F4F | Jonathan Yadon's Sanctification Thru Risk Taking

Fighting for the Faith

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:14

Welcome to another installment of fighting for the faith. My name is Chris Roseboro. I am your servant in Jesus Christ.

00:22

This is the channel that compares what people are saying in the name of God to the Word of God. Now let me ask you a question right off the bat here and the question is why were the four

00:33

Gospels Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John written? What's the reason they were written? It's gonna kind of be important.

00:41

You know the reason why they were written will impact how you read them, how you understand them, and thankfully we have a biblical text where one of the

00:50

Apostles explained to us the very reason why he wrote his gospel and we would note that this then would apply to the other ones as well.

00:59

John in his gospel at the very end writes these words. Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book, but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the

01:14

Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name. That's the reason why the

01:22

Gospels were written. In fact, I've read theologians who argue that this thesis statement made by John at the end of his gospel really technically should be considered the thesis statement for why the entirety of Scripture is written, so that you may believe that Jesus is the

01:41

Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna head over to the

01:49

Champions Center. We're gonna head over to the Champions Center and we're gonna be listening to Jonathan Yadon of the

01:57

Champions Center, and this is out in the Tacoma, Seattle area, and we're gonna listen to a sermon titled,

02:05

Risk Equals Reward. We're gonna listen to a large part of it, and we're gonna note what he's doing with the biblical text.

02:12

We're gonna note the errors that he's committing, but we're going to run his, well, whole point that he's trying to make in this text, run it through the thesis statement of John, which then applies to all four

02:28

Gospels, and see if it makes any sense, because that's not what we're gonna hear from Jonathan Yadon.

02:36

He's not going to be preaching in a way so that you may believe that Jesus is the

02:41

Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name. In fact,

02:47

I think you can kind of reduce the message we're gonna hear from him down to, this was apparently written so that you could be a, you know, a risk taker.

02:57

Yeah, which doesn't make any sense. So let's get to it. Here is Jonathan Yadon and his sermon titled,

03:06

Risk Equals Reward. It's Mark chapter 5, Mark chapter 5, verse 25, and we'll continue from there.

03:14

A woman who had suffered a condition of hemorrhaging for 12 years. Now, notice here, so Mark chapter 5, 25 through 29, and the

03:27

MSG, doesn't that stand for monosodium glutamate? So you look, now that I'm just thinking,

03:34

I'm having an epiphany here, an apostrophe. Lightning has just struck my brain, yeah!

03:40

That, you know, MSGs are bad when it comes to food. The MSG, really bad.

03:46

It comes to preaching. That stands for the message, by the way, and the message is not a translation.

03:52

It's a horrifyingly awful paraphrase, and nobody should be preaching from this thing, period.

03:59

The job of a pastor is to preach the word and to give the proper sense of what's revealed in the biblical text.

04:06

The MSG, yeah, no, I would like a zero MSG sermon, please, yeah.

04:15

I feel a t -shirt being designed as I speak. Anyway, so you're gonna know what he's gonna tell us something about this text from Mark chapter 5.

04:25

We're gonna spend some time in this text. Also note some of the wordplay that's in there in the Greek, and it's an amazing story, and so let's let him kind of spin his part out before we do any more corrective work, but let's go.

04:40

Twelve years, a long succession of physicians had treated her, and they treated her badly, taking all of her money and leaving her worse off than before.

04:51

This woman had heard about Jesus, so this this woman been sick for 12 years. And she heard about who?

04:57

Jesus. What's the reason why this story is recorded for us? So that we might believe that Jesus is the

05:04

Christ, the Son of God, and by believing Him, I have life in His name. Here's Jesus is in town, she sees this crowd of people, and she says,

05:11

I've tried every doctor, they've taken advantage of me, they took all my money, they took every, she's been hurt. Yeah, it's worse than that.

05:18

In the past, but she says, if I could just touch the hem of his garment, then perhaps I could be healed. And the

05:24

Bible says that when she she got to Jesus, she touched Jesus, the Bible says that power left

05:29

Jesus. He felt power leave him. Yeah. And he asks, in verse 32, he says, who touched me?

05:37

And his disciples respond, they say, dozens have touched you. But he went on asking, looking around to see who had done it.

05:43

And the woman, knowing what had happened, knowing that she was the one, stepped up in fear and trembling.

05:50

She knelt before him and gave him the whole story. One translation said she told him the full truth.

05:57

And Jesus said to her, daughter, you took a risk of faith. Everyone say risk. Yeah, that's not what the

06:06

Greek text says, nor is it what a good translation says. You took a risk of faith.

06:12

So yeah, we need zero MSG sermons. That's something that we need. Risk. You took a risk of faith, and now you are healed and whole.

06:22

Go and live well, live blessed and be healed of your plague.

06:27

Go and live well and live blessed and be healed of your plague. We're going to go into a series as a church, and the series is entitled

06:35

Risk Equals Reward. Risk equals reward.

06:41

Now, this, he thinks that this is all about the importance of risk taking.

06:48

So let's spend some time in the biblical text. Take a look at what's going on here.

06:53

This is an amazing story, and we're going to cross -reference some of what's going on in the

06:58

Greek here, because that will help us, because there's kind of an interesting wordplay going on here. And so the text in question is the gospel of Mark chapter 5, and we're going to start at verse 21.

07:15

Here's what it says. When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side.

07:21

Now, Jesus in the early part of Mark 5 had crossed over to the

07:27

Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee. That is the region near the

07:33

Decapolis, and that's where the Gentiles hung out. In fact, they were pig farmers there. There ain't no

07:39

Jewish pig farmers in the time of Jesus, not if they were keeping Torah. I'm just saying, bacon was not on the menu for Jesus.

07:46

But anyway, and so that's where the demoniac of the Gerasenes was, and the legion of demons that Christ confronted cast out, and it's an amazing story.

07:58

And the pigs ran down the cliff. You should read that. So Jesus now crossing back to the

08:04

Jewish side of the Sea of Galilee lands in Capernaum. That's the town that he's in.

08:09

So it says, when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him, and he was beside the sea.

08:16

Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name, seeing him fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying,

08:26

My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be well and live.

08:35

And he went with him. Now, a little bit of a note. The ESV is translating the word sozo.

08:44

Sozo can mean save. It can also mean heal, and the context is going to dictate it.

08:52

But it's important to note that the Greek, a Greek here would have heard the word save.

08:58

Come lay your hands on her so that, hena sothe kai zese, in order that saved, so that she can be saved and live.

09:11

And so save, salvation here, you know, clearly in the context is referring to her physical healing.

09:18

So this guy is in dire straits. Twelve -year -old daughter is very sick, sick to the point of death.

09:25

And, you know, if you put this back then into the context, Jesus has been away for a little bit of time while all this is going down.

09:32

And while Jesus is away, this 12 -year -old girl is getting sicker and sicker and sicker and sicker, and her situation is getting dire and dire and more dire.

09:43

And so, and you can tell by the fact that no sooner does Jesus get on the ground there in Capernaum that this fellow seeks

09:50

Jesus out and says, you got to come quick. So, you know, you can tell this guy is just anxiety -ridden.

09:56

He's in a race against time. He doesn't have much time and he knows it, that if Jesus doesn't get there soon, his 12 -year -old daughter, they're going to be having a funeral for her.

10:10

And he does not want that to happen. He loves his daughter. So 12 -year -old girl. So it says

10:15

Jesus went with him. So, I mean, without any question, Jesus is on his way. And you're going to note then that the crowd is like, wow,

10:22

Jesus is going to go heal this girl. So a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.

10:28

And like out of nowhere, Kaigoune. So, and there was this woman.

10:35

And a woman was, and there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years.

10:42

Kind of fascinating. So 12 -year -old girl, woman with a discharge of blood. Now, let me reference the old covenant here in the book of Leviticus.

10:50

This is going to help us understand her situation. It says when a woman has a discharge and the discharge in her body is blood, she shall be in her menstrual impurity for seven days.

11:03

And whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening. So note here that, you know, this is assuming that this discharge will come to an end.

11:12

You have your normal cycle. It comes, it goes, and then you're unclean during that time.

11:18

And anybody who touches that person is now considered unclean and asked to, you know, be cleansed.

11:25

So everything on which she lies during her menstrual impurity shall be unclean. Everything also in which she sits shall be unclean.

11:34

Whoever touches her bed shall wash his clothes, bathe himself in water, and be unclean until evening.

11:40

Whoever touches anything on which she sits shall wash his clothes, bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the evening.

11:49

Whether it is the bed or anything on which she sits, when he touches it, he shall be unclean until the evening.

11:55

And if a man lies with her and her menstrual impurity comes upon him, he shall be unclean for seven days.

12:02

And every bed on which he lies shall be unclean. So we can see then here that this woman then, because she has had an issue of blood for 12 years, has been unclean for 12 years.

12:18

She hasn't been able to attend the synagogue. She is clearly in distress to the point where, you know, and we're going to see this in verse 26, as she had suffered much under many physicians, had spent all that she had, and was no better, but rather grew worse.

12:35

So despite all of her efforts to get, you know, to experience healing for her body, every effort has only resulted in things getting worse for her, and she is suffering deeply, suffering deeply, spiritually, psychologically, physically.

12:53

This is, and you're going to see this in the, in how the Greek describes what she goes through. We'll talk about that in a minute.

12:58

So anyway, she had heard the reports about Jesus, and she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment.

13:06

For she said, if I touch even his garments, I will be made well.

13:13

Now a little bit of a note. The part of the garment that she was touching here would have been the tzitzioth.

13:21

According to the book of Numbers, Jews, Jewish men are required that their shirts, that they, on their corner fringes, that they have these tassels that come off of them.

13:32

So she's just thinking, I'm going to sneak up, I'm not going to touch Jesus, I'm going to touch, you know, the fringes of his garment, the tzitzioth, and if I touch him,

13:42

I will be, and here's where the Greek gets interesting, I will be sozo, yeah, sotheisomai,

13:52

I will be saved. That's the word that the

13:58

Greek uses. Now clearly in the context here it's referring to physical healing, but again, the

14:05

Greek here, you know, somebody who knows Koine Greek would have heard this and said, I will be saved, and their mind would have to fit in the context what's being referred to here, but sozo is also the same word that's used for salvation, so keep that in mind.

14:20

For she said, if I touch even his garments, I will be made well. Verse 29, and immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.

14:33

Now, fascinating word here for disease. It's not the normal word that you would expect for disease.

14:41

Healed of her, and the, and here in the in the text, it says, hati iatai apates mastigas, okay, and it's from the

14:53

Greek word mastix, which means a scourge, a whip, or a beating.

14:59

Yeah, let me pull this up, you know, research tools, we want the Greek tools here for mastigas, so a whip, a lash used to urge on horses or laborers, that's one way.

15:13

A mastix is a scourge or a whip, so you get the idea here.

15:18

There's something pretty serious about how a mastix works here.

15:25

In fact, let me open this up here, there we go, and I'll close this window here.

15:31

So here's our BDAG lexicon, so a mastizo is to strike with a whip, and then here, the noun for mastix, an instrument used for lashing, a whip, or a lash, or a condition of great distress, torment, or suffering, so that's what's being described here of her, how her disease is being described.

15:55

So, she felt in her body, verse 29, that she was healed of her scourge, her, you know, you get the idea, it's something far more than just a disease, that sounds too clinical, of the thing that was really tormenting her, and that's how we know that she was suffering greatly.

16:15

So, now something terrible and awful, terrible, awful, and wonderful all at the same time kind of happened.

16:22

So, Jesus, perceiving himself the power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd, and he said, who touched my garments?

16:33

Now, no, Jesus didn't, you know, well, I guess he did say, who touched me?

16:39

So, he's very clear that somebody had touched my garments, but then he goes, and his disciples said to him, you see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, who touched me?

16:49

So, Jesus is making clear, somebody touched my garments, he knows that this has happened, which then is going to recall

16:55

Leviticus, chapter 15, to mind for this woman. She knows she's not allowed to touch anybody, and Jesus has stopped, the power has gone out of him, and she knows that she's been healed of her scourge, and he stops and says, who's touched my garments?

17:11

And you can just tell that at this point, it's as if the blood, you know, just runs cold and drains from her body, and she's having this horror, where what was there for joy now has turned to horror for her, but Jesus is not about to treat her harshly.

17:32

Instead, what happens is just absolutely beautiful. So, his disciples said to him, you see the crowd pressing, and yet you say, who touched me?

17:38

So, he looked around to see who had done it, but the woman knowing what had happened to her came in fear and trembling.

17:49

So, we can see here that she comes, and now she's just shaking, she's totally come unglued, you know, she's just trembling.

17:59

She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth, and with this fear and the trembling, there's got to be tears, and it's just a mess, and so she's telling him the whole truth.

18:14

She confesses, I'm the one who touched you, and she says all of this, and rather than say, don't you know

18:22

Leviticus 15 says that you are not, that anybody who touches you, your touch is made unclean.

18:29

How dare you make me unclean? No, you see, the thing is, is that just touching even the hem of her garment, of Jesus's garment, healed her.

18:39

Jesus wasn't made unclean by her at all, and so after she tells the truth,

18:45

Jesus's first word to her, and it's beautiful, first word is thugater, daughter.

18:55

I mean, what a beautiful text here. Man, Jesus, rather than, you know, laying into this woman, he comforts her.

19:04

The reason why he stopped was not, was not to upbraid her, to rebuke her, to discipline her.

19:13

He wanted her to know that although she had snuck this miracle from him, that it was her faith in him that, that healed her, and he wants her to be comforted, and for her not to sneak away, but for her, for her to know his love, and mercy, and kindness, and grace.

19:33

So, first words, thugater, hepistosou, sesokensei, your faith has, and this is the word, saved you.

19:44

I know it says has made you well, but it's, it's the, the Greek here says saved. Thugater, hepistosou, your faith, sesokensei, has saved you, and then he says, then he says, go, hubaget, ais ereine, go in peace, and, and then, and then be healed of, you know, actually be healed from tes mastigasou, and so Jesus even knows that this for her was not just a disease, but that this was a scourge for her, and so he's able to read her mind, and know the pain, and suffering that she's gone through, and he says, be healed, kaisthe, huge, huge ais, apotes mastigasou, be healed from your scourge.

20:52

This is so amazing, so compelling, so comforting, that this woman who has been kept, who literally, you can tell by the fact that she considers her disease a mastigas, you know, a mastix, that, that this is a scourge, this is something terrible that she's had to bear up under, and Jesus unbinds her from this, and wants her to know his love, and mercy, and that her faith has healed her, her faith has saved her.

21:21

Indeed, she is saved. Her faith in Christ is not for naught. You see, these things are written so that you might believe that Jesus is the

21:29

Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name, and so his word to her again, thugater, daughter.

21:38

This, this Jesus is amazing. Jesus is this amazing.

21:45

He's this kind. He's this merciful. Now, while all of this is going down, you know,

21:52

Jarius here, who's on the clock, I mean, it, you know, you might as well, you know, pull out, like, a prop from, like, you know, the

21:59

Wizard of Oz, you know, that, that, that hourglass with the red sand in it, you know, he, the, the sand is running out, and he knows it, and what can he do?

22:07

I mean, there's that woman, the, the woman who's been kept from coming to the synagogue for 12 years, and she's stopped

22:15

Jesus. We, we were on the way. He would have made it. We, we're running out of time. Can we go?

22:21

You know, and so while this was going on, while he still was still speaking, there came from the ruler's house some who said, and these are terrible words, your daughter is dead.

22:35

Why trouble the teacher any further? I can't,

22:42

I, I have two daughters. I could not imagine having somebody say these words to me.

22:50

I mean, he had faith that Jesus could heal her, but I mean, clearly,

22:58

I mean, he's, he's, he has limitations. I mean, we can't expect him to raise her from the dead, can we?

23:05

But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, and you can see, I mean, it's almost like he's getting up in his face, looks him dead in the eye, do not fear, only believe, believe in me, trust, okay, trust, do not fear, only believe.

23:28

So then Jesus allowed no one to follow him, except for Peter and James and John, the brother of James, and they came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly, and when he had entered, he said to them, why are you making a commotion and weeping?

23:46

The child's not dead, but sleeping, which is weird, okay, she's clearly dead, but you know,

23:52

Jesus, as the Son of God, can talk about death in this way. You and I don't get that privilege, because death for the, the believer is like a sleep, at least for your body, right?

24:08

You know, your spirit is with Christ, so the child's not dead, she's sleeping, so they laughed at him, but he put them all outside and took the child's father and mother, and those who were with him, and went in where the child was, and then another just great moment of kindness, and just tenderness on the part of Christ, taking her by the hand, he said to her,

24:30

Talitha, Kumi, which means little girl, I say to you, arise, and immediately the girl got up, and began walking, she was 12 years of age, and they were immediately overcome with amazement, and so Jesus strictly charged them that no one should know this, and then he told them to give her something to eat.

24:53

That, just that little last part is so amazing, because you think whatever it was that killed this girl, she got sicker, and sicker, and sicker, you know, that, you know, clearly there was vomiting involved, and she wasn't able to keep anything down, and Jesus, after raising her from the grave, even carried off this little girl, and says, she really needs something to eat.

25:15

I mean, these little details to tell you, this really went down, this truly happened, and so note the kindness, the mercy, the power, the love, the compassion of Jesus, the one who can take somebody who is unclean, and make them clean, whose faith, when people have faith in him, they are saved, and that he unburdens them from their scourges, raises their dead, restores,

25:45

I mean, who is this guy? In fact, I would argue that Mark, the guy who recorded for us the sermon notes of Peter, because Peter's the apostle behind the

25:58

Mark, the guy who wrote the gospel, that he's recording these things so that we would believe that Jesus is the

26:05

Messiah, that he's the Christ who's come to save us, and look at this kindness, and his mercy, and his grace, and his love, his compassion, his power.

26:15

I mean, this, I want to know more about Jesus, and this text just draws me in further, and says,

26:25

I want to know more about you, Lord Jesus. I am compelled by your compassion, your power, your love, your mercy, your grace, and see, that's kind of the point, right?

26:40

You remember what John said, these things are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the

26:46

Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name. So, all of that being said, you now know what's going on in Mark chapter 5 in this section, and notice there was no

26:58

MSG, as we were exegeting it out, and there was some Greek in there, but I explained to you what it meant, so now you know what this text is about, and tell me, seriously, that this isn't the most amazing story ever, and yet the stories even get better regarding Christ, but you get the point that I'm making.

27:17

Now, let's go back to the Champion Center, and see if we can see what's going on in this sermon, and note what's really going wrong here, because this fellow preaching clearly doesn't understand why this text was written, and because he's making a point from the

27:39

MSG, he's making a point that this text never was intended to make, that somehow we got to get out there and take risks.

27:48

Yeah, no, that's not what this is about, but let's let him continue. And the risk that we're going to be talking about is, it's a risk that we don't really get excited about all the time.

27:58

It's a risk that doesn't really jump off the page when we see this, or when we hear this talked about.

28:03

It doesn't really leap up in our hearts, and we're going to be talking about the risk of vulnerability. Everyone say vulnerability. The risk of vulnerability.

28:11

What? What? Now, so we get just a little bit of the text.

28:17

We don't get the whole story. The whole story really carries a magnitude, and so I just have to ask the question, is the reason why

28:24

Mark wrote the Gospel of Mark, and this particular chapter, chapter 5, so that we would embrace and jump into and take the risk of vulnerability?

28:40

John says these things are written so that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name.

28:48

Just saying. So I'm having a hard time believing that the reason why

28:53

God, the Holy Spirit, through the author Mark, recorded this event, you know, this miracle, these two miracles of Jesus, is so that I would embrace risk and make myself vulnerable.

29:07

Yeah, it doesn't make any sense. It's a powerful word, and we're going to be talking about this, and we're defining the word vulnerability as making moves that have no guaranteed outcome.

29:19

The risks that we're going to be talking about with vulnerability is making moves that have no guaranteed outcome.

29:26

One more time, just tell the person next to you, I'm glad I'm sitting next to you. I'm glad I'm sitting next to you. Let's pray real fast.

29:32

God, thank you so much for today. God, thank you for every single person at all of our campuses that I represented.

29:38

Lord, you brought us here today because you have something in store for us, and Lord, right now we just, we choose to put our attention on you and your word,

29:47

Lord. God, we ask that you make us better. God, we pray the prayer of Paul that he prayed in Ephesians that said, a spirit of wisdom and revelation,

29:56

Lord, that we would know you better, and we would know you more, and we would know your plan more today, Lord, because of what you're going to speak to all of us individually.

30:04

God, I pray for clarity as I communicate that you would help me speak clearly to every single person, and again,

30:10

Lord, I thank you for every single person that is here. In Jesus' name, everyone said amen, amen, amen.

30:18

A couple years ago, I got the chance to go to Africa on a mission trip. Now, this story now that he's telling, this anecdotal story from his life, from his life experience, mission trip to Africa, the reason why he's telling the story is because he thinks that this will help flesh out what he believes is the point of this text, and that is the importance of taking the risk of vulnerability, so we'll let him tell his safari story here.

30:54

I'm gonna be drinking some Earl Grey while he does that, and there was a group of us from Champion Center that got to go together, and we were there, and we were representing

31:03

Champions Foundation. It was incredible. If you've never been on a mission trip, I really think that every single person in some time in their life should go on a mission trip.

31:13

It is the best time. God works in and through you. You see things. You get to experience things. It's the coolest thing, and on the last couple days of our trip, we got to go on a safari.

31:24

Now, if you know me, you know that being out in the wilderness with people that I love, surrounded by a wildlife, that is where it's at for me.

31:33

That is my garden of Eden. That is my heaven on earth. I love being out in the wilderness.

31:39

I love being with people that I love. Notice we're learning a lot about Jonathan.

31:47

Jonathan Yadim. That's his name. We're learning nothing really about Jesus at all, and I mean that like at all.

31:56

This text is about Jesus. Hello? And we saw everything on the safari.

32:03

We saw elephants. We saw gazelle. We saw giraffe. I don't know if you've ever seen a giraffe run.

32:09

It is the most epic thing that you will ever see in your entire life. Those things take off, and we saw crocodiles.

32:17

I saw this massive 24 -foot crocodile sitting on the bank by this river that we got to go through this beautiful waterfall.

32:24

We saw hippos. If you've never seen a hippo, those things are huge, okay? Bigger than your car.

32:29

Hippos are massive. We saw wild dogs. We saw lions. We saw this lion in a tree, and we got a picture of it, and our tour guide parked under the tree, and we're like, dude, this thing could jump out and get us.

32:41

What are we doing under this tree? Let's move. But on the safari, we'd have an incredible time driving around looking at all the animals and everything, but when we came back to our place we were staying, we fought one of the biggest battles of our lives, and at this place we came back to, it's honestly one of the greatest fears of this generation.

33:02

We had no wi -fi. We had no wi -fi, and we're out in Africa, no communication with our family.

33:11

We can't send them pictures. We can't tell them how we're doing. We're still alive. We're having a good time. No communication.

33:17

Why was this a big deal for me? Why was this a struggle for me? Because I hadn't talked to my wife in four days. I had just gotten married a couple months before, and it's been four days since I talked to my wife.

33:26

This is a big deal. I wanted to talk to my wife. I wanted to FaceTime her. I wanted to call her, but we had no wi -fi.

33:33

It's been four days since I, yeah, wow. All right, so we're almost nine minutes into this thing, the sermon, and we didn't start at the very beginning, and we're not learning nothing about Jesus here.

33:49

Thank you. Thank you for having sympathy for me. Four days. Then one night we're in the lobby, and we're walking around, and all of a sudden our phones start dinging.

33:59

I'm with my cousin Nathaniel, David, and my brother Chris, and our phones just start going ding, ding, ding, and we're like, did it happen?

34:07

Like we found a hot spot. We found wi -fi, everyone. We found some. We're saved. Wi -fi, and here we are, four millennials huddled around this couch, and we're so excited, and we're getting texts, and we're trying to text people back, and I'm like, guys,

34:21

I gotta call my wife. I gotta call her. It's been four days since I've talked to her, and I'm so excited to call her. I pull my phone out, two percent battery as if it couldn't get any worse, right?

34:33

It's not that big of a deal because my charger is just across the courtyard in the room, so I'm like,

34:39

I'm just gonna walk and get my charger, but there's another problem. When the sun goes down in Africa, these things take to the sky.

34:47

They're called bats. Hundreds of bats flying around in this courtyard that is between where I am at and my phone charger so that I can talk to my wife.

34:57

Swarms of bats, and if that's not big enough, there is like this monsoon crazy downpour of water, like raindrops the size of this water bottle, like five pounds each.

35:07

You get knocked out by hitting one of these things in your head, falling from the sky. Mean creatures don't do well, but then the downpour on top of it, like in between where I'm at and where I want to be, and I'm trying to talk myself out of it.

35:20

I'm like, guys, I don't know if I can do this. Like, there's bats out there. Like, they're going to run into me. They might like bite me.

35:26

Something might happen, right, and I had a decision to make. Was I going to play it safe or was I going to make a move with no guarantee that I might get hit by a bat or something?

35:35

Notice this guy practices what he preaches. He decided to take a risk, which is not the point of Mark 5, but as a kid,

35:47

I grew up on Animal Planet. Anyone like Animal Planet? Like, that was my jam. I grew up on Animal Planet, and Steve Irwin, he was my hero, and he taught.

35:55

I am not joking. We are learning way more about Jonathan Yadon than we are about Christ, and that's a big problem.

36:02

Me, that bats are blind, but they have this sonar so that they don't run into things, and the sound that they make bounces off things so they can maneuver and like not run into stuff, and I believed him.

36:16

I really believed Steve, but I was still hesitant. I was nervous, and I told the guys

36:22

I got to make this move. Like, I got to run, grab my phone charger. It's pouring down rain. Bats are flying.

36:28

I take off into the courtyard. I'm sprinting as fast as I can, trying to get through this swarm cloud of bats, and as I am running, it happens.

36:38

This bat hits me, and it felt like a bald eagle just hit me in the chest, and I absolutely lose it.

36:45

This bat like let out the most horrific, terrifying, like screech that you have ever heard, and it was like a little demon just like jumped on me, and this thing is flapping.

36:57

It didn't just hit me and fall to the ground. It attached itself. It clawed itself to my shirt.

37:03

The wings got underneath my sweatshirt, and this thing is just like going nuts, and I lose it.

37:09

You would have thought I was getting eaten by a pride of lions. Like, here I am in the middle of Africa, laying down.

37:15

I mean, it took me out. I just went down, and I'm laying in the middle of Africa, rain falling, bat on top of me.

37:22

Help! Like, I lose it. I'm terrified, terrified, but I wanted to talk to my wife, so I get the bat off me.

37:36

Finally, it felt like an hour. It was probably like 10 seconds, and I grab my charger, and I'm in the room, and I realize

37:45

I don't got Wi -Fi here. I got to go back. I got to go back, so I convinced myself maybe

37:54

I was running too fast, because then the bat didn't have enough time to maneuver and all that.

37:59

I really convinced myself of this, so I walked downpour, the bats just praying, like,

38:05

God, please, just no, no, but ladies and gentlemen, I got back. I got to plug my phone in, found the

38:11

Wi -Fi hotspot. I got to talk to my wife that day, and I was so happy and fulfilled. Yay.

38:21

The job of a pastor is to preach the word, and these things are written so that we might believe that Jesus is the

38:29

Christ, the Son of God, and by believing, we might have life in his name. I'm not sure what you're doing here.

38:36

I'm glad to hear that you were able to talk to your wife after finding the Wi -Fi hotspot there in Africa.

38:44

Yay, but this has nothing to do with Mark 5, and I share that story because I just want to illustrate that there's a real battle that we fight every single day.

38:56

There's a real battle in all of us with our flesh and our spirit.

39:01

They're at war when it comes to taking risk and putting ourselves out there, and there's a war between our flesh and our spirit regarding taking risk.

39:13

Okay, we got to do some more biblical work here. Galatians, I think it's chapter 5.

39:19

Hang on a second here. Yeah, I think it is. Yeah, it is.

39:32

I'll start at verse 16. Galatians chapter 5, verse 16. It talks about how our sinful flesh and our spirit that, you know, the new person that we are in Christ are in conflict with each other, but it's not about taking risks.

39:50

No, it's really not. So Paul says in Galatians 5, 16, I say, walk by the

39:56

Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. And here,

40:02

Sarx is referring to the sinful flesh, you know, our sinful, corrupt nature. For the desires of the flesh are against the

40:09

Spirit. The desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other.

40:14

So here we've got a text that's talking about how the Spirit and the flesh are at odds with each other.

40:22

And let me go back to the sermon just for a second. I'm going to back it up 10 seconds, and I want you to hear again that this is the category that he's operating in.

40:33

There's a real battle in all of us with our flesh and our spirit.

40:38

They're at war when it comes to taking risk and putting ourselves out there. So there's a real battle between our flesh and our spirit.

40:47

Here we got Galatians 5 talking about the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit. The desires of the

40:53

Spirit are against the flesh. This is clearly what the Bible is teaching regarding this conflict.

40:59

There's now no doubt. So I'll read verse 17 again. The desires of flesh are against the

41:05

Spirit. The desires of the Spirit are against the flesh. These are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do.

41:11

But if you are led by the Spirit, you're not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident.

41:17

And let's see if lack of risk taking or lack of risk taking regarding vulnerability is in the list.

41:27

The works of flesh are evident. And they are sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.

41:53

I warn you as I warned you before that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

42:01

Yeah, I didn't see anything in there about lack of risk taking when it came to vulnerability. No, not at all.

42:07

Well, let's check the positive list. The fruit of the Spirit. Truly, I mean, if this is what he's saying, talking about the conflict between the

42:14

Spirit and the flesh, that maybe the Spirit, that one of the fruit of the Spirit will be vulnerability and risk taking.

42:25

Yeah, so, but the fruit of the Spirit, then, verse 22, is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self -control, and against such things there is no law.

42:38

Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and its desires. So now we got a problem, and that is that this guy is clearly identified, and it is true biblically, that there is a conflict between your sinful flesh and the

42:51

Spirit, and he is thinking that that conflict is manifested by a refusal to engage in risk taking rather than let

43:04

God speak and answer the question is, you know, what are the details regarding the conflict between the flesh and the

43:11

Spirit? He's just made up his own. So let me back it up again, 10 seconds, so you can hear it, and then we'll keep going.

43:17

There's a real battle in all of us with our flesh and our Spirit. They're at war when it comes to taking risk and putting ourselves out there and making ourselves vulnerable.

43:30

There's a real risk. Our Spirit is constantly saying, go for it. Open up. Put yourself out there.

43:37

Take the leap. Make a move. Don't play it safe. Don't stay back. Where'd you find that list of things that the

43:43

Spirit is saying? It's not in the Bible, and it's definitely not taught in Mark 5 or Galatians 5.

43:51

Have the conversation you've been wanting to have, but our flesh is just as loud sometimes, and our flesh screams at us, what if I get hurt?

44:02

I've already tried that once. I've already... What is it? I think this falls into the category of moralistic, therapeutic deism.

44:11

So we're now, rather than talking about actual Christian sanctification and holiness and mortifying the sinful flesh and things like that, we're now,

44:20

I'm going to make myself vulnerable, man. I'm going to take the risk. I'm going to ask the girl out, and that's living according to the

44:27

Spirit. Unbelievable. I had that conversation. What if I embarrass myself again?

44:34

What if it doesn't work out? What if they don't listen? What if I put myself out there and what

44:40

I want to happen doesn't happen? It sounds like George McFly. Yeah. So who knew that, you know, that back to the future, the original one, you know, with George McFly, you know, what if they don't like what

44:52

I've written? What if she says no? You know, that the whole plot there of, you know, getting

44:58

George McFly to ask out, you know, Lorraine was all really, really a true look at Christian sanctification.

45:09

Can't make this stuff up. Happened like I thought it was going to happen. And our spirit and our flesh are at war because making ourselves vulnerable is like a two -edged sword sometimes.

45:20

I mean, we love it and we hate it, don't we? We love the benefit of what it brings in our life, opening up our life and opening up ourselves, but we also don't like it at the same time.

45:31

We love it when other people are open, but when it comes to our turn, we kind of shut down and retreat sometimes, don't we?

45:39

And it doesn't help that we have a culture that is screaming at us, that is saying, to protect yourself, you have to hide.

45:46

Protect yourself, hide your flaws, hide your insecurities, don't trust anybody, figure it out yourself.

45:52

When it gets hard, you might as well quit. I have no idea what this is. This is not biblical

45:59

Christianity. I'm learning nothing about Jesus, and this is not Christian sanctification.

46:05

This is not holiness or mortifying the sinful flesh. I don't know what this is. I think he's like leading group therapy there.

46:13

I mean, we see it played out on social media. We play it safe on social media.

46:19

We cover that picture up with a filter. We post all the wins, the best family photo, all the victories, all the highlights of our life, what's good going on in our life, but behind the scenes, sometimes there's some real stuff that's going on.

46:36

Technology is awesome. By real stuff, do you mean sin that needs to be repented of?

46:43

Technology is incredible. We are more connected as human beings than ever before because of technology, but there are so many people that are still desperate for connection in their life.

46:59

Technology is incredible, and we find ourselves paralyzed sometimes in life because we're pretending to be something that we're not, and we're pretending that everything is okay when sometimes there's a necessary ingredient to having

47:13

God's best for our life. What? Necessary ingredient for having God's best?

47:18

What are you talking about? And it's the willingness to take a risk and open up your life and get vulnerable.

47:24

If you want God's... Which text says this? Let me back this up. So apparently now you can have God's best by being willing to take risks and allowing yourself to be vulnerable.

47:35

...willingness to take a risk and open up your life and get vulnerable. If you want God's best, it will require some risk.

47:42

If you want God's best for your relationships, it's going to require some risk. If you want

47:47

God's best for your relationship with Him, He's going to call you to step out and open your life. It will require some risk.

47:54

I've had so many... Yeah, I've kind of gone as far as I can.

48:01

I can't take it anymore. I just... Wow! This has nothing to do with Mark 5.

48:06

We learned nothing about Jesus, and now it's all about taking risk.

48:12

Clearly, that sermon had way too much MSG in it. MSG! Ow! My stomach lining!

48:20

And not enough Jesus. And what a complete hot mess.

48:27

And so sadly there, the people at the Champion Center, which is normal for them, did not hear

48:34

God's Word rightly taught at all. Not even close. They were fed basically a mess of rancid beans and group psychotherapy.

48:46

They learned nothing about Christ, His wonderful grace, His mercy, this beautiful text. I mean,

48:52

Mark 5 is amazing. And worse, I mean, they learned nothing about the true conflict that exists between our sinful flesh and the

49:00

Spirit, and what the list is of the things that you can look at and say, these are the desires of the sinful flesh.

49:08

These are sinful, and yet the fruit of the Spirit being love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, self -control, none of that was even brought forward at all.

49:17

Instead, this new thing, the importance of being a risk taker, which the

49:23

Bible teaches nowhere at all. So if you found this helpful, and I hope you did, all the information on how you can share the video is down below in the description and all that kind of stuff.

49:37

And I need to remind you that Fighting for the Faith, we are supported by our viewers and the listeners to our podcast.

49:43

Now I need to say this, YouTube now is systematically demonetizing our videos, which means that we are losing one of our major revenue streams.

49:53

So that being the case, if you don't already support us, and by support us, I would recommend joining our crew.

49:59

It's a great way to support us. All the information on how you can join our crew and contribute to us on a monthly basis is down below.

50:08

The link's on how to get to our website so that you can join our crew. That would be very helpful, because like I've said,

50:15

YouTube now is systematically demonetizing practically every one of the videos that we post, which seems to be par for their course.

50:23

So just want to let you know that. And let me thank you, though, for your support, because we truly honestly cannot do what we are doing here without it.

50:31

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.