Podcasts about 19we

John 17:1-19We walk slowly through John 17 and let the Greek sharpen what Jesus is praying for as he speaks about glory, authority, eternal life, and unity. We connect word studies like doxa, exousia, parousia, logos, cosmos, and hagiadzo to Quaker concerns about the presence of Christ, the true church, and being sent into the world without being shaped by it. • Heaven as sky and as spiritual reality in the Greek word ouranos • Glory and glorify as honor and as God's manifested presence linked to shekinah • Eternal life defined as knowing and experiencing the only true God • Authority exousia as right, power, domain, and sphere of rule • Parousia as presence and why translating it as coming can mislead • Christ and the logos in relation to creation and pre-existence • Cosmos as creation, humanity, and worldliness depending on context • name as essence and character, not only a label • unity as Jesus's repeated prayer and a warning against sectarianism • Sanctify hagiadzo as set apart, purified, and made holy in a Hebrew sense • Quaker language of being favored and grace charis as divine favor, not flattery The quote in our introduction was paraphrased from the Eleventh Proposition of Barclay's Apology. A complete list of our podcasts,  organized into topics, is available on our website.To learn more about Ohio Yearly Meeting (Conservative) of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), please visit  ohioyearlymeeting.org. Those interested in exploring the distinctives of Conservative Friends waiting worship should consider checking out our many Zoom Online Worship opportunities during the week here. All are welcome! We also have several Zoom study groups.  Check out the Online Study and Discussion Groups on our website.   Advices read in these podcasts can be found on page 29 in our Book Of Discipline.We welcome feedback on this and any of our other podcast episodes.   Contact us through our website.

How Do We Break the Power of Sin in Our Lives?Grace 1 Breaking the Power of SinBrian UyedaOriginal Air Date: 2026.04.19We believe The Bible, God's word, is inspired by Him, through the Holy Spirit and is sufficient for everything you need in life – guidance, wisdom, strength, encouragement and HOPE. His word reveals His nature and character and His plan of redemption through His Son Jesus Christ, through whom we can have eternal salvation when we choose to follow Him. We also believe the Bible remains relevant in our world today and its power is experienced when personally and consistently applied and practiced.Part of your journey may include choosing a Bible translation and there are many. To help you choose, it is important to know that a “translation” is word-for-word while a “paraphrase” is thought- for- thought. If you are new to Bible reading or don't yet have one, we offer FREE Bibles that are English Standard Version translation – a very easy to read Bible. Other options are Bible Apps you can download to your phone, or sites like: www.Bible.org, www.biblegateway.com or www.blueletterbible.org.We invite you to join us for weekend services:Saturday Evening at 5:30pm. Question and Answer period after service.Morning Social at 10:00am: A time to connect with others over coffee and donuts.Sunday Morning at 10:30amPromiseland Kids' Ministry: Toddler – Sr. High, Sunday at 10:30 am, offers Christian education and worship for children and youth.If you have missed a message or are viewing from home, you can catch weekend services on our Facebook page and YouTube by going to www.crossroads-ridgecrest.org, or through the church app. We also have podcasts available by looking up Crossroads Community Church - available on several podcast apps.Have a question for one of our Pastors? Submit your questions via text at: (760) 301-4840 for our Ask It! Your Questions Answered segment every week. Watch or Listen what others ask!If you have any questions or would like to make an appointment, please call (760)384-3333 Weds. – Fri. 10am-4pm, text (760)301-4840, or email ccc@ccc-rc.org

In this live broadcast from April 8th, Pastor John Alworth shifts the focus of recovery from mere abstinence to the necessity of a personal relationship with the Creator. Drawing a parallel to "Gallery Furniture's" famous slogan, Alworth emphasizes that God’s plan for healing is "free, free, free," provided one is willing to engage in a reciprocal bond of love. The episode outlines the dynamics of the man-God relationship through several key perspectives: God’s Initiating Love: Alworth explains that God’s love is "initiating" and "sacrificial." Using the imagery of the Garden of Eden, he notes that when humanity hid in sin, it was God who came looking for them, asking, "Where are you?" He highlights that Christ’s sacrifice on the cross occurred while we were still sinners, proving that God loves individuals into transformation rather than waiting for them to clean themselves up first. The Two-Way Street of Love: A healthy relationship cannot be one-sided. Alworth challenges listeners to move beyond "knocking" and actually open the door to Christ (Revelation 3:20). He defines loving God back through obedience—not as a rigid set of rules, but as a path to clearing the "chaos" of a sinful lifestyle—and through trusting His plan over personal preferences. The Biological Benefit of Worship: Alworth introduces the concept of neuroplasticity, specifically how worship affects the brain. He explains that acts of devotion and creative praise cause "dendrites" (the connectors between neurons) to flower and bloom. Remarkably, the area of the brain most improved by this spiritual practice is the center for empathy, which directly impacts the second greatest commandment: loving your neighbor. Recovery as Reconciliation: Whether recovering from addiction, pride, or a "divided society," the solution remains the same: reconciliation. Alworth reminds listeners that unforgiveness is a "ball and chain" that only weighs down the person holding the grudge. By forgiving oneself and others, the "bridge" broken in Eden is restored. The program concludes with an invitation to move past "religion" (a man-made construct) and embrace "relationship"—the intimacy of crying "Abba, Father" to a God who is ready to pick His children up every time they stumble. Key Scriptural References Romans 5:8Christ dying for us while we were yet sinners. John 5:6The fundamental question of recovery: "Do you want to be healed?" Revelation 3:20The invitation to open the door and "sup" (socialize) with God. 1 John 4:19We love because He first loved us. Psalm 139Being fearfully and wonderfully made with an individual purpose. Reflection Question Pastor Alworth mentioned that we often try to "clean ourselves up" before coming to God. Is there an area of your life you've been trying to "fix" on your own before inviting Him into the process?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hebrews 3:1-19We would love to see you during our Sunday morning service.  Click here for the time and location.https://ubcellsworth.org/#schedDo you have a prayer request? https://ubcellsworth.org/#prayerIf you are seeking biblical counseling....click here https://ubcellsworth.org/

Introduction: Psalm 32:5 – I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,” and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Proverbs 28:13 – Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. Conceal or Confess? If You Want to Confess: (1 John 1:5 - 2:6) You Have to Be Done LYING About Your Sin. (1 John 1:5-10) 3 Lies You Have to Stop Claiming: I BELIEVE in God. (When You Don't LIVE Like It.) (1 John 1:6-7) I'm a GOOD Person. (1 John 1:8-9) I Don't SIN. (1 John 1:10) You Have to Come to JESUS. (1 John 2:1-2) Your LIFESTYLE Proves Your Sincerity. (1 John 2:3-6) Hebrews 4:14 - Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANKHint: Highlight blanks above for answers! Audio Transcript 00:00-00:09Open up those Bibles to the passage that Levi just read, 1 John 1.00:12-00:14While you're turning there, let's just quiet our hearts for a moment.00:14-00:19And I'm going to ask that you would please pray for me to faithfully communicate God's Word.00:21-00:29And I'll pray for you to have a heart open to receive what it is the Lord wants to teach us from His Word tonight.00:29-00:31All right, let's pray.00:33-00:44Father in heaven, I pray that this time would allow us to feel the weight of what it is we're remembering here tonight.00:46-00:48We're so distracted with so many things.00:50-01:02I just pray, Father, by the power of Your Spirit, everything is off our minds and hearts except your word.01:06-01:14And that we would be honest enough with ourselves to see things as you see them.01:18-01:24Thank you, Father, for the sacrifice that was made.01:26-01:29You spared not your own son.01:34-01:38We pray in the glorious name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, amen.01:40-01:41Amen.01:41-01:46We're in this series, this short series called Respect the Office.01:49-01:54That if Jesus presented a resume, it would have a lot on it.01:56-02:00But there are three roles in particular.02:02-02:07We're just sort of slowing down and looking at, and last Sunday Pastor Rich talked about Jesus as prophet.02:08-02:10He is the word of God.02:10-02:14Who God is, is represented in Jesus.02:16-02:22Tonight, we're going to see that Jesus Christ is our priest.02:25-02:27What is a priest, anyways?02:28-02:36Well, in the simplest terms, the prophet represented God to man.02:37-02:42And the priest represents man to God.02:43-02:50And in the Old Testament, the priests offered sacrifices from sinners to God at the temple.02:51-03:12So tonight, as our minds naturally think of Jesus Christ on the cross, what you need to see in your mind in that moment when Jesus was on the cross, was He was not only the the sacrifice that was being offered for sin.03:12-03:17At the same time, He was the priest who was offering the sacrifice.03:19-03:28Jesus Christ, as our priest, came to deal with our sin.03:32-03:51There is one thing you must do Before you can receive forgiveness, before you can have a relationship with God at all, there's one thing you have to do.03:52-03:53You have to confess.03:55-04:09And if you're a Christian, if you are truly born again, and you're sitting here tonight, and you're wondering why your walk is so weak, why you aren't the strong Christian that you thought you would be by now.04:13-04:15Maybe you stopped confessing.04:16-04:19Look at verse 9 again.04:21-04:30If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.04:34-04:36We're going to talk about confess tonight.04:37-04:39What does it mean to confess?04:41-04:44Well, in the Greek, it's a compound word.04:44-04:54It literally means, "say the same." In other words, to confess means that you're agreeing with God.04:56-04:58Agreeing with God that you are a sinner.04:58-05:02Agreeing with God that your sin is wrong.05:05-05:06I agree with God.05:07-05:08It's saying I'm guilty.05:09-05:11I'm not a good person.05:11-05:16I look at my actions and I do things that are just shameful.05:18-05:21I hear the words that come out of my mouth sometimes.05:22-05:24What is wrong with me?05:27-05:27Shameful.05:29-05:38So I look into my heart and I realize, there's something broken in me.05:40-05:41There's something evil in me.05:44-05:47How is it that I can be so full of selfishness?05:47-05:51How is it that I can be so full of hatred sometimes?05:52-05:53How is it that I can be so full of lust?05:55-05:56Why is that?06:00-06:01Confessing is agreeing with God.06:05-06:10And the three hardest words that you will ever say, it's not, "I love you." Those ones are hard.06:10-06:12But there are three harder words to say.06:13-06:24And those words are these, "I have sinned." To get to the point where you are saying this from your heart, "I've sinned.06:25-06:26I have sinned.06:27-06:30You know, I was thinking about that a lot this week and preparing for this message.06:31-06:32Why is that so hard?06:35-06:46I mean, it's clear in the Bible, it's clear from observation that we have a problem, but why is it so hard for me to get to that place where I say, "I have sinned"?06:46-06:49Why is it so hard for you to admit that, to confess that?06:52-06:53I think it's a lot of things.06:55-06:57I think the big reason is pride, right?06:58-07:02To admit that you're a sinner is also an admission of weakness.07:02-07:06I'm not the morally strong person that I want to think that I am.07:07-07:15Maybe it's hard to confess that I am a sinner because deep down the reality is we actually kind of like our sin.07:16-07:19We would miss it if it wasn't in our lives.07:19-08:13is that. If you're sitting here tonight and you're like, "Well, I don't feel like I love my sin. I want out of it, but I feel trapped in it. I'm in bondage to it." That's hard to confess. That something is so ruling over you. "I don't want to do this, but I keep doing it. What is my problem?" You know, I think really for a lot of us, it's hard to say I have sinned because it's just so hard to not see yourself as the hero in your own story. Sometimes you're the bad guy. So am I. Acknowledging sin is uncomfortable. It's offensive. And it just it goes against our natural inclinations.08:17-08:18Here's the reality from God's Word.08:20-08:21Unsaved people.08:22-08:29People who don't sincerely know the Lord, are always going to try to downplay sin.08:31-08:32It's not that big of a deal.08:33-08:36And one of the ways they do that is by trying to redefine sin.08:36-08:40We won't call it sin, we'll call it something else and kind of soften the blow.08:41-08:46But the big one is, unsaved people conceal their sin.08:47-08:48Let's keep it hidden.08:48-08:50Let's make sure nobody finds out about it.08:50-08:52They conceal their sin.08:55-09:05Saved people, on the other hand, according to that passage Levi just read, saved people confess their sin.09:08-09:10So tonight I just want to ask you one question.09:12-09:12What are you doing?09:16-09:18Conceal or confess?09:19-09:20Which one are you?09:25-09:32Bible's so clear about this and what's at stake in this.09:33-09:40Psalm 32.5 says, "I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity.09:41-09:49I said, 'I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,' and you forgave the iniquity of my sin." Do you see that?09:51-09:52Conceal or confess.09:55-10:20Same thing, Proverbs 28.13 says, "Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper. But he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy." So what are you doing with your sin? Are you concealing it? Or are you confessing it?10:23-10:33So on your outline, if you're taking notes, it says at the top, "Conceal or confess?" And there might be some people in here that are honest enough to say, you know what, I'd rather just conceal it.10:34-10:37And I would say respectfully, I don't know why you're here tonight.10:41-10:42You should have stayed home.10:45-10:48But I do know that there are some people here tonight that are like, you know what?10:51-10:53It's gone on beyond too long.10:54-10:54I need to confess.10:56-10:57I need to confess.10:57-11:03Well, I'm so glad you're here, if that's you, because I want to help you with that, from the Word of God.11:03-11:07So on your outline, if you want to confess, number one, this is where you have to start.11:09-11:11You have to be done lying about your sin.11:11-11:12You have to be done with that.11:13-11:16You have to be done lying about your sin.11:18-11:19Again, look at verse five.11:20-11:29He says, "This is the message we have heard from Him "and proclaimed to you, God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.11:30-11:31God is light.11:32-11:38We could spend a whole sermon series talking about that, but the bottom line is this, that represents life.11:39-11:40That represents holiness.11:41-11:43There is no death in God.11:43-11:45There's no unholiness in God.11:45-11:46There's no sin.11:46-11:48There's no darkness of any kind in God.11:49-11:54A man, on the other hand, I probably don't have to sell you on that, do I?11:57-12:04And you see, when we talk about confessing, yes, you absolutely must confess with your mouth.12:07-12:10But, it has to ultimately start in your heart.12:12-12:18Because you can say something with your mouth that isn't actually true in your heart.12:20-12:27And when you say something that's not true, that's called telling a lie.12:28-12:30And that's where John starts here.12:31-12:32Like, you want to confess?12:33-12:33You've got to be done lying.12:36-12:46You see, three times in this passage, he says, "if we claim" or "if we say" "if we say" "if we say" He's pointing out the lies We tell ourselves.12:47-12:48He goes, you've got to stop that.12:49-12:50Let's look at them quickly.12:51-12:53Three lies you've got to stop claiming.12:54-12:55You've got to stop these.12:55-12:57Number, or letter A, sorry, letter A.12:58-13:00Here's a lie that a lot of people are saying.13:01-13:02I believe in God.13:05-13:07When you don't live like it.13:09-13:15People are saying, yeah, I believe in God, but they don't live like they know Him at all.13:16-13:18It's a lie, right?13:18-13:19Not my opinion, look at verse six.13:20-13:31He says, "If we say we have fellowship with Him, with God, while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.13:32-13:35If we claim we have fellowship with Him," do you know what that is?13:36-13:40That's the guy or the girl that says, "Oh, I believe in God.13:41-13:42"Oh yeah, yeah, I believe in God.13:42-13:43I know God.13:44-13:49I mean, yeah, I'm a Christian." But he says they walk in darkness.13:49-13:54They're living in some secret, sinful lifestyle.13:57-13:59And John points out here, look, you're living a lie.14:00-14:02You're just, you're living a lie.14:03-14:05I don't know who you think you're fooling, but it's not God.14:07-14:08And this is a hard truth.14:11-14:14that I think tonight we need to confront ourselves with.14:15-14:18Not everyone who claims to know God actually does know God.14:20-14:23Not everyone who claims they know God is actually heading to heaven.14:26-14:33Not everyone who's sitting in a church, not just tonight, any church, week after week, not everyone sitting in a church is saved.14:37-15:04I got to tell you, I talk to a lot of people who will be talking about a family member of theirs, their brother, or their adult children, or their parents, and we'll be talking about these family members, and I'm like, "Well, do they know the Lord?" And they'll say, "Well, yeah, they're Christians." And then they say, "But they haven't gone to church "in years, they're not interested in praying.15:05-15:08They really don't want to have any spiritual conversations.15:09-15:12You know, I invited them to Good Friday service and they absolutely didn't want to come.15:14-15:15But yeah, he's a Christian.15:18-15:24I mean, yeah, he's living in adultery right now.15:25-15:26Oh, he's foul-mouthed.15:27-15:29And he is such a heavy drinker.15:32-15:32But he's a Christian.15:35-15:36Based on what?15:37-15:39What are you basing that on?15:39-15:41And you know what the response usually is?15:41-15:47Well, one time we were in a church and they said they believed in God.15:48-15:51They like raised their hand in a service one time.15:54-15:55But what does the Bible say?15:56-15:58Do you see that in verse six?15:58-16:03If we say we have fellowship, but we're walking in darkness, what does your Bible say?16:04-16:05It says you're lying.16:06-16:06It's just not true.16:10-16:12But on the other hand, look at verse seven.16:12-16:25He says, "But if we walk in the light, "as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, "and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin." Walking in the light.16:26-16:27No hidden sin.16:29-16:35No secret sin that you hope to heaven nobody finds out about.16:43-16:46You sin, you confess.16:48-16:49You are walking in the light.16:50-16:51You're like, yeah, I did sin.16:51-16:53That was wrong what I did.16:53-16:54It was wrong in God's eyes.16:54-16:55I've sinned against my family.16:55-16:56I'm confessing that.16:56-16:58I'm getting with God on this.16:58-17:04I'm getting accountability on this to help me drag this to the light.17:07-17:09So what's your plan tonight?17:09-17:10Are you going to conceal?17:12-17:13Or are you going to confess?17:20-17:23You're walking in the light or you're walking in darkness?17:26-17:28There's no middle ground, by the way.17:29-17:33The Bible doesn't talk about walking in half light or half dark.17:33-17:36What typifies your life right now?17:37-17:39Which one describes you?17:40-17:42Are you walking in the light?17:45-17:47Or is there a whole lot of stuff that you're trying to keep concealed?17:51-17:53Well, John says, "Stop lying.17:54-17:54"Stop lying.17:54-17:59"Your claim of believing in God means nothing if your life is characterized by sin.18:00-18:03All right, so that's a lie you have to stop claiming.18:03-18:06Here's another lie you have to stop.18:07-18:08Letter B, I'm a good person.18:11-18:12I'm a good person.18:12-18:14Well, let's see what the Bible says about that, verse eight.18:14-18:22If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.18:23-18:25We claim we're without sin.18:26-18:27I'm not that bad.18:28-18:32I mean, I'm actually a good person.18:33-18:39Like deep down, you know, deep down, I have a good heart.18:40-18:42I'm a good person deep down.18:44-18:45God knows that.18:48-18:49Here's what God knows.18:51-18:54God knows that you were born with a sin nature that you inherited from Adam.18:55-18:58that's been passed down from generation to generation, and you got it.19:02-19:02Don't believe me?19:04-19:07Sometimes I have people challenge me on this, like I don't think that we're born with a sin nature.19:08-19:09I don't think that that's true.19:09-19:11I don't think that we are born with a sin nature.19:11-19:13I'm like, have you ever been around a kid?19:14-19:15Ever?19:17-19:18(congregation laughing)19:19-19:21That's exactly what I'm talking about.19:25-19:28That's exactly what I'm talking about, that little sinner tried to hijack the sermon.19:31-19:33You just proved my point, little lamb.19:40-19:43And look, if you don't have kids, there's plenty of people around here that do have them.19:43-19:45I'm sure they'll let you hang out.19:47-19:49I'm sure they might ask you to watch them for a few days.19:55-19:56Who has ever taught a kid?19:58-19:59I mean, think of a little toddler.20:00-20:01Think of little Joey back there.20:02-20:06Does dad ever sit down with him and say, "Listen, listen, Joey, I'm gonna teach you "something important here.20:07-20:12"If you learn how to lie convincingly, "you're gonna go far in life, all right?20:13-20:17"I guess, son, what I'm saying is "always cover your tracks, okay?20:18-20:25"Because if you got away with it, then you've mastered the art of deception.20:26-20:29Has any dad sat down with their kid and taught them that?20:29-20:30I sure hope not.20:30-20:31You're a monster.20:31-20:33You're a monster if you're teaching your kid how to sin.20:34-20:36But you don't have to.20:37-20:45How is it that these kids automatically know how to sneak, how to lie, how to steal, how to be selfish?20:45-20:46How do they know that?20:47-20:50Like, were they reading some manual in the womb?20:50-20:51Like, what is going on here?20:54-20:55We're born with a sin nature.20:57-20:59So if you're like, "Well, you know what?21:00-21:01I'm really not that bad.21:01-21:05I'm not really a bad person." The Bible says you're deceiving to yourself.21:05-21:09You're telling a lie, and then you're turning around and believing the own lie that you just told yourself.21:12-21:13You say you have a good heart?21:15-21:30Actually if that's your stance, if that's your stance here tonight, to think that you're You're really a good person, I've got to tell you, you're in a hopeless situation when it comes to the gospel, because you're not going to confess.21:32-21:36What can God do for someone who doesn't think that they need Him?21:39-21:40It's a hopeless situation.21:44-21:45Look at verse nine again.21:45-21:56If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins, excuse me, forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.21:59-22:02I did a lot of reading this past week in preparing for this.22:02-22:12And you get to this verse, and these scholars and commentators are like, is this verse for believers, or is this verse for unbelievers?22:16-22:28The answer is yes. The answer is yes. Confession is like repentance. Think about repentance.22:29-22:44Is repentance something you do when you first come to Christ? Yeah. But if you're a true born again believer in Christ, when do you stop repenting? Never. In Matthew 3.8, Luke 3.8, both say the exact same thing.22:45-22:49Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.22:49-22:53Repentance is to be the lifestyle of the follower of Jesus.22:54-22:56And confession is exactly the same.22:56-22:59In coming to Christ, you have to confess.22:59-23:07And if you're a Christian, your life is typified by constant acknowledgment of your sin before a holy God.23:11-23:18regular occurrence in our walk with Christ, Christians are characterized as confessors.23:20-23:23A true Christian is always going to God.23:23-23:25"God, I hate my sin.23:25-23:27God, this is what I did.23:27-23:29I messed up.23:29-23:29I sinned.23:30-23:33God, specifically, here is what I did.23:34-23:35God, I need to change.23:35-23:37God, I'm confessing that.23:38-23:42Thank You for the forgiveness that You've purchased through Your Son, Jesus Christ, God.23:42-23:49I need the power of Your Spirit to help me repent." That is how a Christian confesses their sin.23:51-23:54And John says that God's response is to forgive and purify.23:56-23:57Why does He do that?23:59-24:00Because you're worthy?24:03-24:03Not hardly.24:04-24:09John says he does that because he, he is faithful and just.24:11-24:17See, God's forgiveness is based on his promise, not your performance.24:17-24:21God's forgiveness comes to you on his terms, not your terms.24:22-24:28And God's forgiveness, the assurance that we have that we are forgiven is because of God's integrity.24:30-24:39that I can say, "I know that I have the promise of heaven," not because of me, I know I have the promise of heaven because I believe in a God who always keeps His word.24:41-24:42And this is what He's promised.24:45-24:50So if you're sitting here tonight, you're like, "Yeah, I'm a good person." You're really not.24:52-24:59As long as you think you are, you're not going to understand what the cross of Jesus Christ was all about.25:01-25:03Three lies you need to stop claiming.25:04-25:07Letter C, same vein here, right?25:07-25:08Letter C, I don't sin.25:11-25:12I don't sin.25:13-25:15Believe it or not, I've met people that have made that claim.25:15-25:16Look at verse 10.25:16-25:30He says, "If we say we have not sinned, "we make him a liar and his word is not in us." If we claim we have not sinned, that's the person, And again, I've met these people, they're like, "Sin?25:33-25:43I don't sin." Well, you did just call God a liar then because He says differently.25:46-25:50It's one of the interesting things about sin, wouldn't you say?25:50-26:00interesting, that we tend to minimize our sin and we maximize other people's sin.26:02-26:08Ours is so small and insignificant, but somebody else's, oh boy, they really blew it.26:14-26:16God wants to deal with you about your sin.26:18-26:24And you can't confess Jesus as a Savior if you say you don't have what He saves from.26:27-26:36And if you refuse to acknowledge your sin, you refuse to admit, you refuse to confess your sin, then the cross means nothing.26:38-26:45And we come to a service like this, we think of Jesus Christ on the cross, and we're really left wondering why did he die in the first place?26:48-26:49Concealer confess.26:53-26:53What are you doing?26:58-26:59Concealer confess.26:59-27:01Are you going to leave tonight lying to yourself?27:04-27:07Or are you going to finally agree with God?27:12-27:23So if you want to confess, if that's you, and I want to help you, first of all, you gotta stop lying to yourself, you gotta stop lying to God, you gotta stop lying to everybody, you gotta stop the lies.27:23-27:27Number two, you have to come to Jesus.27:30-27:33Confession is about the person of Jesus Christ.27:33-27:47Look at verse one, he says, in chapter two, "My little children, I'm writing these things to you "so that you may not sin." But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.27:49-28:01John says, "Look, I'm writing this so you don't sin." God's Word doesn't allow us to have a dismissive attitude about sin, which a lot of Christians have.28:02-28:05It's like, "Well, yeah, I sin, but it doesn't really matter.28:05-28:10I'm forgiven in Christ." we just sort of dismiss it.28:12-28:13John goes, "No, no, no, no.28:14-28:35I'm writing these things to you so that you are turning from sin." He goes, "But if anybody does sin, and you will," spoiler alert, "you will," John says, "when you sin, you have an advocate, if you're in Christ." And this is one of the most beautiful pictures in all the Bible.28:36-28:39You know, it's a courtroom scene actually.28:39-28:45Revelation chapter 12 says that Satan is the accuser of the brethren.28:45-28:46Do you know what Satan does?28:47-28:52He goes before God, and if you're a follower of Christ, Satan accuses you before God.28:53-28:55Satan's like, he's no good.28:57-28:58Did you hear what he said?28:58-29:00That's one of your guys?29:00-29:01Did you hear what he said?29:02-29:03That's what Satan does.29:03-29:06Satan, he's a slanderer, he's an accuser.29:06-29:10But you see, when Jesus Christ is your advocate, he is your defense attorney.29:11-29:22That when Satan says, "Do you see what a miserable person this is?" Jesus steps up and says, "He did sin, "but I took his sin on myself when I died on the cross." He's forgiven.29:22-29:25He is not guilty because I paid that penalty.29:27-29:28And Satan goes to the next person.29:28-29:30You see what a miserable person she is?29:30-29:31Do you hear how she talked?29:31-29:32Do you see what she did?29:33-29:43Jesus says, "I died for her." All of the sin that was committed by her, Jesus said, "When I was on the cross, I paid the penalty." She is not guilty.29:45-29:50That's what it means that Jesus as our advocate, and that is way better than Edgar Snyder.29:53-29:55Owen might not think so.29:57-29:58If you know, you know.29:59-30:00Look at verse two.30:03-30:10He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.30:11-30:12Propitiation.30:12-30:15Oh, that's like one of the best words in the Bible.30:15-30:20John's just hitting like all of the most awesome concepts in a row right here.30:21-30:27Propitiation, your Bible might translate it, atoning, sacrifice, but this is a concept that you really need to understand.30:28-30:29Propitiation just simply means this.30:30-30:34God is satisfied with what Jesus did on the cross.30:35-30:36That's what it means.30:36-30:43When Jesus was on the cross, God was pouring out his wrath on Jesus for my sin and for your sin.30:44-30:47God put all of the wrath that I deserve on Jesus.30:47-30:50And that is awesome news because you know what that means?30:50-30:52God has no more wrath left for me.30:54-30:57And if you're in Christ, he has no wrath left for you.30:57-31:07And Christian, you've gotta get this in your head I've talked to so many Christians that are like, "I just really feel like God's mad at me, "and I feel like God's so disappointed in me." He's not!31:08-31:16It's not like God poured out His wrath on Jesus, and then God turns around and sees you sinning, and is like, "Oh, I'm still mad!31:17-31:20"I gotta punish her now, too!" That's not how it works.31:22-31:23Propitiation, God is satisfied.31:24-31:29He has no wrath for you if you've truly received Jesus Christ.31:32-31:47And not just for you, not just for you, look at verse two, he goes on to say, "Not for ours only, "not for our sins only, "but also for the sins of the whole world." Again, this is where a lot of scholars get caught up.31:50-31:55I just, you're like, "Oh, you think you're smarter than those scholars." No, I don't.31:55-31:57I think they're too smart sometimes.31:58-32:01I think they make this way too complicated.32:03-32:04You know what I mean by that?32:04-32:16You know, I was reading, and I heard some pastoral panel thing, they were talking about this very verse, and they were like, what is being talked about here for the sins of the whole world?32:16-32:19Is he talking about the elect?32:19-32:20Like it's just for the elect?32:22-32:25Is this speaking to limited atonement?32:28-32:33You're making this way more complicated than it needs to be.32:33-32:34Do you know what this means?32:35-32:36Do you know what this verse means?32:36-32:38I'll tell you what this verse means.32:39-32:39Right here.32:41-32:49What this verse is saying is I can confidently say to anyone, when you believe in Jesus, you will be forgiven of your sins.32:50-32:52You will be adopted as a child of God.32:52-32:54I can say that to anybody, because it's for the whole world.32:54-33:04I can say that here, I can say that in Thailand, I can say that in Blonox, it doesn't matter where I am, this truth holds, Jesus forgives sin.33:06-33:08Let God figure out all that other stuff.33:10-33:14My job is to tell the world, and your job too.33:16-33:17Concealer confess.33:19-33:19Conceal or confess.33:21-33:31At this point, if you're still wanting to conceal, you're committed to walking out of here like, "Yeah, I just can't, I can't come clean about my sin.33:31-33:38"Not to God, not to anybody." Well, it's not gonna go well for you.33:39-33:45Remember what the Proverbs writers say, that if you conceal your sin, you're not gonna prosper.33:46-33:48It's not gonna go well for you.33:51-33:57But if you want to confess, that's business that you have to do with Jesus.33:59-34:16Not only confessing who you are as a sinner, but confession includes saying who He is, agreeing with God who Jesus is, agreeing with God that Jesus is your advocate, agreeing with God that Jesus is your propitiation, agreeing with God about that.34:17-34:24If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.34:28-34:34So this night more than any other probably reminds us why Jesus is the only one who can take your sin away.34:35-34:36Nobody else can do that.34:38-34:46Nobody else can make you be pronounced not guilty in the courtroom of God.34:49-34:50Conceal or confess?34:52-34:59Well, if you want to confess, number three, your lifestyle proves your sincerity.35:02-35:04Your lifestyle proves your sincerity.35:05-35:07Look at verses 3 through 6 again.35:08-35:13He says, "And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments.35:15-35:20Whoever says, "I know Him," but does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him.35:21-35:27But whoever keeps His word in him, truly the love of God is perfected.35:28-35:34By this we may know that we are in Him.35:35-35:41Whoever says he abides in Him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.35:44-35:48I'm sure if the hospitality team grabbed every person on the way out, do you wanna confess?35:48-35:50I'm sure they would get 100%.35:50-35:51Yeah, I confess.35:51-35:52I can, yeah, I confess.35:58-36:02We'll find out if it's sincere by how you live, right?36:03-36:05That's why he says it in verse three.36:05-36:06He says it at the end of verse five.36:07-36:08We know that we have come to know him.36:09-36:10We know that we are saved.36:10-36:12Like what's the evidence?36:12-36:15How do I really know if I'm saved or not?36:15-36:16How would I know that?36:16-36:17He tells you right here.36:17-36:19Here's how you know that you're saved.36:19-36:20You keep his commands.36:22-36:28The proof that you know God is just simply you do what he says.36:32-36:34It's not just what you claim.36:37-36:38Are you saved?36:38-36:38You know the Lord.36:39-36:40And people say, well, you know what?36:40-36:46I was baptized 17 years ago at First Baptist Church of so-and-so.36:47-36:47Goody.36:49-36:51That's not evidence that you're saved, though.36:53-37:05Or somebody says, "Well, I go to church almost every week." I mean, not when Declan has lacrosse, but every other week I'm in church.37:05-37:06Great.37:08-37:10I strongly encourage church attendance.37:10-37:13I think that's a good thing, but that's not evidence of salvation.37:14-37:17Evidence of salvation is I do what God tells me to do.37:19-37:22It's just that simple, according to John.37:24-37:30I believe, I believe not verified by what you say, I believe is verified by how you live.37:30-37:32Are you gonna conceal or are you gonna confess tonight?37:33-37:34Which is it?37:36-37:51Because obviously, if you really agree with God that sin is evil, you're going to be constantly confessing and forsaking sin.37:55-37:57So do you live a life of confession?38:01-38:04Do you agree with God about your sin?38:06-38:19And do you agree with God concerning what He said the crucifixion of His Son accomplished for the person who will turn to Him?38:22-38:23Our worship team would make their way back up.38:26-38:54And our communion servers, we're gonna close our time around the Lord's table And you do not have to be a member of Harvard's Bible Chapel to take communion, but you do have to be a born-again believer in Christ. This is for believers.38:58-39:02And fellow Christians, it is gathering around the Lord's table.39:02-39:06Well, this is a time to confess everything.39:08-39:11Everything that John said in this passage, we get to confess that right now.39:13-39:21When we take these elements, what we're saying, what we're confessing, I confess that my sin is evil and wrong in the eyes of God.39:22-39:23I confess that.39:24-39:27I confess that Jesus Christ died for my sin.39:29-39:35I confess that God is satisfied with the work that Jesus accomplished on my behalf.39:37-39:40I confess Jesus Christ is my advocate.39:41-39:46I confess that I need His Spirit to make me who God wants me to be.39:49-40:00I confess that I will prove that I believe when I obey God in every area of my life.40:03-40:16Hebrews 4.14 says, "Since then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God.40:18-40:22Let us hold fast our confession.40:24-40:36We're going to ask, when you're ready, if you would come down to the center aisles and receive the elements from one of our pastors, and you can return to your seat by the outside aisle.40:37-40:49I'm going to ask that you hold on to it, and let's confess together tonight, church, that We are agreeing with God in all these things.40:52-40:54So please come, take the elements.40:56-40:57This is our confession.40:59-41:05This is our agreeing with God that Jesus is who God said He is.41:06-41:09And that Jesus accomplished what God said He accomplished.41:11-41:16The Bible tells us on the night that Jesus was betrayed, He took bread and he broke it and he gave thanks.41:17-41:20And he said, "This is my body, which is broken for you.41:21-41:45Eat this in remembrance of me." After the meal, Bible tells us that Jesus took the cup and he said, "This cup is my blood, the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for the forgiveness of sin.41:46-41:48Drink this in remembrance of me.41:50-41:51What are you doing tonight?41:54-41:56Conceal or confess?41:59-42:01Jesus has quite a resume.42:04-42:06As the prophet, he is the word of God.42:08-42:11As the priest, he takes away our sin.42:12-42:15I want to invite you to come back in two days on Sunday.42:15-42:26Pastor Taylor is going to talk about the other role that Jesus has, the King of Kings.42:27-42:28You don't want to miss that.42:30-42:31You are loved. Small Group DiscussionRead 1 John 1:5-2:6What was your big take-away from this passage / message?BreakoutPray for one another.

Introduction: Hebrews 1:1-3 - Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high... The Prophet (Deuteronomy 18:14-22): Will Speak God's Words – But they did not all listen See: John 12:49-50 and John 14:10, 24 Will be Like Moses – But they did not all believe See: John 6:32-35 and John 6:51, 57b-58 Will Die if He Lies – But they killed Jesus for telling the truth See: John 8:26b-28 | Psalm 22:7-8, 16-18 | Psalm 22:22-25 Jesus is the Prophet – Will You: Listen to Him? Believe Him? Speak His words? Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANKHint: Highlight blanks above for answers! Audio Transcript 00:00-00:01Good morning, Harvest.00:03-00:05It's a joy to be with you this morning.00:06-00:11Open your Bibles, please, if you haven't already, to Deuteronomy chapter 18.00:12-00:16It's where we will be studying God's Word this morning.00:18-00:37And as is our usual, sometimes usual custom, I would ask, please, that you pray for me, that I would clearly, accurately preach God's Word, and I will pray for you that your hearts will be open to receive it.00:37-00:37Let's pray.00:43-01:18Gracious and holy Father, I pray, Father, you would open our hearts and minds to receive your word, that we would be absolutely convinced beyond all doubt that your word is true and that Jesus is your prophet who speaks your truth to us through your word, through your spirit at all times.01:19-01:30And I pray as we believe and trust in Him, you would transform our lives and make us more like Him every day.01:30-01:33We pray in Jesus' great name, Amen.01:35-01:44So in preparation for Resurrection Sunday, we are beginning a three-part series examining the three offices of Christ.01:45-01:47the office of prophet, priest, and king.01:49-01:53And we begin this morning with the first of these, which is prophet.01:55-01:59Now, we may listen to a lot of modern day prophets for advice on how to live.02:00-02:12The experts, the doctors, the internet influencers, the media talking heads, podcasters, entertainment celebrities, even astrologists and politicians.02:14-02:16The sources of information are endless.02:17-02:24And now we have AI at our fingertips to synthesize and summarize the sum and substance of human experience.02:27-02:40Now to be clear, I'm not talking about doctors who say eating this one food three times a day cures sleep apnea or the weird trick that cures tinnitus caused by eating this one food three times a day.02:40-02:47Now I'm talking about the major life information, answers to questions like, "Who am I?02:48-02:49What's my purpose?02:50-03:03What's the best way to live?" And when it comes to that kind of information, few to none of the infotainment talking heads can really help us, because they can only tell us what they know.03:04-03:11I'm not suggesting they aren't intelligent, but what they say may or may not be true.03:12-03:15But you say like, well, no, hold on, hold on Sprung.03:15-03:20I've heard it said that all truth is God's truth, wherever it's found.03:22-03:24Well, let's think about that for a minute.03:25-03:29God's word is perfect, pure and true according to Psalm 19.03:30-03:44So I have a metaphor this morning for us, For God's word, I think that everyone can relate to the delight over opening a brand new container of Play-Doh.03:45-03:46It's all one color.03:47-03:49Nobody's played with it yet.03:49-03:51It's not mixed up with other colors.03:52-03:57It's just fresh and clean, and it's ready for my artistic expression.04:00-04:04But you know, the inevitable happens, doesn't it?04:04-04:19Soon, what was once pure and clean, it's all mashed together with a lot of other colors and that original color becomes unidentifiable.04:22-04:23I think you get the point.04:25-04:29How do you discern God's truth in a mishmash of worldly ideas?04:30-04:37How do you extract the truth once it's all blended into futile human thoughts?04:40-04:45Well, this is the problem with the infotainment experts.04:46-04:53Their learning and experience and perspective is just a conglomeration of worldly thinking.04:54-05:09They can make educated guesses as to how to live and what's going to happen, but ultimately every single one of them is going to reach a point where they have to say, "I don't know." And some of them are speaking directly out of the pit of hell.05:10-05:13And those folks will drag you down to hell with them.05:14-05:20So you see, that's why when it comes to the astrologists and the mediums and perhaps the to celebrities and influencers.05:22-05:33Verse 14 of this morning's passage says that, "As for you, the Lord, your God, has not allowed you to do this." So to whom or what can we turn?05:33-05:37Where can we get truth for an accurate world view?05:38-05:41Because we need a perspective that is outside of ourselves.05:42-05:46Outside of this world, really, and that's what God's Word is.05:47-05:53It is the specific and special revelation of God about himself.05:58-06:01It comes from the throne of God.06:02-06:18The problem with the world is, people in the world, they look at the Bible and like, "Well, yeah, that's just one more system of thought like any other." In fact, it's probably even not as good as what AI can tell us now.06:19-06:21They have a low view of scripture.06:22-06:24We need to have a high view of scripture.06:26-06:33And as we learn from the word that was just read, we can get the truth from the prophet.06:34-06:36It is to him we must listen.06:38-06:40But what is a prophet anyway?06:41-06:42What does a prophet do?06:42-06:52We typically think of prophets as forecasting future events, often in a cryptic or mystical way, like that Nostradamus guy.06:52-06:58But biblically, that is only a partial description of what a prophet does.06:59-07:03Basically a biblical prophet speaks God's words to people.07:05-07:09The Old Testament prophets revealed three basic messages.07:11-07:18The first was that God sent many prophets to his people to rebuke them for breaking the covenant and worshiping idols.07:19-07:31This was perhaps the prophet's most important function, to remind the people of Israel that they, and only they, were in a covenantal relationship with the Lord God Most High.07:33-07:36and they were violating His covenant in a high-handed way.07:37-07:47Time and again He warned them to return to Him, or they would face the ultimate covenant punishment of being expelled from the Promised Land.07:48-08:03Not only did the prophets warn Israel and Judah that they would be punished by pagan nations for their idolatry, God also spoke to them about a future restoration, both near and at the end of the age.08:05-08:09And indeed, after the exile, they would return to the promised land.08:10-08:18And the nations that assaulted and tormented Israel in their exile, they would in turn be punished and overthrown by God.08:19-08:29And then finally, the Old Testament prophets spoke of the coming Messiah, a sometimes suffering, but ultimately victorious anointed servant.08:30-08:33The anointed one would bring salvation to his people.08:33-08:37He would inaugurate a new covenant between God and his people.08:38-08:45And the prophets gave many clues that would help the people identify the anointed one when he arrived.08:46-08:51Now, what did God expect his people to do in response to the prophets' messages?08:52-09:29expected, well no, he commanded them to repent and believe the messages to return to him and live in accordance with the covenant he made with them at Mount Sinai. And yet the Old Testament records a nearly continuous account of Israel's idolatry. They worship the idols of the nations around them. They And they sought out and listened to the words of false prophets, mediums, fortune tellers, and diviners.09:30-09:31They did not listen.09:32-09:34They did not believe.09:34-09:37They became futile in their thinking and their worship.09:37-09:47They mixed God's truth with the religions and lifestyles of the surrounding nations, and they ended up with the equivalent of this, gudo.09:49-09:52It's just a mash, a mishmash of ideas.09:53-10:02And when the prophets exposed their sin and their hypocrisy, they took offense and they put them to death.10:04-10:13So God, after bearing with his people for hundreds of years, he brought the covenantal curses down upon their heads and inflicted the ultimate punishment.10:14-10:16He exiled them from the promised land.10:18-10:22Now God of course kept his promises and he returned them to the land.10:23-10:37And roughly 400 years after that, the anointed one who was known before the foundation of the world, he was made manifest in the last times for the sake of all who would believe in and through him.10:39-10:45We of course know from the New Testament that Jesus is the promised Messiah.10:46-10:52He's the Son of God who fulfilled all that was spoken of Him by the Old Testament prophets.10:55-11:03As the writer of Hebrews says, "Long ago and at many times and in many ways, "God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.11:04-11:12"But in these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son, "whom He appointed the heir of all things, "through whom also He created the world.11:13-11:21"He's the radiance of the glory of God God in the exact imprint of His nature, and He upholds the universe by the word of His power.11:21-11:36After making purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." And this verse summarizes the three offices of Christ that we're going to be studying this week.11:36-11:37First is prophet.11:38-11:48"In these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son." And then priest, he has made purification for sins.11:48-11:53And then finally king, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.11:56-12:01So how do we know Jesus is the prophet foretold by Moses?12:02-12:08What evidence is there to conclusively connect Jesus to the promise of a prophet just like Moses?12:11-12:15Well, first the prophet will speak God's words.12:16-12:19Look at verse 15 of chapter 18 in Deuteronomy.12:21-12:27Verse 15 says, "The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers.12:28-12:35It is to him you shall listen." Thus the prophet would be raised up by God from among the Israelites.12:36-12:46And the gospels of Matthew and Luke establish that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the Virgin Mary, and he was adopted by Joseph.12:47-12:50And both Mary and Joseph were descendants of David.12:51-12:53Jesus was born in Bethlehem.12:54-12:57His birth was attended by an angelic announcement.12:59-13:08And then when John baptized Jesus, God the Father announced that Jesus was his beloved son with whom he was well-pleased.13:09-13:17All of these events attest that Jesus was indeed raised up by God the Father from among the Israelites.13:18-13:29And these events disprove the idea that Jesus was merely a self-appointed and possibly deluded religious figure, as some people think he was.13:31-13:35And then verse 18 tells us that God's words would be in his mouth.13:36-13:47"I will put my words in his mouth and He shall speak to them all that I command Him." Now, we've already established that the prophets spoke God's words to the people.13:48-13:59But whereas they prefaced their statements with, "Thus saith the Lord," Jesus spoke as the Lord, out of the oneness that existed between Him and the Father.14:00-14:17For example, in John 12, verses 49 and 50, Jesus said, "For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment, what to say and what to speak.14:17-14:20And I know that his commandment is eternal life.14:21-14:38What I say therefore, I say as the Father has told me." And then in John 14, verses 10 and 24, he said, "The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works.14:38-14:59And the word that you hear is not mine, but the Father's who sent me." As further proof of his prophetic office, Jesus spoke God's words in the way that the Israelites requested.15:00-15:13What I mean is this, In Exodus chapters 19 and 20, God descended in a dark cloud on Mount Sinai with thunders and lightnings and the mountains shook.15:14-15:18And out of that cloud, God spoke the 10 commandments to the people.15:19-15:54And when all the people saw the thunder and the lightning and the sound of the trumpet that they heard and they were seeing the mountain shake and the ground shaking beneath their feet, They were terrified and they stood far off and they told Moses, they said, "You speak to us and we will listen, "but do not let God speak to us lest we die." Certainly Moses continued to speak to the people and gave them God's commands during their journey to the promised land and during their wandering for 40 years in the desert.15:55-15:57And then in his final address to them in the book of Deuteronomy.16:00-16:21But in chapter 18, verses 16 and 17, Moses told the people that God would send a prophet in direct response to their request at Mount Sinai, to let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, or see this great fire anymore, lest I die.16:24-16:31So how did Jesus, in his speaking, demonstrate that he was the prophet sent by the Lord?16:32-16:37Well, there's three events that directly identify Jesus as the prophet.16:38-16:42And all of them occurred, not coincidentally, on a mountainside.16:44-16:48First, he was on the mountain when he was transfigured before Peter, James, and John.16:48-16:59and while talking with Moses and Elijah, and a bright cloud appeared and God said, "This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased.17:00-17:08Listen to him." And the three disciples were like the Israelites of old, terrified by the voice of God.17:09-17:11But when they looked up, they saw only Jesus.17:14-17:26Second, the most direct connection A connection between the prophet and God speaking in the 10 commandments out of a stormy cloud is found in Matthew 5-7, the Sermon on the Mount.17:29-17:33Jesus, seeing the crowds, went up on the mountain.17:34-17:36And when he sat down, his disciples came to him.17:37-17:39And he opened his mouth and taught them.17:41-17:42And what did he teach them?17:44-17:50Well, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus exegeted the law, including most of the 10 commandments.17:51-17:59The greatest commandment, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and then to love your neighbor as yourself.18:01-18:12In that sermon, he showed the people that righteousness was not about outwardly keeping rules, but inward devotion to God that flowed from a broken and contrite heart.18:14-18:18a heart that revealed itself in confident dependence on God.18:20-18:31Instead of fire and terror, Jesus spoke to the people face to face on the mountain, just as they requested of Moses so long ago.18:32-18:41He revealed God to be merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.18:42-18:50And when Jesus finished, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority.18:52-18:57And yet, as so often happened in Israel's history, they did not all listen.18:59-19:06Yeah, there were those who did, but it seems for the most part, people were going out to Jesus for signs and wonders.19:07-19:08The crowds were fickle.19:08-19:10They were ambivalent about him.19:11-19:15and the religious leaders were so hostile, they wanted to kill him.19:18-19:26In Jesus, Israel got what she asked for hundreds of years earlier, a prophet speaking God's words to them face to face.19:27-19:35And even though his teaching astonished them, they eventually decided that Jesus really wasn't the prophet or Messiah they wanted after all.19:36-19:38They wanted a vending machine God.19:38-19:42They wanted a Messiah-o-matic and give them what they wanted.19:46-19:57You see, the divide between what the people craved and who Jesus is, is revealed in a third event that demonstrated the prophet would be like Moses.20:00-20:06The third thing Jesus did on a mountainside that proved He was the prophet like Moses is this.20:07-20:12He fed well over 5,000 people with bread and fish.20:14-20:36According to John 6, after everyone had eaten their fill and 12 baskets of leftovers were collected, the people said, "This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world." And a day or two later, the people went looking for Jesus in Capernaum because they wanted more bread to eat.20:37-20:49Jesus knew what they wanted and he told them, "Do not work for the food that perishes, "but for the food that endures to eternal life, "which the Son of Man will give you.20:52-21:16"For on Him, God the Father has set His seal." And then the people said to him, "What must we do to be doing the works of God?" And Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent." So the people said, "Jesus, what sign do you do that we might believe you?21:18-21:26What are you going to do for us, Jesus, that will persuade us to believe in you?" And then they said, "Our fathers ate manna in the wilderness.21:27-21:40Have you got more bread?" Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly I say to you, "it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, "but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.21:41-22:02"For the bread of God is he who comes down "from heaven and gives life to the world." They said to him, "Sir, give us this bread always." Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life." The people responded to Jesus' assertion with grumbling.22:03-22:11First, because he said, "He's the bread that comes down from heaven." They're like, "We want food.22:11-22:12We want bread.22:12-22:21We don't want you." But their grumbling increased because of Jesus' next extraordinary statement.22:24-22:28He said, "I am the living bread that came down from heaven.22:28-22:31"If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever.22:32-22:36"And the bread that I will give "for the life of the world is my flesh.22:36-22:41"Whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me.22:42-22:47"This is the bread that came down from heaven, "not like the bread the fathers ate and died.22:48-22:57"Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever." Well, this was just all too much for the Jews.22:57-22:59This was just too bizarre.23:01-23:09Jesus was speaking of himself as eternal nourishment, and all they could think about was their temporary physical hunger.23:10-23:24Like the Jews in the wilderness who grumbled about God providing manna for 40 years, the crowds and even many of Jesus' disciples grumbled about Jesus being the true bread of God.23:25-23:32Like Moses, Jesus led and fed the people in ways that revealed His prophetic office.23:33-23:35But they did not all believe.23:36-23:37They took offense at Him.23:39-23:42Many turned back and no longer walked with Him.23:45-23:50So Jesus asked the 12 if they too wanted to leave Him.23:50-23:52But Peter said, "Lord, to whom shall we go?23:53-23:55You have the words of eternal life.23:56-24:00And we have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God.24:03-24:07You see, Peter recognized Jesus is more than the prophet.24:07-24:14He declares Jesus is the anointed one, the Son of God, because Jesus spoke God's words of eternal life.24:17-24:22And what was the most important thing that Jesus said during his earthly ministry?24:23-24:27What did he explicitly prophesy at least three times?24:29-24:33And what did he emphasize in other ways multiple times to his disciples?24:35-24:41That he would be mocked and flogged and crucified and that he would be raised to life the third day.24:42-24:44It's a pretty extraordinary prophecy.24:47-25:05But you see, this was extremely perplexing to the disciples because they said, "Jesus, you're telling the truth." And along with the words that he spoke and the signs and wonders that he performed, all of this amply demonstrated that Jesus was in fact the Messiah.25:06-25:14There's no way he could be a false prophet because they knew that a false prophet will die if he lies.25:16-25:18Look at Deuteronomy 18.20.25:19-25:38"The prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name, that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die." The religious leaders, particularly the Pharisees and their lawyers, they insisted that Jesus was a liar.25:39-25:43They claimed he was merely witnessing about himself and that his testimony wasn't true.25:45-25:57Well, Jesus countered that by saying that God the Father is also born witness about me and that he who sent me is true and I declare to the world what I have heard from him.25:58-26:02They did not understand that he'd been speaking to them about the Father.26:04-26:25So Jesus said to them, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own authority but speak just as the Father taught me." In this passage from John chapter 8, Jesus hints at what the religious leaders are planning to do to him.26:26-26:34They want to kill him, and he knows that their murderous maneuverings will result in his crucifixion.26:36-26:38You see, this is the supreme irony.26:39-26:42A prophet will die if he lies.26:43-26:49But they killed Jesus for telling the truth, just like they did the prophets of old.26:50-26:56And when Jesus was lifted up on the cross, his opponents thought he got what he deserved.26:57-27:06They were certain he was a false prophet, because if he wasn't, he wouldn't be suffering a vicious and humiliating death at the hand of Gentiles.27:09-27:17He was on the cross, the chief priests and other religious leaders mocked Him, saying, "He saved others. He can't save Himself.27:18-27:40Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe." And yet in the midst of His agony, Jesus cried out, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" His enemies might have said, You're forsaken because you're a liar.27:41-27:44Everyone who gets hung on a tree is accursed.27:45-27:51The fact that we were able to get you crucified is proof that you, Jesus, are accursed by God.27:52-27:53You're no prophet.27:57-28:02But by crying out the first line of Psalm 22, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?28:03-28:13Jesus continues to speak the word of God in a way that reveals that the cross is the culmination of his earthly mission.28:15-28:17Psalm 22 is a messianic psalm.28:18-28:22It summarizes the Messiah's humiliation and exaltation.28:23-28:24Let's look at a few passages.28:26-28:27Verses seven and eight.28:28-28:30All who see me mock me.28:30-28:32They make mouths at me.28:32-28:33"For they wag their heads.28:34-28:35"He trusts in the Lord.28:36-28:37"Let Him deliver him.28:37-28:44"Let Him rescue him, for He delights in him." Then verses 16 and 18, through 18.28:45-28:46"For dogs encompass me.28:47-28:49"A company of evil doers encircles me.28:50-28:53"They have pierced my hands and feet.28:53-28:55"I can count all my bones.28:55-28:57"They stare and gloat over me.28:57-29:00"They divide my garments among them.29:00-29:27"For My clothing they cast lots." And finally, verses 22-25, "Reflect the Father's care in the midst of Jesus' great suffering and His resurrection." He says, "I will tell of Your name to My brothers, and in the midst of the congregation, I will praise You." Stop there for a minute and think about that.29:28-29:34Christ is on the cross, and he's telling the name of God to his brothers.29:34-29:39In the midst of the congregation, he is praising God.29:40-29:42All you who fear the Lord, praise him.29:42-29:48All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him, and stand in awe of him.29:49-30:03All you offspring of Israel, for he is not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, "And He has not hidden His face from him, but He has heard when he cried to Him.30:04-30:19And from you comes my praise in the great congregation, my vows I will perform before those who fear Him." You see, even in the throes of death, Jesus preached to all who would listen and believe.30:20-30:38If those who heard Jesus cry began themselves to recite this Messianic Psalm, perhaps the realization began to take hold that what they were reciting was happening right before their eyes.30:41-31:00The psalmist's words are being fulfilled here and now, just as Jesus said, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man, "then you will know that I am He." And perhaps the horrible realization set in, we've killed the Messiah.31:01-31:12And perhaps that is why, as Luke records, all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, they returned home beating their breasts.31:13-31:15We have killed the Messiah.31:18-31:24But what looked like an accursed death to the crowd instead a triumph over death.31:25-31:34On the cross, Jesus put death to death, and in his resurrection, he offers eternal life to all who would believe in him.31:36-31:38All that Jesus said came to pass.31:39-31:41He said he would die, and he did.31:42-31:44He said he would return to life, and he did.31:45-31:48He is the reliable and trustworthy prophet.31:48-31:51Every word He spoke was true.31:53-31:55And He is still our prophet today.31:56-31:58We have His word.31:58-32:03We have God's word and His Spirit to lead us into all truth.32:05-32:17You know, everyone who preaches is obligated to faithfully and accurately speak in the name of the Lord Jesus and to preach His words, not our own.32:17-32:20In this way, Jesus is still our prophet.32:21-32:25He indwells his people to speak to his people from his word.32:28-32:35Therefore, now that you know that Jesus is the prophet, will you listen to him?32:38-32:45Will you daily cast off worldly thinking and unbiblical ideas and commit to reading and meditating on God's word?32:47-32:58Are you willing to jettison old patterns of negative thinking and replace them with what the Bible says about your worth and your purpose in Jesus Christ?32:58-33:05Will you conform your thinking to God's truth and Jesus' example and teaching?33:08-33:14Or will you continue to seek advice from the influencers and false prophets clamoring for your attention?33:16-33:17Will you look for guidance?33:18-33:26Will you look for guidance in the gudo that shapes and drives the lives of so many people?33:30-33:35The skeptic will say, "Ah, I don't believe anything in the Bible is true.33:36-33:37It offends my reason.33:38-33:39I'm an independent thinker.33:40-33:52I don't need a God or a religion to tell me what to do." But that same person has no problem with the collective hive mind telling them what to think.33:53-33:57And they'll employ artificial intelligence to do their thinking for them.34:00-34:03So much intelligence, so little wisdom.34:05-34:20The short of it is, if you refuse to listen to what Jesus says, If you take offense at him and his words, you're just like the Israelites and the religious leaders in past time.34:21-34:26You're essentially putting him to death in your heart and in your mind.34:28-34:31Now, there are probably very few people in this room that hate Jesus.34:34-34:44And if we took a survey of the people in this room, probably most of you would agree that, Yeah, we shouldn't be committing the kinds of sins which the world heartily approves.34:46-34:49We shouldn't be following all that chatter out there.34:51-35:05And yet how many of us choose to remain on friendly terms with the world and feel free to indulge in all its whims and entertainments and pleasures so long as we avoid open sin.35:08-35:22The most dangerous sin is the idea that we can listen to worldly prophets advocating for the lusts and pleasures of the world and follow along and yet still be devoted to Christ.35:23-35:30Beloved, you cannot listen to and serve multiple masters and still walk uprightly before Jesus Christ.35:31-35:35You must listen to Christ and serve Him only.35:38-36:14Jesus is the prophet. Will you believe in him? In some ways I have laid this sermon out like a closing argument in a court case. You've heard from the witnesses Moses, God the Father, Peter, and of course Jesus himself. And you have evidence to consider more than 5,000 people fed on a mountainside. Jesus transfigured on a mountain. And of course Jesus crucified on a cross just as he said he would be.36:17-36:36And then this singular fact. Jesus rose from the dead on the third day according to the Scriptures and according to his own prophetic words. He to pay the penalty for their sins and remove the penalty of death.36:37-36:43And rising again, he offers forgiveness of sin and eternal life for all who would believe in him.36:46-36:48So you've heard the evidence.36:49-36:51You must now render a verdict.36:52-36:59Will you believe that Jesus is everything he says he is, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world?37:00-37:03He's the one mediator between God the Father and humanity.37:04-37:07He is the only priest, prophet, and king.37:08-37:13And Jesus is the only name given among people under heaven by which we can be saved.37:15-37:22If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.37:23-37:26With the heart one believes and is justified.37:27-37:30and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.37:32-37:33Jesus is the prophet.37:35-37:37Will you speak His words?37:40-37:44As disciples of Christ, we are all prophets of His gospel.37:45-37:49We are to proclaim His life, death, and resurrection until He returns.37:50-37:52This is no mystery religion.37:53-37:56There is no hidden knowledge in the Scriptures.37:56-37:58There are no secret rites to perform.37:59-38:02The words of Christ are all out in the open.38:03-38:10And we have the awesome privilege of possessing the oracles of God, the word of God.38:10-38:13We have God's words in our hands.38:16-38:20It's not always been true, but it's true for us.38:22-38:28Do we have the ability to read it, to reason through it, to engage with it by the help of the Holy Spirit?38:31-38:38We can personally and intimately know God, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe.38:40-38:50Jesus reveals the truth so that we can repent of our sins, trust in His finished work on the cross and receive the gift of eternal life now and forever.38:55-39:16And we have the responsibility of repeating his words clearly to others so that they may hear and believe in him by faith too. God forgive us for shirking our responsibility to share the gospel and for being insensible to the the spiritual condition of the lost and the dying.39:18-39:19We must speak His words.39:19-39:22We must share the good news of what He has done.39:24-39:33We are like beggars dressed in fine linen telling other beggars where to find bread and new garments.39:34-39:37It is the most loving and kindest thing we can do.39:39-39:42as our worship team returns to the stage.39:45-39:46I will conclude with this.39:49-39:52Not everyone will listen to us.39:53-39:55But then they didn't all listen to Jesus either.39:57-39:58Not everyone will believe.40:00-40:02But then they did not all believe in Jesus either.40:04-40:08We are not responsible for the results of sharing the gospel.40:09-40:11The results are for God to work out.40:13-40:18Our responsibility is to faithfully speak the words of God from Scripture.40:19-40:24For faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.40:25-40:25Let's pray.40:28-40:31The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul.40:32-40:36The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.40:37-40:40The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart.40:42-40:45The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.40:47-40:49The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever.40:51-40:54The rules of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.40:56-41:04Let the words of our mouths and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight.41:04-41:08O Lord, our rock and our Redeemer.41:09-41:09Amen. Small Group DiscussionRead Deuteronomy 18:14-22What was your big take-away from this passage / message?Can you assess how deeply worldly ideas influence your thinking? What about how deeply they influence your view of Scripture? How about your walk with Christ?What expectations do you have of God? That is, what do you want from Him, and what do you want to hear from Him? How do these questions and your answers relate to Israel's history with the LORD?It was said the sermon was constructed like a closing argument, requiring a verdict. Imagine you are a jury member – was enough evidence and testimony presented to render a judgment that Jesus is the Messiah? If not, what further evidence would you seek? Where would you look for that evidence?What are some reasons we don't take seriously our responsibility share the Gospel of Christ with others? How valid are those reasons?BreakoutPray for one another.

Send a textThis is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased” Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord. Psalm 19:14Tongue has the power of life and death. Proverbs 18:21Like a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death is one who deceives their neighbor and says, “I was only joking!” Proverbs 26:18-19We can make a large horse go wherever we want by means of a small bit in its mouth. And a small rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot chooses to go, even though the winds are strong. In the same way, the tongue is a small thing that makes grand speeches. People can tame all kinds of animals, birds, reptiles, and fish, but no one can tame the tongue. It is restless and evil, full of deadly poison. James 3:3-5, 7-8What is impossible  for humans is possible for God!How to TAME your tongue.T –Think   before you  Speak.Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. James 1:19And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Philippians 4:8A – Ask God to purify  your heart. You snakes—how can you say good things when you are evil? For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. Matthew 12:34The condition  of your heart will be revealed by the content  of your speechCreate in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Psalm 51:10M – Meditate on God's Word. Garbage in , Garbage out This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. Joshua 1:8Put God's word in   now, so it will come out   when you need it.E – Encounter God's Presence.In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Isaiah 6:1Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.” Isaiah 6:5Discussion Questions:Think about a time when someone's words deeply encouraged or discouraged you. What did they say, and why did it stick with you?Psalm 19:14 asks that both our words and our thoughts be acceptable to God. Why do you think the writer includes both speech and meditation of the heart?When do you most need a yellow light in your conversations?What practical habits could help you fill your heart with God's truth so that life-giving words come out naturally? Thank you for listening to the Relate Community Church podcast! Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode. If today's message spoke to you, share it with a friend or leave us a review to help spread the word. To learn more about Relate Community Church, visit us at www.relatecommunity.com. You are always welcome here, and remember—you are loved

Disciplines of Engagement are the active spiritual practices that help you connect with God, experience His presence, and grow in Christlike character.

Living in the Last Days Pt. 1: Life In Three Dimensions 1 Thess. 1:1-10 By Louie Marsh, 2-22-2026   "16But this is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: 17" 'And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh…(Acts 2:16a, ESV)   TO LIVE IN THE LAST DAYS I NEED…   Three Graces to  MOTIVATE me.   1) FAITH   "3remembering before our God and Father your work of faith… (1 Thessalonians 1:3a, ESV)   Work = a job or task   · Faith brings us into SALVATION.   "8For by grace you have been saved through faith… (Ephesians 2:8, ESV)   · Faith looks BACK. (TO THE CROSS)   "20I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." (Galatians 2:20, ESV)   · Faith always produces ACTION.   "26For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead." (James 2:26, ESV)   2) LOVE   "3…your…labor of love… (1 Thessalonians 1:3b, ESV)   labor = to cut, beat and used of working bread dough   · Love is my response to GOD LOVING me.   "19We love because he first loved us." (1 John 4:19, ESV)   · Love looks at the NOW.   "17But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?" (1 John 3:17, ESV)   · Love keeps me GOING through the tough times.   "18Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth." (1 John 3:18, ESV)   3) HOPE   "3…and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Thessalonians 1:3, ESV)   · Hope keeps me from GIVING UP.   "4For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope." (Romans 15:4, ESV)   · Hope looks AHEAD.   "24For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience." (Romans 8:24–25, ESV)   · Hope is just as IMPORTANT as faith & Love.   [1 Cor. 13; Gal. 5:5-6; Col. 1:4-5; Heb. 10:22-24; 1 Pet. 1:22-23; 1 Thess. 5:8]   4) AIDS TO COMMUNICATE God's plan   ·  The CONTENT of the gospel.   "5because our gospel came to you not only in word…(1 Thessalonians 1:5a, ESV)   ·  God's POWER   "5… but also in power…(1 Thessalonians 1:5b, ESV)   · BEING FILLED with the Holy Spirit.   "5… and in the Holy Spirit..." (1 Thessalonians 1:5c, ESV)   · A vital FAITH in Christ.   "5… and with full conviction." (1 Thessalonians 1:5d, ESV)   5) Necessary RESPONSES TO GOD   · I must TURN from my idols   "9For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols…(1 Thessalonians 1:9a, ESV)   · I must live to SERVE God alone.   "9…to serve the living and true God," (1 Thessalonians 1:9b, ESV)   · I must LOOK FORWARD to Christ's return.   "10and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come." (1 Thessalonians 1:10, ESV)    

Introduction: Matters of Marriage: A Word for Each of You. (1 Corinthians 7:8-16) Singles: Enjoy the GIFT of SINGLENESS or GET MARRIED. (1 Cor 7:8-9) Single & Want to Get Married? 3 Don'ts: Don't SETTLE. Don't Look for the RIGHT PERSON. Don't Seek MARRIAGE – Seek LOVE. Married Christians: STAY MARRIED. (1 Cor 7:10-11) Married to a NonChristian (Who Wants to Stay Married): STAY MARRIED. (1 Cor 7:12-14) Married to a NonChristian (Who Wants to Leave): LET THEM GO. (1 Cor 7:15-16) Romans 7:2 – For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. Matthew 19:8 – He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce...” Matthew 19:9 - “And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.” Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANKHint: Highlight blanks above for answers! AUDIO TRANSCRIPT 00:36-00:39Open up those Bibles, 1 Corinthians chapter 7.00:41-00:42Chapter 7.00:44-00:47We're in the third section of 1 Corinthians.00:48-00:51Chapters 1 through 4 is about unity.00:52-00:54Like church, get it together.00:56-00:58Chapters 5 and 6 are about purity.01:01-01:08And then when we get to chapter 7 verse 1, you see that Paul is addressing some questions that they had.01:10-01:17And the first subject of this Q&A session is marriage.01:20-01:22So that's where we are.01:22-01:24We go where the text takes us.01:24-01:33I'm going to ask that you would please just quiet your heart before the Lord for a moment and pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's Word.01:33-01:44This is a passage that is going to get a reaction, and it's not about really my opinion or your opinion, it's what did God actually say?01:45-01:46That's what we're going after, right?01:48-01:52So pray for me to be faithful to clearly communicate what God said.01:52-01:57I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive what it is that God said.01:57-01:59All right, let's just take a moment and pray.02:02-02:16Our Father in heaven, I know that many times in my life I've had strong opinions about things that have had to change because of what your Word says.02:22-02:26Because at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what any of us think, Father, It only matters what you think.02:27-02:42So I just pray that you would give us wisdom, that you would eliminate any distractions in our hearts and minds so we can just lock into what your Word has to say here.02:44-02:45It's for the glory of your name.02:46-03:00We pray in Jesus' name, and all of God's people said, "Amen." If you've been with us at all through our series in 1 Corinthians, we've seen that everything was a mess, right?03:00-03:06So now Paul's talking about marriage and no surprise, marriage was a mess.03:07-03:09We talked about this last week.03:09-03:16There were people strong on the single side and there were people strong on the marriage side.03:16-03:17Which one is good?03:17-03:21And the answer is both of them are good.03:23-03:28Marriage was a mess in Corinth, and if we're going to be honest, we're not doing so hot here today either.03:31-03:38As I was preparing this, I get an email that has just short news articles in it and updates and things like that.03:39-03:42And I just read this on Friday, I wanted to share part of this article with you.03:43-03:50This is the newest craze, I haven't heard of this one, maybe you have, but the newest craze is divorce rings.03:51-03:52Have you heard of divorce rings?03:53-03:54Raise your hand if you've heard of divorce rings.03:55-03:57Okay, a couple of you have, all right.03:58-04:04This is new as far as this article told us, but I just want to read part of it.04:04-04:18It says, "The diamond ring Alex Weinstein," that's a female, "wears every day is a reminder that once upon a time she said, "I do," these days she happily says she does not.04:20-04:45Weinstein got divorced last March and tossed her engagement ring in a drawer for a few months. Then the Tampa, Florida-based content creator decided to make herself a divorce ring. She reset a radiant three-carat stone from her ex- husband into gold, turning it east to west in a bezel." I should have looked up what that meant.04:45-04:46Anybody know what a bezel is?04:47-04:48Okay, nobody?04:49-04:50All right, I shouldn't have said anything, huh?04:51-04:53I was safe until I just said that.04:53-04:55All right, noted.04:55-04:56That helps me for the second service.04:58-05:07The shame and stigma, the article goes on, "The shame and stigma of divorce has been replaced for some women with empowerment and celebration.05:10-05:17While diamond rings have long been a cultural signifier of marriage, some women are also choosing to mark the end of their matrimonies with a little bling.05:21-05:26Weinstein says, "I'm not proud of getting divorced, but I am proud of putting myself first.05:28-05:34Why shouldn't I celebrate this chapter of my life?" Why am I sharing this article with you?05:36-05:49Because I think if anything sort of personifies how far we have drifted as a culture from God's ideal, I think this kind of nails it.05:50-05:53We are celebrating divorce.05:55-05:56We are celebrating it!06:00-06:04You know, we look at Corinth and we're like, "Man, those people were messed up." Us people are messed up.06:08-06:20Back to Corinth, though, some would say...some in Corinth had said, "Excuse me." Some said, "You know, being single is actually being more devoted to God." And they actually had married people get a divorce.06:21-06:36Like, "Hey, you'll be more devoted to God if you get the divorce." And then there were some that said, "Look, if you want to be devoted to God, you can't have intimate relations with a woman.06:36-06:48So if you want to stay married, just don't have any intimacy." Those were some of the thoughts they had in Corinth, and both of those are wrong.06:50-06:54In the previous passage, again, Paul said, "Staying single is good.06:54-06:56Marriage is good.06:56-06:59And intimacy in marriage should be a regular thing.07:03-07:05But what if I'm not in a biblical marriage?07:09-07:12What I mean is, what if I'm not married to a Christian?07:13-07:29I mean, you could go through the last couple of messages and say, "Oh, that's well and good for two people who love Jesus Christ, have the Word of God as their authority, and Oh yeah, like easy for them.07:31-07:33But what about me, Paul?07:34-07:38My spouse isn't a believer, so what am I supposed to do?07:40-07:41Should I just get a divorce?07:44-07:44What should I do?07:46-09:17Well, in this section we're looking at today, Paul clarifies matters of marriage addressing everyone in the church. Literally everyone in the church and everyone in this church. So this is kind of a good news/bad news thing. We're not having one sermon today. You're like, "All right, we are having four sermons today. All right, four sermons." Because each of these are very specifically addressed to a different group. So first up, matters of marriage, a word for each of you. You can take notes on the other ones if you like, but pay attention into the category you fall. Number one, singles. Singles, a word for you, here it is. Enjoy the gift of singleness or get married. Enjoy the gift of singleness or get married. All right, so if you're here and you're single, if you're streaming and you're single, if for you. All right? If you're single, enjoy that if it's a gift or get married. Look at verse 8. Paul says, "To the unmarried and the widows, I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am." Unmarried for any reason, right? Paul, once again, this is a We're going to go through this quickly.09:18-09:19We talked all about this last week.09:19-09:21Paul said being single is good.09:23-09:23Right?09:23-09:24Being single is good.09:24-09:26Why is he circling back to that?09:26-09:34Because there were Jews in Corinth that said, "You couldn't be holy unless you were married." That was a common Jewish mindset in that day.09:35-09:36You couldn't be holy unless you were married.09:36-09:41Paul's like, "That's not true." All right?09:41-09:43It's a gift for some people.09:45-09:47And Paul listed himself as one of those people.09:48-09:50Paul here very clearly says that he was single.09:51-09:52Like what happened to Paul?09:52-09:52Did he get a divorce?09:53-09:54Did his wife leave him?09:54-09:55Is he a widower?09:56-09:57We have no idea.09:59-10:03We don't know the details, but we know from this verse that he was single.10:06-10:07Okay, so single people, listen.10:10-10:27not denying that there are pressures to being single that married couples do not have. Things like loneliness, things like trying to manage a household yourself.10:28-10:34There are pressures that single people experience that married people don't.10:35-10:39But Paul is reminding the single people again, it is not wrong.10:40-10:44You don't have to feel like you're a second-rate Christian because you're not married.10:44-10:46It is not wrong.10:46-10:51And we're going to see later in this chapter, there are actually some advantages to being single.10:52-10:54All right, but look at verse 9.10:56-11:05He says, "But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry.11:06-11:16For it is better to marry than to burn with passion." So Paul's like, "Okay, you're single, but you have those urges.11:19-11:20You can't control yourself.11:20-11:23You like want to be with a person so badly.11:24-11:27Like you found that being single really isn't for you.11:27-11:28What should I do?11:28-11:29Paul's like, get married.11:30-11:31Get married.11:32-11:35He says it's better to marry than to burn.11:36-11:37Again, we talked about this last week.11:37-11:40If you have the gift of singleness, you aren't burning.11:42-11:47But if you have those desires, God gave the right context to use them.11:48-11:49That's why he says get married.11:50-11:50Get married.11:50-11:54You have the passion, you have the desire, get married.11:57-12:07I've got to say a couple of things about that, unless somebody runs out of here today, runs right across the street to Pantera Bread, and is like, "Look, Pastor Jeff said to get married.12:07-12:10Are you single?" No, okay, "Are you single?" "No, I'm going to find somebody.12:10-12:11Pastor Jeff said to get married.12:12-12:12It's right in the Bible.12:13-12:15I've got to find somebody today." Let's pump the brakes for a second.12:17-12:17All right?12:17-12:21If you're single and you want to get married, I'm going to give you three don'ts here, all right?12:23-12:27He says to get married, yes, but I want to caution you on a couple of things here.12:27-12:28Three don'ts.12:29-12:30Letter A, don't settle.12:32-12:33Don't settle.12:36-12:38I know being single can be hard.12:39-12:40Do you know what's harder than being single?12:42-12:44Being married to the wrong person.12:46-12:54Rushing into a marriage, not really knowing somebody, not understanding they don't really love you, they don't really love the Lord as they should.12:58-13:02It is absolutely heartbreaking how many times I've seen that.13:02-13:14Somebody wanting marriage so badly that the first single person that comes along that looks eligible and there's some kind of interest, we're rushing right into it, and oh, the regret that comes from that.13:15-13:16I've made a huge mistake.13:17-13:18What do I do now?13:20-13:30settle. Letter B, don't look for the right person. Don't look for the right person.13:34-14:46Like, wait a minute, you just said it was bad to be married to the wrong person, now you're telling me not to look for the right person? Yeah, don't look for the right person. You need to focus on trying to be the right person, all right? Try to to be the right person. In the early days of this church when we were really teeny tiny we had a single guy that came to me. He came up to me, he goes, "Pastor Jeff, I think I'm going to go to another church." I'm like, "Oh, why? What's the matter?" He goes, "I love this church so much, but I really want to meet somebody and I just really want to get married." Not a lot of single people in that tiny church. And I said, "That's a terrible way to pick a church. You know, who's got the best single scene? I said, "That's a terrible way to pick a church." I said, "You need to find a church where God is feeding you and where God is using you. You find a church where that's happening, you trust God to do the rest." He's like, "You're right." He goes, "You're right." And it wasn't long after that he did find a single lady, even in her teeny tiny church, and they're married. They since moved away and they have like, I I don't know, 20 or 25 kids, I don't know.14:47-15:03But the point was he was willing to trust God and seeking God first and seeking to be the person worth marrying, not just trying to find the right person for him.15:04-15:06So try to be the right person for somebody else.15:08-15:12Letter C, I read this great advice from a pastor this past week.15:12-15:19He said, "Don't seek marriage, seek love." Don't seek marriage, seek love.15:20-15:24Because ultimately, you're going to marry the person that you fall in love with.15:26-15:27All right?15:27-15:33So when Paul here says, "Look, if you have the desire," he goes, "Don't burn with passion." He goes, "Go get married.15:33-15:41Go get married." But again, let's temper that with, let's not rush into anything.15:43-15:44It's going to bring regret.15:45-15:52God has called you, God has called all of us to be content and thankful in every chapter of life we find ourselves.15:54-15:56So singles, this sermon's for you.15:56-15:58Enjoy the gift of singleness or get married.15:59-15:59All right?16:02-16:04All right, next sermon.16:04-16:06This is for married Christians.16:07-16:09Are you and your spouse both Christians?16:10-16:38a word for you. Stay married. Very simple. Very simple. Look at verse 10. Paul says, "To the married I give this charge, not I, but the Lord. The wife should not separate from her husband." Not separate, obviously, he's talking about divorce. So he's talking here specifically to Christian couples.16:40-16:46We know this because he talks about mixed couples in verse 12.16:46-16:49And by the way, let's get this out of the way.16:50-16:56When we talk about mixed couples, or we talk about intermarrying, that has nothing to do with race.16:58-17:00There's only one race, there's the human race.17:01-17:10So as long as you're marrying another human of the opposite sex, oh, the things I didn't think I'd have to say.17:14-17:15Race doesn't matter.17:15-17:16Okay?17:16-17:21So when we talk about mixed marriages, biblically there is no such thing except for mixed faith.17:22-17:26That's what the Bible forbids, mixed faith marriages.17:26-17:28He talks about them in a second, all right?17:28-17:29I felt like I had to say that.17:35-17:50So Christian couples, Paul says, "I get a word for you," he goes, "not I, but the Lord." Meaning Paul's like, "Look, what I'm about to tell you came straight from the mouth of Jesus Christ Himself." This is the Lord's charge, all right?17:52-17:57The Lord's charge is, Christian couples, no divorce.17:59-18:00Divorce isn't an option.18:00-18:02Divorce isn't a word that's said in your home.18:04-18:10Jesus talked about this so many times, Matthew 5, Matthew 19, Mark 10, Luke 16.18:11-18:15Jesus taught over and over that marriage is meant to be lifelong.18:16-18:16All right?18:18-18:45So we're going to try you out for a year or two, if it's not going to work, we have our exit strategy. That's not how marriage is designed according to our Lord. Marriage is meant to be lifelong. And remember, there were some Corinthians that thought, "Yeah, but if you really want to be devoted to God, you've got to get a divorce." And Paul here is just saying, "You know, God's not on board with that." I mean, just imagine for a second.18:48-19:08for a second if that sentiment was legitimate. Let's just pretend for a second that you could be more devoted to God, you could be more devoted to Jesus if you got a divorce. Do you see what would happen? Everyone that's looking for an out would just use that excuse.19:11-19:13They'd be like, "You know what, sweetheart?19:14-19:27I think we should get a divorce because I just want to love Jesus more." Right?19:27-19:28It'd start a new phrase.19:28-19:36It would be, "It's not you, it's Him." Right?19:36-19:37But that was the mindset they had.19:37-19:38And Paul's like, "No, no, no, no.19:40-19:42The words of our Lord are quite clear.19:43-19:52Don't get a divorce." But then you have the person that's like, "Oh, Paul, I wish you would have wrote this letter two weeks ago, because I did buy it.19:52-19:53You know what?19:53-20:00Yeah, we are both believers, but I bought into the idea that getting a divorce would benefit my walk.20:00-20:05So what do you do if you are both Christians and you did get a divorce?20:05-20:09What do you do about that?" Well, look at verse 11.20:09-20:18He says, "But if she does get a divorce, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband.20:21-20:28And the husband should not divorce his wife." Okay, so if you're like, "You know what?20:28-20:33I did get the divorce, and now looking back, we are both believers.20:33-20:37I shouldn't have done that." Paul goes, "Okay, well now you have two choices.20:37-20:58You're either unmarried the rest of your life, or go back to your husband and get back on track." Like, "I'm not sure that's possible." Well, if you're both Christians, forgiveness and healing and reconciliation should not be foreign concepts to you.21:01-21:04So if you and your spouse are both Christians, stay married.21:06-21:07All right?21:07-21:11And as we saw last week, verse 3, married Christian couples, pay your debt.21:13-21:13All right?21:14-21:16I know that's the sermon that always gets applied.21:16-21:20I know the nursery is going to be restocked in about nine months.21:21-21:21I know.21:24-21:25So married Christians.21:26-21:26All right.21:27-21:33This is where things get even more difficult.21:35-21:39This is addressed to those of you who are married to a non-Christian.21:39-21:44And I know there are some people in this church that are married to a non-Christian.21:46-21:49But this non-Christian wants to stay married.21:49-22:02Okay, you're like, "Yeah, my husband's not a believer, or my wife's not a believer, and Like, she's okay with me being a believer, and she's okay with me going to church, and she wants to stay married, so what do I do?22:02-22:03What do I do here?22:06-22:11God says, "Stay married." Stay married.22:14-22:21You know, back in, look at the, back in chapter 6 verse 15, we talked about this a couple of weeks ago.22:21-22:32Paul says, talking about those who were being sexually immoral with the cult prostitutes, he says, "Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?22:33-22:37Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute?22:38-23:01Never." You see, there would have been some that heard this principle like, "Okay, so me physically being with a prostitute is like defiling for me, so what about me physically being with a non-Christian spouse?23:02-23:13Well, me being intimate, I mean, isn't it the same principle that I am defiling my body because I'm in this mixed marriage?23:14-23:16We have different faiths?23:18-23:20That's the question on the table.23:23-23:32Regarding mixed marriages, meaning one's a believer and one's not, you're like, "What do you do?" Well, first of all, it's forbidden, single people.23:34-23:42Second Corinthians 6.14, if you're single, listen, if you're single, you are not to get married to a non-Christian.23:45-23:46Corinthians 6.14.23:48-23:50You are not to get married to a non-Christian if you're single.23:52-23:54If you can prevent this, you should prevent this.23:55-24:03That people think, "Well, I'm going to get married to the person and I'll save them, and I'm going to be such a good influence on them," and it usually works the other way.24:07-24:12So if you're single, you are not to marry a non-Christian.24:13-24:23So all right, now with that out of the way, the question is, "Well, what if we were married as non-Christians and I got saved and he didn't get saved?" Or vice versa, man.24:23-24:26You're like, "Well, I got saved and my wife didn't get saved.24:26-24:29What do we do?" Well, look at verse 12.24:29-24:54He says, "To the rest I say, 'I, not the Lord, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her." By the way, when he says here, "I, not the Lord," you know what some people do with that, right?24:55-25:11They're like, "Oh, well, this is just Paul's opinion." So we can sort of disregard this section because Paul here, I mean, he's saying that this is just his opinion, and that's not what he's saying at all.25:13-25:29Back in verse 10, he was saying, "I'm quoting Jesus here." Now in verse 12, he's saying, "This is also from the Lord, but this isn't a direct quote from Jesus, do you see?" He's not saying this is uninspired.25:30-26:06He's just saying, "Before I was directly quoting from the ministry of Jesus, and now this is new revelation from God. That's all he's saying. So what if I'm married to a non-Christian and he wants to stay married? Paul says, "You don't get a divorce, you stay married. That's what you do." Like, really? Verse 13, "If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him." Oh yeah, that question, being with this non-Christian make me unholy?26:06-26:10Like isn't it the same principle as being with the prostitutes?26:11-26:13No, not at all.26:14-26:15Because look at verse 14.26:17-26:26For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband.26:29-26:47You see, when one of you is saved and your spouse is not, it's not that the Christian is made unholy in the eyes of God, it's the unsaved person is made holy.26:52-26:53I want to be clear here.26:54-27:01That does not mean that the unbelieving spouse is saved because they're spouses.27:01-27:03That is not what that means.27:03-27:06The Bible is crystal clear on salvation.27:06-27:09Salvation is an individual transaction.27:10-27:14You can't get saved because of somebody else.27:14-27:18Biblically, you have to make the choice to turn from your sin.27:19-27:20You have to make the choice to repent.27:21-27:27You have to make the choice that you are going to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.27:28-27:35It doesn't matter how good of a Christian your grandmama was, or your mama, or your spouse.27:35-27:36It doesn't matter.27:37-27:38You're not saved.27:38-27:40It's not like group raid here, all right?27:42-27:46You're saved by you making the choice.27:47-27:49You're like, all right, so what's he talking about here?27:50-27:57Well, it's a big fancy theological term that's known as matrimonial sanctification.27:58-28:01Impress your friends, drop that in conversation this week.28:02-28:03Do you have a water cooler at your workplace?28:03-28:04Drop that.28:05-28:08Yes, we were talking about matrimonial sanctification at church.28:10-28:12And they're like, "Oh, what is that?" And you'll tell them.28:13-28:18Well, in God's eyes, if one spouse is saved, there's blessing for everyone in the house.28:20-28:22I mean, think about it this way.28:25-28:26Think about it this way.28:26-28:36Imagine this married couple, you have this married couple, and the wife's parents die, and they leave her an inheritance.28:39-28:40They leave her a speedboat.28:42-28:44Now husbands, are you going to benefit from this inheritance?28:48-28:48No?28:49-28:50All right, let me try something else.28:52-28:55Her parents left her a Harley Davidson.28:56-28:58Husbands, are you going to benefit from this inheritance?29:00-29:02Yeah, some of you.29:02-29:03All right, let me try this again.29:06-29:08Her parents left her a monster truck.29:08-29:11Husbands, are you going to benefit from this inheritance?29:12-29:15Okay, this is really going to help for the second service.29:15-29:17Do you see the point?29:17-29:18You got the inheritance.29:19-29:26You know, you're driving grave digger down the road, but you had nothing to do with that, right?29:27-29:31You were blessed just because your wife received an inheritance.29:31-29:33It's the same principle at play here.29:34-29:35You're blessed by association.29:37-29:43In the same way, in marriage, two become one, and when God blesses one, the other gets blessed.29:43-29:48I mean, it's not salvation, but it's better than two pagans being married to each other.29:49-29:49Right?29:49-30:05Think of the blessing that comes to the non-Christian spouse when the Christian spouse is exhibiting the fruit of the Holy Spirit, when the Christian spouse is showing humility and love and service and selflessness.30:05-30:09And how could you not be blessed being in a house like that?30:13-30:14That's what he's talking about.30:16-30:23Oh, and regarding the salvation piece, look, nobody can deny the influence the believing spouse has.30:23-30:32I've heard the story so many times of people getting saved because of the witness that their Christian spouse has had.30:34-30:39So if you're in this situation, if your spouse is unsaved, God wants to reach them through you.30:41-30:43So let him see Christ in you.30:45-30:48And you're like, "Well, that's well and good, but what if we have kids, right?30:48-30:53I mean, I'm saved, he's not.30:53-30:59Does that make our kids like half pagan?" No, no, it really doesn't.30:59-31:01Look at the rest of verse 14.31:02-31:16Paul says, "Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy." See, even if you have kids with a non-Christian, your kids are also made holy through that.31:16-31:16Same principle.31:17-31:23Your kids are also blessed through that because God sees your marriage as holy, so He's going to see your kids as holy.31:24-31:30So if you're married to a non-Christian who wants to stay married, God's going to bless the family.31:31-31:34Stay married if they want to stay.31:36-31:38All right, one more.31:39-31:42One more group we didn't cover, and that's the last one here.31:43-31:48Let's say someone is married to a non-Christian, and that non-Christian is like, "I want out.31:49-31:55Like look, I didn't sign up for all this Jesus stuff, all this Bible study stuff.31:55-31:57I didn't sign up for all this church stuff.31:58-31:58I'm not interested.31:59-32:00I'm not a religious person.32:01-32:05I want out." So what do you do when you're married to a non-Christian who wants to leave?32:05-32:07The answer is, let them go.32:09-32:10Let them go.32:14-32:15Look at verse 15.32:15-32:33He says, "But if the unbelieving partner separates," that's divorce, look what he says, "let it be so." If the non-Christian spouse initiates a divorce, Paul says they can go.32:37-32:38And I know the reaction.32:38-32:39You're like, "Wait, wait.32:39-32:40Well, that means I'm stuck.32:41-32:49You know, I wanted to save this marriage, and they divorced me, and now I can never get remarried again because they left me.32:49-32:53So I'm stuck, right?" Paul doesn't say that.32:56-32:57Paul doesn't say that.32:57-33:04Paul was clear on situations where you had to be remaining unmarried.33:04-33:05We saw that in verse 11.33:06-33:11He was clear in those situations, and he could have said that here, but he didn't.33:13-33:14You can remarry.33:14-33:22If you are married to a non-Christian that abandons you, initiates a divorce, and leaves you, you can remarry.33:23-33:24Look at the rest of verse 15.33:25-33:30He says, "In such cases, the brother or sister is not enslaved." God has called you to peace.33:31-33:32Not enslaved.33:33-33:34Like, not enslaved to what?33:35-33:37He's talking about free from being bound to the marriage.33:38-33:39That's what he's talking about.33:41-33:53See Romans 7, 2 says, "For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives." That's what he's talking about here in 1 Corinthians 7.33:53-33:55That's the bound to the marriage.33:55-33:57He goes, "You're not enslaved.33:57-33:58You're not bound anymore.34:01-34:19You're no longer bound to the marriage." Now look, I know some sermons are easier to preach than others, and divorce is a very touchy subjects.34:26-34:27It's always painful.34:28-34:29It always brings regret and hurt.34:30-34:30I know that.34:33-34:40So I want to take a moment and I want to be clear on my best understanding on the subject biblically.34:42-34:43All right?34:44-34:46I don't want there to be any ambiguity.34:47-34:48I want to be clear.34:48-35:00I believe that there is only one cause for divorce biblically, and that is hardness of heart.35:04-35:05Like, why do I think that?35:05-35:08Well, Jesus was asked about divorce in Matthew 19, eight.35:09-35:09This is what he said.35:10-35:24He said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart, Moses allowed you to divorce." Jesus said divorce was allowed through Moses, through the law, because of hardness of heart.35:25-35:27Again divorce is allowed, not commanded.35:30-35:30Right?35:31-35:32Allowed not commanded.35:34-35:38But the question is, how do you know when someone is hard hearted?35:40-35:43Towards their spouse or towards their marriage, right?35:45-35:46Kind of a hard thing to gauge, isn't it?35:47-35:52Well Jesus said, "I can divorce you if you're hard-hearted." Well you seem hard-hearted to me, I'm getting divorced.35:52-35:53How do you know?35:54-36:07Well biblically there are two ways that hard-heartedness manifests, and both begin with the letter A. It's affair and abandonment.36:11-36:12Jesus spoke on a fair.36:13-36:30Matthew 19, 9, Jesus says, "And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for sexual immorality and marries another commits adultery." Now again, divorce is allowed, but not commanded.36:30-36:39Understand this, when this happens in a marriage, that doesn't mean you are required to get a divorce.36:39-36:43I can tell you so many stories of marriages where this did happen.36:43-36:51And there was much repentance and seeking the Lord, and marriages are on track better than they were on their honeymoon.36:55-37:05But when someone is committed to having relations with people outside the marriage, Jesus says that's evidence of hard-heartedness.37:06-37:08Moses allowed for divorce for that.37:08-37:17Here, Paul is addressing the other manifestation of hard-heartedness, and that's abandonment.37:18-37:22That if your non-Christian spouse divorces you, abandons you, you are free.37:24-37:27That's how you know your spouse is hard-hearted.37:29-37:35When they are willing to engage in relations with someone else, they're hard-hearted towards you.37:35-37:41Or when they're like, "I'm fine to just walk away from this marriage.37:41-37:43I'm fine to walk away from our vows.37:43-37:50I'm fine to walk away from that." Those are evidences of hard-heartedness.37:54-37:57And Jesus says abandonment is like adultery.37:57-37:59I'm sorry, Paul says abandonment here is like adultery.38:00-38:01You are called to peace.38:05-38:10You are not called to fighting a non-Christian to stay in a marriage that they are committed to getting out of.38:12-38:13One more verse.38:15-38:20Paul says, "For how do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband?38:21-38:31Or how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?" You know, people are really divided on what this verse means.38:35-38:41Some people think this verse means, "Well, you don't know if you're going to save your spouse, so let them go.38:41-38:43I mean, you have no guarantees, just let them go.38:44-38:56There's no promises are going to come to Christ, if they say let them go." That's what some people think, but other people think this means, "No, no, no, you might be the one that God uses to save them, so you should try to save your marriage at any cost.38:59-39:00I lean towards the latter.39:04-39:05There's no guarantees either way.39:05-39:06You don't know.39:08-39:10You don't know what God's doing.39:13-39:18So you better be sure that you did all you could to save the marriage.39:20-39:23I personally believe that this verse pumps the brakes.39:26-39:38This verse, as one person I read this past week said, this verse tempers any tendency that just easily give up on the marriage.39:41-39:45Because some people are just so quick to run to divorce as like option one.39:47-39:56Again, if things are hard now, how do you know that God isn't using you to reach your spouse?39:58-40:00Our worship team would make their way back up front.40:07-40:16Paul continues, and I think he's doubling down on some of these things because some of it's hard to accept and some of it's hard to hear.40:17-40:20But again, Paul reminds us that singleness is God's gift for some.40:23-40:25Marriage is God's gift for the rest.40:28-40:30One of these four sermons applies to you.40:32-40:37So whichever it is, go after it with the reverence and with the sacredness that God has called you to.40:38-40:39Let's pray.40:41-40:52Father in heaven, we're asking today, Father, that your Holy Spirit be at work in our hearts.40:54-41:03When we talk about singleness and divorce and all these things, it's such an emotional subject because there are people here that have been deeply wounded by these things.41:06-41:12And we by no means, Father, wanna kick someone when they're down or rub salt on the wound.41:12-41:15We just, we wanna take an honest look at what your word has to say.41:17-41:19Father, we thank you for your grace.41:19-41:21We thank you that you are the God of miracles.41:21-41:35We thank you, God, that no matter how badly things might have gotten in marriage, whether it was able to be saved or not, God, there's always hope with you.41:35-41:37There's always healing with you.41:39-41:40That's why we come to you.41:40-41:51Father, I pray for all of us that we would take a hard look at the place you have us right now, because there's something in here for each one of us.41:55-41:59And that we would go after it, trusting you to always do what you promised.42:00-42:02We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Small Group DiscussionRead 1 Corinthians 7:8-16What was your big take-away from this passage / message?Explain 1 Cor 7:14. How is the nonChristian spouse made holy because of a Christian spouse? What does that mean?If you are married to a nonChristian who wants out of the marriage (1 Cor 7:15), how do you know when to grant their divorce (when to stop trying to save the marriage, asking for counseling, etc)?Why should you allow a nonChristian to divorce and leave a Christian (v15)? Is the believing spouse free to remarry? Why or why not? BreakoutPray for one another.

Read OnlineWhen he got home away from the crowd his disciples questioned him about the parable. He said to them, “Are even you likewise without understanding? Do you not realize that everything that goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters not the heart but the stomach and passes out into the latrine?” Mark 7:17–19We experience varying levels of intimacy in our relationships. Some acquaintances, such as neighbors or colleagues, we only know superficially, while with a spouse, sibling, or close friend, we share a much deeper bond. Yet, even in the most intimate human relationships—such as that of a longtime married couple—we never achieve perfect knowledge of the other person.Similarly, our relationship with Christ must continually deepen. Unlike human relationships, however, God already knows us perfectly—better than we know ourselves. Still, He invites us to grow in knowledge and love of Him as He gradually reveals Himself to us. This ongoing process will continue not only in this life but even in eternity, as we behold the Beatific Vision. In Heaven, our union with God will be ever-expanding, as we enter more deeply into the infinite mystery of His divine presence.In today's Gospel, Jesus revealed Himself more clearly to His closest companions than He did to the crowds. His self-revelation came by way of an intimate teaching about the “parable” He taught to the people. In this context, Jesus' parable was not a traditional parable but a short and direct statement that used symbolic language to convey a deeper spiritual truth. He taught the crowd: “Hear me, all of you, and understand. Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile” (Mark 7:14–15). While seemingly straightforward, this teaching is called a parable because it invites contemplation and requires deeper understanding to grasp its full spiritual significance.In this parable, Jesus' teaching challenged the crowd's preconceived notions regarding purity and holiness. By addressing the heart as the true source of defilement, He invited His listeners to move beyond mere external observance of the law and to focus instead on the inner disposition of their souls. It's also important to understand that He taught His close disciples in a more intimate way than He taught the crowds. After teaching the crowds, Jesus and His disciples went “home,” where they questioned Him about the parable. This intimate moment teaches us that personal prayer is our own “home,” where we encounter Christ away from the distractions of the world. It is there that we must approach Him daily with questions—not out of doubt, but from a desire to know Him more deeply. Questions lead to attentive listening, understanding, and intimacy.At the beginning of our relationship with God, He often speaks in more general terms. For those going through an initial conversion, Jesus' general teachings are life-changing. As we mature in our faith and seek to deepen our relationship with God, we must see ourselves among Jesus' close companions as they grew in holy intimacy. Doing so requires daily effort and intentionality. Just as a married couple cannot grow closer without meaningful communication, so too must we open our hearts to God each day, speaking honestly and listening attentively to His voice. Without this, our relationship with Him risks remaining superficial. Reflect today on the ways you approach your relationship with Christ. Do you seek Him in the quiet of your personal “home,” asking questions and listening attentively? Consider how you can make your prayer life more intentional, opening your heart to deeper understanding and communion with Him. Just as a loving spouse or a close friend takes time to speak and listen, so too must you dedicate time daily to converse with our Lord, allowing Him to lead you into the depths of His divine wisdom and love. My intimate Lord, You desire to reveal Yourself to me, to draw me into Your presence, and to converse with me more profoundly each day. Grant me the desire to know You, the resolve to listen attentively, and the grace to understand the depths of Your truth. Draw me ever closer, dear Lord, into a loving and intimate relationship with You. Jesus, I trust in You!Image via Adobe StockSource: Free RSS feed from catholic-daily-reflections.com — Copyright © 2026 My Catholic Life! Inc. All rights reserved. This content is provided solely for personal, non-commercial use. Redistribution, republication, or commercial use — including use within apps with advertising — is strictly prohibited without written permission.

Dr. Deb Muth 0:03Welcome back to let’s Talk Wellness. Now, I’m your host, Dr. Deb. If you’re a woman who’s doing everything right, eating clean, exercising, taking supplements, yet you still feel exhausted, inflamed, or like your body suddenly stopped cooperating, this episode is for you. Today’s conversation challenges one of the biggest myths in women’s health. That midlife struggles are just about hormones or worse, just part of aging. My guest today is Dr. Deb Heald, a naturopathic physician with one of the most fascinating backgrounds I’ve ever encountered. Yeah, she’s got a really diverse background, which is kind of exciting. She’s been an ER nurse, a stockbroker, a Silicon Valley data analysis, teaching machines to learn from microbiome research. And yes, she holds an mba, too. But it was her own menopause crash that changed everything. When the protocols she had been teaching stopped working for her, her, she didn’t double down on templates or trends. She did what she was trained to do. She followed the data and what she discovered reframed menopause, metabolism and women’s longevity in a completely different way. This isn’t about willpower. It’s not about another diet, and it’s definitely not about copying what worked for someone else. It’s about learning to listen to your body and finally understanding what it’s been trying to tell you and all along. So grab your cup of coffee or tea, settle in, and let’s dive into this amazing conversation about women’s health and menopause. And right after our guest is arriving with us, we’re going to get a word from our sponsor quick here. And then we are going to come right back to having this conversation with Dr. Deb Heald. Ladies, it’s time to reignite your vitality. Primal Queen supplements are clean, powerful formulas made for women like you who want balance, strength, and energy that lasts. Get 25% off@primal queen.com Serenity Health. Because every queen deserves to feel in her prime. But okay. All right. Welcome back, everybody. I am here with my new friend, Dr. Deb Heald. And she has such an amazing background, like I shared with you a few minutes ago. But I would love for her to give us her insight in how she got where she did, because it’s rare that you find somebody with a data background and a medical background. So, Dr. Dove, welcome. Dr Deb Heald 2:30Thank you. I am so glad to be here, and it’s a real privilege to meet you. Dr. Deb Muth 2:34I feel the same way. Dr Deb Heald 2:35Yeah, it’s. I think that the more of us that start to think and practice this way, the easier it’s going to be for women going forward. Because it’s not easy. Dr. Deb Muth 2:44It is not easy. I mean, I’ve been in this industry a long time, over 25 years. And every time I think it’s getting easy, it’s getting harder for a variety of reasons. It’s the medical system, it’s the. The clients we work with are sicker. It’s taking longer to get them to a place where they feel good. There’s just so many variables these days. So tell me a little bit about what got you here. Dr Deb Heald 3:06Well, I made the decision when I was graduating from high school to be a nurse instead of a teacher, because those were really still the two options that were common for women. I thought about medicine at that point, but my sister convinced me that if I would spend all that time learning and practicing medicine, I might not be as good of a mom. So I took the path of nurse, because nurse works around kids schedules and that sort of thing. I’d only been practicing about six months before I thought, oh my gosh, there has to be more to it than this, and toyed with the idea of starting med school at that point, but then married and started having children, and I just sort of fell into that pattern. But I typically work emergency room. There was a short stent in the post anesthesia recovery room as well. And emergency room was a place where western medicine actually shone. Right. People come in, they are no longer capable of functioning, they’re having a heart attack, they lost limb. Whatever else, they do need the, the bells and the whistles of western medicine. But when you think about it, western medicine was derived out of the Civil War where you didn’t have to say what’s the cause of the problem. It was a bullet or a bayonet, and it was, it was about patching up the soldiers and getting them back on the front line so they could continue to fight. And naturopathic medicine, which had been a lot around for an awful lot longer than that, just didn’t work in the battlefield then. The assessment was done in the early 1900s as to which style of medicine got people back to work faster. The Flexner report was all about how corporations could maximize the value of employees. And naturopathic medicine didn’t win because nutritional fixes take a long time. Taking away somebody’s stress so that they can just function more capably is. It’s a, It’s a big ask, right? So the funding of naturopathic medicine went away and western medicine became all that we knew. So in context to the emergency room, it worked. But when I saw the same person coming in, having their third heart attack, I just thought, how is this happening? Has no one told this person what, what’s going on in their lifestyle that’s creating this environment for them to continue to have heart attacks? And so that’s when I made the switch. And that was after 17 years in practice as a nurse to head on over to the naturopathic side. There was a little bit of a, a segue there, but we’d need a much longer interview to get into the details of that. I was a stock broker for six years. Anyway, when I jumped into the idea of med school, it didn’t make sense to be practicing the same thing that was already being practiced because I saw where it worked and I saw where it was failing. So hopped into the naturopathic tract. I also had one child that had a lot of physical and emotional ailments that western medicine couldn’t solve. Their answer to everything was putting her on amoxicillin. And I, I just absolutely could not convince the medical system that she didn’t have a deficiency of antibiotics, but that was their only solution. And so while she was on the antibiotics, her sinuses were clear, her sleep apnea was not an issue, and she appeared better, but her microbiome got decimated. She was on antibiotics for seven years. So, yeah, so my pursuit down the naturopathic pathway was in large part to try and figure out what else could be done for my daughter. And I did take her to a naturopath or I embarked on the field myself. And her GP threatened to call social services. Oh my gosh, yes. Dr. Deb Muth 6:22You hear these stories, I’ve heard these stories from clients before over really dumb things that they’re going to call CPS for. And it always blows my mind that we think it’s appropriate to call CPS on somebody who’s truly not injuring their child. Dr Deb Heald 6:38So anyway, that started my 17 year path in the naturopathic realm. And after, after I’ve been in practice about 10 years, an opportunity came up to move to Silicon Valley and research the microbiome and then take what we were learning from the microbiome and program it into AI. So I did that for a few years and it was amazing. There was a huge disconnect between the funding model and what its expectations were and what the research was able to do. There was a time gap, there was a funding gap. And so I thought, medicine doesn’t understand what’s important to business. And Business isn’t understanding what’s critical to research. So I went and did my MBA and wanted to be able to be the translator between those two worlds. And then the pandemic hit and then. Dr. Deb Muth 7:24Everyone’S life got turned upside down, right? Dr Deb Heald 7:26Yeah. Yeah. So I’m back in private practice. My, my practice always tended to be more autoimmune focused, which is predominantly women and predominantly middle aged women. But through my own experience of menopause and looking at how I assisted people that were in menopause before I was, you know, that the success rate wasn’t as high as it needed to be. And I started to really drill down into the biochemistry behind what was going on and then also realized that my menopause was very different than even my sister’s menopause. There we were, the same genetic template, the same lived environment, though very different lived experiences in that environment. And realized that we have to find ways to make it relevant to the person in front of us. And it’s not so much which herbs will or won’t work historically, it’s how is this person’s body responding in the immediate term to the diet we’ve put them on, to the nutritional plan we’ve suggested to the supplements, and because we’ve come so far in the data world, our whoop straps or aura rings or whatever else, there’s so many devices that are actually able to let us know whether somebody’s burning carbs or fat in this moment or ketones. We can see how an individual’s body is responding and course correct right now. And it isn’t that a ketogenic diet may not be helpful down the road. It’s right now it’s actually putting more stress on your body than it’s already under, which puts you into fight flight, which stops you from burning fat. So, and it’s not just the burning fat, it’s the inflammation. Right. So our food is completely void of nutrients. And we used to have 24 inches of topsoil, now we’ve got, so who’s eating four times the number of vegetables that we, we used to eat to get the same number of nutrients? We’re just not. And our environment is so full of plastic and chlorine molecules and just toxins that our liver says, I have no idea what that is, I have no idea how to detoxify it. And we can’t, we can’t clean the air around us. We can put air filters in our homes and try not to live under pulp mills. But the world is just becoming a Much more aggressive place to live. Dr. Deb Muth 9:33So it definitely is. I mean from the time that you and I grew up to the time that we have now, we have over 75,000 new chemical in just that short period of time. And honestly, as you and I both know, these chemicals have never been tested for this long term use or the way we’re using it, or how much we’re using them or exposing them to our kids that’s never been tested to see how safe they truly are. Dr Deb Heald 10:01I have to apologize to my children and all of the children of that generation. We use latex baby bottles that were plastic line and we linked them up in the microwave. So the wave of endocrine disruption that’s coming at us from practice feeding our infants plastic, it’s a different world. And so we have to approach it just in a completely different way. And you know, menopause shouldn’t be a disease or a state of dis ease, but it is because we’re so depleted. And women used to have predictable stresses and now because most of us are working outside of the home, many are have children that have, how do I want to put this confounders. The number of kids that are neurodiverse and the, the ext work that that creates in a household is unbelievable. So moms typically carrying most of that and then all the guilt that goes with it because moms do guilt, our nervous systems are completely fry, right? So we’re in a constant state of low level fight flight and it changes every single other biochemical process in our body. So when we hit the hormone depletion of menopause, every organ system is profoundly affected. And then we do see more autoimmune diseases cropping up. We do see more inflammatory conditions turning into organ systems not working. And the medical system is. I don’t, I hate to say this, but it’s decades from being able to figure this out. So in the immediate term, what can we do for every woman out there and, and help surround them with community? That’s the other thing that’s really missing. How often do we go next door and have tea or coffee with our neighbors? Dr. Deb Muth 11:41You don’t anymore? Dr Deb Heald 11:42No. So where’s the community supporting you? Dr. Deb Muth 11:45You don’t have one unless it’s online. And then if it’s online, you know how that goes. You can have some support and you can have not support and you can have people be really rude to you. But that support is not the same as having the neighbor next door that you can call on that you can go over and just get out of your house for a few moments and have somebody truly support you. And, and I think back in the day that’s what women did, women supported women. And today there’s so much competition that women are no longer supporting each other. We’re many times tearing women down and judging them and accusing them of doing things that aren’t right for their career, their family, their husband, their this, their that. It could go any way or any shape, but we’ve stopped supporting women in the decisions that they make, whether it’s to be at home or to work or do both or to not have children or to have children. We were just chatting earlier before we came on about having children late in life. That support is completely gone, at least from what I’ve been seeing and hearing, hearing in my practice and what I’m seeing around me. Dr Deb Heald 12:48So another form of depletion. Right. So right. Deplete. Our, our society is. And it’s a wonder we’re upright at all. And all of the other pressures that we take on. We’ve just come through the holiday season and having to have the holidays just so, so that everybody else thinks we’re doing a good job. So our family is enjoying themselves at the cost of our sanity. And the shame that goes with feeling like you’re not enough. Dr. Deb Muth 13:14Yeah. And for your family and your kids to just be like, I don’. Time to come, I don’t have time to do this. I, I hear this every day. You know, families that women mostly that are creating these beautiful experiences for their kids and their relatives. And then at the last minute you have one that calls and says I can’t come and another one that calls and says I have to go to my in laws or I have to go here, I have to go there. And then again we go back to this guilt of what did I do wrong as a woman, as a mother, to not have everybody be with me for the holidays. And I’ve worked so hard to create this environment, beautiful experience for them, for nobody to care but me. Dr Deb Heald 13:53Yes. Dr. Deb Muth 13:53And then that just depletes us more. Dr Deb Heald 13:55So, and then, and then you hit the, your breaking point and you go see your doctor who first of all doesn’t, doesn’t have the time. And I, I can’t call doctors practicing in the world today because you might be scheduled for 15 minutes, but they’re running late. I, I knew a physician quite well who in the wintertime was so busy in Canada with cold and flus, he’d see a hundred people a day. Yeah. So Sitting in front of him, trying to say, so devastated inside because of this happening or that happening. They, they don’t have or take the time to address what’s really going on there. So the number of times people say to me, you’re the first person that has actually sat and listened to me. Dr. Deb Muth 14:36And yeah, I get that same thing. And that’s, that’s part of what natural medicine is. How do you get to know somebody and understand what’s happening to them if you don’t hear their stories? Dr Deb Heald 14:45Agreed. So it’s, it’s a tricky world for women to navigate, so we have to be here for each other. And where I’m sitting right now in practice is literally just helping women replete themselves and looking at the different organ systems or the organelles within the systems that, that being supplied with what they need. And where do we start with this woman? You know, it’s not everybody that needs to have their GI tract optimized first, though. That’s a pretty common one for a lot of women that feel like they’re going out of their minds. We have to start with brain. But everything we do to, to make the environment better for the brain function also makes everything better for the cardiac function and the muscle function. But it’s, it’s just so misunderstood. And then when we get into the, the metabolism, which is where most women end up coming in, is, why am I gaining weight? Right. And so the weight is the physical manifestation that finally breaks them. But what caused them to be gaining weight is also impacting their brain and their heart and their liver and their, their entire system. It’s just, that’s the thing that finally made them come and get help. But when we look at how metabolism comes to a screeching halt in menopause, it’s a wonder that we can carry on at all. Dr. Deb Muth 16:00Yeah. So at what age do you think women should start paying attention to their situation, to their data, and not just their symptoms? Dr Deb Heald 16:0830 way, way, way before you hit menopause, let’s have a strong baseline. Let’s see what’s happening in your early adult life that is putting you into a state that right now you’ve got the tolerance to fix, but over a longer period of time is going to lead to inflammation and dysfunction. And I’m seeing my nieces actually start to pay attention and my daughter to, to their health in a different way. And I think the wearables have a huge amount to do with that. Right. So if you went out last night and celebrated and you’re paying any Attention to a recovery score. And you see that that fourth tequila took three days for you to recover from. Maybe next time don’t have four. Yeah, right. Dr. Deb Muth 16:58One or two, Right? Yeah. Dr Deb Heald 17:00Yeah. Lack of sleep. How does that actually impact you? For how many days? Something that is not. Not the best choice, though. If you’re eating well, 80% of the time, you’re way ahead of the curve. But when you. When you eat something that upsets your system, you can know that right now, literally, if you’re watching heart rate and you eat something that’s inflammatory to you, your heart rate will go up by six or seven beats a minute almost immediately. And that’s a little thing saying your immune system just kicked in. Is this the right thing for you to eat? So the. The more people pay attention without obsessing, and especially on the food thing, I don’t want to create disordered eating for people, but getting to know your body, getting to know its tolerance, and then as women start to have children, how did those tolerances change? Well, they’ll change profoundly because your sleep just disappeared. Yeah, right. If nothing. Dr. Deb Muth 17:54And your hormones changed and everything else is different. And I think that’s a really great point about the wearables. Like, people can get really obsessed with that data, but I don’t think people really understand how to use the data appropriately. You know, like, if you’re eating something that you don’t normally eat or you’re eating something that you know is somewhat inflammatory, you know, it’s the holidays. I’m gonna have some chips. I’m gonna have, you know, some cheese. I’m gonna have some nuts. I’m gonna have a variety of things. That’s really where you want to check your data, right? You know, your. You’re doing something that’s outside of the norm. And we all kind of know, like, I’m puffier, I’m swollen, my brain’s a little foggy. Maybe I have more pain. That’s the time you really want to tune in and say what’s happening? And then start tracking that. Draw the line so that, you know, like, this is the food that bothers me. Because sometimes it can be a healthy food. It doesn’t always have to be a bad food. You know, it can be a healthy food. I have patients that are allergic to lettuce, and they wonder why they’re gaining weight when they’re dieting, and all they’re doing is eating salad. Salads, and you find out they have an allergy to lettuce, and they take that out and their weight goes right back to normal. So it doesn’t have to necessarily always be a bad thing. But using that data appropriately could really make a huge difference. Dr Deb Heald 19:07And making informed choices. Dr. Deb Muth 19:08Yeah. Dr Deb Heald 19:09I was born with a dairy allergy. One of the proteins in milk. And so, and gosh, in the, in the early 60s there weren’t options for formulas that weren’t dairy based. So I was raised on evaporated milk because the heating process in evaporating the, the fluid out of the milk broke down this particular protein. So how I don’t have diabetes, I do not know. But I will elect sometimes to eat Manchego cheese and I know that tomorrow I’m going to pay for it. But I’m making an informed decision today to do it or I’m making an informed decision today. Not. Yeah, right. And so giving people the power, I think the data is power when you know how to use it. And so when women have pregnancies later in their reproductive cycle, seeing how fast that pregnancy taxation on hormones and then the, when the pregnancy concludes and the hormones fall through the floor, I have seen so many women whose ovaries never recover, they start perimenopause literally in that postpartum period. And so knowing that and making sure that you are getting, you know, the sleep that you need, making sleep kind of your, your one non negotiable. There are other things that you’ll sacrifice instead. But maybe sleep’s the most important thing to you or maybe your, your nutrition’s the most important thing. And the wearables will help you determine where you’ve got that play and where you don’t. And so making sure at a much younger age that you’re building muscle mass. We get a lot away for a really long time with being skinny fat. So we look little and everybody assumes, we assume that we’re in shape, but we’re not consciously developing the muscle mass. And for women that’s critical because when our hormones turn off and our metabolism slows down for all of the reasons that it does, the only thing that’s going to drive your metabolism in a non estrogen environment are chemicals that made in muscles. And without the muscle mass, your metabolism will stay slow. Without the muscle mass, you’re not going to have the strength to prevent falls. So if you think at 55 you can start to build muscles, it’s a really big ask. Dr. Deb Muth 21:26Yeah, it’s tough. Dr Deb Heald 21:28And testosterone is the hormone that we need to build muscle mass. And through menopause and postmenopausally most of our Testosterone is getting converted to estrogen. So starting at that point, it’s just too late. So once again, let’s go back to the 30 year old and what are you doing on a regular basis to build and maintain muscle? Dr. Deb Muth 21:49Yeah, when you’re in your prime is when we should be looking at these things. We shouldn’t be waiting until our health and our life age is declining to all of a sudden say, okay, now I’ve got to biohack my way back to being 30 at 50 or 60, because A, it’s much harder to do and B, for a lot of women you don’t ever do it correctly and so you’re trying to mimic that time frame, but it’s, it’s a major challenge for sure. Dr Deb Heald 22:15And then back to these kids that we fed plastic from day one. What are their menopause is going to be like? Because the, all that plastic will disrupt their estrogen receptors and we don’t know what impact it’s having on ovaries directly. The stronger that they can be, the more nourished they can be before their menopause starts, the further ahead they’re going to be. So this isn’t, it’s not just really targeting women that are 45 and older. It’s literally all women really need to be taking it into their own hands because the medical system, like I said so far, is not. And I’m not sure when they will. But we don’t have to wait for the medical system. There are things we can do every single day that are going to help us stay in control of our, our health. I can tell you that. Health span. Dr. Deb Muth 23:02Health span, Correct. And I, I see a lot of young people and there is maybe one out of ten of the young people that I see that have normal hormone levels for their age. I start testing hormones on young women and men around 20, unless there’s a need to do it sooner. But I want to see what they are at their peak. And I have men, young men in their 20s and 30s that have a testosterone level of 100 to 300, when they should be closer to 800, 900. I have young women who can’t peak an estrogen above 50 at 20, when in mid cycle when they should be closer to 100, 150, they’re making no progesterone, they’re making minimal to no testosterone for women. And so when we ask what has this environment done to those young women and men that we have, it’s completely destroyed their hormonal function. They are not at peace and then we wonder why they sit around and have no motivation or drive. I have young men in their 20s with no sex drive. They’re just kind of asexual beings. They don’t even look at a woman and get excited. Women don’t look at men and get excited. There’s none of that that’s happening because they’re lacking these hormones that allow them to do that. And then we wonder what is that going to do to them at menopause? Well, what is it doing to them now? You know, it is creating damage. Those hormones are necessary for cognitive function and bone health and cardiovascular health and all of that. And we’re not asking the right questions, I’m afraid. Dr Deb Heald 24:29Yeah. And, and even if we can see that the gonads are producing the hormones, what’s going on on the cellular membrane level with all those pollutants that the cell can’t absorb them? Dr. Deb Muth 24:43Right. Dr Deb Heald 24:43So anyway. What a mess. Dr. Deb Muth 24:45Yeah, it is. Dr Deb Heald 24:45And, and here’s the thing is it boils down to the naturopathic principles. Improve food, how can we improve sleep, how can we help people manage stress more effectively and, and encourage people to be exercising. I mean, this stuff is gold. Yeah. Dr. Deb Muth 25:01And it’s things that you could do very simply. We don’t, you don’t need to build a, you know, ten thousand dollar gym in your basement to do this. There are ways that you can do this very easily for no cost at home. You just need to get the motivation and the drive and understand how to do it. Dr Deb Heald 25:17Yes. And with the resistance bands that are absolutely available everywhere, even if you’re traveling, you can throw a band in your suitcase and do just the tiniest little bit of muscle reinforcement while you’re away. Dr. Deb Muth 25:32It’s so much simpler than we think. We make it very complicated. Dr Deb Heald 25:35But then also the thing that’s missing when you’re doing it at home can be that motivation. So how do we make this important enough that it’s, it is non negotiable for people? They wake up and they do, they woke, woke up a little bit late. So today Maybe they do 10 minutes, not 20, but just be doing something. Right. Dr. Deb Muth 25:54Yeah. You got to get moving it, you know, sitting around on the couch isn’t moving. You know, you have to get up, you have to move. Even if you’re sitting at your desk and you get a little bike thing underneath your desk that you can put into pedal, you know, you’re moving. It’s not weight bearing, but you’re moving. And that weight bearing exercise is so important to Us. Dr Deb Heald 26:17How does this become something that’s sexy? Dr. Deb Muth 26:21Yeah, that’s what we need to make it right. Dr Deb Heald 26:24Yes. Even, even in the realm of food, when people decide to go onto an exclusionary eating plan, so they’re, they’re going to go keto. So excluding anything that is carbohydrate based in their diet, there are a few people healthy enough to do that and they generally can do it healthfully for a short period of time. But to stay on that type of diet for a long time, that’s where I love the wearables. It’s sort of like the same thing when people are vegetarian or vegan, it’s very, very hard. It has to be a very conscious process to stay healthy as a vegetarian or a vegan. Because your liver has so many things to do. It has 500 functions that it carries on at all moments every day. And when you eliminate animal protein, you’re now also asking it to manufacture other protein and amino acid sequences on top of everything else it’s going to do. So when you make a decision like that, what are you going to eliminate from your world to take some of the burden off of your liver so it has the capacity to do extra work and you have to do these negotiations or you just end up being depleted. But the communities that are vegetarian or vegan to a greater degree and keto to a greater degree have support. You can join all sorts of online groups for people that are following these restrictive type of diet. Being an omnivore, which is eating not bread but carbohydrate in the form of vegetables and fruits, and getting some animal protein, some plant based protein, healthy fats, not the processed fats. There’s no support group for being an omnivore. Dr. Deb Muth 28:05No, there’s that. Dr Deb Heald 28:07So it isn’t one that people are going to opt into necessarily. Because who’s going to support you through your healthy eating choices? Dr. Deb Muth 28:15What are some of the biggest advancements you’re seeing right now in whole body healing that actually move the needle for us that just aren’t fancy trends but actually work? Dr Deb Heald 28:25It’s back to that individual monitoring of what’s going on. So for women that want to lose weight and go on a calorie restricted or carbohydrate restricted diet and they are deciding that they’re going to exercise at the same time. If you are in a rested state, when you go to sleep, your body will burn from fat. In the rested state, if you’re in a stressed state, it needs carbohydrate, it needs Instant energy, right? To. To break down fat into a usable fuel. Takes the liver about eight steps to burn carbohydrate. It’s instant. So when you’re stressed, you’ll burn carbs. When you’re resting or relaxed, you’ll burn fat. But if somebody goes to bed in a stressed state, they opened an email that annoyed them. They are wondering why their child came home late again. Whatever. You go to bed in a stress state, you’ll burn carbs all night long. You wake up in the morning already in a stress state. You decide you’re going to exercise in a fasted state because somehow it got imprinted in our head that you’re supposed to be fasting when you exercise to get the best benefit, and you decide to do intervals, which are a huge stress on your body, an intentional stress on your body. You’re already stressed. Stress. How much fat are you going to burn in that process? None. None. Dr. Deb Muth 29:45And you don’t have any carbs left to burn. Dr Deb Heald 29:48Right. So guess what you burn now? Muscle. Dr. Deb Muth 29:50Muscle. Dr Deb Heald 29:51So here we are working out to try and build muscle, but instead we’re breaking muscle down. So if people can use the biometric data to say, I’m in a stress state, and I know that because my heart rate is higher, or I’m using a device that can actually show how much carbon dioxide I’m exhaling. So if you’re exhaling a lot of carbon dioxide, it means you’re burning carbs. You don’t exhale carbon. You don’t need to exhale carbon dioxide if you’re burning fat as your energy store, it’s not a byproduct of fat. So if you’re already in a stress state, you can either change the type of exercise that you want to do today, so doing more of an endurance exercise, or you can eat and then do your concept. Dr. Deb Muth 30:31What. Dr Deb Heald 30:32So that’s where I’m seeing the improvement is when people are actually starting to collect their data and I interpret it for them until they can start to make those. Those correlations themselves. What. What do I need to eat right now? What do I need? What type of exercise do I need to do right now? And in everybody’s day, there is an ideal time for them to eat carbs. But for a great number of women through Perry and postmenopause that eat carbohydrates, in the evening, they get these big sugar spikes or from eating the carbs, blood sugar. And then about the time they’re going to bed, maybe an hour or two after they go to bed, their blood sugar drops and their body thinks, oh my gosh, we’re starving and it goes into a stressed state. So all night long from that point on, they’re breaking down muscle to create carbohydrate energy so that their stress system can be satisfied that they’re not starving to death. So it’s, it’s not that they can’t eat carbs, it’s that eating them in the evening is putting their body into a stressed state. But at lunchtime it might be fine. And it isn’t even eliminating every single simple carbohydrate or every, I’m going to say treat. We are a reward based society, so the treats are a thing. But maybe it means that if you want to have something sweet after a meal, you do that at lunch and your data will tell you, personally, I would eat, I’m going to call it healthy snacks in the evening mostly because I was bored, certainly not because I was in a starvation state and I started paying attention to my own data and I don’t snack in the evening anymore because it throws my sleep completely off track and it puts me into that stressed, burning carbs all night state. And it’s completely contradictory to my health plan going forward. My parents were, my dad was very long lived, he lived to 93. My mom passed at 84. But I have to say I don’t want the last 15 years of life that either of them had. Just. Yeah, at one point I think my mom thought the family vehicle had flashing red lights on the top of it because she was in an ambulance so often. So I don’t want that. And if I’m doing something that on a routine basis, this is confounding my plan for health span, I have to revisit that. I have to say to myself, you said that you’re, you know, maintaining your health is more important than maintaining your length of life. Look at what you’re doing to your body every single time you eat in the evening. Dr. Deb Muth 33:08If you had to choose one data point that really made the difference for people with a wearable or a device that completely changed how you understood menopause and all of this eating pattern, what would it be through the, through the data lens? Dr Deb Heald 33:22Heart rate variability. Yeah. And so that’s. And certain devices, well, a lot of devices measure it. Some of them are more meticulous with what time frame they’re capturing the variation in heart rate. And I guess for the listeners, we should talk about what heart rate variability is. If your heart rate is beating 72 times a minute, which used to be considered the norm. If you’re in a stressed state, if your sympathetic nervous system or your adrenaline nervous system is driving the bus, every single heartbeat in that minute will be the exact same distance between the beats. When you’re in a relaxed state, it still might be beating at 72 times a minute, but one beat might come a little bit earlier, the next one a little bit later, and there’s more variation between the time between the heartbeats. And that shows that you’re in a relaxed or adapting state. When we’re in fight flight, we’ve got one mission and that’s just staying alive. When we’re in that rest digest, it’s like if it’s a little bit slow, it doesn’t matter because I’ll just speed the next one up. And we’ve got the ability to adapt second to second. So if we are measuring heart rate variability in somebody and in it’s low, it means that they’re in that stressed nervous system state more of the time. And it causes you to burn carb more often than fat, even though fat’s a much better energy store. And the byproducts of carbohydrate combustion cause free radical stress to our body oxidation and inflame organ systems. So the more time we can spend not in fighting flight, the more healthy we will be. And so if you’re using some devices, they’re measuring your heart rate variability through a 24 hour period. So when you are in the peak of your stressed state, your heart rate variability will be little. And then when you’re in a relaxed state, it will be more. And on a 24 hour scale, it looks like you’ve got more heart rate variability. Some of the devices narrow it down to measuring your heart rate variability in the first five minutes after you come out of deep sleep. So there’s way less variability in that number. So the number will be lower than a 24 hour measure, but it’s more accurate. And so I like to, I like to narrow it down to that. But if somebody’s using a device that does it the other way, let’s just compare apples with apples. And so if your heart rate variability is improving, it’s improving. Dr. Deb Muth 35:58So that’s awesome. And that’s an easy thing to be able to measure for people. Dr Deb Heald 36:02It’s on most watches that are measuring biometrics and it’s definitely on the rings and the bands and all of the things. So just working to improve that. And if you’ve had your heart rate variability at a certain level. And then today it’s much lower. Literally just do that process in your head. What was different about yesterday? Oh, I lost my job or I ate from a buffet or whatever it is. And then the next time it has that same fall, see if the trigger for it correlated. And it’s literally just teaching us to pay attention to when our body’s in a state of stress because we’re so used to it that we don’t know anymore. The body’s screaming at us, but we’ve just become so numb to the changes to our body that we think it’s normal. Dr. Deb Muth 36:58Right. Because most of us, let’s realistically are walking out around in a State of Stress 24, 7. The only time you’re at quote, unquote rest is when you’re sleeping, if you’re lucky enough to be doing that. But we think we are because we’re not conscious anymore. And we think our body’s resting, but it may not be. Dr Deb Heald 37:17That’s right. So we are in a state of unconsciousness. But if, if we are burning carbohydrate while we’re sleeping, we are not getting into that restorative state, which means your liver is being distracted and isn’t able to do its peak detox at night. Here’s the thing. Our body is supposed to make cholesterol for us between 1am and 4am and if we’re in a stress state, the mechanism that limits the time that the body manufactures cholesterol to those three hours, that mechanism gets turned off. Off. So the body now manufactures cholesterol 24 hours a day. Oops. Dr. Deb Muth 37:53We wonder why it’s always high. Dr Deb Heald 37:55So, and, and it has everything to do with not getting into restorative sleep. So why are we getting into restorative sleep? Dr. Deb Muth 38:02Right. Well, because we’re constantly stressed and we’re not eating properly. Dr Deb Heald 38:06There we go. So we’re back to sleep and food and exercise and stress management. Dr. Deb Muth 38:11Yeah. Is there an easy way for people to. To pull their data out of their devices that they can look at it as a picture so that they can kind of see maybe the last week or the last two weeks and really start to dig in and see what that data means? Dr Deb Heald 38:29Yes. Almost all wearables now have an app attached to them. So when they know where to go to find the data, it will almost always, in an app, pull it up. But what I’m seeing now is almost all the wearables have some type of AI integration where you can literally, on the app, type in, please show Me, my heart rate variability over the last two weeks. And it’ll just populate on the app a graph. What we’re doing with biometric data and the science and the availability of analysis of that data is mind blowing. I think it could be more effective at improving people’s health than anything that we’re going to see happen in a hospital or in a pharmaceutical company’s research lab. Dr. Deb Muth 39:12Yeah, I think AI has a lot of great benefits in the medical world like this. Compiling data, looking at data over a period of time. We all know, you and I both, we’ve done research. You know, how long it takes to comb through the research and to find things and to try to put it all together. And when AI can be used to help us hack that in a shorter period of time, we are going to make new discoveries so much faster that are going to help people in ways that we’ve never seen before. Dr Deb Heald 39:46It’s the perfect indication for AI. And even when I was working with it back in 2017, oh my gosh, it was just barely an embryo back then. And the whole premise behind it was we still need the, the clinical brains, yes, to point out the relevance of the data, but the AI can take care of all of the mundane stuff that none of us like doing anyway, and it can do it instantaneously. And at this point, we still need the clinicians to show where that’s relevant. Dr. Deb Muth 40:19We started using AI this last year to look at our own data. I have data going back almost 25 years of patients that we’ve seen and protocols that we’ve done. And we wanted to see, of all the protocols that we’ve used over the years, which ones actually worked compared to those that didn’t and how much better outcome and how quickly, because we wanted to see, can we make our protocols better and which ones just should we be abandoning that just are not working for the majority of the people. And we started combing our data and it’s been incredible because it’s easy for us, us to, to see the client and think, gosh, this is working, and so I’ll use it on this person and this person and this person. But then you lose sight of those little intricacies of, well, it worked on this person at this age, but it didn’t work on this person who had this or they didn’t have the combination of these two things. And now we’re being able to see all of that so that we can get people better, faster just by simply knowing the data. Dr Deb Heald 41:20Well, and it isn’t Even so much protocols that need to be scrubbed. It’s. If you’ve got somebody on a protocol, there’s real time data to say continue or pause. This isn’t the way it should. That’s my least favorite word in the entire language but should be going, so what’s different about this person or what was different about their yesterday that we’re. We’re not seeing what would encourage us to continue. And, and every single individual has different needs at different times. Even, even twins. Right. With the studies are amazing. And when any difference in their environment they manifest completely differently. So it’s not genetics. Dr. Deb Muth 42:10No. It’s epigenetics. Dr Deb Heald 42:11Right. Dr. Deb Muth 42:11It’s our environment that changes our genetics and that is the difference. Dr Deb Heald 42:17So looking at the genes is one thing, but looking at somebody’s actual response to an intervention in lifetime. This isn’t blood work that’s going to be done every three months. This is, this is what form of exercise should I do right now or should I eat or not eat before I do it. It’s. I think that’s where medical science to me is the most exciting is literally putting the power back into the hands of the human. Dr. Deb Muth 42:46And honestly, from a client perspective, if you don’t learn this and you don’t learn how to hack your day to day stuff, there is nothing that Dr. Heald or myself can really help you with to make you get where you want to go. Like we have the information, we have the knowledge, we can teach you. But you have to be willing to learn this to hack your like life every single day to get to the optimization that you’re looking for. Because trying to depend on somebody like us to tell you what to do every day is unrealistic. It’s just not going to happen. Dr Deb Heald 43:17Agreed. Yeah. It’s almost gamifying your health. But if that’s what it takes, let’s do it. Dr. Deb Muth 43:23Yeah, why not? Why not have some fun with it. Dr Deb Heald 43:25I love waking up and seeing not so much. I can tell by the way I feel how deep my sleep was. My brain’s either foggy or it’s not. Yeah. But I still love looking at the data and then saying, oh, I did do that yesterday. And to me it’s, it’s a game in the morning to open my app and see how yesterday actually manifested in my ability to get rest last night. Dr. Deb Muth 43:53Yeah, it’s so true. I, I did some traveling on Tuesday and we have a little snow. The weather was bad. What normally should have taken me four hours to get somewhere took me seven. There was a crash on the freeway. We got diverted and like the entire drive was completely white knuckled. Right. And so by the time I arrived where I needed to go, it was 12:30 in the morning and I was super stressed. I kind of relaxed a little bit and then I went to bed and I woke up the next, I didn’t sleep well. I was up almost all night. I was up till probably four in the morning before I finally fell asleep. And it took me two days to recover from that stressor and, and I laid low and I rested. It was the holiday, it wasn’t a big deal. But when it takes you that like you have to be conscious, it took me two days to bounce back from that. And we have stressors like that that happen maybe not at that magnitude every single day, but if you’re not paying attention to how long it’s taking you to recover, that is a huge disservice. Because what are we going to do as women? We’re going to put push through. Right. We need to take care of the kids, we need to work, we need to take care of our parents, we need to check on this person, we need to do this, we need to do that and we’re just going to keep pushing in that state of stress, not realizing that that’s the last thing that we should be doing. Dr Deb Heald 45:08And so there will be non negotiables in that when and which generation where our near adult or adult kids still need us and our parents are, are still needing assistance. Maybe it just means don’t do the intense work up to day move, but just pair it back. Or if your partner suggests inviting the neighbors over for appetizers and drinks like not tonight sweetie. Right. Like literally just drawing the line because you said it. Well, we, we will just push through. Yeah. It’s our future health that we’re sacrificing when we do that. And I do not want to spend my last 15 years sick. I do not want to spend my last, last however many 15 minutes in, in a care facility. Right. Dr. Deb Muth 45:54You and me both, we both know how those are. No, that’s a non negotiable for me. Dr Deb Heald 45:59Agreed. And so when, when people are thinking, well, I know it matters but I can pay attention to it later or it costs money to do this and I’d rather not spend that money. Let’s just price out what one month in a nursing home is going to cost. Dr. Deb Muth 46:13Yeah, you’re going to spend it on the front end or the back end. You get to choose how you’re going to do that and what that’s going to look like for you. Dr Deb Heald 46:20So if that’s some wearables and some guidance up front, let’s do it. And my hope is that when we are more aware of what our behaviors do to our physical body, we’ll also start to tune into the physical signs that’s been sending us all the way along. So we don’t have to be dependent on some band on our wrist. But if you eat something that that’s triggering your immune system, you’ll pay attention to the fact your nose is running. You won’t just wipe it and carry on. It’s literally a histamine release unless it’s hot soup. But it’s saying, this is going to inflame you a little bit. Are you okay with that? And when we start to treat our bodies like the temples that they are, we won’t need the wearables. Right? We’ll say, oh, I’m starting to feel tired. So what that means is I’m going to go to bed. I’m not going to turn on a Netflix series. I’m not going to dive into some project for work that I’d like to get off my plate. My body’s asking for rest right now. So let’s do it. Dr. Deb Muth 47:23I love that this has been such a great conversation. How can people find you and work with you if they’re interested? Dr Deb Heald 47:30I agree. This has been an amazing conversation. I hope that we can do it again. I have a website which is is doctorhealed.com r h E-A-L-D.com I’m on Instagram. That’s Dr. Deb healed. And just direct message me and we will see what we can do. Dr. Deb Muth 47:48I love that. Thank you so much for joining me today. Dr Deb Heald 47:51Well, thank you for hosting and it was just an amazing, amazing time on this. Yeah. Friday morning. Dr. Deb Muth 47:58I agree. Thank you. Dr Deb Heald 47:59Okay, take care. Dr. Deb Muth 48:00This is the part of our conversation I hope you sit with. Because if there’s one truth that keeps coming up not just in today’s episode, but across thousands of women’s stories, it’s this. The body isn’t broken. You haven’t failed, and you’re not imagining what you’re feeling. You have just been taught to follow templates instead of trust data, to chase fixes instead of understanding function, and to silence symptoms instead of listening to them. My hope is that today’s conversation gave you permission to stop guessing and start getting curious about your body’s needs and how to thrive in this episode. If it resonated with you. Please take a moment to subscribe, follow and share. It was someone who needs to hear it. It means the world to us and it really helps us get in front of the eyes of more people. You can find let’s Talk Wellness now on YouTube, Spotify and wherever you listen to podcasts. And remember, healing doesn’t just start with another diagnosis. It starts when you finally feel seen and empowered to take your health back. Until next time, I’m Dr. Deb and this is let’s Talk Wellness Now. Dr. Deb Muth 49:08Welcome to let’s Talk Wellness now, where we bring expert insights directly to you. Please note that the views and information shared by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of let’s Talk Wellness now, its management or our partners. Each affiliate, sponsor and partner is an independent entity with its own perspectives. Today’s content is provided for informational and educational purposes only and should not be considered specific advice, whether financial, medical, or legal. While we strive to present accurate and useful information, we cannot guarantee its completeness or relevance to your unique circumstances. We encourage you to consult with a qualified professional to address your individual needs. Your use of information from this broadcast is entirely at your own risk. By continuing to listen, you agree to indemnify and hold let’s Talk Wellness now and its associates, harmless from any claims or damages arising from the use of this content. We may update this disclaimer at any time and changes will take effect immediately upon posting or broadcast. Thank you for tuning in. We hope you find this episode both insightful and thought provoking. Listener discretion is advised. The post Episode 255 – Advancements in naturopathic medicine and whole-body healing first appeared on Let's Talk Wellness Now.

Dr. Deb Muth 0:03There’s a quiet shift happening in healthcare right now, and most doctors aren’t talking about it yet. People aren’t chasing diagnoses anymore. They’re exhausted by them. I see it every single day in my clinic. People who come in with stacks of paperwork, portals full of results, and a list of diagnoses longer than their grocery receipt, yet they’re still not living their lives. And they’ll say to me, Dr. Deb, I don’t want another label. Dr. Deb Muth 0:32 I just want my life back. If you’ve ever been told this is just how your body is, if you’ve been diagnosed, rediagnosed, and then dismissed, if you’ve been handed labels but never handed a roadmap, today’s episode is for you. Because we are officially entering what I call the post diagnosis era and it’s changing everything about how healing actually happens. So grab your cup of coffee or tea and let’s settle in to let’s talk wellness. Now, before we dive in, we need to take a quick pause to thank today’s sponsor. And when we come back, we’re going to talk about why diagnoses are no longer the most important thing about you. Dr. Deb Muth 1:17Did you know sweating can literally heal your cells? And infrared saunas don’t just relax you, they detox your body, balance hormones, and boost mitochondrial energy. I’m obsessed with my health tech sauna, and right now you can save $500 with my code at healthtechhealth.com Dr. Muth req 25 so here’s some truth for me. Dr. Deb Muth 0:47It was three years ago Christmas that I received my Ms. Diagnosis. And I remember it very clearly. It was the day before, two days before Christmas Eve, that I got the call and I heard the words, you have white matter brain disease. That’s consistent with Ms. And I immediately stopped in my tracks and thought, okay, well, this is just the way it is. We’re gonna fight this. We’re gonna figure this out. And it led me down a deeper path of healing and spirituality and emotional growth. And there were some really difficult days ahead for me because I remember thinking, what am I gonna do? How am I gonna practice what’s going to happen in my life? And every year at this time, I reflect back to that day that I got the call that really changed my life. And not for the worse, but for the better. It changed the way I was thinking about life. Dr. Deb Muth 3:01It changed the way I was complaining about things being ungrateful for all the amazing things that I have in my life. Not intentionally, but just living the American life. Right. Dr. Deb Muth 3:14And striving for more and wanting more and chasing more and doing more, and never really having the opportunity to just be present and just really think about life and enjoy what the Lord has given us and enjoy what’s around me, the people in my life, the family that I have, the amazing practice that I have, and the amazing people I get to work with and change lives with. And it really changed me for the better. And I’ve watched diagnoses like this change people for the worse and for them to sink deep into a depression and give up and. And live to their label instead of living to their potential. And that’s why I think this episode is so important for us, because we all have a choice in life. When we get dealt something kind of difficult, we can let it consume us and let it take every ounce of life from us, or we can allow it to become the fuel that makes us better, makes us contribute to life maybe differently, but in a better way. So, you know, I know that this idea of letting diagnoses lose their power can be really uncomfortable for some people, because there’s people that are waiting for that diagnosis. I’m in some. Some social media groups, and I’m listening and reading to people who are saying, I’m so angry I didn’t get the Ms. Diagnosis today. I’m so angry I didn’t get the Lyme diagnosis today. I’m so upset that they can’t find anything wrong with me. And I understand. Dr. Deb Muth 5:20I know the feeling of wanting to put a name to what you’re feeling so that you have validation and you have power around this diagnosis, and you can prove to people that what you’re feeling is not in your head. I get all of that. But for many people, the original diagnosis is meant to help guide treatment in the conventional sense. It’s a created, shared language that we have, and it brings clarity. But for many people, you give that label and that name so much power and so much control over your life and who you are and what you’re being. And that’s not what the label is meant for. Somewhere along the line, medicine started confusing naming with healing. And today, we have more diagnoses than ever. We have more testing than ever. We have so many thousands of specialists, and yet people are sicker. They’re more inflamed, they’re more exhausted, they’re more confused than ever. And that’s not just a coincidence. That is how the system is meant to work. It’s meant to confuse you. Dr. Deb Muth 6:44It’s meant to keep you dependent on it. It’s meant to. Meant to keep you on medical management for the rest of your life. And by doing that, we enrich the pharmaceutical companies to the point where their whole role is to continue to create drugs that you need to be on for the rest of your life. And the hard truth about all of this that I’ve seen in my practice is for many patients, the diagnosis really becomes their identity. They own it, they gravitate to it. It’s who they are. It also becomes their prison because they only live confined inside the diagnosis. I can’t do this because I can’t do that, because if I do this, this will happen, because I have. They’ve capped their ceiling of life based on a couple of words that somebody gave them at a point in their life when they were so low and potentially so desperate that they needed that name to identify themselves and what was going on. And instead of asking, why is this happening? Dr. Deb Muth 8:05Why are these symptoms happening? What’s causing these symptoms? They’re told, this is what you have, and this is what you’re going to have to live with. And instead of restoring function, these people become managed. Like I said, they’re managed with drugs. They’re managed inside the system. And instead of healing, they’re monitored with this blood test and that blood test and this MRI and that mri. Instead of providing hope, they’re handed a lifelong prescription with expectations that do nothing but decline. So you walk out of that room with this expectation that your life is never going to be the same, that your function is going to decline, your neurological disease is going to take over eventually, you’re going to be put in a home, you’re going to lose everything you have because you’re not going to be able to afford the care that you need. And that’s the expectations of our healthcare system today. When you’re labeled with a chronic illness diagnosis, and for a woman, especially women, this is magnified because their symptoms are told to them as. It’s stress, it’s hormones, it’s anxiety, it’s aging, it’s motherhood, and then, of course, it’s perimenopause. Like that is some major traumatic thing that should disrupt your entire life. Yet it shouldn’t, and it does, and it doesn’t have to. And of course, my favorite is always, but your labs are normal. We don’t know what’s wrong with you. It must just be in your head. Dr. Deb Muth 9:53And this is why women are done being dismissed, why this shift is happening now that we are empowering women to take back Their lives, take back who they are and take back how they’re being treated in the healthcare system. And it is one of the most important things that we can do right now is to give women their power back so that they can stand strong in who they are and in their intuition and fight and say, no, this is not happening to me right now. I am not accepting this label. I’m not accepting this diagnosis. I will fight, I will find answers, and I will do what I need to do to be the woman that I want to be. So why is this conversation exploding right now? Well, there’s actually three big reasons, and first and foremost, it’s over. Diagnosis, burnout. People are collecting diagnoses without solutions. Autoimmune labels, syndromes, vague neurological names, but no one’s connecting the dots. Dr. Deb Muth 11:02You see, when you start to stack these labels on top of each other, one after the next after the next, you know, it’s celiac disease, it’s Hashimoto’s, it’s fibromyalgia, it’s autoimmune. You know, rheumatoid arthritis. It’s. Whatever it is, it’s long haul Covid. These days, no one is putting these connections together to say, why are you developing so many diseases that are so similar in nature, ones that just kind of domino after each other? Nobody’s looking at your immune system. Nobody’s measuring it, Nobody’s telling you how well it’s working. No one’s supporting it. They’re just throwing these biological drugs at you. And if there’s an autoimmune disease and sending you on your way and saying, this is what you have to look forward to for the rest of your life. But don’t worry, these side effects are rare, including cancer. It does not make sense to me that we are not looking at the root cause for all of these crazy diagnoses that we are labeling people with today. And I am guilty of it myself, because within the system that we work, we have to label something in order for you to receive the care that you need, for your insurance, to pay for the treatment, for the tests, for the visits. There has to be a label. And that’s what we call an ICD10 code. And if we don’t have the appropriate label, none of what we’re recommending gets covered for you. And that’s the label game began. The second thing is long haul Covid. And post viral illnesses. Dr. Deb Muth 12:47Millions of people were told, we don’t know why, and then we sent them home to figure it out by themselves. We don’t know why your immune system is failing, we don’t know why you’re having these clotting issues that are happening. But don’t worry, these clotting issues really are not that severe. They’re mild in nature. You’ll never have to worry about it. And we’re not going to treat it even though it’s four times the level that’s normal, because we’re going to wait until it’s 10 times the level of normal to even worry about it at this point. Dr. Deb Muth 13:19And it will take us 25 to 30 years before we understand any of the risks and barriers that have happened from these post viral illnesses that have occurred in our environment and the ones that are in the future to come. Because it takes time for us to study things, it takes time for us to figure it out, takes time for us to train the practitioners, and it takes time for us to accept something different than we thought was reality. And that is the problem that we have today with these post viral illnesses that are long acting, that are retriggering new viruses, retriggering old illnesses like Lyme, reactivating things like Epstein Barr virus. It will take decades before this becomes mainstream. And right now it’s fringe medicine and it’s not realistic. And those of us that are speaking about it are chastised and gone after, but by our medical communities and we are told that we are the crazy ones. And that is how medicine has always been. Way in the beginning, and I forget the doctor’s name, who started just observing that when medical students worked on cadavers and then came into the labor and delivery ward and delivered babies, these women were getting sick with infections and they were dying. And he said, what if we just washed our hands between the cadaver and the delivery? Would we save lives? And he did a small study and he was right. And over time he was made fun of and he was put into insane asylums and he was locked away. And now today we would never think of entering a room and working on a patient without washing our hands beforehand. But that took 30 years for that one concept of washing hands to be adopted. And it destroyed one man’s life because he simply asked the question, what if it’s a crazy society that we live in, It’s a crazy outlook that we have on medicine and asking questions. And sometimes I wonder, is it truly science or is it politically driven? And I think the answer is it’s both. And the third thing that we have is technology. And technology is outpacing wisdom by far. Hands down, AI, advanced labs and imaging can identify everything. Now using AI, but without context, it creates a fear. Dr. Deb Muth 16:08And instead of clarity, without context, using AI to interpret labs makes absolutely no sense. Without context and understanding and us actually training this LLM model, the AI doesn’t really know what it, what it means. And someday it will, I’m sure, but right now it doesn’t. So as everyone is taking to AI to treat themselves and create a protocol and diagnose themselves and understand their labs and know that it is without context that you are doing this, and research is wonderful, but without having somebody truly understand you and the art of healing and the art of medicine, this is going to get lost and you will not have the information that you truly need simply by using chat GPT. Now I’ve created my own version called Venari and I hope that this will be much better because it will have context. It will have 15,000 protocols that I have used for the last 25 years. It will have lots of research. It has all of the research databases that we can connect to. It has training that I have given it using my brain and how I see a client every single day in practice. So when you’re using our Venari app, you will be able to have that context. You will be able to have that pushback and that voice. And not only that, you will have the option then to work alongside someone to help you identify that context that you’re looking for. Does this make sense? Dr. Deb Muth 17:53I’ve seen this a lot in the peptide world, where in these Facebook groups, people are talking about the peptide stacks that they’re using and they’re telling people that it’s okay to use any peptide you want because they’re just small chain branch amino acids. And that can’t be farther from the truth because there are some peptides you would not want to use because they can stimulate the growth of cells. And if you have cancer or if you have a history of this, there are some peptides that we need to avoid. And unfortunately, AI doesn’t understand that yet and doesn’t know that yet. And it’s just creating stacks. And people are creating stacks without understanding what they’re doing. And I watched my best friend do this as she was learning peptides and she had cancer and it created an aggressive sarcoma. And I believe the peptides had a lot to do with that because it stimulated the growth of the cells. And it wasn’t until after she had passed away that we found this journal of hers that she was studying peptides and recognized that this could have contributed to her advanced cancer. And if you don’t have that context and you’re using AI to create these stacks for you, you can put yourself in harm’s way. And so AI technology, I think, is going to be fantastic in a lot of ways. It’s going to have its downfalls. And you’re going to need an expert when you’re using AI. You’re not going to just be able to treat yourself with this. You know, understanding that more data doesn’t always equal healing, and more data can be helpful. But again, you have to understand how to put those pieces together, how to ask the right question questions. And for that, you need somebody who has seen thousands and thousands of cases to find the missing pieces for you. Because AI is not going to do that unless it’s been trained to do that. Vanari has been trained to do that. Dr. Deb Muth 20:01It’s been trained to push back and look at lime and mold and toxins and chemicals and metals and all of those things. But there is no other AI bot out there, LLM that has been trained to do that using clinical data that I use every single day in my practice. And people are finally realizing that, you know, they’re understanding that although this world of AI and technology is amazing, it has its limitations, just like practitioners have their limitations. We don’t know everything. We are not perfect. We are human. And humans make errors and we miss things. With or without technology, we miss things. And part of it is because we just don’t know what we don’t know yet. And sometimes it’s because we have our blinders on, and sometimes it’s just simply because we don’t have the information today that we’re going to have five years from now. And here’s what I teach instead. I teach the seenet last. And that’s what we built it on. Restore and root. Rise and restore. Sorry, that is my methodology. And it’s in the scene at last book. And it starts with healing. It starts with asking better questions. So instead of asking, what do you have? We want to ask, what has your body been exposed to? What symptoms are underperforming? What’s driving the inflammation for you? When you have joint pain and you have muscle pain and you have achiness, that is not normal. Dr. Deb Muth 21:38I don’t care if you’re 20 or you’re 80, it is not normal. And yes, I did say 80, because we are not supposed to have that kind of inflammation at 80. And why are we underperforming? Why is our Brain not working correctly? Why is our mood not working? Why can’t my body push up a hill? Why can’t I lift 10 pounds? What’s going on? Why can’t I recover from that activity? What’s interfering with my ability to repair and heal after I’ve done some things that I need to do? What’s keeping your nervous system stuck in this survival mode, in this fight or flight mode? Why can’t I get past that? Sometimes that answer is really simple and sometimes that answer, it is so hard and so complicated and it is so many things that are causing this body to be stuck. And sometimes it’s a six month fix, and sometimes it’s a six year fix and sometimes it’s decades long. And it is one of the most challenging things as a practitioner to get clients to understand and to be on the other side of the table and not get you that quick fix. It is extremely difficult for us as well when we are not seeing the results that we think we should see. We need to focus on function over diagnosis, root cause over labels. Dr. Deb Muth 23:09What is driving all this inflammation and certainly restoration over resignation. Do not resign to the fact that you have this life altering disease that is never going to change. Because if we find the root and we restore the body, you don’t have to live in that death sentence that you’ve been given of a diagnosis, whether it’s fibromyalgia, MS, Alzheimer’s disease, celiac disease, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, it does not matter what that diagnosis is. We can change it, we can make it better, we can reduce the symptoms, we can improve your life. Maybe not in ways that you are absolutely looking for, maybe not in a perfect world, but we can change the trajectory of where your life is going. And it’s because you’re not an ICD9 code or an ICD10 code. You’re not a code, you’re not an MRI result, you’re not a lab result, you’re a human body asking support, not a name. And I say that with a little hesitation because so many people are looking for the name. So many people are angry that someone didn’t find the name. I have clients that come to me that are so angry that the conventional medicine system did not identify their Lyme disease, that they’re looking for someone to sue and there is no one to sue because they didn’t find it, because sometimes they just don’t know. You’re asking for conventional medicine, practitioner and system to provide for you a label that is not within their wheelhouse to do. Because the way they treat Lyme disease and the way an eyelads practitioner looks at Lyme disease and has. Has the ability to test differently are two very different things. Dr. Deb Muth 25:27You’re asking for a system to perform in a way that they are not trained and guided to do. Then you’re looking and asking for somebody to place blame for an illness that you have, that you have yet taken ownership for. And I know that sounds harsh, and I know there’s going to be a lot of people that are angry at me for saying that. But I sit in front of you as someone who had Lyme disease, who had mold mycotoxin illness, who had high viral titers, who had post Covid peripheral neuropathy, who had the diagnosis of ms, who has white matter brain disease, who treated all of it not in the conventional world, who has halted the white matter disease and regrew her brain by 1.5 standard deviations, which is unheard of in 18 months. So I can say this to you. There is no one to blame for your lack of diagnosis or your diagnosis. It is life. It is what happens to us. And you have a choice at the crossroad to either take the path of hatred and anger and bitterness and blame and never getting better a result of that, or you have the ability to take the path of curiosity and openness and willingness to change and willingness to walk down a path that is different than what the conventional medicine is telling you to do. And those are your choices and you get to make those choices. But what you don’t get to do is blame some someone else and try to destroy them for something that they are not able to do. That is not what we get to do in this life. Dr. Deb Muth 27:29It is not right and it is not fair. If someone has truly injured you, that’s different. That’s different. But this looking to blame somebody because they didn’t give you a label, Ridiculous in my opinion. And if you’re listening and thinking right now, I’ve been diagnosed, but I’m not better, I want you to hear this clearly. You are not broken. You are not crazy, and you are not done. Sometimes the most healing moment isn’t getting that diagnosis. It’s realizing that the diagnosis was never the whole story. And that’s where the real healing begins. When we look at the entire story, we look at your entire life from the beginning to where you are now and what has happened to get you there. And once we get that, then we can put you back together. Not in the old way, in a new way in an amazing way, in a way that you would cherish your life for every moment that you have of it. Good, bad and ugly. A diagnosis should not be the doorway. It’s not a dead end. It is just the beginning. Remember, you don’t need another diagnosis. You need your life back. And that’s what’s important. Dr. Deb Muth 29:19We are living in a moment where medicine is being forced to evolve not because systems want to, but because patients are demanding better. This post diagnosis era isn’t about rejecting science, it’s about using it wisely. It’s about restoring function, dignity and hope. And I hope that if this episode resonated with you, share it with someone who’s been labeled but not yet helped. Because sometimes the most powerful healing starts when someone finally feels seen. Thank you for being with me here today. If you haven’t already, make sure you subscribe and follow. Let’s talk Wellness now on YouTube, Spotify or wherever you’re listening and I’ll see you next time. Until then, keep asking better questions, trusting your body and remembering you are more than a diagnosis.The post Episode 254 – Beyond the Diagnosis: Healing in a Post-Diagnosis Era first appeared on Let's Talk Wellness Now.

One income, rising costs, and child expenses are stressful.

Bob Schwahn  |  Lead Pastor  |  January 18, 2026 Referenced Scripture: Luke 9:23-24, Ephesians 5:25, Mark 1:14-15, James 2:18-19, Revelation 2:1-5 Reflection Questions: Luke 9:23Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. 1) WhoeverWhat were the requirements and pre-qualifications to be a follower of Jesus? Give some examples.What does that say about God that the bar to entry from a cultural perspective was really low? What thoughts might you have had in observing who Jesus chose to be his closest followers? Explain. 2) Wants to be my disciple“Wants” implies it is a choice that we make to follow Jesus or not. Why do you think Jesus would give us a choice and not demand that we love and follow Him? Can love be forced? Explain. 1 John 4:19We love because he first loved us. 3) Must deny themselvesWhat do you think Jesus meant by this? What does this NOT mean? Explain.What has it cost you to follow Jesus? Why is it important to know up front that following Jesus can and will be costly?Is there an area of your life that you find difficult to surrender to Jesus (or an area you find it difficult to follow)? Explain, why? 4) Take up their cross daily and follow me.What did the symbol of the cross mean to a first century person? How is that different from how we view the symbol?Why does that appear to be a “bad marketing” strategy by Jesus? What do you think he was trying to be clear about?How have you experienced humility, suffering, and death as a follower of Jesus?Do you ever experience FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) because you are a follower of Jesus? Explain. Luke 9:24For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.5) Explain what Jesus is promising in this statement. Have you experienced the reality of this promise? Why or why not?6) How do you need to take up your cross TODAY in order to follow Jesus? Why do we need to do this DAILY?7) What do we do if our heart grows cold, hard, tired, or apathetic? Read Revelation 2:1-58) Why is repentance always the answer when we are off track in following Jesus?9) Being an ALL IN follower of Jesus is about DIRECTION and NOT PERFECTION.What does that statement mean? Agree or disagree? Why? What's your next step? * Connect: We'd love to connect with you! Fill out our Connect Card to receive more information, have us pray for you, or to ask us any questions: http://journeybozeman.com/connectcard* Connect: Get your children connected to our children's ministry, Base Camp: https://journeybozeman.com/children* Connect: Our Student Ministry is for High School and Middle School students: https://journeybozeman.com/students* Give: Want to worship through giving and support the ministry of Journey Church: https://journeybozeman.com/give* Gather: Subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/JourneyChurchBozeman* Gather: Download our app: https://journeybozeman.com/app * Gather: Join our Facebook Group to stay connected throughout the week: https://facebook.com/groups/JourneyChurchBozeman Chapters (00:00:00) - One Christian's Challenge to the Gold Medal(00:04:18) - Who Will Follow Jesus?(00:08:50) - Jesus Says He Wants You to Follow Him(00:15:58) - Must deny themselves for Christ(00:23:19) - Taking Up the Cross(00:29:16) - All In Followers(00:34:04) - Come and Die and Follow Me(00:35:52) - Jesus Prays for Direction

We have more sermons online than any generation in history. More Bible apps. More livestreams. More Christian content than ever before.Matthew 28:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Write this down: Real love is a boomerang: the more you send, the more returns.1 John 4:19We love because he first loved us.1. Love is a gift2. Love is an undeserved gift3. Love is a holy gift4. Love is a reciprocal giftNext Steps: Believe: I need to experience God's love for the first time today.Become: I need more of God's love in my life this week. Be Sent: I will give away God's love this week.Discussion Questions: Who in your life is most deserving of your love?Describe what makes someone deserving of your love?If someone deserves it, is it really love?Can you say you love God if you don't love people the way God loves them?Is God's love different than human love?  Explain your answer.What holds you back from loving people like Jesus loves them?Pray for the Holy Spirit to help you love like Christ this week. 

Denver Nuggets — 0:23How have they played without Jokic, plus a breakdown of the best passing stretch of Jamal Murray's career.Portland Trail Blazers / Houston Rockets — 12:12A set between these teams saw the Rockets change their approach against Deni Avdija, but he dominated crunchtime on Friday nonetheless.Sacramento Kings / Golden State Warriors — 35:27Sacramento has a discordant present, while the Warriors are in a mini-surgeDallas Mavericks — 54:00We take stock of what AD was able to do this season, plus what a possible end to that season means for the MavsMemphis Grizzlies — 1:09:19We look around the league again for a Ja Morant team, but focus on the Grizz present with Cedric Coward's willingness to do the dirty work. Join Dunc'd On Prime for for 35% off a yearly subscription in honor of the Mock Trade Deadline! Use code mockdeadline26. Join Dunc'd On Prime! It's the only place to get every episode with Nate & Danny, plus every pod with John Hollinger & Nate as well!Subscribe on YouTube to get Dunc'd On Clutch Calls, Real Video Scouts, and more.Or, sign up for our FREE mailing list to get Dan Feldman's Daily Duncs with all the major topics around the league twice a week. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Incomparable Christ Pt. 1: Our Standing In Christ By Louie Marsh, 1-11-2026 1) Who & what I AM. "1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are IN EPHESUS, and are faithful IN CHRIST JESUS: 2Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Ephesians 1 1-2, ESV)   Intro.  Verses 3 - 14 have been called a Hymn of Grace.  They are a statement of our spiritual blessings in Christ.  These verses are one long, complex sentence in the Greek. According to Purdue University: Run-ons, comma splices, and fused sentences are all names given to compound sentences that are not punctuated correctly.   You can divide these verses into three parts.  1) The Father, 2) the Son, 3) the Spirit.  They are also mainly concerned with 1)the past, 2) the present, 3) the future.  These three sections are marked off by the repeated phrase "Praise of His Glory," or "glorious grace."  See verses 3, 12, 14.   This Passage is About   The Father -  The Past The Son – the Present The Spirit – The Future Created Loved Sealed Predestined Redeemed Guaranteed Blessed Blessed Blessed   Paul begins his letter by looking at what each member of the Trinity has done for those who have become followers of Christ.   2) I am BLESSED beyond measure.    3Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us IN CHRIST with every spiritual blessing IN THE HEAVENLY PLACES, 6to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.  (Ephesians 1 3-6, ESV)   Bless = eulogy.  The word literally means "to speak well of"   It's in the aorist tense, which refers to something done at a particular point in time, with effects still being felt now.  Example - rock in pond, ripples.   We bless God because He first blessed us   "19We love because he first loved us." (1 John 4:19, ESV)   God's word equals action. He created the universe by speaking so if God says you're blessed - you're blessed!   In the Heavenlies this phrase used 5 times in Ephesians and nowhere else by Paul. Paul is saying that these blessing of the Father reside in the unseen world of spiritual reality.  They are real - even though they can't always be seen.   Every Spiritual Blessing! Aorist Tense again. This is important, you have ALREADY BEEN GIVEN THIS! Freely Given. You don't have to do anything to earn this - works, praying through, study, etc. All These blessings are gifts of the Father's GRACE!!   3) God the Father CHOSE me before He created the universe.   4even as he chose us IN HIM before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. IN LOVE 5he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, Ephesians 1:4-5 (ESV)   A Misunderstood Bible Truth. Entire Denominations have split over this issue of Predestination.  Obviously we don't have time today to go into it fully. This is my understanding of it in a nutshell.   God chose us. This word used in LXX of God's choice of Israel, implies taking a smaller number out of a larger group.  Written in aorist tense.   This choice is called Predestination. It's actually 2 words and literally means -  "Before the Horizon" & It was used of making a blueprint.   Add to this the word "before" in verse 4 which means "to see down into"   Then read I Peter 1: 1-2 and you arrive at what I believe is the Biblical doctrine of Predestination.   "1Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, 2according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you." (1 Peter 1:1–2, ESV)   "God knowing everything – even what we call the future (also called foreknowledge) based on that knowledge he chooses (predestines) those who respond to His Grace in Jesus Christ."   Our problem with this is we are time bound people used to dealing with things in a certain order, God isn't and doesn't.   4) To prove that GOD'S WAY is superior to Satan's or the world's way.   6to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.  (Ephesians 1:6, ESV)   Introduce Lindy Beige and show video – the world and the devil always rely on force. God doesn't.   5) Forgiveness is found ONLY in Christ.    7IN HIM we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8which he lavished upon us, IN ALL WISDOM AND INSIGHT 9making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth IN CHRIST 10as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things IN HIM, things in heaven and things on earth.  (Ephesians 1:7–10, ESV)   · The grace of God in Christ is rich · It is LAVISHED upon us. · God does this wisely with insight · To show that only IN CHRIST will everyone & everything come together.   6) I am SEALED in Christ by the Holy Spirit.    11In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, 12so that we who were the first to hope IN CHRIST might be to the praise of his glory. 13IN HIM you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed IN HIM, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory." (Ephesians 1:11–14, ESV)   · God CHOSE me – that's amazing. · I'm part of God working all things according to His will. · The Spirit seals me · He (Spirit) guarantee's our inheritance (all those spiritual blessings referred to above) until the time we can receive & live in them. · All of this results in the praise of God's glory.      

Hope is one of the most misunderstood words in our culture. We say, “I hope things get better,” or “I hope this works out.” But biblical hope is not uncertainty; it is confidence rooted in Jesus.Hebrews 6:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

You Are Either With Jesus And Obey Him Or You're Under Satan's Control. No Middle Ground. 1 John 5:18-19 18We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them. 19We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.

**[Watchman SPECIAL Report: The Gunpowder Plot...Remember, Remember the 5th of November!]**Why do bonfires blaze every November 5th? This thought-provoking analysis goes beyond the history books to reveal a profound biblical truth. The failure of the 1605 Gunpowder Plot was not merely a foiled treason; it was a direct intervention by the Almighty. We explore the dark history of Bible suppression, the divine timing of the printing press, and the series of remarkable setbacks that exposed the plot. This presentation uncovers how God's purpose for the British nation and the global spread of His Word rendered this human scheme powerless. An outstanding exposition of how the Most High rules in the kingdoms of men.---**Chapters:**00:00 - Introduction01:16 - The Dark Ages and the Forbidden Book02:33 - Divine Occurrence: The Printing Press and the Reformation04:28 - Catholic Persecution and the Birth of a Plot05:53 - The Hand of God: Setbacks that Foiled the Plot07:23 - The Discovery and Aftermath07:39 - The Ultimate Reason: The Authorized Bible and God's Prophetic Plan09:31 - Conclusion: The Most High Rules**

False followers are people who appear to follow Christ outwardly but inwardly have no true faith or love for God.1 John 2:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Our conundrum? We, as humanity, believe ourselves to be the center of all things, and yet we know how awful we are in our thoughts. We also face what seem like meaningless events in our lives and erratic circumstances we don't understand. Solomon summed it up for us: "All things are wearisome; Man is not able to tell it. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, Nor is the ear filled with hearing." Ecclesiastes 1:8The Bible calls Christians His treasured ones, and such we are, knowing, "This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, 20 where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek." Hebrews 6:19-20We learn as we sojourn through this life, "If the LORD had not been my help, My soul would soon have dwelt in the abode of silence. 18 If I should say, "My foot has slipped," Thy lovingkindness, O LORD, will hold me up. 19 When my anxious thoughts multiply within me, Thy consolations delight my soul." Psalm 94:17-19We have our personal intimate consolation, even in the person of Jesus the Messiah.We know thus far in October, our King of Glory is our hope, comfort, the King of all creation. He holds our hands, trains us, and keeps us safe. All those vagaries to us are actually in His control, and He is our personal, intimate consolation.Our So What?How might an upcoming conversation with our Creator, Savior, and sustainer go if we meditate on all His consolations? What a glorious conversation that is!Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen1 Timothy 1:17Brethren, let's pray for one another. "What a man is on his knees before God, that he is and nothing more." Robert Murray M'CheyneeM'Cheynee Donation link:https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=G9JGGR5W97D64Alternatively, visit www.freerangepreacheronprayer.com and use the Donations tab.Assistant Editor: Seven Jefferson Gossard.www.freerangepreacheronprayer.comfreerangeprayer@gmail.comFacebook - Free Range Preacher MinistriesInstagram: freerangeministriesAll our Scripture quotes are drawn from the NASB 1977 edition.For access to the voice-over services of Richard Durrington, please visit RichardDurrington.com or email him at Durringtonr@gmail.comOur podcast art was designed by @sammmmmmmmm23 on InstagramSeason 007Episode 152

1 Kings 19:19We are starting a new series today. In our new series, “Live your calling”, we'll see what happens when we leave comfort behind and pursue our true purpose 

The Crossroads Part 4 – Walking with JesusBrian UyedaOriginal Air Date: 2025.10.19We believe The Bible, God's word, is inspired by Him, through the Holy Spirit and is sufficient for everything you need in life – guidance, wisdom, strength, encouragement and HOPE. His word reveals His nature and character and His plan of redemption through His Son Jesus Christ, through whom we can have eternal salvation when we choose to follow Him. We also believe the Bible remains relevant in our world today and its power is experienced when personally and consistently applied and practiced.Part of your journey may include choosing a Bible translation and there are many. To help you choose, it is important to know that a “translation” is word-for-word while a “paraphrase” is thought- for- thought. If you are new to Bible reading or don't yet have one, we offer FREE Bibles that are English Standard Version translation – a very easy to read Bible. Other options are Bible Apps you can download to your phone, or sites like: www.Bible.org, www.biblegateway.com or www.blueletterbible.org.We invite you to join us for weekend services:Saturday Evening at 5:30pm. Question and Answer period after service.Morning Social at 10:00am: A time to connect with others over coffee and donuts.Sunday Morning at 10:30amPromiseland Kids' Ministry: Toddler – Sr. High, Sunday at 10:30 am, offers Christian education and worship for children and youth.If you have missed a message or are viewing from home, you can catch weekend services on our Facebook page and YouTube by going to www.crossroads-ridgecrest.org, or through the church app. We also have podcasts available by looking up Crossroads Community Church - available on several podcast apps.Have a question for one of our Pastors? Submit your questions via text at: (760) 301-4840 for our Ask It! Your Questions Answered segment every week. Watch what others ask!If you have any questions or would like to make an appointment, please call (760)384-3333 Weds. – Fri. 10am-4pm, text (760)301-4840, or email ccc@ccc-rc.org

Fr. Bliss Spillar, our senior pastor, preaches on the seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time.Readings from Sacred Scripture2 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15cPsalm 1112 Timothy 2:8-15Luke 17:11-19We join Christians worldwide by reading weekly texts from the Revised Common Lectionary and, over time, hearing the whole gospel story read within our community.Intro for Sermon PodcastsOutro for Sermon AudioIntro for Sermon Podcasts Outro for Sermon AudioWe are a community hoping to live the Jesus-way in our city as a people of God's hospitality, God‘s restoration, and God's shalom. Learn more about All Souls Charlottesville: www.allsoulscville.com

Jesus didn't suggest sharing the Gospel; He commanded it.Matthew 28:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

You Can Trust The Bible Because God Wrote It 2 Peter 1:16-21 16For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” b 18We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain. 19We also have the prophetic message as something completely reliable, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. 20Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation of things. 21For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Division and hostility among God's people grieve Him.Proverbs 6:16-19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

9Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better thingsthings that belong to salvation.10For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do.11And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end,12so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. The Certainty of God's Promise 13For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself,14saying, Surely I will bless you and multiply you.15And thus Abraham,[a]having patiently waited, obtained the promise.16For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation.17So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath,18so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.19We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,20where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

9Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better thingsthings that belong to salvation.10For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints, as you still do.11And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end,12so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. The Certainty of God's Promise 13For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself,14saying, Surely I will bless you and multiply you.15And thus Abraham,[a]having patiently waited, obtained the promise.16For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation.17So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath,18so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.19We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,20where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Send us a textLesson 16: The Birth of Egoic ConsciousnessSection 6: Fear Has Taken Its Final FormParagraphs: 15-19We dive deep into Lesson 16 of The Way of Mastery, exploring how our consciousness creates our reality through our beliefs and perceptions about ourselves.• Fear causes contraction in our being, drawing us into experiences that match our beliefs about ourselves• We are divine beings having a human experience, not separate from God but using God's power to create a dream of separation• Our life circumstances perfectly reflect the subconscious beliefs we hold about ourselves• Every soul chooses its human experience as a curriculum for awakening and growth• When we identify with the ego, we experience ourselves as separate, lonely, weak individuals• At death, we experience our vast consciousness, but fear drives us back into limited physical experience• Self-honesty is the greatest act of love we can give ourselves• Changing our beliefs requires commitment, repetition, and willingness to look for evidence of our new perspectives• Community support is essential for maintaining momentum in our spiritual growthIf you found value in this episode, please share it with someone who might benefit, subscribe, and join our Way of Mastery community.If you're interested in the Living The Way of Mastery Year-Long Program where we will dive deep into Lesson 1-12 (The Way of Heart) over 12 months, starting Feb. 9th, click here.Join the Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/livingthewayofmasteryIf you'd like to support the podcast, you can donate here:https://www.buymeacoffee.com/thewayofmasteryIf you would like to experience Revelation Breathwork, you can get our FREE 3-part Breathwork for Beginners series here.Purchase The Way of Mastery here. (This is a link to the Shanti Christo website, not Amazon. I want to support the organization. I don't receive any commission from this.)You can purchase access to the Lesson 5 Guided Meditation Prayer that Jason recorded here for $4.44

Reminding one another of the eternal hope we have in Jesus.Hebrews 6:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultSponsored by: Bethlehem Kung Fu Center https://bethlehemkungfu.comBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Principle 76 – Abiding in Christ   Psalm 80:1-19We must live in close fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ, drawing our strength from Him.NEW! - Let us know what you think of the program! Support the show

Some people are living like God is wasting their time on earth.Philippians 3:18-19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultSponsored by: Bethlehem Kung Fu Center https://bethlehemkungfu.comBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

17By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. 18There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. 19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannota love God whom he has not seen. 21And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

For more information about our ministry, please visit: highwaydeliveranceministries.org   If you would like to visit, our address is: 431 15th St. NE. Washington DC. Thanks for listening.Scripture Reference:Ephesians 4:17-19We must avoid and resist the ways of the world. Futility is a tall tell sign of the world's conditionRomans 1:21 Our Website

Faith requires action. If God gives you a promise, obey it, even if you don't see immediate results.Philippians 4:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Join the Adult Bible Study: https://soulwinnerz.org/adultBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

in this episode, Pastor Dom teaches us about the importance of pursuing holinesHebrews 12:1414 Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord:1 John 5:19We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.1 Peter 1:13-16 13 Therefore gird up the loins ( waist area ) of your mind, be sober ( to be self-controlled, to be watchful ), and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ;  14 as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; 15 but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 because it is written, “Be holy, for I am holy.”2 Corinthians 7:1Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.Ephesians 4:24and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.1 Thessalonians 4:77 For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness.

How does God reconcile?2 Corinthians 5:18-19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Visit our Sponsors: https://soulwinnerz.orgDonate: https://soulwinnerz.org/DonateBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Series: Suffering JesusScripture: Luke 17:11-19We hope you enjoyed listening to this message! If you'd like to stay updated on what God is doing at Citylight Council Bluffs, be sure to follow us:Citylight Council BluffsFacebookInstagramCitylight Council BluffsSunday Gatherings at 9:00 & 11:00 AMLivestream at 9:00 AM2109 Railroad Hwy, Council Bluffs, IA 51503Support the show

Can Nikola Jokic hold off Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for our MVP pick? Plus, a fascinating name enters the bottom of the ballot. There also continues to be some new blood compared to past years in our All-NBA discussion (25:48), and Defensive Player of the Year has some awesome bigs in the discussion but a few traditional names that haven't been competitive. 46:21Coach of the year is impossible to choose with all the great jobs that are being done this year. 55:11Sixth Man of the Year features a strong crop of players who do a lot of different things. 1:02:21Rookie of the year features a protest vote. 1:11:19We also give our picks for Sophomore of the Year (1:16:14) and Executive of the Year. (1:18:29). Subscribe to Dunc'd On Prime, the only place to get every episode with Nate & Danny, plus every pod with John Hollinger & Nate as well! DuncdOn.SupportingCast.FMSubscribe on YouTube to see our hilarious faces and, more importantly, see watch this free pod twice a week.Or, sign up for our FREE mailing list to get Dan Feldman's Daily Duncs with all the major topics around the league twice a week.

In this podcast we talk about the essence of love, relationships, and cultivating a life filled with love centered around Allah first. The aspect of love is first learned by connecting to Allah and then through loving Him, you learn how to love others such as your family, spouse, children, and community. Learn about developing a connection with Allah, understanding unconditional love, and fostering meaningful bonds with others.DeenTour is a podcast and channel where 3 brothers showcase their love for islam through reminders, brotherhood, motivation, entertainment, and more!Let us know if you enjoyed this video and if you'd like to see more of this!!Start your FREE Trial in Guided Success!https://www.skool.com/guidedsuccessRead about finding your purpose and our journey to getting closer to God!!Cop Our E-Book!!Deentour.shopJOIN THE DISCORD:https://discord.gg/xUdqnuDY6wFOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA!Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deentourr/Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@deentourrIntro - 0:00Why we didn't have a podcast last week - 1:15Love & Hate being tied to Allah - 4:49What is love? - 6:06When you love for the sake of Allah - 7:32How often we sin against Allah yet He forgives us.. - 8:19We don't know Allah - 9:17When's the last time you thanked Allah? - 10:58Allah teaches you how to love Him so you can love others - 11:28High quantity, low quality - 14:14Show love to people the way you want Allah to show love to you - 15:00The bonds built by family - 19:13We put unnecessary burden on ourselves - 20:35Looking for love in the wrong place - 21:35Showing love & being sincere as a form of worship - 23:10The love, respect, and compassion of Muhammad (SAW) - 23:51The honor of Nuh (AS) - 25:47Patience compliments love - 26:40We have the blueprint for life as Muslims - 27:49Build your confidence in your religion - 29:00Do you not think Allah would provide for His religion? - 29:45An example of us giving advice and still getting bashed - 32:18difference between worshipping Allah and submitting - 35:49Trying to change for Allah - 39:00

Contact us at: thewavecolumbus@gmail.com, or www.thewavecolumbus.com1 John 4:19We love, because He first loved us.Romans 8:31-39 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Who will bring charges against God's elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, but rather, was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or trouble, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? Just as it is written:“FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE KILLED ALL DAY LONG;WE WERE REGARDED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED.”But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.Contact us at: thewavecolumbus@gmail.com, or www.thewavecolumbus.com

The Christian's body, as a temple of the Holy Spirit, should not be subjected to the harmful effects of drug and alcohol abuse.1 Corinthians 6:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Visit our Sponsors: https://soulwinnerz.orgDonate: https://soulwinnerz.org/DonateBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Contact us at: thewavecolumbus@gmail.com, or www.thewavecolumbus.com1 John 4:19We love, because He first loved us.Ephesians 5:1-2 Follow God's example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.1 John 4:7-8 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.Colossians 3:14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.Romans 13:8-10 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law.Contact us at: thewavecolumbus@gmail.com, or www.thewavecolumbus.com

The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father and the Son.Matthew 28:19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Visit our Sponsors: https://soulwinnerz.orgDonate: https://soulwinnerz.org/DonateBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.

Send us a textEpisode starts at 8:19We're back! Kade goes over where Knocked Prone has been on their 4 month hiatus.The party takes a long rest where Earl talks with Javi about his interest in staying in the Baddies to help take down the Pinkerton's. The party then compares notes with the spirit inside of Earl's bone staff to get closer to the bottom of their afterlife mystery. Talroth reveals that he hid the amulet that is containing Delry in his ichor cage.Joshua Lorimer's projects and profiles to check out:The Titans of All'Terra: https://www.lorimermedia.com/the-titans-of-all-terraSneak Attack!: https://sneakattack.libsyn.com/I Cast Fireball: https://www.icastfireball.net/Twitter/X: https://x.com/Joshuathehippie#KnockedProne #DeadSeason #dndactualplay #dndpodcast  #ttrpgpodcast #dnd5e #dungeonsanddragons Consider supporting our podcast by going to  patreon.com/knocked where you can get tons of behind the scenes content to our show!Links to everything else: https://beacons.ai/knockedproneFund Dice Around the World on Kickstarter by clicking the below link & get culturally inspired sets of hand crafted dice! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mistymountaingaming/dice-around-the-world?ref=android_project_share Get your copy of the most historically accurate ancient Egypt supplement ever created by backing the Kingdom of Keshanar now on Kickstarter: Click here to support now: https://launch.keshanar.com/ Support the show

The desire for more things can ruin you.1 Timothy 6:17-19We are (LIVE) on our website's [Morning Devo] podcast now!:::: sELAH rADIO Network https://soulwinnerz.org ::::::::: https://live.soulwinnerz.org and we want to see who you are by simply clicking here https://chat.restream.io/fb :::::Visit our Sponsors: https://soulwinnerz.orgDonate: https://soulwinnerz.org/DonateBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-blaze-bible-study--525630/support.