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Welcome to ECB's Weekly Sermon Podcast. ECB is an international church in Bangkok, Thailand,

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with dozens of nationalities worshipping together. We invite you to connect with us from wherever

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you are through our website, ecb.asia, or our mobile app. And now we pray that you are blessed

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by this week's sermon. In this series, Servants Devoted to God, we are learning that God saved

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us for so much more than just dying and going to heaven. In fact, when he saved us, he made us part

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of his people, the kingdom of God. And in this kingdom, we see ourselves as servants devoted

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to God. We love him, and we serve him with devotion. And that summarizes our lives. And that

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heart has been from the very, very beginning of the movement of Jesus that he established on earth

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that became known as Christianity and the church. It's been a movement of people that repented of

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their sins and realized that Jesus loved them and asked Jesus to save them. He gave them the Holy

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Spirit to indwell them and lead them into a life of service to God. That's why anyone that is a

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follower of Jesus is invited to see herself or himself as a servant devoted to God. And we learn

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that in this kingdom, the attitude that we need to have is like water, flexible, adaptable. When God

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leads us, we go. When he says stand, you stand. When he says stop, you stop. We are following him.

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But also we have a motive, which is not fear or shame or selfish ambition, but it's love for God.

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That is why we serve him. He loved us first. Now we love him because of what he has done. And we

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also learn that in the kingdom, there are pillars. And it's our godly servants who are driven by a

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love for God to serve God. And they have an intimate relationship with the Holy Spirit

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because they lead from that place of flow from within. Today we are going to discover the

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foundation of the kingdom. And if you already are familiar with foundations, you know that

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foundations are very, very important. So important that picture says it all. The foundation upon which

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you build your life is going to be strong and solid or faulty. Like Jesus put it in the parable

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of the person who built the house on the rock or on the sand. We don't have sand. We have a rock.

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We have Jesus, our strong rock upon which a foundation is built. The apostle Peter, the

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apostle Paul, they write about these things. The apostle Paul says that in Ephesians, that the

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foundation of this kingdom, the rock is Jesus and the foundation is the teaching of the apostles

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and the prophets. God's word is the foundation of the kingdom. And this will become clearer and I

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will take much more specific shape at the beginning of the church. So what we will do in this study is

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two things. We will first look at what the early church had to face in order to start defining

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what was their foundation for truth. And secondly, we will then look at what the apostle Paul wrote

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to Timothy, how important this foundation was. So let's go at the beginning. After Jesus ascended

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to heaven and the church began, the apostle Peter preached the gospel and 3,000 people came to know

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Christ. We studied that before. But then as the church started growing, Barnabas and Paul went

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from the area of Jerusalem all the way now to Antioch in the north. And they started preaching

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the gospel there. What was different is that in Jerusalem, it was a city primarily populated by

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lots of Jews that were responding to the gospel. The first Christians in Jerusalem were all Jews.

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Then later, a Roman man, Cornelius, he came to know Christ. He was the first Gentile,

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meaning non-Jew, to come to know Christ. But that was in that area on the south. But then in the

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north, it was a very cosmopolitan city, very multicultural, commercial center. And in that

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area, the apostle Paul and Barnabas started preaching the gospel and many people came to

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know Christ. And that church started growing and became the center of world missions, Antioch. But

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at the beginning, as these Gentiles started coming to know Christ, the first Christians that were

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Jews started wondering, so how does it work? They are not Jews, but they're believing in Christ. So

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is that all it takes to be saved? Or they also have to become Jews like us to truly be saved.

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So there were these guys from Jerusalem that went all the way to Antioch and started teaching the

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people certain things that created a dispute. Certain people came down from Judea to Antioch and

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were teaching the believers this, unless you are circumcised according to the custom taught by

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Moses, you can not be saved. What? Really? Wow. The church of Antioch was like confused now because

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they knew, yeah, the scriptures in the Old Testament talk about the love of Moses and it says you need

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to be circumcised, but that was for the Jews, but I'm not a Jew, so really, what do we need to do?

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The apostle Paul and Barnabas said, no, no, no, that should not be the case. But these guys were,

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no, it is, it's just there, the word. You have to be circumcised. So in the middle of that dispute,

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they had to start discerning, okay, what is true? They cannot both be true. Which one is right? So

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they decided to go to Jerusalem, meet with the apostles and the elders. And when they got there

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to start talking about this issue and try to figure out, okay, let's reason through this, as the

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meeting begins, we are told that some of the believers right now in Jerusalem, they are meeting

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with apostles and the elders who belong to the party of the Pharisees, stood up in the middle

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of the meeting and said, Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the love of Moses, period.

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Huh, wow. And these are Pharisees, they are well connected to the other people in Jerusalem,

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so it's like, what do we do now? So the apostle Paul and Barnabas started telling the leaders

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in Jerusalem about what had happened. And they started sharing with them all the experience of

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how people have come to know Christ. And now as leaders, they were trying to discern together

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which one is true. Now I know that throughout church history, many more disputes have come up

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throughout different denominations and churches. And depending on what denomination you come from,

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we have different convictions about secondary issues. Like when is Jesus going to come back?

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Is it before the millennium, during the millennium, after the millennium? Is there a millennium? Maybe

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there's no millennium. You know, all those questions. It's like which one is true? And people

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try to discern these things. But there are other things that are much more fundamental. How many

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genders are there? What about sexual identity and all of these things? Should we be an affirming

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church? What does that mean? You know, these are things that people are dealing with in churches

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around the world today. And they're trying to discern what is true. The first Christians got

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together and this is what they did. First, it tells us that the apostles and elders met to consider

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the question. Why the apostles and elders and no one else? Because we learned last week that the

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leadership that emerged, the pillars in the kingdom, were the elders and the servants, the deacons.

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And these two forms of leadership had complete different functions, different roles. The servants,

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the deacons, they were there to help execute and mobilize. But the elders were responsible for

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ensuring the organizational health of church, as well as doctrinal integrity, biblical teaching,

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they were responsible for making sure people were being shepherded well. These were the elders.

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And that's why now the elders come together in Jerusalem with the apostles. And now they're

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going to engage and they start listening to Paul and Barnabas and then Peter is the first one to

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stand up. After much discussion, have you ever been in an elder meeting? That's true. After much

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discussion. That's the way it is. That's why elders have to have self-control. They have to

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love the word. They have to be trustworthy servants because we can never put our interest

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in front of God's church. We can never put our opinions, our preferences in front of God's Word.

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So it takes a certain quality of person to lead in eldership. And these were them.

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So Peter got up and addressed them, brothers, you know that some time ago,

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God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the

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gospel and belief. True, because the apostle Peter was not the only the first one to preach

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the gospel in Jerusalem when 3000 people came to know Christ, all of them Jews and some

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Hellenistic Jews. But he was also the first person to preach the gospel to the non-Jews,

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to the Gentiles when God led him to Cornelius and preached the gospel there. And when he preached

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the gospel to Cornelius, he remembers how the Holy Spirit came upon them and they started

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experiencing the same thing that he had experienced in Jerusalem when they were baptized with the

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Holy Spirit and the experience was exactly identical. But without a doubt, he knew that

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these Gentiles had come to know Christ. So he says, guys, I have some experience here.

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I'm the only one here in this group of elders and apostles that has led a Gentile to Christ.

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So God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to

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them, just as he did to us earlier in Jerusalem at Pentecost. He did not discriminate between us

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and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. What gave them the Holy Spirit was that they

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believed. That's it. They didn't go and get circumcised and then they received the Holy

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Spirit. No. We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved just as

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they are. Can I hear an amen to that? This is why we believe salvation by grace through

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faith alone. Because it is believing in Christ that caused you to be in dwell with the Holy

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Spirit. And if you are in dwell with the Holy Spirit, he is there to stay with you until

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the day of redemption. So he is speaking from the experience. And the

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Apostle Paul and Barnabas start saying, yeah, that's true. Let us tell you more about some

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of our experiences. There was another guy that he was an elder. He was not one of the

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Apostles. His name is James. He was very well acquainted with the Scriptures. He was a theologian.

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And he was the brother of Jesus. And James, who later writes the book of James that you

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have in the New Testament, he has been just listening the entire time. Have you ever met

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someone like that in those leadership meetings? It's just listening quietly. Not quick to

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say anything, but then when the person speaks, wisdom. That's James.

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When Paul and Barnabas finished talking about all these things, James spoke up. Brothers,

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listen to me. Simon here has described to us how God first intervened to choose a people

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for his name from the Gentiles. Also eloquent, huh? And as I listened to him, I've been thinking

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about this. The word of God, the word of the prophets are in agreement with this. As it

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is written, and he's going to quote the book of Amos, after this, I will return and rebuild

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David's fallen tent, its ruins, I will rebuild and I will restore it. That the rest of mankind

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may seek the Lord. Even all the Gentiles who bear my name says the Lord who does these

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things, things known from long ago. It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not

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make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. We should not ask them to

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go and get circumcised. We already heard. They received the Holy Spirit by believing.

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They already belong to God's people. Circumcision is not necessary. And we just heard it in

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the scriptures. It's aligned with God's word. Gentiles will come to follow God. As Gentiles,

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not as Jews. But then James is thinking about another dimension. And you can see how analytical

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he is. Because he's thinking now with cultural intelligence. See, cultural intelligence is

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that awareness that there are cultural differences and we need to adapt to different circumstances

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so that our relationships can remain strong. And he knows that in all of these cities like

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Antioch and throughout the empire, many of the Jews that were Christians were persecuted

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in Jerusalem and they had spread out throughout the empire. So there are Christian Jews in

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all of these different places. Also there are synagogues for centuries that have been

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teaching the law of Moses in all of those places. So there are Jews, also non-believing

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Jews, waiting to learn about the gospel. So now that we start having all these Gentiles,

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non-Jews becoming part of the church, we have now a mixed community. And there's a problem

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that he anticipates. He says instead we should write to them telling them to abstain from

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food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from

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blood. For the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and

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is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath. Right, because what happened is that if I

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am a Jew, I am told by the law of Moses that it touch you, I cannot have fellowship with

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you, I have to stay away from you because if I get close to you or I get to touch you,

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now I become unclean. They have all these regulations. So if now I go to a church that

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is surrounded, that has a bunch of Gentiles and these people are doing things that make

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them ceremonially unclean, that's going to be chaos. How can we be the church if we cannot

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be in the same proximity? Imagine, it's like, hey, you're scheduled to do worship this

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Sunday. It's like, oh, but so and so is in the worship team. I know they eat this kind

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of meat. I cannot be close to them so I can't leave worship that day. You know, it was just

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like a complicated thing. So it's like, oh, James, you're right. We hadn't thought about

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that. Yeah, this is not about salvation anymore. But there is an issue that is not so theological

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in nature, but it's ecclesiastical in nature. It has to do with our fellowship, our community.

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How can we maintain these relationships without damaging them? That's a good idea. And now,

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after much thinking together with the scriptures as the foundation and the experience of spiritually

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mature people, they come to a conclusion of clarity. And they decide to write this letter,

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send it to the Gentiles, send it to the church in Antioch, and they send Paul and Barnabas

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back with the letter telling them everything that they had, discussed, their conclusion,

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and what the recommendation was. And as the letter is written, at the end of the letter,

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it said this, it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything

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beyond the following requirements. Did you notice something interesting he says? It seemed

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good to the elders and apostles that we should, is that what it said? No. It seemed good to

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the Holy Spirit and to us. And that is the reason why the scriptures and the authority

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of the scriptures are the foundation of the kingdom. The apostle Peter said that the prophets

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did not speak out of their own will. They were led by the Holy Spirit to write what

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they wrote. The Bible says that the Holy Spirit is the one that inspired the scriptures. So

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I cannot have an intimate relationship with the Holy Spirit and be a good, reliable, godly

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pillar in the kingdom if I don't have a strong relationship with his word. And also, as the

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elders and apostles were leading, they are praying, first of all, God lead us into all

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of these things. And the Holy Spirit leads. It's not that they are creating truth. They

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are discerning it. It's like mathematicians discover, as they come out with these formulas

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and these theories and things that they write, it's not that they are creating it. They are

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trying to define what is already there through mathematical formulas. They are not creating

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the laws. They are just giving out words or numbers. And the same thing here. The Holy

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Spirit is leading them. They have the word from the Holy Spirit. And as they are engaging

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together as leaders in the unity and power of the Holy Spirit, now they have this clarity

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and they can write this with confidence because it's aligned with the foundation of the authority

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of the word. And that's why they say at the end, you are to abstain from food sacrifice

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to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. You will

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do well to avoid these things. And that's it. Farewell. Now when that letter got to

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Antioch and they read it, people were so excited. It says that people read it and were glad

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for its encouraging message. And that is an understatement. Because imagine if I was the

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pastor of that church and I was with the men's ministry and I said, hey guys, we got the

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letter from Antioch. Guess what? No circumcision. It's like everybody was like, oh, praise God

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for Holy Spirit. Thank you for leading them into all truth. If they would have played

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politics, say, oh, but these Pharisees are the ones that are saying we should do this.

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We can get in trouble with the authorities. Can you imagine if the church in this moment

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decided to make a decision not based on God's word and the wisdom of trustworthy pillars,

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but instead they went with the popular vote, instead they played politics, they could have

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gone completely the opposite direction and you and I guys would have to be circumcised

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today to be Christians. The foundation of the kingdom matters. And this is how they

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faced it. The authority of the scriptures is the foundation of the kingdom. That's how

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it was at the beginning and that's how it will continue to be until the very end.

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The apostle Paul went through this first experience. This was the first time engaging in disputes

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about these things with the leadership of the church, engaging now with the scriptures

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to figure out how we discern truth. And after all these years of ministry, he started mentoring

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another servant devoted to God. His name was Timothy and he was young. He writes two letters

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to Timothy telling him lots of things about how to serve God well. And in these letters

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he's going to talk about three convictions of servants devoted to God when it comes to

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the foundation of the kingdom. And I want to stake then the next part of the study to

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focus on understanding these things. Because if you and I are servants devoted to God and

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we are going to love God and serve him with devotion, we have to make sure that the foundation

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that we have is not having cracks, but it's solid. And the first conviction of a solid

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foundation as a servant devoted to God is that we need to know the word. Know it. Master

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it. Get so familiar with it. During my first year of marriage, we bought a piece of furniture

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that was a corner piece of wooden furniture that needed to be stained. I had no idea how

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to do that, but my wife, she had a college degree in art. So she knew how to do this

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very well. So we took this thing and she taught me how you stained. You choose the color,

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you use these sponges and then you go, then you let it dry, then you sand, you let it

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dry, then you sand, then you let it dry, then you sand. Every time that you do another coat,

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you sand it until finally, little by little, you get exactly the color you want and the

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consistency you want. It was very dedicated work. I had no idea about it, but she taught

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me. And then much later when we moved into our home, we had bought a bigger TV when the

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flat screen TVs came into the market and it was one of those flat screen TVs with a very

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thick background. I still remember it was a Sony TV, you know, like a very thick piece

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in the back, not those flat that we have today. So the piece of furniture we had in the TV

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room was not the right size, so I built one. I never built anything, but hey, let's try

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it and it fit. And I stained, just like my wife had taught me and it took time. And then

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we were remodeling a part of the house and we hired this contractor to bring his crew

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to start building a wooden frame around the fireplace. And I remember that I walked in

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as the worker was doing that. I got my attention that he was like using the stain like he's

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painting a wall. You know, I was like, that doesn't seem right. So it occurred to me to

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ask him, hey, how long have you been doing this kind of work and staining furniture and

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stuff? And he said, oh, this is my first time. Oh, that explains it all. It's like, okay,

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you have no idea what you're doing. And that's not uncommon. You hire the contractor, but

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you're not hiring the employees, you know? And so I learned from that experience that

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you have to stay on top of the game when you have construction going on. So anyway, I had

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to teach him, no, that's not how you do it. This is how you do it. I was not an expert,

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but I had learned enough as to discern when something was not being done right. And Paul

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is going to tell Timothy, you need to be like that. Will you read out loud? Second Timothy

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2, 15 with me. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does

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not need to be ashamed, who correctly handles the word of truth. You need to be a servant

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of God. Shame is no longer part of your life. You are living right before God. You put your

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life together, but you know the word. You know how to handle it. You have mastered it.

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You need to do your best to get to that level of maturity as a follower of Jesus. And I

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tell you, Timothy, avoid godly chatter because those who indulge in it will become more and

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more ungodly. Don't even engage with those conversations that lead nowhere. Some people

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just want to argue and they are deceived. In fact, let me tell you what I'm talking about.

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These guys that I came across, it's just like that. Their teaching was spread like

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gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus who have departed from the truth. They say

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that the resurrection has already taken place and they destroy the faith of some. They will

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be people in your ministry, in your community, in your life group. There will be people in

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your church. There will be people in your family that say, I believe in Jesus. I follow

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God. But they are teaching something that is not aligned with the scriptures. And somebody

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has to know how to stay in the furniture. Somebody needs to know how to use this tool

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called the scriptures well. Because if we don't, any teaching goes. And the problem

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was that some people were already deceived by this thing so it's going to spread like

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gangrene, like cancer. So Timothy, if you're going to be a servant devoted to God, know

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the word. Do you know the word? Can you detect when the guy is staining something and say

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that doesn't look right? Or you are there looking, oh that's awesome, is it going to

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look pretty? Because you have no idea, spiritually speaking. You cannot discern deception from

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truth. Just because the guy has a YouTube video doesn't make him an expert. Just because

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the guy published the book doesn't make his true, his right. We need to grow in our understanding

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and the proper handling of God's word. And one of the things that I have discovered is

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that a lot of the bad teaching, doctrine that is not sound at all, comes not because we

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do not believe in the Bible. It's because the way we interpret the Bible is faulty.

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There's a word that perhaps will be new to many. It's called hermeneutics. Hermeneutics

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is simply a fancy word to describe the study and method of interpreting texts. How do you

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interpret a text? The answer to that is hermeneutics. There are systems in place to properly interpret

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a text to reach the right conclusion. But people have different hermeneutics systems

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just like people have different glasses that they look through. And the way we engage with

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interpretation matters. Let me give you an example. Can you read this word out loud?

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What does that mean? Huh? Greeting? Yeah, hello, hi. Greeting, right? Yeah, you're right.

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It says hello and it means a greeting. So simple. Yeah? It says hello, it means greeting.

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Perfect. But what if somebody comes to you and says hello? Huh? What did the person say?

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Hello? So it says hello, but it means, ah, that person's not greeting me. That means

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a reproach. That person is actually being rude. What it says, what it means, what it

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implies. It implies that you better talk to that person because that's not how we interact

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with each other. Especially if you're in my team. Don't treat me that way. Huh? Right?

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What it says, what it means, what it implies. Now imagine that you're walking on the street,

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you're a lady, you're with a friend, couple of ladies with you, and on that corner there's

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a guy standing and he looks you up and down and then he says hello you. He says hello.

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What does it mean? Oh, he's greeting me. Hi. Your friend will say, what are you doing?

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Well he's greeting me. He's not greeting me, I'll tell you. Yeah, it doesn't mean a friendly

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greeting. It means I'm flirting with you. What does it imply? Well, you better walk

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fast. You don't want to be around this guy. Hmm? It's not secure. What it says, what it

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means, what it implies. You see? That is hermeneutics. And we engage with hermeneutics all the time.

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We just did not know that word existed. But let me give you a little background. Three

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common or dominant models of hermeneutics can be summarized with these three different

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types. Postmodern, allegorical, and grammatical, historical. Postmodern is thinking, huh, what

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does it mean to you? Allegorical says, what does it represent? It's just a symbol, it's

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a metaphor. And the grammatical, historical says, well, what does the text say? What does

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it mean in its original context? What's the internal evidence that that's the right interpretation?

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Three different ways. Each one of these is a form of hermeneutics. So let me take you

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to this text. Can you read it out loud? Okay. That's what it says. What does it mean and

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what does it imply? Hmm. That's hermeneutics. So if I start with the postmodern system,

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it's like, what does it mean to you? Well, for me, it means that, hey, this person needs

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honey and bananas and milk and bread. And most likely between bananas and milk, I think

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that the person forgot to add a couple of things. So I'll just add a few more things

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there. Yeah, that's what it means to me. So you show up home, at home with honey, bananas,

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milk, bread, and a bunch of other things. I say, here. And your wife says, what? Well,

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I just was interpreting it with this hermeneutics system that I learned from Pastor Pablo. This

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is the postmodern way of thinking about text. That's what it meant to me. So that's what

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I got. Well, the allegorical will be different. The allegorical says, well, honey, bananas,

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milk, some bread. That's definitely breakfast food. That's what it represents. So this person

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is asking you to just buy breakfast food. So fine, good. So I'll go and get some coffee,

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some donuts, some jelly and butter, and maybe milk. So I show up with that stuff. And my

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wife says, what did you get all this? Well, I thought you were just asking me to bring

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breakfast food. So this is why I brought donuts and all this stuff. Okay. That's a way of

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interpreting it, you see. Well, the third system, the grammatical historical is different.

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It says, okay, wait a second. Honey, I need bananas, milk, and some bread. Or honey, I

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need bananas, milk, and some bread. Oh, this could be interpreted in two ways. Maybe the

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person is asking you four things or three. Hmm. Which one is it? I don't know. Okay.

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Let me get the text. Can I get your phone? Who sent you this text? Was it your son, your

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friend, your wife? Because that will help a little bit, right? If your son sent you

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the text, he didn't most likely call you honey, huh? So maybe that's part of the list. That

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will mean honey, I need bananas, milk, and some bread. Did you send any text before this?

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Yeah? Okay. So what? Okay. You are talking to your wife and you ask, do you need me to

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get anything from the store? Okay. Does she typically call you honey? Yeah. That's our

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term of endearment. Okay. That's what it means. She's asking you to buy just bananas, milk,

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and some bread. So I show up with bananas, bread, and some milk. And my wife says, honey,

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thank you so much. You see how we're engaging with the text? Three different ways of interpreting.

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What does it say? Everybody reads the same thing. But what does it mean? It changes.

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And what does it imply? It changes. The problem that I believe we have is that we have hermeneutical

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systems that are faulty. And we're reading the scriptures and we come up with conclusions

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that the text never meant to give us. And we show up to God with all these ideas and

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say, well, this is what I believe now. And God says, well, I never said that. I personally

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believe in the grammatical historical system of hermeneutics. And that is how I engage

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with the scriptures. And that is where I come from. When I am teaching the word and studying

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it, I can tell you the power of God's word when you pay attention to what it says. It's

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amazing. The second thing that Paul tells Timothy, not just know the word and master

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it and use it correctly, but you need to trust the word. Because Timothy grew up in a home

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where his father was a Greek, his mother was a Jew, and his grandmother from the mother's

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side taught him the word from the beginnings since he was a little kid. So he was a kid

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that you could say grew up going to church, even though not truly. But he was familiar

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with the scriptures. So now the apostle Paul says to him, but as for you, Timothy, continue

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in what you have learned and have become convinced of because you know those from whom you learned

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it and how from infancy you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you

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wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Timothy, you know the word since you

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were so young. Don't walk away from it. It is the foundation. You know who you learned

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it from. Timothy, you need to understand that all scripture, not just part of it or some

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sections of it, but all the scripture was God-breathed. It originated in God himself.

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That's why we call it God's word. It came from the Holy Spirit and that's why we treat

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it with authority for our lives. It is useful to teach. It's going to rebuke you. It's going

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to make you realize when you are doing something wrong, it's going to say, not that way, that's

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wrong, but it's going to also correct you. It's going to teach you how to do it right.

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And as you go through this process, it's going to train you in righteousness so that the

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servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work because that is the kind

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of maturity that you're going to acquire. The more you know it, the more you align your

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life with it, the more wise you become, the more trustworthy you become, and you are thoroughly

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equipped for every good work. When I was seven years old was the time I remember getting

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my first Bible. I remember it was a black Bible with the gold sides. It was very beautiful

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and it was nice. I also remember it so much because one time we took a taxi from church

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to home and I left it in the taxi so I lost it. But somebody had written something in

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that Bible, a little quote at the beginning that said, this book will keep you away from

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sin or sin will keep you away from this book. And the more I've grown older, the more profound

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I find that. So true. Don't walk away from the foundation. But I understand that there

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are complexities. I went through it myself when I was in graduate school. I had my faith

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crisis from all places when I was studying theology. Because that's when I became acquainted

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with the way, the manuscripts, the Old Testament, New Testament manuscripts and all these things

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about textual criticism. I had never even thought about how did the Bible come together

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and how do we have all these books, what's the history of it. I never studied any of

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that. I was just a Christian. But when I started taking those classes and learning the technicalities

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of it, it's like, oh, my faith started shaking and I started realizing, can I really trust

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this thing? But that was a good crisis of faith because it allowed me to consolidate

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my convictions and solidify my foundation. I trust the word of God more than I did before.

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So I understand that this is something that may take engaging with certain things. That's

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why I would like to give you a few resources. Because you need to trust the word, otherwise

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your foundation will crack. If you've been wondering about how do we know that the text

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we have is reliable, just like the same Bible that Jesus read, how do we know the quotations

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are proper, you know, all these things about text. There's this documentary called Fragments

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of Truth. You will get to hear from the experts on the field and you will learn about how

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is it, what are the New Testament manuscripts, how does this whole thing work. Amazing documentary.

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I'm so glad that they put it together. YouTube, type that and it will come up. Watch it. It's

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technical but good. Secondly, if you want to get acquainted with one of the New Testament

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manuscripts we have. When I was at the theological seminary, one of our professors in Greek,

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New Testament department, was Dr. Wallace. He eventually left that academic world to

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focus specifically on creating the digital collection of New Testament manuscripts, traveling

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around the world, digitizing all of these things. And there's this website. It's just

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amazing that we have access to this. High resolution images of all the New Testament

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manuscripts that we have right now, digitized. And there's many more. You can see first,

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second, third, fourth century manuscripts of different sizes and qualities and right

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there, accessible from your phone. Thirdly, if you're wondering, is the Bible

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historically accurate, how do I know, what is the archaeology of it, the Associates for

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Biblical Research put together this program that is called Digging for Truth, that is

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about biblical archaeology. You go YouTube, you type Digging for Truth and you will see

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all these videos. They have a whole collection of videos about biblical archaeology and

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you will be amazed how much archaeology is there to verify the historicity of the scriptures.

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It's really amazing. I give you those so that your trust in the word will increase in case

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it was shaky. But the third thing that Paul tells Timothy

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is that Timothy, you need to live the word. And he's going to end the last part of his

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book, the letter to Timothy, with a charge. And you can see by the words he uses, it's

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very solemn. He says, in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living

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and the dead, and in view of his appearance and his kingdom, I give you this charge. Wow.

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Whatever he's going to say, this is very serious. What is the charge? Preach the word. Timothy,

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if you're going to be a servant devoted to God, preach the word. Be prepared in season

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and out of season. Correct, rebuke, encourage with great patience, but careful instruction.

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Stand for the truth. Let the truth be known. Breathe it in, breathe it out. For the time

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will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to soothe their own

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desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching

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ears want to hear. People will not care about truth. They will just care about being right.

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And they will hire leaders to teach them exactly what they want to hear. They will turn their

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ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. By you, Timothy, servant devoted to

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God, you keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist,

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discharge all the duties of your ministry, live the word so that people will come to

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know truth because of you. You know it, you trust it, you proclaim it, you stand for it.

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Even when it feels like you are swimming against the current. Do you live the word? Are you

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knowingly disobeying God? Why you are following Jesus? Is he convicting you and you are trying

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just to be deaf to what the Lord is telling you? Then your foundation is cracked. Because

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it's not just about believing in the word, but practicing it. Is the Lord asking you

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to stand up for truth and speak up, but you are not because you are afraid of what may

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happen? Correct. Be patient. But don't give up the truth. We need to live it. And Eris

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was a man that was so glad he met Christians that were living the truth. Because you know

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he was a guy from Israel. He was a Jew himself. He grew up there not knowing anything about

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Christianity. He had friends and relatives that lived in Galilee. He remembers, you know,

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time we would visit them and we would go fishing in the Sea of Galilee. And I had no idea that

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there was a Jesus or apostles. None of that stuff. I had no knowledge. Zero. But as I

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was growing in my study of Judaism and going to school and everything, it just didn't satisfy.

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And I started searching for more. So eventually he says like many Jews that live Israel, they

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come to this area of Asia to explore some other religions. Buddhism, Hinduism and things

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like that. So I was reading all these other writings from all these other religions trying

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to find something to feed my spiritual hunger. And none of that worked. And then I ended

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up going to Holland. And when I was in Holland he says, I met this group of Christians that

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were talking about a relationship with the God and they were very nice people. And what

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surprised me were two things. They knew more about my book than I did. They kept quoting

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it. And secondly, there were people that were different. They had a godliness about it,

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a joy about them that I didn't have. So one day I told them, how come you use my book

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and you keep quoting it and know so much? And they said to him, it's not your book.

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This is what we Christians believe. This is our foundation. The Old Testament and the

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New Testament is one book that we have the Bible. And for the first time he was intrigued

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enough to start reading the New Testament. But he got a Hebrew version of it and as he

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was reading it, he came to learn about Jesus and the apostles and all of these things.

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And he came to know Christ. All because of these Christians who lived the word. So he

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said at that moment, I really believe I was like the apostle Paul. I'm the only Christian

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here going back to Israel. I need to tell my family about it. So he went back to Israel

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to tell about his family, about Jesus. And he says, my father sent me to the psychiatrist.

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My mother made an appointment with the rabbi. And then I wanted to study the word more,

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but I realized there was no place for me to do that in Israel. So I moved to the U.S.

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where he got his doctorate and he felt called by God to go back to Israel and start a place

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where people could study the word. Because he says, you know, we say that Jesus is the

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best kept secret that Christians have. There are many Jews like me that know nothing. So

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he went back to Israel and he founded a ministry called One for Israel. That's the story of

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One for Israel. That's Eris. And that's because God put people in his life that knew the word,

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trusted the word, and lived the word. Exactly what Paul tells Timothy. This is the foundation

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of the kingdom, the authority of the scriptures. So I want to conclude the study by simply

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asking you to look at your foundation. Do you find any cracks? These are three cracks

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that will appear. First, ignorance. You do not know the word. And because you do not

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know the word, secondly, deception. You cannot tell truth from falsehood. And you are that

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Christian that just watches a bunch of YouTube videos thinking all these people are right,

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and you are absorbing deception and you have no idea. We are here to help you in your journey.

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We're not asking you to turn off your brain to follow Jesus. Quite the opposite. Turn

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it on. And we are here to help you engage with the complexities of interpreting and

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developing doctrine and things like that. But the third crack is disobedience. You have

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compromised the truth because you are no longer living it. And if you have compromised it,

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this is the time to align yourself with the Holy Spirit once again. From the very beginning,

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servants devoted to God build their lives from the foundation that is the authority

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of God's word. Hold tight to it. Father, thank you for not leaving us, not leaving us, Lord,

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with any empty places, just with words, but not scripture. You give it to us written so

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we can have it throughout millennia. Thank you for the way you have led people throughout

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the centuries to do archaeology and textual criticism and all the studies that have gone

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before us. There are foundation today is even stronger because we have more access to verifiable

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knowledge than ever before. But thank you, Holy Spirit, for the power of truth. Will

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you strengthen our foundation if it has become weakened? And I ask you, call among us people

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that can be equipped to the next level with the word. So there will be a group of godly

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people that can defend the truth with compassion, but with conviction. For the glory of your

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name and for the impact of your kingdom in Jesus name.

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Thank you for tuning in to the ECB sermon podcast. Whether near or far, if you are looking

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for community or are in need of prayer, we welcome you to engage by sending us an email

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options on our website. And remember to join us next week. God bless you.