Welcome to the Gospel Truth Project podcast.
I am your host, Jason.
I usually have my co-host here, Dylan, with me, but this time I'm actually by myself.
This isn't a common occurrence.
There's actually going to be a lot more podcasts that are just me or just Dylan or both of
us together.
The main reason behind that is because, interestingly enough, our times have just been so hard to
match up to where we can both do this together, sit down for an hour, and actually push through
on these podcasts.
I really want to start doing some bonus episodes with just me or bonus episodes with just him.
That way we can fill the gaps between us being able to record together, kind of give you
some more backstory to what we're going to be doing as well.
I know this is like season two and we had a lot of plans and life has just been absolutely
chaotic for both sides of us.
I've been traveling and he has a kid on the way.
There's a lot of things that are moving pieces that keep us busy.
He literally gets off of work when I go on to work.
There's a lot of backs and forths that we have an issue with in the long sense of being
like, okay, well, we can't do it that way.
We can't do this.
We can't do that.
How about this?
How about that?
There's been a lot of discussion.
There's been a lot of backs and forths.
What we can do, what we should do, how do we proceed?
We definitely want to continue with the Gospel Truth Project and make it something to where
people can tune in to listen to and hopefully get some information that they haven't learned
before or get deeper understanding about who God is and how God can interact in their life
and how they can show God love back and that kind of stuff.
We want to help people grow and relationship wise with God, with Jesus.
That's been our mission from the beginning and we've definitely changed some ideology
in the sense of how we're going to layer and structure Gospel Truth Project.
So first off, before I get into what I'm talking about today, I wanted to talk about all that,
obviously.
But the other thing is I wanted to mention that the big thing is that we're going to
be pushing to become a nonprofit.
Gospel Truth Project is going to be pushing to become a nonprofit so that anything that's
donated to us we can use to actually donate 100% to different causes and different churches
or different people who are struggling or suffering.
We really want to create something that will actually be impactful, not just on a verbal
side but actually something that does help people who are hurt.
I know before we were thinking about like, oh well what if we just put a certain percentage
over to donations so that way we can manage it a little bit better or easier or whatever.
But then in the long run it came down to we should donate everything.
Everything that we get from this because it's not our ministry, it's God's ministry and
it's His Word, His life, His Gospel, His Truth.
And we can't look at that and try to profit off of it.
And I don't want to profit off of it.
Honestly I really don't.
I really want to create something that just makes it easy for people to learn more about
Him without having any regards to us on the back end getting funds for this or that.
I'd rather pay for it out of my pocket like the podcasting fee, the website fees, all
that stuff.
I'd rather cover that myself if I know that I am doing it for God and because He wants
us to share more of the Gospel, etc.
So any proceeds that we do get are going to go 100% to charities and we're going to put
up charity this, charity that.
We're doing it through this charity this time.
We're doing it for this charity that time.
I'll be working on getting the certifications or whatever is needed on the back end to make
sure that we are an official nonprofit.
So anyways that's just kind of updates.
I know it took like what five minutes of your time.
Those are just kind of updates and this episode is going to be a bonus episode.
I think it's going to go on to iTunes first.
So if you're there listening, thank you for being part of the iTunes group.
Otherwise it's just going to be launched everywhere.
It's just all know I wanted to create an episode where I discuss some of this stuff so everybody
who does listen can have an update.
And then once that's done, we can I can kind of go into some Bible stuff that's been kind
weighing on me a little bit more recently, just kind of things that I've been reading
and been discussing and been seeing on my tick tock feeds and you know, this stuff.
So I'm really excited to keep moving forward.
I'm really excited to well just be on here.
Actually I do a lot of like streaming and a lot of other stuff on the side that I tend
to talk a lot.
And even though it's just by myself, we'll be fine.
So yeah, anyways, I wanted to I got a verse this morning and it put me onto a whole not
tangent, but like a whole rabbit trail basically of just some good stuff that I wanted to share
with everybody and just discuss.
And this is going to be a shorter episode, obviously, because I'm the only one here that's
just for this time.
We also I will say because I just remembered future episodes, we do have some guests planned.
So there will be guests being added into the podcast.
It will be me and Dylan and the guests or Dylan, the guest and I, I guess is the better
more correct way to say it.
So there's going to be guests.
We want to start adding things.
We're going to start doing a little bit more.
Again, it's just going to come down to making sure our schedules line up a little bit better.
And I think next month, if you don't know what month it is for me, it's April right
now.
But I think for next month, which is going to be May, it's going to be a lot more beneficial
where we can actually work together a lot clearer with schedules a lot clearer schedules.
So because next month I'll be getting off the same time he gets off.
So it should work a lot better.
And we should actually have some more episodes out where we're both talking and doing what
we do.
So anyways, kind of get into it.
You know, I was I know that some people heard about Mari Mari.
She's an amazing, I would say, prophet or I would say teacher or I would say speaker
of who God is.
And he's a great representative of Christ.
And you know, I love listening to his sermons.
I love listening to just how passionate he is about Jesus and just how loving and caring
that man is.
So it's it's cool to see that, you know, even after he was, I don't know if you know, but
he was attacked.
And even after he was attacked, he got up and immediately put his hand on the person
that attacked him and just prayed for him.
Like he was he just I'll pray for you like that was it.
And it's so cool to just see someone who talks about God live that lifestyle where, you know,
we are to be loving, we are to be like, hey, like, you're hurting.
Let me pray for you kind of thing.
Like, you know, in that kind of context where people are just like they they're going through
things and a lot of people forget that the person you looking at the person you did look
at or did see walked by or drove by or whatever their life is just as complex and complicated
as your life.
Our thoughts are just as complicated and complex as your thoughts.
And this this makes it a lot more.
I don't know if the word real is the best term, but it definitely adds a layer for you
to process or even for me to process to be like, OK, so, you know, my perspective on
a situation might not always be accurate in the sense of like what they're going through.
Or if they say something, I'm like, oh, that was rude.
You know, on their side, they might have not meant it to be that way at all.
That's just what they thought was the right thing to say or something.
I don't know.
And that's something that that changes how you interact with people.
Like my my goal is to be more caring, be more loving in the sense of what God defines as
love and understand that people are hurting.
People are trying to find things to fill voids in their life or trying to fill that desire
to feel good or feel happy or feel peace.
And everybody is doing something to, you know, feel better about their situation, about their
circumstance, et cetera.
And that's the kind of crazy thing.
Like I realized over time, like at first, when I was a lot younger, I was like, oh,
I have this, I'll be happier if I had this, I'll be happier if I had this, et cetera,
et cetera.
And it just kept coming back to where it's like, OK, so I thought that if I had this,
I'd be happier.
And I was I was happy for a bit.
And then, you know, I felt that sad kind of like emptiness again.
And then I was like, OK, so what can I do to fix that?
Oh, well, I'll just buy this thing.
This thing will make me feel better or feel good about it, too.
And I just kept going from thing to thing, trying to find things that I could buy or
have or do that would make me feel good.
That would make me feel like, hey, I'm doing something with my life.
Hey, I'm I'm doing the right thing.
Or this thing will amplify my talents, like music wise and stuff like that or whatever.
I was doing things to make life better from my perspective.
And that was consistent.
And everybody does that.
And whether they think about others in that perspective or not is different per person.
But this gets a point to where each individual person is just trying to live a life that
benefits them in some way.
And that is just that's human nature.
And with that, this brought up a lot of things for me in an attention wise to like pay attention
to.
So like when people do something and I'm like, hmm, that was that didn't seem like a good
thing to do.
I can't just immediately look at that.
And like if like for a friend of mine, let's say a friend of mine offends me or does something
that I don't like and they know it and they do it anyway.
I mean, I got to look at that and be like, hmm, I wonder, you know, they're a friend
of mine.
We get along.
We work great together.
Why did they do this?
Or why did that happen?
You know, or did they forget?
Did they know where they trying to get me riled up or were they trying to get me mad?
Or what was what's going on here?
Because this isn't normal for this situation or this relationship to be that way.
And it's better because now I kind of look at it where someone does something and I hear
a friend of mine or family members like, can you believe they did this?
And I'm like, hmm, that's not like them.
So what's that?
That's hmm.
I wonder what's going on.
And they're like, well, don't defend them.
I'm like, no, no, I'm not defending them.
There's just that's not normal.
That doesn't sound right.
Like, I wonder why they're doing that.
Maybe they are just doing it because they want to be doing something bad or wrong or
they got fed up or maybe I said something that I didn't realize offended them.
So it just changes my mentality to, you know, pay attention to people around me that I'm
not the center of the world.
God is Jesus is his love is his light is.
And when I look at other people, I got to realize that everybody tends to put themselves
at the center of their own world.
And when I change and shift that to where God is the center, all of a sudden, everybody
around me is just their people living their life, trying to do the best they can with
the resources they've got and the life that they were raised up in.
And it's a whole different perspective.
And I think overall, it's just it's really cool to see that.
God's opened this up for me a lot as well, kind of like teaching me, I guess, is a great
way to say it, to understand other people so that I can love them better or love them
more.
You know, and, you know, it's cool because I was on I think it was Instagram.
I don't remember Reels and Tiktok and all those things kind of blend together a little
bit sometimes.
Or even the Facebook on Facebook, you can scroll through Reels too.
But I was scrolling through and somebody, this artist, very, very, very talented artist
was showing off their artwork.
And I was looking at it, I was like, wow, that's really cool.
But it was like super demonic looking and a lot of like pentagram stuff and really not
so good stuff.
But the thing about it was that I was looking at I was like, this person is so talented
and they are using that talent.
But if they used it for God, this talent would just go way beyond what they could imagine
because they're glorifying the one who gave it to them.
And I was like, wow, this talent is so cool.
And I love that.
And I think that that's really cool, be able to look at that, even though it was something
completely demonic.
And this artwork was just not really God like or anything like that.
But I was able to look at that and just be like, wow, this person is talented, very,
very talented.
I would love it if they knew God and knew who gave them that talent and who helped them
get that talent to where it's at and experience the love and peace that they could experience
from God and grow that talent even more so and give that talent back to God in the sense
of doing it for him.
And that was something that was like a little bit different because before I would just
like scroll by like years before.
I'm talking like a long time ago.
Like I remember when I would see that stuff and be like, you, you, you or scroll by or
like, oh, gross or oh, man, that's horrible or whatever.
But I see the person behind the actions a lot more now where I can see that and be like,
huh, you know, this person, they just don't know.
They don't know who God is.
They don't they don't know the peace that God brings and the love that he brings and
just the overwhelming just all around peace and love and comfort.
And I don't know.
It's just it's just really cool to see the perspective that God's given to me because
I've been trying to get closer to him, like reading more and and other stuff that I'm
doing.
But it's just cool to see that perspective.
And I highly recommend anybody listening to this is like you look at the people around
you differently in the sense of like, don't look at them by like the the evil that's in
front of them, the stuff that that's happened because of that.
But look at them like they're a person, a human being worth the same that you are.
But they're struggling.
They might be struggling with this or that or they have a complex life.
They were raised in a really abusive home.
You don't know.
You don't know if they were raised in a way that they had to deal with things that most
people don't.
We don't know if they had to go through whatever.
Like there's so many things that can change your perspective on life by growing up and
dealing with different things as you grow up.
And even if it's an accident that you were involved in or there's so many things, there's
so many so many lists of things that can change.
Everybody has a different perspective on life because of how they lived up until this point.
So when people are doing things that are wrong or people who have done things that are just
not of God or not godly or not OK, you there are people who are dealing with things, struggling
and just trying to do the best that they think that they are doing.
And you know, I pray for them.
Like I want I want them to experience true foundation that gives them peace of mind,
that gives them strength to move on to the next day, that gives them love that they probably
or maybe didn't feel from friends or family as they grew up or where they're at now.
And you know, I really do hope that they receive who God is.
And so at that point, it's like, well, what does that look like?
And that's a that's a great question, because if.
You know, I saw this tick tock and I was reading to the comments on it because it was about
teaching and preaching.
And there was a guy on the street with a megaphone saying, like, God loves you.
Don't don't leave.
You know, don't leave this world without knowing him kind of thing.
And people were commenting back and forth.
There's people saying, this is ridiculous.
Do this.
This isn't how God did it.
Or people would say, yeah, you do it, man.
Just don't know.
You're a monger.
You know, there was like, don't do this, do this, don't do this, do this, and so
et cetera.
And know what?
I it's kind of brought up a point where.
It's kind of brought up more ideas of like, well, OK, so let's let's look at this.
What what are we called to do that know the truth?
That know God, who know Jesus and know that he lived and he died and he rose again and
then he's going to come back.
But when he comes back, it's with judgment to to bring his people home kind of thing.
Like how do how do we talk to people about this?
And you know, this is real quick.
This is a way different topic than what I originally was going to go to, but that's
OK.
So like I'll we'll go this we'll go this route because I think that's this is good.
But how do you how do me or people who know the truth, how do we discuss this with people?
And you know, it's really easy to say, oh, you know, the best way to do it is just to
stand in front of people and just say Jesus loves you.
Jesus loves you.
And that is the solution to everything is just saying Jesus loves you.
But that's not enough because how how do what does what does that mean?
Like what does that mean?
Jesus loves you.
Like why does that matter?
Why did why should somebody walking on the street care?
They don't have the Holy Spirit in them that helps them with their daily lives.
They don't have that access because that's something that you get when you are saved.
So what does that look like?
What are we supposed to do about it?
How do we share the word of God?
And you know, sometimes it's easy as you know, talking to people and just being like, hey,
I believe in God.
I believe in Jesus and who he is.
And yeah, and it's just like, OK, so what do I you know, what do we do?
It's this is where sorry, I got distracted with the text message.
But this is what our mission is.
It's like, how do we talk to people?
And it could be as simple as just saying, hey, I know Jesus.
I don't know if you know Jesus.
And if you ever have questions, I'm here because I know that a lot of people have questions,
et cetera, et cetera.
And you know, I had that conversation with somebody a long time ago, a long, long time
ago where I was like, oh, OK, so.
So it was like, OK, so what do I do with blank or blank, et cetera?
Like I had a friend who was super, super hardcore atheist.
He's younger dude, though he was very young.
He just he came from a very, very strict Catholic church and they really didn't help him understand
who God is.
And they were most religions out there are do this to get saved or do this to be saved.
And most people's perspective on Christianity or religion in general is going to be do this
to get this.
And that's most of like everything is do this to get this, et cetera.
So yeah, so that's just something interesting.
I this younger person I used to talk to, hardcore atheist, would always make fun of me.
But we did hang out for most of it.
We worked a lot together, et cetera.
And you know, there was times where he would say, well, what do you think about this?
Like just kind of like trying to get me in a gotcha like you should think for yourself
kind of thing.
And you know, it worked.
It worked out because then I would respond and he was like, well, well, well, that why
do you think that then?
And then he would actually ask a genuine question.
I think a lot of this comes back down to how how are we talking about God?
Like I wasn't sitting there trying to argue with him.
He's like, oh, I'm an atheist.
I'm like, well, why are you an atheist?
Like I wasn't trying to make fun of him or anything.
I was like, OK, well, I'm a Christian.
Like if you ever have questions about the Bible, who God is, like I know that I'm here.
Like I'm always happy to talk about it.
And you know, I wasn't trying to be pushy.
I wasn't trying to be like, hey, crazy, crazy thing here, blah, blah, blah, whatever.
But I think I think it was really helpful in the long run because he still to this day,
years after not seeing him, like nine years after not seeing him, he still comes around
and says something snarky every once in a while just to see what I would say.
And sometimes he's like, interesting.
I don't think about it like, you know, that kind of thing.
So yeah, it's just kind of one of those things where it's like, all right, dang, that's crazy.
Like cool that just a little thing of like, hey, this is this is who I am.
If you ever have questions and it just sparks conversation even years after years of not
knowing him or seeing him or knowing who he is, it's just like, wow, it's crazy.
So anyways, kind of get back on track here.
I kind of changed shifts here because originally I was going to talk about what does a relationship
with Christ look like for us individually.
But I think I don't I don't know.
I think this is going to be more important to talk about.
How do we how do we talk to people about God?
How do we discuss this?
Like, how do we even get talking about it?
Because I remember seeing that tick tock and yeah, I just it's one of those things that's
like, oh, man, I could just see.
You know, this tick tock of this guy out there and they have signs like you're going to hell.
Repent repenting is good.
I'm not saying it's not, but like there's a place to where you don't fear monger.
You know, you don't fear monger this kind of thing to be like, hey, you should do this
because you're going to burn.
People don't respond well to fear mongering.
And you know, the reality is, is that we we should be talking to people about what who
Jesus is.
That's the most important part of the story is who Jesus is.
Why is he important?
Why is he different than other people?
And like Muslims even put it where like where Isa, Jesus and there when they talk about
him and like, why was he different when all the other prophets died, but Jesus went to
heaven alive?
Like, why is that specific?
And same with the Christian Bible, like the actual texts and stuff from, you know, way
back in the day in first century and of Jesus life, et cetera.
Like you have all these like that's e-school stuff like that.
But you have a lot of context to Jesus, even outside sources of who Jesus was and saying
like, oh, yeah, he was a man.
He did stuff.
You people persecuted him, killed him on the cross.
Five hundred witnesses came back and said, oh, yeah, he's alive, which is weird.
Five hundred plus witnesses roll like this guy.
Jesus, they killed on the cross.
He's he's still alive.
What happened?
So anyways, I want to talk a couple of verses real quick because I don't want to take up
too much of your time.
I know you kind of talking a little bit, just kind of stuff that I've seen and been dealing
with.
And so in the long run, what does what does the Bible talk about for what are we to do?
Like what are we supposed to do?
So Matthew, I wanted to bring up Matthew twenty eight, nineteen, if you don't know what that
is, go there for make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the
Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
It's the great commission.
If you want to read the context, it's Matthew twenty eight, sixteen verses through twenty.
So sixteen through twenty, that context actually describes Jesus commissioning the eleven remaining
disciples on the Mount Mountain and Galilee, if you didn't know.
And he had given them a message to meet him there.
Now he he appears and commands them to make disciples from all the people of all the nations
of the earth.
He calls on them to baptize these disciples in the name of the Father, the Son and the
Holy Spirit, which right there is one of the things that we talk about for the Trinity
in that sense.
But he goes on to say they must also teach these new believers to obey everything Jesus
has commanded them to do.
And Matthew ends the book with Jesus promised to always be with those who believe in him.
So when you get to Matthew twenty eight, nineteen, the reason why I want to bring this up because
it talking about going out and making disciples in Matthew's story of Jesus, these are his
parting words to his eleven remaining disciples, verse eighteen through twenty, and are often
called the Great Commission.
Like I was I usually call it the Great Commission.
Most people call it the Great Commission because Jesus is sending his hand chosen disciples
out into the world to accomplish a specific mission, right, to make more disciples.
This comes with like some noteworthy inclusions.
But what is also crucial are things with Jesus, which Jesus does not say.
So specifically, the disciples are to make more disciples of all nations, like all people,
people from like every group and ethnicity on earth.
And through Jesus, God's relationship with humanity has moved beyond Israel to include
people from every corner of the world who comes to the father through the son, who is
Jesus.
Jesus's command here is to make disciples.
Now a disciple is someone who becomes like his or her master by living in a servant relationship
to him.
They learn from and submit to that person's example.
Basically, that's that's what each of the eleven disciples hearing this for the first
time had done and to answer Jesus's call.
And is now what they will invite others to participate in from around the world.
So discipleship to Jesus involves at least two things.
Jesus mentions in this command, baptism and obedience.
Those are important.
So disciples are commanded to baptize new disciples in the name of the Father, Son and the Holy
Spirit.
And then the choice to be publicly baptized is evidence that someone has believed in Jesus
and made the commitment to follow him.
The disciples were given the authority to baptize that person in the name of God, declaring
that person's position in the eternal family of God.
So one one thing, one thing that's really important as well.
Is that with baptism, we'll get into the baptism part because a lot of people say, well, you
can't if you're baptized in water, if you haven't been, then you're not saved.
I don't there's baptism when it comes to under God, under Christ.
I'll go into verses about it, but it's baptism of the Holy Spirit.
We do the baptism in water to show others that we've making that commitment.
So baptism of the Holy Spirit is the new standard to salvation.
You aren't saved without the Holy Spirit and you only get the Holy Spirit once you accepted
Christ.
So you are baptized in the Holy Spirit that you are cleansed at that point because you
have repented or ask forgiveness for the things that you're done, etc.
So that's like an important part of it.
But anyways, talk about this verse.
I'll get into that later, but we also did a whole episode on it.
I definitely recommend going back and listening to it if we did.
It's been so many episodes.
I always forget which ones we done.
But anyways, in this verse, it's notable that Jesus does not command his disciples to, you
know, print Bibles or anything similar.
The written word of God is our ultimate reference for matters of faith.
You can read that in First Corinthians, four, six or Acts 17, 11.
It was intended for that purpose by God, which is in Second Timothy three, 16 to 17.
Yeah, it is not meant to be the only means or even the primary means by which new Christians
learn about the faith, which you can read in Acts eight, 32, 31.
The primary work of the Great Commission is to make disciples, which means the cooperative
mentoring process we now do refer to as discipleship.
More on discipleship, you can go to Acts 18, 24 to 28 and then Hebrews 10, 25 and then
Hebrews 13, 7.
This all talks about that and what discipleship looks like, etc.
This is just something important for this versus that this is what they were called
to do and then continue on.
And this was like why I was saying the Great Commission is important.
So that's something that I think is a good verse to talk about because it's really easy
to just look at it.
Oh, just baptize, make disciples.
That's it.
But there's so much more to it when you start looking into what the words are, what they
mean and how they're being referenced to other verses, etc.
So yeah, I think that that's something important.
So I wanted to also talk about Matthew 24.
If you don't know the context here, Matthew 24 verse 14, which the context is verse one
to 14.
So that whole passage right there is all the context.
So the verse 14, though, this is why I'm focusing on this is this good news of the kingdom will
be proclaimed in all the world as a testimony to all nations and then the end will come.
Now I know a lot of people talk about this and saying like, hey, this is a prophecy for
end times, like if the good news of the kingdom can be proclaimed to all the world at once,
then the end will come shortly.
Like that's the whole thing is that it's coming after that.
Well, at the moment, we're kind of in a place to where we have Internet, we have access
to billions and billions of people to just share all this stuff, etc.
It's crazy.
It's absolutely crazy.
But it's really cool to see that we have that capability.
But anyways, the context numbering for verse one to 14, I want to touch on that first before
I get into more about this verse.
It follows Jesus and the disciples out of the temple.
And this comes after his devastating criticism of the scribes and the Pharisees in Chapter
23.
Christ predicts a moment where the temple will be destroyed without one stone left on
another.
Later, his disciples asked for more information about these future events, obviously, and
Jesus describes a season in which the world will be in turmoil, but then that alone will
not be proof that the end has come.
His disciples will be persecuted, killed, hated for his name, and false prophets will
rise and some of them will fall away from the faith.
We let us stray, I guess is the best way to put it.
So that's kind of the context here.
And so when you get to verse 14, which is the last bit of the context for this, this
case, Jesus described difficult times to come for those who followed Jesus after he leaves
the earth, which is John 16, five to seven.
He has pointed to an era of intense persecution, death, hatred for any association with Jesus
and his name.
And many who seem to be true believers will fall away in response to the teaching of false
prophets.
Their lawlessness will increase, many will grow coldly on unloving, etc.
You can read that more in Matthew.
Well, actually, in this section, read it in Matthew 24, three to 13.
You just read any the whole context of one to 14, you'll see what I'm talking about.
But still, none of this will stop the proclamation of the gospel in the kingdom, right?
The word gospel here means good news.
So the good news, Jesus has been preaching about the kingdom of heaven is that it is
coming and will soon be here.
And he himself is the king and he will reign forever.
You can see that in Matthew 417, Matthew 1343 and Matthew 2629.
So letters written by apostles such as John, Peter, Paul will give more specific details
about the astounding kingdom of God, which is awesome.
And the message Jesus disciples preached to the world was what all who put their faith
in Jesus will receive the grace of God.
Acts 412 for that one.
And God will take Jesus' death on the cross as payment for the sins for those who believe,
right?
So that's Romans 623, if you want to look that up too.
And then and we'll give them credit for the perfectly righteous life Jesus has lived,
which is 2 Corinthians 521.
If you want to see that specific backing.
But in short, the good news is that all who accept Christ are welcome to the kingdom of
heaven through faith in the Son of God, which you can see in Ephesians 2, 8 through 9 puts
it out pretty plain and simply.
But aside from Judas, the men to whom Jesus speaks, Matthew 24, 3, if you this whole context
did indeed remain faithful through process persecution.
They succeeded in launching the delivery of the gospel throughout the world as a testimony
to all nations.
They did not complete the work.
However, Bible teachers tend to debate when and if the whole world has been reached with
the gospel of the kingdom, though all agree that this good news has reached the vast majority
of the earth.
And like I said before, at this point, we're at this place to where we can reach practically
like majority of the world at this point with a message because we have technology.
The question, though, matters because Jesus prophesied that when the gospel had been proclaimed
to all nations, the end would come, meaning that he would return as king and judge.
And this was his partial answer to his disciples about a sign that the end of the age was near.
And again, this is where, you know, for me, someone who studies eschatology, like based
on the Bible and what the Bible says about the end times, this is just something where
you can see is everything's kind of falling into place.
And it's really important that when you're getting to the point to where you start seeing
things from way back then like this, where it's like everybody will know, will be able
to get preached the gospel to the gospel be preached to everybody and all nations.
And it's really crazy to think that, you know, I can send a message.
And you know, even if I decided to pay for the message or whatever, it can reach everywhere.
Like all around the world, it can reach every all these different nations.
Like it's insane to see that we have that kind of technology power kind of thing.
And with, you know, satellites going up for satellite internet, you'll be able to access
internet and be online anywhere in the world.
And this makes it to where everybody around the world period could hear the gospel and
the good news.
And it's just crazy to think like we're so close to this being a reality.
Crazy cool.
But yeah, that's something that I wanted to talk about as well for that verse.
Also you know, like I said before, Great Commission, there's a summary of the Great Commission.
I will touch on it a little bit.
It's Mark 16 15.
If you go to Mark 16 15, it says, if you don't know it, it says, then he said to him, go
into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.
Right?
So this verse, so this verse, it's the context is 14 to 20.
It's is it's kind of covered in Matthew 28.
Like I was talking before, this part is also covered in that Luke 24 36 to 43, John 20
19 to 19, 19 to 29.
Sorry.
It's interesting because the disciples finally realized like Jesus will not overthrow the
Romans like they were hoping, but they will and they would not rule from the 12 thrones
or at least not yet in that sense.
You can see that Matthew 19 28.
But but they had to work spread the message that Jesus died for the sins of the world
and is had and risen and was risen and and is risen.
I guess is the best way to say it.
And in this mission, they will be able to perform miracles and do our dangers that would
normally kill them.
That kind of thing.
If you read the context, it's really it's really cool to see what they discussed there.
But yeah, this is just a summary of the Great Commission.
It's just saying the commission where it said go for make disciples of all the nations,
etc.
So there's a lot of talk about this verse.
Actually, it's kind of interesting talking about like it was like a later footnote kind
of thing, but yeah, so the disciples here, they cannot fulfill the Great Commission under
their own power.
They needed permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which they cannot have until Jesus
leaves, which was John 16 seven.
Soon at Pentecost in the house in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit will come, which was acts
to one to four.
And then the disciples who had scattered when guards came to arrest Jesus.
You can see that Mark 1450 will welcome the chance to go to trial to testify about Jesus,
which is an acts for one to 31.
Brash, impulsive Peter, as he was, was the first preacher of the gospel, which was acts
to 14 to 41.
And the gospel was spread through all the world.
So the word here proclaim that's important because going to all the world and proclaim
the gospel, preach the gospel.
The word there proclaim is actually from the Greek word carousel, which Jesus command is
akin to a herald shouting out what is needed to be heard.
All is from the Greek word root pass, which can mean each and every, or it can mean some
of all types, which is interesting because this puts it in perspective that could be
some of some of the like all types, so it could be read as all the nations and some
of the people are most of people, but all the nations creation is from the Greek Greek
root word to this.
I can't, I don't remember how to say it.
KTIS, I S if you want to translate, right.
And can mean anything created on created or it can mean a foundation or a founding of
a new thing.
The disciples are called a preach to the truth to the people and places that will start the
church.
So really cool summary mark, but I think this is important because so what does what does
that mean?
And I want to make this clear to is that we can't, you know, I don't know the best way
to put this.
Give me a couple of seconds here.
Okay, so I'm going to put it this way because I think it's important to know, you know,
I had a friend that was that believed in God and read his word.
But anytime anybody talked about God or made fun of God or, you know, any of the atheist
friends would just like yell blasphemies or whatever.
They're just like, yeah, whatever the Christian, whatever, you know, they would make fun of
Christianity, etc.
He would just sit there and just say, yeah, yeah.
Like, he wouldn't say anything.
And they would be like, aren't you a Christian?
He was like, I believe I'll believe a lot of it.
And they just like laugh and move on and go do their own thing.
Let's go play video games, whatever.
And you know, he this friend came to me and was like, I don't know what to do.
Like, like when that happens more and more now, and I don't know how to deal with it.
And I wish Dylan was on this recording because I'm going to talk about the verse that he
loves so much.
And he actually has a tattoo of it because he loves it so much.
Romans 1 16 is a great verse to talk about.
In this instance, if you don't know, the context is actually 16 and 17 for this verse, one
Romans 1 16 and 17.
It's just often used as as the key verses to summarize the book of Romans, basically,
because Paul declares boldly why he is not ashamed of the gospel about Jesus and that
he preaches around the world.
And this message is not nothing less than the power of God for everyone who believes,
both Jews and Gentiles.
And it is about being declared righteous by God because of our faith in him.
Right.
And so with this verse, many, many Bible teachers described this famous verse like it's it's
a big 116.
You can probably find 116 on a lot of albums and a lot of artists on a lot of tattoos.
You'll find this on like a lot of books.
You'll find it on a lot of like even restaurants out there have 116 on the bottom because it
is just like little bits of hints to things of this verse.
It's really it's really popular.
But together with the one which follows the central theme of the book of Romans, like
I said, it's kind of like a summary.
Paul in the previous verse expresses his eagerness to come and preach the gospel in the great
multicultural city of Rome is what's going on.
But Paul declares here boldly that he is not ashamed of the gospel.
Perhaps his he sensed that some of the Christians in Rome were tempted to be ashamed about it.
There may have been very few Christians in Rome because given time.
Oh, the verse itself.
I'm so sorry.
I read it, but it says for I'm not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God
for salvation to everyone who believes first to the Jew and also to the Greek.
The great truths about Christ seem new and absurd to many people in Rome.
That was kind of what was going on.
And Christians were being persecuted.
It's one thing to believe in the gospel.
It's another thing to take the risk of preaching it to strangers, which is very true.
So Paul will not have he Paul didn't want to have any of that.
He was like none of that.
The gospel message is nothing less than the power from God for everyone who believes it
to be saved.
Anyone, everyone who puts their faith in Christ and his death for their sin on the cross will
be justified, will be made right with God and welcomed into God's family.
And that is all true.
When Paul had staked his life on it more than once, then what is there to be ashamed of?
Paul continues this that the salvation from God by faith in Christ is for the Jews first
and also for the Greek.
In this context, Greek is similar to the meaning of Gentile as a reference to all the non-Jewish
people of the world.
So why for the Jews first is a good question.
In this instance, Paul will spend a lot of time on the concept in this letter.
Jesus said simply that salvation is from the Jews, which you can see in John 4 22.
Paul's letter will show that God prioritized the Jews first in revealing that all can be
saved by faith in Christ.
Though they rejected that message as a nation, obviously at that point, many Jewish people
did indeed trust in Christ for their salvation, starting with Jesus, 12 Jewish disciples,
for example.
So this explains in part why Paul often began his work in a new city by preaching in the
Jewish synagogues before moving out to preach to the Gentiles, which Acts 13 5 you can see
example.
It's true that Christ sent Paul to preach to all nations, but he also commissioned Paul
to preach about him to the children of Israel, which was in Acts 9 15, if you don't know
it.
So these are really important.
These are really important.
In the long run, this shows that we're supposed to be confident.
If we really believe this is the message, then we should be confident in sharing it
and give our life to God and talk about it.
And that's something that's really important.
And in this instance, again, we have a situation where we see that it's very forward to say
that we are to be bold in that sense.
And we can see that the idea there was to preach to the people, the Jews who, if you
don't know, Jesus fulfilled the Jewish prophecies and was the salvation to what the Jews were
waiting for because of prophecies from the Torah, the old prophets like Isaiah, etc,
etc.
David did some and you go back and you're like, oh, wow, okay.
So Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of Savior as was written hundreds of years before Jesus
and fulfilled these prophecies.
And so he is the Messiah.
He is Christ, the Christ.
And so that was the whole thing with Jesus.
And if we believe that, then we can stand firm in that and be like, this is the good
message.
The good news is that Jesus came fulfilled the prophecies of the Messiah from the Jewish
nation from Jewish culture and fulfilled the prophecies is the Messiah as proclaimed.
He is God in the flesh, and then with that, he led the perfect life as a human, as a man,
and then died, rose again, and showed himself to over 500 plus people to show that he did
live like live again, and then was brought up to heaven.
And the whole thing was that we have faith in him, that his life on earth, we have faith
in him, and that he came to die and rose again, that he would cover that sin that we deal
with and that he would be paying for our sins, that his life was as payment so that now we
are our life is made right within Christ because of Christ in his life.
I guess that's the best way to put it.
So the good news, the good news overall is that he loves us so much that he died and
rose again, and obviously I can go straight to John 3 16 and 17 and read through there
because that's really easy to do.
And I love the those verses.
Obviously they're probably some of the most famous verses of all time.
I think let me see here and let me just check my notes for this because I will say this
I'll add on one more verse.
I'll do one more verse because I think this is important and then I'll close it out because
I know I've been talking for a while.
I think do I want to do two more verses?
Okay, let me do it this way.
I recommend reading Acts one.
If you do Acts one in one versus eight, you can see where it talks about the power of
the Holy Spirit will come upon you and be witnesses and drew some and all Judea and
Samaria into the ends of the earth.
It's just kind of a summary of the whole book of Acts.
If you read Acts one eight, the context is one through 11 right there.
Yeah, the Holy Spirit's work is to spread the message that salvation is found in Jesus
and Jesus alone.
As people accept Jesus, they join together in local groups, churches, which are part
of the universal church of all believers.
And then the Jesus work was done on earth because that was the whole point was him to
die and rise again and for our sins live a perfect blemish free life.
And the Holy Spirit was left for those who believe they get the gift of the Holy Spirit
to empower us, God's followers basically and continue God's plan for the world.
The Holy Spirit will come and did come on Pentecost, which was nine days later, which
was Acts two one to four.
So I'll just say that real quick.
I'm not going to go into it too much.
Read that.
You can see what it talks about the Holy Spirit.
We did a whole episode on the Holy Spirit as well.
And John 14 six.
This is very, very important because a lot of people tend to be like Jesus is like he's
not the only way or what if somebody never met Jesus?
There are going to be people in heaven who never knew Jesus.
And the reason why is because Jesus before Jesus was born, people put their faith and
trust in Yahweh, God, right?
God the father.
And so Jesus came and died for the sins of the past, the present and the future.
And so with that death and resurrection and that covering of those sins, we just have
to accept him, have faith in him and follow him.
That's that's that's it.
Super easy.
Just like grace through faith in Christ alone.
John 14 six says, which context is one to 14.
If you don't know, it's at the Last Supper.
Read the whole thing.
It's interesting.
But in verse six, he said Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth and the life.
And no one comes to the father except through me.
Right.
Few verses are cited as often as the scripture.
Jesus is preparing his disciples with reassurance and at advance of his arrest and death, which
John 14 one to four.
These words also broadly encourage believers to maintain faith in the face of hardship.
Confidence comes to Christians in part from knowledge that Jesus is preparing to take
us to be with him.
Travel home is usually much less stressful than the outbound trip, since we're so much
more familiar with the destination.
Romans eight, 18 or Hebrews 12 to definitely recommend looking those up to in the prior
verse, John 14, five.
Thomas asked a reasonable question.
If we don't know where we're going, how can you say we know the way there?
Christ answered to me and forces a doctrine of salvation by grace through faith, as well
as denying there are many paths to God prior to the label Christians Act 11, Acts 11 26
and Jesus was often referred to as the way acts 24 14 if you're curious.
So Christian was a term came together to describe followers of Christ Christ, Tians Christians,
right?
But it was always referred to as the way.
So Jesus is the way and the truth in life.
No one gets to him except through him.
And he was making a point here to deny any other thing of saying there are many paths
to God because there's not there's only one.
Thomas question in the previous verse assumes the normal pattern of human accomplishment.
We determine an end goal and we work accordingly.
But salvation cannot be accomplished by good works.
You can see this many times in the Bible, for example, Titus three, five, our sinful
natures make it impossible to behave in a way that reconciles us to God.
Romans three, 20.
Jesus did not tell disciples they knew the destination.
In fact, he said he would come and get them.
John 14, three.
But they know the way there like the way in quotations there like because I did the quotations
with my fingers, but you guys can't see that.
So my bad.
The way in quotations there.
John 14, three to four, he explains that which is the previous verses.
This is this is true because that means of salvation is not a process.
It is a person.
It is through and only through the person of Christ.
We cannot strive to earn heaven.
We can only seek to follow Christ.
This is how we are meant to know God.
John 14, verses seven, the very next verse.
Paul, Paul memorably restates that salvation comes through a person in second Corinthians
for six rescue from sin comes through Jesus, not rituals or accomplishments or personal
virtue.
Disciples know how to arrive where Jesus is going to be going because they know him.
They know the way because the way is Jesus.
Eventually, men like Thomas will connect to this deck, like connect this declaration to
Jesus.
Other teachings, right, and fully realize the meaning of salvation by grace of faith.
John 316, John 1010, John 1125 to 26, John 1244 to 46 and Matthew 1615 to 17.
Definitely recommend reading all those.
Each component of the statement is given a definite article, both Greek and English refer
to the way and the truth and the life.
There is no possibility of translating this comment as Jesus being one way or truth or
just life.
He doubles down on the idea.
In fact, by emphasizing that nobody comes to God except through Christ.
Really does anyone object to the idea that those who believe in Christ will be saved?
The offense many is a suggestion that only those who believe in Christ can find salvation.
Yet this that is a very clear teaching of scripture Acts 412 and first Timothy to five
through six.
I think out of everything I ever dealt with and talk to people about it.
When I say there's only those who believe in Christ find salvation, they always well,
well, well, what about what about and then all of a sudden breaks loose.
People say, no, that's not accurate.
That's not true.
Jesus, what about that?
This is the this is just their way of doing it doesn't matter if it's their way or not.
It's not the God's way.
It's not Christ's way.
This is and so for this this verse, this is the sixth of seven moment and John's gospel
where Jesus invokes the I am terminology.
This echoes God's self identification to Moses in Exodus 314.
The seventh and last I am statement will come later in the same discourse in John 15 one.
OK, so I know I'm running out of time.
I just want to share one verse and then I'm going to call it good.
I appreciate you being here if you're still here.
First Peter 315 is the last one I am sharing and reason being the first pretty of 315.
But in your hearts, regard Christ as Lord is holy.
The Lord is holy, ready at any time to give a defense to anyone who asked you for a reason
for the hope that is in you.
If you read the context is eight to twenty two.
I'm not going to go into what the context is.
Go read it.
This verse and the previous verse, Peter instructs Christians not to fear those who cause them
to suffer for the sake of Christ.
In this verse, he reveals how believers should choose to respond.
First, we set aside our hearts as the place where Christ is fully honored as the Lord.
Peter is writing to people who are already believers.
So his audience already understands Jesus to be the Lord of all.
Still he instructs Christians to focus intently on Christ's role as our master, living as
if they that were absolutely true in all cases, even in suffering.
And Peter calls us to full submission to Christ.
Very important.
When we set apart Christ as Lord, it will change us and it does.
Peter says those who observe us will notice the difference.
The difference is hope.
Even in the midst of our suffering, our hopelessness should be apparent less like our hopefulness
are hopefulness should be apparent.
So Peter here instructs us to be ready to answer the question of our our life should
inspire.
How can you be so hopeful in such difficult circumstances?
This is a very common question I get all the time.
How can you be so positive?
And there was things like I'll give an example.
Sorry, time.
Really quick example.
A couple weeks ago, life hit me and my wife really hard.
There was just thing after thing, day after day after day of just bad, bad, bad, bad,
bad.
And through it, I was looking at it.
I'm like, this is really cool.
She's like, what are you talking about?
And I was like, like, you know, my car broke down and I put it in the shop and I got a
rental car.
And it was like the car that I've been thinking about buying.
And I was so excited to be able to drive it around for a couple of weeks because it was
going to take some time.
I was like, this is so cool.
She's like, it's not cool.
Like we had like the cars in the shop.
I'm like, yeah, but the little things make it OK.
Like there's always hope.
There's always something good around the corner.
Like I got to drive this car and I'm so excited.
It was a Mustang, like a brand new Mustang.
And I was like, oh, this is so fun.
I'm so excited.
You know, and this other thing happened where my computer crashed and I was like.
And and I took it in.
I had to get it fixed.
And once I got it fixed, all my data was still there.
That's a blessing.
I'll take it.
I thought my data was gone.
You know, little things like that were thing after thing kept happening.
And it was just like, oh, my gosh, like if I let it get to me, I would have been like,
this is the worst week of my life.
I can't do it.
But in the long scheme of things, I just kept looking at it like God is good every day.
God is good.
And things kept little things that happened during those hardships made it so easy to
get through because I knew God was there with me.
And you know, he knew that I wanted to drive that car.
Sure.
And if he it was funny because I pulled up and like, I need this kind of car.
I just said I need a Ford because the circumstances I had, I have a Ford and they're like, we
only have one Ford left and some Mustang.
Do you care?
I'm like, yeah, that's great.
Perfect.
Thank you.
Little things like that.
It was like little blessings in the suffering.
And then I just knew God was just there and I appreciated every second.
And that was something that was really cool.
So this is kind of the same thing where, you know, we anticipate that question.
So Peter anticipates people will become curious.
Like exactly.
People kept asking me during that week, like, aren't you upset?
No.
Are you mad?
No.
Are you are you?
Why are you okay with this?
But yeah, so much we want people because hopefulness and joy are like starkly different from the
normal human response of suffering.
Right.
So much so that people will be eager to understand it.
Like what will what will we say when they ask?
You know, like we maybe we have to be prepared to give our defense to make the case for faith
in Christ.
We need to reject the cultural pressure to keep our beliefs to ourselves.
Instead, believers should openly share the good news of redemption through faith in Christ.
The Greek word translated as make a difference or sorry, make a defense or give an answer
is apology.
Right.
So if you hear someone says, I study apologetics, that's the idea.
Apologetics came from this from the word that apology and is actually from the root word
apologia.
This is not related to the English word apology.
Like I'm sorry.
This is this one actually where that one kind of expresses regret and remorse.
Apologia and apology and refer to the term of like justification or an answer back or
reason.
This is a sir, this is like I said, this is like the source of the terms apologetics or
apologists, etc., which refers to a rational defense of the Christian faith, which is something
I've been studying.
But finally, the end of all this, it matters how we make that case for Christ.
We must present it with gentleness and respect.
Christians are not called to condemn those who are curious about our hopefulness, nor
are we to be vindictive or vengeful or insulting to those who disagree.
Rather, we should explain our faith without harshness or dismissiveness.
And to just finalize that point, this is that's the whole idea is that every single person
has the right to not believe what you believe or believe in the truth.
They have a choice and I respect their choice to choose not to believe in it.
If I share it, they don't like it.
That's OK.
It's their choice.
It's their right.
You know, and that's something that I had to come to terms with as I grew up, because
when I was a lot younger, I was like, you don't understand.
You got to go to heaven.
Like this Jesus is awesome.
And he is.
Sure, I agree.
But I was so aggressive with it.
I was just telling people and they're like, no, I don't believe him.
Why don't you believe him?
Because it doesn't make sense to me.
How does it not make sense to you?
Tell me.
I'll answer it.
Like, you know, I was just aggressive.
And now I'm just like, I understand that now I am calm about it.
If someone's like, why are you so hopeful?
Why are you why are you this way?
Why is it you are different?
And I'm like, because Jesus, God is good.
And Jesus is the answer.
And I learned that, you know, he loves me and he loves you.
And have you heard like, have you ever read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in the Bible?
And they're like, no, or something.
And I'm like, you should check it out.
I don't wish somebody that's curious about the gospel.
I don't recommend starting from Genesis.
I recommend starting from Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
Read the gospels.
Read the eyewitness testimony of Jesus Christ and his life, what he did.
He died.
He rose again.
And these are these are things that were written within like 100 years of Jesus.
And these were people who met him and knew him and wrote these things out.
And this is why it's really important to understand where it comes from and why we are to believe
it.
And this is why we can be confident in that.
So all in all, I just wanted to end this episode.
I don't know if this is a special episode or not.
But anyways, I'm ending this episode.
I do thank you if you do listen to the whole thing.
I am sorry for the long episode, but I do appreciate it.
And I'm looking forward to doing more of these, especially when getting Dylan back in here
and then him doing his his one one on his solo podcast episodes.
But anyways, till the next time, I will see you in the next one.
And hopefully with Dylan or otherwise, Dylan will see you in the next one.
I hope everybody has a blast day.
Bye.