WWUTT 2485 Q&A Where to Find Gospel Tracts, Cain and the Death Penalty, Comments About Voddie Baucham

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What's a good place to pick up some solid gospel tracks? After Cain killed

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Abel, why did God not kill Cain? And how do we think about these great preachers of the faith being taken from us so soon?

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The answers to these questions when we Understand the Text. This is

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When we Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Be sure to tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt

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.com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you Becky. You're welcome. And that sound while you were talking, if the mic picked it up, was the brim of my hat knocking into my microphone.

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Like that. Yeah. Sorry to mess up your introduction there. That's alright. Psalm 2 says,

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Why do the nations rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the

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Lord and against His anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds apart, and cast away their cords from us.

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He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord holds them in derision. Then He will speak to them in His wrath, and terrify them in His fury, saying,

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As for Me, I have set My king on Zion, My holy hill.

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Yes. So whatever is going on in the world and in the news, fear not,

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Christ is still seated on His throne. Laughing. Yeah, right. Laughing at those who attempt to thwart the plans of God.

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Yeah. Or do things their own way. I was talking with a friend just the other night about this psalm, in fact.

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So Psalm 1 says, Blessed is he who is like a tree that's planted by streams of water and bears fruit in its season.

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Right? Yeah. So then in Psalm 2, where you read about the one whom

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God has set on His holy hill, He is the one who is planted by streams of water.

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The tree that is rooted by streams of water. That's right. Now, of course, that's talking about how we're supposed to be.

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The tree. The tree, right? With the fruit. Exactly. Yeah. Bearing fruit. Right. So like fruit of the

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Spirit. Uh -huh. But it is ultimately Christ who is the one who walks not in the counsel of the wicked nor stands in the way of sinners.

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So when we are planted by streams of water, it's because we're rooted in Christ. Yes. Who is the one that is the tree there in Psalm 1.

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Right. Anyway. Didn't He say that we will thirst no more? Yeah. Well, that's what

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He said. Because He's the living water. Right. In John 4. Yeah. That if we drink from Him, we won't thirst anymore.

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And at the very end of the Bible in Revelation 22, let he who is thirsty come and drink from the water without price.

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Yes. So all of it pointing to Christ. Amen. There we go. Genesis to Revelation. There you go.

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We're going to go to Genesis in just a moment here because that has to do with one of the questions that we received. Awesome. This is the

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Friday edition of the broadcast when we take questions from the listeners. And you can send those questions to when we understand the text at gmail .com

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or send us a voicemail going to www .utt .com and click on that voicemail tab.

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I don't have any voicemails this week. Oh, okay. But we do have a couple of emails and I'm going to play some clips.

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I'm going to come back to some Votibachum clips here in just a moment. And a couple of the messages that were shared at the

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Charlie Kirk Memorial service. Okay. So I mentioned last week I was going to do some of that and just didn't have the time.

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We are too busy, babe. Oh my goodness. Yes. Like I even - Trying to cut back on some things.

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I know. We tried and then our girls wanted to do another play the other night. So now we've got more play practices that we have to -

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Yes, we do. We have to attend. That we do. What was I going to mention?

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I was going to mention something related to last week. Oh, no, I know what I was going to say.

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I need to get you in here to record new liners for the show. Right. And we don't even have time to do that.

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Nope. Some people have asked me why Hear the Word of the Lord has fallen behind.

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I don't have time to do it. Yeah. And plus when I was - Well, first when I started that at the beginning of the year,

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I was already pretty well ahead. Like I was already up to the wisdom books and then just had to record it periodically as I went.

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Once we got through Psalms though, I caught up with as far ahead as I had recorded.

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And so then I had to like push my way through Isaiah and now Jeremiah, I'm just not getting there.

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It's been so difficult. We've done renovations at the church, which is a good thing because we're kind of opening up the room to accommodate with the more people that we've had that have come in, praise

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God. But in that process, I've lost my office. So I have a space there, but I have to put a desk in there and otherwise

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I'm just standing in there recording and I can't even possibly do that. So because I don't have two locations to record at right now -

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It kind of cuts back on some of it. It does. This has been eating into my time tremendously. We drive everywhere.

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I think everybody drives everywhere. I know, but there was one day I didn't even leave Casa Grande and still put over a hundred miles in one day.

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Yeah, that's true. And spending that much time in a vehicle, where do I have the time to sit down and record?

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I'm driving more now than I've ever driven before. Just around Casa Grande. Yes. It's crazy.

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Yep. Yeah. Our family keeps us busy. Well, I take that back. It can't be more than I've ever driven because when

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I was in a band - Oh yeah, that's true. I was driving every day, sometimes hundreds of miles a day.

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So that was definitely my most driving period. I didn't have a podcast or sit down and have to record things during that period of time.

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So yeah, this is just a busy time. All of our kids are growing up and getting involved in things and we have to drive them to and fro because our 17 -year -old doesn't know how to drive her car yet.

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To be fair, the accident that we got into with the person that rear -ended us -

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Yeah, that was a year ago. Yeah. That kind of set her back quite a bit. Yeah. So, she's just nervous.

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Gave her driving PTSD. Yeah, a little bit. Yeah. Well, and we thank everybody for helping us out through that ordeal.

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Oh, amen. Yeah. Definitely. We named the vehicle we were able to get after that charity -

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Yes. Yeah. Because of the kindness that everybody showed to us after you were in that terrible accident. Had nothing to do with us, she just got royally rear -ended at like 45 to 50 miles an hour or something like that by somebody who was not paying attention, was probably looking at their smartphone.

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Possibly. There's a good probability of that. We don't even know what ended up becoming of that as far as that person, what she got charged with.

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We don't know. But we finally got all that done and squared away.

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Praise the Lord. Yep. But still missed that van, though. Oh, yes. Definitely.

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That van was good to us for a lot of years. Yes. All right. So, questions. Let's get to some of these emails here.

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This one is from Violet. Good afternoon. My name is Violet, and I listened to the podcast from Michigan.

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Awesome. Great sermon this Sunday. I don't remember when I pulled this email up. It could have been this past Sunday, or it could have been the week before.

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I don't recall. But anyway, I'm in Romans 6 on the podcast. I just finished up Romans 7 in real time,

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I guess. At the church. At the church. There you go. Yes. I just finished Romans 7. So, the podcast is back by a month.

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Okay. And then we're starting Romans 8 this Sunday. Correct. Yes. And we're going to be in Romans 8, the way that I have the sermons planned out for the remainder of the year.

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We're in Romans 8 for three months. Awesome. October, November, and December. And then

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Romans 9, starting January in Romans 9. Everybody knows how controversial that one is.

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Just kidding. That's right. Not in a Reformed Baptist church. We won't have those issues.

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Great sermon this Sunday. I was wondering if you had any recommendations on where to purchase gospel tracts to pass or mail out that properly articulate the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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Thank you for your time and consideration. I've recently shared your podcast with a few friends, and I just wanted to thank you for the work that you do.

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My dad, Jeffrey, has been a long -time listener of your podcast and viewer of your YouTube videos, and I just started listening myself.

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Appreciate all that you do, Pastor Gabe, and team. Aw, that's awesome. Babe, you're my team.

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I am. And we've had various people periodically throughout the years that have helped with social media or something like that, responding to emails, managing the, well,

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I guess that would be social media, but managing the Facebook page, because I hate Facebook. Yeah, you put Facebook in its own category because you don't like it.

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That's right. It's not even social media. It's just Facebook. It is. So, a great place to get tracks.

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This is the number one place I send everybody, and that's livingwaters .com. Oh, yeah.

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So, that's Ray Comfort's ministry, and I trust every track that they put out, even though I've probably read only half of them or something like that.

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But I know and I trust that ministry that what they're going to produce will be solid gospel material.

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And even - The whole gospel. Exactly right. Even to the point of talking about law, convicting you of your sin, so that you understand your need for a savior and for the gospel.

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And there's not a lot of sites that I can trust like that. There was a site that I just looked up not long ago, and I wanted to see if they had any tracks on there.

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Very popular Christian publisher. I won't say who it is, because I'm not trying to throw anyone under the bus, but they had a section on evangelism.

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And so, you click on evangelism, and they had something like 20 tracks on there. And I thought, wow, this is great. They actually have a great library of tracks.

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But as I was looking through them, there were authors on those tracks that I was like,

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I don't trust that person to actually give you the gospel. They'll probably -

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Is it just Jesus's love? Yeah, right. It would probably be an approach like that. They're surely going to share

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Christ, but it's not going to be to convict you and make you realize that you're a sinner going to hell who needs a savior.

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And he is the savior. Yeah, that's right. I wasn't convinced they were going to preach like Jesus and the apostles preached.

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That's basically it. So, Ray Comfort and the Living Waters Ministry, they do such good work.

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I know that whatever you get from their site is going to be solid tracks. And they're generally very affordable as well.

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Nice. They have a lot of great people that donate to that ministry so that they can keep those tracks cheaper.

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That's awesome. And give you the opportunity to buy more of them so you can hand more of them out. So check out their site, livingwaters .com.

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They have a tracks button there in the menu bar. Oh, cool. So just click on tracks and that will get you there.

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Now Fortis Institute, which by the way, this is Wretched Radio with Todd Friel. And they've renamed it

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Fortis Institute. So everything that they do is under that umbrella of Fortis. How do you spell that?

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F -O -R -T -I -S. Oh, okay. I would not have guessed that. Yes. Well, that would be why.

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I wouldn't have guessed. So Fortis, F -O -R -T -I -S Institute .org.

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And if you go there and click on resources, you will find a category called evangelism.

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Click on that and they have tracks. Not a lot. Living Waters has bunches of tracks.

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Fortis only has maybe four or five. But they're still good. And they're a little bit longer too.

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So it's more than just a quick booklet or leaflet that you hand to somebody that has a very brief gospel presentation on there.

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It's a little bit longer than that. So they're kind of like books, like small books.

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I think of Charles Spurgeon used to have the penny sermons. So whenever he would preach, he's got scribes that are sitting on the front row, basically, who are writing down whatever

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Spurgeon is preaching, because he didn't use a manuscript. Oh, wow. So whatever he preached, they're writing down furiously.

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Yeah, definitely. And then the guys that are writing everything, they confer with one another and get from each other the whole sermon.

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It's like what one person missed, another person got. You know that sort of thing? Yeah. So then they would publish it and they would pass it out for a penny.

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So they got to be called penny sermons. That's neat. And it's obviously the length of a sermon.

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These tracts from Fortis are kind of that way. So it's going to be a little bit longer than just a tract like you would pick up from Living Waters, but still a solid gospel presentation.

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If you can convince somebody to read it, they're going to get the full gospel. Yeah. If they're ready to read it anyway.

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That's right. Yeah. So check them out to FortisInstitute .org or again, LivingWaters .com.

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And those are the two places that I trust the most for gospel tracts. If I had all the time in the world, which we've already talked about here that I don't have,

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I would love to sit down and just write tracts and books. I would dedicate so much more time to that.

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Yeah. But I can't even get my Bible recording done. So. It's true. I don't have to write anything for that.

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I'm just reading what's already been written. This next one comes from Ari. Hi, Pastor Gabriel.

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I was wondering the other day about Genesis 4 and the murder of Cain.

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How do we reconcile the fact that God in Genesis 11 commands that a murderer be put to death, but forbade anyone from putting

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Cain to death for the murder of Abel and threatened to curse anyone who would. There may have been no magistrate to do it, but Adam should have been the magistrate to avenge the death of his son,

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Abel. How would you explain that? Just want to say that your program is a blessing to me. I appreciate you and your family.

14:40

God bless. Okay. Well, when you read this account in Genesis 4, there might be some things here that you will pick up about the sentence that God had put upon Cain because he had murdered his brother

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Abel. Okay. So let's read this together and maybe we can come to an understanding of why didn't

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God kill Cain with the death penalty. Now some have said, some have answered this question by saying, well, because God didn't institute it yet.

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It wasn't until after the flood that God then says,

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I will require the blood of man from whoever takes the life of man, whether it's a man or an animal, that man or animal who takes the life of a man must be put to death.

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That's in Genesis 9. So you have the Noahic Covenant in Genesis 9. So some have argued the reason why

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God didn't put Cain to death is because the Noahic Covenant hadn't been given yet.

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But the Noahic Covenant is not just a covenant in the sense of God now issuing a new law that had never been given because the wages of sin has always been death.

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Life for a life is just. That is justice even before God lays it out in the

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Noahic Covenant. Right. So I don't think that's the reason why God doesn't put

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Cain to death. It's not because the Noahic Covenant hadn't been given yet. But again, let's look at the text and maybe something will become clear to you.

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All right. All right. Genesis 4, 1. Now Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bore

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Cain, saying, I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And again, she bore his brother

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Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain, a worker of the ground. In the course of time,

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Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions.

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And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering. But for Cain and his offering, he had no regard.

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So Cain was very angry and his face fell. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry?

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And why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted?

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And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.

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Cain spoke to Abel, his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother

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Abel and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, where is

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Abel, your brother? He said, I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper? And the

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Lord said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground.

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And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand.

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When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.

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Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear.

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Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground and from your face I shall be hidden.

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I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me. Then the

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Lord said to him, not so. If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.

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And the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him.

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Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

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So what did you see there regarding the sentence that God gave to Cain?

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It was bigger than he could bear. Right. It was worse than death. Yeah. So it would have been more bearable for Cain, for God to have put him to death.

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Yeah, for him to have died. But instead, God curses him from the ground.

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So already the curse on man is that the ground is not going to yield for you its fruit without a lot of hard work.

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You will get thorns and thistles from it, and you have to work harder in order to receive your produce.

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Right. Cain was a worker of the ground, and now his livelihood has been taken from him.

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Basically like a farmer. Yeah, right. And it's more than he can bear. So already the curse is double on Cain than it already is on the rest of mankind because of man's sin against God.

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And then you're also going to be hidden from God. Cain will be hidden from God. The blessing of God will never be upon Cain again.

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Right. I mean, he's not going to be repentant. Well, obviously not. Exactly. So the

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Lord is saying this, and you're like, well, that's not fair because Cain doesn't get the opportunity to repent. Well, Cain was never going to repent.

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And God knew that. And God knew that. So then you're looking forward as well to places in the

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New Testament, like especially in 1 John, where Cain is equated as being the seed of Satan.

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And so Cain did what his father the devil did, and he murdered his brother.

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And so Cain becomes a representation of Satan throughout the Old Testament, throughout

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Genesis, and then even through the rest of Scripture. Cain is always marked in this way.

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And now that's not the mark that it's talked about here. We don't know what that mark was. The Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him.

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There's some weird theories out there. Oh, I'm sure. One is that he was black.

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So the Lord made him a black man. That's one of them. That's strange. That usually comes from the racists whenever you hear that theory.

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Yeah. That's nuts. Yeah. Anyway. Another one is that he had a big horn coming out of his head.

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Oh. I don't know if you've ever seen the paintings on this, but they're really funny. No. Like, he's got a giant rhino horn coming out of his head, because I read...

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Well, that's a mark. I read why. I can't remember what it is now, but it has something to do with the way that that word translates that's made some people assume that it was a horn on his head that God gave to him.

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Okay. I can't remember for sure what the reason for that was. That is so strange.

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Now, the Mormons believe... Well, I say this very loosely, because it's not like it's in their official documentation or anything like that.

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Okay. But I encountered this, and I've encountered it through quite a few Mormons. They believe that Cain is

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Bigfoot. Yeah. I've heard that one. So Cain is still wandering the earth.

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Yep. Still. And he's Bigfoot. Yeah. And so, any of those Bigfoot sightings you ever see floating around on social media, it's

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Cain. He's still a wanderer on the earth to this day.

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But yeah, anyway, so you see in the curse that God gives upon Cain, he even protests it as worse than death itself.

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And he says, whoever finds me will kill me. So he's talking about living in constant fear. I never know where I can go or where I can be that somebody is going to put me to death.

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But God puts a mark on him so that he can't be killed. So at least he knows, okay, it's less likely now that somebody's going to pop out from behind this tree and kill me, or something like that.

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Right. Or they hear that I've killed Abel, so they'll try to put me to death as well. God still had a purpose for Cain.

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And that's what you have next in Genesis. As you continue on in chapter four, you have

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Cain's genealogy. So here's all the people that came from Cain. So God had a purpose with Cain.

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And one of the things this also demonstrates to us, and we see this throughout Genesis, is that God is slow to anger.

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So when Adam and Eve sinned, he should have struck them dead. I mean, by the same argument that you would make regarding Cain, why didn't

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God just strike Cain dead? Well, why didn't he strike Adam and Eve dead? Right. They certainly died.

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They died spiritually. And they suffered. Exactly. And then death comes into the picture.

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An animal is sacrificed for them so that they would be covered. Their nakedness would be covered.

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Their shame would be covered. So death does enter the picture after Adam and Eve sinned, but they themselves don't die.

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Not right away. But what you see in the genealogies from that point on is so -and -so lived and then he died.

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Right. That's the next chapter in Genesis 5. Right. So you see, as a result of Adam and Eve's sin in chapter 3, death comes into the picture.

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Cain kills Abel. That's what happens to their first sons. And then even with Seth's genealogy.

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So Seth is considered to be the more righteous seed, or he's of that generation that sought after the

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Lord. And you see one after the other that this man lived and then he died.

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This man lived this many years and he fathered this person and then he died. And so you're seeing that over and over again throughout the genealogy.

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And then he died and then he died. So that's showing us the consequence of sin and how death has now come into the world because of original sin.

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The first sin that was committed. Do not eat from this tree. And Adam and Eve did. Yeah.

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And so now they die spiritually, but then death comes into the picture for every man. Every man down the line continues to die because they have inherited the sin nature and therefore the consequence of their father,

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Adam. So God is slow in his anger to destroy man. Once you have the wickedness of Cain's line that now infects

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Seth's line. So now everybody on the world is wicked and God regrets, it says, that he had made man in the earth and he's going to bring him to death.

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But he's going to preserve them through a remnant. There's always a remnant, Noah and his three sons and their wives, eight people on an ark.

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And through this man who is declared righteous in scripture, God is going to preserve the human race.

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He will wipe out all of mankind because the stench of their wickedness had finally become too much for God to allow to continue.

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And so he wipes them out in the worldwide flood, but continues the human race through Noah and his sons.

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Right. Okay. Then after that, you eventually get to Genesis, well, you're still in Genesis.

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Genesis 13, we're introduced to Abraham. And in Genesis 15 is where God says,

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I'm going to give all this land to your descendants. But right now, the land is occupied by Canaanites, Amorites, you know, all the, all the ites that lived there in that land.

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But with regard to the Amorites, the Lord said in Genesis 15, verse 15, as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace.

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You shall be buried in a good old age and they shall come back here in the fourth generation, talking about Abraham's seed, for the iniquity of the

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Amorites is not yet complete. So God wasn't ready to wipe them out, even though they are deeply wicked people.

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Right. But he's slow to anger. So even here, you see God's patience until the time is right, which you don't get to until Joshua.

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But when the wickedness of this people had finally come to a place where God is punishing them with the

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Israelites going into that territory and driving them off the land and saying in the book of Deuteronomy, understand that you're getting this not because of anything righteous that you've done, but because this people is so wicked that I'm driving them off my land and I'm giving it to you.

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But again, that repeated pattern of though we are sinful and deserving of the wrath of God, he is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

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Even in Cain's case, even in the line that would continue through Cain, God is patient.

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And then once the evil reaches a certain place, then he pours out wrath on mankind.

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But it's again, it's demonstrating the patience of God. Peter talks about this in second

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Peter chapter three, the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you talking to the believers in that church, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance or talk about the elect in general is what

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Peter is addressing there. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief and the heavens will pass away with a roar and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

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So we have previously talking about how that fire is being stored up for that day.

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So God used a flood to destroy the world in the days of Noah. But now the heavens that exist are being stored up with fire for the day of judgment.

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So still the same sort of thing that's going on. We got types and shadows that exist even there. But I hope that somewhere in there, you got an answer to your question about why

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God didn't put Cain to death. Mm hmm. Excuse me. All right. Anything else to add there?

28:20

I know I was the one that kind of rattled on and out. Yep. No, I was just going to say, um, whenever they're explaining the do not murder, you know, in the

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New Testament, it says, you know, that even if you have sinned against your brother in your heart or what was it if you've said, oh, in, in Matthew chapter five, even if you've called your brother names, you're guilty of the fire of hell.

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It's as if you have murdered him in your heart. Right. Yeah. So, so, I mean, God is just patient, very, very slow to anger, like even with us.

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So absolutely. It's just affirming Romans two, four. Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance, right?

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So God has his way of doing things. The Lord is in the heavens. He does all that he pleases as said in Psalm 115.

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And so we trust God knowing that his purpose is perfect. Why does he kill one and, uh, and not destroy another?

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That's it's his plan. That's his plan, right? That's his doing and his business. You continue to be faithful, right?

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Well, I thought it was interesting that even Cain talking with God, trusted him, like trusted him with the mark being sufficient enough that he's not going to be murdered somewhere.

29:44

You know, like, don't, don't do this to me. You know, can't you to give me a easier sentence kind of thing.

29:51

And then he, you know, he just, I don't know, it just sounds like he trusted him a lot.

29:57

I don't know. Like just looking at someone today in the same situation, if you will, granted that won't happen, obviously, but just theorizing, okay.

30:06

The trust is not there to trust God, to put a mark on him, to not have him.

30:13

I don't know. He's talking to God too. Right, right. So there, there's a bit of a difference there. So this element, and we would probably understand this too, is the last time that Cain would talk with God.

30:24

True. So there's still that kind of relationship that's going on with mankind, though they've been driven out of the presence of God that he's still communicating with them.

30:32

Yeah. But this was Cain's last time, because now God's face is hidden from him and he would not know where God is in the earth.

30:41

He would not know how God is working in any situation. So again, the curse that had already been given to man becomes worse for Cain.

30:51

And then you see progressively how it becomes worse and worse. Amplifies. Yeah. After that.

30:57

Definitely. With everybody getting so wicked that God ends up wiping out mankind as they were then.

31:02

That's crazy. So we, I talked there about how we don't know why

31:08

God allows one to live and he takes the life of another. And we just had

31:15

Vodibachan pass away just last week and young, I mean, 56 years old.

31:20

Very young. He's obviously had some health issues. He talked about even when he was living in Zambia, the problems that he was having with his kidneys.

31:28

I can't remember what disease it was that he had. I don't remember either. That was causing him kidney issues.

31:34

But he was asking for prayer because if his kidneys got bad, if they got worse, he was going to have to leave

31:40

Zambia and come back to the U .S. and he didn't want to leave. But then they had the heart failure issue that happened in 21, 2021.

31:48

Somewhere around there. Yeah. And so that he had to come back to the United States for a lifesaving operation. And that was a tremendous undertaking.

31:56

A lot of money was raised. You're probably aware over a million dollars was raised for the Bauckham family in the midst of all of that.

32:02

And then that money even could be used to save his life from another heart attack.

32:09

But it looks like that wasn't an option this time around. So I don't know that it was his heart, but it seems that would have been the case because we already know that his heart was kind of in a bad spot.

32:22

So at the age of 56, Vodie Bauckham was taken home to be with the

32:27

Lord. And we don't know why God has chosen to take Vodie home. We don't know why he took

32:33

Charlie or even John MacArthur. There was at one point, I remember Phil Johnson saying,

32:39

John is as strong in the pulpit as he's ever been. I wouldn't be surprised if the guy preaches well into his 90s.

32:45

And unfortunately, that wasn't the Lord's plan. But even with John, it just suddenly deteriorated.

32:53

Went from certainly an old season wise man who's in the pulpit, but went from that to not even being able to stand in the pulpit anymore.

33:03

And so again, it's all the Lord's timing and we trust his plan.

33:09

And the people that pour into your lives the most are always going to be your own pastor and your own church anyway.

33:16

Yeah, so true. So look to their guidance and counsel more than we look to any of these other guys.

33:22

It is certainly great that we have the internet and we can listen to some of these great preachers.

33:27

And I can't even begin to tell you what kind of an impact Vodie has had on me. And as I shared with my own congregation,

33:34

I'm an expository preacher today because of Vodie Backham. So it's great the kind of ministry and outreach that they can have, but I'm still deeply, deeply thankful for the local church, obviously being a local church pastor.

33:48

Nonetheless, we miss Vodie greatly. Yes. Praise God. There is a library of so many great sermons online.

33:55

Oh, amen. I'm still listening to Sproul stuff I've never heard before. Yeah. You know, it's great.

34:01

It's great that we have this and that these ministers have made this accessible as well. They could be charging a lot of money for it, but they don't.

34:08

It's free. Yeah. It's Bible teaching that any of us can access and learn from. And where do we access it?

34:15

Just anywhere? Well, YouTube. Yeah. I mean, go to YouTube. You've got to be careful not to go to church on the Internet, but there's still a library of great teaching out there that we can go to and listen to.

34:25

So I did this video. This is the one that came out on over the weekend. This is 10

34:31

Great Vodie Backham Moments. And I'll play this here and then respond to a few comments.

34:46

May I never get over the fact that God saved a wretched sinner like me?

34:54

The simple answer comes from John MacArthur, who says, as only John MacArthur could, if you could lose your salvation, you would.

35:07

Amen, somebody. How arrogant does a person have to be to believe that it's possible for them to lose their salvation, but they haven't?

35:19

Who do you have to think you are in order to be saved?

35:26

I'm a Christian, and I'm saved, and I'm on my way to heaven when I die. Now, there's a possibility that I could mess this thing up, but I haven't.

35:40

You probably just did. If you can't say amen, you ought to say out, all right?

35:47

I choose to believe the Bible because it's a reliable collection of historical documents written down by eyewitnesses during the lifetime of other eyewitnesses.

35:54

They report to us supernatural events that took place in fulfillment of specific prophecies and claim that their writings are divine rather than human in origin.

36:03

This is why the doctrine of original sin is so important. If we don't understand the doctrine of original sin, then we don't get this.

36:11

We don't understand the sinfulness of our sin, because somehow we think that we're innocent, and our environment just somehow made us go all wrong.

36:22

Nothing could be further from the truth. People who don't believe in original sin don't have children. I've said it before, and I'll say it again.

36:35

That's not a little angel. That's a viper in a diaper. Think about it.

36:45

Two knights meet each other in medieval times. One draws his sword.

36:55

The other says, I do not believe in thine sword. There are two options here.

37:05

Option number one, you put your sword away, and you try to convince them, using the science of metallurgy and other things, that this is a dangerous thing you have.

37:16

Option number two, cut him. He will either come to believe, or it will not matter.

37:36

We must not agree with the culture when it says the Bible is irrelevant.

37:42

We must not surrender that ground. As we say in Texas, that dog won't hunt.

37:49

We've all got melanin just to differing degrees. So it's not that some of us are, you know, this color, some of us are that color.

37:57

No, we're just different shades of the same color. Some of us just have more melanin than others.

38:04

And I want you to listen to me on this. Listen to me. Just because you don't have as much melanin as I do, don't you dare think

38:11

God doesn't love you as much as he loves me because he gave me more. We do not have a

38:19

God who calls upon us for blind faith. We have a God who speaks. We have a

38:25

God who has revealed himself. God is holy, and he is righteous, and he is just, and he must punish sin.

38:31

All sin everywhere. And you are a sinner who deserves the wrath of God to fall upon you.

38:39

God should have killed you in your sleep last night because of what you thought, said, and did on yesterday. But he was merciful, and he didn't.

38:46

But one day he will. And your only hope is for your sin to be paid for.

38:53

Every other religion in the world says you need to have a religious experience, and then do more good things than bad things, and hope for the best when you die.

39:02

And it doesn't work. Why? Number one, because you can't be good. And number two, because they don't have an answer for the sin that you committed before your religious experience.

39:14

We have an answer. Christ died for sin, once for all, but just for the unjust, so that he might bring us to God.

39:23

We have an answer. All we like sheep have gone astray. Each of us had turned to his own way, but God hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all.

39:31

We're justified, and we're adopted into the family of God. And we're sanctified.

39:37

And as his children, we begin to bear the family resemblance. And we're further sanctified throughout this life by the very same gospel that saves us.

39:47

Until one day, when it's all said and done, we're not just saved from the penalty of sin.

39:53

We're not just saved from the power of sin. But one day, we're glorified and saved from the very presence of sin.

40:02

That's the gospel that we preach. That's the gospel that we need. And that's the gospel that's more than enough.

40:11

You are going to hear a rumor one day, that Voddie Wacken is no more. Don't you believe it?

40:18

Don't you believe it? Don't you believe it? Because though I die,

40:24

I will rise with Christ. It will not be the end of me. Because Christ is raised.

40:32

And I too will be raised with Christ. That is why he is called the firstborn from the dead.

40:40

Folks, you don't talk about a firstborn unless there's others who are born after him. In 2nd

40:46

Timothy 4, 6 -8, the apostle said, The time of my departure has come.

40:52

I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith.

40:58

Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day.

41:07

And not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing.

41:13

When we understand the text. Well, some of those clips

41:20

I knew that I had to put in there because I was there when he preached those sermons.

41:26

Yep. There was one of them in particular you probably remember. I know exactly where we were sitting when he said that.

41:35

One was from the Truth Matters conference in 2019. And every sermon that he preached at Truth Matters, which

41:42

I think there were three of them, or it might have just been two, plus he had the Q &A.

41:47

But everything he did at Truth Matters was fire. Oh, yeah. So I was like, how do you take the hours that he preached at Truth Matters and just section those out and stick it in?

41:59

Into just a few? Into a collage, yeah. Then there was the gospel one that he did at Shepherds Conference.

42:06

And I was among the first to stand up and applaud him with a standing ovation at the end of that gospel presentation.

42:14

I know where I was sitting in that crowd when he did that. So I was there for that message.

42:20

I was right there. But, yeah, I love Vodie and the ministry that he has left behind now for us to continue to listen to and grow from.

42:34

I didn't know him personally. I shared on the broadcast last week that I did a few conferences with him in which we were both teachers at the conference.

42:45

I drove him to and from his hotel a couple of times, which was a treat. I've driven

42:52

Michael W. Smith to and from his hotel and Vodie Baucom to and from his hotel. So I feel like the two biggest heroes that I had in my respective worlds in which

43:02

I've done ministry, I've gotten a chance to drive them around and pick their brains.

43:08

Anyway, here's some comments that we have on that particular video.

43:14

Okay. This person says, Vodie's passing is a huge loss. I'm not a Calvinist, but I loved so much of his preaching and books.

43:23

Amen. And I will miss him. This person who, his name says Jesus. It's Jesus 2024.

43:30

I'm going to assume it's Jesus. Sure. In our area, that's probably safe.

43:36

Yeah, that's right. Actually, it's probably politically connected because Jesus in 2024.

43:43

Since that was an election year, that's probably what it is. God is never done. He is always working.

43:49

He was working through Vodie, so good. He is enjoying his reward right now, being with Jesus forever.

43:57

Amen. Josset says, I'm still sad with his sudden departure, but thank you, Pastor Gabe, for this video.

44:03

Very comforting. Will terribly miss him for sure, but had to move on, for the battle is getting fiercer.

44:09

Soli Deo Gloria for all his mighty men of war. This one from Gemma.

44:17

Amen, Vodie. You will surely rise, not just as surely as the sun rises every morning, but as surely as the

44:23

Christ is risen once. And so shall your brothers and sisters that have lived, that are living now, and that will ever live.

44:32

Amen. Amen. This from Karina. Vodie clarified the gospel with love, dignity, and a jovial mood.

44:40

Ah, yes. Always. You were sure to get two things out of Vodie when you heard a sermon.

44:47

Laughter and tears. Yeah, I was going to say laughter and convicted. Yeah, that's right. Being convicted, yes.

44:52

Could be that too, yeah. Yeah. It's like, what was that? If you can't -

44:58

Can't say amen, you got to say ouch. Yeah, exactly. That became kind of the hallmark of his ministry.

45:08

What would you say? Like a tagline or a slogan or something like that from Vodie. Expectation. Yeah. So much so,

45:15

I think Wrath and Grace, the t -shirt company, I think they have a t -shirt that has Vodie's face on it. If you can't say amen, you got to say ouch.

45:21

Oh, yeah? That's awesome. Or they have a sticker. It's one of those things. Yeah. But he said one time,

45:27

I can't remember where it came from now, but I remember him talking about it in an interview and he said that he got that line from this guy and he named the guy.

45:37

He said, I know that line has been associated with me and it's kind of become a mark on my ministry, but I actually got it from this guy.

45:44

Yeah. And just repeated. That's sweet that he gave him props. Yeah, gave him credit. This one from,

45:50

I can't pronounce his name, but I had a picture of heaven where Vodie arrived and was greeted like Norm from Cheers.

46:00

Vodie. Oh, that's funny. Not necessarily the analogy

46:07

I would go with, but that's still pretty funny. This one from Linda, Vodie is truly resting in peace.

46:13

He will be missed. Definitely. From Char Upton. We've heard from Char before.

46:19

Thank you, Pastor Gabe. We love this man. Lord, we can continue to sit under his preaching through the many years that you gave him.

46:28

What an era to be living in that. Oh yeah. We have such a library of sermons that we can come back to.

46:35

That's crazy. This one from Troy. What a beautiful tribute. God is calling his people home.

46:41

John MacArthur, Charlie Kirk, now Vodie Bauckham. I enjoyed his preaching so much. I struggled daily on what the

46:46

Bible means and Vodie Bauckham helped me a lot. He will be missed so much in the witnessing of using

46:53

God's words to us sinners. And Gabriel Hughes keeps spreading the good news and keep your videos coming.

46:59

I learn a lot from you as well. I don't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as these men.

47:05

They're much braver and bolder than I am or were, I guess now at this point. But nonetheless, my desire is simply to preach the word.

47:15

Amen. And I use any and every opportunity to do it.

47:21

No matter how big or small the setting. When I was in a band, when

47:27

I was a singer and we're traveling around singing in different places, I had that attitude when I was a musician.

47:32

And I remember my brother, who's not a believer to this day, but I remember my brother saying that how much of a witness that was to him to not complain or argue about your circumstances.

47:44

Because he said, we've been through enough stuff as a band and yet I never saw you complain about, man, five people showed up or something like that.

47:52

He's like, you still did the show. And you did it with all of the passion playing that you would have done for a crowd of four or 500 people when we had crowds like that.

48:02

And yeah, it was just, I loved being able to do it. And so any crowd or any opportunity that I had to be able to minister and share

48:12

God's word and sing God's praises, I took the opportunity. And that same attitude is now just translated to what

48:20

I do as a preacher as well. I do not have to have a big church. We left a church in Texas of a thousand people and came out here to Arizona for a church of 70 people, which is now growing and we're over a hundred now.

48:33

But it's wherever the Lord leads and puts us and I'm gonna do ministry there and do it all to the glory of God.

48:40

Amen. So it's a wonderful thing. And I appreciate y 'all listening because without you, we wouldn't still be doing this.

48:48

So true. Now, in the process of putting all of that together, there were clips that I didn't use of Votibacham.

48:59

So I don't know how many I ended up pulling out 15 or 16. And in that video, you heard 12.

49:06

It was 10 main clips. And then there were the two quick ones. Like if you can't say amen, you gotta say ouch.

49:11

Yeah. And that dog won't hunt. Right. Like I had to put those in there, even though they weren't parts of the clips that I was using.

49:20

But yeah, there was so much more good stuff. This is actually one of my favorite messages that Voti ever preached.

49:28

And he preached this at a Crisis Pregnancy Center charity banquet.

49:34

And he was talking about abortion and how we respond to the culture on this issue.

49:41

The way that we typically respond is with stories and anecdotes, things that will tug at the heartstrings.

49:49

And that gets people to be emotionally moved toward a particular position.

49:55

Right. Whether that would be pro -life or pro -choice, of course, pro -abortion. Right. But we use emotional manipulation to try to move people there.

50:04

And on the pro -life side, it may not be that we're trying to manipulate people, but still emotionally moving them toward our side.

50:11

Right. When Voti's argument in this message was, it has to come back to the gospel.

50:17

And so listen to this clip here. It was because of the length of the clip, because it's over two minutes.

50:24

And I was trying to keep everything down to like 40 seconds or something like that. So because of the length of the clip, it didn't end up in that video.

50:31

And also the audio quality is not real great. You'll notice it kind of like phases out or it gets, it kind of fuzzes because the gain was turned up too high or something like that.

50:43

Okay. But anyway, this is Voti on how Christ sanctifies the entire human process.

50:50

And that needs to be the message that we share when it comes to winning the culture on this issue.

50:56

Here we go. This is a spiritual battle. So what is our message to the culture at large?

51:05

Our message to the culture at large is that gospel message. And here's what we see.

51:11

That Christ, through his incarnation, vindicates, validates and verifies the sanctity of human life at every point from conception to natural death.

51:24

How? Folks, he could have come to this world in any way, shape, form, fashion he chose.

51:35

God chose conception. And every step of the birth process, thus validating, verifying the sanctity of human life while it's in the womb all the way to the end of life where God the son experiences death.

52:04

Thus validating and sanctifying even that part of our experience.

52:09

But here's the other thing. He also validates and sanctifies human suffering.

52:17

God the son suffers and dies. He doesn't just die.

52:23

He suffers and dies. So from conception, we know that life is sacred and set apart because God has told us so through having his son, the second person of the

52:37

Trinity, go through every phase of that process. The human life and the human experience itself is validated and verified and sanctified by Christ because he experiences it.

52:51

Death as a part of human life. He experiences it. And suffering prior to death.

52:58

So that whether we're talking about protecting babies in the womb or protecting people when they're weak and frail at the end of their lives from being cut off from the suffering that Christ validated it's all the same theological principle.

53:17

That's the story. Not my story. Christ's story.

53:23

That's the one that gives us the biblical theological foundation upon which to build our argument.

53:31

Always a powerful speaker on just about any issue Definitely. that he touched.

53:38

Yeah. Thank the Lord for Votibacham. Amen. Now I did mention that I was going to get to some

53:44

Charlie Kirk clips here, but we are pretty close to the end. Oh yeah? Let me play one.

53:50

I'll do one of them here. Okay. I want to do Frank Turek's, but we can do that in another week because I really love

53:57

Frank Turek's presentation. We've already gotten a lot of gospel with Votibacham. Jesus Christ who died on the cross for our sins who rose again from the dead who has ascended into heaven is seated at the right hand of God and by faith in him, we are forgiven our sins and have everlasting life.

54:16

At the Charlie Kirk Memorial that was a couple of weeks ago now that message was shared there many, many times as well.

54:24

It was incredible to hear it and not just like paying lip service to Jesus Christ as often is the case whenever you have a lot of politicians that come to the platform and share these things.

54:33

But even that this was, there were deep doctrinal truths that were being shared from the platform.

54:43

Praise the Lord. And I saw way more gospel presentations from Charlie Kirk than I even knew were out there.

54:49

I really did not know how much of an evangelist he had turned into in the last couple of years. Interesting. Until after he died and then my social media feed, no matter what

55:00

I was on, when it was usually X or YouTube, it was just filled with Charlie Kirk clips that of him sharing the gospel.

55:08

Yeah, there were clips of him making political arguments, but even maybe four out of every five of those videos of him making political arguments, he still brings it back to Christ in the gospel.

55:19

I would have been real curious to know where he was headed if he stayed on that trajectory because he wasn't always there.

55:26

You can go back to videos that he did back in like 18 and 19 or even 20 and you would not hear the gospel nearly as often.

55:35

You would hear him talk about it occasionally, but it was very much in the sense of like, we're American, so we're

55:41

Christians. Ah, okay. It kind of felt more like that. Okay. But just in the last few years, got a lot more passionate about the gospel.

55:48

And because that marked his life and that was so much of what he was doing, even in the college campus stuff that he was doing, it was almost like the campus crusade for Christ.

55:59

Yeah. You know, like from back in the seventies and Charlie Kirk was bringing that back. And now there's more people doing it after Charlie Kirk since he was assassinated.

56:09

They're picking up the mantle, so to speak. Yeah. And hitting college campuses and sharing the gospel in great ways.

56:15

Now, there's other people that are imitating Charlie Kirk that are not doing such good things. Sure. Which is typical.

56:21

You know, that's not really very surprising, but thankful for the number of people that have been emboldened to go out and share the gospel even more.

56:29

Amen. But anyway, because this was what was on Charlie's life, we heard it a lot in the memorial service.

56:36

One of them was from Marco Rubio, who I understand is a Catholic.

56:41

He's actually Roman Catholic. Okay. So Marco Rubio is our Secretary of State and he spoke at the

56:47

Charlie Kirk Memorial. And at the end of his speech, gave this gospel presentation.

56:53

I played this for the Bible class that I teach. So I teach a high school Bible class. Becky's just saying, uh -huh, but she already knows that.

57:00

Yes. And I played this clip for that class and asked them a question after it was over.

57:08

So let me play it. I'm going to ask you the same question, okay? All right. All right, here we go. One of the things he wants us to take away from this, from all of this, is the following.

57:19

His deep belief that we were all created, every single one of us, before the beginning of time, by the hands of the

57:26

God of the universe, an all -powerful God, who loved us and created us for the purpose of living with Him in eternity.

57:34

But then sin entered the world and separated us from our Creator. And so God took on the form of a man and came down and lived among us.

57:43

And He suffered like men. And He died like a man. But on the third day

57:48

He rose unlike any mortal man. And then, and to prove any doubters wrong,

57:58

He ate with His disciples so they could see and they touched His wounds. He didn't rise as a ghost or as a spirit, but as flesh.

58:06

And then He rose to the heaven but He promised He would return. And He will. And when He returns, because He took on that death, because He carried that cross, we were freed from the sin that separated us from Him.

58:18

And when He returns, there will be a new heaven and a new earth and we will all be together. And we are going to have a great reunion there again with Charlie and all the people we love.

58:29

Thank you and God bless you. Okay, that was great.

58:37

Uh -huh. I'm going to get nitpicky though. Okay. What was wrong with that? Honestly, I don't know.

58:46

Because all of the extra echo. Yeah, the echo.

58:51

And the clapping. Being in that loud arena. It distracts me. Okay. A lot. Right. Okay. So if you could just like take out the background and just have

59:00

His words, I might be able to hear it again. Without the stadium amplification. Yes, drives me crazy.

59:05

This was obviously, it was up in Phoenix. It was at State Farm Stadium. Okay. There were 100 ,000 people present in that stadium.

59:14

And then I think another 100 ,000 in the annex across the street. Goodness. So they had -

59:19

That's a lot. It was a lot. Yeah. They had a massive turnout for this memorial, which has led a lot of people to say that this is revival.

59:29

Okay. I'll talk more about that next week. Okay. And maybe this week. But anyway, so with regard to Marco Rubio's presentation,

59:36

I played that for the class, for the Bible class. And then I asked them, was that good?

59:41

What was missing from that? And for the most part, at the very beginning, all the students were like, sounded like a solid gospel presentation.

59:48

Was it our sin? No. I don't know. I wasn't looking for what was wrong.

59:55

He never mentioned faith. Oh. Never mentioned believe.

01:00:00

Okay. In the Lord Jesus Christ, and you'll be saved. All he gave was that presentation and then said, and we will all be together.

01:00:07

Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so you could have said of that, well, it sounds kind of universalist.

01:00:13

That's what I was gonna say. Yeah. Okay. I mean, all the doctrinal - After you pointed that out. Right. All the doctrinal points, all the gospel points were exactly right.

01:00:24

Right. And somebody who's - Almost right. Yeah, right. Somebody who is a universalist, even, doesn't believe that.

01:00:32

They don't, they wouldn't even say that it's necessary to have to believe that Jesus rose bodily from the dead.

01:00:38

Rubio was sure to point out, he didn't just rise as a spirit. Right. He rose bodily from the dead and his disciples saw him and ate with him.

01:00:47

So all the points that he makes there, it's like it goes right back to 1

01:00:53

Corinthians 15. If Christ is not raised, none of us get raised. Right. So Marco's making that same sort of argument in his gospel presentation.

01:01:02

Now, it could be that he just forgot to say it. It could have been oversight. Sure. I'm not saying that Rubio is a universalist, but when you listen to that gospel presentation, the one thing that was missing in there was believe.

01:01:16

Believe, yeah. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. We're not all going there just because he did this.

01:01:23

You have to believe. But otherwise, like I said, the gospel presentations that we heard at Charlie Kirk's memorial, it wasn't like every speaker was right on the money.

01:01:35

There were some that weren't. Trump wasn't that great. You know, he had to follow

01:01:40

Erica Kirk and really Erica should have been, you can't upstage the president. Right.

01:01:46

Fair. And even Trump in his own personality is not going to allow anybody to upstage him.

01:01:53

But anyway, so we'll come back to that. We'll come back to some of those other clips and things like that were heard at the memorial. And like I said, even coming up on this broadcast, we'll get more into discussing revival and whether these things are, you know, everything that we've kind of seen in the culture is it headed that way.

01:02:09

I just read from another preacher today who was talking about, it's very, very encouraging what we see happening right now.

01:02:15

It's a really amazing time to be alive and see some of the things that are taking place. And that's true.

01:02:23

Yeah. It is pretty amazing to see what's going on, but honestly, it's just kind of feels like, you know, call me a skeptic, but it still feels like the usual ebb and flow of things.

01:02:32

The glass is half empty. Yeah. I'm on the glass is half empty kind of side.

01:02:37

Yeah. But yeah, it's - You're such a pessimist. It's like we'll hit these moments where, yeah, it does feel like things are coming back up again.

01:02:44

It does. But is this - And we pray that's true. Exactly, right. This is an opportunity for us right now.

01:02:51

We have a tremendous opportunity to share the gospel with people. So let's continue to do that.

01:02:56

The climate is certainly, you know, kind of like in our favor for that right now. Hearts are open.

01:03:02

People are in tune with what's happening in the world and they want answers beyond just my daily this, that, and the other.

01:03:09

Right. And don't let it settle first before you go out there, like the dust settle, you know?

01:03:17

Yeah, right. Use it now. Let's get out and share the gospel. Now, one thing that Charlie demonstrates and what happened with Charlie demonstrates is it's still dangerous.

01:03:26

Very. It doesn't matter that these things are, you know, there might be some sort of optimism that's kind of moving things in a more positive direction.

01:03:34

Certainly you might be able to feel that or a vibe shift is one term that a lot of people have been using.

01:03:40

Yeah. There's like an obvious vibe shift that's going on there. But just because you might feel that doesn't mean going out and sharing the gospel safe.

01:03:48

Right. It can be a dangerous thing, but that can't stop us. Right.

01:03:53

Didn't stop Charlie Kirk. He understood the danger, which is why he had bodyguards. And those guys did not pick up that there was a sniper on the roof that ended up taking him out.

01:04:03

Yeah. So he knew the danger and he still continued to do it. But we need to recognize that as well.

01:04:09

It's not like, you know, the climate's now perfect. Now it's safe for me to go out there. Right. It still could be dangerous, but we still have to do it because we value the gospel and the lives of the people that we are sharing the gospel with more than even our own.

01:04:23

Yeah. Their souls. That's right. Definitely. Well, thank you again for listening. And if you have any questions, email them to when we understand the text at gmail .com

01:04:31

or voicemail by going to www .utt .com and click on the voicemail link.

01:04:37

Babe, as always, you're the best. Oh, you're the best. This is so much easier to do with you than it is to do it by myself.

01:04:48

Even if you don't feel like you contribute much. Sometimes I'm just a uh -huh, uh -huh, uh -huh, yeah.

01:04:55

Everybody loves having you. That's all right. I love it. I heard somebody make a comment of me like,

01:05:03

Gabe, I love listening to you on the podcast, but you do talk different when Becky's there. Yeah. I spruck a change in you.

01:05:11

Yeah, that's right. That's right. You light up my life. Let's pray, and then we're done.

01:05:17

Yes, let's. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this time. We thank you for the ministers that you have given to us.

01:05:23

Not just these big names that we've listened to, whether it's a John MacArthur or a Charlie Kirk or a

01:05:29

Votie Bockham, or even when Marco Rubio, somebody in a high public office gets so stirred to share the gospel of Christ.

01:05:38

But you have given teachers, shepherds, even in our own respective lives, in our own churches that we attend that pour into our lives and guide us in all matters of faith.

01:05:51

And I pray it would definitely be those men that we are looking up to and imitating their faith as instructed in Hebrews 13, verses 7 and 17.

01:06:01

Remember those who taught you the gospel and imitate their faith. As said in Ephesians 4, verse 11, that God gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds, and the teachers to prepare the saints for the work of ministry.

01:06:16

So these men that we have in our lives who serve as our pastors, our gifts from God that grow us in the love of Christ that we must grow in and be sanctified in before we are to enter into eternity.

01:06:30

We don't know what day that will be, but Lord, on whatever day it is, may you find us faithful servants that have our eyes on the prize.

01:06:41

We are running the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith.