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00:00:00
[music: Crossroads Music,
Count Me In]
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00:00:13
- Well hey, everybody,
welcome to Crossroads Anywhere.
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00:00:15
My name is Andy. I'm so
glad that you're here with us.
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00:00:17
Now, I don't know what
kind of week you've had.
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00:00:19
Maybe it's been great,
maybe you're crushing it,
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00:00:21
or maybe you're here
holding on by a thread,
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00:00:24
and that thread is caffeine now.
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00:00:26
Either way, well done.
You made it.
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00:00:28
You showed up, and that matters.
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00:00:30
Now this right here
is a place for you
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00:00:32
to take a breath and to
remember, be reminded
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00:00:34
that God's got something
special for you today.
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00:00:37
Now we're continuing a series
called Go Reach Your People,
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00:00:39
looking at how there are
people in your in my life
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00:00:41
that God wants us to impact.
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00:00:44
But first we're actually
going to spend some time
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00:00:46
connecting with God through
music, using these songs
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00:00:49
not just as
something to listen to,
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00:00:51
but to be reminded of who
God is and who He says we are.
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00:00:55
So we'd love it if you'd
stand and sing with us.
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00:02:45
- Let's get those hands
together. Come on.
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00:02:48
Hey, you believe this? We say:
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- We are a church that
no matter who you are,
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no matter where you're from,
you're welcome here
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00:06:57
and ready to seek and
explore at your own pace,
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00:07:01
in your own place.
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00:07:03
So when we sing songs,
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00:07:05
anybody's welcome to sing,
all of us.
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00:07:08
And for those of us
who've been around a while
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00:07:10
and we call ourselves
followers of Christ,
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00:07:12
when we sing a song like this,
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00:07:14
I hope you're doing
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some self-examination
at the same time.
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It's one thing to sing the song.
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It's another thing to say I
am completely abandoned.
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00:07:25
It's another thing to say I
am completely surrendered.
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00:07:28
So as we sing this, we should
simultaneously be saying,
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"Am I? Am I abandoned,
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or am I still thinking what
other people think about me?
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Am I, am I abandoned,
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00:07:38
or am I still trying
to play it safe?
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00:07:40
Am I surrendered,
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or have I still not repented
of that specific sin?
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And it's just my little
pet little troll I'm petting.
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00:07:49
Am I? Am I submitted,
or is there parts of my walk
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00:07:53
that I'm like, 'God,
no, You're not there.'
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And I've got my reasons
for why that's not right."
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Hey hey hey,
let's let's sing this song
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and simultaneously
spiritually examine ourselves.
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00:08:03
And maybe we'll do
some time with God
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to where we get to
say with a fresh heart,
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"I'm getting this right, God.
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I am completely
abandoned to You.
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I'm different.
I'm going to be different.
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And I want my life to
match the words of this song
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that I sing to You."
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00:16:45
- God, would You see
everyone gathered online,
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everyone standing in this room,
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at rooms across all of
our sites as us saying,
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"At least count us in for the
next, the next chunk of time
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00:16:58
because we're looking
for an encounter, God.
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00:17:01
I think we're all
done with content.
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00:17:04
We're all done with programs.
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00:17:06
What we want is an
encounter with the living God
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that changes us
from the inside out.
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00:17:11
Would You meet us here now?"
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That's that's my expectation
for what's going to happen.
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It's in Jesus's name we pray.
Amen.
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00:17:22
Come on, y'all. It's so good.
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00:17:24
So good to get to
worship with you.
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00:17:26
Why don't you turn to
somebody and just say hey
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00:17:27
and then grab a quick seat,
all right.
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00:17:33
- In November 2024, God
called Crossroads to a moonshot.
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00:17:37
He asked us to grow the four
territories 10x in 10 years.
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Our community pushed themselves,
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faithfully committing
$210 million
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above and beyond
our regular giving.
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00:17:48
As soon as money comes in,
we release it
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00:17:51
to resource the territories
God has called us to expand.
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00:17:54
Over the last ten months,
we have taken ground
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00:17:56
to expand all four territories
as we pursue revival
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00:18:00
for our friends and neighbors
who don't know Jesus
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00:18:03
and an awakening in our land.
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00:18:05
And we are just getting started.
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00:18:07
In the last few years,
our student ministry
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has experienced amazing growth.
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00:18:11
In particular,
Mason is bursting at the seams
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00:18:14
with no space to
invite more students
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00:18:16
into the life purpose
God has for them.
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00:18:18
Because many have begun
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fulfilling
their push commitments.,
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we have been able to
follow through on our promise
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00:18:24
to make space for
all of our students
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00:18:26
to learn about Jesus in a
language they can understand.
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00:18:29
- Hey, I'm Joel,
Director of Next Gen.
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00:18:31
And right now,
as I look around at culture,
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00:18:33
they are investing in
spaces for the next gen.
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00:18:36
We as a church,
we want to take action
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00:18:37
and do the same thing.
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00:18:39
If we see students in
malls and movie theaters
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and bougie restaurants,
we want to see them
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filling our churches.
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00:18:44
To win with the next generation,
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we have to invest in
the next generation.
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00:18:47
In fact,
that's what we're doing.
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00:18:49
Right now I am
standing in what will be
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the brand new Mason
Student Section.
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00:18:53
The old one was at capacity
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because it was an
old meeting room.
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00:18:56
It was the afterthought.
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00:18:57
Yet 503 students
recently attended
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our back to school
event at Mason. 503!
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00:19:03
Even in an old
converted meeting room,
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we are seeing a desire,
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00:19:06
I'd call it a hunger with
the next generation,
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00:19:09
and we're seeing
this across sites.
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00:19:11
We are in the
process of renovating
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the old Mason chapel into
the new student section.
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00:19:15
This new space is way bigger,
as you can tell,
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00:19:18
and it's going to be
designed to be attractive,
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exciting, really student
focused that gives them
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more space to run
after their friends.
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00:19:26
Our students are
passionate about many things,
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00:19:28
but we're also seeing
kind of this music
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and worship awakening.
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00:19:31
And so we want to
specifically invest in that,
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video equipment,
audio equipment, lighting.
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00:19:36
We want this to be our
best expression of worship.
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00:19:39
And we want to see
students fill this place.
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00:19:41
We lead the way in immersive
experiences as a church,
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but not yet in students.
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00:19:45
And I say not yet, because that
changes now with this space.
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00:19:48
And it's just the beginning.
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00:19:50
In fact, it's the beginning of
us looking at all of our spaces,
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both kids and
students across sites,
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to maximize their
ability to reach students
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and prepare them
to lead the church
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into a future awakening.
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00:20:02
And if you're a part
of the 10X Push,
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00:20:03
you are making this happen,
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00:20:05
and you will never
know the impact
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00:20:06
that this is going
to have on students
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00:20:08
and families for
generations to come.
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00:20:23
- Man, how awesome was that?
Come on.
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00:20:25
I love seeing what God is doing
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00:20:27
in the lives of our
students right now.
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00:20:29
Hey, I'm actually in
our video control room
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00:20:31
because I wanted to
bring you behind the scenes
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00:20:33
so you could just a small
sense of how much work
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00:20:35
and effort goes into
the thing that enables
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00:20:38
you and I to experience
God in church every week.
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00:20:41
But it's a reminder
that all the stuff,
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00:20:43
as we talk about 10X
growth and impact
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00:20:45
across our sites and online,
and it's not just about
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00:20:48
more technology or bigger
buildings or cooler lights.
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00:20:50
No, it's about reimagining
the experiences
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00:20:53
that we have,
that our students have,
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00:20:55
that the next generation
has to encounter God
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in a way to change their lives.
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00:20:59
Now I've got three kids,
the oldest of which
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00:21:01
is going to be in
middle school next year.
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00:21:03
And I'm so thankful,
so thankful that right now
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00:21:06
is the strongest our student
ministry has ever been,
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00:21:10
and that my kids
and countless more
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can fall in love with Jesus
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through the experiences
that this place creates,
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online, in sites and in homes.
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00:21:19
And all this stuff
happens because you,
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00:21:22
and people like you
keep showing up, serving,
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giving, praying and inviting.
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00:21:26
You see God move
in incredible ways.
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00:21:28
Man, and I'm so
thankful for the people
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00:21:30
who are on the team
and call this place home.
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00:21:32
If that's you,
I just want to say thank you.
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00:21:34
And if you want to
follow the example
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00:21:36
of faithful people like that,
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00:21:37
you can go to
crossroads.net/give.
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00:21:40
Now, we've got a
saying around here that
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every number has a name
and every name has a story.
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00:21:46
I want you to hear the
story of a man named Kelvin.
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00:21:51
- My dad was in the Air Force,
so we moved around quite a bit.
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00:21:54
We didn't have a
lot of community.
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00:21:56
When I left the home after
I graduated high school,
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I went to the Naval Academy.
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00:22:01
So we would do
deployments and go out to sea
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00:22:03
for six, seven months at a time.
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00:22:05
I'd done that 2 or 3
times before I got asked
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00:22:08
to deploy to Afghanistan.
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00:22:10
Obviously,
there's no water in Afghanistan.
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00:22:12
You're getting
plucked off the ship
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00:22:14
and asked to go
support the folks
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00:22:15
that are on the
ground fighting a war.
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00:22:18
That brought a real reality
check, like what's going on?
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00:22:22
Got a little nervous about that.
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00:22:24
It didn't help a
couple of months
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before I was was
scheduled to deploy
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00:22:30
one of my good friends was
shot and killed in Afghanistan.
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00:22:34
And so I was scared.
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00:22:43
Walking through that, it even
heightened the level of fear.
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00:22:47
Questioned why, like,
why am I going over there?
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00:22:49
I'm not trained to do this.
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00:22:51
Getting over to the base
that I was going to support,
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00:22:53
not knowing anybody, you didn't
really have any community,
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00:22:56
didn't really have
anybody to tag along with
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00:22:57
or to guide me.
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00:23:00
But the Marines that were
there treated me like family
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right off the bat.
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00:23:04
I had a different uniform
on that they were wearing.
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00:23:06
They're like, "We can't have you
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00:23:08
looking like somebody
else out here."
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00:23:09
So they gave me like the
uniforms that they were wearing.
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00:23:13
They had this sense
of peace that, like,
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00:23:16
didn't really make
sense in an environment
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00:23:19
that is a war zone essentially.
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00:23:20
There are things happening,
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00:23:22
there are things that they see,
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00:23:23
people get hurt, people die.
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00:23:25
But they walked and
talked with an assurance
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00:23:28
that things are
going to be okay.
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00:23:31
The reason that they had
that confidence and that peace
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00:23:35
is because of the
strength of their faith.
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00:23:37
They came in with it.
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00:23:38
They lived it while
they were there.
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00:23:40
It spread amongst everybody
that was around them.
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00:23:45
Things like holding
prayer groups
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00:23:47
or eating with
their guys at lunch,
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00:23:51
embracing folks when
they come back off of
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00:23:53
being out in the field
after a long day of work
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00:23:57
having seen some things
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00:23:58
that could really
mess with your mind,
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00:24:01
the way that they embraced them.
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00:24:03
That's the type of
leadership and love
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00:24:04
that I hope that I could exude.
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00:24:06
Just being around that I
wanted more of it. Right?
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00:24:10
So I wanted more of it.
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00:24:11
They were a piece of that.
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00:24:13
And so me being able
to attach onto them,
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00:24:16
ask them questions,
talk about their walk,
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00:24:18
understand how they
came from where they were
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00:24:20
to get to where they are now.
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00:24:22
It wasn't a group of folks
that were just born great
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00:24:26
and strong in their faith,
which made their journey
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00:24:28
to where they are now
even more impactful.
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00:24:30
I think one of the guys, he
had struggled with alcoholism.
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00:24:33
He was divorced, had a kid
who didn't have custody of.
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00:24:37
When he connected
with this group
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00:24:38
it helped change
his life as well.
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00:24:40
And now he was sober.
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00:24:42
He has a relationship
with his daughter
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00:24:44
and a working
relationship with his ex-wife.
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00:24:46
And so the stories like that,
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00:24:47
it's kind of allowed
me to connect with that.
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00:24:49
Like, all right,
I got some issues too, right?
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00:24:51
I got some things going on.
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00:24:53
I got to the point where I
was like, I want that too,
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00:24:55
and I want that before
I go back to the States.
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00:24:57
I want it now.
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00:24:58
At that point,
I went to the chaplain on base
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00:25:00
and just told him that I wanted
to give my life to Christ.
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00:25:04
And on Christmas Day 2010,
did that
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00:25:07
in the middle of the
desert with that group
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00:25:09
and a bunch of other
folks surrounding me
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00:25:11
with love and encouragement.
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00:25:13
And that was how I
came to know God.
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00:25:16
Definitely was a
weight off the shoulders.
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00:25:18
The fear and the worry,
the things that I had
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00:25:21
coming into the deployment
were just released,
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00:25:24
and it was just reassured by
the folks that were around me.
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00:25:31
- Kelvin looked at these people,
these Marines,
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00:25:34
and they had a peace.
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00:25:35
And he said, "Well,
how do they have this peace?"
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00:25:37
That peace comes from
what we've been talking about
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00:25:40
the last few weeks, the gospel.
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00:25:41
Gospel is good news,
good tidings.
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00:25:44
And people who give the
gospel are known as evangelists.
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00:25:47
And these are words
that were around
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00:25:49
before the New
Testament was written.
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00:25:50
It's just ancient words,
good news, good news.
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00:25:53
And someone who gives it
is known as an evangelist.
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00:25:56
These folks, these Marines,
were evangelists of good news.
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00:25:59
He saw peace that he
couldn't have had any other way.
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00:26:03
There was a level of power
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00:26:04
because of the presence
of the Spirit of God.
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00:26:06
There was forgiveness.
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00:26:08
All of these are reasons why
the gospel is good news for us.
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00:26:12
Now I'm going to share today.
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00:26:13
I'm going to take one of our --
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00:26:16
I'm going to take our Lead
Pastor Kyle Ranson's cue,
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00:26:19
I thought last week
he did a great job
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00:26:21
and he shared some of his story.
-
00:26:22
I'm going to share some
of my story with this today,
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00:26:24
and hopefully it's helpful.
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00:26:26
And let's pray before
we get any further.
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00:26:28
God,
I am really looking forward to
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00:26:31
what it might look like
for this many people
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00:26:35
to really be turned on by You.
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00:26:38
I'm looking forward
to what could happen
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00:26:40
if people got led by Your
Spirit to a greater degree
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00:26:43
to bring more people
into the good news.
-
00:26:45
Help me to communicate
this as compellingly,
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00:26:49
clearly,
and accurately as possible.
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00:26:52
Thank You for the honor,
Jesus, I appreciate it.
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00:26:54
In Your Name I pray. Amen.
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00:26:56
So big idea for this,
the main sign,
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00:27:00
the main sign of the
presence of the Holy Spirit
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00:27:03
in your life is you
sharing your faith,
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00:27:06
if you have faith.
-
00:27:08
Wherever you are
in the faith spectrum,
-
00:27:10
the closer you get to God,
-
00:27:11
the more you're going
to get of His Spirit,
-
00:27:13
the more this is critical.
-
00:27:14
And I know that sounds
really weird to a lot of us,
-
00:27:18
but you got to hear
hear me on this.
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00:27:20
This is just a basic Bible thing
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00:27:22
for some reason gets
really lost with people.
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00:27:27
I stuck to Kelvin's
story so much because
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00:27:29
he was connected
with the Marines,
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00:27:31
and that's a part of my story.
-
00:27:33
I didn't go to the Marines,
-
00:27:34
but I am a rebellious
human being.
-
00:27:36
I don't know if you know
about anything about me,
-
00:27:38
but you should
know that about me.
-
00:27:39
And you're the same way, right?
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00:27:41
We tend to be
rebellious human beings.
-
00:27:44
And my parents
had a will for my life,
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00:27:46
and I didn't want to accept it.
-
00:27:48
My parents were big,
big into schooling.
-
00:27:52
Big, big into higher learning.
-
00:27:55
They were both valedictorians.
-
00:27:57
They were saving money for me
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00:27:59
to just do anything
I wanted education.
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00:28:02
That's what they wanted for me.
-
00:28:03
And I didn't want
that for me at all.
-
00:28:05
I didn't want to be an aca
-- acama -- academician.
-
00:28:10
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
-
00:28:11
There's a professor
from NKU gets that one,
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00:28:13
academician, right.
-
00:28:15
I didn't want to be
an academician.
-
00:28:17
I didn't want that.
I was rebelling against that.
-
00:28:20
So if you're not going to
go to school where I was
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00:28:22
the only choice, they said,
well, go to the Marines.
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00:28:24
So I started working,
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00:28:25
going down to the
marine headquarters,
-
00:28:28
started doing like
their fitness tests,
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00:28:30
hang out with the recruiters,
all that sort of stuff.
-
00:28:32
And I had some skills.
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00:28:34
This was early in high school.
-
00:28:36
It was kind of a fun
thing for me to do.
-
00:28:37
I had some skills because
back in the early 80s,
-
00:28:41
man, going to high school was,
man, it was amazing.
-
00:28:46
They had this thing
called shop class,
-
00:28:49
this thing called shop class.
-
00:28:51
You could cut your
finger off in school.
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00:28:55
It was awesome.
-
00:28:57
They had that.
They had power mechanics.
-
00:29:00
You would go and
work on engines,
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00:29:02
be taught how to
work on engines.
-
00:29:04
And if you took
a look at my life
-
00:29:06
from my sophomore
year in high school
-
00:29:07
all the way to my senior year,
-
00:29:10
it tells the story of my
spiritual progression.
-
00:29:12
Here I am in the
sophomore yearbook.
-
00:29:15
I'm at power mechanics class.
-
00:29:17
Kneeling down, trying to get
a lawn mower engine running.
-
00:29:20
That year we also
took a Gran Torino
-
00:29:23
and chopped the roof off of
it and made it a convertible.
-
00:29:25
It was great, man. Wonderful.
-
00:29:29
That guy, that guy right there
-
00:29:30
wasn't just learning
how to work on engines,
-
00:29:33
it was helping him in his
Marine Corps entrance exam.
-
00:29:36
It was also a guy who got
drunk every Friday night,
-
00:29:42
every Saturday night,
and every couple of weeks
-
00:29:45
skipped school
to do day drinking.
-
00:29:47
That's what I was about.
-
00:29:49
That's what my world was about.
-
00:29:51
And my parents, if they
wanted me to go to school,
-
00:29:53
I wasn't going to go to school.
-
00:29:54
I'm doing my own thing.
-
00:29:55
They didn't drink at all.
-
00:29:56
They didn't, I'm going to drink.
-
00:29:58
I'm gonna drink a lot.
-
00:30:02
During this time,
getting into my junior year,
-
00:30:05
this transition,
spiritual transition.
-
00:30:07
I never had like
a -- it wasn't like a
-
00:30:08
necessarily a light on and off.
-
00:30:10
It was just this slow,
gradual working
-
00:30:13
of the Spirit of God in my life.
-
00:30:15
I found myself in my
junior year not starting,
-
00:30:22
but playing.
I was on special teams.
-
00:30:24
And this is in the yearbook
-
00:30:26
from Franklin
Regional High School.
-
00:30:28
I would come off and
I'm huffing and puffing.
-
00:30:32
I wasn't catching any passes.
-
00:30:33
I wasn't good enough
to catch passes,
-
00:30:35
wasn't good enough to start.
-
00:30:36
But I was, you know,
I was a hustler
-
00:30:38
so I was on the kickoff team.
-
00:30:39
And this guy at Franklin
Regional High School
-
00:30:41
would sit up against
the fence and say,
-
00:30:43
"Hey, Tome, do something.
-
00:30:44
Why don't you do something?
-
00:30:45
Why are you sitting on
the bench? Do something."
-
00:30:47
He was, like, who is this guy?
-
00:30:50
And I learned that this guy
worked for an organization,
-
00:30:52
national organization
called Young Life,
-
00:30:55
that would go around
trying to help people,
-
00:30:57
students, understand
the good news of Jesus.
-
00:31:00
And he was just trying
to playfully heckle me,
-
00:31:03
woo me into some sort
of friendship with him.
-
00:31:06
This 28 year old
guy or so like that.
-
00:31:08
And I'm, "Who is this guy?"
-
00:31:10
Found out Young life,
this and that.
-
00:31:11
And there's a guy on
my team who said, "Hey,
-
00:31:15
I've got -- we got
this thing going on.
-
00:31:17
Do you want to, uh,
would you want to come
-
00:31:19
to a Young Life
meeting with me?"
-
00:31:20
I was like, "Uh, okay,
okay, fine. I'll go."
-
00:31:23
So I go to this meeting
-
00:31:25
and there's kids
in this living room
-
00:31:28
and they're singing songs.
-
00:31:29
They got this guitar,
like, it's kind of weird
-
00:31:31
when you sound like, right?
-
00:31:32
Kids come together, like,
sing songs in somebody's house.
-
00:31:35
But it was cool,
actually, I liked it.
-
00:31:37
And then this guy gets up
and he opens up the Bible
-
00:31:40
and he starts talking.
-
00:31:41
And because my
mom played the organ,
-
00:31:43
my dad sang in the choir,
I could --
-
00:31:45
I knew most of the stories,
a lot of them.
-
00:31:47
And he's telling the story,
and I'd heard the words before,
-
00:31:51
but for the first time,
the melody came alive.
-
00:31:54
I heard the melody
for the first time.
-
00:31:56
I was mesmerized.
-
00:31:58
He spoke in a language
that that I could understand,
-
00:32:01
all because somebody
had invited me.
-
00:32:05
John 1:46, this is how
Jesus created a following
-
00:32:09
and how you're here today,
-
00:32:11
no matter where
you are spiritually.
-
00:32:13
John 1:46 says: Nathanael
said to him, a friend of his,
-
00:32:17
"Can anything good
come out of Nazareth?"
-
00:32:19
Like Jesus is known
as Jesus of Nazareth.
-
00:32:21
Nathaniel is asked by Philip
to come and see who Jesus is.
-
00:32:25
"Nazareth?"
Like, think of the grossest,
-
00:32:28
least respectable area of
town that you grew up in
-
00:32:31
or where you live right now.
-
00:32:33
That's not as bad as Nazareth
to early Middle Easterners.
-
00:32:36
"Nazareth?
-
00:32:38
You're saying that the Son
of God came from Nazareth?
-
00:32:41
What good come out of Nazareth?"
-
00:32:42
And Philip,
he doesn't have all the answers.
-
00:32:44
He just says this in John 1:46.
-
00:32:46
He says, "Come and see.
Just come and see."
-
00:32:50
He's inviting him into
a relationship with Him.
-
00:32:54
When I got into this group,
I started changing
-
00:32:59
and something significant
started to happen in my life.
-
00:33:02
And somewhere along the line,
-
00:33:03
I ended up crossing
the line of faith.
-
00:33:06
And then my senior
year in high school,
-
00:33:08
if you look at my senior year,
I got a new number.
-
00:33:10
I got a new number because
they wanted to use me
-
00:33:12
and I realized I
had horrible hands.
-
00:33:14
So I was kind of a grunt worker.
-
00:33:16
They said, "We're
going to put you in line."
-
00:33:18
"Great. I'll take the line."
-
00:33:19
So here I am.
-
00:33:21
By the way,
my middle name is Douglas,
-
00:33:23
in case you're
wondering about that.
-
00:33:24
Like, oh got it. Okay.
-
00:33:28
I should have brought that
up with the other services.
-
00:33:30
All right. Got it. Okay, good.
-
00:33:33
So here I am, here I am.
Maybe around a campfire.
-
00:33:38
So here I am -- Not that,
really.
-
00:33:41
Here, here I am, my senior year.
Different number.
-
00:33:45
And two friends are to my right.
-
00:33:48
To my right is a friend
of mine named Bob.
-
00:33:51
An we partied hard together,
hard.
-
00:33:55
And right behind him is AT.
-
00:33:57
We partied and drank
hard together a lot.
-
00:34:01
And when I came to know Christ,
-
00:34:03
I didn't want to
give up the parties
-
00:34:07
because I had formed
relationships there,
-
00:34:10
I'd formed friendships there,
and it was important
-
00:34:13
to me to actually be
in those relationships.
-
00:34:15
Here's what The Atlantic
says not too long ago.
-
00:34:18
It says: Simply put,
America is in a party deficit.
-
00:34:21
Only 4.1% of Americans
attended or hosted
-
00:34:25
a social event on an average
weekend or holiday in 2023,
-
00:34:29
according to the Bureau
of Labor Statistics;
-
00:34:32
this is a 35%
decrease since 2004.
-
00:34:36
So of course, we're getting
more and more lonely,
-
00:34:38
of course, because we're
not partying with each other,
-
00:34:41
we're not hanging
out with each other.
-
00:34:43
And for me, in high school,
-
00:34:45
alcohol was a social lubricant.
-
00:34:47
Now, I've actually read
people bemoaning that
-
00:34:51
people in high school aren't
drinking like they used to.
-
00:34:55
Now it's please, kids,
don't do this. Don't do this.
-
00:34:58
Hear me out all entirely. Okay?
-
00:35:02
I knew as Jesus
came into my life,
-
00:35:05
He started transforming me,
I needed to stop drinking
-
00:35:08
and abusing alcohol, but I also
-
00:35:10
didn't need to stop
going to parties
-
00:35:11
because that's where
my friends were.
-
00:35:13
So I would go to these
parties with a red solo cup.
-
00:35:16
I fill you up with apple juice.
-
00:35:18
I would sit there with
apple juice. No one cared.
-
00:35:20
I was just as funny
as I was before
-
00:35:21
or as stupid as I was before,
and just hanging out
-
00:35:24
with my red solo cup
and interacted because I --
-
00:35:28
Because here's the thing,
here's the reason
-
00:35:30
I came to know
Christ wasn't just that
-
00:35:33
Denny Paton from Young
Life was heckling me
-
00:35:36
and inviting me in.
-
00:35:38
He was praying for me.
-
00:35:40
I was on his mirror in
a list called a paste list,
-
00:35:45
which as he brushed his teeth,
he was praying for me.
-
00:35:48
And I learned this from him.
-
00:35:50
So for 45 years
I've had a paste list
-
00:35:54
and these guys
were on my paste list.
-
00:35:57
And I'm going to go, I'm
going to go to work for them.
-
00:36:00
I want them to
have the good news.
-
00:36:01
Isn't that when something
makes sense to you
-
00:36:03
and is great and
impacts your life,
-
00:36:05
don't you want other
people to have it?
-
00:36:07
Like who invented
toilet paper first?
-
00:36:09
You'd be like, "Dude,
you got to do this.
-
00:36:11
This is amazing.
You gotta, you gotta."
-
00:36:13
You can't keep quiet
about toilet paper, right?
-
00:36:16
Sliced bread, whatever it is.
-
00:36:18
So I wanted to have them say,
"Come and see, come and see."
-
00:36:23
I didn't have all the right
answers, all the right stuff.
-
00:36:25
I just come and see.
-
00:36:27
So I went to Danny and I said,
"Hey, how about
-
00:36:29
if we have Young
Life at my house?"
-
00:36:32
"Oh, yeah.
Yeah, we could do that."
-
00:36:34
So scheduled it.
And, man, I worked it hard.
-
00:36:37
I invited everybody who I knew.
-
00:36:39
I went --we had the
largest Young Life meeting
-
00:36:41
of the year in my house,
and it was massive.
-
00:36:44
And furniture got
broken in my house
-
00:36:46
because people were
standing on dining room chairs
-
00:36:48
to be able to see
over this thing.
-
00:36:50
And it was awesome,
except for my mother
-
00:36:52
who had her furniture broken.
-
00:36:55
And I was going to
give my testimony
-
00:36:57
and I asked to
give my testimony.
-
00:36:58
And Denny said, "You want
to give testimony?" "I do."
-
00:37:01
So I got up and first time
-
00:37:02
I basically ever
public speak like that,
-
00:37:04
and the first time I
ever cried and I cried
-
00:37:08
because I don't
know what it was,
-
00:37:09
the weight of the moment,
-
00:37:11
the beauty of telling the
greatest story ever told.
-
00:37:14
And I'd never cried before.
-
00:37:15
I cried when I got paddled.
-
00:37:18
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-
00:37:20
Man, you used to go to school
to get your fingers cut off
-
00:37:23
and get paddled.
-
00:37:25
Like, how many people here
got paddled? How many people?
-
00:37:28
Amazing. We're all alive
and we're not scarred.
-
00:37:32
Mom and dad, you
ought to try it. Just saying.
-
00:37:34
So that's another
sermon for another day.
-
00:37:37
I will give that sermon someday.
-
00:37:39
I never cried before in public,
ever,
-
00:37:42
or about something emotional.
-
00:37:44
I never cried about something.
-
00:37:45
It was really, really odd.
-
00:37:47
And afterwards Bob
came up to me and he said,
-
00:37:49
"Hey, man." He had hushed tones.
-
00:37:52
He said,
I'll never forget, he said,
-
00:37:54
"That thing that
happened with you,
-
00:37:57
was that you or was that God?"
-
00:38:00
I said that was God.
-
00:38:04
AT to my right would
never go to Young Life.
-
00:38:06
I'll try something.
I'll try something else.
-
00:38:08
I was involved
peripherally in this church.
-
00:38:10
It was meeting in an
abandoned grocery store,
-
00:38:12
and they were trying
to have this outreach.
-
00:38:14
They had this guy who
was a former Hell's Angel,
-
00:38:19
not Hell's Angels, but one
of the competing biker gangs.
-
00:38:21
And he had become a
professional arm wrestler.
-
00:38:24
And he was going
to give his story.
-
00:38:26
And they came to me and said,
"Hey,
-
00:38:28
what if you got the
strongest person
-
00:38:29
you could get in
the school and see if
-
00:38:31
they'll come arm wrestle him
-
00:38:32
and we'll make
that kind of a thing?"
-
00:38:34
I said, "Huh. Okay." So I
went to AT who is at my right
-
00:38:37
and said, "Hey, we need the
strongest guy in high school."
-
00:38:39
Like, hint, hint, nudge nudge,
-
00:38:41
kind of compliment for you,
"to arm wrestle this guy.
-
00:38:44
And he's going to give
a little talk afterwards.
-
00:38:46
Can you do it?
We really need you."
-
00:38:47
He said, "Uh, yeah, I'll do it."
-
00:38:50
I'll never forget him coming in.
-
00:38:51
And of course,
David Story was his name,
-
00:38:53
he put him down
immediately down.
-
00:38:56
But there was AT who
stayed the whole time.,
-
00:38:59
listened to this guy's story.
-
00:39:00
Guy shook his hand.
It was beautiful.
-
00:39:01
I don't know, I didn't see
either of those two guys
-
00:39:04
come to know Christ
and receive the good news
-
00:39:06
while I was there,
and I don't know right now
-
00:39:09
where they are,
but I will tell you,
-
00:39:11
there was something
powerful and profound
-
00:39:14
in my life with God
in doing that work.
-
00:39:18
In fact,
because of that, I said,
-
00:39:20
"I'm not going to
do the Marines.
-
00:39:22
I'm rebelling against God.
-
00:39:23
I'm actually going
to do ministry.
-
00:39:24
Can I do this and
get paid to do this?
-
00:39:26
Have more time to do this?
I'm in."
-
00:39:28
And that meant I
had to go to school.
-
00:39:30
I had to go to college.
-
00:39:31
It's like, "God, count me in.
-
00:39:33
This is what I want
to give my life."
-
00:39:35
Now, where are we
going with all of this?
-
00:39:38
Where we're going
with this goes back to
-
00:39:39
the core of the faith,
the core of your faith.
-
00:39:43
All of us in here
right now are here
-
00:39:44
because you want to
be more spiritually alive.
-
00:39:46
That's why you came
here on a beautiful day.
-
00:39:48
All of you are in here right now
because you want more of God.
-
00:39:51
All of you in here
right now because
-
00:39:52
if there's some X factor,
you want it.
-
00:39:54
All of you are here today
because you're hoping
-
00:39:56
there's something you
can't see and you want it.
-
00:39:58
That thing, that entity is
known as the Holy Spirit.
-
00:40:03
That's the Holy Spirit.
-
00:40:04
When we say, I receive Jesus,
I did receive Him.
-
00:40:07
I said He's my Messiah.
-
00:40:08
But Jesus doesn't live in here.
-
00:40:11
Jesus isn't in my heart.
He wouldn't fit.
-
00:40:15
But the Holy Spirit,
His Spirit He's one with
-
00:40:18
is in here and in anybody
who receives Him.
-
00:40:21
When we learn about this
Holy Spirit, we find that He --
-
00:40:24
When I say he, it is a he, he's
a person with a personality.
-
00:40:28
He's given the definite article
-
00:40:29
in the original Greek
when was recorded.
-
00:40:31
Jesus talking about this,
a masculine definite article.
-
00:40:35
He's a person
with a personality.
-
00:40:37
And when Jesus forecasts Him
coming, here's what He says.
-
00:40:41
It's read in Acts 1:8 says this:
-
00:40:46
You will receive power
-
00:40:47
when the Holy Spirit
has come upon you,
-
00:40:49
and you will be My
witnesses in Jerusalem
-
00:40:53
and in all Judea and Samaria
and the ends of the earth.
-
00:40:55
Kyle talked about this
verse really well last week,
-
00:40:57
but I want to highlight
something else in this.
-
00:40:59
He's talking about how
does the good news spread
-
00:41:02
to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria?
And how does it spread?
-
00:41:06
It spreads through you and me.
-
00:41:10
And we're not strong enough.
-
00:41:12
So what is the agent of power?
-
00:41:14
It's the Holy Spirit.
-
00:41:17
The Holy Spirit,
what the Holy Spirit's main job
-
00:41:21
is to get Jesus publicity.
-
00:41:25
The Holy Spirit's main
job is to give you and I
-
00:41:29
power for sharing our faith.
-
00:41:32
So when you're not
sharing your faith,
-
00:41:35
or we're not interested
in evangelism,
-
00:41:37
to use a dirty word,
we're saying,
-
00:41:40
"I'm not interested
in the X factor
-
00:41:41
of the Holy Spirit in my life."
-
00:41:43
Because Jesus says here,
this is the reason
-
00:41:45
the Spirit is coming, to empower
us to communicate who He is.
-
00:41:51
Now, if we go to Acts
chapter two, the next chapter,
-
00:41:55
Jesus had said this
is going to happen.
-
00:41:57
The Holy Spirit's coming.
-
00:41:58
When we see when the
Holy Spirit actually comes,
-
00:42:00
because up to this point, people
didn't get the Holy Spirit.
-
00:42:04
You could get the Holy
Spirit once you got Jesus,
-
00:42:06
once you committed to Him,
-
00:42:07
that's when the Holy Spirit
comes and dwells in you
-
00:42:09
and gives you a peace
that passes understanding,
-
00:42:12
gives you forgiveness,
gives you an identity,
-
00:42:15
all of these things.
-
00:42:16
But this is like
brand new stuff.
-
00:42:18
No one in the Old
Testament ever had this.
-
00:42:20
Like,
people group didn't have this.
-
00:42:22
So when the Holy
Spirit first does come
-
00:42:25
and actually inhabit His people,
-
00:42:26
I'm going to read it for you.
It's pretty crazy.
-
00:42:28
It's at Pentecost.
-
00:42:29
Pentecost is a Jewish holiday.
-
00:42:32
It's an Old Testament holiday.
-
00:42:34
And so Jews from
all over the place
-
00:42:36
have come to
Jerusalem to celebrate
-
00:42:40
and have a high holy day.
-
00:42:41
That's what holiday means,
a holy day.
-
00:42:44
They've come in to have this,
-
00:42:45
people all over the place
with different languages
-
00:42:48
and different backgrounds.
One thing in common.
-
00:42:50
They all believed in Yahweh
-
00:42:51
and they all believed in keeping
-
00:42:53
the Old Testament scriptures.
That's why they're there.
-
00:42:55
So let's look at what happens.
-
00:42:57
Okay, here it is.
-
00:43:03
When the day of
Pentecost arrived,
-
00:43:06
they were all
together in one place,
-
00:43:08
and suddenly there
came from heaven
-
00:43:12
a sound like a mighty
rushing wind. [wind sounds]
-
00:43:16
And it filled the entire house
where they were sitting.
-
00:43:25
The apostles have
gone to lick their wounds
-
00:43:27
after Jesus has been crucified.
-
00:43:28
They've gone back
to the upper room.
-
00:43:31
They've gone there to lick
their wounds and go inward.
-
00:43:35
Instead something else happened
is going to take them outward.
-
00:43:41
And divided tongues as
of fire appeared on them
-
00:43:47
and rested on each one of them,
-
00:43:51
and they were all
filled with the Holy Spirit
-
00:43:57
and began to speak
in other tongues
-
00:44:00
as the Spirit gave
them utterance.
-
00:44:03
[overlapping talking]
-
00:44:10
Not everybody gets this gift.
-
00:44:16
The gift of being able
to share your faith,
-
00:44:19
because you got
people in who are Jews,
-
00:44:21
who are speaking French,
-
00:44:22
people who speak
German speaking Germany,
-
00:44:24
people who are Acadian
speaking Acadian,
-
00:44:27
people, whatever they are,
they're all in.
-
00:44:29
And the Holy Spirit wants
these people to know
-
00:44:33
about the possibility of
forgiveness and empowerment.
-
00:44:36
And so what He does
is He empowers people
-
00:44:38
to speak languages they've
never learned in class.
-
00:44:45
That's what the
Holy Spirit does.
-
00:44:49
All of us want something
unique to happen in our lives.
-
00:44:53
I do.
-
00:44:54
All of us want some
some vision from God. I do.
-
00:44:58
All of us want some miraculous
new spiritual gift. I do.
-
00:45:03
All of us want some
new spiritual feeling,
-
00:45:05
wherever we get it, I do.
-
00:45:08
Let me be very clear,
very, very, very clear,
-
00:45:11
the Holy Spirit,
though you may have a vision,
-
00:45:13
is not about
giving you a vision.
-
00:45:15
The Holy Spirit that you may get
-
00:45:17
a miraculous spiritual gift,
His goal is not
-
00:45:19
for you to have a
miraculous spiritual gift.
-
00:45:22
The Holy Spirit,
though we may and want
-
00:45:25
mountaintop experiences,
that's not His role.
-
00:45:29
His role is to equip
you to do evangelism.
-
00:45:33
That's what He does.
-
00:45:35
Jesus said,
this is going to happen.
-
00:45:37
You're supposed to do this,
and then the first thing,
-
00:45:40
when the Holy Spirit comes,
the very first thing,
-
00:45:42
they start telling
people about their faith.
-
00:45:44
And people en masse
start starts converting
-
00:45:47
over to Jesus being the Way,
the Truth and the Life.
-
00:45:51
Jesus talked about this.
-
00:45:52
He said this is going to happen.
-
00:45:54
In the book of John
15:26 He said this:
-
00:45:57
But when the Helper comes,
-
00:45:59
that's the Holy Spirit,
capitalized H.
-
00:46:03
When the Helper comes,
whom I will send to you
-
00:46:06
from the Father,
the Spirit of truth,
-
00:46:08
who proceeds from the Father,
He will bear witness about me.
-
00:46:13
And you also will bear witness,
-
00:46:15
because you have been
with Me from the beginning.
-
00:46:18
So the Helper, the Helper here
-
00:46:20
isn't just helping you
in your medical trauma,
-
00:46:23
isn't just helping you through
your emotional trauma,
-
00:46:25
just helping you do a
good presentation at work.
-
00:46:28
All those things may
be true and are true
-
00:46:30
to one degree or another.
-
00:46:31
But the Helper, the Helper
is so you can bear witness.
-
00:46:38
So if you want the Holy Spirit
-
00:46:40
you have to be a
bearer of good news.
-
00:46:42
The Holy Spirit empowers
us for evangelism.
-
00:46:46
Sometimes we're
part of churches where
-
00:46:50
churches are afraid
of the Holy Spirit,
-
00:46:51
like afraid of what might happen
-
00:46:53
if the Holy Spirit
got unleashed.
-
00:46:54
Afraid of what crazy
things might happen.
-
00:46:57
So people like me might
not talk about the Holy Spirit
-
00:47:00
because we're like, "I don't
know how this is going to work."
-
00:47:02
And then what happens,
if you leave
-
00:47:04
from a church like that
where that wasn't happening,
-
00:47:06
you get to another church
where it's all Holy Spirit
-
00:47:08
all the time and, like, no one
ever comes to know Christ.
-
00:47:11
It's just a bunch
of disenfranchized
-
00:47:13
previous church
people were hanging out
-
00:47:15
in those places where
there's no power.
-
00:47:16
Why? Because there's no
evangelism that happens.
-
00:47:20
The Holy Spirit is
actually uncomfortable
-
00:47:23
I'm talking about Him right now.
-
00:47:25
He doesn't want
to be talked about.
-
00:47:26
Just take Jesus's Word,
"He will bear witness about Me."
-
00:47:31
The Holy Spirit wants
Jesus to be talked about.
-
00:47:34
He wants Jesus.
-
00:47:36
So he's a little
squeamish about it.
-
00:47:38
All this to say,
friends, if you want
-
00:47:40
a supercharged spiritual life,
if you want the X factor,
-
00:47:44
it rests in the Holy Spirit,
-
00:47:46
and you have to go
where the Holy Spirit is.
-
00:47:48
And the Holy Spirit's about
pointing people to Jesus.
-
00:47:50
The Holy Spirit's about
people receiving Jesus.
-
00:47:55
And if you want a
spiritual buzz, man,
-
00:47:57
your best game in town is
putting people on a mirror
-
00:48:01
and praying for them
and then asking God,
-
00:48:04
asking God how you can be used
-
00:48:06
to actually
articulate your faith.
-
00:48:08
Asking God for some
place you can invite them.
-
00:48:11
As I mentioned,
I've been 45 years
-
00:48:13
I've had someone's
name on my mirror.
-
00:48:15
And a lot of them are
part of this church right now
-
00:48:17
have come to know Christ.
It's wonderful.
-
00:48:19
I've met playing basketball
or doing whatever.
-
00:48:20
And some are up there
have there for a while.
-
00:48:23
I had one guy in there
for a couple few years now,
-
00:48:26
and I've invited him to things,
"Come and see."
-
00:48:29
And try to talk to him and just,
you know,
-
00:48:32
no, no,
no apparent warmth there at all.
-
00:48:35
No -- just just nothing.
-
00:48:37
I found out a couple of
weeks ago a mutual friend
-
00:48:41
that we have,
a mutual guy we know
-
00:48:43
invited him to Man Camp
and he's coming to Man Camp.
-
00:48:45
I'm like, "Man Camp?
My gosh, Man Camp is a far cry
-
00:48:52
from Super Bowl of Preaching,
let me tell you,
-
00:48:54
a far, far, far cry."
-
00:48:56
As is revival, which is
coming up in a few weeks,
-
00:48:59
our Revival.
-
00:49:01
It's interesting
how I've read --
-
00:49:04
I read just recently
in Relevant Magazine,
-
00:49:06
it's a Christian magazine that
-
00:49:07
80% of all people in
America surveyed said
-
00:49:13
if I was invited to church,
I would go. 80%.
-
00:49:17
Especially,
here's the other thing.
-
00:49:19
The younger you are,
the more likely you are
-
00:49:21
to take somebody
up on your invitation
-
00:49:22
because in America right now,
the younger you are,
-
00:49:24
the more spiritually
hungry you are.
-
00:49:26
That defies everything.
-
00:49:27
Like, that's not the way it
was 20, 30 years ago, right?
-
00:49:31
But that's the way it is now.
-
00:49:33
And what's missing?
Just being asked.
-
00:49:37
And my friend asked
him to Man Camp.
-
00:49:40
Not Super Bowl of Preaching.
-
00:49:42
He wasn't interested
in that shenanigans,
-
00:49:45
which I love it,
but like I guess,
-
00:49:47
I haven't talked about this.
-
00:49:49
I guess I'm up for
getting hit in the mouth.
-
00:49:51
I want to see the X factor.
-
00:49:53
I don't know what he's thinking,
-
00:49:55
but all I know is wonderful.
Wonderful.
-
00:49:56
Been praying for him
-
00:49:57
and God's working
through somebody else.
-
00:49:59
It's awesome.
-
00:50:00
Friends, the greatest adventure
you'll ever be a part of
-
00:50:03
is seeing how God
uses you to work
-
00:50:06
in and through somebody else.
The revival.
-
00:50:09
Revival is another one, man.
I'm telling you, Revival.
-
00:50:13
You can come,
you can come camp two nights,
-
00:50:15
you can camp one night,
you can come up and back.
-
00:50:18
You can come up and back,
one time if you want.
-
00:50:21
You can put your kids,
tuck them in bed
-
00:50:23
and come up and
come up at midnight,
-
00:50:24
stay until four in the morning
for worship in the woods.
-
00:50:27
It's one of the most
transcendent things
-
00:50:28
that many of us did.
-
00:50:29
You do whatever you want.
-
00:50:30
We just want you
and I to be revived.
-
00:50:33
And what do you know,
what do you know?
-
00:50:35
There might be
people that you know
-
00:50:38
that wouldn't go to church,
but would go to a field
-
00:50:41
and have a beer and hear
about Jesus. You know?
-
00:50:44
There just might be.
-
00:50:46
As I've done a deep dive
on revivals and awakenings,
-
00:50:51
I've unearthed a lot,
a lot of really good stuff.
-
00:50:55
Cane Ridge Revival
in northern Kentucky,
-
00:50:58
somewhat close to us.
It was in Bourbon County.
-
00:51:03
And the historians
say the Spirit flowed
-
00:51:07
as freely as the spirits
in Bourbon County.
-
00:51:13
20,000 people came to that
thing over the course of a week.
-
00:51:17
Historians say as they come,
-
00:51:18
this is not a highly
populated area, right?
-
00:51:20
It's not like 20,000
people here for something.
-
00:51:23
20,000 people,
and they said as they came
-
00:51:24
on their horses
and their carriages,
-
00:51:26
it sounded like the rush of
Niagara Falls from miles away.
-
00:51:32
Just the amount
of people praying
-
00:51:34
and the singing
and the utterances.
-
00:51:37
A friend of mine,
Paul McConaughey says that
-
00:51:40
every church has to
have its own Pentecost.
-
00:51:42
Every church has
to have its own thing
-
00:51:44
where the Spirit of God
does something unique in it.
-
00:51:46
I think we're in the --
Have been in the midst
-
00:51:49
of some sort of Pentecost
-
00:51:50
or some sort of revival,
awakening.
-
00:51:53
I'm not sure what the
right word is to give it,
-
00:51:56
but over the last several years,
you know,
-
00:51:58
for the last 3 or 4 years,
-
00:52:01
we've on a rolling 12
month basis, any 12 months,
-
00:52:04
we've baptized 2000 people
every 12 months, every time.
-
00:52:08
That is crazy.
-
00:52:10
We're seeing healings,
legitimate healing.
-
00:52:12
I just met with
another guy yesterday
-
00:52:14
or earlier service about it.
-
00:52:16
We're seeing legitimate,
miraculous Holy Spirit
-
00:52:19
kind of things, and I
believe there's another level
-
00:52:23
the Spirit's going
to take us to.
-
00:52:25
I believe in large part
because He wants
-
00:52:29
to equip more of us
to talk about the thing
-
00:52:31
He's really fired up about,
-
00:52:32
which is the good
news of Jesus Christ.
-
00:52:34
And I think that, I'm praying,
man, Lord, do something,
-
00:52:38
something different
at our Revival.
-
00:52:40
Maybe, maybe, I don't know.
-
00:52:42
But I know it's an
amazing journey to be on.
-
00:52:47
What if we share our faith?
-
00:52:50
What if we share our
faith and we get rejected?
-
00:52:53
Well, it's a good
thing the gospel says
-
00:52:55
that Jesus doesn't reject you.
It's a good thing.
-
00:52:57
What if I do something?
What if I say the wrong thing?
-
00:53:00
Well, good thing that the
gospel says you're forgiven.
-
00:53:02
So no matter what you say,
you're forgiven. Great.
-
00:53:04
Well,
what if I go out and I say it
-
00:53:06
and they actually kill me
because they're so offended?
-
00:53:09
Well, good news.
You go to heaven.
-
00:53:11
It's wonderful. Good,
good news you go to heaven.
-
00:53:13
Well, what if I can't?
-
00:53:15
This is the good news.
You can't lose on this.
-
00:53:17
And it's the very thing
the Holy Spirit is about.
-
00:53:20
It's the very thing that
Jesus did and He came to do.
-
00:53:24
So there's all kinds of
things I can talk about,
-
00:53:26
about my I'm
rebelliousness and all that.
-
00:53:28
But man, when I'm walking
with God, this is always on it.
-
00:53:32
Let's fast forward
from high school
-
00:53:34
all the way to like,
the present day
-
00:53:36
how's it playing out in my life.
-
00:53:38
As you may know, Lib is,
we're going through chemo,
-
00:53:42
chemotherapy, Lib is.
She's doing it.
-
00:53:44
And we we go in and we,
every other week
-
00:53:47
she's getting these chemical
concoction stuff jammed in her.
-
00:53:50
And she's lost her hair.
-
00:53:51
And she's she's doing
really well, by the way.
-
00:53:53
Thank you for your praying.
She's doing really good.
-
00:53:55
But we go in and we've
come to look forward
-
00:54:01
to chemotherapy
because we get to go in
-
00:54:05
and spend a day with
people who maybe,
-
00:54:07
maybe we get to bring
someone to Christ.
-
00:54:10
We go in and my daughter,
my daughter Moriah
-
00:54:13
has a friend that we knew
actually in high school
-
00:54:16
who's a nurse in the
same nurse practice thing,
-
00:54:18
but not in this office,
someplace else.
-
00:54:20
And she went to our
daughter and said,
-
00:54:22
"Man, all the nurses and the
staff, they love your parents."
-
00:54:25
They said, like, my daughter's
like, "Oh, really? Why?"
-
00:54:28
They said, "Well, they
actually look them in the face
-
00:54:30
when they talk to him.
-
00:54:32
They look at their name tags
and call them by their name.
-
00:54:35
They try to make
them a little humorous.
-
00:54:36
They bring bananas."
-
00:54:38
When we go in, like,
let's take something,
-
00:54:39
let's not go empty handed.
-
00:54:41
Let's take for everybody
enough bananas
-
00:54:42
for people to eat
if they want them.
-
00:54:44
Orange juice for people.
-
00:54:45
Let's do whatever that is.
-
00:54:47
The last couple times we've
taken in hoagies, sandwiches.
-
00:54:50
Let's take it up a notch.
-
00:54:52
First time I went,
I'm going around,
-
00:54:54
aAnd now people know,
like, "Oh, you're the people
-
00:54:56
who just are nice and do that,"
right?
-
00:54:57
This woman,
I go up to her and say,
-
00:54:59
"Hey, we got these
different sandwiches.
-
00:55:00
Which one would you like?
Would you want one?"
-
00:55:02
She tries saying something.
She couldn't.
-
00:55:04
She couldn't get her words out.
-
00:55:07
And I said, "Well, I'm sorry.
What did you say?"
-
00:55:09
She said, "I wish there
was more people like you."
-
00:55:15
And I said, "Can I pray
for you right now?" Yes.
-
00:55:19
Reach over,
put my hand on her knee.
-
00:55:21
I prayed for her.
I probably chickened out.
-
00:55:23
I probably could have baptized
her right then and there,
-
00:55:25
but I prayed for her there.
-
00:55:29
Now I blow -- I've blown
all kinds of opportunities,
-
00:55:32
but it's fun to talk
about things recently
-
00:55:34
that haven't gone all that bad.
-
00:55:37
We want to be a witness.
We're there.
-
00:55:38
We're in the same room,
the same, the same everything.
-
00:55:41
We're on mission here.
This is our Jerusalem.
-
00:55:42
Here in this room maybe,
maybe God sent us
-
00:55:46
for these people right here,
right now.
-
00:55:48
Maybe this is the adventure.
I don't know.
-
00:55:51
So we just -- I'm just
more verbose with my faith
-
00:55:54
than I would have
been even ten years ago.
-
00:55:56
I don't know if it's me
getting more gonads
-
00:55:58
or I don't know if it's
our culture shifting
-
00:56:00
or what it is,
I'm just a little more verbose.
-
00:56:02
So one of the
injections they give you
-
00:56:04
when you first start the
whole chemotherapy,
-
00:56:06
at least what Lib is
on is the nurse said,
-
00:56:08
"Are you ready for red devil?"
"Red devil?"
-
00:56:12
"Yeah yeah yeah.
It's this thing you got to take
-
00:56:15
the next four weeks,
these red vials."
-
00:56:17
We learned that it it gives you
metallic taste in your mouth.
-
00:56:22
And it just not, not good.
-
00:56:25
So you have to chew ice or
ice cream while you have it,
-
00:56:29
while they're injecting
this in you like red devil.
-
00:56:31
And it's kind of a
humorous thing.
-
00:56:32
They're like,
"People call it the red devil
-
00:56:34
because it makes them
feel bad and all that stuff."
-
00:56:36
And I got the humor.
That's cool.
-
00:56:38
Afterwards,
we were thinking about it.
-
00:56:40
After the first one, we said,
"Red devil, we don't like that.
-
00:56:43
You know, the Bible says,
as a man thinketh, so is he.
-
00:56:47
Like what? What?
We need to rename that."
-
00:56:50
So we said, "We're going
to call this the blood of Christ
-
00:56:53
is what we're going to call it."
-
00:56:54
So we go we go in.
-
00:56:57
She nurse brings out the vials,
right?
-
00:56:59
She brings out the vials.
-
00:57:00
And we told her right
when this picture was there,
-
00:57:02
like we said,
"We ready for red devil?"
-
00:57:04
"We're ready for
the blood of Christ."
-
00:57:06
And she said, "What was that?"
-
00:57:08
"Well, we look at this
concoction as bringing healing,
-
00:57:12
and that's what Jesus does
to us, He brings us healing.
-
00:57:15
So we're going to call
this the blood of Christ."
-
00:57:17
She was like,
she looked at me, she went,
-
00:57:21
"I like that, I like that.
Good."
-
00:57:22
So I don't know if it's going
to stick for everybody else.
-
00:57:25
But it was another
opportunity for us
-
00:57:27
to do some sharing
of our faith with them.
-
00:57:32
Man, it's a powerful thing
when you see God use you.
-
00:57:36
It's a powerful thing to
opt into God using you.
-
00:57:40
And you can do this in
any environment you're in.
-
00:57:43
You can choose because
you're the one who's sent.
-
00:57:46
You're the one who
has the opportunity.
-
00:57:48
I don't, the person next
to you doesn't, you do.
-
00:57:51
We have some people
up in our Dayton campus,
-
00:57:53
they saw an opportunity.
-
00:57:54
They said, "Man, there's a lot
of people going to strip clubs.
-
00:57:58
Maybe we should go
minister to those people."
-
00:58:00
That's -- somebody's like,
"Ooh, ooh,
-
00:58:02
I'll do some strip
club ministry.
-
00:58:04
I'm gonna have to go in there.
-
00:58:06
I have to go in there and
build some relationships.
-
00:58:09
And, you know,
you got to be seen to be heard.
-
00:58:12
So I gotta just check
the place out for a while,
-
00:58:15
make sure it's -- make
sure everything --"
-
00:58:17
I don't recommend
internal strip club ministry,
-
00:58:20
but nonetheless,
they went up ahead of time.
-
00:58:23
They talked to the
the owner that week,
-
00:58:25
the owner, the general manager,
I'm not sure which.
-
00:58:27
They said, "Hey, we'd
just like to serve the people
-
00:58:29
who are coming out
and the employees.
-
00:58:32
Would it be okay if
we set up a coffee truck
-
00:58:34
here in the parking lot
when they come out?"
-
00:58:36
And they said, the guy said,
-
00:58:37
"Yeah,
yeah, it's fine, no problem."
-
00:58:40
So they go up, they go up.
-
00:58:42
A guy comes out at
like 2:00 in the morning.
-
00:58:44
They go, these folks say,
"Hey, do you want some?
-
00:58:46
Would you like some coffee?"
-
00:58:47
He goes, "No thanks,
I have cocaine."
-
00:58:49
He keeps going.
Okay, whatever works for you.
-
00:58:57
A couple comes out,
husband, wife or couple,
-
00:58:59
dating couple,
I don't know, I don't know.
-
00:59:01
They come out and say, "Hey,
would you like some coffee?"
-
00:59:04
"Yeah, yeah. Who is this? What?"
-
00:59:07
"Oh, it's our church,
Crossroads Church."
-
00:59:11
They go, "Crossroads Church.?
That's my effing church.
-
00:59:17
That's my church.
We go to Oakley. [laughter]
-
00:59:24
Told ya,
all types of people come here.
-
00:59:27
It's wonderful. Awesome.
-
00:59:29
I will tell Oakley
staff has to start
-
00:59:32
upping their game,
that's for sure.
-
00:59:36
Another woman comes up.
-
00:59:39
She comes up and she
has tears in her eyes.
-
00:59:42
She says, "What's going on?"
-
00:59:43
They tell, they tell her.
-
00:59:44
She starts getting emotional.
-
00:59:46
She's one of the dancers.
-
00:59:50
She said, "I felt like
God has given up on me.
-
00:59:53
I just asked Him earlier today
if He would send me a sign."
-
01:00:01
[applause] And she took it as
the sign is what she took it as.
-
01:00:05
And she's been going
to Crossroads Mason.
-
01:00:08
So she,
she doesn't want to go in Dayton
-
01:00:10
because patrons and stuff.
She feels a little awkward
-
01:00:13
and she's got a lot to
work through and how to --
-
01:00:15
But she's been
going to a safe place
-
01:00:18
where she's hearing and
walking in the good news.
-
01:00:20
Friends, come on.
My gosh, My gosh.
-
01:00:26
Your greatest adventure,
bar none, nothing second,
-
01:00:30
your greatest
adventure is going to be
-
01:00:33
allowing the Holy Spirit to do
-
01:00:34
what the Holy
Spirit wants to do,
-
01:00:36
which is to bring
people to Jesus.
-
01:00:39
And as you listen to the
lie of the evil one says,
-
01:00:41
"No, I can't do that.
No. Not me. No, no.
-
01:00:44
That's rude.
No, I can't do that."
-
01:00:45
What, what?
-
01:00:48
This is the greatest blessing
you can give somebody.
-
01:00:50
They're not going to kill you.
They'll be okay.
-
01:00:52
And you're going to
partner with the Spirit,
-
01:00:53
you just might find that this
is the reason you're stuck.
-
01:00:58
This is the reason why
you're not sensing Him.
-
01:01:02
Because, like, you're not
into things that He's into.
-
01:01:06
This is what heHs into,
the Spirit.
-
01:01:09
And He wants to fill you fresh.
-
01:01:10
He wants to set you
on a place to do things
-
01:01:14
in ways that you
couldn't do in your normal,
-
01:01:16
natural flesh, and where
people in their natural flesh,
-
01:01:18
they wouldn't even say,
naturally, "Yes, I will,"
-
01:01:21
but they will.
-
01:01:22
And that's the good
news in their life,
-
01:01:25
in eternity will be
changed forever.
-
01:01:28
And it can be because of you.
-
01:01:31
Make somebody
thankful for your life.
-
01:01:35
Make that happen.
-
01:01:38
God, I am honored that
someone prayed for me
-
01:01:42
and took swings for
me and sacrificed for me.
-
01:01:45
And I'm honored
to be able to do that
-
01:01:47
in some other way with others.
-
01:01:48
And I'm honored to be
laboring alongside other people
-
01:01:52
who get that vision.
God, we just want more.
-
01:01:54
We want more people to know You.
-
01:01:56
We want more people
to have Your Spirit,
-
01:01:57
more people to have the
power and the forgiveness
-
01:02:00
and the identity that
comes from Jesus.
-
01:02:03
I pray these things in His Name.
Amen.
-
01:02:06
- Hey,
thank you so much for watching.
-
01:02:08
Now, I hope that God
spoke to you today,
-
01:02:11
that maybe God sparked
something in you today,
-
01:02:15
man,
that helps you understand that,
-
01:02:17
God created you
to make an impact,
-
01:02:18
God created you and
wants to see you share H
-
01:02:21
is story with the people
around you and make an impact
-
01:02:23
in the lives of your
friends or your family
-
01:02:25
or your neighbors or coworkers.
-
01:02:27
And this is so challenging,
it's so inspiring,
-
01:02:29
it's so convicting,
and it's exciting.
-
01:02:31
This is the
adventure of a lifetime
-
01:02:33
and the adventure of
faith that I want to be on.
-
01:02:36
And I want for you, too.
-
01:02:37
Now, speaking of God moving,
man, Brian talked about it.
-
01:02:41
One of the biggest
things happening
-
01:02:42
in our entire year is Revival.
-
01:02:45
You know what I'm talking about.
-
01:02:47
It is Revival, and it's
right around the corner.
-
01:02:49
This is our church
wide family reunion
-
01:02:51
meets, man, expecting God
to show up in a powerful way.
-
01:02:55
Every site, every city,
all coming to one place
-
01:02:57
to see God move.
We've been praying for this.
-
01:02:59
We've been preparing,
we've been planning.
-
01:03:01
And man, it's almost here.
We say Revival.
-
01:03:04
We're talking about
not just another event,
-
01:03:06
not just about
something you sit through,
-
01:03:08
but we're talking
about an experience
-
01:03:10
that you get to have with God
-
01:03:11
where He brings dead
things back to life, joy, faith.
-
01:03:15
Man, God's going to
do something beautiful,
-
01:03:17
and we want you there.
-
01:03:18
And we want your friends
and your family there too.
-
01:03:20
So some details for you.
-
01:03:22
It's happening November
1-2 out of Base Camp.
-
01:03:24
Saturday morning, 11 a.m. sharp
-
01:03:26
we're going to get rolling
-
01:03:27
with incredible teaching,
worship,
-
01:03:29
multiple sessions,
prayer, incredible stuff,
-
01:03:31
baptisms,
even fireworks at night.
-
01:03:33
It will be an
incredible time for you
-
01:03:35
and the whole family,
and for your people,
-
01:03:37
your friends who need
to experience Jesus.
-
01:03:39
If you're a part of our
Anywhere Community,
-
01:03:41
don't live near one
of our physical sites,
-
01:03:43
we're actually going to be
hosting you starting on Friday.
-
01:03:45
We'd love for you to join us.
-
01:03:47
You can get all the details
at Crossroads.net/Revival.
-
01:03:52
And if there's
anything we can do
-
01:03:54
to encourage you in
your walk with God,
-
01:03:56
encourage you to
experience more revival,
-
01:03:59
more of God bringing
dead things to life in you,
-
01:04:02
in your heart,
in your situation, man,
-
01:04:04
we'd love to pray for
you around those things.
-
01:04:06
You can just email
anywhere@crossroads.net
-
01:04:08
or just click the chat button.
-
01:04:11
We're here to help you
experience more of God
-
01:04:14
wherever you are.
Thanks so much for watching.