SPEAKER_01: So I'm telling you, I'm so accepted by God, so deeply loved by God, so unconditionally elected, chosen, affected, and accepted by God that if everyone of you in this room rejects me, I'm still going to be okay.
SPEAKER_01: Now listen to this part.
SPEAKER_01: Because my friend was like, oh, I could hear him clutching his pearls over the phone.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the part.
SPEAKER_01: Don't misunderstand this.
SPEAKER_01: It's not that I don't care about you or I don't care about what you think.
SPEAKER_01: It's because I believe what Jesus says right here.
SPEAKER_01: I believe what God says.
SPEAKER_01: I believe what he says of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son, whom I love, with whom I'm well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: I believe he feels the same way about me.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're a Christian, you should feel the same, you should believe the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's what the Bible teaches.
SPEAKER_01: This is how he feels about you.
SPEAKER_00: This podcast is brought to you by Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people to know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_01: Amen, amen, amen.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray together, church.
SPEAKER_01: Lord Jesus, we just agree with what the Bible says that when we call your name, dead things come alive.
SPEAKER_01: And the reason we believe that is because there was a time when we were spiritually dead.
SPEAKER_01: And we called on the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And the Bible says, whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
SPEAKER_01: We were spiritually dead and we were resurrected.
SPEAKER_01: You regenerated our cold, dead heart and brought us to life.
SPEAKER_01: And so we're not singing a song about somebody else's life.
SPEAKER_01: We're singing a song about ours.
SPEAKER_01: We're reminding ourselves of the capacity and the nature of Almighty God.
SPEAKER_01: And so demonstrate both of those things today: your capacity, what you're capable of, and your nature.
SPEAKER_01: It's good.
SPEAKER_01: You're loving, you're faithful, you're kind, you're generous.
SPEAKER_01: There's so much about you, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: That's why every time we come together to study your word, to open up your word, it opens us up to think about things we've maybe never thought about before, to ask questions that we were afraid to ask.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible's not afraid to ask those questions because there's an answer.
SPEAKER_01: That's why Jesus, you said we'll know the truth, and the truth will set us free.
SPEAKER_01: So, Holy Spirit, illuminate the scripture today and set us free with it, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Answer some questions that we've had in our head and in our heart.
SPEAKER_01: We've thought and we've felt, but maybe we've never asked before.
SPEAKER_01: Answer those questions today and invite us for some people for the first time into faith, and for all people into a deeper experience of faith.
SPEAKER_01: This is our prayer, God.
SPEAKER_01: Make it our experience.
SPEAKER_01: We ask in Jesus' name, and everyone said, Amen, amen.
SPEAKER_01: You could have a seed if you got a Bible.
SPEAKER_01: I invite you to take it and open up to Matthew chapter 3.
SPEAKER_01: If you're our guest today, we just started, you're you're here at a great time.
SPEAKER_01: We just started going through the book of Matthew, the gospel of Matthew.
SPEAKER_01: He's one of Jesus' disciples.
SPEAKER_01: He kind of records the life and ministry of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to talk to you this morning about thinking through the questions.
SPEAKER_01: Thinking through the questions.
SPEAKER_01: And you say, What do you mean by that?
SPEAKER_01: A long time ago, I was I was meeting with a young man and he just he just became a believer and he just started reading the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I started on page one in Genesis.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Don't do that because you won't make it through Leviticus, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Uh let's start with the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Let's start in the New Testament, life of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Well, I got questions.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Questions are great.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I got a lot of questions.
SPEAKER_01: I said, every time you got a question, get a notebook, write down your questions, and the next time we meet, uh, then we'll just kind of go through the questions.
SPEAKER_01: So he said, Okay, great.
SPEAKER_01: He leaves, we meet two weeks later.
SPEAKER_01: The cat's got 37 questions.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, How much have you read?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Four chapters.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, I just quit reading after that.
SPEAKER_01: I just couldn't live with the questions.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Oh, you're gonna live with the questions.
SPEAKER_01: When the Bible asks you a question, or you have a question about the Bible, that doesn't mean you're not smart.
SPEAKER_01: That means that you're actually thinking.
SPEAKER_01: So I want to demonstrate what I'm talking about today.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna read Matthew chapter 3, starting in verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Just gonna read like five verses, and now I want us to think through three questions that the Bible uh asks us today.
SPEAKER_01: So this is Matthew chapter 3, uh starting in verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus' earthly miner ministry has just started.
SPEAKER_01: Uh last week, John the Baptist came on the scene, and he is like a hairy mongrel from the woods, all right?
SPEAKER_01: He smells like a squirrel, and he got a big voice, and he's like, Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone's like, Oh my gosh, after 400 years of God being silent, I don't care how it comes out.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm I'm comforted to know I'm not in this world all alone.
SPEAKER_01: There is a God, he is real, he speaks a language that I understand.
SPEAKER_01: Now Jesus comes to John because John's baptizing people, and Jesus comes to John and says, Hey, I want you to baptize me.
SPEAKER_01: And John's like, uh uh-uh, no, man.
SPEAKER_01: He's the way the Bible says it.
SPEAKER_01: Then Jesus, verse 13, then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized by him.
SPEAKER_01: John would have prevented him, saying, I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus answered, Let it be so for now.
SPEAKER_01: For thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: Then he consented.
SPEAKER_01: And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were open to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him.
SPEAKER_01: And behold, a voice from heaven said, This is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: Did you see the three big questions in there?
SPEAKER_01: Do they jump off the page to you?
SPEAKER_01: Let me point to them.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the first one I want us to think about and think through this morning.
SPEAKER_01: What does it look like to be missional?
SPEAKER_01: That's in verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Hear it again, verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Then Jesus came from Galilee to Jordan to John to be baptized by him.
SPEAKER_01: One of the things, if you read the gospels, you'll realize there's no wasted movement or motion with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Everything he does is purposeful and is on purpose.
SPEAKER_01: When we talk about being a missional, this is what we mean.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is very intentional in everything he does.
SPEAKER_01: Now, that does not mean because sometimes churches can make it mean sound like if you're gonna be missional, I'm not saying being a missionary, I'm talking about being missional.
SPEAKER_01: Whether you work at a gym or you work at an oil change facility or you teach school or you're gonna drive in the morning, you're gonna get up and drive from here to channel view, channel view to teach middle school art, like one of our people does every school day.
SPEAKER_01: Uh what what whatever you do, uh do all those things.
SPEAKER_01: Have some fun, but do them with intentionality, okay?
SPEAKER_01: So if you golf, if you if you if you race, uh if you ride uh a barrel horse, do do all these things, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Enjoy all of that, but do not waste so much movement and so much motion in your life that you cannot be intentional, or what the Bible says is missional.
SPEAKER_01: To be missional, you have to understand two little words from and to.
SPEAKER_01: From and to.
SPEAKER_01: You say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Then Jesus came from Galilee, by the way, which is 29 miles away.
SPEAKER_01: Then it gets real like real focused to the Jordan, to John, to be baptized by him.
SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself, you know, it seems like that that that that that okay, how'd you get that out of that?
SPEAKER_01: To see why this matters, ask yourself the simple question.
SPEAKER_01: How much time did you waste this past week doing nothing at the expense of doing something?
SPEAKER_01: How much time did you waste this last week doing nothing at the expense of doing something?
SPEAKER_01: Uh I I was at a wedding yesterday, uh last night actually.
SPEAKER_01: Uh I did a wedding up in Montgomery, and I walked by a table of seven people off of the same family, and all seven of them had their family, their phones out, and we're just looking at them.
SPEAKER_01: And I just walked by and said, hey, hang up and hang out.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all are family, talk to each other.
SPEAKER_01: And one of the kids looked up and said, Ha ha ha ha.
SPEAKER_01: Wait, right back to scrolling.
SPEAKER_01: Like, I'd rather doom scroll than talk to these fools.
SPEAKER_01: Uh yeah, we just we we can't we unconsciously waste time so much that we don't know what we're doing.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just say this.
SPEAKER_01: Remember this unseized time flows to your weakness.
SPEAKER_01: Unseized time, time that you're not aware, you're not intentional about, it will flow to your weakness.
SPEAKER_01: Now let me say this.
SPEAKER_01: If you're from, I said it's about two words, from and to.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why being missional involves your understanding of those two simple words, from and to.
SPEAKER_01: If you're from, it's bigger than you're to, then your past will always appeal to you and have power over you.
SPEAKER_01: If you're from, it's bigger than you're to.
SPEAKER_01: Where you've been is bigger and feels bigger and takes up more space in you than where you're going to.
SPEAKER_01: Then your pastor, it'd be hard to stop, oh man, but you know, these are my friends, and I and he loves me, and he said, We're my oh man, I uh here's your problem.
SPEAKER_01: It's not that you're a bad person, it's not that you're not very disciplined, it's just that in your head and in your heart, your from is bigger than your to.
SPEAKER_01: And when that's the case, your pastor will always say it's hard to break some bad habits.
SPEAKER_01: However, when your to is bigger than your from, obedience becomes a lot easier.
SPEAKER_01: And when obedience becomes easier, being missional is the byproduct of easy.
SPEAKER_01: Are you tracking with me so far?
SPEAKER_01: You see, if you're from, what where you come from?
SPEAKER_01: Your past, your relationships, your friendships, whatever, when you come from, it's bigger than your two.
SPEAKER_01: It's always gonna be hard.
SPEAKER_01: It's like, ah, yeah, but when you're two, what's your where are you heading to?
SPEAKER_01: And for Jesus, his two was always bigger than his from.
SPEAKER_01: This is why, like in Luke chapter 9 by verse 51, it says that Jesus set his face like flint to go to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: Because he was going to the cross.
SPEAKER_01: And why was he so excited about going to the cross?
SPEAKER_01: Because he knew he was gonna go to the cross, he was gonna die, he's gonna be buried, he's gonna be resurrected, he was gonna appear for some 40 days, and then he's gonna ascend back into heaven, and he's gonna say to the Father, like he did in John 17, give me back the glory I had with you before the world began.
SPEAKER_01: Because every minute of every day Jesus Christ walked this earth, his two was bigger than his from.
SPEAKER_01: And so it wasn't hard.
SPEAKER_01: Paul was the same way.
SPEAKER_01: That's why it says in 2 Timothy chapter 4, about verse 7 and 8, he's getting ready to die.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I fought the good fight, I've kept the faith, I finished the race, and now is laid up for me.
SPEAKER_01: And now what I'm going to is bigger than where I'm coming from.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm not sad to leave all of this.
SPEAKER_01: This is the essence of what it means to be missional.
SPEAKER_01: All you have to do is make sure that you're too, what you're heading to, what's in front of you, is bigger than you're from.
SPEAKER_01: So if you're a middle school or high school student, I know school starts tomorrow for some of you, starts later this week for some of you.
SPEAKER_01: If you want to be the most freed up cat in the room, you do not don't focus on your past, where you come from.
SPEAKER_01: Think more about where you're headed to.
SPEAKER_01: High school's not forever.
SPEAKER_01: Don't fall in love with all these people because you're gonna graduate high school.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you are gonna go off to a trade school, some of you go off to college.
SPEAKER_01: These people are not gonna be in your life forever.
SPEAKER_01: I tell people all the time do not make decisions for the approval of the people who will not be there to watch you live out the consequences of those decisions.
SPEAKER_01: And that's all that's all adults grunting students.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all are just kind of like, that's a lot of words.
SPEAKER_01: Let me go back to my phone here.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: So the first question the Bible asks us today is what does it look like to be missional?
SPEAKER_01: It's real simple.
SPEAKER_01: What you're going to has got to be bigger than you're coming from.
SPEAKER_01: Where you're going to has got to be more enjoyable.
SPEAKER_01: It's got to stir more motivation in you.
SPEAKER_01: Then where you're coming from stirs guilt in you and remorse in you.
SPEAKER_01: This is the essence of what it means to be missional.
SPEAKER_01: Because when you're to is bigger than you're from, then obedience is easier.
SPEAKER_01: And when obedience is easier, mission being missional comes is just natural.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the second question that when I read this, you should have thought this.
SPEAKER_01: I've been asked this before, typically by people of uh other religions.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the second question the Bible asks us today.
SPEAKER_01: Why does Jesus get baptized?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says right there that he came to John to be baptized by him.
SPEAKER_01: And John would have prevented him, saying, I need to be baptized by you.
SPEAKER_01: And do you come to me?
SPEAKER_01: Verse 15.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus answered him, Let it be so for now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: And then he consented.
SPEAKER_01: When Jesus was baptized, and it goes on from there.
SPEAKER_01: Why does Jesus get baptized?
SPEAKER_01: You see, earlier John had a problem baptizing the Pharisees and the Sadducees because he didn't think they were worthy of baptism.
SPEAKER_01: Now he has a problem baptizing Jesus because his baptism is not worthy of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And the plot thickens even more when you consider that baptism was a result of repentance and it demonstrated that people had confessed their sinfulness.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so if Jesus is the Son of God, if Jesus is sinless, like you Christians say he is, or you you you say the Bible teaches he is, if that's true of Jesus, then why does he need to get baptized?
SPEAKER_01: I was talking to a man of a different world religion one time.
SPEAKER_01: We got in a conversation in an auto shop.
SPEAKER_01: I'm getting my oil changed, and I'm sitting there and I'm on my phone, and he said, You spend a lot of time on your phone.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, actually, I'm reading a text and I'm preaching on this Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Uh-oh.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, So you're Christian?
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Yes.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, he said, Are you a religious man?
SPEAKER_01: You're devout.
SPEAKER_01: I said, uh, I'm I'm a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, What he was, and I said, Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, May I ask you a question?
SPEAKER_01: I said, sure.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Why was your Messiah, if he was the Son of God, why did he have to undergo baptism?
SPEAKER_01: Because isn't baptism for people who've repented?
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, dude, I just came to get oil change.
SPEAKER_01: Don't ask me questions like that.
SPEAKER_01: No, I was actually, I was like, oh, okay, let's have this conversation.
SPEAKER_01: We had a great conversation.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Jesus identifies with sinners in his baptism, but he's not a sinner.
SPEAKER_01: He identifies with the people that he came to redeem.
SPEAKER_01: And away we went.
SPEAKER_01: It was a great conversation.
SPEAKER_01: Now you may be sitting here thinking, dude, I don't, I'm never going to get asked this question.
SPEAKER_01: You don't know, but there's a lot of people that get hung up on this question, and you need to have a biblical response to their objection.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, if Jesus is the Son of God, why does he have to undergo baptism?
SPEAKER_01: Let me give you four reasons and I'll unpack one of them.
SPEAKER_01: Four reasons Jesus gets baptized.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, he identifies with the people.
SPEAKER_01: He identifies with the people that he's going to eventually redeem.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Isaiah like 53, 12, that he was numbered among the transgressors.
SPEAKER_01: He identifies.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, he submits to the will of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: He submits to the will of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: Thirdly, he practices what he preaches.
SPEAKER_01: You say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Matthew, just don't turn to it right now.
SPEAKER_01: Matthew 28, 18 to 20.
SPEAKER_01: We call it the Great Commission.
SPEAKER_01: Like everybody knows what that means, but it's we'll get to the end of Matthew.
SPEAKER_01: And we will read these words in Matthew 28, 18 to 20, where Jesus says to his disciples, here's my parting shot.
SPEAKER_01: Here's my here's here's my last thing, guys.
SPEAKER_01: Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I've commanded you.
SPEAKER_01: And lo, check it out.
SPEAKER_01: Hello, don't miss this.
SPEAKER_01: And hey guys, by the way, I am with you always to the very end of the age.
SPEAKER_01: So what God commissions Christians to do, not just his disciples, but all commission, all Christians, is three things.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, go and make disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Don't get decisions, go make disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Go make disciples.
SPEAKER_01: That means people convert to Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: People say, hey, I believe not only there's a God, but but but I sinned against this God.
SPEAKER_01: If there is a God and He's holy and perfect and just and to get into heaven on my own merit, I have to keep all the law and never break one of the commandments and never sin.
SPEAKER_01: Dude, I'm in deep weeds already.
SPEAKER_01: Go and make disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Here's how you become a disciple.
SPEAKER_01: You realize, hey, I'm man, God, I'm in such need of forgiveness.
SPEAKER_01: And here's the great thing about that.
SPEAKER_01: You're in need of forgiveness, and God is willing to forgive.
SPEAKER_01: Go and make disciples of all nations, all ethne, all people groups.
SPEAKER_01: And then he says this baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: You get baptized as a result of becoming a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: You don't get baptized, and then, oh, later on, I've got the order is always conversion and then baptism in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: It's always conversion and then baptism.
SPEAKER_01: You never see anybody go, well, I got baptized, and then years later, well, it happened for me.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's conversion and then baptism.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Go and make disciples, baptizing them, and then he says this, put a star by this in your mind.
SPEAKER_01: He says, and teaching them to obey.
SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself this question: who's ever taught you to obey all that the Bible says?
SPEAKER_01: Now, the problem with a lot of people is you just try to obey, you just try hard out of determination or motivation.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not talking like a one-on-one team.
SPEAKER_01: The reason you should find you a church, I'd love for it to be this one, but everyone in you in this room should find you a church that teaches you the Bible and helps you understand what it says.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because in teaching you the Bible, what it says and what it means, they are teaching you to obey.
SPEAKER_01: And remember, obedience is the thing that makes being missional much easier.
SPEAKER_01: It makes it just a natural expression.
SPEAKER_01: It's reflex, but it's not labor.
SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01: Say amen.
SPEAKER_01: It's not like, oh, I'm pushing this boulder uphill.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's like you're riding the log ride downhill with six flags.
SPEAKER_01: Remember that?
SPEAKER_01: Everybody just braces for impact.
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
SPEAKER_01: This is what he said.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the last one reason Jesus gets baptized to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he says in verse 15.
SPEAKER_01: He said, hey, this is hey, that for now let's do this.
SPEAKER_01: So we can fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: So what does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: Two things.
SPEAKER_01: Two ways, excuse me.
SPEAKER_01: How does Jesus fulfill all righteousness?
SPEAKER_01: Two ways.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, it confirms John is a forerunner to the Messiah, John's ministry, and it confirms that it's authentic, and it affirms that what he's saying is true.
SPEAKER_01: That's why back in verse 3 of chapter 3, he's kind of saying, it says in those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea.
SPEAKER_01: Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
SPEAKER_01: Here, verse 3.
SPEAKER_01: For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight.
SPEAKER_01: If you're a Bible nerd, here's a Bible fun fact.
SPEAKER_01: There's three people in the Bible that their birth was supernaturally foretold.
SPEAKER_01: Not just their birth, but hey, this cat is gonna be consequential in the world.
SPEAKER_01: All right, Samson, John the Baptist, and Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: These are gonna be rainmakers, these are gonna be people, ship shafters, whatever you call it.
SPEAKER_01: These are people that God is going to use to change the world.
SPEAKER_01: And so when he comes on the scene, and there are people like, oh, this is the guy that Isaiah talked about, okay?
SPEAKER_01: We understand.
SPEAKER_01: And so how does he fulfill righteousness?
SPEAKER_01: Well, it confirms John is a forerunner to the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: Now, now you're smart people, look at me.
SPEAKER_01: If John is the forerunner, the one that goes to prepare the way for the Messiah, then there's a good chance the one that comes after him is the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: True or false?
SPEAKER_01: And so here's a second way that they fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: It confirms Jesus as the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: There's four, what's called now, if you're visiting today or you're in church today and you say, I come all the time, but I'm kind of uh don't overwhelm me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want you to be overwhelmed.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to be confirmed in your belief in Jesus as the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: Uh because the Bible is, I mean, Christianity is not just personal, it's historical.
SPEAKER_01: I say all the time, before it's personal, it's historical.
SPEAKER_01: So, like in the Old Testament, there's a book called Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: And one of the themes in Isaiah is they talk about this guy called the suffering servant.
SPEAKER_01: The suffering servant.
SPEAKER_01: And then he's gonna come, and it's about the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: And they talk about why is he called the suffering servant?
SPEAKER_01: Because not only is he gonna come, but he's gonna come and he's gonna suffer and he's gonna die.
SPEAKER_01: And people are like, John the Baptist is getting people ready for this.
SPEAKER_01: And in the book of Isaiah, there's they call them songs, uh, but it's like a series of verses that kind of spells out, hey, this is gonna happen in the life of the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: So when this happens, you will know that this person really is the real deal.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's the beauty of biblical prophecy.
SPEAKER_01: No other world religion has a book, the Quran or any other book that has prophecy in it.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible is the only book of any world religion that has what's called prophecy.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, it's a promise that was made way back here and it comes true in the future.
SPEAKER_01: The only thing that has to happen to discredit the Bible and Christianity is for the Bible to say, hey, here's a prophecy, and then it doesn't come true.
SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01: Say amen.
SPEAKER_01: So God puts himself in the lurch and says, Hey, by the way, here's a promise.
SPEAKER_01: Here's a prophecy I'm making back here in Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: Uh by the way, there's four songs of the suffering servant in Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: They're in chapter 42, chapter 49, chapter 50, and chapter 53.
SPEAKER_01: Scripture promised that the Messiah would have the Spirit of God on him, and he would be God's son.
SPEAKER_01: So you say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Isaiah chapter 42, verse 1 says this Behold, my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights, I have put my spirit upon him, he will bring forth justice to the nations.
SPEAKER_01: Now that's why when we read in Matthew chapter 3, and it says that the Holy Spirit came on Jesus like a dove, this is what the people, because it's like they've gone to religious school their whole life, and they're like, No, wait a minute.
SPEAKER_01: Isaiah said that God's spirit and he's gonna come on him, and uh-oh, and so what they said about John the Baptist, this is the guy Isaiah talked about.
SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden they're looking at Jesus, going, This also is the guy that Isaiah talked about.
SPEAKER_01: Now, just for coherence, coherence is a big word uh that means it all fits together.
SPEAKER_01: The Old Testament, uh oh, the New Testament doesn't cancel out the Old Testament, the New Testament feels full the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_01: Uh you say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Let me read from this is from Acts chapter 8 in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: A guy named Philip, this is why you should read the Bible because there's some crazy, beautiful things happening there.
SPEAKER_01: There's a guy named Philip who's he's a Christian, and he's just walking on about his day, and and the Holy Spirit, there's a guy riding in a chariot, and he's reading from the scroll of Isaiah, and he's reading out loud to himself.
SPEAKER_01: And the Holy Spirit tells Philip, hey, go run alongside that chariot.
SPEAKER_01: And he runs alongside the chariot, looks at the guy and says, Hey, do you understand what you're reading?
SPEAKER_01: This is the way the Bible says it.
SPEAKER_01: So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet, and he asked him, Do you understand what you're reading?
SPEAKER_01: And he said, How can I unless someone guides me?
SPEAKER_01: And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
SPEAKER_01: Now, the passage of scripture that he was reading was this This is Isaiah 53.
SPEAKER_01: Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb before his shearer is silent, so he opens not his mouth.
SPEAKER_01: In his humiliation, justice was denied him.
SPEAKER_01: Who can describe his generation?
SPEAKER_01: For his life is taken away from the earth.
SPEAKER_01: And the eunuch said to Philip, About whom I ask you, does the prophet say this?
SPEAKER_01: About himself or about someone else?
SPEAKER_01: And then basically, here's a guy who's come to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: He's the Ethiopian eunuch.
SPEAKER_01: Basically, he he is the treasurer of the whole nation of Ethiopia, of Canaanist the Queen of Ethiopia.
SPEAKER_01: If you had an Ethiopian dollar, his name would be on there.
SPEAKER_01: This is an important man.
SPEAKER_01: He's gone to Jerusalem to worship and he comes back.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't know God.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't understand the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: And he asks Philip, he says, Hey, Philip says, Do you understand what you're reading?
SPEAKER_01: He said, How can I, unless someone explains it to me?
SPEAKER_01: Again, another reason you need to find a church that explains the truth of the gospel to you.
SPEAKER_01: And then the eunuch says, Hey, I got a question about who I ask you.
SPEAKER_01: Does this prophet say this?
SPEAKER_01: Is Isaiah the prophet talking about himself or is he talking about someone else?
SPEAKER_01: In verse 35, then Philip opened his mouth.
SPEAKER_01: And beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, Philip says, Isaiah's talking about Jesus Christ, the Messiah, who is to come.
SPEAKER_01: And so Jesus fulfills all righteousness in that he is numbered among the transgressors.
SPEAKER_01: He's numbered among sinners.
SPEAKER_01: He fulfills, he fulfills the law with his life, and he meets the demands of the law with his death.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: He is numbered among uh sinners, the transgressors.
SPEAKER_01: He fulfills the law with his life.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, that's why we'll see in Matthew, Jesus says, I didn't come to abolish the law.
SPEAKER_01: No, I'm not canceling the law.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna meet all the requirements of the law.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna obey everything the law says, all right?
SPEAKER_01: And so he fulfills the law in his life, but he also meets the demands of the law in his death.
SPEAKER_01: And so when he says here in Matthew chapter 3, Jesus says, Hey, it's fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: This is why.
SPEAKER_01: And as if that wasn't enough, the Holy Spirit descends on Jesus like a dove, and God the Father speaks from heaven and says, This is my son, whom I love, with whom I'm well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: Back to the oil change place.
SPEAKER_01: Remember that?
SPEAKER_01: Uh y'all thought, well, how'd that end?
SPEAKER_01: Here's how it ended.
SPEAKER_01: I said to the guy, the guy goes, Well, it's just a it's just a difference of opinion.
SPEAKER_01: I guess you know your religion teaches this and my religion teaches that.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yeah, but uh here's the thing.
SPEAKER_01: Uh I it's not just I'm set, I'm trying to convince you of something that I don't believe, or the Bible kind of says the Bible teaches that God Himself spoke.
SPEAKER_01: When Jesus was baptized, it was a very Trinitarian experience.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, this is the first experience record of the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Not three separate gods, but three in one, one God.
SPEAKER_01: And people, and he also said, Yo, you have three gods.
SPEAKER_01: I said, No.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Here's the thing about my God that's great.
SPEAKER_01: My God has never left me alone.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, How do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: And I said, God the Father, okay?
SPEAKER_01: He's present, you see that in the Old Testament, pillar of cloud by day, pillar of fire by night.
SPEAKER_01: He's always with his people, all right?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus comes in the New Testament, he's present on earth, incarnates as a baby to the womb of a virgin, lives a sinless life.
SPEAKER_01: He dies, is resurrected from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: He's just getting ready to send back to heaven, but he's not gonna leave me as an orphan.
SPEAKER_01: And so he says, I gotta go so that the Holy Spirit, the comforter, may come.
SPEAKER_01: So it's not three separate gods, it's three in one.
SPEAKER_01: He's a triune God.
SPEAKER_01: And here's why that and he said, Why is that important?
SPEAKER_01: I said, That's a great question.
SPEAKER_01: It's important because my God has never left me alone.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, I said, Do you feel the presence of your God?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Well, I'm I'm going to be a devout man, and then I and then I'm gonna I'm gonna get to go to heaven because I'm devout.
SPEAKER_01: I said, You're gonna get to go to heaven if you keep all the rules.
SPEAKER_01: That's exactly right.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna get go to heaven because I believe in the one who kept all the rules.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and all of a sudden everybody else in the old change places nodding their head and kind of like, I think he got you there, Skippy.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, And by the way, I'm not trying to win an argument.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, You have given me much to think about.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yeah, and I've enjoyed the conversation.
SPEAKER_01: The guy comes in and goes, 2002 for it.
SPEAKER_01: I said, That's me.
SPEAKER_01: Don't touch my radio, okay?
SPEAKER_01: I got it just like I like it.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and and and I walked over and shook his hand and I said, Enjoy the conversation.
SPEAKER_01: I said, What's your name?
SPEAKER_01: He said, My name's Muhammad.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Are you named after the prophet?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Yes, I am.
SPEAKER_01: I said, No pressure there, huh?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Tell me about it.
SPEAKER_01: Look at me.
SPEAKER_01: People that believe something different from you are not by nature bad people.
SPEAKER_01: They just believe something different.
SPEAKER_01: You have to so understand what you believe that you can engage with them in a meaningful way and not just yell at them and walk away.
SPEAKER_01: And I just said, hey, it's really good.
SPEAKER_01: I really enjoyed it.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Again, so you're yes, I don't need something to be true to win an argument.
SPEAKER_01: I Christianity is me submitting to what I know to be true.
SPEAKER_01: And that God the Father, I believe Jesus is the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're here today, you're like, I don't know if Jesus is the son of God.
SPEAKER_01: I think he was a good man, I think he was a righteous prophet, I think he's a good moral example.
SPEAKER_01: I would say to you that you need to go back and ask yourself, why does God speak from heaven and say, This is my son?
SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden, it's God putting his stamp of validation on the life and ministry of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the third question from the text.
SPEAKER_01: What are my real needs?
SPEAKER_01: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Look at what it says.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Then he uh and Jesus was baptized in verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: He went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were open to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him.
SPEAKER_01: And behold, a voice from heaven said, This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: Now I would say this to everyone in this room.
SPEAKER_01: Then in verse 17, God speaks to three of our biggest needs.
SPEAKER_01: Not three of my biggest needs, not just three of your biggest needs, but three of the biggest needs of everybody in this room.
SPEAKER_01: Anybody that'll watch this on the internet, uh, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Your three, what I call your core needs.
SPEAKER_01: If you did you see Iron Man, say amen.
SPEAKER_01: They only made seven of them, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Remember Tony Stark has this thing that powers him, all right?
SPEAKER_01: Remember that?
SPEAKER_01: You take it out, and Tony Stark, whoa, whoa, whoa.
SPEAKER_01: He powers down.
SPEAKER_01: You have these core beliefs.
SPEAKER_01: You have these core needs.
SPEAKER_01: Some of your core beliefs are true, some of them are false.
SPEAKER_01: Some of your core you have core needs that drive you.
SPEAKER_01: You need to understand what they are.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus speaks to all of them right here.
SPEAKER_01: You say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: He says, This is my son, whom I love.
SPEAKER_01: I said, when he says beloved son, I separate those out so you can get the emphasis of both of them.
SPEAKER_01: So let's just start.
SPEAKER_01: What are your what do you what are your three biggest needs?
SPEAKER_01: The first one is it's right there.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son, your identity.
SPEAKER_01: That's your first big need.
SPEAKER_01: Your identity.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son.
SPEAKER_01: When we were building this building, a man in our church was standing in my office and he was looking out the window.
SPEAKER_01: They had the steel girders going up, and he looked out the window and he said, Hey, are you letting in all the ways God's used you as our pastor?
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Nah, probably not.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Why not?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I really don't think of myself as a pastor.
SPEAKER_01: He said, Well, how do you think about yourself?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I think about myself as a beloved son of the father.
SPEAKER_01: He looked at me like, Why are you touching yourself?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Now there's people in my church that think of me, you know, they use son of in other words, uh, but I'm a beloved son of the father.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Well, I said, Yeah, I he said, So you don't I don't think about myself as a pastor at all.
SPEAKER_01: Matter of fact, last night at the wedding, someone had a pride out of me.
SPEAKER_01: So, so are you what so who are you in relation to the bride and the groom?
SPEAKER_01: I'm the efficient.
SPEAKER_01: That's what you do at wedding, that's what you're called.
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, So, how do you know Justin and Karen?
SPEAKER_01: I'm Karen's pastor.
SPEAKER_01: You see Aiden Reyes over there?
SPEAKER_01: I knew him since he was three years old.
SPEAKER_01: Now he's a grown man with facial hair.
SPEAKER_01: Looks like a silverbacked gorilla.
SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh, so you're the pastor.
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_01: But I don't think of myself as a pastor.
SPEAKER_01: Not that I'm ashamed of being a pastor.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Identity is so important, one of your core needs.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, men, especially you listen to this.
SPEAKER_01: Never confuse your activity with your identity.
SPEAKER_01: That's why when men lose their job or retire, it's an existential identity crisis.
SPEAKER_01: Because you attach your identity to what you do.
SPEAKER_01: I do not attach my identity to what I do.
SPEAKER_01: I love what I do.
SPEAKER_01: Don't get me wrong.
SPEAKER_01: I love what I do and the people I get to do it with.
SPEAKER_01: But my activity is not my identity.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son.
SPEAKER_01: That is my identity.
SPEAKER_01: This is my daughter.
SPEAKER_01: I'm a child of God.
SPEAKER_01: That is your core identity.
SPEAKER_01: Then here's your second core need: whom I love, affection.
SPEAKER_01: Identity, first need, affection, second need.
SPEAKER_01: Whom I love, whom I love.
SPEAKER_01: That means he doesn't tolerate me.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't just love me, but he enjoys me.
SPEAKER_01: Let me ask you a weird question.
SPEAKER_01: Where were you the first time you understood the love of God for what it really is?
SPEAKER_01: Where were you the first time you understood the love of God for all that it encompasses and all that it really is?
SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you mine.
SPEAKER_01: I was in college, I went to a private Christian school.
SPEAKER_01: And guys, here's the good thing about going to a private Christian school.
SPEAKER_01: You've always got a cheap date with a girl.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, would you like to go to church on Sunday?
SPEAKER_01: You can check her out and see if she sings.
SPEAKER_01: Does she have a Bible?
SPEAKER_01: Are the pages of that Bible so clean you can eat off of it?
SPEAKER_01: Or is she written in that bad boy?
SPEAKER_01: She takes notes.
SPEAKER_01: Does she have a journal?
SPEAKER_01: So I'm checking all this out.
SPEAKER_01: Me and this girl have been hanging out.
SPEAKER_01: We've gone out a few times, and I said, hey, I'm going to church on someone.
SPEAKER_01: I'd love to.
SPEAKER_01: I don't have a car.
SPEAKER_01: Can you come pick me up?
SPEAKER_01: Listen, I got a Ford Fiesta.
SPEAKER_01: I'll be about to roll up in this shaggin' wagon.
SPEAKER_01: Two coats of paint and a heater rolled up in front of Lime Berry Hall.
SPEAKER_01: She got in.
SPEAKER_01: We go to church.
SPEAKER_01: I'm sure this has been sung in the church forever.
SPEAKER_01: I had never heard this hymn sung.
SPEAKER_01: This was how bad, this is how impacted I was.
SPEAKER_01: I stole the hymnal and took it home that day.
SPEAKER_01: I brought it back the next Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: I borrowed it.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't really steal it.
SPEAKER_01: So don't steal from us today, kids.
SPEAKER_01: Because we sang a hymn that had these words in it.
SPEAKER_01: Could we with ink the ocean fill, and where the skies of parchment made, where every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade, to write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry.
SPEAKER_01: Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky.
SPEAKER_01: And holding there, standing there holding a hymnal, it landed on me.
SPEAKER_01: Not like a dove, but like an elephant.
SPEAKER_01: And I in the back of somewhere I heard Howard Cosell, Down goes Fraser, down goes Fraser.
SPEAKER_01: Because I just I felt myself going down and I grabbed the pew in front of me and just eased myself down.
SPEAKER_01: And this beautiful girl I'd been going out with was like, Are you okay?
SPEAKER_01: People are staring.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, No, I'm not okay.
SPEAKER_01: And if you keep talking, you're not gonna be okay.
SPEAKER_01: And I just put my face down in the hymnal at the Emmanuel Baptist Church in Marshall, Texas, and just sobbed like a kitty.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's crying and then there's bawling and then there's squalling.
SPEAKER_01: You're squalling when noise is coming out of you.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, and she says, This is really embarrassing.
SPEAKER_01: And in my mind, I thought, you're walking back to campus.
SPEAKER_01: I tried to stop.
SPEAKER_01: I couldn't stop.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, keep singing because this is loud.
SPEAKER_01: And here's the only explanation I have for it.
SPEAKER_01: For the first time in my life, it dawned on me, not that God loved me, I heard that all the time.
SPEAKER_01: God loves you, and I'm playing for your life.
SPEAKER_01: But it it dawned on me when church full of old people, not a bunch of students.
SPEAKER_01: Hey students, you've got to stop just going to to to youth.
SPEAKER_01: You get you you need to be in this room around people who've been married longer than you've been alive.
SPEAKER_01: It gives you hope for your future.
SPEAKER_01: The reason you fear leaving your from is because you don't look around and see that your two is more enjoyable than you're from.
SPEAKER_01: Because you're not around old people who've been through some stuff and they still love Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: You're around everybody your age, like, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
SPEAKER_01: You got a phone, I got a phone.
SPEAKER_01: Let's be phone buddies.
SPEAKER_01: This beautiful girl.
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful, physically beautiful, spiritually ugly.
SPEAKER_01: Did I tell you she didn't have a Bible?
SPEAKER_01: I was like, why don't you have a Bible?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I've never really read it that much.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, oh, gee, whiz.
SPEAKER_01: And she's like, hey, all our friends are staring.
SPEAKER_01: Would you mind standing up?
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I can't stand up.
SPEAKER_01: I've been wrecked.
SPEAKER_01: Because after all this beautiful, poetic, melodic language, here's the part that just like a harpoon through my heart.
SPEAKER_01: Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretch from sky to sky.
SPEAKER_01: It was like the Holy Spirit just bent over and said, You have no idea how much I love you, and I'm never gonna stop.
SPEAKER_01: So get used to being a man who's loved by God.
SPEAKER_01: You can't disqualify yourself from this with your stupidity.
SPEAKER_01: Are you sure?
SPEAKER_01: Identity, affection.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just say this about the love of God.
SPEAKER_01: Oftentimes it's hard for us to believe that this is true, that this applies to us because of based on all that you've done, or you promised God you wouldn't do it again and you did it again.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna do this ever again.
SPEAKER_01: If you just give me a good guy, give me a good girl.
SPEAKER_01: You got a good guy and you got a good girl, and you kept doing bad things.
SPEAKER_01: And you can't get your head around this, you can't believe that the love of God applies to you, is available to you, and you fall into this place where don't miss this, your disbelief masquerades as unbelief.
SPEAKER_01: Your disbelief, they're they're totally different, masquerades as unbelief.
SPEAKER_01: And your mom and dad are like, oh man, I'll tell you what, oh, my kid just they deconstructed their faith, they left the faith, blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the here's the distinction in those two, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Meaning, this sounds impossible.
SPEAKER_01: I just simply cannot believe that.
SPEAKER_01: I cannot accept it.
SPEAKER_01: I don't deserve it.
SPEAKER_01: How could God love me?
SPEAKER_01: I have to disbelieve this, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And my disbelief, this really what's going on, it masquerades is unbelief.
SPEAKER_01: And so people, especially if you got kids that are in college or young adult, you're like, oh, they've left the faith.
SPEAKER_01: No, they have to disbelieve because if the love of God is that unconditional, how do you explain my life?
SPEAKER_01: That's what your kids are thinking.
SPEAKER_01: You have to hold the love of God at arm's length so I can keep on sinning.
SPEAKER_01: Because if the love of God is all the Bible says it is, then how do I continue to live like this?
SPEAKER_01: Because I know if I don't, I don't know a lot, but I know one thing.
SPEAKER_01: I do not deserve that kind of love.
SPEAKER_01: None of us do.
SPEAKER_01: So if you're here today and you're persistent in disbelief, masquerading is unbelief, I just want to say to you, the love of God will find you and unwind you.
SPEAKER_01: It's why Romans chapter 2, verse 5 says this of God, it is your kindness that leads us to repentance.
SPEAKER_01: So if you've got somebody that's stuck in disbelief, like I just can't believe that, you just keep pouring on divine kindness on them.
SPEAKER_01: Uh let me give you a distinction of the two.
SPEAKER_01: Disbelief is the inability to accept something is true.
SPEAKER_01: Unbelief is the unwillingness to believe.
SPEAKER_01: Big difference.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the third core need: identity, affection.
SPEAKER_01: Put a start by this one acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: Acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son, that's your that's my identity, whom I love, that's that's my affection.
SPEAKER_01: I start with that.
SPEAKER_01: I don't start with the love of my wife, which is incredible, which is very calibrating to my soul, uh, whom I love, and get this part, with whom I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: Some of your children engage in behavior that makes you crazy, whether it's they drink or they smoke weed or they lie or they engage in immoral behavior.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, not because, and here's the thing I want you parents to understand your kids do not do that because they enjoy it.
SPEAKER_01: They do that because they crave acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: And that is the price they have to pay to get acceptance from the people they want to be accepted by.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: And here's the thing, as soon as you don't understand, your peers know that you crave their acceptance and they withhold it from you in an effort to control you.
SPEAKER_01: If you could just get your head around with whom I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: I asked somebody recently, do you like the behaviors?
SPEAKER_01: Kid had to come see me because his parents caught him doing some things, and he's like, How long is this gonna take?
SPEAKER_01: How about five minutes?
SPEAKER_01: Because I could rock your world in five minutes and go back and drinking coffee and reading books about dead people.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, What'd you say?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Shut up and listen for five minutes.
SPEAKER_01: I don't think you're a pothead, I don't think you're a thief, I don't think you're a pathological liar.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, pathological, the reason that word is so good, because in your kid's mind, this path makes the most logic.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I don't think you're a bad kid at all.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, What do you think?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I think you crave acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: I think you cannot stand isolated and alone another day.
SPEAKER_01: So whatever your friend group says you've got to do, whatever they do, you will do that to fit in because you crave acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: And he looked at me and he goes, How'd you know that?
SPEAKER_01: I said, That's two and a half minutes.
SPEAKER_01: You got the other two and a half minutes, we'll be done in five.
SPEAKER_01: Well, my mom said it lasts about an hour.
SPEAKER_01: No, I told you I could rock your world in five minutes.
SPEAKER_01: Your world's not complicated, it's not like a Rubik's Cube.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, What's a Rubik's Cube?
SPEAKER_01: Son, you're gonna go to hell on a slipping slide if you don't know what a Rubik's Cube is.
SPEAKER_01: Now, by the way, by the way, I was talking to a friend and he said, What made you laugh this week?
SPEAKER_01: Because I said to him, What made you laugh this week?
SPEAKER_01: He's like, What my friend struggles with low-grade depression.
SPEAKER_01: I said, What made you laugh this week?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Oh, well, nothing really.
SPEAKER_01: What made you laugh?
SPEAKER_01: When people don't know how to answer the question, they flip it back on you.
SPEAKER_01: He said, Well, what made you laugh this week?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I was talking to Blake, our connections, I mean, our uh uh equipment pastor, and we were talking about in this podcast, and he asked me a question about a Nineveh list.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yeah, Nineveh list is people you have on your list that you can't sin against them.
SPEAKER_01: You know, Tanya Harding's on there, O.J.
SPEAKER_01: Simpson's on there, uh, Brian Kohlberg and the kid of those college kids in Idaho, he's on there.
SPEAKER_01: And then this is what got awkward for Blake.
SPEAKER_01: I said, and for a lot of people, I'm on their Nineveh list.
SPEAKER_01: And Blake was like, and my friend said, What was that about?
SPEAKER_01: I said, the look on his face on his face said, I know some people who have you on their nine of a list.
SPEAKER_01: And my friend said, Was that hard for you to hear?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Absolutely not.
SPEAKER_01: And this is my friend who struggles with acceptance.
SPEAKER_01: One of the reasons he's depressed is he wants acceptance from people and they withhold it and it rocks his world.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Well, when people, when people withdraw from you, I said, it just gives me more time to get stuff done I need to get done.
SPEAKER_01: And he said in the phone, You're not normal, Neil.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, No, here, here, here, here's the thing.
SPEAKER_01: I'm so loved by God that there's nothing I can do to make God love me more, and there's nothing I can do to make God love me less.
SPEAKER_01: If you're going around thinking, what can I do to make these people love me?
SPEAKER_01: You do not have a friendship, you have an arrangement.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Well, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: I said, God loves me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm so loved by God, and not only does he love me, he loves me with this everlasting, unchangeable covenant love, and he knows everything about me, and also the one who knows everything about me, the one who knows what nobody else can know.
SPEAKER_01: He's the one that not only loves me, he accepts me at such a deep level that if I am rejected by everybody in the room on Sunday, and he goes, Will you tell your people this?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Now I will.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm telling you, I'm so accepted by God, so deeply loved by God, so unconditionally elected, chosen, affected, and accepted by God that if everyone of you in this room rejects me, I'm still gonna be okay.
SPEAKER_01: Now listen to this part.
SPEAKER_01: Because my friend was like, oh, I could hear him clutching his pearls over the phone.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, here's the part.
SPEAKER_01: Don't misunderstand this.
SPEAKER_01: It's not that I don't care about you or I don't care about what you think.
SPEAKER_01: It's because I believe what Jesus says right here.
SPEAKER_01: I believe what God says.
SPEAKER_01: I believe what he says of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: This is my son, whom I love, with whom I'm well pleased.
SPEAKER_01: I believe he feels the same way about me.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're a Christian, you should feel the same, you should believe the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's what the Bible teaches.
SPEAKER_01: This is how he feels about you.
SPEAKER_01: Your deep core need for identity, affection, and acceptance is all met in a relationship with Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And if you don't have that relationship, you're gonna go out, you're gonna go to school tomorrow or Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday, whenever it starts, you're gonna walk into a social meat grinder, and you're gonna be like, please, please, give me some identity, please, please, please, dislike me, just like me, give me some affection, please.
SPEAKER_01: You can you can disrespect me, you can talk about me, but don't break up with me.
SPEAKER_01: Who's going to accept me today?
SPEAKER_01: Listen, if the acceptance of an all-knowing perfect God doesn't center you, what do you think being accepted by people is gonna do?
SPEAKER_01: So I want to end today with three what I call back to school questions.
SPEAKER_01: This is not just for students.
SPEAKER_01: Every one of us in this room got to get an answer to these questions, and they're right out of the Psalms.
SPEAKER_01: And here they are.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the first one Psalm 56, 4.
SPEAKER_01: In God whose word I praise, in God I trust, I shall not be afraid.
SPEAKER_01: What can flesh, what can people do to me?
SPEAKER_01: That's the question.
SPEAKER_01: What can flesh?
SPEAKER_01: What can people I say do all counseling sessions?
SPEAKER_01: I say to people all the time, you got to get an answer to this question.
SPEAKER_01: What can flesh do to me?
SPEAKER_01: And when you go out there and you get an answer to that question and you come back, you manifest, you show up differently in all social settings.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the second back to school question.
SPEAKER_01: Psalm 27:1 The Lord is my light and my salvation.
SPEAKER_01: Whom shall I fear?
SPEAKER_01: The Lord is a stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?
SPEAKER_01: So if you're here in the room and you're going to sixth grade tomorrow and you're like, it's a little just meditate on this question.
SPEAKER_01: Whom shall I fear?
SPEAKER_01: Of whom shall I be afraid?
SPEAKER_01: And then finally, Psalm 42, 5, why are you cast out?
SPEAKER_01: Why are you cast down, oh my soul?
SPEAKER_01: And why are you in tormoil within me?
SPEAKER_01: Hope in God, for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.
SPEAKER_01: Why are you cast down, oh my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?
SPEAKER_01: Translation, why do I feel what I feel?
SPEAKER_01: And then hear this part.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Hope in God, why?
SPEAKER_01: For I shall again praise him.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, the Bible's so raw, so honest, I shall again praise him.
SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like praising him right now.
SPEAKER_01: But the way I feel right now is not gonna go on forever.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna feel this way forever.
SPEAKER_01: And therefore, I'm not gonna let this moment have power over me.
SPEAKER_01: Or Jason Gray says, I'm gonna be better, but not right now.
SPEAKER_01: My friend Ross King lost his wife this week.
SPEAKER_01: Laid in bed beside her, heard her breathe her last breath, died of cancer.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, I'm just angry.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want anybody trying to fix me.
SPEAKER_01: And Marsha and I were talking, she said, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna be better, but not right now.
SPEAKER_01: For I shall again praise him.
SPEAKER_01: You get answers to these questions.
SPEAKER_01: Look at me and we're done.
SPEAKER_01: You get answers to these questions, and all of a sudden, in here, you start to feel differently because you believe differently and you show up out there differently.
SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01: Say amen.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_01: If you're our guests, just relax.
SPEAKER_01: We like to teach the Bible, then give you some space to think about.
SPEAKER_01: Some questions come on the screen.
SPEAKER_01: That's for your consideration, your reflection.
SPEAKER_01: Right now, just ask the Lord, hey Lord, what's where do I direct my mind?
SPEAKER_01: What do I think about right now in this moment?
SPEAKER_01: There's a lot, like five verses, and boom, like a pop-up book.
SPEAKER_01: It just kept coming.
SPEAKER_01: That's the way the Bible is, God.
SPEAKER_01: And so we just want to still ourselves and sit under for just a moment and think about what you said.
SPEAKER_01: So, Holy Spirit, press in on us everything necessary.
SPEAKER_01: Let the rest fall to the wayside.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we understand today that there's an enduring quality to the love of God that we don't find in our own.
SPEAKER_01: Our love for most people is conditional.
SPEAKER_01: The next time they take us off, we'll write them off.
SPEAKER_01: We're that flighty and thin and vapid and revengeful.
SPEAKER_01: Small.
SPEAKER_01: That's us, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: We have really small affection and we're manipulative and we play little popularity games, and you're let yet you love us so unconditionally.
SPEAKER_01: You've got to just look down and shake your head and go, come on, guys, really?
SPEAKER_01: Against the backdrop of this immense, vast, holy affection, you choose to do that.
SPEAKER_01: Oh God, have mercy on us.
SPEAKER_01: Have mercy on us, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Have mercy on us.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for loving us the way you do and meeting our core needs so we don't go to school tomorrow hoping somebody else does.
SPEAKER_01: We're grateful for that in Jesus' name, and all God's people said amen.