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- [00:05]
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Welcome to the Crazy Love podcast. What happens when the church is shaped more by culture than by scripture? In this episode of Staff Talks, Francis shares a growing burden for the modern church. The loss of reverence, the fear of man, and the tendency to follow influential voices over God's word. As truth becomes increasingly blurred, Francis urges believers to stop following the noise of the culture and return to a faith grounded in the fear of God.
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I was in. I was teaching in the jail on Sunday, then teaching at Stanford on Monday, which is a good contrast. But, you know, there was this one cell where. This one block where, you know, Al was telling me the week before they were just out of control or whatever. So I was like, okay, you. You teach first, and then I'll just kind of listen and. And chime in and. And, you know, as I'm praying for the people in there, you know, asking God to give me a heart of love for them, Yeah, I just started thinking, okay, do I care about these guys? And the truth is, I don't. You know, sometimes the natural thing to talk to them about is their life when they get out, how can it be helpful, this or that, trying to get them out of the situations they're in, Whatever it may be, it's just other stuff. But as I'm praying for them, you know, God's showing me, is that what I really care about, you know, and it's almost disingenuous sometimes because it's an easier thing to care about. But the reality is, what I care about is the day they stand before God and how terrifying that will be. And so, you know, the verse I shared with them was, you know, Matthew 10. You guys all know it. Verse 28. Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. I just told him, look, I'm not really that concerned about your family or your kids. I wish I could say I'm, you know, was more compassionate about that stuff, but, you know, we're all going to die, and we're all going to stand before God, and I don't care how tough and fearless you want to come off here in this room, but it's not going to be like that. When you see God, it just. It really isn't for any of us. It's just sheer, like, I've never seen anything like this, anyone like this. And the truth is he's saying, don't be afraid, you know, and these guys live their whole lives, you know, always looking around, you know, checking out every car that passes, whatever. I mean, that's just a life they live and have built for themselves. And. But it's like, you're gonna die, you're not gonna live forever. And so what really matters is this God who can not only take your life today, but can't throw your soul into hell. And then the whole idea that, you know, later on he says, so everyone who acknowledges me before men, I'll acknowledge him before my father in heaven. And he who denies me before men, I'll deny him before my father in heaven. And just telling you, you know, like, I could just lay out the gospel and say, look, I'm not afraid to share this with you. I don't ever want to be ashamed of this. And there have been times, and even last night when we were worshiping at Stanford again, you know, it was an awesome time of worship. Like, I loved it. You know, we're right there in Meyer Green at the center of campus. And you know, Delali, I don't know if you guys know her. She's a Gallinar, our house church. Great worship leader. Just heart of gold. And she's getting us all closer, closer, closer to where we're just kind of huddled around the keyboard and the guitar and everything, and just worshiping unashamedly in the middle of the campus, you know. And then at the end, Constantine, I don't know if you know him, he's in our church too, but super gifted worship leader. He and Dalali both start going off, and now pretty soon people are dancing. You got a priest dancing. You know, all sorts of. It was. It was pretty weird. But I was sharing with them. I go, you know, I remember when I first became a Christian in high school, I was still very like, image, conscience, conscious, like, didn't want to overdo it or whatever. You just. I wanted to be bold. But there's also this other side of you don't want to acknowledge him before men at certain times. And. And just how I don't want to be that type of person. I want to just be able to be straight up. It was just nice to worship and see these young people worshiping in the middle of campus. That would be just as hostile as, you know, being in prison in some ways. And kind of don't want to be the guy that's too into Jesus. And that's just something we have to fight. But I just thought, you know, here's the crux of it. And it's just not fearing those who can kill the body or kill the reputation or kill anything of this earth, but to truly fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. And I guess when I taught that in the prison, I thought, wow, I haven't taught that verse in a long time. Just because we can get involved in other things and talk about other things. And there's very few people who talk about a God who can destroy your soul in hell and your body in hell. And we get into all these different arguments about, well, what is hell anyways? And, you know, you just go on and on, and it's like, is that temporary? Is it this or that? So it's not that big a deal because it's probably temporary. Or it's. We're getting all these theological arguments, and at the end of the day, no one just reads the verse anymore. And I just thought, well, if I'm perfectly honest, it's verses like that that got me serious about God is thinking about eternity apart from him. It's stories like Lazarus and the rich man and him just begging, you know, for someone to just dip their finger in water and put it on my tongue because I'm in agony in this place. I. The reality of some of these things that we don't want to talk about in the church even, because it's. And there's becoming more and more things like that where people are just questioning everything. And now there's churches that kind of cater to that. You want to be friendly towards this issue, this issue, this issue, you can find it. But at the end of the day, if you just kind of read the Bible, and I think this has been my bread and butter, you know, when you're in seminary, you start reading these papers by people that you just can't refute because you're not intelligent enough. They're on another level. And so you're like, oh, gosh, I guess he's right then. But, you know, he's not right because you're just, gosh, that goes against everything I read. But you quickly learn in seminary, you can make this say anything. You can get to a level of scholarship where you can make this say anything. And there will always be a group of people who are with you on that. And at the end of the day, you just have to read it again. God help me. I don't want to be wrong about anything. But it sure seems like this is the natural, most simple understanding of Scripture. And yet there's these people so much smarter than me that are saying the opposite of that, Whether it's about hell or sexuality or whatever. You're just like, wow, you could just have AI write you the most solid, you know, paper on defend this for me using the Bible, and you're not going to be able to just fight it and everything else, but there's just something where you're like, God, I've read this book so many times and it sure seems like in the end there is a serious punishment for some and there is a serious reward for others. I can't get away from that. It seems like it's completely in your hands. And honestly, I do still. It's all the same things that I started with, like, life is going to be over for any of us at any time, and what is going to matter when I stand before that God? Do I really believe in his love, in his grace, in his mercy? Have I bet everything on it and not to be afraid to just let. It's almost like when you hear so many arguments against basically everything the saints have believed in for 2000 years, but now in the last 50 or so, it's like, wow, all these new theories and thoughts and everything else. And it's very easy to get intimidated by that. It's like, well, I can't argue with him or him, or him or him. You really can't argue with about anything at that level. You just have to hire AI to do it for you. It's like, is this really what God taught in Scripture? Which also brings me to like, I also don't believe it's just like every man or woman for himself and just get in a room and study and you'll come up with the truth. So I just woke up wrestling with that this morning. I got this, this is not right. That whether it's because this guy is super intelligent and you can't argue with him, that you better go with that guy and let's follow him, or super charismatic or super this or that. It's like you have individuals pulling groups to themselves and it's all so new and it's so, like, goes against church history. And it just made me long for like, God, we need a solution here, God, that it can't be that I just sit in my prayer room and read this and over and over I will do that and seek him and seek truth. But I also don't want to be another person that says, oh, I've got the truth, and then find and rally people who believe like me. See, this person agrees, this person agrees, this person agrees. There's just, we're just in this point of crisis in the church. Where, you know, do you pick a larger denomination and go, well, at least the Eastern Orthodox have been around forever. Or at least the Roman Catholics in some form been around, you know, forever. But then there's things that have seemed to be additions over the years that I'm like, gosh, but no one believed that for three or four hundred years. And now you're saying it's absolute truth, and then you establish that in 1950 or 1970. Like, that's very hard for me. And yet the same time it's like, well, then what are you going to do? Rely on yourself and whatever you come up with? But you just go, gosh, But I don't know if I'd pick them over these guys, you know, it seems like I'd probably go that way. But then he just come before God and it's like, lord, I don't have an answer for this. I so want to do what's right. And at this point, what I do know is to seek as much authority as I can, not to seek to come under as much authority as I know how to. Which is, okay, at least let me come under the elders of the local church and let me start there and then go, gosh, somehow I can't read the Old Testament and see the authority that God has on the earth and then read the Apostles and the Jerusalem Council and, you know, have some sort of checks and balances and authority from God and then jump to whoever gets the Most views on YouTube has the biggest say. It's like, gosh, that's so weird. So not right. And whoever's the most intelligent or the best debater or I just. I just keep praying for that saying, God, you gotta fix this. Please fix this. I want whatever's right. I'll become whatever you want me to call myself. But I know those are two seemingly, like, polar opposite things, and maybe they are in a lot of ways. You're talking about hell and you're talking about authority and. Yeah, but there's just something about this is what believers have believed forever. But now, because we don't have that authoritative backing, you can have individuals just change our views on so many things to where we're scared to preach some of these things anymore because we heard this from this guy or that from that guy, and you can't really refute it. I don't know. It's just kind of a ramble. So maybe I'll just leave it at that. There's no perfect bow to put at the end of this one.
- [16:11]
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Thank you for listening to the Crazy Love Podcast. Join us next week for a new episode, but until then, for more resources from Crazy Love Ministries or to support the work of Crazy Love, please visit our website@crazylove.org.