SPEAKER_01: You're listening to the road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_00: So he came to redeem you at the cross through the blood of Christ to set you free.
SPEAKER_00: And in today's world, most people want to come and get you to make you a product so that they can enslave you to something that makes them money.
SPEAKER_00: Christ comes in the opposite spirit, and he comes and he redeems you to actually set you free.
SPEAKER_00: Now, awesome, nothing quite like it in this world.
SPEAKER_00: If someone would come and give their heart and give their life and give their blood so that you, by believing that, could be set free to a new future.
SPEAKER_01: At The Road, our mission is to empower people to change the world.
SPEAKER_01: For more information on the road, visit theroad.org.
SPEAKER_01: We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_00: So, you guys that were not here last Sunday, we started the book of Ephesians.
SPEAKER_00: We're in the book of Ephesians, and I'm calling it Born for War, a spiritual manual for living out the Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: And I shared last week that there's really two parts, almost like two outline parts to Ephesians.
SPEAKER_00: And the first three chapters are about our position in Christ, and the four through six chapters are about the power we have in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So it's position and it's power.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're going to start going through verse by verse through the book.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the deal: that the Christian life is hard.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody say the Christian life is hard.
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't think so, then you're not living in reality.
SPEAKER_00: All right.
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, sometimes in the Christian life, because of the religious circles that some of you may have come in, there is a tendency to get over-religious about things that really are not helpful.
SPEAKER_00: So we get over-religious and we think that we're just going to go from victory to victory to victory, and the Christian life is just one victorious step after another.
SPEAKER_00: And my experience personally, my experience of being a pastor and a counselor, that's just not true.
SPEAKER_00: That you're you hit the wall a lot of times.
SPEAKER_00: You go through difficulties.
SPEAKER_00: We're living in a sinful world.
SPEAKER_00: We're living in a demonically infested world.
SPEAKER_00: And so the victory is to the man and the woman and the child that learns to fight.
SPEAKER_00: So what we're trying to do with our children's ministry, what we're trying to do in our youth ministry, what we're trying to do in our young adults' ministry, what we're trying to do with the men at aim on Tuesday morning is to train and equip you to fight, to battle, to see that you have to go after it with a focused life, a focused life.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Ephesians, you can't get any better than this book on how to focus our lives toward taking back territory that the darkness has taken in all of our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody here has shame.
SPEAKER_00: And so God doesn't want us to walk in shame, he wants to walk in victory.
SPEAKER_00: And Ephesians begins to set up an understanding of the warfare like no other book in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: So turn to Ephesians chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: And I began a little bit last week, but we're going to dive a little further this week.
SPEAKER_00: Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus and faithful in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Look at the two ends here.
SPEAKER_00: In Ephesus, in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Men and women, you have two addresses.
SPEAKER_00: One address is you're in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Second address, you're in Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so it's living out the in Christ in Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_00: God puts you in a territory.
SPEAKER_00: God puts you in a locale and he expects you there to be used by him.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, you're uniquely built, uniquely set up by God for this city, this county, and this time in history.
SPEAKER_00: There's a reason you're here.
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you may not be here next year, and so God may move you on.
SPEAKER_00: I've been here 28 years.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: And I love this county.
SPEAKER_00: I love El Paso County.
SPEAKER_00: I love Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_00: I love this church.
SPEAKER_00: I love building this church.
SPEAKER_00: I love building Mountain Springs Church before that.
SPEAKER_00: I believe in the destiny of Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_00: But the destiny of Colorado Springs will not be realized without a whole lot of people in this city who are in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Because let me tell you, if the in Christ people don't start living for being in Colorado Springs, the uninchrist people will take over.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so God needs you and He uses you in a mighty way to bring His love, His passion, His power, His commitment, and His kingdom to this city.
SPEAKER_00: So you are in Christ, positionally, you're in Christ, experientially, you're in Christ, in Colorado Springs.
SPEAKER_00: You're a, most of you, I think, are U.S.
SPEAKER_00: citizens.
SPEAKER_00: So you're a part of this country.
SPEAKER_00: You're in America in the third millennium.
SPEAKER_00: Here in the third millennium, we're in America.
SPEAKER_00: And it's it's kind of a mess right now, okay, in many ways.
SPEAKER_00: But that's why you're here.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: We can sit on the sidelines and just watch it all go by and say, Sarah, Sarah, whatever will be, will be, and that is not biblical.
SPEAKER_00: That's called lazy.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: So God wants to use you in a mighty way.
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to vote in elections.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you need to run for office, like Jay Inman's doing.
SPEAKER_00: He's running for office in District 2.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you may run for mayor.
SPEAKER_00: Some of our little kids downstairs may be pastoring churches, or they may be leading these fantastic businesses in the years to come because they learned about how to be in Christ at the road.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we're here to do.
SPEAKER_00: We're here to be in Christ at the road, in Colorado Springs, in El Paso County, in the United States of America, in the Rockies for a kingdom of God revolution.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it's all about.
SPEAKER_00: So he says here, your saints in Christ, in Ephesus, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Now notice the chronological order here: Grace to you and peace from God.
SPEAKER_00: You can't have peace from God until you get grace to you.
SPEAKER_00: So there's a lot of people out there that want peace, and they're trying to find peace through drugs, they're trying to find peace through sex, they're trying to find peace through jumping from job to job and trying to find peace without God.
SPEAKER_00: But you can't have peace from God until you receive the grace of God.
SPEAKER_00: So when we receive the grace of God, we now have a fighting chance to have peace from God because now we can be in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that exciting?
SPEAKER_00: Because you can't be in Christ without his grace because he reaches out to you.
SPEAKER_00: We love him because he first loved us.
SPEAKER_00: So his grace is caras, comes to us, his love comes to us, but it's not like Smokey the Bear.
SPEAKER_00: So, kind of modern-day evangelistic crusades are that, you know, stand up or raise your hand or say the prayer or come forward or whatever different crusades do, sign the little thing saying you've received Christ, and now you're in.
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like we got you out of the hell fire.
SPEAKER_00: We got you out of the fires of hell.
SPEAKER_00: Smoky bear came.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus the smoky bear.
SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you this.
SPEAKER_00: The Christian life, as I read about it in here, is not about getting you out of the fire, it's about getting you in the fire.
SPEAKER_00: You need your heart fired up.
SPEAKER_00: You need to be whole-hearted disciples.
SPEAKER_00: We're not running from hell, we're running to heaven, and we're running into hell.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so the reality is when we become a whole-hearted disciple, is it's you receiving the grace of God.
SPEAKER_00: It's about a heart transformation.
SPEAKER_00: It's about getting this heart fired up.
SPEAKER_00: Because listen, men and women, I'm gonna talk about this at AIM on Tuesday morning to the men, and that is that God's heart burns for you.
SPEAKER_00: Men, God's heart burns for you, and what he is, is he is a fire starter.
SPEAKER_00: He's not Smokey the Bear.
SPEAKER_00: He's a fire starter.
SPEAKER_00: And so what God wants to do is he wants to light fires in our hearts by us understanding I'm accepted, I'm loved, I'm beloved, I'm cared for, I'm adopted, I'm predestined, I'm elected to be in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the rest of the first chapter is all about.
SPEAKER_00: So that I have peace from God.
SPEAKER_00: Not peace from problems, peace from God.
SPEAKER_00: So you can't have so I'm not gonna ask for a show of hands, but if I were to ask for a show of hands, half of you that are honest would raise your hand and say, you don't have any peace right now.
SPEAKER_00: Well, the reason you don't have any peace right now is because you're not walking in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: You may know Christ, but you're not experiencing him on a regular basis.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have peace from God half this week.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: I get paid to get peace from God.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: All right?
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have it, you know.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, because you got things going on.
SPEAKER_00: I know what this is, I know what it's like.
SPEAKER_00: But every time I don't have peace from God, I have to go back into being in Christ because when I'm in Steve, it doesn't go very well.
SPEAKER_00: And I just like to go with Steve, because that's my habit pattern.
SPEAKER_00: Hello?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody know what I'm talking about?
SPEAKER_00: So you go into you.
SPEAKER_00: That's bad, that's not good.
SPEAKER_00: And so one of the things about maturing in Christ is to realize I've got to quit going into me because I'm selfish, I'm up to no good, and I and I get myself in trouble, and there's no peace there.
SPEAKER_00: There's no peace from Steve.
SPEAKER_00: There's no peace from Bill, there's no peace from Mary.
SPEAKER_00: It's peace from God through the grace of God.
SPEAKER_00: Receiving that grace, that caris in our life.
SPEAKER_00: Then he says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So now we're we're kind of living above it all.
SPEAKER_00: And what I mean by that is the old covenant was about material blessings.
SPEAKER_00: It was about a fruitful womb.
SPEAKER_00: It was about money, it was about land, it was about camels, it was about donkeys.
SPEAKER_00: You know, you see it in Abraham and Moses and others.
SPEAKER_00: That was the old covenant.
SPEAKER_00: The new covenant is you have spiritual blessings in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So the spiritual blessings are way better than the old covenant material blessings, because you and I know you can have a lot of stuff, and if you've got no peace in your heart, you're a messed up dude.
SPEAKER_00: You look at the movie stars and the rock stars and uh and the athletes that have everything for them.
SPEAKER_00: And they go from wife to wife and they're in drugs, and because then because they thought that the old covenant, the material blessings, were gonna make them happy, but we have a new covenant, which is spiritual blessings, and that is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentlemen.
SPEAKER_00: That's the work of the new covenant in our lives, and that's what this is about.
SPEAKER_00: That we've been predestined, we've been redeemed, we're adopted into a new family.
SPEAKER_00: You have all of those spiritual blessings the moment you take on grace.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're not experiencing it, it's still true.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, if you call yourself a Jesus follower and you're not experiencing what I'm talking about, then that's job security for me.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's why I'm here.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we meet.
SPEAKER_00: And if you just keep coming, you'll get a little bit more.
SPEAKER_00: And a little bit more, and a little bit more.
SPEAKER_00: I'm feeling a little more peace this week.
SPEAKER_00: I'm learning how to walk in joy a little bit better because I'm starting to read the word.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't read the word before.
SPEAKER_00: If you're not reading this book, I'll guarantee you you're not walking in the peace of God.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not real smart, but I figured it out.
SPEAKER_00: CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and whatever blogger you listen to don't give you peace.
SPEAKER_00: They build their company on making you unpeaceful.
SPEAKER_00: This is where the peace comes from.
SPEAKER_00: It's from Jesus, Spirit of God, in this book.
SPEAKER_00: Spend more time in this book than you do with the news.
SPEAKER_00: Spend more time in this book than you do with bloggers, and I promise you, you'll start to feel the peace come.
SPEAKER_00: It'll come.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: You see, we're in Christ positionally, but we're not in Christ experientially a lot of times.
SPEAKER_00: So probably the biggest challenge of the Christian life is how to take what we are and bring it down to how we live.
SPEAKER_00: So, okay, it's up here, we know that.
SPEAKER_00: All right, great, Steve, that's fantastic.
SPEAKER_00: But how do I bring it down here?
SPEAKER_00: That's how we grow.
SPEAKER_00: That's called maturity.
SPEAKER_00: That's called the working out of our salvation with fear and trembling.
SPEAKER_00: And so we work that out two steps forward, one step back sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: So, so this heavenly places in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's what he's talking about as we move on.
SPEAKER_00: These are the spiritual blessings that we have in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this word in Christ or in him is mentioned 10 times in the first 13 verses and some 26 times in the rest of the book.
SPEAKER_00: This is a really important part of the message of the spiritual blessings that we have in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: It's about being in him.
SPEAKER_00: Our position in Christ is in him.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's what's interesting it's a it's a partnership.
SPEAKER_00: It's a partnership.
SPEAKER_00: That before the foundations of the world, he knew you.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that weird?
SPEAKER_00: That's a little weird.
SPEAKER_00: He knew you.
SPEAKER_00: He was planning for you to be here this day.
SPEAKER_00: He was calling you forth before the foundations of the world because he loves you.
SPEAKER_00: He was adopting you before you knew about you.
SPEAKER_00: Before your parents knew about you.
SPEAKER_00: He was calling you into that.
SPEAKER_00: Now, that's called predestination or election.
SPEAKER_00: But he also says that we're adopted into a family, we're we're called forth into him with a responsibility to walk that out.
SPEAKER_00: You say, well, how does that work?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the only way I can think of it is if we took a piece of paper here and we turned that piece of paper around and made a cone.
SPEAKER_00: We made a cone and then we taped it so it wouldn't fly open when we put it out.
SPEAKER_00: And you laid it down right here on the stage, and if I'm looking at the cone from here, I would say that is a you know three-dimensional triangle.
SPEAKER_00: But if I walk up to it and then I look down straight on it, it's a circle.
SPEAKER_00: Both are true.
SPEAKER_00: Both, it's a triangle, it's a circle, it's all according to what?
SPEAKER_00: Perspective.
SPEAKER_00: It's all about perspective.
SPEAKER_00: So listen, so let me read this verse again, and I want you to see it from two perspectives.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: He chose us in him before the foundation of the world.
SPEAKER_00: That's God's responsibility, that's God's sovereignty, comma, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.
SPEAKER_00: That's your responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: To walk that out.
SPEAKER_00: So, in one sense, God's sovereignty is calling you from the perspective of the fact that he loves you, he cares about you, and has grace for you.
SPEAKER_00: But on the other hand, because of his work, we have a responsibility to walk that out in love.
SPEAKER_00: And so we look at it, you know, from this side, God looks at it from this side, both are true.
SPEAKER_00: So, men and women, the only way we can experience God's love and his power in our life is our responsibility being that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.
SPEAKER_00: Now, nobody's holy perfectly, no one's without blame perfectly, but what he's saying here is look, I chose you to be holy, I chose you to be blameless, and if you'll keep walking that out, I will literally do the work in you supernaturally.
SPEAKER_00: But I've got to have you take that step.
SPEAKER_00: I have to have you trusting me.
SPEAKER_00: So there's no contradiction, because you, you know, in one sense, some people, if you don't know these theological terms, don't worry about it, but there's kind of a Calvinist side.
SPEAKER_00: And the Calvinist side would be heavy on what we call predestination, which is right here in Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's definitely a biblical concept that God has chosen us and predestined us.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to look at that in just a second.
SPEAKER_00: But then there's an Armenian perspective, much more Wesleyan, which would be more emphasizing our responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: Guess what?
SPEAKER_00: They're both true.
SPEAKER_00: They're looking at it from different perspectives.
SPEAKER_00: So God is sovereign and we have a responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 5, having predestined us to adoption as sons and daughters by Jesus Christ Himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.
SPEAKER_00: And I love this word.
SPEAKER_00: I love the word.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know how many times I've heard people just argue over predestination.
SPEAKER_00: We don't argue about predestination at the road because I know what it means.
SPEAKER_00: It means pro-horizo.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it is in Greek.
SPEAKER_00: Pro-horizo.
SPEAKER_00: It means to see ahead the horizons of your life.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, I know the boundaries of your life.
SPEAKER_00: I have a destiny for your life.
SPEAKER_00: I can see the horizons of your life, and as you follow me, you've got a destiny.
SPEAKER_00: Every one of you in this room has a destiny in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it means.
SPEAKER_00: Who would worship a God who doesn't know the future?
SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_00: I want to worship a God who's smarter than me.
SPEAKER_00: Alright?
SPEAKER_00: So He knows the future.
SPEAKER_00: He's, and if we'll follow Him and we'll trust Him, you'll come into your full destiny.
SPEAKER_00: Does everybody come into their full destiny?
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
SPEAKER_00: As a matter of fact, most don't.
SPEAKER_00: But if you'll follow Christ, if you'll continue to grow in Christ, you're going to be predestined, pro-horizo, into the boundaries and the horizons of what God's got for you.
SPEAKER_00: And that's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Tremendous.
SPEAKER_00: It's exciting.
SPEAKER_00: To go after that in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's your destiny.
SPEAKER_00: Your destiny in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So he says, predestined as adoption as sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you come from really messed up families.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, all families are messed up.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, but some of some are more messed up than others.
SPEAKER_00: But we all come out of families, we've all had brokenness, we've all experienced difficulties in our life, but you've been adopted into a family of love and grace, and you can come out of the abuse and the pain.
SPEAKER_00: And come into his family.
SPEAKER_00: Now, is his family perfect?
SPEAKER_00: No, there's mean people at church.
SPEAKER_00: There are.
SPEAKER_00: I know.
SPEAKER_00: Take it from me.
SPEAKER_00: There's mean people in church.
SPEAKER_00: There's probably some mean people in this church.
SPEAKER_00: But we're gonna we're gonna change that over time, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: Because you're gonna keep growing and we're gonna hurt your feelings and you're gonna hurt our feelings.
SPEAKER_00: That's part of family life.
SPEAKER_00: Family life is that we we hurt each other, but then we have a covenant of harmony around here and we ask for forgiveness and we work it out.
SPEAKER_00: I'll take this family over my old family any day.
SPEAKER_00: So come into the family.
SPEAKER_00: You're already in the family, but why don't you start experiencing the family?
SPEAKER_00: So people who tell you, well, I'm a Christian, but I don't go to church, I'm not involved in any church family, I'll just tell you, you're not a wholehearted disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Because a wholehearted disciple reads the whole Bible, obeys wholly, and comes into the family.
SPEAKER_00: And this is the best thing we've got, and I didn't invent it.
SPEAKER_00: He did.
SPEAKER_00: He made this thing up in Acts chapter 1 and 2.
SPEAKER_00: It was his idea.
SPEAKER_00: And so we come into a family, we've been adopted into his family, and his family is the local church.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what's exciting is that when you get into the local church, you start realizing, wow, these people over here, they're smarter than me.
SPEAKER_00: Wow, these people over here are further ahead than me.
SPEAKER_00: And it moves you forward.
SPEAKER_00: It causes kind of a part of our heart that wants more, and then we're kind of sharpened by each other.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we do at AIM.
SPEAKER_00: That's what AIM's about on Tuesday morning for us men is that we sharpen each other.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, because you're in a table.
SPEAKER_00: You get fed first, because we figured out what the priorities are in a man's life.
SPEAKER_00: The way to a man's heart is his stomach.
SPEAKER_00: And so we go to Ricky Bobby's Roadkill Cafe.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we start with.
SPEAKER_00: And and You got four different meats to pick from.
SPEAKER_00: You got hash browns, eggs, two gravies, and some other sweet stuff for five bucks.
SPEAKER_00: You show me where you can get anything better than that.
SPEAKER_00: It's pretty good.
SPEAKER_00: So we need each other.
SPEAKER_00: That's what those tables are about.
SPEAKER_00: Is it that we we're adopted into a family and we need brothers and sisters in Christ that helps us grow.
SPEAKER_00: To the praise of his glory, of his grace, by which he made us accepted in the beloved.
SPEAKER_00: So this idea is that it's grace upon grace.
SPEAKER_00: That's what that means.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying it's a praise, grace upon grace, grace just stacked on top of grace.
SPEAKER_00: And you can't get out of it.
SPEAKER_00: So give up trying to get away.
SPEAKER_00: Give up trying to run.
SPEAKER_00: Come, join the family.
SPEAKER_00: Grace upon grace.
SPEAKER_00: I tell my kids, all my kids as they've grown up, you know, you're a holt.
SPEAKER_00: I'm your dad.
SPEAKER_00: Your mom's your mom.
SPEAKER_00: And if you get married, if you move away, if you get a job, or we go years without seeing you, you're still in our family.
SPEAKER_00: You're still our son and our daughter.
SPEAKER_00: And you always will be.
SPEAKER_00: No matter where you go, no matter what you do, you're still my son, you're still my daughter.
SPEAKER_00: And you've got grace upon grace, you guys.
SPEAKER_00: You can't run away from God.
SPEAKER_00: He still loves you.
SPEAKER_00: You can't out-sin and you can't outrebel the love of God.
SPEAKER_00: So give up.
SPEAKER_00: Give up today.
SPEAKER_00: If you're running from God, if you're trying to do it on your own, it's time to quit doing that.
SPEAKER_00: And find the real life, the life you've been longing for.
SPEAKER_00: You're predestined for it.
SPEAKER_00: It's your horizon, it's your destiny to know Him.
SPEAKER_00: And it's to the praise of His glory because His grace did it.
SPEAKER_00: So, in other words, I'm saying it, but it's the grace of God that does it.
SPEAKER_00: And so when you act on it, He gets the glory because you already know you couldn't do it by yourself because you're up to no good by yourself.
SPEAKER_00: And so in Christ, we start to find that position.
SPEAKER_00: We start to find that place of His love and grace in our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: In Him, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace.
SPEAKER_00: That word here has an article in it in Greek.
SPEAKER_00: It actually could be read the redemption.
SPEAKER_00: And it was a marketplace word at the time of this writing of a master who would redeem a slave in order to set them free.
SPEAKER_00: So he came to redeem you at the cross through the blood of Christ to set you free.
SPEAKER_00: And in today's world, most people want to come and get you to make you a product so that they can enslave you to something that makes them money.
SPEAKER_00: Christ comes in the opposite spirit, and he comes and he redeems you to actually set you free.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that awesome?
SPEAKER_00: Nothing quite like it in this world.
SPEAKER_00: That someone would come and give their heart and give their life and give their blood so that you, by believing that, could be set free to a new future.
SPEAKER_00: That's predestination.
SPEAKER_00: That's the pro-horizo.
SPEAKER_00: That's the destiny of our lives is to walk in freedom and break the power of enslavement from the devil.
SPEAKER_00: In him, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace, which he made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence.
SPEAKER_00: Having made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in himself.
SPEAKER_00: Circle this phrase, the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is interesting because not everybody here has been to college.
SPEAKER_00: Not everybody here has been to graduate school.
SPEAKER_00: Probably a few of you have PhDs, but not a lot.
SPEAKER_00: Some are doctors, some are not.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you have never graduated from high school.
SPEAKER_00: Guess what?
SPEAKER_00: You know the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: Did you know?
SPEAKER_00: You know so much you can't even believe it.
SPEAKER_00: Because you open this book and you read it, it's in Genesis, and he made them male and female.
SPEAKER_00: That's the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: They're not 38 genders.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody go like this.
SPEAKER_00: There's not 38 genders.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the doctors in the PhD say.
SPEAKER_00: They don't know the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: They are confused.
SPEAKER_00: They're very, very confused.
SPEAKER_00: And they live their life.
SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine that if you have to push this much to get everybody to agree with you, it just might be a lie?
SPEAKER_00: If you have to push this much and hammer it and make it law on every front, it just might be not true.
SPEAKER_00: So you shall know the truth, the truth shall set you free.
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
SPEAKER_00: If you believe it.
SPEAKER_00: Truth does not set you free until you believe it.
SPEAKER_00: But when you believe it, it sets you free.
SPEAKER_00: And we know the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: And the mystery of his will is he made them male and female.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying that people don't struggle with same-sex attraction.
SPEAKER_00: They do.
SPEAKER_00: Always have.
SPEAKER_00: It's been true, it's been true in all cultures.
SPEAKER_00: It's been true.
SPEAKER_00: And in that struggle that we all have, there's people in our society that have multiple partners heterosexually.
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
SPEAKER_00: It's been true in all the time.
SPEAKER_00: They say that the oldest ambitious profession in the world is prostitution.
SPEAKER_00: So immorality in whatever form it comes has always been there.
SPEAKER_00: The reality is that's why the church is here.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the kingdom has come.
SPEAKER_00: Because he comes to set us free.
SPEAKER_00: And everyone in this room has bondages in our life that we're working through, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so God can set us free.
SPEAKER_00: And so I don't want to be defined by my sex.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be defined by who I have sex with.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be fine by being in Christ and by being in Christ to set other captives free because somebody was used by God to set me free.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm obligated to tell others about the love of Christ because when others get set free, they join the family and we get a bigger family and a more fun family.
SPEAKER_00: And when we do that, we get to revel in the praise of his glory.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that right?
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: He's coming back.
SPEAKER_00: Christ is coming back.
SPEAKER_00: That's the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: You tell the average person, Christ is coming back.
SPEAKER_00: What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_00: No, Christ is coming back.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna burn up this earth.
SPEAKER_00: Talk about global warming.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna burn up this earth and he's gonna recreate it.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna recreate it, and I wanna be in the Rockies.
SPEAKER_00: I want an elk hunt every day.
SPEAKER_00: I want a fly fish every day.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's gonna be a recreated heaven earth.
SPEAKER_00: We know that.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that good news?
SPEAKER_00: So even as we see all these things happening around us, we know the mystery of his will.
SPEAKER_00: I know that I'm a man, and I know that I married a woman.
SPEAKER_00: Man, great one too, I tell you.
SPEAKER_00: And I know that he's coming back.
SPEAKER_00: And on my worst day, I can say, Christ is coming back.
SPEAKER_00: And he's gonna take me home.
SPEAKER_00: I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
SPEAKER_00: And I've been given, you've been given the keys of the kingdom of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: What you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: What will be loosed on earth will be loosed in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: We have the power of prayer, we have the power to pull down strongholds.
SPEAKER_00: We've had meetings here, prayer meetings, we have noonday prayer, war rooms, and we prayed against sex trafficking.
SPEAKER_00: We've prayed in you see what's happened in the last two weeks?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, massive arrests all over the country because we've prayed.
SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna pull down strongholds.
SPEAKER_00: We are.
SPEAKER_00: So men and women, the reality is this is that we're walking as the adopted sons and daughters of the king.
SPEAKER_01: You've been listening to The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_01: We hope you have been blessed by today's message.
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SPEAKER_01: Thanks again for tuning in today, and be sure to listen to the next edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.