Jesus Isn't Calling (Part 2)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the apostle

Paul said, "'But we did not yield in subjection to them "'for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel "'would remain with you.'"

In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her king.

Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio. My name's Mike Abendroth, and Tuesday guy is right here, and he just got done eating a protein bar.

It was nasty. You know what? I think these aren't too bad, though, but I quit doing the fibers, but I just would go for a regular protein.

The full bars I've been liking, and actually some, what's the one with the crisps, the wafers?

I don't know, but I know what I'm going back to, tuna fish sandwiches, because I'm looking for something that's a little easier on my stomach.

Those things are really rough. I told Janet, she went to the store today, I said, load up on tuna fish, because I'm gonna start doing tuna fish sandwiches.

I like tuna fish, yeah. And so today we're talking about Jesus Calling, the

Sarah Young book, and Sarah has received a bunch of direct communicados from Jesus himself, and she writes it down, 365 days a year, plus whatever extra study

Bibles, or whatever, not quite a study Bible, but close. Well, on special days, he sends her special messages.

Well, yeah, because if every day's special, that means no day's special, that's right. So Sarah Young, and if you didn't listen the last week, you probably should, because that set everything up with her conversion.

And you're gonna play a little tribute music? Yeah, for Sarah. So don't you think this is just kind of perfect?

Because when I read the book, Steve, it makes me smile. And we don't want her to be sad. Yeah, well, see, the thing is, it's helped me.

Has it? And if it's helped me, therefore it must be good. It might even be inspired.

Not inspired in the same sense as scripture. See, it's with a woman's eye. That's what

Jesus said to her, I can feel you're watching in the night. See, all along with me.

It's just some special time. It's me and Jesus. Huh, well, that's nice. That makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

How many copies of this book do you have? I can't even count that. I can't even count the number.

Now, it just said, when I feel cold, but she feels Jesus as a warm mist. And kind of like a golden light.

It was some kind of vaporizer. So if you wanna feel Jesus, put the vaporizer in your room and you'll be fine.

And you'll be decongested. Oh, we have to finish that.

You come and hold me. It's like Voskamp, Sarah Young.

She's smiling all the way to the bank, I'll tell you that. All right, here's one, June 9th. Seek to live in my love, which covers a multitude of sins, both yours and others.

Wear my love like a cloak of light covering you from head to toe.

So is that like a light beam head covering according to 1 Corinthians 11? I don't know, but I mean, there's no insight here.

I mean, there's some language that kind of, you know what, here's what

I would say. This is kind of like a hallmark version of some scriptural thoughts. Steve, this ranks right down there with the message

Bible. This is the machinations of a woman and how she'd like to be talked to. And I'm not a psychologist.

Although if I was a pagan, I'd probably wanna be, have the power over folks like that.

But it's almost like her husband doesn't talk to her this way. So she's gotta be fulfilled some other way.

And so therefore Jesus talks to her this way. You know what this reminds me of? It's kind of like the pseudo

Christian version of a deep thoughts by Jack Candy. So this is Love Thoughts by Sarah Young.

Steve, I have a principle and here's Abendroth's principle or maxim. Oh, I'm gonna write this down.

It might be inspired. If God is talking to a woman in a way that men couldn't dig, it's not

God talking. And conversely. I hear you, man. I dig that. If God is talking to a man in a way that a woman wouldn't like or appreciate, it's not

God talking. Because when God talks and you read scripture, both men and women affirm, yes, this is scripture.

This is I give you thanks, oh Lord, with my whole heart before the gods I sing your praise.

Now both men and women hear from God in the exact same way. So when it's gender specific, my spidey senses aren't up.

My spidey senses are saying, destroy. This is not good for the church.

This is not just, well, it's kind of lucky charms. No big deal. Just watch out for the little clovers.

No, this is bad. This is like eating rocks and garbage for breakfast. Let the flames go higher.

That's what needs to happen here. Return to me your first love. Gaze at me in the splendor of my holiness and my love will once again envelop you in the light.

Return to me and always be my melody of love. Steve, it's - Bobby Vinton. Well, speaking of Bobby Vinton, when

I was a camp counselor at the Camelot Camp in Whittier, California.

First time I'd ever been to California. And I wasn't overweight. I was a sports camp director guy.

We had overweight kids and they would for seven weeks be on about, I think the boys 1500 calories a day, the girls 1200 a day.

And they'd lose a lot of weight in seven weeks. And we'd go out and have fun and exercise and go to the beach and go to Six Flags and all these other places.

And they would whistle March of the River Choir. No, but Bobby Vinton's kid was in the program.

Really? That was my first brush with greatness. Wow. Bobby Vinton. And then I took the kids at Camp Camelot down to Disneyland and it was 1982, summer of.

And remember what movie came out that summer? I was actually in Okinawa.

All right. I think The Wrath of Khan. Really? Star Trek II. Kandanian Singh, remember him?

Yeah. Anyway, I'm walking around Disneyland and there is a guy doing a little promo, but nobody's paying attention to him.

They don't know, but I can, don't know him, but I recognize his ear. Ricardo Montalban. No, Walter Cohen, because.

Oh really? The earwig got stuck in his. And I kept looking at his ear, thinking that that's creature that makes him tell the truth or makes him.

And so, see, here's what I think. I think that Khan's earwig thing got into Sarah's ear.

Oh, that's what she's hearing. It's Kandanian Singh. That was kind of a triple bank shot off of, you know, a couple of extra cushions, but yeah,

I follow you. So how can we believe that we are changed, as Sarah would say in her

March 27th journal entry, by experiencing the presence of God? What would that mean?

How would Paul affirm that in the book of Romans or Galatians or something like that?

You mean, how would he objectively say what she's subjectively suggesting?

Steve, this is pagan. This is new age channeling. This is, remember the movie stars wanted to channel through that lady and they would be channeled.

Rafta or something weird creature would be channeled through the astrology lady of the stars.

This is a cultic. This is not Christian. This is a deviation. Well, it reminds me, you know, I was a new believer and I was actually looking for Christian bookstores and it led me into one day an

LDS bookstore and then into a new age bookstore. And they had books where, you know,

Jesus in India, you know, and different stuff like, and that's what this sounds like to me.

You know, it's like, well, you know, there's only so much we can learn about Jesus from the New Testament, but there must be more.

So why don't I just make some stuff up? The desire for more that many people have in the charismatic movement and other places as well.

The desire for more is really a delivery of less because you have everything you need.

Can you imagine Paul writes to Timothy and he's at Ephesus and there's all kinds of crazy stuff going on there and a cultic deals and Diana and worship and Judaizers and everybody else.

And Paul says to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3 .16, you've got a toolkit, you've got your ministry box, you've got your equipment for everything you'll ever need here and around the world.

And it's called the word of God, all scripture. And at the time it was just the Old Testament.

Everything you need is found in this toolkit and it will make you adequate, thoroughly rigged out using nautical language for every good work.

Everything you need for ministry and life and godliness is found right here.

Yeah, but that was only for Timothy. And you know, what's wrong with like, I think if we just kind of look at Sarah Young's book as a devotional for young women who are struggling with depression or maybe some self -image issues and just want to feel better about themselves.

You know, these things are all kind of based on scripture ultimately, aren't they?

Steve. I'm just playing

Sarah's advocate. Oh, nice. Now I was saying she had a study Bible and I will admit publicly on No Compromise Radio that there is not a

Sarah Young study Bible. I'm working on it. But actually I was pretty close. It's the

Jesus Calling devotional Bible. No. Here's what it says.

Set aside at least half an hour to start. When you're ready, quiet yourself.

So here's where this is going, by the way. Sarah, you know, reads this book,

God Calling about these crazy people and now she thinks it's good for her. So now Jesus is talking to Sarah and she lets us know what

Jesus is saying through her book. But now she's also letting you take her place.

She's gonna no longer be the mediator, the vicar. Now you can be Sarah. When you're ready, quiet yourself.

If stray thoughts come through your mind, write them down on a separate piece of paper.

Read some scripture. By the way, this is autobiography in my opinion. This is how she did it. Right. Now cloak it in scripture because otherwise you're gonna just seem like more of a loon.

Ask the Lord to speak to you through it in a way that you can understand. Outside of Paul's original intent.

Because there's no way you can understand that. Ask God to protect you in Jesus' name from deception.

Then write down your question for prayer. Pause. This is where you wait and listen.

By the way, does it say you should start your question, dear Rapha. Dear Beelzebub.

Take your shoes off, walk across these cold, really hot, send your money to Tony Robbins.

Drink a half cup of Merlot. Steve, once I was in California, Brentwood playing basketball and we would play, the guys would all get together and play and you play shirts and skins, right?

So I was a skin and played there for the afternoon. And then afterwards you go pick up your T -shirt and then drive home.

And I've told you the story once where I drove past the liquor store and saw Helen Reddy there with a bunch of alcohol on her thing.

And I just kept thinking about her. Delta Don. Yeah. So I picked up the red shirt and just jumped in my car, drove home.

Well, then I did the laundry and all that stuff and it wasn't my red shirt. It was someone else's red shirt and they picked up mine and therefore then

I picked up theirs. And it was the gift that you received when you graduated

Tony Robbins' firewalking class and you walked across the fire and like, I firewalked.

Nice. And that was my shirt. And I could wear it around telling people that I had the mind over occultic matter.

Sweet. You became somebody. I was somebody. Then it says,

God, while you're pausing, may share a tender word. Whatever you feel he may be saying to you, write down.

Ask him to confirm anything he shared with you. Why doesn't, you know, here's what

I would like to see. Sarah Young saying something like, you know, sometimes he just tells me what a fathead

I'm being, you know. Well, can you just quickly go to some of the quotes from the real

Bible in the prophets where they are just breathing out

John the Baptist like what's the word I'm looking for?

Well, refutations. Yes. You know, quit sinning and repent. And you know, what about all the, and I think the

ESV does do a good job in the Old Testament often about stop your whoring, right, to Israel.

And what if all of a sudden you were contemplating those passages about, you know, Ezekiel 16 and your whoring whoredoms.

I skipped those because they're not very affirming. See, that's exactly right. And that's one of the reasons we know the

Bible is the word of God for many, many reasons. But one is, and it's pretty low on the list, but it's still on the list, is who, what kind of man would write such an indictment against humanity with we are wicked, we are sinful, we are depraved.

I actually love that one because here's, you know, people say, oh, it's made up. And I go, I don't know. I've read a lot of made up religions and they usually talk about how good mankind is, you know, and we're well on our way to perfection if we'll just keep working at it.

And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart,

I will never again curse the ground because of man for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth.

Sarah, your heart is evil from its youth. Lord, come again. I'm asking you to affirm that because I think you're in error.

All right, how are we supposed to pray by the way?

This is contemplative prayer where you void out your mind, you evacuate your mind, and then you listen.

This is Hinduism, this is Buddhism, this is new ageism, this is mystic Catholicism.

What's the right way to pray? Aren't we supposed to say like our father who art in heaven?

What's the right way to pray? I'll be thy name. You know, just the other day I saw Russell Simmons, the rapper.

The fitness guy? No, no, no, the former rapper, big business tycoon.

I was just joking. I was talking about that guy. And he was talking about meditation. And what was the first thing he said?

He said, well, you know, to instruct your audience on how to do this.

I don't remember what TV show it was. It wasn't Oprah, but it was some show I was just channel surfing around. And he said, you just need to empty your mind.

And I'm going, this is, that's exactly what they tell you. You know, empty your mind of all positive thoughts so that Satan cannot take up a seat.

Steve, renewing your mind is important through scriptures, the intellectual aspect of Christianity.

We know we're more than feelings. We have to use our mind to worship the Lord, your

God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. When Sarah says this, Sarah Young, this was far more than the intellectual answers for which

I had been searching. This was a relationship with the creator of the universe. How do you have a relationship with God outside of his word?

And he walks with me and he talks. You're so bad. How do you feel

God's presence? I mean, I don't know. Here's the thing, when

God talks to people today, if he were to, outside of his word, don't you think he'd talk to people that were pretty theologically astute?

Why does he talk to all the theological numbskulls all the time, in my opinion? I don't know.

You know, here's what I do know. I do know that I feel the closest to God, not when he speaks to me audibly, because he does not, but when

I have the greatest sense of my sin. That's when I feel the closest, because that's where I feel the greatest thankfulness, the greatest joy, in knowing who

I was, even who I am, and yet that Christ died for me.

That's what motivates me. That's what stirs me. It's not any kind of mushy hand -holding while we cross the street together kind of thing.

I never even wouldn't, in a million years, would contemplate about that. And she's kind of putting down intellectualism here, you know, because I guess the concept would be the letter kills, but the spirit gives life, you know?

Well, with faith, if you just go back to the definition of faith, it contains knowledge, assent, and a volitional trust, but there's more than intellect, of course, but this is a feeling -oriented, emotional response.

Steve, when I take walks with a dog, I like to pray, and so it's just a time for me to empty my mind.

But seriously, I like to take walks and I just pray, and it's usually when I'm walking and I'm praying,

I'm usually thinking about creation and how God's natural revelation is speaking of his wisdom and his power, and it's just Revelation, excuse me,

Romans chapter one stuff. And so I'm thinking about creation, and then I take a stick, there's a pond by our house, and I throw it in the pond on days it's not frozen solid.

Two months a year, we have warm weather here. And my dog jumps in and retrieves that stick, knows how to swim without ever being taught, and then returns it to me and drops it and wants me to throw it in again.

I say things like this to myself. I cannot believe that the Lord God, first of all, gave me salvation, but then every other little thing,

Romans chapter eight, like the enjoyment of a dog. Now, that's not a mystical thing.

Everything is driven by scripture. The heavens declare the glory of God. It's all the psalmist.

It's all Romans chapter one. And then I think even God to give mankind a dog, this is pretty amazing.

God, thank you. And those are the times where I'm kind of the most emotional, just thinking you'd even give me a dog for pleasure.

If I get pleasure from that, how much greater is the son of God in the world and for me in particular?

I agree. Although when I take walks with my dog, I'm usually like, I hope he doesn't wriggle out of this leash and go kill something.

Here, Sarah says, the following year I began to wonder if I too could receive messages during my times of communing with God.

See, I've got to commune with God with special messages. I think this is selfish.

She's not saying Jesus is speaking to her only, Steve. She's saying something much more egregious.

God's speaking through her. I'm speaking through Sarah to you, person who wants to buy a book about Jesus calling.

Calling sounds good. Jesus sounds good. Everybody else is buying it. It's at the bookstore. I might as well buy it too.

You know, if I could get a message from the Lord for Sarah, it would be this. Stop misrepresenting me.

Stop it. Just stop it. The Bible is inerrant, we believe that. It's reliable, we believe that.

But she basically is teaching it's not sufficient. No. Well, I mean, how could it be under her so -called ministry, what she's doing?

Everything she's doing suggests that you need something other than or in addition to the Bible. What people don't know here at No Compromise Radio, I often ask

Steve to decode something for me. With his police background and his deputy sheriff knowledge, sometimes things come to my attention and then

I don't know what they mean, and so I ask Steve to decode them. Sure. And so I'm going to give you, Steve, something that Sarah said, and would you please decode those for us?

Yes, I will. Let the light of my presence, God said to Sarah, soak into you as you focus your thoughts on me.

Learn to hide in the secret of my presence even as you carry out your duties in the world. I didn't get what

I wanted for my birthday. Oh, friends, if you've learned anything from No Compromise Radio, it's back to the sources.

Ad fontes, that'd be a good Renaissance thing to do. Let's go back to the original text. Let's go back to the scriptures.

Is there any book you cherish more? Just begin to read the scriptures. I was reading Exodus 1 the other night to the kids and Shipprah and Puah and these two midwives and they will not do what

Pharaoh says. And they rescued the Hebrew boys. And then Moses, before he's named

Moses, is put in the little basket and by chance, by luck, by serendipity, here comes along someone is going to take care of him and then they pay

Moses' mother to nurse him. And you just go, it's the unbelievable sovereign hand of a gracious God.

But what is, how does that help me? Where am I in that text?

Well, the text is it's wrong to have a doctor deliver your child, it must be a midwife.

Oh, and then I'm sure in the next chapter it gets into homeschooling. Oh, sacred territory.

So Steve, are there any books about channeling the occult that you would recommend? You mean how to?

You know, I always go back to the seven sons of Sceva. So no. Wait, wait, wait, excuse me, excuse me, this is important.

I'm getting a message from God right now in my heart. Okay. His spirit is prompting my spirit to say something and I want to make sure

I get the grammar correctly because when God speaks. You know he's serious because he's holding his hand up to his ear.

Yes, dear Mike, tell the listeners never to read

Sarah Young's book. Okay, I think that's fairly inspired.

Excuse me, Lord, is that correct? Her name isn't Sarah Young, it's Scary Young? No, I think that was just my own gizzard.

Are you asking to affirm that? I always ask for the Lord to affirm his message.

Is the canon closed, Steve? It is as closed as it could be.

There are no new books, no new scriptures, no new revelations. So if Jesus is actually talking to Sarah, would it be authoritative?

No. Well, I mean, if he actually is. Right, so when

Jesus speaks, it's authoritative. Well, yes, and so you'd have to say that the canon's back open. So we'd have to reopen the canon.

I mean, so we'd have first and second Sarah and third Sarah. That is so good.

Hey, if this is Sarah's high point, what does that tell you about her relationship with the Lord through the scripture?

That's the medium point? Yeah, it's pretty meager. That's the sub -point, that's the meager point? Yeah. All right.

I mean, it would be interesting to have a theological discussion with Sarah and see how much she really knows. Right, I don't think that's the point because the spirit kills.

The letter gives the law. I think you got that backwards, but anyway. No, God told me to do it the other way. Oh, okay.

Mike Abendroth here with Steve Cooley, No Compromise Radio. We'd love to have you write us, especially about this topic, the Tuesday guy at nocompromiseradio .com.

Sarah Young. Sarah Smile, all the notes. It's a great song. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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