WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.480 Real life presents the Jack Hibb's podcast with intention and boldness to proclaim truth, 2 00:00:06.480 --> 00:00:09.440 equip the saints and impact our culture. 3 00:00:09.440 --> 00:00:12.560 Hey, do you go to a church that God is saying not to go to? 4 00:00:12.560 --> 00:00:16.800 Or are you going to a church that you're wondering should you be attending at all? 5 00:00:16.800 --> 00:00:20.080 Does God want you there? How can you know? 6 00:00:20.080 --> 00:00:25.280 Is God speaking to you? Let's find out. Let's dive into church. 7 00:00:25.280 --> 00:00:32.320 Does it have a head? Church, is it pleasing God? Church, is it really? Let's go. 8 00:00:35.760 --> 00:00:41.680 You can get the outlines of this podcast by going to jackhibs.com slash podcast. 9 00:00:42.320 --> 00:00:48.160 Today, if this podcast lifts you up and encourages you to live a more fulfilled life in Christ, 10 00:00:48.160 --> 00:00:51.440 then make sure you leave us one of those five star ratings. 11 00:00:51.440 --> 00:00:57.360 To us, that's like saying amen or yes, then that rating will encourage others to listen. 12 00:00:58.000 --> 00:01:02.880 Now open your hearts to what God's word has to say to you. Here is Jack Hibb's. 13 00:01:04.320 --> 00:01:08.560 Well, everybody, welcome to this podcast today. Glad to have you with us. 14 00:01:08.560 --> 00:01:14.000 And somebody asked me not too long ago, how can we don't sell product? How can we don't have 15 00:01:14.000 --> 00:01:19.760 sponsors? They have a podcast and they have product and they have sponsors. And I don't know the 16 00:01:19.760 --> 00:01:26.560 answer to that. I just thought it was kind of funny because I have my mug, but we don't sell them. 17 00:01:28.240 --> 00:01:36.720 This is just a white t-shirt. It's no brand. Not just us. No flash, no bang. 18 00:01:36.720 --> 00:01:42.720 So, but I'll do something different today. This is kind of interesting because we don't, 19 00:01:42.720 --> 00:01:48.720 I don't know if we've ever done this. We're responding. I'm going to be responding to a letter 20 00:01:48.720 --> 00:01:57.040 that was written to us, which was honestly a letter that represents many, many times this question. 21 00:02:00.080 --> 00:02:07.520 Our particular church, this particular ministry has, by the grace of God, a very long reach. 22 00:02:07.520 --> 00:02:13.360 When I say long, I mean out into the world. And so people write to us, are they call us or they 23 00:02:13.360 --> 00:02:18.800 let us know that they have these circumstances or these issues going on in their spiritual 24 00:02:19.680 --> 00:02:27.120 journey, wherever they may be, however they may be. And this one, it was a three-page letter 25 00:02:27.120 --> 00:02:34.560 by a very sweet couple who they were asking the question after they had made a statement. 26 00:02:34.640 --> 00:02:44.240 And their statement was this, that we, we from afar, from a distance, we tithe to 27 00:02:45.520 --> 00:02:55.360 a particular ministry. We also tithe to this other particular ministry and to another ministry. 28 00:02:55.360 --> 00:03:02.080 And they actually threw a fourth one in, which shocked us only later to find out that they said, 29 00:03:02.080 --> 00:03:08.880 OPS, we were joking about supporting that guy because that the guy is a charlatan in my, 30 00:03:09.600 --> 00:03:15.360 my opinion. So listen, this is a great thing to kick around everybody because if you go to a church, 31 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:20.720 I have to ask you, listen, if you go to a church, why do you go? Can we just kind of do this right now? 32 00:03:20.720 --> 00:03:27.280 So if you go to a church, why do you go? And you want to write that down. Why do I attend the 33 00:03:27.280 --> 00:03:32.480 church that I attend? You need to write it down. And it's going to be, by the way, the first thought 34 00:03:32.480 --> 00:03:39.840 that comes to your mind. Number two, should I be going to this church? That should be the second 35 00:03:39.840 --> 00:03:44.960 question. By the way, the first question is going to have a lot to do with the second question. 36 00:03:46.160 --> 00:03:49.360 And then the third thing is, do I support this church? 37 00:03:50.320 --> 00:03:58.880 Should I support it? Should I give my tithes and my offerings, my efforts, my service, 38 00:03:59.920 --> 00:04:08.960 my attention to this church, whatever church it may be? We ever since COVID have been asked this 39 00:04:08.960 --> 00:04:16.080 question more than I can count. And so here's, here I wrote down, by the way, some of the most common 40 00:04:16.080 --> 00:04:26.720 responses when this question is asked of us, this is what we hear. It's the church that we've 41 00:04:26.720 --> 00:04:34.080 always gone to. It's the church that we've always gone to. Okay, time out. That means literally 42 00:04:34.080 --> 00:04:41.040 nothing. Why would that play into anything of significance? Number one, the book of Colossians 43 00:04:41.120 --> 00:04:49.120 tells us that a church needs to make sure that Christ is the head of that church. Now if Jesus is 44 00:04:49.120 --> 00:04:56.320 the head of the church that you attend, you're going to be answering the question with, I attend that 45 00:04:56.320 --> 00:05:03.360 church because I'm growing like crazy. There's ministry opportunity. The word of God instructs me, 46 00:05:03.360 --> 00:05:11.840 convicts me, rebukes me, develops me in all these check boxes, which by the way, we should probably 47 00:05:11.840 --> 00:05:17.280 make a how to find a church check box list because it's not easy in this day and age to find a 48 00:05:17.280 --> 00:05:26.720 church. It's very, it's become difficult said to say. But anyway, you'd want to do this diagnostic, 49 00:05:26.720 --> 00:05:33.680 okay, on why do you attend the church that you attend? And these are some of the answers that 50 00:05:33.680 --> 00:05:40.160 do not work. Our family, my grandpa attended this church, my parents attended this church, 51 00:05:40.720 --> 00:05:48.400 and I was born in the hallway of the church. That's not an answer. It was irrelevant. 52 00:05:48.880 --> 00:05:57.440 The answer must be you attend the church because of what I said earlier. You're growing, you're 53 00:05:57.440 --> 00:06:05.680 challenged. The word of God is alive. The worship is focused on Jesus, not on people. It is praise and 54 00:06:05.680 --> 00:06:16.720 not performance. It is worship and not, you know, people centric. The word of God is relevant. This 55 00:06:16.720 --> 00:06:22.960 is one of the greatest signs of the presence of the Holy Spirit in a church where the word of God 56 00:06:22.960 --> 00:06:34.240 is taught. The word, even though it's Genesis 1, 1 or Exodus 15 or, you know, Jude 1, it is going 57 00:06:34.240 --> 00:06:42.400 to be relevant. This is what's so amazing about our God who is alive and well and so is his word. 58 00:06:42.960 --> 00:06:50.560 That when we deliver the Bible, simply the Bible, the relevance of the message being delivered to 59 00:06:50.560 --> 00:06:59.280 the flock will speak to people from all walks of life, from different skin pigmentations, 60 00:06:59.840 --> 00:07:11.120 to different financial levels, and irregardless of age, where you give a message or your pastor 61 00:07:11.840 --> 00:07:19.760 gives the sermon to the congregation. And an eight year old gets something out of it that's 62 00:07:19.760 --> 00:07:28.240 meaningful, meaty, and so does the 88 year old. It's a miracle. Same in the way of an evangelistic 63 00:07:28.240 --> 00:07:33.200 message. There are eight year olds who get up and come forward and there's 88 year olds that 64 00:07:33.200 --> 00:07:38.960 get up and come forward. How do you do that? You can listen. You can't do that in the mall. You can't 65 00:07:39.040 --> 00:07:45.520 have a store that does that. Nobody, no eight year old walks into Nordstroms and buys shoes like 66 00:07:45.520 --> 00:07:56.960 the 88 year old does. Listen, there's a land that Nordstroms is, you know, working on and 67 00:07:56.960 --> 00:08:03.760 selling to. And at least in here, we have places like Jack's Surf Shop. I don't know it. I wish. 68 00:08:03.760 --> 00:08:07.120 Jack's Surf Shop. It's like a caters to a certain genre and age. 69 00:08:09.280 --> 00:08:14.400 But all these stories, you know what I'm talking about, but the church, how is it that the church 70 00:08:15.440 --> 00:08:21.040 can affect so many people in one sermon from all walks of life and of all ages? How is that? 71 00:08:21.040 --> 00:08:26.400 The Holy Spirit's in charge. He'll exalt the Lord Jesus Christ and he'll use the word of God. 72 00:08:27.280 --> 00:08:33.760 And the pastor may be speaking, you hear his voice, but it's obvious that what's happened in 73 00:08:33.760 --> 00:08:39.520 supernatural because you just brought your friend as a hypothetical and your friend might be struggling 74 00:08:39.520 --> 00:08:46.400 with homosexuality. You bring your friend to church and the Bible study is on Genesis 11 or Romans 75 00:08:46.400 --> 00:08:52.720 chapter 12 or Revelation chapter 4 has nothing to do with homosexuality, but the pastor's teaching 76 00:08:52.720 --> 00:08:58.560 and there'll be something that comes out where your homosexual tempted friend will say, 77 00:08:58.560 --> 00:09:04.800 man, you know what? That's sermon today. Gosh, I felt like the guy was like I was the only one in 78 00:09:04.800 --> 00:09:12.080 the room. That's the Holy Spirit. Do you go to a church like that? If you don't go to a church 79 00:09:12.080 --> 00:09:19.040 like that, it's probably time for you to leave. Why? Because there's more to this than what meets 80 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:25.120 the eye. Somebody might say, gosh, we went to this church for years, we couldn't stand it, 81 00:09:25.120 --> 00:09:33.600 but our kids loved it. Not a good reason. Not a good reason because the same God that 82 00:09:33.600 --> 00:09:38.800 equips the adults will be the same God that will work in children's ministry to equip the kids. 83 00:09:38.800 --> 00:09:46.000 In other words, avoid a church that babysits your kids on a Sunday with candy canes or 84 00:09:46.080 --> 00:09:52.640 lollipops and Bible stories. I know I'm going to get hate mail for this, but that's just tough. 85 00:09:52.640 --> 00:09:58.960 I do not believe that children should be taught Bible stories, and I think kids should never be 86 00:09:58.960 --> 00:10:07.120 told that they're going to hear another Bible story because so often stories are not real. 87 00:10:07.120 --> 00:10:14.320 Jack in the Beanstalk is a story. Santa Claus is a story, and your kids are going to grow up thinking 88 00:10:14.320 --> 00:10:22.800 Jesus is a story that Noah was just a story, and so they won't believe the Bible. Listen, 89 00:10:23.760 --> 00:10:33.360 the church should be focused on truly creating disciples. Just think how smart this is. 90 00:10:34.640 --> 00:10:39.520 Pastor, you don't know these adults you're speaking to. You don't even know if they're listening to you. 91 00:10:40.160 --> 00:10:47.200 By the time they get into the main sanctuary, they can lie just sitting there looking at you 92 00:10:47.200 --> 00:10:53.440 because they're off into lawland. Kids, man, I was told by Pastor Chuck Smith personally. I said, 93 00:10:53.440 --> 00:10:59.520 I don't think I can do this when our home Bible study was just growing gangbusters. I was freaking out 94 00:10:59.520 --> 00:11:05.040 because I didn't want to leave my career, and I was trying to hand the home group over to somebody 95 00:11:05.040 --> 00:11:09.280 else at the time. I was talking to Pastor Chuck Smith of Cover Chapel Coast of Mesa at the time, 96 00:11:10.240 --> 00:11:15.280 and he said, didn't you teach five-year-olds at second service? And I said yes, 97 00:11:15.920 --> 00:11:22.320 and he said, if you can teach five-year-olds, you can teach adults. There's a lot of truth to that. 98 00:11:22.320 --> 00:11:26.720 If you can hold the attention of a five-year-old, you can hold the attention of adults. The amazing 99 00:11:26.720 --> 00:11:32.080 thing about five-year-olds is that they're actually easier to teach because even though they don't 100 00:11:32.080 --> 00:11:37.520 look like they're listening, they're not missing a word. We know this, and so we make sure that 101 00:11:37.520 --> 00:11:43.520 our children's ministry and youth ministries are absolutely top shelf. In fact, so much so 102 00:11:44.160 --> 00:11:50.160 that even the youngest ages at our church are taught, they're introduced to Christian apologetics. 103 00:11:50.160 --> 00:11:56.880 I'm not kidding. We have an apologetic course for our elementary aged kids. And of course, 104 00:11:57.040 --> 00:12:02.480 at the time they get the junior high and high school, these kids are pretty much able to step 105 00:12:02.480 --> 00:12:09.280 into a pulpit somewhere and deliver a message that most people don't get from a pastor out of 106 00:12:09.280 --> 00:12:14.880 some university. I'm not joking. And if you've ever visited here, you know exactly what I mean. 107 00:12:16.640 --> 00:12:21.920 The next thing is, well, we attend because all of our friends are there. I mean, our social 108 00:12:21.920 --> 00:12:26.720 network is at the church that we attend. We could never say goodbye to our friends. 109 00:12:28.160 --> 00:12:34.400 That's very sweet and very kind. But is it possible that God is stirring up your heart 110 00:12:34.400 --> 00:12:39.360 and their heart also, and you don't know it? Because you guys have not talked about it. What if God 111 00:12:39.360 --> 00:12:44.880 is calling you in a whole bunch out of that place? Why don't you say something to somebody? 112 00:12:45.840 --> 00:12:50.480 If they're your friends, why don't you ask them, hey, have you been growing under these 113 00:12:50.480 --> 00:12:56.560 sermons these last six months or 12 months? Ask your friends that. If they say, well, you know, 114 00:12:57.920 --> 00:13:02.080 the pastor's gone through a lot of stuff lately. That has nothing to do with it. You know, 115 00:13:02.080 --> 00:13:09.040 the pastor, he hasn't been as funny as that has nothing to do with it. It would be evident 116 00:13:09.040 --> 00:13:13.280 that the Holy Spirit does not have freedom to work. That's what's going on. And you need to, 117 00:13:13.280 --> 00:13:18.800 you need to honestly say, gosh, I love my friends, but spiritually, I got to stand before God 118 00:13:18.800 --> 00:13:25.120 for our spiritual growth as a family or as an individual. Yeah, my friends are here. But listen, 119 00:13:25.120 --> 00:13:33.200 you can get together and go with them to watch the rams play the goats or whoever the angels 120 00:13:33.920 --> 00:13:40.720 play the devils. You can do that with them, but to stay at a church because the church stinks, 121 00:13:40.720 --> 00:13:45.840 but you stay there because your friends are there. That's displeasing. Listen, Jesus is the head 122 00:13:45.840 --> 00:13:55.040 of the church. So far, I'm describing a headless church. What about this? And I actually had 123 00:13:55.040 --> 00:14:00.480 somebody tell me this, I am not kidding. I wish I was kidding you. Pastor Jack, we would love to 124 00:14:00.480 --> 00:14:06.720 come to the church that you pastor, but I have the opportunity at the church that we're at to 125 00:14:06.720 --> 00:14:14.080 lead the worship and the the teachings messed up. It's a mess. I don't believe it. I can't stand it. 126 00:14:14.080 --> 00:14:22.000 It's crazy, but I get to lead the worship ministry. And so that's why we're there. Wow. 127 00:14:23.680 --> 00:14:32.080 Can I be honest? You are an opportunist and I'm going to ask you to repent of it because you, 128 00:14:33.040 --> 00:14:43.040 it's like you being some performer in Hollywood and you can't stand the owner of 129 00:14:44.400 --> 00:14:49.760 you know, some club and you hate the club and you hate the people that attend the club, 130 00:14:49.760 --> 00:14:56.640 but you'll go and sing or play at that club because they'll give you the audience and they'll 131 00:14:56.640 --> 00:15:03.040 pay you a nickel, but you go because you get the stage. That's sick. Listen, there are people who are 132 00:15:03.040 --> 00:15:07.520 involved in worship who lead worship at a church that they don't believe in. That's not worship. 133 00:15:07.520 --> 00:15:11.600 It was never worship. It's not worship now. It's fraudulent because your heart's not in the 134 00:15:11.600 --> 00:15:15.680 right place because your heart's not in the ministry and you say, well, Jack, I can't get into 135 00:15:15.680 --> 00:15:23.200 the ministry. I can't get into it. It's off base. Get out. Trust God. Didn't God give you that gift 136 00:15:23.200 --> 00:15:31.600 or is it just a human talent? If you have to be on stage to satisfy your carnal pursuit of 137 00:15:31.600 --> 00:15:38.960 feeling or being important, look, if I have to be on stage to be a pastor teaching on camera, 138 00:15:38.960 --> 00:15:46.720 I'm sick. That is wrong. But listen, if God has called you to be a worship leader, 139 00:15:48.160 --> 00:15:52.560 God is going to lead you to a church that you can believe in and a leadership team that you love 140 00:15:52.560 --> 00:15:59.600 and they love you. And then it comes down to this. The question that this couple asked was, where 141 00:15:59.600 --> 00:16:08.240 should we give our money? We attend a church. We don't really like it. So we're sending a little 142 00:16:08.240 --> 00:16:14.160 bit to this guy we like and get ministered to on TV. Same with the other guy and same with the 143 00:16:14.160 --> 00:16:27.760 other guy. But our own church should we leave. And they made it more complex, which is often 144 00:16:27.760 --> 00:16:34.560 the situation is we don't believe in the church that we attend. 145 00:16:35.120 --> 00:16:45.760 We not only have friends there, but we have been basically detoxing our friends from the ministry. 146 00:16:46.640 --> 00:16:55.280 God has been using us to wash away what they're being taught in the church. 147 00:16:55.520 --> 00:17:02.000 And so it's kind of a ministry. Now this makes it tough, doesn't it? 148 00:17:05.920 --> 00:17:11.520 For me to answer you in this situation, should you leave or should you stay 149 00:17:13.680 --> 00:17:20.640 is not for me to respond. Let me explain. No man can give you the answer. Hear me out. 150 00:17:21.360 --> 00:17:32.240 If I tell you what I'm thinking, I would be an heir because I would need to get more 151 00:17:32.240 --> 00:17:38.240 information from you. And to be honest with you, it have to be really convincing for me to say, 152 00:17:38.240 --> 00:17:43.440 yep, you should stay there. In other words, I would need to see true fruit of the Holy Spirit using 153 00:17:43.520 --> 00:17:53.280 your covert ministry to rescue people from this church of the crazy. If some pastor told you, 154 00:17:53.280 --> 00:17:59.200 black and white, yep, right now you stay there or yep, right now you go. I would be a little 155 00:17:59.200 --> 00:18:06.640 leery of that response. It's not that cut and dried. If you can absolutely believe that the two of 156 00:18:06.640 --> 00:18:16.800 you have been led by God to stay, then he's going to give you the passion and the confirmation 157 00:18:17.440 --> 00:18:26.880 and the peace to stay at it, even though it's a goofball church, okay? If you don't have peace, 158 00:18:27.200 --> 00:18:36.480 if it keeps nagging on you that you should leave, then you need to obey God. And I'm not going 159 00:18:36.480 --> 00:18:42.320 to tell you which one he's saying to you because nobody knows except you guys. You guys need to 160 00:18:42.320 --> 00:18:48.800 ask the Lord. Do we go or do we stay? Lord, if you want us to stay, give us overwhelming peace 161 00:18:48.800 --> 00:18:58.080 and confidence. Give us, show us that this is our ministry mission. If you don't show us that, 162 00:18:58.080 --> 00:19:11.120 then increase the uneasiness, grant us discernment so that we leave here. And friends, with this also, 163 00:19:11.120 --> 00:19:18.720 I would say to your brothers and sisters, hey you guys, we've got to be moving on. We'd love 164 00:19:18.720 --> 00:19:28.720 you and how about us getting together on Thursday nights at the house. And we'd love to meet with you, 165 00:19:28.720 --> 00:19:35.920 but we're not coming here to the first Baptist of the Coastal Church of Mozambique. We're just not 166 00:19:35.920 --> 00:19:43.120 coming. We'd love to see on Thursday nights at our house, make coffee, Bible, fellowship. Yeah, 167 00:19:43.120 --> 00:19:48.800 it'd be great. It's possibility. But listen, I'm telling you right now, I'm not going to tell you 168 00:19:48.800 --> 00:19:55.120 what to do. Jesus will tell you what to do. Both of you love the Lord. Your letter was awesome. 169 00:19:56.400 --> 00:20:02.560 And you're really searching. You really want to do God's will. And I'm encouraging you to do what he 170 00:20:02.560 --> 00:20:08.400 says. He'll tell you. And you know what's fun about it? He'll tell both of you. It won't be lopsided. 171 00:20:08.960 --> 00:20:14.160 Amos 3.3 says, how can two walk together unless they be in agreement? The Lord's going to speak to 172 00:20:14.160 --> 00:20:21.200 the two of you. And so that issue that came up also in the letter was the issue of where do we tithe. 173 00:20:23.280 --> 00:20:30.800 You know, is this right to tithe to ministries that we get fed by spiritually instructed in the word, 174 00:20:30.880 --> 00:20:40.640 but they're miles and miles if not states and states away. It's completely fine to support 175 00:20:40.640 --> 00:20:46.320 ministries that feed you. I do believe that we're supposed to do that. If we are being instructed, 176 00:20:46.320 --> 00:20:52.800 built up, edified, educated, uh, and equipped for the for the ministry as a believer, then then 177 00:20:52.800 --> 00:20:59.760 you should support that or those ministries. But if the ministry in your neighborhood is not doing 178 00:20:59.760 --> 00:21:09.200 that, I could not give God's money that's in my account or my pocket to a work that he's not 179 00:21:09.200 --> 00:21:16.160 involved in. Does that make sense? If he's not there, then why give them money? See, listen, 180 00:21:16.160 --> 00:21:22.960 then I have to end with this. Christian should never think about money as being money. 181 00:21:23.920 --> 00:21:31.040 Christians, especially pastors, especially board members, should never. 182 00:21:32.400 --> 00:21:39.200 No way, no way do I want people in leadership starting with me that focus on money. 183 00:21:40.880 --> 00:21:47.520 The moment people start getting interested in money, it starts with them seeing it the wrong way. 184 00:21:47.920 --> 00:21:56.960 Come out like this. That's all it costs. Let's get to or it costs that much. We can't do that. We 185 00:21:56.960 --> 00:22:04.240 could never justify that. Wait, it's it's oh, we don't have enough money to to do the children's 186 00:22:04.240 --> 00:22:11.440 camp. For example, all these things are real comments that people make, but where's it coming from? 187 00:22:12.000 --> 00:22:21.920 In Christian ministry, we should never refer to money as green dollar bills. I learned this lesson 188 00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:29.600 years ago. This might be TMI, too much information, but it's a lesson I learned with Jesus 189 00:22:30.400 --> 00:22:34.800 and I've never forgotten it and I've passed it on to others and it's this. 190 00:22:35.040 --> 00:22:45.840 It was in the early 1990s, I'd gotten a group of people together to respond to a need to start churches 191 00:22:45.840 --> 00:22:53.600 in Russia. The Soviet Union had just broken up and the government of the Soviet Union, whatever 192 00:22:53.600 --> 00:22:59.440 government was, opened the door for American churches to plant churches in Russia. We responded 193 00:22:59.520 --> 00:23:07.840 within months to that request. We were somewhere over the North Atlantic. I was sitting on an 194 00:23:07.840 --> 00:23:14.560 Air France flight with about 25 other people from our church and I started thinking because 195 00:23:14.560 --> 00:23:20.400 each and every one of them had paid their own way and it wasn't cheap and I was thinking, 196 00:23:21.200 --> 00:23:27.280 what am I doing? These people are going to give a week and a half of their time. They're 197 00:23:27.360 --> 00:23:33.840 taking their vacation time from work. They're paying for themselves 100 percent. 198 00:23:36.800 --> 00:23:47.200 That's so much money and I felt God, I didn't hear God, I felt God say, would it make you feel 199 00:23:47.440 --> 00:23:57.760 any better if I told you that it's not money, it's tools. The resources that got these people on 200 00:23:57.760 --> 00:24:05.280 this plane heading to Moscow, it's all tools for the building of the kingdom. God showed my heart, 201 00:24:06.080 --> 00:24:12.880 he doesn't look at it as dollars, he doesn't look at it as currency. God looks at what we call money 202 00:24:13.440 --> 00:24:20.880 as tools in building. I got to tell you, because I'm such a tight wad, I would skimp and save, 203 00:24:21.600 --> 00:24:28.160 I would put stuff in envelopes. I'm like a squirrel pack of nuts somewhere. I grew up, 204 00:24:28.160 --> 00:24:36.720 stashed money in books and in places and labeled, this is for that and I was just like a nut, 205 00:24:37.600 --> 00:24:45.280 a crazy person. I don't like to spend money, but God had to heal me of that when it came to his 206 00:24:45.280 --> 00:24:55.440 church. Listen, it's his church, those are his tools, it's his gospel and these are his people. 207 00:24:56.880 --> 00:25:06.400 And I am a sheep dog in that work. And so that's so revolutionized me by the time we had left 208 00:25:06.960 --> 00:25:16.480 Los Angeles to Moscow, I was converted regarding this argumentation. And so beware of ministries that 209 00:25:16.480 --> 00:25:22.480 get all Google I'd about money. For example, I'm not faulty and I'm not attacking anybody, I'm just 210 00:25:22.480 --> 00:25:28.160 saying this is how it works in the ministry that I've been pastoring for 36 years now. 211 00:25:29.280 --> 00:25:34.560 We have never once asked for money, we've never once had a thermometer, a building fund, 212 00:25:34.720 --> 00:25:42.320 never. I won't do it because if God is leading the vision, it's up to him to fund it. 213 00:25:43.520 --> 00:25:50.160 If God needs us to fund his work, then something's very, very wrong. It's probably not his work. 214 00:25:50.160 --> 00:25:57.440 We're funding some committees idea. I'd get away from that. If God is in it, God will provide for 215 00:25:57.440 --> 00:26:02.960 it and he will invite you to participate, but he's going to get it done with or without you. Why? 216 00:26:03.040 --> 00:26:11.680 Because it's tools, but the moment you start looking at this dollars, you're going to get sideways 217 00:26:11.680 --> 00:26:18.000 goofy. Jesus said, it's hard. You'll either serve God or Maman. I know exactly what he meant by that. 218 00:26:19.040 --> 00:26:27.440 And so your money, your time, your effort, your breath, your body, your influence, your witness, 219 00:26:27.760 --> 00:26:34.800 their all tools for the building of the kingdom. So you need to use those wisely because every single one 220 00:26:34.800 --> 00:26:39.920 of those areas I just mentioned, you and I will give an account to God on the day of judgment regarding 221 00:26:39.920 --> 00:26:45.360 them. So just because you attended that church forever, doesn't mean you're supposed to stay. 222 00:26:45.360 --> 00:26:50.000 Just because you're being used, doesn't mean you're supposed to stay. Just because you have friends 223 00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:56.400 or kids that enjoy it, it doesn't mean you're supposed to stay. Then what does determine if I'm 224 00:26:56.400 --> 00:27:05.040 supposed to stay? God telling you to stay. That's the answer. Listen, as always, it's what we believe 225 00:27:05.040 --> 00:27:10.400 in. It's time for you and I to live out what we believe in. It's time for real life. And if this 226 00:27:10.400 --> 00:27:18.960 is a blessing to you guys, can you go to either the podcast app or whatever it might be on your 227 00:27:18.960 --> 00:27:27.680 device? Can you give us a thumbs up? Can you give us a like or a comment? Because in the AI world, 228 00:27:28.480 --> 00:27:34.800 it sees that our people are engaging and responding and it moves the conversation up the food chain. 229 00:27:35.680 --> 00:27:42.080 And why do I say that? Well, because we want more people to hear truth. That's it. That's it. 230 00:27:42.160 --> 00:27:48.880 So help us along. We can partner in this together. Why? Because this microphone, this camera, 231 00:27:48.880 --> 00:27:56.000 and the device that you're viewing this on right now is a tool for you and I to get the gospel 232 00:27:56.000 --> 00:28:02.880 out and to make disciples of all people. So until next time, God bless you so very much into this 233 00:28:02.880 --> 00:28:04.080 new year. Amen.