In this week’s sermon, we will be unveiling the wisdom of the Cross.
This episode: We look at fasting—why it will help you battle porn, doing it with a right heart, and how to incorporate it into your life.
In the latest sermon, our speakers unpack several biblical texts to unveil Yahweh as Redeemer.
This episode: In this podcast we'll give a biblical answer to the question: "What role does accountability play in overcoming sexual sin?"
Every single day we can make choices that either allow us to participate in the life of God or create a barrier in our hearts toward Him.
In the beginning, God created man to dwell in His presence, living entirely for His purpose. But Satan lured humanity away from this noble call by appealing to our desires and brought us into willing rebellion against God. From that point on, every human being was born with the instinct to choose their own way and reject God’s plan for their lives.
Many of us who’ve grown up around Christian teaching agree with that intellectually. But we must ask ourselves how deep does that understanding go? Do we really comprehend that the desires we experience and the choices we make every day are leading us somewhere? Is it real to us that if we aren’t careful, we could easily stray from God’s presence?
Three of our staff took time to study through Ephesians 4:17-24, and in this interview they sit down to talk about what they learned. They also share how the enemy used their desires to blind them and lead them away from God.
We hope this discussion will inspire all true believers to continue to fight against their former passions and to grow deeper in their fellowship with the Lord.
This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.
Our motivation and purpose for godly living in America has become enmeshed with the desire to preserve our American way of life.
When the founding fathers gathered to sign the declaration of independence, they fully believed that the Christian God was behind their endeavor. They were, after all, championing noble causes such as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Centuries later, multitudes of evangelical Americans have the same conviction - God is on our side. Today we're going to take a look at Christian nationalism, and full disclosure, we're going to stir the pot a little bit.
Jesus is our model. In the same way that He laid down His life wives are to lay down their lives for their husbands.
What a husband and a wife value in their relationship often differs significantly. The way women process emotions and situations can seem like a foreign language to many men. Kathy Gallagher joins Nate in the studio to discuss her thoughts on this and explain how a wife can learn to love and support her husband, even through their many differences.
Nate: In the past you’ve said that it's really important to praise your husband when he succeeds, even if it's a small thing. What makes that so important?
Kathy: I don't know that I actually ever did that literally with Steve. I was just very, very grateful. I really respected Steve for the effort he put into getting right with God. Also, gratitude and respect were just coming out of me, I wasn't saying it, it was just flowing from what was in my heart towards my husband. I'm not the type that would walk up, throw a hug on him and say, “Honey, I'm so proud of you.” That is totally not my style. He knew how I felt. I wasn’t just saying those things, I was showing him I was proud of him by my actions.
He absolutely knew I was supporting him and that I was totally on his team, but I never used those words. It was my life that spoke to him about where I was at, and that's what he needed. What's in us comes out of us and that's where we have to be very, very careful. Especially when we're getting very upset inside, when there's this rumbling going on inside and you want to just let it come out. It will come out, even if you don't open your mouth at all. It just shows up in your disposition. What's in the heart does come out of the mouth, but it also comes out of the life.
Nate: Yeah, it does. The looks, the tone of voice, even the lack of words can speak volumes to people. I would think that gives an opportunity for a husband to misread you. Sometimes when things are not said we are quick to fill in the blanks. We try to interpret what the other person means, and it can be real mess.
Kathy: That's a mess. That's a very big mess.
Nate: Yeah, that really feeds into something that I was thinking about, which is really interesting. I was listening to a sermon by Paul Washer a month or two ago and he said something that I thought was fascinating. He was talking about the difference between men and women and what husbands need versus what wives need in the relationship. Basically, he said, “I don't need my wife to send me little notes or a text telling me that she's thinking of me and loves me. I can go a long time without needing that. What I need is for my wife to believe in me. If she doesn't believe in me, I'll fall apart.” And that was really interesting, because it resonates with me as a man and I'd like to hear your perspective on that as a wife.
Kathy: It’s hilarious to me that somebody else is saying that, because I think I said something like that in my book. Your husband does not want to sit around and talk about your emotions and your feelings - he's not your girlfriend and he is not wired that way. He doesn't want to talk about feelings and all the gooey stuff. The whole idea of trying to get men to think like women doesn't work. A woman’s needs are very vastly different than a man's needs. She's the one who needs all of the things that would be classified as more emotional. I think because of the differences in the way men are wired and the way women are wired there is a lot of strife created in marriages. As a woman, I think I need him to tell me how awesome I am or how much he loves me and that I'm his forever, and he's looking at me like I have two heads. A man doesn't have a point of reference for that, because that is not what he needs and he is not wired that way. Men don't think like that and there are a lot of problems in marriages because of that dynamic.
I cracked up when I heard Paul Washer saying that because it is so true. A husband doesn't need a text message and he doesn't need you to put love notes in his lunchbox. He doesn't need that stuff. He doesn't operate and think the same way that you operate and think. As a wife, you have to learn that he is wired so completely differently than you are and to not be offended when he doesn't have the same needs and responses that you have. Also, don’t fall into the notion that he's this ominous ogre or brute or beast, because he's really not. He's operating the way that he was created to operate by the Lord. Now obviously mixed into that are sin issues, but I'm just talking about the way our minds work.
The other thing I would like to add is about the differences in the temperaments of a man and a woman. That helped us so much in the early days of our marriage, because me and Steve are opposites. We could not be more opposite if we tried to be. Learning the different temperaments that we had really helped me to understand that what I was misunderstanding about him is just the way he is. I have a much different temperament than my husband, and on top of that I am female. A male and a female with opposite temperaments can have so many issues if they don't understand the temperaments they have. But if you understand those things, things start to make more sense to you. So, I encourage wives to take some time to try and explore those two different situations, because they're very helpful in marriage.
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Nate: Yeah. The thing that I'm thinking about as you're talking is that it really is all a matter of the flow of the heart. If a wife is coming into this marriage relationship demanding that her husband meets her needs, most of the time she is going to find out, “Wow, he can't, because he's not like me.” But if she comes into the marriage thinking that what she wants to do is give and learn, then she will find more unity in her marriage. This requires real death to self, because usually as humans what we want to do is give to people what we value. So, a wife thinks, “I can love him by being super emotional and telling him about all my feelings, because that's what I want him to do for me.” In his mind, he didn't ask for her to do that and he doesn’t even know what to do with all of that. So a wife needs to learn what her husband values and the husband needs to learn what the wife values. But having the knowledge of what a spouse needs and values is only one step in the battle though. Actually taking the step to give of yourself that which isn’t as much a value to you takes real death to self.
Kathy: In a certain sense, yes, it takes a ton of death to self. But if in your heart you are more of a taker then this will feel like it is killing you. On the other hand, if you are more of a giver, you will really enjoy the process of learning how to please your husband. If your heart is, “I want him to be so happy. I want him to get what he needs,” you're going to win. But if you're a taker and you're always needing your needs met from a guy who's pretty clueless to your needs, you will be very, very disappointed. The problem with so many marriages, and this was true for me too, is that we come with a list of wants. I didn't come with a list of how I could bless him and how I could make his life richer and fuller. I came looking for how he could bless my life and make my life richer and fuller. That is a setup for disaster on both people's part, because men do the same thing.
A man falls in love with a woman, and he falls in love with his attraction to her in mind. That's not a very good recipe for an enduring relationship. But if you're walking with the Lord and you are putting Jesus at the very center of your marriage, you learn how to love because none of us know how to do it right. Does anybody that can hear my voice right now love perfectly as is mentioned in 1 Corinthians 13? Love believes all things, hopes all things and it never fails. I don't have that testimony. But just as any Christian seeking to be more like Jesus, I want that to be my testimony. I may have already said this in another podcast, but it's worth repeating. After a message at one of our conferences several years ago, this young girl came rushing up to me after the meeting and said, “I have to just share this with you, because it goes so well with what you just talked about. Someone told me at a camp I went to that marriage is a death march to a life camp.” And that is exactly what it is. It's a death march. Death to self. That’s because if you're going to love rightly, if you're going to be the right kind of wife and the right kind of Christian, it's a matter of losing your life in this world. But you're headed to a life camp and the eternal life of Jesus Christ becomes yours. His life is being formed in you through all of it and it's worth it and there is joy in the journey. But it is joy mingled with pain.
Nate: I'm not married, but I’ve experienced where I set myself up to try to meet the needs of someone else and I found my own needs being met somehow. It puts in you a spring of satisfaction and contentment, and this grasping goes away, because you're satisfied. So, if husbands and wives could learn to set themselves to meet the needs of others, it would remove the source of so much conflict.
Kathy: That's very, very true. It's a spiritual principle that is very much active and alive, and it's real. We women have the profound privilege of helping our husbands learn how to meet other’s needs, because women tend to be more naturally wired to be givers or nurturers. We nurture, we coddle and we naturally want to take care of others. So, by selflessly laying down your life and giving up your rights, you can show your husband how to do that. That is a beautiful thing, because men do not naturally have a nurturing side to them. I know this is going to sound bad, but men tend to be more takers and women tend to be more givers. So, I would just encourage women to go for it when it comes to laying down their lives. I know a lot of women, including all of my friends that are mothers, lay down their lives for their children. If you're going to be a good mom, you need to lay down your life, but you can easily cut off the spirit of giving with your husband if you've got issues with him.
I just want to encourage you not to stop with your kids. In fact, I would say that your husband should be the recipient of all that you have to offer. It's not wrong for you to give yourself to him, even if he's not exactly doing the same for you, because that is the heart of God. God didn't stop doing the mercy to us. He came to us while we were yet sinners, while we were His enemies. I'm not saying that we are able to do that perfectly in the way that God did it, but He is our model. He has shown us how to build relationships and that is the framework for it. We are commanded to follow Christ’s model for how to love. It is very hard, but I don't have a day of regret being a Christian or being a wife married to a man who was horribly addicted to sexual sin. I'm grateful for all of it because of what it did in my relationship with Jesus and how it brought me closer to Him.
Satan’s plan for every human being is to bring them into willing rebellion against God, through the pursuit of their own sinful desires.
Dictionary.com defines a “rebel” as “a person who refuses allegiance to, resists, or rises in arms against the government or ruler of his or her country, a person who resists any authority, control, or tradition. ”Most rebellions rise and fall without grand success, their leaders lost to history. Very few have gained the prominence and merit of Nimrod, the world’s first rebel leader. Nimrod’s ability to persuade people to follow him, and not the Lord, relied upon the promise that he could bring them a level of joy, happiness and satisfaction God never could.
Today, mankind is not being enticed by a single leader vaunting the potential of a better life. Instead, a message of worldliness is luring billions into its web through countless voices around the globe. The spirit behind that message advocates rebellion against the Lord and His authority by promising unprecedented, unrestricted pleasure. It is a cause devoted to the here and now, and one which can never provide humanity the satisfaction of life which it truly craves.
In episode 5 of Babylon: The Seat of Satan’s Power, Steve Gallagher explains, through Scripture, how this message can only lead a person one way,into utter ruin and desolation.
This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.
We need daily bread from the Word and daily guidance from the Lord in order to allow Him to shepherd us in the way we should go.
Here is the full discussion from Episode #502. In it, Nate, Patrick, and Jon discuss their church backgrounds prior to coming to the Pure Life Residential Program and how it shaped their way of thinking. They look at how their background led them to elevate talent and good works over devotion to God, and how various online preachers and music artists influenced their religion more than the truth of God’s Word.
False teachings have been able to flourish in the American church because it has become more of an enterprise system.
Church plays a significant role in the lives of many professing Christians today. It provides a sense of community and belonging. Church is a place where people rally around us when we're in trouble. It's the place where we develop our closest relationships. Sometimes it can be the scene of our deepest hurts. Our churches have a major impact on the kind of people that we become. But there is also something else that happens when we attend church, something that you may not have thought about. Our church is shaping our view of what it really means to be a Christian. And we're either getting a true representation of Christianity, or a false one. In today's episode we're going to look at one of Satan's key strategies in the war to unite mankind in rebellion against God - infiltrating the church with false teachers.
The American culture holds more sway in the average Christian’s life and heart than the word of God.
The word “antichrist” typically incites images from an end-times movie and of a world leader set completely against the Christian religion. But as we’ve been learning throughout this series, antichrist isn’t just a person but a spirit. That spirit wants to lead all humanity in rebellion against God.
Steve Gallagher joins us in our studio to shed light on some of the specific schemes the spirit of antichrist uses to draw believers away from God. Pastor Steve also gives us some key tools that can help us stay vigilant, alert and unscathed from the enemy’s tactics. This is critical for any professing Christian who finds themselves in bondage to some form of sexual sin, which is so closely tied to the spirit of this world.
This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.
A loving and patient wife is a source of great help and encouragement for a man learning to walk rightly before God.
Once a man comes to the Lord in genuine repentance over sexual sin, he will begin a long and difficult journey. This “walk of repentance” means continuing to face the hard realities of who he has been and seeing how deeply he has hurt others. If he is married, one of the greatest sources of support the Lord can give him is a compassionate and caring wife. In this interview, Kathy Gallagher shares how a wife can support her husband as he learns to walk in true victory over sexual sin.
Nate: So, Kathy, this interview is part of our “Refined as Silver” series, and in our last talk with you, you really laid out what some of the vital issues are for wives. You were calling them to see a much higher purpose in the struggles of marriage, specifically the aftermath of sexual sin. And really, the issue isn't even just about the marriage, but about becoming Christlike, and a lot of that becoming process happens in the fire of trials. We’re going to continue talking about some of those themes, and today we’ll be discussing what it means to die to our own desires and become like Jesus in the midst of difficult situations.
Speaking from a man's perspective, the Christian walk is a tough process, and even when a man has repented of some really big besetting sin, there's still so much in him that has to change. He’ll keep on struggling with selfishness, self-centeredness, irresponsibility, indecisiveness, and insensitivity. The list just goes on and on because we are a fallen people. In other words, we as men need a ton of grace and you've got a lot of firsthand experience with offering grace to a very needy man, because even after your husband, Steve, repented, things were still really challenging for him in his own Christian life. How can a wife support her husband, especially when she can see his old, flesh-nature rearing its ugly head in some way?
Kathy: It's difficult. The short answer is that you just have to learn how to control yourself. Often as woman, we operate out of fear and frustration because we've been through so much already. We often associate our husbands’ weaknesses or character flaws with his sin. If he's angry, short tempered or just disinterested, we can easily associate those things with his sexual sin. It takes time to learn when something is simply a flesh issue. Everyone has a flesh nature and every pitfall that a man has isn’t necessarily an indicator that he is in sexual sin. I know for me, irrational fear was a big issue because anytime Steve did anything that was rude, dismissive of me or just selfish, my immediate reaction was to think that he had been up to something. All his personality quirks in my mind were connected to his sexual sin, but that's not true and I just had to learn to be patient.
I look back on my life and I see so much grace. The Lord helped me to be patient and not so self-focused and fearful of my husband being in sin again. When I did fall back into my irrational fears, it just led to a bunch of other issues sprouting up that we both had to deal with. The truth is that it is going to take time for a man to transform. Even though he has repented, it's going to take time for him to walk through a bunch of stuff. It's not just sexual sin that he has to overcome. In a certain way, that’s just the tip of the iceberg and we need to learn how to be patient and do our best to love our husband through the process.
Nate: As you're talking, what strikes me is that this process of living with a man who's got real issues and character flaws is itself a refining fire.
Kathy: Yeah. We have it in our minds that the guy that he was when we were dating is so different than the guy that we're married to now. Coming to grips with the disparity and the discrepancies that we see in him is very hard for us. But that's who he is. It’s good for us to let God use the disappointments that do come with marriage on both sides. Rather than letting those disappointments and discouragements turn us against our husbands, we need to ask the Lord to search our hearts. We need to ask the Lord to reveal what is in our hearts. We need to ask the Lord to cleanse us from the root of what is causing us to harbor bitterness and resentment towards our husband. The Lord used the trial of my husband’s sexual sin to tear down my walls of bitterness and pride. The trials and hard times don't fit in well with the American fairytale narrative of marriage very well, but it’s the reality. You put two sinners together and all the junk starts coming out.
Nate: It's interesting, because when we think about marriage in Ephesians 5 language, it's a picture of Christ and the church. But that's only one picture of what marriage is. It’s also this union of two imperfect people and God using iron to sharpen iron to create something that's much more like His image.
Kathy: That is what this process is. You are being melted down and the dross will be scraped away. In our flesh, none of us really want to go through the melting down process. We ask the Lord in prayer, “Lord, please refine me. Give me a pure heart.” Well, the reality of that answered prayer is a lot of death to self. In the early days, I used to pray that prayer all the time. I would pray, “Lord, just have all of me. Do in me everything you want to do in me. Make me the woman of God you want me to be and please make Steve the man of God you want him to be.” I didn't have a clue what I was actually asking for, but the Lord was faithful to start answering those prayers. As women we need that to happen in us every bit as much as our husbands do. We may not have been living in the same sin as our husbands, but we still have to go through the process of being refined, purified, and being made Holy.
Nate: I want to focus on how to support a man who is struggling in the battle for holiness, because one of the things that you see in the Old Testament is that a very strong picture of what it means to be Godlike is to bear other people's sins. That's what Jesus did for us. He took our sins on His shoulders and He bore them up to God so that we could be free. When we do that for other people, that is very godlike. But that represents a huge refining process for us, because we're not naturally like that. I was thinking maybe you could give some practical things that a wife could do to positively affect her husband. Then, maybe later, we can talk about things that she can avoid doing which could negatively affect him. You've mentioned in the past when we've had conversations about this that you did your best to keep your feelings of fear, suspicion and worry to yourself. Why is that so key when you're trying to support your husband?
Kathy: I feel like it can come off as if I'm always defending the husband and I’m only focusing on the shortcomings of the wife when I share, but that's not my heart. I just know from a lot of experience that a husband is not strong enough to bear the weight of a wife’s anxieties, because if he's truly repentant, he's going through a lot of stuff. True repentance means you're really facing off with yourself and you are getting really raw and real with yourself and with God. You have to look inside at who you are, and what you've done and face it. It takes a lot for a person to do that.
It takes a ton of energy. It takes quite a bit of courage to do that, because what you end up seeing in yourself is nasty stuff. You start to see what you have done to other people and it's a lot to bear. Somehow in my youth, I understood that Steve was in the battle of his life. I knew that, but I don't know how I knew that, because I was too young to understand these things and certainly not spiritual at all. But somehow God got it into me. And I did not want to be one more source of weight to the already weighty battle that my husband was in. I wasn't going to remind him of what he did to me and how deeply he hurt me.
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One of the things I want to add as well is that one of the biggest issues for a lot of women is trust. It's enormous. It's one of our biggest issues probably because naturally as women our radars for someone to break our trust is always up. We don't want to get hurt and we don't want to go through being lied to or betrayed again. Some of the women going through these trials have children they have to worry about and they're trying to protect their kids. In a sense, during the trial of a husband’s sexual sin, a wife’s whole life is hanging in the balance. So, there's a lot of insecurity, but there comes a time when we have to rein in our fears and put our trust in the Lord because our husband doesn't have everything that we need.
It takes time for a husband who is truly repentant to change. It does not happen overnight. It is not like, “Okay, he came to a place of brokenness before the Lord and now everything's good.” No, that's not how it goes. There's still a lot of internal junk to eradicate, deal with and face. I remember when Steve repented. It was tremendous. But my expectations were off the chart. I thought that everything was just wonderful, and everything was behind us. It wasn't behind us, but we were on a path towards the Lord that gave me so much hope.
Nate: This is so helpful because we as human beings have such a limited perspective on things. We oftentimes only see in the moment, and it really clouds our ability to discern the real issues. You're bringing to the forefront that it's incredibly helpful to a husband when a wife pushes back on her fears and doesn't load the fear of failure back onto her husband. I'm sure that sometimes a lot of husbands are also afraid for themselves that they're not going to make it.
Kathy: They absolutely are. They're terrified with the idea that they are not going to make it. When another load of a wife’s fear and doubt is piled on top of him, it's very disheartening and it's very discouraging. Steve has told me before that one of the things that helped him so much was that I wasn't a drain on him. This is something else I would love to impart to these young women. Just support your husband and believe in him. If he has repented, you have no reason to keep looking to the past. You have every reason to go forward, but you must have the faith, not in your husband, but faith in the Lord. You have to trust in the Lord with all your heart. You can't lean on your own understanding. If you do, you will make mistake after mistake. You will go with your inclinations, your flesh, and your fear and that is not what either one of you need.
Nate: Man, everything you are saying is biblical, but it is really counterintuitive. Another thing I've heard you say, which is totally counterintuitive, is that it's incredibly helpful to a husband when a wife is vulnerable with her own struggles. Why is that?
Kathy: If you look at Luke 18 and you start looking at the dynamic that was going on in the situation of the pharisee and the tax collector, you have this pharisee who had it all together, but then you have this slob over on the other side of the temple who could hardly even lift up his head to heaven to plead with God for mercy. That's the heart that I wanted, because I knew that's what I was. And I think that is the crux of vulnerability that a husband would deeply appreciate from his wife, because a lot of us wives can be self-righteous, and we can wave our holiness in front of our husbands. We frame words without trying to that end up comparing our righteousness to our husband’s unrighteousness and that is not what he needs. He already feels like a slob. He has so totally blown it and he already sees you as more spiritual than he is. To have that rubbed in his face more is not helpful.
If you can get back to the place where you began with Jesus that place of saying, “God be merciful to me, the sinner;” if you live in the reality that your sin is just as heinous in God's eyes as your husband's is; if you really wrap yourself around the Cross of Jesus Christ where that blood was shed for your sin and you live in the reality of the power of that forgiveness, that gets communicated. If you're living in that yourself, you don't even have to say words, it's just what's coming out of your life as a person. You and your husband are on a level playing field at the Cross because you both are sinners. That is the thing that wives need to constantly remind themselves of, that they need Jesus just as much as their husband does. They need to realize that maybe they would have committed the same sins under different circumstances. It’s that kind of a heart, the heart of a tax collector. I know that that level of humility and reality is pleasing to God, and God honors that in a wife. That is one of the ways that a woman can really be supportive and helpful to her husband.
While pride and selfishness are celebrated in much of American culture, the Lord tells us in His Word that they will lead to destruction.
We're taking a break from our series, Babylon: The Seat of Satan's Power, this week. In this replay from our "Exposed" series, we look at what allows pride to flourish and grow inside us. We’ll look at life in America and examine the ways it encourages us to be proud. We’ll also talk about trials in marriage and how they can foster our pride in unexpected ways. Both topics will help us see more clearly the way God deals with pride and the consequences of its unchecked influence.
Mankind is growing in rebellion against the Lord to serve a god of their own choosing.
Nimrod’s name is only mentioned four times in the entire Bible, yet his legacy is infamous. First Chronicles 1:10 credits him as the first mighty world ruler, garnering the attention and admiration of all the people on the planet. Under his irascible and warlike leadership, he was able to leverage the people’s devotion and begin the construction of the Tower of Babel, the premiere symbol of rebellion against Yahweh. Only 2 generations separated him from godly Noah, and yet he able to amass a cult following of defiant souls in rebellion against the Lord.
In our fourth installment of Babylon: The Seat of Satan’s Power, Steve Gallagher helps us see how the spirit of antichrist in Nimrod was able to accomplish such a horrific achievement, and how that same spirit continues to amass power and influence in the 21st century.
This series is based on the book Intoxicated with Babylon: The Seduction of God’s People in the Last Days by Steve Gallagher. You can find out more about that book by visiting our bookstore.
Whatever IT was that happened, it’s now a mountain between you and God. If He ever loved you, it seems impossible to believe He could now.
Can God love someone like me? Does this question ever trouble you? Perhaps it comes up in those quiet moments when you’re all alone. Maybe there was a time—in your childhood years perhaps—when you could believe that God really did love you. But that was… before thoughts of God were overrun by the alluring pleasures and entertainments or athletic ambitions the world offered you… before the molestation… before that first sexual tryst in high school or college… before the abortion… before pornography became an obsession… before secret sin took over and began to dominate your life… before you crossed lines and engaged in things you swore you’d never do. Whatever IT was that happened, it’s now a mountain between you and God. If He ever loved you, it seems impossible to believe He could now.
I remember all too well being in that place. My carefully constructed life was demolished in quick fashion when my secret sexual behaviors came to light. I lost my job in ministry, lost my treasured pristine reputation, severely damaged my marriage and wound up exiled to a program for sexual addicts in rural Kentucky. I wasn’t just lost; I was a 38-year-old Loser at the lowest point of my life. Years of self-love had left me hardened outwardly and hollow inwardly.
One day, shortly after my unceremonious arrival at the Pure Life Ministries Residential Program, I took a walk out on the ridge, to the place where a hand-hewn wooden cross stands amidst a small grove of cedar trees, and sat down on the bench overlooking the cross. I began to pray. I told God how miserable and wretched I was. I confessed sexual sins, sins of deception, sins against others, sins against Him, sins too shameful to speak of here. I told Him how wrong I was; how sad I was; how lonely I was; how I felt like a failure my whole life; how nobody really loved me and I couldn’t blame them.
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I lost track of time but I’m sure I spent at least 30 minutes babbling on and on, admitting to God precisely how disgusting, vile and wretched I was. At some point, a vague memory of some preacher saying I shouldn’t do all the talking but should allow God opportunity to speak when I’m praying came to mind. So I paused in pouring out my heart to God and said, “Sorry Lord; I’ve been doing all the talking.” (In my thinking, this was just one more failure to add to the list.) “Do You have anything You want to say to me?”
It’s hard to put into words what happened when I asked that question. But somehow, I felt—in a very literal way—the arms of God Himself draw me into a hugging embrace, and I heard Him say with perfect clarity in my heart, “I love you.”
That was it for me. He won my heart. I had just spent a good half-hour or more telling the Lord all the reasons why no one could possibly love me, why He shouldn’t love me or even have anything to do with me. And how did He respond? What did He want to say to me about all of this? “I love you.”
Friend, that’s what He wanted me to know above all else. To be sure, He fully intended to deal with my sin, my selfishness, my pride and self-righteousness, my unfaithfulness, my utter lack of respect for His Word. But first, I needed to know a very, very vital piece of the puzzle that I had long been overlooking: He loves me.
There’s a story in Genesis that helps to make the love of God come alive for me. Perhaps you remember how Jacob deceived Isaac and stole his brother’s inheritance, then fled to the distant home of his mother’s relatives. In exile, Jacob wound up agreeing to tend the flocks of his Uncle Laban. He also happened to fall in love with Rachel, Laban’s younger daughter. Soon enough, the arrangement was made that he would work for Laban for seven years, at the end of which time Rachel would become his wife. Here’s how the Scriptures summarize Jacob’s years of toil: “So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed only a few days to him because of the love he had for her.” (Genesis 29:20)
Wow! “…and they seemed only a few days to him because of the love he had for her.” Can you imagine love like that?
There are two sides to consider from this profound statement about love.
While it’s easy to sing “I love you Lord” while participating in the congregational hymns and worship songs of the church, and perhaps even to utter the words in prayer now and again, the truth for most of us is that we do not love God—at least, not like we ought to. Not like Jacob loved Rachel. If we did, then years of serving Him would seem as nothing more than a few days to us. He would truly be the center of our affections. Doing what we know would be pleasing to Him, wouldn’t be such a struggle. Obeying Him wouldn’t seem burdensome or restrictive. It would be exhilarating!
If you spent time studying Scripture about what it means to truly love God, you just might discover that your love for Him is pretty weak and superficial. If that is the case, the best response is to begin by confessing the truth to God. Be honest. Be sincere. Pour your heart out to Him. He can handle the truth. And He can help you change.
There’s another side to this divine portrait of love between Jacob and Rachel. This passage also provides great insight into the Father’s love. God does love you. What if it meant serving seven years for you? Would He do it? Yes, He’s willing. And He proved it by coming as the Servant-of-All for us. (Mark 10:44-45) Would He serve seven years? I suspect He would serve seventy-times-seven years. In fact, He would give His whole life. He did give His whole life: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16) Let these familiar words become full of new meaning to you.
The Lord desires to wake us up from our apathetic lifestyle so that we'll put forth the effort to seek Him and know Him more.
For thousands of years, thick spiritual darkness covered the entire world. The prince of darkness, Satan, longed for the day when he would once again unite the globe in open rebellion to God's authority. But one day, 120 men and women left an upper room in Jerusalem with a fiery zeal and a white hot love for Jesus of Nazareth - the man who had changed everything about their lives. Their passion and their testimonies were infectious and began plundering the kingdom of darkness of its subjects daily.
When God's people are inflamed with love for Jesus and a zeal for His Kingdom, Satan's master plan for humanity is presented with a massive threat. But the enemy won't go down without a fight. In this show, we'll look at one of his most effective counterattacks - fostering a church culture that is full of apathy.
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