Go Do Something Good | The Good God Journey Week 5

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- Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Good God Journey.

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So glad you could be with us today.

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And we're here with all of these folks.

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- Yes. - Yeah, we are.

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- Yeah. These are our dancers, by the way.

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Dancers, thank you so much

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for answering our Craigslist ad

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for dancers who are available

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at a moment's notice on Monday morning

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who are only mildly afraid of moving vehicles,

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which is an important point because today

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is not Dancing with the Stars.

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- Today is Dancing with the Cars. - Ok.

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- You seem less excited than I thought you'd be... cars.

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- Right. Right. Right. - Yeah.

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- OK. OK, all right. Kyle, what he's trying to say

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is that while folks are in their cars

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stopped at that stop light --

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- Right over there.

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- They might be in their cars like, "Man, today sucks."

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Or they might be in the cars like, "I'm so grouchy.

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Is 2020 going to get any better?"

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- I've got some great choreography,

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I've been working a long time on, a lot of moves.

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Yeah, in my studio back in my basement.

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- Okay.

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- A lot of moves on late, late nights.

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And we're going to bless some people with it

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if you can hang with me, I think you probably can.

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I want you guys to know,

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I'm your king of choreography for the moment.

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I don't want you to feel bad

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if you can't hang with me.

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It's OK. I've watch a lot of YouTube.

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I've watched a lot of So You Think You Can Dance?

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It's called My Leg's on Fire.

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Do this, pretend your leg's on fire

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and shake it. Shake it.

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This is called tippy toes. Tippy toes.

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Not bad, not bad. Tippy toes.

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- Good.

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- Then itsy bitsy little spider, up the water spout.

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And then the rain comes and you wash the spider out.

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I know you feel the loss of the spider

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and then you twirl and you twirl and you twirl.

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- The itsy bitsy spider, on our tippy toes.

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- Hey, Macarena!

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- Hey, Macarena. Perfect.

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-There's a safe word.

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The safe word is go go, go, go.

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Ready, let's go, let's go.

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On the count of three let's hear good God.

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One, two, three.

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- Good God!

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- OK, everybody, this is it.

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This is game time.

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We're to show people God's goodness.

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You know just know jazz fingers

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and our arm twirls.

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- These are real cars with real engines.

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They might be trying to come for you,

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but I want you to stand your ground

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for God's goodness today.

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- All of us might not make it back.

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- We might not make it.

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- But don't stop. We keep going.

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- Commit anyway.

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- Let's go. Go, go, go, go.

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Five, six, seven, eight.

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[Music: Good God]

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Oh, I bet you $20 20 years from now

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(Good God)

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This will be a moment worth a million.

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(Good God)

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Behind us there's a shadow

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(Good God)

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From rays of light that shine on us so

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so brilliant

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[honking]

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- Go, go, go, go.

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- They're actual cars, run.

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-They actually like it, they like it.

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- Go, go, go, go, go, go, go,

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go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

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Come on!

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[music resumes]

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[honking]

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- Get out of here! Let's go!

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- Run, run, run, run.

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- OK, I think you guys got it that time.

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- That was so good.

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- Amazing. Give it for yourself, that was great!

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- We're really spreading God's goodness.

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I can see it in their eyes, a lot of goodness,

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a little bit of anger. That's OK.

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Let it go. Let it go.

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- I never saw anybody use that finger before.

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- I think it's from France,

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it's like pointing the way to God.

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It's a different finger to use than this one.

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It's fine. We're doing great.

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- After all that, we're about to continue

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the rest of our series in our last week

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of a Good God Journey.

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Can't wait to get started.

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- Let's go.

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- Is God good?

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Is he good on day one of working from home?

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How about day 180?

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Is God good when school is online?

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Is He good when your business is struggling?

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Is He good even when everything in the world

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makes you want to scream, "Good God,

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what is going on and where are You?"

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That's a fair question and actually a great prayer

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because we believe there is a good God with good answers.

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- Hey, my name is Brian,

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and welcome to the Good God Journey,

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specifically the last week of the Good God Journey.

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We've been looking at how God is good

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in every area of my life.

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And have you ever considered that

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the goodness of God very frequently

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comes to us through other people?

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Like when I get encouraged, I feel good.

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I feel the goodness of God

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and it came from other people.

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I've been hurting financially before

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and I've had people give me money.

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That is when I experience the goodness of God

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and it came through another person.

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Good works happen in your normal day to day life.

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There are decisions you and I make

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to be a blessing to others

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and to bring illumination to other people.

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They're not just when you occasionally

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go serve at the soup kitchen, as wonderful as that is.

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It's when we actually go about getting work done.

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The Book of Matthew 5:16 Jesus says:

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Now, Jesus, when he talks about light,

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He's not thinking about what I think about.

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Like when I think about light,

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I think about electricians.

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I think about electricity.

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Jesus and Jesus's disciples

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didn't know anything about electricity.

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That sounds really awful to say.

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It's dangerous to say,

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"Jesus didn't know anything about..."

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Because isn't He God, he knows all things?

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Yeah, he does, but He's also human

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and he had some limitations when He was human.

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He's not talking about electricity,

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but that verse really pops for me

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when I think about a structure

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and a light on a hill all illuminated

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that says to people, "Hey, goodness is here,

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life is here, come here."

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And you know what happens whenever there's a light?

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There is somebody who worked.

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There's somebody who wired that electricity

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to give that warmth and give that illumination.

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Today, I'm going to do some work.

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I'm going to some work on this old lamp

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I picked up some salvage place.

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We're going to try to rewire it and get it going.

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And I don't necessarily enjoy electrical projects.

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I can do them. I don't really enjoy them.

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That's why it's called for me "work."

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Like I hear people going like, "Well, I don't know,

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I don't really love my job. I don't like it.

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I don't -- I don't feel--"

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And I got, "Whoa, it's called work.

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It's called work.

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There's going to be things in your job

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you're not going to like, that's why it's called work."

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There's things in my job that are amazing and wonderful.

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There's things my job that aren't,

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it's called work and there's things and works

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that God wants you to do to illuminate others

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and bring light and bring warmth.

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It's going to be difficult to do,

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but it's going to be worth it.

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So let's get rewiring this thing and let's do some work.

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I'm in a lighting show room right now.

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Maybe, maybe we can get this thing worthy

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of hanging up in a place like this,

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and that's what the work is going to be about.

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The book of Ephesians 2:10 says:

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God work to create me. God worked to create you.

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That's pretty cool when you think about it.

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One verse in the Bible says that

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He knitted us together in our mother's womb.

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So God went to work to form you and I.

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That's pretty cool.

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And then we get to be part of His business,

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His family business, by likewise going back to work.

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All of us have things we like to do in work,

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things we don't like to do in work.

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Things you like to do, I might not like to do, vice versa.

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One of my early jobs was working at Hardee's

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and I used to actually like

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putting together the hamburgers,

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literally flipping burgers.

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I used to like putting together hamburgers

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because I got the satisfaction of making something

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and then it went out and somebody was happy.

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Inversely to end the night when I would close,

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I would have to empty the fryers,

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take this big, huge thing out

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and just kind of poured into this drum out back.

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And one night I chose not to wear my rubber apron.

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And what do you know?

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That's the night that I missed and I spilled

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and I just had boiling hot grease go all over me.

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And I got second and third degree burns right up here,

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very close to very precious territory.

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Let me tell you, I hated that job.

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Now, some people, they actually like to empty the fryer.

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They felt that accomplishment

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and they hated doing the hamburgers.

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All of us are going to have things we like to do

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and don't like to do.

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All of us are going to have opportunities

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to do some things that other people

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aren't going to have opportunities for.

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But the important thing is to see

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that God is preparing us for good works.

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That's what it said.

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He prepared it for us.

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Works are prepared for us.

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I don't have to get up some day and go,

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"OK, what are all the good things I want to do today?"

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I can just get up and say, "God,

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as I see things that you want done, I'm going to do them.

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If you've set me up for something,

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then I'm going to do that thing."

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It could be an intense thing,

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it could be a simple thing.

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This last week I got a text from somebody saying,

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"Hey, can we get together?"

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And I just felt there was something

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more weighty behind the text.

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And and I text back, "What's up?"

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And he gave me like a couple snippets

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of what he wanted to talk about.

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And all of a sudden it washed over like,

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"Oh, no, I know what it is."

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I had had some fun at his expense.

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He wasn't present

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and I wasn't necessarily picking on him,

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but I was saying something that

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I thought was funny and innocent enough.

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Well, what do you know?

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It wasn't innocent and it wasn't funny to him

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and he was hurt by it.

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I thought I bet that's what it was.

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So I immediately gave him a call.

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And sure enough, that's what it was.

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And I just said, "Hey, brother, I'm sorry.

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I'm sorry. I was wrong.

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Would you please forgive me?" And he did.

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And then I realized there was somebody else

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who was related to this, I need to call them, too.

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And that person didn't know and didn't care anyway,

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but I just wanted to do that.

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And in both those situations with those folks

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I felt us being closer to one another.

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And it's all because I saw a good work I could do

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that came out of a bad work that I had done.

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And that was to just ask forgiveness

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and take responsibility.

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That was an opportunity I had.

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What are the things that are right before you

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every day that God wants you to do?

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There's things you can do that I can't do

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because you've been prepared for them.

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There's things I can do that you can't do

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that I've been prepared for.

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The last three weekends I've been in Indiana

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and Tennessee and in Colorado

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doing an event with men from those regions.

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And it's something that not a lot of people get to do,

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but I get to do it.

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It also takes a lot of work.

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I don't want to be away from home on the weekends,

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but I know and feel like I have a calling,

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a responsibility to speak to the hearts of men.

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Men are, I think, the last data I saw was

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5 times, 4 or 5 times more likely

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to commit suicide than women,

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men are 3 to 4 times more likely

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to suffer from mental illness than a woman.

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Men are 1.5-2 times more likely

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to suffer an alcohol abuse incident,

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whether it's a DUI or something like that.

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Men have unbelievable pressure on them.

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I know women do too, I'm not diminishing that at all.

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But God has prepared me

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to uniquely speak to men in those situations.

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And so when I can do that, I do that.

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Just last night I had to call with

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a bunch of college students on male mental health.

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It's a work and that is literally work that I can do.

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It's personal and there's work that you can do as well.

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What is it that's right before you

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that you need to do and you need to get done?

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This is good work,

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working with your hands is good work.

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Apologizing, that's good work.

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Using your mouth to bless somebody, that's good work.

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All those things are good work

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and it's good not just because

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there's the light of God that illuminates

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and does good things because God is good.

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It's also because these works that reveal our heart,

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they tell us something about who we are

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and what we're made of.

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We talked in the very first week of this Journey

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how there are these these extremes in the Bible

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that look like contradictions.

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But it's not that, it's just the truth is found

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in the midst of these tensions.

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Tensions like God is one, and yet God is a trinity.

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God is in control, He's sovereign.

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And yet I have a responsibility

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to take control of my life

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and make something out of my life.

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Tensions like the Jews are God's people,

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and yet Gentiles like me,

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it's everybody who isn't a Jew,

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gets to be part of the family of God

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as a result of who Jesus is.

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We can be God's people as well.

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All of these tensions.

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And here's another one. Here's another one.

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James 2 speaks to it. It says this:

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This was another one of those.

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Wait, am I -- do I come to God by faith?

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Does my faith get me to God or is it my works?

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Well, yes. They fit together. That's the tension.

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Yes, God is one and three.

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Yes, God's sovereign and we need to be

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at the same time taking control of our life.

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Yes. Yes, the Jews are God's chosen people

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and God grafts gentiles in as well.

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Yes, yes, our faith gets me to God, not my works.

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My faith, what Christ has done

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and what He has worked on the Cross gets me to God

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and my works show me that I have faith.

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That verse, that verse says, "Yeah, you believe,

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you believe, oh, wow, wonderful, yay.

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You believe, whoo-hoo."

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The demons believe, demons know the truth.

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Demons have more knowledge than you and I.

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It's not what we believe that makes us different.

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It's what we do that makes us different.

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It's how we put our faith into practice

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that makes us different.

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Now, there's a word here, there's a story

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that I'm going to get to you in just a moment.

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It's a huge pivotal story in the Bible,

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the story of Abraham and how the Jews came into being.

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It's massive.

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I'm going to tell you about it in just a moment.

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Let me say this.

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If we want to feel the goodness of God,

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we've got to do the good things that God wants us to do.

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If we want to be aware in the warmth and the light of God,

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the warm light, we've got to get to where the warmth is,

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that is getting to do the works that were prepared,

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that are set up for us to do.

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I'll do -- I'll give -- I'll do a work right now.

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It's again a unique one because

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not everyone can do the works I'm doing

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and I can't do all the work you're doing.

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It's a heavy one.

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I have the privilege and responsibility

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to lead a church that is multiracial.

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It doesn't have everybody who looks like me.

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Everybody doesn't listen to the same music I do.

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Not everyone who comes to Crossroads likes Bad Company,

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like, "Bad Company? Who's Bad Company metal group?"

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[music sound effects]

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Bad Company 'til the day I Die.

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That's why they call me --

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That's great. Right now Spotify is racking up

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some major two perce, two cents,

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like racking up charges.

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Everyone go, "Bad Company.

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I haven't listened to Bad Company in a while.

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It's amazing."

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You need to get yourself some of that."

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No, guess what?

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A 50 some year old white guy likes Bad Company.

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A lot of other people at Crossroads

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don't like white company -- Bad Company.

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They don't like white company either I don't think.

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Hold on, hold on, racial humor.

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That's always the good stuff.

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They don't like that stuff.

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But here's the thing, man, here's the thing,

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I have a responsibility inside of our church

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and inside of our culture to say, "Folks,

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we have a race problem.

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We have a race problem in our country.

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We have a race problem in our church even.

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There is racial tensions in our church.

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There's people who have a different skin tone than I do

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who have a different experience.

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I've never experienced any discrimination

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because of my skin tone.

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My skin tone has never hurt me in a job interview.

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My skin tone never hurt me

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when I've been before a court of law.

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My skin tone has never -- I can't think of a single one.

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My friends who have darker skin all have stories of that.

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And I've got to bear their burden.

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And the same wise,

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I have friends who are police officers

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and they've never done anything

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that was racially motivated

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and they won't likely ever do anything

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that is racially motivated or racially harmful

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or physically violent and they're hurting as well.

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They're hurting as well.

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We have to -- I have to be about reconciling,

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speaking and saying, "Hey, where can we see this truth?"

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And it's hard work.

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It's like -- it's like I'm in the fryer at Hardee's

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spilling grease on myself every day

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when I talk about it, it's awful.

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It's hard work because I never say it right.

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And even if I say it right,

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I'm going to say, "What are you doing about it?"

00:19:24

Someone said to me recently,

00:19:26

"Whenever you talk about race, you can't win.

00:19:29

You can lose. And you can't stop."

00:19:34

Can't win, you never going to say it right.

00:19:35

Someone wishes you would have said something differently.

00:19:38

You can lose. You can totally screw it up.

00:19:40

But we can't stop because my Dad,

00:19:43

my King has got people of different skin tones

00:19:45

that are part of His family.

00:19:47

It's all throughout the Bible,

00:19:49

whether it's Moses who marries a Cushite,

00:19:52

who's an African woman.

00:19:53

Whether it's the Book of Revelation talking about

00:19:56

all different ethnicities being before the throne.

00:19:58

Or actually Moses, he leads out, it said a mixed multitude.

00:20:01

There was different races that were there

00:20:02

that he led out of slavery.

00:20:03

Whether it's the dominant theme in the New Testament

00:20:05

where the Jews and Gentiles,

00:20:07

different nationalities are fighting with one another

00:20:09

and not getting along with one another.

00:20:12

I've got to honor my Dad as King

00:20:14

and try to put my heart and my work there.

00:20:17

And so do you.

00:20:20

This is difficult.

00:20:22

You have something difficult to do,

00:20:24

it may not be race related, but it's something related.

00:20:26

And you've got to see that as God being personal

00:20:29

about that, Him setting you up for it.

00:20:32

When He sets us up for something, oh, man,

00:20:35

and we don't do it, it's bad stuff

00:20:37

because we're not feeling His warmth.

00:20:39

We're not sensing His closeness.

00:20:42

There is likely a test for you

00:20:45

that is tied to a good work,

00:20:47

tied to an illuminating activity.

00:20:51

Let's go back to that Abraham story,

00:20:53

I said this was a big one, this is huge.

00:20:55

When I went over to Israel the first time,

00:20:58

one of the things I was struck by was how prevalent

00:21:01

the story that I'm going to tell you is.

00:21:03

It's etched in stone.

00:21:05

It's carved in church doors.

00:21:07

It's a big, big deal.

00:21:10

It's a story of how the Jewish nation was founded.

00:21:12

God comes the guy by the name of Abraham.

00:21:14

And He says to him, "Through you

00:21:16

all people will be blessed."

00:21:18

Basically, you're going to shed light on all people.

00:21:21

This is the beginning of a new nation.

00:21:25

And it's a really crazy vision that God gives him

00:21:28

because Sarah is Abraham's wife.

00:21:32

She and Abraham are old and they don't have kids.

00:21:37

We're going to start a nation,

00:21:38

a nation is going to come forth from us,

00:21:40

but we don't have any kids

00:21:41

and we're past child rearing age, um, okay?

00:21:47

But God has prepared them for this.

00:21:50

So what do you know?

00:21:51

They get pregnant and have this child.

00:21:53

His name is Isaac. Isaac means laughter.

00:21:56

I think it's laughter on both ends

00:21:59

because Sarah laughs when she finds that

00:22:01

she's going to be pregnant from God.

00:22:04

She's kind of laughing like, "Yeah, right,

00:22:07

like I can get pregnant."

00:22:08

And there's laughter like, "Oh, my goodness,

00:22:11

we have a baby."

00:22:13

So Isaac reminds them of this crazy, crazy miracle.

00:22:18

And they do what all parents do,

00:22:20

love their kids, or many parents do.

00:22:22

Some of us have not had that, we talked about

00:22:25

this is why looking to God as a father

00:22:28

is hard for us because

00:22:29

we haven't experienced that in our life.

00:22:31

She and he look and they love this child.

00:22:35

They take care of this child.

00:22:36

And it's going wonderful and beautiful.

00:22:39

And then God gives them a test.

00:22:41

He says, "You know, I'm -- I'm not sure

00:22:47

that you love Me more than this child.

00:22:49

I'm wondering," He basically says,

00:22:51

"If your identity is caught, wrapped up in this child

00:22:53

versus identity being wrapped up in me as your dad

00:22:57

and the vision that I've given you.

00:23:00

I'd like to take your your son, Isaac,

00:23:04

your only son," is what He says.

00:23:06

"Take your son, your only son,

00:23:08

take him up to the top of the mountain

00:23:10

and I want You to offer him up as a sacrifice."

00:23:19

What? What?

00:23:20

I mean, any parent would be horrified

00:23:22

at killing their own child.

00:23:24

It would be awful. What?

00:23:26

I'm sure they were too.

00:23:29

Maybe one thing in their mind, in Abraham's mind

00:23:32

that made this a little bit understandable

00:23:35

was there's this consistent theme of the Bible

00:23:38

of giving the first fruits or giving your first born.

00:23:42

God says again and again and again, "I blessed you.

00:23:44

I've given you My goodness.

00:23:45

I always want the first portion."

00:23:47

It's the first fruits, the first born always.

00:23:49

And maybe, maybe Abraham is going, "Well, OK.

00:23:51

This kind of makes sense, I guess,

00:23:52

he is my first born, he's the first one.

00:23:55

But really, God?" He's not liking this at all.

00:23:59

He gathers his son, Isaac.

00:24:01

They start walking up this mountain.

00:24:03

Start walking up, they're gathering wood,

00:24:05

they're getting ready.

00:24:06

And Isaac knows this deal.

00:24:08

He knows the thing of, "OK,

00:24:10

I know what a sacrifice looks like.

00:24:11

It looks like we're getting ready to burn something."

00:24:13

But he's looking around going, "Hey, dad,

00:24:15

where's the -- Where's the sheep?

00:24:18

Where's the ram? Where's the something?"

00:24:19

And all Abraham could tell him is, "God will provide."

00:24:22

This is difficult for him.

00:24:24

Again, he's an older parent. No one to give up their child,

00:24:25

but especially as an older parent.

00:24:27

I've seen this very regularly, that people

00:24:30

who have kids when they're younger,

00:24:32

they're much more open handed.

00:24:33

They're less freaked out about anything.

00:24:34

Like I had my first when I was 22.

00:24:37

I was like, "She's born.

00:24:39

Let her let her chew on magic markers or on nails

00:24:42

or on circular saws that are running or whatever.

00:24:45

She'll be fine. She'll be fine."

00:24:46

When you're a young parent, you just don't think

00:24:48

that anything bad can happen.

00:24:50

You think your kids are bulletproof and you're just--

00:24:51

You're just kind of footloose and fancy free in life.

00:24:54

But man, parents I see who have them when they're older,

00:24:57

it's like everything.

00:24:58

"Don't let them around a magic marker

00:25:01

unless they have a helmet on

00:25:02

because this could really be bad, the toxic fumes."

00:25:05

You just the older you are, you really

00:25:06

you've seen a lot of bad things happen in your life

00:25:09

and you think that could happen to your child.

00:25:11

You're just much more cautious and conservative.

00:25:12

I can imagine what Abraham and Sarah would be like.

00:25:15

They never thought they would have any child at all

00:25:18

and they have no backup plan either, by the way,

00:25:20

it's not like they have six kids.

00:25:21

This is the one that they got right now, just the one.

00:25:24

He says, "Isaac, God will provide the sacrifice."

00:25:29

Maybe he thinks that God's going to save him.

00:25:32

Maybe he just doesn't want to tell Isaac the full story,

00:25:34

we don't know.

00:25:35

He takes him, takes him up to the top.

00:25:37

They get ready and then he takes his knife,

00:25:42

he raises his knife, and Genesis 22:11 says this:

00:26:27

God says, "Oh, whoa, stop, stop, stop.

00:26:30

Don't do it, don't do it."

00:26:32

And here's the big word.

00:26:33

This is really -- this is -- this is tough.

00:26:36

It's deep, hear me, he says, "Now I know,"

00:26:40

is what God says to Abraham.

00:26:41

"Now I know that I'm number one in your life.

00:26:45

Now I know that you serve Me more than you serve your son.

00:26:49

Now I know that I'm more important.

00:26:51

Now I know."

00:26:53

God added to his knowledge base

00:26:56

based on the work that Abraham was doing, he knew.

00:27:02

Now, a lot of people get freaked out by this,

00:27:03

like "Oh, man, hold on.

00:27:04

Doesn't God know everything?"

00:27:05

Yes, He does know everything.

00:27:07

"Can't God see in the future?"

00:27:09

It's depending on how you see that.

00:27:11

Yeah, He does. Yeah, he can.

00:27:12

He's never surprised by anything.

00:27:14

Some say, "Well doesn't God know Abraham's heart?

00:27:18

Why would He have to put up this is really sicko test?

00:27:21

Doesn't He know?"

00:27:22

Apparently He doesn't know his heart.

00:27:24

He doesn't know his heart until He sees what he does.

00:27:27

That's what James is saying.

00:27:29

It's not our faith, our beliefs,

00:27:31

our intensions that tell God where we are.

00:27:33

It's our works that tell God.

00:27:35

Have you ever considered the one of the reasons

00:27:38

why you might not be feeling the warmth

00:27:41

and the grace of God is because

00:27:43

your works aren't taking you to a place

00:27:45

where the warmth and the goodness of God is?

00:27:47

Had you ever considered that there's a cap

00:27:51

between you and God, there's a cap

00:27:53

and that cap is your refusal

00:27:55

to go to a higher level on your works,

00:27:57

your refusal to do the things

00:27:59

that He has prepared for you to do?

00:28:02

I just gotta tell you,

00:28:03

I've talked about race a few times.

00:28:05

I am -- I get so disheartened when people like

00:28:09

hear a race thing like, "Oh, no."

00:28:10

I understand it because race conversations

00:28:13

are very exhausting for everybody.

00:28:16

But man, when someone is like, "Stop it.

00:28:18

I don't wanna hear this.

00:28:19

My views are always right. I got my --"

00:28:21

It's like, man, really?

00:28:23

I can't -- I can't --

00:28:24

I can't tell you how disheartened I am

00:28:28

of people who are so proud of their Bible reading

00:28:30

and so proud that they could quote the Ten Commandments.

00:28:33

Like, they haven't kept the Sabbath forever,

00:28:35

they don't take a day off, but they know these things.

00:28:38

They they trash people, they steal things,

00:28:41

they steal people's honor,

00:28:42

they steal people stuff, how they gossip.

00:28:45

They don't see it?

00:28:47

Another one, a test, one of the tests in the Bible,

00:28:49

in the book of Malachi.

00:28:50

God actually tells us we can test Him

00:28:52

by giving Him the first fruits, the first 10%

00:28:55

of everything He gives us back to Him.

00:28:56

We can live on 90% of His goodness.

00:28:59

And I'm just so disheartened by the people

00:29:01

who've known that that I know for decades

00:29:05

and have never done that, never.

00:29:08

Never had a plan to go 2%, 5%, 10%,

00:29:10

never had the faith to just go, never.

00:29:12

And I'm like, "You wonder, you wonder why.

00:29:15

You're wondering where God is your life,

00:29:17

why things feel stale."

00:29:19

All of us feel staleness from time to time.

00:29:22

All of us do.

00:29:23

For some folks it's long runs

00:29:25

and there's like punctuated with things that are just--

00:29:28

Because there's a test.

00:29:30

God prepared you a work.

00:29:32

And until you do that and until you step into that,

00:29:35

you're not exhibiting faith,

00:29:36

you're not getting into the glow of His warmth.

00:29:41

We've talked about these triangles

00:29:42

the last several weeks that

00:29:44

our Father hands down our identity,

00:29:46

the King hands down our authority,

00:29:49

and then out of that comes our works.

00:29:52

Out of that comes our power, but it comes from God.

00:29:55

He hands it down to us.

00:29:56

Our faith comes from God and then we work.

00:29:58

And guess what happens?

00:29:59

While we work, check it out, I'm closer to God.

00:30:03

I'm closer to God.

00:30:04

When I try to go the opposite direction,

00:30:06

I'm going the wrong way

00:30:07

and I'm going against the flow of how God operates.

00:30:10

Works are important.

00:30:11

I just can't think that my works get me to God.

00:30:13

When I'm with God I see what He's prepared me to do.

00:30:19

And then when I do that, I feel closer to Him.

00:30:23

God says, "Now I know you love Me.

00:30:27

Now I know you want to honor Me."

00:30:30

When I do that, the goodness of God comes in my life

00:30:33

and I'll come to your life as well.

00:30:34

Child abusers don't feel the goodness of God

00:30:36

because they're in a place

00:30:37

where God doesn't want them to be.

00:30:38

Racist don't feel the goodness of God because

00:30:41

they're in a place where God doesn't want them to be.

00:30:43

Judgmental people don't feel the goodness of God

00:30:45


00:30:47

Materialistic people aren't feeling the presence of God

00:30:48

because they're in a place

00:30:49


00:30:52

But when we turn, when we change,

00:30:55

when we walk up the mountain to make a sacrifice,

00:30:58

to do a good work of blessing somebody,

00:31:00

however simple it might be of buying their lunch

00:31:04

or confessing our sin,

00:31:06

we're acting in the family business

00:31:10

and these are the people who are fresh

00:31:11

and have an abiding, deep relationship with God.

00:31:16

Isn't that what you want?

00:31:18

Yes, it's what you want.

00:31:20

For you to have something different,

00:31:21

you got to do something different.

00:31:23

You've got to work on it.

00:31:24

You've got to work about it.

00:31:26

Under the presence and approval of a Good God.

00:31:35

- I really love what Brian just said:

00:31:37

our actions are what show God where our heart is.

00:31:40

- They do, and it includes our money.

00:31:42

The actions we take with our money

00:31:44

show God where our heart is.

00:31:45

The Bible says that where your treasure is,

00:31:48

is where your heart is also.

00:31:49

- Yeah. So if you're following Jesus,

00:31:51

that just means that we give.

00:31:52

- That's right.

00:31:53

That's something you and I both do.

00:31:54

And if you want to join us, the easiest way to do that

00:31:57

is a text Crossroads to 313131.

00:31:59

Or if you have more questions about that,

00:32:02

why you do it, how it works, what the money goes to,

00:32:04

all that stuff, go to Crossroads.net/give.

00:32:07

- Well, I'm going to catch up with

00:32:08

some of my friends, Heather and Kyle, actually.

00:32:11

- A great name.

00:32:12

- Yeah. And they have a wonderful story

00:32:14

about how sometimes God will call you to do good work,

00:32:17

but that doesn't mean it'll always be easy.

00:32:26

- I'm so excited to hear your story today,

00:32:28

because I think we've got a responsibility

00:32:30

when God is good to us to let others know about it.

00:32:32

And I know that you guys have a story

00:32:34

of maybe where that felt like a moment in your life,

00:32:37

but the Lord really turned that around for you.

00:32:40

- We always knew we wanted to have kids.

00:32:41

We weren't always sure it was going to be adoption.

00:32:44

But about two years into our marriage

00:32:46

we made that decision.

00:32:47

When we decided that we are going to adopt,

00:32:51

I felt very strongly

00:32:52

that we were going to have an open adoption.

00:32:55

And I really felt like God made it very clear that for us,

00:33:00

not only was that going to be an extension of our family,

00:33:02

but that there was going to be

00:33:04

racial reconciliation involved in that as well.

00:33:07

We went through Undivided.

00:33:08

We started kind of preparing ourselves for this journey.

00:33:11

- We wanted the child to know the birth mom,

00:33:13

to know if he had brothers or sisters,

00:33:15

to know the family, to be a part of our family

00:33:18

and have the birth mom be a part of that family as well.

00:33:21

- Everyone we talked to was like,

00:33:23

"Yeah, that's not really how adoption works."

00:33:25

Then COVID happened

00:33:28

and the agency that we wanted to apply to

00:33:31

closed their new application process due to quarantine.

00:33:36

And so it was kind of looking like

00:33:40

our adoption journey was stalled.

00:33:42

It was heartbreaking.

00:33:43

It was really hard because I felt that there was

00:33:46

this very clear vision that God was giving us.

00:33:50

But at the same time, I felt like

00:33:53

I cannot possibly figure out how this is remotely possible.

00:33:58

- We had gotten so close, so many people supported us,

00:34:01

so many people had given us money,

00:34:04

had given us resources, helped us prepare our home.

00:34:08

And then it was gone.

00:34:10

I work as an athletic trainer

00:34:12

and so when coronavirus hit, sports went away.

00:34:16

So my job is gone.

00:34:18

I mean, honestly, I was worried for my family

00:34:21

because the whole adoption thing, we're like

00:34:23

now that's not even going to be an option anymore,

00:34:25

because if I don't have a job,

00:34:28

there's no way we can afford it.

00:34:29

I was lucky enough that I found a consistent place to work.

00:34:33

One day I show up to work

00:34:35

and a different person was working with me.

00:34:37

I brought up that we were looking into adopting.

00:34:40

And she goes, "Oh, that's really interesting.

00:34:43

I actually have a friend whose daughter

00:34:45

is looking for a family to adopt her child."

00:34:48

And I was like, "Oh, well, you know,

00:34:50

if you're comfortable with it, here's my phone number.

00:34:52

Here's my email address.

00:34:54

I'd love to have a conversation with her."

00:34:56

We talk to her about how we want to do an open adoption.

00:35:00

You know, that call ends and we're like,

00:35:01

"I hope this is it, because she's amazing.

00:35:05

We all want the same thing. This has to be it."

00:35:07

Sunday comes and we're just sitting in the basement,

00:35:10

I think, watching a movie or something.

00:35:12

And I get a text and it's from the birth mom

00:35:15

and she's like, "Hey, we only talked for an hour,

00:35:18

but I really feel like this is what's supposed to happen.

00:35:21

So if you guys want a kid in six weeks, he's coming.

00:35:24

And I would love for you guys to be his parents."

00:35:26

We contacted an agency that says they'll let us --

00:35:29

They'll help us do the home study,

00:35:30

but they said the only problem is

00:35:31

we can't get a fire inspection done.

00:35:33

Nobody is doing it.

00:35:34

We actually volunteer with high school ministry.

00:35:36

And because of that, we know a firefighter

00:35:38

with the Cincinnati Fire Department

00:35:40

who said, "Yeah, I can do that."

00:35:43

- She wanted to have a home birth, the birth mom did.

00:35:46

And so we had to figure out legally how that works

00:35:49

and how to not have him in a hospital.

00:35:51

- Had some friends who threw us like

00:35:53

a fundraiser for the adoption.

00:35:55

And there we met a family lawyer who was like,

00:35:58

"Yeah, I'm totally down to help you guys."

00:36:00

All that to say that it all kind of came together

00:36:03

when I get a text from the birth mom saying,

00:36:08

"Hey, just so you guys know,

00:36:10

I'm starting to have some contractions.

00:36:12

They're kind of close together,

00:36:14

so you might want to start being ready."

00:36:16

So I leave work and we go in the apartment

00:36:19

and she is literally holding this baby inside her

00:36:23

so that we could be there for this moment.

00:36:25

And I mean, she is an amazing person.

00:36:27

I don't know anything about giving birth,

00:36:29

but I imagine that she is the champion of giving birth

00:36:32

because she literally waits over there.

00:36:35

We walk in the room

00:36:36

and within five minutes Heather was catching Kiran.

00:36:39

- This has been a lesson for me in the fact

00:36:42

that God sees me individually.

00:36:45

Despite literally the entire world falling apart,

00:36:49

God saw us and our little family and did good things in it.

00:36:56

- God is good all the time,

00:36:59

even when it feels like He's not,

00:37:02

even when it feels really hard, God is good.

00:37:10

- Right just about there.

00:37:13

Hey, success.

00:37:21

That's good work right there.

00:37:24

Well, we've come not only to the end of today,

00:37:27

we've come to the end of the Journey.

00:37:29

And I hope this has been good for you.

00:37:30

I hope you've seen the goodness of God

00:37:32

in ways you haven't seen or experienced before.

00:37:34

I hope you're sensing His pleasure.

00:37:37

You just did something that was really important

00:37:38

and really, really good.

00:37:40

And I hope that this affects your future,

00:37:42

not just a good day or good Journey, but a good future.

00:37:46

Let me pray for you right now.

00:37:47

God, I'm thankful to be able to talk about

00:37:50

these things that are so important and change things.

00:37:54

I know a lot of us have changed,

00:37:55

and I look forward to seeing how

00:37:57

You're going to continue to change us because You're good.

00:37:59

You're a good Dad and You're a good King.

00:38:01

We thank You for what we've just gone through.

00:38:03

I pray these things according in the name of Jesus. Amen.

00:46:49

- Is that it? Is it over?

00:46:52

- Yeah, that's pretty sad.

00:46:53

- Do we get to keep these, did you ask?

00:46:55

- I didn't ask, man.

00:46:56

-Do we get to keep the van?

00:46:57

- This was so much fun. How can it be over?

00:46:59

- I don't know.

00:47:00

We did such a good job spreading God's goodness

00:47:02

- Wait a second. Does this mean we're canceled?

00:47:05

- No. No, it doesn't. It does not mean we're canceled.

00:47:08

In fact, spreading God's goodness

00:47:10

does not have to stop here.

00:47:12

- Ok, ok, I'm happy with that.

00:47:14

- OK? - I'm happy with it.

00:47:15

Man, thank you so much for joining us.

00:47:17

It has been an amazing five week Journey

00:47:20

and we are so excited.

00:47:21

If you want to spread some more of God's goodness,

00:47:23

like Kyle said, it doesn't have to stop here.

00:47:25

You can find more ways to engage at crossroads.net.

00:47:28

- Also, your Journey group doesn't have to stop here.

00:47:31

Getting together in community is critical to following God.

00:47:34

And if you want to keep going on that,

00:47:36

you can join a weekend follow up group.

00:47:38

You go to Crossroads.net/weekendfollowup.

00:47:41

- Yep. Next week we're going to be talking about

00:47:43

a healthy response to the election

00:47:45

and it's going to be almost as good. Almost as good.

00:47:48

- Almost as good.

00:47:49

- As the Good God Journey

00:47:50

- It has been amazing to be with you all.

00:47:52

Thank you so much for joining us.

00:47:54

Signing off for the last time, Good God.

00:47:57

Bet you $20 20 years-- - Good God.

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	That's Good Work💡	37:09
	Worship: The Fathers House 🏠	38:07
	Worship: We Say Yes 🙌	42:28

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