Latest / Bible Tract Echoes Podcast / Finding Help in Broken Places

Transcript

Finding Help in Broken Places · Bible Tract Echoes Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, friend.
• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Mike and McCurray.
• 0:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for joining once again today for Bible Tract echoes.
• 0:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: And did you know that God can use less than optimal circumstances for his glory?
• 0:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: Of course you do.
• 0:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: You think of so many opportunities and so many times in Scripture that God did so, but did you know he can do so at the family level as well?
• 0:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're talking about this week, the Household of Faith, the Household of Faith, and I'd like to apply it to your life and mind in our families, so often we can be beat about the hidden shoulders with biblical truth.
• 0:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know I've experienced it, not that I'm saying it's a bad thing, but
• 0:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes we can just look up at the guy doing the bludgeoning, the guy with a Bible in his hand, trying to say, why, just smack in one way and the other, why won't you just do this and you think, I get yelled at at work sometimes, I get yelled at my family sometimes, I get, but I didn't come here to be yelled at, I'm just looking for...
• 1:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Some help.
• 1:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: And that's my desire today.
• 1:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: We talked Monday about the scriptural mandate for our household of faith.
• 1:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's so very important.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: We talked yesterday about the impact of a legacy, impact of the household of faith and some practical things that we could do to help that impact.
• 1:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: But today I want to talk about finding help in broken places.
• 1:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: Finding help in broken and less than
• 1:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: When I find as our text, sing it Timothy chapter number one, sing it Timothy chapter one, going to read the first five verses.
• 1:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'd like you to tune your ears, it's likely there are many people I'm talking to right now that you have come from, a less than perfect place.
• 1:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: We all have, if we're honest, even those of us with that would say we had a great upbringing.
• 1:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: There were times that were difficult, people are people everywhere, doesn't matter which side of the world you grew up on, things can be difficult, but I'm glad, again, I think I quoted this verse on Monday, James 46, but he give it more grace.
• 2:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: Saying a Timothy chapter 1, in verse number 1, says this, Paul, and a apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, according to the promise of life which is in Christ.
• 2:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: Jesus, and we could just pause, learn, shout, and praise the Lord for a little while, but let's continue on.
• 2:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Two Timothy.
• 2:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: So here we have kind of the return address, Paul and Apostle, and then here's the address who it's going to.
• 2:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Two Timothy, my dearly beloved son, Grace, mercy and peace, whom God the Father in Christ Jesus are Lord.
• 2:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: I thank God whom I serve from my forefathers, and there's a little bit tidbit kind of where we're going with this.
• 2:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: I thank God whom I serve from my forefathers with pure conscience that without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and day.
• 3:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Greatly desiring to see thee, being mindful of thy tears that I may be filled with joy.
• 3:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: When I call to remembrance the unfained faith that is in the which dwelt first in that grandmother's lowest and that mothered units and Empress swated that in the also, when I kind of attack this from two different sides if we can, finding help in broken places.
• 3:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: could we stop for a moment?
• 3:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't do this every episode.
• 3:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe I should more, especially with a theme that we're going to come at this from.
• 3:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: But could we pause and take a moment and invoke the holy name of God?
• 3:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Could we pray for just a few brief moments?
• 3:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Would you join me in that?
• 3:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let's pray.
• 3:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: Father, we're so very grateful.
• 3:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have much to be grateful for.
• 3:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: You've been so very good to us.
• 3:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: God, I ask you would please.
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Would you please work through these few brief moments we have?
• 4:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: Would they be a blessing, yes?
• 4:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: Would they be a help?
• 4:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe even a conviction is necessary.
• 4:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: God, please do work now.
• 4:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: We ask all these things in your sons' name, we pray.
• 4:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
• 4:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, as we look at this and we do our best to find help in broken places, I notice that Paul, we could say in a worldly sense, he came from a good upbringing.
• 4:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: We could look at his family history and all that type of stuff, but as far as his raising educationally, status wise,
• 4:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Even if his parents, I'm sure, much like your parents were not perfect, and they raised him in a false way of worship, of course.
• 4:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was not a Christian until that Damascus road experience, but at the same time, Paul had this upbringing that he probably looked back and said he was thankful for the way he was raised.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: But then you have a guy like Timothy.
• 5:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Timothy.
• 5:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: His father was a Greek.
• 5:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: His mother, Eunice, was a Jewish.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was raised as a half-breed.
• 5:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was raised as someone with one foot and one world and another and one foot in the other.
• 5:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was raised culturally split.
• 5:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: A difficult thing.
• 5:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if his parents were by that standard of the day divorced in a way that you and I would understand it.
• 5:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: We don't know the entirety of the background.
• 5:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: We do know because of Acts chapter 3 I believe it talks about his father, some what, and the Bible of very specifically points out that Timothy's father was not a Jew.
• 5:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: But regardless, there is some split to the home.
• 5:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: You notice how often the scripture, the Bible, speaks of the men of the home and the importance of the men of the home.
• 5:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: But here in Saint Timothy 1, the man of the home, Timothy's father is not mentioned.
• 6:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: But the faith of his grandmother and mother are.
• 6:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: The first thing I'd like to point out is the fact that there is hope to be found.
• 6:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: What a joy, what a blessing, what a thought, what a an anchor to latch on to to know that in a difficult situation like this, a man whose name is all over the New Testament, especially Paul's epistles, this young man Timothy, so greatly used when we think of Paul and Timothy, it's like Moses and Joshua, Elijah and Elijah, these different characters
• 6:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: Bible accounts of God blessing them as they worked hand in hand striding across generations.
• 6:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: What a joy.
• 6:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: And Timothy was used in a great way and carried on the legacy of Paul.
• 6:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: We don't know precisely how many years, but carried on a legacy that was given to him by the apostle Paul and did so with strength.
• 7:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: And did so with not just a need to carry on because the old man said so, but because he had a relationship with God Almighty himself.
• 7:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: Can I speak to you?
• 7:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: Single mothers?
• 7:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Can I talk to you grandmother's maybe that are raising your grandchildren?
• 7:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: Because of circumstances?
• 7:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: There is hope.
• 7:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now, is it difficult almost certainly?
• 7:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes needlessly so it feels like doesn't it?
• 7:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: But there is hope.
• 7:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think back on the young people that we picked up and still pick up at different churches that have been a part of on bus routes and things.
• 7:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think back on those times when the mother got involved.
• 7:56
  [SPEAKER_01]: Instead of just sending the kids every time when all we'd ever see was mom.
• 8:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: And if you once know all the kids maybe once a month or even twice a month,
• 8:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: The kids would be gone because they would be at Dad's house for the weekend.
• 8:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: They couldn't come to church.
• 8:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe Dad lived too far away.
• 8:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was amazing to me to see the ratio, the rate, the percentage of young people that decided to live for God when Mother started getting involved with church.
• 8:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when I say church, I don't just mean a social club, I mean she established a personal relationship with God and started coming, started being faithful, started leading the little family group that she now had, of course a father, a dad being absent, there was a man,
• 8:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Mail, I should say that Father, some children, but did not take up his mantle as he should.
• 8:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was a male.
• 8:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was not a father.
• 8:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: He was not a man, as he should be.
• 8:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: That is, you know, that is God's plan, that's how it should be.
• 8:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: But we live in a broken world.
• 9:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I also see this.
• 9:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: I see first that there is hope, just two thoughts today.
• 9:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: There is hope.
• 9:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: But where do we often find that?
• 9:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hell.
• 9:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: I see here the answer in verse number three, I thank God Paul says, whom I serve for my forefathers with pure conscience, that without ceasing I have remembrance of the in my prayers, night and day.
• 9:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: I see whether by their own desire, whether just by the grace of God, how it came to be I'm not sure, but lowest and unice, grandmaw and mom, Timothy was allowed to be around Paul.
• 9:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: Timothy was put in position where he could be invested in by a mentor by some people that came along side.
• 9:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is not some plea for, you know, it takes a village or anything like that to raise a child, but there is something be said for allowing some godly Christian men and women to invest in your children.
• 10:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so glad for the people that my parents let invest in me.
• 10:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: And if I were to start naming names, I didn't write a list down before I started this broadcast
• 10:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: hesitate to do so because I would forget some people, but I think back on those that invested in me.
• 10:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think back on one occasion, I was out door knocking, soul-winning, trying to win people a Christ and invite people to church with a pastor.
• 10:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember we led a young man to the Lord, through a closed door.
• 10:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: I remember that.
• 10:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: vividly comes to mind I remember standing there.
• 10:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was a little chilly, not too cold, but I remember the young man was 15 years old.
• 10:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: And knocked on the door, he said, I'm not allowed to open the door.
• 10:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: And the pastor there, he invested him, he was a short time of life, and he wasn't able to say he was chief among my mentors or anything like that.
• 10:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: I learned some things from him.
• 10:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: But he said, hey, hey, if your mom said don't open the door, don't open the door, man.
• 10:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: I just want to ask your question.
• 11:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: And there was a, uh, one of those, uh, male slots.
• 11:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: You could slide things through.
• 11:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: He said, hey, I just want to ask if you'd read this when you have a chance to pass a gospel tract and imitation of church, he asked him, hey, did your family go to church anywhere?
• 11:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: It was seen natural as anything from just to talk to that door.
• 11:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: I watched a man be a little inventive and the 15-year-old boy on the side said, no, we don't really go to church and they talked for a little while along and he said, hey, let me ask you this and just talking to the door and the boy on the other side, just I was a probably about his age, actually it was a younger, I was probably 10 or 11 at the time and it was just fastening me and he turned it to eternally.
• 11:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: He said, sir, a young man, I called his name, I can't recall it now, called his name and said, if you were to die today, do you know for sure where you'd go?
• 11:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: And the young man said, no, I don't.
• 11:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: And they start to talk and the young man said, it's been bothering me, someone.
• 11:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: Using the track, the young man was holding on the other side of the door.
• 11:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: He opened up the pass, did it open but track on his side, and kind of walked him through that.
• 11:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Led that young man to the Lord, took 15, 20 minutes, looked, took maybe longer than it could have, if they could have talked to each other face to face.
• 12:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: But I remember that.
• 12:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I think of the people that have prayed for me, the people that have invested in me.
• 12:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think about the people that my parents have allowed to help mold me.
• 12:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: They say, you will be who you are in five years, say for the books you read and the people you meet.
• 12:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: I've been blessed with a lot of great people, my parents have got me around.
• 12:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm so thankful for this example of Eunice and Lois, allowing Timothy to be around Paul.
• 12:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: Let's continue on in this week when we talk more about the household of faith.
• 12:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you're listening right now, I pray that you have a great day for his glory, and we'll talk to all of you very soon.
• 13:00
  [UNKNOWN]: God bless.
• 13:10
  [UNKNOWN]: Thank you very much.
• 13:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tuning in to Bible Tract Echoes, the radio ministry of Bible Tracts Incorporated.
• 13:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: Want to see our gospel tracks and other resources?
• 13:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: Visit us online at BibleTracksInk.org that's BibleTracksInk.org or follow us on social media to learn how you can partner with this ministry.
• 13:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks again for listening.
• 13:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: May the Lord richly bless you as you live for Him.