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God Doesn't Need Crowds · Bible Tract Echoes Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, friend.
• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome back to Bible Tract Echoes.
• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Michael Curry, your host.
• 0:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so very much for listening in today.
• 0:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, there are times when the Lord makes it very easy to write a message out.
• 0:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: Those of you that have ever even taught a sunny school lesson or preached to God's people.
• 0:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it was in a nursing home.
• 0:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it was in junior church.
• 0:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it was a full-fledged church service, revival service for some of you, or maybe a preacher you've done missions, conferences, or teen camps, I've been blessed to be a part of many of those endeavors.
• 0:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: But it's such a blessing to know when God is right in the message for you.
• 0:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: When you're not just trying to work out something that it wasn't meant to be.
• 0:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe you maybe even isn't
• 0:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: You get halfway into something like, man, I just don't think I can prove that from Scripture and like, all right?
• 0:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I got to trash that and we got to come back at it.
• 1:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: Much to do about nothing.
• 1:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: What it's a blessing when the Lord directs your steps.
• 1:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: not just in the sermon preparation, but in life in general.
• 1:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: When the Lord draws your attention to something that, if I can put it this way, that he is looking for.
• 1:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Something that on your own, you might not have noticed.
• 1:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: Something that by yourself would not have been on your radar.
• 1:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: It wouldn't have pinged, it wouldn't have made you say, oh, oh, I need to pay attention right here.
• 1:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: But God grabs you, like you might do with a toddler when they won't look at you.
• 1:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you just take them by the head and just kind of just very gently, very gingerly, just turn them so their eyes have to find yours.
• 1:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: And he is a, hey, now listen here, bud, or listen here, sis, you need to pay attention.
• 1:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: And oftentimes, the Lord will do that in study, so blessed by that.
• 1:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not talking about extra revelation, it always comes from God's Word.
• 2:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: But in experiencing that,
• 2:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's amazing to know that we, I'll speak for myself that I, so often strive, struggle, to look anywhere, but where God wants me to look, to pay attention to anything, except for what God wants me to pay attention to.
• 2:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes God, or often times, God is looking for something different than what I'm looking for.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Humanity.
• 2:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: often we look to be the best.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: God tells us the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.
• 2:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: My daughters were learning in school not long ago in their Bible class about how, when the master of the feast, they called you to his house and says, come on over, don't go sit at the high table in the big room where the nice spread goes sit at the low table.
• 2:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: And let the master of the place call you up, instead of,
• 3:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: God forbid you sit at the right hand of the master of the house and get told actually there's someone more important.
• 3:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: You need to scoot on down.
• 3:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: but we look to be the best.
• 3:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: We look to be the boldest.
• 3:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Seems like on social media, everyone is trying to one up each other.
• 3:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're trying to overdo it.
• 3:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: When I say overdo it, we've already overdone it.
• 3:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's hard, we are hard pressed to view the inanity and the trash that is on our phone screens, on our TVs without realizing,
• 3:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: We are living anti-biblical.
• 3:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Everyone is about themselves, about their follower accounts, about how many views about how many likes we do so by being the boldest.
• 3:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: we do so by being the biggest.
• 3:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: We want to do things bigger and better and bolder, then have come before us.
• 3:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: And with that comes so many pitfalls.
• 3:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: When you walk outside of the lamp that is to our feet and the light to our path, the Bible, there are many pitfalls there and we can twist an ankle or worship it.
• 4:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I wonder if God is looking for something different to what men are looking for, what is God looking for?
• 4:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, God is looking for the fragments.
• 4:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: We learned on, I think it was Tuesday, that the book of John, God is looking for, John chapter 6, those fragments that remain.
• 4:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's looking for those that are broken, discarded, or insignificant.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: God specializes in using what others and using those
• 4:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: that others might overlook.
• 4:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Those of two small, those that are fragments.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: God is looking for the frail.
• 4:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: Just like that woman with the alabastra box in Mark 14, where other saw waste, Jesus saw worship
• 4:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't just the value of what was being given, it was also the victim.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was also the woman, one who would be looked down upon by every other, but Jesus didn't see her the same way.
• 5:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus was looking for something different.
• 5:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: God's looking for the fragments, but God is also looking for the frail.
• 5:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Many feel unworthy because of their weaknesses or their past failures, but God calls the frail unworthy though we all are to sit at his table.
• 5:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: We used his proof of this, saying it's Samuel chapter 9,
• 5:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: And Maphibasheth, Jonathan Sun, Jonathan was Saul's son, and David, instead of chasing down Saul's grandson to kill him because he could have a claim to the throne, David seeks him out and invites him to sit at his own table, and be treated well, really as a member of his own family.
• 5:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: David does so, despite what any other king might have done, he did so because of a promise he made to Jonathan, and a promise that was kept in spite of the fact that Mfffff was frail.
• 6:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: He didn't know that Mfffffffff would be crippled in his feet when he promised Jonathan to look out for his family.
• 6:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: But to make it even more awe-inspiring Jesus, God, the King of kings, He actually knew how frail we are and were.
• 6:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: When He died on the cross, when Jesus died on the cross and commended His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, He died for us.
• 6:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: God's strength is made perfect in weakness.
• 6:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: If we were big and bad and better and bold, then God wouldn't get much glory from using us, would he?
• 6:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Because it would make sense that we are usable.
• 6:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: but God likes to do mysterious things.
• 6:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: God is looking for the frail.
• 7:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: God is looking for the fragments and go to the book of Mark chapter six.
• 7:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're gonna end this particular discussion of what God is looking for.
• 7:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: I encourage you to tune into more.
• 7:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: Have something special tomorrow, but Mark chapter number six, and the Bible says in verse number one.
• 7:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: Mark six verse one.
• 7:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: and he, Jesus went out from dense, and came into his own country and his disciples follow him.
• 7:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when the Sabbath day was calm, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many hearing him were astonished, saying, from whence had this man these things and what wisdom is this which is given unto him that even such mighty works are wrought by his hands.
• 7:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joseph's and of Judah and Simon?
• 7:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: And our not his sisters here with us, and they were offended at him.
• 7:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: But Jesus sent unto them, a prophet is not without honor, but in his own country and among his own kin, and in his own house.
• 8:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: And he could there do no mighty work, say that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, and healed them.
• 8:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: The main stream of the day, the big bigs, the powerful, they had nothing good to say.
• 8:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus was disparaged.
• 8:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was put down, but praise be to God that He's just looking for a few.
• 8:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: He found in His hometown those that were
• 8:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: those few sick folk.
• 8:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, it may have been in the news.
• 8:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: They didn't have radio back then.
• 8:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: They didn't have television.
• 8:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: Social media wasn't a thing and it don't even know that they had newspapers.
• 8:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: But all of those,
• 8:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was noise to broad that Jesus, this charlatan, this hometown boy gone rogue.
• 9:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: He has no respect for the natural order of things, and later they would say about his followers.
• 9:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: They turn the world upside down.
• 9:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure they were whispering the same things about Jesus.
• 9:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: And what did they say?
• 9:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: Were the Bible say they were offended at him?
• 9:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus looked past all of those.
• 9:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: He wasn't looking for those that weren't looking for him.
• 9:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was looking for the few.
• 9:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: And like that old Marine Corps saying, the few, the proud Marines, unlike that, God's not looking for the proud.
• 9:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's looking for those that can't on their own.
• 9:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: Those sick people had no hope.
• 9:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: They had no way to fix their own problems.
• 9:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: The world celebrates large movements.
• 9:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: But God often works through a faithful remnant.
• 9:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: We of course know Gideon's 300 in the book of Judges.
• 10:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: God used a small group of warriors to defeat an enormous army.
• 10:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Matthew 714 says, because straight is the gate, and narrow is the way which leads them to life, and few there be that find it.
• 10:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: What happened after he touched those few and healed them?
• 10:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, in verse number seven, Mark six, and he called unto him the twelve, and began to send them forth by two and two, and gave them power over unclean spirits and commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only, no script, no bread, no money and their purse, but to be shot with, but be shot with sandals, and not put on two coats.
• 10:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sounds like he was saying them out with meager provisions.
• 10:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sounds like just fragments of a pack out, not much to go on.
• 10:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: And those disciples, I'm sure in some ways they felt frail, to go and preach this gospel of Jesus.
• 11:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is maybe the first experience, talking about what Jesus did for them, and there's just six groups of them, 12 disciples.
• 11:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: And yet, these, some of the same men would later, as I mentioned, alluded to, they would turn the world upside down.
• 11:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: We think because God, we don't see Him filling up stadiums with gospel crusades as much today.
• 11:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: He must not be working in front.
• 11:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: God isn't calling you to be the
• 11:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: our return, the judge, of how he's working.
• 11:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: He's just calling you to do what he did and look for just a few.
• 11:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let everyone else celebrate large movements.
• 11:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: But the problem is movements often become machinery.
• 11:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: And machinery can grind to a halt and become a monument and a museum.
• 11:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: There are many names we can mention who had what we would call much fruit while they were here on earth, but it didn't outlive them.
• 12:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was all about them.
• 12:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: whereas some 2000 years later, we are still speaking of and glorifying the name of our Savior.
• 12:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus Christ, I'd say, well it did not live him.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: He will outlive his own fame, he will be in heaven forever.
• 12:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I wonder, in your life and in mind, what are we looking for?
• 12:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Do we look for the same things God is looking for?
• 12:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you willing to be a fragment of your new soul?
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you frail, feeling unworthy?
• 12:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Know that God seeks you.
• 12:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you part of the few willing to stand for truth in a world that opposes God?
• 12:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: Will you let him use you today?
• 12:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Please, friend.
• 12:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: Ponder for a moment.
• 12:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: Where is your viewpoint?
• 12:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you looking for what God is looking for?
• 13:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: My prayer is always a symbol that you have a great day for his glory.
• 13:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: And we will plan on talking to you soon.
• 13:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tuning in to Bible Tract Echoes, the radio ministry of Bible Tracts Incorporated.
• 13:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: Want to see our gospel tracks and other resources?
• 13:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: Visit us online at BibleTracksInk.org that's BibleTracksInk.org or follow us on social media to learn how you can partner with this ministry.
• 13:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks again for listening.
• 13:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: May the Lord richly bless you as you live for Him.