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127. Freedom In The Church - Bible Colleges · 4-Freedom Podcast

• 0:04
  Welcome to the For Freedom podcast.
• 0:10
  I found my freedom of you. I found a joy I can't lose.
• 0:19
  And thank God it's true. You wrapped your arms around me
• 0:23
  and heaven broke through From the moment she found me.
• 0:28
  I found my freedom in you. This podcast exists to bring the
• 0:35
  freedom of the gospel for everyday Christians with
• 0:38
  everyday issues. Now here are your hosts, James
• 0:42
  Seyfried and Brett Martin. Welcome back to the Four Freedom
• 0:47
  Podcast today. So glad you're back with us.
• 0:50
  We are in our series Freedom in the Church and I have just
• 0:55
  really been enjoying every single week.
• 0:58
  We enjoy your comments too, on social media, we enjoy your
• 1:03
  comments, your likes, your shares, your subscriptions, the
• 1:07
  suggestions that you give us every week.
• 1:10
  We we read each and every comment that you post to social
• 1:14
  media. So we really appreciate all the
• 1:17
  support that our audience has given us.
• 1:19
  But we have just been in a great time, great season of life.
• 1:23
  This is we've got Easter coming up this coming Sunday.
• 1:27
  Great day. We had Palm Sunday this past
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  Sunday. Great day in the House of God.
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  We have Lord's Supper at our church and good time was spent
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  together, together and just a great time in church.
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  And things going on. James, what's going on in your
• 1:42
  neck of the woods? Yeah, we had Palm Sunday as
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  well. Great time there.
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  We just finished our core values.
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  So I spent 1213 weeks talking through the core values of the
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  church. There's four of those core
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  values that we've implemented and just some great response in
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  our church. And then we sort of ended that
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  with a Sunday night celebration. You may remember the Hips family
• 2:04
  from the meet up at Asheville there at Nathan's church that
• 2:09
  led us in worship. I had them come in and they led,
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  they came in and man, they knocked the roof off the house.
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  They brought the walls down. It was incredible.
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  They sang, we worshipped, man, it was a great time.
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  We had a great house full about 80 or 90 people here, which was
• 2:27
  fantastic for our church and we just worshiped, we did
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  contemporary, we did Southern gospel, we did bluegrass, they
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  did acapella. I mean everything you can think
• 2:38
  of genre wise, old hymns, it was there and if there wasn't a song
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  that you didn't know or was familiar with then you just
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  don't know music. And so that was a great time we
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  had then. We ended that night with a fan
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  of fellowship, with food and gorged ourself and hung out and
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  laughed and had such a great time.
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  So Sunday, Palm Sunday was fantastic for US.
• 3:00
  One of those highlight days, it was one of those days.
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  Brett was a great service, a great atmosphere, but I felt you
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  may have been there with with me on this and and if not you're,
• 3:11
  you know, I'm just probably out there on an island by myself.
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  But you ever preached one of those messages and it just sort
• 3:16
  of feels like you just fell flat a little bit.
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  Like it may be the points didn't drive home the way you thought
• 3:21
  they were going to or the crowd wasn't quite into it.
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  I just told my wife. I said it felt like the
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  atmosphere was just a little different on Sunday and it said
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  may have just been me, but but I finished and I had more comments
• 3:34
  and response after that message than I've had probably in a long
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  time. I actually had a message from
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  one of our deacon's wives that I mean pretty much had me in tears
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  just thanking me and and thanking me for the message and
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  the series and the challenges that I've given over the last
• 3:49
  couple of weeks and how I've challenged her and her family.
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  And then sort of the part that that just really hit me was the
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  she said, you know you are an answer to a prayer from our
• 4:00
  family. We've prayed for Someone Like
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  You to lead our church. And I mean I just, I broke down
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  like Ally because she got, she put me out of both of the
• 4:09
  message and I was like, man, I'm just, I'm home because this
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  morning I I sort of fell flat like I didn't feel like this was
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  even the right thing. And then all of a sudden people
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  were reaching out. It was just sort of the Holy
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  Spirit and the Lord just saying I I'm taking care of it.
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  It doesn't matter where you're saying or what you're doing, Let
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  me take care of it. And man, it was just a great
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  time, great time of fellowship, great time of worship and
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  looking forward to what the Lord has planned for us on Easter
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  Sunday. Sunrise service.
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  We're doing communion to finish out the service on Easter, so
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  that'll be the last thing we do on Easter Sunday is communion at
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  the church. So really excited about that.
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  You know, we had. I've definitely felt like that.
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  I almost felt that a little bit, you know, this past Sunday,
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  Sunday, before I had a missionary come in and I let her
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  give a report. We cut some songs and I let her
• 5:00
  give a report. And while it was good and, you
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  know, we've supported her for a long time, it did.
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  It cut into my message a little bit.
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  I had to cut it a little short. So this Sunday I was determined,
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  Look, I'm just going to, I'm just going to preach.
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  I'm not going to worry about length.
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  And then the song service ran long and I'm like, I'm still
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  preaching. And then we've got Lord's Supper
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  after that. And so, you know, it was 1235
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  when we finally dismissed, which is a rare thing for us.
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  I like to cut it, keep it close to 12.
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  But at the same time, it was such a beautiful service.
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  People didn't care about the time.
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  You know, when the Holy Spirit gets a hold of a service,
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  nobody's looking at the clock. Amen.
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  You know, And that, you know, I definitely had the same response
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  that you were having that, you know, you know, I thought I had
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  missed the mark just a little bit.
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  But people were saying that it was just what they needed.
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  And so I I like, like said I, you like to have the Lord's
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  Supper. And that's why I like about our
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  autonomous churches, because there's no set way to do it.
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  You have your Lord's Supper on Easter, and I I have my Lord's
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  Supper on Palm Sunday. And so, you know, there's no
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  right or wrong way to do it. The Bible just commands us to do
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  it. And so I'm, I'm thankful for
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  that. I had a great Sunday this past
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  Sunday. Looking forward to what we had
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  this coming Sunday. Yeah.
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  Well, talk about looking forward, Brett, We're 11 days
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  from the Rapture happening. 11 days. 11 days I I don't know if
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  you've been counting down. I have been.
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  It's been fantastic. Just know when the Lord's coming
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  back in 11 days. Those of you who don't know,
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  April 8th is the day of the return of the Lord.
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  There's going to be a solar eclipse that crosses each other
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  seven years apart, seven years apart.
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  For all the numerics out there, the first solar eclipse seven
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  years ago went through seven towns of mercy, repentance, I
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  can't remember the name of it. And so they were all seven towns
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  named the same and crossed over. I think it was in Kentucky
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  somewhere, but it was a full solar eclipse.
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  And now we're going through another solar eclipse seven
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  years later, and it's going through the town of.
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  Nineveh. Nineveh seven times.
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  They're gonna be 7-7 cities named Nineveh.
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  There's an eighth city in Canada named Nineveh that it's going to
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  go over. But of course, you know the
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  Bible only talks about America, but the Bible doesn't talk about
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  no Canada. That's the evil top out of
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  America. Come on, Bible only talks about
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  America, so we're not going to worry about that 8th Nineveh up
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  in Canada. We're only worried about the
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  seven Ninevehs that it's going to pass over in the US Not to
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  mention, there's one particular town in Indiana that it's going
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  to pass over. Let's go, baby.
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  Do you know the name of that town?
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  The Rapture Town. Rapture Indiana and let's go If
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  this isn't enough evidence for you to know that the that that
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  the that the harpezo, the Rapture is about to take place.
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  James, this this solar eclipse. It's going to pass over the Ark.
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  You're woody, wet baby. If you're if it's experience, if
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  this don't get you excited, your wood's wet baby.
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  I mean, that's just all it is. I mean this should be.
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  Answers in Genesis. We're talking about Answers in
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  Revelation, baby. I mean, Brett, let's take a step
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  further. Jesus wrote 7 letters to seven
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  churches. Come on.
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  He had seven last statements on the cross.
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  How can you? It's going through the seven
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  towns of Nineveh. I mean, I mean, really, really,
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  if we think about it, this is the end.
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  This is the day the Lord comes back.
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  I mean, there's no sign that shall be given to you is the
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  sign of Jonah. The sign of Jonah and Nineveh, I
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  mean, and the stars there. Really Met.
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  Not the three days. He's talking about the seven
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  cities of Nineveh. That is exactly what it is, and
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  so hopefully you're ready. Hopefully you're you're getting
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  ready for this. And if you haven't been getting
• 8:59
  your theology on your Facebook reels and TikTok, you need to be
• 9:04
  getting back there. OK?
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  No. No good from church.
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  No, JC said that the other day. He's wrong.
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  You need to get your theology from Facebook reels TikTok.
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  Instagram. That's where our theology should
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  be grounded, at 1st and fore. I've I've dusted off my show for
• 9:18
  my show my show far. I mean, we're ready, baby.
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  We're in this. We're in it to win it, baby.
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  I'm. Going to be jumping up and then
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  it's and it's going. They're going to get me off the
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  ground and I ain't going to hit the ground, buddy.
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  I've been to Rapture practice. Half, half of your half inch
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  vertical man, well you're going to be up in the air then boom,
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  it's going to be gone. So we're ready baby.
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  So hopefully you can tell we're in a little bit of a fun
• 9:39
  bantering state and today is a is a great day and hopefully you
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  are Brett, you know I'm not going to say nothing's going to
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  happen that day. The Rapture can happen today.
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  Rapture can happen after this episode's released and you know,
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  no problem whatsoever. And so whatever happens there,
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  I'm great with it. The only thing is, you know,
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  there are some unique things, there are some some fun things
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  to look at. But in the end, it doesn't
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  matter what we decide, it's all going to be what the Lord
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  decides and. Knows the day or the hour when
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  the Lord's going to come back, so we look for his return, but
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  we don't set dates. Yeah, the I I would say the only
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  thing is take away the the Jonah, Nineveh and stuff.
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  The Bible says, as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be
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  when the Son of the Man returns. And it's passing over the Ark.
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  And it's passing over the ark, baby.
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  Come on. I mean, you can't get better
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  than that. Sorry, I had to.
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  I was going more serious of how bad America is, my man, and how
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  bad the world is. And and he he threw in the ark
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  again. He went back.
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  Sarcastic baby. Love it.
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  Oh man, this is. It's been good.
• 10:47
  It's been great. Yeah.
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  So, well, we've got, we've been mentioning this last couple
• 10:54
  weeks and so we'll just briefly hit this before we get into our
• 10:56
  episode. We've got our meet up in
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  Indiana. Hopefully you'll come and meet
• 11:01
  with us. We've got our Catoosa meet up in
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  Georgia with our for, for the sake of the gospel, meet up one
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  of my favorite conferences. Brett, that weekend is one of my
• 11:12
  busiest weekends because it's the Catoosa meet up, the RFP
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  meet up and then it's Sunday, I come back and then Monday and
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  Tuesday and Wednesday is the OR Sunday night, Monday and Tuesday
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  is our North Carolina State convention, the Baptist
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  convention for North Carolina. So it's like 5 days back-to-back
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  to back. I mean, it's just going, going,
• 11:34
  going. I see.
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  I'm going to take the I'm going to go to the RFP conference and
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  then I'm going to take a week vacation afterwards.
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  Going up to the ark to see it not there, a non existent ark.
• 11:44
  Exactly. Yeah.
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  And then we got our Israel trip coming up in March.
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  And so we hope you'll join us in that, Brett.
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  We're in the church, baby, and we're talking about the church.
• 11:56
  We're talking about freedom in the church.
• 11:58
  We've had some great interviews. We've got more, better
• 12:00
  interviews coming up. We've got interviews with
• 12:04
  discipleship, evangelist that is at the Mississippi convention.
• 12:08
  We've got an interview with Marcus Merritt.
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  We've got a couple other things lined up, but what are we
• 12:14
  talking about today in the church?
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  Today we're going to be discussing colleges and
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  seminaries. You know, there's so there's
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  some schools of thought out there that say the church
• 12:26
  prepares people for the ministry, that you don't need
• 12:29
  colleges, you don't need seminaries, you don't need
• 12:32
  things like that. But then there's another school
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  of thought that that things that those things are necessary.
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  But though, you know, colleges can be abused and you, you know,
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  it's one thing to go for education, it's another thing
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  just to go for status, to go for letters after your name.
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  So where do we find a balance with seminary and Bible college
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  training? And so that's kind of the
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  subject we're going to talk about today.
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  And and I'm just kind of kind of open it up, give you just kind
• 13:01
  of my testimony about how I was called to go into the ministry
• 13:08
  and go to college. And it all started for me at 13
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  years old when I went to my first youth conference ever and
• 13:17
  it was youth conference at First Baptist Church Hammond IN.
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  And so I'm there with with you know with my youth group for the
• 13:26
  first time and I hear the infamous message America,
• 13:32
  America as preached by Jack Scott and he comes out in a a
• 13:37
  burlap sack suit shows an abortion video.
• 13:41
  It's really hard to watch. And then through that process I
• 13:45
  surrendered to the Ministry. At that point I do believe that
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  my my calling was genuine, that I was genuinely call, had a had
• 13:52
  a calling on my life and I had felt before then really even
• 13:56
  though I wasn't ready to admit it, that a calling on my life to
• 13:59
  go into the ministry. Now of course they had a college
• 14:03
  and so I'm like I'm going back to that college, to the same
• 14:07
  church that I surrendered to preach at to go to their
• 14:10
  college. And one opponent that I had was
• 14:13
  my dad. My dad did not want me to go way
• 14:17
  off to that college. So he was the only sane man in
• 14:21
  your family? He was, But at the time, at the
• 14:25
  time, I thought he was, you know, the devil.
• 14:29
  You know, like the devil. Satan's trying to keep me down.
• 14:31
  He offered me everything. He was going to buy me a four
• 14:34
  Wheeler, buy me a car, do all this stuff to keep me from going
• 14:38
  to to that Colt College all way up in Chicago.
• 14:41
  He wanted me. Actually, Brett, if you're going
• 14:44
  to go to New Orleans, you know, go to New Orleans seminary,
• 14:46
  that's where you need to go. But I didn't listen to him and I
• 14:50
  I I went to college and. I was actually did listen to
• 14:54
  him. It just took you like 20 years
• 14:56
  to listen to him. Took me a while, but I did
• 14:59
  listen to him, definitely. But really, I was considering.
• 15:03
  I was considering House Anderson, I was considering
• 15:06
  Windsor Hills, I was considering Crown, I was considering PCC.
• 15:13
  But they had that devil, the credit devil accreditation, and
• 15:17
  so accreditation was the devil. And so we don't want none of
• 15:21
  that. Like, we don't want the
• 15:22
  government controlling our Bible education.
• 15:25
  And so I had to go to an unaccredited college.
• 15:28
  I decided to go to Howes Anderson.
• 15:30
  And I I went to Howes Anderson. And we're going to get into more
• 15:34
  details about, you know, about our experiences, positive and
• 15:41
  negative and the Bible college that we went to in just a
• 15:44
  minute. But, you know, I went to college
• 15:47
  to get prepared. I wanted to be in the ministry.
• 15:51
  I went to be to learn how to be a pastor because that's what I
• 15:54
  was called to do. And I wanted to be prepared for
• 15:58
  the ministry. And that is why I ended up going
• 16:01
  to college. And then, you know, like I said,
• 16:04
  in just a minute we'll get into some pros and cons of that.
• 16:08
  James, why don't you tell us a little bit about your experience
• 16:11
  with college? All right, So I went to public
• 16:15
  school my whole life, junior year of high school, I wanted to
• 16:19
  go to a Christian School and Lord had called me into ministry
• 16:24
  and Christian education is what I needed.
• 16:26
  And so was a good Christian School down the road.
• 16:30
  And my buddies there, John, had graduated from there and a
• 16:34
  couple of friends were going there.
• 16:36
  And so I went to my dad and said, hey dad, I want to go to
• 16:39
  this Christian School. I work a job.
• 16:43
  I'm going to pay for it myself and this is my dad said.
• 16:45
  He said why don't you save your money, need you to help out
• 16:50
  taking your brother to school. My brother's two years younger
• 16:52
  than me. He said save your money and put
• 16:55
  it toward Bible college. And I said, man, I really want
• 16:58
  to go now, but that's really good advice as well.
• 17:01
  Education's free. Let me just continue that.
• 17:03
  So I did continued there and I finished out public education
• 17:07
  and I had three colleges I was looking at.
• 17:10
  I was looking at West Coast. I was looking at Champion
• 17:14
  Christian Bible College, Christian College, now Baptist
• 17:16
  College and a church up new up in the Northeastern part.
• 17:20
  I think it's like Veritas or something like that.
• 17:22
  I can't remember the name of it. It wasn't solid rock.
• 17:24
  They hadn't started college up and began looking at those.
• 17:29
  My mom and dad sat down with me. My dad laid out all these
• 17:34
  options. He said you can go to the Air
• 17:37
  Force. They'll pay for your education.
• 17:39
  You can be a chaplain in the Air Force, he said.
• 17:42
  You can go to Piedmont Baptist College, which was a local
• 17:46
  college here in North Carolina. He said you can go.
• 17:49
  And he he began laying all these things and my mom's like, Nope,
• 17:52
  he's not going to military. Nope, he's not going here.
• 17:56
  Like my mom was like this bulldog.
• 17:58
  And I said, guys, I said let me, I'm going out to Arkansas to see
• 18:02
  my friends and let me just look at the college.
• 18:04
  I may look at it and be like, Nope, I don't want to go there.
• 18:07
  Got there relatively new college, nice dormitories.
• 18:11
  Stayed in the dorm one night I think, and met some good friends
• 18:16
  and began to meet some of the administration.
• 18:18
  Of course I hung out with brother Eric that week and got
• 18:21
  to hear him and just seeing what was going on there, had some
• 18:26
  friends there, had some connections, felt that that was
• 18:29
  the direction that I needed to go.
• 18:30
  And so I came back and told my parents that's where I was going
• 18:34
  to go. Cost to go there was relatively
• 18:36
  inexpensive. I think it was.
• 18:38
  My first semester was $600 a month.
• 18:41
  That was room and board and and tuition for a year.
• 18:45
  So whatever that comes out to be, you know 7200 dollars or
• 18:48
  something for the year. And so it wasn't that bad of a
• 18:51
  college education wise and so did that.
• 18:55
  I think it went up a little bit my later years, but we didn't go
• 18:59
  up too much and so I could relatively afford it by working
• 19:02
  and paying for that. And so I graduated debt free and
• 19:05
  I was really just excited about being there in college.
• 19:08
  One of the things that often gets asked and I just had an
• 19:10
  interview, so hopefully I don't mix up all my thoughts.
• 19:13
  But I had an interview this past week with the We Are One podcast
• 19:17
  and I shared my full story. But one of the things that gets
• 19:20
  asked Brett, is were you fully understanding of everything that
• 19:24
  was going to be expected of you when you went to Bible college?
• 19:28
  You know the rules, regulations. A lot of people sort of rebel
• 19:30
  when they go to Bible college, and part of that's because they
• 19:34
  are forced to go. Their mom and dad make them go.
• 19:36
  It's not their choices. So they're going to know whether
• 19:38
  they like it or not. What was your perception when
• 19:41
  you went and you got into Bible college and how did that make
• 19:45
  you reluctant or apprehensive or excited about the rules and
• 19:51
  regulations? Well, you know, I'm kind of the
• 19:54
  same way. When I signed up to go to Bible
• 19:57
  college, I knew what I was signing up for.
• 20:00
  Like I didn't come in to. Regret the rules.
• 20:05
  I didn't come in on these. You know, these are, for those
• 20:07
  who don't know, these are Independent Fundamental Baptist
• 20:09
  colleges we're talking about. So, I mean, I had already been
• 20:13
  wearing ties every day. I had already been doing all
• 20:16
  that stuff, keeping my hair high and tight, you know, not, you
• 20:20
  know, not listening to, you know, different music and stuff
• 20:24
  like that. And so when when I was first
• 20:27
  there, you know, I was like down the line, you know, I know what
• 20:32
  I'm signing up for. I'm here.
• 20:34
  I don't mind the rules. Now I will admit, as time
• 20:37
  progressed, the rules wore on me and I did start going to the
• 20:42
  movies, which you weren't allowed to do, and things like
• 20:46
  that. Wicked as hell.
• 20:48
  I know, I know. How are you the?
• 20:49
  Pastor, right now, you went to the movies.
• 20:51
  Exactly. God bless.
• 20:52
  God let. Me turn my my ordination back
• 20:55
  in, but man, we went to I went to the movies and stuff and so,
• 21:00
  but for the most part we, you know kept all the rules.
• 21:03
  So you know, when it comes to that, you know, I kind of knew
• 21:07
  what I was getting into and knew what I was signing up for.
• 21:11
  Same here, I I said I've told this to many people.
• 21:15
  They sent me the rule book when they I was accepted in the
• 21:18
  college before I ever made my first payment.
• 21:21
  I read the entire rule book. I knew what I was expecting.
• 21:23
  Like kids came in and they're mad.
• 21:25
  They were upset that they're making us do all these things.
• 21:28
  I'm like, dude, did you guys not read the rule book?
• 21:30
  And I guess from the other side of it is maybe they were forced
• 21:32
  to go. Maybe their parents made them go
• 21:34
  and they were having to acclimate to something.
• 21:37
  They didn't sign up for me. I signed up for it.
• 21:39
  Like this was something I wanted to do.
• 21:40
  This is something that I knew God wanted for me.
• 21:43
  And so I went and just was head in first to it and and Champion
• 21:47
  wasn't as legalistic. On some things they were a
• 21:50
  little more LAX and especially now they're I mean they wear
• 21:53
  shorts and T-shirts and and beards to school like it, it's
• 21:57
  it's crazy. But then at the time it was a
• 22:01
  little different and there was a certain tie and a suit coat
• 22:05
  every day before we had to go to class and had to keep our
• 22:07
  sideburns cut and hair certain way.
• 22:09
  And they did hair checks and white glove room checks like
• 22:13
  they did all those things and you know it is what it is and
• 22:16
  didn't mind it whatever. But out of that there are some
• 22:21
  cons and there are some pros. Let's begin talking through some
• 22:24
  of the positives that have came out of college going to Bible
• 22:28
  college and and going to these education learning centers and
• 22:34
  then we'll talk through sort of our take at the very end.
• 22:37
  And so I'll start Brett. The the pros for me were the the
• 22:42
  the life that God had for me and the wife that God had for me.
• 22:47
  There I met my wife at champion. My my wife was reached through
• 22:51
  the ministry of Eric Capaci. She got saved on the bus route
• 22:55
  and was reached through the bus ministry and her whole family
• 22:59
  began to come to church through the bus ministry and she started
• 23:03
  going to the Christian School in 4th grade.
• 23:05
  And I was way behind her education and they helped her
• 23:08
  get her education where she needs to be and which spurred
• 23:11
  her own to become a teacher and then went to champion to become
• 23:15
  a teacher. And that's where she her life
• 23:18
  got changed because she met this wonderful red headed guy who was
• 23:21
  going to change her world forever.
• 23:23
  And so it's more of a pro for her that she got to meet me than
• 23:26
  it was for me to meet her. But again I'm tongue in cheek
• 23:29
  there but great time. Loved it and would not have the
• 23:33
  life I had today. If I didn't go to champion.
• 23:36
  If I didn't go to the college there.
• 23:38
  The friends that I've made, Brad, me and John of course our
• 23:42
  relationship grew and and others that we made.
• 23:44
  Some friends that have become friends after college that we
• 23:48
  went to college with and didn't have a great relationship.
• 23:52
  I'm thinking of one that's particular that did not like him
• 23:56
  in college. And then three years later when
• 23:59
  we're in Idaho, two years later in Idaho, we brought him on on
• 24:03
  staff as a children's pastor. And I'm like, man, I don't know
• 24:05
  if I like this guy coming and working with us, but man our our
• 24:08
  our friendship grew out of that and of course that all started
• 24:12
  out champion and so a lot of great things and and I could go
• 24:16
  on on and on about the the fun times that we had and the
• 24:19
  memories that were made. Brett, what are some good fun
• 24:22
  pro cons about the Bible college experience that you had?
• 24:25
  OK, I've got a list of pros here, and I did not pencil in
• 24:29
  white because you mentioned yours.
• 24:31
  I was already going to talk about her.
• 24:34
  So that's something we're going to happen.
• 24:36
  But of course, first of all, just like you, my wife that I
• 24:40
  met at tri-state, tri-state, the the church at tri-state is
• 24:45
  Bethel, and Emily grew up at Bethel.
• 24:48
  And so I met her while there. You know, we dated after a while
• 24:54
  and got married there. And I just like you.
• 24:56
  I just can't imagine what my wife, what my life would be like
• 25:01
  without my wife. And she's just perfect for me.
• 25:05
  She was made for me. We're just a perfect match.
• 25:07
  She she fills in my gaps. You know, the the things that
• 25:12
  I'm deficient in, she makes up for it.
• 25:15
  There's only a few of them, but she does.
• 25:17
  Yeah, exactly. They're not me.
• 25:19
  Yeah. Another thing is, you know the
• 25:22
  friends that I made in college, they're still my friends today.
• 25:27
  I can call them today and they'll be there for me.
• 25:30
  These are friends that I've had a lot of friends leave me
• 25:35
  because of legalism, 'cause I turned my back on legalism.
• 25:39
  But many friends are still right there with me.
• 25:43
  And like, I have friends today that close college friends that
• 25:46
  will be there tomorrow. One good friend that I made in,
• 25:51
  well, actually out not in college but out of college, was
• 25:54
  Josh Westmoreland. He's a Hope Church pastor, and
• 25:58
  me and Josh. Josh grew up at Bethel, and in
• 26:03
  college we were not friends. We were acquaintances.
• 26:06
  We were nice to each other, but we were not friends.
• 26:09
  And then when we both came out of college, we both got on staff
• 26:12
  at the same church. And there it was like we became
• 26:17
  best friends. It's like, you know, you know,
• 26:20
  getting buddies with somebody in the trenches of war.
• 26:23
  And so that's what it was like. So Josh is a lifelong friend of
• 26:28
  mine and and we made all these connections.
• 26:31
  I made a connection with Matt Dudley through tri-state and so
• 26:35
  the friends that I have, that's definitely a pro now.
• 26:38
  I've really thought about this. What are some positive things
• 26:42
  that I can say about my IFB Bible college experience?
• 26:46
  I think forcing me to go out and knock doors every week to talk
• 26:52
  to people, you know, that really brought me out of my shell.
• 26:56
  I was an introvert going into college and it really forced me
• 27:00
  to learn how to be extroverted, how to come out, how to be
• 27:04
  outgoing, to kind of draw out my pride, get it done.
• 27:08
  I mean, from visiting these bus routes, you know, we joke about
• 27:12
  the bus routes and we joke about Goldfish Sunday, but in all
• 27:16
  actuality, while I was in it, I was enjoying it.
• 27:20
  I was having a good time with these kids, bringing them to
• 27:23
  church, doing these crazy things, so I do enjoy that.
• 27:27
  Some other things that I thought were pros was at Howes Anderson.
• 27:31
  The Hermeneutics class had some good points.
• 27:35
  I won't go as far as you say it was all good, but it had some
• 27:39
  good points. In fact, I took my Hermeneutics
• 27:42
  class under Jack Scott. Jack Scott was my hermeneutics
• 27:47
  teacher. And to be honest, I still
• 27:49
  outline my messages today, how Jack Scott caught me to do it
• 27:53
  because it's functionally good. And so I still do that today.
• 27:59
  But, you know, I I think the location that house Anderson was
• 28:02
  at was basically in Chicago, Tri-state was in Memphis, and me
• 28:07
  being a Mississippi country boy, coming to the big city was good
• 28:11
  for me. Give me a little culture, Get Me
• 28:14
  Out of my comfort zone. I think it was good for me to
• 28:17
  get lost in Gary IN one night with a buddy of mine is where,
• 28:21
  you know, leaving First Baptist, you know, who cares if it's the
• 28:24
  murder capital of the world? You know, it's, you know, it was
• 28:27
  good for me. It was good experience or as we
• 28:30
  say in the South, it was good Spurrants, and it was good for
• 28:34
  me to go pass out tracks downtown Memphis.
• 28:37
  And one other thing that I thought was a Pro is I took an
• 28:41
  evangelistic song leading class at tri-state from one of my
• 28:45
  professors named Robert Fletcher.
• 28:47
  He's one of my favorite professors.
• 28:50
  He's he's he's a pastor in a Baptist Church today.
• 28:53
  I respect that man so much. No, we're probably not on the
• 28:56
  same page right now. I don't agree with a lot of what
• 28:59
  he does and he doesn't agree with a lot of what I do.
• 29:01
  But man, I respect that man. And I remember he taught me
• 29:04
  evangelistic song leading. Little did I know the first
• 29:08
  decade of my ministry. I was going to be a song leader.
• 29:12
  And I used what he taught me in that Class A lot.
• 29:15
  It was most practical, functional class I ever took in
• 29:20
  Bible college. And those are some positives
• 29:23
  that I did take away from my experience, Yeah.
• 29:26
  One of the things you said that that I probably should have said
• 29:28
  as well was the the practical level of of learning first hand
• 29:33
  how to do ministry. One of the things under Brother
• 29:37
  Eric while we were there was, and I was going to tell you this
• 29:40
  later, but it came to my mind now again was just the the way I
• 29:45
  got to see Brother Eric cast vision bigger than any vision
• 29:49
  I've ever seen in my life. Often times we get in our little
• 29:53
  shell of the world and we don't see what massive vision can
• 29:58
  hold. And that was one of the things
• 30:00
  that Eric did that that propelled me into ministry in a
• 30:04
  in a massive way to be able to have this really, really big
• 30:07
  vision. All right, Brett, so we looked
• 30:10
  at the pros of Bible college. What are some cons of Bible
• 30:13
  college? What are the of our experience?
• 30:15
  Not in general, but of our experience.
• 30:18
  What are some of the cons? I'll let you take off on this
• 30:20
  one first. So one of my first cons from my
• 30:25
  IFB Bible college experience is both colleges which you know
• 30:30
  tri-state was a mini house Anderson but you got tri-state
• 30:34
  and House Anderson. Both of these colleges that I
• 30:37
  went to, the college students were farm system for the church
• 30:41
  and ministries like my education took a back seat to the
• 30:45
  ministries of First Baptist Church.
• 30:49
  You know, Doctor Howes, I used to hear him say all the time
• 30:51
  because I was there right before he passed away.
• 30:55
  In fact, his last semester there was my first semester and my
• 30:59
  first Sunday being promoted as a bus captain was the weekend he
• 31:03
  passed away. But you know, he would always
• 31:07
  used to say I will not use my people to build my work, but I
• 31:10
  will use my work to build my people.
• 31:12
  And that is the biggest lie I ever heard in my life.
• 31:17
  That was totally, totally not true.
• 31:21
  I've explained on here how you know in my testimony that I was
• 31:25
  expected to give my college tuition money to pay the city,
• 31:30
  my city Baptist kids bus, kids school bill instead of my own
• 31:36
  tuition and lose all my credits because I couldn't pay.
• 31:40
  I passed my classes but I didn't have the money to pay.
• 31:43
  I was expected to do that as a sacrifice and it was OK And my
• 31:48
  my division we leader let me do it.
• 31:50
  The college let me do it because it was expected of me.
• 31:54
  Another con that I have is the education was just horrible.
• 32:00
  It was, you know, Howes Anderson was worse than tri-state, but it
• 32:04
  was all preference driven. I mean, I'm taking English,
• 32:08
  English class classes geared to teach you how to explain to
• 32:13
  people why the King James English is the best version of
• 32:17
  English, and why it's the better version than all the other
• 32:20
  versions. And that was the purpose of the
• 32:22
  English class was to promote the King James Bible 'cause it was
• 32:26
  English was at its peak at 1611. And the VS and the vows and the
• 32:30
  vines are better than EU because you know, and all that stuff.
• 32:35
  And it's just and the church building classes regurgitated
• 32:41
  the house church. Emanuel didn't give you any
• 32:43
  practical, you know, information, some hands on
• 32:48
  stuff. And it was just, it was really,
• 32:50
  really. The education was definitely not
• 32:52
  up to par. In my pro column, I talked about
• 32:56
  how the hermeneutics class had some good points, but the
• 33:00
  hermeneutics class, you know, that may have taught me how to
• 33:02
  outline a message but didn't teach me how to study for a
• 33:06
  message at all. I came out of House Anderson and
• 33:10
  tri-state preaching some of the stupidest things that I've ever
• 33:15
  preached. You know I look back on some of
• 33:17
  the things I used to preach and I just cringe at the some of the
• 33:21
  messages that I used to preach. You know, I I I wasn't taught
• 33:25
  how to break down a passage. I wasn't taught to look it up in
• 33:28
  the original language. I wasn't taught to read
• 33:30
  commentaries. I literally thought you read a
• 33:33
  verse and then whatever God puts in your mind is what you're
• 33:37
  supposed to preach. And so I can remember one time I
• 33:40
  got up and I broke down Psalms 1/1/19 and I used every word
• 33:46
  that the that the that chapter has for the Bible.
• 33:50
  And I kind of drew it out on a big board, kind of like I was
• 33:52
  diagramming a sentence. And it was it was awful.
• 33:56
  It was awful. It was the most cringiest thing
• 33:59
  I can remember. People were looking when I would
• 34:02
  turn to look at the board, they were looking at each other like,
• 34:05
  what is he talking about? It was so dumb.
• 34:07
  I had no clue what I was doing fresh out of college.
• 34:11
  I had no clue what exposition expositional preaching was.
• 34:15
  I have no clue what contextual preaching was.
• 34:18
  Both colleges. This is my last one.
• 34:21
  Both colleges have the, you know, 123 prayer after me
• 34:26
  mentality. I left Bible college, walked
• 34:29
  away from both these. Bible College walked away with
• 34:32
  my degree with no clue how to do discipleship.
• 34:35
  I had no I didn't know how to disciple anybody.
• 34:39
  I thought discipline was getting them to pray, a prayer, going to
• 34:42
  Goodwill, buying them a shirt and a tie and tell them to come
• 34:46
  to church and let's go knock on doors.
• 34:48
  That's the the extent of the of the discipleship.
• 34:52
  You know, pass out as many tracks as you can, preach
• 34:55
  topical messages that make your echo chamber stand up and say
• 34:59
  Amen. That's all that I was taught to
• 35:01
  do at Bible college and I could go on and on, but forsake of
• 35:05
  time, I'm going to stop there. Yeah, and I will echo for me the
• 35:10
  cons for me were the lack of education.
• 35:15
  Again, the quality of education since I've been out, I've, I've
• 35:19
  had to really watch seminars and watch other classes and and
• 35:24
  things online. And at the time, man, yeah, at
• 35:29
  the time I thought man, this is the the premier education And
• 35:34
  then I got out in the real world in in ministry and I'm like they
• 35:37
  didn't teach me for any of this, like practical stuff.
• 35:39
  Yeah, I knew how to handle, but it was the education side that I
• 35:43
  was just so lacking. And I wish that that $7200 a
• 35:48
  year would have purchased a better education that now I've
• 35:53
  had to pay for through IBCDACBC certification and other
• 35:58
  certificates that that I've pursued on.
• 36:01
  And and really the greatest education that we ever got was
• 36:03
  our doctorate from the RFP and absolutely, yeah.
• 36:08
  So looking at all those things that that was one of the biggest
• 36:11
  cons for me. The other one, and I mentioned
• 36:14
  this on the other podcast I did, and so I don't want to rehash
• 36:17
  too much of it, was that Bible college became my faith.
• 36:24
  Living and breathing ministry every day, Living and breathing
• 36:29
  Bible college every day was my faith.
• 36:32
  And so coming out of Bible college, I didn't really have
• 36:36
  any. And I talk to guys all the time.
• 36:38
  That'll say, I just regurgitated everything that I was told when
• 36:43
  I got up and preached. I just regurgitated a message or
• 36:46
  thoughts that I'd heard my whole life.
• 36:48
  It wasn't anything that was original to me, or even
• 36:52
  biblical. It was just what the professor
• 36:54
  had told me was true. And so I got up and I preached
• 36:57
  that as truth, even though I never stayed one moment of that
• 37:01
  in my life. And for me, coming out of that
• 37:03
  and coming out of our first ministry and beginning to dive
• 37:06
  deep, that those two years when I was out of ministry was the
• 37:10
  years that I grew so much. Because I began to develop my
• 37:16
  thought for why I believed it. Because it was what I was
• 37:20
  studying. It wasn't what someone was just
• 37:21
  telling me. It was someone was having a
• 37:24
  seminar or a debate, and then I was studying that for myself and
• 37:27
  I was reading books and I was reading commentaries and then
• 37:31
  going through these, these salts for myself.
• 37:34
  And it became to where Bible college was a crutchy.
• 37:37
  I've got my degree, I went to Bible college, I've got the
• 37:40
  stamp. And so now I'm ready for
• 37:42
  ministry. And it was the misconception
• 37:45
  that that's not what ministry is about.
• 37:48
  It's not about having that degree or that stamp, but it's
• 37:51
  about heart and it's about knowing what we know and why we
• 37:54
  know it. So there's some of the pros and
• 37:57
  cons we had. And as we're looking through, we
• 38:00
  sort of wanted to get you a sort of a background of where we were
• 38:03
  at as we jump into this next portion of the podcast today of
• 38:10
  Bible colleges in the church. Are they needed?
• 38:13
  Are they not needed? Why should we have them?
• 38:16
  Why should we not have them? Brett, you want me to start or
• 38:20
  do you want to start? You can start.
• 38:23
  All right, Bible college is in the church.
• 38:25
  Do we need them? When I was in high school, we'll
• 38:28
  back back up here. When I was in high school and I
• 38:31
  knew I was going to go into ministry, we had to got a new
• 38:33
  pastor. And I sat down with him in his
• 38:36
  office and I said I believe that the door is opening for me to go
• 38:40
  to Bible college. And he looked at me and he said,
• 38:42
  James, if you go to Bible college, you're going to be out
• 38:46
  of God's will. I mean 18 year old kid what what
• 38:51
  do you what do you expect your this is your pastor.
• 38:53
  Like I'm going to be out of God's will like OK, tell me what
• 38:56
  God's will is then. And so I looked at him and I
• 39:00
  said pastors or what what what what should I do?
• 39:03
  He said, well sometimes you just need someone in your life to
• 39:06
  close those doors. And I know you said the doors
• 39:09
  are opening and you need to walk through those doors.
• 39:12
  But I'm here to tell you that doors closing and I'm going to
• 39:14
  close that door because you need to stay here and you need to
• 39:17
  study under me. Because biblically you should be
• 39:20
  studying under your pastor. You shouldn't go off and listen
• 39:22
  to some Bible college. You should study under me, work
• 39:26
  your job, work where you're at. Let me be your trainer.
• 39:30
  Let me be your Paul. Let me be your educator and I'll
• 39:33
  train you in the ministry. And looking back I knew what he
• 39:37
  meant. He I was active.
• 39:39
  I was teaching. I was doing some things in the
• 39:41
  youth and he wanted free labor. He wanted someone to do all
• 39:45
  those things and continue to do those things instead of
• 39:47
  replacing me with someone else. He wanted to train me to
• 39:50
  continue to do those things. Is this the same pastor with the
• 39:53
  shorts and the painting? Yes, yes, same pastor.
• 39:58
  And I said, well pastor and I'm not going to mention his name,
• 40:00
  but I said pastor, I I appreciate that.
• 40:03
  I said it's great advice. I said let me, let me go home
• 40:05
  and pray about it. And ultimately, I knew that that
• 40:09
  was not what God wanted for me. And so I went to Bible college.
• 40:13
  So do I think Bible college is needed?
• 40:16
  Yes. Do I think the Bible colleges
• 40:18
  are needed that we went to maybe for someone?
• 40:23
  All right. It was great for me.
• 40:24
  It was a great learning experience.
• 40:26
  It was a great moment. But man, all of a sudden you
• 40:32
  leave. And that was part of the thing
• 40:33
  was we left Arkansas, we were in Arkansas.
• 40:35
  We both had a degree in Arkansas.
• 40:37
  My wife had a unaccredited degree, was a teaching degree in
• 40:41
  Arkansas. In the state of Arkansas was an
• 40:43
  accredited degree. She can teach at any school in
• 40:45
  Arkansas because it met the qualifications of Arkansas
• 40:48
  College in the higher level institutions.
• 40:51
  The moment she leaves Arkansas, it's just a piece of paper.
• 40:55
  She can't get a job unless it's a Christian School.
• 40:58
  And so that was sort of our dilemma when we got into some of
• 41:01
  those things. Even a Christian School like
• 41:03
  where we're at right now, part of her education wasn't really
• 41:07
  accepted and she's having to take continuing education
• 41:09
  classes in order to continue to be able to teach there because
• 41:13
  they're an accredited Christian School that has a higher
• 41:16
  education. So.
• 41:17
  So some of those things are, are they needed?
• 41:19
  Yes. I think they're needed at a
• 41:21
  different level. I think they're needed at
• 41:24
  accredited levels. I think they're needed at levels
• 41:27
  that are going to give the proper education, that's going
• 41:31
  to educate the pastors and leaders of churches and give
• 41:36
  them the quality education they need that's going to teach them
• 41:39
  at that standard. And you know, you can find these
• 41:43
  at at Liberty and Pensacola and Luther Rice and New Orleans and
• 41:46
  Southeastern and Southern. The list goes on and on.
• 41:49
  But none of those were even a list of options when I was a
• 41:53
  teenager. And that's the problem I think
• 41:56
  is we're so much digging a small hole and we're not telling
• 42:03
  people about the options that are out there that are going to
• 42:05
  give them the quality education they can need and use.
• 42:09
  And not just because that these are the colleges that are my
• 42:13
  friends go to so. What we need is we need
• 42:18
  leadership for somebody who's wanting to go into the ministry
• 42:23
  is we need leadership to care about that person's ministry and
• 42:27
  not be selfish and want to hold because that's what's what's
• 42:32
  hindering a lot of people. Like even your story, like my
• 42:35
  pastor, he, he, you know, wanted me to go to Bible college
• 42:39
  because he went to Bible college.
• 42:41
  But then when I was getting ready to graduate, he said,
• 42:43
  look, it's God's will for you to come back and work for me.
• 42:47
  And so that he said if you don't get a full time offer, which a
• 42:51
  lot of people didn't, he said you need to come back and work
• 42:55
  for me at my church. And he wanted me back in that
• 42:58
  spot doing what I was doing as a teenager where he didn't have to
• 43:02
  worry about that position and just keep me there forever.
• 43:07
  And so that was kind of his deal with that.
• 43:09
  But you know, we, I, I wish we would have had somebody in our
• 43:13
  lives to kind of care about our ministry and what we needed and
• 43:17
  gives us all the information do we need.
• 43:20
  The churches need colleges and seminaries.
• 43:23
  You know, I think absolutely, yes, the church can train.
• 43:27
  But you know, if for somebody that's going into the ministry,
• 43:31
  you need to go somewhere where not only can you get the
• 43:35
  information, but where you can also get a different view where
• 43:41
  you can be outside your box, you can be outside your comfort
• 43:45
  zone. I think we see plenty of
• 43:48
  evidence in in the scripture about people who were trained.
• 43:54
  Paul was under Gamma Little and you know, the apostles, they
• 43:58
  they went to college at the Jesus University.
• 44:02
  It only took them 3 1/2 years to get a four year degree and tuch
• 44:07
  Amen Anyway. But yeah, obviously, you know, I
• 44:12
  think colleges and seminaries are a good thing.
• 44:15
  Now I would like to take just a second and talk to our listeners
• 44:20
  about my current educational journey.
• 44:25
  It was maybe a couple years ago. You know, I have this my, my, my
• 44:30
  Bible college degree, but I wanted to get my master's and
• 44:35
  and not just to have the paper, but to have the education that
• 44:40
  goes along with it, you know, to have that level of education.
• 44:44
  Because I knew I needed more than what I had gotten.
• 44:48
  I know that the, the current degree, you know, a lot of what
• 44:50
  I learned in the ministry, I learned from actually being in
• 44:54
  the ministry boots on the ground.
• 44:57
  You know, I watched YouTube videos.
• 44:59
  I watched videos of the Masters seminary on YouTube and you
• 45:03
  know, a lot of my experience was, you know, make, you know,
• 45:06
  was in, you know, making mistakes and then correcting
• 45:10
  that mistake and moving forward. So a lot of my experiences, you
• 45:14
  know, experiential, experiential experience, but one day I was
• 45:19
  like, I want to be, I want to have a master's degree and so,
• 45:24
  but with my unaccredited degree, there's no way I could do that.
• 45:27
  Well, then I found out about a program at Trinity Baptist
• 45:31
  College in Jacksonville, FL. And what they do is you go to
• 45:38
  them, you say that you want to, you know, go after get a
• 45:42
  bachelor's degree, accredited degree, and they will look at
• 45:46
  all of your, you know, they have a program, interdisciplinary
• 45:50
  program. Well, they'll look at your
• 45:52
  transcripts from all these other colleges, IFB unaccredited
• 45:56
  colleges, and they'll sift through those credits in your
• 45:59
  grades and you know, accept the ones that go towards the degree.
• 46:05
  And what was all said and done, they accepted all of my credits
• 46:09
  from Howes Anderson and all of my credits from tri-state.
• 46:12
  They accepted all those credits and their minimum requirement is
• 46:15
  32 credits. So you they said, OK, you come
• 46:18
  take 3232 credits with with me, with us and then we'll we'll
• 46:25
  give you a interdisciplinary bachelor's degree, fully
• 46:29
  accredited 4 year bachelor. And so that's what I did.
• 46:33
  I got financial assistance with this.
• 46:35
  James's program only cost me 100 and about $125.00 a month, and
• 46:42
  it took me one 2-3. Took me about a year and a half
• 46:46
  or a well, that's working through a summer.
• 46:49
  And you know, I wasn't full, full time.
• 46:51
  I was doing, you know, at the most three, maybe four classes
• 46:55
  at a time. But I worked through it and I'm
• 46:59
  graduating. I got finished this past
• 47:01
  December. I'm graduating next month.
• 47:05
  I'm graduating in May. You know, I'm driving down to
• 47:09
  Jacksonville. I'm going to walk across the
• 47:11
  platform, get that, the, get that bachelor and then I'm
• 47:15
  already, you know, I'm already enrolled to begin my masters
• 47:21
  program at New Orleans this coming August.
• 47:24
  I'm going for my my Mdiv, my Masters of Divinity, and I don't
• 47:29
  know if I'll go for my doctorate or not.
• 47:31
  I might just stop at the masters and we'll just see what happens.
• 47:35
  Now one of the cool things that New Orleans has, that New
• 47:39
  Orleans if you are pastoring a Church of 150 people or less,
• 47:45
  they have a scholarship called the Caskey program, the Caskey
• 47:49
  scholarship, the Caskey program. And through the Caskey
• 47:52
  scholarship, if you pass your church 150 or less, they will
• 47:57
  pay 100% for your schooling. And so I'm getting my masters
• 48:03
  completely free, you know. So I I say this to anybody out
• 48:09
  there that A wants to have an accredited degree but you don't
• 48:14
  want to go through another four years of college.
• 48:18
  This is an option for you. You can go to and I'm sure there
• 48:21
  are other places, other colleges that have programs like this.
• 48:25
  But I know for a fact Trinity does.
• 48:27
  I did it all online. All I'm up here in Mississippi,
• 48:31
  Trinity's down in Jacksonville. You can do this all online.
• 48:36
  You can get an accredited bachelor degree and you can have
• 48:40
  that accreditation and then for pastor out there that wants to
• 48:44
  pursue their masters and then you have AIFP college degree,
• 48:47
  you can do that. And then go to somewhere like
• 48:50
  New Orleans that has this Caskey program, do it all, do it all
• 48:55
  online and it'd be 100% paid for.
• 48:58
  And so these are all options. So just because you have that
• 49:02
  degree, you don't want to go through another four years of
• 49:05
  college, but you want an accredited degree so you can
• 49:08
  further your career or you know, further your goals or get the
• 49:13
  education that you want to get that you didn't get the first
• 49:16
  time. There are options available and
• 49:19
  I'm living proof that that you can do this.
• 49:21
  So I definitely wanted to make this information available to
• 49:25
  anybody who wants it, because this is the situation that I was
• 49:28
  in that I know other people are in.
• 49:32
  It's fantastic. I love it.
• 49:33
  Love that option. Brett, I don't know if this was
• 49:36
  was your case. This was not my case until I
• 49:40
  sort of gotten to Bible college and began listening to other
• 49:44
  people. But often times I would hear a
• 49:46
  pastor say every young person in my church needs to go to Bible
• 49:50
  college. Was that, was that the thought
• 49:52
  for you guys? Yeah.
• 49:53
  The we did said the same thing. Yes, that's the part of.
• 49:57
  It's just for a year. Yeah, go get your certificate.
• 50:00
  That's what I'm not for. I'm not for every single person.
• 50:03
  I mean, some people may know that they're going to be a
• 50:05
  doctor or a lawyer. Why would they go and be at a
• 50:08
  Bible college for a year, 234 years if they're not going to be
• 50:13
  able to use that in their actual field of what they're going to
• 50:16
  be in? And so that's where it it's
• 50:19
  using discretion, it's using discernment.
• 50:22
  If you know what you're going to do with your life, if you know
• 50:24
  where you're going to be at, don't waste your time going
• 50:27
  somewhere. I would not say that I wasted my
• 50:30
  time going to champion. Believe God had me there for a
• 50:33
  purpose. Believe God showed me things
• 50:35
  that I wouldn't have seen elsewhere because I was going to
• 50:38
  be in the ministry. It's a different animal.
• 50:42
  And so. You know, you can go to a
• 50:43
  regular college and take a Bible class.
• 50:45
  You can take a New Testament Old Testament survey at a regular
• 50:48
  State College. Yeah, and there's options like
• 50:51
  Liberty. There's options like Pensacola
• 50:54
  that offer some of these higher education, you know, bachelor's,
• 50:58
  master's, doctorate programs that are going to offer some of
• 51:02
  these things. And I'm not promoting any of
• 51:04
  those. But it's being wise with where
• 51:07
  you're at and knowing what your desire, your will for God is of
• 51:12
  your life. Now I will say in the state of
• 51:15
  Mississippi, the Southern Baptist Convention has three
• 51:20
  schools. They are Blue Mountain, which is
• 51:23
  in the north North Mississippi and the Mississippi College
• 51:27
  which is in Clinton near Jackson.
• 51:30
  And then you got William Carey which is down in in Hattiesburg.
• 51:33
  These are the three Southern Baptist schools in in
• 51:37
  Mississippi. And for me, you know my, my
• 51:41
  oldest son is 16. You know, soon he's going to be
• 51:45
  graduating high school. We're going to be sending him
• 51:47
  off to college and you know, we could send to a state school.
• 51:52
  I personally, this is personally, this is just me.
• 51:55
  I feel more comfortable cuz he was homeschooled his whole life.
• 51:58
  We've homeschooled our kids. I feel more comfortable with him
• 52:01
  going to, you know, a Baptist school.
• 52:04
  So those are the three schools that we're going to be looking
• 52:08
  at as it gets close to him graduating.
• 52:11
  I like Mississippi College because right now they have a
• 52:15
  scholarship where if you live in the state of Mississippi, you
• 52:18
  get to go to college for free. The only thing you have to pay
• 52:20
  for is room and board and it's the closest college to us.
• 52:25
  But I also don't want to rule out Blue Mountain and William
• 52:28
  Carey if you know, if we can get some good scholarships from
• 52:31
  there as well because these are all three good schools.
• 52:34
  I definitely want him. So I mean I'm sure your state
• 52:37
  has options like this, but for our state these are the three
• 52:41
  Southern Baptist, you know, colleges for through the
• 52:45
  Mississippi Baptist convention board and that those are the
• 52:49
  ones we're looking at for our kids.
• 52:51
  Yeah, that's cool. We've got two of those in North
• 52:53
  Carolina, it's the Fruitland Baptist Bible Institute which is
• 52:57
  a two year associate's degree level and then we've got
• 53:00
  Southeastern, they're over in Winston, no, I'm sorry, Raleigh
• 53:04
  Durham area and that is the two that we have.
• 53:07
  And so and they've just partnered together to where you
• 53:10
  can take agent classes at Fruitland and get your four year
• 53:13
  degree and you can also take satellite campus classes at
• 53:17
  Fruitland to get your two year degree there.
• 53:20
  Yeah. And and another thing I forgot
• 53:22
  to mention, when I say these are Southern Baptist colleges, I'm
• 53:25
  not saying they're all ministry colleges.
• 53:27
  At each one of them you can go for ministry.
• 53:31
  But they have, they're credited and they have other.
• 53:33
  You can go for nursing. My son Colin, he wants to be in
• 53:37
  computers. He wants to be a computer
• 53:40
  engineer. And so they've got a computer
• 53:42
  engineering program at Mississippi College, which is
• 53:46
  what he wants to go for. So yes, just because he's our,
• 53:48
  you know, Southern Baptist College doesn't mean it's all
• 53:51
  ministry. You know, they have regular
• 53:54
  professions there, too. One, my youngest son, he wants
• 53:59
  to be a preacher. He wants to be a pastor.
• 54:01
  But my older one, he wants to go into computers.
• 54:02
  And I'm all for him doing that. Love it.
• 54:06
  Well, I hope this has helped you today.
• 54:07
  I believe that higher education is a good thing.
• 54:11
  I don't think it's an end all be all me.
• 54:13
  Personally, I don't think that you have to have this higher
• 54:16
  education in order to be successful in life.
• 54:21
  A high school diploma, man. There's some of the richest
• 54:23
  people in the world have simply a high school diploma.
• 54:26
  Some of them are high school dropouts with the GED.
• 54:29
  What we're saying is there's not A1 size fits all when it comes
• 54:34
  to your higher education. I have very little, if any
• 54:38
  desire to go past my bachelor's degree where some guys, they
• 54:42
  live for that Masters and doctor like that.
• 54:44
  They live for education and that's just not where I'm at.
• 54:47
  And so it's understanding that and not allowing someone else to
• 54:51
  dictate sort of where you're at in your life and it's just
• 54:55
  understanding who you are and how God's designed you and not
• 55:00
  repeating the same mistakes that we've made in the past.
• 55:03
  It's allowing us to have freedom in that area.
• 55:06
  Absolutely. And I just want to end by
• 55:08
  saying, look, you know, if, if you are, if you do want to
• 55:13
  further your education and look, there's nothing wrong with that.
• 55:16
  And you know, I think that if you're in a situation like we
• 55:20
  were in, you've got this piece of paper from an IFB college
• 55:25
  that holds no weight because it's not accredited, There are
• 55:28
  options for you. You don't have to throw it away.
• 55:32
  You don't have to start over from square one.
• 55:35
  There are avenues that you can take to get accreditation and
• 55:38
  move forward with your education if if that's your desire.
• 55:42
  But just like you said, James, it's it's not the end all be all
• 55:45
  thing. It's not something we have to
• 55:47
  have. But if you want it, and you're
• 55:49
  feeling led to, there are options available.
• 55:52
  Absolutely love it. And well, hey, one thing you
• 55:56
  know with the with the onset of YouTube and people recording
• 56:00
  things, one beautiful thing is you can go and you can listen
• 56:04
  and absolutely observe a lot of these classes before you ever
• 56:08
  take them. You can go to master seminary
• 56:10
  and watch most of their courses. I watch.
• 56:12
  So many courses, dude. I take them courses, I put them
• 56:15
  on double speed and I just listen to them.
• 56:17
  Man, well and that's the great thing about it is you can take a
• 56:20
  class or or listen basically all of that class for a little bit
• 56:23
  and like hey man, I this isn't for me.
• 56:26
  Like I I don't, I don't want to go into this.
• 56:28
  I want to this is, this is not appealing to me.
• 56:31
  And so it helps you, before you even get to that understand what
• 56:35
  God has designed you for. So thank you for listening
• 56:39
  today. I know we went a little longer
• 56:40
  today, but Bible college for us, it was a lot, a long part of our
• 56:43
  life. It was a part of our life that
• 56:45
  was, you know, it's been a lot of our time, our effort, our
• 56:49
  money. And that may have been your same
• 56:51
  story. And that doesn't have to be the
• 56:53
  end of that story. We can continue on and we don't
• 56:56
  have to continue to harbor on those things.
• 56:58
  We can seek forgiveness and restoration and move forward and
• 57:02
  and grow from those experiences and help others not experience
• 57:07
  the same things we experienced. And so that's why we're talking
• 57:09
  today. We hope you've enjoyed it.
• 57:12
  And if you have any questions, always feel free to reach out to
• 57:15
  us and let us know. And again, we'd love to see you
• 57:18
  in Indianapolis coming up here real soon.
• 57:21
  And so, Brett, until next time to God.
• 57:23
  Not the pastor. Be the glory.
• 57:27
  Found my new name. Found that good grace.
• 57:32
  Found that healing. And the tears fell down my face.
• 57:36
  When I found my beginning. That has no ending.
• 57:38
  I found that second chance. Found my best friend.
• 57:40
  Found my forgiveness. Found my happiness.
• 57:42
  I've been singing ever since. I found my freedom on me.
• 57:59
  Thanks for listening to the For Freedom Podcast.
• 58:02
  If you enjoyed our content, do us a favour by liking,
• 58:05
  subscribing or sharing our podcast on whichever podcast
• 58:09
  platform you use. Be sure to join us next time for
• 58:12
  the For Freedom podcast.