Latest / CraveMore / Is The Church In Trouble?
Transcript
- Victoria: you you Victoria Grant: Welcome and thank you for joining us. I'm Victoria Grant, alongside of my husband Mark. And we are so excited to be formally launching Crave Moore Ministries. Absolutely. We are we are recording today from Funky Frog. See that? From East Texas, a studio in East Texas where they're guests. And we are really glad to be here. Absolutely. Crave Moore has been two years in the making. And so the question we want to ask and we are going to answer today is: why another Christian podcast? What is driving our passion? And it is simply this. We believe the church is in trouble. Absolutely. The church what we're seeing happen right now in the church is concerning to us and is really driving a passion. And we've been looking into some different things. And Victoria, you recently came across some research from the Barner Group. Why don't you share some of that? Because that's really core to this. So one of the things when we say the church is in trouble, we want you to know we love the local church. We love her and we know that God has great things for her. But this is what we've uncovered. Covered. 53% of self-identified Christians, American Christians, has stated that the God of the Bible has no existing spiritual authority over them. So half of the believers who self-identify say God is not their authority. Problematic. That is definitely problematic. It's shocking. It's truly shocking. Especially when you look at scripture, and scripture is is directly contrary to that. God has all authority. And Jesus said at the end of Matthew, Matthew 28, I've been given all authority. Yeah. So also 22% of self-identified Christians did not include Jesus Christ among their living spiritual authority. So Christ has no authority in their lives. 22% of self-identified Christians, Jesus has no authority in their life. No authority, and yet Jesus said in John chapter 5, verse 23, he said, He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. And there was another passage during the Transfiguration, if you remember, when Jesus took Peter and John and James up during the Transfiguration. Voice from heaven said, This is my son. Listen to him. Listen to him. But we're saying he doesn't have authority. He doesn't have authority in our lives. We aren't saying that. Absolutely not. This is a problem. This is a problem. Eleven percent of these self-identified Christians worship God but not Jesus. 31% worship Jesus but not God. And 36%, more than a third, worship both God and Jesus, but they don't recognize Holy Spirit. Spirit. my. And in in in the Gospels, Jesus is talking to the disciples, he's speaking with Pharisees, and he says very clearly that sins spoken against the Son can be forgiven, but he says a sin against the Holy Spirit, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven. And so to deny to deny him the third part of the of the triune God, the Trinity, is is unbelievable. But that's what is in the church. These are shocking to us so we've been walking with the Lord for forty years. So another statistic that really had me trouble, sixty-four percent, nearly two-thirds of of US eighteen to twenty-nine year olds who grew up in the church, they now have withdrawn from church involvement. So these are our future leaders. These are the s the kids we raised and we encouraged and exhorted in the faith and now they have walked away. Two thirds of that demographic who would be our future leaders are not even engaged in the local church. And that is a problem. It's a huge problem in this research that you came across listed several examples or or reasons as to why. So we're gonna go through those very quickly. Very quickly, but share them. Yeah, there were six things stated in this article called Faith for Exiles, and this is what their research showed. out of this demographic, they feel the church isolates them and has not prepared them for the world that they are living in. Now you and I, if you're around our age, we are retired, and we didn't face what some of the the students and young adults and even the younger generations just behind us are facing. So they feel that they are not prepared to live in a world. The church has not prepared them for that. They also feel that their church experience Lacks deep spiritual substance. And I think that is so alarming to us both because church, as as we grew up, as as we formed our family, church was center to our lives. And there was such a a depth to it because there was always teaching. There were people that came alongside you, you understood and experienced, but what that is telling me. and us is that church isn't imparting life into these eighteen to twenty nine years. At least in this demographics. The other thing, point number three that they point out is young adults perceive the church as anti intellectual. And having raised three sons, who are very intellectual, I really can tell you that this is true. I have seen my sons want to engage at a deeper level on an intellectual basis, but they were rebuffed. They were somewhat turned away because church leaders couldn't really grapple with their intellect as they tried to grapple with their faith as young adults. And I can see where that is still true today. And within that, it wasn't that there was any contention, it was Help me understand this. Let's dig deeper. But there was a level of of authority within the church that was, well, this is what the Bible says, so just take it at face value. No one's disputing that. But you've got to teach it, you've got to go deeper and bring about those applications and really encourage the exploration into the world. Don't discourage it. Right, don't shut it down. So seventeen percent of the same demographic with young Christians, they believed that they were judged in the church. That they were judged for their mistakes. And that is a huge concern to me because he who is without sin, let him cast that first stone. So we understand. We know that we are sinners. We are fallible. And we cannot afford to to not show grace and mercy and kindness while we are sharing truth and walking people through their faith, this journey that they are on. So to judge and to feel judged, first of all, that's a terrible feeling. No one wants to feel judged. Now Repentance of course and forgiveness is all part of that. We don't want to miss those elements of it. But we don't want young adults to feel like they have no place to be real and to share what they're struggling with. Absolutely. Scripture is very clear. you've gotta be able to share that, but to the sense of feeling condemned Paul wrote, There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. In the book of Matthew, Jesus said, Do not judge lest you be judged, for the way you judge, you shall be judged. That's a hard word. You think about that if we're going to sit in judgment on somebody who's fallen. But you brought up the woman who had been cast before Jesus, and Jesus said, He who is without sin cast the first stone. If you remember, he then turned to the woman and he said, Woman, where are your accusers? And she said, There are none. And Jesus said, I don't accuse you either. Go and sin no more. So if Jesus isn't going to accuse, who are we? We better get off our highlights. Absolutely. We better walk with young adults and walk with other people that are struggling in their faith because They're walking away from the church and they are walking away from Jesus Christ. So let's stop. Let's stop with the judging and let's walk alongside each other in the word. Lastly, cited in this research was that the church again was not a safe place to wrestle with their faith, which caused this demographic to feel like they needed to hide. They needed to not be themselves. There was more anxiety, there was more depression, and there was doubt. So if you do not feel safe to say to somebody this is It's what I'm struggling with or this is what I've done. Where will be the the guidance and the mercy and the praying with people to help them get right with the Lord? Where will be driving them back to the Word so they can figure out what God says about some of the things that are happening in their lives? Because if the if the church isn't there to do that, then people will go elsewhere. They'll wonder they'll go to other places who will say, Don't worry about it, that's not so bad. There are others like you. It's okay and they will actually embrace the fall as opposed to to encourage and exhort to walk away. But if the church isn't there to receive and to love and to walk alongside, they will turn elsewhere. And and that is tragic. So why crave more? We said we believe the church is in trouble. What is crave more all about? We are called as a ministry to unpack the word of God for the purpose of impacting people. And it's not just for you up there. We we do this with one another. We unpack God's word. We go deeper. We're going to inspire each other and inspire you to mind the depths of scripture, to go below the surface. There are hidden gems that God has hidden for us, and He wants us to uncover them, but we need Do that by going to his word. Absolutely. Cravemore is a ministry where, as we unpack that word, we're going to present to you different tools that we have used to bring forth the true meaning or the better understanding of scripture. By that we mean looking at the context. When was this passage written? Who was it written to? Who is it written by? What else is around that particular verse that leads into it? So that we have a clearer understanding of what the passage really is to be meaning us and how we apply that. And we don't see that as often in the church as we'd like to see. We see it in just a quick skim. Here's the word, we give a little application and away we go. But there's so much. You know, if that sermon goes past 17 minutes, boy, we're looking at our watch, and that really there's so much more. We cannot exhaust God. We can't exhaust his word. We want you to be excited about it. We want you to be thorough. Thrilled to be in his word and to mind those depths. The other thing that we want to do as a ministry is to invite you on a journey. You're not alone. No, we're not a brick and mortar church. We are a ministry, but we want to encourage you, we want to exhort you. And so you can go to info at cravemore.org and you can write questions out. You can ask what certain passages mean, and you can even put some topics in there that you would like to see us do. Discuss and we'll bring those on camera. And you use the word exhort. That's not a word we use frequently in today's vernacular. So when we say we want to exhort somebody, what do you what do you mean? We want to encourage you. We want you to walk faithfully with God. We want to see your faith grow, just like we want to see our relationship with Christ grow. We want to encourage you as well. And in that process, this is something that Victoria and I have practiced. for for the 40 years of our marriage where we will be individually and together in scripture, in word, in devotion, and we'll ask each other, what are you reading? What what is that applying to you? What is that meaning? Or we'll pick up something and say, Wow I've never seen this. I've read that passage hundreds of times, and now God is showing me something new. That's part of the exhortation. And that's part of the community of the word, right? Yes. To encourage one another. So we're gonna hunger and thirst for righteousness. Cravemore was built off of and developed under Matthew five, six, and you'll recognize the passage if you don't already. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they what? They will be satisfied. They will be satisfied. So we want to encourage people to seek the kingdom of God in a way that pleases God and satisfies the longings of our own souls. Right? Because there are ways and places that we can go for different cravings, for different forms of satisfaction. Sure. But they never truly satisfy, do they? at some point we'll go into some of our testimonies in future podcasts and share about that. We've gone through those experiences. We have. So some of the things that we do hunger for, if you are in social media, if you watch TV, if you're, you know, on a social platform at all, you'll see what people and in the culture, what people are hungering and thirsting for, and how that can oppose God, oppose his word. And so a couple things that I took away just even recently was the hunger and thirst for power. Used for personal gain. You know, we talk about this. Power isn't a bad thing. If power defines you and power makes you trample over people and you don't use it for good, then that's gonna put yourself on your own throne, It'll be all about you and you hurt people in the process and you hurt and wound your own soul because you'll start following yourself and you won't go to God's word. Power power's a real thing. that you have to wrestle with. And it can be used for good. So power is not bad. It's how do you use it and what does it define inside of you? Absolutely. and one of the Beatitudes, Jesus said, Blessed are the meek, right? What is meekness? Power under control. Power under control. So God's not afraid of power. and He's not afraid about power in us. It's how we use it and does it use us to hurt other people. Exactly. We can hunger for success. Success is not bad. No. I went through a 40 year business career. Successful business career. And it was successful. We had a great deal of success in the different businesses that I was in. And we enjoyed that and we celebrated that. Success in and of itself isn't bad. We would never ever speak against that. But if that is what defines Correct. If that is all that motivates you, is the next success, the next trophy. Emptiness, and you'll never be satisfied. It won't be enough. It won't be enough. Matthew five, six is to hunger and to long for what is right, and to long to be made whole, and to be made holy. And that's the scripture that comes with a promise to be satisfied. And yet when we're satisfied, when Jesus really satisfies the longings of our heart, we'll come back and thirst for more of Him. He'll fill us with more of Himself again and again and again. It's like when when you've been out and you find a great source of fresh water. And you drink from that. And then you go and well here's tap water or here's this source of water. You continue to go back to that one source that always satisfies, that always refreshes, that always fills you because you know nothing else will be satisfying quite the same. Here's a funny little story actually. Yesterday we went to a little diner here in East Texas and I just got water with my meal. Well, anyone who knows me knows I'm not a water fan. I don't really like water. I know I need It and I drank a glass of it, and I was like, Man, I just drank that down with I said to Mark, it's the best water I've ever had. So I got a second glass, and actually, as we came into the studio today, I thought to myself, I wonder if I can go to that diner and get a glass of water because I haven't tasted water that good. And I was like, Okay, I'm thirsty now for something that really satisfied good, good water. Well, that's Jesus. Good, good, and you go back to get satisfied because it does satisfy, but there's there's more. Than just power, and there's more than just success. We as people, individuals, we're human beings, we want to be noticed, we want to be accepted. We want to be known, we want to be seen, we want to have peace with ourselves, we want to have peace with God. We hunger to have peace with other people, we want to be accepted, we want to be part of a community, we want to have a purpose, right? Bigger than ourselves. Where do we find That kind of satisfaction. Where would we get that information? Well, God's word satisfies. He will speak. The Holy Spirit speaks to us and He sees us. He knows us. He is our community. Even if there was never any other community, He is and will never leave us. He is our our community. We want to keep pointing you back to the truth of God's word. And with acceptance. We're always looking, what do I have to do? Do I have to dress a certain way? Do I have to speak a certain way? Do I have to know the current slang? What do I do so that I can fit in? And God is not like that. He loves us just as we are. He loves us because he formed us, he made us, he knows us. And Jesus accepts us not for what we can become, but for who we are. We don't need to do anything further. So we crave and we have to decide in today's society where will we get our satisfaction? Where will we be satisfied? And God says it's gonna be Him. He will satisfy those. So why crave more? Let's get back to that. Why us? Why now? What's going on with us that we feel such urgency? the pressures of this time right now are so significant. And I'm certain you feel it. You you can't look at the news, Victoria mentioned that a little bit ago. You can't look at social media and not see what's happening. We feel urgency. There is an urgent call for the church. There's an urgent call for us as believers who are the church. Right. There's such an urgency because the time is coming near. And that urgency is created. Something within us driving our life and driving this ministry. And what does that urgency create? I feel like for both Mark and I, and I hope for you too, that the urgency of the times is building inside of us a very deep passion. Absolutely. We are passionate about God's word. We are passionate to see the church be everything she was ever meant to be. I've been in ministry since 2007 and maybe even before that. And if Jesus Christ gave his life, he died for For the church, you and I, people, not a building. He died for his creation. Then we want to see her be everything she is supposed to be. And right now we think she's struggling. Right now we think she is in trouble. So the urgency for us is to inspire, to encourage, to exhort, to walk alongside, to speak truth. Even when it's not popular. We also have that passion. I'm sorry, we also have that passion for his word. Because his word defines us, his word defines himself. His word from Genesis chapter Integrated message that is a continual theme that shows God desires presence with us. Yes. God exhibits his love for us. God exhibits his mercy towards us. God exhibits his desire for us to be in communion with him. But within that passion for the word, we have such great respect for it because we see where the word is being misapplied or misused. And we'll touch on that in a bit, but that passion for the word. is so key to crave more. And I think too, not only do we see where there are false teachers right now, we're gonna jump into that here in just a minute. But there is nothing on this planet besides the living presence of Jesus Christ in his word that transforms lives. That's the source. He is it. He's the source. And so that is one reason why we're passionate. But we also are urgent and we feel this sense of urgency because recently we have been listening to and watching modern day false teachers currently speaking some of the most outrageous claims regarding Christianity. Mark and I recently watched a message and we're gonna go ahead and say the name out loud because this is a public statement. James Tallerico from Texas. We watched him preach. He is a state representative in Texas running for a Senate seat. He's also seeking a master's degree in divinity. So he's looking at an MDV and he preached and these are his words. This is in quote, Jesus was a radical feminist. God is non-binary and there are six biological sexes. Those things just they they just crush my soul when I hear them because it is a person taking human terms, terminology, and using them to shape God, the all-being, the all-knowing, the ever-present, Alpha Omega. They're taking these terms to create and form God into an image that works for for them. Makes us feel comfortable, makes us feel comfortable. Justifies their their style of living or their their choices or their beliefs. And nothing could be further from the truth. So let's take a couple of those bit by bit. Let's talk about God is non-binary, God is spirit. To take some the term non-binary and say that that it's a male-female thing completely obliterates who God is. And in James Talerico specifically uses the book of Galatians, chapter 3, verse 28, to justify his position because he says, Well, the Bible says that there's neither male nor female. Time out. Let's go back to context. What is Paul writing about? He's writing to new believers who are facing an influx of false teaching. And he is saying, Listen, now that you're in Christ, he is your identity. No longer does Christ see you and I or others, and this is Paul's writing, as Jew or Gentile. He doesn't see you as a free or a slave person. He doesn't see you as male or female. You are equal, all equal within Christ. He never said that now in Christ it negates your gender, it negates your ethnicity, it negates your position or status in in life. None of that. All he said is our identity is now in Christ, so stop looking at somebody and creating their identity based on other things. They're in Christ. So one thing we just want to be really clear about. This isn't about a political party. This isn't about anything else other than the public square and someone speaking from a place of authority. Someone speaking from a spiritual authority and also as a state rep running for Senate. You can see this in a lot of places. You can see this in the pulpit today. You can see this from men, you can see this from women, you can see this from both sides of the aisle. our passion is that you would know the Word of God. And you would be able to identify what is false because in that falsehood is intertwined a little bit of truth. And isn't that what Satan did to Eve? Did God really say? Did God really say You gotta know the word and these outrageous claims just simply are not true. Well let's talk about radical feminism for a moment. If you read the book of Luke, just a moment. Just a moment. if you look at the book of Luke, the passage in Galatians, Jesus loves women. And there's no question in that society, in that time period, women were in a second class. No question in in any way, shape, or form. And we see through Luke and other gospels where Jesus really affirmed women in their role in his ministry. Right. But That's not radical feminism. That is just Jesus being Jesus. Loving people. his full love and full authority. And the fact that John chapter 1 says, He created everything. This is his love. This is his passion. So to apply a term and say, well, he's a feminist because no, that's our term. Right. So radical though. I I just want to be clear. The things that Jesus taught and the things that Jesus said in the New Testament before the church was started, was radical in the sense that it was very counter-cultural and he was addressing issues with the Pharisee. so we understand the term, we do not label Jesus as a radical. He was coming against the culture of its time, so we don't label him a feminist. We cannot find that in Scripture. And it's wrong to use those terms to justify our own actions. Well, Jesus was a radical, so I'm gonna be radical. No, Jesus. came to love so instead we should just love. We're gonna talk about another gentleman here recently that we came across. And again, he's a public figure, he is a pastor in a local church in Kansas. He happens to pastor the largest Methodist church in America. He has a platform, he's coming at this with authority. He is also running for the Senate seat in Kansas. Yes. And so again, when we hear outrageous claims about God and about scripture, we feel the need to not be silent. And so it isn't about a person. This isn't personal. We want to pray for these people We just want to say we can't sit silent. There's a term called affirmation by silence and we are feeling this passion as Victoria describes, such that we can no longer be silent. So I'm gonna read an excerpt from a book by Adam Hamilton. and the book is called Seeing Gray in a World of Black and White. And he wrote this in the early two thousands. And in the book he he goes through several different scenarios. In this specific one, he's talking about About Muslims, he's talking about Hindus, he's talking about other religions and whether or not they're going to be in heaven. And even if they were approaching God or trying to understand God, would they be in heaven? And so here's what he writes. We say that God forms such persons, these the people of other religions, in their mothers' wombs, which is true. God said, I knew you when I formed you in the womb. So there's a little truth there. He knows them by name, that's true, loves them, that's true, sees and hears every prayer they utter, and surely sees their attempts to do what is right as they understand it. What do we see in the Old Testament? We see people doing what is right in their own eyes, not by God's standards, but by our and Isaiah said that our righteousness is but filthy rags, so so much for our own righteousness. And he goes on, is it really the gospel truth that God then stands by and watches as they perish? Does God stand by and watch as they perish? No. No, I can't. God sent his son so that none should perish and have everlasting life. So how can somebody say God just stands by as like he's, you know, snacking on some peanuts or something and says, Well, another person just perished in and so nonchalant. There is nothing further from the truth. There was nothing passive about Jesus Christ coming to earth, sacrificing himself, giving his life for us, paying a debt we couldn't pay. So that we would not have to perish. Absolutely. He goes on. Not only so, but must we believe as Christians that God has designed an eternal punishment, a torment for them? Because though they sought God, they did not understand that Jesus is the Christ. Design eternal punishment? Where would you find in scripture that God designed a place of hell and torment for people? He didn't. Matthew 25 states very clearly, Jesus said that hell was created for Satan and his demons. That's what hell was created for, Satan and his demons. Again, John three sixteen and seventeen, read it, read it, read it. God so loved, so that none should perish. None. That is not God's heart. But yet this is a person who is leading a church and leading into government office, weaving some basic truths here. With lies. But incorrectly. Yeah. And it is applying scripture caution. Taking scripture out of context. So why the urgency behind Cravemore? We know that false teachers have infiltrated the church for centuries. That is not new. Nope. Their claims of preaching a gospel that is really no Gospel at all is distorting the truth. And at Cravemore we really believe that God's word provides what the world craves. And we want to just keep talking about it. Absolutely. And we want to share the truth. Truth has a name, and his name is Jesus. Absolutely. We want to share hope. We want to share our faith. We want to share love with you. And we want you to be aware of what's being said in the marketplace, what's being said on social media. And we want to encourage you to stay Christ-centered and kingdom focused. We are called to discern. What's being said. And so we really just want to encourage that very, very quickly. Matthew 13. Mark, give us the context very quickly about what Matthew 13 is and what does it mean that there is a leaven in the branch. Sure. So Matthew 13 is a passage, Jesus is speaking to Jewish people, his disciples and others, and he's sharing about what the kingdom is to look like. And he goes through several passages, parables, and most of them are familiar to us that read scripture. And one of the initial ones is about wheat and tares. That there's a farmer who sows wheat, but an enemy comes in and sows tares in the field, and that's discovered. Why that's so significant is the tares grow up and they look identical to wheat up until the point of harvest. Right. And Jesus is saying the enemy is going to sow people that look like you that look like Christmas. Sound like him, but they're not. They're not. They're not, and you won't know till the end. But here's what's really significant is further down, he talks about a woman who sows leaven into a lump of dough. And again, remembering context, remembering who his audience is, for the Jewish, leaven equates to sin. And so to tell a Jewish audience there was a woman who intentionally put sin Into the bread leavened, that they would be aghast at that. And I've heard several people, several pastors, numerous, well-learned people use this as a way to say, well, that's like the church, because once the church gets into the core of humanity, it's going to expand and grow. Well, that's a nice analogy, but that's not the context or content in there. It means that there are individuals who will come with intent. And put that leaven in there into the dough. Right. So that is one of our driving passions here at Cravemore. We ask and encourage you, whenever you hear something, search scripture. Right. What you hear from us. Search scripture so that you know that it's true, that it's accurate. So as we launch this brand new ministry, we understand that the times are urgent. We understand that there are false teachers. We understand that the word of God is the answer. And we want to keep sharing that with you. And there's another reason the Bible talks about an apostasy. We don't use that word either very much, but it's a falling away, a falling away from the teachings of Jesus Christ. And we want to encourage you, go back to the Word, keep your life. Christ-centered and kingdom-focused. 1 Thessalonians 2.3 talks about a falling away. 2 Peter 2.20 talks about a falling away. 1 Timothy 4.1 talks about a falling away. So we want you to read that for yourself. We want you to be aware of that. Absolutely. And recognize that why is that so significant? And maybe you think, boy, you guys are really on false teachers. Well, yes, we are. And it's causing a falling. Away. Why? Because as you read those passages that Victoria shared and numerous others leading into the book of Revelation, we recognize the urgency because it says the apostasy will take place, people will fall away, people's love will grow cold, and that's what we see happening, which means that clock you hear ticking. Is getting sooner and sooner and sooner. Okay. That's the urgency. So to wrap it all up, why us, why now, I think we have shared that with you. we believe the church is in trouble. We have shared that with you. We believe that the future leaders of The movement of Christ and following Christ are being drawn away from the church and drawn away from the teachings of Jesus. And at Crave More, we want to build a community that keeps seeking God, keeps seeking His Word, and growing in their faith. We don't want to build a church. We want to support the church. Absolutely. We encourage you, be part of your local church. We simply want to be a community that you can come alongside and we encourage each other. here's our promise. We promise to be intentional. We're gonna be intentional with our time, intentional with our topics. We will handle the word with accuracy and integrity, and we will encourage you to grow in the faith. Listen, we said the church was in trouble, but I'm gonna tell you this as we close. College campuses all around America right now, there's a surge of young adults, revivals actually going on, where kids are just getting baptized in the dead of winter in the back of people's pickup trucks. There's a movement going on and we want to see them encouraged in the faith. We want to see them grow up in the faith and we want to see them take their place. So we're not down on the local church. We love the local church and we want to see her grow. We want to encourage you. We didn't go over our bios. We didn't tell you everything about Cravemore. We'll encourage you to go to our website at cravemore.org. You can read all about us. You can read about our past and where God has had us before and where we think that He is leading us. Absolutely. And as you go through that, you'll see that we're in this journey with you. And we want you to come along with us. Absolutely. And why is that? Because we're gonna tell you what we tell ourselves all the time. Follow us as we follow Christ. we look forward to you joining us next time where we're gonna get into some deep stuff We're gonna talk about the spiritual realm. We're gonna talk about spiritual warfare and explore: is the spiritual realm real? We know that pulpits right now are discounting that and really discounting sin and how. So we're gonna address that topic. We're gonna address it from the word and we're gonna talk about not just darkness, but the best part. Authority victory. That's right. Jesus Christ has given us all authority, and we're gonna point those things out. So until next time, follow us as we follow Christ. Victoria: Bye!