Dont Hang Out With Cowards

Okay, so a lot of you are doing the Christ Church Bible reading challenge and all that kind of thing.

And if you are, then a few weeks ago, you read through Deuteronomy. And I at the time when

I read this verse from Deuteronomy 20, it definitely struck a chord with me. But the last few days, there's been some really kind people on Twitter and Facebook that have been that have been adding me and attaching me on to comments where they say how encouraged they've been by my content and other people as well, not just me.

And how that, you know, without social media, they wouldn't have been able to even know who

I am or seen some of that stuff. And they would have felt like they were alone, they would have felt like they were isolated and going crazy kind of thing.

And brothers, let me just say the same thing. I've told a lot of you guys this as well. I listened to some of your content.

Just Thinking podcast, it's good to be a man, I read a lot of your tweets. And let me just say this, that people dog, you know, social media all the time, but I honestly do not see it that way.

I don't come come away from social media discouraged or troubled or any of that kind of stuff. The kind of content that I consume on social media is encouraging it is it emboldens me it makes me realize that there are a lot of people that have their heads on straight about some of the issues that affect us in our culture today, some of the most important issues that we have out there right now.

I'm not crazy. And if I am, then we're all kind of crazy together kind of thing, which is something that we should always watch out for.

We don't want to be in an echo chamber or anything like that. I find, you know, a lot of you brothers,

I find you so emboldening, not discouraging, not troubled. I don't walk away wringing my hands full of anxiety about how divided we are and stuff like that.

We're not divided. Christ's people are powerful and they're everywhere. There's a lot more of Christ's people out there than you realize.

And I think one of the blessings of social media is the fact that we can really see that play out.

Christ's people are everywhere. And even in normal life, you know, when I when I go out, you know, in New Hampshire or Vermont, there are a lot

I mean, look, a lot of people call this a spiritual wasteland here in the Northeast. But really, there's a lot of Christians around here.

So we should be emboldened. We should feel like we're powerful because we're on God's side and God is with us.

And so maybe our enemies are more in number. Maybe they have more of the thrones of power. Maybe they have the presidency and the legislative branch of the judicial branch.

And for some reason, our Supreme Court justices can't figure out the difference between a boy and a girl and stupid stuff like that.

We should still go about our business. We should still be encouraged to not consent with it because there are a lot of people that have refused to bow the knee to bail.

And here's the thing, though, guys, because there's also a lot of fear peddlers amongst Big Eva and evangelical preachers as well.

There's a lot of pastors that for whatever reason trade in anxiety and fear and despair.

And you should just reject that kind of stuff. Do not deal with despair merchants.

If your pastor is preaching despair, for God's sake, get out of that church. That's not a

Christian message. Despair is not a Christian message. And listen, like social media is great.

But the thing is, like, sometimes it can poison you, right? Like, like, like I had a guy and I still love this brother.

This brother is someone I get so much value out of. But during the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, he started peddling fear.

And it wasn't like fear that made any sense. It was just like everything was negative and it was like the worst case scenario.

And and even when you look at the data, it's like, well, yeah, the data is not really bearing this out. So why are you peddling this fear?

But I will say this. In the beginning, he did kind of wake me up to some of the the the threat.

And in other words, like I didn't think coronavirus was a threat, but if other people thought it was a threat,

I needed to prepare for that eventuality. So I went to the store and I bought supplies because not because I thought coronavirus is the worst thing in the world, but because I thought people would react crazily.

And they did. And so I was very grateful for that. But eventually it started becoming just despair, despair, despair, nothing but despair.

And look, as much as I like to say no despair, as much as I like to say, I can just reject it and refuse consent.

If you read, if you consume enough of that kind of content, you're going to start to to get some of those feelings as well.

Hey, buddy. Hold on. Sorry about that. So, yeah, so even even even if you go into this saying, you know,

I'm not going to I'm not going to believe the despair. Sometimes you do just need to shut it off because and that's what I did. What I did was

I muted this particular person for a time and then I unmuted him because he's a very valuable person to me.

He's got a good message in general. And when I unmuted him, he had actually already realized that maybe he had jumped the gun a little bit, which is which makes sense because he's a smart guy.

You know what I mean? He he he didn't apologize for pumping the despair, but he did kind of realize, yeah, you know,

I was given bad information kind of thing. And so it's OK to cut some of that stuff out.

Like cancel culture is not bad, necessarily, you know, if you're if you're actually being negatively affected by what you're seeing, like I don't recommend watching too much

CNN or MSNBC because it'll it'll it'll rub off on you. It really will.

Like the panic and the despair, despite your good intentions, will rub off on you.

And I was even catching myself the other night on Reform Jellicle with some of this despair rubbing off on me. In fact, I would actually recommend disconnecting from a lot of big

Eva content like I consume big Eva content in fits and spurts because I can't take too much of it because it's just too much despair.

It'll rub off on you eventually. And so I would recommend that if you're laughing at big Eva content and consuming it and stuff like that, take breaks every now and then, man, because you don't want that despair to rub off on you.

And by the way, this is a biblical I'm not saying they're the worst people in the world, but they can't join you in the fight if they're full of despair and hopelessness and fear and all of that kind of stuff.

Like there are certain Christians that you should not necessarily go into the foxhole with.

I'm not saying they're the worst people in the world and I'm not saying they're not believers, but there are certain men that I respect greatly that I would not go into a foxhole with.

Why would I? This is a biblical concept. I, this is from Deuteronomy 20. So this is what got me thinking about this.

These, the, the Christian standard Bible calls this section, the rules for war. Listen to this.

Ready? Verse one says, when you go out to war against your enemies and see horses, chariots, and an army that's larger than yours, do not be afraid of them for the

Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt is with you. That's just a statement of fact, like the army is going to be bigger than yours, but don't be afraid because you've got the

Lord. He's with you. The Lord is bigger than your enemies. So what you see is a bigger army than your army.

Maybe they're even bigger men than you are. Maybe they're even more powerful, better connected and stuff like that. That's what you see with your eyes, but remember you're on the

Lord's side. So do not be afraid of them. Okay. That's a statement of fact, and it's a command.

Do not be afraid of your enemies when they appear more powerful than you. Brothers, you need to hear this.

Do not be afraid. Then what it says is this verse two, when you are about to engage in battle, the priest is to come forward and address the army.

So the religious leader is supposed to come forward and address those that are about to go to war. And here's what the priest is about is to say, he is to say to them, listen,

Israel, today, you are about to engage in your battle with your enemies. Do not be cowardly.

Do not be afraid, alarmed, or terrified because of them. For the Lord, your

God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to give you victory.

Here's what the religious leader's duty is, is to say, look, don't be cowardly, don't be alarmed.

Don't be terrified. Don't be troubled. Don't be, Oh, I'm just so I can't believe it on Twitter. None of that stuff.

God is with you. He's fighting for you. He's the one to give you victory.

So go and be bold and do what you're supposed to do and have Thanksgiving, whatever it is, don't wear the mask.

Go to church, regardless of what the governor says. I know the governor looks very powerful. Go to church. God is with you.

He'll give you the victory. The Lord, your God is the one who goes to fight with you. That's what the religious leader's duty is to do is to remind you of the truth of the matter when it doesn't look like it's going to be a good outcome.

He's supposed to encourage you. If you don't come back home from church, encouraged and bold and feeling powerful, that's a problem, my friends.

That's a big problem. And here's what he says. Here's what it says here. This is the part that, um, that made me, you know, just really want to think, right?

Here, here's what it says in verse, let's see, verse eight, the officers.

So this is the people that are leading you. This is your evangelical leaders, you know, thought leaders, stuff like that. I'm using this as a metaphor, right?

The officers will continue to address the army and say, is there any man who is afraid or cowardly?

Let him leave and return home so that his brothers won't lose heart as he did.

If you're afraid and you're pumping fear and despair and you're peddling despair and, and just, and everything is just terrible and you're just troubled and dying,

I'm grieved. And just all that stuff, you're afraid and you're cowardly stay home.

It's better for you to stay home than to engage this fight, because what you're going to do is you're actually, you're, you're, you're friends and your brethren, they're going to catch your fear.

They're going to catch your fear quicker than a cold. They're going to catch your despair and they're going to be despaired.

In fact, the way that the Bible talks about this is their hearts are going to melt like yours. Your heart has turned into, into a stream of melty gooby, gooby.

What does that supposed to mean? It's turned soft. You're going to make everybody else soft. So just stay home.

Don't even sit this one out, sit this fight out. If you're not willing to go to battle with, and just, and just crack some skulls when necessary and be bold and be courageous and, and know that God is going to have this victory for you.

If that's you, then don't even fight the fight. Stay home, keep your mouth shut. And that's the reality, brothers.

You need to surround yourself when, when things, when the goings are getting tough here. And the battle is starting to rage, man.

This is a battle that's starting to rage. You might get a citation for going to church next Sunday. You might get, oh my goodness, goodness me, a citation for going to church on Sunday.

You might end up in prison or I'm sorry, jail for a night. I've been in jail before. It's not the end of the world.

You'll survive it. You might end up in jail for going to church on Sunday. This is the, this is where the battle is right now.

We're not in an actual literal battle, but we are in a war. We are in a war. And so surround yourself with people that are like -minded that will encourage you.

That will remind you that it's God who fights. So no matter how big your opponent looks, no matter how strong your opponent looks, you are going to win this fight because God is the one who gives you the victory.

If people aren't reminding you of that, and instead they're pumping fear that the same fear you'll get on CNN, they're pumping anxiety, the same anxiety that you'll get on Fox news.

They're pumping despair, the same despair that you'll find from the worst liberal progressive blog that you can imagine.

If your evangelical leaders are promoting that kind of stuff, get away from them.

It's better for them to just sit this one out, sit this fight out, stay home, keep your mouth shut than to make other people cowardly like you.

And so when you see people attacking those that are actually engaging in this fight, you see them shooting them in the back, uh, you know, friendly fire and all that kind of stuff.

And I'm not talking about, you know, people that are actually trying to engage, but, but, you know, you know, maybe they actually have legitimate concerns.

I'm not talking about those people. Listen, we can all fight each other as well to make sure that we're refining each other.

That's something that's required for a Christian. What I am saying is people that are like, essentially say, well, just to fight at all.

I mean, it's, it's, it's not what you, it's not what you're saying. It's how you're saying it. And they go, okay, so how do I say it? And then you look at their work and it's like, they're not saying it at all, right?

That kind of thing. Like that's just, that's the insanity. Brothers surround yourself with people that are actually going to fight this fight.

People that are confident in the Lord, people that are confident in what the Lord has commanded us. Those people, those are the people that you should follow into battle.

Those are the people that you should be side by side with because otherwise their despair and their fear and their anxiety and their cowardliness is going to rub off on you.

So avoid that like the plague. And I would suggest that if you're on social media, that you use that block and and, and, uh, and mute button very liberally.

If you're the kind of person that you could see that stuff rub off on you too easily. Some people, some people are very strong with that kind of stuff.

It doesn't rub off on them, but just be aware of it because what does the, what does the Bible says is bad company corrupts good morals.

People have a tendency of becoming like the things that they consume. People have a tendency of becoming like the people that they hang out with.

And so I would suggest hang out with and follow and read and all of this people that are actually taking courageous stances and getting things done in this, in the face of difficult odds.