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Nephilim Death Squad
Is Holy Spirit Working Today? w/ Pastor Rick & Raven
01:38:48
Is the Holy Spirit still actively working today? In this powerful and deeply personal conversation, The Raven sits down with Pastor Rick to discuss the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of believers, miraculous encounters, hearing God's voice,...
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- [00:00]
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Pastor Rick
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- [02:30]
Matt
The Studio Productions. Very special guest today, everybody, Pastor Rick. This is Top and Raven's pastor, which a lot of people are going to be incredibly intrigued about because they wonder, like, where would these guys go to a church and what would that pastor be like? So it's going to be very intriguing for you to kind of talk to us a little bit about your life and, and what you're doing.
- [03:23]
Guest Host
I feel like this was a mistake already, how this is.
- [03:25]
Raven
Yeah, you could feel his energy. Right. By the way, our audience, Pastor Rick, is already passively familiar with you.
- [03:32]
Pastor Rick
Okay.
- [03:32]
Raven
Because we, we say things about you, always good things.
- [03:36]
Pastor Rick
I, I bet you said something about the crimson worm.
- [03:39]
Raven
I, I did it. We mentioned it. And I would love if we can get into that conversation just a little bit today because it's fascinating.
- [03:47]
Matt
You wanna, you want to unpack that right now and then we're getting your story. Know, that was like a very moving sermon. What was that a week or two ago?
- [03:54]
Pastor Rick
Top Father's Day. Yeah, it was Father's Day.
- [03:57]
Matt
So Top said it was great, man.
- [03:59]
Raven
Yeah, it was a. It was a really fantastic.
- [04:02]
Matt
What is it? It's an Isaiah 50 something pretty close.
- [04:07]
Pastor Rick
Psalms 22.
- [04:09]
Matt
Okay. I thought Tom said it was an Isaiah 50 passage, man.
- [04:17]
Raven
And by the way, since then I have spoken to you and you said there's more to it to unpack. And you're planning on doing that. Did you already do that or is that happening? This coming.
- [04:27]
Pastor Rick
That's coming July 19th. We do a show, our show, a service where we bring in the Spanish church that's right with us. We call that one church Una Familia. The pastor of that church interprets me as I preach. And so we go from there and, and I've already given him the first sermon so he can listen to it. And I've already prepared the second sermon, so I've got that information if you want to sneak it in. Second one. Yeah.
- [04:59]
Raven
So can we lay the groundwork for this? This is something that you, you said you organically came upon. Right. Which is remarkable because how long have you been reading the Bible?
- [05:10]
Pastor Rick
Well, I've been in ministry 49 and a half years. I was a youth pastor for 14 years, lead pastor for 35, and I've been a senior associate now for six months, so.
- [05:27]
Raven
And still the word of God is revealing itself to you in ways it hasn't, you know, in all those decades.
- [05:35]
Pastor Rick
Absolutely. One of the joys of my life. I tell young preachers this all the time. My favorite thing to do is to study God's word and then get ready to preach it by prayer and fasting and seeking God. And so it's cool.
- [05:53]
Matt
You know what's a wild thing I heard in the last, I don't know, year or two, and it kind of pierced my heart a little bit. You familiar with G. Campbell Morgan?
- [06:01]
Pastor Rick
I heard the name, not much.
- [06:02]
Matt
He said if he hadn't been preparing sermons, you think he'd be backslidden at this point. Is that something you could relate to?
- [06:11]
Pastor Rick
I can understand that, yeah.
- [06:13]
Bluff
The.
- [06:13]
Pastor Rick
One of the downfalls, if you will say, about pastoring is you don't have the time to study like I do now. Since the other guy has taken my senior pastorate, I have more time to read and study what I want to.
- [06:30]
Matt
Amen.
- [06:30]
Pastor Rick
And so it gives me the time to dig deeper into God's word. When I ran across this, I almost lost my mind. It was so good. I mean, it was. It was. It was so powerful. And I keep digging into it and it gets deeper and deeper, and if I get emotional, you know, just hang with me because.
- [06:49]
Matt
All right.
- [06:50]
Pastor Rick
It's touching, for sure.
- [06:51]
Matt
Do you want to get into that teaching right now or.
- [06:54]
Raven
Because.
- [06:55]
Guest Host
Can I say something real quick? Because the way that I. I spoke with you about coming on the show, and you were telling me a little bit about the sermon, and I. And I heard, and I go, man, how crazy is it that, like. Because Pastor Rick doesn't preach every. Every Sunday anymore? And I go, you know, it's just crazy that David said he's. He's going to come back to visit the church. And then you told me the message that you were giving. I'm like, I don't want to hear it. But I already knew it was like. It's one of those things where it's like, bang, like a shot in the dark. And it seems to happen that way more often than not.
- [07:25]
Raven
Oh, yeah.
- [07:26]
Pastor Rick
Oh, sure.
- [07:26]
Raven
In fact, our. My first. My first time attending your church, it was like. I don't even know if I ever ended up telling you this, but we were going through something very particular and actually top. And I kind of sought you out for counsel on the matter. And when you gave your sermon, that visit that I had made that Sunday, it was like. And I'm sure this happens to all sorts of people all the time, but even my wife was like. It was like, was. He was talking to you, and. And I remember in particular you had given an anecdotal story regarding a relationship of yours, a friend that you had fallen away from because of some differences. There was some contention and you were, I believe, periodically reaching out to him, praying for him and just, just trying to bridge that gap. And, and I think in the story you might have made leeway, like there was finally some sort of a breakthrough. But, you know, my entire issue was a falling away with someone who I was feeling compelled to, to reach out to. So such a.
- [08:28]
Matt
You're soft.
- [08:29]
Raven
You. No, you. Such a unique circumstance in my life at that time. And it was like, it was, you know, like the sermon was made for me. And I can guarantee you that there was countless others in the congregation who probably felt that way too, because despite being a unique situation in my life, it's a very relatable one in everybody's life. And so, but that happens very often that what you're saying and what you're reading, God is working through that in, in people that are listening.
- [08:58]
Pastor Rick
Well, one of the things I've found is that if I will be real with people and I will tell them I have issues with people with personalities, with conflict, with family, with everything like that, people are going to relate to that because people definitely have conflict. Everyone has conflict. Everyone has issues they have to work through. But the standard for a Christian is a whole lot different than the standard for somebody that's in the world, if that person's in the world. But then the standard becomes even a little bit harder if both of you are Christians, because then you've got Matthew 18. If you got odd against your brother, you go to him, you try to work it out. And if that doesn't work, you get somebody else go with you. And, and so I, I try to express real life to people. My pastors that have worked for me for years and years say you're a storyteller. And I said, well, that, that's my life. I love telling stories. And matter of fact, the, the sermon I did about the criminal crimson worm, I ended it on a story about my son and reconciling with, with him. Sorry.
- [10:15]
Raven
It was, it was tremendous. Well, let's, let's, let's get into that.
- [10:18]
Matt
Well, the guys, kudos to you too though, because the guys are very, in this world of fake and real and spotting fake from a mile away. And one thing they've always said about you is that you're just a real ass dude. Like they've always said that, that no matter what, you know, regardless of anything else, they're like, this dude is real, man. Yeah. So that's very cool and very needed, very needed in the church today.
- [10:38]
Pastor Rick
I've always said what you see is what you get. And don't expect me to give you a preachy answer. If you come to me privately, I'll give you the word of God and I'll give you what you need to hear. But I'm not going to just, you know, brush you off with something that's going to make you feel good when you leave the room. So, man. So you have to, you have to be real with people.
- [11:01]
Matt
Amen.
- [11:03]
Raven
So, so let's get into this story because we've already alluded to it a bunch and, and it's a fascinating one. So this topic of the crimson worm, how did you, how did you put us in the mindset of, you know, where you were when you stumbled upon this? I think that's very interesting. Like, what was that like?
- [11:20]
Pastor Rick
In my study.
- [11:22]
Raven
Yeah.
- [11:23]
Pastor Rick
And rightfully called the study because I was in there just reading and studying and then I, I forget who alluded to Psalms 22 and the worm. And as soon as they said that, I said, well, wait a minute, that's a prophecy about Jesus. And I as. And I asked myself, I said, would Jesus consider himself a worm? And then I go to Psalms 22, verse 6, and he says, I am a worm, not a man. That blew me almost out of my seat. And immediately I started digging into that as soon as I looked up crimson worm. Because the, the original Hebrew is that it's a tola, which is a type of worm. Well, tola means crimson worm. And so I looked up crimson worm on the Internet. And as soon as you do that, it shows a worm, but it also shows the cross. I was like, whoa, what's going on here? You know, and so I started digging deeper and deeper into that. And then you start reading the, the life of the crimson worm. Everything about it is so identifiable with the cross and what Jesus went through.
- [12:47]
Raven
We actually have some images here on the screen. You want to make that, that picture big top.
- [12:51]
Pastor Rick
The, the.
- [12:54]
Raven
That one. Yeah, that's actually, if I'm not mistaken, the one that you showed.
- [12:57]
Pastor Rick
Yes.
- [12:58]
Raven
That day at, at church. Hard to see a worm in all that mess. Looks like a gigantic blood stain. So already we're off to some interesting imagery.
- [13:09]
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- [14:39]
Pastor Rick
Yeah. Well, the, the image that you just saw is when the tola, or the crimson worm actually gives up its life. And when it does, the, the fluid in the worm gushes out. And I'll have to get a little bit ahead on my next sermon, but not only does it stain the tree, which is like symbolic of the cross, it covers its babies. It's young. So the, the, from the tola worm, once it gives up its life and it knows when it goes up on that tree, it's going to die. It knows that. And so when it dies, this, the cross or the tree is stained, but the kids are covered in the blood.
- [15:32]
Matt
Amen.
- [15:33]
Pastor Rick
Which is so saving the children. Exactly. And so they become blood red for the rest of their lives. And those who are females that do the same thing will go through the same process and be willing, which you can carry that further too, because that's what we should do once we have accepted Christ.
- [15:54]
Guest Host
Amen.
- [15:55]
Raven
It's remarkable too, because you're saying it, it climbs this tree knowing that this is going. I mean, that's, that's its purpose.
- [16:02]
Pastor Rick
Right?
- [16:02]
Raven
Right. That is its purpose. That's its destiny. Ultimately. And it's fulfilling it. Yeah.
- [16:08]
Pastor Rick
And. And. And I found this so interesting when I read this. I. The. The whole time I was sitting there, I was just. Just blown away with what God was speaking. But the young, before the mother even dies, before the worm even dies, start feeding on the body of the mother.
- [16:28]
Matt
Jeez.
- [16:29]
Pastor Rick
And Jesus said, unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no part with me. And so here is this. These babies that are partaking of the body of their mother so that they can live. And. And it's so interesting to me that when Jesus did that teaching, when he said, unless you eat my baby, you know, eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no part of me. Well, the Bible says that many turned away and never followed him again.
- [17:05]
Matt
Yeah, we laugh about that passage in regards to church growth. Like in the modern 501C3 system is like, church growth. Church growth, Church growth. It's like, well, then Jesus is the biggest failure if it's about church growth, because he. I'm guessing at thousands at that time. He says, you got to eat my flesh and drink my blood. And then he's down to 12, right. I think he even asked them, you guys gonna go, too?
- [17:25]
Pastor Rick
Where would we go? Have the words of life.
- [17:28]
Matt
I love that.
- [17:29]
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- [17:29]
Pastor Rick
And that's true. And all these church growth specialists that come to me and want to come to our church and want to. And I'm all. And I asked them the same question. Why do we think numbers are the thing that God is looking for? I thought he was looking for disciples.
- [17:50]
Matt
Amen.
- [17:52]
Pastor Rick
Not for. Just to get a number so you can be in a magazine or be on TV or be whatever. We're to make disciples. And when you look at it, 11 out of those 12 turned the world upside down right after they became the disciples Christ wanted them to be. So. So it's not so much. And. And that's why I've tried to invest in people like Pastor Mark and my other pastors who are there a whole lot, because they can do twice as much as I've ever done, you know, by. By, you know, discipling them and watching them grow and mature. And so, yeah, you're right.
- [18:28]
Matt
Get a couple real ones that are serious about it, because I think they even say that about Paul and Silas. They say, these are these men that have turned the world upside down and now they've come here.
- [18:37]
Pastor Rick
Yep.
- [18:38]
Matt
Yeah, you get a couple real ones. It's way different than just a giant building of people who may or may not really be Dedicated to it.
- [18:45]
Pastor Rick
Well, one of the, and I don't want to regress too far back, but when I was a youth pastor one time I, I had a youth group that I took from six. By the time I left there three years later, it was like 120. And about 30 of those went into full time ministry because I pumped it into their heads. The Jesus said, pray the Lord of the harvest that he'll send forth laborers. And so I, I kept telling them, God didn't just save you to sit on the pew, he saved you to be a world changer. And so go out there and do something and make something out of your life. And so every now and then I'll hear from some of them and they'll tell me what they're doing. And I just rejoice that, you know, that's powerful, man. That to me that's, that's what we should be doing. We concentrate way too much on things that matter very little to the kingdom of God, you know. And so it's, it's about the show. Most of the time it's about how we appear, what we look like. But, but if we make disciples, Jesus will take care of the rest.
- [19:51]
Matt
Amen. Yeah. No, that's the staggering thing for me, man, is like the thrust of Jesus teaching revolves around don't be a hypocrite, like, don't be a stage player, don't be an actor. That's really the thrust of, of his teaching. And then we somehow we do kind of find ourselves in a place where, like you're saying, it becomes more about like what things look like as opposed to what's actually happening.
- [20:15]
Pastor Rick
Oh, we, and I am one. So I can say this. Sometimes pastors get caught up in the presentation. We get caught up in the information.
- [20:27]
Matt
Sure.
- [20:28]
Pastor Rick
And where God teaches us. And I'm learning this more now that I've stepped back than I did while I was there. Is that if I will spend time with him when I get up there to, to share, I'll, I'll be ready. But, but if I don't spend time with him, and I'm always polishing that sermon, you know, trying to make it look good, trying to make it sound good, that this will make them cry, this will make them laugh, this will make them engage, this, it's not about that. It's as I seek God with all of my heart. Then his anointing comes, his power comes, and he'll speak to someone like you who just showed up for a service because you're needing some Answers. And I may say something that had nothing to do with my sermon.
- [21:22]
Matt
Amen.
- [21:23]
Pastor Rick
And I'm like, where'd that come from? God knew someone was sitting there. And there have been so many times that I have said, I don't know why I'm gonna share this, but I'm gonna share something that God did in my life one time. And there will be people sitting there who needed to hear that. Yeah, well, that only comes from prayer and seeking God and being filled with Holy Spirit, you know, to be filled and. And to walk in there ready. And I. I don't think you're ready until you've been filled with Holy Spirit and spent time in prayer.
- [21:56]
Matt
Amen. I'm very intrigued by this. Preparing. I do show, like, once a week, and there's a lot of preparation to do it.
- [22:08]
Raven
And.
- [22:09]
Matt
And so that morning time that I'm typically just spending with God for an hour or whatever it is, that it can just be like, hey, God, what. Whatever you want to talk about.
- [22:18]
Pastor Rick
Right?
- [22:18]
Matt
And then it changes to, hey, God, I love you. This is what I'm working on, though. Like, this is what I'm preparing right now. And, you know, by the grace of God, I got kicked off the show, like I was telling you for a little while, and so I got a little bit of a break. I got a little bit of a break. And it was wild how I was like, wow, yeah, we did that for your own good. I know. I was like, this is so nice to be kind of back to like, hey, God, we can talk about whatever you want.
- [22:43]
SpinQuest Announcer
Right?
- [22:44]
Matt
But I'm trying to live in the balance of that, because I don't think God's like, oh, that's so cute. You just hang out, and me and you just hang out every morning, and you just, like, you're saying to just sit in the pews, and it's like, you know, this is the next thing. And I'm just trying to live in the balance of that now. But.
- [22:57]
Guest Host
Well, if I could. If I could interject for a second, too, because I think, you know, Matt has some valid criticisms of the church, but I think doing this, what we're doing now, I'm like, do you realize what. What's happening? Like, if we're talking about a show, if we're talking about the production. Look around you.
- [23:15]
Raven
Yeah.
- [23:16]
Guest Host
If you're talking about the preparation that the pastors do, and then, like, you know, maybe they. They can't focus on this is like, in. In a way, like, I feel like you're. You're going through this now you're seeing this. But like I, I still struggle and I, I don't think I'll ever understand exactly what is necessary to bring this forward without like, this takes a lot of work.
- [23:36]
Raven
Yeah. Doing this helps to understand the slippery slope that it is because.
- [23:40]
Guest Host
Well, how do you balance it?
- [23:41]
Bluff
Right.
- [23:41]
Raven
Well, you also have this, this sense of like I bringing the word of God to people. That that's, that's what I've chosen to do in my service. And so to say there should be a standard of the way that it's presented and that mean. Yeah, yeah, I can understand that jump. It should be of the highest standard. Right. We're talking about bringing people to Jesus Christ. We're talking about salvation. This is the most important subject, full stop. And therefore dedicating resources to having it look good and sound good and all these other things. They're important. But then I guess the question is where does that line get drawn? And we're just men, so we're fallible and we tend to slip on these slopes. You could easily just go in a direction where all of a sudden you're going through the repetition of it and you get caught in the groove almost and you turn around one day.
- [24:39]
Guest Host
Haven't we done that just on our stupid show?
- [24:41]
Raven
Well, I think saves us from that is on our, on our stupid show. Well, it is kind of is that I am never preparing like anything and, and I, I don't want to say I humble myself but I'm constantly presenting myself in a way to the audience that is to say like I'm an idiot and I'm here for the ride and, and we're, we're going through this together and maybe that's part of it but like I'm never preparing anything and, and I, I just. And also something that Pastor Rick that you taught me and you don't know this, but you have such a, a big emphasis on holy spirit that I began. Hey everybody.
- [25:23]
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- [25:53]
Raven
You know, probably around the time that we opened up in here Every time I come to do a show, I always ask for Holy Spirit. And it's like, it's not what I want to talk about. It's whatever needs to be said through me so that someone will be drawn closer to God by the words that we say here. So please, Father, send Holy Spirit and, like, over and over. Like, that's every day. Every day. And my, My, my walk is new, and I've never been to a church before, your church. And so I don't have a framework for maybe a church that doesn't really push the idea of inviting Holy Spirit in. I even. Maybe it's a little bit silly, but I. I say the show is God's show, and to send Holy Spirit to be, you know, in the studio with us on the show.
- [26:43]
Guest Host
On the show with us.
- [26:44]
Bluff
Yeah.
- [26:45]
Raven
I don't know if those words are silly, but I think that that's been my saving grace for a lot of it is like, it's not on me.
- [26:52]
Guest Host
It's.
- [26:53]
Raven
It's on, you know, it's God I'll. I want to serve. And whatever happens through me is great, but I don't really have a lot of plans. But I do always ask for Holy Spirit to come.
- [27:02]
Pastor Rick
Yep. The. Just to add a little balance. The Scriptures say, Paul says, and when he's talking to Timothy, he says, study to show yourself approved. You know, you don't want to be ashamed. And so study, you know, do that. But then as you minister, make sure your dependence is on Holy Spirit, not on knowledge. You know, knowledge puffs up, you know, But. But if you have Holy Spirit with you, he will guide what you're saying. And he will say to a person in the building, like I said earlier, something that you hadn't even really thought about. And I've had. Literally had people come to me and say, you said this. And I was like, I didn't say that. But I believe because of Holy Spirit's presence, he lets them hear what they need to hear for that moment. And they try to give me credit for it. And I'm like, no, no, you know, I, I said, that was just God speaking to you in that service. And so preparation is good. I would never go to the platform going, like, we're just going to trust God today and, you know, flip a coin. Yeah, okay, Timothy, today, let's do that. But I, I would never do that. I always go in with a plan, but my plan is always subject to the presence of Holy Spirit. And if he says, go this direction, then I just put down what I have prepared and say, okay, Lord, lead me. And can I give you an example of that?
- [28:40]
Matt
Yeah.
- [28:42]
Pastor Rick
Years ago, we had one of those services where that the presence of Holy Spirit was so strong.
- [28:50]
Matt
And.
- [28:50]
Pastor Rick
And maybe later I can tell y' all why I started doing that about inviting Holy Spirit. But let me tell this story first. And so, I mean, the presence of God was so strong, I felt Holy Spirit whisper to me and say, give an altar call. People are here at need to be saved. So I gave an altar call. Five people came forward weeping, gave their hearts to Christ. We had people praying with them, getting ready to move on with the service. And he said, there's more. I was like, oh, okay. So I gave another altar call, and I said, okay, I believe there's some other folks here. God spoke to me. Well, like, three more people came forward for salvation. And so I said, okay, you know, we've taken care of that. And then God says, there's one more. And the word for that person is desperation. They came here desperate today. Today is life or death for them. So I repeated what God said to me when I said that this lady screamed out in the service and started weeping just uncontrollably. She was with her husband. I mean, he was freaking out. It was their first time in our service, and he. She was freaking out. He was wondering what was going on. About 20 ladies came and got her, and they. They brought her to the altar, prayed with her. She had planned her suicide that afternoon. She would have killed herself. She said, I woke up this morning, and something inside of me told me to go to that church on Pixieola Road and. And get. Take one more chance. Give me one more chance with your life. So she came to our church, and I wonder how many times we miss.
- [30:45]
Matt
Yeah.
- [30:46]
Pastor Rick
What Holy Spirit's trying to do. Because we have our plan. We have our program. We've got to do it this way. And if it's not done by 11:20, then we're out of sync. We need to figure this out and. But back up and give room to Holy Spirit just to come and to do whatever he wants to do and. And be sensitive to that.
- [31:10]
Matt
How much of a hindrance do you think it is of people that operate in the intellect, like just in the intellect or just in their knowledge, as opposed to surrendering and being guided by the Holy Spirit?
- [31:23]
Pastor Rick
I. I think it's one of the reasons people are turned off from the church. I. I think there's a reason that people, you know, kind of take a step back and they Go like. Well, that feels kind of canned. That feels kind of, you know. But saying that I still think the church is the best thing afloat, and it's it to, even though it's got its problems. I played team sports. Every coach I had, every team I played with. We had our problems, we had our arguments. We wanted the fight. I traveled on a tennis team. You know, we had our struggles. We had our fights. I worked at the paper mill, and we've had our struggles. We had our fights. And so I'm not going to abandon the church just because we've got struggles. You know, the. We've got things we need to figure out. But one thing I have learned, that if the church will come together, work together, love each other the way they're supposed to, they can touch the world. When I went to our church, they supported nine missionaries. Now we support 240, because I kept presenting that vision to all these people for all these years. And every year we add to that number. The gospel is being preached all over the world, not because I've done anything exceptional, but because the churches come together and we put our resources together and our hearts together. And it's made the church more real to me of what we can do together compared to what we can do separate. And so let me go back to the story of why I invite Holy Spirit. We were having a Christmas Eve service. Great service. Everything went well. You know, God was glorified. We felt like. We felt good about everything. This guy comes up to me, I'd never seen him to this day. I think he was an angel. Yeah, I don't know if you believe in that, but.
- [33:27]
Matt
So we just read it in Hebrews in the earlier show.
- [33:29]
Pastor Rick
There you go.
- [33:30]
Matt
Entertain angels unaware.
- [33:32]
Pastor Rick
There you go. And so he comes up to me and, you know, I. I hadn't been the pastor very long, and he said, great service, really enjoyed it. The singing was great. He said, what you shared was good. And he said, but can I offer you some advice? And I'm like, of course. I. I think a lot of us would be a lot better off if we. We would listen to the people God puts in our lives. And so I said, yeah, sure. He says, he says, you would be blessed and this church would be blessed if every time you did something, anything, invite Holy Spirit.
- [34:13]
Matt
That was right when you started, you're
- [34:15]
Pastor Rick
saying, not long after I became the lead pastor.
- [34:18]
Matt
Wow.
- [34:18]
Pastor Rick
And that was probably. That's probably been, I would guess, 28, 29 years ago. So I'd been the pastor for about seven years and this guy shows up. I turn around to talk to somebody because they tapped me on the shoulder. I turned back, he was not even there. I was like, this is kind of freaky. But from that time to this, everything we do, we invite Holy Spirit.
- [34:44]
Matt
Yeah.
- [34:44]
Raven
How about your, your personal life? I mean, like, I, I, it's not just the church.
- [34:49]
Guest Host
Right.
- [34:49]
Raven
You're going places if you have something going on. Because I, I try to get in the habit of that. It's like, you know, for, I think, leaning on God, you know, even on, on small struggles or, or I think
- [35:03]
Pastor Rick
he
- [35:05]
Raven
wants to participate and, and wants to be a part of. It doesn't have to be the, the show. Right. It doesn't have to be the church.
- [35:13]
SpinQuest Announcer
Right.
- [35:14]
Raven
What about just your life?
- [35:16]
Pastor Rick
The Holy Spirit is probably the most important thing person. He's not a thing. He's not a just a spirit. He's a person. He's the third person is like my best friend. When I go to the gym to work out, I invite him because there's people there that need God.
- [35:42]
Guest Host
Yeah.
- [35:43]
Pastor Rick
When I, I, I kind of make fun about this, but I, I have a restaurant ministry. When I go to restaurants, I'm going to witness to that waitress or waiter. I'm going to share Christ with them. We've got a family in our church right now that for five years I invited this waitress to our church and thank goodness it was a Mexican restaurant because I love Mexican food. And so, so she, she finally went home and she's Mexican. Her husband is gringo. And so, so he, you know, she went home and she said, if we don't go to this church, this preacher is going to drive me crazy. So can we go to his church? When they came, they both got saved and they've been in our church for the last five years.
- [36:37]
Matt
Wow. Amen.
- [36:38]
Pastor Rick
And so.
- [36:39]
Matt
Amen.
- [36:40]
Pastor Rick
We take Holy Spirit with us everywhere we go and we invite him to be a part of that because it's so important.
- [36:47]
Matt
So I think that's the intriguing thing. The more you read the Bible is like, wow. In the life of Jesus specifically is like, if this Bible was written today, it would be the story of Jesus at Walmart. Like.
- [36:56]
Pastor Rick
Right. The restaurant, of course.
- [36:57]
Matt
Gas station, at the kids, sports games. At what, you know, at the job, like at, at all of these things of life. It's, it's so tied into our everyday life.
- [37:08]
Pastor Rick
Absolutely. And one of the reasons the church does not grow.
- [37:14]
Raven
Hey, everybody.
- [37:15]
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- [37:38]
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- [37:44]
Pastor Rick
Is they meet him at the door of the church, Holy Spirit, and they tell him goodbye when they leave. And they don't have any relationship with him until they get back. Holy Spirit was never meant to be just someone to make you feel good about being in church. He was to be there to lead your whole life. Jesus said it is necessary for me to go away because if I don't go, Holy Spirit won't come.
- [38:18]
Matt
Yeah.
- [38:18]
Pastor Rick
And so when I leave, I'm gonna send him to you. And when you read John 14, 15 and 16, he tells you he's gonna teach you, he's gonna guide you, he's gonna lead you, he's gonna glorify Jesus in your life. He's gonna. And it just goes on and on and on of everything that he's going to do. And so we need him not just for church, we need him in our, we need him in our family.
- [38:45]
Matt
We bring that up a lot. Even the John 14 passage where he says will teach you all things and bring all things to your memory. And it's like, yeah, if you're going to read a Bible, you're almost wasting your time if you're not saying, God, explain this to me. If the Holy Spirit's the author, I understand it. Then, then certainly I don't really care so much what a commentary says. Like if you wrote a book, it wouldn't mean very much. If I went to the Raven and said, hey, what do you, what's this passage mean? It'd be a lot better for me to just come to you and ask. And I think that's what that passage is telling us is like. The Holy Spirit will teach you absolutely.
- [39:20]
Pastor Rick
And he will let you know when people are not preaching the truth. You'll be grieved in your spirit when you hear them because you'll know it's not real. And so, so you can tell. And, and a lot of people just get comfortable coming to hear a message. They, they have a little concert with the music and everything and they feel good about that. They like the contemporary music, some people like the hymns, whatever. And so that, that I Want to happen. Service on Sunday makes them feel good about themselves. But I need Holy Spirit teaching me all the time. I need to learn about Jesus being called a worm. Can I tell you something else about the worm?
- [40:04]
Matt
Yeah, absolutely.
- [40:06]
Pastor Rick
Once the worm dies, when it's still on the tree, he's burst open, but his shell is still there. Guess what color that shell turns? Solid white.
- [40:21]
Matt
Thought you were going to say that.
- [40:22]
Pastor Rick
And then Isaiah 1:18 says, Though your sins be as scarlet. Scarlet worm. Same word. Yeah, Tola, same word. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.
- [40:41]
Matt
Amen.
- [40:42]
Pastor Rick
So did I get the verse?
- [40:43]
Matt
I told Top there was an Isaiah.
- [40:45]
Raven
Okay, I'll tell you, you nailed it.
- [40:47]
Pastor Rick
You were ahead of me.
- [40:48]
Raven
We moved past it before, you know, we said this, then we moved on to some. To some, you know, some of your stories. And, And I was still hanging on there about the. The first, you know, chunk of the crimson worm that we're talking about. It's just such an unbelievable parallel. We find this all the time. You know, the show that Top and I do is. Is very heavily into conspiracy through a Christian lens. And there are all these elements about the nature of reality that echo Christ and lots of other people of. Of, you know, different proclivity, would you say? New age practitioners, occultists, they will look at these elements and you can point to so many of them, and they will say, there it is. Jesus Christ is purely allegorical. It's a metaphor for this natural phenomenon that takes place.
- [41:39]
Guest Host
It's.
- [41:39]
Raven
The Bible is a metaphor. It's an allegory for the stars, for the Maserat, the.
- [41:43]
Pastor Rick
The.
- [41:44]
Raven
The story of Jesus Christ in some people's eyes might be an allegory for the crimson worm, for the Tola. And what I find is that God's creation echoes and all of it seems to point to. Towards Jesus in this unbelievable way. It's much like in, like an orchestra works together to. To make a song creation. All points to Jesus Christ. And there's some that do it a lot more. I don't know what the word would be on the nose that. I mean, that's an unbelievable one. And then, sure, I, I want. I. I want to go around and just present that to people like, hey, what do you think of this? Because it's incredible. It really is incredible. I was just caught up there before when we were talking about it like that is. If I didn't believe what I believe, I would say that is bizarre.
- [42:35]
Matt
Yeah, but there's so much like you're saying that it's supposed to bring us back to God, right? But we see it like in the food forest community, we grow our own food. We have a food forest. And in that world, most of the people are like, oh, man, Mother Nature is so incredible, you know, and nature becomes God. We're like, no, no, no, no. There's a God of nature. Like, like all of this should be pointing us back to the Creator, not the creation itself, but the one who created it. It should be pointing us back to that. But you're right, that happens in all these different aspects of life.
- [43:04]
Pastor Rick
For people say Mother Nature is good, but Father God is better.
- [43:09]
ZipRecruiter Announcer
Amen.
- [43:10]
Pastor Rick
Because he's always pointing to his son. Yeah, he's. He is always pointing. And that's one thing that makes unity. If you read John 17, you know, Jesus is like, one of his last prayers is that we'll be one. The Father is always, this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. But Jesus is like, oh, it's my Father, My Father loves. And Holy Spirit's like, I'm no, I'm here to magnify Jesus. What would happen if the church did that? If we began to, to lift each other up instead of ourselves and to be others centered. And the beauty of the Trinity is that God invites us into that Trinity to be a part. That's what John 17 is all about. You got Father, Son and Holy Spirit and there's this, this unity. That's so great. But he says, matt, come on in.
- [44:09]
Matt
Yeah, yeah, it's staggering, that whole.
- [44:10]
Pastor Rick
Johnson, guys, come on in. You know, you're welcome to be a part of this and, and that again, that's why I would never. You know, I've been part of churches that, that have hurt me. I've been part of churches and stuff, but I still think the church is the best thing floating.
- [44:27]
Matt
It's staggering because he's saying, he prays that the church would be one as he and the Father are one.
- [44:33]
SpinQuest Announcer
Right?
- [44:33]
Matt
And then he says even more staggering things than that. He says, you love them as you love me, Right? That God loves us as much as he loves Jesus. The whole, the whole thing's staggering.
- [44:43]
Pastor Rick
Oh, sure.
- [44:44]
Matt
But it's based on that unity. And there is a, a wild thing in the Godhead that, like, for humans, we think that servanthood means lower than, it means less than. But like, Jesus was setting up his life as a servant to the Father. He was no less than the Father. And the Holy Spirit sets himself up as a servant to Jesus, saying he'll only he'll only say things of me. He's not going to say things of his own. So you have. The Holy Spirit's a servant to Jesus. Jesus is a servant to the Father, but nobody's lower than anybody else in the Godhead.
- [45:11]
Raven
You're giving Pastor Rick a softball there. When I first arrived at the church, I showed up in the middle of, I believe it was a seven part sermon.
- [45:19]
Guest Host
You showed up late?
- [45:20]
Raven
No, I didn't show up late, but I did show up. I mean, I didn't know that you were starting and I would have started attending a few weeks earlier. It was a several part sermon on humility. Humility. And it was, it was fantastic. And you know, you're talking very much about exactly what Matt is highlighting right there.
- [45:38]
Matt
Can we just go back to the Mother Nature is good, but God the Father's better. Was that the quote? Can we get that on a shirt or a bumper?
- [45:46]
Raven
That's a banger. Yeah, yeah, I like that was solid. That's for all the pagans out there.
- [45:51]
Matt
I love that.
- [45:52]
Raven
You know, there's something that I did want to talk about in regards to the church because you have something that it's centered around. It's centered around Jesus Christ, it's centered around the word of God. This is incredibly powerful thing. And the more you spend time in it, the more it reveals itself to you. You're talking about this relationship that you're having with the Word for how many years now? It's four or five decades and you're still exposing or being exposed to different revelations. How, how? And you guys are going to know better than I because I've only been on this walk for. It's been like four years or five years. How does something that is centered around something so powerful and so important, you know, being your salvation and being welcomed into this trinity like you're talking about, turn into, for some people, a, you know, an appearance once a week. You talked about, like, for some people it feels good. Maybe they like the music, things of that nature. It seems to be almost a cultural phenomenon that I wonder if it's unique to the west because I hear testimony from other countries where it seems radical. Radical. These people are, especially in third world countries. You had missionaries from. Oh, well, they spent some time in Africa.
- [47:08]
Guest Host
Sorry to interrupt, but maybe, maybe you can tell us that story that you told on Pentecost, on the Pentecost service about the mission that you did in. And I guess it was a Spanish country, because I think that's what he said.
- [47:19]
Pastor Rick
When God Called me. Is that what you're talking?
- [47:23]
Guest Host
I think so, yeah.
- [47:24]
Pastor Rick
Yeah. The. We were on a missions trip to Mexico and for the food. And so, so we, you know, we, we're doing our typical trip. We would go into a village having no knowledge of what was going on there. We would pass out literature all day long and then have a service that night. We took our own generators, we took our own food, we took everything. It was pretty much roughing it, you know, as, as far as Americans are concerned. And, and so, you know, before that service that night, I was preaching that service that night. And so I was on the back side of a mountain behind the church. Church was way up on the side of a mountain. And so I went behind it and I was praying. And it was one of those biblical Holy Spirit moments where the wind began to blow. The presence of God was so strong. And I was begging God that I'm one of those guys that I wanted to be a missionary. I was begging God to let me stay there in that village. I said, I, I won't even go home. I'll just stay here and I'll pastor this church. They didn't have a pastor for the church. And so I said, I'll, I'll stay here. And. And then the presence of God just got stronger and stronger. And then he spoke to me, he said, you're going to go back to the United States. You're going to eventually become a lead pastor, and your job will be to make that a great missions church. And, and I mean, I began to weep and cry. And of course, you know, he's Lord, so whatever he says, you're like, yes, you know, even though my heart was to be a missionary, he let me know that what would happen in the church I would become the pastor of. And this is the only church I've ever pastored. I've never went built up through the ranks and made it to where we ended up being. But, but the first thing I did when I came to this church after they called me to be the lead pastor, I was a youth pastor and was plan a missions, you know, conference. Because I said, if this is going to be a great missions church, it's going to have to start now. And I can't, I, I can't deceive these people and make them think that I'm just here to fill a position and get a salary. I'm here to build God's kingdom. And so we started with those nine missionaries, and we have just added to that every year. We have A missions convention every year where we add more and more. And, and this year is going to be. And for our size church, you know, y' all may not think this is very much, but this year we'll prob $600,000 to missions. And that's a lot. And that, you know, that's not a very big church to be able to do that. Well, that's because people have caught the vision of missions and, and to be a part. Is that the story you were talking about?
- [50:40]
Guest Host
No, you. You had mentioned a story in the village. I think you bought like a pair of speakers there and, and things went kind of crazy in, in this village when you were given the word of God there.
- [50:51]
Pastor Rick
Are you. I'm. I'm trying to give me a little bit more information.
- [50:57]
Matt
Well, well, even before we get into that, can we. So, so that you feel like that was the call of God at that time when you went around the back side of the church and was that when you were a youth pastor or is that even before you were a youth pastor?
- [51:08]
Pastor Rick
I. I was called by God to preach. Before that. I. I was like you. I was not raised in church, never went to church.
- [51:16]
Raven
Hey, everybody.
- [51:17]
ZipRecruiter Host
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- [51:41]
SpinQuest Announcer
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- [51:47]
Pastor Rick
Matter of fact, the. The year I gave my heart to Christ, my doctor had told me, you keep doing the drugs you're doing, you're gonna die within the next two months. I said, I guess I'll die because I can't quit. I was addicted to drugs. I was drinking like crazy. I was just doing everything in the world.
- [52:06]
Matt
Where did you live at at that time?
- [52:08]
Pastor Rick
Louisiana.
- [52:09]
Matt
You're in Louisiana.
- [52:10]
Pastor Rick
North Louisiana.
- [52:11]
Matt
Wait. Born and raised in Louisiana.
- [52:12]
Pastor Rick
Born and raised in north Louisiana, A community called Bastrop and just close to Monroe.
- [52:19]
Matt
Okay, so like straight Cajuns or. No, that's.
- [52:21]
Pastor Rick
No, no Cajuns there. Mostly just country people. Yeah. Big paper mill town. Two paper mills there. You could smell when, when you came into town.
- [52:31]
Raven
And what is that?
- [52:32]
SpinQuest Announcer
Ink.
- [52:33]
Raven
Ink or. You're talking about the actual smell of, of the paper.
- [52:36]
Pastor Rick
The, the chemicals. They Use for the processing of the wood.
- [52:40]
Raven
You would smell it when you came into town.
- [52:41]
Pastor Rick
Oh, yeah.
- [52:42]
Matt
So you were smoking weed and drinking and doing.
- [52:45]
Pastor Rick
Didn't smoke weed, but I was doing, you know, a variety of drugs and stuff like that. And the. My doctor told me, and I showed him what I was taking, and he said, two or three of these would put an elephant.
- [52:59]
Matt
So we talking about pharmaceuticals or. Okay, got it.
- [53:02]
Pastor Rick
And so he said, how many are you taking? I said, 18 a day. And he said, you're. And he showed me a vowel. He. He held it up to me, and he said, you know what this is? I said, that's nasty. He said, that's your blood. We just drew your blood.
- [53:19]
SpinQuest Announcer
Whoa.
- [53:19]
Pastor Rick
He said, your blood looks like nasty water.
- [53:23]
Matt
You were going hard in the paint.
- [53:24]
Pastor Rick
And so. And. And then two months later, God put a Christian bounty hunter in my life that would not leave me alone for two years. A Christian bounty hunter. He would not. He would chase me down wherever I was.
- [53:41]
Matt
It's a kingdom, man. That's very logical word. I like that.
- [53:45]
Pastor Rick
So he would chase me everywhere. And finally, after about two years of him driving me nuts, he said, go to a revival with me. I didn't even know what a revival was. He said, go with me. And I said, okay, I'll go with you.
- [53:59]
Matt
What year?
- [54:01]
Pastor Rick
That was 1974. Who.
- [54:03]
Bluff
Who.
- [54:03]
Matt
So who was doing revivals in 74 in Louisiana?
- [54:06]
Pastor Rick
Let's see. Oh, it's so long ago.
- [54:10]
Matt
Is that William Branham, or is it like.
- [54:13]
Pastor Rick
No, I. I can't even remember the guys. Oh, I can't believe I couldn't think of this. The guy that became the pastor of that church was doing the revival, Mike Cheshire. And so probably not very well known, but I went to the service. I was very frustrated sitting there. I was very antsy. I didn't feel comfortable. I was not in an.
- [54:40]
Matt
Was it in a tent or was it in a.
- [54:42]
Pastor Rick
No, it was in a building. It was in a big church, and it was a symbol of God church. And so. So I'm hanging on to the pew in front of me, just waiting just to get out of there. I. And I even said to God, I said, God, once I get out of here, I'll never come back, and you won't have to worry about me again. And about that time, the evangelist, who used to be an ex football player, huge guy, he sat down beside me and grabbed me, pulled me up close. He said, hey, Rick, how you doing? I went, how do you know my name? He said, everybody knows your name. He said, this church has been praying for you for over two years is what the pastor told me.
- [55:25]
Matt
No way.
- [55:26]
Pastor Rick
And. And I said, well, that's. I said, I can tell I've been miserable.
- [55:30]
Raven
And for perspective, how many people in that town, you think, if you had
- [55:34]
Pastor Rick
to guess it, about the size of Leesburg?
- [55:38]
Raven
Okay.
- [55:38]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, about the size of Leesburg. And he says, you want to live for God, don't you? I said, I do, but I can't. And then he. He said the words that changed my life. He said, stop trying. I went. I said, great, now the preacher's telling me to give up. I said, my life is already. He said, no, wait a minute. Let me share with you. So he opened the Word of God and he shared the Scripture, Galatians 2:20. For I have been crucified with Christ.
- [56:09]
Matt
Yeah.
- [56:09]
Pastor Rick
Nevertheless, I live, yet not I. But it's Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live, I live. You know, and then it goes on and tells that. And what I got out of that was I didn't have to live a life I couldn't live.
- [56:26]
Matt
Amen.
- [56:26]
Pastor Rick
I needed Jesus in me to live his life through me.
- [56:29]
Matt
Amen. That sounds simple, but it's profound.
- [56:32]
Pastor Rick
And so I gave my heart to Christ that night, and. And, you know, and started serving God. Went straight to the paper mill where I worked, told all those guys, you know, and they pat me on the head and said, you'll be all right. You'll get over it. And. And that's been since 1974. So I never got over it.
- [56:49]
Matt
So that's profound, man. I mean, I think there's a lot of people today that are trying to. I mean, even if you look at, like, Thomas the Campus, It's a great book, the Imitation of Christ. But that's not what we're doing. We're not imitating Christ. We're just surrendering to him and letting him live through us.
- [57:03]
Raven
That's a hard concept, though, because culturally speaking, like, from the outside looking in, you know, you. And this is a lot of the judgment that I'm experiencing now, because I, you know, I wasn't always a Christian, is. Well, you're supposed to behave like this, or you're supposed to do that. This is what a Christian looks like. And. And these standards are in your mind, because give me an example of something else that has a standard. And if you are that thing, you're not supposed to try to.
- [57:34]
Matt
Sure.
- [57:35]
Raven
That's.
- [57:35]
Guest Host
That's.
- [57:36]
Raven
It's a difficult concept, actually, to grasp, even though it's simple and it is profound. It's a little confusing, and I, I think I'm getting better at it as time goes on. But it's, it is, you know, you're like, you're letting go and, and a lot of it is, maybe I don't know if I'm doing it right, but it's, you know, talking to God and, and trying to, to let go and, and allow this thing to happen. Instead of trying to do this thing, it's. Allow this thing to happen.
- [58:07]
Matt
Yeah.
- [58:07]
Raven
And, and I don't know, it's hard to put into words for me, but it is.
- [58:11]
Matt
Oh, you're explaining saved by grace through faith, like that's what you're explaining. It's just surrender of your life.
- [58:17]
Raven
But I can see how from the outside looking in, like people that will criticize Christians or, you know, whatever ideas they have, that is not the lens. Allowing Christ to live through you, dying to yourself so that Christ can live through you is man. It's, it's, it's a hard concept to grasp.
- [58:39]
Matt
Well, I, and I think because for a lot of people, Christianity is just another division of society. It's just, you know.
- [58:45]
Raven
Yeah.
- [58:45]
Matt
Maybe, you know, you're this type of person, this type of. Oh, there's that type of people. They're called Christians. Yeah.
- [58:50]
SpinQuest Announcer
Yeah.
- [58:50]
Raven
Well, this is going back to the question that I had originally, which is like, how do you, how do you have something that is so profound? And for some people, it is just. It's like walking the dog or doing the dishes. It's just a thing that they do. Yeah. It's a monotonous, repetitive thing where, especially if you were raised in it, I think for a lot of people, if you're raised in it, it can become habit.
- [59:14]
Matt
Sure.
- [59:14]
Raven
Instead of relationship. And, and once again, the most important thing in your life, the most important thing in your life has for some, been reduced. And I don't think that's necessarily like the fault of the church or, or the, Everybody's walk is their own. But you do see it. You see, I was in a, a church once where it was. I stepped into one before I stepped into yours and I, I left. And the reason that I left is because it was. I had felt like I had walked into the Walmart of Jesus Christ and there was several floors with balconies that overlooked and they, There was, you know, an entire. What would you call that? You go and get like lunch. It's. There's an entire restaurant, a breakfast spot. You go and you buy breakfast. And I didn't think that was too bad, honestly. I said this is kind of fantastic to get a little coffee and a sandwich. And then I'm looking at this thing and it is. So the word that came to me was manufactured.
- [60:18]
Matt
Sure.
- [60:18]
Raven
And I felt like this doesn't feel, I don't know what it's supposed to feel like, but it doesn't feel like that. And I think there are certain people that gravitate towards that. And I'm not saying there's not real people there that have real relationships with God. And I'm not saying that that church isn't helping people in their walk. But there is this person who has just gone through the motions and it is now just a repetitive thing. You might catch your favorite show on Saturday every week and you might go to this one on Sunday every week. And it almost carries the same weight. And I don't know how that is happening around something so profound.
- [60:59]
Matt
Yep, well put, man.
- [61:02]
Pastor Rick
The one of the things that to me is so dangerous about the way the gospel is presented now is that that we're becoming more and more secular. If we can appeal to them by being a super Walmart, we have everything for you, your children, your family, we, you know, one stop shopping, you can get everything here. But the message of Jesus is deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me.
- [61:34]
Matt
Amen.
- [61:35]
Pastor Rick
If I wonder how I'm supposed to live, if I follow Jesus and watch him, I'll know how to live. And so in this whole concept in America of denying yourself, man, we live in a society. I've got to have more, I've got to have better. I've got to have a new car every year. I've got to have a bigger house. I've got to get this boat. I have to get. And for us, we have been preaching and teaching our people. Deny yourself and give to missions. Don't you, you don't have to have everything now. Lay up treasures in heaven and instead of trying to lay them up here, you know, and so it's, it's a hard sell because no one wants to deny themselves.
- [62:15]
Matt
Sure.
- [62:16]
Pastor Rick
And so it's tough for sure.
- [62:18]
Raven
Have you experienced anything resembling a, I don't know, like a, like a revival or a resurgence or, or an uptick, a dramatic uptick in not just, you know, appearances in the church, but an interest in this.
- [62:34]
Bluff
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- [62:59]
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- [63:06]
Raven
Our show is kind of got our finger on the cultural pulse and and I would say that after the Charlie Kirk situation there was a nationwide. If it wasn't a full pivot towards Christ people at least started looking over their shoulders with interest and I wonder if that resulted in anything meaningful. Did these people come? Did they stay?
- [63:30]
Pastor Rick
They. One of the heartbreaking things to me about that whole situation was there was that strong emphasis on Christ. All the politicians, you know, were talking about Jesus. Some who admittedly said, you know, that I normally don't talk about Christ and you know, in my public life but now I'm going to be bold, I'm going to be. And it, it kind of has drifted away because of, you know, the cares of this world. We, we are so self centered that it is hard for us to stick with something. Even Charlie Kirk dying now I believe a lot of people's lives were changed and I believe a lot of people came to Christ because of that. But I don't know what the long term effect of that will.
- [64:21]
Matt
Yeah, I wasn't in the church game in 2001 but I remember hearing that after 911 a lot of. Oh sure, back to church too. That was a thing back then that.
- [64:31]
Pastor Rick
Oh yeah, we, we had one of the largest services we've ever had. The whole time I've been there right after 911 we had like 800 people in that building.
- [64:41]
Raven
Wow.
- [64:41]
Pastor Rick
That we have. Which, that was that same building. That same building.
- [64:45]
Matt
And then it just kind of fizzles out. Is that like kind of the same
- [64:48]
Pastor Rick
as people are touched but they're not changed.
- [64:55]
Raven
The comforts of life.
- [64:58]
Pastor Rick
We, we, we, we're touched by you know, people dying. We're touched by buildings falling down. We're, we're touched by that. But until we're changed, you know, until we receive Christ and live, let him live his life through us. There's not going to be a permanent change.
- [65:18]
Matt
Yeah, the change is so, is a profound thing. My wife and I were talking one time about how why is the Bible different every time you read through it? Like if you read through. She started a few years ago to read straight through also Genesis to Revelation and then pick back up in Genesis and go to Revelation. And we were talking about it, and she came to the conclusion that, like, because you're a different person now, every. Every time you. You've been changed. Like, every time you read through the Bible, you. It's changing you. Sure, I know you're talking about the born again experience, that until you're born again and changed in that sense. But even, like, as you read through the Bible, like the second time you read through it, you're not the same person you were the first time, and then the third time, you're not the same person you were the second time.
- [65:57]
Pastor Rick
Right.
- [65:58]
Guest Host
There's also something interesting about, like, the prophets, like Daniel, Elijah, these guys that have this very strong, what seems like unbreakable connection to God because what David just described, it's something that I. I've done to. I've done as well. It's like you get like, hot and cold and like, you don't want. Like, I don't want to. It makes me not want to. I don't want to burn too hot because I know that I'm gonna then get cold on this and forget. And then now I have to be. Now I'm a hypocrite within myself. You know what I mean?
- [66:28]
Matt
I remember people in church telling me that when I first started to go to the 501C3 system. They tell me now, brother Matt, slow down.
- [66:35]
Raven
Don't get too past.
- [66:35]
Matt
We've seen a lot of people come and go. They're on fire for God, and then it fizzles out. And I also remember hearing this from the pulpit. People would say, think back to when you first got saved. Think back to when you in very early in your relationship with God. Think back to how good it was in those days. And I remember being like, dude, I wouldn't go back to that for a million dollars. Dude, I would never go back to that time.
- [66:58]
ZipRecruiter Announcer
Right?
- [66:58]
Matt
Like, I'm so grateful for where I'm at today and what I was like. What do you mean? Like, that was your best time with God was in the beginning. Like, I don't know anything about that. I don't. I don't know that experience. All I know is that it's. It gets better the closer you get to them and the more time goes on. But that does seem like a thing that happens is that, like, people get hot and they fizzle out or. I don't. I don't know.
- [67:19]
Pastor Rick
We're event oriented. We are as excited as the last event we had, and we always look back to that event to measure Any upcoming event to see if we're going to be any better. And you know, my whole thing and, and every pastor has a struggle, you know, we're not like some kind of super spiritual. I mean, you've seen enough going on in the news for the last 30 years to, to know that pastors are real. But every person that has a relationship with Jesus and back to Holy Spirit. Every time you open this book, you should say, holy Spirit, come here. I'm about to read. Please reveal to me what you're saying to me in this book. I need your revelation. Because if I don't have his revelation, it's just going to be information. But if I have the revelation of Holy Spirit, if I invite him every time I read this book, it's going to be life changing for me and I'm going to find new stuff that excites me, you know, more. Even Pastor Mark, the, the new pastor at our church, he's like, man, he said, you know, when you preached about the crimson worm, he said, you got more information? I said, I said, well, matter of fact, I do. And he said, well, you want to preach again? I went, sure. And so, so he sees, you know, that we don't have to fizzle out.
- [68:50]
Raven
Yeah.
- [68:50]
Matt
Amen.
- [68:51]
Pastor Rick
We all go through life. Life hurts. Yeah, you lose somebody you love rough down here, man. Yeah, it's love rough on this side of heaven and it's tough.
- [69:03]
ZipRecruiter Host
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- [69:28]
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- [69:34]
Pastor Rick
With Jesus, it's definitely better than it could be without him for sure. So.
- [69:39]
Matt
Amen.
- [69:40]
Raven
So earlier you were talking about, you know, we, we talked about the Walmart of churches and how there's something for everybody. And one of the things that dawns on me as to the danger of this trying to appeal to everyone is that it results in some of the things that we're seeing today. Wasn't long ago that I saw trans pastor, something like that, and I saw another pastor, it was a, a female talking about how Jesus Christ isn't the only way to salvation, but she's standing in front of what purports to be a Protestant church. And you know, so, so that in other words, in order to please everyone, there is no standard. And, and we've, we're living in this era now where maybe the most egregious thing was one of the, the, the mega church pastors with the jets and things like that. And that was egregious enough. You know, that was the talk of the town when it was happening. Look at the wealth that they're hoarding. But, but now we have something totally different. We have something totally different where everything is flying in the face of what scripture says. We're even now changing this idea. Not we in this room, but there are those who claim to be, you know, shepherding people towards Christ. Or maybe not. Maybe. I don't know. If you're standing up there and you're saying, he's not the way, then I don't know what you're doing. But this has, it's of kind, it's gotten to clownish places. And I don't know, maybe you could speak a little bit to this idea of what we should be doing instead of trying to appeal to everyone and being all inclusive. I mean, we've seen what that spirit that goes under the guise of inclusivity, the fruits that it bears.
- [71:30]
Pastor Rick
I think there's should be a lot of caution to the church that when you start trying to make everyone feel accepted even in their sin. You know, we welcome everyone at our church, but the call is to repentance. You know, the homosexuals welcome to come to our church, but they're called to repentance. If you come to Christ, you can't stay in your sin. You've got to repent and ask God to help you. If I would have stayed in my sin when I came to the church, I would have died because I was lost. I was empty. I needed that call to repentance. And, and when they confronted me with my sin and they said, you, you know, you need to get right with God. And, and fortunately, the church was patient. And this is how bad it was for me. When I first started coming to the church, every lady who had a child, if I walked close by, the. The ladies would grab their kids and pull them away and say, stay away from nobody.
- [72:39]
Matt
No, we have customers like that when Top and Raven Walks.
- [72:42]
Pastor Rick
I'm very familiar with that.
- [72:43]
SpinQuest Announcer
We love children.
- [72:44]
Raven
The children love us. They come, they hang out in the studio.
- [72:46]
Pastor Rick
And this was old school back then. And I, I would wear like a sleeveless shirt to Church, no socks, tennis shoes, shorts, you know, and I was just glad to be in the kingdom.
- [72:58]
Matt
Yeah.
- [72:58]
Pastor Rick
I had no sense, you know, of any type of rules or anything like that. I was so, you know, I was so happy to be free. And every now and then, the pastor hinting for me to dress better would say, we're going to take an offering for Rick to get some socks this week.
- [73:16]
Matt
Maybe, Maybe quite a heavy hit.
- [73:20]
Pastor Rick
I'm like, really?
- [73:21]
Matt
You know, so the evangelist that kind of. You rubbed elbows with you. It ended up. I don't know if we finished that part of the story, but it ended
- [73:29]
Pastor Rick
up that that night I received Christ. I invited Christ into my heart, into my life. And life changing. I went home and told my dad, of course my dad was not a Christian. My dad and mom were not raised in church. And I went home and told my daddy, knocked me flat of my back with his fist and spit on me and said, don't ever talk about that in this house again. And through the tears, I told him, I'm gonna love you into the kingdom of God.
- [74:00]
Matt
Respect. Yeah.
- [74:01]
Pastor Rick
And he just, every time he'd see me, he'd kick me, slap me, spit on me. My dad was an ex boxer, so he was strong, you know, Golden Gloves and all that stuff.
- [74:11]
Matt
And so young adult at that time. You're a young man.
- [74:14]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, I was 19.
- [74:16]
Matt
Yeah. Wow.
- [74:17]
Pastor Rick
And so. And that was a pretty big boy.
- [74:19]
Matt
That's profound, though. A lot of people in this nation don't know anything about suffering, loss for Christ.
- [74:25]
Pastor Rick
And so. So I kept sharing with them and then God called me into the ministry and I went off and there's so many stories, but I went off to Bible school. When I was leaving Bastrop, Louisiana to go to Bible school, my dad was punching me through the car window and yelling at me, cussing me because I quit the paper mill to go into ministry, to go get trained.
- [74:50]
Matt
How many years later was it? So, and from when you were 19 till you left for Bible school?
- [74:55]
Pastor Rick
One year.
- [74:56]
Matt
So within a year, you were like,
- [74:58]
Pastor Rick
in a year, I'm out of here. Yeah. So. And of course, that's a story too. You know, they. They had to help me a lot at Bible school. My first semester, I got in four fights. They told me if I got in one more fight, I was going to be kicked out.
- [75:11]
Guest Host
Did you win? Did you win?
- [75:13]
Bluff
Yeah,
- [75:16]
Raven
dad was in Golden Gloves. You better win.
- [75:17]
Pastor Rick
But. But what makes that story so beautiful about my father? Before that happened, I hated him so bad when I was lost, I hated him I used to dream of hurting him, killing him. I used to dream of, you know, ways of getting rid of him. One time he beat my mother. And I told him, I said, you got to sleep sometime. I will cut your throat. And that. That's how deep the hate wants. I could go off to Bible school. Been at Bible school for, like, four months. I run into a guy from my Hometown, which was 320 miles away. He said, hey, I ran into your dad at Safeway grocery store, and. And your dad told me to tell you he's praying for you.
- [76:03]
Bluff
Oh, wow.
- [76:03]
Pastor Rick
And this guy started to walk away, and I just grabbed him. I said, what'd he say? He said, your dad said that he's praying for you. He said, let me go. And I. I said. I said, what. What did my dad look like? He said, well, he's about your height, and he's built like a gorilla. I said, that's him. And so I ran to the phone, and I called my dad and I said, tell me what happened. And he said, why don't you come home this weekend? I'll tell you what happened. So I went home. He. He had invited the whole family over, and. And he stood up. My dad never did anything like this. And he started telling the story of how that he and mom got up on a Sunday morning, and he told her to put a dress on. And she's like, why? He said, we're going to church. They went to the nearest Baptist church that they could find because they knew they'd give an altar call. So they went there, and when the preacher gave an altar call, they gave their hearts to Christ. And he came over to the place where I was sitting, and he grabbed me and picked me up, and he embraced me, and he said, it was your love that led me to Christ. And so it was just unbelievable. So I can't wait to see my mom and dad in heaven.
- [77:20]
Raven
So how long was that after you. You got to Bible school?
- [77:23]
Pastor Rick
About almost six months. Wow. And so. And his words were the only light I had in my life. Was gone when you left.
- [77:35]
Matt
Wow.
- [77:36]
Pastor Rick
And he said I needed someone in my life. And he said it made me realize how much I needed God. And so. And. And he was faithful to God till the day he died. I mean, he. He got every kind of award you could get for not missing a day in church or missing Sunday school or anything. He was all in. And. And right after, you know, he got saved. I went home, and he snuck in my bedroom, and. Which terrified me, because I had flashed Like a gorilla. I had flashbacks of when he used to come in there and.
- [78:18]
Matt
Yeah.
- [78:18]
Pastor Rick
You know, and be. Yeah, yeah. You know what I'm saying? And so I see him get my wallet and I'm like, oh no, he's a thief now. And what he was doing was opening my wallet. My dad never gave me anything.
- [78:33]
Matt
Yeah.
- [78:33]
Pastor Rick
And putting money in my wallet to help me at Bible school. Wow. And. And I knew that he was changed
- [78:42]
Raven
and so talk about dominoes or, or ripples, right? I mean, from that one guy pestering
- [78:48]
Matt
you,
- [78:50]
Pastor Rick
that guy, huh?
- [78:51]
Guest Host
What happened to him?
- [78:52]
Pastor Rick
You know the guy that was the Christian bounty hunter.
- [78:55]
Guest Host
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [78:56]
Pastor Rick
Still in my life. Still in my life. Good friends currently.
- [79:00]
Matt
Yep.
- [79:00]
Pastor Rick
They, they're. They live in Monroe, Louisiana.
- [79:04]
Matt
So he was about same age then,
- [79:06]
Pastor Rick
maybe a little bit older. He's like three years older than I am. And. But they're still, he and his wife and I are still good friends, you know, and love them. She had a stroke a few months ago. I check on her every week and. But he, he, I mean he took such abuse from me. What, what my father did to me, I was doing to him. Except I was not hitting him, I was verbally abusing him. And I would mock him. We worked at Safeway grocery store together. And so I mean I abused that boy every, every way you could be abused. But. And he would tell me the same thing I told my father. I'm going to love you into the kingdom.
- [79:50]
Matt
That's where you got it from.
- [79:52]
Bluff
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- [80:16]
SpinQuest Announcer
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- [80:22]
Raven
That those little things right. Earlier in this conversation you were talking about, you know, saying things that you don't even know why you say. And it just means something to somebody. Somebody out there hears that and it sets them off in the right direction. This guy over had every reason to stop trying to push you to do this. And, and this seed that he plants your whole family, much more.
- [80:52]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, not his whole family, his whole town.
- [80:54]
Matt
I mean this whole church.
- [80:55]
Pastor Rick
200, 240 missionaries all over the world.
- [80:58]
Raven
That's an insane, that's an insane you never know, man.
- [81:01]
Pastor Rick
You start looking at the. How many people are going to be in heaven because one person comes to Christ.
- [81:08]
Matt
Amen.
- [81:09]
Pastor Rick
And, and the, that's why we have to, you know, Jesus said the fields are white unto harvest, but, you know, the workers are few. Pray to the Lord of the harvest that he'll send forth workers. And that's, that's our job, is to not only be senders, you know, we want to send people, but everywhere we go, you know, Paul says, I make the most of every opportunity, whether it's in the gym, whether it's in the restaurant, whether it's in Walmart, God forbid, because I don't go to Walmart. That's my wife's job. So I, I do not go to WALMART.
- [81:49]
Matt
Not after 9pm Anyway.
- [81:51]
Pastor Rick
Exactly. And so, but it's so important how. And we've all probably seen the movie, Jimmy Stewart, you know, It's a Wonderful Life, how one life touches so many other people. Have you ever seen that?
- [82:05]
Matt
No, it's a little before my time.
- [82:07]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, definitely before your time, I'm sure. But that they show it every Christmas, if you get a chance.
- [82:15]
Matt
I'll have to watch it.
- [82:16]
Pastor Rick
Yeah. It's a Wonderful Life. And the whole premise of the show is to show how his life. He was going to commit suicide and God sent an angel to save him. And the angel let him have his wish of seeing what life would be like. He said, I wish I'd never been born. And he let him see what his, what life would have been like without him being there.
- [82:42]
Matt
So it was way worse. It was bad because.
- [82:45]
Pastor Rick
Because he was not there. So many lives were affected negatively. And so, and, and I believe that's true with all of us, that we touch more people than we realize.
- [82:56]
Matt
Yeah.
- [82:56]
Pastor Rick
I believe that what you guys are doing here is touching a lot more people than you realize it's touching people. Yeah.
- [83:03]
Bluff
Right.
- [83:06]
Matt
Yeah. That, that is like one of the worst things though, right? To, to look back at your life and say, what would it look like if I never existed?
- [83:13]
Pastor Rick
Right.
- [83:13]
Matt
There's no difference. I remember thinking that. I remember thinking that when I was young, I was like, yeah, what if I just look back on time and like, there was no difference whether I was ever born or not? Like.
- [83:23]
Pastor Rick
Right.
- [83:23]
Matt
That would be the worst feeling.
- [83:25]
Pastor Rick
Yeah. And that's why it's imperative that we figure out what it means to deny ourselves. I'm not here for me. I'm here for every life that I can touch.
- [83:38]
Matt
Amen.
- [83:40]
Pastor Rick
Every person that there, there's People I. I can call names right now of people that I'm working on trying to get them into the kingdom of God.
- [83:49]
Matt
You ain't retired, man. You say you're retired.
- [83:52]
Pastor Rick
No, I'm still working full time because I'm the senior associate. But everywhere I go, I have what I call a project. Somebody that I'm working on trying to get them into the kingdom of God. And so it's important that. What would the church look like if everyone did that?
- [84:12]
Matt
Amen.
- [84:13]
Pastor Rick
If every family just won one family a year, the churches would explode with growth. But instead, we. We don't reach out. We don't try to help people, we don't try to love people. And because of that, the church gets smaller and smaller. But if. If we could ever catch the vision of, you know, one leading one to Christ and then do that again and do that, and, and they do it. And, and as we do that, you know, lives can be changed for sure.
- [84:46]
Matt
Yeah. That. Every time I think of something like that, it reminds me of the story when Paul's on the ship to Rome and they get in the terrible storm. They start throwing all the food overboard and everything. And then he gets up in the morning, he says, relax, everybody. An angel of God visited me last night of whose I am, of whom I belong to. And the angel tells him, like, you're not going to lose anybody on the ship. And I always. I even, like the first time I read that, I always remember thinking, like, I wonder who's on my ship, right? You know, I wonder who. Like, if I don't do my part, who else is getting absolutely toasted by that? They're just not, like, I don't know. I want to be aware of who's on my ship and who all am I affecting and who's not going to make it if I don't. Not that I have to come up with my own story or my own life, but if I don't surrender to God and live out whatever destiny he's made me for, how many other people are not going to make it because of that?
- [85:41]
Pastor Rick
And, and we. We all bear that responsibility that I've got to care about the souls of the people around me. I looked in the eyes of a couple the other day and. And I told them, I said, stop defending your child's lostness and start being concerned about their soul being lost for eternity if you don't do something. Yeah, I said, you just keep pampering them, babying them in their sin. You keep supporting them in their sin. When you should be crying out every day, night and day for their soul to get right with God, for them to come back to Jesus or to serve him. And I said, I said, you can measure a person, you can measure how much you love a person about whether you care if they go to heaven or not.
- [86:35]
Matt
Amen.
- [86:36]
Pastor Rick
And so, so it's so important. And the story I told the other day about my son Joshua, that, that was hard to get through, to share, you know, to share about that.
- [86:47]
Raven
That was like a continuation of the, the crimson. And you know, you talked about John the Baptist becoming less or decreasing so that Christ could increase. And that was a really heavy idea. You know, I'm a father and, and everybody here is, is a father. And, and it's this idea that at some point you are going to have to decrease so that your son can increase. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because that was, that was a great.
- [87:22]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, my son also.
- [87:23]
Guest Host
Pastor Rick, if you're, we want to respect your time too. We've been going for a while, so.
- [87:28]
Matt
No, he's got time. You're right now, right?
- [87:30]
Pastor Rick
There you go. It's a preacher.
- [87:31]
Matt
Are you kidding me? Okay.
- [87:33]
Guest Host
I just want to make sure we're ready to rock.
- [87:35]
Pastor Rick
Well, I, I'll share this story and then we'll call it a day.
- [87:38]
Matt
Perfect.
- [87:39]
Pastor Rick
All right. The, My son growing up because I played tournament tennis, I taught him tournament tennis.
- [87:46]
Raven
Any good?
- [87:47]
Pastor Rick
Was I good? I was all right. I still prefer to play for I, I, I got an offer to play pro and, and a guy was going to sponsor me and I had a choice to make about ministry or being approach player. You suffered loss and I, I didn't lose anything.
- [88:07]
Matt
Amen.
- [88:08]
Pastor Rick
When I accepted cry, when I accepted the call and the police I put out before God was that if a pastor calls me and tells me he needs a youth pastor by this Friday, I gotta let the guy know on Friday whether I'm going to play pro tennis. He was going to pay me, you know, very well and, and pay for all my travel for everything. And, and I, and I told him, I said, well, if I hear from any pastor, I don't care what they pay. I shouldn't have added that part. That, that was the bad part. And, and so, so I ended up that Thursday night before the Friday pastor called and said, I need a youth pastor in South Louisiana. So I called the guy and said, I can't play Pro10. He said, you gotta be kidding me. And I said, nope, not kidding. And so three weeks later, I left to Go be a youth pastor where they couldn't pay me anything. I worked part time as a bricklayer and in south Louisiana and that heat, you know, but, but I would do
- [89:12]
Raven
it all over again like a church tennis competition.
- [89:17]
Pastor Rick
We.
- [89:17]
Raven
Did you show anybody?
- [89:20]
Matt
Oh, yeah, he did.
- [89:21]
Raven
Who they're dealing with?
- [89:22]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, we, we had another guy in the church that kept telling everybody he could beat me. So somebody got the idea of having a, you know, a tournament and inviting the people to come out and we used it for a fundraiser, you know, permissions, of course. And, and I beat him, of course.
- [89:43]
Raven
Of course.
- [89:45]
Pastor Rick
But anyway, back to the story. But Josh was a great. Joshua, our son, was a great tennis player. Live for God. Seemed like, you know, all of his young years and everything, about 17, a shift happened in his heart, in his life, and he started drifting, started going the other direction. Very rebellious.
- [90:08]
Matt
That was in Louisiana or that's here.
- [90:10]
Pastor Rick
Here in Florida. Yeah. All of my kids were raised in this church. And so, you know, and so he, to make a very long story short, he was doing the drugs. He was, you know, he was drinking like crazy. We, we would get calls from New York State. Your son is in a rehab up here. He fell and he's got 18 staples in his head because he was so drunk he couldn't walk. Phil hit his head. He went to South America with a girl he didn't even know. Swimming in rivers with anacondas and, and just all kinds of stupid stuff. We, and we kept, you know, praying that God would save him and, and so finally he came home and. Because he just ran out of money, run out of hope or help or anything, and, and he came home, he was angry at God, he was angry at me, he was angry at the world, but he was especially angry at me.
- [91:08]
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- [91:38]
Pastor Rick
And so a couple of weeks after he got home, we were sitting at dinner, everybody else got up and left and, and he was, I mean, he, he was angry. And I told him, I said, son, and this is where the John the Baptist thing comes in. God laid on my heart that if I would be willing to decrease, my son might be able to increase. And so if I was willing to die to myself, then my son could live. And so. So I told him, I said, you can say anything you want to to me, and I will not get angry. I'll not be mean to you in any way. You can say whatever you want. He said, you're lying. You. You. You were. You knocked me in the head. I know you will.
- [92:23]
Matt
And I'm like, what was he mad at you about?
- [92:27]
Pastor Rick
Being raised in a Christian home. He felt like, you know, that he was restrained from doing all the stuff he wanted to do. And. And we, you know, we were just trying our best to raise him the way God wanted us to raise him. And so, man, that's a rough.
- [92:40]
Raven
That's.
- [92:41]
Matt
That's been a rough balance for us.
- [92:42]
Pastor Rick
Oh, sure, sure. And. And I understand that, you know, I. I understand that in kids that's been raised in church, there was a battle there for our kids, and, man, it's a. It's a tough battle, but you got
- [92:54]
Matt
to be careful, because if. If they live, like, restricted like that. So restricted, then when they're finally allowed out of it, they just go haywire. So there is a balance of allowing some stuff. I. I would say that's ultimately what we came to the conclusion of, is allow for some stuff, be open and honest. But, like, man, that you. It does end up for a lot of kids, especially pastors, kids just kind of carry that burden. Right. And a grudge and.
- [93:20]
Pastor Rick
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And. And if people in churches said stupid things to them, they don't forget that.
- [93:27]
Matt
Yeah.
- [93:28]
Pastor Rick
If. If someone prophesies over them what they're going to do or what they're going to be. And that's not true. It scars our kids. And so people need to be careful. I was very protective of our kids. You know, I would tell from the pulpit, don't say anything to my kids.
- [93:42]
Matt
Yeah.
- [93:43]
Pastor Rick
About what they're supposed to do with their lives. And if you do say it and it's not God, I'm coming to you. Yeah. And I'm gonna.
- [93:50]
Matt
Because you believe in the power of words.
- [93:51]
Pastor Rick
And so, you know, the. When appropriate. Yeah, yeah. When appropriate. But anyway, for three hours, he told me, you know, everything he thought I'd ever done wrong. Wow. Every.
- [94:05]
Matt
Every.
- [94:05]
Pastor Rick
And. And. And Holy Spirit said, you know, this is a setup, and this is how you're to answer him. And so one after another after another, things that he said, I would say, I am so sorry. Please forgive me. And he'd go, you're not going to Argue with me. Nope. I am so sorry. Please forgive me. After three hours, the atmosphere changed. His heart got softer. He became more open. And not long after that, we had a guest missionary. Of course, it had to be a missionary that came to our church and gave an altar call. And Josh gave his heart back to the Lord.
- [94:47]
Matt
Wow.
- [94:49]
Pastor Rick
And so it. It's, you know, and he's doing great now. Beautiful wife, two beautiful grandsons.
- [94:55]
Raven
And it's a hard thing for a father to sit there for three hours and. And just respond with, I'm sorry, please forgive me. I mean, that's.
- [95:03]
Guest Host
Or even with everything you got wrong, like as.
- [95:05]
Pastor Rick
Yeah, well, even though in your heart, you know, 90 of it is just filtered through a mind that's all messed up. I knew it, right? But the, The. The benefit of doing it was worth that. It was worth me dying for to see him live.
- [95:25]
Matt
Amen.
- [95:26]
Pastor Rick
And the. Somebody asked me, did it hurt? I said, dying usually does.
- [95:31]
ZipRecruiter Announcer
Yeah.
- [95:32]
Bluff
Yeah.
- [95:32]
Matt
But seeing your kid walk with God, there's not really any you can't put a price on.
- [95:36]
Pastor Rick
Yeah.
- [95:36]
Matt
What is the thing I wouldn't give for that?
- [95:38]
SpinQuest Announcer
Right.
- [95:38]
Pastor Rick
And so. And so, you know, he's been living for God now all my kids are living for God. And so he was our prodigal. He's the one that kept us praying all the time.
- [95:49]
Matt
Like the prodigal. Some sounded very similar, but you said something wild right there. You said it was a missionary, and you said, of course it was a missionary. What do you mean by that?
- [95:57]
Pastor Rick
Well, the. The passion of my life has really been three things, and we covered all three of them is missions, Holy Spirit, and one on one soul winning. And so it. To me, it felt so appropriate that a missionary was there speaking when my son gave his heart back to Christ. And so that it just felt right.
- [96:22]
Matt
Do you think it's easier for people, though, when it's a foreign person for whatever reason?
- [96:26]
Pastor Rick
He was not a foreign person. He was actually someone who was saved in our church, raised in our church, sent out from our church to Honduras and was back preaching, you know, and raising money to go back on the mission field. And he gave a great message and gave an altar call. And, you know, they always say, close your eyes and bow your head, but that. My Bible tells me to watch and pray. So I was doing like this, watching my. I was watching my son, you know, so. And when that hand went up, I was just like, yes. So it. It was a beautiful thing.
- [97:04]
Guest Host
We did. We did read the scripture of Jesus when he. They asked him how to pray and he lifted his head. He didn't haven't close his eyes. I'm just saying something to that.
- [97:12]
Pastor Rick
And, And I'm not against people falling down. If. If Holy Spirit or the presence of God is real strong. But most of the people who fell down in the scriptures fell on their face. They didn't fall backwards. Just a thought.
- [97:26]
Matt
No. It's interesting. There is some interesting parallels or like when they prayed and the whole place was shaken, not just. Not just the person shaking, but the whole place was there.
- [97:34]
Guest Host
You're going, was that the story? Did something shake? Man, I'm gonna have to re. Listen to that.
- [97:39]
Matt
Yeah.
- [97:40]
Pastor Rick
I'm trying to figure out what you're talking about.
- [97:41]
Matt
That.
- [97:42]
Pastor Rick
That night that I preached, some weird. It was. There were two people in the service that Holy Spirit spoke to me about, and he said, call it out and give the altar call. And it was two people in an inappropriate relationship. I didn't know. There's people from Adam's house cat, you know, I had no idea. And I was like, God, that's, you know, you're asking me to do something that's kind of tough. And he says, okay, I'm good with that. Go ahead and do it. And so I said, okay. Well, then when I said it, the interpreter that I was preaching through with, I'm not saying that. I said, you can say it. I said, you're going to say it. And I said, you're gonna. And I yelled at him. I. I yelled at the interpreter or the translator. I said, say it. Well, when they call these two people out, they both. The person over here and the person over here jumped up. Up and ran to the altars.
- [98:45]
Raven
Wow.
- [98:46]
Pastor Rick
To get their hearts right with God. And revival broke out. I mean, we were there for the next three hours praying for people because God was moving. But people knew something was wrong, but they couldn't figure out what it was. And it was those two people living in sin that had stopped God. It affected everyone. And when we called it out, God, you know, did something. I don't think that's the story, but
- [99:12]
Raven
it's a good story, though.
- [99:13]
Guest Host
It's a great. It reminds me of. I think that's Joshua, where they brought the forbidden stuff into the camp, right?
- [99:17]
Pastor Rick
Oh, yeah, yeah. The sand of Aiken.
- [99:20]
Matt
Yeah.
- [99:21]
Pastor Rick
My aching body. They got through with it.
- [99:25]
Matt
His whole family, too.
- [99:26]
Pastor Rick
Family. And that's a boy that'll preach.
- [99:28]
Matt
Yeah. The cursed thing. Bring it into your home. And the whole. The whole family's cursed.
- [99:32]
Pastor Rick
Yeah.
- [99:33]
Guest Host
Pastor Rick, I. We really appreciate Your time, man. And we've had you for an hour and a half. I know.
- [99:39]
Raven
This is great.
- [99:39]
Guest Host
He went to the wrong standard shop, and he. Then he drove over there.
- [99:42]
Matt
Yeah.
- [99:43]
Pastor Rick
Yeah.
- [99:43]
Guest Host
But thank you for coming and talking with us. This is.
- [99:46]
Bluff
Yeah.
- [99:46]
Guest Host
Always great to hear you speak and what a great conversation. I'm glad that you came and spoke to Matt. He's. He's a little slow, so it's great.
- [99:57]
Pastor Rick
I like you, Matt. I don't care what they say.
- [100:00]
Raven
He's all right.
- [100:01]
Matt
You're all right.
- [100:02]
Pastor Rick
Thank y' all for the privilege. I appreciate it very much. And you'll be in my prayers for sure.
- [100:07]
Matt
I appreciate that a lot. And that story about your dad's powerful
- [100:10]
Pastor Rick
man, it makes me cry every time I talk about that. Yeah, because he. He was so lost. So lost. And so it's a little thing you do.
- [100:19]
Raven
You never know, right? You do a little thing for someone.
- [100:22]
Pastor Rick
You.
- [100:22]
Guest Host
You.
- [100:22]
Raven
You preach a little bit to somebody, and you could have 50 years worth of dominoes.
- [100:28]
Guest Host
Oh, hey, do you want to ask, like. It's not a question that Matt. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's the question that we asked.
- [100:32]
Raven
So, yes. We like to ask this at the end of our other show to all of our guests. I mean, man, you just laid out a really crazy life story in so many ways for us. Are you having fun?
- [100:46]
Pastor Rick
Am I having fun right now? I feel like my Christian life is the best it's ever been. That. That relationship with Holy Spirit just gets fresher every day. Matter of fact, at our staff meeting today, I challenged our other pastors to Tennessee. I said, come on, guys. I said, depend on Holy Spirit more and more and more and stop giving information and start doing transformation with people by the power of Holy Spirit. So it's good.
- [101:25]
Matt
Amen.
- [101:26]
Pastor Rick
It's good.
- [101:26]
ZipRecruiter Host
Amen.
- [101:27]
Pastor Rick
Life's always challenging. You know, Last year, went through cancer, 45 treatments with you did prostate cancer. Never missed a day working out. I said, I'm not gonna miss a day. They're not gonna.
- [101:40]
Matt
That's why you beat it.
- [101:42]
Pastor Rick
And so I did beat it, and it's doing well. Right after that, I got a. A bowel and. And, you know, obstruction. Lost 18 pounds in five days.
- [101:53]
Matt
Wow.
- [101:54]
Pastor Rick
And my daughter had called her son, said, dad's dying. He's done, you know, And. And God touched me through that. So within a day after I got out of the hospital with that, I was back in the gym, you know, so I'm driven personally, but I'm driven more by Holy Spirit.
- [102:18]
Matt
How old are you?
- [102:19]
Pastor Rick
How do you think I am? You better be nice.
- [102:21]
Matt
55.
- [102:24]
Pastor Rick
What are you thinking? When you get. Get some time, read Revelations 21:8. All liars have their part in the lake of fire that burns forever. 71.
- [102:39]
Matt
71. You look good, dude. And you're just steady in the gym, like, every day, too.
- [102:44]
Pastor Rick
Six days a week. One day.
- [102:45]
Raven
Six days a week.
- [102:46]
Matt
I have a day of rest.
- [102:47]
Pastor Rick
Well, the. That's my day to prepare sermons, study, pray, seek God, you know, And.
- [102:54]
Bluff
And.
- [102:54]
Pastor Rick
And Pastor Mark has me doing a lot of stuff. I'm doing a lot of teaching training at the church. And so I. I. Just because we have holy Spirit doesn't mean we don't do things with excellence. Yeah, I think we should.
- [103:08]
Matt
The opposite. Right, Right.
- [103:09]
Pastor Rick
The. The more of God you have in you, the more you should do everything with excellence and integrity.
- [103:15]
Matt
Amen. We thought that even with the coffee shop was like, if we're. If our claim is we have rocket fuel that we're running on that the rest of the universe doesn't have, it should be the coolest coffee shop.
- [103:26]
Pastor Rick
There you go.
- [103:27]
Matt
Something that we're just, you know, making excuses to have weak coffee. Everything we do should be great.
- [103:32]
SpinQuest Announcer
Yeah.
- [103:32]
Guest Host
I guess to answer Matt's question, too, is like, that's kind of why I started. I. I started wanting to play guitar in the church because it's something I haven't done a long time, but it's like, I have this skill, and it's like, what am I doing with this? Like, I'm. Yeah, put it toward that. We have this skill of what we do here. Put it toward all effort, a full court press. Put. Put it towards this. It just makes the most sense. And it, like, look at the rewards that it reaps. It's. It's almost. I don't know, it's like, almost selfish because, you know, it's like, yeah, duh. Like, the more I do this, the better my life gets. It's like, so then just do more of this.
- [104:08]
Matt
But what about for other people? Because is it true that they don't necessarily really like him on guitar?
- [104:14]
Raven
I have been told that. I don't know if you've heard that.
- [104:16]
Pastor Rick
Get tired of it.
- [104:21]
Matt
Wow.
- [104:25]
Pastor Rick
I'm a punster for sure.
- [104:27]
Raven
That was a fast one. 71. And you're still. That was pretty fast, man. That was good.
- [104:32]
Matt
All right, so we're wrapping it up. We gotta go.
- [104:34]
Raven
Let's bring it in for a landing.
- [104:36]
Guest Host
You done?
- [104:36]
Bluff
No.
- [104:37]
Guest Host
You're doing smooth, man. This is your show. Oh, yeah.
- [104:39]
Raven
You're the one that ends it.
- [104:40]
Bluff
How are you gonna end it?
- [104:41]
Matt
No, no, we're just gonna end. Did you have anything else you want to say?
- [104:44]
Raven
And would.
- [104:44]
Matt
Would you ever consider coming back on? Because I had a really good time hanging out out with you.
- [104:47]
Raven
You'll come back?
- [104:48]
Pastor Rick
Yeah.
- [104:48]
Raven
All right.
- [104:49]
Matt
We love that. And I'm. And I'm sure, like I said, like, the. The whole fan base loves you and knows you and knows stories of you and you're talking about really real people that would spot a faker from a long way away. And so we just really appreciate you a lot. And. And I, like, I feel like we just scratched the surface of like, your life and your stories, man. I was already moved very much by. I appreciate that your story of your salvation, your dad especially, hits hard. That's. That's very happy, man. Your son. I mean it. The whole thing was just great. I'm really grateful you came on today.
- [105:20]
Pastor Rick
Well, thank you very much. I appreciate the invitation. And it was better than I thought it was going to be. I was terrified for sure.
- [105:29]
Matt
I told you.
- [105:30]
Pastor Rick
I told you. I have never done cameras very well. During COVID I was just freaking out with the camera looking at me.
- [105:38]
Raven
Everything's on zoom.
- [105:39]
Pastor Rick
And so they finally pulled it way, way back and then zoomed in real far.
- [105:43]
Matt
So that's better.
- [105:45]
Pastor Rick
But. But thank you. Thank you very much.
- [105:47]
Raven
Thank you.
- [105:47]
Pastor Rick
And you guys will be in my prayer every day.
- [105:50]
Matt
Thank you.
- [105:50]
Guest Host
Appreciate that.
- [105:51]
Pastor Rick
For sure.
- [105:52]
Guest Host
Great episode of Straight Bible. Let's get out of here. Matt, tell the people goodbye.
- [105:56]
Matt
Wrap it up.
- [106:21]
Bluff
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