How does Romans 6 challenge cultural Christianity?
• Where has the American church compromised with the culture?
• Can grace become an excuse for ongoing sin?
• What does genuine obedience to Christ look like today?

Whether you've been following Jesus for years or you're just beginning your faith journey, we hope this episode encourages you to examine your heart, pursue holiness, and live fully surrendered to Christ.

🎙️ Make Heaven Crowded – Episode 41
📖 Scripture: Romans 6
✝️ Topics: Romans, Sanctification, Holiness, Grace, The American Church, Christian Living
🌐 Learn more at teamfbc.info

SPEAKER_00

Welcome to the Make Heaven Crowded Podcast. I'm Pastor Jordan. Joined with Pastor Roger, Pastor Luke. Pastor Luke, you preached on Sunday. I did. You did. You did a fine job. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01

I'm just glad we can see Roger this week.

SPEAKER_02

I was here last week.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, but I wasn't seen. You were not seen. Yeah. And so it's good to see. Explain that. What happened? You know what? There's just a camera. Technical difficulty. Technical difficulties. But you know what? The sound was still there. You know what? You have a radio face.

SPEAKER_02

And uh no, I mean I I was content. And I uh you know, I listen to podcasts. I never watch podcasts ever. Uh-huh. And so mainly because most of my podcast listening, I do driving from A to B. Um of course the only podcast I listen to every day is the Matt Wall Show. And his podcast is just him talking for an hour, looking into the camera. So I don't I don't need to see Matt and they don't need to see me. So I think they do.

SPEAKER_00

I'm glad you're visual now. Good. Yeah. Hope you're in difficulty, but the sound was still working. Sound working. Well that created a personal difficulty for us. That did. That actually got a lot of that got cut out. So a lot of people did not see. You cut out the multiple rounds of multiple rounds. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

No, to me, the follow-up rounds were actually way funnier than the actual act itself. Yeah. Um because well, because you had to go right back into see it. Because it stopped right at the moment happened. We won't even say what it was. The moment happened at C It as you start talking about uh screw tape tape letters. The demon named Screwtape. And so then he so he had to repeat, all right, all right, we're gonna do one more time. Start back up with C.S. Lewis. And then it just it was like Or just one of the look at what's the shameful plug of go and listen to it. It's the example I gave. When you're in high school and something happens that's funny, but it's not like the funniest thing ever. But the moment the teacher says stop laughing or stop talking and it's silent, it's 10,000% funny way funny. You cannot and then the teacher sends you to the office and you're like, I couldn't help it. That's where we were.

SPEAKER_01

Do you think you'd be any more mature now if you had to go back and do high school, or would you just be the same?

SPEAKER_02

I think ministry has forced me to be mature in certain ways, but no, I think I think, and this is my philosophy on this, and and some people may be offended by this. I don't think there's an age, in my opinion, where farts stop being funny. I think that's a weird example. Why'd you use that example? Well, because that's what happened last week. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00

We did want to say it a minute ago, but now we just I just imagine myself in a nursing home.

SPEAKER_02

I've got a roommate, like I'm 87 years old, like I've got a nurse, all this stuff's going on. And it happens. I don't know how 87-year-old Roger doesn't just start die laughing. I don't understand. And people that are like, that's immature, that's not funny. I genuinely question like what do you find like do you laugh at Big Bang Theory? Like, what do you find funny if you don't think that is funny? Like, they probably think Will and Grace is the funniest show ever if they don't think farting is funny. That's that's that's my so long. Yeah. Did you think Big Bang Theory was funny? Never watched it.

SPEAKER_00

Did you think it was funny? It was funny. But I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd rather watch Leslie Nielsen fart in an interview. Absolutely. What about Friends? Friends was funny. I I didn't get it.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, Friends is actually more unfunny than Big Bang Theory. That's not, I mean, I've never seen Big Bang Theory, so I can't give an opinion.

SPEAKER_00

Oh man, Friends is Big Bang, though, is just silly funny, but Leslie Nielsen farting in an interview or in a movie is always Naked Gun.

SPEAKER_02

You've never seen Naked Gun. No. Airplane legend.

SPEAKER_00

Anyways, wherever there are interviews with Leslie Nielsen that he is in an interview, like supposed to be serious about a show, and then he literally, on purpose, farts or makes a fart sound just cuts. This is well, this is what people want to know.

SPEAKER_02

Imagine the 1980s FBC podcast having this conversation. We're here with Dr. Bob Taylor. Like hey, there's nothing funnier than a good dude. Like what has happened to this leadership? I was about to ask what your top three favorite shows are. Like television shows. Yeah. Oh man, that's a great question. That really is a solid question. What would okay? Let's not do top three. It's gonna take too long. What is your number one favorite all-time show? Top gear. UK. You talked about that a lot. What about you? Um Survivor, Criminal Mind? Survivor. Big Brother. Um why is that funny? I always like Hawaii 50. That's good. I never watched it. No, Michael Scott from The Office, and and that really is usually my benchmark to tell someone's sense of humor. Ask them if they've watched The Office. If their answer is yeah, and I didn't think it was funny, you can dismiss that person. If they think it's funny, then that's somebody that you can have. I thought it was kind of funny. Yeah, so that's someone you keep around at a distance, basically. Which makes sense. Yeah. The issue with The Office is people watch the first season and they give up because the first season's not that good. Season two, three, and four, I don't see how anyone doesn't find that funny. So, anyways, that that that's my my view on uh on humor. We we could we could have this entire show because you want to know. Now I yeah, I said the office. Now I want to know. I thought you were just asking him. What do you think the funniest movie of all time is? Funniest movie? This is where we incriminate ourselves. Oh I'll tell I'll tell mine first because I think it's PG 13. What about Bob with Bill Murray is the funniest movie of all time. Never seen it. It's pretty funny. It is so funny.

SPEAKER_00

Never seen it. Man. Funniest movie. Because that I already kind of gave away my Leslie Nielsen stuff. And because those are Airplane? Yeah, probably fantastic to dumb and dumber. I mean, it's hard not to see Napoleon Dynamite. Yeah, I mean, there's uh Napoleon Dynamite's another funny one. I mean, that's a hard one to pick.

SPEAKER_02

Napoleon Dynamite, though, is the first time I watched it, I was angry at how unfunny it was, and then I watched it again. Like maybe I'm like, oh, I get it now because like it's it's supposed to be dumb. Like, yeah, it's a great movie.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah. There's those movies I just every time I watch them, no how many, no matter how many times I still giggle, you know. Even the new Naked Gun, I was just giggling all the way to watching it. Liam Neeson? Yeah, he did good. It was just a constant giggle. Caitlin all the way through watching.

SPEAKER_02

You guys are mentioned ones I've never seen. Caitlin and I went to the new Naked Gun last year with Liam Neeson, and we're at a relatively full theater, it's in Lebanon, and nobody is laughing. And I am like wheezing, like I'm crying. And Caitlin's like, get yourself together. And I almost want to turn around and be like, Do you guys not think this is funny? Like, what is going on here? They probably wouldn't laugh if I farted. So, like, you know.

SPEAKER_00

There's a similar my sister and dad went to go see Dumb and Dumber in the theaters. From 19 the original. The original. And it was one of my sister's embarrassing moments of her life that my dad was laughing so hard he started snorting. She's just like, See, I don't snore to wheeze.

SPEAKER_02

He died. I mean, I was wheezing.

SPEAKER_01

I've only heard you wheeze a couple of times.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Well, I did last week. But no, I would that during that naked gun, you would think, like, does this guy have sleep at? Like, is it what's going on over here? I mean, I sounded like a tea kettle. And meanwhile, everyone else watching the movie is just like they're watching days of our lives. It's like, okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I think this is funny. So how do we connect that to Roman 6? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00

I don't either. We don't. Well, we had to connect it back to last week's podcast of what happened, the multiple meltdowns that got cut. Jaden. Should have left those in. We're going to it seemed like it was over real quick, and we had multiple rounds where we couldn't keep it together.

SPEAKER_02

So see, I was gone for a month, and you guys had like good episodes. You wouldn't you went and interviewed some buff guy.

SPEAKER_01

That's the most viewed episodes we've had.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, because I don't know if that's true. But if we're gonna throw it out there, it would make sense though, because people that work out a lot probably look up on YouTube, and so I could see why that would the search algorithm and all that. But but uh anyway, so you you concluded Romans chapter six, of course, going into Romans 7, which which is up this Sunday, but the conclusion of Romans 6, basically, um Paul is talking about the power of sin, and that um for for all of humanity on the surface, sin is our master, sin controls us. Sin is the compass in which we live our life, but yet when salvation comes, when we are justified, Jesus is savior, we then have the opportunity to look at sin and say that sin, you no longer have power. You you are no longer my master. That's basically what Paul is saying here.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, and so right there in the first part of six, you just summarized it really well. He he tells us we're justified in Romans 6, 1 through 14. And as we've talked about, justified means justified never sin. What that means is penalty, your penalty for sin is no more. You have been saved. The penalty of sin equals death. Well, now because we are justified through Christ, we no longer have that penalty because it was paid for by Jesus. Now, what he moves into in the back half of six, and he uses a great literary technique there in verse 15, and he repeats a question that he kicks off chapter six with. But he changes it just a little bit. But he uses the same format. So listen to these differences. You know, Romans 6 1, he says, What shall we say then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means. That's his transition from talking in chapter 5 about how, hey, you can't outsend God's grace. Like you, the gr his grace is always going to be greater than your sin because of the work of Christ on the cross. And so they're like, Okay, if grace is good, sin is bad, should we go on sinning? And he's proposing this question as if they are going to be asking great lawyer technique, asking them this question before they even get to it. Um, and so uses that form of the question. Now in 15, repeats it a little differently. He says, What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law, but under grace? And again, he says, by no means. And so what he lays out for them in the first part six, like, hey, because you're no longer under the law, you're under the law of grace. You guys have to understand that's why you don't have a penalty, that's why you are justified. Well, then they're saying, Well, if we're not under the law and we're under grace, can we go on sinning then? And he's still like trying to get to him, like, no, you guys are missing the point. And that's what he tells them in the first part the penalty paid for. Now, the back part of six, the power of sin is no longer reigning over your life. You now have a new master. And the whole part, the whole theme of this back part of six is him showing them, hey, no longer are you a slave to sin, you are now a slave to righteousness because sin is not your master anymore. Jesus is your master. And the way we would put that is Jesus is our Lord. And so that's what he unpacks in the back half of chapter six.

SPEAKER_00

I like your analogy of Dumbo. Even though I'd never seen the movie, wasn't ever allowed to watch Disney, but um it it worked really well. Being the as a small elephant, they're shackled to a tiny little post that they're able that keeps them in check as when they're small, but as they grow bigger, that little post would have been nothing for the element elephant to just walk away from. But its mind has been conditioned to believe that I can't go anywhere because I'm chained to this. Yeah. That was a really cool analogy that I think I think it helped a lot of people. Because even you know, from the crowd's perspective, you can hear uh people's reaction to that. And I could hear a lot of people like you can just you can tell that it resonated. I thought that was a good idea.

SPEAKER_01

Well, it's crazy. We actually, you know, referencing back to last week, talking about uh nef nefarious and the screw tape letters. Nefarious actually brings up this principle in that movie um where they outline you know there's a demon called Nefarious, and he's talking through how a demonic activity works. And he says they start when they are young. And he said all they are trying to do is what? Get them to say yes. And if they can get them in condition to sin, to say yes on a little thing, like, hey, lie to your parents. Hey, see that candy bar, take that piece of gump, take that candy bar. And if they can get them to say well yes to that sin, now what they are doing, they're teaching them to be obedient to the devil on their shoulder, obedient to sin instead of what they know is right.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, but the hard part when we talk about sin, which sometimes we take for granted, even the word sin, which we think is an obvious word that we learn at VBS, some people don't even comprehend what we mean by sin. Like if you I've asked some adults, what is sin? And they kind of give the seven-year-old answer well, when you lie to mommy, when you lie to dad, when you you know take a piece of candy, like I've seen 40-year-old men answer that question exactly how seven-year-olds like it it anything that we do that goes against the nature, the will, the love of God, anything that goes against his nature. And so then the question is, okay, there's obvious things. And we use examples like, okay, um, adultery. Well, well, that's easy. You don't cheat on your wife. We know that's a sin. Uh murder, we know that's a sin. That's self-evident, right? The founding father said these truths are self-evident. But what about the subtle sins that we actually don't know are a sin? For example, when we do premarital counseling and we sit down with a couple who are genuinely wanting to follow Jesus, but they actually don't know that premarital sex is a sin because they're gonna get married anyways. They're gonna they're gonna take their vows and normalizing our culture, exactly. So you actually, and I don't know if you've had this experience, but I've sat down with young couples and you almost it's like the scales falling from their eyes of like, well, we had no idea. And then they turn it around. But that would be an example of a sin that might not be as self-evident as some of these others. So then the question is, how do we know that we are sinning? How do we know that that sin still exists? And that's where the law comes in. The law is the mirror. It does the mirror doesn't fix my face, it doesn't clean my face, but the mirror allows me to see what needs to be corrected, and that's the purpose of the law. The law by itself doesn't give me the power of eternal life, it doesn't give me salvation, it allows me to see where I need to take certain things accountable for and take care of that sin.

SPEAKER_00

You know, you were talking about when you ask adults, they always kind of come answer with the childlike answers. And even just in the conversations with couples in a premarital counseling, they don't understand that they're sinning. Because I wonder how much of it is because in our minds we associate sinning as to I did something wrong to you. I was mean to you, or I stole from a store. I was I wronged the store owner. How do we repent against ourselves? That's the question. Yeah, or we can't do that. Or I need to go and r um repent to you and apologize to you or reconcile with you. But in all that, like especially with the premarital counseling in regards to uh sex before marriage, to them in their mind, they're not doing anything wrong because they're not doing anything to defend each other. Because I wonder if they're not connecting it to their sinning against God. Yeah, we always connect it to a person or each other instead of no, God has set a standard of what he wanted humanity to be, and we chose to go over so that goes back to your and that's the difference.

SPEAKER_02

And that goes back to the world, moral relativism, social contract theory, which says what is morally good is what does not harm others. So what is bad, what is sin according to the world is if I harm another person, then that is a sin.

SPEAKER_00

We don't connect it to God instead. Yes, exactly. We've wronged the way God intended for us to be originally. And I wonder if that would be a difference maker for people. It's like, yeah, because even though you two are consenting adults and you're not wronging each other, it's against what God's original plan was, and it changes the perspective of oh, I see, I understand. I wonder how much of it has to do with that.

SPEAKER_01

So let's go back to the actual definition of sin, which literally means to miss the mark. Yeah, like it's not an archery. We always use it in a term of the biblical perspective or in relation to God, but it actually is first used in archery terms. And so when we hear that term sin, it's in reference to missing the bullseye. And anything outside of the bullseye is a sin. And so if you miss even just by by one, that's a sin. Split the two. Split the light. That's a sin. And so in the same way, if God is the bullseye, his word and his law and what how he's instructed us to live is the bullseye. Anything outside of that would be a sin. And that's what it looks like to miss the mark. Some of those are greater distance, even though it'd say the equal result to sin is all the same. The Bible actually never says all sin is equal. Some but a sin is still a sin. Sin is still a sin which distances us from God and creates that distance from us to God. And so that's why Jesus came to remove that distance, as we know. Yeah. But that sin, that missing the mark. So going back to your analogy, if they are not sinning against one another, so why is this a problem? Yeah. As a Christian, and what Paul's saying, as now Jesus is your Lord and master, you should measure every decision you make and what you do to God and what he has called you to do in that area. So before you're making the decision of, okay, should we move in together? Should we sleep together before marriage if we're nowhere to get married? As Christians, what should we do? And you go to God's word, you're gonna be able to see, oh no, that's not right. Yeah, I gotta wait, I gotta wait till we're married to do that. And instead of just making that decision first, you would go to his word and seek guidance.

SPEAKER_02

And that's and that's where we we talked about legalism a couple months ago. Legalism is the belief that the law saves you. And so, again, using the mirror analogy, I have dirt on my face, I don't know it because I can't see myself. The mirror allows me to correct that, to remove that from my life. But the mirror has no role whatsoever in actually fixing what needs to be fixed. And so the law by itself would if you worship the law, if you believe, well, I'm a legalist, I'm a hundred percent truth and and not a hundred percent grace, then you are essentially believing that looking into the mirror, the mirror itself, is the thing that will clean my face, and not myself that has to do what I need to do to be a good idea. Yeah, you know, and that's why I think many people um will will split hell wide open. And their first question is, Well, I did all I could to f to follow all the laws. Why am I here? It's because you elevated the law over the grace of Christ. That's the problem.

SPEAKER_01

You put the law as your master instead of Jesus as your master. Yeah. And this is just saying, Yeah, the the law is good as in it helps us understand what it looks like to live righteously, but also what it does is to reveal how sinful we are. And instead of putting our hope in it, that's why we need a savior.

SPEAKER_02

Probably the better analogy is my house burns down, and I look at the firefighter and I say, Well, my smoke detector went off. Why did my house burn down? The smoke detector alerted you. Yeah, there's a problem. That's a good analogy. But you can't use, I might use that next week. Um but alerting you, and that's what the law is. The law is the smoke detector. Yeah, but don't you dare put your faith in that smoke detector to take that flame out. That's that's the analogy.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Or even to save you to get out of the house. It's an alert to get out of the house, but you still have to take action to get out of the house.

SPEAKER_02

It still requires something of your accord to realize, okay, I'm in trouble. I have to do something.

SPEAKER_01

But going back to what goes on and what takes place is again, we have to look into the spiritual realm. And even from an early age, they're Satan's trying to condition us to say yes to the things of sin and said yes to the things of God. And that's what it looks like to miss the mark. And so when that's conditioned inside of us at such an early age, going back to the Dumbo analogy, that power starts to take over, and that becomes our instinct instead of the things of God. We become instinctly following those things because we have trained ourselves to say yes to the things of the world, to the things of sin, instead of being obedient to Christ. And so what Paul is saying here in the back part of six, okay, justification is the first part, but sin has lost its penalty. But now the back part is sanctification, which that means sin has lost its power. And now, since it's lost its power, it's no longer our master, it no longer dictates what we do, how we live, how we feel, and what we're gonna do. No, now we're sanctified to Christ, and every day is an ongoing step of growing closer to Him. It's a lifelong process, is that sanctification process? But it starts by saying, Sin, you had no longer have power over me. And starts saying, and now you gotta become obedient into saying no of the things of the world, no to that sin, and start moving forward to what that looks like in Christ.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. There was another thing you said that you said it really fast, and people responded to it, but you kept going and it it's almost like, oh no, no, let's talk about that a little bit more. Um it was in regards to we I want to say we reconcile with or we do things to other people and we feel like we need to fix it. Stop doing that to God, or something to that. You said something about then stop doing it to dog, then stop doing it to God. Um and it was you said it really fast, and people are like, ooh, and then you kept on going. Yeah, and it was like, oh wait, come back to that. Do you remember what it was? Yeah, so it's about repentance.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, and so like it was step one of moving out of being a slave to sin and now into a slave of righteousness. The first thing you have to do is repent. And when you repent, you gotta truly mean it. Like you have this sin struggle in your life.

SPEAKER_00

Say ask for forgiveness and then they go and do it again. Did you really repent? Did you really repent? Then why do you keep doing that? Right, and so yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Let's say, give me a sin. Give me one.

SPEAKER_02

Um uh I'll use what Paul uses coveting.

SPEAKER_01

Coveting. So, you know, okay, that's a hard one to Okay, fine. Adultery. Oh, let's shoot sex before marriage. We've already mentioned that one. There we go. Sex before marriage. Okay. Say, all right, you know, you you've understand God's word, you are following Christ now, and you realize that that's a sin. You go to the Lord and say, Hey, I'm I'm I'm sorry. I failed you, I've fallen short, and Lord, I I repent. Can I have forgiveness? Well, then when you go home, you still crawl in bed with your boyfriend or girlfriend, and you guys still end up having sex before marriage. Did you actually repent? Or did you just come under conviction in a moment, but you didn't change any action to stop it? So you said the words, but you didn't follow through. That's like you going to somebody and apologizing for hurting them or for mistreating them, and then the very next day or the very next breath, you do the exact same thing.

SPEAKER_02

Do you actually believe that they actually the hard part of that though? And this this was the last sermon I preached before my sabbatical. I made the sin cycle, yeah. Where we sin, we feel bad, we attempt to repent, but then we fall right back in, and it's just this cycle. And so you have a lot of people that are like, okay, fine, I'm doing the same thing over and over. I'm doing my best. I'm I'm actively trying to get out of that sin cycle, but yet I always find myself back in. Therefore, I'm not actually repenting. And so it it could be very difficult. And for some, I would say even repenting of a sin, that could be a lifelong process. I always bring up Brendan Manning. I mean, struggle with alcohol his entire life, died as a uh complications of alcoholism. His repentance of that sin was a lifelong battle. It's a lifelong struggle. So some sins aren't simply saying, I'm sorry, God, I'm not going to do that again, and then not doing it again. If only it were that simple, I think it would be a good thing.

SPEAKER_01

But I would say I would say the key is you're making an active effort not to continue to fall into it. Yeah, it's an internal decision. Yes, part decision. If you're saying you repented and you ask for forgiveness, but yet then you don't follow it up with any action to even try, did you actually mean you're usually what I usually look at is guardrails.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I just can't have okay. Well, what guardrails have you set up, right? What have you set up? Well, we we just can't stop, we can't stop doing the deed, right? Sex. Um, okay, well, um are are you still living together? Well, yeah, yeah. But okay, well, how many bedrooms do you have? Two bedrooms. Okay, are you sleeping the other bedroom? Well, no, that's weird. Okay, gotcha. So that would be evidence that there is no step.

SPEAKER_01

How many couples have we had where once they came under this conviction, like they understood that it was a sin?

SPEAKER_02

Oh, the husband will go live with mom and dad. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

We've had multiple couples. Absolutely. And then now the fruit that's coming from their marriage, because they truly put God first in their relationship in that moment. Because that's what you're doing, is whenever you're able to see, like, oh man, we messed up, and then you're like, no, Lord, we want to make you the sinner. Yeah. And I'm even willing to move back in with my parents, or hey, maybe parents aren't around. We are legitimately sleeping in different bedrooms and locking the doors. Like we're we're removing that. And you know, or we have friends sleep over to help us keep us in check. Like, that is how far you're willing to go.

SPEAKER_02

I'm even thinking of a couple I married recently, and they took a two-month hiatus. They were having sex pre-marriage. Yeah. They took a, I told them, I said, 60 days, move out and then come back together. And they came up to me after their wedding night and they said, that was the best thing that we ever did. Because even taking two months off, it was so radical in our life. And we realized how much of our engagement relied on that physical action. Once we took that off the table, even for 60 days, it allowed us to truly grow and get ready for that wedding day. So it's incredible what will happen when you take those steps.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And so that's just an example of many others. But you in your sermon even mentioned, hey, don't drive by that bar, don't drive by that liquor store, don't drive by that house. You need to change your, you need to come up with a plan to avoid. Yeah. So even outside of that, sin, there's many others that you got to come with a game plan.

SPEAKER_01

Well, if you think about it, sin is habitual. And you know, we find ourselves in the same situations, maybe a different place, or the same place, different situation, falling for the same trick over and over again. Because now we've created the habit of whenever we're there, we say yes. Or whenever we're in that mindset, we say yes. Or we're having a bad day, what have you trained yourself to go to? And so all of those things, what you have to do is you have to break that cycle. You have to break that habit. And it starts, how do you break that habit? By saying no. And you're not gonna put yourself in that situation, you're not gonna go there. And a great way to start training yourself to say no to those things is start saying yes to the things of the Lord. And so, whenever you start getting those disciplines of saying yes and turning to that, now you're turning and you're training yourself to say yes to the things of the Lord, which is gonna help you say no to the things that are.

SPEAKER_02

And I would say just an apologetic point. Um if I were to create a religion and I were to make up a book and call it the Bible, I would include in that book laws that benefit me, right? Because I the it my motive of making up this religion, writing this Bible, is I want to be um more flourishing in life. I want to have more money, I want to have more power, I want to have more sex. What's incredible is that when you read the law, if if God is not involved in that and it is just man-made, then what in the world was their motive to say, hey, I know you really want to have sex before marriage, but you shouldn't. Hey, I know you really want to spend all that money, but you shouldn't. Hey, I know you're coveting your neighbor's goods and it's easy to covet, but yeah, that's a sin as well. The law takes everything that is man-centered and it completely removes it and it shifts that focus on God.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah, and like I thought I heard a Bible teacher explain it, you know, this way. We we we have a hard time saying, like, well, I I enjoy my freedoms. Why would I want to submit myself to a religion where God has to be my master? Like, is God so egotistic, like he has to have that? And what he asked is like, okay, you think you're free, then try to stop the sin that you are currently doing. Could you actually stop? Exactly. Like it is your master. Isn't that your master? Like you wake up in the morning and you re you you are thinking about when's the next time you can do it. Or, you know, as immediately you say no and you feel a little bit guilty and you you're shameful, but then you wake up and you're like, you can't wait to have that taste again. You can't wait to do it again. You're willing to lie about it, you're willing to hide it from people. You you know, you're you're willing to um do whatever you have to do to do it. Are you really that free? And the thing is, it's like no. And that's what Paul's talking about. You're a slave to it. Yeah. You are a slave to that.

SPEAKER_02

And the other illustration, I would this is a Francis Chan illustration. He says, when people come up to him and say, Well, you know, I don't want to be a Christian because if I become a Christian, then I have I have to do this or I have to do that. And Francis Chan says, No, you don't. You don't have to do that, but your life's gonna be a lot harder if you don't. Like what you see as, yeah, you you can call yourself a Christian and you can have sex with as many people as you want. But I promise you, the end result of that, it's not about just glorifying God. God didn't just create these lists just to make himself happy. He knew that when you break this law, your life is going to be more difficult because of what you do. Doesn't mean you can't make it to heaven, right? Because you're the power is not in the law. But if you live a life that is antithetical to what I have given you in my word, what you see is an easier life is actually gonna be a life that is infinitely more challenging.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Yeah, and you think about all the different things you could fill in the blank with, almost all of them lead to a destructive life. And that's really what God's trying to help you to avoid. Yeah. It's a destructive life. Uh, but then also the cool thing in that is um you don't have to go through the, you don't have to, you're gonna, I'm gonna choose to say no, but guess what? God's also gonna help you with that. That you're not on your own and to just left to your own strength and abilities and self-control or whatever it is you need in the moment. Uh it's not on just you. That's the other beautiful thing, is he wants to help you through it, and you're just you're not trying to do it by yourself.

SPEAKER_01

That's a sanctification process. That's the lifelong process of continuing every day saying, Sin, you don't have power over me. God alone, you're the one that has power over me. But that is an it's an ongoing lifelong process.

SPEAKER_00

And I think it's also an important thing to mention that as a Christian, a major difference in understanding, am I really saved or not, is that you continually go to the Lord with your sin, saying, Ugh, yeah, I need help. I'm not doing this, I need to come with another plan, I need your help to do that. The fact that you're taking it to the Lord is a very good sign that you have had a changed heart.

SPEAKER_01

Absolutely. And now, like, as you go to the Lord, now start putting those things in action of what you need to do. And if you're having trouble coming up with that battle plan by yourself, talk to somebody. I mean, pastors, that's why we're here is to help you create that battle plan, what that looks like. Talk to your a Christian mentor, talk to a friend that can walk alongside you and help you defeat that. Stop fighting alone because the enemy wants you to fight in isolation. And so have somebody that can help put together a battle plan, keep you accountable, check in on you when it comes to those things. So stop fighting alone. And part of the discipline is to start saying yes. You know, I'm gonna use the working out analogy. You know, when I first started working out, it was it was hard. Like I didn't want to go to the gym every single day. I was tired, I was sore. But after doing it day after day, it hurt like day after doing it day after day, you know, and I got the physical side down of showing up to the gym. But do you know what I did not have down for the first couple years? Eating right, fueling my body right. And then once I added that into the mixture, started getting better and better and better. And now, guess what? I am probably addicted to it. I'm a slave to working out, fitness, and eating right. And I know that's the case because if I don't, my day feels off. Like I something feels weird about that day. Even so to the point Emily's kicking me out of the house, she says, Hey, go go for a run or do something and then come back, right? Or, you know, when I don't eat right, I feel it. My body is telling me, like, hey, you messed up. You did, I'm not used to this, right? So, yeah, I'm I'm that's an example of something I'm a slave to. The same thing in our spiritual disciplines. And that's what he's talking about. Hey, when Jesus is your Lord and you are a slave to Christ, guess what? It may be hard to start reading your Bible every day. It may be hard starting to pray. Hey, it may be hard showing compassion to somebody you don't want to show compassion to. Hey, it may be difficult representing Christ and his love everywhere you go. But after you do that and you force it day after day after day, guess what? After a while, you're just doing it out of habit. Like you don't even know it. It's as easy as breathing. Next thing you know, you have to have that. You need his word, you need prayer, you need the church. And then when you get in those situations, there's no other option but to love, there's no other option but to show compassion because that's what you've trained yourself to do in those situations. It just takes time. It just takes time, consistency. Yeah. Day after day. And and that's what the whole picture and what I was trying to show, and using the example of Don Clark. You know, how does Don Clark get to the age of 94 and us be able to look at him and say at his funeral, that right there is a man marked by holiness. How does that happen? It was day after day of making the right decision.

SPEAKER_00

Choosing to be a certain way every day, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, choosing that. And I think people look at their life and they're like, I'm too far gone. Right? You know, Roger, I'll give you a hard time. We'll we'll talk about you. Like, if you would have done a spiritual inventory on your life coming out of high school, like could you have even pictured you being where you are at right now as a pastor? I don't think so. Right, because you're like, Man, all of these things that I I have been through, all these things that I have done, yeah, you know, I'm the kingpin atheist at the school, right? And giving teachers, everybody a hard time. Well, now you're a pastor of the largest church in town. Like, you would have been like, there's no way. But how'd it happen? One right decision at a time. Obviously the work of Christ, yeah, but then you being devoted to uh making that one right decision, and those right decisions, time after time after time, compounded for you to be sitting where you are at, yeah, and and being a man marked by holiness. And the same thing, that's how we become a slave to righteousness.

SPEAKER_02

Even in that, I'm not naive to think that tomorrow, if I give sin an inch, it will take a mile. That all of that great story, you were the atheist kingpin, you're now a pastor, you've got a doctorate, you're all of this stuff, that's great. I could ruin that in five minutes by taking this phone and making one decision.

SPEAKER_01

Many pastors have.

SPEAKER_02

And many, many, many pastors have. Some of my mentors have fallen into going back to Ravi Zacharias. I mean, the reason I love apologetics is because of Ravi Zacharias. Ravi Zacharias's name is destroyed because everyone thought he's doing all this stuff. Well, he's got a bunch of parlors. Exactly. Exactly. And uh and so it's like, oh no, like how could that happen? Was he always a charlatan? Was he just trying to make money? Absolutely not. No. He gave sin an inch. And I'm not naive to think when people say, tell me this, and I've said this a million times, I don't know how this pastor fell. I I don't see how I can't imagine why this pastor would fall. I can't imagine why you can't imagine why that pastor would fall, because that pastor, because that is the persuasion of sin. That is that is what sin could do. And I I want to give this going back to the sin thing and what sin can do to get you out of one good choice at a time. Because you can take a thousand days and make a good choice every single day and it'd be ruined in five seconds. But I was reading an article. We talk about sin. There's three things that that most sin encompasses that we want as humans money, sex, and power. Do you know what profession by far has the most obviously money and sex, but also power, fame? Can you think of it? Adult film. The pornography. Okay. I don't I don't know what you're gonna say. The the the pornography industry. The pornography industry. You get paid to have sex on camera. You make six figures, you get all the drugs you want. How much?

SPEAKER_00

Notice.

SPEAKER_02

Don't even think about it. You you you get the money, you literally get paid to have sex.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

And you get the mansions, you get the cars. Do you know the suicide rate for porn stars in the United States is 27%? If you enter into adult film, if you do pornography as a career, you get all the money, all the sex, all the power, all the fame, all the drugs, the chances of you dying of suicide are more than one in four.

unknown

That's great.

SPEAKER_00

And so the idea is then how does that compare to like the average with the regular?

SPEAKER_02

I mean, it it is that that that suicide rate is astronomical compared to the average. One in four is an insane. It's insane, right?

SPEAKER_00

And so the idea is because not one in four people in the in the world are killing themselves.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, absolutely not. No, not even because especially in the West, right? And so the so the point being is man, all of the things that entice us as human beings leads to destruction. And yet verifiably we see them self-terminating because what they thought, this is where my hope is, this is what I've always wanted, and it always ends in destruction.

SPEAKER_00

And Satan, yeah, that's how he works. Yeah. So well, and then you outside of that industry, even just applying those into normal life, when you focus in on those things, if you're if your whole goal is to make a bunch of money, well, you're gonna be working constantly and you're going to be uh neglecting other things in your life, such as family, wife, children, and then you're gonna be have you're gonna have gonna have relationships with them, and then you're gonna have a destroyed family. It'll be a broken unit. Yeah. You can pick any one of those and you can start to see the destruction that it brings in your life. Uh, even on just breaking one out on its own. Yeah. Uh and it can lead down a path that God's like, that's not what I had it planned for you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

That wasn't the original intention for you. And that's and that's why the the joy of Paul's message in Romans 6 is that it feels so often that that is our master, that sin, that addiction, that temptation, that vice, and yet it is powerless when we are in Christ. That's the promise.

SPEAKER_01

I had to look up the numbers because, like, you mentioned that percentage.

SPEAKER_02

Did you do it on the church Wi-Fi? Be careful when you type in.

SPEAKER_01

Sorry, Dave. Uh ChatGBT from CDC says that it's less than one percent. It is zero. Of the US population. A tenth of one percent. Yeah. Of the population.

SPEAKER_00

We're talking we're talking tenth of one percent versus twenty-seven percent. Over over over a quarter. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Um it's that's incredible, right? And and and that just goes to show, though, the lie and the persuasion of sin that is so easy to run towards. And again, well, if I'm a Christian, I don't get to do this, this, and this. Hey, I promise you, God had an ultimate purpose in in creating this law and and why that law is important in order to look in the mirror and say, Oh wow, I thought I was squeaky clean. I I I'm I'm disgusting. I I've got to get this fixed, I gotta get this cleaned up. That's the point of the law.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I want to go back to your Avi example. And you know, how did that happen? And it's how it happens for everybody, honestly, is the devil just tries to get you to compromise on one thing. And that's how he becomes a foothold. If he can get you to compromise on one thing and for one moment get you to stop thinking about the spiritual realm and that he's an enemy trying to attack you and tear you down, if he can get you to compromise on that one thing, if he can get you to look that one time, if he can get you to touch that one thing, if he can get you to take that one hit, if he can get you to take that one drink, if he can get you to compromise that one time, guess what? He's like, I can get you to compromise again. If I can get you to compromise on your convictions, then I can get you again. And that one time leads to two times. And so that's why when Paul says in another letter, do not give the enemy a foothold, do not give him a seat at and and and some would be like, Don't give him a seat at the door, yeah. Don't even give him a seat at your table because that's what he's looking for. He's just looking for a crack because he's prowling around like a roaring lion and seeking to devour. What most people don't understand is they've been watching you. You're all going back to like that in affairs, whatever. They they know they know what they watched you and they know you know. They know your family history better than you know your family history. They know your your genetic disposition better than you know your genetic dispositions.

SPEAKER_02

And do you know 99% of affairs, sexual adulterous affairs? Do you know what they start with? A text message. A text. A text message. Hey, I noticed you the other day. Hey, I really like that. Oh, I'm being harmless. I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm just complimenting their outfit. A few weeks later, few weeks later.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, this we're just friends. This is how friends talk. This is yeah.

SPEAKER_02

It's the one, oh, it's just a match. It's not gonna do any harm. Uh-oh, now the whole building is engulfed. Yeah. That's what sin does.

SPEAKER_01

It hardly ever does it start physical, it starts with emotional. Always. And they they feel like it uh an emotional need. But the same thing. Anything that we fall into, what he tries to get to, is some temporary fulfillment. He knows our need. Like, oh, you know what? I just need to escape for a little bit. And so this thing, you know what, it numbs things out, it takes me to a different place. It and I feel that hit, and then we feel that one time, well, then we chase it. And then after we but here's the thing, it never satisfies like it does the first time.

SPEAKER_02

Well, you've heard you've heard in school and dare the gateway drug. And that's the idea is there's gateway sin. Oh, well, I'm just gonna do this. But the more you do it, the more you have to have a little bit more, and then a little bit more.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah, or even it can even disguise itself. I deserve this. Yeah. Um, I've worked hard for this. And again, that can come in many different things. Um, but there's there's just so many different it's literally a fill-in-the-blank opportunity of that the enemy has to entice or yeah uh get you to just do the one little thing that the start, take that inch, um, give that inch, I should say, and then all of a sudden it's a mile before you know it. Uh, it doesn't take much. And and it's usually very disguised, it's very innocent. You it's very much a what's the big deal? Uh you never would have thought that what you said yes to would lead to where it ends up. Yeah, it's never thought of. It never comes across that way out of the gate. It's always very deceptive. And it's even the same thing as you're talking about, even just false teaching in a church. It comes in just a little bitty thread, a little bitty thing that seems insignificant or no big deal. Uh, but you have to really have your eyes wide open.

SPEAKER_02

Some of these churches that are just outright heretical, they're outright preaching against the true gospel. And you look at it and they're big buildings and people and you're like, did this happen overnight? No. Look at the history of that church. There's a Baptist church in Colombia that brought a drag queen to church. And you look, it's a historic, you probably know the church.

SPEAKER_01

I think it's first baptist Columbia. Yeah, we'll call them out.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, we should call them out. Absolutely. We should call them out with all caps. I mean, they're flaming heretics. And the idea, how could a a historical church, and I think I researched, I think they left the convention in like 95 or 97.

SPEAKER_01

They're just still called First Baptists.

SPEAKER_02

But they still call themselves First Baptists. Can we change that? DOM of Columbia, call them. Let's get this fixed.

SPEAKER_01

Because you know how many messages we got? Like, how can you guys allow this? Do they not know we don't talk about the biggest thing?

SPEAKER_00

The First Baptist Church of Deaf City is in the same convention.

SPEAKER_02

Do you know why I called them flaming heretics? Because the drag queen that they brought in was named Flamie Grant. And it was yeah, trust me. You think I'm making that up? You think like this is the onion, this is uh Babylon B. No. I promise you, I don't know their history, but I promise you, Flamey Grant didn't happen overnight, right? I mean, I promise you that there is a point. Looks like the title to the movie. The movie I don't want to watch. The advertising certain industry in that movie of a 27. But I promise you, I don't know their history, but I look at their building. It looks like a traditional good. That church did not turn into that overnight. No, right now. And that's that that's the problem. Um and now you see that church, and and and I don't want to just call them out. This is churches all across the world.

SPEAKER_00

Well, that's what FBC for of Jefferson City is in kind of a similar situation, yeah. They're not a part of, I don't think they're part of the association anymore. And why do you still call yourself First Baptist Church? It's uh I think even like Concord Baptists of Jefferson City is more like the first church anymore.

SPEAKER_02

What clothing do wolves wear? They wear sheep. So I think, oh, first Baptist, oh, they're sheep, and then you walk in and then the sheep. It's gotta be good.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, but that's what the church is, and the part of a big problem Western churches is the church has now started serving people instead of serving Christ. And they see what's going on in the world and they're changing their theology to match what the people need in the world instead of keeping it holy and reverent and worshiping Christ through the church. And it's a huge problem. And I I love that you call them out because if you have a church that's starting to compromise in those areas, especially to the point of that, don't just leave run. And on your way out, dust your sandals off at the door and just keep running.

SPEAKER_02

Because that's not a secondary issue. We're not we're not calling out churches that baptize by sprinkling. Like we're calling the churches that are actively leading the sheep astray need to be called out. And there's a biblical precedence for that.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and but I'd also argue what you were talking about there, Luke, that's not to be confused with um the way we do things here with regards to you might hear secular music, yeah. But appealing to the people of the world to entice them in, I guess, to then smack them in the face with the gospel. You know, and then there any kind of issue they have is not between us, it's between them and Jesus.

SPEAKER_01

Well, that's what everything we are doing is in reverence and worship of the Lord. Yeah. And Jesus, he used parables to worldly parables. Worldly everyday stories. Why?

SPEAKER_00

To win people to Jesus. I would argue the parable of the shrewd managers. He's saying, hey, use how his worldly ways of taking care of himself when he was about to get fired, he found he was very shrewd in the way he took care of himself. You need to be shrewd. How you lead people, yeah, you get many people into heaven. Use the almost like we use worldly ways to lead people to to heaven.

SPEAKER_01

But like that, I again I would go back to the difference though. Then they're trying to affirm people in their sin. We yeah, we we can love them despite their sin, but we are looking for them to be transformed. That's that's the end goal, that's the result. And that's like I mean, again, the whole passage in chapter six is about chant transformation. But both the first part of six, second part of six. If you go back and read, I would challenge anybody, read the whole thing. So we we split it up into two, read it all in one, because he's m essentially making the same argument. He's just talking about how sin has lost his penalty here and how sin has lost his power here. And the argument he he is trying to show them is you have been transformed. And so sin no longer rules over you, it no longer reigns. Now start acting like it. And so stop giving it control. And I love the argument, and what he is making is saying it's time for you to take control of your decisions, and the only way to do that is turn the control of your life over to the Lord. And when you do that, you stop letting sin reign and have power over your life.

SPEAKER_00

Well, that brings up a very key word that a lot of people struggle with and that with, and that is called surrender. Yeah. And am I willing to give up the things of this world to live for God? Yeah. I think that you start tapping into a whole nother conversation of passive Christian or a someone that is a Christian in name only, they don't live like lukewarm. Uh, those you're starting to get into the evaluate when you start to really evaluate your life, how much of my life follows the world, or is how much of my life follows the way God wants me to live? That's gonna start to be like, oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_01

But this is why I think you know, Sabbath was such an important thing for God and why he laid it out for us. Because no time in our culture nowadays do we just step back and take an inventory on our life. Yep. We we no longer take a pause and say, you know what? What is bearing fruit in my life? What is stealing in my life? What is draining or leading to destruction? What is leading to destruction? We never take a step back and evaluate. Yeah, we do that in every area of our life. At work, you you're if you're not doing it, I promise you, you're the boss or the owner of where you work, they are what's going good, what's going bad? What do we need to change? What do we need to continue to do so that we can improve? We do it in every area of our life, we don't do it in our spiritual lives to step back and say personal. Yeah, yeah, personalized. What's bearing fruit, what's not. And that oftentimes would happen when somebody would take a day of rest and they would just pause and they had nothing else to think about. And like for us, man, I'm I'd say it's important for you to take a Sabbath, but let's start with this. Stop scrolling. Instead of scrolling on Instagram or Facebook, how about you do you use that time to take a step back and pause and do an inventory on your life and reflect what you know what what today did bear fruit? What today would I did I miss the mark that I need to change?

SPEAKER_02

Well, I took I took 30 days. And I I I even joked with someone on Sunday. They said, How is your sabbatical? I said, I don't call it a sabbatical, I call it an audit. Yeah, you know what an audit is, right? You go in and you go into detail. I did a 30-day audit of the small stuff, and what I realized is the small, insignificant things were actually the most destructing things of my life. It wasn't the I was out, you know, getting drunk, having sex, doing drugs. Like it wasn't these big things that are obvious. It was the very small, subtle things. And I realized that Satan had kind of crept in almost like a tick, right? I mean, you don't feel it, you don't think it's powerful, but then you realize the, oh my goodness, I now have this disease, I now have this illness because of this little bitty insignificant thing. And so for me, it truly was sitting down and auditing my entire life, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. So that's what I would encourage you.

SPEAKER_01

It's like the pebble in your shoe. Like you get a little rock in your shoe, and you feel it as soon as it's there. But it's just this tiny little rock. Every step that you take, you're like, gosh dang it. If you throw it at your head, it's not even gonna be. Yeah, you're fine. But like you keep walking on it, you keep stepping on it, and it drives you crazy. And if you walk on it long enough, you're actually gonna get a bruise under your foot. But what do you all you have to do is do what? Take the shoe off, take time, stop, take your shoe off, pull the pebble out, and then you're gonna be fine. Exactly. It takes you five seconds. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

And your life is immediately better because you did it. Yeah. But we're too lazy to stop and take the shoe off.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, could you imagine walking around and them just complaining, like, man, this this dang rock in my shoe. All day. And like, I we're like, why don't you take it off? I don't have time. And meanwhile, you look over there and they're on their phone. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Watching what was on your lemon and link. Like, what are you doing?

SPEAKER_01

Like, why why why take your shoe off?

SPEAKER_02

Stop scrolling. Get off of there. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely correct. So did you just connect Loven and Link to evil? I did not. You did. Speaking of doom scrolling, yeah. Um I can't get on. I'm banned. But uh it happens.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Well, but the point is just that spiritual evaluation, the self-introspection. I think I don't we don't put enough significance to the living for righteousness versus being a slave to righteousness versus a slave to sin. And what that actually means in our life. I think um we I don't think people understand the game changer or the change in life or the changes in life they would need to make in order to live that way. Yeah. Uh because again, it's like Dumbo. We still have that mindset that is stuck to that little post that we could easily kick out and go walk away from, but our minds are so used to just how we've always lived. And so it is a very important thing that people do need to truly stop and say, Who am I going to live for? Because if you're gonna claim you're a Christian, you do you have to stop and say, How am I living my life? And does that model what Christ is calling how Christ is calling me to live? Man, I think if people actually took that that minute and that time to evaluate their day-to-day, it would be a massive change in lifestyle. Uh, just because we are so inundated with stuff. I mean, it's just even like the other day, I can't remember what brought it up, but just Heather and I even constantly talk just how much we're inundated with sexual stuff of what just in commercials, in just scrolling, in just everyday life, there's something about sex that is a get your attention, or that there's that little flash, the shiny bright thing. It is in everything now because it sells.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I saw this on Forbes. You know that you know the number one ad campaign for fast food in the 21st century was the Hardy's. It was here's a naked woman washing a car, the new Thick Burger. Like, okay. Honey, we gotta go to Hardy's. It just like, but that's it, like they don't even hide it. It's it's it's you know, here it is.

SPEAKER_00

So it just, I mean, if we really evaluate, and even like well, you were joking about you drive a ram because uh because that's what's in uh Yellowstone. Well, one of the things someone yelled out, John Bryant, he yelled out, well, that's why I drive a Ford because I'm not going to go with what Yellowstone, right? A show that's probably pretty inappropriate for most viewers. Don't watch it as a family. Uh, and that was his point of well, that's why I don't drive a Ram. Because Ram has decided to partner with that show and use that as a means to advertise. Well, then I'm not, you know, that's how like nitty-gritty you can get with how you live your life of choosing certain products over others, or just I'm going to choose to stand for Christ and what he calls me to be, and that's going to change so much in your life, all the way down to what kind of vehicle you might drive. I mean, you never know what it can report.

SPEAKER_02

A lot of people that chose Coke back in the day because of me and Joe Green.

SPEAKER_00

That's the only you know, that's I'm sorry, that's why I'm a Steelers fan. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, that's but that's the power of culture. I was that kid. That's the power of the power of culture. Yeah. And if we're not careful, and I'm guilty of this too, allowing culture to take that step where we exalt that along with along with God, because Jesus was so utterly counter-cultural. Like he did not come to appease the culture, he came, for lack of a better word, to spit in the culture's face to say, This is the way you are living, this is the way that you should be living, and they nailed him to a cross because of it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so as he's getting into, and this is where I want to we can land the plan, we can keep talking through it.

SPEAKER_02

But I think we can land it.

SPEAKER_01

I think we've been talking about it, and I I mentioned it in second service. What would Paul, what would his letter be to the American church?

SPEAKER_00

I've seen a shirt recently said if Paul was around, he'd be writing us a letter.

SPEAKER_01

We would be. But I think a large part of it's like I want that shirt. A large part of it, I think, is America especially. We love to rely on Jesus as our savior, but we never allow him to be our Lord. Because if we allow him to be our Lord, that means everything is going to have to change. Everything. So we like the savior aspect because our penalty has been justified. But now, when it comes to sanctification, him as our Lord, now it's us having to start living like it. That's where the true hard work comes in. And that's where it's difficult because what does that mean? And what does he say here in Athenian in Romans 6? It takes obedience. It takes obedience to righteousness. And now you got to become a slave to that righteousness. So here's like, are you willing to take your body and say, I am willing to become a slave to righteousness? That Lord, you own every single part of me. Every total surrender. Total surrender. And so the question then it becomes is all right, what is Jesus not the Lord of in your life? What is he the the Lord of your time? What what do you spend time doing? Do you spend time? Is he the Lord over your mouth? The Lord over your tongue? Is he the Lord over your marriage? Is he the Lord over your family? Is he the Lord over your thoughts? Is he the Lord big one over your finances? Have you trusted it all back, like saying, hey Lord, God, it's just your money? Using it. Is he a Lord over your conversations and the things that you do for people? Is he the Lord over your friendships? Is he you know, we can go, which area in your life are you not allowing him to be Lord over? And I bet I'm gonna be able to point out and say, what is the biggest stressor of your life? So let me push back then. It's probably the same thing. Let me push back then.

SPEAKER_02

Because I believe everything you just said, I agree, but I'm gonna play devil's advocate. Everything you just described are external evidences. Your marriage, that's external. Your your how you speak, that's external. So actions, how is that not legalism?

SPEAKER_01

That's good because those are not, you're not relying on those things to save you because again, your penalty has already been paid for, like you're justified. This is now through the sanctification process of saying how you start living in that righteousness. So you are going to heaven, but now it's like, okay, now it's time to start bearing fruit of that relationship as him being the Lord of your life. And that's how things change.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. The change has to change in your heart internally first before those things externally can change.

SPEAKER_02

But I hear that pushback from some Christians. For example, when we meet with a couple, hey, guys, you shouldn't be having sex. Well, you know, that that that's kind of legalistic, right? They they use it thinking that what I'm saying is, hey, if you don't stop having sex, that is going to have you like that that is what's going to send you to hell. And the fact is, is all it takes is one sin to send all of us to hell. Yeah. And we've all sinned once. We've all sinned many times. Yeah. So we all the wages of sin is death. So don't hear me and say that making the Lord of or putting the Lord over your marriage, finances, et cetera, et cetera, that that's saying that that itself is what's going to get us saved. No, that naturally comes from the justification.

SPEAKER_01

That's right. I it Jesus came to give you eternal life, but he also came to give you abundant life. And that's not a prosperity gospel. It is just saying, like, hey, if you choose to follow Jesus in his word, your life is going to be better. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And we truly believe that. Even just playing out like you were talking about the premarital sex. In their mind, they're not harming anybody because they're not doing anything against each other. But if you think of it from a God perspective, God wants there to be a connected mom and dad as in regard, or a husband and wife that will then have an offspring that then has a mom and dad. So let's say that they're having premarital sex outside of marriage. They have a child prior to being married, and then something goes wrong between the two of them. Now there's a child out of wedlock that then will potentially have not time with both mom and dad in the family. Then go look up your statistics of how things are for kids that are in a broken home.

SPEAKER_02

We're already talking about the Brookings Institute, stay out of poverty, is graduate high school, get married, have children out of wedlock, and have a job. If you do those four things, you will not be in poverty, and that child will grow up. And so that's that's the idea.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. So anyway, just something that seems so simple, there is the potential to then lead down a path. And it may not be for you, but it definitely could be for your child. Yeah. Yeah. There is a lasting issue now that there's gonna there's this brokenness in a child's life. There's brokenness in your life too. And that's it's even though it seems simple and no big deal, that's what God's trying to avoid.

SPEAKER_02

One of my biggest pet peeves when I was a cop is when people they bring up the drug problem. They say, Well, I don't really care about drugs because it's a victimless crime. And a victimless crime is a crime where it just hurts them. And then you go into the home and you see what drug addiction does to the spouse, what it does to the children, what it does to everybody involved. There is no such thing as a victimless sin. Yeah. That's the argument.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah. But I think what overall, you know, we talked about the letter to the American Church. It's probably gonna be the name of this episode. But the letter to the American Church would also probably be it's not about you. Oh man, yeah. Because how many churches do you see they're trying to just feed it because it's all about them? And if I can feed, just like anything else in the world, if I can feed your ego, then you're gonna come to church here, you're gonna give here, you're gonna come to the church.

SPEAKER_02

I need a self-help sermon. Please teach me. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

You know, or hey, the more you give, the more you're gonna get. Right. You you know more, and so, oh, you you're not getting healed. Oh, it's because why? Your faith. You don't have enough faith.

SPEAKER_00

And you, you, you, you. You, you, you, you. Well, even one of your your man, Francis Chan, says, you know, I didn't like the worship today. Oh, really? Or who are we worshiping? Yeah, we weren't worshiping you.

SPEAKER_02

That's the idea. And I didn't like the songs. The idea of, and this is I've always said, I call it the Bucky's church. The American church is the Bucky's church, the Golden Corral Church. I'm gonna stuff my face, I'm gonna get as much as I can, even if I elbow everybody outside, and I'm gonna leave. And then if you ever eaten at Golden Corral, man, this is amazing, then you feel miserable the next day and you go back. Like that, that is this idea. The consumer church is what is what has really been capable of. And then that's what it'd be.

SPEAKER_00

Have you ever noticed when you eat Chinese buffet, you're hungry again just a few hours later, even after stuffing yourself? Absolutely. It's something weird that happens.

SPEAKER_02

But that's the idea. If I if if my whole focus is I need to consume as much as I can and not focus on anybody else, what am I hungry again? I I'm just gonna be starving for more. And those are usually the people that say, hey, I'm not being fed enough. Oh no, you just had 8,000 calories. But it it's there's that that's the that's the problem.

SPEAKER_01

But that's why like one of my goals in life is to be like the senior saints in our church. Because their church has totally changed from when they first started coming here. But yet, they're still here. Yeah, and in the words of Lou Schaefer, right? There you go. I was just thinking of that. Yeah, you know, why are they still here? And he says, Because look at what's happening in the next generation. Look how many young kids we're reaching, look how many young families we have. Yes, it may not be their favorite songs, yes, they might miss some of the hymns, yes, they might disagree with a few things, but they are still here. Why? Because they said none of that matters, because what matters is we're reaching people, we're reaching young families, and that's what it's about.

SPEAKER_00

That was one of the greatest speeches at a couple business meetings all the time.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, business meeting of all places. One of my favorite is talking to Gary Moore. Gary Moore, I mean, he was the chairman of Deacons a long time ago.

SPEAKER_00

He's our deacon emeritus.

SPEAKER_02

Seeing Gary Moore talk about our baptisms and seeing him get emotional. Yeah, yeah. That's when you're like, he gets it.

SPEAKER_01

And you know, they've had people, they had friends leave, they have people that they love that are going to different churches. I'll talk to try and talk to him. But that's a type of faith and like priorities that I want to have when I'm I'm their age to say, you know what, that's not what church is about. That's they they get it. We're winning. They understand. And I and that's what I love about it. So great way to end it. That's a great way to end it. But I'm excited for you. Romans back in the South. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Eight weeks off. Are you ready to roll? I will see how it goes. I feel like I will be a little rusty. But yeah, because Romans 6 is Romans 7 is where Paul, you know, he just said sin does is is no longer a master over your life. But then Romans 7, he kind of says, okay, we're gonna take a step back because it still stinks. It's still gonna be difficult at times. And so we're gonna go through the difficulty of sin, but then it pays off in Romans 8. And uh it just goes. So I would say go back, don't just read a chapter at a time. I would say read it as much as you can because Paul wasn't writing the chapters, you know, it wasn't okay, I'm done with chapter six. Now that was us that put chapters in there. So read it.

SPEAKER_01

That's like you're bringing up a good point we talked about before the podcast, but all this is following through from chapter five, where he's saying it's a building off. Yeah, it's building off of chapter five. So if you understand chapter five, where he's talking about, hey, you're no longer in your Adam nature. Yep, you're now in Adam realm. You are in now Christ realm. Yeah, you are now in that realm. And when you start understanding that, it helps apply what you learn in chapter six, and especially what you're learning in chapter seven, and the stamp on it all. That's what I've heard.

SPEAKER_02

And that's why I've always said the book of Romans is a Netflix miniseries. Each chapter is an episode that if you read the chapter by itself, you're not gonna get the full picture. But if you're able to actually watch the whole thing, then you're gonna Well, like we originally had chapter six on one week.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, you remember it. And we went to you last week and I said, Roger, there's no way we can do that. There's no way we can do it in one week. No way we can do it one week. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

That's kind of the case in every chapter. Really? But uh so Romans 7 next week. I'm excited to get back on at the pulpit. We'll see how I do, but I know it's gonna be great. So thanks for joining us. Maybe this was I don't know how's that for humility? Because I know it's gonna be great. I know because the Holy Spirit will be speaking. The Holy Spirit, but also the voice of my mom when I would strike out five times in the little league. And she said, Son, you still did good. She's a liar. She lied. I couldn't play baseball. So we will see you next time. Make heaven crowded. And as always, Pastor Luke, Pastor Roger, Pastor Jordan. Uh, I'll say it again. Go make heaven crowded.