Latest / Gospel Talks Podcast / #83 - “Someone Already Talked to Me About Jesus…” — Missed Opportunity or Divine Sign?

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#83 - “Someone Already Talked to Me About Jesus…” — Missed Opportunity or Divine Sign? · Gospel Talks Podcast

• 0:00
  You ever met somebody who's already been witnessed to by another Christian and you realize, somebody's already talked to you.
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  Is that a good thing?
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  Is that a bad thing?
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  Should I just give up?
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  Cause like you didn't listen to the other person.
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  Should I receive it as confirmation that, Hey, like God's been working here.
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  What are we supposed to think when we run into this kind of scenario?
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  This episode is for the Christians who want to be able to recognize divine appointments.
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  and what to do with them.
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  And this is in continuation of the previous episode, that is, How Do You Know You're In A Divine Appointment?
• 0:37
  Welcome everybody to Gospel Talks Podcast, where we help Christians all over the world become more effective in relational evangelism and discipleship.
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  With me today is Jeff Musgrave, the author and founder of The Exchange, and I'm George Binoka his
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  co-host.
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  Hey, Jeff, how are you?
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  Doing good today.
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  How are you doing, George?
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  doing good, doing good.
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  I'm excited about this episode.
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  Last week, we started kind of first in nine evidences of you're in a divine appointment.
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  We talked about what it is, and I said, a divine appointment.
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  You know you're in a divine appointment when God's already been at work.
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  For those who are just jumping into the conversation now, could you kind of catch us up on what you meant by that first evidence as we go into the rest?
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  Yeah, a divine appointment is when God providentially empowers you to touch a life in which he's already been working.
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  And so what we were doing was just going down through, know, you're in a divine appointment when and uh this particular one is you enter into a situation and it's obvious
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  God's been at work before you got there.
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  And sometimes it's obvious and sometimes it's not until later that we actually see it.
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  And so the divine appointment doesn't
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  always show itself as we begin the conversation.
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  It's it's as we move on.
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  I think I've told you about my friend Michael, who is the board member of the exchange.
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  When I talked to Michael, I realized Michael had actually been involved in a Bible study years before.
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  And it was is one of those things where I had no idea there was any kind of a contact at all.
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  Michael wasn't extremely interested when we first met him.
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  And uh it's just it's kind of cool when you begin to see, Oh, God has been working in this guy for a while.
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  Hmm.
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  Yep.
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  That's, I mean, that's evidence, right?
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  And just like any investigator, you always want to follow the evidence.
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  What's cool is you give a lot more evidence than just that one.
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  I mean, it's incredible when you think about the amount of evidence God gives us.
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  I also wonder why we ignore the evidence sometimes.
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  Yeah.
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  And I, you know, the reason that I like evidence is because there are literally billions of people in this world and I'm not going to be able to reach all of them.
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  I kind of need some evidence from God.
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  Who do you want me talking to?
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  And so I've always believed that when God shows me where he's working, that's his invitation to me to get involved right there.
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  So that's, that's why I love the evidence.
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  I like to think of it as neon lights that are kind of pointing down and saying, this is the person that I want you to focus on.
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  want you to invest into this relationship.
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  So what about that scenario of, you know, you're talking to somebody and they're like, you know what, actually there's this other Christian somewhere else or another church
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  somewhere else or whatever.
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  And they're like, somebody's already talked with me about this.
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  I don't know, is that a negative or is that a positive?
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  Yeah, actually, one of the definitions of divine appointment we have in our giving the exchange book is you know, you're in a divine appointment, when the person to whom you're
• 3:45
  talking tells you somebody else has been talking to me about the Lord.
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  I actually think that's one of those divine, or you know, those kind of evidences, those arrows pointing down, this is the person I want you to focus on.
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  Think about it this way, George.
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  If you had a loved one, and maybe you already do,
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  that you want to see saved.
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  I can almost guarantee you you are praying for that person.
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  And, and often we not only pray for them, but we're praying Lord, would you send somebody else into their life to talk to them about this?
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  So I always when I hear those kinds of statements, I always think, I bet that I'm that person's answer to prayer.
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  They're praying for this guy.
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  And I know this is God wanting me to get involved here.
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  Well, it reminds me of what Paul said, Some plant, some water, but God gives the increase.
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  And whenever I'm in the chain, I get excited no matter where I am in the chain at the beginning or at the end, because I know God's going to increase something here real soon.
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  Yeah.
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  And I think that's really the issue.
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  We just want to be God's servant and want to be used of God.
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  wherever that fits in God's plan, that's okay.
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  I just like knowing I'm in God's plan.
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  I mean, I'm walking the path today that he wants me in.
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  Yep, that's, I mean Spurgeon actually kind of helps us think about this even more broadly.
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  He says, you know, God doesn't put a yellow stripe down the back of Christians.
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  So I preach to everybody.
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  And there's some level in which I don't think, and you correct me if I'm wrong here, you know, if I'm misunderstanding you, but I don't think what God is saying in his word is you
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  have to have evidence to preach, but
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  One of the things that we have to realize is that even if we weren't the one to start the chain of evidence that God is working, even if we weren't there at the ground floor, that
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  when we find ourselves in the middle of what's already happening, the momentum that God has already placed in this person's life, oh, this is spiritual momentum.
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  am gonna, this is, drop everything else, it becomes a priority.
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  I think these evidences help us prioritize.
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  I love it.
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  I love to think of it that way.
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  I really do.
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  You know, we have been using stories to kind of illustrate each of these concepts.
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  And so this one is somebody else has been talking to me about this.
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  I was on an airplane once in which I got moved from seat to seat before I got on the airplane.
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  I prayed and I asked God, God, would you sit me next to somebody that I could talk to about Jesus?
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  And I ended up next to a woman who was incredibly shy.
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  uh Her name was Sherry.
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  And I don't know if you've ever met anyone this shy, but Sherry would be able to look at me as I was talking.
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  So if I was talking, she would turn to look.
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  But if she were talking, she literally had to talk to her lap.
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  She couldn't look at me and have
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  eye contact while she was actually talking.
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  was it.
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  And it wasn't that she didn't like the conversation.
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  She just was shy and it was difficult for her.
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  Uh, so that's the kind of conversation that I was in.
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  And, um, um, I don't even remember how I probably was a little too bold.
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  Uh, um, and, uh, I ended up, um, she says, and you'll read, I I'm going to read a letter from her that I got later.
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  in a little bit.
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  But she says that I said, Can I talk to you about God?
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  I don't think I did it quite that abruptly.
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  But that that was as that was abrupt enough that that's how she heard it when I when I did it.
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  And she looked at me and then she looked at her lap and she said, My daughter's been talking to me about this.
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  And it was it was immediately that I began to realize, this is my divine appointment for today.
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  And so I said to her, said, Sherry, I don't know if you noticed, but I've actually been moved a couple of times on this air on this airplane.
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  And, and I actually believe Sherry, that God put me here to talk to you.
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  And then we went right on into the gospel conversation.
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  She was clearly interested, clearly moved.
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  But when I got all done,
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  and ask her if she was ready to trust Jesus.
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  It was just obvious that this is a woman that is way too shy to actually pray right there on the airplane.
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  I mean, I don't know if you've ever met anybody like that.
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  So yeah, and I mean, she's she's gonna make it happen.
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  So I asked her, I said, Sherry, would, would you promise me that you'll deal with this today?
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  that that you and I said it in these words, I don't I didn't mean it any particular way.
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  I said before you lay your head down on the pillow tonight, would you you make sure that you get this settled that you you talk to Jesus about this, and you put your faith in him.
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  And she told me yes, that she would do that.
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  And I, I don't always do in fact, I don't ever remember doing this before.
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  But I actually took out a gospel tract and wrote my name and address on the back of it.
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  And I just said, Sherry, would you just drop me a line and let me know that you've done that?
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  And she said, Yes.
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  Well, I'd love if it's okay with you to read the letter that she sent this, this came in the mail to me a month later.
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  And I just think it's really, really cool.
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  She starts Jeff Musgrave.
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  I don't know if you remember me, but I have something to tell you.
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  You sat next to me on an airplane going from Indianapolis to St.
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  Louis.
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  And you had changed seats with little girl.
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  She talks about those experiences as to who I was sitting next to.
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  And she said, I think anyway, you asked me if it was okay if you talk to me about God.
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  So that's, that's, that was her impression of that.
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  And I guess you thought at first I wasn't interested because of the expression I had on my face, but the expression had a reason for it, which at the time I didn't want anyone to
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  know about.
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  My reaction was,
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  Well, God, you've got me 35,000 feet in the air and now I can't run.
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  You told me you thought God put you there to talk to me.
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  Well, he did.
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  Before I went on my trip, I had been seeing several doctors and surgeons and found out that I had inflammatory breast cancer.
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  It was a cancer that only 5 % of women in the world get.
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  I knew that I was going back home, that I would be going through six to 12
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  months of chemotherapy, having a double mass, radical mastectomy, not to mention my long hair.
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  And then she knew paragraph, I told my daughter when I got home what had happened to me on the airplane.
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  And when you talk to me, and she began to cry.
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  She said everything is going to be okay.
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  And that I really didn't know how many people were talking to me.
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  She goes on to talk about the fact
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  that she and to thank me for talking to her and telling me what a wonderful person I am.
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  And really, it wasn't a wonderful person.
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  It was just simply working together in God's wonderful plan to reach that woman for Jesus.
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  I, I, that was the last I heard from her.
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  She closes, God bless you, Sherry, and never, never, never had another conversation with her.
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  But I believe that God
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  put me in the order of workers and he let me do a little reaping that day and I didn't sow, I didn't water, all I did was just come in and put in the sickle so to speak and God
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  did the work.
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  I just want to take a second and just for the audience, just look at that letter and recognize a couple of things.
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  One is as you were reading this letter, I mean, it's hard not to get emotional when you read a letter like that because number one, you realize the high risk, you know, handling
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  these opportunities the wrong way has an incredible price.
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  Now God, his plan never fails.
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  So it's impossible for us to put God's plan in jeopardy.
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  But when you're in the order of workers and you don't take the opportunity, the price could be high.
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  I think the second thing is the high reward.
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  Wow, I mean, who knew that's who's sitting next to you on an airplane.
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  That's what she's about to go through.
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  And that's what her I'm trying to imagine if that was my mom.
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  And I was child in that situation, the kid, not not a kid young, but you know, the adult child and mom comes home who I've been praying for and says God sent someone.
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  Wow.
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  I mean, you've just changed.
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  God has used you to change a family and all you did was take an opportunity where God had already been working.
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  um And you know how many of us sit on airplanes and dread it as Christians because we've heard in a sermon somewhere, you gotta witness if you're gonna get on an airplane, you
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  know, and so, and that's right, that's good.
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  But the way you're making it, know, that example, what it does is I think it encourages me
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  about a positive way to go about those situations instead of looking at it, hoping the seat next to you doesn't get filled and that the flight's not completely full.
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  You know what I mean?
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  Yeah, that's incredible.
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  just this last week, I had a chance to sit next to a woman that we had a really, really wonderful conversation.
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  She was already a believer, but got a chance to talk to her about our app and what we do.
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  And I think that the key to all of those kinds of connections is that we, we connect on a personal level first, and we don't just go in with our
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  spiel in our agenda, that we find out who this person is, she was getting married this summer, and she's super excited about what the Lord is doing in her life.
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  And, you know, those are the those are the connections that we saw first, and then we able to talk about where she is in her walk with God.
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  And I just think, if we can think in terms of relationship, and then using the relationship as a conduit,
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  for the gospel as opposed to just, you know, I've got my spiel, I'm going to say it.
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  That that really helps really, really helps.
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  Hmm.
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  You know, there's a couple things there.
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  mean, we talk about this all the time at the exchange.
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  Talk about be a person of risk, right?
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  Be somebody, no, sorry, not a person of risk.
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  What's the word?
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  Be a person of crisis.
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  Create crisis.
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  Make people choose.
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  crisis does come with risk.
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  mean, the two are connected for sure.
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  For sure, you have to be a risk taker to create a crisis, to create a sort of a crisis, be willing to take on a crisis.
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  I think the second thing is people taking an interest in them.
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  We've talked about this a lot.
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  You sit down next to somebody, it's not the first thing out of your mouth is, so, when you die, you going to heaven or you going to hell?
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  That's a really bad way to start.
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  What's your name?
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  Where are you going?
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  You know, what do you do?
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  know, and that taking that interest in somebody.
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  And I just think, again, I know you guys, listeners are hearing us talk about this all the time, but it's so important because I can't tell you how many believers I meet that have
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  never led somebody to Christ because they feel like this, that thing you just covered right there on how you went from stranger to having a conversation about a relationship
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  with God, that right there is.
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  feels like the biggest hurdle to a lot
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  Yeah.
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  And, frankly, it is a big hurdle.
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  And I, I will say this, I don't get there every time I ride an airplane.
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  In fact, I find that in the world we live in today, it is much, much more rare because everybody is in their own little digital world.
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  And I, it's much, much more difficult to be able to connect with people on a, on a personal relationship basis.
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  So I, I think that
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  what we cannot do is be compelled by guilt.
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  I have to do this.
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  But but a relationship of love and which we enjoy the person and want to want to share with that person the best thing that ever happened to me.
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  And uh that happens sometimes and it doesn't happen sometimes.
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  And I think God is the one that's why we're talking about divine appointments.
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  God is the one who has to open those doors.
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  And we talked about it last week.
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  We jiggle the doorknobs.
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  Well, they're not all unlocked and they're not all open doors.
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  And we're not going to feel guilty about the ones that aren't.
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  Hmm.
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  I love that.
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  You're right.
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  We should not be propelled by guilt, compelled by guilt, motivated by guilt.
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  It should be motivation of love.
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  We take the opportunities that God provides, but we don't force opportunities where there aren't any, you know?
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  And so I'm not gonna pull somebody's headphone off their ear and be like, hey, you got a second?
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  And I understand it's the world we live in.
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  So the next one on the list, you know you are in a divine appointment when somebody has an obvious interest uh or conviction.
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  of those.
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  And I think the reason that that this one is said this way is because the Bible says, no one seeks after God.
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  So when we find someone who appears to be seeking after God, they they are genuinely interested, you know, this is something that they want to talk about.
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  Or they have clearly been impacted.
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  by something that was said in the conversation about the Lord.
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  We can be confident that's not the work of the flesh.
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  That's not just a happenstance.
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  That's that's the Holy Spirit.
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  And I think we might have mentioned this last week.
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  Frankly, I talk about this all the time, so I never know where I talked about it.
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  But
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  We don't actually see wind.
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  We only see evidences of wind.
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  The Holy Spirit is like, in fact, the word numas is the same word for breath or wind.
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  And I think it's used that way on purpose, you're not going to actually see the Holy Spirit, you only see evidence of what he did.
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  And when we see someone genuinely interested, someone under conviction, I mean, when I'm talking to someone,
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  and I'm telling them about God's holiness and I'm using the law and I began to say, you know, the Bible says in the 10 commandments, we're not supposed to lie.
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  And then I just, I always do it this way.
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  You know, I know I've told a lie.
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  I wonder if you'd be willing to answer this question.
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  Have you ever told a lie?
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  And when I watched that person go, yeah, yeah, I've done that.
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  And you know, what is that?
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  That's the conviction of the Holy Spirit helping them recognize that was wrong and I shouldn't have done that.
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  that's, whenever I see that, again, that's like those neon lights.
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  God is saying, I'm here.
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  It's not just cool, it's God.
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  it's, God is literally saying, I'm here.
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  I am working in this circumstance.
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  This is a place for you to invest.
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  invest time and face invest relationship.
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  Take that risk.
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  You know, those are the things that I'm encouraged to do when I when I begin to see that.
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  Hmm sounds sounds just like when I met Cody he was looking and You know what?
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  find really humbling about this one number three is You know, you're in a divine appointment when you see, know conviction or interest is Really means we never can take
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  credit for these things I mean God is the orchestrator of all of them and I can't produce conviction in somebody I can't make you convicted.
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  I have to be careful
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  because people sometimes when they do a gospel conversation feel like they have to emotionally manipulate to evoke a certain decision, and that's spiritual malpractice.
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  And I think what everybody listening, what really want the laborers to get out of what you just said is this is so comforting that when God gets it to that point where he wants the
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  conviction and the interest to be there, he'll put it there through his word, through the truth.
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  you never have to feel the responsibility to be a used car salesman.
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  I think that's what evidence number three of divine appointments really kind of, it relieves us of that.
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  I gotta sell this and did I do a bad job selling it and that's why they didn't accept it?
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  No, it's not how it works.
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  Yeah, years ago, I knew a godly uh woman who is a great disciple maker.
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  And she said to me, and it's one of those things that I've it just has always stuck with me, Jeff, you can trust the Holy Spirit that this is not about us.
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  manufacturing a response in a person drumming up business.
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  uh This is just us walking with God and believing that God is still in the saving business.
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  He's still wooing people to himself.
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  And I'm just a mouthpiece.
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  I sang a song in church last week called Channels Only and the idea is an old song and it just means we are a channel of God's working in the world around us.
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  Hmm.
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  Yep.
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  I love that.
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  And by the way, you stack these three evidences, right?
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  God has already been at work.
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  Somebody else has already talked to them about this and they have conviction and or interest.
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  Wow.
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  Yeah, then the next one is really, quick.
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  And frankly, it doesn't it doesn't tag on as strong as those three do.
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  But I think that it's one of those moments at which we think, Oh, this is God here.
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  Here's here's the way it's stated, you know, you're in a divine appointment, when the Lord leads you to say something you don't normally say.
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  Mmm.
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  don't know if you've been in this kind of a conversation, but it's almost like sometimes you quote a verse you didn't even know you knew.
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  And uh it's like, Whoa, how did that come from?
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  And, uh again, that's that's the Holy Spirit.
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  So all of these and really what we're saying divine appointments are that they're literally God, the Holy Spirit, connecting us with people that he's working in their
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  lives.
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  And this is one of those circumstances in which the evidence is more
• 21:53
  me, not them, because I don't know if you've ever observed this, but sometimes, even when a person is not responsive, I still go away thinking God was in that God was talking to
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  that person.
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  And so this is one that it's really primarily I noticed it about myself.
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  I give you just a story about this one.
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  This is not a Bible verse.
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  I was sitting
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  next to an air guy in an airplane.
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  And not all of my conversations are like this, but we're just I don't know why airplane stores are coming up today.
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  But this guy had been any, he told me he'd been studying Buddhism, and he had become a Buddhist recently.
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  And I am
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  probably from a guilt perspective, thinking I need to talk to him about the Lord, but I don't know how to go from he's, he's just become a Buddhist, to let me talk to you about
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  Jesus.
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  And so I was, I was raking my brain, and I'm, praying, just almost begging, God, God, give me, you know, a way to be able to get to the gospel here.
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  And what I did instead,
• 22:58
  ah is I just started asking him questions about what he was learning and what he would what they were teaching him.
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  And while he's doing that, it's like there's this voice in my head saying, ask him how that's working for him.
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  And I, I frankly didn't want to do that, because it sounded a little sarcastic to me.
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  And I, I try to connect with people on a um basis and not a sarcastic basis.
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  And, and yet,
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  I just couldn't get away from it.
• 23:26
  And so he went through these four stages of, of getting towards Nirvana that he's working towards.
• 23:32
  And he's telling me all about what he's learning.
• 23:35
  And I actually looked at him with genuine interest and genuine concern for him and said, how's that working for you?
• 23:44
  And he looked at me and he said, not very good.
• 23:46
  It was like,
• 23:50
  all of a sudden, there is this open door.
• 23:53
  And I said, Well, you know, it's interesting that you were talking about these four levels of movement towards Nirvana.
• 23:59
  He said, I, I talked to people all the time about God, and we actually talk about four things that God tells us about himself.
• 24:07
  And boom, was right in the gospel conversation.
• 24:10
  And uh I've never done that in my life, never.
• 24:14
  But I just, felt like it was the Holy Spirit leading me to say, so how's that working for you?
• 24:21
  And I just feel like, okay, that's how God works.
• 24:26
  That's not how I work, but I can trust Him to do what He's gonna do.
• 24:30
  Hmm.
• 24:30
  Hmm.
• 24:31
  That's incredible.
• 24:32
  So, in review, for those of you that are listening, you know you're in a divine appointment when God's already been at work, you know you're in a divine appointment when
• 24:41
  somebody's already talked to them, you know you're in a divine appointment when there is conviction and or interest, and you know you're in a divine appointment when you say
• 24:50
  something you would never normally say and God led you to say it.
• 24:53
  That
• 24:54
  That is awesome.
• 24:55
  mean, I can't think of anything more encouraging.
• 24:58
  And this is so important that we just have to continue it.
• 25:00
  I gotta hear the other five.
• 25:02
  I think everybody that's listening to this has to hear the other five.
• 25:06
  Before you guys go, I just wanna say thank you to our audience.
• 25:09
  I mean, you guys are incredible listeners.
• 25:10
  I can tell you're sharing this podcast with other people, because it keeps growing.
• 25:15
  think we're about 10,000 listeners that have listened to the podcast.
• 25:19
  And so I just wanna...
• 25:21
  Thank you so much for that.
• 25:22
  All of this is made possible by our generous donors.
• 25:25
  The books don't really pay for the bottom line of the ministry in terms of expenses.
• 25:30
  The donors make that happen.
• 25:32
  And if you could spare for the cost of a pizza, the cost of a cup of coffee, $10 a month in a regular donation, reoccurring donation, that's the kind of donation that makes what
• 25:43
  the exchange does in the United States with hundreds of churches.
• 25:46
  tens of thousands of laborers, what it does internationally overseas, giving the material free to missionaries, free to all those efforts across the world.
• 25:55
  That is all made possible by people like you.
• 25:58
  And I just want to say thank you.
• 26:00
  Yeah, yeah.
• 26:02
  Just this week, I got an invitation from a pregnancy crisis, crisis pregnancy center, and we sent them four different PDFs of the Bible study, uh so that they could be using it.
• 26:16
  And we're not charging them for that.
• 26:18
  They're going to be using that when people give these are the kinds of things that they're enabling us to be able to do.
• 26:25
  Well, I mean, that's huge, a crisis pregnancy center.
• 26:28
  I mean, that's, I think, one of the things that every Christian that I know is extremely passionate about, and that's a perfect example of what we're talking about.
• 26:36
  The other thing I would say to you guys is, you know, even if you're not a pastor, go talk to your pastor.
• 26:40
  like, hey, have you ever heard of these guys?
• 26:41
  You could reach out to me.
• 26:43
  I'll talk with your pastor for you if you want me to, you know, kind of be like, this is what our ministry does, but what Jeff and Anna do and what I believe they're world class
• 26:51
  at, I'll brag on them since I'm not them.
• 26:54
  is they go in and they train laborers for the harvest.
• 26:57
  I mean, they really come in and encourage a church that could be downtrodden a little bit, discouraged about evangelism.
• 27:05
  Maybe you're struggling to see biblical growth in your church, evangelistic growth.
• 27:10
  Jeff is the exact guy that you want to come in and just say, hey, this is what the Bible says.
• 27:16
  This is possible.
• 27:17
  Don't let Satan tell you it's not.
• 27:19
  And so if your church could use that, reach out to us.
• 27:22
  My email is george at exchangemessage.org.
• 27:25
  If you want to be one of our reoccurring donors for $10 a month, you can give to exchangemessage forward slash donate.
• 27:32
  And we'd be excited about either opportunity.
• 27:36
  And we thank our Lord Jesus Christ for all that he's provided and given.
• 27:39
  And pray with us as we pray to the Lord of the harvest that he would send forth laborers.
• 27:44
  We don't have an opportunity problem.
• 27:46
  There's not a lack of divine appointments.
• 27:48
  There is a lack of people who are willing to rise up and take the opportunity and present Jesus Christ to the lost.
• 27:56
  And uh we want to have gospel conversations, introduce them to a person.
• 28:01
  So be praying with us that God would do that work.
• 28:04
  We love you guys.
• 28:05
  We'll see you next week.