Latest / Gospel Talks Podcast / #97 - When Life Falls Apart: Sharing Christ In The Middle of Trauma (Part 2)

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#97 - When Life Falls Apart: Sharing Christ In The Middle of Trauma (Part 2) · Gospel Talks Podcast

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Some people think that the only people who can walk into a hospital
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and be spiritual and know the right thing to say are pastors.
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And that's just not true. What your pastor does when he walks into the middle
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of a traumatic event, when he walks into a crisis,
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when he walks into the hospital,
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what he's doing shepherding people through the truth,
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lovingly, caringly, that's something
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All of us as Christians have to be able to do because Jesus said,
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How will you know them by their love for one another?
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And God gives the tools in His Word to equip all of us to shepherd people
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in those exact circumstances. This is the second part of last week episode
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on how to light somebody else's candle that has gone out,
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how to help in a time of trauma and crisis,
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and how to especially when you're helping an unbeliever,
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how to
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respond to that situation and see the open doors that God has in it for the gospel.
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Welcome to Gospel Talks Podcast where we help Christians all over
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the world become more effective in relational evangelism and discipleship.
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My name is George Binocca and with me today is Jeff Musgrave,
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the author and founder of the Exchange.
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Jeff, how you doing?
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Doing well, doing it we got a cool down around here,
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George. I'm I'm pretty sure you're gonna be jealous because ~ we
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we dropped fifty degrees in twenty-four hours the other day.
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Went from a hundred down to the fifties in ~ in one twenty four hour span.
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So it's it's it's
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Wow. Yeah.
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actually beautiful here. We're we're having a great time.
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I am so happy for you.
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Yeah, and you're not.
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I can see it in your eyes.
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Just kidding, just kidding. All right.
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Well,
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boy, I I am really, really enjoying this episode.
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It it's it's ministered to me.
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It's it's helped me be a better believer and friend to unbelievers
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who are going through a time of crisis.
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And last week we kind of left off,
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you know, talking about how to listen like Jesus listens.
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And this week we're moving in a different direction,
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you know.
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You're in this traumatic situation.
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How do you know when it's the right time to talk about the gospel?
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We talked about soul needs, but it's tricky.
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I mean, like in a hospital room or a crisis like when's the right time?
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Yeah, yeah, that's interesting.
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I I I think I might have told this story before,
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but I had a ~ a guy who made a profession of being a believer,
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but I think my wife and I both wondered if is this guy genuinely a believer?
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Well, this time went on and he ended up in
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Mm.
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the hospital. I went to see him,
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we had a good conversation, and it was rather surfacey.
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D does that make sense? It w it was
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Hmm. Yeah,
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yeah, yeah.
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It was
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kind of almost he was giving me the platitudes,
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you know, and and ~
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Mm.
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well a a couple ~ weeks, maybe a month later,
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he was back in the hospital. Both times he had fallen and hurting himself.
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And ~ this time I'm showing back up again and he is ~ acknowledging
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and he looked at me and he said,
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Pastor, he said, I I I gotta I gotta tell you something.
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It's not just that I fell and hurt myself.
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I
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I have a drinking problem and and I
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Mm.
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I I've I've been drinking and I don't know how to stop.
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Now you see w what happened was he we went away from talking about the
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the pain in his knee or whatever it was we were dealing with.
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And he he began to genuinely open up and tell me about
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the the real d deep needs that were in his life.
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Mm.
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And I I I feel like sometimes we have to be
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We have to be willing to wait till we get there.
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It's not to say that you can't get to the gospel earlier.
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I'm just simply saying that when someone clearly states to me,
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I've got a sin problem, I need help in knowing how to deal with it,
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now I can I'm I'm I can go to the gospel without any difficulty at all.
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And so I I
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I feel like that's why we aim at soul issues is so that people can start telling
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us about what's really going on.
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And then it's like they're almost asking us to tell them about Jesus.
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Now
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Hmm. Yeah.
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I do think I need to be careful here,
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George, because I'm not I'm
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Okay.
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not saying that that happens in every situation.
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I'm just saying when people are going through traumatic events,
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that that
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Mm.
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happens more often than you would think.
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Hmm. Hmm. Yeah, I I I agree with you.
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you know, we call them the soul knees when they start exposing them,
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you know, you there's a level of trust in you,
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the openness they're demonstrating.
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But we can, I think, and maybe I'm asking,
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can we become so afraid of being that insensitive person
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and accidentally jumping too soon,
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that we never actually share the hope.
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They need most and how do we avoid becoming like that?
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You know, I I think that being self-conscious,
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being inhibited, will always get in the way of the gospel.
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It will always, because
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Hmm.
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what we're doing is we're not thinking about that person as much as
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we are about ourselves. Am I doing this right?
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Am I and as as long as I have my eyes pointed this way.
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It's gonna be very, very difficult for me to be able to help that person.
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So what we have to ask God for is Lord help me to lose myself and
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my own words in my head and concerns about myself
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and and genuinely be concerned about this this person that has the need.
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I I
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I I think that frankly, sometimes we use the phrase insensitive
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as maybe I I I I'm afraid that this wouldn't be appropriate.
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It's it's almost like that's an excuse.
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Our real problem is fear. I'm afraid.
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Yeah. Yep.
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And ~
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and we we we have to kind of name what it really is.
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Yep. You know, I'll say this about ministry,
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about being a Christian, having hard conversations,
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and presenting people with the truth in a hard time,
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is that most of the time that I think,
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okay, I begrudgingly, I know I have to tell them this truth from
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the Bible right now, and I'm gonna lose them.
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And I just already know that going into this.
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And then I sit down with them and I say,
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Hey, did you know that Jesus, this is what he says and what you're saying.
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Is not the truth, and this is the real truth and hope.
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Every time in ministry that I thought I was gonna lose somebody doing that,
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most of the time I didn't. Most of the time
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Yeah, that's good.
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you get them back. Yeah. And so
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That's good.
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truth is powerful. Just unleash it on you know at the right time in
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the right place in the right manner.
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And I actually think
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that and I've been there, George.
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I know exactly what you're talking about.
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I'm not supposed to say that, am I?
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I can't imagine how that feels.
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the ~ the
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I love that. You're awesome. ~
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the I think sometimes we tend to think negatively when God wants us
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to think this truth could really change their entire life,
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you know?
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yeah.
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And
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I I think maybe if we could walk into circumstances with a little more hope,
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God opened this door for a reason.
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Do you know what I mean? I I and the reason I say I know
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Yes, yes.
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what you're talking about is because I I have had those thoughts before
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a conversation and been surprised afterwards and God did have a plan to do it well.
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Yep. Yeah, I think you're I think you're exactly right.
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So I guess what does it look like to naturally make this transition
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and from listening to sharing Christ?
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'cause I wanna give people the practical like as much rubber rubber meets
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the road kind of thing.
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Well, I I think praying for and watching for those natural openings that we've been
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talking about with the f with the guy that I talked about earlier.
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I was actually this was the second tr traumatic event that happened in
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his life that finally the open door came.
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And I think some sometimes
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Mm.
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the reason we don't find the open door 'cause it hasn't come yet.
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And so I think
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Mm.
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I think praying about it and watching for it is really,
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really
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important. I I think that the the real issue is we're
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not talking about a plan of salvation.
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So in other words, I got to think in terms of what am I actually going
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to talk to them about. And what I'm going to talk to them about is
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how Jesus can help their need.
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And to to me, that's if if you've got a real need and we've we've discussed that
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need
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It is very natural for me to say,
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well, let me help you see how Jesus can help this.
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So it's about a person of salvation,
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not a not a plan of salvation.
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Yeah. Yeah.
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And if we can help
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ourselves remember that, I think it is so much more natural to
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get to a place where I can introduce them to the real Jesus than it is for
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me to get to the place to go through my story.
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my gospel spiel. And so I
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Yeah.
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think that really helps me a lot if I think about it that way.
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So let's go a little deeper here because a lot of people might get this question.
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You sit down with somebody in a hospital or in a tough situation or whatever,
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and they go, Why would a loving God allow this?
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How do you begin answering that question?
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I I start by saying, you know,
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when when I see the world in the beginning,
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and when I see the world in the end,
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it's a totally different world.
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There's there's
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Mm.
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no sin, there's no pain, there's no suffering,
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there's no death. And ~ you know,
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I wouldn't say this necessarily right then in the room,
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but that's Genesis
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One through three, that's Revelation 21 and on.
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I mean, that that's the two ends.
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The Bible tells us that death and the curse
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Mm.
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and weeds and thorns and sweat and and all of the ugly stuff of life came into
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the world when sin came into the world.
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And helping
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Mm.
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a person recognize this pain you're going through.
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Is not because God is loving. The pain you're going through is because there's
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a we live in a simple world and there's a lot of ugly things.
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What God wants to do is number one,
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walk through this painful life with us,
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and then number two, give us a life that is not painful.
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And and kind of helping a person recognize that the source of
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our suffering is not God.
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The source of our suffering is the sin cursed world that we're in,
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and that Jesus is the savior from our suffering,
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not not the perpetrator of the suffering.
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Does does does that help?
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Yeah.
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Yeah, that I think that's a great because you're telling the story
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of why the circumstance they're in they are in and how Jesus is gonna resolve it,
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how he has resolved it. You know,
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y it's it's the biblical way to frame this.
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I think about Isaiah fifty three.
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It says, By his scars we are healed and there are people we meet
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as Christians that have scars.
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They are in pain. How does the cross change the way Christians understand pain?
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How we relieve it?
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You know, you were talk you were talking about scars.
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I heard a song the other day. the only scars in heaven are the scars
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on his hands and his forehead and his feet.
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~
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Mm.
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he he's he's the scar remover,
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not the scar giver. Does does does that make sense?
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Yeah. Yeah.
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And so helping
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people see that that Jesus literally suffered in our
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plays ultimately to remove our suffering.
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~
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Yeah.
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And we're studying through the book of Hebrews right now in our church.
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And so Hebrews is kind of on my brain,
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but in Hebrews chapter four and verse 14 it says,
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since therefore the children share in flesh and blood,
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in other words, the the stuff that can get hurt,
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you know, we call ourselves mortals.
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Which is interesting
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Yeah.
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because it it literally has the name death built right into ~ who our existence.
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Jesus became a mortal. ~ he took on flesh and blood.
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~ and it says he himself, and I love that phrase,
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he himself, likewise partook some took partook of some things that through death
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or the excuse me, I read that totally wrong.
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It's not the word sum, it's the word same.
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He partook of the same thing. So we have flesh and blood.
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He took on flesh and
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Yeah.
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blood so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death.
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That is the devil. And again,
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Mm.
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we just have to keep in our brain:
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God is good. It's the devil that is bad.
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And ~
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Rade.
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the the the devil's the perpetrator of sin.
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He's he that's really the genesis of where all the suffering has come from.
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And then later on in verse 18,
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that was verse 14 of chapter two,
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later on it says, because he himself has suffered when he was tempted,
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he is able to help those who are being tempted.
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And the per perp the the idea of the word tempted here is not tempted to do wrong,
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it's that we're going through trials,
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we're going through suffering.
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And because he suffered, he knows how to help people when they're suffering.
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Mm.
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And ~ I I love that reality that we can just help people
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see that Jesus literally came and took the pain so that number one,
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he can walk with us in this pain.
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And number two, ultimately ~ take us totally away from pain the the pain.
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And that's that's really part of the pain picture of giving people
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the gospel is helping them to see that God wants to rescue them not just from
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the sin of this world, but from this world.
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He wants to put us in a in an in a world that lives forever where he will
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be with us forever.
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Amen. you know, as we're rounding this topic off and getting ready to conclude,
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there's an area where we could neglect that I don't want to neglect because there
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could be people listening right now that they are Christians,
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they are laborers in the harvest,
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but they're actually the ones suffering.
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So what if I'm the one walking through trauma?
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What if you're the one walking through trauma?
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What about that?
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Can I back up just a little bit and answer make another statement
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and then get there? I I'm I'm doing this on purpose.
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~ when I'm on a mission trip in a third world country,
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it's not comfortable. It's it's it's usually,
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I mean, there are smells that I'm not used to smelling,
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there are sights I'm not used to s seeing,
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there are feelings of of heat or
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extreme cold and I mean it there's it's an environment that is hostile
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to my comfort zones. And I there's a there's a piece of me that likes
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not the pain and the suffering,
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but that it is a constant reminder.
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I'm I'm here for a purpose. I came to do a mission.
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And I think sometimes God lets us live in a world that is filled with pain.
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Because he's trying to remind us this is not the world we were made for.
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Yeah.
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We're exiles here. I mean, literally,
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we're we we really don't belong here.
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We were created for eternity. And ~ and the
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Mm.
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longing, the Bible uses this word,
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in this we groan. Literally, in this circumstance,
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in this body, in this pain, we we groan.
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But it's it's
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That groaning is literally reminding us that this world is not my home.
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I'm just passing through. My real hope is the hope of heaven.
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And I'm my job on earth is number one,
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to live in that real hope. And then number two,
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in the midst of my own pain, I can still help others who are in pain because they
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don't have the hope of heaven that I share.
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And some sometimes some of the most powerful witnesses are the people who are dying.
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I you know, I was at your church w before way before you were the pastor there,
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and ~ I one of the men that I met there,
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gray with cancer. I mean, you you he had the the death look
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About him. And we always give to everybody a 30-day challenge
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and a 10-year challenge. And the 30-day challenge is then the next 30 days,
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I'm gonna ask somebody to do this Bible study with me.
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And the 10-year challenge is in the next 10 years,
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I'm going to it touch as many people for Jesus as I possibly can.
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And he came up to me with a knowing look in his face.
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And he said, I took that 10-year challenge.
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Now, he and I both knew, unless God worked a miracle,
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he wasn't going to live another 10 years.
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Probability was
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Mm.
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is that he wasn't going to live another year.
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But he was committed that in this death sentence I'm in,
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I'm going to point as many people to life as I possibly can.
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And I I just really believe that the the testimony of hope and life in the midst of
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Suffering. We started this talking about when your candle's gone out.
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Well,
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Yes.
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suffering as a Christian is not the same as suffering as as as
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not being a Christian. And your candle can still burn brightly in the middle
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of your suffering. And that's that's what I would want to ~ ask everybody
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to to pray for. Lord, if I have to suffer,
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will you help my candle burn bright?
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And will you make the contrast
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open doors for me to be able to help other people.
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So obvious question, but I'm asking it because I don't want to leave anything
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on the table. Can our own suffering actually become a testimony how?
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Yeah, yeah. And and I I that is exactly what I'm talking about is when
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we are willing to genuinely hold on to hope.
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By the way, hope is not boy, I feel good today.
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hope is ~ literally l looking towards something I don't yet have.
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I mean that's the reason we call it hope.
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Mm.
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If
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~ and and so when I am living in the middle of pain or suffering or whatever,
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and and I am living with with that genuine obvious hope,
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literally ~ God can use that in a powerful way.
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And one of the things that I think we all have to remember is whereas God
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is not the perpetrator of pain,
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he
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Is the one who gives it purpose.
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He is the one who
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Mm.
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gives it meaning. And your
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Mm.
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pain and your suffering is not meaningless.
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And if you can live with the real purpose in mind,
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it will make a drastic impact.
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So, yeah, all by itself, your own suffering can be the testimony.
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And then as people are around you,
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God's going to give you an opportunity to talk about it.
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Hmm. Have you ever actually seen this where God's used broken believers
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to reach broken people?
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Yeah, yeah. I I think I don't know how many times I have watched people
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who are not only broken but ~ literally passed off the scene.
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I I have a story of a man that I led to the Lord ~ two hundred and eighty nine days
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before he died. And ~ he he had no idea he was sick when he trusted Christ,
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but
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~ he he actually died about a month and a half after his cancer diagnosis.
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But he lived with hope the entire way through his ~ cancer.
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And at his funeral, I had the privilege of giving the gospel
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and literally reading from ~ his own words in his own Bible study book,
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and ~ saw multiple people come to Christ
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Mm.
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because.
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of of that man's life of hope in the midst of even dying.
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so yeah, and I've I've got other names up here,
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Mitch and Eric and Jeremy and Miles and Anna and Rob and each of those a story
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of of broken people helping someone in pain and in the process of doing so,
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watching them come to Jesus. Over and over and over we watch that happen.
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Yeah. Yep, you see it a lot in life ministry.
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Suppose somebody listening right now has a coworker,
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neighbor, family member who just experienced tragedy.
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So what's five practical things they could do this week for them?
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Yeah. Well, it's interesting. ~ for those of you who are listening,
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George wrote this question and then he wrote the five things down for me.
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So I I've got the answers right here in front of me.
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No problem. I can hand I can handle this one.
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Sorry.
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No, the the the reason I said that is because one of them was ~ bring a meal.
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And last night Anna and I took a meal to some people in our church that
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are having a rough time right now.
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And had a had an opportunity to have a meaningful real conversation with someone
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who is not walking with the Lord.
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And ~ and I I think that the reason I kind of joked a little bit about that
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is because these five things are real genuine steps that
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are going to provide open doors for you.
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So the first one is to to bring a meal.
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I I think asking someone, hey,
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can I can I pray with you about this?
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I I think that's a really, really powerful way.
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So in other words, not just praying for them,
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but asking them if you can pray.
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How you know what's what's this one thing that I can really pray for
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you about as you're going through this?
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those are just really great ways to get into conversations with them.
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when you're trying to help them,
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don't forget.
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listen more than you talk. it it's it's that listening that's going
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to show them that you care. You can literally speak all you want to
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and not really care. but you can't listen without caring.
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And then keep showing up. I I I don't know whether you've observed this or not,
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George, but when there's a great need
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Most people are willing and desirous to jump in and help.
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But when there's a long need,
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Mm.
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you w you you use up all your help really quick.
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I mean, it it's
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Right.
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it's it's like everybody goes away.
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~ what we want
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Mm.
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is we want to be able to come in and make a difference and then we're everything's
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good. Now let's go on to life.
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Yeah, yeah.
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And ~
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and that's just not the way suffering works.
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And there are many times when everybody else is gone and you keep showing up,
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you're the one that's going to make a difference.
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One of the dear friends of our ministry is a woman who got saved doing
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the Exchange Bible study. She had some major issues going on in her life.
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And part of the issues that she had was eating disorders,
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drug and alcohol addictions. And so she has a heart.
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For people who are struggling.
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And ~ she tells me, she says, you know,
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most of the time when I saddle up to someone who's really suffering,
22:55
they don't want me around. They,
22:56
they, it's like I'm I'm kind of happy in my own misery.
23:00
And she said, they
23:00
Mm.
23:01
they just can't get rid of me.
23:02
I just I I
23:03
Mm.
23:03
keep showing up. I'm gonna bring them a pie next week.
23:06
I'm gonna I'm I'm just going to keep helping.
23:09
And eventually.
23:11
I get a chance to talk to them about the Lord.
23:13
And I don't know how many. I I mean,
23:15
literally, George, this woman has sent us 30 or 40 stories in
23:21
the last 10 years of people that she's led to Christ just simply by showing
23:26
up when everybody else disappears.
23:28
And then I think more than anything else,
23:30
just always be asking God to give you eyes to see.
23:37
The opportunities he brings in your path.
23:39
If indeed the harvest is plentiful and the laborers are few,
23:43
the reason people are getting saved is because there's not enough people telling
23:46
them, then that means that there are opportunities in my pathway.
23:51
And so if I if I can just number one,
23:54
be looking for them. But then number two,
23:56
I always pray it this way Lord,
23:58
would you make it obvious I'm a little dense?
24:01
And just ask God, you know, God,
24:03
God help me to be able to genuinely see it.
24:05
Hmm. There's there's two truths that we hold distinctly as Christians that
24:12
I think really enable a Christian to go through very trying times with a lot of joy.
24:17
Heaven and the resurrection. How I'm just curious if those two truths,
24:24
how how do those practically change the way we comfort hurting people?
24:28
How do they change the way we go through?
24:31
Hard things as as believers.
24:33
Yeah, I I'm I'm telling you, George,
24:35
this question we could do two different podcasts off of.
24:37
And maybe w maybe we ought to write that one down.
24:41
Yeah.
24:42
the topic that you wrote at the top of this one is eternal perspective.
24:45
And Randy Alcorn, probably my favorite author,
24:48
~ has a ministry that he entitles Eternal Perspective.
24:52
And I I
24:53
Mm.
24:53
I it has drastically impacted my life.
24:56
So these are really,
24:57
Mm.
24:57
really important dis topics to me.
24:59
I I think
25:00
I've we've all heard this statement.
25:02
That guy is is too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good.
25:07
And
25:07
Mm.
25:08
and I think to myself, you know,
25:10
I think most people get that that statement backwards.
25:12
I think
25:13
Mm.
25:14
the real problem is we are too earthly minded to be of any heavenly good.
25:19
And that
25:20
Yeah.
25:20
we we we literally live with our heads in the dirt and and you know thinking about
25:26
earthly stuff.
25:27
As opposed to living with our eyes on the sky,
25:31
~ Jesus says, Lift up your heads,
25:34
your redemption draws nigh. Colossians Paul said,
25:37
~ set your minds on things that are above and not on things that are on the earth.
25:42
And the hope of heaven is only genuinely help is when it's hope,
25:47
when we've got our eyes set on it.
25:48
So I I think we the
25:51
Heaven really does help when we really do see it as genuine hope.
25:56
and then the the resurrection,
25:57
this one is so powerful because I I live my life today in him.
26:04
Colossians chapter three, verse two is the one that says to set your affections,
26:09
your mind on things that are above.
26:11
But in verse three, he says, For you have died.
26:16
And your life is hidden in God.
26:19
And literally, what he's saying to us is that ~ my sin was so bad it deserved death.
26:25
And Jesus
26:25
Mm.
26:26
died in my place. And and the Bible says that when I took him,
26:30
I literally got the benefits of my own death before I died.
26:36
And so I
26:36
Mm.
26:37
I have died.
26:39
in the sinful life and I have a new life.
26:43
The Bible says it this way
26:44
Mm.
26:44
if any man's in Christ, he's a new creature.
26:46
The the old things have passed away and behold the new has come.
26:51
And this new life we have is the resurrected life of Jesus.
26:55
And so the
26:56
Mm.
26:56
Jesus resurrection is not just my hope in the future that one of these days
27:02
I will have a new body and a new place to live.
27:05
But right today
27:07
I have him. I am the way, the truth,
27:11
and the life. And that life, literally,
27:15
the the next verse, verse four of Colossians three,
27:17
when Christ, who is your life,
27:21
appears, then you're going to appear with him.
27:24
That's the hope of glory. That's that's the reality of my life.
27:28
I get to literally right now let Jesus be my life and be the vitality
27:33
and the energy of my life. And
27:35
When I die, I get to spend eternity with him.
27:37
I mean it's it's the
27:38
Mm.
27:38
these two topics are the topics that oughta give Christians a hope that
27:43
no one else could possibly have.
27:45
Mm.
27:45
You've said a lot of great things today,
27:48
a lot of great truth has been spoken today,
27:50
wisdom and all that, but if somebody's listening right now who knows
27:54
a person whose candle has gone out,
27:56
what's the one thing you'd encourage them to do today?
28:00
the song says it this way: carry your candle,
28:03
run to the darkness. We we want to flee from the darkness.
28:07
We we don't want to go into dark places,
28:08
but because we have our candle,
28:11
which is Jesus Christ, he's the light of the world.
28:13
we we can go into those dark places,
28:16
we can seek out the helpless, we can c seek out the confused and
28:21
the ones whose lives are torn apart.
28:23
And we can hold out our candle and literally light their world,
28:29
bring the light of Jesus into their world.
28:31
That's that's what God has called us to.
28:33
And frankly, when we see suffering people,
28:36
that's the time frame for Christians to shine.
28:39
Hm. Well
28:41
That was an awesome episode. It was awesome for me.
28:43
it ministered to me. Thank you for those of you to listen,
28:46
subscribe and share this podcast.
28:48
And ~ I just pray that you'd go to the harvest with this knowledge,
28:53
with these truths.
28:55
And be able to minister meaningfully in these situations.
28:59
And don't think I just call a pastor when this happens.
29:02
Sometimes you can't.
29:02
Yeah.
29:03
Sometimes you're the only one.
29:05
Sometimes it's you and God put you there on purpose.
29:09
And so now's the time to grab onto these and train and prepare because
29:13
I think for all of us in life,
29:15
we all know somebody or ourselves who will one day be in this exact boat.
29:19
So pray to the Lord of Harvest that He send forth laborers.
29:22
We love you guys. We'll see you next week.