Good evening, everyone, and welcome to our Wednesday night live stream. It's good to have all those that are joining us tonight. I hope that there's some young people out there that have joined us tonight. I pray that this lesson will be a help to all of you that are watching, but I hope maybe this will speak into some of the lives of our young people as well. Let's go to Lord in prayer, and we'll start out that way tonight. Dear Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to gather together, Lord, whether it be in the building or whether it be online, Lord. I thank you, Lord, that we have this capability to gather together. Even though we may not be in the same room, we can still gather together and talk about God and speak about what wonderful things that God's done. in our lives and in the lives of those that we have examples of in the Bible. Lord, I pray that you just have your way here tonight, Lord. I pray that you would speak through me, Lord, and use me, Lord, in a mighty way to convey the message that you've prepared my heart for, Lord, that you've put upon my heart. And Lord, I pray that it'll be a help to all those young people out there that may be watching, and not just the young people, but all the people that may be watching tonight, Lord, and it'll be an encouragement to them, Lord, to know that that you are with us and you'll never leave us, you'll never forsake us, Lord, and you can use us in mighty ways. Lord, I pray that you just have your way tonight. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, tonight we were thinking when Josh had called us and asked us to speak and he kind of said maybe gear something a little bit more towards the young people. So we were thinking about the young people and I was thinking about young people and what they, what their interests are. And a lot of people, a lot of young people have interest in heroes and you see them go and watch the superhero movies or things like that. Well, I was thinking about the heroes of the Bible and not just any specific heroes, like not just any hero of the Bible, but the young people, the young young heroes of the Bible, those that were in their teenage years maybe, or that were really young in their lives. And I was thinking about those people so that it could be an example to our young people that God can use you no matter who you are, no matter how old you are, or no matter what you've come from, no matter your background, It doesn't matter. God can use you no matter who you are and he can do miraculous things through many people of the Bible. And I've got a few examples tonight that I want to go through of young people in the Bible, young heroes of the Bible. And just maybe it'll help us and not just young people, it'll help us all to realize that God can do amazing things through us if we would just allow him to use us and if we would just allow him to have control of our lives. And tonight I'm not gonna do a whole lot of scripture reading. I'll be probably doing a lot of paraphrasing of what these stories of these people are and the things that they've went through at young ages and and maybe it'll be a helpful to read some scripture and just to pull out some things there to show just how young some of these people were. But our first one we come to tonight is Joseph. Now Joseph was in in the book of Genesis chapter 37 when Joseph shows up on the scene here And he was 17 years old, the Bible tells us. The Bible tells us that in chapter 37 of verse 2, it says, there are the generations of Jacob, Joseph being 17 years old. He was feeding his flock with his brethren. And Joseph now, the story of Joseph goes along and you can read it. But let me encourage you parents, maybe, that if you want to sit down and maybe jot some of these scripture down, maybe you can sit at home Maybe you have some Bible time with your young people and read through these stories. And young people, let me encourage you to maybe come see me next Wednesday with some of the things that you may have learned through this, and maybe we can work up some prizes, maybe. All right? So if you want to come back to me, and maybe we can talk about some of these heroes, or maybe tell me about a hero that I didn't mention, and we can maybe work up some prizes. But Joseph here was 17 years old. And a little bit about Joseph was that, that when he was 17 years old, the Bible tells us in verse 5 of chapter 37, it says, And Joseph dreamed a dream, and he told it his brethren, and they hated him yet the more. See, they'd already hated him because he was Jacob's favorite son, because the Bible says that he was Jacob's son of Jacob's old age. So Jacob really loved Joseph. and he made him the coat of many colors, and now Joseph's having dreams, and he dreamed a dream, and then he went and told his brothers what the dream was. And the dream was that one day, he said, well, the dream was pretty much telling them that one day, you all will bow down to me, the younger brother. You're going to bow down to me one day, and I'm going to have rule over you. and as we as the story goes along his brothers they hated him and they decided to sell him into slavery so they sold him and told his dad that he had died and so they as he went into slavery we can talk about that story a little bit but you We think back to Sunday night's message from Josh. Josh talked a little bit about Joseph and how Joseph was wrongfully accused and put into prison because of Potiphar's wife. He was wrongfully accused of doing something that he didn't do and he was put into prison. So he was sold into slavery. and he was wrongfully accused and put into prison, but God was still faithful to Joseph. I want you to understand that, that no matter what wrong may come against us, no matter what may happen in our lives, no matter what difficult times that we may have to go through, I want you to know that God is still faithful to us. No matter what we may have to go through, He is still faithful. So He was still faithful to Joseph. So Joseph, he interprets a couple of dreams in the prison there. And then word got back to Pharaoh, the ruler, and he told Pharaoh, and Pharaoh eventually had a dream that he needed interpreted. And he interpreted Pharaoh's dream. And in Pharaoh, in chapter 41, Joseph was 30 years old now. And Joseph was made the governor, which was basically, he was second in charge, right? And now they became where there was a food shortage, and all of Joseph's brothers needed food. So guess what? They came and they had to bow down before Joseph. So Joseph's dream that he had when he was 17 years old, it took about 13 years to come to fruition or for it to come true, for his dream to come true. But God was faithful as Joseph. And it did come true. The brothers did have to bow down to Joseph. And Joseph was made a ruler over all the food in the land. And he was second in charge pretty much. All because he interpreted a dream of Pharaoh. So even though we may not understand while we're going through certain things in our lives. Even though we're maybe having hard times in our lives, maybe something happens that we just don't understand. And I know you adults out there that are watching, you know you've been through some of those hard times in your life. And maybe these kiddos that are watching, maybe they haven't had to experience something like that yet. But we as adults, we know that even though we have hard times, God is still faithful to us. And we need to stay strong and stick with him because he will bring us through. He will the end will be greater than all the trials that we've had to go through. So let's stay strong young people No matter what's going on at school. No matter what your friends are trying to get you to do that You know is wrong. Let's just stick with Jesus Christ and follow him because in the end He's going to bring us through any trials any troubles any situation that may come up against us so that we can take Joseph's example even though Joseph went through all these things he could have just Denied God and went the other way, but he stayed true to God and followed God so next Next person that we come to, and this is one of the two books of the Bible that is named after a woman. So I wanted you young girls out there, I didn't want y'all to feel left out because I was only talking about the boys or the men of the Bible, but the book of Ruth is a book about a woman, a young woman, who I don't know exactly how she was, the Bible doesn't say, but the Bible does say that she was referred to as a damsel, and a damsel is a young woman or a girl. But Ruth apparently had gotten married when she was young and her husband died. And that was a difficult time for her. She was probably, I don't know, in those days she probably married when she was a teenager. And she was married and her husband died. But she stayed with her mother-in-law Naomi. And Naomi helped her and she was loyal to Naomi. And Naomi told her when they went back to Naomi's land to live, Back to where Naomi came from, Naomi told her to go down and get food from the field that Boaz owned. Now Boaz, he was a mighty man of wealth. He was a rich man, so to speak. So now Ruth, she's down here getting She's down there in the fields of Boaz, and she's getting food, and she's helping to feed Naomi. Well, Boaz sees Ruth. In Ruth 2, verse 5, it says, Then said Boaz unto his servant, What was that was said over the reapers? Whose damsel is this? So now look it's this love story that a lot of you young women like to talk about or like to see maybe in a movie or in a book or or maybe on tv this is her here's a love story brewing here that Boaz sees Ruth and she's like well whose damsel is this whose young woman who who is this woman who's in my field he's got an eye for Ruth so now Ruth, eventually, as the story goes on, because of Naomi telling Ruth to go glean the food in Boaz's field, now Ruth and Boaz become, they get married. And now they're married. And now she's married to a rich man. She's no longer poor. She's married to a rich man. And God is really moving in Ruth's life. God is really helping Ruth. Now she's married to a rich man. Now they're married and then they had a child named Obed. If any of you young people want to name your child Obed, that would be awesome, right? Maybe not. So this young Ruth now, she has a child named Obed. Now Obed, what's the importance of Obed? Obed had a son named Jesse. Well, Jesse had a son named David. Now David, and that's our next young person that we'll talk about here in just a second. David eventually becomes the king of Israel. So Ruth had, Ruth's grandson, A great-grandson is now the king, will be eventually the king of Israel. So in Matthew chapter 1 verse 5, this is something interesting about Ruth. In Matthew chapter 1, I believe it's verses 2 through 17, The Bible lists out the family of Jesus Christ. It goes all the way back to Abraham and lists everybody that came in the family of Jesus, all the way from Abraham to Jesus. Well, there's four women mentioned in that family, and Ruth is one of the ones that's mentioned in that family in Matthew 1, verse 5. So you've got Ruth was mentioned, and Mary, of course, his mother was mentioned. So you think Ruth was mentioned. So there was some importance to Ruth. A young woman in the book of Ruth, one of the only books in the Bible, there's only two books in the Bible named after a woman, and Ruth has her own book about her love story with Boaz. And now that she had Obed, and Obed had Jesse, and Jesse eventually had King David, the mighty king, a king after God's own heart. And let's move right on into David. In 1 Samuel chapter 17, I know I may be moving quickly, but I'm not trying to linger too long. We're trying to do it pretty quick here, just trying to do some really quick recapping of what's going on with some of these young people in the Bible. In David's life, King David, he eventually became a king. But a lot of us know the story about David and Goliath, how David defeated Goliath. David was called a youth. A youth, that's us, young people. That's our youth department. That's all you young people that come up here on Wednesday night and hang out with me in the fellowship hall. That's all you young people. We call you the youth group. So this is David here. He's called a youth by King Saul in 1 Samuel 17, verse 33. It says, And Saul said to David, Thou art not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for thou art but a youth. And he a man of war from his youth. So he's saying, man, you're outmatched here. You're trying to fight this big giant, and you're just a little kid. Basically is what he's telling him. He's saying, you ain't able to do that. You're just a little kid, David. You're just too young. This old Goliath, man, he'll chew you up and swallow you, buddy, because you're so little. And he's so big. There's no way you can fight him. There's no way. And then David tells him about how he had He had killed a bear with his bare hands, I believe it was, or a lion, I'm sorry, a lion and a bear. And they were trying to steal his sheep from his father's flock and he killed a bear and he killed a lion at his young age. He's like, I ain't afraid of no giant. That's what David said. But what David said, ultimately what David said was this. Chapter and verse the mystery verse 45 and 46 This is what David said to the giant when the giant said you're just a youth He said you come over here, and I'll chew you up and spit you out pretty much He said you come over here, and I'll take care of you. You don't worry about that Well, this is what David said in verse 45. He said then said David to the Philistine. That's Goliath He said thou comest to me with a sword and with a spear and with a shield But I come to thee in the name of the Lord Behold the God of the armies of Israel whom thou hast defied this day will the Lord deliver thee into mine hand what David was saying is yeah I may be small but the God that I serve he's a lot bigger than you and the God that I serve is in control of everything and the God that I serve can take your life in a moment if he wanted to he's telling Goliath that you're nothing compared to my God. You think about in your life now, whatever you may be going through, maybe starting back to school, maybe you're a little nervous about it, maybe you're a little scared about going back to school, maybe you're struggling with going to school. Well remember this, the God that is with you is always with you. And you have nothing to be worried about, nothing to be afraid of, because God, this same God who helped David defeat Goliath, that giant that is in your life, Guess what? God can help you overcome that giant just like he helped David overcome this giant. Now we know the story that if David would have lost this battle, all the children of Israel would have became the slaves of the Philistines. But because David prevailed, The Philistines, they had to bow down to the children of Israel. It's all because of David trusting in the God, trusting in the Lord. I want you to just trust in the Lord. Now David, he went on, the Bible does refer to him as a man after God's own heart. Bible is very speaks very highly of David, but David done some things wrong to David's just like us we may do things wrong David had some flaws He done some things wrong But in the end David was a good king and he was a king a king and a man after God's own heart so young people Stick with God stick with him stay with God because he'll help you fight those giants in your life all right, so David went on to be the king of Israel now There's another woman the other book of the Bible is named after a woman is Esther now Esther she was She was a she was orphaned. She didn't have a parent. She didn't have parents. So she had to live with her uncle Mordecai well Mordecai they they eventually the king was looking for a queen and The king of Persia was looking for a queen. Well, he kind of had a bunch of women come up to kind of compete to be the queen of Persia. Story goes that the king really fell in love with Esther Esther became his queen and Listen, they were they were coming up the the people of Persia They were they were coming up against the the Jewish people of that time the Jews there that were the slaves of the Persians They were wanting to kill all the Jews. Well, eventually Esther being a Jew herself She eventually talked the king into saving all the Jewish people. So Esther, I mean, she was a young woman. The Bible even tells us that she was a young woman. She was young. It talked about the young women. He brought in a bunch of young women. She was a part of them, young women. But it was because of her, she saved the Jewish people. See, God used that. And God used Esther there to save His people. Because we know that in the Old Testament, if you don't know maybe, but in the Old Testament the Jewish people were God's people. And they still are today. God's chosen people. The Jewish people, the Israelites, the children of Israel, those are God's people. And God used Esther there to save His people. So God can use you young girl, you young woman, you young lady, you you can use you to do mighty things to if we just allow God to use us and The last one that I wanted to speak about was not even named in the Bible. I They didn't even name him in the Bible. And that's in John chapter 6 and verse 9. It says, there is a lad, well this is, we'll go back, backstory. Jesus has all these people following him. This is when Jesus was alive. Jesus has all these people following him. and wanting to listen to what he's saying, listen to what he's teaching, and see all the miracles that he's performing. He had 5,000 people following him at one time, at this point in time in the story. And it says in verse 9, they become hungry. You got 5,000 people there that are hungry. How many of you ever get hungry? I'm getting a little hungry right now. It's almost dinner time, right? So these 5,000 people are hungry. How are you going to feed 5,000 people, right? Whoa, you got these 12 disciples, and you got Jesus. How are they going to have enough food to feed 5,000 people? Well, the Bible says this in John 6, verse 9. It says, there is a lad here which had five barley loaves, which is five loaves of bread, and two small fish. But what are they among so many? So he's talking about this lad. That word lad is pretty much a boy. He's a boy. He might be 10 years old, like Nathan's going to be tomorrow night. Tomorrow's Nathan's birthday. He's going to be 10 years old. Maybe he was a 10-year-old boy. Maybe he was younger than that. Maybe he was a little bit older. The Bible doesn't say exactly how old he was. But he had five loaves of bread and two fish. Listen, he had five loaves of bread and two fish. Is that going to feed 5,000 people? Probably not, right? Probably not. So listen, what Jesus did, he took that five loaves of bread and two fish that that boy decided to give up. That boy gave what he had to Jesus. And what Jesus did was pray and bless that five loaves and two fish. And I'll tell you, the Bible says that everybody there ate. Everybody there had food and had plenty of food. Everybody ate enough food and had plenty of it that they had even took up leftovers. They'd even had some food left over after Jesus had blessed it and done a miracle. Definitely, he'd done a miracle with what this little boy had given. So my point on that would be that if we would give God what we have, or give Jesus what we have, He can do miraculous things through you. No matter how old you are, no matter what you do, no matter whatever you have, He can do miraculous things through you. And that might not mean giving Him your stuff. That might not mean giving Him your possessions or the things that you own. That might mean giving Him yourself. A lot of times, listen, we need to submit our lives to Jesus Christ, all of us, no matter how old we are. This is the goal for, this is my goal for every young person. It would be my goal for every young person, but especially the young people of the West Side Baptist Church, is that every single one of you, you decide to be like this lad and give Jesus your life. You give everything to him. Everything. I want you to give your life to Him and let Him use you in mighty ways. He will bless you. He will do miraculous things through you. And that's what I want is for all our young people to give their lives to Jesus Christ and let Jesus use you. Listen, I was a young person in this youth group. I grew up in this youth group. I think I started coming to this church when I was three years old. And I grew up in this youth group, and it's nothing that I've done. It's all because of God. It's all because of Him. But I'm here today standing and teaching and telling you about these heroes of the Bible, all because of what Jesus does through me. It's nothing that I do. It's nothing that I can do on my own. If you'd have told me When I was a teenager in this youth group, you're going to stand one Wednesday night and talk to people on the internet about Jesus. I'd be like, you're crazy. No way. But listen, what God can do with somebody like me He's got me here tonight telling people about Jesus. And Josh, he's the same way. You've heard him talk before. He grew up in this youth group. You may be the next person that 20 years from now, you may be standing here on a Wednesday night talking to a camera to all the people on Facebook. Or it might be something different then. You might be the one. Because God can use any one of you, and He will if you just allow Him to do so. So tonight, no matter what stage of life you're in, no matter whether you're young, no matter whether you're middle-aged, no matter if you're older, no matter what, God would love to use you for His glory. And all we have to do is submit our lives to Him and trust in Him. That's the little lesson tonight. I know it was kind of basic, but I wanted to keep it brief so the young people can keep their attention maybe a little bit better. But maybe you parents, if you want to or would like to, maybe you can write down these verses and maybe you could go over some of these stories with these young people. And maybe, young people, if you have another hero of the Bible that maybe I didn't mention, Now, don't say Jesus, because Jesus is everybody's hero. I want to challenge you a little bit, but if you've got another hero that you'd like to talk to me about next Wednesday, come talk to me about it. I'd love to hear it and maybe, like I said, we can work up some prizes or something. And maybe if you just want to talk more about, want to come talk to me more about these heroes that I've mentioned here tonight, hey, come talk to me about those. We'd love to talk to you about anything in the Bible. We'd love to talk to you about anything, period. We'd love to talk to you about the Bible for sure. All right? You all have a good evening, and let's go to Lord in prayer. Dear Lord, we thank you for this night. We thank you for these heroes of the Bible, these young heroes of the Bible who you worked miraculously through. you work through to see that your will would be done in the lives of many, many, many people. Lord, there were so many people that benefited from these young people of the Bible, and what they had done, and what You had done through them. Lord, I pray that You'd help us to realize that You can do mighty works through us too, if we would just allow You. I pray that You'd help us, Lord, to submit our lives to You, and put our faith and trust in You, and follow You all of our lives. Lord, I pray that You'd help us to give our lives to You, and You use us the way that You see fit, the way that You would want to use us. Lord, we praise you tonight. We thank you, Lord, that you're a great God, an amazing God, who's done so many great and wonderful things. Lord, not just in the lives of these people, but in the lives of the people of the Westside Baptist Church, and the lives of the people all across the world, Lord, who put their faith and trust in you. We thank you for all that you do and your faithfulness to us. We love you, dear God. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.