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Not Without Faith · Bayside Davis Podcast

0:05
SPEAKER_02: Welcome to the B-side Davies Podcast.
0:09
SPEAKER_02: You're now listening to our current teaching series, Not Without.
0:16
SPEAKER_02: You know, a lot of people in culture talk about changing the world.
0:21
SPEAKER_02: Organizations start, people go to university, get undergraduate degrees, PhDs, so on and so forth.
0:28
SPEAKER_02: You guys know that.
0:29
SPEAKER_02: You guys all have more degrees than Fahrenheit in here.
0:33
SPEAKER_02: And essentially, everybody starts out at some point in life, they have this dream.
0:38
SPEAKER_02: How can I change the world?
0:42
SPEAKER_02: And the reality is that there's this aspiration to do something great in this world, but rarely are there moments in life where you tangibly do something collectively with a group of people to change the world.
0:59
SPEAKER_02: And all of us should aspire to do something great in this world.
1:03
SPEAKER_02: All of us should aspire to leave a legacy of goodness, of doing what Christ has called us to do in this world.
1:11
SPEAKER_02: And yet none of us can change the world without faith.
1:18
SPEAKER_02: We have an opportunity to change the world.
1:20
SPEAKER_02: We have an opportunity to shape generations and cities and regions and literally our state and world, but none of this will become a tangible reality without faith.
1:37
SPEAKER_02: Faith gives us the courage to dream.
1:40
SPEAKER_02: Faith gives us the courage to move when God is moving.
1:44
SPEAKER_02: Faith gives us the courage to step in and make a difference in moments of history, in areas that matter most.
1:55
SPEAKER_02: A lot of the times we start out with dreams and visions for life, but we get inundated by the everyday realities of life that end up sidetracking our desires to do something great in this world.
2:10
SPEAKER_02: But faith causes us to dream and believe and move and live in a way that matters most.
2:19
SPEAKER_02: You know, I was thinking about this.
2:22
SPEAKER_02: Every church that is started starts with a dream.
2:26
SPEAKER_02: Starts with faith that God can move in a region, in a city, and it takes steps to pray and make that dream a reality.
2:33
SPEAKER_02: But no person, trust me, I've done this twice, no person will ever start a church in any city without faith.
2:45
SPEAKER_02: Faith is the seed that is planted in the ground that becomes something beautiful.
2:52
SPEAKER_02: And it takes faith to get through all the awkward parts of planting a church as well.
2:57
SPEAKER_02: It takes faith to speak that, hey, this group of five people or whatever, 26 people in a living room, or the few amount of people that started this church here at Bayside Davis, it takes faith to say, one day you will see what God has called and designed for us to do, even though you haven't seen it come to fruition yet.
3:22
SPEAKER_02: This is a moment that you and I can step out in faith and shape our generations and generations to come.
3:31
SPEAKER_02: I thought about Proverbs chapter 3, verses 5 and 6, because we just went through Hebrews chapter 11, and I didn't want to do that again, but I thought this is one of the most instrumental and well-known verses around faith.
3:43
SPEAKER_02: Look with me in your Bible, Proverbs 3, verses 5 and 6.
3:47
SPEAKER_02: Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
3:53
SPEAKER_02: In all your ways, submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
4:00
SPEAKER_02: By the way, last week I talked for one hour and I felt bad until I looked at the Bayside Granite Bay teaching, and it was an hour and six minutes.
4:09
SPEAKER_02: So then I felt a lot better.
4:12
SPEAKER_02: I actually don't have my phone.
4:13
SPEAKER_02: I usually have my clock, so if I go long, just tell me.
4:17
SPEAKER_02: Tell me it's getting it's getting late, Wesley.
4:20
SPEAKER_02: So this essentially is a passage around faith.
4:26
SPEAKER_02: Essentially, the let me just shape the context here.
4:29
SPEAKER_02: In Proverbs chapter 3, the writer is talking about all of these aspects of life that can sidetrack somebody from the way of God and the fear of God.
4:42
SPEAKER_02: Callous independence in verses three and four, self-determination in verses five and six, freedom to make one's own moral rules in verses seven and eight.
4:53
SPEAKER_02: Total ownership of your own goods, meaning this isn't God's, this is mine in verses nine and ten.
5:01
SPEAKER_02: And then freedom from correction in verses 11 through 12.
5:05
SPEAKER_02: And so he's talking about things that can sidetrack us from a fear of God, a life walking with God.
5:13
SPEAKER_02: And in the middle of that, he talks about faith.
5:17
SPEAKER_02: If you're a no-taker, write these points down.
5:20
SPEAKER_02: If you're not, you can start today.
5:22
SPEAKER_02: Verse 5.
5:24
SPEAKER_02: Number one, look what he says, first of all, in verse 5.
5:26
SPEAKER_02: Trust in the Lord.
5:29
SPEAKER_02: You're like, yes, that's what he says.
5:31
SPEAKER_02: Write it down.
5:32
SPEAKER_02: It's so important.
5:34
SPEAKER_02: Trust in the Lord.
5:36
SPEAKER_02: The Hebrew term here is Batak.
5:39
SPEAKER_02: Say that one time.
5:40
SPEAKER_02: Batak.
5:42
SPEAKER_02: It's it's an interesting word.
5:44
SPEAKER_02: It's not necessarily like essentially the meaning that we see in the New Testament of just faith.
5:51
SPEAKER_02: It's this idea of total dependence and reliance on God.
5:59
SPEAKER_02: I do pray in this moment in Bayside's history that we would all have this heart posture of God, we want you to move.
6:09
SPEAKER_02: We have vision for the next 30 years.
6:11
SPEAKER_02: We want to collectively participate in this vision, but our heart posture is total dependence and reliance on God.
6:22
SPEAKER_02: Trust in the Lord.
6:26
SPEAKER_02: Be totally dependent and reliant on God.
6:30
SPEAKER_02: Here's the reality.
6:31
SPEAKER_02: It's easy to say, like, we're Christians, and this is inside our Christian language.
6:36
SPEAKER_02: It's easy to say, like, trust in the Lord.
6:39
SPEAKER_02: And here's the truth: trust is easy when life is easy.
6:47
SPEAKER_02: Trust is easy when there's easy choices that are before us, when life is going well, but trust is hard when life is hard.
6:57
SPEAKER_02: Trust is hard when there's sacrifice and difficult decisions and challenges that we're facing in life.
7:03
SPEAKER_02: Trust is easy when life is easy.
7:07
SPEAKER_02: Trust is hard when life is hard.
7:12
SPEAKER_02: And all of you can resonate with that.
7:15
SPEAKER_02: Because you know instances and moments in your life where you follow Jesus where there's decisions that either you're going through something very difficult or there's sacrificial moments of your life that you're like, uh, this is not an easy time or moment in my life to be totally dependent on God.
7:38
SPEAKER_02: But those are important moments in our life.
7:41
SPEAKER_02: Those are moments that reshape history.
7:44
SPEAKER_02: In fact, you remember the story of Abraham?
7:46
SPEAKER_02: God said, Go to a place that I will show you.
7:50
SPEAKER_02: He didn't know where he was going, but he was called to take the steps of faith.
7:54
SPEAKER_02: Moses, God spoke to Moses and he said, Go tell Pharaoh, the most instrumental leader of his time, the most powerful leader in the world, go tell Pharaoh, let my two million people go.
8:09
SPEAKER_02: That was not easy, but it shaped generations to come.
8:13
SPEAKER_02: God told Israel when they went into the promised land, march around Jericho seven times.
8:19
SPEAKER_02: What do you mean, God?
8:20
SPEAKER_02: This is like people are gonna make fun of us, like this is so weird and awkward.
8:26
SPEAKER_02: No, I just want you to follow what I'm gonna say in faith.
8:30
SPEAKER_02: And if you march around the walls of Jericho seven times, you'll see the victory.
8:35
SPEAKER_02: When God spoke to me a long time ago, move from Maui, Hawaii.
8:41
SPEAKER_02: First of all, that was a hard decision, to the great rainy state of Oregon and plant a church in a community where you know no one.
8:55
SPEAKER_02: That was a step of faith.
8:58
SPEAKER_02: And years later, thousands of people came to the Lord and were following Jesus.
9:08
SPEAKER_02: There's this person in history, recent history, that has been such an influential figure in my life.
9:14
SPEAKER_02: And his name was Chuck Smith.
9:16
SPEAKER_02: He had pastored a bunch of churches and he was middle-aged.
9:20
SPEAKER_02: And God said, I want you to go to Costa Mesa, California, and I want you to take over a church of 25 people.
9:28
SPEAKER_02: The church that he was leading was far larger than 25 people.
9:34
SPEAKER_02: So through a series of events and prayer and discussion, they end up moving to Costa Mesa.
9:39
SPEAKER_02: And one of the reasons he said he felt like he was supposed to move to Costa Mesa is because he was a surfer and you could surf every day in Costa Mesa, California.
9:48
SPEAKER_02: So he moves to Costa Mesa, California.
9:50
SPEAKER_02: He takes over a church called Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa.
9:54
SPEAKER_02: 25 people.
9:55
SPEAKER_02: Small church.
9:57
SPEAKER_02: And in the early years of pastoring that church, there was the hippie generation in the 1970s.
10:08
SPEAKER_02: And all of these hippies were doing drugs and living just uh, you know, wild, lascivious lifestyle.
10:16
SPEAKER_02: And they started inviting these young hippies into their church.
10:22
SPEAKER_02: And then the hippies invited their friends and so on and so forth.
10:26
SPEAKER_02: And that launched the fastest growing church planting movement in American history.
10:35
SPEAKER_02: But it took faith to go from the church he was pastoring to Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa.
10:41
SPEAKER_02: It took faith when the older people in the church were talking about no, you should not allow these kids with no shoes and sometimes no shirts and you know, high as a kite, as they used to say, coming into the church, like partying all night, coming in church on Sunday, smelling like all the things that were at the party.
11:02
SPEAKER_02: You should not let these kids come into the church.
11:04
SPEAKER_02: But he was like, no, we want these young people to get saved, and God started a movement of God.
11:17
SPEAKER_02: It takes faith.
11:19
SPEAKER_02: Whenever God is moving, it takes faith to see a move of God.
11:24
SPEAKER_02: And there's different types of faith.
11:26
SPEAKER_02: There is saving faith, there is doctrinal faith, but then there is practical faith.
11:31
SPEAKER_02: The everyday life where you wake up and you trust God for that day.
11:41
SPEAKER_02: In James chapter 1, 2 and 4, it says, Consider a pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
11:53
SPEAKER_02: Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
12:02
SPEAKER_02: Abraham was tested his faith and he trusted God.
12:07
SPEAKER_02: Moses was tested and he trusted God.
12:10
SPEAKER_02: Israel was tested and he Israel trusted God.
12:15
SPEAKER_02: There are moments in life where there's a test before us, and God says, fill that gap by faith.
12:26
SPEAKER_02: Can I encourage you this morning?
12:27
SPEAKER_02: You can trust God to change your life.
12:30
SPEAKER_02: 16 people were baptized last weekend, and their life is eternally changed by Jesus.
12:38
SPEAKER_02: Seven, so far during 2026, seven, on average, seven people a week are coming to Christ at Bayside Davis.
12:46
SPEAKER_02: Their life is forever changed.
12:49
SPEAKER_02: You can trust God to change your life.
12:52
SPEAKER_02: And I just want to say this in the moment of sharing vision for the next 30 years of Bayside.
12:58
SPEAKER_02: We can trust God to change our city and world.
13:03
SPEAKER_02: But if we want to see God move, if we want to see generations change, we have to take this moment and say, God, we are totally dependent upon you for every good thing that you want to do.
13:18
SPEAKER_02: But we're going to trust you in this moment.
13:21
SPEAKER_02: Notice what he says next.
13:22
SPEAKER_02: Number one, trust the Lord.
13:23
SPEAKER_02: Number two, trust with your entire being.
13:27
SPEAKER_02: Trust with your entire being.
13:30
SPEAKER_02: He says, trust in the Lord with all your heart.
13:34
SPEAKER_02: Now, we think of heart as just like, you know, the physical organ in our body.
13:40
SPEAKER_02: But heart here has more to do with the internal nature of being a human than the physical organ in your body.
13:47
SPEAKER_02: In fact, this term heart in Hebrew lev is a term that encompasses the entire inner life of a human being, every part of what it means to be human, or we might say our soul.
14:04
SPEAKER_02: This includes your ability to think, your ability to feel, your ability to relate to other people, your ability to worship God, your ability to make decisions and build habits.
14:15
SPEAKER_02: All of that is encompassed in this Hebrew term heart.
14:19
SPEAKER_02: So when God says, trust in the Lord with all your heart, he's saying, trust in God with the entirety of your being.
14:30
SPEAKER_02: Trust in God with your mind, your emotions, your body, your will, your life, your gifts, your habits, your decision making, every part of your being, trust in God.
14:46
SPEAKER_02: Back to this word trust.
14:48
SPEAKER_02: I think this is so appropriate for the moment that we're living in.
14:52
SPEAKER_02: You know, I mentioned last week that secularism is kind of dying in the Western world, that there's a return to God, because secularism can never give you what it promises to give you, it can never satisfy your soul.
15:06
SPEAKER_02: Only Jesus can do that.
15:09
SPEAKER_02: And everyone said, But it's so easy to say, okay, I'm gonna trust in Christ, but I'm really only gonna be reliant on him, dependent on him for certain aspects of my life.
15:29
SPEAKER_02: But God is calling us and inviting us and encouraging us to trust in him with every aspect of what it means to be human.
15:42
SPEAKER_02: I pray and hope that the faith that we have in this moment not only leads to a historical moment of Christianity in the city of Davis, but I also pray and hope that in this moment, that the faith that we have changes how we see every aspect of our life as human beings and followers of Jesus.
16:07
SPEAKER_02: That maybe we're here today, and maybe there's some aspect of my life or your life that we're like, okay, God, I'm gonna trust you with this, this, and this, but I'm holding back this.
16:18
SPEAKER_02: And maybe the Lord would encourage you today today that He is not only calling us as a church to trust Him, but He is calling you to trust Him with every facet of your being, what it means to be you and be a human being, creating the image and likeness of God.
16:37
SPEAKER_02: Trust in the Lord, number one, trust in the Lord with your entire being, number two, number three, trust beyond your understanding.
16:46
SPEAKER_02: Trust beyond your understanding.
16:48
SPEAKER_02: Notice what he says here trust in the Lord with all your heart, and this is great for the city of Davis, and lean not on your own understanding.
17:00
SPEAKER_02: Like this is really good in a college city.
17:03
SPEAKER_02: In an intellectual hub, because we are so, you guys are so smart that sometimes our intellectual capacity can hinder us from trusting God.
17:22
SPEAKER_02: So God says, trust beyond your understanding.
17:27
SPEAKER_02: Now, you might say, well, Wesley, what does this mean?
17:30
SPEAKER_02: Human understanding is the uh is the idea here, and human understanding is equivalent, write this down if you're a note taker, to self-reliance.
17:42
SPEAKER_02: We can be like God, we're really smart, we're really logical, we're all a bunch of learners, we're problem solvers, we're geniuses, not me, but you, we're PhDs, we're masters, we've got degree on degree on degree on degree.
18:00
SPEAKER_02: And so, God, we can figure things out.
18:03
SPEAKER_02: We don't need to rely on you.
18:04
SPEAKER_02: We've got our human understanding, we've got all of our nuanced learnings and education and so on and so forth.
18:12
SPEAKER_02: And sometimes we become so smart intellectually that we rely on ourselves instead of relying on God.
18:25
SPEAKER_02: And God says, trust beyond your understanding.
18:31
SPEAKER_02: Proverbs chapter 4, verse 5 says, Get wisdom, get understanding, and do not forget my words or turn away.
18:38
SPEAKER_02: We should long for understanding, but a different kind.
18:42
SPEAKER_02: Proverbs chapter 9, verse 10 says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.
18:51
SPEAKER_02: Proverbs chapter 3, verse 7 says, Do not be wise in your own eyes.
18:58
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes, not you, but maybe people, sometimes people get so smart they think they're smarter than God Himself.
19:08
SPEAKER_02: And God would say, We should seek understanding, but our understanding should not just be on the human level where we become self-reliant.
19:19
SPEAKER_02: Now, let me just qualify this.
19:21
SPEAKER_02: The warning does not suggest that God's children, God's people, are to turn off their brains and ignore their intelligence and common sense.
19:29
SPEAKER_02: He's not saying that.
19:31
SPEAKER_02: He's simply cautioning us to not depend on our own wisdom and experience, but to depend on God Himself.
19:45
SPEAKER_02: When you get more degrees than Fahrenheit, you sometimes push God out of the equation of your brain.
19:56
SPEAKER_02: And there's gonna be so many moments in your life, and you know these, where you have all of this intellectual knowledge and comprehension, but it does not solve definitive moments in your life.
20:11
SPEAKER_02: There are moments where you are left without any answers other than total dependence on God Himself.
20:23
SPEAKER_02: So God is not knocking our intelligence, don't worry, like God created your brain, you're to use your brain, you don't come to Christ and leave your brain at the door.
20:32
SPEAKER_02: You use that as you follow the Lord, but you don't want your brain to become so self-reliant that you don't trust God anymore.
20:43
SPEAKER_02: Every moment that you're breathing and living as a human being that God has created is a moment to live and breathe a trust for God.
20:55
SPEAKER_02: In every part of your life, in every facet of what it means to be human, we are to pursue understanding from God's vantage point.
21:05
SPEAKER_02: In other words, we should be asking ourselves today, what is it that you want to do, God?
21:11
SPEAKER_02: What is it that you are calling us to fully rely upon you in God?
21:16
SPEAKER_02: And how can we put our feet to our faith?
21:20
SPEAKER_02: How can we have practical, everyday, active faith in a moment like this where we're not leaning on our own understanding, but we're leaning on God Himself.
21:32
SPEAKER_02: You remember in the Gospel of Matthew, where Jesus, Matthew is writing about Jesus' last days on earth, and we read that Jesus goes into an olive grove called Gethsemane.
21:44
SPEAKER_02: If you've ever been to Israel, there's a hill that overlooks the temple in Jerusalem.
21:51
SPEAKER_02: And it's full of olive trees.
21:52
SPEAKER_02: It's an olive grove, and it's called Gethsemane, and it means crushing.
21:57
SPEAKER_02: And Jesus was sitting there, I've been there.
22:00
SPEAKER_02: And you're sitting there around all of these olive trees, and he goes into the garden and he begins to pray.
22:05
SPEAKER_02: And three times he says, Father, if it be your will, take this cup from me.
22:12
SPEAKER_02: Not as I will, but thy will be done.
22:15
SPEAKER_02: Second time, if it be your will, take this cup from me, not as I will, but thy will be done.
22:21
SPEAKER_02: Third time, he's sweating drops of blood in stress and anxiety, in anticipation that he's about to be crucified on the cross.
22:32
SPEAKER_02: He says, Father, if it be your will, take this cup of suffering from me, but not as I will, but thy will be done.
22:47
SPEAKER_02: That moment in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus was not leaning on his own understanding.
22:53
SPEAKER_02: He was fully leaning on God.
22:58
SPEAKER_02: And over and over in the Bible we read about God's ways being higher than ours.
23:03
SPEAKER_02: Jesus could have been like, I don't want to go to a cross.
23:05
SPEAKER_02: I want to save humanity without going to the cross.
23:08
SPEAKER_02: I want people to come to know an eternal relationship with God apart from the cross.
23:14
SPEAKER_02: But he fully trusted that God's ways in that moment were far better than his present feeling over the anticipation of going to the cross.
23:30
SPEAKER_02: Even Jesus' suffering was hard for him.
23:35
SPEAKER_02: He never minimized his suffering.
23:37
SPEAKER_02: This is why over and over in the Bible, the Bible encourages us, Isaiah 55, for my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways, declare the Lord.
23:47
SPEAKER_02: Romans 11, 33, oh, the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God.
23:56
SPEAKER_02: Trust God beyond your own understanding.
23:59
SPEAKER_02: God could be at work in your life in ways that you never planned or dreamed.
24:04
SPEAKER_02: I think of people in here, we've got 15, we've got 15 people in our ministry cohort.
24:09
SPEAKER_02: These are students that are undergrad, grad, and PhDs that are starting to feel a call to ministry.
24:16
SPEAKER_02: And they're racking up student loans.
24:19
SPEAKER_02: 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200,000 in student loans.
24:25
SPEAKER_02: And they're starting to feel like God is calling them to ministry.
24:30
SPEAKER_02: Like that's a moment to say, not as I will, but thy will be done, Lord.
24:37
SPEAKER_02: Because it's a step of faith beyond your own understanding.
24:41
SPEAKER_02: And then finally, finally, trust with all things in life.
24:47
SPEAKER_02: Trust with all things in life.
24:49
SPEAKER_02: Notice what he says next.
24:51
SPEAKER_02: He says, in all your, no, in some of your ways, is that what your Bible translation reads?
24:56
SPEAKER_02: No, in all your ways, submit to him, and he will make straight your pass or your path straight.
25:05
SPEAKER_02: A lot of people don't understand what God is saying here.
25:08
SPEAKER_02: It's actually a beautiful relational uh encouragement here.
25:13
SPEAKER_02: In all your ways, notice this term submit.
25:15
SPEAKER_02: It's yada in Hebrew.
25:18
SPEAKER_02: It means to know personally.
25:22
SPEAKER_02: We think of submit as like, oh, you know, like here's like an authority figure saying you must do this and this and this.
25:29
SPEAKER_02: And yes, Jesus is called Lord.
25:31
SPEAKER_02: He is the master of all of our lives, and he's the best leader you could ever have.
25:36
SPEAKER_02: But the beauty of this relational term is that God is saying, first and foremost, I want you to have a relational, personal knowledge of God.
25:49
SPEAKER_02: That you trust in the Lord with all your heart and you lean not on your own understanding and in all your ways.
25:56
SPEAKER_02: If I'm gonna translate this from Hebrew, in all your ways, know Him.
26:04
SPEAKER_02: Now, why does it say submit to Him that then?
26:07
SPEAKER_02: Well, there's a really good reason.
26:10
SPEAKER_02: To know God in all our ways means to trust God in all things in life.
26:18
SPEAKER_02: To know God is to acknowledge God in every part of our life.
26:27
SPEAKER_02: We have to acknowledge God in every part of our life.
26:30
SPEAKER_02: And that's where the translators pick up this idea that knowing God leads to acknowledging God or submitting to God in every part of life.
26:42
SPEAKER_02: Acknowledge God in every place of your life.
26:46
SPEAKER_02: With your family, acknowledge God, with your kids, acknowledge God, with your work, acknowledge God, with your sexual desires, acknowledge God, with your sport, acknowledge God, with your relationships, acknowledge God, with your finances, acknowledge God, with your thoughts, feelings, and decisions, acknowledge God in all things in life.
27:13
SPEAKER_02: And He will make straight your past.
27:17
SPEAKER_02: This means to make smooth your past.
27:20
SPEAKER_02: It pictured a king or a royalty traveling down a road that had been cleared and leveled before they took the trip.
27:27
SPEAKER_02: Workers would go ahead of kings and royalties in the ancient time and they would smooth out the pass.
27:33
SPEAKER_02: You know, there's a few places in the city of Davis you wish that the city would smooth out the pass.
27:39
SPEAKER_02: Like potholes just randomly in the city are huge bumps that everybody drives around, and you're like, why don't you just level that out?
27:47
SPEAKER_02: In the ancient world, they were better at that than in our current world.
27:53
SPEAKER_02: This is not a promise that all of life will feel safe.
27:59
SPEAKER_02: This is a promise that God is always going before us in life, even when life feels unsafe.
28:08
SPEAKER_02: This is not a promise that every step of faith will be an easy decision.
28:14
SPEAKER_02: This is a promise that God is with you and for you in every step of faith that you take.
28:21
SPEAKER_02: Because God is good and He's in control even when life is hard or decisions are hard.
28:28
SPEAKER_02: God is good and in control.
28:35
SPEAKER_02: This is a moment for all of us to say, okay, God, here we are in 2026.
28:43
SPEAKER_02: In a very secular city, in a city that has narratives that will always exist that counteract or contradict the stories, the doctrines, the teachings of Jesus and the scriptures.
29:02
SPEAKER_02: This is a moment for all of us to say, in the midst of the world that you have placed us, God, we want to fully trust you to move and do what only you can do in the city of David.
29:20
SPEAKER_02: And this moment of faith can change generations to come.
29:33
SPEAKER_02: It is quite incredible.
29:36
SPEAKER_02: In a city like this, that in four years our church is the second largest church in the city.
29:44
SPEAKER_02: That doesn't mean we're better than any church in the city.
29:49
SPEAKER_02: That simply means that God is up to something.
29:52
SPEAKER_02: There is something happening in our time, even in a deeply secular environment where people are getting saved every week.
30:01
SPEAKER_02: There is something unique about what God is doing in this moment.
30:08
SPEAKER_02: And my prayer and my encouragement for us is let's fully lean into this moment by faith and see what God can do.
30:25
SPEAKER_02: This is cool.
30:26
SPEAKER_02: You wanted some good news?
30:28
SPEAKER_02: A little update.
30:30
SPEAKER_02: Last week, we launched Next, which is our, as many of you know, uh, is our vision and compassion campaign across Bayside.
30:41
SPEAKER_02: I think this is correct.
30:43
SPEAKER_02: Scott Connor is here.
30:44
SPEAKER_02: Scott, why don't you come up here?
30:46
SPEAKER_02: I saw you.
30:46
SPEAKER_02: Scott, why don't you come up here this morning?
30:49
SPEAKER_02: I think this is correct.
30:50
SPEAKER_02: Correct me if I'm wrong, Scott.
30:52
SPEAKER_02: Scott is the executive pastor of Bayside.
30:55
SPEAKER_02: He's incredible.
30:56
SPEAKER_02: We've been so blessed to work with him and be on the team with him.
31:00
SPEAKER_02: Uh, everybody welcome Scott Connor this morning.
31:03
SPEAKER_02: So blessed to have you here.
31:05
SPEAKER_00: I tried to hide in the back.
31:06
SPEAKER_00: I didn't want him to know I was here.
31:08
SPEAKER_02: Oh, I saw you right away.
31:09
SPEAKER_02: We're so glad to have you here.
31:11
SPEAKER_02: Uh, I think we're at over$20 million.
31:15
SPEAKER_00: God has done some absolutely miraculous things as we have started this next initiative, as God has started to just stir in people's hearts, and we've told the story across different campuses.
31:26
SPEAKER_00: A week and a half ago, a family stepped up out of nowhere and said, Hey, we want to give a$5 million gift to be able to launch this thing and to let it go.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: And then just on Friday, we had another family step up and give another$5 million gift to another one of our campuses, which is amazing.
31:43
SPEAKER_00: But here's what I want you to hear.
31:45
SPEAKER_00: Those numbers for all of us that live a normal life, those are like crazy numbers that we can't wrap our mind around.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: Like, could you just imagine just one time seeing your bank account with that many zeros and it's not negative?
31:58
SPEAKER_00: Right?
31:59
SPEAKER_00: So here's the deal.
32:00
SPEAKER_00: Even though we hear those numbers, it's absolutely amazing, absolutely humbling to hear what God is stirring in people's hearts.
32:08
SPEAKER_00: But as we share this next initiative, what we're saying is, God, will you stir in every one of our hearts?
32:13
SPEAKER_00: Because it's not about the number, it's about the sacrifice, it's about what Wesley's talking about today.
32:18
SPEAKER_00: The faith to believe that God will provide for all of our needs, and especially as we sit in this room, to see a gathering of world changers, to see what God will do through you and what he will do through this community for the city of Davis, and what we believe when you go wherever God sends you, hopefully you stay here, but we know some of you are gonna go all over the place as world changers, that you take the message of Jesus with you.
32:43
SPEAKER_00: So it's absolutely amazing to see what God has done already.
32:46
SPEAKER_02: Do you want to just stay up here with me?
32:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna preach?
32:48
SPEAKER_00: Where are we at?
32:48
SPEAKER_02: Here, here, here.
32:49
SPEAKER_02: No, no, no.
32:50
SPEAKER_02: We're not up, we're we're ending the preaching.
32:51
SPEAKER_02: Do you want Scott Connor to stay up here with me?
32:56
SPEAKER_02: Hey, we never we never get this guy here, so I'm like, let's let's get him up here for as long as possible.
33:01
SPEAKER_02: So this is incredible.
33:03
SPEAKER_02: One week into our our initiative, everybody, if you did everybody bring their little booklets, can we get these passed out?
33:10
SPEAKER_02: Anybody who's missing?
33:12
SPEAKER_02: This is the campus brochure that we went through last week.
33:15
SPEAKER_02: There are 83 compassion projects around the world that we would love to fully invest in.
33:21
SPEAKER_02: And we talked about a few of those last week, one of which is the hospital.
33:25
SPEAKER_02: We built a hospital.
33:26
SPEAKER_02: How many years ago did we build?
33:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so it's about 10 years ago we built the first hospital, which you saw in the beginning of the video.
33:32
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I love about the Faith Alive Clinic is uh in Joss, Nigeria, uh, this is the amazing part.
33:39
SPEAKER_00: They don't charge a dime for any of the medical help that they provide for families.
33:43
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
33:44
SPEAKER_00: Imagine that if in Davis they didn't charge for us to go get health care, what that would mean for us and our uh lives.
33:50
SPEAKER_00: But as we are helping them to start a pediatric clinic there, and once again it will be absolutely free for every single family there because here's what happens culturally in Joss, Nigeria is oftentimes they have so many kids, each family, that they choose not to name the child for the first two years because of the infant mortality rate is so high there.
34:10
SPEAKER_00: And so what we're saying is we're gonna take that down in the name of Jesus, where every kid deserves, those are God's image bearers.
34:17
SPEAKER_00: They deserve to have a name.
34:18
SPEAKER_00: God has a plan and a purpose for every one of them, and we're gonna come alongside them to be able to provide uh the medics, medical needs they have.
34:25
SPEAKER_00: But here's what I love about what happens at the Faith Alive Clinic.
34:28
SPEAKER_00: Every morning when people go to seek out medical coverage or medical help, the first thing that happens is what we just did right here.
34:36
SPEAKER_00: They have a worship service.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: So they gather, these are people in a high, highly Muslim area.
34:41
SPEAKER_00: They gather, they worship Jesus, they hear the message of hope through Jesus.
34:46
SPEAKER_00: So we hear about the spiritual part first, then we take care of the physical part afterwards.
34:51
SPEAKER_02: It's amazing.
34:52
SPEAKER_02: So that's just one of 83 compassion projects that we we are going to undertake and fully fund across the world.
35:02
SPEAKER_02: And we also talked about last week JVI, which is uh rescuing, it's a sex trafficking organization where Kurt, I don't know if Kurt's here this morning, um, where he's a part of it, he's a part of our local church, but he's a part of this organization, and it's an incredible organization.
35:17
SPEAKER_02: But a couple more that I want to highlight today.
35:19
SPEAKER_02: Uh, if you have your next brochure, as we say at Bayside WAMO, that comes from our founder, Ray Johnston.
35:27
SPEAKER_02: These are his favorite.
35:28
SPEAKER_02: And uh the the few other ones that I want to highlight, we're gonna highlight a few of these every week is God Behind Bars.
35:35
SPEAKER_02: We have a church in Folsom Prison, and we want to fund churches and ministries uh not only through Bayside with God Behind Bars, but through other uh through this particular organization and other areas, we want to see churches planted in Bible studies in prison across the United States.
35:57
SPEAKER_02: Another one that I thought was really amazing, all of them are amazing by the way, but this is uh a part of how I'm wired and my background is we are gonna support Bible translations.
36:07
SPEAKER_02: Do you know that there are places in the world that they do not have a translation of their Bible in their known language?
36:15
SPEAKER_02: And if we can fund more of those translations to go into unreached areas that can have never had a Bible in their primary language before, that is an amazing opportunity to spread the gospel.
36:31
SPEAKER_02: And then the final one that I want to point out today of the 83 is we want to we want to plant churches in Ukraine.
36:40
SPEAKER_02: We are connected to people that have influence on the ground, but also in the Roseville area that have a ministry in Ukraine, and we want to fund in a war-torn country that's had so much trauma over the last so many years, we want to fund churches that can be places of hope and light in that country.
37:02
SPEAKER_02: That is an amazing thing.
37:05
SPEAKER_02: These 83 projects.
37:07
SPEAKER_00: Can I add in there really quick?
37:08
SPEAKER_00: You want to hear something that's crazy about the church planning movement in Ukraine?
37:11
SPEAKER_00: You know what their issue is?
37:12
SPEAKER_00: It's not that God hasn't called men and women to go and spread the gospel.
37:16
SPEAKER_00: The issue is they don't have the resources to spark those new churches.
37:20
SPEAKER_00: And so there's people lined up, named, they're ready to go, they're already discipled, they're trained.
37:25
SPEAKER_00: They're literally waiting for churches here in America to come alongside them to help fuel, to help them launch, to get those churches off the ground.
37:32
SPEAKER_00: And these are in places where most of us we wouldn't want to fly there and spend the night.
37:37
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna go and minister to people who desperately need the message of the gospel.
37:41
SPEAKER_02: That is amazing.
37:42
SPEAKER_02: So they're ready.
37:43
SPEAKER_00: They're ready to go.
37:44
SPEAKER_02: They just need Bayside to fund them, and we will be planting churches in Ukraine.
37:48
SPEAKER_02: That's incredible.
37:49
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna send Wesley there just to go visit for a weekend, too.
37:53
SPEAKER_02: Look at the back of this.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: You notice how he just moved right on right there.
37:58
SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I'm called to Ukraine.
37:59
SPEAKER_02: I'm called to Davis for sure.
38:01
SPEAKER_02: No, no, you were just going to visit, not stay.
38:03
SPEAKER_01: We'll bring you back.
38:04
SPEAKER_01: We need you here.
38:05
SPEAKER_02: I might I might be called to visit, but you're coming with me then.
38:09
SPEAKER_02: Let's move on.
38:11
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
38:12
SPEAKER_02: If you look at the back of this campus brochure, uh, you heard about some things that we began to unveil last week.
38:19
SPEAKER_02: Uh, number one, we as part as uh part of our campaign here, which is also part of the collective campaign, is we want to raise money to secure a permanent location in the center of the city of Davis.
38:34
SPEAKER_02: Uh we are in negotiations.
38:36
SPEAKER_02: We've you can clap there.
38:42
SPEAKER_02: We've looked, we've looked at a couple downtown buildings, we're in negotiations.
38:47
SPEAKER_02: More info to come there.
38:48
SPEAKER_02: Do you want to say anything about that?
38:49
SPEAKER_01: So we just let the cat out of the bag a little bit.
38:51
SPEAKER_01: Go.
38:52
SPEAKER_02: Hey, hey, I was the one that told you not to, so he hey, he told me not to, but he is he is over all this stuff at Bayside, so he can do whatever he wants.
39:01
SPEAKER_02: Let the cat out of the bag.
39:03
SPEAKER_00: So here's what we're trying to do.
39:05
SPEAKER_00: We we know, I mean, you look at here, is we're trying to find a permanent location closer to where so many people do life.
39:11
SPEAKER_00: We want it to be on the main kind of drag of where you do life.
39:14
SPEAKER_00: And so we looked at a couple locations.
39:16
SPEAKER_00: Uh, I'll tell you where one of them is.
39:18
SPEAKER_00: It and this is the one we're prayerfully hoping that we can get across the line, which is where the Regal Cinema downtown used to be.
39:24
SPEAKER_00: Um, they took out all of the walls.
39:26
SPEAKER_00: It's a giant empty box.
39:28
SPEAKER_00: And so what we're prayerfully asking is, God, would you allow us to be able to rent that dirt cheap because it's empty so that we can gather not just one day a week, because this is absolutely amazing what's happening here.
39:39
SPEAKER_00: But what if we're able to have a space every day a week where we can gather for Bible study, where it can be an outreach, where we can put a cafe there, because everyone in Davis lives on coffee, evidently.
39:50
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so what if we can have a coffee shop open seven days a week where you can gather, where we can come and we can invite our friends?
39:58
SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes the first step to invite a friend to church is not to a service, although we wish it was.
40:03
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the first step is what if you can have a cup of coffee?
40:07
SPEAKER_00: And it bridges it, it takes the walls and it takes it from I don't know about this church thing because it's weird to me, to bring the walls down to like, wow, that was really comfortable and there's not weird people there, and God just starts to stir and break down walls.
40:19
SPEAKER_00: So we're negotiating right now.
40:20
SPEAKER_00: We've looked at a couple different places, we're actively negotiating for that regal cinema.
40:25
SPEAKER_00: And so would you pray?
40:26
SPEAKER_00: Would you pray because what they're asking and what we should pay, they don't match, and what can we can afford to pay is really far apart.
40:33
SPEAKER_00: And so would you pray that God would just stir in the people who own that building's heart, and that God would also allow us collectively to raise up enough money so that we can also take a just empty concrete box and make it into a beautiful place where we can make it our church home, where we can gather seven days a week, and it can be an outreach hub, a hub right in the middle of the city where we can reach all of the city for the message of the gospel.
40:58
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
40:59
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
41:01
SPEAKER_02: I'm so glad you're here today.
41:04
SPEAKER_02: So we have four local initiatives.
41:07
SPEAKER_02: One is a new building in the heart of the city that we lease long term, uh, and placing a coffee shop in that building that can be used as a hub of outreach and relationship and reaching people in the city and building relational connections, and then also strategic ministry staffing uh so that we can have more than one pastor at Bayside Davis, which would be amazing.
41:31
SPEAKER_02: And then also we would love to help DCF, a major strategic moment in DCF's history, where they're sending out literally a core of leaders, they're long-term leaders to plant uh campus ministries on UC campuses in Southern California, where we can help uh uh Leanne and Peter enter into that new role where they'll be leading the local uh role here uh and ministry, and then we can send off the leaders who are going down with some funding that can bless and support them because we so believe in what God is doing through them.
42:07
SPEAKER_02: And so for our local goal, every church has their own goals.
42:11
SPEAKER_02: 300,000 is kind of our baseline goal.
42:14
SPEAKER_02: Uh 600,000 is our challenge goal, and we are praying one actually for all of this,$1 million, that's actually not a lot to get all of this.
42:23
SPEAKER_02: So$1 million is our faith goal, and we're gonna talk more about just kind of the layers of that and the nuance of that next week.
42:31
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we wanted to give two weeks of vision, but can I add one quick thing and just as a point of clarity, and then I won't interrupt anymore because I actually was just coming to listen to you preach today uh with my family.
42:41
SPEAKER_00: No, no, we're glad you're here.
42:42
SPEAKER_00: This is amazing.
42:42
SPEAKER_00: Maybe to just try to help to clarify because you heard me share at the very beginning that these God-sized gifts that we've been given, which are amazing.
42:49
SPEAKER_00: The way that our church model works, we have 10 churches spread throughout, mostly Northern California, uh, and then we have actually a church down in exactly Costa Mesa, what Wesley was talking about earlier, which is in its early infancy stages as well.
43:01
SPEAKER_00: Um, but the way our financial model works is the money that is given from the local church stays within the local church to fuel the local church.
43:09
SPEAKER_00: And so when we look at these initiatives, any money that we're gonna be raising here, short of going after those compassion causes, because we don't just teach the tithe, we live the tithe, right?
43:18
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna give away because we want to fuel that.
43:20
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna do those compassion causes first, no matter what.
43:23
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna do those, we're saying in faith, we're gonna take care of those 83 different moments.
43:28
SPEAKER_00: But anything that we raise here at Davis, when we look at that 300,000, 500,000 goal, or peripherally a million dollars, which sounds crazy when we say that number, but that money will stay right here in this community to hopefully help us to be able to build out a permanent location to help pay for rent so that we can see this church continue to blossom.
43:46
SPEAKER_00: We love that this is the second largest church in Davis.
43:50
SPEAKER_00: Here's what our view is is that when we reach a tithe, only 10% of a community, then we start talking about oh my goodness, look at us.
43:57
SPEAKER_00: No, we want to reach as many people because you You know when you go downtown, when you go to whatever your favorite coffee shop is, or you go to class.
44:05
SPEAKER_00: There are so many people in this community that are so far from Jesus, we want to reach them, and we know that the hope of the world is the local church.
44:13
SPEAKER_00: This gathering, this community, God is going to use in amazing ways.
44:18
SPEAKER_00: So when you talk about those finances, that's where it goes.
44:20
SPEAKER_00: And the last thing I'll say, and I will be done, is we take financial stewardship so serious.
44:25
SPEAKER_00: That is my job is to help oversee our financial kind of operations.
44:29
SPEAKER_00: It's the boring business side.
44:31
SPEAKER_00: Any of you that are business or accounting majors, you'll love what I get to do.
44:35
SPEAKER_00: Um, but on the back side, uh, we look at every penny that God has entrusted us with.
44:39
SPEAKER_00: We want to maximize those for Kingdom Impact, and we take care of all those safeguards and audits and all those things that are important.
44:46
SPEAKER_00: Those all happen.
44:47
SPEAKER_00: We don't talk about it all the time.
44:48
SPEAKER_00: Why?
44:49
SPEAKER_00: Because we want to talk about the hope that we have in Jesus.
44:51
SPEAKER_00: That's what we talk about in services.
44:53
SPEAKER_00: But even as you pray and ask God, what is it that you God is calling you to do in this initiative?
44:58
SPEAKER_00: Know that all those safeguards are in place, and that vision of reaching this community is very strong and it is a fire in the midst of all of our leadership.
45:06
SPEAKER_02: Amazing, Scott.
45:07
SPEAKER_02: You don't want to do that.
45:08
SPEAKER_02: Aren't you glad?
45:08
SPEAKER_02: No, I like him up here.
45:12
SPEAKER_02: This book we talked about last week, too.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: This is kind of our global um campus.
45:17
SPEAKER_02: Well, it's like a book or a brochure, a big brochure, a mega brochure.
45:22
SPEAKER_02: But uh, for those of you who missed last week, there's devotions every day of the week that are coinciding with the campaign.
45:30
SPEAKER_02: You can also sign up for our refuel, just text refuel to 56316, and you can get daily devotions from all of our pastors uh that coincide with these as well, that parallel each devotion.
45:41
SPEAKER_02: But these this is globally all the things that we are praying and believing that God will do through this campaign season.
45:49
SPEAKER_02: And I just want to point out one other one.
45:51
SPEAKER_02: This is quite amazing, that we want to plant 20 gospel centered Bible teaching churches in influential cities in California and across the world in the next five years.
46:03
SPEAKER_02: This is a God dream.
46:04
SPEAKER_02: You want to say something about that?
46:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we we we're looking at uh we interviewed somebody who has a heart to plant a church in downtown San Francisco recently.
46:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we're in conversations with somebody who would love to plant a church in Silicon Valley.
46:15
SPEAKER_00: You want you think Davis is hard to reach?
46:17
SPEAKER_00: Silicon Valley makes this seem like the gospel center of America.
46:21
SPEAKER_00: Uh so we're looking at there.
46:23
SPEAKER_00: We we have a conversation with someone down in Pasadena.
46:25
SPEAKER_00: We're praying that God will allow us to plant churches in communities where honestly most church planters are avoiding.
46:32
SPEAKER_00: We're saying let's not run away from the fire, let's run right into it because there are people that need Jesus in every community.
46:38
SPEAKER_00: And very specifically, as you look at we all live here in California, this state is where so many things go.
46:45
SPEAKER_00: What starts in California goes across America.
46:47
SPEAKER_00: And uh, as we've talked, and and Wesley talked about the the Calvary Chapel movement, three of the greatest movements in you look at the history of the American Church happened in California.
46:57
SPEAKER_00: Why can't the fourth one happen and why can't it start right here at Davis?
47:00
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
47:01
SPEAKER_02: Hey, have you ever met an executive pastor that is a preacher?
47:06
SPEAKER_02: This is amazing, Scott.
47:08
SPEAKER_02: We love you.
47:09
SPEAKER_02: Go finish it up.
47:09
SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much for being here.
47:11
SPEAKER_02: We are so blessed to have you.
47:17
SPEAKER_02: So if you did not get either of these, make sure to take them home, pray through them.
47:21
SPEAKER_02: Next weekend, we're gonna talk more strategically about how this comes to pass or our part uh in these steps, but we just believe this is a really important definitive moment in the history of Bayside and in the history of Bayside Davis.
47:37
SPEAKER_02: And we just want to see our city come to Christ, lives changed, and have a vibrant spiritual home where people can learn about Jesus, believe in Jesus, learn how to follow Jesus, get the Bible, be in community, and be a light at the center of our city.
47:57
SPEAKER_02: Wouldn't it be amazing if we literally on the most well-known street in the city of Davis have a big church sign where people know that a core part of our city, there is a place that is light spiritually across our city.