Rethinking Church

0:00 Can we just pray? I'm just, I'm so stirred. I'm so blown away by that. I'm so, I just want to praise God. I just want to worship Him for what He just did. Thank you. Oh, Father, you are so good. Your mercy, your grace, your sovereignty, your power.

1:03 God, I thank you so much for bringing glory to your name by what you did through the Bensons and Jorge's life, God. Thank you for saving him. Thank you that we'll be with him in eternity. God, it could have ended so differently, but it was your grace. You just decided to pour out your grace. God, it's only by your grace that we're in this room God, we could be doing so many things Lord, left to ourselves God, we'd be a mess and we'd be under your wrath We were by nature objects of wrath and then you come and you pour out this mercy on us because you're rich in mercy because of your great love with which you loved us God please just help us to understand that from our souls right now Lord just how good you are and how you deserve all the glory, all the glory, all the glory.

2:18 Jesus I pray that you would just bring honor to your name right now that we'd leave here in a few moments just blown away by you whatever you want to say God, just help us. God, we need you so badly. We need your Holy Spirit right now. I need your Spirit right now just to pray according to your will.

3:00 We need your Holy Spirit to hear your word of God in the way that you intend. Help us, Father. Bring glory to you with whatever is left of our lives starting right now, God. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you. You know, I... I had this picture a while back. I believe it was of the Lord. I was just, for some reason, I was getting ready to speak or something. And I got this image in my head of, you know how in India or Africa or some of these third world countries, you know, where they're washing clothes in like dirt puddles?

4:01 Like I've been in my hotel room in India one time just watching people in these dirt puddles, like in the street, washing their clothes. And you look and you go, could that be doing anything? Right? You've seen it on TV or whatever. They're in this muddy river and they're washing their clothes. And you're going, wait, is that really making it any cleaner? Right? but it must be because they're doing it and i and i as that picture was in my head i was just thinking lord that's what i believe the lord was revealing to me is francis that's that's like your sermon you know it's it's it's washing but yeah and it's doing something but what people really need is the pure water of the word. There's something the word does when we revere, and it's just red, and we allow it to, it's like, imagine going from that dirty puddle, which is cleaning, I'm not saying it's not doing anything, but then just having someone pour just this pure water all over your clothes, all over you. That's the way I've been feeling about the word of God lately.

5:25 In so many of our gatherings now, it's just like, would someone just start reading it? And I just want to be cleansed completely. And so I'd like to do that right now. I asked my wife, because she's a better reader, and my voice is kind of going. But, you know, imagine right now, you know, you've had whatever, seven, eight different speakers so far. but imagine we say, okay, now Jesus is going to come to the stage.

6:01 I hope your attention level would rise like a hundred times what you gave Jorge or John or whatever. It's like, Jesus is about to speak? Like we should just be like, okay, okay, you know, let me record this. Let me get every bit of this. You see, and so often in the church, it's not like this. You know, and I remember being confronted about this as a young speaker. I would get up there, and I would read a verse pretty quickly, and then get into my story. And I remember that one of my mentors was like, Francis, you know, I see this happen a lot, where you'll get up, you'll read a verse, and you'll just skim through it, and then you'll go and get to the thing that you want to say, the jokes you want to tell, or whatever else, and you've got to have more reverence for the Word of God.

6:57 I'm just thinking about those words again. And so right now, man, I just believe we in America, we're part of this generation that got so tied to voices and personalities and everything else, and it's time for us to just love the pure Word read like that pure water and go, please, just read, read, read. And so I just asked her to read, actually, I don't know, did I tell you? Like, it's a whole chapter of Matthew 24. Is that cool? And can we just imagine Jesus walking on the stage and just hanging on every word because his thoughts are higher than our thoughts. As far as the heavens are above the earth, so are his thoughts above ours.

7:55 And let's just enjoy and worship and soak this in. Jesus left the temple and was going away when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them, you see all these, do you not? Truly I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down. As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately saying, tell us when will these things be and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age? And Jesus answered them, see that no one leads you astray for many will come in my name saying I am the Christ and they will lead many astray and you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed for this must take place but the end is not yet.

8:57 For nation will rise against nation, and the kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains. Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. and many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel standing in the holy place, let the reader understand.

10:04 Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in his house. And let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. and alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days. Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath, for then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short. Then if anyone says to you, look, here is the Christ, or there he is, do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. So if they say to you, look, he's in the wilderness, do not go out. If they say, look, He is in the inner rooms. Do not believe it.

11:17 For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light. And the stars will fall from heaven and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. From the fig tree, learn its lesson. As soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near.

12:18 So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near at the very gates. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. But concerning that day and hour, no one knows, not even the angels of heaven nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark. and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away. So will be the coming of the Son of Man.

13:13 The two men will be in the field. One will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill. One will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you did not expect. Who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his master has set over his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions.

14:10 But if that wicked servant says to himself, my master is delayed and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Father, I pray that those words would just stay in our minds. in our hearts, God, help us to stay awake.

15:13 please father help us to stay awake help us to be ready for your return it's so hard here to stay focused please by your spirit help us give me words to say even right now lord that would just encourage us to stay awake, stay focused. Holy Spirit, I need you so badly. In Jesus' name, amen. Man, I just got back from Ethiopia about a day ago, and it's really hard to transition, you know? Like, I went there, it was kind of like a last-minute trip because I heard of a situation there where there was like a million people who were displaced.

16:19 and there's starvation, lack of food, everything. And when I got there, found out it was actually 2 million. And crazy situation. You know, I'm just trying to figure out how do we keep these guys alive so they can hear the gospel. In God's sovereignty, we had prepared, we were gonna do a pastor's conference in the very village where a million of these displaced people showed up, and yet it was violent and everything else. There was just concern about safety, so they're saying maybe we should cancel. It's like, well, no, or maybe we should double down, and can we actually release these pastors in to care for these displaced people? Let's just go there, and let's just figure something out. And once we got there, we found out the reason for a lot of this, you know, the whole reason for all these displaced people, which it's crazy, and you can hardly find it on the news.

17:23 But it's because of warring between these tribes. And so the guy that was helping us set up the conference over there decided, well, you know, let's do the conference, and let's get pastors from the different warring tribes and bring them together and see what happens. I mean, it was a scary thing. And so we actually had two different hotels, you know, where we gathered these pastors. You know, it was a blessing to them to get away from everything. And we put like 50 pastors and 50 pastor's wives, you know, so 100 in this hotel, 100 in this hotel, and then let's bring them together. And let's just read the Word of God. and to see God move through his word as we just started to read, and then we had a time of foot washing.

18:24 I mean, you've got to understand, some of these pastors had fresh stab wounds. Some of these pastors were just dragging out friends from the village near death. I mean, this is just a crazy situation. situation i mean there's houses torn down everything we're seeing all these this destruction craziness and now these opposing tribes are there and let's brace ourselves let's see what happens and so to see people who were at war now washing each other's feet in tears over the word of god man and then they were talking about possibly joining arms and marching into some of these places of violence and i'm in the middle of this thing just going man come on lord please this is this is incredible and then i had to leave to come here I mean Colorado Springs is exciting and it's great to be one of 12 speakers but there was a part of me that you know where you listen to the story of Jorge right and we're trying to figure out man you guys know me it just seems like I'm like this schizophrenic like what am I doing because I want to stay awake I want to be in the middle of the battle, and there's something about being here that it's so easy to get caught up in.

20:06 Okay, so now I'm trying to figure, okay, what am I going to do this afternoon? Am I going to go to the zoo? Am I going to go bowling? I mean, there's a few different options here. And then it's like, oh, no, but then am I going to feel guilty if I do this? You know, can I bowl after what I just saw, you know, and then what I just heard, right? It's just this crazy thing. And now I'm trying to get aid to these 2 million people, and we're trying to bring reconciliation to these tribes. And we're just going back and forth. And I believe a lot of you are here today because you're like, yes, exactly. It's like I don't know what to do. It's like I want to do something. I've got to get in this fight. Man, we just read from I'm sitting there listening to Matthew 24, listening to Jesus and going, yeah, yeah, I want to be awake. I don't want to be like the days of Noah where, you know, where those people are just, he's not naming like horrible sins. Eating, drinking, getting married, giving in marriage.

21:01 It's just everyday life. And yet he's trying to save us from that. And I think there's something in all of us because God's seed abides in us. like it says in 1 John 3, we're dying to climb out of this normalcy and be a part of the fight, be a part of the war. And when Christ returns, we don't want to just be casually giving a little bit. Man, when I came back from Malaysia, I didn't know that was going to impact me that much. You know, I just went over there to speak, you know, because I'm the token Asian American preacher, you know, and let's go, and let's go over there and share the vision and everything else, and so I just kind of went, you know, because I believe in this so much, and I love the word, and I cannot imagine, like I said in that video, like, what do you do without this?

22:02 What do you do without this? We just go around and say, hey, Steve, what do you think? What do you think God is like I don't know I think he's big you know hey hey Mark what do you think like and we just go off everyone's means well here's what's coming out of my mind what a joke that would be horrifying and so I believe in this because it's like whatever any of you says to me I'm going that doesn't really sound like what Jesus just said and I'm always going back to this and so this is something I care about very much so I was there but I didn't know how much God was going to stir my heart. I would doubt that anyone was affected by that conference as much as I was. I mean, it was just like when John, you know, I read your book, Gospel Patrons, and I'm thinking about Tyndale and him giving his life and these people. And, you know, just the scriptures coming alive out there.

23:02 I came home, I told my wife, I'm like, gosh, you know, I never really thought about it. I never really thought about what if I didn't have this book? And so this is the first time I really thought about what if we didn't have the Bible? And I'm just going, I don't know what happens in the end. You know, what would I do? What would I give to get one of these? I mean, I really don't think I'm exaggerating. I think I would give everything because I'm thinking, man, I don't know. Yeah, I got another breath. I'm still alive. Another day. I don't know if I'll be here tomorrow. I know I'm supposed to speak early in the morning. That's not a guarantee. and so man i better know the truth like i i would i think i would sell the house i think i would sell everything and say just give us that and go kids i don't know if we're gonna get to eat but we've got to know what happens after this life because it's just too short anything can happen today we must have this like i would give anything to have this i think and so then you know i'm telling them why if the Bible's saying like, I'm supposed to love my neighbor as myself.

24:20 Like I don't want it to come to the end and realize, oh man, I had equity in my home. That equity could have translated a whole of the scriptures like in a language. It would have been a whole people group. Man, I don't want to have these things. You know, it's like that game back then, you remember when we were young, some of you, you know, that game Hot Potato, you know, where, you know, you just passed like a ball pretending it was like a hot potato. I don't know. It was dumb. I mean, no one plays it anymore because there's no app for it. But it's just, you know, it's just, it was this thing where, you know, you didn't want to be caught holding this thing whenever the time ran out. It's like, get away, get away from me. Like, I feel that way with my resources. It's like, oh, you know, get that out of the bank account. Get that out. Because at the end, when Christ returns, I want them to see that it's like, oh man, this is what I was about. And this is the way I want to end it. It's not going, oh man, look how much I had left over.

25:24 And so I just started thinking, honey, what do we need to do? Like, let's just start praying. man I'm ready to sell the house again I'm ready to do whatever she is too because I want to be a part I want to stay awake I want to stay in the battle and it's very hard to do here it is very hard and yet the battle's real when I was in Ethiopia a few days ago I get a text from a bunch of texts from my elders because this guy that had left our church about a year ago. Just didn't want to be under authority, whatever, just kind of went off on his own. You know, he came back like that week and said, something's wrong. I need your help. I feel like there's like some sort of oppression, whatever else. And so they just started laying hands on him, praying for him. And then a couple of the elders said, you know what? There's still more. Let's get together tomorrow. We need to pray over you more. But he didn't show up the next day.

26:40 And then it was all over the news. He ended up murdering his grandmother because he thought he saw a demon in her and decapitated her to get it out. and the police come, kick down the door. it's like this war that's going on, it's getting so real to me.

27:17 And just, you know, so I'm in Africa dealing with this thing, and I'm getting these texts about this other thing back home, and it's just like, okay, God, I got to stay in this, man. What's going on? I'm picturing, you know, this friend of mine, and what did it feel like when the police break through the door? You're like, what did I just do? But I heard this voice, and he let Satan have a foothold in his life, and now suddenly these voices just leading him to do these crazy things, and all of this, but then you switch, right? And we come to this nice hotel, and everything else. It's just like this crazy world, and I'm just saying, look, I don't even, I don't really have a plan right now. I just thought, you know what? I'm just going to throw it out there. I don't have like this. So here's what you do. Step one, you know, I've never been good at that. And I don't know what it means for each of your lives, like what it's going to take. So because I know when you heard the story of Jorge, you just go, man, that's just so congruent with Scripture.

28:30 And you see that video and you think about the Bensons and you go, man, I want to be a part of something like that. That's why I think it's beautiful, you know, the book, Gospel Patrons, about, and I don't make any money from it. I feel like I'm selling it. It was just that idea of those of us who have means, it's a real part of life, you know? I do some work with Steve and the pro baseball players and football players, and sometimes they just tell me, man, I think I want to quit. I think I'm going to quit baseball, and I'm just going to go do human trafficking, care for that, or care for becoming a missionary. And I'm like, no, probably not. Do you understand if you just play another season, you could fund 1,800 missionaries? I mean, I'm sure you're good, but go hit someone.

29:28 Go do your thing, right? But just be so careful as you're doing it that you don't put yourself in this situation where it's all about you and your safety and your comfort. Figure out how to do it for the glory of God. Live simply. Give it away. You don't want to be holding this stuff at the end. My time's up.

30:01 Father, I just ask that you use your word. and that your Holy Spirit now would just lead us to do what we need to do, but just help us to see that the battle is real, God.

30:22 Show us Holy Spirit. teach us how to be in the war amidst our jobs, our responsibilities, our families. Help us to stay in the war, Lord. Help us to stay awake. Help us to truly be a part. God, I pray for my brothers and sisters in this room, Lord. Please save them, protect them from the evil one. Protect them, Father, from the comforts of this world that they don't just fall in love with it, Lord. Protect them from just a casual commitment to you and casual giving.

31:09 God, we want to give our lives to you. We don't want to waste whatever is left. wake us up Lord by your spirit we don't have to be in Africa we don't have to be in Peru we need your Holy Spirit to wake us up right here in Colorado Springs by your spirit wake us up reveal truth to us so we can really live like the end is about to happen in Jesus name we pray amen