Latest / Gospel Talks Podcast / #48 - Be Salty! Making People Thirsty for Jesus.

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#48 - Be Salty! Making People Thirsty for Jesus. · Gospel Talks Podcast

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Welcome everybody to Gospel Talks podcast where we help Christians all over the world become more effective in relational evangelism and discipleship.
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uh Jeff Musgrave is with me today.
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He's the founder, author of The Exchange.
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I'm George Menoka and we're really excited to jump into today's topic which is uh be salty.
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ah You should we be salty?
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And I know that word salty has a connotation in slang today.
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Just recently been uh kind of uh
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pointing to somebody who's a little angry, but that's not what we mean by salty.
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We actually were referring to this idea that's in the New Testament uh about being salty, making people thirsty for Jesus.
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So in your experience, um Jeff, how do you help people want Jesus because it seems like nobody wants him right now?
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Yeah, yeah.
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I love the phrase making people thirsty for Jesus.
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it.
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I don't know.
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I'm a picture person that kind of paints a picture.
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When I was a kid, you know this statement, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
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And my dad used to say yes, but you could put salt in his oats and then he'll want to drink.
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And the idea is, is not just trying to force
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the horse into something but kind of changing the way the horse perceives life.
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uh And I think in general animal training uh is a whole lot better in terms of trying to help that animal want the right things.
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You're going to move him in the right direction.
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think the same thing is true when we're dealing with people.
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uh If we just try to make people want Jesus
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that's really not going to get us very far.
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And so what we have to do is we have to help people to become thirsty, to become interested in the gospel.
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Yeah, I think that's exactly right.
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um You don't want to force anybody to do anything.
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um And it's God's job to draw them, as we read in the book of John.
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um But in trying to make people thirsty, what is our role in that?
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I wonder what God's agenda is sometimes in terms of, I mean, we know what God's agenda is in the Bible, but
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Sometimes it seems like that waxes and wanes practically on the ground here, though we know it doesn't.
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So it's like, how do you encourage people?
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Does God want us to make people thirsty?
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Is that what he wants us to do?
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Yeah, well, I actually think that people are thirsty.
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You make this statement all the time that those soul needs don't go away and that people do want God.
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They just don't know that it's God they want.
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And so that's the perception that we have to help them with.
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Back to the control issue, I had someone tell me once that
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human control is an illusion.
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We think we can control people, but we can't.
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And we kind of really have to get that concept out of our minds.
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um I do think that we can recognize that from God's divine agenda that you were talking about, that we can uh kind of extract some truths that we can know are consistent on the
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ground, even when we can't see them.
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Because
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God is invisible and his hand is not always evident, but we can be confident that his hand is always at work.
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He's sovereign.
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He's controlling everything that's going on.
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And so let's go back to that divine agenda and kind of state it from scripture.
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I don't want to be too pedantic with it, but the Bible says in Luke chapter 19 that the son of man, this is actually Jesus talking about himself.
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the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.
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And so we know that God right now, this is kind of the taking out of that divine agenda, this is a concept that I think we can know for sure is true, that God is always at work
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wooing people to Himself.
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You like to use that word relentlessly pursue, and I think that we can be
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convinced in our hearts that God is relentlessly pursuing lost people because He loves them and He wants to rescue them.
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Yeah, I really do believe that's God's business, that's God's kingdom, that's what it's about, is the people, and redeeming them, and our job is to bring him glory.
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But it's interesting that there is a partnership between us and God in that endeavor.
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uh He has chosen to use us, and though that at times is highly inefficient,
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on his part to a part...
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I think the angels would have made better partners in many respects, but he has chosen to use weaker vessels, ah you know, for his glory, I think.
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I love the picture in Ephesians chapter 3 when he talks about the purpose of man and literally we get to show the manifold grace of God and the word grace is an interesting
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word.
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It's giving something to someone who doesn't deserve it and so uh that's I think why he chooses us because we are quite undeserving.
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And yet, what a grace that God will use even us.
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And in the context of Ephesians three, Paul is literally talking about the privilege of having been called by God to speak the gospel into people's lives.
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So yeah, that's that's exactly what is happening.
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God uses this partnership.
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That's why we end every single one of our podcast with that recognition that
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harvest is plenteous, the laborers are few, the passion of the exchange is for laborers because that's the part that as you would say the weak link is us and God calls us to pray
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about that and then what he calls us to pray about I think he wants us to do something about.
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My grandmother used to say you got to put feet to your prayers uh and uh and so some of that uh
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putting feet to our prayers is just recognizing we have the ability and we want to at the exchange stir up the laborers to go out and to work together in God's relentless pursuit
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of souls of the lost.
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Yeah, absolutely, it's our greatest privilege.
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um We ought to be thankful that God uses us um because in using us, he has given us the opportunity to bring honor and glory to him in a way that also we get to be honored with
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Jesus later for it.
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And so um it's gonna be great to cast those crowns back at Jesus' feet.
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But um nevertheless, there's great honor in this relentless pursuit, in this amazing race.
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um
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to go and pursue the lost, uh which is the privilege of our lives as pastors especially.
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Absolutely.
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I think that you made a comment about the fact that we're to be casting our crowns are back at his feet.
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And when people kind of downplay rewards with that thought, I often wonder, so do you not want any crowns at his feet?
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mean, it seems to me like we would want as as much
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uh ability to glorify Him in heaven just like we want to here on earth and uh those rewards will be to His glory because it's all about grace.
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We can't do what we do without His grace.
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It's His grace that called us.
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It's His grace that enables us.
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Well, I tell whenever I discipleship, living the exchange, that portion of discipleship after somebody's accepted Christ, explaining to people, we're image bearers.
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I you're like a mirror, right?
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You reflect the glory of God.
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So anything that the Creator does to embellish you or to honor you only brings greater honor on Himself as the Creator, as the one who made you and designed you and redeemed
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you, especially as the one who redeemed you.
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and the fact that you can have a crown to cast back at Jesus' feet is a tremendous work of grace that he could change you and transform you in such a way that you could have a
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crown.
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It would be worthy of one to sit on your head.
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And I think that it's so beautiful to see that God um lifts up humans and puts crowns on their heads.
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we don't even deserve to be in his presence, let alone to be lifted to the status of being able to work together with him.
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um
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It's just a beautiful, beautiful picture to be able to see what God allows of us.
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Yeah, it is absolutely amazing.
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It makes you think of Revelation 22 and um even the work there of evangelism being so directly tied to the glory in the end, Jesus saying, okay, come, and the bride and the
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groom together.
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Yeah, I think that that's a beautiful picture because there it it we are together with the groom finally, but we're not yet.
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And in this age, Revelation 22 and verse 17, it says the spirit and the bride say come.
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And to me, that's a that's a powerful um picture for us about what we're supposed to be doing in this age.
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The spirit
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which is obviously invisible in this, the, the bride, that's the individuals of the church, uh calling to the loss to come.
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Yeah, it is incredible, by the way, I don't know that we've ever hashed this out on here, but there are some people that say that there is a segment of the world that is not called
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to come, but I tend to read scripture and see that Jesus draws all men toward himself.
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He um is lifted up so that all can see, and there is this universal call to come, though rejected.
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uh
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by a number of people.
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uh But I think it's amazing that he wants all kinds of people to come to him.
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And I think we don't naturally think like that.
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We naturally think he wants people like us to come to him.
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And he's saying, come all to me.
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Come you are heavy laden.
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It's like, well, but maybe not the people who've been sexual offenders.
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Or maybe not the people who vote.
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uh
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left of the aisle or the people that vote right of the aisle depending on where you're at and all that.
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We tend to think that that come to me applies to only people like me.
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Yeah.
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we every single time we feel like someone is too bad to be saved.
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We really do.
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We're lifting ourselves up in pride and saying that my sin wasn't really that bad.
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And the very fact is that none of us deserve it.
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I mean, we almost commend if we say that guy is too bad.
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We're almost commending ourselves that I was somewhat worthy.
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of being rescued.
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And the fact is that none of us are worthy of being rescued.
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You know, um so in pointing to this, okay, so there's come and then there's before that, we're talking about um Jesus's desire to seek and save the loss and the relentless pursuit
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and all of that.
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um How do you connect that back to this concept of being salty?
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we're actually going through these verses totally backwards from what I had thought we would.
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that this is it.
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Yeah.
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No, no, no.
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That I'm not meaning that at all bad about you.
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It's just kind of funny in my mind.
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Um, Jesus called when he was here on earth, he was at the festival and, uh, in Jerusalem and he stood up in the middle of the festival and he says, if anyone thirst, let him come
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to me and drink.
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This is in John chapter seven, and he says, whoever believes in me, the scriptures say, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.
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And then it goes on and says, now, this he speaks about them, about the spirit who's going to be working in the lives of those who believe.
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And he goes on and says, but the spirit hadn't been given at that point.
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So um Jesus is literally saying that the Spirit is going to be working in the world satisfying the thirst of human beings.
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um And we've already said we really believe that everyone is thirsty.
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People just don't know what they're thirsty for.
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That brings me all the way back to the first one I was going to work with, but it kind of goes in great order.
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think this is
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But in John chapter four, Jesus is talking to the woman at the well.
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And here's a woman uh looking for satisfaction in all the wrong places.
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And of course, she's coming to the well, but she's coming to the well that is less traveled by and the well that nobody else goes to.
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And she's going in a time of day that no one goes to the well, clearly striving to avoid people.
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This is a this is an outcast.
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And one of the reasons she's outcast Jesus points out when he says to her, um yeah, I will be glad to give you water.
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uh But go get your husband first.
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And then, of course, comes out the story that she's living with a man she's not married with.
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She's been divorced five times.
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And here's a woman who has been rejected and rejected and rejected and and now sees herself as an outcast.
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And it's almost as if she has given up on being satisfied.
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And I wonder if there's a lot of people in the world today who just really wonder, is there a way in this world to genuinely be satisfied?
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Jesus said to her, whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again.
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And the implication is you are going to be
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Totally and completely satisfied So go ahead No, you go ahead
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I even wonder if, you know, we could stretch Jesus's analogy a little bit.
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I know outside of maybe what he intended, but you think about what other worldviews, other religions, uh religions of any kind do to this whole people have kind of given up on
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satisfying their thirst.
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I mean, you have to imagine there's so many different religions out there.
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and really all of them leave you thirsty except for this relationship with Jesus Christ.
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And people kind of often will leave a religion and not necessarily go to another one but actually become atheists.
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Go further away from God than they were even before.
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And I can't help but think we have a world full of people like that who are just, I've just given up on satisfying my thirst.
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Yeah, I think that's a very interesting observation, George, because I believe that a lot of people who claim, especially here in America who claim to be atheistic, have just,
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they're just saying, I've given up on God.
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I just don't think that's going to satisfy me.
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um And so it's not necessarily that I don't think he exists.
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It's just that I've totally given up on him.
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I don't think that's going to ever satisfy.
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It's interesting in that uh
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picture that he's given to the woman of the well.
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uh he's we do know that religious events can um bring into our lives excitement and maybe a little bit of immediate uh satisfaction.
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But like you say that it kind of goes away and then move on to something else.
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Jesus said to her, the water that I give to people will become in him a spring of water, welling up into eternal life.
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And so every time he uses that phrase, living water, he's talking about that ever, the source that never runs dry, it just keeps going and keeps coming.
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And that's what Jesus wants to offer to people.
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That's what we have to offer to people.
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And I think just like people give up on God and so they become practical atheists, I think the people of God give up on watching the gospel work because they feel like, you know, I
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tried to talk to people and I didn't find anybody who was interested and they just kind of give up on it.
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And um so the second half of our analogy of a whore, can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink, but you can put salt in his oats.
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um The picture of salt is a really interesting one.
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Jesus is the water of life.
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We are the salt of the earth.
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So he literally wants our lives to be making the people around us thirsty for him.
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um In in
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the book of Matthew where Jesus is preaching the Sermon on the Mount, he says, you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt has lost its taste, the King James says it's savor so
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that it's no longer salty tasting.
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um How shall its saltiness be restored?
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And I kind of thought this would be a good place for you and I just to stop for a minute.
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and talk about the fact that a lot of the salt, a lot of believers have kind of lost its ability to connect with unbelievers and create this sense of, need Jesus.
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What do you think is causing that?
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I think that maybe we had already lost our saltiness, but we had lived in a culture that was steeped in Protestantism and, you religion.
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And in an increasingly secular culture, our lack of salt, so to speak, or the lack of saltiness that we have is just more apparent.
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So there's been this cultural radical shift in America, but...
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Christians have just the reliance on, say for instance, weekly evangelistic meetings.
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Like they used to have tent revival meetings and when I was growing up there would be evangelists that would travel in fifth wheels and come.
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And now we don't even do that anymore.
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Not really.
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I mean there's very few guys traveling like that.
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And those guys did phenomenal work.
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There's nothing against their ministry.
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I think they did a great job.
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But we had this reliance on somebody else to do our evangelism without relationship because there was a time in America when it didn't take really much relationship to see
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people in church because they were there for cultural reasons almost.
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And now that that time is gone, it's really, really apparent that our churches are struggling.
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Some churches, some churches are okay.
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I see a lot of churches um that are really working hard at trying to connect with unbelievers.
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And so they're having lots of different events and thinking that if I can just get them into church.
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I don't know about you, but I really believe that when Jesus said, are the salt of the earth, you are the light to the world, that
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Clearly he is talking about the church, but if in that particular day when he was saying you are the light of the world, I stood in that place where Jesus was probably preaching
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the Sermon on the Mount and there is a uh village on the hillside up in the hills and you really can't even hardly tell that it's there except at night when the lights come on.
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And if you think about the kind of light that he was talking about, he was talking about lamps and those are not street lamps.
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Those are lamps inside of houses and the windows are glowing.
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But every single individual lamp is what made the city glow.
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I, I, I just believe that what God had in mind when he's talking about being salty and being the light.
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is that individual believers carrying the light to the darkness um knew an old song that talks about carry this candle into the darkness because there are people that have lost
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their way and they need us, the light of the world.
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uh
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I think that this salt, this light that he's talking about is not just a lifestyle from humans, but it is literally a supernatural ability for believers to impact unbelievers.
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That God puts into us, believers, a light that's able to impact people around us.
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That's why I call
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relational evangelism, bringing Jesus up close and personal because he lives inside of us.
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And if we live that supernatural life in which people are observing, you were talking about being an image bearer, observing God in our lives, then I do think that that makes
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people thirsty for Jesus, that we are now being salty and that salt is going to make them look at us and recognize because in the passage he says,
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people don't put the light m under a basket.
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They put it on a stand and it gives light to the whole house.
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And he's talking about the way we should be living.
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And then he goes on and he says, so let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to the father who is in heaven.
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And God is saying, if you will shine, if your light shines into the world,
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It is going to make people hungry for the light, thirsty for the water.
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I mean that's the picture that he's painting here and I think what we have to ask God for is, make me salty.
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God make me a light.
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Use your supernatural Holy Spirit to show the person of Jesus Christ to the people that I get close to.
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Yeah, and it's like you were saying, there is no way to detect whether that salt has lost its saltiness or not, other than tasting it, right?
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Other than experiencing it.
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And so if people never interact with a Christian, they never have meaningful conversation or relationship with a Christian, how could we even know about that Christian's
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effectiveness?
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But then I really believe that what is so distinctive about us is Christ within us.
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And it's like you say, if we're not connected to Jesus, if we're not walking with Jesus, we are not gonna have that distinctive flavor to us.
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uh People, they wonder is something different about you, the thing that makes them wonder that is Jesus.
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Otherwise, the only other reason they would have a reason to say that is what they mean is,
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What's so weird about you?
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And we don't want them to think you're weird.
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We want them to think you're different.
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And some Christians have read weird where the Bible says different.
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But what is different about you is that some, the Holy Spirit, right after that verse in John 7, he says, living waters, come and drink of me and I will give you living water.
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There'll be living waters in your heart.
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And then the next verse he talks about, I'm gonna send the Holy Spirit.
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The Holy Spirit is gonna come and dwell in you.
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I mean, that is what people are tasting and they're saying, whoa, that's of another world.
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I've never seen that on the shelf at Target.
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That is a different kind of product.
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What is that?
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And that's the thing that makes them thirsty.
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So what's great about that is it's about me getting out of the way.
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uh So people say, people are not interested in me.
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Well, they don't have to be interested in you.
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uh You don't have to be interesting.
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think there are two concepts kind of summing up what we've talked about that are critical.
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you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink, but you can put salt in his oats.
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then we carry that to, you know, I've tried to witness to people, but no one's interested.
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So, okay, let's figure out how do we help people be interested.
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And I think that the two things that I see that
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we've been talking about is number one, we have to personally be that light bearer.
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We have to personally have that satisfying flavor about us, as you would say.
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And that only comes supernaturally and that only comes from being with God and letting God walk through our lives.
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But then the second thing that is important, and I think that a lot of believers miss this one, and that is that we have to connect with unbelievers enough
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authentically enough that they see it and desire it.
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mean that that's the part where it says let your light so shine.
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In other words, I think that there has to be a strategic aligning my life with an unbeliever so that they can see it.
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Yes, yeah, mean, isn't that exactly geographically what Jesus was talking about?
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Because wasn't there a city when he talked about that?
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Look, you you can't ignore the city set on a hill.
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mean, um am I recalling correctly that, okay, okay, yeah, so just like that, I mean, there has to be this distinct um aspect to our lives, but then to not hide it and like you say,
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wear it comfortably.
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on our sleeve, right?
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ah It's one of the hallmarks of what we've said here on the podcast.
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Yeah, and I think that...
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um
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This is probably important enough that maybe we can just have another whole podcast about it, about having the kinds of friendships with unbelievers that eventually help them
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embrace the same Jesus.
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And that friendship isn't just earthly, it's eternal.
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Right, right.
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It's the kind of friendship that Jesus had with people on earth.
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Because it wasn't just about breaking bread with them and it wasn't just about healing them.
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It was about something more eternal.
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um And if we never get there in our conversation with people, if we never get to that point of crisis, it's kind of like you waste the salt.
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um You know, because then you're just, you're spreading salt to no avail.
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I mean, we have to make it count.
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mean, salt was an expensive commodity back in those days.
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It was a very, very valuable thing.
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It was very, very important to preserving food and it had medicinal values and a lot of things.
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besides just the flavor of it.
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So we have to be careful we don't waste our salt either.
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Yeah, and I think there's two parts of that then.
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The first is we have to actually be salty.
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um That's the supernatural part.
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And then the second part is we have to get into conversations with unbelievers.
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That's what friends do that really matter.
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And Jesus is going to use those ingredients to meet the needs and give the water of life to
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to people who are thirsty and need him.
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Amen, amen.
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Well, um that's our kind of rounding off of being salty and being salty with your neighbors and just making people thirsty for Jesus.
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just living everyday life, enjoying what you do have in Christ.
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That's my favorite part of living the exchanges at the beginning when you talk about what's this new inheritance you've come into.
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I mean, if that is true and that is real and you believe that, you're gonna live like it and people are gonna go, wow, why is that guy, I mean, his life stinks.
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Why is that guy always so happy?
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Or how come they don't have as nice a car as me and they have joy?
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And how come this and how come that?
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And you make people wonder and how come they love people so much?
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Or how come they do this or they do that?
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Well, that's the joy we have to live with and demonstrate.
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uh We have an amazing inheritance in Jesus Christ that we're enjoying.
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Yeah.
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All right.
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Well, thank you guys so much for listening Pray with us as we pray to the Lord of harvest that he would send forth laborers And we need more folks to go out there and be salty.
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We love you guys We are praying for you and we will see you next week