Podcasts about what christian

Join Pastor Travis Hall and guest Sherman Farmer as they talk about untimely ambitions, displacement syndrome, and what helped draw him out of the seasons of discouragement. In this episode, Bishop-designate Sherman discusses the main areas where Christian leaders are commonly discouraged and attacked, together with how they can lead from identity instead for one. For Bishop, there is nothing wrong with being ambitious. What Christian leaders, or Christians in general, need to hear about are the instances of being the right person at the wrong time. Tune in as they put the spot on the Transformational Truth #28 - If we lead for affirmation, we will never be a courageous leader with Sherman Farmer. Ready your notes, as there will be a ton to take away from this episode. In this episode you will learn: · Having an identity that’s not anchored to Christ. · Being the right person at the wrong time. · The four (4) major areas where leaders are attacked. · The power after honesty. · What contributes to a leader’s confusion over worth and identity? · …and so much more! About Sherman Farmer: Bishop-Designate Sherman D. Farmer is an author, visionary, and prophet entrusted with the vision of God to shepherd and disciple souls into the kingdom. Over 20 years, his soul-saving messages have reached the hearts of men and women throughout the world. Bishop-Designate Farmer’s distinct and unparalleled ability to impart training of integrity through the compassion, empowerment, and inspiration of the Holy Spirit has caused his ministry to flourish. He is the founder of The New Apostolic Prophetic Reformation of the United and Covenanted Churches –a subsidiary of New Gibeah Ministries for Christ, Inc. and Straightway Apostolic Ministries located in Maryland. He also serves as Apostle and Bishop to Greater Revival Center (VA), NGMC-Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, and Nigeria. Bishop-Designate’s main intensive in kingdom building is to help prophets establish and fully develop their gifts through spiritual, biblical, and doctrinal aptitude courses. He is also the founding visionary of the New Kohath Prophetic Institute. Connect with Sherman Farmer on: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sherman.farmer.54 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/straightwayapostolicministries/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/DalontaFarmer Clubhouse: Sherman D Farmer YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMTA6_2Yyk0X511AmMpWLHQ Catch Pastor Travis Hall on: Website: http://cultivatemypurpose.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pastortravishall/ Seven Deadly Thoughts Book by Travis H. Hall: https://cultivatemypurpose.com/book/

On today’s Equipping You in Grace show Dave and Stephen Nichols discuss the life and ministry of R.C. Sproul, the lessons Christians can learn from his ministry, how friendship shaped R.C. Sproul’s ministry, along with his new book, R. C. Sproul: A Life (Crossway, 2021). What you’ll hear in this episode The legacy of R.C. Sproul. The influence Dr. Sproul has had on Dr. Nichols. What Christian readers can learn from R.C. Sproul’s example of evangelism. The marriage of R.C. Sproul and Vesta Sproul and what married couples can learn from their life of service to the Lord. How R.C. Sproul’s friendship furthered the impact of his ministry. Some interesting facets of the life of R.C. Sproul. Why Christians should read Christian biography. Some of the biggest lessons Christians can learn from the ministry of Dr. Sproul. Why we again need men like R.C. Sproul. About the Guest Stephen J. Nichols (PhD, Westminster Theological Seminary) serves as the president of Reformation Bible College and chief academic officer of Ligonier Ministries. He has written over twenty books and is an editor of the Theologians on the Christian Life series. He also hosts the weekly podcast 5 Minutes in Church History. Subscribing, sharing, and your feedback You can subscribe to Equipping You in Grace via iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast catcher. If you like what you’ve heard, please consider leaving a rating and share it with your friends (it takes only takes a second and will go a long way to helping other people find the show). You can also connect with me on Twitter at @davejjenkins, on Facebook, or via email to share your feedback. Thanks for listening to this episode of Equipping You in Grace!

On today’s Equipping You in Grace show Dave and Stephen Nichols discuss the life and ministry of R.C. Sproul, the lessons Christians can learn from his ministry, how friendship shaped R.C. Sproul’s ministry, along with his new book, R. C. Sproul: A Life (Crossway, 2021). What you’ll hear in this episode The legacy of R.C. Sproul. The influence Dr. Sproul has had on Dr. Nichols. What Christian readers can learn from R.C. Sproul’s example of evangelism. The marriage of R.C. Sproul and Vesta Sproul and what married couples can learn from their life of service to the Lord. How R.C. Sproul’s friendship furthered the impact of his ministry. Some interesting facets of the life of R.C. Sproul. Why Christians should read Christian biography. Some of the biggest lessons Christians can learn from the ministry of Dr. Sproul. Why we again need men like R.C. Sproul. About the Guest Stephen J. Nichols (PhD, Westminster Theological Seminary) serves as the president of Reformation Bible College and chief academic officer of Ligonier Ministries. He has written over twenty books and is an editor of the Theologians on the Christian Life series. He also hosts the weekly podcast 5 Minutes in Church History. Subscribing, sharing, and your feedback You can subscribe to Equipping You in Grace via iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast catcher. If you like what you’ve heard, please consider leaving a rating and share it with your friends (it takes only takes a second and will go a long way to helping other people find the show). You can also connect with me on Twitter at @davejjenkins, on Facebook, or via email to share your feedback. Thanks for listening to this episode of Equipping You in Grace!

John 18:28-37 A Kingdom, Not of this World In 1979, the late Jerry Falwell pioneered a political machine known as the Moral Majority. Falwell, originally a pastor and university president, became alarmed at that social and cultural transformation taking place in America through the 1960’s and 70’s and responded by seeking to reclaim the nation through the American political system. Falwell saw traditional family values were under attack. Sexual promiscuity was on the rise, the advance of homosexual agenda socially, the legalization of abortion, schools were promoting evolution and removing group prayer. Falwell shifted his focus in 1979. Previously he had been a radio and eventually a television preacher. But he found a greater opportunity in politics than in preaching. One historian writes: Recognizing that he could gain greater attention by talking about social issues than theological topic, Falwell turned (from television preaching) to politics.1 Things started off with a bang. In the fiscal 1979, the program raised $35 million from the two and a half million people on its mailing lists.2 Adjusting for inflation, that would be $95 million in today’s money. Almost $100 million raised in one year. The Moral Majority, was self-described as pro-family and pro-American. They were anti-abortion. Anti-pornography. Anti-communist. Anti-homosexuality. Anti-gambling. Pro-Israel. In 1980 the Moral Majority was credited with helping Ronald Reagan win the presidential election. A new day of political conservatism seemed to be dawning. Grass roots campaigns were taking place at the local and state level. Many others had tried unsuccessfully to create similar movements and failed. What gave the movement such success? Well Falwell was joined by other megachurch pastors—Charles Stanley (adding a Southern Baptist contingency) and D. James Kennedy (from the PCA, the Presbyterian Church in America). Reached across doctrinal lines within Christianity. And not just from within Christianity, but beyond it. They found allies and supports among Catholics, Mormons and Jews who shared the same concerns about society and desire to see cultural transformation.3 As sociologists reflect on what made this movement so powerful, it credits the key to the apparent success the fact that they were able to enlist the support of 72,000 pastors. 72,000 pulpits that began to unite a grass roots campaign and a concerted effort to take back America and reclaim the moral high ground. 72,000 pulpits that began to prioritize the focus of God’s people from the simple message of justification by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, to one of reclaiming America. That was the trade. Fast forward ten years to 1989 and the Moral Majority had already disbanded, and although they had aligned the American church with the republican party in the so-called religious right, even they recognized that their ambitions never materialized as they hoped. So, what’s to show for all the time and money today? Every moral battle the Moral Majority fought for in America is now either in the same spot or much worse. Go down the list and compare the legislation, the legal rulings, the media and entertainment industry, the practice and celebration of sin and compare the 1980’s to today. What was the problem with the Moral Majority? Was it what they stood for? No. Not really anyway. Christians should care about many of the things the Moral Majority did. They should fear the Lord, affirm what he affirms and hate what he hates. Was it that they involved themselves in politics through legislation and supporting candidates? No. Christians have a stewardship and the privilege of living in a democratic republic where we get to tangibly support what we believe honors God. The problem was a misplaced hope and a misplaced means for accomplishing that hope. What they failed to understand, and what we so often fail to understand is that although there are consequences of legislation and legal rulings from court battles and elections, God’s mission for his church is to center on the evangelizing of the lost and the edification of the saints so that we would be worshipers of God, for his glory. What they wanted was a good desire. What Christian doesn’t want to see righteous leaders and just laws. And punishment of evil doers and the promotion of legitimate civil liberties. The restraint of evil. Truthfulness. And honor and respect. The protection of the vulnerable. And peace. That kingdom is coming, but it isn’t here yet. We struggle because we want to see the promised kingdom come here and now through our own efforts. Through something that we can control. Something we can fundraise for. Mobilize. Gain enough influence and clout. Have the right party in control. Have the right person in the White House. God’s mission for his church is to center on the evangelizing of the lost and the edification of the saints so that we would be worshipers of God, for his glory. And to wait for his coming kingdom. It is a misplaced hope and a misplaced means for accomplishing that hope. We want the promised kingdom to come here and now through our own efforts. My friends, there is no such thing as a Christian nation or empire. What if the Moral Majority had been successful? What if every initiative had proved successful? What if we had a Christian for a president? Christian governors and judges and senators? What if abortion was illegal? What if evildoers were punished and true civil liberties were protected? Everyone feels better about their grandkids and reading the news and what others are posting online. But how does achieving that impact the cause of Christ? We don’t know exactly. But we have somewhat of a case study in church history. At the end of the third century, Christians suffered the most intense persecution the church had ever faced to that point. It started in rather indirect ways. First, pressure came against Christians regarding the military. Around A.D. 295 a number of Christians were condemned to death, some for refusing to join the army, and others for trying to leave it.4 Basically, Christians were viewed as a problem because they might not be embracing the military the way the pagan would. It was viewed as a threat to military morale. So, the pressure for conformity wasn’t direct (i.e., you believe in Jesus) but rather your lack of conforming to our military expectations. Next, in 303 A.D. Diocletian issued an edict to remove Christians from positions of responsibility within the empire. It seemed fairly benign. Just remove believers from government positions. And yet when it came to applying this decree, there were those who did it with greater zeal—they went beyond what was commanded by the decree. They began to destroy Christian buildings and books. If people refused to hand over their books, they were tortured and condemned to death. This caused conflicts that led Diocletian to become convinced that Christians were conspiring against him. And so he decreed all church leaders be arrested, and every Christian sacrifice to the gods. Thus was unleashed the most cruel of all persecutions that the ancient church had to endure… efforts were made to encourage Christians to abandon their faith. Accustomed as they were to the relative ease of several decades, many Christians succumbed. The rest were tortured with refined cruelty, and eventually killed in a variety of ways.5 Galerius was the mastermind behind Diocletian who was pushing the agenda against Christians. He was succeeded by Maximinus, who: …sought to perfect the policies of Galerius by having Christians maimed and put to work in stone quarries.6 But of course, that work didn’t stop the progress of the church: But then many of the condemned began organizing new churches in their places of punishment, and Maximinus had them killed or deported.7 Soon there was a decree granting a stay to stop punishing Christians as long as they “do not interfere with the public order.” I highlight that because the injunction wasn’t to stop preaching Christ, but to not do things that would threaten society. Public health and safety and peace in the empire were the ways that pressure came against the church. All of this set the backdrop for the arrival of Constantine. Constantine the night before a battle for the empire, had a dream where he received a command to put the Christian symbol on the shields of his soldiers. He didn’t come to salvation through repentance and faith in the finished work of Christ, but he had an experience that led him to believe that he wanted the Christian God on his side. And we get a window into what happens when the church goes from being persecuted to being in vogue. Constantine legalized Christianity. Finally, we had a guy who was on our side. He immediately upheld the free exercise of religion. He gave Christians back their property. Constantine was convinced that the glory of the Roman empire would be realized not apart from, but through Christianity. With the empire led by a supposed Christian, people were flocking to the churches. Apparent converts were happening so fast that there was hardly time to catechize them before baptism, let alone disciple them in the faith, or even validate if they were truly regenerate. Churches were receiving donations from the government. Soldiers were ordered by edict in A.D. 324 to worship the God of the Bible on the first day of the week. Constantine appointed a number of Christians to high positions within the government. He called together a church council in 325 and also sought to remove pagan temples and replace them with churches. During this time there were those who saw Constantine as God’s man for the job. He had been given to bring the church and empire together and for history to culminate. Constantine’s influence is difficult to underestimate because western civilization and much of our view of Christianity here in the West is connected to these very roots. Just consider some of the changes that were taking place… Christian theology was being shaped by the new circumstances, even to the point of abandoning some of the traditional themes… For starters, the prevailing view of the early church was that it was rare for the rich to see their need for salvation and be saved. But under Constantine, Riches and pomp came to be seen as signs of divine favor… Church buildings went from simple structures to get the job done (i.e., be a place to gather) and became ornate. There was a clerical aristocracy that began, that is to say church leaders began to operate in an official capacity, not longer just one of the common folks. They began to change from normal clothing to special attire. But perhaps the most significant change was in the area of a believer’s hope. Eusebius of Caesarea was one of the great theologians of his time. He was caught up in the apparent success of Christianity as marked by money and buildings and social clout and favor. And in the midst of that, his theology shifted. Although Eusebius does not go as far as to say so explicitly, in reading his words one receives the impression that now, with Constantine and his successors, the plan of God has been fulfilled. Beyond the present political order, all that Christians are to hope for is their own personal transference into the heavenly kingdom… there was a tendency to set aside or to postpone the hope of the early church, that its lord would return in the clouds to establish a Kingdom of peace and justice… the scheme of history that Eusebius developed led him to set aside a fundamental theme of early Christian preaching: the coming Kingdom of God.8 Do you see what happened? The shift from being out of season, to being in season marked a shift in focus among God’s people. Rather than think about the kingdom to come, they began to focus on seeing the kingdom come in their own time in their own way. My friends, it is a luxury to have such a view. In fact, I would dare say that the worldview that things will get better and better until Jesus comes not only misunderstands the Scripture, but could only be maintained if you live in a place like Rome during the time of Constantine or America for the past 300 years. And the kingdom is not here right now. We are not living in the spiritualization of kingdom promises. By that we mean to say that this world does not fit the description we read about in Scripture when the Messiah is reigning and ruling with his enemies subdued under his feet. World religions. Islam fastest growing religion in the world right now. Buddhism. Hindu. Atheists. Paganism and other faiths. Then you have within the supposed Christian numbers Roman Catholics. Prosperity Gospel. Protestant liberalism (to say they don’t believe in the core tenant of the Gospel). Worldwide lawlessness abounds. Error abounds. There’s no nation you can point to that is experience peace within and without, with God-fearing rulers who love justice and citizens who live righteously. We reject post-millennialism, that is to say that we are going to see the kingdom ushered in through the gradual progress of Christ’s dominion on this earth. We reject amillennialism, which says either the kingdom doesn’t exist at all, or we are in the kingdom right now. Rather, we believe that the kingdom is a bona fide reality where Jesus will actually be visibly seen, seated on a throne, and by which his glory will be made known. He is coming to establish this kingdom. The Bible teaches that we are still waiting for this to come to fruition. Turn with me to Acts 1 to see this in just one place so evidently. This was after Jesus died and was raised and appeared… Acts 1:6 (ESV) So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” Is it gonna be here now?? What does he say next? My kingdom, the promises you have been waiting for are actually spiritual realities. I’m head of the church, so all of that stuff about peace and justice and righteousness, I meant that will happen in the church, not in society. You misunderstood the promises of my kingdom. No. Acts 1:7–8 (ESV) He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. We are waiting on it. I’m not giving you a date. But in this Jesus is affirming that there is a kingdom and in that kingdom is coming. What are the disciples to do in the meantime? But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” Wait for the spirit and then get to work. I’m tasking you with a mission until my kingdom comes. Make your way back to John 18 with me and we get to see how this kingdom is presented here by Jesus. Pilate meets his maker today and declares him innocent (John 18:29-38). Last week we parked on the first verse and saw that… Religious hypocrites do anything to keep saving face (28) That was our main point. Religious hypocrites don’t want to be righteous, but they don’t want to stop looking righteous. So they pretend. Pilate meets his maker and declares him innocent (29-38) John 18 (ESV) 28 Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor’s headquarters. It was early morning. They themselves did not enter the governor’s headquarters, so that they would not be defiled, but could eat the Passover. 29 So Pilate went outside to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” 30 They answered him, “If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you.” 31 Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law.” The Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death.” 32 This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. 33 So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” 34 Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?” 35 Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?” 36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.” 37 Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” 38 Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, “I find no guilt in him. 39 But you have a custom that I should release one man for you at the Passover. So do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?” 40 They cried out again, “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Now Barabbas was a robber. John’s purpose here as we said, is to demonstrate that Jesus Christ was unjustly condemned and in fact, exonerated of any guilt. He records the details, and we will look at them briefly as we make our way to the statement, we are going to hone in here in v. 36 my kingdom is not of this world. 28 Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor’s headquarters. The they here, is explained by Mark in his Gospel as: Mark 15:1—the chief priests with the elders and scribes and the whole Council, immediately held a consultation; This was the Sanhedrin, the ruling body in Jerusalem made up of various religious leaders. Almost like a city council, except they operated in behalf of the nation. It was early morning. Not a legitimate trial. This was carried out through the night. But a man wasn’t to be tried and convicted on the same day according to their own statutes. Due process is being violated because they aren’t concerned with justice. This is an outcome-based trial. We know what we want and so we force the situation to fit into those rules. Jesus knew this was going to happen and said as much: Mark 10:33–34—…Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes; and they will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles. The whole thing is a sham. But these men are hell-bent on their own desires and they are blind to their hypocrisy. They themselves did not enter the governor’s headquarters, so that they would not be defiled, but could eat the Passover. Save face at all costs. Unwilling to come clean and drop the pretending. The religious leaders, filled with pretense, must still keep the appearance of righteousness. They must keep it up to appease their own consciences and to garner the esteem of others. Normally the governor lived in Caesarea, but during the great feasts it was prudent for him to come to Jerusalem in case a riot or insurrection took place. Passover was particularly dangerous because emotions ran high as the Jews remembered their deliverance from bondage. 29 So Pilate went outside to them and said, He goes outside. One time when the Jehovah’s witness ladies came to our door and I didn’t know that that’s a big no-no for them to come into the house. So, I told ‘em, “come in, let’s talk…” I told them… I’m in seminary right now, and we were just talking about you guys the other day. I’d love to sit down and try out some passages on you. They never came back… I think we had a different idea of a good time. Anyway, we had to stay outside to talk. Pilate goes outside. He’s no dummy. He knows this is a sham. And so, he asks them, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” 30 They answered him, “If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you.” Great non-answer. Just be honest. They say if he were not doing evil… What’s the truth about what Jesus has done? … he has cured every kind of diseases, has driven the devils out of men, has made the paralytics and the lame to walk, has restored sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and life to the dead? Such were the real facts, and those men knew them well; but… when men are intoxicated with pride, nothing is more difficult than to arouse them to form a sound and correct judgment.9 31 Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law.” Look, I’m not going to be sucked into this. You can’t even bring a legitimate charge for something that I need to deal with. The Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death.” We can’t. the Sanhedrin already condemned Jesus for blasphemy. But they can’t carry out the sentence because they would be breaking Roman law. They need the conviction at that level. Pilate isn’t going to swallow this thing. Even though he could at times be hard on the Jews, he has no interest in petty matters, and he certainly isn’t interested in granting false death sentences. So, he chooses rather than to simply affirm the case the Jews have made, to conduct his own trial and investigation. All of these events from the individuals are just happening. But God has a divine purpose in all of it. Verse 32 is an editorial comment by John. This would be in parenthesis if we were writing it today. Note: 32 This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. If the Sanhedrin had Jesus killed they would have stoned him. Stoning broke bones. Here Jesus would be crucified in order: (a) to fulfill prophecies (e.g., that none of His bones be broken; cf. 19:36–37); (b) to include both Jews and Gentiles in the collective guilt for the deed (cf. Acts 2:23; 4:27); (c) by crucifixion, Jesus was “lifted up” like “the snake in the desert” (cf. comments on John 3:14). A person under God’s curse was to be displayed (hanged) on a tree as a sign of judged sin (Deut. 21:23; Gal. 3:13).10 33 So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” What’s he trying to figure out? Is this guy actually an insurrectionist? Is he trying to overthrow the government? 34 Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?” Putting it Pilate’s conscience. Is this really what you think I am? The charges of course were partly true and party false. Jesus was in fact the Christ, but Luke tells us the charge they made was: Luke 23:2b—We found this man misleading our nation and forbidding to pay taxes to Caesar, and saying that He Himself is Christ, a King. They knew the claim to be a king would be the only potential way to get Rome involved. Jesus is an enemy of the state. 35 Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?” Why are you here? You’re the one who got delivered over today… not me.11 36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.” I wonder what went through Pilate’s mind at that moment. Jesus is no doubt unphased being before Pilate. He isn’t begging for his life. He isn’t railing insults. He is calm. And he is undeterred. Unintimidated. And he looks him in the eyes and he says: my kingdom is not of this world. Unlike your kingdom that is of the world, mine is not. Jesus is speaking of origin here. The preposition of is ἐκ = source. It doesn’t originate from this world. It isn’t brought about through traditional forms of conquest. What’s his evidence? If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, We would have organized a militia. We would have some plan to overthrow Rome. I would have been campaigning. Stockpiling resources. Organization. Planning. When I was to be brought into custody my servants would have been battling… that I might not be delivered over to the Jews.12 There would have been a coup. A coup d'etat is defined as a group who overthrows a government and rules for at least a week. Usually requires significant skill or resources to overthrow even a weak government. You need a lot of power on your side. Jesus is saying, if my kingdom originated here on this earth, I’d have some military guys who knew how to use weapons and kill people. Instead look at me… I’ve got fisherman, tax collector, one random zealot with Simon who was involved in politics but wasn’t a trained military man that we know of.13 Look, if you need proof, just go ask Malchus. Malchus is the servant of the high priest who Peter took a swipe at with his sword in the Garden. The guy should be dead right now because Peter went for his head and came away with just an ear. Jesus gives him the truth. Gives him the opportunity to submit himself to the truth, which Pilate will not do. He repeats himself. But my kingdom is not from the world.” Such strange words. Not backing down his claim to authority. This would be unnerving. You catch an insurgent leader—someone trying to lead a rebellion you expect them to be either 1) belligerent and defiant; or 2) diminutive and meek. Either still fighting or else trying to smooth things over. Either spit in your face or kiss your hand. But to stand there and not be angry or defensive and also not cower is astounding. Jesus sticks to the claim. He repeats himself. I’ve got a kingdom. Rome? Whatev… Yawn. Jesus doesn’t mock Pilate, but you could almost see him laughing… oh wait, you think I’m talking about this goofy little empire you guys have going? No. Sorry Charlie. I’m sorry, but I’m not interested in your cute little job Pilate. That’s so cute you guys stamp your faces on your money in your little kingdom. Pilate’s trying to figure out if Jesus wants Rome. Jesus is sticking to the facts—I’ve got a kingdom and it has nothing to do with yours. I actually feel bad for Pilate here. 37 Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Struggling to track this whole situation. Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. Jesus never claims to be a king during his first coming. It wasn’t part of his mission at this time. Jesus never refers to himself “the King of the Jews.” He says, “the designation is yours” And He answered him, “It is as you say.” Why? Well, because it is true that he is the promised, anointed one of Israel. Calling himself a king is going to bring confusion.14 Pilate is going to call him King of the Jews. The Maji are going to call him that. But that’s not a moniker he takes for himself. It’s not the right timing for him to be revealed as such. He’s not going to be caught saying, “I’m the King of the Jews” because it is going to be misunderstood, and his kingdom is going to include a lot more than just Jewish people. Nevertheless, the kingdom is a central theme of the earthly proclamation ministry of Jesus.15 Some would say it’s the central theme of the Bible. Explain Michael Vlach… Just let’s take one sample. Here in one gospel record. Matthew wanted to demonstrate Jesus was the promised Messiah fulfilling Jewish prophecies. But he’s just recording Jesus ministry. Let this convince you of how central the kingdom is. Matthew 2–Jesus Messiah… John the Baptist came on the scene before Christ saying what? Matthew 3:2 (ESV) “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Satan comes to tempt Jesus. And what’s the bait? Matthew 4:8 (ESV) Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. You can have your glorious reign now with all of the nations bowing to you in worship, and I’ll offer it to you without the pain of the cross. Bypass the humiliation and get the glory now. What’s his temptation? The kingdom exaltation without the suffering. Right off the bat, same chapter the preaching ministry of Jesus is centered on what? The kingdom.16 Matthew 4:17 (ESV) From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” It is near. Matthew 5, Jesus preaches what we know as the sermon on the mount. What does he address in that sermon? Who inherits the kingdom? Who gets to be in? Matthew 5:3 (ESV) “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5:10 (ESV) “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5:20 (ESV) For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. The future kingdom is to influence your life today recognizing that there are those who will be great and those who will be the least in this kingdom… Matthew 5:19 (ESV) Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. You are to pray for the arrival of this earthly kingdom: Matthew 6:10 (ESV) Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Your entire life is to be oriented around Christ and the future you have with him. Matthew 6:33 (ESV) But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Finally, entrance in the kingdom will not be based upon what you have done for God or done in his name. It will be based upon those who those who obey God out of a heart of love because they have been born again. Matthew 7:21 (ESV) “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Jesus is found preaching about, you guessed it, the kingdom.17 Sons of the kingdom, Matthew 8 The gospel (good news) of the kingdom, Matthew 9 Sends his disciples to go preach 10:7 that the kingdom is at hand Talking about the kingdom in Matthew 11 The kingdom in Matthew 12 In Matthew 13, Jesus says that: Matthew 13:11 (ESV) And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. And from then Jesus begins to teach in parables saying, “the kingdom of heaven is like…”18 The seed that a sower sows on various kinds of soil The wheat and the tares (good soil mixed with weeds) Like mustard seed Like leaven Like a treasure Like a fishing net It’s going to be a place where righteousness and justice reign: Matthew 13:41–43 (ESV) The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. The church is given the keys to this kingdom. Talk about an amazing and wonderful responsibility. The idea that the church is carrying out the responsibility of on earth clarifying who is and isn’t part of the kingdom Matthew 16:19 (ESV) I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” Humility is esteemed in the kingdom… Matthew 18:1–4 (ESV) At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. A few days prior to this, Jesus had come riding into Jerusalem on an unridden foal. It was the sign of a humble king: Matthew 21:9 (ESV) And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” Many are called into this kingdom, but few are chosen. Matthew 22 records that Jesus tells a parable of a King who offers an invitation to his son’s wedding. And when his invitation is disregarded (in this case by Israel) he extends the invitation to anyone who will come. And yet those who come in their own clothes, their own righteousness are cast out. 19 You are to be ready for this kingdom by repenting and turning to Christ now while there is time. So, you are not left like the virgins who are unprepared when the bridegroom arrives and they miss entering the kingdom. Matthew 25:1 (ESV) “Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. You are to be looking forward to the fact that there is a new kingdom coming that will be your inheritance. God will be doling out rewards and punishment. Matthew 25:34 (ESV) Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. The glorious promise of this kingdom. What you are desiring is good. And it will be fulfilled. Just not yet. So many in Israel at the time of Jesus had a hard time understanding his ministry, not because they were completely wrong about the fact that Jesus was David’s promised Son who would rule. But they misunderstood that he wasn’t establishing his kingdom in his first coming. It was coming later. Too often we lose sight of this coming kingdom and we want to see these things here and now through means that we can control. It’s a misplaced hope. What you want isn’t wrong with regard to the desire for a coming kingdom. But you have to understand the timeline and agenda for getting there. It’s a different path, generally speaking: Acts 14:21–22 (ESV) When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. That message isn’t suffering so that you can get saved. You get saved by trusting in Christ. But entering the kingdom, that process—is fraught with many trials. Many hardships. Right now, where is Jesus in all of this? He is seated at the right hand of the Father. He has all authority. He has been affirmed in the right to rule. But not all things have been put in subjection to him. Satan is still deceiving the nations. World superpowers are still doing what they will in rejection of Christ. Error and deception and wickedness is running amuck. 1 Corinthians 15:24–25 (ESV) Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. You can belong to this kingdom. Jesus invites you to enter into his kingdom. He beckons you to be part of it. How do you gain citizenship in this glorious kingdom? Faith in his all-sufficient sacrifice for you. But there’s a catch. You’ve gotta wait for it. Conclusion See his kingdom not of this world. It doesn’t originate from any human authority. And it isn’t brought about through human means. This should be an anchor point for you. It should be invigorating. Hebrews 12:28–29 (ESV) Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire. His kingdom agenda is not cultural transformation. It isn’t to eradicate poverty. Or to relieve human suffering. That day is coming. But it comes when he brings it. And it comes when he is seated on David’s throne and he rules over all in perfect justice and righteousness and peace. It comes when he subdues his enemies underneath his feet. And at that moment he comes and reverses the curse and begins to make right what is currently wrong with this earth. Pilate has Jesus killed. Ok so that just accomplished God’s will. And then it didn’t even work because Jesus came back to life. Diocletian tries to get people to abandon their faith. Maximinus starts maiming Christians and sending them to work camps—ok now they have work camp church plants. Constantine ushers in a golden age of Christianity. Well kinda. Some huge benefits to the church—free to work on out theology and yet it also weakened the the church. Earthly kingdoms rise and fall. Pendulums will swing. The wicked are going to prosper. Not bringing the kingdom here and now… Your invitation… Are you part of this kingdom? Then are you joining in advancing this kingdom? Don’t you dare for a second get caught up in the wrong definition of the kingdom. You can properly care about good legislation and good candidates without hoping in it. So now we are ambassadors for this king: Matthew 24:14 (ESV) And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. It was the words of our Lord to comfort his disciples: Matthew 26:29 (ESV) I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.

Christian Eckhardt is the CEO and co-founder of Customlytics, a Berlin-based app marketing agency. They specialize in consulting and supporting mobile strategy, analytics, and ASO integration.Questions Christian Answered in this Episode:What was a component of the mobile marketing landscape that you had to learn the most about or that you found the most challenging when growing Customlytics?What is the Marketing Master Map?What are the goals of the Marketing Master Map?What do you think of the customer journey? How do you break it down?What surprises came up as you were creating this map?What was the process of putting this together?Timestamp:6:14 Why paid campaigns are the trickiest component of mobile marketing8:28 What is the Marketing Master Map14:32 Benefits of the new digital marketing framework17:18 Breaking down the 11 steps of the customer journey24:07 What Christian’s learn about mobile marketing in the creation of the map30:28 The making of the Marketing Master Map33:28 How to access the map, free prints of the map, and tutorial videos!Quotes:(15:53-16:02) “I think the second big benefit of the Marketing Master Map is to point you towards things that you might have been missing out on in terms of which channels to you, in terms of the different technologies to use.”(28:42-29:12) “For me, this is really just the beginning. I know and I can guarantee you that, for example, the advertising strategy chapter is a very incomplete one because all of the things that are in there--there are the most important things, but a lot of them are exemplary. And there are many, many more sub-advertising strategies that you can adapt to. And this holds true for a lot of chapters in the map. The only thing is if we were to put them the whole thing would be even bigger than it is now.”Mentioned in this Episode:Christian Eckhardt’s LinkedInCustomlyticsMarketing Master Map & Tutorial Videos

The very last verse of 1 John tells us to -keep yourselves from idols.- This comes at the end of a book dedicated to how we can know we are saved as we love God and love others. John understood that our love for God directly correlates with our holiness because it is only as we grow to love God as we should that we will continue down the path of holiness. Idols are roadblocks in that path. What -Christian idols- are the greatest threat in our lives to the holiness that God has called us to-

The very last verse of 1 John tells us to -keep yourselves from idols.- This comes at the end of a book dedicated to how we can know we are saved as we love God and love others. John understood that our love for God directly correlates with our holiness because it is only as we grow to love God as we should that we will continue down the path of holiness. Idols are roadblocks in that path. What -Christian idols- are the greatest threat in our lives to the holiness that God has called us to-

What is your relationship with fitness? Do you have any fitness or health goals for 2021? It’s no secret that gyms are among the many industries that were hit hard from the lockdowns during the global pandemic, but some owners have found a way to still be around for the people that wanted to keep their bodies in shape. In this episode, I am joined by my friend, Christian Lee. Christian is a biomechanical specialist and the owner of Escape Fitness Training Facility. Christian started in the financial industry and soon realized that he wanted to enjoy what he did for a living and pivoted to the fitness world. We talk about how his gym has been impacted by COVID-19, our experience playing semi-pro baseball together, and all about his inspiring background. Christian’s passion, focus, and the brand that he is building is something incredibly special to witness.Listen to Episode 12, to learn about Christian’s training facility, how his business was impacted by the global pandemic, and all about his background that led to where he is today. Some Questions I Ask How have you pivoted and made changes to survive this pandemic? (2:07)Why was your career at St. Johns cut short? (12:07)Biomechanical specialist means the quality of movement, correct? (23:17)Why is your training facility different from others? (24:38)In This Episode You Will Learn The background of Christian’s training facility (5:15)How Christian went from working in the financial industry to starting his gym (7:28)About Christian’s experience working with young baseball players (15:25)What Christian says is the hardest part about coaching (19:44)Where Christian wants to see himself in five years (27:15)Connect with Christian LinkedInTwitterFacebookLet’s Connect!LinkedInInstagram TwitterMPC Builders - WebsiteMPC Builders - Facebook See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Episode Summary On this episode of The Gospel For Life, the Pastors answer the following question: What Christian biographies have impacted you the most? About Gospel for Life Four Treasure Valley pastors – all committed to showing that the Gospel is not just for the religious part of your life. Rather, it is for all of life. You never graduate from the Gospel. Josh Bales, Russell Herman, Phil Moran, and Jonathan Van Hoogen host The Gospel For Life every Monday through Friday at 8 AM MST. For more information about this group, please visit their website at reformationboise.com.Read More →

All around the world, Catholics are taking up the work of the Church through compelling movies and other productions. With new technology and affordable tools pairing with sensible storytelling, we are in a renaissance of Catholic media and content. Rudy and Jordan discuss approaching the new media landscape for Christ, and discuss a few of their favorite Catholic movies and how they help bring about the salvation of the world!00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:04 Looking back on the Covid Lockdowns and the Effect on the Church 00:05:45 Pope Pius X Stamp and Modernism 00:07:32 Thank you Subscribers! and the reason for the Glad Trad Podcast 00:16:49 Using Influence correctly 00:19:48 Jordan's curse of pipes 00:22:00 Renaissance of Catholic Media 00:23:25 Unplanned and Fatima 00:25:25 Bad Tropes of Christian Filmmaking & God's Not Dead 00:31:19 Risen 00:34:20 Overt Catholicism in Christian Films, Paul & Case For Christ 00:39:00 Fulton Sheen Story on Atheist husband to Catholic priest 00:43:00 Brother Francis Audio Drama 00:46:00 A Man For All Seasons 00:51:35 The Culture today doesn't fulfill us, but the saints do 00:55:23 Passion of the Christ 01:00:00 The Faith is a part of reality 01:02:20 Silence 01:05:15 What Christian film would we make? 01:14:00 The Young Pope 01:15:20 The First Presidential Debate & Fr Altman 01:16:45 Abortion is the PREEMINENT ISSUE 01:21:00 ConclusionInstagram: @gladtradpodcastTwitter @gladtradpodcast________________________________________________________________________________________ The Glad Trad Podcast is a series that highlights positive and exciting changes happening in the Church Militant, namely the rediscovery of the Traditional Latin Mass and a commitment to Catholic Orthodoxy. Brought to you by your favorite pipe-smoking, rosary-clutching, and meme-producing duo, naturally. Podcast is live at https://www.gladtradpodcast.buzzsprou... A

Yes this involves history, philosophy, truth-claims, and power. But there is still more at stake for me in all of this: profound suffering. Under Marxism the poor and the vulnerable are always the first ones to get eaten. What Christian values deeply benefit society? What American values deeply benefit society? What kind of things keep the state in check? What role does American niceness have to play in all of this? Why do I even care?

What Christian isn't curious about heaven? Although heaven is discussed extensively in the Bible, centuries of fictional characterizations of the afterlife have left most believers with an inaccurate picture of what heaven is really like. In A Place Called Heaven, author, pastor, and scholar Dr. Larry Ollison searches the entire Bible for rock-solid answers to your deepest questions about heaven.  Dr. Ollison tackles questions like: What happens when you die? Is heaven really a paradise? Where is heaven, and what does it look like? How will our heavenly bodies be different? Are loved ones there waiting for us and will they recognize us?   Get Larry's new book A Place Called Heaven: Your Journey Home.   For additional show notes, visit ShaunTabatt.com/468.   The Shaun Tabatt Show is part of the Destiny Image Podcast Network.

In the past few weeks, our country has been reminded of the reality of racism. As Christian leaders, how should we as the church be responding? And what can we do on an individual basis?  While some of us may not be affected by or see racism on a regular basis, the issue was brought to light in a significant way in recent weeks due to the death of George Floyd (among other incidents). As I considered this issue, I knew this was something I wanted to address on this podcast. Yet I knew that I needed to invite someone who has the expertise to speak to this topic. In this episode, I’m talking with my friend Dr. Shannon Polk. Shannon shares her leadership journey and how she ended up as a lawyer, associate pastor, wife, and mother. Despite being encouraged in her leadership gifts for most of her childhood and young adult years, she still faced doubts about her gifts and leadership ability later in adulthood. We also dive into the topic of racism and how the church can and should respond. Shannon provides both historical and personal insights into this issue, helping us to understand the origins of some of the practices that still live on today (even if they are no longer policies). Finally, Shannon and I dive into how we can practically respond as individuals, as well as one caveat we should all be looking out for as we navigate this season. This incredibly powerful conversation is a must-listen for all Christian leaders (not just women), so I encourage you to consider sharing it after you listen. Become a Partner & Get Access to Bonus Content This post contains affiliate links, which means if you choose to make a purchase via one of the links, we will receive a commission at no extra cost to you. This helps to support the costs of running the podcast and blog. Key Points Discussed: Shannon’s current life & leadership [4:06] Her leadership journey [7:20] Natural gifting for leadership Encouragement from family and other leaders When Shannon faced doubts about her leadership [16:00] The current events involving racism and the church’s response [28:48] The need to speak up if you see racism happening The importance of listening Shannon’s own experiences The issue of dehumanization  The issue of segregation of our churches & how it started [40:00] Historical background Redlining and how this impacts the segregation Look at the message you are sending to the black community Dealing with the discomfort [50:15] Asking God to search our hearts Examining our own biases The need to change policies and practices The practical ways that we can do better as individuals (even if you’re in a predominantly white area) [59:44] Educate yourself Adopt a listening posture Speaking up vs. doing the inner work [1:05:00] Communication is key Recognize you may not get it right Look at your structures and see if you have people who can help you craft the message Don’t let the fear of saying the wrong thing stop you from saying anything Build the relationships  Caution about the rush to normalcy [1:11:20] Leaders are learners [1:13:45]  Key Quotes from the Episode: Quotes are by Shannon Polk unless otherwise noted. “We are women and there's a place for us in the body and there’s a place for us outside of the body.” “Go where you’re celebrated, not where you’re tolerated.” “If we want to really release women to do all that God has created them to do, we need to let them lead with all of who they are.”  “Imagine living in that tension every day; where the simplest encounter could escalate beyond your wildest imagination.” “You wouldn’t leave your sex education of your kids up to Netflix, so why would you leave the education of race up to Netflix, up to the media, up to the neighbors next door?”  “We have to ask ourselves: are we willing to be uncomfortable?”  “Are you willing to lock arms with your black brothers and sisters in a way that could inconvenience you, and could possibly even harm you?”  “Instagram activism is super easy.... Are you willing to be that person to stand up and say ‘this isn’t right’ if it could cost you your job?” “What Christian authors are you reading that are not white?” “We’re not expecting you to get it right, but we’re expecting you to participate in the journey.”   Links and Resources Mentioned: Be the Bridge Episode 2: What is Leadership and Why Does Your Leadership Matter? The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America by Michael O. Emerson and Christian Smith Leadership Pain: The Classroom for Growth by Samuel Chand Didn't See It Coming: Overcoming the Seven Greatest Challenges That No One Expects and Everyone Experiences by Carey Nieuwhof Take the Day Off: Receiving God's Gift of Rest by Robert Morris Connect with Dr. Shannon Polk: Website Twitter Facebook Instagram   Shannon Polk, JD, DMin is an associate pastor at Riverside Tabernacle in Flint, Michigan.  She is an attorney and consultant on issues of race, gender, faith, and leadership. Become a Podcast Partner & Receive Bonus Content We have a fun way for you to partner with the podcast and get access to exclusive content. Every month, we add at least 1 bonus clip from an interview or from Holly and I to a special podcast for our partners. You can become a podcast partner for as little as $5/month by clicking here. Connect with Esther and Holly: Esther’s Website Holly’s Website Instagram Facebook Group Facebook Page   This episode was originally published on estherlittlefield.com/episode103.

What Christian cliche did Jesus give Martha and Mary? Real hurts require real answers; there are times real compassion, understanding, and empathy speak louder than any words. All our Scripture quotes are drawn from the NASB 1977 edition. freerangeprayer@gmail.com @PreacherRange For access to the Voice Over services of Richard Durrington, please visit RichardDurrington.com or email him at Durringtonr@gmail.com

Now more than ever we need to be meeting our audience where they are to reach them with our message. As an MC at comedy gigs being able to build a rapport with your audience is an imperative and that is why I am chuffed to have Christian Russell-Pollock as my guest on this show. An award-winning comic and marketer, Christian is a master at engaging his audience whether it's onstage doing comedy or online promoting events or individuals. In this episode he is sharing some game changing tips for speaking and growing your brand. Enjoy! What we talk about: What Christian loves about stand-up comedy. How you can cover if your material doesn't land and still get a laugh. Why it's better to know your material and trust yourself than learning every word. How to bring an audience into the experience and move easily between your material. The difference between an MC and a performer and how the skills of an MC can increase your impact. Christian's tips for being successful with humour. Why the truest thing is the funniest thing and what that means. Top tips for an MC that apply live and for online events. The No1 thing you should think about when building your brand. Why you need to give your audience a way to keep in touch. Persona examples and why this matter. Why it's important for your audience to like you. Why you should always find your opposite to work with in business.   All things Christian: Website(s) – https://1steditionmarketing.com https://www.crpcomedy.com Twitter @crpcomedian Books: It's Not How Good You Are it's How Good You Want to Be by Paul Arden Man of Letters by Spike Milligan Other Resources* Getting Your Public Speaking Persona Right! – 103 https://www.saraharcher.co.uk https://www.mystorywizard.com https://www.standoutpitch.com https://www.thespeakingclub.com/masterclass Thanks for listening! To share your thoughts:                                                  leave a comment below. Share this show on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. To help the show out: Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and review really help get the word out and I read each one. Subscribe on iTunes. *(please note if you use my link I get a small commission, but this does not affect your payment)

What happened when a youth pastor set up a Tik Tok account and started following his students? What Christian parents need to know about this popular social media platform and how it is shaping our kids' souls.

What happened when a youth pastor set up a Tik Tok account and started following his students? What Christian parents need to know about this popular social media platform and how it is shaping our kids' souls.

Dr Carolyn Lam: Welcome to Circulation on the Run, your weekly podcast summary and backstage pass to the journal and its editors. I'm Dr Carolyn Lam, associate editor from the National Heart Center and Duke National University of Singapore. Dr Greg Hundley: And I'm Dr Greg Hundley, director of the Pauley Heart Center at BCU Health in                                                     Richmond, Virginia. Dr Carolyn Lam: So Greg, guess what? We are going to be discussing predicting the benefit of evolocumab therapy in patients with atherosclerotic disease using a genetic risk score. That's our featured paper this week coming from the results of the FOURIER trial. I bet you can't wait to discuss it, but I'm not going to let us until we talk about some of the papers in today's issue. Do you have one? Dr Greg Hundley: Yes, Carolyn, but first I'm going to get a cup of coffee because there's a lot of data in this one. This study is from the ODYSSEY trial and it involves alirocumab and it's from Dr Charles Paulding. Remember Carolyn, the ODYSSEY trial was a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial comparing alirocumab, a PCSK9 inhibitor or placebo in 18,924 patients with acute coronary syndrome and elevated atherogenic lipoproteins despite optimized statin treatment. And the primary endpoint of this trial comprise death from coronary artery disease, non-fatal MI, ischemic stroke, or unstable angina requiring hospitalization. Now Carolyn, this is a sub-study and it was performed an A genome wide polygenic risk score for coronary artery disease comprising 6,579,025 genetic variants. And they were evaluated in 11,953 patients with available DNA samples. Analysis of the MACE risks, all those outcomes together, was performed in placebo treated patients while treatment benefit analysis was performed across all the patients. Dr Carolyn Lam: Ooh, so what did they find? Dr Greg Hundley: Well, Carolyn, both the absolute and relative reduction of MACE by alirocumab compared to placebo was greater in high versus low PRS patients. Those genetic, polygenetic risk scores combined in the patients. There was an absolute reduction by alirocumab in high versus low PRS groups of 6% and 1.5% respectively, and relative risk reduction in the alirocumab of 37% in the high PRS group versus 13% in the low PRS group. And so Carolyn, these results suggest the possibility of an independent tool for risk stratification using sort of precision medicine by selecting those using these genetic constructs, who may be more likely to benefit from this form of therapy. Dr Carolyn Lam: Wow Greg, that is really interesting. I genuinely think that our world is moving towards precision medicine and this really, really speaks to remember that feature paper also talking about genetic risk scores, but from the FOURIER trial. But before we get to that, I've got a basic science paper. Now this one provides insights into the mechanisms underlying age related hypertension. And it's from Dr Ying Yu and colleagues from Tianjin Medical University who hypothesize that since proinflammatory cytokines increase in T lymphocytes with aging and prostaglandin D2 suppresses T helper 1 cytokines through the D-prostanoid receptor 1, that this axis in T cells may play a role in age related hypertension. Dr Greg Hundley: Ah, Carolyn. What did they find in this study? Dr Carolyn Lam: Prostaglandin D2 biosynthesis and D-prostanoid receptor 1 expression, were both markedly decline in CD4 positive T cells from older humans and aged mice. D-prostanoid receptor 1 depletion in these CD4 positive T cells, exaggerated age dependent blood pressure elevation in mice by increasing tumor necrosis factor alpha and interferon gamma secretion. Whereas its over expression showed the opposite effect and its activation suppressed TH1 cytokines. These results really indicate that D-prostanoid receptor 1 and its downstream pathway may serve as an attractive immuno-therapeutic target for age dependent hypertension. Dr Greg Hundley: Oh wow. Very insightful Carolyn. Well, I've got a basic science paper to go over and it's from professor Kinya Otsu from Kings College London. This study addresses the mechanism of ongoing inflammation within the hearts of patients with cardiomyopathy. The study involves the assessment of Regnase-1 and RNAs involved in the degradation of a set of pro inflammatory cytokine messenger RNAs in immune cells. And the study involves the role of Regnase-1 in non-immune cells such as cardiomyocytes. Dr Carolyn Lam: Wow. Dr Greg Hundley: The degradation of cytokine messenger RNA by Regnase-1 and cardiomyocytes plays an important role in restraining sterile information in failing heart. Once the inflammatory cascade gets going, this is that constant inflammation that's ongoing. In addition, the Regnase-1 mediated pathway might be a therapeutic target to treat patients with heart failure as adeno-associated virus 9 mediated cardiomyocyte targeted gene delivery of Regnase-1 or administration of anti-IL-6 receptor antibody, attenuated the development cardiomyopathy induced by severe pressure overload in wild type mice. Dr Carolyn Lam: Wow, that's really interesting. I find this whole field of inflammation in heart failure of course, of key interest, but I'm going to next tell you about the results of the FUEL trial, which is the Fontan Udenafil Exercise Longitudinal trial. Dr Greg Hundley: Tell us about the Fontan operation. Dr Carolyn Lam: Aha, I thought you may ask, Greg. Well, the Fontan operation to remind us all, really creates a total cavopulmonary connection and a circulation in which the importance of pulmonary vascular resistance is therefore magnified. Over time, the circulation needs to deterioration of cardiovascular efficiency associated with a decline in exercise performance. This FUEL trial and reported this time by David Goldberg and colleagues from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia was a phase 3 clinical trial, which randomized 400 patients with Fontan physiology from 30 sites in North America and the Republic of Korea. The participants were randomly assigned to Udenafil at 87.5 milligrams twice daily or placebo. And the primary outcome was the between group difference in change in oxygen consumption with peak exercise. Dr Greg Hundley: Hmmm, very large important trial it seems like Carolyn. What did they find? Dr Carolyn Lam: Treatment with Udenafil did not result in a significant increase in peak oxygen consumption, which was the primary outcome, but did result in improvements in measures of exercise performance at the anaerobic threshold, which was a secondary outcome. Udenafil was well tolerated with side effects limited to those previously known to be associated with phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitors. These results and future perspectives are discussed an editorial called FUELing the Search for Medical Therapies in Late Fontan Failure, by Doctors Gewillig and De Bruaene. Dr Greg Hundley: Very nice, Carolyn. Now how about the rest of the journal? Dr Carolyn Lam: Oh well I want to tell you about this in-depth review by Dr Rosenkranz and it's entitled, Systemic Consequences of Pulmonary Hypertension and Right-Sided Heart Failure. Very intriguingly, talking about non-cardiac features, as well as cardiac, of right heart failure, a real, real must read with beautiful figures. In the cardiovascular case series we discuss a case of left ventricular non-compaction and cardiogenic shock by Dr Shenoy. There are also two research letters I want to tell you about one by Dr Gillinov on the accuracy of the Apple watch for detection of atrial fibrillation. And this time looking at the Apple watch series 4, which interestingly employs electrodes to generate a single lead ECG and provides two mechanisms for rhythm assessment. Won't tell you more. You got to pick up this beautiful letter. The next is by Dr Mazer on the effect of empagliflozin on erythropoietin levels IN stores and red blood cell morphology in patients with type II diabetes and coronary artery disease. And this really provides evidence to suggest that SGLT 2 inhibition with empagliflozin may stimulate erythropoiesis via an early increase in erythropoietin production in people with diabetes. Dr Greg Hundley: You know Carolyn, we just keep hearing more about EMPA and DAPA and they are just going to really pave the way I think for a whole new class of agents that we're going to be using frequently. I've got a couple letters in the mailbox and one is by Sugimoto and Taniguchi regarding the article, Internal Versus External Electrical Cardioversion of Atrial Arrhythmia in Patients with Implantable Cardio Defibrillators, a randomized clinical trial. And then also there's another research letter by Dr Hiroshi Sugimoto from Kobe Red Cross Hospital with a response by Jakob Lüker from University of Cologne. What a great issue. How about we proceed to that feature article? Dr Carolyn Lam: You bet. Can a genetic risk score identify individuals who will derive greater benefit from PC SK9 inhibition? Well guess what? We're going to find out now in our feature discussion. So pleased to have with us the first and the corresponding authors of our feature paper, Dr Nicholas Marston and Dr Christian Ruff, both from the TIMI study group in Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School and also to have our lovely associate editor, Dr Svati Shah from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Welcome everyone. Nick, could I get you started with telling us about this exciting analysis that you did from the FOURIER trial? Dr Nicholas Marston: The FOURIER trial was a 27,000 patient cardiovascular outcomes trial that studied the PC SK9 inhibitor, evolocumab and it demonstrated a significant reduction in major adverse cardiovascular events in patients who had established atherosclerotic disease. And in the study, there was a 15% relative risk reduction and a 2% absolute risk reduction, which earned it a class 2 recommendation for very high-risk patients with atherosclerosis in the recent cholesterol management guidelines. And what we've done in previous lipid trials is we studied the interactions between genetic risk and treatment benefit. For example, in 2015 we showed that patients with high genetic risk, those in the top 20% of genetic risk, had the greatest benefit from statin therapy in terms of both absolute and relative risk reductions. And so now we have the opportunity with evolocumab and data from the FOURIER trial to ask the same question of PC SK9 inhibitor. That is, could a genetic risk score identify patients who will drive a greater treatment benefit and we hypothesize that like statins, there would in fact be a significant interaction between genetic risk and therapeutic benefit. Dr Carolyn Lam: That's so cool Nick. But could I ask, the question always comes, is it nature versus nurture? And so I really love the way that you dealt with the clinical risk factors as well. Could you maybe walk us through that and then tell us the results? Dr Nicholas Marston: Yes, absolutely. We for this study, kind of had two objectives. One was to look at risk prediction and then the other look at treatment benefit and using a genetic risk score for both. However, we wanted to go further than just use the genetic risk score. We wanted to incorporate clinical risk factors since that's how we would do it as physicians in the clinic. We would have not just genetic risk data in front of us but also clinical data. And so when we were grading a patient's risk using genetic risk, we also factored in if they had multiple clinical risk factors. And what we found by combining both genetic and clinical risk was that there was a significant gradient of risk across these risk categories. That is patients who were without high genetic risk and without multiple clinical risk factors actually had no benefit from evolocumab over the 2.2-year follow-up period. However, those without high genetic risk, but who did have multiple clinical risk factors, derived an intermediate benefit. About a 13% relative risk reduction and 1.4% absolute risk reduction. And then it was the high genetic risk group, independent of whether or not they had multiple clinical risk factors that had the largest benefit from evolocumab with a relative risk reduction of 31%, absolute risk reduction of 4% and the number needed to treat of 25. And that's actually a twofold greater benefit than was seen in the overall FOURIER trial population. Dr Carolyn Lam: That's really stunning results. Now I know Svati's going to have questions for us, so maybe I should invite you Svati, just put these results into context and let the audience know what we were thinking as editors when we saw this brilliant paper. Dr Svati Shah: Yeah, thanks Carolyn. And I think Nick has done a fantastic job of describing the exciting results from this paper and just kind of taking a step back to help the audience understand what we're talking about when we're talking about genetics. For decades, we've been trying to figure out the genetics of heart disease and we're not talking about the genetics of things that are really rare like long QT syndrome, but the genetics of just common complex heart diseases. And amongst the scientific community, we've tried all different ways of sort of analyzing these data and so I want to make sure that everybody who's listening understands the novelty of really looking at these polygenic risk scores. Where we have now come to understand that it's not a single gene, it's not even two genes, that it's multiple variants and multiple genes and when they're combined, that's when you really have the power to understand how it might be useful in terms of how we take care of patients. Really important with how Nick and Christian have laid out this really nice paper as well as their prior work in statins, is that not only did they show that these polygenic risk scores are associated with cardiovascular outcomes or even different amongst whether you get treated with the drug or whether you don't, but really importantly they're getting it clinical utility, not only with regards to showing that they compare it to a clinical risk score, but really showing that if you use these polygenic risk scores, you can identify patients who may derive the greatest benefit from PC SK9 inhibitors. And importantly in their paper, they show that if you have low polygenic risk score and low clinical risk score, you may not derive benefit from PC SK9 inhibitors. With all the caveats that this is a secondary prevention population, so I really applaud Christian and Nick and his team for the nice work that was done. Dr Carolyn Lam: Oh, couldn't agree more, Svati. You know what I was very struck with too, because some people go, I may have a genetic risk. Maybe I could undo it or somehow overcome it with my clinical risk factors. And that's why I really appreciated that they showed that it was additive, and genetics still matter even if you have risk factors and vice versa. That was really cool. Christian, could I ask you to maybe describe a bit, what kind of genetic risk score this was and maybe perhaps point out some of the limitations therefore of what you studied. Dr Christian Ruff: As Svati mentioned, this is really a quickly evolving field. We now have the ability to either genotype or sequence all of the variation that makes us different from one another. Our susceptibility to disease as well as our potential benefit for treatment. We had for this study, looked at several different risk scores. The one we focused on was a coronary artery disease genetic risk score that had 27 different variants that had been shown to predict having a cardiac event, both in primary and secondary populations. And we have previously identified patients who may have been at a higher risk who received greater benefit from statin therapy. And in this study, we actually compared this 27 variant genetic risk score with actually a much larger score of over six million variants. And interestingly, the two scores performed fairly similar with respect for risk prediction. One of the big questions going forward is, we have lots of ways to develop genetic risk scores, how many different variants do we need? What more information do we have with more complicated scores? And I think Svati really hit on a really critical point is that really this study is really layering in genetic risk on top of clinical risk factors, which we can easily assess at the bedside. And I think what's reassuring to patients is that not only is genetic risk able to give us much more information for prognosis, but that this risk is modifiable. People think that their genetic risk, they're sort of born with it and there's nothing that they can do about it. But in this study, as Nick pointed out, even over a very short period of time with powerful lipid lowering therapy with a PC SK9 inhibitor, we essentially reduced these patients at high genetic risk to the risk of the very low risk patients on placebo. I think this is a reassuring message that genetics plays an important role for risk prediction and it identifies patients who we might target for more intensive therapy and that we can potentially reduce that risk even though that risk is based on the DNA that they're born with. Dr Carolyn Lam: Indeed. That's a great point. And Svati, I'm sure you were thinking along those lines when you invited that beautiful editorial by Doctors Daniel Raider and Michael Levin. But Svati, would you like to comment on your thoughts on, is this ready for prime time? Dr Svati Shah: I think that's the key question. What Christian and Nick and his team have done is take us a big step forward in how we use these polygenic risk scores. I think there still are many skeptics amongst the genetic scientific community about, well great, you can look at 27 variants and some of these polygenic risk scores, you're looking at a million things. How do we actually use that to take care of patients? I actually want to turn this back, that question back around Carolyn, and I'd like to ask Christian next, what are the next steps? There are a lot of cardiologists who if you're listening to this podcast, should we all run out and get our patient's genotype to order this genetic chip so that we can figure out what their polygenic risk score is? Dr Christian Ruff: Yeah, that's a great question and I could start off and then hand off to Nick, but I think one of the key questions is obviously there are a lot of genetic risk scores and I don't think as a field that we've come up with which one we really should implement in clinical practice. There's still a lot of fine tuning and figuring out which score gives us the most amount of useful information. And then I think as something that you had mentioned that these scores are generated in both a healthy cohort population and now, we're looking at it in clinical trials and there's no sort of reference. Like when we have a blood test and we say, "If your hemoglobin A1C is above or below this number that means that you have diabetes." And we haven't figured out, what are the actual thresholds that you use for these genetic risk scores that you can implement broadly across different patient populations. There's still a lot of work that needs to be done to make these scores ready for prime time. This is really setting the stage. Is this something that we should be doing? And I think these studies and others say that the data looks great that we should be doing this, but we haven't yet figured out the logistics of which score and how do we actually reference to population. Dr Nicholas Marston: Yeah, I agree with Christian definitely that we need to figure out what's the optimal genetic risk tool and for which population and what the cut points are. And then I think another piece that's going to be very important moving forward is doing a lot of this work and studying in non-European ancestry and cohorts and populations. Because most of the work done so far in discovery has been in databases such as the UK Biobank. And that limits us in our analyses to European ancestry patients. And so, I think for this to go to prime time, we want to be able to offer it to all of our patients. And so that means making sure we have scores that fit all populations, not just primary and secondary, but also all different types of ancestry. Dr Carolyn Lam: Oh, I'm so glad you mentioned that, Nick. That was exactly on my mind coming from Asia. And the other thing of course, would be cost effectiveness of these approaches. Oh my goodness. I wish we had all the time in the world to talk about this more. The implications are enormous, but just let me thank you on behalf of all of us for publishing this remarkable paper in Circulation. Audience, you've been listening to Circulation on the Run. Don't forget to tune in again next week. Dr Greg Hundley: This program is copyright, the American Heart Association 2020.  

Sermon Recording Sermon OutlineSpeaker: Rev. Scott StrickmanSermon Series: Faith, Hope & Love1 Peter 1:2-9 (ESV) 2 May grace and peace be multiplied to you. 3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, 7 so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, 9 obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.Sermon OutlineYou should expect the Christian life to be joyful.1. Where does it come from?v3 “blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!”v3 “he has caused us… a living hope”vv8-9 “you love him… you believe in him”2. How do you sustain it?v6 “though now for a  little while…”v7 “faith – more precious than gold”v3 “his great mercy;” “through the resurrection;” v4 “to an inheritance;” v5 “are being guarded;” “a salvation ready to be revealed”3.  What should you do?v6 “in this you rejoice”vv8-9 “rejoice with joy…”Questions for ReflectionDo you expect the Christian life to be joyful?  Why or why not?If Christians should be joyful, how do you understand Jesus’ warnings that following him will include suffering?What does it look like to pursue joy in God?  How do you do it?  What challenges will you have to deal with?Does every experience of happiness have to be “religious”?  How do you enjoy life and the things in it in a way that is integrated with faith, and is God-focused?When do you find it most difficult to be joyful?  What outlook can keep you sustained by hope?  What can you bring to mind at those times, or what perspective do you need to hold on to?Is deepening in faith in God a priority for you?  If it is, how will this alter your experiences of trials?  If it is not, how will trials cause problems for your faith?Which of the many “benefits” of following Jesus grip you most?  What components of the Christian life are most attractive, do you want most, will you seek after most fervently?How can rejoicing be a more regular practice in your life?  What can you do as part of your daily routine to celebrate and give thanks to God?What Christian song speaks most to you?  Why?  Identify or find a few songs and make singing them part of your devotional practice. Prayer of ConfessionMerciful Father, our hearts are joyless until they find their joy in you.  We have sought joy in the things you have made, but we have not been satisfied.  Out of a sense of emptiness we have pursued forms of pleasure that you forbid.  In our desperation for happiness, we have done things for our own happiness that have robbed others of joy.  In our failure to attain joy we have blamed and resented you.  We have failed to recognize and appreciate who you are and all you have done for us.  Forgive us, and open our eyes to this living hope, that we would rejoice with a joy inexpressible, filled with glory.  Amen.

Let’s relive teen drama of the 90s with Save Ferris and their 1997 album “It Means Everything!” with special guest, the fantastic Jenn de la Vega! Would Ramsey hang out with Ferris Bueler in high school? What Christian hardcore bands existed and what deserts did they play in? How did Alex Mack expose this band to a generation of new music consumers? All this and MORE! Don't want to end the fun? Check out our Spotify playlists for more music choices from Ramsey and Heather. Wanna get a shout-out on a future episode? Give us a rating on iTunes! It helps us, and it helps you feel good about yourself!

Christian Modjaiso is Founder and CEO of OBSERVE. He is the Xtreme Stress Coach, helping extremely stressed people to deal with their stress by observing it for themselves. Christian lives in Democratic Republic of the Congo. He speaks six languages, was on a university chess team before he went to high school and attended a top engineering school in the US. He has a bachelor’s degree in pure mathematics. This episode wasn’t all love and praise; however, Christian & I had serious disagreements about important topics, including race, relationships and anxiety. But as students of human nature who love to learn, we enjoyed every minute of it. Other topics we discuss: Dikembe Mutombo vs. Michael Jordan His expectations of America vs. his experience Understanding American jokes Getting spanked vs. caned Adapting to American’s perception of child abuse His favorite African-American comics My friend in Zambia, Bonie Getting an American Education: Coming to America [from Africa] at age 19 Being a minority for the first time “White people-smart” vs. “black people-smart” Racism in America Culture of dependence Victim mentality Incidents of racism he experienced in America American Culture: Attending a top engineering school in the USA Getting a Math degree What Christian thinks of the term “African-American” “Black culture” in America Feelings of inadequacy “Looksism” vs. Racism The African-American comedians he admires Latino culture in America Dealing with Stress & Anxiety: Ending human suffering Having a strong desire not to suffer Catalyst for starting his company Getting kicked out of school Understanding your suffering How he observes emotional states How he became better at handling his own mental stress The difference between stress and anxiety Capacity for emotional intelligence Separating thoughts from emotions Confidence stemming from preparation Coach Christian’s 3-step program Fun questions: If someone dropped a million dollars in your lap, what would you do with it? What’s your favorite book for dealing with stress? What’s your favorite podcast? What are you most grateful for? The solution to a stressful situation isn’t something you control. The effects [to causes] happen on their own . . . Focus on what you can do . . . Observe the facts . . . The solution will take care of itself.  – Christian Modjaiso Connect with Christian Get free coaching

Over the past few weeks, hundreds of thousands of Christian students have started their first semester of college. But how strong will these students' Christian faith be when they leave college? Or will they still see themselves as Christians at all? Even if these students' faith remains intact, what beliefs will be the hardest for them to believe and to defend? In this special back-to-school episode, Garrick Bailey and Timothy Paul Jones are joined by Dr. Grady Adkins and Dr. Joshua Swindall, two researchers who have spent the past year exploring which specific Christian beliefs are the most difficult for college students to believe and to defend. Now, Grady and Joshua are broadcasting the results of their research for the first time in the first half of this week's program. In the second half of the program, Garrick and Timothy dig deeper into the nature of faith by looking at biblical faith through the lens of one of the greatest rock hits of all time, "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey. Along the way, your intrepid hosts search unsuccessfully for south Detroit, contemplate what sort of people “streetlight people” might be, and discover a strange and mysterious link between the band Journey and prosperity preacher Paula White. As if this week's back-to-school episode wasn't strange enough already, the Infinity Gauntlet pits midichlorians against mutant powers, forcing a showdown between the Jedi and the X-Men that you won't soon forget. Subscribe to Three Chords and the Truth: The Apologetics Podcast: Apple / Android / RSS. In this Episode Grady Adkins, Ed.D., is Executive Pastor of Coram Deo Bible Church in Davenport, Iowa. Grady has been married to Alissa since 1998 and they have four lively, red-headed children: Landon, Reagan, Griffin, and Rowen. Joshua Swindall, Ed.D., is the headmaster at Cullman Christian School in Cullman, Alabama. Joshua and his family attend Crosshaven Church, where he serves as the student minister. Questions to Discuss 1. What Christian beliefs do college students struggle most to believe and to defend? 2. Why does college seem to have a corrosive effect on students' faith? 3. How can churches prepare children and students to persist in their faith in college, in light of what you have learned in this episode? Links to Click If you're interested in learning more about how to help children and college students keep their faith, one great place to start is Perspectives on Family Ministry, edited by Timothy Paul Jones. To learn more about this book, visit http://www.bhacademic.com B and H Academic The Institutes of the Christian Religion: book by John Calvin Soul Searching: book by Christian Smith "Don't Stop Believin'": song by Journey "Like a Rolling Stone": song by Bob Dylan "All Along the Watchtower": song by Jimi Hendrix "Sweet Child O'Mine": song by Guns N' Roses "Highway to Hell": song by AC/DC Trial by Fire: album by Journey ThreeChordsApologetics.com If you are interested in earning a master’s degree online or on campus that will equip you with the most comprehensive apologetics training available anywhere, go to http://www.sbts.edu/bgs/degree-programs/mdiv/apologetics/ How to Make Three Chords and the Truth More Amazing than It Already Is Support the show and spread the word! Here are a few ways to do that: 1. Subscribe to Three Chords and the Truth: The Apologetics Podcast: Apple / Android / RSS. 2. Leave a rating and review on iTunes to encourage other people to listen to the show. 3. If you purchase any of the books mentioned in Three Chords and the Truth, consider using the Amazon links provided in the show notes. The show will receive a small percentage of each sale. 4. Visit our Patreon site where you can support the podcast, suggest future songs or topics, and order Three Chords and the Truth merchandise. 5. Make contact with us on Twitter: @DrTimothyPJones  @GarrickBailey  @ApologeticsPod The Closing Credits Three Chords and the Truth: The Apologetics Podcast thanks B&H Academic for their sponsorship. Music for the podcast has been licensed through Artlist.io and performed by the band Vegan Friendly—even though neither Garrick nor Timothy has ever been vegan friendly. Brief excerpts of music played in each program are included solely for the purposes of comment and critique as allowed under the fair-use provision of U.S. copyright law. "The fair use of a copyrighted work ... for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, ... scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright" (U.S. Code § 107, Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use).

On today’s Equipping You in Grace show, Dave Jenkins and Dr. John Frame have a wide-ranging conversation about why Christians should read and study philosophy, free will, the problem of evil, making good arguments, and his book, We Are All Philosophers: A Christian Introduction to Seven Fundamental Questions (Lexham Press, 2019). What you’ll hear in this episode Why Christians should read and study philosophy. How philosophy relates to theology. What Christian philosophers Dr. Frame has found helpful, who they are, and why they’ve been so beneficial to him. How the question, “What is everything made of?” relates to a Christian worldview. What free will is and how important it is for the Christian to get a good idea and understanding of this concept. Free will, stewardship, and the Christian’s responsibility before God. How Anslem has influenced Dr. John Frame. Why Christians make arguments. Why human thinking should be through a biblical worldview. How Christians should think about the problem of evil and answer those who question or doubt whether God is good. Some of the most significant Christian philosophers in the history of the church. About the Guest Dr. John M. Frame is the retired J. D. Trimble Chair of Systematic Theology and Philosophy at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando and is the author of many books, including Salvation Belongs to the Lord, A History of Western Philosophy and Theology and the four-volume Theology of Lordship series. Subscribing, sharing, and your feedback You can subscribe to Equipping You in Grace via iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast catcher. Ifyou like what you’ve heard, please consider leaving a rating and share it with your friends (it takes only takes a second and will go a long way to helping other people find the show). You can also connect with me on Twitter at @davejjenkins, on Facebook or via email to share your feedback. Thanks for listening to this episode of Equipping You in Grace!

On today’s Equipping You in Grace show, Dave Jenkins and Dr. John Frame have a wide-ranging conversation about why Christians should read and study philosophy, free will, the problem of evil, making good arguments, and his book, We Are All Philosophers: A Christian Introduction to Seven Fundamental Questions (Lexham Press, 2019). What you’ll hear in this episode Why Christians should read and study philosophy. How philosophy relates to theology. What Christian philosophers Dr. Frame has found helpful, who they are, and why they’ve been so beneficial to him. How the question, “What is everything made of?” relates to a Christian worldview. What free will is and how important it is for the Christian to get a good idea and understanding of this concept. Free will, stewardship, and the Christian’s responsibility before God. How Anslem has influenced Dr. John Frame. Why Christians make arguments. Why human thinking should be through a biblical worldview. How Christians should think about the problem of evil and answer those who question or doubt whether God is good. Some of the most significant Christian philosophers in the history of the church. About the Guest Dr. John M. Frame is the retired J. D. Trimble Chair of Systematic Theology and Philosophy at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando and is the author of many books, including Salvation Belongs to the Lord, A History of Western Philosophy and Theology and the four-volume Theology of Lordship series. Subscribing, sharing, and your feedback You can subscribe to Equipping You in Grace via iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast catcher. Ifyou like what you’ve heard, please consider leaving a rating and share it with your friends (it takes only takes a second and will go a long way to helping other people find the show). You can also connect with me on Twitter at @davejjenkins, on Facebook or via email to share your feedback. Thanks for listening to this episode of Equipping You in Grace!

I've grown up being scared of my emotions. I was told they were weak, "girly," so I suppressed them, especially the more heartfelt ones. Anger was OK though, since it was more fierce and powerful, but also dangerous. But as we know, all human beings are social, emotional beings at the core. We are meant to feel emotions, whether we like it or not, we'll feel things. And like anything, when you try to silence that voice, there are many consequences that result from that, i.e. shallow relationships, stagnant life, burnout in career, loss in integrity and direction, low self-confidence. Only when we identify what we're feeling specifically, get to the root cause of the issue, can we start developing the steps and strategies to know what to do with it. But if we leave our emotions clouded in vagueness, it will always feel overwhelming and difficult to deal with. This is why I love this conversation with former professional MLB player, fellow life coach, and motivational speaker, Christian Lopez about society's limited perspective on what it means to be a man. We talk about his story through manhood and how he's working on not only becoming the best man he could be, but human as well. ------------------------------------- Timestamps: [6:43] Christian's story [17:29] Get over fear by having bias towards action [26:59] How to manage emotions as men in judgmental environments [45:03] There are many definitions of a man [49:52] Everyone needs role models [57:00] How to take emotional risks without getting wounded [1:11:29] The 5 Core Emotions [1:21:46] What Christian's up to ------------------------------------- Resources: Christian's podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/behind-the-mask-ulinity/id1474423662. Join Christian's FB group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2523230051072858. Find a local Toastmasters group to improve your communication skills: https://www.toastmasters.org. ------------------------------------- Subscribe to get your free list of 11 Emotional Resiliency exercises and to get updates on this podcast and blog at http://victorung.com/subscribe. Schedule a free coaching call with me to work on your emotional intelligence: http://victorung.com. Become a Patron to support this content: http://patreon.com/humanup. Clap for me on my blog on Medium: http://medium.com/@victorung. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/victorung/message

Today it’s great to have Christian Miller on the podcast. Dr. Miller is A.C. Reid Professor of Philosophy at Wake Forest University and Director of the Character Project, funded by the John Templeton Foundation and Templeton World Charity Foundation. He is the author of over 75 papers as well as the author of Moral Character: An Empirical Theory, Character and Moral Psychology, and most recently, The Character Gap: How Good Are We?  In this episode we discuss: The main aims of the Character Project Christian’s attempt to integrate positive psychology research with philosophy Replication of the famous Milgram experiment Fairness norms among infants Can we draw boundaries around the notion of “moral character”? What factors predict whether people help? How we’re a mixed bag between the poles of compassion and callousness What Christian’s research has discovered about people’s tendency toward helping, hurting, lying and cheating Can we make humans better? How SBK and Aristotle are on the same page

What Christian leaders are saying about the immigration crisis at the border. Americans are growing less tolerant. And an adaptation of Leonardo DiCaprio’s The Beach is headed to TV.

Pastor Rick Gaston teaches from the First Epistle of Peter (1 Peter 2:6-10) The post What Christian's Are first appeared on Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville.

Pastor Rick Gaston teaches from the First Epistle of Peter (1 Peter 2:6-10) The post What Christian's Are first appeared on Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville.

On today’s Equipping You in Grace episode, Dave Jenkins and Andrew Davis discuss the place and importance of contentment in the Christian life and ministry along with his book, The Power of Christian Contentment: Finding Deeper, Richer Christ-Centered Joy (Baker, 2019) What you’ll hear in this episode What Christian contentment means. How to fight for contentment in the Christian life. How the gospel helps Christians to grow in contentment and train their new desires and affections towards contentment in the Christian life. How Christians learn to find contentment even in the most difficult and challenging or in the mundane of life. How pain factors into Christian contentment. How fear and anxiety rob Christians of joy in Christ and what Christians can do to fight against anxiety and fear and for contentment in the Christian life. Why we are more discontent even though we have more advancements than ever from modern medicine to revolutionary technology. How parents and spouses can model Christian contentment. The dangers of Christian contentment and how to fight against complaining in the Christian life. How Christians attain contentment and protect it in their lives. How Pastors can grow in contentment as they minister to difficult, hurting, and struggling people. About the Guest Andrew M. Davis is pastor of First Baptist Church of Durham, North Carolina, and a visiting professor of church history at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Chairman of the governance committee of the Gospel Coalition, Davis has written articles for TGC's popular website and has spoken in plenary and breakout sessions at TGC's national conference. He is the author of Revitalize and An Infinite Journey, named by Tim Challies as one of the top ten books of 2014. Check out his work at  http://twojourneys.org/ Subscribing, sharing, and your feedback You can subscribe to Equipping You in Grace via iTunes, Google Play, or your favorite podcast catcher. Ifyou like what you’ve heard, please consider leaving a rating and share it with your friends (it takes only takes a second and will go a long way to helping other people find the show). You can also connect with me on Twitter at @davejjenkins, on Facebook or via email to share your feedback. Thanks for listening to this episode of Equipping You in Grace!

YOUR FALSE HUMILITY IS HURTING YOU. We all can struggle with taking money in return for our services. It’s hard to ask for what you need. My father sold life insurance. He taught me a lot about not being ashamed of selling something that adds value to another person’s life. That’s why, for this Five Minute Friday, I revisited a conversation I had with my brother Christian Howes about how artists can set themselves up for financial success. It’s all about knowing your worth. If you are making other people’s lives better or easier, you should be comfortable putting yourself out there as a business. Learn how to believe in your value by using the power of selling in Episode 771. In This Episode You Will Learn: The most important thing that sets people up to make money from their art (1:41) What Christian learned from his dad about selling (2:30) Why you need to know your value (4:10) About the danger of “false humility” (5:25) Follow me on: Instagram @lewishowes Twitter @LewisHowes Facebook: Lewis Howes

We start out 2019 with an explosion not a bang. Our guests are award-winning investigative journalist May Jeong, award-winning writer/stand up comedian Josh Gondelman and singular blues punk rock n’ roll bad ass musician Shilpa Ray. Along with special surprise guest Mitch The Enthusiasm Coach and Megan Fitzpatrick Gets It Off Her Chest. Christian and Shonali catch up on the holidays, mom talk, Nancy Pelosi, Howard Schulz' signature and the opportunity which 2019 will hopefully bring. Their first guest is investigative journalist May Jeong.  May is a wunderkind.  She's spent years living in Afghanistan covering the war and received high accolades for reporting from there.  We discuss her courage, smarts and as she calls it being "young and dumb" in terms of saying yes to every opportunity to get the real story.  Look for her upcoming work in the New Yorker regarding another explosive ground breaking story. Shonali's new 2019 positive attitude is due to the new man in her life, Mitch The Enthusiasm Coach.  Mitch who also wears two headbands at one time shows Christian how to get inspired about the year and take charge of his life.   The second guest in the lineup is award winning writer and stand up comedian Josh Gondelman.  He was a former writer for Last Week Tonight with John Oliver and currently write for the new late night show on Showtime with Desus and Mero.  What Christian and Shonali find most interesting about Josh is that he is from Boston, has no accent AND was a former preschool teacher. 2019 is going to be a big one for Josh.  He just recorded a one hour comedy live special and has written a new book "Nice Try - Story of Best Intentions and Mixed Results" to come out this year. Oh and Desus and Mero's show debuts on February 21st.  Get It Off Your Chest with audience member Megan Fitzpatrick.  She comes forth with martini in hand.  Our problems stem mostly from the weather and inconsiderate people.  Whew, don't you feel better.  Our last guest is the amazing multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter punk rock blues musician Shilpa Ray.  Wow.  Shonali bonds with Shilpa on being Bengali Female Desis who play rock n' roll.  Unbelievably she had a music pageant dad who had to force her to practice her harmonium and vocals at a young age.  Believably he also still wants her to go to med school.  Shilpa says she is actually shy which is shocking.  Shilpa kindly answers Christian's template musician question beautifully.  Please go see Shilpa play live at El Cortez on February 8th with James Chance to find out why people call her god. Shilpa performs two songs live on piano in the Red Room, 1) Same Sociopath and 2). Cry For the Cameras  Enjoy!  Happy New Year! Also special thanks to Matt Hunziker for coming in a crushing it as Mitch the Enthusiasm Coach!

Download this Episode Learn to stop wasting your time and money. Reign in your focus as a real estate professional and double down on things that will make you money in 2019. Today we discuss where agents are making their mistakes. We share how agents can refocus their efforts on what they're currently doing and how they can change their direction to make more of an impact in their business. Real Estate Podcast Transcription Audio length 33:57 RTRE 43 – Stop Wasting Time and Money [music] [Chris] Welcome to re:Think Real Estate, your educational and hopefully entertaining source for all things real estate, business, news and tech.  [Christian]: I am Christian Harris in Seattle, Washington. [Nathan]: Hi, I am Nathan White in Columbus, Ohio. [Chris]: And I am Chris Lazarus in Atlanta, Georgia. Thanks for tuning in.  [music] [Chris]: Hey everybody and welcome back to re:Think Real Estate. I am Chris Lazarus here with Christian, Nate and this week we're talking about shiny objects and things that real estate agents waste their money on. [Christian]:  And time. [Chris]:  And time. OK let's do that again [laughter].I have run out of words today. Christian start us off man. What are agents wasting their time and money on? [Christian]:  Hi. I think it depends on if you're a brand new agent in the business or if you're a veteran. If you're brand new you should be focusing on sales. Spending much of money on IDX websites, waste on time and money. It…because it's…everything that is expensive and doesn't directly co-relate to new sales, new agents should not be doing. But I think it is very sexy when people say “Hey you need a website, you need this, you need that, you need to buy leads”. Don't do any of that.  Like that's all maybe once you built up your business and you have the experience to be able to convert leads maybe you can do that but I think initially it should be a lot of new tech network, thinks that are cheap and easy and free which is gonna be social media profiles, you're getting out to you know community events, reaching up to people you know already via email, phone calls, that kind of thing. Those are several in one but the first thing I am thinking of is like a website or something that people tell you need to do but probably isn't the best use of your time or money to get sales now. Thinking of business now. [Chris]:  So I am gonna agree and disagree with you at the same time.  [Nathan]:  Well you're wrong. [Chris]:  [laughter] I don't know about all that. So I think you're right for most agents. You know if somebody comes in and they just buy a website and do nothing with it, right. It's a waste of money. If somebody is gonna come in and run as part of building that business, if they're coming in as a new agent or even an experienced agent, if you're doing the right way, you have landing pages, you're going out doing ads, lead capture… [Christian]:  No agent does that unless they're coming from a professional marketing background no agent is gonna do that. [Chris]:  People do that. People do that. I try… [Christian]:  Maybe one person. Maybe one person that has an actual conversion rate on their website that is a brand new agent spend money on that. [Chris]:  They're not brand new agents. [Christian]:  Well there you go. I said as a brand new agent. If you're experienced and you've got some runway to go OK that's a project that you can work on and you have some money to spend but that's not gonna get you business in your first year.  [Chris]:  Yeah and that's why I am agreeing and disagreeing. [Christian]:  OK. [Chris]:  Because the website could be, it can be a business hub, right? It is not something that you need right away but it can be an extremely well utilized source of revenue for agents if they do it right. It can also be a supporting piece for their marketing collateral that they create and they're putting in front of people. So…But… [Christian]:  Eventually yeah. [Chris]:  But most agents in my experience, there was a time when I paid for 20 professionally done websites, gave them to 20 of my agents, one of them updated their bio. Like completely waste of money. So I agree with you for 99% of the agents. They never gonna use it. Whatever their profile is on the MLS is whatever they need.  [Christian]:  Right. Well and I say that also understanding that even if you do a website and you're doing all the right stuff I mean I think statistically it is like across you know the whole nation, it's like 10% of business comes from people's websites. And that's in the high end. That's if you're killing it. That's if you have actual quality SEO. And… [Chris]:  Visitors [laughter]. [Christian]:  And marketing is good. And they're actually doing everything right. [Chris]:  Yeah. [Christian]:  And most agents don't do that. [Chris]:  So instead of doing a website, instead of doing a website right off the back Christian what would you recommend they start with?  [Christian]:  I say spend your time and energy getting your database together, so that you can set a mail chain for something similar and get in front of the people who already know they can trust you as opposed to trying to reach people that don't know you from you know, Adam and it's gonna be a much harder sale, much harder conversion. Take a longer, lumber longer you know to convert.  So you know go for the low hanging fruit and you gotta let people know and that's through social media, through mail chain, thorough that kind of stuff. And that's all free. Cheap. And just requires some time. [Chris]:  Absolutely. [Christian]:  Because as you get busier your time is gonna become more value and you have less of it but you have more money. And you can switch 2 things that are gonna take more money to get set up and more of a long term marketing strategy. [Chris]:  Oh yeah and I think instead of having a website right off the back you can create a Facebook business page and still have all of the lead capture features that a website is gonna give you if you just run Facebook lead ads. [Christian]:  True story. [Chris]:  And any conversion system is gonna have Facebook ads as part of that whether you push them to your website or your business page. That's just a personal preference based off of what you have out there. So you can easily replace the website initially with a Facebook business page. [Christian]:  True.  [Chris]:  Gives you the stats, the insight, so all the analytics too once you get 100 followers. So definitely. Definitely. [Christian]:  If you have a place to you know have your persona and drive traffic to. [Chris]:  Nate what is one thing that you think real estate agents are wasting their time and money on? [Nathan]:  They're wasting their time on time. I don't know if that makes sense but it makes a lot of it to me. Why? And what I mean by that is they don't have the product. They don't have any direction. They're literally like that ship, that went out to the bay but it never reached the ocean. They don't have a plan. They have not thought about what they're doing. Right? I mean I know Chris you know what you have been doing lately. I know what I do.  You know you wake up with a sense of purpose every day and we know the direction we're going. I know the direction that my ship is pointing from when I get up at 4:45 in the morning. Versus you got all these other agents. I can't tell you the [censored] callus time I have talked to somebody and I am  like “Hey what are you up to today? What are you up to today?”. And that's another agent. And they'll be like “Oh nothing”. And that is a common response.  Well [censored]. Nothing yields nothing. You don't have to be a genius to figure that out so stop wasting your time. Either do what you set up to do and…or at least develop a plan on how to do that and achieve it. I…you know…So stop wasting time. That's what they're doing. Wasting time.  [Chris]:  Zero plan. Zero equals zero. [Nathan]:  Yes I mean it's you know it's a zero sum game. Right you know it's like when I was fat I didn't just lose fat by doing nothing right? I had to go on and do something. I had to develop a plan. Well you're not gonna go sell a [censored] house without a plan. I mean you might get lucky but you know you're throw [censored] against the wall, it will stick. So… [Chris]:  I thought that's all real estate agents in the business.  [Nathan]:  Yeah right I just… [Chris]: They think they're just gonna list it and sell their house. There… [Nathan]:  Yeah right. So… [Christian]:  Well I was gonna say the other side of the coin on that, you know like you wanna have a plan whether you're new or realizing that your business is disorganized and you need something to give you direction. The other side of the coin to that is analysis, paralysis. Where you're always waiting to your ducks in a row, you do too much planning and you think everything is perfect before you execute. You need to execute while you're planning. Planning execute. It's a cycle not like I have this done where I can now start getting business, you know. I commonly see that where they're always planning and they always got something they have to do before they can actually get in front of their clients. [Chris]:  For everyone who wants to learn more about business planning and how we do it go to our website rtrepodcast.com and check out episode 40 which is our 2019 business planning episode. So it's a few weeks back. [Nathan]:  Right.  [Chris]:  But I gotta agree with you. People come into this and a lot…I think Bufenian [phonetics] company, on one of Brian Bufeny [phonetics] podcast. He said that they did a study. And in that study they tracked the time management of real estate agents that were working from home. And they found that on average like 0.5% of the time was spend on income generating activity. And here's why.  Because when you're working from home for somebody who is not monitored, who has zero accountability in the activities that they're supposed to do, when they get faced with getting the kids off to school, coming down, sitting down and then they look around and they're like “I gotta vacuum”. So they vacuum and they sit down and they're like “Gotta get the laundry going.” And they do that and they constantly find something to distract them from making calls.  And I am not talking about expires or foosballs I am just talking about calling your sphere. Warm calling. Calling to let people know that you're doing what you're doing and trying to set appointments to get referrals. It doesn't have to be cold calling. But nobody does it. So on average the income generating activities that are done by real estate agents that are not in an office, less than 1%. It's ridiculous. [Christian]:  Yeah and kind of going along that same, I am feeling a theme here of wasted unaccountable time. And one of the big ones, and this is a little tricky because really if you start off with your planning and your tensionality, time blocking, whatever tool you use to account for and manage your time so that like you know like a prior guest you know was talking about, it's all your focus and intensity of focus not the amount of time you spend. So like there's very real place for social media in your networking and connecting and getting the message out there. But you should be like “OK this is my 50 message off in a half hour and then turn off”. Don't be on social media all day long because they will sap your productivity. I guess. [Chris]:  Definitely. [Nathan]:  Man this is yeah I agree with Christian here and common theme I guess where we're going with this. But I am reading a book here now, by an author named Peter Changman [phonetics]. And it talks faster than normal, turbo charge your focus, productivity and success would be the secrets of an 88 charge de-brain ADX my brain right. So we'll use me as an example.  What have we talked about here in several episodes that I have yet to do and complete? My CRM right and get that updated. And I was struggling with that. And continue to struggle but finally started to get things done on it and I took it out of the book and figured how to get that done and for me what I had to do is set a deadline. You know I can have like you know Christian said I was the king of you know I plan on doing it, right. Write it on the list even but once I started putting deadlines on when I needed things done my…the way my brain worked at least was “Alright you gotta get it done and you got until this date to do it”.  So for me that works and I think part of it is you know than you can get into further and say “What are those triggers?” And you have to figure out for yourself what works and I knew for me if I didn't have a date I wasn't gonna get it done. So when I do a lot of my planning now I do a put dates behind it because than I am working towards a completion date and it helps me stay on track for where I need to be. Therefore, I am not wasting my time. So… [Christian]:  Yeah well you can take that to micro level and use an app or regular timer to say “Hey here is my hour to do this project and have it counted down. So it creates that artificial timeline that kind of forces you to focus. So… [Chris]:  Sense of an urgency. [Christian]:  Yeah exactly. [Chris]:  Yeah. [Nathan]:  Yeah you gotta know what those distractions are you know. I…you know like for me distractions are the lower but after I read the book, impressive how he wrote the book. He knew he wasn't gonna get it done so he booked a round trips fly to China and back. And just [laughter] flew out, flew back and he got the book done. Than he got even more distracted right. You know you don't have to go down the extreme but if that is what it takes, that's what it takes. [Chris]:  You know that is impressive I gotta say. [Christian]:  Yeah. [Chris]:  All right so one thing that I think agents are wasting their time on, and their effort and their money is spending time with vendors, spending time going out getting coffee with your title rap or your home warranty person or the lendors that are begging you for business. Taking those meetings as an agent is just a complete waste of time. What do you guys think? [Christian]:  I, I tend to agree and I will take it one step further. Where there…I don't know about you guys but I get inner dated you know I work my best to keep my email clean you know unsubscribe from everything that ends up in there. But I get inner dated with marketing people and you know LinkedIn connections and basically all these people that want to sell me something.  And with my mentality I am like you know I have got stuff in place that works. I don't need to perpetually be spending my time entertaining “Well maybe this is a little better, maybe this time title company that…” I have got people that unless we have a pinpoint that needs to be fixed you know like you said you're wasting your time is taking out an hour ago meet with coffee with a new lender that you know is trying to sell you on you know their products over whoever someone else's.  You only have so much time in a day, don't spend it entertaining meetings that aren't going to…you know people are gonna try and ask you for your money. [Nathan]:  I agree and disagree and I think this goes back to what Christian said earlier.  I think that is where you are in your business. If people are a new agents those relationships aren't doing anything for you at the moment. Give them business and then you can nurture those relationships. If you're an established agent than yeah taking those meetings, I do that all the time now but I am established.  I took a gazillion of them when I was new. The thing was none of those helped me getting new business. Yeah. [Christian]:  Yeah they're not gonna lead to new business by themselves so… [Nathan]:  Yeah yeah. Exactly. [Chris]:  Yeah. This is one of the reasons why you know when we started doing team meetings and team training we made it clear that outside vendors were not coming in. Because with about 100 agents I have people calling me all the time wanting to get in our sales meetings. “Oh we'll bring breakfast, we just want 15 minutes”.  “I have my agents for an hour. I am not gonna waste 15 minutes of that hour letting you pitch them on something that they don't need to be spending their money on. They don't need to be buying a magazine. They can be doing other things to build their client base. They don't need your website or shiny object or social media tools so that they can manage all.”  Now granted when a lot of people do need those things but for the most part as new agents, people that are growing their business they don't need that stuff. And when they do get up to the point where they need those meetings, those coffees with lenders and marketing people they've got money to spend and that's fine. But off the back just it's a complete waste of time. Just anything that is not getting you directly in front of a client or mailing it so that when you do get in front of a client you are polished and professional; and they want to do business with you, anything other than that not worth it. It's a waste of time. [Nathan]:  I got another one that you all are gonna disagree with me on that. But… [Chris]:  I love disagreeing. [Nathan]:  Maybe I am wrong, maybe I am right. What are people wasting their time on? They are wasting their time on Facebook.  [Chris]:  You're wrong. [laughter] [Nathan]:  I…This [crosstalk] [censored] standing concept in what you're trying to do, I use it as an example Chris. I watch X,Y because you stuck with it. You continue to do it. Then I see these others kind of one head wonders or they do it twice or 3 times, the content sucks. It's got no purpose, no meaning behind it. Just stop. Like you know, 1-just quit. Find another angle but don't be that guy or gal on Facebook if you would because it just gives me some stuff. It's…put some thought. I have a great time but it causes a distraction for me watching your really horrible Facebook post.  So get off Facebook if you're not good at. It's just another one of those things that if you're a new agent and you're on there going weekly as an agent I don't know, it just doesn't do anything for me. And there's gonna be several people out there that I am you know they're gonna say Facebook is the amazement of the world. I will say this and I will challenge anybody.  I had a lender comment a week ago who said “Let's get on Facebook” and I said no. I want to do what's next and here is my belief in what's next. And it's already happening. Is an Instagram app. Why? I look at all the women in my neighborhood that my wife is friends with. And they got off of Facebook, took it off their phones. Have chosen to go to Instagram. And I have asked all of them why. And they said “You know why because there is no [censored] and complaining, there is no whining, theirs is no…” you know any of the negativity. So they have chosen to go to the Instagram realm and Facebook is a thing of the past. So what's next? Maybe, maybe we are already seeing it. [Chris]:  I think that Facebook is going to be around but the extent to which people use Facebook is way more than it needs to be. And I am so guilty of it. Over the last 7 days, 6 hours on Facebook, screen time. [Christian]:  That's disgusting. [Chris]:  I hate this app. I hate the fact that my phone tells me, it judges me and says “This is what you're going”. Now granted a lot of that, primarily most of that is work related, it's keeping up what the conversation is amongst other brokers. It's posting content with other brokers and it's having conversation in those groups. I am not sitting there you know taking quizzes on what cats are. But it's about an hour a day. That's… [Christian]:  You spend that much time on the toilet? That's amazing. [laughter] Or is it just me? That's where I spend most of my Facebook time. [Chris]:  Well I've got 3 kids. So I am trying to you know you've gotta hide. [crosstalk] “Sorry, busy can't come out [laughter]”. No it's…but seriously look at your screen time people because I have and… [Nathan]:  I just…I just did. I am actually proud of myself.  [Chris]:  Yeah? [Nathan]:  Yeah 3 hours in the last 7 days. [Chris]:  Good for you. That's half of the amount I have spent so I am working to spend less and less time doing that. Most of my time is spend mailing messages and then granted, in Instagram. So…But seriously doing that stuff like Facebook, the network, there is a ton of potential there. I would be lying if I said I never got business off of it. But the extent to which most of us use it is just way more than it needs to be. And even with Instagram. You put that much time in Instagram. How many pictures do you need to look at in a day?  So back to, back to the topic at hand. What Christian…anything else? What things are real estate agents wasting their time or money on? What are…Because we spend a lot about time. What are agents wasting their money on?  [Christian]:  I mean this one is kind of controversial but in general buying leads is a waste of time and money. Obviously it kind of depends where they are coming from and stuff but by in large you know I think it's really expensive even if you have a perfect system in place. Otherwise it's really low. The conversion is really low and takes a lot of time.  You know I am more of an organic guy you know like if you…you know if you're gonna built your business being totally based on someone else being able to turn on and off a funnel controlling the quality of those and where those are coming from I don't think that is super sustainable. You know I know some teams here locally that like that's their business. You know, and they spend you know, multiple you know 50-60 thousand in Zillow leads and they're hurting because they're conversion is low and their ROIs is even lower than it has been.  Because of you know, Zillow kind of going through some of their figuring out you know what kind of lead services they're gonna provide and you know and I think like you're talking about with Instagram kind of being the new sexy and you know people going over there. Yeah there's still place for Facebook but the market shifts, the user you know how people use Facebook or Instagram or Zillow that shifts based on the market, based on whether or not…yeah I mean it's shifting you know. 10 years ago Zillow leads were a lot more valuable because there was a lot more people willing to give information out. Nowadays people just want the information but they don't want to put the information out there. I mean like that's… I know from myself my ideal contract is not someone who is naïve enough “I want the information on this house I am going to give you my email and my phone number and my real name”. You're not gonna do that. That's stupid. You know, because they don't want someone calling them because they're not actually in the market buying a house and that's you know 98% of leads who buy form realtor or Zillow is not a real lead. Is gonna be you know as Bufeny [phonetics] says “It's not a lead, that's you know a touchpoint when someone is going to the age”. That's someone curious you know not someone who is ready to buy. So you're gonna spend a lot of time sifting through that for one deal. Like it's not usually worth it. [Chris]:  It's interesting that you bring that up because I have that same kind of thought process before we started doing some work with Zillow and now granted our business model is not run solely off of them but we are…we are a premiere broker with them. And for anybody you know in our audience if you're interested in the premiere broker program just shoot me an email Christ@sellectrealty.com. Two “L”s in Sellect. I am happy to talk to you about it. But there are solid numbers and after running it for 3 weeks now we've got 3 homes in the contract. Those are 3 properties that my agents would have not had otherwise. It's additional revenue to the company. More than covers the cost of the lead generation that we've done. [Christian]:  Does it cover your agents' time they spend in converting them? I mean you've got the hard cost of leads but what are they doing? 8 hours a day… [Chris]:  They're not doing 8 hours a day. They're at about an 11% and conversion rate. Well actually it's higher than that. We've had…We're probably running about a 13%  conversion at a premier broker program. We've had about 22 leads come in and 300 contract so far and 2 active buyers and 3 that are thinking about looking next year that are in conversation. So there's…we're doing it really well. We're putting a lot of time and effort into planning how we're gonna…How we have it set up. [Christian]:  Sure. [Chris]:  And there's a lot of accountability in place with us and I think where people get tied up with lead generation and online lead providers is that accountability factor. There's another agent friend of mine, he is with KW we both went to the knights of Columbus together. You know he, he would go up to spending 300.000 a year on it as long as the ROI is there. And he just closed 3 or 4 buyers this month or last month now. They were all Zillow leads and it's giving him the ROI.  So the…trick with doing Zillow leads or any other lead provider is making sure that you're strategic about it. Trying to find areas that are gonna give you a higher ROI than maybe aiming for the most expensive neighborhood. Right. So there's a lot that goes into it. But I do agree with you. It should not be your full business model. 80% of all deals in real estate are done through people's individual networks and it should remain that way. But as a supplement tool, a way to help new agents grow their business or a way to help agents that are just coming in, if they do it right and they have the right training and the right tools it can be… [Christian]:  If you've set up the right systems and accountability… [Chris]:  It can be beneficial. [Christian]:  You can make it work. [Chris]:  That's the trick. That is the trick 100%. If it's done properly. The problem is most people don't do it properly.  [Christian]:  Right. Well the other problem is new agents come in and they're told “Hey go do this.” You're not gonna…as a new agent you're gonna be out of money before you get your first conversion.  [Chris]:  Right. I wish I could do a mic drop but it's in the thing [laughter]. But yeah. [Christian]:  You probably need big numbers for Zillow to be sending you, you know looking at the average numbers you're talking 2% you're talking you know 100 leads before you get one that converts. [Chris]:  Yeah and that's on row. The 100 leads on row. We're not doing row. We're in the premiere broker program so we have the concierge that is supporting us and helping us and we have…there's the trainers and all sort of stuff. I probably would never have done premiere agent as a solo but as broker I think that the premiere broker program is excellent. [Christian]:  Sure. [Chris]:  And I have been very happy with it so far so…I will be an advocate and haven't closed anything yet but again with 3 weeks in and we've got 300 contracts so if I…Hell if I average 1 closing a week off of this thing than I'm gonna be doubling down. Like…but so far we're just kind of waiting to see. So yes and no. I am kind of in agreement but kind of not. Nate what do you think? You're Redfin partner agent so you're got a little different aspect. [Nathan]:  Redfin partner agent, former Zillow premier agent. My ROI with the Zillow PA program was [censored] so I terminated it. Hopefully I am still a part of one of their small groups that operate, that they seek out agent advice in what direction they're gonna take the premiere agent program on…I again prefer Redfin just because I play on the back end when I close a deal. It's 30%. Again I don't think it's a bad deal. Again I think it depends on your situation. I am on a flat fee model so premiere works and it comes with it. But if you own a 70-30 split than a team split that's probably not right for you. So…you know. [Christian]:  So getting back on topic Nathan do you have any more rants with agents wasting their time and money on?  [Nathan]:  Time Facebook. What else do they waste their time on? We waste our time on a lot of silly things. Again Travis Robertson talks about you know squirrel. We're just distracted like that it doesn't matter right. We're always looking for the next best thing instead of just taking what we have and using that and giving it time to…allow it time to work for us.  I think we're all guilty of getting something and going 2 months later “Well that didn't work”. Well months is not enough time to judge if something works or doesn't work. You know we have talked about this forum and set it. When we started this podcast we said 100 episodes. Because we wouldn't be able to judge anything in 30. But we're just over that. [Christian]:  I judge you guys all the time though. But…Oh that's not what I am talking about. [Nathan]:  That's very true so again… [Chris]:  We'll see how long we make it Christian [laughter].  [Nathan]:  Stop wasting time. That's my big one. It's one I have struggled with. I still struggle with you know find things that work for you. And you know I heard you guys the last week we're talking about…Oh Gosh what was it. Oh it hit me after we're done recording this but I don't know. Something I said in last week's episode that I was not part of. [Chris]:  Last week we were talking about Christian pivoting. [Nathan]:  Oh right you I think Christian had mentioned something about sometimes when you take a break from something and you come back to it you look at it different, right? And so you may be able to find something that didn't work before but works now. So again yeah you may have to pivot. Zillow didn't work for me. When I go back to it if they change the structure probably maybe my attitude will be different. I don't know.  So just kind of parlor up what you talked about last week. Yeah sometimes you do have to pivot and you've got to shift and if not you got still in all. But I don't know time is a big thing with me right now because I am still trying to understand how to manage my time the best and that's between being a dad, being a husband and being a realtor and then wanting to do my own thing. So…Don't get distracted by your own time.  [Chris]:  Alright, well I think that we've kind of given a lot to rant about today in what we think is wasting time and money for agents in the real estate base. Guys before we wrap up for the day, any final thoughts for our audience? [Christian]:  Nope [laughter]. [Nathan]:  Is this going out before the end of the year? [Chris]:  This is going out before the end of the year. [Nathan]:  Well than have an awesome rest of 2018. I hope everybody has already started to think about 2019. If you haven't, than you need to get on it. But I hope that any of our listeners just an awesome holiday period. Great Christmas. Great New Year and just with a great close out to what has been a good year for all of us here and then I hope that everybody that listens and that I share this with that you have a great start of 2019. [Christian]:  Word. Merry Christmas and Happy New year. [Chris]:  Merry Christmas. Happy New year. This is gonna be our last episode for 2018. So we will see you bright and early in 2019. We hope that you have a very blessed Christmas, new year and hit the ground running as soon as we get back. Talk soon everybody. Have a great year.  [music] [Chris]: Thanks for tuning in this week's episode of the re:Think Real Estate Podcast. We would love to hear your feedback so please leave us a review on iTunes. Our music is curtesy of Dan Koch K-O-C-H, whose music can be explored and licensed for use at dankoch.net. Thank you Dan. Please like, share and follow. You can find us on Facebook at Facebook.com/rethinkpodcast. Thank you so much for tuning in everyone and have a great week.  [music]  

How do the three big neurotransmitters dopamine, adrenaline, and serotonin impact your workouts and influence who you are as a person? That's what Christian Thibaudeau, the former head writer for Testosterone Magazine, and I will discuss in this episode of The Vince Del Monte Podcast Show. Here's the thing: When you understand how you're wired, you'll understand how to adjust your workouts and tweak your nutrition so you can achieve your highest potential in the least amount of time. It's the same for your clients—understanding how they're wired will help you deliver to them maximum results in minimum time. Christian also shares his personal experience with intermittent fasting and how this nutritional strategy can be used to improve your physique and health. Join Vince and Christian to learn how to put your best self out there. “Those who are established in this business, give something back! Give someone a break.” -Christian Thibaudeau Subscribe to iTunes, TuneIn, or Stitcher Radio! Enjoying the podcast? Leave a review on iTunes! What do you want to hear from the Vince Delmonte Podcast Show? Tell us here Timestamps 12:38 - Mastering your neurotype so you succeed faster. 21:49 - What you need to know about glutamate, a powerful neurotransmitter 26:53 - Identifying your prospect's neurological type so you can market to them more effectively 42:39 - What's next for Christian, plus how he markets himself today 57:50 - How intermittent fasting and casein hydrolysate can improve your health 59:42 - The right way to supplement your protein intake while fasting 1:01:14 - What to avoid when it comes to nutrition and intermittent fasting 1:07:25 - What Christian learned through the legendary Charles Poliquin's 10% rule for fat loss 1:13:34 - How to use your beliefs, experience, and leadership skills to give back in a way that matters   People Mentioned: Charles Poliquin Resources: Grant Cardone - 10x Growth Conference Connect with Christian: Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube ThibArmy.com Connect with Vince: Facebook Instagram YouTube  Contact: Personal@vincedelmontefitness.com

As any Creative knows, getting started can be a challenge. Christian Oth is no stranger to the effort that goes into success. He moved to New York City when he was 19 years old in order to go to photography school, and he went from having to pawn his only camera, to owning his own wedding photography business. Today, Christian sits down with Andy to tell his story and to offer advice to aspiring photographers and Creatives.   Show Notes: How Christian knew he wanted to be a photographer since he was 17 How having his own website in 2001 put him ahead of the competition The value of constantly being aware of your surroundings Christian shares how his approach varies with each wedding and couple The most important ingredient between a couple and photographer Why it’s vital to let go and trust your wedding photographer The role environment plays when it comes to photography What Christian enjoys about his clients who are more visually aware The approach Christian takes when it comes to his business and being the “boss” How social media is changing the business of photography Suggestions and the importance of networking His major announcement about his innovative new program:Jetsetters Resources: Christian Oth Studio  Jetsetters Christian Oth Instagram Christian Oth Facebook

What Christian doesn't want to live a life that is fearless and producing fruit for the kingdom? Here are some ways Paul directs the Thessalonians to grow.

The investing experience can stir a flurry of emotions; most common are fear and greed. There are also many traps that investors fall into. Christians are not exempt from these traps. Proverbs 4:23 Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.   In This Episode, We Look At: Being anxious to increase wealth  God warns us of the dangers of desiring to get rich quick. In Proverbs 28 verse 20, we are made aware that, ”A faithful man shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent.” And in verse 22, “He that hasteth to be rich hath an evil eye, and considereth not that poverty shall come upon him.” Pleasure and pain We look at our statement and half of our portfolio is down (US Large stocks)—**Pain** The other half is up (Bonds)—**Pleasure** The temptation is to flee pain by dumping the one that went down and put that money into the one that went up. That is common investor (bad) behavior. Doing that breaks ALL the investing rules! False bravado We can feel euphoric because the markets continue going up. We think that we should be making a higher rate of return and are tempted to increase our risk level. Stick with the written plan. Greed Greed can creep into our hearts. What Christian wants to readily admit that they are greedy? Trusting money Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy; 1 Timothy 6:17 Pride (self-sufficiency) We can be easily impressed with what "we" have done; based on impressive sums in our financial statements. Proverbs 30:8-9 Remove far from me vanity and lies: give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me: Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain. Covetousness Compared to others, we are not content with where we are in life financially.   One Thing You Can Do Today to Improve Your Faith and Finances: Approach investing with the heart of a servant who is managing God's resources. Trust Him and guard your heart daily from worldly wisdom.   What Are Your Thoughts? If you have a question or comment about today's topic, we invite you to share your thoughts.

Join the LBC Community On Facebook | Follow Carey on Facebook | Follow Carey on Twitter   If you’ve never asked, “Should I start a business?” I’d be surprised. Most people who hang around the entrepreneurial space on the internet (which is where I assume you came across this little post) have asked the question at one time or another. And it’s not an easy question to answer. Behind it is the assumption that there really IS a “should” or “should not” to the issue. In other words, God Himself has an opinion about whether you should be getting into business or not. I think that’s true. No, I KNOW it’s true. God indeed DOES have an opinion on the subject and I have no doubt that one of the most important things you can do is work to discover what His opinion is. In my journey as a Christ-follower (over 44 years at this point), I’ve discovered that not only does God have an opinion about things like that - He also delights to make His opinion known to us. But it doesn’t come through a heavenly megaphone or bullhorn. There’s no Bat-phone equivalent (a burning bush, maybe?) that He uses to give us marching orders. But there IS a surefire way to know if God wants you to go into business. It’s very simple. But it’s not easy. I hope you’ll take the time to understand how a very simple principle I cover on this episode can open up all kinds of doors to you when it comes to knowing exactly what God wants you to do. Outline of This Episode: Should You Start A Business? [0:14] My invitation to you to listen to the ZERO episode - it’s important! [0:42] What does it mean for a Christ-follower to open for business? [2:56] What our wisest decisions in life depend on. [3:53] The foolproof way to know if God is leading you into business (it’s simple, but not easy). [9:29] What Christian disciplines are meant to do and how it impacts your life direction. [14:23] Why you need to relax and rest while trying to answer this important question. If you want to know if you should start a business, God has the answer. And He wants you to know it. But you’re going to have to seek it. No - even more than seeking the answer you’re going to need to seek HIM. And there’s a world of difference between those two things. Do you realize that? God isn’t a Genie or vending machine who spits out what you want when you put in your quarter of faith. He’s a Person, THE Person who holds the universe in His hand, the most important person in your life. In order to answer the question, you need to know the ONE who has the answer. You may say, “Sure, I know God.” And it may be true. But the most important part of knowing God is that you know His heart, His desires, His will - and that you delight in them. It’s that delight, that glad submission to what God is up to that enables you to understand what He wants for YOU to do, specifically. I unpack the idea from the scriptures on this episode of the podcast - aimed at helping you understand if you should start a business of your own. I hope you listen. :) Join the LBC Community On Facebook Follow Carey on Facebook Follow Carey on Twitter (@CareyNGreen)  

What Christian music do you listen to that makes you feel as if you had a cardio workout? Find out if your favorites made our C-Pop top Christian music list and the bands and artist you need to be listening to.

Christian communication - what are the keys? What Christian principles are there that can help with effective communication?