Speaker 1: All right, welcome to the podcast. Got my buddy Marshall
Speaker 1: repeat guests over and over. Yeah, and every once in
Speaker 1: a while Marshall's one of our pastors at a Mayas
Speaker 1: and Georgetown and everyone saw people that hear this podcast
Speaker 1: actually show up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been cool to meet some of those people
Speaker 2: and have conversations with what the Lord's doing in their life.
Speaker 2: It's been really encouraging.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is. It really is. And so sometimes people
Speaker 1: will going to visit in laws or whatever they're doing
Speaker 1: that they kind of make a little effort on a
Speaker 1: Sunday to come through and see it at a mais.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's always a good feeling.
Speaker 2: Yeah, especially after service when they say they were encouraged
Speaker 2: by it all and then it wasn't weird or anything.
Speaker 2: It's always helpful. Yeah. Yeah, it's been really cool hearing
Speaker 2: those stories though.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So if you're one of those people that have
Speaker 1: done that, just know that it encourages me. There were
Speaker 1: actually there was a couple last Sunday. I'm assuming you
Speaker 1: spoke with them.
Speaker 2: Oh I didn't. Another member told me about it, but
Speaker 2: I didn't get a chance to talk to them.
Speaker 1: So that member that you're talking about she was like, hey,
Speaker 1: don't I don't want to bother you. But these people
Speaker 1: came and they heard the podcast, and I was like,
Speaker 1: that's never bothered me. Yeah, I'll wait all day just
Speaker 1: to hear that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So to those people that told you, hey, I hope
Speaker 1: it's not weird, man, it's it's it's really encouraging.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, especially when people were coming. So we
Speaker 2: had a couple weeks ago some family members that flew
Speaker 2: into San Antonio actually to business and family and drove
Speaker 2: up just come check out the church.
Speaker 1: It's a long drive.
Speaker 2: It is a long drive, but they had friends in Georgetown,
Speaker 2: so they got to hang out with some friends too.
Speaker 2: But it was just an encouraging to get to meet
Speaker 2: them and hear a little bit about their story and
Speaker 2: encourage them on their way.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so I think that that kind of we're
Speaker 1: going to get into the questions and that's what we
Speaker 1: do here. If you have a question, email me podcast
Speaker 1: at grangersmith dot com. But before we get into our
Speaker 1: first question, I think that kind of brings up a
Speaker 1: good point that if people are traveling to Amais said
Speaker 1: they hear us on here, they want to come to Georgetown.
Speaker 1: That's great, But what we really what's even more encouraging,
Speaker 1: is that they find a good church in their own hometown,
Speaker 1: their own city. And I'm assuming most people, most people
Speaker 1: that would listen to this podcast and call themselves a Christian,
Speaker 1: have something that they consider to be a home church
Speaker 1: or a local church, or the church that they go
Speaker 1: to on Easter or Christmas at least. So let's talk
Speaker 1: about what makes a good church. And if someone is listening,
Speaker 1: thing perhaps in thinking I'm not quite sure if my
Speaker 1: church is good or not, or I would like to
Speaker 1: look for a church, but I don't really know where
Speaker 1: to start. I don't know what to look for, what
Speaker 1: to look for. I think it would be helpful if
Speaker 1: you and I got on this podcast and over several
Speaker 1: episodes we answer questions like we normally do, and we
Speaker 1: don't have to be consistent about it. We could just
Speaker 1: lay it out of the next six months or whatever.
Speaker 1: But every once in a while when you come in,
Speaker 1: we'll give a small aspect about what to look for
Speaker 1: in a good church, or also in the same way
Speaker 1: to how to identify a bad church. There's nuance to
Speaker 1: all of this, and there would be things that would
Speaker 1: instantly identify a church that you should leave immediately. There
Speaker 1: would be those things, and we can get into those things.
Speaker 1: But here's something I wanted to bring up because in
Speaker 1: all of my travels, as I go and speak at
Speaker 1: some of these churches, things that I see there is
Speaker 1: a there is one nuance that I have a lot,
Speaker 1: a lot of close friends do that I personally am
Speaker 1: am convicted against doing, and that is having multiple services
Speaker 1: on a Sunday. Multiple Let me let me refrain, rephrase that,
Speaker 1: multiple identical services, meaning you're you're repeating the same exact
Speaker 1: service two, three, four, five, even six times on a Sunday.
Speaker 1: And I know that a lot of people listening right
Speaker 1: now attend a church that does that, and that's just
Speaker 1: because of this year number of churches that do it.
Speaker 1: I've attended a church like that. I'm sure you have.
Speaker 1: I've I've spoken to many of those, and I know
Speaker 1: that you've probably spoken at some of those church as well.
Speaker 1: So what could we say to people that are considering
Speaker 1: a church, or or looking at their own church and
Speaker 1: wondering what makes a healthy church and they're in a
Speaker 1: church that has multiple services? Where do we start with that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, first we start with it's not a gospel issue.
Speaker 2: So it's not one of those things that if your
Speaker 2: if your church has the church you go to has
Speaker 2: multiple services, you should leave today. Don't go back, but
Speaker 2: look back. That's right question you need to ask.
Speaker 1: That's why I said that there are things that you
Speaker 1: would identify and go we need to leave right away,
Speaker 1: and this is not one.
Speaker 2: Of them, right, But it is something to think through,
Speaker 2: but something to think through. So really you can think
Speaker 2: about it in multiple ways. Is so a minute ago
Speaker 2: you said identical services. So I'll hit on the ones
Speaker 2: that have different services first because I think it's a
Speaker 2: little bit easier to talk about if the if a
Speaker 2: church has multiple services where the services look different. The
Speaker 2: sermons might be the same, but you might have a
Speaker 2: different style of music. You might have a certain type
Speaker 2: of dress, a tire is appropriate for this service, and
Speaker 2: then a certain dress attires appropriate for this service, and
Speaker 2: don't ever mix those up. The danger there is you're
Speaker 2: feeding into consumerism. So church now becomes what do you
Speaker 2: want out of church and what fits you most, and
Speaker 2: not what is the Bible? Say churches, because it's really
Speaker 2: at the core with this question is is what is
Speaker 2: the church? Because that will dictate how you think through services,
Speaker 2: how you think through preaching, how you think through your
Speaker 2: responsibility as a church member. All those things play into
Speaker 2: whether or not multiple services is good and helpful. Doesn't
Speaker 2: mean they're evil, but again things you want to think through,
Speaker 2: and so I would discourage any church from doing multiple
Speaker 2: services where they have different versions. Most common I think
Speaker 2: is you have a service that's traditional and then you
Speaker 2: have a service that's contemporary. Again, you're you're dividing the
Speaker 2: church based on preferences at that point, Well, this group
Speaker 2: over here prefers this type of music, prefers this kind
Speaker 2: of feel in the service. This group prefers this type
Speaker 2: of feel and this type of look and this type
Speaker 2: of music. So you're really pushing in on people. Your
Speaker 2: preferences are what matter most here, not what the Bible
Speaker 2: says we should be doing together. Because if you look
Speaker 2: in scripture, specifically the New Testament, every time it's talking
Speaker 2: about the church is talking about this gathering of people together.
Speaker 2: There's no differentiation of well, this group means at this
Speaker 2: time to do this. This group at this time means
Speaker 2: to do this, and that mean the word itself, right,
Speaker 2: ecclesia clesia means assembly. So there's this understanding that these
Speaker 2: groups of people are meeting together, assembling together to worship
Speaker 2: the Lord. And so you want to have this understanding
Speaker 2: of Sunday service is not about me going there for myself.
Speaker 2: Me attending Sunday service, yes, benefits me spiritually. I'm getting
Speaker 2: fed spirit by the word. I'm communing with my other
Speaker 2: brothers and sisters in Christ. But also me gathering on
Speaker 2: Sunday is for the benefit of brothers and sisters in Christ.
Speaker 2: So therefore I need to know my brothers and sisters
Speaker 2: in Christ that I've covenanted with through membership. And so
Speaker 2: this is why membership plays role in it. Because if
Speaker 2: I think, if my thought is well, membership just means
Speaker 2: that I'm connected to this church somehow, then it doesn't
Speaker 2: really matter how many services the church has, because I
Speaker 2: have no responsibility. So what is the responsibility of the members?
Speaker 2: Why be a member of a church? And we would
Speaker 2: argue you're a member of a church because you are
Speaker 2: agreeing with other people, you're covenanting with them. I want
Speaker 2: to be held accountable by you, and I want to
Speaker 2: hold you accountable to your walking with Christ. And so
Speaker 2: that's the mutual agreement. We are making with one another.
Speaker 2: I need to know you. And if You're going to
Speaker 2: a ten thirty service and I'm going to a nine
Speaker 2: am service and we never worshiped together, then it's going
Speaker 2: to be really hard to do that. I remember in
Speaker 2: college I went to a church that had three services
Speaker 2: on Sunday morning, two on Sunday night, and one on
Speaker 2: Saturday night, and eventually had two on Saturday night. And
Speaker 2: I would meet people out in the city and find
Speaker 2: out they were members of the same church of me,
Speaker 2: and I'd never seen them, and I was going there
Speaker 2: for at that point a year and a half, and
Speaker 2: so it was just insane to me that I was
Speaker 2: meeting person after personally like, oh, yeah, I'm a member
Speaker 2: of that church too, and I'm thinking, I've literally never
Speaker 2: even seen you before, not that I just don't know
Speaker 2: your name or I don't know how long you've been
Speaker 2: I just I literally have never seen you, and we
Speaker 2: claim to be members of the same church. Like that.
Speaker 2: That's a problem, I think because of what Scripture calls
Speaker 2: us to do as members of churches.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the different kinds of multiple services.
Speaker 1: And I think you hit on two of them. One
Speaker 1: of them is the identical services. You're just recreating the
Speaker 1: same exact thing with the same worship songs, the same room,
Speaker 1: the same building, the same pastor the same message. You're
Speaker 1: just replicating it over and over, and we would call
Speaker 1: that wrong for the reasons you just named. There are
Speaker 1: churches I go and speak at and I will tell
Speaker 1: them this. So this is not like I'm this not
Speaker 1: a secret that I'm just revealing on the podcast. I
Speaker 1: will tell the pastors when I go, and I don't
Speaker 1: give them like a fierce rebuke. I just say, would
Speaker 1: you at home, tell your family that we're going to
Speaker 1: split the family and some of the family's going to
Speaker 1: eat at six o'clock and some of the family's going
Speaker 1: to eat at six forty five, and we're going to
Speaker 1: make the same meal. Now everyone would say no, that's
Speaker 1: that would be weird. So that would be the identical services.
Speaker 1: And then the different service is that are modern. Some
Speaker 1: people call it contemporary, some people call it the other
Speaker 1: one traditional or classic. I've heard the name classic. So
Speaker 1: that's the same thing that's splitting the different styles of people.
Speaker 1: As the grandparents eat at six o'clock and then the
Speaker 1: kids eat at six forty five, it does the same thing.
Speaker 1: And really what that is that's legitimately two churches. It's
Speaker 1: two churches. But here's a nuance when I think multiple
Speaker 1: services is okay, and it's when you have a Sunday
Speaker 1: evening that's the same people that came Sunday morning, you're
Speaker 1: coming Sunday evening and it's a different message, a different style.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's more of a prayer night. Maybe you have
Speaker 1: a shorter sermon on something else, an opportunity for different
Speaker 1: people to engage in different ways, different songs, but it's
Speaker 1: the same people. It's the same family. That means the
Speaker 1: family had breakfast together. Now the family's having dinner together.
Speaker 1: But it's the same family in the same room. So
Speaker 1: these are things that I think that that's a way
Speaker 1: that you could have multiple services and it's okay. So
Speaker 1: don't hear me in that way, but tell me about
Speaker 1: why if you have a church that is that maybe
Speaker 1: we should go back, because people are already thinking, well,
Speaker 1: our church is its just busting at the seams. There's
Speaker 1: no there's no more room, there's no other way to
Speaker 1: do this but have three services and we might have
Speaker 1: to move to four. But there's there's an easy solution
Speaker 1: to this, and I shouldn't say an easy solution, but
Speaker 1: there is a practical solution to this. There's a biblical
Speaker 1: solution to this, and so let's talk about that.
Speaker 2: A little bit. Yeah, so I think you're talking about
Speaker 2: church planting, yes, right, like, because that I get the argument.
Speaker 2: You know, there's just a time that we're running out
Speaker 2: of seats. What are we going to do? I mean,
Speaker 2: in some sense we're kind of facing that problem right
Speaker 2: now our church of what are we going to do
Speaker 2: because it's getting harder to have as many people in
Speaker 2: the room. So I'll preface this by saying, also my
Speaker 2: personal conviction on it is, while I'm convictionally against multiple services,
Speaker 2: there could be a season where a church needs to
Speaker 2: go to multiple services in order to buy time for
Speaker 2: something else. And by season I means something short, you know,
Speaker 2: six to twelve months. I have a buddy right now
Speaker 2: who's at their church. They literally they had put every
Speaker 2: single chair they could fit in their meeting space in there,
Speaker 2: and then there was some standing room only in the back.
Speaker 2: They have gone to two services with a time limit
Speaker 2: of eight months on it. So they're giving themselves eight
Speaker 2: months to either find a new space or figure out
Speaker 2: a way to add to their current building. But eight
Speaker 2: months they're stopping it and potentially we'll plant a church
Speaker 2: out of it if they can't figure out the space.
Speaker 1: So before we go to church planning or finding a
Speaker 1: new building, let me add on to that as well,
Speaker 1: because I was going to go here too. But Chad,
Speaker 1: who Chad's on this podcast multiple times, he was sent
Speaker 1: out and took a senior pastor role in Montana. They
Speaker 1: had three services, So I'm going to preach for him
Speaker 1: in October and it's two on Sunday. So we all
Speaker 1: have Chad this podcast. We love Chad so and that's
Speaker 1: also what I'm trying to say too, is that this
Speaker 1: is we're not trying to speak out against any of
Speaker 1: our friends. We're just saying for people that are looking
Speaker 1: for a church, what could be encouraging to you. Chad
Speaker 1: came in and immediately he said, I'm going to work
Speaker 1: towards getting rid of the Saturday night service first. So
Speaker 1: it took one step at a time as he took
Speaker 1: over a very old church that's been doing things for
Speaker 1: a lot of years the same way. First, his first
Speaker 1: really goal was I'm going to get rid of the
Speaker 1: Saturday service and move us to Sunday. Once we get
Speaker 1: just to Sunday, I'm going to try to get us
Speaker 1: to one service. But that's something he's working toward and
Speaker 1: that's the goal. So that's that's one nuance when like,
Speaker 1: similar to what you said.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and to that point, most of the churches that
Speaker 2: I've engaged with that have multiple services, let's say they
Speaker 2: have three, they really could do with just two.
Speaker 1: Yes, right, I said.
Speaker 2: So some of the motive behind it too is well,
Speaker 2: if we have extra space, meaning another service where there's
Speaker 2: more seats, we can we can still grow faster, or
Speaker 2: we have room for growth, you could say that. But
Speaker 2: to back to the point of church planting, that's the
Speaker 2: normal pattern of when the church gets too big. Now
Speaker 2: that that's not to say a church can't get us
Speaker 2: a bigger space, because so when we talk about this
Speaker 2: in our membership process, when people are joining the church,
Speaker 2: they see the room's getting pretty packed. What's y'all's plan.
Speaker 2: So this is where we get to talk about how
Speaker 2: we don't plan to have multiple services. That's we're trying
Speaker 2: to prevent that, but that we could potentially add onto
Speaker 2: the building or get a different building or something like that.
Speaker 2: And so the next follow up question is always, well,
Speaker 2: how big is too big? When do you cut it
Speaker 2: off and say we're not growing this space anymore, We're
Speaker 2: we're straight planting. And I think that question is answered
Speaker 2: differently based on philosophies and personalities. So for me or
Speaker 2: for us as elders of our church, too big would
Speaker 2: be when we can't act adequately care for the members
Speaker 2: that the Lord has put underneath us, that is entrusted
Speaker 2: to us, because you know Hebrews thirteen, we have to
Speaker 2: give an account for every soul that has covenanted at
Speaker 2: that church.
Speaker 1: And so, which I think is a different talk too.
Speaker 1: I think we could do an entire podcast on just
Speaker 1: that subject as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so because of texts like that, and then
Speaker 2: even Acts twenty where Paul's writing to the Ephesian elders
Speaker 2: about how they're supposed to care for all the flock,
Speaker 2: all of the flock among them, he's using language of
Speaker 2: your members, know you, you know your members, and you're
Speaker 2: caring for each of them. And so for us, too
Speaker 2: big would be when we as elders go, there's no
Speaker 2: way we can care for all these people. There's no
Speaker 2: way for us to know them. They don't know us,
Speaker 2: and there's just no way we can adequately adequately care
Speaker 2: for their soul, of which we have to give an
Speaker 2: account to the Lord for we're too big. We're getting
Speaker 2: too big, So let's plant people out. And planting is
Speaker 2: hard man, not even logistically. I mean, we plant it
Speaker 2: out of the church we were in. But it's hard
Speaker 2: because the way we understand church planting is it's not
Speaker 2: just sending out two guys and saying, hey, we bless
Speaker 2: you in your church planting process. Hope it goes well.
Speaker 2: Let us know if you need any advice or anything.
Speaker 2: Praise the Lord. Look, we've planted a church. We sent
Speaker 2: these two guys out. That could be done. That's not
Speaker 2: sinful to do it that way. But what we would
Speaker 2: love is to be able to send a couple elders
Speaker 2: out with thirty to sixty people at least and send
Speaker 2: money with them and help them find a place and
Speaker 2: send you know, speakers or MIC's, whatever we can to
Speaker 2: encourage them and do whatever we could to show we
Speaker 2: really want this thing to succeed if the Lord wills,
Speaker 2: and so that means you're giving up a lot of
Speaker 2: good members you're giving up money, you're you're you're taking
Speaker 2: a hit membership wise. But the church and the leadership
Speaker 2: have to be okay with that because it's not about
Speaker 2: building our name. So I mean, you say the church
Speaker 2: name on here. I don't really care if people know
Speaker 2: who our church is. As long as we are doing
Speaker 2: faithful gospel work where the gospel is spreading and we
Speaker 2: are doing Kingdom advancement work. That's what I care about.
Speaker 2: And so if if and I've heard the argument before,
Speaker 2: what if people just like the preaching here, and so
Speaker 2: if you plant something out like they're really kind of
Speaker 2: sacrificing your preaching, I think that's I think that's a
Speaker 2: bad thing. I think that's a bad argue. You're building
Speaker 2: it around potentially one man in his speaking ability. What
Speaker 2: happens when he retires, What happens if he dies in
Speaker 2: a plane accident or car crash or God forbid, he
Speaker 2: as a moral failing has to get out of ministry.
Speaker 2: Now the church is what do we do? We've built
Speaker 2: around this guy, And so there's other stuff you can
Speaker 2: do to kind of help the congregation not feel that
Speaker 2: way about a specific things that we've tried to put
Speaker 2: in place, So it's not built around me. But if
Speaker 2: the idea going in is we want to plant other
Speaker 2: churches because we know the Lord will grow stuff. We
Speaker 2: grow churches. That's what the Lord does. And it's not
Speaker 2: about making our name big. It's not about being the
Speaker 2: biggest church in town. We want to send people out
Speaker 2: to the communities in which they live. And so if
Speaker 2: people are driving forty five minutes to come to our
Speaker 2: church regularly, that's not like a win for us. It's
Speaker 2: not like wow, look at using people are willing to
Speaker 2: drive forty five minutes to come to us. Our goals
Speaker 2: to plant a church in that area so they can
Speaker 2: be gathering in their community, worshiping together and serving their
Speaker 2: community in tangible needs and with the Gospel and not
Speaker 2: having to drive forty five minutes to meet on a
Speaker 2: Sunday morning with with brothers and sisters in Christ. And
Speaker 2: so we want to equip people to go out and
Speaker 2: do that. So we see in Scripture, I mean, you
Speaker 2: see Paul just encouraging the planting of churches. Paul tells
Speaker 2: Titus this and Crete says, you know what we left,
Speaker 2: what was left disorganized? Organize it. And he's taught, he's
Speaker 2: telling him start churches. He's not telling him to start
Speaker 2: a single church. He's saying start churches and get elders
Speaker 2: in those churches and help help those churches get started
Speaker 2: in a place where there are no churches. And so
Speaker 2: that's something we want to see as churches giving of
Speaker 2: themselves for Kingdom advancement, not building themselves up. And so
Speaker 2: it does tie back to things like you know, you
Speaker 2: asked how as if I'm thinking about finding a church,
Speaker 2: what are some things that I want in a church.
Speaker 2: You want a church where you have access to your pastors.
Speaker 2: It's a super discouraging thing to me when people come
Speaker 2: to our church and visit and it's just a shock
Speaker 2: to them that they have the ability to talk to
Speaker 2: me after service because I'm standing in the in the
Speaker 2: four year and the at room, whatever you want to
Speaker 2: call it, after service just talking to people. They're like,
Speaker 2: I've been a member at my church for seven eight
Speaker 2: years and I've not once had a conversation with our pastor.
Speaker 2: And that's not an attack against that guy. I think
Speaker 2: there's some situations where the church just get so big
Speaker 2: it's really hard to do that.
Speaker 1: And not only meeting in the in the four year
Speaker 1: after but coming to you and saying I need to
Speaker 1: speak with the pastor this week.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And so all of our pastors, every member
Speaker 2: has every pastor's contact info. If somebody reaches out for
Speaker 2: counseling or for a meeting with one of the pastors,
Speaker 2: we do whatever we can to make that meeting happen
Speaker 2: within about a week. Most of the time it's within
Speaker 2: a couple days, depending on how urgent it is. But
Speaker 2: there is the sense again Paul writing in Acts twenty
Speaker 2: to the Ephesian elders and then Hebrews thirteen of you
Speaker 2: need to know the sheep among you. And so if
Speaker 2: you're at a place where you're looking at churches and
Speaker 2: you get somewhere and it's like, man, there's no way
Speaker 2: I'll ever know these pastors, and then they'll never really
Speaker 2: know me. I think that's discouraging and should be concerning.
Speaker 1: It would be it's just with the analogy of sheep
Speaker 1: and the pasture, which a pastor literally means shepherd. So
Speaker 1: to think of a pasture with too many sheep and
Speaker 1: not enough shepherds, what would you do in that situation?
Speaker 1: You would either split the pastures and send sheep out,
Speaker 1: or you would get more shepherds into the current pasture
Speaker 1: so that every sheep is accounted for. So if one's lost,
Speaker 1: you know it. If one is sick, you know it.
Speaker 1: If one needs fed, you know it. If one gets
Speaker 1: out of the fence, you know it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you want to know how they're doing spiritually.
Speaker 2: You want to know how their souls are. That's what
Speaker 2: you're giving an account to the Lord for as elders
Speaker 2: as pastors is and I'm using elder and pastor interchangeably there,
Speaker 2: but that's what you're doing as a pastor is you
Speaker 2: are caring for the souls of the people that you're over.
Speaker 2: So it's not even usually need to be in a
Speaker 2: place where the elder knows your name. You need to
Speaker 2: be in a place where the elder knows you, where
Speaker 2: your elders, your pastors know you. That doesn't mean every
Speaker 2: pastor has to be your best friend or has to
Speaker 2: be best friends with every member, but it would be
Speaker 2: extremely discouraging if somebody came up to me and I said, hey,
Speaker 2: it's great to see. Is this your first time here
Speaker 2: and they said, and they would say, I've actually been
Speaker 2: a member for about eight months now. That would be
Speaker 2: incredibly discouraging. To me, I would be failing at my
Speaker 2: job as a pastor if that ever happened.
Speaker 1: So, if you're in a church right now with a
Speaker 1: video screen, watching a pastor on a video screen, I
Speaker 1: think this conversation kind of speaks for itself though, that
Speaker 1: would be extremely discouraging. Yeah, and probably dangerous for you
Speaker 1: and your family.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So for me, this whole discussion is less about
Speaker 2: multiple services and more about do you understand what the
Speaker 2: church is? Do you understand membership, do you understand what
Speaker 2: the role of a pastor is, and do you understand
Speaker 2: what preaching is? So Martin Lloyd Jones, dead guy, amazing preacher.
Speaker 1: He's in the hallway on the way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's got a picture of walking up the hallway.
Speaker 2: He would talk about something what he called the preaching moment. Now,
Speaker 2: his argument for that was why sermons shouldn't be recorded
Speaker 2: or they shouldn't be written down and saved. But I
Speaker 2: think what he is arguing there has implications for this
Speaker 2: because his point in the preaching moment is the Lord
Speaker 2: is doing something in that moment of preaching between the
Speaker 2: preacher and the congregation to whom he's preaching, And so
Speaker 2: there is something he's not just he's not written a
Speaker 2: sermon and going all right, I'm just going to deliver
Speaker 2: this now, and whoever hears it hears it. He's the
Speaker 2: Lord is using that specific pastor, over his specific congregation
Speaker 2: to feed their souls with this word that the Lord
Speaker 2: has equipped him with from the Bible. And so there's
Speaker 2: something happening in that preaching moment. And so if you say, well,
Speaker 2: we got four services, now you have four different preaching moments,
Speaker 2: because that guy will not deliver the sermon the exact
Speaker 2: same way every single time, and if he is, it's
Speaker 2: more of a performance at that point, right, And so
Speaker 2: he's doing something in there, and that doesn't necessarily mean
Speaker 2: it's wrong. The Lord can use different can use each
Speaker 2: four of those to speak to the people listening. The
Speaker 2: problem with that is is now you're getting a different
Speaker 2: message than the person at the ten thirty service. You're
Speaker 2: getting a different message in the person at the twelve
Speaker 2: o'clock service. Yes, you might be getting the same content,
Speaker 2: but the message is being communicated differently. And you know,
Speaker 2: with the view of preaching not being a performance, I
Speaker 2: would discourage people. We've talked about this a little bit
Speaker 2: you know, when you've gone place and had to preach
Speaker 2: it multiple services. I think we've talked about this discouraging
Speaker 2: people from editing the sermon in between services, because what
Speaker 2: you're trying to do at that point is you're trying
Speaker 2: to perfect the sermon.
Speaker 1: That's definitely happened with me.
Speaker 2: This didn't work, So I'm gonna pull that out or
Speaker 2: oh I thought about this, I'm going to add it in.
Speaker 2: At that point, one, you're potentially short changing people who
Speaker 2: decided to come to the earlier services, although they're getting
Speaker 2: probably the most authentic sermon for the day. But at
Speaker 2: the same time, the preacher at that point, the pastor
Speaker 2: at that point is now trying to perfect some sort
Speaker 2: of message to the people. And I don't think that's
Speaker 2: how preaching works. You're not trying to perfect a message.
Speaker 2: You're preaching. You're proclaiming a declarative word to God's people
Speaker 2: that He has entrusted under your care.
Speaker 1: If you want to get a hold of me, go
Speaker 1: to cameo dot com slash Granger Smith quick way for
Speaker 1: me to send you a video message, an update, happy birthday, congratulations,
Speaker 1: send it to someone else, whatever it might be. I
Speaker 1: just pull out my phone and record something, record a
Speaker 1: video for whatever you want me to say. Again, that's
Speaker 1: cameo dot com slash Grangersmith. Okay, So talking about churches
Speaker 1: with multiple services, and we kind of we went down
Speaker 1: the aspect of splitting the family. You wouldn't split a
Speaker 1: family at home. The pastor not being able to care
Speaker 1: for all the sheep, the shepherd not being able to
Speaker 1: follow all the sheep in the pasture, the preacher changing
Speaker 1: potentially some of the message and short changing one of
Speaker 1: the congregations. I mentioned the video message. I want to
Speaker 1: make sure that you understand I'm not talking about necessarily
Speaker 1: the projected image of the pastor. I'm talking about if
Speaker 1: he's not even there and they're piping in the message
Speaker 1: on a video, that would be extremely dangerous considering everything
Speaker 1: we've talked about. And then I want to say that
Speaker 1: the traditional versus modern and contemporary, I'm extremely convicted against that,
Speaker 1: and I believe that those would be multiple churches. You
Speaker 1: might as well just call it that because most likely
Speaker 1: the people that go to the contemporary service don't even
Speaker 1: know the people in the traditional and so in that aspect,
Speaker 1: they're not part of a family at all. I don't
Speaker 1: even know each other's name, and so I think that's
Speaker 1: dangerous in multiple ways. I think we talked about a
Speaker 1: little bit about the nuance of how it could work
Speaker 1: if a pastor had a vision moving forward, having traditional
Speaker 1: and contemporary. There's no vision to that. That's just saying, hey,
Speaker 1: we want to make our church as big as possible.
Speaker 1: We want to keep as many people happy as we
Speaker 1: possibly can, because these people want the church oregon or
Speaker 1: the piano, and these people want the drums, and we
Speaker 1: want to keep them both happy, and we want young
Speaker 1: people to keep coming. So we're going to keep both.
Speaker 1: And that's a greedy mentality. That's a meme mentality based
Speaker 1: on me and not God's design. And it's really communicating
Speaker 1: a message that multiplying your services is more important than
Speaker 1: multiplying churches, and multiplying churches is biblical and multiplying services
Speaker 1: is not. So you're communicating in some way to your
Speaker 1: people that growing your own campus and growing your own
Speaker 1: name is more important than what the Bible says the
Speaker 1: church really is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'll add to one of the dangers behind
Speaker 2: it is multiple services will lead to bigger churches. Bigger
Speaker 2: churches are not evil in an other stuff. Now, the
Speaker 2: danger with it is the bigger the church gets, the
Speaker 2: greater potential there is for the church to run more
Speaker 2: like a business instead of being run the way Scripture
Speaker 2: commands it to. So if you have five thousand members,
Speaker 2: it's really hard to do some of the things scripture
Speaker 2: caused the church to do. That's not saying it's impossible.
Speaker 2: I think it could be done.
Speaker 1: Were you on the podcast where we were talking about, well,
Speaker 1: how many can you have? Were we talking about that,
Speaker 1: because I think it came about but we're like, maybe, well,
Speaker 1: if you had a thousand, you're gonna need like fifty elders,
Speaker 1: sixty elders potentially, yeah, or pastors we should say for people, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because again it's a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And also it depends on personality, right, Like some
Speaker 2: guys are like, I have the mental capacity and the
Speaker 2: ability to really know about seventy five people.
Speaker 1: Well we did talk about this, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And some guys will be like, I can know
Speaker 2: three hundred easy. This is my personality. I'm an extrovert,
Speaker 2: I'm always with people. I can know three hundred easily.
Speaker 2: And so if you have this is why plurality of
Speaker 2: elders is helpful because that'll help dictate how you care
Speaker 2: for the congregation. But again that's you want to make
Speaker 2: sure that the pastors know and can care for the
Speaker 2: congregation and their souls. But you want to avoid the
Speaker 2: church being run like a business to where the bigger
Speaker 2: you are, and what I mean by business is the
Speaker 2: bigger you get, the more pressure you will feel to
Speaker 2: be the best at what you're doing, and you'll feel
Speaker 2: the need to hire things like a social media team,
Speaker 2: a digital graphics team, a project management people, office managers, things,
Speaker 2: And these are all things I've heard churches have. So
Speaker 2: it's not like I'm just grabbing these out of nowhere,
Speaker 2: and you really pull from members being able to serve
Speaker 2: the church because it's now become a product a business
Speaker 2: to be the best at what they're doing when and
Speaker 2: that's training people to say this is what a church needs.
Speaker 2: A church needs these things when really scripture's pretty clear
Speaker 2: on what the church needs. That's not to say social
Speaker 2: media is bad for our church has an Instagram page.
Speaker 2: We do it. I mean it's not done amazing, but
Speaker 2: it's done. We put our sermons online, we have a website.
Speaker 2: So it's not those things are evil, but you start
Speaker 2: running the church in a way that's really hard for
Speaker 2: the congregation have any onus and responsibility within the church,
Speaker 2: because as you've you delegated it out to people you're
Speaker 2: gonna pay to take care of it.
Speaker 1: So yeah, So people listening right now, like I said,
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people listening probably attend to
Speaker 1: church with multiple services. I would like you, guys, do
Speaker 1: me a favor and when I post this, go to
Speaker 1: the YouTube version. So whatever version you're listening to right now,
Speaker 1: go to the YouTube version and comment on this video
Speaker 1: and tell me something that either Marshall and I missed
Speaker 1: or didn't explain well enough, or something that needs an elaboration,
Speaker 1: or if you disagree and you want to push back
Speaker 1: on something we said, that will allow us to sit
Speaker 1: down here next time and then go through this episode
Speaker 1: in real time and go look like Sally says that
Speaker 1: she loves her multiple services and here's why, and then
Speaker 1: we could we could just talk about it. What we're
Speaker 1: not doing is we're not accusing any any congregation members
Speaker 1: or church goers that you're wrong for where you are
Speaker 1: right now. We're just literally trying to encourage you to
Speaker 1: be in the best most nourishing, most well fed place
Speaker 1: that you could be with you and your family. That's
Speaker 1: the conversation we're trying to have, and it kind of
Speaker 1: spurs from people coming and either listening to us or
Speaker 1: visiting and going this is a little different. And we'll
Speaker 1: say for the tenth time when I say a maus
Speaker 1: is a little bit different, I'm not saying that we're
Speaker 1: special or that we are better than everyone else.
Speaker 2: I mean we make mistakes.
Speaker 1: We make a lot of this.
Speaker 2: We're still learning, we grow in it.
Speaker 1: But and so I think you would admit, this is
Speaker 1: not about a maus. This conversation is not This is
Speaker 1: about all the people that are in their own hometowns
Speaker 1: listening wherever they're listening to this podcast and thinking about
Speaker 1: how could I serve my family best in a church body.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And because it's not about a mais, we'll have
Speaker 2: people visit and they'll say, Oh, I say, do you
Speaker 2: live in Georgetown? Well, no, we live over here. Oh
Speaker 2: have you checked out this church? Yes, We'll try to
Speaker 2: encourage them at least check out this other church before
Speaker 2: you make the commitment to come here. That doesn't mean
Speaker 2: we tell them they're not allowed to join us, but
Speaker 2: we just say, have you checked out these other churches
Speaker 2: that are a little closer to where you live, and
Speaker 2: they're faithful churches where you'll be poured into and cared for.
Speaker 2: But then also we do an extended time of prayer
Speaker 2: in our service every Sunday morning, and we always pray
Speaker 2: for at least one other church in our area. We'll
Speaker 2: pray for one other church in our area, and then
Speaker 2: we pray for another church in the country to encourage people.
Speaker 2: One if you're in our area and you're closer to
Speaker 2: this other church, go there. They're a faithful church that
Speaker 2: you could be attending, some of whom are in Georgetown
Speaker 2: with us five minute drive down the road, and then
Speaker 2: some of them are closer to downtown Austin. But then
Speaker 2: also we've had people where we pray for churches in
Speaker 2: other parts of the country. Amber's done this. We prayed
Speaker 2: for a church up near Dallas, and she said, I
Speaker 2: got a friend or a cousin or somebody, and so
Speaker 2: I recommend to that church and they visited. So that's
Speaker 2: what we're doing when we're praying for these churches to
Speaker 2: help people go, Oh, I know somebody who lives there.
Speaker 2: That must be a church that I should encourage him
Speaker 2: to go check out.
Speaker 1: We could do that if you comment below your city too,
Speaker 1: we could also recommend someone that we would encourage you
Speaker 1: go to in that area if there is one, hopefully
Speaker 1: there is one. I have one more thing. This is
Speaker 1: a little bit of homework for you guys listening. I
Speaker 1: never do this, but I want you to be thinking
Speaker 1: about this question. What is the goal of the church.
Speaker 1: We're not going to answer that. I want you to
Speaker 1: think about it. What is the goal of the church.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you one thing that it's not. The
Speaker 1: goal of the church is not growth. And a lot
Speaker 1: of times and a lot of people I talked to,
Speaker 1: I ask them, what's your goal here? And they say
Speaker 1: to grow? And that is not the goal of a church.
Speaker 1: It's not what the Bible says. Go therefore and grow churches.
Speaker 1: Grow one church and make it really big, and make
Speaker 1: multiple campuses and pipe in all the messages on video.
Speaker 1: It's not the goal. So be thinking. That's the homework.
Speaker 1: What is the goal of church? And see see if
Speaker 1: you could find biblical, something biblical to back that up.
Speaker 1: And then comment blow on the YouTube page and we'll
Speaker 1: look at that. We'll read it next time. Should we
Speaker 1: get to a question or two? We talked a long
Speaker 1: time about that, but I like to and I think
Speaker 1: it's important. Uh. This first question comes from Tyler once again.
Speaker 1: You could email podcast at grangersmith dot com and says,
Speaker 1: good evening. My name is Tyler. I have a question.
Speaker 1: How do I raise my newborn to be a godly man?
Speaker 1: I love my dad, but he is not a godly man.
Speaker 1: I've been trying to figure this out, but I haven't
Speaker 1: any advice. Thanks Tyler, Hey, thanks buddy, thank you, thank
Speaker 1: you for the email. Congratulations on your newborn little boy.
Speaker 1: What a gift, what a blessing. I'll tell you something.
Speaker 1: You almost answered your own question in some form because
Speaker 1: you said, how do I raise this godly man? My
Speaker 1: dad was not a godly man, and so you're you're
Speaker 1: making a connection that the father and how he represents
Speaker 1: an example is important. And so there are a lot
Speaker 1: of factors on what makes a godly man, but one
Speaker 1: of those is you being the example of the godliness
Speaker 1: that he could imitate. And and then the discouraging part
Speaker 1: is you say, but I've been trying to figure this out,
Speaker 1: but I haven't. It's okay, you have a lot of
Speaker 1: you have a lot of time for this newborn. But
Speaker 1: this is something Tyler, you have to figure out this,
Speaker 1: This is something that falls on you. You can't look
Speaker 1: at this newborn and go, Lord, make him godly because
Speaker 1: this is the this is the airplane. Uh, put the
Speaker 1: mask on yourself before you help your kid. This is
Speaker 1: the exact scenario. You have to put the oxygen mask
Speaker 1: on yourself before you put it on your kids. So
Speaker 1: you seek godliness in yourself and then all that and
Speaker 1: that'll be a big factor in him understanding what that means.
Speaker 1: So that this is a this is this is very
Speaker 1: common kind of question. But how would someone seek to
Speaker 1: be a godly man? Because Tyler, now I'm speaking to you,
Speaker 1: not your newborn. What are what are I mean, there's
Speaker 1: a bunch of ways, but what are what are a
Speaker 1: few ways that we could just encourage Tyler with?
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I'm a pastor, so to read your Bible,
Speaker 2: being the word daily. That's good for your own soul,
Speaker 2: but also that's good for your your sons.
Speaker 1: One.
Speaker 2: You know, I love making book recommendations, so I know
Speaker 2: and I know most guys go I don't read. I
Speaker 2: think every guy out there should be reading, so I'll
Speaker 2: always give book recommendations. So one, uh, and this one's
Speaker 2: more almost a pamphlet Thoughts for young Men by J.
Speaker 2: C Ryle, Dead guy, but really good stuff. And then
Speaker 2: Thomas Watson wrote a book called a Godly Man's Picture
Speaker 2: where he just walks through what does a Godly Man look, think,
Speaker 2: and do? So that one's a little bit longer, but
Speaker 2: both really helpful, excellent books. Read those, but also Tyler, yep, Tyler,
Speaker 2: get into a church if you're not already in one,
Speaker 2: and find godly guys in that church who can pour
Speaker 2: into you and speak into your life, because that's what's
Speaker 2: going to give you understanding of how one you could
Speaker 2: be a better godly man, but two your learning from
Speaker 2: them things. You can encourage your son as he grows up,
Speaker 2: and you're able to point to those guys like let's
Speaker 2: say the Lord allows you to be able to stay
Speaker 2: in that same church for an extended period of time,
Speaker 2: and your son, this is nine, ten, eleven, twelve. You're
Speaker 2: able to tell him, Hey, look to so and so,
Speaker 2: look to so and so. These are godly guys. Hopefully
Speaker 2: you're modeling it as well. But you're also able to
Speaker 2: point him to other godly guys in the church who
Speaker 2: can model for him walking with Jesus looks like faithfully,
Speaker 2: and so it's not just on you at that moment,
Speaker 2: but you're encouraging him to look to other guys, especially
Speaker 2: specifically older guys, who who are faithfully living out the
Speaker 2: Christian life and modeling for him and for you what
Speaker 2: that looks like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know. I don't have much to add
Speaker 1: to that, Tyler. The same way that you want to
Speaker 1: model to your newborn, you want you need somebody to
Speaker 1: model to you, to to kind of redefine what you
Speaker 1: mean by godly or holy or mature. I think you
Speaker 1: could wrap that up by saying obedience to Christ. So
Speaker 1: to learn what it means to be obedient to Christ.
Speaker 1: You're going to see this first and foremost in the Bible,
Speaker 1: and then a good, healthy church like we just talked
Speaker 1: about in the whole first section of this podcast, will
Speaker 1: take what that Bible is saying and help apply that
Speaker 1: directly to your life so that you could use what
Speaker 1: you've learned from the Bible and then and walk in it,
Speaker 1: and and then having these these older men to help
Speaker 1: say what's what's going on? What what's your what's your
Speaker 1: routine look like? What are you reading right now in
Speaker 1: the Bible? What's your prayer life like?
Speaker 2: What you what do you?
Speaker 1: What are you praying? What do you need in today?
Speaker 1: What are you? What are your temptations? What kind of
Speaker 1: sin battles are you having right now?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: What we're what are encouraging things that are happened? But
Speaker 1: the things that that are preferably an older man. Really
Speaker 1: it could be anybody, but preferably an older man that says,
Speaker 1: walk where I walked. I'll show you, and I'll show
Speaker 1: you where I messed up, and I'll show you where
Speaker 1: the Lord took me. And it was a good path.
Speaker 1: And so Tyler, would you're going to need a church
Speaker 1: and you're going to need a good Bible.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I love I love so many times how
Speaker 1: a baby is what starts these kind of conversations. It's
Speaker 1: a it's a great turning point in a man's life
Speaker 1: when he goes, you know, I've been kind of off
Speaker 1: the rails. Now I've got this baby. I can't be
Speaker 1: that man anymore. I need to be better. And that's
Speaker 1: a that's a good start.
Speaker 2: And one thing I'll say Tyler. This won't apply much
Speaker 2: as with a newborn, but you need you need to
Speaker 2: impress it, have it impressed on your heart right now,
Speaker 2: so you're prepared when you need to do it. This
Speaker 2: isn't guaranteeing a sign of a godly man, but it
Speaker 2: is one of the markers of a godly man is
Speaker 2: a guy who's willing to admit when he's wrong and
Speaker 2: ask forgiveness from his kids. I've been talking to this
Speaker 2: a lot, to a lot of guys about this recently.
Speaker 2: It's a very humbling thing to go to your six
Speaker 2: year old and ask for forgiveness because you handled the
Speaker 2: situation wrong, or you disciplined out of anger instead of love,
Speaker 2: or you yelled instead of being gracious and patient kind
Speaker 2: with your words. But you're teaching them Dad makes mistakes too,
Speaker 2: and dad needs forgiveness, and in that you're also modeling
Speaker 2: the forgiveness that you have in christ if you're a Christian.
Speaker 2: So it's one of the markers I think every guy
Speaker 2: should should be working on, is the humility to be
Speaker 2: able to ask forgiveness from your kids when you mess up.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 1: I'm just finishing up such a good book that I
Speaker 1: know you've read Marshall, that's when people are big and
Speaker 1: God is small.
Speaker 2: Oh it's a great book.
Speaker 1: It's a great book, and I thought I actually went
Speaker 1: into that book thinking it was going to be more
Speaker 1: about pride and humility, but it's much more than that.
Speaker 1: So yeah, recommend that to anyone when people are big
Speaker 1: and God is small.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Next question comes from Read says hey, mister Smith, my
Speaker 1: name is Read. I hope you're doing well. I'm fifteen,
Speaker 1: I'm a sophomore in high school. I a professed believer
Speaker 1: in my church, and I love showing steers for four ah.
Speaker 1: My question is, when going through hurdles and ruts in
Speaker 1: your faith, how have you kept your faith and built
Speaker 1: your faith even stronger out of the struggle. I know
Speaker 1: Christ is my Lord and savior, my only hope in
Speaker 1: life and death, But if you were ever in a
Speaker 1: spiritual slump, how would you get out of it? Thanks
Speaker 1: free time, read all. I read, So it's going to
Speaker 1: be hard not to answer the same way we just
Speaker 1: answered Tyler. But those those questions are connected, and probably
Speaker 1: the most common question I get is how do you
Speaker 1: build your faith? Or when you're in a slump, how
Speaker 1: do you get out of it. That's actually great for
Speaker 1: that book when people are big and God is small,
Speaker 1: because you know what you know. Another book is, I
Speaker 1: don't know if it's for a fifteen year old maybe
Speaker 1: it depends on you read. But Dark Clouds Deep Mercies
Speaker 1: is is really good at understanding how to, how to pray,
Speaker 1: how to lamit, how to The book talks about how
Speaker 1: to complain to God, how to have a godly complaint
Speaker 1: and what this does. And there's a lot of ways
Speaker 1: to answer your question about how do you build your faith,
Speaker 1: But one thing it does is when you're in the
Speaker 1: struggle of it, you know that God is. God doesn't change.
Speaker 1: God is immovable, but you, emotionally, you're the one changing.
Speaker 1: So when you feel like when you feel like God
Speaker 1: is far away, he's not. It's it's this. It's the
Speaker 1: the false representation of your emotions and your feelings that
Speaker 1: make you feel like He's far away. And so then
Speaker 1: you go back and you remind yourself of the truth
Speaker 1: of who God is. And so you can interchange that
Speaker 1: word faith with trust. So to grow your trust in
Speaker 1: someone in anyone in Marshall. For me to trust marshal more,
Speaker 1: I would need to know him more. Read to I
Speaker 1: don't know you at all, so I can't really say
Speaker 1: I have faith in you, Read, But that's just because I.
Speaker 2: Don't know you.
Speaker 1: But if I learned to know you, my trust would
Speaker 1: grow in you, and then my faith would grow in you.
Speaker 1: And so did you know that God has provided a
Speaker 1: way for us to know Him? And so many times
Speaker 1: I find that this is some a concept that's not
Speaker 1: often thought about because we live in a world that's
Speaker 1: just there's a heightened spirituality where it's like, yeah, I believe.
Speaker 1: You know, Christ is my savior, my hope and life
Speaker 1: and death, and we sing about it, and you know
Speaker 1: we has victory over death and he went to the
Speaker 1: cross for my sins, and you know I love Jesus.
Speaker 1: And yet we're lacking in an understanding, a true understanding
Speaker 1: of who he is as he's revealed himself in sixty
Speaker 1: six books of the Bible, and not just the popular
Speaker 1: pop songs that we sing Christian pop songs we sing
Speaker 1: you sing on Sunday mornings. So read, I want you
Speaker 1: to think about I want you to think about reading
Speaker 1: your Bible. And there's a lot of benefits to that,
Speaker 1: but I want you to think with one focused aim
Speaker 1: of knowing who God is, learning who he is as
Speaker 1: he's revealed himself. And as you begin to know who
Speaker 1: he is and learn who he is, it's amazing how
Speaker 1: all the outside factors that are putting you in a
Speaker 1: spiritual slump or your struggles, and I'm assuming you've had them,
Speaker 1: that's why you asked this question, it's amazing when you
Speaker 1: stop thinking about that and yourself and look to Him
Speaker 1: and what he's done and what he has promised and
Speaker 1: who he is, how your faith starts getting stronger. What
Speaker 1: do you have to say to this? The disciples ask
Speaker 1: Jesus the same question.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't have much to I echo everything Gradeer
Speaker 2: said if being in the word and praying is not
Speaker 2: the issue, because I think that's where I would start,
Speaker 2: right if somebody said that, I feel like God's really
Speaker 2: distant from me. God doesn't go further a closer way
Speaker 2: to his people. He's there. We can feel further away
Speaker 2: because we're not engaging with like we're not reading the Word,
Speaker 2: we're not praying, we're not gathering with his people. But
Speaker 2: let's say that's not there. And part of this is
Speaker 2: I'm going through really difficult times this word. Being in
Speaker 2: the word's helpful because you can remember the promises of God.
Speaker 2: But the promises aren't always positive, meaning hey, I'm with you.
Speaker 2: Some of the promises are and don't forget you're going
Speaker 2: to have to suffer, like there will be suffering in
Speaker 2: the Christian life. And so to the point earlier when
Speaker 2: we're talking about churches, and sometimes there's churches that you
Speaker 2: need to get out of right now. If the church
Speaker 2: you're going to is promising you that you shouldn't have
Speaker 2: to suffer or promising you that you shouldn't be experiencing
Speaker 2: some of these difficulties if you, if you truly had faith,
Speaker 2: that's a church you need to leave quickly, because that's
Speaker 2: not biblical. Jesus himself says that you will have to
Speaker 2: bear your cross, you will have to, you will have to,
Speaker 2: you will suffer for my name. And that's and then
Speaker 2: when we're preaching through Hebrews right now, we just we're
Speaker 2: in the middle of chapter twelve and it says God
Speaker 2: loves us, and we know that because he disciplines us,
Speaker 2: so that there's a promise that he will discipline his children,
Speaker 2: just like a good father will discipline his children. And
Speaker 2: we talked about in the Sermon on Sunday that discipline
Speaker 2: is not just corrective. So it's not like you did
Speaker 2: something wrong, I have to discipline you. It's more like
Speaker 2: a coach who will help equip and train you through
Speaker 2: some hard stuff sometimes. So yeah, sometimes you have to
Speaker 2: you have to go run laps because you fumbled the ball.
Speaker 2: But sometimes you just want run windsprins at the end
Speaker 2: of practice because the coach is trying to build your endurance,
Speaker 2: not because you did anything wrong. And that's what the
Speaker 2: Lord is doing. So there are things that we go
Speaker 2: through in our lives that we've been promised it will
Speaker 2: be difficult at points. James Chapter one talks about this
Speaker 2: rejoice in your sufferings counted all joy, my brothers. When
Speaker 2: you face various trials. It's very odd to say you're
Speaker 2: going to suffer and you need to rejoice in it.
Speaker 2: It's because you recognize that I'm going through this stuff
Speaker 2: because God is sovereign. He's putting it in my life
Speaker 2: to shape and mold me into the image of Jesus.
Speaker 2: And so there is a sense where you know, how
Speaker 2: do I strengthen my faith when things are really rough
Speaker 2: and difficult. There's really not anything you do. To make
Speaker 2: that strength, that faith stronger, you lean in on the
Speaker 2: promises of God, knowing God has promised never to put
Speaker 2: something in my life that he won't get me through.
Speaker 2: God has never promised me an easy life. God has
Speaker 2: never promised me health, wealth and prosperity. He's never promised
Speaker 2: me that. Because Jesus suffered, I don't have to suffer.
Speaker 2: What he has promised is you will face things. I
Speaker 2: will get you through those things, and all of those
Speaker 2: things are for your benefit. So that gives me greater
Speaker 2: faith in God. Knowing I have no clue why I'm
Speaker 2: going through this, I have no clue what the purpose
Speaker 2: of this is, and it hurts. But I also can
Speaker 2: lean on the fact that God has promised he will
Speaker 2: not leave me or forsake me. He will get me
Speaker 2: through this. He has not left me, and he will
Speaker 2: get me out of this rut. And so my faith
Speaker 2: is in Him who has not left me, even though
Speaker 2: my circumstance may not change.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good. I hey read. I had a guy
Speaker 1: come up to me one time at the end of
Speaker 1: one of my talks, and he talked. He pulled me
Speaker 1: aside separately, and he said, man, I just feel like
Speaker 1: my faith is not growing. And I'm reading. You said,
Speaker 1: you said read in the mornings, and that's what I'm doing,
Speaker 1: and I just don't feel like anything's changing. And I said,
Speaker 1: I said, what what do you read on? And he's like,
Speaker 1: wait what. I said, well, do you have a Bible?
Speaker 1: Do you have an iPad phone? He goes my phone.
Speaker 1: I said, you read this morning? He said, yeah, I
Speaker 1: read this morning. I said show me. He's like, right
Speaker 1: right now. I was like, yeah, yeah, show me. So
Speaker 1: he pulls out his phone and I said, show me
Speaker 1: what you read. And he pulls it out and it's
Speaker 1: it was literally one of those apps that sends you
Speaker 1: one verse every morning, and it was you know those
Speaker 1: apps are they're going to send you something about love
Speaker 1: or you know, something to make you feel better, always
Speaker 1: to make you feel better. And I said that, I said, brother,
Speaker 1: that's not what I mean. Reading the Bible. That's that's
Speaker 1: great to have that appen at four o'clock. You're getting
Speaker 1: off work and you read a verse. That's fine, but
Speaker 1: that's not what I mean. That's that you're every morning
Speaker 1: you're getting up and you're eating skittles when you need
Speaker 1: a hearty breakfast, and you're going I don't know why
Speaker 1: I'm still hungry. I eat every morning. What are you eating?
Speaker 1: I'm eating skittles. I'm saying that because my son Lincoln
Speaker 1: ates it was last night, so read. I would go
Speaker 1: to something. Go to the meat, go to the steak.
Speaker 1: Stop eating skittles and go to something like the Book
Speaker 1: of John, the Book of Mark, that's the shortest gospel.
Speaker 1: Go to Mark, I said John too much, or Matthew.
Speaker 1: Go to Mark and start a Mark one and start reading,
Speaker 1: not fast, not too much, don't consume too much. Do
Speaker 1: it at a pace that you could understand, and move
Speaker 1: slowly through the different little perick apes, and pray before
Speaker 1: you read, say Lord, will you show me who you are?
Speaker 1: I don't want my faith to fail me. Will you
Speaker 1: reveal to yourself who you are as you promised to
Speaker 1: do through your word? And read, and then close your
Speaker 1: Bible and think about it throughout the day, and then
Speaker 1: the next morning open your Bible again or your app
Speaker 1: and pick up right where you left off yesterday and
Speaker 1: continue doing that the rest of your life.
Speaker 2: And getting to a church where you have older godly
Speaker 2: guys who can encourage you when you're having those difficult
Speaker 2: times and you feel like your faith isn't strong enough,
Speaker 2: so you.
Speaker 1: Want to come again, and we'll continue as the conversations
Speaker 1: on church.
Speaker 2: Yeah okay, I love talking about church.
Speaker 1: So comment below if you have a question and we
Speaker 1: will return to this see you guys. Thanks for joining
Speaker 1: me on the Granger Smith Podcast. I appreciate all of
Speaker 1: you guys. You could help me out by rating this
Speaker 1: podcast on iTunes. If you're on YouTube, subscribe to this channel,
Speaker 1: hit that little like button and notification spell so that
Speaker 1: you never miss anytime I upload a video.
Speaker 2: Yii