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1:18
This is Undaunted Life of Man's Podcast.
1:22
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
1:24
Let's get into it.
1:25
Welcome to Saturated 2024.
1:27
I want to welcome Kyle Thompson from Undaunted Life, who's joining us all week.
1:31
A man's podcast.
1:32
That's right.
1:33
Can you do my intro outro?
1:35
I'm wrong side.
1:36
I'll do every one of them.
1:37
Hey, let's go.
1:38
Let's go.
1:39
Equipping man to push back darkness.
1:40
That's right.
1:41
Didn't even pay him to do that.
1:42
And also a special welcome, Pastor Jim.
1:43
Thank you so much for that.
1:44
Awesome.
1:45
Ross, the fire.
1:46
Incredible.
1:47
Good lord.
1:48
Incredible.
1:49
How are we going to make it to you are not going to do well on Sunday?
1:52
I'll just tell you.
1:53
I was in train wreck tonight.
1:54
So what Jim Bergen has been like my pastor, you know, from a long ways off, we only met
2:02
like a year ago.
2:03
He's funny.
2:04
He's sending me this text.
2:05
So I've been listening to you at flat arms for probably eight or nine years, something
2:08
like that.
2:09
A lot of the stuff.
2:10
I have to kind of tone it down because I'll just start copying you.
2:12
I'll say exactly what you say.
2:14
So I'll do like a whole series and I'll quit for a series because I'm a such a mimicer.
2:17
Well, anyway, then about a year ago, I get this text.
2:20
I think Chandler gave you my number or something and it was like, Hey man, I've been listening
2:24
to your stuff.
2:25
I'm going to use this in my sermon this weekend.
2:28
I go, well, that's cool because I've been preaching to your sermons for about a half
2:31
a dozen years.
2:32
So we'll call it.
2:33
I'm sure it's like a preacher joke, but when you said he's gotten so good, like he's
2:37
like before me.
2:38
Yeah.
2:39
I made that up.
2:40
That was good.
2:41
That was a good one.
2:42
That was a good one.
2:43
But man, thank you.
2:44
The influence you've had on the church of 1122 far before you knew it.
2:47
The sermon you preach is really the heartbeat of this church.
2:52
We are a movement for all people in all means.
2:54
Before we started recording, you were talking.
2:56
So talk a little bit more about that, like the vision of starting this place.
3:01
And if you would take that whole sermon and be like, we want to be like that.
3:04
So talk about, talk about your heart for being a church for broken people.
3:08
Yeah.
3:09
So, you know, Pastor Jim was preaching out of Matthew seven and about really about reaching
3:12
lost people and everybody loves the idea until lost people show up.
3:16
Yeah.
3:17
That's like lost, right?
3:18
And so I get it, man.
3:19
I've been on church staff since I was 19 and I had some experiences to like I got saved
3:24
at this camp.
3:25
I didn't know anything about church and I get radically saved at this camp.
3:28
Then I come home and I try to get involved in these youth groups.
3:31
And I was like, this isn't, I think these are different.
3:33
Jesus is or something.
3:34
This is not the same.
3:35
So then I remember at one point, I'm like a junior in high school and I'm very involved
3:40
in my youth group.
3:41
Check this out.
3:42
So they have a president and a vice president of the youth group.
3:44
So they vote and I'm the president.
3:47
And then they told me I was disqualified because my parents were divorced.
3:51
Oh, really exactly straight up and I'm like, that's cool.
3:57
It's the most painful thing I've ever been through that just happened last year.
4:00
But if that's this, I just, I couldn't say what?
4:04
And then some version of that in most of the churches that I was involved in, and a lot
4:11
of times it wasn't me because I learned to play the game, at least for them.
4:14
I mean, I was totally duplicitous in my lifestyle.
4:17
Thank God.
4:18
We didn't have Instagram, but, um, amen, but I'm not a fake and I get an amen out there.
4:23
Yeah.
4:24
Yeah.
4:25
And so anyway, and, and then was able to serve the church I came from out of here, had a
4:29
real heart for lost people for sure.
4:31
It was great.
4:32
Pastor Jerry Sweatt at Beach Church is, it's awesome.
4:35
But when you get to plant a church, you get to start with a blank slate, you know, and,
4:39
um, and, and Gretchen and I, and our kitchen table, we just beg God that this could be
4:45
a movement for all people to discover and deepen relationships with Jesus.
4:49
And, and that discover and deepen mattered us.
4:51
We're not ignoring the long time Christian.
4:53
We just want to equip them to be the church.
4:55
Yeah.
4:56
You know?
4:57
Yeah.
4:58
And if you're known as a movement for all people, all people show up, man.
5:02
Mm hmm.
5:03
You know, I mean, the light of the world attracts crazy people too.
5:06
Right.
5:07
God bless them, man.
5:09
So, uh, I was an absolute wreck.
5:11
Mm hmm.
5:12
I mean, the Lord just wrecked me.
5:16
You know, the vulnerability that you preach from, you're one of the few preachers that
5:19
I listen to that doesn't act like they've got it all together.
5:26
And every.
5:28
That's not hard.
5:29
Yeah.
5:30
I, I've worked some stuff out, but.
5:33
But you're a big time successful and famous and big church, you could play the game where
5:38
you're the hero of all your stories.
5:39
Mm hmm.
5:40
You never do.
5:41
Yeah.
5:42
Um, and so I just, all I could think about, especially right at the end is like I've given
5:48
my life to everything you just preached.
5:52
And I'm in a room with, I have no idea how many people, however many people can be here
5:56
times too.
5:57
That's how many were here.
5:58
It was crazy.
5:59
And all of the campuses.
6:00
And I.
6:01
On a Wednesday night.
6:02
So it's crazy.
6:03
So man, I, I was, I'm still undone.
6:08
Yeah.
6:09
So your sermon was about how, how glad the heart of God is to save lost people.
6:17
Yeah.
6:18
Yeah.
6:19
Yeah.
6:20
Yeah.
6:21
Yeah.
6:22
Pastor Jim, is there anything besides, what else besides your story and your own reluctance,
6:23
which you shared tonight, inform for you the kind of church you wanted to, to have it flat
6:29
aren't.
6:30
Well, I, I can't really separate it all the way out for my story.
6:35
My story is kind of the play in the game for a long, long, long time, which drove you
6:40
just deeper into hiding and shame and, and, um, because of some abusive stuff happening
6:50
as a, as a kid for me, right?
6:52
Then, uh, there's certain points in your life where I, or somebody's kind of compared
6:56
to your brain.
6:57
It's like a hard drive.
6:58
If you make it through this season of life, that's hard where I'd been, right, especially
7:03
than that eight to 12 year olds, especially for boys.
7:05
All right.
7:06
If something goes bad in there, it's always going to be there.
7:09
Now you can learn to rewire around it, but to say it's not, he like, uh, didn't happen.
7:15
Guy, uh, God doesn't give you any of you, right?
7:18
Right.
7:19
Right.
7:20
But he does, he can rewire it, but you can't ever go like, okay, that's not in, that's
7:25
not in play.
7:26
Call it your shadow.
7:27
Call it whatever this.
7:28
God can heal it, but it will always be there.
7:31
And I think that sometimes like Paul, when Paul goes like, Hey, I got this thorn, I really
7:35
want it gone.
7:36
And God says, it didn't even serve you well for me to remove that.
7:40
Right.
7:41
It's like to keep me from becoming, cause I mean, like this guy, listen, there's a certain,
7:48
like you got enough charisma, talent, passion, whatever that is, you could run a church for
7:51
quite a while without even consulting God, right?
7:54
And so there's this thing that keeps calling you back to, Hey, let me just tell you what
7:58
I call you.
7:59
Right?
8:00
Not, not a shameful thing.
8:01
Not a, whatever is like, um, Hey, I rescue you.
8:03
I say, I love you.
8:04
Now let's, let's keep, let's move on, but don't, don't ever, don't have anything you can do
8:09
without me.
8:10
Right.
8:11
But it's came really to a head a few years ago, but I think that I've always said this.
8:17
I wish I had sexier stuff to be ashamed of.
8:19
I used to rob banks, you know, is like, I won the lottery 12 times and then I, you know,
8:25
gambled away.
8:26
That'd be cool.
8:27
It's like this abusive little fat kid in Indiana, well, and that's all you are, right?
8:33
And then then that wolf chases you, right?
8:36
But it's just broken.
8:37
But I think it, my point that is like we all, we all want to say that my, my victory or
8:45
my success or my win is what I want to put in front of people and hope they connect to
8:49
it.
8:50
And that's not it.
8:51
It is that like, Hey, I believe this is true.
8:57
But I have a hard time living it out.
8:59
Anybody else?
9:00
Right?
9:01
I get angry with God.
9:02
Like you need to get on my page, God.
9:04
You're not being a very good God right now and you need to take my advice.
9:06
Right?
9:07
Anybody else pray that prayer?
9:08
Yeah.
9:09
Yeah.
9:10
We all, we all do.
9:11
So, so I think that my connection with especially the hearts of men is one is I think that God,
9:17
I just tell him earlier, I'm talking to a friend earlier today and said it's a good
9:24
thing to be a Christian man.
9:26
And there's nothing in this world that says that's true.
9:29
It's good to be a Christian.
9:30
It's good to be good.
9:31
It's good to be a man.
9:32
Right?
9:33
Because God has put this mantle of responsibility on us and I want to lean into that.
9:38
But every tape in my head from my past and everything around me says, dumb it down.
9:43
Right?
9:44
It's like, I don't know, like the church did the same thing to Jesus.
9:48
Right?
9:49
Right?
9:50
It's like, I don't want to follow him with Jesus.
9:51
I want to follow Jesus and take a punch.
9:53
And the pile looks at him and goes like, just say it's not true and I'll let you go.
9:57
I have the power of life.
9:58
You don't have any power.
9:59
Well, it's like we love to call them out, but we don't call them up.
10:02
And so when you dumb it down, that's exactly what you're doing.
10:05
Well, as you're saying that, men who are living a gospel saturated lifestyle are naturally
10:12
conservers, not necessarily conservative like in a political sense, but they're conservers.
10:17
But like, how does that jive with what you were talking about?
10:19
Like, hey, if you build a church, sinners might end up showing up.
10:23
And as a conserver, you want to be like, okay, I've made it.
10:26
I'm in the club now.
10:27
I'm, you know, inside the house in Mark two and now stuff's fallen down on my head.
10:31
Like how can Christian men that are already in the club that are naturally conservers still
10:36
keep their, you know, I guess, palms open or hands open, palms up.
10:41
That color's great.
10:42
I go back to that story.
10:44
Like what was everybody there to see?
10:49
Jesus do tricks.
10:50
Yeah.
10:51
Like he's going to stick an arm back on, he's going to make it right, he's going to make
10:53
it right.
10:54
He's going to make it right.
10:55
He's like, I'd buy, I'd buy a ticket to that.
10:56
Jesus show, you got to stick some of his head back on.
10:57
Let's go.
10:58
Right.
10:59
When he goes, your sins are forgiven.
11:00
I think there's a big sigh in the whole room goes, that's let down, that's a let down.
11:05
It's like, we want his legs to work.
11:07
And he says, so that you may know, okay.
11:09
So I think it's separating going like, Hey, there is a real felt need out there.
11:13
I mean, I got to take, I got to pay attention to it because nobody came here to be saved.
11:19
Nobody came here to be redeemed.
11:20
They came here to find, they don't have the words to say that.
11:25
That is why they're there, but they don't have the language to say that.
11:28
All I know is that if I get one more DUI, I'm losing my kids, right?
11:33
One more fight.
11:34
And she said, it's over.
11:35
If I get busted for being on my phone, you know, again, it's like, she says, she says,
11:40
we're done.
11:41
That's my son won't speak to me.
11:42
I don't know what to do.
11:44
And so I'm showing up in that desperation.
11:46
It's like, what great friends those guys had that parallel, right?
11:50
I don't know if you preach it like, do you have those four two, do you have four friends
11:53
of care?
11:54
You Jesus is like, wow.
11:56
But I guess it's like your story has to, your story has to form either I once was lost,
12:04
but now I'm found, right?
12:05
They always will be in the, in the picture now that you're keep continuing rehashing your,
12:12
I was a piece of crap.
12:14
But now I'm not.
12:15
I was a piece of crap, right?
12:16
But I was a, I was worth saving.
12:19
I was, God had plans for my life.
12:20
All right.
12:21
I was like, God had a plan for my life and like, I, so here's, here's a, I don't know
12:25
if it's theology, correct?
12:26
So you've got higher, better grades than me.
12:29
That's why I think he's here.
12:30
So, so I remember right before I actually went to a retreat where I started leaning in
12:36
and going like, I have dots in my life.
12:38
I've never connected.
12:39
Like this happened to me as a kid, right?
12:41
And it's coming out of me as a dad.
12:43
Like, like, I, I want to, people said, why, why did you get in a ministry?
12:47
I was, I was on a front porch at my cabin with about 18 heroin addicts.
12:50
They go, Hey, pastor, why did you get in a ministry?
12:52
And I had this aha moment and I'll clean it up that is like, nobody's gonna screw kids
12:56
on my watch.
12:57
Oh, yeah.
12:58
I'm a rescuer.
12:59
Okay.
13:00
Now I, that's noble, right?
13:02
Unless you're always rescuing one of your kids and then in your mind, you keep that him
13:07
a little boy and his mind, he can't take care of himself.
13:10
There's dots, but I'm a rescuer because nobody's going to do the, right?
13:13
Yeah.
13:14
For sure.
13:15
So I had to work through that.
13:16
So see if this stands up.
13:17
Right?
13:18
I'm taking all the time.
13:19
I'm sorry.
13:20
So the night before I go to this to really lean into like, okay, do I even want, I want
13:24
you to know the states and nobody will know me because pastor Jim, you had no bullets.
13:27
You'll get shot.
13:28
Right?
13:29
So I went, anyway, yeah, yeah, I've seen on my back porch and I had this aha moment about
13:41
the book of Job, Job was doing fine till God brought him up.
13:47
Right?
13:48
He's doing fine.
13:49
So Satan comes back and goes like, yeah, can you think to report?
13:50
Yeah.
13:51
Yeah.
13:52
But look, did you see Job?
13:53
I said, oh, and he's doing well, right?
13:56
Yeah.
13:57
Yeah.
13:58
Yeah.
13:59
Because you did this.
14:00
You did this.
14:01
I let me at him.
14:02
Okay.
14:03
You go at him with limits.
14:04
So here's Job.
14:05
And this is the hand of God.
14:06
God spreads his fingers.
14:07
Here comes Satan.
14:08
Right?
14:09
And, and at the end of it, God's glorified things.
14:10
Right?
14:11
And I played out in my mind.
14:12
Right?
14:13
God goes, see that little kid down in Indiana, right, like I'm going to do amazing things
14:19
through his life.
14:20
Well, yeah.
14:21
I gave him a Christian mom.
14:22
I gave him a Christian dad.
14:23
I gave him a Christian grandpa.
14:24
He gave me a little love.
14:25
Let me at him.
14:26
And God said, okay.
14:27
Right?
14:28
And I got hurt.
14:29
Now, I, I, that might be logically fall apart, but this is what I don't know.
14:33
It's like in the New Testament, it happens because Jesus is like, Hey, Peter, the devil
14:36
is going to kick your butt.
14:37
Yes.
14:38
I'll pray for you.
14:39
How about stopping?
14:40
Yeah.
14:41
Killing me.
14:42
All right.
14:43
Sorry.
14:44
I'll turn it to the Lord.
14:45
All right.
14:46
Thanks for your prayers.
14:47
So, so I got hurt.
14:48
Okay.
14:49
And now I am my, my, I'm not saying abuse has to be that, but all of us get hurt and wounded.
14:53
Nobody walks out of the house without scars.
14:54
Nobody.
14:55
Right?
14:56
Your dad might be the best dad ever.
14:57
He's still got to work through some stuff.
14:58
That's right.
14:59
Here's the big question that you cannot ask anybody in the moment.
15:05
If the, if the only way to get here, right, to have Gretchen as your wife, right, to have
15:12
Robin as my wife, to have these two kids, to have these six grandkids, to, to leave flat
15:15
on it.
15:16
Right.
15:17
Just keep on going.
15:18
All right.
15:19
If the only way, it's a very similar prayer to a garden prayer, right?
15:22
If there's any other way to get here and not that way, is it possible?
15:27
But if that's the only way to get here, I'd sign up again.
15:30
Now, you can't tell somebody that other kid's funeral.
15:33
No.
15:34
Right?
15:35
But you have to look back and go like, I don't see how it's redeemable in, in the moment.
15:40
But I, I now can look back and go.
15:42
The reason that I can defend, I mean, I'm, I'm the guy that, you know, I'm a cliche.
15:49
You're, well, you're the president of that guy.
15:51
Like you've got camo, you've got guns, you've got deer heads, you've got, you've got country
15:55
music, you've got trucks, you know, right, right, right, I was sitting in boot barn parking
16:00
lot one time, right?
16:01
On my truck, listen to country music, we just ate a cracker barrel and I got an elk skull
16:04
in my back.
16:05
Amen.
16:06
Right?
16:07
All right.
16:08
And I look at my wife and go like, I'm a cliche.
16:09
Yeah.
16:10
Yeah.
16:11
We don't have a shallow end.
16:12
But I'm that guy, all right?
16:13
Yeah.
16:14
Why do I preach sermons about like, hey, there's this gay guy coming to your church with rainbow
16:17
suspenders who's into gay porns like that and you better take good care of him.
16:23
Because just a little bit of different happens.
16:26
Like sometimes abuse kids become abusers, sometimes abuse, like their sexuality gets
16:30
all messed up.
16:31
Right.
16:32
Right.
16:33
They're but for the grace of God.
16:34
That's why.
16:35
It's one of my favorite things that you've said.
16:36
I think you said it last week or two weeks ago at flight irons that I heard and I'm going
16:39
to preach it this weekend.
16:41
I am, dude.
16:42
I'm going to give you credit this time.
16:43
Then I'm going to say you've always heard me say, so it'll be mine soon.
16:46
But this this line right here, bro, you want a gospel line.
16:50
There are no second chances.
16:51
There's the blood of Jesus and from now on, bro, that's run over by a grace train.
16:57
Yeah.
16:58
That's what that is.
16:59
Like you don't need another shot.
17:00
You can't back.
17:01
In fact, the people that have heard us most, if we went back in time, they can't even give
17:05
us what they took from us anyway.
17:06
Like you can't, you can't get in the, in the glory and get the flux capacitor and go
17:10
back in time and they do it.
17:11
You can't do it.
17:12
So there's no second chance.
17:13
Yeah.
17:14
There's the blood of Jesus and from now on and he's going to start with you wherever you
17:18
are right now, no matter how dark or how, I mean, a big part of my talk on Sunday is
17:23
if you're busted up and broken, whose fault it is, is irrelevant.
17:28
Right.
17:29
Right.
17:30
Jesus is here to help you.
17:31
Yeah.
17:32
Whether, whether it happened to you or you happened to you or some common combination
17:36
of both is irrelevant.
17:38
He just came to save you right now.
17:41
You said, you said in the sermon, like God's not disappointed.
17:45
It's not like he didn't know what he was getting.
17:47
I know.
17:48
That's a hard one for people to swallow though, right?
17:50
Because they think God expects something of me and then I'm going to screw it up, right?
17:55
Well, yeah, the issue with ministries that don't care about discipleship though, because
17:59
both of you all tonight, just tonight, both of you talked about discipleship and how important
18:04
it is.
18:05
But with places that just want to make converts and not disciples, that seems like Satan can
18:11
use that trick pretty quickly because you're going to immediately run into your old life
18:15
pretty fast.
18:16
Right.
18:17
You're going to, what'd you say when you got saved at church camp?
18:19
Like you're like, I promise I'm not going to sin and then two weeks later, you're like,
18:23
Oh, no, I wonder if this whole save to me.
18:25
It's too weak.
18:26
No, that's just like two days.
18:27
I was being nice.
18:28
Here's the funniest thing.
18:29
Here's the funniest thing I was ever said, nothing will make your doubt so nothing will
18:34
make you doubt your salvation, like reading a John MacArthur book on the assurance of
18:38
your salvation.
18:39
Yeah.
18:40
That's it.
18:41
Oh, wow.
18:42
Oh my God.
18:43
He's literally got a book.
18:44
I still laugh at that.
18:45
He's looking like got a book called say beyond a doubt, but I was actually going to ask that
18:47
because like, so you said a great anecdote about the guy who struggled with gay porn
18:53
and, you know, acting out in a homosexual same sex manner.
18:56
And you know, guys, go listen to the entire sermon so you can get the anecdote and send
18:59
your book as well, right?
19:01
But you had a quote that I wrote down.
19:03
He was not completely changed, but he was completely saved.
19:06
This was after he had passed and you alluded to how he passed, right?
19:10
And so, so we'll just leave that there.
19:12
He was not completely changed, but he was completely saved.
19:15
The problem is, is especially in some of these reform circles, especially if you're a J
19:19
Mac guy and I love J Mac, right?
19:22
But I listened to 45 minutes of J Mac flow and on assurance of salvation.
19:25
And I'm like, I'm not even sure I'm a human, much less a saved like human being anymore.
19:30
Like I'm in the reason is, is because he wants, he talks about the sweetness of the fruit.
19:34
And I'm not beating on J Mac.
19:35
Like he's incredibly important, but there are a lot of people that are like, is my fruit
19:40
sweet enough?
19:41
And then we start looking at other people like, I don't really see fruit in someone's life.
19:45
So this guy that passed away, that you said, hey, he was completely saved.
19:50
Other people would look at the behavioral modification that they did not see and be like,
19:54
I don't see the fruit that is indicative of a saved individual.
19:57
So no, he's not that.
20:00
That's the rough part.
20:01
That's where you really get into the thorny weeds.
20:02
Sure.
20:03
But you have to look back and go and like, so who is your fruit fruity enough?
20:08
Like is your fruit like is it enough?
20:11
Because like we can talk about homosexuality or, you know, the transitive, you're like,
20:14
I think the number one sin I hear Jesus address is greed.
20:18
Yeah.
20:19
Totally.
20:20
It's like, nobody's going to preach that sermon because we got to build some stuff, you
20:22
know, it's like, I'm just saying in general, but it's like, usually the person that says,
20:27
I don't know if they're saved or not, right?
20:30
It's, it's what I do.
20:31
I deflect you and just don't look at mine.
20:33
Yeah.
20:34
Right.
20:35
I mean, most typically, but we have to believe that we're saved by grace and not by our good
20:40
works.
20:41
Therefore, our bad mistakes, right?
20:43
And that goes back to the Jesus did not like, sign me up and go, I didn't, I didn't know
20:48
you were going to do that.
20:49
Right.
20:50
But that's what we project because we've been told that by people.
20:54
Yeah.
20:55
Well, I wouldn't have had you here.
20:56
You live what you learned.
20:57
Absolutely.
20:58
I got that from a horse book, you know, so it's like, you do, you live what you learn
21:02
because that's what it takes to survive and to find to survive any way you want, right?
21:10
But keep my job.
21:11
Right.
21:12
Stay married.
21:13
What human relationship do you have that's actually unconditional?
21:15
Right.
21:16
Like a puppy.
21:17
Right.
21:18
Yeah.
21:19
My dog of a lifetime just passed away on June 12th and so we can't hug and cry.
21:27
Stop it.
21:28
I was in Costa Rica with my wife, like a month later, we almost had to leave the restaurant.
21:33
I mean, it's like, it's, it's, it's a thing, yeah, but it is, but I preached on it too.
21:37
It's like, here's what I learned on my sabbatical, my summer break.
21:39
They're one of my dog guys like, oh, that's unconditional love.
21:43
Also, if you open up your heart to great love, you also open it up to a day is coming when
21:48
it's going to get broken.
21:49
No doubt.
21:50
Now you got to make your decision.
21:51
Like, is it worth it?
21:52
Or you can just build this big shell around so nothing breaks it, hurts it.
21:54
I'm talking about a dog, right?
21:56
But then it's like everybody's sitting there going, we're not really talking about dogs.
21:59
No, of course not.
22:00
Well, that the way that I talked about it, whenever my dog died recently is when that
22:04
dog turned three, it hit me all of a sudden, this dog is going to die someday.
22:09
And I'm not going to be able to handle it.
22:10
And you know what I mean?
22:11
Cause like that was my dog.
22:12
It was more than a dog.
22:13
Cause like, you know, you grow up in the country and it's like, oh, the dog starts limping.
22:15
Let's shoot it.
22:16
And like, you know, we don't, what do you think about it?
22:18
What's country you from?
22:19
Oh, cool.
22:20
It was a weird place.
22:21
Yeah.
22:22
I used to live out.
22:23
Lots of outlaws.
22:24
But like the way that I correlate it is you and I are on the same wavelength about a lot
22:28
of stuff in men's ministry, men's ministry related things.
22:31
And so you want to talk about men's community and it can be described in a million different
22:35
ways.
22:36
I describe a foxhole.
22:37
Matt Toders.
22:38
He and there's got his Kings table.
22:39
I talk about three AM friends.
22:41
I'm on my way friends.
22:42
Who's car?
22:43
We're going to take friends from the movie, the town, all these types of things.
22:45
But I do one episode about two of my brothers that are not brothers, but two of my guys
22:50
that are closer than a brother showing up after they found out my dog died.
22:54
One started watering the grass where we were going to bury his body.
22:58
And the other showed up with like a tent because we were going to be digging a grave
23:01
at two o'clock in the afternoon and a hundred degree day in Oklahoma.
23:04
Neither one of those guys was invited to come, but they showed up because they knew what
23:07
the dog meant.
23:08
And so it's like, that's the corollary, like that's the example for what types of men do
23:13
you need in your life?
23:14
And when Samson died, Joby's dog years and years ago, this was like pre-JP, wasn't it?
23:19
Yeah.
23:20
Okay.
23:21
What happened after Samson died?
23:22
A bunch of gangsters showed up to his house with shovels to help bury them and a bunch of
23:26
their gals stayed inside with Gretchen to help her with the stuff going on inside, right?
23:30
And by the time they're done burying that dog, they're all in tears.
23:34
They didn't know Samson, right?
23:35
They knew of Samson.
23:37
Those are the types of guys you have to have.
23:39
Those guys are going to go to battle and not just say it because it sounds good during
23:42
like discipleship meetings.
23:44
So good.
23:45
One of the guys was the first missionary that we sent, Tyler Workman, he helped me dig
23:48
the hole.
23:49
Yeah, man, talk a little bit about the herd, about your men's ministry that you got going
23:53
home that I preached at.
23:55
Yeah.
23:56
Talked about it.
23:57
I'd love for our guys.
23:58
Cross ship, too.
23:59
It's so good, I think we had your favorite call to worship ever.
24:08
And I just sat there and went like Satan just pooped his pants.
24:11
Yeah.
24:12
And then he said that's the best call to worship I've ever heard in my life.
24:15
Yeah, we're taking over the territory.
24:18
Yeah.
24:19
So, uh, Jim Morgan.com.
24:21
Yeah, herd dot the herd dot online.
24:25
So we're moving it over to that.
24:27
So, um, I think the primary function of the church is to bring people far from God and
24:33
turn them into followers of God, all right, followers of Christ, all right.
24:36
And that's good.
24:37
And that's the calling of the church, all right.
24:39
Um, a lot of churches, if you answer the what's next, they go like, uh, we just want them to
24:47
watch less porn, you know, and maybe, you know, tie the words.
24:51
I don't know what it is, but so, but, but like, it's this brotherhood thing that we're
24:56
all the same we want, but don't, don't know how to find it.
24:59
And so we, we kind of landed on, on, on the, on the phrase forging followers of Jesus.
25:04
So you're already following you, right?
25:06
Forging followers of Jesus into leaders of men.
25:08
And so we're trying to take that.
25:09
Okay.
25:10
Now that you have the Holy Spirit living now, you have grace.
25:14
Now you're leading to know the word and we've had, we baptized 86 guys.
25:17
Let's go.
25:18
Right?
25:19
That night, it's not an evangelism thing.
25:20
It's just like, Hey, like let's, let's, let's move into our faith.
25:24
Let's move into that.
25:25
You can't do anything we just talked about on your own.
25:27
You got to have the Holy Spirit living inside here, right?
25:29
Yeah.
25:30
I preached that same sermon later this past weekend at 3,100 minutes, step across, put
25:34
on one of these thin red lines and go like, I'm fixed my eyes on Jesus.
25:36
I'm going to love my wife.
25:37
I'm going to protect my daughter.
25:38
I'm going to leave my son.
25:40
Like, and, but the herd is this concept with, I don't know, I don't have a spirit animal,
25:44
but when I first started doing some work around like my, my own journey, like you say, pick
25:50
an animal that kind of symbolizes like your struggle.
25:54
And I picked anaconda, not for the reasons, not the reason that we all.
26:00
Yeah.
26:01
Yeah.
26:02
It's in the book.
26:03
Yeah.
26:04
Anyway, because it's a, it's a ambush predator, it wraps itself around you, own Jane until you
26:09
can't breathe.
26:10
And finally, you just go, I, I got to give in that shame.
26:13
So then through that, I was getting ready for my first elk hunt at the same time in 2014.
26:18
And I, I, that, does that name still fit you after you worked out some stuff?
26:23
I said, no, it doesn't.
26:24
So what, what?
26:25
And I said herd bull, because this is what about a herd bull, because I, you know, you're,
26:29
you're like me.
26:30
He's like, if we're going to, we don't have a shallow end.
26:31
It's like, we're going to know everything there is to know about.
26:33
Right.
26:34
Yeah.
26:35
Like I, before my first son, I, I think I put 2000 rounds down range, right?
26:38
And, and it worked.
26:40
Yeah.
26:41
But, um, here's, here's the thing about the herd bull.
26:44
Sovereign God has entrusted this bull with this mountain for this season.
26:48
It's his.
26:49
Now it didn't used to be his and a day will come when it's not his, but it is his now.
26:53
Right.
26:54
So sovereign God has entrusted me with this part of his kingdom.
26:57
What am I going to do with it?
26:58
Well, I'm going to do everything I can.
27:01
I'm not very good alone.
27:03
So now you take that and then you get into, then I, that kind of turns it into like, then
27:07
I started shooting bison.
27:08
Right.
27:09
And then you go to Africa and you see these cape buffaloes and right where you, the strongest
27:13
cape buffalo in the world.
27:14
Right.
27:15
They can have five lions.
27:16
Right.
27:17
But eventually.
27:18
Yeah.
27:19
They're down.
27:20
Because nothing can survive five lines.
27:21
Right.
27:22
And they form that shield wall that Spartan shield wall.
27:27
There is nothing getting through that.
27:29
But most of us as men, we say, I want to be a leader.
27:32
I want to be this.
27:33
I want to be this.
27:34
And how are you going to do that?
27:35
All by myself.
27:36
All right.
27:37
The number one thing I hear when I, when I talk to men is I'm lonely and I'm making,
27:41
I'm making stuff.
27:42
I was a, I'm making stuff up as I go and I'm about to tap out and I don't have a 3 AM
27:48
friend 2 AM friend.
27:49
It's like, who's going to bury my dog?
27:50
I'm going to bury my dog and I'm not going to tell anybody, I don't know how I can tell
27:53
anybody about it because they just like, it's a dog like they don't understand, right?
27:57
So what would be, what would could be possible to say, I got a man on my left, man on my right.
28:01
They're not going to do it instead of me, but they're going to do it with me.
28:06
And they're, they're, they're, they're, they're not going to give me a pass.
28:10
They're not going to go like, Hey, frat buddy.
28:12
Right.
28:13
Let's tell her.
28:14
No.
28:15
No.
28:16
I had a fire pit earlier in the spring and I, and he's, in his ministry leader and I look
28:23
at him and go like, did you sleep with her?
28:25
Yes.
28:26
Yeah.
28:27
I mean, okay.
28:28
I love you.
28:29
I'm not going to worry.
28:30
Listen, how are we going to tell his wife and he was what, I mean, oh, I mean, you can
28:37
tell her or I'll go with you, but we're not going to not tell her.
28:41
And if it doesn't go south, then you can move in my basement, but we're not going to
28:45
not tell her.
28:47
But right.
28:48
And he's like, man, you went home and told her.
28:49
Yeah.
28:50
You'll never be free until you learn to be honest.
28:52
Yeah.
28:53
But how scary is honest when almost everything you experience in your life is conditional.
29:00
That's right.
29:01
Yeah.
29:02
Like if I, I went to Texas and go like, Hey, this is the thing I don't want to be to know
29:04
about me.
29:05
And then most people went back and sat down.
29:07
I walked out of the room, walked in the bathroom, tears screaming down my face went, I, I just
29:11
finished it.
29:13
There's no icons, but nobody shot me with those bullets.
29:15
First time I really experienced grace.
29:17
So that, that the herd is, can I create a movement, right?
29:21
That comes alongside the church, right?
29:24
I don't want this to be a flat-earn thing.
29:26
I want this to be this movement of men that.
29:30
And again, so I was, I was talking to a guy today back at the hotel, he lives in Tennessee.
29:38
And kind of the aha moment was the e-courses are good.
29:41
The content's good, but it's the connection is like, I want to say that my content and
29:48
our books and all that kind of stuff are like that changed my life.
29:51
But, and it does.
29:52
I'm not into getting that, but what you're creating and what I'm creating and the ones
29:58
that seem to be effective are we shared some experiences together and then down the road,
30:05
the unforeseen happened, but that's who was showed up for me.
30:07
There it is.
30:08
All right.
30:09
There's horns on my left, horns on my right and none of these horns are going to stab
30:12
me in the back.
30:13
I had to, I had to let somebody, I got to be careful with this, I had to make a hard call
30:20
on somebody on my lead team of the herd, right?
30:26
And then we all surrounded him, right?
30:29
He pushed a little bit, he pushed a little bit, you know, and, and then when he didn't
30:33
respond well, we go, not okay, man.
30:35
Yeah.
30:36
We're surrounded though, but we also didn't go like, we're on your side, we understand,
30:42
right?
30:43
We, we were not frat buddies.
30:44
We were, we were our brothers when we signed on for that.
30:47
So.
30:48
I think a part of the reason I'm, I have been so drawn to you and even more so now that
30:52
we've got to hang out a little bit.
30:53
I mean, we've got so much in common, which is great personalities.
30:56
All that stuff works, which is cool.
30:58
Um, but it takes a man to bestow manhood on an upcoming generation.
31:05
We don't even know what our culture, what a man is.
31:07
And so we've got boys trying to bestow manhood among boys.
31:10
And this is why everybody's a taker and a consumer instead of a provider and a protector.
31:15
And you're a man.
31:17
I mean, just straight up dude, physically, spiritually, emotionally, you're just what
31:23
a man is.
31:25
And I think that's why so many people around the country are drawn when you talk, probably
31:30
the most impressive thing.
31:32
We're on this cool mountain in Colorado towers, it's like 8,000 feet.
31:35
My house is at six feet.
31:37
You have this thing called oxygen, but it went up there so I had to get in a can between
31:44
every session.
31:45
There's like morning sessions and evening sessions and all these fun things to do, you
31:49
know, really fun too.
31:50
Like they do.
31:51
It's cool.
31:52
You want to be at it.
31:53
It's not like mandatory fun.
31:54
It's fun fun.
31:55
And then you would just sit at the fire pit and men of every generation would just surround
32:01
you.
32:02
And it was that that's how you know, you could see it, man.
32:05
It's like in the bones of every male, like we want to be around the elder of the tribe
32:11
and try to get some of it on us.
32:13
That's what it is.
32:14
Yeah.
32:15
Yeah.
32:16
It's called you old by the way.
32:17
That's okay.
32:18
I'm actually okay with that.
32:19
13 years.
32:20
Low key rude.
32:21
I remember like, like, I like to go to Jim a lot, you know, but I was in Mexico City in
32:31
the airport and I saw this guy and he's probably my age a little bit older and he was like,
32:36
you win.
32:37
Yeah.
32:38
Yeah.
32:39
He had muscles on you.
32:40
I didn't know there's the muscles there.
32:41
Right?
32:42
Like, it was wrong.
32:43
Right.
32:44
And then I thought at what point does it become this farce like in order for you to do that,
32:51
what did you not do?
32:52
Correct.
32:53
Right.
32:54
Right.
32:55
Right.
32:56
What did you let go of him?
32:57
What did you say like this?
32:58
And then now you're going to be like 60 by 70 years old.
32:59
And what happens when you can't bench press your car anymore?
33:01
Correct.
33:02
And you're like, I don't know who I am anymore.
33:04
So I think the biggest if I've if I've grown in I'm going to call it biblical masculinity,
33:13
strong strength, you know, like, it is I do think that we should take care of us physically,
33:20
spiritually, emotionally, all right.
33:22
I want to I'm going to Serbia next week, like if I'm like, I'm just really tired, like before
33:27
I came here, I rode a horse at five o'clock in the morning because I need to get a ride
33:30
in.
33:31
And then I had to go do something else.
33:32
And then I got to the airport in time and when I get off the plane tomorrow, I'm going
33:35
to do laundry, go to my granddaughter's sixth grade volleyball game.
33:38
Let's go.
33:39
That should be so right.
33:41
And then I go ride a horse again because I go to Serbia the next day, like I can't be
33:44
like this slouch going like, I just eat Doritos, you know, but but here's what I think.
33:51
So I think that's always important.
33:53
They did not gather around me because my biceps are a little smaller than yours, all right.
34:01
They didn't because I drive a truck.
34:03
They don't because I like to hunt, right.
34:06
I think the biggest way I have grown personally in my own, like spiritual masculinity, and
34:10
this is what I think the definition of my man is I'm I'm trying to make more take more
34:16
responsibility and play less victim, not my fault, somebody else's fault is a, I think,
34:24
I think taking responsibility, the difference between a boy and a man or a boy says this
34:28
is about me and a man says this is about what God's entrusted to me, right.
34:35
And so her bull is trying to lean into that because I won't always be her bull, I won't
34:39
always be pastor Jim, I won't always write, but I will always be one thing, right.
34:45
My big takeaways from after sabbatical, that's another podcast like Jesus time out for more
34:50
Jesus to help, right.
34:51
But it's like a my job is not my identity and it used to be I was on sabbatical for six
34:58
months and I stomped my foot until God gave me back my church and he goes, not your church.
35:02
Second thing is there's very little in my control.
35:05
And when we tried to control everything, we're really just trying to manage outcomes, which
35:08
means we're trying to manage pain.
35:10
And it's like, and I think about how little you control Dallas, what it says, if you're
35:17
going to know how little control, go push on that boulder, like, okay, that's just one
35:20
more thing.
35:21
And then the other thing is the end of the day, the most important thing is Jesus and
35:24
Robin.
35:25
And so, and those are the two people that always get pushed down the list because they'll understand.
35:30
And now I'm trying to come back and go and like, I remember when I first got like sabbatical
35:33
Robin, we went to a Christmas party and she, she got a migraine, she goes, Jim, I'm going
35:37
to throw up.
35:38
I said, this is my, this is my comeback.
35:39
And I was like, I can't leave, I got to give a speech and I'm going to vomit.
35:43
Right?
35:44
I said, okay.
35:45
And I went to one of my staff, and he went, can you cover this and he goes, yeah.
35:48
So I took him, took her home.
35:50
Right?
35:51
Monday, I'm sitting in a, a, a leading meeting and somebody's looking at me and goes like,
35:55
yeah, that one probably cost you.
35:57
I said, what?
35:58
Now, the old, the old person, I probably would have said, Robin, go sit in the car and
36:02
I'll come out after the speech.
36:04
That's the old broken me, right?
36:06
He says, you know, you're leaving early.
36:07
And I said, okay.
36:08
I'm, I'm saying, I have wrongly chosen this church, this job over my wife so many times.
36:15
If every once in a while, I wrongly choose my wife and this is not a case, but if I did,
36:20
I can live with that.
36:21
You better be okay with it.
36:23
That's, that's the difference, right?
36:25
How my priorities are more in line.
36:27
And I think what, whatever the draw is, the same thing with you already, we're honestly
36:33
saying up there, we're calling into a deeper level of living, of honesty, of truth.
36:42
And they all want it.
36:43
It just scares the heck out of them because it, all I can think about is what it might
36:47
cost them.
36:48
It's interesting.
36:49
The culture here at 1122, like last year it saturated.
36:52
This is the biggest thing we do other than an Easter.
36:54
In Friday night, I was not here because JP Martin was starting at free safety his senior
37:00
year and I ain't missing it.
37:02
I don't care.
37:03
We'll have a thousand more saturateds.
37:04
I got one kid has a senior year.
37:06
And you know what this place did?
37:08
Great call pastor.
37:09
The whole, that's all this.
37:11
The only feedback I got.
37:13
One of my best friends on the planet is one of my Mac here.
37:16
He's got him Jeff cop, toughest nails played college football at USC.
37:20
Pete Carroll was his coach.
37:21
Then he played in the NFL for a while and I asked my neighbor, he's a pastor here.
37:24
He's awesome.
37:25
Pete Carroll would tell the football team at USC the three most dangerous words you can
37:29
say is I got this.
37:31
Yeah, I preach it all the time.
37:34
So first and foremost, spiritually, the most dangerous thing you can say is I got this.
37:38
I mean, I don't need you Jesus.
37:39
I got this.
37:40
That's what Adam and Eve did in the garden.
37:42
That's right.
37:43
Yeah.
37:44
Horizontally, it works too.
37:46
If the linebackers look at the alignment and be like, I don't need you, I got this.
37:49
It's like when believers look around and be like, I don't need you.
37:52
I got this.
37:53
You ain't got this.
37:54
Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane feels the weight of the world on him and is falling
38:01
down.
38:02
I feel like he's going to die.
38:03
And he's like, Hey, boys, my three.
38:04
Will you all pray for me?
38:05
If the son of God is requesting prayer in his time of need, then who the hell do you
38:11
think you are to think I got this, but Jesus needs some bros.
38:16
Yeah, man, we need each other, but it's just go ahead.
38:19
Go ahead.
38:20
I think I was sitting around your fire pit.
38:24
We see our preferred future in you.
38:28
You are tough.
38:29
You're at horses.
38:30
You lift weights.
38:31
You're tough.
38:32
You're all the things externally.
38:34
You just spent 45 minutes only preaching from vulnerability.
38:40
You didn't.
38:41
It's crazy.
38:42
And men know if I'm actually going to be the man God's called me to be.
38:46
I got to get some more of that.
38:48
I got to be more honest about my sin.
38:49
I got to be more honest about what has happened to me.
38:53
I got to be more willing to say every day.
38:55
Guess what?
38:56
I need the cross again today.
38:57
Yeah.
38:58
Oh, it's so good.
38:59
So when it was all over, I just sat there and worshiped them, but then there's one guy.
39:06
Yeah.
39:07
And he's got some memory, some demons, like he's like some real actual war stories.
39:15
I don't know why, but I needed that.
39:18
I needed to pray for him.
39:20
Crawford Laurets.
39:21
Yeah.
39:22
He prayed saturated a few years ago.
39:23
Yeah.
39:24
Incredible.
39:25
I think God should give him like a chapter.
39:26
You get to write another chapter for Proverbs 32, but he has this great, here's a great
39:32
proverb from him.
39:34
We parents, but it was absolutely right.
39:37
We are to be a portrait of the destination, right?
39:41
Looks like that.
39:43
And men recognize it.
39:45
It's either like, I can never do that or like God will do anything to get that because the
39:50
weak man, so the story you just said, if Jesus needed three, why don't you?
39:54
The weak man goes, well, the reason I can't do is I don't have three.
39:58
It's victim.
39:59
It's excuse.
40:00
It's like, hey, you know, if, if you want something, listen, if you want to buy a gun,
40:09
if you want to go on a hunting trip, if you want to buy a truck, right, right, will you
40:12
find a way to do it?
40:13
Yes.
40:14
Right.
40:15
You just will because it's like, it's what is important.
40:17
I go after the things that are most important to me and rightly or wrongly, but it's like,
40:23
if you want three men in your life and you say, they just don't exist, like that's victim.
40:29
Well, there's a whole lot more to that to even follow up with what Joey was saying.
40:34
I think when people look at you, if I would be a little poetic here, but I think people
40:39
see you as a lion amongst lions, whereas everyone's trying to be a tiger.
40:43
And the difference is people don't really know this, tigers don't have packs, tigers
40:48
hunt alone.
40:49
Yeah.
40:50
Right.
40:51
So one of the, one of the most gorgeous things I've ever seen in my entire life, it was like
40:52
one of those BBC Planet Earth shows or something like that, and it's Siberia, right?
40:58
And that's the opening scene is Siberia.
41:00
It's complete desolation, right?
41:01
It's basically like it's just white and gray and nothing and cold.
41:06
And then you see the most beautiful orange and black stripes walk into the frame.
41:11
And this thing will survive on its own and only on its own one on one.
41:17
And that, you know, top of the food chain, lion, apex lion versus a tiger.
41:23
The tiger doesn't, the tiger wins a million times out of a million.
41:27
Like that's the difference between how a tiger fights and a lion fights.
41:31
But when alpha male lions apex lions fight together, it's an astonishing level.
41:36
It's exactly what you're talking about with the king buffalo.
41:38
That's the phalanx, right?
41:39
Yeah.
41:40
And this shield is covering the guy to my left and the guy to my right is covering me.
41:45
And this is, you know, kind of blew your mind a little bit when I told you about this, it
41:48
blew my mind because I was obsessed with the phalanx because I was just like every guy in
41:51
college watching 300.
41:52
It's like, I thought I had abs and then I watched this movie and it's like, this is
41:56
an issue for me.
41:57
They were real.
41:58
They were real.
41:59
They're all super tan, which is like real as a ginger.
42:00
It's really, really watching that many, like I was so envious.
42:03
But the thing that's interesting about that is I start digging in to the phalanx.
42:07
We have renderings and pictures of phalanxes from like 25th century BC, like we're talking
42:12
about ancient Sumeria, right?
42:13
And then it just kept getting like change and there was one line in this history of
42:19
the phalanx, right?
42:21
It's a throwaway line.
42:23
But they said, I can't remember if it was the Greeks or the Romans, I figured it out.
42:26
But they figured out that if you put guys next to strangers on the phalanx, the odds of the
42:31
phalanx breaking went up as opposed to when you put them next to their family.
42:37
So here I am.
42:38
They're going to put my dad on my left.
42:40
So I got to cover my elder, my dad, right?
42:43
On my right is my brother.
42:45
On his right is my other brother.
42:47
On dad's left is my uncle.
42:49
And so because the thing is, is if the phalanx breaks at one point and it doesn't immediately
42:53
come back together, the phalanx shatters.
42:56
And men don't think like that because we're Western American males.
43:00
We think, I need my beef jerky.
43:02
I need mud on my truck and I need, you know, blood on my boots.
43:06
And that's going to be good because I'm an alpha wolf.
43:08
But what they don't, what they fail to realize is the alpha always dies alone.
43:13
Watch nature, but the alpha wolf that ran the pack will die by itself, right?
43:19
It'll age out and then it doesn't have a calm death.
43:22
It doesn't walk into the meadow and then just calmly pass over the rainbow bridge to
43:26
the wild other side.
43:27
Once a predator takes that former apex predator out and you know what the pack does, nothing
43:34
because it's already gone.
43:36
Most men don't realize that they're in the meadow alone.
43:39
And then all that's waiting on them is the predator.
43:41
They don't get it.
43:42
And that's what's just happening left and right with men.
43:46
Wow, that's that.
43:49
And now we're finished.
43:50
It's like, I don't know, it's just so clarifying that that picture, you know, that's how God
43:56
speaks to me a lot through nature and outdoors and horses and dogs and hunting.
44:02
And like that's like that, that'll probably preach in Colorado soon.
44:07
Are you going to take that?
44:08
Is that going to be all your sermon?
44:09
I'll say that.
44:10
He's going to preach it.
44:11
I'm going to try to make it better.
44:12
That's what I do.
44:13
Well, we are running low on time, but I want to come back to the central picture that you
44:18
were hovering on in the sermon, which was the, the bread for like the rocks versus the bread.
44:25
And I had never heard that before of like, you know, the illustration of a father and
44:31
a son saying, Oh, no, no, I'll trick you and give you that rock instead of bread.
44:35
And how that so often happens to the church.
44:37
So maybe two parts to the question like, why does that happen?
44:42
And then how can we prevent as believers from doing that bait and switch?
44:48
It's going to touch on what we've already talked about, like being familiar with where
44:50
we've come from.
44:51
Yeah, why is the church so often known for being judgmental instead of being loving?
44:57
It's just quicker.
44:59
It's like a sanctification is a process and we don't want any processes.
45:04
We want it done by Tuesday.
45:06
So we, when we go like, Oh, you love Jesus, okay, then you need to right get these things
45:11
out of your life by this amount of time.
45:12
And if not, well, then we'll either throw you away or tell you weren't really a Christian,
45:18
right?
45:19
And then we'll move on to some other notch in our belt.
45:21
I don't know.
45:22
I don't know what's like around the world.
45:24
American church is like we are kind of known for, well, America is known for microwave
45:31
everything, like get it fast, get it fast, right?
45:33
And if you don't make it, let's throw you away and get another one.
45:35
Okay.
45:36
I think sometimes we might project that on to life change, even though this is what we've
45:42
all learned, I can fake it for a while.
45:45
I can fake life change for a while.
45:48
And then it just puts blowing it up in disciplinary down, right?
45:53
So I think, I think, I think the other part of that summer be fair on this is when we
45:58
offer bread, we really do mean it.
46:00
And then when, when some really messy person comes up, we have no idea what to do.
46:05
So we just go like, ah, I didn't know you were coming, right?
46:08
And it's, it's like, I don't know how to, I don't know how to fix that.
46:13
And somehow we've told ourselves, if you had enough faith or if you had enough Bible
46:18
verses, if you have enough, whatever that is, you could fix people.
46:21
Like I've spent so many years in a lobby going, I should have the magic phrase or the magic
46:28
Bible verse thing go like, well, Jesus said this, and now you're not gay.
46:33
And it's like, oh, right?
46:35
Right.
46:36
Right.
46:37
Right.
46:38
Like I really, I don't, I'm sure it happens because God can do all things, but when somebody
46:41
comes up to me and says, I prayed your prayer, I was in alcohol after 30 years.
46:44
I prayed your prayer and I've never even thought about alcohol again.
46:48
I'm sure that's possible because all things are possible, okay?
46:52
I probably won't believe you because I'd never, that's not my walk with God.
46:59
Like somebody goes like, God delivering me like Richard, God delivering me from gay porn
47:02
and, and all this other, like it's like, and I think in that moment he thought that I'm
47:07
like, oh, buddy, I, you know, it's kind of like, kind of like when you're almost in a
47:13
car accident and he'll always adrenaline like, I'll never do that again.
47:15
And you mean it.
47:16
Yeah.
47:17
I mean, he meant it all of his life, but it was like, we all know that that journey.
47:22
I mean, Peter, again, best mom group ever, and like, it's like, he was a wreck.
47:28
Yeah.
47:29
Yeah.
47:30
Jesus called him the devil.
47:31
Right after he called him on this rock in the same aircraft.
47:34
I know.
47:35
I got it.
47:36
Yeah.
47:37
His performance review was not up to par.
47:38
It wasn't.
47:39
Mm.
47:40
But that, that is, it's like, I think we know I need bread and I got bread and I want
47:47
to offer bread.
47:48
No.
47:49
Nobody started a church to throw rocks.
47:51
I mean, I'm sure they're out there, right?
47:53
I think the intentions are good.
47:55
And then when that person shows up, we're like, one is, I don't know what to do.
48:00
And the two is like, it kind of reminds me of me.
48:05
One, and Jim, this, this goes to my favorite quote from run over by the grace train.
48:10
It's probably from me, but go ahead.
48:12
Yeah.
48:13
I mean, I started thanking him for everything.
48:17
The woman caught an adultery and I'll get the line pretty much right.
48:22
You can probably turn the page.
48:24
It's, I wonder if she heard the rocks fall.
48:29
And so imagine someone that needs bread and yet they're, they're given the rock because
48:36
what did the woman caught an adultery need?
48:38
She needed the bread of life and she was about to get a bunch of rocks.
48:42
Yeah.
48:43
I think I think the way I, whenever we talked about it on the show, you know, talking about
48:48
the book, it's like she had to have been crouched down covering her head, just waiting for
48:55
impact.
48:56
Waiting for impact.
48:57
Exactly.
48:58
And she had very, very likely seen a stoning at some point in her life.
49:04
She knew exactly what was about to befall her, but the only thing that fell were the
49:08
rocks from the, the sinner's hands, right?
49:10
Right.
49:11
That's, that's the thing that's so interesting about all these core layers is what the expectation
49:16
is versus what we get.
49:18
And if you are in any type of ministry pastors out there listening to this, make sure you're
49:23
offering bread.
49:24
Right.
49:25
We're walking back here into the studio and we're like, somebody baking bread.
49:27
It's like there should be, it should be pungent.
49:29
Yeah.
49:30
Like if it should, there should be an aroma in your ministry of bread at all times, not
49:35
the, is this the corner I walk around and then I eat a rock.
49:39
You preach the most grace saturated sermon, which was incredible.
49:44
Here's some, I haven't figured it out yet.
49:47
I think we're only called Christians three times in the New Testament.
49:51
I think that's right.
49:52
Only three.
49:53
One of them is derogatory.
49:54
It's like they're making fun of them.
49:55
Right.
49:56
Okay.
49:57
I think the phrase in Christ is 216.
49:58
Ooh.
49:59
Yeah.
50:00
Cause when you say, when you go with the label Christian, then you start getting into where
50:04
I grew up is like, yeah, but are you a good Christian?
50:07
And then you become, you get definitions of good Christians.
50:09
And so here's the things you don't do.
50:11
Here's the things you do.
50:12
The Bible talks about life and death, not good and bad.
50:16
And then you said, so when did it change for Peter?
50:19
Pentecost.
50:20
Yeah.
50:21
Cause Jesus moved in.
50:22
Okay.
50:23
So then, so I've been working through this in Christ thing versus Christian.
50:29
I think the question to ask somebody is not, are you a Christian, but are you in Christ?
50:33
Like, have you accepted him?
50:36
And, and if they go, yeah, I called her in the name of the Lord.
50:41
Here's all the things I'm still doing terrible.
50:43
Like, okay.
50:44
But if you're in Christ, I get incredible news.
50:46
He's in you.
50:47
And if he's in you, since we'll work out, nobody checks the sanctification boxes in the order
50:53
we would like, or especially the one our wives would like for us to check them in.
50:57
So we got struggles.
50:58
We got, I mean, Paul enrollment seven is like, I'm a jack wagon.
51:01
Yeah.
51:02
What is wrong with me?
51:03
But man, if you're in Christ, then Christ is in you and he is going to be the one that
51:08
takes you to the finish line of glorification.
51:10
So.
51:11
And Romans, I won.
51:12
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
51:15
Praise God.
51:16
I finished Richard.
51:17
That's it.
51:18
Not completely changed.
51:19
Right.
51:20
But on the journey, completely saved.
51:21
Correct.
51:22
Correct.
51:23
Correct.
51:24
This phrase came to my mind towards the end of the sermon and it was, you know, sometimes
51:28
we repel.
51:29
I mean, myself, we say, I'm uncomfortable with the mess or I don't know what to do.
51:34
I feel ill equipped to handle messes situations, but then this phrase came to my mind like,
51:40
but the mess is beautiful because that means I, means I'm welcome to, you know, because
51:45
I'm a mess, you know, and when we say, Oh, get out of here because you're a mess.
51:50
It's because we're forgetting that we're part of the mess.
51:53
Sure.
51:54
You know?
51:55
Yeah.
51:56
The question, why are Christians so judgy? I mean, you know, we make a lot of pronoun
52:00
jokes lately is because you start with the first person singular pronoun because I and
52:07
you forget.
52:08
No, no, no.
52:09
The gospel is because he, right?
52:10
And you take your eyes off the gospel.
52:12
It is impossible to simultaneously fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of
52:16
your faith and look down your nose at any other human being or becomes day instead of
52:20
us.
52:21
No doubt, man.
52:22
Because we have levels to depravity, right?
52:23
The way it was described to me early in my Christian walk was, well, there's varsity
52:27
sins and junior varsity sins.
52:29
And typically you focus on everyone else's varsity sins because those are the ones you
52:32
don't struggle with.
52:33
So the person that has same sex attraction and you are opposite sex attracted, you love
52:37
focusing in on that one because you don't have it.
52:39
You don't have the struggle, but some people have a chemical bend.
52:42
So they can't have a whiskey.
52:44
It's always 10 or more, right?
52:46
The 450 pound pastor won't talk about gluttony for anything.
52:50
Because that's not his varsity.
52:51
Well, at least my porn's heterosexual.
52:53
Right.
52:54
Yeah.
52:55
You know, I can ask that a lot.
52:56
They're like, Kyle, why do I have to go to your podcast here or someone rail on porn?
53:00
Why can't I listen to pastor's do it?
53:01
I was like, because they're using it.
53:03
That's why, like, because if they talk about it, then they're going to have to get face-to-face
53:09
with that truth, right?
53:11
That's going to bristle up against them and then make people feel like a little bit different
53:15
around them as opposed to they're building a bridge now between them and somebody else.
53:20
And that's one thing that, you know, watching Jobe and having Jobe mentor me and something
53:25
like that.
53:26
When you have a weird job, I'd be in a pastor's kind of a weird job, right?
53:29
Anytime you get paid to have a mic on your face to say things out of your face hole,
53:32
it's weird, right?
53:33
So people think you're cooler than you are funnier than you are, like, better looking
53:36
here.
53:37
Well, not you.
53:38
But like, they think certain people are better looking than they actually are.
53:40
The thing is, is you have to take that away from people when you meet them.
53:44
One thing that I do when I meet people that just want to ask me about me and the podcast
53:47
and all that is in my head, I have six.
53:50
I have six boxes.
53:51
I need to ask them six questions about them before I will answer any about me, right?
53:56
Just to create a like, Hey, I'm, I'm you.
53:58
Like I could be selling insurance or driving UPS truck or being a cop or something like
54:02
that, but, but I'm you, but we have so much of this bravado and this, this issue of like,
54:07
I have to stay on my pedestal because if they, if I get knocked off, they're going to know
54:10
I'm an imposter.
54:11
That's right.
54:12
Right.
54:13
And it's like, okay, so there are levels to this depravity game, but like nobody gets
54:17
a trophy.
54:18
We all should end up in the same place.
54:19
I think that, and I'm sure we're out of time, but I think he, Henry now and had to look
54:27
at me.
54:28
I read books or somebody told me that Henry now and said that he coined a phrase the loneliness
54:34
of leadership.
54:35
I was unpacking that with a spirit director in my life, James Henderson, he says, I think
54:40
Jesus might have been the loneliest person on the planet because everybody just wanted
54:44
something from him.
54:45
Right.
54:46
I need to go to a decimal place to be with, to be with my father.
54:51
I think that the loan, the higher you go in leadership, the lonelier it is and the more
54:57
you feel like you have to hide.
54:59
Right.
55:00
Because if people knew, and if people, like, you're exposed out there on the tip of the
55:06
spear.
55:07
You're exposed, right?
55:08
And that's why I think that the higher you go in leadership, the more you, I think the
55:15
more consolidated that that group of three around you and the, the, the deeper they have
55:22
to be.
55:23
Like this illusion that, yeah, maybe it's just the whole Instagram, like, I've got 40,000
55:29
friends.
55:30
I got 65,000 friends, right?
55:31
That's cute.
55:32
You really don't.
55:33
Right.
55:34
Like, like if your dog dies, right, if, if you go like, Hey, I, I, like, I've, I've got
55:42
some guys in my life.
55:43
Like the other day, my friend, Adam Stevens, it hands me up.
55:47
It's a bowl and it has painted rocks in it from his daughters and a note from his wife
55:52
and something else.
55:53
And they're all about mom, mom, mom, mom.
55:56
And it's like, he looked to me and I said, what, what is this?
55:59
He goes, this is the week of your mom dying.
56:02
I didn't even remember that.
56:04
Wow.
56:05
You know, because I was, I was getting ready to host the thing at my barn and all that
56:07
kind of stuff.
56:08
And he shows up and going, Hey, art, my daughters and Megan made this for you.
56:11
Why?
56:12
Like, who, who does that?
56:15
Right.
56:16
I'm very, but you better have them.
56:19
Yeah.
56:20
Right.
56:21
Yeah.
56:22
Um, anyway, well, it's the first thing Jesus said on the cross, man, his father forgive
56:27
them.
56:28
If you ever forget that we're them, it'll lead to all the bad places that we've been warning
56:34
can use.
56:35
Right.
56:36
The moment that you are constantly, so thank you for reminding us of what we've been saved
56:42
from.
56:43
And that Jesus came on a rescue mission for us.
56:46
And when we get rescued, we get to be a part of his rescue team.
56:49
Right.
56:50
And we've been saved too.
56:51
That's it, man.
56:52
That's it.
56:53
Right.
56:54
Yeah.
56:55
So thank you.
56:56
It's honor.
56:57
Pastor Jim, thank you.
56:58
That's honor.
56:59
Like, I'm going to retire one day and I'm just going to come be your landscaper.
57:00
Come on, man.
57:01
I'm just going to just hang out.
57:02
Well, buy horses for the retreat center.
57:03
Go on.
57:04
Hey, he's not kidding.
57:05
I'm not kidding at all.
57:06
Well, however you'd like to close this pastor job.
57:08
Oh, let's just pray.
57:09
That's always a good way.
57:10
Father and heaven, Lord, I thank you for the gift that is Jim Bergen.
57:13
God, I've prayed this before over and over and when I don't know how it works, but when
57:16
you came up with the idea of this man and you marked out his days and his influence
57:23
and all the things that the enemy intended for evil, you intended for good.
57:29
And now thousands of men and women are being impacted towards you by your gospel, experiencing
57:38
your grace, because you gave this man the courage to say yes to your invitation a long
57:45
time ago.
57:46
God, I thank you so much for what he has meant to our church and especially the ministry
57:50
that you did through him tonight and that you will do through even our time together
57:54
here, God, we love you, because you love us first, pray in Jesus name, amen.
58:13
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
58:34
Remember keep pushing back darkness, keep forging spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
58:41
You're seeking the lion of Judah.