Good afternoon, good early evening to everyone. It is Wednesday, July the 15th, 2020. It is currently 5.01 p.m. Central Time. I'm coming to you live from Victory Baptist Church, located here in Ovalo, Texas, where I believe the current temperature outside is 104. I think it's 104, maybe 105, who knows. Feels like 180, but that's probably me exaggerating and complaining. Yes, I know. I'm gonna get emails. Yes, I keep telling you how hot it is, and I know that you don't actually care. I know you don't, but... So, I guess I should just stop telling you, but you know what? I know it's hot outside, but guess what it's time for? It's time for a road trip! Yes, we get to take another road trip to one of the most influential churches and see what's going on. Now, if you're new to this kind of mini-series we're doing, we're taking a virtual road trip. We don't actually have to get in a car, we don't actually have to get in an airplane, but we go travel to one of the churches that is considered one of the most influential churches in America or in the world, and we go check out what's happening. We may check out their website, we listen to a sermon, we talk about it, I analyze it, the good, the bad, the ugly, I try to be fair. And another thing to remember is when we listen to something that comes from the church, I don't listen to it first, try to find a sermon that's really, really bad so that I can make some point or rehearse my responses. No, we're taking a road trip together. So in a sense, if you imagine it the way I'm trying to describe it, we get in a car, we get in an airplane, We arrive at the city where the influential church is located. We all end up in the parking lot of that influential church. We all go in together and we listen together in real time. So here we virtually show up, we virtually listen together in real time, and then I jump in and offer my feedback as we are listening. Um, I don't plan it. I don't rehearse it. And so it's always a little, um, it's always a little nerve wracking because I never really know what's going to happen. Sometimes I think, oh, this, and then I'm, as I'm listening, I'm like, okay, what do I say here? I don't, I don't really know what, what to do here. So, um, it, it makes it a little bit more exciting, makes it a little bit more organic and it real, it doesn't come across as rehearsed. So I, I like that idea. Hopefully you do. I don't know. I don't know if people are liking this series or not liking this series, but I think the series is important because it's always important to know what's happening within Christianity. It's important to know what's going on, what's happening out there. Look, you can sit in your church and have in your mind, you can have in your mind an image of what's going on in Christianity and your idea can be completely wrong. your perception can be completely flawed. The only way to really know what's happening is to get out there. So that's what we're doing. We're taking road trips to see what is happening, what is going on. And if it's great, yes. If it's bad, if it's telling us something that we need to be on the lookout for, is it giving us some sign of a trend? Are we seeing the development of a trend? So I think this is an interesting, Series and so I've been doing this and hopefully you have enjoyed it. But are you ready? Where are we going today? Well today we're gonna be traveling. I can't remember how far it is from where I'm at I think it's about eight hours. I think it's about eight hours This church is located in the Houston, Texas area now. I was in the Houston, Texas area in January I was there for a big wrestling event and and Houston, Texas. So I've gone to Houston, Texas for a number of wrestling events. This church is located in the kind of the Houston, Sugar Land, Woodlands area of Texas. I think that's kind of—you kind of group them all together, I guess, in a way. Maybe some do. But Woodlands, Texas. That's what you need to know. That's where we're headed. We're headed to Woodlands, Texas, to Woodlands Church. Woodlands Church, located in Woodlands, Texas. The pastor is Carey Shook, S-H-O-O-K. So, Woodlands Church, The Woodlands, I guess that's the name of the town, The Woodlands, so it's Woodlands Church located in The Woodlands, Texas, right? Pastor Carrie Shook, I know I've driven through The Woodlands at some point. I don't remember what for, but I know I've driven through there at least once. But Woodlands Church, located in The Woodlands, Texas, Pastor Kerry shook the average weekly attendance. Are you ready for this one? Now, we've been looking at those churches with the 16,000 to right at 17,000. Those are small churches, because now we're moving up. Now we're moving up to the big churches, right? Their average weekly attendance at Woodlands Church is 18,385 people. 18,385 people. That's, that's insane, okay? That's crazy. Now, of course, they have how many different locations here? Look here, let me look. They have three locations, so three locations, I'm assuming those three locations together give you the combined number of 18,385 average weekly attendance, but that's still a lot of people. Now this one is interesting because most of the churches have been independent non-denominational. This church belongs to the Southern Baptist Convention. So they're a Southern Baptist church. Now, Depending on where you grew up and when you attended a Southern Baptist Church, I became a Christian in a Southern Baptist Church, and a Southern Baptist Church back when I was a kid in West Texas is very different than the Southern Baptist Churches that are so big and popular today. You look at them today and sometimes, to be honest with you, I'm like, is that a Baptist Church or is that a charismatic church? because it's very charismatic in its theology, very charismatic in its practice, it's very charismatic in many aspects of it. So, it's like, how is it still Baptist? Is Baptist in what way? So, I don't know if denominational names really mean much anymore. I know maybe there are some denominational churches where it's still still looks, you know, they hold to those denominational distinctives, but you'll have another church that bears your denominational name, Presbyterian Lutheran, and yet they'll be so contrary to what Lutherans believe or Presbyterians believe, but yet they still are part of some branch of a Lutheran denomination or a Presbyterian denomination, that because those other kinds of churches exist that still bear that denominational name, then the denominational name, for all practical purposes, doesn't mean anything anymore. Like, my church is a Baptist church, Victory Baptist, but does the word Baptist really even mean anything in 2020? Because I can go to Abilene, Texas and walk into Baptist churches, and I'm telling you, We're not the same, okay? I don't even know if we're in the same universe, okay? So, like, then does Baptist really mean anything? So, this one's interesting. They're part of the Southern Baptist Convention, all right? Let's give you a little background about this church. The Woodlands Church was founded in 1993 by Carrie and Chris Shook. Now, please note, the church was founded by Carrie and Chris Shook. This is a husband and wife, as far as I know. As far as I know, they're a husband and wife. But male and female are seen as being the ones who founded the church. Now, we're seeing somewhat of a trend in many of these big churches when you look up leadership. Um, it'll be the husband and wife. Like it'll be like, here are our senior pastor, teaching pastor, whatever. And it'll be, it'll be listed as husband and wife. Placing the wife, I guess, as a co-pastor or a leader. And now here the founder of the church is a husband and a wife. Now, You could argue, some will argue, well, this is just saying that for the husband to, quote unquote, be the founder of the church, his wife is right there with him, supporting and helping, so she should be listed. Do you mean that, or does she have a position of leadership? And if she does, well, then even in a, like, then how do we understand that biblically? So that's been an interesting trend in looking at some of these churches. Here was their vision. Their vision included reaching families with uplifting music. What? Hey, I'm gonna start a church and our vision is to reach people with uplifting music. I think that's right there in the Bible somewhere. A friendly atmosphere and a relevant message. Ooh, some of those buzzwords, a relevant message. The church now has three locations as well as an online presence, including a blog and Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages. The ministry also owns WC Trading Company, which operates two retail stores and offers internationally sourced handmade items. Now stop right here. If you're a church, You're supposedly non-profit, right? Tax exempt. And you operate two retail stores and offer internationally sourced handmade items. First, when was the church supposed to get into the retail store business? When was this supposed to happen? See, I get tired of churches operating as businesses and then want What the tax-exempt status, and I don't get it, I don't get it, I don't get it. But okay, so they operate two retail stores. Maybe the stores, maybe they operate them, but the stores don't fall under the tax-exempt status. But then why is the church into a business? I don't know. One of the stated goals of the company is to break poverty cycles and create sustainable change and development. So I guess they're gonna try to break the poverty cycle by operating retail stores, I guess where they can hire people who are in poverty to help them get out. But I don't know. We could talk all day about the theology of that. I guess it comes down to, I mean, this is the question we ask ourself all the time. Should the church operate under a regulative principle that we only do what we see in the New Testament? We don't go beyond that or to go with a normative principle and we can do anything we want as long as the Bible doesn't condemn it. Well, does the Bible condemn operating a retail store? Doesn't mention it. So then, see, this philosophy greatly determines how you do church. I just, man, just a church operating a business, I don't know, I don't know. So here's what we're gonna do. This trip to Woodlands Church is going to be a little different. We're not going to jump right into a sermon, and here's the reason why. I went to the Woodlands Church website, and I looked at the little tab that said messages, and it opened to their YouTube page. And that seems to be that's that's another very interesting trend is many of the churches now don't have Their sermons like in a podcast feed that you can subscribe to and listen to in an audio format They have a youtube page or a facebook page and you have to try to get the videos from and everything's video I it's like well I mean, when people commute, they may listen to things in audio format. They may be at work and not able to watch the video. I don't know why churches don't make their sermons easy to download and easy to obtain through a podcast. Feed like from all the podcast apps There's a million podcast apps get your pod get your sermons placed in a podcast type format So that people can just subscribe to it and listen to it easily I I don't understand why churches make it so complicated to get their sermons I just don't understand in 2020 like I'll go to some of these websites and it'll take me 20 minutes to figure out Okay, how can I get the audio of this? It's like why? I don't, I don't get it, but that's a whole different story. All right. So, but I went to the YouTube page and the first thing that showed up was something that was posted seven hours ago. And I'm like, well, it's the newest thing. It's not a sermon, but we'll grab it and we'll see what it is. And we'll analyze that. And then maybe we'll come, we'll, in the next episode, we'll, we'll go back to Woodlands Church in the Woodlands, Texas. And, um, We'll then listen to a full sermon. So let's see what this is, and I'm not gonna give you any hints or clues. I hit play just for a second to see what it was, so I already know what it was. Let's see if you can figure it out. All right, here we go. This is from the Woodlands Church from the Woodlands, Texas. Weekly attendance of over 18,000 people. They are supposedly a Southern Baptist church. This was posted seven hours ago to their YouTube page. Let's listen and see what we discover. Here we go. Welcome to my overflow time, my daily time with God that Carrie and I are sharing these times with you this week, just the normal stuff of what we do every day. All right, let's stop right here. Okay, first thing, it's a female, all right? Clearly, this is a, well, I don't know, I think she said Carrie, so is this Chris? Is this Chris Shook? Let me look here. Oh, Carrie and Chris, maybe I thought Carrie was the female. Give me a second here, let me look. Who is this talking? Give me one second here. I don't want to close down my... Nope, I don't want that. Give me one second. I want to make sure I know exactly who's talking. It's Chris. So it is Chris. So I thought Chris was the, I thought Carrie was the, I thought Carrie was the male and Chris was the female. I got it backwards. Chris is the female, Carrie is the male, okay? So Chris, this is Chris, Chris and Carrie have been sharing, as she put it, their overflow time. They call it their overflow time, which is, I'm not familiar with this term, overflow time. I guess their overflow time is their devotional time. Now, on one hand, let me make it very clear. I applaud this. I think pastors and churches can use technology to post devotional messages on a daily basis, two or three times a day, where your people can hear devotional type messages. I think it's a great idea. Help your people grow spiritually. So I think this is a wonderful idea. I'm looking forward to it. Now, we could ask ourselves, should a church have a woman basically teaching a devotional study on their church YouTube page. Some will argue, well, it's only for women. Some will say, well, it's only for women. Others will say, well, she's doing it on the YouTube page, even though it's the church YouTube page, she's not teaching in the church, so therefore it's not a violation. We could get into all kinds of arguments here. This is what I will say, though. If you remember, If you go way back, especially in the 1990s and the early 2000s, you had people like Beth Moore, Kay Arthur, and there was always this argument, hey, what's going on here? And the women would always tell you, hey, these women, They're great Bible teachers, and they teach just for women. So this is for us. And you would say, well, hey, ladies, if you're going to have a Bible study, why do you need a Beth Moore book? Can't you just study the Bible without a book? Or, you know, what's the deal here? And you never really could get any good answers. And then we see what's happened. You know, Beth Moore now basically is preaching in front of men, preaching in churches on a Sunday. And you're kind of like, well, that That's kind of where a lot of people were warning you it would go. So I don't she may preach from the pulpit. I don't know But it's just interesting that she's here on the church website teaching a devotional study Do you agree, do you disagree, do you believe it's biblical, unbiblical? I know, look, we can state this, if she teaches from the pulpit, well then clearly we know that's gone beyond the biblical thing. So I'm applauding them that they're trying to do devotional studies online for their people, that is cool. But let's see what's the content of this message, and then you can judge whether it should be a woman or not. I mean, we can get into all kinds of discussions there, but let's see where this goes. in hopes that you can develop this in your life too, that you'll develop the practice of spending time with your creator every day. It's not anything that's difficult or mystical, but it does require a lot of discipline. And as Carrie and I have learned over the years, just from experience, that this is a huge thing to invest in our lives. We've seen the benefits that come out of it, and it's something now that we you know, just don't ever want to go without because it makes such a big difference in our days. So, especially during this time that all of us have been forced to spend inside a lot more, by ourselves a lot more. We wanted to be sure that you guys saw this opportunity to get to develop this practice in your own lives. So, that's what our daily overflow time is. And I just want to share with you, you know, every day, maybe a few more things that have helped me, a few more ways that I have learned to focus my mind, to be still, and get to know my creator. It's something that Carrie and I are praying that you guys will develop in your own lives. There's nothing like having your creator speak to you. His word is alive. The words in the Bible are alive. I know this is true because I read that and also because I've experienced it. Because every time I open his word, there is something in it for me that applies. The Lord knows what that is a lot of times It's things that nobody else would even be able to draw the connection between but I do in my heart So I want you to have that Nobody else could draw the connections, but I can in my heart. Is that the new hermeneutic of 2020? Hey, I can draw a connection here, because I can do it so in my heart. Let's see where she goes. This is going to be short. She's only got nine minutes. I'm hoping there's something good here. I really am. Here we go. that experience as well. So we are in First Thessalonians, that's the book we've been going through this week. And so if you were jumping in for the first time today, welcome, glad you're here. I really wish you guys were just sitting here with me and everybody had a coffee, or I had my Topo Chico and you had a coffee. But I would love to be together in person, but I'm just so grateful that we get to be together like this, and I'm also in spirit. The Bible says that, you know, believers, we can pray for each other, we can, you know, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. So, even if you feel lonely right now, whether that's just today or during this, you know, this past few months, you know, a lot of people feel alone. You're not alone in feeling alone. But the Bible tells us we are never, ever alone. Jesus Christ is right there with you. And that's why I like to have a chair next to me to remind myself of that fact, that this is a relationship. So let's jump right in to First Thessalonians. I've already spent some time thanking the Lord for this awesome day. And I am in my living room. You may have noticed that I am usually outside, but that's where I love to have my quiet time. But also, like I told you, flexibility is a good thing. So I thought I'd show you real life. And real life is, I walked out there and thought, you know what? Well, it's just too hot right now. It's hard to focus because it was so hot. And so I moved it inside for today. And You know, you'll find times when you, whatever it is, that practice that you have, whatever works best for you, morning or night or some other time that you spend with the Lord, whatever habits you develop, sometimes we have to be flexible with them. And that's okay. You know, the important thing is not the time of day. It's not the kind of, you know, the journal that you use or pen that you use or exactly the program or plan that you're using to work through the Bible. The important thing is to do it. So way to go. I encourage you. I encourage you. I'm proud of you for being here today. Stick with it. Stick with this daily time. So in First Thessalonians chapter two, I read that Paul, and as I started off reading this morning, and I'm just going to share with you a couple of things the Lord showed me as I read through. All right, now stop right here. This is what I call Christian-speak, Christian-ese, what the Lord showed me. What the Lord showed me. I hope I've never used those words. I hope I've never used those words. I hope I've never used those words. I reject Christian-speak. I reject Christian-ese. No, you read it, you saw it, and you drew a conclusion. All right, that's how it works. There's no mystical, God showed me something. God showed me something. I was reading it, God showed me something. There's such psychological manipulation going there. If I turn on this microphone and I tell you God showed me it, well then you can't tell me I'm wrong because God showed me it. No, you read like any person reads and your brain process those words using some method of a hermeneutical system of interpretation. Now she's either being influenced by presuppositions, she's being influenced by things she's been taught. There's a lot going into what she saw. But to say, God showed me, I hate that. That is such Christian speak. We just throw that out there. Like, I'm gonna tell you that God showed me this. Well, let's just say for instance, because listen, there have been people throughout church history, God showed me this, God showed me this, and they teach absolute, undeniable biblical heresy. But God showed me this. A Catholic priest can say, God showed me the truth of Catholicism. Okay, well, you'll say, well, God didn't show them that. Okay, well then, Who gets to say God showed them that? You can say God showed you something and I can say you're wrong. Who gets to say? No, we read and we draw conclusions, okay? That's what we do. We do that, all right? I'm not into this whole God showed me this, God showed me this, God showed me this. Because what happens if what she's about to tell us God showed her is absolute garbage? What do we do? Well, we're not gonna blame God, right? So yeah, I hope I never say that. No, I studied. I spent some time thinking about it. I started doing some cross-referencing, running some different Bible study methods, utilizing some different hermeneutical thoughts, and this is the conclusion I found. This is what I'm thinking. Here's my idea. That's what I usually say. Here's my theory. Here's my hypothesis. Here, what do you think? I don't say, God just showed me this. I, yeah, okay, let's go. Let's see where she's going to go here. She's she says First Thessalonians chapter two. All right. I'm just curious where she's going to be. All right. Here we go. And to give you an idea of the way this goes for me as I as I talk to the Lord, as I had this conversation with the Lord as I read his word. So I started reading in chapter two, which is just a continuation of last of yesterday, of chapter one. As I've told you, I like to read sequentially through. whatever book I'm reading, and Paul says that, you know, he starts right off the bat talking about suffering and being treated outrageously, and that, you know, it says, we dared to tell you the gospel in the face of strong opposition. So I stopped right there and I thought, okay, so what's going on here? Paul's facing strong opposition and he's having a lot of problems, but wow, this is a giant in the faith, And I believe she's referencing 1 Thessalonians 2, verse 2, but even after that, we had suffered and were shamefully entreated, as you know, at Philippi, we were bold and our God to speak unto you the gospel of God with much contention. All right, so that seems to be what she's referring to. All right, as far as I can tell. You know, he's doing a really good thing. I mean, he's trying to share the gospel, but he's still having problems. And so, you know, I just kind of stopped right there and said, well, okay, so I should not be surprised when hard stuff comes in my life today. You know, if, if I try to do things, even good things, maybe especially good things, and yet I have opposition. Well, that's to be expected. Don't take that as a sign that I'm on the wrong track and need to quit. Expect opposition when you're going the right way because this isn't heaven and we have an enemy and he will try to stop you when you're on the right path. So I go on and read that. Let me just stop here. Counterpoint. just because you face opposition doesn't mean you're on the right path. This is a clever technique that you'll see sometimes Jehovah's Witnesses use. If a Jehovah's Witness comes to your door and you, if you are very, if you're kind of rude to them, slam the door in their face, hey, leave me alone, I'm trying to have supper, whatever, they almost walk away Like, hey, we've been persecuted for preaching the truth. We're being persecuted. And not just Jehovah's Witnesses aren't the only one to do this. When I was a member of an independent fundamental Baptist church in Papillion, Nebraska during the 1990s, We had, what night was it? Tuesday night, Thursday night, I don't remember what night it was. I loathed, I loathed, I loathed this night. I had to go to it because I was in the Bible Institute and it was required, but we would go door to door. I am not a fan of door-to-door. I hate door-to-door. And now I know I'm gonna get emails saying, that's because you don't have a heart of God and you hate evangelism. Okay, you can accuse me of everything. Let me explain. When we went door-to-door, this is what I saw over and over and over and over and over and over. I don't ever think I ever witnessed anything positive coming from door-to-door. I truly don't. I would see a lot of people get irritated that you are at their door All right, because we would always go, it seemed either some weird hour like, you know, like there's a good chance people are eating supper now or it's starting to get late. They're trying to get the kids down or you just know that there are people, you know, trying to go along with their normal life and there you are knocking on their door. And so usually, A, people were irritated. People would just want to just, they liked everything in their body language, which was like, leave me alone. But the people I would be with would not realize and they're sitting there trying to present the gospel to them. But anytime people were rude, anytime people said, you know, get off my doorstep and used a couple of extra words with some, you know, four letters, the people I was with always acted like, You know, we were persecuted for the gospel. And I always wanted, and I would say at times, no, you were persecuted because you're irritating them, bothering them while they're in their home. They're at home. If they wanted you, they would have called you to come to their door, okay? They don't want to be bothered. And the only reason I hate that is I hate when someone comes to my door. I don't care what it is. if they're selling a magazine subscription. Okay, Girl Scouts can knock on my door because I like Girl Scout cookies, okay? All right, but other than that, anybody else knocks on my door, I get irritated. If it's UPS delivering a package, even though it's a package I want, I still get irritated, because when they knock on the door, the dogs go crazy, and it's just, it's always, and maybe I'm trying to do something, it's always irritating. And if I don't wanna be bothered, I don't wanna bother other people, but just because you face opposition, doesn't mean that you're doing the right thing. You can face opposition because you're doing the wrong thing. You can face the opposition because you're irritating to people. You can face opposition because you're condescending, rude, and a jerk. So, opposition does not correlate you're doing the right thing. doesn't always correlate to doing the right, or you can face opposition because you're doing the right thing, but you're doing the right thing in a wrong way. So I just, sometimes I think Christians just fall into this trap. Oh, oh, my boss was mean. My boss was mean to me because I'm a Christian and they hate Christianity. Or your boss was mean to you because you're lazy and you're pathetic at your job. I just think sometimes any opposition we face, we immediately assume it's there, it's because I'm a Christian. because I'm a Christian. That's why this bad stuff is happening to me. Oh, praise God. I'm suffering for Jesus." Now, I'm not saying that's what she's saying, but I'm just saying I hear this narrative, you know, hey, we should expect to face opposition. Yeah, but you've got to make sure that opposition is because of the gospel. Or is it opposition to the gospel or is that opposition to you because of what you're doing and how you're doing it? There's a very big difference there. So, all right, so let's continue. We spoke as those approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel. So, it's like... I just read that and I thought, entrusted with the gospel. You know, it's a privilege to get to talk about the Lord. This isn't only just a responsibility. Sometimes I know I can start thinking of that. It's like, oh, I need to tell this person about the Lord. It's a privilege. We've been entrusted with the gospel. You know, God has allowed us to share the story of his precious son. So it just shows that, you know, there's a feeling of God's favor there just in being you've been approved to share the gospel you know that you get to do this so that again was a little attitude check for me it's okay i need to you know i i'm thinking of it all wrong if i think oh this is something hard i really are oh this is so typical christianity um she's not even bothered i mean really Basically what she's doing is she's gone to first Thessalonians chapter 2 Paul speaking about some things that's happening She's not really trying in any way shape or form to figure out what happened how it happened Is there any cross references to that we can read about what happened? All she's doing is basically reading it and making it about her She's making it about her. She's not making it about the people that who this is speaking of and what happened and trying to find out what happened. We could probably look up, let's see. I could be wrong here. I'm just gonna guess. Give me a second. I'm just, this is, and remember, these are live, so I am doing this off the top of my head. I think I could be 100% wrong. Where are they at in Acts chapter 16? Acts chapter 16, where are they at? Then came he to Derbe and Lystra. Okay. Now when they had gone, see here, they were gone into, I'm looking at all the areas, Troas, Macedonia, Troas, Philippi, of the city of Thyatira, the city of Thyatira. Okay, the city of Thyatira. Let me, do I have a Bible dictionary? Give me one second. And what I'm doing is I just like to, sometimes I just like to show you like, you know, she's doing a devotional time, and I understand devotional studies, you're not trying to go all in, but you're gonna mention certain things. Let me just look here. I don't wanna say anything until I am positive. Give me one second. Where are they at? THY. Let me look here. I may not have an entry. Thyatira, a city of the province of Lydia. Thyatira, all right. I didn't know if Thyatira had any connection to, See, Thessalonians, I'm seeing Thessalonica, if it had any connection to Thessalonica. Thessalonica is a city in Macedonia, visited by the Apostle Paul in Acts chapter 17, verse one. Okay, Acts chapter 17, so I thought it was Acts 16, so that's where, okay, there we go, Acts chapter 17, that now when they had passed through, Okay, there we go. And Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews. Then Paul goes in, he begins to speak in Acts chapter 17. Some of them believed, and then here we go, Acts 17, verse five, but the Jews, which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the household of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. All right, so here we go. We see some of the opposition they face in Thessalonica in Acts 17. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 2, when Paul speaks of this opposition that he endured, you can read about it in Acts chapter 17. This is not about the opposition I endured, it's about the opposition Paul endured in Acts chapter 17, which was a real historical event. Now, can I learn some lessons from that? Yes. Can I learn how to deal with opposition? Yes. I'm not saying there's no lessons here, it's just she's running to it and making it about us. She can at least reference that what was happening there. She could at least reference what was happening there. All right, so, all right, let's continue. I know that took a little while to find, but please note, it only took me a couple of minutes, grabbing a Bible dictionary, looking up a couple of things, and I was able to figure it out relatively quick. On the top of my mind, I thought it was Acts 16, it was Acts 17. So there you have it. That's how easy it is to do actual Bible study. Doesn't require a lot of work. to do this and I should feel guilty if I don't say something to that woman or that man I see about the Lord. No, it's a privilege. It's a privilege to get to share about my Lord. And goes on to say that we never used flattery, nor did we put on a mask to cover up greed. Wow. Put on a mask. Does that ring a bell to anyone? Putting on a mask. And he's talking here about putting on a mask. And I thought, well, okay. He was saying that some people mask, cover up their greed. And I thought, well, what am I, you know, okay, Lord, what am I masking? And a lot of times I will just take whatever I'm reading and think, and I just turn it around and say, how does this apply to me? How does this apply to me? How am I doing this? So, just so. All right, this is just typical. No, the first thing you do is not, how does this apply to me? The first thing is, what does it mean to the people it was being spoken to, and what did it mean to the people writing it? That's the first thing you have to ask. It doesn't, no, what does it mean to you? What does this mean to me, Lord? No, okay, no, what does it mean? What was going on? What is Paul referencing? This is actually, her translation is using masks. I don't even know what translation she's using. This is the way it reads. For neither at any time used we flattering words, yes ye, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness. God is witness." Right? So they did not wear a cloak of covetousness. That's an interesting phrase. We could probably do a little bit of research and find out what he's referencing here, but they didn't, I guess the idea of a cloak to hide their covetousness or that they were motivated by covetousness? That they were not acting in a way based off covetousness, hiding covetousness? Like in what way could this, well, we'd have to figure out exactly what it's referring to. She's not even gonna figure out what it's referring to because she's just worrying about what it means to her, right? This is, oh boy, all right, let's see what she says. So far, I think when he says we were only trying to please the Lord, we were not looking for praise from people. I think, am I looking for praise from people? Lord, in what ways? Help me correct that. And then it says, we never use flattery. Lord, show me ways. Father, show me. And it's usually subtle things. He'll show subtle things throughout your life. I've found that when I ask God to show me where I'm going wrong, he does. There's never a shortage of places that he can tell me about. So, I don't know if God is speaking to her directly, if God shows her things. I don't know. I mean, this is such typical Christian language. This is usually how it works. God, show me how I use flattery. Okay, let me sit here and think about it, think about it, think about it, think about it, think about it. Oh, okay. Yeah. I used flattery yesterday at work. Okay. Okay. God show me that! God show me that! Or you just thought and remembered and... Were you given some divine insight? Were you given some divine revelation? Is God revealing to you something outside of the Bible? I know this is like so common in the Christian world of talking this way, but it's... Man, okay. All right, whatever. Let's see where she goes. And it could be something as simple as spending time on social media, giving people likes so that they will like you, they'll think well of you. I think, okay, is that a form of flattery, Lord? And also, is that just a waste of time? Lord, you've given me this precious day. Teach me, Lord, teach me in it, teach me in this day. And, but I think about like what, you know, the masks, you know, he's saying, you know, some people wear a mask to hide their sins, such as greed. And then I think of, okay, and then there's masks that can be to, so to keep us from other people or to protect, protect them from us as so in the case of COVID. So I don't know, the word mask just jumped out at me. I'm just telling you how my mind works here. And then in verse eight, He says, because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our lives as well. And so then I thought, oh wow, okay. So sharing the gospel isn't just words. All right, the cloak of covetousness while she was talking there. Whatever, okay. I pulled up the very first commentary. basically undercover of which we might gain a worldly advantage, a cloak of maliciousness, all right, as a pretext of covetousness. We did not use the gospel as a pretext to mask our real motive, which was covetousness, pretending to seek your spiritual good, where in reality we sought our own advantage. Whoa, now see, we could get some preaching going on there, right? Okay, how many times with the church are we really wanting to reach people with the gospel, or are we wanting to reach people so they'll come into the church to give more money so that we'll have bigger buildings and a pastor have bigger salary? Like, what are we really motivated by? Because we can cover our real motives, right? We can cover that covetousness in a cloak, with a pretext that we're trying to do something spiritually good, but that spiritual good is a cloak to cover the greed and the covetousness that we're really motivated by. Now that, yeah, that's very applicable to the church. She could have spent a lot of time really going on that. She turned it into, I don't know, she didn't really expound it or really help us with it. All right, let's continue. Extravagant love, sharing the gospel really means sharing our lives, sharing our very lives with people. So, you know, laying down that right to keep, you know, just keep sharing the gospel in one section of my life, in one compartment, and then there's all my other stuff that I just want to be in control of. Paul's saying here, no, because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you, not only the gospel, but our lives as well. So I thought, okay, who am I sharing my life with? How do we share our lives? Lord, how can I do better in this? Teach me, Lord, teach me. How can I be like this? And he goes on and on. There's really every verse we go through, there's something I can turn back on and say, okay, God, am I doing this? What can I learn here? How can I be more like you in this way? In verse 12, he talks about that they've been encouraging and comforting them, urging you to live lives worthy of God who calls you into his kingdom. And so I think, okay, you know, kingdom living, you know, in the Lord's prayer, when, you know, we've all said it or recited it before, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, kind of rhymes, it rolls off the tongue. But you know what? Kingdom living is for now. He says that, you know, your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. That means we should be living out his kingdom here on earth. So how today, Lord, can we make our homes, our neighborhoods, our communities, our cities, our nation, how can we make this more like your kingdom? How can we bring your kingdom to earth? Let us be a part of that, Lord. So that was just a bare start, scratching the surface of this stuff in chapter two, but I encourage you, spend some time with the Lord today, experience it in your life. Love you guys. See you tomorrow, eight o'clock. Wow. What? Wow, man. I don't even know what to say. I think, I mean, and I, and I don't want to be, I don't want to be mean here. I don't want to be, I don't want to be mean, but I'm going to be very honest with you. I think I've heard better devotional messages given in a youth department than that was. And remember, she's listed as one of the founders of the church. She's been given the privilege, the power, the authority to share the Word of God on the YouTube page of the church. So she's speaking in some capacity of the church. That's a great responsibility. And what she did, she went to 1 Thessalonians 2, basically ignored anything that could be referring to in a historical setting. She completely ignored the historical context. She didn't even really try to apply this to Paul and to them. She made it all about her, and she made it all about what we do, what we do, what we do, what we do, what we do, what we do. Lutheran theologians would say she made it all law and no gospel. I don't, I'm not even going to get into that argument, but she didn't, I mean, she's just jumping from verse to verse to verse. There's no, I understand it's a devotional, but focus on one verse and then make that your devotional. Don't just jump randomly from verse to a different verse, she's not even giving you scripture references, and at least stop and provide a basic context. Like, the opposition, this is the opposition Paul faced in Acts chapter 17. Let's look at the opposition Paul faced. How did he face that opposition? What can we learn in regards to what Paul did? Like, there's your devotional. I mean, it's right there. Now, what she did, now let's make it very clear. I could listen to this devotional, I would get irritated with how she handled it, but it would give me now the opportunity to go back to 1 Thessalonians 2 and go, okay, let me find out what happened in Acts 17, let's see what Paul did, what Paul didn't do, and what we can learn from it. I could turn it into my own good devotional study, it just seems like that's so... That's such a symptom of a mindset with the way the Word of God is handled. It's very much this individualistic thing that it's all about me! It's all about me! It's all about me! No, it's a story about what was happening to Paul and in writing to the people at the church at Thessalonica, and we need to understand how they understood it and how it applied to them. Once we've understood the historical context, once we understand how it applies to the people it was originally written to, Then we can see what what we can gain from it, but she didn't even care about doing that. It's about me. It's about me It's about me. It's about me now to be fair. It's a devotional message My devotional messages always miss a lot of content as well. I understand that but Man, but there you have it. I mean, that's the thing that was posted seven hours ago, eight hours ago. That gives us kind of an insight. Now, it will be interesting to see what happens from the pulpit. So, the next time we take a virtual road trip, we'll go back to the Woodlands, Texas. We'll go back to Woodlands Church. We'll go into the actual church, and we'll listen to a sermon. And if she preached a sermon, if she did, and I see it on the YouTube page, I'm going to purposely listen to her preach to see if her preaching is different than her devotional. I think her devotional study may give us a great insight to how she handles the word of God in preaching. If she doesn't preach from the pulpit, that's a good thing, but we'll see if her husband handles the word of God in a different way. So we'll see. But there you have it. There's one of the most influential churches in the United States of America, over 18,000 people. And let me tell you, I can guarantee you, let me look here. I'm just curious. Okay Well, she's had 71 views. She's had 71 views. I thought it was going to be like 17 000 views. Okay, so 71 views, uh, that's that's pretty good. It's not as much as I thought but um So that that doesn't that doesn't scream massive influence 71 is not a massive in view. Uh, um, that's not a massive a lot of views. I've got a friend in Nebraska who has a YouTube channel where he talks about books and he's got videos with a thousand or two thousand. I think he even got one with maybe even five thousand views. I mean, he's knocking out hundreds and hundreds of views per video. You know, but it's a devotional. I also have learned this. When I do a devotional study, when I do one of my devotional studies, I know my numbers. I'm going to be lucky to get to 71 for a devotional study. I do other things and I'll get a whole lot more. But just because she's a part of a church with 18,000 people, you figure she would have more than 71 views. So that kind of diminishes her Maybe the influence is not being as much as I originally... I thought she was gonna have a lot more, but who knows? It's only been up for seven or eight hours. Let's see how many views it has by tomorrow. But yeah, that's modern day Christianity right there. She's got the Christian speak going on, and she's got the very modern day Christian way of handling scripture, which that tells you something. Here's what, I'll end with this. when you go from church to church to church. What I always ask is, why can't there be churches who do things drastically different? Why can't there be churches out there that offer a true alternative? They don't use Christianese. They don't use the Christian speak. Like, why can't there be? But it appears that if you deviate too much from the template, you're banned to the land of irrelevancy. And that's just sad. You wish Christianity could be big enough to say, hey, Let's think about things differently, but I guess not. All right, so I'll stop right there. There's our virtual trip. We'll go back to that church next time. Thanks for listening. Everyone have a great Wednesday. Be safe. I should be on the air around 7 p.m. for the Wednesday evening live stream. So feel free to tune in and listen. All right, everyone have a great night. God bless.