April 12, 2025 • 49 mins
Six months of Blue Chair Podcasts! This month Pastor Jared and Charles are talking over the Come to the Mountain series and what they thought sitting in the Blue Chairs.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Welcome and thanks for joining us on the Blue Chair
Podcast, brought to you by aFresh Wind Church.
Each month we discuss thelatest sermons from the
perspective of the Blue Chairs.
Hello and welcome to the BlueChair Podcast.
This is Pastor Jared.
I'm here with Charles.
Say what's up?
How's it going?
We are not accompanied byanybody.
(00:39):
Today we're throwing it back to, like the first episode.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Yeah, I think it's been.
We did one or two episodes,maybe with someone else on, but,
uh, we are by ourselves todayand so we are covering the come
to the mountain series, thefirst four weeks.
That.
It's still going strong.
It's going to lead us all theway to Easter, and if you're
listening to this on the dayit's released, this should be
(01:05):
the 12th, which is the daybefore Palm Sunday, and so we're
going to go all the way toEaster.
It's going to take us, oh yeah,um, so so far we got four, four
sermons uh, about the call tothe mountain, the, uh, trusting
(01:26):
in God's provisions.
Tim talked about the call to themountain, the, trusting in
God's provisions.
Tim talked about the gentlewhisper of God and Ryan talked
about the God of glory.
And through this series, whatwe're doing is we're taking a
look at God and basically beingreintroduced to him, or maybe
(01:47):
it's your first time and you'rebeing introduced to God.
God is a mighty, magnificent,multifaceted God that shows,
just like anything and anybody,there's different aspects of him
, and we can see those when wedraw close to him and we come to
the mountain and we get to knowhim, and so that's what this
(02:08):
series is covering, and I thinkit's been a hoot.
Uh, what is the old saying?
A hoot in a handbag?
Yeah, it's been a hoot in ahandbag.
And so, uh, charles, what haveyou thought?
What are your thoughts on it?
Speaker 2 (02:19):
um, honestly, I think the whole, the whole series is
pretty good.
Um, the call to meet God, whichwas the first one with Ryan, it
really had me thinking because Ifeel like my early walk in
Christianity I was one of thepeople that he talks about in
terms of I didn't let Scriptureshow me who God was and I didn't
(02:40):
put in, I don't think I put inenough effort, honestly, even in
the beginning, to um meet God,you know, come to him and and
get to know who he is.
Um, and Ryan talks on that interms of um, people would rather
paint a picture in their ownmind of who they want God to be,
um and turn that more into theimage of their God than actually
(03:03):
wanting to learn and understandwho our God is.
And I think my early walk Iwanted it to be easy, so it's
easier for, I guess, earlyChristians to paint this picture
in their mind of what theirexpectation of God is, not who
he actually is, what theirexpectation of God is, not who
(03:24):
he actually is.
So I know this like that firstsermon made me think, because I
think now more with scripture,it does paint a good picture of
who our God is and it has aninstruction of how we are to
come to him and it definitelyopens my eyes of how I was
starting out versus where I amtoday.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Oh yeah, there's always sanctification and we are
always going to be transformedinto the likeness of Jesus and
we can only do that throughscripture.
But when we first come to knowChrist, more often than not we
have to take some time to trulyget to know him.
Just like any honestly anyrelationship.
(04:04):
You get to know him, just likeany honestly any relationship,
right, you get to know your wifeand when you first meet it
might be like, hey, I'm Charles,what's your favorite show?
And like you're just gettingintroduced, you're just kind of
getting to know each other andyou might hear something that
you take a certain way.
She may say something in someway and you're like, oh, she
(04:26):
doesn't, like she doesn't likeany type of ice cream, because
she said she didn't like onetype of ice cream.
You know what I mean.
You might make thoseassumptions and it takes a
little bit to get to knowsomebody.
Getting it takes us a little bitto get to know our god and we
have to approach god just likewe would, or in a similar All
right, I'll say in the likenessof approaching any other
(04:47):
relationship.
And getting to know it takesintentionality, it takes um a
desire, right, if you're, ifyou're kind of intentional and
stuff and you don't really havea desire and you're not fully
committed to getting to know God.
You're only going to know somuch of him.
I think Tim puts a really goodpoint out there in his where
(05:11):
when he kind of lists thedifferent tips that are not tips
what's the word I'm looking forhere On the pastor's blog it
says apply these truths.
So he lists out some truths onwhat we need to do to get to
know god, and one of those isknow scripture.
The more you know scriptureyeah, um, the more you know
(05:32):
scripture, the more you candetermine if it's god speaking
to you and god's going to speakto you and reveal things to you,
and you got to know if that'sgod.
And so the more you readscripture, the better you know
god.
Um, I think you know God um.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
I think you're entirely right.
Yeah, cause he did mention like, in terms of like knowing
scripture too.
He also mentioned in that umthat wisdom is seeing a
situation from God's perspective.
So I liked that one too, likein those, in those points he
ended with I think it was thefive points, um wisdom is,
Wisdom is seeing a situationfrom God's perspective.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
I've been every time we talk about wisdom.
About once a year I have aseries on wisdom with the youth
group and every time I'm likeall right guys, what is wisdom?
And you get different answershere and there.
This time around, though, Ithink I kind of nailed it.
I was like I give thesedictionary definitions.
It's hard to remember.
But I looked at the youth.
(06:29):
I was like all right, wisdom isapplying our knowledge of God
to any situation.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So understanding God enough that, when a situation
comes about, we can apply likewhat would Jesus do.
Remember the old bracelets andstuff, and so I was like but
that's a whole lot to remember.
Wisdom is knowledge applied.
Yeah, that's all it is.
It's the knowledge of how godwould react in a situation and,
um, what god wants you to do,and applying it to your life.
(06:59):
And so if you ever struggle toremember what wisdom is I've
hopefully it's stuck with theyouth group.
I got to test them on it Ishould give them a pop quiz.
That'll be fun.
Hey guys, for youth group,we're going to do a pop quiz on
the last year of your lessons.
Right, I'm joking.
If you're a youth listening,you don't have to take a pop
quiz.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
And I know something else that stuck out with me in
the first sermon with Ryan wasyou know he talks about God
coming down on the mountain inthis dense cloud and how you
know he instructed Moses.
You know, obviously there was arule set in place when he told
Moses to go down and tell themyou know, you can come to the
foot of the mountain, just don'tcome up the mountain.
So God's inviting them in toknow him and they all rejected
(07:46):
the invitation to come to thefoot of the mountain out of fear
.
And I sit there and think aboutit and I'm like that's actually
kind of heartbreaking.
I think that his children, youknow, denied his invitation to
come to the foot of the mountainto know him.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
They would rather have Moses come down and tell
them what he said instead ofcoming to the foot of the
mountain and hearing him.
Ryan points it out in the sermonthough, like, how often are we
doing that?
Yeah, how many people do weknow that?
And, like I, can I look at itfrom, like the what I've, from
my lived experiences?
Right, and so a lot of thetimes what I would, where I
would see that, is a guy at thefactory being dragged to church
(08:24):
because his wife said it's timeto go, or, um, go, ask your mom
about that.
She's she knows more about thatstuff.
And I'm not saying that'sinherently wrong, right to hey,
your mother has more knowledgeabout this subject.
Uh, whatever the subject may be,you should ask her.
She'll give you a better answer.
We're lying to each other inthat right, but I think I've,
(08:44):
from conversations I've had alot of times.
Rooted in that is a fear ofcoming to christ, of coming to
know who he is, and because wedon't, we know we're gonna have
to change our lifestyle and weknow we're gonna have to stop
doing this and stop doing that,and we know that and we have all
these presumptions of what'sgoing to happen with our lives
if we come to know God.
It doesn't ever really work outlike that, like yeah, there's
(09:09):
some things that you're going tochange in your life, you come
to know Christ.
It's a fact, it's going tohappen, even if it's not
something that you changepersonally.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
It's something that he's going to manifest a change
in inside you that's just goingto change.
I can't tell you how many timeslike for, like there could have
been things that I did on adaily basis that I just don't do
anymore, like it's.
It's one of those things whereit's not necessarily that I was
(09:35):
just sitting there one daythinking about it and I'm like
no, I'm just.
I just the drive to do it is nolonger there.
So it's.
It's just like this inwardchange also.
I feel like that happens as yougrow closer.
So did I come into it mentally,knowing like hey, I know these
things are not of God, I'm goingto stop doing them.
Yeah there was some stuff that Isaid.
I'm just not going to do it.
(09:55):
But there was also like aninward change, things that I
didn't even think about prior,that just changed.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
It was like you said, the desire to do it wasn't
there anymore another, where,another situation, where I've
seen this um, hey, I'm going tosend moses there to know god.
Right, I've met people who havestraight up told me like, yeah,
I believe in god, I know whogod is.
Um, I'm saved, but church isn'tfor me.
(10:22):
I don't go to church on Sunday.
I don't like theinstitutionalism of it, where
it's staying upset down or wehave to be there from this time
to this time and then they ropeyou into all the volunteer
opportunities and they make youdo all these things and,
la-da-da-da-da, that's also justsending someone else to be your
ambassador.
That's not really you.
Knowing God Christ calls us tocommune together and have church
(10:46):
together, and so when we'relike I'm not going to be a part
of the body, I mean what abetter place to feel the
presence of God, though?
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Like what is the saying when to and where gather?
I am there.
So it's like, even if you putall of the structure of it aside
, just the fact of knowing thatyou can come to a place where
the body of Christ is comingtogether and feel the presence
of God there with you, like thatto me, is already enough.
Oh yeah, past sermons as well.
(11:25):
That to me, like even justthinking about it outside of all
, that is also me showing myfaithfulness and obedience to
him to show up and learn abouthim and get to know him and be
here with the body of christ.
Like it's.
There's so much more to it thanjust the structuralism like
you're talking about, um, thatpeople may feel like there's,
there's so much more to it andI'm not saying that I wasn't one
of those people at one pointLike, oh, I don't have to go to
church, I can just stay home andread my Bible.
(11:45):
But the more I grew andunderstood, it's like no, I
really should be there.
Like there was a day I wasscheduled for overtime.
You're like you know what?
I'm not going to work in thatovertime.
I'm going to church today, butit's one ourselves to that idea
(12:07):
and not and not hold it as sucha negative thing over us.
Oh yeah, and then, uh, even so,with that note that I had made
in terms of you know howheartbreaking it is that they
denied his invitation, I made anote also for myself to think
about.
You know, there's so manyvideos out there on youtube
where you know someone's walkingdown the street and asking
random people like, hey, do youbelieve in god?
Do you believe?
And you hear no, no, people whodon't respond.
And I'm sitting there thinkingabout what Ryan's talking about,
(12:27):
where he comes down in thedense cloud, and I'm like could
you imagine, if that happenedtoday, the amount of people that
deny God and deny Christ, ifthat cloud were to descend today
and said all my people, come tome how many people would deny
it and not go to it.
Oh, there'd be a super, not asupernatural, but like a natural
(12:48):
phenomenon made as an excuse,but I even, I even think about
it, even in my own mind.
I'm like, yes, because I loveand believe in god, I would go,
but I'm not telling you Iwouldn't be terrified.
Oh, absolutely, my knees wouldbe shaken.
But it just.
You know, hearing these people,you know how many are out there
and I honestly, I don't know.
Maybe I had more faith inpeople, I don't know, but there
(13:10):
is a surprisingly large amountof people that will deny Christ
and God openly and it scares me.
It's so hearing that sermonlike really made me think about
these videos that I've seen ofall these people and I'm like
man, it's a scary.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I don't want to say scary, I'm trying to word this
properly it is.
It's scary for some.
I'll say yeah.
Because I mean there are peoplethat will deny Christ when
asked about it.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
But that right there is what scares me, and not for
myself, but for other people,because what does scripture say?
Like you deny me in front ofeveryone and I'm going to deny
you to the Father, like itscares me.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Scares you for them, right.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Yes.
Okay, because it's not any ofour will for someone to not you
know come to god or to be saved,or whatever the case may be,
and so it scares me, for, likemy fellow humans, you know, like
yeah, we're called to be hischildren, like and it just it
scares me for them when I hearthese things going on.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
My first mission strip back in 2013 or whatever
that was, I was going into myfreshman year high school and
they sent us to this evangelismcamp at Moody Bible Institute
and one of the pastors therespoke and he said when it comes
to evangelism, the trick youneed to have is to look at
(14:42):
everybody, you know everybody,you see and assume that they
have some sort of like signaround their neck and on that
sign says bound for heaven orbound for hell, because
everyone's bound to somewhereand it's your job as a Christian
to fulfill the Great Commissionand to start that and do that
effectively.
You kind of have to, like, makean educated guess, like do you
(15:03):
think this person's bound forheaven or bound for hell?
And sometimes they'll juststare it up, tell you like no,
I'm not a Christian, I have nodesire to be.
And then you know,unfortunately, like that's where
they're bound right now and itgives you a responsibility
because there should be somefear in it.
There should be some fear andwe're playing for eternity here
(15:26):
and we as Christians need tospread the gospel.
We need to help others discovermore in Christ and it's great
because we can discover more inChrist right now.
Right, we're both saved.
We know Christ.
We can still come to know himmore, but we have to start
somewhere, and so that's whywe're having so many.
We're trying to get 30,000gospel conversations.
That's a lot.
We need to have those, though,assuming that we had.
(15:50):
Two-thirds of them are someonenew.
A third of them are justrepeated conversations.
That's still 20,000 people whohad a gospel conversation
because of one church, 20,000people who had a gospel
conversation because of onechurch, and so when we do that
and when we're active with it,it kind of helps our own fear
(16:11):
get relieved some.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
And not for our own salvation, not because we're
checking off the box of hey, yep, christ, I'm an evangelist.
I did that for you.
Now I can get into heaven.
It's not by works, it's byfaith.
But that fear and stuff is thechange in you from Christ,
because you know what's going tohappen and so we need to, as a
(16:34):
church as the big C church theysay, multi-denominational
worldwide we need to make thateffort and be aware of that and
go and share the gospel Becauseunfortunately, there will be
people who, in the situation youlaid out, if the cloud came
down today, would deny Christ.
You're looking up something.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Yeah, well, I can't remember where it's at.
I'll have to look it up and talkto you about it later too.
But I think in everything thatyou were just talking about and
even what I brought up later too.
But there's, I think, ineverything that you were just
talking about and even what Ibrought up there is a scripture,
and I can't remember where it'sat, but it it pretty much says,
like, if you see someone likewillingly going against God,
(17:16):
that if we don't correct it,it's more dangerous for us in
terms of the judgment on that.
Like we're called to alsocorrect people that are leading
themselves down the wrong path.
So that's like when I'm, whenI'm talking about, like seeing
these people and we've eventalked about evangelism and
everything else like all thisstuff kind of tied together is
(17:38):
what's been pulling me more tohave these conversations,
because I do feel like I'mcalled, like, if I see someone
doing something ungodly, even ifthey don't believe in the
gospel and don't believe in it,like I just feel like it's my
duty to step in and say, hey,like this isn't right, you know,
give the detail and from it andeven use that as an opportunity
to spread the gospel.
Um, so I feel like I don't knowall that together, like whether
(18:00):
I'm scared for their salvationor not.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
I just feel like more of us should be doing something
about it, um I think we need tokeep in mind, though, that
there's only so much we can do.
Yeah, and we have to.
Um, regardless of what we sayand regardless of what they may
be doing, everything we sayneeds to be true, and everything
we say needs to come out oflove.
(18:23):
And, um, christians have gottena bad rap in general of being
the people that are going to saythat they stand for love but
spew hatred and yell at people.
Um, and honestly, if you're not, if you don't have love, you've
missed the point.
Yep, right, and so what we needto do is, yes, we need to
(18:49):
lovingly with people, likepeople have asked me.
I think it was in, I can'tremember who asked me.
Someone asked me one time how doyou correct?
Right, like, as a Christian,what do we?
You see someone sitting, whatdo you do?
And it is relativelysituational, right?
(19:11):
If it's someone brand new tochurch, who's just learning how
to be a Christian, or has nevercome to church before, and
they're not a Christian, are wegoing to sit there and point out
everything they're doing wrong?
They're not a Christian.
Are we going to sit there andpoint out everything they're
doing wrong?
Or, if you're sharing thegospel, like I know you were
talking to the prison chaplainat some point.
(19:32):
If you were helping him out.
One day and you go and talk tosomeone who's in prison and
they're cussing up a storm, isit going to be beneficial?
Is it going to work towardstheir salvation to point out
every single time they cuss andscold them for it?
Yeah, I agree.
No it's not Um.
(19:53):
We have to trust thatsanctification will come.
It's not our job to sanctify,it's God's job.
And so other people like if meand you?
You see me cussing up a stormand you're going to be like hey,
Well, I'm correcting you forsure.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Oh, I know you will.
Yep, I'll crack the whip onthat.
Get the ruler out startsmacking my knuckles and stuff.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
That is a situation where you step in right away
like hey, what are you doing?
Come on, dude, and you mighteven be loving but still stern
like dude.
Have you lost your mind?
And it's there's.
How you approach those thingsis so important, based on who
you're talking to.
Ryan and Tim talk a lot aboutyour influence, bucket.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Where, as Christians, as anybody in any leadership
role, you have a bucket.
Every drop of influence you getgoes in there and it comes drop
at a time.
When you mess up, you stab ahole in the bottom of your
influence bucket and everythingflows out.
We need to be aware of whereour influence bucket is, how
full our influence bucket iswith that person and how what
(21:01):
we're going to say is going toaffect that.
Not because our life goal is tohave influence or anything, but
because when we have theopportunity, the privilege, the
responsibility, honestly, ofhaving some influence, of having
some influence, it's importantthat we nurture that, because
(21:22):
even that influence we get, itis a gift from God, it's a job
from God, even where it's likehey, I'm going to trust you to
nurture and disciple thisrelationship and help them and
lead them to Christ.
Right, yeah, we don't get tasks, we don't get jobs.
Relationship and help them andlead them to Christ.
Right yeah, we don't get tasks,we don't get jobs, we don't get
(21:43):
things that without some sortof responsibility I talked this
with.
Talk about this with Lila.
If you want opportunities andyou want chances to do things,
you're going to have moreresponsibility.
If you want to go outside byyourself, you need to make sure
that you ask mommy and daddy.
You need to make sure thatyou're staying in the backyard,
like we've asked you.
Jamie can't go outside byhimself because we know he's
(22:04):
going to be tempted and he'sgoing to walk into the front
yard more often than not.
And so same thing withChristians it's our job to share
the gospel and do all thesethings.
We have to do it with amplethought, with love and walking
in step with Christ, listeningto God's whisper, bringing it
(22:25):
back to some sermon where it's.
We need to know what the voiceof God is.
And so if we're not spendingtime in silence, paying
attention in the mundane moments, like he says, or do you know
how many times God has spoke tome when I was specifically
working in the factory, when Iwas building 500 wrenches one
(22:49):
night and I'm sitting therepounding away at wrenches and
running them through mills andI'm like, oh thanks God, that's
some good information rightthere.
I was just chewing on that fora while.
It's those things when you'renot distracted by other things.
If we're not able to do that,we've got to be aware of how
we're approaching situations,because we need to make sure
(23:11):
that we're speaking from theHoly Spirit.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
I like what he mentioned too in terms of all
that is.
I feel like me personally, Iget so caught up in how busy
that we are that I don't takeadvantage of those quiet moments
that you know.
Whether it's the minute I pullinto my work's parking lot, I
know I'm going to be sitting inmy truck for 10 minutes.
So usually I put on music,whatever.
But instead of like, why nottake that opportunity to meet
(23:36):
God and sit there and have aconversation and, you know, chew
things over, and but a lot oftimes it's like I don't know if
it's just the idea that I knowthat I'm I don't have a lot of
free time, so I take advantageof it and I don't use it in the
way that I should Like.
I feel like there's many timesthroughout our day whether, even
if I'm at home just washingdishes, I take that opportunity
(23:59):
to have a conversation.
So it's definitely somethingthat's grown on me more and more
.
I tried to stop making excusesas to why I'm not in the word,
which I know Ryan touched on abunch because I had talked to
him about it, but it's like Ican't really go a day without
reading, and if I can't read.
Then while I'm doing dishes, Iput on like the audio Bible and
(24:20):
I just have it read me stuff, um, but it's one of those things
where it's like I try toresonate in it in a daily now,
compared to where I was before.
Um, cause I feel like once I gotoo long without it, you know,
it's like you can feel that,that emptiness like creeping
back in Um, so I like to be fullof his word all the time.
But even with that being said,I liked something on one of the
(24:45):
other.
I don't remember if this was thefirst one or not, but when Ryan
talked about the King's WeddingBanquet and how the invitations
went out and the initial guestrejected it, so he said, send it
out to everybody and the guycame without wedding clothes and
I really liked what hementioned there because it goes
back to like building this imageof what expectations god has.
And it said that ryan's commentwas sadly, you know, a lot of
(25:09):
people want to come to god ontheir own terms and all of them
want forgiveness, grace andsalvation, but none of them want
to take off that, that, thatfilthy clothing that they have,
and and become the image God'slooking for.
Um, and again, that just takesme back to where I was, you know
, in the past and it's like Ifeel like and I'm still not.
(25:29):
It's not like I'm perfect, but I, when I look at where I started
versus where I am now, likethese things that they're
talking about in these sermonsare things that I've been
through and it's it's it's goodto to think on that and think
like, is there still parts of mylife that you know, maybe I
don't understand some of hisexpectations, like is there
parts of me that I still don'tunderstand yet need to work on?
(25:53):
Um, so I'm glad that you knowthese are, these are the things
that are being brought up,because when I read the wedding
banquet, like I didn't sit thereand think about it in the way
that Ryan's up there talkingabout it.
So when he talks about it, I'mlike man, that really hit me,
because I'm like I was coming tohim in the filth.
That I was, you know, and it'slike I didn't think about it.
Like you know, there's anexpectation, you know he
(26:14):
expectation he wanted them in aspotless robe before they came
to the foot of that mountain andI'm like I would have been one
of the ones that's probablytrying to go to the foot of that
mountain in my dirty, filthyrags.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
I'm here for you Now.
It's important to remember that, with this parable, the initial
meaning that Jesus is trying toconvey is that, in order to
come to God, in order to knowGod, it's not that you have to
have everything, you need to bewearing perfect robes and you
(26:47):
have to be perfect to know God.
That's not what Jesus is tryingto convey.
What Jesus is trying to conveyis that there's one way and that
there's.
If you don't do these things, ifyou don't put on the tuxedo,
you don't get into the wedding.
Um, and putting on that tuxedois receiving salvation from
(27:10):
Jesus.
There's one way to God and thatis through Christ Jesus.
And if we don't do it that way,follow those steps, put on that
tuxedo, we don't get to knowGod.
What else we want to touch onhere today?
Charles?
Speaker 2 (27:25):
I think it was on it was week three on Tim's he had
made a point that you know, Ithink about too, is we need to
align ourselves with how Godwants to speak to us, and that
was, you know, in the same lineof you know, make time in our
commutes to sit in silence andhear his voice?
Um, I think not even in ourcommutes.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Make time before you go to bed, right?
How many of us are scrollingthrough Facebook or doing
something on our phone before wego to sleep?
First off, studies show don'thave that blue light in your
eyes, so they're number one saveyour vision uh, I had a phone
once that like supposedly cutout the blue lights in it and I
was like haha I can be on myphone nighttime feature.
(28:09):
Yeah um, but whether it's beforebed or, honestly, being more
intentional with it, is alwaysimportant to me, like if it
becomes.
If it's like a routine thing,it becomes less meaningful.
Not that a routine is bad,routine's good, but I kind of
just go through the motions andso for me it's like find five
(28:32):
minutes today, even where it'sI'm not doing anything, I'm
going to spend time with God andpraise him and worship him and
pray and listen and just sit inthat it's so important.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Yeah, oh.
So I also liked there was acomment that he had, because I
actually hear this a lot Fromeven people who are Christians
that say, well, tim made thecomment that Satan's biggest lie
is that you're finished, you'veruined it, it's never.
And then he goes on to tell youlike it's never too late.
(29:08):
But there's a lot of times thatI see people enter into a
conversation that's already inprogress and they're like you
know, I don't believe, because Ifeel like, even if I did all
these things that I've done,like there's no hope for me and
I actually I do hear that a lotand it's and, like Tim said, you
know that Satan's biggest lieis telling people that you've
(29:32):
already ruined it, like there isno salvation for you.
Um, which, honestly I, nosalvation for you, which
honestly I feel like before Istarted coming here, when I was
in that kind of shallow moment Ieven told Ryan I was like a
part of me feels like I'm notwelcome back.
You know, I did get into a spotwhere I'm like and it wasn't
that I was doing anything wrongand necessarily it's not like I
(29:54):
was out, you know, breaking allthe laws and everything else,
but it was the fact that I wasso angry with God for so long
and I stopped going to church.
I told him I was like I, just apart of me is like I don't
think I'm welcome back.
And that's when, you know, ryankind of corrected me and he's
(30:14):
like you know, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I think part of that and not in every situation.
But I think when we're kids andwe come to know Christ even if
we're teens right, we're meetingChrist for the first time and
we know him and we know himintimately, right and then when
(30:36):
we know that love and we've runaway from it anyways and then
walk back, there's a there islike a sense of shame where it's
like I knew this before I didit.
I knew this while I was doingthis, while I was running from
you, I knew how perfect and howamazing and how wonderful and
how deserving of my worship Godis, and how amazing and how
(30:58):
wonderful and how deserving ofmy worship God is.
But I was angry, so I walkedaway.
Like there is a sense of shamethere and it is normal, but Ryan
is so right that we couldsprint as fast as we can away
from God and say I want nothingto do with you.
I am angry, I am whatever, andGod's going to be like be like,
(31:19):
hey, come on back wheneveryou're ready.
I'm calling you, I'm callingyou to the mountain, I'm calling
you to come to know me betterand to understand that situation
that you just went throughbetter.
Yeah, and you need to, just youneed to come back and, like you
said, saying's gonna tell, totell you man, you mess this one
up, you can't.
You can't fix that relationshipright Like we.
(31:42):
We do that to people where wejust walk away Like I don't want
anything to do with you, I'mdone talking to you.
We we're.
We can usually expect them tobe, at the very least, hesitant
of wanting to um, have that sametype of relationship again.
God's completely different.
God's like come back, we can.
You're still my boy.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Bring it back.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
And then also in that sermon too it was talking about
.
So this isn't the provisions onebut when I think about the
provisions, I think about it inthe sense of, like God knows
what we need, but I think a lotof our, a lot of, I mean.
I still fall to it every nowand then.
(32:26):
But it's like you're prayingand praying because you know,
let's say, there's something inyour life that you need working
out.
Whatever it may be, it's notalways going to be provided to
you when you want it, but whenyou actually need it.
And a lot of times I feel likeit's the impatience in myself
where it's like I know that weneed it but it's not when we
(32:49):
need it.
So there's been conversationswe've had, even actually when
Forrest was on with us, where Iwas talking about you know, the
situation with losing the rentalhouse and having to buy this
one.
It's like so many times have Iseen like when we are actually
in dire need of it.
I don't think he's ever shiedaway from providing.
(33:10):
It's usually in the momentswhere it's like something that I
want and even if it may besomething I need in the future,
but I don't actually need itright now, it's not there, like
the, the means aren't there,it's not provided.
But it's coming to thatunderstanding that he knows when
it's actually needed.
And a lot of times I feel likethose moments isn't just him not
(33:31):
answering something that wewant, or even if we don't need
it, but it's it.
How many times I've gottenstuck in traffic and I'm sitting
there like man, I'm stuck in it, but who's to say that he
didn't cause you to get stuck intraffic because something bad
could have happened, you know,down the road or or whatever?
So, long story short, I guessI'm just saying that, uh, I
(33:53):
agree with what they, with whatTim was.
I think it was Tim that wassaying that, you know, it's on
his terms.
Like we need to realize thatit's not up for me to dictate
when God provides things for me.
So when I think about, like theAbraham and Isaac thing and you
know, god promised him the ramwhen he got up there and the
whole way Isaac's asking likewhere's the sacrifice?
(34:14):
And it's all in the faith thathe's going to provide that ram
at the top of the mountain, andit's like for me, I'm sitting
there thinking about it and evenlistening to Ryan talk about,
you know, him putting his son upon the table and everything,
just you know acting it out.
I'm like if I'm looking atCharlie and I'm if this was like
me and Charlie, I'm like Idon't know if I'd be able to
lift my hand.
(34:34):
So it's like terrifying yeah, solike that provision, like when
you're thinking about that andand god providing what he's
promised.
It's like you know, you readthat story and I'm like man, it
took a lot for abraham to tolift his hand oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
And honestly, I wonder how many?
How often some of thosesituations where it's like, man,
I've been looking for a newhouse for so long and nothing's
coming up, and it's coming tothe deadline and boom, we got a
new one here.
How often is that God takingaway our excuses?
(35:09):
Right, we mentioned earlier,like how, how many people would
walk away from God if the cloudcame down?
How many would say come up witha reason why that's not God?
Like, oh, it's just a naturalphenomenon down?
How many would say come up witha reason why that's not god?
Like, oh, it's just a naturalphenomenon.
How many times would we excuseaway what god is doing in our
lives if we had the opportunitywe saw with the israelites,
god's like yeah, we're gonnatake this city of jericho by
walking around it and screamingyeah.
(35:30):
Like, okay, that's gonna workwell with god, it will.
Yeah, you know what I mean.
So how?
I wonder how often in our livesGod is saying you're going to
make an excuse for what I'mdoing, unless I make you pretty
nervous about it?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
And so we're going to make you a little nervous,
we're going to make youuncomfortable.
It's going to come down to thedeadline.
It's going to be kind of close,but it's not close for God.
I mean, god's good, it's done.
That's all it takes Just a snapof a finger, Um, and so I think
(36:07):
you're right.
Like with that.
Uh, my thoughts left me.
We're cutting this part out too.
I say that just so.
I will cut it out for therecord yeah yeah, anyhow, you
ready for the hard one.
what's the hard one when itcomes to God's provisions?
(36:33):
Ryan points out that Godblesses obedience Obedience is
important.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Obedience is not something that God takes lightly
.
God calls us to do things andGod calls us not to do things,
and we have to follow that.
We have to choose to bear ourcross, whatever that may look
like, you know what I mean.
It could be something simplethat we're going to go out.
(37:07):
Or simple for me is differentfor other people.
So, with that in mind, god'sgoing to call me at one point to
have more gospel conversationsand I'm going to say, all right,
this is what I'm going to do.
And other points in my lifeGod's going to call me to spend
a little bit less time with myfamily and do more stuff
(37:29):
planning for a situation or atrip or an event or what have
you right?
Maybe Ryan needs a little helpand God's like, hey, you're
going to fill in for him inthese areas, whatever that may
look like, where there's goingto be some sort of cost, we have
(37:50):
to obey that.
Or if God's calling us to laysomething down and get rid of it
See, you shall have no othergods before me and you shall
don't have idols, and you shoutlike don't have idols.
It's important to keep in mindthat what is an idol today may
(38:11):
not be an idol for you tomorrow.
What's not an idol today maybecome an idol for you tomorrow,
right?
So I used to have an Xbox 360or an Xbox One one of them,
right, one of the Xboxes and Igot to a point where I was
playing that thing way too much.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
I can relate to that, oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
It was taking up like solid five, ten hours a week
Doesn't seem like much, but whenyou're going to school
full-time and have a full-timejob and things like that, that's
five, ten hours.
It's important, with the help ofmy loving wife saying hey,
(38:53):
you've been on that a lot lately.
God was like look, dude, it'san idol.
Yeah, get rid of it.
I literally gave it away.
I was like, all right, we gotto get rid of this, it's not.
Uh, I I tried to putrestrictions on myself and it
was becoming too much.
Um, and that story isn't to belike oh, I'm so amazing.
I gave her my Xbox.
That's, it's just an uh, anexample.
(39:13):
Um, and it wasn't until I waslike all right, I've got, I've,
I can do this better.
I ended up buying a PlayStation.
It's not an idol for me.
If I can't play my PlayStationfor six months, it sits there
and looks pretty.
If I can get 10 minutes in oneday because I have a little bit
(39:34):
of free time and I want to enjoyit for a bit, I can do that.
And so when it says God blessesobedience, one of the things
that I think of when I hear thatis whatever God's calling us to
do or whatever God's calling usto get rid of.
We have to be malleable to thatand what God wants us to do
there.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
You know I agree and honestly I relate to that story
a hundred percent because videogames for me for the longest
time was an idol and honestly,me and Erica had the same exact
conversation.
She brought it up on multipleoccasions that thank.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
God for why I know Right.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
She brought it up on multiple occasions of thank god
for wives.
She brought it up on multipleoccasions of you know how much
time I spent on it, which Inever let it become like
something that put a barrierbetween me and them, like I
always waited for them to besleeping, whatever, and then I
would go and play like all nightlong.
But uh, my thing was, I think,once I started A her comments,
because obviously everything mywife says means everything to me
(40:30):
, right, erica?
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Suck up.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
But even after I started reading more and
understanding what an idol wasbecause a part of me at that
time never really understoodwhat could be an idol in my life
, really understood like whatcould be an idol in my life and
once I really started to get anunderstanding of it, I'm sitting
there thinking about it and I'mlike man, I really have put
this thing on a pedestal whereit's like I felt like I couldn't
(40:53):
survive if I wasn't going downthere and playing.
So I actually went like almost awhole year without even
touching it, and it wasn'tbecause I felt like I wasn't
being obedient, but it wasbecause I got sucked into
reading the Bible Like obedient,but it was because I got sucked
into reading the Bible Like themore I started understanding,
it was like I didn't want to dolike I would get home from work
when I was working nights andinstantly go to my computer and
start playing a game.
Once I broke that cycle, it wasI was coming home and before I
(41:14):
went to sleep I was reading theBible.
So it was.
It was kind of like an inward,like what I was explaining
earlier, where it wasn'tnecessarily like a decision that
I made, but just like a changethat was already happening
inside me, like as I was going,um, and it was kind of as that
change was happening, is when Irealized, like man, I really
held this thing at a much higherstandard than it should have
(41:35):
been held.
Oh, for sure.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
It's super easy to do and we can.
I can knock out 50% of thepeople listening to this right
now.
Is your phone an idol?
Oh, for sure, are we.
Are we spending every wakingmoment scrolling through
newsfeed or scrolling throughFacebook or Tik TOK or Instagram
?
Speaker 2 (41:55):
I mean, look at how many, all the benches in a
restaurant when you walk inthere, like all the families and
I say this to Erica all thetime because I am probably the
least in my house that's ontheir phone.
In terms of like, even at thedinner table, you know Charlie
will pull out his phone orOakland will try to do something
, and I'm like no, no, no,because like even at restaurants
, it drives me insane.
Like when we're sitting therewaiting and you look around and
(42:18):
no one's communicating.
Parents aren't talking to theirkids, kids aren't talking to
their parents, they're all ontheir phone.
I'm like that is sad, it isreally sad.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
We do have a phone epidemic, I think.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
And what you were saying, too, like about the
obedience, and I don't know ifmaybe these, maybe I'm
misspeaking, but the thoughtthat came into my head as you
were talking about that is Iforget the exact verse, but when
it's talking about Abraham andhow he was saved by his faith,
but by his works his faith wasperfected.
So I think about that and Ithink about being called to
(42:51):
obedience and the works that weput in throughout our life, and
it's not the works that save you.
But when I read that, I'm likethe stuff that you're doing
throughout your life inobedience to God is perfecting
your faith as you're going.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
So I definitely am a firm believer in terms of the
obedience thing and, if youthink about it, your faith is
sometimes tested by what God iscalling you to do.
All right, god wants me to dothis.
A you can do it and see thatGod helps you through it and
provides for you and doeseverything that he said he would
(43:29):
, and your faith gets stronger.
Or, b, you could be worriedthat God's not going to do that
and so you run away from it andyour faith doesn't grow any
stronger by being obedient inwhat God is calling us to do.
Inherently, we see, ooh, I canrely on him.
Yeah, he's faithful, he's goingto he, he blesses obedience.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
When I listened to him and man, it's just it's
definitely a night and daydifference Like, oh yeah, where
I like just in my mood every day, like where I'm at today first
where I was years ago.
Like just in my mood every day,like where I'm at today versus
where I was years ago, like justin the conversations I have.
I told you about the guy atwork.
You know he's getting marriedthis year and they're actually
(44:11):
having like a big Catholicwedding, but he's never been one
that like dove into the Word.
So, dude, it's every day.
He's asking me questions andI'm like this is what I love,
like not, you know, sitting in a, in a you know professional
room, you know whatever, notsitting even in this setting,
but just sitting here one-on-onewith someone who is just coming
(44:32):
into understanding God and justhaving like a good conversation
.
And actually, you know, I Iwould have never taken my Bible
to work.
That thing stays in my book bagand it goes with me everywhere.
So like we'll sit there andhave conversations and I'll take
them through the Bible and I'mlike this is I love this.
But it's uh, it's definitely,like I said, the inward change,
like it's it's night and daydifferent, when when you start
(44:53):
to understand the obediencething.
And that's not to say that youknow, one day I'm just, you know
, being stubborn and I'm I don'thear him or I don't listen,
whatever, but you definitelytell it's, I don't know it's
just night and day different.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
In all of this.
We're not talking aboutperfection.
No, we're called to be perfect,but we understand that we're
going to miss the mark.
We're going to mess up, we'regoing to make mistakes, we're
going to be sucked into ourvideo game when god's like hey,
I gotta tell you something, andit's first time we've played in
(45:29):
a while and we we played toomuch.
You know what I mean.
Um, whatever that looks likefor us, where we're not being
obedient, there are some thingsthat god is calling like.
Clearly, I think some thingsare easier than others.
Don't kill people.
That's not particularly a hardone.
Speaker 2 (45:45):
For the most part, we can avoid that pretty well,
most people but most people yeah, I don't know Put a stipulation
on that, because not everyone Ihad all of my bets.
Speaker 1 (45:55):
If you haven't noticed this by now, I hedge my
bets all the time.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
But other things where God's like hey, but other
things where God's like hey,spend time in your work.
That's one that, believe it ornot, people could genuinely
struggle with getting in apattern of that and however that
looks for you I think it wasDarlene who mentioned it one
time a single verse, chew on averse for a day.
(46:20):
Start with that until you get asolid habit.
When we go there and we'regoing to read well, I'm going to
read the book of Genesis in twodays we're taking off a huge
bite.
Yeah, and we're.
We're, honestly in thosesituations Sometimes we're kind
of like going so macro thatwe're missing all the, all the
important details.
Um and so, however, we got toapproach those things to get
(46:44):
into the the good spiritualdisciplines of following Christ
and listening and spending timein the word and praying and
meditating on his uh.
Ryan points out, like in hissermon about glory, meditating
on Jesus's majesty.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
I actually really liked that one, that sermon,
when he's talking about you knowthe disciples seeing him
transformed.
Just thinking about, like, if Icould have been one of those
disciples sitting there seeingthis, like I can't even like try
to paint an image in my mind ofwhat it would have looked like.
Like, even with Ryan'sdescription, with you know
(47:22):
coming up over the hill and thesun's just blaring in your eyes
Like just this radiant lightthat you can't even see through
it, other than to make out theimages of two men you know
sitting there talking with him.
It's like I couldn't imaginewhat that glory would even look
like.
It blows my mind.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
It would be awesome.
Speaker 2 (47:39):
Every time I read that I'm like man, what it would
be to see that, but it's.
Speaker 1 (47:44):
Let's finish on that one.
We're at 48 minutes.
Let's finish on the glory ofJesus and spend some time today,
if you're listening to this,spend some time meditating and
thinking about how amazing ourGod is and how much glory and
how perfect he is and howprivileged we are to get to know
(48:08):
him, when we don't deserve it.
Whether it's the first time wecome to him or whether we run
away and come back, we don'tdeserve to know God.
We are sinners, we're broken.
We're given the opportunity andwhen we think about how amazing
our God is, it just makes thatopportunity so much brighter and
(48:31):
so much better and so much moreof an opportunity.
I don't know how else to put it.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
I do know, I know what you mean 100% Good deal.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Even if I don't, I do .
Well, now you're just confusingeverybody.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
Before we end it, I'm going to say because we checked
before it started, there was noe on the blue chair pocket.
Speaker 1 (48:47):
I'm going to start making Ryan put in the end of
his sermon.
Just finish the sermon off withsomebody.
Please email Jared and CharlesPlease.
No, we got an email before.
Yeah, just one.
Speaker 2 (49:00):
Before.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
You're going in on people right now.
It is Charles making you feelguilty, and it's and it's not
pastor Jared.
Um, I understand that when youleave church, you're thinking
about lunch.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
It's okay 100%.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Oh, I'm thinking about lunch, when I leave church
.
Are you kidding me?
Um, but if you, if God doesreveal something to you and
you're like Hmm, and you're like, hmm, this is good, I want to
share this, we'd love to hear it.
So go ahead and emailbluechairpodcasts at
afreshwindorg and putbluechairpodcasts in the subject
line for me so I can find you.
Or, honestly, if you shot me atext and started it with hey,
(49:36):
put this in the Blue ChairPodcast, I would accept that,
even.
Or I'll just give Charles'number to everybody and
everybody can blow Charles'phones up.
All right, guys, thanks forlistening this month.
We appreciate you, we love you.
Easter is coming and we'reexcited for it.
All right, have a good one.
Welcome and thanks for joining us on the Blue Chair
Podcast, brought to you by aFresh Wind Church.
Each month we discuss thelatest sermons from the
perspective of the Blue Chairs.
Hello and welcome to the BlueChair Podcast.
This is Pastor Jared.
I'm here with Charles.
Say what's up?
How's it going?
We are not accompanied byanybody.
(00:39):
Today we're throwing it back to, like the first episode.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Yeah, I think it's been.
We did one or two episodes,maybe with someone else on, but,
uh, we are by ourselves todayand so we are covering the come
to the mountain series, thefirst four weeks.
That.
It's still going strong.
It's going to lead us all theway to Easter, and if you're
listening to this on the dayit's released, this should be
(01:05):
the 12th, which is the daybefore Palm Sunday, and so we're
going to go all the way toEaster.
It's going to take us, oh yeah,um, so so far we got four, four
sermons uh, about the call tothe mountain, the, uh, trusting
(01:26):
in God's provisions.
Tim talked about the call to themountain, the, trusting in
God's provisions.
Tim talked about the gentlewhisper of God and Ryan talked
about the God of glory.
And through this series, whatwe're doing is we're taking a
look at God and basically beingreintroduced to him, or maybe
(01:47):
it's your first time and you'rebeing introduced to God.
God is a mighty, magnificent,multifaceted God that shows,
just like anything and anybody,there's different aspects of him
, and we can see those when wedraw close to him and we come to
the mountain and we get to knowhim, and so that's what this
(02:08):
series is covering, and I thinkit's been a hoot.
Uh, what is the old saying?
A hoot in a handbag?
Yeah, it's been a hoot in ahandbag.
And so, uh, charles, what haveyou thought?
What are your thoughts on it?
Speaker 2 (02:19):
um, honestly, I think the whole, the whole series is
pretty good.
Um, the call to meet God, whichwas the first one with Ryan, it
really had me thinking because Ifeel like my early walk in
Christianity I was one of thepeople that he talks about in
terms of I didn't let Scriptureshow me who God was and I didn't
(02:40):
put in, I don't think I put inenough effort, honestly, even in
the beginning, to um meet God,you know, come to him and and
get to know who he is.
Um, and Ryan talks on that interms of um, people would rather
paint a picture in their ownmind of who they want God to be,
um and turn that more into theimage of their God than actually
(03:03):
wanting to learn and understandwho our God is.
And I think my early walk Iwanted it to be easy, so it's
easier for, I guess, earlyChristians to paint this picture
in their mind of what theirexpectation of God is, not who
he actually is, what theirexpectation of God is, not who
(03:24):
he actually is.
So I know this like that firstsermon made me think, because I
think now more with scripture,it does paint a good picture of
who our God is and it has aninstruction of how we are to
come to him and it definitelyopens my eyes of how I was
starting out versus where I amtoday.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Oh yeah, there's always sanctification and we are
always going to be transformedinto the likeness of Jesus and
we can only do that throughscripture.
But when we first come to knowChrist, more often than not we
have to take some time to trulyget to know him.
Just like any honestly anyrelationship.
(04:04):
You get to know him, just likeany honestly any relationship,
right, you get to know your wifeand when you first meet it
might be like, hey, I'm Charles,what's your favorite show?
And like you're just gettingintroduced, you're just kind of
getting to know each other andyou might hear something that
you take a certain way.
She may say something in someway and you're like, oh, she
(04:26):
doesn't, like she doesn't likeany type of ice cream, because
she said she didn't like onetype of ice cream.
You know what I mean.
You might make thoseassumptions and it takes a
little bit to get to knowsomebody.
Getting it takes us a little bitto get to know our god and we
have to approach god just likewe would, or in a similar All
right, I'll say in the likenessof approaching any other
(04:47):
relationship.
And getting to know it takesintentionality, it takes um a
desire, right, if you're, ifyou're kind of intentional and
stuff and you don't really havea desire and you're not fully
committed to getting to know God.
You're only going to know somuch of him.
I think Tim puts a really goodpoint out there in his where
(05:11):
when he kind of lists thedifferent tips that are not tips
what's the word I'm looking forhere On the pastor's blog it
says apply these truths.
So he lists out some truths onwhat we need to do to get to
know god, and one of those isknow scripture.
The more you know scriptureyeah, um, the more you know
(05:32):
scripture, the more you candetermine if it's god speaking
to you and god's going to speakto you and reveal things to you,
and you got to know if that'sgod.
And so the more you readscripture, the better you know
god.
Um, I think you know God um.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
I think you're entirely right.
Yeah, cause he did mention like, in terms of like knowing
scripture too.
He also mentioned in that umthat wisdom is seeing a
situation from God's perspective.
So I liked that one too, likein those, in those points he
ended with I think it was thefive points, um wisdom is,
Wisdom is seeing a situationfrom God's perspective.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
I've been every time we talk about wisdom.
About once a year I have aseries on wisdom with the youth
group and every time I'm likeall right guys, what is wisdom?
And you get different answershere and there.
This time around, though, Ithink I kind of nailed it.
I was like I give thesedictionary definitions.
It's hard to remember.
But I looked at the youth.
(06:29):
I was like all right, wisdom isapplying our knowledge of God
to any situation.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So understanding God enough that, when a situation
comes about, we can apply likewhat would Jesus do.
Remember the old bracelets andstuff, and so I was like but
that's a whole lot to remember.
Wisdom is knowledge applied.
Yeah, that's all it is.
It's the knowledge of how godwould react in a situation and,
um, what god wants you to do,and applying it to your life.
(06:59):
And so if you ever struggle toremember what wisdom is I've
hopefully it's stuck with theyouth group.
I got to test them on it Ishould give them a pop quiz.
That'll be fun.
Hey guys, for youth group,we're going to do a pop quiz on
the last year of your lessons.
Right, I'm joking.
If you're a youth listening,you don't have to take a pop
quiz.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
And I know something else that stuck out with me in
the first sermon with Ryan wasyou know he talks about God
coming down on the mountain inthis dense cloud and how you
know he instructed Moses.
You know, obviously there was arule set in place when he told
Moses to go down and tell themyou know, you can come to the
foot of the mountain, just don'tcome up the mountain.
So God's inviting them in toknow him and they all rejected
(07:46):
the invitation to come to thefoot of the mountain out of fear
.
And I sit there and think aboutit and I'm like that's actually
kind of heartbreaking.
I think that his children, youknow, denied his invitation to
come to the foot of the mountainto know him.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
They would rather have Moses come down and tell
them what he said instead ofcoming to the foot of the
mountain and hearing him.
Ryan points it out in the sermonthough, like, how often are we
doing that?
Yeah, how many people do weknow that?
And, like I, can I look at itfrom, like the what I've, from
my lived experiences?
Right, and so a lot of thetimes what I would, where I
would see that, is a guy at thefactory being dragged to church
(08:24):
because his wife said it's timeto go, or, um, go, ask your mom
about that.
She's she knows more about thatstuff.
And I'm not saying that'sinherently wrong, right to hey,
your mother has more knowledgeabout this subject.
Uh, whatever the subject may be,you should ask her.
She'll give you a better answer.
We're lying to each other inthat right, but I think I've,
(08:44):
from conversations I've had alot of times.
Rooted in that is a fear ofcoming to christ, of coming to
know who he is, and because wedon't, we know we're gonna have
to change our lifestyle and weknow we're gonna have to stop
doing this and stop doing that,and we know that and we have all
these presumptions of what'sgoing to happen with our lives
if we come to know God.
It doesn't ever really work outlike that, like yeah, there's
(09:09):
some things that you're going tochange in your life, you come
to know Christ.
It's a fact, it's going tohappen, even if it's not
something that you changepersonally.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
It's something that he's going to manifest a change
in inside you that's just goingto change.
I can't tell you how many timeslike for, like there could have
been things that I did on adaily basis that I just don't do
anymore, like it's.
It's one of those things whereit's not necessarily that I was
(09:35):
just sitting there one daythinking about it and I'm like
no, I'm just.
I just the drive to do it is nolonger there.
So it's.
It's just like this inwardchange also.
I feel like that happens as yougrow closer.
So did I come into it mentally,knowing like hey, I know these
things are not of God, I'm goingto stop doing them.
Yeah there was some stuff that Isaid.
I'm just not going to do it.
(09:55):
But there was also like aninward change, things that I
didn't even think about prior,that just changed.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
It was like you said, the desire to do it wasn't
there anymore another, where,another situation, where I've
seen this um, hey, I'm going tosend moses there to know god.
Right, I've met people who havestraight up told me like, yeah,
I believe in god, I know whogod is.
Um, I'm saved, but church isn'tfor me.
(10:22):
I don't go to church on Sunday.
I don't like theinstitutionalism of it, where
it's staying upset down or wehave to be there from this time
to this time and then they ropeyou into all the volunteer
opportunities and they make youdo all these things and,
la-da-da-da-da, that's also justsending someone else to be your
ambassador.
That's not really you.
Knowing God Christ calls us tocommune together and have church
(10:46):
together, and so when we'relike I'm not going to be a part
of the body, I mean what abetter place to feel the
presence of God, though?
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Like what is the saying when to and where gather?
I am there.
So it's like, even if you putall of the structure of it aside
, just the fact of knowing thatyou can come to a place where
the body of Christ is comingtogether and feel the presence
of God there with you, like thatto me, is already enough.
Oh yeah, past sermons as well.
(11:25):
That to me, like even justthinking about it outside of all
, that is also me showing myfaithfulness and obedience to
him to show up and learn abouthim and get to know him and be
here with the body of christ.
Like it's.
There's so much more to it thanjust the structuralism like
you're talking about, um, thatpeople may feel like there's,
there's so much more to it andI'm not saying that I wasn't one
of those people at one pointLike, oh, I don't have to go to
church, I can just stay home andread my Bible.
(11:45):
But the more I grew andunderstood, it's like no, I
really should be there.
Like there was a day I wasscheduled for overtime.
You're like you know what?
I'm not going to work in thatovertime.
I'm going to church today, butit's one ourselves to that idea
(12:07):
and not and not hold it as sucha negative thing over us.
Oh yeah, and then, uh, even so,with that note that I had made
in terms of you know howheartbreaking it is that they
denied his invitation, I made anote also for myself to think
about.
You know, there's so manyvideos out there on youtube
where you know someone's walkingdown the street and asking
random people like, hey, do youbelieve in god?
Do you believe?
And you hear no, no, people whodon't respond.
And I'm sitting there thinkingabout what Ryan's talking about,
(12:27):
where he comes down in thedense cloud, and I'm like could
you imagine, if that happenedtoday, the amount of people that
deny God and deny Christ, ifthat cloud were to descend today
and said all my people, come tome how many people would deny
it and not go to it.
Oh, there'd be a super, not asupernatural, but like a natural
(12:48):
phenomenon made as an excuse,but I even, I even think about
it, even in my own mind.
I'm like, yes, because I loveand believe in god, I would go,
but I'm not telling you Iwouldn't be terrified.
Oh, absolutely, my knees wouldbe shaken.
But it just.
You know, hearing these people,you know how many are out there
and I honestly, I don't know.
Maybe I had more faith inpeople, I don't know, but there
(13:10):
is a surprisingly large amountof people that will deny Christ
and God openly and it scares me.
It's so hearing that sermonlike really made me think about
these videos that I've seen ofall these people and I'm like
man, it's a scary.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I don't want to say scary, I'm trying to word this
properly it is.
It's scary for some.
I'll say yeah.
Because I mean there are peoplethat will deny Christ when
asked about it.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
But that right there is what scares me, and not for
myself, but for other people,because what does scripture say?
Like you deny me in front ofeveryone and I'm going to deny
you to the Father, like itscares me.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Scares you for them, right.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Yes.
Okay, because it's not any ofour will for someone to not you
know come to god or to be saved,or whatever the case may be,
and so it scares me, for, likemy fellow humans, you know, like
yeah, we're called to be hischildren, like and it just it
scares me for them when I hearthese things going on.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
My first mission strip back in 2013 or whatever
that was, I was going into myfreshman year high school and
they sent us to this evangelismcamp at Moody Bible Institute
and one of the pastors therespoke and he said when it comes
to evangelism, the trick youneed to have is to look at
(14:42):
everybody, you know everybody,you see and assume that they
have some sort of like signaround their neck and on that
sign says bound for heaven orbound for hell, because
everyone's bound to somewhereand it's your job as a Christian
to fulfill the Great Commissionand to start that and do that
effectively.
You kind of have to, like, makean educated guess, like do you
(15:03):
think this person's bound forheaven or bound for hell?
And sometimes they'll juststare it up, tell you like no,
I'm not a Christian, I have nodesire to be.
And then you know,unfortunately, like that's where
they're bound right now and itgives you a responsibility
because there should be somefear in it.
There should be some fear andwe're playing for eternity here
(15:26):
and we as Christians need tospread the gospel.
We need to help others discovermore in Christ and it's great
because we can discover more inChrist right now.
Right, we're both saved.
We know Christ.
We can still come to know himmore, but we have to start
somewhere, and so that's whywe're having so many.
We're trying to get 30,000gospel conversations.
That's a lot.
We need to have those, though,assuming that we had.
(15:50):
Two-thirds of them are someonenew.
A third of them are justrepeated conversations.
That's still 20,000 people whohad a gospel conversation
because of one church, 20,000people who had a gospel
conversation because of onechurch, and so when we do that
and when we're active with it,it kind of helps our own fear
(16:11):
get relieved some.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
And not for our own salvation, not because we're
checking off the box of hey, yep, christ, I'm an evangelist.
I did that for you.
Now I can get into heaven.
It's not by works, it's byfaith.
But that fear and stuff is thechange in you from Christ,
because you know what's going tohappen and so we need to, as a
(16:34):
church as the big C church theysay, multi-denominational
worldwide we need to make thateffort and be aware of that and
go and share the gospel Becauseunfortunately, there will be
people who, in the situation youlaid out, if the cloud came
down today, would deny Christ.
You're looking up something.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Yeah, well, I can't remember where it's at.
I'll have to look it up and talkto you about it later too.
But I think in everything thatyou were just talking about and
even what I brought up later too.
But there's, I think, ineverything that you were just
talking about and even what Ibrought up there is a scripture,
and I can't remember where it'sat, but it it pretty much says,
like, if you see someone likewillingly going against God,
(17:16):
that if we don't correct it,it's more dangerous for us in
terms of the judgment on that.
Like we're called to alsocorrect people that are leading
themselves down the wrong path.
So that's like when I'm, whenI'm talking about, like seeing
these people and we've eventalked about evangelism and
everything else like all thisstuff kind of tied together is
(17:38):
what's been pulling me more tohave these conversations,
because I do feel like I'mcalled, like, if I see someone
doing something ungodly, even ifthey don't believe in the
gospel and don't believe in it,like I just feel like it's my
duty to step in and say, hey,like this isn't right, you know,
give the detail and from it andeven use that as an opportunity
to spread the gospel.
Um, so I feel like I don't knowall that together, like whether
(18:00):
I'm scared for their salvationor not.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
I just feel like more of us should be doing something
about it, um I think we need tokeep in mind, though, that
there's only so much we can do.
Yeah, and we have to.
Um, regardless of what we sayand regardless of what they may
be doing, everything we sayneeds to be true, and everything
we say needs to come out oflove.
(18:23):
And, um, christians have gottena bad rap in general of being
the people that are going to saythat they stand for love but
spew hatred and yell at people.
Um, and honestly, if you're not, if you don't have love, you've
missed the point.
Yep, right, and so what we needto do is, yes, we need to
(18:49):
lovingly with people, likepeople have asked me.
I think it was in, I can'tremember who asked me.
Someone asked me one time how doyou correct?
Right, like, as a Christian,what do we?
You see someone sitting, whatdo you do?
And it is relativelysituational, right?
(19:11):
If it's someone brand new tochurch, who's just learning how
to be a Christian, or has nevercome to church before, and
they're not a Christian, are wegoing to sit there and point out
everything they're doing wrong?
They're not a Christian.
Are we going to sit there andpoint out everything they're
doing wrong?
Or, if you're sharing thegospel, like I know you were
talking to the prison chaplainat some point.
(19:32):
If you were helping him out.
One day and you go and talk tosomeone who's in prison and
they're cussing up a storm, isit going to be beneficial?
Is it going to work towardstheir salvation to point out
every single time they cuss andscold them for it?
Yeah, I agree.
No it's not Um.
(19:53):
We have to trust thatsanctification will come.
It's not our job to sanctify,it's God's job.
And so other people like if meand you?
You see me cussing up a stormand you're going to be like hey,
Well, I'm correcting you forsure.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Oh, I know you will.
Yep, I'll crack the whip onthat.
Get the ruler out startsmacking my knuckles and stuff.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
That is a situation where you step in right away
like hey, what are you doing?
Come on, dude, and you mighteven be loving but still stern
like dude.
Have you lost your mind?
And it's there's.
How you approach those thingsis so important, based on who
you're talking to.
Ryan and Tim talk a lot aboutyour influence, bucket.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Where, as Christians, as anybody in any leadership
role, you have a bucket.
Every drop of influence you getgoes in there and it comes drop
at a time.
When you mess up, you stab ahole in the bottom of your
influence bucket and everythingflows out.
We need to be aware of whereour influence bucket is, how
full our influence bucket iswith that person and how what
(21:01):
we're going to say is going toaffect that.
Not because our life goal is tohave influence or anything, but
because when we have theopportunity, the privilege, the
responsibility, honestly, ofhaving some influence, of having
some influence, it's importantthat we nurture that, because
(21:22):
even that influence we get, itis a gift from God, it's a job
from God, even where it's likehey, I'm going to trust you to
nurture and disciple thisrelationship and help them and
lead them to Christ.
Right, yeah, we don't get tasks, we don't get jobs.
Relationship and help them andlead them to Christ.
Right yeah, we don't get tasks,we don't get jobs, we don't get
(21:43):
things that without some sortof responsibility I talked this
with.
Talk about this with Lila.
If you want opportunities andyou want chances to do things,
you're going to have moreresponsibility.
If you want to go outside byyourself, you need to make sure
that you ask mommy and daddy.
You need to make sure thatyou're staying in the backyard,
like we've asked you.
Jamie can't go outside byhimself because we know he's
(22:04):
going to be tempted and he'sgoing to walk into the front
yard more often than not.
And so same thing withChristians it's our job to share
the gospel and do all thesethings.
We have to do it with amplethought, with love and walking
in step with Christ, listeningto God's whisper, bringing it
(22:25):
back to some sermon where it's.
We need to know what the voiceof God is.
And so if we're not spendingtime in silence, paying
attention in the mundane moments, like he says, or do you know
how many times God has spoke tome when I was specifically
working in the factory, when Iwas building 500 wrenches one
(22:49):
night and I'm sitting therepounding away at wrenches and
running them through mills andI'm like, oh thanks God, that's
some good information rightthere.
I was just chewing on that fora while.
It's those things when you'renot distracted by other things.
If we're not able to do that,we've got to be aware of how
we're approaching situations,because we need to make sure
(23:11):
that we're speaking from theHoly Spirit.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
I like what he mentioned too in terms of all
that is.
I feel like me personally, Iget so caught up in how busy
that we are that I don't takeadvantage of those quiet moments
that you know.
Whether it's the minute I pullinto my work's parking lot, I
know I'm going to be sitting inmy truck for 10 minutes.
So usually I put on music,whatever.
But instead of like, why nottake that opportunity to meet
(23:36):
God and sit there and have aconversation and, you know, chew
things over, and but a lot oftimes it's like I don't know if
it's just the idea that I knowthat I'm I don't have a lot of
free time, so I take advantageof it and I don't use it in the
way that I should Like.
I feel like there's many timesthroughout our day whether, even
if I'm at home just washingdishes, I take that opportunity
(23:59):
to have a conversation.
So it's definitely somethingthat's grown on me more and more
.
I tried to stop making excusesas to why I'm not in the word,
which I know Ryan touched on abunch because I had talked to
him about it, but it's like Ican't really go a day without
reading, and if I can't read.
Then while I'm doing dishes, Iput on like the audio Bible and
(24:20):
I just have it read me stuff, um, but it's one of those things
where it's like I try toresonate in it in a daily now,
compared to where I was before.
Um, cause I feel like once I gotoo long without it, you know,
it's like you can feel that,that emptiness like creeping
back in Um, so I like to be fullof his word all the time.
But even with that being said,I liked something on one of the
(24:45):
other.
I don't remember if this was thefirst one or not, but when Ryan
talked about the King's WeddingBanquet and how the invitations
went out and the initial guestrejected it, so he said, send it
out to everybody and the guycame without wedding clothes and
I really liked what hementioned there because it goes
back to like building this imageof what expectations god has.
And it said that ryan's commentwas sadly, you know, a lot of
(25:09):
people want to come to god ontheir own terms and all of them
want forgiveness, grace andsalvation, but none of them want
to take off that, that, thatfilthy clothing that they have,
and and become the image God'slooking for.
Um, and again, that just takesme back to where I was, you know
, in the past and it's like Ifeel like and I'm still not.
(25:29):
It's not like I'm perfect, but I, when I look at where I started
versus where I am now, likethese things that they're
talking about in these sermonsare things that I've been
through and it's it's it's goodto to think on that and think
like, is there still parts of mylife that you know, maybe I
don't understand some of hisexpectations, like is there
parts of me that I still don'tunderstand yet need to work on?
(25:53):
Um, so I'm glad that you knowthese are, these are the things
that are being brought up,because when I read the wedding
banquet, like I didn't sit thereand think about it in the way
that Ryan's up there talkingabout it.
So when he talks about it, I'mlike man, that really hit me,
because I'm like I was coming tohim in the filth.
That I was, you know, and it'slike I didn't think about it.
Like you know, there's anexpectation, you know he
(26:14):
expectation he wanted them in aspotless robe before they came
to the foot of that mountain andI'm like I would have been one
of the ones that's probablytrying to go to the foot of that
mountain in my dirty, filthyrags.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
I'm here for you Now.
It's important to remember that, with this parable, the initial
meaning that Jesus is trying toconvey is that, in order to
come to God, in order to knowGod, it's not that you have to
have everything, you need to bewearing perfect robes and you
(26:47):
have to be perfect to know God.
That's not what Jesus is tryingto convey.
What Jesus is trying to conveyis that there's one way and that
there's.
If you don't do these things, ifyou don't put on the tuxedo,
you don't get into the wedding.
Um, and putting on that tuxedois receiving salvation from
(27:10):
Jesus.
There's one way to God and thatis through Christ Jesus.
And if we don't do it that way,follow those steps, put on that
tuxedo, we don't get to knowGod.
What else we want to touch onhere today?
Charles?
Speaker 2 (27:25):
I think it was on it was week three on Tim's he had
made a point that you know, Ithink about too, is we need to
align ourselves with how Godwants to speak to us, and that
was, you know, in the same lineof you know, make time in our
commutes to sit in silence andhear his voice?
Um, I think not even in ourcommutes.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Make time before you go to bed, right?
How many of us are scrollingthrough Facebook or doing
something on our phone before wego to sleep?
First off, studies show don'thave that blue light in your
eyes, so they're number one saveyour vision uh, I had a phone
once that like supposedly cutout the blue lights in it and I
was like haha I can be on myphone nighttime feature.
(28:09):
Yeah um, but whether it's beforebed or, honestly, being more
intentional with it, is alwaysimportant to me, like if it
becomes.
If it's like a routine thing,it becomes less meaningful.
Not that a routine is bad,routine's good, but I kind of
just go through the motions andso for me it's like find five
(28:32):
minutes today, even where it'sI'm not doing anything, I'm
going to spend time with God andpraise him and worship him and
pray and listen and just sit inthat it's so important.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Yeah, oh.
So I also liked there was acomment that he had, because I
actually hear this a lot Fromeven people who are Christians
that say, well, tim made thecomment that Satan's biggest lie
is that you're finished, you'veruined it, it's never.
And then he goes on to tell youlike it's never too late.
(29:08):
But there's a lot of times thatI see people enter into a
conversation that's already inprogress and they're like you
know, I don't believe, because Ifeel like, even if I did all
these things that I've done,like there's no hope for me and
I actually I do hear that a lotand it's and, like Tim said, you
know that Satan's biggest lieis telling people that you've
(29:32):
already ruined it, like there isno salvation for you.
Um, which, honestly I, nosalvation for you, which
honestly I feel like before Istarted coming here, when I was
in that kind of shallow moment Ieven told Ryan I was like a
part of me feels like I'm notwelcome back.
You know, I did get into a spotwhere I'm like and it wasn't
that I was doing anything wrongand necessarily it's not like I
(29:54):
was out, you know, breaking allthe laws and everything else,
but it was the fact that I wasso angry with God for so long
and I stopped going to church.
I told him I was like I, just apart of me is like I don't
think I'm welcome back.
And that's when, you know, ryankind of corrected me and he's
(30:14):
like you know, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I think part of that and not in every situation.
But I think when we're kids andwe come to know Christ even if
we're teens right, we're meetingChrist for the first time and
we know him and we know himintimately, right and then when
(30:36):
we know that love and we've runaway from it anyways and then
walk back, there's a there islike a sense of shame where it's
like I knew this before I didit.
I knew this while I was doingthis, while I was running from
you, I knew how perfect and howamazing and how wonderful and
how deserving of my worship Godis, and how amazing and how
(30:58):
wonderful and how deserving ofmy worship God is.
But I was angry, so I walkedaway.
Like there is a sense of shamethere and it is normal, but Ryan
is so right that we couldsprint as fast as we can away
from God and say I want nothingto do with you.
I am angry, I am whatever, andGod's going to be like be like,
(31:19):
hey, come on back wheneveryou're ready.
I'm calling you, I'm callingyou to the mountain, I'm calling
you to come to know me betterand to understand that situation
that you just went throughbetter.
Yeah, and you need to, just youneed to come back and, like you
said, saying's gonna tell, totell you man, you mess this one
up, you can't.
You can't fix that relationshipright Like we.
(31:42):
We do that to people where wejust walk away Like I don't want
anything to do with you, I'mdone talking to you.
We we're.
We can usually expect them tobe, at the very least, hesitant
of wanting to um, have that sametype of relationship again.
God's completely different.
God's like come back, we can.
You're still my boy.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Bring it back.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
And then also in that sermon too it was talking about
.
So this isn't the provisions onebut when I think about the
provisions, I think about it inthe sense of, like God knows
what we need, but I think a lotof our, a lot of, I mean.
I still fall to it every nowand then.
(32:26):
But it's like you're prayingand praying because you know,
let's say, there's something inyour life that you need working
out.
Whatever it may be, it's notalways going to be provided to
you when you want it, but whenyou actually need it.
And a lot of times I feel likeit's the impatience in myself
where it's like I know that weneed it but it's not when we
(32:49):
need it.
So there's been conversationswe've had, even actually when
Forrest was on with us, where Iwas talking about you know, the
situation with losing the rentalhouse and having to buy this
one.
It's like so many times have Iseen like when we are actually
in dire need of it.
I don't think he's ever shiedaway from providing.
(33:10):
It's usually in the momentswhere it's like something that I
want and even if it may besomething I need in the future,
but I don't actually need itright now, it's not there, like
the, the means aren't there,it's not provided.
But it's coming to thatunderstanding that he knows when
it's actually needed.
And a lot of times I feel likethose moments isn't just him not
(33:31):
answering something that wewant, or even if we don't need
it, but it's it.
How many times I've gottenstuck in traffic and I'm sitting
there like man, I'm stuck in it, but who's to say that he
didn't cause you to get stuck intraffic because something bad
could have happened, you know,down the road or or whatever?
So, long story short, I guessI'm just saying that, uh, I
(33:53):
agree with what they, with whatTim was.
I think it was Tim that wassaying that, you know, it's on
his terms.
Like we need to realize thatit's not up for me to dictate
when God provides things for me.
So when I think about, like theAbraham and Isaac thing and you
know, god promised him the ramwhen he got up there and the
whole way Isaac's asking likewhere's the sacrifice?
(34:14):
And it's all in the faith thathe's going to provide that ram
at the top of the mountain, andit's like for me, I'm sitting
there thinking about it and evenlistening to Ryan talk about,
you know, him putting his son upon the table and everything,
just you know acting it out.
I'm like if I'm looking atCharlie and I'm if this was like
me and Charlie, I'm like Idon't know if I'd be able to
lift my hand.
(34:34):
So it's like terrifying yeah, solike that provision, like when
you're thinking about that andand god providing what he's
promised.
It's like you know, you readthat story and I'm like man, it
took a lot for abraham to tolift his hand oh, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
And honestly, I wonder how many?
How often some of thosesituations where it's like, man,
I've been looking for a newhouse for so long and nothing's
coming up, and it's coming tothe deadline and boom, we got a
new one here.
How often is that God takingaway our excuses?
(35:09):
Right, we mentioned earlier,like how, how many people would
walk away from God if the cloudcame down?
How many would say come up witha reason why that's not God?
Like, oh, it's just a naturalphenomenon down?
How many would say come up witha reason why that's not god?
Like, oh, it's just a naturalphenomenon.
How many times would we excuseaway what god is doing in our
lives if we had the opportunitywe saw with the israelites,
god's like yeah, we're gonnatake this city of jericho by
walking around it and screamingyeah.
(35:30):
Like, okay, that's gonna workwell with god, it will.
Yeah, you know what I mean.
So how?
I wonder how often in our livesGod is saying you're going to
make an excuse for what I'mdoing, unless I make you pretty
nervous about it?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
And so we're going to make you a little nervous,
we're going to make youuncomfortable.
It's going to come down to thedeadline.
It's going to be kind of close,but it's not close for God.
I mean, god's good, it's done.
That's all it takes Just a snapof a finger, Um, and so I think
(36:07):
you're right.
Like with that.
Uh, my thoughts left me.
We're cutting this part out too.
I say that just so.
I will cut it out for therecord yeah yeah, anyhow, you
ready for the hard one.
what's the hard one when itcomes to God's provisions?
(36:33):
Ryan points out that Godblesses obedience Obedience is
important.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Obedience is not something that God takes lightly
.
God calls us to do things andGod calls us not to do things,
and we have to follow that.
We have to choose to bear ourcross, whatever that may look
like, you know what I mean.
It could be something simplethat we're going to go out.
(37:07):
Or simple for me is differentfor other people.
So, with that in mind, god'sgoing to call me at one point to
have more gospel conversationsand I'm going to say, all right,
this is what I'm going to do.
And other points in my lifeGod's going to call me to spend
a little bit less time with myfamily and do more stuff
(37:29):
planning for a situation or atrip or an event or what have
you right?
Maybe Ryan needs a little helpand God's like, hey, you're
going to fill in for him inthese areas, whatever that may
look like, where there's goingto be some sort of cost, we have
(37:50):
to obey that.
Or if God's calling us to laysomething down and get rid of it
See, you shall have no othergods before me and you shall
don't have idols, and you shoutlike don't have idols.
It's important to keep in mindthat what is an idol today may
(38:11):
not be an idol for you tomorrow.
What's not an idol today maybecome an idol for you tomorrow,
right?
So I used to have an Xbox 360or an Xbox One one of them,
right, one of the Xboxes and Igot to a point where I was
playing that thing way too much.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
I can relate to that, oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
It was taking up like solid five, ten hours a week
Doesn't seem like much, but whenyou're going to school
full-time and have a full-timejob and things like that, that's
five, ten hours.
It's important, with the help ofmy loving wife saying hey,
(38:53):
you've been on that a lot lately.
God was like look, dude, it'san idol.
Yeah, get rid of it.
I literally gave it away.
I was like, all right, we gotto get rid of this, it's not.
Uh, I I tried to putrestrictions on myself and it
was becoming too much.
Um, and that story isn't to belike oh, I'm so amazing.
I gave her my Xbox.
That's, it's just an uh, anexample.
(39:13):
Um, and it wasn't until I waslike all right, I've got, I've,
I can do this better.
I ended up buying a PlayStation.
It's not an idol for me.
If I can't play my PlayStationfor six months, it sits there
and looks pretty.
If I can get 10 minutes in oneday because I have a little bit
(39:34):
of free time and I want to enjoyit for a bit, I can do that.
And so when it says God blessesobedience, one of the things
that I think of when I hear thatis whatever God's calling us to
do or whatever God's calling usto get rid of.
We have to be malleable to thatand what God wants us to do
there.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
You know I agree and honestly I relate to that story
a hundred percent because videogames for me for the longest
time was an idol and honestly,me and Erica had the same exact
conversation.
She brought it up on multipleoccasions that thank.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
God for why I know Right.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
She brought it up on multiple occasions of thank god
for wives.
She brought it up on multipleoccasions of you know how much
time I spent on it, which Inever let it become like
something that put a barrierbetween me and them, like I
always waited for them to besleeping, whatever, and then I
would go and play like all nightlong.
But uh, my thing was, I think,once I started A her comments,
because obviously everything mywife says means everything to me
(40:30):
, right, erica?
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Suck up.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
But even after I started reading more and
understanding what an idol wasbecause a part of me at that
time never really understoodwhat could be an idol in my life
, really understood like whatcould be an idol in my life and
once I really started to get anunderstanding of it, I'm sitting
there thinking about it and I'mlike man, I really have put
this thing on a pedestal whereit's like I felt like I couldn't
(40:53):
survive if I wasn't going downthere and playing.
So I actually went like almost awhole year without even
touching it, and it wasn'tbecause I felt like I wasn't
being obedient, but it wasbecause I got sucked into
reading the Bible Like obedient,but it was because I got sucked
into reading the Bible Like themore I started understanding,
it was like I didn't want to dolike I would get home from work
when I was working nights andinstantly go to my computer and
start playing a game.
Once I broke that cycle, it wasI was coming home and before I
(41:14):
went to sleep I was reading theBible.
So it was.
It was kind of like an inward,like what I was explaining
earlier, where it wasn'tnecessarily like a decision that
I made, but just like a changethat was already happening
inside me, like as I was going,um, and it was kind of as that
change was happening, is when Irealized, like man, I really
held this thing at a much higherstandard than it should have
(41:35):
been held.
Oh, for sure.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
It's super easy to do and we can.
I can knock out 50% of thepeople listening to this right
now.
Is your phone an idol?
Oh, for sure, are we.
Are we spending every wakingmoment scrolling through
newsfeed or scrolling throughFacebook or Tik TOK or Instagram
?
Speaker 2 (41:55):
I mean, look at how many, all the benches in a
restaurant when you walk inthere, like all the families and
I say this to Erica all thetime because I am probably the
least in my house that's ontheir phone.
In terms of like, even at thedinner table, you know Charlie
will pull out his phone orOakland will try to do something
, and I'm like no, no, no,because like even at restaurants
, it drives me insane.
Like when we're sitting therewaiting and you look around and
(42:18):
no one's communicating.
Parents aren't talking to theirkids, kids aren't talking to
their parents, they're all ontheir phone.
I'm like that is sad, it isreally sad.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
We do have a phone epidemic, I think.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
And what you were saying, too, like about the
obedience, and I don't know ifmaybe these, maybe I'm
misspeaking, but the thoughtthat came into my head as you
were talking about that is Iforget the exact verse, but when
it's talking about Abraham andhow he was saved by his faith,
but by his works his faith wasperfected.
So I think about that and Ithink about being called to
(42:51):
obedience and the works that weput in throughout our life, and
it's not the works that save you.
But when I read that, I'm likethe stuff that you're doing
throughout your life inobedience to God is perfecting
your faith as you're going.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
So I definitely am a firm believer in terms of the
obedience thing and, if youthink about it, your faith is
sometimes tested by what God iscalling you to do.
All right, god wants me to dothis.
A you can do it and see thatGod helps you through it and
provides for you and doeseverything that he said he would
(43:29):
, and your faith gets stronger.
Or, b, you could be worriedthat God's not going to do that
and so you run away from it andyour faith doesn't grow any
stronger by being obedient inwhat God is calling us to do.
Inherently, we see, ooh, I canrely on him.
Yeah, he's faithful, he's goingto he, he blesses obedience.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
When I listened to him and man, it's just it's
definitely a night and daydifference Like, oh yeah, where
I like just in my mood every day, like where I'm at today first
where I was years ago.
Like just in my mood every day,like where I'm at today versus
where I was years ago, like justin the conversations I have.
I told you about the guy atwork.
You know he's getting marriedthis year and they're actually
(44:11):
having like a big Catholicwedding, but he's never been one
that like dove into the Word.
So, dude, it's every day.
He's asking me questions andI'm like this is what I love,
like not, you know, sitting in a, in a you know professional
room, you know whatever, notsitting even in this setting,
but just sitting here one-on-onewith someone who is just coming
(44:32):
into understanding God and justhaving like a good conversation
.
And actually, you know, I Iwould have never taken my Bible
to work.
That thing stays in my book bagand it goes with me everywhere.
So like we'll sit there andhave conversations and I'll take
them through the Bible and I'mlike this is I love this.
But it's uh, it's definitely,like I said, the inward change,
like it's it's night and daydifferent, when when you start
(44:53):
to understand the obediencething.
And that's not to say that youknow, one day I'm just, you know
, being stubborn and I'm I don'thear him or I don't listen,
whatever, but you definitelytell it's, I don't know it's
just night and day different.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
In all of this.
We're not talking aboutperfection.
No, we're called to be perfect,but we understand that we're
going to miss the mark.
We're going to mess up, we'regoing to make mistakes, we're
going to be sucked into ourvideo game when god's like hey,
I gotta tell you something, andit's first time we've played in
(45:29):
a while and we we played toomuch.
You know what I mean.
Um, whatever that looks likefor us, where we're not being
obedient, there are some thingsthat god is calling like.
Clearly, I think some thingsare easier than others.
Don't kill people.
That's not particularly a hardone.
Speaker 2 (45:45):
For the most part, we can avoid that pretty well,
most people but most people yeah, I don't know Put a stipulation
on that, because not everyone Ihad all of my bets.
Speaker 1 (45:55):
If you haven't noticed this by now, I hedge my
bets all the time.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
But other things where God's like hey, but other
things where God's like hey,spend time in your work.
That's one that, believe it ornot, people could genuinely
struggle with getting in apattern of that and however that
looks for you I think it wasDarlene who mentioned it one
time a single verse, chew on averse for a day.
(46:20):
Start with that until you get asolid habit.
When we go there and we'regoing to read well, I'm going to
read the book of Genesis in twodays we're taking off a huge
bite.
Yeah, and we're.
We're, honestly in thosesituations Sometimes we're kind
of like going so macro thatwe're missing all the, all the
important details.
Um and so, however, we got toapproach those things to get
(46:44):
into the the good spiritualdisciplines of following Christ
and listening and spending timein the word and praying and
meditating on his uh.
Ryan points out, like in hissermon about glory, meditating
on Jesus's majesty.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
I actually really liked that one, that sermon,
when he's talking about you knowthe disciples seeing him
transformed.
Just thinking about, like, if Icould have been one of those
disciples sitting there seeingthis, like I can't even like try
to paint an image in my mind ofwhat it would have looked like.
Like, even with Ryan'sdescription, with you know
(47:22):
coming up over the hill and thesun's just blaring in your eyes
Like just this radiant lightthat you can't even see through
it, other than to make out theimages of two men you know
sitting there talking with him.
It's like I couldn't imaginewhat that glory would even look
like.
It blows my mind.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
It would be awesome.
Speaker 2 (47:39):
Every time I read that I'm like man, what it would
be to see that, but it's.
Speaker 1 (47:44):
Let's finish on that one.
We're at 48 minutes.
Let's finish on the glory ofJesus and spend some time today,
if you're listening to this,spend some time meditating and
thinking about how amazing ourGod is and how much glory and
how perfect he is and howprivileged we are to get to know
(48:08):
him, when we don't deserve it.
Whether it's the first time wecome to him or whether we run
away and come back, we don'tdeserve to know God.
We are sinners, we're broken.
We're given the opportunity andwhen we think about how amazing
our God is, it just makes thatopportunity so much brighter and
(48:31):
so much better and so much moreof an opportunity.
I don't know how else to put it.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
I do know, I know what you mean 100% Good deal.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Even if I don't, I do .
Well, now you're just confusingeverybody.
Speaker 2 (48:41):
Before we end it, I'm going to say because we checked
before it started, there was noe on the blue chair pocket.
Speaker 1 (48:47):
I'm going to start making Ryan put in the end of
his sermon.
Just finish the sermon off withsomebody.
Please email Jared and CharlesPlease.
No, we got an email before.
Yeah, just one.
Speaker 2 (49:00):
Before.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
You're going in on people right now.
It is Charles making you feelguilty, and it's and it's not
pastor Jared.
Um, I understand that when youleave church, you're thinking
about lunch.
Speaker 2 (49:12):
It's okay 100%.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Oh, I'm thinking about lunch, when I leave church
.
Are you kidding me?
Um, but if you, if God doesreveal something to you and
you're like Hmm, and you're like, hmm, this is good, I want to
share this, we'd love to hear it.
So go ahead and emailbluechairpodcasts at
afreshwindorg and putbluechairpodcasts in the subject
line for me so I can find you.
Or, honestly, if you shot me atext and started it with hey,
(49:36):
put this in the Blue ChairPodcast, I would accept that,
even.
Or I'll just give Charles'number to everybody and
everybody can blow Charles'phones up.
All right, guys, thanks forlistening this month.
We appreciate you, we love you.
Easter is coming and we'reexcited for it.
All right, have a good one.
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