F4F | Big Sighted Part I

Fighting for the Faith

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Welcome to another installment of Fighting for the Faith here on YouTube. If you've ever been told that, you know, you've got to have a ginormous, huge, gigantical,

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Godzilla -sized dream for your life and stuff, otherwise you're disappointing

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God and you're not doing something right, yeah, go ahead and hit the subscribe button down below and don't forget to ring the bell.

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You've been taught some pretty awful false doctrine. Case in point, we're heading down to C3 Church, San Diego, as we listen to John Heinrichs from his sermon titled,

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Big Sighted. In fact, this is such a big mess that I'm going to cover two segments, two different videos on this particular sermon, at least portions of it, for our

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YouTube audience because it's just that bad. It's bad part one and then bad

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B -side two, you know, I grew up in the days of vinyl, but anyway, you get the point, so let's head down to C3 San Diego as John Heinrichs is getting ready to cast some big vision, tell us the importance of dreaming big and stuff and things, yeah.

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Here we go. Vision Sunday. How many people here this morning are

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Pastor Juergen, anybody? Come on, Pastor Juergen, nobody like Juergmeister around vision.

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But God's not done, he's still got a word for you.

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And Vision Sunday is always a big Sunday because it always challenges me. Because I believe this,

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I believe God wants you to do the impossible, but to do the impossible you've got to have a vision of something impossible.

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Really, God wants me to do the impossible? Well then why did he give it to me to do?

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I can only do things that are possible. You know, that's the kind of limitations of being a human and stuff, but which biblical text actually says

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God wants you to do the impossible? Yeah, with God all things are possible, but that's because, you know, with him nothing is impossible.

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I think you get the point, but this is already weird. We got to think bigger than just with our human minds, it's hard to do, that's why we got to get into the house of God where this kind of an atmosphere where it stretches us a little bit.

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Stretchy atmospheres there, yeah. Okay, made a spandex or something there. And I believe some of us need a dream to wake us up.

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We've just, consider the paradox there, some of us need a dream to wake us up.

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Yeah, this is pseudo profundity here. I've been living this ordinary life, this ordinary

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Christianity, but God wants to give you a dream to wake you up. Yeah, now I'm going to back this up. I want you to hear it again, and I'm going to show you a text that just throws a wrench into this monkey.

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Wait a second, no, a monkey, never mind, you get the idea, there's a monkey wrench thingy going on there, but there's a text that'll do that.

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So let me back him up just a smidge, listen again. I believe some of us need a dream to wake us up.

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We've just kind of been living this ordinary life, this ordinary Christianity, but God wants to give you a dream to wake you up.

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There's other people... Yeah, ordinary life, ordinary Christianity, God wants to give you a dream to wake you up, he says.

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Yeah, here's the thing, and that is that our good works are pretty much spelled out for us as Christians, and passages like Ephesians chapter 5, be imitators of God, don't be sexually immoral and things like that seem to come to mind.

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And then in Ephesians chapter 6, well actually the tail end of 5, let me do this, I'm going to put 5 and 6 together, and watch then how we do our good works.

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Wives, submit to your own husbands, says to the Lord, a husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church, and his body is himself its savior.

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Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

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Yeah, sounds kind of common, sounds kind of ordinary. Husbands, get this one, love your wives as Christ has loved the church, and gave himself up for her, so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing that she might be holy and without blemish.

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In the same way then, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies, and he who loves his wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

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Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother, and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

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This mystery is profound, and I'm saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband, kind of common, kind of ordinary.

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Watch this one. Children, obey your parents. Yeah, bond servants, here's the best part.

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Bond servant, Greek word douloi, that's the plural, doulos, slaves.

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Imagine this. Back in the day when the scriptures were written, slavery was still a thing.

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How does a slave who doesn't even own himself do his good works?

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Are you ready? Here's what scripture said. Slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would

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Christ, and not by way of eye service as a people pleaser, but as bond servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will, as to the

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Lord and not to man. Yeah, so even somebody who doesn't own themselves can do good works, and you'll note here nothing about saying now because of Jesus is raised from the grave and done the impossible, now it's your turn.

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You get to do the impossible and stuff and thingies. No, our good works are done in our vocations, and somebody who's a slave can even do their good works, and what's called for is for them to obey their masters.

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I wonder what John Heinrichs would say to somebody who's a first century Roman slave.

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You know, oh don't worry, God's going to give you a big dream to stretch you and stuff. Yeah, that doesn't work.

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This is not biblical doctrine that he's teaching here. Here that have, maybe you've got a vision in the past, or maybe you've got a dream in the past and you're almost caught up to it, and so that's why we do vision

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Sunday every week because you need a new vision for a new year, you need a new vision for a new season. Pastor Tommy Barnett says never catch up to your dreams, because God's always, he's always looking forward, he's always looking ahead.

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Yeah, whatever you do, don't catch up to your dreams. No biblical text says that. Also, I don't know who

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Tommy Barnett is, but he's wrong. Got something new for you. I'm 44 at the moment, and I haven't been to an optometrist in a long time, but I was talking to one at a

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Christmas party this year, and I was just kind of asking him, you know, because I'm having a little bit of trouble of seeing close.

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So when I'm at the restaurant, I get out the iPhone light, and I light up the menu.

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My wife's like, turn that thing off, it's so annoying. So I was talking to the optometrist, and he says, well, you're farsighted.

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That means you can see far away, but you can't see very well close up. So if you're nearsighted, you can see kind of close, but you can't really see far away.

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And one of my strength finders thinks it's futuristic, so I'm down with that. I can see in the future, futuristic, so it kind of made sense.

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One of the things I'm praying for, though, is that my eyesight would actually regenerate in 2019.

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That's not a joke. That's serious. I'm really praying that. I refuse to put on glasses at the moment. So I'm just—

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I always find it fascinating when faith healers, you know, they wear glasses, and they're calling down healings and stuff.

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Like Bill Johnson of Bethel, yeah, he wears glasses, isn't that weird? In God, 2019, my eyesight's going to get better, not worse.

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God can do the impossible. Indeed. And so when I was thinking about nearsightedness and farsightedness,

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I was thinking about God and how He gives us visions that are nearsighted, and He gives us visions that are farsighted.

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In other words, He gives us— Which biblical text says that God gives us visions? I'm not familiar with that Bible passage.

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Second Hesitations, yeah, Fourth Hezekiah, yeah, where'd you find that?

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That can happen now or this year or this season, He gives us things that can happen in the future far away.

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And it's our job to discern that. Because if you write down a vision on your vision card, expect it to happen this year, but God's given you a farsighted vision that might even outlive you, then you're going to be frustrated and discouraged.

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Not more frustrated than I am listening to this sermon. He gives us farsighted vision, He gives us nearsighted vision, but—

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Yeah, no scripture talks about far or nearsighted visions that we're supposed to be receiving as Christians.

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And He always gives you, whether it's near or far, is it's big. It's always big -sighted. So the title of my message is

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Big -Sighted, hence the name of the sermon. So God is always going to give us big -sighted visions, really.

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How come the slaves in the time of the Roman Empire when Paul wrote Ephesians, how come they didn't get no big -sighted visions?

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They were left with the small tiny stuff like, you know, yeah, you're probably going to die a slave, so just obey your master as you would the

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Lord. That's a pretty small vision right there, yeah. It's not as big -sighted.

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God wants to give you a big -sighted vision for 2019 and beyond.

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Really, yeah, to infinity and beyond. Yeah, I'm not familiar with those—where in the

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Bible does it say God wants to do that for me in 2019? I believe this.

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I believe that when we get to heaven, God is not going to look at us and say, I can't believe you believed me so much.

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I can't believe you believed I could do that. I can't believe you had so much faith in me that I could do that for you.

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You should have believed less. He's not going to say that. He's going to say, look what you left on the table. There was so much more.

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I gave you a big -sighted vision, but you chose not to believe it, or you chose not to walk into it.

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Yeah, you know what's really funny is that Jesus talks about the Day of Judgment in the

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Sermon on the Mount, and it's worth taking a look at what Jesus said regarding the judgment in the

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Sermon on the Mount. And I'll start—we're going to apply our three rules for sound biblical exegesis here. Even I have to follow those rules, which are context, context, and context.

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And we'll start at verse 13, but the passage in question is just a little down there.

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But we'll work it out. Here's what Jesus says, Enter by the narrow gate, for the gate is wide.

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The way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.

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Yeah, that's not making me feel warm and fuzzy. Yikes! Okay, so the way to destruction is huge.

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It's a highway. It's a highway. The way to eternal life, it's not a very well -trodden path.

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It's small. It's narrow. The gate is narrow. The way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it,

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Jesus says, are few. So beware of false prophets, and those false prophets then come up in that context of enter by the narrow gate, right?

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False prophets are these people who are going to lead you astray and put you on the wide highway rather than on the narrow path.

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Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing. Inwardly they are ravenous wolves.

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You'll recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes or figs from thistles?

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So every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit.

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A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire, thus you'll recognize them by their fruits.

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And now watch what comes up next, get an example of some of the things we need to be watching for. So, not everyone who says to me,

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Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my

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Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name?

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And watch this, do many mighty works in your name. Big sighted dream vision kind of thingies, right?

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Oh, do mighty works in your name. Then I will declare to them, notice

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Jesus is the judge, I never knew you. Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.

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So doing mighty works, having big sighted dreams, prophesying and all this kind, that's not the sign that you're a believer in Christ.

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And especially if you're a teacher in his church, you're not teaching the truth, you're one of those ravenous wolves.

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I think we've got this sorted out now, we can come back to what

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John Heinrichs is saying. I'm going to say you had too much faith in me. He's never going to say that.

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He's never going to say that. I was at Dream City Conference with Pastor Juergen about 18 months ago, two years ago, and he's told this story.

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But we were at this conference in Phoenix, and it's Dream City, and at this conference they have vision cards, kind of like what we have here, and they tell you to write...

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Dream City. Not sure where that is on the map. On your dreams.

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And so we're sitting there during this time, but you're going to have that opportunity at the end. We're writing down our dreams for the future and for that year.

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At the time we had three campuses. We were talking about the fourth with the awesome Hundleys that are sitting right here in the front row.

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But we'd only had three, and Pastor Juergen's vision when he got here was one church in four locations. And so while we were there, we're writing down our dreams, and Pastor Juergen tells this story.

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He's having this conversation with the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit's telling him, like, is that all you got, basically?

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Is that all you're going to write down? Really? He was having a conversation with the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit was saying, is that all you got?

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Hmm. Okay. Hmm. So apparently the visions are dependent upon us. They don't come from the

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Holy Spirit. We've got to work them up within us or something. And Pastor Juergen's like, you know,

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I don't want to bother you, God. You know, there's so many thousands of people here. It's a lot on your plate. I don't want to bother you.

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But the Holy Spirit kept pushing him, and so I just remember, I didn't know he was having that conversation. I just remember him nudging me and saying, hey,

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God's telling me not to make it easy on him. He's big. Don't make it easy on him. And I can remember going back to my car and crossing stuff out and adding zeros and increasing my vision on that night.

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And then God, you know, the story he got, Pastor Juergen writes down. I would note that C3 San Diego regularly makes it on Fighting for the

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Faith, both the YouTube channel and the podcast, because of their lamentably awful false doctrine and teaching and Bible twisting.

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Pretty sure God the Holy Spirit wasn't talking to Juergen, you know, at Dream City, wherever that is.

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16 campuses, $250 million worth of real estate, and he's thinking, you know, what do you think about that,

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God? And then we go up to the mountain, Prayer Mountain, and we all pray over our vision cards. And by the time he got down, there was something in his spirit that he really believed that we could do 16 campuses, and now, you know, we're one church, 16 locations just in San Diego, and who knows what's going to happen beyond that.

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The reason I tell you that is because God wants to give you an impossible vision. No text says that.

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No text says that God wants to give you an impossible vision. And again, if that were true, why didn't

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God give slaves of the first century Roman Empire, who were Christians, an impossible vision?

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Why did he just say, yeah, yeah, you just go ahead and obey your masters? I'm curious about that.

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Give you something big -sided, something bigger than what you can think, and we don't have to take it easy on him. He can take it.

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He's a big boy. You can believe him for something huge, for something massive, and something big for you might be something small for somebody else, but it's still big for you.

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So we can believe God for big things. So we can believe God for big things. You know, again, in order for a doctrine to actually be biblical, you would need to find it in the

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Bible, and we didn't see no biblical text that says that God is going to give us big -sided visions and thingies like that.

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Yeah, no, not at all, but we're not done with John Heinrichs. This is going to be a part two to this sermon because what comes up next needed to be its own video.

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It's just that. It's the best way I could put it. So hopefully you found this helpful.

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That's all down below in the description. So until next time, may God richly bless you in the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ and his vicarious death on the cross for all of your sins.