Accept No Substitutes - Costi Hinn
00:00:00.000 | In 2020, Ligonier sponsored that study that was conducted by LifeWay, it was the state
00:00:07.400 | of the American theology study, and it assessed how Americans view God.
00:00:14.520 | The following was reported on all four surveys, two-thirds of Americans have considered the
00:00:18.860 | resurrection an actual occurrence, that's good, but the majority of Americans deny the
00:00:23.720 | deity of Christ.
00:00:24.920 | That gets weird.
00:00:25.920 | They say, "You believe in the resurrection, but He wasn't God," and it only gets kind
00:00:29.880 | of weirder from there.
00:00:30.880 | Listen to this, almost six in ten categorize the Holy Spirit as being a force rather than
00:00:38.600 | a personal being, and then the majority of Americans denied that Jesus has always existed,
00:00:47.400 | so now we have created being.
00:00:50.200 | A consistent seven in ten Americans believe in one true God in three persons, that's good,
00:00:58.220 | and almost two-thirds believe God is perfect, that's good too, it's better than nothing.
00:01:03.480 | Almost as many believe God accepts worship from all religions, that's not good.
00:01:08.600 | And then listen to these, 65% of Americans agree God is a perfect being and cannot make
00:01:13.600 | a mistake.
00:01:14.960 | 52% of Americans agree Jesus was a great teacher, but He was not God, 55 agree that Jesus is
00:01:22.360 | the first and greatest being created by God, probably a lot of Mormons in that group, two-thirds
00:01:29.480 | of adult Americans agree biblical accounts of the physical bodily resurrection of Jesus
00:01:36.640 | are completely accurate, this event actually occurred, and then 59% of Americans agree
00:01:43.280 | the Holy Spirit is a force but not a personal being, 19% of Americans agree the Holy Spirit
00:01:50.560 | can tell me what to do with something completely forbidden in the Bible.
00:01:58.160 | Okay, 72% of Americans agree there's one true God in three persons, God the Father, God
00:02:05.280 | the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and 64% of Americans agree God accepts the worship
00:02:09.760 | of all religions including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.
00:02:12.720 | These surveys, I always get a kick out of them, and the only reason I'd use this one
00:02:15.680 | is Ligonier's name is on it, so we know that the train is on the tracks.
00:02:20.880 | The amount of contradictions, you catching it?
00:02:27.140 | It's a microcosm of how a lot of us see the issues around us and the world around us filled
00:02:34.200 | with contradictions.
00:02:35.280 | People who come to our churches and say they believe one thing, but then they say they
00:02:38.200 | believe another, those two things are illogically at odds with each other.
00:02:42.480 | We see the world around us.
00:02:45.160 | Mike Riccardi did a phenomenal job dismantling all of that.
00:02:49.280 | I hope with sermons like that I sit there sometimes and I pray, "Lord, would you let
00:02:53.480 | this one just sort of leak out that even an unbeliever who's conservative would go, 'Look,
00:02:59.240 | you may not believe in Jesus, but listen to this guy.'"
00:03:01.400 | And Mike's just blasting every worldly ideology with the truth.
00:03:07.680 | People are confused.
00:03:09.420 | We serve a lot of confused people.
00:03:11.320 | In America, in Canada, and take it further, those of you who are international, the stats
00:03:18.080 | would be even worse than this.
00:03:19.640 | You guys don't even get surveys, I think, in some of the places you are, because no
00:03:23.040 | one cares.
00:03:24.940 | It's tough.
00:03:26.560 | George Barna concluded in one recent study that only a small minority, they found six
00:03:30.680 | percent of professing Christians actually possess a biblical worldview, six percent
00:03:36.760 | of professing Christians.
00:03:39.400 | And so, brothers, we need to be teaching our people theology.
00:03:43.480 | They're not too simple-minded for it.
00:03:45.040 | They're actually hungry for it.
00:03:46.200 | A lot of people keep coming to church because they want the Word.
00:03:50.060 | I think more and more this has been fun to watch people exit shallow pools of easy-believism
00:03:57.000 | and sort of the social club version of Christianity to come to a church where a guy gets up with
00:04:03.160 | the Word of God and says, "Turn in your copy of God's Word," like H.B., or, "Turn in your
00:04:07.840 | Bibles."
00:04:08.840 | I was talking to a family recently that came to our church, and they had asked their son
00:04:12.800 | what he enjoyed the most about his morning there.
00:04:16.760 | And he said, unprompted, "It was really awesome.
00:04:21.200 | I actually felt for the first time that I wasn't in kid care," he called it.
00:04:25.840 | He comes from a mega church that has about 5,000 to 7,000 in weekend attendance.
00:04:30.680 | Mega is not bad.
00:04:31.680 | I know where I'm standing right now.
00:04:34.160 | Big isn't bad, but the way that we try to draw people often in those movements, you
00:04:39.240 | already know, is let's have fun.
00:04:42.040 | There was a Sunday where he was told, "You don't need to bring your Bible.
00:04:45.120 | Just leave it over there.
00:04:46.120 | We have a lot to do today.
00:04:47.120 | We have a lot of activities.
00:04:48.120 | You won't need that."
00:04:49.120 | A child should never hear that at church.
00:04:52.720 | We talked to parents at our church, I'm sure you do too, crying over the 15 or 20 years
00:04:56.880 | they wasted.
00:04:57.880 | They feel so guilty.
00:04:58.880 | They think, "What have I been doing?
00:05:01.040 | Our kids had fun.
00:05:02.120 | That's why we chose it.
00:05:03.120 | I didn't know this stuff.
00:05:04.120 | The woman I talked to and her husband at membership class, bless their hearts, so sweet, dear friends,
00:05:09.640 | now that first membership class, I remember them, she's clutching her new MacArthur study
00:05:14.120 | Bible like it was a life raft in the middle of a storm in the ocean.
00:05:19.400 | And they said, "We just, we didn't think of this.
00:05:21.600 | We didn't know."
00:05:25.080 | That's what they want from you and I now.
00:05:27.600 | They always have, the remnant at least.
00:05:29.800 | But more and more, I think people are waking up and the Lord is gathering His church.
00:05:34.680 | I think some pastors may be insecure if this is you.
00:05:38.620 | Don't get sucked into it.
00:05:39.620 | "Well, they'll be bored with theology if I preach this stuff."
00:05:45.560 | I would argue that people only get bored if we're boring or they're unbelievers.
00:05:51.420 | But believers don't get bored unless you're the one putting them to sleep.
00:05:55.860 | I remember a seminary professor once telling me, "You're not supposed to sound like a running
00:05:59.200 | commentary."
00:06:01.800 | Another man who was a seminary professor said, "Too many of you guys preach like your seminary
00:06:07.280 | professors are listening."
00:06:10.400 | I was convicting, "Just in case they watch on YouTube, I really want to sound smart."
00:06:16.400 | Like, who cares?
00:06:18.080 | Preach for, you know, Jay, the plumber who's going to work the next morning, dealing with
00:06:25.120 | issues, preach to Mark, who shook his fist and added another appendage when he was driving
00:06:33.720 | and didn't like what the guy next to him did.
00:06:39.240 | Pray for him.
00:06:40.240 | Preach to him.
00:06:41.240 | Help him.
00:06:42.240 | Don't preach to your seminary professors.
00:06:43.400 | They poured into you, so you'd go preach the Word to people.
00:06:45.600 | You don't need to sound smart.
00:06:47.380 | Give them doctrine.
00:06:48.380 | But if we're joyful and we're vibrant and we love the Lord and we are practical as well
00:06:52.960 | or experiential, as Joel Beeky always talks about, you know, taking it all the way.
00:06:58.240 | We don't need to apply things as much as the Puritans did.
00:07:02.880 | You know, the Puritans in their preaching, they'd spend all that time just in every facet
00:07:06.680 | of those of you who are lawyers and those of you who are...
00:07:10.280 | We don't need to make long lists, but make it practical, bring it into daily life.
00:07:14.600 | This is good for us and it will help them in the midst of their challenge of knowing
00:07:19.960 | what to believe.
00:07:21.800 | Their discernment will increase as their armory of truth does, so give them that.
00:07:26.520 | Many times over, Christians suffer from what Spurgeon described with discernment is the
00:07:32.120 | difference between knowing what is right and then almost right.
00:07:36.640 | I think people hear a lot of that.
00:07:38.760 | They need our help.
00:07:39.800 | And so I want to walk you through three particular ways that you can recognize and rejoice in
00:07:46.240 | the Spirit's work with your people who are God's people, and then you can add to these
00:07:51.280 | and their sub-lists as well.
00:07:54.560 | And before I get to number one and unpack it, I want to talk about two extremes.
00:08:02.160 | Extreme number one.
00:08:05.120 | We've got charismatic abuses and we've got a lot of sensational emotionalism, and that
00:08:12.560 | confuses a lot of people.
00:08:14.120 | That's a bad thing today.
00:08:15.360 | It's a lot of bad theology.
00:08:17.160 | That's an extreme.
00:08:18.160 | We want to be aware of it and we want to watch out for it.
00:08:22.280 | Not long ago, I was watching the video again, the old video of Jen Johnson, you know the
00:08:27.240 | Bethel singer, and she's up there and she does this multiple times in conferences, and
00:08:32.560 | the one I saw, she has no shoes on, which is like a thing in that world.
00:08:36.880 | I've got a family member who every time I see her on video leading worship, she's barefoot
00:08:41.680 | and sort of just running around all over the place.
00:08:45.240 | It's a thing.
00:08:46.240 | It's kind of like the "take off your shoes, this is holy ground" idea.
00:08:49.160 | And so Jen Johnson's in the chair and she says, "The Holy Spirit to me is like the genie
00:08:54.680 | from Aladdin."
00:08:55.680 | How many of you guys have not seen that video or heard that before?
00:09:01.040 | Wow.
00:09:02.280 | Okay, brothers, that's a useful illustration then.
00:09:06.600 | I thought I was going to just get, "Oh yeah, we've seen it, Costi."
00:09:09.760 | Yeah, that would be a great place to start.
00:09:12.240 | I don't have time to get into Bethel and all their issues, but that's a real like popular
00:09:20.920 | kind of foundational teaching.
00:09:22.320 | They make a mystical funny.
00:09:23.800 | She says, "He's funny, he's sneaky, and he's silly."
00:09:29.600 | And then she says, "He's wonderful.
00:09:30.920 | He's like the wind.
00:09:31.920 | He's all around."
00:09:32.920 | And then in another video she goes, "And he's blue," after talking about...and she holds
00:09:36.960 | up her barefoot with her blue jeans and waves her foot up and down in the air, and everyone
00:09:41.440 | laughs and thinks it's great.
00:09:44.360 | And then she's, you know, at these major conferences, and she's all over the place with the lineups
00:09:51.840 | of other women speakers, and you're Christine Caines, and you're Jackie Hill Perrys now,
00:09:56.400 | and it's just that whole swath of individuals.
00:09:59.680 | And I'm not saying that, you know, they all think as weird as she does, but that would
00:10:06.200 | give you an idea of sort of just what Big Eva, and I'm not using it in the conspiracy
00:10:10.440 | theory way, it's just that the way that kind of Big Eva, giant kind of conference world
00:10:15.760 | does it.
00:10:16.760 | They bring together all these people with their disillusioned and confused and divergent
00:10:24.760 | theology, a wide spectrum, and say, "Hey, we're all just, you know, big tent, big family
00:10:31.000 | of God.
00:10:32.000 | Let's just worship Jesus."
00:10:33.000 | And your kids go to Passion, and they feel the feels, and they've got the wristbands
00:10:36.120 | that light up like the Coldplay at concerts to the music, and they're all experiencing
00:10:41.800 | God.
00:10:42.800 | I mean, these are the people who are teaching and modeling theology for a massive generation
00:10:49.480 | who, by the way, is really eager for the power of God.
00:10:52.120 | Why do you think the Asbury stuff started, and why do you think it went viral?
00:10:55.640 | It's because young people, they're not just floating around.
00:10:59.120 | They actually want the power of God.
00:11:01.480 | They want to experience God.
00:11:03.200 | They want truth.
00:11:04.600 | They want to be a part.
00:11:06.600 | The largest demographic of volunteers in our church plant, and believe me, we're multigenerational
00:11:12.880 | already.
00:11:13.880 | We have a lot of gray-haireds, you know, the crown of wisdom that serve.
00:11:18.040 | We have elders that range from age 67 to 50s, and I'm 39, I mean, we have a wide amount
00:11:26.660 | of people.
00:11:27.660 | The largest demographic of volunteers in our church are college students.
00:11:34.060 | They show up in droves.
00:11:35.580 | We don't even have to ask them.
00:11:37.220 | They set the church up.
00:11:38.260 | They tear it down.
00:11:39.660 | They go to snobby coffee places together.
00:11:43.400 | They eat burritos together.
00:11:45.640 | They have their own shirts, their own hoodies.
00:11:47.700 | Some guy's making something.
00:11:48.700 | Next thing, I go, "I want one of those."
00:11:50.340 | They're like, "We'll make you one," you know.
00:11:52.280 | They have their own little, like, Christian in the church kind of cult thing going, and
00:11:56.520 | I'm okay with it.
00:11:57.520 | I love it because they want to be mobilized.
00:12:01.160 | They're going in groups to Radius.
00:12:02.800 | Some of them want to be missionaries.
00:12:04.000 | They're going to Fiji with pre-men choy in May.
00:12:09.520 | They just want to keep going.
00:12:10.720 | They're crazy.
00:12:11.800 | And I think of them, and I say, "Wow, imagine if none of you had sound doctrine.
00:12:18.160 | You'd be in all these YouTube videos chasing the stuff that's hitting the mainstream."
00:12:23.280 | They're a zealous generation, so what they need from you and I is truth to be paired
00:12:29.880 | with their zeal.
00:12:31.960 | Give them the doctrine.
00:12:33.000 | Give them the truth.
00:12:34.000 | They want answers.
00:12:36.400 | When studies are showing that six out of ten have an inaccurate worldview, and they think
00:12:42.960 | the Holy Spirit's a force, brothers, you are the solution from God to His people.
00:12:49.200 | You're not the mediator.
00:12:50.200 | That's Christ.
00:12:51.200 | You're just the messenger.
00:12:52.880 | But if you do your job well, and I do, that extreme of charismatic chaos and that insanity,
00:13:00.320 | the noise quiets a little more in your parts.
00:13:04.080 | It'll never go away until Christ returns.
00:13:06.160 | Certainly, we know that.
00:13:07.160 | It'll only get worse as more of the world gets sucked in, but the church will grow stronger
00:13:12.840 | in the midst of that darkness, amen?
00:13:16.000 | Extreme number two, this is some of us, neglecting His work, ignoring His work, or even with
00:13:26.640 | the best of intentions, because we don't want to be weird, treating Him as a bit of a "less
00:13:31.840 | than" in the Trinity.
00:13:32.840 | Now, you don't believe that, and neither do I theologically.
00:13:36.480 | Doctrinally, you and I would be orthodox.
00:13:40.760 | But the way that we treat His work is sometimes, in some places, and if this is you, let the
00:13:48.080 | Holy Spirit convict you, metaphorically we relegate Him.
00:13:54.240 | And in a room like this one, metaphorically, so relax, you can't relegate God, but we would…
00:14:01.640 | I didn't do this on purpose, but it's a perfect illustration.
00:14:04.560 | We would put Him behind that curtain over there, and we would metaphorically hope the
00:14:09.560 | Holy Spirit sort of is there, it's sort of awkward, no one knows what to pray.
00:14:16.620 | Some guys, we thank you for your spirit, and that's all.
00:14:22.000 | They don't want to say too much more.
00:14:23.900 | Some people, they get weird if you sing a hymn, and even weirder if you sing a hymn
00:14:28.360 | to the Holy Spirit.
00:14:30.200 | We shouldn't be talking to Him.
00:14:33.960 | We don't know what to do at times, and I don't mean to make fun, I'm with you in this.
00:14:37.960 | That's why part of the reason I wrote the book is I sometimes don't know what I fully
00:14:41.380 | think or fully believe about something until I just spend a lot of time like you, studying
00:14:45.840 | it, then writing it on paper and looking and saying, "Is that biblical?"
00:14:52.080 | That's what we need to do.
00:14:53.080 | So in church, at times, through our leadership, maybe we don't know what to say, we don't
00:14:57.360 | say things as fully as we ought to, or we ignore them in the song selection, which by
00:15:02.800 | the way, thanks to Piper, this quote, "The congregation doesn't learn its theology from
00:15:06.400 | only the sermons that it preaches or they preach, but the songs that they sing."
00:15:10.080 | So we want to sing about the Spirit's work, His true work.
00:15:14.480 | At the same time, in our prayers, we don't acknowledge Him, we're just happy that nobody
00:15:19.040 | did anything weird.
00:15:21.040 | Then somebody raises their hands and we're like, "Oh, they must have been influenced
00:15:24.320 | by the charismatic movement for sure."
00:15:32.880 | We forget at times the way that the Bible describes a people who are excited about their
00:15:37.620 | God.
00:15:39.180 | The Old Testament is not useless in this regard.
00:15:44.560 | I sometimes tell our church how exciting it would be, I'm like hinting.
00:15:48.720 | One day if they would, when I read the Word of God, raise their hands, like when the book
00:15:53.840 | of the law was read aloud, you think about Ezra and Nehemiah and that whole era, what
00:15:58.040 | if people got excited in the Reformed-ish Bible church camp, if you will, because they
00:16:04.520 | believed this stuff.
00:16:06.840 | And I'm not saying that everybody has to be a hyper-emotional expressor, some of you men
00:16:11.200 | are going, "What are you suggesting, Costi?"
00:16:12.640 | I'm suggesting that if it's your personality, brother, to stand and meditate on the lyrics
00:16:17.440 | MacArthur-style, praise God for you, sing with all your heart.
00:16:23.280 | But if it's the style of some in your church to be excited and they do a little bit of
00:16:27.920 | this in the middle of something, you don't need to go.
00:16:38.320 | Bob Kauflin means the stuff he's doing up there, you could tell.
00:16:42.760 | You could tell because it doesn't fit all the time, he's just in his little world worshiping
00:16:46.680 | Jesus, and he's yelling, "It's true!
00:16:49.420 | It's true!
00:16:50.760 | This is true!"
00:16:51.760 | And it just sort of almost makes it okay.
00:16:56.120 | You start thinking, "Yeah, people are just excited about Jesus.
00:16:59.680 | Not everyone is a charismatic crazy here to derail the whole service, they're just excited
00:17:06.140 | about Jesus."
00:17:07.140 | I've got a brother that likes to say amen during sermons a lot.
00:17:15.840 | I'm not going to tell him to stop.
00:17:18.940 | He's saying, "Let it be."
00:17:21.000 | I'm saying, "I hope so."
00:17:23.220 | That's my prayer.
00:17:24.220 | That's the elder's prayer.
00:17:29.020 | So let's be careful of the extremes.
00:17:31.200 | Amen?
00:17:32.200 | All right, three things.
00:17:35.480 | Number one, the deity of the Holy Spirit.
00:17:37.120 | I'm going to go through these things quickly so we can get to Q&A with about solid 20 minutes
00:17:42.640 | and 15 to go.
00:17:43.640 | The deity of the Holy Spirit.
00:17:45.080 | Your church needs to understand that He's God, and you need to teach about His deity
00:17:51.240 | and His equality in the Trinity, that He's an active and equal person in the Trinity.
00:18:00.160 | In Christianity we understand our God is one, yet He exists in three persons, and that will
00:18:05.040 | seem a little bit confusing to their minds, and you come alongside that with understanding
00:18:10.440 | and say, "Yeah, me too.
00:18:12.680 | He's an incomprehensible God."
00:18:15.680 | And you can quote R. C. Sproul who said, "The doctrine of the Trinity is not a contradiction
00:18:19.600 | but a mystery, for we cannot fully understand how God can exist in three persons."
00:18:25.840 | You don't ditch doctrine because it's beyond your comprehension.
00:18:31.580 | You just submit to it.
00:18:34.560 | You embrace that tension.
00:18:36.680 | And what a comfort to know that God, while He's knowable, He's made Himself knowable
00:18:42.020 | to a degree, is altogether unknowable in all that He is.
00:18:49.080 | Teach your people that He's God.
00:18:52.760 | The Holy Spirit is God in the Old Testament.
00:18:54.480 | Let me just give you 10 observation or examples.
00:19:00.520 | If you want to screenshot these, they'll be on the screen.
00:19:03.160 | Hovering over the waters before creation, Genesis 1-2.
00:19:06.880 | Killing certain men under Moses, Exodus 35, empowering Joshua, coming upon Gideon, Samson,
00:19:12.460 | rushing upon David when he was anointed as king, departing from Saul, carrying along
00:19:17.420 | the word of the prophets.
00:19:19.260 | I love this though from 2 Peter.
00:19:21.060 | So in the New Testament, Peter saying the Holy Spirit was in the Old Testament, carrying
00:19:25.440 | along the word of the prophets.
00:19:27.100 | Isn't that good?
00:19:28.320 | What a comfort to know He was always there, ensuring that the Word made it to its destination.
00:19:36.120 | You could apply that in your own prayer life, asking God to take the Word that you preach
00:19:40.960 | to its destination, ask Him to penetrate their hearts, to open up their minds.
00:19:45.460 | What a neat thing.
00:19:46.460 | We're not prophets anymore in the sense that we're foretelling the future, but we have
00:19:51.520 | the preaching voice, the prophetic voice of forth telling the Word of God to His people.
00:20:00.380 | Calling Ezekiel and then prophesied to one day rest upon the Messiah.
00:20:06.400 | We're in the book of Matthew at our church right now going verse by verse.
00:20:09.420 | It's been so fun to see the Holy Spirit's present activity, His work with Christ, baptism
00:20:19.880 | through temptation, onward, powerful stuff, all the way back to His conception.
00:20:28.680 | The Holy Spirit in the New Testament, He moves in a normative way, if you will, because the
00:20:34.920 | language we see suddenly shift a bit from coming upon believers, mostly, in the Old
00:20:41.600 | Testament.
00:20:42.600 | I unpack this a little bit in the book.
00:20:44.840 | There are some instances where the description is "in" or "filling," but generally moving
00:20:52.740 | to entering into believers under the new covenant through Christ.
00:20:56.760 | Why?
00:20:57.760 | Because He's God.
00:20:58.800 | And now He's made us, the church, the believer, His temple.
00:21:03.520 | And so that's made clear.
00:21:05.160 | He's mentioned almost a hundred times in Matthew, Mark, and Luke alone.
00:21:11.040 | He conceives Jesus in Mary's womb, present at baptism, sent by the Father.
00:21:15.760 | He teaches the disciples all things and reminds them of what Jesus was taught.
00:21:19.720 | You know it's good to teach your people when they have these questions about bibliology
00:21:23.320 | is how did they know?
00:21:26.160 | You know, "So-and-so says," or the YouTube video I watched, you know, the guy is saying
00:21:30.560 | that how do you know?
00:21:32.040 | That's why we have all these conflicting accounts.
00:21:34.240 | You could take them to a clear understanding of how the Holy Spirit called to memory for
00:21:42.320 | the disciples.
00:21:43.320 | And then you can take them to John 16 and just preach on the Holy Spirit's job description
00:21:48.080 | through the original apostles and the authors.
00:21:51.960 | Powerful stuff.
00:21:52.960 | He's God.
00:21:54.400 | Believers are baptized in His name, Matthew 28, 19 and 20.
00:21:57.960 | He's eternal, Hebrews 9, 14 says.
00:22:00.440 | He has the power to seal believers so nothing can steal them and rob them of their salvation.
00:22:06.480 | Only God can do that.
00:22:08.440 | He dwells within believers, makes them His temple, and He has the power to make believers
00:22:12.800 | new.
00:22:13.800 | He washes away our sins, Titus 3, 5 says.
00:22:17.000 | He's God.
00:22:18.000 | It's not hard to find that He's God.
00:22:19.000 | And one of my favorite examples of this is in Acts chapter 5.
00:22:22.680 | You remember the story of Ananias and Sapphira?
00:22:26.500 | They kind of flaunt their big offering, but they held back.
00:22:31.140 | What does Peter say?
00:22:34.200 | Apostle Peter confronts them saying, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to
00:22:38.160 | the Holy Spirit and to keep back some of the proceeds of the land?"
00:22:42.800 | Don't do this, by the way, in your building campaign.
00:22:46.240 | We're starting one in April.
00:22:47.560 | I'm not going to go this far.
00:22:50.800 | "You have not lied to men but to God."
00:22:55.800 | Why would he say that unless the Holy Spirit was equally God?
00:23:03.160 | He's God.
00:23:04.160 | He's not the low man on the totem pole of the Trinity, not a lesser, he's not the JV
00:23:10.640 | benchwarmer, he's not the backup, he's not the minor leaguer, he's not the footnote,
00:23:14.200 | he's not the understudy.
00:23:15.480 | So be careful in taking the John 16, 14, "He will glorify me" and turning that into, "Well,
00:23:23.960 | we don't really want to make a big deal about the Holy Spirit."
00:23:26.920 | No, you want to make a really big deal about His true work.
00:23:31.920 | You don't want to turn Him into this shy, sort of background individual who doesn't
00:23:37.880 | really want to be talked about.
00:23:39.280 | You've got to teach about Him, teach the whole counsel of God.
00:23:44.240 | And yet, we don't need to go too far into sensationalism.
00:23:50.300 | Number two, the person of the Holy Spirit.
00:23:52.560 | Teach your people He is a person, and He's personal.
00:23:56.840 | He's active in their life.
00:23:58.240 | He's not a distant deity.
00:24:01.680 | The Father loves you and calls you, Son died for you, calls on you to believe, John 11.
00:24:08.560 | Then the Holy Spirit fills you, baptizes you in the body of Christ, fills you, transforms
00:24:13.680 | you, sanctifies you.
00:24:16.040 | He's your helper every single day.
00:24:19.120 | We don't want to forget His work, neglect His work, or misrepresent His work, especially
00:24:23.240 | with our churches, because He is the agent of salvation, and He's the agent of sanctification.
00:24:29.480 | He's the one they desperately need, and the one whom Paul commands, "Walk by," who?
00:24:35.600 | "The Spirit, and be filled with the Spirit."
00:24:42.600 | Don't ignore the God you need.
00:24:46.720 | Is it weird if I look at you while you're taking a photo?
00:24:56.600 | The Holy Spirit doesn't exist to put the spotlight on me, He exists to put the spotlight on Christ.
00:25:03.080 | We love you, Lucas.
00:25:08.240 | So if the Holy Spirit's a person, what else does that mean?
00:25:10.720 | He's not an "it."
00:25:12.760 | Don't call Him an "it" in your prayers, don't model treating Him as an "it" in the way you
00:25:17.240 | minister, in the way we sing, in the way we talk, and guide your people, again, gently,
00:25:23.400 | lovingly, with compassion, with a purpose, when they call Him, by ignorance, an "it."
00:25:32.280 | You don't need to interrupt their prayer, but help them.
00:25:38.840 | We don't call the Father an "it," we don't call Jesus an "it."
00:25:45.420 | I'm uncomfortable even giving examples by way of illustration.
00:25:52.740 | Why would we call the Holy Spirit an "it?"
00:25:54.640 | We ought not to.
00:25:59.600 | In John 16, verses 1 through 15, we get the job description of the Holy Spirit.
00:26:06.480 | Jesus is preparing His disciples to see Him go, and He tells them what?
00:26:15.960 | It's to your advantage that I go.
00:26:20.080 | Why?
00:26:21.080 | Well, because the Holy Spirit is going to carry out a ministry that is going to strengthen
00:26:26.560 | and equip and baptize and fill.
00:26:29.520 | He's going to give them Scripture, lead them, guide them, comfort them, be their advocate,
00:26:36.800 | be the helper.
00:26:38.400 | He's going to descend on them, if you will, and enter into them at Pentecost, and the
00:26:44.080 | gospel is going to go out explosively from the epicenter of His work in Jerusalem.
00:26:53.320 | And when Jesus describes this, He does it in a very personal way.
00:26:58.960 | He doesn't talk about a distant "it" or a force, but a person.
00:27:04.520 | One of the most dangerous deviations in church history that continues to wreak havoc, even
00:27:10.080 | though people don't use the term, is Sibelianism, named for its namesake, Sibelius.
00:27:18.440 | He taught that the Holy Spirit wasn't a person, but rather a force, an impersonal force, just
00:27:23.080 | an expression of God.
00:27:26.280 | According to him, God is one person, He just expresses Himself in three different ways.
00:27:32.240 | This view holds that God the Father was expressed in creation, God the Son through redemption,
00:27:37.360 | and then God the Spirit in sanctification.
00:27:39.560 | Eventually, the belief was declared a heresy, but it almost preaches pretty good, if you
00:27:45.360 | don't know the Bible.
00:27:47.560 | We love steps and formulas.
00:27:50.160 | God the Father was expressed in this way, God the Son in this way, God the Spirit in
00:27:55.000 | this way.
00:27:56.000 | That's why people get sucked into these things.
00:27:57.600 | It sounds clever, but it is damning.
00:28:01.320 | We need to teach well about His work.
00:28:03.800 | He's a person.
00:28:05.980 | The Bible describes more aspects of His personhood, comforter, helper, advocate, but there's more.
00:28:14.360 | He feels, reveals, searches, and dwells.
00:28:17.040 | He teaches, He helps, He prays, He speaks, He has a will, and He bears witness to our
00:28:20.840 | spirits that we are children of God.
00:28:24.080 | He is an active person.
00:28:27.160 | And third, the work of the Holy Spirit.
00:28:33.340 | The work of the Holy Spirit.
00:28:34.640 | We need to teach our people, and this is just a short list, let me give you six, but I'll
00:28:40.040 | list a few at the end that you can add.
00:28:42.600 | Regeneration.
00:28:43.800 | Don't forget Him in your soteriology.
00:28:46.280 | He's very much involved.
00:28:50.680 | Titus 3, 4 to 7 explains this, "By the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit,
00:29:03.200 | whom He richly poured out upon us through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, being justified
00:29:11.560 | by His grace, we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life."
00:29:14.920 | The Bible clearly teaches that the Holy Spirit's work is directly attached to and involved
00:29:20.680 | with rebirth, regeneration, being born again.
00:29:24.920 | Number two, teach your people about sanctification and all of its aspects.
00:29:29.320 | "The such were some of you, but you have been washed, you've been sanctified."
00:29:34.160 | Paul ends up saying it's by the Spirit of our God.
00:29:37.360 | The Holy Spirit is the one sanctifying, and there's aspects to sanctification that your
00:29:41.160 | people need to understand, and this will be a comfort to them.
00:29:44.680 | Probably talk to people weekly, if not at least monthly, somebody sending you an email
00:29:49.040 | or coming up to you after service or meeting you in the office and saying, "I feel so convicted."
00:29:55.640 | They're weeping after your sermon on what it means to be a true believer and what a
00:29:59.960 | true believer's life will look like, and they come to you and they are distraught.
00:30:06.720 | And you either help them see they're absolutely right.
00:30:13.680 | They've been a false convert, or what else do we do when we counsel that situation?
00:30:17.520 | We help them see that this besetting sin they're wrestling with, the fact that they're weeping
00:30:23.420 | over it and they hate it, and they're going to war against it, and they're seeking counsel
00:30:28.400 | for it, and they've come to talk to you about its effect on their heart and their life is
00:30:34.760 | part of progressive sanctification.
00:30:38.400 | As the Word comes to bear on their soul, and they can't sleep until they come and meet
00:30:42.880 | with you.
00:30:43.880 | They've got to tell you about this thing.
00:30:46.120 | Unbelievers don't do that.
00:30:48.080 | Unbelievers hide their sin, they love their sin, they relish in it and then try to look
00:30:51.160 | perfect.
00:30:52.160 | A believer who's experiencing progressive sanctification and the convicting work of
00:30:56.120 | the Holy Spirit and responding to that is someone that we bring comfort to.
00:30:59.640 | So we want to help them understand the differences, and then when they say, "So when I sin, can
00:31:03.440 | I lose it?"
00:31:04.440 | I mean, you said, "I can't lose my salvation," but based on what you're teaching, if I have
00:31:07.560 | sin in my life or I'm not bearing fruit, I mean, unbelievers do that, and they kind of
00:31:10.680 | get all twisted up in their own thoughts and fears, you come along and say, "Let me help
00:31:14.920 | you understand three aspects of sanctification."
00:31:17.760 | There is positional.
00:31:18.760 | You need to remember that, that you have been saved.
00:31:23.360 | You went from sinner to saint in God's eyes based on your profession of faith and that
00:31:31.480 | you've been bearing fruit.
00:31:32.480 | You're a member here.
00:31:34.360 | You don't need to every week be worried about losing it.
00:31:38.840 | You can have assurance today, and you give them biblical assurance, not your own.
00:31:45.960 | You all know we do not give people the assurance of salvation.
00:31:48.880 | We point them to Scripture for their assurance of salvation.
00:31:52.620 | They were a target of the Father's wrath and now they're a recipient of Christ's righteousness.
00:31:56.920 | That's the gospel.
00:31:57.920 | It's the good news.
00:32:01.580 | And then progressive.
00:32:02.580 | It means you're not going to change into this perfect person overnight.
00:32:05.160 | Talk to my friends who have been coming out of Nazarene churches.
00:32:10.280 | They teach perfect sanctification.
00:32:13.800 | Some of you know that.
00:32:14.800 | You navigate those issues.
00:32:16.920 | And the idea that they're not going to be perfect yet.
00:32:20.960 | So helpful last night when Piper, I think he's echoing something that a lot of older
00:32:24.360 | men and older pastors have said when you say, "What's the Lord teaching you at 80 years
00:32:27.880 | old?"
00:32:28.880 | I remember asking a man this one time.
00:32:29.880 | He said, "Just how sinful I really am."
00:32:31.720 | I was like, "That's really encouraging."
00:32:34.600 | In 40 years I'm just going to realize that, yeah, you just see your heart.
00:32:43.520 | Salvation is a gift and you love it and you're grateful to the Lord.
00:32:45.960 | Now wait until you're 80 and you really know so much more about your wicked heart.
00:32:51.380 | And you think, "He saved me?
00:32:54.760 | Wow.
00:32:56.400 | He's changing us day by day, slowly but surely."
00:32:59.160 | Philippians 1:6 will come to pass.
00:33:01.000 | Number three, perfect.
00:33:02.960 | Perfect sanctification.
00:33:03.960 | What is this?
00:33:04.960 | It's what awaits us in glory.
00:33:05.960 | And you can talk to your people about the freedom from sin that awaits us.
00:33:10.880 | That's why we long for heaven, to be with Christ and to not sin, and to have no separation
00:33:15.480 | from Him relationally, and to not be weighed down by all these encumbrances that slow us
00:33:21.240 | down in the race.
00:33:23.160 | If you love Jesus, how many of you know you really hate sin?
00:33:26.640 | I hate it.
00:33:27.640 | I can't stand my sin.
00:33:28.640 | I don't love it.
00:33:29.640 | I want to love Him all the more.
00:33:33.080 | You talk to your people about the now but not yet promise that the day is coming.
00:33:38.200 | Third, so regeneration, sanctification, illumination.
00:33:43.520 | That without the Spirit's work through the Word, their eyes will not be opened.
00:33:47.680 | I love what MacArthur says, "God must open the eyes of our understanding before we can
00:33:51.600 | truly know and rightly interpret His truth.
00:33:54.080 | Only the Spirit can illumine Scripture."
00:33:58.120 | Martin Luther said, "Nobody who has not the Spirit of God sees a jot of what's in the
00:34:03.000 | Scriptures.
00:34:04.000 | The Spirit is needed for understanding of all Scripture and every part of Scripture."
00:34:07.520 | So not only teach your people that, but brothers, we should be practicing that in our own study
00:34:12.120 | and in our own prayer life.
00:34:13.300 | So my encouragement to you is don't neglect the work of the Spirit in your prayer life.
00:34:18.680 | Don't forget before we study to ask His blessing on your study, His wisdom to pour out, James
00:34:25.760 | 1:5 wisdom, which the Father will give.
00:34:28.320 | And this is maybe a good, a great point of discussion with your own team and your own
00:34:33.040 | mind and you can do this study.
00:34:34.800 | Some, this is one of those kind of open debates that can be debated, some would say that they
00:34:40.080 | feel very uncomfortable speaking directly to the Holy Spirit in their prayer life.
00:34:44.160 | Those same people sing hymns to the Holy Spirit, I don't always know how those two things jive,
00:34:48.400 | but they don't necessarily want to say, "Holy Spirit, help me in my study."
00:34:52.880 | Okay, but don't forget Him altogether.
00:34:56.440 | And others, they may say bluntly in line with His work, "Pray that the Holy Spirit would
00:35:05.080 | fill me for service to our church this weekend.
00:35:08.200 | I pray that He'd bear His fruit.
00:35:09.560 | I pray He'd give me eyes to see."
00:35:13.200 | However you pray, don't forget His work.
00:35:17.920 | Now pray in line with biblical job descriptions.
00:35:21.260 | We would never say, "Holy Spirit, thank You for dying for me."
00:35:24.160 | That doesn't make sense theologically.
00:35:26.240 | We want to acknowledge the Father, the Son, and the Spirit's work through the Bible.
00:35:31.480 | But many times, because we don't think about these things, we don't pray about these things.
00:35:39.720 | So pray for His illuminating work, baptizing, filling, and sealing.
00:35:46.760 | Three more aspects, baptizing, filling, and sealing.
00:35:51.000 | I'll give you these in kind of a 60-second bundle, and then we'll get to Q&A.
00:35:56.920 | People need to know the difference between the baptism and the filling of the Holy Spirit
00:35:59.840 | big time.
00:36:00.840 | 1 Corinthians 13, 12, real clear, sorry, 12, 13, that it is through one Spirit, by one
00:36:11.440 | Spirit, we're all baptized into the body.
00:36:13.520 | So everybody gets the baptism of the Holy Spirit when they get saved.
00:36:16.720 | It's not this secondary experience they need.
00:36:19.180 | They're not on the JV team until they get it.
00:36:22.040 | They're in.
00:36:23.040 | He's in them.
00:36:25.160 | And the filling, the Ephesians 5:18, "Be being kept filled," the ongoing action that's happening,
00:36:31.760 | that, yeah, there's one baptism and there could be many fillings.
00:36:36.180 | That's a daily thing, by the way.
00:36:38.040 | Why?
00:36:39.040 | Well, because what does it mean to be filled with the Spirit?
00:36:40.760 | It means to be yielded to Him.
00:36:42.520 | I don't know about you, but I don't want that happening quarterly.
00:36:47.560 | One annual conference, really felt like I got filled this weekend.
00:36:52.420 | Maybe you were filled with a renewed zeal for the gospel.
00:36:56.640 | Praise God.
00:36:57.700 | And that can be accompanied by the Spirit's filling work.
00:37:01.520 | I don't know how it all works.
00:37:03.080 | No one does.
00:37:04.080 | He does what He does in us.
00:37:06.780 | But what we do know objectively is that we want to be yielded daily.
00:37:10.760 | So certainly you want to be filled with the Spirit ongoing.
00:37:13.800 | You're either under the influence of something else or Him.
00:37:17.880 | And then you think about Galatians 5, 16 and all the way to verse 23, "In the fruit of
00:37:21.320 | the Spirit," but start at 16.
00:37:23.040 | And when Paul says, "Walk by the Spirit and you won't carry out the deeds of the flesh,"
00:37:26.680 | what does walk mean?
00:37:27.680 | It's the Greek word peripateo, means to be preoccupied with.
00:37:31.520 | So you fill your life up, your pursuits up, your recreations, your vacations, your work
00:37:36.680 | and your vocations, all of it with what is in line with the Spirit of God and His will,
00:37:44.080 | which of course will be aligned with the Word of God and helping you glorify Christ.
00:37:48.280 | It's a preoccupation.
00:37:49.840 | You should teach your people that so that they would view their work as still worship,
00:37:55.960 | everything under the glory of God.
00:37:59.160 | When we're all filled up with Him, there's not a lot of room for much else.
00:38:05.960 | I love the illustration, well-known evangelist D.L.
00:38:08.560 | Moody is going to have a big service in England, pastors get together to talk about it.
00:38:13.560 | Pastor stands up and protests, you know, "Why do we need this Mr. Moody?
00:38:17.040 | Who does he think he is?
00:38:18.560 | He's uneducated.
00:38:19.560 | He's inexperienced.
00:38:21.320 | What does he think he is, a monopoly on the Holy Spirit?"
00:38:23.760 | An older, wiser pastor stood up in that pastoral meeting and said, "No, but the Holy Spirit
00:38:28.400 | sure has a monopoly on him."
00:38:31.880 | That's what it means to be filled and yielded.
00:38:36.440 | We want to model being monopolized by Him.
00:38:41.120 | Number six, the sealing.
00:38:42.360 | I already mentioned this so I won't have to go too far with it, but give your people the
00:38:47.800 | doctrine of eternal security and teach them how the Holy Spirit keeps them secure.
00:38:57.780 | What a joy to know He's working.
00:39:00.440 | That's just the tip of the iceberg.
00:39:02.800 | You can add His gifting, meaning the gifts of the Holy Spirit, worshiping in the Spirit,
00:39:08.600 | praying in the Spirit, conviction of the Holy Spirit, grieving, blaspheming, walking, unity,
00:39:14.100 | how He speaks today.
00:39:15.100 | You could talk about His work in Scripture, get into bibliology.
00:39:19.320 | All these things matter and they help your church have a fortified pneumatology.
00:39:25.760 | It is good and right to preach Christ.
00:39:27.800 | You ought to be all the time.
00:39:30.140 | It's good and right to ensure people know their Father and love Him all the more and
00:39:35.940 | live for His glory.
00:39:36.940 | It is also good and right that they have a clear understanding and personal relationship
00:39:43.760 | and daily communion with the Spirit of God.
00:39:48.800 | He is in them.
00:39:51.280 | They should be aware of His work.
00:39:53.400 | Let's do questions.
00:39:55.360 | We've got ten minutes and I'm going to take all of it.
00:39:59.800 | Yes, sir?
00:40:02.840 | Hey, Philip.
00:40:05.840 | How would you describe what a true biblical revival is to someone who has adopted more
00:40:19.920 | of a Charles Finney type perspective?
00:40:20.920 | How would I describe true revival to someone who's adopted more of a Charles Finney approach
00:40:22.600 | to it?
00:40:23.600 | I'd go to the book of Acts, explosive conversion, bold preaching, courageous evangelism, endurance
00:40:32.320 | through suffering, eternal perspective, joy, exuberant joy.
00:40:38.240 | I'd go over to the Philippian jailbreak, Paul and Silas, and just show a generation, "Look,
00:40:48.200 | there it is.
00:40:49.200 | You're not sitting around."
00:40:50.200 | I mean, look, no offense at all.
00:40:52.720 | We should sing all the more, and we do.
00:40:54.200 | We're doing it in there.
00:40:55.200 | I mean, I love, when Bob walked off last night, it was like the best walk off, better than
00:40:59.480 | any baseball walk off I've ever seen in my life.
00:41:03.080 | Just walked off.
00:41:04.080 | Those are moments where I would go, "Man, you want to talk about renewal or some revival,
00:41:08.880 | something awakening inside of the hearts of men as they go back and serve missionaries."
00:41:14.000 | I met a pastor today who when he goes back, he can get arrested.
00:41:17.200 | He has to have his phone wiped before he goes back to his country.
00:41:20.640 | I don't even want to say what country it is just in case, but, you know, that's revival.
00:41:26.480 | That's renewal.
00:41:27.480 | And then people's being saved because of that.
00:41:31.320 | But you know, when you sit in a room and you feel really good, that's fine.
00:41:35.440 | I feel good after this.
00:41:37.200 | It's awesome.
00:41:38.280 | It's what do you do after.
00:41:39.640 | If I go to Chick-fil-A and then go play more Xbox at Asbury, that's great.
00:41:45.300 | But if they're in their churches and there's a vibrancy, like we should see, if it were
00:41:50.200 | real revival, and I have my skepticisms about all that kind of stuff, but if we see an explosion
00:41:57.640 | in global missions and pastors, I just think it's a little less hyped and a little more
00:42:07.560 | of the long view.
00:42:09.160 | It doesn't go away, but there'll be a steadiness to it, if that makes sense.
00:42:17.240 | >> [Question inaudible]
00:42:22.040 | >> Yeah.
00:42:24.840 | >> [Question inaudible]
00:42:31.320 | >> Yeah.
00:42:34.680 | He said his brother-in-law says the gift of healing and these things in 1 Corinthians,
00:42:57.960 | they're available.
00:43:00.920 | That would be one of those conversations that you just have privately and personally with
00:43:05.680 | them.
00:43:06.680 | I don't think that's just some terrible heresy.
00:43:09.040 | It's a misunderstanding, but it's available.
00:43:10.960 | What it does is it makes us feel good about them being available to us, and now we're
00:43:15.200 | not taking a hard stance on something, which is kind of this generation's MO.
00:43:19.000 | We want to just live in the middle and make it feel good for everyone, like they're available.
00:43:24.480 | It also makes us feel more in control.
00:43:26.280 | And, I mean, I don't want to dismantle his view in a cheeky way or a rude way, but it
00:43:32.200 | makes us feel more in control.
00:43:34.720 | It's there.
00:43:35.720 | They're available.
00:43:36.720 | I just need to step out and do what?
00:43:39.280 | I would ask him truly, genuinely, "So, how do I get them then?
00:43:44.080 | You know, how do I get Justin Peters out of his scooter?"
00:43:48.040 | Not being funny, like, "How do I help that family in my church and deal with the stage
00:43:52.200 | four cancer if they're available?"
00:43:54.080 | You know, I'd rather just pray for someone to be healed and then say, "Lord, we trust
00:43:59.240 | Your will in the matter, no matter what."
00:44:01.280 | You know, there was nothing available for Tim Chalice when sweet boy Nick dropped dead
00:44:07.120 | at 20 a few years ago on the podcast, not this Monday, but next Monday.
00:44:12.280 | Tim is coming on the For the Gospel podcast for three weeks, and he's telling the story.
00:44:17.200 | And I just think of Tim, and I go, "What didn't work for him?"
00:44:21.720 | They tried to revive him.
00:44:22.720 | I mean, he was at Southern Seminary.
00:44:23.960 | I guess they're Baptists, right?
00:44:25.200 | So they didn't get the power of God in that moment.
00:44:27.240 | I don't know.
00:44:28.240 | That's what we used to think when I was in the charismatic movement.
00:44:30.880 | So I think it gets touchy and dangerous because how do you get them?
00:44:35.920 | But I would dialogue with him on that.
00:44:39.120 | But the fact that you're in a solid church and you're in his life, that's a gift from
00:44:41.880 | the Lord to him.
00:44:42.880 | What else?
00:44:43.880 | Yes, sir.
00:44:44.880 | You're standing.
00:44:45.880 | I got to go to you.
00:44:46.880 | Okay, on top of all that conspiracy theories, that one might have to wait.
00:45:06.400 | Jeff Williams isn't here, but we can talk about the moon landing later and chemtrails
00:45:13.720 | and flat earth.
00:45:16.800 | Stay off YouTube is probably some of the best advice unless you're watching John MacArthur
00:45:19.960 | sermons.
00:45:22.280 | Okay.
00:45:25.000 | Your original question was about reaching family.
00:45:31.920 | Okay.
00:45:32.920 | Let me try to give you this in like 60, 120 seconds, be easier.
00:45:40.520 | First expect a diverse response just like in church.
00:45:46.240 | Some will be saved, some will be interested in what you're saying and assessing, and others
00:45:50.960 | will be angry and it will irk them.
00:45:54.080 | I'll give you examples.
00:45:55.440 | When I told my family members that I've come to faith and that I've come to the realization,
00:46:04.600 | literally said this to a room of multiple individuals, we'll leave it at that, "You're
00:46:08.560 | all wolves, but if you'll just repent, like this could all be fixed."
00:46:15.520 | Literally what I said, like 12 years ago or something.
00:46:19.000 | And I had a McCarthy study Bible, true story, black goatskin leather, it was open, I was
00:46:26.040 | in 1 Timothy 3.
00:46:27.040 | I was like, "Can I just read you this?"
00:46:29.280 | And they're just like gnashing of teeth, you know?
00:46:32.740 | And I read all the qualifications, it was the longest reading I've ever done in my life
00:46:37.880 | of such a short span of verses, and I looked up and said, "You're none of these, none of
00:46:43.840 | you are, but I've got friends, they would love to walk with you."
00:46:49.920 | They're like, "Oh, here we go," you know?
00:46:52.400 | You've got to expect that with some.
00:46:54.320 | That's how it started.
00:46:55.320 | If I could do like a meme, you know, how it started, how it's going, there's some...how
00:47:00.000 | it started, it was really rough.
00:47:01.360 | I got cut off for years, ridiculed.
00:47:04.120 | I'm still today, I don't get invited to anything, you know, none of that.
00:47:09.120 | But some of my family members are circling around with me, and I talk to them.
00:47:13.560 | I'm going to go visit a few of them in April, non-heretics, but definitely used to be, and
00:47:18.600 | they're in that, and they're like assessing things.
00:47:20.160 | So I want to have those dialogues, but some will never talk to me.
00:47:23.920 | And part of that is, you know, I brought the heat, I think, early on when I was in cage
00:47:29.920 | stage.
00:47:30.920 | So I was ready to just, you know, burn them all, but then throw cold water and go, "Now,
00:47:35.240 | let me help you."
00:47:36.360 | You know, like, "I'll just manage them up after you beat them up."
00:47:39.520 | And that would be my...that's where I failed so bad.
00:47:42.040 | Like, in God, greed, and the prosperity gospel, one of the last chapters is reaching people
00:47:45.960 | caught in deception.
00:47:46.960 | None of that's like expertise.
00:47:47.960 | Look at me, ivory tower.
00:47:50.240 | It's man, I failed so bad.
00:47:52.360 | No one told me about cage stage, but I was definitely in it.
00:47:56.160 | So I would say, try to keep as many bridges as you can built for conversation where you
00:48:00.280 | influence them, not the other way around, and understand that some are in that third
00:48:04.680 | category in Jude.
00:48:06.460 | Have mercy on others with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh.
00:48:09.560 | I'm not having steak dinners with my uncle to like, "I just want to explain."
00:48:13.720 | No, I'm not being rude.
00:48:15.360 | Just like Francis Chan, like, "I'm going to win them from the inside," and not like, "No,
00:48:19.840 | you need to win them from the shoreline, throw the rope, and pull them out of the river."
00:48:24.320 | You don't go jump in and be like, "Hey, guys, I'm here to help you."
00:48:28.000 | And then we're all looking going, "What are you doing?"
00:48:29.960 | You save, you reach by what?
00:48:32.320 | The verses prior in Jude 17 through 23, snatching them out of the fire.
00:48:36.320 | So you want to stay safe and careful with some, but if you've got family that aren't
00:48:41.200 | like flaming heretics, try to have as much interaction with them in love with the truth
00:48:47.720 | as you can, and then trust the Lord.
00:48:49.920 | Let me get one more.
00:48:51.640 | Verse 59, "Brother with the glasses."
00:48:57.800 | Yeah, yes, okay, one of the best.
00:49:11.880 | If you just wanted to kind of give a menu, Greg Gilbert's "What is the Gospel?"
00:49:17.720 | You know that little hardcover?
00:49:20.360 | It's just a great book, doesn't attack heretics, doesn't name any names, it's about the gospel.
00:49:27.200 | That would be a good one.
00:49:29.060 | If you...if they're tolerant of John MacArthur, try to get them like "Vanishing Conscience,"
00:49:33.520 | some things about sin and soteriology, one of the most interesting conversations I had
00:49:37.260 | with this guy who's kind of in that whole world.
00:49:39.460 | He said, I sent him my book, and he said, "You know, I don't agree with you on some
00:49:43.000 | things."
00:49:44.000 | I said, "Yeah, obviously."
00:49:45.000 | And then he said, "But that whole section on soteriology, whatever it's called, I'm
00:49:50.080 | like, 'Yeah, you got it right.
00:49:51.080 | Good job.'"
00:49:52.080 | Probably one of the first times he's ever used that word, I'm not kidding.
00:49:54.760 | He said, "We're really shallow in that."
00:49:57.400 | And I was like, "There's a good entry point.
00:49:59.760 | If I can get him to understand the gospel, I can get to, 'Hey, your prophets are absolutely
00:50:05.840 | of Baal,' you know?
00:50:08.200 | But let me get the gospel first to you."
00:50:11.120 | And so that would be an interesting one.
00:50:12.880 | You know another one would be Tom Schreiner, "Spiritual Gifts."
00:50:15.520 | He is so nice to Pentecostals in that book.
00:50:17.720 | My friend, Wayne Grudem, my friend, Sam Storms, my friend...he doesn't say friends to heretics,
00:50:23.040 | but he's, you know, my friend.
00:50:24.840 | He is so irenic and so kind, it is hard not to say, "Yeah, the guy's kind of right.
00:50:32.000 | That makes sense."
00:50:34.760 | I wrote "Knowing the Spirit" to be nice.
00:50:36.640 | There's no heresy hunting in it.
00:50:38.840 | And then one other book, I know this seems self-promoting, but it's actually based on
00:50:42.600 | my burning down of everything for the first two years.
00:50:47.440 | I wrote a book called "More Than a Healer" about Jesus, and it's not...there were people
00:50:53.000 | that actually reviewed it and were like, "Man, what, are you going soft?"
00:50:55.440 | I'm like, "No, I'm trying to give people something that they can give to someone, and the first
00:50:58.840 | line isn't, you know, about their favorite false teacher."
00:51:02.520 | That one's just about Jesus and all the other things that He is.
00:51:05.880 | I would try to get them a devotional, a good biblical devotional.
00:51:11.080 | If you can introduce them to Spurgeon, that's always helpful, like a morning and evening.
00:51:15.160 | I have some things I've leaked in.
00:51:17.960 | I've sent my mother a few books that really put cracks in the dam, but I was never like,
00:51:23.280 | "You need to read this, that."
00:51:25.720 | So hopefully, there's probably more that I would say.
00:51:30.320 | You know who's really good?
00:51:31.480 | Last one, and then I know we got to go.
00:51:33.120 | But Allie Beth Stuckey is kind of a sleeper, fellas.
00:51:37.200 | Let me explain this.
00:51:38.520 | My sister, who is way caught up in some weird stuff, shoots me a message like a year and
00:51:46.120 | a half ago, and she was like, "Hey, I saw that you were with Allie Beth Stuckey at a
00:51:51.360 | women's conference."
00:51:52.360 | I was like, "Yeah."
00:51:53.360 | She was like, "She's my favorite."
00:51:54.360 | I'm like, "Yes!"
00:51:55.360 | You know, I never realized that.
00:51:57.920 | And then she said, "Yeah, I think we'd agree on more things than we used to now.
00:52:02.760 | We should talk."
00:52:03.760 | I was like, "Thank God for Allie Beth."
00:52:06.080 | She's not just a political pundit at this point.
00:52:09.480 | She kind of throws some theology around.
00:52:12.040 | She defends pastors, but that she's drawing in.
00:52:14.800 | So her book, "You're Not Enough and That's Okay," it is anti-everything that their women's,
00:52:20.960 | Lisa Bevere and all these women's ministries are pumping.
00:52:25.140 | She's like, there's Sadie Robinson and Christine Kane and Lisa Bevere, and then there's Allie
00:52:30.400 | Beth.
00:52:31.400 | They're like, "You're enough.
00:52:32.400 | You're you.
00:52:33.400 | We love you."
00:52:34.400 | And she's like, "You're not enough and that's okay."
00:52:35.680 | And then she points to Christ.
00:52:36.680 | It's a pink book.
00:52:38.400 | Getting one of those to a sister would be a good idea.
00:52:41.320 | This was fun, guys.
00:52:42.320 | I hope it was helpful.
00:52:43.320 | So thanks for letting me talk.
00:52:45.440 | (audience applauding)