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348. The Difference Between Belief & Faith · The Impossible Life

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  Speaker 1: That's impossible. Let me tell you what I believe. That
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: your weakness is not your technique. Yes!
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  Speaker 2: Yes!
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  Speaker 1: Don't think you are.
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  Speaker 3: Know you are.
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  Speaker 1: The Impossible Life Podcast.
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  Speaker 3: You're sitting on a winning lottery ticket.
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  Speaker 1: An idea that is fully formed, fully understood.
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  Speaker 3: That sticks. This is the Impossible Life Podcast. because Nick
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  Speaker 3: and I are attempting to live impossible lives. What we
• 0:30
  Speaker 3: know is that nothing is impossible. So instead of using
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  Speaker 3: impossible as an excuse to not try, we'll use the
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  Speaker 3: pursuit of impossible as an accelerant for greatness. If something's
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  Speaker 3: never been done before, that just means it's unexplored. If
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  Speaker 3: they tell you it's too hard, it's just waiting to
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  Speaker 3: be simplified. Impossible is a default label, used by uncourageous people,
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  Speaker 3: unwilling to take a risk. The real truth is this.
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  Speaker 3: The solution to any impossible task starts with this question.
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  Speaker 3: If I had to, what would it take?
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  Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of the Impossible Life Podcast. I'm
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  Speaker 1: your co-host, Nick Surface, and I'm looking across at a
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  Speaker 1: man whose faith is so great, he doesn't just move
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  Speaker 1: the mountain, he makes it do burpees first. That's right, friends,
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  Speaker 1: the former Navy SEAL, Garrett Unkelbach, a man who makes
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  Speaker 1: mustard seeds feel insecure. Burpees.
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  Speaker 3: Burpees isn't good enough. We're doing eight counts.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, man. What's an eight count?
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  Speaker 3: Eight counts. So you go down and then there's also
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  Speaker 3: a leg movement and a push up. Then you stand
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  Speaker 3: back up. All right. Okay.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I've never seen a mountain move, let alone do that.
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  Speaker 1: But I'd see that you're working it.
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  Speaker 3: Burpees, especially people who do crossfit burpees, you just throw
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  Speaker 3: your body to the ground.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, sprawl burpees.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, and then stand back up. Eight counts, you have
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  Speaker 3: to keep it like the way they would make us
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  Speaker 3: do them. You have to keep your feet together, like
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  Speaker 3: go down to the ground. Hands down, kick your feet back,
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  Speaker 3: push up. And then from the push up, you split
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  Speaker 3: your feet apart, bring your feet back together. And then
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  Speaker 3: feet come up underneath you together and then stand up.
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  Speaker 3: And that's one. And there's eight different movements in there.
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  Speaker 3: So that's why I would call them eight counts. Because
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  Speaker 3: you could count through. You could go one, two, three, four, five, six, seven,
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  Speaker 3: and then count the rep on eight.
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  Speaker 2: One.
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  Speaker 1: An eight count. Man. I like that you guys take
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  Speaker 1: simple things that already suck and say, hey, how can
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  Speaker 1: we make this even worse? That's great.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: That's a good question.
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  Speaker 3: All right.
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  Speaker 1: Well, dude, today, G, we are diving deep on faith
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  Speaker 1: and what it is to truly live by faith and
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  Speaker 1: apply faith. I'm excited to get into this one because
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  Speaker 1: we all know that we're called to live lives of faith.
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  Speaker 1: But I think that to quote the great philosophizer, Darth
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  Speaker 1: Vader says, I find your lack of faith disturbing. And
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  Speaker 1: I think that that's probably the case for a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people as they walk out their faith, truthfully, because
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  Speaker 1: I think it's, you know, we have armchair quarterback faith.
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  Speaker 1: When we sit there and we can like, when nothing's
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  Speaker 1: going on, we can talk about it. But whenever you
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  Speaker 1: actually get in the fire, that's when you actually find
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  Speaker 1: out what you believe. As you guys always say, and
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  Speaker 1: I quote this all the time, I say you guys,
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  Speaker 1: you military people, you don't rise to the occasion, you
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  Speaker 1: fall to your level of training. And so what you've
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  Speaker 1: practiced mentally, what you've practiced in your heart and in
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  Speaker 1: your spirit on a daily basis of, oh man, what
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  Speaker 1: if this happens? And where does your mind go? Where
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  Speaker 1: does your heart go? That's what gets revealed whenever it
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  Speaker 1: actually comes out. And it's a real challenge.
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  Speaker 3: You're going to have a better life with faith if
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  Speaker 3: you understand the life that we're called to or if
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  Speaker 3: you read any scripture. If you spend your whole life
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  Speaker 3: trying to maintain or create certainty, you're going to spend
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  Speaker 3: your entire life upset, afraid, and anxious. As I've said before,
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  Speaker 3: peace doesn't come from knowing what will happen. It comes
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  Speaker 3: from knowing what you'll do. And I would say that
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  Speaker 3: in different ways that relates to faith is that peace
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  Speaker 3: comes from knowing who God is. Yeah, exactly right. And
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  Speaker 3: we're going to dive deeper into that. We're going to
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  Speaker 3: give very practical examples of places where people feel a
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  Speaker 3: lack of faith. We're going to talk about what faith is,
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  Speaker 3: what it's not. We're also going to just like talk
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  Speaker 3: about why God gave us faith. So with all that
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  Speaker 3: being said, let's dive in.
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  Speaker 1: One of the most recent times where I feel like
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  Speaker 1: I got to experience what I think a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people would like to know when they get in the
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: fire was with Rian, which we told the story of
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: when we did the 50 miler. And she had hyponatremia,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: which is where your sodium levels get dangerously low. And
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: I had no idea. She's drinking water because she's barfing.
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  Speaker 1: She's going into shock, which means she's mumbling. And parts
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  Speaker 1: of her brain that use language are shutting down. So
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  Speaker 1: over the course of six hours, my wife went from like,
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  Speaker 1: you know, shivering and definitely feeling out of it too.
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  Speaker 1: She can't even formulate a sentence and she's mumbling what
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  Speaker 1: a lot of people would say sounds like speaking in tongues.
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  Speaker 1: And so we get to the hospital and by the
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  Speaker 1: time we get to the hospital, she gets taken back
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  Speaker 1: and then she goes into seizures. And I watched my
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  Speaker 1: wife turn blue foam with the mouth. And then I
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  Speaker 1: have to, I'm sitting there with the doctors while they're
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  Speaker 1: telling me about the permanent brain damage she could have,
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  Speaker 1: that seizures might be a part of our future and
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  Speaker 1: all the different things that they're doing their job. but there, there, um, there, there,
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  Speaker 1: there's so a lot of seeds of doubt. And what
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  Speaker 1: I had in that moment was absolute confidence and certainty that,
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  Speaker 1: and I felt like I was being carried along by
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  Speaker 1: something that was way beyond me. And it was, I
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  Speaker 1: think it's what a lot of people would hope that
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  Speaker 1: they would find because I had, when we were driving
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  Speaker 1: to the, to the hospital and I was praying and I,
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  Speaker 1: I heard the Holy spirit just say to me, it's
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  Speaker 1: not her time. And once I had that, When she
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  Speaker 1: went into seizures, did not expect that. That wasn't on
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  Speaker 1: the bingo card. That definitely threw me for, I was like, oh, okay.
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  Speaker 1: I thought this was just going to be like, she'll
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  Speaker 1: have an overnight in the hospital or whatever and we'll
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  Speaker 1: be out. But whenever the doctor came and said like, hey,
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  Speaker 1: we had to save her life. Now you're kind of
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  Speaker 1: put in a situation where you didn't expect it. You
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  Speaker 1: weren't planning for it. And I found out what my
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  Speaker 1: reliance was. And I spoke scripture on the way to
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  Speaker 1: the hospital. And I told every single person that we
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  Speaker 1: spoke to what was going to happen. And it was
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  Speaker 1: not something that was, I felt like was within me.
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  Speaker 1: Like you have that level of, like, I think if
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  Speaker 1: people said like Garrett told everybody in the hospital, what
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  Speaker 1: was going to happen, people would be like, well, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: of course. Cause that's very much you. I'm not like
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  Speaker 1: that naturally, but in, in that entire time, And even
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  Speaker 1: since then, I just felt like this. I felt like
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  Speaker 1: I've unlocked what it truly is to trust in God
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  Speaker 1: in the fire. And there's lots of things I could
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  Speaker 1: go in into this. But if you've ever had intuition
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  Speaker 1: where you're like, man, I just know something's going to happen.
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  Speaker 1: That is what I experienced. That was the actual feeling
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  Speaker 1: was I was just like, no, there was like never
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  Speaker 1: any time where I was like, well, maybe or what
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  Speaker 1: if like I never played out the scenario of what
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  Speaker 1: I would do if my wife died. I just never did.
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  Speaker 1: And so I think when people, when I share that
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  Speaker 1: with people, like I always wanted to share that with
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  Speaker 1: them because it's like, that was a situation where I
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  Speaker 1: was facing the fire, but to actually like walk that
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  Speaker 1: way all the time, to have that in every single
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  Speaker 1: way is really God's desire for all of us. And
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  Speaker 1: so we're going to dive into that because we want,
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  Speaker 1: we want people to, to truly walk with the Lord,
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  Speaker 1: to know what faith is. And so. You have this,
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  Speaker 1: we're going to get deeper into it, but you have
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  Speaker 1: this great analogy you use where you ask people, because
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  Speaker 1: you talk about what it is to really use your faith.
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  Speaker 1: And so you ask people, what's your favorite sports team?
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  Speaker 1: And then you say, and then they answer and you go,
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  Speaker 1: would you bet on them? Like you, you want them
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  Speaker 1: to win?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Okay. Do you, would you bet your, would you bet
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  Speaker 1: on them to win?
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  Speaker 3: And for me, would you bet everything you have that
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  Speaker 3: they would, you know, win the world series or the
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  Speaker 3: super bowl or whatever that the big match is for
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  Speaker 3: your sport? Would you bet that they would win all
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  Speaker 3: of it? And nearly everyone responds to that with a
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  Speaker 3: lack of certainty or maybe a lack of faith or a, well,
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  Speaker 3: hold on a second. I'm not willing to put everything
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  Speaker 3: on that situation.
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  Speaker 1: Well, and in my case with Manchester United and the
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  Speaker 1: Padres and even the Yankees, that's just wisdom because they
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  Speaker 1: just do nothing but disappoint me. But put it like this,
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  Speaker 1: because I think if you're a baseball fan, By and large,
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  Speaker 1: before the season began, and especially even as it went on,
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  Speaker 1: you're going, the Dodgers are going to win the World
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  Speaker 1: Series again. They've got by far the best roster. Then
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  Speaker 1: they went out and signed the biggest free agent for
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  Speaker 1: a stupid contract in Kyle Tucker. And then as if
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  Speaker 1: that wasn't good enough, they got the best free agent
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  Speaker 1: pitcher on the market, who's an absolute stud and current
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: AL Cy Young winner, Tarek Skubal. So they are overwhelming
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  Speaker 1: favorites to win the World Series. Now, here's the question.
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  Speaker 1: Would you bet your house that the Dodgers would win
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  Speaker 1: the World Series? Because everybody's going to go like, well, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: they're the odds-on favorite. But we all know that that's
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  Speaker 1: why we like sports is because the odds don't always
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  Speaker 1: go that way. And that's when it's like, oh, my house?
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  Speaker 1: Because what does your mind go to? What if I'm wrong?
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  Speaker 1: And that's immediately where you go is you start to
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  Speaker 1: go like, well, there's other teams. I mean, we're further
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  Speaker 1: along in the playoffs now. But if this was at
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  Speaker 1: the beginning of the season, you start going like, well,
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  Speaker 1: what if this guy gets hurt and I can't predict
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  Speaker 1: the future? And all these different things would start to
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  Speaker 1: play with your mind. And that's why people don't place
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  Speaker 1: their bets, wouldn't bet their house on the Dodgers.
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  Speaker 3: And really the takeaway or the point of that example
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  Speaker 3: is the difference between belief and faith, right? I could
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  Speaker 3: tell you, I believe the Dodgers will win the World Series.
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  Speaker 3: I wouldn't tell you I'm willing to bet on it.
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  Speaker 3: And when it comes to faith, faith is different than
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  Speaker 3: just like, oh, I believe, I think it's likely, or
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  Speaker 3: that sounds good. When it comes to faith, like scripture says,
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  Speaker 3: faith without works is dead. And what you've got to
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  Speaker 3: do is be able to make decisions in accordance with
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  Speaker 3: your faith. That's where I challenge people sometimes when they
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  Speaker 3: say like, why? You know, I believe in God. It's like, well,
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  Speaker 3: do you? Do you make all your decisions in accordance
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  Speaker 3: with that? Because really what it means to believe in
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  Speaker 3: God is you believe he's going to win the Super
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  Speaker 3: Bowl and you're betting everything you got on him winning
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  Speaker 3: the Super Bowl. Not you like the story, not you've
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  Speaker 3: been to church, not you understand. what the teachings mean.
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  Speaker 3: It's I make all of my decisions in accordance with
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  Speaker 3: this belief. That's really what it means to believe. And
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  Speaker 3: I can tell you when you begin to walk in
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  Speaker 3: faith like that and you get all of your decisions
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  Speaker 3: in your life lined up, there's some massive fruit that
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  Speaker 3: gets produced by that. The fruit of faith in your
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  Speaker 3: life is amazing. And that's what we're going to talk
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  Speaker 3: about Before we go into that, I want to just
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  Speaker 3: start with why. Why do we even have faith? Why
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  Speaker 3: does faith exist? We believe in Christ because then we're
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  Speaker 3: saved by that, saved by grace, but faith is us
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  Speaker 3: receiving that gift. But why did God even make us
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  Speaker 3: in a way that we need faith? If God made
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  Speaker 3: it all and he could make it however he wanted
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  Speaker 3: to make it, why did he make it such that
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  Speaker 3: we need faith? Well, it's a very simple answer. Let
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  Speaker 3: me just start with first, why did God make us
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  Speaker 3: in the first place? Well, it's an outpouring of his glory.
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  Speaker 3: Think about if you had so much power, so much wonder, glory,
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  Speaker 3: creative ability, and all these things on the earth, and
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  Speaker 3: you just decided to make things. You decided to paint pictures.
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  Speaker 3: That's what God did. Or you can oversimplify that into
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  Speaker 3: God wanted children. And if you want children, you want
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  Speaker 3: to have a relationship with them. And what would not
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  Speaker 3: be a relationship is if God forced certainty onto us.
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  Speaker 3: where he's like, you already, you know, and the angels
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  Speaker 3: are made in that way. Angels were created with full knowledge,
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  Speaker 3: full understanding of who God was. We're created in a
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  Speaker 3: way that we can have relationship with him, where you
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  Speaker 3: can learn about him and you can choose to follow him.
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  Speaker 3: He's not going to make you do something, but he
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  Speaker 3: does want you to want to do those things. And
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  Speaker 3: so the setup of faith is understanding that this is
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  Speaker 3: the beginning. Faith is a part of our relationship with God.
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  Speaker 3: Through faith, we know him, and as we know him,
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  Speaker 3: it develops our faith. Whereas on the flip side, if
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  Speaker 3: God gave everything to us, all the knowledge, it would
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  Speaker 3: just be a forced certainty on us. It's like, oh,
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  Speaker 3: I already know how the end of the earth is
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  Speaker 3: going to be. I know who God is. I have
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  Speaker 3: this full understanding of all of time. There's no faith there,
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  Speaker 3: and there's really not any relationship there. You would just
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  Speaker 3: immediately bow at the reverence of God because of his greatness,
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  Speaker 3: but it wouldn't be the same type of relationship.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. And that's where free will becomes such a, you know,
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  Speaker 1: which is, there's people that argue about it and Calvinists
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  Speaker 1: and all that sort of stuff. That's where it becomes
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  Speaker 1: such a big concept. But when you understand, you know,
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  Speaker 1: what it is to have relationship. And I always put
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  Speaker 1: it to people when I talk about why God created us.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: I'm like, you know, why did you have kids? Like
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  Speaker 1: no one has kids because they're like, Hey, maybe 10
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: years from now, they'll unload the dishwasher for me and
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: do a few chores around the house. Wouldn't that be great?
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  Speaker 1: You do it because you love them. Right. And you,
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  Speaker 1: and you, you know, that's, that's the father's heart. But,
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  Speaker 1: If there was no free will, now it's servanthood, right?
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  Speaker 1: Now it's servitude and it's slavery. And that's not an
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  Speaker 1: actual relationship. And if we're to inherit and Jesus is
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: the firstborn among many brothers, guess what? We're growing up.
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  Speaker 1: We're being developed. We're being trained. We're being matured. We're
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: being the same way that you're going to raise your
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: kid to hopefully take over an inheritance that you leave
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: for them. That's what we're doing. We're going to be
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: reigning with Christ. And so like, we have to remember
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  Speaker 1: that big picture. And if there's no free will in that,
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  Speaker 1: would you give a nepo baby something that you would,
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  Speaker 1: you know, that would you give them an inheritance?
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  Speaker 3: Maybe.
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  Speaker 1: They probably wouldn't do very well with it, though.
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  Speaker 3: So that's why faith, in the context of asking God, why?
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  Speaker 3: Asking the character of God, why does faith exist? But Nick,
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  Speaker 3: what is faith?
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  Speaker 1: Man, so faith, this to me has been such a revelation.
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  Speaker 1: And we're going to get into what is faith and
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: what faith is not. So a little note for you guys.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: If you go to BibleHub.com when you're studying your Bible,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: you can go to the INT part, which is the interlinear.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: And what it does is it lays the Greek and
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: the Hebrew, depending on what part of the Bible you're reading.
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: And it also puts the word, what it is, and
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: you can click on it and get the actual definition
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: because so many words, I think there's three or four
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: different words in Greek for love, and we just have one.
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  Speaker 1: And that's just one example. There's so many different times
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  Speaker 1: where we either don't have a word or there's multiple
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  Speaker 1: words that give different meanings.
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  Speaker 3: Some of my deepest understandings of reading the Bible have
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: come out of pulling the lexicon out and saying, you know,
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: what did the, What does the Hebrew say here? What
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: does the Greek say here?
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, if you want to get fancy, your exegesis means
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: that you need to dive into what the words actually mean.
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  Speaker 1: And you have a love of, you often like to
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: break a mental sweat. You like our man, White Goodman,
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: and read the dictionary. So you appreciate people who like language.
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  Speaker 1: So the word is pistis. And this is, so I'm
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: going to read you the definition from the lexicon. So
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: it says, pistis is always a gift from God and
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  Speaker 1: never something that can be produced by people. Capture that.
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  Speaker 1: In short, histis for the believer is God's divine persuasion
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  Speaker 1: and therefore distinct from human belief, confidence, yet involving it.
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  Speaker 1: The Lord continuously births faith in the yielded believer so
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: that they can know what he prefers. I love that
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  Speaker 1: so much. Uh, that, that definition of, of like that
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  Speaker 1: part about yielding your heart and understanding that, like, like
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  Speaker 1: knowing what God prefers when you realize that it's God's
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  Speaker 1: divine persuasion in you and that he's literally, I mean,
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  Speaker 1: think about what a gracious God to actually divinely persuade
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: you to believe. Uh, I just, I love that definition
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: so much. And there was a commentary from, uh, M
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Lloyd Jones that I want to share real quick, because
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: I think that this captures it even more. He says,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: faith always has the element of assurance, certainty, and confidence.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: and evidential value substantiating the thing we hope for. With faith,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: there is no strain or tension. Rather, it has the
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: element of assurance and confidence in it. If there is
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: strain or tension, trying to persuade yourself to keep from doubting,
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: you can be quite sure that it is not faith.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: That's a big word. That's a big thing to say.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Faith is not the law of mathematical probability. It's back
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: to our example with the Dodgers. Faith is a spiritual
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: is spiritual. It's the gift of God. It's not natural.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: You cannot command faith at will. It's always something that
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: is given in rot by God. Therefore, if you want
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: to be a man of faith, it will always be
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: the result of becoming a certain type of person. Man,
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: Right there at the end. We're going to come back
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: to that later. But he says that if you want
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: to be a man of faith, it is always the
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: result of becoming a certain type of person. But faith
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: starts with God. And what does scripture say about faith?
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: Romans chapter 10, verse 17. So faith comes by hearing
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: and hearing by the words of Christ. Christ's gift is
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: when he's speaking to us, he's telling us who he is.
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: When you receive that word, in your heart and you
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: understand who God is, that helps you understand, okay, if
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: I know the character of God, I know how this
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: situation is going to work out. That's really how we're
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: able to believe. God, if I know who you are,
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: then I know how everything you made works and I
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: know who you are and what you're going to do
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: in the future.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's so good. And one other quick scripture I
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: want to throw in there because that M. Lloyd Jones
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: commentary was on Romans 4, 18 through 25. In Romans 4, 20,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: when he's talking about Abraham, It said, no unbelief made
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: strong in his faith as he gave glory to God.
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: And I just love that because when you look into it,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: once again, I dove into that. When it says he
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: gave glory to God, it's praise, honor, worship. Like you
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: want to grow strong in your faith, man, get in
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: the presence of God. Spend time worshiping him. Spend time
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: acknowledging what he's done for you already. We all have
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: so much to be grateful for. And your mind, if
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: you don't control it, if you don't allow it and
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: you're unaware, will just go to all the things that
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: you lack or all the things that you think would
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: be different. And you will miss God working so actively
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: in your life. So if you want to grow in
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: your faith, man, give glory to God. Start thanking him.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: And so to the point that we made about what
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: faith is, let's be the impossible life like we always
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: are and say what faith is not. And this is
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: where I'm very grateful because I thought this was a
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: great example. Faith is not straining it out. If you
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: noticed in what we read there, both in the actual
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: definition from the lexicon, as well as the commentary from
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: Emily Jones, if you, if it's like, if there's strain
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: or tension, trying to persuade yourself to keep from doubting,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: that's not faith, right? It's not like getting the belief
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: meter high enough. Like you always say, he's not Santa Claus.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: God doesn't need to like, Oh, you passed level 70.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Now I'll move. It's not like that. It's also not
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: bludgeoning yourself with scripture. I have had some experiences growing
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: up as a kid where it was like, you know,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: if we said the wrong thing, it was like, speak faith,
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: speak faith. And like, you're getting like beat by the scripture.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: That's not faith. And it's also not a magic power
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: to determine outcomes and control God. Like, Oh, if I
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: just have, like, if you have faith, you can move mountains.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Sounds like it's just you wielding like the power of
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: a genie. That's absolutely not what faith is at all.
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: And some of those things it's, it's, what does God
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: care about most? It says the Lord weighs the heart.
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: God shows us his character and God cares a lot
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: about our character. And when we try to use faith
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: in the wrong way, it dissipates from us when we're
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: trying to get faith. What do I got to say?
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: What do I got to do? What's the magic buttons
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: I got to press? Oh, I guess I just got
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: to go to this. Some people first come to church
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: because they're like, well, I got to go to church
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: so that God will bless my business. Or if I
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: just believe, if I spin around three times and I
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: hold my breath while I read the first half of
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: the book of Romans, then God's going to show up
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: in my life and it does not work that way.
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: God cares about your heart. And what scripture also says
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: is that God gives willingly and righteous qualities to those
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: who ask for it. Like the man who comes to
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: Jesus and says, Lord, I believe, help me in my unbelief.
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: And anything that you would ask for God, if you
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: want more faith in your life, you can ask and
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: God will give you more faith. But it does matter
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: in the heart why you want that faith. If you
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: want to know the character of God better, God will
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: reveal that to you. And what that turns into is
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: your ability to walk through testing and your ability to
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: walk through trials. But when you're looking to God to say, hey, God,
• 19:55
  Speaker 3: what do I got to say or do to get
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: you to do what I want you to do? That's
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: just not the way that faith works. But really what
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: we're trying to lean into now, and then we're going
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: to get into some of the fruits of living a
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: life of faith, which is the great part here, But
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: if I could just give you one last analogy of
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: how faith works, it's, you know, starting with the sports
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: analogy at the beginning, you got to bet on it.
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: You got to take action on it. And there is
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: an example that I've heard, you know, since I was,
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: I think this one's been around in church for hundreds
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: of years, if not longer, and talking about how faith
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: is similar to a chair. Okay. You can see a
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: chair or believe that there's a chair, maybe even watch
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: other people sit in that chair. But many people in their,
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: in their, walk with God and their Christianity, they're at
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: the place where like, no, I've seen the chair. I
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: know about the chair. I've heard of it. I've seen it.
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: I could describe it to you. I could tell you
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: about it. I could tell you where the chair is.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: But the question is, have you sat in the chair?
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: Did you put your own weight in the chair such
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: that if the chair wasn't real, if you were wrong
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: about the chair, that you would have fallen down, right?
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: That's what faith is. Faith is us not just seeing
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: the chair, but it's making decisions in accordance with it.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: And what we're going to talk about here in just
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: a second is some of the fruit that comes from that.
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: But that fruit comes from you taking action on your faith.
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: It comes from you passing some of these tests. Here's
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: what you've got to do in the face of doubt.
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: Here's what you've got to do in the face of uncertainty.
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: And when you do these things, you get great fruit
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: in your life. Yeah.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: And just keep in mind, because you mentioned this, Gene,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: I think it's such a key point. I don't want
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: people to miss this because if we're talking about it's
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: not straining, but it's from becoming a certain type of person.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: You know how you're going to become that certain type
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: of person? I said about worshiping God and getting his presence.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: It's coming from knowing the Lord. Like if you think
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: about what the apostles did so often when they like
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: you see Peter whenever he's performing miracles and he puts
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: everybody out of the room and raises a little girl
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: from the dead. Where did he see that? He saw
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Jesus do the exact same thing. When you see Paul
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: goes around because he had a revelation of the revealed
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Christ and spent time with God. Like what I love
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: about Paul is you could say that I don't think
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: you could really even argue it. He did more than
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: anybody else. And he never actually walked with the Lord
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: the way the other apostles did, which is a great
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: encouragement to us. But what do we see? We see
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: that we see people seeing Paul do miracles. And there's
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: a guy who goes in the name of Jesus, who
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: Paul preaches, and he tries to cast out a demon.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: And what happens? The demons beat the living tar out
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: of him. because he had no actual knowledge of God.
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: And so what he was saying was like us rubbing
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: the magic genie going like, I think I've got my
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: faith meter high enough because there was no actually knowledge
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: of God in relationship with the Lord. So like you
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: growing in faith and walking in this certainty and walking
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: in this place where you're like, no, I know this
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: is going to happen. It comes from your confidence in
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: the character of who God is because you know him,
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: you've walked with him, you spend time in his presence,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: you know his word. That's what we're saying. That's where
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: it becomes inwrought. And it's not something you're straining out.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: It's a natural outpouring because of the level of relationship
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: that you walk with with the Lord. It's like with Garrett.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Garrett's one of my best friends. I know Garrett about
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: as well as anybody does, I would say, outside of
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: his family members and obviously his wife. There's some things
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: I'm like, I know exactly what Garrett's going to do here.
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: And whether it's what I want him to do or not,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: I know what he's going to do. Now, he will
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: quickly say he doesn't ever want to be predictable, so
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: he'll keep me on my toes.
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: And I know that about him.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: But that's a picture of how it is to walk
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: with God. When you know somebody, you start to understand
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: their actions. You start to be able to go like, yeah,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: I know what's going to happen here. And you're not
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: sitting there going like, oh, I don't know. I'm not sure.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: It's like, no, I know what's going to happen. And
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: that's what it feels like to have the in-wrought faith.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: And so I just wanted to highlight that because it's
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: such a key point of where it comes from. So, G,
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: let's dive into what some of the choices we have
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: to make when we're actually applying this faith.
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, so we're going to talk about three choices
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: that we got to make and some of the fruit
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: that it produces in our life. But I want to
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: just start us off with this scripture, right? We've already
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: covered plenty of great scripture, but I want to give
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: this one more scripture that makes the point that I
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: was just making of, look, you've got to take action
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: with your faith. Until you do, you're not going to
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: see these fruits. And this is James chapter two, verse 17.
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: In the same way, faith by itself, if it is
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: not accompanied by action, is dead, right? Faith without action dies.
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: is dead. We've got to put some action to our faith.
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: So what does living by faith do? What is it
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: unlocking us? Okay, here we go. Three choices that we
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: got to make, right? And I'll say this again. I
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: say it often. This is my entire theology in a statement.
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: God is sovereign. Man's responsible, which means God's in control
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: of it all. He owns it all. He made it all.
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: But there's a few things that God's made us responsible for, okay?
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: And so we do have a responsibility to take action
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: on our faith. Here's three choices. Number one is you've
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: got to choose obedience. Choose obedience over control. And here's
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: the great fruit that this is going to produce in
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: your life. We'll talk about it. Here's the great fruit
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: that's going to produce in your life. It'll produce peace.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: It'll produce freedom. And these are some of the things
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: that all of us want so much. We want freedom
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: and peace in our life. I think this entire country
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: was founded on the desire to just have a couple
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: of these qualities. This is probably where we're going to
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: start here is Proverbs 3, verse 5 and 6. Trust
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: in the Lord with all your heart and lean not
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: on your own understanding. Most of the anxiety in our life,
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: it comes from us trying to control the things that
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: are outside of our authority. It says trust in the
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: Lord with all your heart. It doesn't say trust in
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: the Lord with some of your heart. It doesn't say
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: trust in the Lord with your knowledge. It doesn't say
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: depend on the Lord on Sunday. It says, trust in
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: the Lord with all your heart. And your heart is
• 25:39
  Speaker 3: your desire center. It's what you care about most. It's
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: what you believe most deeply. And what it's saying is
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: where that should be built out of, what it should
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: be based upon is your trust in God. When the
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: very center of who you are is based upon that,
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: then you're going to quit trying to control these other situations.
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: You'll look at some things and maybe say, yeah, certainty
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: would be nice here. But even certainty for me is
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: pale in comparison to to the power of God and
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: more so trust in what I could do or wish
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: that I was another foot taller or had a little
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: bit more money or had a little bit more control
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: in this situation. What I'm going to lean on is
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: the quality and the character of who God is. And
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: that's the greatest source of peace and freedom in my life. Yeah.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: I think that that's such a man. How many times
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: do we want to control things? And I'm like, that's
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: one of the things we say all the time on
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: here is like, if you want to walk with God,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: you have to get okay with uncertainty, right? Because it's just,
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: it's always the way, I mean, you talk about why
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: faith in the beginning. I think it's so interesting how
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: many times God tells people to go do things without
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: giving them any explanation. I mean, look at Job. Job
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: never got the explanation. Like you get to the book
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: at the end of the book of Job. There's no like, hey, Job,
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: let me tell you about what happened. It was kind
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: of like, and God restored him and the book ends.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: John the Baptist, go baptize. Okay. And the guy that
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: you see, like, it wasn't like, Hey, here's who the
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Messiah is. This is exactly your role. It's go baptize.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Whoever you see the spirit descending on. That's the, that's
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: the Messiah.
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: Like Moses go. You know what I mean? Like it's always,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: it's always obedience first. And he does not explain everything afterwards.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: And that's why we always say like, you won't see
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: God's purpose until afterwards when you're looking back and you
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: connect the dots. But like, I look at where we
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: want to have certainty, like G and marriage.
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: Man.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: And in relationships, how much do we want to be
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: able to like, no, if like, Hey, things are tough
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: right now. If I do this, is it going to
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: work out? And that you're asking the wrong question because
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: what you're really saying is like, give me the three-step
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: process to have control. And we find tricky ways to
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: try and get control. But like, so like marriage is
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: a big one. I would say finances. If you look
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: at where people have the most anxiety, like that's actually
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: probably a massive one is, is in finances. For me,
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: I know that that was my favorite. That's like my
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: flavor of choice or anxiety?
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: I think because finances is, marriage can be less tangible.
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: It's people. And there's more so much of the interaction
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: and transaction in marriage is person to person. And maybe
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: it's easier for you to lean on the Bible and
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: that quality. But when it comes to money, people are like, hey, look,
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: there's money, there's banks, the economy, math, like, hey, this
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: isn't necessarily God's world. That's where a lot of people
• 28:16
  Speaker 3: might think. And so, They would look at a situation like, look,
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: it's just not practical for me to believe in God
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: in this situation. Like, I need money, so I need
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: to go do this. That's the way the world works.
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: And if you live that way, if you live by,
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: that's the way the world works based upon your understanding
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: of the world that's not first and with a foundation
• 28:37
  Speaker 3: and who God is in the world that he made,
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: you will constantly be living in struggle and in anxiety.
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: Even in this, even in these things where it's like, man,
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: this would make so much sense. Like you want to
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: know that God cares about math. You can see this
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: in many of the battles in the Old Testament. This
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: is God with Saul and God gets mad at Saul.
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: He's like, look, I know that there's way more enemy
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: soldiers than how many you got. Don't go count how
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: many enemy soldiers there are. I can do math way
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: better than you. That's not the point that I'm trying
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: to make here. What I'm trying to show you is
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: you got to trust me. And I think that example
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: of God with Saul and counting the enemy is a
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: perfect example of how money is in our life. People say, look,
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: hey man, it's just numbers. There's a few hundred of us.
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: There's thousands of them. There's no way this could work.
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: The math doesn't math. And we do that with our
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: finances sometimes. Like God, like, hey, look, you just don't understand.
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: You forgot how to count. No, God's saying, I didn't
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: forget how to count. I'm greater than math. I created math.
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: And in the same way, we've got to come back
• 29:38
  Speaker 3: to God with every area of our life. and decide
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: that we're going to put our trust in him instead
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: of what we think we can understand or control. Yeah.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: And let's just be, let me just be straight with
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: what that looks like. The obvious example for in finance
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: is like, man, we're not doing very well. So like
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: I either need to take on an additional job. That
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: means I'm going to start missing church or we're going
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: to stop tithing because you know, Right now, that 10%,
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: we need it for insert whatever.
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: I get it.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: I've been there 100%. That's the downside of it is
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: where you're like, well, we can't afford to do this anymore.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: That's whenever you're beginning to take control instead of obedience.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: On the good side, and praise the Lord, I will
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: tell you from experience, my tithe does not hurt my
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: finances at this point that I'm living in analogy. When
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: I give my tithe to God, it's not like, oh man,
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: we could really use that. We're very blessed. Now, here's
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: where that becomes a problem. and you see this with
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: David in, I believe it's in 2 Samuel, when he
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: takes the census. If I start feeling good and feeling
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: relaxed and feeling a sense of peace and confidence because
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: I can flip open my bank balance or whatever my
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: investment portfolio is.
• 30:38
  Speaker 3: And go like, you know what?
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: Things are good.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: I'm not living by faith that way either. And so
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: it's always, like you said, God cares about our heart.
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: It's always a sense of like, where is our confidence
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: coming from? Where's our source of strength? And where are
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: we actually putting our trust? And so, I mean, in finances,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: like you said, we have a very tangible one. in
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: your marriage, it's the same thing, man. It's like, you know,
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: when things are not, are not going good, do you
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: stop sewing in what you're supposed to do? Do you
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: stop loving? Do you stop leading? Do you stop serving?
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: Because it's like, well, you know what? Like I, she,
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: my wife, you don't understand. Like she I'm doing all
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: this stuff and she's not reciprocating. And once again, it's,
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: it's what does the word of God say? It's Ephesians five, right?
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: That you would love your wife the way that Christ
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: loved the church, that, that level of sacrificial love and
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: the understanding of what's required of you, man, it's, it
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: is a high, high standard. And I almost feel like
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: it's harsh to put that. I genuinely, as I say this,
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: I go, man, that is such a high requirement of men.
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: But when you actually understand what's required of you, it
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: is very humbling because you would never try and do
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: it on your own. But these are the areas when
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: it comes into the rubber meet in the road and
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: you find out, you find out in the bad times
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: and also in the good times where your trust is
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: and where your faith is actually placed.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: So when you trust in the Lord with all your heart,
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: the fruit of this is that You become a man
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: who can work hard, face all sorts of difficulty and uncertainty,
• 31:59
  Speaker 3: and you still have peace in your life. That what
• 32:02
  Speaker 3: a great gift because your peace doesn't come from, hey,
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: I feel like I can control the situation. My peace
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: comes from, I know who God is. And you're no
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: longer an emotional slave to all the things that are
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: going on around you and what happens in your life.
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: And this is Philippians chapter four, verse six through seven.
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: God's peace guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: When we're in Christ, that's what happens in our life.
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: So what you want to do is you want to
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: become the type of man that you can have complete
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: commitment without needing complete control in your life. I'll be
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: honest with you. There's a lot of times where I
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: wish I had a little bit more power, a little
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: bit more control of my situation. But I understand God's
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: given me what he's given me. And with everything else,
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: I'm going to trust in God. And the fruit of
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: that is peace and freedom. Let's go on to the
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: second one.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, before we do, I was just going to say,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: everybody wants to live that way. And you've said one
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: of your great quotes is, peace comes not from knowing
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: what will happen, but from knowing what you'll do no
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: matter what. And I'll just say, with that situation with Rian,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: like I said, I never ran the tape on what
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: would happen if she died. But I already knew. I
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: was like, if that happens, then God still loves me.
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: His plans are still good. And he's still faithful. And
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: I've had, because your mind wants to run scenarios. And
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: then if you know what you would do, that's where
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: your peace comes from. Whether it's been when my kids
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: have been in danger or when my finances have been
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: low or my wife's life was on the line, what
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: I always came back to is I was like, my
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: trust would not change no matter what. That was why
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: I had peace in all the situations that I walked through.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: I know you said it that way and I don't
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: want to belabor the point, but I want to emphasize
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: for people because I think it's so important that when
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: you're like, no matter what, God is good. It's Job.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: Though he slay me, yet will I praise him. Man,
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: when you have that, What can life do to you?
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: You are in complete freedom because what can come your way?
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: If you die, you go get to be with Christ.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: If you live, you're going to keep fulfilling the plans
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: and purposes he has for you. You can't lose. It's
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: the best proposition ever. Anyways. All right.
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: What's number two? So three choices here. Number one, choose
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: obedience over control. Number two, choose principles over feelings. Choose
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: principles over feelings. Principles, something we talk about here all
• 34:13
  Speaker 3: the time, the impossible life and the fruit of this.
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: is stability and wisdom in your life. What are principles, right?
• 34:22
  Speaker 3: Principles govern outcomes. We've talked about this a ton in
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: The Impossible Life. Principles govern outcomes. And when you know
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: who God is, you also understand the world that he made.
• 34:33
  Speaker 3: And if you understand the world that he made, then
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: you have a good understanding of this is the way
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: things work, right? I know that if I plant a
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: seed in the ground in the right time of year
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: and I water it correctly, that it's going to grow.
• 34:44
  Speaker 3: I don't have to do anything else. It says God
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: made a world of order. And when I learn how
• 34:49
  Speaker 3: to choose in principles over feelings, because sometimes emotions are
• 34:52
  Speaker 3: really loud. Logic is not high volume, but emotions is
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: very high volume. And when we listen to those emotions,
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: it takes us towards anger. It takes us towards frustration.
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: And it really ends up blowing up a lot of
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: the greatness that God has planted in our life because
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: we can't just trust in him and the way that
• 35:11
  Speaker 3: he made things. And this is Matthew 6, verse 33.
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: things will be given to you as well. What are
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: all these things in that scripture? He's talking right before this.
• 35:25
  Speaker 3: Jesus is saying like, hey, why do you keep asking
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: me for bread? Why are you so worried about where
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: you're going to sleep at night? Why are you so
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: worried about what you're going to wear? He's saying, seek
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: first his kingdom and his righteousness. Focus on what is right.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: Focus on principles. Focus on the way things work. then
• 35:41
  Speaker 3: don't worry about all the other things and let me
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: take care of that. Because what the people were coming
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: to Jesus with was anxiety, was uncertainty. And he said,
• 35:50
  Speaker 3: what did he say? He didn't say, hey, don't worry.
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: I got you. I'll take care of you. He said, no,
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: seek first the kingdom, principles first. Then all these things
• 35:59
  Speaker 3: that you're so worried about, those will be taken care
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: of as well.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think this is where certainty, I think, almost
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: is a feeling. I think this is very closely tied
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: to number one. Because that's really like, but that's what
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: you want when you want certainties. You just want to
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: know because then you can relax. And so you're being
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: driven by anxiety. You're being driven by feelings. Let me
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: ask you this, G. With having this kind of application
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: of faith, do you think it just removes all doubt? Like,
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: would you say that it removes all doubt and that
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: that goes away? Or do you still have to like,
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: you know? battle those things down. Because I think what
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: I described in the beginning of just being like having this,
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: cause I genuinely felt like I was carried along. I
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: will not say it's always been that way, but like
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: in that moment, it 100% was, is that, is that
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: always the case or will doubts keep trying to, you know,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: poke their heads in?
• 36:48
  Speaker 3: I think the more, the more you walk in it,
• 36:50
  Speaker 3: the more you've done these things, the more you've lived
• 36:52
  Speaker 3: this way, the easier it is to trust. But I
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: say easier. I wouldn't say it's ever easier. It's ever
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: just like, it's, you know, I absolutely, Because even in
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: the context of sowing a seed, you know what? Storm
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: can come and destroy your crop. But the principles is
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: that's okay. It doesn't hail here every day of the year.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: It doesn't hail here every year. Sometimes storms come and
• 37:15
  Speaker 3: they wipe you out. And maybe there's a lesson to
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: be learned from that. Or maybe that's just a difficulty
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: that you've got to walk through. But if you'll stick
• 37:23
  Speaker 3: to the principles, right? And this is the principles of endurance.
• 37:26
  Speaker 3: This is the principles of stewardship. hey, even though one
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: bad thing happened, I'm going to keep living by principles
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: and doing the right thing. And I know that I
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: will produce a great fruit. The longer you've done it,
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: the easier it is to walk in it. But when
• 37:40
  Speaker 3: you're brand new to it, it's so easy to get
• 37:43
  Speaker 3: brought back into an emotional control. So to answer your question,
• 37:46
  Speaker 3: I would say it's never just like easy or automatic,
• 37:49
  Speaker 3: but it certainly gets easier over time.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: And I think one of the things we're assuming here,
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: and I want to always point out the assumptions, the
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: prespositions in what we're saying, one of the things we're
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: assuming here is that, you know, what God's word says,
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: if you don't understand principles, just, just know these are
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: truths that govern what happens. The Bible is truth. So
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: you can always say the word. So like my question
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: would be, do you know what the word of God
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: says about how you, you know, your role in your family,
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: about how you should do finances, about what you should
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: do with friendships, what you should do with your health,
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: you know, how you relate to God, because the more
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: you dive in, I'll just tell you, man, like one
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: of my favorite things that pastor Keith said is that, um,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: success is hidden in templates. And he talks about the
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: Bible is the greatest book of templates ever. That was
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: one of the most profound things I think I've ever
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: grasped onto that he said, because the more I go through,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: the more I start going like, Oh, this is how
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: God operates. And when I understand how God operates, now
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: I know what truth is. And then I just operate
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: the same way. And you're telling me that like, now
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: I know how to, like, I'm not just playing the
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: video game. I'm writing the code. That is literally what
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: we're saying. But you, if you don't know the truth,
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: You're not going to choose principles. You're not going to
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: choose principle truth. You're going to choose your feelings because
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: they're going to be screaming at you.
• 38:58
  Speaker 3: Principles is like math and templates are like formulas. Like
• 39:02
  Speaker 3: if you do these things, you get these same solutions.
• 39:05
  Speaker 3: But here's what happens is when people get so emotionally led,
• 39:09
  Speaker 3: they don't use the formulas. When fear takes over, we
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: abandon principles that are meant to lead us through difficulty.
• 39:17
  Speaker 3: And this is where I'm saying, when you've got the faith,
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: you'll also have a faith in the world that God made.
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: Not a fear of all these other things that could happen,
• 39:26
  Speaker 3: but hey, I'm going to trust in God and I'm
• 39:28
  Speaker 3: going to trust in His order. Because what happens is
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: we get afraid and we throw out all the principles
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: that were supposed to save us in the middle of
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: the storm. We go through money gets tight and we
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: stop being generous. Marriage gets painful. Marriage gets hard. And
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: then we stop being people of love. We stop loving
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: our spouse because we're going through such a hard time.
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: life becomes uncertain and we abandon patience and start trying
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: to force all these outcomes and we make our situations worse.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: Now, yeah, and the big thing that we want you
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: guys to take, I think about what you went through, G,
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: and I'm trying, because I don't really have a better
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: analogy than this, but like on your very first mission
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: as a Navy SEAL, I asked you this recently for
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: the first time. I said, did you have to use
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: your combat medicine training that you had? And you said, yeah.
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: And like you had been through so much training and
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: for us training is you've read the word. You know
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: what the word says. You've heard preaching. You've listened to
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: podcasts like this and you've had it. Well, now, you know,
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: that's your combat medicine. Now somebody has been shot. And
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: what are you going to do? Because when someone gets shot,
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: I've never seen someone get shot, but I can imagine
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: it was not a peaceful experience, but you had to
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: use all your training to actually apply what you got taught.
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: Was there like aha moments of like, okay, that's why
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: they told us to do this because until you, you know,
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: cause it was theory until you actually applied it.
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: Right. Well, SEAL training is, is very good training. And
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: I can tell you, though, I've been through many emergency
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: procedures and in any of the emergencies I've been in,
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: I did. I never once had the thought, oh, my gosh,
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: what am I going to do? I didn't even think
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: about what I was going to do. It was an
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: automatic response because we had done so much training, so
• 41:05
  Speaker 3: much preparation for these moments that when the moment comes,
• 41:08
  Speaker 3: it's like, oh, this is. Yeah, just do the thing.
• 41:11
  Speaker 3: It's automatic. You trust in it. And that's part of
• 41:14
  Speaker 3: that's a part of good training. And that's part of
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: the reason why just a note there for out here
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: for many of the men's leaders out there who listened
• 41:22
  Speaker 3: to us. If you ever come to Mighty Men, you'll experiences.
• 41:25
  Speaker 3: We do a lot of the same things over and
• 41:27
  Speaker 3: over again. What we've created is a training ground where
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: you're going to prepare for the testing that's coming in
• 41:33
  Speaker 3: your life.
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's so good. And realize that your training is
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: every day. It's like I said in the beginning, it
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: was all the scenarios that you run through in your mind.
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: you have to become very aware of what you're allowing
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: your heart to drift to, to generate a feeling that
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: you want, or, you know, when you're being pushed on
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: by different emotions throughout the day, because exactly what you said,
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, I think that this one is probably one
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: of the more challenging ones is to choose principles over
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: feelings because man, it's like, you know, we've been given
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: feelings for a reason, but what your feelings do is
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: they highlight the way that you think. And to your point,
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: because like what I found is whenever I was in that,
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: that situation with Rhiann, man, nothing seemed puzzling. Like there's a,
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: there's a song by a very famous worship leader where
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: he talked, I think the lyric is when I read
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: your word, I find it so hard to believe the
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: miracles so hard to believe. And when I was walking
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: through and I was like, I don't find those hard
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: to believe at all because like, and I'm not saying
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: that to like flex, but I w it was like,
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: when you're so, um, when God is, when you, when
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: you experienced the power of God in your life and you,
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: you are applying the truth of, of God's word, It is,
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: I just, I, I, I'm getting chills as I describe it. I, I,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: the puzzle isn't puzzling. The dots connect. You understand like
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: what it is that the power in the name of
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: Jesus truly to be in line with his essence of
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: who he is. There is so much power in the
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: name of Jesus. And it's not a matter of like, oh,
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: I had to strain or do this. You're like, no,
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: this is exactly what we're made for. And so that's
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: what I was asking.
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: And what were you for your family in that moment?
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: You were stability, right? And that's, that's, that's the fruit.
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: That's the fruit here. The fruit is stability and wisdom.
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: And where this comes from is when you're choosing principles
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: over your feelings, what you're not doing is you're not
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: changing your standards in the moment of circumstance. I didn't
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: say in the military when things got really bad, like, oh, well,
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: this is crazier than what they trained us for. So
• 43:23
  Speaker 3: I'm just going to come up with a bunch of
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: new ideas. No, I did exactly what I had been trained.
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: And that's what created stability. That's what created wisdom, which
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: is the ability to understand the ability to know how
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: things are going to happen. And so the fruit here
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: is when you begin to trust in principles, and the
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: Bible is full of principles. Listen to some of our
• 43:42
  Speaker 3: other episodes where we talk about principles. When you trust
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: in God's principles, what this fruit is, is you become steady, consistent.
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: You become dependable. Your wife, your business partner, your children,
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: all the other men in your life, they see you
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: and they see that your character is not determined by circumstances.
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: Your character is determined by who God is. You become fruit.
• 44:03
  Speaker 3: This is exactly what God... wants us to be. It's
• 44:07
  Speaker 3: some of the great testimony in your life when you're
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: going through difficulty of circumstance and it doesn't change you
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: or doesn't make you fall back to an old way
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: of thinking. Instead, your faith grows, your response to who
• 44:19
  Speaker 3: God is, your understanding of his character, all of that grows.
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: It's the best testimony that you can have. And this
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: is Matthew chapter 7, Verse 24 through 25, the wise
• 44:31
  Speaker 3: man builds his house on the rock. The storms still come,
• 44:35
  Speaker 3: but his house stands. The man who built his house
• 44:39
  Speaker 3: on the rock and goes through the storms, everybody talks
• 44:41
  Speaker 3: about that guy. They're like, man, I want to be
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: like him. I want to build my house on the rock.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: And the man who built his house on the sand,
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: he had a lot of friends because he built his
• 44:49
  Speaker 3: house so quickly in a moment. But then the storms
• 44:52
  Speaker 3: came and everyone was talking about the guy who used
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: to live here, but he's not here anymore. Yeah.
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: And I want to just give one more caveat before
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: we move on to the final one, G. This will
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: seem harsh when you say a man that's governed by
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: truth instead of emotion becomes someone others can depend on.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: No one disagrees with you when you say that. But
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: then whenever you're going through something difficult and you say
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: to a man, hey, your wife and your kids don't
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: need you crying right now. They don't need you feeling
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: sorry for yourself. They don't need you needing a timeout
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: to just go take care of yourself and have self-care.
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: When you say that, they're like, oh, that's a little
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: bit harsh. Well, you know what? That is what the
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: truth is. Someone's got to lead. God said, it's you.
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: And in the moment, even though, you know, even though
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: you may be having all the, all the things that
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: want to jump on you and you're seeing things fall
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: apart and it's like, oh my gosh, this is scary.
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: Or this is whatever. That's whenever it's like, that's when
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: you choose the truth. My what's required of me to
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: be the leader. What does people need? They need somebody solid, dependable.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: That's not falling apart and crying and thinking about themselves.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: So that means that you don't have time to shed tears.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: You have to step up and be strong. And that's
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: whenever people like, well, that's a little bit harsh. But
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: there's a harshness to the consistency of truth and principles
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: as we understand it. And I think that's because we've
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: gotten soft.
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: And if not tears, then anger. Anger is weak and
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: anger is selfish. Nick, Faith is just now getting to
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: that age where she's starting to act a little bit more.
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: My youngest, she's almost a year and a half and
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: starting to get to that age where she's not doing
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: baby stuff anymore, but doing toddler stuff. And I had
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: the first instance the other day where like she was
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: doing something. I just picked her up and carried her
• 46:28
  Speaker 3: out of the situation. That's just kind of all you
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: do with them at that age. But she like and
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: I set her down and she turned around and looked
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: at me. She made a face and like puffed at me,
• 46:38
  Speaker 3: threw her hands down and then ran at me and
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: hit me in the leg and then turn around and
• 46:42
  Speaker 3: threw herself on the ground. I was like, oh, okay, Faith,
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: now we're getting into toddler mode. Got it. But that
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: was an anger response. And men, when you get upset
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: and you get angry at people, I want you to
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: see yourself the way that I just described my little girl.
• 46:59
  Speaker 3: She's not saying like, well, what's the right thing to
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: do here? What should my response be? How could I
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: add value here? What does a leader do in this situation?
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: She says, no, I don't like the way that you
• 47:08
  Speaker 3: made me feel. I'm going to make sure you understand it.
• 47:11
  Speaker 3: That's what anger is. As a man, sometimes you're not
• 47:14
  Speaker 3: going to like the way your kids talk to you.
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: You're not going to like the way that your wife
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: talks to you. But you are not a leader when
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: you get angry and upset and you think you're huffing
• 47:22
  Speaker 3: and puffing and stomping your feet is going to get
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: the reaction that you want. That's what happens when you
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: follow your feelings. Don't follow your feelings. And so that's
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: what we say here. A man who's governed by truth
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: instead of emotion. you're going to be someone that people
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: can depend on. But if you're governed by emotion versus truth,
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: you're going to be someone that gets laughed at. You're
• 47:41
  Speaker 3: going to be someone that is untrustworthy. You're going to
• 47:43
  Speaker 3: be someone that people can't follow. Let's go on to
• 47:47
  Speaker 3: the number three here. Again, these are choices that we
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: got to make. We said in the beginning with James too,
• 47:53
  Speaker 3: like faith without works is dead. You're going to have
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: to make some choices. And here's the third choice. Number
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: three is choose faithful action over fear. right? Fear will
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: rob you of your destiny. And what's the fruit on
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: this one? The fruit is your growth. The fruit is
• 48:10
  Speaker 3: courage in your life, the ability to have the right response.
• 48:13
  Speaker 3: And the fruit is a greater capacity. Who would like
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: to grow? Who would like to be capable of more?
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: Who would like to become everything that they're called to be?
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: Who would like to have more courage in the face
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: of uncertainty? Hebrews chapter 11, verse 8, Abraham obeyed and went.
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: even though he did not know where he was going.
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: Abraham didn't need a complete plan. He didn't need to
• 48:38
  Speaker 3: know all the details. All he had to do was
• 48:40
  Speaker 3: he had to trust the one who is giving the instruction.
• 48:43
  Speaker 3: That's faithful action. God, I don't need all the details.
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: I know who you are. Think about it. Let me
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: make a more practical example. Nick's understanding of the battlefield,
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: Nick's understanding of weapons, things like that, It's very junior.
• 49:01
  Speaker 3: It may be more than someone who knows nothing just
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: from some of the time that we've spent together. But
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: in practical reality, Nick has next to no experience. However,
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: Nick knows me really well. Nick knows my experience level.
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: He knows how I handle things. We could get into
• 49:17
  Speaker 3: any situation and I could just say like, Nick, I
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: want you to grab this gun, hop over this wall,
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: run that direction, start shooting up at the hill. And
• 49:25
  Speaker 3: he would just say, okay. Right.
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Why?
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: Because he just trusts me. He knows I know what
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: I'm talking about. This is what happens when you understand
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: the character of God. You're going to say, God, okay,
• 49:35
  Speaker 3: I'm just going to trust you in this, even though
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: I don't know how this is supposed to work out. Yeah.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: And this situation actually happened whenever we played airsoft. We
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: used some battlefield tactics and Garrett told me what to
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: do and it was very effective. But yeah, I mean,
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: that's such a great way of, that's such a great
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: way of putting it. That analogy for me personally hits
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: home because it's a hundred percent accurate. And like, like
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: we said, if you want to grow in your faith, no,
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: no God, like, like spend time with them because what
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: the example you just gave is a hundred percent because
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: I trust you and I trust your, your knowledge of tactics.
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: The more you start to like, you get close to God,
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: you start, you stop doubting whether he's going to act
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: for your good. Because I think that's really where, when
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: we talk about, you know, choosing a faithful action over fear,
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of people's fear is tied to, yeah,
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: but what if God doesn't? And like, when you start
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: to know God, you go, you know what, but even
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: if he doesn't, right? And that's a very good thing
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: because you know, he's still good. But if you don't
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: know his character very well, like, well, that's when you
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: start asking questions. Well, how could a loving God do this?
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: And these are questions that people who have spent zero
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: time actually pressed into the presence of God, they just
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: hear about some Bible story in the Old Testament and
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: they go, how could a loving God, I'm going to
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: throw the whole thing out. And it's a shame because
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: it's like, man, you're not, you're like, that's like seeing
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: somebody for five seconds and judging them on the entirety
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: of their character, which unfortunately is called the internet and
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: social media. And it's what we do a lot of.
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: Don't do that with God. And don't do that with people.
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: You're going to end up with a lot of wrong conclusions.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: What's the fruit of that?
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: So, well, faith, I'll get to the fruit in just
• 51:05
  Speaker 3: a second, but faith requires, right? This is what is it?
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: What is the choice here? Choose faithful action over fear
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: and faithful action requires, it requires us to have faith
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: before we get the certainty. The certainty may come or
• 51:19
  Speaker 3: we may see the answer later, but we're going to
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: have to have, we're going to have to have to
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: make faithful choices before we see the results that we
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: want to see what this looks like. This is having
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: difficult conversations instead of avoiding them. Men, sometimes you've got
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: to talk to your wife about stuff that you don't
• 51:36
  Speaker 3: want to talk to them about, and you're going to
• 51:38
  Speaker 3: have to deal with it. You may not get the
• 51:40
  Speaker 3: certainty of, is this going to get the response, or
• 51:42
  Speaker 3: is this going to go the way that I want
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: it to go? That isn't like, hey, I'm going to
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: really give my wife a piece of my mind. That's
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: not what I'm talking about. You need to address what's right,
• 51:50
  Speaker 3: and you need to address what's true. You need to
• 51:53
  Speaker 3: make the right decision, especially when the cost is really high.
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: Everyone has integrity when it's easy, but when integrity is expensive,
• 52:00
  Speaker 3: that's really the test. And you've got to do this saying,
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: you know what? I'm about to go tell this person
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: what happened, or I'm about to go explain to these
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: people how this business deal is about to go. And
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: I'm nearly certain that it's going to be a consequence
• 52:14
  Speaker 3: for me. I'm going to be the one that has
• 52:16
  Speaker 3: to fix this, be the one that has to pay
• 52:18
  Speaker 3: for it. Even in that situation where you know that
• 52:20
  Speaker 3: you're going to get the consequence, what you're doing is, God,
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: I trust your principles. I trust your character. Instead of
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: trying to think, how could I get the most money
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: through this singular transaction? What I'm going to say is, God,
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: what honors you? What glorifies you? And that wisdom, that
• 52:36
  Speaker 3: wisdom is what's going to lead to your fruitfulness and
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: your success. This is you deciding, I'm going to step
• 52:42
  Speaker 3: into the responsibility that God has placed on my life.
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: Instead of saying, like, how do I just get to
• 52:48
  Speaker 3: the next position or the next title, the next thing
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: that I want? God, I'm just going to trust in you.
• 52:52
  Speaker 3: So you've got to continue doing what's right, even when
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: you don't see the results. The fear is, what if this?
• 52:59
  Speaker 3: What if that? What if it doesn't work out the
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: way that I want it to? This is where we're
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: going to choose faithful action, even if it looks terrible.
• 53:06
  Speaker 3: Even if Garrett's telling me I got to jump over
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: the wall and charge this hill where people are shooting
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: at me, I'm going to choose the faithful action over
• 53:13
  Speaker 3: fear because I trust in God. I trust in his character.
• 53:17
  Speaker 3: instead of just what I think the next result's going
• 53:19
  Speaker 3: to be. You've played that tape. You've done this in
• 53:23
  Speaker 3: your life already where you tried to step where, hey,
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: this is where I think I have the most control.
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: This is where I think I can force the outcome
• 53:30
  Speaker 3: of a situation. And how far did that get you?
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: It didn't get you where you wanted to go. So
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: we've got to decide to have faithful action over fear.
• 53:39
  Speaker 3: And the fruit of this is when you're taking on
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: this extra responsibility, when you're stepping over the wall, when
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: you're having a difficult conversation, when you do these things,
• 53:49
  Speaker 3: your capacity grows. Every time you make decisions, every time
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: you act in faith and you're practicing courage, you're strengthening
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: your perseverance, you're developing confidence in God's faithfulness in your life.
• 54:03
  Speaker 3: And this is James chapter one, verse three and four.
• 54:06
  Speaker 3: Because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be
• 54:16
  Speaker 3: mature and complete, not lacking anything. God isn't just interested
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: in what you can accomplish. He's not interested in what
• 54:24
  Speaker 3: your faith accomplishes. What God cares about, what God is
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: interested in, is who your faith is transforming you into.
• 54:31
  Speaker 3: And that's why God cares about faithful action, right? God's
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: not just trying to make you be bold, but what
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: God wants to see is who you become through this
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: process of trusting in him. He's not just saying, well,
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: let's see how much these guys really believe in me.
• 54:46
  Speaker 3: That's not what it's about. God's developing you into someone
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: who's like, you'll trust me in the battle. And if
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: you'll trust me in the battle, I can take you
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: to the next place and to the next place. God
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: cares because we're his children. God cares greatly about our development,
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: specifically about our character development.
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that is so good. And when you see it
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: like that, that's why I said, like, the more you
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: know God, the more you realize he's good. And in
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: Romans 8, 28 through 30 gives us the template of
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: what he has. He says, those he foreknew, he predestined
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: to be conformed to the image of his son, that
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: he would be the firstborn among many brothers. And that's
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: when you realize that that's what God's, that's God's desire
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: for you. you'll start seeing every test as an opportunity
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: rather than as something that's like, oh, I wish it
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: would go away because you realize that what God's developing
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: is perseverance. He's conforming your character. I mean, Jesus, it
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: says when he was on the earth, he was a
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: man of many sorrows. It's like, okay, if that's how
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: he treated Jesus when he was on the earth, like
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: we should expect no different, but we should also understand
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: what's happening from that, that for the joy set before him,
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: he endured the scorn of the cross. There is a
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: joy in it, right? And that's your favorite scripture, consider
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: it all joy. That's like the development and the maturity
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: of faith. That's capacity growing is that in the fire,
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: you're going like, man, I'm made for this. Like God,
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: you're at work. So like, we want to see people be,
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: be men of faith. The world needs great men of faith.
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: We've got so many people, um, you know, I, I've
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: read this thing. I can't remember who said it, but
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: my wife posted and I reposted it for so like
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: the Bible is not for unbelievers. The Bible is for
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: us as those who fall after Christ for many people,
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: the only Bible they'll ever read is your life. So
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: is your life glorifying God or, Are you a person
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: who's giving honor and actually placing your bet? Are you
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: sitting in the chair like the analogy that we gave?
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: Are you the person that when people look at you,
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: they're like, man, there's a person of great faith. There's
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: a person that whenever times get tough, we know they're
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: going to be consistent. I hope that is true of
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: you because the world needs men of great faith. God
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: chose to work through his sons. And if things are
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: going to happen, if his kingdom is going to come,
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: it's going to be because he's working through sons like
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: you and me. So go out, be a person of faith,
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: trust in God. Faithful action over fear, choose obedience over control,
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: and choose principles over feelings. Thank you very much for listening, guys.
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: Remember to share, like, subscribe. If you think that this.
• 57:04
  Speaker 2: Would be something that someone would enjoy, please send it
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: to them.
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: We appreciate it all.
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: If you want to get in touch, you can follow
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: us on Instagram at The Impossible Life. You'll find us
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: on there. You can also email at impossiblelifepodcast at gmail.com.
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: If you have any questions, if you want to get
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: in touch and find out about Garrett's personal or business coaching,
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: that's the way to do it.
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: Thank you again for listening. Go out there, think better,
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: and live the impossible. See you again soon.
• 57:29
  Speaker 3: Thank you.