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SPEAKER_01: Father, we uh we understand that this morning, that there's no one like you, that no one compares to you, uh, that you're the only God who ever was, will be.
SPEAKER_01: You're the God who was and is and is to come.
SPEAKER_01: And so when we build and bank our lives upon you, we are building and banking our lives on the most certain thing this world could ever know.
SPEAKER_01: Everything else is uncertainty.
SPEAKER_01: Or as the hymn writer said, it is sinking sand.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Lord, we're not here to get mad at the sinking sand.
SPEAKER_01: We're just not here uh to depend upon it.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Holy Spirit, uh, lead us into the truth today.
SPEAKER_01: We want to sing to you, not just about you.
SPEAKER_01: We want to hear from you.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to just hear about you, and so every time we open the Bible, we are reading the will and the words of God.
SPEAKER_01: And so let us bring sufficient sobriety to the moment so that our intellect can bow down before King Jesus today.
SPEAKER_01: Big, sufficient Jesus is here to proclaim his rule and reign over everybody and everything.
SPEAKER_01: And we're great with that.
SPEAKER_01: Our heart beats fast at the prospect of that.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Holy Spirit, illuminate the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: It's not a lesson today, it's an invitation to a life.
SPEAKER_01: Give us eyes to see, we pray in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone said, Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: You can have a C if you got a Bible.
SPEAKER_01: I invite you to take it and open up to Daniel chapter 3.
SPEAKER_01: If you're our guest, we're going through the book of Daniel, just verse by verse.
SPEAKER_01: It's called expository preaching, and it's not sexy, but it's the way you nourish a congregation over the long haul.
SPEAKER_01: I have a friend that checks in with me, not every week, but consistently to say, Hey, what are you gonna tell your people this week?
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I'm gonna talk to them this week about what we learn from suffering for our faith.
SPEAKER_01: Now, my friend is not a believer, my bad.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saying he's not a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: He is not in a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: And therefore, the requirements of the gospel do not apply to him.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, you know, I said, you know, what we learn from suffering for our faith.
SPEAKER_01: I said, you have to be a Christian to suffer for your faith.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, I don't know that I'd ever want to be a Christian if you suffer.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Oh, everybody's going to suffer in a fallen world.
SPEAKER_01: The difference in you and me, my, I said to my unbelieving friend, the difference in you and me is that when when I suffer, there's there's resources in reality available to me.
SPEAKER_01: When you suffer, there is no resource and available and reality available to you.
SPEAKER_01: You suffer all alone.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Well, I wouldn't have to, I would hate to believe in something and have to suffer for it.
SPEAKER_01: I said, This is how you know you you believe in it, is that you suffer for it and you don't have your mind changed about it.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Yeah, I I just never suffer.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, But he said, Well, I said, it's not the devil.
SPEAKER_01: We Christians say, Oh, the devil's attacking me.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it is the will of God that you suffer.
SPEAKER_01: Because I told him, I'm gonna tell my people that sometimes it's the will of God that you suffer.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Man, they're not gonna like that.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, That's okay.
SPEAKER_01: It's not my job to be liked by my people, it's my job to equip them uh to be the people the Bible says they can be.
SPEAKER_01: And I would never look into your life and say, oh, this is the will of God.
SPEAKER_01: It's God's will you're suffering right now.
SPEAKER_01: I that's insensitive and not my place.
SPEAKER_01: And my friend kept going in the conversation.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Well, I just don't know how I feel about uh uh about something where you know, and I said, here's the thing: I said, you don't have to worry about suffering as a believer because you're not one, and you really don't have to worry about the devil attacking you because y'all are on the same team.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: I said, if you turned on TV and two teammates on the Pittsburgh Steelers are fighting each other, that would be news.
SPEAKER_01: If the Pittsburgh Steelers were fighting the Baltimore Ravens, that would be just, oh, it's just football.
SPEAKER_01: But when teammates don't really turn on each other, why would the devil awaken you if he's got you blinded and you're going to hell?
SPEAKER_01: And he said, So you think I'm going to hell?
SPEAKER_01: No, I don't think you're going to the whole of things.
SPEAKER_01: I said, I know you are.
SPEAKER_01: This is why I talk to you like I do.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not trying to be shocking to you.
SPEAKER_01: And my friend's like, man, you are the most consistently narrow-minded person I know.
SPEAKER_01: I said, or I'm right.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm willing to bank my life on it.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, You've banked your life on what you believe, I banked my life on what I believe.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why am I telling you all of that?
SPEAKER_01: Because this morning we're going to read about three men who banked their life on what they believe.
SPEAKER_01: Give you the context.
SPEAKER_01: Daniel chapter 3, King Nebuchadnezzar, an insecure ruler, has built this 90-foot-tall, nine feet wide idol out of gold, covered with gold, and told everybody we're going to play music and you're going to bow down to it.
SPEAKER_01: And three guys, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they were Hebrew teenagers, about 16, 17 years old.
SPEAKER_01: They said, No, we're not worshiping any God but the one true God.
SPEAKER_01: And they didn't bow down.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, if you don't bow down, I'm going to throw you in the fiery furnace.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, a big brick oven, and you're going to be cooked alive.
SPEAKER_01: And they were like, Okay, our God is able to save us, but even if he doesn't exercise his capacity, we're not going to change, have our minds changed about this.
SPEAKER_01: And so he's where we are, we left off last time.
SPEAKER_01: He gets them up there and he asks the question, What God is going to deliver you out of my hands?
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, dude, we do not live in your hands.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: And so I want to talk to you this morning about what we learned from suffering for our faith.
SPEAKER_01: Daniel chapter 3, we'll pick up the story in verse 19.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with fury, and the expression of his face was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
SPEAKER_01: He was for them, in other words, until they said, We will not bow down to you.
SPEAKER_01: And then his face was changed towards them.
SPEAKER_01: He ordered the furnace heated seven times more than it's usually heated.
SPEAKER_01: And he ordered some of the mighty men of his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.
SPEAKER_01: And then these men were bound in their cloaks, their tunics, their hats, their other garments their other garments, and they were thrown into the burning fiery furnace.
SPEAKER_01: Because the king's order was urgent and the furnace overheated.
SPEAKER_01: The flame of the fire killed those men who took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
SPEAKER_01: And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell bound into the burning fiery furnace.
SPEAKER_01: Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and he rose up in haste.
SPEAKER_01: He declared to his counselors, Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?
SPEAKER_01: They answered and said to the king, True, O king, and he answered and said, But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt, and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.
SPEAKER_01: Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the burning fiery furnace, and he declared, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out and come here.
SPEAKER_01: Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came out from the fire.
SPEAKER_01: And the satrapes, the prefects, the governors, and the king's counselors gathered together and saw that the fire had not had any power over the bodies of these men.
SPEAKER_01: The hair of their heads was not singed, their cloaks were not harmed, and no smell of fire had come upon them.
SPEAKER_01: Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants who trusted in him and sat aside the king's commands and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any God except their own God.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore I make a decree: any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb, and their houses laid in ruins, for there is no other God who's able to rescue in this way.
SPEAKER_01: And the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the province of Babylon.
SPEAKER_01: Just by way of notification, this is now the second promotion they've gotten in two chapters.
SPEAKER_01: So being a Christian is not always about, oh, it's suffering every day.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's not.
SPEAKER_01: But there are going to be moments and circumstances in which you suffer for your faith because of the fact that you're a believer.
SPEAKER_01: And so what can we learn from that?
SPEAKER_01: Four things from the text this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Number one is that culture is hostile to nonconformity.
SPEAKER_01: Culture is hostile to nonconformity.
SPEAKER_01: Even this past uh week, uh let me say it like this: you cannot not conform and expect everything to be as it's always been.
SPEAKER_01: Even this past week, Twitter, Facebook, and Google, all these big high-tech companies, big tech companies, uh, if you do not agree with their political ideology, they will ban you.
SPEAKER_01: They have ways to go in, alter the algorithm, and say, hey, this is you can't put this content out of here.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone's freaking out about that.
SPEAKER_01: And I get people call me the guy that's not on social media, that's never been on Twitter, and go, what do you think about this?
SPEAKER_01: And I just say, hey, I'm actually preaching about this this coming Sunday, that culture is hostile to nonconformity because these people all are on the same page and they're driving everything.
SPEAKER_01: If you're getting your news and information from social media, that's your first problem right there.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just start there.
SPEAKER_01: If you're like logging on to see what you should think, big problem, okay?
SPEAKER_01: You got to ask yourself, how did these people get so powerful?
SPEAKER_01: Because you let them into your home.
SPEAKER_01: You let them into the way your kids think.
SPEAKER_01: This is why depression and anxiety is crippling our students because all social media is just a platform for comparison.
SPEAKER_01: And they realize I do not measure up, and they just sink down under the weight of not measuring up, and we can't seem to figure that out.
SPEAKER_01: Do the data, look at it, all you data-driven people.
SPEAKER_01: And with the rise of social media, we've seen a decline in the way our students feel about themselves, and the depression and the anxiety is crippling because culture is hostile to non-conformity.
SPEAKER_01: Conformity communicates to the culture that nothing's wrong, everything's okay, and nothing needs to change.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: Conformity communicates to the culture that nothing's wrong, everything's okay, and nothing needs to change.
SPEAKER_01: So when Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 3 rolls out the golden image and says, All right, when the music plays, you know what to do.
SPEAKER_01: And everybody and every language the Bible said bows down, except three Hebrew teenagers who just stood their ground.
SPEAKER_01: And he is enraged.
SPEAKER_01: He loves these men, he respects these men.
SPEAKER_01: He's already promoted these men once and he expects, hey, all my mid-level managers are gonna bow down.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Nope, not gonna do that.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes crazy because conformity communicates one thing to the culture, while non-conformity is like mercaptin in natural gas.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody know what Mercaptin is?
SPEAKER_01: Mercaptin is the chemical that you put in natural gas that makes it stink.
SPEAKER_01: Natural gas by nature is tasteless and odorless.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot smell natural gas.
SPEAKER_01: But nowadays, if you realize you you'll realize this, like when I said natural gas, some of you are kind of like, oh, I can taste it on the back of my tongue.
SPEAKER_01: I hate that smell.
SPEAKER_01: It smells like cabbage or rotten eggs.
SPEAKER_01: That's exactly right.
SPEAKER_01: You ever wonder why?
SPEAKER_01: If something is odorless, why would you make it smell so bad that it is the most, it's one of the most recognizable smells in the world?
SPEAKER_01: Like if you go home, you turn on the burner and it doesn't come on, and you're like striking matches, and for 30 seconds you're striking matches, and then you're like, hey, maybe we just get out of the house right now.
SPEAKER_01: You're like, I smell gas.
SPEAKER_01: Something's gone.
SPEAKER_01: No one smells gas and says, What's that smell?
SPEAKER_01: What could that be?
SPEAKER_01: No, it is one of the most recognizable smells in the world.
SPEAKER_01: You know why?
SPEAKER_01: Because of something that happened at a little Texas community up in Russ County on March 18th, 1937, at a place called the New London School.
SPEAKER_01: New London was a little community that was that was in an oil boom.
SPEAKER_01: And they built this really nice multi-grade, all the way first to 12th grade school complex.
SPEAKER_01: And back then, Mercapton was not in natural gas.
SPEAKER_01: It was odorless and tasteless.
SPEAKER_01: You could not detect it.
SPEAKER_01: And so no one knew that under the eight-inch concrete slab in the sub basement of the school, natural gas had been pulling up and building up.
SPEAKER_01: And then in a shop class, a shop teacher turned on an electric sander and the spark from the ignition blew the school sky high.
SPEAKER_01: The roof came off, the walls came in.
SPEAKER_01: 294 students and teachers were killed that day, and countless other people were injured.
SPEAKER_01: It is the third highest uh uh uh uh fatalities in the history of the state of Texas.
SPEAKER_01: Number one is a 1900 hurricane that hit Galveston.
SPEAKER_01: This thing came in at number three.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because they couldn't smell what had the capacity to destroy them.
SPEAKER_01: So when I say that nonconformity is like Mercapan in natural gas, what I'm saying is that you and I, nonconformity is not being a jerk.
SPEAKER_01: Nonconformity is not trying to stand out and distinguish yourself from anybody else.
SPEAKER_01: Nonconformity is just being faithful to what you know the truth to be.
SPEAKER_01: Case in point, I'm in Kroger right here on Highway 6 this past week.
SPEAKER_01: Minded my own beeswax.
SPEAKER_01: There's like eight self-checkouts, because apparently not only do I shop at Kroger, but I work there whenever I shop there because no one can check you out anymore.
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm waiting.
SPEAKER_01: There's like eight people, they're all full, and one guy's got like a jar of pickles, and he's like, hey, these pickles, the thing I scan, and I'm like Aquaman, telekinetically communicating.
SPEAKER_01: Just put it in the bag, dude.
SPEAKER_01: And it's saying, Do you want to skip bagging?
SPEAKER_01: He's like, oh, oh, this is fascinating.
SPEAKER_01: And I think it's just me.
SPEAKER_01: And I glance over my shoulder, and people behind me are just like, oh, for the love.
SPEAKER_01: Have you never been to the grocery store?
SPEAKER_01: And I just think this is a captive audience.
SPEAKER_01: Why not have a conversation?
SPEAKER_01: And so the guy behind, and I'm just like, and one guy's like, oh, well, I I bought these supposed to be on sale, and what's the deal?
SPEAKER_01: And the guy said, the lady comes over and says, Sir, you have to buy four to get the price.
SPEAKER_01: She says, sir, right.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Well, can I get three for the price?
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, why do the rules not apply to you, dude?
SPEAKER_01: Just get four or else get out of line.
SPEAKER_01: The guy behind me goes, preach.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, and so I said, What is it with people these days?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Man, this world's messed up.
SPEAKER_01: This world's going to hell in a handbasket.
SPEAKER_01: I said, You have no idea how true that is.
SPEAKER_01: And it launches into this conversation.
SPEAKER_01: And then he gets in conversation, the lay two people back, she's uh-huh, yeah, now you're talking.
SPEAKER_01: And we talk about everything.
SPEAKER_01: We talk about the election coming up, we talk about the state of America, and all in the whole time, all you hear is beep, beep, beep.
SPEAKER_01: People are just scanning stuff.
SPEAKER_01: And the guy said, You know, I just think as soon as we get the election, things are gonna get better.
SPEAKER_01: I said, And who's gonna get in the White House that's gonna make things better?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Well, you know, he told me his candidate, and I said, Here, here, here's the thing, here's the problem with looking to people.
SPEAKER_01: When you look to man to meet your deepest needs, the byproduct of is violence.
SPEAKER_01: So if your guy gets elected, this other party's gonna be mad.
SPEAKER_01: And if this other person gets elected, this party's gonna be mad.
SPEAKER_01: And so people are gonna go burn down and destroy target and steal stuff in the name of social injustice.
SPEAKER_01: Really?
SPEAKER_01: This is social injustice?
SPEAKER_01: You're just lazy and you don't want to work, and so you'd rather steal than go punch a clock.
SPEAKER_01: The lady in the back is like, Come on now, you talking now.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm just like, and all of a sudden, people all start, the people in the other checkout lanes are all looking like, what's going on over there?
SPEAKER_01: And the guy, and the guy looked at me and goes, Man, where do you get these ideas?
SPEAKER_01: Again, Mercatin.
SPEAKER_01: It just takes one drop of Mercatan to inform the way thousands, thousands of gallons of natural gas.
SPEAKER_01: How you measure natural gas.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says a little leaven leavens the whole lump.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm not saying take a bullhorn and go to Kroger.
SPEAKER_01: That's not that's not what it is.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you think, oh man, I'm really standing out.
SPEAKER_01: I'm practically nonconformity with my trump sticker on the back of my minivan.
SPEAKER_01: No, you're not.
SPEAKER_01: No, we have to open our mouth and speak to people.
SPEAKER_01: And the people stand there, they're just like, uh, uh, uh.
SPEAKER_01: And one lady said, Well, I just think once we get the right person, I said, we look to the wrong people for the right things.
SPEAKER_01: That's the problem with America.
SPEAKER_01: I said, because here's the thing Donald Trump isn't gonna solve it, Joe Biden isn't gonna solve it, none of these people are gonna solve it.
SPEAKER_01: The manager comes over and like, sir, is there a problem?
SPEAKER_01: We have a little church up in here, there's no problem.
SPEAKER_01: She said, Okay, okay, people are filing by, and the guy's like, Hey, can we people hey, you go ahead to this guy?
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I've been waiting in line.
SPEAKER_01: He wants to keep talking.
SPEAKER_01: People are dying for the truth.
SPEAKER_01: See, conformity sends a message to the culture, everything's fine, nothing needs to change.
SPEAKER_01: Nonconformity, not being obnoxious, just kind of standing there, whatever.
SPEAKER_01: Nonconformity is what you choose to do when everybody else is doing the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: And it stands out like Mercaphton.
SPEAKER_01: You smell it.
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of like something thinks about this, and I just gotta speak to it.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Now, now, by the way, that day on the butt in the rubble, 295 students mainly, and some teachers were killed, other countless others were injured.
SPEAKER_01: They dig into the rubble, they find a chalkboard, and this was written on the chalkboard that day.
SPEAKER_01: Oil and natural gas are East Texas's greatest mineral blessing.
SPEAKER_01: Without them, this school would not be here.
SPEAKER_01: None of us would be here learning our lessons.
SPEAKER_01: See, we live in a culture that says the same things about politics and this candidate and that candidate.
SPEAKER_01: Pick your candidate.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: I don't trust any of them, I don't look to any of them.
SPEAKER_01: I lift my eyes up to the hills.
SPEAKER_01: Where does my help come from?
SPEAKER_01: My help comes from the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: If you can get everything you need from man, you never need God.
SPEAKER_01: You just don't.
SPEAKER_01: We look to different things and say, without them, we would not be here.
SPEAKER_01: None of this, none of us would be learning our lessons.
SPEAKER_01: I'm submitting to you that going way back to Daniel chapter 3, we still haven't learned the lesson, beloved.
SPEAKER_01: Culture is hostile to nonconformity.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, what we learn when we suffer for our faith is that God is with us when we suffer.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 24.
SPEAKER_01: Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and he rose up in haste.
SPEAKER_01: He declared to his counselors, Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?
SPEAKER_01: And they answered and said to the king, True, O king.
SPEAKER_01: He answered and said, But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt.
SPEAKER_01: And the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.
SPEAKER_01: Hello.
SPEAKER_01: See, when I say that God is with us when we suffer, this is what my unbelieving friend doesn't understand.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, So, so you're a Christian and bad things still happen to you.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, because I live in a world that is under the price and penalty of sin.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot have heaven here on earth.
SPEAKER_01: Perfection is not going to happen until heaven.
SPEAKER_01: And so, in this world, the where creation is groaning as a woman in the pangs of childbirth, okay?
SPEAKER_01: When people have a free will and they use that sometimes for good and sometimes they use it for evil, we are going to experience hardship and we are going to suffer as Christians.
SPEAKER_01: Christianity, some of you got sold a bill of goods.
SPEAKER_01: Christianity is not the way you escape suffering.
SPEAKER_01: Christian, sometimes you suffer for being a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you will be passed over.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes, students, you will not be invited to the party because you're simply because of your faith.
SPEAKER_01: It's not because you're not cool, it's not because, oh, you don't understand.
SPEAKER_01: It's because they love conformity.
SPEAKER_01: They don't want a non-conformist, a conformist in this big vat of conformity.
SPEAKER_01: So when I say God is with us when we suffer, when they're thrown in the furnace, they're not alone.
SPEAKER_01: You know, my favorite part of this is that before they throw them in the fiery furnace, basically in a big brick oven, that's heated up seven times faster.
SPEAKER_01: They say to them, put your coats on.
SPEAKER_01: Really?
SPEAKER_01: What's the point of that?
SPEAKER_01: They put their coats and they bind them up.
SPEAKER_01: And it's kind of like, hey, we're gonna burn you alive.
SPEAKER_01: But here, you're going to hell, put on a big fat parka.
SPEAKER_01: You don't want to, it's like, what in the world?
SPEAKER_01: But God is with us when we suffer.
SPEAKER_01: Nebuchadnezzar looks in and says, Hey, there's a fourth person in the fire.
SPEAKER_01: This isn't the first time God has said this, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: They are experiencing the promised reality that God has promised his people way back in Isaiah 43, verse 1 says this, but now says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob.
SPEAKER_01: Jacob is not a person, it's a people, referring to the nation of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: He who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel.
SPEAKER_01: Fear not, for I have redeemed you.
SPEAKER_01: I have called you by name.
SPEAKER_01: You are mine.
SPEAKER_01: When you pass through the waters, I will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: And through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you.
SPEAKER_01: When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.
SPEAKER_01: This is the way God says now.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what we do.
SPEAKER_01: We hear that last part when we preach Daniel 3.
SPEAKER_01: We hear, oh, you'll pass through the flame and not be burned, and the flame will not consume you.
SPEAKER_01: And that's great and that's true.
SPEAKER_01: But I want to draw your attention back to the first part where God says, But now, thus says the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Thus says the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Does that phrase still get your attention?
SPEAKER_01: Is that sufficient for you?
SPEAKER_01: Is that enough for you?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, God said this.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, end of discussion.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to hear what people on Facebook say or think about it.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: Thus says the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And then God, by way of introduction, says four things just to remind you who I am.
SPEAKER_01: He says, by now, says the Lord, who is who is this Lord?
SPEAKER_01: Number one, I created you.
SPEAKER_01: Number two, I formed you.
SPEAKER_01: Number three, I redeemed you.
SPEAKER_01: And number four, I called you.
SPEAKER_01: You are mine.
SPEAKER_01: Why does he lay claim to his people?
SPEAKER_01: Because he created you, he formed you, he redeemed you, he called you by name.
SPEAKER_01: As a parent, there is no more galling reality than your kids to disrespect you like they do not have to obey you.
SPEAKER_01: You think God's any different?
SPEAKER_01: You think God's like, oh, I just I remember riding the escalator up at the Denver airport, and some four-year-old, his mom's holding him, and he just leans back and slaps her in the face.
SPEAKER_01: I'm catching a 6 a.m.
SPEAKER_01: flight.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not full of the spirit at this point.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like four steps down the escalator, and I'm like, oh boy, you wouldn't, you'd walk with a limp for the rest of this week, son.
SPEAKER_01: And the dad is like, let me have him.
SPEAKER_01: And the mom's like, he slapped my glasses off.
SPEAKER_01: And we're like, hey, here's your glasses, man.
SPEAKER_01: They get to the top elevator.
SPEAKER_01: The dad takes the four year old boy, goes over to the side, and kneels down and says, Now, do you remember the video the other day about greedy bear?
SPEAKER_01: You're being like greedy bear.
SPEAKER_01: I couldn't help myself.
SPEAKER_01: I got to the top elevator.
SPEAKER_01: I just stepped to the side and see how this is gonna go.
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm like, you can have my belt to whip that kid.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Oh, you're you're being like Greedy Bear.
SPEAKER_01: Do you want to be like Greedy Bear?
SPEAKER_01: And the kid's like, I don't want to be that Greedy Bear.
SPEAKER_01: I'm over here, like, what about the spanking bear?
SPEAKER_01: Was the spanking bear in the video?
SPEAKER_01: Because the spanking bear is here right now.
SPEAKER_01: And the spanking bear is gonna wear your little self out, four-year-old.
SPEAKER_01: Slap your mother.
SPEAKER_01: Now, some of y'all are kind of like, Are you for corporal punishment?
SPEAKER_01: Boys and girls, Pastor Sunshine is a good man.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing and don't miss the point.
SPEAKER_01: There's no more galling experience than someone you created and brought into this world disrespects you.
SPEAKER_01: Don't choke on your own hypocrisy if you get mad that God's the same way.
SPEAKER_01: I would just flip the script and say you're that way because God is that way.
SPEAKER_01: He's with us with us when we suffer.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing I want you to understand.
SPEAKER_01: Where God is not present, now this is where I go back to my unbelieving friend, who I'm not mad at.
SPEAKER_01: He's a good guy.
SPEAKER_01: He just doesn't know Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: So I don't expect him to live like people that do.
SPEAKER_01: Because see, when we when you get in the furnace, where God is not present, the realities of the gospel are not available.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I'm not saying, oh, God's everywhere, yeah, but I'm talking about in people.
SPEAKER_01: See, the unbeliever suffers by themselves.
SPEAKER_01: They have no recourse, no resource, no presence, no fourth person in the fire.
SPEAKER_01: It's just them and their insufficient worldview, and it's sad.
SPEAKER_01: And my friend's like, so when I suffer, I said, Yeah, who saves you?
SPEAKER_01: You have to save yourself because you are your own God.
SPEAKER_01: That's the insufficiency of being arrogant and unbelieving.
SPEAKER_01: And I would say the same thing to any of you in this room who do not have a relationship with God that you're just like, I'm just here for the free coffee because my parents make me come.
SPEAKER_01: You have no resource, you'd no God to call on.
SPEAKER_01: When you find yourself in the context of the fiery furnace, you just have to look around and make the most out of it from a naturalistic point of view.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's all you bring to the equation.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because where God is not present, the realities of the gospel are not available.
SPEAKER_01: But by the same token, here's what we see in Daniel 3 where God is present, all of the realities of the gospel are available in all their fullness.
SPEAKER_01: This is why these men, Nebuchadnezzar, is like, I'm gonna throw you in the fire.
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, Okay, great, but here's the deal: we're not gonna bow down, we're not gonna play along like everybody else.
SPEAKER_01: We don't care.
SPEAKER_01: We don't care what the polls say, we don't care what the focus group says.
SPEAKER_01: We could care less.
SPEAKER_01: Do whatever you gotta do.
SPEAKER_01: This is why the text earlier says they paid no attention to him.
SPEAKER_01: Tragically, most Christians do not respond well when they suffer because you got sold a bill of goods.
SPEAKER_01: That Christianity is how you escape.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, you think it's strange when you suffer.
SPEAKER_01: So let me just read a passage from the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: I know the Old Testament was like, man, oh mean old God, he like killed people.
SPEAKER_01: New Testament, we like Jesus because he's friendly and hung out with hookers.
SPEAKER_01: That's good.
SPEAKER_01: New Testament, 1 Peter chapter 4, verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you.
SPEAKER_01: Hello.
SPEAKER_01: You mean fiery trials are not just for Hebrew teenagers that won't bow down to golden idols?
SPEAKER_01: As though something strange were happening to you, but rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.
SPEAKER_01: If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed because the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.
SPEAKER_01: But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler.
SPEAKER_01: Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.
SPEAKER_01: When he says, in that name, he's saying, talking about the name Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, for it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God.
SPEAKER_01: And if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
SPEAKER_01: And if the righteous are scarcely saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful creator while doing good.
SPEAKER_01: There's six things I want you to take away.
SPEAKER_01: Don't try to write them down.
SPEAKER_01: You can just take a picture.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just listen briefly.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, suffering is a test, not a form of punishment.
SPEAKER_01: It's a test.
SPEAKER_01: He says in verse 12, don't be surprised at this fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you.
SPEAKER_01: This is where you see what's really in you.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, people who suffer have a proportional capacity for gladness.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: People who suffer have this proportional capacity for gladness.
SPEAKER_01: They can be glad in a way that people who've never suffered cannot be glad.
SPEAKER_01: So if you see somebody and you're kind of like, man, there's a great line in a hymn that the church used to sing that's it referred to God as the giver of immortal gladness.
SPEAKER_01: This God that gives you a gladness that cannot be killed and never dies.
SPEAKER_01: When you get around somebody that has that gladness in them, I don't care who you are, you are drawn to that person kind of like, what is up with her?
SPEAKER_01: And you should ask her, hey, tell me the ways you've, some of the ways you've suffered in your life.
SPEAKER_01: And I promise you, she's like, oh, girlfriend, let's go to La Madeline's and have those strawberries roaming off.
SPEAKER_01: This is gonna take a while.
SPEAKER_01: This is going to take a while.
SPEAKER_01: And look at me, it's not pity, it's not complaint, it is gladness.
SPEAKER_01: This person will tell you with them crazy eyes, like, oh, and then this happened, and you'll be like, Oh my gosh, do they serve alcohol here?
SPEAKER_01: Somebody please bring me a drink to numb the pain because I think suffering is driving to church in the rain.
SPEAKER_01: Here's another one.
SPEAKER_01: Suffering as a Christian magnifies the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Suffering as a Christian, he says, for it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God.
SPEAKER_01: And if it begins with us, then what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes when things happen to me, I had a friend say to me, he's an unbeliever, he said, Man, this wasn't suffering, this is just life.
SPEAKER_01: The transmission went out on my old truck, and he said, Dude, you deserve better than that.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, On what basis?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, you don't you work for the big man?
SPEAKER_01: So you think because I'm in ministry, I'm exempt from just uh just just the natural attrition, the law of thermodynamics that says the natural progression of things is from order to chaos.
SPEAKER_01: No, that didn't get suspended for me.
SPEAKER_01: I wish it did, but it doesn't.
SPEAKER_01: But what you should be asking yourself, I told him, is if this is what happens for me and I have a resource, what's it gonna be like for you?
SPEAKER_01: Because the Bible talks about this.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the fourth thing.
SPEAKER_01: There'll be occasions where it is God's will for you to suffer.
SPEAKER_01: This is what my friend told me this past week that calls me.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, dude, I mean, you your church is gonna die if you tell your people that.
SPEAKER_01: Look at me.
SPEAKER_01: If you're watching at home, look at me.
SPEAKER_01: There are gonna be occasions where it's gonna be the will of God that you suffer.
SPEAKER_01: And I would never look at you and say, Oh, this is one of those times.
SPEAKER_01: But but but but but but if you just willy-nilly could suffer for no reason at all, that that is exacerbating to your soul.
SPEAKER_01: If you cannot find comfort and tell yourself, you know what, I'm not being punished, I'm not gonna be destroyed, I'm being tested, and I'm gonna come out of this on the other side, and God's gonna get glory, and this is gonna be great.
SPEAKER_01: In the meantime, this is difficult, but I'm not going anywhere.
SPEAKER_01: Because here's what here's what here's what the world wants to see.
SPEAKER_01: What do you really believe?
SPEAKER_01: Do you really believe all this?
SPEAKER_01: Is this just a good way to raise your kids?
SPEAKER_01: And once they leave, your affiliation and association to the church kind of flakes out.
SPEAKER_01: You get a lake house or a beach house, and then the church sees you Christmas and Easter if we're lucky.
SPEAKER_01: And you didn't really believe the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: You use the church to affect the moral behavior of your children.
SPEAKER_01: But there will be occasions.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, look at verse 19 of 1 Peter 4.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful creator while doing good.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the last takeaway from that.
SPEAKER_01: When suffering, entrust your soul to God and do good.
SPEAKER_01: When suffering for your faith, because of your faith, you know, don't try to rescue yourself.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just gonna entrust myself to this God that I trusted a long time ago, and I'm gonna just keep doing what I'm gonna keep doing good.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna stop and pity myself and say, woe is me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna put something out there on social media and invite you to have pity for me.
SPEAKER_01: No, love me enough to show up at my house and kind of go, man, you are suffering, and it just might be the will of God.
SPEAKER_01: Tell me about tell me what this is like for you.
SPEAKER_01: You say, I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_01: So you can do this because God is not just faithful for creation.
SPEAKER_01: It says that, hey, entrust their souls to to a faithful creator.
SPEAKER_01: God is not just faithful for creation, he is faithful to everything he's created.
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes when it's just going haywire, it's okay to pray this and to say, hey God, what would it look like for you to be faithful to me right now?
SPEAKER_01: And you say, Well, I don't I don't want to ask that.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the only reason you don't want to ask that is because God will ask back, what would it look like for you to be faithful to me right now?
SPEAKER_01: God's not put off by that.
SPEAKER_01: He's not like, oh, that's kind of arrogant, that's kind of disrespectful.
SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: God's like, oh, that's a great question.
SPEAKER_01: Let me demonstrate that.
SPEAKER_01: But see, here's what happens, and here's what comes into play for most of us.
SPEAKER_01: Like, I talked to someone recently, and they're just like, oh, I, you know, I just I just don't know about all this.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I mean, I and so when it gets hard, this person takes responsibility for themselves.
SPEAKER_01: And it just doesn't quite seem to work.
SPEAKER_01: And they they they they tried Christianity and blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_01: Because see, I don't have time to plunge on this, but let me just say this: what is at stake and what is in play here is uh it is the soteriology of the church.
SPEAKER_01: What soteriology is a big word that means our doctrine of salvation.
SPEAKER_01: How does a person come to faith?
SPEAKER_01: Because I see a lot of people who like they came to faith like six times.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and every time it gets hard, they come to faith again.
SPEAKER_01: And then when it gets easy, you don't see them ever, ever.
SPEAKER_01: They're gone.
SPEAKER_01: They're just running and bucking and jumping, and oh, it's great.
SPEAKER_01: But when the calamity strikes, they're back coming to faith.
SPEAKER_01: And so recently I had to say to a person that I love, listen very carefully, love this person.
SPEAKER_01: And you said, I just think what's really going on here is that you don't have a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: You want relief from hardship, but you do not want a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: And this person said, Well, I mean, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: How can you say that?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Look at your life.
SPEAKER_01: You don't live in submission to the commands of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Here's a question.
SPEAKER_01: David says this in the Psalms, he says, the commands of the Lord are not burdensome.
SPEAKER_01: Are the commands of God burdensome to you?
SPEAKER_01: I tell my kids to do hard things.
SPEAKER_01: I have daughters.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you have expressed concern.
SPEAKER_01: My wife even's like, every once in a while, like, you can't talk to girls like that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I'm just telling the truth.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not a yeller.
SPEAKER_01: I don't raise my voice to my kids.
SPEAKER_01: So don't be like, oh, well, I don't.
SPEAKER_01: But I say, bless you, I say to my kids, hey, don't be lazy because if you're lazy, it puts you on a bad trajectory for the rest of your life.
SPEAKER_01: Nobody likes to be around lazy people because you're just needy and dependent, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Don't live palm up, live head down, be a worker.
SPEAKER_01: And my kids are like, okay, Dad, we're seven.
SPEAKER_01: We got it.
SPEAKER_01: If you get that when you're seven, you'll be so much better when you're 17.
SPEAKER_01: For I said to my my friend, I love this person.
SPEAKER_01: I said, I just don't experience you as someone who knows God.
SPEAKER_01: Well, how can you say that?
SPEAKER_01: Because the commands of the Lord are burdensome to you.
SPEAKER_01: He said, like what?
SPEAKER_01: I said, just pick any of them.
SPEAKER_01: And so I would just say to all you ask yourself today, hey, do I have a relationship with God?
SPEAKER_01: Or do I come to God when I need relief?
SPEAKER_01: Are the commands of the Lord burdensome?
SPEAKER_01: Like bring the whole tithe in the storehouse.
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh, I've heard everything.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, we're we're buying a boat, we're trying to pay off debt.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, we're gonna go on a vacation in six months.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta save that money for that.
SPEAKER_01: Like the commands of the Lord are burdensome.
SPEAKER_01: Here's here's good news, beloved.
SPEAKER_01: Love does not negotiate the terms of its surrender, it just doesn't.
SPEAKER_01: And so I just said to my friend who I love, I do not experience you who enjoys the commands of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And it would be hate, listen carefully.
SPEAKER_01: It would be hate for God, for you to be in a relationship with God and hate what he says so much and to be so unhappy.
SPEAKER_01: It's like being married to someone you don't like.
SPEAKER_01: If you're married right now to somebody you don't like, you can't fake it.
SPEAKER_01: People that know you know, like, hey, bro, you don't seem to enjoy your wife.
SPEAKER_01: Some of y'all come up to my wife on occasion and kind of go, I pray for you, ma'am.
SPEAKER_01: I am so sorry.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what you don't understand for whatever reason, my wife just likes me.
SPEAKER_01: She just likes me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't try to figure it out, I enjoy it.
SPEAKER_01: But that explains it.
SPEAKER_01: If you're wondering, like, hey, where's the magic?
SPEAKER_01: She just likes me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: But if you're married to someone you don't like, you can't fake it.
SPEAKER_01: You're like, now, why would God see?
SPEAKER_01: Here's why our so chair doctrine of salvation gets into play.
SPEAKER_01: Because some people act like, well, I can just just just, I mean, when it gets hard, I'm just gonna call on God and God's gonna come.
SPEAKER_01: No, to be converted, God has to regenerate your cold, dead heart.
SPEAKER_01: And a lot of people, their heart's never been regenerated.
SPEAKER_01: See, there's there's two schools of thought when it comes to how does a person come to faith.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that you're dead in your trespasses and sin, and God makes you alive.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus says in Matthew 11, no one can come to the Father except those that I reveal him to.
SPEAKER_01: And then there's a school of thought over here that says, Hey, I've got this salvation voucher in my pocket and I can whip it out when it gets hard.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna just trust myself until it gets unmanageable, and then I'm gonna call on God.
SPEAKER_01: And that person gets relief, and then three months later, they're the back living the same lifestyle.
SPEAKER_01: There's really no change in them.
SPEAKER_01: The commands of the Lord are burdensome to them.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the third thing that the Bible teaches us about hey, what what happens when we suffer for our faith?
SPEAKER_01: That who we trust determines what has power over us.
SPEAKER_01: Who we trust determines what has power over us.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 26.
SPEAKER_01: Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the burning fiery furnace, and he declared, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out and come here.
SPEAKER_01: Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came out from the fire, and the satraps, the prefects, the governors, and the king's counselors gathered together and saw that the fire had not had any power over the bodies of these men.
SPEAKER_01: Can you imagine?
SPEAKER_01: This is not some kind of a magic trick.
SPEAKER_01: See, who you trust determines what has power over.
SPEAKER_01: That's why they were like, hey, I'm gonna throw you in the fiery furnace.
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, hey, we're out of pecan sauce.
SPEAKER_01: Can we get some more pecan sauce and some chips while you're standing up, Nebuchadnezzar?
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna I'm gonna make the furnace seven times hotter.
SPEAKER_01: I need some more sweet tea as well.
SPEAKER_01: They just pay no attention to him.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because what he's threatening them with doesn't have power over them.
SPEAKER_01: You should ask yourself before you go to bed tonight, what has power over you?
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, if your boyfriend broke up with you, you would be devastated.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it would be crippling to you.
SPEAKER_01: I think I'm helping people like single people that are dating.
SPEAKER_01: I tell them, I ask them, hey, what would happen if she broke up with you?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, she's my life, she's my everything.
SPEAKER_01: Oh man, don't say that.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, You don't feel that way about your wife?
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're single right now, you're like, oh, your wife probably, if I said to my wife, you're my everything, she'd be like, oh, that's idolatry.
SPEAKER_01: Stop.
SPEAKER_01: She's my wife, and I love her.
SPEAKER_01: I've been married to her for 27 years.
SPEAKER_01: The first time I kissed her, I just thought, I want to do that again.
SPEAKER_01: Never kissed another girl.
SPEAKER_01: Haven't since.
SPEAKER_01: Totally satisfied.
SPEAKER_01: She's not my everything.
SPEAKER_01: I have needs in me that my wife cannot meet.
SPEAKER_01: And so I don't look to her to meet those needs.
SPEAKER_01: And my wife has needs in her that I cannot meet.
SPEAKER_01: I think she's kind of borderline psychotic sometimes.
SPEAKER_01: Because she says things like, I just need to not hear your voice for a period of time today.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, why would you want to miss out on the fount where the glory comes out?
SPEAKER_01: And she says with a smile, not as much glory as you might think.
SPEAKER_01: Love her, not my everything.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Who we trust determines what has power over us.
SPEAKER_01: They go on there.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to see this.
SPEAKER_01: He says, not having power over the bodies of these men.
SPEAKER_01: The hair of their heads was not sins, their cloaks were not harmed, and no smell of fire had come upon them.
SPEAKER_01: Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who sent his angel and delivered his servants.
SPEAKER_01: Who, why did he do this?
SPEAKER_01: Because he trusted, they trusted in him.
SPEAKER_01: They set aside the king's command and they yielded up their bodies.
SPEAKER_01: Notice a couple things.
SPEAKER_01: First of all, that their hair was not sins, their clothes were not harmed, and the smell of fire was not upon them.
SPEAKER_01: If you've ever been in a house that burned down, even if it's just one room of the house, the whole house smells like it.
SPEAKER_01: And what the Bible's saying to us is that you can be involved in some really, really, really impactful things, and God can bring you out of them, and the smell of that will not even be upon you.
SPEAKER_01: This is the power of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 28, what makes these decisions possible?
SPEAKER_01: Well, the text tells us plainly three things.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, they trusted in Him.
SPEAKER_01: When did this happen?
SPEAKER_01: Not when they started the furnace.
SPEAKER_01: This happened before they left Babylon, when they were young boys.
SPEAKER_01: They trusted in God.
SPEAKER_01: And so, because they trusted in God then, when they get to Babylon, they trust in God.
SPEAKER_01: When they say, hey, we're gonna kill all the wise men, they trust in God.
SPEAKER_01: When they say, hey, we're all gonna bow down, they trusted in God.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna throw you in the furnace if you don't bow down.
SPEAKER_01: They trusted in God.
SPEAKER_01: Is trusting in God a lifestyle for you, or is every day a decision you have to make?
SPEAKER_01: They set aside the king's command.
SPEAKER_01: We are fast approaching a day and age when civil disobedience is gonna become more and more popular.
SPEAKER_01: And then thirdly, they yielded up their bodies.
SPEAKER_01: Mark this in your mind.
SPEAKER_01: They yielded up their bodies.
SPEAKER_01: Why is that a big deal?
SPEAKER_01: Because central to any belief is what you do with your body.
SPEAKER_01: Don't tell me what you think, feel, or believe.
SPEAKER_01: Let me watch what you do with your body, what you put into it, and the way you represent it in public, who you let touch it.
SPEAKER_01: Then I'll tell you what you believe.
SPEAKER_01: This is why the Bible says that fornicators and adulterers do not inherit the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_01: Say everything you want.
SPEAKER_01: We can't hear you.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because of what you do with your body.
SPEAKER_01: This is what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: Does anybody say to single people nowadays, hey, if you're sleeping with your boyfriend, that's called fornication, sex before marriage, and people that do that don't go to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Can you hear how hateful that sounds?
SPEAKER_01: Because we have separated, we have emancipated what we do with our bodies from the clear teaching of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: It's like, oh, it's my body.
SPEAKER_01: Fundamentally false statement.
SPEAKER_01: Never was.
SPEAKER_01: You do not want to live in a world where you say, Well, it's my body, I can do what I want.
SPEAKER_01: Now, now are you trying to tell me what to do with my body?
SPEAKER_01: I'm not at all.
SPEAKER_01: I'm warning you from the Bible that what you do with your body is central to what you believe.
SPEAKER_01: So much so that I don't have to hear what you believe.
SPEAKER_01: I just have to see what you do with your body.
SPEAKER_01: How you represent your body on social media.
SPEAKER_01: How you let your children represent their bodies on social media.
SPEAKER_01: That's why there's an outrage in our country last month because of a show on Netflix called Cuties, because we've gotten younger and younger with what with the way we will sexualize little girls' bodies.
SPEAKER_01: It's just like a nation of perverts.
SPEAKER_01: It's just, it's your body, it's not your beliefs, it's what you do with your what do you do, what you put into it.
SPEAKER_01: We live in a country where 40% of people on any given day are under the influence of some drug or alcohol.
SPEAKER_01: Because what they do with their body.
SPEAKER_01: We've got a subculture, an opioids, opioid subculture, where people just live in this pharmacological fog all day, every day, and wait for that government check to show up.
SPEAKER_01: Because of what they do with their body.
SPEAKER_01: Romans 12, verse 1 says it like this: I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
SPEAKER_01: Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
SPEAKER_01: I just want to draw your attention to verse 28.
SPEAKER_01: We're just about done.
SPEAKER_01: You still with me?
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 28, because here's the choice we're coming to.
SPEAKER_01: America, okay.
SPEAKER_01: The last part of verse 28.
SPEAKER_01: He says they trusted in him, they set aside the king's command, and they yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any God except their own God.
SPEAKER_01: We are coming to the place in America where the temptation coming upon the American church is not no God.
SPEAKER_01: Now, the culture is not going to say no God.
SPEAKER_01: That's far too extreme.
SPEAKER_01: They cannot bear that out, okay?
SPEAKER_01: What they're gonna say is any God, just any God.
SPEAKER_01: All roads lead to God.
SPEAKER_01: So it doesn't matter what you worship.
SPEAKER_01: The guy said to me in Kroger, so you're telling me that everybody that doesn't worship the God that you believe in is wrong.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saying there's only one God, and the one God who is believes that He's the only God.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, say that again.
SPEAKER_01: There's only one God, and the one God who is believes He's the only God.
SPEAKER_01: That's why the first two commandments, you ever read the Ten Commandments?
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Yeah, but it's been a while.
SPEAKER_01: And my old memory school was on the wall.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_01: You notice that's not anymore?
SPEAKER_01: Because we are anti-nomian.
SPEAKER_01: We are anti-no mass law.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want any law, no authority.
SPEAKER_01: Had a great conversation about defunding the police in Kroger while we're waiting to check out.
SPEAKER_01: I said, that sounds great, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna defund the police.
SPEAKER_01: I said, but let's just pan the camera back.
SPEAKER_01: He said, go, big fella.
SPEAKER_01: I said, listen, don't mess with the pale whale, he'll get on you.
SPEAKER_01: Uh I said, you defund the police.
SPEAKER_01: That sounds great.
SPEAKER_01: They did it in Minneapolis.
SPEAKER_01: They had crime went to the roof.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what happens: crime goes to the roof.
SPEAKER_01: The people cry out, and the government comes and enforces martial law.
SPEAKER_01: What's the first casualty of martial law?
SPEAKER_01: The Constitution.
SPEAKER_01: Lading three people back, it's like my ma.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yeah, so it's not defund the police, it's really let's get rid of the constitution.
SPEAKER_01: Man, you all right, fella.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
SPEAKER_01: Can I call my wife and you say that into the phone real softly?
SPEAKER_01: No, we live in a culture that's like, hey, just any God.
SPEAKER_01: You ah, just any God, that's great.
SPEAKER_01: But you say one God?
SPEAKER_01: And the guy's like, What do you mean the commandments?
SPEAKER_01: I said, the first two commandments.
SPEAKER_01: First commandment, you shall have no other gods before me.
SPEAKER_01: So there's other gods.
SPEAKER_01: I said, No, no, no.
SPEAKER_01: There's other idols, there's other gods, liturgy, but there's only one God.
SPEAKER_01: Because he says he knows the human heart.
SPEAKER_01: Human heart's an idol factory, John Calvin said.
SPEAKER_01: Second commandment is you shall not make for yourself a graven image.
SPEAKER_01: Because human nature is when I don't like what God says, I make a God out of my own imagination and I worship that.
SPEAKER_01: It's called preference.
SPEAKER_01: I do it and you do it.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Man, that's that's my whole life right there.
SPEAKER_01: I said that was my life before I came to faith.
SPEAKER_01: Hmm, okay, all right.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the last thing we learn when we suffer for our faith that there's a difference in appreciating God and knowing God.
SPEAKER_01: There's a difference in appreciating God and knowing God.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to verse 29.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, Nebuchadnezzar says, I make a decree.
SPEAKER_01: Any people, nation, or language that speaks against anything, anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they shall be torn limb from limb and their houses laid in ruins, for there's no other God who's able to rescue in this way.
SPEAKER_01: And then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the province of Babylon.
SPEAKER_01: This is appreciation.
SPEAKER_01: This is not relationship.
SPEAKER_01: Nebuchadnezzar does not submit to this God.
SPEAKER_01: He appreciates the God of these three Hebrew teenagers.
SPEAKER_01: But that doesn't make him a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why is that a big deal?
SPEAKER_01: Because some of you in this room, you appreciate God, but you don't submit to God.
SPEAKER_01: Appreciating God is not what makes you a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Agreeing with things in the Bible don't make you a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Back to that really formative question.
SPEAKER_01: Are the commands of the Lord burdensome?
SPEAKER_01: Do you chafe underneath their weight in consequence?
SPEAKER_01: Or are you like, oh man, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to get away from that.
SPEAKER_01: I want that in my life.
SPEAKER_01: There's a big difference, my love.
SPEAKER_01: Hear me and I'm done.
SPEAKER_01: And appreciating God.
SPEAKER_01: We live in a country that appreciates God.
SPEAKER_01: We put on our money in God we trust.
SPEAKER_01: Do you think we as a nation trust God?
SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: We appreciate God.
SPEAKER_01: But we don't know God.
SPEAKER_01: There's a big difference.
SPEAKER_01: The three teenagers, they knew God.
SPEAKER_01: Nebuchadnezzar appreciated God.
SPEAKER_01: Which one do you do?
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray to God.
SPEAKER_01: If you're our guests, we like to just uh teach the Bible and give you some space to think about it.
SPEAKER_01: And saw a voice of prayer and Lindsay will come, sing something over us.
SPEAKER_01: Some questions come up on the screen.
SPEAKER_01: This time is for you just to think about your life in light of what you heard this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Let me pray.
SPEAKER_01: God, thanks for the truth.
SPEAKER_01: It sets us free, it invites us to think.
SPEAKER_01: It awakens our conscience and it convicts us.
SPEAKER_01: And all those are good things.
SPEAKER_01: Those are all motivated by love.
SPEAKER_01: So, Holy Spirit, just brood over us for just a moment while we think about what we've heard this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we're grateful today that there's another in the fire and he's inviting us in, saying, Come on in, the water's fine.
SPEAKER_01: And that only makes sense to people of faith.
SPEAKER_01: So, God, I pray for anybody in this room that's having to rethink and think through the lens of scripture about their relationship with you, or just their desire for relief on occasion, and then their desire to be left alone by the commands of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: So, Holy Spirit, lead us into the truth like Jesus said you would.
SPEAKER_01: The rest will sort itself out.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, thank you for your word.
SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: If you're a guest today, let me say thanks for being here.
SPEAKER_01: You're always welcome.
SPEAKER_01: If you have any questions, we'll be available down front.
SPEAKER_01: We'd love to answer your questions, pray with you about anything.
SPEAKER_01: Uh uh hopefully you've had a chance to pull those guest cards in your seatback pocket in your row, fill it out as you leave in just a minute.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, drop it in the wooden box by the door.
SPEAKER_01: If today's the day you worship God through obedience or generosity as a believer, that's where you take care of that as well.
SPEAKER_01: That applies to everybody.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, let me make you aware of our announcements by way of video this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Here's a look at what's happening at Grand Parkway Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_00: The table is an evening for women to gather for worship, teaching, and community.
SPEAKER_00: Come join Marcy and Lindsay on November 1st at 6.30 p.m.
SPEAKER_00: in the sanctuary for a night designed just for women.
SPEAKER_00: Child care is available by registration only at grandparquay.org slash events.
SPEAKER_00: Houston Welcomes Refugees is offering an orientation November 1st at 12.30 p.m.
SPEAKER_00: This orientation is a one-hour interactive session to understand the flight of refugees relocated in Houston and provide tangible ways of sharing the gospel within.
SPEAKER_00: Registration is available at grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_00: Operation Christmas Child shoe boxes are available on the front of the stage.
SPEAKER_00: If you would like to flex the child with a tangible reminder that they matter to God, grab one box after our service today.
SPEAKER_00: Following the instructions in the box, fill it with quality items that include$9 cash or a check made out of their.
SPEAKER_01: Bless you.